Every once in a while, one feels as though he has stepped off of H. G. Wells time machine and bumped into himself in another age. No, it is not like running into dark-haired, swarthy skinned chthonic creatures snacking on clueless blond blue-eyed babes and their androgynous curly-headed boyfriends (although it often seems like that). It is more like meeting the you you never knew.
It all began with entering the Cafe Internationale in San Francisco with its intermittent hint of freshly lit joints floating through the air and the funky sounds of the “Jug Band” as background for some light flirting with someone whom I was convinced had slipped into my bed one stoned night 40 years or so ago.
Then a few evenings later at my sister’s home on the bluff above the clashing waves of the Pacific Ocean in the tiny picturesque town of Mendocino, I took another voyage into my past.
My father’s obsession for most of his life was to take, or assemble, family photographic images and organize them (mostly, if truth be known, organize) obsessively in one way or another. My sister had acquired them and now in a converted water tower on her property that serves as a guest house, much of one room is devoted to the collection.
Although the collection itself includes films and photographs, its bulk is made up of perhaps a hundred boxes of slides (after all it had been the golden age of slide photography), meticulously arranged and labeled in the circular holders that fit into the ubiquitous slide projector of the time. My sister chose five or six from the horde at random and we sat down to review them.
The images were all from the mid sixties to the early seventies. The first thing I noticed (preoccupied as I am with myself) was that I was much better looking that I ever thought I was. My own self-image at the time, as I recall, was of a sallow young man with an enormous clown like nose, great baggy eyes and a slack and sagging jaw. Now, although that may be very much what I in my emerging decrepitude look like now, I certainly did not look like that then. The young man I saw then was actually somewhat handsome in a minor movie extra sort of way. I was skinny though. I did not simply lack the beefy look of modern fashion, but had the emaciated look of the depression years. I was very very skinny, skinnier than Fred Astaire.
Among the almost forgotten influences of my late teen and early adult years were Margaret and Tony Pannicci, or “Panneech” as we referred to them, and Ruby and Arnold Maurizio.
Margaret Panneech was one of those loud hyperactive people who often dominate their environment and everyone around them. The Paneeches owned two homes on a large single lot in Yonkers NY. One of which they lived in and one which my parents rented. She suffered from what appeared to be a bi-polar disorder, diagnosed at the time as female hysteria and treated with massive overdoses of various medicines, primarily steroids leaving her moon-faced and jovially divorced from reality. Tony on the other hand appeared to me much more reserved in a slightly spooky way. My sister and I spent some time discussing whether or not Paneech was having an affair with our mother given the excessive amount of time he spent lurking around our house “fixing things.” My sister suspected he may have and I thought he was simply a hopeless voyeur.
Ruby and Arnold were to some extent fashion icons to my sister and I. Not because of any slavish devotion to current fashion trends but for their unapologetic obsession with large, clunky, sparkling jewelry and loud flashy colors. They had a daughter, Judy, they feared would not get married because she was both overweight and dressed in a more subdued manner than that favored by her parents. One day, however, she lost some weight, put on some Day-Glo colored garments, rhinestone jewelry and multi toned silk scarves, and brought home a young man who, to everyone delight, she eventually married.
The slides also chronicled family trips to Italy and family vacations in the Catskills that loiter on in the mind as more amusing than they actually were at the time.
The following day, and still wrapped in a lingering dream like fog inhabited by the screaming ghosts of a smiling Paneech carrying a jar of happy pills and the bouffant teased raven haired Ruby, rhinestone sparkling and encased in a scarlet black and Chartreuse gown, I drove with Mary and George up the coast to visit a winery in the tiny town of Westport. Along the way, I pointed out projects I had worked on and told interminable stories about them, especially the brilliance of my analysis and effectiveness of my actions. Whether incessant pressured speech is one of the effects not speaking to anyone during the months I reside in Thailand, or merely to keep the ghosts at bay, I do not know.
We arrived at the winery, perched above one of the most magnificent wave battered coasts I have ever seen. Perhaps 50 yards or so off shore the St. Andreas fault runs through a cleft 90 feet or so deep before it dips below the Gorda plate and disappears, marking the point where the Pacific Ocean swells unhindered by a coastal shelf batter the continent.
We walked into the winery tasting room where behind a row of planks on wine barrels the winery’s owner stood serving the dozen or so visitors sips of the winery’s products. Looking down at the tasting list I read the word that made my heart stop: CHARBONO.
CHARBONO, a wine varietal that I thought died about the same time the denizens of Cafe Internationale departed the Bay Area and disappeared into the mists of history. Although at one time a somewhat common varietal in Italy and California, following prohibition it had been reduced to the province of a single winery, Inglenook, in Napa County where it had been a staple of their line. When Francis Ford Coppola purchased the winery with his profits from “The Godfather,” he bulldozed the vineyard in front of the winery to enhance his view not knowing it contained perhaps the last Charbono wines in the world.
Sally, the owner of Pacific Star Winery, who looked like the mature Fara Fawcett in unruly windblown hair, explained that a few years ago she discovered the aged and diseased vines of the last three or four Charbono vines in the world, had them restored by the scientists at UC Davis and now has about 80 or so acres of the variety under cultivation. (For more on Charbono see Charbono Appreciation Society)
This morning, Naida told me a wonderful story about meeting with the granddaughters of Elitha Donner the main character in the second book in her masterful California Gold trilogy, River of Red Gold.
