I’ve settled into my new surroundings quite comfortably. Here’s a typical day for me:
At 8:30 AM, I walk Hayden to school, and then at 9:00 AM, I head to the gym for some swimming, exercise, and a relaxing sauna. Around noon, I grab lunch at a nearby affordable restaurant close to my apartment. After lunch, I usually take a nap at 1 PM, and from 2 to 3 PM, I either read or work on my computer. At 3 PM, it’s time to pick up Hayden from school and help him with his homework. From 4 PM onwards, I enjoy some more reading or computer time while Hayden plays with the other kids downstairs. Dinner usually happens at 7 PM, and by 8:30 PM, I’m getting ready for bed.
On weekends, I head to my apartment in Paradise by the Sea, and on Wednesdays and Thursdays, I include a massage in my daily routine.
Now, there’s been a development with our maid. She has moved into the spare bedroom. I assume that now that the maid is here to keep an eye on Hayden, SWAC will find some reason to encourage me to leave and go back to Paradise by the Sea full-time. Our apartment has maid’s quarters off the kitchen with its own separate entry into the hall. It’s a windowless room that feels more like a dungeon, complete with a small toilet, more like a hole in the floor in a closet. But don’t worry, the maid won’t be staying there – she’ll have one of the three bedrooms for herself.
Some news on my health – the results of my medical tests show that while the CT scan of my abdomen makes my kidneys look pretty beaten up, my kidney functions are actually normal. I’ll need to undergo an operation soon to sort out the rest of my plumbing to avoid the possibility of spending the rest of my life on dialysis. I’ll probably have the procedure done in the US as early as April.
Our street here in BKK starts (or ends, depending on how you look at it) at a gate to a large piece of land in the city center. The gate announces “The Tobacco Monopoly of Thailand,” but I have no clue what that’s all about. This property is filled with many run-down low-rise wooden buildings and a few neglected parks. From this gate, Soi 4 goes generally north, passing by my apartment building, along with a few other mid to lower-class condominiums and hotels. Family restaurants and pushcarts line the street along this stretch until it reaches Hayden’s school. Beyond that, it becomes increasingly populated with massage parlors, bars, and budget hotels until it reaches the traffic mess that is Sukhumvit. Once across Sukhumvit, Soi 4 turns into Soi Nana and goes through Arab (and Indian) town before continuing on its way.
On Soi 4, just before it meets Sukhumvit, you’ll find Nana Plaza – the first neighborhood you encounter after passing through the gates into Hell. There, surrounding a small, crowded plaza, stand three and four-story interconnected buildings offering a variety of entertainment options, from regular Go-Go bars to ladyboy lounges to short-time units.
Much like in the US, where urban private schools tend to locate in transition zones due to cheaper rent, Hayden’s school is in a similar area. One morning, as I walked Hayden up to the school gate across the street along an extended cement platform in front of some shops, I spotted a burly, shirtless foreigner in his forties, obviously high and sporting scars on his head and body, but surprisingly devoid of tattoos. With him was a ladyboy, displaying the defining features of both genders (known as “pre-op”), and another professional woman. It seemed they had spent the night there, and as the ladyboy put on the man’s shirt to cover up, the man staggered across the street and attempted to enter the school grounds.
Now, like most private schools and important buildings in BKK, there are typically four or so Bangkok police officers stationed by the gate to manage traffic during the morning and evening hours. The school also has its own uniformed security personnel. One well-dressed cop (all Bangkok cops dress sharply) signaled for the farang to stop with a vertical palm gesture while using his other hand to indicate firmly that the man should return to the other side of the street.
It’s crucial to understand that the Thai cop did not show any intention of physically engaging with the farang, nor did he display anger. Such actions would be seen as a loss of face and inhumane. It makes you wonder how people from this culture perceive Western entertainment that often glorifies uncontrolled fury and violence as a sign of manliness. To them, someone like John Wayne might seem like a circus clown. (Come to think of it, American football, with its glorification of anger and violence, probably looks like a sport played by water buffalo rather than humans to them.)
After the incident, I asked Hayden what he thought, and he simply said, “The girl was naked, and the policeman had a gun.”
