331: I STOOD ON THE THRESHOLD OF HEAVEN, AND OH WHAT A VIEW

Within minutes after my photographer’s alarm rang at 6:00am on Saturday July 12, 2025, Tom prepared to take on the day, and his wife wasn’t too far behind. From my position on the living room table where I had spent the night in the basement of our Bellevue, Washington VRBO rental, I heard some banging and cussing – and the noises were coming from the postage stamp-sized bathroom. I couldn’t help but laugh to myself because nothing spells disaster quicker than a fat man in an extremely small bathroom.

For the first time on the trip, Vicki had a bounce in her step and a smile on her face – which surprised me that early in the morning. Funny thing was, she reminded me of myself and the feeling I get when the first site of the day is a Presidential gravesite or home. But that obviously wasn’t the case for my photographer’s wife. Vicki was tingling with excitement over the fact the three of us were meeting up with her cousin, Kelly Frye, for breakfast at Lil’ Jon’s Restaurant. Kelly has lived in the Seattle area for her entire life, and it had been roughly thirty years since the two cousins have seen each other.

I had met Kelly’s sister, Kim Johnson, numerous times in Texas and have grown quite fond of her, even though she’s a gun-toting, Trump loving, Liberal hating, through-and-through MAGA disciple. As for Kelly, who is now 62 years old, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. I had heard Vicki’s cousin has been deemed an old soul, even in her younger days, and has always been somewhat rebellious. And that was cool – I consider myself a hell-raising bobble head in my own right.

I also figured there was a chance Kelly might be on the opposite end of the political spectrum from her sister Kim, which didn’t surprise me since the state of Washington is nationally known for its liberal beliefs. At the end of the day, none of that mattered. Not only are politics never a factor in my Presidential interests, but that morning’s breakfast at Lil’ Jon’s was intended to be an incredible reunion between two cousins. Just the fact that the two Knight girls, Kim and Kelly, have always marched to the beat of their own drums, and are very unapologetic about anything, have given me good reason to respect them all the more.

Our planned reunion with Kelly Frye was scheduled to last for about two hours, which meant Tom and Vicki still needed to decide where the three of us would spend the remainder of the day. That question was answered in what might be considered divine intervention. Roughly ten minutes before we left our ramshackle VRBO rental, an unsolicited Facebook message appeared out of thin air and onto Vicki’s phone. It was an advertisement for gondola rides to the top of Crystal Mountain Resort where visitors are afforded breathtaking and unobstructed views of Mount Rainier, which was located about a dozen miles West of the resort. When Tom’s wife said the cost to ride the gondolas would be nearly sixty bucks apiece, I figured that would be a deal-breaker – thanks to my cheap photographer. But he paused, thought about the offer, and said to his wife, “Let’s wait to see if the sky is still clear when breakfast is finished. We don’t want to pay a lot of money just to have cloud-cover obscure the mountain. We’ll make the ‘Go’ or ‘No Go’ decision in the parking lot after breakfast.”

Not wanting to be late, which is always a pet peeve with my photographer, the three of us arrived at Lil’ Jon’s Restaurant at 7:45am and waited in the parking lot for the arrival of Vicki’s cousin. Fourteen minutes later, at one minute before eight, a vehicle was driven at a high rate of speed into the lot before the driver parked near our Jeep. I laughed to myself when Tom said, “That must be Kelly – she drives just like Kim!” When I got my first look at the woman behind the wheel, I was stunned – I thought she looked similar to Janis Joplin, had Janis lived into her sixties. As a fan of the singer known as Pearl, I hoped that woman was Vicki’s cousin; and better yet, I hoped she could sing like Janis.

I watched as my photographer’s wife stepped out of the Jeep – while at the same time, the woman approached our vehicle with a huge smile on her face. Through my painted eyes, the reunion was pure magic – it was a Kodak moment for sure. At one point, when the two cousins embraced, I nearly shouted out, “Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah!” I could tell there was something special about Kelly Frye, I saw it in the way she walked alongside Vicki as the four of us headed towards the entrance to Lil’ Jon’s.

