LFS: The Storyteller

©2013 text and photos by LeeZard Monday July 15 It’s time to leave Spokane. I really enjoyed visiting The Lilac City. I’ve been here before, usually on business, and never really had time to drive around. It is mostly a pretty place; the neighborhoods and homes are well kept but frankly, downtown is butt ugly except for its magnificent Riverfront Park along the Spokane River. My next destination is Yellowstone National Park and a few days off to enjoy one of our nation’s great treasures. I do hope, with an improving economy, we can stem the deterioration of all our national parks. It is tragic the way they have fallen into disrepair. Rather than a straight shot to Yellowstone, an eight-hour drive without stops, I will stop tonight in Butte, MT and conduct some interviews there. I quickly cross the state line into Idaho’s beautiful panhandle. I am driving on I-90 because there aren’t very many other highways heading east in this rugged mountainous part of America. ...

©2013 by LeeZard Saturday July 13 My faithful canine companion Trooper and I are tenting about seven miles from downtown Spokane at Riverfront State Park’s equestrian campground. The sites have small corrals for folks traveling with their equine companions, although the campsite is open to all. I decide to start my Spokane experience by interviewing my camping neighbors. Looking at their campsite across the small dirt road from me, Spokane residents Jason, 39-years old, and Susan, 52, look to be doing fine. There is a shiny red late model Ram truck with a bed camper and a trailer for three corralled horses (theirs and one for their nine year old granddaughter). Looks can be deceiving; everything was purchased pre-recession when Jason had full employment as a welder. Susan still works from the home as a medical billing clerk. “It’s affected me a lot,” says Susan. “I make fairly good money but everything has gone up, especially fuel and food. Buying clothe...

©2013 text and photos by LeeZard July 12 – Anacortes, WA to Spokane – 326 Miles The Cascade Mountains divide Washington State in more ways than one. Physically, they are the north-south spine between the densely populated western third of the state – Seattle and the Interstate-5 corridor – and Eastern Washington, the so-called “Inland Empire” that runs all the way into Idaho. The mountains are also called “The Cascade Curtain” because crossing them is like going from one dimension to another. While Washington is called The Evergreen State, most of the evergreens are west of the Cascades. So are most of the liberals, most of the money and most of the votes. The late Democratic Senator Warren Magnuson famously said, “You can see all the votes you need to get elected statewide from the top of Seattle’s Space Needle.” It drives the folks in Eastern Washington crazy. Talking about driving, I left Anacortes this morning for Spokane looking forward to a long, leisurely ...