Awwww Therapy

"Come look," Feather whispered to me.

Big Dog and I were up in Arcata, staying with Arby and Feather and their 3 cats.

I followed Feather down the hall to their room.

"Look," she sighed. "Isn't it the cutest sight?"

Spaz Cat was in bed, tucked under the sheets like a little baby.

"It's our 'awwww' moment for the day. It's good for the bones."

Huh?

Feather went on to explain that moments of intense cuteness stimulate you into producing more female hormone, thereby preventing osteoporosis. Hmmm. She could have something there.

"What's that term in Japanese?" asked Arby. "Kowai?"

"Actually, kowai is scary. Kawaii is cute."

"Kawaii."

"Yeah. Maybe that's what I need. More kawaii in my life."

Big Dog snickered.

"You? Kawaii? There's not the slightest whiff of kawaii about you," he laughed. "Look at her! All in black... She used to wear coveralls and smoke cigars!"

"Long before it was sort of trendy."

But maybe that's my problem. I've decided to make more of an effort to seek out the kawaii moments. Like Feather says, it'll be good for my bones. We can all use a bit of Awwww Therapy.

They're Here!

Just love the colors...

Oh, and we are just wrapping up Mirabelle Season. These amazingly tasty yellow plums ripen all at once. A very short season makes them even more delectable!

Picture Show

A few visuals while I have my fast(er) internet connection...



Love the greeeeeeen!


The Periwinkle House (not so periwinkle in this photo)


Victorian Ladies...








Wildlife...small...


...and big...


A most cooperative model!






Funky Humboldt


Don't ask Big Dog

Ten Reasons to Love This Town

I'd been to Arcata several times in my last incarnation (figurative, not literal.) Coming from Big Bad Tokyo, it seemed like the cutest, quaintest, teeniest town I ever visited. Now that I am spending so much of the year at The Ranch, where the nearest town is even smaller (but not nearly as cute or quaint) this place is bustling!

Aside from the fact that we have actual internet connectivity at a 21st century level, there are many reasons why I still love this place.

* It will always be Hippie Central
While some of the original flower children have "grown up" ("And a few have become thorns! Ha ha ha!" cackles Big Dog with glee) there is always an influx of newer, younger bohemians looking for that Utopia, keeping Arcata the most left-wing town in the U.S. (as far as I know.)

* Big Business (note capital letters) is not welcome here
"That's why the area remains depressed," bitch the old-timers who may have once been happy to panhandle for food money. "It's too anti-business here!" Yes, they burned down every McDonald's that tried to open shop in town until Mickey D finally got it. "You don't deserve a McDonald's!" they said in a huff on their way out. There IS a McDonald's out on the edge of town, but if you want burgers, you can get great ones at V&N's or Stars, so who needs terrible fast food? There are no Starbucks, no Barnes & Nobles, no Bed, Bath & Beyond, no Sears, no WalMart... I think the only franchise/chain outfits are Safeway, Longs, and a gas station or two.

* Everyone is Community Minded
Actually, the town is very supportive of its businesses. Everyone makes an effort to buy local. So if you have a unique product or service (or even a not-so-unique product or service) this is a great place to start. On our first night back, we met a young man in a local bar who told us about his upcoming mead business. "Mead? You mean like the beverage?" I asked. Sure, I read about it in old novels, but... He told us about how he's already gotten his honey sourced and his label designed. "It's going to be a honeycomb between two redwoods with a bee on top!" Sweet!

* Creativity Abounds
And they never put on that "I'm an artiste..." attitude. The first time I came here, I met a big group of artists. They were awesomely good, but many had day jobs as car stereo installers, sales clerks, etc. "I can't believe this!" I told Big Dog back then. "If these people lived in Tokyo, they would be the biggest sensation! They'd actually be rich, I think." Every small town has its group of artists, but the people here are really, really good. It must be the long, dark winters. Central California is just too nice most of the year to be sitting inside making art (as I am finding out very quickly!)

