2013 My Year in Review- Happy New Year!

"Stay the course"

Nick Thomas' year 2013 in review.

Highlights:

1. Completing year 2 and starting numero 3 as a full time 32 year old college student at Eastern Washington University. "Non traditional" is what that is called. I like it! Though it was stressful, challenging, and I entertained fantasies of riding my moped off into the sunset of some other, less broke occupation, I stuck with the plan. I heeded the "STAY THE COURSE" signs hanging all over my apartment. 

Katie at EWU. Go Eagles!

It has been a joy to have my sister Katie transfer out to EWU this school year. She was accepted into the excellent Social Work undergrad program there. We also both successfully passed Math 115, (my second time taking it) and are now done with math classes hopefully forever. I also finished my last science credit, and my first Spanish class.  Just two more quarters of Spanish and I will be done with all my General Education Requirements.

In the fall I also was hired as a staff writer for The Easterner, EWU's student run newspaper. I greatly enjoy this job and am learning so much about the field and the process of writing, editing and publishing, as well as the web/social media components that are critical components of modern news writing and gathering.

My great looping 2013 US road trip.

Last summer I commuted weekdays to paint houses in Seattle, swim in the freezing Puget Sound, then I spent a month on the road criss crossing the great USA for my first time coast to coast, and actually more like a big loop, a la "Blue Highways" (by William Least Heat Moon, anyone?). Drove from Spokane to Denver then vanpooled to Portland, ME then raced my 1979 Puch Magnum moped on the Pinball Run from Portland to Key West, FL, then vanpooled back to Denver where it was flooding.

Then drove to meet Alicia in Brekenridge where her cousin Ben and his wife Molly live. We did a bunch of spectacular hikes in Colorado, and then north to Grand Teton National Park where we hiked with Kelly, Alicia's longlost college friend who is now a park ranger there. We had an amazing road trip together. It was the perfect way to end what was surely one of my most hectic, yet adventurous, most eventful summers of my life.

Me mopeding southward, somewhere in South Carolina.

Thanks to all the people who sponsored me and my moped for the big race. It was so amazing, both physically and emotionally draining and exhilerating. I never thought before this trip that I could function on 2-4 hours of sleep a night, for ten days straight, or ride an old, finnicky moped 1,200 miles by myself. I pushed myself and my endurance and I made many new friends too, and saw so much of our incredible, diverse continent that was new to me. I feel honored and humbled. Since we started school the day after we got home on late September, I had not had the time to process the summer much, as it was such a blur and so stimulating I was in serious sensory over-load till now.

Alicia ponders the 3 hour trip back down Paintbrush Canyon,
in Grand Teton National Park. In a thunderstorm.

Thinking back to last new years, Alicia's brother-in-law Justin said that last new years seems like way in the past. I totally thought the same thing. A year ago we were in Detroit, just hours away from a 6am flight back to the Pacific NW after a week in Northern Michigan visiting family. Alicia's friend Cheryl took us to a great bar where we had yummy local brews and then Alicia flushed her drivers license down the toilet. We panicked a bit as we were scheduled to catch a 6am flight home and she had no other ID. Calling the airline they said to just arive 3 hours early to leave time for extra security checks. So we continued to party and proceeded to sleep for all of 45 minutes before getting up to drive the airport and first return our red 2013 Ford Mustang rental car. Everything went without a hitch and we returned home safe and sound on the first day of 2013.

Granny's memorial service, July 30th at Oceanside Beach, OR.

Granny Kay Thomas, 1927-2013. She was the last
of my grandparents, passed away peacefully,
though unexpectedly, on April 7.

April marked the passing of my dear Grandmother Kay Thomas. She lived to be 86. After falling and breaking her hip 3 years ago she started the inevitable rapid decline common after such injuries. She lived the last few years of her life at Rockwood Retirement Community just around the corner from her longtime, beloved residence at Rockwood Apartments. "Granny K" (as she like to be called) lived a long full life, and was ready to move on to the great beyond. My father and I were humbled to be at her side as she passed away very quickly on a Sunday night on April 7th. She was a unique, special person to me and always loved me and her other grandkids in her own way. She encouraged me to look at the world as a chance to find beauty and be creative wherever I was. 

She taught me to make paper from native grass and organic matter, took me to museums and on walks in parks, birdwatching at Turnbull wildlife refuge and to countless lunches and ice cream treats at her various favorite spots over the years like Rosauers Family Restaurant, Huckleberries, The Two Seven Pub, Pizza Hut, Baskin Robbins, and TCBY. In July the extended family traveled to Oceanside on the Oregon Coast to scatter her ashes near her one of her favorite landscapes. Her remains joined with the tides of the mighty Pacific. I miss you Granny K.