It has been over a month since my last blog posting and I have a good deal of information to share.
Let me begin by introducing the lovely young lady in the above picture. This is Maureen Book. Ian and I met Maureen on Wednesday morning on the Cape Flattery scenic trail, the trail that goes between the parking lot and the overlook observation deck at the end of the .75 mile trail.
Cape Flattery is the northwestern most point of the contiguous United States. The Cape is on the Olympic Peninsula where the Strait of Juan de Fuca joins the Pacific Ocean. It is also part of the Makah Indian Reservation. The three pictures above were taken from the observation deck at the end of the trail. The lighthouse is located on Tatoosh Island (middle picture).
As Ian and I began our walk down the trail, we met Maureen who was coming up the trail. Maureen appeared to be mildly troubled. She mentioned there was a man at the end of the trail who appeared to be dead. Maureen was trying to get a cell phone signal to call 911 when we met her.
Ian and I had met a couple of people in the parking lot before we began our walk down the trail. This couple soon arrived (Renee and John) and we all began to talk with Maureen about the man at the end of the trail. Ian and Renee decided to run down the trail to see if they could offer the man assistance. Maureen, John, and I followed behind at a slower pace.
When Ian and Renee arrived at trails end, there was man lying face down on the ground (just as Maureen had said) to the left of the observation platform. There was a good deal of blood on the ground next to his head and a handgun. It appeared to be a suicide.
Maureen, John, and I soon arrived. We all attempted to get a cell phone signal, but none were available. I do have a photograph of the victim, but I’m not including it on the blog. If you want to see a picture let me know. I will send it to you in an email.
Ian and I decided we should go and report the apparent suicide to the authorities. I asked Maureen to accompany us as she was the first person to find the dead man. Straightaway we rapidly walked back to our vehicles and drove to the Makah Tribal Headquarters four miles down the road. We ended up in the administration office.
We explained to the woman, behind the desk, the apparent suicide. She called the local tribal police department and soon Maureen was on the phone explaining what she, and us, had found. The chief of police was soon in the lobby of the administration building speaking with us. We could hear sirens from police and emergency vehicles heading up the road.
For the next three hours we occupied the administration office conference room. We were asked to remain and give written testimony of what transpired from the time we entered the parking lot to the time we arrived at the tribal headquarters. We also had our statements recorded by the county police, as the victim was not a tribal member. We became known as the “Reporting Party” (RP).
The tribal police performed background checks on each of us, also running our vehicle license numbers through the system. In hindsight, I assume they did all this paperwork, interviewing, and background checks to make sure our stories matched each other, and we were not considered to be unscrupulous characters.
When asked by the tribal officer to describe the cars in the parking lot, Ian was able to describe each of the six cars in the parking lot in great detail. Make, model, color, etc. If I had known I would be asked this question I would have prepared in advance. But not knowing this was going to be a question asked by the police, I had no reason to take note. How Ian was able to do this was remarkable to me. The only car that could not be matched up to one of the hikers on the trail was the white car with Texas plates. We assumed this was the victims vehicle. We speculated he may have been military.
During our stay in the conference room, a number of people in the office came in and spoke with us. We were offered counseling, food, and water. One tribal leader came into the conference room and spoke with us, thanking us for reporting the incident, and apologizing for all the time the process was taking. Another tribal member brought to each of us a tribal necklace, meant to show their appreciation for our service.
The concern and appreciation shown by the tribal members far surpassed whatever anxiety we may have experienced from finding a suicide victim at the end of the trail. It was a joy spending time with them under somewhat difficult circumstances.
Since Ian and I had a lot of downtime with Maureen, we learned Maureen was from Washington D.C. and on vacation in the Pacific Northwest. This will certainly be a vacation to remember for her. Hopefully, Maureen will come back in the future and replace a bad memory with a better one.
Ian has the email address of one of the tribal police officers. Ian is planning on emailing him in the near future to see if the police with provide the victim’s name and the circumstances surrounding his death. It would be nice to have that closure. One wonders what events happened in this man’s life that caused him to take his life. So sad.
So, what where Ian and I doing at Cape Flattery you ask? We took three days at the Washington coast to do some beach combing, looking for agates. we started at Ocean Shores on Monday, working our way up the coast to Cape Flattery on Wednesday. The weather was beautiful and unusual for this time of year. The Hoh Rain Forest on the Olympic Peninsula gets as much as 14 feet of rain per year.
On Tuesday we reached Rialto Beach, just west of the small town of Forks. Forks is the town where Stephenie Meyer based her Twilight saga novels. The beach was closed due to the government shutdown. But, we would not be deterred. We parked our car near the gate and walked the 1.5 miles to the beach.
