My husband proposed that we drive down on a Sunday to see an Earthdog competition. I thought I’d heard him wrong. “You mean Earth Day exhibition?” I’d gone to the very first Earth Day event in 1970, and remembered how New York City police on horseback intimidated the 100,000 who’d gathered in Union Square that April day to raise awareness of environmental issues.

When it’s time to go out for a special occasion celebration, some really good options are easily accessible from Leschi. As a fan of farm to table dining, where meals are built around locally-sourced, in-season foods, I gravitate to restaurants that have perfected this concept. I especially like it when they prepare a meal around a theme, offering three, four, or five courses for a set price. When impressed by what a chef can do, I’ll go back another time and order from the à la carte menu. 

Where do you go when you have a special occasion to celebrate? Since I entertain a lot and cook almost daily, dinner out is a real treat. And for special occasions, I love a fixed course menu, where the chef surprises you with three, four, or five courses. Why is it a surprise? Because with these meals, the menu changes daily, or weekly, allowing the chef to use the freshest, in-season ingredients. 

What kind of traveler are you? Do you like to know what you’re doing, where you’re eating, and plan things down to the last detail? I prefer building a loose outline and filling in the rest as we go. Spontaneous travel without advanced hotel reservations can result in a “no room at the inn” situation, so for a recent Southwestern road trip, I booked refundable lodging.

For years, my home was full of pets: two cats and two dogs, all “rescues.” Over time, one by one, our animal companions died. First, Nile the cat, at age 19 or so. Then his sidekick, Sid. Next, we said a tearful goodbye to Mondo, our Jack Russell Terrier. Two years later, Poco, a Cairn Terrier, reached the end of his road.

The 2025 Northwest Flower and Garden Festival awarded its Founder’s Cup - the biggest prize of all - to Michael Orr of Method Hardscapes. His installation, “The Salish Retreat” included a large patio and a handcrafted, timber-framed pavilion with a fireplace made out of four giant boulders, a marvel to behold. But the two jaw droppingly beautiful totem poles, and the story behind them, put this entry above all the rest.

Nine years ago - in August - my youngest son moved to Phoenix. Hating the idea of him all by his lonesome in a U-Haul truck, I accompanied him. Driving through the desert, we needed oven mitts to open the door handles. It was 117 degrees! But that was summer. The time to go to Phoenix is in the winter, when Seattle’s weather is damp and dreary. 

As a special treat for my husband’s birthday, I’d gotten tickets to see Abraham Verghese at Benaroya Hall, part of the Seattle Arts and Lectures Series. The author of Cutting for Stone and The Covenant of Water - two best-selling novels - as well as nonfiction, is one of our literary heroes. 

Mercer Island owes its lushly landscaped lid park to former mayor and city council member, Aubrey Davis (1918 – 2013). In the 1960s, Washington State was eager to complete I-90, fulfilling the vision of a highway connecting all the way from Boston to Seattle. A thirteen-lane freeway slicing through the north end of Mercer Island was proposed. Davis’ mantra was “we don’t want to see it. We don’t want to hear it. We don’t want to smell it.” 

In October 2023, I wrote about the Hamas attack on Avi’s kibbutz, Alumim. Fifteen months later, the war was still going on. “That’s coming from Jabalia,” Avi said, referring to a city of 172,00 in the northern Gaza Strip. As we watched plumes of smoke rising, he told the story of the past fifteen months, and what life is like now.

Standing on a concrete bridge in downtown Issaquah, the cold worked its way up from the soles of my feet to my legs, and onwards. Drops of rain clouded my eyeglasses. I struggled to balance an umbrella and hold my cellphone steady as I waited, fearing my fingers would freeze. My mission: photograph a Coho salmon approaching its final hurdle before returning “home” to the salmon hatchery. It was early November, slightly past the height of the salmon run. But two mergansers, bobbing their cinnamon-rust-colored heads as they circled the water, offered a clue that fish were still coming. They were awaiting a feast. 

