public reflections on arriving, leaving; also, my hair

today the last paper that i will ever fully participate in (at the paper where i currently work) was published. for this last issue, i wrote a 'farewell and thank you' column. i wanted to preserve that, and the column that i wrote when i first arrived in cannon beach almost four years ago, here. those columns follow.

also, life lesson learned today: it is not, when one is already in an emotional state of mind, a good idea to make a spontaneous, (relatively) radical decision regarding one's appearance. today, i had 8 inches (plus layers) cut off my hair. (enough, as my hairdresser said, to make a small terrier.) i had been growing my hair out since 2000 - that's more than six years - with the goal of eventually being able to sit on it. i actually like my hair cut, and like it shorter. but i was hoping it would look like this:


and i fear it looks more like jennifer aniston circa 1995. too layery and polished and not chunky enough. but i will 'live with it' for the next few days and if it still bothers me, i shall return to see what can be done and if there's anything that i can do with it to make it look fuller.

so... after that pettiness... here is what i wrote reflecting on coming to and leaving Cannon Beach.

Arrival

published in the Sept. 26, 2002 issue of the Cannon Beach Gazette (the second issue I worked on at the paper)

"During the two-and-half days and more than 1,600 miles that separate a car in Cannon Beach and a car in Frazee, Minn., I had plenty of time to think about exactly I was doing.
A little more than a week before I left, I received an e-mail from the Cannon Beach Gazette offering me a job as a reporter. A good thing; a very good thing. 'It sounds stupid,' I told my mom later that night in the kitchen, 'but I kind of knew from the first time I heard about this place that it was right and I'd end up there.'
All I knew about Cannon Beach I learned from the internet. I saw the pictures of Haystack Rock, knew about the galleries and theater, saw from the yellow pages that the city had three book stores. I was excited. Oregon was in my list of 'Top Five States Where I Want to Get a Job" and here was a small city on the ocean with a beautiful landmark, hiking trails and forests galore nearby, an active cultural life and an award-winning newspaper to boot.
After a few days, it occured to me that I was moving to a place that I knew next to nothing about, besides the fact that it was 'beautiful' according to anyone I ever talked to about it. (Despite any pacifistic, poetic tendencies that I may have, I am not yet at a point where I can feel comfortable moving somewhere that I know nothing about just based on the fact that it is beautiful.) I checked out the travel section at Barnes and Noble and read things that matched with what I was increasingly aware was an impossibly perfect image of Cannon Beach that was growing in my mind.
My mom's friend called. 'I heard you got a job in Cannon Beach. I just had to call to let you know how lucky you are and how much you're going to love it!'
Now I was getting nervous: could anywhere be that good? And if it is that good, would I be able to fit in there?
This nervousness stuck with me for the next few days as I packed and finalized U-Haul reservations and said goodbyes to grandparents and friends, but attacked again with a vengence after my dad and I were on the road at 6:30 a.m. Friday morning.
I was the lead car in our two-car caravan, the little black Chevy paving the way across the interstate, the backseat not even filled to the ceiling with things. My dad followed, pulling the U-Haul with his pickup, making up for the car's lack of stuff. As we plowed our way across North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon, we were closer than ever to Cannon Beach, and no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't imagine that this place where we were going was a real town.
I wasn't very tolerant of such thoughts for very long and distracted myself with music and radio. During on particularly isolated stretch of interstate in Montana, no radio stations came in and I popped in a tape of a mock radio show written by one of my college professors.
A collection of music, poetry and humor, the opening lines of one of the show's monlogues struck me as particularly relevant: 'I am studying to be a regular.'
A Cannon Beach regular. That sounded right; not everywhere can have regulars. Regulars have character. Regulars are regulars are definition because they belong in a place. They may not always admit it, but regulars keep returning or stay in a place because they are happy there - they just 'belong' there.
When my dad and I got into town on the Sunday before Labor Day, Gazette owner and publisher Tom Mauldin gave us a tour. As we drove down one street (the street where I currently live), he said something to the effect of, 'You'll find there are two types of people in Cannon Beach: those that have been successful and because of their success can afford to start over and want to come here, and those that love it here so much that they're willing to work three or more jobs to live here. Both groups love Cannon Beach and are here because they want to be here. How many places can say that?' Ah, the regulars.
I don't yet know where I fit in, and I know that I'm not a regular, bur from my week here I can testify that people in Cannon Beach are friendly, outgoing and, above all, truly happy peole who are proud of their community and know that it's something special.
I don't think I ever would have imagined that trait of Cannon Beach when I was in Minnesota trying to picture what it was like here. But this community pride and happiness play an important role of making Cannon Beach the unique community it is and what makes me so excited to be here, studying to be a regular."


Departure

published in the July 13, 2006 issue of the Cannon Beach Gazette

"Four years ago, I had never heard of Cannon Beach.
When I got a job as a reporter for the Cannon Beach Gazette, I had never been west of Montana, never seen the Pacific Ocean, and came only with a vague notion that it would be interesting to live in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest – especially in a small town on the ocean – for awhile.
After three days of traveling from my hometown in western Minnesota, on Sept. 1, 2002, I passed through Portland and started the final leg of the journey west. As my father and I drove down Highway 26, through its towering evergreens that confirmed Midwestern stereotypes about the Pacific Northwest, there was an excitement of anticipating over the next hill, around this curve, might be the turnoff – Cannon Beach, this great unknown, could be just around the bend.
Later this month, I’ll drive down Highway 101 and Highway 26 again, this time heading east and not knowing the next time I’ll return. I’ll go back to Minnesota briefly before leaving for a year of teaching English in Japan.
In the 46 and a half months I’ve lived and worked here, I’ve burned through dozens of legal pads and reporters’ notebooks, written hundreds of stories, and conducted thousands of interviews as reporter, then community editor, for the Gazette. Cannon Beach is no longer the great unknown.
But it’s the people I’ve met that ensure Cannon Beach will never again be just a spot on the map to me.
I want to thank all those who let me into their homes and shared their stories with me. I know that’s not always an easy thing to do. Thank you to my regular contacts over the years at city hall, the fire district and Cannon Beach Elementary School for your time and assistance. To everyone who took extra time to get a picture, who talked to me on their lunch breaks, who responded to an “on deadline” call or who otherwise made an extra effort to get the Gazette and me information, thank you.
I’ve learned a lot in the last four years. I’ve grown immensely as a writer and a journalist, and for that I want to say a special “thank you” to Gazette owners and publishers Tom and Cat Mauldin.
Because of my job, I’ve been fortunate to meet so many people and talk to them about things they care about and why Cannon Beach is special to them. I can honestly say I’m inspired and humbled by the sacrifices and the hours that people put in to improve life here. The word “community” gets thrown around a lot, but I’ve witnessed, been touched by and been the beneficiary of genuine acts of community – people reaching out to help one another and demonstrating what it is to care about people and a place.
As I leave the Sunset Empire to head across the Pacific to the Land of the Rising Sun, I may not know when I’ll be back, but Cannon Beach – opalescent nudibrachs at low tide, cats at city hall, the COmmunity Warning System (COWS), sunsets from Ecola State Park, and the people – will always have a place reserved in my heart.
Thank you. It’s truly been an honor and a privilege."