What About Random Order?

Random order seems to be an oxymoron, but how else do describe rain or clouds or dried leaves swirling in a gust of wind?  Look closely, and more closely still, and you see the infinite in a speck of dust.

If you take the wide - very wide - view, what you may perceive as randomness up close begins to appear logical and orderly, maybe even becomes predictable in some way from a long way off.  The basic experience we perceive in random events is that something was out of control, that it just happened.  But, when did it begin and when does it end?

A particularly odd random incident happened several years ago.  A family was sitting in its living room, at ease, digesting dinner and getting a little sleepy, when suddenly a large hunk of frozen blue liquid came blasting through the roof and ceiling, landing with a resounding crash.  A jet had flown 30,000 feet overhead some time before with its chemical toilet leaking outside the jet's exterior.  It froze and froze some more as more liquid was added to it.  The heavy frozen chemical blob eventually let loose and became a meteor, essentially.  It was subject to the forces of gravity, atmospheric friction, wind currents, and several other laws of physics until it bombed the ordinary, unsuspecting, perfectly innocent house.  It was not aimed, was not shot from a barrel, did not have wings.  It just dropped off when its weight overpowered its ability to bond to the jet's aluminum skin.  Random?  Sort of.  The family thought so.  Chemists and physicists know differently.  Engineers love that stuff.  Not that stuff.

The startled homeowners (who most appropriately might have yelled, "Holy shit!") might have perceived it as an Act of God, but what God would bomb a Midwestern home with blue poop gunksicle?  "Why our house?  We're good people!  We pay our taxes.  Why us?"  The sheer audacity of a large, hurtling frozen piece of, well, excrement, was almost heroic in proportion.  I am 100% certain that if none of the folks at home were hurt, none of them has been the same since.  I sincerely hope, by the way, that none were hurt.

The point is, the bombees were changed by the randomness, but I doubt the bombers were because they didn't perceive it.  For them, it didn't "just happen"; it didn't happen at all.  The bombees were affected by randomness on an astonishing scale.  As Forrest Gump might say:  Randomness is as randomness does.  

Randomness is everywhere.  Your existence is random.  A sperm got to an egg before its competitors, and you are you because of that.  At least it seems that way from a distance.  Up close, biologists or whoever studies those things have found that proteins and molecular bonds on the surfaces of the egg and sperm are such that at a certain point the egg's protein bonds are weakened by....well, it's detailed and your eyes may glaze over, but even that explanation leads to an increasingly minute level of randomness where science is not yet able to explain the initiating point in time when something that did not exist before now exists.  Ants running randomly around helter skelter suddenly form into an organized column that is functioning to serve its members with food.  Droplets of water in the air coalesce into a cloud, but it keeps moving and changing.  One second it was air, then it was a cloud, and then it disappeared again.

The question most asked in war and disasters is, why me?  Why was I spared when my neighbor or my buddy died?  Fate is random if you are on the receiving end.  It's infinitely complicated, puzzling, and deviously evades total firm definition, but I believe it depends on your vantage point.  How deeply do you want to explore disorder?  There is always one more step beyond the one you reach.  It's infinite, circular, layered and linear all at once.  And there, in my opinion, is where we begin to glimpse God.

Who Cares?

Who cares?

That's what I'm asking myself as I work on a short story these days.

It's a question that you have to ask, but I've noticed if you ask it too soon or to harshly, you kill your own magic.  Imagination is everything, but the freedom to let it fly as far as it needs to before you start hauling it down for repairs is even more key, I believe.  Self-censorship too early on makes for a crash landing.  

There are a lot of aspects of storytelling that you should never really notice if you're reading or listening.  If you're lucky, you are pulled into a story as if by some magnet.  You cling to the scenery desperately as the story winds to a close and never want to leave that new landscape behind.  You really care about what happens, you understand deeply,  and your own imagination carries the story far beyond its original pages.  It all really matters.

When I was in seventh grade, our English teacher read us a story for about 15 minutes at the end of each class.  The bell would ring, she'd have finished her reading and we would exit the room.  Once, there was a suspenseful story in which the main character was facing certain death, and all of us were on the edge of our seats, spellbound.  The bell rang.  She looked up, and we all urged her, "Keep going!  Don't stop!"  We were all late for our next class, but nothing was more important than hearing what happened next.  It was the coolest thing.  No Star Trek transporter ever did a more effective job moving 30 kids to another world.

As I write my story, I feel really glad I am not God.  No disrespect intended, but it's crazy enough keeping track of one ordinary character.  Imagine seven billion of them swarming everywhere.  What a headache.  Sometimes, my character just sits there no matter what I do, and other times he is going to town, moving like mad, and I can barely keep up with him.  Who knows why.  I'm letting him roam for now.  Later, I'll net him, examine him and see what needs trimming.  I'll find out who cares, and hopefully it will be me.

So, there was this man, a successful man with a broken heart ...

Transformation: Nature Small and Wide

Overnight, a hundred buds opened and out came butterflies with stems.  This is magic.  You can't convince me otherwise.  How could this ever be an ordinary thing, this silent unfolding, exquisite perfection nearly gone unnoticed.  

All afternoon, the late summer heat intensified and the air compressed, exhausting the ground of moisture.  The oaks looked desperately dry, as they do in September, the dirt around their roots hard as a rock and devoid of water.  A heavy ocean swell rumbled in the distance hour after hour, a fine haze of drifting mist veiled the hills, born of tons of smashing salt water battering weary granite and sand.   

Summer has burst upon the west coast like a switch thrown by a startled stage hand caught sleeping on the job.  It's very hot.  The whole state is flattened under intense heat, a high-pressure atmospheric blast that will last until there's a shift of some other low-pressure air somewhere else.  Then the air will lift or settle and move on, and we'll cool.  It's a timeless form of magic that feels like an easing, a transformation of invisible scope and dimension.   

After the temperature rose today, in the hours after the butterfly flowers emerged, tradesmen hammering, sawing, scraping or dishwashers rattling pots in hot kitchens looked up at the sky, wiped their brows and remarked about the spike of heat.  From the south, in a sympathetic gesture, nature sent a bevvy of clouds to shield the coast from the relentless sun.  They tumbled in a slow flight, turning and changing until they captured the sun itself, blushing pink, ochre and amber, an unmistakable magic spread across the darkening twilight sky.   

Summer to Fall: The Bay is Changing

My view of the earth, the part I can see from my chair here, is turning gradually away from the sun.  The sun, a blazing mass of hydrogen with shooting tendrils of gas that arch far out into dry cold space, is roasting our blue planet wherever it shines.  I hear it sizzle if I listen.

