Travel

Cambodia: Angkor, 2005

In 2005, my son, David and my mate, Jeff spent two months in Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand. This would be David’s first trip to his other homeland (Cambodia) and Jeff’s and my first return to Vietnam since the war! I was inspired to post this by reading a travelogue on Vietnam and Cambodia written by Jean’s friend, Brigette. Summer 2005:

Battambang to Siem Reap & Angkor

Bayon, part of Angkor

What a day. Started at 0600 in Battambang with moto ride from our hotel to another hotel to buy boat ticket. Got to “Port of Battambang” about 0630. To get to the boat to Siem Reap we walked down steep steel steps maybe 100 -120 feet with too much space between each step and we were each carrying a large backpack. We climbed aboard the semi-crowded boat and waited for 0700. Shortly before then a police officer and someone else came down to ask to see our tickets. We were on the wrong boat. We moved to the next boat, which had a higher awning/roof – a very good thing. Plus, we were the only passengers! Off we went down the river and though we picked up a few passengers, it was never crowded. The boat was a “rooster tail” boat with propeller that stuck way out behind and when the speed picked up, there was a large plume of water about 10 feet high.

Angkor Wat in the morning

The river was fascinating. High banks most of the way, brown water all the way, and people on the shores most of the way. We cruised (so to say) though the backs of river people’s homes, some of which were boats, some hooches on stilts, some floating homes like on rafts, and some pretty nice. People were bathing in the river, fixing breakfast, fishing, and in general, carrying on with life. Children would run to the shore or stand on their boat homes and wave, shouting “HELLO”. One little boy about 3 years old ran to the shore, shouting and when we waved and shouted back he got all consternated and went stumbling backwards. We saw a great mud slide running from the top of the bank to the river and tiny boys hurtling naked and laughing down the the mud into the river. Reminded me of Chris and David when they were little, playing in the mud in our back yard.

As we got closer to Tonle Sap, the great lake and source of food in Cambodia, the river widened and the banks became less steep. Many river people along this section and more and more lotuses or some aquatic plants growing in the water. At several points they covered the entire river and there was nothing to do but fire on through, creating a brown and green rooster tail. Jeff looked back and said, “Man, we were jammin’ through them plants. It looked like a vegetarian with diarrhea.”

Someone’s home near Battambang

Finally we broke on through to the other side – to Tonle Sap. What a sight – huge brown lake with the shores out of sight. David and I were both deeply touched as the lake is so central to the life and well-being of Cambodia.

Got to dropping off point for Siem Reap and took a moto with a little trailer attached up the most amazing rutted road to Siem Reap. The ride was really bad – especially after a 5 hour boat ride – though David found the boat nothing but enjoyable. Got two rooms at Two Dragons Guest House. Very nice, very clean. $23 USD for a twin and single room with AC together first night, then went out and checked other places and negotiated down to $18 USD for the two rooms. Took off to Angkor Wat to see the sunset. The place to see the sunset was up seriously deteriorated and steep steps, but not bad for a millennium of use. When we got to the top, there was a second summit with an ancient temple on top. The steps up the temple were 12-16 inch risers with about 5-6 inch steps. It had just rained and was still sprinkling, so another interesting climb. The reward was immense, however. Again, David and I were deeply touched.

Tomorrow we head out at 0500 to watch sunrise. More later.

The street where our guesthouse was in Siem Reap

Siem Reap & Angkor

We’re staying at the Two Dragons GH, down a small dirt (muddy) lane off a side street in SR. There is no traffic and the people around are friendly. The GH is run by an American ex-pat who is out of town at the moment. Two Dragons is very clean, food excellent – but expensive, like $2.75 USD for pat si ew, and there are great photos on the walls. All in all a nice place.

We got some little battery-operated speakers in HK that are attached to portable CD or MP3 players. So here we are in this clean, AC room listening to Robert Earl Keen, Van Morrison, Willie, U2, Beethoven, Bach, and so on. It’s good, all right.

Except I had a long night with multiple multiple trips to bathroom. Still feeling bad in the morning, but, onward.

We got up at 0430 for an 0500 pickup by tuk-tuk to see sunrise over Angkor Wat.
– Angkor = the entire temple complex.
– Angkor Wat = most commonly pictured temple – 12th century – 5 towers on an elevated platform 1025×800 meters with towers and so on representing the universe.
– Bayon = Buddhist and Hindu ruin with huge faces set into the towers – most faces of the Boddhisatva Avaloketshivara (not sure spelling name)

Sunrise was beautiful. There were probably more than a 100 people there for sunrise, but no problem at all finding places where they were not. David and I walked up the long stone walkway across the moat through to the central building and on through to the other side. Stunning views in every direction. Walked past Angkor Wat to a smaller building same era and then through a cool and kind of eerie forest (though I sweated through my trousers – like the Hotel California guy in Bangkok) and back around to the front. By now the long night was catching up to me.

We went to one of the open air restaurants near the temple to use the restroom and have something to eat. The restroom, such as it was, was interesting. The water tank for use cleaning and flushing was shared by the two stalls. Made me think of the Seinfeld when Elaine was in the restroom and couldn’t get the woman next to her to pass over any toilet paper. In this case, however, the dipper was passed.

Bayon (Photo beginning of post) was next – a huge pile of ruins, with multiple towers, each with large faces carved into the blocks of stone. Many small corridors, cool and dark and nobody around.

By now I was weakening with abdominal pain, diarrhea, and dehydration – so I went back to the guesthouse and lay in the bed in a stupor – except of course, for those fast trips to the head. I thought David or someone was standing outside the room at the door, knocking with a quarter, but I was too feverish to answer and it was so hot. It turned out the overhead fan has an irregular clicking sound and it was all just a dream. David and Jeff got back in the afternoon. By then I was better, especially after David turned on the AC. David and I talked for awhile and he fell asleep, as did I.

The rain started later. This is my 3rd monsoon and I am so happy to be in it – though I hope it is not as heavy as the 2nd one in Vietnam, when water covered everything but the highest points and I got trench foot such that my feet were like two gross pink cantaloupes and I had to crawl everywhere for a week.

Musicians along a path in Angkor

So yeah, let it rain. LET IT RAIN. To be here with my son is a blessing beyond belief.

In Siem Reap

The past few days have been a true highlight of my life, despite the gastrointestinal issues: Traveling down the river to the Tonle Sap, being on the great lake itself, and now for the past three days, being in Angkor – and all with my son and my best friend. Photo: Angkor Wat

Angkor is breathtaking. For 25 years (since we first began our work with Cambodian refugees) I have wanted to see this and had begun to think, maybe I would not. So, to walk in and around Angkor has been like a dream – I mean it really felt like a dream – especially walking up the long roads leading to the structures and for most, hearing a drum in the distance and as we got closer, the sounds of other traditional Khmer instruments. Outside of most temples there is a group of 3-6 musicians sitting on a mat playing traditional music. All these musicians are disabled in some way, many from landmines – no legs, blind, arm gone – playing this haunting true trance music.

