My Five Year Old Friend

       One of my all time favorite kids lives in my neighborhood.  Her name (coincidentally) happens to be Gracie Magdalena.  Gracie is such a cool little kid.  She is five years old and has life firmly in her grasp. She is a pretty child, on the small side for five.  She has a winsome smile and light brown hair generally captured in braids.   She is not a noisy child but rather an oddly reflective child.  It's not that she is shy.  In fact, she is not shy at all.  She is confident but never has to be the center of attention.  She prefers to watch and evaluate a situation before stepping into it but when she moves into action, she is self assured and engaging.

    Gracie embraces the world through all her senses.  Her sparkly greenish-gold eyes do not miss a detail.   She is happy to observe everything around her, especially faces and anything to do with light and color.  Unlike lots of kids, she never objects to car rides or having to wait while an adult takes care of some piece of business.  That kid will settle in and survey the territory around her, noting details, noting faces, seeing colors, detecting patterns and comparing them all. She might decide to share some observation but she doesn't have to tell you everything that she sees.  Sometimes, I think she just likes to keep her thoughts protected in her mind and in her imagination.  She is also an usually strong listener for a five year old.  Music can entertain her for long periods of time - with or without lyrics.  She's not so interested in the loud, big beat kind of thing but rather prefers music that evokes reflection.  Odd for a little kid but that's my pal Gracie.

     Gracie clearly prefers to be outdoors.  She is the kind of kid who wakes up with a grin and ready to go.  She is a little kid bike rider, a tree climber, a wave chaser, and a barefoot dancer in the sand and a tumbler in the grass.  She is all about up close looks at spiderwebs, dandelions, rocks, seashells, and cracks in the sidewalk.  She definitely enjoys using her half-pint hands to explore her  world, carefully cradling whatever treasure she is examining.  She is keenly aware of warmth and icy cold and will leap to point out sunbeams drifting in on the clear air or frozen water drops on her front porch.  I've watched as she twirls in the spring breeze, boisterously laughing as the wind tries to pull up her skirt, and, at the same time,  begging me to grab her hands and twirl with her.

   I asked her recently if she was afraid of anything.
   "Well, yes,"  she immediately replied.  "I'm scared of the dark.  One time the nightlight in my room broke in the night and I woke up and I couldn't see anything!  It was so daaaarrrrk!  (Can you hear her as she draws out the word dark?)  I thought I was going to be lost in the dark forever.  I started crying and mama came and found me and showed me that the light was still there - just broken.  But I don't like the dark.  Ever."

    I think I am really lucky to have Gracie Magdalena in my neighborhood.  She likes to visit and  always greets me with a wide open hug.  There's something about Gracie's presence that makes me slow down and remember what it was like before.  Before tension, headlines, deadlines,  and life's complexities took away twirling and time for chasing waves.  It might be good for me to watch the world more often through Gracie's eyes but I wonder how you do that when you are way on the other side of five years old.
 

And Then There Is November

    On the way back from the coast this weekend, we were treated to November's finest.  I have made it abundantly clear that October is not my favorite month of the year.  I am not saying that November is my favorite (not by a long shot) but I sure do like it more than its slightly older sister.  November's colors are more intense.  November holds the promise of leaving the sharp, electrical heat and light of October behind and taking on the more muted light of late fall.  I hate the shorter days but at least the light does not cut as much.  And, tucked at the end of November, is that sweetest of holidays, the holiday that just can't seem to take on much of the commercial mantle.  Sure, it's about food and that part does not impress me.  But is also, in my book, about a pause in the days, a pause to appreciate and to be with what matters.  And then there is the tumble into December but that is another post.

  Enjoy some of November's gifts:

She Is Powerful

      No, not me!  The Pacific Ocean!  A few weeks ago I attempted to entertain you with some photos from Pt Reyes National Seashore.  That spot is incredibly beautiful and it was fun to show you photos.  This weekend RR and I traveled in the opposite direction to have a date with the ocean.

       Ft Bragg is a fishing and logging town on the north coast of California.  Possibly you have heard of its more trendy neighbor Mendocino but I prefer to spend my money in Ft Bragg.  It is an economically depressed area but that does not take away from the ocean connection.  I have been going there regularly for about thirty years and feel as if it could be home.  In years passed I have camped on the Ft Bragg coast or stayed with friends or relatives in town.  In more recent years, RR and I have taken to staying in a motel at the northern edge of town.  This motel,  the Ocean View Motel, is right there at the ocean's edge.  You can leave the sliding glass door open at night (if you dare and I do) and sleep with the ocean's roar in your ears.  On Saturday morning, I was impressed with how calm the ocean was - nary a whitecap in view.  But then there was Sunday morning.  Oh my! What a difference 24 hours makes.  I don't believe I have ever seen the Ft Bragg ocean so violent.  Such powerful and high swells, breaking way out there and then breaking again closer in.  Amazing!

