Solsticial
June 23, 2025
It has been a long time . . . life is very strange lately, and I like it. I recently spent four days in Santa Rosa, visiting a human, and a dog who is enamored with me, shopping, making a pot roast, the usual. So happy to be home with my bed, my garden, my silence, my local routines.
I am seeing an acupuncturist, adjusting my diet, finally getting the diagnosis that concurs with my suspicion that my mercury fillings are the source of my tinnitus, ear infection, and leg discomfort. I am attempting to contact a recommended dentist to remove the leakiest of the three amalgam fillings that still remain. The dentist I am calling is Iranian–more’s the pity, with the war at fever pitch now.
I did a big detox, a fast, and was living on smoothies for a week. I returned to solid foods in anticipation of the Meadow Muffin, and thereupon helped kill three bottles of wine with my two invited guests on the first night. I also recall storming the stage with my Martin bass and jamming with Maaatt and another bass player for an hour that night. The next day Art and I played some of our repertoire, and Maaatt joined us to steamroll some Lost Hippies material. He takes all my vocal parts, so I can’t harmonize. If I do, he jumps the track and sings what I am singing. Ah well, just as well to be rid of it. On the Monday after, I went up on the bare stage alone, with my Martin, and sang a bunch of tunes while folks rolled wires and packed the sound gear away.
Art and I are getting on, as friends. We’ll play two festivals in August, the International Musical Saw Festival on the 10th, and the Cotati Accordion Festival with Greg on the 18th will pay for the gas it takes to get there. Oh yes, plus the yummy chicken BBQ lunch. I didn’t think there would be a time that I would be Okay with it again, but here we are.
There have been some odd dreams of late, as suggested by the current Jupiter/Neptune square. James had a wonderful NDE type dream of angel people who basically said, it’s all right, don’t worry. I had a dream about my studio at Howe Street. There was an actual ARTIST there (me??) taking up the full half of the two-car garage that I had 1/4 of, climbing over dog shit, furniture, paint cans and storage bins to access. An older (like me) guy, dramatic landscapes, must have been acrylics (or pastels?) because I don’t recall the smell of turps. There was a doorway, and a woodworker in the other half, so yay! Framing! and sawdust? I don’t recall that smell, either. Then we walked out to the street, which had become a road, overlooking the bridge through trees, and sparse traffic driving through knee high mist, with the City in the distance. At some point, he (me??) kissed me! Did I receive a blessing from the pastel gods?
I’m pining for those studios, sad to recall how appropriate both Howe Street and the Roofing House were for pastel dust, which I never realized. I had so much fun with my acrylics then, and just painting walls and building shelves and hanging lights and stenciling floors, all the prep work that goes into having a working space, only to be ejected, and abandoned. So frustrating. What can it all mean?
So I’m airing out my pastels, I bought some board to try, small panels that fit in a pouch I can carry about. I have a sheltered space and table in the garden to clear. There is so much junk I have been getting rid of lately, it’s groundbreaking, making space for me–even Steve’s circular saws and MAAP gas, out on the curb and snatched up in moments by someone who might actually use them. Not letting go of the jigsaw and Sawzall tho, yo.
So much time in the garden, and it’s feeling really settled. It’s all about letting things unfold, following the whim, letting the Crows be the birds in my garden, I can’t fight them. I put in two more raspberry plants, two more high bush blueberries, two thornless blackberries my neighbor had put on the street. I have cut the Insipid Pink Pearl back to three fruits, and there is more wood to take out to make room for the Pink Lady, which has its first apple this year. Every day I get out into the garden I make huge progress, with my worm box in place, and new attempts at weaving the patio chairs underway.
Another Oregon
November, 2024
I left home not very early on Monday, November 4, because AGAIN with the bad battery, AAA, and a replacement, under warranty. In fact, the same guy, Don, came to switch it out. I hosed the van off, stopped for gas, didn’t waste time at the carwash because I was going to stop at Varmint’s for coffee and to see the new foster kitten. I made it to Van Damme by 3:30 PM. I was heading for Jughandle, but the Ranger said there was no camping there. Just lucky I pulled in. $38 + $1 for a 5 minute shower.
In the morning I had wifi but no phone signal, so I emailed my safe arrival, and regrets that I would not be in town for dinner. There was a beach, a forest, a hike, and my little sanctuary. In Eureka I stopped at a thrift store and found a perfect shirt, and texted my cousin a song about it I made up on the spot. Up the coast at 5 PM I had a guy riding my bumper, so I turned in at Humbug Mountain campground, where the nice camp host brought me a bowl of chicken and pasta in homemade tomato sauce, and I gave him one of the large pink tomatoes I had bought at a farm stand. Camp site $18, free showers, plus a snack. Only drawback, I had to sleep with an eye mask to block out the light shining through the curtain.
By Wednesday afternoon I hadn’t dawdled long enough, my cousin was not yet home. I had driven all the way to Pacific City and could not find camping, so I turned around and headed south, past Lincoln City to Beverly Beach. I hiked all around and took the first photographs of the trip. What a beautiful campground, with a big marsh in the middle, $21. More than half of it was closed for the winter, and it took some backtracking to locate the open (free?) showers.
