Freak'en interesting. It was far more fun than I had imagined. Not many of us showed up.........but it was good to see a few of the folks that did. There were plenty of people I would have liked to have seen that didn't show.
Overall, I was impressed at how important it really is to have known someone since you were seven..... or even 13. Strange bond that is impossible for me to explain.
AND -- how good it was to have had 20 years between now and high school.
Highlights of this experience: Seeing Randy Standridge whom I have known since I was seven. He lives in the same place he grew up in with his family......just a mile or so from where I grew up. And, Becky Gordon -- my best friend high school. A few years have passed since I have seen her and we slipped right back into ease with each other. She brought her three fantastic children out to the Hill on Saturday morning and we played in the yard and picked berries up at the Rose's garden.
Saturday afternoon Steve and I attended a friend's wedding out on the North Umpqua River. Beautiful people, beautiful place, beautiful reminder of what it is and why it is we seek love.
Sunday: My and Steve's 12 YEAR WEDDING ANNIVERSARY!!!
Very proud of this and very excited to see what is next for us. I love him
Sunday noon: Steve helped me all morning get ready to head out for 17 days of field work on the Middle Fork John Day.
AND -- here I am. Sitting in the glow of a purple sunset on the Middle Fork John Day River. I hear Granite Boulder creek rushing by; sand hill cranes just broke the silence of dusk as they flew up valley; and two coyotes where just spotted in the west field.
Still amazed that I get wireless internet out here. I am literally sitting in a lawn chair in the middle of a meadow about 200 meters from the Warm Springs log house that has a wireless router. Crazy stuff.
Today, after orienting our two new field workers (Jessica and Stephanie) to the tasks at hand, we headed up-valley to the monitoring project on the Forrest reach river segment. A series of log structures have been placed on/in the floodplain and channel to enhance fish habitat just this week. Actually, they were out there finishing up today with their heavy equipment. We mapped, GPS'ed, photo documented, and recorded each structure.
In the afternoon we had some difficulties with our expensive survey equipment (it wasn't working). Waiting to hear back from the manufacturer on it because the error messages we got were not listed in the manual (always reassuring).
It was a fabulously lovely day with temps in the mid 80s (perfect).
I am well fed and getting sleeping. The temperature is dropping quickly as light fades from shades of soft purple to dark. The stars will take up almost the entire sky out here. If I can, I'll try to get a picture of them (as if!).
It feels good to be sleeping/working/eating/playing outside.
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