Shomer Shabbos...

Cathleen is watching the plants grow out in our new garden. That's what she said for the third time walking out the front door, I'm gonna go watch the plants grow again. And that's what she's doing.

A few weeks ago we enlarged our tiny garden to a small garden by pulaskiing the heck out of a thick line of African Lilies that were choking out a line of earth along the far wall with our neighbors. Now we have rainbow chard, carrots, spinach, lettuce and tomatoes poking their heads from the soil and the final crisp pods of snap and sugar peas growing on some stunted vines in the flower bed.

She found another sprout of one of her mystery plants growing from seed on the balcony. These starts are surprises and she won't tell me what they are. Perhaps a superstition to my hampering their growth if I only knew what they might be. Whatever the case, she tries and succeeds in making my quiet life interesting every day.

Lately I've been a real pill, carrying an erratic mood about me all this past week. Today I feel it breaking away and am happy for its riddance. The stress of job searching and the panel interview are behind me. There's nothing to get your blood moving like three interviewers all eyeing you curiously and frantically scribbling answers to methodical questioning. And knowing in that mid-afternoon screening that matters had proceeding exactly this way since early morning; the only difference being the person in the chair I was seated in. Phew! The bay area has many ways of wearing a person down.

And so there hasn't been quite the spry step in my gait lately. Instead I've been kind of bitching and temperamental and not really doing much other than following the NBA playoffs, shopping for groceries, and for the most part eating them.

Today has been beautiful. The summer warmth we felt last month has returned and plenty of bugs are finding their way inside our home. We ate Lucky Charms Cathleen bought from the pharmacy and walked down to the Saturday market. We bumbled around the stalls for a while and bought some minneolas and then headed over to the library and lakefront. On the way home we had one of those coincidences that make a person feel kinda special regardless of whether they actually are. Stopping at a yard sale we found a brand new hand-capping instrument for bottling beer (which we'll be in need of next week, considering our current one is on the fritz). We also found a trivial pursuit board game for a buck, which has been on the list of things to purchase. Plus a few non-necessities that yard sales are known for. I know it doesn't sound like much, but I know the Great Magnet when the Great Magnet comes to pass.

From the Oakland Zoo the other week. We set up a booth near the chimps, representing the Jane Goodall Institute and its Roots & Shoots project, by handing out stickers and drawing pictures with kids... occasionally mentioning ten-dollar words like ecosystem and conservation.

Next!

It's nearing 80° in metropolis. We found our way home through the network of streets, baking slow rotisserie-style in the black confines of our car Cubby. Bellies full of tuna melt from our favorite cafe, Lois the Pie Queen, aptly named for its fabulous sweet digs, though a sprite and melt always suits me fine leaving little room for yam or cream pie.

I'm a free man again, though you wouldn't know it the way I kowtow to my baby day in and day out. Yesterday I shook a few hands and wished the small company I was selling myself to a fond farewell. No more Dickies blue jumpsuits, gloves, and giant Lawrence of Arabia hat to block the sun. No more picking on non-natives that'll die and grow back next year. No more blue herbicidal mist cascading across steep stretches for the reception of a poor broom or gorse.

Let em live I cry...cry all our tears cry them all out now. Let them flow down and clean all the rivers. And the evening sky is the reason why I'm going driftless. We're the same people that miss the clean rivers our mothers swam and grandmothers drank. And yet this is our solution for habitat restoration~ herbicide treatment and the rare case of hand-pulling. And we do this with the complete knowledge that disturbance creates the ideal niche of invasive weeds. We know this as we tromp heavily weighted on steep sliding slopes. We work in wet ravines and in the rain leaving deep prints in the soil. Weeks later the treated plants brown and we look at our work and say effective. Six months later a barren circle where it once was; and, one year later a giant clump of thistle. It's replacement. Translocation. Favoritism. And, quite ineffective. Creating future work with present work. I'm out...

