Projects That Interest Me

Forty years ago this spring I was living in and around Santa Cruz in a converted step van with a crazy redhead, her two kids, and a three legged dog.  The redhead, “Janice”, and I were in the Whaler bar in Davenport when Ed Walkinstik came in looking for us.  Ed was a self styled medicine man who drove a rig called the Solar Chariot, which was a solar powered cabin built on the bed of a 1949 one ton flat bed.  Ed had come to deliver an urgent message to us.  Seems Ed had been in consultation with a local shaman and she had warned him of a massive earthquake to hit the region soon.  He urged us to flee the area and seek safety.

It happened at the time that Janice had friends who had just bought some land in south central Washington state near Chehalis and had invited her to move up there.  Ed’s warning had been most forceful and to be honest we had little reason to stay in California.  The late seventies was a difficult time economically and I had been struggling to find work.  Meanwhile Janice had pretty much worn out her welcome in town so it seemed like a good time to make a change.

As money was tight the journey would take some time.  Leaving Davenport we headed for my folks place in Stockton where we parked my pickup for future retrieval.  Down to one vehicle we headed north, with stops at Lake Shasta and Eugene.  As we set out on the last leg of the journey we found ourselves beset by a blinding rainstorm.  The old vacuum wipers on the step van were no match for the deluge, so as I drove in the slow lane at snail’s pace Janice sat in the passenger wheel well and watched the white line on the shoulder.  A couple of times this led us down the off ramp and we would have to re-enter the freeway.  Finally late that night we arrived at her friends property.

The property was a 10 acre parcel outside of Onalaska, which back then was little more than a post office. Any supplies required a trip to Chehalis.  The land was wooded with two clearings, one where her friends, “Bob” and “Ornina” were building a makeshift cabin and one further back from the road where we set up camp. Bob and Ornina were Santa Cruz brown rice hippies with a toddler and another on the way who had fled California to get back to nature and live the simple life, and you couldn’t get much simpler.  Water and electricity were run with a hose and an extension cord from the front of the property.  A crude shower was rigged and a tarp awning to shelter against the incessant rain.  At one point I went back to Stockton to retrieve the pickup…a story for another time…and the camper which served both as transportation and master bedroom.

Jobs in the area were scarce unless you wanted to work for Weyerhaeuser, who was busy clear cutting as much of the local landscape as they could get they’re hands on.  Bob and I managed to find work at a nearby state park as park aids. The jobs were part of the CETA program designed to create minority employment, but since there were no minorities in the county at the time they gave them two the only two hippies in the area. So we spent the summer cleaning restrooms and hauling garbage at sub-minimum wage.

Over the summer I found little to like about the new reality.  Not only I was stuck in a dreary low wage job but I found I had little in common with the locals, who seemed quite happy to exist in this rural backwater.  They would gush about how green everything was.  Did I mention the incessant rain?  It rained on Memorial Day, the 4th of July, Labor Day and every other day in between that summer.  The days it didn’t rain were almost worse because the combination of heat and humidity was a recipe for a low grade migraine that would last all day.

The home life was just as bleak as my relationship with Janice had been deteriorating since before we left California.  Janice was a career welfare mom who held as a core belief that as long as she kept popping out babies that the government would provide her a steady income. That I refused to contribute to this scheme created no small amount of tension in our relationship.  In addition she had over time developed a jealous streak to the point where she would have dreams about me with other women and wake up and start pounding on me in the middle of the night. The close quarters only made things worse and the lack of privacy would drive me to distraction.

The final straw was when I asked one of the locals what the winters were like.  “Not bad,” he replied, “It rains every day, but you expect it to.”  That was all I had to hear.  I went home and announced that I was headed back to California asap.  Much to my chagrin Janice decided she would come along and so we started packing for the trip back south.  When I told people I was leaving their response was unanimous that I was crazy to do that.  There was going to be a big earthquake in California and that I should stay up there where it was safe.  My thought upon hearing this was that I would rather die in California than live in Washington.  And so we made our way south. Predictably soon after returning to California the relationship with Janice became untenable and we went our separate ways. I embarked on new adventures and didn’t give much thought to my time up north until about six month later when I picked up a newspaper and read that the mountain in the back yard had blown up.

