The Great Floridian Expedition

Well, I'm back from Florida.

Yes, Florida! After scarcely leaving the house for the last three years, I decided to go all out and travel to the opposite side of the country and risk all kinds of complications. Why? Because my one of my former college roommates (and favorite people on the planet) was getting married and of all the things I've missed since the migraines became a full-time disability (several weddings, my grandfather's funeral, trips to Europe and to visit family in California), this was the one I hated to miss the most. So my mother asked me, "What would it take for you to be able to go?"

It's absolutely crucial that I get a lot of sleep and if I don't sleep well, I can't just go on with my day anyway. And I can't deviate from my sleep schedule without consequences. Not only is there a three hour time difference between the West and East Coasts, but the wedding was scheduled to start four hours before I normally woke up. There was no way I could just show up in Florida, power through a couple days of getting up early to reset my clock and then be fine. I knew one of the most important things I would need to do was to shift my sleep schedule over to being in line with Eastern Time. So over the course of two months, I took my nighttime medicine half an hour earlier each week. That meant that in the weeks just before the trip I barely saw my parents at all because I was going to bed right when they came home from work, but it was a huge success in terms of being able to adjust to the three hour time difference without wreaking havoc on my migraines.

Food was another important factor. Florida is a lousy place in general to be a vegetarian and the area where the wedding was taking place, in the rural Panhandle area, was even worse. Eating out is also stressful for me because noise and other stimulation, while deciding where to eat, especially when already hungry or tired, is hard for me even when well. So I packed a lot of food that I could eat in the hotel room. For breakfast I had my usual dry cereal, dried fruit, and nuts. For dinners I packed instant soup cups that I could make by heating water in the hotel coffee maker. When we got to Florida, I supplemented the food I packed with applesauce cups, Triscuits, and grapes. It worked out well to have filling, nutritious food at my disposal so that I didn't have to wake up in time to ponder the items offered by the hotel's complimentary continental breakfast (not likely to be very appetizing) and at the end of the day, when tired, I didn't have to worry about dinner because I knew I had a couscous lentil soup cup that could be ready in five minutes. (My father, meanwhile, got to enjoy some genuine Southern barbecue and local seafood restaurants.) Having sufficient sleep and sufficient food made functioning possible.

Taking my father along was also an important part of the plan. There was no way I could have done all that driving and maneuvering of suitcases (especially since I started out the trip on crutches!) and his presence spared me the necessity of taking care of the mundane details of travel, like checking in and out of the hotels. We had separate rooms so I wouldn't have to contend with his snoring and he wouldn't have to tiptoe around my sleep schedule. His presence made things much easier.

In addition to modifying my sleep schedule, I had worked to build up my physical and social stamina during the months before the wedding. I also purchased several new, cute summer tops (my summer wardrobe had not been updated for several years and a number of my tops were worn out or didn't fit well anymore) and found a clutch I could take to the wedding that I'd be able to fit a pair of sandals inside so I could take off my heels. I covered all the bases I could think of, including scheduling in days for resting during the trip, but there was one big question mark that remained: how I would respond to air travel.

Red stars mark stops during the trip.

We were concerned because I am so sensitive to pressure changes and while they pressurize the cabins of airplanes, there's still enough change on takeoff and landing that your ears pop. It was possible that a flight would be agonizing and here I was, proposing to fly across the country. We decided that a direct flight would be the best way to cope, since it would require only one takeoff and landing, rather than two. The only non-stop flight between Seattle and anywhere in Florida flies into Orlando. The wedding was taking place outside Tallahassee, nearly three hundred miles (and five hours of driving) from Orlando, but we concluded that it was better to drive than have to transfer planes in Texas. We also scheduled a day of total rest following our arrival in Orlando and I prepped for the flight with multiple migraine medications, muscle relaxants, a travel pillow, two different types of earplugs, an eye mask, a iPod loaded with classical cello solos, and easy-to-eat-even-when-queasy snacks, but it was with a certain amount of trepidation that I boarded the plane. So I doped myself up and off we went. The headaches didn't end up being too bad (I think my preventative medication approach really helped), but on flight to Florida I endured some pretty agonizing muscle pain. I'm so thankful I had muscle relaxants to take! The cello music helped, too, because it gave me something to focus on besides the pain. But the five and a half hours did pass, and after I'd taken a very long hot shower upon arriving in Orlando, I was actually okay.

