It’s been a minute, Spokane

When I was 17 years old, I entered into contract to join the United States Air Force. I had to have my dad sign with me. By the time I graduated high school, I was 18 and off I went to San Antonio, Texas, where all Air Force Basic Trainees go. My first duty station was in the tiny town of Airway Heights just outside of Spokane, Washington, which was a disappointment because all my life I had been dreaming of going far, far away. Spokane (pronounced spoh KAN, named after the Spokane Tribe) was the closest big city to my home. It’s where we went school clothes shopping, and where the big hospital was. My dream had been to go to another country, but nearly any other city in the United States would have made me happier than going to a city I already knew well.

When I finally did leave Spokane, I went to Alaska, then Colorado, and other than passing through a hundred times on the freeway, I never stopped there again until a couple weeks ago. One of Pedro’s favourite bands was going to be in concert. My brother, Tanner, and niece, Bruce (actually Megan, but Bruce is my nickname for her) would meet us there.

We arrived a day early, to make the most of catching up and spending time together. On the day of the concert, we had many hours to kill. The first thing I wanted to do was try to get on base. I wasn’t even sure they would let me, let alone bring my whole family. But…easy peasy. We pulled in at the gate and after one look at my military ID, the man smiled, waved us in, and wished us a good day.

After looking at the aircraft on display, we moved to the runway and Base Operations, adjacent to the meteorology office, since that’s where I worked when I lived here. Things have changed (it has been 36 years after all) and I was not perfectly sure which door was the one I used to enter each day. Military buildings at this base are nondescript and similar to each other. I looked then for the scene I remembered clearly after all these years: the B52s lined up on the tarmac beside the runway. When I was working in meteorology in the Air Foce, I was required to physically step outside a minimum of once per hour to put eyes on the sky.

Next we went to try and find where I had lived. I couldn’t remember anything about the dormitory, except the direction I walked to the chow hall from my room. So we found the chow hall first (Air Force leaders insisted that we call it “dining facility,” but we never did), parked, and walked from there.

The buildings are exactly as old as my memories. When I first arrived at this base, there was no room for me and I was stuck into an embarrassingly decrepit bunker. A few months later, construction was complete on the buildings above, and I was among the very first group to move in. The rooms were classy and so easy to clean for inspections.

I couldn’t think of any thing else to see on the base, and I was aware that the boring buildings were not as thrilling to everyone else as they were to me. I noticed the young, enlisted people on base and thought about how the world was different. For one, when I was here, the US had not been in a war since Vietnam. The Airmen we saw had lived during US wars their entire lives.

Though my family had been to Spokane before, they were not aware of Riverfront Park. In my opinion, it’s the best thing about the city. They all agreed to head into the city. Spokane has been looking more and more tired over the decades. There are some shiny, appealing places in town, and there are lots of beautiful old buildings, but much of it seems underfunded and neglected. I recall it being like this when I lived here.

Riverfront Park is a gem, however. It’s based on a peninsula and an island in the center of town, so there are water views and bridges all around. It exposes the natural landscape here, which contains picturesque rock formations, and waterfalls. Soaring above it all is the eye-catching United States Pavilion tower that remains from the World Expo ’74, an international exposition held in Spokane, Washington, from May 4 to November 3, 1974. It was the first World’s Fair with an environmental theme.

The ’74 Expo focused on humans’ environmental impact, and one of the installations that was a hit was the garbage goat. I had put garbage into the goat’s mouth as a child, and I was eager to find it again.

A button mounted in the basalt wall behind the goat is pressed, and that turns on a vacuum that runs for a minute. Then, any piece of trash held before the mouth of the goat gets sucked into the goat’s belly. I recall that when I was little, there was no trash to be found around the goat, due to all the little kids running around picking it up to feed the goat. It remains true today, and we watched a dad digging a piece of paper out of his pocket and tearing a portion for his little boy to put into the goat.

The SkyRide is brand new and I was eager to get on board. However, it was stopped due to maintenance. They asked us to check back in an hour. So we wandered around the park before trying the SkyRide again.

Repairs completed, we were able to climb into a capsule and take a ride over the river. We gazed down upon a pretty city plaza, some art honoring the region’s Native heritage, and views of the power plant infrastructure. And more bridges, of course.

It had been a full, fun day already, but we were hungry and the concert was yet ahead of us. We went back to our Vrbo in Airway Heights, and got ready.

We could look out across the field and see the casino that was hosting the concert. We left Bruce to herself and we went to the casino to gamble. I mean, we were at a casino!

We collected Bruce, and all walked over to the concert because we planned to drink and didn’t want to have to worry about safely driving back. I found the counter to pick up our tickets, and passed an interesting corridor inside the casino and stopped to take a photo. Then the table and chairs next to me caught my eye and I remembered blogger Bushboy, who has reminded me to take photos of chairs. I finally remembered. Here you are Brian:

We were there to see Dead Poet Society, who was opening for Chevelle. The guys also like Asking Alexandria, who was the second opening band. I had never heard of any of those bands, but I’m always happy for an opportunity to do something Pedro wants to do, because he constantly does stuff I want to do.

The concert was a total blast. I enjoyed all the music though it was new to me. It was a great venue. Though outside during the Autumn, the weather was lovely. We spent a second night at the Vrbo, and in the morning, tidied the place, stripped the sheets, ran the dishwasher, and hugged goodbye. They drove 2 hours home to Montana and we drove 6 hours home to Oregon in time to meet his twins, who came to the house as soon as they got out of class.