I watched them at weddings and ceremonies in Dallas over the years. The way it works is they come into the place where they will play, sit on a mat with their instruments, light incense, offer (to the muse?) cigarettes and whiskey, and begin to tune. And as they tune, they begin to come together and in a while, take off all together.

So we’re slow-walking through 1000 year old temples, monasteries, funerary structures, and the like, going deeper and deeper until the sounds of the Japanese and Korean

tourists are gone and there are only the sounds of the forest and our own occasional conversations. It’s hot here, but not bad in the shade and we’re slow-walking for sure through series of doorways through the centers of the structures, through narrow dark corridors, across jumbled piles of large sandstone blocks at the edges, and along dirt paths through the forest outside. And coming back, as we near the entrance, again, the sounds of the music.

Oh! I feel so good, so right
in my heart
in my life
in my soul

From Siem Reap we went to Phnom Penh, the capitol of Cambodia and that’s another story.

 

Eulogy

Eulogy, Charles Kemp

(10-minute reading, so relax)

Born August 30, 1944, in Tyler, Texas. Died ______________ in Berkeley, California. His greatest achievement in life was overcoming the karma of a difficult childhood and becoming a decent man, husband, and father.

He dropped out of high school in his senior year and spent a year and a half as a “climbing bum,” rock-climbing and hitch-hiking around Colorado and Wyoming, and working as a short-order and dinner cook. After returning to Dallas he completed high school, then returned west to climb. He started college but dropped out and joined the Marines in 1965.

After eight months of training, he was sent to Vietnam as an infantryman in the 26th Marine Regiment Special Landing Force. He saw heavy combat throughout his 13-month tour of duty near the DMZ but was only slightly wounded. He was proud to have fought in both the 26th Marines and 9th Marines in Operation Deckhouse (IV and V), Operation Prairie, the Hill Fights, Con Thien, Dodge City, and other engagements. Decorations included the Purple Heart, Combat Action Ribbon, Presidential Unit Citation, Navy Unit Commendation, and others. He learned that life is a gift. His entire life he was grateful to be alive.

He returned home in 1967 and attended college for a few semesters, but much of 1967-1972 was spent integrating the experience of the war with civilian life. He married his high school sweetheart, Leslie, in 1969. They had met outside the cafeteria at Thomas Jefferson High School when they were 16 – it was love at first sight and it endured. They were married 45 years. His healing came through Leslie, LSD, and the personal strengths he carried within. In 1972, he returned to school and graduated magna cum laude in 1975 from Baylor University School of Nursing. After working in community health for several years he entered graduate school in 1977 at the University of Texas at Austin, earning a master’s degree in psychiatric nursing.

In 1978, he founded the first hospice in Texas, the Visiting Nurse Association Home Hospice, serving as its director and hospice clinical specialist. Under his leadership the VNA Home Hospice had the largest daily census in the US and became a National Hospice Demonstration Project. He worked with people at the end of life for most of the rest of his life.

He taught at Texas Woman’s University and Baylor University, where he led courses in end-of-life care, psychiatric nursing, and community health nursing. Under his guidance in clinical settings, students took on expanded service-learning roles in planning and delivering health services in underserved refugee communities. In 2000, he completed the family nurse practitioner program at Baylor. He worked as an FNP at the Agape Clinic serving mainly immigrants and refugees for the rest of his career.

Hospice care, refugee health, community health, and primary care were the primary focuses of his career. Most of his professional work centered on building and sustaining collective efforts involving multiple individuals and entities. Throughout his life he was committed to doing and teaching compassion. He authored three books, over 70 articles in professional journals, and numerous papers.

In addition to hospice work, he had sole or primary responsibility for planning, implementing, and/or securing funding for the below.

  • District health services through Baylor School of Nursing and community agencies serving refugees
  • Expansion of the Agape Clinic
  • Vietnam Veterans Resource Center (later part of the VA VSO service)
  • The East Dallas Health Coalition, a community-oriented primary care clinic now open seven days a week with multiple adult and pediatric services

These and other services benefitted thousands of people. Most are still in operation today.

In addition to his Marine Corps decorations, awards included inclusion in the Great 150 Baylor graduates over the 150 years of Baylor’s history, Fellow of the American Academy Nursing (national), the Abner V. McCall Humanitarian Award (Baylor University), Faculty Award for Excellence from Elsevier Science (national award), Outstanding University Scholar at Baylor, Outstanding University Lecturer at Baylor, Margaret Stein Award for Outstanding Service in Community Health (national), Presidential Citation Vietnam Veterans of America (national), Outstanding Volunteer from Dallas Volunteer Center/ARCO, J.C. Penney Golden Rule Award, and other awards from the Dallas Police, DFW Vietnamese Community, DISD, State of Texas, Presbyterian Church, and others.

He was a serious baker, gardener, and rosarian. He was a backpacker with numerous treks in Wyoming and Colorado, culminating in a 10-day trip deep in the Wind River Wilderness to celebrate his 65th birthday. In his 60s, he reconnected with his hippie roots through involvement in the psychedelic trance scene. He (re)learned to dance in these underground forest parties and led workshops on the end of life and psychedelic therapy at gatherings in Texas, Colorado, and New Mexico.

He and Leslie adopted their son, David, at birth, and took great joy in “our little family.” David was a good and faithful son to Leslie and Charles. Charles and Leslie worked closely together in the Cambodian refugee community and at the Agape Clinic. From the time David was a baby riding on Charles’ shoulders to now David has been involved in these efforts to serve the poor and for justice. They found happiness in their simple family life, their home, and in working and traveling together. Leslie died in 2015, and Charles cared for her during her final months. They had been married for 45 years.

Written in the beautiful city of Hue in Central Vietnam in 2012: We went to the Thien Mu Pagoda, 45 minutes up the perfume river from Hue. This where the monk Thich Quang Duc lived before he went to Saigon in 1966 to immolate himself in protest against the VN government and the war. The pagoda and grounds were quietly beautiful – understated and mossy with just a few people around and a view from the grounds across the wide river, past the plains, to these mist-covered mountains where we fought and bled, where so many from every side fought and bled and died, aching for life – me for a beautiful dark-haired girl whose photo was so washed out from the constant slogging through rain and padi water that only the shadow of her left eye was left and now, 45 years later, looking across the room from where I write she’s sitting on the bed, the love of my life, beautiful, her hair white now and here we are in Hue and I look out through the glass-paned doors through the mist toward palm trees and mossy buildings.

