Spring Warmth At Last

It has been chilly here on the Central Coast lately.  The sun comes out, but you still need a sweater. It's kite flying weather. So, it being cool, the growth of my garden flowers has been slowed. That is, until today. Warmth and moisture makes almost anything grow, and when there is finally a series of warm days, flowers burst into bloom and plants go into super-grow mode.

Rosebuds I'd been anticipating opening for a few days are finally unfurling, some at a rate nearly visible to the naked eye.  No time-lapse photography needed.  The roots are warming, the sap is flowing and plants are using energy at a tremendous rate.  After this first flush of blooming, I'll trim them back a bit and fertilize again.

A woman and her husband who got sick of industrial-grade produce went off to the countryside in the midwest and bought 30 acres of land to begin a farm.  She researched the steps she needed to take by scrutinizing every article she could find on the internet and has made a success of the effort so far.  Her kids complained, it is said, about having real chores to do every day, day in and day out, but now they're stronger and have more real skills.  The woman said, "Life doesn't happen in 30-minute increments. It happens in seasons!"

One's gardening and growing effort has to be continuous and driven by the plants themselves. A careful eye must be kept on shoots, suckers, insects, watering, and feeding or the previous 80 or 90 days' work is all for nothing.

Nothing surprises a gardener or farmer more than seeing the immense bounty from the farm or garden once it's in the house.  I have one container of herbs that is producing enough for many families to use, far more than we need.

So, I saw the flowers' blossoms exploding open around me today, the sun bright overhead and then the wind galloping across the open bay in the distance, kicking up whitecaps as it came.  As the days grow longer until June, extended periods of warmth will produce even more flowers and growth than I'm enjoying now.  Hard to imagine since the garden's already flush with color, shape and texture.

A Soft Rainfall: Hints of Time

As I drove along a city street early one morning after my swim, the morning bore a heavy cloak of gray clouds. The air was moist, fecund with humidity.  I saw that it had rained lightly in the night.  The street surfaces were damp and cars beaded with water.  All the wetness was evidence of what had passed very quietly.  Its transient nature meant I was only aware of it because of what remained. I had missed knowing of its presence as it happened in the night, having heard no sound of dripping water in the drainpipe and no pronouncement that a storm was on the way.

I looked up ahead and saw a woman crossing at the intersection, on foot, walking with a distinctive loose gait that reminded me of artists' renderings of the parade of mankind from the earliest ages to the present.  The spark of life in her body, I thought to myself, has existed since the dawn of time.  She is the current version of her lineage.  Untold thousands of her ancestors produced her, custodians of an eternal flame that lives within her now.  I watched her cross the street, stride to the corner and then disappear from view, a metaphor for all her forebears and every living thing that has ever existed.

There has been - (the idea seems so profound) -  no interruption of the life that now resides within her or me, ever, not even for an instant.  How long has that been?  What were the stories of all the ancestors and predecessors?  What happened along that long chain stretching into the mists of time? If she does not have a child, what will be lost that no other human being can pass forward?

Evidence of the silent rainfall spoke to me of things that go lightly before us in time, hardly noticed.  There is so much that is unknowable about the past; the rain has evaporated, so to speak.  And yet, every thing and all life forms bear evidence of what has happened.

The thought that life is both complex and mysterious as well as simply there or not there is a lot to contemplate.  I drove on, newly aware that wet did not look simply wet; it was proof of a transient storm.  People were not simply people but vessels of historical evidence presented in exquisite detail, perhaps totally ignorant of what might have happened in the past in order to endow them with life now.

I got home and saw rain on the leaves and flowers of my garden, more evidence of the night's rainfall, all wet and cool.  The rain had been so light and silent.  I had no idea it had come and gone while I had slept until I saw the glistening droplets and a sheen of moisture on the ground.  It had been a light rain as ephemeral as the spark of life within every living thing, within me and the leaves dripping wet before me.  I had seen mankind represented in the swinging stride of a briefly glimpsed woman and felt in awe of my own forefathers and mothers, whoever they have all been since time out of mind. It is too much to know.  The rainstorm passed as a shower of crystalline droplets, and my ancestors before me passed too.  Here I am now, for now, my life transient as a storm.

Sea Otter Classic 2011

The Sea Otter Classic, a four-day celebration of all things bicycle, just ended today.  It is one of the biggest presentations of bicycles and racing in the country.  At the heart of it all is mountain bike racing at Laguna Seca Recreation Area, a racetrack and terrain primarily known for its twisting and climbing motor speedway.  After 21 years, the event includes any and all forms of mountain bike racing as well as BMX racing, road racing, demonstration and trick riding, and a huge bike expo where 315 exhibitors show off their products.

