The Journey Part 32

JASMINE AND THE OSTRITCH MAN

I interviewed a young woman who serves as one of the front-desk clerks here at the RV Park, asked her about Tehachapi, about life, random stuff about being a human in general, the kind of stuff I will do often once I go solo in the Fall, meeting America one handshake at a time . . . and she was an absolute jewel to talk to and learn about.

Born and raised in Tehachapi, 25 years old, and unlike many of her peers she loves this town, plans on staying in it for many years, has no desire to run off to the big city.  Her smile is quick to appear, her joy of life also apparent, she just appears to be a happy person, albeit a tired one, a single mother of a three-year old, and that will wear anyone down, toss in holding down two jobs, plans on training to be a crane operator and, well, Jasmine is my kind of people.

When asked what she loved about Tehachapi she did not hesitate. She loves the small town feel to it, the fact that everyone knows everyone, or seems to, the fact that she feels safe in this city of 14,000, the fact that there is history here, her history, and a comfort to it that she has not found anywhere else.

Earlier in the day, me walking the two mutts down a country road, and if that’s not a lyric in a country-western song I don’t know what is, and a white pickup truck pulls alongside us and stops.  Grizzled driver, scruffy beard like mine, white as the driven snow, cowboy hat on, chewing a blade of grass, told me I looked like I was getting’ a good workout, walkin’ them dogs, smiling as he said it.  I told him walking into the wind of Tehachapi was all the workout I could handle.  He laughed, said yep, said this was nothing, should have seen it two months ago, ninety-mile-per-hour winds, air temp of twenty, literally froze one of his ostriches solid.  Shook his head, spit the grass out the driver’s window, smiled, tipped his hat, wished me a good day, look out for that wind, he said, and he was gone.

I smile writing about those two encounters.

The ostrich man, taking life as it comes, frozen bird, all part of living, wind of ninety, all part of living, a quick smile, talking to a complete stranger, all part of living for him, and I instantly liked him.

Jasmine, single mother, holding down two jobs, stretched thin, sleep a luxury, and yet an easy smile, a genuine smile, eager to help, again, a complete stranger who asks if she would mind being interviewed, being filmed, all part of living for that young woman, all part of being who she is, who she was raised to be, who she wants her young daughter to be, no excuses, work towards a better future, and always be friendly and courteous.

This meeting America one handshake at a time? I’m going to love this assignment.

WALKING DOWN A COUNTRY ROAD

For those of you who are as old, or almost as old as me, there was a song by James Taylor with this same title. The partial lyrics go something like this:

“Mama don’t understand it,

She wants to know where I’ve been.

I’d have to be some kind of natural born fool

To want to pass that way again.

But you know I can feel it

Walkin’ down a country road.”

I was walking the dogs down a country road today, in Tehachapi, and that song came to mind, started humming it, then singing, the dogs looking at me like what in the holy hell are you doing, Papa, and me without a reasonable answer.

When was the last time you took a stroll down a country road? It’s like being transported back in time, let’s say fifty years, probably more like seventy-five.  Walking down the middle of the road, not a care in the world, looking at the clouds as I walk, looking at the flowers, watching the grass bend in the wind, listening to birds, watching birds, messin’ with the dogs, them playful as all get out, and not once, jot this down in your grey matter, not once worrying about being hit by a car.

Now don’t get me wrong, during that particular walk there were three cars which came upon us, but I heard them coming, it being a gravel road, stepped to the side, in no particular hurry, pedestrian or car owner, waved at them as they slowly passed, one rolling down her window, telling me my dogs were pretty, gotta agree with her on that one, and not once did I see an unhappy driver who felt put-out because some idiot was walking down the road blocking “traffic.”

Liberating!

It probably seems like a silly thing to write about, but to me it screams so much about modern, city-life, and how we get wrapped up in that lifestyle, that hurry, scurry, gotta get this done, gotta get that done, no time, no time, no time, when in reality we have all the time in the world, and really it’s the priorities that are all scrambled up.

