One thing about Damon is that he’s an easy caricature. In fact, he’s his own brand. I think I’m going to take this somewhere, if he doesn’t beat me to it.

The fates gave us rain, and we stayed at home pretending it was November. We went outside in the weepy drizzle and turned the sweet-smelling compost, added some red earthworms, and swung in the front yard all morning long.

We are going to the beach. I don’t care if the tide is low or high, or whether I feel like going tomorrow or not. I am washing clothes and packing our possibles, because I need to breathe cool, salty air and drive home with nappy hair and sandy toes.

Ford, when finally finished with his painting yesterday afternoon, stood back and looked at it. I stood beside him. I remarked on the different greens, how each had a different color mixed within it. I asked him about the painting, about what he was thinking about as he painted. He told me that there were images hidden inside. Could I, for example, find the hidden sickle? “You know, like Cronus’ sickle. Can you find it?”
It made me feel victorious, that he’d actually absorbed some of the stories I’ve been reading lately. And lately, we’ve been reading about the birth of the Titans, and how Zeus and his children came to be. I had gotten fed up with Pokemon and decided to take Ford’s zeal for characters and funnel that passion into mythology; this time, Greek mythology. Last year, we lurked for a while in Norse myths, but the Greek myths are hidden everywhere, like little green sickles, in the best (and in Pokemon’s case, the worst) of children’s literature and comics. They’re all a bunch of trading card characters. Like, the free kind.

We were sitting in the Santa Cruz Diner. The neighborhood began to pop fireworks and fizzers into the purple dusk. We were about to pay the bill and drive through boardwalk traffic to a fireworks show that didn’t really exist. We discovered that the best seats in Santa Cruz might have been on the beach, choking on camp smoke and trying to keep Chas out of the fire. Therefore the car, as it turned out, was the best seat. It was simply one of those fourths that we decided not to plan. In other words, it was a time for us to be lame.
The day itself was much more gratifying: an afternoon spent on a warm secluded beach about a half hour north of Santa Cruz.

Ford is practicing basic board maneuvers. He circumnavigates the driveway in rough squares of measured effort, propelling himself faster each time. His legs are slightly bent and his form conveys assurance and ease, but his arms carry some tension. They coil upwards toward lifted shoulders, bearing fear’s weight in two invisible buckets. All the while, joy and satisfaction beams through his proud, young face.

Chas soars above the ground, speeding faster than the sound of his rolling bearnings. He clicks over twigs in the driveway, sometimes rolling over the board as it stops dead beneath him. He laughs, I laugh. His palms are black from asphalt soot and his nubby toes are fearlessly worn smooth and black, too. I can hear him acting out an action scene, his voice trails behind him as he flies across the blacktop, exaggerated cries of help and pleas for mercy, ending with a thud as he slams into the woodpile, throwing himself in a heap onto the ground. He lies spread-eagle beside his skateboard, looking up into the walnut boughs above him, swaying in the hot afternoon breeze.

After a three minute meditation, watching the leaves flutter and sway, he mounts his hovercraft and soars back across the driveway, his own little cosmos

to flail himself into the jasmine, in another utterly romantic gesture of bravado. His heart just couldn’t beat any louder.

Ford and I laugh again. We follow no particular path, only minding not to run in to each other. Sometimes we glide just so close, knock knuckles, smile again. There is no two o’clock school traffic on our street to mark our passage through the afternoon. Chas is in his own world but he sometimes shows us where he’s been. Sometimes he shows us where he’s going. And then, like us, you can catch him just gelling with the afternoon. At that moment you know he’s off any agenda and he’s just somewhere in the middle of a summer afternoon in the driveway.

Above my expectations, the MOMA trip was something I can’t believe we didn’t try sooner. But our mental armor was strong that day. We pared the visit down to a Braque and that huge dog painting in the second floor foyer (hell if I remember; I was too busy trying to convince Chas that, even though the paint looked like dabs of toothpaste, he indeed could not touch it)…

And then, the Matisse exhibit. For both boys, a treat: nothing but nummies, in all dimensions. Having found our medium, our tether to real life, we were set. All we had to do was circulate smoothly without shouting too many body parts and we’d eventually hit the outdoor mezzanine. It was perfect! Couldn’t have dreamed up a better recess.

After knocking out the ya-ya’s, we had pizza downstairs.

The MOMA heats up a good pint-sized pepperoni pizza and the kids devoured it. We swilled a few pints of beer and then Damon and Dwight (Damon’s brother) took the kids across the street to Yerba Buena Gardens so that I could see the rest of the Matisse exhibit in peace.

