Sellwood River Park incited a conversation similar to that surrounding my writing on x Butte—this fan-nonfiction on the parks of Portland has the potential to draw attention to, enthusiasm for, and ultimate overuse of this fine site, thereby becoming a kind of eulogy for what it attempted to celebrate. So how does one share literary love for a place while preserving the wendigo, so to speak?
In the case of x Butte, I decided to let it go unnamed, to turn the physical place into an unrooted universal story of any place that could reflect our shared history. In the case of Sellwood Riverfront Park, the park lot is consistently full on a sunny day, and I don’t think it would be a huge tragedy if cyclists used it as a destination or detour on Springwater Corridor adventures. As you can see from this picture this past August, the place is already overrun by dogs:
I tried for too long this morning to find I picture I had seen on the internet two days ago when writing about Oaks Bottom. It was from a story about how darn nice it is outside for it being January, which maybe was taken down when they realized that didn’t count as journalism. The photo was taken just southeast from the dock depicting a family sitting with their feet in the water while in the foreground THERE IS A CROUCHED 8-YEAR-OLD BOY LAUNCHING A GODDAMNED TOY SAILBOAT INTO THE MINIATURE HARBOR CREATED BY THE RIGHT ANGLE OF THE DOCK. You can see why I am frustrated by the inability to locate this picture. Here’s a picture of the dock on a less special occasion. I hope you can forgive me. I understand if you can’t.
Not only is the beach west facing, meaning you can swim and dry in the late-afternoon heat, it is slightly south facing, which is important this time of year, and most of the year really. This is a fantastic place to read slightly utopian, anti-capitalist ideas of urban planning. The city is a decentralized school, and our access to its fruits is a fluid constant process of aware being, everybody!
But really none of this matters—all of this feet-on-the-ground, clothes-on-the-skin distraction—we are here on the precipice of this constant freshwater flow, whose upriver molecules drain from the south, run-off from a u of o student’s umbrella interacting with Mount Jefferson snowmelt. Why remain here with words in our hands, preoccupations of the new neo-colonialism, the sun beating down, and confusion proliferating. As WCW wrote, Those who led yesterday wish to hold their sway a while longer. It is not difficult to understand their mood. They have their great weapons to hand: “science,” “philosophy” and most dangerous of all “art.”
Meanwhile, Williams informs us, SPRING, which has been approaching for several pages, is at last here.
However imagined all of this might be, however popular this beach may become, however removed from the river you might feel, the water is there. Swim in it already.
And don’t leave any trash or invite any assholes.
An Unauthorized Guide to the parks of the world 