My One Son Has Me Being Uncle Bub Back In Washington

In the past week or two I've made mention to a person or two or three that if I still had my house in Mount Vernon I'd be thinking about moving back there.

But, that house was sold in 2002.

Today one of those to whom I'd mentioned my wish to return to Washington proposed a variant of My Three Sons, with the variant being called, I suppose, My One Son.

I would be Uncle Bub in this scenario.

Moving is not an easy thing. Just moving a short distance is a pain. Moving a couple thousand miles amps up the pain.

When I moved to Texas it was to a ranch type situation in the far north Fort Worth suburb called Haslet. I did not like living in Haslet. It was a rough road east to get to the closest grocery store. The puny skyline of downtown Fort Worth was a spiky blur in the distance.

I miss living near a Big City. Which is, maybe, a little ironic, because I live in a big city. But it really is not a Big City. It is Fort Worth. A little town with pretensions of being a Big City. Dallas is a Big City, but I don't go to Dallas very often.

In Mount Vernon, the Big City of Seattle is just a few miles to the south. The Big City of Vancouver is just a few miles to the north, in an entirely different country.

I miss being able to drive a short distance to the west and being at saltwater beaches. I miss driving a short distance to the east and being in the mountains.

I miss a cornucopia of fresh produce, much of it free for the picking. Like blackberries.

When I lived in Washington an entire growing season could go by where I would not have bothered to get myself some fresh strawberries. That would not happen upon my return. If you have only had a California strawberry, you have no idea how good the real thing is, deep red, sweet and delicious.

And don't get me started on the difference between a Parker County peach and a peach grown in an Eastern Washington orchard.

And apricots. I can not remember when last I had an apricot. When in Washington I would make an annual trek to Eastern Washington to acquire a box of apricots.

I miss driving the flats of the Skagit Valley in August and buying fresh corn from a roadside stand. Usually purchased via the honor system. Put your money in the jar.

It has been several things of late which have made me homesick. Maxine's tales of Cascade Mountain hikes. Me recently thinking about Deception Pass State Park and its bridge due to thinking about the pathetic Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's Three Bridges Over Nothing.

That is another thing.

I miss being where BIG things happen. Where the people get to vote on BIG things that happen. Where the world's biggest tunnel boring machine can get stuck with the locals collectively shrugging their shoulders, confident it will work out and the tunnel will get bored.

I miss living where the population is highly educated, highly literate, progressive, liberal, smart. Where I am not embarrassed by the politicians. Where there are places to complain when a wrong needs to be made right.

I miss taking a ferry out to the San Juan Islands, waiting for the last ferry leaving Friday Harbor to take the night float back to Anacortes.

I miss the smell of Christmas trees which is the norm when you are surrounded by the mountains of Washington.

I miss rain.

Slow rain that lasts for days before adding up to an inch.

I miss gray, day after day after day of gray, with drizzle, followed by a day when the gray lifts and you are looking at the bluest sky you have ever seen, with the trees the greenest green.

I miss the moss of a rain forest. Big waves on a Pacific coast beach. Ocean Shores and Copalis. Long Beach.

The Washington volcanoes. Especially Mount Rainier. I miss hearing "The Mountain is out."

I miss Mount Baker, the location of the deepest snow the world has ever measured. I miss looking out my kitchen window at the stewing steam vent near the top of Mount Baker.

In Texas, no matter where I look I will see no stewing steam vents atop an active volcano.

So, long story short, I am thinking of returning to the place from which I came.....