VIRAL HAIKU

Ice cream is what's for dinner.
Fever finally broke but walking
is a surreal experience.

Slept all afternoon.
Yesterday I was so tired
I dozed off in the car.

Isn't it lovely to contemplate
ice cream for dinner and have no guilt?
Remorse, maybe later.

Maybe that wasn't such a bright idea.
Ice cream is hitting my lower gut
with a renewed vengeance.

Historic Dixie School District to lose its name

In a reference to Nazi Germany, novelist George Orwell wrote, in his science fiction novel, 1984: Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past. In an alarming trend to be "politically correct" replete with an Orwellian twist, school boards are intent on whitewashing the past. In June, a Marin County school board voted to expunge the name of a school, the school district, which includes the historic one-room Dixie School building, now a museum, though its founder, pioneer James Miller, did not support the Confederacy during the Civil War. It's an odd case of guilt by association.

The man who founded the school ca. 1862, rancho owner, Irishman, James Miller had a right-hand foreman who was a Coast Miwok named Dixie, whose wife was Mary Dixie. Miller, who had also adopted two Coast Miwok children, XXXX named the school after her, Hence the name Dixie School, or so one story goes.

Wilfred A. Lang, painter (1915-1994)

in progress....

from the  The Wilfred A. Lang Gallery 

My growing collection of Wilfred A. Lang notes from my previous post, suggests another post entry is needed. So little information on him on the internet. Where to even begin, when my imperfect memories gathered in youth, imperfectly recollected and transposed now that I'm older that dirt, makes this more of an act of fiction than anything else.

A defunct Angelfire site was the only decent reference I could find on Wilfred. (No I'm not referring to the Shanghai artist, born in 1954, who cranks out dreadful urban landscapes and sailboats with a palate knife and a fan brush.) Wilfred A. Lang was a complex artist, a student of Robert Stackpole, who worked in complex layers, his imagery embellishing a mythos to ordinary subjects.

I knew Wilfred’s first wife Betty—who was like a second mother to me, and four of his children, and the infamous Sausalito Hoffmans.

Wilfred was always larger than life. As kids, we were terribly excited whenever he came to visit Pat & Betty Wall. I remember him, grizzled, and laden with massive turquoise and silver jewelry, and his haughty second wife, Marcia, in her long flowing skirts, and aquiline nose, who walked like a goddess. She very much resembled her portrait that hung above the daybed in the living room.

That colorful full-length abstract portrait that Wilfred gave to Betty mesmerized me. I always thought it odd that he gave Betty a painting of his next wife, who left him soon after. But the full-length portrait was gorgeous. As a child, I stared at it for hours on end, following the intricate ghost calligraphy embroidered on the painting.

I didn't know of Wilfred's Sonoma County presence until I began this post. I'm sitting here writing this blog post a stone's throw from where he built a house in Mays Canyon. Wilfred was friends with Bernard Zachaim, and also stayed at Marguerute Wiildenhain's Pond Farm, in Guerneville. So he also had Bauhaus connections as Walter Gropius was a frequent visitor to Pond Farm as well.

Sonoma County supported a thriving artist colony. After McCarthyism raised its ugly head, many artists, writers, and especially the Jewish movie industry folks fled the urban jungles for a country life, raising chickens. When the bottom of chicken nest fell out, and chicken farming couldn't compete with agribusiness, the fallow chickensheds morphed into artist studios. It was odd to see a portion of a movie backdrop incorporated into a chickenshed. 

Polish-born deep Leftist, Bernard Zacheim (1896-1985), a student of Diego Rivera, painted the Coit Tower murals in San Francisco. He co-founded the San Francisco Artists and Writers Union, which supported artists viafederally funded arts program during the Great Depression. The Public Works of Art Project, funded Zakheim's work on Coit Tower. Zacheim moved to Sonoma County, first to Mayes Canyon, a pocket canyon near Guerneville, and later, to a Sebastopol apple orchard. 

Several artists fleeing the confines city, joined him, Wilfred Lang, among them. I would love to know more about that era, Zacheim was always a presence at art openings, but both he and his daughter Masha, who documented the WPA mural movement are both gone now. Perhaps his son, Nathan, a mural restorer, might have some oral history of that era to share. Wilfred’s eldest son Pete, wrote a comprehensive biography, which I’ve posted below in the notes. At one point, I will weave them in with my notes.

NOT DONE

Giving back old photos

Scanning old photos and trying to date them always conjured up the most unlikely of memories. Like the photos I took of Pete Lang in Park City, near Nanaimo, on Vancouver Island in 1981. I never expected to find his daughters on Facebook when I posted some old photos on my friend Micaela Wall's page. It was such a magical time for me hanging out with Pete's family. I always adored Pete, I knew him since I was a child. Almost as long as I've known Micaela. She was called Miranda in those days. Pete was her step-brother. He mooned after her while she mooned after his handsome younger brother, Stan—a wild one with hair slicked back like James Dean. Those New Mexico boys by way of Sausalito, with their tall boots and tooled leather belts, seeking distant horizons, got under the skin like fine desert sand. I was always the one left out of the moon's capricious equations. Pete saw me as the little kid down the road. Sometimes he'd drop by to visit my granny and me in Forest Knolls after Micaela's dad, Pat Wall, sold the house moved north to Fort Bragg. Pete was living in a trailer on the headlands by the botanical garden. Paradise on earth. I've an early memory of Pete leaning against our sawhorse, by the woodpile, playing his Martin guitar. He left town, became a spy, joined the CIA, or was it the FBI? The Lang brothers went the way of lost cowboys in search of a one-horse townor a horizon that just wouldn't settle. Maybe it was the high desert winds spurring them on. But they couldn't stay still in any one place for long. We ran into each other in BC, by then Pete was married, with two daughters, but the wife was stepping out with the mayor on the side. It broke my heart. We lost touch. They moved to Florida where he built wooden boats, got divorced. Last I heard, he was in Galveston, Texas, working as a private eye, probably to be closer to his father, the Bohemian sculptor / painter Wilfred. Stan sailed off to the Virgin Islands became a carpenter, and met death by bottle on the old plank road. I eventually got a Martin guitar too, but I could never play it like that. Pete gave me some folk songbooks too—which I still have. Back copies of Sing Out!, a little Woody Guthrie, some Baez, but no Dylan. But I never could play those songs without remembering Pete bending over his guitar, head canted as if he were ciphering a story from those whispering guitar strings.

JUNE GLOOM

Winter blankets back on the bed.
Eyeing my folded flannel sheets
will not warm my feet.

