NOTICE:
I just found out about WORD VERIFICATION for comments. I enabled it. So, if you want to leave me a comment, you'll have to go through this small inconvenience of copying a few letters in order to verify that yes, you really are a human being. It's the only way that I can cut out the annoying blog spam that I've been getting recently
Thanks for your patience,
Le Menagerie
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
CAUTION BLOG SPAMMERS
CAUTION BLOG SPAMMERS
I am not going to tolerate blog spam any longer. I don't care about Lesbian dating services or Internet Opportunities to get Paid to Shop.
From now on, I am going to trace any blog spam back to its source and find out who you are and come over there and kick your arse, destroy your servers and put the shoes to your CPU's.
Understand?
Thank you for Complying
Sincerely,
The Management
I am not going to tolerate blog spam any longer. I don't care about Lesbian dating services or Internet Opportunities to get Paid to Shop.
From now on, I am going to trace any blog spam back to its source and find out who you are and come over there and kick your arse, destroy your servers and put the shoes to your CPU's.
Understand?
Thank you for Complying
Sincerely,
The Management
Motorcycle Memories
I was just outside in the garage, working in the afternoon heat with Gib. I was splicing some anchor lines for the boats, and he was fiddling with the carburetor off of one of the four wheelers, trying to get the thing to run. Bored with the task at hand, and insane with the oven like temperatures inside of the garage, it wasn’t too long before we drifted outside into the hellishly hot, red tide air day to take a look at our scooters, glossy black paint and chrome gleaming in the midday sun. I started thinking about bikes I've owned and loved.
It takes another biker to understand.
During the 1970’s I was stationed up in Kodiak Alaska at the Coast Guard Air Station. In those days, there was always a down and out cutthroat war between the officers and enlisted men …I think that in todays military where everyone is in there on a volunteer basis, the distinction between ranks is one of mutual respect and benevolence. During my incarceration in the military, which were the days of the draftee, officers were thought of as “zeros” and fair game for just about anything. We were barely past the days of fragging. There were no scruples…no honor, only abject warfare between the hierarchy and serfdom, a sense of eat or be eaten.
One time we streaked the officers club in the middle of their sit-down dinner time, penis’ painted red; ballsacks, painted white and blue. Just hauled ass through there, with paper bags masking our faces, genitalia flopping about, laughing insanely. It made the base newspapers, and I’m sure, more than one officers wifes’ evening.
My first bike was a little Honda 125 two stroke machine, custom made for zipping around the dirt roads and trails that crisscrossed Kodiak Island. My friend Martin did a lot of work on it, porting the cylinder and tweaking the carb so that it would get maximum wheelies. Then I got a DT-250 Yamaha, a much more powerful machine, and did much the same to it. I bought it fairly cheap because the previous owner had gotten the gas tank stolen by leaving it alongside the hangers where it was fair game to marauding thieves, among who were just about all of us. We ported and polished the exhaust and intake ports, sleeved and put in a new piston and rings, and bolted on a new exhaust...essential items necessary to make it stand on it's back wheel for a block or two.
Finally the time came to get the bike out there on the road and trails. I had a slight problem though, having neglected to order a fuel tank for my machine. Kodiak was, and is an island far out in nowhere, I would have had to order a new fuel tank, and that would’ve taken weeks to arrive via SeaLand. I was impatient.
In the dark and dusty recessed spaces of the hanger, sat stored until spring, a few bikes belonging to officers who thought that they might be safe from predation there. Not so. One of my friends spied a dust covered DT-250, the same vintage as mine, back among the piles of caribou antlers and spare lifejackets. It appeared to be a neglected and homeless machine, one prime for the recycling of clandestine parts. He suggested that I promptly remove the offending part, preferably in the middle of the night, and claim it as mine. I took his suggestion, it was fair game. Late one night, I carefully lifted the tank from the frame, stuffed it into a small duffle bag and smuggled it out of the hanger. Oh, consider the job done.
Over the course of the next several days, I stripped off the glaring purple paint , and primed and painted my new prize a beautiful electric yellow color. I installed it on the bike and went riding, proud of my accomplishment. Kodiak goes from the drearies of winter to the drearies of spring in a season almost unnoticable. The bears wake up and look around for the summer salmon run, and devils club and fidddlehead ferns pop out of brown barren hillsides, heralding the arrival of spring and all of its attendant mud, the time to haul out and dust off motorcycles, neglected during the long winter months.
It was late May, and the weather was improving. Everyone was starting to get out there. Everyone including the owner of the other Yamaha.
One evening he hauled the bike out of the hanger, and went blasting down to the officers club for happy hour. On the way back, the bike ran out of gas, having operated all the way down there and half the way back on a thimbleful of gasoline in the carb. As he was fiddling around with it, wondering why it didn't run…he noticed, yes, just noticed that the gas tank was missing. Jesus God, what a dumbass. And this guy was a C-130 pilot too....I couldn’t imagine taking off on my scooter and not noticing that the friggin’ fuel tank was missing. Forlornly, and I imagine more than a bit pissed off, he pushed the thing back to the hanger and back into the dark corner. The story made the rounds.