In 2021, after living together for five years, he married the artist Jean Cacicedo. Together they enjoyed an “endless summer” (that lasted more than two years), the magic of Berkeley, countless intimate days, and the fullest life imaginable. They traveled all over California, Colorado, Montana, and Wyoming, and in Asia and Europe. They prepared numerous meals together, endured health challenges, got through the pandemic together, and they lived happily ever after in Paradise (Berkeley).

He was fulfilled in every respect.

He is survived by his son, David Kemp; his wife, Jean Cacicedo; and his brother, John Kemp.

“Walking downhill in Paradise”

Avenue of Trees on the way into cabin near Mendocino

Parked on Cedar Street, walked past one beautiful garden after another (it’s mostly gardens here, not lawns), walked past the original Peet’s on Vine at Walnut and down to the Cheese Board Collective on Shattuck. Standing in line at the Cheese Board today, surrounded by people more or less like me. What a great thing to be able to do this quintessential Berkeley thing, walking through a beautiful community and standing in line for a great bakery. People and dogs walking by, people sitting and standing at the sidewalk tables, babies and old pe

Red Sea Orange Feather

ople and everyone in-between. Inside, past all the great cheeses and on to the bread counter. Got sourdough batard, spelt loaf, cheese roll, double chocolate cookies. I do this once a week, along with trips to a truly great produce market and to the big and unique Berkeley Bowl.

In the past two months we had lovely three-day visits from David and Charles and from Jean’s niece Anne and her great niece Beatrice. They were the first overnight visitors we’ve had since the downstairs bathroom was redone and everything worked well.

Red Sea Orange Feather

Drove to Carmel for a show at the Carl Cherry Art Center featuring Jean’s and Janet Lipkin’s work. It was the first time I’ve seen Jean’s work on a person and finally I really get it that these coats she’s made are sculptures. https://carlcherrycenter.org

Peter Goodman wrote a book about his family bakery on Telegraph Avenue in the 1950s and 60s. The Berkeley Historical Society sponsored an event around the book and about a hundred people showed up. Lotta white hair and canes in that crowd!

The mighty Pacific from van

Drove to Mendocino. Stayed in a nice cabin across from the small town of Mendocino on the other side of a fjord-like inlet along the Pacific coast. From Mendocino you can barely see the cabin on the headland among the trees. Spent a beautiful day at the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens. The dahlias are in full and breathtaking bloom. https://www.gardenbythesea.org

The journey with getting the VA to recognize my service-related challenges is over with my goals achieved.

Watching the sun go down behind Mount Tam with the mighty Pacific stretching endlessly beyond into the great beyond. And in the morning in the hot tub looking out over the SF Bay with fragrant Philadelphius flowers hanging down above us.

Morning from deck

I’ve been writing my obituary and planning my funeral. One of the “tasks” at the end of life (or, preferably before the end of life) is a “life review.” Involvement in hospice and related work has led to an understanding of the importance of reviewing and an obituary is really a summary statement of review (and thus is worth doing).

Happy Birthday in Mendocino Coastal Gardens

I flew to Dallas for an appointment. The flight was scheduled for 6pm, delayed until after 8pm, and after an hour and a half, turned around and went back to Oakland. There were emergency vehicles lined up where we landed, but nothing happened. The passengers all disembarked, walked to another gate, and got on another plane. I got home at 5:37am, took a quick nap and showed up at 8am appointment, then went elsewhere to transact business (feeling impaired after 24+ hours awake).

Going to friend’s homes for dinner or having people over. Meeting friends for lunch. This week we celebrated my birthday with Jean at Dalida in the Presidio. Nancy and Peter had us over for another birthday dinner and we had Andy and Simone over for dinner the next evening. Happy birthday, CK!

Morning – in hot tub looking up

Peter N-R and I were walking home from lunch at the Kensington Inn. It’s an uphill walk – uphill is getting harder and harder – to get there and a downhill walk going home. Peter said, “We’re walking downhill in paradise.” That’s right.

Garden, Berkeley, 2019

Strawberries, salvia, iris, more salvia, thyme

The first glimmer was long ago pictures of some New Zealand cottage gardens. Then the gardens at City of Hope Cancer Hospital near LA. And Mitta Angel’s front garden and riding around with David when he was learning to drive – in Old East Dallas, especially Hollywood Heights, seeing gardens in front of homes – cottage gardens… From my Cottage Garden page – put up in 2003.

Sweet peas on the compost, recycle “corral”

Now I’m in Berkeley, which must surely be the cottage garden (and hippie garden) capital of the universe! We took out the front garden to revision the front – including putting in a fence to keep the deer out. Now, in addition to the beautiful flowers that were here in the front garden before, there is a kitchen/herb garden in front. A pretty curving stone path starts at the arbor and splits to go to the kitchen door (the one everyone uses) and to the front door. No lawn – all flowers and herbs.

Herbs in the front (kitchen) garden:

Going up path from kitchen steps

Thyme
Lemon thyme
French tarragon
Lemon grass
Sage
Chives
Oregano
Sweet marjoram
Lemon verbena

Map of the garden – posted on corral gate

Lemon balm
Rosemary
Peppermint
Spearmint
Borage
Parsley
Basil (sweet, lime and Genovese)
Cilantro
Chamomile

Other good things in front include about 25 ever-bearing strawberries (Seascape and a few other strains). We have two blueberry bushes, which will give a few berries this year. Lemon tree. Lime tree. Garlic is coming up. Raspberries look strong. We put in one Sungold tomato in front. I planted cantaloupes (Ambrosia) and cucumbers yesterday.

I’m excited that this year is the first time I’ve ever grown sweet peas and foxglove. One of the sweet peas is blooming,

Front gate. Sculpture by Bill Sorich.

but I think the ones I planted from seed will need another 3-4 weeks to bloom.

Flowers in bloom right now. There is a beautiful clematis with white flowers on the arbor. Also, the aforementioned sweet peas, manzanita, coreopsis, sweet alyssum, lantana, rosemary, lavender, tansy, rose, blue salvia, butterfly sage, purple bell vine (rhodochiton), maroon salvia, orange-red salvia, iris (from Jean’s father and from Sydney), camellia, helleboros, calla lilies, borage, nasturtium, persicaria, loropetalum, Aztec marigold, and impatiens sodenii. Alstromarium, foxglove, and hollyhocks are budding.

Berries photographed in 2018

And so the garden grows. Baked chocolate chunk cookies yesterday. Gave some to the people across the street. A few weeks ago we got a bale of straw for the strawberries (to keep the berries off the dirt so they won’t rot as they ripen). Now we seem to be growing a fine crop of hay alongside the strawberries.

