.
JUNE 09, 2019
EXCELLENT BIRDS
Last time we sported a picture of Oaktown cranes. Here are cranes of
another type. Storks actually. By artist Carol Taylor who lives in the
Gold Coast area.
GOUDY KIMBLE
So anyway. The unruly weather has led to a season of hot spells and the
unavoidable annual commemoration of Javier's birthday.
Javier, who stems from Mexico City, always has wanted a Big City celebration,
but since relocation to Silvan Acres his style has been crimped in so
many ways. He has always lived life in a grand urban style which the Bay
Area had previously provided all access, but Marin is not quite Bay Area.
Marin, although cheek by jowl with 8 mllion residents of neighboring counties,
inhabits a mind zone that features a very provincial concept of itself.
A series of isolated rural towns that have no knowledge or experience
with the Pacific Rim from which so many residents derive their income.
Jose decided to have Javier's birthday located at the San Geronimo Community
Center, which is about the most conservative and laid-back sort of place
to hold any event one could imagine, but about as urban as a place surrounded
by elk and trees can get. Jose figured that surely a group of recidivist
hippies would provide a safe environment for Javier's 61st birthday.
Javier, although turning 61, had not abandoned a single one of his bad
habits of drinking, smoking, womanizing, gambling, womanizing some more,
running fast and loose and womanizing to the third degree, and these habits
have generally led to discomfiture, disarray, dismay and injury on the
part of his close companions.
He felt it was his duty as a native son of Mexico City to preserve the
image and honor of the hot-blooded Latino and so he was constantly getting
into scrapes and difficult situations, while Jose and Jesus act as good,
well-behaved boys who were well instructed by their honest abueltas.
Andre's band, The Monkey Spankers, performed on stage, alternating with
a local band called Tiny Television and it was pretty much an all day
affair with dancing and music and food made by the Household women and
drink concocted by Denby and Pahrump and Occasional Quentin, who dumped
an additional fifth of vodka into the punch that was well laced with absinthe
that had fallen of the trunk on the Island. Several kegs of Fat Tire ale
appeared although no one knew who had paid for them.
Martini rigged up disco lights and some pyrotechnics for when Javier
was to blow out the candles on an amazing cherry chocolate cake topped
by a miniature toreador. There was to be a candle for each decade of Javier's
life plus one, which is very symbolic and everything.
The day was merry with feasting and jovial jumping up and down and Javier's
presents were quite the thing. From Marlene Javier got a silver dagger
that was quite the letter-opener. From Denby he got a hand-carved buddha
about a foot high. Beatrice gave him a serpentine chain with a pewter
skull on it -- Beatrice was soft that way. From Sarah he got a miniature
Hitachi Wand and from Suan he got a box of flavored condoms.
"Are they edible?" Javier asked, as he was most intrigued by
the latter item.
"O I do not think you want her to bite down while you are wearing
them," Suan said.
As the sun set behind the ridgeline and the cake was brought out on a
rolling server, Melisandre strode in carrying an assegai. She was followed
by Carmen and Miranda. Carmen, leaning on what looked like a cane, was
dressed in a blue dress and Miranda was dressed in a red outfit so tight
you could read the label on what little underwear she had on underneath.
She was a size 6 and she carried a pistol, size 38.
Javier was known to attract girlfriends who all bore reputations for
excitement. When repeatedly asked by trauma unit teams just why Javier
always chose such extraordinarily dangerous women, Javier would reply
that he found them interesting.
"Why were we not invited last year?" shouted Melisandre.
James, the Center superintendent and event planner stepped out with his
right hand up. "Keep it chill; we practice peace and mindfulness
here!"
"That's good," said Miranda. "Mind your business and practice
your piece." Then she shot him in the leg.
James, a large man, went down in a heap in front of the three women which
hampered Melisandre's charge at Javier with the short spear.
The lights abruptly cut out and everything degenerated into a an atavistic
melee of screaming and thuds and gunshots by the light of the seven birthday
cake candles.
Jose started yelling, "Stop beating me! I am Jose not Javier!"
"I don't care; you are his friend and I will beat ALL of you!"
Carmen said.
One of the gunshots punctured a beer keg and stuff started foaming across
the floor among the writhing bodies. Pahrump and Denby were trying to
wrestle the pistol out of Miranda's grip and the thing kept discharging
at random as she tried to kill them. Finally the gun clicked empty and
she let go of it to take out something that glimmered in the half-light;
it was a short-bladed knife.
"Where the heck did you keep that!" exclaimed Pahrump.
"Hah! You'll never see where!" crowed Miranda as she drove
it into Denby's thigh.
"Yaaaahhhhh!" said Denby, somewhat dramatically and at high
volume
Occasional Quentin, percieving by sound and moisture what had happened
to the beer keg tried to save the glass bowl of punch, which must have
contained some ten gallons of liquid. Naturally he slipped in the darkness
causing Quentin and the bowl to crash to the floor, adding a muddled idiot
and shards of broken glass to the mix.
Everyone stayed low as Carmen swung her cudgel wildly in the darkness
and Melisandre chased at shadowy forms to stab them with her assegai until
Carmen accidently clipped her on the ear and she went down in a heap with
the others on the floor until Carmen was the only one standing in the
middle of some kind of scene from a movie by Quentin Tarantino.
The sound of distant sirens approached, drew nigh, and stopped outside
as flashing red and blue lights came through the windows.
That is when Martini's timed pyrotechnics went off.
"Come out with your hands up!" barked a voice.
Those who were still ambulatory ran out the back, as had Javier long
ago. Denby leaning against Pahrump, who was wheezing, hobbled to the door.
"What's up with you?"
"I think she broke one of my ribs," Pahrump said. He then fell
down face first outside the door, causing Denby to fall over and lay there
on his side.
"I did not tell you to lie down! Yet." The voice barked. "Get
up! Now! Then lie down when I tell you!"
"We can't," Denby said, as he thought reasonably. "We
are hurt."
So the sheriff tased both of them and bundled them into the car to be
taken to the hoosegow.
It was at the County hoosegow that they had to remove the knife still
embedded in Denby's leg as no one was allowed to bring those kinds of
things into the jail under any conditions.
Denby commented that he was bleeding and the Sheriff gave him a bandaid
before locking him up, commenting, "You smell like a distillery."
While lying on his cot in his cell Denby promised himself that next year
he was going a road trip at this time of year.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
MAY 19, 2019
THE CRANE WIFE
So okay all the songs that feature Cranes point at the bird. Not even
the Boss has written a song that features this mechanical thing that so
importantly occupies everyone's horizion, no matter where they live.
These guys are part of the Oaktown port, one of the busiest in the world,
and they hover over the Estuary where massive ships come in from all over
the world to unload boxcars of junk you and me are gonna buy. Those cranes
inspired a local boy named Lucas to create a fantasy transport\fighting
machine for one of his Star Wars movies.
SEA CHANGE
So anyway, the weather turned unruly for this time of year. When normally
we have dry temps in the 70's, we had storms come marching in with very
cool weather to swell the streams and send cars sliding on the freeway
because Californians just cannot handle any kind of precipitation on the
road, North or South.
Fire, earthquake, mass murder, general foolishness, that we can handle
better than anyone from New Jersey or Chicago, but rain on the road, that
is such a rare commodity nobody here has learned to deal with it properly.
Sometimes they get snow in the mountains and that too we can handle.
We do not run around with our hair on fire and close all the schools because
of a few inches of snow like they do in Baltimore. We just handle it and
if the snow gets like fifteen feet deep we just close the passes over
the Sierra Crest and that is that. No big deal.
The Editor charged Pahrump and Jose with a singular task. They were to
deliver a cow to Mr. Gruffman's barn and there was a lot of mysterious
shuffling of cards about this particular transaction.
For one thing, the two of them went out to a field on the edge of Dickson
Ranch and none of the Dickson Ranch would admit any knowledge of this
transaction for the Dickson ranch is a ranch that features horses, and
save for a couple that are unduly overweight none of them can be called
cows. For another the cow was tethered in a field with a rope and nothing
more formal other than a notice attached to a post in that field that
this cow was "D feed source". And there were many signatures
and writs involved that looked highly financial and official in all regards
making this deal a fully bona fide sanction to sell a cow for some kind
of purpose not yet divined but the papers were all in order and in this
modern age it is most important to have your papers in order.
Generally speaking as mentioned previously the Dickson Ranch was devoted
to horses so this introduction of a cow was an odd bargain.
So the guys took the rope halter and commenced to leading the cow out
of the ranch and onto the road outside and the guys started talking about
what to name this particular cow because all the paperwork just referred
to her by numbers. The guys are going down the road with the cow in tow
and various names were suggested, some obvious like Bessie and some not
so obvious like Coliform and Sweetie Methane Pump and Midden Heap. Eventually
they agreed upon the name Trillium for the flower that erupts so energetically
in the area.
They arrived at Mr. Gruffman's yard and Mr. Gruffman said it was okay
if they left at that point but they did not want to leave for curiosity
and it was curiosity that revised their lives going forward forever.
"Moooooor!" exclaimed the doomed Trillium.
Mr. Gruffman threw open the barn doors and then emerged Hubert the dragon
and then occured the end of Trillium rather violently and Jose was sick
in the bushes amid the savage, atavistic crunching of bone and blood and
viscera.
"I told you," Mr. Gruffman said before locking Hubert back
into the barn.
"For Pete's sake what are you doing with a live dragon in a barn?"
exclaimed Pahrump.
"O I do not think you would want Hubert flying about unfettered,"
Mr. Gruffman said.
"That thing can fly!?"
"Of course. He is a genuine dragon."
"What else have you around here?" Pahrump asked carefully.
"O the usual sort of stuff left behind by the hippies. Unicorns,
faeries, a number of witches, elfs and elves -- that sort of thing."
"I should like to meet an elf," Denby said.
"No you wouldn't," Mr. Gruffman said. "The elfs of Marin
are all bad tempered because of the wretched parking."
On the march back to the Household it was agreed between Pahrump and
Jose they would never name a cow ever again for they had just witnessed
something which no amount of cheap jug wine could be made unseen again.
It was up to Denby to report to the Editor while the others got seriously
drunk that the cow had been delivered as charged.
"Good," said the Editor. "There will be another due in
a month if we cannot capture a wild deer."
"Good lord, this is aweful!"
"The good Lord has nothing to do with it," said the Editor.
"This is the Trump Era and the dragons must be fed."
"This sounds like a terrible political metaphor."
"Political metaphors are like farting in a crowded room. Social
realities must be acknowledged while the place still stinks to high heaven
during which everyone denies everything. Now get back to work making the
media look like it is still useful."
The Editor turned to his desk as the others completed their tasks in
the converted barn which had become the new Island-Life offices after
the terrible Night of Shattered Fires which had pushed the persecuted
people outward from their home of many decades to wander the earth. A
story that has been told before and should sound familiar and which is
perhaps another metaphor.
From some barn somewhere a person started practicing the drums. From
another location another person started noodling upon an electric guitar.
All the night was filled with sound.
As Spring returned to stir dull roots with rain, stimulating life to
erupt from the dead land, metaphors flocked on furry wings through the
gathering night to bang onto window screens. This land which has been
so beaten down by adversity, by fire and flood, shall live again while
in the darkness drummers were sending messages to distant listeners, musicians
were communicating via secret code to one another. All around the area
was fraught with messages being sent from unknown senders to unknown recipients.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
MAY 12, 2019
GATHER YE ROSEBUDS WHILE YE MAY
This week, contrary to the spirit of Spring and the renewal of Life have
a memento mori. This is the hand of Jessica holding the ashes of her father,
Doyle McGowan, shortly before they are distributed over the Grand Canyon.
Doyle shall be sorely missed as he was a spark of life, one who seized
adventure and life at every opportunity and provided reams of material
for novels, stories and music by his adventures throughout his lifelong
journey. At the end one has an handful of ashes, so one one might as well
gallop madly across the fields with your hair flying, might as well dive
down into the blue-green depths in pursuit of that shimmering prey, keep
the neighbors up all night with loud lovemaking that makes the bricks
shed dandruff by the vibrations.
