Regroup and Redeploy

I wish I could remember more about what happened when we got back from that road trip in September of 1972... I suspect it's so hazy because (as usual) I wasn't involved in the decision making process. (Just along for the ride.)

As best as I can recall, Karina and I told mom about the places we'd been and the things we'd seen, and it was quickly decided that moving to Oregon had been the right idea but (for whatever reason) the timing was wrong. Mom also determined that Eugene was where we were supposed to be - largely because of the rainbow that appeared next to our car as we were passing though :-)

So - around the start of October I got my child support payment, mom got a sizable check from aunt Vesti and we started selling everything we weren't planning on taking with us... I'm not sure exactly how long it took (maybe a couple of weeks?) but we scraped together enough money for three plane tickets and a couple of months rent once we got to Eugene... Yeah - we were "good to go".

Aside: My sister Karina made her ex-husband Bernie rent a trailer and haul all of our stuff up to Oregon with the Mazda. (He had to go through California because of the weather.) I'm not sure he really wanted to leave Texas but he was kind of "lost" at that point and didn't know what else to do... I felt kind of sorry for him :-)

Now... Many posts ago I mentioned a young orderly (Ron) at the hospital in Denton whose wife had recently died during surgery - and he spent a lot of time with my mom while she was being treated there for cancer... As it turned out, he had moved back to Portland (his home town) and when mom contacted him he volunteered to pick us up at the airport and help us get settled in.

It was early evening when our flight landed in Portland - a bit too late to drive to Eugene. So we spent the night at Ron's house in North Portland (it was supposedly a bad neighborhood, but it looked fine to us)... I think we slept late the next the morning, went out for breakfast and took our time getting on the road.

I remember the drive down to Eugene quite well. That's because Ron didn't have a car, so he borrowed his brother's 1967 Firebird 400 convertible (dark green) and let me drive it most of the way there... Now - I am not a fan of GM cars in general, but I love Firebirds - and the 67 400 vert is about as sweet as they get. (The only GM vehicle I have ever owned is a '75 Trans Am - but that is yet to come.)

And while I'm on the topic of cars I guess this is as good a place as any for this story:
A week or so later Ron borrowed his sister's 1970 Mustang so we could spend the day at the Oregon coast. It was a "plain Jane" blue coupe - no emblems or badges to indicate there was anything special about it... Then I got into a situation where I was passing some slow traffic on a two-lane road and slightly misjudged the speed of an oncoming log truck. It was too late to back off, so I floored it - and the Mustang took off like a rocket - made it with plenty of room to spare... I turned to Ron and asked what the deal was with the car and he claimed ignorance, so when we stopped for lunch I popped the hood and found myself staring at what I instantly recognized as a 300 horsepower 4-bbl 351 Cleveland V-8 (the valve covers are a dead giveaway)... I was rather surprised, because that engine was a performance upgrade for "Mach 1" models. I had no idea you could even get one in a base coupe... Ron said his sister bought the car new off the lot and didn't think there was anything special about it, so I figure somebody else must have special ordered it and backed out of the deal... (BTW: I really like 65-70 Mustangs too, but again, I've never owned one.)

Aside: I was pretty "obsessive compulsive" about cars at the time. When we were in Tyler I subscribed to both Hot Rod and Car Craft magazines and had accumulated a small reference library of magazines, books and new car brochures... The point is that I can still name the visible differences between the Windsor and Cleveland 351 engines down to the orientation of the fuel pump bolts. But I digress...

When we arrived in Eugene we found a room at an old hotel in the downtown area. I'm not 100% sure, but I think it was the "Eugene Hotel" (now a senior living facility)...
We picked up a newspaper in the lobby and as soon as we got to the room Karina went through the rental ads calling out numbers to mom (who was working the phone) while I sat there with a map and a notepad jotting down the addresses. As soon as we had a workable list we prioritized it and took off in the Firebird with Ron driving and me navigating. I'm not sure how many places we looked at, but we quickly settled on a 2 bedroom unit in the Clairmont Apartments on Adkins Street (near Coburg Road south of Beltline). It was furnished and already vacant, so we could move in the next day.

When we got back to the hotel (not much more than an hour after arriving in Eugene) we called the telco to arrange for phone service and took care of a few other odds and ends (like calling Bernie to give him the "go" signal)... Ron was stunned... He said he had never seen anybody get settled in that fast after arriving in a new town. (It was almost like a military operation.) And we were like "Yeah - we've done this before" :-)

OK. There's one more related story that I thought was kind of funny:
After Ron left we decided to call room service for dinner (that was one of our usual indulgences) and after looking over the menu I decided on the "Ragout Hogie". When I told mom what I wanted I pronounced ragout just like it's spelled: "rag-out"... Mom and Karina both started laughing (they were frequently amused by my lack of sophistication) and explained that the correct pronunciation is "rah-goo". (Yeah - I was a bit embarrassed)...
So mom called to place the order, and for some reason she had to repeat "Rah-goo Hoagie" three or four times. When she got off the phone she totally cracked up and told us that after the last repetition the woman had said: "Oh! You mean the rag-out Hoagie!". (So - apparently my pronunciation was the correct one in Eugene)... Well - I thought it was funny :-)

The next morning we took a cab to the apartment - and thus began the next chapter...