Life, Death and Dances with Squirrels

Many of my friends have seen this Tucson photo:

And they say to themselves that’s just John, old grandpa that he is, dozing and sitting around a fire pit while old age and Alzheimer’s take their toll.

Nothing could be further from the truth! I have, in fact, been engaged in cutting edge research, making countless discoveries about desert ecology.

I submit, therefore, this lengthy chronicle of my late night and early morning observations--an outlet for my own insomnia and a cure for yours:

Life and Death on the Desert's Edge

A Tucson Spring, Morning Arrivals

Not yet full dawn and a roadrunner is outside the bathroom window. I lean forward to see what’s in its beak. He obligingly pauses so I can admire a large yellowish insect which looks a lot like a scorpion. Guess I should appreciate his early morning efforts to make my hearth and home safe for bare feet and grandkids.

The roadrunner is a stately bird, as are all his kin, and the ones in our neighborhood particularly large and well-fed. Sometimes they call to mind slow roasted chickens or small turkeys on a rotisserie. But why eat something that eats something that can hurt you? The enemy of your enemy is a friend, right? I wish this roadrunner well, push myself away from the window sill and stagger toward the kitchen.
Coffee summoned, a weak momentum carries me outside to my pre-dawn observation post, a folding table and beat-up deck chair. No binoculars, sadly. Maybe next visit. 

 Here Comes Peter Cottontail…

I prepare myself for visitors. First up today, one of the gate bunnies--so called because they always enter under a locked gate when they could just as easily slip through the wired squares of the fencing. Perhaps they want to declare independence from human barriers. This one eyes me suspiciously before making the crossing.

The cottontail then moves tentatively into human territory and south toward a more hospitable environment. You see, my more lenient neighbor allows native vegetation and a water bowl whereas I have terminated all weeds and would-be cacti between myself and the 40 yards to the fence. Sorry bunnies, but when it comes to separating myself from life forms beyond my control, I have one rule: “This far and no further.”

And as for my neighbor’s habit of leaving out a water bowl...
The southwest is certainly as parched by drought as California and easy water would be much appreciated by the local fauna. But what if it’s at the cost of a “kill zone” where predators gain an easy advantage over their prey, upsetting long standing natural balances?

More on this later—and it won’t be pretty.

Symbols of Peace—But Not Quiet

Soon I will be visited by noisy neighbors, the ubiquitous doves. They sit on the top of the dividing fence, singing their diminutive brains out. I remember the words of a prominent Arizona ornithologist, Stevie Nicks. All knowledge pertaining to the science of dove calls is conveyed in her 80’s classic, Edge of Seventeen, the Rosetta Stone of dove talk:

           Just like the white winged dove
          Sings a song, 
          Sounds like she’s singing
          Ooh, ooh, ooh
Note the incremental variation in the following lines:
         Just like the white winged dove,
          Sings a song, 
          Sounds like she’s singing
          Ooh baby, ooh said, ooh
Astounding, isn’t it?
Listening to the songs of actual doves, I can’t help but hear the same cadence:
          Ooh, uh-ooh, uh-ooh, ooh
So there it is, the genius of Ms. Nicks. These multi-syllabic calls represent the rudiments of communication, a sort of Morse Code of dots and dashes. And though I’ve yet to fully decipher the entire code, I interpret the above passage as follows:
          I’ve just sat on barbed wire,
          Ooh! Ow! Oooh!  (sing it Stevie!)

Obviously, I need to gather more data before submitting these findings to Bird Turd Fancy.

Wear a Fez, Go to Jail

Anytime now the other destroyers of desert peace, quail, will make known their cacophonous presence. Theimost frequent call is a ragged and high pitched “ahhh” as if in some 19th century novel, a woman has “taken fright”.

          Ahhh! (high pitched and prissy)

Ironically, it is the tasseled male who’s responsible for this cry, usually while standing atop some fencepost. He stretches his neck to maximum height and cries out while pushing forth his black-patched belly. Kind of absurd really, picture a middle aged guy trying to impress girls by showing off his beer belly.
Always the cry is followed by Marco-Polo responses from distant points in the scrub. This dude bird call is obviously a way to check in with available females, running through his quall-cell phone directory, hoping for a booty-call.

The female responses to these come-on’s are lower pitched and better modulated, the females of a species always being more verbal (way more verbal). I notice that the female responses are sometimes broken at mid-utterance, much like the human salutation, “Hello”. Other variations parse out to a flirtatious “yoo-hoo.” Doubt me on this? Spend time on the sand--or visit a local single’s bar.

The Unknown

In the background are bird calls which I have yet to associate with a particular species.

1.  The Repeat Bird can often be seen  standing on fencepost. 
Other than his perky tail, he's a nondescript brown bird who calls out an incessant and shrill “repeat, repeat!” from morning to night. Oh, occasionally he might say his name, "Repeat Pete," but otherwise all he has to offer is “repeat, repeat!”.

Get a freakin' miracle ear, deaf birdie! And shoot me if I'm reduced by old age and deafness to a constant barrage of “Say what, say what?”

2. Then there’s the Taunting Bird who says “Stewart, Stewart” over and over in the same plaintive tone. For some reason, this call annoys the hell out of my otherwise deaf and placid dog.

3. Similar high register tones come from the Rude Bird who utters a cat-call whistle identical to construction workers showing their appreciation for a major babe crossing a street near their job site.

4. And then there’s the Car Alarm bird… but maybe I’m just hearing actual cars somewhere in the distance…
Admittedly, several (or all) of these calls could be emanating from a single bird. But again, with more time on the sand, I will become more positive about my findings.

And Now the Fun Begins…

One species I have positively identified is the Round Tailed Squirrel, a family of which have set up their household underneath the large white rock on the other side of the fence. We're talking Lilliputian squirrels that seem all the smaller because their tails are less than the diameter of one of those large pipe cleaners we used for crafts as children. Imagine a chipmunk-sized creature, erect as a prairie dog. His/her gaze is intense, having the balls and curiosity to stare right at me. Perhaps he is trying to decide if the fat blob in the chair represents any kind of threat. 
I remain perfectly still, cease reaching for my coffee because I don’t want to miss any of the show. It’s May, the time for pups to come out. This happy family has at least four of them, probably two months old, feisty and playful as a child's best memory of puppies and kittens.

Though they stay close to the large mother rock, their antics take them further and further from the den and involve endless variations. There’s the Circle Race where one pup frantically chases another. And the Fence Hang where a pup dangles from the wire fence like a monkey. The Huddle, where they all stand facing each other as if deciding on a critical sports play. But only until one of them drops down and attacks the others, followed by a melee of wrestling. My favorite moment: when a pup  gathers enough courage to charge a passing dove, scaring it enough to discharge feathers into the breeze. I scan the sky during each diminutive circus, hoping no hawk will end the festivities by flying off with one of the performers.

Adults and Prelates Only

A matinée performance of this show involves only adult squirrels. The couple forges deeper and deeper into the perils of my neighbor's backyard. Obviously they’re on a family support mission.  The frolicking and all inclusive family activity I witnessed earlier in the day was a mere training activity.  This outing is serious and the stakes are survival.

Late afternoon might also involve a visit from a local dignitary, one who brings a scarlet effusion of red to the predominant green and yellow of the desert spring. The rare occasion of a cardinal sighting is an experience well beyond my powers of description.

But give me time. I’m just getting started here.

Morning Rain, a Little Pain

Much cooler and little activity, the squirrels must be snuggled down. I sip my coffee in a damp backyard.

My wife and I leave to buy groceries.
She sees a roadrunner.
“He has his something in his beak. I think it’s a mouse.”

“That’s not a mouse, Deb. It’s a baby squirrel.”

For a moment I am sad. I know it’s just that circle of life stuff.  But where’s a coyote when you need one? You know, like the one in those old Warner Brother’s cartoons who kept his adversary so busy he never had time to spear baby squirrels?

Later that day I take a photo. A roadrunner is stalking the squirrel den.

Who Will Stop the Rain?

Another cool morning, very quiet. Trailing showers drift over the Catalina range. Birds silent, squirrels absent. My phone/camera is beside me and I'm ready to record the next squirrel circus and send it off to America’s Funniest. 

I finish my coffee and wait for things to warm, sleeping bag around my shoulders. Nothing. I’m about to go inside when an adult squirrel stands straight up, hands held limply in front like the stuffed prairie dog I saw at a Tucson museum yesterday.