Revising old Facebook posts: Ebbe Borregaard, Stephen Torre & John Haines

An old Facebook fragment also written on a dreary Saturday, in 2013, evolved into a memoir piece of sorts, Woodbutchers and carpenter poets: Remembering John Haines, Stephen Torre, and Ebbe Borregaard. Six years later, I still haven't found out much about those poets. They seem to predate the internet, as it were, and were obscure enough poets, that no one has taken up the torch to post their work online, or to mention them on blog pages. They were my teachers. And here I am, still wondering about those poets on this grey misty morning, mid June. I sometimes revisit my FB memory lane pages to see if there's a fragment of writing I might have missed or that that I might want to add to my blog. Mostly dross. But every so often, I find a fragment that's still compelling. I had already added my knee comments and fashioned them into a blog post, but not this first bit on Ebbe. Like Death, I stopped to fix a typo, and an hour later, I'm still revising it, hammering the nails into the memory coffin. Ya never know what will spark another bit of writing. I'm certainly the last to know. Typical. So, the question begs: is it a piece from 2013, or a new piece if it's extensively revised? Too OCD for my own good.

SHEET SWAP

Whenever I swap my flannel sheets 

for crisp summer ones, the weather changes—
damn near froze most of the night.

6/14/19

Flannel nights

Hot June nights. Time for the ritual to swap out my winter flannel sheets. Now watch, as soon as I do that, the weather will take a turn for the worse. Never fails. Whenever I swap out my flannel sheets for summer ones, the weather changes—damn near froze most of the night. Why do I always forget about June Gloom? This is as close as we get to rain these days. Fizzle drizzle. I managed to wear my summer nightie all of  3 times. Now it’s back to my flannels. I've been cold all day, I'm hopelessly dressed for summer, a sleeveless top and shorts, but my frozen feet are realists. We may be moving toward the Summer Solstice, but encouraged by an outbreak of Karl the Fog, the coast has its own ideas. I found some really nice extra roomy flannel nightgowns at the local Goodwill. I won’t be able to wear them for months but I’m very excited by the prospect. 

Feeling blue

Feeling a bit blue today—as if the light
at the end of the tunnel was closed
due to unforseen circumstances
& I'm left without a torch.

This sadness is palpable. I know it will pass, but when? One foot in front of the other. Trying to stay absolutely in the present tense, knowing this too shall pass, which helps. Sometimes I think it help to admit it, and then it's easier to let it go. I feel better now, more empowered, thanks to a core of Facebook friends. Better. Emerging. Slowly. Thank you. My litmus ones. My heart's core.

I edited some Tomales Bay pix, etc., and it got me out of my head for a few moments. Hanging out in bed today....much better today. So far. Absolutely hate it when this happens. So crippling. When I was a child I'd curl up somewhere and hide. Reading was my escape, or my horses. When it happens, I can barely do anything at all. Doesn't happen often, TG. A few times a year. A reading jag usually works. I understand it's all part of the process. The ups and downs. It's just so debilitating when it happens.

Form a Facebook post

Indus Arthur, Renaissance Pleasure Faire, photo, 1984

I posted some photos of the Renaissance Pleasure Faire on Facebook’s Lost Marin site. My post was wildly popular and soon I had hundreds of hits—and so many wonderful comments emerged as people began identifying each other, and sharing the post. I wanted to capture a slice of oral history so I asked people for their stories. One viewer took umbrage because I had asked people to tag themselves, or their friends on my posts. I asked, so that I could credit the Ren Faire actors, and also so they could have a copy of the photos for their own archives. Her rage—it toppled my house of cards. She started maligning me, calling me a stalker because I wanted people to share their stories.

In frustration, and dismay, I took the entire post down rather than leave the negativity up. Katelin Stuart said don’t rent space to them in your head. But it was too late. The reason why it was so distressing was that because for 35 long years those slides were locked away behind cellulose, never before seen by the world, and I was so excited to finally have a scanner that could scan those slides and negatives, and I thought Lost Marin would be the perfect venue to do a wild release of those photos... But Carrie Smith wanted to equally share my photos—while berating me, the photographer, for wanting to know performers' names, and of their Ren Faire stories... Kill the messenger.

Indus Arthur, Renaissance Pleasure Faire, Agoura, CA, 1984

The photo that set off the imbroglio was of Indus Arthur, a beautiful harpist, which ignited a FB war in the Lost Marin group. The reason was completely lost on me. It was like a bully scene right out of Animal Farm. Sadly, Indus died in December, of 1984, a few months after my photo was taken. Complications of skin cancer, and a brain tumor.

This may be among the last photos ever taken of the stage and screen actor, Indus, who, like her grandmother, was named after a river in Tibet. I remember that we talked about our grandmothers. I had no idea that Indus was a popular TV star—none of that mattered, we were in a time out of place, in a backlot of Paramount Ranch, in Agoura.

The photo was a moving tribute, or so I thought. I had spent the afternoon talking with her, a lovely soul, both ephemeral, and fey. Did she know she was dying? That this was her last gift to the world, this harp music? She died so young, she was only 43. She is buried somewhere in a secret location in Los Angeles.

But Carrie Smith wouldn’t let it go, she objected to my asking people to tag themselves, or my even knowing who Indus was. Then Carrie waged war on me, she began tagging her equally obnoxious friends, dragging them into the fracas. Where did all this anger and rage come from, over an old photo? Clearly Carrie (aka Mrs. Owens, Dickens’ cook for the Dickens Faire) had some deep-seated anger management issues, but for some reason, she came unhinged when I asked for people to tag themselves. It was the last straw, too many other negative things going on in my life. I saved the vitriolic conversations thinking I might someday use it, but it’s so depressing. And I so wanted to honor those actors who brought us such delight during the heyday of the RPF.

Apparently Carrie, thought I was a stalker, or worse, because I was asking people to tag themselves in the photos of themselves. But it’s not my job to explain her aberrant behavior. Get out of my head. I had merely asked people to tag themselves so that THEY could keep my photos—and/or share stories from the Ren Faire days among themselves. After all, that was the whole point of the Lost Marin Group. Here I thought that it generous gift from the past. No strings attached. The cadre of Ren folk even objected to my use of the word Ren Faire, took umbrage to the term Ren Faire, and to the rather endearing term, Ren folk... All of this tempestuousness is so ironic as the Renaissance Pleasure Faire’s actual web address is renfaire.com

Suffice to say, it was a total bloodbath. So, rather than leave the negativity up, I deleted all 36 photos. Most folks were thrilled to see the photos, one woman even tagged the Patterson sons... but I didn't want to leave an album of my photos up, as a chronicle their bad behavior.

