Notes of the Day

As a Father’s Day gift from Alison I received a massage from Claudia whose studio is in Alameda. This is the second time I’ve gotten a massage from Claudia. She is very skilled, and is also a practitioner of shamanism and hand analysis. She worked on my left shoulder where I experience pain if I lift and rotate it a certain way.

This day was also marked by a first meeting I attended of the West Contra Costa Retired Educators Scholarship Fund. I was invited to attend their end-of-year meeting at which they reviewed their financials for the year, their raffle and scholarship awards, and looking ahead for participation on the major committees, which include scholarship and raffle. Next year, July 2023-June 2024 are covered, but the following year two people are stepping down from each committee, meaning that this coming year the hope is that someone new will volunteer to join each committee and receive training to take on primary leadership in 2024-25.

This end-of-year meeting is always a potluck, and I, after much agonizing, decided to make an Asian chicken salad, a combo of a Vietnamese cole slaw that I’ve made in the past, but not for a while, and Chinese Chicken Salad. What I made ended up being Vietnamese Cole Slaw with eight ounces of shredded chicken from the whole chicken I cooked in the Rommertopf casserole clay pot. It turned out quite good. The dressing was a classic salty, sweet, sour mixture of lime juice, sugar, fish sauce, and chili flakes into which I mixed the shredded cabbage (I used savoy cabbage as napa cabbage was 4.99 a pound at El Cerrito Natural, which seemed outrageous to me!) I added red onion sliced with the mandalin, chopped cilantro and mint, chopped toasted almonds, and the chicken (the herbs and almonds were added at the meeting place in Pat Dornan’s kitchen).

It was good to see people who I hadn’t seen or heard their names mentioned in at least 15 years: Pat Dornan of course, Carol Honey, Jo Scherich, Debbie Haynie (though I have seen her more recently, say within the last few of years), and several others whose names I can’t remember. The other challenging part is that because I haven’t seen almost everyone in decades, I couldn’t recognize folks because their aging appearances have changed quite a bit.

I think I will join the board; people are desperate to have help and new people. This is so true for the raffle and scholarship committees. I’m a little hesitant to take either of these jobs on, not knowing how much time and work will be involved and whether or not I can commit to that. But several people said that everyone helps each other to get things done; this is a little reassuring that asking for help, and getting it, is part of the culture.

I must get back to Sue Kahn, who recruited me, along with Debbie Haynie indirectly, to let the group know of my decision. At this point I am leaning towards doing it. Eek!

i confess to one addiction I have: junk food. Fast food is usually the way I’ve consumed junk food, and it’s a struggle at times because there are so many fast food franchises within a couple of miles in either direction from our house. Burger King, Taco Bell, Popeye’s, Nation’s, Chipotle are a few that lie to the north. Der Wienerschnitzel, Jack in the Box, McDonald’s, and Wendy’s. I am not listing the several good tacqueria and burrito places, and burger and pizza joints. that serve food quickly and on demand. The commonality is that all of these choices are excessive and over the top with either fat, carbs, calories, salt, cholesterol, or often all of these. Which is why they taste so good. I think out of all the choices, the Mexican food places are less greasy and calorie-laden, but I have to go easy on the rice and beans.

On the way home from dropping Aya off, I was tempted to stop at one of these places for a breakfast sandwich or burrito, but passed on it and went home. I made myself a bowl of meusli with chopped up pear, apple, and strawberries, then topped it with high quality almond milk, pumpkin seeds, and chia seeds. After letting this sit for several minutes, I chowed down and now, about 20 minutes later, I am full and satisfied without feeling bloated like I would have if I had eaten fast food. So this is my reason for celebrating. Just acknowledging being successful and letting that sink in.

My 9-month old granddaughter I believe had a few firsts today. One, she rode in her car seat in my truck for the first time, which meant she rode next to the person driving the vehicle. In all the other cars she rides in, her car seat is in the back. We drove to Monterey Market, again her first time going there. She sat up in the shopping cart and did really well. That may have been a first for her, too. We picked up some 2% milk, non-fat Greek yogurt, almond milk, baking powder, bananas, almonds, and I think that was it.

While I was in the bulk foods section getting almonds, which runs the length of the aisle where people check out, there were three women at one checkstand who were watching Mayari adoringly. One of them was the checker. They said, “Such a cute baby! We’re the fanclub!”