It has been almost a week since I have written here. Yesterday, a brief hailstorm crashed down on the Enchanted Forest but today is warm and sunny again. I guess yesterday constitutes this year’s one day winter.
Last night, we went to sleep listening to an old tape of the first Suspense Theater radio program. It was directed by none other than Alfred Hitchcock. Interestingly, it ended without resolution of the mystery. That was what I had intended to occur in my unfinished novel “Here Comes Dragon,” only to discover half-way through that indeed there was a mystery, two dead people in fact, without a suspect in sight. Then of course, I am no Hitchcock.
The days have drifted by. I am beginning to lose track of them. It is Sunday morning. The dog is asleep on Naida’s lap. She is recovering from her second vaccine shot yesterday. I am sitting here trying to remember what, if anything, of interest occurred recently. Alas, nothing. Since we usually better remember theio bad that occurred to us than the good, I guess my lack of recall tells me things have been going well.
Today the weather was a little cooler with temperatures in the low 60s. I drove the Mitsubishi into the Golden Hills to pick up some medicine and to have lunch with Hayden. We ate at the Spaghetti Factory.
The Ides of March — the recognition of the rise of the March full moon or the celebration of dispatching would be Roman emperors — passed by me without notice or comment. Similarly, my onomastica, my name day, Saint Joseph’s Day March 15 flew by without celebration. Sad really. In Italy it is your Saint’s Day and not your birthday that is celebrated. That is a sound custom. After all, once childhood ends who really wants to be reminded how old you’ve become.
On Saint Patrick’s Day evening, we watched TCM’s festival featuring movies about Ireland — of course. The Quiet Man (John Wayne drags Maureen O’Harra and fights Wallace Beery across Ireland), Young Cassidy (Sean O’Casey biopic), and Odd Man Out (James Mason’s finest performance). All enjoyable — Happy St. Patrick’s Day.
Now that Columbus Day is no longer a suitable excuse for Italian-Americans to parade down the streets to honor their hyphen, we need another day to celebrate ourselves. September is a good month for a holiday. How about a holiday in September to honor Frank Sinatra? Yes, I know he was born in December and died in May but remember it’s a long long time from May to December, but the days grow short when you reach September. (I am ashamed at myself for writing that.). Frank Sinatra — Something else my great grandchildren will know nothing about.
The following morning we woke up at about 11 AM. Boo-boo, our usual alarm clock, seemed to have decided to take the day off. Outside, the sky was overcast and the temperature bounced around the cooler end of the 60s. The morning news shows appear to have gotten beyond flooding us with images of history being made as we watch. It now titillates us with hints that somewhere just behind the scrim something momentous is happening that will be revealed as soon as the hungry hot lights of the media illuminate it. In other words, not too much is happening that we know about.
One bit of news that did not make it into the media’s clutches was that the bannister on the stairway to our bedroom pulled out from the plaster-board and crashed down upon the stairs. A handy-man (I am not very handy or, I admit, much of a man anymore, if I ever was,) was called and he proved to be both handy and manly and repaired the thing lickety-split. (No one knows where the term lickety-split came from or why, but there is general agreement it arose in the American midwest or south sometime between 1817 and 1849. There is some confusion about when it went out of general use except by smart-alecs like me.)
Now, the origin of “smart-alec is another kettle of fish entirely. “Alec” was actually a real person, named Alec Hoag. He was a pimp and a thief in New York City in the 1840s. Partnered with his wife Melinda and another man known as “French Jack”, they would rob his wife’s “customers” while she otherwise distracted them.
“Melinda would make her victim lay his clothes, as he took them off, upon a chair at the head of the bed near a secret panel, and then take him into her arms and close the curtains of the bed. As soon as everything was right and the dupe not likely to heed outside noises, Melinda would give a cough, and the faithful Alec would slyly enter, rifle the pockets of every farthing or valuable thing, and finally disappear as mysteriously as he entered.” (George Wilkes editor of the Subterranean who spoke with Hoag in prison.)
“Sometime after that, Alec would bang on the door and Melinda would make out that he was her husband who had returned early from some trip. The victims would hastily grab their clothes and escape through the window.”
“The police, who Hoag was paying off, soon discovered he was cheating them out of their share of this con and arrested Hoag and Melinda. Hoag promptly escaped from prison, with the help of his brother, but was eventually recaptured.”
“Alec Hoag was then given the nickname “Smart Alec” by the police for being too smart for his own good. The thought is that the police then used this term when dealing with other criminals who seemed a little too smart for their own good, often thinking of ways around giving police their payoffs: ‘Don’t be a Smart Alec’”.
On Thursday March 18, 2021, I, obviously, had nothing to do and so I wrote the above and no, I will not research the derivation of “kettle of fish” except to point out that in 1785 Thomas Newte published A Tour in England and Scotland. In this he referred to fish kettles: “It is customary for the gentlemen who live near the Tweed to entertain their neighbours and friends with a Fete Champetre [a picnic], which they call giving ‘a kettle of fish’.
