Life of Wry

And yet ANOTHER baseball season has come to an end. This one: Pre-Varsity Fall Ball. If it wasn’t so late, I might try to count just how many seasons Peter has played baseball… spring and fall little leagues, summer all-stars, summer and fall travel balls, high school fall, spring and summer seasons… lots.

I will just enjoy this very sweet blue-scale, color-faded photo, courtesy of Wes Young, the dad of Ray, pictured with Peter above.

I’m betting they are feeling very relaxed, both having their innings under their belt. Coach Ariola pitched eight guys over sixteen innings in today’s final pair of games up in Rocklin. Whew!

Both of these guys pitched well this season, and should feel very satisfied. It was a lot of fun.

Been doing a lot of reading lately.  When I can stay awake.

Yesterday, I was caught sleeping on the job (thanks a lot, Jim).

1. That’s Huckleberry Finn on the iPad. Turned itself off, wisely. Not sure how long I’d been out.

2. I’m lying over a mountain of couch pillows because my back was a bit sore. In spite of how it looks, it was really comfortable.

3. I really AM enjoying Huckleberry Finn, the above notwithstanding.

After nearly a YEAR, Jim is back to a full set of choppers.  Jim would say it’s technically been only 8 1/2 months. But to me, the wife, it feels a lot longer, especially if the tooth your husband is doing without is right up front. It feels like an eternity if your ever-practical, not-a-vain-bone-in-his-body husband has opted not to fill the space with a temporary tooth (you know, because that’s a silly, unnecessary expense).

Implants. My lord. Super expensive, potentially a very uncomfortable procedure, and a lengthy, involved process (nearly a year!).

I have no right to be this happy, they aren’t even my teeth. It’s really none of my business if he chooses to go toothless for the better part of a year…..  but… well, yeah….. it made me cringe every time he opened his mouth.  I felt self-conscious as I introduced him around at my 40th high school reunion. (Yes, I’m shallow.) He seemed not to mind at all–at least not enough to fork over another $500 and endure the awkwardness of wearing a retainer-like appliance. No surprise there, I guess.

Anyway, the Jethro nightmare is over! His beautiful smile is back:

Wednesday gardening day: pruned the Meyer lemon; hacked the matilija poppy; planted arugula, collards, kale and chard; weeded, watered, wore ourselves out. It was a one-nursery day. Yadda. Pant.. pant. Yadda.

The really fun part of the day, however, was meeting up with a woman named Wendy, who used to be a kindergartener named Wendy, who I knew then, but haven’t seen in forty years, when we both left high school on different life paths.

Maybe that’s a silly way of saying Wendy is visiting Davis this week with her husband Barry to see if this is where they want to settle for what is likely the last chapter in their lives. It’s a huge decision and one they are considering with impressive intention. Their son just graduated from UCD and they’ve visited him many times over the years. They have liked what they’ve seen, and now are doing a lot of due diligence… meeting with the Chamber of Commerce, meeting with city officials, meeting with real estate agents, meeting with rabbi Wolfe at Bet Haverim, and…. meeting with people who live here, like me.  They plan to rent a house here next summer to see what a central valley summer is like, and if they can take it, they’ll rent for a whole year, while renting out their house in Huntington Beach. If all that goes well, they’ll sell their house and move here.

Okay, so none of that may interest Life of Wry readers–sorry for all the detail–but I found it fascinating.. this business of considering one’s last chapter. How do you want to live the last 20, 30, 40 years of your life? Where? What are the things you want to be doing… what’s important, meaningful? Work, consult, travel, write, volunteer, veg? Be near family? Nurture friendships? Who matters? What do you love? Where’s your magic?

I thought their approach was well thought out.  And I imagine (hope) Jim and I will ask ourselves the same questions. The thought of taking the easy path, finding yourself in a certain place due to inertia or by default is so missing an opportunity. A future characterized by decreasing options because you let time run out is so depressing.

We have another set of friends who decided ten years ago that they wanted to live in Mexico, specifically Progresso, a coastal town on the Yucatan Peninsula, not too far from Merida. They began ten years ago to prepare–bought property, fixed it up, rented the house out, but visited enough to start to get a lay of the land. Then they decided all the things they wanted to do in the U.S. before moving permanently to Mexico. They built their dream home on a forested mountain ridge in the California foothills, they lived there for many years, then sold that and lived on a sail boat in the San Francisco Bay. They thrived and were professionally respected in high level jobs (one of them especially), they took up, and in most cases mastered, hobbies and activities (sailing, hiking, travel, photography), and so on. All stuff they identified as bucket list items.. they checked them off the list. They both just retired, and to the very letter of their plan (which, incidentally, was detailed in the Sacramento Bee and in a story on local television), began to divest of, sell, or donate all their stuff— cars, boats, household items, excess clothes. It’s been an interesting process to watch. Their swan song was a friendship tour.. going to places they love up and down the state, visiting friends and saying goodbye to everyone (and inviting everyone to visit them in their new home). They’ve also documented the whole ten-year process… who knows… could be a book one of these days.

