Had an old dog and his name was Blue / you know Blue was mighty true / you know Blue was a good old dog / Blue treed a ‘possum in a hollow log / you can know from that he’s a good old dog / Blue treed a ‘possum out on a limb / Blue looked at me and I looked at him / Grabbed that ‘possum and put him in a sack / Don’t move Blue till I get back
I walk to State Street where I meet Richelle and we go see the movie ‘Slumdog Millionaire’. For me it’s a little disturbing ..reminding me of how cruel people can be to one another. Afterwards, we sit and talk about ‘karma’ ..which I believe is closer to the law of cause and effect than it is to the notion of destiny or fate. No argument there. The next morning I send my sister an IM simply saying that I saw the movie. When I don’t get a reply before I have to leave ..I add: “don’t take it as an endorsement or anything.” She responds immediately asking: “why not ?” ..and says she’s planning to go see it this weekend with my niece. I know she doesn’t like to watch disturbing movies ..so, I tell her to brace herself. She asks me what I mean and I tell her it’s not like what you see on PBS ..it’s a different ‘slice of life’. She’s disappointed ..which makes me feel bad, so ..I tell her to go; it’s definitely worth seeing . She tells me she intends to ..and reminds me that I’ve lied to her about these things in the past. I know she pays close attention to the entertainment news, so, like a jerk, I add: “Ignore the critics who say it’s not a balanced portrait of India ..it may not be balanced ..but it sure is realistic” ..to which she replies: “Well, duh .. how else would they have time for all the romantic stuff” ..and I’m like: “That’s right” ..knowing full well that I’ve just chucked whatever credibility I had left out the window.
Karla arrives here right after school ..we go to IHOP then to the mall for tennis shoes. They don’t have my size so I get a pair of sandals instead ..they don’t have the one’s Karla likes ..so we go looking for a store that carries Adidas without the colored stripes. We find them at a Footlocker store ..but then she remembers that Laura told her not to get them until she sees her grades ..which means I can’t get them without undermining Laura’s authority ..so, we take Andy to the park instead. They wait there while I go to physical therapy ..where I put on a pair of goggles so they can track my eye movements while moving my head around ..to see if my eyes get spastic trying to compensate for problems with my inner ear ..(?) (sense of balance). They say I have problems with ‘gaze stabilization’ ..who’d of thought ..this means I can’t even gaze properly. I thought it was my speciality. Back home, I have a smoothie while Karla has broccoli, avocado and cheese with mayonnaise and soy sauce ..I feel light headed so I lay down for awhile ..later we watch Shrek 2 ..which makes me laugh ..and feel better .. so I make some pasta and stay up to watch Wimbledon highlights ..and Jay Leno. Tonight is Karla’s last night here ..tomorrow Laura arrives home after eight days in Mexico ..untangling immigration/adoption problems. I’ll miss Karla’s company ..she’s good natured and delightful to be with.
Karla comes home right after school today ..thinking its Friday ..so, she plays with Andy ..cleans Fred’s cage (Aria’s pet rat) ..and I take her skateboarding on the strand. I unhook Andy and let him go running on the beach ..where he runs into Judy and Michael ..who love Andy because they once owned an Airedale too. On our way by the skateboard park, some boys howl at Karla and hide .. she is embarrassed ..she knows them from school and says that they are only doing it because they know it makes her mad. Afterwards, we have Pho and Dover Sole at Little Saigon ..I love the way they prepare the fish ..and I drink fresh coconut out of the shell ..which I haven’t done in a long time ..I don’t know why. I ask a couple of the waiters, who recently emigrated from Vietnam ..if they had problems with Hanoi about coming to the US. They say no ..they are foreign exchange students. I tell Karla that relations between Vietnam and the US must be better. She has no idea what I’m talking about ..or even why I asked the waiters anything. See, she says .. even they say there’s no problem ..and I start thinking: maybe I’m the one who’s out of touch. Later, Karla shows me her interior decorating job ..she corrected a problem with the lighting in the guest bedroom. Now people won’t have to grope in the dark to find a lamp switch. I tell her what an excellent job she did.