I think the kids, mostly Ford, would have appreciated that second half of the exhibit, being a bold departure from the previous body of work. Matisse had begun cutting pieces of paper to rearrange in composition for his larger paintings. And then, down the hall, the “Jazz” series of prints, all laid out on the white table–what have we all come to know better as the work of Matisse?

Still, what’s best for the boys is plenty or room in the schedule for freeform fun. And fortunately, what’s best for them worked out to be best for me, too. Thanks, D 🙂

We’re a little culture starved around here, snug within the benign mycelium of silicon valley. Granted, if I’d just know where to look around here, I’d find something interesting on exhibit. But the truth is that I’m just acheing to go to a fussy art museum where I can feel the music of terrazzo under my feet and experience air conditioning without a trace of retail and ride that fabulous chase from security guard to security guard, close behind Chas, always on the fringe of expulsion as he tries to weave fast arcs around freestanding sculptures. Art is, after all, mostly about the personal experience one has with the piece, and with Chas there is no exception. He loves sculpture, it FASCINATES him to discover giant colorful pillars shooting from the ground or brushed-steel geometry shining in the sun. OH! The joy! Must scream and run circles around them all!

There’s one exhibit in particular that I’m planning on taking them to see sometime soon, the Matisse exhibit at the SFMOMA. Ford is a collage guru and I figure it might provide a springboard for translating some of his 2D work into a new dimension; specifically, creating something 3-dimensional that his younger brother might be tempted to play with (especially if it’s made of paper or papier-mache). But again, really, I’m just sad that we haven’t been able to go for so long, for fear that we might die during the struggle to patiently corral our children politely through a quiet space for art.

I think it’s more important that they experience art from a very young age for several reasons. First, I think it’s fun for them to see how some people have translated emotions or themes into art. Secondly, I like for them to understand the value and purpose behind the art process. Thirdly, I want them to grow to respect the work of others as well as their own art, because the enduring value of art is that it has the power to change the future in many ways: it can alter a person’s perspective, create controversy, quiet a restless mind, you get the idea. Lastly, I want them to evolve quickly within the rigid confines of the art museum institution so that they naturally respect that paticular environment as they would a shrine, an that is mostly because I’d LIKE TO ENJOY THE MUSEUM, TOO.

So, this weekend I’ve requested we pay the MOMA a visit, take our chances, hope for the best. There’s a book I heard about that recommends certain tips for taking 5 year-olds and older children to the museum, How to talk to children about art: is the title. As an art teacher, I feel qualified enough to come up with my own suggestions (which, in all it’s conceit, is actually true) but I’m still curious about what it has to say and am ordering it anyway.

Wish us luck! Double that for the MOMA.

Wow, what a hiatus. I’ve taken another mental health month, this time following a hectic family visit, and I am beginning to feel much better now, thank you. Your sympathetic messages have been a sustaining force and the only reason, I have to admit, that I’m sitting here at the computer now. It’s one in the morning, I’ve been cutting fabric and thinking about the friends I’d like to keep, the ones like you whom I’ve met through this blog, who remind me that it’s okay. Just keep writing. Keep taking photos. Don’t say you’re forgetful. Move forward.
Thank you.

So here we are. I’m sure you wanted more details, but here we ARE:
and watch out!

Summer is here, so very here. Each afternoon the hot winds off the valley blow through the garden on the way to Santa Cruz or wherever they go. Judging by the weary droop of the Lady’s Mantle, the Huecheras, the zucchini—I’d say an inch or two more compost would buffer tender roots from heatstroke. But the deer lop it all off and solve the problem instantly. Genius! Here’s Chas, clearly offended by the marauding:

The deer. The wait until the tomatoes have sprung three tall feet and sprouted yellow flowers along the vine like christmas lights. Then they mow down the vines and pluck the hard green tomatoes, dropping them to the ground to rot at the bitemarks:

But the evening, it’s so summery. In the city, I have to wear fleece to dinner. In my backyard, however, I wear a tank top and feel nothing as the evening blues. The quail, scampering down along the fenceline, shepherd a new clutch of chicks. There must be twenty! I can’t see details without my glasses, but my eyes register fleeting puffs of down, left, right, then left, and the parents zig left then right, alerting the other of the dog by my side. Seti, mouthwatering, tenses and tracks their path.

When I water the zuchinni, it sounds like the heavy rain that I haven’t heard in months. A few weeks ago, the water pattered the mulch and the seedlings bowed under strain. Today, tall and turgid, the large uneaten leaves bat back at the downpour, an audible splattering, a hollow summer sound that I miss from Texas (and everywhere else I’ve lived in summers past, for that matter). I miss the moody days, shrouded in gray clouds, rain that evaporated off hot concrete, lightening that awoke a summer midnight. Puddles. Rainbows. Clouds.

Oh, screw it. Sunny days and starry nights rock!