I Went to Seattle!

Seattle skyline

That title took me ages to come up with. Whew, the mental strain. I may have to go rest in a minute.

So, I went to Seattle. I took the bus on my own, which turned out to be a pretty enjoyable way to spend four hours. In that quiet alone time, I read a silly book, looked out the window, napped, and listened to some music. It was restful bliss.

This wasn’t a solo trip though. Once in Seattle, I went to my hotel and met up with one of my favourite people, a friend from elementary school, whom I shall here rename “Ruby.” There is something quite lovely about spending time with friends you have known for most of your life. They understand you in a true and simple way because they were there back when you were creating yourself once upon a time; they probably even helped with the creation. There’s a beautiful comfort to that.

We had very little agenda on this trip: four days to poke around, try some nice food, do a little shopping, and go to a dance. It was all brilliant.

Chinatown

We wandered around Pike Place Market, which, while crowded, is a real treat for a market fan like me. We also found a very impressive farmer’s market on Capitol Hill. The fruits and veggies were so beautiful, you could imagine becoming one of those super-healthy people who would never even think of eating boxed macaroni and cheese. (I myself often dream about boxed macaroni and cheese. I love it so.)

Pike Place Market

We attended a rather unique carnival that featured a trailer park market and power tool races.

Trailer park market, Georgetown

I bought strange, fancy chocolate (tortilla and lime! french toast!) and raspberry pepper jelly and sampled many other tasty things. We ate at an African restaurant and some fabulous breakfast places.

Sitka and Spruce, a breakfast dream

Oh and the dance, it was wonderful. I do not usually go to dances, (‘never’ would not be far off the mark) because I am not much of a dancer. That knowledge breeds in me a self-consciousness that tends to prevent me from really enjoying myself. But Ruby is a dancer, and she had found us a waltz night to attend (as you do,) and it sounded fun, and new experiences are what life is about after all, so off we went to Sonny Newman’s Dance Hall.

Now, I did take a waltz class once with my husband in the lead-up to our wedding, in the hopes that it would give us something to do besides stand and sway. It was a few years ago though, and I remembered little, so I wasn’t sure how this would go. But everyone there was great! They were so nice! We were the youngest people there by twenty years easily and they all seemed really happy to see new faces. Everyone rotated partners and we got to dance almost every song. And here’s where it’s nice to be female: it didn’t really matter that I didn’t know what I was doing, because I got to be the follow. So we waltzed and swung and cha-cha’d and two-stepped and it was all completely fine. And, I was wearing my travel dress, which it turns out is perfect for dancing, because every time you do a turn, it twirls very satisfyingly.