From a Facebook post

Phyllis Patterson RIP – She changed my life! JoshWillTravel blog, a good inside peek into the Faire.

Rainbow at the end of the tunnel (photo)

This visage certainly stopped me in my tracks. I thought I was seeing things. Turns out, I was. I was also at the right place at the perfect, if odd time—the right angle of the sun, and right time of day, as the light rapidly changed. I was thinking about what photographer Jerry Downs had said about seeing ordinary, or mundane things "different" when I climbed the rise. And gasped. The old adage rang true—tho  best camera was the one in my hand, tho it be on its last legs. I wasn't expecting to find a rainbow in a culvert at the end of a fireroad. Or a magic portal to another world in a dam runoff overflow culvert.

Upon closer inspection, it looked like an entrance to the Otherworld. At first I thought I was having some sort of flashback, or heatstroke vs. brainfreeze. The side view was equally astonishing. By then I was singing Somewhere Under the Rainbow.....

Added bonus, it was a huge swamp cooler. I stood in front of the colorful culvert to chill out on this hottest day of the year. No rainbows were harmed in the process. Synchronicity at Soulajoule Dam, Walker Creek Road, West Marin. The synchronous moment was right before I got out of my hot car, I was using a little battery-operated spray fan, wishing it was way bigger. I think I got my wish, and then some.

Truth be known, I was feeling a bit despondent, and in need of a lift. From a rainbow, apparently. It was hot, I took the weird way home, planning to stop at the Elephant Rocks. See, 22 years ago, I was in a horrific car accident on Walker Creek Road, something that changed my life completely.

Today, I was making amends with the road. I forgave it, and the person who drove us off the road. This was merely a madcap pitstop, a girding of the loins segue enroute to the spot where my life irrevocably changed. I think it also means after 22 years, I get my old life back. Trying hard not to think of those years as wasted years. But, in retrospect, it was a life-sentence of sorts.

The mystery rainbow revealed—a dam overflow runoff valve with so much pressure, it's ricochetting off the culvert creating a fine mist. The culvert, acting like a hood contained the rainbow.

This version was shared in Digital Photo Academy Community

Brownie Mary photo scan

Well, that's done. Spent three intense days cleaning up a 27-year-old photo of Brownie Mary Rathbun for a traveling show. On its way to the Weedmaps Weed Museum where it will tour for three years. I scanned it in 24-bit color at 800dpi, so I could capture all the greyscale range, and to properly clone out the artifacts....all those slubs on her sweater had what looked like lint, OMG!

And I was aghast by all the embedded artifacts and surface scratches. I don't like DigitalIce, it softens the image. Ah, the joys of Tri-X, pushed. My trusty old Pentax K1000 with a Vivitar zoom lens. Good glass. Not that I know much about PS, but after I cleaned it up, I did a sharpen layer, for her face, then a Gaussian blur layer, sans her face, to soften the clone clean up (even tho the print looked fine, it was a mess!) I also scanned the negatives later. They came out better than expected.

We met Brownie Mary at SF General Hospital's AIDS ward, as she was making her volunteer nurse rounds delivering respite to her AIDS patients. Her boys,, she said. I first met her at the Sonoma County Jail where she was arrested for buying pot in Cazadero. I covered the story for The Paper. Tony Serra took on the feds and won. I coordinated a photography expedition for Dutch photographer Jan Bogaaerts who was doing a story on the AIDS crisis for Granta Magazine. It was a heart-wrenching time. The frailness of mortality.

FWIW, I ate some of those brownies, but I may, or may not have swallowed. Mary and I had an Irish heart connection that went deep. In the process of working on the photo, I just found out my aunt Jane used to make travel arrangements for Mary at Valley Travel. Small world. Of course, she never knew... Special thanks to Jerry Downs for contract advice.

Museum of Weed coming to Los Angeles in early 2019

Que Sera, Serra: Remembering Tony Serra
Brownie Mary

Godspeed, Edwin Drummond

For Edwin Drummond, who reached for the clouds. And got a handhold. May the mountain gods pull him up to safety to the sky and beyond. The only regret Edwin had was not climbing Everest. The gods quashed it. May he find a new toehold in that unscaled escarpment. Alas, my love, godspeed. So honored to say that I knew you when.

May 14, 1945 - April 23, 2019

I was supposed to be the second wife between Grace and Lia, but I said No, and ran the other way. He never quite forgave me. Last time I saw him was after he divorced Lia. We reconnected but the same old ghosts were still hiding in the closets of time. Lately Edwin has been on my mind. Haunting me. Almost an obsession, really. I guess I was sensing the end was near when I began to search for him on the internet in January, but I never found him. It was so ironic that he was so close, yet so far, in Oakland, right down the street from where I used to live. And we never reconnected. Weird that he died a year after John Oliver Simon. I'm losing the significant men in my life. Is there a memorial service?

Edwin Drummond shaving, Forestville, ca. 1980. These negatives were mixed in with the photos of Boschka Layton I had taken for her book jacket.

Sutro Baths (photo)

If my grandmother hadn’t met my grandfather at the Sutro Baths in San Francisco, I wouldn’t exist. She didn’t even know how to swim... but somehow she swam right into his arms. Lol, FB autocorrected Sutro into sutras. Ken Larsen said: “I love your typo (maybe intentional?) conjuring images of bathing in sutras. I’m too young to remember the baths but fond are the memories of skating there. Be sure to check out Sutro Bath giant water slide movies on YouTube—perhaps your grand parents slid into each other’s arms???” And Ken Bullock asked: “And if you never existed, who would've started the fire?“ Amergin’s fire in the head.

From a FB post

Free Morning off

Good grief, I have a rare morning off and I hardly know what to do with myself. That feeling of guilt, I must be forgetting something. Right? Believe it or not, the hardest part when I'm doing these poetry residencies, is eating. If it wasn't for Peggy Maddock, my host, feeding me, I wouldn't eat at all! I get that keyed up. Gonna take a much-needed shower, stop by school to do evaluations, then a drive up to Pine Flat, and Modini Preserve to take pix, then back to AVS to do kid reading this evening... Evaluations, student poetry release forms, and poetic licenses have been passed out. One class turned them in early. I’ll collect the rest tonight, and send them into CPITS, and then I’m done. These last fiddlybits can consume a lot of time. Eh. it's a Catholic guilt hangover...You know, never done? I'm off, then, into the wind.

