- July 2008
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Alas, it’s now more than a fifth of a half-decade since we returned from Scandinavia and I’ve left us in Finland for months. I am going to finish this journal, I hereby solemnly promise to myself. Already I’m having trouble with the exact sequence of events, and town names which nobody would care about but me, but I might like to look back on this someday and know I got it right.
Day 8
We left Kuopio and headed for the city of Rovaniemi, the “Gateway to Lapland.” More about the Lapps later, the indigenous people of the area. (They don’t like the word “Lapp” though. I gather it’s kind of like calling an American Indian a “redskin.” The preferred term is Saami, and we had quite a Saami experience on day 9, about which more later.)
That part of Finland is flat and covered with small lakes, thousands of them. If you keep an eye peeled you’ll see moose (yes, Scandinavia is home to the loveli lakes and the majestic moose) walking among the trees, and the reindeer are everywhere: They’re a stock animal like the cows in Texas, with tags in their ears. The Saami depend on them.
We stopped in Oulu (site of the annual Air Guitar World Championships) for lunch at a big market and enjoyed a newspaper cone of fried “bait fish.” These were tasty handfuls of fried, minnow-sized fish. With some malt vinegar they were quite good. Funny thing, I had ordered it and was paying for it before I even knew it was happening. I know I never asked; the guy just congratulated me on my choice, scooped it out, handed it to me, and requested some number of euros. Those folks know how to handle a busload of tourists.
World War II Monument in Rovaniemi Cemetery. 90% of the town was destroyed by the Germans.
We arrived at Rovaniemi late in the afternoon. After settling at the hotel we took off on foot and ambled down to the river, next to the Jätkänkynttilä bridge (say that three times fast), where intense preparations were under way for the midnight midsummer bonfire.
The crowd grew larger and larger, musical bands played, dancers danced, drunks wheeled around and collapsed, and we had a blast watching as the excitement built. It was not an event staged for tourists; the crowd was almost entirely local. Proud parents watched their children perform as dancers or musicians.
At 11:59 a small contingent of young townsfolk dressed in gorgeous local costumes marched to the water’s edge and sang a beautiful song, about midsummer I suppose.
We were all hushed as the hour struck. Midnight on midsummer’s day in northern Finland is bright as noon in Texas, but the torch was applied and the cone of wood crackled and flared. There was a cheer, and the planet began its long tilt towards winter. I wished I had had the good sense to get drunk and dance with the locals. Next time I’m going for it.
I don’t think anyone could put it more succinctly than Ben Franklin:
Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
It is now legal for our government to wiretap U.S. citizens without a warrant. “Don’t worry!” we’re assured. “Unless you have al Qaeda on your speed dial you have nothing to worry about! Ha ha!” In other words, Go Shopping!
Or you could sign this petition.
You show me one jot of authority ever ceded to this government that wasn’t expanded, abused, and exploited in the interest of ensuring that those in power stay there. Republican or Democrat, when push comes to shove, they want it bad and they don’t give it up, even if the “temporary” crisis is averted. The original justification (however specious) will be long forgotten and federal surveillance of citizens will become the status quo.
Suppose you were a member of Congress, and suppose you were an idiot. But I repeat myself. — Mark Twain
Better thank Obama while we’re at it. Like I said: just a politician.
I suppose I’m the last person to hear of the “Stuff White People Like“ blog. It does a good job of skewering the comfortable affluent white liberal class, of which I’m a member. I don’t fall in line too closely, though. For example, I don’t like Whole Foods Market or National Public Radio very much.
At Whole Foods, especially the flagship store in Austin, you get the feeling you’re supposed to congratulate yourself for shopping there. There are murals of farms and cows everywhere, fair trade this and hemp that. Shade-grown toilet paper. The old Whole Foods (it was actually called SaferWay in the early days) is gone with the Austin hippie, onward through the fog to the great Armadillo World Headquarters in the sky. It’s now a giant corporation promoting conspicuous consumption and pocketing truckloads of cash from studiously hip, urban lawyers and software engineers. Their stores are icons of pretentious marketing. I like H.E.B.’s Central Market much better: It’s gourmet and specialty food, but you’re not expected to feel better about yourself or your gluttony.