By this time I had come down with an extreme case of the guilts, hell, I’m not a thief, and was not raised to be one. The whole time I felt guilty and dirty, so I decided to return the fuel tank. One night I crept down there late and put the bright yellow tank back on.
The pilot who owned the Yamaha later told his friends; “yea, the goddamnest thing happened. I went down there to install the new tank that I bought for my bike (an oversized 2.5 gallon plastic one), and noticed that a new metal tank was back on my frame….Not the old purple one...a NEW yellow tank!!” he announced gleefully. And then somewhat glumly he added; “What am I gonna do with this plastic one?”
When I found that out, I contacted him and played stupid, and offered to buy it. I told him I was looking for a bigger tank for my Yamaha so that I wouldn’t have to refuel on the way out to Saltery Cove. He sold it to me for something like thirty bucks.
I kept that bike for about two more years, never even thinking about swiping another part, and always thankful that my somewhat compromised conscience made me (at least try) and right that wrong.
I made the mistake of leaving it outside the hanger though, when I had to fly down to Honolulu for four days, and some jerkoff stole the carburetor.
I never got THAT back.
It takes another biker to understand.
During the 1970’s I was stationed up in Kodiak Alaska at the Coast Guard Air Station. In those days, there was always a down and out cutthroat war between the officers and enlisted men …I think that in todays military where everyone is in there on a volunteer basis, the distinction between ranks is one of mutual respect and benevolence. During my incarceration in the military, which were the days of the draftee, officers were thought of as “zeros” and fair game for just about anything. We were barely past the days of fragging. There were no scruples…no honor, only abject warfare between the hierarchy and serfdom, a sense of eat or be eaten.
One time we streaked the officers club in the middle of their sit-down dinner time, penis’ painted red; ballsacks, painted white and blue. Just hauled ass through there, with paper bags masking our faces, genitalia flopping about, laughing insanely. It made the base newspapers, and I’m sure, more than one officers wifes’ evening.
My first bike was a little Honda 125 two stroke machine, custom made for zipping around the dirt roads and trails that crisscrossed Kodiak Island. My friend Martin did a lot of work on it, porting the cylinder and tweaking the carb so that it would get maximum wheelies. Then I got a DT-250 Yamaha, a much more powerful machine, and did much the same to it. I bought it fairly cheap because the previous owner had gotten the gas tank stolen by leaving it alongside the hangers where it was fair game to marauding thieves, among who were just about all of us. We ported and polished the exhaust and intake ports, sleeved and put in a new piston and rings, and bolted on a new exhaust...essential items necessary to make it stand on it's back wheel for a block or two.
Finally the time came to get the bike out there on the road and trails. I had a slight problem though, having neglected to order a fuel tank for my machine. Kodiak was, and is an island far out in nowhere, I would have had to order a new fuel tank, and that would’ve taken weeks to arrive via SeaLand. I was impatient.
In the dark and dusty recessed spaces of the hanger, sat stored until spring, a few bikes belonging to officers who thought that they might be safe from predation there. Not so. One of my friends spied a dust covered DT-250, the same vintage as mine, back among the piles of caribou antlers and spare lifejackets. It appeared to be a neglected and homeless machine, one prime for the recycling of clandestine parts. He suggested that I promptly remove the offending part, preferably in the middle of the night, and claim it as mine. I took his suggestion, it was fair game. Late one night, I carefully lifted the tank from the frame, stuffed it into a small duffle bag and smuggled it out of the hanger. Oh, consider the job done.
Over the course of the next several days, I stripped off the glaring purple paint , and primed and painted my new prize a beautiful electric yellow color. I installed it on the bike and went riding, proud of my accomplishment. Kodiak goes from the drearies of winter to the drearies of spring in a season almost unnoticable. The bears wake up and look around for the summer salmon run, and devils club and fidddlehead ferns pop out of brown barren hillsides, heralding the arrival of spring and all of its attendant mud, the time to haul out and dust off motorcycles, neglected during the long winter months.
It was late May, and the weather was improving. Everyone was starting to get out there. Everyone including the owner of the other Yamaha.
One evening he hauled the bike out of the hanger, and went blasting down to the officers club for happy hour. On the way back, the bike ran out of gas, having operated all the way down there and half the way back on a thimbleful of gasoline in the carb. As he was fiddling around with it, wondering why it didn't run…he noticed, yes, just noticed that the gas tank was missing. Jesus God, what a dumbass. And this guy was a C-130 pilot too....I couldn’t imagine taking off on my scooter and not noticing that the friggin’ fuel tank was missing. Forlornly, and I imagine more than a bit pissed off, he pushed the thing back to the hanger and back into the dark corner. The story made the rounds.
