Evacuating Suburbia

Throw out them LA papers

And that moldy box of vanilla wafers.

Adios to all this concrete.

Gonna get me some dirt road back street

~  From L.A. Freeway, Lyrics by Guy Clark

“Concrete and cars are their own prison bars”

~ From Toes, Written by Zac Brown, John Driskell Hopkins, Shawn Mullins and Wyatt Durette

Retirement talk has been revolving around the domestic circle a lot lately.  Mine, not the wife’s.  You see she’s been retired and according to her it’s the shit (that’s urban slang for she likes it).  I know this because she tells me it’s the shit all the time, quite often after I've dragged my worn out bones into the house after a day at the office and an hour on the freeway with a few thousand of my fellow Americans feeling like shit; about 10 pounds of it in a 5 pound sack (which is old school for suburbia blows).  

Reno Rambling - Too.

Reno's Peppermill; a mile or so from what’s left of The Strip's glory years.  In the sixties the strip was a glittering string of casinos and hotels; Fitzgerald’s, The Sahara (which would become the Flamingo Hilton), Mapes, The Nevada Club, Cal Neva, Harold’s Club and a full deck of smaller players. The strip has since been stripped. 

Dinner at Mom's

“The oldest form of theater is the dinner table. It's got five or six people, new show every night, same players. Good ensemble; the people have worked together a lot.”  ~ Michael J. Fox

San Mateo, circa 1960s.  Dinner was the required event at our house and in most American households.  In our home it was straight up six, every night right after mom and dad had drained their martinis.  About five, dad would shake up some gin with a whisper of vermouth in a gray metal cocktail shaker and the parents would savor a couple of cocktails until dinner time.  The gin was cheap stuff, probably Seagram’s.  I doubt the existence of snooty boutique gin in 1960 and mom and dad wouldn't have it if it did exist. It was after I’d moved back home after college that dad included me in the ritual and I developed a taste for martinis.  I still had the cocktail shaker and used it up until a few years ago when the doc took alcohol off my menu.  I recently gave it to my son in law for his home bar. In sixties America you didn't entertain the thought of skipping dinner for work or an “activity.”  Yeah, dinner was the activity; not soccer or dance class or karate.  And certainly not work.  You worked your 8 hour day and then came home.  Those leashes known as cell phones and laptops were fantasies in the minds of a few dreamers.  Dinnertime was sacred.

A May Day Medley

It’s International Workers Day, AKA May Day.  Most of the world takes this day off.  In America, most people work just like any other day.  In a sad irony, the Grand Old Party celebrated International Workers Day by blocking a bill to raise the minimum wage from an “extravagant” $7.50 an hour. 

Peddling Arrogance

During the recent Olympics Cadillac dusted off that worn out and musty Protestant work ethic to peddle their ELR.  In the process the car maker scored an impressive hat trick by also trafficking in xenophobia and firing some salvos in the ever escalating class war. The ad opens with a vaguely familiar actor standing in a well-manicured yard in front of a gorgeous pool asking nobody in particular, “Why do we work so hard?  For this?  For stuff?”  And then as he strolls towards his well-appointed, ultra-modern kitchen he takes up that great American pastime - Euro-bashing.  “Other countries; they work, they stroll home, they stop by the café.  They take August off – off.”  Then with a sneer he asks, “Why aren't you like that?  Why aren't we like that?”

The Monster of the Great Northwest

“I am not a role model.  I’m not paid to be a role model.  I am paid to wreak havoc on the basketball court. Parents should be role models.  Just because I dunk a basketball, doesn’t mean I should raise your kids”  ~  Charles Barkley

A monster is prowling the great Pacific Northwest.  A creature that has terrified the populace; making women faint, grown men cry and forcing parents to lock their children indoors.  Have they found Sasquatch?  Is it a crazed serial killing mountain man lurking in the dark forests preying on unsuspecting campers?  Is it a rogue grizzly bear or a rabid wolf tearing apart hikers?  No it’s none of those.  It’s much worse.  It’s a football player; Seattle Seahawks’ cornerback Richard Sherman. 

Tall Tales of Trimming Trees

Never worry about the size of your Christmas tree. In the eyes of children, they are all 30 feet tall.”

~ Larry Wilde

“I have been looking on, this evening, at a merry company of children assembled round that pretty German toy, a Christmas Tree. The tree was planted in the middle of a great round table, and towered high above their heads. It was brilliantly lighted by a multitude of little tapers; and everywhere sparkled and glittered with bright objects.”   ~ Charles Dickens

“You know,” I said to Cora, “I've been thinking more and more about getting an artificial tree.” 

“Yeah, we aren't getting any younger and a real tree is a lot of work.”

“Wanna stop by Home Depot and just look?” 

This was our conversation as we pulled out of our street headed for the local Christmas tree lot. 