Besides, I don’t have any tattoos, or staples in my nose–this means I can only be an outsider at the Austin Whole Foods.
As for NPR, their news shows All Things Considered and Morning Edition never, ever have a story anybody in their right mind wants to hear. Flip to the NPR station for some news and you’ll get a rundown on the bleak economic outlook for growers of a particular variety of the Chardonnay grape in the Napa valley, something really close to the heart of the average NPR listener, which I guess ain’t me.
I’m much more interested in this story.
Hey, Obama has run afoul of left-wing orthodoxy on the FISA thing. Heaven forfend. Now we’re seeing hissy fits as any disagreement with his “base” is seen as rank betrayal. Markos went apoplectic. Barack ain’t dancing with who brung him!
I support the guy, because I think his heart’s in the right place and we damn sure don’t want any more Republican dim-bulbs in that office to screw things up worse, but come on. He’s a politician. He’s not going to make everybody happy all the time. In fact he’s going to act out of his political self interest quite often. That’s what they do. It ain’t the Second Coming, people. Some of the fundie nuts actually floated that idea about their man Bush, God’s Tool on Earth; we don’t need to make that kind of mistake.
This is great. Especially the “synchronized flush salute.” Make it happen, S.F.!
Despite the pundits’ hand-wringing (which is all they ever do), I don’t see that the drawn-out Democratic primary was a bad thing. Obama and Clinton were in the news constantly while McSame tried to get anybody to listen to what he was saying.
But it’s nice that it’s over. On to November!
vs
I don’t follow any TV shows now so I don’t know if there’s any theme music these days worth mentioning. The last distinct theme I remember is the one from “Friends” and it was catchy in an annoying way. I can hear it in my head now and I hate it. I’ll be there for you…ye gods.
The shows I catch lately seem to have hired New Age composers to noodle on a synthesizer for a couple of hours; the producers then pick little two-second snippets to throw in when The Character is Moody. Cut to commercial.
So I think back to the glory days when show themes were so good they became part of our very culture, such as it is in ‘Murica, we do love it so.
Go on, admit you know all the words to “The Ballad of Jed Clampett.” I bet I could play just the rhythm part from “I Dream of Jeannie” and you’d recognize it. And think of all the great themes from old sci-fi shows like ”Star Trek” (especially the first season, with the bongos), ”Lost in Space,” and “The Twilight Zone.”
The mournful whiney theme music from the new “Battlestar Galactica” is awful; it sounds like Enya was punched hard in the stomach.
The indisputable masterpieces are the whistled theme from “The Andy Griffith Show” and the swinging big band tune from “The Dick Van Dyke Show.” Hell, I had a dog that loved the Andy Griffith theme. TV theme music is a lost art, now truly dead.
Retired Accountant, 89.
That’s probably what the short death notice in the paper would say. So ridiculous to try to sum up a man by his work…I know it’s only a little extra identifying information for the reader, but it still seems an attempt to capture someone in a nutshell. Like pouring the ocean into a jar. Retired accountant. Nothing about the hugeness of the man’s heart, his lust for life, his determination to grab the finer things and enjoy his good food, his wine, his family, his travels all over the world. All without meaning a soul any harm.Without being selfish…in fact, his pleasure in things was increased a hundredfold when he could share it with someone. Like the first day I met him and he dragged out his impressive collection of liqueurs from all over the world, insisting I try them all, until I couldn’t see. Taking us to fine restaurants where I didn’t even know how to eat the food…I felt I was such a country bumpkin. Sometimes I wondered if he wondered what his daughter saw in me. But he saw I made her happy, and that was all he needed. I was in.
