What Makes Friends?

What circumstances occur to make two persons previously unknown to one another become bonded as close friends? More than accident, I suggest. Many times it is a shared experience, one of unusual or memorable quality. For instance, I remain bonded to my freshman sorority roommates Shirley and Dolores some 66 years later because we shared the same big life transitions together.
In the case of Nancy who is visiting me now from Denver it was humor more than anything else that brought us together. Nancy is one of those people who was blessed with a funny bone parallel to her spine. Interacting with her is always such fun.
The circumstance that brought us together was attendance at an Elderhostel in Trinidad, Colorado eighteen years ago. Nancy had just retired from teaching second grade, whereas I, her elder, was still shrinking heads as well as learning to paint.  Nancy picked this Elderhostel because she wanted to learn more about the Santa Fe Trail (which ended in Trinidad) whereas I wanted to learn about the small town in which I believed my father was born.
As it turned out the content of the Elderhostel was wonderful. What was stressful was where we were assigned to hang our hats. Our large group of men and women attending were housed in the aging dormitory of the local junior college, women on the first floor, men on the second.  Clearly these halls had seen too many years of college freshmen. The walls of the gang toilets and showers were crawling with cockroaches. To confuse matters, the facilities were reversed: the men's john on the first floor and the women's on the second. At night we would put out a sign on the door reversing the genders to shorten the walking distance, however we were forever mixing up the order.
In the midst of all the complaining I sought out the company of one other participant, Nancy, who turned every challenge into a humorous adventure.  Toward the end of the experience, on a bus trip,  I stepped off the edge of a hill in the dark, badly twisting my ankle. The only surgeon at the tiny local Catholic hospital was famed all over the country for performing sex change operations (I'd seen him on 60 Minutes). I chose to avoid the hospital and limp around the last few days, learning after I got home that I had seven bones broken.
Like me, Nancy loved her Mac, and over the last decade we have emailed each other almost daily.  I've travelled to Denver to enjoy her hospitality twice and she has visited me in California numerous times, this being her first visit to Oakmont. She is so easy to entertain for she loves to go out to restaurants to eat. You can see how intent she is on every morsel.

Yesterday after Weight Watchers (we are both struggling often straying life members) we skipped the salad place and opted for Goji's Kitchen two blocks away where we feasted on grilled prawns and rice noodles. Who knows what yummy restaurant we will find today.  I am so lucky to have Nancy in my life.

Celebration and Elation

Eighty-three year. Egads. What fun. Last Sunday my dear housekeeper Kelly surprised me with a special birthday cake from a fancy French bakery here in Santa Rosa. It must have been superb because there was only one piece left after my fifteen house guests left.  I had it for breakfast Monday morning along with other leftovers including two chocolate dipped strawberries.  Yum.
Checking the scale Tuesday I groaned and determined to reenroll in Weight Watchers, which I did Thursday. Like life, the scale goes up and down, often but not always by one's own efforts.
The supreme court decisions re DOMA and Prop 8 are affecting so many lives, including many in my lesbian family. For some its a complicated decision with multiple legal and tax implications. Old friends Gayle and Marilyn who will celebrate their 20th anniversary in December spontaneously decided to marry and last night at Rainbow Women a lesbian couple who have been together for 47 years announced their marriage right here on the site..
I don't envy the CPA's and tax preparers who are going to have to figure all this out come tax time next year.  It makes me wonder if Lee and I would have done the same, although neither of us would have expected same sex marriage to be legal in our lifetimes.
Below are pictures from Sunday: the new gang of friends at my potluck, neighbor and good new friend Joyce and I, and old friend Jennifer Chandler (just back from Bhutan) and the birthday girl.