While I was busy stupefying myself with etymology for idiots, Naida occupied herself with writing a few wonderful paragraphs of her memoir about the night in the 1950s she and two friends went to Nepenthe, the gloriously situated restaurant in Big Sur. After the restaurant closed, the restaurant staff turned up the speakers hanging over the terrace and they and the other hangers on danced various line dances. Kim Novak, and Henry Miller nearby Big Sur residents were also there, much to the surprise of the excited tourists. Another evening she wrote about, she and her date travelled down Highway One to the old hot springs later to become Eselen to attend a get together held by the aged Miller, his 19 year old wife, and his hangers on for more dancing. The ancient bathtubs and lead piping of the old spa were still there then.
Her story prompted me to recall that my friend Chris Ames, who was also a friend of Hunter Thompson, told me that he was at the old spa when Hunter, stoned and drunk, so enraged the other people at the spa, that they tried to throw him off the cliff. Chris managed to calm them down and save him from becoming famous only for his Gonzo way of death.n
Today, I visited Hayden again in the Golden Hills for our usual lunch at Subway. Nothing new to report except he is supposed to get his driver’s license on April 10.
On the way back to the Enchanted Forest, I thought about how sad it was that we 70, 80 and 90 year old decrepits will have no one to tell our stories to about how we spent our time during the Great COVID Pandemic Quarantine. Not to our peers. They have experienced it along with us. Not to our children or grandchildren either for the same reason. Most of us at our age will have passed on before our great grandchildren are old enough to appreciate our adventures in confinement. We will just have to leave the storytelling for future generations to our children and grandchildren and content ourselves with swapping tales with our cronies.
On Saturday morning at about 10:30, I was awakened by a phone call from my daughter. She seemed in good spirits. We talked about her efforts to analyze and integrate protections against various contagious viruses into the United States foreign aid programs. When I finally got out of bed and went downstairs to prepare myself some breakfast it was noon. Outside, the sun was shining and the temperature in the upper 60s.
I finished my breakfast of blueberry bagels, cream cheese and salmon at about 1:30 and played on my computer for a couple of hours before again looking through the window and realizing it was a shame to waste such a pretty day. So, I decided to take the dog out on a long walk.
And walk we did. Nice and long, through the Enchanted Forest and along the river. Along the way, I took a photograph of our shadows who kindly agreed to accompany us.
The next day, I drove into the Golden Hills to pick up Hayden and his friend Ethan and take them to lunch. When I got to the house, I found them with “Uncle Mask”(Dick) in the garage. Hayden had gone to a local junk yard and removed the cylinder cover from a junked four cylinder Honda, taken in home and painted in Ferrari red. Once he inserts the spark-plugs, he intends to hang it on the wall of his room to hold keys and things.
Today I washed the clothing I will be taking with me to my for our week in Mendocino, while. Naida played some Beethoven concertos on the piano. The azaleas are beginning to bloom everywhere in the enchanted forest, except in our yard.
Off to Mendocino for our first post quarantine visit, a week with my sister and George. Last minute packing. Drive the Mitsubishi to EDH so that Hayden and the gang can detail it and make minor repairs while we are gone. And then we were off for an exhausting drive of five hours or more.
We arrived in Mendocino after a pleasant but tiring five hour job. I immediately took a nap until dinnertime. We had a pleasant dinner with my sister where we remarked on how strange it seems after a year to be having dinner with more than your housemates. (Naida and I, of course, had had dinner with Peter and Barrie every six weeks of so when I traveled to San Francisco for treatment.) Then, after watching an episode of Montalbano we all went to bed.
The next day, it was sparkling clear outside. If was an exquisitely lovely day in Mendocino except for the gale force winds that raced across the headlands. Naida, Boo-boo, and I walked into town for breakfast. On our way back to the house, my foot slipped out of my Crocs, tangled up with my other foot and sent we tumbling. On the way to the ground, I thought, “Oh no, here comes the broken hip.” I slammed my shoulder into a fence and thought, “Oh no, it is not the hip that will break but my collar-bone.” Bouncing off the fence, i continued sliding along until I jammed my thumb into the ground. “Oh no,” I thought, “it’s a broken thumb instead.” While lying there, as Naida tried to help me back up, I realized neither my hip or collarbone seemed broken but, my thumb hurt like hell.
Back at the house, where, as coincidence would have it, George had just gotten off a Zoom conference on emergency treatment of traumatic injuries and put me through the protocol to determine whether or not I had broken my collarbone, hip or thumb. I passed but my thumb still hurt. So, George prepared an Ice-pack and I sat on a rocking chair for an hour or so waiting for the pain and embarrassment to subside. I then went upstairs and took a nap. It’s always something.
That evening, George made Broccoli Scacciata a calzone like peasant dish from Sicily featuring a broccoli and sausage filling. We had a long discussion during dinner beginning with economic development in Mendocino, continuing on with the history and defects of Mormonism and ending with authors, novels and Naida’s influence on the Sacramento literary scene. Tomorrow is another day.
The day broke sunny and less windy today. I spent the early morning sitting where I usually do by the large window overlooking the yard and the ocean. Later we walked to a coffee house behind Beaujolais restaurant for breakfast. On the way back, I bought a new pair of boots, the first pair of shoes I have worn other than my Crocs for six years.