He was loud, full of stories, insatiably curious, a tender hearted bull of a man with eyes quick to mist over, who loved a good tune and a great bottle of wine, a creamy Mexican beer, a fiery mole sauce. He wrote poetry; he took beautiful photographs. He acted zany with his grandchildren. He did things his own way. I appreciated that there was nothing artificial about him. He didn’t hem and haw. If you asked him a question and the answer was no, he said “No.”
These last few years I’ve watched him fade in a nursing home, the old lion remembering what it was like to roar. When he died suddenly last week, one day short of his 90th birthday, we felt a tremendous presence gone, like a mountain razed and only a flat and lonely prairie remaining. His sweet wife of 66 years died in February and I think he just couldn’t bear being alone on this earth without her. He hung on for a few more parties, a few more visits, but he knew it was time to leave.
The nurse at the home burst into tears talking about him. He made friends of them all.
He had just passed away when I last saw him, and I stroked his thin white hair and said goodbye to the old warrior. Fighter of many battles, big and small, lover of life. We must continue with him in our hearts, and never forget what we’ve learned from him.
My absolute favorite record when I was a little kid was Eddy Arnold’s version of ”Tennessee Stud.” Here it is in great audio quality, along with another beauty. Rest in peace, Eddy!
The abundant advice we get from the food industry about their products’ health benefits is a load of hooey. The ads on TV would have us believe that the only things saving us from malnutrition and horrible disease are: 1) The latest scientific-sounding ingredients in breakfast cereal bars and other brightly packaged junk, and 2) pills, pills, pills.
Leaving aside the pharmaceuticals, what about those cheerfully labeled, “Heart Healthy” yogurt-in-a-plastic-cup things with anti-this and zero that and pro-the other? Garbage. The cereal boxes covered with health claims? That packaging is how General Mills gets you to pay $30 a pound for oats.
“But the American Heart Association stamp of approval is right there on the package!” The American Heart Association is paid a lot of money for those endorsements, just like Tiger Woods. It’s meaningless.
For something as basic as the food going into our bodies, we no longer turn to our culture (Mom) for advice, but instead to General Mills and Archer Daniels Midland. Or countless “experts” flooding the market with books about healthy diets. Think about it: For 3 million years humans did just fine deciding for themselves what went in their stomachs. Now all of a sudden we need reams of information and packaging labels concerning Omega-3 acids and trans-fats, beta-carotene and anti-oxidants. Who’s benefiting from our confusion?
I first heard Michael Pollan on NPR’s “Fresh Air” several years ago. That interview changed my way of thinking about food. Pollan is a journalist who writes about the current campaign of “nutritionist” nonsense based on poor science to keep consumers in the dark about what to eat. The video below is a fascinating one-hour presentation he gave to Google employees in March.
I bought my first $70 tank of gas today (Update, July 2008: $83.00). I wanted to post this now, so I can look back in a year and think, “how innocent!” Somewhere in an old blog entry from 2003 I complain about spending $40 on a full tank. Same vehicle. Ha ha ha!
In other news, the following words and phrases are dead to me:
- A perfect storm. In other words, a set of conditions existed that was conducive to a particular outcome. Thanks, Moron! Used most often to imply that no one could have predicted or avoided a supremely predictable and avoidable screw-up.
- Synergy. If you use “synergy” in a conversation with me, I will stab you.
- Leverage. Leverage. Leverage…I spit on your stinking leverage.
- Price point. Not one person on this planet can tell me the difference between a price point and a price.
- No problem. That is, instead of ”You’re welcome.” I didn’t think it would be a problem for you to bring me a glass of water. You’re a waiter. I just wanted to thank you. Glad it didn’t ruin your day, getting me some water. I appreciate your magnanimity and stoicism.
- Dead to me. Apologies to Stephen Colbert.
Speaking of waiters, I was in some pretentious restaurant at lunch recently in North Austin, in The Domain shopping center, which is basically Disneyland’s Main Street U.S.A. for affluent shopaholic bimbos. In other words Dallas-ism is creeping down here, slowly but surely.