All around the Peninsula, "citizen" rides (now called gran fondo), road races, and other evidence of the presence of thousands of fans of mountain and road racing shows up in bright lycra clothing, and car racks bristle with mountain and road bikes.

I volunteered at the racetrack today for a few hours, where I was made to count visitors at the VIP tent, directed them to the catered food and drinks.  I also watched the dual slalom downhill races in the distance.  In the span of time I was watching races, I saw five crashes with big clouds of dust, tumbling bodies and bikes.  Cheers from the crowd erupted when the riders remounted and continued their downhill runs.  One little boy, only two years old, was riding around on a tiny bicycle with really wide wheels.  He wore a helmet, t-shirt, sweat pants over his diaper, and he rode back and forth over a four-inch ramp in the parking lot pavement, a tough and sturdy boy with energy to burn and remarkable coordination.  I waved at him.  He blew me a kiss, sort of, after his mom taught him how.  Pretty cute.

The expo was jammed with thousands of people, clouds of dust, a few acres of bicycle exhibits in colorful product tents.  Truly a circus, with never a moment of boredom to be had, the Sea Otter has mountain biking at its heart.  It does include a road stage race over the four days, BMX demos, test courses for riders to try out new products, and - best of all - no cigarette smoke for miles around.  

Pros were being interviewed on camera, signing autographs and posing for pictures. (Wouldn't you know it, my iPhone was not charged up; no pictures to show you.) It was a restless tribe of exuberant humanity, an oasis for bicycle-loving bedouins who will all be gone tomorrow.  The energy was high and a family atmosphere reigned.  Everyone there had something to do or see at every point in the weekend of the festival.

Swimming is still my mother sport, but cycling has a special place in my heart.  There will always be an unfortunate and sometimes literal collision between bicycles and motor vehicles in the American west; we will never really be a peaceable society that moves calmly about on two wheels, intelligent and practical as that may seem to we who like the idea.  As fuel prices climb and alternatives to gasoline are considered and planned, riding a bike - the most efficient means of transportation ever invented by humankind - may become an ever more obvious choice for us to make.

Events like the Sea Otter Classic that promote cycling and give more and more people the spark to get on bikes regularly gradually change the balance so that drivers behind the wheel get more accustomed to sharing the road.

New Toy

I went shopping for an iPad 2 and came home with a Macbook Air.

I won't take the time to review the iPad as I am no expert on electronic products.  But, I was curious to see this particular bit of equipment for myself, especially since we own a Kindle, two iPhones and I write on a Macbook.

The iPad is an exciting tool, I have to say.  It's fun.  Dazzling actually. Apple will sell a zillion of them, and people will think of at least a zillion different ways to have fun with them.  I think the main appeal is that using them feels a lot like play, and not too many products made today can give an adult that sense of unlimited discovery and delight.

But, I didn't buy one.  I bought a Macbook Air instead, and it all came down to being a practical person and prioritizing my needs as I looked at a few different products.  I write, I travel, and I am not tech savvy. The iPad has a "keyboard" but it's really a touch screen that an experienced typist would find somewhat frustrating to have to use heavily. I need to feel the keys and type without looking at the keyboard at all.

When I travel, lugging around a laptop is a chore.  My Macbook weighs 5 lb or so, which is pretty light compared to some beasts I've seen out there.  A few PC-style laptops I've seen are blunderbuses and need a pony to them carry around. The Air weighs 2 lb and is as slim as a magazine.  The iPad weighs even less, but the lack of a keyboard killed it for me.  It was fun to see the features of the new Tiger operating system and all the brilliant applications that make using it wonderful, elegant and alluring.  I came this close to buying one.

Once I realized that virtually all the applications and the operating system were the same on the Air, and it also had a keyboard, I felt my choice was obvious.  

I'm happy with my choice and can travel a little less encumbered than before.  Traveling light is very important to me. I don't want to feel like a beast of burden as I move from car to hotel to airport to train. I am always looking at ways I can shave weight and try to choose items their efficiency and effectiveness.  I think it comes from my days as a cyclist when components and accessories were considered primarily because of their durability and light weight.

So now, back to writing, using the tools I've got.  When my vacation comes up next month, I'll be carrying three pounds less stuff than I would have before, and two pounds of what I will carry uses beautiful, fun and easy-to-use technology.  That much I am savvy about.

The Teeth of the Matter

"Are you a daytime clencher or a nighttime clencher?"