Think about what people are going to say about you when someone holds
your ashes in their hands after all is said and done. Doyle built a real
estate empire out of nothing after getting out of prison for a manufactured
offence that is no longer illegal. He fathered a beautiful child and he
continued to adhere to the core values of the 60's. Now what have you
been doing with your life all this time?
WILL YOU PLEASE REMEMBER ME
So anyway. The days have presented milder temps, softened light. Early
mornings are packed with pogonip, the Ohlone word for fog. The afternoons
have been bright with sunshine. The nights have been cool with the howling
of coyotes approaching near dawn.
The girls still living on the Island and their exiled friends living
in Silvan Acres reunited with their moms at Momma's Royal Cafe in Oaktown
for the annual celebration of motherhood.
It has been 17 months since that terrible February of 2018 and the night
of Shattered Fires when all that had been the Island had changed forever
due to the evil actions of the Taikeff "Angry Elf" gang. Many
things had happened not unlike the adventurous Game of Thrones now obsessing
so many people with fantasy.
Marsha was there. So were Tipitina, Suan, and Sarah, all of whom had
relocated to Silvan Acres. With them was their new friend Barbara who
had always lived in the San Geronimo Valley. Rachel showed up, along with
Malice Green, Latrena Brown, and Ms. Larch who was thinking of relocating
to Marin, and all of them were there with their mothers save for Rachel,
whose mother had passed away in 2008.
It was quite the Hen party there at the Royal Cafe with everyone talking
at once and everyone getting caught up with the news.
Sarah's mother wanted to know if there were any Stores in Silvan Acres.
You know so that a girl could get herself set up appropriately, but no,
the San Geronimo Valley has no big box stores and it did not look like
it would get them any time too soon. It had skunks and deer and coyote
and raccoons but no Macy's.
This seemed a dreadful impediment to obtaining and keeping a man, as
Sarah's mother saw it, but the others chimed in that there was always
"going down the hill" to San Rafael where they had civilized
things like salons and suppliers of fine linen and lace.
At the end of the day, all the mothers were satisfied that their children
were on the right track and that the San Geronimo Valley, albeit somewhat
barbarous and remote, did have potential for sophistication and marital
possibilities on account of there being so many millionaires in residence
in the neighborhood.
"Tell me again about the Town of Ross," Tipitinia's mother
asked. "I hear the servants pay people to wax their Caddilacs!"
In the Valley, the Editor had a conversation with the neighbor, Mr. Gruffman,
who was in need of a cow.
The Editor did not have a cow in his back pocket at the moment, but Mr.
Gruffman felt that now was the time to clue the newcomers into a few of
the differences that affected Marin County as seperate from the rest of
the world.
"Come around back and meet Melisandre," said Mr. Gruffman,
who turned and stumped along a ratty path bordered by wild poppies and
thistle along a wall that led to a small open space.
The Editor followed the man and discovered there in that small open space
a white horse, some eight hands high, with blue eyes and a knurled horn
extending from its forehead about 28 inches in length.
"That is a unicorn!" said the Editor.
"I admire your perspicuity and directness of observation,"
said Mr. Gruffman. "That is indeed a unicorn which is found, to the
best of my knowledge, nowhere but Marin County and parts of Minnesotta
I have not yet explored."
"I thought you must employ a Virgin to capture a unicorn,"
the Editor said.
"Silly man! This is not a captured animal, but one that is free
to roam at will. It comes here freely because I am an old man with no
pretensions to contest, I have been through Hell and High Water, I have
lost more than anyone will ever own, I have no more claim to ownership
or dominance of anything, and so Melisandre is safe here with me."
"I see."
"You probably do not, but here we have an example of one thing that
makes Marin County different from other places. And I am in urgent need
of a cow so I must introduce you to Hubert."
"Hubert?"
"Yes, yes. Hubert. Everyone is talking about Tolkein and Game of
Thrones and all this fantasy that is a distraction from the dreadful realities
of mass shootings and all that comprises the execrable Donald Trump, the
most detestable vermin to inhabit the White House since Richard Nixon.
No one pays attention to the San Geronimo Valley because we are off the
grid, so to speak. I can see that you are having troubles with Island-Life
because your people are real. They have been abused, discarded, treated
barbarously -- just like everyone else. Who wants to read about themselves
when that is what they suffer all day long. Come along and meet Hubert
and my problem."
The two of them walked around the field with Melisandre and came to a
barn where Mr. Gruffman threw open the bolts and drew back a long plank
to let the big doors open to reveal what was inside.
"Arrrouggheghhh!"
"Good god in heaven!" said the Editor. "You have a dragon
in this barn!"
"I doubt the god in heaven had anything to do with the creation
of Hubert," Mr. Gruffman said. "But here he is. All thirty feet
and 1.5 tons of him. Once again I admire your ownership of statements
of the obvious."
"Schnarrrrf!"
"Does he breath fire?"
"Of course not! That is a silly superstition and entirely impossible
as energy consumption would be off the charts. This is a physical animal
living in the real world of Marin County and it must have a cow."
"What happens if it does not have a cow?"
"Hubert starts eating people. Can you find me a cow rather soon?"
"I will see what I can do," The Editor said.
"Thank you," said Mr. Gruffman. "Welcome to Marin. We
are different from other people." He then shut the barn door and
the Editor returned to the offices, attended with the following offer
from Mr. Gruffman.
"I see you have a readership problem. Everyone wants to see movies
with flying wizards and dragons and pseudo-medieval gamesmanship with
dragons and sex and ultra-violence and exotic magic. We have all that
already in Marin. So I offer a unicorn and a dragon. Handle the sex and
violence yourself. You just manage to get me a cow once a month and we
have a deal. Capiche?"
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
APRIL 21, 2019
POPPIES! POPPIES!
Spring has arrived in California and the State flower is in bloom everywhere.
This image is from the fence at the San Geronimo Church.
EID MA CLACKSHAW
So anyway, the vigorous breezes of March usher in the outrageous blooms
of April. Already we have seen the fog banks announce a change in seasons
and the Most Dangerous Season is upon us (see last week below).
As if cued by some hidden occult sign of the Masons, burly men with pickups
and lithe women wearing sun visors and old lumberjack shirts appear in
their driveways unload bags of fertilizer, soil, chemicals of dubious
origin, all to return to tilling the soil in an annual ritual as predictable
as the migration of monarch butterflies and the swallows at Capistrano.
Mr. Spline, the CIA operative who has been keeping tabs on the Greek
Orthodox chapel next to the Mormon Temple on the hill, has become worried.
As a person who considers it a patriotic duty to keep an eye on where
that traitorous whistleblower Joshua is supposedly holed up and who leaves
that place only to engage in highly secret stuff that would compel him
to kill you if you knew about it, has pursued Security as a lifelong profession.
As an expert in security he is concerned about this Wall that the Carrot-topped
One has been promoting. As every security expert knows, relying on a single
hardened perimeter is a disaster waiting to . . . well, become a disaster.
Nobody in their right mind in Security every relies on something so basic
as a wall. You need multiple physical shells, a strong and diffused surveillance
system over soft target areas, martial law extending 20 to 50 miles from
the border, standing shoot on sight orders, a corps of trusted plainclothes
IDS police on 24 x 7 alert, and continuous and vigorous roundup of suspicious
persons for processing in suitable cleansing centers away from media scrutiny.
That would be a reasonable start, Mr. Spline thinks.
But Mr. Spline does not see any movement in that direction, only a desire
and he sighs. The problem with politicians is that they seldom go far
enough. Mr. Spline envisions an America that is totally controlled and
terrorism impossible because the Right People control everything.
Barbara is a 6th level Tunt in the Maccab Corporation, working on the
11th floor of 101 California. She has recently been promoted and so she
is feeling pretty good as she rides home on the Caltrans bus to her home
in Silvan Acres. As with any corporate promotion there are risks and there
are benefits. The main benefit, besides more money is a good helping of
responsibility and greater visibility to VIPs. The downside is the possibility
that her head might explode. That happened to her predecessor, who had
slacked a bit on reporting and been caught making un-positive comments.
So right there beside the water cooler his head exploded and Facilities
had come and clean it up.
Once you sign on with Maccab as an Exempt they own you and everybody
knew that.
There was some speculation as to whether that proprietorship extended
to family members. Jason Tilde had shirked going to the Family Picnic
and then the Family Founder's Day Banquet and it was right there in line
at the cafeteria that his head exploded. The line crew had to replace
the entire lasagna tray and the soups on account of the mess.
Barbara got off the bus and walked up the way to her in-law apartment
where she greeted her cat John Galt with relief. Wifi coverage was terrible
in the valley and she somehow felt that the tracking microchip implanted
in her skull worked less or not at all.
In the offices of Island-Life the Editor scanned the week's news and
shook his head. How on earth could he write about anything when the world
was so crazy and people took crazy ideas with utter seriousness. He stood
on the deck out back under the half-moon with his hands clasped behind
his back, his cigar clamped in his jaws.
Deer moved carefully through the foliage. The natural world continued,
indifferent to the follies of Man.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
APRIL 14, 2019
TANGLED UP IN BLUE
This week we have a shot of the outside of the San Geronimo Pre-School.
NEW TIMES! NEW TIMES! NEW, NEW NEW TIMES!
It seems very likely that Measure A will pass, given the County ROV numbers
as of Friday.
The Alameda Country Registrar of Voters posted updated results from the
April 9 special election on Thursday, April 11.
It shows "yes" votes for Measure A still has a sizable lead,
but the gap did shrink slightly. Currently 10,732 voted their approval
of Measure A's passage as of Friday, April 12. There are currently 9,614
"no" votes. "Yes" votes account for 52.75 percent
of the votes that have been tallied. "No" votes have just 47.25
percent of the vote. In the previous update on April 10, "yes"
votes had 53.36 percent of the 14,241 votes tallied.
Measure B's continues to look like a long shot after the recent update.
Currently, 56.12 percent of voters (11,304) chose to vote against the
measure's passage. Just 43.88 percent (8,838) chose to vote "yes"
on Measure B. In the previous update 43.61 percent voted for Measure B.
Less than half of the 48,793 registered Alameda voters had been tallied.
The passage of Measure A will allow Alameda Point Collaborative to move
forward with its plans to develop the Alameda Wellness Center, a facility
for medically fragile Alameda County seniors who lack housing.
Now this measure brought to light an host of issues blocking effective
tackling of the homeless problems in all the ABAG regions. The virulence
of people opposed to Measure A displayed a harsh NIMBYism that is prevalent
everywhere. Everyone wants a solution to homelessness, but nobody wants
to take on the responsiblity for action because getting the homeless into
places to live means these homeless will then be living among us in stable
environments.
It is headbanging why people think keeping people living in sidwalk tents,
being eyesores, defecating in the streets, raving madly with insanity
in public, and fostering the drug trade is better than putting those same
people in housing units in or near the same location but defecating in
toilets and being overseen by supervisors skilled in stopping prostitution
and drugs and handling mental illness. But that is the way people are.
People do not always choose the sane path -- just look at Donald Trump.
Another look at the benefits to the land use that the APC intends reveals
that no traffic stats will be seriously impacted. Homeless mentally ill
seniors do not drive cars, so such a residency. So the Island will get
a facility that will bring jobs, do seriously good work, partially resolve
the homeless problem and still not contribute to traffic congestion.
We note that the residence on Lincoln near the Tibetan temple has caused
no problems in the area, and we are surprised nobody has looked at where
such plans have already been implemented on the Island to see the effects.
In Marin we hear complaints about potential "low income housing"
coming in and to tell the truth, people who oppose such projects do not
have a leg to stand on. Marin has poor people, it has mentally ill, and
it has homeless people and pretending they do not exist is numbskull ludicrous
and savagely cruel as well as obnoxiously indifferent to surrounding counties
who really dislike Marin foisting its problems onto them.
Berkeley and Oakland have large homeless encampments and these are due
largely to neighboring municipalities practicing that NIMBYism.
WOKE UP DREAMING I WAS GONNA DIE
So anyway. The torrential monsoons have given way to drier weather with
skies mottled with dabs of cloud and cool air that occasionally becomes
warm when the sun hits for a time. The nights hover around 47 degrees
and the morning fogs dissipate quickly.
