There are things that have happened to each of us that probably shouldn't have. I have told you the story of meeting my wife on a train that I almost didn't board. Welding and art came to me in a gift when I was fifty years old. I received a printing press when I was fifteen years old, introducing me to the world of poetry. I once bought a lottery ticket, the quick pic kind, and on the same day in a different store bought another one with the very same numbers! The odds on that are about the same as winning the lottery except I didn't win the money!
If I made a list of the top ten improbable things I would have to include something of no significance that happened to me when I was eleven years old. I was away at summer camp, a beautiful place along the Oregon coast with its own lake, surrounded, guarded by Douglas Fir.
I am eleven and the councilors were all in their very young twenties. One day my councilor, I have forgotten her name, was in tears. She had gone swimming the evening before, what camp guides do to get away from their wards and lost her engagement ring "somewhere in the lake"!
This was a huge lake, maybe six acres, but the swimming area was around the dock, a floating wooden platform a hundred feet of walkway, a finger into the lake. It is a shallow coastal lake and the bottom is covered with algae, dark with vegetation for the first five feet. There are no odds to this. It is totally unbelievable, one of many twists and turns of life that could have gone either way.
I was a fat little boy until I turned seventeen and grew taller instead of rounder. I had red
swimming trunks, I remember that, and it was cold with coastal fog that morning. Too early to swim but I walked along the dock, pacing back and forth. The lake is huge, dark blue and flat.
Visibility in the water is zero, any lost items become a gift to the lake gods. I wanted that ring so bad. I remember walking back and forth and always pausing at the same spot.
I have always been a good swimmer, not so much laps back and forth in a pool, but under the water, deep and to the bottom. Just like this is what happened. I paused for the last time at the very same pausing place, took a breath, deep as I could and dove in. Straight, perfect dive without much splash, I went to the bottom and opened my eyes. Everything was black and I could feel the plants on my legs and in my face as I opened my hands, praying for the lake gods to give up their gift. First dive and I put my hand right over the ring!
There is no reason to this. No cause and effect. Totally improbable. It was all a good kind of accident. I was the happiest, proudest eleven year old in the world! I stole the ring from the Lake Gods!
Showing posts with label youth. Show all posts
Showing posts with label youth. Show all posts
Friday, December 10, 2010
Saturday, December 4, 2010
I am Rich!
Living in Europe on three dollars a day was pretty easy in those days. Youth Hostels were everywhere and cost about twenty-five cents for the night. In Spain you were rich with three dollars.
I had only about a dollar of Spanish money on me and maybe six dollars in Lira's, Italian money. I needed to find a "cambio", money exchanger. This was on a Sunday and the banks were closed so I would have to find the train station where there were dozens of money exchangers all making a living off the unsuspecting tourist.
Spanish money is beautiful, in lots of colors and even the paper money is in different sizes.
The bigger the denomination the bigger the bill. I found the money exchanger and presented my six dollars in lira, expecting maybe five dollars in pesetas, the coin of Spain, the rest would be lost in the transaction. He put my lira's in his drawer and began counting out Spanish bills beginning with very large ones! And he kept counting. I am thinking he is not talking to me. I knew a little Spanish, enough for directions and to order wine and I could count. This was not my money.
It is in a pile with the big notes on the bottom in descending order with small bills on the top.
It is a beautiful pile sitting there like that in greens and reds and golden ribbons. It was well over eighty dollars in Spanish money and there were coins on top of this pile. This man is in a hurry. He looks at me as if to say, do you want this or not? and he is after the next person in line.
I am a thief. I took it, wading the bills into my fist and stuffing them into my pocket, not counting anything my heart was racing. I can imagine Spanish prisons. I was eight blocks away, headed to the market place before I counted the money, carefully unfolding it and separating the bill according to size. I had over eighty-five dollars in Spanish money. I was a wealthy man.
I should have felt horrible but I was absolutely dancing with joy.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
The House was Gone!
One day, on a Monday afternoon, I came home from teaching school and the house was gone! Jane had gone to England to visit with her mother and I remember telling her that I might do something with the house while she was away. No plans of any kind, maybe rebuild the steps or put a garden in. It was May, there was a month left of school and I had the summer off.
I must be thirty years old and have never worked a full year in my life. I had worked seasonally
along with my wife at the local cannery, a job I had while putting myself through college. Now I was a teacher of fourteen year olds and had the entire summer off with pay!