"I do not clench at all," I think to myself. It is impossible to speak, so I shake my head no. I am in the dentist's office for my semi-annual cleaning, and the hygienist is rooting around in my mouth, asking probing questions while she probes with her pointed metal pick.  I remember that Daniel Craig clenches his jaw and looks perfectly fierce, with all his muscles bulging and electric blue eyes blazing. If I were James Bond, I'd clench too, but I am not.  Doing just fine, totally clenchless, here in the dental chair, thank you.  My teeth have been fine for a long time and I expect that they will continue to be trouble-free for an equally long time into the future.

"Your filling back here looks a little bit concave, more so than the last time you were in.  I'm seeing receding gums, worn teeth, that sort of thing. Sure signs of clenching all through here (pressing my gum with a latex-glove-clad fingertip).  And here (tapping with the metal dental pick). And did you say you were flossing regularly?" The dental hygienist is going over my teeth with a fine-toothed comb, so to speak.  She is going over my teeth with a lot of other things, too, and I am beginning to feel a bit worse for the wear. She asks me to open wide, and my jaw clicks loudly.

"Ah ha. TMJ," she says, "Your jaw muscles are probably clenching to try to adjust to the joint misalignment." She extracts her tools and leans into my view so I can see her a bit better. "Does your jaw sometimes dislocate when you chew bagels or apples?  Hmmm?"  I frown, and doubt is nudging under the doorway, creeping into the room.

I glance quickly at the hygienist who is again stuffing all of her fingers into my mouth all at once.  She is talking to me and expecting answers.  She's scraping, probing, polishing and using her squealing dental tool while looking serene, her teeth perfectly aligned and brilliantly clean.

"I'd like to observe your flossing technique," she says crisply, after removing her hands from my mouth finally.

This is akin to showing Yo-Yo Ma your cello technique.  It will never measure up.  Nevertheless, as requested, I show her what I can do, with plenty of wrist flexion, finger dexterity and long trails of floss flicking about in impressive ways.  She's looking at me skeptically and sighing.  I fail the flossing challenge.  Too little up and down, not enough going around corners, and you're pressing too hard on the gums, she says.  She smiles at me and puts all her fingers and a new length of floss back into my mouth to demonstrate the proper technique.

She is talking at length about taking the time to floss, soft pick, and brush regularly, and she goes on for a while about clenching, grinding, jaw misalignment and tooth wear. I am under the impression that my social life is over for good and that I must chain myself to my bathroom sink to remove every bacterium and bit of food that ever crosses my lips or risk edentulation immediately.

I leave the dental office and slink home in a funk, now slotted into the clenching and bad flossing categories of my hygienist's mind. I'm disappointed because I'd actually been brushing diligently, if not flossing regularly.

At home, I sit down to enjoy my lunch, hopeful that the dental visit will become a dim memory very soon.  I bite into my fruit and feel an odd crunch in my mouth.  Clink! A tooth lands on my plate.  A tooth!  Teeth don't just break off for no reason; they must be provoked.  I don't recall biting down on anything like a rock or a nail (who knows, maybe I'd bitten a dental tool).  I look at the tooth, explore my mouth with my tongue and feel a yawning gap back on the lower left side.  I feel no pain and determine that I've broken a crown, most likely by clenching and exerting force on the thing.  I wrack my brain to try to recall any preceding symptoms of impending tooth loss.  Not a one comes to mind.  I wonder if clenching causes amnesia, too.

"I am falling apart," I think. "Literally, my teeth are falling out of my head."  

Now I begin to wonder if I also sleepwalk, sing off key or frighten small children. The creaking door that has held doubt at bay has been pushed open to reveal a host of unfortunate possibilities. I see that tooth lying innocently on my lunch plate and wonder what I might be in denial about, what else could be ready to blow at any second.  I feel like parts of me are simply time bombs, ready to go off with no warning.

Ugh, maybe I have flat feet and varicose veins, too.  Perhaps all my teeth will gradually land on my plate, one by one, when I least expect them to.  I am not so sure about much of anything.  Jeez, I thought I was healthy, in fine fettle.

I call the dentist's office.  They can fit me in at 9 in the morning. They don't seem very concerned; they don't ask if there is pain (there isn't) or how I'm doing (I'm okay).  Sometimes it's just nice to be fussed over and given a bowl of soup and gently rocked to sleep.  I know I'm fine, and the tooth will be repaired again, so what's the fuss? I cannot climb out of the funk I am in.  I don't want to look at the moon tonight; it could crash to the ground or it will be discovered that the man in the moon is a woman after all, or a cross dresser.