There are many new buzzwords that I’ve read in the public discourse over the past—say, five years or so—which have become topics for discussion, debate, and analysis. By public discourse I mean didactic and interpretive writings in the internet and social media typically published by opinion writers, “thought leaders” (new term itself!), journalists, and the intellectual crowd. And before proceeding, from here on out in this post I will place quotation marks around words that feel to me have surfaced pre-pandemic or earlier, and are now accepted them into our usage.

Sadly, much of social media, news content, and choice of words smell of “chatter” and “noise” because the underlying demand for “clicks” smacks of the longing for quick individual notoriety, fame, and fortune. Let’s call this thing—individual clicks for quick attention—”qulicks”.

There

a string of moments

lemons, onions, and garlic

a chicken is cooked

Yesterday, Friday, I was walking towards Hal’s Office to meet my buddy Michael for our usual chat over two Americanos. I parked two blocks away to avoid a $60 parking ticket, got out with my two seat cushions in hand and began walking towards my destination. On the way I noticed an old, battered and bent sheet pan out on the curb in front of one house. On its surface were several converging cutting marks, telltale signs of the many baked and sliced pizzas which fed who knows how many people. I thought of a haiku.

Creases

bent, battered sheet pan

goldened so many pizzas

then left on street curb

Today is Day 13 in Chile, South America.  It´s February 26, 2010, and it is five hours ahead from Pacific Standard Time in California.

As one can easily see, it has been over a year since I have posted to this blog.  In the intervening months I have tried other methods of getting myself to write, including creating a web site on Google.  I´ve also been working on a web magazine that I´ve dubbed South59Review, using a web page design program, but it´s kinda slow going since it´s not Microsoft-based and therefore uses different conventions.  It´s a really decent program, from the UK and cost much less, but it´s taking me a while to learn how to use it efficiently.  I will keep plugging away at it, and upload the site to a web hosting service when I´m ready.

The reality is that the form in which I write is of little consequence.  My critical struggle and challenge is for me to write.

Being on another continent has been great in this regard.  It pushes and inspires me to reflect upon and write down my experiences over the past two weeks.  Many of my thoughts are about the privileges that my life is based on as a citizen of the United States.  While to date I´ve considered my existence somewhat modest in the context of the U.S.–living in a 900-square-foot home in a working class neighborhood in Richmond, California–the level of comfort I take for granted compels me to think about how my condition and its consumption of resources is based on the collective infliction of hardships upon many other human beings all around the globe.

I say this not in a spirit of self-aggrandizement, but as an effort to describe reality. 

Even within the U.S. context I realize that I live a life that has a lot of privileges and luxury.  I can drive where I want and not have to rely on public transportation.  I can buy any kind of food I want, eat at any number of restaurants serving any conceivable type of cuisine.  In the form of my pension I receive a stable form of income.  While I don´t have the capital to own a vacation home, or drive a Prius or Lexus or Audi or Mercedes (let alone a Maserati or Porsche) , or travel abroad whenever and wherever I want to, or buy the kinds of gifts for my loved ones that I´d like to, or buy season tickets to the Warriors or Giants or 49ers, I figure that I´m still  squarely in a privileged class. 

So this is what I notice and think about during my stay here in Chile.   It´s in the background of my mind  as Alison and I visit her Chilean friends and family members, as I struggle to understand the conversations in Spanish and try to communicate so clumsily and ineptly with the beautiful people here.   If only I can hold on to this feeling of life here through the lens of another people when I get back home.  My life in California is so U.S.-centric, and as such, my humanity feels a bit mummified, wrapped in layers of cloth encrusted with fossilized layers of individualism, isolation, consumerism, fear, and paranoia.  What I´ve learned from my Chilean friends is how being warm with each other is expected and natural, just part of being a human being.  It´s an important lesson to remember.

Tomorrow is our host Myrtha´s 80th birthday party.  This is the reason why we are here.  Myrtha is Alison´s Chilean mother, the matriarch of the family she stayed with during her senior year in high school.  Myrtha had 6 children over a period of 7 years–four daughters and two sons.  One daughter was murdered by the Chilean secret police during the Pinochet years.  The youngest, a son, died three years ago from a at the age of fall while climbing in the Chilean Andes.  The other four are all in their late 40s or early 50s, have families of their own and are doing well.

These are the folks Alison and I have been spending most of our time with.  It´s difficult to express how special for me to have these experiences.  I hope to figure out a way to stay connected with these people.  This experience also compels me to learn how to speak, read, and write Spanish.  So I´ll need to do this.  And learn how to speak Japanese.  The world is vast, yet touchable.  And I want to be able to touch it.

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