My son is doing a paper for an English class and typical of students aiming towards Engineering, finding he doesn't have (or thinks he doesn't have) the right sort of mind to analyze a poem.
"There's really nothing there," he says. "Just the poem, and a bunch of people giving their opinions on it. Nothing definite."
Math and physics are definite. This is what makes them easier to do. But college also teaches us to write about things we will never understand. And so he is writing about Frost's "The Road Not Taken." It's a lovely poem, simple of imagery and rhythm and rhyme, and as a well for pondering, bottomless. I'm reading it so I can better proofread his paper later. I enjoy reading it. Rhyme and rhythm assist the mind in framing concepts. Freeform poetry also has its place, but honestly, a lot of freeform poetry is little more than offhand prose written by a lazy poet.
My simple take? Choices are choices. We always have roads not taken. Once done, our sigh may be of regret or relief, but the choice itself cannot be wrong. It's the choice we make and that makes it right. What we do on the road now chosen, how we seize it and make the most of it, is what makes all the difference.
Showing posts with label kid stuff. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kid stuff. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Fun at Fry's
Got Skzx's new computer for school last night. He moves hundreds of miles away in a few weeks and needs time to verify Facebook works correctly on it.
Went to Fry's. Once upon a time that was the place for the geeks of Silicon Valley to get all their electronic components and gizmos to invent new stuff with. Now it's just a big-ass electronics dealer with branches all over. But it's real electronics. Besides TVs and washing machines they still sell a lot of parts and tools. I like browsing.
We narrowed the field and got him something with, as they used to say about Rolls-Royce engines, "sufficient" power. One more thing to check off the list.
I hate shopping. But I love shopping with ma boys. Invariably. Doing just about anything, really.
It was also fun to look at one of the netbooks and say to the sales guy, oh yeah, I've got the innards for that one all over my desk. Powered up, guts out, trying to solve a problem the manufacturer has found. He sort of gave that little smirk that people do for an instant when they think something's cool and don't want to show it. That was fun.
Went to Fry's. Once upon a time that was the place for the geeks of Silicon Valley to get all their electronic components and gizmos to invent new stuff with. Now it's just a big-ass electronics dealer with branches all over. But it's real electronics. Besides TVs and washing machines they still sell a lot of parts and tools. I like browsing.
We narrowed the field and got him something with, as they used to say about Rolls-Royce engines, "sufficient" power. One more thing to check off the list.
I hate shopping. But I love shopping with ma boys. Invariably. Doing just about anything, really.
It was also fun to look at one of the netbooks and say to the sales guy, oh yeah, I've got the innards for that one all over my desk. Powered up, guts out, trying to solve a problem the manufacturer has found. He sort of gave that little smirk that people do for an instant when they think something's cool and don't want to show it. That was fun.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Cannibal
Here is the picture that the Eagle Scout chose.
Here is the cake with the picture that the Eagle Scout chose.
Here is the Eagle Scout destroying the cake with the picture that the Eagle Scout chose.
Here is the cake with the picture that the Eagle Scout chose.
Here is the Eagle Scout destroying the cake with the picture that the Eagle Scout chose.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Best Present Ever
They were gonna get me a garden cart or something, and while at the big box store my sons wound up playing with large sharp objects. Their mother made them stop lest someone lose a hand, and my elder son looked at the tool he was holding and went, aha!
He inherited my fascination with swords and knives along with the creativity. Quite under my radar, he took this implement and secretly made of it a work of art, presented on my birthday.
He inherited my fascination with swords and knives along with the creativity. Quite under my radar, he took this implement and secretly made of it a work of art, presented on my birthday.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Homecoming
From the archives of my long gone original blog, Wed 10 Sep 2003.
The school schedule was passed around the dinner table and note was made of the upcoming Homecoming celebrations: A bonfire, a parade, a football game.
The ninth grader asked, “What's Homecoming?”
The mother's face lit up. She knew the child needed encouragement to go to social events, that given a choice he'd rather hang with a couple long-haired kids in a stuffy room and listen to heavy metal. She wanted to talk it up.
“It's … fun!” she said. “It's like back-to-school, but it's all for the kids. There's parties, and games, and stuff going on … “
The father said, “I thought it was about coming home, like for the football team after being out on the road for weeks.”
“No,” she said. “No. It's coming home, back to school.” Her smile faded.
“Do you have to, like, wear a suit?” the ninth grader asked.
“No,” she laughed, a little forced. “Jeans and t-shirts. There's activities, and there'll be a parade, and floats … “
She fell silent. The ninth grader said “Hmm”, and tried to look game.
The family saw tears on her face. She worked to hold them in, but it was no go, and she abruptly left the table. They ate in silence awhile. The father took on a neutral expression and left her alone to her space, for he knew the children took their cue from him. In time she returned, wiping her eyes. She sat down.
“Sorry.”
“No, no,” said the father.
“Mom, what's wrong?” asked the younger child.
Happiness and sorrow strove together across her features. She tried to smile, but the tears would not stop.
“I never went to Homecoming,” she said. “It was a lot of fun.” She paused.
“My mother wouldn't let me. She was so jealous. She made sure, every year, that I couldn't go.”
“What the hell …” interrupted the father but she waved him silent.
“She never had a life. And she was damn sure I wouldn't either. She hated me. Hated me. Every year we had to go to her mother's house on Homecoming weekend, or something.
“Finally, in 12th grade – my last chance! – I decided to go. She wasn't going to ruin it for me any more. I just didn't come home. I stayed at school and helped make floats. We made floats for the parade! It was a blast. It was an absolute blast.”
The happy memory disappeared from her face as she started crying again.
“I went home, oh, maybe about four in the afternoon. I wanted to change my clothes. I wanted to be in the parade! Or hang with my friends, or go to a party. Something! Anything! It was my senior year. My last chance ever to go to Homecoming!”
She sobbed.
“That bitch was so mad. She hated me! Went after me with a baseball bat.”
Anger chased off the tears.
“Took a baseball bat to me.”