Soda Rock Lane (photo)

Yesterday we had sunshine and blue skies. Not so much today. Massive stormfront, and rain. Maybe even snow. I teach poetry to Alexander Valley School kids every May, and I stay with a former teacher. I  ran off 100 copies of a  kid poetry anthology on a cranky copy machine that needed constant reassurance every time it overheated. This is a view from Soda Rock Lane very near artist Richard DIebenkorn's place. The studio barn has been quiet and shuttered for a long time, but the northern light waits at the ready for the artist to resume, and the wild birds still come and sit on the fence as if in waiting.

Deluge, teaching journal, Alexander Valley School

Unbelievable buckets of rain, it’s a freakin’ deluge in Alexander Valley & I only have summer duds with me. Ides of May? A couple more deluges this morning. Sheets of rain in Healdsburg and in west Marin. A half an inch of rain in Santa Rosa, my ass! Somebody needs to clean out the rain gauges.

Of course I only brought summer clothes to teach in..... I am freezing.

The internet is slower than molasses, I'm trying to save time by dictating kid poems for the poetry book (final edit, 2 classes done, 2 more to go), and I'm thinking of calling it quits, and crawling off to bed. This gig is pretty labor intensive. I’m so tired I can’t rest.....

Four classes a day, three days a week, is a challenge. I actually was so tired I crawled into bed at 8:30, just to get some down time. I taught MTW, then work for Sam in Forest Knolls tomorrow, I’m off Fri &  Sat. Work again in Forest Knolls on Sun, drive back to Healdsburg on Monday to produce a kid book. Monday is art, Tuesday is pasteup and runoff, then the big Open House readings for four classes, then we celebrate. Then fun may commence with Alexander Valley wine.

The real family photo of Mother’s Day

Normal? what is "normal?" This is the real whackjob family photo after we were done posing as normal people. Grandma is sucking down another Manhattan, between takes, Guy is way cool and aloof, thinking of the next video game, better than his early B&E phase, I'm spaced out, trying to reconcile how I'm related to all these people, how I can escape the madness, meanwhile, my mother the artist, is seriously chuffed, the only one totally present, lord knows what she was on at the time, she was den mother to the punkrocker in the Hamm's Vats, so anything was possible. Sean is off in his own world, jonesying for an escape route which will lead to a stint at Pelican Bay. Billy, who has CP, is the only one MIA, but he's been gone most of our lives, thanks to the State of California CPS stealing him from his crib as he slept, leaving no note. That's what sent my mom over the edge. She never recovered. All the miscarriages didn't help either. It's probably also my birthday to boot. Thanksgiving, 1981. You want story? We got story. And then some. Move over, Faulkner. Happy Mothers' Day to you all! <3 p="">

San Geronimo Valley Community Center Spring Art Show

A moment of synchronicity

Lately I've been scanning old slides, one was of a collaborative poet-artist art show I was in at the Falkirk Cultural Center in San Rafael in 1984. My artist-collaborator was Anne Faught. Of course, as I scanned slides of Carl Dern, Bill Wiley, and curator Bill Witherup, I wondered who was still alive—including my artist-collaborator, Anne Faught. And danged if an email didn't arrive from her tonight out of the blue—nearly 35 yeas later. See, she saw a pastel landscape series I had submitted to an upcoming group show next week—and she invited me to submit two pieces to an upcoming group show in October. She was surprised to discover I was also the same Maureen Hurley the writer...and confessed that she didn't remember the piece she submitted to the Magabark exhibit. So naturally I sent her a scan of the slide. What are the chances? Never would've happened if I hadn't taped my biz card to the back of my piece. Synchronicity werks in mysterious ways.

Ann Faught's Magabark piece

Dear Maureen~

I got your email off the back of your lovely painting at the SGVCC as I was checking in work this morning for their group show. I am curating a show there in October called Where We Call Home. I would love for you to be a part of the exhibit. Below are the two letters I have sent out thus far. I will send another letter/submission form in August. Please read both letters below and consider if you would like to be a part of this show and do let me know if you will. I hope to meet you this Friday night at the group show opening.

Thank you, Anne Faught

So you are the same Maureen Hurley! I wondered as I do remember you as a writer. I am sorry to say I do not remember what I submitted for that exhibit or your piece! Yes, Carl is gone and Wiley has Parkinson’s and has moved to north Marin. Still getting around but not well. I am so glad you will be in the show!

One of the pastels I had submitted.

Upcoming art show.

DESCENT OF THE HEART

DESCENT OF THE HEART

My heart is like rusty springs in an old car,
abandoned by the railroad track
seats stuffed with cotton and jute
where generations of mice
have raised countless families.
My heart changes colors like a mood ring
whenever it encounters strange things,
ideas attached to wings or musical notes.
Sometimes I catch it sobbing in the dark
like a small child, other times, it runs off,
cutting school like a truant—
especially when chocolate is involved.
My heart can’t tell time well.
It always wants to play in the now,
futures are always distant,
but it likes to daydream
or procrastinate whenever a deadline
approaches at the speed of light.
My heart squeezes me,
and sobs over dumb things like movies,
or dead pets, but not for the man 

I lived with for 20 years.

I guess it figures that it already gave 

at the office.

It’s a sentimental fool
for memory and angst,
but it also giggles in the dark
like a maniacal monster
waiting for the time where darkness
descends like bat wings.

5/6/19
Alexander Valley School

JACK THE CAT

JACK THE CAT

I didn’t know I loved the way Jack the cat
would sit patiently for hours
then make a beeline for our wine glasses
every time we sat on the couch.
Wild water was so much better
than ordinary water out of the bowl.
Or the way he would sit so politely
and silently beg whenever we had meat for dinner,
but with the wine glasses all bets were off.
Everyone’s glass was fair game.
He’d make the rounds like a veteran,
work the room like a comedian
in the borscht belt
until all glasses were scrubbed
scrupulously clean by his small pink tongue.
No matter that you wanted to take a drink
from your wine glass,
he’d follow it right up to your face,
licking all the while,
with a glazed look in his eye
as he were dreaming of distant futures
where water was like a dream.
I didn’t know that Jack the cat was diabetic
and was dying, I didn’t know
that this would be the last time,

the very last time.

May there always be frosted wine glasses 

to greet you wherever you are,

Jack.

5/6/19
Alexander Valley School

Wilson Hill Road (photos)

 Wilson Hill Road, West Marin, facing north.