We are seeing golden poppies bursting out during this early Spring. Everyone
talks about the cherry blossoms in DC, that wierd city east of Chicago,
but we have an entire cherry blossom orchard in Mariner Square Village
blooming madly each year over acres of parkinglot. It is not something
special we go to a special place to gawk at; it is part of our daily lives.
How parched must be the lives of Washingtonians who do not have this every
day of the year while we enjoy live music from multiple venues all over
our metropolitan area, birds of paradise blooming in the most remote corners,
scads of golden poppies, tulips and gladiolas and yard after yard of extraordinary
roses that have yet to erupt amid the abutilon and bluebells.
Spring is the most dangerous season.
Yes, Spring is the most dangerous season. Maybe it is different in other
places, but here, wise men remain indoors and order pizza for dinner,
hunker down by the TV to watch endless reruns of Monster Truck Destruction
and Terminator I, II, III and IV. It's safer cuddled there in the dark
lit only by the blackout curtain blocked TV set glow.
Bees dive-bombing the clover, hummingbirds bayoneting the jasmine that
keeps throwing out punches this way and that while sending wafts of chemical
weapons of mass disruption. Army ants on the march in great phalanxes
and squirrels conducting reconnaissance forays add to the mayhem, while
raccoons begin nightly raids. The daisy bush bursts with yellow ack-ack
blooms while the poppies erupt with tiny explosions across the fields.
Squadrons of swallows swooping and diving, ducks performing sorties, Canadian
geese streaking overhead in formation and then, worst of all, there are
the girls in their summer dresses.
Meanwhile, somewhere overhead, flying in stealth mode -- that naked,
blindfolded, fat boy keeps firing off at random his erring arrows of wanton
mishap, those IEDs (Improvised Erotic Designs), wreaking chaos in a wide
swath more terrifying that Sherman's March to the Sea. Squadrons of women
and girls swelling with fatal charms stroll on patrol, their smooth lithe
legs flashing beneath their uniforms: thin summer dresses, haltertops,
daisy-dukes, and god knows what else underneath that armor. If anything.
It's all agitprop left to the imagination.
Save us all from Spring's violent terrors.
Observe Johnnie, happy and carefree as a lark, striding with ruddy cheeks
and full confidence. But after him comes Jane, armed with those sharpshooter
eyes, that flippy short skirt, and strappy high heels. Now Johnnie is
down! His face wan and his appetite poor, his breath coming out in ragged
gasps as Jane cradles his head among the wildly blooming, victorious daisies.
Right in the heart, poor lad. A goner for sure.
Yes, Spring is the most dangerous Season.
A while ago Denby went back East for a wedding and went down to ask the
Front Desk where was a good place to hear music and was rewarded with
the comment, "Is the room radio not working? Are you talking about
going to a disco?"
"No," Denby corrected. "I mean live music. Live bands
with live people in them. Not canned music."
"I dunno. I suppose you have to drive to Georgetown where they have
a university and maybe there they have clubs and things like that."
"There is no music in this county at all? You have to drive to another
city?"
"Sir I am afraid I cannot help you. Next . . . !"
Poor, impoverished people. They have cherry blossoms once a year and
no idea about music to enrich their lives.
Yet it is Spring and Mr. Twicket has engaged an army of laborers to clean
up the grounds and prepare the roses. He has some annoying problems with
electrical lighting in the house which the electrictian has told him needs
to be addressed, but the cost seems exhorbitant for that kind of thing
which does not beautify the landscape.
John Gaack saw Milton leave his car in the parkinglot of the Costco to
go shopping. Gaack snarled and tried the door of Milton's car, finding
it unlocked and reached into to shove the air condition temp controls
all lthe way to hot. He then closed the door and went in with his two
ugly daughters to get some things for the house and keep an eye on Milton,
whom he detested for no other reason than Milton came from Alameda and
did not Play the Game, the game in which the Gaack family and similar
families were entitled to all that floated into their comfortable mouths.
Jason Arrabiata stepped up to deliver another sermon in Silvan Acres
at his new CFSM chapel, a charming one-room shed surrounded by willow
trees.
These families are the Grumpies of San Anselmo, but every town has Grumpies
just like the Gaacks. Whenever something goes wrong or modern life interposes
some new harsh reality, it is always the people from somewhere else at
fault.
"Ramen!" said the congregation.
Let us pity the Grumpies, so self-entited and never destined for true
happiness, Jason preached. They came here long ago to kill the Natives
and steal their land and although they have gained the title rights to
Paradise, they shall not enjoy the Kingdom of Heaven.
"Ramen!"
Let us now join in the Lord's Prayer and then eat heartily and drink
lustily.
"Ramen!"
Our pasta, who art in a colander, draining be your noodles.
Thy noodle come, Thy sauce be yum,
on top some grated Parmesan.
Give us this day our garlic bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trample on our lawns.
And lead us not into vegetarianism, but deliver us some pizza,
for thine is the meatball, the noodle, and the sauce,
forever and ever. RAmen.
"Ramen!"
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
APRIL 7, 2019
BOYS OF SUMMER
Few images are more iconic than scenes like this played out across America
in Spring. Here we have the Little Leaguers, not a one above three feet
in height, gathering for the annual ritual at Warner Field in Woodacre.
WE PRINT ALL THE NEWS THAT FITS
Preliminary election results from the Special Election in Alameda show
Measure A passing and Measure B failing by slim margins. With 100 percent
of precincts reporting, there were 7599 "Yes" votes for Measure
A, garnering 53.36 percent of the vote. "No" votes were 6642,
or 46.64 percent.
For Measure B, the tally was 7956 "No", or 56.39 percent of
the vote. "Yes" votes were 6152 or 43.61 percent.
The contentious election has pitted present and former elected officials
against one another, and sparked a social media battle between supporters
for each side.
Voters are deciding the fate of vacant former federal offices on a 3.65-acre
parcel on McKay Avenue across from Crab Cove. Measure A calls for a $40
million project to convert the property, which is near Robert Crown Memorial
State Beach, into 90 units of senior permanent supportive housing, a 50-bed
respite center for homeless adults and a daytime resource center for seniors.
Measure B would declare the land to be open space.
The election has been typical of many efforts to handle the many-headed
hydra of homelessness, aging population, and the rental crisis, which
has all the NIMBYS pitted against activists and lawmakers trying to hack
through a gordian knot of problems. The Island is one place where you
hear people decrying efforts to create affordable housing because affordable
housing will bring in people that the NIMBYS find icky.
Meanwhile Oaktown admins are getting really peeved at all the surrounding
municipalities shoving homeless populations and other problems onto their
doorstep by NIMBYS and officials only too willing to kick the can down
the road to stay elected. Meanwhile Alameda has stuck to absurd resolutions
like what happened along the Bayside shore which has been made ridiculous,
impossible to navigate, dangerous for pedestrians and car traffic and
a general fiasco with concrete barriers and confusing green paint that
are more reminiscent of the old East\West Berlin divide than a passageway.
The whole thing from Washington Park to the breakwater has been turned
into a congested, urbanized, Manhattanized wreck. Correct that: Manhattan
is better organized for high volume traffic. The current arrangement is
just citified stupid. You want to rub our noses in the fact that we are
a densely packed city? Ok fine.
APRIL IS THE CRUELEST MONTH
So anyway. March really sucked around here. Several Island-Lifers died.
The Chief reporter contracted pneumonia and nearly went over the pearly
gates himself. Work has been insane with impossible people demanding impossible
things. Issues have been slow to get out because of these and other problems.
So anyway again. The rains have stopped and the days have been overcast
but largely dry with winds whipping through the trees and tossing cars
here and there on the freeway. People have been out and about under the
sometimes sun-streaming lanes while the creeks of Silvan Acres continue
to burble with water wealth.
Traffic on San Pablo was halted in the early morning as a covey of wild
turkey's strutted across the road from greenery in the Albany district.
People have been stopping by the Herrick campus of Alta Bates to photograph
the magnificent cherry blossom tree there on the corner of Milvia and
Dwight.
News has it that Trump has not passed any new legislation since in office,
that most of his early supporters are in jail or facing indictment, that
most of his grand plans to shove obnoxious orders on the Nation have been
shunted aside, and that even the GOP is beginning to see the light about
this ne'er do well. And we hear they have cherry blossoms turning in DC
as well.
Among the hillocks of snow, there are dips and divots at the bottom of
which bright color is beginning to show. Whorls of yellow and red and
green shoots. You look into these pits and you can see activity involving
color. Young men are starting to stare at the rear ends of young women
as they pass in their yoga pants. Yes, something is going on down there.
Yes there are signs that things are about to change. As bad as he is,
Trump cannot go on forever, and there will be an end to his particular
brand of lunacy.
Back at the Homestead John C. Smelling was marching around his property
wearing a bright red Maggot hat, making sure no one parked on his side
of the road and also the opposite side, which his family had claimed some
time ago. Curious odors come from that side of the road, a sort of rotten
smell, and the Smellings are extremely defensive about protecting what
they see as parking rights. John was spraying Roundup on all the weeds
sprouting on the edges of his large parking platform while his son, Charles,
worked off his personal demons by firing up the chainsaw and destroying
things made of wood. Chrissie Felling, his mother, came out with her hair
all disarranged and James could see she was in a state again.
"I just want everyone to know the National Observatory is at it
again. They are sending microwaves into people's brains." Her blouse
was buttoned up wrong and her left foot sported a sock with stripes while
the other displayed black polka dots.
"All right ma," Charles said. A flurry of wood chips sailed
in all directions.
"I am talking with my attorney, just so you know. Everyone is against
me, but I have important friends. I know everything that is going on."
"All right ma."
Chrissie spotted a lizard and went over to stamp it dead, shouting, "I
know you are spying on me! All of you creatures, talking with your lizard
tongues!"
Down the hill Missy Moonbeam returned from her job as a barista in San
Rafael as the sun set behind the valley ridgeline. She took off all of
her clothes, lit some sandalwood incense before sitting in meditation.
At the end of her meditation she put on a Kate Wolf CD and went into the
yard to dance as the moon rose above the trees.
Jason Arrabiatta, CFSM was walking by with Denby who commented on how
crazy Marin was.
"Denby there are two kinds of crazy," Jason said.
"You are going to deliver another preacher sermon, aren't you?"
Denby said.
"Yes I am. Because I am a preacher and it is good for your soul.
Now listen up. There are two kinds of crazy in this world. There is the
harmless, gentle kind like the guy who believes he is Jesus Christ, Elon
Musk, and this Missy dancing over there. They do not hurt anybody and
often they have jobs useful to society. Then there are the sociopaths,
psychopaths and true dangerous nut cases that hurt people, like Hannibal
Lecter, Richard Speck, most Nazis, the Angry Elf kingpin, and Donald Trump.
Be sure to keep them seperate for I am quite concerned and worried as
well as afraid of so-called normal people who pretend rationality. Those
people are just as dangerous as John Wayne Gacy and Ted Bundy. They will
rationalize everything to death, including you and me. Just look at Standard
Oil and Exxon."
"Most profound words." Denby said. "Ramen."
"People say I am crazy because I profess a belief in the Flying
Spahetti Monster, but my God never inspired a Crusade, never burned witches
at the stake, never held an Inquisition, and never allowed rationalization
of cruelty in His name. Besides my heaven features a volcano that spouts
beer."
"Spring! It is Spring!" Missy said and did a grande jete
across the yard entirely naked under the moon.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
MARCH 30, 2019
TIPTOE THROUGH THE TULIPS
Here they are, with crocuses the harbingers of Spring.
WINTER IS THE CURTAIN, BUT SPRING TAKES THE BOW
So anyway. The Editor sat with a box on the floor and his bottle of Glenfiddich
on the table with a glass and a pitcher of ice. The box contained the
culled photographs, proofs, negatives and slides from Chad's lifetime
of photography. The Editor had driven the ancient Volvo down to the Island
to sort through the last effects of his website designer who had suffered
a massive heart attack three weeks ago, while his widow moved through
the scene that the Editor had seen many times before. The Editor was an
old soldier and death was a familiar acquaintance.
