The wind is to Ellensburg what the rain is to Seattle. It comes through the mountains and descends upon the valley with vigor. While a good head-wind can nearly double the time it takes me to walk to or from work, it seldom gets really good till after dark. The wind passes quickly through Ellensburg much like its transient population of truckers and college students.
Now that the snow has all melted and spring is unfolding into summer, the afternoon breeze carries the smell of lilac through the air. I breathe it in like it's a sacred tonic for my spirit.
In the morning I walk east toward the sun down a gravel alley way. It has the appearance of an old country road... the kind you'd walk down in Roslyn. It makes me feel more at home and puts me in the right frame of mind to embrace the day ahead of me.
It's funny how my internal compass has changed since I have lived here. As I mentioned before, I walk east in the morning.... only in truth it has always felt like north to me. What is north feels west, west south and so on. I believe it has something to do with the magnetism of the area. Some have suggested that it's because of Mel's hole. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel's_Hole)
Most likely it's because this little valley is surrounded by rolling hills that all look the same no mater which direction you're facing. Where in Albuquerque I had the Sandia mountains, and in Seattle the water to orient me, here I have nothing but.... but the wind which always blows in from the west like an urgent message from the ocean carrying the smell of lilac into my nostrils as I go about my relatively simple existence.