The paradox that is Florida: gorgeous nature and
ugly development

And so there I was in Florida. This was not the first time I found myself in that state. I spent four years attending (and then graduated from) the excellent New College of Florida in Sarasota. My opinion of Florida, formed during my college visit in October of 1998, was that it was one weird state and that opinion never changed. It was the polar opposite of Seattle's brooding landscape of hills and mountains, dark green forests, gray skies, cool temperatures, and dark blue waters. Florida, and especially the southern Gulf Coast around Sarasota, seemed like a land designed and colored by Disney: turquoise water, white sand, pink stucco, palmetto greens, and blue skies with perky, puffy white clouds. Oh, and it was almost comically flat. That goofy, cheerful landscape had a dark underside to it, one of high humidity, zillions of insects, the sharp contrast between the wealthy retirees and impoverished black populations, a desperate lack of decent bread, an alarming number of sex shops and rent-by-the-hour motels, and a general swampy atmosphere of accelerated decay. There were things I loved about Florida--the alligators, the sunsets, my school, the beaches--but I was not the least bit sorry to leave it. Upon arriving in Orlando, I found myself surrounded by Florida's most depressing landscape: mile after flat, desolate mile of strip malls and chain stores, a soul-sucking vision of America at its ugliest. It reinforced my feeling that Florida was a place best left behind.

On the road in the Sunshine State.

Fortunately, after my day of rest following the flight, we hit the road headed toward points north and the scene of many fond memories. During three of my four years in Florida, I dated a native of Gainesville and his wonderful family had always welcomed me into their home with open arms. It meant a lot to me to have this surrogate family to spend breaks and Thanksgiving holidays with when my own family was 3000 miles away. I've remained in touch even after my boyfriend and I parted ways at graduation, so I'd arranged to have lunch with his mother when we passed through Gainesville on our way north. It was lovely to see her again and sit down at the table of the house that I knew so well and remembered so fondly, but the best part of the day was yet to come. My former boyfriend and I had remained very good friends and I was overjoyed when he and my first-year roommate fell in love after graduation--she was a much better match for him than I was! I had the honor of attending their wedding and now I had an opportunity to be present to celebrate another milestone: welcoming their first child!

My friend holding his new baby.

The baby hadn't been in any hurry to make his debut and things had reached the point that his mother was scheduled to have labor induced the day I was passing through Gainesville. Fortunately, he decided it was time to come out on his own and was born the day before the deadline! I was planning on visiting my friends and their new baby on my way back through Gainesville after the wedding, but was delighted (and honored) to learn that they wanted me to come visit them at the hospital! So that is how I found myself on the maternity floor of the UF hospital, cradling the 28-hour-old son of some of my dearest friends in my arms. I've always been intimidated by babies and babies, sensing my discomfort, have always squalled in alarm when placed in my arms, but holding this brand new infant was different experience. He really was amazing, so tiny and warm and vulnerable and alive! Fortunately, he's proved to be a very mellow baby, still spending most of his time sleeping, so he made no protest when he was transferred into my arms, allowing me to marvel at his newness without fear of discomforting him. I've hear people rave about baby feet and toes and hands and now I know why: they are astonishing in how perfectly formed they are, complete with all the creases at the joints and those amazing tiny nails! It was also so special to see my former boyfriend transformed into a father as he held his infant son in his arms! I felt so honored to be invited to share these early moments with them as a family and was really blown away by the experience of meeting a newborn in the flesh! I was feeling much more inclined to view the state of Florida in a positive light when my father and I once again got under way, heading toward the Panhandle.

On the backroads of the Florida Panhandle.

During my college years, I went to Gainesville regularly and visited both Cedar Key (on the Gulf Coast) and St. Augustine (on the Atlantic) several times, stopped off at Dino World in Plant City and had dinner in Orlando on a day-trip, went down to the Everglades on two occasions, and flew in and out of Tampa whenever I went home, but I'd never been to the Florida Panhandle. I knew very little about it, other than that it was considered part of the Deep South (there's the saying that "The farther south you go in Florida, the further north you get"), that many of Bailey White's stories take place nearby, and the highest point in Florida, a laughable 345 ft about sea level, is located in the region. (Did you know that the highest non-nautral point in Florida is the roof of the Four Seasons Hotel Miami, at 789 ft?) I was therefore rather unprepared for how beautiful it was as we left Tallahassee behind us and turned south toward the Gulf, heading toward Wakulla Springs.

The spring-fed Wakulla River

I HAD heard of Wakulla Springs before. Many years ago, while watching TV in the hotel room during a long car trip, my family had viewed a program about the spring, one of the largest and deepest in the world. Divers have found plenty of bones of prehistoric animals in its depths, but the network of underwater caves is so vast (12 miles have been mapped and surveyed so far), that it has yet to be explored in its entirety. I found the program fascinating enough that I've remembered it after all these years and recognized it as the spring in Bailey White's piece "Large and Deep" from Sleeping at the Starlite Motel. I was pleased, therefore, to get a chance to visit in person a place that I'd heard about.

