Category Archives: California

Plant Sale

Americana, Cactus & Succulents, California, Psychological Musings

As a preamble – When I was in highschool, I was part Jewish – by heritage – in a world that was almost completely WASP and at a time when Jews were still considered second class. (I went out with a girl and later found out that her father beat her because she had sullied the family name by going out with me.). Our family was desperately trying to be middle class – we liked to think upper middle class – trying to follow a set of arcane rules we didn't quite understand.

By the time I got to highschool, I wanted to be cool. I suspect this is pretty much a universal impulse, and  – at the time and for years after – it was my major motivator. I pretty much pulled it off. I played football – not because I liked playing football – to be one one of the cool kids. I got in fights. I dressed like the cool kids, etc, etc. I didn't get very good grades.

I was a nerd: but I was a closet nerd.

In my mid-30's, I discovered the San Jose Cactus and Succulent Society – here were nerds who liked being nerds, who were willing to let their nerdieness enrich their lives – and it changed my life. End preamble.

Sunday was the UC Botanical Garden at Berkeley Fall Plant Sale. I hadn't been to a plant sale at a Botanical Garden in about 30 years and Michele had never been so we were a little unprepared for how great and tempting it would be.

It was a beautiful late summer day and plant people were out in force.

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What makes plant sales fun – whether it is the Rhoddy Club, the Cactus and Succulent Society, or UC Botanical – is that the people involved are so into the plants they are hawking. Putting up for adoption is probably a better term.

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At the cactus area – where I always go first – I got into a discussion on watering in which the seller? docent? salesperson? plant sitter? promoted watering some plants every six days and others – in the same greenhouse – every seven days. And he did this with a straight face. Now I am a little nutty on watering myself – being willing to hand water, with water that has a tablespoon of vinegar added to five gallons of the tap water, to bring the acidity up – but this seemed extreme.

Michele got hijacked at the shade plant table where the seller exposed her to the joys of a Podophyllum hybred – Asian Mayapple to us less informed – seen here on the left of the table.

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Everywhere there were interesting plants.

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And interesting people buying them. It was fun and going to an event like this and seeing young, hip, kids buying plants is very exciting.
 


   

 

 

 

 

Mad Men and the missing Civil Rights Movement

Americana, California, Politics, ,

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Mad Men is about a lot of things in the 1960’s but one thing it is not about is the Civil Rights Movement. That is way off to the side, not apart of the life of any of the main characters. I think that is just brilliant.

It is hard to tell from this close, but I think that the most important, long lasting, earth shattering, thing that came out of the 1960’s was the Civil Rights Movement. When I was a child, the typical black person was Stepen Fetchet or Uncle Ramos, by the time I was twenty five, the typical black person became Bobby Seale or Eldridge Cleaver.

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Bobby Seal Elridge Cleaver

There was no stopping in the middle. Between the 50s and the 70s – that is the 60s – blacks went from being friendly but powerless to scary but powerless. It is hard to overstate how marginalized blacks were. For example, Willie Wood , of USC,  was the Pac 8’s first black quarterback – now this is California, not the south – and he led USC to
a conference championship. In the pros, he could only play defense. Blacks weren’t considered good enough – although nobody said it, but I think they were not considered smart enough to boss around white guys – to play quarterback.

Another example, much closer to home (both figuratively and literally). We had a black – I so much wanted to type in colored – cleaning lady, Carrie, who came in once a week. Behind our home was a one way dirt alley and one day, as Carrie was coming to work, a white kid – driving the wrong way down the alley – hit her. The cops showed up, took one look at black Carrie and then the white kid and gave HER a ticket – now, this is still California. I tried to talk her into fighting the ticket, but, wisely I think now, she said No.

Now, back to Mad Men. What is so brilliant, I am sorry to say, is that Mad Men – by only showing a black maid and elevator operator – shows that the Civil Rights movement was not in most white people’s lives. Oh, sure, we felt superior because the papers all made it look like a southern thing. But, really, it was a white thing. The world was changing and most of us were too busy with our daily lives – just trying to keep one nostril above the water line – to do anything but – slightly – notice the world changing.