I am riding the grand blue ball eastward, feeling the cooling breath of twilight ahead.  Across the way, a short distance from my window, the last light of the evening is setting the leaves of my neighbors' trees aflame with light, a searing light beaming horizontally, parallel to the street.  The wind has died down for now, and I can hear the din of distant waves kicking up along the long curved shoreline.

Yesterday, we stood on Monterey State Beach and watched the sweep of waves bubbling and foaming back and forth across the tanned, curvaceous swells of packed sand.  They eddied back out again in wide ripping currents that made an effervescent hiss.  I felt an increased intensity of energy in the sea, building and changing with the season.  It's a mean ocean, beautiful as it is.  Tons of water, undertow, cross currents and riptides must be watched as well as wind gusts, logs and kelp washing in and out of the water's edge.  Those who are lax or inattentive are sometimes lost.

We parked above the beach, strode like giants down the steep dune to the more level beach below and then headed north, eyeing the waves, running for higher ground when they rushed up to us.

After a few miles at a steady pace heading north on the wet sloping sand, we trudged back up a steep dune and looked back to take a look at the vista spread before us.  The water was a dark titanium blue and a bobbing cluster of small fishing boats out in search of sea bass were collected a mile offshore.  Waves' constant muffled low roar was the voice of nature in full cry.  A scuffing wind made small white crests, brisk enough for small sailboats to keel over before it.

One man, dwarfed by the vista and expanse of ocean, stood alone below us, a solitary figure, buffeted by the wind.  He looked ahead to the tossing seas and boats, alone with his thoughts, with the elements of nature constantly jostling for his attention.  Tides and bright sun never leave you untended, always demand your respect.  You may seek solitude in nature, but, unlike a place built by people to segregate, silence or confine, nature is always vigorous and stimulating in constantly changing ways.

Enter, Hummingbird

(Written Saturday, Sept. 25, 2010, but kept in draft form by mistake)

My back door is open and I'm sitting at my kitchen table, reading, waking up slowly.  The day is bright and clear, the town is bustling, breakfast is half gone.  The coffee is very good.

I hear a rumbling noise, a muffled thrumming sound and my mind takes it in, considers it and compares it to other  sounds coming up from the street.  At first, it's possible I'm hearing a motorcycle engine in the distance, but it sounds too - what? - thrummy, if that's a word.  A weed whacker?  Something is making a steady beating sound.  I'm still reading the newspaper and finally look up.

There in the kitchen is a hummingbird, examining the many magnets and postcards covering the refrigerator, gently weaving back and forth a few inches, up and down an inch.  One magnet is made of pressed flowers laminated between plastic.  Many of the others are red, and the little bird is intrigued by them.  Then he comes a bit further into the kitchen, his wings drumming the air softly.  There is plenty in my kitchen that is red and attractive to a curious bird, I notice, and I hope he does not make the mistake of flying further in.

I've had brief encounters with small creatures within my own "nest" now and again, and they always stir a thrill and excitement in me.  The sense of wildness entering my domain, unbidden and unpredictable, is curious.  A raccoon peeked into one house, a scrub jay flew down a chimney, a coyote visited my vegetable garden.  The wild world, usually shy and barely seen, is out there.  I know it, I see their tracks, hear their songs, but I seldom get to see them up close, especially not arriving in my kitchen on a Saturday morning.

"Hey,  there's a hummingbird in the kitchen!"  I find myself exclaiming, wondering what will happen next.  Suddenly, the small wild thing is telling a story and I am leaning on the edge of my seat to find out about it, hope it will be okay, wonder why it took a wrong turn.

The thrumming beat of the wings intensified when the hummer sped back out the door, and it squeaked its tiny cry to the neighborhood as it flew.  Later it returned very briefly, took quick glance back at the magnets and color, zoomed away.  It was a first, being visited by a speedy little dart made of feathers.  I am half hoping he comes back and feels comfortable with our kitchen, but I don't want him to.  Wildness and self-determination by wild things, their freedom to move amidst our predictably dangerous world, is inspiring and beautiful if not wonderfully whimsical and fun.  I want them to always fly free, wander safely, out of reach of danger, original inhabitants of nature.

Apricot Butter Bars

After I posted my description of the farmers' market on Friday, I was asked to post the recipe I'd mentioned.  So, here it is.  I've had it ever since I was a teenager and have made it successfully every time I used it.  It's pretty fool proof unless you forget to use the timer and they cook too long.  I haven't made it lately or I would post a picture of the little beauties.  They're chewy and have a great tangy element from the apricots.

Note:  If you can get your hands on it, use King Arthur Flour.  It's by far the best flour I've ever used.

Apricot Butter Bars

Heat oven to 350 degrees
Use a 9 in. x 9 in. pan

1 C. flour
1/4 C. sugar
1/2 C. butter
1/3 C. flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1 C. packed brown sugar
1 C. dried apricots, snipped
3/4 C. walnuts, chopped

Mix 1 C. flour with sugar.  Cut in butter with pastry knife or two knives.  Press into 9 x 9 in. pan.  Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

Blend all other ingredients, pour on top of baked ingredients and bake another 30 minutes.  Should appear lightly browned and dulled, kind of like brownies.  Cool and cut into squares, serve and enjoy.

Summer to Fall: Evident at the Farmers' Market

The gradual turn of the season is most deliciously evident at the farmers' markets, of which I enjoy the Friday market held at Monterey Peninsula College's lower parking lot the most.  It's large, varied and easy as pie to access by car or bicycle.  

Since the market moved from Thursdays at 3 PM to Fridays at 10 AM, we have been eager to make the trip to the market a weekly must-do trip.

Today, a day that signaled the beginning of a heat wave coming on, we took our bags and headed over.  Ahmed at the Zena Mediterranean Foods stall said hello with his big smile.  Ramadan is over now, his little son is the apple of his eye, and his booth is very busy with curious buyers.  I can't tell you how hooked I am on his basil hummus.  It's embarrassing.

Farmers are now selling the last of their crops of pluots, peaches, nectarines and plums.  Most of them offer small sample bites to help you select the exact variety you'd like.  My favorites this year are Flavor Grenades, an appropriately named pluot that starts a flavor riot in your mouth.  Wow.

I sampled almonds, walnuts, and dried apricots, which are tangy and dark orange. I promised the apricot lady my favorite recipe for Apricot Butter Bars, which she was thrilled about.  It's a killer recipe.

We've found a favorite vendor for tomatillos, tomatoes and squash, a little old couple who add up purchases with pencil and paper, carefully bagging your goods and charging very fair prices.  Although competition is keen between booths, and selection is wonderful, we do develop favorites.  One farmer offers crimini, white and porcini mushrooms.  Another has baskets of berries, but I wasn't in the mood for them; I felt more inclined to eat other fruit instead.  Stone fruit offer great flavor out of hand, tangy zest or quiet sweet flavor.  I will be sad to see the last of them, and the season is nearly ended.    