When I was a kid my parents held artificial trees in contempt.  Easy enough to do back then, when artificial trees were strange looking aluminum structures in ghastly, garish colors; pink, silver and blue.  Christmas tree shopping is one of the few things that's not seen much change since I was a kid.  We took the half hour or so drive to one of the lots on El Camino Real near downtown San Mateo.  A fellow with a 10 foot ruler followed a few steps behind us as we tiptoed through the mud created by the rain that we always got then and never seem to get now.  We followed the ritual that every family has followed since the 1840s when the tannebaum became a saleable commodity.  Dad would grab a likely candidate by the trunk and tilt it and turn it as we inspected it for any flaws that might disqualify it from adorning our living room.  The tree had to be full and without any conspicuous gaps in the branches and it had to stand straight.  Size didn't really matter.  Six foot was just fine because in the 60s cathedral ceilings were something that only the folks in nearby, ritzy Hillsborough had.  Our plebian ceiling topped out at 8 feet.  Once we found a likely candidate the fellow with the ruler stepped up and measured the tree, my mom watching carefully to make sure he didn't add phantom inches.  He wrote the tree's height and price on a slip of paper for my parents to take to the cashier.  Once the tree was ours dad stuffed it in the back of our big, clunky Mercury station wagon. 

TV; Episode One. Buying a Set.

 “If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there'd be peace.”  ~ John Lennon.

“People are sheep. TV is the shepherd.”  ~ Jess C. Scott

With Black Friday looming and all the pre and post-holiday sales yet to come, the wife and I have resurrected the, “should we get a new TV” discussion.  It happens about this time every year.  We don’t really exchange gifts so the idea is to get the big gift for the household (which is just the two of us now).  This year the idea got a little more impetus by a short stay at the Atlantis in Reno.  The room’s 55” flat panel made us realize that our circa 2000 tube television could be improved on. 

A Football Fan's Dilemma

Leigh Steinberg’s recollection of a conversation with a concussed Troy Aikman.

 “Leigh, where am I?” And I said, “Well, you’re in the hospital.” And he said, “Well, why am I here?” And I said, “Because you suffered a concussion today.” And he said, “Well, who did we play?” And I said, “The 49ers.” And he said, “Did we win?” “Yes, you won.” “Did I play well?” “Yes, you played well.” “Did— what does that— and so what’s that mean?” “It means you’re going to the Super Bowl.”

Five minutes later Aikman asked the same questions again. 

The VHS tape, NFL Crunch Course still occupies a space on a shelf near our TV.  We haven’t watched it in years.  It used to be an unofficial tradition to bust it out and watch it on Super Bowl Weekend to get us ready for the spectacle. 

Produced by NFL films, it’s a compilation of vicious hits, frightening in their violence and intensity.  Football fans know what I’m talking about.  It’s when the wide receiver, almost foolhardy in his bravery, goes across the middle and doesn't see the safety about to unload on him; or when the 285 pound linebacker blindsides a quarterback at full speed, jolting the unsuspecting player, sending the ball skyward, causing the player’s head to whiplash as if attached to his body with a spring.  My son, my nephew and I would lean forward in anticipation of each de-cleating.  They would watch, mouths agape, while I told them, in old geezer fashion, that this was real football; the way I remember it when I was their age.  Not this namby pamby, wussy stuff they call football these days.  

When Movies Matter

“Epps asked me if I could write and read, and on being informed that I had received some instruction in those branches of education, he assured me, with emphasis, if he ever caught me with a book, or with pen and ink, he would give me a hundred lashes.”

~ Excerpted from the book 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup, who could not only read, but wrote eloquently and passionately. 

Every so often a movie is released that is important more for its message than its entertainment value (and oftentimes they are still from an artistic point of view, excellent viewing).  Nearly always these films are historical dramas. 

A Dog Day at the Park

“[Baseball] breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall all alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops.”  ~ A. Bartlett Giamatti, Commissioner of Major League Baseball, April 1^st 1989 – September 1^st 1989. 

It’s been a season nobody saw coming. Like that line shot foul ball into the stands that finds your skull when you turn away for just an instant, we glanced away for a moment in June and looked up just in time to be struck by 2013.  After a 2012 World Series Championship the Giants have found themselves in last place in their division, playing baseball that is often sloppy, passionless and sometimes downright unwatchable.

11 strikeouts in the better days of 2012

Roughing It (With apologies to Mark Twain)

The Family Camping Chronicles: Part III

"On the seventeenth day we passed the highest mountain peak that we had yet seen, and although the day was very warm the night that followed upon its heels was wintry cold and blankets were next to useless."  From Roughing It  by Mark Twain

“It would be distressing to a feeling person to See our Situation at this time all wet and cold and with our bedding &c also wet, in a cove scarcely large enough to contain us…canoes at the mercy of the waves and driftwood…robes and leather clothes are rotten.”   William Clark describing being stranded at Point Ellice, Washington (1808).  (For those who slept through the day they taught about the Lewis and Clark expedition in history class, Clark was Meriwether Lewis’ expedition partner)

“We’re really roughing it,” Dad would say as he loaded our camping gear into the station wagon.  The words were served with sides of arched eyebrow, a wry smile and a large helping of sarcasm.  Dad was alluding to Roughing It, Mark Twain’s chronicle of his adventures in the Wild West of the 1860’s.  Looking back it seems like a magic trick that dad was able to get a big canvas tent, two bulky cots, lantern, fishing gear, stove, clothes, some pre-cooked meals that mom packed for us and an assorted pile of “possibles” into that wagon.

