Dreams, Memories

          I’m blaming the heat and my lack of work for what’s happening in my brain:

          Last night I went to sleep at 10:15 and woke up at 4:45. When the cat heard me stirring, she came out from under the bed, where I had occasionally heard her heavy sighs throughout the night.  I cuddled with her for a minute, remembering a dream in which I wore yellow socks and was mad at John because the floor of his room was so dirty the bottoms of the socks were black.  I laid awake until about 5:30. Then I had this dream:

          I dreamed I was in a house with white walls. It was hot outside. I thought I better close the sliding glass doors. I stood for a moment and thought, something’s missing. Walter! I’d left him outside in the heat. He was sitting by the patio door. I let him in.

          I turned on a big screen TV. A show about darling teenage girls was on. They had braces on their teeth.  I was sitting on the floor, watching the show and turned to Walter, who was now a  seventeen-year old boy. He had very black hair, cropped short, but not too short, about an inch long, it was thick and lustrous. He wore a long sleeved white shirt and white pants with a black belt.  He wore the latest style for young guys: a 1” wide black tie, like a very thick ribbon, tied in a stiff bow, with two long “tails.” He was absolutely adorable.

          He said a sentence with a made up word in it that started with a V. I knew it was not a real word but I got his meaning. He didn’t like living in a city. He missed the country.  I told him I did too.

          The outfit he wore was very much like what Tom Gray was wearing the first day I saw him at SMCC in 1968.  Tom was sitting, leaning against a sycamore tree.  He wore the white shirt, white pants, black belt, but also had a black vest and brown suede boot moccasins. His hair was medium brown, to his shoulders.

          I had gone back to SMCC with the intention of meeting “a guy” who would take me out of LA.  In January 1970 we left LA for Mt Shasta. Tom returned to LA a few months later without me, under the auspices of trying to get a recording contract.  I stayed until May 1971.

          I think the reason I’m stalled, writing my memoir, is that I’m not looking forward to writing about those years because they were traumatic and I made so many stupid mistakes.  According to Jane Fonda’s latest book, Prime Time, the last one-third of our lives should be spent reflecting on and coming to understand the previous two-thirds of our life, how we got to where we are, what we learned.

          I saw wonderful therapists in the 1970s and 1980s and thought I had come to terms with the mistakes of my youth.  But now they resurface. Now I have the opportunity to look at them with the added “wisdom” I’m supposed to have gained from my experiences since.

          We’ll see. So far, in writing my story I haven’t done much editorializing. I re-read the first few chapters today and found that the ones I like best are the ones in which one main event occurs, not where I cover several years at a time.

          So when I write about meeting Tom, I will have to describe my delight at finding that he was in one of my classes and how I casually  asked him if he knew where I could get some mescaline.  I’ll have to describe that tiny one-room cottage in Ocean Park where he first played Mozart for me on tinny speakers and how his body felt like an ironing board when we laid on his narrow bed.

          In the meantime, I look at my dog with different eyes. Of course I know he’s not a seventeen-year-old boy, but he is my constant companion. He delights when he sees me return from being out, or just from being in another room. Like a kid he’s excited when I ask him to find his squeaky. He brings it to me with bright eyes, anticipating what?

That I’ll steal it, throw it, roll it down the hall?  Or is what I call anticipation just pure delight that he has a squeaky toy and someone bring it to?  

BRAND LOYALTY

          Is it because I’m a Taurus that I place so much importance on brand loyalty? Does buying the same products year after year feed my need for security?  When I try something new I have a momentary feeling of anxiety - what if I like the new brand better? Or is my life just so boring that any change shakes things up?  I think part of it is this never-ending drought and heat. Watching lawns die was one thing but now that the leaves of beautiful mature trees are crinkling up and drying out two months before normal, I need something to distract me.

          So yesterday I went to Walmart. Walking down the school supply aisle I feel like I’m twelve-years-old again. I want to buy a new pencil box! But I have four already that are in perfectly good condition.  Oh, look at the cool new rulers! I don’t need a ruler. But I do need a new spiral notebook.  I can buy three-subject college-ruled or one-subject wide ruled. I want one-subject college ruled.  I choose two wide-ruled and have a tingle as I anticipate all the information that will be committed to these pages. When I get home I date the front and retire the April-August one to a nearby shelf.