Apples are beginning to show up in greater numbers, a sure sign that fall is upon us.  Pumpkins and other winter squash are colorful and at least fun to photograph if not eat just yet.  Crops such as golden beets like those you see here are gradually replacing tender greens and short-season speciality vegetables.

Last of all, I bought some ultra fresh sea bass that we enjoyed for dinner tonight, probably the best I've ever eaten, caught the night before out on the bay.  That, plus Corralitos Meats' German sausages and a dozen eggs at a third booth, and our protein was ready to take home.

Sometimes I can't resist flowers, and other times baked goods halt me in my tracks, but the fact that I can shop all the way down the row and back and be forced to pick and choose is very encouraging.  The market has certainly grown.  People are embracing the opportunity to buy organic, locally grown, fresh and varied produce.  Farmers are able to make a go of it in the tough world of agriculture, meet their buyers face to face, and add a dimension of community and trust that's lacking in regular supermarkets.

I brought home a variety of kale I haven't tasted before.  Next week, who knows what new crop will arrive, what will be missing.  The point is, the market responds to the season, and it keeps me in touch with it, too.

Northern California Looks Beautiful Now

Here we go zipping through September, dipping our toes into Autumn, peering down the line to Winter.

In Monterey and Pacific Grove, summer is showing its shy face, late to the party.  Anyone who has ever been here for a year or more knows what to expect and somehow survives a very long cold spell during June, July and August.

Now, with tourist season quieting down gradually, the really pretty weather is here.  This is worth waiting for.  If you are considering visiting Northern California or the Sierra foothills, all the way up to Yosemite or Lake Tahoe, the beauty is undeniably special.  Except for lack of lush green and gushing waterfalls, colors are richer, the sky is more clear, and the night air is refreshingly cool even if its warm in the daytime.

Long-time Californians know the look of folded hills covered with pastures of dried grasses, bent and aged oaks or redwood groves standing in the crooked angles of steep ravines.  Go out with your camera early in the morning or late in the day and watch how the sun plays across the tips of those grasses and gilds their edges and tips with a beautiful light.

California's natural places are uniquely appealing, beautiful and dramatic panoramas to feast your eyes on.  Just one look at the golden rolling hills with the sun glancing off them really does something to those who love the sight.  I am immensely grateful that places are preserved simply because they are beautiful and still wild.  That is priceless.    

Almost Sleeping

"Mamma?" Small muffled voice, sleep very nearby.   

"Yes?"  Hand stroking hair off forehead.  

"Can you tell me a story?" Quiet rustle of small legs under cotton covers.  "Please?"

"Well.  What story?"  Soft light from one small lamp.  Stuffed animals in a heap in the big basket. 

"The one where the little girl is going to sleep and her mother tells her a story."  No movement, no sound.

"Oh, that one.  I remember it.  That's a good one."  

"Mmm hmmm.  Tell it.  I like it."  Small hand reaching out, small hand exploring big hand, its knuckle wrinkles, ring, palm, nails, warmth.   

"Once there was a little girl who was all tucked into bed and ready to sleep, but..."

"What about the stuffed animals and the covers?  That part, too."  

"Shhhh.  That part's coming."  Two hands, lying one on top of the other, reassuring.

"Mamma?" The small voice again.

"Yes?"  

"You smell good.  I always know it's you.  Good night, mamma," a sigh, quiet breathing.

"Good night." Face bending to kiss hair.  Tears, warm love tears, soft child scent.  "Good night."

Cute Babies and Insect Feet

It's an odd thing to be looking at insect feet and wondering how they hold on to slick surfaces that are vertical, especially when everyone else is watching a cute baby gurgling and smiling.

I like cute babies, but, you know, they just cannot walk on walls or ceilings.

I don't know where to go with that thought, but there it is.

I'm glad babies don't have insect feet, because mothers would never want to nurse them up close to themselves.  You can imagine the screaming and edginess, can't you.  I hope genetic engineering never gets to that point.  Babies need to be cute so that parents won't really notice how much diapers cost.  Speaking of diapers, mothers who nurse need little porta potties to tie around their waists so babies nursing can just get potty trained at the same time.  In one end, out the other.  One stop shopping, so to speak.

I am thinking I am ready to go visit Gabriel The New again soon.  He is about a month and a half old, has gained weight steadily and is charming every visitor for miles.  His uber super mother, has finally finished her masters degree in sport psychology.

I guess, too, I could check out the insects' feet if I see any while I'm there.  Don't you think it's like Star Wars that insects can walk on water, rest upside down on ceilings, migrate hundreds and hundreds of miles?  Not one single insect looks capable of doing anything, really, but they do all sorts of bizarre things.  I mean, you aeronautical engineers, what are the chances a bee can actually fly?  I'm pretty sure no jets are patterned after them.

Babies, on the other hand, grow like mad when you aren't looking.  They get really stout, then they fall asleep solid as a little rock and grow taller all at once.  I heard that some babies have actually been measured after a 24-hour growth spurt two inches longer.  That's equal to insect feats. Or their feet.  

It's all mind-boggling, no matter which creature you choose to admire.  What can you say except it's all much stranger than fiction.  You can't make that stuff up.  

Monterey: Squid Boats at Night

Every night, fishing boats rumble and creak out of the harbor, sounding echoing pings to locate schools of bass or salmon or squid.  Then, encircling a roiling churn of fish, they cast their nets and wait.  Men gaze at the oily black water.  At night, intense white lights lure masses of squid upward, the sea's deer in headlights.  Seeing the shimmering blaze above them, squid swarm into the nets cast in wide circles.  They dart, peer with strange eyes in bizarre bodies, hunters hunted.  Night after night, the lights glow silently, a bright stadium of 20 or more boats, a deadly game thrown into sharp relief.

It's quiet when you stand on shore and watch, picturesque and quaint to passersby.  When the fog settles down low, the boat lights form halos on the underbelly of the cold gray mist.  The glow is beautifully sinister, otherwordly in its attractive force, both to people and sea creatures.

Ghostly and strange buoy bells clang forlornly on the rocking swell.  Low waves send a stinking salt mist laden with kelp and fish and guano up and away, as if it were the rank perfume of ocean flowers.

How strange this scene, and how stark the visible kill of sea life so we can eat.  Not like distant slaughterhouses far from our view, the ocean is immediate, cold and embodies the plain reality of life and death.

Frog Songs Silent Now

"Hi, frog."

