Bisbee and Elliot

The Oregonians in our family--
I cannot say, "Oregonian" without wondering at what a strange word it is--came to see us in Tucson, not so much because the sun shines here, but because the sun keeps forgetting where Oregon is.

The plane with Daniel and Eliza and our newest grand-daughter, Elliot, came into Arizona trailing fog like a crop duster, sharing Pacific Northwest humidity with the whole Southwest.

Going to Bisbee was first on our agenda. "Bisbee" is a real town, a very old town, a town once made famous for its copper ore; lots and lots of copper ore. Today it is a thriving arts town, having taken occupation of what copper magnates built when copper was king. The stone-working skill of immigrant miners is everywhere. We five stayed at what had once been a grand, old hotel: The Copper Queen.

It was not in the plan, but we bounced between the downhill-side annex to the main building itself. Renovation of the main building edged us out of the old building, and a plumbing leak moved us to the Queen itself, or herself.

With the help of the Federal government--Do you remember when we believed the government ought to be active in building a better nation?--helped finance the repair of the mine so that people could tour the mine. More than a million people have gone down into those seemingly endless mine shafts and tunnels.

Bisbee was built for pedestrian traffic. The hillsides are steep. The old high school, for instance, was four stories high, with a ground level entrance on each floor.

On our last visit to Bisbee, a thunderstorm turned Main Street into a river, something like a bobsled run for running water, but this time we maneuvered our way on the edge of shirtsleeve and sweater weather, with sun.

Elliot, especially, was impressed. She speaks in whole sentences, you know, with proper intonation, but with a vocabulary that eludes all of us. We worried, the whole time, that when we were stopped by Border Patrol, that she might say something and be deported as a glib alien, but who could not talk English good like the rest of us.

Bisbee is a delight, as is Elliot. A treasure is a treasure! Elliot is still talking about what she saw and learned, I think.

Comments

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