By this time I had come down with an extreme case of the guilts, hell, I’m not a thief, and was not raised to be one. The whole time I felt guilty and dirty, so I decided to return the fuel tank. One night I crept down there late and put the bright yellow tank back on.
The pilot who owned the Yamaha later told his friends; “yea, the goddamnest thing happened. I went down there to install the new tank that I bought for my bike (an oversized 2.5 gallon plastic one), and noticed that a new metal tank was back on my frame….Not the old purple one...a NEW yellow tank!!” he announced gleefully. And then somewhat glumly he added; “What am I gonna do with this plastic one?”
When I found that out, I contacted him and played stupid, and offered to buy it. I told him I was looking for a bigger tank for my Yamaha so that I wouldn’t have to refuel on the way out to Saltery Cove. He sold it to me for something like thirty bucks.
I kept that bike for about two more years, never even thinking about swiping another part, and always thankful that my somewhat compromised conscience made me (at least try) and right that wrong.
I made the mistake of leaving it outside the hanger though, when I had to fly down to Honolulu for four days, and some jerkoff stole the carburetor.
I never got THAT back.
Monday, September 26, 2005
Martin Looter King Day
At the risk of pissing some of you off, especially if you don't live in a large metropolitan area with this sort of problem, I feel obligated to pass this story along, because it represents a fundemental ill in our society, one that we are all responsible for by not holding the gum'ment accountable. Our taxes fund countless billions of social programs designed to lift people from poverty. But, as we all know, most of these problems are hand outs, not hand-ups. Hand outs are a powerful drug, as addictive as heroin, with the consequences of that addiction the loss of self respect and motivation.
My friend Sean lives up in Pasadena Texas and had to bug out for the most recent chubasco, hurricane Rita which was taking full aim at Houston, until a series of last minute joggles put it on the Texas-Louisiana border. Sean makes about the best surfboards that I’ve ever seen, and spends a lot of time between his home in Texas and his adopted home on the beaches of western Mexico, chasing the fabled swell. In between we talk a lot, and sometimes he and his lovely girlfriend Michelle even find time to come down here and visit.
Sean called from Spring Texas where they had gone for refuge during the great big evacuation of Houston last week. He said it wasn’t too bad to get there, except for a few spots, because they had taken the back roads. The worst spots were going through the ghettos he said. There, the people appeared unconcerned, and were even standing around drinking “40’s” like it was some kind of party with no consequences. At one point he said a young girl of about sixteen rode her bike right into the middle of the street and handed a package to another girl who in turn, handed her a wad of bills. A drug deal in the middle of the street, because all of the cops were preoccupied. Life as usual as the big storm approached. It was his conjecture that much the same had happened in New Orleans. And the harsh reality was that people died, and who was really to blame? Was it the government, or some infrastructural snafu that didn’t take care of the poor because they were oppressed minorities, or was the system simply overwhelmed with the stupidity and arrogance of people who have been used to being handed things for so long that they simply no longer can even think for themselves ? People who didn't care if they could get out or not. People who waited for the government to take care of them.
Sean returned home yesterday, to find his house still standing, although it sustained a bit of damage that he'll have to work at to repair this week. He called me to tell me some hurricane stories.
He told me a story about what really happened up there in Houston. It seems that the media has been covering things up in order to play down a problem that is much bigger than either Katrina or Rita themselves. He told me about a friend of his whose mother was evacuating by car prior to the storm. Unfortunately, she had not had the opportunity to fill her tank with gas prior to leaving, and found herself in much the same situation as Sean did as she was traveling through the backroads on her way out of Houston in order to avoid the massive traffic jams.
Running low on gas, she turned into a convenience store in the middle of one of Houstons ghettos, and found the store to be abandoned, but taken over by looters. Yes looters. These people were helping themselves to freebies even before the storm hit. I thought about the recent political controversy in New Orleans, the media firestorm comparing a picture of a white guy getting some food, labeled something like “man salvages food to feed family”, and a photo of a bunch of true looters, blacks, stealing TV’s and other “essentials”, and the outrage it inspired in my liberal friends.
Sean went on to tell me that somehow, the looters had found a way to turn on the gas pumps, but were only dispensing gasoline to other blacks. The end result was that his friends mother had to travel on, at the risk of running out of fuel until she was finally able to find a station somewhere in a civilized area.
So I worry today about things like this. I worry about them much more than natural disasters such as hurricanes and floods. The fabric of America is rotten, and we’re more concerned with rebuilding the buildings that house it. I see in the not to distant future, a country thrown into chaos by our own notion of survival of the weakest, the lowering of the common denominator, the guilt over things of long ago that has led us to oppress folks by making every opportunity available to them without the necessity of having to work for it, an oppression that’s enslaved them to the government.
