Journal Text
3.13.07
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There is a place on planet Earth that feels more like planet Earth than any city could. The air feels like air was most probably designed to feel; the wind is as raw and as ancient as the Redwoods......................................................................and not snow...................................no isolation except from the trees.........................................from the sunlight.........................................from the pleasant chirping of pacific birds.
3.14.07, perhaps 15.07
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As I stand up and walk towards the impenetrable steel stealth of a brick wall, my insides jump up at once in unison. A ballet of perfectly orchestrated and choreographed sequences; first the liver, then the lungs, then the heart. I can hear them counting the beats for rhythm, a rhythm so jagged and unexpected they collapse back to rest suddenly, in mid leap in the second act.
The brick wall in the alleyway brightly lit by sun and salt spray seems even more impenetrable when I'm closer to it, when I can see its veins up close and watch the blood cells individually bustle along with their Starbucks in hand walking briskly to make the morning elevator. I traced each masonry line between each brick with my finger and I still remembered their order from he top left brick; down and out down and out.
3.15.07
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Today we have seen a beautifully organized, systematic farm. It is the sustainable living experiment from what I gather. Rows and columns, rows and clearings, perfectly green grass. Solar panels. There is a wild abundance of bushy yellow flowers, we don't know if they are weeds but they probably grow fast, breaking the farmer's order and perfectly planned grid of agriculture. Unless they are planted flowers, their stems in perfectly parallel rows, and it is just their growth that makes them seem unplanned, unwanted. If they are weeds it is a poetic justice to the farmer, the completely breathtaking beauty of the uninvited yellow.
The sky is so clear I can see up to space. The space is so clear I can see far, far down the hill to the ocean and the peninsula further south, wearing a full fog strapless dress, testing my wanderlust with its shyly protruding peaks.
My writer friend from Chicago hates adverbs. She doesn't write poetry either, and is majoring in Animate Arts despite her natural penchant for creative non-fiction. I'm reading a creative non-fiction book right now and I really respect the art, making something personal, and probably boring, into something of literary worth that people actually want to read. I suppose it's easy to fail. Regardless, she wouldn't be feeling my unabated use of the adverbial modification of my admittedly lackluster verbs.
There is a gopher on my left. He is periodically poking his head out of his hole, reaching his teeth for something on the lawn. He doesn't leave his head out for long, and when he returns to his hole it is as if he is in immediate danger. He is a very paranoid gopher. To be fair, he could be a she. Or... are there transgendered gophers? He has ugly teeth; he's showing them to me.
3.15.07 actually, it's 3.16.07 now...
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Tonight I was situationally forced to walk across the HUGE [UCSC] campus to try to find my way back to my sick, dear dear friend and her boyfriend who was, thank GOD, talking great care of her. Right this moment I am typing to preserve my energy to watch my lovely blonde friend sleep her intoxication off and wake up to her full schedule. While i am relaxing in the sun, taking the luxury of sunburns and 2 hour disco naps, she is studying diligently her biology and worrying about her final exams.
The CSO [Campus Security Officer] is here. He is unbelievably authoritarian, fascist. As I type I wonder if he will read this paragraph, confiscate it, delete it. Erase my memory, or some 21st Century shit.
What is the CSO doing... is he waiting? Waiting to strike? Sniffing the bathroom like a bloodhound? Did she give him the right room number? My heart is actually bounding faster here, I am watching the crack beneath the door too see if I can see the shifts of light that indicate footsteps... Where is he? What is he doing? ... This is nerve racking and brain racking and just generally racking to my well-being, which has recently been infused with Vitamin D and other special benefits of being near the wonder of the Pacific Ocean, so close to the northern Pacific coast.
I have a feeling the CSO is gone now. Perhaps he was never laying in wait and it was my adaptation of the local brand of paranoia setting in. I hope she is not ill, I hope she isn't angry at my not coming with her exactly when I had the chance. Luckily she is safe now, and I probably would have just complicated things on the great quest East on the hill.
3.16.07
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Hours upon hours have passed since my night wanderings and my early morning paranoia. I have spent the majority of the day downtown, reading in the sun at sidewalk cafes, lazily checking out the citizenry and half-heartedly flirting with gelato salesmen. During my cat-like sits along the ocean street, I saw a one-footed bird rooting for crumbs along the sidewalk next to me. Every so often it would look me in the eyes, make a very bird-ish trill or chirp, then continue on its bizarre hobble in search of food. It was spectacular. I couldn't help but wonder how it lost its foot, and if there were other handicapped birds out there doing so well for themselves despite a lack of special parking spaces or government relief checks.
I also found out that the gopher of the lawn is my beautiful blonde friend's acquaintance. Perhaps I'll have her introduce me.
3.17.07... more accurately 3/18/07
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An uncorked bottle of champagne and a set of poorly communicated plans set the night in motion, and another uncorked bottle later we found ourselves in the middle of a meadow up a dark trail on the northern edge of campus. Apparently this is the entrance to the area where the "forest people" have decided to take residence, living out their anarcho-agregarian "free" dream in the forest surrounding UCSC. It's a bizarre idea and I have often fantasized about meeting one, asking him or her questions and looking at the stick they probably use as a toothbrush.
Regardless, we were in their, or someone else's, meadow, and without any warning we had become the audience to a troupe of performers. Two men were on African-inspired drums, and one was dancing with flaming balls doused in kerosene on the end of medium length ropes. He was the fire-dancer, and dancing with surprising coordination shirtless in the forest clearing covered by transient Pacific clouds, he transformed into an object of lust. A seedy proposition guarded and accented by two wildly moving balls of fire in the darkness. Accepting that his actual physical form may be... disappointing, to be somewhat restrained in my description - as the fire-dancer he is certainly a demi-god. A fabulously lit object. Lust in tangible, albeit scraggly, form.
After a brief, and unnerving, encounter with other members of the "audience," we returned to her dorm, maybe better described as a forest outpost, to recuperate. Giggling wildly, both with intoxication and nostalgia, my friend and I went to bed; her to her boyfriend's roommate-less room, and me to the bunk above the other roommate, the one who about two hours ago we had loudly interrupted during her sex with a friend. Luckily, the weather remains on track. Thank god for California and its "eternal bloom."
3.21.07
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On the airplane, returning home, The sun is rising over what looks like a sea of whipped cream--delicious and fluffy-- and the morning colors of the high altitude are a nice set of blues and oranges. It's a perk of waking up at 4 a.m. to begin the journey for a morning flight. The airport was aggravating as usual, but by now that's to be expected.
The cities below are still illuminated by their electric night, even as the sun comes up in dwarfing abundance. The vacation was good. It was necessary to breath air, to relax on beaches and sidewalk cafes and junky used book stores. Not thinking about much of anything.
- C, Santa Cruz, 2007