Sunday, January 27, 2008

Rainy Days

I so enjoy the quiet of rainy days especially living where the sun is shining most of the year. When it rains there are fewer drivers, people and no sunny day noise to distract you from finally getting to your well needed chores.
Another blogger I enjoy reading tells about her unwanted feelings toward weather blogging. She says its boring. I find it fascinating how changing weather affects in different ways. However severe weather is another story altogether especially when it inflicts tragedy - so we'll put that on the back burner for a while.
Rainy weather used to keep me from going places. I'd whine and moan and groan about the rainy and use it as a poor excuse as to why I should stay home. My view is different today, I don't think I'll melt if I get a little wet out there.
Last night, Saturday, when the rain began to fall in a quiet drizzle I decided to attended my usual art gallery opening reception parties and was surprised at the large turnout. Maybe that's a sign of successful people. Very little stops them from doing what they intended to do and thus keep commitments to themselves and others. That's a definite sign of success. Not afraid to be a bit uncomfortable.
Even if you want to cuddle up on your couch with a good book and drink a hot tottie, if something is going on outside where you'll be with people, interesting or not, just go.
Oh its so easy to be an armchair philosopher these days offering advice to others when you sometimes feel you're drowning in a pool of rain in your own life. Sorry for the swift shift in mood and tone but there were several gallery crawler schnoorers I bumped into last night who I thought were maybe a reflection of myself. If they were, indeed, mirrors of me, it made me frightened so see my self on the artists canvas.
Especially one person I'll call Mike, to keep his identity private, has been wearing the exact same KGB black on black on black outfit since the first time we met a few years ago. I'd like to write a fictional story loosely based on his lonely but happy go lucky character like Kramer on Seinfeld. Then it suddenly dawned on me that the dozen or so rat pack art gallery and book reading crawler schnoorers were not so far removed from me. Its hard to see yourself spiritually naked with all your flaws, dreams and regrets fully exposed. Maybe that's why we fill our blow holes with wine, vodka and beer during these shows, to make us numb to the reality of life and awake to the beautiful fantasy that will soon diminish like a puff of smoke.
I'd like to think I'm a bit cool and cosmopolitan. I believe I did have my fifteen minutes of fame in 2000 before 911 changed the world. But as one of my new years resolutions of neither lying nor exaggerating the truth or accuracy, I'm neither. Having left the corporate world to seek a writer's existence was a complete shock to my complete body system in more ways than I could have imagined.
In today's caste society, people are what they do more so than their worth. The toughest question to answer these days are, "So, what do you do?" My response is "I'm a writer and photographer" Although not untruthful I've yet to earn an income in those fields. I've submitted my works of high art to local and Internet media but am still waiting for a response as my beard grows greyer each day.
Well. the light drizzle turned into a windy hard rain, a sound so enjoy hearing.
Today is a full day of chores including writing up my "blurb" for a short course in autobiography writing which I will lead. I so enjoy writing biographies of others. The interview process is quite fun. Everyone has a story to tell. Not all are interesting, but everyone wants to he heard and listened to. Autobiography writing is a good exercise to share one's life story including milestones and intimate moments. Their stories will be a legacy to their families, a catharsis for themselves and a way to have their long time friends and sometimes relatives to get to know them a little better.
I'm looking forward to teaching the class and any of you out need any bio tips, just ask.
OK enough blathering. Time to do some real writing and household chores.
Bye for now all thos who have gotten this far.

Rainty Days

I so enjoy the quiet of rainy days especially living in a part of the world where the sun is shining most of the year. When it rains there are fewer drivers, people and just sunny noise to distract you.

 Another blogger I enjoy reading tells about her unwanted feelings toward weather blogging. She says its boring. I find it fascinating how changing weather affects different people in differnt ways. However severe weather is another story altogether in that it sometimes inflicts tradgey - so we'll put that on the back burner for a while.