Just so you know, Hayden isn’t too young to understand the word “naked.” A few nights ago, as we were getting ready for bed, he took off all his clothes and put a paper bag on his head like a hat, then proudly pranced into the bathroom where I was brushing my teeth and announced, “Look at me. I’m the Naked Chef.”
I’ve come to realize that at a certain age, one’s desires are mostly directed towards having more time and less pain, but one’s hopes tend to be for others. The realization that these hopes are often in vain leads to despair.
On Wednesday, January 17, 2024, I woke up at the more reasonable hour of 10:30 AM. The day was splendid, with clear blue skies and a temperature that felt much warmer than the low 60s indicated by the thermometer. I decided it was a perfect day to accomplish something. After breakfast, I assisted Naida with some financial matters, albeit without success in determining the extent of her dental coverage, if any. I then went to the drugstore to pick up some medications and began tackling the pile of bills and my unfinished correspondence. Later, we hurried to the bank before it closed to address some of Naida’s banking issues. Upon returning home, I abandoned my efforts to make much progress on my bills and correspondence, opting instead to watch television.
On Thursday, I woke up surprisingly early at 8 AM, went downstairs, prepared breakfast, and read more of “Songs Of Penelope” by my newest literary crush, Clare North.
“People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.”
Logan Pearsall Smith
Clare North is the pseudonym of science fiction author Catherine Webb, who also writes adult fantasy novels under the name Kate Griffin. I’m not sure why she uses two pseudonyms, and the distinction between science fiction and “adult” fantasy intrigues me. In the past, science fiction was essentially “adult” fantasy, fantasy wrapped in a veneer of “science” to convince adults they were reading mature literature. In the 1990s, real science demonstrated that science fiction was, in fact, just fiction, with fanciful ideas that could never become reality.
Nevertheless, in her novel “Penelope,” Clare North relocates the action of Aeschylus’ play “Eumenides” to Ithaca before Ulysses’ return, turning it into an exciting story of women’s liberation and vengeance.
As long as I am going on about the doings on that fabled island, I recall a short, short bit of a conceit I had written in T&T a little over 10 years ago about that legendary dwarf king of Ithaca, Ulysses. While it is far longer than what I usually post, I really cannot resist an ego massage whenever the opportunity presents itself:
Speaking of Ulysses, Homer’s account is not quite how it happened. It actually occurred something like this:
One night the short, bandy-legged, scraggly bearded young man named Ulysses, who lived in a subdivision on a small island in the Adriatic, left the home on a cull-de-sac he shared with his wife, young son, various hangers-on, and a pack of dogs, telling everyone he was going to the store to buy a carton of milk, or an amphora of wine or new sandals or conquer Troy or whatever. Now twenty years later he stood on the corner of the block down from his old home, broke, hungry and older. He contemplated the excuses he would have to tell his wife explaining his long absence. He concocted stories about ships and strange wars, jealous gods, wooden horses, one-eyed monsters and to cover up the long periods of time he spent living with a succession of comely young women, he fell back on the tried and true excuse of philandering husbands of the time, bewitchment.
On the other hand, the also aging but still zaftig and supposedly loyal Penelope wanted no part of the smelly midget bastard’s return. She had happily spent the past 20 years screwing the Mexican pool boy and every young stud in town. The assholes’ return would only mean she would have to give up the good life and return to working on that goddamn loom. Besides, she needed an excuse of her own to explain why for the last 20 years the same old piece of cloth hung on that machine with no further work done on it since he left. She told all her boyfriends that she would choose one of them to settle down with when she finished weaving the cloth. They were so stupefied with the thought of getting into her toga whenever she lifted it for them they forgot all about the status of that rotting rag.
She believed however, that she would need something better to convince the crafty asshole of her unbelievable 20 years of fidelity. She decided to elaborate on the story she had planned to tell her returning husband, if unfortunately he should ever return. She would tell him that she weaved at the loom all day and every night she tore out what she had done during the day. If the simple and unbelievable story had worked on her lovers why wouldn’t this expanded version work on that scheming lying bastard Ulysses?
Nevertheless, she still was surprised when the testosterone poisoned dwarf suddenly and unexpectedly showed up at her door and started killing all of her boyfriends and the Mexican pool boy as well.
Sadly, Penelope was forced back to working all day at the goddamn loom and at night diddling herself while the drunken scumbag lay snoring among his dogs after buggering some prepubescent boy-chick.
