Pelican Days
Louisianians may flee the coast when a storm approaches, but Marlou and I do just the opposite. We head for the water and hunker down. How else to explain the two weeks we spent above the waters of Tomales Bay in August, 2006, just weeks before Marlou's cancer diagnosis? And what is there to say about our latest stay right on the same bay? This time we had the diagnosis, just not the update.
The latter was coming. The storm warnings were up, low-lying areas evacuated. The storm hit and things scattered. In this case, Marlou's cancer cells. They've spread themselves around, and now there are no forecasts, and the evacuees are returning.
We had met with Marlou's doctor and heard about the new tests, new drugs and new game plan. Things were serious, but there was still time, still hope. So, on the following day we looked around and wondered what to do next. Go to the coast, of course. The coast was clear. So what was there to do, but load up the van, crank up the speed and hurtle over the hill?
Half Moon Bay, Marlou observes as we wind down the coastal canyon, is looking awfully spruce. The pumpkin fields, site of the imminent and ever mindnumbing Pumpkin Festival, are raked and tidy. The garden centers are looking awfully, well, centered. And the only produce stand along the highway keeps up a certain standard with its four-dollar-per-box strawberries.
Turning onto the coastal highway, the Pacific spray predominates. Now everything to the left of the northbound road is about the setting sun, rising mist and rolling waves. Pacific Brown Pelicans, almost extinct from DDT exposure in my childhood, are out in force. In fact, they have opened a diving range just off shore.
Our friend Tom drives up, parks and joins us on the front. Like Navy jets, the pelicans take off, circle, identify the target, go into a dive. And now they do what no Navy jet ever has or will. They go into the water and actually submerge. Marlou's theory is that they stun their prey. I'm not so sure. I think they have a contract with Lockheed Martin for real-time lock on prey detection and acquisition. Fish got to swim. Birds gotta fly. And pelicans gotta do both.
Every few seconds the birds plunk into the water. The Pacific's roar blanks out the sound. The lowering sun heightens the sparkle from the spray. I point out the pelicans' deficiencies in air traffic control. Marlou laughs in her inimitable way. Her eyes lock on mine the way the pelicans do on the fish. We agree on the target, the laughter target. It's not the pelicans -- it's each other.
We are locking onto some wavelength that in times of soul weariness opens up to people in distress. It's an emergency frequency solely for the transmission of observed data. Our topic happens to be pelican airspace management. But that's only today. Tomorrow the topic will change, but the channel will remain open. Marlou's capacity to be emotionally present, to maintain a perspective on the world that is at once wry and openhearted, this is what I love in a timeless way. And since we're both destined to have only so many trips to Half Moon Bay, this particular visit keeps expanding in both scope and significance.
Marlou, Tom and I wander along the shore. The two of them wander into a fanciful garden of a New Agey healing center. It's an utterly California phenomenon with a politically incorrect five inch step blocking wheelchair access. For which, in this case, I am grateful. You can take the boy out of the curmudgeon, but you can't take the curmudgeon out of the boy. I want to tell this to Marlou and to Tom, but both have disappeared into the garden. Never mind. For I am thinking of my own.
My raised garden beds. The tomatoes keep arriving at a steady clip. There is lettuce. Now and then a forgotten Spanish onion surfaces. As for the basil, it is overripe, overgrown and bursting with neglect. I have neither the time nor the will to make pesto. Most mornings I just stare at the basil, then make tracks. I was just about to do so this morning when the gardeners arrived in their truck with ear-shattering leaf blowers and went to work blasting garden waste off available surfaces.
It was time for the annual offering, my homage to Wendell Berry. To the Hispanic gardening assistant to whom I give 30 bucks each spring for pitchforking my cover crop back into the ground, I also give vegetables. This year the ritual has come awfully late. I yell at him enough to be heard through his earplugs and over the sound of the leaf blower. He follows me down the walkway where I pull off a meager harvest. A couple of tomatoes. Some scrawny lettuce. One onion. It's very token this year. Even halfhearted. It's just the principle of the thing. And I'm not even sure what the principle is. Something about sharing the fruits of the earth. Sharing the earth itself. I notice that he is graying about the temples, this gardener. He knows very little about English, very much about leaf blowing, and he's not young. I thank him and hope he enjoys the vegetables.
* * *
A few days later, Marlou brings up the topic of wills. Actually, I am focusing on objects. Marlou has a glass case full of them. This piece of furniture, it turns out, is called a breakfront. Part of my education as a male, not to mention an undomesticated person, is this word, an item for storage and display, which does have a front but, no, is not broken. I long ago absorbed the apparent misnomer. What I am absorbing now is the ceramic contents, the figures and knickknacks that Marlou will want to bequeath to others. Our relationship has its limits.
I am staring at the pre-bequest figurines, because I do not want to acknowledge the situation regarding wills. Marlou has written hers. I, inexplicably, have not written mine. Superficially, my reason is that it doesn't matter. I have no kids. The ridiculousness of this is transparent, of course. I will die and leave behind people and things, and a will is designed to connect these two. It's a practical matter. And the truth could not be simpler. I have avoided willmaking. I don't have the will.
Marlou does. She made hers long ago. In this regard, Marlou has taken the lead. I want her to know this. She does not think of herself naturally in a leading role. But it is not up to us to choose the lead. That's up to Central Casting. Marlou has been chosen. The part has been written for her, and it is sad and funny and warm, just as she is. The rest of us have supporting roles, and the action and meaning emanate from Marlou. I would like to say she is my star, but truly, she is ours.
