Beauty * and * Bread

Most of the items I’ve kept over the years have sentimental value. Much as Nasreen and Farida think otherwise, there usually is a reason for every thing I hold on to . . . like the ancient dining room table in my Retrospectives. Or the Chinese vase and the Polish crystal bottle that my mother bought during our trip to the midwest back in 1979. That was the only long journey my mom, the girls and I ever took together.  Every time I look at either one of them, I think of my mom and that vacation.  Of course I don’t see them too often since both currently reside with Farida, along with many of my other possessions that I failed to take with me during my moves to Shevy’s, Carol’s and now my own abode. I did not do Farida or Jason any favors when they moved into this house–leaving way too many of my treasures for them to deal with.

Little by little Farida is returning things to me. A couple of weeks ago she shifted some blankets and pillows my way, including the Pendleton pillow that I was given during an Adopt-a-Native-Elder ceremony and the two wolf pillows that our Dineh friend Lillian gave us. Those really bring back memories, too.

Two treasures have stayed with me through my moves. This:

Czech Teapot - a Gift from our Opera at Oakhurst Czech Extravaganza

and this:

A pillow in honor of King Grey Eagle - as a remembrance of our 2010 Shakespeare at the Opera! He knew I am worried about the 20-year-old kid.

Both of these were given to me by Dr. James Keolker, who has facilitated ECCO’s annual Opera at Oakhurst program for the past 13 years. The 14th, coming up at the end of April 2011, will be his last. Although you’d never guess his age, he’s decided that it’s time to hang up the ECCO opera hat and move on to other endeavors, among them a chair at the prestigious Fromm Institute at the University of San Francisco.

In August 2000, the opera program with Jim in charge was already a fixture. When Melva said, “Judi, I’d like you to take over opera,” I hadn’t the foggiest what she was talking about. At ECCO we kind of learn in a trial-by-fire scenario. If it needs to be done, you do it. Whatever IT is. If you don’t know, you’ll find out soon enough. Plunging toilets, bailing water out of flooded rooms, cutting snakes out of deer netting (I held the camera), planting flowers, raking leaves, herding swans. Whatever.

I didn’t work all that closely with Jim that first year. The whole thing was somewhat of a mystery to me, and–I’ll confess it now–I’m not much of an opera buff. I pulled stuff together as best I could. When Jim and I finally met in person, we discovered kindred spirits of sorts–both determined to give our guests the very best experience possible and willing to work as hard as necessary to achieve that goal.  I muddled through that first program, Jim gave his usual outstanding performance, and I discovered that I love working with him. He’s diligent, incredibly organized with an intense attention to detail–all those things I long to be and struggle to achieve.

By the time he arrived for the 2010 program, Shakespeare at the Opera!, he was already at least halfway through preparations for 2011–Wagner’s The Ring of the Nibelung.  Me? I’m always putting the finishing touches on a program seconds before the guests show up, and sometimes even after that.

In fact, Jim’s a huge reason why it’s taken me this long to move on from ECCO  to other endeavors. We’ve not only established a comfortable and seemingly successful working relationship., we’ve become great friends. I just couldn’t imagine not being a part of any ECCO program Jim Keolker presents. Now that he’s decided to leave, I can, too. It wasn’t an easy decision for either of us.

We email back and forth throughout the year about our lives, occasionally politics and even the upcoming opera program.

In a sea of conservatives, he shares my liberal leanings.

We also share a love of Tony Hillerman and things Native American. During the years I was making journeys to the Navajo reservation, he would often show up at ECCO for his annual program loaded with supplies for me to take to the elders.

He loves Glacier Point, but for as many years as I can remember, he’s never made it there during one of ECCO’s opera programs–because they always take place before the road opens.

He loves the mountains and the stars and has a cabin at a lake close to the Napa Valley where he can retire (well, go–I doubt he’ll ever retire) with his telescope to study the heavens.

Although I’ll miss working with him, I look forward to the opportunity of continuing the friendship we’ve forged over the last ten years. That will never change.

Although the “official” announcement of his withdrawal from the Opera at Oakhurst program has yet to be announced, I don’t think any of the attendees has discovered my blog, so the not-so-secret secret is safe until the letter goes in the mail later in September. A number of the participants have attended every year since the beginning. Newcomers often sign up as a result of Jim’s stellar reputation and the allure of his classes at Fromm. They come from across the country, and again in 2011 we’ll have guests from coast-to-coast.

The participants, too, have become friends as much as clients/guests, and we all look forward to catching up with each other once a year.

Jim qualifies as Hero No. 3 in my series of heroes.

