Speaking Of The Past Present

  The same night that Maria and I took a break to see the Alvin Brothers (here's a link to a good Terry Gross interview  Fresh Air with Phil and Dave Alvin -at least until the link is removed), we also went to see our friend Ben play a gig at the Mason Social House, downtown.  We got there a little early, just early enough to wander back outside to encounter an enthusiastic street man tell  Maria that she is still very pretty. He crooned to her and I said he could sing with Smokey Robinson, he acted as if I had slandered and denigrated him for decades.  "Smokey aint got nothing on me!! was the nicest thing he yelled as we walked away.  Oooh baby baby.

    Ben, with his sardonic comments, notable man hugs and  guitar playing that adds to the living room settings we are used to visiting the Cohens in was back on stage with friends and family.  He seemed to have a good time and the band sounded really good. A good live performance provides a sustaining energy; how a band interacts with each other,  how the musicians interact with the audience.  It's nice to see Anne singing too. Decades ago my memories of her exploring her voice possibilities had an occasionally eerie effect as I was scooping ice cream. Digging into the freezers had a type of sound proof quality and backing out, you might be surrounded by the swirling sounds of O'Leary .  Here's a nice write up of Ben's recent record,  Digging The Past To Mine The Future , this was a successful Kickstarter venture.

    I could play Nothin' Gonna Turn Me Around as a daily anthem and also especially enjoy the sound and feel of St.Francis and Milkalove.  It is a fine album, something someone could feel very proud of completing and sharing.

Beginning to Sink In

   Howdy. I've been feeling very tired and looking forward to being in one place, freed from the deadline we've placed over our heads to get this moving business done.  29 years in one home accumulates a lot of stuff.  It's so much and the task is daunting.  We might spend an evening cleaning and sorting, tossing and recycling, saving and storing and still feel that there is so much more to be done.  We clear out what seems to be a mass amount, take in a moments satisfaction- then feel the reckoning of what we still need to do. Completely exhausting.  At work- what ever happened to ordering small packages?  Well, there's plenty of those but it seems that lately bikes, generators, shelves, 1/2 ton of books are in great demand.

    When I ride the cable car up the hills of SF with the views of California Street, I feel sad.  Nearing the end of time in San Francisco- sure, I'll still work here and yes, we will spend time here but we will just be visitors.
It's a feeling of being caught in between with giant amounts of nostalgia and memories with the flip side of the mess that still is.  I realize that once we are done, and can fully embrace our next as now, a certain amount of peace and content will be present.  Plus it wouldn't hurt to get that jukebox back and functioning.

     For now I enjoy the comfort of our bed (old friend) and count the days we have left in San Francisco.  Hey, will someone just take a crap in front of the building one more time?  I'd count faster then.

Ollie in Aqua

Oliver used to be the reluctant to get his head wet, extremely cautious in the water.  To a point, not a bad idea. To the point of having to be within a distance of a foot for him to feel secure, not great for us, or even for Oliver. Now after many visits at Aunt Kathy and Uncle Bob's, he's found his comfort zone.  Jumping, dipping, flopping, floating, submerging (with one hand clipping his nose), swimming-Oliver is confident. Yesterday between two pools, he spent 4 hours in the water.  Dexter and Ollie even got me to jump in...without my usual 30 minutes of hesitation.  

      

Finally

 It's a bad leap of faith, or perhaps it is a leap for the loss of faith, and hope.  Finally San Francisco has announced that the Bridge Board has voted to put up nets to catch/deter jumpers.  I have not understood why there has been so much opposition to any substantial effort to preventing the end to valuable lives; 45 people a year, over 1600 deaths.  Note that each death is not counted as a suicide jump unless the body is found, and not every body is found as some wash out to sea.  If these bodies are discovered they often are counted only as a drowning, not as a bridge jumper. The Golden Gate Bridge as one of the most iconic symbols in the world has the appeal of being the place to choose to die.  And yet, the Eiffel Tower and the Empire State Building have barriers to prevent jumpers.  Why not us?

• Cost?  Is this the best reason not to save lives?  76 million dollars to construct the nets is not a minor chunk of change. However football stadiums cost 720 million to 1.6 billion dollars to build, big budget Hollywood films cost over 200 million dollars to produce, hosting an Olympics is 10-15 billion dollars (normally not a profitable venture)- what would you pay to save your child? what should a society pay to save the lives of children and those that have not yet jumped?
• Aesthetics:  Really? Really? It will take away the beauty of the bridge. I have a tough time honoring that argument. Put glasses on my pretty face if it helps me see better. 
• Will the deterrent work? I believe it will. Historically and recently, this has been proven true.  do suicide bridge barriers work?  
• The funds should be spent on mental health services. Yes, there should be more money provided for mental health services. Since the Reagan years, support for mental health services has been lessened but this is no reason for making a case of either/or.  
• We don't see the deaths and somehow this makes the numbers tolerable.  Why is this so? If we had five people jump from the stands at AT&T park, there would be immediate action in putting up a barrier in the part of the park where this was happening.  
• They're going to find another way to kill themselves.  Perhaps but consider that the answer might actually be for the majority, no. The majority of survivors never try to kill themselves again.  Bridge jumpers have a different mindset. Some do consider death by jumping into the bay a romantic notion; the idea of flying to their end . Many choose this way because they anticipate leaving no bloody crime scene for others to clean, possibly no body for others to bury- drifting off to sea. They choose this way because they don't want to bother others, their families.  They are for the most part wrong but this does not alter their intent  Take away the bridge option and these people may not be so quick to use a gun, or crash a vehicle. These people will have more time to learn to work through their pain and live the type of lives they deserve.
• It's so easy- allowing a depressed individual to simply hop up the 4 foot siding and jump.  Alter the end result of an impulse can halt the impulsive act (instead of a glorious death from the Golden Gate Bridge, it will be an embarrassing flop into a net)
• 10-15% of jumpers are under the age of 18 -children who recognized the ease of this choice. Removing this ease and perhaps these children-our children might ask us, a friend for help.  It's too...easy.
• It's a painless way to go.  Survivors have almost all commented that their first thoughts on the way down are "I've made a serious mistake".  Hitting the water may instantly kill the jumper but other times, it instead cripples their bones, breaks their neck leaving them weakened in pain, and fighting not to drown.  
• It's not my problem.  My kids, my friends would never do this.  This is a sad concept and as a leading city for ideals and forward thinking, San Francisco has sucked for decades in being proactive to saving lives.  Until maybe now.   San Francisco Finally Chooses a Suicide Barrier
• some of my arguments are from a book I read a couple of years ago, The Final Leap, John Bateson

