Before hiking several miles in the Denver-Boulder environs, Becky and I paused to read our trail maps. Reading a trail map is tricky business, especially out west, where distance of trail is not nearly as telling as difficulty or time. Usually, Becky would pick a trail, as would I, and then she would acquiese in the iron-clad logic of my explanation and say, "Okay, then let's go up yours."
This was our usual procedure on this vacation. And today I'm helping my wife prep for her first colonoscopy. So, it's payback.
I actually didn't get much reading done in Denver-Boulder, and I didn't have time or place to present Becky with any of the dozen romantic poems I wrote for this trip. We just visited family (they live in the historic Eisenhower "summer White House"). We slept in Ike's bed, used Ike's bathroom, ate at Ike's table, and hiked. All in all, Denver-Boulder was a great first stop and offered the very best weather of the entire trip.
I was itching, however, to give Becky some of my poems . . . which I had stashed inside the underwear pocket of my luggage, as I knew this new batch of verse would be too hot to handle in Denver. Cooler climate was needed. Enter Portland, the Columbia river valley, and eventually Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Rainier, and Seattle.
Too bad I can't offer any of these poems on my blog. You'll have to watch for them in my obituary. But if I keep climbing like I did last week in those high altitudes, you might see these verses sooner than you think.
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