The next morning, I am up for my swim and greet my coaches.  He has an obvious limp and she says she has poison oak all over her back, and it's getting worse.  The limping coach had been wading in a creek, tripped on a rock, lost his shoe and smashed his bare foot on another rock. The poison oak coach's rash sounds gruesome and awful; no one wants that kind of itching.  It must be awful.  Wow, I think.

Knowing they are miserable takes the focus off my cratered mouth and my impending second dental visit to recrown the tooth.  I am not alone in my suffering.  Knowing they are worse off than I am helps my empathy reassert itself and my blue mood of self-pity evaporate.  I look around at the other swimmers arriving and realize I am among friends who accept me the way I am, poorly flossed teeth and all.  We share our war stories but also urge each other to swim a little further, return tomorrow.  We can face our challenges anew now that we have suffered together for a little while.

I wouldn't go so far as saying I'm glad I have a tooth war story to tell, but I can say my friends are a pretty durable bunch, what with hobbled feet, itching rashes and bulging disks.  It may be hard getting old, but it's much harder without friends.

Good Ol' Pacific Grove

My hometown, which claims to be "America's Last Hometown," is kicking up its heels this weekend.  We took a look around Pacific Grove downtown yesterday and left the mobs of people collected up and down Lighthouse Avenue to their frolic not much afterward. It was very crowded, but it was all peaceful and pretty mellow.  Little kids, dogs and their adults probably numbered several thousand.

The festival is called Good Old Days and includes a parade, which we saw, and then a two-day craft and food fair.  Other events that go on are much less visible and include a quilt show at the Chautauqua Hall.  There are three or four "stages" where bands play for a one-hour stint and then give up the space to the next band.  So, you hear all kinds of music, ranging from middle school rock bands just cutting their teeth musically to cover bands playing Beach Boys or Helecasters favorites.  It looked like about six blocks of Lighthouse were stuffed with people shuffling along enjoying the opportunity to eat exotic foods all the way from Deep Fried Twinkies to Thai Panang Curry.  Bring on the Alka Selzer!

Very seldom has the Good Old Days enjoyed such fine weather for the entire event.  Yesterday was a little cool and breezy, but it in no way kept anyone from the area.  I'd say there were close to two hundred craftspeople selling a wide range of products.  We bought some gourmet vinegars from one of five different vendors, some Kettle Korn (I'm a sucker for the stuff), and shared a Lucy Lucy! sandwich from Babaloo, a local food truck that sells Cuban-style sandwiches.  The Lucy Lucy consisted of sauteed dark chicken meat, Jack cheese, and a tasty avocado and mango salsa on a crusty panini-style roll.  They had other inventive selections named after characters on I Love Lucy, and after eating the sandwich I had, I'll be looking for their truck around town from now on.

I hear singing and music echoing up from the fair even as I write.  I would be the Chamber of Commerce is going to be completely happy with the event, and so will the thousands who have attended, bought trinkets and eaten themselves into a fog of fair-food happiness.  Those were the Good Old Days.

Chiaroscuro

I looked up at the dark predawn sky and saw nothing, looked more carefully and saw the merest hint of clouds to the east.  They were more a dreamy suggestion of what might be a cloud eventually.  Not even that much definition existed.  I even wondered if I was just hopeful to see clouds.  But the dawn came up steadily if not slowly.  

I had a satisfying swim, not just because the clouds had become visible, but because it was the end of a long week of work and I had a full span of daylight in which to be healthy and alive.  I do count my blessings.  I know I am fortunate.  I do not take anything for granted.

It was an immense relief to begin a day that, from the minute I first noticed those dim outlines in the east, suggestions of clouds -- and not simply clouds but grand piles of slowly roiling collections of charged moisture and air currents -- I chose to do the things that were beautiful, pleasurable and interesting.  It's the way I have to regain a sense of what is good and right in life.

We drove to the water's edge, parked and walked a mile or so to a favorite breakfast spot and ate out in the fresh air, and I tasted every bite, eating slowly, savoring my meal.  It was delicious.  We went to the Friday Farmer's Market and took our time walking to and fro, talked to a couple of friends we chanced on there.  Every flower was vivid, each display of greens or fruit was rich with color.  All of it seemed splendid.  The clouds were now thick and white, piled up high like mounds of cream and the wide sky was intensely blue as if painted there by exuberant patriots.

I took a long luxurious nap and ate a late lunch made of the meat and mushrooms we'd purchased earlier.  Fresh, simple flavors.  That's all it was and all it had to be.  Absolute simplicity was exactly perfect, a relief, a splendor.