Once inside, we were seated at a booth in the restaurant where I remained silent in my camera case alongside Tom. From an opening in the small, padded bag, I looked across the table at the bespectacled woman with the wry smile and listened as Kelly told stories about her life over the past thirty years. Her voice; her mannerism’s; her accent; all filled my hallow head with visions of Janis Joplin. I waited with bated breath and hoped Kelly would say, “Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose; and feeling good was easy, Lord, when I sang the blues. That feeling was good enough for me; good enough for me, and Bobby McGee.” But instead, Kelly sang the blues about the woke and liberal ideals in her home state and how she was more in line with her sister Kim’s views. And who could blame her? After hearing my photographer and his wife complain about the extraordinarily high cost of everything in the state of Washington, including gasoline at $4.70 per gallon, the three of us knew exactly why Kelly had changed teams.

At precisely ten o’clock, the four of us emerged from Lil’ Jon’s Restaurant with full stomachs and fuller hearts. For me, it was déjà vu all over again. Nearly six years earlier to the day, on July 21, 2019, I watched as my photographer reunited with his long-lost cousin Margaret Ann Long at a Cracker Barrel outside of Waco, Texas. And on that Saturday morning, some 2,400 miles from home, the same scene played out in front of me in Bellevue, Washington. Nothing says love like family, and for Vicki, she found a piece of her heart that had been lost for thirty years.

As Vicki and Kelly embraced for a final time, Tom and I looked skyward and saw nothing but blue sky. That meant one thing and one thing only – it was ‘Go Time’ to visit Mount Rainier.

For the next hour and forty-five minutes, my photographer’s wife did a great job as she navigated the winding route along a handful of remote state highways towards Crystal Mountain Resort. Roughly halfway to our destination, we came across a few amazing views of Mount Rainier in the distance. As a matter of fact, one of the views seemed so spectacular, Tom nearly aborted our potential gondola ride as he thought about taking his photos from the roadside just South of the town of Enumclaw. When his wife pulled the Jeep off onto the shoulder of the highway, I heard my photographer say, “This view of Rainier is great. We can avoid another twenty-five miles of driving; plus, we can save over a hundred bucks for that gondola ride.” But just as he was about to open the Jeep’s passenger door, my cheap camera guy changed his mind. “Heck with it – let’s go all the way to Crystal Mountain. That gondola ride sounds pretty exciting and maybe the view of Rainier from there will be even better.”

At a few minutes before high noon, after Vicki had navigated the two-lane highway along the Northern side of the winding White River for over twenty miles, we arrived at our destination – Crystal Mountain Resort. It was an adventure for the three of us just to get from the main highway to the resort’s parking lot, as the narrow roadway wound around the mountain while we gained a few thousand feet of elevation at the same time. Once my photographer’s wife had found a place to park in the overflow area of the large lot, the three of us had our first look at the red gondolas as they maneuvered up the mountain in the distance. That was the moment I knew we were in for a memorable experience. That was also the moment when Vicki realized her fear of heights might be an issue.

The cost for the privilege to ride the gondolas to the top of Crystal Moutain was $116.74 for the three of us – and bobble heads were free. Although I knew the steep price had made my photographer cringe a bit, I could also tell Tom’s demeanor changed the moment he and his wife climbed aboard the number 31 car. For the next ten minutes or so, we experienced the sensation of flying over the treetops at an elevation of roughly 100 feet as we ascended the side of Crystal Mountain. There were several times during our breathtaking ride to the top when I overheard Tom say his ears had popped, which wasn’t a surprise since we were in the midst of travelling over 2,400 feet of vertical elevation. The entire ride was quiet; it was very smooth; and the view was spectacular from inside the car, even though the only thing we saw were evergreen trees. I thought perhaps I might catch a glimpse of a bald eagle, or a bear, or even an elusive Squatch – but unfortunately, that never happened.

Please enjoy a few images taken during our gondola ride to the summit of Crystal Mountain.