It had been late enough when we finally checked into our hotel in Crawfordville that we put off visiting the springs until the next day. By then, I'd been on crutches for five and a half weeks. I'd gotten quite skilled at getting around with them, but found that using the crutches in the sweaty, humid Florida climate produced some agonizing chaffing under the arms. I'd been doing exercises to strengthen my back and reduce pressure on the nerve and had noticed it was getting easier for me to walk around my hotel room without crutches (or any pain) as long as I wore my shoes with major arch support. I decided to venture out that day without the crutches, and while I had to walk very slowly when I first started out, I haven't used the crutches since! It turns out that improving the nerve signals to my foot by strengthening my back helped the bones in my foot move back into their usual positions so that the bone spur no longer was digging painfully into places where it didn't belong!

I loved this sunlit patch of swamp visible from the road that ran through the park to the lodge!

I had been warned by my friend, the groom-to-be, to watch out for wild hogs because the best man had encountered two on one of the area roads, an incident that resulted in some damage to his car. I was quite delighted to add hogs (pronounced as two-syllable word when spoken by the locals) to my list of animals to keep an eye out for, but when my father and I arrived at the springs, the dominate wildlife on display was several hundred teenagers on a field trip. The cacophony they created was a great incentive for us to quickly hop on a boat for a tour of the Wakulla River, which is created by the 400,000 gallons of water flowing out of the spring every minute. It was a fantastic decision because that beautiful boat ride ranks as one of the greatest outdoor experiences of my life!

The Wakulla River

The river flows through a magnificent landscape of tall cypresses draped with long gray streamers of Spanish moss. The shores are dense with brush and the shallow river is dotted with swaths of pickerel weed and bullrushes. Ibises, anhingas, and egrets abound, as do turtles, common moorhens, and alligators. The very best part of all, however, was the manatees. During my previous years in Florida, the only manatees I saw were those in an aquarium, so seeing them in the wild was such a treat. We must have seen about a dozen of them, including a mother and baby. I was absolutely thrilled when one surfaced right next to where I was sitting in the boat, allowing me to snap several clear photographs! By the time the hour-long trip was over, the buses carrying the hundreds of rowdy teens were pulling away and my opinion of Florida had been vastly improved by the beautiful scenery of the Wakulla River.

Wakulla River views.

An ibis.

A female anhinga.

A close encounter with a manatee.

A small alligator shares a sunning spot with four red-belled turtles.

A larger alligator swimming in the river.

The wedding guest.

I encountered my friend in the lobby of the 1937 lodge on the park grounds where the wedding was to be held, but he was deep in preparations for the wedding and I opted not to take up much of his time. I intended to go to the informal party being held that night, but ended up needing to rest after my first day of walking and the effects of so much scenery. The next morning I dolled myself up for the wedding and headed back to the lodge. It turned out the only person I knew well other than the groom was another one of my former roommates, so I felt a bit awkward. I went to a very small school, so I knew most of the guests by sight and remembered many of their names, but I didn't personally know most of them, especially since they were almost all a year or two behind me. (The groom, also a year behind me, was my roommate my senior year and made friends with most of the guests from our college who were present, as well as the bride, after I graduated.) I also found that while I was able to get around without crutches, my legs were so weak from five and a half weeks of minimal use that I kept having to sit down. But at least I looked fabulous! I also did a great job chatting with the people at my table once we'd sat down for a meal, but ultimately had to leave before the wedding was over. That said, I was there for eight hours! I had only expected to make it through two or three, so this was a triumph.

Egrets wading in a pond in the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge.

Heavy rain falling
on the refuge.

All of the other guests departed the next day, but we had scheduled an extra day in the Wakulla area in case I needed to rest up after the wedding. I arranged to see the groom later in the afternoon and then my father and I set off for the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, comprised of 68,000 acres spread across three counties along the Gulf of Mexico, and only a few miles south of Wakulla Springs. It's a vast system of pine and hardwood hammocks, wetlands, ponds, and estuaries that have been set aside as wintering habitat for migrating birds. Our arrival coincided with that of a heavy downpour, but after a bit of waiting, it moved on and we slowly drove out to the St. Marks lighthouse, stopping now and then so I could photograph various birds and butterflies. The sun was shining--rather thinly--over the choppy, silvery Gulf when we reached the end of the road at the lighthouse. I was thrilled, when looking up into a pine tree next to the lighthouse, to spot an osprey sitting on a branch just above me! I took dozens of photographs and was immensely pleased to have found myself in such close quarters with one of my favorite birds of prey. On our drive back toward the visitor's center, I spotted an even more exciting photographic opportunity: a softshell turtle! I'd never seen such a weird-looking face on a turtle and was delighted that it tolerated my presence as it basked on the road, allowing me to get some extreme close-ups. I also saw a snake sunning on the road as we were driving, but unlike the turtle, it didn't stick around to get its picture taken. Then we took a little walk near the visitor's center where baby alligators had been sighted the day before, but we spotted nary a baby gator. I did get to photograph a colorful grasshopper, though. I was well pleased with my nature photography successes as we went back to the lodge at Wakulla Springs so I could spend a little time with my friend.