 

I had been in Italy a few days when my daughter informed me that the next day she would be busy and that I would be on my own for the day.  She suggested that I take a trip up to Assisi and we went down to the bus station to check departure time for the bus to Assisi.  The woman behind the glass informed us that there was only one bus a day and that it left at 10 am.  So the next morning I made my way to the bus station, arriving fifteen minutes early.  It was then that the same woman we had spoken to the day before informed me that the bus to Assisi actually left from the train station five miles away.  Realizing that reaching the bus in time was extremely unlikely it was time to rethink the plan.

The obvious solution was found at the nearby car rental agency, where I soon found myself behind the wheel of generic Fiat.  I had been warned many times about driving in Italy.  The drivers had a reputation for being crazy, but I figured I was little crazy too so I should fit right in.  The drive up was delightful as I motored through the bucolic Tuscan countryside and up into the Umbrian hills surrounding Assisi.  As I approached I could see Assisi from a distance, nestled on a hilltop gleaming white in the morning sun.  The traffic was light and mostly consist of farm vehicles, so I made good time and arrived about lunch time.

After lunch I embarked on a walking tour of the town.  A major earthquake had hit Assisi a couple of years before and there were still repairing the damage.  Tall cranes dotted the skyline towering over the domes and the tile roofs as I made my way up the Via San Francesco toward the basilica.  The basilica is a massive edifice of white stone that stands on the spot where St. Francis had built a humble church centuries ago.  Within the cavernous interior is a massive altar under which St. Francis is said to be buried.  I wondered what he would think of all this.

Nearby is the ruins of the old fort.  It had suffered extensive damage in the earthquake, but part of it was still intact and open to the public.  In side their was a modern metal spiral staircase which rose three stories up to the parapets.  At the second story landing there is a long arched passageway that leads to another spiral staircase, illuminated only by the small gun ports on either side.  The passageway was so narrow that my shoulders would scrape on the sides and I had to keep my head bowed to keep from bumping it on the rough stones above.  The staircase led upward through an open hatch.  Emerging I found myself atop a tower that offered a stunning 360 degree view of the surrounding countryside.  Stunned by the view, I found myself shouting “WHOA!” at the top of my lungs.

The sun was setting as I made my way back to Sienna.  It was the oncoming darkness I believe that was the cause of the wrong turn at Perugia.  By the time I  realized I was on the road to Terni it was not feasible to turn around and go back, so I found my way to the autostrada and headed back north.  The autostrada, for those who haven’t experienced it, can best be described as I-5 on meth.  As I drove north, keeping to the speed limit I would come up behind trucks lumbering along in the slow lane.  As I would move into the left lane to pass it the Ferrari that was at least a kilometer behind when I signaled was suddenly right on my tail, flashing him brights and wanting to know what the hell I was doing in his lane.   So dodging and darting through the night I made my way back to Sienna and the conclusion of my adventure in Assisi.

 

I cut myself this morning

Seem to do it every day

Just removing whiskers

When some skin gets in the way

 

It happened ’cause I’m running late

The way I always am

So I curse the razor

And I curse my clumsy hand

 

Then I look into the mirror

And stop myself to pray

May this unsightly gash

Be the only blood shed today

 

Who am I

Yes I have a name

I answer to it

The cat has a name

It answers to it

The name is not the cat

As for numbers we won’t go there

 

This wasn’t how we had planned it.  I was visiting my daughter Amethyst and her boyfriend Marco in Sienna and it was almost time for me to leave.  The plan was that we would all go down to Rome for the weekend and take in the town before I flew out Monday morning, but on a trip to the coast a couple of days earlier she had caught a chill and was sick in bed.  So, with Marco staying to take care of her I found myself on the bus to  Rome alone.  I have always been comfortable traveling on my own and as we sped down the autostrada I looked forward to the adventure ahead.  I had no way of knowing what the next two days would bring, but I certainly wasn’t expecting it would play out as it did.