On Dirt, Beans and Wild West Whimsy

“Camping is nature’s way of promoting the motel business.”  ~ Dave Barry.

There’s a family camping trip looming on the horizon and I’ve spent the last few weekends gearing up.  I’ve made lists, rummaged through the big plastic bin in the backyard and a couple of garage cabinets; pulled plastic tubs from an attic storage area and crawled around some closets in the house.

To B & B or not to B & B?

It seemed the appropriate question as we surveyed our room at Anne Hathaway’s Bed and Breakfast in Ashland, Oregon.  Maybe survey isn't the right word.  Surveying conjures visions of a large expanse.  This room was tiny.  I suppose I should mention that this B & B, located in the home of The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is named after The Bard's better half and not the American actress.  Did I mention that it was small?The room was small enough that sitting on any edge of the bed I could reach out and touch a wall.  It wasn't big enough to swing the proverbial cat in.  I’m certain that at some point as I put our suitcase in the only place it would fit, under the bathroom sink and pondered the nightly rate that Lady Macbeth’s words came to mind; “What’s done cannot be undone.”

The American Adventure - The Open Road

It's July, 2013 and my wife Cora and I are taking a driving trip through Northern California and into Oregon. 

The wife and I have embarked on that great American summer adventure; that annual migration of the dog days; that paean to the interstate, the motorcar and fuel consumption; the modern day version of the pioneers’ tale – the road trip.  We've headed north from the San Francisco Bay to a distant, uncharted and exotic land – Oregon.  Okay, it’s not distant; it’s only 300 miles or so.  And it’s hardly uncharted.  After all I went out recently and bought a GPS so Oregon, the rest of this land and all of hell’s half acre are all pretty well charted.

A Recollection of Fishing

I got up that Sunday morning a little after 5 o'clock.  During these long summer days it’s more or less my usual time.  Has to be early.  It’s the only time I can take my dog Rainey for a run.  Rainey is day blind; can’t see the paw in front of her nose once the sun starts to peek out so we have to hit it while it’s still dark.  And so when I staggered out of bed Rainey jumped out of her's, did her happy laps around the bedroom while I shushed her lest she wake the little woman and then she rumbled down the stairs. 

“Sorry Rainey, I’ll let you out to do your business but then it’s back to bed."  She wasn't getting it yet.  While she was outside I crawled into my clothes and threw the camp chairs into the truck.  Rainey came back inside, wagging her hind quarters expecting me to grab the leash until I sent her up the stairs.  “Back to bed girl,” as she sulked up the stairs

A Terrorism of Indifference

"I would invite anyone in Washington to come look my patients in the eye and tell them that waiting for a flight is a bigger problem than traveling farther and waiting longer for chemotherapy."  ~  Dr. William Nibley, of United Cancer Specialists in Utah.

It came home to roost this past week.  The IT is sequestration.  You remember sequestration don’t you?  It’s only been about 8 weeks since President Obama and Congress foisted the sequester on the folks they’re paid to serve, and for the most part it’s been almost forgotten; by the public, by the media and most of all by the men and women who are responsible for it.  Perfectly content and comfortable with sequestration conveniently out of the news, they were no doubt equally disappointed when it came back to the headlines with something of a vengeance.

Glove Story

Donning a glove for a backyard toss, or watching a ball game, we are players again, forever young.~ John Thorn; baseball historian.

Its baseball season again.  Time to dig into the closet and pull out the glove.  I did that last year about this time and went through some moments of panic when I couldn’t find it, tearing the closet apart, shouting at my wife, "Cora, Where in hell is my glove?" 

"I don't know. I don't play baseball." she yelled back. 

Then I remembered that I’d loaned it to my son.  I asked him to give it back which gave me an idea for a present for his upcoming birthday. 

A Convenient Epiphany

In the capitals of our nation a person’s worth is defined by the size of his bank account, his clout or his political expediency.

There has been a mass epiphany within the ranks of the Republican Party's politicians.  For many in The Grand Old Party, the notion of gay marriage no longer poses the threat to western civilization that it did about 5 months ago.  Let me think, just what was it that happened 5 months ago?  Oh yeah, I remember, that was along about the time of the last election when the self-described Party of Lincoln got shellacked when it came to garnering votes from just about everyone who isn’t an old white guy.  And just for the record I'm an OWG myself. I just happen to be an OWG who doesn't relate at all to the GOP. 

What's Happened Here?

When did it all change?  Why did it all change?  How did it all change so much?  I grew up in the suburbs of San Mateo.  It was a middle class neighborhood in the hills above the town, on the San Francisco Bay Peninsula, about 30 minutes south of San Francisco itself.  It was the fifties and sixties; a time when we boomers lived the American Dream defined by well-manicured lawns, ranch style homes and the notion that we, the children, would live in a better America.