Letter to Arnie Published

After some thought the other day, I took a section of my Dear Arnie letter (see below), slapped it around a little, trimmed and tightened, took out the obvious slurs and sent it to various newspapers. Lo and behold, SF Chronicle ran it today: Shut Parks? Danger!

A nice little surprise with the breakfast coffee.

p.s thanks, Lucia for your encouragement!

Dear Arnie

With all due respect, you've had your share of ridiculous schemes, social gaffes (remember the Nurses?) and ill-conceived programs. But closing the State Parks? Not only is it impossible to enforce (closed road? no problem. We'll just four-wheel over or hike in from down the road) but it's truly dangerous. Of all your hare-brained ideas, this is the worst I've ever heard.

First of all: the State Parks are a tremendous resource for the stressed-out populace whose non-existent incomes can no longer provide other forms of relaxation and entertainment. This is a time when we need the parks the most, where folks can exercise or be in nature to relieve their economic worries. It is not only healthier to be at the beach, but even with parking fees, it's cheaper than movies, or walking around a mall stressing out about what you can't buy. And camping is a much less expensive alternative to Disneyland or other travel vacations.

Secondly: have you tried to book a camping vacation? Most of the parks are already full, meaning income, Arnie, income. Parks bring in money. Maybe not as much as you'd like, but it's money coming straight to the State. Why turn off the spigot? What the bleeep are you thinking?

Thirdly: With no rangers or staff around, who do you think will be the first to populate empty campsites and avail themselves of bathroom facilities? Will a closed fire-gate keep the riff-raff out of beaches or wilderness? I think not, Arnie. Without supervision, parklands and campgrounds will become squattervilles and party-down HQ's. Who's going to patrol the parks? The Rangers you just fired? Certainly not the over-stretched police and fire forces. Can't you see the scenario? Alcohol, drugs, impulsive, thoughtless behavior, and worst of all, un-monitored camp fires. You thought last fire-season was bad; wait until irresponsible riff-raff have unfettered access to our treasured woodlands. And fighting fires, of course, cost money. Now where's the savings?

This idea might look good on paper, Arnie, but it will only cost us, not only in the long run, but as early as next month. Myself (and others I'm sure) would rather see increased fees and better tax schemes, as painful as it might be, than lose our parks and woodlands. It makes more sense for legislators to take the same 15% pay cut, lose their perks and pay more for their healthcare like the rest of us than close parks, an act that punishes everyone in California.

Legislators need to accept the fact that when prices go up and income goes down, sometimes the adults in the family have to get another job. It's time for the legislators to grow up and admit that California needs more income in order to maintain the basic functions as a government.

Heathens in the House

A sharp ping: the doorbell. Who could that be, 1 pm on a dull Saturday afternoon? We haven't been getting many Solicitors for Jesus since we posted that "We're Finnish Pagan Unitarian Buddhists" sign years ago. Friends and family tend to walk in the back door with maybe a rap on the door frame and a quick "Yoo Hoo!" --if we're lucky.

I opened the front door, swathed in XX-Large grey and red bathrobe, blue-striped pj legs just showing above my bare feet. (It was that kind of dull Saturday.) And instantly and infinitely glad I was swathed; three men, all in gold-edged kurta-paijama, with snug round brimless topis on their heads, stood at staggered heights down the narrow steps. Muslims from the mosque a few blocks up and over. Yes, there is one in our fair town, in a church building purchased from a Pentecostal private school that went bust about five years ago.

"Is the Khan here?" the nearest and oldest said through the screen, as all of them averted their eyes, turning half around in their confusion to avoid looking straight at me.
"No, no, he's not." The nearest, in white, turned back towards me a bit and raised his eyebrows. He'd had some practice dealing with the likes of us.
"No?"
"I was married to a Sanauddin Khan once, but no longer."

Now they all sort of glanced back toward me without actually looking at me, truly askance; though the youngest, maybe in late 20's, in a lovely blue outfit, then snapped his head back around, having already retreated to the sidewalk.

"He's in Pakistan. But thanks for coming by. Have a nice day!"
"Oh," the oldest fella said, nodding a bit. The two still on the steps glanced at each other, then waved their hands and walked down.

