The City of Roses.
Portland is known as the city of roses, and green is everywhere: An emerald jewel that's easy to walk.
Carlton and I made our approach to Portland with the excitement of two adventurers on a clean air mission. And with the trepidation of one who'd been lied to about conditions in Troutdale, surely, I surmised everything could only be uphill.

Portland appeared as a pretty skyline on the Willamette River.
I captured this postcard moment from our giant gray Chrysler cruising into town.
The buildings were smaller but no less impressive than major U.S. cities, and the backdrop was trees.
My first impression of Portland was it's pretty but a city. It has a river where cargo ships spew diesel as they pass through.
The air went down easy, nonetheless, and the sky was clear blue.
Of all my chasing clean air destinations, Portland is the most livable city. Other choices are, naturally, smaller towns and islands, islands where claustrophobia, hopefully, isn't an issue.
Could I live in a city again? Could I really leave a city?
Ode to transition.
We found a parking lot near Powell's Bookstore in downtown Portland, and squeezed through its entrance.
Carlton--being no coward--maneuvered our giant gray whale of a car with aplomb.
Steering, while pausing to check the right, left, and rear-view mirrors to ensure we wouldn't hit people or cars, he twisted and contorted his head, neck, and body, and made our whale fit between a small Saturn, with Obama for President stickers, and a red scooter, without one scratch.
Whew!
Carlton's perspiration was palpable. He removed one layer of clothing, and then another. And unencumbered, he morphed back into a Southern Gentleman, sauntering over to a money box where he paid the $9.00 a day city parking fee. And we were ready to begin our walking tour of Portland at the world's largest bookstore.
Birkenstocks, and unusual looking flat sandals seemed to be on every stooped over old lady, hide-in-go-seek playing kid, and not-so-fashionable looking woman and man.
I looked down.
I wore red and white ASICS running shoes that I bought at Frontrunners in L.A., made in China, which, means, this purchase contributed to air pollution not to mention our big car that Thrifty said was the only they had to offer.
Feet! Feet! So very many toes, exposed.
Did they have pedicures?
Some.
Maybe it's my Los Angeles influence coupled with my San Francisco upbringing, hammered by my New York work stints (co-ghostwrote a book) that made me more aware of feet attire than books.
Maybe it's also the fact my New York literary agent gave up on my fiction, which was otherwise earmarked to sell, and...
Feet attire reflects an overall package, creates a mood, which in Portland, is au natural. In a good way, just different than what I'd grown accustomed to.
Wandering the aisles, and looking at hesitating, striding, and pausing feet in front of stacks of books got me some attention.
As I was about to photograph an older woman's left sandal to capture the mood of Powell's Books, (it was an unusual brown sandal with lots of straps), she shot me a glare. That's right. And before I knew it, a white male with a thick stomach hanging over a frayed brown belt and wearing smudged silver wire-rim glasses, told me there were no such photos allowed in Powell's Books without permission.
He looked at me as though I were strange.
So I diverted my eyes from a sea of sandals and looked up to find myself drowning in fiction books. Yes, there I stood in the middle of a raging fiction section, facing my music again.
I wasn't in the mood.
For the umpteenth time my voice sang out with that which I'm supposed to be over:
Why didn't my fiction book make it when their's did? Why did my agent give up after 16 rejections when writer friend's agents didn't give up until a book deal? And why is my self-talk like a twelve year old? Grow up!
Where's Carlton?
"Carlton!"
I walked upstairs. "Carlton!"
Down another flight of stairs. "Carlton!"
Under a canopy of books, I found Carlton absorbed in a history book. It lay open flat in his hands, like, sure, he fit into the scene.
He looked the college professor he was.
I tugged at his sleeve. "Carlton, can we go now?"
As we exited Powell's Books to walk Portland streets, I saw a woman wearing high-heeled shoes. She stood out like a fashionable New Yorker might at a grassroots Save the Whales convention. She looked like someone who could be my friend.
I didn't dare take her photo in the sea of Birkenstocks, but I wanted to.
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