“Did you hit her back?” asked the ninth grader. He knew the bitch in question. She was his loving grandmother. But he also knew people were not usually what they seemed.
The mother paused, nodded, shook her head.
“I … I had to defend myself.”
The father had been told in dark nights past of mother-daughter struggles that ultimately sent the girl's mother to the hospital. He suspected this had been one of them. But the mother did not share that detail with her child.
“I defended myself,” she said.
“So you!” she cried, pointing a finger at him. “You go to Homecoming, and have a great time! Or I'll take a baseball bat to you.” She laughed and her damp, deep brown eyes sparkled.
The school schedule was passed around the dinner table and note was made of the upcoming Homecoming celebrations: A bonfire, a parade, a football game.
The ninth grader asked, “What's Homecoming?”
The mother's face lit up. She knew the child needed encouragement to go to social events, that given a choice he'd rather hang with a couple long-haired kids in a stuffy room and listen to heavy metal. She wanted to talk it up.
“It's … fun!” she said. “It's like back-to-school, but it's all for the kids. There's parties, and games, and stuff going on … “
The father said, “I thought it was about coming home, like for the football team after being out on the road for weeks.”
“No,” she said. “No. It's coming home, back to school.” Her smile faded.
“Do you have to, like, wear a suit?” the ninth grader asked.
“No,” she laughed, a little forced. “Jeans and t-shirts. There's activities, and there'll be a parade, and floats … “
She fell silent. The ninth grader said “Hmm”, and tried to look game.
The family saw tears on her face. She worked to hold them in, but it was no go, and she abruptly left the table. They ate in silence awhile. The father took on a neutral expression and left her alone to her space, for he knew the children took their cue from him. In time she returned, wiping her eyes. She sat down.
“Sorry.”
“No, no,” said the father.
“Mom, what's wrong?” asked the younger child.
Happiness and sorrow strove together across her features. She tried to smile, but the tears would not stop.
“I never went to Homecoming,” she said. “It was a lot of fun.” She paused.
“My mother wouldn't let me. She was so jealous. She made sure, every year, that I couldn't go.”
“What the hell …” interrupted the father but she waved him silent.
“She never had a life. And she was damn sure I wouldn't either. She hated me. Hated me. Every year we had to go to her mother's house on Homecoming weekend, or something.
“Finally, in 12th grade – my last chance! – I decided to go. She wasn't going to ruin it for me any more. I just didn't come home. I stayed at school and helped make floats. We made floats for the parade! It was a blast. It was an absolute blast.”
The happy memory disappeared from her face as she started crying again.
“I went home, oh, maybe about four in the afternoon. I wanted to change my clothes. I wanted to be in the parade! Or hang with my friends, or go to a party. Something! Anything! It was my senior year. My last chance ever to go to Homecoming!”
She sobbed.
“That bitch was so mad. She hated me! Went after me with a baseball bat.”
Anger chased off the tears.
“Took a baseball bat to me.”
“Did you hit her back?” asked the ninth grader. He knew the bitch in question. She was his loving grandmother. But he also knew people were not usually what they seemed.
The mother paused, nodded, shook her head.
“I … I had to defend myself.”
The father had been told in dark nights past of mother-daughter struggles that ultimately sent the girl's mother to the hospital. He suspected this had been one of them. But the mother did not share that detail with her child.
“I defended myself,” she said.
“So you!” she cried, pointing a finger at him. “You go to Homecoming, and have a great time! Or I'll take a baseball bat to you.” She laughed and her damp, deep brown eyes sparkled.
Friday, May 08, 2009
Mothers and Other Such Things
The dog was a puppy just a little while ago, full of romp and jump and dash away. But now she tires easily and is pooching out and growing teats and in a few weeks I imagine she will recline with her little parasites and go, Where the hell did these come from? Then I will have to escape-proof the yard.Mother’s Day is a weird one to me – okay, all holidays are weird to me anymore. The only one that makes sense is Halloween. That and Yule, when we light great bonfires and drink and dance and fornicate under the holly -– wait, that was a long time ago. Don’t you hate when memories of past lives blur together? Anyway, this ultimate greeting-card holiday has always been one of organizing my troops into shopping and cooking teams and making The Day into something flowery and loving. This year will be similar. But it’s the last! Young men, they are, and young men should not live with their parents. Next year one of them won’t, who knows, maybe both.
Why’s it weird to me? At some deep fundamental level where belly meets brain, I guess because mothers don’t make sense to me. Put that down to my particular circumstances. We all have particular circumstances, of course, and a lot of them have to do with mothers. Mine are nothing unusual, and since my mother reads this (Hi Mom!) I’m not going to launch a long speculative screed exploring my intercrossing feelings on the matter. I love her (You!) and at this point nothing else much matters. But I’m not the only one with snakes intertwined where the greeting cards would give us bland platitudes. My wife loves but especially hates her mother, and for many excellent reasons, and the past week has been dominated by telephone arguments over my mother-in-law trying to weasel out of attendance at her grandson’s high school graduation out of some ignorant fear of catching the swine flu on an airplane.
Thank you Joe Biden.
The complications arise of course because there are conflicting emotions: It’s your grandson! … Wait, you mean I never have to see you again? Balance one against the other … But of course she must come, because she must, that’s the way it is, and so (she now says) she shall. We’ll see. I hope so but I’ll not miss the bitch if otherwise.
Grandson is neutral about it, being as the grandma showed clear favoritism towards the other brother for most of his childhood, and he’s absorbed more than enough of his mother’s angry-sad tears over not having a “real mother” when something or other happens; yet she’s not an actual monster, even attempts humor sometimes, and of course he loves her as a grandmother of just about any type cannot help but be loved. So, fine, we’ll see. Mostly he’s just happy to be growing up. Let me count the ways.
