Vashon

Onct upon a time when I lived on Vashon isle...
there was a tetherball in the backyard by a creek with skunk cabbage in it.

Skunk cabbage. Native to the Northwest. My mother's boyfriend's mother, who lived in Des Moines (WA) had immigrated to America, from Norway, at an early age. When she came to Washington someone played a trick on her "see those pretty flowers? go smell them." But I think she just laughed when she told us that story.

The first house on Vashon had several acres of land and a beautiful view of the water. After we moved in I went out into the backyard and screamed at night but I knew my screams would be muffled by woods and blackberries and salmon berries and no one would hear or care and I thought it was fun and funny. I was finishing fourth grade.

Down the hill, a guy who had retired from Boeing had a farm which had Siamese cats and drafthorses. We often saw (or heard) them clop clop clopping by. The horses I mean.

It was different from the apartments we'd lived in in upstate New York (in Latham and Watervliet)or the old woman's house we first lived in when we moved to Washington State in 1986. The old woman's house was in Renton. She was a recluse and she'd died in that house before we moved in. We found old black and white photographs and some old books of hers in the garage (the door between it and the house would often mysteriously open). Some of the photos were from the wars over in Europe and were quite scary. In Renton, we lived by some mean dogs. There were also blackberries in the back yard. I learned to play tetherball at school and read all the Little House on the Prairie books by Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Shortly after we moved to the island, I got up early one morning and went for a walk. I walked several miles, until I got a bit scared, and then I turned around and walked back. Mostly I remember flowers and grass and trees. That was really great.

In the early 90s my mom and sister and I were a part of the Vashon Cohousing group, but we pulled out before they started building, and then we moved to Northern Virginia. When I was looking at the Vashon Cohousing group website and I noticed that a lot of people in it were from New York. Both upstate and NYC.

I think that one day I want to be able to have a place in NY state and a place on Vashon Island. Even if its just a piece of land with a tent!