Meeting of the Minds

Of all the places to hold the coveted title of ‘best third places,’ San Francisco has to be at the top of the heap. While London has its pubs, Paris, its sidewalk cafes, and Beijing, its teahouses, I haven’t found a spot that carries such a coveted history.

Down through the decades, the ‘old lady by the bay’ has attracted a wide swarth of the talented, troubled, possessed, dispossessed, and marginally-coherent individuals who gave the city its unique brand of literacy.

The Montgomery block, when constructed in 1852 on the bay shore survived earthquake and fire long enough to become San Francisco’s most illustrious literary landmark. More than two thousand creatives are reputed to have lived in the building over the years. Among the writers, Stoddard and Joaquin Miller had rooms and affairs there. Ambrose Bierce wrote his blistering ‘Prattler’ newspaper column there. Jack London stayed there near his friend George Sterling who had a room for his many secret amours.

Long before North Beach and the infamous Barbary Coast brought San Francisco to America’s attention, the disenfranchised creatives were gathered on the Montgomery block. South of the city, Monterey Bay, also became a literary hot spot.

Much like Carmel before it, the area attracted a wide swath of brilliant, troubled, talented, drugged out writers, artists, actors, anarchists, alchemists, and socialists.

Many years later, my mother lived and worked as a maid in the same fog-draped, wind-swept enclave known as 17-mile drive after the bohemians moved back to San Francisco. The Black Cat Café, located next to the Montgomery Block, was the most famous of bohemian hangouts during the 1930s right up until the Berkeley Renaissance of the late 1940s.

My brief exposure to the sights and sounds and aroma of post-beatnik, pre-hippie culture came from several jaunts to an old working-class neighborhood not far from the base. Haight Ashbury was just beginning to attract a younger crowd of Berkeley intellectuals, folkie drop outs, drug dealers and young people looking for the next big thing. I was just a lonely GI accompanying a seasoned veteran looking for weed and hippie chicks.

As a young enlisted man, the closest I got to those mid-Sixties social and cultural changes was working at the Larkin Theater in the Art District and watching a ton of foreign films. Barracks life exposed me, for the first time, to a wide swath of other life styles captured as we all were by two or more years in Uncle Sam’s Army.

Life in the barracks was but a brief moment in time when we were all young and stupid and far from home. Asinine antics, weed-smoking on the window sills and stupid horsing around were daily occurrences. It was a non-stop party we all knew would end all too soon.

As a motley collection of draftees, we all knew there were eventual transfers for all of us to other army bases far less permissive than the Presidio. So, while we were there, the collective mantra seemed to be ‘let’s be stupid now for who knows what our future holds?’

After the service, it was the Triangle Bar on the West Bank that gave me the same comfortable ambiance to continue my search for direction and a glimpse into my future. It wasn’t the Chelsea Hotel in the Village where my folk idols gathered but it was better than nothing.

Third places take many shapes and forms but all serve as a collective gathering spot for like-minded souls. Mine have come and gone, based on current writing projects, Sharon’s art classes and lucky accidental meetings.

The one coveted ‘third place’ I’ve only visited once was the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur. It played prominently in my last novel ‘Playground for the Devil.’ The kids and I stopped there on our tour of the West Coast a couple of years ago.

The place reeks of moldy paperbacks, old rag sheets, new literature, cook-out and sing-alongs on the back porch and a gathering spot for the eccentrics of the area.

Unfortunately, there are no third places in Palm Springs, at least not for me. A patio chair and coffee will have to suffice. Minnesota does better with my mulch garden hideaway, my ‘Coffee and Chat’ sessions and one coffeeshop in Norde East.

It’s not the same as other third places but it still provides an out-of-the-way place to collect my thoughts, jot down writing ideas and spend the quiet with other like-minded souls.

Spot Bowling as a Metaphor for Life

Back in August, I published a blog entitled: ‘The Ultimate Filter.’ It garnered a number of comments and reactions from friends and some of my ‘coffee and chat’ salon compatriots. One of those friends responding commented that he had written a book a while back that seemed to encapsulate some of the same recognitions of life’s intricacies. His book was on spot bowling,

I had never thought of spot bowling as a metaphor for life. My coffee companion began telling me about a book he had written on wheelchair bowling years earlier. During the course of our conversation, I realized that my friend was right; that ‘spot bowling’ could be seen as a unique way of living one’s life.

