(Posted out of sequence because I’m behind, but the time is now - we fly out in a few hours)

Let’s finally turn the page on a unique time in our lives: 57  turbulent, hyperemotional days, nearly a full two months - a period longer than any of our bike tours before we sold our homes and went migrant.  57 days, nearly each of which had something consequential enough occur to make it stand out and feel significant or even life changing as we experienced it.  

Let’s finally turn the page, let’s get back on the bikes, let’s go to Tucson, Rocky.

Before we go though and it all gradually starts blurring together in our minds, let’s look back in awe and amazement, and give thanks.

• 11/18: we take the train from Barcelona to Calella on the coast for our last stay of the tour.  We’re there three nights.   I get the beginnings of a cold, and limit myself to fairly easy rides while Rachael hikes her legs off.
• 11/21: we take the train to the Barcelona airport, box the bikes for home, and stay overnight in the airport sleep and fly hotel.

•  11/22: we fly home from Barcelona.  Jonathan picks us up from the airport, drives us to our new apartment on the 14th floor overlooking and listening to the freeway right below.  The day goes as well as could be hoped for, but we both arrive with colds.
• 11/25: I experience by far the worst headache of my life that almost takes my breath away it’s so severe and sudden.  After some research I self-diagnose myself as having a bad sinus infection and the headache was triggered by the glsss of red wine I had a few hours earlier with dinner at Justa Pasta.
• 11/26: the presidential election happens and life goes to hell almost immediately afterwards.  We blame all the subsequent trauma on this horrific catastrophe.  Good luck, America.  Good luck, world.
• 11/27: I buy the new Canon SX70, and I have the first of the four dental appointments I’ll have here in the next two weeks: an exam, deep cleanings of both sides, and a replacement of last winter’s temporary crown with a new one in preparation for the permanent one that comes when we retirn from Tucson. They become a red herring that leads me to assume the upcoming pain in both jaws results from them, not from the disease I’m unaware I actually have.
• 11/28: Thanksgiving.  We send our regrets to the family for missing the second Thanksgiving gathering in a row (I returned from Nice with Covid last winter) because I can’t risk putting my 96 year old father’s health at risk when I don’t know what ails me.
• 11/29: Black Friday.  I have a videoconference with an urgent care nurse about the nonstop headache that has plagued me since we arrived.  Nothing conclusive or useful results from this.  The next few weeks are a journey through hell for me - a nonstop headache leaves me living from one ibuprofen dosage to the next, and in the background the incessant dull roar of the freeway far below leaves me unable to sleep.  Ever.  Horrible.
• 12/01: I turn 78.  No celebration occurs or observance is made.  I have no idea what we did on my birthday this year.
• 12/02: I have my annual checkup with my PCP.  Most of the session is spent discussing my headaches and the presumed sinus infection that causes them.  It doesn’t occur to me to mention two other minor symptoms: the back of both sides of my mouth hurt when is open my jaw wide or chew, badly enough that it’s painful to eat, which I blame on the dental work; and the beginning of what I assume is an eye infection, a sometime spinoff from sinus infections.  It’s a missed opportunity, since both are classic symptoms of onset GCA.  I’m sent away with an antibiotic in case the sinus headache has gone bacterial.
• 12/03: I return to Kaiser for a CT scan of my sinuses to confirm I’ve got a sinus infection.
• 12/04: The CT scan result is essentially negative.  In what feels like the first real medical error, I should probably been referred to someone for further diagnosis of an unknown condition; but time is short and we’re about to drive south.  It’s likely I’d have had a full recovery if I’d gotten seated before the right doctor at this point and been placed on steroids.  Too bad.
•  12/06: We begin the drive south, starting with a three day drive to SLO, where we plan to stay for six nights before continuing on to Borrego Springs for another three nights and then finally Tucson.  It’s a difficult drive for me the entire way.  My headaches have abated and are manageable, but my eyesight is getting worse and my right eye has started swelling shut from the presumed eye infection.
• 12/07: I’m encouraged that my headache is finally abating and I’m managing to get by with cutting my ibuprofen down by half.  On the other hand my eyes continue to bother me to the point that they’re now my most troublesome symptom.
• 12/08: we stay overnight in Palo Alto and visit our friend Lynn in her new home.  I have to use the flashlight to read the menu when we go out to dinner together.
• 12/09: we arrive in SLO and check in to our airbnb for the planned six night stay.
• 12/10: I bike to Laguna Lake for some birding with the new camera, and on a wobbly ride accumulate the first and only biking miles since returning from Spain.  We’re still holding steady at just nine miles for the winter.
• 12/11: we go to an urgent care clinic: I’m there for what I assume is my eye infection.  She examines my eyes, sees nothing wrong, and dismisses me with an eyedrop prescription.  It’s the second missed opportunity.  Since she had no explanation for my symptoms she should have referred me to someone.  Darn.  Rachael’s there for the presumed wax buildup in her ears that bothers her badly enough that it affects her hearing.   No wax is found, and she’s sent away with eardrops. We’re an odd couple at this point and not communicating too well - I have trouble seeing her, she has trouble hearing me.  Having dinner together at Lure is a bit comical, as I have trouble reading the menu and we have trouble talking about our lives.