 

Hawks, healing, in the Temple, Siem Reap, the miracle

Father’s Day, 2018 (at The Ritz – oh my)

“And we will not remember that we ever felt the pain.

We shall walk in gardens misty with rain.

And we will never grow so old again.”

Front door, Berkeley

We were sitting on the deck high over the San Francisco Bay, watching a hawk, soaring high above us, and now another, soaring, spiraling in great sweeps in the blue sky, and now a smaller hawk, soaring upward, following one of the larger ones – it’s a flying lesson! Higher! Higher! The young hawk soaring into the blue distance.

“Just then I saw a young hawk, and my soul began to rise” – from Roll Me Away

Jean and I met on OKCupid. Her name on that site was birdsoaringhigh. Life!

We were listening to When the Healing Has Begun and we talked some – realizing that we’re experiencing “our song” differently now, because we’re different – no longer crushed by grief. It’s not that the grief is gone; it’s that we’re both so much better now – seeing the healing process as mostly in the past.

Yet the song resonates so strong within both of us…

“We’re gonna stay out all night long

And in the morning we’re gonna run across the fields.”

It’s been about 10 months since we stayed out all night long – in our tent, in the forest, psychedelic trance music echoing through the woods – and in the morning we did yoga with Kristina and then swam in the cold spring-fed lake. Cannonball!

Precious days and nights overlooking The Bay in our warm bed, grey mornings and now the light breaking through the clouds like in layers and the coffee is strong and good. We’ve learned not to talk too much about the coming day because then we’re there and then and we’d rather be here, now. It’s cool in the bedroom, the temple, here with a shaman princess (seriously). There are always flowers by the bedroom/deck doors, the curtains are three layers of lace, of starry night, of black and white, stirring barely in the soft morning breeze.

Chancellor’s cutting garden

(I was in a guest house in Siem Reap, the town closest to Angkor. I had a fever and I was lying in the bed, barely able to move. Someone was knocking on the door with a quarter – click click click click on and on and on will it ever end click click click and later that day, when David and Jeff got back to the room, I discovered that it was the fan, clicking along driving me insane like some old Indochina colonialist way up river, lost in a jungle fever…)

Will we really never grow so old again? Surely we’ll be sad again, we’ll grieve, we’ll lose our way, we’ll die, but old like before? No. That was like soul loss. Those were the darkest days for both of us. Then arcing across 1700 miles our hearts united. Our life together a magical poem. Knowing, yet again, love is the main thing in life.

 

Vietnam 1967, 2005

Jeff Wiseman, Charles Kemp, 2018

Jeff and I met in Infantry Training Regiment (ITR) in 1965. We went through ITR, weapons school (he was in rockets, I was in machine guns), a holding company at Camp Pendleton, landing force training with the 26th Marines, the sea voyage from Long Beach to the Philippines (Olongapo – hell yes!) and on to Vietnam. In VN we fought together at the DMZ, near Dodge City, and elsewhere in I Corps – life on the edge. After the war we lived together in Dallas and Carson City. Ultimately we went different directions, but stayed connected. In later years we went backpacking and to festivals together. He stayed with me when Leslie died.

It’s been 53 years.

Charles Kemp, Mike Noumov, Jeff Wiseman – Hill 55, at the rear, drunk as lords, 1967

He was visiting me in Dallas a couple days of ago. Hanging out, the usual. We told war stories – checking one another’s memories, filling in the blanks. I was thinking he tells more stories than I, for which I am profoundly grateful. But yeah, I have memories. Like when the rocket hit right beside the tank driver’s head. To me, it looked like a radio exploding. Later, after the fighting stopped, I helped pull the driver’s body up through the hatch. His head had been blown off from his upper teeth up; you could see his bottom teeth in all the blood kind of like looking up at us when we pulled him up out of the tank. I got his .45 to replace the one I’d been issued and then sold.

It had already been pretty horrible, “like Tarawa” some old-timer journalist said close to the edge of battle, and I thought, not really like Tarawa, but Fuckin-A anyway.

My gun. 37 pounds with 200 rounds

It was a 4-5 day battle. Balls to the wall all the way. When we got to what passed for the rear, the tanks circled up and everyone in our infantry company just fell out on the ground, sleeping wherever we hit the deck. In the morning I remember seeing all that was left of 1st squad guns spooned together under one poncho. Three men of the original 10.

I remember one of the guys who had been shot in the chest, lying there on his back, all white from death and no blood left. The round that killed him had punched through the Bible he was carrying in his chest pocket. I remember someone going through his pockets and holding up the Bible, saying something like, “Look at this” and then tossing it to the ground. We were getting hard.

(In 2005, David and Jeff and I went to Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand. For David, it was his first visit to Cambodia, his other homeland. For Jeff and me, it was our first time back to Vietnam since the war. Here is the travel blog for that trip.

We were on the train from Saigon to Danang. It was about an 18 hour ride in our four bunk “soft sleeper.” In the fourth bunk was a Vietnamese woman with

Girl on the train

her 3-4 year old granddaughter. In the green Vietnam morning I was in my top bunk listening to Cat Stevens.

Morning has broken, 

like the first morning

Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird

Praise for the singing

Praise for the morning

Praise for them springing

Fresh from the world.

Someone brought rice porridge with a little meat and onion. Tabasco, I have it! We pass the bottle around. The lady digs the Tabasco. Back in my bunk. The coffee guy comes along the passageway. Café sua da –

Vietnam, near “Dodge City” – in the old days, walking across the beautiful padi was very dangerous.

strong and sweet on ice. Could it be any finer than this?

The green of Vietnam, that intense green, passing by my window…

Praise with elation

Praise every morning

God’s re-creation of the new day.

Tears running down my cheeks. Vietnam, I’ve been loving you too long. “Whole generations of westerners who went out there as soldiers, doctors, planters, journalists … lost their hearts to these lands of the Mekong … they are places that take over a man’s soul” (Jon Swain, one of the last westerners out of Cambodia in 1975).

David and Jeff in Hoi An, 2005

War posts and photos:

https://ckjournal.com/vietnam-1966-67-part-1-landing-force-dmz

https://ckjournal.com/vn-66-67-part-2-hill-55-dodge-city

https://ckjournal.com/vn-66-67-part-3-psyops-and-the-hill-fights

 

 

India 2018

At palace in Udaipur (photo by Jean Cacicedo)

Hong Kong to Delhi – another easy flight in Cathay Pacific business with good food, quiet cabin, lying down, sleeping – what a way to travel!

