They say “never say never” so I’ll say “only in extremis (feet first) or in the wake of a disaster (a tsunami)” would I move away from Oysterville. Maybe the word “willingly” should be in there somewhere.

Those thoughts occur to me periodically and, I have to say, oftener as I age.  It’s not just the thing about proximity of medical assistance and convenient transportation that are siren calls to move away from the isolation of our rural area.  There are all those day-to-day difficulties that crop up as we slowly lose our independence.  Getting someone to do the heavy lifting, change the lightbulbs in the fixtures on our eleven-foot ceilings, get down on hands and knees in the garden (and to scrub the shower stall, for that matter.)

Freddy Modeling Paris Review T-Shirt, 1960s

And then there are the daily irritants such as not having enough oomph or whatever they call it to be able to stream Netflix on our TV.  So we get our DVDs the old-fashioned way and, even though they come within two days, we’ve often lost interest or don’t have time or whatever…

So it was last night that we finally saw “Plimpton! Starring George Plimpton as Himself.”  It’s been sitting on the shelf near our DVD player for six months.  At least.  And before that it had malingered in my Netflix queue for maybe a year.  I think I’d ordered it shortly after my cousin Freddy’s death in February 2015.  I knew there were clips of her in the film and I hadn’t seen her for ten years or so.  I felt the need.

Freddy was George’s first wife and also the mother of his oldest children, Medora and Taylor.  It had been even longer since I had seen them and their appearances in the film were an extra bonus.  Even their grandfather (my uncle) Willard showed up in one scene.  It was lovely to see them and to feel a reconnection (of sorts.)

Freddy and Sydney at 1947 Fiftieth Anniversary of their Grandparents, the H.A. Espys

I wondered if I’d have felt any more pleasure from the film had I been able to stream it live a year and a half ago.  Probably not.  And surely not worth the tradeoff of living in the speedy hustle-bustle of the big city (or even five miles south where CABLE is available) rather than in slow-time Oysterville. At least that’s my current thinking.