No, I won’t count. But the past few weeks have been amazing. Last night – I’m still absorbing last night. You know, you have to get all your Eagle Scout stuff done by midnight before you turn eighteen or all that hard work is for nothing. Badges, the project, write-ups, forms, interviews, signatures … There is a blur of requirements and we have known many young men who were working at it right up to their last day as a seventeen year old – and a few who did not finish in time, and sometime down the road will look back and kick themselves for it, hard. I’ve had this huge check-off in mind for months. Will it all get done? All of it? Truly? In time? Much suspense, believe me.Last night he drove around and met with various leaders and got signatures and handed stuff in and was able to tell me that everything that has to be done before he turns eighteen … is done. No more deadline.
No more deadline.
You see? I’m still absorbing and would like to write that a few more times but for your sake, I will not. It’s just … No more deadline. (!)
And just last week they struck the set of the school play in which he had the Raymond Massey role, and the week before that the yearbook for which he was editor-in-chief was complete and sent off to the presses, and this week he completed his senior project, and, oh, I could build it up but the point is, all that stuff that he has been juggling is done now. No more deadline! Just a few weeks of high school to finish up, turn eighteen meanwhile, and … no more childhood.No more childhood.
Maybe you were wondering what this part has to do with Mother’s Day? Of course you weren't. When we’ve whelped, I’ll post pics.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
More Boldly Going
More Camping Caving Spelunking pics and random commentary.
This was our last outing. My scout turns eighteen soon and then it's all over. I didn't get all weepy. Most guys don't really appreciate that.
Nature was kind. It rained heavily during the night and sometimes during the day but never when we were cooking.
There was an eagle's nest nearby, up on a pole specially made for it, I think to keep the eagles from nesting on power lines. A mating pair waited patiently for us to quit messing around near their pole.
Here's us before we went in. You can tell it's a before shot because we're not all muddy.
Here's another of me because the cute redhead who fitted us up took it and so I have to publish it. She took my camera because visitors aren't allowed to carry cameras while going down the rope. Probably they had too many dropped cameras shattering on top of people watching down below. Did I mention how cute she was? And a redhead. Real easy-going, too, I think foothills life is either very slow or very, erm, hemp-enhanced.
Done with the rope thing, we went spelunking. This is where you follow your guide, preferably an adorable redhead, down into the mountain and crawl through mud-enslimed cracks in the bones of the earth. Passages have names like Devil's Chimney and Meatgrinder. I was the only adult to go on this part. Somehow the tale of another trip in which one of our heftier ASMs got stuck between two rocks and had to wait in the dark for three hours before they managed to get him out failed to inspire the other grownups to go. Some of them, to be fair, couldn't go because they had smaller boys to look after. Maybe it's just a general rule that grownups don't go. That would explain why I do.
Not a place for the claustrophobic. Also helps to be able to pull your weight with just your arms, because some places there just wasn't room to get a leg in place with which to push. Wriggle an inch at a time is what you have to do, while protruding rocks dig into whatever spine or hipbone is convenient. It's a lot of fun. It really is.
Once back out in the main cavern, we watched some more scouts do the rope thing. It’s a wonderful thing to watch a twelve year old boy who’s never done anything like repel 165 feet down a rope take his fears in hand, focus on the moment to moment motions, and make it to the bottom in one piece, filled with a quiet triumph. You see a positive growth that will never be taken away. I strongly wish no child would be ignored, but would be guided through the paces of their choosing, challenged, facing fear, and coming out a winner. How much happier would the world be?
This was our last outing. My scout turns eighteen soon and then it's all over. I didn't get all weepy. Most guys don't really appreciate that.
Nature was kind. It rained heavily during the night and sometimes during the day but never when we were cooking.
There was an eagle's nest nearby, up on a pole specially made for it, I think to keep the eagles from nesting on power lines. A mating pair waited patiently for us to quit messing around near their pole.
Here's us before we went in. You can tell it's a before shot because we're not all muddy.
Here's another of me because the cute redhead who fitted us up took it and so I have to publish it. She took my camera because visitors aren't allowed to carry cameras while going down the rope. Probably they had too many dropped cameras shattering on top of people watching down below. Did I mention how cute she was? And a redhead. Real easy-going, too, I think foothills life is either very slow or very, erm, hemp-enhanced.
Done with the rope thing, we went spelunking. This is where you follow your guide, preferably an adorable redhead, down into the mountain and crawl through mud-enslimed cracks in the bones of the earth. Passages have names like Devil's Chimney and Meatgrinder. I was the only adult to go on this part. Somehow the tale of another trip in which one of our heftier ASMs got stuck between two rocks and had to wait in the dark for three hours before they managed to get him out failed to inspire the other grownups to go. Some of them, to be fair, couldn't go because they had smaller boys to look after. Maybe it's just a general rule that grownups don't go. That would explain why I do.
Not a place for the claustrophobic. Also helps to be able to pull your weight with just your arms, because some places there just wasn't room to get a leg in place with which to push. Wriggle an inch at a time is what you have to do, while protruding rocks dig into whatever spine or hipbone is convenient. It's a lot of fun. It really is.
Once back out in the main cavern, we watched some more scouts do the rope thing. It’s a wonderful thing to watch a twelve year old boy who’s never done anything like repel 165 feet down a rope take his fears in hand, focus on the moment to moment motions, and make it to the bottom in one piece, filled with a quiet triumph. You see a positive growth that will never be taken away. I strongly wish no child would be ignored, but would be guided through the paces of their choosing, challenged, facing fear, and coming out a winner. How much happier would the world be?
Friday, March 27, 2009
Boldly Go
Sometimes you stop at the gas station and right when you’re out in the open space between the pumps and the mini-mart a huge gas truck comes barreling down the road and turns into the gas station and you think, damn, if that guy’s having a bad day and or his brakes are out this going to be a day when everything changes.
Big-ass gas truck is hurtling down the road, I can hear it, and there’s really nowhere to go and avoid it. Either it will hit me or it will not but either way, everything is going to change.
Not just kids moving out, empty nest looming. That’s the driving factor but not the only factor. Instincts proclaim it is time to change things around. Yes, because the kids will be going but also yes because my long-suffering is tired of the drama. Kid drama? No, no, well, yes, but I’m the kid. A life struggling against the box I put myself in. Time to break the box. Time to be bold and risk it. All of it.