As Holden Caulfield would say, “Crummy.”
(Note: I asked ChatGPT to edit this bit of fluff about Ulysses. It responded that its community standards rules prevented it from doing so. What does that mean?)
On Friday, around 2 AM, my grandson Anthony arrived at our house. We had planned for him to drive me to my sister’s home, where we intended to stay for a week. At about noon, we left to drive to San Francisco to pick up Anthony’s mother, Anne, and change cars before continuing to Mendocino. Naida, my wife, stayed behind as she prefers not to travel. We arrived in San Francisco at about 2 PM, collected Anne, switched cars, and arrived at my sister’s home in Mendocino around 6:15 PM.
After settling in with hugs, kisses, and some snacks, my sister brought out a small mysterious lockbox. She explained that it had been in the garage for a long time. Recently, while cleaning, she considered discarding it but became curious and checked its contents.
She paused, then opened the box for us to see. Inside were numerous envelopes and a bundle of notebook pages filled with handwriting. She revealed that our mother, who passed away four years ago at the age of 99, had left a note with the box. It instructed that the letters, addressed to her children, and the notebook pages, her autobiography, should not be opened until after her death.
I was stunned to find at least seven letters addressed to me. Among the others, there was even one to one of my ex-wives. We decided to open it. The envelope contained two documents: a brief one and a longer one. The brief one said:
“You have turned out to be a manipulating person who hates the world. You turned Joe and Jessica from loving us to hating us. It’s obvious you hate yourself and may someday become alone and unloved. You’ll get what you deserve.”
After reading that, we were all a bit stunned, so we decided to postpone reading any more of them until the next morning.
I had also brought along a box of old photographs that my daughter had sent. We spent a couple of hours sorting and organizing them. There was a lot of discussion and amusement as we reviewed the photographs and identified the people and places in them. I felt somewhat embarrassed by the number of photos of former girlfriends whose names I’d forgotten, which amused the others. I wondered why anyone would keep photos of my old girlfriends and planned to ask my daughter where she found them.
LettersThe lock box on the left and the box of photographs on the right.
Later, as I prepared for bed, I pondered whether I truly wanted to know the contents of the letters my mother addressed to me.
The next morning, after breakfast, Maryann and George read to us the autobiography that my mother had left. It was well over 100 handwritten pages and took almost three hours to read. It was stunning and filled with despair. I wanted to share some of the more interesting passages here, but it had been written in very difficult-to-read longhand, so my sister volunteered to type it up so I can share it here in T&T. Nevertheless I copied out a few pages. Her story began:
I was born in Sicily in the town of Canicatti in the year 1918 on the seventh day of June. I was the fourth child of my parents Josephine and Giacento Corsello. I had two sisters and a brother. When I was born my father was a soldier in World War I. While there my father contracted Heart Disease and Leukemia and was sent home, a very sick man. When I was 15 months old my mother gave birth to another child but both she and the child died. She was 32. My father, a sick man, was left with four children to raise…. When I was seven another tragedy struck my father passed away…. It was very sad, but I did not understand why everyone was so nice to me. I guess they all felt sorry for us now that we were orphans….When I was 8 1/2 my uncle Vincent who was my father’s brother Vincenzo, my father’s younger brother decided since we were now orphans… we should get the chance to come to America to live with another brother of my father and his wife… (My Uncle) married my oldest sister who was then 17… He and my dear sister were not allowed to come to this country (America). I didn’t want to … leave my family, my aunt who loved me and my grandmother. But the papers were drawn and we… (found ourselves on the boat Giuseppe Verde on the way to another world. My brother(aged) 18 my sister then 16 and I age 9 (were) 3 homeless scared kids who did not know what was ahead of us. We were all seasick on the boat with no-one to console us. We cried all the way. When we got to Ellis Island we had to stay there a week, desolate, lonely and not knowing the language… We slept on the floor and ate strange food …our hearts were broken and we didn’t know what to expect. It was hell, just not the hell we were going to encounter when we met our aunt and uncle…
After a very nice dinner, I went upstairs to bed, but I could not fall asleep, and the images from my mother’s story haunted me. As a child, she had no relief from disappointment and fear.