* Economically it's depressed, or is it?
"Any big business that set up shop here would be able to employ thousands!" bitch the pro-business minority. True. The small mom-and-pop businesses just can't compete that way. (Nor would they be able to compete in any way if some big box store came this way and actually made it, though that is highly unlikely.) There aren't a whole lot of jobs. No wonder so many people get involved in growing/selling pot. It's relatively easy to start up such a business, you will have lots of experienced people to help you, there's a very good market for the product, and, best of all, until it is decriminalized, the 420 business is tax-free! So, on the record, the median income here is pretty low, but in actuality, who knows. Students pay their way through college, couples buy nice homes with plenty of cash, etc. all without having to sell your soul. And most of them probably have prescriptions that allow them to grow their own anyway, so until they sell to non-prescription holders, it's all legal. ...Right?

* Materialism is the scourge
You won't know that there are any wealthy people here because no one wants to be perceived as materialistic. There are tons of junker cars, junker bikes, thrift stores. Everyone looks like they are wearing 30 year old clothing. (In my case, I really am!) Here, Big Dog and I are not the eccentric weirdos we are elsewhere.

* It's GREEEEEN
In every way. From the Green Party (Arcata elected the first-ever Green party city council majority in 1996 and was the first city in the nation to pass a law nullifying the USA PATRIOT Act) to its eco-consciousness to the land around, everything is green, green, green. It has the most amazing wastewater treatment system in the Arcata Marsh and Wildlife Sanctuary, was the first municipality to ban the growth of any type of Genetically Modified Organism within city limits (with exceptions for research and education,) and has more hydroponic supply stores per capita than anywhere else (needs fact checking.) And there's been an on-going campaign to preserve the Headwaters Forest from logging for years.

* It's Young
More than 30% of the population are between 18 and 24, and the median age is around 26 years. The City Council, and at times even the mayor, is sometimes composed in part by college students. (There's a college student in the Council right now.) But more than actual chronological age, it's a youthful town. Or maybe I should say, ageless. My mother who came to visit a few years ago couldn't stop giggling over all the grey-haired "youngsters" skateboarding around town. We all think we're 18 here.

* It's got a Heart
And I don't mean compassion for the homeless, but a geographical heart. Most American towns no longer have a center. Arcata still has its Plaza and what an active plaza it is! From the weekly Farmer's Markets to the start of the annual Kinetic Sculpture Race to the Oyster Festival to the weekly protests to all the "freegans" just hanging out or sleeping, it is a plaza much like the zocalos of Mexico.

* The Local Baseball Team is named after one of my favorite foods
Arcata is home to the Humboldt Crabs, the nation's longest continuously operated semi-pro baseball team that's played every season since 1945! And they serve soy dogs at the ball park.


Okay. Now, here is one reason why I may not love this town as much in the years to come:
I see more and more people here who seem to have come only because of Arcata's cannabis reputation. They have no social or ecological awareness. They are disrespectful of others. They come here, live in the shrubbery by the freeway or in the Community Forest and leave behind tons of trash. Plastic bottles, plastic bags, grungy blankets. Their use-and-discard mentality has no place here. Somehow they think they belong because they don't work and don't own property. They should have stayed in Idaho...or Utah...or wherever.

The other reason why not to love this town? It's that four letter word that starts with R......

Behind the Redwood Curtain

After a long, frantic week of socializing, visitors and tidying up the ranch, we escaped gorgeous, sunny Central California to arrive in misty, magical Humboldt.

Not only are we behind the Redwood Curtain, but shrouded in fog. We're very hidden here in Arcata, a pretty little town of fanciful Victorian architecture, colorful denizens and majestic redwoods.

I remember the greeting we got a few years ago, as we just arrived and were driving through downtown Arcata. At a stop sign, an old hippie stood in front of our truck and "flew" his glass pipe over the hood of our car. It was like a benediction.

"We're back in Arcata!" Big Dog and I laughed.

No such welcome this time, but I'm impressed with the creative men's fashions. Men in long, flowing black skirts, men in kilts and leathers, a guy with dots tattooed over his eyebrows... it used to be just flannel and dreadlocks.

Aside from the fun of being in a town that's sort of trapped in the 60's, it was also good to get away from the ranch. As much as I love it there and as much as I think it IS paradise, I've recently found myself becoming more...what? bourgeois?...when I stay there too long, much to my disgust. I'm getting way too protective of everything there. ("Don't hang your exercise equipment on the fruit trees, JD! We already lost one apple tree!" "The kids are leaving too much crap all over the place!" "Daddy McC shouldn't have called the sheriff on our neighbor! No one in this valley wants the law to show up on their property!") The Road to Satori takes a backslide.