I ordered a $14 salad. After it arrived the waiter approached brandishing what I thought was a baseball bat, but which turned out to be a big wooden pepper mill. He asked if I wanted some fresh ground pepper. “Sure,” I said, thinking, what a bargain! $14 for a bowl of leaves AND I get free pepper!
Then he asks, I kid you not, “Would you like coarse, or fine-grained?”
Take me back, magic time machine, to the Bantam Cafe in Smiley, Texas for a plate of Lupe’s enchiladas. Or the old Texas Grill in Bastrop at 3 a.m., giggling and ravenous with my stoner friends. Or the old meat market downtown for sausage and brisket on a cold, cold day (thumb over the punctured bottle cap, shake up the cayenne-vinegar sauce, pour it on the butcher paper, wrap a sausage link in white bread, sop. Oh hell yeah!). How about the Nighthawk in Austin, whose burgers hastened LBJ’s demise? Royal Burger in Del Valle. Mmmm. Of course I wouldn’t eat any of that stuff now, because I don’t want a triple bypass, but oh, the simplicity and deliciousness!
Well, I’m approaching 50 and am entitled to start a long slide into indulgent nostalgia, simultaneously bemoaning the decadence of the modern world. Everybody else does it, so why shouldn’t I?
Something new is happening in this campaign. Have you heard a speech this good from any of the cookie-cutter, focus-grouped politicians of the last several decades?
Does he have all the answers? No, of course not. But he’s willing to talk to us as adults with brains, not some amorphous blob of ”political consumers” that must be marketed to, pandered to, and condescended to.
As a teenager I was a rabid Arthur C. Clarke fan. I think I read everything the man produced, beginning with Against the Fall of Night, which comprised our little town library’s entire science fiction section, and later 2001 - A Space Odyssey, and a moth-eaten anthology in my school library titled The Nine Billion Names of God. Oh, and of course Childhood’s End and Tales from the White Hart. Fantastic stuff.
For years I would read something by Hemingway or Faulkner and think, “he’s alright, but he’s no Arthur C. Clarke.”
What I liked about Sir Arthur was his eye for detail. His stories were soaring flights of fancy, giving free rein to an incredible imagination, always with the ballast of a scientifically trained mind and disiplined attention to the smallest details. A glaring error of scientific fact or an obvious plot hole (i.e., so glaring or obvious that even I catch it) ruins a movie or book for me, but his work was airtight. It might be naively optimistic about the pace of technology, but the science was sound.
Sir Arthur died today at 90. It’s sad news, the loss of a friendly voice I’ve heard in my head for years. But I have well-thumbed copies of his work in my bookcase still, and perhaps it’s time to check in with him.
We left Helsinki for Kuopio on the morning of June 21st. The weather was beautiful, and the bus was full of Austrailian and American chatter. We were quickly out of the big city and cruising through the green countryside dotted by what must be thousands of little lakes mirroring the brilliant blue sky. Finland is a sparkling green country that’s perhaps a little smaller than California, with just a few million residents. It’s a mostly wild and beautiful land.
Arvid the tour guide had got up on the wrong side of bed and after several attempts to narrate something about the area we were passing through, groused that he couldn’t talk if all of us were talking at the same time. “So I’ll just keep my mouth shut,” he said, then switched off his microphone and settled in his jumpseat for a bit of a sulk. Chastised, we were good schoolchildren for awhile and he warmed back to his subject, whatever it was.
Most of his talks were interesting, giving us a smattering of local history, usually concerning the war. Sometimes he would read funny articles or tell jokes. Here’s one he promised would illustrate the differences among Norwegians, Swedes, and Finns (or at least illustrate how they think of each other):
Two Finns, two Norwegians, and two Swedes were shipwrecked together on a big deserted island. When it became obvious they wouldn’t be rescued any time soon, they decided to split up and meet again after a year.
A year later, they met at the designated place to report what they had been up to.