Delhi airport – easy immigration and no security slowdown for foreign elders. Then taxi chaos and a wild ride in a tiny rattling van to our hotel near the airport in the dystopian smog of Delhi. I’ve never seen smog like this. I’m starting to react – “reactive airway” is the perfect description and diagnosis. Cup of chamomile tea and sleep with dreams. In the morning, Delhi airport domestic departures OMG a true sea of humanity, but everybody behaving and the line moving pretty good and before long taking off in morning smog just like the night smog. Got a cough and wheezing going on.

Udaipur: another crazy taxi ride beep beep beep. In California, motorcycles go between lanes of cars; in India, cars go between lanes of cars. The taxi stops before the hotel as streets are too narrow for cars. Onward via tuk tuk and now here we are at Amet Haveli, a “heritage hotel.”

Hanuman temple Udaipur

Ahhh, now we’re truly in India and the first part of the trip is over! The Amet Haveli is very nice, old-fashioned, luxurious. Time to hit the streets – narrow lanes, barely enough room for a tuk tuk, and when you add Jean or me, someone has to yield, and it won’t be the tuk tuk. Yikes! Intense!

Mind your head, she said

The next day we’re back on the streets, walking to the City Palace – it’s rural kids field trip day at the Palace with crowds of students filling the halls and rooms. We’re sitting on a ledge and a crowd of 10-11 year old boys starts crowding around us, staring, seemingly mystified, some smiling, some just staring, crowding closer and closer until they’re too close for (our) comfort and we split, up stairs, narrow corridors, doorways (“Mind Your Head”), small rooms, down stairs, narrower corridors, and all the while b

Photo by Jean.

ody space closer than what we’re used to – bring it on!

We had dinner on the hotel lake terrace. Great food. Went for a walk after dinner, along dark alleyways, opening on to a temple for Hanuman and here is a smaller shrine to Hanuman with two men inside. One man steps outside and the other man says to me, “Do you want to know about God?” “Sure! Is this for Hanuman?” “Yes – here,” he says, offering me and the other man a bite from the offering he was making. “Thank you. What should I do?” “Eat.” “Okay.” And I take the bite, offering it to Hanuman and David Overton.

Our room in Udaipur

In the morning, sunrise over the lake and Palace, making love in the early light.

We take a car from Udaipur to a village, Narlai. On the way we stop at a Jain temple in the middle of nowhere. It’s a marble wonderland, with endless carved columns and rooms and domes. Onward to Narlai, where we have a reservation at another heritage hotel, Rawla Narlai.

Here we are at the most opulent place I’ve ever stayed. Our suite has a terrace on the manicured lawns, marble floors, and on our jukebox, a mix of Grateful Dead, Chopin, Brandy Carlisle, Jerry Lee Lewis (has Jerry Lee ever been heard in this place?).

At night we meet two other couples for wine and then a ride in bullock carts (two people/cart) through narrow village streets and into the very dark countryside – see the stars! I recall the first time flying over India at night where it was all completely black, black as black, and occasionally a sprinkle of lights where there was a city with electricity. Now there is electricity almost everywhere.

When we were almost to our destination there was a fire by a 20’ high rock by the road and an almost naked sadhu standing there blowing a little horn and soliciting baksheesh, which we gave, which elicited more excited horn-blowing. Ahead were 100s of candles and lanterns and the step well (a hole in the ground about 75 yards on a side and 50 yards deep). There was a man part way down strumming a string instrument and shaking cymbals and singing – home-grown trance. Good food, good times.

Hotel restaurant Udaipur

In the morning, lying in bed talking about intimacy and what happens when we die. Will we ascend like sparks of light to join with all the other lights of those who went on before – unimaginable Union!? Will we be united with loved ones who’ve gone on before with our consciousness and identity intact, i.e., “me,” “you,” “her,” “him?” Will we just cease?

Whatever the case may be, it’s our homegoing and we’ve lived enough, suffered enough, loved enough that whatever, we embrace it. Oh Life! It hurt so much and now our happiness and all else embraced. This is the train. Complete.

Some food:

Curries

Thali in Narlai

Bharwan tandoori aloo

Mint raita

Garlic naan

Chicken soup

Pakora

Thalis

Khozi kozambu

Lahsumi palak (spinach)

From Narlai we took a car to Jaipur – a five hour ride, including a stop at a fantastic Jain temple in the middle of nowhere. Guy offered to say a prayer for us, which we declined as it was a hustle. Onward, through troops of long-tailed monkeys sitting on stones

Marigold deco in Narlai. Getting ready for a party.

beside the road. Someone in a people’s bus ahead of us threw some bananas out the window and monkey-shines ensued. Otherwise it was an uneventful trip.

Jaipur – oh my, more urban chaos, but not near as polluted as Delhi. I’m coughing and wheezing more than before, so we stop at little pharmacy to buy an inhaler. I’m thrilled to find exactly what I wanted: an inhaler with levalbuterol and beclamethasone. Puff-puff.

We stayed at the

Not a bad pharmacy in Jaipur (photo by Jean)

Arya Niwas, a mid-range hotel recommended by Jean’s friend, Sophina. It was “an oasis in a sea of chaos.” Nice room, nice staff, decent food, good breakfast buffet.

On our first full day in Jaipur we went to a nearby town to visit Jean’s friend, Charlotte, who deals in textiles (see https://maiwa.com/). Traveling now is much like the last few times Leslie and I went to Southeast Asia: everything seems to take so much effort that we basically do one thing/day other than be, eat, sleep, and so on.

Tuk-tuk girl

Somewhere along the line we began experiencing GI issues. Was it the soup? The ginger drink? The hummus? Who knows? Jean kept on trucking while I laid up at the hotel. She had some misadventures at the Pink Fort and good times at a museum.

Dancing in the hotel (however briefly).

Winding down. Trying to figure out what next – Goa vs. Dharamsala? Both lead through Delhi twice and though I’m wheezing less, I’m not 100%. Then there are the GI issues. In the end we decided to come home early – a great decision.

We took a car Jaipur to Delhi – about five hours past endless iterations of the same shops, cafes, cows, trucks, buses, etc., etc. The lounge at the Delhi airport was perfect: nearby workers were cutting metal with a power saw – RRRRRRR, Screeeetch, the smell of hot metal… sigh. On to HK for a 6 hour layover, but we found a couch to lie on. Feeling marginally better. Nice, clean, quiet airport. Easy, long flight. Both of us very tired, still with GI problems.

Night view from our room in Udaipur

Random thoughts:

Independent travel in India is probably best done when younger. It’s a very challenging place, even with staying in nice places and comfortable flying.

We’re both good travelers, good attitudes, good communications, and that feels good.

Based on how I feel now (home for a week and today was my first day of feeling physically well all day), our decision to leave early was clearly the best decision.

Sunset today, 1/29/2018, Berkeley California.

