Charles Kuralt
Hello
family and friends! You may be wondering,
where are the HKs now? Transitioning
once again! And I didn’t even fill ya’ll in on our arrival in Washington…yeah,
that post will be along at some point but for now, this is the one I feel needs
to be done.
We
are done with traveling, for now, but that does not mean that we are done
moving around. Once we left Nora and
Bend we took a jaunt over to the coast to catch our first glimpses of the
Pacific Ocean. I felt like I did five
years ago when traveling with Leah and Adrien.
We were driving towards Charleston, SC and my heart was quite literally
yearning to reach that magical city that had made such an impression on me when
I was a child. The morning after we
arrived at our campsite in Newport, Oregon, I had the dogs out for a walk. I had only meant to get them out and about
for a moment but then there was this trail that said “beach this way” and I
felt that yearning rise up in my chest once again. I didn’t care that what I was wearing was far
from appropriate or that it was misting, chilly and I had an extremely full
bladder, I was walking to the beach dammit, and I was going to see the Pacific
Ocean that morning.
I
must say, it’s a good thing I’m a determined person. The walk was much more than I had expected
and by the time the actual trail was gone I found myself wandering along the
sand dunes until I finally came over a hill and there it was…fog, and crashing
waves, the smell of salt, mud, ocean life and ocean death all hit me in the
face and I knew that trek had been worth it.
I had managed to sneak off one of the side trails, tie up the dogs, and
pee in the woods so I no longer felt a pressing need to do much of anything
except enjoy this first meeting with our new coast line. It was breathtaking.
The
next day, after the campsite was all packed up and we were just about ready to
leave, I informed the boys that we must take a walk along the beach. The day was sunny and bright, quite a change
from the day before, although fog still hung out around the edges, resisting
the power of sunlight as it created beautiful shapes around the people playing
on the beach.
When
I say “beach” I usually think swim suits, sun, HEAT – not here. People were wearing shorts but for the most
part they were paired with sweaters or sweatshirts. Our family was wearing jeans and I only took
my cardigan off after I had run around and played long enough to build up the warmth
in my body. That warmth was quickly a
thing of the past as Aydan and I decided to go further and further out into the
water. Stupid. It was COLD.
But man was it fun.
We
traveled north from Oregon into Washington, camped over one night and then kept
heading north. Andrew had his first
Seattle job interview on August 19, a little over two months ago, and we left
for Canada that night. It was a long day
for all of us but we knew we had a goal in mind: getting to Leah and Adrien as
quickly as we could.
And
that’s what we did. We arrived on
Vancouver Island (two hour ferry ride from Port Angeles in Washington to Victoria,
BC) around 11:30 and made the drive to Leah and Adrien’s house that night. The time we spent there is a story all its
own and will definitely be shared along with all our other stories sometime
soon, I am getting distracted enough from my goal as it is…
A
month with Leah and Adrien and then a return to the states that was far from
fun for any of us. I had been SICK. Really sick for several days, unable to eat
or drink or think or anything and we made the decision to get me to an
emergency room as quickly as we could once we got back to the US. All I could think of was how desperately I
wanted an IV and Zofran. Andrew says
that the moment the IV started my color changed and I started looking more like
myself. Thank goodness. It hasn’t been quite a month since that
happened and the extreme nausea isn’t with me any longer but I still have
strange stomach upsets and my appetite has been quite peculiar. I can feel as though I’m starving right
before dinner and then we sit down to eat dinner and I can eat maybe half of
what I’ve served myself and I’m full and nearly sick feeling. Andrew and Mama Nora have insisted that I
seek some medical attention this week and I will mention this to the doctor I
speak with. Maybe they can suggest
something…I don’t know. I did read that
the level of nausea I was experiencing can be caused by inflammation of the
central nervous system – my thoughts; possibly MS related. But…if that’s my flare up this year, I’ll
take it over losing the use of my arms, and or legs, and or the ability to talk…yeah,
I would for sure.
Vashon
Island has been our landing space for almost a month. In
that month, and this is really what I wanted to get at, Andrew has done 10
resumes a day looking for a job. There
had been roughly an interview a week for him until this last week – and that’s
when it was like the heavens opened up and poured down job opportunities on
Andrew. It was almost as though we were
being told not to give up and to keep trying because things were about to break
wide open for us and everything was going to be ok…it always is.
While
we have been quite generously allowed to stay on the island, we were also given
a time limit. Three weeks from the first
week we arrived, a month total. And
really, that’s totally ok even though it was terrifying to me. I didn’t know where we would live or where we
would settle or what we would do if we didn’t have jobs. We talked with Nora a lot and she was of
course so encouraging. The main thing we
were worried about was putting a stop to the momentum we had started. But then…
Monday,
Andrew does his 10 resumes as usual. We
spent the day up at Café Luna (our coffee shop of choice on the island) – I had
a phone interview at noon that I wanted to finish prepping for and one other
job lead that I wanted to put the finishing touches on. The phone interview went amazingly well and I
received a call from them asking me to come in for an in person interview the
next day. Andrew had also received news
that same day that one of the jobs he had applied for would be interested in
doing a phone interview with him the next day.
Well,
then we learned that everything can change in a very short period of time. Andrew had several interviews this past week
and I can’t really go into a lot of detail because he has asked me not to until
we know which job he is going to be offered or take. What I can share is that even if the #1 job
that we both want him to have comes through he won’t be able to start for
another two weeks. The big thing became “where
do we go from here?”. We have to be off
the island this coming Thursday.
Enter
Mama Nora to the rescue again. We have
made the decision to take a break from busting butt looking for jobs and being
more or less cooped up in the camper (which feels smaller every day) to hang
with Nora for two weeks or so in Bend.
The drive to Seattle from Bend is roughly five hours, not terrible if we
need to do some back and forth-ing which I am going to bet is very likely. What I
think each one of us is looking forward to is the soothing, energizing presence
that comes along with being around Nora.
She is an amazing person. I am
still in awe of the amazing family I belong to now. The love that has come to us from the Matthews
and the Kolberg side have been healing and strengthening. I am thankful that I have the rest of my life
to spend getting to know my new family better.
Bend
is an amazing place and I’m looking forward to getting off an island. I’m pretty much over ferry rides. The first one was really exciting and fun,
and maybe the second and third one but then when you are using the ferry to do
things that you need to do and you have a time limit, not so much fun. And it’s pricey. The island has most of the things we need but
not everything and we aren’t really island people. Each time we head into Tacoma or Seattle we
all kind of sigh in relief at the variety of people and places available to
us. Vashon is a wonderland for the
people that want to be here but it’s not the right place for us.
We
spent the day in what will hopefully be our new neighborhood yesterday. We have been told there is a high sense of
community and the schools look great.
The thing that we keep being told is that it’s really “hippified” and
Andrew and I keep looking at each other wondering why people think we are “hippies”…any
ideas friends? We did have nothing but
pleasant interactions yesterday. To me,
it’s very city…but I guess that’s what I should expect in a city that is home
to 650,000 people…right? I think it will
be exciting to get to know this amazing city.
We are definitely looking forward to our exploration opportunities once
we are settled. Waiting again…but we are
getting closer and closer to our end goal.
Hang with us! Our travels may be done but our adventures will constantly
be ongoing – we can’t seem to avoid it!
PS: I will do a whole post of just pictures soon because I LOVE pictures and love sharing them :)
