I’ve kidded that my dating life peaked in junior high. And I’m going to leave it at that because my parents read this blog and there’s stuff (oh so innocent - come on, I was 12-13) that they need not know about, even now.

If you look at the map, in the top-left corner, you’ll see Victoria, Canada. This is one of the prettiest towns in North America, imho.

Moving to the right, you’ll see an island called Orcas - in the 6th grade our school sent the four 6th grade classes to Orcas Island for an extended field trip. I want to say it was at least a weekend. We took a ferry over, toured the town (which boasts an historic pip organ in some building), then headed to this camp where we lived in dorms, woke up to revelie and flag raising, spent our days studying how to get unlost in the woods with nothing but a weird map and compass, identifying trees and flowers, and I can’t remember what else. I remember that it was a good time and before or since I had never heard of a school doing such a thing.



Moving to the right again, you’ll see Anacortes. You’ll see that from the northern tip of Whidbey Island looks to be a road. There was a huge, amazing bridge at Deception Pass that was ethereal in the fog and really long and really high. I took swimming lessons in Anacortes.



Looking a little up, you’ll see Bellingham. We would ocassionally shop there. Moving down from there you’ll see Everett, we would shop there as well. Still further down and right - off the map - is Seattle. We would go to Seattle a lot - I saw Star Wars and Empire Strikes Back in Seattle, I think.



Moving back to the lower left, you’ll see Port Townsend. This town is on the Olympic Peninsula. I lived in the area when An Officer and a Gentlemen was filmed there. Because we were a huge Navy community, it was exciting to have a movie about the Navy filmed so close by.



Now moving up a little, to Whidbey Island, you’ll see Coupeville. I know we would go there, but I can’t remember why. It was a tiny little town.



Oak Harbor was settled by the Dutch, so you see a lot of their influence in the town. In April of every year they have a festival called “Holland Happening.” And they always have a huge July 4th thing.



I remember walking to school. We lived at the top of this hill and the whole walk to school was down hill. I would cut through the woods and when I came out of them I could see over the town to the east. On a clear day I could see Mt Baker, venting steam in the distance. On a really, really clear day, from our street you could see Mt. Rainier as well.



One last thing and then I’ll stop rambling.



We lived in Oak Harbor from 1978 - 1981. I remember May 18, 1980, like it was yesterday. It was a Sunday. I was sitting in our kitchen, eating cereal before I hopped in the shower to get ready for church when I heard and felt these two huge BOOMs. The windows rattled and the house shook.



My thoughts went like this:



1. How odd, we don’t have artillary at the Navy base.

2. I wonder if a plane crashed (it is a Naval Air Station).

3. I wonder if Mt. St. Helens finally erupted.

I even posed the thought about Mt. St. Helens in the car on the way to church. When we arrived everyone was buzzing with the news that the volcano had finally erupted and that it was devastating.



Here’s the weird thing. Go to the map and zoom out so you can see Seattle.



Mt. St. Helens is almost directly south of Seattle. We were about 200 miles northwest of the mountain. The ash cloud moved east-northeast with a smaller band that went northwest. There was a V over the Puget Sound that got no ash at all, we were in that band of clear air. I didn’t see any ash until we took a trip to Seattle months later and we could see it piled up and lining the street gutters.



We moved away in January 1981.