Rainy weather used to keep me from going places. I'd whine and moan and groan about the rainy and use it as a poor excuse as to why I should stay home. My view is different today, I don't think I'll melt if its a little wet out and there's an exciting event taking place in which I'd like to  partake.

Last night, Sataurday, when the rain began to fall in a quiet drizzle I decided to attended my usual art gallery opening reception parties and was surprised at the large turnout. Maybe that's a sign of successful people. Very little stops them from doing what they intended to do and thus keep committments to themselves as well as others. That's a definite sing of success.

Even if you want to cuddle up on your couch with a good book and hot tottie, if something is going on outside where you'll be with people, interesting or not, just go.

Oh its so easy to be a philosopher these days offering advice to others when you sometimes feel you're drowning in a pool of rain in your own life. Sorry for the swift shift in mood and tone but there were several gallery crawler schnoorers I bumped into last night who I thought were maybe a reflection of myself. Especially one I'll call Mike, to keep his identity private. 

Monday, January 21, 2008

A few good days

Enjoyed lunch with the Bees, my friends from Westlake village, on Thursday. We met half way in the west valley at our favorite Indian buffet restaurant, Shalimar where their speciality is mulligatawny soup, saffron rice which mixes well with the paprika bright red tandoori chicken, hunter green creamed spinach, yellow curried hard boiled eggs chick peas with green peas and white potatoes. All courses followed by sweetened rice pudding with cinnamon and raisins. Mmmmm.
Fatboy was supposed to be there too but couldn’t join us for lunch. His grandpa passed on last week so he took off for the cold middle west to pay his respects. My condolences to he and his family.
David and I made our travel arrangements Friday for my to visit to see him and his family, including my new grandson, for a long weekend in Feb. It will be good to see his wife Tami, the new Benji, the old twins Grace and Hannah and of course sis Keri and maybe even Tom and Suzanne. Who knows what other surprises may bring.
Was feeling a bit blue Saturday as I was anticipating my usual venture out to visit Bergamot station art galleries where only a few opening receptions were scheduled that evening. Got itchy so I left my flat earlier than usual, got a good parking spot and saw the old regular gallery crawlers wandering around as well waiting for the wine bar to open.
Met Mike first. He’s the king schnoorer. Knows of every free-be event in town. He chatted me up as usual asking for writing tips he’ll ever use. Maybe I’m uncomfortable around him because he’s a mirror of the other world to me in some ways. I’ve been schnooring and not putting in the writing time required myself.
The best art exhibit of the evening was actually pretty cool with original classic and newly rendered reproductions of ancient album covers of various music genres. Maybe that’s way it attracted so many musicians and wannabes. The wide variety of costumes were pretty darn cool looking. Traditional conservs, GBers, Goths, PP and mad hatters.
Wanted to get into the swing of things by looking like the artist I’m not. Dressed more like an artist hipster than a hipster artist with my Chinese Mao cap, cargo pants, striped sweater and jean vest I didn’t even stand out in the circus dressed crowd.
Told people I was a writer and blogger which is one and one-half percent true. Had a couple of cocktails so I read the palms of a few beautiful women. One was a makeup artist who was “in” with the several musician celebrities whose names escape me.
She introduced me to a rock band like looking man named Billy who was dressed as if he were about to go on stage and perform in front of a hundred thousand people. He wore a feathered watch cap type hat, a long two pointed reddish blond beard. We chatted for about ten minutes. Then suddenly the gallery exploded with gawkers and the crowd gyrated straight to Billy asking for hugs kisses and autographs.
I guess I’m not as hip as I thought. Billy turned out to be Billy Gibbens of ZZ Top.Real nice fellow with a pleasant soft voice and welcoming personality. Cool cat, man. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRYy4OBEvHE
Sunday morning was a typical trip to Peets sipping, eating and reading. Mmmmm good. Got bored and a bit unsettled while listening to two very young beautiful mothers talking about a house one them just purchased at a bargain price of under three mm. Guess I became envious. I left and went to the local farmers market down the road in Brentwood. Not as cool as the one on Main & OP but I was too lazy to head down to the beach and wanted some bread and tasty fruits mixed in with a true hip crowd of locals. Lots of kids and a few farm animal too.
Did some laundry and food marketing. Had a good but too large dinner at home for a change and was grazing for hours. It felt good but I had way too much.
Today is MLK birthday with all sorts of tribute events around town. There’s one in Santa Monica so I’ll be attending in a couple of hours.
Ciao for now