Because it is for the most part inevitable, it really shouldn’t be so hard.
That’s how it felt last weekend, as I hung from a rope, one foot on a mud-slimy rock wall, the rest of my skinny ass hanging out in space. I really didn’t need my foot on the wall anymore. I was way past the point it did any good. ‘Deed it was above my head at that point. I just didn’t want to let go, to lose my touch on Mother Earth and trust everything to a slim winding of fibers. But I was already trusting them completely. A booted foot touching a wall above your head isn’t much use if the rope breaks.
So I pulled my leg in and spun a bit and kept on going. Fed the rope, looked down, enjoyed the view. 165 feet is more than far enough to make thought of anything going wrong fairly pointless. Just do it! Go, and boldly.
Repelling and spelunking at Moaning Cavern. Camping amidst rain-wet scrub oaks and soaring eagles at New Melones Lake.
Big-ass gas truck is hurtling down the road, I can hear it, and there’s really nowhere to go and avoid it. Either it will hit me or it will not but either way, everything is going to change.
Not just kids moving out, empty nest looming. That’s the driving factor but not the only factor. Instincts proclaim it is time to change things around. Yes, because the kids will be going but also yes because my long-suffering is tired of the drama. Kid drama? No, no, well, yes, but I’m the kid. A life struggling against the box I put myself in. Time to break the box. Time to be bold and risk it. All of it.
Because it is for the most part inevitable, it really shouldn’t be so hard.
That’s how it felt last weekend, as I hung from a rope, one foot on a mud-slimy rock wall, the rest of my skinny ass hanging out in space. I really didn’t need my foot on the wall anymore. I was way past the point it did any good. ‘Deed it was above my head at that point. I just didn’t want to let go, to lose my touch on Mother Earth and trust everything to a slim winding of fibers. But I was already trusting them completely. A booted foot touching a wall above your head isn’t much use if the rope breaks.
So I pulled my leg in and spun a bit and kept on going. Fed the rope, looked down, enjoyed the view. 165 feet is more than far enough to make thought of anything going wrong fairly pointless. Just do it! Go, and boldly.
Repelling and spelunking at Moaning Cavern. Camping amidst rain-wet scrub oaks and soaring eagles at New Melones Lake.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Pampanito
I've slept aboard a couple times, thanks to Scouting. Bay waters whisper against the hull, and Bay mist and diesel fumes drift about. A ghostly light from the City's distant nightlife comes down through the fog. Boys run and play and parent chaperones snore. Blood in hair is not uncommon, the hatches being short and rimmed with steel edges. The parent who's still mostly a kid wanders through taking pictures incessantly, imagination all ahead full. It is extraordinarily tight quarters.
A sweet story about a man who got to see it again: Aussie comes to S.F. to see sub that saved him.
U.S.S. Pampanito -- Pix I've taken over the years:
A sweet story about a man who got to see it again: Aussie comes to S.F. to see sub that saved him.
U.S.S. Pampanito -- Pix I've taken over the years:
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Going South Smiling
As I watch the unsurprising results of electing an inexperienced and relatively left-leaning president come in much faster than I expected (and no I haven't forgotten that Bush kicked off this particular debacle by forgetting the economic principles he probably never understood -- or just as likely, he simply didn't care anymore and went along with the ideas flowing out of the initial panic), I decide not to worry about it and pay attention to what matters: Never mind the Educational IRAs being cut in half, we probably have enough equity in the house to send the boys to college anyway. Well, so long as our lending institution thinks so. I guess nothing's guaranteed.
All the same, Skzx and I had a look at UCI and UCSB. Once it stopped raining (and snowing in the high passes), the weather was beautiful. I've never been a great fan of Southern California, but that is largely my petty Northern California prejudice talking. I have to admit, oftentimes the winter weather is gorgeous. Hell, all year, what do I know. There is some scenery I haven't seen yet. Some nice plants here and there ...
Okay, look, I'm trying, okay? Point is, the kid took this trip with little intention of actually moving down there, but seeing the places for himself opened up some possibilities. Maybe he'll go down there after all. We'll see.
We spent the first night across the street from John Wayne Airport. I enjoyed the wafting aromas. Jet fuel always smells like going places. We had a free evening so we went up into Huntington Beach to see The International after eating at Islands. Pretty good: A slower pacing than Bond or Bourne, a more contemplative and realistic movie. Plus it was cool to recognize a tile floor in Milan I've walked on (you may now roll your eyes). Next morning the fact that the hotel soap looked like a slice of cheese was not nearly as annoying as the three bottles of ... whatever they were. One, shampoo. I understood that. But I couldn't figure out which of the other two bottles was a hair conditioner and which a conditioning cleanser for the skin. To a rube like me they just weren't clear, and I really didn't want to put skin lotion in my scalp. Pissed me off.
UC Irvine is mere blocks from JWA but it is also in Orange County so it took me over half an hour to find it. That place! There are freeways every which way, the boulevards are continually curving in different directions, and somehow I couldn't get my compass bearings (didn't have a detailed enough map either). There's a lagoon or something and we wound up on the wrong side of it and had to go around. It was nuts. But what the hell, the weather was nice. Once there we got some coffee and walked around until it was time for the tour to start at the Visitor Center.
"Are you interested in taking the noon tour?"
"Sure, or we'll take the old tour, either one, never been here before anyway."
Sometimes having rock-and-roll-and-firearms hearing makes me such a dork.
UC Irvine was built in the 1960s during those flush times when California had a top-notch educational system and the growing aerospace industry was paying for everything from exhibits at Disneyland to freeways and subdivisions. The architecture shows it. Most of the buildings have a late-60s concrete-future look to them. They're not at all unaesthetic. Just somewhat quaint, in that way buildings are whose architecture is about halfway between ugly out of style and cool retro. I don't mean to criticize. The place is a park. Lovely, green, full of trees and sculpture and sunshine. And students, duh, full of energy and promise and mischief. It was a very cool thing for Skzx to see. Plus one of the housing sections is named Middle Earth, which is sort of dorky but sort of cool. We were only disappointed that it was run by "Administration" and not by a High Council.