But see? Thoughtful, proactive, smart.  I’m taking all this in.. I want to be so intentional.

Back to today’s meet up…

Wendy and Barry are giving the possibility of living in Davis a thorough evaluation, so it seemed important to give them my best and most honest assessment.  Well beyond the usual Davis stuff. I loved offering my opinions and experiences and having them be part of their calculus. It was a fun, and I think very helpful, data dump.

For instance, given she grew up in Palos Verdes (in generally the same neighborhood I grew up in) and given they’ve lived the last 25 years in Huntington Beach, it’s safe to say they are climatically predisposed to cool ocean breezes in the summer and relatively warm, temperate winters. They are very concerned about the heat. I hate the heat. We had to have that conversation. I said get out of dodge or buy a house with a pool.

More interesting was the conversation about the liberal bubble that is Davis; life in a college town; the active, engaged citizenry; the opportunities for volunteerism; the diversity of cultures and faiths; the art scene; the proximity of mountains, coast, wine and San Francisco.

While sitting there, people dropped by our table (Mishka’s of course), some joined us and offered more lively opinions. I even got to introduce them to our mayor pro tem, who talked seriously with them for 15 minutes about the challenges facing Davis and how their life and work experiences could be put to use on various of our commissions, as one example. It wasn’t bullshit; it struck some very real chords, especially with Barry.  I was so delighted.

A guy sat at an adjacent table strumming on an acoustic guitar. Thanks, guy.

Davis looked great today and it was affirming. It’s good to look at your town (your life) with a critical eye now and then, to see it as others might.

AND, I’m eager to go through a similar exercise, to look inside, to look at Jim and me together, and to figure out that next part. I think we’ll end up with the Davis-Plus plan: Davis plus travel, Davis plus some new activities…

…but I don’t want to get ahead of myself here.

After a few years of garden diligence, we’ve arrived at the fine tuning stage of yard design… looking for the just the right flowers to go in certain corners of the yard to fill in empty spots and add a final bit of accent drama and/or charm.

Last week, the guy at Three Palms Nursery pointed out that the more specifications we have for a given area, the fewer are the options. For example, “We need a drought tolerant plant that grows well in deep shade, to a height of 3-4 feet, with stalks that will drape nicely over a low fence, preferably a perennial that blooms most of the year with a colorful flower easily seen from a distance.”

Uh.. that would be hard to find.

While at Three Palms, we bought, among other things, a cool looking plant with a pretty orange flower called Lion’s Tail (leonotus leonurus). And today, to my huge surprise, I happened to run into a hillside adjacent to Putah Creek with a whole bunch of them.

NICE, huh?

These don’t fully satisfy the need described above (they require full sun, for example), but may work really well in another hole needing filling.

Here’s what I found out about them:

Leonotis leonurus (Lion’s Tail) – An erect evergreen shrub to 4 to 6 or more feet tall… from late spring through fall appear the fuzzy orange curved tubular flowers in whorls at spaced intervals….plant in full sun in a well-drained soil. This plant is drought tolerant but can tolerate and thrive with regular irrigation and it can survive temperatures down to 20 degrees F…often treated as a perennial…it responds well to pruning….useful as a screening plant….known to attract birds, bees and butterflies to the garden.    

And, most interestingly:

Leonotis leonurus is also known as Wild Dagga because of its traditional medical uses in South Africa. The dried leaves and flowers have a mild calming effect when smoked. In some users, the effects have been noted to be similar to cannabis. It has also been reported to cause mild euphoria, visual changes, dizziness… etc. It is not currently scheduled under federal law. The picked and dried leaves are also commonly brewed as tea. 

Who knew? Let the planting begin.

Vic Braden died this afternoon. He was 85.

While my very, very first tennis coach at the Jack Kramer Tennis Club–when I was about nine or ten–was an English man named John Melhuish (a Google search turned up the small fact that he once played a first-round match at Wimbledon in 1955, and lost, but hey, Wimbledon!), and while I took a few lessons (not many) from Del Little, also at the Kramer Club, Vic was my guy. When I think of who taught me to play the game of tennis, who gave me beautiful and fluid forehands and backhands especially, it was Vic without question.

For years, I took semi-private lessons, most often with my friend Judy.  I may also have taken some privates–I just can’t remember.

But what i do remember, very fondly, were the countless upon countless Friday night junior workouts that Vic conducted for years. Usually a couple dozen teenagers (and maybe pre-teens, too) crowded onto the court for an hour or two of fast-paced lessons and games. Super fun and highly instructive. He knew the mechanics of the game like nobody else, and how to instill perfect fundamentals into all of us… while making it incredibly fun. He made you laugh… always laugh. I looked forward to the workouts. He laughed throughout, used colorful language (not swearing, just colorful, descriptive, funny expressions), kept things moving. We wanted to be there. It was the place to be.

He also had a way of making you feel like you were a shining star. Always special, always talented, always gifted. Everyone. We rooted for each other when we weren’t laughing at each other.  And we all came out with exceptional skills. Many went on to greatness (number one in the world greatness, like Tracy Austin). With few exceptions, I’ll bet most still play the game.