So it's good to be here, in a completely empty house, sleeping on foam mats, having only an odd assortment of stuff left over from Big Dog's student days. Old T-shirts work well as pillowcases. Empty pie tins make decent plates.

"You guys are way minimal!" commented Big Dog's high school buddy, J., when we met him and his wife for dinner in San Francisco on our way up here.
"You guys are zen!" laughed his wife.
True, we don't have much at the ranch, at least not stuff, but I get really possessive about the trees, the hills, the land. When in fact, in this life, ownership is only an illusion. Nobody really owns anything and so thinking that you do only makes for unhappiness.

Like slack key wonder Makana said in Hawaii, "Access trumps ownership." You understand that when you let go.

Hello Kitty

Big Dog is allergic to some cats, so it was close to miraculous that we were cat-sitting for our old friends, Arby and Feather. We needed to be in Arcata to do some winterizing at Big Dog's Victorian and Arby and Feather were vacationing in Yosemite, so I guess Big Dog thought staying at their house was better than the bargain basement motel we were in last year.

"Spaz Cat won't use her litter box, but don't worry. She poops briquets," Arby warned us while we sipped Anchor Steam beers at a funky tiki bar in San Francisco. It was an unusually sunny Saturday afternoon and the warm light filtered into the darkness through the open door. Every so often, there was a roar of jets flying overhead. A fleet was in town, there was an air show going on and the city was packed.
"And don't worry if she pees during a seizure. We're used to that," added Feather. "Just remember to give her the meds."

At that, Feather gave me a little sheet describing the cats and listing what each one needs. Spaz Cat was only one of them, though the one with epilepsy and needing the most care.

"She's used to taking her phenobarbitol," Feather assured us. "I usually just touch the side of her mouth til she opens up and then slip the pill under her tongue. She's pretty mellow."
"Why wouldn't she be? She's on reds all the time!" laughed Big Dog. "Don't worry. I used to work for a vet when I was a teenager."

-------

"It's time for Spaz Cat's pill," I said.
"You do it."
"I've never given a pill to a cat! I've never given a pill to anyone but myself!! You're the one who worked for the vet!"
"Those were cats that weren't used to taking medication. We forced open the mouth and shoved in the pill with the eraser end of a pencil," Big Dog clarified.
That sounded a bit extreme for poor, mellow Spaz.
"Okay, Spaz. Guess it's going to be me, sweetie," I cooed to her. She merely blinked back with her giant, multi-colored eyes.

At first, I was gentle.
"Open up now...that's it...pill's in... Spaz! Stop spitting it out! There, that wasn't so bad... No!"
Every time I had to pick the pill off the carpet and get it back in her mouth, the pill was less solid and I was less gentle. In the end, I jammed the gooey pill (which I am sure promptly dissolved in her mouth, it was so saliva saturated) and clamped her mouth shut. There was no more pill to spit.

"Bossie won't come in and Huffy's nowhere to be seen," I whined to Big Dog. Feather wanted all her cats inside at night, but I had only seen Bossie outside earlier and she ran away when I called to her.
"Shhhh," he shushed me like he always does when he's engrossed in TV. I glanced at Arby's state-of-the-art 5.1 surround sound HDTV. There was a political discussion going on and BD cared about the cats about as much as he cared about the treasure trove of cat-themed items that turned the house into a Temple of All Things Feline.

Unlike Big Dog, I like cats and, moreover, cats seem to like me. A Bad Dog is actually a pretty Good Cat. We both like doing our own thing, we don't care much about what others think, or want us to do. We enjoy company when we are in the mood, but feel that "alone time" is "quality time." We're independent and not particularly emotionally needy. Thus, I became Keeper of the Cats. Bossie who is known to bite was well-behaved with us (though she showed me her aggressive side when she hissed at one of the neighbor cats in a display I could only interpret as "Stay out, or I'll kill you with my bad breath!") and shy, shy Huffy let me play with her when there was no one else around. But, it was with Spaz that I felt a special bond...because it takes one to know one?

