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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Archives Revels Classifieds Real Estate Menu Guide Wedding Weather Subscribe Contact Us April 28, 2005 Downtown Back in the saddle after a week’s vacation and a Red Sox game I still have my fourth grade report on Alaska. I was obviously proud of my effort at the time, because there it sits in the same file cabinet as my graduate school papers on Freudian Analysis and my articles on the integration of theology and psychology that were eventually published in psychological journals. Andrew Scot Bolsinger I also still recall my journals of summer vacations spent touring national parks with my parents in the back of our station wagon. My dad laid down all the seats and made a mini-play area for us kids as we traveled. My mom read us books like “I Heard the Owl Call My Name,” and “The Last Catholic in America,” to pass the time; a forerunner of my addiction to books on tape. We kept journals and wrote about our travels. We felt a little like John Muir, recording what we saw as if it was an important record for humanity. But looking through that old file cabinet at the things I have kept over the years — believe me, it’s not much when you move all your belongings across country in the back of a Honda — I realized that early on I was taught to think through my writing, and write about things important to me. To write stories and keep them. To record our footsteps in this life, if for no one else but ourselves. Why did the Alaska report make the cut? It likely has something to do with memories of my larger-than-life father coming into my classroom and telling stories about his childhood in the great state as part of my report. I remember him captivating my friends and I felt proud of our ties to such an exotic place. Somewhere during these years I learned the value of writing a story. When I interviewed Sandra Scofield she said that she tells her writing students that it all starts with taking any story, and writing it. Five pages or five hundred, it doesn’t matter. Just tell the story and learn to tell it well through prose. Over and over again. It sounds so simple, but for me it’s the closest I get to art. I don’t paint, or sing or sculpt, but I like to take stories and tell them. My vacation Following a week on the East Coast, I returned to my desk at work, piles of papers await, phone calls need to be returned and problems fester like mosquitoes over a swamp. But first, I want to relish just a bit more in my vacation. Like a fourth-grader, I want to stand up and tell what I did. First, New England. Traveling up the Atlantic coast. Sticking our fingers into the cold northern waters. Eating a lobster roll in a small local restaurant in New Hampshire. Watching the Portland Sea Dogs play on a surprisingly warm afternoon in their quaint ballpark. Simple pleasures of sun, baseball, food, oceans — and of course shopping at the outlet malls for the ladies. My friend and I smooshed onto the T, clad in Red Sox attire with seemingly all of Boston on Monday. We left early, and luckily so, as the Fens was packed with adoring fans soaking up the first home opener — always a huge Bostonian event — as World Champions in almost a century. There we were in our seats behind the bullpen as the mighty heroes came forward and were given their World Series rings. Then the guys of old —Yaz, Dom, Oregon’s own Bobby Doerr (the one guy I want to interview more than Bill Clinton) and of course, Johnny Pesky — walked out to centerfield to raise the championship flag. A grown man with a lump in his throat over a silly game like baseball is hard to explain. Somehow, despite the irrationality of being a fan, it matters. It makes me feel more human. The next day we dash to the Big Apple, feverishly touring the city in less than a few hours. By dinner time we are at Times Square, ready to see a new play, “All Shook Up,” that some Ashland friends of ours are involved with. The play is musical celebration, with complex sets that explode with color and life. The story line is tissue thin, but it doesn’t matter as the stage teems with joy, fun and beauty. It’s a fun night, one anyone will enjoy. You may soon be hearing about this new Broadway hit, which will make my friends very happy. The next morning we wing our way to the Nation’s capital and rather than scurry around sight seeing, we opt for a late afternoon lunch on the patio of a Dupont Circle pub. It’s the type of unusually warm spring day on the east that brings people out in droves, shedding off their winter coats and embracing the first taste of summer warmth. We people watch, talk, enjoy an afternoon of doing anything but working. Eventually, we wander down to the Mall where the World War II memorial is a new addition since I lived here. I didn’t like the idea of this monument breaking up the Mall when it was first approved, but today, standing amid the flags, memorials, quotations carved in marble and water softly flowing in tribute to the Greatest Generation, I am touched. I am proud to be an American and pleased that this monument honors our grandfathers and grandmothers who served. The next day we have to try four taxis before one driver agrees to take us to RFK stadium for the first home regular season baseball game in Washington, D.C. in nearly 40 years. Somehow, despite overcrowded trains and jammed freeways, our driver finds a dirt road off the freeway, right into the stadium and we are then in minutes. We tip him more than the fare for his expertise. The game is an event longed for by Washingtonians for what seemed like a century of ridiculous negotiations by major league baseball leaders. What was once Montreal’s neglected team, and briefly Puerto Rico’s team, is now ours. President Bush is there to throw out the first pitch, but most fans wish he wasn’t. Intense security has people backed up outside like angry cattle for more than an hour, missing most of the festivities. When he is introduced, Bush gets the only boos of the celebratory night. Oh yeah, the Nationals won. And for those keeping score at home, my newly printed Oregon Driver’s License works perfectly in getting me through security in our travels. My identity is again finally mine; and just as the story of my vacation, it will always be with me. 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