 

It is a thin line between madness and art; between madness and riches

Americana, California, Psychological Musings

We went to see the Green Prix in San Jose over the weekend. Why is sort of a long story. Michael Moore sent me several pictures his brother had taken at Burning Man. One of them was of a  '60 Chevy -  '94 Komatsu1 mutant vehicle called Maria del Camino.

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Mike also sent along a URL that referenced that the mutant vehicle would be in an artist parade in San Jose.

So we were lead to "Build Your Own World,” ZER01 in San Jose. It was billed as an biannual event that in collaboration with dozens of partners,
will present over the course of 4 days, from September 16-19, hundreds
of artworks, performances, events, and artist talks, which not only
imagine the future of the world but begin to build it. Not including participants but including us, I think there were about twenty six people there.

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Many – probably the majority – of the participants were just goofy. Many – probably the minority – required a lot of work and it got me wondering, What is art?

To paraphrase Stalin who once said Quality is important, but quantity has a quality of it own; lots of work is art of it's own. Somehow a goofy project done with sincerity and an investment of work, becomes art. Take Watts Towers

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or many of the parade floats – or whatever – at the Green Prix.

I was reminded by the Green Prix that, to create art, we have to be goofy; I know that, to have any chance of creating art, I have to be willing to risk it. I am reminded that the risk may result in my falling flat on my face but being safe only guarantees that I will be safe. There were not many spectators, but there were quite a few participants willing to be unsafe.

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Interestingly enough, the New York Times – that's The Time to the cognoscente – in an article entitled Just Manic Enough: Seeking Perfect Entrepreneurs,  says almost the same thing about guys trying to raise money for new ventures.  

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Probably it's a comment on life.

My 70th birthday trip over Mono Pass and down Mono Creek: part 3

California, Camping, Sierras, Travel

(For part1, go here; for part 2, go here)

Tuesday morning, everybody slept in. Except for me, that is. I got up when I woke up at about 7 and watched the sun light up the bright granite faces across the valley from our camp and down into the valley that we would be hiking through in the next couple of days.

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As the sun got higher, it started coming through the trees, highlighting and backlighting patches of flowers and grasses. I wandered around like a kid in a candy shop.

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Our original plan had been to move our camp down valley the first day and then explore from there. But we had an excellent camp and, as we talked about it, explored a little, and looked at our maps alot; staying right where we were became a better idea. We were above 10,000 feet which meant we couldn't have a fire, but the campsite had lots of flat places to sleep, few mosquitoes, and no dreaded deer flies which we were told we would find further down canyon.

The plan became to stay here, take it easy, and wander down to the Fourth Recess Lake – about 1/2 mile away and down 500 feet – for a mid-day lunch.

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After hanging out for a while and exploring a little – very little – around the Fourth Recess, it was time to go back to camp. This was our second day we ended it by doing a little laundry. 

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My 70th birthday trip over Mono Pass and down Mono Creek: part 2

California, Camping, Photography, Travel

(For part 1, go here)

I have not hiked extensively anywhere but the Sierras – I have hiked a little in the Andes (Peru), the Atlas Mountains (Morocco), The Alps (Switzerland), and the Canadian Rockies – but I am still convinced nothing compares to the Range of Light as John Muir called the Sierra Nevadas.

Most mountain ranges, including all of the ones above except the Sierras, are sedimentary rock, layers of brown or reddish- brown rock, lifted up and then eroded by glaciers or water. The Sierras are different, at least, the core of the Sierras; they are bright, almost white, granite. Gleaming towers of pure granite; meadows lined with glacial polished granite; with giant erratics left behind by the retreated glaciers. All in what is essentially a very high desert. It is intoxicating.

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And, as we went over Mono Pass, we were all pretty much intoxicated. The rock was almost white and the sky was dark blue; we had miles to go to get down into the valley, but lots of time.

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Time to look at the wildflowers that were blooming in the high spring, time to take a dip in Trail Lake, or just relax.

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But, with all the intoxication and all the time, we didn't get camp setup until late and finished cooking dinner in the dark. Tired and happy campers.