       I got to thinking about people who didn't have the privilege of growing up and always living within 45 minutes of the ocean.  I feel bad for them and what they miss by not having the ocean connection.  I can't imagine what that must be like: to have never seen the power of the waves or heard their roar.  I tried to capture at least some of the ocean energy in these photos.  If only I could have included the waves, the birds, the breeze, the fragrance that is the Pacific Ocean.

Waves!  Huge!

Surreal, if you ask me.

This gives you some perspective on the height of the waves.

More perspective.  I won't be going beach combing down there.

Foam with a veil of fog

I am always impressed with the many shades of blue in the ocean.

And there was no wind!  That was pretty surprising. With waves like these you expect there to be lots of wind.

Beautiful blues

Can you hear the wave hitting the rocks?

If only we could capture the energy in those waves!

More blues!

Of Skies, Leaves, and Tractors

     In late October, the sun doesn't start to bring blue to the black sky until nearly 7:00 am -- and later when storm clouds or fog fill the sky.  I set out shortly before 7:00 to see what colors were in the vineyards now  and got to see sky colors galore too.

Clouds, circling in from the south, cut off sunlight to the laguna.

 

Grapes vines wait for the sun to reach them.

And now the sky finds its familiar blue.

Rolling vineyards decked out in fall's colors

This little grouping calls to me!  

Yup!  Farm equipment gets the right of way.......

.....including (or maybe especially) this guy.

Quintessential colors

I see eerie here....

Can't take my eyes off of you....

Death in front of dying?

     There it is, people.  NorCal wine country getting ready for winter.  The first real fall rain is supposed to roll in tonight.  The SF Giants just took the sixth game in the NL championship series - one more game to go before meeting up with Detroit in the World Series.  That World Series action just puts the exclamation point on the fall sentence!

Stopped

Stopped

slammed up against the wall
tortured hands dug into brick
neck wrenched as if wrung
cheekbones touching concrete

no breath
aching power
strength beyond the years
and the wall won't budge

Wall so high
wall so hard
wall so gray
soul so done



step back
two steps
breath returns
movement  possible

edge of blue above
edge of green below
lungs expand
and wall still there

eyes open

Muddy Feet

       To follow yesterday's post of things I've never done, I decided to make a list of some things I HAVE done.  Just for fun.  But it actually turned into not fun as I came to see that the things I celebrate about myself were largely accomplished in the earlier years of my life.  Sadness reigns.

    It's not that I haven't done anything interesting over the past 30 years .  It's more that life after marriage became an accumulation of minutes and hours that then turned into years.  There is a line from Ralph Waldo Emerson that reflects this: "The years teach much that the days never know". That pretty much says it all.  The moments in my life turned two infants into responsible, thoughtful adults.  The hours sustained a marriage through challenging times.  The days found me serving families in my community,  teaching 5 year olds to read and guiding middle school families through rough days.  It was all moments, hours, days, and weeks turned into a life.

    I am ready for some changes.  But change is scary.  I actually like change but I am also a person who appears to need security.  Much as I might like to leave my job and start over in some other work, I can't push myself to abandon the paycheck and the health benefits.  Much as I might like to sell the house and start over in some other geographic location, I can't get myself to give up the house and the financial investment.

    I like novelty.  I like change.  But my feet are stuck in the mud.  Damn!

Never

     My friend Jen over at Living a Full Life wrote a  blog post about things she's never done.  I hadn't really thought much about the things I haven't done and when she tagged me to play along, I decided that would be fun.  I'm thinking it's going to inspire upcoming "things I have done" and "things I will do" posts too.

1) I have never been to Las Vegas.  Ever.  I live on the Left Coast and know plenty of people who routinely go over there but I am not one of them.  I have driven through Reno a couple of times and once I think we actually got out of the car there.  Not much appeals to me about either place.

2)  I have never been to a professional football game.  I went to a college game once (SJSU vs Stanford) because it was the thing to do.  Probably went to three or maybe four football games in high school - again, the thing to do.  Not really into crowds and watching things from afar.  I went to a SF Giants game once at Candlestick.  Stayed in the bar the whole time.  Too miserably cold in the stands.

3) I have never eaten a Chicken McNugget.  Whatever the hell that is.  I had a MacDonald's hamburger once in high school.  I had a Carl's Jr hamburger maybe a half dozen times in college.  It was the dinner of choice for some guy I was dating. I was trying to make him like me.   I don't like fast food. Period.

4) To my knowledge, I have never been on TV.  Don't want to be either.

5)  I have never been arrested.  My behavior has not always been above the law but I was never caught.  I have never gotten behind the wheel if I have been under the influence of anything.  Not right.  Could not live with myself were I to be the cause of a serious accident.