"Salaam Alaykum," I said, hoping to break the ice.
"Alaykum Salaam," I think they muttered as they left.

I closed the door, quick-like. Obviously, this was not what they came for. I'm sure they were hoping to rope another Khan into their mosque. But Sonny (as he preferred to be called) wouldn't have been a good prospect anyway; he hadn't been that good of a Muslim when he lived here. He moved to America for a reason.

At least I wasn't in frayed jean cutoffs (above the knee!) and a ratty tee-shirt (a cleaning-on-a-hot-day sort of Saturday) when I opened the door, like the last time this trio of Muslim men came by, scouting for the Khan in the little house on B Street. In micro-seconds, they had completely turned around, scuttled down the steps in their soft-soled shoes and stood with their backs to me, talking very briefly from the safety of the sidewalk. All of us were furiously blushing.

Yes, once again, there be heathens in this house.

Pushing Pedals, Digging Clams

So ...what do you call those mid-calf pants, the ones that are neither proper knee-and-above shorts nor proper to-the-ankle pants? They seem to show up every decade or so, sometimes closer to the knee than the ankle, sometimes closer to the ankle than the knee, fitted or baggy, with pockets, without. No matter what, they are for people with good ankles and a well-turned calf (i.e. not me). I've heard them called toreador pants, calypso pants, pedal-pushers, capris, clamdiggers and, most recently, cropped pants. But for all those names, aren't they describing the same style of pants? Or are there differences? and if so, what are they?

Perhaps those with a better sense of fashion or fashion history can set me straight. Not that it would convince me to wear them; I just want to know. I wouldn't want to insult a pair of pedal-pushers by calling them clamdiggers. Lord knows I have enough trouble with putting together get-ups and outfits; I don't want to incur the wrath of the Fashion Gods or Gremlins with misplaced references. A Clothing Curse I can do without.

And if I should ever dig for clams (not very likely, just saying) I'd simply roll up my jeans.

8 Things About Books on Tape

1. Can fully appreciate the cadence and rhythm of beautifully written prose.
2. On the other hand, the horrible clunkiness of language is revealed as well. Some authors really can't be listened to.
3. Let's say you miss an important detail the author so craftily slipped by you. Trying to "re-read" a passage is a far different proposition: rewind, nope, rewind, nope, rewind, wait, this is before that important bit, FF...no, not yet...FF, too far! rewind, FF, rewind, where the heck is it, end up listening to the whole second chapter in reverse order of the scenes...oh, drat, just hand me the book. Over there, under the chair...
4. You can get dressed, feed the cat, wash dishes all while listening to a fabulous story! As long as there's no one to tease you when you scrub a pot for five minutes at the good part. And better check the mirror before you leave the house. Just in case.
5. Be forewarned, people will think you are demented if you start sobbing for no discernible (to them) reason. The pantomime explanation of "earbuds,listening, big woman shot by crass ex-lover, fell in canal, ....oh never mind!" only seals the deal, in their opinion.
6. Can't answer the phone. That's what voicemail is for.
7. All the aural pleasure of talk-radio without annoying callers or knuckleheaded hosts.
8. More mentally engaging and creative than tv or video. You can dress the characters anyway you want (until the author tells you otherwise), even vary it from scene to scene...who cares? You can have your own interpretation of wine-dark sea or bowlegged or flinty-voiced; maybe the Snopes's have an uncanny resemblance to your ex-spouse's cousins by marriage.

Worst Stoopid Cold Ever

Well, I'm finally down from 1 to .5 TBPD*; I think I'll make it. Don't know exactly what this disease is. Never snorted nor squealed, so it wasn't that Swine-ish Flu; didn't crave super-thin pancakes or meatballs in cream sauce so it wasn't the Swedish Flu either. But hands down, it was the Wickedest Damn Cold on the Planet. It sucked 4 days out my life like an anteater on an anthill. According to the Germ Theory of Disease, no one actually cursed me -- they just coughed in my general direction. This is the sort of thing people should keep to themselves, hiding it at home with the blinds drawn.