I observed in my blog that our mind is the ultimate filter. It’s the newest cliché in a long list of ‘feel good’ labels is mindfulness. It comes after a long list of mind-altering techniques, with or without chemical enhancement, to see more clearly the world around us and thought patterns inside our head.

Starting in high school, I was always intrigued and curious about how to see the world in a different perspective. Back in the day, I wanted to journey inside my head sans chemical enhancements.

I had stumbled upon Carlos Castaneda and I was hooked. Granted, his approach to cerebral Valhalla was with magic mushrooms but the journey mesmerized me nevertheless. I was also mesmerized by a hip, chain-smoking priest named Malcom Boyd. Father Boyd’s approach to life wasn’t your semi-hippie ‘transcendental meditation’ approach that held my attention. Rather, it was his attention to detail. He spoke openly and honestly about real feelings, real emotions and real consequences in my own very real world.

Down through the decades, we’ve been introduced to a myriad of new-age dynamics that are guaranteed to change our lives. A quote from a book I recently read said it best: ‘Until we look directly at our minds we don’t really know ‘what our lives are about. Everything we experience in life goes through just one filter – our minds – and we spend very little time bothering to see just how it works.’

I would suggest that once people get a taste of it - it’s so completely fascinating, because really our life is a clear manifestation of what our minds are telling us.’ Good, bad, right or wrong, it’s all there for our perception, acceptance, denial, rejection or embracing.

I’m going to quote frequently and liberally from my friend and his book ‘Spot Bowling.’ So, let’s begin:

‘The important thing to realize from the very beginning is that there is only one score that matters in bowling. That score is the one you keep inside yourself. The one that says how good you really are.’ In our own little world, that truism can be applied to almost every aspect of life. Be it our job, our parenting skills, our hobbies, our relationships, or our aspersions in life.

Dick goes on to say: ‘Maybe the best bowler you can be is an 80-average bowler. So what? If 80 is the measure of how good you should be, when you shoot 90 you have won against the important opponent you will ever have to face – the one you see in the mirror every morning.’

I was never a good runner. To be honest, my jog-run-shuffle could best be described as covering a certain number of miles in any fashion fathomable to get to the finish line. I desperately wanted to run ultra-marathons. The closest I got was twenty-two miles in a 50 miler. I did run three marathons and surprised even myself by not dying on that asphalt journey to hell and back.

Dick continues: ‘Bowling is a mental game first, a scoring game second. What you are up against on the foul line is your ability to concentrate: to be aggressive, to be patient, to be consistent. Whether you have bowled up, as we refer to walking bowlers, or never in your life before wheeling out to the foul line, in a chair, there are only two significant differences between walking bowling and wheelchair bowling.

‘First, a walking bowler has an approach: the four or five steps he takes toward the foul line before releasing the ball. From a wheelchair, you do not have an approach in this sense. While that costs you something in speed and leverage on the ball, it can also be an advantage. Why? You can position yourself to deliver each ball you throw from the same spot. A wheelchair bowler can be far more deliberate and, as a result, potentially far more consistent.

‘The second difference is one you have probably long since adjusted to simply by being in a wheelchair. To be a good wheelchair bowler, you will have to depend on finesse, not force; smarts, not sheer strength. That is why I say bowling is a mental game first.’

I tried to touch on this subject in one of my blogs about my ‘secret garden’ and other quiets spots around my home. Each area provides a very peaceful daily dash of zest to my life. The journey inside one’s head is a life-long affair. Most of us don’t even know it in our lifetime. A few of us made that discovery a long time ago and are still exploring where that pathway might take us.

Carry on, fellow traveler, carry on.

The Bear State

Old reliable Wikipedia tells us that:

“The California grizzly bear (Ursus arctos californicus) is an extinct population or subspecies of the brown bear, generally known (together with other North American brown bear populations) as the grizzly bear. In California, it was particularly admired for its beauty, size, and strength. The grizzly became a symbol of the Bear Flag Republic, a moniker that was attached to the short-lived attempt by a group of American settlers to break away from Mexico in 1846. Later, this rebel flag became the basis for the state flag of California, and then California was known as the "Bear State."

