Bike Basket

I think it’s been a year and a half since we’ve seen The Hawes.  Otherwise known as “Tricky” because his name is Dick and if you are old enough that doesn’t require explaining.  You’d think he lived in another country.  Well, maybe Bainbridge Island qualifies now that we are all close to the doddering age.

I’ve known Dick Hawes since my California days.  Clear back to the early seventies.  He was from the northwest but for a time worked near Half Moon Bay (I think) where a teacher-friend of mine lived.  The Tricks (we also call him that) moved back up here a few years before I did and we’ve kept up our friendship ever since.  The teacher friend, though… not so much, at least not for me.

Checkin’ Out the Bay

For a long time, Dick lived in a spiffy condo in Belleview.  When we went to the big city, we’d stay with him, and when he wanted a bit of country air, he’d come and stay with us.  He always came armed with a camera – a real one, not digital, even now – and he’d take long, solitary walks soaking up the ambience.  Later, he’d send us a card with a picture on it – something he saw or, more often, something we see every day.  But when seen through Dick’s eyes, it becomes a work of art.

M m m m m Good!

A few years back he formed his own little company called “one eye open” and marketed his cards at various galleries in the Seattle area.  He even had a show of his originals here at Bailey’s Café and, as I recall, made a sale or two.  That’s remarkable for a photographer.  In my salad days when I was married to Marta’s father (who is a photographer) I got used to hearing people visit his exhibitions and say, “I took a shot just like that!”  Yeah, right.  You don’t hear that so much at watercolor shows.  Or sculpture exhibits.  Or even at book signings.

Anyway, The Hawes will be here for the weekend and beyond!  Yay!!  We have a lot of catching up to do.  I don’t think he’s been here since my birthday two years ago this very week.  Is that possible?  Have we been up there?  I wonder if any one of the three of us can remember.  A sad, sad situation to be sure!

The View from Our House

I never stop counting my blessings that our friends Carol and Tucker live just a spit and a holler away.  It’s less than a block door-to-door and even less than that if you take the shortcut through the churchyard – a good thing to do in the summer, but pretty puddly in the winter.  It’s 165 steps by road; 122 by the shortcut.  Not a lot shorter but, somehow, walking across the lawn and through the gap in the fence seems to be faster by far.

It’s not that we spend that much time in one another’s houses nor necessarily in one another’s company.  Usually, Friday nights at our house.  Now and then around their table or their firepit.  Working on projects together, occasionally.  No… it’s not about time saved or spent – it’s just knowing that they are there.  They’ve come to our rescue many, many times in the years (Is it five, now?) they’ve lived in Oysterville full time – feeding the chickens when we are out of town, keeping an eye on the house, even preparing our ‘home hospital room’ after Nyel’s quadriceps surgery three years ago.

Taking the Shortcut

Sometimes we get to reciprocate.  But not very often.  If they are away for a few days, we stand in for them, tossing out birdseed in their yard each morning and, if it’s a Wednesday, we deal with their garbage can.  Hardly enough to feel that things are ‘even’ in terms of time or effort, though. When I worry about the inequality of it all, they assure us that that’s not the point.  But we wish we could do more for them.  Mostly, I guess, we wish we weren’t so often in need, ourselves.

The best part, though, is that we enjoy one another’s company.  Sometimes Carol and I dream up a ‘double date’ and the four of us go out to dinner or maybe on a day trip.  For a couple of winters, we’ve shared rides to the Community Historian meetings and, I think out of interest rather than neighborly support, both Carol and Tucker took the class I gave at Grays Harbor College a year or so ago. We’ve worked on community projects together and have sat side-by-side at programs at the schoolhouses and during services at the church.  We enjoy meeting one another’s friends and visiting with one another’s relatives. Living in proximity seems like extra icing on the cake.

Walking Home the Long Way

Tucker is the one who ‘discovered’ the shortcut.  It used to be that he got the best cell phone coverage out in his backyard or over toward the church.  If I called from the kitchen, I could look out the window and we could see one another as we talked.  (Those teenaged whipper-snappers have nothing on us old ducks, by Godfrey Daniel!)  And, one step led to another, you might say.

It all puts me in mind of my childhood when kids came in and out of neighbors’ back doors with ‘nary a knock or a ‘yoo-hoo.’  I don’t really remember any shortcuts then and we aren’t even close to that sort of bursting-through-the-door boldness now, but the feeling is the same – unconditional neighborliness!  It’s the best!