          I pick up two packets of pencils: black for boys and pink flowers for girls. These are for the class I’m supposed to start teaching on August 23, a six-week program at Art2Heart dance & art studio. It’s been five months since I finished my program at Tom Daniels Elementary and none of the classes I proposed for summer panned out.  I hope I remember how to teach.

          But back to new things: for a long time I’ve watched TV ads for Garnier hair products.  I’m tantalized by the promise of shiny tresses, even though my hair is short now.  The reason I’ve never bought their shampoo is that I can’t stand the apple-green color of the bottles.  My bathroom has a beach theme with soothing blues and purples. True, I have a magenta towel, but that’s still a “cool” color.

          In the last few years I bought Pantene, in white bottles, until my nieces ex-boyfriend, a hairdresser, said it coats your hair with wax. I switched over to Dove, also in white.  This year I bought Clairol Herbal Essence because (1) I remember when my mother used to wash my grandmother’s hair in the bathtub, the first year Herbal Essence came out – it was dark green and smelled delicious, and (2) the new pale lavender shampoo smelled good.  But those Garnier ads kept calling to me.

          Not long ago I bought Garnier under-eye roller, which is a concealer with caffeine that’s supposed to diminish dark circles and puffiness. I don’t have a lot of puffiness but I’ve always had dark circles, which my mother used to say looked like “two burned holes in a blanket.”

          So, yesterday I broke down and decided to try Garnier shampoo.  There was a display at the end of an aisle – a sale! But the bottles were nearly quart-size, which would not do at all.  I was not ready to make that sort of commitment, plus I have weak wrists and could barely get my hand around the circumference of the bottles.

          Down the aisle I found smaller sizes and after looking at all the types of shampoo available – for shine, for curls, for thin hair, for dry/damaged hair, etc. I chose Triple Nutrition Fortifying Shampoo for Extra Dry, Damaged Hair.  The green apple smell is lovely.

          But do you think there was a matching conditioner?  No. However I found Sleek & Shine Frizz Defeat Deep Treatment, for Fuzzy, Dry, Unmanageable Hair.  I couldn’t smell it because it’s a foam and I would have had to take out the little stopper and press the top, then where would I rub it?  So I took a chance and bought it.

          When I went to bed I felt like I did when I was a little girl who had new shoes to wear to school the next day.  I couldn’t wait to slip them on and yet I felt sad that the smooth soles would get scratched up with wear.

          After my morning walk, which was unusually muggy and oppressive, I fed the dog, fed the cats, had a glass of juice and took a shower.  I inhaled the green apple fragrance as I squeezed shampoo into my palm. Too much?  Not enough? Rinsing, I found my hair felt nice and slippery, but I still had to put on the Deep Treatment and let it set for three minutes.  I turned down the water to a dribble while I washed and shaved my legs.

          And now, after a delicious breakfast and cup of coffee I sit at my desk with my hair air-drying, giddy with anticipation that I may have something new to love.

Lunch at Camp Verde General Store

            Yesterday I went to lunch with neighbor ladies, Dottie, Sandy, and Sue. They took me where I’d never been, to the Camp Verde General store, about a ten-minute drive out of town. 

            The store was established in 1857 because “army regulations prohibited the sale of intoxicants upon the reserve” -Ford Camp Verde. Four years earlier Secretary of War Jefferson Davis petitioned congress to appropriate $30,000 so the army could experiment with camels for army transportation and military purposes.  The bill was approved in 1855. In 1856 the first shipment of nine dromedaries from Egypt, twenty burden camels and four of mixed breed arrived at Camp Verde, with four native drivers.  A second load for forty more camels arrived the next year.  The third shipment, used as cover on a slave ship were turned loose to range the coast.

            When the civil war broke out there were fifty-three camels at Camp Verde. The fort was captured by the Confederacy in February 1861 but was recaptured by the U.S. Army in 1865.  The camels were excellent pack animals but when the war ended there were not enough funds to continue the operation. In 1869 the fort was deactivated but the store and post office continued to supply pioneer families.  The original structure was destroyed in a flood in 1910 and rebuilt.  In 2005 the new proprietors “carefully and conscientiously introduced a new spirit to this part of the Texas Hill Country . . . with spectacular outdoor patio . . . a front porch that invites you to ‘sit a spell’ and enjoy the day.”

