Day 7: Zooming and Demasiado

Yesterday began with losing something important and spending a couple of frantic hours trying to find it. Finally, I gave up and settled for a make-do replacement, only to then have the original lost item show up … exactly where I had put it. Life offered me a metaphorical lesson about slowing down, however, I opted to make up lost time and sped through a kaleidoscope of stunning sea scapes and a thousand-shades-of-green trees that deserved a life-time of appreciation.

Crab catcher at MacKerricher State Park

 

And, one he didn't catch

Zooming

My eyes are full of the incredible splendor of this part of the world, but I’m starting to wonder if I’ve zoomed past what I wanted. Zoom is the verb of our time. The short-cut, make-do, safe-way to meet, learn, share information, connect. And, it works. Tasks get done; ideas get shared; we go about our business. But something is lost in that efficient, streamlined, fluff-less engagement. 

I’m beginning to think that, in all this zooming, I’ve missed what I was actually yearning for ... a deeper understanding of and connection to nature. 

Pacific Trillium

 

Recently I’ve been reading about some of the great naturalist/scientists … Darwin, von Humboldt, Banks. They all made voyages of discovery: years-long, hazardous journeys of observing and experiencing the worlds they were exploring.  I'm reminded of one of my favorite words from Mexico: demasiado … too much. While I never heard it used, Google Translate says the words for too little are demasiado poco.

Clouds of insight are gathering on the horizon of my mind hinting that this trip of exploration has actually been a dance of demasiado and demasiado poco. Too many miles, too much beauty whizzing by at seventy miles per hour, too much data gathered from information road signs, too little understanding gained from direct contact, too much carbon poured into an exhausted environment, too many dollars spent on comfort, too little time spent observing and listening to nature. 

I’ve called this trip an “exploration” of Northern California when it could more rightly be called clean sheets and hot showers sight-seeing.  

The question now is, how will I slow down today? Perhaps this photo taken at a stop on the Avenue of the Giants offers a metaphor ...hopefully, not a reality.

Day 5: Bending to the elements: wind and sea

 

One of the challenges of living long is that we’ve seen and done so much that the thrill of finding new things happens less frequently. Yesterday though, it came at Jug Handle State Natural Reserve, named for a rock arch known as the Jughandle. 

This part of the world belongs to the elements. Wind and Sea are major characters in the story: uncontrolled, uncontrollable. My walk along the sea this morning reminded me of the shifting impermanence of the world. An old, wire fence blocked access to the fragile cliffs; however, a metal cable several feet further in revealed the creep of erosion, and an information sign spelled out the message: “In only 100 years, where you stand may have eroded to 100 feet behind you.”

At Jug Handle, my wanderings led me into a darkened grove where trees looked like they had been bulldozed into a pile. It took awhile to realize that these were living trees all in a tangle. It was disorienting confusion. Thankfully, another sign told the story:

Notice that most of the trees before you are sculpted by salt-laden north winds that dry and kill the tips of the branches. The bent and twisted quality of this tiny grove is called krummholz, from the German word meaning “bent wood.” These trees usually grow tall and straight. This grove creates a sheltered environment for many local species of birds, mammals and insects that otherwise could not live on this windswept bluff.

What a powerful reminder that life finds ways to live. It bends and adapts, creates communities for mutual benefit.

More from Jug Handle:

 

Natural reserves are part of the state park system and similar to parks in that they protect natural landscapes, but the emphasis is more on plants and animals, or specific geological features. They generally have fewer facilities and less development than state parks.

Day 4 of 15: Comfort zone freakout or where's my mettle? Updated)

Mount Diablo picnic site

The 4 am voice of reason woke me up with one word: mettle … a person's ability to cope well with difficulties or to face a demanding situation in a spirited and resilient way.