An absolutely wicked, awful, horrible, no-good, very bad head-cold and lung thingey. Been down for 5 days, shuffling from one resting spot to the other like a blind elderly cat, intermittently lapping up a bowl of soup, slurping a cup of Gypsy Cold Cure tea, batting at toast. Not enough energy to read much or even watch stoopid daytime tv. A good day was getting out to the hammock for the first mid-morning lay-about in the sun. Books-on-tape (and a humidifier, thanks, Cory!) saved me, getting me through the hacking afternoons and restless, sweat-drenched nights.

And I was blessed by having on hand a CD of Toni Morrison's "A Mercy," read by her. What a treat to listen to Morrison's remarkably beautiful and cadenced voice; I was lost in that fictive world so beloved by authors and readers alike. The poetry of her prose sprang out, was song; the story unfolded as if sitting around a fire late into the evening, each character's voice taking over the dirt stage in turn, speaking their truth. I was enthralled, entranced. I flung up my arm to stop hasty actions by Florens; I reached out a hand to wipe Rebekkah's brow as she lay abed with pox (then I snatched it back; wouldn't do to get pox, too); I tried to pound Sorrow's back when she was hauled out of the river.

Or maybe I was just plain delirious. Whatever, I'm back to work tomorrow, for as long as I last. I promise not to cough in your general direction.

*Tissue Boxes Per Day

Sotomayor ~ yes!

Funny that talk-radio right-wingers are all up in arms about the New Haven fireman's case Judge Sotomayor ruled on years ago. They are beginning to seem a bit desperate if this is what they resort to, dredging up one case and stomping all over it. Or a few remarks here and there. For one thing, I like to look at the overall picture, to consider her whole record, not simply one case. Certainly Judge Sotomayor's life experience is an invaluable viewpoint to bring into the Courts.

.. and the charge of her being racist? Give me a freaking break! Wasn't so long ago some of those folks were damnably proud of being racists their own selves; seen in that context, it could be a (perverse) complement. Puhhhhleeezze!

An Egretful Morning

Yes, some things are irresistible, like egrets and puns. When they occur simultaneously, well, pack me in cotton and send me to China, I'm a happy camper. (zoooom! I'm back now, whew.) Meanwhile, an essay was published in SSU's Newsbytes last month (April 10th, tbe) and I neglected to post the link. So here it is, An Egretful Morning.

Love to hear what you think....

A two-timing, Twleve-stepping, twentysomething temptress....

The other Saturday I went to a book signing party for a friend, Z Egloff, whose book "Verge," was just published this year by Bywater Books. This was a party with balloons, streamers, a signing table, a reading, a nun (ersatz but still!), a cake, a fire ceremony (which I regret that I missed) and a blue bike. Z was totally stoked; friends from all her many walks of life were there to cheer, clap, stomp and yell. At any moment dancing could break out, and for all I know, later on it did.

A bunch of us loitered by the wish-writing table and reminisced about reading the first chapters of "Verge" in it's maiden workshop up at Wellspring, when it was but a workshopping virgin. From the get-go, this was a dynamite story. We loved its pacing and verve and characters and smart-alecky voice. The bookjacket blurb pretty much captures it: "Can a two-timing, Twelve-stepping, twenty-something temptress find happiness with a nun?" Of course to discover the answer...you'll need to read the book. Don't forget, there's a bike involved.

How To ... what?

I don't know if anyone else caught this event, The White House Correspondent's Association Dinner (by Dinner we mean Roast) last Friday night, but this was the quip by President Obama that caught my attention:

"Dick Cheney was supposed to be here but he is very busy working on his memoirs, tentatively titled, 'How to Shoot Friends and Interrogate People'."...and there's much more posted here along the same lines, some pretty darn hilarious lines. Plus some rather pointy barbs, amid the great giggles and guffaws.

Just had to share.

Quick and Quirky

The buzz bzzzt buzzz was annoying and close, disturbing the few minutes of peace I'd snagged to read in the back room that had once been a porch. Come to think of it, I'd been hearing it all afternoon. Stepping through the laundry room to the tiny back-stairs landing (what's left of the outside portion of the porch), I stood transfixed by the flit and flutter of some tiny upstart perky-tailed birds all around the back yard. Definitely them making all the noise.

