Thrihyrne

This will be yet another fast post; I visited three people yesterday that I'd been corresponding with via the Portland craigslist and settled on the first one after it all. I spent an hour or so at Mt. Tabor park [pictures coming forthwith], writing on my Wraeththu fic since I've not really been able to work on it outside of a few snatched moments, but I'm enjoying a wonderful few days with my grade school friend and her children. I love that I can provide something so simply exotic as a computer on Zoe's desk with headphones so she can play with pbs.kids, and just being a part of a family out here. I spent quite a while last night in the kitchen with Cally, going through our grade school friends, wondering who'd married who, who had divorced whom, and all of that. We were also comrades in an accelerated program for bright grade schoolers together, and we were trying to figure out which particular Billy Joel song it was that we made a video of, and whether or not said video might be archived somewhere.

Our 20th high school reunion is at the end of July, and while I moved away after 5th grade, many of the people I knew are still there, and I'm going to go. To add a bit of spice, or something.

Today we're headed to the beach, and I'm thrumming with a rightness of all of this. Some elements are still quite scary, but being in the household of someone I've known since 3rd grade is really quite tremendous. Geography does imprint, and it did on me. That, and I'm now at an age that I've been a step-parent, and I really do resonate with pre-adolescents, and I'm just so grateful. I've lived all over the U.S., and this is my choice, to be back out in the northwest. I'd been hoping/planning for this for quite some time, and while the cost has been, well, what it is, I'll take it.

I'm here with verdenia and her BF! I got here yesterday afternoon and it was as though I'd switched climates, all by driving an hour away. I spent some wonderful time in their backyard chatting after having a nosh in the kitchen and I had to put on jeans and socks and a cardigan. It's such a dramatic change from my days in the Tucson desert to be in a place where the current range of temperatures is from 55 to 63 degrees. And it's nearly July! Apparently this is called the 'June Gloom.' I've been reminded a lot that Portland gets loads and loads of rain, though I'd been under the impression that it was mostly overcast, which I have no problems with. Eeks.

( chatting with the delightful Verdenia and her love )

Today we'll hang out and I'll probably do research about where to stay next as I move on to Oregon, and I may find out what Pride events are going on here today. May need to try and take their public transport (and ride a cable car?!!) and get out for a little while. They're off to a wedding this afternoon/evening so I may well curl up on this totally comfy guest bed and do some serious writing and editing. I need to decide whether I'm staying tomorrow too, or if I'll get on the road. It would be fun to relax another day, but I do need to get onto Portland and get settled, so I'll see how the day goes and what my instincts say. There'll be pictures later, once verdenia and her BF are gussied up for the wedding and I've had a shower, lol.

In a somewhat unrelated element, my dear friend and fellow Wraeththu fan veloona took some fabulous pictures in Uigenna style with another Wraeththu friend of hers. The pictures and description of their photo shoot are found here at her LJ. For the Wraeththu fans on my flist, do go and give them a look-see!

Hope you all are doing well, especially those I've had the fortune to spend time with along the way. It's been such an amazing journey.

I seem to be able to grossly underestimate the time it takes for me to get from point A to B these days. :P I'd thought seven hours; instead, it was 9 1/2 before I was safely in elfscribe5's driveway. Still, here I am in Tucson, safe and sound. In keeping with my new moniker, Arrives With Storms, I did get rained on at the 79 miles from Tucson mark. Though it wasn't so much being rained on as globs of water being hurled at the car from the sky. Thankfully it didn't last all that long, but I really should have stopped on the other side to take pictures. Once again, the sky in my rear view mirror was black, but the other scenery was quite exotic, at least to my eyes, which haven't been to the southwest in quite some time.

