All There Was

The only sad thing about my trip to LaConner was that my camera batteries died. At the Maldives show the night before, I told a couple people where I was going the next day, but no one knew anything about our favorite little town. The next day I got a text message from one of the cute bearded boys who had been at the show - "Have a great time at that place that I can't remember!"

I was hoping to come back with a camera full of photos of that place, such a different world from the High Dive, where Jason and the boys played. It was a weird night, last Friday - an "Away Game", we called it. For a while I stood next to a big doughy guy who kept throwing the goat like we were at a Slayer show or something, and when he wasn't doing that, he was calling his buds on the cell phone (yeah, while the band was playing) and hollering things like "My Space! Check them out on MYSPACE! The MALDIVES! MYSPACE!" or "Dude, I'm HAMMERED drunk!! HAMMERED!"

Awesome dude.

Of course, there were a lot of the usual good folks there, too. Kevin looking happy with his GF, a couple of nice Maldives wives, not to mention the band themselves. I heart those guys, some time I'll have to write a little thing about them. Did you know that cute young Chris the bass player is also a scientist? You know I love that.

Anyway, different world than the Skagit Valley, where there were fields colored with flocks of migrating birds, and purple husks of cabbage, and the yellow of the single field of daffodils just after that last left turn to LaConner. There were ramshackle barns with their weathered graying planks, daylight showing through, and a perfectly still Great Blue Heron isolated in a field, the bright vintage 7-up sign at the old cafe in Edison. Not to mention the cozy tables at Nell Thorn, the fireplaces that heat Mom's place and her excellent giant bathtub.

Pretty simple weekend, but good good good.

Mom's celebratory bamboo