Jim Kershner : A bright future, if you’re into heat

The following reverie is titled “A Walk Through Globally Warmed Spokane, Year 2107”:

The leaves are turning as I stroll through another gorgeous day in Riverside State Park. Just look at those fiery reds, those brilliant yellows. Man, I love New Year’s Day! It’s always been the prettiest time of year.

And who knew palm trees could turn such pretty colors? Not to mention banana trees. It’s amazing what science has done with genetic mutations. For more proof, check out my brother-in-law, Arnold! (Just kiddin’, Arnold!)

Anyway, this little stroll along the Spokane Water Aqueduct has always been my New Year’s Day tradition. It boggles my mind to think that the very water gurgling in this giant concrete trough will, in mere days, issue forth from the Giant Overhead Spritzer System in Los Angeles. It gives me a feeling of civic pride to know that our Northwest water is being used for such noble purposes – to cool a great city down to a livable 120 degrees so that the entire infotainment industry won’t have to move to Prince Rupert, B.C., which has been bandied about.

Of course, a large percentage of Los Angeles residents moved up here in the last 10 years or so. The Spokane Valley has been a particularly popular destination. Californians say that, aesthetically speaking, it reminds them of Burbank. The biggest rush came 10 years ago, after the Great California Conflagration. That sad period in American history was sparked by a particularly unfortunate combination of events – an unusually hot summer, a 75-year drought and a carelessly discarded cigarette butt from the last smoker in California, an extremely elderly Sean Penn.

Anyway, a lot of our newer California residents love it up here. They say the climate reminds them of the climate they remember from the old California. Not the nice climate of San Diego or Santa Barbara. More like Needles. Still, it reminds them of home.

I have several other holiday-week traditions. Usually, I go golfing up on Mount Spokane. Ever since they repurposed the old abandoned ski area, it has become one of the top golf destinations in the country. From the tee box on the summit, I swear, you can see Glacier National Park, shining like a white beacon on the horizon. Those would be Glacier’s famous sand dunes.

We often take at least one day and go swimming in Priest Lake. Frankly, though, ever since they drained Coeur d’Alene and Pend Oreille and turned them into ATV parks, Priest has been overcrowded. A guy can hardly find room to water-ski on Priest anymore, especially during Christmas week.

Sometimes we head over to the mouth of the Columbia (near Kennewick) to do a little fishing. The marlin and swordfish runs have been pretty exciting lately. As much as I enjoy those big fish, I sometimes get wistful when I hear the ancient tales of the bounty that once existed in the cool waters of the Northwest.

The other day, I stumbled across an old account, related by Spokane’s long-ago fishing peoples, of trout streaking brightly through the mountain creeks and steelhead racing by the thousands up the Northwest’s streams. As I recounted this tale to my brother-in-law, Arnold, he got a dreamy look on his face and said, “Yes, the native peoples truly do tell wondrous stories of those olden days.”

I said, “Native peoples? Don’t be a dolt, Arnold. This was an account written in 1998 by a white guy in the Spokane suburbs who liked to fly-fish a lot.”

These are the gentle thoughts that tumble through my mind as I stroll past the Memorial Ponderosa Pine Grove in Riverside State Park. The ponderosas have been replaced by eucalyptus most places, but here we have five survivors. Must have been hell for the old-timers, raking all those needles!

Well, it’s about time to head back home. We live in Spokane only in winter now. We spend the rest of our time at a little patch of paradise we call Yellowknife, Northwest Territories.

But darn it, there’s still no better place to live, from Dec. 1 to Jan. 30, than good old Spokane.