Hanging with the Hooligans

Hanging with the Hooligans on Whidbey Island

Saturday, August 26th – our 8th day on the road.

We’re on our sixth state now, and in Eastern Washington the roads are flat and straight and dotted with pine trees. It is 270 miles to Seattle, 335 to Whidbey Island where we have an assignation at the beach home of Ray and Elizabeth Pelley, with the two of them and Bill O’Hearn, who is visiting from New York. The four of them attended ISU together some thirty years ago, and Ray, Jim, and Bill were roommates. We see Ray and Elizabeth periodically, but Jim and Bill have not seen each other in a long time, perhaps since college, so this is a significant reunion for The Three Hooligans.

Closer to Seattle, the Cascade Mountains loom large and brown as we press west. As is the cast all over the Northwestern United States, drought has taken its toll.

Before crossing the Cascades, we stop in Ce Elum, Washington, after viewing the Columbia River Reservoir, which provides water for most of Washington, and across from it Petrified Tree State Park. A sign on an overlook tells us that the Wampunum Indians once lived peacefully along its banks. Being peace-loving, the tribe had no treaty with the government, and are now extinct, as are tribes who fought back when their lands were taken away. Ce Elum doesn’t look like much from the highway, but its main street is full of stores – coffee houses, outfitters, and, for us, the motherlode: A high end wine emporium next to a pet store that carries all Ethan’s favorite brands: Wellness, Nutro, and one I’ve been wanting to try: Merrick’s Turducken and Mediterranean Feast brands.

Ethan, you see, in the entitled state of mind that has been created by his status of King of the Road as he perches on his dog throne in the back seat, has been slightly off his feed.
It all began two nights ago, when lacking a microwave, we are unable to heat his food. He is served room temperature food, Unacceptable meal, and he looked at me like I was serving platescrape stew.

Yesterday I bought him a can of Mighty Dog, a commercial, available-in-any-grocery-store wet food. He gobbled it greedily, but the byproduct was the most horrible dog breath either of us have ever smelled, especially in a closed-up car. This event is close on the heels of us blaming Ethan for the sulphurous smell of Yellowstone Park, but this time, it is, indeed, emanating from him.

So, $16 later, armed with chlorophyll dog biscuits, breath-refreshing Greenies, and organic dog food, we can finally breathe through our noses in the car.

Sunday, August 27th

Having crossed the Cascades in a scent-cleansed car yesterday, we headed north from Seattle to the ferry at Mulkiteo. It’s a stunning Saturday, but the ferry ride requires a 60-minute wait due to weekend traffic on this last summer weekend. As the cars inch toward the port, pulled over on the shoulder of the road, Jim waits impatiently while the universe and the ferry fail to comply with Jim’s Rules. This is the first sign on this trip of Jim’s customary crankiness, and I don’t understand it until it occurs to me that we are within Ray Range. Only Jim surpasses Ray, his wife Elizabeth tells me, in curmudgeonry. When they get together, they rant and rave and drink until they mentally collapse, spent with the effort of raving against the universe at large.

Indeed, we are within range: on the other side of the Sound on Whidbey Island, Ray and Bill await our arrival. Ray’s directions are precise: .4 mile here, turn and go .7 mile here, down the hill .8 mile, etc. There’s the house: beachfront, a house-wide deck facing the bulkhead, a view of Seattle 35 miles across the Sound and Mount Rainier, visible on this incredibly clear day at 100 miles. There are blue heron, seagulls, and osprey.

The cocktail hour moves forward, enriched by a walk to the beach at the end of the lane, and a grilled shrimp dinner prepared by Ray and Elizabeth, and a fire in the firepit. A glance through the telescope at Pluto and its four stars, and I’m off to bed. The Hooligans carry on late into the night, with only minor injuries. (firepit brush-up adding wood.)

In the night I wake to surf banging against in the bulkhead, but in the morning, the sea is like liquid silver. We meet a man on the beach who has spent the past 28 years on the island, fixing up an 82-year-old house up on the cliff overlooking the beach. His hobby, when not working on the cabin, has been combing this beach at Satchett Head Point, where he has found Wooly Mammoth bones at low tide. He tells us that during one of several glacial ages, cave people from Alaska and upper Canada would run the Wooly Mammoths off the cliff, or find them chased over the edge by predators and would take what meat they could salvage. His finds are now in a museum further up the Island, in Langley. Ray and Elizabeth have also met this man, and he has also told them about the remains of an underwater Indian village.

The next day we drive to Coupeville for a lunch of mussels harvested from the farms just outside town, on Medrona road. We l earn that Whidbey Island is the largest island in the contiguous United States, second only to Rhode Island. Its rolling hills and pines and, in areas, sheer cliff faces over looking the ocean, point to its identity as a product of the Whidbey glacier. Today, it’s known for its shellfish, produce and fruit (sold at a number of farmers’ markets) and is a weekend getaway for many Seattle families, who own second homes here as Ray and Elizabeth do.

Leaving the restaurant, we walk up a hill to a scenic oversight for an official Hooligan Reunion photo op. In the background is Mt. Baker, around which a huge group of cumulous clouds is rapidly building. The Hooligans pull out a conspiracy theory, not for the first time during our visit. Mt. Baker has erupted, they claim, but the government is keeping it under wraps. We scurry to the liquor store to lay in provisions. Back at the beach house, we drink Lemon Drops, made meticulously by Ray and poured into sugar-rimmed martini glasses, to await our demise, should Mt. Baker actually erupt.

It’s hard to leave the beach house and to see The Hooligans bid each other a fond farewell once again. Elizabeth and Ray are marvelous hosts, and we have been treated like royalty. It’s heartening to see The Hooligans together after all these years, crafting conspiracy theories and bickering their way through jigsaw puzzle races (yes, there was such an event and Ray and Bill now hold the Whidbey Island record for Jigsaw puzzle racing, which is 23 minutes and some change. Elizabeth and I hold the distinction of second place winners. As far as we know there are no other contenders.) Ethan has embraced his new Beach Dog status, barking at the surf and wading into the water to retrieve his ball. Back at the house, he sits on the bulkhead with the Hooligans enjoying the sunset, then crashes on the deck, oblivious to the escalating Hooliganism at the evening wears on.

We wave goodbye as we leave. It’s turned misty and cool and we’re headed to Portland.