Jim Keolker

So you may have guessed by now . . . my friends are the real treasures. No matter how near or far the physical distance is, we are always together.

Shevy used to kid that every place I ever went was my very favorite (until the next one). That’s pretty much true, I have to admit. Still and all, Yosemite ranks at the very top of the list. I can never get enough, no matter the season, no matter the weather. So when friend Penny suggested a road trip, I had to suggest that we go to Yosemite. The deal was clinched when I found out that Penny had never been to the high country.

What? Someone who’s lived in Oakhurst for five years, Fresno for who-knows-how-many and she’s never seen Olmstead Point. She’s never felt Tenaya Lake’s water lapping at her feet? She’s never seen Half Dome’s back side?

It’s a crime, that’s what it is.

Truth be told, I had my apprehensions. Ever since she’s lived in Oakhurst she’s suffered debilitating and crippling panic attacks. She never knows when they’ll hit, and if they strike when she’s out away from home, they can be devastating. I purposely hadn’t given her my home phone number, dirty rat that I am, but I half expected to arrive at her house on Wednesday morning to have her say “I can’t go.”

And she almost did. “I was going to send you an email last night, but then I figured you might not see it. If I’d had your phone number, I would have called this off.”

But she didn’t, so there Foxy and I were, ready and waiting at 8:00 a.m. sharp. Foxy, who’d visited Penny and Katie for the first time just two days before, walked into the house as if she owned it. She took her place on “her” couch right next to P.I.T.A. a Siamese of the feline persuasion, who normally wouldn’t permit such a travesty, according to Penny. Both of Penny’s cats looked at Foxy as if they’d known her forever. What an auspicious beginning.

Get two control freaks in a car together and you’ve got real problems. Penny wanted–no, needed–to take her car and do the driving, even though she wasn’t as familiar with the route and roads as I was. I let her, without complaint, because I knew it was important to her sense of security.

As it turned out, the entire day was perfect.

In order to avoid the miserable road construction on Highway 41, we took the long way around through Mariposa and the Merced River canyon. Although the water level is down and the white water rafting that takes place when the river runs wide, high and fast was over for the season, it was still a beautiful drive. I insisted that we detour our trip up Tioga Road with a jog over to the heart of Yosemite Valley to do some research for my job at the Visitors Bureau. (IRS, does this make it a business trip????)

Amazing. Yosemite Falls still has water. It’s nowhere what it was in June, but visitors who come here in August are often surprised to find Yosemite Falls virtually dry. Not this year. (Bridalveil Fall maintains at least a trickle all year long.)

Upper Yosemite Falls behind the Woodpecker Tree

Although you can’t do white water rafting any more this year, at least the easy-flowing Merced in Yosemite Valley still accommodates the rafters who want to float lazily down to the spot where the crew picks up float and floaters and takes them back to Curry Village.

Down a lazy river

In order to take the above photos, we had to park at Sentinel Bridge and give the pooches (and us) an opportunity to stretch our legs. Katie, who is a therapy dog who visits assisted-living centers and libraries, didn’t mind at all when folks wanted to give her a pet or two. I confess I was a bit nervous about Foxy. Shy as they come, she generally backs away from any encounter with strangers. Except on this day. She was very accommodating when someone wanted to get acquainted. I think it was Katie’s influence.

My Favorite Fox

The Little Ladies. Aren't they a pair?

Through either luck or good planning or a combination of both, we were able to negotiate Yosemite Valley with a minimum of problems. Our area is enjoying our best tourist season in years, and there are wall-to-wall people in the park, especially the valley. When I was there just over a week before, it was so frustrating to fight the crowds that I had to leave. This time we arrived fairly early–around 10 a.m.–and were able to find parking where we needed to.

After our brief break at the Woodpecker Tree, we loaded up the girls and ourselves and headed for the glorious high country.

To be continued . . .

(Note to my one astute reader who wondered if I’d lost my mind and forgot to post the photo . . . YES! on both counts. I started this post yesterday morning, realized I hadn’t saved the photos to Flickr, had to go to work and forgot I had scheduled the post for midnight.)

Here she is, in all her glory–Basement Cat, the survivor.

Basement Cat

Hunter and his new friend

In the first photo above, you can see the residue of her wound. It looks amazing considering the bite is at the most 8 days old.

I have had cats all my life, as have my girls. Every cat I’ve ever known has had attitude bar none. Except this one. Farida agrees with me that this is, hands down, the most loving, good-natured, sweetest cat we’ve ever met.  Nothing you do to her ever flusters her.  I’m so thankful it looks like she’s going to survive her bout with the Slithering Beast.

