Remember, we will return to our usual programming on March 27; meanwhile, I am publishing SBH rhapsodies twice a day, for my own delight.
Sunday, 15 March 2015
I had a hard time sleeping because the Steinbeck room was too hot, and I’ve never been able to get the windows open in there. I’d forgotten about the thermostat. As soon as I remembered, at three AM, that I could turn the heat off in that room, all was so much better! Allan, who is not an insomniac, slept better than I did. Because a delicious breakfast is served in the Tables of Content till ten AM each morning, we were up at the early-for-us hour of nine AM. We walked around the outside of the hotel to get to the dining room; that’s easier for me than going down that last flight of stairs.
view from the Tables of Content
assorted pastries, fruit, cereal, fruit juices, and a hot entree
Today’s breakfast: scrambled eggs and brocollini, delicious.
flowers by the door
As I took the above photo after breakfast, I realized I had committed a faux pas by sitting at table updating the Discover Ilwaco Facebook page on my phone (something I do daily); even with all the sound off, it probably was not proper in an “electronics free dining room” (see sign to the right). Oops.
A big storm was due in the early afternoon, so Allan left after breakfast to try to race ahead of it home to Ilwaco. My friend of 37 years, Carol, would be driving down I-5 to Corvallis and then across to the coast, so she would miss most of the wind by being inland. You can see some photos from Allan’s drive in a previous entry.
I stopped to pet Shelly on my way to the third floor.
I went up to the library and sat by the north window with a cup of tea from the library kitchenette, a pile of library journals, and a rainy view.
ever changing view
houses to the northeast
looking down at a garden that I always admire from that window.
garden detail, telephoto
Soon there were only two hardy souls on the beach, walking bent over, as the wind picked up to 70 mph gusts with 100 mph on the headlands. I looked around at other readers in the library when the building shook, as one does when there is turbulence on an airplane, to see if others were disconcerted by the buffeting. Everyone looked calm. I had always wanted to be at the hotel in a storm so it was a dream come true for me. I divided my attention between the view and the journals, where I found other entries about being there in a storm.
“The weather has been threatening, but surprisingly wild for the last two days. We enjoyed several beach walks, tide pool explorations, and the outdoor pool and hot tub at Otter Crest. Today, the weather really turned. High winds and lots of rain made it uncomfortable to be outside. The hotel swayed and twisted in the wind. Water came in through all available openings. A perfect day to curl up and just enjoy. There is never a bad day on the Oregon coast—you just have to find the right place for the conditions! I can’t remember when I have been so awestruck by the power of the ocean. High tides and high winds are an amazing combination. A little fear helps amplify the feeling of getting away from the normal routine.”
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“Speaking of storms, two nights ago, the whole building was shaking in 60-70 mph winds. They records 100+ mph from some spots in Newport, and a friend in Portland said it made the ABC national news as a ‘hurricane’. It was VERY exciting, and as the building has been here for 85 years, no one was really worried.“
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“It was very cold, wet and windy when we arrived. An inn cat escorted us to the Melville room on the third floor. How perfect—we appreciated the author, loved the room and theme, the windows looking out to sea. As we sat in the library, the wind battered this 88 year old building, the windows shuddered but held their ground.
“We slipped into the ancient wood bed at 11 PM. The crescendo of wind, waves and rain began to shake the building a bit off its foundation. Bob slept deeply… I could not sleep. Was the Melville room haunted? How long could this elderly building resist the wind and sea’s battering?
“The next morning, there was light bright blue sky….”
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“There is a bit of a blow coming up this morning and the waves are coming to shore with an unnatural urgency. The wind has picked up in the last half hour, making the building shudder as the gusts hit. I can understand why some guests are unnerved by the sensation. But I’m glad these timbers flex and give a little in stormy weather. That’s what has helped the Gilmore/Sylvia to survive this long.”