I remember drinking with my neighbor the night before. He was unemployed and we were drinking cheap wine together, getting drunk as guys tend to do. I vaguely recall talking about remodelling my house.
It was a small house, not particularly well built and had no foundation at all. A "fixer-upper"
they were called, but we had lived in it for almost five years without any major repairs.
When I came home from school that day the living room remained and the bathroom floor
with facilities in tact. No walls and no door, just a toilet, a sink and a wonderful six foot cast iron bath tub, all open to the air and the neighbors to the back and side of us. The rest of the house lay in a dead heap having been attacked with a chainsaw by my neighbor. Now I remembered!
This time in my life I didn't own a saw, not much of a hammer, not many tools at all and I had no idea what I was doing, neither the process nor the application. To top it all off I didn't have any money! You learn to act quickly as a school teacher or you will soon lose all control over the classroom. The next day in the teacher's lounge I was laughing I hope and telling this tale to fellow teachers. They were extremely helpful. One wrote me a check on the spot for $2,000,
something to get started with and others told me the process, about needing building permits and plans drawn, blueprints. As a kid I had built lots of tree houses and forts and never needed all this confusion, all this paper work, all these details. I just sort of built it as it came to me.
I made lots of phone calls and within a week I had all the proper documents and had the building permit in hand. Two more weeks until Jane got home and all I had was a living room and open air bathroom. I had a lot of work to do.
I still had teaching to do but I got the foundation under the living room and the steps poured before Jane got home. "I need tarps around the bathroom," she said.
My wife has this unflinching belief that everything will turn out alright, and as long as she has a shower she seeks no room to complain.
We took three days to get from Genoa to Barcelona and it was hot and dry and dusty the whole time. She had mentioned that she would like a hat, something to keep the sun from her eyes.
We found a little pension in the center of town, a tiny room but one with its own shower! I remember the cost was $1.25 per night, a little over budget from the normal 25 cent youth hostel. She wanted a shower and offered to wash my clothes if I would go out and find us something to eat. This is way before laundromats and we always washed our clothes in the bathroom sink when we could find one. This is Spain on a hot day in May and I am wearing short pants, a shirt dirty with street dust and my size 13D loggers' boots! I hadn't shaved in three days, I am sure I looked a mess.
I went on a search for food, that bread and cheese and wine that we lived on, but as I left
her for her shower I knew I was hunting for a hat.
I must be thirty years old and have never worked a full year in my life. I had worked seasonally
along with my wife at the local cannery, a job I had while putting myself through college. Now I was a teacher of fourteen year olds and had the entire summer off with pay!
I remember drinking with my neighbor the night before. He was unemployed and we were drinking cheap wine together, getting drunk as guys tend to do. I vaguely recall talking about remodelling my house.
It was a small house, not particularly well built and had no foundation at all. A "fixer-upper"
they were called, but we had lived in it for almost five years without any major repairs.
When I came home from school that day the living room remained and the bathroom floor
with facilities in tact. No walls and no door, just a toilet, a sink and a wonderful six foot cast iron bath tub, all open to the air and the neighbors to the back and side of us. The rest of the house lay in a dead heap having been attacked with a chainsaw by my neighbor. Now I remembered!
This time in my life I didn't own a saw, not much of a hammer, not many tools at all and I had no idea what I was doing, neither the process nor the application. To top it all off I didn't have any money! You learn to act quickly as a school teacher or you will soon lose all control over the classroom. The next day in the teacher's lounge I was laughing I hope and telling this tale to fellow teachers. They were extremely helpful. One wrote me a check on the spot for $2,000,
something to get started with and others told me the process, about needing building permits and plans drawn, blueprints. As a kid I had built lots of tree houses and forts and never needed all this confusion, all this paper work, all these details. I just sort of built it as it came to me.
I made lots of phone calls and within a week I had all the proper documents and had the building permit in hand. Two more weeks until Jane got home and all I had was a living room and open air bathroom. I had a lot of work to do.
I still had teaching to do but I got the foundation under the living room and the steps poured before Jane got home. "I need tarps around the bathroom," she said.
My wife has this unflinching belief that everything will turn out alright, and as long as she has a shower she seeks no room to complain.
We took three days to get from Genoa to Barcelona and it was hot and dry and dusty the whole time. She had mentioned that she would like a hat, something to keep the sun from her eyes.