I ended up teaching tennis for years (four or five) after graduating from college. I used the same games that he used on us, employed a lot of the same instructional techniques, but I was definitely not Vic.  He was a phenomenon. As the obits will surely say, a legend.

Rest in Peace, dear Vic. And thanks.

The sweatshirt’s a little small, but I’ve kept it all these years.

Today, I am enjoying this guy’s.

I had either not read this book in high school, or cobbled together my best understanding of it through Cliff Notes in order to pass the test or write the paper or whatever (I think the former). In any case, I know nothing of the story, except the barest of cultural references.

Peter’s reading it for his American Lit class, so I decided I’d read it too.  So glad this is the way I decided to spend a Sunday. Have spent the day with a faint smile on my face, appreciating the wit and social commentary of Samuel Clemens. When not snoozing.

In a lecture on the book’s moral themes, Mark Twain said: “A sound heart is a surer guide than an ill-trained conscience.”  Going on to say: “…a book of mine where a sound heart and a deformed conscience come into collision and conscience suffers defeat”.

Interesting. I shall read on….

It’s a I got nuthin’ day. Great day… baseball (DHS home game), movie (Colin Firth, Julianne Moore), dinner with friends (Case de Bolle)… but no pictures, no blog-worthy anecdotes.

Plucked one from among the 46,380 in my iPhoto library. Chose this one because it was taken at a SF Giants game about four and a half years ago (Peter’s 11 years old) and it seems a fitting way to honor tonight’s 18-inning playoff game against the Washington Nationals (SF won 2-1).

The perfect Friday night. Warm (what is it, August 20th? No? October 3rd?! Whoa.. thermometer at 10pm still reads 72 degrees); the students are back, which means it’s nutty downtown, but full of youthful energy–clusters of manic kids roaming the streets, music everywhere, strings of lights wrapped around trees that give everything a festive glow, enhanced by a couple of glasses of smooth as silk wine, which all happen to complement perfectly the warm October night; a FANTASTIC dinner at Our House (god, I love their food**) with two friends we’ve not seen in awhile; a little wine overload, and a lot of dessert overload…. and now I gotta blog.

Luckily for me, I have two pictures from today (more or less) that I can curate for today’s blog that fall under a common theme.  Under the circumstances, that is a minor miracle.

As the title suggests, the theme shall be funny faces. 

Funny face #1, taken by Wes Young at last night’s varsity baseball game in Yuba City, Peter on the bump… I NEVER get tired of these:

And funny face #2, a selfie taken this afternoon at Carrie my 30-year+ stylist’s place:

She seems to be on the phone, maybe calling for reinforcements?

** mountains of sour dough french roll and sweet butter; Sonoma-Cutrer chardonnay; sausage-stuffed mushrooms with mustard; goat cheese-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon; Alaskan halibut in a coconut sauce over fried rice; banana cream pie; chocolate decadence cake; coffee w/ cream. Each and every bite and sip insanely satisfying.

Having a split-rail fence in our front yard’s been on my list for a long while… not sure why I’ve been so bent on it–maybe I grew to love split-rail because, growing up, our front yard had one. Rustic has always appealed to me, too, so maybe that’s it.

For years, Ive been trying to find ways to make our front yard more interesting, to give our house more curb appeal (real-estate-ly speaking).  I’ve never disliked our front yard, but I’ve never been in love with it either. I’ve just wanted to wander down A Street and love turning into our driveway… and I really don’t. I mean, it’s okay, but aesthetically, it’s just kind of non-descript.

So, I’ve been thinking of ways to give the front yard some texture, to create something visually interesting to catch the eye, and I thought a fence was at least part of a good strategy. Peter was angling for a white picket fence, but I needed to angle him away from that because I’m not really a white picket fence kinda gal. Jim pretty much has no dog in this fence fight. He agreed to be the non-partial fence builder, which is a good thing to have. I ended up unilaterally vetoing Peter’s idea–he wasn’t that invested in it anyway–and just declared a split-rail fence shall be built.

Here are some pictures:

Day one: Jim dug four very deep holes and placed fence posts.

Day Two: Jim trimmed the rails (kids, do not use your own leg as a sawing platform):

Then placed the rails into the posts:

Voila: new fence and sore back.

Here’s a close-up of the stone path and edge of the abutilon/red bud bed:

And here’s what it looks like from a little distance:

As I’ve written before, we’ll be removing this winter the large, unruly Meyer Lemon which dominates the yard front and center, and not in a good way (we’ve already planted a new one in the back yard). We’ll anchor the south side of the raised terrace with a new tree (we removed the huge tangelo last spring), something smaller than the sycamore (on the north side), and something that either blooms in the spring, turns golden and gorgeous in the fall, or both. We have to wait until the bare-roots arrive in January. And then, finally, plant a bunch of new flowers and shrubs–some to fill the holes left by departed trees and some in our newly bordered bed that will charmingly drape over the fence.

Then… make a statement with some bold new house paint!