The Widow moved aimlessly among the scattered detritus of a man's life,
each movement generating a different sort of new pain. The ornate urn
of ashes there next to the wooden Buddha. Useless wires, bookshelves,
lamps, end-tables, objets de arts, books, paintings, and loads upon loads
of photographs done by a man who had practiced art photography for years
with his own b/w darkroom. There were thousands upon thousands of images
taken from 1962 onwards.
Here a photo of a painting, but without attribution. There, a picture
of a wharf in Boston or Philadelphia. Trees and foliage from anywhere
- the man had travelled across the country and to Scotland and Tahiti
where apparantly he had done scuba diving. There were pictures of that,
too.
All the slides and negatives were unmarked and without dates save for
a series of negatives and proofs of art nudes marked Roberta, 1982.
Where was Roberta now and what did she look like now when those images
had captured her in the bloom of twenty-something youth more than thirty
years ago? What was the meaning of her standing on a table in a cluttered
room, naked and holding a wind chime?
Outside the windows of the new Island-Life newsroom that had yet to dry
from wood preservative and rehab, the air had turned soft with the suggestion
of Spring. The Japanese plum trees were blooming as were the cherry blossoms.
Tulips and irises had announced that life would return to this earth so
savaged by indifferent drones seeking money.
You can thrust Nature out with a pitchfork, but it always come roaring
back.
Pictures of people of people, old and young, babies and elderly. Pictures
of people at street faires and happenings, concerts and festivals. All
of whom by now had led entire lifetimes of their own. In some rare cases
he had composed indices, which were as densely useless as hierogrphics
composed in long forgotten languages. Ken and Esther/ kitchen (harsh sun)
1982. Bill Bodie. smiling dog / coffee house/ - 1982. Gene Oldfield w/
renegade robots 1981. hippotomous / . girrafe. cassovaries/ Sacto City
zoo 1982.
It was an entire life, but the key which had provided reference meaning
had left the stage and was not going to return. The Editor found it impossible
to infuse any of this with a sense of order or meaning. Each image now
belonged to the world of public knowledge, without reference as if presented
to an alzheimer's patient without an attached memory. That memory was
now gone.
The Editor took the box out to the dumpster and dropped it in, inhaling
the combined scent of refuse and of new lilacs. He then went back inside
to have a drink and deal with his grief. There would be other ways to
preserve memory.
But for now, the lilacs were in bloom again.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
MARCH 20, 2019
AND HER NAME IS G.L.O.R.I.A
This image says it all. And you should look up the lyrics of Gloria by
Patti Smith to find the reference to the parking meter.
WE PRINT ALL THE NEWS THAT FITS
You know the news already. Most of you have formed your opinions in molds
of lead. Trump is either a crass, disgusting, egotistical, total shit
lacking decency, truth, empathy and American values, or he is your Strongman
really sticking it to the obnoxious "elitist" tree-huggers and
Liberals, dousing the welfare-moms with gasoline, exalting the White Right
to true justice that they deserve and showing the World that the USA is
not to be pushed around.
We heard Lyndon Larouche has died. Good riddance. He and his group were
asshats in drag.
The McKay Avenue property continues to be a bone of contention to some
people who did not get the memo. Seems some people are endorsing Measure
B in the next election out of some wierd orientation we cannot figure.
The land was federal and the land will go to federal purposes that appear
quite sane for the area. As in all cases, we ask that people follow the
money to find out just why some entities are endorsing Measure B against
sane usage that excludes private monatization in favor of high rent commodities.
TOO MANY MYTHS
So anyway. The rain let up for a bit, with grumbling skies yielding to
splashes of sunshine. The Japanese plums are blossoming all over the place
and the parkinglot of Mariner Square is redolent with cherry blossoms.
The night fell on St. Patrick's Day as the Supermoon arose in glory,
occasionally obscured by cloudwrack. In the Old Same Place Bar Padraic
and Dawn whipped up the Gaelic Coffees, which are so-called by Padraic
because, according to his opinion, no "daycent lad of the auld sod"
would ever concoct such a travesty upon the usce-que-bah, the Water of
Life. It is known that the beverage consisting of whiskey, coffee, brown
sugar, whipped cream (horrors!) and other ingredients was designed first
in America and Padraic is fine with that story.
As usual, Suzie was made to wear a green miniskirt and a cap and the
entire joint roistered with great enthusiasm as the jukebox cranked out
Van Morrison, Luka Bloom, U2, the Pogues, Damien Rice, and the like.
All was going great and there was no fear of the Angry Elf gang showing
up for all the grief they suffered in past years trying to threaten and
abuse the gentle people, but it came late and a rock was thrown against
the window, breaking the glass, followed by the evil ound of The Cackler
as they sped off in the small time Napoleon's red Miata. This caused some
dismay as Suzie and Dawn bent to work to sweep up the shattered glass
and offer words of consolation and a drink on the House to Latreena Brown
who got some of it in her hair.
It was then the door opened and the wind appeared. The candles blew then
disappeared. The curtains flew then He appeared, saying "Don't be
afraid."
It was He, the Wee Man returned again.
Then he observed the broken glass and said with a stern voice, "What's
all this then?"
Padraic shook in his boots and Dawn and Suzie clutched the hems of their
skirts.
"Its only a few vandals, omadhauens throwing stones," Padraic
said, lapsing into his Western accent. "We are daycent folk and we're
wantin' na' throuble."
"I believe you," said the Wee Man. "Carry on." He
waved to Dawn and Suzie with their broom and scoop. He then strode up
to the bar and climbed up upon the stool and ordered a Guinness and a
shot and a Fat Tire while waiting for the Guinness to stack.
This is the proper way to order a Guinness for a Guinness is good for
you and it takes time for a Guinness to properly stack in the glass when
done right and proper.
When the Wee Man had his glass at last he made his pronouncements, swiping
his sleeve across his frothy mustache.
What did he look like? For a start he wore a twill newsboy cap on a head
of bright red hair. Red, too was his full beard and cobalt blue his eyes.
He wore a green checked waistcoat which sported a gold chain that went
into the side pocket and green checked pants. And on his feet a set of
green suede brogans with tassels and toe tips that curled up and about
in a merry way. He stood all of three feet in height.
The Wee Man downed his shot of Jamison's with satisfaction and produced
a small derringer pistol which he discharged into the ceiling without
so much as looking before putting the weapon away into his waistcoat.
A bit of faery dust rained down and everyone remained quiet.
As to what the Wee Man really was, besides himself all day, which most
of us can claim at nearly the same rate, the matter was open to speculation
and never-ending discussion. Some say he came from the Spanish Armada
that sank off the coast and others say he was of the legendary Firbolg
that harried the ancient Romans loose from the Emerald Isle thousands
of years before. Some say despite his stature he was related to the mythic
giant Finn ni Cuchulain, Finn McCool, whose body extended the length of
Howth, and that his apparent manifest physical size was merely a kind
of trick, and some say that he was of the tribe of the Bann Sé
that howl about the chimneys at night and cause the tree branches to toss
about and wave by way of their long hair as they fly among the trees and
so therefore a sort of faery, but with some disreputable attributions,
including cigar smoking and farting.
"I have been to the Post Office," said the Wee Man.
"Not the Post Office of 1916," said Padraic.
"Nao," said the Wee Man. Well, yes I was there in 1916 and
I did what I could, saving the lads from the cannons, without being able
to save them from English hangman's nooses afterwards, but I mean the
Post Office down the way where I recently spied a brace of omadhauens
in a red Miata."
"The Angry Elf gang!" Everyone exclaimed.
"If you know about these nasty people, why do you not do anything
about them?" The Wee Man said reasonably.
"We are afraid of them," people said. "And the police
do nothing."
"Good people you need to learn that someone has power over you only
if you give it to them. If you refuse to empower evil people, the reverse
is true. And I will now show you just as I showed the Pakhistanis who
once feared the powerful General Muschariff."
The Wee Man picked up the rock on the floor and threw it out of the open
doorway, saying, "Come here!"
A wobbling Brian Kring wandered through the door, holding the rock and
rubbing his noggin which now sported a lump, exclaiming, "G--d d---m!
I was just at the Fireside Lounge!"
"Lie down!" commanded the Wee Man.
"Wahh!" And Kring was compelled to lie face down on the floor.
"And now Nasty Narita," commanded the Wee Man. He again threw
the rock out the door and crooked his finger and a dazed Asian woman came
through the door, holding the rock. "Lie down!" commanded the
Wee Man. The woman fell heavily to the floor, scattering dozens of keys.
"My keys!" Narita shrieked. "My precious keys!"
"Yes the keys you used to sneak into poor people's apartments and
rob them," said the Wee Man. "Now your power is all gone, spread
across the floor."
"Now you, evil spirit of rumor, spreading lies about people and
injuring reputations and spreading fear through threats," the Wee
Man said. "Extortion, theft, threats, rock throwing, and destruction
of reputation. Come here now, I command you!" With that, the Wee
Man hurled the rock through the open door again.
Next the Cackler reeled through the door and was made to lay down on
the beer-soaked tiles.
"I wish I could bring the Angry Elf here now, but he is so evil
that it would be destructive," said the Wee Man. "But I assure
you all that I will make him sorry."
The Wee Man then began to walk across the backs of the gang who lay there
on the floor, causing much anguish.
"You who have caused so much pain to others, complaining now about
my light step that serves to fix your posture," said the Wee Man,
" Have only yourselves to blame. You hurt people and laughed at their
pain, and so how do you feel now? Are you not sorry for your misdeeds?"
"Ow! Oww! Ow!" said Kring and the Cackler while Narita groped
in vain for her keys, weeping.
The Wee Man stood with one foot on Kring and one on the Cackler with
his fists balled up on his hips, looking down. O he was fierce! "I
command you three to leave and never come back to bother these people
again with your homegrown terrorism." He then got off of them and
caused them to get up and wander out the door as the rock bounced mysteriously
from one head to the other, propelling them out just as it started to
rain again. Thunk, thunk, thunk, went the rock no matter how much they
tried to avoid it.
"Well," said the Wee Man. "I see my work here is done
for the nonce. From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom
of the just suffereth violence, and the violent shall bear it away upon
themselves."
With that the Wee Man climbed up upon a stool, clapped his hands once
and there was a brilliant flash of light, followed by the room being thrust
into darkness. Padraic ran to the back to flip the breakers by flashlight
and the warm barlight returned. All the candles had magically relit and
many gasped to peer past their waistbands.
"O for Pete's sake," said Dawn. "The Wee Man has once
again transformed me knickers!"
Suzie turned very red and pressed down her skirt.
"The man's a soddin' pervert!" Padraic said. "But I am
grateful he fixed the window." Indeed it was true. The broken glass
had been replaced.
Knowing what happened each St. Patrick's day, Padraic had prepared for
the eventuality and so he went to the restroom armed witih a new package
of boxer shorts from Macy's, returning to drop a nearly transparent, green
thong upon the bar. Pimenta Strife sidled up to the Man from Minot and
said, "Wanna see what I am wearing?"
When everyone had calmed down. Suzie returned to her place behind the
bar with her Anthropology book. It was a dark night on an Island that
knows how to keep its secrets, but in the Old Same Place Bar there sat
one bartender pondering Life's Persistent Questions. . . .
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
MARCH 10, 2019
DINER
This iconic image was snapped by Carol in the Gold Coast area off of
Webster and is one of those last vestiges of Old Tyme Alameda when the
streets were lined with shops that sported big neon signs like this one.
NEW TIMES! NEW TIMES! NEW, NEW, NEW TIMES!
Ok the Island is set to vote on Measure A to apportion the McKay Avenue
parcel that was used and disused by the Feds via GSA to either make the
place a Senior wellness center cum support services for homeless or not.
Pretty much everybody with serious influence is in favor and the anti
group consists of a disparate group of unfunded individuals whose argument
the development would cost taxpayers is entirely erroneous.
Given that this project replaces the previous one that would have jacked
the traffic situation six ways to Sunday down there, we would have to
say this is a no-brainer yes.
