The Anderson Epistle for 2023

or
Covid and Ferries and Snow – Oh My

Our recent Christmases seem to come with drama – Covid, snow, power failures, plumbing failures, filled ferries, but also peace and joy and so much worth the drama.

Christmas used to be “over the river and through the woods to grandmothers house we go” -- Oh, that was Thanksgiving, but a peaceful Christmas with family and maybe a visit from that fat guy with rain deer makes for a wonderful holiday. Ours for the last few years have always included challenges, a bit of adventure and near disaster, but interspersed with the joy of sharing it all with dear family: Carty and Anderson.

We have celebrated Destination Christmases with our daughter and son-in-law, Bill, our two grandchildren, his parents, and usually his brother, wife and  their two children at some wonderful location.  Bill would arrange a large vacation house rental and we would stay with them or find another small rental nearby.  The location has varied: Santa Fe, three times on Orcas Island shores (in Washington’s San Juan Island)s and this year was going to be one of the best, in San Diego.

But first a little about previous years. Two years ago, we had a white Christmas – not typical for western Washington -- with 4+ inches of snow on Christmas day.  The vacation house was on Orcus Island on the shore with wonderful views but about 45 min from the ferry landing and over roads that are not perfect even without snow.  We were staying nearby in a lodge but spent most of our time at the vacation house.  But both locations were down fairly steep roads from the main road, ours steeper.  Orcus is not prepared for much snow.  They have very little equipment to clear roads.  It was very wet snow on the steep hill and even though we had an all-wheel SUV we were concerned about getting back up to the road.  Fortunately we found that it was scooped – well sort of -- and the wind had knocked down evergreen debris and that provided better traction.  Then at the end we made it back to the mainland to find roads very little better than on Orcus and were concerned about getting in our gravel lane to our house. We made it home but exhausted. I cleared the drive but the first night it went down to 10 degrees and we got another 2” of snow.  We were snow bound for a couple of days.

So last year our hopes were high but then we again had snow several days before Christmas, (4-6”)  which required the cancelation of our planned Winter Solstice Party and threatened our trip to a different house on the north shore of Orcus Island for Christmas.  Then Katherine came down with Covid (a mild case) on our grandson Emil’s birthday, which required canceling his party. The snow conditions improved and most of the group went to Orcus several days before Christmas but Kat had to wait to test negative.  When the main group arrived the power was out and they had only 30 minutes to buy groceries due to a limited store generator. We were going out later when Kat tested negative. She was going to drive on the same ferry with us but could not get a reservation, so she drove up, parked and walked on a later ferry and Bill picked her up.  When we got there they had another power failure but the grocery store was open a couple of hours, just as we were arriving, and so we got more groceries.  We battled snowy roads to get to the ferry at the end of our stay only to find the roads on the mainland were just as bad but made it home. We are seriously thinking about NOT wishing for a white Christmas if we plan a destination Christmas.

This year was going to be another Destination Christmas, but just in case we chose a warmer location: San Diego. It was perfect for us because my sister Karen lives in San Diego along with her wife, Adriana and we could also see Karen’s son, Kai, who was coming home for Christmas. Bill’s grandparents lived in San Diego, Bill’s parents lived there a couple of years while his dad was a grad student and so the family spent summers there.  For them, it was  homecoming to revisit favorite spots and share them with us and their grandkids.

Everything started out perfectly.  We all arrived a week before Christmas.  We were in a five bedroom house with a hot tub, swimming pool, roof top deck, huge kitchen/dining room/ family room and only 5 blocks from the beach in the Pacific Beach district of San Diego. Bill’s grandparents had lived only a few blocks away. We started with a day at the San Diego Zoo (one of the best and largest in the world) and a tour of the Maritime Museum (a old US submarine and several large sailing ships including the Star of India), with plans to continue with the Wild Animal Park and some spending a day in Anaheim at Disneyland. 

But then things started to go less well!  Jan and I were going to meet Karen and Adriana at a nice restaurant on the downtown waterfront. But a few miles from the house, as we were turning into the onramp to I 5, I hit a curb or other object at the edge of the lane with the right front tire.  It was immediately obvious the this caused a blowout. So we safely pulled onto the dirt verge two or three feet beyond the lane edge.  We had rented an EV, Chevy Bolt, from Hertz, so we called Hertz roadside  assistance.  It turns out that due to the large battery, it has no spare tire and many towing companies will not tow an EV (why??).  After 2+ hours on the phone with Hertz arranging a tow and a Lyft car to take us to the Hertz rental center for a new car, our ride arrived. Even the tow truck and the Lyft car finding us was an issue.  Both wanted a street address, but a highway onramp does not have a mailing address (it rarely receives mail) and Hertz’s computer seemed to have no way to accept a description (isn’t that common on highway breakdowns?) and even the Lyft needed an address for the driver. So the Hertz agent tried to use a street address nearby but that meant it took nearly 30 minutes on the phone with the Lyft driver to guide him to us. Hertz was very good about arranging the replacement vehicle, but we were first offered another Chevy Bolt which had a defective Android Auto navigation system.  The next Bolt had a working Navi, but when we got to the exit, we found that it had less than ¼ charge so distance would be limited – not acceptable.  In desperation we took a gas car and drove home.  We had, of course, canceled our diner plans. 

