The City That Never Dries Out

Today’s post brought to you by: sands through the hourglass

Grateful for: silver linings

Trying hard to accept: I’m about to get very wet. Again.

Dear Eugene

As in City of, not bloke from ‘Days of our Lives’.

• Stop raining.

• You don’t have to recycle EVERYTHING.

Like street names.

Do you have W 27th AVENUE next to W 27th PLACE?

I’m quite capable of misreading Google maps without any help, thanks.

Do you realise I got lost walking 3 streets from Airbnb to supermarket yesterday?

When I eventually found the supermarket, look what I found! Took 58 minutes to wander every aisle (looking for free samples).

• Stop raining. Please.

• But thank you for employing super helpful bus drivers. Enjoy ‘em while they last though because I’ve rung 1-800-DISCOUNT-HUMAN-TRAFFICKING and they’re all coming back to Wellington with me.

Never has a soap opera character been more aptly named than Eugene the Drip, after a city where you half expect to see Noah knocking up an ark in his back yard.

On the subject of rain, early this morning I splashed my way to Full City Coffee Roasters (Google reviews lied again).

Of course the only people on the wet streets at 6.30am on a Saturday were early-bird-worm-grabbers and homeless men.

Being so far from home, in cities where I know nobody, I’ve realised how lonely the homeless must be.

Couple of days ago, wandering the wet, grey, wet, grey streets of Salem at dusk, watching people head home to their Christmas-lit warm, cosy homes, and their families, I felt so lonely.

But unlike the homeless, my little cloud had a silver lining.

In the form of the Salem Public Library, and the little charity shop inside. They take the biscuit. (My name is Gail and I haven’t had a biscuit in 8 days).

1960s low, concrete and stucco building with flat roof that extends out a long way (yes, that is an architectural term … Peter you’ll know what I mean).

After an hour there chatting to the charity shop volunteers, lounging in the mid-century wool-upholstered chair and overdosing on house, design and food magazines, I was once again one very happy camper.

For $3.25 in the charity shop I got 2 Christmas cards (that one’s from the Williamsburg Historic Foundation), 2 recipe collection cookbooks (my favourite kind) and … lo and behold … a ‘Sound of Music’ magnet. I treated the volunteers to a couple of lines from ‘A Few of My Favourite Things’. The smoke alarm went off shortly afterwards.

After reading that lot I found the best magazine ever published: ‘American Bungalow’. What I would give (kidney, right arm, brother) to own a house like this.

Pretty quick and cheap fix for me. But for the homeless it’s not just a few minutes of feeling alone.

The worst thing for them must be the lack of contact with people. Nobody talks to them. Nobody even looks at them. Let alone gives them a hug.

They obviously have no contact with family. Or probably even friends. They just wander the streets day after day after day. Every endlessly long day must be the same.

There are 2 things that’ll sum up this trip. You can guess the first. Starts with f. Contains 89% fat.

But the best thing by far has been the kindness of strangers. In train stations, stores, Airbnbs, churches, on the street, in tour groups, everywhere. Even in hospitals.

Never more so than my last few hours in Salem.

Like a good Girl Scout I bounced with excitement into Amtrak ready for another 2 hours on my favourite Cascades train.

11 minutes, 47 swear words and one quick charge of the cellphone later I headed back to cafe I’d left 4 hours earlier.

Why? Because. The. Train. Broke. Down.

It never left Portland. And special Christmas treat. It’s a bus to Eugene. And even better! It’s gonna be 2 hours late!

Give. Me. That. Tell-Amtrak-Your-Thoughts. Form. Now.

But once again, the lining was silver and was coming my way. Lovely Amtrak man stored my bags for free and happily answered all my time-wasting questions about why every station is a union station.

I burned off one-nineteenth of the calories eaten for breakfast by power walking back to the cafe.

Where I watched HGTV on the iPad and ate free Christmas bread samples from the bakery next door.

And best of all, when I told the server it was my second visit of the day, she remembered me and only charged me cost of coffee refill. 75c.

How to kill time in Amtrak station. Whip out plastic folder (stolen from Ministry of Education job) to use as a chopping board. Grab 6 slices oat and walnut bread ($1.99 bargain of the year from Safeway). Grab plastic knife (stolen from Amtrak). Slice tomatoes, avocados, cucumber and peppers. Grab another knife after first one snaps. Cram sandwiches in Ikea container (stolen from Erik’s apartment in Chicago). Happily munch away bus ride. Take photo, carefully hiding wrinkles above lip. (But then recall Karen from Minneapolis’ words: Wrinkles don’t hurt so keep smiling). Smile to self.

Pulling into Eugene the first thing you see from the bus window is a massive marijuana leaf painted on a building.

Off one bus and onto another. Quick, drug-free ride later I’m sitting chatting to my lovely Airbnb host and eating the 50th birthday cake she so thoughtfully (and superbly-well remembered) bought me.

Then it was off to the supermarket. Fruitless mission to score free samples but I did spy a Super Cuts across the parking lot.

$16 + tip later I looked like a man again. Mavis, you’ll be interested to know my hairdresser Skye is so- named after the isle she grew up on.

In a last-ditched attempt to find a husband to love and cherish till United States Citizen and Immigration Services us do part, I swapped emails with Sharon (Shazza) the other hairdresser.

She’s as desperate to marry her way into NZ residency as I am to the US. If only I could cut hair we could life-swap.

On the subject of marriage, well divorce actually, within 3 minutes of opening up the iPad at the cafe this morning I found out that Pam, the head-to-toe-lycra-clad, 50-something high school sports coach sitting next to me is:

• Separated
• Dating
• Renting out her spare room to a 27 year-old asbestos tester who doesn’t know how to wipe down a countertop
• Buying her daughter snow tyres for Christmas.

You’ve gotta love Americans’ openness.

Except in the form of opening heavens. Which I’m about to go walk under for next 7 hours.

Doris, have you been sticking banners up round Williamette University?