Portland, Oregon. For years it reigned as the city I most wanted to drive past on the Interstate. I attended university in Seattle where many of my classmates hailed from Portland, vowing never to return. They proclaimed it even wetter than that icon of rain situated on the edge of Puget Sound where we slogged through the campus, and some even swore they had grown up with webbed feet.
Since then I had no desire to visit Portland, even though the Weather Channel tells me that the City of Roses does not receive more rain than Seattle. I don't believe official statistics would have made any difference to my water-logged friends. If they knew anything, they knew wet. The only hometown more reviled among my college buddies was Butte, Montana. That, however, is another story.
Last March I wanted to attend a rock garden conference, but put off registering when I found out it would take place in Portland. Well, I thought, I'll just be in the airport and at the hotel. Seminars and social events would keep me happily occupied indoors. Still, I made sure I packed a warm rain coat and my waterproof hiking boots.
At the airport I stood flummoxed in front of the automated ticket vending machine for MAX, the light rail system. The conference brochure suggested this as the best way to get to the hotel, but I couldn't figure out which button to press for my destination. An off-duty transit officer approached and asked if she could help.
"How old are you? Okay. That means you're an Honored Citizen and pay less than half price. Put your dollar in here and press that button."
I must have looked silly standing there open-mouthed while she went ahead and shoved in the bill. Honored Citizen. It sounded like something out of a Chinese fairy tale. Was she making a little joke? But, no. There it was printed on my MAX ticket: Honored Citizen. Suddenly I felt proud. I stood taller and accepted my paper ticket almost as a Certificate of Esteem. On the smooth, efficient ride into town, I sat there aglow with the realization that I had finally been recognized for what I was. What a wise city, I thought—and beautiful, too, as I caught a glimpse of snowy Mt. Hood rising on the horizon behind the cluster of downtown skyscrapers.
That first day the sun shone and not only Mt. Hood but Mt. Baker and Mt. Adams, volcanoes all, shimmered as a most unusual backdrop for a North American city. True, the wind howling off the Willamette River, which cuts through the city, was so fiercely cold that I cancelled my plans to spend a couple of hours walking on the hike/bike path along the water.
I arrived for the conference a day early so I had an afternoon and evening free to explore the city. My hotel was a step away from the light rail stop and my map showed the art museum only a few blocks from another stop. Before leaving the hotel appropriately bundled, I stopped by the concierge's desk.
"From here to the museum you travel in the Free Fare Zone," he explained. "In this area you don't pay anything to ride MAX. And Powell's is five blocks from the museum stop." He drew a circle on the map with bold red ink.
I have never had a concierge recommend a bookstore, and I hadn't even asked. But Powell's is world famous and, as I soon discovered, Portland's premier destination. I was beginning to love this city.
I knew, or thought I knew, all about Powell's. After all, as a librarian I had ordered from them—they seemed to stock everything long before Amazon.com was a gleam in a programmer's eye. So after I stopped by the charming, old-fashioned main branch of the Portland Public Library and spent a few hours in the museum, which consists of two buildings containing excellent Impressionist and Northwest Indian collections, I walked through a rather quiet five p.m. downtown to the bookstore's original flagship site.
The San Francisco Chronicle, on July 25, 2010, said this of Powell's: "If reading is a religion, Powell's is a church for the most devout." Powell's is actually a whole block of seemingly unrelated buildings with no outward pretensions. Just walking by, you wouldn't have a clue as to the riches inside. Walk through the front door and you discover a warren of high-ceilinged rooms jammed with books, beautifully organized into subjects: philosophy, mysteries, gardening, children's, cooking, history, languages, ad infinitum, and all color coded. A free map is available—and recommended. Used books rub spines with the new, which pleased my librarian heart.
I bought a few minor treasures—out-of-print mysteries by Dashiell Hammett and Patricia Highsmith and a guide to wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest—and left vowing to return and savoring the thought of that future visit. To top it off, I found an Italian deli kitty-corner across the street. Now, that's excellent city planning.
The next day the rains came and joined the cold and the wind. I remained warm and cozy in my seminars, feeling all's right with the world knowing that everything I needed was encompassed in the Free Fare Zone right outside the door, that a few minutes away I could walk into the world's best bookstore, and that I was an Honored Citizen.
I'll never drive past Portland again.
