hmmm...

When we first got to Eugene, I heard one young dude on the bus tell another, "My friend in Australia inherited $57,000, and blew it all in two months on cocaine, heroine and prostitutes." He went on to describe a recent drug experience, one where he had difficulty breathing and said, "People think I am a junkie and dealer, but I'm not. The other dude, nearly sient, watched him and kept his I-phone earphones in his ears. I watched and thought, "Is this where we want to be?"

This town is, indeed, a mixed bag. There are very nice hiking trails, again, by the Williamette River. Some places are woodsy and very wild. One part of the trail we followed yesterday had a large sculpture of the sun, with small models of the planets at the proportionally right distance. A Great Blue Heron waded in a pond, surrounded by swimming mallards.

Yesterday we visited the Cascade Raptor Center. A really wonderful place, with many rescued raptors, from screech owls to golden and bald eagles. They stress enrichment for the birds, and give them perches at different levels and of different textures.. They do have an educational program and not enough staff (I know all about it). Puck, their kestrel (small falcon) used to live at the Lindsay Wildlife Museum, where I do a lot of teaching. WE had good discussions with the volunteers and a staff person, and were very impressed!

Downtown is car congested and unpleasant, blocks of uninteresting businesses. There doesn't seem to be a real center to this town, no central place where people can gather and find community. We'll see, we need to look more.
Today we are going to an Occupy Eugene Christmas potluck. We don't know what to expect. The occupy movement was evicted the other night; apparently some people came from Portland, etc. and tried to confront the cops. It reminds us of the politically rigid situation back in the Bay Area, which neither of us is comfortable with. The Occupy Eugene website has comments saying that the main group is elitist and unfriendly. We man not spend much time at this gathering, then again it may be different from what we expect.

A touch of the Christmas blues may be effecting me... but on the whole, this feels more like a small city than a laid-back, friendly community like Corvallis, where we were both quite comfortable. We'll see, though, we're here for another day and a half.

Have a good holiday, more to come.