 

 

 

Hong Kong 2018

Hong Kong Island, Central

50 years ago this month I first was in Hong Kong. Since then I’ve been in this city about 20 times. The first time was on R&R from the war in Vietnam. The last time was with Leslie in 2013, less than a year before she passed away. Most of the times it was on the way into Asia and again on the way out, with Hong Kong bookending two month trips into the magic of travels with Leslie. Now I’m with Jean and the magic is alive. It’s different, of course, but undeniably beautifully magical.

At the moment we’re on the big A-350 jet riding high and smooth above the mighty Pacific Ocean – the same Pacific we see from the deck of our home in Berkeley.

Life!

The first time in HK was a surreal respite from

Exactly 50 years ago, after R&R in HK

war. I stayed in an anonymous hotel, had anonymous sex with several women (I was anonymous; they were anonymous), drank a lot, hung out with several British soldiers, rode the Star Ferry, ate at Ricky’s Café, drank more – one night I got everyone in a bar to stand while I stood on a table singing The Eyes of Texas, yeah – I was a piece of work alright – and most notably spent a few days with a nice Chinese girl. On the way back

to Vietnam, I got a

Jean resting at the (people’s) Fa Yuen Market

quart of gin and a bottle of champagne, which Jeff Wiseman, Mike Noumov, and I drank on an epic drunk at battalion headquarters on Hill 55 before I staggered back insensate into the war.

In 1978 when Leslie and I were living in Austin, she came home from work one day and asked what would I think about going to Thailand? Yes! Sure! We bought one-way tickets in the back room of a Thai grocery store going from Dallas to Hong Kong to Bangkok.

That first time we stayed in a place in the Chung King Mansions. Leslie was nauseated every time we got into the back hallways. We rode the very funky, very small elevators crowded in like sardines with people from across the world – Indians, Arabs, Europeans, Africans, not many Americans. I would wake at 2 or 3 in the mornings and sit all folded up in the tiny, tiny bathroom reading a Larry McMurtry book. We rode the Star Ferry, ate at Ricky’s, and walked and walked and walked, high on life. Then onward to Thailand, Burma, Nepal, and on around the world.

The view from our room

In 2005, David and Jeff and I were there on our pilgrimage back to Vietnam (for Jeff and me) and the first visit to Cambodia (David’s other homeland). We stopped off in HK on the way in and the way out of Asia. Sometime during those days I was riding the Star Ferry alone (I thought probably my last ride). There was a little girl and her father sitting directly in front me. She was singing, first in Chinese, then in English,

“Row, row, row your boat,

gently down the stream,

Merrily, merrily, merrily,

Life is but a dream.”

The day before we left we were in Big John’s Café, a small place in Tsim Sha Tsui, and on the sound system was,

“Those were days, my friend,

We thought they’d never end,

Writing on the Cathay Pacific plane

 

We’d sing and dance forever and a day.

We’d live the life we choose

We’d fight and never lose,

 

Those were the days,

Oh yes those were the days.”

And so it has been.

And now it’s three hours before we land (we slept for about six hours)… Jean and I in our life together, 22 months and still our magic unfolding. I’m writing and Jean is creating art – because that’s what she does. My jukebox is playing Brandi Carlisle, Chopin, Van Morrison…

These are the days.

These are the days that

Wonton noodle soup (shrimp) at Tsim She Kee

will last forever,

You got to hold them

In your heart.

I’m so high!

In the Fa Yuen Market (photo by Jean)

Two nights ago we went to a party at Peter N R’s house. It was a total Berkeley party. Stood out front smoking a joint. Inside the question arose, who was Joe Hill? Three people broke into song – “I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night, alive as you and me.” Someone was talking enthusiastically about her meditation teacher. I laid a little something from the Bible on her – “In my Father’s house are many

Tsim Sha Kee

rooms.” Jean danced, I didn’t. An old friend of hers and I talked about how just because someone is gone from our lives doesn’t mean that they have to really be gone. Jean and I were talking with a Jewish woman and Jean said, “I have Jewish guilt.” I could see the woman prepping for something weird. Jean said, “I’m the only person who didn’t bring any food.” LMAO.

From Victoria Peak

New Years Day lunch with David and Charles and John and Sherry at a restaurant on the water in San Francisco. David updated

Jean’s Global Entry on his iPad. We talked of music and writing and art and life.

“Baby, ain’t it all worthwhile.”

Tuesday I went to San Francisco to see David. We talked about travel and Leslie and what David said a few days about he and his Mom and I never really had any issues – any big anger or angst – it has always been all of us trying hard, knowing what we have, just like now.

Life!

A couple of days later (night before last): I went for an evening walk along the crazy crowded streets and saw a place I had looked for several times since David and Jeff and I were in HK in 2005. It was Big John’s Café. I had wanted to take Leslie there, but never could find it, and now here it was! The next morning Jean and I went there for breakfast. On the sound system was The Sounds of Silence.

On the Star Ferry. Deep personal meaning to this photo

Life is a miracle!

 

First post: Vietnam

At the DMZ – with 1/9, “The Walking Dead”

This post (a repost of part of my first web page, 2007) marks the transition from blogspot to my own web address (ckjournal.com). Thanks David!

American Dream…

To Dwight Laws, KIA 10/30/66 inside the company perimeter near Hill 55
To Lurch Donohue, KIA 3/1/67 in a deserted ville near Route 4
To Jerry Georges, KIA 3/23/67 at the Hill 55 bridge

They were good men. We were young. They could have lived a long time.

Photo: me, Mike Noumov, Jeff Wiseman at the rear on Hill 55 on my return (bearing gifts) from R&R. Over and over again we were playing the Byrds album with Turn! Turn! Turn! on it – “a time to be born, a time to die; a time to kill, a time to heal; a time to laugh, a time to weep; a time for peace, I swear it’s not too late.” Do you think that wasn’t blowing our minds? (4 of the first 5 photos are mine; the rest by someone else; all are taken at places/battles I was in.)

Here is the whole story of how Donohue was killed. For the first 10 or so years after I came home, there was never a day that I didn’t run this through my mind at least once – like some kind of video. I gave my compulsive rumination a name: How Donohue Got It. Then in 1978 I spent a week in a retreat with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, Stephen Levine, and others. That was the first time I told this aloud. The second time was with my brother, Jeff (who identified Donohue’s body back at battalion). I seldom think of this now.

We were on patrol north of the bend in Route 4, the dirt road that went by C Company’s

My gun at the DMZ. Ready to rock.

position. There were no civilians left in this area (where 1/9 got its name, The Walking Dead) – a ghostly overgrown area of deserted villes, fields, and woods. Donohue was my A-gunner. We were digging in the first night of the patrol and he wasn’t doing his part of the digging. I asked him what was going on and he had trouble answering, but finally said he wasn’t going to make it. He was really sad. I said something like, “Bullshit, man – we’ve been here too long to not make it.” I dug us in and gave him a smoke (though I don’t remember that he smoked – I’m not sure about this – maybe I just wish I’d given him a cigarette). But he was inconsolable. He knew.

