The Wood-Pussy

As I was spreading out a pile of duff and detritus gleaned from the side of the old family home, I decided to also clean up part of the driveway under the madrone tree, where we sometimes sleep out. The dirt hump was killing me during last night’s lunar eclipse. As the blood red moon crossed the sky, the Milky Way, the heart of our galaxy, was a brilliant swath of stars. The water road in full flood. Last night, I couldn’t get comfortable, so I decided to level the dirt hump out. There was one tantalizing red shag carpet thread poking out of the dirt that I pulled and pulled trying to get to the bottom of it. The hardpan cracked. I pulled and pulled that thread. No end in sight. Like a red herring leading me on. Like trimming a sail. Pulling the wind in close to your chest. Ariadne’s thread, a guide to the labyrinth of the past. I dug up a large tuft of rotted red carpet. And another. I found a huge colony of amaryllis, or naked ladies, nested on top of it, and flakes of embedded plastic and paint. It was from the hull of the old 1940s Wood-Pussy sailboat my uncle had raised from the bottom of Tiburon Harbor. Don’t know how it got to the West Coast. Uncle John thought he was going to restore the 13’ sailboat. A weekend project that never happened. Like the pile of galvanized sheeting he was going to make into a greenhouse. Never happened.  All those lost weekends of good intentions got away from him. And now it’s too late. My mother made a teepee from the old sails. The mast and rudder disappeared along with the centerboard. And I had turned the bow of that little sailboat into a planter circa 1970. But the gophers had drilled through the bottom of the boat and climbed up it to get to the bulbs planted in its bow. Only the toxic naked ladies survived their voracious hunger. Ah, but the imaginary trips we all took in the stern of that little wooden catboat sailing towards unknown shores. A generation of cousins sat in that boat, the wind luffing our hair. I thought the little dingy had long since been removed. But someone had filled it in with dirt. I had been sleeping on the carcass of the Wood-Pussy. A WoodPussy,  dubbed a Woodie by afficionados, is a Yankee name for a skunk. The little stinker became an archaeological dig, like a viking burial ship of the past. I found the rusted metal metal bars that bridged the sides of the boat, broken glass, toy wheels, brass screws, a doll’s white go-go boot, pennies, a soda straw, cigarette filters, more shag carpet in green. My inheritance. Now my penance is to clean up all that embedded toxic marine paint, punky wood, fiberglass and resin parches, and shag carpet that once lined the hull of the boat. And maybe to resurrect some of those old dreams.

• Excavating the Wood-Pussy, Part II

DEAR GOOGLE, Google’s Blogger took down my memorial service post April 3, 2011 Resurrection not possible

Google’s Blogger took down my Juanita Musson memorial post at Olompali on April 3, 2011 stating it went against community standards. My Blogger post would’ve been dated on April 3, 2011, or sometime later that month. I am trying to resurrect bits of it via Facebook posts. I wonder if this iconic bathtub photo of Juanita is the reason why Google took my blog post down to begin with? How do I get it back? 

From Facebook: It's been confirmed: Juanita Musson's Memorial Service is on Sunday April 3rd, 2011 Olompali Ranch in Novato—Noon to 3pm. Please wear bright muumuus & Hawaiian shirts! A cock or a monkey on your shoulder, bedpans of food and wild Juanita stories will do...what a peculiar tribe we've been! Juanita Musson's memorial at Olompali, Sunday, April 3, 2011. It  was a Gate 5-ish reunion of sorts. Juanita stories abounded. Do you have a Juanita story or photos, etc? Post them here.

We were all trying to remember the 60's with little success — with Jerry Tomlinson, Yerushalmi Ben Yehudah, Larry Otis, Kurt Crowbar Kangas, Shannon Cinnamon McCloud, Stuart Ramsey, Lynn D Kircher, Neil O'Neill, Julia Brigden, Letitia Graves, Caron McCloud,  Laurie Steese, and Shiloh Sophia. (Stuart's gone now...)

 friends that were not in group photo: Pagan Neil and Carolyn Heal

"The food's good but not necessarily the temperament of the cook". —Juanita's Galley, Gate 4 and a half, Sausalito 

If you had complained, she would've walloped you with a frying pan. Then it wouldn't matter at all. 'Course if you were blottoed, she could've crowned you one and you wouldn't have noticed!

We met a lot of folks at the memorial that sort of knew, or people who looked familiar, or we were at the same place/time thing. I recognized Jerry Tomlinson who lived at Rancho Olompali when it was a Grateful Dead commune. I remember going to parties there, wading in the grotto. Before that, I got my saddle fixed there—so it was a three-wave tier of memory rolling in. 