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“The first storm of the winter rocked the building as one of the caretakers said ‘Like an old ship creaking on the sea’. The heat and crackling of the fire in the library provided a cozy counterbalance to the stark sound of hissing rain and thundering waves. Both the town and our stay at Sylvia Beach have been idyllic.”
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About the reality of storms for fisherfolk: “3/16/93 Three wonderful days in Melville, sharply tempered by the stark realization that people still go ‘down to the sea in ships’. High seas leaving grim reminder on the shore that a once proud 42 ft boat was splintered and torn by a rogue wave. The mighty deep has shown its power once again.“
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about someone longing to stay here in a storm: “The weather was so fantastic that we didn’t full advantage of this charming room or the comfortable library. The food was superb. The atmosphere was friendly and relaxing. Next time we’ll schedule a winter storm so that we can cozy up inside and enjoy the full value of the Sylvia Beach Hotel.” (Even the best weather won’t get me out of the hotel if there are journals to read, but I do have the advantage of already living by the seashore. Although I like the Newport beach better because people don’t drive vehicles on it like they do on the Long Beach Peninsula.)
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Bad weather is the best weather to be here. Here is someone after my own heart: “Beautiful weather, almost too good to stay in the library. However, we did. The weekend was a success in spite of the weather being so nice.“
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All weather is good at the SBH but I do think that stormy weather is the best.
“Friends noted dourly that the weather outlook was not positive for this weekend, but they just don’t know what a weekend at the SBH represents. Rainy, foggy, windy, sunny, clear, or cloudy…no matter. Our hosts will be gracious, the company at dinner will be good, the food excellent, and we’ll learn about a new author.”
fewer beach walkers…
I found another entry about someone learning to love reading:
Dec 29 1987 “Being here at this hotel makes me think I have never really appreciated literature. I have always blown off any suggestions on reading some of the world’s classic books. I now realize that I have missed out on a lot since I am only 14. I feel I still have time to start to read the classics. This hotel has been an awakening to my mind to explore the world through books. I am no longer afraid to delve into the unknown.” In the evening, I read that to Carol, who made it her mission to read the classics (Dickens, et al) at age 40 or 50! I still haven’t, unless Margaret Drabble and Iris Murdoch and Barbara Pym and PG Wodehouse count.
Here’s a hilarious entry regarding the hotel cat (before Shelly): “I came to the Sylvia Beach Hotel to renew my spirit. But once again I find myself being emotionally exploited. When we are apart, I’m a perfectly rational person. But when he is around, I lose all self respect and try to please him.
“He never shows appreciation for my efforts. He shuns all public displays of affection. I keep telling myself that next time, I’ll treat him as he treats me.
“It never works. As soon as I see him my resolve melts.
“I have no shame left.
“This morning, he found my room here and demanded entrance. The door was barely closed before my bed contained both of us. What can I do? (After all, it IS Jersey’s hotel.)”
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In my continuing quest for enlightenment and companionship in the journals, I found some good advice from someone who had bought a photo album and… “I didn’t put photos in it. I brought out the birthday cards and valentine’s cards that I had received over the years where people had written something personal; something about me for which they were grateful. I cut out the writings and put them in the album. If I liked the front picture of the card, I included it, too. Now when my father’s voice comes welling up out of my memory, berating me, punishing me, I think of my album. I hold it. I open it. I have created my own voice to remind me of who I am in my heart, to remind me of what others see in me, to replace the voice of my father.” This tied in very well with my efforts to counter the mean voices that I had heard in my head while working in Long Beach on Friday.
the middle and south end of the library, which I had to myself at midday as people departed for home.
At a bit after noon, I was able to check into the Herman Melville room, which is right off the library.
the view from the bedside window
Melville reading nook
These bookshelves hold a treasure: years worth of Melville room journals going back to 1987.
I read them all.
on the top shelf of the glassfront cupboard
bed, reading nook; In most of the rooms, the bathrooms don’t have room for the sink because the tub and toilet are fitted into the old closet.
the mirror….used to be curvy, but that one got broken so now it is plain flat glass.