In the afternoon we drove into Fort Bragg to pick up the framed painting of the garage doors of Roccantica done by Alexandra Leti that I had given to Mary and George for Christmas. Then we went on a brief walk along the Fort Bragg Waterfront Park, in part a Conservancy Project that created what, in my opinion, is the greatest urban waterfront park in the world. While walking along we stopped to watch a woman standing on the rocks just above the raging surf doing some odd but fascinating exercises.
That evening we had a pleasant time sitting around the fire on the front patio, and drinking prosecco. I bit into an olive and a piece of my front tooth broke off. Enjoyable as it has been so far, this trip has been a trying one for me physically — yesterday’s trip and fall and today’s loss of almost one half of my front tooth. I am a little worried about what today has in store for me.
This morning after breakfast Maryann, George, Naida, I, and the two dogs Finnegan and Booboo went for a long walk along Big River. Big River is a drowned river, a river subject to the oceans tides for a significant portion of its course. It is not a long river,10 miles or so, but surprisingly wide for so short a watercourse. It winds through heavily forested steep hills on both sides. Along one side, behind the hills a road passes. Along the other, a popular broad hiking and biking trail clung to the side of the hills.
About 47 years ago, newly arrived in California and living in San Francisco, a New York city boy, I drove in the early morning with John Olmstead along the road passing along the south side of the river to very close to its headwaters. There, we placed canoes into the water and spent the day paddling back down to the ocean. Along the way, John in his crackly voice would describe, sometimes scientifically and at others mystically, what we were seeing and feeling. It was a trip that changed my life.
Today we walked along the path on the north-side until I grew to tired and we returned.
Then we drove to Noyo Harbor for a delightful lunch of fish and chips at a fisherman’s outdoor restaurant that we like a lot.
After a nap, Maryann whipped up one of my favorite dishes for dinner, pasta piselli from my mom’s secret recipes. After that, we had a Zoom call with Alexandra Leti our cousin in Australia. She and her brother are well known artists in Australia. We called because Maryann had just hung up in her home Alexandra’s painting that I had given to Mary and George for Christmas. The framer had just finished framing it.
The very pleasant and interesting day ended with Naida falling down the stairs requiring a visit from a Mendocino Fire and Rescue squad led by George himself. They were concerned. Naida was embarrassed and frightened. George was appropriately empathetic. The dogs were hysterical. Maryann was businesslike. And, I was useless as usual.
Ultimately, it seemed Naida suffered nothing more serious than a bruised knee, a wrenched ankle, and a shattered ego. The MFD people left and we all went to bed. All in all, it was a fitting day to end a year long quarantine. Life is back.
Sunday morning the sun shone brightly but soon a light fog rolled in that hung around for most of the day. Brendan, Maryann and George’s son arrived. We took the dogs to the dog park and watched a group of people playing the French version of Bocci. We then drove up coast to Pacific Coast Winery, drank some wine, ate some snacks, bought a rock painted to look like a frog, talked and laughed with Sally the owner of the winery, and drove back home.
That night after dinner, Mary brought out some home movies taken by my father about seventy years ago, and some, I was surprised to learn, taken by me. I was more than shocked to see that I had taken moving pictures of my honeymoon in Puerto Rico with my first wife. I admit I thought I was much better looking than I believed I was then. Given the amount of trouble I have gotten into in my life, however, I cannot imagine how much more trouble I could found myself in had I had such an inflated belief in my hotness.
The next morning, it was sunny and crystal clear outside. We walked into the town for a tasty but expensive lunch at a restaurant named Millennium. On the way back to the house we stopped at a shop and bought Naida new shoes. She seemed very pleased. Later I took a nap.
That night we watched a few more old home movies — me of my high school and law school graduations and a 1968 family trip to Italy.
The following morning broke bright sunny and warm. We packed up our suitcases, hugged my sister and brother-in-law good-by and drove off for out long drive into San Francisco for my treatment at UCSF.
We arrived a Peter and Barrie’s house in Noe Valley. I was exhausted. After another great meal prepared by Barrie, Peter told us our fortunes using Tarot cards designed by a friend of my brother. After a discussion about editing we went to bed.
The next day I spent the entire day at UCSF for my various tests, meeting with my doctor and infusion. Everything seems to be going well. That night we had our usual great dinner a Bacco. The next morning we returned home.
In the week we had been away summer seems to have descended on the Enchanted Forest. Even the ornamental fruit tree in our backyard which had be bare was now in bloom.
If I were a purveyor of conspiracy theories like Limbaugh, Alex Jones, Russia, and the Committees to re-elect Trump, I could say that Trump created and released the virus in order to decimate the minority groups who oppose him and eventually declare a state of emergency so that he could eliminate the 2020 election and rule by martial law. Of course, I would not do that. Would you?
Given the number of hours Naida and I watch television news about the coming presidential election and the misadventures of our so called Commander in Chief, I, at least, seem less and less able to discern an understandable story as to what is happening except that it is generally bad and the CIC seems to be losing his bid for reelection as well as his mind. People continue to die in droves from COVID and we continue to be shackled to our homes. Perhaps the sun rises and sets over some happy place on our planet, but I have no idea where that may be.