The good news: everything. The bad news: none. A few fresh checks in my pocket and a few interviews ahead for possible vocations. Battlestar Gallactica, the sweetest sci-fi show ever made (minus The Next Generation) is on tonight and a few couples are coming over to beveragify and throw popcorn at the tele. Modern traditions are perverse and wonderful.

Cathleen's starting dinner now and I'm melting in the heat writing. If by chance I'm correct in sensing a cowboy pastlife, I must've been the mountain Montana-type wrangler up where moose and antelope roam. I marvel at 90°+ days and seeing the Latino community walking about in boots and black jeans, button-up western shirts with ten gallon hats on their heads. I mean, what in the flying fuck, right? I'd be sneaking across the border for different reasons, looking northward to the crisp air of the Rocky Mountains...

Ridiculosity

The anniversary of ridiculosity. A couple hundred strong near the steps of City Hall to commemorate five years at war, if you don't count Afghanistan. What was I thinking?


A fine specimen looking on from the lower left...





...as if to say, Get me out, please...

Selling it...

I awoke this morning at the beautiful hour of 9:30 am without qualm or worry for a day of duty to the man. Thursday, my Friday, I arranged my absence for a top-secret job interview downtown with the City of Oakland. In evading the boss-man's know of my being still on the market, I told him of an appointment but said no more. Luckily he didn't ask for details and so I didn't lie.

I shaved and got my face real close to the mirror to inspect for cleanliness and made looks of sincerity and honesty in preparation for my interview. A three-person panel would do the questioning again... just like last time, three months ago. I showered and then combed my hair with my fingers and put on the only shirt I find semi-respectable and hurried out the door.

I left the car a few blocks away and found my building heading up to the third floor. At the proper desk I announced my arrival and took a seat. After a few minutes a woman named Joyce informed me that my interview had been canceled and that a message had been left for me. Back in her office we checked the telephone history on her computer (which was pretty hi-tech, I felt, considering the junk-show I was experiencing in HR). On the way out I found myself in the elevator with a young spruced up businessman; we headed down to street level together in deafening silence. With the ding and the doors open we both hesitated offering first departure, psyching each other out a few times, Two polite people... we'll never make it in this world! he shouted after me.

Out on the street I felt a little better. It's funny when you catch yourself thinking of the money you could be making in your free time. That's what I was imagining... the two-hundred bucks I could've made today, instead of wasting my time in dressshoes downtown. Time is money. I always disliked that saying. How do people find so many opportunities to use it? I tried to think of something smarter.

Down half a block I waited for the walk sign and the loud chirp that now signifies it. A leather clad motorcyclist pulled next to the curb wearing a keffiyeh about his neck. He put his gloves on the seat and helmet on the handle, knelt to the rock and tar of 12th street and bowed toward the Pacific Ocean. The electronic bird began chirping in my ear and I headed across the street. I looked back from the adjacent corner and found him still praying, his head only feet away from the wheels of traffic.

Transplantation

We're on the steps of Mount Diablo, a beautiful four-thousand foot bump overlooking Walnut Creek and the Bay Area. Dow AgroSciences are blessing us with a 125 gallon concoction made of Transline, an herbicide for the control of broadleaf weeds. The enemy in question is yellow starthistle, which blankets the grasslands of northern California and ruthlessly strangles out native vegetation. Starthistle arrived via alfalfa seed contamination from the Balklans and now rules many miles with little hope of letting up.


That's my gloved hand there letting out the four-hundred foot hose to work a stretch of rangeland. The ground is tore up pretty fierce in some places where feral pigs, also introduced (obviously! from the Russians and Spaniards), have ripped the shit out of the earth with sharp cloven hooves. Further down the ridge wild turkeys are gobbling loudly cos it's mating season and the gobblers are all tricked out trying to attract the positive attentions of some hens (also introduced by the Spanish, thanks! with an origin of yes! Turkey!).