The small frog waited, blinking slowly, breathing.  It simply existed, with damp and leathery skin, a speckled, curious-looking creature.  I watched it for a long time, waiting for something to happen.  Hey! It sprang away as if a trigger had been released and sent it awkwardly up, out and then splashing down into the swamp water beside its soggy dirt-clod perch.

I heard the frogs all stop creak-croaking, all at once, when my shoes shushed and swished in the grasses and sucking mud at the marsh bank, their silence resounding in contrast to the wide chorus they formed throughout the rushes and soggy grasses.  I set my lunch box down, walked with slow exaggerated steps on tuffets of grass in the seeping drain water, looking for more frogs.  They held their voices and sat stock still, hidden.

The frogs who were not close by, the distant ones in the marshy swamp, continued their creaking frog calls.  Their long strings of eggs were suspended in slimy ropes attached to the mud banks and trailed in the drain water like iridescent bubbled ribbons.  Tadpoles, eggs, frogs, slime, moss, water and mud intermingled, a rich earthy soup of frogs, insects, and microscopic life.  I squatted down and looked for the tadpole gangs wriggling in masses, dark and simple looking with two eyes and a lashing tail.  The trailing sinuous moss swept in the stream's current looked like dark-green, wet hair.  It was repulsive, more so than frogs were.

I uncapped a jelly jar and scooped a good measure of muddy water, tadpoles and some grass and held it up.  Yes, six or eight tadpoles had slithered inside and I was their master now.

I stood still and waited for the chorus to resume, and it did when the frogs had heard no movement for a time.  First one, then two or three frogs who were at scattered distances, one from another, hesitantly began to call.  In a spreading ease, frog voices called to one another, high pitched and droning pleasantly.  These were small frogs mostly, but some had deeper voices that held to a lower register of sound.

This marshy swamp we called The Polliwog Pong was a bog of runoff water.  I could trace it upstream to a rivulet that bordered our school tennis courts to the northeast and before that from a neighborhood and low hills further east.  The swampy field southwest of our school where the frogs sang was open and free of human intrusion because it was boggy, of uncertain footing most of the time, and consisted of repulsive slime and unwanted creatures, rude and homely little things with no known friends.

At twilight and early evening, crickets and singing frogs croaked, buzzed and buggrummmed.  We always heard them in our rural community, making that combined single-note chirring chorus that is now nearly totally silenced forever.  It was sweet and steady and was the sound dimension of the night world, joined by screech owls, the hesitant soft crunch of deer hooves on crisp leaves in the yard after the moon rose, the needling squeak of bats, and whispering leaves on the night breeze.

I walked home with my jelly jar of tadpoles and intended to watch their back legs grow, then their front legs as their tails shrank down and they became frogs, but, as usual, they eventually died.  I didn't know enough about them to give them good frog food or plenty of frog room to grow or to just simply let them alone.

The bog was so plentiful a frog marsh that it seemed the amphibians' slimy numbers were endless.  Most children disdained them, playing with them like toys, teasing them, shrieking with hilarity, entertained at their expense.  Our ignorance ruined them, all the frogs who science now regard as bellwethers of environmental change.  They were forced out by steady encroachment and appropriation of their marsh so that a park could be built next to the school.

I walk outside in the dark when I have the chance, and I listen for frogs or crickets or bats singing their high wild songs, calling for mates and offspring.  It's rare to hear them.  You only hear people, cars, and a lonesome emptiness ringing far and wide.

Endless Transition: Night and Day

There goes the day, below the gaudy sun.  They go, together, quietly sweeping up bits and pieces of lingering questions and half-formed thoughts.  Now comes twilight and then night.  It seems a pity to end in desultory colors a day of such beauty, one that breathed cool whispers, implied passage, and consisted of infinite transition.   
This minute separated from that, one hour from another?  No.  An arc, smooth in soundless flight, invisible to my searching eyes.  I felt time passing, saw it in shadow and glare.

Time is only the rumble-less turn of the earth.  Time is not passing; I am passing, round and round again, riding this jutted and jumbled ball.  Time is light and dark and all their blurring permutations.

Flying past the searchlight of the sun's intensity, daylight changes to night.  Still flying headlong, rushing, the other side of the world is taking its turn from dark to light.  While I sit here, still, just breathing, the headlong rush of the earth goes on and on.  I am swept forth, even as I sit here unmoving, away from the sun and then back into its view again.  It is a fantasia, an escapade, a wonder, this spinning globe and our blazing sun, creating constant transitions of light and dark.

A wall outside, gilded so recently in sunlight is cloaked, darkened, biding its time.  There it is again, the thought of time, of measuring, incrementally subdividing evidence of the turning of the earth.  The earth will round again, and soft colors will emerge from the dark edge of night, and all life will ride on.  That gilded wall once visible through my window reflected the disappearing sun, then yielded to the lavender, gray and fawn of evening twilight and then no color at all.  One infinite span of color, time is all one time, nothing at a standstill, ever.  All is transition, all is change, we are turning, we are always waiting, to see the sun again.  

In Preparation

My mind is on a meeting I'm setting up for tomorrow.  I'm hosting a meeting of friends who find a restlessness and curiosity within themselves.  We will study and talk about personal transformation and the Hero's Journey for several hours.  It will feel like far less time, which is the nature of work done that is fulfilling and interesting.

I chose some interesting music to listen to while we meet, and I've assembled some poetry and short essays.  We will eat some, talk some, listen some and transform to something none of us imagines exactly.  Our senses will be engaged, and the arts will be used to facilitate discovery of the personal call, the journey and the return.  We will be surprised and intrigued, softened and opened to new possibility.  Something will emerge.  It always does, which is no surprise at all.

What Were They Thinking?

If you've been reading my posts, you will remember that a woman crashed into my next-door neighbor's garage door, crushing it, as she attempted a U-turn in a small space. She leaves me asking a question that was renewed by another driver today.  

I live on a skinny little street that looks like a one-way alley where cars can only park along one side.  It's maybe 10 feet wide, 12 at most.  Yet, people routinely try to make U-turns on the street.  The woman who bashed into the garage was trying to make a U-turn.  From cross street to cross street, the block itself is short.  It's not a long journey to get to the next street, which, by the way is four lanes wide, a very wide avenue where you can turn around all day long and never crash into anything.  The nearby avenue looks like an airport runway, enormously long and wonderfully wide.  From my house to that avenue is a distance of about 50 yards.  A mediocre baseball player could throw a ball to the stop sign without too much effort.

In the past eight months, two cars have made a mess of turning around, one hitting my car, and the other the aforementioned bash job on my neighbor's garage.  As a matter of fact, the person who hit my car was driving a very large sedan that, when perpendicular to the street itself, had about one foot of extra length to move back or forward.