I checked in to a little hotel near the Colosseum and settled in.  Dining in a small trattoria next to the hotel I contemplated plans for the evening.  After all, I was alone in Rome on a saturday night and this presented a unique opportunity to explore the culture of the Eternal City.  I decided I was in the mood for some nightlife and went looking for a jazz club.  I found a cab driver that understood “musica” and dropped me off in front of a club downtown that he was apparently very familiar with.  The bouncer met me at the door and escorted me to the bar.

As I gazed around the room it had a surreal quality to it, like a set from a David Lynch movie.  Red leather booths and mirrored walls.  There was a small stage on the far wall where older couples in tuxedos and evening gowns discoed beneath a mirror ball.  Immediately upon taking a seat at the bar I was joined by a very attractive young women as the bartender poured us each a glass of champagne.  Her name was Leila, and she led me to a booth, where she explained to me that she could show me a very special evening.  All it would cost was two hundred euro for her and three hundred for the club.  I explained that while this was a very attractive offer, that for one that wasn’t what I was looking for and in any event I didn’t have that kind of money.

We were then joined by the maitre’d who explained that the champagne we were drinking was not complimentary and that the club had a two bottle minimum at two hundred euro a bottle.  When I repeated that I couldn’t afford this he proposed a deal.  “I’ll knock a hundred off the girl.  If you don’t take that deal you’re crazy!”  He was clearly becoming agitated.  Scanning the room I picked out at least four of the staff casually watching our conversation, each of them to my mind calculating how to inflict the most damage were I to become a problem.  Deciding that this was the wrong place to start an argument, I agreed to pay for the bottle that had been opened.  My bank account drained, I made my way back to the hotel.

I woke up the next morning I woke up with ten euro in my pocket.  The train to airport cost nine sixty-five so I immediately made my way to the station to buy my ticket so that whatever happened I had my ticket home.  That left me with thirty-five cents to make it through until the plane left at six o’clock the next morning.  Back at the hotel the manager kindly agreed to take a post-dated check from the credit union in Petaluma.  I still had a whole day to kill and all of the old city to see.  Leaving my luggage at the hotel I took off walking through the streets of Rome.

Now, if you’ve never been there I can tell you that Rome on a Sunday afternoon is one of the coolest spots on the entire planet.  They close the streets to traffic and everyone is out walking in there Sunday best.  There are street musicians on nearly every corner and the music echoes throughout the city.  Walking past the ruins of the old Forum I passed a young man dressed in Andean garb and playing a pan flute.  And as I walk past I pick out the tune and it’s “The House of the Rising Sun”.  So I’m walking through the streets of Rome and some guy who looks like he just got off the boat from Peru is playing Leadbelly on a pan flute.  Bemused, I walked on past piazzas and fountains toward the Spanish Steps.

From the top of the Spanish Steps you can see the dome of St. Peters, so getting my bearing I headed off toward the Vatican.  Past the Villa Medici and across the Tiber.  It was about at this point that I realized that I had not eaten since the night before and that in my current financial situation my next meal would be on the plane the next morning.  However I had eaten so well on my visit that I really wasn’t hungry.  Italians believe as a point of national pride that they have the best food in the world and will never tire of proving it to you and any uneaten food remaining on your plate is considered the highest of insults.  So food was not a problem.

St. Peter’s square was teeming with pilgrims.  It was the first Sunday in Lent and the Pope had said Mass earlier that morning.  I meandered through the square, past a giant obelisk that had been plundered from Egypt, and entered the basilica.  Inside the opulence is stunning to the first time viewer.  A towering edifice of marble trimmed with gold and stained glass.  Front and center is the massively ornate altar, under which they say St. Peter himself is buried.  Fun fact, the basilica also serves as mausoleum and over ninety deceased popes are buried there.  The older ones are in crypts, but the newer ones are on display in glass vacuum cases.  In one of the cases was John XXIII laid out with a death mask.  Pilgrims were kneeling before the case, some crying and some praying and many leaving offerings of the folding kind.  A procession marched by marking some unknown ceremony of the day.  There was an admission price for the Sistene chapel so short of raiding the collection box that would have to wait for another time.  With that I made my leave of the Holy City.