I wait, muscles frozen. No other members of this family of six emerge. Just a single squirrel, which for no particular reason I assume to be male. He stares fixedly across my back lot, a playground where squirrel pups romped about just yesterday. I try to imagine what is going on in that walnut-sized skull. Is he lonely or just perplexed by the empty landscape before him? 
Maybe "loneliness" is perhaps too complex of an emotion to be ascribed to a lower mammal. Still I wonder if he dimly expects them to return? Does he remember the road- runner’s fatal rush toward his family? I hope not.

Just Another Day

Again, not much is happening. I've been at my chair for several hours.
Breakfast is calling and I’m about to go inside.
I witness an explosion of activity to my right. Two bunnies race in different directions, the larger disappearing between the houses. Another is coming straight at me. I’m about to stand up and drop kick this possibly rabid rabbit when he swerves off. 

I settle back and wonder what caused all this commotion.

Just down from the where the bunny race began a tawny flash emerges beyond the fence, a coyote. We face each other. He recognizes me for what I am. A nuisance competitor, potentially dangerous and the one responsible for the loss of his bunny breakfast. He vanishes--as do my hopes of getting a photo.
I'm trying to reconstruct what just happened. Then the tawny back of Mr. Coyote rises again from behind squirrel rock... He creeps on his belly. I decide against intervention. The squirrel, if still alive, must take its chances. I get out of my chair to view the endgame. Mr. Coyote repeats his disappearing act. Close call for Mr. Squirrel.

Why is life is so harsh in the desert?
And as I approach the house, I wonder whether the leftover meat from last night’s dinner might go well on this morning's scrambled eggs.

Another Morning, a Few Days Later…

I pause before assuming my post at the observation chair. A squirrel again stands atop the rock, prairie dog style, staring vigilantly into the distance. I sit down, phone in hand, frustrated because I have no record of the previous drama. The squirrel has melts down into the shadows beneath his den.

But I stay hopeful, recalling the term “wait time” from my teaching career and the agonizing seconds while I prayed that that someone out there might actually have heard my question and, given enough time, would answer back. Yeah well, that only worked about half the time…

Shadows move through wash, hide and seek behind the bushes. I hear a roadrunner in the vicinity of the squirrel den (by the way, it’s not a “beep, beep” like the Warner Brother’s cartoon but a clicking buzz created by the rapid chattering of upper and lower beaks). At times, it sounds like the pneumatic wrench when a tire guy tightens down my lug nuts.

Minutes pass. Then the blur of passing roadrunner. He's in the fence shadows sprinting with the forward lean that is so characteristic of his species. I barely manage a photo. 

Upon reaching a clearing, he stops to raise his tail feathers. This repeated pattern of rushing, stopping, and elevating feathers must be a way to analyze each new location for air disturbances made by approaching predators.

With his tail up and immersed in shadows of a mesquite bush, he is a study of invisibility.

I sip my coffee, blink, and he’s gone. Things happen fast in the desert, sometimes faster than the shutter and nearly always faster than the finger that controls it.
I trek toward the squirrel den, phone/camera armed and ready. There he (she?) is, half in shadow outside the den entrance. Closer. And closer…

All the while my finger tapping away until I lean over the fence and take the following photos.
Pretty obvious here why they're called round tailed squirrels.

I was less than three feet away when the squirrel bolted into it’s hole.

The wide open ear and ovoid cranial structure is nearly identical to a prairie dog. I return to the house shocked at how close I got to this squirrel. Had he lost the will to live?

Dusk, Four Days Later

 

Not a single squirrel sighting since. Light lingers long past sunset. It’s always light in Southern Arizona--which I suppose makes the brief hours of darkness all the more dark, filled with sounds sudden and strange. But only until 4:30 in the morning when I can sit in my observation chair with sufficient visibility to make out advancing snakes and scorpions.
The den has a desolate and uninhabited look, the earth around it bereft of tiny scratching's. He's gone, I decide, but still he deserves a name: The Lone Survivor.
I wonder what became of him... 
One more kill for the carnivores?

I'd like to think he just moved on, found somewhere else to live--a place without memories.

Next Day

I wake and look out the windows that afford my best view of the desert. Strangely enough, the best seat in the house is the toilet of the master bathroom. Here I can watch the drama without worry that my slightest movement will make me a part of it.
Outside three young quail, neither babies nor large as adults, are chasing each other in a circle. Wreckless teenagers cavorting with too much energy. “Watch Out!” I want to yell, “Things happen fast here, and death is the fuel of this ecosystem.”
Later as I exit the shower, I see six tiny quail chicks followed by Mama as she leads them to the water bowl my neighbor has so graciously provided. Are Messrs. Coyote or Roadrunner stealthy spectators to this parade? A prey buffet.

Late May in the Observation Chair

I'm still questioning my neighbor’s wisdom in providing a water hole thinking back to the bear I saw “put down” in a national park too accustomed to human handouts.  But with all the west experiencing a drought, what’s the harm in a little supplemental water?

Unless, of course, your best intentions create the kill zone I referred to earlier. It's time to take photos at the scene of the crime.

The "bunny gate" on the left, toward the right a slanted platform (where I suspect food is deposited from time to time), and behind the shady tree the is ultimate trap... a cut Folger's can filled with water.

Blending into the shadows is a roadrunner. He stands silent as death, patient as hunger.



The Dating Game, 10 am

I thought my photo ops over for the day. Deb and I sit on the elevated porch and roadrunner couple pay us a visit.

 

Below us the male performs a flashdance to impress the female.

But can he provide for her? She has her doubts and walks past him toward the front.

Standing under our orange tree, she looks expectantly up into the branches. Then she does something I've heard about but didn't believe. She imitates the"ooh, ooh" of a cooing dove.

"Come on down baby doves," she sings, "Momma wants to hold you!"

I rush to the other side of the house to see what happens next. Down the street, something is walking up the sidewalk toward the orange tree...a fledgling dove.

"Mama?"

My appearance disrupts this touching but violent meeting. I walk to the back where I last saw the male roadrunner. I find him at the fence. He's pounding something against a rock that might once have been a lizard.

My photo comes out blurry. Considering the gore factor, probably a good thing. Nonetheless, his girlfriend must have been  impressed.

I must talk to talk to my critter-enabling neighbor. This highly efficient predator needs no additional edge to provide for itself.

Next morning... (5/20/15)

I’m sitting out back. An exotic bug lands near my coffee cup—gold wings, red highlights. I flick him off. Don’t care.

I'm thinking about our dog, how uncharacteristic for him to resist our morning walk. His urinary functions were normal, but his back legs are losing their coordination and strength. After defecating, he fell l back into it. I did my best to clean him up. Back at the house eventually he came to a complete halt. He looked up at our back steps as if facing Everest. I carried him inside and made sure food and water were nearby.

He’s been sleeping all day.

Canis Familarius. Just a dog. In this case of indeterminate breed and age. Our daughter found him in 2001, apparent road kill. She took him to a kind vet. He cautioned her not to adopt until all operations had been completed. She could then inexpensively claim him inexpensively at the animal shelter. So he became ours.
And his age? Since he seemed mature then (well, within his limits), he must've joined our family around the age of three. So now he's anywhere from 16 to 20. Calculate that in dog years...
Throughout his long life, he’s been the source of immeasurable joy and a little frustration. A terrier mix, bouncy, enthusiastic but strangely barkless. Yes, he has been known to bark but only when extremely excited or happy.

He’s never snapped at a child, never chased birds of any size small (even peacocks) when they helped themselves to his food bowl. He just wants to coexist. We once had another dog that treated him roughly. Stewie’s response? Walk to the corner of the patio and turn away. Gandhi would’ve been proud.

Canis Familiarus, just a pet. He wouldn't survive long in the wild. Too dependent on people. We've become equally dependent on him, a constant source of happiness. We try to imagine our lives after he is gone…

Dinner tonight, like a wake. We hold back tears as Stewart drags himself out of his bed for the first time today and staggers around the kitchen. Blind with cataracts, deaf and dealing now with some sort of neurological impairment, his sojourn is not graceful.

I try levity. It falls flat, something lame about the difference between “life sucks and then you die” and the better fortune implied in “life sucks because you die.” To this day, Stewart has been a happy dog, enjoying each moment of his life. He’s going to vet in he morning, we decide, and barring some miraculous remission or cure, we don't expect him back. He lies down on the floor and enters a deep sleep.

Next Day

Morning dawns early in this inflexible piece of dirt called Arizona, with its constant sun and aversion to daylight savings. Take a bathroom break at 4 am and mountains are visible outside the window. By 8:30, the sun is shining like noon in California and the ground too hot to walk on. Today we stay in bed until 9:30. But we've been up. From time to time both of us have crept by Stewart’s bed, checking his breathing.

