My new geographic crush and other things

So Oregon, which I’d never visited before, was lovely, and the Oregon coast especially so. Forest and ocean and sand dunes! All together, and not separated into the three distinct landscapes I’d previously thought of them as. In the Central Coast we twice hiked through the pines and sand of Oregon Sand Dunes Recreation Area to find ourselves utterly alone on a stretch of wild gray beach. Scared off a bald eagle, managed not to scare off some seals or sea lions, watched snowy plovers run along the shore, the sea erasing their prints behind them. Two nights we found lodgings overlooking the water, once from several hundred feet above it, once from a balcony near sea level. Further north, the beach was more populated, but it was only us humans who cared about that; the water crashes to shore regardless. Standing atop cliffs looking down at the water, I was reminded how like the edge of the world an ocean is. Standing right beside the crashing waves, letting them wash over my feet as they dug into the sand, I thought, if I could learn how something so loud could be so peaceful, I’d understand something I need to know. lnhammer has a haiku summary of said vacation. I want to return with a tent and backpack someday. Before said trip up the coast, we spent a day in Portland’s downtown Powells (they ship!), and had lunch and dinner with friends, and generally discovered there’s no such thing as bad food in Portland (two words: kimchee quesadillas). After we headed in to the Columbia Gorge and the Sirens conference, where we sated ourselves on book talk and general good conversation amid more towering pines, along a river instead of an ocean. After that, I signed alongside Cindy Pon, Mettie Ivie Harrison, Malinda Lo, and Sarah Rees Brennan at the Beaverton Powells (which also ships). Malinda Lo has a picture here … and there are now signed copies of all our books at there, so if you’re ordering from Powells, be sure to ask for them! Got home late Monday night. Tuesday, my psyche demanded that I do some bookbinding for the first time in almost a year, so I did, and last night, one of our trademarked bright pink-cloud sunsets welcomed me back to the desert. Now onward to catching up on email, maybe some more bookbinding, and pondering a rather thinky editorial letter.