To My Wonderful, Caring West Seattle Neighbors:
During last night's storm a powerful gust of wind blew down the stairs behind my house.
Can you please help me out by placing them correctly?
(Easy on the neck there, compadres . . .)
P.S. Thanks in advance, Vivian!
there are lots of stairs around...hmmm...there's stairs at...46th? 47? south of Stevens SW...there's stairs off of 60th near Beach Drive, south of Admiral Way a couple of blocks. There's stairs...at the foot of Thistle, on the west end. And there's stairs going from Genesee SW right about 49th SW, that go north up the hill. But you're probably going to tell me this ain't none of them, aren't you? ;-)
Oh! Oh! Jan!
You're sooooo close.
You have already narrowed it down to somewhere in West Seattle.
hahahahaha
BigRed
Member Profile
The stairs at tthe top of thistle. One block west of california.
Got 'er. BigRed!
Good dog!!
Whew! Thanks. Believe me, I was getting all discombobulated walking up, down and sideways on those stairs untl you came by.
And now I'd like to tell you all a story about a dream I had on this same subject, but only if people are interested.
Well . . . ?
sam-c
Member Profile
do tell..
hmmm, those stairs look a whole bunch like another set of stairs I'm remembering but are East of California. Now I'll have to go look again (they're scary to climb, kinda).
Your posts are great DP and I do enjoy reading them. Please, do tell the story!
OK. You're asking for it now . . .
(Oh, and Admiral . . . please wait until it's dry and you get your land legs back before you do any stair climbing on my account. I'm pretty sure the Blog is not insured for any "unauthorized" adventures.)
With all due respect, didn't Jan get it right? - "at the foot of Thistle, on the west end"
-
And ditto, I love this game :)
DP, until what's dry? Oh, oh yeah, gotcha. No I was just thinking how nice this red wine is. You're probably talking about the weather. In that case...will do!
GenHillOne, yes, Jan did get it right. But she also got it wrong.
See, Jan (bless her soul), has this cute little way of playing the game. I'll put up a picture and she'll respond within minutes (seconds, sometimes) with:
Oh wait! I know this one. It's either such-and-so or this-and-that. It's right down the block from a bing-bang-bong. Or maybe the one on the other side, etc.
But I'm on to her Jan-i mind tricks, see? So I formulated a rule (which Jan is aware of) to the effect of "one-guess-per-customer-per-turn-and-you-pretty-much-have-to-be-right-on-the-money-according-to-what-I-say-is-the-money."
Although Jan doesn't always play by the rules, she still wins a prize, just for being adorable. At the meet-up, someone even thought she and I were related. So what does that tell you? About adorableness, I mean.
So on to my story.
(Now turn the page . . .)
BigRed
Member Profile
Now re-reading it Jan did say it first… I just got so excited that I actually new one of these I skipped all replies an answered. Good job Jan…. We both are winners!!! :-)
OK, before I get into the actual story, I have to warn people of two things:
1) the story involves me, and
2) the story involves nudity.
And when I say that, I mean to say that the story involves the nudity of my actual self, which is to say, the nudity of the real me, David, in the flesh, rather than "nudity" as represented by some amateurish attempt at so-called sculpture that was foisted upon Western Civilization by some old fuddy-duddy who wasn't concerned with being anatomically accurate anyway, to say nothing of flattering.
So, anyway . . . given that this story involves myself, in the nude, you are hereby advised to finish up whatever you're eating, and put any potato chips or other food items completely out of sight and mind. The only way you could even have food in the room at this point is if you were in an official state-licensed vomitorium under the personal supervision of a . . .
of a . . .
Well, never mind.
Just stop eating now. OK?
(Turn the page.)
austin
Member Profile
Did this take place on the bus?
lol..
True Story:
So I've been having this recurring dream/nightmare lately, right? Ever since I've been thinking about using stairs for the SWIWS game.
In the dream, I'm back in my old government job in downtown Seattle. And I'm sitting at my desk, worrying about the stack of stuff on my desk, when suddenly a horribly loud and persistent bell starts ringing.
Now this bell could actually be my alarm clock; I don't know. But in the dream, it's a fire alarm of some kind. And somehow I know that I've got to get the hell out of that office right away — OR I'M GOING TO DIE!!!
(But something weird is: I'm the only one who seems to even care that there's a fire in the building!)
So I bolt out the front door of our office (7th Floor, "Melbourne Tower," downtown), and I'm sprinting down the hall to the elevator. And I push the "down" button.
But the elevator is soooooooo 'effing slow coming up from the first floor, right? And I'm like the only one waiting there. I'm the only one who realizes that there's a FIRE and we all have to get out of the building or were ALL going to die.
So I'm watching the elevator light slowly creep up from the first floor to the seventh floor
bing
bing . . .
bing . . . .
bing . . . . .
bing . . . . . .
BINGGGG !!
—and meanwhile, I'm screaming back down the hallway for everyone to get the hell out of the building CUZ THERE'S A FIRE!!!
And finally, my coworkers start to take me seriously. And they come shuffling slowly out of the office — government workers! — and start lining up behind me to get onto the elevator.
But just when the elevator doors open, I see there's a FIRE in the elevator, too. So it's like: OMFG! That's obviously no good; there's no escape that way.