Ten minutes after we had boarded the small gondola, we disembarked at the summit of Crystal Mountain. While the sky above us was pure blue, the air was cooler than it was when we began our ascent up the mountain. Seconds after the three of us left the unloading area, we were instantly stunned by sight in front of us. Not only did we see the snow-capped 14,410-foot-tall Mount Rainier, which was only twelve miles away and directly to the West of us, we also saw Mount St. Helens and Mount Adams in the distance.

Mount St. Helens was the famous volcano that had a cataclysmic eruption in 1980 and was located to the Southwest some 60 miles away. Mount Adams, which was also a snow-capped volcano, was roughly 50 miles directly South of Crystal Mountain’s summit.

Shortly after we walked to the primary viewing area, my two companions got lucky when a couple of the dozen or so Adirondack chairs opened up. I laughed when Tom plopped his fat rear into one of the low-riding chairs, but once he was there, he settled in for what seemed to be an eternity. And that was okay with me. Words couldn’t accurately describe the view of the Cascade Mountains that had opened up in front of us. It seemed as though we were on the edge of heaven as we gazed in wonderment at God’s creation below us. I had to admit – it was one of the most spectacular views I’ve ever experienced.

Please take a moment and check out the images Tom captured at the summit of Crystal Mountain.

There was only one thing that would’ve made our visit to the summit of Crystal Mountain even better – and that was to be there alone with my two companions. The peacefulness of the quiet Summer’s breeze was broken only by the annoying chatter of numerous foreign languages spoken all at once. And although I have no problem with folks from other countries spending their money to visit the sites in our land, it would have been a surreal experience for me to bask alone in nature’s beauty for an hour.

After forty-five minutes of basking in the comfortable Adirondack chairs, my photographer decided it was time for the three of us to head back to the gondolas. However, at the precise moment Tom struggled to get out of the low-to-the-ground wooden chair, I heard a muffled pop. At first, I thought one of my photographer’s knees had given out. But when my rotund friend stood up, and his pants stayed in place, I realized what had happened. The buckle on Tom’s belt had broken, and if he wasn’t careful, the sightseers on top of Crystal Mountain were about to get a show they weren’t prepared to see.

To make sure his belt was truly broken and hadn’t just come undone, Tom carefully shuffled along the walkway to the restroom of the nearby Summit House, which is the highest-elevation restaurant in the state of Washington. As soon as the two of us entered the cozy stall, I saw the buckle of my photographer’s belt fall in two pieces to the tiled floor below me. Yes sirree Bob, his belt was toast, and we were a long way from the nearest fat man’s belt store. As a matter of fact, we were a few hundred feet from the nearest gondola car, which we needed for the ride down the mountain. There was also another catch – there was a long line of people waiting to board the gondolas.

While the wait for a gondola car seemed excruciatingly long, I remained entertained by the fact that Tom’s britches might end up around his ankles at any time. As the line slowly moved along, my photographer shuffled his feet in an effort to keep his pants up. He knew one wrong step and there might be another Wang making an appearance next to the sightseers visiting from China. I felt a bit sorry for the poor sap – Tom had me clenched in his right hand; his left hand was affixed tightly to the upper part of his jeans; and his camera and heavy zoom lens were safely tucked away in the camera case that was slung around his shoulders.

Everything seemed to work out well, as Vicki and I were the only ones who were aware of Tom’s predicament – that is until the three of us boarded gondola car number four. As my photographer held me his one hand, and he grabbed for the door of the gondola with his other hand, that meant only one thing – he had no hands left to hold up his drawers. I snickered to myself as Tom quickly scrambled to get seated, but when I heard some giggles in the background, there was no doubt some of the visitors behind us were “treated” to an unexpected sight. As a matter of fact, I thought I heard the words, “Crack kills” spoken in several foreign languages.

For the next ten minutes or so, as we slowly descended from the summit of Crystal Mountain, Tom didn’t have to worry about losing his pants. In fact, he brought new meaning to the phrase ‘hands free’. But as our gondola swayed slightly in the gentle breeze while we soared silently over the treetops, I heard my photographer say to his wife, “How in the heck fire am I going to walk all the way out to the parking lot without my pants falling down? And once we get to the Jeep, where am I going to find a belt big enough to fit around my fat ass? We’re out in the middle of nowhere – there’s a reason Sasquatch runs around naked. It’s because there aren’t any Big & Tall Men’s stores for hundreds of miles.”