Another surprise in the box was three letters from my brother addressed to my mom. He was estranged from the family from the late 80s until he died a few years ago. I believed he had refused any contact with the rest of the family during all that time, especially with our mother, who had always told me he had refused to allow any communication with her and the rest of us. The last letter was written in 1993 and ended as follows:
In your letter you asked me to make you happy by meeting you for coffee. I wished you would have asked how it might make me feel. I am not going to be at the appointment you scheduled because I am feeling very good about my life and the way things are now. I want to keep it this way. I know that you will be disappointed, but possibly you will think about my feelings also, and maybe you can accept the fact that this is right for me. Please have a wonderful birthday and many, many more — and remember I do love you.
All the best,
Jim
On Monday, when I woke up, there wasn’t a drop of rain in sight. I figured it would be the perfect day for a stroll into town. However, the night before had been rough, and I wasn’t feeling my best. So, after breakfast, I decided to head upstairs for a nap before embarking on my town adventure. As expected, I ended up sleeping until about 4 PM, and with the skies getting darker, I decided to postpone my walk until the next day. I then ventured downstairs and indulged in some reading before dinner.
During dinner, I opened one of the envelopes from my mom contained in the lockbox. To my surprise, it held a three-page letter addressed to me and two poems I had written years ago that she had kept. Her letter began like this:
After having a wonderful day in Bodega Bay, I cannot believe you can turn and be the most disrespectful and miserable person in this world. Yesterday was your birthday, how I looked forward to. Making it a nice day for you. I wanted so much to thank you for Bodega Bay. So, I wanted to have a nice dinner. An d have a birthday cake and a gift that I thought you would like. I knocked myself out and put all my love into it only for it to turn into a disaster. Why? Because of you my son. You have got to be the most antagonistic, miserable, cold and unfeeling person I have ever known. Why do you hate me so much?…
Well, I guess I know now how she felt. She then goes on in the same vein for the remainder of the three pages. My mom was sickly and often dominated by others. As a result, she had no childhood and not much of an adulthood either, at least until she was in her forties when my sister was born. She believed had little no control over the major events in her life or decisions made for her by others. She devoted her life to doing what they needed or wanted. Only in a few cases were her needs recognized or acknowledged so she lived a life of pain and resentment until much later in her life. But let’s not delve too much into amateur psychology. I always felt I couldn’t adequately respond to the needs of others, not due to a lack of willingness to try, but because I struggled to understand what those needs were.
Anyway, rather that reading the entire letter at that time I decided to read the shorter of the poems. It was one I had written when I was about 14 years old.
Some walls work well
Some don’t
But those that do,
Will never tell
Why the hell
They work so well
Sometimes when I am alone
I wish I were not me
But when I think again
Who else would I be
Who else knows me so well
Who so patient understands
Who my secrets could I tell.
This was written by one obviously lonely and isolated little boy.
“(A)s Aristotle put it, ‘To do is to be’; and more to the point, as Zappa put it, ‘You are what you is’.”
Brookmyre, Christopher. One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night (p. 258). Grove Atlantic.
The following day, despite the persistent overcast sky, the rain thankfully held off, so I decided to venture into town. I took it easy, but to my surprise, I found myself getting tired after just about 100 steps, forcing me to take frequent breaks. Eventually, I reached Frankie’s, where I happily settled in and indulged in a delicious lunch of pepperoni pizza, washing it down with a refreshing bottle of root beer.
My next destination was my favorite bookstore, where I had initially planned to shop for presents for everyone I could think of at the time. By the time I arrived, I was so drained that I could barely recall my purpose, let alone select any books. The idea of lugging them back home seemed impossible. So, after spending quite a while on a bench amidst the bookshelves, I decided it was time to make my way back. The journey home took a long time, with me pausing to sit on every available bench I passed and leaning on fences or walls to rest whenever I could.
Eventually, I made it back to my sister’s place and practically collapsed onto the sofa by the window, my favorite spot. At that moment, I couldn’t help but wonder if this might be the last year of my life. As I gazed out over the ocean, the sun peeked out from behind the clouds, casting rays of light that transformed the frothy waves into bursts of fire.
The following day, I struggled to get out of bed. On Wednesday, my sister drove me back to Sacramento, as she had a conference to attend with local economic development directors, representing Mendocino. We hit the road around 1 PM.
