Linda & David Voting For Bernie In The Washington Democrat Caucus With A Yellowstone Bear Story

In the photo you are looking at something you can not see today in Texas.

Because what you are looking at are a pair of voters at today's Washington Presidential Caucus at some location in my old hometown of Mount Vernon.

The identity of these two are Linda R and David B.

Linda R. text messaged me earlier today when I was out under the sun in Arlington, asking me if I thought Bernie had a chance and how appalled was I at the Trump/Cruz ongoing embarrassment.

That and Linda R. had made reservations to fly her mom's ashes to Hawaii to be scattered in tropical paradise.

Linda R. moved back to Mount Vernon, from Seattle, to help take care of her mom.

Now, the David B. part of this story is interesting. Soon after Linda R. moved back to Mount Vernon she ran into David's mom, Mrs. B.

Mrs. B. and Linda R. had themselves a nice reunion. Mrs. B. had been our Sunday School teacher long ago. Mrs. B. asked Linda R.whatever became of those two wonderful boys, whose names Mrs. B. could not remember. Linda R. named off a series of possible boy pairs, with Mrs. B. saying no to each, until Linda R. asked if it was Durango and Jake Jones she was thinking of.

That's the ones, said Mrs. B.

So, Linda R. then emailed me, telling me about the encounter with Mrs. B. and asked me to relay that story to my brother. Well, my brother and I were not emailing each other at that point in time.  But, my brother had Facebook friended me a day or two before. I Facebook messaged my brother the Mrs. B. story, did not hear back from my brother, and thought no more of it.

Until a week or two later when my brother's oldest son, Spencer Jack's dad, my Favorite Nephew Jason, called me to tell me he got a real odd call that day.

From Mrs. B.

And now the shocking part.

My brother, who was not known, by me, to be a big communicator, had written Mrs. B. a long letter, telling Mrs. B. a variety of things, such as what a wonderful nurse Mrs. B.'s daughter, Barbara, had been when my brother was hospitalized for one of his many sports injury repairs.

To this day I do not know how my brother knew where to mail the letter to Mrs. B.

My brother had told Mrs. B. that Jason has a restaurant in Anacortes, called the Fidalgo Drive-In. Which is where Mrs. B. called. Explained to Jason who she was and that she was so touched to have received a wonderful letter from his dad. Mrs. B. then proceeded to read the letter to Jason.

Shortly thereafer Linda R. ran into Mrs. B. again, who tearfully shared with Linda the tale of my brother's letter.

Well.

The shocks for me were not over with yet.

A week or two later I called my mom and dad. I asked if Jake had mentioned writing to Mrs. B. to them. He had not. I told mom the series of Mrs. B. events. I told mom I did not know my brother did things, like write letters.

To which my mom shocked me by telling me my brother had taken to writing stories. Stories about his childhood memories. He'd been over to mom and dad's and had read them some of the stories.

A short time later Jason called me.  I asked if he knew about his dad's story writing. He knew, but he was not supposed to tell anyone. Jason had several of them. He read me one. About seeing LBJ at the Peace Arch in Blaine, Washington. I was, once again, shocked. Shocked at my brother's memory of details. Shocked at how well written the story was. Just plain shocked.

A short time later Jason confessed to his dad that he'd read me one of the stories. And that I'd liked it. At this point in time my brother and I were text messaging. At some point mention was made of his story writing. I indicated my surprise at his new hobby and how good the one I was read was.

My brother then told Jason to email me all the stories my brother had emailed Jason. About 30 of them. Which is just a fraction of the collection.

I forgot to mention, my brother has illustrated many of the stories. My brother always has been good at drawing.

So, I get the batch of stories. Read through them. Was surprised at some of them. Like I have long wondered if Jake remembered the traumatic time he dropped three salmon into the Skagit River. He did, he wrote a story about it, with some poetic license.

Some of my brother's stories had details wrong. I'd text him a correction, about which he was pleased, asking me to send more, and more details about things I remember.

He had details of our long vacation to Yellowstone mixed up. I used to remember that trip in detail.

My brother had the details of the most infamous incident of that Yellowstone trip all wrong. This would be the incident where mom was soaking her feet whilst sitting at the picnic table at our campsite in the Old Faithful Campground, when a big brown bear came running into camp. My brother and I were in our sleeping bags in the car when we heard mom screaming for our dad, whilst jumping up and down on top of the picnic table. We popped up in time to see the bear running away. I suspect it was more scared of my mom than mom was of the bear.

My first two teenage years the yearly family vacation trip was to California and Disneyland. My brother had those two trips morphed together. It taxed my memory to try and separate the two years. Like was it the first year we drove into Mexico, to Tijuana? Or the second year? Stuff like that.

Anyway, all that,  me reading my brother's stories, which I did not know existed, would not have happened if Linda R. had not run into Mrs. B., who could not remember the names of those two wonderful Jones boys.....