Herman Melville room back in 1991 when the bed was known as the Great White Bed
Journal entries used to sometimes complain about the difficulty of shaving in the old mirror. This response gave me a revelation about one reason why I feel so relaxed here at the hotel: “This is a wonderful room… We like the mirror—it adds character—not to mention the unpretentiousness of the SBH—who care what you look like!!!?”
Alice Walker (one of the authors who has a room here) had something to say about being judged for appearance, as quoted in a later journal entry: “He’s getting fat for sure, but he’s still slim compared to me. I’ll never see three hundred pounds again and I’ve just about said (excuse me) fuck it. I got to thinking about it one day an’ I thought aside from the fact that they say it’s unhealthy, my fat ain’t never been no trouble. Mens always have loved me. My kids ain’t never complained. Plus they’s fat. And fat like I is I look distinguished. You see me coming and know somebody’s THERE.” Alice Walker ‘Nineteen fifty-five’ YOU CAN’T KEEP A GOOD WOMAN DOWN! A journal reader adds to the page: “Thank god! WOMEN—it is a political act of liberation to love yourself, including your body.” (And I add that if you want some information about the allegedly unhealthiness of being fat, read a book by Paul Campos called The Obesity Myth.)
These guests were funny and comfortable in themselves:
The location of the Melville room is so convenient to the library that it inspired some journal entries:
“It becomes the Melville suite after 11 PM each night, complete with large living room, fireplace, and kitchen.“
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“We love the Melville room and allow some of our closest friends (fellow hotel guests) to share our sitting room, also known as the library. Several projects got done during these windy and stormy Christmas days. The room’s slight starboard list suits Melville fine.”
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“At first I thought it would be awkward to pass through the common living room (library) on the way to our private room. However, it turned out to be advantageous. The quiet souls in the library who either glanced up briefly from their books or paid no attention to us at all became part of the comfortable and friendly ambience, and there were several times when we had the library all to ourselves, our own private living room—the pay-off for having to share it the rest of the time. Goody’s lesson is about sharing anyway and it all just makes sense and felt good after the first moments of doubt.”
I had a moment of enlightenment there: Wow, Goody’s lesson is about SHARING, and much as I think of the hotel as an introvert’s retreat. it does cause more interaction with strangers than any other part of my life, probably even more than gardening in downtown Long Beach.
Even though I wanted to sit in the Melville reading nook, his room was more sheltered from the thrilling storm, so I returned to the library.
in the kitchenette….I make myself more tea. I want a boiling water faucet like this.
Up to the very tip top attic I went, where the pipes were clanging and juddering. I made a little video which you can see here on the Sylvia Beach Hotel Lovers Facebook page. It somewhat captures the noise in the attic, but it was even louder with some whumping noises from the roof, right after which some roof tiles flew past the north window where I sat myself down.
north window by the attic pipes, two blue chairs, coziest reading spot in the whole hotel
attic view to the north, with tea (Earl Grey, hot)
one of the two clanging, rattling pipes and another hotel guest at the south end of the attic
a beautiful journal page
and an entry from someone who loves the journals like I do
a writer’s postcard
A new journal theme emerged for me this time: people who are reminded of the homes of their aunts or their grandmas:
6-10-95 “I think the reason why the Sylvia Beach feels so comfortable is because it reminds me of my grandparents house in Spokane. Lots of books and outdated 50s furniture. It really IS like a second home.”
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4-18-06 “My sister and I are on a road trip one on one for a few days to catch up. Neither of us had been to the Sylvia Beach Hotel. What a delight in the unpretentious character and style. It reminded me of my grandmother’s turn of the century house in Corvallis. It took us back to a place of our youth that had unique memories we hadn’t shared in over 50 years. I’ll be back with my wife.”
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June 18, 1991: ” There truly is a sense of magic about the SBH. I feel like I’ve just spent a night in my grandmother’s house!”
