Skamokawa spotlight: Connie Bassi

It could be said that a place is made up of its people, and that people are made up, in a way, by the place where they live. This interplay of people and place was apparent in a recent interview with Connie Bassi. A Skamokawa resident since 1996, Connie's career has found her working at such familiar establishments as the old Duck Inn, the Skamokawa General Store, the Oasis Tavern, and Skamokawa Gardens, as well as St. John's Hospital in Longview. Additionally, she has worked locally in the commercial fishing industry, and as an in-home caregiver for a number of elders in the community: the Doumits, Tostes, and Hollands, among others. Today Connie is employed at Little Island Creamery. She is a mother, grandmother, and great grandmother.

Prior to our conversation, Connie had described an impressive trophy in her home that was bagged by the late "Skamokawa Pete." "So that's the elk," I asked upon entering the house. "Yup, that's him," said Connie, grinning. Shot in the swamps of West Valley in 1947, the head easily dwarfed the other mounts on Connie's wall: the antlers of two other mature bulls, and the heads of a black bear and a black-tailed buck. Photographs of Connie's family hung neatly below the display.

"Have a seat," said Connie, gesturing to a plush armchair. When asked how she came to live in Skamokawa, Connie said, "Well, I grew up in Longview. In the 60s and 70s gas was 23 cents a gallon and I could walk the streets without fear." This sense of safety receded, she said, as the city quadrupled in size. "I moved here for my girls. I wanted to give them a better schooling experience, a better childhood, and I wanted to give them roots."

The move was not without its trials for Connie and her family. "How many houses we lived in [before this one], I don't even know," she said. "In 2006, we flooded. It came to the bottom of the floor and the floor just disintegrated." It was the SBA (Small Business Administration) that helped fund the rebuild. "[The flood] happened because the tidegates didn't work," she said. "It's a big bowl right here, and it's like somebody plugged the drain. We're the lowest piece of property [around]. There are new tidegates now, so it shouldn't happen again, but I definitely have PTSD when it comes to water in the wrong place!"

When asked about her connections to this place and its people, Connie spoke of a particular friend. "She made me feel like I'd come home." Connie said. "I remember when I used to work at the O [Oasis Tavern], she and I would talk for hours into the night at the bar." On the non-human aspects of the region, Connie said, "I love the Columbia River, and I love how, most of the time, I go outside and I hear quiet. I hear nothing: just birds and frogs. I love sitting out [on my deck] and hearing the birds wake up in the morning and hearing them go to sleep at night." Connie also touched on the importance of being attuned to nature, and her love of herbalism. "The higher power gave us everything we need to heal ourselves," she said. "I have studied herbs for 40 years and I still only know so much."

Connie went on to describe her love for hunting and foraging, activities she once enjoyed in the company of her late husband Quin. "We had 22 beautiful years together," she said. The big bull on the wall, as it turns out, was given to Quin by Skamokawa Pete. "Right before Pete died, he told Quin, 'I want you to have that elk head, because I want it to stay in the family," Connie said. "Pete always thought of Quin as a son." The elk was actually the smaller of the two bagged that day by Pete and his hunting partner. "That one is five-by-six, and Jimmy's was six-by-six," she said. "Can you imagine those two standing out there in that swamp?"

Reflecting on local elders like Pete and Jimmy, Connie said, "Yeah, a lot of those old-timers, they're all gone now. So odd, but I guess that's how life goes. One old timer - Craig Nettles - I can [still] hear his voice... he once told me, 'You can't consider yourself a local 'til you've been here for 30 years, y'know!'" Laughing at this 30-year metric for achieving "local" status, Connie said, "If that's true, I've only got one more year to go!"