Nobody wants to start this day. Coffee pot is activated by Deb. I force myself off the mattress. Stewart is awake but his legs are in an unnatural position.

I take him carefully outside and down the steps. I am grateful that he does not whimper with pain. After setting him down, he doesn't move and looks up apologetically. I coax him with a gentle leash tug. Nothing doing. "Stew!" I whisper (though screaming it inside), "Today more than ever--right now--you've got to get up, walk and do your business!" He can't. I carry his shivering body out to my chair. He's lies in my lap and we're both enjoying the sun. The second to last photo we have of Stewart:

After a while, his shaking subsides. I hear a shower running inside the house. Deb and I prepare ourselves for Stewart’s final journey.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see something unexpected and a bit absurd.  "Soul Survivor" is hanging on the back fence like those comical Garfield's we used to see suctioned onto the back windows of cars. But this one’s real and looking in our direction. He gets off the fence, digs furiously at what might be a new den, then stops. What happens next surprises me so much that I make no attempt to photograph it. 

The squirrel begins a halting march towards us. Stewart lays inertly in my lap, barely aware of my caresses and oblivious to is happening. 

A mere six feet away, the squirrel halts and solemnly regards us. It's as if he understands and has come to pay his respects. Any second a roadrunner could appear, I worry, and destroy this moment.

I scan sky and brush. After a moment, Lone Survivor scampers back to the beginnings of a den. Dirt flies as he resumes tunneling.

Strange being face to face with a creature that has experienced more loss than I can imagine, a mate and four offspring. Yet he’s busy adjusting his environment to new circumstances and continuing to take risks…

The definition of “living” maybe.

An Ending...

And yeah I'd like to conclude these notes positively, throw out some light-hearted quip or plot twist. But things didn't go that way at the vet. Stewart is gone.

Deb and I sit on the patio and tell funny stories about our dog, his crazy adventures and how when we felt everything had truly gone to pieces, he made us laugh. Feels like we're moving in the right direction...

Sweet dreams, Stew. We will miss you.

The desert is harsh but the heart…

Ah Hell, you finish that sentence if you want.
I'm done writing for a while, can't possibly imagine establishing a new den. 

June and the Heats Just Keep Coming!

My wife emerges from the bathroom like the goddess she is and announces, “Rodents are racing around your fire pit.”
“Really?”
 I look out the window and, sure enough, it looks like Lone Survivor--with a new girlfriend!

June 5^th

Sensing some weird need for exercise, I hop over the fence that separates me from the desert. “Be aware of your environment,” I tell myself.
It’s a chore I’ve long put off, exploring the wash.

I find only dirt, sand, clawing needles and some not so fresh javelina tracks. In the background, the gattling gun click of a roadrunner. The heat is unbelievable and before long I return to the fence. I meet a roadrunner returning from the general direction of the kill zone. A limp mammal hangs in his beak.
Damn. What is it with these birds? The're like ISIS. Can’t just make a clean kill, they've got to parade their prize around like a political statement. Thank God they don’t have access to vidcams or the internet would be overrun with their triumphs.
I remember yesterday's conversation with neighbor Tom, the one responsible for the kill-zone. First we shared our appreciation of local wildlife. Apparently he, too, is a “watcher” as evidenced by the white chair in a previous photo. 

“Oh yeah, the squirrels, they got wiped out by roadrunners,” he says.

And as we compare notes on the squirrel holocaust, I casually mention that his water bowl might be tipping the odds in favor of the higher order predators.

An Arizona pause. Was he thinking or dealing with flatulence?

“Well, I figure there’s thousands of them out there, thousands.”
An enticing argument which I consider for my own long moment. I hear the voice of Mike Nakada. Decades ago, we were collecting seaweed for a marine biology project. I picked up particularly large and beautifully starfish, dropped it into my bag.

"Why did you do that?” asked Mike, sounding very much like the son of a biology prof he was.

“It looks cool and after it rots and dries, I might put it up on my apartment wall. Look around, it’s low tide, there’s tons of them out there so what’s one less?”

Mike laughed his strange Burl Ives laugh and said ruthlessly, “Right John, and do you really think that somewhere out there a voice says, “Attention everyone! We’ve just lost starfish 5,796 at More Mesa beach, Santa Barbara, California. Starfish 5,797 please move up and take its place.""

“Geez, Mike," I said, “It’s only an echinoderm...”

But I realized Mike’s ecological argument would be lost on Arizona Tom and resorted to a more lawerly approach.

“No doubt there are thousands Tom, but didn’t you just say how much you enjoyed seeing these squirrels scamper about your lot, picking up the food YOU provided, filling their cheeks and going back to their pups?”

“Yeah, that was fun.”

“Uh, huh. I think so too. And would it be fair to say that you will miss them, now that roadrunners who gather around your food and water bowls have probably nailed every last one them? All ambushed on the way to a resource not normally provided by nature.”

Tom shrugs his shoulders. After another long moment of what passes for thinking around here, he evades the point of my cross-examination.

“I have a friend way across the wash. He feeds two coyotes, Long Tail and Short Tail he calls them. He likes to watch them up on the hillside along with a Javalina family and their babies.”

I did not comment on these babies, babies not likely to have been conceived without his friend’s beneficent interference.

But feeding javalinas! That is wrong in so many ways that I didn't know what to say. We’re talking an animal that has the size and looks of boar in looks but is actually a large member of the rodent family!  Feed them? There’s a reason that Tucsonians never put their garbage cans out until about 20 minutes before the sanitation trucks arrive. Otherwise, javalinas will mount a charge, throw their considerable girth against the cans and strew the neighborhood with nasty refuse. Feed them?

Seeing this man was beyond both sentiment and reason, I slapped myself mentally on the forehead. I'd forgotten the state’s unofficial motto:  “Arizona, It’s a Dry Hate.”

But today as I cross over the fence back into my lot, I’m really not that bothered by the roadrunner's success (even though the dead animal in his beak looks a exactly like Lone Survivor). 

I go inside the house for a moment and return to my observation chair with a cold one.  Beyond the fence, Mr. Roadrunner is repeatedly slamming the body of my favorite squirrel against a rock, reducing it to a bloody pulp.

And this does not particularly faze me, either. Which of us has not used a little hammer to tenderize a tough piece of meat?  Most of us have also put stuff in a food processor to create a substance more palatable for young children. Nothing personal here, just food prep for roadrunner babies.

Birds gotta hunt, babies gotta eat, men gotta drink beer.

The desert is about letting go. Learn from it or run from it.

June 10^th

We're the edge of some tropical storm. The desert is getting pounded and the aluminum roof of my porch reverberates as if pennies are falling from the sky.

It’s a little after midnight and I am trying to end this overly long blog, proofread all that as wrong and rough. But I'm restless.

The rain still streams off the awning and I realize that tomorrow will be a good day for rock collecting. The exposed rocks will sparkle after being freed from a desert rhyme of dust and  the water sluicing down gullies will reveal new ones.
Rain usually energizes me. I want to stay up and clear up this mass (or mess) of words.

Good sense tells me I should go to bed so I that in the morning I can continue tutoring my grandkids with a clear head. I want to help them with reading and math so they won't be pulverized and eaten-up by life.

I'm tired and discouraged. Maybe I could instead share my excitement about reading, the satisfaction I get from learning new things, and my continuing struggle to grow and understand the world. The simple things.
Yeah, right. 
A walk in the rain might settle me down. And why not? This is Arizona, after all. It's a dry rain.        

                When the rain washes you clean
                    You'll know
                    You will know.

                     Stevie Nix & Fleetwood Mac, Dreams

23 Hours after Your Day Sweety and Deja Harrassment

Feed Me!

I came around a bend heading north and immediately noticed the white SUV parked high above the highway on a fire control path.  Could this be officer D. Olenko?

Of course it was. And I could so easily imagine him hunched over his radar gun hoping  to nab scores of unsuspecting speeders. I shook my head, feeling bad for him. Again, flawed technique. After placing himself 150 feet above the highway, no easy feat by the way, and backing up on high and narrow fire control road, he was probably wondering why he hadn't written more tickets. Well first of all, his "set-up" and that's what speed cops call it, was an obvious 12x6 buzzard so high above the highway that only a double cataraced Mr.Magoo could miss it. Secondly the precarious dirt he chose had a downward slope which made his rack of overhead lights stand out like Rudolph's red nose, multiplied by eight.