The late afternoon drive across L.A. and into Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties wasn't bad at all. Never really hit what I would call bad traffic. Can't account for that but not complaining. It was neat to see the famous names on the exits -- Sepulveda, Wilshire, Hollywood, Beverly Hills. Some day maybe we'll check them out -- yes, I've never really been there. But just as every other time, we had somewhere to go. Enjoyed the drive along the coast. We were pretty impressed with this palm-studded island out there on the end of its own pier. Thought, damn, someone's got some MO NAY. Only later learned it's a dressed up pipeline terminus built by Richland Oil in the 50s. Okay, whatev.
At UCSB I dropped Skzx off to hang with a couple high school friends going there and found us lodging and hung around the room feeling brain-dead. Not from the drive. I just wasn't as energetically creative as I thought a free evening would inspire me to be. Funny how we get. At least I didn't watch TV. Next day he audited a couple classes (well, visited) and met me for the noon tour. Same deal, different campus. Santa Barbara is weird to me. It's its own little world. There's really nothing out there but ocean and students. Not much in the way of a local town. This makes it a very pleasant cocoon and to someone whose idea of a university sits smack in the middle of Berkeley and in view of San Francisco it is kind of weird. But hey, great school, all that. I liked the trees. Oh, and apparently Blu-ray technology was invented there. That doesn't impress me, and I doubt it anyway, but that's the sort of selling point a smart university puts out in front of its prospective freshmen. Maybe the consortium funded a little research. It's all good.
Majors? Engineering or Physics, that sort of thing. Watching me grow into an embittered old man for dropping the various arts I was good at in order merely to make a living doing the weird and incomprehensible things engineers do apparently didn't scare him off it. Besides, he wants to save the world. Alternate and inexhaustible energy development inspired me at first, why not him a generation later. God knows we need some good people working on that stuff and this kid, if he doesn't lose the vision, will make a difference.
So: It's all good. The same applies to my snarky comment up top about current political events. Whatever mistakes our new president makes now, I -- this is hard to admit but it's true -- I trust the guy. I trust him and his abilities and his intentions. Weird, iznit? So it's all good, selling half the house back to the bank to pay for a child's college degree notwithstanding.
All the same, Skzx and I had a look at UCI and UCSB. Once it stopped raining (and snowing in the high passes), the weather was beautiful. I've never been a great fan of Southern California, but that is largely my petty Northern California prejudice talking. I have to admit, oftentimes the winter weather is gorgeous. Hell, all year, what do I know. There is some scenery I haven't seen yet. Some nice plants here and there ...
Okay, look, I'm trying, okay? Point is, the kid took this trip with little intention of actually moving down there, but seeing the places for himself opened up some possibilities. Maybe he'll go down there after all. We'll see.
We spent the first night across the street from John Wayne Airport. I enjoyed the wafting aromas. Jet fuel always smells like going places. We had a free evening so we went up into Huntington Beach to see The International after eating at Islands. Pretty good: A slower pacing than Bond or Bourne, a more contemplative and realistic movie. Plus it was cool to recognize a tile floor in Milan I've walked on (you may now roll your eyes). Next morning the fact that the hotel soap looked like a slice of cheese was not nearly as annoying as the three bottles of ... whatever they were. One, shampoo. I understood that. But I couldn't figure out which of the other two bottles was a hair conditioner and which a conditioning cleanser for the skin. To a rube like me they just weren't clear, and I really didn't want to put skin lotion in my scalp. Pissed me off.
UC Irvine is mere blocks from JWA but it is also in Orange County so it took me over half an hour to find it. That place! There are freeways every which way, the boulevards are continually curving in different directions, and somehow I couldn't get my compass bearings (didn't have a detailed enough map either). There's a lagoon or something and we wound up on the wrong side of it and had to go around. It was nuts. But what the hell, the weather was nice. Once there we got some coffee and walked around until it was time for the tour to start at the Visitor Center.
"Are you interested in taking the noon tour?"
"Sure, or we'll take the old tour, either one, never been here before anyway."
Sometimes having rock-and-roll-and-firearms hearing makes me such a dork.
UC Irvine was built in the 1960s during those flush times when California had a top-notch educational system and the growing aerospace industry was paying for everything from exhibits at Disneyland to freeways and subdivisions. The architecture shows it. Most of the buildings have a late-60s concrete-future look to them. They're not at all unaesthetic. Just somewhat quaint, in that way buildings are whose architecture is about halfway between ugly out of style and cool retro. I don't mean to criticize. The place is a park. Lovely, green, full of trees and sculpture and sunshine. And students, duh, full of energy and promise and mischief. It was a very cool thing for Skzx to see. Plus one of the housing sections is named Middle Earth, which is sort of dorky but sort of cool. We were only disappointed that it was run by "Administration" and not by a High Council.
The late afternoon drive across L.A. and into Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties wasn't bad at all. Never really hit what I would call bad traffic. Can't account for that but not complaining. It was neat to see the famous names on the exits -- Sepulveda, Wilshire, Hollywood, Beverly Hills. Some day maybe we'll check them out -- yes, I've never really been there. But just as every other time, we had somewhere to go. Enjoyed the drive along the coast. We were pretty impressed with this palm-studded island out there on the end of its own pier. Thought, damn, someone's got some MO NAY. Only later learned it's a dressed up pipeline terminus built by Richland Oil in the 50s. Okay, whatev.