And that sort of thing happens all the time on this journey, outside of the hustle bustle cities, in the small towns, hamlets, call them what you will, but it’s a slower pace of life, people understand the need to walk down the middle of the road, kickin’ up clumps of dirt, tossing a few rocks at fence posts, singin’ Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah and wishing Jiminy was there to sing along with me.

I think the dogs get it.  Maggie has always had this weird understanding of me; Toby is a country boy at heart, let him off the leash and he’s perfectly content to rush into the tall grass, sniff the wind, dig at a gopher hole, then come prancing back to me, tail wagging, pleased with himself and the fine place he calls home on this particular day.

To borrow from James Taylor, I would have to be some kind of natural born fool to ever want to return to the old life I left behind.

“What more could please the soul than to walk free and know no superior?”

What more indeed!

If not now, when?

CRAZIER THAN BAT SHIT

I laughed this morning when I got an IM on Facebook from a casual friend I’ve known in Olympia for maybe ten years. She wrote that when she first heard Bev and I were going to sell the house and live out of a bus, she thought we were crazier than bat shit.

Maybe we were. Maybe we are.  And how crazy is bat shit, anyway? Does anyone know?

This is such an interesting topic for me to discuss.  Where to begin?

Listen, I have nothing at all against homeownership, big screen televisions, two cars, large yard, and all the other fine trappings of life in America.  I truly don’t. I partook, myself, for decades.  What I can’t’ understand, however, is having all of the fine trappings, all of the possessions money can buy, and then complaining about your life, as in “this mortgage payment is killing us,” or “we really have to cut down on these credit card payments,” or “damn, we need a new furnace,” or . . . shall I go on? And I know people, and you do too, who are quite literally depressed and/or angry because they don’t have enough money because, well, they overspent, or the damned government is taxing their possessions too much, or the current rate hike for cable television is outrageous, so they blame the politicians, or the rich bastards who live in mansions, or the minorities for draining city budgets, or anyone else who is handy, other than themselves.

That’s where my understanding takes a quick goodbye out the back door, and my empathy is a no-show.

We all make choices, and choices have consequences.  Period. End of discussion.

I had reached the point where I no longer was willing to make excuses for myself. I had put myself into a suburbia-induced coma, I was the reason why money was tight, and the foreseeable future, without a drastic change on my part, would be more of the same until the day they shoved my body into the furnace.

I was the reason.

And, one step further, I was the reason I was basically unhappy, feeling suffocated in a snare trap of my own making. I fell for it, hook, line, and proverbial sinker, the concept of the American Dream, the work-your-ass-off-to-obtain-more syndrome, but there was only one small problem with it, for me . . . it did not make me happy. In fact, it had the opposite effect, and I was drowning not only in an economic struggle I could not win, but also drowning in a sea of quiet desperation, wondering if that lifestyle was as good as life ever would be.

It never dawned on me, until about six months ago, that I could change it all, simply by saying “No mas,” tossing in the towel, and walking out of the ring.  And that’s the point where people start to think I may be bat shit crazy, to walk away from the financial security of a home goes against the very grain of America.  It flies in the face of conventional wisdom. It’s a recipe for disaster.

Except it isn’t, and I’m thriving, and I can’t remember the last time I was this happy.

Yes, wait a moment, yes I can remember . . . 1975, I was holding down a Teamster job, some serious security in that job, making about $15 per hour, serious money back then, a pension, I had it made if I hung in and put in my twenty years . . . and I quit, went back to college, obtained my teaching degree, and made, first teaching job, $13,000 first year, down from what, just short of $30,000 as a teamster, and that first year of teaching was one of the happiest in memory, living in a garage apartment, Goodwill furniture, eating mac n cheese by the case, and loving every minute of it.

Bat shit crazy? Guilty as charged, a dyed-in-the-wool Thoreau disciple, and you can sprinkle my ashes wherever the hell the bus ends up after my last breath, a newspaper obituary which simply says “He refused to play the game any longer, and died bat shit crazy.”