So, apparently, both drivers were coming up the street and, for God's sake, decided to turn around and go back.  Just had to turn, could not go the next 50 feet and take a left or right on The Huge Avenue, and both crashed into something.  Whammo!

Just a little while ago, I looked out the window down to the street and, lo and behold, a woman in a late-model large blue sedan was making a U-turn in the middle of the street, very close to my parked car.  What the heck?  I think I'll go outside and look for some kind of diversion device that repels cars backwards and into my car and our garage doors.  Could it be that large sedans just quit going forward on the street and must be turned back downhill mid stream?  The hill is a goose bump compared with the monstrously steep avenues and streets in San Francisco.  I've seen cars go up them like arrows shot out of bow, straight up without any hesitation.  The same cars on my street stop and go back where they came from.  Why?  I want to know why!

I would never go so far as to say people are logical as they drive.  Most of the time they are not even close.  Drivers are sleeping, texting, drinking, talking, painting their toenails (I've seen it), daydreaming, and who knows what else.  Definitely, they are not thinking, especially on my skinny street that goes nowhere.  I'd hate to think what would happen if I actually painted a target on my garage door, but I am pondering the idea of reverse psychology...

After a Dream

"Good morning.  Is there any coffee?"

"Yes.  Mugs are up above the counter, on the left."

"I had such a weird dream last night.  Want a cup?"

"I'm good.  What was the dream?"

"My legs fell off, but I could still walk."

"That's weird all right."

"Yeah.  I was sitting in a big wooden chair.  You know, one of those outdoor chairs like we saw at the outdoor center.  What're they called?"

"Adirondack?"

"Yes.  I was sitting in the sun and then my legs fell off like they were branches coming off a tree.  It made a loud cracking sound.  No blood or anything.  Just crack and there they were lying on the ground like dummy legs.  But then I got up and went in the house and I was fine.   I have no idea."

"Well, your legs are still there.  I can see them.  All ten toes.  You okay?"

"Uh, well, I was fine.  Now I don't think so.  What do you think it means?"

"It, well, um.  You need a hug?  I give really good hugs, remember."

"I do.  You do.  You sure my legs look okay?"

"Look more than okay.  Great legs.  All hooked up to the hip bones.  Hug coming at you.  Set down your coffee and get a proper hug."

"Mmmmm.  It was just a dream.  I love you."

Chimps and Writers: A Mental Thing

Using vivid language as a writer well means I have to overcome a strong urge to scream from the tree tops and throw branches.  Instead, I have to sit down and think. That's the hard part about writing:  Doing the screaming in written words, translating emotion exactly and precisely into descriptions and passages, working with a part of the brain that overrides the primitive response so that others may experience it later.

Parents say, "Use your words" to hysterical children who need to tell about something that's happened.  Using words in the heat of emotion is a big challenge, especially when emotions feel like catapults throwing you head over heels into a wild fray.  The words eventually catch up, but it can take real effort.

At least two really different parts of the brain are involved in emotional responses.  One is the rear brain, the original primitive seat of emotions and quick responses.  The other is the much more recently developed forebrain where judgement and decisions take place.  Language in humans is complicated and takes years to develop as children grow because the forebrain is one of the last parts of the brain to become mature.  

A chimp sees a leopard and begins to scream and jump up and down, thrashing branches, throwing things.  You can picture that, right?  You also want to do that when you get really excited (admit it).  That's why we love sports and rock music so much.  We get to be primitive and scream and holler in our excitement, react the same way chimps do when they scream, thrash, throw things and wave their arms around.  Probably a leopard just runs for the hills once faced with so much commotion.  I would if I were a leopard.  Definitely.

A writer must not only set a scene but describe characters and their emotions perfectly so you are riveted with excitement, feel like you are there yourself, and care about what happens next.  No jumping up and down and shrieking unless you are the character or the reader.  A writer must think it all through, one word at a time.

Chimps don't have that luxury.  Whooping and swinging in the treetops is the height of their experience.  It's not just an opposable thumb thing, because chimps and people both have them.  A chimp has far less forebrain than we do, relies more on instinct and reaction to deal with its world.  We have a brain that allows for philosophy, foresight, planning, judgement and reflection.  All of those things depend on using our words.

Famously, one attempt to acknowledge the existence of both violent reaction and considered response to situations, keeping one foot in both worlds, is illustrated by the quote:  Speak softly and carry a big stick.   

I sure hope the vast majority of us are taking the option to think and use our words because if all 7 billion humans currently alive suddenly opted to be chimp-like, scream and jump around in the treetops, not only would every tree be crushed to the ground really quickly but we'd run out of good books to read, like Tarzan the Ape Man, for instance.  Well, that and a few other things.

What Choice Is There?

This is a test and only a test.

Someone ripped off my debit card number and started charging purchases against it.  Card's now frozen, so those debits will be stopped, but it's on me to dispute the charges that I didn't make.  No new card until I do that.

Awesome.

Now, what was I saying a few days ago about gratitude?

I found myself taking the usual angry and fearful approach to the situation we are all so familiar with.  You know it ad nauseum.  Wait a minute here, I thought to myself.  Learn your own lesson.  Think and learn.

So, what does this teach me?  The concrete answer regarding watching out for my security, monitoring my use of my money and debit card goes without saying.  You need to be careful and keep both eyes open for theft, for sure.  The deeper thing it teaches me is that I do have a choice in how I react, how far I spread anger and bitterness.  Or not.  It presents an opportunity to understand myself and what my actions create in the world.

Of course, I don't like the inconvenience of this, and I have nothing good to say about a coward who steals from people, except one thing:  I do not choose to jump in a pit of ugliness with them.  I say, let their bad juju be only theirs, their negative karma only theirs, not mine.  I can clearly see I must choose.

So now that I have contacted my bank and the corrections are being put in place, I am going to make a nice dinner and enjoy this fine evening and think about all the people I love and admire in the world and imagine blessings and beauty surrounding them all.

I am looking around the room right now.  It's a good room, full of colors and things I like.  The sun is just setting over in the west and neighbors' voices are murmuring outside.  It's peaceful here.  The whole day was fine and I choose to keep it that way.  Free will is that amazing thing that we have inside us.  It's tested in situations like the theft of money from my account, no doubt about that, but the truth is I am grateful I noticed the test instead of rumbling down the ugly road of anger any further than I did.

Jubilee In A Frozen Summer

Devilish cold gripped our necks and turned our hands to stone.  It's summer in Pacific Grove still, and little mean 'ol Mother Nature is getting her kicks, taking a wry humorous turn as trickster, but so can we when we want to, especially when the low rumble of old cars make their presence known.