The two Finns had learned to domesticate wild pigs on the island and spent the year enjoying feasts of pork.
The two Norwegians had learned to harvest wild rice and distilled a delicious liquor from it, and spent the year pleasantly drunk.
The two Swedes spent the whole year looking for a third person to introduce them to each other.
I didn’t find the Swedes all that formal or stand-offish. No more than any other Scandinavians. If you had a question or looked lost they’d help you out in an instant with a smile. Every local we met on the trip was helpful as can be–the last snottiness I encountered was at Kennedy Airport in New York–and I decided then and there that if I’m ever in a position to be of service to a foreign tourist, I’ll do my best to represent America well.
The Scandinavians are certainly a bit reserved compared to most Americans, but so is my own American family and I found it rather refreshing. To tell you the truth I liked it a lot. We could use some of that reserve in this country: We introverts would be a lot more comfortable with less of the good ol’ boy backslapping har de har har I-just-met-you-three-seconds-ago-can-I-call-you-Dave. I know I’m in the minority: Most of my countrymen think there’s something wrong with introverts and that we should be more like them. Another topic for another day.
Where was I…so Arvid was narrating the countryside and his mood was improving. The magic bus nosed into the dense forest (which is what most of Finland consists of) and we stopped for lunch at a big tower in the woods, with a rotating restaurant on top.
At this point I should introduce Tux, our little toy velvet stuffed rabbit who makes every journey with us. He’s the best-traveled stuffed toy rabbit in history, and we felt he should get a view of the lovely lakes and trees of Finland from the top.
Tux will appear again in this narrative. Anyway, you can see the town of Kuopio below the tower and some of the myriad lakes and the ubiquitous tall conifers. After a snack we went for a stroll in the beautiful woods, birds singing like a symphony (I heard magpies and robins, along with many I couldn’t identify) and gorgeous near-Arctic sunshine streaming down.
I wish I could adequately describe the air. On a good day on a mountaintop in Colorado, or perhaps deep in the redwoods of Oregon, you get the same feeling. A double lungful of sheer heaven that charges you with electricity. Summer temperatures are still a little crisp at Finland’s latitude, but not too cool, maybe 60 degrees in the shadows but very pleasant in the sunshine. It’s about like Austin in the early Spring.
The organic smell of the forest. Ahh.
Near the tower is a winter sports complex including Olympic quality ski jumps which, believe it or not, are open for practice in the summer. As Tux observes below, the jumps are covered with a plastic material something like shaggy Astroturf, upon which the flying skiers can take off and land just like snow. Perhaps at considerable more risk in case of a spill. I have some great video of the practice from our later visit to Lillehammer, which I’ll try converting to web video. It’s fascinating.
Our hotel in Kuopio was situated on the shore of beautiful Lake Kallavesi. Obviously an establishment that caters to a big winter sports clientele, it was practically deserted at midsummer. After a gourmet dinner we enjoyed a stroll by the lake, a few blocks into town along the water through a quiet city park to some small boat landings. We lolled on the grass under the trees and chuckled at a young family of ducks, five or six fuzzy ducklings nestled under their fat mother, emerging shakily and waddling into the water for some swimming lessons under her watchful eye.
On our return to the hotel Karen decided to try a real Finnish sauna. I declined, having been unimpressed by sauna experiences in America. I should have known better. Hearing her rave about it made me determined to give it a try later.
The sauna at, say, your average Courtyard by Marriot in Anywhere, U.S.A. is a joke. They’re barely hot, probably because their lawyers don’t want anyone having a heart attack. I’m not saying you can’t find a good sauna in America, but I haven’t.
The Finnish sauna is unbelievable. It’s a national religious ritual.
It must have been 120 degrees in there when I first went in. There was a bucket of eucalyptus water and some hot rocks, and a ladle. Like an idiot, I filled the ladle and poured it onto the rocks.