Shimmery

It's Friday the 13th!! And our last weekend this season in Arcata and I'm sorry to be leaving. The weather has been amazingly beautiful for days. It's positively shimmery. Our neighbor's giant cherry tree is loaded with cherries, our luscious mirabelles will be ready in a couple of weeks and those veggies that were so slow to grow in the spring are getting into their groove. The air smells great, we can see the bay from our Victorian, and today, when we were filling holes in the fern-fringed driveway at the country property (back on the chain gang!!) the air was so sweet and lovely I had to look at Big Dog and ask, "you still wanna sell this?!"

In our wrap-up mode, we finally had to evict the birds. The babies had long ago grown up, but when I came back from Japan, the "studio" eaves were beginning to get a little slummy with too many bird families crowding into the limited space. Big Dog blocked the spaces with boards and netting last week and all afternoon, the birds were angrily flying around, unable to get back into their boarded up homes.

"Find another one!" Big Dog shouted. I'm surprised they didn't peck his eyes out.

No Happiness in PVC

Today was plumbing day.
PVC pipes do not make me happy.

But I know that no leaks anywhere at the end of the day makes Big Dog very, very, very happy.

Happiness is a Warm Gun

In my case, happiness is a flowing caulk gun.

Last Tuesday, I left Tokyo at 6pm and by 4:30pm the very same day, I was back on the work crew on the other side of the Pacific. Lucky for me, I love detail work and find caulking to be one of the most satisfying things to do! The concentration, the delicate balance between caulk flow and gun movement, the feeling of complete satisfaction when the line is straight and even and oh-so-perfect!

But now, most of the work is done. It's our final week behind the Redwood Curtain. The weather has been gorgeous and neighbors are starting their own summer home repair projects. Do they need a girl with a (caulk) gun? She's really, really good...

Bird Condo

While the blackbirds are happily raising their little ones in the tiny "studio" apartment, the sparrows have found their nursery in the second floor bathroom vent.

"Turn the vent on!" Big Dog says. "I don't want critters living in my house."
"No way! I'm not going to churn up the birds with the vent. Gross me out. You want blood and feathers and baby bird guts dripping down the outside of the newly washed house? You want to be up there again on that deathtrap ladder, washing the gunk? Not me!"

Guess Big Dog pictured that scene, too. He hasn't mentioned anything since.

I know my presence on ladders so close to their nursery makes them rather edgy, but while Mama and Papa keep a keen eye on me, they also fill my porch painting days with song. There's something to be learned here.

Bye-bye Bamba

La Bamba left us.
She was Big Dog's old 1975 Volvo that he kept in the garage here in Arcata for the last 15 years. It was a bomb of a car, but ran well and when he had it in LA, was the perfect Urban Camouflage Vehicle. It was originally a maroon color, but I've only known it to be a tri-colored monstrosity, with exploded seats and an actual working eight track. Friends laughed at first. Then, when their nice Mercedes and Beemers kept getting stolen right from their driveways, they began to make offers on La Bamba.

When people panhandled Big Dog, he'd tell them, "Yeah, I've got a quarter. And it's going into a piggybank when I get home. See that car over there? When I've saved enough money, I'm going to get a paint job." Sometimes, the panhandlers would actually give him some change "for the cause." That's how crazy people are about their cars in LA!

We thought she'd eventually come to The Ranch. It would have been the perfect place for her to spend the twilight of her days. But this year, Big Dog finally got sick of her taking up so much space -- excruciatingly valuable space -- in the garage and even after he was able to start her up by dropping in a new battery, he put her up for adoption (i.e., he tried to give her away to a Charitable Cause.) After too many hours of negotiating with towing companies and red tape, he gave up and called a local tow operation.

A giant ramped truck arrived (their motto, "We don't want an arm and a leg; just your tows" painted on the cab in beautiful script) and in no time at all, La Bamba was pushed onto the truck. Big Dog only had the Volvo hood ornament and an old, sun-bleached Sensoji amulet that had been hanging inside. The amulet's already inside our Tacoma. Maybe I'll weld the Volvo ornament onto my bike.

People have relationships with their cars the way they don't with, say, their washing machine. I've never owned a car, so I can only imagine, but it was still sad to see her rolling away from us. Big Dog didn't appear to be too torn up about it, though. There is certainly something new and different in the air. Not only did BD off La Bamba, he's been in the process of trying to sell the first piece of property he bought, when he was still in university.