• 12/12: Rachael takes another hike and bags her second peak here in her ascent of Bishop Peak.  I drive over to the coast to Morro Bay State Park for some birding and finally come away with my 300rh bird of the year, an American white pelican - and just in time ironically, as birding will disappear from my life imminently.  Later we’ll meet up with our friends Liz and George.  It’s a good day, the best I’ve felt since returning from Spain.  I go to bed thinking I’ve finally turned the corner and am returning to health.  The proverbial calm before the storm.
• 12/13: Friday the 13th.  I wake up in the middle of the night with the lower third my right eye alarmingly half greyed over.  We manage to get an appointment at an eye clinic where I am seen by an optometrist because an ophthalmologist isn’t available on such short notice.  I’m sent away with a stronger eyedrop prescription, but he’s just guessing because he can’t see anything wrong either.  The  vision in the top half of that eye is still quite clear at this point, so perhaps there was still time for a partial recovery if there’d sent me across the hall to a colleague.  Oops #3.
• 12/14: I awaken in the middle of the night and the right eye is almost completely blind now.  And coincidentally, the headache is gone finally, and still has not returned to this day.  In the dark I use the iPad to  self-diagnose myself as having had an eye stroke.  It’s described as a medical emergency, so we check me into the ER at nearby Friends Hospital as soon as it’s light out.  Later we’ll take that white knuckle drive south to Santa Maria to see an ophthalmologist who agrees that eye stroke is a possibility.  He sends me home for the weekend with a blister pack of prednisone (he’s at least getting closer to identifying what’s needed) and tells me to check back Monday morning for next steps. Mistake #4, since as an ophthalmologist he probably should have recognized the other possibility and sent me back to the ER for the classic response of putting me on intravenous steroids just in case because time is so important.  Perhaps he was distracted by the remodeling project, or maybe he already has his head stuck up his golf bag and is off to the links soon.  As a friend passed on during this crisis, one of his teachers when he was learning the medical profession presented the class with a medical mystery to solve - coincidentally, an elderly woman with exactly my set of symptoms.  He sent them off to research it with the reminder that we are all doctors, but we are not all valedictorians of the class.  There is so much luck in life!  I’ve finally been sent to the right profession but the wrong professional.  He’s just the wrong guy.
• 12/15: I stay close to home, with a short walkabout downtown to buy some CD’s for the drive to Tucson we’re still planning on.  I drop my glasses and scrape the lenses on the sidewalk with my foot.  I lose my drivers license.  I see a red shouldered hawk atop a snag above the creek and decide to initiate the 2025 bird count early, wondering if I’ll even hit 50 this coming year.