Now, can someone tell me what a “tonk rocket” is?.......
My friend Sean lives up in Pasadena Texas and had to bug out for the most recent chubasco, hurricane Rita which was taking full aim at Houston, until a series of last minute joggles put it on the Texas-Louisiana border. Sean makes about the best surfboards that I’ve ever seen, and spends a lot of time between his home in Texas and his adopted home on the beaches of western Mexico, chasing the fabled swell. In between we talk a lot, and sometimes he and his lovely girlfriend Michelle even find time to come down here and visit.
Sean called from Spring Texas where they had gone for refuge during the great big evacuation of Houston last week. He said it wasn’t too bad to get there, except for a few spots, because they had taken the back roads. The worst spots were going through the ghettos he said. There, the people appeared unconcerned, and were even standing around drinking “40’s” like it was some kind of party with no consequences. At one point he said a young girl of about sixteen rode her bike right into the middle of the street and handed a package to another girl who in turn, handed her a wad of bills. A drug deal in the middle of the street, because all of the cops were preoccupied. Life as usual as the big storm approached. It was his conjecture that much the same had happened in New Orleans. And the harsh reality was that people died, and who was really to blame? Was it the government, or some infrastructural snafu that didn’t take care of the poor because they were oppressed minorities, or was the system simply overwhelmed with the stupidity and arrogance of people who have been used to being handed things for so long that they simply no longer can even think for themselves ? People who didn't care if they could get out or not. People who waited for the government to take care of them.
Sean returned home yesterday, to find his house still standing, although it sustained a bit of damage that he'll have to work at to repair this week. He called me to tell me some hurricane stories.
He told me a story about what really happened up there in Houston. It seems that the media has been covering things up in order to play down a problem that is much bigger than either Katrina or Rita themselves. He told me about a friend of his whose mother was evacuating by car prior to the storm. Unfortunately, she had not had the opportunity to fill her tank with gas prior to leaving, and found herself in much the same situation as Sean did as she was traveling through the backroads on her way out of Houston in order to avoid the massive traffic jams.
Running low on gas, she turned into a convenience store in the middle of one of Houstons ghettos, and found the store to be abandoned, but taken over by looters. Yes looters. These people were helping themselves to freebies even before the storm hit. I thought about the recent political controversy in New Orleans, the media firestorm comparing a picture of a white guy getting some food, labeled something like “man salvages food to feed family”, and a photo of a bunch of true looters, blacks, stealing TV’s and other “essentials”, and the outrage it inspired in my liberal friends.
Sean went on to tell me that somehow, the looters had found a way to turn on the gas pumps, but were only dispensing gasoline to other blacks. The end result was that his friends mother had to travel on, at the risk of running out of fuel until she was finally able to find a station somewhere in a civilized area.
So I worry today about things like this. I worry about them much more than natural disasters such as hurricanes and floods. The fabric of America is rotten, and we’re more concerned with rebuilding the buildings that house it. I see in the not to distant future, a country thrown into chaos by our own notion of survival of the weakest, the lowering of the common denominator, the guilt over things of long ago that has led us to oppress folks by making every opportunity available to them without the necessity of having to work for it, an oppression that’s enslaved them to the government.
Now, can someone tell me what a “tonk rocket” is?.......
Friday, September 23, 2005
The Osprey on the Post
This morning as I was riding to work, I passed by the large intertidal area just south of the Causeway. It is an area filled with mangroves and salt loving plants with exotic sounding names like Salicornia, Borrichia and Batis. The wind was from the northwest, and there was a feeling of something in the air. Further west the bay glimmered sparkling blue as little whitecaps began to form on its otherwise placid and expressionless surface.
I ride this way almost everyday. During times of big tides, when the water laps around the prop roots of the mangroves, tiny shorebirds; plovers, killdeer and Dunlin forage along the margins of the wetlands while secretive night heron peer from behind the foliage, oblivious to the traffic speeding over the bridge, on the ribbon of blacktop, well on their way to another day of work, people just filling in time before they die.
I always pass the “for sale” sign planted out there, advertising this acreage as prime real estate, and to contact so-and-so reality company for more information. Someday probably, someone will buy this piece of land. They’ll fight and wrestle with the various agencies who administer the regulations which make it difficult for any self respecting developer to “improve” this wetland he now owns, and if and when they finally get their appropriate permits, gleaming buildings will rise up out of the primordial muck, like giant excavated fiddler crab burrows and docks and piers will jut defiantly out into the bay and the developers, investors, buyers and town fathers will all grin a smug self satisfied grin, satisfied in the knowledge that they have “improved” this formerly worthless piece of real estate.