At UCSB I dropped Skzx off to hang with a couple high school friends going there and found us lodging and hung around the room feeling brain-dead. Not from the drive. I just wasn't as energetically creative as I thought a free evening would inspire me to be. Funny how we get. At least I didn't watch TV. Next day he audited a couple classes (well, visited) and met me for the noon tour. Same deal, different campus. Santa Barbara is weird to me. It's its own little world. There's really nothing out there but ocean and students. Not much in the way of a local town. This makes it a very pleasant cocoon and to someone whose idea of a university sits smack in the middle of Berkeley and in view of San Francisco it is kind of weird. But hey, great school, all that. I liked the trees. Oh, and apparently Blu-ray technology was invented there. That doesn't impress me, and I doubt it anyway, but that's the sort of selling point a smart university puts out in front of its prospective freshmen. Maybe the consortium funded a little research. It's all good.Majors? Engineering or Physics, that sort of thing. Watching me grow into an embittered old man for dropping the various arts I was good at in order merely to make a living doing the weird and incomprehensible things engineers do apparently didn't scare him off it. Besides, he wants to save the world. Alternate and inexhaustible energy development inspired me at first, why not him a generation later. God knows we need some good people working on that stuff and this kid, if he doesn't lose the vision, will make a difference.
So: It's all good. The same applies to my snarky comment up top about current political events. Whatever mistakes our new president makes now, I -- this is hard to admit but it's true -- I trust the guy. I trust him and his abilities and his intentions. Weird, iznit? So it's all good, selling half the house back to the bank to pay for a child's college degree notwithstanding.
Sunday, January 04, 2009
High Flyin' George
Where's George? Found this when sorting through tree pick-up money. Neat idea: Track the progress of money across the land. It would be fun to know if any of the other hundred or so singles in this stack are in the database. I said fun to KNOW, not fun to enter them all and find out. Prob'ly very few bills without the marking are tracked anyway.
Yeah, I blanked out the serial number. It's to protect the integrity of the data.
So where had this one been? Nowhere but San Jose, where the guy stamped it and released it a couple months ago. But other bills have been around. Check it out. Notable stop for top-traveler $1 Bill # K24------I: Dallas' Penthouse Key Club, which looks like some sort of cheesy overpriced "bikini bar". Comments on the most-entered twenty include "Bill somewhat worn, folded in the middle. Must have been in someones pocket or up their butt @ one time." Yup. You can't make this stuff up. Oh, you can? Okay.
* * *
I went ahead and entered five more. No pops: They were all first-timers.
Yeah, I blanked out the serial number. It's to protect the integrity of the data.
So where had this one been? Nowhere but San Jose, where the guy stamped it and released it a couple months ago. But other bills have been around. Check it out. Notable stop for top-traveler $1 Bill # K24------I: Dallas' Penthouse Key Club, which looks like some sort of cheesy overpriced "bikini bar". Comments on the most-entered twenty include "Bill somewhat worn, folded in the middle. Must have been in someones pocket or up their butt @ one time." Yup. You can't make this stuff up. Oh, you can? Okay.
* * *
I went ahead and entered five more. No pops: They were all first-timers.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Old Man in Pajamas
I spent my evening opening and logging mailed requests with donations for the troop to pick up retired Christmas trees, envelope after envelope, spreadsheet entry after spreadsheet entry, the laughter and conversation drifting down the stairs of teenaged kids who were fat and happy on pizza and DVDs and were talking, because they didn't know an adult was silently working at the bottom of the stairs, about first orgasms and the phenomenon of blue balls (these were boys AND girls). Finally the horrible, horrible thought occurred to me that I might hear my own son's voice enter into this conversation and I hastily shut down and went off to bed. I lay there a little while reading a book when I suddenly had the urge to write something, anything, notes for a story, a blog post, whatever, and rather than stare at the ceiling contemplating the essential practicality of keeping a notebook by the bedside (a very good habit I've never approached having), I got up to retrieve my laptop from the table at the bottom of the stairs. My bed clothes are just a pair of boxers and a t-shirt, unless it's too warm for a t-shirt, but I figured since no one had come downstairs for over an hour while I was working, what were the odds that they would do so while I was out there just long enough to get something?
What WERE the odds? Miz Liz heard me explaining to some teenaged kid I don't even know what cupboard to find the cups in, and was chortling most energetically when I came back to bed, wearing just a t-shirt and these droopy old sweetheart boxers with the faded hearts and X's and O's.
What WERE the odds? Miz Liz heard me explaining to some teenaged kid I don't even know what cupboard to find the cups in, and was chortling most energetically when I came back to bed, wearing just a t-shirt and these droopy old sweetheart boxers with the faded hearts and X's and O's.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Do You Hear What I Hear
I'm managing the fundraiser where we set up a table in front of the grocery store and solicit signups to come pick up people's Christmas trees after the season. Raises money for Scouts, helps the environment, blah blah. All weekend every two hours I'd go facilitate shift changes, make sure everyone does their hours, take care of problems, keep the morale up, and generally coordinate the whole thing over a period of two months with my mad Excel skilz.
I had stuff in the back of my truck and had locked it in so I showed up late and it was raining and I was fumbling with the keys. There are three keys that look like the one for the camper shell. Why the hell are there three keys? I don't even know what the other two are for. And they all look the same. I once offered to take them off but that idea got cut off right quick. Wife hates when people mess with her keys.
DO NOT touch the keys, I was told. Leave them there.
Okay, okay, whatever, I just don't know which is which.
Let me see, she said, and found the right one.
Fine, but what if I'm out somewhere and it's raining, how the hell am I supposed to know which is which but FINE, WHATEVER.
So this weekend I was out there somewhere and it was raining and I had to fumble with these three keys.
One. No.
Two. No.
"Oh, you God damn motherfuckers," I said out loud.
"Don?"
I turned. There was a parent and his young Scout, a fresh-faced eleven year old kid in uniform, ready to do his part to raise funds for the Troop.
Instant demeanor change, hearty greetings all around, let's get going, we set up, they got to work. They did a manful job of ignoring my vehement profanity. But, you know. What a schmuck, huh?
I had stuff in the back of my truck and had locked it in so I showed up late and it was raining and I was fumbling with the keys. There are three keys that look like the one for the camper shell. Why the hell are there three keys? I don't even know what the other two are for. And they all look the same. I once offered to take them off but that idea got cut off right quick. Wife hates when people mess with her keys.