Better would've been to park down on the flat below where my friends and I do when visiting the area we refer to as "The Lagoon".  Just a white SUV, then, no need to hit the brakes. At this rate he was never going impress his supervisor, much less gain the attention of state level people I had offered to put him in touch with the day before (previous blog entry). But in the course of my educational career, I've worked with many special needs individuals and realized you have to let them find their own way.

I gave an affectionate wave as I passed though he was apparently too absorbed with his radar gun to acknowledge me.

I passed him and made a decision not be distracted by his deficiencies, instead focusing on the green and blue beauty of this wonderful spring day. I romped on the gas anxious to visit another beach today, happy that Officer Olenko had found a way to occupy himself while I pursued my own interests.

Roping myself down a steeper descent than yesterday, I bounced around, got a little roughed up. A reminder, I thought, there was no guarantee of balance and coordination at my age. 

But the beach was good. The beach is always good. If you think otherwise, then you're not paying attention to the beach.

I sat down, observing the waves  trying to mentally sync with their rhythm. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the warmth of a soon to be setting sun. Sadly, a part of my mind was listening for the errant walkie-talkie sounds l heard yesterday. Hearing none, I focused instead on the screeching interplay of gulls hovering above me.

In time, I forgot all about Officer Olenko, and got up to collect some geologic samples, always hopeful that these little rocks might be transformed into jewelry. Then I returned to my backpack, sat down and pulled out a tin of sardines. Just a weird ritual I enjoy when sitting on a deserted beach, not sure why. I was down to my last sardine and two more crackers when I detected significant movement off to my right.

Fully expecting to see the khaki outline of a uniformed officer (and thinking No F-ing way), it took a second or two for me to remember the rules bifocals. Up for distance, down for close up shit. Upon further inspection, I determined the object in question in this case about 25 yards away, was a tawny-coated juvenile sea lion. Did this wondrous creature beach because he/she smelled my fish? Possibly.

And, oh man!
This sea lion was looking at me with same laser intensity as my dog Stewart when I'm eating a snack. It's a telepathic thing, I've decided, and he makes the message clear, "Don't be a jerk, John, share with the family dog!"

For a moment, I actually considered forking over that last sardine. But my aged and chemically compromised brain still managed to remember some training from my late-life ranger days.

First of all by providing the sardine I would be placing myself in danger. The sea lion would undoubtedly enjoy it. Afterwards, though, he might turn on me and think, "Hey Fat Man, is that all you got, one lousy sardine? Open up another of those containers or I'll chew you ankles off."
Now I'm not sure sea lions actually get that aggressive, having never been a beach ranger, but who wants to find out?

But secondly, by feeding this animal I could create a chain of events, an expectation of highly caloric foods associated with humans. And this could ultimately make me an accessory in the death of a higher order mammal. Unintentional, of course, but throwing out that sardine might be the first step, I told myself, in creating a "problem" sea lion. 

Not absolutely sure this works with the otariidae family (seals and sea lions), but I know it holds true in the ursus family (bears). "Feed a bear, kill a bear" was a statement I remember from a poster at the Ash Mountain visitor center where I was briefly employed as a seasonal ranger at SEKI (Sequoia Kings Canyon National Park).

Simplistic phrasing, typical of most posters I thought , beginning my employment there, but I came to know its truth. It happens slowly. You report to the station, one day, and a supervisor casually says, bear #232 is now yellow tagged. You understand that bear technicians have probably captured #232 in their tube traps, sedated her with a tranquilizer dart and changed out the color of a plastic tag stapled into one of  the bear's ears. No one pays much attention, you've got a lot of work to do and little sympathy for the person who initiated this event, another dumb-assed "guest" who left his food out and somehow had the temerity to complain, despite all signs and warnings, that it was missing.

Maybe it's just a month or two later when your supervisor says, "Bear #232 has been red tagged." Everybody gets quiet. If you've done patrol lately, in my case just a short stretch along the Kaweah River and up to the Potwisha campground, you pause. Normally, I make every effort to keep healthy distance between myself and bears. But if things are slow at the visitor center and your supervisor tired of looking at you, he will entrust you with keys and send you out on missions where you are guaranteed to have close encounters of the bear kind.  
Now I was 15 years younger then, just getting used to wearing my glasses on a regular basis, but when I came around a sharp turn and braked hard for a surprise bear, I'm pretty sure I saw a green ear tag labeled #232.  And I'm just as certain that it was bear #232 I shot with paintballs while sitting in a white SUV cruiser. After all, there she was standing on a campground table scarfing KFC because some of our "guests" decided hiking was more important than clean-up. What I did that day, is called "bear harassment," an officially sanctioned method in the hope of modifying bear behavior. Still, I bet it hurts and in the safety of my government issue SUV, and I noticed she had now been accessorized with a yellow tag. I also remembered that several months ago my wife and I were walking along a meadow in the vicinity of Morrow Rock. We  saw a bear and two cubs playing in a meadow. I'd forgotten my binoculars, couldn't see a number but the bear and her the yellow tag was unmistakable.

All memories, moot points after my supervisor announced the red tagging. She's displayed aggressive behavior, maybe despite loud shouting from outraged guests, she'd refused to put down the ice chest they'd left out. Mybe she initiated a bluff charge or punched through a car window because a guests decided to store food inside his car rather than use the provided our bear locker storage.compartments That's all and seldom are our guests physically harmed except in cases of astonishing stupidity.

And just forget about relocating "problem" bears. It never works. Drop them in the remotest section of back country and one of two things happen.  They find their way back to familiar campgrounds (sometimes traveling a hundred miles to do so) and resume those fatal habits learned through negligent human contact. Or they die violently, usually in less than a week's time, torn apart by local bears in the drop off area who decide to defend their territory.

And the day comes, all to often, when you enter the visitor center after some mundane task, maybe you've flipped over the closed sign or raised the flag, and your supervisor says, "Bear #232 has been put down." It's sad. Few in the station have ever heard the gunshot, fewer still have ever watched it happen, but many of us have assisted bear techs in  the field, attaching tracking devices to these noble creatures in the hope that this research will promote a better interspecies understanding. And it's very hard to do this kind of work, working hand in hand with the bear techs, without being infected by a reverence for these fellow travelers.
We talked less on the days when a bear had been put down and in quieter tones. 

I can't speak for the thoughts of my coworkers during those days. But I remember being angry at  homo sapiens, crappy conservators of this magnificent earth and pitifully unable to coexist with species that mean us no harm.

If anyone is still with me at this point, you're probably wondering what all this had to do with the sudden appearance of a sea lion--and whether I should share that last sardine. Guest what? So am I. But I need to reveal the final event that led to the execution of #232.

I know I should've use the word "execution" in the previous sentence but considering the freak circumstances, the term seems too mild. Ironically it was not a thoughtless guest, but one of our own that brought about this tragedy. An employee parked his vehicle at the day-use are adjacent to the Potwisha campground. He wanted to use the restroom and was in a hurry. He did not see the bear behind a nearby car, and he did not register the unsupervised child standing on the sidewalk with a tuna fish sandwich in her hand. But he did manage to walk right between bear and child. Except for a huffing sound to his left, that's all he remembered. The ambulance took him out the park with a forehead laceration. Just four or five stitches. Bears sometimes just cuff as when reprimanding their offspring, but when really pissed or threatened, they extend those enormous claws. The man in the middle was lucky to have received only one swipe of that extended cuff. Two cubs were shipped to appropriate agencies.

A summer later I found myself maneuvered into an overnight inservice for seasonal rangers, a group of 20-24 year olds along with a supervisor who was easily half my age. As is the custom (and fun) of telling strange tales around a campfire, one of the young'ns retold an exaggerated account of the ranger stood bravely between the bear and little girl with the tuna fish sandwich. After the telling, it was quiet and I realized everyone was looking at me. Don't be paranoid. I'm an old guy, I said to myself, it's natural that people focus the extreme differences. I was doing my best to be calm.
"You're him aren't you?" A question was spoken by someone so young she could have been in my senior English class three weeks ago.
"What?"
"You're the one who stood between the bear and a little girl, weren't you?"
Everyone was looking straight at me, expecting something. My supervisor who had been around long enough know it wasn't me, was disguising a quiet belly laugh. Yet he was the one who had hand repeatedly asked me, "So how did you get that scar?" 
"Eric," I told him on those occasions, "it's not a scar, nothing happened. Just some kind of hereditary wrinkle kind of like you might get yourself--should you get lucky and live that long."