Today I saw an Osprey sitting on an old broken post in a clearing in the middle of the mangroves, watching the water which had inundated the area because of a recent storm far up the coast, watching for mullet or other small fish to prey on. I see this same bird often, sitting on his perch. This is his sanctuary, his kitchen, dining and living room. When the “improvements” inevitably come, he’ll simply fly off and occupy another space, until that one inevitably gets improved, until inevitably, there are few sanctuaries left, and those that do remain will be far back in areas that are worthless pieces of real estate, waiting patiently for the chance to someday be “improved”.
Undoubtedly it will be an area filled with Mangroves and plants with exotic sounding names like Salicornia, Borrichia and Batis. Little plovers, killdeer and dunlin will work along the shoreline, bills bobbing and dipping, foraging like miniature sewing machines, and night herons will peer secretively through the foliage at the whole scene, oblivious to the relentless march of civilization.
I ride this way almost everyday. During times of big tides, when the water laps around the prop roots of the mangroves, tiny shorebirds; plovers, killdeer and Dunlin forage along the margins of the wetlands while secretive night heron peer from behind the foliage, oblivious to the traffic speeding over the bridge, on the ribbon of blacktop, well on their way to another day of work, people just filling in time before they die.
I always pass the “for sale” sign planted out there, advertising this acreage as prime real estate, and to contact so-and-so reality company for more information. Someday probably, someone will buy this piece of land. They’ll fight and wrestle with the various agencies who administer the regulations which make it difficult for any self respecting developer to “improve” this wetland he now owns, and if and when they finally get their appropriate permits, gleaming buildings will rise up out of the primordial muck, like giant excavated fiddler crab burrows and docks and piers will jut defiantly out into the bay and the developers, investors, buyers and town fathers will all grin a smug self satisfied grin, satisfied in the knowledge that they have “improved” this formerly worthless piece of real estate.
Today I saw an Osprey sitting on an old broken post in a clearing in the middle of the mangroves, watching the water which had inundated the area because of a recent storm far up the coast, watching for mullet or other small fish to prey on. I see this same bird often, sitting on his perch. This is his sanctuary, his kitchen, dining and living room. When the “improvements” inevitably come, he’ll simply fly off and occupy another space, until that one inevitably gets improved, until inevitably, there are few sanctuaries left, and those that do remain will be far back in areas that are worthless pieces of real estate, waiting patiently for the chance to someday be “improved”.
Undoubtedly it will be an area filled with Mangroves and plants with exotic sounding names like Salicornia, Borrichia and Batis. Little plovers, killdeer and dunlin will work along the shoreline, bills bobbing and dipping, foraging like miniature sewing machines, and night herons will peer secretively through the foliage at the whole scene, oblivious to the relentless march of civilization.
Thursday, September 22, 2005
Chris' Canoe, Part Two
I got this picture from my friend Chris. He finally launched his canoe after about eight or nine years of working on it. Launched it up in central Texas in the Hill country, on the Guadalupe River.
He called and told me that everywhere he went, people asked him; “Where did you get that boat? and “Did you build it yerself?” and inevitably also “….yer not gonna put it in this river are ya?”. You see, the rivers up there are shallow and full of rocks, sharp rocks which could produce gashes of monumental proportion on a fine wooden craft like that. Up there people only float plastic boats, and they all have the deep scars and gouges to prove it. But Chris remained undeterred. He was gonna put that boat through its paces, see what it could do. It’s his boat, and torpedoes be damned…full speed ahead! The Texas Hill Country is a fine place to christen a canoe no matter what. It is an especially fitting place to take a boat like this, a craft that is more a work of art than a vessel. I can imagine the sight of the boat framed by tall cypress and oak lining a river gurgling an inviting melody, the air redolent with the incense of cedar and moss, in the hot Texas day, a canopy of blue overhead. I'm sure it was a joy that made the tedium of construction all worth it.
The years that Chris lovingly studied the plans, worked the fragile wood, and assembled the craft with all the hope and care required a place as special as the hills and the crystal clear cold streams to bring it to life.
My friend Rene and I always get a kick out of Chris' single minded dedication, his attention to some inner song that no one but he can hear. The results are things like large areas of once scarred and abused land supporting lush vegetation and life, masses of unconnected people working together to share a common vision, and things like his canoe. Chris has the training of a botanist and the heart of an artist.
So he told me “I first put the canoe in Town Lake, in Austin, and it tracked as straight and true as you could imagine, turning heads wherever we silently paddled through the water”. “Later I put it in the river and floated downstream…in some places, in the whitewater, I could hear the hull scraping against the rock, and it made me cringe”. “We portaged it a few places, and even the canoe hauler was worried that I might fuck up my new boat.” “ So what, I built it and I could fix it”. “But…. there’s nothing like the sound of wood against rock”. When he took it out of the water and put it back on the roof of his car he noticed that there was not much damage, because he had used epoxy for a final coat, and the damage was in the epoxy layer, cutting down into the mat…not the beautiful wood that he used to create the planks.
