JulieLeung.com: a life told in tidepools

Sometimes in my mind I participate in the If I Only Lived Elsewhere Fantasy. I wonder why on earth do we live on this island. The costs are incredible. The kids are on drugs. The parents are competitive. The ferry is inefficient. Living here feels isolating and expensive. I reminisce about places we lived in the past and imagine where we might move in the future.

Then a day like yesterday happens. And I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.

In the morning a friend and I went down to the south end of the island to go for a walk near the beach.

When we arrived, it was still before dawn, dark enough that moonlight was shining on the Sound.

We heard noises. To me it sounded like large frogs croaking. Investigating further, we wondered if it was the cormorants lined out on the posts, the rows of black diving birds. They were noisy too. But I think perhaps we were hearing seals as well, barking and playing.

A funny sight to see in one neighborhood was the juxtaposition of a pocket of palm trees and other tropical plants set against the Olympic mountains, in the pink of the sunrise.

As the day dawned, the trees around us became more visible. It’s a lovely forest, with limbs dressed in lichen and mosses.

My camera was claiming low battery as we left, but I was able to try to squeeze out this last picture of our final view of the morning, the ferry from Bremerton catching the sunlight.

Then later in the afternoon, on our way home from a shopping trip, the girls and I stopped by the park to enjoy the sunny day. What evidence of deprivation: all parking lots crowded with cars, children running wildly around the playground. It’s as if we Northwesterners are secret sun worshipers, craving any occasion to fill our deficit.

If pharmaceuticals could capture sunshine in a capsule, they’d get their R&D money back immediately. No advertising or cute commercials required. All of us here in the Pacific Northwest would become addicted to our prescriptions.

But for now we have to wait for sunny days. Sunny days like this one, that tempt with a taste of summer. I was wearing my jacket and fleece but I felt warm enough to bake. Warm enough to want to wear summer clothes, to want to break out sun tan lotion, lemonade and ice cream. It was amazing for February.

I tried taking a shot of the crowded playground and its parking lot – look at that sun! What a day.

A day we could see our shadows. Here we are on our way back to the van from the park.
Jumping and enjoying the moment in the sun.
Oh so happy to be Here.
Happy in the here and now.