Not having had enough of politics and being addicted to watching television programs glorifying it, Naida and I tuned into the Vice-presidential debate. At the end of it I concluded I could not support the dead man with the fly on his head to be the person a heartbeat away from the presidency.
Sometimes I just have to agree with James Lee Burke’s opinion that:
If you’re lucky, at a certain age you finally learn not to contend with the world or try to explain that the application of reason has little or nothing to do with the realities that exist just on the other side of one’s fingertips.
Burke, James Lee. The Glass Rainbow: A Dave Robicheaux Novel (p. 218). Simon & Schuster.
Thinking about debates, I wrote a bit of doggerel about the first presidential debate a week or so ago:
No President stood upon that stage nor someone of an adult’s age but a loathsome and petulant child. with mouth not pants defiled.
Biden then boxed his ear, and said “I’m not here to call him a liar.” “Everyone already knows he is a liar”. And with that, I happily close.
Tomorrow, I plan to travel into the Golden Hills to visit Hayden. Because he twisted his ankle at the skatepark, was in great pain, and resting at home this will be the first time I will see him in over a week.
On Friday, he applied for his learners driving permit, a teenagers license into adulthood — or so they think. This lead me to ponder this moment when one gains all the indicia of adulthood, the body, the hormones, the grossly expanded frontal lobe and yes, the learners permit. It is a tough time for them. There is a good chance they will not become what we expected. Their teachers, parents and others with responsibilities for them are usually presented with two questions about this often unexpected stranger — What they would say to the child who evidences behavior they do not approve of (e.g., poor marks, late hours, drugs, anger, sullenness and on and on) and what is it that really makes them upset.
As to the first more often than not we tell them it is because they will be harming themselves or others in some form. As to what makes us upset is the deep feeling that we no longer know what to do with them. They make us uncomfortable, these beings we held in our arms and watched them grow but who now we no longer know and have begun to drift from us forever. Teachers, parents and other caregivers fear they failed. The child can no linger be fixed and so we all look to pass him off to somebody we believe can — the parents to the school, the school to the parents.
Alas, they no longer need to be fixed. The child, now the almost-adult, does not need to be fixed. They just have to be ready for when we stop trying. They rarely are. Were you?
Today we washed the dog. It has been far to long. At first he ran and hid, but when he was finally put into the tub to be lathered and princes he behaved admirably. After the bath we wrapped him in towels and I sat on the sofa holding him while Naida played “How much is that doggie in the window” on the piano.
I picked up Hayden from his house. He was still limping slightly from his scooter accident. We picked up Ethan. He was on crutches. He had stepped on while clearing some brush. We had lunch a Subway’s. The conversation consisted of the usual teenage monosyllabic responses to my questions.
— Here I erased about one weeks entries —
Anyway, to try to make it all back up from memory:
On Thursday the three of us, Naida, Boo-boo the barking dog and I left the Enchanted Forest and drove to the Big Endive by the Bay for my immunotherapy treatment at UCSH. As we drove out of the garage, Naida began a magnificent tale about her grandmother Hazel Ker Miller. She continued the fascinating story without stop until we arrived at the UCSF parking garage at Mission Bay. Hazel was a fascinating women. Her mother a school teacher from a well to do family in NY as a young women traveled to the Dakotas to teach school. While there she met an Irish Catholic stage coach driver, fell in love and subsequently married much to the chagrin of her family who promptly disowned her and leaving her and her husband to move to Idaho where they raised their family in great poverty in part because the Irishman preferred singing and drinking to working. Their daughter Hazel, a great beauty and accomplished pianist fell in love with the oldest of two sons of the largest landowner in the area but eventually due to a lovers quarrel of some sort separated from him and married the second son much to her regret as the second son was far less accomplished and would inherit much poorer land that the first son. Nevertheless, she persisted, ran the business while her husband was off in the mountains with his sheep and cattle raised a family and ignored the rumors of romantic liaisons that followed her. Hr daughter Alice, Naida’s mother, also an accomplished pianist, singer and actress fell in love with a boy who Hazel had hired to teach at the local school attended by her children. After three children were born to the couple that marriage failed and Hazel, Alice and the three children left the hardscrabble life, bitter winters and embittered families of the Mormon dominated Montana-Idaho area for pleasant weather and more easy-going lifestyle of Carmel California.
My hospital visit went as well as can be expected. The doctor said I will be coming to the end of my treatment in April and things had gone better than expected and he fully believes at theist the specific tumor they had been treating what no more than dead tissue. Good for me.
After leaving the hospital precincts we left for Peter and Barrie’s house for a Birthday dinner. Barrie’s again prepared a wonderful and tasty dinner washed down with prosecco and a fine bottle of Brunello di Montalcino wine. All in all, it was everything one would want for a dinner good wine, good food, good conversation and good friends.
We then left to spend the night at the Mark Hopkins where we enjoyed the view, slept well and lazed around in bed the next morning.
The View From My Window
Later in the day, we enjoyed a birthday lunch at the Fog City Diner with my son Jason, his wife Hiromi and my grandchildren, Amanda and Anthony. Amanda enjoyed her first raw oysters while Anthony and I gorged ourselves on them.