But people don't want truth, they want romance.
So I looked back at the expectant sets of eyes around the campfire and told them what they wanted to hear.
"Hell no! This scar didn't come from standing between a bear and a tuna fish sandwich!  I was attacked by an eagle. And I'm too tired to tell that story right now. Goodnight everyone. This old boy is tired."

And so I left them, staggering two or three trees into the underbrush because I really needed to pee.

My family knows the truth. If there truly is a scar on the left side of my forehead--and I'm not sure since looking at myself in the mirror this morning, a practice I abandoned in my teens. I have a vague memory of climbing the steps up to the Big Meadow Lookout and failing to duck below a barrier of jagged wire. My family members were sympathetic and helped me invent the more heroic eagle story just so I wouldn't be embarrassed by my innate clumsiness. Nice people, my family.

I'd really like to end this digression, right now, a story about a sea lion on the beach several days ago but there's one more event I have to reveal. Now or never a voice says to me. You see, after taking care of my business behind that tree, I found the way to my tent and collapsed. And awoke to a slippery sensation on my pillow. Sweat I told myself until I could no longer ignore the oppery odor. I touched my forehead and held out my fingers, blurry having not yet located my glasses. Looking a lot like blood. Yep.

I made my way to the campground restroom and looked into a wavy mirror. Blood had at some at time pored down the left side of my forehead. I was being watched by several college kids/wannabe rangers at the time. They said nothing, neither did I.

During the rest of the day, I was grateful for once about the ridiculous flat that rangers are forced to wear. Making every effort to achieve invisibility, I said nothing (though I knew most of the answers to our leader's questions). All the while, I was very aware that everyone was looking at me, studying the gash on my forehead. And I'm thinking, too many beers, must have fallen against some branch, clumsy old fart that I am. A likely explanation but I had no memory of such events (weak proof indeed after a bunch of beers). Stigmata, maybe, a wound so intently felt in your mind that your body creates it. An explanation not likely to be well received by my young atheistic supervisor.
 
Must have been about then that I realized that my khaki wearing days were numbered. Certainly other events occurred that insured my departure from federal employment, but those will have to wait.

So.....
I guess the point of this enormous intersection of "All Creatures Great and Small" and how I parted ways with the national parks system must return once again to my food-begging dog and how the sea lion to my right reminded me of him. It really comes down to this: there was no way that sea lion would get my last sardine .

And wow, didn't see those last 20 paragraphs coming!

So I slid the last sardine down my throat, after which I put the tin can in my backpack, zipped it shut, and got out my camera. Approaching my target indirectly, I was hoping the sea lion wouldn't bolt leaving me without any proof of his visitation. After only a few frames he returned to the water, clearly not appreciating my proximity. And this was good. Despite his surprise visit, he had demonstrated a healthy threat level. Any wild animal should be shy of humans and rightly so. If they're not, watch out. Things are wrong:

     1. The has animal has become accustomed to humans, having received food                            from them indirectly or directly. Not a problem if you're talking cute little squirrels.                  They seldom have attitudes. Larger animals like coyotes, cougars, and bears are                  unpredictable. They have bad days, behaving erratically and will attack their    
         own species. In this they just like us, humans, so watch out for them.
    2. Animals may also reduce their proximity levels because of disease, like rabies, which           can so erode their central nervous systems that Skippy the family dog becomes Cujo.           Consider also the cuddly campground squirrels who allow you to feed them, offering             no aggression but all the while harboring black death infested fleas happy to         
        desert a cooling squirrel body and jump right on to you.
    3. A older animal or one so injured that it can no longer acquire food through normal                 methods. You are its prey. This is bad, very bad. Do the usual posturing to      
        demonstrate width and size, but do not look directly at its eyes, a sign                       
        of imminent attack in both the animal and human world. And only when well out of   
        sight, run like hell, which your body had pleading for you to do all along.

These photos aren't very good--not because I'm lousy photographer--but because the sea lion moved away before I could get close enough. Again, threat level, a signature of a healthy organism.

He's quickly off, not wishing to dick with an untrustworthy species.

So stay away from animals who do not display an expected threat level. 

And after all of these mammal hugging thoughts, I am lead me to consider my behavior yesterday. Seriously, talking near smack to a law enforcement officer, someone able to incarcerate me or, if really pissed off in this remote location, make me disappear?  How wise was that and what was it all about? 

I climbed the cliff and took one last photo. It would be several weeks before I could return. 

And my during my return to San Simeon, the weird circularity of my life asserted itself again. Coming at me was the white SUV of Officer Olenko. At 5:00 pm, he was likely returning from a dinner at one of Cambria's fine eateries. I waved furiously at him as we passed each other, but he never responded. Maybe he'd read some rules forbidding a lawman like himself to take his hand off the wheel. Or maybe he just thought that's what he read, confused by too many big words.

Whatever. 
I've decided to close this weird blog entry by taking the high road. I will never again use the "D" word to describe Officer Olenko.

Still I doubt he'll ever receive an award for being the sharpest tool in any law-enforcement shed...

And, seriously, who am I to criticize a well meaning public servant?  I count myself lucky to know one man who is willing to camp with me and endure this kind of drivel and more fortunate to have married a woman who listens to it all--but still insists she loves me. 

So How Was Your Day Sweety?

(My wife has been out of town for a day and I've already had a close brush with the law)

Secondary Title: Deja Harrasment, All Over Again

There I was, enjoying a glorious day along the almost north coast. My treasures (15 to 20 small rocks and shells) were arrayed on the boulder to my left. Peacefully enjoying the warm sun, most of my clothes on, and sipping a beer.

And the moment was good. I had happily squandered the afternoon tracking a retreating tide, occasionally getting up to check newly exposed sections of shoreline for collectibles.

The beer was good and purchased for a ridiculously low price at Trader Joe’s the day before. Four hours on the beach and I was still on my second brew, all part of my new regime to live healthy, eat organic, and consume moderately.

I leaned back against a warm rock, the beer casually wedged between my knees, and heard a disconcerting sound. The unmistakable squawk of radio response, female in this case, coming from somewhere up on the cliff. Oh dear! Someone had just 10-20’d into dispatch but forgotten to turn down the response volume. Even a lowly interpretive ranger like myself, not likely to encounter any real crimes, had been cautioned during inservice to report misdeeds discretely.

Whoever had allowed the noise from above, I decided, was definitely not “A” team law enforcement. I settled back and waited calmly for what was about to happen. In my backpack I had maps, printouts of all applicable rules and regulations, and a secret weapon.

During the time it took Johnny Law to find my rope and descend, I nearly dozed. Truly an extraordinarily afternoon at the beach, one not to ruined by bureaucratic stupidity.

My thoughts were soon interrupted a clumsy crunch, crunch, crunch. I turned and immediately recognized the source of this noise. I was facing the man who had subjected me to my first “interview,” an experience that inspired a blog entry several years ago. And, yes, this was the very same dumb-ass who allowed me to stand above him while he knelt down and pawed through my backpack.

I considered a lecture on the inherent danger of  his shakedown techniques, how anybody with an ounce of military/prison training (maybe just someone who’d read a Jack Reacher novel) could kick his brains out, drive off in his government SUV, ditch it at some public location, and proceed merrily on to further mayhem.

But something told me he might not be receptive to healthy criticism. So what did I do?  I began to say things that were much, much worse.

“Not again!" and lifted my hands in frustration,  "I’m telling you, this is a waste of your time.” 

“Listen,” he said walking forward and responding quickly, and I could hear the tension of his voice ramp up: “I came down here from above, maybe you heard my radio (duh!), and find you with rocks.” I'm initially processing the "I came down here from above" statement. Who the Hell did he think he was, Zeus? Were it not for MY rope, he could have never gotten his fat ass down here. And had I just heard him say "and find you with rocks" likely I was playing with my balls or something?

I interrupted him, the tension now ramping up in my voice. “Stop talking, it is absolutely legal for me to collect my 45 plus one pounds of rocks here.”

"You’re wrong, it's actually 15 plus one. I’m a state park’s ranger. I know and study the laws. This is a protected marine sanctuary and part of my jurisdiction.”

Okay, so this ape can read, I thought, it's at least 25 lbs but I didn't want to push this particular point since my command of numbers and fear of people with carrying guns run at inverse proportions.

“Nonetheless," I said (even though this is the kind of word that only to be used when trying to further piss someone off), "What little you see on this boulder is certainly less than 15 lbs, right? And as for this being a protected marine sanctuary, I've made some calls and discovered that the term refers OBVIOUSLY only to marine LIFE and, OF COURSE, rocks and uninhabited shells don’t fall into that category, DO THEY?”