We found a little pension in the center of town, a tiny room but one with its own shower! I remember the cost was $1.25 per night, a little over budget from the normal 25 cent youth hostel. She wanted a shower and offered to wash my clothes if I would go out and find us something to eat. This is way before laundromats and we always washed our clothes in the bathroom sink when we could find one. This is Spain on a hot day in May and I am wearing short pants, a shirt dirty with street dust and my size 13D loggers' boots! I hadn't shaved in three days, I am sure I looked a mess.
I went on a search for food, that bread and cheese and wine that we lived on, but as I left
her for her shower I knew I was hunting for a hat.
The Longest Story...
I did not suffer this cancer by myself nor get to where I am alone. I have been married for over forty years, to the same person even! That is almost a record in our throw-away society, isn't it? It is not a perfect relationship, perfection would be South Sea Island beaches, gentle breezes, moonlit nights and soft lapping of the waves, footprints dancing in the sand. That idea is always there but somehow down in the stack of things necessary to do. First there were utility bills and rent payments, this and that, the necessary things. I promised you the story about how we met and it might be a long story, there is a lot to remember but I will begin it at the very beginning and tell you everything.
The Hat Story
Most Americans who go to Europe usually return with one special story. It is usually a funny one, somewhat anecdotal, or an account of losing one's passport, a language barrier with the natives or some story about the food. My story sounds rather simple and is called, "The Hat Story".
To make a real story out of it I have to account for more than just acquiring a hat and handing over six hundred and sixty two Pesetas. That happened in Barcelona, Spain. The story really begins Genoa, Italy, but I will begin it just outside Pavia, Italy where I was hitch-hiking East.
I say East because I seldom hitch with a definite goal, a place to be each night on a tour-bussed itinerary. I was going East, meaning in the general direction of Genoa, East Italy, Southern France, Spain, Morocco, North or West Africa. That direction. I didn't have a very clear picture in my mind. If I found a nice stream, a pub or an interesting person I would stop.
Sometimes I would stop for an hour or two to play soccer along some side street in no particular town with a name I remember. Once I stopped at a little Danish cove, a tiny little blue stretch of sea with fishermen's nets stretched along the sand to be repaired. It was quiet and isolated and I spent three weeks there doing nothing. It was wonderful.
It was only ten o'clock in the morning some day in May and the early Spring had been quite hot. I had been hitching for about an hour which normally isn't unbearably long but the trucks were whizzing past me and I was getting dusty without getting any place. This shouldn't bother a hiker but I had just had a shower and I didn't know when I was going to get another one. I started walking towards the train station. I would take the train to Genoa where I would grab a boat to Spain.
The train was almost empty. I got on it and the first compartment had only one person in it, a girl by chance, but I didn't want to talk to anyone and found the second compartment empty.
I just sat there and smoked cigarettes waiting to get into Genoa. The train stopped with a lurch that would have stopped an airplane. I put my pack on and walked into the hallway. Ahead of me was the girl and she had a pack on too. She got to the door and I expected to open it for her when she kicked it open with her foot and jumped to the station floor. I climbed down and starred at her. She walked off and I couldn't find her in the crowd. I walked around the station aimlessly
hoping to see her and to my surprise she came walking directly towards me!
"Do you speak English?" she asked.
"Yes, a little" I responded thinking now where in the hell will I take this? What a stupid answer, but I had heard it a million times. Street sweepers in Europe speak "a little English".
"You are American. Where are you hitching to? Do you want to take the train to Marseilles with me and hitch to Spain?" This was the '60's, we were open and honest and a bit naive.
I am really thinking OMG how do I respond to this?
"No. I'm going to take the boat to Spain. Why don't you go on the boat?" What a brilliant answer, an opportunity, an invitation, an adventure and I just rejected it!
We had two hours for my boat and her train to leave. It was two o'clock and my boat and her train left at four. I told her I would buy her a glass of wine and we could talk a couple of hours, but I didn't want to go to France.
"Why don't you like the French?" she asked me over wine.
We sat and talked until ten minutes past four. We missed the train and the boat. The next boat wasn't until three days later and the next train was at four o'clock the next day. We decided to hitch.
We bought some wine in a two litter bottle, some cheese, cold meats and a loaf of bread.
I wanted to cash a traveller's check as I had only about a dollar on me but we couldn't find a place open. She said she had some money and would support us through France if I would support us through Spain. Spain is much cheaper than France and I thought I had a good deal.
That is how we met.
There is a lot more to this story. It takes place over forty years and two continents, two children, various careers, dreams lost and found, death and rebirth. I will see what I can remember of it.