            We certainly enjoyed our lunch – King Chicken, spinach salad,  pecan cobbler and iced tea  - only $6.77 each – in one of the high-ceilinged shelf-lined rooms displaying home made jams, body and bath products, kitchen items, art, candles, jewelry, etc.  When the weather finally cools it will be nice to go back and eat outside.  We plan to get together for lunch monthly, although Dottie will be returning to Colorado at the end of September.

            I’m happy that they included me. I love being with women. Conversation moves so easily from topic to topic. We always learn something from each other and about each other.

            A minor disappointment:  I won’t be teaching at Kerr Legacy Christian Academy. Turns out there are only fifteen students in the entire school; only three who were interested in working with me. I am willing to do it, but expect to be paid my normal rate, which the principal said the parents would not be able to afford.

            However, Lorraine has me set up to teach at Art2Heart, starting August 23 for six weeks. I have no idea how many children, or what ages will be there, as this is part of after school art/music program. But I’m game.

            Speaking of children – a must-see documentary Koran by Heart aired on HBO last night.  It’s fascinating.  Afterwards I read an interview with the filmmaker on Huffington Post. Shooting a documentary is so different from working with a script. He had to shoot tons of footage of many children who participated in the international recitation competition last year in Cairo, then edit down to cover the stories of the most fascinating kids and their families: boy from Tajikistan, girl from the Maldives.  We’re reminded that children are empty vessels into which adults pour information. Who would these children become if they were raised in America?  Who would we be if had been raised somewhere else?  My mind tingles at the thought.

POETRY & POLITICS

          Last week, on John’s birthday, we got a brief rain shower which took the temperature from 99 down to 80 and made it possible to enjoy a lovely dinner on the deck of the Pinnacle Restaurant in Comanche Trace, a nearby golf-course development. Thank you neighbor Bobby for a delightful evening.

          Other social engagements included lunch with my friend Deborah and dinner with next door neighbor Dottie.  I took Deborah by the Kroc Center and she loved the yoga room with its wooden floor and mirrored wall. The next day she met with the fitness manager about teaching a class in Nia this fall.  How fun it will be to take her class!  I remember how I loved Kim’s aerobic dance class in the 80s when we’d bop around to Annie Lennox and the Cars . . .

          Dottie is an upbeat octogenarian who lives next door half the year; the other half she lives in Colorado. She looked so pretty in turquoise.  Speaking of our elders, I’m enjoying my friend Jane’s mother’s book Everyone’s Good for Something about her life growing up in Minnesota in the 1920s and 1930s.  What we would consider hardship, such as  no indoor plumbing, were simply facts of life. Doing laundry was a big  production, from boiling water in huge vats on the stove to hand-wringing. Only when there was a hard freeze did they hang clothes in the basement, otherwise in winter they’d let the clothes freeze-dry.

          I joined two Texas organizations last week. The first is the Poetry Society of Texas.  They offer one-hundred writing contests, each sponsored by an individual or family. For example the Scott Carle Memorial Award ($100) “offered by Barbara Ann Carle of Friendswood, in memory of her son, for the best poem about the loss of a family member.” I’m going to submit “Losing My Father.”   Another is the Grayson/Logan prize ($100) “offered by Budd Powell Mahan of Dallas for his animal companions, for the best poem of 50 lines or fewer that includes or is about an animal. Any form.” For this I chose “Two Cats Watching” written in 1994.

          It’s painstaking and tedious but a must if I want to continue being a published poet.  A benefit of pulling out old work is that with fresh eyes I see things that I want to change. Many of my poems are long, so having a line limit – most are limited to 25, 32, 36 lines – makes me go back and see what I can cut.

          The other organization I joined is the Libertarian Party of Texas. I became a Libertarian in 1992 and ran for state senate in 1998, in California’s 12^th district.  At the time John and I were working in an office on Highway 41 so I contacted local Libs and had them come sign my petitions, which waived the filing fee. However, my district covered five counties, so I relied on people I’d never met to get signatures for me. When I showed up at the election office I discovered that the fellow from Tuolumne County had not turned in all his petitions because, supposedly, they’d blown out the window of his car!  I had to pay about $80.00.