• 12/16: Monday morning the office in Santa Maria calls up and asks me to drive down for a follow up.  Rachael drives, her first long or highway driving in at least two years.  I sit before a different, younger, much more engaged ophthalmologist this time - a female Dr. House - who asks me if my jaws hurt.  It confirms what she believes is going on with me and immediately sends me back up to the ER room in Friends Hospital.  They’re waiting for me when we arrive and I’m seen as soon as I step in the  door and admitted for at least a one night stay.  A CT scan of my head is performed, and then I’m put on the first of the IV steroid drips they’ll administer over the next three days.
• 12/17: in hospital, on an IV steroid drip.  the CT scan is negative, showing no indication of a stroke or aneurism.  I have an MRI of my brain and both eyes.  I’m encouraged by being able to barely make the largest word on on the wall 10 feet in front of me, a large orange WELCOME - but if I were being honest with myself and Rachael it’s a bit of an educated guess.  I experience nonstop, unimaginably detailed hallucinations generating from the right eye for what must be 24 hours straight.  Rachael and I play our first game of gin in probably 20 years.  We abandon the plan for Tucson, cancel our reservations for there and Borrego Springs, and feel grateful that they’ll do so with a full refund.  We arrange to extend our stay at our airbnb here for several more days.
• 12/18: I have the biopsy to test whether I have GCA or not, and then my final intravenous steroid drip.  I’m discharged at midday with a 60 mg/day prednisone prescription and the instructions to get home ASAP to see an ophthalmologist there.  Rachael drives us back to our apartment to start packing.  We walk back to My Thai in the dark for dinner.
• 12/19: Rachael drives us to Liz and George’s to drop off the car, and they drive us to the SLO airport.  Bruce and Andrea pick us up at PDX and drive us to our new, very small apartment.  we walk to Safeway for groceries, where I get carded when I try to buy a six pack.   Rachael covers for me because I lost my drivers license.  Back in the room I have one, my last alcohol at least until getting off the prednisone.
• 12/20: I walk to Caffe Umbria for the first time, walking slowly and cautiously and staying close to the right side of the street because it’s dark and I’m insecure and a little unsteady on my feet because my sight is still quite bad.  Bruce drives us to my first ophthalmology appointment.  The surgeon from SLO who took the biopsy calls me on the way down to tell me the results were positive and I have GCA.  The ophthalmologist has the discouraging news that the odds are that my vision may not improve, and the goal of treatment is preservation of what remains.  He sends me home with a stronger 80 mg prednisone prescription and an appointment to return in a week.  Afterwards I take my first short walk along the river, to the Steel Bridge and back.  I can just barely and briefly make out the shape of what I assume is a sparrow right at my feet.  Very discouraging, maybe the darkest hour of all.