I might have written about it before, but Big Dog collects real estate the way others collect cars. He's not into real estate the way many people are -- he doesn't buy anything to "flip" and these are not really investments. It's like the guy who loves fine art and pays a bundle for a Picasso and justifies it by telling people about its investment value even though he has no intention of ever selling it. So this new move is a Big Deal. What is going on here?

"I'm finally moving on," he says, but he's usually way more tied to the past than I am. So why now?

When you start letting go, interesting things can happen. We might be coming upon some exciting times...

Less is More?

Man, it's cold.

Enough years of an endless summer and Arcata in April feels...well, Arctic. The flannel-shirted, Indian-robed, long-skirted, costume-wearing denizens of the town don't seem to mind much. Like the Glorious Founder of the Great Kinetic Sculpture Race, Hobart Brown used to say, "If the sun is out, we race anyway." When the sun is out, the locals still gather in the plaza, the homeless still camp next to the freeway, the crazy old man still accosts unwary visitors with his flying glass pipe.

We finally have a phone! And thank you, Dan and Cheryl, for letting us piggyback on your WiFi! But we still have no furniture, washing machine, dryer, oven, dishwasher or cable...the usual comforts of Life in America. When I wrote that to a friend of mine, she encouraged me to harass Big Dog into buying more appliances. It made me laugh because she's not the only one. Why does everyone thinks it's BD who is so eccentric and making me live like this? I miss the oven, but most Japanese homes have no oven either. Sleeping on foam pads on the floor is also commonplace and we have two brand new foam pads this year. (They look just like the fold-out foam pads that are called futon in Japan, but these were being marketed as some kind of deluxe yoga pad!) None of it is a big deal and to fill my life with more STUFF just doesn't make much sense. We have a working shower and toilet (indoor plumbing! woo-hoo!), a laundromat near by, and best of all, our health and strength.

Besides, we are in Humboldt where people with PhDs live in cabins with no running water or electricity. Where a house in town could be getting their electricity from the house next door. Where a twenty year anniversary present is sheetrock. Or indoor plumbing, as they joked in the Northcoast Journal. We're waaay normal.


Here's a typical Humboldt dwelling. Big Dog lived in this house many years ago. It actually has indoor plumbing! And electricity! But the biggest appeal is the awesome privacy, so close to town, the huge redwoods and Strawberry Creek babbling year round. Who cares that it's a little...Tabacco Road-y.

Behind the Redwood Curtain

Last Tuesday, we drove past all the familiar sights on 101, from Central California to Northern Humboldt. Including, of course, the statue of Padre Junipero Serra pointing the way, next to the highway near Palo Alto. It's kind of a rough creation and looks as much like Yoda as it does Father Serra. It's one of the sights I look forward to everytime we travel north.

"So where IS Yoda, already?" Each time we rounded a bend, I was sure we'd see it.
"It's near the reservoir, right?"

And there it was. Father Junipero Yoda. In all his dune-colored glory. It was right after the Yoda House, a strange bubbly stucco house with rounded roofs and organic form, straight out of Star Wars (the first one which is always Star Wars One to me, not Episode Four.) The house used to be white but now it's a bright, dark orange. Much less Star Wars; much more Moomin.

"There it is! Yoda! He's pointing the way. 'Use the force, Luke.'"
"'Pull my finger, you must. Quick, Brother Juan. Pull my finger,'" Big Dog as usual, had buttholes on his mind. I play along.
"'Hurry! Brother Miguel, come pull my finger.'"
"Are you Yoda or Serra?"
"Yodaserra?"
"'Why will no one pull my finger? Oh, Dear Lord, will YOU pull my finger?'"
"'Oh, why not. Everyone's asking me to pull his finger. First Adam, now you.'"

* * * * *

It is early spring in Arcata. Our little apple tree is just beginning to bloom. We missed out on the daffodils, but there are wild onions and little purple flowers everywhere. A stray tulip is trying to bloom in front of the house.

The unseasonably sunny weather we had for the first few days is waning. There's more mist and fog in the morning and sporadic rain. And it's cold. We have no internet connection, no phone. We really are hidden behind the redwood curtain. So if you don't see many new entries for a while, you know why. It's not because I'm zoned out of my mind in the forests.

Wait. Today's April 20th. Okay, so maybe I am.