          The process is different in Texas. If I want to be on the ballot I simply submit my name to the party.  Also, party affiliation is determined after you’ve voted – so you don’t have to choose when you register.

          As there was no chairman in my county, I’ve volunteered to be it. Once the head of the party returns from South America, and he approves me, I’ll have access to names of local Libertarians. Then I’ll plan a get-together, probably at a local restaurant.

          Many people think belonging to a third party is a waste of a vote. I used to think this too. I was raised a Democrat and never thought of changing until I met John and found that Republicans weren’t the close-minded, money-grubbers I’d been led to believe. I listened to what he had to say – he was raised believing that Democrats were greedy bastards – and then took a look at the platforms of each party.

          I found that I agreed with the left on many social issues but with the right on fiscal issues. In sort, I’m of the mind that the whole political system has become entrenched with professional politicians beholden to “special interests” – corporations on the right, unions on the left.

          I spent two days reading the Texas Almanac, realizing I needed to understand not only the political process but how we got here. The first thing that impressed me is that the Texas legislature meets only every other year, for six months.  Occasionally a special session may be called. All legislators earn $7,200 a year. Plus about $100 per diem. 

          There is no initiative process like in California but there are proposals to amend the state constitution.  I believe there will be twelve proposed amendments in next year’s election.

          I found the history of Texas fascinating. The five points of the Lone Star represent the five flags under which Texas has been ruled:  Spain, Mexico, the Republic, Confederacy and United States. It was interesting to find that there was a huge rift when it came to the Civil War. Most of the state did not want to join the Confederacy and did not endorse slavery. However, the eastern cotton-producing part of the state relied on slaves and since that’s where most of the money was generated, they won. Still, there were many abolitionists in Texas and from the early years education for blacks was a priority.

          I have five proposals out to teach starting in late August.  I’ve never liked the hot summer months when I’m away from “my kids” and this year is no exception. I was touched that one of my students in California sent a message that he missed me this summer at Vision Academy of the Arts.

          Now it’s time to hit the gym. I’ve started riding the exercise bike because afternoons have been too hot for a proper walk. At least mornings are pleasant, high 70s, so Walter and I can take a half-hour to amble through the neighborhood. With his nose he checks his “d-mail”  while I listen to NPR and nod to the deer who stare at me with their big eyes. Today I was happy to see a big, long-eared jack rabbit gamboling through a dry meadow. 

WALTER

    

          Today is the tenth anniversary of finding our dog Walter.  John and I were working for Rosedale Products, in a strip mall on Highway 41 in Coarsegold.  I was on my way to Goldmine Pizza to buy some taco soup. A man I’d never seen before said, “Is that your dog?”

          I turned around and saw a medium-sized, black-and-white dog  following me.  I said, “No. I’ve always wanted a dog but my husband doesn’t like dogs.”

          The man said, “Well, he sure looks like he wants to be your dog.”

          I looked at the dog. He panted up at me, ears slightly raised, deep brown eyes imploring.  I switched directions and led him back to the office.

          Nan’s desk was to the left of the front door. Mine was straight ahead behind a line of black file cabinets. I had a view of the creek. A white soji screen created a bit of privacy.

          To the right of the front door was Cyndy’s old couch, covered with a pink and blue sheet. The dog jumped up on to the couch.

          “Who’s that?” Nan said, getting up.  The dog licked her hand when she petted him.

          I told her I’d found him and was going to the market to get him some food.  I returned ten minutes later. The poor thing was famished. He was also thirsty, lapping up two bowls of water.

          I phoned my friend Pat, who fosters dogs and cats for the local SPCA. She came over. “He’s a good dog,” she said, sitting on the couch beside him.  I had hoped she’d take him home with her, but she already had six cats.

          The funny thing about memory is that I don’t remember John’s comments about the dog until that evening, even though his office was right there too. But with his door closed he was in a world of his own.

          I must have taken the dog home in the back of the Explorer. Or was it the Jeep? I drove him to our house on Quartz Mountain, which was only a year old.