Look, in this era of land-greed somebody is going to build something
down there and there is no way of avoiding that save hand the place over
to the Parks as was attempted initially. We think what would have been
the best outcome. Well, that is not going to fly, so people get real with
what is.
The Black Brothers will hold forth at the Freight & Salvage in Berkeley,
Sunday, St. Patrick's Day. Brothers Michael and Shay Black play an exciting
mix of Dublin street songs, music hall songs, and historical ballads,
as well as songs from the Irish, English, and Scottish traditions. Singing
in close harmony, telling funny stories, and even dancing occasionally,
Michael and Shay draw people in with their energy, wit, and superb musicianship
It is Late Winter season, so there is a lot of chancy newnames appearing
at the Fox and the Paramount in Oaktown. If you missed Black Ladysmith
Mambazo at the Freight and Yoshi's, well, too bad. They are gone now.
And Judy Collins is sold out, but you can still get Elvin Bishop at the
end of the month and he is always worth the price of admission.
LET IT RAIN, LET IT POUR
So anyway. This past week the rain came down with a vengeance. It poured
down in monsoon strength, giving us record-breaking numbers. The rain
pounded Santa Cruz and it drenched Santa Rose with levels more appropriate
for places like Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana. Hillsides slid down taken
houses with them. Roads were obliterated. Creeks normally inches deep
swelled to 8, 12, 15 feet. Chunks of the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge dropped
down to wreck cars, closing the entire bridge for hours.
Then it all subsided to intermittent showers, steady winds. The engineers
put a steel plate into the bridge. The workers shored up the hillsides
and shoved the dirt and rocks to the side to open up the roads.
Power went out of course all over the place. The Household of Marlene
and Andre made do with a fire in the stone fireplace providing heat and
rations of bread soup for everyone by the light of scattered candles,
electric lanterns, flashlights.
On the Island, Mr. Howitzter had Dodd distribute octopus cocktail canapes
by candlelight in his mansion during his annual midwinter soiree while
the band sawed through a number of acoustic waltzes. At the Old Same Place
Bar, Suzie and Dawn served up traditional cocktails and highballs by the
light of electric hurricane lanterns. Everyone got by until the lights
came back on and everyone stared at one another with astonishment in the
bright new light as if they had never seen before.
The sudden light caught Pimenta Strife with her hand down inside the
pants of the Man from Minot.
In the Island-Life offices the Editor continued to scribble by the light
of a desklamp that never went out while outside the San Geronimo Creek
gurgled and plashed. The word had arrived that the Sierra snowpack was
120% above normal, and so there would be skiiing well into April this
year, and another year of drought pushed away. For now.
And so the Editor continued to work, the remaining white hairs on his
head flying about in an aureole.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
March 3, 2019
Issue cancelled due to illness
FEBRUARY 24, 2019
WHEN THE MUSIC' S OVER
This week's image is of our Chad's banjo. In the guitar case there was
a frailing pick and two playing cards. No idea what significance the cards,
silent relics of an untold story.
NEWS
News is Gung Hay Fat Choi for the Chinese New Year and the year of the
Pig, which seems appropriate in these Trumpian\Weinstein times. Every
year Mei Mei goes to the annual Chinatown Parade to see Gum Lung, the
dragon, which seemed so enormous when she was so small, but with each
passing year, as things changed with Mei Mei, the dragon seemed to get
smaller.
Now she had children of her own and they pointed up in fear, "O
the dragon is so big! So big!"
Baby Blunt is having his Emergency reviewed and somebody somewhere won
an Oscar award.
FOR A DANCER
So anyway, Baby Blunt is still on a rampage about getting his wall between
his property and that belonging to Brown People. Largely because he was
denied during the last election of a majority supporting his enterprise
and also being sued by a number of Me**Too** folks and under investigation
of collaborating with the Enemies of the Island in the form of Russian
Collusionists, Baby Blunt has in his own mind a State of Emergency, which
generally is the last resort of tin-pot dictators who wear mirror sunglasses
and epaulets.
We see how much this sort of image helped Musharrif and Idi Amin and
Ghaddafi. And the Berlin Wall is a good example of how effective these
things are in reality. But nevertheless, Baby Blunt wants his wall to
protect his garden vegetables and in his mind he has an emergency because
nobody takes him seriously and that is a problem.
Denby got let out of jail after the latest Valentine's day Massacree
Disaster and headed wearily home after a long discussion with the desk
sergeant who felt that Denby should stop engaging in illegal activity
and doubtful circumstances every year.
Denby protested that it was not he, but the circumstances at fault all
the time.
Then how is it you wound up in the women's restroom of the movie theatre
without your pants that time?
That was children's bubblegum, Denby tried to explain.
Last I heard bubblegum has neither intoxicating nor aphrodesiac qualities.
If it does turn out to possess such powers, please let me know and I will
purchase a case. But I suspect you were under the influence by other means,
so do not blame Double Bubble.
And so it went. It is impossible to prove innocence, as many a one falsely
charged can attest, while guilt is easy to suppose.
Please do not come into my jail during Valentine's time or any other
time for that matter, as I find you a troublesome sort and a blot upon
the honor of my District. Go away and come no more, said the Sergeant.
So it was, Denby got on the bus and returned to Silvan Acres even as
the rains began again to flail the sweet earth and the trees. As the bus
pulled up to the willow-hung bus-stop Jose and Javier were there to greet
him and give him the news about Doyle who had suffered a stroke up north
at the River and was now in Napa, comotose.
The three walked in the rain without umbrellas, using only their fedoras
and long coats for protection while the tree branches whipped angrily
in the rough wind above them and the cold, cold pellets gathered like
ravens, fell down like bombs.
In the Island-Life offices, now a converted barn in Silvan Acres because
of the criminal elements that had forced everyone out, the Editor remained
in the cavernous space pounded by the weather, all alone and doing his
work at the desk lit by a single pool of light. It was mostly dark in
that space, save for the occasional desklamp left on, the occasional computer
screensaver flickering in the dark pool of shadows. All around hung the
muttering curtains of night, while beyond this pale, beyond the circle
of dark, somewhere out there gleamed the spirit of a like mind.
At one time he had imagined he had found such a spirit in the flesh,
but now that light was extinguished forever. Departed, leaving behind
some website code, a banjo and a guitar once held by a founding member
of the Jefferson Airplane to add distinction to its humble trash guiltar
origins.
Now we hear talk of yet another of the Karass leaving this life.
And what the hell is all this talk about bubblegum and Denby's pants?
Ribald comedy interrupts our grief.
Maybe that is the way is should be. Our grief and our trouble is just
hysterically funny to other people who take comfort in our pain.
That is just the way it is. That is just the way it has always been and
playground bullies have always been there and succeeded in the end.
We have only ourselves and our sense of humanity as sword and shield
against those dark forces that burn crosses.
Gum Lung grows and shrinks with our age, always pursuing that glowing,
fiery ball down through all the corridors of Time. Perhaps the Dragon,
too, pursues Company in all the thousands of years of chasing that evasive
sphere. What would happen if the Dragon would catch that sphere and become
one with it?
In the cold space of the Island-life offices, the Editor sat in the pool
of light shed by the single desklamp, his white hair flying about his
head in a corolla, searching and doing all for Company.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 17, 2019
SHOCK THE MONKEY
The recent storms have caused havoc on many streets. Here is a shot of
where powerlines were brought low in Woodacre.
This Global Climate Change has consequences, as some of us understand.
PINK MOON
So anyway. This Valentine's day proved to be no different than all the
others for members of Marlene and Andre's household.
But before we get into that romantic stuff, all the latest flap in Silly
Hall was about Baby Blunt's hissy fit over not getting his wall approved.
For those of you just catching up, Baby Blunt owns a big construction
company and was set to block City Hall's entrance with a couple of his
five ton loader rigs.
These rigs are all bigger than anything you have seen on the Teevee program
Highway Through Hell. Blunt was going to set down a series of concrete
freeway dividers in addition so as to totally block government, but Silly
Council came through -- for once -- and all voted to keep the government
open, especially as the entrance is shared with the Police Department
and we couldn't have no Baby Blunt, no matter how rich and famous and
all those things, blocking the Police and Officer O'Madhauen was right
on it, for obstructing the passage of official police cars was all kinds
of mean, nasty, lawbreaking kinds of things and if Blunt dared become
a perpetrator of such heinous anti-traffic statutes, he was gonna make
darn sure this alleged perpetrator of all kinds of mean, nasty kinds of
things would be hauled off into a tiny, dark room in the newly re-aquired
jail where Blunt would be interrogated, irrigated, dissipated, irradiated,
syncopated, and further remediated by a number of Boys in Blue who like
to play with Babys like Mr. Blunt.
Yes, they have ways of making bad boys behave. And we call that all Supreme
Justice.
So Baby Blunt acted as mature as he always does. He pitched a fit, rolling
on the ground, screaming, crying and shaking his rattle at the sky in
the most severe of anguish that he wanted his wall so bad the original
reason for the Wall had gotten lost in all the tantrums and screaming
and accusations.
So Baby Blunt, most mature and adult-like, swiped the treasure-chest
savings that were supposed to go to the Crossing Guard Program, claiming,
that because he was President of Protection and Discourse, as well as
General of Bums, he had the legal right to do so on account of it being
a Declared State of Emergency.
And the State of Emergency was that for the first time in History a lot
of people united and said NO to Baby Blunt for once.
This, of course, stimulated a legal furor of Olympic proportions, which
Baby Blunt enjoys, for he has always done well by chaos and disorder,
even though the majority of people do not.
So now we have armies of attornies arrayed in lines of battle over Baby
Blunt's declaration of Emergency. Which makes us wonder, just when did
this Emergency begin? For it was not referenced at the start of the man's
Presidency. It only seems to have become important after the Midterm elections.
Ponder that timing, will you.
As for what is happening along McKay Avenue, we can say that good intentions
will not prevail, for the entire progress as been one of irrational greed
and pumping more people down that narrow strait than the physical environment
can support. Every plan has been like that and the current one is no exception.
The region is infected with landgreed fever and that spit is not unaffected.
Yes, we can see what you are doing and we can see it still from afar.
Meanwhile, in the San Geronimo Valley, the cold front set in to make
the nights stiff with frost. The House residents huddled close in the
decrepit buildings there as the rains and hail pounded the acres. Power
went out and creeks flooded over the roads. The winds flung huge branches
down.
In such an isolated place and in such weather, Denby felt confident and
assured that this year would pass with no contretemps upon the dreaded
V-day that so many others adore.
That night he went out with the gang to the Saloon where a band played
old school blues and everyone had a few beers and all was groovy because
the place was filled with Blues and good music and the band was good and
everyone was having a good time and Denby danced mostly with Marsha from
New Jersey, save for a few rounds with a willow-haired gal from Lagunitas,
whose name turned out to be, unsurpisingly, Willow. There was no Trouble
anywhere to be seen at all. Then everyone went back home after last call
and everything was fine until a rude light shone in Denby's eyes before
dawn.
Turned out he was under arrest for consorting with somebody under the
Me-too-movement and there was nothing to be done about it. Until it all
got cleared up.
In the San Rafael jail, Denby looked up at the moonlight of the new Snow
Moon streaming through and asked just why this sort of thing always happened
to him and god answered, because Denby, I really love you.
Thanks alot, Denby said.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over Fairfax and White's Hill, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 10, 2019
DEER ON THE PARKWAY
When you are at loss for a headline foto, there are always images of
deer creeping around the place.
HE WAS A GOOD FRIEND OF MINE
This is one of the more difficult issues to write. Life is a vale of
tears, full of suffering with only the the scant consolation that it does
not go on forever. There is a guaranteed end to all of this, and that
is all the guarantee we get. Not even Reincarnation is a guaranteed delivery.
When the body fails while the soul and mind are still in drive, we call
that Tragedy, as in the case of Stephen Hawking during his lifetime. When
the body fails entirely, halting the mind and allowing the soul to leave
the body, we call that Finality, which is Death. After that, there is
no going forward; we have only memories.
As of a few hours ago, Chad Chadwick, our in-house web developer and
friend of many decades passed away due to a massive heart attack.