So I want to turn around and run back toward the office, right? But for some reason — and this is the part that utterly makes no sense — I suddenly realize that I DON'T HAVE ANY CLOTHES ON! In other words, I'm totally naked. (Eww!) So if I turn around and run back toward the office, ALL MY COWORKERS ARE GONNA SEE ME NAKED.
As in FULL FRONTAL NUDITY.
[Insert "Bill the Cat" noises.]
(Meanwhile, all my coworkers still have their clothes on, naturally.)
So it's like I'm confronted with the two terrible options of A) jumping into the burning elevator to try and get out of the building, but being burnt to a crisp in the process, or B) turning around to go back to the office and having all my co-workers, including a girl I like, see me naked.
So at that poiont in the dream, when I realize those are my only options, I always wake up in a cold sweat, gasping for air and feeling like absolute Hell.
OK, now let's pause there for a moment, to let you visualize this awful scenario . . .
OK. So have you visualized the awful scenario?
Good.
So, I scheduled an appointment with my psychoanalyst about this, right? And this guy is one of those classic Freudians who totally subscribes to the symbolic importance of dreams. (He's got an encyclopedia of dream symbols!)
And I say, "Doc, if there was ever a dream that had symbols in it, it's got to be this one, right?"
And he says: "Oh yah! Zis dream is r-r-richly zymbolic. You vant to get on zee elevator, no? To avoid turning around and having your vrends zee you nekkid, no? But you can't because it's on fire."
And I say: "Yes, doctor! I don't want to burn in a fire, but I don't want my co-workers to see me naked! —especially the girl I like. But I know that if I turn around, they'll all stare, because I'm naked, and they have their clothes on. And I don't want them staring at me. I really don't like that idea. I'd rather die, I think maybe."
And the shrink goes: "But you vill for certain die if you take zee elevator, yah?"
And I say: "Yah! I mean . . . yeah!"
And he says: "I sink I know vat you must do to resolve zis."
"Well for God's sake, Doc, tell me."
And he says: "Vell, zo it's a choice being burnt to des in zee elevator, or turning around und surviving, but being shtaired at nekkid, kor-r-r-ect?"
Und I zay: "Korrect!"
Er . . . I mean . . . I say, "Correct!"
So he says, "Aha! Zo gut! It's r-r-really zimple den. It's a zimple choice betveen dying in zee elevator und being shtaired at nekkid, yah?"
"Yah! Yah! Yah! That's it. So what do I do?"
"Vell," he said "I sink zat if you are nekkid, in a d-r-r-ream, viss many peeple also in zee d-r-r-ream, und zer iss a feuer, zen you zhud never take zee elevator . . ."
"No?"
"No," he said. "You zhud take zee shtairs."
ba-da-bing...
(actually, dreams about being nekkid can be about fearing rejection in real life, or...being fearful of being ridiculed...or...interpreted to mean that perhaps you're trying to be something that you really aren't....hmmmmm - just take the stairs ...hehe)
I am still waiting for the part where ran to the stairs and woke from your dream to find yourself naked on the thistle st stairs
MercyMoi
Member Profile
Bah!! Hahaha - I was with you on pins and needles until the psychoanalyst entered the story. High-larious. Thanks for the storytelling! Thr vomitorium cracked me up.
miws
Member Profile
"I am still waiting for the part where ran to the stairs and woke from your dream to find yourself naked on the thistle st stairs"
I am so glad I didn't have a mouthful of coffee when I read that! :-D
David, As you probably know, the elevators are automatically re-called to the building lobby during a fire alarm.
So, I think the elevator is the gateway to Hell, sent by Satan.
Or perhaps a malfunction of the elevator's computer system.
Mike
When is May coming this year? As in Sunlight, Plants, and Goodness? I am feeling a compulsion to go climb the stairs at Thistle, but am resisting it. Gonna take the dogs to Westcrest, instead. They went to Marymoor yesterday: Dog-o-rama. It was bliss, although a long drive. Thanks, DP, for the perceptual stair jumble to wake people up from the rainy Seattle stupor.
And the fun part if you've never been there is, that's only HALF the staircase (the shorter half) from Northrop to one-block-east-of-Lincoln-Park...
Ultimately, a flight of stairs must always lead us either up or down . . .
. . . but a single step leads only to the next step.
Wow! I just made that up.
I think it means something.
365Stairs
Member Profile
Funny thing...this location is the reason for my user name...there are 365 stairs going from Thistle down to Lincoln park...
Garden_nymph
Member Profile
DP, As you know, I would be happy to sit at your feet listening to you tell stories any day of the week. Thanks for brightening the gray days!
Is the stair here?
Where's the stair?
'The stair's right there,
But it goes nowhere.'
And the abyss? the abyss?
'The abyss you can't miss:
It's right where you are—
A step down the stair.'
[ . . . ]
Too much reality can be a dazzle, a surfeit;
Too close immediacy an exhaustion:
As when the door swings open in a florist's storeroom—
The rush of smells strikes like a cold fire, the throat freezes,
And we turn back to the heat of August,
Chastened.
So the abyss—
The slippery cold heights,
After the blinding misery,
The climbing, the endless turning,
Strike like a fire,
A terrible violence of creation,
A flash into the burning heart of the abominable;
Yet if we wait, unafraid, beyond the fearful instant,
The burning lake turns into a forest pool,
The fire subsides into rings of water,
A sunlit silence.
—Theodore Roethke
"The Abyss"
DP post 25
Holy M.C. Escher Batman!
Nice photo!
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