An abandoned loveseat dumped by the side of the road. Artist's light. You know I had to stop. There were pineapples carved on the oak headboard—a sign of welcome and hospitality. And the oak is a door to the Otherworld. I loved the incongruous red No Trespassing sign swinging from the fence. So, I sat there the entire afternoon just because I could, and got a fierce sunburn for my troubles. The April sun on Irish skin definitely takes prisoners. Hardly any traffic for a Sunday afternoon. Odd. Most people who passed by were preoccupied and didn't notice me sitting there drawing. Who was Wilson? Was this his hill? A lone cyclist rang his tinny bell and yelled Hi. That was it. I was so tired from the dread virus, I thought I'd never make it back to Sonoma County. That's the border on the horizon. Earlier, I had trolled Nicasio Reservoir for wildflowers because my caretaking job was cancelled. I spent my energy chasing flower photos, so I was grateful for the somewhat self-enforced respite. Sadly, my camera's failing. It can no longer focus despite the Leica lens. My eye is wounded. But I was also procrastinating. I needed one more pastel for the upcoming art show. As usual, the dreadline rendered me helpless. See, I was feeling sorry for myself, for a love gone so wrong, there's no mending it. I was punishing myself again, debating whether or not to stop to sniff the wildflowers, or flee the scene. And then I found a red stop sign embedded in the grass. What would you do? Synchronicity in action. That's what was needed. Follow random instructions from the world.

SPRING FEVER SNEEZEKU haiku

SPRING FEVER

Empty Kleenex box—
As a headrest offers surcease
from the dread virus.

SPRING SHAVE

SPRING SHAVE

It's been such a long and lonely winter
my leg hairs are high-fiving each other
and waving like royalty with every step I take.
There's enough static electricity between them
to create a galaxy of sparks when I walk,
reminding me that we are sloppy batteries,
each leg, a polar opposite.
I get rug-burns getting out of bed.
The decision, to shave or not to shave
however, is put off to another day.

4/16/19

Sick as a dog

A

What I thought were allergies morphed into a head-chest cold in record time. I'm slayed. The cough alone... I made lemon garlic chicken broth and couldn't even taste the garlic. I'm not going anywhere. Too sick. Maybe there's some zinc in the cabinet above the sink. As to the retinol, won't it grow hair in my throat? Throat feels like 5 o’clock shadow stubble. 

The lemon curd is as good as sucking on ten Ricolas. Tastier. Bonne Mamam from Grocery Outlet $1.99! Tastes especially good off my granny's tiny sterling spoon. And it gives me the illusion that I'm not eating very much of it. Yes, my voice has taken a beating...keeps cracking, so painful. I'm really sick. This is a bad one. staying home. Soaked in the hot tub, and am a noodle but it eases the dry cough that is leveling me. Also, I’m using the car as a dry sauna. 

Day two of hot tub and car sauna to ease the symptoms. My granny used to bundle herself up and sit in the car to break or bake a fever. I find myself doing the same. impromptu sauna. And I don't readily sweat when I'm healthy. I'm at the impossible coughing stage so I need all the help I can get. Coughing jags are horrible. The cough is MURDER. I'm going to have six-pac abs at this rate with all the coughing I'm doing. Though I can safely say, the turning point was yesterday. I'm on the mend, after three days of misery.  The virus took the wind out of my sails. I fell asleep reading this afternoon. I never fall asleep in the afternoon. AK! 3 AM. there's a reason why I never take late afternoon naps. Still pretty shaky, though. Staying in bed the full week on this one. Other than the unproductive cough, I can feel the shift. I am on the mend. 

ANTI-VIRAL CURE

ANTI-VIRAL CURE

Lemon curd on madeleines,
that's what's for dinner.
I can't taste anything else.
Oh, hell, forget about Proust's cookies.
Notre Dame is burning, and so am I.
So, it's lemon curd straight from the jar
with my granny's silver salt spoon
minted during La Belle Époque.
You got a problem with that?

4/16/19

SPRING GOLD

SPRING GOLD

OK, so I'll finally admit it is a cold
that finally declared itself in all its snotty splendor
after a day of chasing wildflower photos
in high winds where the air was so laden with pollen
the distant coastal hills were lost in a dream haze
like an alkali curtain had descended upon them.

The first time in over a decade a ritual is broken,
no more travels to the desert in springtime.
My partner dumped me at an unmarked trailhead.
So I learned to find my way and make do
with the local landscape, sneezing all the while,
remembering the trips to the Mojave Desert
where vast floral carpets of goldfields,
poppies, and purplemat stretched farther
than the eye could see.

I release my anger, I release him back
to the darkness that is his alone to bear.
He keeps calling me but I will not take him forth
into a future where the wildflowers
steal small pieces of the sun to dress the hills
in such gilded array that I am sick with joy.

4/16/19

Tree & rock, Hick’s Valley Road (photo)

Tree & rock, Hick's Valley, West Marin. If I can take the back-back road from point A to point B, and bypass the idiot tourists, I’ll do it. This vista is my reward. I've been meaning to take a photo of this particular tree and rock on Hick’s Valley Road for ages, but there's no place to pull over. So yesterday, I just stopped right in the middle of the road and made time to just do it. I'm afraid it's a one-off snap, no time to fiddle with composition, placement, etc., so there's a random element to it. I'm thinking of making a chalk pastel of it for the upcoming art show.

A Facebook friend, Marc Nassar, who once lived here long ago, said, Like seeing a photo of a long lost old friend. Love it, thanks. I always tried to pull over and sit with it hours at a time, for years. Go for the pastel. Very inspiring spot.

Another friend, Arlyn Millie said, If Poetic License Press weren't such a tiny press, I'd publish Volumes 1-3 of Good News and Beautiful Reminders by Maureen Hurley, Artist & Writer. I appreciate that tragedy and ugliness don't obscure your view of the awesome and delightful. As I like to say: And also. That this.

At this point I'd be over the moon with a chapbook or a broadside. Hell I’d be over the moon if I could just feel better. Still feeling pretty sick, the cough is a killer. But I'm champing at the bit—this is the longest I've stayed in one place since August—I’m flat out sick. I want to feel better soon so I can do a drawing of this photo. Maybe later today.

But someone stole my iPad the other day—and I had several photos in waiting all lined up for art pieces. I’m still reeling. Luckily, I took this photo with my camera, not the iPad. So I had a backup of it. On a lark, I had entered an art show at a Senior Center (I haven't shown any art in DECADES!) so, iPad or no iPad, I gotta crank something out soon. Deadline approaches.

(I wound up making a print of this photo for the art show, which sold! Thus paying for my frames, and developing.)