A colorful Gulf fritillary.

The St. Marks lighthouse.

An osprey overhead.

A bizarre-looking Florida softshell turtle!

A large and brightly-colored grasshopper.

Here I am with the happy couple.

I was glad to spy him in the lobby and we were able to engage in pleasant conversation for an hour or so, just the kind of talking that we used to do back when we were roommates, the sort that had endeared him to me all those years ago. I was so glad to have a chance to spend some time with him outside the rather stressful setting of the wedding. After my father snapped a photo of me with my friend and his new wife, it was back to the hotel to get some rest ahead of the next day's drive back to Orlando, once again through Gainesville.

We rolled back into Gainesville in the early afternoon with two items on the agenda: to hang out again with my friends and their new baby and also to meet some dogs I met on the internet.

Bug and Pug share some love.

Yes, dogs. Of course, anyone who knows me at all knows that I love dogs and it should be no surprise that I follow quite a few dog rescues and "dogs" on Facebook. One of the pages that makes me laugh the most is the one belonging to Sarge Wolf-Stringer. Sarge himself is now deceased, but I find the antics of the remaining members of his pack, and especially those of elderly Mary Todd Lincoln the Pug and her young boy-toy Junior "Bug" the Pit Bull, to be highly entertaining. Their family had recently moved to Gainesville and I'd sent them a message asking if I could meet the dogs while I was in town, figuring it to be a long shot. But they said yes! So on the first of October, I found myself in the company of their six friendly dogs, distributing petting and being enthusiastically licked in return. It was fun to meet them in the flesh, though they seemed SMALLER in person than they are in their photos and I was reminded that the personalities they assume in cyberspace are, in fact, largely invented by their owners, not that I couldn't project them back on the dogs! It was a lot of fun and a great example of how the internet (and Facebook) can help strangers find common ground and meet, then, in person. I wasn't able to take as many good photos as I would have like (the dogs were far too wiggly!), but I certainly carried away some wonderful memories.

Mary Todd Lincoln and Martha Washington were nearly as happy to see me as I was happy to see them!

Dark clouds and rain move across Paynes Prairie

I should also mention that some scheduling conflicts with squeezing in both the dogs and my friends arose, so my father and I found ourselves with about an hour and a half of spare time. We opted to drive out to Paynes Prairie so I could take more photos of Florida plants and animals, though we once again encountered a Floridian downpour of the sort that makes driving nearly impossible. But like most Floridian downpours, it eventually moved on and we were able to take a walk out onto a viewing platform. We didn't see any alligators, as we had hoped, but the rain ended up giving me the opportunity to photograph dragonflies. With an abundance of mosquitoes and other flying insects to feed on, dragonflies are all over the place in Florida, but they move so quickly and are so easily startled that it was impossible to get a picture of one. As it so happened, the dragonflies needed to stop and sit and dry their wings out after the heavy rain and one opted to do so on the railing of the viewing platform where I was standing. I carefully moved my camera closer and closer, taking picture after picture, knowing it might fly away at any moment, but it never budged! I was able to photograph a few other dragonflies pausing to dry their wings, too, though none nearly as close. I was also extremely excited to spot a pair of yellow garden orbweavers. In my mind, "garden" implies a certain smaller domestic scale as well as an indication of habitat, but these spiders were enormous. The body of the larger was about the size of my thumb! I personally think "huge dramatically-colored orbweavers" would be a better name, though they were surprisingly camouflaged; I'm sure many people walk past without seeing them. I was glad to add their photos to the great shots of a banana spider I'd taken up at Wakulla Springs.

I couldn't believe my luck when this dragonfly remained still long enough for me to photograph it!

The innocently named "yellow garden orbweaver."
It is bigger in real life than it appears on your screen!

And then it was time to see the baby again, now at home and five days old! It also gave me an opportunity to converse more closely with my friends, though make no mistake, I made sure I got to hold their infant again! It was such a pleasure to sit in the pretty sunroom of their apartment, cradling a baby, and having pleasant conversation with longtime friends! It was evening when my father and I finally got on the road again, heading south to Orlando. We were followed into town by yet another downpour, but Florida without storms wouldn't be Florida!

Babies are cool.

Especially this baby.

Baby feet!

Heavy rain in Orlando.

