I'm spinning wool, drinking hard lemonade, and I'm easily distracted. Yesterday the locusts were buzzing, ninety degrees and oh so humid, we had lightning flash and thunder rumble in the distance during the night. Can the crows not caw? I wish for a longer dawn.
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California. We drove the crazy road through San Jose, hills to the west of the highway covered with stucco houses all the ticky tacky, postage stamp yards, but look at the view. Bigger hills with oaks and Yertle the Turtle Oh marvelous me I am the king of all that I see houses on top of the hills. My spouse said McMansions. It's nice land, it's beautiful land, but like John Steinbeck said, you can't have none of that land, that land was stolen a long time ago. And now it's all shrouded in a layer of smog so it doesn't really matter but the sunsets are stunning.
We saw a bumper sticker on a bigass blue sedan that said LIMBAA and couldn't decide if it were appropriate, or a tongue-in-cheek joke. Some people think they're in the middle of a movie car chase scene, and the speed limit signs are mere suggestions. I have no respect for people who drive beyond their ability, who think speed and lane-changing are indications of a good driver. There are good drivers and then there are assholes and idiots. None of them have any idea what I keep under the car seat. That's all I gotta say about driving in Cali.
It was cold and foggy driving through the rocky coastal mountains and eucalytus groves heading towards the coast, that fresh smell of the ocean trapped by the marine layer of clouds that blankets the valley. The road narrows and the hills end gradually, row farms of lettuce, strawberries, artichokes unfurl across gently sloping hills. Some fields seem to stretch forever, the rows long and straight, perspective guides. The dirt is black and smells dark and rich, and sometimes it smells of rotting vegetables and dairy air. Produce, such a mutifaceted word.
We visited with S's family, everyone very big and loud and very practical and emotional and very sweet natured but don't make them mad and this is what happens when no-nonsense Scots marry wild moody gypsies. The new baby has blond hair that stands straight up like Billy Idol's and big blue eyes with amazing eyelashes. She is only 7 months and is forming words and can walk with assistance, drunk-sailor style, wobbly legs and grunting the whole time. She has the sweetest smile and a will of iron.
We went to the Aquarium and she loved the fish and sea otters and jellyfish. I liked watching the bat rays glide in their pool, and I could see the octopus swell and deflate with the tank's false tide. I watched its tiny eyes and it rolled its sinuous tentacles like water over the glass, suction cups in pairs, pulsing and writhing. The baby didn't care about it. She touched the starfish and the velvety sea slugs in the petting pool and was happy to let everyone take turns carrying her. Even S held her for a short time and seemed amazed and surprised she didn't cry or fuss. I had fun with her and took secret pleasure knowing some people probably assumed she was mine. Not yet, though, not yet.
We ate lunch on Cannery Row and of all the people I could run into, my ex-boyfriend's kid sister was having lunch in the same restaurant. She still looks like three miles of bad road, pale eyes and wispy hair, teeth gapped and pointing out of her mouth and more were missing than last time I saw her. My ex was a jerk, and that's letting him off nicely; time and perspective have left me with no desire to ever get in contact with him. I smiled and nodded and she told me all about her life, and about how my ex has a job as a sheriff, which she said seems to satisfy all his control issues and I thought yeah, thank God I broke up with him. I managed to get away from her without telling her anything other than I live in Oregon. Strange encounters. The world is not so big after all.
We celebrated the Fourth of July, which doubles as my otherMother's birthday, with good food and much laughter. We joked about S's brother, who was being sassy about something and his wife said, "Just wait, we'll get the yard-stick!" and she meant about beating him for his sass but his super-quick Dad threw up his hands and said, "You win!"
Probably you had to be there.
My in-laws are moving to the big mountains in Colorado next year, escaping California's increasing insanity. They're both native Californians and find it hard to live with the noise and pollution and population. It's not what it was 50 years ago. It's not even what it was 5 years ago. The little house on the levee road where S & I lived when we first got married has been plowed under, paved, and had 10,000 new homes built upon those fields, none of which we could afford to buy. Maybe this is what they mean when they say you can never go home again.
But it is a beautiful place. And there's a lot of it. Although you can't have none of that land. It was stolen a long, long time ago.
After leaving the Salinas Valley we drove north and east, over the steep rocky crags and golden hillsides of the Gabilan Mountains, then across the San Juaquin Valley, up into the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, to where the manzanita chapparal and red clay meets the big pines and granite cliffs. Gold country.