From a Facebook post, revised
San Geronimo Valley Community Center Spring Art Show

SOCIAL MEDIA

SOCIAL MEDIA

As I searched for information
on the internet, whether or not
my old MacBook would run the latest tax software,
I never in a million years dreamed
I'd be plugging a laptop in-
to the wall socket of my old classroom.
My call to attention was that snap of electricity
surging as metal made contact with the grid.
I was too busy eating library paste,
peering out of the cloakroom for Miss Lenz
to imagine futures where man
would walk on the moon,
or that we'd all be joined at the hip
via social media.

4/13/19

TEMPORARY ANGELS

TEMPORARY ANGELS                       —For Linda Gregg

At Open Mike, I stood in my old 2nd grade classroom
& pointed to the room where Linda Gregg would've been,
in the other wing of the school with the big kids.
Before I read her poem, to commemorate her death,
The Weight, about a string of horses from Forest Farm Camp.

I told the story of how the Gregg's dude horses
were wintered over for the season in Tamal canyon—
after the summer campers had gone back to the city,
and how the horses crossed a liminal boundary
of barbed wire, seeking more clement pastures,
to the top of our hill, and how we
eagerly raced up the steep slope to greet them.
They whickered, lonely for the company of young girls.
We were their kin, leggy, skittish, happy to see them.
We breathed in their horsy odor as they carefully whuffed,
hoping to find sugar, carrots, or an apple in deep pockets.
They grew bored, sleepy eyed, and lop-eared. Sighed.

It was so easy, leaning on them, savoring their warmth
as they canted their hips and bent massive heads down
to tear at pale winter grasses. We scratched their necks,
leaned farther still, draped over their backs
as they drifted around the crest of the hill.
We slipped our slender legs over, and were astride.
They were all action, dancing in the wind
and we were flying. Wingless angels.
Temporary goddesses, no longer fettered to the earth.
Little did we know it was as close to heaven
as we'd ever get.

Later that night, the sheriff came knocking,
inquiring about the theft of those horses.
We trembled and of course we denied everything,
our thighs still rimed with telltale horsehair and sweat.
I used to have nightmares riding those horses to safety,
not knowing which side of the divide they belonged on.
Horses on the horizon still takes my breath away.
And now Linda is traversing the last long valley,
all the dead horses bugling in the distance.

4/13/19

Spring cold misery

Ah, spring. Allergies morphed into a head-chest cold in record time. I'm slayed. I'm not going anywhere Too sick. The cough alone... Maybe there's some zinc in the cabinet above the sink. As to the retinol, won't it grow hair in my throat? My voice feels like that.

I swear, right now, lemon curd is as good as sucking on ten Ricolas. Tastier. Bonne Mamam from Grocery Outlet $1.99! Tastes especially good off my granny's tiny silver spoon. And it gives me the illusion that I'm not eating very much of it. Hah. I did eye the graham crackers. Next round. Or, I could just drop all the pretense and go for lemon curd on a spoon right out of the jar.

I made lemon garlic chicken broth earlier, and I couldn't even taste the garlic. My tastebuds are pretty whacked.

All this coughing, my voice has taken a beating...keeps cracking, so painful. Last night was rough. Aching hips, sieve of a nose. Advil and a soak helped. Soaked in the hot tub, and am a noodle but it eases the dry cough that is leveling me. Also using the car as a dry sauna.

Day two of hot tub and car sauna to ease the symptoms. My granny used to bundle herself up and sit in the car to break or bake a fever. I find myself doing the same. impromptu sauna. And I don't readily sweat when I'm healthy.

I'm at the impossible cough stage so I need all the help I can get. Though I can safely say, the turning point was yesterday. I'm on the mend, after three days of misery. Today I could feel the difference. Still pretty sick. Fell asleep late nap....and I never nap. fell asleep reading this afternoon. I never fall asleep in the afternoon. Other than the unproductive cough, I can feel the shift. I am on the mend. Yes. 

Not going to FK on Sun. Not going anywhere. AK! 3 AM. there's a reason why I never take late afternoon naps. Still pretty shaky, though. Staying in bed the full week on this one. The cough is MURDER. I'm going to have six-pac abs at this rate with all the coughing I'm doing.

DESPERATELY SEEKING LATTE

Stranded for a few hours in the city,
I hunted down a latte and a choco glazed & raised.
None to be had at the Starbucks on Masonic.
Even though cops, muni drivers, and the dispossessed
trolled the only coffee bar around.
The shuttered Lucky Penny hadn’t changed in decades.
I looked at the mermaid askance, sighed,
& settled for an overpriced chocolate croissant.
The barista barked, you want that thing heated?
When I bit in, I thought I had joined the fishes.
Where had such a simple pleasure
been hiding all my life? Under a rock?
I adjusted my attitude and sank
back into the restless flotsam of the streets.
Waited for my friend to resurface after surgery.

4/4/19

And then afterward, while my patient was having a recovery coffee at Peet’s in San Rafael, someone stole my iPad. So this poem was lost for a year only to resurface a year later on Facebook.

BigHairDay (photos)

Self portrait with an iPad as a young pixel. This is a real selfie. Only I can see it. My hair is an exhibitionist today. Never wash your hair in the late afternoon. When I was an extra in Etruscan smile, I still had waist length hair that went full bush ringlets because it was the first rains after the drought. They had to put a can of hairspray on it....boing! My hair woke up with an attitude for which the only fix is a drowning in floodwater. The only thing worse than not combing it, is, well, combing it. I don’t dare comb or brush it. I just need to wait until it calms down, or gets bored and moves along. Or I dunk my head in a bucket, which I usually resort to.

I’m looking for the snakes.

#BigHairDay

Near miss at the lake (photo)

A good thing I was channeling Jerry Downs, thinking of how I would compose my photo.

I think I might have just sidestepped fate. A near miss. Or at least the avoidance of a head-on collision. I was getting ready to pull into my usual pullout by the lake where there was a faint cellular signal where I could pick up my email (zero reception in Nicasio), and to take a morning photo, but a huge semi truck was coming the other way.

I don’t know what prompted me to change my usual daily pattern, other than I was thinking of taking a photo and what photographer Jerry Downs had said earlier about having the patience to wait for the exact right moment to take a photo. So, by chance, I pulled off the road to the shoulder to wait for the truck to pass—just as a pickup stuck behind it, was passing it with a vengeance. Talk about right moment.