The Hat Story
Most Americans who go to Europe usually return with one special story. It is usually a funny one, somewhat anecdotal, or an account of losing one's passport, a language barrier with the natives or some story about the food. My story sounds rather simple and is called, "The Hat Story".
To make a real story out of it I have to account for more than just acquiring a hat and handing over six hundred and sixty two Pesetas. That happened in Barcelona, Spain. The story really begins Genoa, Italy, but I will begin it just outside Pavia, Italy where I was hitch-hiking East.
I say East because I seldom hitch with a definite goal, a place to be each night on a tour-bussed itinerary. I was going East, meaning in the general direction of Genoa, East Italy, Southern France, Spain, Morocco, North or West Africa. That direction. I didn't have a very clear picture in my mind. If I found a nice stream, a pub or an interesting person I would stop.
Sometimes I would stop for an hour or two to play soccer along some side street in no particular town with a name I remember. Once I stopped at a little Danish cove, a tiny little blue stretch of sea with fishermen's nets stretched along the sand to be repaired. It was quiet and isolated and I spent three weeks there doing nothing. It was wonderful.
It was only ten o'clock in the morning some day in May and the early Spring had been quite hot. I had been hitching for about an hour which normally isn't unbearably long but the trucks were whizzing past me and I was getting dusty without getting any place. This shouldn't bother a hiker but I had just had a shower and I didn't know when I was going to get another one. I started walking towards the train station. I would take the train to Genoa where I would grab a boat to Spain.
The train was almost empty. I got on it and the first compartment had only one person in it, a girl by chance, but I didn't want to talk to anyone and found the second compartment empty.
I just sat there and smoked cigarettes waiting to get into Genoa. The train stopped with a lurch that would have stopped an airplane. I put my pack on and walked into the hallway. Ahead of me was the girl and she had a pack on too. She got to the door and I expected to open it for her when she kicked it open with her foot and jumped to the station floor. I climbed down and starred at her. She walked off and I couldn't find her in the crowd. I walked around the station aimlessly
hoping to see her and to my surprise she came walking directly towards me!
"Do you speak English?" she asked.
"Yes, a little" I responded thinking now where in the hell will I take this? What a stupid answer, but I had heard it a million times. Street sweepers in Europe speak "a little English".
"You are American. Where are you hitching to? Do you want to take the train to Marseilles with me and hitch to Spain?" This was the '60's, we were open and honest and a bit naive.
I am really thinking OMG how do I respond to this?
"No. I'm going to take the boat to Spain. Why don't you go on the boat?" What a brilliant answer, an opportunity, an invitation, an adventure and I just rejected it!
We had two hours for my boat and her train to leave. It was two o'clock and my boat and her train left at four. I told her I would buy her a glass of wine and we could talk a couple of hours, but I didn't want to go to France.
"Why don't you like the French?" she asked me over wine.
We sat and talked until ten minutes past four. We missed the train and the boat. The next boat wasn't until three days later and the next train was at four o'clock the next day. We decided to hitch.
We bought some wine in a two litter bottle, some cheese, cold meats and a loaf of bread.
I wanted to cash a traveller's check as I had only about a dollar on me but we couldn't find a place open. She said she had some money and would support us through France if I would support us through Spain. Spain is much cheaper than France and I thought I had a good deal.
That is how we met.
There is a lot more to this story. It takes place over forty years and two continents, two children, various careers, dreams lost and found, death and rebirth. I will see what I can remember of it.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Old Girlfriends
Never die, in fact they don't even age. Caught forever in a memory they remain as we knew them, youthful, romantic and full of strength. I don't go to High School Reunions because I wouldn't recognize all the old people there. It is interesting how we see ourselves and how others see us.
I don't have the soul of an artist, that quiet desperation, that always hunting for something that isn't there, a need for silence and isolation and with all this a determination to become famous. I don't paint into lonely hours nor find much significance in the torrential rains pounding on my shop roof, battering my garden. I am only thinking I need to fix the gutters.
My paintings are fast and furious, an experiment in extremism, colorful, loud, nonsensical, without meaning at all. They don't exist except in this computer, the internet cyber world and maybe outer space if they get sent by radio waves. I make them quickly and while still wet, photo them and do it again, painting over the one just finished maybe seven times. The last one
might live the longest, tossed into a corner of my shop until I need the metal it is painted on.