Yesterday was a hard day, a disturbing day from the beginning. The plan was to drive 2 hours to the campsite at Mount Diablo. The first “demanding situation” was traffic. It’s obvious that the lessons offered to us by COVID are being forgotten. Smog is back in the LA basin and even non-rush-hour traffic here on the outskirts of the Golden City is horrendous. However, I made my way through the peach-colored hills and found a no-railings snake path up Mount Diablo. Fear woke up. 

As I inched my way to the campsite, resilience evaporated. On the single road to the summit, I missed my camp turnoff and found myself desperately trying to figure out where the hell I was. Help came in the form of a woman on a candy-apple red motorcycle looking out over the incredible view. She wasn’t much younger than I am and we chatted for a bit and she managed to figure out that I was about two miles off course. I back tracked and finally found my allotted campsite, which was wholly inadequate. In a basically empty campground, this spot wasn’t big enough for my tent and my car. And, while it was beautiful, live-oak studded country, fear was yelling in my ears that this wasn’t right, that I needed to flee. 

 

I decided to at least have lunch and found a lovely picnic spot under an huge oak, where I began to unravel my plans. I would go to the coast for a couple of days before picking up my planned route again. So back down the trail and into the river of traffic I went. 

I thought the traffic would lessen as soon as I was across the bay, but it continued. The 101 I remembered from a honeymoon bike trip some forty years ago was now a congested freeway all the way to Healdsburg (charming by the way) where I gave in to the call of sugar. 

 

My 2-hour drive had now become 7, but I decided to make it to Ft. Bragg, another 2 hours. When a road sign offered a different way to get there, I turned onto Hwy 128 and immediately fell in love with its mostly empty, stunning twists and turns. It quickly became one of my favorite roads although it was getting late so I didn’t stop for pictures. Big mistake.

Finally reaching Ft. Bragg, I turned into a motel, contemplating a day of beach combing and exploring before continuing on up the coast. The minute I stepped out of the car, frigid wind blasted my summer-clad body and reality struck: the next ten days could be more of the same. When I checked the weather app, it confirmed that reality and I went in to full body, comfort zone freak out. If I could have tele-transported myself to my little RV in Julian, I would have. Since I couldn’t, I began cancelling reservations, begging friends for a warm bed, and pulling into my turtle shell in every way possible.

Then came 4 am and I woke thinking: what kind of an explorer am I to quit so easily? I have base layers. I have a coat and gloves. So I get cold; so what? Where’s my spirit? Where’s my mettle?

(To be continued) 

 

Later. Yeehaw! Put on my base layers, jeans, gloves and fleece and headed to Glass Beach. Was it cold? Yes. Was it wonderful? Absolutely! Meltdown is over. The question that came to me is:

What would I miss if I didn't do this thing I intended to do?

 

Here are some photos from an exhilerating walk I would have missed this morning ... and my theme song for the day. Stay Alive!

 

 

Click here for video!

Day 3 of 15: Mustard and Mystery

Driving north from Santa Barbara through yellow velvet hills rolling toward the moody blue Pacific. I’ve barely cleared the Goleta outskirts when I'm stunned by a yellow, bright and pure as sunlight, draping across the land and demanding one stop after another and a detour along an unexplored backroad through surprising orchards stretching inland and up the verdant valleys … El Refugio Ranch, Rancho Guacamole, Edens hidden from the noise and grind of the destination-determined 101 traffic. 

The beauty of the super bloom of common mustard (Brassica rapa, I presume) belies its non-native, invasive nature, a gift from Russian immigrants who inadvertently planted it here with their wheat. While wild mustard is a botanical outcast to most, some Napa vintners are deliberately planting it in their vineyards because it helps aerate and condition the soil. 

 

 

 

Pushing away from the seduction of yellow, I turn inland at San Luis Obispo to take the long route along the recently opened, repeatedly repaired coastal Highway 1. At an age when I can no longer count on “next time,” I long for one more trip along the endlessly heart-pounding joy of twisting turns and breath catching vistas with their vertical drops to the rocks below. As a kid from Kansas, I have to wonder if is my early, land-locked, flatlander years that makes this thrill ride so compelling.  