Reflections on Bucket Lists

Ask me "What's on my bucket list?" and I do a double take. I know folks mean, without saying succinctly, what is it I want to do before I die? Since my 83rd birthday is coming up Sunday and I have invited many new friends to a potluck, I expect someone might ask me that very question. I know they mean well, but it frustrates me since I come up with zero. Usually I scramble for an answer and end up stuttering.
First of all, I never heard of the term until the terrific 2007 movie with Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman.  Secondly, what it implies to me is when am I going to kick the bucket and/or what will I regret on  my death bed (assuming one has the wherewithal to
reflect such trivia on his/her death bed.)
There are several explanations for the historical meaning of the term, kick the bucket,  one being a method of suicide in which one stands on a bucket with a noose around their neck and kicks the bucket to complete the scenario. Surely that is not the meaning assigned by kindly inquirers.
When I was in my late 40's my bucket list (though I did not know the term yet) consisted of one goal: ride on the back of someone's motorcycle in the Dykes on Bikes in the Gay Parade, streaming purple ribbons. Then someone gave me my first ride on a motorcycle and it was so scary I chucked that aspiration.
In earlier decades I would write yearly goals, which invariably included "loose ten pounds". Other common listings included make more time to play with the dogs, clean my study, answer letters to relatives, etc. I would make a stab at these.
But in the current decade my wish list gets shorter and shorter.
This last six months it has centered around getting unpacked and my taxes done, neither of which is accomplished, though I'm getting closer. But the last four days we have been in a heat wave and of course that is the time my almost new house air conditioner decided to be temperamental. It was 107 on my deck when it sighed "I quit".
Calls to PGE and the contractor who installed it went unanswered for a day while I camped out at friend's house. Finally both sources showed up, each blaming the other for the malfunction. Some folks say its all the fault of the PGE smart meters; PGE says that is nonsense.
Anyway, the PGE smart meter is now disemboweled from my house, I paid the contractor $309, but the guaranteed fix only lasted half of one day. So now I am once again on the wait list for service. Can you see why my bucket list contains only one item?

Endings and Beginnings

Navigated the Bay Bridge interchange this morning about 8:15, car packed to the gunnels with the last load from Cathy Lane, stuff the new owners kindly stored for me. Although I know I will visit the bay area often in the future, it felt, symbolically, like a last goodbye. I'm a little sad, but what better timing than this historic week of affirmations for the GLBT community. Part of my scheduling plan was to sit in on my old Lafayette writing group Friday afternoon. The prompt for this week's writing was "When I was a teenager... Its a great prompt. Just try finishing the sentence yourself. Sharing a story was not on my agenda until the Supreme court ruling came down on Wednesday. Then I could not contain myself and immediately sat down and wrote the following, which my old buddies seemed to applaud. When I was a teenager, my world was foggy grey, the permeating color of Seattle nine months of the year. Not just the shadow of World War 2, the abandonment of my mother, the sudden death of my father, the move to a log cabin with no electricity; not just the culture shock of attending a funky rural high school where scholarship was defined not in calculus but in the number of football touchdowns. Daily with crumpled newspapers I polished the globes of our six kerosene lamps so I could see to read, which I did well into the night. What color are tears, as alone, in the pale copper glow, I turned pages of my confirmation class bible, looking for comfort, searching for answers to my losses and to my secret sexual identity? What color is shame? What color is despair? I gave up on God, keeping even that a secret. Loneliness defined me, though I found comfort in nature. Sometimes, picking ripe wild blackberries in the old cemetery just down the dirt road, dark red juice would stain my fingers and fingernails. I’d plunge my hands into the cold running water of Bear Creek but the burgundy-blackish stains would persist for days. I guess they matched the circles under my eyes. It pleased me that the color seemed indelible; nothing else did. The following year the war ended and we were able to get electricity, but never running water. I could not wait to grow up and move to California, where indeed the sun shone on my life and I experienced the full spectrum of color. Gratitude abounds. Next week I turn 83. Little did I dream that this week rainbow flags would fly over many city halls throughout this country and that the Supreme Court of the USA would affirm my existence. I rejoice. I came across the old charmer above many years ago on a street near downtown Benicia. I painted it on the spot. I hope the flags still fly.

Indulging Yearnings

Finding myself a skosh homesick for my Cathy Lane garden this week, I signed up for the Oakmont free garden tour. About 125 admirers joined me in the same trek. Someone with a clever mind planned it, as each of the five gardens selected demonstrated a different purpose. The largest, 3/4 of an acre, was a hillside home with a grand view of the mountains and part of the Valley of the Moon. Photos of big bobcats and other critters in their natural habitat adorned the patio walls. Another garden was planted carefully with only edibles. A third featured the owner/landscaper/artist's oil paintings set out on easels in various settings, a la Monet. All of them sported drip systems of sophistication. One small garden on the golf course demonstrated deer resistant shrubs only. I learned a lot. Of course I had to hit the nearest nursery today and indulge a little addiction. Some of the plants I have purchased this spring have already died; too much or not enough water, I expect. Alas.