Cherries Jubilee is in town, an annual homage to hot rods and classic cars of a different category than were here only three weeks ago for the Concours d'Elegance.  In comparison to the ritzy and rare (read:  extremely expensive) collectible automobiles on auction at many venues around the Peninsula, road-worthy cruisin' cars have been taking center stage.  '64 Chevelles, '57 Chevys, '65 Mustangs and their equals lined up on Lighthouse Avenue for any and all to admire and photograph.  Everyone picked their favorites, many turned heads and all brought smiles.  A '54 Henry J. Kaiser coupe was probably the oddest looking vehicle with its very dull beige interior and completely featureless dashboard.  It was so ugly that it was beautiful, but mostly ugly.

A '55 Chery Bel Air stole the hearts of those who love its hood ornament and grille design.  One giant beast, a '66 Chevy Long Panel weighs 4,700 lb unladen and was just huge.  Classy rocket ship styling of a '62 Cadillac convertible is 22 feet of two-tone red and white paint looked like a rolling party site, leather and chrome, all glossy and sweet.  One red-and- chrome prize winner was being meticulously massaged with a soft cloth, all 25 coats of its paint, every bit of its trim and inch of its engine.  Insanely horrible gas mileage on any of the cars stopped no one from feeling immense pangs of envy and admiration.

We ogled until we were good and frozen and then hustled back home to warm up again.  Today, all of the entries in the Jubilee are out at Laguna Seca doing laps and struttin' their stuff, going down memory lane.

Crazy for Chocolate

I am shocked.  Some people don't like chocolate.  I find that to be absolutely incomprehensible.

I do like chocolate, to the furthest extent of liking, way out on the far reaches of the universe of passion.  The first time I went to the Ghirardelli Chocolate Factory in San Francisco, I was on heavy, heavy overload.  Where should I start?  How much could I have?  Chocolate, unbelievable chocolate!!! I was excited, fascinated, giddy with the fragrance and taste of chocolate, cocoa, cream, everything.  I believe I stared at a deep vat of glossy darkness as a heavy paddle turned through it, round and round, just as hypnotized as a cat.  I had to be guided away just like a drunk.  My eyes had become spirals.  

Yesterday, I took a nap and woke up after a short while feeling a little irritable, unsatisfied with my sleep.  Then, it began. Tall rich chocolate cake floated before my eyes, four layers high. Devil's Food tempting me like sin itself.  What a great name, I smiled.  Back to dreamless sleep.  

Still later, I woke briefly and there floated the chocolate cake again, with its tender, moist and yielding crumb.  I swear I could taste it.  Oh, what a cruel thing, this persistent delusion with ten million calories hidden inside, an embodiment of sensual allure and instant gratification of a giant dark chocolate tooth.  What misery to be denied its satisfaction, said my dream as I was regarding the cake.  Oh, did I want that cake.  I slept again.    

Finally, I woke for good and did not think of chocolate cake.  I guess I was finally rested at last.  I felt the need to check my balance and equilibrium when I stood up.  Still good, back to normal, no problem.  What a relief.  

But, now that I am thinking back on it, the chocolate cake is just as vivid as if I had it sitting here in front of me and I can taste it, smell it, touch it.  Tall, dark and handsome.  Come to me, baby, it calls.  See what happens when you diet?  

The Gratitude KISS (Keep It Simple Sweetie)

Here and there today, I noticed wilting flowers, bird poop, and potholes in the road. That dismal little list hardly accounts for the things I am grateful for, which makes it odd I recall them at all.  It makes me realize something, though, about what I am most grateful for.

In the long intervals of time briefly punctuated by those odd little details, I savored a mellow cup of coffee, meandered along a long line of vendors' tents and tables at the farmers' market, took a leisurely nap, and saw George Clooney in The American at our movie theater here in Pacific Grove.  To top all that off, I had dinner out at a local cafe and a stroll home on this soft late-summer night.  It was a very relaxed and enjoyable day, beginning to end.  That's a fine list of delights to be grateful for, indeed.

I could leave it at that and say good-night, but I keep feeling a sense of gratitude and appreciation for...my existence, I guess.  Just that simple?  I think it goes deeper. 

I appreciate the fact that bird poop and potholes do not rivet my attention, that the world I am privileged to enjoy is beautiful, bountiful and peaceful.  I am not obsessed; I can discern between reality and delusion. I cannot begin to tell you how immensely grateful I am to be able to think clearly about that, to say that coherently, to understand that it is profound.

I work with people who are mentally ill, some of whom are completely undone by a speck of red, believing it is blood and that they will be contaminated.  I work with those who are continuously and forever engulfed in the sound of fierce condemning voices interrupting their every thought, day and night.  I work with people enslaved by drugs and alcohol and those preyed upon by abusers.  They teach me to keep things simple, to appreciate what I have and to enjoy a laugh at any opportunity.

I am healthy, can solve my simple problems, have no complaints to speak of.  Chalk it up to the luck of birth.  By whatever force, I am free to live peacefully.  I am not perfect, and I am very deeply grateful -- almost to an extent that cannot be expressed -- for the ability to notice little things and keep them in perspective.  Surrounding my gratitude is relief that I am fine.  All I need I have, and that's the simple truth.

Thoughts on Community and Loneliness

"Anybody out there?"

I recently had a conversation with a few friends about community, and the question seemed to perplex us:  Where is it exactly?

What do we need a community to be in order to even recognize that it exists?

I swim at a local pool each weekday, something I've done for years.  I've become familiar with the routine at the pool, recognize people, know what I'm supposed to do and not do there.  More than any other place, I consider the people who come and go every morning to be part of my community, but even that is a very loosely structured concept; there is one common goal of maintaining fitness, but we do not engage in each other's lives much beyond that.  A lot of what I understand about my pool community has to do with choice.  I choose to go swim and so do all the other people there.  We find enjoyment and benefit from gathering there.

On the other hand, I also work eight-hour shifts with coworkers eight days out of 14.  That's a lot of time, but I don't feel nearly as interested in defining that place as a community as I do the pool.  The hours I am scheduled to work are not my choice.  The work I do is defined by someone else, and rules are externally applied and enforced.

I also write and seek out writers in an attempt to form a community of sorts, although the community at this point exists almost entirely in virtual space, online.  I choose to write, I enjoy it, but I do not have a physical space in which I meet other writers and write together or speak to one another casually.

So, the question comes up:  Do I have a group of friends or a community?