          I tied the dog up in the patio with a clothesline. I hadn’t yet learned that he chewed through everything except metal.  It was a warm summer night.  John had his shirt off.  I said, “I didn’t imagine myself with this sort of dog. I thought I’d have a small, brown, female dog, not a big mutt.”

          John said, “You married a mutt.”

          “So, do you want to keep him?” I asked John.   He must have said, “He’s your dog,” because even after ten years he has not brought himself to like the dog. I named him Walter, after Walter Matthau a favorite actor, who used to be seen ambling down Chatauqua to State Beach.

          When I’m out of town and John takes care of Walter, he throws sticks for him in the “side yard”, the vacant lot next door, instead of taking him for walks.

          I have mixed feelings about the dog. He was a lot more fun when he ran free every day. It was such a delight to watch him gallop on the open trails, head high, smiling.

          Now Walter spends most of his time lolling on the floor within eye shot of me.  At six o’clock he tugs me from bush to bush on our blistering hot afternoon walks.

Culture Shock

        

          I’ve lived in Texas less than ten months and already when I go back to California I experience culture shock.

          A week ago I made a trip to the Golden State.  This time I had a direct flight from San Antonio to LA, via Southwest. Three hours. Standing in line at Hertz I chatted with a male flight attendant from Qantas who was on a twenty-four-hour layover. He was headed to Venice beach. By the time we got to the front of the line, a twenty minute wait, the guys in back of us said, “You two can go.”  They thought we were a couple!  I said, “Oh, we’re not together, he was just willing to listen to me!”

          The Nissan I got stunck of cigarette smoke but I couldn’t face going back inside. I drove to my mom’s house, via Lincoln, stopping at Albertson’s to pick up provisions.  The drive from our house in Texas to the San Antonio Airport is sixty-five miles and takes a little over an hour. The drive from LAX to my mom’s is nine miles and also took an hour.

          My four days were a whirlwind which I will not go into. Suffice it to say that nothing on my list got accomplished. However, because my mother kept saying, “If you’d just let me trim your hair . . . you have such a lovely neck . . .”  I surrendered, went to Supercuts and got a haircut.  At least I did one thing that made my mother happy.

          I promised I would not bitch in this blog but I must mention that the first night I laid awake until 2:30 a.m. listening to a frog.  At first he kept repeating, “Anthony! Anthony! Anthony!”  and later, “He has to take a crap, he has to take a crap.”   I woke up at 4:30, which is 6:30 “my time”.

          The entire trip I was sleep-deprived but at least the hottest it got was in the mid eighties, not 100, as it’s been here. This is the worst heat and drought south Texas has seen in decades.  Good citizens that we are our lawn is completely brown. Soon all lawns will be brown as water restrictions become tighter.

          But getting back to what makes Texas different.  Here’s one thing:

when you ask most people where they’re from, they’ll tell you the city. If you ask a Texan where they’re from, they’ll say Texas.

          In California the distinctions between geographic locations is so distinct.  The North feels superior to the South.  The coast feels superior to the Inland Empire. I remember my own father being proud to say, “I never go east of Sepulveda!”

          This is not the case in Texas.  If you’re from Brownsville or Houston,  Dallas or Austin, you’re treated as an equal. Likewise I notice that blacks, Latinos, Asians or Middle Easterners are Texans, first and foremost.  There is more racial tolerance.

          Likewise, even though Texas is a very Christian state, people here are accepting of varying religions.  The largest Hindu temple in the US is just outside of Austin.

          And then there’s the pace.  True, in the big cities people seem to be in more of a hurry, but most of the state is rural or small-town.  More often than not I get behind a driver going under the speed limit, not over.

          In L.A. I knew I couldn’t handle the

Pacific Coast Highway

at rush hour, so I met my friend Debby, who I’ve known since kindergarten, at her apartment in the Palisades, and she chauffeured me and our friend Geri up to Malibu for a four-hour yak fest with Heidi and Mary Ann.  I had a great time breathing in the fresh sea air and reminiscing with friends.