Oh. My. God. A heavy, thick steam blanket of unbelievable oppressive power descended on me and squeezed. Suddenly it was hard to breathe. I bolted for the door.
Never give up, though. Once I got the hang of it (just a little water, dumbass, like an eighth of a ladle) I really enjoyed the heck out of it. But I could only stay ten minutes or so.
The hardy Scandinavian will head right out of a sauna and go jump in the snow, or at this time of year at least have an ice cold shower. No way. But a luke warm shower later I was in my comfy bed and as relaxed as I’ve ever been in my life. Even with the midnight sun blazing through the thin curtains, I slept like a rock.
Looks like an interesting film coming from Terrence Malick, Robert Redford, Laura Dunn et. al. about the recent boom years in Austin, as our population tripled over twenty years’ time at a terrible environmental price. The canary in the coal mine: our beloved Barton Springs.
There’s still a lot of beauty in Austin but on a pessimistic day I fear Barton Springs is doomed. The Japanese Shinto religion considers anything of natural beauty to be sacred. You have only to float in Barton Springs on a hot July day to appreciate that sanctity–sanctity that will never be honored by the goddamned vandals in suits with their bulldozers. The hills and streams west of Austin should have been Hill Country National Park. Instead we have crappy office sheds and parking garages perched over Bull Creek, the high cliffs dominated by gaudy, utterly tasteless McMansions.
The Good Life in West Austin, 11-Car Garage, Golf Course Nearby
God forbid this town should not continue to grow…then something would be wrong. Nothing can ever be big enough, right?
The ethics of the cancer cell.
Who is this Aqui fellow and why is he running in every election? Puzzling.
I voted early today at our local supermarket. I have never seen such a turnout for early voting at this place. I usually walk in, sign the roster managed by a couple of bored ladies, and vote right away. This time I stood in line for twenty minutes and the tally by the door said they had over 3,400 voters yesterday.
It was a co-primary location so there was one line for Republicans and one for Democrats. I saw one Republican. The line for Democrats stretched to the back of the room.
From the Secretary of State’s statistics web site: As of yesterday the cumulative Republican early voter count was 131,876 in the 15 largest Texas counties versus 419,192 Democrats.
If this kind of early turnout is any indication, people are pissed this year.
Did I mention…
And by the way Hillary: this guy you say is all platitudes and no specifics? Try clicking this link. Get Chelsea to show you how. You can find a lot of info on the Internets.
I’m sorry; I’d love to see a woman president, and if she’s the nominee she gets my vote without reservation, but H.C. represents a well-oiled and established political machine. The party operatives behind her are the ones that want to steer the Democratic party to ”the center” whatever the hell that is. Terry McAuliffe? That bald braying jackass what’s-his-name? Not to mention the First Gentleman. I think a lot of us just want to see some fresh faces on the scene.
Oh, and let’s send Cornyn packing. This is the only guy who has a shot. And it’s real:
I’m an Obama man, and I think he won the debate in Austin the other night, but Hillary slaughtered him on that last question. You could practically see him thinking “damn she just blew me away on that one.”
It wasn’t a particularly substantive question; more like one of those freebies you give a candidate in a job interview to end on. He rambled and lost his way, while she used the opportunity to great advantage.
But earlier she couldn’t resist a cheap shot about supposedly plagiarized lines in an Obama speech–lines that were suggested and written by a guy working for him. The audience weren’t idiots and knew better. She was roundly and justifiably booed for that lame jab. The Clinton camp can’t seem to get past the stupid attack syndrome. Silly season indeed.
I was surprised to learn that Helsinki’s population is only about 500,000. It seems much bigger, because it’s packed into a small area, like San Francisco. Regardless of size it’s a world-class capital, cosmopolitan and modern.
Everywhere the streets were spotless and the shops were neat. The famous Scandinavian flair for design is evident everywhere, and not just in the Marimekko stores. There really is a Scandinavian style, which I’ll do my best to describe as clean lines, polished wood and brushed metal surfaces, and simple, elegant, organic design manifested in high quality construction. Everywhere we went the doors clicked closed with a satisfying precision, drawers slid silently shut, windows opened and closed with the slightest pressure.