Monday, January 14, 2008

Sunsets


Sunset some  evenings are spectacular during the winter in So Cal. A few clouds around make for colorful night shows during the dry desert very warm to very cool change in temps. So here is just what a taste of what it looks like in  the desert at night.
Ice, snow, rain, tornadoes, hurricanes,,,,not here. Just earthquakes and high winds.

Sunday, January 13, 2008

Bergamot Saturday

Saturday night at Bergamot Station presented more than the usual odd and interesting character art gallery crawlers, hipsters and sophists. The gallery exhibits were unsurpassed that night with more superb opening reception shows than usual. There might commonly be just one or two good show artists in an evening, but last night was extraordinary. And one of the largest crowds I’d ever seen. All ages, genders, gender-benders, metros, walks of life and eminent death defying parking feats.


Wine but no cheese was flowing freely. Met my one professional dedicated gallery crawler Mike, who chatted me up to no end. Loralie and Mille are regulars who dress conservatively enough to assume they’re together when they’re actually way out there. Joe the 83 year old schnoorer who can barely walk with his arthritis and Pete who has a hard time holding up his plastic wine cup as he suffers from Parkinson's. But the creme de la creme is the Puppet lady who never travels alone. She always has an authentic puppet that seems too realistic with properly engineered strings in tow to whom she usually chats with and introduces to people as her companion. Last night she had a dog with a flashing rhinestone collar who looked so real many cutesy voiced girls attempted to to pet him or it and became embarrassed when they realized the dog was a puppet.

The last exhibit to open that night was sponsored by the LA-WEEKLY, Los Angeles’ money cool underground left wing weekly rag that digs deep into the more than main stream LA events. They even have a Pulitzer prize winning food critic on board. Their sponsored exhibit was wild. Several neat artists including an unusually disgusting performance art exhibition where a fat old naked man only wearing a makeshift crown was sitting on a ratty old stuffed chair while being painted by an artist who was running on a treadmill at the same time. Yikes !
 an unappetizing sight to see which we all could have done without. Yes, there were many young and mature women who seemed embarrassed by the naked man in the center of hundreds of art gallery goers. They were not embarrassed for reasons of modesty of viewing a strange fat man’s nudity, but rather by the way one feels embarrassed for someone else who seems to be making a fool out of themselves.

Met a few interesting faces. A group of three girl friends and on with an especially most exotic look. Like a cross between Angelica Houston and Shelly DuValle.
After enough wine and being burnt out on people watching but not art viewing it was time to head home where I stopped at my favorite rotisserie chicken eat-in and take-away home style spot. California Chicken Cafe on Wilshire in Santa Monica. But it was late for an old geezer like myself so I ate just enough to taste the silky soft meat surrounded by the crisp seasoned sumptuous skin. Its OK I’m on Lipitor.
Cool night. Today on the other hand was hot in the mid seventies. And we’re on the middle of January. I Won’t waste your time on my boring chore filled day.

So Ciao for now and have a great week.

Bergamot Saturday

Saturday night at Bergamot Station presented more than the usual odd and interesting character art gallery crawlers, hipsters and sophists. The gallery exhibits were unsurpassed that night with more superb opening reception shows than usual. There might commonly be just one or two good show artists in an evening, but last night was extraordinary. And one of the largest crowds I’d ever seen. All ages, genders, gender-benders, metros, walks of life and eminent death defying parking feats.

