Hike 11A: Near Northwest

Dear Diary,

This page exists mainly because of how I got to Ballard on January 20 (correction:  January 21).  While there, on January 21 (hence hike 11, but correction:  January 22), I took a few photos related to hygiene for homeless people such as (then) myself, but those won't take long to explain to you, and I could easily have fit them into "Hike 8C", from April 4.  The hike there, however, is part of the story of how I got ready to give up homelessness, and is therefore the main topic here, and what I couldn't find a way to fit into the earlier pages.

I didn't want to go all the way downhill and south to the path I'd taken before, via Fremont and Leary Way.  I had two stops to make - at the Urban Rest Stop's Ballard branch, and at Ballard Commons - both of which are in downtown Ballard.  I knew I couldn't leave Green Lake and Woodland Parks via West Green Lake Way N to N 65th St, but figured I could take Green Lake Way N (note the lack of an initial direction), or maybe Aurora Ave N, I forget, south to N 46th St, and then follow that as it turned into N Market St and finally NW Market St.

The sun had already set when I started, and that's the only explanation I have for what happened next.  You see, dear Diary, from about Palatine Ave N to about Baker Ave NW, along the north sidewalk of Market St, the vegetation on both sides of the sidewalk very often encroaches onto it.  I walked this stretch again a week or two ago to verify by daylight, and someone has obviously cut the overgrowth back for a stretch near Palatine, but in general, it's still visible.  Now, I'm out of the habit of pushing my cart, so maybe I've forgotten how wide it really is, but in any event I can't explain what I experienced that night.

Basically, I thought I was pushing my cart through a jungle that had just about engulfed the sidewalk.  Most of the time, at least one back wheel was on greenery, not pavement.  It was a horrible experience, made more so because under these circumstances the left back wheel found a way to overcome its construction, which should have prevented this, and come into contact with the cart's structure every time it turned, which of course both made noise and slowed me down.

Now, this particular shopping cart is wonderfully designed for homeless users, with sturdy steel spokes so the wheels can stand up to heavy use, sturdy steel frame ditto...  This of course doesn't suit modern manufacturing at all, so they had to build it with planned obsolescence.  After a year or so, the rivets start to come loose.  But they also make the buyer spend money on it more immediately.  The back wheels my first cart came with were so designed that after about 20 miles, they'd start to brush against the structure.  (Replacement wheels sold separately have a simple fix to prevent this.)  Also, if one uses it on four wheels, at about the same distance one of the front wheels flies off its spokes.

The back wheel problem is far more important, so on my second and third carts of this brand, the seller had installed the necessary fix up front and raised the price to compensate.  This is why what the left wheel was doing was, and remains, a mystery to me.  But it meant I had to run the cart on all four wheels for the hiking remaining in January, and you can probably already predict, dear Diary, what consequence that had.

Anyway, finally the overgrowth that so mystifyingly obstructed me ended, and I continued down Market.  At which point I realised that I proposed to sleep in Ballard, a place whose homeless population, like its housed population, strikes me as amazingly entitled and somewhat dangerous.  I finally figured maybe Marvin's Garden would be a safe place to crash.

But on the way I found Bergen Place, which I've maligned so much in the past that I had to go back to Ballard specifically to correct myself.  (In "History and Parks" part II, June 25.)  I'm still not crazy about it, but it has a bunch of well-spaced wooden benches, only two of which were occupied that night, and one of those people got up and left soon after I arrived.  And it's sort of screened from the main street, i.e. Market St.  So I settled in, ate supper, read some, and went to sleep.

So I was in position to meet the appallingly early hours kept by my first target:

The Urban Rest Stop, Ballard branch

As noted in "Hike 8C", the first time I went to Ballard on that hike, I'd dawdled too long trying to economically stimulate Fremont, and all I found was this charity location's closed doors.  The resulting photo is probably as good a postcard shot as I could've taken, so I'll see if I can show it to you again here, dear Diary.

Wow, so many things about writing you are easier on a laptop than on a phone, dear Diary.

Anyway, here's a photo that shows the open door one actually finds if one gets there during its open hours:

Seemed like a nice place, but it never made sense for me to try to shower in Ballard, so I haven't had occasion to deal with it.

Ballard Commons

Ever since I'd found (in "Hike 8C") that the "Portland Loo" actually had a toilet in it, and was not just a fancier "sanican", I'd been dithering over what the word "restroom" means.  I decided that one relevant issue was the sanitiser "sanican"s supply (when it hasn't been stolen).  Since I've until recently always lived far east of Ballard, I've tried never to go there without more than one reason to, and this was the second reason that got me to go do justice to the Urban Rest Stop there.  Does the "Portland Loo" have sanitiser?

Well, it's designed to:

I took another photo, but to be honest can't remember what it's meant to show.

Looks like I was pointing out either that the lock worked, or that it didn't.  Beats me.  It seems there's always a loose end after my every trip to Ballard, and this was this trip's loose end.

Anyway, dear Diary, as I said, not much to these photos.  Tomorrow I'll tell you about the one area left, my home then, the near (i.e., southern) NE.  And there's one park left after that.  Until then, good night.