It's very common to feel lonely, isolated and left out in modern America, which I find incredibly ironic considering our affluence, mobility and freedoms.  It's my opinion that ideas that die for lack of interest represent a huge loss for us all, and they die because those with ideas have no community in which to share.  In addition, the wisdom to be gained by recounting adventures and undertakings often is limited or lost because adventurers have no community that will listen to what they've learned.

My swimming friends say they go to the pool to see who's there, catch up on each other.  They miss it when they're away for any length of time greater than a week or so.  We know each other's strengths, weaknesses, gauge each other's progress or health.  We accept whoever shows up, make room for them. People come, take part, leave.  This may be as close as we modern Americans will ever be to the idealized "village" of yesteryear.  But, what else do we need for it to be a community, really?

A Split-Second of Steak

At the edge of the meat small bubbles are sizzling, hissing, popping brightly.  A violet-blue circlet of flames is a hot whisper under the pan.  I am hungry.

There's only meat in the pan.  No good.  I want more.  I find salt, pinch some, and dismiss it from my fingertips.  Go!  Pepper, too.  Go!  The meat will taste better, but I want more.

Onion!  I strip the onion, it protests, and I remind it of its destiny.  It becomes minced at the edge of my sharp keen knife, waves its odor into the air below my nose.  It is eager to join the meat, to my delight.

Onion and meat shisssshhhhh together, steam rising in quick whorls, savory, serendipitous.  My mouth is juicy with waiting, wants the flavors now.  I think of more, of garlic, of mushrooms, of balsamic sour.  I am a magician, the pan my apprentice, the food my spell.

I sit with the plate before me, touch the edge of the smooth, cool ceramic, lift the fork and slice down with a silvery serrated steak knife.  Juice flows in small swirls, the scent of it wafting, gathering me into an expectant, watering-mouthed, breath-held verge.  There it is, my hot food, rising to my waiting mouth and it is a perfection of pleasure.  Yes.  In one split second, I am not hungry, and all the universe is bliss, encompassed entirely by the delicious satisfaction on my tongue.  Ahhhh....

Gratitude in the Face of Random Acts

An Amish woman was killed in her buggy, rear-ended by an SUV.  Who are you?  There is a woman who is threatened with stoning in Iran.  Who am I?

What happens within us when we learn these things?

Buddhists believe that all of what happens everywhere affects everyone and everything. Nothing is foreign; it is all of us, all the time.  There is no other-ness.  Our life force and spiritual energy is interconnected.  We are assaulted and cheered, encouraged and oppressed by things that happen everywhere.   

The most difficult teaching of the great religions is that of gratitude, especially when it relates to our enemies and the oppressors in life.  We may be joyously grateful that lively music fits our mood perfectly, but can we be grateful that a loved one has died or mayhem is imminent?  Why do spiritual teachers ask us to do that?  What's the sense in it?  

Gratitude is a very difficult concept in the face of evil, makes much more sense in the realm of beauty and love.  The truth is, if we can be grateful for the oppressor, we are more accurately ourselves as defined by them, and we become better aligned with what is good and true in the world if that is our intention.  But, this is not simply a statement like:  "Wow, they are so horrible, and I in comparison am an angel."  More in truth it is:  "I understand myself more clearly, and it is very certain that I must never become or be part of evil and destruction."

It is far simpler to hate hate-filled people and love love-filled people, but it really is just easy and teaches nothing.  It is said that to know your enemy is to know yourself, and I say it is because you are forced to define your self very clearly when faced with clearly awful things.  

Asilomar: Rest and Refresh

The sun lifted up out of the Gabilan Mountains to the east, spreading sweet light on the morning.  I woke up hungry and everything looked like food, still felt like summer.  After a succulent brunch of plums, grapes, cheese and Canadian bacon, I finished my mug of coffee and said yes, let's walk at Spanish Bay and Asilomar State Beach, and off we went to the shore west of here.

The ocean was tumbling toward the rocks and sand in a jumble of swells and riptides, lacy streaks of white foam streaming back out oceanward.  The boardwalk that undulates and curves alongside the road was restless with people in motion.  Surfers, tidepool hunters, joggers and cyclists moved silently, as they seem to always in the presence of this jagged restless shore.  Certainly, our own voices were diminished with wind and ocean everywhere booming and sighing.  

Stitching between clots of humans who stood or sat at the beach, always gazing westward at the waves, were dogs, leaping, racing, splashing, circling, busy with all their dog business.  Their smiles were huge and their tongues flapped like pink flags in the breeze.

Circling back up off the beach after walking southward first, we found the boardwalk again, lined with sweet-smelling chaparral and feral nasturtiums, to the Phoebe Hearst Social Hall at the Asilomar Conference Center.

Julia Morgan, a prolific architect, designed and built hundreds of buildings including the YWCA retreat center, a conference center now, a testament to her ability to merge manmade structures with nature, using local building materials.

In the hall, stone, burnished wood and the fragrance of a glowing pine fire in the giant hearth invite restful reflection and offer retreat from the shoving and jangle of our crowded world.  Guests and visitors find the room both spacious and peaceful, a place to play the grand piano, practice billiards, read, write or sit in conversation with a companion.  Simply gazing out of the tall old window panes into the woods surrounding the area refreshes the mind and soul, too.  TV and telephones are absent throughout the conference grounds.  Murmuring voices, clicking billiard sticks, and piano notes become the white noise of this very special place.

Serenity and calm are made three dimensional in this hall.  Wind, sand, trees and ocean, so close by as to be indistinguishable from the grounds themselves, wait restlessly nearby, vital counterpoints to the organic majesty of the buildings of Asilomar.    

Monterey Goes Greek

(Yesterday, when I wrote, I did not realize it was my 300th post.  A milestone of sorts, an amazingly big number to me.)

The Greek Festival is one of the best ethnic festivals held in this area, so we decided to meet some friends there and savor an hour or two there.  It's held every year at the Custom House Plaza and like other festivals highlights food and music from the nominal country.  Others to look for at various times of the summer and spring are:  The Santa Rosalia Festival (Sicilian-American), the Turkish Festival,

We walked over to the Plaza from Pacific Grove, an easy flat walk of perhaps two miles and joined another couple at a blue-checked table to pass the time, think about Greece and eat.  Gyros, spanikopita, dolmas, tomato salad with feta and red onions, and Greek coffee were all delicious, especially the gyros.  Whole lamb turning on a roasting spit, live music, people dancing in traditional costumes and booths filled with ceramics, art and jewelry were lively and interesting.

A large crowd filled the plaza.  Either there were very few authentically Greek people there or Greeks also look like every other nationality in the world, because that's what was evident:  The world in its entirety, give or take an aborigine or Zulu hunter.  It was definitely not a crowd you'd typically see in Colorado or Utah, for instance.  Monterey is multi-ethnic, as are most areas of the entire state now, a beautiful enriching thing for us here.  Something like 65 languages - probably a whole lot more - are spoken as a first language at home here.  Truly, it is a melting pot.  Lucky for us on days like today, the pot produces terrific food that we can munch on for equally terrific prices.

