Summer in the Mountains and the Sea

The last few times I’ve been in Oregon, it’s been around 7 – 10 days, but this time I’ve been here for a month. It is a different feeling to be here for so long; I start to recognize the old Oregon more, and I start forgetting Rhode Island as a place.

Since my wife and I separated, I get asked a lot about why I’m still living out there, and if I like it better than Oregon. Before, it was an easy answer: I had outgrown Oregon, or maybe Oregon had outgrown me. It’s no Oregon that I don’t look fondly on; it is Portland.

This morning, I went and had brunch with two friends in NW Portland, where I spent a lot of my life working, playing, and living. All my memories are of multi-use buildings, where thirty-somethings lounge around in the sun without a financial worry, sipping matcha and eating brunch. Here and there, an old relic from the old Slabtown neighborhood sits in the shade of the steel and glass shoe boxes that are called Slabtown something or other to remind me what used to be there.

Slabtown got its name in the late 19th century from the stacks of unused ends and slabs from the mill that the poor residents would use for fuel to heat their small, modest homes. Most of the families that lived there worked for the mills. Now it’s the home and playground of the upper class who wouldn’t know or care about the history of where their newly constructed, imposing condo sits.

Another example is in SE Portland, where they celebrate what they call the Goat Blocks. About fifteen years ago, there was a vacant lot where several goats lived. They had small structures where they lived and played, and it was a delight to go and watch them. Sometimes you could feed them. Then the land was sold to developers, and the goats had to move to 92nd, far from their previous neighborhood. Several multi-use buildings were built, celebrating what had to be kicked out to build them.

I’m not here to keep writing about gentrification or the crimes of developers, but what I am writing about is going “home” and finding it not what it used to be. I grew up in Portland, and for a long time, I felt more at home there. The culture, the architecture, and even the climate matched who I was and even helped shape me into the man I am today.

Providence has its issues, but I appreciate that many areas remain untouched by developers. I’m not sure it is because they won’t develop. There are signs that Providence’s grit and character might be in jeopardy in the form of Trader Joe’s opening up in downtown Providence. However, it still reeks of an eastern city in decay. Yet, in the shadows of the mill buildings, creativity and communities are thriving, reminiscent of Portland’s past, when people participated and fostered momentum, rather than moving in to be entertained.

Why do I want to live in Providence and not come back to Portland? I can’t quite put my finger on the answer. My parents live on the Oregon coast, while my brother and his family live in Portland. My best friend, along with many other special people in my life, still call Portland home. Whenever I visit, I feel loved and wanted.

And I love Oregon. It is so beautiful and epic. Rhode Island is a swamp for most of it, while Oregon has a beautiful coast, giant mountains, deserts, plateaus, and forests. I got to walk through the woods with the moss dripping down on me. I watched the sea crash on the rocks under a canopy of old-growth firs. I saw the Cascade Mountain rise above the horizon while some friends and I drove to the last Blockbuster left on earth. We stood at the timberline of Mt. Hood, where the peak reaches into the heavens.

I also love Rhode Island. Providence, like I said, has a thriving art scene and a great food culture, and while the coastline isn’t as epic as Oregon, you can swim in the warm, briny Atlantic. I am down the street from Boston and just a three-hour trip to New York City. There are numerous museums and cultural places to visit that don’t exist in the West.

What makes it hard between the two is the people. I have left many loved ones behind in Oregon and made so many new, close friends in Rhode Island. Rhode Island was a little tougher to break in than other places, and most of New England is a very insular place, a lot like a small town, but after I broke through the hardened defenses and stopped offending people, I have made some very close friends who feel like the friends back in Oregon. Two of my closest friends in Rhode Island came out to join me for a few days so we could make our Blockbuster pilgrimage. They got to meet my close friends at a birthday party and see and hear the love I get in Oregon.

I don’t believe in any of the gods, but I do think sometimes that things aren’t random. I couldn’t believe I’d have to move across the country, get separated from my wife, and then move back to Oregon. I have faith that there is a deeper reason I am there. There is some purpose that I am either fulfilling or being primed for. I believe I need to be open to what comes my way so I can act on it. Maybe I’ll never know what it is, but I think that I am supposed to be in Rhode Island.

I also believe in perpetual growth, where I shouldn’t be finding comfort and trying to stay there as much as possible, even if it is beautiful. I am not the same man I was when I moved to Rhode Island four years ago. I have experienced significant personal growth while there, but I have also suffered from my lack of self-improvement. I don’t believe that I can live life without a connection to a spiritual way of life and a therapeutic outlet. I need to strive for growth and never settle for being just good enough.

I used not to be able to sit with my back to a door in a public place. If I went to a restaurant, I had to sit with my back to the wall, looking at the door so I could see everyone who was coming in. I was so afraid of someone sneaking up on me, way past the point where that might be a reality. People would give me shit about it, and I just told them it was who I was. I had PTSD. I had trauma. I looked at that quirk as just as permanent as any of the rest of my personality. This is just a minor example, but through work, I found that I didn’t have to let fear drive where I sat in restaurants. I could sit with my back to the door and not worry who was coming in. Sometimes I can be more “curious” than other times, but at the end of the day, I am not stuck in anxious paranoia that isn’t even based on reality anymore.

I still hold onto things that don’t work for me, but I refuse to let them go because I might still find a use for them. I have to be willing to change a behavior, but until then, I’ll have it in my stack of responses to life. Some of the anxiety and behaviors weren’t getting to that point, and while moving doesn’t mean anything will change internally, the move made me willing to do the work to make the changes I have made.

So, while it took some pain and caused some harm to people I love, it brought me to a place that I needed to be at to grow. I had let the years after cancer build up without asking for real help dealing with my anxiety and depression. I had left the treatment to my regular life. Everything on the outside was mostly the same, and I felt alone and unable to break through the weight of the medical trauma I had just been through. When it comes to being an alcoholic and drug addict, I have a whole community that relates to each other, trying to recover, but the cancer made me feel isolated. I was dealing with feelings that I hadn’t dealt with before, on top of old traumas that I thought I had closure about, that came to haunt me again.

So while I have enjoyed my time here in Oregon and seeing most of the people I care about, I am ready to go home to Rhode Island. I miss my dog and my RI friends. I’m looking forward to moving to a more central location in Providence, which should give me a greater sense of putting down roots than I’ve had before. If you have been a long-time follower of this blog, you know that I’ve been grappling with the feeling of “home”, which still eludes me. However, I’ve come to terms with the fact that not finding it won’t be the end of me.

I’ll live in Rhode Island until it makes sense not to.