I dressed too warmly Sunday for a hot autumn day, so in a way appreciated it when Elizabeth peeled off her clothes and threw them in the river for daddy to retrieve. His garage opens out to the river, perhaps so his sapphire blue Lamborghini can enjoy the view. But he's such a decent guy you can darn near forgive him his success. Elizabeth dragged her new Kids for the Columbia yo-yo around the informal stage as I warmed up the crowd for the governor.
Timing is everything in politics.
Standing up there in the wind, I imagine spinning at the center of great waterwheel, surrounded by an ark of life. Clouds sweep by within reach and soon the geese will be passing in their tens of thousands, soaring by in lines that seem wide as the river and which I'll always think of as magic. Sometimes I wake to their calls, so many that they no longer have a single voice, but are joined in vast choir singing of the coming rain. Elizabeth and I sat on our deck high above the river on a sunny day last week and as she laughed on my lap, all blond curls and rosy cheeks, I felt the mighty past of that place as a palpable presence. Looking at Elizabeth, I nearly felt I could see the traces of a Chinook child playing with her daddy in that same spot a thousand years ago, joyful in a world of beauty, looking forward to the ordinary but profound pleasures of a plentiful life.