And so we have the generator on and pump running, spraying out gallons of blue-dyed herbicide into the grasslands. A few coyotes are hanging out by a rabbit hole down the trail, very unconcerned as to what we're doing. The Bay's spandex community of bikers are drudgingly climbing the mountain, each with a million-sponsored jersey and every conceivable gadget, up-to-date in every possible way as they time their heart rate and circuit length on this, their 800th ascent of Mount Diablo. I love biking, but there's something severely perverted about today's techni-decked road bikers on $5,000 jobs financed by the stock market. Sometimes I get the feeling that simplicity is gone and won't return anytime soon.

I also think about nativity and subsequent homeland ownership and find that I struggle formulating an opinion on who holds the rights. Sometimes I think of the Holy Land, but rarely, and then of America a nation of once non-native immigrants. And more, the originally occurring flora and fauna of the lands I know, fighting the fight with non-natives and invasives.

How long does it take before we're home, before we belong? Take all the pride of one with generations back in the same place, is that really something to brag about, or is it more to unease the veritable newcomers? I can feel the pride... though my roots don't go much further than the bend. I can also see... there's a light in the immigrant eyes that we misplaced long ago.

The case that is me

I recently received an email from an old friend I met traveling in Colombia. I forget the circumstances of our meeting, but I remember finding him to be a very unlikely friend to have. A dutchman with stringy hair in loose curls falling past the chin. A prominent beak of a nose and goofy smile. And the strange compliment of an incredibly chiseled body from weightlifting, and a playful egomania to accompany.

We ended up traveling together loosily for a week or so... a few days together in a city, a few apart while we wandered off into the sticks. This happened a couple times until I took a more lasting leap to some islands off the coast and he headed into the dense rainforests of Ecuador. We just got in touch again and this is what he wrote:

Hi there mister Encyclopedia! That's what I called you, but I am not sure I shared that piece of information with you;) You were that guy who had an answer and explanation on everything, highly annoying! You were that existentialist who was questioning everything. Pretty stressful! But somehow I thought you were a special kind of type. So I am happy hearing from you! Whats up, what became of you? Still chessplaying?

I am happy in The Netherlands, and working for an American company. Making lots of money, but it doesnt satisfy me anymore. I am planning new careers, will tell you one day if my plans succeeded...

Ciao Jesse

Warm regards
Jurre

I was a little shocked at my quick reaction to this note. Honestly, I have to say it broke my heart a little and caused a hollow wreck inside my chest where I leapt between a few thoughts, searching for an explanation. The first was, Well my God... he's exactly right! That was me and is still, regardless of the years passed. And is that how he really felt? Was I unbearable? Another was dull rage at his approach, shouting inside me, I was 19 years old! It was appropriate the way I felt, the way I voiced my opinions, and believed that things were happening... actually happening, and that I played some integral part in its evolution. I was a kid, give me a break! And you Jurre! Should I even start? Womanizer! Egomaniac! I talked that stupid girl into trusting you, that Colombiana that you bedded and left! The one with the doe eyes and vacant brain cavity! Oscar Wilde wrote, I am not young enough to know everything. Exactly! A rite of passage! A sad sad, yet hilarious privilege that was mine!

And so I raged for a spell and got it out of my system. I came back to the letter a few days later. I could still feel some self-pity crooning down deep and mulled on it for a while. It's a bummer to realize you've been a pain in the ass and that your personality can be trying; and, that someone you reserved judgement on, didn't do the same for you. But I had to laugh... at my sensitivity, and at his choice of words and the obvious fact he had meant no harm and was merely pointing out a fact or two. I also laughed at the likelihood that I would still, never write back.

To all those who grew up with me and had to field my manias on a daily basis, I apologise and thank you for bearing with me. And I won't pretend that I'm not still a trying bastard when it comes to opinions and matters of intensity. I'm indebted to your patience and support. I take a low bow now and quietly backpeddle behind the curtain...