Running down the center of Helsinki is a long open pedestrian boulevard called the “Esplanade.” It’s a tree-lined avenue surrounded by cafes, trendy boutiques, and galleries. We spent two delightful evenings wandering up and down this green public space admiring the sculpture, serenaded by street musicians, watching a trained dog act, stopping at a sidewalk cafe for coffee, grabbing an ice cream (the ice cream vendor warned me to walk with my cone tucked close to my chest, as the seagulls love to dive and steal unwary tourists’ treats). We both loved Helsinki the most of any city we visited in Scandinavia…and we loved them all. I could sit on a bench in that fair city all the 20-hour daylight in summer, just watching the people and soaking up the atmosphere of a hip European capital. Our verdict: Helsinki Rules!
Sculpture on Helsinki’s Esplanade.
On the Esplanade.
Visiting the Sibelius monument in Helsinki.
I intended to complete my Scandinavian journal long ago before the details began to fade, but I’ve been reluctant to sit at the computer after working all day on one of the damn things so I’ve left us adrift on the boat to Helsinki for months. Time to pick up with beautiful Finland, which was green and shining in the midsummer sun.
I can only imagine what it’s like now, crusted with ice and snow and no sun at all. I’m sure it’s beautiful in its own way, but I’m looking out my window now at a warm, sunny January day in Texas and I’m damn glad to be here.
On the sparkling morning of June 20, 2007 we arrived in Helsinki. A quick walk down the gangway and there was our trusty bus, which had made the trip with us in the ship’s hold. The bags were already on board and we headed to our hotel, excitedly chattering. Helsinki is a beautiful jewel of a city and we arrived on a perfect day: The sea air was clean and fragrant, and the skies were brilliant blue with gorgeous white clouds.
After settling at our hotel we hopped back on the bus and headed through town to the open air market. Colorful stalls were overflowing with vegetables, fruit, and handmade crafts. The first thing we noticed was the unmistakable scent of fresh, sweet strawberries. Finland is famous for them, and the strawberry is the symbol of midsummer–pictures of strawberries are on banners and signs everywhere. We purchased a little pail of the bright red berries and walked around munching them. They’re small and sweet as candy.
Karen purchased a little handmade troll doll of felt and yarn:
The city’s atmosphere is vibrant. It’s young, a university town, and seems still to be enjoying a deep breath after years of Soviet domination. Russian influence is evident in the architecture–one corner of the skyline near the harbor is dominated by a huge Russian Orthodox cathedral, its polished gilt onions gleaming.
Rather a severe picture with the looming clouds, but appropriate to a severe religion I think. Suffice to say it’s hard to imagine a joyful noise in there. It’s full of gorgeous, intricate artwork depicting what appear to be very unhappy people. Of course I don’t really know. Former Baptists like me know nothing of hagiography or religious iconography. We had nothing like it; therefore the artistic beauty is appreciable but the themes are disturbing and unfamiliar. All the tourists naturally whispered in the cathedral…even the Americans.
Perhaps a mile from the Russian church stands a much brighter Lutheran cathedral, perched high on a hill.
Full of light and bright colors, with clean lines and relatively spartan decoration, it seems the antithesis of the Orthodox church frowning at it with disapproval just across the way. Two world views in architectural contrast. Dazzling sunshine streamed into the sanctuary. Voices bounced around the vaulted ceiling. Few felt compelled to whisper.
Cheerful, we left to continue our city tour. The only dark clouds in the sky still lingered over the Russian church, which seemed perfectly satisfied.
Wow, that sure seems like a misty-eyed remembrance of a beer joint. I should mention it was good maybe 3% of the time and that was because a bunch of friends were having a good time together.
The rest of the time it was a dank, depressing dump. I didn’t want to leave the impression that I miss the place!