Amanda and Papa JoeAmanda enjoys her first raw oyster with Anthony and Papa Joe at Fog City Diner.Anthony, Papa Joe, Amanda, Jason, and Naida
After lunch we drove back to the Enchanted Forest. One the way, Naida tool a story about Vardis Fisher the famous (at least at one time) Idaho novelist. He grew up in the little town that Naida had lived in and knew her great grandfather as well as her grandfather. Fisher’s father the town ner’do well worked for her great grandfather. Fisher’s first novel and perhaps his best was entitled “Toilers of the Hills” was about he great grandfather who “clubbed the desert and made it grow.” Fisher, before beginning a novel her would write an Elizabethan Sonnet about the characters in the novel. He wrote the following about Robert Miller
Time built a pioneer and set him down
Upon the greyest wast of Idaho
He clubbed the desert and made it grow
In broad and undulating fields of brown
He laid his might upon it, stripped its frown
Of drouth and thistles; till by sweat and blow
He left the aged and barren hills aglow
With color — and its flame was his renown
Few loved him, many feared, and some would smirk
Derisively and call his mind untaught;
Of foul speech, and unclean fro head to feet,
Who poured his great dream into golden wheat;
Until his gnarled and calloused hands had wrought
A deep quiet holiness of work.
In her memoir, Daughter of the West, Naida remembered her great grandfather’s hands and wrote:
“Throughout my life I would see such hands — hands used as bludgeons and prying tools on farms back when men engaged in the “deep and quiet holiness of work.”
Later in his life after publishing his book Mountain Man that was made into the movie Jeremiah Johnson by Sidney Pollack, Fisher was soundly criticized for writing in the book about the mountain man considering a storm like a performance of Beethoven because it was believed that they were ignorant and uncultured. Naida, however, told the story related to her by Hazel about the night she had her piano loaded onto the back of a wagon and driven deep into the Idaho mountains where she played Beethoven and Chopin to the sheepherders at their yearly get together (The Eastern Idaho Sheepmen Convention). They, the sheepherders, sat on bales of hay and listened to the music until it drifted off into the darkening skies over the mountains. Could Fisher have been there that night? Naida thinks so.
Hayden called and asked for a ride for him and his friends to the go-kart track so, on Sunday, I drove into the golden hills to pick them up. When I arrived I found that one of his friends who had gotten his driver’s license and had an automobile with him. Most of the Scooter Gang piled into that care leaving just HRM and Kaleb to ride with me. When we arrived at the raceway we found that they would have to wait several hours before karts would become available so Haden suggested I drive on home and he and Kaleb will return in the friends car after the races. I mark this day as the one where H the teenager has finally severed his social dependence on the adults that cared for him. Now, and for the next five years or so, his social life will be defined by access to his and friends automobiles. Financial independence takes a bit longer.
This morning Naida was feeling especially good, singing and dancing around the house. I asked her what was it that made her feel this was. I feel better about myself and I owe it all to a song — Little Red Riding-hood. Here are the lyrics. If they made her happy maybe they will make you happy.
Owoooooooo!
Who’s that I see walkin’ in these woods?
Why, it’s Little Red Riding HoodGo-
Hey there Little Red Riding Hood
You sure are looking good
You’re everything a big bad wolf could want
Listen to me
Little Red Riding Hood
I don’t think little big girls should
Go walking in these spooky old woods alone
Owoooooooo!
What big eyes you have
The kind of eyes that drive wolves mad
So just to see that you don’t get chased
I think I ought to walk with you for a ways
What full lips you have
They’re sure to lure someone bad
So until you get to grandma’s place
I think you ought to walk with me and be safe
I’m gonna keep my sheep suit on
Until I’m sure that you’ve been shown
That I can be trusted walking with you alone
Owoooooooo!
Little Red Riding Hood
I’d like to hold you if I could
But you might think I’m a big bad wolf so I won’t
Owoooooooo!
What a big heart I have
The better to love you with
Little Red Riding Hood
Even bad wolves can be good
I’ll try to be satisfied just to walk close by your side
Maybe you’ll see things my way before we get to grandma’s place
Little Red Riding Hood
You sure are looking good
You’re everything that a big bad wolf could want
Owooooooo I mean baaaaaa!
Baaa?
Baa
Now, to tell you the truth although I enjoyed the music, the lyrics didn’t do all that much for me.
So, days have gone by, things have happened. There was another presidential debate. The weather has gotten cooler. I have driven into the Golden Hills and spent the day with Hayden. We ate lunch at McDonalds. The dog still barks. Naida and I spend a lot of quiet time together and at other times sing and dance with each other. Now and then we sit and watch the telly or I read or write while she plays the piano or works on her memoir. A lot has happened and little has happened. I have read a lot of books. I am reading two right now one is “The Girl Who Could Move S**t With Her Mind,” and the other, “Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick.” I usually read about Dick punching Zoey during the day, especially while eating lunch and I read about the shit moving girl before I go to bed. Their stories are a lot alike. I often get them confused in my mind and have Zoey moving shit and the other girl punching someone’s dick. It’s always something.
But, tomorrow is another day and I think this is enough for today. Take care and remember to:
“The universe doesn’t much care if you tread on a butterfly. There are plenty more butterflies. Gods might note the fall of a sparrow but they don’t make any effort to catch them.”