Okay I'm a little out of hand here and I know it's stupid to talk patronizingly to a law enforcement officer. But after 10 or more shakedowns I was feeling a little cranky.

“Are you saying you know the law better than me?”

When he said that I realized the situation had become tenuous; his tone hinted at reprisal.

“No, officer, and I’m sorry if we got off to a wrong start. I was undoubtedly disrespectful." And even as I said this, I remembered my secret weapon. If you will allow me to pull out my phone, I could play you a recording of an official saying, “Mr. Richardson, you are fully within your rights to collect rocks along that area of the coast…”

“Who was it, my supervisor?”

(I’m running a bluff here, the recording probably erased after Verizon’s 21 day limit)

“Well, no, I don't think so. And I can't remember the name but the voice was female. Probably two or three levels above your supervisor, state level actually."

This significance of this penetrates him and he pauses moment. 

But just like the last time we met, he did not give up easily, and pointed to the hammer nestled among my treasures.

“You are also in state park jurisdiction and not allowed to collect anything with tools.”

“Well you know, I've read that section of state code about tools and can quote it by section and subcategory. I can even pull out a copy of it from my backpack and we can look over it (here I am not bluffing).  But that would be a waste of your time and mine, don't you think? Pretty sure that passage refers to mechanically operated devices, jackhammers, and other things like pneumatically driven sluices, you know?”

“A tool is a tool.”

Oh you got that right, Officer Olenko!  

And for the first time in my recount of these shakedown narratives, I've used a real name. I’m angry and tired of this shit.

“You might be right about that Officer Olenko,” I said realizing the full extent of his immunity to reason, “and I admit those rock chips you see to be the result of using my hammer. You see, thee was this rock with small geodes.” Here, I held out my hands to indicate an oval object 10 inches in diameter.

“Yeah, I know what geodes are.”

“Of course you do. But the rock was heavy, and I’m getting older. Not sure I could haul it up the cliff put it in my car, you know? So I broke it into smaller pieces hoping to take just the geodes.”

At about this moment he too embarked on a more conciliatory tone.

“Okay, I get that. And I want you to know that I didn't just come down here to hassle a guy who’s trying to collect a few rocks, relax and enjoy a beer.”

(Could’ve fooled me)

“I appreciate that officer and, again, I apologize for my initially rude response to your contact. It’s just that I've been interviewed (and I say this word with some delicacy) by the highway patrol, sheriffs, game wardens and, of course, state park rangers—hey, you don’t remember me?”

“Well, yes, your car did look familiar.” My bulllshit radar went overload, but I continued, “And I was also detained by some mysterious people who were pretending to be game wardens.”

“What?”

“Yeah, two guys well trained, professional. I wrote down their names and mentioned them later when interviewed (again spoken with delicacy) by yet another game warden. You know what he said? 'Never heard of them--and I'm the only warden in this region.'”

Silence from Officer Olenko.  

I continued, “So I guess these guys were Home Land Security or DEA?”

“I can’t talk about that, of course” he said pompously, “and, of course, you know this is a corridor for drug smuggling, with all those panga boats carrying marijuana up from Mexico.”

"Uh, huh. I've heard about that but, honestly, I haven’t seen a panga boat all day. Wish I had.”

Again he didn't respond, apparently unable to detect my facetiousness. I waited a beat and explained, “You know, maritime law?  Yah, find an abandoned boat, claim it and after a certain time it’s yours. But I guess that law doesn't work with drug smuggling, eh?”

Again a pause--guess he also couldn't to detect my dead-on Canadian accent.

Finally I got a response, “Well, I don’t know anything about that, and I just want to say again that it was not my intent to come down here and hassle someone who’s just trying to relax. But I have to make sure nobody is poaching abalones or defacing the place. It’s a beautiful area and I've enjoyed fishing here.”

An opening, I sense--and also a potential ending.

“Really? I fish, too. So it’s legal to fish on this section of the beach then, with a license of course. Have you ever caught a ling cod?”

The rest of our conversation was fish talk. Eventually he left. 

Dickwad.

The Wreck of the Fun Train from Reno

(With utmost respect for a Canadian: Gordon Lightfoot, composer/singer and author of the best modern day ballad ever written, The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald)

Down the aisle a guitar man was taking requests.
I'd heard this song outbound and was taking inventory.
 

The ship was the pride of the American side
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
With a crew and good captain well-seasoned.  

This train was our ride on the California side
Coming back from casinos in Reno
As big freight trains go, it was shorter than most
With a crew and conductors ill-mannered.

Concluding some terms with a couple steel firms
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
And later that night when the ship's bell rang
Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?
 
Concluding some tabs at a couple of bars
We left fully loaded from fun land.
And later that night, with Visalia in sight
We wondered what the hell we'd been smokin'?

A north wind blew, my jacket collar was up, and we raced down the railway platform. The impatient conductor waved us off, indicating the car for Hanford was some vague distance ahead. Eventually, we joined an equally winded group all of us looking as hopeful and spiffy as your average passengers waiting for the Greyhound. Off the "Snow Train" and transferred to Amtrak, the whistle blew loudly for Hanford.

I felt lower than the concrete platform on which we stood, weighed down by blackjack loses. Despite "two-to-one" and "ace-in-the hole" comps, I had dropped an entire $15 at the casinos of Reno.  For me, that's manic-depressive devastation, the exact polar opposite of the godlike ecstasy I usually feel when leaving Nevada just $5 dollars to the good.

Trying to undo my inner funk, I replayed the free drinks won the night before, the game where my friend blacked out, not from drinking, but after marking every spot on his bingo card. And I recalled how he won us more free drinks, a couple of dinners for himself and his beautiful wife Jill Maurer and believe it or not, a gigantic big-assed Miller High Life bar mirror. Wow. 

In the words of Joe Walsh, "Life's been good to me so far..."

My mental massage was waylaid, however, by two of my fellow boarders. A late 20's male, average height with sandy blond hair wearing an inappropriate-for-the-weather orange T-shirt. Guess he just didn't have time to change clothes after his prison release. And a darker man who stood apart, covered with more tattoos than Ray Bradbury's Illustrated Man.

The train doors opened and everyone boarded, still clueless whether this was the right car for Hanford or the last train to Clarksville.  But before long we were underway to... somewhere. Time and Amtrak wait for no man, woman, or criminal. Certainly, our car was spacious (or would have been if single passengers hadn't commandeered all the four person booths because they needed room to play with their I-Phones). So much for a little game of cards with friends. This train don't carry no gamblers, this train...

Deprived of sport and restless by nature I wandered back to the food car to scout out my options. Three and a half hours is a long time without burgers or beer.  But thank the good lord, both were on the menu. I continued to study this menu while another customer stood before me at the counter.
"I'd like the combo, please."
"What?"
"The combo"
The customer was a middle-aged black man, cardigan sweater, neat slacks. The "food conductor" was white, rotund and definitely not smiling.
"What combo? We have a lot of combos." I was looking at the menu myself and saw only one combo: drink, chips and sad photo of a chicken burrito, beans and rice included.
"I'm sorry," the man before me said and pointed to the photo, "This one."
"Well, what do you want for a drink?" the white man said briskly.
"Uh...coke, I guess."
"Well, we only have Pepsi."
"Oh say, I'm sorry, yes Pepsi would be fine."
Without another word the white food conductor microwaved his order and the black man paid and thanked him graciously. It was not so much what the conductor said as the tone he used to say it. I loitered around the posted menu hoping he would turn to me and say politely, "And how can I help you sir?"

He never did, so I didn't have a chance to say, "What do I want? I want all the racist bastards to take a flying leap off this train." I took my time before ordering something. He was brisk but not so much that I could ascertain rudeness or deference.
My snack in hand I walked back toward my seat and saw the black man bent over the tiny fold down tray, eating his combo while highlighting a thick book. Passing him again on my way to the restroom, I saw the title: The Differentiations of God. A minister probably or maybe a late life seminary student. And I wanted to sit down and say, "That guy was really an asshole, you know?" But he did know and had probably endured more of that kind of rudeness than I could imagine. Maybe not every time he tried to buy something but enough to know what it's all about. Perhaps that's why he was pursuing theology, I thought, and why others just get Ferguson angry. I walked on. There was nothing I could say to this man.