We left the sun-kissed festival behind and strolled down Alvarado Street a block or two to reach The Osio Cinema, our local indie-film theater, to watch a matinee showing of Get Low, Robert Duvall's current film, which we felt was a good film, mostly a character study of one man supported by an ensemble of skilled, empathetic actors.

Monterey is a very pretty city, lined with sycamore trees and Spanish mission style offering pleasing vistas at almost every turn.  The sun splashed down through the leaves and shadows dappled the sidewalks. Strolling throngs passed by in twos and threes as we sat on a bench, savored coffee and relaxed on a sunny bench.

We finally turned ourselves back toward Pacific Grove.  Almost immediately, we were distracted by batucada drumming that was attracting a big crowd at the entrance to the wharf.  Listen to The Obvious Child on the album Rhythm of the Saints by Paul Simon to get a good dose of it.  Little kids, old ladies, spectators in a crowd four or five deep were held in thrall by the drums.  Rhythmic drumming by six or seven musicians in a beautiful public space was intoxicating to everyone.  To me, only taiko drumming comes close; both are fantastic.  This style, a constantly varying and complex one, pulls you over closer and never lets go.  Smiles abounded and feet could not keep still.

We walked on, rejoining the moving river of humanity flowing along the Rec Trail back to Pacific Grove.  Glory of glories, there was no fog in sight, icing on a cake of a day.

The Cats Console Me

"Body of Christ," said the priest up at the altar and held up the Host.  

"What's that?" my sister asked, now five years old, a year younger than I.   

"A little wafer of special bread.  The priest blessed it.  Shhhh," said my mother.

"I have to go to the bathroom.  Really bad," said my other sister, who was four, barely.  

"Now?" my mom looked at her anxious face and saw real urgency.  They gathered themselves up and shuffled out of the pew and left me and my sister sitting on the hard bench.  


"Behave yourselves while I'm gone," my mom whispered and made the shush sign with her finger over her lips.  


"Peas be with you.  I thought he said peas be with you.  Get it?" I looked at my sister, and I snorted as I tried to keep from laughing out loud.  She made a face back at me and tugged at her dress, scratched her hair under her bobby-pinned circlet of lace.  I looked at the backs of all the adults in front of me, pew after pew, dark suit jackets and the edges of the women's skirts.  I thought about my snort and how funny it sounded.  I felt my laughter building up in my chest, and I snorted again.  My sister caught my giggling mood and we started to laugh inside and mess around with our feet on the padded short bench below us where we had knelt.  We were thrashing our ankles clad in anklet socks and our patent-leather Sunday shoes.  


We sisters in a pew in the back of the small church lost track of the mass being said, forgot about keeping up with the kneeling-standing-kneeling-sitting-standing-kneeling that the adults were doing around us.  We rustled, snorted, giggled, mimicked noises we heard.  Everything became hilarious so that we would not be left in boredom by the incomprehensible sermon, and so we could ignore the bloody Christ hanging from a cross beyond the altar, beyond the wan and smiling Mary who looked like she had never been a girl.  


My mother and my younger sister shuffled sideways down the pew until they reached us, my mom scowling at us.  The look said, "You are going to catch it when you get home," but I was just glad to have her with us again.  It was better that way.  I grinned at her.  


"Hi Mom!" I whispered loudly.  She concentrated on scowling some more, but I saw her suppress a smile.  


Finally, I saw the priest between some of the adult elbows in front of me, waving his hands in the cupped upright position that priests always held their hands in during Mass.  He was signaling the Sign of the Cross and the adults were moving around and gathering up their sweaters and purses and hats and beginning to genuflect and leave reverently.  We did that too, as we had been taught, but much more quickly, a token bend of the knee and a swatting motion of the hand around the four corners as we crossed ourselves.  I made my way outside with my family where I inhaled fresh air like it was the last chance to inhale deeply ever again, so grateful was I to take it.  The adults were clotting around in the yard with their voices rumbling and murmuring saying words in their tedious adult language.  I moved away from them, looked for other kids, but saw no friendly ones. 


I spotted the car and dashed for it, fiendishly happy to be moving quickly with my muscles bursting with energy.  I tagged the car, using it to slow myself down and then turned and waited for everyone to join me.  I saw my sister tugging on my mother's arm, as if she were a horse hauling a woman out of a tar pit, with all her might.  


"Come on, mom.  Can we go?  Please?"  My sister was desperate to get away from the slow adult movements and tedious conversations they never seemed to end.  "Pleeeeease?" she whined, an unparalleled nuisance and nag hanging onto the arm over her head.  


Finally, we were all in the Chevy station wagon and rolling away from the church, all of us giggling about how awful that had been.  "I thought we were going to die!" we yelled to each other, making puns and laughing hysterically about almost nothing.  


Suddenly, the car stopped.


"Roll down your window.  There's Father Juan.  He wants to say something.  See?"  my mom said, looking excited.  I rolled down the window and looked up into the Latin face of our parish priest, a Spaniard with an accent and charm that captivated my mother's attention every Sunday.  Because she liked him, I liked him, and because I liked him, I assumed he liked me.  I grinned at him winningly.


Father Juan gripped my arm in a fierce vise of strong fingers and smiled at me but said in a low angry voice, "I have no doubt you fully enjoyed the Mass today.  I am looking forward to your full attention next week."  The fingers released, and his voice wished us a happy Sunday.  My mom waved good-bye and said, "What did he say?  I didn't hear him."  


"I don't know," I said and went silent.  I still felt the pain of the grip.  I was pitched into a dark anger and felt intensely betrayed.  I had not understood his sarcasm and only felt the vicious grip, felt the shock of his anger hitting my stomach.  I hated him now, but there wasn't anything I could do.  He was the priest and we went to that church, and that was it.  


I thought about the fake little wafer Father Juan had held up earlier, pretending it was Christ, about the tepid smile on Mary's face, the way adults looked at each other and laughed together and then complained about each other later.  I didn't trust any of it.  


At home, we scattered to our rooms to play before our midday meal.  I went outside and found a sleeping pile of warm cats and buried my face in their musty fur.  I explained to them how much I hated church, hated the stupid priest and his dumb church and congratulated the cats on the wisdom of not going to church.  They purred and I was consoled by their simplicity and acceptance of my wailing sadness.  Then, healed by this, I went inside to change out of my constricting dress and stiff black shoes whose gloss was now gone.