Sunset from the deck. Photo not altered in any way – this is what we saw!
It’s been a full few months since the last post with visits from Anne and Keith, Marika, and David and Charles; trip to Vashon Island near Seattle in part to test the effects of an oxygen concentrator on flying and changes in oxygen concentration; another trip to Dallas with 3-day visits from Jeff both times; Jean and I made a guidebook for pure autonomic failure and it’s available on Amazon; I put together a trauma and emergency pack; dinners out and at home with and without others; good harvest this year (Sour Diesel, Godfather OG, White Widow); making the shrine described below; countless lovely mo
Walking in Berkeley. This is actually in an industrial area.
rnings; cozy bedtimes; life. Photos don’t always track words in this post.
Driving to SFO, out of the hominess of Berkeley past the jammed bang and clang of freeways past huge mutestructures and indecipherable signs pimping AI and through the airport with ease and then a lounge with dry scrambled eggs and not bad coffee and finally (on-time!) flying to DFW, easy flight and then the vastness of DFW and in a car through Irving and then Dallas with all the big buildings unreeling outside the window canyons of condos and apartments and what is it like to live in these places and on to riding past endless gigantic structures wondering at the idea of working in these places and not for the first time feeling small and out of touch, insignificant, the world gone past me and finally
John, me, Jeff, 2015
to my house in Old East Dallas for slow, full days seeing friends and family then back to DFW and flying back to SFO and not quite third-world chaos at the Uber pick-up and the driver taking us past more buildings endlessly and taking a short-cut through The City and there is a couple walking with a friend and suddenly the world not so overwhelming because these are people just like people everywhere living their lives with all the ups and down and Uber taking us into Berkeley and I’m looking into the windows of houses along the way and those people, too, living their lives as are we.
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In Berkeley. Walking along Milvia on this street of trees and old houses and green, gardens, flowers, herbs in the morning
Living room, Dallas. Light from crystal
sun on a warm day. See the old people, slow, bodies changed over the years, bent, canes, walkers; and the young people, strong, yoga pants, no clue of what’s to come and babies, beautiful beyond their dreams.
I was listening to Darling Belle, a beautiful song by the Incredible String Band. A-Cha! I figured out how to play this song to my wife – lyrics printed in sections and each section on a separate page
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2026 morning
We went to an art show in Dallas at the White Rock Lake Bathhouse. The show was about Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). I wasn’t eager to go because I’ve seen enough psychedelic skulls and dancing skeletons. This was
Walking in Berkeley
different though – there were 12-15 actual family altars which were beautiful to us both. I felt like I got it about Dia de los Muertos. It’s honoring our loved ones who have passed away, our loved ones who are dead, as we will be too one day sooner than later. I’m on the way!
Afterward Jean suggested we make an altar
for our deceased spouses. Yes! This is what we made for David Leach and Leslie Kemp.