1/11/24
I’m so excited! In December, I completed all the medical procedures that had brought me back to Portland this time, despite my distaste for the weather here. I’m so happy to be on the other side of all of that! And, as a silver lining I have managed to capture a few nice “mood shots” of some of my bicycle and transit adventures here in the rain and early darkness.
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Now it’s January, and I’m choosing to stay another month here because I’ve really enjoyed reconnecting in person with my former partner, now close friend, Johnny. (Who, by the way, after an extraordinary past seven years manifesting an incredible Japanese healing garden inside the maximum-security Oregon State Penitentiary, will be seeing the parole board this year for his first time, after 26 years of incarceration. If you know and love Johnny—even just through me, as I know many of you do—and if you’d like to possibly support him in his bid for parole, please let me know! It’s going to take a village, and he will need everything from letters of support to employment opportunities, to housing, and more, in order to put together a viable parole plan.)
But meanwhile, I’ve been yearning to get back to the warmth and sunshine—especially since Portland has a polar vortex on the way for about a week, starting tomorrow, with temps dipping down to 15F/-9C—so I’ve been waiting for the perfect opportunity to present itself to get back down south.
And the other day, that opportunity presented itself! My friends Trina and Phil, in Escondido just north of San Diego, will be visiting Portland in early February, and offered me to cat sit for their sweetie Lily while they are gone.
I have visited Trina there before, for a magical meeting on her beautiful jungle of a balcony overlooking the pool, so I’m excited to do this! I also have other friends in Escondido and San Diego I’m hoping to see (including my friend Michele, who took that top photo of me on the beach back in 2016) and my intention is for this one-week sit to launch me into at least two months in southern California, doing various sits as I can find them. (Do you know anyone around San Diego or LA who might need a cat sitter?) I’m looking forward to also connecting and/or staying with various friends and Servas, Warmshowers, and Host a Sister hosts. I’m excited for all the new and amazing people I will be meeting!
Speaking of which, I’ve had a wonderful past week, with many magical feline and human connections. First, I sat for two really mellow and cute kitties in the Pearl district, Monte and Theo.
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Then, I stayed three nights with a wonderful Servas couple in Westmoreland. (Like me, they also moved to Portland in 1990.) Most recently, I’m now being hosted by an incredible woman from Host a Sister, just a few blocks away from my condo here in SE Portland! I’ve got one more night with a friend of a friend here in SE tonight, then four or five nights with a wonderful sweetie of a 13-year-old kitty named Mac, in NW Portland.
I’m finding that it continues to be a growing edge for me to navigate finding places to stay. I’ve been living this lifestyle, in one way or another, for almost two and a half years now, and it has been absolutely wonderful. I’m always having meaningful adventures, and I never get bored! I meet incredible people at every turn. This is the life of my dreams! But wow, it was a bit of a nail-biter for me this past week, when I had a six-day gap between sits, and was struggling to fill it. It has worked out swimmingly, though, so I’m choosing to trust that I will also find just the right place—either a sit or a host—for next Tuesday and Wednesday, the 16th and 17th. After I sit for Mac—and before I sit for the next cutie, Groucho, in SE Portland on the 18th—we will have sub-freezing temperatures and quite possibly snow. I am concerned about how I can even navigate safely to whatever next host I find. I will put it out here, just on the off chance that anyone reading here might know someone who could host me for at least the 16th, and maybe the 17th, in NW Portland within about half a mile of 21st& Raleigh. If so, please feel free to work your magic and connect us!
But as my current host Carolyn reassured me last night, magic has been holding me so far, and it will continue to do so. I will find the perfect, wonderful place for those two nights, and I’m excited to discover where, and with whom, that might be!
And, I have already manifested nearly $200 of that $600-$1000 I need to head south. It happened within about 24 hours of my making the decisive choice to take the trip, so I trust that I am on the right track for my life’s continuing journey, and the rest of that money will find me in the next few weeks.
And… on February 2nd, I am so excited to board that magical Coast Starlight train once again, to the land of sunshine!
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