Greeley Hill, California

There's a piece of land up near where the Sierra Nevadas rise from farmland patchwork seamed with canals and fenceposts. In the valleys the farmers want to sell their water instead of watering with it this year, it makes cents they say, as if the water running beneath the land were theirs to sell. It reminds me of concert and sports ticket scalpers asking for a good sound beating, ruining the essence by ruining the audience and the people's trust in other people. I think Arizona might take a bid on the water or perhaps Nevada would be happy to, now comfortably quadrupling their carrying capacity.

This land is above the thirsty plains, filled with white and doug fir, live oak and ponderosa pine. It was in the family that I've now become a part of. I think of it often; what I'd do first in maintaining it, tending to the himalayan blackberries along the fenceline and ivy at a giant's base. I think of it when the first hour elapses in traffic cos the Bay Bridge's construction continues its plight beyond three years and continues daily bottlenecks of five to three lanes, backing up for miles. I think of commerce and economy and financial security... and then I think of running.

But I imagine too much and it becomes difficult to evaluate my most sincere reactions to the elaborate fantasies I inhabit. Would the quiet become deafening? Would my thumb turn green if I read enough, tried enough... would I try enough? And when the creek dries up in the summertime, could I find water like Cal in East of Eden following the footsteps of his wife in the drought, up the still slippery moss of a giant boulder (one of the best books I've ever read)? Steinbeck always developed that sacred space for his character, a place for respite and refuel and sometimes, for sacrifice. And it's that fear that drives us for freedom and yet, warns us of the way.

I think of the porch and a number of nice places to sit. A cribbage board and bottle of wine, make that two bottles of wine. I imagine something that's not, and perhaps something I don't even want, couldn't handle. Like the southern songs of men being driven crazy by the call of the whippoorwill. But the idea is still there and I do my best to welcome it. One day my hands will have calluses again and maybe my beard will grow in finally. I'll have smooth red lines on my shoulders when I take off my suspenders at night (ha!) and dirt under my nails that'll never come out.

The democratic nomination is candy and I eagerly await each state's results. I like the blues and reds on CNN and that crazy new technology they have, zooming in on each district with Apple products and the whole triangulation of gender, race and social status. I like the way newsrooms all look like Sportscenter with up-to-the-second tickers and bar graphs, with an occasional pie chart of approval. Wolf Blitzer is Michael J. Fox on a full moon night. Anderson Cooper is George Clooney smocked and running down a hospital corridor. Lou Dobbs is Rodney Dangerfield under wraps, a slob in a three-piece suit.

I stirred some gin and soda together and sat down with my baby. The house is cozy and the ten-hour work day is over, rush hour traffic an afterthought to consider again tomorrow. Tonight's race is with Hawaii and Wisconsin, and God bless Washington state, a true stand-up motherfucker for the Dems. I'd like to send a few shoutouts to my political junkie friends... one in the Middle Nowhere, Jordan. Here's to the red, white, and blue and Tom Petty Half-Time Shows. And one for the Olympian, enjoy the mayhem.

Delegates and superdelegates are fucking bologna...

A long time coming...

Every epiphany is hard to hold onto. Within seconds i can feel it drifting, more difficult to grasp. And this one: that i've found what i wished for. And though i've been happy, i didn't realize until now that what i wished for was granted.

It struck me driving across town today on a shopping run for provisions, food and drink. It struck me that i was so happy with my life. That whats come to pass in the the last year was exactly what i'd wished for. And then i went about my day forgetting this strange elation.

2007, another kaleidoscope year like the one before, refracting upon itself, the events and projections melding into one jumbled mess of living. I think that every aim whether gained or lost must still face the scrutiny of what is worthwhile. So often i've managed a feat of stability in reckless moves and undertakings that would otherwise be a success in abandon. Endlessly i have questioned each place and each job and the faces around, contrasting them with something that has never occurred. Production and success, as if i knew what such things meant.