The sun was getting low by the time I reached the Pantheon so I decided it time to make my way back to the hotel and on to the train station.  I approached one of the street vendors and in my best italian asked directions to the Colosseum.  Before coming over I had bought some tapes and a book and spent a month learning basic italian.  However soon after arriving I realized this would be of no help when it came to understanding directions as the locals spoke at such a rapid pace that I was helpless to follow.  My only salvation was that they would point as they talked, so I would strike off in the direction they pointed until I found someone else who would point me further along my way.  So the street vendor at the Pantheon launched into a long, convoluted set of directions while pointing with his left hand, adding at the end, “It’s about ten minutes”.  So with a general idea of where I was going I  headed back to the hotel and retrieve my hundred pounds of luggage and make the final grueling half mile trek to the station.

I checked in at the airport about ten that night, only to find that I could not check my luggage until four the next morning.  So luggage tightly in hand I spent the night in the airport trying to sleep on those oh so comfortable airport seats designed to keep you from sleeping on them.  At some point I managed to contort my body to the point where I get a couple of hours of shut eye before it was time for my flight.  Finally morning came and I boarded my flight, exhausted, sore, and hungry but elated at the same time, leaving Rome with thirty five cents in my pocket and a story to tell.

Black days ahead…a world in turmoil

Hatred bubbles beneath a cloak of fear

Storm clouds hide the sun as darkness grows

Tyrants stoke fear of “the other”

Barbarism in the name of freedom

Working their evil in the dim shadows

 

And darkness spreads

Feeding on fear, hatred, and revenge

Preaching the gospel of intolerance

Darkness serves the masters’ greed

But the masters are deceived

As darkness is the master they serve

 

Yet in the darkness pockets of light

Light of compassion, truth and love

Beacons of humanity mark the realms

Shadows move to shroud the light

But in the blackness the light glows

And darkness cannot quell the light

 

The light radiates from within you

Feel the power and the warmth inside

Let it shine upon the path of man

 

He came there in the usual way. On the run from something with no real clue where he was running to, trying to lose some baggage along the way. Mark never talked about his family. They were part of another life he had left behind. He had a new life with a new family. We had become his brothers and sisters. Sally had found him in San Rafael and dragged him out to the lot. There he found a home among our odd little group. He started out on the garbage crew and worked his way up to dispatcher for Service and Supply. He picked up the handle “The Mule” which was both a play on his last name and a nod to his disposition. He had an eternal chip on his shoulder and an acerbic wit that could range from biting to skin peeling depending on his mood. But if he decided you were ok he could be as good and loyal a friend as you would ever know.

When I refer to “the lot” I’m talking about the old Northern California Renaissance Faire site at Blackpoint in Marin County. Many of the crew that worked the faire lived on the property year round in old trailers and school buses, except for the three months we traveled south to stage the southern Ren faire. The crew was a rough around the edges, hard living bunch of self-styled new age carnies. And the garbage crew was the roughest and the hardest, and the crudest, of the bunch. The garbage crew motto was, “hard drugs, naked women, and automatic weapons”. So Mark got himself a trailer and a dog and some guns and embraced the lifestyle. As you can guess the lifestyle included large quantities of drugs and alcohol and Mark embraced those with gusto. He went through a couple of relationships but he was always at his core a loner. But to some extent we were all loners who had come together in this ragtag community. He and I became friends and spent a bit of time together. We bonded especially over a week we spent in a broken down Willys at the top of the Cuesta Grade, but that’s a story for another time.

After I left the faire we would run into each other from time to time. At some point I became aware that he had also left the faire. And at some point I became aware he had gotten hooked on meth. We reconnected when I rented a room in the house where he was living in Santa Rosa and we shared a wall for three years. He and the other room mates worked for a company that did deco for events, including the Sonoma County Fair and Ghiradelli Square in the city at Christmas. He did their high work and plumbing. He learned to sculpt with cement and created the water features for the Hall of Flowers at the Sonoma County Fair. It was seasonal work and in his off time he would work on projects at his work bench in the garage. Though he seemed much the same I noticed that the speed had hardened his edge. The youthful arrogance had morphed into an opinionated cynicism. He was quicker to anger and slower to forgive. There was a bit of the paranoia that comes with meth. Some people began avoiding him and he began avoiding some people. When he was working he was better but idle times brought the darkness. He would spend his days out in the garage, often making weapons, and nights at the console in his room playing Grand Theft Auto, all to the constant drone of talk radio. There was the accumulation of more and more stuff. I introduced him to the internet and he would spending hours searching for new and better tools and toys. We got along fine but his relationship with the other room mates became increasingly strained. I decided I had to get out.