Summer school and the Boys and Girls club ..Karla is making a pouch for her iPod ..and learning ‘relative clauses’. This evening she reads lyrics while listening to a Jerry Garcia CD called 'Shady Grove' ..which is made up of nineteenth century British and American folk tunes ..sung to guitar and mandolin ..each one tells a story ..some of which she finds funny. I switch to some early Grateful Dead ..and get out a book of lyrics (Box of Rain by Robert Hunter). It’s really not her preference in music ..I know she listens to some pretty classy hip-hop ..people like Chris Brown, Akon and Gwen Stephanie. To her, rock and roll sounds like a party full of loud and obnoxious drunks. That makes me laugh ..but I know what she means. Anyway, she reads along to a few Dead tunes .. says she likes ‘Tennessee Jed’ and ‘Ramblin Rose’ ..and tells me she can hear the similarity between Celtic music and Bluegrass ..and Bluegrass and Grateful Dead (Jerry Garcia started out playing bluegrass in a jug band) ..I feel proud ..we eat leftover chicken and salad for dinner.
Karla leaves for summer school at 8 am ..from there she goes to the Boys and Girls club until 5 pm ..meanwhile I play with Andy ..discuss the creek situation with Raul ..plan my day ..my week ..and my month (don’t know why, everything after this moment is a crapshoot anyway) ..I catch up on my ‘book-keeping’ ..which means paying bills that are either due ..or past-due ..I pick up Karla ..and we go to the post office ..tri-county produce ..trader joes ..and scolaris ..we stock up on sparkling apple cider ..avocados ..brie cheese ..crackers ..oreos ..ice cream ..cup of noodle soup (I hope Laura isn’t reading this) ..and carrots and broccoli (just in case she is) ..but couldn’t find any fresh papaya or mangoes ..we have baked chicken and one of my masterpiece salads for dinner.
I sleep late ..Karla has been up since 7 am watching cartoons ..we go for bagels and cream cheese on Milpas ..then skateboarding and walking on the strand with Andy. We swing by the skateboard park ..but Sean isn’t there ..he’s a surfer dude with long blond hair who sits next to Karla in one of her classes ..there is plenty of sunshine though ..and crowds everywhere ..big pelican convention going on in the tide pools ..and tourists galore ..there’s a van in the parking lot drawing a lot of attention ..it’s plastered, inside and out, with every imaginable icon of American culture ..from the fifties to the present ..in pictures ..figurines ..dolls ..and various assundry paraphernalia ..real kitsch. A picture of Timothy Leary immediately pops out at me ..Karla recognizes Sponge Bob .. Justin Timberlake ..John Lennon ..the cast of Star Wars ..Taz ..and Barbie ..or is that Marylyn Monroe ..Karla says it’s Madonna ..we sit and vegetate at the end of the pier for a while ..then go to Nature Cafe for avocado sandwiches and smoothies ..and another humongous So Cal day slips away.
Today Karla and I went to Ventura to pick up Karla’s clothes ..Laura was in such a hurry to leave that they forgot those ..I didn’t mind ..I chatted with a Gary, an attorney friend, for nearly two hours ..mostly about the reasons why marijuana laws are still on the books ..turns out Uncle John had it absolutely right (you can see his comments here ~> Drug warp) ..Gary also tells me to ‘follow the money’ ..it goes to law enforcement ..prisons ..juvie ..prosecutors .. judges ..narcotics officers ..and keeps the whole ball rolling. He tells me about a client of his, who is allowed to possess a small amount of marijuana for medical reasons ..but tried to trade some of it, to an undercover officer, for equipment to start a hydroponic garden ..and grow like about a thousand plants. Gary tells me the legal limit is closer to 50 plants. Then I’m like, oh shit ..I forgot about Karla ..who is lying on the sofa right behind me ..quietly watching the Disney channel on TV. Driving back, she tells me how funny it was watching the way I pace when I talk ..I try to tell her that I didn’t want to sit down because then we would have been there forever ..but I realize, for her ..we were there forever. We stop at IHOP for lunch. Back at the house, she rides her bike while taking Andy for a walk. I have no memory of what we had for dinner that night.
