OREGON BLUES ON A FATHER / SON DAY

Oregon blues are a different blues. I blame the clouds.

But no clouds on Waterfront Blues Festival Saturday, which is why I wore a rash-guard hoodie instead of layers of sunscreen.

It was a no cloud Saturday awash in family time:

I counted fifteen couples who had to be fathers and sons.

Sixteen including me.

No, I didn’t ask, “Are you a father and a son like me and mine?”

From appearances, age difference, and twinsy outfits I’m confident about the family ties.

(My kid also wore a rash-guard hoodie for the twinsy copycat and good sense award.)

It felt awesome and wholesome and we’re all wearing “BUD LIGHT, ENJOY RESPONSIBLY” bracelets along with a walking beer.

I got a Stella so I was walking in Belgium? Then it was Ten Barrel to stay grounded in Portland.

Two main stages pulled the crowd from one side of the field to the other like a big blues magnet.

Bands were either going full blast, or getting set up for the next show.

The walking beer made the journey both ways and then some.

Walking Beer Bathrooms

In past times the blues festival bathrooms under the Hawthorne bridge had a Men’s side and a Women’s side.

I was there with my wife one year while she waited in line on the women’s side. No line on the men’s side.

She went over to the men’s side.

It felt revolutionary. She just walked down a line of port-o-potties with guys going in and coming out until she found an empty one.

My wife the ground breaker.

No concerned men rushed to save her from herself and her obviously misguided judgement for using the men’s side instead of standing in line on the women’s.

If they had, what would my response be? What’s my move?

What’s your move?

Now we don’t need to ponder what we’d do if our wives are roughed up and manhandled for using the wrong bathroom, or like Kathrine Switzer in the Boston Marathon.

How To Oregon Blues In Portland

If you drive in for a single day ticket don’t park on the streets near the concert.

They are all two hour spaces and you can’t increase the time because once you leave the festival you can’t get back in.

At least that’s now I understood it.

So the choice is either a parking ticket, a parking garage with uncertain rates, or heading further west of the river.

I say uncertain rates because of the time I got charged triple what I expected for parking in the wrong garage.

My move the time?

I drove up to SW 13th and Jefferson for a five hour spot. The 405 lays in a ditch between 13th and 14th.

Is it too far? No. Besides, it’s all downhill.

The first thing that caught my interest on the walk down was an open church door.

I’m out on an Oregon blues day with my guitar playing son and we’re meeting the rest of his band?

I know what’s going on in that church.

You get the spirit, walk past an array of city towers, open space parks, and then you’re ready for Oregon blues and a walking beer.

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How did it end? One of the four guys had to get back home for his babysitter.

Another was staying to the last song.

I was leaving after the next set.

My kid decided to stay after checking in with his home front.

Later he texted me to say I missed the best shows of the day, which is my normal.

Since I was on my designated driver drinking schedule I stopped at my neighborhood taproom on the way home.

A man came out of the gambling machine room with a ticket.

He’d just set the record for the house with a $3500 jackpot.

“Rounds for everyone on me,” he said.

He put in $50 on a lucky Saturday.

Luckier than someone who put in eight hours mingling with music fans?

Luckier than parents who do things with their kids?

I shook his hand for good luck then went into the taproom casino and put every dollar in my wallet on the same machine that hit for him?

No, I said thank you and went home to tell my wife everything she missed out on.

What did I miss? I missed spending the day with her and wanted her to know it.

And yet it was still a family day.

Oregon blues are different.

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The last stop at the Waterfront Blues Festival?

The Front Porch Stage with the Zydeco dance lesson.

Where do three guys find a dance spot?

Not on the perimeter.

That’s for the travel dancers, not the Louisiana Shuffle of four steps to the right, four to the left, one right, one left, quarter left, four steps right to start over.