Our plane bound for Seattle didn't depart until evening, so my father and I decided to use our final day in Florida to drive over to the Atlantic coast. We thought about visiting the Kennedy Space Center, but ultimately decided it would be too much walking for me. Instead, we opted to see the ocean and found ourselves in Cocoa Beach. I was surprised by how glad I was to see "my" kind of Florida. Cocoa Beach may be an Atlantic surfer town and Sarasota a artsy/wealthy-retiree Gulf town, but they share the same plants, the same pastel hues, and same cheerful brightness to the light. I hadn't thought I missed Sarasota at all, but I guess part of me HAD developed a fondness for the landscape. But what I really wanted to see was the water, so after passing the Ron Jon surf shop that had been advertised on billboards our entire route, we parked at the end of a side street and made our way over the small dunes and onto the beach.

Yours truly enjoying
the beach.

Boy, was it ever lovely! I love the ocean and of course couldn't resist wading in the water. It was incredibly warm, probably close to eighty degrees. It was the kind of water you could have lingered in all day. I was rather sorry we only had fifteen minutes to spend there. It did my soul a great deal of good to stand on the white sand with warm water swirling around my ankles, gazing out at the blue ocean and the white foam of the breaking waves even for just those few minutes. It was with a light heart that I followed my father back to our car. After lunching on some excellent Thai food (why is Thai food in Florida so good? and furthermore, why was all the Thai food I ever tried in Chicago so mediocre?), we headed inland, back to Orlando, to the miles of chain stores, and toward looming storms. Once we reached the airport, I changed out of my shorts into a pair of soft pants for the plane, but I liked knowing that I carried on my legs the sand and salt of one coast as I journeyed to another.

Cocoa Beach.

Laughing gulls taking it easy.

Warm surf.

All in all, I was gone for eight days, traveled 1,010 miles by car, traveled more than 5,000 miles by plane, and took 927 photos. I saw some of my closest friends from college, encountered wild manatees, finally ate at Waffle House, photographed a softshell turtle, and met my first newborn baby. I discovered I could once again walk without crutches and I could fly on an airplane without too much misery. In other words, the trip was amazing.

A flock of ibises flying over the wetlands in St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge.

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An Island Interlude: How Abbey Spent Her Summer Vacation

A Washington State Ferry and a sailboat negotiate the waters between the San Juan Islands

The foot injury that I still haven't written much about has been taking up most of my attention the way an injury that forces you to be on crutches will. I've been wearing an air cast and was not allowed to put weight on it and that means everything I do (other than sitting) involves a tremendous amount of effort. It was very nice, then, that I got to have a lovely weekend away from home that finally shifted my focus away from my foot for a few hours!

The San Juan Islands

The occasion was the wedding of the daughter of longtime family friends. She had opted to get married in the San Juans, an archipelago of islands in the Salish Sea between northwestern Washington and Vancouver Island of Canada. Her wedding was held at the Lakedale Resort on San Juan Island, the second largest island in the group, and the most populous. The islands can only be reached by air or sea, so on Saturday morning, after an hour and a half drive from Seattle, we boarded a ferry bound for San Juan.

Okay, maybe I should back up, because it wasn't that simple. It had already been decided that my father would take the car and the dog and catch an early ferry because we had decided to make the trip on the day of the wedding. Arriving in your car before a ferry's scheduled departure time is no guarantee that you'll catch that ferry: if there are too many cars ahead of you in line, you'll have to wait for another boat. Because I require a lot of sleep, it was decided that my mother and my sister and I would walk on a later ferry and my father would meet us with the car on the other end. It was a clever plan until I damaged my foot. That it how I became a roll-on passenger!

Our San Juan Island-bound ferry crosses paths with a ferry
heading to the mainland and a third docked at Lopez Island.

A pelagic cormorant perches on
pilings at the ferry dock.

Crutches are hard work for anyone, but they are especially hard work if you're at all prone to fatigue, and with my migraines, I am exceedingly prone to it! So that's why I went to the islands in a wheelchair. Frankly, I didn't mind this at all, and it only proved to be an inconvenience when we discovered--on the gangway--that the wheelchair could only make it over certain gaps and down certain ramps if I was facing backwards. So I kept having to be spun around while my mother and sister--already dressed for the wedding--struggled to get me aboard. Once onboard, however, it was--so to speak--smooth sailing. If I had been more mobile, I would have spent more time outside photographing things, but I was glad that being seated in the wheelchair allowed me to bring my heavy DSLR along at all. The weather was sunny, if a bit hazy, and the forty minute trip to the island is a beautiful one as the ferry winds through the various straits and channels. I'm always on the lookout for interesting marine life--we'd seen a harbor seal at the ferry dock and orcas roam the waters around the San Juans--but sightings were limited to some red and purple jellyfish. It was without incident that we arrived in Friday Harbor, though it didn't quite work when my mom and sister tried to push me over a largish joint in the ramp up from the ferry to the dock: the wheelchair came to a sudden halt, but the camera bag in my lap did not! Nothing was damaged and we were swiftly reunited with my father, the car, and my ecstatic dog.