Karla arrived today ..she is staying with me for a week while Laura travels to Mexico to sort out some adoption/immigration problems. Karla is in summer school studying English at Santa Barbara High. Today’s homework assignment is ‘independent clauses and coordinating conjunctions’ ..which, anyone who reads my writing knows ..I tend to avoid in favor of run-on sentences with little coordination. However, I try to be good so Karla doesn’t pick up any of my bad habits ..although, I don’t understand why they’re using ‘for’ instead of ‘because’ ..I mean, who ever says “She can’t come out ‘for’ she is sleeping” ..? but then again, I’m biased toward writing the way people speak instead of the other way around ..and since Karla is learning how to speak English for the first time ..I’d rather dey be teachin’er da’spokin’ English ..but Karla just looks at me patiently and says ..that’s high point level 5 ..and I look back at her and go ..are you talking about a star wars episode ..? After she has endured a few more confusing exchanges like that ..we go to Little Saigon for pho and seafood ..I’m talking about a SB restaurant ..not the OC community ..a distinction which is also lost on Karla, who is only 13 years old ..from Monterrey Mexico ..and I look at her mercifully .. ‘for’ the poor soul is facing a week-long deluge of inconsequential matter ..made up by a generation that might as well have existed a thousand years ago.
This evening we watched 'Kill Bill 1' ..and saw lots 'n lots'a blood.
I learned something about Andy the other day ..he’s not a ‘bird dog’ like I had originally thought ..instead, I found out that he’s been bred to track critters in the bush ..like otters and possum and stuff. When I think we’re out taking a walk ..he’s out on a hunt. I learned something about rats the other day too. They’re one of the critters Andy was bred to hunt. I have first hand experience with this, because ..I am temporarily in charge of Aria’s pet rat ‘Fred’ while the family is away. It took me awhile, but I have finally given up any hope of trying to negotiate a truce between Andy and Fred ..there’s just too much history. After my final attempt ..while I was putting Fred back in his cage ..Andy defied my order to stay and made a move ..causing Fred to leap out of my hand and into the detritus of my garage ..making himself nearly impossible to find. It was 10 pm ..the end of a long day, and I hadn’t eaten. So, I took Andy inside and began to prepare supper ..figuring Fred would turn up eventually ..and hopefully not dead. Then I started getting these images of wild animals tearing him to shreds ..or my car tires squishing him to death ..and wondering how I was going to explain this to Aria ..when I suddenly remembered that ‘finding critters’ is what Andy does best ..so, I let Andy back in the garage and continued preparing supper ..while listening to him run around and around out there ..and thinking that he’s just excited ..when I go back to find that he’s actually got Fred cornered behind some storage boxes. Now, Andy was not able to see him ..but he could smell him ..and man, he was a dog on a hunt. Andy looked at me and I looked at him ..and then I started throwing boxes out of the way. When the boxes got too heavy to move ..I got a flash light and mirror and spotted Fred between the boxes and the wall. So, I put a jar on one side ..and Andy flushed him into it from the other side. Fred is now safely back in his cage ..apparently unfazed ..and perhaps, who knows, maybe even a little thrilled to have momentarily re-connected with his natural role in the wild. But I’m anthropomorphizing. What I can say for sure is that Andy felt the thrill of the chase ..and he got treated to a steak dinner that night. Fred, on the other hand, got treated to sliced avocado ..which I found out is his favorite dish.
My nightmares entertain me ..it takes a sonic boom to wake me ..daylight blocks my view ..ideals surround me. I follow a windy road ..compounding delusions as I go. People whoosh by like signposts at ninety ..their expectations confound me. Daylight dissolves into disappointment ..and the mist of ideals fading ..but that’s OK ..most of them are my own anyway. My niece Karla spent the day ..which I enjoy greatly ..goes by like a blur though ..we ate at IHOP ..walked around the lagoon at UCSB ..Andy explored ..I showed Karla where the students live ..we cruised Isla Vista ..walked on the bluff ..Andy ran into a volleyball game ..they told him it’s his turn to serve ..got a pair of converse for Karla ..then everyone disappeared ..people sure hang on and let go in a hurry ..only the voices in my head still remain.