 

Love the water someone left for the critters.

 

Fortunately, it’s Sunday, with no road work delays and relatively light traffic allowing me to stop repeatedly. Not long after passing Gorda, one of the three small settlements along the Big Sur coast, an unexpected riot of orange and pink-violet stops cars in both directions.

The Mystery

 

 

It’s obviously a created display; however, the only semblance of a sign read: the flower trap. Googling that lead me to an instagram account where I’m trying to get more info. Who is doing this and why?

Poetry Month: Problematizical by Dave Bonta

Posted on February 19, 2021 by Dave Bonta

Problematizical

Up, and to the office, where busy all the morning, and then at noon to the ’Change with Mr. Hater, and there he and I to a tavern to meet Captain Minors, which we did, and dined; and there happened to be Mr. Prichard, a ropemaker of his acquaintance, and whom I know also, and did once mistake for a fiddler, which sung well, and I asked him for such a song that I had heard him sing, and after dinner did fall to discourse about the business of the old contract between the King and the East India Company for the ships of the King that went thither, and about this did beat my brains all the afternoon, and then home and made an end of the accounts to my great content, and so late home tired and my eyes sore, to supper and to bed.

which to be
a ropemaker or a sun

the old East India Company
or the rains

no end of accounts
to tire my yes

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 25 January 1668.

Author: Dave Bonta

Dave Bonta (bio) often suffers from imposter syndrome, but not in a bad way — more like some kind of flower-breathing dragon, pot-bellied and igneous. 

 

Be that as it may, all of his writing here is available for reuse and creative remix under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. For attribution in printed material, his name (Dave Bonta) will suffice, but for web use, please link back to the original. Contact him for permission to waive the "share alike" provision (e.g. for use in a conventionally copyrighted work).

 

 Published in Via Negativa 

 

Via Negativa is a unique experiment in daily, poetic conversation with the living and the dead. Dave Bonta founded the site in 2003 and Luisa A. Igloria joined seven years later. Guest authors contribute as well. Both poets are based in the eastern United States, at least part of the year: Dave in the mountains of central Pennsylvania, when he isn’t in London, and Luisa in the Tidewater area of Virginia, where she teaches in the MFA Creative Writing Program at Old Dominion University. Dave writes, among other things, daily erasure poems from the 17th-century diary entries of the odious but fascinating Mr. Samuel Pepys, while Luisa has been writing and posting a poem a day since November 2010, often in response to Dave’s posts here or at The Morning Porch.

Love Letters to My Life #34: Taking a step changes the path

(We know the day we were born, but most of us do not know the day we will die. This love letter to my life is written on the day I've designated as my death day: the 17th of every month, and reminds me to be grateful for my incredible life.)    

It began when I bought a tent. The yearning for kayaking time on a lake had already prompted the purchase of a lime-green kayak and an easy-load rack. A couple of day trips to lakes close to Reno, though, had failed to scratch the itch for time on clear water surrounded by big trees. Turns out, my yearning was quite specific.

Camping appeared to be the only answer. Thus, the tent. Which lake was prompted by a decades-old memory of one night spent on the beautiful Lake Almanor, two hours north of Reno. So off I went for a four-day shake-down cruise on what I imagined might be my get-away plan to balance my urban life in Reno.

The lake was everything I remembered and more. The camping had some rough edges which I assumed would be smoothed out over time. With the pandemic in full swing, campgrounds were forced to close half their sites in an effort keep people socially distanced. At the same time, people were desperate to get away from their locked-down lives. Simply getting a camping spot required lining up at the break of dawn (or earlier).

Kayaking toward Mount Lassen

Leaving Reno at 5:00 a.m. mid-week, I lucked into a ponderosa-shaded beach site and settled in to a lazy schedule of kayaking, reading, napping, and making lists of things I needed to improve the camping experience. Afternoons were filled with exploring and kayaking other bodies of water in the area and the small town of Chester which has a lovely outdoor coffee shop, a tiny bookstore stocked with treasures, and the Blue Goose Gallery, filled with incredible art. This felt like my place.