After I moved we would see each other from time to time. He came out to Tomales to do some tree work for my landlord, but his nerves were shot and he ended up blowing up at the landlady and losing the job. A year after I moved the death of one of  the room mates caused the dissolution of the household. At that point Mark began to drift. He bounced from place to place, hauling his demons with him. A DUI took his truck, and at some point he stopped paying for his storage unit. He finally hit bottom, shunned by most of his friends, sad and alone on his birthday. So he sought family. He went up to Sally’s for as long as she could stand him before sending him down to Mojo’s. It was at this point he had become claustrophobic and began sleeping outside by choice. From there he drifted into the homeless community in Guerneville. He managed to kick the speed but by then his heart was so damaged that any attempt to quit drinking would have likely killed him. At this point I noted a change in him, The softness and the sweetness that he had kept well guarded over the years began to emerge. His smile lost that cynical grin and he seemed more at peace than I had ever known him. He became a beloved leader in the homeless community, quickly gaining their trust and respect. He was the guy you went to when you needed to settle disputes or when the cops took your stuff. The sheriff’s knew him as someone they could reason with and he became a liaison with the community.

One cold winter night Mark and his friends were hanging out in front of the liquor store downtown. Suddenly two of them darted across the street just as a van came speeding down River Road. Mark reacted instantly. Leaping from the curb he pushed his friends to safety just in time to absorb the full impact of the van, hurling him to the pavement. As his friends gathered around him he looked up to see that his friends were safe and with a smile he was gone. Farewell, brother, go in peace.

 

 

 

With spring training coming up the game is much on my mind. While spring is generally a time of optimism for fans this spring comes with concerns about the state of the sport in general. Talk of a potential players strike, which most agree would be disastrous, has thrown and cloud over the sport at a time when many are questioning it’s future. A lot of the buzz on sports talk radio is about how interest in the game has decreased. Most commentators agree that the key is to make the sport more relevant to younger fans. Baseball, invented in the 19th century, has been declining in popularity. The “National Pastime” seemingly has for many become the game of our fathers, a reminder of a bygone era. It has been noted that the average age of baseball fans has steadily risen and now is over 50. In today’s fast paced, super aggressive culture baseball seems slow and passive. Young people have trouble relating to the game, save stats nerds that prattle on endlessly about spin rates and launch angles. Indeed some would argue that fantasy baseball has become more popular than real baseball. In addition the increasing urbanization of America has led to a scarcity of ball fields in the inner city. The sport has increasingly had to rely on foreign players as many home-grown athletes choose other sports. The fallout from the steroid era has left a stigma on the game that turned off many fans and potential fans. For these reasons among others baseball has struggled to gain new fans as other sports gain in popularity.

To properly understand the dilemma we need to look at the status of sports in America and baseball’s place in it. Football, dominant since the 70’s, is in decline and it has little to do with Colin Kaepernick and anthem protests and more to do with CTE. Where ever you stand on police violence and respect for the flag, how many of you would, knowing what we know now about concussions and brain damage, would sign the permission slip for your son or daughter to play.  As I see it football is where boxing was in the late 70’s. Back in the day boxing was huge. Live from Madison Square Garden into homes across America every Friday night. Names like Dempsey, Louis, and Marciano were legendary and Muhammad Ali was arguably the most famous athlete on the planet. However as the effects of brain trauma became better understood the sport began losing popular appeal. When Duk Koo Kim died at the hands of Boom Boom Mancini on live TV from Ceasar’s Palace boxing’s decline from a major sport became irreversible. Football now stands on a similar precipice. I can see a future where football is a pay-per-view sport. Basketball is in ascendance, not just here but internationally and the popularity of the NBA is at an all time high. The three-point shot has revolutionized the game. The Warriors are pursuing history and LeBron James has become not just the face of the league but an international icon. Soccer, the most popular sport in the rest of the world, is rising in popularity especially among women and immigrant communities.  The challenge for soccer is that it doesn’t translate easy on television to the average fan, but with youth leagues expanding the appeal soccer is gaining in popularity.