It’s an iconic image that immediately resonates with a lot of people; native Californians and out- of-staters alike. I’m a recent settler to the state and then only on a seasonal basis. Nevertheless, I can still feel the vibe that is California. The state, because of its size, population diversity and overall draw to a lot of people, always seems to be going through some kind of drama and trauma. It’s no surprise that Hollywood and other fantasy factories are located there.

It seems that almost every day there’s another incident being played out in Sacramento, San Francisco, or the forests of Northern California. An attempt to oust the governor failed but opposition to mask mandates continues on. Forest fires have slowed down but an offshore oil spill continues to ruin beach activities and wildlife. Drought conditions haven’t gotten any better and water restrictions continue. California is so large that every five years or so, there’s a call to dismember the state and separate it into north and south or other variations of the same theme.

This summer was a scorcher with continuous waves of rising temperatures which would begin around 110 degrees then grow daily until it was hovering at 123, peaking for a day or two then slowly diminishing to a somewhat tolerable 100 degrees for a week or so before the next wave started to swell up again. That pattern of rolling, ever increasing heat waves, did wonders for the vegetation but wreaked any notion of outdoor activities during the afternoon hours for most residents.

Unfortunately, Covid restrictions continue on, showing little change from last season. It’s ‘masks on’ whenever entering a store and a lot of restaurants are still on limited hours. Surprisingly and despite Covid restrictions, Palm Springs is starting to open up again. Parking lots are full, the airport is bustling and downtown is crowded each night with tourists and locals alike almost desperate to go back to their old routines and mingle with the masses.

Just before we left last season, Sharon and I were fortunate enough to meet some of our new neighbors. Over the summer, they shared their own encounters (via Ring doorbell) with some other neighbors; coyotes and a bobcat that seem to have taken up residency nearby.

Coyote video

https://www.facebook.com/1615615684/videos/10222159783496317/

Bobcat videos

https://www.facebook.com/1615615684/videos/2740013619631406/

https://www.facebook.com/1615615684/videos/576469177122384/

That may account for a dramatic decrease in the number of bunnies scampering about our yard as compared to last season. I love sitting outside at night and staring up at the stars. Nowadays, it’s always a question of what’s lurking on the other side of my wall. There’s a rumor going around that a cougar was sighted just two blocks away about a month ago. I’m still going to sit in the dark but close enough to my back door if I need to seek shelter there.

Our birds survived the heat and our hummingbird family grew from three to seven flighty, flirty tiny creatures. They’re not too happy that we’ve invaded their turf but we’ll find a way to get along.

Unlike other hipster hotels like the Ace and the V, the Saguaro Hotel remains closed. Sharon and I used our social membership there two years ago to use their facilities during off hours. Even if I can’t go there, I do want to return to walking the berm every day.

Local hiking trails still abound and are calling me back once again.

There will be new trails to explore and more distant attractions like Joshua Tree, Laguna Beach, and Idyllwild to add to that list.

It’s a different environment for me here among the bobcats, cougars, coyotes, and bear-state mentality, but the workload continues on unabated. I have a plethora of writing projects that are screaming for my attention.

Waleed, the skinny hippo, is almost ready for the next stage of production; creating colorful panels for my children’s book. Then I’ve got three nervous nuns I’m trying to help navigate a new and confusing ‘real world’ environment. ‘Agnes’ will have to wait a little longer before she and I begin our wondrous affair set in the turbulent sixties and my imagination. The mystery of Henry Miller and Big Surf has been solved but I’ve still got to find the time to get it out to a larger audience.

Finally, now that I’m back on home turf, I don’t think I’ll have any problem getting volunteers to workshop one of my latest plays ‘Widow’s Waltz’ for their fellow audiences. There are even more projects waiting in the wings but they’ll remain there for the time being.

As much as the surroundings may change in this bear state-of-mind, and now with some growling at night, the workload continues on and I wouldn’t want it any other way.