Facebook conversation on Lagunitas with Pete Sutton while in the Rockies (oral history) (photo)

Outside my window...YMCA of the Rockies. Petrichor!

Mo: YMCA of the Rockies is pretty amazing. Like summer camp. We landed in Denver, went thru Aurora—yes, that Aurora. Got supplies before heading into the Rockies.

Pete Sutton: Mo, do you ever stay still? Very nice photo.

LOL! Wanderlust at an early age—look at it this way, when I was four and a half and had to walk a mile from Barranca Road to Sir Francis Drake Blvd., I rarely made it in time to catch the bus. Had an equally hard time making it back home on my own steam but your mom Chuck was pretty cool about the little gatecrasher. PB&J sandwiches, and sometimes even a ride home. Still wandering. Er, hobbling...icing the knee now.

Rockies are socked in the AM. Rain last night. Divine petrichor! We're here for the Long's Peak Highland Games—Neil wants to get on the menu for next year. Never been to Colorado before. Wyoming, Idaho & Montana, yes. Saw elk the size of horses down by the Fall River last night. Had bacon for brekkie and thought of you and The Kev. Lots of folks fishing. You'd love that. Thinking a lot of Thano Johnson right now. I ran into his ex-wife, and he wrote me a nice, long, lovely letter about living in Colorado...I was in a horrific car accident and never wrote back. Still feeling guilty. Wonder if he's even still alive?  (Musician Kevin McConnell)

Pete: Thanks for the kind story of my mother.  I of course, do not remember such antics but am very glad you do. I hope that I played with you. Thano was a tough old son of a bitch - he's probably still dodgering around although i doubt it. Colorado s a favorite state of mine. My dad left us in '64 and we started visiting him in Aspen in '65 - nice place , this was before the fucking rich people found it. Why do they always fuck places up by moving there?

Note Bene: Pete’s das was the famous stride pianist Ralph Sutton. Chuck, or Charlene, was friends with Grover Sales, and probably poet Lew Welch (as was my mom).

Mo: Yeah, it's hard not to get pissed off...lots of bullshit estates and luxury homes here—juist like what happened to Marin. Yeah you played with me...sort of...sometimes you ditched me and Nick when Jeff was around... I absolutely adored Chuck. Is she still alive? When did you move to Lagunitas? I remember visiting you a few times there but that was a long way from home—until I got the horses.

Pete: We moved to Lagunitas to the Hawaiian Princess's house on Corona Ave across the SFD blvd divide from Weaver's mountain top enclave during 3rd-4th grade- between Miss Lenz and Mrs Raddick's class. We used to yell  over to the Weaver's from time to time.. "Hey Weaver!"  and one of them would yell back, "Hey Sutton!" and so forth.  I scandalized Mrs R because I read 'The Rise and the Fall of the Third Reich' brought to yours truly by Arrow Scholastic Books. Any way I met the Woodacre crew in her class. Mom died in 2012, May 24th I believe. Then some sonofabitch invents a beer and names it after my home town. Pretty good beer I must say. Not really my home town but what the hell...

Mo: Great story, Pete. So sorry to hear about your mom. I don't even know the names of the roads we played on—I rode them all... Tell me more about the Hawaiian' princess? I remember going inside that house. Like the Argentina House that was TR's old hunting lodge.

Pete never answered my last question. And then, weirdly, deleted all his comments on my Facebook thread. I am glad I saved them here. Research is required. But the Hawaiians came to Marin and Sonoma counties. There was a cane chair factory in Lagunitas, at the old cafe,, and another in Forestville, I think. We had three cane chairs from Lagunitas. Each one had a different patterned bottom of stamped wood. The Hawaiians were called Kanakas.