Just as we approached the end of the line during our gondola ride, a new idea popped into Tom’s head – an idea which would free up both of his hands. He placed me inside the camera case where I stood alongside his zoom lens; then Tom slung his camera over his neck where it would dangle by its strap. With that new innovative setup, my camera guy figured he could use both hands to help keep his drawers from dropping to the ground while he walked.

And it worked – although his maneuver didn’t stop Vicki from poking fun at the way he walked or keep her from suggesting a few items he could use to replace the belt; such as a rope or even suspenders. I laughed when Tom shot back with, “Who do you think I am, Jethro Effing Bodine? And I’m not gonna spend the rest of the trip looking like a damned Amish guy or a friggin’ hillbilly. There has to be a fat man’s store around here somewhere, even if we have to drive all the way back to Seattle to find one.”

Seventy miles later, and after my companions couldn’t find a “gently used” belt at a Goodwill store in Maple Valley, Vicki pulled into the parking lot of the Southcenter Mall in Tuckwila, Washington. I stayed in the Jeep while I watched my photographer shuffle-off towards the JCPenny store with his hands gripped tightly to his britches. When he and Vicki emerged from the mall twenty minutes later, Tom had a smile on his face and a bounce in his step – he was once again a hands-free pedestrian.

After they had just shelled out forty-five bucks on Tom’s new belt, my two companions were dealt with a first-hand look at how much more expensive it is to live in Washington compared to their home state of Michigan. That dose of reality came shortly after my photographer and his wife had finished their steak dinners at the Outback Steakhouse, which was located next to the mall.

I listened intently as Tom vocally shared his frustrations when he first looked at the bill. “You have got to be kidding me – ninety-two bucks for one margarita, one beer, two small steaks, and a small blooming onion. And quite frankly, my steak didn’t taste all that great – at least not compared with a Texas Roadhouse steak. What the hell is going on out here on the Left Coast?”

I try to stay neutral when it comes to politics, but I was forced to agree with my photographer – especially when I saw him pay $107, which included the tip, for dinner. We had been in the state of Washington for only one day and I personally saw how expensive gasoline was, and how expensive food and lodging were – except for the ramshackle dungeon we were staying in. It’s no secret the states of Washington, Oregon, and California are considered ‘blue states’ because of their allegiance with the Democratic Party. However, if I resided in one of those three states, I’d think twice before I voted for a Democrat – at least until the cost of living came down.

At roughly ten minutes before eight o’clock, the three of us returned to our humble abode in Bellevue. It was an incredible day for me – not only was I held in the hands of Janis Joplin; but I also stood on the threshold of heaven where I had a front row seat to nature’s breathtaking grandeur – and I’m not talking about seeing my photographer’s butt crack after his belt had broken.

After Tom had placed me on the kitchen table where I spent the night, I heard my photographer tell his wife we would spend the following day in downtown Seattle. He figured traffic would be lighter and parking more available on a Sunday. I for one was excited to visit the Emerald City – primarily because I knew there were a handful of Presidential sites my photographer had penciled-in on our agenda.

At the same time, however, I remained cautious as to what might lie ahead for us in Seattle – the three of us just might be in for a culture shock on Sunday. In my mind, I wondered how my photographer would handle the city’s diversity, including its controversial gender ideologies that we’ve been exposed to on television. The two of us love to look at women, and Tom likes to talk sports with the guys. But my photographer draws the line when it comes to mixing the two genders – except when it comes to a man named Alice Cooper.

Tom is similar in some ways to the All in the Family icon Archie Bunker. As a matter of fact, I could envision my photographer reciting some of the TV show’s theme song in downtown Seattle on Sunday.

“And you knew who you were then, girls were girls, and men were men. Mister, we could use a man like Herbert Hoover again!”

Yes, those were the days!