Views of offshore islands known as “sea stacks” define Rialto Beach. Giant drift logs also litter the beach. I’m not sure what type of wood this is, but I would have liked to have taken some of it home with me to use in the woodshop.
On our drive to Cape Flattery we pulled off the highway after seeing a sign that read “Big Cedar Tree.” Sure enough, it was big, but also unusual in its shape.
Let me backtrack in time to Christmas. I turned a bowl on the lathe for Kevin & Janet. The wood is from the Sequoia tree that was cut down at the farm in Corvallis (see picture below).
I also made a wall hanging for Lisa, also partially made on the lathe (see picture below). Her gift is representative of the “Tree of Life” and is made from Hawaiian Koa wood.
The day after Christmas Lisa and I were on the road to Meridian, Idaho. Our grandson Oakley was getting baptized. Here is a picture of the entourage.
Chelsi’s husband Eric works for Scentsy, the wickless candle and scent company in Meridian. Scentsy decorated their corporate campus for Christmas with more than 20 miles of lights on 275 trees. Chelsi and Eric took us on a very cold stroll to view the lights.
Before the holidays Ian was helping a church member replace an underground sewer-line. Throughout the day it continued to rain and rain and rain, completely saturating the soil. As Ian was excavating dirt with his little excavator, the side of the ditch gave way and down and over Ian and his excavator went. Luckily, neither Ian or his excavator were hurt or damaged. After Ian’s phone call, I drove over to the job site with my truck. We connected a chain between his excavator and my truck bumper and we were able to get his excavator upright and pulled away from the ditch.
Lisa and I received our yearly Fitbit summary for 2018. Here are the results:
Lisa -
2,275,704 total steps. That’s an average of 6,235 steps per day.
938 miles walked. That is like walking from Anacortes to Lehi, Utah.
375,155 calories burned. That’s 1,443 scoops of ice cream Lisa burned off. Since she didn’t eat that much ice cream last year, I assume it is safe for her to eat a lot more ice cream this year.
Tim -
3,292,259 total steps. That is an average of 9,022 steps per day.
1,523 miles walked. That’s like walking from Anacortes to North Platte, Nebraska.
532,679 calories burned.
Last week Ian and I planted four Sugar Maple trees alongside the road next to their home. Once the trees mature, they will be 60 feet high with a spread of 50 feet. The foliage produces spectacular fall colors. The tress will grow at a slow rate and can be expected to live to a ripe old age of 100 years or more.
Back in 2012, while we were living in North Carolina, Lisa was diagnosed by Doctor St. Claire from the Duke University Medical Center, as having “Undifferentiated Connective Tissue Disease.” This disease, and associated symptoms, were triggered as a result of her cat bite back in 2009.
In a 2012 blog posting I wrote the following:
“Undifferentiated connective tissue disease (UCTD) is a systemic autoimmune disease. This means the body's natural immune system does not behave normally. Instead of serving to fight infections such as bacteria and viruses, the body's own immune system attacks itself. In UCTD, autoimmunity causes the immune system to attack specific parts of the body resulting in a variety of problems.
There are many people who have features of connective tissue disease, however, they do not fulfill the diagnostic criteria established for any one disease. In such circumstances, they are often considered to have "undifferentiated" connective tissue disease. Over time, people with UCTD may evolve into one of the more specific connective tissue diseases, such as Lupus, Sjögren's disease, or Rheumatoid Arthritis .
Twenty percent of patients with UCTD go on to develop a definite connective tissue disease. As many as one-third will experience a remission of their symptoms. The rest continue with generally mild disease in the undifferentiated form. The overwhelming majority of people with UCTD do not develop major organ damage or life-threatening disease. The hallmark of UCTD is its mild course and low likelihood of progression to a more serious state. We are praying Lisa will fall into the one-third group where there is a remission.”
That was 2012. This is now 2019, six and one half years later. Lisa’s symptoms have progressed over the years from mild to more serious, and her autoimmune problems are no longer “undifferentiated.” Lisa has been diagnosed with three different diseases - Fibromyalgia, Sjögren's disease, and Osteoarthritis.
Lisa is seeing a Rheumatologist to better understand her condition and develop a treatment plan going forward. Although, like many autoimmune diseases, there seems to be little that can be done. There is no magic pill. With aging comes a certain amount of loss, and no matter how you stack your cards, age will always win the game. Just as Bettte Davis once said, “Old age ain’t no place for sissies.”
We will keep you updated as more information becomes available.
Last month Lisa had a biopsy of her left breast. Doctors were concerned that she may have breast cancer. After much stress and anxiety the report came back negative, indicating no cancer. Life is somewhat back to normal.
While in the waiting room of the doctor’s office I snapped a picture of their Christmas tree. As you can see the ornaments are fancifully decorated brassieres. The office staff have a much needed and wonderful sense of humor.