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October 2, 2004: “Deep sleep is possible here. Feels like someone’s old auntie’s house, a treasured connection. All those peering faces from old photographs framed…”
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April 17, 2014: “My first impressions were of visiting my grandmother’s house oh so many years ago. Always comfortable and welcoming with warm and friendly people to talk with. We will definitely come back.”
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“Like returning to my great-aunt Avis’s house, from many years ago—as a child I played there, running up the wide staircase, falling into big stuffed chairs to read on rainy afternoons, sounds of voices downstairs, or pulling a book out of the filled bookshelves, one that called to me, finding it was just the one I needed.“
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Another theme that caught my attention was age; because I was at the hotel to turn 60, I was encouraged to see many people older than I writing in the journals. Here are some I found over the next five days:
Age 60 (my age!!): June 11, 2008: “One year ago today R had a total hip replacement at age 60. Wow, what a shock to learn that if you don’t do this extreme remedy, you won’t be able to climb stairs or walk up the sand dunes! Where did that young, strong body go? We talk about this—we were always the youngest person at our jobs—now all of a sudden (or so it seems) we are among the oldest! The second half of life is upon us. Life looks different now. There is an urgency to ‘be here now’ and live life to the fullest. This room was a wonderful way to do just that. We are trying to live our lives in a very passionate, purposeful way.”
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I felt my age intensely when trying to get up from the very low blue chair by the attic window; I had to roll, and crawl past the pipe to find a table to pull myself up with, while hoping no one from the library looked up through the railing and saw my pitiful efforts. I was glad I could make it up to Melville when I read this entry: “I stayed in Melville before—found my entry back in 1991! My knees no longer like the stairs so tomorrow I will move to Dr. Seuss.”
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I remember reading a most poignant entry about someone who realized it would be her last stay as she could no longer make it up to the third floor library. I also read this time of a woman and her grandma who made it up to the library via the back stairs: April 24, 2002 1:30 AM “Couldn’t stop reading. Must get to sleep but I don’t want to miss anything. Mom (age almost 85) and I (just turned 60) came to experience SBH. She with her walker and I with my crutches (arthritis) made it to the library (via the back stairs). It was worth the effort. I didn’t want to come down. What a fabulous view.”
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Age 62: “I’m enjoying looking AT the beach as my knees refuse to walk one step further than downstairs and up!”
My friend Destiny tipped me off about using the back stairs, where one does not have to feel one is slowing quicker people down.
It was reassuring to see that it is not unusual to have aches and pains at 60 or 62. And even more reassuring to see people coming back in their 70s and 80s, although I lack any prospect of children or grandchildren to bring me here.
Age 63: “How did I get this old? I’m sure I was 20 something just last week.”
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Age 63, Sept 17, 2012: “It’s my birthday! Odd to say to others that I was born in 1949. I mean that is like another world. I remember all black cars, heavy black phones with stiff cords in little cubbies on the wall, laying near the RCA combo radio, tv and hi fi. I remember the 1st tv in our house with 2 channels and Howdy Doodie, Sky King, and I Love Lucy. ….Mind you, my father is still alive at age 95, born in 1917. I was there before xerox and computers and when we all took photos on flash bulb Kodaks and film. My, how things have changed to link us all to the present. Well, here at Sylvia, we get to step back some, take a breath, see where we have come from.” Wow, I feel mighty old when I realize I remember all those things, too.
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Age 65, Sept 22, 2013: “I wake in this room and want to leave my record here with the many who also were here. I feel part of a legion yet all to myself. It is clear others come here for rest, renewal, reassessment. I feel part of that company yet the experience is both mine and shared. This is my first morning of another chapter. I can’t see as well as I used to, but in my heart, I’m seeing just fine. It took a long time to find myself and contentment.”