Chris’ Dad was a sailor and a man of the water. The stories he tells me, tell me of a man who loved the sea, lakes and rivers, a man drawn to the liquid element. Chris’ Dad died when he was young, but I know that he would be proud of him today, on the day he launched his boat, on the day that he took the tiller of Le Menagerie and felt the power of the wind. Chris’ Dad died when he was young, when he needed him the most, it is a lifelong heartbreak and a cruel fate for a child. I always feel his loss, and know that deep inside he’s trying to please the man, somewhere far out there in the stars. Maybe that’s why Chris is so dear to our family, he understands that value, and is reciprocal to it. He’s learning to be a sailor, has constructed his very own boat, and is listening to the sirens song of the water. It is something that runs in him and through him…not so much now to please his father, but because…that is who he is.
The genetics that rumble along inside of him were given to him by the man, and now they’re being nurtured and developed, with a life of their own – and somewhere out there in the stars his father smiles.
He called me last night with a few questions about putting on another layer of epoxy over the sanded one, to fill in the gouges and dings. He’ll be bringing it over to the bay soon to chase the fall fish, and I can’t wait to go for a ride with him.
He called and told me that everywhere he went, people asked him; “Where did you get that boat? and “Did you build it yerself?” and inevitably also “….yer not gonna put it in this river are ya?”. You see, the rivers up there are shallow and full of rocks, sharp rocks which could produce gashes of monumental proportion on a fine wooden craft like that. Up there people only float plastic boats, and they all have the deep scars and gouges to prove it. But Chris remained undeterred. He was gonna put that boat through its paces, see what it could do. It’s his boat, and torpedoes be damned…full speed ahead! The Texas Hill Country is a fine place to christen a canoe no matter what. It is an especially fitting place to take a boat like this, a craft that is more a work of art than a vessel. I can imagine the sight of the boat framed by tall cypress and oak lining a river gurgling an inviting melody, the air redolent with the incense of cedar and moss, in the hot Texas day, a canopy of blue overhead. I'm sure it was a joy that made the tedium of construction all worth it.
The years that Chris lovingly studied the plans, worked the fragile wood, and assembled the craft with all the hope and care required a place as special as the hills and the crystal clear cold streams to bring it to life.
My friend Rene and I always get a kick out of Chris' single minded dedication, his attention to some inner song that no one but he can hear. The results are things like large areas of once scarred and abused land supporting lush vegetation and life, masses of unconnected people working together to share a common vision, and things like his canoe. Chris has the training of a botanist and the heart of an artist.
So he told me “I first put the canoe in Town Lake, in Austin, and it tracked as straight and true as you could imagine, turning heads wherever we silently paddled through the water”. “Later I put it in the river and floated downstream…in some places, in the whitewater, I could hear the hull scraping against the rock, and it made me cringe”. “We portaged it a few places, and even the canoe hauler was worried that I might fuck up my new boat.” “ So what, I built it and I could fix it”. “But…. there’s nothing like the sound of wood against rock”. When he took it out of the water and put it back on the roof of his car he noticed that there was not much damage, because he had used epoxy for a final coat, and the damage was in the epoxy layer, cutting down into the mat…not the beautiful wood that he used to create the planks.
Chris’ Dad was a sailor and a man of the water. The stories he tells me, tell me of a man who loved the sea, lakes and rivers, a man drawn to the liquid element. Chris’ Dad died when he was young, but I know that he would be proud of him today, on the day he launched his boat, on the day that he took the tiller of Le Menagerie and felt the power of the wind. Chris’ Dad died when he was young, when he needed him the most, it is a lifelong heartbreak and a cruel fate for a child. I always feel his loss, and know that deep inside he’s trying to please the man, somewhere far out there in the stars. Maybe that’s why Chris is so dear to our family, he understands that value, and is reciprocal to it. He’s learning to be a sailor, has constructed his very own boat, and is listening to the sirens song of the water. It is something that runs in him and through him…not so much now to please his father, but because…that is who he is.
The genetics that rumble along inside of him were given to him by the man, and now they’re being nurtured and developed, with a life of their own – and somewhere out there in the stars his father smiles.
He called me last night with a few questions about putting on another layer of epoxy over the sanded one, to fill in the gouges and dings. He’ll be bringing it over to the bay soon to chase the fall fish, and I can’t wait to go for a ride with him.
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Mr. Rod
My final duty station when I was in the military was at the Hale Boggs Federal Building in New Orleans Louisiana, the eighth Coast Guard District Office, somewhere high above the City.
I was flying a desk. Processing travel and flight orders.
My direct supervisor was a civil service employee, Mr. Rodriguez. Mr. Rod was a coonass, a true Louisiana Cajun, and as cynical and crusty as they come. I had just arrived from Alaska, with a fine ghostly pallor from not having seen any prolonged sunshine for almost three years, and New Orleans was culture shock. The City was a unctuous caldron of humanity, oddball history and poverty bound together by the oppressive swamp humidity, each lung full of air redolent with the odor of gasoline, automobile exhaust and moldering buildings was excruciatingly painful, as the body struggled to assimilate it into its own depths.