It’s a snakey year. Don’t let anyone convince you otherwise.

The last “person” who will try to convince you of that is Basement Cat. Basement may be down to either 7 or 8 lives at this point after her encounter with a critter of the reptile persuasion somewhere between Sunday afternoon and Monday evening.

Farida and her little family were down in Southern California visiting Snappy, and Jason called me Sunday to let me know they’d all be home Tuesday, but in the meantime asked if I’d go up and feed and water Basement and water the crops up the hill. At that point, Sunday evening, I was able to assure him that the animals were all well, and the crops were doing awesomely, as well. I’d just come back from the Cascadel compound.

Insert here a complaint that IF I had a camera, I would have been able to include photos of both Basement and the crops. But I don’t, and that’s a rant for another post unfortunately.

Anyhow. Basement had settled in at the ol’ homestead as if she’d always lived there. She’s turned out to be an incredibly friendly and loving cat, and Farida and Jason have become quite fond of her.

Fade to Monday. Because I needed to water the plants as late as possible to avoid the heat of the sun, I didn’t go up to the farm until almost 7 p.m. The plants were still all fine, but call as I might, I couldn’t find Basement. Anywhere. Her food had been eaten and her water drunk, so I replenished them in hopes that the kitty would reappear. I called Farida and let her know all of this. Jason apparently assured her that it wasn’t too surprising that Basement didn’t appear. She’d taken to wandering here and there in the short time she’d made her home with them.

At 4:00 pm Tuesday Farida and Hunter arrived home, and I caught her by phone just as she walked in the door.

“Is Basement there?” was my first question.

“I haven’t seen her yet,” the reply.

Not ten minutes later Farida called me back. “I’ve found Basement.”

“Oh, good.”

“Not so good. She’s been hurt.”

I felt awful . . . and responsible, although there was nothing I could have done, short of taking Basement home with me. Owning cats in the country, if they’re allowed to go outdoors, is always tricky business. We have raccoons, coyotes, mountain lions, the occasional bear . . . and snakes. The upside of that scenario is that . . . cats chase snakes. I’ve seen it with my own eyes, that country cats will face off against a rattler and send the interloper slithering off into the hinterlands.  That’s why Farida and Jason were happy to adopt Basement when I knew I couldn’t keep her.

So. Basement’s wounds were a little weird. They didn’t exactly look like a raccoon or coyote attack, but she’d definitely been hurt. Amazingly, though, she was quite alert, hungry and still as loving as ever.  Farida and I had made up our minds Farida would keep her inside and try to nurse her back to health, but by Wednesday morning, the wounds were worse. Base was still holding her own, still eating, using the litter box and in general doing far better than one would expect. Finally, though, they decided to take her to the vet, and it’s a good thing they did.

Dr. Nagle took one look at her and pronounced, “she’s been bitten by a rattlesnake. It’s too late for antivenom (which would have cost $1,000 a shot), so it’s all luck from here.”

He assured the kids that IF she survived would be a day-by-day thing. “And she’ll get worse . . . much worse . . . before she gets better.” Dr. Nagle did acknowledge, however, that the fact that she’s eating, drinking and peeing are all excellent signs. He gave her a large and expensive (though not nearly as costly as the antivenom) shot of antibiotics to guard against the infection that will do her in at this point if anything does, and the kids brought her home.

Farida and I had to make a trip to Fresno, so we left Basement in the capable hands of Jason and Hunter. Through the course of the afternoon, Farida checked in several times. Jason assured her that Basement was holding her own, eating like a pig and drinking, as well.

We are very grateful that Farida and Jason made the decision to take Basement to the vet, just so we know what happened to her. Farida has known since she’s lived up here (well, before, actually–since she’s heard me talk about rattlesnakes before) that we live in snake country. This is proof positive that she needs to be very wary of the possibility that one could be lurking about. We have no way of knowing where Basement was when she got bit or exactly when it was beyond the time from 7 p.m. Sunday through 7 p.m. Monday.

I forgot to mention that Hunter came to stay with me, and help with the vacuuming, while Mama and Papa took Basement to the doctor. Before they came to pick Hunter up, Farida called me from home and told me the results. And, she said, she and Jason would be delayed just a little bit longer. Jason was going to take Farida out into the forest and teach her to shoot the shotgun.

That didn’t happen. And that, too, is fodder for another blogpost. One that exposes a danger somewhat greater and more unpredictable than rattlesnakes.

Stay tuned, folks.

Paul Williamson, Bugler Extraordinaire

Continued from Blood, Sweat, Tears and Taps.