( today's visual offerings )

elfscribe5 and I are having a great time, chatting about our fics, sharing pics and fic ideas. It's so fun to talk with her since we have several fandoms in common, including Wraeththu, Tolkien and Swordspoint. I know I'll end up quite inspired from our talks. In fact, I was working on a new Wraeththu fic for my dear veloona in my head today. I don't know that I'll get anything written down on it tonight as, to be candid, I'm exhausted. I woke up at 5:00 a.m., though I did go back to sleep for an hour or so, but I'd not gotten into bed until 1 a.m. or so. That combined with a full day on the road makes for a very tired Thev. But being able to hang out with another fan and be able to gush to her in real time about how much I love her stories in every fandom I've read is such a treasure. She does keep her RL and fan stuff separate, however, so I won't be posting pics of us together. I'll probably take some pictures of the cacti that are everywhere, though; I'm really in the desert. This is foreign territory. So are 100+ degree temperatures. :P

Just a super-quick post to say that I'm visiting a college friend and her family for the night before heading to Oklahoma. The first part of the drive was uneventful, then the clouds came, literally roiling overhead in an ominous yellow-black color. Even with my car weighted down I was getting blown around on the road. And then came the rain. I think I still have a headache from concentrating! But now it's sunny and breezy, much more like typical Kansas weather. I'm also enjoying getting to know my friend's daughter who will be seven in September. The last time I saw her she was an infant, so getting to have a conversation is really cool. :)

I'm safely in a hotel in Bristol, though it's taken me a while not to feel rattled. I had a quiet night last night and got on the road around ten o'clock this morning. I stopped regularly to stretch my legs, and after 3 or 3 1/2 hours on the road, as I was chugging up a hill on I-81 south, this horrendous noise assaulted me and I started yelling invectives because I was scared out of my mind. I slowed down and was pulling over and knew something had happened to one of my tires, and then saw one of my hubcaps hurtling ahead of me up and off to the shoulder of the highway. Panting and my heart racing, I turned the car off and put on my hazards, huge semis still roaring past me as I retrieved my hubcap and investigated what had happened. My back left tire had totally blown out. Not flat, shredded. Once I could breathe somewhat normally, I called AAA and they said they'd be there in about a half an hour. A young man stopped and I let him know that I was being helped but thanked him, then a representative from the county sheriff's office stopped. He stayed with me until AAA showed up and put on my spare, and then he let me follow him to the nearby town (I was, amazingly, only 1 mile from the exit) to a tire place where I got two tires replaced. I could've stood to have all four replaced, but they only had 2 in the right size, so they're on the front. I'm mostly recovered from it all, and have had my belief that a very good number of people in this world really are well-meaning and full of integrity. I told the sergeant once I was at the tire place that he was an angel. "I've been called a lot of things," he said with a smile, "but never that!" I got his card so that I can send him a thank-you note.

So. I actually had to stop about 10 miles down the road after I'd had the tires replaced to walk around and focus on breathing. From time to time I get really tingly hands and my lips tingled and were kindof twitchy; my thumbs get pulled into my palms involuntarily and it's pretty scary. It doesn't happen very often, but after keeping my composure through all of that I think it just hit me and I really couldn't function. I was feeling that my car was the potential enemy; I've not had anything like that happen to me before so suddenly. I've had a flat tire, but nothing that loud and scary. Plus, I'd had a bunch of work done to Bianca (the car) including a timing belt and other belts and two front axles, so there's a part of me that's hyper-aware of the changes to her and worrying that some key bolt is going to drop to the ground and I'll crash into a guardrail or something. It's the downside to being a writer and a person with an imagination that really should be curtailed.

But now I'm safely at my hotel and I have internet again, yay!!! I felt so isolated without my connection to you all. I'm also in active strife with my mother, so I've been keeping my phone off until I get a little more distance and/or I'm planning to call people with whom I'm staying on my journey. On the plus side, I went ahead and posted a room wanted ad on the Portland craigslist, and in the 2 days since I posted it (when I was internet-less) I heard from no fewer than 6 people! One person needs somebody sooner than I'll be there, but the others I've emailed and let them know the situation and I'll see what they say. I think that's tremendous, and bodes well for the future. Tonight I'm relaxing after going to the ubiquitous Wal-Mart to get a chicken ceasar salad and 2-liter of Diet Coke; I brought my little boom box and have tunes on I enjoy, and will type up the beginnings of a fic I'm working on. Today I was too frazzled and emotionally strung out to really think about fic while driving, but hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to get more into that groove. Plus I'll be staying with a fellow writer for a couple of days, and I'm hoping we'll sit around and do some writing and/or talk about it while there.

I'm enabling comments, but I probably won't be able to reply. Just wanted you all to know that I'm safe, en route, and quite enjoying having A/C. :)