Wine but no cheese was flowing freely. Met my one professional dedicated gallery crawler Mike, who chatted me up to no end. Loralie and Mille are regulars who dress conservatively enough to assume they’re together when they’re actually way out there. Joe the 83 year old schnoorer who can barely walk with his arthritis and Pete who has a hard time holding up his plastic wine cup as he suffers from Parkinson's. But the creme de la creme is the Puppet lady who never travels alone. She always has an authentic puppet that seems too realistic with properly engineered strings in tow to whom she usually chats with and introduces to people as her companion. Last night she had a dog with a flashing rhinestone collar who looked so real many cutesy voiced girls attempted to to pet him or it and became embarrassed when they realized the dog was a puppet.

The last exhibit to open that night was sponsored by the LA-WEEKLY, Los Angeles’ money cool underground left wing weekly rag that digs deep into the more than main stream LA events. They even have a Pulitzer prize winning food critic on board. Their sponsored exhibit was wild. Several neat artists including an unusually disgusting performance art exhibition where a fat old naked man only wearing a makeshift crown was sitting on a ratty old stuffed chair while being painted by an artist who was running on a treadmill at the same time. Yikes!

Quite an unappetizing sight to see which we all could have done without. Yes, there were many young and mature women who seemed embarrassed by the naked man in the center of hundreds of art gallery goers. They were not embarrassed for reasons of modesty of viewing a strange fat man’s nudity, but rather by the way one feels embarrassed for someone else who seems to be making a fool out of themselves.

Met a few interesting faces. A group of three girl friends and one with an especially most exotic look. Like a cross between Angelica Houston and Shelly DuValle.

After enough wine and being burnt out on people watching but not art viewing it was time to head home where I stopped at my favorite rotisserie chicken eat-in and take-away home style spot. California Chicken Cafe on Wilshire in Santa Monica. But it was late for an old geezer like myself so I ate just enough to taste the silky soft meat surrounded by the crisp seasoned sumptuous skin. Its OK I’m on Lipitor.

Cool night. Today on the other hand was hot in the mid seventies. And we’re on the middle of January. I Won’t waste your time on my boring chore filled day.

So Ciao for now and have a great week.

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Shabbat Thoughts


This week I participated for the first time in a new committee of the M-Tribe. Here are some thoughts that were brought up during the meeting I'd like to share.
ONE: Developing an autobiography class M-Tribers have led interesting lives with exciting, sad and joyous life stories they might want to share with their family and friends as a written legacy and possibly as a personal catharsis. They might also be surprised to learn how interesting the life of that quiet neighbor sitting next to them during events had been.
Although I'm not a teacher and don't have the patience and understanding that others naturally  possess, I believe I could lead the class at a slow but steady pace. I have already prepared a brief outline of the topics, chronology and goals of the class.
TWO: setting up an expert speaker series harvesting M-Tribe members as subject matter experts (SME) in their fields of expertise Many would be interested in learning about the nuances and amusing anecdotes of their neighbors. 

Although I'm a bit rusty I've organized similar impromptu events in the past. A program is usually 1 1/2 hours in length with the first 20-30 minutes devoted to socializing. The speaker's' talk should be about 15-20 minutes followed by a Q&A session and ending with another social parting event.

THREE: is similar to the SME series idea above but inviting professional experts from outside the Tribe to speak. People with interesting occupations for consideration might be: acupuncturists, chiropractors, authors, artists, musicians, firefighters, police, EMT, local politicians, chefs, scholars, knitters, sewers, scrapbookers, grant writers, etc.
Please note these are merely ideas. Since I'm the new kid on the block and a novice to the proper protocol of conducting such events I leave the appropriate protocol, advantages and pitfalls of developing such ideas to the M-Tribe committee.
I also enjoyed an M-tribe private dinner  last night. We five had quite a lovely and lively time and delicious dinner with vibrant conversation. Looking forward to others
Tonight I'll be off  to Bergamot station art galleries. There will be seven opening receptions. I will attend as I usually do by viewing the art, having some wine,  maybe cheese, mingle with an eclectic group of artists, hipsters, goths, sophisticates schnoorers, schmoozers, wannabes and tall tale tellers trying to attach themselves rising stars.
I'll call dad first in FL and then head out to the big B.
Ciao my friends

