on flight and love of place

i have been spending time in portland, oregon, since 2009, and i’ve lost track of how many weeks i’ve spent here – something like 7? 8? 9? my visits have touched five months: january, february, june, july and november. with dear friends and poetry here, with bartenders and waitstaff at my favorite spots recognizing me and with my shuttle driver asking me for directions (!), it feels like quite like home.

and it is home. one of them, anyway. of course, my boys aren’t here, and so albany will be home base for the foreseeable future. and i need my peeps there as much as i need air: hello, peeps!

it helps, too, that i really like flying. yes, airports are icky and seats don’t have enough legroom and babies cry. but seeing earth from 33,000 feet still feels like magic to me. i have never bothered to learn the physics of flight, so that’s certainly part of it.

but it is more than that: the view. arrival in portland this time didn’t put on a good mt. hood show like it often does, but there were beautiful landscapes earlier in the flight. i hope i never stop being that girl who needs a window seat!

that frame of mind isn’t unrelated to why i keep coming back here. i feel my love for places just as deeply as i feel romantic love. those who know me know that i adore my little neighborhood in albany, too, and portland is a lot of that on a larger scale.

and being here helps to fuel my fantasy of being a bi-coastal writer. eventually, years from now, i’ll need a job with enough flexibility to work from two places, and i’ll need enough money to afford two modest residences. see why it’s a fantasy? ah, well. in the meantime … i am grateful – and in awe of – transcontinental flight.

p.s. if the formatting of this post is funky, it is because i am using a mobile app, otherwise known as blogging dangerously!