My dog, by the way, has not had many opportunities to travel. She's ridden along in the car on many jaunts, but she's never spent the night somewhere other than our house or, in the days when our whole family used to travel to California, the boarding kennel. Her suspicion of strangers makes it hard to take her out and about, but my inability to travel is really what has curtailed Abbey's opportunities. This time, though, we had some excellent dog-friendly accommodations with no others about. One of my father's regular customers has a large piece of property on San Juan Island where we were welcome to stay and we thought it might be fun for Abbey to have an outing. She'd gone in the car willingly enough earlier in the day because she'd seen my dad get out the Gentle Leader (indicative of walks to come), but she was delighted to be reunited with me. She's been extra attentive since my injury and likes to keep a close eye on me when possible. She lounged, the picture of contentment, with her head in my lap as we drove through the beautiful rural island scenery. She was less enthusiastic when we dropped her off at the guesthouse, but we had a wedding to go to!

A view of the lake where the wedding was held.
(Photo by Lakedale Resort)

The weather was perfect for an outdoor wedding--sunny, not too hot, and with no icy breezes--and the location--a small peninsula jutting into a lake surrounded by forest--was beautiful. We were able to take the car quite close to the wedding site and because the remaining gravel path was rough and the distance wasn't far, I opted to go by crutches to the ceremony. It was a pretty scene: the bride (wearing a custom red and gold dress) and her dog (wearing a red collar with silver hearts) were rowed across the lake to the ceremony site by her brother (wearing a captain's hat) in a rowboat (decorated with flowers on the prow). Her father helped her out of the boat and led her up a pathway of red rose petals to stand beside her husband-to-be, flanked by a matron of honor, a best man, and an adorable flower girl. What followed was perhaps the world's shortest wedding ceremony, but once you dispense with all the unnecessary pomp, it doesn't take many words to wed a pair. It prompted some musing on my part about the power of symbols, but the beauty of the setting certainly contributed much to the occasion. A break for hors d'oeuvres gave me a chance to chat with our friends and for the bride and groom (now wearing the captain's hat) to row back across the lake for pictures. I left the festivities shortly after we made our way back to the lodge in preparation for dinner because the stress of the day and the bright light of the setting sun had brought on a significant headache and a great deal of fatigue. I bid my adieus to everyone and my father drove me back to the guesthouse.

Canada is dimly visible across the Haro Strait as sunset light
paints the grass around the guesthouse a reddish gold.

It was on that golden evening ride across the island that the real vacation began. I always love to watch for wildlife, so was utterly delighted to spot a fox hunting in a field and to spy a quail perched on a rock beside the road. After we'd both eaten some dinner, I couldn't resist taking Abbey, my camera, and my crutches out for a quick tour of the sights around the guesthouse. I attached Abbey's leash to one of my belt-loops, trusting, perhaps foolishly, that her concern for my well-being would trump her desire to bolt after any potential prey. She behaved herself very nicely, adjusting to my pace and keeping out of the way of my crutches, and didn't spot the deer grazing on the far side of the field. Once we were back inside, she did have some trouble settling down. She's on the anxious side, so hanging out in this new house, even when I was there with her, was very stimulating. Shortly after she'd she'd finally heaved a heavy sigh--but long before the rest of my family returned from the wedding--I went to bed.

An unsettled Abbey found herself in a strange new world: a different house
with different furniture and a very different view outside the glass doors!

I was given the downstairs bedroom of the guesthouse and I was very glad not to have to go up the stairs. (The entire cottage was so small and so amply furnished that I could actually negotiate most of the downstairs without needing my crutches if I didn't mind hopping from place to place.) The tall bed was soft enough that my leg in its boot (I was wearing it at night, too) managed to find a perfectly comfortable space. I opened the window to let in some cool sea air and fell into a deep sleep. I woke up rather abruptly in the night just as I heard Abbey come out of her crate (she was sleeping in it with the door open, just like she does at home) and start pacing, panting, and shaking. I finally was able to determine that she'd heard something that frightened her and I wonder if it's what woke me up, too. I had to close the window before she could settle down at all and she made it plain to me that she needed to be under the covers of my bed to get over her scare by jumping up uninvited (an unusual behavior for her) and burrowing in. It took a while for Abbey to settle down, but when she did, she got out of my bed and got back in her crate and I quickly went back to sleep.

A very happy Abbey relaxes with her entire family around her after
a nervous night full of strange sounds.