Thursday left me feeling drained, but I perked up in the evening when Maryann returned from her conference. We all enjoyed a delightful dinner at Lemon Grass. The next morning, Mary left to return to Mendocino, and I headed to my appointment with my primary care physician. I’d been grappling with sleep problems and recently had swollen ankles. Later, I met up with Hayden for lunch.
Hayden and I dined at Subway, where he shared captivating tales of his recent adventures in Thailand and Japan. Upon returning to Sacramento, Naida and I spent the remainder of the afternoon resolving a hiccup with her account.
Saturday morning saw Naida heading off to the Saturday Morning Coffee event, while I, feeling under the weather, decided to stay home. In the evening, I felt guilty about missing the coffee gathering and spending so much time in bed nursing my hypochondria. To show my love for her, I told Naida I would have the soup she had prepared for dinner. She attempted to use up the surplus of beets and potatoes delivered weekly by the organic farm co-op and combined them with milk to make the soup. Unfortunately, the milk had curdled. She assured me it wouldn’t taste too bad.
I woke up Sunday feeling better than I had in a while, having finally enjoyed a full uninterrupted night’s sleep. The day was sunny and bright, with fluffy clouds scattered across the sky. January had been an unusual month here in the heart of the Great Valley. Most days had been gloomy and overcast, with damp ground – quite unusual for California, which is typically starved for moisture and known for its sunshine. Even more peculiar were the unseasonably warm daytime temperatures in the high 50s and 60s. Today, still in January, the forecast predicted a high of 70 degrees. We are living in peculiar times, where the old certainties are fading, replaced by the new. We, the older generation, view the future with apprehension, fearing pain and danger for our descendants while they often see opportunities and adventures in the impending storms – the eternal yin and yang of our species.
After a short nap, I decided to head out for a stroll. The weather still was quite unusual for mid-winter January – sunny and around 70 degrees. Some might view this as further proof of global warming, but even if it is, it’s still quite an anomaly. What’s even more intriguing is something I mentioned about a decade ago, which still seems to be overlooked in discussions about global warming.
When it comes to capturing the sun’s heat, the oceans play a significant role, accounting for about 75% of it. We’re all familiar with how El Niño and La Niña affect weather patterns. However, these variations primarily involve changes in ocean temperatures in the deepest parts of the world’s largest ocean. While the impact of this variation, likely caused by atmospheric heating, seems to be growing and influencing global weather patterns, it’s confined to a specific portion of the Earth’s oceans. Other parts of the oceans must undergo similar dynamics, releasing heat at a steady pace or perhaps in periodic cycles with less disruption to the atmosphere. Anyway, why am I digressing from describing today’s walk? I have no idea.
During my walk, I bumped into Naida and the dog, Boo-boo the Barking Dog, who were returning from their own adventure. Naida explained that Boo-boo was all excited to go on his walk, and assuming I would be napping all afternoon as usual, she didn’t wait for me. Feeling a bit embarrassed, I continued on my way.
Physically, I was feeling great, so I decided to extend my walk all the way to the lake and back. There seemed to be more people on the paths than usual, although there are never very many. Normally, I encounter just 4 or 5 people during my walks, but today, I must have passed by as many as 15.
I stopped and rested on a bench near Ed Hullander’s house. Ed had dedicated this bench to his late wife Joni. He used to be a regular at the Saturday Morning Coffee until he passed away a few months ago. I affectionately called him “Spy” because he had served as a high-ranking official in the US Agency for International Development from its inception until his retirement around 2001. He once shared with me an interesting tidbit: American spies weren’t typically stationed in State Department embassies. This was because host governments generally restricted State Department employees from leaving the city where they worked. AID employees, on the other hand, had to be mobile and travel wherever their projects took them.
I made it back home just in time to witness the San Francisco 49ers getting thoroughly beaten in the first half of the NFL Championship Game. It looks like there won’t be a Super Bowl appearance for them this year. What a disappointing day it has turned out to be.
Later, Naida brightened my mood with a dance to “Shall We Dance,” a song from “The King and I,” At dinner, we enjoyed a Newman’s Own frozen four-cheese pizza topped with Naida’s secret vegetable mix, which made me feel a little better. We’ll have to wait till next year.