Birds are fluttering over my head ..I don’t see them but their shadows look like giant bats swooping across the deck ..I look away but now it feels like they’re coming at me from out of the corner of my eye ..so, I deliberately block images from that channel ..only to see them come in on a different one ..yesterday a hawk landed on a nearby tree in Franceschi park ..Karla and Andy were playing in the woods ..I called them but it flew away before they got there ..probably because I was yelling ..after that we walked into a grove of spongy leaves where Andy could pick up some speed .. I can watch him run like that for hours ..reminds me of ..uhhh ..what’s the name of that Greek god ..the one with wings on his feet ..the Flash ..? Anyway, I turn down the volume of those thoughts and return to the writing table in front of me ..a cold wind blows by ..leaves fly ..the candle goes out ..images of Big Sur arrive ..fade ..and pass away ..now I’m in a gap between images ..now I’ve stopped writing altogether ..and I’m wondering why .. I guess my thoughts are not registering very high on the scale of things that interest me .. I remember reading an interview in the paper yesterday with a college instructor ..and I ask myself what’s so interesting about that. He says that an inflated sense of ‘self’ can actually interfere with success in college ..I guess it seems interesting because it sounds so contrary to popular belief ..I mean, isn’t that how you get ahead in this country ..? No, he says .. it’s actually better to believe that there are things out there that you don’t already know ..softens your defenses ..and puts you in a more receptive frame of mind. He says that students come to school so full of themselves ..they don’t have room for anything else ..the ‘buzz’ of self esteem actually blocks whatever the instructor is saying. I think back on my college days ..and I remember learning pretty quickly that ..I did not know shit ..so I figured I better stay tuned ..otherwise, I’m not sure I would have stuck it out .. probably would have bailed right from the start ..but I stumbled along ..come what may ..now, I don’t remember much ..but I have a vague feeling that I can continue stumbling over most obstacles that get in my way .. but I’m still not so confident that I can quit doing things to bolster my esteem. So, I tell myself, when I look back .. I better have some strange stories to write about.
My sister Cindy is a financial whiz ..she can play the numbers and predict the future of global markets the way other people play the ponies. She’s a master numerologist and has been known to make her devotees a ton of money. You could say that she delivers the goods in a clam shell. A natural born explorer, wherever she goes, adventure and intrigue are bound to follow. She knows how to make ‘em smile ..even while kicking their ass on the tennis court. I ought to know ..the ass was frequently my own.
My bother Steve is a genuine inventor and entrepreneur. Where I come from, we call that a ‘master sorcerer.’ He puts light in dark places ..keeps our homes and vehicles secure ..and helps us exercise the right to vote electronically. See ~~> (Jimmi Jammer) for these and other brilliant ideas. He’s been known to put pre-school children behind the wheel of large computers and turn them into photographers and digital artists (KB Gear). He has given apprentice sorcerers a place to conjure up new spells and practice canticles (tablet digitizer). When he’s not testing new ideas ..he can be seen taking us to new heights (in the Austrian Alps) ..and making us laugh till our heads roll off . Well, you get the picture.
While Laura and Karla put tile in their kitchen .. Andy (the dog) and I went for a BIG walk. We raced up the stone steps of the hiking trail ..passed Brooks College ..and Franceschi park ..Andy knows the way now. We stopped and greeted each of my friends growing in the botanical garden. Then we swooped around the mountaintop ..got a 360 degree view of the mountains and ocean ..and slipped down the backside trail underneath giant Oak trees ..into a place I like to call ‘Middle Earth’. Sometimes when I go there ..I recite ‘The Jabberwocky’ ..from ‘Alice in Wonderland’ ..as loudly as I can. It helps me relieve the tension of too much rational thinking. The other day I taught Karla, my thirteen year old Goddaughter from Mexico, the words to ‘Fish Cheer’ ..by ‘Country Joe and the Fish’ ..so now we sing that as loudly as we can. Although it’s an anti-war song from another era ..Karla likes it because it sounds goofy. However, the other day while she was reading the Spanish newspaper ‘La Opinion’ ..she looked up at me and said: "They really do send them home in a box".
Karla and I made Christmas cards today .. she did the drawings, I did the photomanips ..then she did a remarkable job of putting it all together. Next we cut Andy loose on the athletic fields to chase birds (he never catches any). Karla rides her bike everywhere we go ..she says her favorite subject at school is PE ..and I believe it. This evening, Laura, Karla and I go to Rose’s Cafe for dinner ..and, against Laura’s advice, I order albondigas soup ..it’s not their best dish, but it felt warm. Back at the house, abuelito comes by and drops off another portable basketball net. However, there’s no room for it in the driveway. Not a problem, he says: “When I was a kid, we played in the dirt” ..so we set it up in the back lot.