The world beyond the cottage was shrouded in a light fog when I got up. Abbey immediately went upstairs to say good morning to the rest of the family. Unlike the evening before, when she'd been restless and anxious, Abbey was cheerful, relaxed, and delighted to have her whole family around her. Home, in her mind, is where the pack is! I was dressed before the others and couldn't resist taking my camera out on the patio despite my crutches. Our plan was to go out in the large field next to the cottage and let Abbey run free in a supervised fashion. We'd been cautioned that the abundant wildlife could provide temptation for dogs to run off, but we figured she could come out on the patio with me without a leash because she's good with the kind of boundary provided by the plantings around the patio, but she was so excited that she snuck away from me and wouldn't immediately come when I called. I got this great glimpse of her capering in the grass on the other side of the shrubs around the patio, her tail up, her ears up, cavorting with glee in the strengthening sunshine. She did come back to me, but boy was she ever ready to run when the whole family was ready to take to the field!

Abbey and my sister go bounding across the field for the sheer pleasure of running.

Poor Abbey, she's a wonderfully fast runner, but because she can't be trusted with other dogs or people off-leash, and because I'm not usually well enough to take her to one of our secret special spots, she seldom has the opportunity run free. But here she could run as much as she wanted, streaking across the grass after my sister, then turning around to speed toward me, her body low the the ground, a beautiful, primal animal in motion. Because she doesn't get much exercise these days because I'm unable to walk her (she's older now, too), she tired quickly and decided to try to eat grass instead. We discourage this behavior because she has an unfortunate tendency to throw up any grass she eats and we were all going to have to be in the car with her for several hours later in the day. Abbey is never sly or naughty--except when she's hoping to snatch a mouthful of grass! You can leave food unattended or put tempting items in the trash and she will ignore them, but if she's out and feeling frisky, she's going to try to start snacking on grass every time your back is turned! We wanted to check out the pond at the bottom of the meadow anyway, but getting Abbey on the dock, where she'd be unable to munch any vegetation on the sly, was an added incentive. (I'm pleased to report that none of the grass she ate came back up.)

This is what joy looks like.

The perfect pond.

The pond was everything a pond should be, with reeds at the water's edge, rafts of lily pads and flowers dotting the surface, and a lovely blue rowboat tied to the dock. We could see tadpoles in the shallow water and heard several frogs jump, but the frog sculpture on the end of the dock was the only mature amphibian we saw. There were raccoon paw prints on the dock, indicative of nighttime visitors. While they undoubtably visited the pond to hunt, we enjoyed the pond's more aesthetic pleasures. I took dozens of photos of the rowboat, eased down so I could sit on the dock and look into the water, and Abbey thought long and hard about going swimming before ultimately sticking to dry land. Light glinted off the wind-pushed ripples, the reeds swayed, golden eagles circled high above, and all around us was a deep and restful silence. Of course, it would have been MORE restful if Abbey hadn't still been wound up and trying to sneak grass snacks on the side, but it was the kind of scene that soothes the soul.

The roof of the guesthouse where we stayed is visible in this view across the pond.

The rowboat.

A happy Abbey on the prowl for grass snacks!

The beautiful landscaping around the buildings...

At length we got up to explore the rest of the property. Because I had definitely maxed out all of my energy conveying myself from the guesthouse to the pond on my crutches and the property is extensive, this tour was conducted by car. We drove through madrona woods and stands of firs on the slopes that rose up from the grassy meadow and peered out at the garage that houses the car collection, the fitness center, the artist's studio/gallery/guesthouse, the kitchen garden, a variety of outbuildings, another pond, and the main house. Most of the buildings had a perimeter of beautiful landscaping, consistent from site to site, and then the plantings would once again give way to vast expanses of the natural flora. I appreciated that they hadn't tried to eradicate all of the native plants and the landscape portions were so nicely done. We had noticed that the grasses and shrubs around the guesthouse where we stayed were specifically chosen so to screen it from other parts of the property so guests wouldn't be disturbed by other people going to and fro. The buildings themselves were stained rather than painted, with dark green trim, and also fit nicely into their surroundings.

...gave way to a natural landscape of firs, madronas, and black-tailed deer.

After all this fun, clouds were starting to move in and we had to get going in order to catch the ferry home. It was decided that I would ride on the ferry with the car since I was tired. In order to fit my wheelchair in the trunk, Abbey's crate had be transported in the back seat. She has one of those plastic-bodied crates and the top and bottom halves can be unscrewed and stacked, so she got to ride in the car in the bottom half of her crate. It took her a few minutes to get adjusted to the novelty, but when she realized she could lie in her bed, rest her chin on the edge of the crate-half, and watch the scenery through the front window, she was mightily content!

Abbey enjoyed ridding in her deconstructed crate!

Although we'd arrived an hour before the 1:50 ferry was to depart, we discovered that so many people were in line ahead of us that we would not only miss that sailing, we'd miss the 2:15 as well, and would be catching the 3:45 ferry home. After some dismay and then a regrouping, the rest of my family met up with our friends who were also waiting for the ferry while I stayed behind to train the dog.

Abbey would MUCH rather hold eye contact with
you for a Cheerio than bark at strangers!

