Adventure phase 2: Oregon!

Oh, I have so many more thoughts to share about my journey into and through Oregon yesterday!

Once I was on that leg of the journey, I had to backstep on two of my goals for the trip: to not drive on interstates, and to not drive on any road I had driven before. I had actually been following the interstates almost non-stop since Denver, which is the unfortunate thing about deciding to cross the Rockies in November. Technically, this was new road, since the previous two times I drove on I-80 through Wyoming and I-84 in Idaho and Utah I was heading east.

I had never piloted a car from Boise to Eugene, and again, I will rave about what a must-see it is. It was so beautiful. Beautiful doesn't even begin to describe it. If I had seen northeastern Oregon in its splendor, with the perspective of a person who has traveled west and west and west, I don't know if I ever would have dreamed of leaving.

Every part of that drive was enjoyable, and the route takes you through the whole spectrum of the region's geography. I saw snow-capped mountains, granite bluffs, sagebrush, fields, farms, rushing river, more evergreens than I could count, bicyclists and roaring pickups, changes in elevation of several thousand feet, curving highway and windy straightaways.

A slight rain began to fall as I passed through Hood River, about fifty miles east of Portland, so when I first saw Portland, it was through its classic gray veil. I reflected on learning how to drive in the rain to the point where the first few times I drove without needing the windshield wipers I just couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong!

I skated around Portland on I-205, which ultimately connects the driver to I-5 (but is not always the quickest route, thanks to the location along it of the airport and several populous Portland 'burbs). Unexpected tears - of joy? homesickness? sheer lunacy after nine days of travel and not enough sleep? - shot out of my eyes as I found familiar Portland stations on my radio dial, and the Max sped by above me. The lanes briefly clogged with late-afternoon congestion, and even for that I was happy, that chance to sit in a lane on 205 and take it all in.

In keeping with adventure rules, though, I consulted my map, and jumped off 205 at OR-213, heading due south. This would take me through some smaller, farming communities, and was a road I had never driven on! Over the years, I have had the opportunity to drive on many of Oregon's back roads, but this was a route I had never taken. I especially relished the opportunity to observe rural Oregon vs. rural Wyoming, Kansas, Ohio, etc. 213 curved through many small towns whose names I found entirely unfamiliar.

Over the past half-century, Oregon has experienced with logging what other parts of the country have experienced with farming and coal - a sudden need to shift dependence away from this traditional economy. The small towns I drove through south of Portland, however, showed none of this. Logging mills and shipping lanes were alive and well, and though some of the towns emanated this poverty of change, it was not nearly as entrenched or generational as I have seen elsewhere. It was also not very rural; the Willamette Valley holds the vast majority of Oregon's population, so even spots such as tiny Marquam, Oregon, and tinier Liberal, Oregon (yes, that's its real name) are hardly isolated. I suspect I'd draw different conclusions after exploring other parts of rural Oregon -which, naturally, I fully intend to do at some point on this adventure.

I cut across to I-5 at Salem, by which point it was getting dark, and all of my options for getting to Eugene were roads that I had in fact actually traveled before, and countless times at that. I practically have the Eugene-Portland drive on I-5 memorized, down to the exit numbers and knowing what was around each bend in the road. I found great comfort in this, and again experienced a rush of mixed emotions on the approach to Eugene. As I veered off the exit ramp for my parents' house, my body relaxed in ways I hadn't realized it was tense. I pulled up to my parents' house and I could hardly believe it: months ago, I thought to myself, "Wouldn't it be crazy to drive to Oregon and be at my parents' house with my car and whatever belongings I need?" AND THERE I WAS. I ran up the walk to the front door, and let myself in. It was 6:05 pm, and my mom and dad were waiting to greet me. My adventure was complete.

Sunday mileage: 582. Total mileage: 3036.
Thank you, adventure-mobile!

On a personal note, I have one more paragraph to write tonight. I created this blog to share of my adventures to Oregon, and now I am here, having a new sort of adventures. When I conceived of this trip, I longed for the adventure of resting in Eugene for an undetermined amount of time, reconnecting with family, friends, homeland. I had spent a week here in July; my mom paid me a visit in Athens in late August; and by the end of September I was desperately homesick, despite my love for every element of my life in Athens. So, long story short, I quit my job and planned a road trip, buoyed by visions of quality time spent with my mom.

(Okay, more than one paragraph.) In late October, mere weeks before my planned departure from Ohio, my mom called me with news. After an irregular mammogram and follow-up appointments, doctors had found a tumor in her breast. Surgery was to be early in November. So, I moved up my departure plans - that, that is the reason why I was so strongly pulled to Oregon. I knew I had to be there. New updates keep arriving in this situation, and upon my own arrival in Eugene last night, I received more updates still. Tomorrow morning, my mother is having a full mastectomy of a breast that now has four cancerous, albeit small, masses in it. From there, we will learn what to do next. This is extremely new territory for all of us, and any words, advice, love, energy is appreciated. My mother is a very strong woman, and I know and believe that she will make it through this, and I believe so strongly in the healing power of love and energy of those around us. She has touched and inspired so many, and we are already feeling that warmth from all directions. This is part of my Oregon adventure, so I will keep updates. It's not the most swashbuckling of adventures, but life is but one extraordinary adventure after another, is it not?

Good night - sending my love across the miles.