6)  I have never worn a formal dress - like one of those prom dresses.  I eschewed such things when I was in high school and, to my knowledge, those things were off the table in my college days at California public colleges.  I've been married more times than I have been a bridesmaid.  That sounds bad but really?  Really I am only in my second marriage.  I think I have only been a bridal person once and I wore a lovely street sort of dress of my own selection.

7) I have never been to a circus (unless you count my life as a circus).  Not interested in going to one either.

8) I have never ridden in a speed boat.  I've been sailing on the SF Bay (beautiful, I might add) but have never been interested in speed boats.  Notice that I didn't say I am not interested in speed; only in speed boats.  Too noisy.  I like fast cars though.

9) I have never gotten a tattoo.  I have no problem with anyone else getting one but I have yet to have something mean so much to me that I would want the image or words permanently etched into my skin.  I do have five ear piercings, however.  Nine if you count both ears...

10) Sadly, I have never been inside a synagogue, a Buddhist temple,  or a mosque.  I have spent far too many hours in Catholic churches.  I have attended a handful of wedding or funeral services in some other Christian churches.  But I have never been inside the houses of worship for many of the world's people.

Okay, so that was fun!  Thanks, Jen, for the inspiration.  I have a lot of heavy stuff on my mind right now so this light post was an especially nice birdwalk.

Need to Read

 “Books are a uniquely portable magic.”
― Stephen King, On Writing

       Ah, yes, reading.   Reading is what I depend on to get me through the day, through life.  It is my current one-and-only-go-to drug. I start and end my day with reading and spend  much of my free time and my work time reading one thing or another.  Reading, in one form or another, is what motivates me to get out of bed in the morning.

 

      My first pleasure of the day (generally around 4:30 am) is to check my email and see if there is anything good.  "Anything good" means an email from friends or family, a link to some interesting article, a quote from Goodreads to start my day, stuff like that.  After I take a few minutes to compose any necessary responses or send any emails out, I check a few other on line pleasures:  Huffington Post, FaceBook, Blogger, New York Times - just a few minutes to see what might be happening out there.  If time permits or it works into part of my workout time, I check Flipboard on my ipad.

      When I get home from work, generally I simply want some space, some silence, and something to read. I always have several books "going" but there is a primary one.  This is the one I will grab after work.  At other times and in different moods, I will select one of probably ten different periodicals to which we subscribe.  I might also choose something related  to painting or writing or even something related to work.  It's all good.

        I wonder what it is about reading that satisfies me so much.  I would much rather read than watch television.  I would rather read than socialize in the evenings. Reading is my default for relaxation, for escape, for good times and bad times.  I seldom drive away from the house without putting something to read in the car (just in case I have a flat tire and I have to wait for AAA). I love exploring things to read and have an intimate relationship with Amazon.com for book reviews.  I have been on Goodreads for several years but just recently started using it for more than quotes.  My idea of a lovely Saturday afternoon is to wander around the local independent bookseller and drool over all the books.  

      Again, I ask:  what is it that is so satisfying?  Is it the escape?  My life is not so terrible!  I don't need an escape.  Perhaps reading plays with that part of my brain that wants excitement and novelty, wants to learn, wants to feel, wants to be alive.  I find myself reading and rereading some sections simply because I delight in the way the words sound.  Sometimes I am taken with the way the words make me feel, even when that feeling is ephemeral and difficult to describe.  I do think reading connects me to something. Sometimes the connection is to the author or to the content.  More often, the reading connects me to some part of myself.  So that's it!  Reading is about connecting.  Connecting allows me not to be alone in my doubts, my thoughts, my dreams, my imagination.

    Does this fit?  

             “We read books to find out who we are. What other people, real or imaginary, do and think and feel... is an essential guide to our understanding of what we ourselves are and may become.” 

                       Ursula K. LeGuin

    Yes, I kind of like that.

      

   

   

Pulse of the World

     "We need the sea.  We need a place to stand and touch and listen - to feel the pulse of the world as the surf rolls in."                David Brower

    On Sunday, RR and I got out of town - something which we too rarely do.  We didn't go far but, in fact, we went to a whole different world.  We drove down to Pt Reyes National Seashore - about an hour south of our town.  It is a stunningly beautiful national treasure. Even my unwelcome sidekicks Stress and Tension took a hike while I was there.

    I was dazzled by the fall light.  We have been thoroughly socked in with fog and I was pleasantly surprised to see the fog and the sun dancing.  This was not one of those low cloud kind of days.  Oh no.  This was a sun-shines-bright-but-right-over-there-the-fog-completely-obscures-the-cliffs kind of day.  

   I took over 350 photos and had an uber hard time narrowing them down for this post.  I was just so taken with the colors, the intensity, the beauty of the day.  Feel free to browse and feel the breeze.  If you listen carefully you can hear the seagulls screeching.  I thought about giving you stuff to read along with it but no.  You won't want to be distracted by words.