Pratchett, Terry. The Globe: The Science of Discworld II: A Novel . Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.
Today Naida approached near hysteria after spending four hours attempting to send photographs of a cyst on her back to her doctor through the Kaiser computer messaging system. Early on I snuck upstairs to take a nap. Later, after downing three glasses of port wine a much relaxed Naida came upstairs to give a blow by blow description her epic battle with the cybernetic demons.
Today, was the day He Who Is Not My President was scheduled to give his acceptance speech for his nomination by the now virtually non-existent Republican Party. The acceptance speech is to be given illegally at the people’s house, the White House. The White House exterior and the nearby grounds are tarted up with political signage and other detritus of political campaign. We turned away from the telecast after hearing from obviously suborned or otherwise compromised speakers about how much the person claiming to be president loves people of color and sports stars. We turned to show about the coming zombie apocalypse on the History Channel.
I had my own cybernetic crisis that day. A document containing my notes of quotes, poems and other irrelevancies that I use to pepper T&T with cute ephemera had disappeared. I had maintained this document for over two years now and them removing items I had used and replacing them with new. I spent a frustrating hour or two begging the machine to cough up the missing document. Finally, just as I had given up, it magically re-appeared.
We turned away from the Zombie program and returned to MSNBC to catch the Mango Monster’s taking possession of the People’s House as though it was something given to him by his adoring followers for his remarkable ability to turn truth into lies and to defile anything he touches. After watching the commentators tally up his lies, we went upstairs to sleep. All and all it was not the best of our days.
That night while lying in each others arms we discussed the fear and despair of those over seventy years of age who are forced to deal with this rapidly changing cybernetic world.
Two days have elapsed. I assume nothing bad had happened during those last two days. I seem in good health and I woke up this evening after my afternoon nap with the dog asleep on the bed next to me. He was not barking. That was a good thing too.
I began reading James Lee Burke’s The Glasswork Rainbow a Robeacheux/Purcel novel that I had not yet read. It begins, as usual in his novels, with a long lush paragraph containing images of that part of the deep south that makes it appear to be heaven on earth, someplace where you want to lay down your burdens and spend your life sipping daiquiris under some magnolia tree. In most of the rest of the book, however, he demonstrates that that little bit or paradise is not much more than a pit of murder, mayhem, and mendacity. Nevertheless, I love those opening paragraphs.
THE ROOM I had rented in an old part of Natchez seemed more reflective of New Orleans than a river town in Mississippi. The ventilated storm shutters were slatted with a pink glow, as soft and filtered and cool in color as the spring sunrise can be in the Garden District, the courtyard outside touched with mist off the river, the pastel walls deep in shadow and stained with lichen above the flower beds, the brick walkways smelling of damp stone and the wild spearmint that grew in green clusters between the bricks. I could see the shadows of banana trees moving on the window screens, the humidity condensing and threading along the fronds like veins in living tissue. I could hear a ship’s horn blowing somewhere out on the river, a long hooting sound that was absorbed and muted inside the mist, thwarting its own purpose. A wood-bladed fan revolved slowly above my bed, the incandescence of the lightbulbs attached to it reduced to a dim yellow smudge inside frosted-glass shades that were fluted to resemble flowers. The wood floor and the garish wallpaper and the rain spots on the ceiling belonged to another era, one that was outside of time and unheedful of the demands of commerce. Perhaps as a reminder of that fact, the only clock in the room was a round windup mechanism that possessed neither a glass cover nor hands on its face.
Burke, James Lee. The Glass Rainbow: A Dave Robicheaux Novel (p. 1). Simon & Schuster.
The earth rounded upon itself a few times until it was Monday. The air quality outdoors remained intolerable for those of our age so Naida and I spent them indoors as much as we could hoping the air-conditioning would moderate the impact of the smoke filled air.
The Doleful Sun Over The Enchanted Forest.
In the morning I got the sad news of the death of an old and dear friend of mine in Sicily. Marco, my friends son, had text me with the news that Luigi (or Gigi as everyone called him) Gallo had died the prior evening of complications of Parkinson’s disease.
I first met Gigi the day I arrived at my families home in Canicatti Sicily after an almost 2000 mile drive from London England with my two and one half year old son. I have written about that memorable trip in other posts. Gigi and I were the same age and became close friends although he spoke no English and I only rudimentary Italian at the time. During the six months I lived in Canicatti, I saw Gigi almost every day. And when I moved to Rome for the next three years, I would often travel back to Sicily or he would come to Rome for visits. Even after I returned to the United States and settled in San Francisco, I would try to return to Italy and Sicily often. There were many interesting and amusing stories that emerged from our friendship, some of which I also wrote about in prior posts.
Eventually Gigi became a fairly well known race car driver in Italy winning an apartment full of trophies. It was very popular in Italy and Sicily to race mostly production automobiles up and down mountainous roads in the countryside. At this he excelled, and after him his son Marco did also.
I visited him and his wife twice in recent years. Once with my sister Maryann and her husband George and later with my son Jason who got to see the little car we travelled with across Europe so many years ago. It still exists, newly restored in Gigi’s garage along with several of the automobiles in which he raced over the years. Poor Gigi at the time of our visits was fully suffering the effects of his disease. I miss you greatly my dear friend.