The pot and grouping on the left will at least last for a week or so, I hope, as next week on Monday my sorority sisters from 1948 at the U of Washington are coming to visit, and Tuesday my painting buddies from Water Color Connection are making the same trip up Highway 12. Aren't I lucky to be so loved. The manzanita on the top was taken from the largest acreage on the tour. I think its the largest I've ever seen. Manzanita are so slow growing. I wonder if it was here when Jack London hiked these hills?

The nurseries in Sonoma County do tribute to the county's agricultural heritage. But today's trip to the nearest one, Pritchard's, tickled me when the resident roly poly chicken ducked under this display. Thought I, "What a wonderful respite for -any fat and cuddly hen."

Heirlooms

Almost nothing tastes as delicious as heirloom tomatoes fresh from the garden. Agreed? I love them freshly picked, sliced medium wide on a piece of lightly browned toast, adorned with Best Foods mayonnaise, salt and pepper. I created and diddled with the painting above yesterday morning in watercolor class here (which is teacherless during the summer). Its from a photograph of heirlooms spread out for sale in the market in Jack London Square in Oakland. Of course I changed some of the colors, as I am experimenting with Daniel Smith's new Mayan Red pigment. I love the way it granulates but I think its too brash for the tomatoes. In the activity building here, just a few steps from the painting studio, is the community library. Its maintained by volunteers and runs on the honor system, requiring no cards or even signatures for checkouts of books. Often while I am waiting for paint to dry I step down the hall and peruse the shelves for new books. Having just finished The Magician's Assistant, which I could not put down, I'm looking to read everything else by Ann Patchett. I came home with two more. The gym is just a few steps further down the hall. Though I have the best intentions to hit the treadmill before I head home often, like yesterday, I convince myself I'm too hungry for lunch. In Santa Rosa where I live now growing one's own tomatoes is the password for community acceptance. I have five heirloom plants in my slender back yard, and two in pots on the deck. They seem to grow daily, but are not keeping up with my neighbors. In fact the ones interspersed with my roses I used to plant in Oakland seemed hardier. Maybe my Santa Rosa plants are self conscious from my continual peering at their skinny stems?

Old Memories

What memories old cars evoke. Most all of us can emote about our first car, and I am no exception. Recently there was a classic car event here at my retirement community. Almost eighty vintage autos and trucks were were on display, divided between pre-war and post war, meaning WW2. The oldest was 1913. I found myself as interested in the prideful owners as the cars themselves. Clearly they treasured their possessions which were so highly polished a spectator was afraid to breathe on them. A looker could peer inside at the dashboard, or even at the engine, but beware! The owner was on guard. What makes a person collect a vintage auto? I was wishing I had their personal stories, but most of the owners, to my surprise, were rather tight lipped. I snapped a photo of one with the owner sitting on the running board. I hope to paint it soon. My first auto was a 1930 Reo,later Oldsmobile. It stood high and proud, all black. I got it in '46, when I was 16 living in the boonies of Woodinville, Washington, an area now a yuppie community but then very much the sticks with no public transportation. My favorite part of her (I named her Trichinilla Amber Noosepickle, a name I got from an obituary column in the Seattle Times) was the velvet curtains on little rods which pulled closed on all windows making it like a shrine inside. She had no starter, alas, and I would always have to get a boy to wind the wires around something under the hood to start her. It scared me to do it myself because of the sparks. I remember driving her to my high school baccaleaureate. My friend's brother offered to start her for me after the ceremony and played the trick of attaching a stink bomb to the engine. Everyone in the parking lot cracked up laughing at me and I never forgave him. While I was away at camp following high school graduation my mother gave the car to my sister, whose husband wrecked it, so I never got to say goodbye. I've never seen another Reo except on the internet, which has great photos, but I'd dearly love to run my hands over its classic chassis just once more. Some of the vintage autos at the show had been decorated, as below. Art is everywhere!