The legacy left by his work on Island-Life shall remain preserved for
years to come; his personal touch remains on every page and is stamped
in many lines of code and we are going to make sure his legacy remains
preserved for years to come on the Internet.
We first worked together in a dark place underneath the freeway overpasses
in San Francisco in the late 1980's. On the steps of that hardware supplier
to contractors Chad attempted to teach us how to play the banjo.
Chad had always been a sharp and astute observer of events from the 1960's
onward. He played music in livingroom sessions with founders of the Jefferson
Airplane and soon became disillusioned with the music industry's lack
of soul. He often had sharp words for Paul Kantner, with whom we attempted
briefly a late rapprochement that collapsed due to the distances created
between Fame and Normality. Chad felt that Kantner had unfairly stolen
his girlfriend at the time.
A multi-instrumentalist, Chad could play banjo, guitar, harmonica and
sing quite capably before his lung disease. While I would tune a guitar
with a modern electronic tuner, he would call out the pitch on the dot
with each adjustment. "Too sharp! Okay . . . a hair flat. . . Bingo!
Aye natural!"
Chad was no stranger to this disjunct between Fame and the ocean of average-ness.
His grandfather, Charles Nordhoff, wrote the book called Mutiny on the
Bounty, that became made into a rather famous movie.
Nordhoff had three daughters and two sons with a half-Danish Titian wife
named Christianne Tua Tearae Schmidt, sometimes referred to by the Titian
word for "woman", Vahine. After the 2nd son died shortly after
childbirth, Nordhoff divorced Vahine and either married or took as a mistress
with whom he had three sons.
Marguerite moved eventually to the US, married John Chadwick, and had
six children, with one child dying before birth.
Chad lived through the damaged generation that was the 60's and emerged
with an acerbic, biting view of life, politics, culture, and American
Life that was vividly presented with his savage commentary on the way
things are -- the horrific and inevitable consequences of horrific, inhumane
policies expressed domestically and abroad the consequences of which we
see clearly played out in the present day, including a range of obscenities
ranging from what happened to Victor Jara to Trump's porno bimbos.
We met in the late 1980's when both of us worked as slavey's for a contractor
hardware-supply company called MacMurray Pacific underneath the freeway
overpass at 7th street in San Francisco. There across the street from
the 7th Street City Jail where the hookers kept in cells overnight were
let out onto the street in the early morning, dressed in red negligee's
and high heels, Chad attempted to teach us the banjo.
He had many stories of growing up in Sacramento and moving to San Francisco
during the Hippie Era. Although not a Hippie exactly, for he always believed
in working for a living, he embodied many of the best ideals of the Sixties
Counterculture movements. He quickly realized the world was not going
to change save by incremental bits as represented by individuals doing
their small bit parts on behalf of peace, kindness and sanity. Other than
tobacco and booze, he refrained from hard drugs after seeing what that
stuff could do to people. Demonstrations were fine things, but the real
work was done by each person acting morally responsible with and to other
people around them. Not surprisingly Kurt Vonnegut was a favorite author.
For several years we lost touch until in the late 1990's we arranged
for a visit at his lodgings and were shocked to see this once hale and
hearty man hooked up to oxygen tanks.
After his diagnosis of COPD and attendant emphysema, Chad retreated from
the world, attached to it by the narrow lifeline of the Internet, while
still attempting to get out with the help of friends to public arenas.
Chad fought with the heart of a warrior of peace against the effects
of his disease. He told us he had dreams of running, running uphill for
miles and miles.
He suffered much as his COPD progressed, until he could not leave the
house without an oxygen tank. Inside the house, he had to remain hooked
to a machine that delivered air to his lungs 24 hours a day. Nevertheless,
he remained feisty and pugnacious, challenging ignorant Internet trolls
on message boards, posting acid comments on Facebook, and remaining continuously
on tap with local as well as national news by way of all the outlets the
Internet can provide.
Although he could be severe on self-maintained ignorance and outright
boorishness, Chad also preserved the 60's ethic of love for all those
who do not bully others. He was possessed of a kind heart that put him
in the Aristocracy of the Heart, a level way above most of us who have
to play catch-up with someone so magnanimous, so emotionally generous.
He found beauty in the most obscure of places in people who had a hard
time finding the beauty in themselves.
Well he is out of it now. We lost a great heart and a great soul filled
with wisdom. His suffering is now over and now the pain is left to the
survivors. Sisters Shannon and Tina both passed away last year, leaving
Shelly of who we can find not a trace. As far as we know , Chad is the
last of the direct line engendered by the author of the Mutiny on the
Bounty save for grandchildren.
Chad is survived by his loving wife, Tammy Chadwick, who lives in Alameda.
As said in the beginning, Life is a vale of tears, full of sorrow and
suffering. There is no escape from suffering, not even for Donald Trump;
it may be that your time has not yet arrived, or you are particularly
obtuse and unobservant -- these things do happen and probably so for Der
Donald. Generally those people who have no feelings at all are called
Sociopaths.
Again, there is some comfort, a scant comfort at that, there is an end
to all of this. The suffering does not go on forever. And now Chad no
longer suffers. He is gone and we remain with fond memories of having
known him and the legacy left by his work on the Island-life web code
shall persist for years.
LET IT RAIN LET IT POUR
So anyway, the rain fell and nourished the sweet earth these past few
days. All the hillsides trickled with incidental rivulets that had been
dry cuts for years until now and down south people reported snow upon
the Santa Cruz mountains.
A kind of concrete rain fell upon the sad Richmond-San Rafael Bridge
that was built so long ago as an afterthought with sparse funding and
enforced deadlines by tight-assed managers demanding last-minute results
from overworked underlings who had always been pushed to the limit even
before the project had been initiated. The result is a limp, failure-prone
structure that crumbles over time and the result stands before our eyes
as an example of bad management.
On the day that the bridge was closed last week, Pahrump turned his scooter
around and headed back through the stalled traffic, postponing a provisions
run for the Household. Stores and suppliers so bad in Marin that Pahrump
was compelled to head over to the East Bay to fetch basic necessities
for the House on his scooter, meant that vital necessities would have
to be delayed until he could cross again.
Meanwhile I.N.Eptitood contractors spent two days putting in flower plants
around the sign in Fairfax for the Rhino gas station, although everyone
in their right mind avoided the station for any sort of service other
than gas, for the place had a bad reputation for extremely bad service
on anything resembling a gas powered internal combustible engine.
Skateboards and bicycles they could fix well enough. Lawnmowers, perhaps.
Cars, not so much. With cars they had big problems understanding things
like carburetion, exhaust, ignition and spark. Otherwise they were fine,
those boys.
The night fell from scattered clouds to another night of frost. The Editor
sat at his desk as the Nation prepared for yet another snitty Government
shutdown, initiated by the Baby in Chief who wanted his Wall and would
have no truck about it.
Unfortunately, there was a great deal about which to write and so little
time. He had thought on taking this small-town gig he would be compressed
to find things about which to write and found that in the reality there
were too few hours in the day to cover it all.
Now, night had fallen and all around the glassed cubicle the muttering
voices, the gazing eyes.. Beyond all that, somewhere out in the darkness
a like mind. Recently he had lost one of his own and so now was even more
alone without Chadwick, his coder.
But somehow Nohow On. Out there must exist a like mind and all was toward
unified contemplation. Union with another Creator. Perhaps the One. The
Editor persisted in his meditation. Stripping all intervention between
himself and Him. Doing all for Company.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over White's Hill and Fairfax, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 3, 2019
BABYLON
Here is an image of Babylon shot from the verdant hills of Marin. Such
a metropolis and so far away.
WE PRINT ALL THE NEWS THAT FITS
Heard the LII something Pooper Soul was to take place. None of us own
TeeVees and so much of the Ballyhoo was overblown, as it usually is regardless.
Heard that NE with tom brady vs. LA rams was the ticket.
In more important news, we note that Tracy K. Smith is the current Poet
Laureate Consultant to the US. She is currently serving as the 22nd Poet
Laureate of the United States, an office she assumed in 2017. She was
nominated for an unprecedented 2nd term in 2018. She has published four
collections of poetry, winning the Pulitzer Prize for her 2011 volume
Life on Mars.
In his review of the collection, Joel Brouwer also quoted at length from
this poem, writing that "for Smith the abyss seems as much a space
of possibility as of oblivion:"
Perhaps the great error is believing were alone,
That the others have come and gone a momentary blip
When all along, space might be choc-full of traffic,
Bursting at the seams with energy we neither feel
Nor see, flush against us, living, dying, deciding,
...
Dan Chiasson writes of another aspect of the collection: "The issues
of power and paternalism suggest the deep ways in which this is a book
about race. Smiths deadpan title is itself racially freighted: we
cant think about one set of fifties images, of Martians and sci-fi
comics, without conjuring another, of black kids in the segregated South.
Those two image files are situated uncannily close to each other in the
cultural cortex, but it took this book to connect them."
We look forward eagerly to who shall assume the laurel wreath for 2019.
Now what if we held a Super Bowl of Poetry? Would not that be something
to celebrate and truly Make America Great Also? Well, if America really
wants to be Great Also with the likes of China, which cannot conduct any
sort of industrial enterprise without stealing, as it seems, or the Russian
Empire, which does not seem to be able to make anything great without
also stealing and blocking the advance of foreigners in a sort of native
Californian style,
Dweeb report on weather - Pineapple express coming in lead by a cold
front that is the mother of all cold fronts.
LAND OF THE BOTTOM LINE
So anyway. The Pooper Soul LIII happened. Somebody won, the unpopular
guy at the prom, we guess by all the noise.
Oh well. Somebody had to win for somebody to lose or vice versa. Thats
the way it goes.
A few dockwallopers set in this past week to drench the Island and environs,
causing all activities to hustle indoors. The Old Same Place Bar has been
a-bustle with Padraic and Dawn serving up those famous Gaelic Coffees,
infused with Jameson's and other mysterious ingredients, while the busstop
midway around the circle has seen Reverend Inquist and Pastor Danyluk
and Rebbi Mendelnusse collecting for confabs on the failings of the faithful
and the difficulties of the clergy in times like these, fraught with lunatic
Creationists and Anti-Scientists selling false pardons to Global Warming
Parties as was done in the old Medieval days of ignorance and deceit called
The Dark Ages.
Mr. "Baby" Blunt was made to unblock the City Hall government
by more mature adults, but he is still threatening to do the same again
if he does not get his "beautiful wall", installed and paid
for by his neighbors, whom he detests.
A number of people have been talking about this wall and commenting that
building a wall around an Island seems really foolish and stupid and a
waste of tax dollars better spent on running the government that after
the blockade now everybody realizes is terribly necessary.
This realization has caused the Radical Right some concern, for their
main issue was that less government is better and now people have realized
they need more govenment, not less after doing without much of it for
36 days.
It all sucked while Baby Blunt had his tantrum and so now people know
that goverment workers actually do something for the money.
To oversimplify, if you want a toilet when you go to the seashore, you
need to pay for it. You want someone to rush in and defend the coastline
with something like the Coast Guard when the Chinese invade, you gotta
pay for it. Nobody gonna risk their lives for your sorry ass for free.
Meanwhile, a cold front is coming in to superchill the Bay Area that
is not used to frozen temperatures.
Nevermind that the Midwest just got itself unstuck from minus 40 degrees.
Clearly, the climate has gone wacko and we hope you Bushian denialists,
and other climate-denialists are enjoying the weather now caused by carbon
emissions, all repleate with floods, fires, and freezes, because there
will be political repercussions come Spring. Yes, you Assholes.Yes, you,
who will be remembered.
The recent storms swept the San Geronimo Valley undisturbed. All the
trees that were to fall, did fall in the last storm, and the heavy branches
still held above the powerlines. Toto had a tumor removed from one of
his anal glands and so he ran about in the rain with a swollen, red butt,
pooping at will and pissing as usual upon the usual suspects, save for
he wore for the nonce a plastic cone that prevented him disturbing his
stitches. This resulted in some bonking upon the walls where he was used
to sniff, but otherwise he was fine.