Abbey, who has always been suspicious of strangers, has recently become paranoid that people are going to attack our car. She didn't used to pay any mind to people walking by the car or on the sidewalk or in other cars, but we suspect that getting older and not seeing as well has given rise to this fear. It's gotten to the point that when we're stopped at traffic lights, she'll growl or bark at people in other cars who are doing "suspicious" things with their hands like holding cellphones or adjusting their hair! We recently started a training program to redirect her attention away from anything that makes her start to fixate and get in that mindset, so waiting for the ferry for several hours was going to provide lots of opportunities for practice! Cars waiting for the ferry are lined up in parallel lanes are really no wider than your average parking space. When there's a long wait, most people get out of their cars and walk up the lanes to go to visit the shops and restaurants. We were parked near the top of one of the lanes, so all the people coming up from below us were going to pass within a foot or so of the car. So I armed myself with Cheerios and the "look" command (Abbey has to hold eye contact with me until I release her) and we went to work! Fortunately, Abbey would rather do tricks for Cheerios than bark at people walking past the car, so it didn't take too many repetitions before she was either focusing her attention on what I was doing with the Cheerios or settling drowsily into her bed. My mom and sister brought me some books they bought at a bookstore and so I took my boot off, put my feet up on the driver's seat, and began to read while watching for approaching people out of one corner of my eye and gaging Abbey's alertness level out of the other. By the time we caught the ferry, she was either glancing at passersby without any interest or ignoring them entirely--with one exception. She took an intense and immediate dislike to the young man sitting in the passenger seat of the car on our left and every single time he got out of the car or even moved so that his hands or head were visible through the window of his car, she'd burst into a frenzy of "stay away!" barking. I have no idea why she thought he was trouble--perhaps he resembled the abusive man from her past?--but I had to keep a close eye on his movements so that she'd already be focused on me and the Cheerio whenever he got in or out of his car!

A sailboat plying the waters between the San Juans.

My family rejoined me shortly before it was time to board the ferry, bringing a delicious sandwich from the restaurant where they had lunch, and then once again left me and Abbey (at my insistence) to our own devises in the car after we boarded the boat. I resumed reading, occasionally looking up to watch the islands slide by as the ferry plowed on toward the mainland, and Abbey drifted off into sleep, barely even registering the occasional ferry workers--hollering loudly to each other to be heard over the throbbing of the ferry's engines--that passed our car. The forty minute journey seemed to fly by. Abbey indicated with pacing and panting that she needed to make a pit stop after we arrived in Anacortes, but the drive home was otherwise uneventful as the unfamiliar beauty of the Skagit Valley farmland gave way to the forest-lined freeways and well-known cities close to home. When we at last pulled into our own driveway that evening, it felt as if we'd been gone much longer than a single night. In the wee hours of the morning, the gray skies that had rolled in as we left the island unleashed a torrential rainstorm, ending a streak of 49 days without rain.

The last time I spent a night away from home was in August of 2009. Since the migraines started in October of that year, I have seldom left my house for reasons other than medical appointments, much less traveling long distances for pleasure. I have missed many gatherings with the same group of friends that attended the wedding even though they've taken place much closer to home. Spending the night in other houses while dog-sitting is the closest thing I get to a vacation these days. Thus, this weekend away was such a treat for me. I love scenery and San Juan Island is dense with rural beauty: fields dotted with cattle and round hay bales, wind-gnarled firs and peeling madrona trees, a red fox trotting through a field aglow with golden evening light, sea and sky merging seamlessly in the Haro Strait, the blue rowboat placidly drifting on its tether in the pond. Against this peace and silence, my joy was doubled by Abbey's fierce delight in running free across the grass, her amazement of finding all of her family united in a strange dwelling, the clash of her handsome brindle stripes against the pastel patterns of the guesthouse interior, watching her discover the joy that can be found in the tension between the familiar and the new, the sight of her sweet face resting on the edge of her crate as she began to doze off in the car on the journey home.

Island farmland.

A distinctive, red-barked madrona tree.

Sea and sky blur into one.

The perfect rowboat.

Abbey standing out against the pastel patterns of the guesthouse.

My little animal explores a new world.

Running for joy.

An ecstatic Abbey leans in to give my sister a kiss.

I've always been someone who is sensitive to the demands of that ineffable mix of mind and emotion that we call the soul and since the disabling effects of the chronic migraines took hold, finding ways to soothe and feed it have become increasingly important. Macro photography, especially of natural objects, is good for my soul. Being with horses is good for my soul. Unable to be with the horses or engage in my usual photography since injuring my foot had been nearly as burdensome as the pain itself. Our overnight trip to the islands healed those hurts and a week later, the memories I made there--Abbey running, the island farmland, the fox at dusk--sustain me still.

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