Where are the cornflake hills?

The hills outside San Francisco, in my memory, were always brown; Herb Caen called them cornflake hills. But on this trip, after days of rain, the hills were all green and lush. On the way to Davis, near Sacramento, the land became flat farmland: miles and miles of it.

My first engagement in the Davis area was at the home of Cynthia Brantley, an African Studies professor at the university. She had invited six graduate students, all doing research projects in Africa, to come hear me talk. I hoped that what I was saying was new to all of them some of the time, and they seemed interested.

In Davis I stayed with Jeannette Hogan, whom I knew when she was a PCV in Nigeria. She had arranged for me to speak at the Avid Bookstore in Davis and in Sacramento as well as at a class at a community college. In Sacramento, the only attendee was my old friend Mike Shea from my Peace Corps Ghana group, so we sat and talked for an hour, and then Jeannette and I packed up and went home. I was SO glad Mike came, or I would have been disheartened.

In contrast, my talk at the Avid Reader in Davis was attended by 16 people, and it turned out that Jeannette had personally invited every one of them. It takes that contact, not newspaper or radio advertising, that brings people.

In that college town, it seems that bicycles are almost as numerous as cars, and I saw at one intersection the traffic signals included a crossing in any direction for bikes while all other traffic stopped. A bicycle was pictured where one might usually find a "walk" signal.

Outside Davis I visited the Jepson (Jephson?) Prairie vernal pools. The soil there is clay, so dense that water does not filter through it. Rainwater therefore collects in depressions until it evaporates. The varieties of plants that grow around the edges appear in succession as the water recedes, so one gets a "bathtub ring" effect. In a few weeks, I was told, there would be concentric rings of wildflowers dotting the landscape. I was a bit too early; what I saw was the pools.

As Jeannette is taking a class in Japanese massage, I was treated to two massages in my three days there, as a practice subject. What a treat!

A Religious Experience

No, not THAT kind of religious experience; those of you who are acquainted with me and my Freethinkerism know better than that. But I did attend a religious service at which Ken was a paid choir member. Not unpleasant; I always love to sing the old hymns, and the choir was pretty good.

But the technology! The words to the hymns and the responsive reading were projected by PowerPoint successively on the front wall of the church. But the biggest surprise was during the sermon, when the pastor asked us to watch a brief video that was shown on this space as well. What a boon to sermonizers!

The point of the video was to show us that we see what we're looking for, and little else. It was a basketball game, and we were asked to count how many times one team passed the ball. Afterwards he asked if we'd seen the gorilla, and nobody had. When he ran the video again, there it was: a gorilla joining in the game. Good lesson.

Along the Coast

The drive from Santa Cruz to San Francisco was as delightful as I remember it. The beautiful sunny weather helped, of course, but the scenery is magical. Much of the time on Route 1 the Pacific Ocean is in view, and I determined that the whitest white I have ever seen is the color of the foam as waves break against a rock. Fields of yellow wildflowers, grasses and craggy Monterey pines dotted the roadside, with rocky ledges overlooking the sea.

The day after I arrived, my host Ken Malucelli and I walked out on Mori Point. It was quite a hike up from Pacific Beach, but well worth the climb, which was mostly on steps that have been built into the hillside. The typical pastel homes of this area marched up and down the hills, and we could see Mt. Tamalpias north of San Francisco and as far south as Half Moon Bay. Beyond the Farallone Islands (about five miles off the coast) I think I even saw a little bit of Tokyo as well.

A momentary crisis in Santa Cruz

Well, it was more than momentary--about 15 horrible minutes, actually. I had driven to friends' for dinner, and was returning to my old friend Lawrence Stern's condo, when I took a wrong turn. I've taken lots of wrong turns, esp. on this trip in strange neighborhoods, but this was a REALLY wrong turn, onto a railroad track. I stopped immediately, and my Honda Civic hybrid, which I love dearly, would subsequently move neither forward nor back, with a tire spinning on the track as if it were on ice.

I called 911 and stood out in the drizzle with many cars passing me by, though my stuck Honda was clearly visible. I was frightened that a train would come along at any moment and destroy my vehicle. After about ten minutes (the highway patrol had not yet appeared) a car did stop, with two men and a woman, all Hispanic with little English. They couldn't budge my car until another man stopped, and together they pushed me back onto the road.