Gigi and I in the vineyard. 1969Gigi with the restored Trojan that I had driven from London to Sicily.Gigi with some of his racing trophies. 2015.Jason with Gigi and his wife. 2016.In the garage with the automobiles.
Naidahad a cyst removed from her back. After a day or two of pain and discomfort, she appeared better. The air cleared up a bit by Wednesday so I went for swim. It was delightful.
Often, here in T&T, I switch back and forth between the past and the present as though they are one and the same. I have come to believe they are and should not be considered separate entities. As we appear today with all our psychological and physical scars and whatever of our memories that remain makes up the song of our lives.
This morning, I woke up thinking about Marcel Proust. You know, the man who spent most of his adult life lying in bed and writing an exceedingly long book about his also exceedingly boring life during — at least that part of it he was not spending all his time in bed. It is considered a masterpiece of literature because, apparently, it is a marvel of style in in his native language. I do not read in French, so I would not know about that. Anyway, Proust has always been one of my favorite celebrities for his masterful ability to become famous while lying in bed. Winston Churchill was also noted for doing his best work while lying in bed and sipping brandy. He would get up now and then to make a speech and smoke a cigar. Anyway, every now and then Proust would hire some street boys to stand at the foot of his bed and masturbate. Now, when we are bored and lying in bed, we watch television reruns of old video series or more likely YouTube snippets on our smart-phone.
The first thing I do in the morning when I wake up it to grab my smart phone off my nightstand and move through my favorite sites in a strict order, mail, news, coronavirus statistics, 49rs Webzone, messages, Facebook, and Instagram. I did this, this morning, even before hugging Naida and petting the dog, both of whom share the bed with me. In fact most of the bed is owned by the dog. Naida and I share a sliver on one side.
By the way, the dog tucks himself in at night.
On Thursday, I left for The Big Endive by the Bay for my infusion. The traffic down was not too bad. While most of my appointment was as usual, I did learn that I had lost 12 pounds in the last two months. At that rate of weight loss, I probably will disappear from view even before I die. After the appointment, I visited with Peter and Barrie and played ain’t it awful about the current political system. The drive home was awful. It took over three and a half hours to drive 90 miles.
The following afternoon, I took Naida to the emergency room. She had had pains in her arm and chest, confusion and nausea. She has had these symptoms on and off for months now, but today’s episode was the most serious. A bit over three years ago, she had a heart operation in which they replaced a valve. She also has a partially blocked carotid artery so we have to be attentive to anything that may appear to be a problem again. I returned home to await the results of the medical examinations and tests.
I walked the dog during the heat of early evening. We passed the pool where I happily swim most mornings in order to sign up for this weeks slots pursuant to the city’s social distancing guidelines. There was no sign up sheet, only a small sign that said the pool was closed because some people violated the city’s guidelines by holding pool parties instead of limiting use of the pool to no more than two people. This is turning out to be a very bad day.
The hospital eventually admitted Naida to spend the night. I returned to the hospital and brought her some things she wanted. She was hooked up to an EKG machine for the night. I stayed for a while. The hospital, Kaiser, was chaotic and understaffed. Naida appeared to be feeling much better than when I had left her at the emergency room. She was not so confused and laughed and joked with me. She suggested that it might have been the pressure of the writing process and the trepidation of remembering things that she would prefer to forget that may have been the source of her current physical problems. She thought that perhaps she should no longer work on it.
After my visit I returned home. Wandered about the house a bit. Cooked dinner. Read a little of my current novel. Watched Rachel Maddow wax eloquently on Trump’s insults to the men and women in the military. Eventually, I went to bed. It is the first time in a long while Naida and I did not fall asleep in each others arms. I was lonely. Even the dog seemed to recognize something was wrong. He slunk into his dog bed rather then take his accustomed place on ours. Sleep was fitful, full of shadows and dreams of mortality, sorrow and vulnerability.
“Age is an insatiable thief. It steals the pleasures of your youth, then locks you inside your own body with your desires still glowing. Worse, it makes you dependent upon people who are a half century younger than you. Don’t let anyone tell you that it brings you peace, either, because that’s the biggest lie of all.”
Burke, James Lee. The Glass Rainbow: A Dave Robicheaux Novel (p. 124). Simon & Schuster. Kindle Edition.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: It’s not my fault that with a broken heart, I’ve gone this way.
In front of a mirror they have put me like a parrot, And behind the mirror the Teacher tells me what to say.
Whether I am perceived as a thorn or a rose, it’s The Gardener who has fed and nourished me day to day.
O friends, don’t blame me for this broken heart; Inside me there is a great jewel and it’s to the Jeweler’s shop I go.
Even though, to pious, drinking wine is a sin, Don’t judge me; I use it as a bleach to wash the color of hypocrisy away.
All that laughing and weeping of lovers must be coming from some other place; Here, all night I sing with my winecup and then moan for You all day.
If someone were to ask Hafiz, “Why do you spend all your time sitting in The Winehouse door?,” to this man I would say, “From there, standing, I can see both the Path and the Way.” Hafiz. From: Drunk on the Wind of the Beloved.Translated by Thomas Rain Crowe.
Papa Joe's Tales, Fables and Parables 