The next morning we learned that one of our party had awakened during the night with a scratchy throat and, in an abundance of caution, had taken a Covid test and was POSITIVE.  They started waring a mask and went into isolation, but since patients can be communicable even before symptoms or testing positive, we all could have been exposed.  Everyone in the house had also been vaccinated and boosted and thought that her isolation was enough, but with Jan’s immune-related medical issues, we decided to end our trip early and catch a flight home.  None were available that day but we were able to get seats on Saturday and so missed Christmas Eve and Day.

Although it was far from perfect, we were so happy to have had such a great time during the early part of the holiday and sharing it with the Cartys magnified the joy.  We were able to spend some time with my sister and her family OUTDOORS at the house before we left.  She and Adriana hadn’t seen our kids for several years and it was great catching up.

Our trip home was uneventful and we will be enjoying Christmas Eve and Day in our home with a great view of the water and Mount Baker.  We had a gorgeous sunrise the day after getting back.

But the next day we learned that those we left in San Diego lived through much more drama.  The evening we left, Kat was taking a shower and the faucet totally broke with it on full  blast.  Bill’s brother raced  to a hardware store (7 min before it closed) to get screwdriver and wrench, but could not fix it.  A handyman neighbor came but couldn’t repair (it was too corroded inside) and so shut off ALL water to the house (after they filled all available pitchers) so they spent the night without water.  The handyman came back the next day and was able to shutoff just the shower and turn the main back on. Our grandson, Emil thinks that his bedroom next to the shower is haunted and maybe he’s right.

But so far we have not reached our holiday destination and found our Inn was full forcing us to spend Christmas in a barn.

However, to quote Katherine: “We’ve got enough love and cheer to get through it all.”  Absolutely: Being together with family is the Christmas gift that counts and it’s worth a little drama and when that family includes such wonderful people: our daughter, son-in-law, our grandchildren, and all the Carty clan (Bill’s brother, sister-in-law, and children, and parents from Maine) it becomes perfect.

Merry Christmas and may you all have the best that 2024 can offer.

If you have not yet given up in disgust about the length of our epistle, here is some more news about other things we’ve done this year.

We have not yet returned to Europe after Covid but did another two week road trip.  We returned to our tradition of the Oregon Shakespear Festival in June and added a road trip along the northern Oregan coast and the west side of the Olympic Peninsula, including a return to Cannon Beach where long ago we spent every Thanksgiving with Walla Walla friends.  Stops included Long Beach (the Washington one)  and Olympic National Park including Quinault Lodge, the Hoh Rainforest (12 FEET annual rainfall), Forks and  La Push, and Crecent Lake Lodge all including short hikes.

We also continued our enjoyment of the rich arts available in the Salish Sea area, including Seattle Symphany ~15 concerts), Seattle Repertory Theater, the Whidbey Island Music Festival (early classical), the Oak Harbor Music Festival (mostly jazz and folk skipping most of the rock), Whidbey Island Film Festival (about 7 classic films) and the Whidbey Island Guitar Festival.  Most of our trips to Seattle for arts included stops to see our grand kids, 8 and 5 yrs (and to see their parents).

We attended Karen and Adriana’s wedding, in San Diego, in April.  They had been close friends for many years and decided to take the plunge.  It was a wonderful service in an outdoor location with many, many of their friends.

This fall we travelled to Walla Walla for a mini-reunion of Jan’s Oak Park Academy (Iowa) class and other’s a few years either side.  It was organized by Jane Dodds and drew more than 25 (including spouses) from those living in Washington and Oregon.  We also were able to catch up with Jan’s 92 year old cousin living in Walla Walla.

We improved our home with a heat pump for more efficient heating and cooling *yes, we need it a few days a year) as well as a new cable railing on our decks which improves our views of the bay and mountains and less work repainting the wood one every 203 years).  Future plans for upgrading out\r guest bathroom and new windows with better sound insulation (those Navy jets are LOUD).

This will arrive a little late, but we hope each of you had a great holiday season and hope you will have a GREAT new year, with the best 2024 can offer.

Terry and Jan Anderson