I had been busted just before transferring and reduced two pay grades, and money was tight. Stupid adolescent behavior. I lived in ancient quarters with no air conditioning just outside the Vieux Carre, so working in a climate controlled office was almost like a reward. To pass the time, I practiced pen and ink sketching, and it wasn’t too long before some of my work caught the attention of Mr. Rod, who asked if I would do an eight by twelve pen and ink of an eagle sitting on the limb of a tree. No problem. Mr. Rod was pretty benevolent to me, even before that, so with gratitude I got to work. The day came when the drawing was finished, and I presented it to Mr. Rod unceremoniously one morning before work. His eyes grew wide, and he asked me how much I wanted. I refused, hell, it was just some spare time anyhow, and I figured that it would always be remembered.
That day, at lunch, Mr Rod asked me if I had ever tried a muffalata sandwich before? I didn’t even know what that was, and he said “just follow me”. We walked outside into the blazing heat of the mid day, and over to the French Quarter, Decatur Street, to a store called the Central Grocery, where he ordered two muffalata sandwiches. The woman behind the counter split the round buns, piled them high with meat, cheese and a curious looking green dressing, wrapped them up in wax paper and put them into a paper bag. We walked over to Jackson Square, and sat down on ancient iron benches, and I enjoyed for the first time a muffalata and a Barqs root beer, digesting that wonderful sandwich along with the flavor of the French Quarter in springtime. In the following days Mr. Rod took me to places like Antoines, Furdys and Galatoires for epic lunches, and quick street meals, always reveling in showing a newcomer how good the food was in the City, always giving a bit of history as if throwing largasse from floats during Mardi gras.
It wasn’t long before the sitting eagle, now framed and hanging on one of Mr. Rod’s office walls began to get the attention of other civil service employees on the floor where I worked. So I began to trade artwork for food. Wonderful New Orleans food. One big black woman, kindly took me under her wing, and each Monday would bring me a generous portion of red beans and rice, on special days, jambalaya, gumbo and etouffee. Everyone treated me with kindness and respect, adopting me into that strange gris-gris of Nawlins culture. I learned to eat crawfish (mudbugs) the right way, sucking the pungent juice from the head, gorged on oysters, drank countless hurricanes and juleps, all accompanied by the hypnotic, chaotic jazz that was everywhere in the quarter.
All the while, I did more and more artwork at the eighth Coast Guard District, sometimes for civilians, sometimes for the other Coasties. I did party invitations for the Vice Admiral. I worked by request and suggestion, never charging, knowing that maybe I was going to leave behind something good in New Orleans.
Soon the day for my discharge came. I had made no secret that I just wanted to be a civilian again. During my final week, I was called into the main mans office, the eighth district admiral. I thought maybe I had done something wrong, but he kindly gestured for me to sit down across from a small coffee table in his outer office, as he took a chair directly across from me. He began with; “I’m going to dispense with the re-up talk, because I know that you just want to be a civilian again”. I nodded. He went on; “I don’t know why they had a problem with you in Kodiak, and frankly, I don't care. Here we’ve enjoyed having you aboard, and as a small token of our gratitude….”. He produced two roof slates off of the ancient French Quarter buildings, upon which were decoupaged street scenes of old New Orleans, and handed them to me. “We wanted you to have these”. I was caught by surprise, and could feel pride welling up inside, I knew these were treasures to hold onto. I don’t remember much of the rest of that conversation, other than there was a feeling of warmth and respect between two very different people and ages.
In the ensuing years, most of the artifacts of my life have been lost, carelessly strewn like so much flotsam and jetsam on the beaches of time, but one of those tiles still follows me around as a reminder of my time in New Orleans. I worry each time we move that it might somehow get broken or left behind.
I made gumbo the other night, something that felt strange and yet familiar in light of all of the recent tragedy there in New Orleans. In it’s essence, I remembered my time in the French Quarter, my friends at the Hale Boggs Federal building, and most of all, the experience that was New Orleans, the experience that was the food. I have never lived in another place where food attained a status as holy as there.
Mr. Rod and many of the others are probably long gone, long before Katrina wrought her wrath on that place, because they were old even then. Somewhere out there in the stars though, they watch us and smile each time we do things like make gumbo, red beans and rice or boil up a pot of crabs. New Orleans is by definition a geographic location, and one which will never be the same now that the river and the sea have taken their toll.
For me, that swampy Cajun City will always be the same, an immutable force, a spicy, mischievous cosmic roux of history, people, music and most of all, food.
I was flying a desk. Processing travel and flight orders.