Operation Prairie. Real shit, man.

Charles Kemp during Operation Deckhouse. Later that day we had several tanks blown away.

The next day we saddled up and I gave him my machine-gun. Not too much greater love than to give up your gun for another man – because my gun was my hope, my friend, my ticket home. I loved that gun; and I was pretty good with it. Please allow me to introduce myself … We moved out, into a deserted ville. I was walking left flank point and came to a hedgerow of bamboo with a closed gate the only way through. Going through that gate was death – no question about it, there was a mine somewhere with the gate. I was crouched down, trying to figure out a way to stay on line and not be killed when there was a powerful explosion off to my right and someone started yelling, “Corpsman up! Corpsman up!” In a heartbeat I knew Donohue was the explosion.

I took off up the trail to the right and there was a man standing frozen in the trail still shouting for a corpsman and my recollection is that I ran literally up and over him (though how could that be?) and there was Donohue. He was on the ground with both legs blown off. I was beside him and saw that one stump was left with shattered bone sticking out and his guts were spilled out of where the other one had been. He was still alive! He was moaning and moving around a little. I was on my knees beside him and we were receiving fire by then. I was struggling with whether to go ahead and finish him off, because he was definitely going to die and even if he didn’t die, what was the use of going on like that. Then life went out of him. I’m grateful I didn’t kill him. I joined in on the firefight and then

At the Hill Fights (“the first battle of Khe Sanh”)

it was quiet; and then I had to find my gun as it wasn’t by the body. I remember walking through the bushes and trees looking for the gun and there were little pink/grey gobbets of Donohue everywhere and on my face and hands too. The smell. I found one of his feet before I found my gun. The foot was heavy and the gun was out of commission. For some reason this whole deal was the last straw – just too much. I mean, what for?

OR in bunker at Khe Sanh

I pretty much lost hope after that. We had been in the field for about eight months: out on patrol 3-4 days, back to company for a day, out for a night ambush, another day in, and back out on patrol 3-4 days – week after week, month after month and every day, at least one casualty. I realized there were hardly any of the original men left. By then it was a company of mostly fucking new guys and there was nobody I wanted to even talk to.

I was also having weird thoughts. Like maybe I could just walk out of the perimeter a couple of klicks to a ville we’d been through a few times where a one-legged girl lived (lotta one-legged people in them parts) and I could take her an adjustable crutch so she wouldn’t have to walk in the bent and twisted way she walked with her too-short stick of a crutch. A time to heal. Or maybe I could slip out and maybe run across a VC or two and instead of killing each other we could sit down in a clearing somewhere and drink a bottle of whiskey together and have some smokes and talk about our girlfriends. You know, have a good time. Be normal. A time to laugh. These sounded like really good ideas to me and I was thinking about them a lot – all the time. Now I realize that I’ve spent much of the past 40 years taking a crutch to that girl – and I have miles to go before I sleep.

Dinner time

A few weeks after Donohue was killed we were out on a night ambush and ran into another patrol from our company. The word had not been passed that we were going to meet. I was on point and when I saw the first man in the dark – like about 10 feet away, man – I started shooting. I shot the point man of the other patrol in the leg, hip, and chest (lucky for him I was carrying an M-14 instead of the 60); and the man behind me shot him in the chest with a grenade launcher. I remember watching one of my rounds (tracer) hit him and fly off at an angle – which was pretty far out. We were so close that the M-79 round didn’t spin enough to arm, hence didn’t explode and ended up lodged in his neck. Incredibly, he lived. There was an article in Stars and Stripes about the surgery to remove the M-79 round. I don’t remember the name of the man I shot, except that we called him the Red-Headed Mexican and he was a good guy. I remember (before I shot him) him going crazy in Dodge City (Thuy Bo) and charging a VC position right after Zamora was killed. Three helicopters shot down right there that day. 13 KIA and 66 WIA that operation. Keep on rockin in the free world. And now I know his name because a few weeks ago I read a copy of the article about the incident! Raymond Escalera. The article said I shot him only once. There was an investigation and not long after I was transferred out of 1/26.

Sometimes, in a dream
You appear

Thank you Jeff. To everything, Turn! Turn! Turn! there is a season, Turn! Turn! Turn! And a time to every purpose under heaven, Turn! Turn! Turn!

A gunner (like me) at Khe Sanh. Cleaning his weapon. Goddam, good gun, good smokes.

I started at MCRD San Diego, then Infantry Training Regiment & Machine Gun School; Camp Pendleton & las Pulgas for Special Landing Force training. On to Subic Bay & Olongapo (oh, how we partied, like doomed youth) in the Philippines; first landing southern South Vietnam (1st casualties); second landing Deckhouse & Prairie for serious battles (photo from Operation Prairie – yeah, man, it’s real); Hill 55 & Dodge City (snipers, mines, occasional firefights & some battles – see above); Dong Ha & Hill Fights (168 KIA, but it took awhile); also at Con Thien, Gio Linh, and Khe Sanh, though not for long in these last three. If there was a sound track to this section it would be Sympathy for the Devil, maybe Gimme Shelter. We won every battle and beat back very attack, but America lost its will and lost the war. Nice work, so-called “greatest generation.” All told, 13 months

A beautiful sight

in combat (well, you know, not every day) in the two provinces (Quang Nam & Quang Tri) accounting for 25% of the US KIA (I think there are 20 or more provinces in VN); Danang, The World. God. I’m alive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Endless summer, Wyoming, Colorado, grief, love, camping, road trip

Our “endless summer” started in May 2016, though we didn’t name it until May 2017. 
A small section of a very big sky!

…into Wyoming, highway up and down and around in rolling high arid steppe – lots of sage, scattered livestock, a few herds of antelope, into a fertile river valley with green fields, herds of livestock, the majestic mountains in the near distance, the Snowy Range coming into view, coming closer to Centennial, where Jean came deeper into herself. 

Jean’s work, 1970s
What does it mean to be with a woman like you – who opens me to my tears – who opens me to deep awe and joy. Driving across the Wyoming high country, across the BIG SKY country feeling as if we’d taken something psychedelic – so high and so good. “It’s good to have been high before, because now we know what’s happening now.” 
The dream is reality.

Willows!

In the Snowy Range
You told me I help open places in you – as you help open places in me.
That song you sang – “Wy-Wy-WY-oming.”
We stayed with Helen in Golden and with Kenny and Diane in Silverthorne. Good shopping trip with Kenny. Wonderful hospitality from nice people. Colorado and into Wyoming after a stop at Cataract Lake.