This will take 3 years. In these 3 years, we will lose 100-200 more people. 

Taking A Leap

June seems to be a time of transition, a time to move forward, to take a giant leap. And so in work Michael made the decision to move back to Peoria to live and look after his Mother. A transition for Sirina and Zachary that they willingly do for their family- and with a chance to breathe in a house and an affordable lifestyle that provides this opportunity.  At the beach (that once was Neptune Beach?) in Alameda we celebrated.  At work with the team we celebrated. with food from Pasta Pomodoro.  We send them off with our very best wishes.

Marcail hosted a graduation dinner for Rose who looks forward to developing her talents at her new school in the Fall. Delighted to step past her past, B-Rose was honored in the company of family and friends with a very fulfilling meal. G Jones was there and she's moving just like us (after living in the Avenues for decades), and getting married too!  Congratulations to all!

It's fun to be around to experience the changes; not always how I would script it, not always how I might choose the path but just glad to be a part of this, in the mix of things.

so nice, i'll use this photo twice. much of where we are looking back to what was

Cai and Mike

Sirina, Zachary, Michael

Dexter death stare 

My Babe, And a little Yoenis Out At Homez

    Maria says that she got a house and I got a jukebox.  I would say that she is correct!  Of course we will share both.  This is my Wurlitzer 2800, 1964. It works and is a beauty. It needs a cleaning and a fine tune and thanks to Dan Zelinsky of the Museum Mechanique, we're finding people who will get this done. However once we brought this gem back from Santa Rosa (thank you Tim and Jo for your help!) and got it unloaded from the Zipcar truck, it was a chore to carry, slide, push her into the house (thank you Dexter, Maria, Kathy, Bob, and brother Tim).  At that point we decided  the jukebox would never be moved out of this house by us again.  Looks like the task will go to a company called Past Perfect in Petaluma.  They will pick up, repair and bring 'er back...someday.  Hopefully by the time we move in July- is our goal. (Past Perfect picked up the jukebox on 6/18)

   The Wurlitzer 2800 holds 100 45's (that's 200 tunes) and is as lovely to me as the Lost In Space robot!
Also, another visual spender is a view of SF from our east bay point of view.  As we discover Alameda, we're loving it.  It seems out of time....just like a 45.

I haven't been posting much but will catch up in the next couple of weeks.  This has been an incredible time, full of excitement and overwhelming moments.  Mostly when  I can I've just sat back to enjoy baseball- and bay area baseball has rarely been as rewarding as it is now.

6/27 this has changed drastically for the Giants. The A's still going strong.  Also of note was an A's game we saw vs. the Angels where Yoenis Cespedes had an amazing game; throwing out 2 runners attempting to score- deep left field to home, TWICE in one inning. Never saw that before!  2 barehanded grabs of balls hit in the outfield; one an excellent running reach to cut off a hit, another pure hot dog. A 7th inning Triple knocking in two runs (both go-ahead runs), and a 9th inning 3 run home run.  Plus an earlier double.

This game also honored the 1974 A's World Series team with many of the great players; Reggie, Joe Rudi, Rollie, Vida, Campy, Bando, Blue Moon, Dick Green, Bill North, Herb Washington (well, not all were great but of great distinction), Monte Moore, Gene Tenace, Ray Fosse and others. Plus it was Catfish Hunter bobblehead day (Catfish died in 1999).

I notice in Alameda- alot of Green and Yellow. Not so much Black and Orange. What's up with that?

Let's Call This Place Home

This place

built -in porch, Maria is going to pull up the floor tile

living room 

kitchen to back yard

back porch to back yard 

are you kidding me?1 We're going to have actual fruit trees that grow fruit???

view from the back

empty lot next door: "Chempsey Field"

kitchen to the living room to outside

big tree home of Dexter's future tree house

our first piece of mail

back yard 

living room

at Kathy and Bob's 

Dexter's bedroom (hey, this is a cottage after all. 1912)

Oliver watering the garden

Priorities: Oliver runs through a shower of water while...

someone else checks himself out

..and Oliver keeps running. soggy boy. happy boy.

Subpar Putt Putt in Alameda. Indoor course. 18 holes. All with bay area themes.

as much fun as indoor mini golf can be. Creative holes. Also a slot car table and a few arcade games. Hope it sticks around.