Well, book tours are a time to measure one’s life. I was in Helmer’s Haberdashery in Portland where I’ve gone each year for the past three years. Helmer’s, like Portland, evokes a different time in America, before the country seemed to split into two angry halves, perpetually yelling at one another and sending angry messages over the ether. This is the first time I’ve come with Maria, and with Maria things happen.

I’ve always worn blue. Blue jeans, shirts, hats. Maria is the kind of person who opens one up. On the book tour, I step out of my creative and spiritual pursuits and enter the real world of America, which means listening to the Orwellian barrage of disturbing and angry information some of us call news. I’ve been relaying of the warnings and cautions that pass for “useful” information,and this morning I heard CNN report that sex might cause strokes in older people, and that people older 55 should never eat hot dogs or lunch meat without boiling the daylights out of both or demanding that they be reheated. (The last time I was on book tour, the handwashing mania began and they sold a ton of those antibacterial machines, yet another corporate induced Orwellian notion. This week it’s lettuce, sugar, psychotic surgeons, sex and hot dogs). Soon we will be living in concrete bunkers eating radiated food from pouches and greeting one another in space suits.

Be advised. I don’t eat hot dogs but I am otherwise at risk. But then again, I have no notion of living forever and this seems a worthwhile risk to take. The cashier at the Portland Art Museum agreed that I didn’t need a senior discount, and promised to give it to some young couple with kids, who probably need it badly. Then Maria handed me a Red Hat in Helmer’s. I’ve never bought or worn such a thing. She had that look that said “you will buy this and wear it.” See what love will do. And since I might not be around long, what the hell. I bought it.  I love it

I guess this was inside of me all along. Sometimes you need help in letting the inner spirits out. Or you can believe the news and the doctors. Your choice.

Tonight, reading in Powell’s at Beaverton. Nice day today. Walks, bookstore stock signings, interviews. Saturday morning, talk and reading, Tualatin Library, Tualatin Public Library, Oregon. 11 a.m. I’ve brought some notecards to give away tonight and Saturday. On  Sunday, off to Seattle.