• 12/21: Winter Solstice.  I awaken with the eyesight on the left side noticeably improved.  I walk north along the river past the Fremont Bridge, and am thrilled to realize I can make out what I believe is a row of cormorants about three blocks in the distance.
• 12/23: Bruce drives over to have coffee with me at Caffe Umbria, and then drives us to Interstate for my eye exams while Rachael checks in at the optometrist to see if she can get her glasses replaced using her current prescription.  She can’t because it’s too old, and she is very frustrated because the next available appointment isn’t until mid-February.  Afterwards Bruce drops us off down in Sellwood, and we walk through Oaks Bottom and then up to the Daily Cafe at the foot of the OHSU tram where we have lunch before taking the streetcar home.  The eyesight continues to improve and give hope.
• 12/24: Christmas Eve.  My eyesight is much improved over yesterday.   We celebrate with lunch at Jake’s where I have my first nonalcoholic beer, a Heineken Zero.  Afterwards Rachael takes an Uber over to Interstate for her appointment with a hand specialist about her onset arthritis.  While she’s out I walk up to the Steel Bridge and back again and can see much more this time.  I take heart from the fact that there’s a rainbow arcing above the convention center, and that I can see the colors in it.
• 12/26: I take my first ever Uber ride on my own, back to Oaks Park.  The eyesight continues to improve, a dramatic change that continues incrementally every day for a full week.  I see a screech owl! 
• 12/27: Bruce meets me at Caffe Umbria for coffee and then drives me down to my second ophthalmology apppointment.  We get the green light we’ve been yearning for, we’re flying to Tucson in two weeks.
• 12/28: Caffe Umbria again.  This is the first day I realize I’ll be able to see people’s faces again, and they’ve suddenly starting to come into focus again just since yesterday.   I think this is the day Rachael rechecks and sees she can get in to an optometrist today instead of waiting another six weeks. Later, Rachael and I go to an afternoon showing at Living Room Theaters of A Real Pain.  I can see the film just fine, I enjoy my NA kolsch, I can read the entire credit roll at the end.  Life is starting to feel normal, and good - exceptional actually, given what we’d feared just a week ago.  Afterwards we walk over to Alora for dinner, and that feels normal also.  We’re back.
• 12/29: Breakfast with Jonathan at Caffe Umbria, and I realize I can now make out faces at the very  far end of the room.  I have an afternoon lunch date with Elizabeth at Via Delizia. Later I’ll get carded at Safeway when trying to buy a six pack of nonalcoholic beer.
• 12/30: Another eye exam at Interstate, where I escape catastrophe when the technician prepares to give me shots in both eyes because he thinks I’m a different patient.
• 12/31: New Years Eve, and probably the best one of my entire life because my sight is so improved.  The day starts with me Ubering to Clinton Street for coffee with Bruce and then I walk back to town from there.  I have a chance meetup with Elizabeth walking with her friends on Terwilliger.  Rachael and I celebrate with dinner at Serrato, accompanied by a perfectly poured nonalcoholic amber.     I feel reborn, a sensation that sticks with me for days.  
• 01/01: New Years Day.  Bruce and Andrea fly south to drive the Raven, the bikes, our unheard new used CD’s, and most of our travel belongings back home.  I take an Uber out to Kelly Point and then a ten mile walk along the slough to the Delta MAX station for the ride home, pleased with myself for taking probably my longest walk in the last two years.
•  01/03: the Archival Project is reactivated on a rainy day, and a nonstop gusher of old memories blasts in.
• 01/06: Rachael has an appointment at Interstate  that she Ubers herself to, while I have an optometry appointment over on the west side which I very nearly miss.  The Raven returns later in the early evening.  The Rodriguez goes into the shop for a quick tune-up.
• 01/07: I drive out to the Columbia River on a successful scaup hunt and a test of my driving ability.
• 01/08: I take my first bike ride since before hospitalization, a 12 mile loop down to the Sellwood Bridge and back on the tuned up and unflattened Rodriguez.  That seems significant. 
• 01/09: The rheumatologist calls, says I’m responding well to the prednisone, and gives me dosage levels and blood test requirements for the next month.  HAC group meetup.
• 01/10: Third ophthalmologist appointment.  I order new prescription glasses.  
• 01/11: I drive to Hayden Island on the Columbia River for some last minute birding.  It’s overcast in the morning, but in the afternoon there’s a faint rainbow and then the sun comes out over Vanport and everything comes together to make the most perfect day imaginable.  I come away with a respectable 24 birds, including three new ones for the year.  Everything I value is back, full force: vision, people, driving, biking, photography, birding, music, cinema, the vistas, it’s all back.  Even my silly driver’s license is back!  And nothing goes awry to spoil or diminish the intensity of the glow: the Raven doesn’t get stolen, I don’t slip in the mud and ruin my new Pendleton shirt or camera, I don’t get blinded in the other eye by a golf ball from the driving range, I don’t wet my pants on the way to Starbucks.  Life is back.

There’s a full Wolf Moon a risin’ Monday night, Rocky.  Let’s go watch it together as it rises up above the Rincon Mountains to the east. Let’s go to Tucson.