Guest Column: A Wistful Look Back Provides Island Wisdom

by Lin McNulty

I have no idea why I remember the date—June 6, 1991; it was to be just another camping trip, after all. My husband and I had made many camping trips around the state and there was no reason to expect this one would be any different—three nights on the ground in a sleeping bag, cozy campfires. It was a Thursday and I was to be back at work on Monday.

When Monday morning came our tent was still pitched at Moran State Park on some landmass called Orcas Island. We did not want to leave. There was some sort of pull, some sort of attachment to this place that was undeniable and mysterious. We renewed our camping spot, and at the end of our allotted ten days, we returned to our house on the mainland only long enough to get clean clothes, spend the night, and come back for another ten days.

Just before our second ten-day stint was up at Moran, someone offered us a place to live for the summer. We paid $50 a month for a one-room octagonal shelter in the middle of a sheep field at Buck Bay, which featured one leg of electricity, no doors or windows, and a lovely outhouse. We showered at the state park. Sunday evenings were spent listening to “Music with Moskowitz” on the radio; life was simple and marvelous and glorious.

By the end of summer, we put renters into our house on the mainland, found some local employment, and a somewhat suitable rental on the north shore for the winter. (It was only somewhat suitable because it was not insulated, having been built as a summer home. The nor’easter should have sent us running back “home.”)

The following summer found us gleefully back in our sheep field. I became accustomed to the strange looks from campers as I again took my showers at Moran and dressed for my office job.

It’s been 20 years. And there has been a lot of water that has washed up on the beach during that time. There are some Orcas truisms that still speak to me:

• If the island likes you it will provide (from Barb the hair dresser who is no longer here).  This has proven itself over many years, as I’ve watched the island “chew” people up and spit them out, sending them back to America.
• Everything you need is here, just maybe not everything you want. I still appreciate the difference, although the internet has changed it somewhat.
• Not everyone can live here. I am constantly grateful for this. It’s crowded enough as it is.
• If you wait long enough everything will come to you on Orcas (from Tom Tillman). I am amazed at how often this is true, and am patiently still waiting for a few things to arrive.
• It’s not important what someone did before they got here, only who they are now. I don’t think anyone has ever asked about the career I had before coming here; it doesn’t matter.

Now to confess my one (and only) regret in the entirety of my life: During that first summer here, Orcas Center presented Godspell. I did not attend, foolishly thinking oh, how good could community theatre possibly be. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. If I could only take it back….