We walked downtown and saw a movie.  It was a matinee, so we were nearly alone in the theater and wallowed in the happiness of picking our favorite sweet spot in the theater, not too close and not too far away.  I felt like some sort of charm had been cast on the day, a beneficent sweetness that allowed all stress to float away like a film of chaff on a river's surface.  Simplicity was cleansing my spirit, creating a chiaroscuro contrast with the past week of work.  

With a half hour left before sunset, we drove to Asilomar and saw the new version of the early dawn clouds assembling on the western border of the visible sky and the sun gilding the edges of the waves.  It was sunset, 14 hours after I'd first awakened, and the clouds' presence in ever-changing colors and forms reflected the regeneration of my energy, sense of optimism and joy.

Restoration of the spirit is possible.  At times when simplicity is all I can handle, it is simplicity that brings me the greatest peace of mind.

Life Is

While the light was still rising and the day was still fresh, my garden, modest, small and quiet, simply existed.

Luckily for me, I went and looked at its little glories.  

How fine this bit of life looked today, dressed in lavendar.  An iris:  Exquisite, silent, perfect, asked nothing, not even admiration. If I had not noticed, what then? It bloomed anyway, with or without my attention.  It had gathered in all the loveliness of Spring and offered it as six petals on a stem.

Who says there is no magic in the universe?  

Messenger Between Realms

There is a wide sweeping curve that defines the edge of Monterey's harbor, and at the curve a long pier stretches eastward like a pointing finger.  Many small sailing craft are moored on the leeward side of it.  The pier and the two other wharves nearby are places where blood and oil, working men and tools grind and snarl.  Cars roaring in four lanes of traffic raise a din of grinding noise, a ceaseless reminder of human-made mechanized life dominates everything.  All visible humanity and its products are related to mass, weight, inertia and momentum.  Engines and wheels thunder without pause, and we are constrained by their certain limits.  We seem to move freely, but we are bound by the limitations of the machines and our own bodies.

One morning recently, one that now seems to have been long ago and dream edged, the low-slung sun- light drained color from all things so that there appeared to be thin layers of silver filigree.  A fine mist hung low and soft everywhere.  Its veil filtered life's color to a palette of ash, charcoal and bone.

I noticed the light's mystery as a lifting expectation within me.  It all looked so pale, as if the very edge of time existed in the opacity of still sea and thick cloud.  The edge of the world was obscured, erased and smudged away by the mist itself.  Then I saw, going north by northeast, a small sloop, sailing away from my view, a lonely shape with rounded hips and a tall gray mast with a white sail furled on the boom.  In a breath's time it was lost in the silver morning, gone into the dreamscape of a shrouded space that I could not see.

I drove on, taking hard glances at the view as long as it was visible.  That part of the roadway does not afford a stop for lingering and contemplation.  That is the constraint of the car, the road, the time of day when humans rush from home to work; the courier sloop bearing messages to and from the spirit world is missed. The solitary boat's curving shape, its curious disappearance into the enveloping silver gauze cast a surreal spell that put me onto other tacks myself.

Myth is full of creatures who transcend space and time; messages are carried to and received from the gods. Gifts are bequeathed by supernatural powers and brought back to us by the sleek messengers. We seek to know what is in store for us, and wish to know the wisdom of the gods and the ages so that we will not suffer and will not want anymore.  We seek to know and become godlike ourselves, and every myth tells us that this is folly.  The spirit ships and silver arrows that are sent past the edge of knowing carry our hopes and desires.  Many stories tell of the fall of the vain and proud.

The boat appeared to be such a vessel, curving and graceful.  It was not bound by earthly constraints.  It appeared and then moved directly into the spirit world, perhaps sent there at the bidding of Poseidon or Zeus.  I felt a strong urge to look for it, but the only way I could follow was with my imagination.

The urge was more a need that we all feel to be free of gravity and aging, to be lifted to a new dimension of limitless flight or timeless beauty or boundless creativity.  We see the flight of angels at the outward hurtle of a waterfall or tumbling clouds in a storm or a perfect flowers rising from the black wet earth.   Time and again we endeavor to be free of the burdens of gravity and the pain of ordinary existence and then fall back and realize our limitations.  We peer into voids and hope so dearly for enlightenment and relief of ignorance and grief.

But the seeking, the upward curve of grace visible amidst the thundering rush of machinery and chaos, the brief glimpse of perfection - if we are looking - gives rise to hope and briefly lifts the constraints of our humanity.