Sunday, January 6, 2008

Benjamin

Sometimes you meet someone unexpectedly and after  a brief moment passes you can tell from their first smile they're a special person. Well I was recently blessed to meet such a young man from my M-Tribe and we became friendly acquaintances. His name is Benjamin, is an accomplished musician, composer and visiting from France.
He and his girlfriend Ariel are two of the loveliest and tallest people I've met since the ice age.
Find out more about him and his interesting theatrical family history by viewing his web site and face book pages.
Anyway Benjamin I'll see you next week. Ciao ami.

Saturday, January 5, 2008

Born a DP


Whenever someone would ask me where I was born I would immediately cringe at the thought of having to answer that most uncomfortable question. The response usually demanded a lengthy, intimate and uncomfortable answer with elaborate explanations.

Skirting the question was the best solution as I would answer a similar question instead. My response was usually the the place where I grew up - the Bronx in New York City. The South Bronx to be exact, with the manipulatively misleading assumption that it was the place where I was born rather than merely bred.

The mention of the Bronx had its own legs and appeal which usually elicited distinct historic interest. Especially when I threw in that very red herring by bragging about my employment for Harry M. Stevens the famous sole vendor franchise at Yankee Stadium, the Polo Grounds and Shea Stadium where I barked and sold peanuts, popcorn, soda and CrackerJack. Probably other foods and flags as well.

Yankee Stadium was the place to be. It was a classic icon in its own time. I often got to see and sometimes say hello to the Bronx Bombers: Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford, Hank Bauer, Tony Kubeck, Billy Martin, et al. And of course we all loved Mel Allen.

Back to born. If my comfort level is running high, I reveal that I was born in Germany which immediately prompts a bit of surprising curiosity followed by “what happened to your accent?” We all laugh and I take my leave if I don’t have the energy or time for a lengthy explanation. One disguised reason is that I still don’t have all the answers.

If I’m feeling a bit feisty, courageous or having recently imbibed in a couple of Kettle One martinis “neat,” I begin to reveal more historical information about my birth which usually begins without a long introduction. But beware of the Stark truth.

My birthplace and the events leading up to why did I end up “there” can turn a casual conversation into a serious story with a plethora of deep rooted questions; some welcomed and others uncomfortable. I take a deep breath while only a few eyes are making contact with me as I begin my birth tale. Within a few moments most eyes open wide and ears turn toward me for the historical details of a life so different from theirs it seems to be a million miles away.

I was born in a DP camp in Germany after WWII. DP stands for displaced persons or refugees who fled the horrors of war and were without a place to call their own or hang their hats. These refugees were unable, unwanted or unwilling to return to their former homeland. So DP it was and is. Built and run by the US Army the camps was cared for by the US Army GI’s and the German people in the nearby town who my mom and dad always told me treated us well.

Maybe the reason I don’t like to share this information very readily is that I’ve never really liked the label of being called a displaced person. DP somehow sounds, well, more like a cold government acronym, stamp or indifferent number rather than an ingratiating, welcoming and warm term. During my lifetime I’ve been e-placed, misplaced, and recently replaced. But not displaced since I was born.

The name of the DP camp was Bad Reichenhall and located in the outskirts of the city. Only recently have I researched the town’s history and was surprised to discover that it is a small health spa resort city located near Salzburg and the German Austrian border.My sister was born nearby in Munich and I was born in Bad Rachenhall.