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Age 67, Sept 8, 2011: “In reading through all the journals in this room, I find my own life experiences connected to you all and interwoven with all the thoughts and comments written through all the years of youth, young love, times of doubt and questioning ‘What’s it all about’, to the celebration now of senior happiness and contentment at age 67 and yet still open to change and new ideas and wonderment and aliveness, knowing this Now is everything—having made peace with the past, having stopped worrying about the ‘unknowable future’. Take heart, dear readers, no matter what age, life is a banquet.”
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Age 75: “I am celebrating my 75th birthday. How quickly time flies by, but how wonderful life is when there is love. My husband and I have shared over 56 years together. Looking back, there is little I’d change. It’s a wonderful life. It has been a lovely weekend here. The sunshine, beach, and blue ocean are waiting for us to walk the beach. Don’t want to waste a minute.”
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Age 80 plus: “Both my husband and I are octogenarians. We were not able to walk the beach and weather the wind—but still we had a marvelous time. The only regret I have is that we did not know about this place 20 or 30 years ago, but I suppose, after all, it did not exist the way it is today.”
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Age 84, March 13, 2015 (the latest Steinbeck room entry): “This hotel is unique! The food is fabulous and plentiful, the view outstanding, the other guests are fascinating, etc etc etc. Thanks for your courtesy and generosity and for the chance to rediscover John Steinbeck, whom I haven’t thought of in years. (I’m 84.) But in spite of my neglect, he has reappeared in my life as a hero!”
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Age 86: “…awake and renewed. Breakfast with new friends Nessa and Eva, her mom, 86 years young, reminds me how warm and inviting the world can be, Thank you, SBH, for inviting me!”
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Age 86, August 24, 2000: “What better place to spend time hanging out with my favourite person…my Mom….who turned 86 this past April. If I am 1/2 the quirky, elegant, loving and intelligent woman that she is when I am 86, I will be forever grateful.”
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on aging, from an Oscar Wilde room journal: “My daughter (my travel companion for this visit) reminded me of Dorian Gray’s oval mirror. Ah, sometimes I think about the loneliness of aging—but it will never compare to the loneliness I experienced as a youth. Sometimes I think about the ugliness of the physical aging process, but it can’t compare to the fragileness of the prepubescent years, the metamorphasis from the ugly caterpillar to the graceful butterfly. I am grateful for all that I have learned (still believing there is so much more I need to learn) and never ever would I want to turn back the clock—good grief, look how long it has taken me to get comfortable in my own skin.”
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I wish I had met the fascinating Edna, an elderly woman who used to stay for weeks each summer in the 1990s (the decade when I did not visit at all after 1991). One lucky person who wrote, “Last week we met Edna, who comes here every summer for two months and has just told me that she will be coming for 10 weeks next summer. What fun to talk with each other and share opinions, stories, and thoughts. I look forward to seeing her again.” I missed out on Edna who used to “dress for dinner”and regale the table with her stories. Why did I miss all those years? Well, I had a dog, Bertie Woofter, and I had a spouse who was not well suited to the quiet life of the SBH.
Carol, my friend of 37 years, arrived in the very late afternoon as the storm died down. We took up our residence in the Melville room’s reading nook for awhile. She had brought six presents for my birthday, one for each decade. What a clever idea; I wish I’d thought of it for her 60th, which had been the previous June.
presents waiting for tomorrow
view from the reading nook
While I am at the hotel, I try not to leave it. I learned years ago that every time I do, I wish I had stayed in. A journaler writes of discovering this: 7-21-88 “This is my second visit to SBH. Last time I was here—only about a month ago—I was in the Jane Austen room. This time, we spent more time away from the SBH, went down to the Bayfront. Upon returning, I wondered why I had left! It is so much more pleasant here, just walking on the beach, reading in the ‘sitting room’ . Next time I come here, I am staying close.” I’ve had the experience of visiting with friends who want to go out and DO STUFF. I love Carol for being happy to go out by herself for her walks and excursions.