Centennial, Wyoming. Population 270. Jean called the woman who bought her house 40 years ago to see if we could come by and walk past the house to the river. The woman told Jean that she was out of town, but the back door was unlocked, so we could just come on in. And we did. And we walked the 30-40 feet from the back door to the river running fast (we heard a big fish break water). Standing there in the cold rain in this place of tremendous growth for Jean.

In the Snowy Range
We spent the night at the Old Corral Hotel, Peet’s coffee and fruit and yogurt for breakfast in our room. 

The highway (opened yesterday) up out of Centennial into the Snowy Mountains. I first saw these beautiful mountains about 1963 off in the distance on the way to somewhere in Wyoming with my friend, Renn Fenton***. I’ve seen them in the distance 5 or 6 times since; and now, driving into the mountains through pine trees dusted with snow and a little snow on the ground, now more, stopping the car down a smaller side road and getting out to be in the snow surrounded by trees with the snow too deep to walk in. Driving up and up with deep drifts on the side of the road and the snow coming down and at the top of the pass the snow is coming down sideways, stinging our faces – Yes!

The Bighorns

The endless arching of this endless summer from Berkeley to Mendocino to Dallas to Santa Cruz to San Francisco to Vancouver to the golden afternoon of Big Sur to Marcia’s house to Indian Rock to The Temple to Flagging to the Edge of the World, to Yosemite (walking with faeries in the forest) to the beach the seashore the waterfront to La Honda to Esalen(!) to massage class to New York to Spain to our beautiful life in Berkeley to Colorado into Wyoming into the place where Jean became so much and arching across the beautiful Snowy Range! This isthe train. Here is a moment on a Mendocino beach that captures when the endless summer started.

At the beginning of the Endless
Summer – Mendocino beach
Driving out of the Snowy Range it was a short drive to Saratoga, to visit the hot springs there. The Saratoga Hot Springs hotel was overpriced and the restaurant mediocre, but we had a great time along the river and in the room. (More later on the municipal hot springs – a much better option than the “resort.”)

From Saratoga, we drove north – first to Medicine Bow for breakfast with bikers (and not 50 year old divorced guy “bikers” with do-rags) – and onward to the Sheridan area to visit Jean’s friends, Katie and Hal for a few days. We hung out on their ranch, then drove up into the hills, parked, and walked along a dirt road lined with lupines. Hal forged ahead with the dogs (Dan and Marty) and Katie and Jean walked through the lupines and I wandered along in my own world. Lunch was at a café in Bighorn. After lunch we went to a “roping” – a cowboy Memorial Day get-together and a birthday party and so there we were, standing along the corral fence with the “headers” and “heelers” roping the steers and the other people sitting on their horses and a few along the fence.

Sheridan roping
And THEN, it was time for the “boil” – a huge pot of boiling seasoned water, with potatoes, sausage, corn, and shrimp – plus bread and slaw and macaroni salad and watermelon and rhubarb (harvested yesterday) pie and coconut cream pie and a humongous tub of ice cream and nice people – though most are probably farther to the right than I am to the left.
A great Memorial Day.
At the “boil” after roping
Memorial Day 2017
From Sheridan we headed south to Thermopolis for a short time in their municipal hot springs, then on to Lander (home of the National Outdoor Leadership School – NOLS). Good times and good food in this pretty Wyoming town.
We drove the few miles from Lander to Sinks Canyon where we camped in a state park. This was Jean’s first night in a tent in 40 years. Very windy and rained for awhile – a great night.
(“Grief is the final act of love, and recovery from it is the necessary betrayal on which the future depends. There is only this one life, and we are the ones who are here to live it.” From NYT review of Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy by Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant.)

We talk of our spouses and the terrible grief. Driving up the highway across the Wyoming steppe and through the mountains, singing Grateful Dead and Beatles songs together – Here Comes the Sun! Such an emotional trip. Tears just beneath the surface… Attics of My Life – not about a person as much as self… attics = past – I laughed with delight.
In the tent

Onward back across this magnificent big sky country to Saratoga, where we stayed in Hacienda motel on the edge of this small town and drove five minutes to the municipal hot springs – free, sandy bottom, convivial scene. Back at the cowboy motel we rested then went to the Wolf Hotel for a prime rib dinner.

Vedauwoo campsite

Continuing south we again camped, this time in the Vedauwoo area – we had a great campsite among the hoodoos. Our nearest neighbors were a hippie family on their way to the Rainbow Gathering in a great bus. The man and I were talking about an Incredible String Band song quote on the side of bus (“We love you, but Jesus loves you the best”) and he and I sang a few lines together. Later I recalled that I sang that song to Keo as she was dying last January.

Camping with Jean was great. We were comfortable in our warm sleeping bag and tent, enjoyed our camping food, and had good times hiking around and watching sunsets.
From the Vedauwoos we drove to Fort Collins to spend the night, but it was too cityish, so we drove into the mountains and rented a cabin along the Fall River in Estes Park. This was a great move – clean mountain air, rushing river, and… a bear walked by less than 20 yards from Jean!!! This happened a day after we talked about our spirit animals (mountain lion for me; bear for Jean)!
Sunset Vedauwoo

In the morning we took off up Trail Ridge Road across the Rockies. It’s been more than 50 years since I was there and Jean had never made it across that pass at 12,183 feet. Wow! Surrounded by tundra and snowy peaks and the thin air and clear skies. Now over the pass toward Winter Park and then Golden to spend the night at Helen’s (and her dogs, Louie and Stella).

Jean and Helen were talking about a car we saw with a bumper sticker – Women for Trump. Jean said, “Don’t they realize their bodies are sacred.”
Denver airport and flying from one paradise (Wyoming/Colorado) to another (Berkeley/Bay Area).
Bear outside our cabin. Photo by Karen

*** Renn Fenton and I lived together in a cabin in Estes Park and climbed in Estes and the Needles in South Dakota. While Jean and I were traveling in Wyoming and Colorado, I told her a little about Renn. When we got home I googled him. I discovered that he died in 2007. Here is something from an internet forum: “I am a travel nurse who has taken care of Renn while he was in the hospital. I wanted all of you to know that I have felt privileged to be one who got to spend time caring for Renn during his last days. It was clear to me the first time I laid eyes on Renn that he was quite a character – when I googled him, I found this site and saw a comment that made me want to respond. I was actually able to “break through” with Renn and get him to talk back to me and say my name. I will forever remember his vivid blue eyes and “cat that got the canary” smile. I just wanted all of his friends to know that there are several of his nurses who have appreciated Renn for being the kind of person who makes this world interesting and feel honored to have cared for your friend.” 

Renn’s country – Jean’s country – my country