One correction needs to be made from the information reported there. When Sara read my post, she said, “I didn’t find out Paul’s age until we were on the trail. I didn’t have the nerve to ask his age directly, so I asked him the year he was born.”

I’d misreported that she’d found out at Von’s, before we left Oakhurst. If she had, she might have taken us aside and redesigned our plan.  As it was, we didn’t know, and we proceeded.

***

Shevy was not the fan of Yosemite that I am. In fact he’d told me that he’d been to the park more often since we’d been together than in all the years before that, put together. Still, he loved the hike to Sentinel Dome as much as any he’d done. He loved the 360 degree view from the top of the dome, and he loved the “top-of-the-world” feeling it gave those who ascended it. We’d climbed it in early morning, and we’d climbed it at sunset to watch the moonrise over the Clark Range. We’d negotiated that rocky trail by the light of headlamps, and Shevy had helped to doctor a fallen hiker in the very spot where Paul took his tumble.

That we were on this particular trail together to celebrate Shevy’s life (not his passing) was entirely fitting.

That we were there with a 92-year-old adventurer-raconteur-musician and life-of-the-party type fellow was even more so.

Shevy was no musician. He couldn’t carry a tune (although he could do a passable job of whistling the theme from “Bridge of the River Kwai” while I butchered it), but all those other things Paul is, Shevy was. As I began to realize having Paul there was almost like Shevy being with us, the tears began to flow, and they continued intermittently through the morning. Too many memories. Good ones.

Sara told me that Shevy’s non-stop talking actually was a later-in-life phenomenon. When the kids were growing up, he was mostly silent, and he engendered a certain amount of fear in them.  He made up for the silence in spades as he aged. As we hiked trails all over Yosemite and the Sierra Nevada, he would talk to everyone we met along the way. Sometimes he’d engage hikers from Britain or France or Tasmania in conversations so long the listeners’ eyes would begin to glaze over. Shevy wouldn’t notice, but I would, and I’d gently try to find a way to pull him away.

Paul was much the same. He clearly loved to tell stories, and he relished the company this outing afforded him.

Once planted on the rocky seat we found for him, Paul opened his trumpet case and pulled out the well-worn instrument he loved. It dated way back and had served him well as he’d actually performed with well-known bands. Wynton Marsalis had even expressed an interest in playing it. (That’s the problem with writing from memories several weeks old. Paul regaled us with tales from his youth and his earlier adult years, but I can’t remember the details. Where was my mini-digital recorder when I needed it? Back home in my office, of course.)

Sara took out the American flag she’d brought along and draped it over the rock in front of Paul.

“My friend Betty told me Jews place stones on a grave as a mark they were there to honor the deceased,” I mentioned, as I looked about for a stone to place beside the flag. The others did the same. It was like having Betty there with me, and she’d been with me at the memorials for both my mother and father.

Stones for Remembrance

When we’d hit the trail an hour before, there weren’t that many other people on it. Now more and more folks were passing by the spot where we’d set up camp. We waited for them to pass by before Paul began to play.

As the trail cleared in both directions, Paul raised the trumpet to his lips and sounded a crystal-clear version of the melody that for centuries has signaled the closing of a life.

Taps for Shevy

Paul certainly wasn’t shy, and he wanted to give Shevy his full due. After he finished “Taps,” he played and sang “Amazing Grace,” and then went on to “Claire de Lune” in honor of his wife.

After he’d finished, some of the folks went on to summit the Dome, while Angela, Nehanda and I waited. It gave Paul the perfect opportunity to share some of his memories with us. Turns out he was an educator, too, as Shevy was. And he impacted lives, as Shevy did.

After the rest of the group returned from the Dome, John decided to scout out the road I’d remembered from previous trips. We wanted to be sure we wouldn’t have Paul walk that distance only to find out it was a road to nowhere. Although once again he’d never admit it, he’d done about as much hiking as his 92-year-old body could handle. Just getting him to where he could get into the car would be enough for him.

After no more than five or ten minutes, John came back. “The road’s right up there.”

We got the gear packed up, and I slipped a rock  into my pocket. That’s a no-no. You’re not supposed to remove even a pine cone from a national park, but I needed a permanent remembrance of the day.

As you can see from the photos, Paul wore his U S Navy hat.

U S Navy all the way

The one thing missing from this gathering, besides Shevy himself, was Shevy’s Korean vet hat. He’d bought it one day when we’d stopped at the Fresno VA hospital to see about medical benefits. He wore that hat proudly whenever he felt he’d be around people who’d appreciate his military service. It would have been fitting to place it atop the flag while “Taps” was played.