Years later during a visit to Israel I met my aunt Sonja in Tel Aviv and discovered that we also had a brother born at the DP camp who didn’t make it. My folks never brought up the subject and I didn’t ask about any of the details upon my return. Some secrets need to remain secrets for no particular reason other than a secret is a secret for a reason.

During our stay at Bad Rachenhall a private organization named H.I.A.S. which stands for Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society tried to locate and identify holocaust survivors by visiting the camps, writing down the names of the the survivors and sending them to Jewish newspapers around the world. These, mostly yiddish newspapers published their findings each day in the Yiddish newspapers around the world. My uncle Morris, already living in New York for years read the Yiddish daily called “The Forward” and found his brother’s name, Nathan my father, on the list of survivors.

It took more than a year and a half to make the blue ink and red tape arrangements to brings us over to the land paved with gold and freely flowed with milk and honey.

When I was just two years old we were rescued by uncle Morris, aunt Rose and cousin Ann by having completed the lengthy document and verification process allowing us boarding privileges on a a ship to Boston. We bunked in the accommodating steerage section with all its finest amenities and services. Mom was sea sick throughout the entire ten day trip. Until the day she died, my mother vowed to never board a ship again - even a row boat would make her ill.

When we arrived in Boston harbor we were examined, deliced, given proper American names, appropriate documents and met with our aunt, uncle and cousin at the docks. We all boarded a train together to New York City where the South Bronx became our new home for many mesmerizing years top come.

The four of us first lived in a one room flat as part of a larger apartment sharing a kitchen, bathroom and living room privileges. We later moved to a larger one bedroom flat on a main thoroughfare called Webster Avenue. I remember all four of us slept in the one bedroom. When all the beds were side by side there was only a narrow walkway in which to move about, Yes it was quite cozy.

The south Bronx area in which we lived was an ethnic ghetto neighborhood shared mostly with other Irish and Italian immigrants. Yiddish was our first language and english was not yet a second language. In many cases english was a very foreign language which brought fear, uncertainty and confusion to more than a handful of immigrants.

Filling out any forms, especially the ones received by schools and the government; or answering uniformed people’s questions were the most imposing part of the day to day existence . Simple communication with those outside the ghetto neighborhood was scary, unheard of and tougher than making the rent or having enough food on the table at the end of the week.

The most prevalent form of communication in the ghetto were extremely loud voices, physical pushing and shoving, especially in food queues, some common violence and lavish verbal abuse. Those were a few areas in which the most illiterate uneducated and intolerant neighbors freely expressed their right to free speech and thoughts without having to construct a formal sentence or even utter a single word.

Oh they were the best communicators. As we sometimes ran from them out of fear and at lighting speed we knew their intentions without a word being spoken. Oh we were fast runners alright. Fast or beaten were the two choices. Diplomacy was not yet practiced. I should have tried out for the olympics in those days.

Even during the later years, my folks were literally shackled by the lack of a good command of the english language; both in written and verbal terms. At least in the factories most of the foreigners spoke the same language and was therefore not a barrier.

Mom and dad worked in the garment center where they toiled and slaved in dark and dingy factory lofts making umbrellas, hats, gloves and who knows what else.

My sister and I went to local public schools with creative names like P.S. 90, 22 and 40. To this day I don’t remember attending public school classes until I got to high school. And even that school still remains a mystery to me. How in the world did I graduate?

Bathgate Avenue, nearby, was the bronx version of Manhattans Orchard street. You could buy anything original on the wide lengthy streets spanning many blocks of old brownstones where people lived upstairs while selling their goods downstairs. Or there were street vendors with hand carts or tired old horses pulling old world shtele carts.

You could be measured for a suit, pick out a chicken, have it slaughtered and feathered by the chicken flicker in back of the barn, have your eggs candled, select a chunk of butter or cheese, buy a live carp to put into the bath tub until you were ready to make gefelite fish, finish your marketing and return to the tailor in less than an hour to pick up your hand made expensive $7 suit that fit well and looked great.

