Rockport, Washington awoke to the kind of snow they knew would be with them for months.
They agreed to scatter. It was a graceful decision made without prickly discussion or drama. None knew how it was arrived at or even how their discussion began.
They forgot it had been late at night, around the stone fireplace in the little house off Kanan Dume Road, where chunks of sweet coast oak burned slowly on the andirons.
Their conversation tumbled into variations on a thorny theme. Who draws the line between a difference of opinion and a difference of principle? Where does loyal opposition end and treason begin? What distinguishes the transgressions of a demagogue from the enraged voice of the people?
Off they went, scattered across the west like puffy seeds carried on a warm wind.
Rockport, Washington kept an eye out for them. One would likely pass through.