Up the coast again, I stopped at a little antique store in Bay City where two little chairs sat on the sidewalk, $19 each and I considered I would (not) be able to put them in the van and still camp at my cousins’. I decided to risk it, and they were still there when I drove back five days later. I also bought a little graniteware pitcher for heating coffee, as well as the cashmere scarf in a thrift store in Lincoln City.
My cousin texted that they were home, so I headed up to Hammond. I spent five days there, and hiked through nearby Fort Stevens almost every day. The herd of Elk were sometimes tricky to navigate around. My cousin has vast quantities of family memorabilia, old photos and documents, and I found some surprising information and filled a memory card with files to sort through and try to remember who was who. On Veteran’s Day I drove to Astoria and wandered through thrift and antique stores, found some gift items, and brought home dinner from Mo’s for everybody.
Then I was off to my Sister’s for a few days, which turned into an extra week when a huge storm, a “bomb cyclone” came through. I spent days doing five 1000-piece jigsaw puzzles, fixing my sister’s gate, and navigating around the electrical installation that had delayed my trip since before October. One day we drove to Depoe Bay to see the king tide splashing over the sea wall, and to eat chowder.
There was still a bit of storm on my return trip down the coast, but I made good time, camping at Floras Lake, and Standish-Hickey, which was empty except for the camp host and me, and some deer. I was home Tuesday before Thanksgiving, and enjoyed the holiday curled up in bed with a nice steak.
Texas!
4.17.24
Over the weekend we spent mornings hanging out at Central Market where Grif likes to go for coffee and a breakfast taco. At RADIO there is coffee, beer, food trucks, more tacos, and grackles, one of my all time favorite birds. On Monday after watching the cloudy eclipse from Grif’s back balcony we went to the open mic at Bhodi’s Hideaway, where no one (else) shows up to play, and did a two hour showcase, minus a beer break for a Pinthouse Brewery Electric Jellyfish hazy IPA. We mostly did songs one or the other of us barely knew, plus some oldies we miraculously remember after 15?? years.
We went to see friends perform at a hotel cafe and a winery, took home some Rudy’s BBQ, walked around a bit, listened to music. We met Grif’s old room mate for more tacos back at RADIO, with heat lightening and pouring rain coming in. I slept on his couch a couple nights, then decided I was happier and cooler at home in my van, with the lightening and soothing sounds of a hail storm!
Austin is so green, water and little lakes everywhere, and the for miles around hiways are bounded by wide swaths of wildflowers, pink Indian Paintbrush, Bluebonnets, Blanket Flower, and yellows, yellows, yellows everywhere. On the way out I hit the road early and drove west via Rt 71, marveling frequently that I might have been driving on sketchy tires at 75 MPH, thanking my lucky star or two. Wednesday night I ended up at a rest stop near Roswell by a quirk of my electronic navigator. Steve would approve. I stopped to pick up some provisions, planning to hunker at another rest stop on I-40/66, when a local suggested I turn toward the free campground at El Morro National Monument. I ended up staying there for two nights. It is designated a #3 Dark Sky site, with the “enthusiastic support” of neighboring communities, and the Zuni Pueblo.
The hike was closed due to a washout, but just hanging out, reconfiguring my string and solar lights, cleaning, sorting, puttering, and reading Bruce Catton’s The Coming Fury made for a perfect day. Slowly thinning out the excess, the van is overly-outfitted for two people and dinner guests, with cribbage, dominoes, books, multiple cups, plates, glasses, candles–when what I really use is three coffee mugs, two forks, a frying pan, coffee pot and a spoon. I haven’t touched my art supplies. No WiFi for days, no access to email, and my inverter won’t charge the laptop. I did watch a youtube video on my old iphone 6, by gosh. How cool is that.
Then it was back to Gallup where I decided not to wait in line at Jerry’s Cafe, another recommendation by a local, maybe some other time. I had errands to run, then headed west to see how far along I could get. I wanted to hit that taco stand in Seligman again, and there I got a burrito bowl made to order, refritos, cheese on top please, then rice, carnitas, hatch chilis, mexicorn, jalapenos, and crema: perfection. It took three days to finish it off. I made it to Mojave NP that night, almost no thanks to the wacky app that put me at the Goffs 4×4 entrance via Bullhead City, 47 minutes out of my way on a Saturday night. Luckily Mojave is a relatively unsung park, not crowded, and there I decided to stay another night rather than join the Sunday rush home. Why go back to street-sweeping day? I moved to site #17 up the hill and watched as folks packed and left to go finish their taxes, or the retired jeepers maybe heading further into the desert. Westina stalled while re-parking, and as she does after a short drive, would not start, and it turned out she found a better vantage than I had planned, 360 views, unobstructed out each window. Relaxed and rejuvenated, I woke at dawn to finish the long bleak drive back to dreary civilization, traffic, my beloved home, and the tasseling box elder out my window.
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