In the Offices of Island Life, now become Silvan Acres, the Editor arranged
his papers. Stories about Toto were placed here in this corner, and stories
about San Geronimo Presbyterian were placed in this other corner and stories
about the rain and floods and the creeks were placed here . . .
The Editor realized that because of the expectation of weather and its
unruliness, all was left in a state of stasis. Not much could happen until
all this weather was done with, for anything could happen at any time
due to rain and flood. And after a season, anything could happen due to
fire and drought.
What can one do in such times save persist and go on.
I dont know: perhaps its a dream, all a dream. (That
would surprise me.) Ill wake, in the silence, and never sleep again.
(It will be I?) Or dream (dream again), dream of a silence, a dream silence,
full of murmurs (I dont know, thats all words), never wake
(all words, theres nothing else).
You must go on, thats all I know.
Theyre going to stop, I know that well: I can feel it. Theyre
going to abandon me. It will be the silence, for a moment (a good few
moments). Or it will be mine? The lasting one, that didnt last,
that still lasts? It will be I?
You must go on.
I cant go on.
You must go on.
Ill go on. You must say words, as long as there are any - until
they find me, until they say me. (Strange pain, strange sin!) You must
go on. Perhaps its done already. Perhaps they have said me already.
Perhaps they have carried me to the threshold of my story, before the
door that opens on my story. (That would surprise me, if it opens.)
It will be I? It will be the silence, where I am? I dont know,
Ill never know: in the silence you dont know.
"You must go on.
I cant go on.
Ill go on.
The Editor sits at his table in the Offices after all the staff have
gone home and the cold rain beats now upon the saggy roof and tired windowpanes.
His desk is lit by the pool of a single desklamp and the dim light of
the monitor in front of him. A notepad sits to the left and a mouse sits
below that on the keyboard platform that extends from the old cherrywood
desk that once was a schooldesk in Iowa in the late 1800's.
Tonight he does all for Company. As usual. Nohow on, ill seen, ill said.
A voice comes to one in the dark . . . Imagine.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over White's Hill and Fairfax, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 17, 2019
SHOCK THE MONKEY
The recent storms have caused havoc on many streets. Here is a shot of
where powerlines were brought low in Woodacre.
This Global Climate Change has consequences, as some of us understand.
PINK MOON
So anyway. This Valentine's day proved to be no different than all the
others for members of Marlene and Andre's household.
But before we get into that romantic stuff, all the latest flap in Silly
Hall was about Baby Blunt's hissy fit over not getting his wall approved.
For those of you just catching up, Baby Blunt owns a big construction
company and was set to block City Hall's entrance with a couple of his
five ton loader rigs.
These rigs are all bigger than anything you have seen on the Teevee program
Highway Through Hell. Blunt was going to set down a series of concrete
freeway dividers in addition so as to totally block government, but Silly
Council came through -- for once -- and all voted to keep the government
open, especially as the entrance is shared with the Police Department
and we couldn't have no Baby Blunt, no matter how rich and famous and
all those things, blocking the Police and Officer O'Madhauen was right
on it, for obstructing the passage of official police cars was all kinds
of mean, nasty, lawbreaking kinds of things and if Blunt dared become
a perpetrator of such heinous anti-traffic statutes, he was gonna make
darn sure this alleged perpetrator of all kinds of mean, nasty kinds of
things would be hauled off into a tiny, dark room in the newly re-aquired
jail where Blunt would be interrogated, irrigated, dissipated, irradiated,
syncopated, and further remediated by a number of Boys in Blue who like
to play with Babys like Mr. Blunt.
Yes, they have ways of making bad boys behave. And we call that all Supreme
Justice.
So Baby Blunt acted as mature as he always does. He pitched a fit, rolling
on the ground, screaming, crying and shaking his rattle at the sky in
the most severe of anguish that he wanted his wall so bad the original
reason for the Wall had gotten lost in all the tantrums and screaming
and accusations.
So Baby Blunt, most mature and adult-like, swiped the treasure-chest
savings that were supposed to go to the Crossing Guard Program, claiming,
that because he was President of Protection and Discourse, as well as
General of Bums, he had the legal right to do so on account of it being
a Declared State of Emergency.
And the State of Emergency was that for the first time in History a lot
of people united and said NO to Baby Blunt for once.
This, of course, stimulated a legal furor of Olympic proportions, which
Baby Blunt enjoys, for he has always done well by chaos and disorder,
even though the majority of people do not.
So now we have armies of attornies arrayed in lines of battle over Baby
Blunt's declaration of Emergency. Which makes us wonder, just when did
this Emergency begin? For it was not referenced at the start of the man's
Presidency. It only seems to have become important after the Midterm elections.
Ponder that timing, will you.
As for what is happening along McKay Avenue, we can say that good intentions
will not prevail, for the entire progress as been one of irrational greed
and pumping more people down that narrow strait than the physical environment
can support. Every plan has been like that and the current one is no exception.
The region is infected with landgreed fever and that spit is not unaffected.
Yes, we can see what you are doing and we can see it still from afar.
Meanwhile, in the San Geronimo Valley, the cold front set in to make
the nights stiff with frost. The House residents huddled close in the
decrepit buildings there as the rains and hail pounded the acres. Power
went out and creeks flooded over the roads. The winds flung huge branches
down.
In such an isolated place and in such weather, Denby felt confident and
assured that this year would pass with no contretemps upon the dreaded
V-day that so many others adore.
That night he went out with the gang to the Saloon where a band played
old school blues and everyone had a few beers and all was groovy because
the place was filled with Blues and good music and the band was good and
everyone was having a good time and Denby danced mostly with Marsha from
New Jersey, save for a few rounds with a willow-haired gal from Lagunitas.
Then everyone went back home after last call and everything was fine until
a rude light shone in Denby's eyes before dawn.
Turned out he was under arrest for consorting with somebody under the
Me-Too-movement and there was nothing to be done about it. Until it all
got cleared up.
In the San Rafael jail, Denby looked up at the moonlight of the new Snow
Moon streaming through and asked just why this sort of thing always happened
to him and god answered, because Denby, I really love you.
Thanks alot, Denby said.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over White's Hill and Fairfax, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
JANUARY 27, 2019
EASY RIDER
Marin can be pretty strange at times, and sometimes in a good way. It
has a lot of strange things in it, and one strange thing is the bicycle
museum in Fairfax where this 8-foot high item sits in the parking lot.
Every weekend this area teems with packs of bicyclists taking advantage
of scenic country roads and challenging hills.
LIKE THE WEATHER
Got the latest report from Howard The Dweeb, who runs a ham meteorological
service from Mammoth. Seems the Sierra snowpack is 120% above normal,
so the drought is done for now. He sees some storms rolling in in early
February, so do not put away your impermeables quite yet. Howard also
forecast some bitter cold weather for the East and Central regions. Warn
your children not to put their tongues on the iron waterpump handle.
BABYLON
So anyway, "Baby" Bobby Blunt did not get his wall and was
persuaded to unblock the City government parkinglot when Ms. Morales came
up to him and said she needed to get into City Hall to file papers on
behalf of her Teacher's Foundation for kids with special needs. Many of
these kids and their caregivers were suffering because of the lack of
services.
Baby Blunt, of course, summarily dismissed Ms. Morales and her tender
charges, saying, "Some people may feel a little pain, but the security
of this City is Paramount and in the best interest of all Islanders. We
need to be strong together like wooden dowels bound around the handle
of an ax to make it stronger. Suck it up buttercup. I alone can solve
every problem known to man and child and dog. That is why I appreciate
your wholehearted support. Not supporting me is being a Loser. Loser!"
"My children are not losers, sir. They struggle hard and with support
they succeed."
"You have an accent. Are you American?"
"I was born on Mandanao in the Philippines," said Ms. Morales
honestly. "But today I am as American as anyone and all of my charges
were born in the US and they deserve the same protections as any citizen."
Ms. Morales stood there, small with her handbag and dowdy black shoes,
but yet defiant.
At this point Officer O'Madhauen made an unaccustomed intervention outside
his purview of traffic enforcement, for he had listened to all that had
transpired.
"Mr. Blunt I urge you to move this 3 ton grader immediately and
unblock Government, or I will have it towed and dumped into the Bay, much
as that distresses the Environmentalist Clan. I will then have you arrested
and taken to Santa Rita where I will inform certain swarthy, biker types
that you are a fellow that likes to diddle children. Get this thing out
of here within an hour or else."
"You cannot do that. I am exempt, because I am the President of
the Lion's Club! And President of many other things besides!"
"Mr. President, I would be honored to haul your cherry-red ass to
Santa Rita, for frankly, I do not give a shit and you were elected by
a minority besides. The majority will cheer as you encounter your special
welcome in the Santa Rita showers. Move the grader. Now!"
The grader got moved and government on the Island was unblocked even
as Baby Blunt shouted, "I can do this again if I do not get my beautiful
wall!"
Meanwhile experts are looking at Blunt's plan to wall off not just his
property, but the entire Island from Oaktown. Most are saying this enterprise
is impossible and foolish, but Blunts, as his followers are called, insist
this is the Final Solution. Others have said the racial overtones here,
plus the term "Final Solution", feel uncomfortable.
Of course, Blunts and Blunt followers see no connections here and say
that a little pain on the part of Little People of inconsequence is a
small price to pay for Security and Missy Whitesyrup feeling safe in her
bed.
Outside of the political arena, where most Americans live, like it or
not, folks gathered at the end of a long working day at the Old Same Place
Bar to unwind with a bump and a shot. And in a few cases, a bit more than
that.
Of course there was some discussion about the Superbowl and how the Saints
were robbed, robbed in full sight of everybody save the judges, but the
Superbowl shall proceed, checkered and marred with objectionable detritus.
We shall see what transpires SBS, realizing that the Saints should have
been there. All else is sheer masquerade. Like the rest of American politics,
the Superbowl has become derelict of value. Let us rather look at women's
volleyball and World Cup Soccer. The Raiders have abandoned their home
city for a foreign place. For this Superbowl is a land leased out; we
die pronouncing it.
Meanwhile the last week has been sunny and chill with dappled clouds
over both the Island and the San Geronimo Valley. After the MLK holiday
and any number of commemorations that still do not much to fix the situation
going on in this country for about 400 years since Slavery, everybody
went back to work, pursuing their personal lives of quiet desperation,
misery, failed marriages, and sometimes momentary joy while traveling
the same labyrinth channels they have pursued day after day, year after
year, following that one learned path from entrance to the Place of Cheese.
The Editor, back at work after his hiatus as a tree, leaned back in his
chair lit by the single desklamp and reflected that he was just like a
lab rat following the same path as everyone else, only he was always looking
now for the triangle lines of escape, the portholes that defied the assertion
that Time is a prison.
The new Island-Life offices were more rustic than the rooms on the densely
populated Island. The interior walls consisted of roughhewn boards and
redwood beams. The wood floor was unpolished fir and redwood plank. Images
of the time when the railway went along SFD Boulevard hung on the walls.
The Editor had lately been perusing through chronicles of the Valley
and was pleased to find a rich trove of material. Time began, after the
Miwok, who had occupied and taken care of the Valley for some 10,000 years
had been decimated, with the Mexican Occupation. "Rafael Cacho, a
military officer and friend of General Mariano Vallejo, was the first
person to hold title to the San Geronimo Valley. On February 12, 1844,
he was granted the 8,800-acre Rancho Cañada de San Geronimo (The
Valley of Saint Jerome) by the Mexican government, in acknowledgment of
his loyal service as a Mexican citizen."
And what of the railroad and of the plans to develop the place with a
superhighway and interchanges and what became of the Master Plan of 1961?
The place was rife with delicious History. Things had happened here. Things
that reflected what America had been doing.
Renewed with vigor the Editor bent to the task of uncovering the history
of Silvan Acres and the San Geronimo Valley.
Out beyond the shroud of darkness the eyes of various creatures gleamed,
but inside he was alone, a man working diligently by the light of the
desklamp. Outside there may be a like intelligence, somewhere remote and
abstracted, some entity longing for contact, while for now he operated
in a vacuum of soul. Somewhere out there beyond the dark curtains of night
there was a like soul.