There had to be a flock...or maybe just four or five, or wait, really just two moving around so fast they seemed like a multitude. Up on the eaves of the nearby garage, over in the roses, down on the end of the kid's slide below me, bouncing through the branches of the plum tree, moving too fast for my poor old eyes to track. And such a brash little thing, suddenly hopping along the railing not even two feet from me, flicking its standing-straight-up-at-attention tail, chut-chut-chut, it goes, posing for a micro-second, only long enough for me to glimpse a long thin white streak just above its pert eyes, like a uni-brow borrowed from Steve Martin. Then, down it flits, to weave in and out the lattice work along the steps in quick hops, reminding me of a game from my suddenly ancient childhood (and the song that went with it): Go In and Out the Window. Cheeky rascals; endearing.

It didn't take so long with Sibley's to identify the sassy little things. Bewick's wrens, facing extirpation in parts of the East Coast, but still abundant here in the West. And it's only taken me another day to realize they are nesting right under the porch.

Deborah Digges, 1950 - 2009:

"Darwin's Finches"

1
My mother always called it a nest,
the multi-colored mass harvested

from her six daughters' brushes,
and handed it to one of us

after she had shaped it, as we sat in front
of the fire drying our hair.

She said some birds steal anything, a strand
of spider's web, or horse's mane,

the residue of sheep's wool in the grasses
near a fold

where every summer of her girlhood
hundreds nested.

Since then I've seen it for myself, their genius—
how they transform the useless.

I've seen plastics stripped and whittled
into a brilliant straw,

and newspapers—the dates, the years—
supporting the underweavings.


2
As tonight in our bed by the window
you brush my hair to help me sleep, and clean

the brush as my mother did, offering
the nest to the updraft.

I'd like to think it will be lifted as far
as the river, and catch in some white sycamore,

or drift, too light to sink, into the shaded inlets,
the bank-moss, where small fish, frogs, and insects

lay their eggs.
Would this constitute an afterlife?

The story goes that sailors, moored for weeks
off islands they called paradise,

stood in the early sunlight
cutting their hair. And the rare

birds there, nameless, almost extinct,
came down around them

and cleaned the decks
and disappeared into the trees above the sea.

Deborah Digges
1950-2009

I didn't know Deborah Digges,had never met her, but I treasured her poetry, so enriched by her keen eye, her deeply reflective mind. I slurped up her memoir, "Stardust Lounge," too. She told it straight about raising her son through adolescence, about what it was really like with a difficult, challenging person, about paying attention to the teen, not the advice books. I didn't know her but whenever I read her forthright work, I feel like I'm with her; feeling the tug of hairbrush, setting the hair-nest free, waiting for a thirteen year old's call.

Here's a link through the Valparaiso Poetry Review of Deborah Digges reading her work just last month in Pasadena for an event co-sponsored by Red Hen Press and Claremont Graduate University.

over a month!?!?!?!?

since my last post?....jeepers, I was busier than I thought. Busy, busy, busy Limes as we used to say in grad school, being so busy we couldn't pronounce simple words like "lives," correctly. Busy: reading submissions for the Napa Conference, polishing up an essay for Newsbytes, attending a conference, signing up for physical therapy for my shoulders and wrists, putting together lesson plans for the Spring class (for all of one student), Tai Chi-ing, finishing my taxes, watching a tooth fall out of my head. Not all the way out; next week I'll go to an oral surgeon and they'll get the rest of the root out. Seems like I clench my teeth a wee bit too much; my incisors are snapping like match sticks.

But! this weekend, I'm off to a self-planned, solo-writing retreat at my favorite hide-in-the-woods place, Wellspring Renewal Center. aahhh! the best place to get un-busy.

Napa Valley Writer's Conference - 2009

The Napa Valley Writers Conference
is up and running, holey-moley, lickety-split. Once again, a fabulous faculty:

Fiction: Robert Boswell, Antonya Nelson, Peter Ho Davies and ZZ Packer.
Poetry: Elizabeth Alexander, Carl Dennis, Jane Hirshfeld, and David St John.

The application process is structured a bit differently this year, with rolling admissions, beginning March 1st. One advantage: the earlier you apply, the more likely you'll get your first choice. Plus quicker response from us. Another difference: those who have been accepted previously to the conference at least two times won't have to submit a qualifying manuscript; obviously we already know your work! Those applicants (fiction, that is) can then get cracking on their workshop manuscripts.