Normally I would’ve just turned in front of the semi truck to park in the pullout by the lake, and thought nothing of it. I had plenty of time to make the left turn, the semi was slow, but I was in no hurry. Besides, I was admiring the stray wisps of morning fog curling catlike through the hills—dreamily composing a camera angle in my head. So, on an impulse, I pulled off the road right onto the bike path.

The pickup spotted me too late, slammed on its brakes, skidding into my lane just where I had just been driving, smoke billowing from the tires. But by then, I was safely off to the side of the road. I just sat on the shoulder, stunned—and popped the clutch. My poor car juggered to a stop, and turned its head as if to look back at me questioningly, like my old horse. Really?

The air is laden with black smoke, the acrid odor of burnt tires and hydraulic fluid. Black skid marks indelibly annealed to the road for months to come. A grim reminder of melted tire tracks right where I had just been driving. It all happened so quickly, there would’ve been no time to second-guess, or even to avert an accident. It was a fluke. Or Karma. Certainly cars were involved. Some cosmic April Fools joke?

Earlier, I was dwelling on the precariousness of life, and the importance of living each day as if it were the last. Fully, in the moment, as it were—I was feeling that mortal coil of time having outlived both my parents.

Meanwhile, the pelicans and grebes carry on with the business of trolling for breakfast, breaking concentric fish circles on the glassine lake, making solemn vees on the surface of the lake as they bear down on their quarry. As if a V for victory. A cormorant skims the surface of the lake, stitching the mirrored surface with its wings. Gathers in the view. In the cattails, a pair of monstrous pale bass break the surface, they lip and taste the air, splaying their tails, they are entwined in that oldest dance of the world. Life goes on.

I’m still sitting by the side of the road, shaken, trying to get up enough nerve to move down the road....as if there were a tiny capsule of protected timelessness here. I’m shaking so bad that I’m uneasy about driving north. 

The rain has arrived. I’m watching the osprey who are building a nest somewhere inland, they fly up the path of the inlet, the lake is their ley line. Earlier I was dwelling on the precariousness of life, as I’ve been living each day as if it were the last. Fully, in the moment, as it were—feeling that mortal coil. I think I’ll just sit here a while longer and shake. Maybe cry a bit.

I must admit that I sat by the side of the road and contemplated my navel for quite some time afterwards. Ironically, I was channeling photographer Jerry Downs in my head, wondering how he’d render the lake and tule fog in a photo as the light was rather flat—so that misplaced moment saved me from a potentially gnarly outcome. One time when being pokey and admiring the view paid off....

The door prize: I found a rare white Fritillaria too. Right across from where I was parked...the bladder wants what it wants, you know... I had to pee something fierce after that scare, I’m surprised I didn’t crap, my pants. I went up the hill and found this rarest of flowers—an April Fool door prize? Not every day one finds a an endangered species with a Plant Rank: 1B.2. I drove around the lake to the spillway, and suddenly the clouds parted, and it was as if I were inside of a painting by Turner.

4/1/19

It’s time for Robert Lee Brewer's Poem a Day! 2019

A poem a day writing prompts. Visit Robert Lee Brewer's blog for more prompts and example poems. I'm posting the prompts here so I'll have them all in one place as I don't always have internet.

Will Durst flyer signed

Like the returning salmon

Like the returning salmon, I only feel at ease when I return to my natal watershed. The  moment I cross the rise over the Tomales Bay Watershed I know I am home. The farmlands rise up to greet me like an old friend. Without judgement, without frame, the convolutions of road, space and time take me back to a place when anything was possible, even love.

D8C8AD, OR BEIGE BY ANY OTHER NAME

D8C8AD, OR BEIGE BY ANY OTHER NAME

A photo of a small green bird, and a series of color swatches. A chic fashion statement of sorts. But nowhere on that bird is that particular color beige, for example. Call it bone, as in bone-dead, because sometimes defining colors or what the eye sees, does not precisely fit the rigid structure as defined by Pantone color charts—D8C8AD. It is the imprecise nature of the variabilities of colors that graces that wild canary’s flanks that gives it depth and it both delights and surprises the eye with endless possibility.

3/27/19

PEN THEFT

PEN THEFT

It evolved into something like this:
She loved purple, and so by default,
all purple pens laying about were hers.
No matter that they weren’t. The siren call.
She absconded with the lot. They were like candy.
No pen was safe from her covetous nature.
Relentless as the sea. To her way of thinking:
Possessiveness was nine-tenths of the law.
Or something like that. Or that’s how she rationalized it.
With purple pen in hand, she was always at the ready
for what may, or may not, come.
Better to ask permission after the fact, than not, she thought,
knowing that the answer was always stacked.
She was well armed and at the ready.
By default, she was his Girl Friday,
even though it was not in the job description.
In the process, he, who hoarded his pens
in every possible color, had to relinquish control
of the purple pens, it was payback time
for all the pens he had stolen from his sister, the writer.
Some pens were tinted with the garish mauveine of analine dye,
an accident involving the synthesis of quinine for malaria,
that forever changed the painter’s palette,
and all the colors addressing the modern world—
not to mention mosquitoes.
Other pens were infused with a touch of the poet’s
secret midnight ink with impossible names
such as aubergine, amethyst or tanzanite.
She never knew what those dark pens
would want to say, or would want to draw, next.
Not to mention the uncharted territories.
She held them up to her ear, and like seashells,
they whispered unintelligible secrets
that were more often than not—lost in translation
on the long and arduous journey
from ear to hand to paper, or prayer,
bypassing that relentless censor, the brain.
She gave them free rein. They whispered nonsensical terms,
like blood diamonds, or high mass, and other raiments of desire.
Ultimately it was about truth. Any truth would do.
Or perhaps it was a case of free reign, because
purple was the color of royalty, after all.
It was sort of like channeling those Roddy Doyle
Facebook dialogues. Nonsensical premises
with sensical endings drowning their sorrows over a pint.
You could almost see the premises flocking
just around the corners of the mind’s eye.
She couldn’t help herself, stealing those pens.
Because purple is the color of forgiveness.
after all.

3/27/19

KILLING THE CAT

KILLING THE CAT

Cat wants in and out at the same time
But she is stuck on the stoop of indecision.
Coming and going are one thing to her.
She doesn’t differentiate, however,
she is merely exorcising her rights—
like Schrödinger’s cat. Ah, the variables of physics.
She complains. Looks up at me as if it’s my fault.
We stand in the doorway, frozen in time. And wait.
Maybe we are the thought experiment in action.
This room, this door. This moment in time
caught in the crosshairs. Not the cat—
who is neither dead nor alive,
depending upon your perspective.
And yes, boxes may have been involved.
If I think of her in the box, then, she is dead.
If I don’t, then, she she is alive. Either. Or.
What’s so ironic is that she’s not even my cat.
We wait, contemplate the vagaries of air.
Measure the depths of sky.
And close the door.