The latter was coming. The storm warnings were up, low-lying areas evacuated. The storm hit and things scattered. In this case, Marlou's cancer cells. They've spread themselves around, and now there are no forecasts, and the evacuees are returning.
We had met with Marlou's doctor and heard about the new tests, new drugs and new game plan. Things were serious, but there was still time, still hope. So, on the following day we looked around and wondered what to do next. Go to the coast, of course. The coast was clear. So what was there to do, but load up the van, crank up the speed and hurtle over the hill?
Half Moon Bay, Marlou observes as we wind down the coastal canyon, is looking awfully spruce. The pumpkin fields, site of the imminent and ever mindnumbing Pumpkin Festival, are raked and tidy. The garden centers are looking awfully, well, centered. And the only produce stand along the highway keeps up a certain standard with its four-dollar-per-box strawberries.
Turning onto the coastal highway, the Pacific spray predominates. Now everything to the left of the northbound road is about the setting sun, rising mist and rolling waves. Pacific Brown Pelicans, almost extinct from DDT exposure in my childhood, are out in force. In fact, they have opened a diving range just off shore.
Our friend Tom drives up, parks and joins us on the front. Like Navy jets, the pelicans take off, circle, identify the target, go into a dive. And now they do what no Navy jet ever has or will. They go into the water and actually submerge. Marlou's theory is that they stun their prey. I'm not so sure. I think they have a contract with Lockheed Martin for real-time lock on prey detection and acquisition. Fish got to swim. Birds gotta fly. And pelicans gotta do both.
Every few seconds the birds plunk into the water. The Pacific's roar blanks out the sound. The lowering sun heightens the sparkle from the spray. I point out the pelicans' deficiencies in air traffic control. Marlou laughs in her inimitable way. Her eyes lock on mine the way the pelicans do on the fish. We agree on the target, the laughter target. It's not the pelicans -- it's each other.
We are locking onto some wavelength that in times of soul weariness opens up to people in distress. It's an emergency frequency solely for the transmission of observed data. Our topic happens to be pelican airspace management. But that's only today. Tomorrow the topic will change, but the channel will remain open. Marlou's capacity to be emotionally present, to maintain a perspective on the world that is at once wry and openhearted, this is what I love in a timeless way. And since we're both destined to have only so many trips to Half Moon Bay, this particular visit keeps expanding in both scope and significance.
Marlou, Tom and I wander along the shore. The two of them wander into a fanciful garden of a New Agey healing center. It's an utterly California phenomenon with a politically incorrect five inch step blocking wheelchair access. For which, in this case, I am grateful. You can take the boy out of the curmudgeon, but you can't take the curmudgeon out of the boy. I want to tell this to Marlou and to Tom, but both have disappeared into the garden. Never mind. For I am thinking of my own.
My raised garden beds. The tomatoes keep arriving at a steady clip. There is lettuce. Now and then a forgotten Spanish onion surfaces. As for the basil, it is overripe, overgrown and bursting with neglect. I have neither the time nor the will to make pesto. Most mornings I just stare at the basil, then make tracks. I was just about to do so this morning when the gardeners arrived in their truck with ear-shattering leaf blowers and went to work blasting garden waste off available surfaces.
It was time for the annual offering, my homage to Wendell Berry. To the Hispanic gardening assistant to whom I give 30 bucks each spring for pitchforking my cover crop back into the ground, I also give vegetables. This year the ritual has come awfully late. I yell at him enough to be heard through his earplugs and over the sound of the leaf blower. He follows me down the walkway where I pull off a meager harvest. A couple of tomatoes. Some scrawny lettuce. One onion. It's very token this year. Even halfhearted. It's just the principle of the thing. And I'm not even sure what the principle is. Something about sharing the fruits of the earth. Sharing the earth itself. I notice that he is graying about the temples, this gardener. He knows very little about English, very much about leaf blowing, and he's not young. I thank him and hope he enjoys the vegetables.
* * *
A few days later, Marlou brings up the topic of wills. Actually, I am focusing on objects. Marlou has a glass case full of them. This piece of furniture, it turns out, is called a breakfront. Part of my education as a male, not to mention an undomesticated person, is this word, an item for storage and display, which does have a front but, no, is not broken. I long ago absorbed the apparent misnomer. What I am absorbing now is the ceramic contents, the figures and knickknacks that Marlou will want to bequeath to others. Our relationship has its limits.
I am staring at the pre-bequest figurines, because I do not want to acknowledge the situation regarding wills. Marlou has written hers. I, inexplicably, have not written mine. Superficially, my reason is that it doesn't matter. I have no kids. The ridiculousness of this is transparent, of course. I will die and leave behind people and things, and a will is designed to connect these two. It's a practical matter. And the truth could not be simpler. I have avoided willmaking. I don't have the will.
Marlou does. She made hers long ago. In this regard, Marlou has taken the lead. I want her to know this. She does not think of herself naturally in a leading role. But it is not up to us to choose the lead. That's up to Central Casting. Marlou has been chosen. The part has been written for her, and it is sad and funny and warm, just as she is. The rest of us have supporting roles, and the action and meaning emanate from Marlou. I would like to say she is my star, but truly, she is ours.
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