When I told Lawrence about the incident he informed me that the trains don't run at night. Would have saved a lot of adrenaline had I known that before!

The next day I wrote a letter to the editor of the local newspaper to thank them, as I had done so in a rather perfunctory way the night before. I do hope my Good Samaritans read it and know how grateful I am.

I'm reminded of a long-ago incident when a female friend and I had a flat tire at night in L.A. and three young Hispanic men came to our aid. One of them said, "My mom would kill me if I told her I'd passed by two ladies in distress." Is there something in the Hispanic culture that encourages this?

Back to SSA

The Social Security Administration was once my employer, and in Los Angeles I returned to the organization, but to the El Segundo branch. This is not an office that directly serves the public, but deals with cases sent to it. What a difference between that and my old Crenshaw office! This one is much smaller, with, it seemed, much more friendly and cohesive staff. They all put down their forms and their mice and listened to my PowerPoint presentation about West Africa, after which they had prepared a delicious potluck lunch. A former colleague from Crenshaw, Anne Sekino, had arranged my visit as she now works at El Segundo, and she had arranged for a surprise visitor: Eleanor Williams, a former colleague of ours, whom I had not been able to get in touch with. What a pleasant surprise!

That was the only booking I had in the L.A. area, but I spent the rest of the time meeting old friends for lunch or dinner. I hardly had any meals with Sara Meric, my host in Santa Monica. Had a wonderful Indian meal at the home of an Indian-Ghanaian former student, along with another former student. Met my nephew James and his wife Ana at a restaurant, and got to see my great-niece Caitlin for the first time. What a lovely, sweet baby!

Reaching California

Another interesting drive: Tucson to the San Diego area. West of Tucson the desert changed completely to a SANDY desert, which I hadn't seen before. Like in the movies we watched as kids. Then hills covered with boulders that looked like huge potatoes and little vegetation. Once over the hills I noticed how lush the growth was becoming, and it became moreso as I approached San Diego. Such greenery! I appreciated it with green-starved eyes, but also kept thinking of how much water it took to keep it that way.

Stayed with my friend Fern Gordon in nearby San Marcos, and she threw a wonderful luncheon after which I spoke and sold some books. Also spoke at Oceanside Library one evening. About 10 teenagers and an equal number of adults (half of them friends of mine) attended, but by half-way through all the teens had left. What a testament to my winning ways with words! I was told that some of them had to get home before it was very late, which was some comfort.

The drive to Los Angeles was long, on a crowded freeway, but there were some lovely views of the Pacific Ocean. I'm so glad I don't have to drive in such traffic at home.

Co-Housing in Tucson

Driving to Tucson from El Paso showed me an interesting change in landscape. Whereas El Paso's desert is dry with scattered scrubby plants, approaching Tucson I saw sajuaro cacti, tall and noble, often with one or more "arms," which don't start to grow until the plant is at least 50 years old. Other, shorter cacti were visible. On a vist to the wonderful Desert Museum I learned a lot about these and other living things of the desert.

I stayed with former Peace Corps Volunteer (Turkey) Jackie Day in Milagro (Miracle) Co-Housing Community whose unifying principle is "To live lightly on the land." Interesting place: about 28 residences, some of them duplex, occupied by young families with small children up to retired folks. Each house has a solar unit on the roof that provides heat for the water supply, and large tanks are at each house to catch rainwater off the roof. Their grey water is piped underground to a "wetland" where a certain kind of reed has been planted to clean the water. The black water from toilets eventually goes there too, after settling. All this is piped back to water the plants in the community, most of which are local and therefore don't require much water. But they do have some citrus and fig and some other fruit trees, I think.

One would expect to see a community garden there, but as with almost any community with voluntary membership, there are a few who don't want to go along with the majority, and there is no garden, though some individuals do grow vegetables on their own property.

I attended a vegetarian dinner at the home of another resident and talked to about ten women about West Africa, showing my artifacts. Ten-year-old resident Emily modeled carrying a baby on her back.

At a thrift shop in Florida where I had hoped to buy a baby doll for such demonstrations I learned that baby dolls can't be sold unless they are tested for lead in the paint. So my "baby" is a teddy bear.