My direct supervisor was a civil service employee, Mr. Rodriguez. Mr. Rod was a coonass, a true Louisiana Cajun, and as cynical and crusty as they come. I had just arrived from Alaska, with a fine ghostly pallor from not having seen any prolonged sunshine for almost three years, and New Orleans was culture shock. The City was a unctuous caldron of humanity, oddball history and poverty bound together by the oppressive swamp humidity, each lung full of air redolent with the odor of gasoline, automobile exhaust and moldering buildings was excruciatingly painful, as the body struggled to assimilate it into its own depths.
I had been busted just before transferring and reduced two pay grades, and money was tight. Stupid adolescent behavior. I lived in ancient quarters with no air conditioning just outside the Vieux Carre, so working in a climate controlled office was almost like a reward. To pass the time, I practiced pen and ink sketching, and it wasn’t too long before some of my work caught the attention of Mr. Rod, who asked if I would do an eight by twelve pen and ink of an eagle sitting on the limb of a tree. No problem. Mr. Rod was pretty benevolent to me, even before that, so with gratitude I got to work. The day came when the drawing was finished, and I presented it to Mr. Rod unceremoniously one morning before work. His eyes grew wide, and he asked me how much I wanted. I refused, hell, it was just some spare time anyhow, and I figured that it would always be remembered.
That day, at lunch, Mr Rod asked me if I had ever tried a muffalata sandwich before? I didn’t even know what that was, and he said “just follow me”. We walked outside into the blazing heat of the mid day, and over to the French Quarter, Decatur Street, to a store called the Central Grocery, where he ordered two muffalata sandwiches. The woman behind the counter split the round buns, piled them high with meat, cheese and a curious looking green dressing, wrapped them up in wax paper and put them into a paper bag. We walked over to Jackson Square, and sat down on ancient iron benches, and I enjoyed for the first time a muffalata and a Barqs root beer, digesting that wonderful sandwich along with the flavor of the French Quarter in springtime. In the following days Mr. Rod took me to places like Antoines, Furdys and Galatoires for epic lunches, and quick street meals, always reveling in showing a newcomer how good the food was in the City, always giving a bit of history as if throwing largasse from floats during Mardi gras.
It wasn’t long before the sitting eagle, now framed and hanging on one of Mr. Rod’s office walls began to get the attention of other civil service employees on the floor where I worked. So I began to trade artwork for food. Wonderful New Orleans food. One big black woman, kindly took me under her wing, and each Monday would bring me a generous portion of red beans and rice, on special days, jambalaya, gumbo and etouffee. Everyone treated me with kindness and respect, adopting me into that strange gris-gris of Nawlins culture. I learned to eat crawfish (mudbugs) the right way, sucking the pungent juice from the head, gorged on oysters, drank countless hurricanes and juleps, all accompanied by the hypnotic, chaotic jazz that was everywhere in the quarter.
All the while, I did more and more artwork at the eighth Coast Guard District, sometimes for civilians, sometimes for the other Coasties. I did party invitations for the Vice Admiral. I worked by request and suggestion, never charging, knowing that maybe I was going to leave behind something good in New Orleans.
Soon the day for my discharge came. I had made no secret that I just wanted to be a civilian again. During my final week, I was called into the main mans office, the eighth district admiral. I thought maybe I had done something wrong, but he kindly gestured for me to sit down across from a small coffee table in his outer office, as he took a chair directly across from me. He began with; “I’m going to dispense with the re-up talk, because I know that you just want to be a civilian again”. I nodded. He went on; “I don’t know why they had a problem with you in Kodiak, and frankly, I don't care. Here we’ve enjoyed having you aboard, and as a small token of our gratitude….”. He produced two roof slates off of the ancient French Quarter buildings, upon which were decoupaged street scenes of old New Orleans, and handed them to me. “We wanted you to have these”. I was caught by surprise, and could feel pride welling up inside, I knew these were treasures to hold onto. I don’t remember much of the rest of that conversation, other than there was a feeling of warmth and respect between two very different people and ages.
In the ensuing years, most of the artifacts of my life have been lost, carelessly strewn like so much flotsam and jetsam on the beaches of time, but one of those tiles still follows me around as a reminder of my time in New Orleans. I worry each time we move that it might somehow get broken or left behind.
I made gumbo the other night, something that felt strange and yet familiar in light of all of the recent tragedy there in New Orleans. In it’s essence, I remembered my time in the French Quarter, my friends at the Hale Boggs Federal building, and most of all, the experience that was New Orleans, the experience that was the food. I have never lived in another place where food attained a status as holy as there.
Mr. Rod and many of the others are probably long gone, long before Katrina wrought her wrath on that place, because they were old even then. Somewhere out there in the stars though, they watch us and smile each time we do things like make gumbo, red beans and rice or boil up a pot of crabs. New Orleans is by definition a geographic location, and one which will never be the same now that the river and the sea have taken their toll.
For me, that swampy Cajun City will always be the same, an immutable force, a spicy, mischievous cosmic roux of history, people, music and most of all, food.
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