3/25/15
rev. 3/25/19
Published in Spectrum 24 August 2020

Dear Deer (Deirdre) of the Sorrows (photo)

Dear deer of the Sorrows. Last night she recognized the sound of my car and then refused to move. Nearly a head-on collision. Nearly the end for her. Right in front of the church too. Where is that young buck Naoise when you need him?

Photo is from 2018. Deirdre the deer is a little hussy, has twins every year without fail. She pops down the roses as if they were cotton candy—much to the chagrin of my cousin Sinead. Doesn’t even savor them. (Her cheekiness finally got the best of her, later in the year, now she hobbles from a run-in with a car, her latest set of twins dutifully mincing along behind her.)

Feral Friday commute

My somewhat feral Friday morning routine—get up before the crack of dawn, watch the mist rising in Nicasio Valley, listen to the cows, like a cat I sneak out of the house before my cousin Dave gets home from working nights at United—he doesn’t know I’m crashing in Sean’s abandoned bedroom— it’s a race to beat the clock. At least I’m no longer on the couch, the house is coming apart at the seams— literally. Where I’ve been staying in Sebastopol is too far from my teaching job in Berkeley. I make tea in a flask, pack out all my things, pour myself into the car, after scraping off frost, navigate icy backroads, through Lucas Valley, pick up Wi-Fi at Big Rock, the only place I can get a signal on my iPad, check the mail and FB, wait for sunrise over San Pablo Bay (none today, only fog and rain), finish off my tea, then head down the hill to outsmart the madness of the freeway and the commute frenzy of the big cities across the bay. I do all this in order to teach kids poetry.

SUMI-E haiku

SUMI-E

In a small clay bowl,
black carbon ink dreams the final song
of trees into being.

3/17/19

UKIYO-E SUMI DREAMS

In a small clay bowl,
black carbon ink dreams the final song
of trees into being.

3/17/19

Shout out from Sharon Doubiago on the publication of Hard Country

I wasn’t expecting a Facebook shout-out from poet Sharon Doubiago, for triggering the events for the publication of Hard Country. But, thanks.

Sharon Doubiago wrote to John Crawford:

“In 1980 two poet friends, Maureen Hurley and I think Leonard Cirino took my manuscript Hard Country, to Meridel LeSueur who was teaching at the annual 2-week poetry symposium in Port Townsend Washington. Copper Canyon Press of Pt. Townsend had enthusiastically accepted it but now was making sexual demands "or no publication." I took my ms from him. Meridel said "I've waited all my life for this book and before I die I'm going to get it published." And she did by taking the ms. to John Crawford of West End Press. Upon reading it he accepted it. Thus began my publishing career (which, as with some of my longtime poet friends as good as any of the superstars, might not have ever happened—writing poetry and getting published are 2 entirely different—in many ways contradictory—endeavors). West End was in Minneapolis as was Meridel. John was wonderful. He founded his press in the West End bar across the street from Columbia University in New York where Jack Kerouac, et al, had hung out and subsequently poets, writers and students. John was a great human being of great integrity and subsequently a great publisher. He never, not even slight hints, demanded what Copper Canyon had. Nor did he require extensive rewriting, changes or cuts to my 264-page poem. Instead he created a 6 female poets committee as editors. An issue rose about the Native American poems in Hard Country, whether a poem about the history of the U.S. by a "white woman" was politically incorrect. It was the great poet, the Native American Joy Harjo, who gave the okay. While in the publication process John came to San Francisco to meet with me, took me to the Basque Hotel/Restaurant in the alley across from what is now the Beatnik Museum, and over dinner educated me in the contemporary political Basque situation. Most awesomely he took me to the Marina apartment of the great poet George Oppen and wife. At least twice he brought me to Minneapolis, for final proofing and readings. He shared with me in several visits and letters his disastrous marriage with a Southern California woman named Sharon. He warned me to never take personally any confusion he might make with my name! He told me this several times! When published he made great connections and readings for Hard Country. When West End moved to Albuquerque he published a second edition. I last saw him there. He picked me up at Margaret Randall’s house and took me to his house which was packed with boxes of West End’s other publications. When he retired West End he sent me the remaining Hard Country copies at no cost to me. In publishing Hard Country he made possible all the rest of my life, all my further publications.  He made possible my poet’s life. He made possible the hope of a great America.  Thank you, mucho gracias, merci beaucoup, shukrin  John Crawford, Love Sharon (the one who loves you).”

https://www.facebook.com/547040818/posts/10156315981285819/

Wild birds

Wild Birds

There were always unnamed rituals to be upheld. The sisters saved up their hair from the comb and each spring they’d place their old hair out on the bushes for the wild birds to build their nests. In this way they were connected to the air. The birds imprinted on their scent, and circled of them like a halo. Like Saint Brigid. Yes. In this way they were all connected.

3/7/19

There were always unnamed rituals to be upheld. 

The sisters saved up their hair from the comb 

and each spring they’d place their old hair 

out on the bushes for the wild birds to build their nests. 

In this way they were connected to the air. 

The birds imprinted on their scent, 

and circled of them like a halo. Like Saint Brigid. Yes. 

In this way they were all connected.

Fat Tueday, Pancake Night

Yes, it’s Fat Tuesday! Pancake night, that’s what’s for dinner. My granny always made crêpes and stuffed them with cottage cheese, sour cream, sugar, and lemon with zest. Erwan Bouchina’s son, Antoine’s lonely crêpe pan was put to good use. No buckwheat flour though. They’re quite filling with the stuffing. I can handle about two, and I’m done. Laissez les bons temps rouler! 

• NOTE: THIS POST ALONG WITH 12 OTHER POSTS WAS ERRONEOUSLY REMOVED BY BLOGGER FOR VIOLATING COMMUNITY STANDARDS ON 5/14/21. It was reinstated as a draft the next day. I am still pissed off.

Atmospheric river

The atmospheric river is back. Rain rain rain rain. Hope the backroads will be open tomorrow. Localized flooding this afternoon—the Laguna is back, full force. Perfect Storm.

TRUE BLUE

He said—I wanna be in a rock ‘n’ roll band.
She said—But honey, you gotta accessorize.
So he strapped on an electric blue guitar
and strutted down the street in style.

3/1/19