But for now, all he did, he did for Company.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over White's Hill and Fairfax, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
JANUARY 20, 2019
DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS
This week's image is of a dumpster sitting in the lot of the County Fire
Department in Woodacre and is a poignant memento mori with xmas trees.
Woodacre FD is the main call center for Marin and also is the place where
a lot of the heavy equipment for the County is housed.
The song "Day after Christmas" by Matthew West begins as follows:
Here comes the letdown Christmas is over
Here comes the meltdown, there goes the cheer
But before we have a breakdown, let us remember
The light of the world is still here
CH. CH. CH. CHANGES
As you will notice the masthead has changed. This is to reflect the shift
enforced by our response to illegal activity practiced by the Taikeff
Gang in Alameda, which activity was not moderated, controlled, or otherwise
deflected by the inadequate police force of the Island.
We are now Sylvan Acres although the primary url will remain Island-life.net
and there will always be a place for Island adventures, as we retain a
love for many of our characters who remain there, despite the horrible
Rent Crisis.
THAT DEVIL MUSIC
So anyway, Bobby Blunt, aka to associates as "Baby Bobby",
has gotten into a terrible wax with his neighbors over building a wall
between his property. Baby Bobby wants a wall because the skateboarders
keep cutting across the far corner to get to the Griddle out in the West
End and his house has been broken into several times.
The presence White Supremacy and Dixie flags in his windows may have
had something to do with the latter.
The hitch is that BB wants his neighbors to pay for the wall, a reinforced
concrete construction some 20 feet high and topped with rollers and barbed
wire like was employed for the Berlin Wall that was so successful back
in the day.
When the City refused permits for such construction (a neighbor called
Building and Planning, who sent inspector Chuck Schaefer) Bobby acted
as mature as he usually does when frustrated. He threw a tantrum and began
rolling on the ground and then parked his 3 ton grader across the entrance
to the City Hall parkinglot, thus obstructing City Government and trapping
Councilperson Nancy Pelotron's car inside the lot.
The Police Department did what they usually do, they booted the offending
vehicle when they found there was no tow truck available that could move
the thing and Officer Popinjay went to speak with the man.
"Now Bobby, please stop blocking the Government," said the
officer.
"I WANT MY WALL AND I AM PREPARED TO BLOCK GOVERNMENT FOR MONTHS.
FOR YEARS EVEN! AND FURTHERMORE I AM GOING TO HOLD MY BREATH UNTIL I TURN
BLUE!"
"Hold your breath, I do not care, but people are suffering. Mrs.
Grimoire cannot get to the restroom. We can't get equipment to tow this
thing for a week; all the big haulers are up in Butte County right now."
"I AM THE ONLY PERSON WHO CAN SOLVE ALL THE PROBLEMS. I WANT MY
BIG BEAUTIFUL WALL AND I WANT IT NOW. THOSE MEXICANS CAN PAY FOR IT, TOO!"
"I was born in this country, as was my father," Mr. Oliveira
said. "And my grandfather came from Venezuela, not Mexico."
"SAME DIFFERENCE!", shouted Baby Bobby.
"Ahhh, tu ese loco y sucio!" said Mr. Oliveira.
And so it went, degenerating into an atavistic melee of recriminations
and epithets until Officer Popinjay stomped away in disgust.
On the weekend before Martin Luther King's birthday, Pahrump and Little
Adam planned to take a walk up White's Hill, but the heavens opened up
and they took the bus to Fairfax where the Scoop had opened up after the
holidays. The Scoop had been serving home-made ice cream since the 1960's
under the paper mache cow and it was the best ice cream in the entire
Bay Area. There were only a few customers on that cold, rainy day, so
Pahrump and Adam sat inside and ate their lavendar mint ice cream while
watching people hurry by in the period downpours.
"You remember that Brother, Mr. King?" Adam asked Pahrump.
"'deed I do," Pahrump said. "Those were mighty days."
"What was he like?"
Pahrump thought for a bit, licking his spoon.
"Well, he was a hero who did not want to be a hero. He was a man
of god, but not a man of doctrine. He led millions, but avoided pride.
And I am afraid we shall not see his like again."
"He do much for your people?"
"Who? People on the Rez? Pyramid Lake?"
"All the Indians."
"My friend, anybody who speaks out against injustice and in the
name of love speaks for all men, all peoples. Red, Black, White and Yellow.
Nobody is free until the last slave walks in the sun."
And so the two sat there, the Native American and the young Black man,
watching as all the White people rushed by outside the windows.
On the Island there was a Block Party held on Grand Street and everybody
came except for Mr. Howitzer who ordered Dodd to close drapes as Mrs.
Stinson stepped to the middle of the road where the yellow lines were
and shook the hand of Luther, owner of the Pampered Pup, for it was symbolic
in that each remembered back in the day when a Black was not allowed to
cross Grand Street to the East End. If anyone did so, if only to go to
the Paramount for a movie, the police would collect them and bring them
back to the West End. And so it had been for years until the days of the
Civil Rights Movement and Rev. Martin Luther King.
The surviving members of the band The Monkey Spankers kicked up and Luther
danced in the street with Jacqueline until another rain squall hit and
the children scattered around them like multicolored petals from a flower
bouquet to the tents. Yes there is much work still to be done, but much
work had been done already and at the cost of much blood. Much by a man
who had been afraid of death, but not afraid of becoming a martyr.
...
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds over White's Hill and Fairfax, ululating through
Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo Valley,
coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the drifts
of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
JANUARY 6, 2019
LET IT RAIN, LET IT POUR, LET IT RAIN A WHOLE LOT MORE
The rains have returned to the Golden State, as some people have noticed.
Howard reported two feet of powder at Mammoth from the more recent storm
and more on the way.
This shot is of the bridgeway to the Ross Valley Fire Department in San
Anselmo. During the summer months this creek runs about six inches deep
at the most and there is over 12-15 feet of clearance from the bottom
to the top of the banks there.
WELCOME BACK MY FRIENDS TO THE SHOW THAT NEVER ENDS
Well it has been twenty years since we began this minor enterprise. Over
twenty years of Island Life issues written each week, 52 issues a year,
each issue containing concert reviews, perusals of the newspapers of the
world, multimedia wretchedness, reportage on fires, rental crisis, halloween
decorations, local politics, disastrous web design featuring hideously
bad floating radios, and Poodleshoot satires.
Probably if any of us had figured out how to do this thing properly,
we would have retired long ago, but, no, we are still figuring things
out. Each issue, retained, is a micro-slice of What is Going On around
here, and so when we look back, we see we have a bit of Bay Area history
preserved. As well as some national items. The search for Weapons of Mass
Doo Doo, in the form of Poodle excrement in Newark, seems pointed and
relevant in terms of the collection of political lies which have cost
all of us so much in real life.
Our motto comes from the plaque that still adorns the Berlin synagogue
that was located in former East Berlin: "Never Forget."
As we march with sadly sure and inevitable steps towards another totalitarianism
of peculularly American flavor, hearing talk of imposed State of Emergency
actions that we have seen enacted in so many totalitarian states in the
past, it remains up to some of us to preserve some memory of when things
were fresh and green and full of hope and Democracy was not a foolish
word stretched this way and that by those who insist the nation is a Republic
and NOTHING ELSE.
We should have retired our tired old bones long ago, but now in this
dangerous age it seems to us to be all that more important to carry on
the momentum of dissent, of real freedom concepts, of true non-slavish
patriotism and a love of Country not bound to ideology like staves around
the handle of an ax.
The Editor attended a holiday party where editors of the National Lampoon
and Harvard Magazine were there talking about their collaboration called
American Bystander, an illustrated magazine devoid of advertising. It
is a challenging work and worthy of checking out. When we see such things
in production, we have some hope for the generations to come that will
inherit the products of our misguided dementias, such as that clown with
the comb-over now infesting the White House with his twittering.
There may be hope for the American experiment yet.
NOTHING CHANGES ON NEW YEARS DAY
So anyway, Pastor Nyquist dropped in on Father Danyluk as part of what
has become an interdenominational tradition for NYE. Several years ago
the two had struck up aquaintance during their respective sermon walks,
for the Father had been in the habit of strolling the block clockwise,
starting from the door of the rectory, and in so doing cogitate the themes
to be discussed on the next Sermon. The Pastor of the Lutheran church
had taken, as was his nature, to walking from his door kitty corner the
Catholic rectory, anticlockwise and so the two were bound to meet at least
once a week for at least a few moments.
It was in that year of torrential rains in which the umbrellas of both
men of the cloth had failed and they had taken refuge together underneath
the bustop overhang that the two had developed their deep friendship.
The two gentlemen of the Cloth sat and sipped brandy culled from the
extensive Catholic cellars while discussing, politely, issues of transubstantiation,
divinity, saints and sainthood, whether the clippings gathered by the
barber of Christ should be sanctified, if found, and other things all
groovy and important to men of spiritual occupation.
Ms. Morales and Mr. Sanchez shared a quiet bottle of champagne in their
2nd floor flat on Santa Clara as the pop bottles went fizz and exploded.
Sgt Rumsbum marched around the premises at the Lunatic Asylum of St. Charles
to make sure no one went up on the roof and as soon as he retired a number
of residents promptly went up there at midnight to look at all the fireworks
going off down the estuary to San Leandro.
The Old Same Place Bar was rocking with canned music from the jukebox,
on account of Denby having left town along with most of the members of
the Monkey Spankers band. Suzie wore a miniskirt with spangles and a cute
sort of hat and blew streamers at the stroke of midnight with good grace
while the new TV over the bar displayed the ball falling in Times Square.
Percy was there with Madeleine, who wore a hat, shoes and a faux mink
stole in deference to the chilly season, but she removed the stole seductively
to the tune of "You can Keep your Hat on," as the bar was rather
warm and Pimenta Strife took the opportunity to grab several male crotches,
eventually seizing upon one belonging to one of the Depuglia brothers,
so as to infuse the New Year with sufficient spritz should that the champagne
provided fail to enliven with bubbles alone.
Lionel dropped in on Jaqueline at her salon and invited her out to the
Embers for dinner and some music there, and so the two star-crossed lovers
managed to enjoy one another's company after Maeve energetically facilitated
the arrangements before heading out to the Old Same Place Bar, where she
had a long tete a tete with the Man from Minot.
Up in the north counties, where many of our old friends had taken refuge
after the Night of Shattered Fires, the New Year passed quietly and with
little noise. Exhuberent noise is frowned upon in Marin, as is wanton
parking at will. Marin is like that.
Members of the Household gathered at Constance's place in Lagunitas where
candles were lit in a ceremony celebrating the long advance of the days
from the longest night through the Solstice to the return of the light.
Recent deaths were recalled and recent births celebrated for when one
door closes another opens and that is the way of the world. Survivors
of recent cancer diagnosis and fire destruction also were celebrated,
for we have also the persistence of memory and continuing life.
Occasional Quentin played with the dogs and Marlene played with the children
and Andre brought his guitar and there was music and life in that place
in the north woods and Denby talked about walking in darkness due to the
Angry Elf gang and this new entering into the land of light and hope as
new births were announced. And folks had returned to the land of their
origins to pursue new families, new origins. And so there was additional
hope and joy.
And so it was up in the North Counties of the Bay Area.
Down on the Island in the rectory of Our Lady of Incessant Complaint,
Sister Perspicacious came into the room where the fire was become embers
and laid blankets upon the snoozing forms of Pastor Nyquist and Father
Danyluk, as in years past and so turned out the light as the old year
fled into the shadows as the New Year ticked steadily towards the long
distant dawn and the two old friends, supposed ideological enemies, snoring
within a few feet of one another.
The sound of the train horn keened from Oaktown across the estuary and
wended its way through the redwoods of Marin's well-matriculated hills
and slid over the sleeping bulk of Princess Tamalpais following the old,
forgotten railbeds that once led along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard to
the coast, stirring the coyotes who began to howl their evensong which
carried forth on the winds through Fairfax and over White's Hill, ululating
through Silvan Acres and the mist-shrouded niches of the San Geronimo
Valley, coursing with faint gray shapes along the ridgetops through the
drifts of fog to an unknown destination.
That's the way it is around the Bay. Have a great week.
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