Brightwood, Oregon and Tsuru Island Japanese Garden
7/25/26
Hello from Happy Valley, Oregon! This is a suburb on the southeastern edge of Portland. I’m so far behind on my blog posts now (the photos are from May!) that I have reached a sort of full-circle moment: I am now back on a subsequent sit with Rocket and Einstein (the black and black-and-white cats, respectively, pictured here) and about to co-host a Servas potluck in Brightwood tomorrow with Mary, whom I met during the events in May that I’m writing about here!
I may or may not get more “caught up” here soon—I’m giving myself grace and allowing myself to enjoy a mostly quiet and relaxing summer—but I actually haven’t done too many photogenic nor newsworthy things since this time in May, so by the time I depart Oregon around late September, I think I should be back on track.
When I was here in Happy Valley in May, I got to enjoy some quality time with these two sweeties, whom many of you may remember from previous sits. I’m happy to have them as regulars. And Sandy, their human, is a wonderful gardener, so her back yard and covered porch are a beautiful place to relax. (The other day, now in July, we had a very Oregon-uncharacteristic thunderstorm, with heavy rain. It was really cool to sit out there and enjoy it!)
After all my wonderful experiences with Servas folks this past winter (and for several years prior) upon my arrival back in Portland this April I decided to explore some of the local Portland-area folks. On the website I found a really cool woman named Mary, living well outside of Portland in the tiny forest town of Brightwood, near Mt. Hood. I asked if she would like to get together for lunch, and we met up at her stunning home overlooking the Sandy River. Tomorrow, a small group of us will gather there for a social potluck I’m organizing for “far east side” Portland-area Servas members.
Mary’s Servas profile stood out to me because she is a very active volunteer at the Gresham (Tsuru Island) Japanese Garden. I have enjoyed visiting this garden many times over the years. And lately, people involved with that garden—including Mary—have also been involved with the Oregon State Penitentiary’s healing garden. What a small world. Mary mentioned that she had even met Johnny (Cofer, my former romantic partner and current close friend, whose idea it was to build the prison garden in the first place) when she visited the prison garden a while ago on behalf of the Tsuru Island garden.
She had also mentioned Little Free Libraries in her profile—she has one at the end of her driveway—which, as always, reminded me of the wonderful serendipity in 2022 that allowed me to meet Rick Brooks, the co-founder of Little Free Libraries, in Princeton, Illinois.
I took two buses from here in Happy Valley to reach Mary’s house. The buses are run by SAM: Sandy Area Metro. One bus took me to downtown Sandy, where I once again admired the large mural on the side of the building adjacent to the small transit center downtown. It appeared to very skillfully combine many natural and cultural sides to this former logging town.
Imagine my surprise, then, when upon my arrival at Mary’s enchanted woodland domicile, I saw another stunning mural on her garage door… and met the neighbor who had painted it… who turned out to be the same artist who had painted the downtown Sandy mural! And she then joined us for lunch, too!
We had a wonderful lunch, with Mary and me and her two neighor-artist friends.
Then Mary drove me back home, but on the way back, we stopped at the Gresham Japanese Garden. The garden is undergoing major reconstruction, and is therefore closed to the public. But since Mary is a very involved volunteer, she escorted me in and I got to see the work in progress.
During our drive there, it had rained pretty hard, so we didn’t think we were even going to want to walk in the garden. But as soon as we stepped out of the car, the clouds parted and some sun rays peeked out.
What a magical day.
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