After dinner, we settled in to watch the final three episodes of “English,” a western series that was beautifully filmed, albeit a bit challenging to follow at times. Nevertheless, it remained captivating throughout all eight episodes. When it concluded, around 11 PM, I decided to check the final score of the football game, and oh my goodness, the 49ers won by coming from behind for the second game in a row. Go Niners! This, of course, is utterly ridiculous because I don’t have any interest in professional sports and don’t typically watch any games. Strangely enough, I also consistently avoid watching the 49ers play because I fear that doing so will jinx their chances. Go figure.
Anyway, Monday blessed us with another beautiful day, with the temperature hovering around 70 degrees Fahrenheit. In the morning, I drove Naida to the Kaiser Health facilities to pick up her medication, and afterward, we had a satisfying lunch at Bernado’s.
Then some grocery shopping and home again.
In the evening we watched Rachel Maddow’s interview of E Jean Carroll and her attorney’s on MSNBC. Three things struck me about the interview.
The first was E Jean’s quirky sense of humor and her stating that when she looked out in the courtroom and saw Trump she realized “He was nothing. He was an emperor with no clothes”
The second was that E Jean’s two attorney’s represented the new face of woman trial attorney’s.
And finally, I was impressed by the closing words of one of the Attorney’s. She mentioned that when she initially joined the lead team she viewed Trump as a powerful, wealthy and aggressive man. However, after observing him in the court room without his usual; entourage of supporters and sycophants around him she realized “He was just a guy, just another guy.”
The spring-like temperatures remained through Tuesday, Naida worked cleaning up the yard while I typed this.
On Wednesday, the rains came. Apparently, a so-called atmospheric river will bring us here in the center of the Great Valley, not only most of the year’s rain but hateful February as well. At mid-day I trundled off through the gloom to have six separate blood tests done. On a positive note the vampire technician painlessly removed about 90% of my blood leaving enough for my to drive back home and plop into bed. I hoped when I woke up it would be March.
In 1970 when I first arrived in San Francisco I made the acquaintance of Keith Lampe, the Ponderosa Pine. It was during his non-talking years. Bearded, shoeless, long haired and carrying a 6 foot long single string instrument he traveled around San Francisco playing on his drone and making strange noises that would frighten the tourists. One night, at about midnight, I was awakened by Keith who was staying in the apartment above mine in Noe Valley, one of the “hippy central’ neighborhoods that dotted San Francisco at the time. He had climbed out on to the back steps and was baying at the full moon.
I first met The Ponderosa Pine shortly after arriving in San Francisco. I was wandering around North Beach (another hippy central) one night looking for something to do when I came upon a lighted store front. I looked in the window and saw a party going on. I decided to go in to see what was happening and to enjoy the free wine and stale cheese that was being dispensed. It was being hosted by John Olmstead who was to become quite significant in my life. After a while everyone sat down on the floor, picked up various simple percussion and stringed instruments and began raising an odd and not completely unpleasant sound. I took a place by the wall and asked the person next to me what was going on. “The spirit animals are coming” he replied. “What the fuck?” I thought, but nevertheless I picked up a set of bongos near me and began wailing away wondering what will happen next. Suddenly from down the stairs at the end of the room came people, adults, dressed as animals, birds with feathers, fish, and one of two who appears as though they were dressed as rats. After they danced around awhile, the room suddenly became quiet. I asked the person next to me what was happening. “We’re waiting for the Ponderosa Pine,” he responded. Suddenly the silence was shredded with loud grunts and howls from the room above the stairs. This lasted a minute or two and then down the stairs came a man dressed as a tree. From two holes of the tree trunk extended arms carrying in each hand Indian rattles. He continued howling, shaking his rattles and danced around the room. It was then I realized that this is what heaven must be all about, not endless singing of Gregorian Chant, but internal delightful insanity.
Keith was everything a hippie was supposed to be, free, poor, compassionate, a bit insane, and loving life and everything in it. Alas, due to overindulgence, commercialization, ignorance and unfortunately maturity, hippiedom died a few years later except for a few old men and women still holding on to their dreams and living in hidden places in the Bay Area and elsewhere.