After we got Paul up and going again with John, the rest of us headed back the way we’d come to get the cars.

It was a simple, unstructured ceremony out in the Yosemite wilderness.

Perfect for the simple, unstructured, unassuming fellow it honored.

Granddaughters Nehanda and Angela

Granddaughter Tiana (Tinker)

Listening - Nehanda, Tinker, Sara, John

It has been almost a week since the 640-foot snake showed up on my living room floor and surprised the bejeebers out of me and my friend Pat.

At the time we had only emptied one of these.

Only the Finest Is Served at Chez Grey Eagle

That situation was remedied rather quickly on the Evening of the Snake.

Since then Pat and I drove to Yosemite Valley, dined overlooking Bass Lake at the Lakeside Grill, enjoyed the magnificence of a Sierra Nevada Spring al fresco on the deck of Chez Grey Eagle, and she has returned to her daughter’s home in Southern California, preparatory to her return to Arkansas in just about a week. It was hard to bid her goodbye at the train station–not knowing when we’ll see each other again.

Due to the miracle of the Internet, we will certainly be in contact every bit as often as we were when she lived in Huntington Beach. It isn’t the same, I know, as being able to jump in the car and be in the same room together within a five-hour drive, but it’ll be okay.

May there be many more bottles of Charles Shaw’s finest in our future.

May there never be another 990-foot snake for either of us anywhere.

The above is courtesy of my favorite site, I Can Has Cheezburger.com .  I tried to paste their html code into my post, but for some reason (technologically challenged, perhaps?), I couldn’t get it to work. So I cut and pasted, giving credit where it’s due.

Seriously, though, today I am welcoming my first-ever overnight guest to the new house.

Pat, my newly-minted Arkansas friend, is back in California for a few weeks and arrives this afternoon to spend three.5 days with Foxy, Grey Eagle and me. We will be having a discussion about her lack of blogging for the past two-plus months, among other things.

Dogs Can Read

Something strange started happening on June 14. I discovered that Foxy can read. Even more amazing than that, she seems to read by osmosis. My two favored blog-reading positions are 1) seated at the kitchen counter and 2) on the couch–where I am at one end and Ms. F. is at the other, with the back of the computer facing her.

But the evidence is incontrovertible. On June 14, Foxy read this.

While both Foxy and Grey Eagle have always been most attentive when I am “doing my business,” as my mother used to say, all of a sudden Foxy has decided that while I am, ahem, incapacitated, I should be able to multitask. As in “pet Foxy.” She has decided that my seating myself is her signal to position herself in front of me, front legs perched on my legs or toilet bowl, belly exposed. Once she discovered that her method worked, she has returned time-after-time.

It has happened every single time since I read that post.

Close the door, you say? I don’t think so. At least not as long as there’s no other human in the house.

On another matter entirely, I love how the blogging world is so connected. If you’re like me, you’ve developed a list of sites that you turn to on a regular basis. They become like old friends. You post a comment and before you know it, that blogger visits your site. If you’re lucky, they become regular readers of your blog as you are of theirs. Then, every once in a while a blogger you know (as in face-to-face, real-time) shows up on a site you visit–it’s like a huge, ever-expanding network of friends.

I wish, wish, wish I could go to the BlogHer conference this year, which takes place in August in New York City. That’s not going to happen, but high on my list of 2011 activities will be BlogHer, wherever it may be held.

You thought I got my dates mixed up, didn’t you? Any self-respecting fan of the King knows his birthday is on January 8.

This is another king, but just as deserving of accolades as Elvis.

Happy Birthday to the King Kat: Grey Eagle Has Turned TWENTY!

I’ve mentioned a time or sixty that I live with an old cat. An old, crotchety, set-in-his-ways, boss-of-the-house animal. On or about June 1 every year I celebrate Grey Eagle’s birthday. I got him on July 15,1990, and he was six weeks old, so I calculate that June 1 would be the date on his birth certificate, if he had one. This year he turned the BIG TWO-OH. That would be One Hundred Forty in cat years.

That’s pretty darn remarkable in my book. And look how handsome he is, how bright his eyes are. He’s got most of his faculties (at least the ones we didn’t get lopped off during his first year of life), and he’s doing incredibly well. The rest of his body is pretty shop-worn, but his face is beautiful. He hears perfectly, he sees well, and he can still jump up on a bed without a problem.

I hope I’ll be doing as well when I’m 140. Guess there’s no hope of that. He’s already got me beat. And the way it looks, he’ll still be going strong when *I* hit 140–and I’ll be six-feet-under.