DO NOT touch the keys, I was told. Leave them there.
Okay, okay, whatever, I just don't know which is which.
Let me see, she said, and found the right one.
Fine, but what if I'm out somewhere and it's raining, how the hell am I supposed to know which is which but FINE, WHATEVER.
So this weekend I was out there somewhere and it was raining and I had to fumble with these three keys.
One. No.
Two. No.
"Oh, you God damn motherfuckers," I said out loud.
"Don?"
I turned. There was a parent and his young Scout, a fresh-faced eleven year old kid in uniform, ready to do his part to raise funds for the Troop.
Instant demeanor change, hearty greetings all around, let's get going, we set up, they got to work. They did a manful job of ignoring my vehement profanity. But, you know. What a schmuck, huh?
Friday, November 21, 2008
Stuff to Post While I Gear Up To Write Some More II
An amplified voice and roaring cheers hit the glass. I open the window to let them in. The football game everyone but me has gone to is underway. Cheers and whistles, game calls, the band brass drifting over trees and houses. Somewhere a dog barks, and in between a motorcycle goes buzzing by. I love the sounds of America.
We built our house in an open lot in the middle of the block, far from the roads but just an almond orchard away from the high school. The location has served us very well. We can walk up to the school for meetings and events (the children always drive). Parents like letting their kids stay here, because we're so near the school. Post-game fireworks can be watched from our driveway.
The football team went 10-0 and is now in Sac-Joaquin Section Division III playoffs against a team from way down in Vallejo, over an hour's drive. No idea how it's going. Tempted to take my Burning Man bike and turn all the colorful lights on and ride up to see. All the cool kids are up there.
That's a difference from my hometown. Not that I knew the cool kids, or even who they were, but I never heard about them going to the football games. I only did when we had a pep band. That was fun. We were good, too. At an away game once we were so dismissive of the opposing band the eight of us marched around to their side of the field and played the Mickey Mouse theme song. Got in trouble for that.
* * *
My kid Skzx started a club at school. It's all about camping. Tomorrow early they're going to Dillon Beach for a couple nights. Parents too. The 19 year old, Sk8r, and I will have the house to ourselves. Might not see each other much, or at all.
I've got four days' writing to catch up on. That means six to do -- ten thousand words -- by Sunday. I'm not a fast writer. I don't want to spend the whole damn weekend at it. But a goal is a goal and frankly, my kids will take me for a weenie if I don't make it.
* * *
Another writing place. My other grandfather's old desk. Backed up to the headboard (bed's not against any walls). Can see the TV from there, and open a curtain to the outside, and have tea and ice cream, and stack books. Doesn't work out as well as the typewriter table upstairs.
Progress chart, kind of showing my behindness.
We built our house in an open lot in the middle of the block, far from the roads but just an almond orchard away from the high school. The location has served us very well. We can walk up to the school for meetings and events (the children always drive). Parents like letting their kids stay here, because we're so near the school. Post-game fireworks can be watched from our driveway.
The football team went 10-0 and is now in Sac-Joaquin Section Division III playoffs against a team from way down in Vallejo, over an hour's drive. No idea how it's going. Tempted to take my Burning Man bike and turn all the colorful lights on and ride up to see. All the cool kids are up there.
That's a difference from my hometown. Not that I knew the cool kids, or even who they were, but I never heard about them going to the football games. I only did when we had a pep band. That was fun. We were good, too. At an away game once we were so dismissive of the opposing band the eight of us marched around to their side of the field and played the Mickey Mouse theme song. Got in trouble for that.
* * *
My kid Skzx started a club at school. It's all about camping. Tomorrow early they're going to Dillon Beach for a couple nights. Parents too. The 19 year old, Sk8r, and I will have the house to ourselves. Might not see each other much, or at all.
I've got four days' writing to catch up on. That means six to do -- ten thousand words -- by Sunday. I'm not a fast writer. I don't want to spend the whole damn weekend at it. But a goal is a goal and frankly, my kids will take me for a weenie if I don't make it.
* * *
Another writing place. My other grandfather's old desk. Backed up to the headboard (bed's not against any walls). Can see the TV from there, and open a curtain to the outside, and have tea and ice cream, and stack books. Doesn't work out as well as the typewriter table upstairs.
Progress chart, kind of showing my behindness.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Presidential Prototype?
Sir Joseph Porter and his Old Man
I grew so rich that I was sent
By a pocket borough into Parliament.
I always voted at my party's call,
And I never thought of thinking for myself at all.
I thought so little, they rewarded me
By making me the Ruler of the Queen's Navee!
I grew so rich that I was sent
By a pocket borough into Parliament.
I always voted at my party's call,
And I never thought of thinking for myself at all.
I thought so little, they rewarded me
By making me the Ruler of the Queen's Navee!
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Musing
Took the dog for a walk today
Took my wife to the matinee
Took my mom to the high school play
And now we host the cast par-tay
* * *
Idly surfing for evidence of people making their escape. Crawled along an intertube and found pictures of the one SCA event I ever went to.
I'll not forget it. I was desperate to be a part of medievalist activities. I had been to the Renaissance Faire. I was a geek and a reader of Sword & Sorcery and terribly lonely. But I had a nicely compliant girlfriend and she wore a peasant dress and I rented some tights and we took the bus from North Berkeley up into Kensington for a Twelfth Night Revel.
January 4, 1975 -- There are pictures of the event, pretty much as I remember it. I'm not in any pictures. We floated on the periphery, shy and uninvolved, and then fled once my inability to merge became terminal.
* * *
Laughter fills the hall. The play closed tonight, and all the kids are here, gorged on our food, sprawled in our furniture, intertwined like so many puppies, good kids, girls and boys full of life and energy and love and promise. Right now, at this moment, I hear cheering. Whatever reason.
Out there somewhere, there are kids who are desperate and lonely and cannot merge. But mine are not among them, and for that my gratitude has no limit.
(And those lonely kids have my sympathy, and hopeful thoughts. I can't do anything for them, but I will always know they're out there.)
