Getting to Portland OR, and a few notes on L-O-V-E

Valentines Day- We don’t celebrate.  I have always seen it as superfluous and superficial.  But if you take out the commercial BS, I can see myself getting on board with a day that reminds us of those we love.  In a recent Daily Show interview with the now adult kid from Indiana Jones and The Goonies he said that he loves Valentines Day because “it is a day I can show my wife how much I love her”.  That is a pluck to my typically cynical heart strings.

Adam Sandler in 50 First Dates says Love is a loaded word.  I guess we have made it that way. But we all use it for trivial things, I love these shoes! I love tacos!… and yet hesitate to say it to other people. 

The dictionary definition doesn’t reflect why this word would hold much weight and have us running scared:
Love- an intense feeling of deep affection; a great interest and pleasure in something- noun verb and participle

Movies and music have put romantic love on a pedestal.  Heavenly and wonderful and rare and maybe forever, or only one sided and fleeting and oh so painful.  Scary hurt or scary commitment. 

“Love is friendship on fire”

“Love is the beauty of the soul”

“Love is patient, Love is kind”

“Love is blind”

“Love is all you need”

“Love is… Love” Whatever that looks like or definition you use.

I love my family. Though this love doesn’t always hold up to the dictionary definition.  There are definitely family who I prefer and hold affection for, and those I don’t really even like.  But I suppose I still love them. 

I love creatures, always have.  As a kid I would save spiders from the shower and ants from under my dad’s shoe.  I have had dogs, cats, budgies, a talking parrot, lizards, turtles and chickens in my household.  The untimely death of an innocent creature has always been a blow.

I felt the bone crunch under me as I landed on the cold ground.  The leash was in my hand but slipped away as my momentum ended and the animal maintained his on a path back toward the highway.  I quickly got up, cradling my right hand, and raced to the side, herding the goat away from the busy road back toward the creek.

My chickens had all just perished from a fire, sparked from an errant frayed wire I neglected to see running to their water heater.  The trauma of waking up to a blazing fire at your home and the guilt of chicken-slaughter was super fresh in the forefront of my brain.  No more death! Not today, I have to save this freaking goat!

Gary the Goat (Scary Gary as my father named him) was a big dude, running down my busy road.  With his 2ft long horns he stood at bicep height. His goaty stink was wicked-strong and he had some low slung giant goat balls.  He had a collar and a leash and I thought he must be someones pet, lost on some well intentioned and poorly thought-through goat walk. It never crossed my mind to fear him, though I came to find out later that he had bludgeoned another male goat to death. My thoughts were hell bent on making sure he didn’t get hit by a car, rather than worrying that he would pick a joisting fight with me.  In fact, he never did.  I broke my hand all by myself.  The story would be better if I had defended myself from a giant vicious animal by punching him in the face, but alas, no such glory here.  

Eventually I caught him with the help of my son who distracted him by walking in from the other direction.  That is when Gary started doing acrobatics. 

He first decided to plant his feet and refuse to move, then he threw his body into a sideways flip, over and over, trying to jerk the leash away from me.  I had to grab a tree with my right arm while holding a death grip on the leash with my left, and try to use voice recognition to find an animal control number on my phone.  As far as I could tell, my town has no such thing, and the SPCA only takes calls on Tuesdays.  Helpful, when you are dealing in frantic goat gymnastics with a busted right 4th metacarpal.  Determined dragging and maneuvering eventually positioned us into the field behind my house, but there was no way we could make it up the snow covered hill.  911 seemed the only option.  The operator was confused and also probably annoyed that I was bothering them with this unsolvable problem of mine.  Did you call animal control?  I would have ma’am, if I could find a bloody number.  Ok, we will send someone out to help.  A few minutes later the owners found us.  They had been driving around for hours trying to find Gary.  He was just rescued from the taco truck today and apparently he didn’t like the look of his new lonely paddock, so he took off running for over 2 miles when I finally caught him here.  A few minutes of trying to figure out how to get the uncooperative guy into the back of the owners tiny hatchback, the state trooper arrived. He was surprised to see the goat, as apparently the call had gone over the scanner as a woman had broke her hand chasing a deer…  (Bet that got a laugh or maybe just a giant eyeroll). The officer watched us brainstorm and hold on to the whirling dervish for a while before he made the brilliant suggestion to call an animal control agency.  He wandered back to his cruiser to call around.  An hour later, we had finally hog tied Gary and threw him in the hatchback where he proceeded to thrash around and clonk his giant horns into the back window.  Gary’s owner will need a new car for sure, even if he didn’t break her windows, the smell will probably never leave.  As the little red car, laden with large ass goat, drove away, two state troopers emerged from over the hill.  “There is no animal control in this town, so I called a buddy to help.” Trooper one says.  No kidding and thanks for nothing I think to myself.  

And that is how I arrive in Portland Oregon with a splinted up dominant right hand, wafting a slightly gamey perfume that hints to an unhealthy love of goat cheese.  

A Penny in the Portland Pond: The East meets the West, briefly.  

We sat in one of Momo’s red vinyl upholstered booths, Issy Badger and I, drinking beer, trying to fit the last 20 something years into a few hours.  Not that we hadn’t been in contact obviously, but the chord of friendship has been stretched to long distances all this time.  Our current residences are about 3,000 miles away and opposite ends of the country.  Issy and I met at college in Massachusetts, and he is the only friend from then that has kept in contact. His presence brings back memories of driving around in a crappy patched together car and listening to The Flys and Stroke 9, lost in a fog of calculus based physics and young adult angst.  The difference with Issy from all those other “friends” from back then is I think he genuinely is interested in people and, incredibly, in me.  He seeps into the spaces and doesn’t wash out.  He remembers shit I wish he would forget.  But the kid has been one of only a few cheerleaders I can count on.  I bet he would dress up as one, for those he loves, Bring IT On style. Let’s get Rowdy!

As Momo’s fills, we finish our beers and head to the street.

It is Portland’s week of the Winter Light Festival.  Issy and I ambulate the parks and blocks among the art lovers and families out for something to do on a Saturday night.  One display is a giant black and electric blue bird with red burning eyes and wings that enfold the onlooking crowd.   An exhibit card has it named as The Heron that represents goodness and empathy.  I question Issy why it looks like an evil phoenix rising up from the ash of hell if it is so benevolent.  He shrugs a non-answer and bends for another drink at the bubbler. 

Arm in arm we finish exploring alit plastic forests and search for another bar, but all there seems to be are strip clubs in this city.  The hour glass eventually drops its last sand and we share an Uber towards our separate temporary housing.

Issy leans down before shutting the car door, aims his glacier blue eyes my way and says:
Love you, Penny.

I love you too, Badger.

And the chord stretches again.

Happy Valentines Day, to all I love, near and far, human and not.

Special shout out to Gary, who I hope hasn’t done a double pike with a half twist right into a trip to the taco truck, or a Middle Eastern wedding buffet.