For 25 of the 26 days we have been on this journey, Dennis and I have
been driving, hiking, sightseeing, and sharing a hotel room. Needless to say, close quarters. For the most part, our hotel rooms have been
your basic king sized bed or two queens with a desk, lounge chair or sofa. We did have a couple of places that were quite
a bit cozier, such as at The National Park Inn in Mount Rainier Nat’l Park,
which was your typical rustic national park lodge. However, our stay in Portland – beginning last
night – is in a full suite….living room, kitchen, bedroom and bath. It feels palatial. So for the 3 nights in Portland, I am relishing in
all the space.
This whole awakening to the luxury of space had me watching how space
was used during our adventures today. The
first stop was Powell’s City of Books. This
main Powell’s bookstore is a renowned location selling new and used books in a
building that covers a whole square city block.
Now, add to that footprint by having books on many different floors and on
shelves taller than me. Well, that is a
lot of space and a whole lot of books. We
called a time-out after 3 hours or I would have continued filling the basket to
overflowing with more books to read.
Our afternoon was one of the items on my “must see” list…the Japanese
Gardens in Washington Park. Years ago, I
had a brief 20 minutes to see the gardens; but they left me with a strong
desire to return and enjoy them again.
We were lucky with our timing and arrived for the last one hour docent-led
tour of the day. It was as amazing as I
remembered. The irony of the tour was
that the docent must have used the word “space” in a dozen descriptions of how
the gardens within the garden were arranged and why the placement of the
plantings were such to create free space and mentally relaxing space or the
illusion of space.
 |
| Re-creating nature in the meditation pond |
 |
| Using the minimum to create quiet space. |
 |
| Even the bird gets personal bathing space. |
Following the tour,
we re-traced our steps and enjoyed the whole experience with less of the tour
crowd and ….more of our space.
What a delightful post!! Powell's is where I want to go if I run away from home! I have not seen the Japanese gardens but "space" is a good topic for discussion. thanks so much for sharing this.
ReplyDeletePowell's is truly amazing. What was really impressive was how knowledgeable the staff were...I'd ask where a topic might be and they immediately told me what aisle to check. In a store that size - that is impressive!!!!
Delete