More tomorrow.
---
California. We drove the crazy road through San Jose, hills to the west of the highway covered with stucco houses all the ticky tacky, postage stamp yards, but look at the view. Bigger hills with oaks and Yertle the Turtle Oh marvelous me I am the king of all that I see houses on top of the hills. My spouse said McMansions. It's nice land, it's beautiful land, but like John Steinbeck said, you can't have none of that land, that land was stolen a long time ago. And now it's all shrouded in a layer of smog so it doesn't really matter but the sunsets are stunning.
We saw a bumper sticker on a bigass blue sedan that said LIMBAA and couldn't decide if it were appropriate, or a tongue-in-cheek joke. Some people think they're in the middle of a movie car chase scene, and the speed limit signs are mere suggestions. I have no respect for people who drive beyond their ability, who think speed and lane-changing are indications of a good driver. There are good drivers and then there are assholes and idiots. None of them have any idea what I keep under the car seat. That's all I gotta say about driving in Cali.
It was cold and foggy driving through the rocky coastal mountains and eucalytus groves heading towards the coast, that fresh smell of the ocean trapped by the marine layer of clouds that blankets the valley. The road narrows and the hills end gradually, row farms of lettuce, strawberries, artichokes unfurl across gently sloping hills. Some fields seem to stretch forever, the rows long and straight, perspective guides. The dirt is black and smells dark and rich, and sometimes it smells of rotting vegetables and dairy air. Produce, such a mutifaceted word.
We visited with S's family, everyone very big and loud and very practical and emotional and very sweet natured but don't make them mad and this is what happens when no-nonsense Scots marry wild moody gypsies. The new baby has blond hair that stands straight up like Billy Idol's and big blue eyes with amazing eyelashes. She is only 7 months and is forming words and can walk with assistance, drunk-sailor style, wobbly legs and grunting the whole time. She has the sweetest smile and a will of iron.
We went to the Aquarium and she loved the fish and sea otters and jellyfish. I liked watching the bat rays glide in their pool, and I could see the octopus swell and deflate with the tank's false tide. I watched its tiny eyes and it rolled its sinuous tentacles like water over the glass, suction cups in pairs, pulsing and writhing. The baby didn't care about it. She touched the starfish and the velvety sea slugs in the petting pool and was happy to let everyone take turns carrying her. Even S held her for a short time and seemed amazed and surprised she didn't cry or fuss. I had fun with her and took secret pleasure knowing some people probably assumed she was mine. Not yet, though, not yet.
We ate lunch on Cannery Row and of all the people I could run into, my ex-boyfriend's kid sister was having lunch in the same restaurant. She still looks like three miles of bad road, pale eyes and wispy hair, teeth gapped and pointing out of her mouth and more were missing than last time I saw her. My ex was a jerk, and that's letting him off nicely; time and perspective have left me with no desire to ever get in contact with him. I smiled and nodded and she told me all about her life, and about how my ex has a job as a sheriff, which she said seems to satisfy all his control issues and I thought yeah, thank God I broke up with him. I managed to get away from her without telling her anything other than I live in Oregon. Strange encounters. The world is not so big after all.
We celebrated the Fourth of July, which doubles as my otherMother's birthday, with good food and much laughter. We joked about S's brother, who was being sassy about something and his wife said, "Just wait, we'll get the yard-stick!" and she meant about beating him for his sass but his super-quick Dad threw up his hands and said, "You win!"
Probably you had to be there.
My in-laws are moving to the big mountains in Colorado next year, escaping California's increasing insanity. They're both native Californians and find it hard to live with the noise and pollution and population. It's not what it was 50 years ago. It's not even what it was 5 years ago. The little house on the levee road where S & I lived when we first got married has been plowed under, paved, and had 10,000 new homes built upon those fields, none of which we could afford to buy. Maybe this is what they mean when they say you can never go home again.
But it is a beautiful place. And there's a lot of it. Although you can't have none of that land. It was stolen a long, long time ago.
After leaving the Salinas Valley we drove north and east, over the steep rocky crags and golden hillsides of the Gabilan Mountains, then across the San Juaquin Valley, up into the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, to where the manzanita chapparal and red clay meets the big pines and granite cliffs. Gold country.
More tomorrow.
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