The exception is going to Nana’s Irish Pub for dinner, which Carol and I did soon after she arrived. She did not feel up to Two Truths and a Lie (the dinner game at the hotel’s Tables of Content restaurant) after her six plus hour drive from Seattle. (I must admit my ideal trip would include dinner at the hotel every night.)
I had been looking forward to the curry pie…as good as I remembered from last autumn.
Celtic Curry Pie at Nana’s Irish Pub
After dinner, Carol and I watched the sunset from the library.
My camera did not want to focus on the after dusk view to the lighthouse on the north, so here is an impressionistic version.
We savoured the hot spiced wine that is served in the libary kitchen at ten PM and I immersed myself in journals till one AM while Carol read a book.
Carol’s reading choice: The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
“It seems that we often forget to slow down and just enjoy until we run into a peaceful haven like this that almost demands you to do so. Sat in the library and read 10 years of people doing what I am now. Only a quiet room, a large bed, and the peaceful quiet to tie as all together.”
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“At last, a place where I can open a book, dive deeply into the sentences, become totally immersed in the fantasy and not feel that I should be out mowing the lawn, cooking supper for the wife, or feeding the cats. At last, a theme park for sedentary introverts.” (That entry amused me because Allan mows the lawn, cooks supper, and feeds the cats while I work on this blog!)
The Herman Melville journals contain an ongoing story of two star-crossed lovers who met at the hotel, returned alone, left notes to each other, and finally reunited…and then the story ended. Writers in the journals of the following years often mention that romance and wonder what happened. One person suggested that when the two were able to communicate via the internet, the secret romance probably became less difficult to arrange.
11-21-04: “Thank you Sylvia Beach for the wonderful quiet and rest. The rain and the sea noise, the chance to be innocently unaware of the time. Thanks to all who have shared their experiences in these journals…especially [the two star crossed lovers of the Melville journals]; I hope your story continues to be as exciting as the entries you have left.”
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“The 19th anniversary of the Sylvia Beach Hotel. What an honor! We enjoyed the quiet as well as the conversation. And of course the journals…. the only frustration being that some of the journals are missing. Having followed the saga of [the star-crossed lovers] for five years until Sept 7, 1997, imagine our chagrin to find the promised next entry of July 1, 1997 missing! There must be at least two books gone. Now we we’ll never know if they found each other.” Fortunately for me, the missing journal was in the room when I stayed there.
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Nov 25: 2006: “I’ve just spent the past hour reading about 2 Melville guests—a chance meeting in 1991, a series of solo returns and entries, hoping to meet, hoping to see each other again. Now I want to know—did you meet? Did you find what you were looking for? I wish you both happiness and peace—I’ll be thinking about your story, your words, for a long time to come.”
I had read some of the Melville entries before, when the room was empty and I was able to take some of the journals into the library. In the late quiet night, I found again my favourite entry of all, by a woman named Robyn.
“So many ghosts are present here. This is the first time since 1962 that I have been back. As a child we stayed next door at the Gilmore Apts—a shabby companion to the old Gilmore Hotel (now the Sylvia Beach Hotel). The apt. house fell victim to the 1962 storms but the tips of the foundations are still visible from the beach. In those old days the little sea cottages were nearby, and a skating rink (now a parking lot) and the tiny business block which used to include a salt water taffy store, a cheap shell souvenir shop and a mom and pop grocery. How odd it is to hold the memory of what should be visible: I am the only one left of that little group who traveled to visit Mrs. Gilmore in the late 50s. Tonight I hung my car phone out of window of the Herman Melville room so my mom in Idaho could hear the surf at her old Newport Beach. She cried and so did I, for time past, family gone, and some things eternal—like this ocean that buffets this dear old hotel still.”
Time and again I have read this entry and it still makes me cry.
I love finding notes by Destiny, who I met here at breakfast several years ago and who is as obsessed with the journals as I am:
She’s hoping to get writers to fill the blank journals in order, but it’s a lost cause as lately rooms often have two journals running at once, and the library has become random with people filling in blank pages.
We live in hope.
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