What i wanted all along was to find a place that felt like home. A place where regardless of my job and placement upon the planet the feeling of home would resound. A counteraction of the temporality that i felt. The only way i can find my place again in this monologue is to course myself back a few years. Beautiful Idaho, greens and blues and the sandy earth sliding beneath my feet walking downslope. I filled pages then in notes to self and letters posted to other states. And every song i listened to seemed to put to words what i was feeling and how i was struggling to find the way i was feeling, what i wanted, and how i would go about realizing what exactly i was doing with my time.

And i don't know what i was doing. I believe i was trying to keep things going, to keep that forward progress and optimism rolling until something happened. Every step back into introspection and analysis seemed dangerous and threatening to stability. Minimizing the ripple effect of poor decisions and turnouts. Trying to stay on my feet and keep coming up with plausible plan Bs.

Here it is. Perhaps i tripped upon it, i don't know. It feels like i came the hard way. I can't say i deserve it, but i know its been a long time coming. I'm feeling home again.

"...in her spare time Cathleen enjoys saving baby seals along the Bering Sea coast, putting in time at the local orphanage, and fishing garbage from the banks of Lake Merritt."

Jesus Christ! Pt. II

Last week we did a good deed and were rewarded with a free dinner of our choosing. The afternoon was getting on, the horizon paling salmon and orange... I was enjoying the Cowboys defeat on the tele, Cathleen was pulling clothes from a box rummaged in the garage. I was voting on each shirt, boo or somebody's gotta like that, get rid of it and occasionally, oh, very nice. We went through a few boxes and then hit the drawers. Despite the twenty shirts Cathleen tried on... oh, and the thirty hanging in the closet, and handful in drawers, she made mention of being short on shirts. This is an outline for future discourse on the subtle differences between women and non-metro-men.

Anyway, we got hungry and thought to cash in the karma ticket at this sushi place we've never tried. I thought it also sounded good cos I was feeling thirsty for sake and this place in particular has the bottomless option and is known throughout the neighborhood for its strange staff and owner who push exorbitant amounts of rice wine on the meek clientele. Well, so it goes... we walk down and the streets and shops are slow or closed cos it's Sunday and people are chilling in their homes and on patios. We find our joint and have a seat up by the chef and commence with an honorary, hands-behind-the-back sipping of our sake from square wooden receptacles (a sake ritual for first-timers apparently). The food is good, we order in waves and I'm really digging on the salmon cuts, but meanwhile every time our squares get lower they're filled again. The deal is, if you don't flip the fucking thing over they will be very pushy to refill it, no matter what level it's at. So we get trashed, unconditionally. Near the end, I'm starting to fight it a little bit and the lady of the house tells me she doesn't speak english, Only the Japanese as she fills my square for the umpteenth time against my wishes. I've always been part of the clean plate club... I just want to put that out there... in other words, this is a potentially disastrous situation for me. Somehow I manage to finish that portion too and quickly, I mean quickly, flip over my square. Cathleen does the same and we're having a good laugh at that cos we're having a nice evening, and the social lubricant has abounded. That's when the owner comes over, a slender smiley grayhaired man and he comes straight over to me and flips my square right side up, and refills the fucker. My reaction time is pretty slow at this point. The lady of the house is telling us a story about people not being able to find the door. Jesus christ!

We thank everyone and sign up our bill and head for the door. There's like eight people eating and eight people serving. The staff is shouting goodbye and we're doing the same. Just as we're getting a few paces from the place, the lady of the house comes running outside with a big smile and shouts after us, Can you walk straight? and all I can think to shout back is, You are such a bad influence! We stumble home in a drunken fashion discussing the restaurant approach of getting your customers shithoused and what that does for repeat business, and/or will they remember how the food tasted. It's called Coach Sushi cos the old grayhaired man use to be a baseball player, and then a baseball coach back in Japan. Now he's the coach of this restaurant, the supercute blondhaired hostess tells us, and I'll get in trouble if he sees me not keeping these full of sake. She has a wry smile as she says this, she knows where this is going. These people are crazy...

