To Answer Your Burning Question. . .

In a few months I am moving to Portland, OR. The delay addresses some financial goals that need tending too and I have a job that I need to quit. This past summer was the summer of goodbye parties. I have never ever in my life been to more parties that end with has ta la vista. It was good and bad, good to see people running after a new normal and bad to be left in their wake.


I've moved to Portland before. The summer I turned 23 I rented a Buick Rendezvous (a car no longer in production) and all of my possessions fit tightly in the back while my dog Sweet Pea had room to spare sitting shotgun. I drove North out of San Francisco and merged with Highway 1. I stopped somewhere around the California/Oregon boarder and fed Sweet Pea some fried chicken. I pulled up to a house in a South East neighborhood where I was going to rent a room in a basement. A few days later I fell in love with a boy named Aaron.


Fast forward 6 years; Sweet Pea still rides shotgun but I no longer feed him fried chicken. I'm still in love with Aaron and sometimes when he and I discuss our upcoming move he will say something like, "I just really want to know why YOU want to move to Portland. I mean, I know why I want to move but why do YOU want to move to Portland?" Yes, the cadence of his inquiry is a little obnoxious but it's a valid question. I'm sure someone asked me the same question when I was moving to Portland the first time. I probably laughed it off, or mumbled something about Teflon and hot air balloons. . . I was a little crazy back then. But now, presently, at this very moment I have solid, valid, REASONS.


1.) Portland makes me feel like writing. After wandering the massive neighborhoods and breathing in the crisp air I always feel like collapsing down with pen and paper. This is one of the best feelings ever and it's been too long since I felt it on a regular basis. I want to take the memoir and poetry workshops here. Another writer also makes me want to move there, she's kind of famous. There are statues of her infamous characters in Grant Park.

2.) New forests to camp in, to mud to get stuck in, new birds to watch. Do you know about Vaux Swifts? They used to nest in the hollow stumps of Redwoods but now they settle for old chimneys. If I ever teach myself to draw, they will be my first subject.

3.) I want to live on the West Coast again, but not in San Francisco - not yet.

4.) I want to take cooking classes and learn about plant life that is in indigenous to the Pacific Northwest. Also, herbs.

5.) Oh my god, food, duh.

I realize that the focus of this list (and most of my other reasons) is on what I want to DO there and not WHY I want to go but the difference between those two ideas is minuscule and infuriating. I guess I find it puzzling to be asked why I want to move back to a place I've already moved.

-Emily-