Stop thinking and relax said my voice of mental preservation. So, despite lurching surprises and inexplicable decelerations, I got back to my seat without falling. And choosing to ignore a few stains when I sat down, I decided the upholstery and chair was relatively comfortable. Seeing a huge red knob to my left, I decided to close my eyes and recline, nobody behind us. I leaned back and pulled the knob, nothing. I pushed it forward backward left and right, nothing, nothing, nothing. I asked my wife if she had a knob. She smiled coyly, "Not on my seat."
So I pulled up on the knob and then smashed it down, all the while pushing hard against my seat.
I could hear my wife giggling during these efforts.
"Maybe it's just a joy stick."
"Well if it is, I'm not getting much joy!"
In an effort to avoid grumpiness, I turned to our friends across the aisle.
"Hey, Ken, pull up on your knob"
"What?"
"Pull up on your stick and see what happens."
Ken and his wife looked at each other, then gave me the "look".
I don't get it. Why am I always getting that LOOK?
After a lengthy discussion, we established that Ken's knob was no more effectual than mine and I decided not to prolong the discussion.
Strike two against Amtrak.
So I closed my eyes and imagined I was reclining. It worked, too, until thundering hooves came from behind. A  conductor so corpulent that I couldn't imagine how he was squeezing between the seats roared past us as if outlaws and Indians were on the attack.

Then the train stopped abruptly, right out in the vast agricultural wilderness of Stockton.
It was dark.

And we waited.
And waited.
I leaned across to Ken and whispered, "We're lucky. Just look out your window and enjoy the sparklers--not fireworks but gun fire. This is Stockton, the murder capital of the world, one homicide per hour--guaranteed!"

I'd had some bad experiences in this city, proof that the wild west was still wild, more wild than your average NHL hockey game.

Which gave me time to notice that the ex-convicts who boarded with us were now sitting together engaging in an animated conversation, probably one-upping each other on the easiest way to make a shiv out of corn flakes or bragging about how many innocent bystanders they'd shot due to shitty marksmanship. Nothing good would come from this.

Eventually (and by this I mean a short millennium) a few more people straggled on board and a frazzled lady collapsed into the seat behind me. The train resumed its slow southern roll. I looked across the aisle and telepathically asked my friend Ken, "What was that all about?"
He shrugged his shoulders. Enough said.

Or so I thought. But the frazzled lady behind us had other plans.

"You were on the train before me, right?"
"We were on the train, yeah," Ken answers (Thank God, she wasn't talking to me).
"And you saw the car on the tracks?"
"Well, there was a train on the left and on the right."
"I was just getting on at Stockton. I was on the outside."
"Uh huh, how'd they do that?"
"What's that?"
"How did they manage to stall a car on the tracks? (Ken pays attention to what people say)
"What?  Elderly lady... guess she didn't realize where she was, guess she thought she was on the street, going really fast. Could you see out the window?"
"No." (Wrong answer, Ken, and the frazzled lady took a deep breath)

"There were these guys, they tried to lift the car off the tracks. They couldn't do it. They couldn't get it up that high. Guess she was on medication."
"Probably she didn't know how to react," Ken said.
At this point I had to interrupt, "How DID they get the car off?" I mean really, tell me this train didn't just plow through a car with some old lady inside!
"A flat bed tow truck came and uh..."
"Winched her off?" Ken suggested.
"Yeah...so they hooked her up. They lifted it off over the track as if they were going to put it on the truck. But I guess there wasn't enough damage to it so they went ahead and left it on the ground. But then they had her get back in it. They were telling her to do something.  You could see they were pointing. The police... but first a white man shows up, then the crime scene techs and, um, the tow truck shows up, then the regular police officers. And they were all pointing for her to get in the car--they were trying to get her to back it up or move it over. She got in the car and just sat there with her hands on the wheel..." 

We were ducking our heads back and forth during this extended narrative so the convicts could pass by and purchase beers in the car behind us. And I had no problem with this except the last time I looked forward I saw them holding their bottles high above the seats slamming them together, no doubt celebrating their unholy alliance or toasting some nefarious plan.

I tried to ignore it all by closing my eyes, pretending my seat was settling back while inserting imaginary ear buds.
But wait, there's more!
The frazzled lady behind me wasn't ready to shut her pie-hole.

"And there was this big to-do. These other guys that were hanging around there. There was this guy that worked for Amtrak, this white guy and some gal, for a while. There were also these hoodlums from Stockton and they were like trying to conduct some kind of drug deal. And I don't know if they thought they could deal something out of their car... Anyway they're running. And there's like this father figure, I mean an adult male, and these kids were running across the tracks, just kids right? So the guy says, "You know, it's a felony to be running on the tracks...and there's like chaos going on. And he turned around and they're still running. So I think wait a minute, you just told them not to do that and I guess, they have no fear--and all these guys they just live out there dealing drugs... But then these four guys were all standing right there with this one woman, and they're all leaning in and I'm thinking I'd be so scared of this..."
At this point the frazzled lady begins a near hysterical giggle.

Oh, Stockton! You never cease to fulfill my expectations for mindless brutality, aimless violence, and absolute anarchy.

Finally Penny, Ken's wife and ever the one to console and be calm in face of insanity says, "Ahhh, a lot was going on out there..."

And Penny has a way of saying "ahhh" drawing it out sweetly so that we all relaxed and enjoyed several minutes of relative quiet, sitting (not quite back) but soothed by the rails that went "clickety-clack, clickety-clack". 

I suppose if someone wanted to get anal about onomatopoeia it was more of a "thumpity-WHUMP, thumpity-WHUMP" interspersed with an occasional "Lurchity-JERK, Lurchity-JERK". But however one might scan the poetry of that moment, it was soon interrupted by a dire intercom announcement--from the engineer, master conductor--or maybe God himself!

Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, someone is smoking on this train. If you are caught smoking, your ride will end abruptly."

I looked forward and--what a surprise--the prison-perps were nowhere to be seen! Meanwhile I considered the various implications of an abrupt ending--divine bolts of lightening, forced ejection from a moving train, or quick suffocation under the weight of an enormous conductor. But before long the jail weasels popped back up and right before sitting back down managed to throw everyone in the car a shit-eating grin.

After which we worked our way south through the "M" towns--Modesto, Merced, Madera during which the graduates of correctional universities actually demonstrated a learning curve: they got off the train and smoked furiously at every bean town between Sacramento and Hanford. The conductor/god's voice came on again to caution us all that we had only two minutes to smoke and were not allowed to be more than 25 feet away from the train. I turned to Ken and winked, hoping our friends hadn't spent enough time in public school time to understand the difference between feet and yards. He acknowledged my wink with yet another wise shrug of his shoulders.

And in between these stops our felonious fellows continued their back and forth movements expending their hard earned jail money to purchase more beers. Then something happened. The one attired in prison orange plopped himself down next to a woman just a few seats ahead of me. I couldn't hear what he said to her but she suddenly went rigid as if touched by a cattle prod. And I continued my observation of this situation until Mr. Orange returned to his own seat, next to the man with the marvelous tattoos. Some vague prompting caused me to get up at this point, time to stretch my legs and relieve my bladder.

I found the nearby restroom occupied and the food station beyond it unmanned. Descending steps to the lower level, I came upon crew quarters, apparently deserted. Books and magazines were open, a dinner left to cool. Remembering my original objective, I found the large door of a restroom with a hastily scribbled note on the handle: "Out of Order".  What had happened to the crew? Were they inside? Unlike the restrooms topside, four or five people or, uh, corpses, could easily fit in this ominous large enclosure.

And so with a definite tightness in my throat, I pulled up on the latch, hoping to God that I was not about to see something that would flash upon my mind every time I tried to piss in the future. But the latch didn't move, tight as can be.

Then I pulled down. No give.

Locked, that's all, our of order. No need to go Stephen King on myself. Still, killers have been known to jamb locks--first lesson in Prison 101 right?

I moved through the empty cabin until I reached the juncture of the next car all the while wishing I'd remembered to bring the machete my wife keeps under her bed. Beyond a glass window, I could see two conductor type persons engaged in heated conversation. After a bit of hesitation, I hit the "Push" button and they both stopped talking, turning to look directly at me. Seriously, why do all these guys look like walruses? And so there we were in an open space, at a precarious joint between two moving boxes of steel hurtling God knows where at 70 miles per hour. A huge crack opened and occasionally presented itself beneath us. I considered how this might be an easy target for urination. But I might miss and wet the shoes of the walrus, or an eggplant, coo-coo-kuh-choo?

This flashback reverie was violently interrupted by the whiplash voice of the food-walrus.

"If you need something, sir, I'll see you upstairs!"

I turned to the other walrus-conductor and said, calmly as I could with a bladder about to go coo-coo-kuh-choo, "Uh, a couple of guys in the car above are getting a little out of control. They haven't done anything serious yet, but--"

"Listen, we're all over the situation. It's already taken care of, okay?"