On the surface these all may sound like romantic experiences but they’re not even close to scratching the surface. These were just the highlights beginning.

More to come in the next chapters so stay tuned.

Friday, January 4, 2008

High Rise


2008 will be a year of moving out of my dusty earthquake cracked once elegant high end high rise apartment with a view of Catalina island to a cozy California cottage bungalow closer to the beach where my new friends live and thrive. Wow that was a mouth full.
The decision to move was easy. Finding a new home is frustrating. LA is expensive and I'm not the only one who enjoys beach living in a hip neighborhood.
One way or another I'll move away from this concrete jungle of carbon  laden single occupant vehicles. Maybe I'll buy a new smart car, if I can fit in it. Well my medication is starting to kick in so the words and thoughts are turning dull so I'd better stop writing while I'm not too far behind in my angst.
Ciao



Advice on a Rainy Day

Got up and out early enough this morning to avoid the rain before I so enjoyed my delicious cup of coffee and fresh apricot Panatone with butter. Mm. Good. Especially the piping hot coffee on a cool and rainy morning.
Read one section of the Wall Street Journal as I received a few calls from my buddies.
One was an invite for a martini tonight which I turned down because of previous plans. The other call was a cancellation of dinner because of an M-Tribee's hubby flu. Got another call asking me to take a drive to Vegas to see the electronics show. Not being an electronic geek and with the few advanced toys I have that take up more than enough time, I said no - to my buddy's dismay.
I think FatBoy just wanted a driving partner to Vegas as a distraction to our unexpected pause in life. I was feeling too comfortable around town and wasn't interested in spending several hours on the road driving through the winter desert winds to see what new gadgets I'll never buy.
Yes if you're thinking there are other exciting things to do in Vegas you're right. But I've been there so many times I would rather take a week off and head to Paris for a croissant coffee and brie.
Well the rain is trickling down at a slow but steady pace now and I'll soon be off to be with my M-Tribe later this afternoon for a quick get together.
Oh, my advice is to stay warm, dry and cozy.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Peets




The streets were unusually bare this morning as the first work week began in 2008.
Where is everybody? It seems vacations were extended into the New Year. I'm not complaining. Glad its quiet for the moment and a bit overcast. My kind of weather. I can actually hear the sound of silence that's usually reserved for country living. I know its not going to last very long so I'll enjoy it while I can.
Having dusted off my REI bicycle I took a ride to Peets for coffee and a snack. I hadn't ridden my bike for a while now so it was good to get back in the saddle literally. Boy did I enjoy sipping that hot delicious coffee at Peets while observing the customers. It's like attending an off Broadway play.
Peets always draws a cool eclectic crowd with a nice combination of friendly and business buzz. There are yuppies, guppies, mothers with babies, retirees with their octogenarian parents, out of work writers and actors, retired business moguls with no one to talk to or listen to their big deal conversations.
But those around me always provide fun and interesting listening. People just seem to boast or greatly fib about their lives and exaggerated events. Maybe one or two thoughts are true but the others are merely dreams we all have. Lot's of bragging and ballooning of stories about exotic travel, big deals and romantic conquests.
The true lovers just sip their coffee quietly, eat their pastries, hold hands, rub each others backs or necks and know they don't need to chatter. They're there and everyone else is not.
Received a plethora of unexpected phone calls but fewer emails than usual. Getting to know more M-tribe members and attending more homespun dinners and group events at a gradual and slow pace. Just the way I like it.
David called yesterday and told me about the colds they're all suffering with and the cold snap the northeast is now experiencing. I'm not sure if he were sharing weather reports or tempering my idea of moving closer to him to be connected to the family. (David, if you read this don't roll up your eyes in exasperation)
Have answered all my e-mails, returned my calls and will begin a new essay. I left a message for my friend Lynda to return my call. Maybe we'll connect later today.
Ciao for now.