This doesn't mean they are bad, misbehaved in some way. In fact I have sold some and do have a few that made it into the house. It only means they are not proper, oil on canvas, framed,
ready to be hung, established style and acceptable for an art gallery. OMG! That is IT! That is who I am! Now, how in the Hell did I get here???
Friday, November 12, 2010
Forever Young
On my OTHER BLOG I talk about my youth, reminiscing and reminding myself of my childhood adventures, and because I am a political animal, I throw some of that in too.
I have been to Europe several times in my life and each time I threw my watch away. I never had an itinerary, a schedule, a destination, no place I had to be and no time restraints. I think this is a key element to youth, an abandonment of time, playing outside until way past dark, forgetting to come in to dinner, and as we got a little older, "dancing the night away"!
Artists still do this, get so involved in their projects, just one more minute can lead to hours and time becomes meaningless.
Old age is watches and schedules and timetables and responcibility and that horrible concept that time can be wasted. We develop that notion that the clock is ticking louder and the hour will strike. When I discovered I had cancer one of the first things I did was to throw my watch away. Oh there are time pieces all over the house and on this computer so I was never late for the dozens of doctor appointments I had. I just never wanted to keep time with me like a chain around my wrist, giving power to that mechanical device. The time is now.
I have been to Europe several times in my life and each time I threw my watch away. I never had an itinerary, a schedule, a destination, no place I had to be and no time restraints. I think this is a key element to youth, an abandonment of time, playing outside until way past dark, forgetting to come in to dinner, and as we got a little older, "dancing the night away"!
Artists still do this, get so involved in their projects, just one more minute can lead to hours and time becomes meaningless.
Old age is watches and schedules and timetables and responcibility and that horrible concept that time can be wasted. We develop that notion that the clock is ticking louder and the hour will strike. When I discovered I had cancer one of the first things I did was to throw my watch away. Oh there are time pieces all over the house and on this computer so I was never late for the dozens of doctor appointments I had. I just never wanted to keep time with me like a chain around my wrist, giving power to that mechanical device. The time is now.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
One Week to Live!
No, no, not me. At least I don't think it is me. We are almost never given this option anyway
and those that do get it are mostly beyond living anyway, too sick to create a "bucket list".
Actually I think this "bucket list" should be for the young, those eager and strong enough to accomplish their dreams. The dreams of youth should be huge! I am always saddened when they are limited to getting a job at McDonalds and buying a car! I am amazed that the Peace Corps
doesn't have lines eight blocks long to enroll in their programs offering a chance to see and live
another's life in a different culture on the other side of the Earth! Too many people live and die within 100 miles of where they were born. Horizons should be expanded, our experiences broadened, our curiosity awakened at an early age.
Youth is not determined by age, of course, and excitement and curiosity can be found in some
of us "older elders"! My mother flew in a hot air balloon over the Kilamari desert when she was
a mere 84! She gave up driving on her 90th birthday! When death took her I think she was ready and her bucket list was empty. She was simply waiting.
and those that do get it are mostly beyond living anyway, too sick to create a "bucket list".
Actually I think this "bucket list" should be for the young, those eager and strong enough to accomplish their dreams. The dreams of youth should be huge! I am always saddened when they are limited to getting a job at McDonalds and buying a car! I am amazed that the Peace Corps
doesn't have lines eight blocks long to enroll in their programs offering a chance to see and live
another's life in a different culture on the other side of the Earth! Too many people live and die within 100 miles of where they were born. Horizons should be expanded, our experiences broadened, our curiosity awakened at an early age.
Youth is not determined by age, of course, and excitement and curiosity can be found in some
of us "older elders"! My mother flew in a hot air balloon over the Kilamari desert when she was
a mere 84! She gave up driving on her 90th birthday! When death took her I think she was ready and her bucket list was empty. She was simply waiting.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
coming of age
I am a Man
I am a man today
Today I am 17.
I am to slay a lion, as
did my father at 17
and his father
before him.
My father's father had his
hands and, perhaps a stone.
My father had a large hunt-
ing knife
and
I have a gun.
( j.a.carlin, age 17)
Friday, October 1, 2010
Young Lad
I wonder if there is a reason, besides physics I mean, that we cannot see into the future? Clearly as we make choices,going down this road instead of that road, we become who we are.
As we get older and look back, would we have done it differently? If we start subtracting experiences we take away from what we are. I don't think I could have done it any different and wouldn't choose any less, no subtractions for me.
[- me at 17!
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