Took my wife to the matinee
Took my mom to the high school play
And now we host the cast par-tay
* * *
Idly surfing for evidence of people making their escape. Crawled along an intertube and found pictures of the one SCA event I ever went to.
I'll not forget it. I was desperate to be a part of medievalist activities. I had been to the Renaissance Faire. I was a geek and a reader of Sword & Sorcery and terribly lonely. But I had a nicely compliant girlfriend and she wore a peasant dress and I rented some tights and we took the bus from North Berkeley up into Kensington for a Twelfth Night Revel.
January 4, 1975 -- There are pictures of the event, pretty much as I remember it. I'm not in any pictures. We floated on the periphery, shy and uninvolved, and then fled once my inability to merge became terminal.
* * *
Laughter fills the hall. The play closed tonight, and all the kids are here, gorged on our food, sprawled in our furniture, intertwined like so many puppies, good kids, girls and boys full of life and energy and love and promise. Right now, at this moment, I hear cheering. Whatever reason.
Out there somewhere, there are kids who are desperate and lonely and cannot merge. But mine are not among them, and for that my gratitude has no limit.
(And those lonely kids have my sympathy, and hopeful thoughts. I can't do anything for them, but I will always know they're out there.)
Friday, August 08, 2008
Shoes and Broken Mirrors
Someone got whacked on the head with a shoe. The schoolroom full of Cub Scouts was a noisy place anyway and now someone was crying.
I was all, “What? What?” until I got my wits together enough to gather them around.
The sniffler was one of those who sniffles a lot and naturally gets picked on. The new kid, whose spirited permutations had led to this tragedy, was stoic and unrepentant.
“Josh,” I said, “that was not responsible.”
The other Cubs, the old guard of ten year olds to whom he was still an interloper, regarded him with disdain.
“We’re all a team, we get along …”
My own son had a superior, almost haughty look about him as he fell in with the anti Josh crowd.
“What happened, how did this … ?”
Words were failing me. Leadership was failing me. Suddenly I had a long look down the tunnel, through the dimness of opposing mirrors reflecting forever into the dark. Moments like this require either instincts to follow or a model to copy. I had neither.
“Josh, apologize to Steven.”
He did.
“What are you going to do so it doesn’t happen again?”
He didn’t know. Another Cub, who had no doubt witnessed a similar scene in his own history, said Josh should keep his hands to himself unless he has permission. I silently thanked that kid’s parents and said something to the effect of, Yeah.
Shortly they were back on track, energetically integrating whatever project I had set up for them within their natural chaos. I had a moment to look down that tunnel again and try to find understanding.
Boys need a man to lead them and show them. In the 1970s, society tried to drum that out of us. Too many men gleefully took the cue to abandon their responsibilities. But it’s true: without a male figure leading us as boys, we are lost and, too often, never again found. In that moment, as in thousands of other moments as a father, I felt lost. I had no childhood experience of male leadership to subconsciously process and return to the next generation. Forty years had given me nothing to base a plan on that would work with ten year old boys. I had nothing to fall back on but logic.
Fortunately, with boys logic often works. For about six minutes. I heard a scream and saw a shoe flying through the air.
“Josh!”
“It isn’t me!”
I was all, “What? What?” until I got my wits together enough to gather them around.
The sniffler was one of those who sniffles a lot and naturally gets picked on. The new kid, whose spirited permutations had led to this tragedy, was stoic and unrepentant.
“Josh,” I said, “that was not responsible.”
The other Cubs, the old guard of ten year olds to whom he was still an interloper, regarded him with disdain.
“We’re all a team, we get along …”
My own son had a superior, almost haughty look about him as he fell in with the anti Josh crowd.
“What happened, how did this … ?”
Words were failing me. Leadership was failing me. Suddenly I had a long look down the tunnel, through the dimness of opposing mirrors reflecting forever into the dark. Moments like this require either instincts to follow or a model to copy. I had neither.
“Josh, apologize to Steven.”
He did.
“What are you going to do so it doesn’t happen again?”
He didn’t know. Another Cub, who had no doubt witnessed a similar scene in his own history, said Josh should keep his hands to himself unless he has permission. I silently thanked that kid’s parents and said something to the effect of, Yeah.
Shortly they were back on track, energetically integrating whatever project I had set up for them within their natural chaos. I had a moment to look down that tunnel again and try to find understanding.
Boys need a man to lead them and show them. In the 1970s, society tried to drum that out of us. Too many men gleefully took the cue to abandon their responsibilities. But it’s true: without a male figure leading us as boys, we are lost and, too often, never again found. In that moment, as in thousands of other moments as a father, I felt lost. I had no childhood experience of male leadership to subconsciously process and return to the next generation. Forty years had given me nothing to base a plan on that would work with ten year old boys. I had nothing to fall back on but logic.
Fortunately, with boys logic often works. For about six minutes. I heard a scream and saw a shoe flying through the air.
“Josh!”
“It isn’t me!”
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Eight Oh Nine Saturday Morning
If having thirty-nine boys and girls aged sixteen to eighteen at your house sounds like anything less than total fun to you, then please don’t move in with me. We had pizza – Little Caesar’s is crap but it’s cheap. We had soda and chips. I made a bunch of milkshakes (chocolate, chocolate mint, cookies ‘n cream) with the milkshake maker thing we got for a wedding present nineteen years eleven months ago. My son opened presents. People jumped or hung out on the trampoline. People wailed on each other in the inflatable boxing ring we hired (complete with big huge gloves about three times the size of your head – and it was very cool to hold my own against two motivated teenaged boys, there’s something to be said for staying healthier than your average forty nine year old). People sat on the porch swing. People shot each other out of the sky with the Xbox 360 on the widescreen. People turned up the music. People went home late. People, about a dozen, are here still this bright sunny morning. Not all of them boys –- clearly some parents have daughters they know and trust, and with this crowd, they should. These are great kids, my son’s friends, a mixture of band, drama, advanced placement classes, swim team, and grade school. Nothing went wrong. It never does. Life is good. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