Justice is served

Did you see that?

Four news stations spouting garbage on the Seahawks upset-to-be, meanwhile playing at home where only one game has been lost? Redskins Win won for the Gipper propoganda, a ridiculous proposition following the death of their gangster, try-to-kill-em hitter Sean Taylor. Did anyone see one of the best passers in the game, with little credit behind him, come back in the fourth and demolish the Skins? It was a great game on both sides. Even in closing thoughts, any credit?... no.



Did you see that?

Hines Ward in the endzone Fourth and Goal, a hand in the facemask, a hand grabbing the shoulder? Defensive pass interference? Bumblebees getting a first down and going on to take the lead in closing minutes because of the bullshit call. I'm not seeing any mention of it in ESPN recap coverage. Are you kiddding me? Someone should be fired. Is this the fucking 2005 Super Bowl? Eat me Pittsburgh! Eat me officiating crew! It was hard earned tonight by the Jacksonville Jaguars. They had to go through multiple teams and they earned it. So let it be known, 2008 predictions are tried and true. Bumblebees fall and that is justice served!

Deprivation on so many levels...

I am taking a deep breath now and contemplating going back to bed. I've fulfilled my duties: stirred awake a friend upon the couch, put coffee in our delirium tremened hands, and managed to drive him to the airport. I rewarded myself with a shower and breakfast, a second cup of coffee.

I am looking at the calendar now. Cathleen has merged our lives such that a Gmail calendar foretells future plans with family, friends, and places along the way. We got nothing, it's beautiful. The only plan we had was called off this morning when I awoke hungover with a voice of gravel, foreseeing a day of Battlestar Galactica and new-fashioned ready-to-eat packaged food.

I have nothing to do. Future possibilities in employment lie dormant, hibernating through the annual budget analysis and holiday hangover. I spoke with a few employers yesterday, kind bored HR types issuing dates of the ten-step hiring process, consulting mundane calendars. "Thank you Mr. Reebs for applying. We felt your interview went very well and would like to string you along for another few weeks before a follow-up interview. How does that sound?"

I made friends last night. Local Oaktowners with major promise in vocational connections (through one's Daddy) and a future tennis partner to take the strain off Cathleen, who I daily ask for a tennis match requiring her to more often than not decline. It was a big dinner party at a friend of a friend's restaurant in Sebastapol. Four courses and forty dollar bottles of wine lining the table. Great conversation and a little yo-yo in the bathroom compliments of the chef. At a local watering hole we played shuffleboard and drank cheap bourbon. I somehow managed a lightning sobering act and got us on the road after one, pushing south 101 to a car filled with chatter and deafening music. Life can be so good.

I want to thank friends for a wonderful week. The love helped me stave nausea for Christmas, my least favorite thing to do... right up there with selling narcotics to children. I want to take a deep breath and manage to cleanse the temple a little bit, lay off the sauce until football rolls around. Want to tell the Bobicks that I respect their guys out there doing battle on the gridiron. May the best man win. And if you got any more lip, eat me.



My baby likes mimosas...

2008 predictions Pt. I

Seahawks walk over Redskins in a 2005 fashion.

2008 predictions Pt. II

Steelers fall early. Roethlisberger can't take the heat.

2008 predictions Pt. III

I will continue to eat and drink copiously of G-D's finest in the coming year.





This year's brewing will be better.

2008 predictions Pt. IV

Baby will buy us a goat farm up in the rugged hills of Carolina.



She'll be briefly be checked into a mental hospital following a run at modeling and the big lights of Los Angeles.



Balance will be regained and a life of love and leisure will resume.

Christmas came and went
A giraffe mug unwrapped on Tuesday morning
Santa in a sleigh overhead
And the Christ child rolling in his grave