So what does this bode for the “national pastime”? There are some positives. Baseball for one thing doesn’t share the fatal flaw of football. Concussions are an issue, especially for catchers, but far less than football or even soccer. Aside from pitchers turning their elbows into shredded cheese, the long term health risks are less than your average construction worker. Indeed baseball overall could have a very positive effects on the health of a nation that struggles with childhood obesity. Baseball also has some international appeal, at least in Latin America and the Far East. Baseball has also increased it’s popularity among women. I remember when I was a kid the only women you saw at the ballpark were our moms who were dragged there to watch the kids so dad could drink beer and watch the game in peace. Today that has changed and it is not uncommon to see couples and single women throughout the stands, though due to price increases you see less families these days. And that is at the core of the problem.

There has been attempts by baseball to solve the problem by changing the game to better relate to the times. Some of the ideas center on speeding up the game by limiting mound visits and potentially installing a pitch clock and these are ideas I can support. There are also idiotic ideas such as using the Designated Hitter in the National League and starting a runner at second base in extra innings, ideas that in my opinion will do nothing to gain new fans and will turn off older fans. However these changes, both good and bad, are superficial and will do little do little to get kids to put down the game controller and grab their mitt. And they are the key to saving baseball.

If you want younger fans it seems pretty obvious you have to start with the kids. If you wait until they’re adolescents or young adults to engage them you’ve lost them. Lifelong fans are exposed to the game at an early age. Indeed it is these childhood memories that are part of the charm of the game. The sooner they gain an understanding of the game the more likely they are to become loyal fans. And the best way to come to love the game is to play the game. What is required in my opinion is a massive investment in youth baseball from t-ball to high school. Whatever MLB is spending in this area they should double or triple down on it. Spend some of those billions you’re raking in to build new ball fields and improve facilities and equipment so that kids have a place to experience the game. There is also a role for the players in this. I propose a program where former players become honorary commissioners of their local little leagues. Show up at Opening Day and awards dinners. Help with recruiting and hold free seminars to teach the fundamentals. Use their star power to give back to the game and reconnect with why they fell in love with the game in the first place. MLB should also insist on standards of conduct for youth baseball to encourage sportsmanship and to ensure equal access for all children, both boys and girls. For at it core baseball is inclusive. You don’t have to be 6’7″ and 240 lbs. In baseball your success is base not on your size but you ability and your determination. And I can tell you from personal experience that your level of ability has nothing to do with your ability to appreciate the game. So in the end exposure is the key. Getting the kids out there and teaching them the game. So play ball!

She was our worst nightmare. Her gaze could inspire fear in the bravest of us. None of us dared incur her wrath so we toiled silently under her watch and tried desperately to endure until we could be freed of her grasp.

Sister Mary Joan Kathleen possessed a doctorate in psychological terror. She, and the other nuns at St. Gertrude’s, were of the order of the Blessed Virgin Mary, BVM, or Black Veiled Monsters as was whispered on the playground. The sisters had been imported from somewhere in the midwest and believed that the path to salvation was gained through discipline. Severe, unrelenting, spirit crushing discipline. Sister Joan Kathleen embraced this calling with the passion of a zealot. Her fourth grade class was a temple of discipline that she ruled with grim determination. She fervently believed that the rambunctious, the restless, the lazy, the slovenly, and worst of all the nonconformist could all be made to embrace salvation under her tutelage…or else.

She had no need of physical violence, she had the Monsignor for that. Father Noonan was an old Irish parish priest with an old irish view of discipline. One of his favorite pastimes was to come into the classroom and call to the front of the room two boys who had committed some offense. Lining them up next to each other facing the class he would then crack their heads together like a couple of coconuts. No, Sister Joan Kathleen’s method’s were much more subtle and insidiously effective. She dug into your psyche to find your weakness…your deepest fears and strongest aversions. Then should would tailor a torture specifically exploit those weakness. From there she would begin grinding you into submission.