Last week I learned that Kieth had died 10 years ago. The following is an obituary written back then by some of his fans in Bolinas.
Ponderosa Pine, who chanted in Bolinas, dies in Ecuador By Samantha Kimmey, 11/26/2014
PEOPLE: Keith Lampe, who called himself Ponderosa Pine, protested tree-cutting and chanted as a form of spiritual practice. He never wore shoes, said friends in West Marin, who are grieving his death this month and planing a local “bardo party.”
Keith Lampe, known to his friends as Ponderosa Pine, penned countless articles when he reported for newspapers and wire services. In his last years, he wrote sweeping emails about planetary woes on an almost daily basis.
But if you ask about Ponderosa, it’s his chanting that imprinted on everyone’s memory, a low tone that resounded around town as he strummed along with a simple instrument that looked a bit like a 2×4.
“It was kind of his way of being,” said Doug Adamz, a friend and guitarist who connected with Ponderosa through music.
Ponderosa Pine died on Nov. 11, at 83 years old, in Ecuador. A Michigan native, he lived on the East Coast and traveled the world before coming to the Bay Area in 1968.
He was an unflinching environmental activist who was jailed for protesting the cutting of redwoods and the building of nuclear power plants, and he organized a so-called All Species event to bring awareness to the rights of all living beings. He expressed his love of the earth in his rugged lifestyle, living barefoot and with few possessions, occasionally wearing a mask made of pine and chanting everywhere he went.
Ponderosa told a friend that his father was an editor for a Detroit newspaper and that he had followed in his footsteps, starting as a reporter for the paper when he was just 18, in 1950.
He said the experience taught him about media corruption; one time, the city’s police commissioner told his secretary to provide Ponderosa with a fake I.D., a quiet trade for ignoring police scandals, Ponderosa said.
He landed a job as a copy editor for the Pittsburgh Press and worked as a Paris correspondent for the International News Service before moving to New York City. In the mid-1960s he did press relations for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and co-founded the Veterans and Reservists to End the War in Vietnam.
Ponderosa, who served as an artillery officer during the Korean War, burned his discharge papers and medals with other veterans in protest of the Vietnam War. He was “busted” while protesting the production of napalm in front of Dow Chemical offices, and again when he and other activists stole onto a navy vessel slated to go to Vietnam, in the Hudson River. He was arrested twice while protesting conscription during Stop the Draft Week and, in D.C., after tossing leaflets from the Senate gallery onto politicians below.
Ponderosa also spoke and wrote about traveling the world, meeting Allen Ginsberg in India in 1962 and, in 1960 in Japan, befriending the poet Gary Snyder. Mr. Snyder mentions Ponderosa in a poem in “Back Country,” a collection published in 1967.
In “June,” part of a poem cycle written while Mr. Snyder lived in Japan in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, he describes a classroom of children learning English.
The poem begins “students listen to the tapes” and then recounts the scene—the teachers, the walls, the sunset—before listing words that seem less like the contents of a language lesson and more like an incantation: “strength strap strand strut struck,” “cord ford gorge dwarf forth north,” “try tea buy ties weigh Tim buy type/ flat tea bright ties greet Tim met Tess.”
“Why that’s old Keith Lampe’s voice, deep & clear,” Mr. Snyder writes, perhaps influenced by some early version of Ponderosa’s now-famous chanting in Bolinas in the 1970s.
In 1968, Ponderosa crossed the country and moved to Berkeley with his then-wife, Judy, and their daughter. The focus of his protesting appeared to shift, but his style didn’t. A few months after arriving in California, he was arrested just north of Bolinas for “blocking a truck carrying redwood corpses from a nearby tree-slaughter site. This in fact was the start of the US environmental movement,” he wrote. (It was not the last time he would be arrested for trying to protect trees.)
His fervent environmental activism was sparked in part by Mr. Ginsberg, who in 1967 showed Ponderosa a book about the looming threat of melting ice caps. It helped kick off Ponderosa’s lifelong devotion to activism on behalf of nature.
At the All Species events he organized in the late 1970s in San Francisco, people wore animal masks and two of his friends, musicians Greg Schindel and Mr. Adamz, now living in Willits and Marshall, played music as Ponderosa chanted. (Mr. Schindel said his mask depicted a steelhead trout.)