We went to Sonoma and partied late into the night. Our host, Tim was a friend of Norton Buffalo's—so sad to see Norton's Ovation guitar silent, by the fireplace. Neil sang. We walked in the sculpture garden. Amazing place over the hill from Beltaine Ranch. One woman Caron, was with Greg Davis in the wayback days—so her kids were related to an old flame of mine, Geoff Davis! Another woman I met went to school with my brother Guy. Shannon McCloud. We all trundled up to Sonoma—Nuns Canyon and drank and feasted until the stars sighed. https://picasaweb.google.com/MoHurleyArt/RelaisDuSoleil#

I'm uploading the last of the photos now. Two more folders to go. I'll leave them all at the end of the album so it's easier to distinguish them form the earlier ones (I had 3 cameras going—and Neil had one too). https://picasaweb.google.com/MoHurleyArt/JuanitaMemorial#

You rarely got what you wanted at Juanita’s Restaurant, but you got a lot of it http://mohurley.blogspot.com/2007/08/you-rarely-ever-got-what-you-wanted-at.html

DEAR GOOGLE, Blogger removed 13 of my blogposts for no reason

 

Who else had their Blogger posts removed by Goofle for “violating community standards” yesterday? Not only did Blogger remove my posts, Blogger posted a big red FRAUDULENT BLOG banner over my entire blog. At least there was a link to contact Blogger and refute the charge. But it was alarming to say the least. Heavy handed, more like. Big Brother’s other name is Google. Move over, Facebook. I thought for sure I had been somehow hacked, or perhaps ransomeware was involved, but after a thorough security check, all systems checked out.

I had 13 of my original posts, for which there was no back up, deleted, now restored TG. But what a rough 20 hours it was, a total nightmare. And a lot of time wasted that could’ve been avoided. Seriously #epicbotfail. Last night I took 170 screenshots to document my nearly 4000 blogpost titles. I spent the entire morning restoring deleted files. Please excuse my lack of clarity, at present I really do have pigeon brain.  

Red flag warning (teaching journal)

 

Nothing quite like being wired & tired, allergic & itchy all at the same time, and desperate for sleep during a diablo windstorm with a red flag warning. I woke up this morning with my mind on sneezing. I hate it when you sneeze so hard that you can’t catch your breath, and the next one’s coming down the track like a freight train on speed. You sneeze so hard, scuttle backwards and jackknife like a crawdad on steroids and wind up in the next county and you consider using Depends. Yesterday the entire Northbay was under a red flag wind warning. The Sudafed is still kicking my butt, the tiny glass of wine wore off long ago. I’m sure it didn’t help. I don’t dare have more wine because of my allergies. It hit me hard—earlier I was both drunk and wired sober at the same time. I was both coming and going—not pleasant. Cheap date. I touched my eye and then had another allergy slam dunk attack. Nothing helps with the heavy sulfuring of the vineyards because it’s not pollen. Alexander Valley is under a yellow haze. The wind is blowing fiercely, practically a gale. That last bit is enough to keep me edgy and wired to the gills. Not to mention the Sudafed which dried up more than my sinuses. Good thing I didn’t take two, or I would be orbiting with Elon Musk’s satellites. I’ve taught poetry to kids in three counties this week. Nine classes. And also another day job. Same schedule next week. I’m wound up tighter than a tick. And I am drop dead tired to boot. Oh, and I forgot to add that the mosquitoes circling like vultures. They know a good thing when they smell it.

San Geronimo Valley Spring Arts virtual art show, painting, drawing, photo

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The 31st Annual ‘It’s Virtually Spring’ Virtual Art Show. You can view this year's incredible work to SGVCC Instragram and Facebook accounts. You can also visit the online gallery here:

I can’t believe that I was dropped from the SGVCC Spring Art Show, an oversight. Larry was very apologetic, but it’s the second time this has happened. As an elder arts promoter, I managed to get both Barbara Scott and Sam Fisk to enter pieces. I made three triptyches of Barbara’s art, so she had 9 pieces total. She works in threes, so they looked great. Sam and I went to the Immersive Van Gogh exhibit and a created a paint night afterwards, so both our paintings were from that experience. I did a riff on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers 22x24”. The stabilo pencil drawing is of Elephant Mountain, Nicasio 9x6”. And the photo is of Chileno Valley.