The one anomaly in this fortress of despair was the fifth grade, where the sister had just come back from the missions in Hawaii and had been slow to re-aclimate to the regimen on the mainland. The fifth grade class was right above ours and as we sweated through our times tables we could hear them singing island songs as she played piano. And as we did each of us raised to the heavens a silent prayer, “Dear God, please let me make it to the fifth grade”. The answer to our prayer came on the last day of school. Still giddy with the news that we had all passed…that our salvation was at hand…the Principal came into the class and shoved an ice pick through that bubble. She announced to us that the fifth grade teacher had been shipped out and that Sister Mary Joan Kathleen had been promoted to the fifth grade. At that moment the loudest silent groan I have ever heard rose to the heavens.

God’s no doubt still laughing about that one.

It was a gorgeous Saturday in the city, late summer turning to Indian summer. Ellenwood and I were out apartment hunting, cruising the upper Market St area. We hadn’t had much luck that morning so we decided to head over to Carlton’s place for lunch before resuming the search in the afternoon. Ellenwood turned left off of Market and headed the Olds down Clipper St. toward Carlton’s.

For those of you not familiar with San Francisco, Clipper St. starts at upper Market near the top of Mt. Sutro, the tallest hill in the city. From there it winds down a parkway until it straightens out and descends through city streets into Noe Valley, a drop of about 300 feet at roughly a 45 degree angle. In the years that we had made the trip many times and this one didn’t seem any different…until at the stop sign at the bottom of the parkway Ellenwood’s foot went to the floor.

I will make note at this time that in the past I had always done the brakes on the Olds. My thinking back then was that doing your own brakes was like packing your own parachute, if it’s not right you’ve got no one to blame but yourself. But Ellenwood had decided a few weeks before to take the Olds to a garage and have them done by a professional. I will also point out at this point that what few safety features were to be found on a 1964 Oldsmobile, the horn and the “emergency” brake, were no longer functional. If it had seat belts they had long ago retreated into the seat cushions.

As we sped through the intersection Ellenwood’s first instinct was to jam the transmission into park. This didn’t work but it did stall the engine, which disabled the power steering. We were in free fall. And we were rolling. As we picked up speed the intersections acted like moguls and we were catching some serious air. It was like being in a movie and waiting for someone to yell “CUT”. Ellenwood looked at me, terror in his eyes, and asked, “What are we going to do?”

“We’re going to hit something.” This proved to be understated. The first was a Chevy at the stop sign at Noe. The impact knocked the Chevy, and it’s four occupants, out of the intersection and caused us to veer left, side swiping a Toyota coming up the hill. Caroming off the Toyota we veer right and clipped the fender of a parked car before jumping the curb on to the sidewalk, skidding along a retaining wall before finally t-boning a car parked in a driveway. The final impact threw both of us against the windshield, creating matching spiderweb patterns. As I looked over at him I noticed a trickle of blood from above his eyebrow, at the same time feeling a warm trickle below my nose. We gazed at each other in stunned silence until the chaos that we had wrought caught up with us and people arrived to pull us out of the car. They were amazed to find us relatively unhurt and able to exit the car on our own power. Miraculously, no one involved seemed seriously injured, save for some minor shock. For myself I was so jacked on adrenaline that I barely noticed the pain in my lower back that I would carry with me to this day. The concussion symptoms didn’t show up for a day or two and last six months or so. A month after the accident I was riding the Greyhound back to Stockton to visit my folks when I began scratching at an irritant at my hairline. After a few seconds I dug out a chunk of windshield glass that had been floating around up there all this time. Never the less they piled us all in the ambulance and hauled us off to SF General where I had my lip stitched up by a very cute ER nurse, who seemed kind of flirty right up to the point when she dropped a lead glove in my crotch before wheeling me into x-ray.

In the aftermath Ellenwood was ticketed for exceeding the safe speed at the time of the accident…which was zero. When Ellenwood protested the cop noted that he could also write him up for running four stop signs. And someone down at city hall noticed that the now defunct Olds had racked up $400 in unpaid parking tickets over the years in the pre-boot city. The other result was that we both would have to move out of the city, although Ellenwood only on a temporary basis. As for myself, I was off on other adventures.