For the fourth year in a row, Lolita the fortune teller sat in residence on a bench outside the post office in La Conner during the month of October. “Look in my purse for your fortune,” her sign proclaimed. Joanne, “Jo” Mitchelle, the artist who created Lolita, hand-writes hundreds of uplifting fortunes, placing them in a container inside the seer’s waterproof pocketbook. 

The score was tied at 2-2 at the bottom of the ninth inning at Fenway Park. Boston Red Sox fans groaned in disbelief as the Baltimore Orioles took a 3-2 lead in the tenth. And then the magic happened. With men on first and third base, a walk-off home run for Boston ended the game at 5-3. The crowd jumped to its feet, belting out “Dirty Water,” the 1966 Spandells hit. So much fun. So much singing! The voices of thirty-seven-thousand people rejoicing to Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline in the 7^th inning stretch (so good! so good! so good!) and Take Me Out to the Ballgame in the 8^th. It all added to the palpable feeling of camaraderie. These folks know how to have fun.

It was like déjà vu all over again. Rushing into the Snowy Owl Theater at Icicle Creek Center for the Performing Arts in Leavenworth, a sculpture near the entrance stopped me in my tracks. Could it be? The artist had to be Richard Beyer, whose whimsical aluminum sculpture of a couple holding marketing baskets I’d just seen in the Mercer Island Town Center, and whose Waiting for the Interurban - a group huddled at a bus stop near the Fremont Bridge - epitomizes Seattle. A quick Google search during intermission confirmed my hunch.

“You are so lucky,” my waitress told me. “It’s gonna be sunny and warm through Friday.” 

“Isn’t it like this most of the summer?” I asked, unaware that the peninsula in southern Washington is famously foggy and cold. Earlier that day, I’d cursed the sun as it beat down while I struggled to sync my phone app with an electric charging station. On an 85-degree, cloudless day, sweating with palpable range anxiety, I worried I’d never get my electric car fully charged. After driving 172 miles, I had 106 miles left. Not enough to explore the peninsula, let alone get home.

In a presidential election year, huge conventions for the Republican and Democratic parties give prime spots to former presidents and luminaries from past campaigns. But Gen Z’s, some of whom will be voting for the very first time in November, couldn’t possibly remember the policies and accomplishments, let alone the challenges and controversies that plagued former presidents, especially those who go waaaay back to before they were born. You know, like 30 years ago! Outside of history class, how are former presidents remembered, and how much control do they have over their legacy?

My whole family was gathering in Chicago for a bat mitzvah. I arrived at Union Station a few minutes early to meet my son’s train, due in from New York. But the reader board posted a delay, so I waited. And waited. And waited. Frustrated, I went to the information booth to ask, “What’s going on with the train from New York?” 

Long pants, long sleeves, and a head net covering my face did nothing to prevent a horde of mosquitos from devouring me. With nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, I tearfully admitted defeat. Together with my husband and then-young sons, we broke down our campsite and hiked out of the North Cascade Mountains. It was too late to drive back to Mercer Island. The big question was “where to sleep tonight?” As newcomers to the Pacific Northwest, we knew nothing about eastern Washington. We searched for the biggest nearby city on our AAA map.

Alfie the Cat stretched himself out on a banquette where he’d been gazing out the windows in the hallway of our 3rd floor hotel room. A look-alike for our dearly departed tabby cat, Nile, he welcomed our caresses and rolled himself over for belly rubs. We were staying at the Royal Crescent Hotel & Spa in Bath, England, after a week of walking the Cotswold Way.

A large snake slithered across the footpath just inches from our boots on our first day walking the Cotswolds, 800 square miles of charming villages and towns in southwest England. Though totally uninterested in us, the snake added drama to the first hour of a weeklong walk. Our guidebook identified it as a nonaggressive, though venomous, rare British Adder. Whew!