I ignored this statement from the rude food dude and instead nodded to the superior walrus while proceeding  to make my way upstairs where I was pleased to find an unoccupied restroom. Ahhhh.
 
Afterwards, I returned to my seat and tried to forget the drama below.
Then the "F" word happened.
Fresno.

The Folsom Twosome had gotten off for their usual smokefest..  
I felt my wife tapping my shoulder, "Look, there's a couple of railroad officials talking to the cons..."

We watched.
Both bad boys returned to retrieve their belongings. They had been forced to leave earlier than expected. And so the train moved forward leaving us with a parting image of the tattooed man shedding his wife beater, revealing dramatic skin art and, I suppose, showing us his disrespect.

Hanford arrived. We found our parked car.

Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searchers all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay
If they'd put fifteen more miles behind her.

Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the rails turn the minutes to hours?
All could be avoided as everyone knows
Had we driven from Sac like the Maurer's.

Gillian's Story

Well this is embarrassing. Several years ago I wrote a memorial for a girl named Gillian.

Her death was senseless and incomprehensible. I am perhaps still dealing with it. 

This is a photo of some poor soul crossing the Little Pico bridge.  Or is it?   

Maybe I captured some mad force that ranges up and down our northern coast, unanswerable, inexplicable, and unopposable.

And it's coming for us all eventually.

But it came too early for Gillian. And her memory haunts me, wont leave me alone.

What do you want girl?

 God rest your soul.

              

Gillian Goldman (1/4/2000--1/10/2008)

A Story Not Published, a Life Not Lived

Winter sunlight glows inside a red Mitsubishi Montero parked north of San Simeon’s Pico Bridge. Windows are up, doors locked, the air still.  Listen and you will hear a whispering… hushed tones like a young girl confiding secrets.

But there’s nobody inside the car.  Heat stirs a mylar balloon, rubbing it against the roof.  The image on the balloon is from a recent movie, Disney’s High School

Musical 2.  The cast smiles, holding hands as they plunge into a background of pool water.  Other than the rustle of the balloon, the car is silent.

Outside the car, chaos--an incomprehensible tragedy, nothing happy like the pool pranks of the Disney movie.

Marcia Harrigan, 43, and her 8-year-old daughter Gillian Goldman were dead, their bodies found awash in pounding surf. 

Five men in wetsuits and yellow crash helmets struggle with wire gurneys as they converge on a rocky alcove 40 feet below the red SUV.  “The conditions were extremely hazardous,” according to Captain Steve Brito of the Cambria Fire and Rescue Unit, “It was pummeling the rescuers into the rocky beach.”

Merle Bassett, photographer on assignment for The Cambrian, captured that terrible moment: one man motions upwards for someone to deploy a rope, another kneels before the basket, its diminutive contents precariously covered by a windblown yellow tarp, Gillian.

Other rescuers are pushing through the surf carrying a heavier basket, Marcia Harrigan—her mother.

I was new to this area and followed the story as it unfolded in The Cambrian and Los Angeles Times, bewildered that such a tragedy could occur on a familiar beach less than a mile from my home. Their deaths were initially determined to be “suspicious in nature” though other scenarios, rogue wave, fall due to high winds, or failed rescue attempt were considered as well.

January 9 2008--Los Angeles Family Court, 4 p.m.  Marcia Harrigan and her daughter, Gillian failed to appear in response to a court order remanding custody to Gillian’s father Glen F. Goldman. Both parents had filed restraining orders, Glen fearing violence, Marcia claiming that her daughter had been sexually abused by her father Glen. After extensive interviews and examinations, shared custody was reinstated.

Marcia picked up Gillian at her Hermosa Valley School earlier that day and was not answering calls from the court.

At 5:15 p.m. Marcia entered a local church, while Gillian waited in the car, requesting that the priest baptize her daughter. He told her it wasn’t possible that night and assumed her many disconnected  references to “the ocean” indicated a desire to perform the baptism herself.

At 7:45 p.m. Marcia met with Craig Donato, the father of her two older daughters, Doniele and Ariana.  She explained she would be too busy “running all around” trying to prevent Glen from taking Gillian and asked Craig to sign a letter giving him complete custody of the younger of his two daughters, Ariana.  Craig asked her what she was planning to do and Marcia replied, “It’s best you don’t know.”

Despite the advice of lawyer Jeff Doeringer and her family, Marcia and Gillian left Hermosa Beach at 8:45 p.m.

Around 11:30 p.m. Marcia purchased alcohol, a balloon and other items at Von’s in Goleta, 150 miles north.

Soon after midnight on January 10, Marcia called Gillian’s half-sister Doniele, a student at San Diego State, stating that she was “too tired to go any further.”  Then she put Gillian on the phone. Gillian said she was watching TV and eating a banana. They talked several minutes and Gillian said goodbye. Marcia came back on afterward, crying, and said, “I can’t let her go with him again. What happens if he kills her? I don’t know what to do.”  Doniele attempted to calm her down and said she would call in the morning.

A call back to her mother at 7:06 a.m. resulted in no answer.

A state park ranger, responded to a 911 call at 10:10 a.m. from a vista point north of San Simeon, mile post 56.  He met a German couple with binoculars who had observed two females beyond the breakers in distress, “not putting hands in air… not a bathing moment.”  He called dispatch requesting an ambulance and a SAR unit, specialists in rappelling and belaying, for a vertical rescue.

After a team of deputies, rangers and rescue specialists performed every intervention possible at the scene, paramedic Takaoka pronounced Marcia Harrigan and Gillian Goldman’s time of death, 10:31 a.m. 

  

Their bodies were sent by ambulance to Los Osos Valley Mortuary at 12:30 p.m. after a preliminary examination and collection of evidence.

The following day at 8 a.m. counselors waited in the library of Hermosa Valley School while principal Sylvia Gluck entered a third grade classroom to tell students their classmate and mother had passed away.  Some children spoke with the counselors or went outdoors with their parents (who had been advised by phone the night before).  Others decided to draw pictures for the family. “She had friends all over the school,” said School Superintendent Sharon McClain, “Everybody here is a little broken up.”

On January 26, 2008 autopsy results for Marcia Harrigan, an adult Caucasian female, approximately 5 feet 8 inches with blond hair revealed a blood alcohol content of .03, less than half of the legal limit. No evidence of drugs found.

Gillian’s body showed no obvious signs of drugs or sexual abuse. Physical injuries were consistent with striking blunt force objects common to the rocky area where her body was found.

A blond hair was found entangled in her left hand.

The pattern of injuries, consistent with Marcia’s fingernails, indicated her mother’s hand had been held over her mouth. Other injury patterns on the arms indicated that she had been held under water.

Cause of death was determined to be salt-water drowning--manner of death, homicide.

Also included in the autopsy I requested, was a list of property recovered at the scene. At the base of the cliff were child-sized Ugg boots and car keys buried in the sand. Inside the car a brown sweater covered a purse.  Also found was a pink book bag with homework, school supplies, and the balloon from High School Musical 2.

As I considered the list and other evidence, Gillian’s interest in this movie seemed quite understandable. Doniele her older sister, with whom she seems to have been especially close, was active in musicals throughout high school and college. She is a professional singer in a southern California band. 

Not so understandable is the way Marcia arranged several items at the scene, how she secured her purse and keys as if she fully intended to return.

Equally difficult to understand is my own involvement in a case that occurred years ago, and how I was connected to an eight-year-old victim I had never met or even seen in a photograph.

And I may never understand why I later felt compelled to spend the night on the beach below that vista point. Perhaps I was hoping that by sleeping at the crime scene I would gain some insight as to how a mother could love a child yet take away that life with her own hands. I left the beach around 2 a.m. after several inexplicable events.  I’m  not ready to discuss these events any more than the countless sensitive details I encountered during the course of my research--perhaps in a book if I ever decide to write one.

I did recently decide to watch the movie High School Musical 2, every minute of it.  It starred Arroyo Grande actor Zac Efron. Though typical of preteen entertainment, overly choreographed and under plotted, it did have some meaningful music.

Gillian would have been 16-years-old this month, old enough to star in her own high school’s musical.

Should you be driving north across the Pico Bridge passing a vista point on the way to the pier, Hearst’s Castle, or an afternoon of music at Ragged Point, you might want to think of Gillian and these lyrics from her favorite movie:

Let’s take it to the beach

Take it there together
Let's celebrate today
'Cause there'll never be another