Environmental History Digital Collection

Snooping around the Jean and Charles Shultz Library (aka the Snoopy Library) website at SSU, I discovered the Environmental History Digital Archive. They've digitized rather an eclectic mix of historical material on Sonoma County: old maps, photos, plans, articles, letters, records pertaining to various contentious issues on the environment. Some unique items.

There's the whole history of the "Hole in the Head," the gaping foundation for a nuclear power plant that was to be built on Bodega Headlands. The plant was not only planned for one of the most beautiful whale-watching bluffs on our gorgeous ocean coast, but was also mere yards from the San Andreas fault. Like that made sense. But it was the 1960's, when suits felt they could do what they wanted and hippies and radical-nut protesters had other ideas and values. The plant was never built, but the shaft dug for the nuclear reactor is still there, a physical and metaphorical hole in the head.

This digital archive also contains two of my Nature's Way pieces, one on owls and ravens (#37), another on Western pond turtles (#51). They had asked permission a few months ago, but I'd neglected to look for them earlier. It's nice to be included.


SSU Historical Archive

Listening to Lucia

My friend Lucia was interviewed on BlogTalkRadio the other day, the 2/18 Moe Green Poetry Show, "Onword"

Lucia Galloway Interviewed by Rafael Alvarado You have to put up with an ad at the beginning, no way around it, but the rest is fun.

It's a kick to hear her read her work (villanelles, pantoums, sonnets, etc) and to remember those MFA Days in Marina del Rey. She read poems from her chapbook "Playing Outside," from Finishing Line Press, and new work from "Venus and Other Losses" coming out soon from Plain View Press. The conversation is freewheeling, casual and informative in the wonderful way of poets.

Frost and Sweet Pea

Been some pretty whack-a-doodle weather this winter: a few heat-wave days, some weeks of icy windshields and frosty lawns, some mornings foggy and soupy, some afternoons almost too bright and sunny. Yet little-to-none of the usual winter rain. Pretty confusing for the plant kingdom; bloom, not bloom, bloom, freeze your tiny little stamens off. I think we're all glad that ol' Punxsutawney Phil, that prognosticating groundhog, hit the snooze button and headed back to catch more zzzzz’s. Maybe this way, winter will regroup, revise and correct itself.


And maybe it is. Today the sky has been many mutable shades of gray. Over the past week, we've had spates of small, cold, drizzly storms; tonight a real rainstorm is predicted to hit. No one is complaining. If we're lucky, we might gain a few inches. Not much and not enough, but after three very dry winters, we're facing the very real possibility of a mandatory 50% water rationing. Perhaps each inch we receive will be one-percentage point less that we'll be asked to save? Well, I rather doubt it works in that tit-for-tat manner. But I will say that it makes for interesting times.

Double Trouble Birthdays

Happy Birthdays to Charlie Darwin and Abe Lincoln. Hard to know who had more influence on our current life - Lincoln for his vision, inherent humanity and dedication to equality for all or Darwin for his decoding of the process of evolution. Can you imagine a world in which neither of them were around? It seems like science fiction just thinking about it. Surely their discoveries and advancements would be accomplished by someone else but perhaps not in such a timely or fortuitous manner. Definitely an alternate universe.

Now, who's going to write that story?

Nests in Winter

....lordy, lordy almost two weeks have scooted by. Interesting weeks, though. Some of it was putting my keyboard to the grindstone and cranking out a Nature's Way essay titled Nests in Winter that was just published last Monday on NewsBytes. In the process of setting the link here, I discovered that half the links in the NW Archive were broken, so I fixed that. Apologies to any who tried to navigate those corrupted channels.

...and oh, yes! finally, I can watch a press conference again.

Seven Days, Six Sentences

Can you believe it has been only a week? Obama has done more righteous stuff in seven days than another, whom I can no longer mention by name, did in seven years. Finally, I can read the paper again and not be either outraged or nauseous; I can listen to an entire news broadcast without clicking it off when that noxious, self-serving, smirking voice came on. I am cheering Obama on with every step he takes, every program he initiates. The road ahead won't be smooth, but at least it will be heading in the right direction. The times might be rough, but it's easier to work together with a leader we respect.