The Coast Isn't Clear Yet...

Remember the other day I said I was at a crossroads?  I was a bit hasty. By my reckoning, I'm still about half a mile out, though I think I can see the signpost off in the distance there, wooden arrows pointing to the four winds.

Since last year--when I shockingly became a widow between one breath and the next--I've been searching for my place, trying to find where I belong now.  I have covered this fair land from Bellingham to Boston, San Diego to Coconut Grove, and most of the country in between.  I've spent long hours reviewing the many places I've lived, searching out places on the internet where I haven't lived but might want to.  I've become addicted to House Hunters on HGTV because they go all over the country where I can see prices, neighborhoods, availability.  Through all my efforts, I still haven't found home.  

My heart yearns for Scotland, but there are other things to consider--financial, emotional, realistic things--before I can decide whether I'm staying in America, or heading back to Scotland. My pro/con list has grown, shrunk, expanded, subtracted for several months now, and it's time for me to stand up, take a deep breath, and choose my path.  After all, once the house is up for sale in just a few weeks, I need a plan, don't I?  Yes. Yes, I do.

Next weekend I'm going to the coast, a last ditch fact-finding mission, my final attempt to clear my mind and make the crucial decisions I will shortly have to make.  Do I go, or do I stay??  (How did that song end anyway?)  I'm taking my Mom, and the boys, and once we get through the mountains, we're going to drive south on Highway 101, down one of the most beautiful 60 miles in America.

I love the sea.  I've said before that for a Fire sign, I have a strange affinity for the water, be it ocean, river, lake or stream.  (Might have something to do with being born on an island in the middle of the Bering Sea). 

I particularly love this coastline, from about halfway down the Oregon coast to just above San Francisco.  Rugged, rocky, stunning. 

The area I am interested in is the Banana Belt of the southern Oregon coast with a warm, temperate climate.  Not too cold, too hot, too humid, or too...anything.  Just right. 

The only concern I have about the place I've chosen to visit is that it's a very small coastal town.  Like really small.  I'm isolated enough up this blasted mountain without going from small to blink-and-you've-missed-it. 

Still, the biggest bookstore on the Oregon Coast is in this little village, they have a theatre (as in stage productions), the Rogue River (a wild and beautiful white-water river) spills out north of town to the sea, so wow, for such a wee place, it seems to have a lot going for it.  At least in theory.

Here are a few photos I took last year.  The halfway point begins right about here--midway down the Oregon coast--and continues south to the Monterey peninsula in California...

Really pretty.  And these shots are at the beginning of the journey; the further south, the better it gets.  I will take a bunch of pictures next weekend, in between scouting out the area, trying to leave myself open to the flow of possibilities, walking the dogs on the beach, and hoping I have a blinding illumination of epic proportions to guide me forward.