          John picked me up at the airport on Sunday. I thought we’d stop in S.A. for dinner, but instead we decided to return to Kerrville and have dinner at Billy Gene’s, our favorite restaurant.  Just looking out over the Guadalupe River to the hills beyond settled my heart.

          And then it was home for a reunion with the animals who all forgave me for abandoning them. John was a good daddy, taking Walter to the park, or throwing sticks for him, and caring for the cats.

          Before I knew it I had two writing assignments: on Tuesday I interviewed an ex-pro golfer and on Wednesday the new President of the Chamber of Commerce.  Since then I’ve typed up first drafts and emailed them for corrections.

          Plus, and this makes me really happy, I’m lining up teaching gigs for fall.  Mondays I’ll be offering a class through Adult Ed on memoir writing; Tuesdays I’ll be teaching in an after school program at Art2Heart; Thursdays my poetry class will resume (at my house) and Friday I hope to be teaching at a small private academy.

          Little by little I’m making connections. Slowly but surely I’m settling in.  Six more weeks I’ll be working with children. 

          Hooray, hallelujah, it’s so good to be home.

Happy 4th of July

          My first July 4^th in Texas. Don’t know if we’ll go to the parade. Probably won’t go to the park to see fireworks. This is one of the few towns that’s having a municipal firework display.  Many towns across the country are just too broke and here in south Texas, where the drought drags on, individual fireworks have been banned because of fear of fires.

          I remember the bluffs in Santa Monica catching fire one year and the traffic was bumper to bumper. It felt like a war zone. I watched from the window of my apartment as fire crews climbed down from

Ocean Avenue

to extinguish the blaze. Revelers in convertibles threw beer cans and bottles out of their cars. 

          I’d spent the weekend working at the Sand & Sea club and watched the firework display on the Santa Monica pier with a young Nick Cassavettes and his friends.  His parents John Cassavettes and Gena Rowland were members.  She’s one of my favorite actresses. I remember once when he called with a question about his bill. “Mary Lee from the Sand and Sea,” he said.  I spent fourteen years working on the beach and most of the time it was the perfect job, but Fourth of July was always exhausting.

          Living on Quartz Mountain we would stand on John’s deck and look out toward Fresno and Clovis at dusk.  Then one of us would say, “There!” and point.  We could see tiny dots of red, yellow, and green, for the towns were over thirty miles away.   One year we went to Bass Lake and sat in a little boat with friends. The lake basin filled with smoke and again I felt an unease – noise, smoke, explosions – and was glad when it was over and we could go home.

          Even as a little girl I didn’t like the sparklers my sister lit. I’d  threatened to call the police. I’m such a party pooper.

          The best thing about 4^th of July is that, like Thanksgiving, its non-religious and non-sectarian, for everyone.  I plan to watch the HBO documentary tonight “Citizen USA” (I think that’s what it’s called) about legal immigrants.  I was sickened recently when I read that the INS accidentally notified thousands of hopefuls that they had been chosen in a lottery to immigrate. People sold their homes, their businesses, their properties. Then they were told it was a computer glitch – the lottery picked only from the first few days of applications, not the full thirty, or whatever. Whoever is in charge is completely heartless. He or she should honor their mistake. Period.  But no.

          Yesterday on TV, I heard George Will say that it’s crazy to admit foreign students to American colleges and then after they’ve gotten their degrees deport them. Why not let them stay? We have a shortage of American students getting advanced degrees in medicine, science, etc. Which, of course, is another troubling matter.

          This last week I’ve heard so many stories from friends and family, or read in the paper, that made me think the world does not run on logic but primitive emotion.  Are we all just little children inside, selfish, pouty, inconsiderate of others?

          I think I’ll spend the day pondering my dream: I’m holding on to John’s back, while he swims across a mountain pond.  When he puts his head underwater I’m afraid he won’t see where we’re going. My feet touch bottom. I can feel smooth rocks.  Then I see the green power box and know we’re at the shore. We hike up to a building that’s all lit up – oh, this is part of a hydro-power plant.  The big room is empty but for a reddish rug. Outside a man in cowboy boots dances. I see him through the big windows and dance, too.  The young woman has left her baby outside. She’s smoking a cigarette. Now the dancing cowboy is showing someone around. This is a resort. I wonder how long we’ll stay?