At another event, the Unity Fair in San Francisco in 1975, Bolinas photographer Ilka Hartmann recalled Ponderosa telling the crowd that he wanted to express the killing of animals on the highway.
“Everyone fell totally silent… He made a very, very deep sound for a long time, for the pain of all those animals, and it reverberated throughout the park,” she said. When Ms. Hartmann sees a dead or injured animal on the side of the road, she still thinks of that moment, she said.
Though many friends still living in Bolinas recall accompanying Ponderosa to protests, he is also widely remembered just walking around town or along Agate Beach, feet bare to connect with the earth, hair cascading down his body. He chanted in a single tone while strumming a stringed instrument; he didn’t play melodies, instead favoring a looser, ambient style.
He also chanted with Mr. Adamz and Mr. Schindel downtown. The two musicians would play together every week where the Coast Café now stands, calling themselves Kindred Souls. The whole town would be there, dancing, carousing or joining in the music while Ponderosa “vocalized,” Mr. Adamz said.
Mr. Adamz met Ponderosa—his first friend in California—when he was 23, while auditioning for a gig in San Francisco after moving from Texas. He and Ponderosa drove to Bolinas in Mr. Adamz’s Volkswagen van.
“When we got to Highway 1, winding along the coast, he’s sitting in the back of my van chanting to the tones of my engine. It was kind of one of those ‘We’re not in Kansas anymore’ moments.”
Ponderosa introduced him around, and invited him to join a group that congregated on the Big Mesa every full moon and stayed out all night, singing, dancing, drumming and chanting.
Mr. Adamz said Ponderosa didn’t seem to belong to any particular religious tradition. “I feel he was definitely on the spiritual path, and that informed pretty much all of his decisions… If anything was his religion, that was it: loving earth and nature,” he said.
One time, Ponderosa had his famously long hair cut (by Bolinas artist Arthur Okamura), perhaps to win the favor of his girlfriend’s father. Some people didn’t recognize him; he looked more like an East Coast professor than an impassioned environmental activist. But the grew the hair back, and he kept it long for the remainder of his life as it turned from dark brown to silvery white.
Eventually, the expense of living in coastal California got to Ponderosa, who realized he could actually live on Social Security income in other, more affordable parts of the world. He traveled to Mexico and Asia, with stints back in America, before ending up in Ecuador. There he continued chanting, and began sending friends almost daily newsletters of his own thoughts on current events as well as articles he collected from the Internet.
His politics were radical. He suspected the United States government of changing weather patterns to maintain the drought in California, and accused mass media of being complicit with big corporations and the government. Every email was signed, “Keith Lampe, Ro-Non-So-Te, Ponderosa Pine, Volunteer.”
He talked recently about returning to Bolinas to see his many friends, but his health took a turn for the worse a few weeks before he died, as his kidneys failed. He knew the prognosis wasn’t good. He consulted with Western doctors, who apparently could not help him, according to the last email he sent. Then he consulted a shaman.
“Too much compassion for plants and animals causes a lung problem,” the shaman pronounced.
Perhaps the last person from Bolinas to see Ponderosa was Jerry Bojeste. He was traveling through South America when he ended up in Vilcabamba, and a bell went off; didn’t he know someone here? He checked his address book and realized Ponderosa, whom he had not seen in many years, must be nearby. After asking around, a woman eventually led him up a mountain path near a river. There was Ponderosa.
Mr. Bojeste said Ponderosa seemed happy. They had a little wine and talked about the letters Einstein wrote to a daughter that were made public several years ago; in one, Mr. Bojeste claims, Einstein says love is part of any grand unification theory of the universe.
“You can send love from your heart to anyone in your neighborhood, anyone you love, in the U.S., in the world and the cosmos. So love is faster than the speed of light,” Mr. Bojeste said.
Ponderosa never made it back to Bolinas. But his chanting—in people’s memories, in recordings online, in his home on the mountain in Ecuador—must have signified not just a love for the earth and the trees and the animals, but for his friends back home, too, who can still hear it.
A bardo party, or a celebration of passage, for Ponderosa Pine will be held on Tuesday, Dec. 30, at 4:30 p.m. at the Bolinas Community Center. ~ Source
Papa Joe's Tales, Fables and Parables 