Driving around the lake on day 3, I saw a sign: Vagabond Resort. Who could resist that name? I turned in, drove down toward the lake and saw the sign that changed everything: For Sale, posted on a beautiful lake-view deck alongside a 5th wheel RV. It was lust at first sight.

Three weeks later I was moving in to what I thought would be my summer get-away from Reno. It didn’t take long to realize I no longer wanted to live in the city, any city. Vagabond Resort is only open five months a year (something about 10 feet of snow making the rest of the year iffy); so I started thinking about possibilities for the other seven months. As much as I loved Reno, I wanted to live in nature, making friends with big trees, wildflowers, wolf lichens, and mosses.

The next six weeks were a head-spinning series of synchronicities that wound up with my seven-month winter home being in an RV park on the outskirts of Julian, in the mountains east of San Diego. This past winter was a steep learning curve teaching me how to live through winter in an RV while falling in love with the oak forest around me, and renewing connections to close friends in San Diego.

It’s now time to get ready for my migration north, from mountains to lake, from oak to pine, from walking trails to kayaking shining waters. A year ago, if someone had told me this would be my life, I wound have thought them crazy, and included myself if I gave it a moment of thought.

 However, although I didn't know it at the time, buying that tent was taking a step toward what was calling me. I truly had no idea I would wind up here in this rather unusual two-RV lifestyle, but I do know I’m deeply contented and grateful.

What is it you still yearn for?

Perhaps it's time to follow Sir Francis Bacon's advice:

"Begin doing what you want to do now.  

We are not living in eternity.  

We have only this moment, 

sparkling like a star in our hand - 

and melting like a snowflake."    

      -- Sir Francis Bacon

Flower anatomy

Tulip from Crystal Hermitage Garden at Ananda

I never tire of taking photos of flowers. For some reason though, I’ve long neglected the process of understanding them. Like all living things, they have organized themselves to survive and reproduce. Beauty is their strategy for success and their anatomy is carefully designed to interact with their environment. I truly appreciate this flower anatomy lesson found at ProFlowers.

Petals are what give a flower its unique shape, and are often brightly colored to attract insects and critters, which unwittingly aid in the fertilization of ovules through pollination.

Sepals are the small, leaf-like parts growing at the base of the petals. They serve to protect the flower before it blossoms.

Peduncle refers to the stem or stalk of a flower.

Receptacle is the thickened part at the bottom of the flower which holds its major organs.

Pistil is the female organ of the flower. It consists of four major parts:

    1.    Stigma – The head of the pistil. The stigma receives pollen, which will begin the process of fertilization.
    2.    Style – This is the name for the stalk of the pistil. When pollen reaches the stigma, it begins to grow a tube through the style called a pollen tube, which will eventually reach the ovary. The style therefore acts as a buffer against pollen contamination, since only compatible pollen is able to grow a pollen tube.
    3.    Ovary – The base of the pistil. This organ holds the ovules awaiting fertilization.
    4.    Ovules – These are the flower’s eggs, located inside the ovary. Upon fertilization by pollen, they will eventually grow into a seed. In fruit plants, pollen will not only spark the growth of a seed, but a surrounding fruit as well.

Stamen is the male organ of the flower, consisting of two major parts:
    1.    Anther – The head of the stamen. The anther is responsible for the production of pollen, which will hopefully be transported to the pistil by animals or insects, such as bees. This is a crucial part of the reproduction of the plant.
    2.    Filament – This is the stalk that holds the anther and attaches it to the flower.

Making More Flowers
It’s amazing for nature to provide a flower with the ability to reproduce without the need for a mate, but not all of them do!

Some flowers have only male or female organs, and require a separate flower of the opposite gender to reproduce. We call these Imperfect Flowers. Perfect Flowers, on the other hand, have both a stamen and a pistil, and are able to reproduce on their own.