In other news, I see that the Scottish government paid a consulting firm a quarter of a million dollars to come up with a new advertising slogan for their tourism industry. I’m in the wrong business.
“Requiem for a beer joint” might be a good title…yesterday the Rodeo Inn of Bastrop, Texas was pushed over by a bulldozer and burned. I passed by and witnessed the smoking rubble. I shudder to think what will go in its place, but as there’s no Walgreens pharmacy for several hundred feet, that’s probably what it will be.
No one else is going to do it so I’ll raise a longneck in tribute to the old honky tonk.
When I was a kid my friends and I would occasionally yawn with boredom and say “Wanna go up the hill?” meaning to the Rodeo Inn, which sat at the top of a long incline out Chestnut Street and up towards the pines. The place was a remnant of a 1930s or 1940s motor court, on a highway that’s more than 300 years old. Before it becomes Texas 21, Chestnut Street is the main drag you’ll find in every little town, where in my day you wasted your gasoline of a Saturday night driving up and down and up, to see who was watching you. Or you stood around the closed service station or in front of the movie theater and watched who was driving by. A new girl–maybe somebody’s blonde cousin from out of town–could cause a ripple of excitement for blocks, but we clueless boys didn’t have much in our arsenal except to scream “yow!” or something. These virile simian grunts never fail to impress females, do they?
Struck out again. Somebody would say “Wanna go up the hill?” Translation: Shall we convey ourselves in motorcars to yon tavern and relax at billiards with a horn of golden cheer? There are thousands of places like it in Texas: a cheap bar with attached pool room (shoddily constructed of plywood and freezing in winter), appalling pissoir in the back where sodden cowboys staggered every few minutes, timing the roll and buck of the floor to enter the door more or less on the first try. Desperate old women (ancient to us teenagers) with hair dyed jet black, cough-speaking with gravelly voices, missing teeth and reeking of cigarettes, eyeing our Levis. Ick. We didn’t spend any time in the bar, which was full of broken down old people (probably in their forties and fifties) drinking beer and taking whiskey out of paper bags. Geriatric ward in there.
The youngsters all hung out in the pool room, where there were four sad coin-operated tables, each with its own pattern of beer stains and cigarette burns on the edge (always a hand lettered sign: “No sitting on tables! Dont set cigarettes on the tables!”). You had to know which tables were level, as only two were. There were maybe 20 cues in the wall racks. 10 of them were almost straight and several were so bent you had to wonder why the hell don’t they throw these out? But they never did. You’d put a stick on the table and roll it back and forth to see how much it bobbed up and down…if it rolled pretty smooth you had a good ‘un. A couple of cones of hand chalk on wooden dowels. Plastic Budweiser table lights, “King of Beers” emblazoned in the fake Tiffany glass. Pearl Beer sign on the wall contrived with an electric motor to look like it contains a moving waterfall. “From the Country of 1100 Springs.”
You’ve got the picture, now add the sound when you push in your coin (just a quarter in those days) and the balls tumble and roll. Ah…that sound is a new day, a fresh beginning. Things will be different this time; rack ‘em up. CLACK! comes the break and the game is on. Jukebox playing the latest Nashville stuff, with a few Eagles or Steve Miller thrown in (this memory is circa 1979). We didn’t waste our money on the jukebox.
Taken all together it was quite enjoyable, especially if you were having a good night and could “hold” a table for awhile, meaning everyone else had to put up their quarters and you played free games until you lost. I might have held a table for three or four games at a stretch in my time, but not often. I had an advantage in that I barely drank, nursing one Lone Star for hours. So my opponents usually got progressively worse, though some didn’t play well until they were somewhat drunk. I never saw anyone gamble on pool. The really good players just held a table all night and you’d see the rows of quarters holding the next challengers’ places in line.
Pool is a calming game, which makes it perfect for a beer joint full of inebriated young men. You might come in mad at the world but the game settles you down. If you can’t let go of it you’re wasting your time trying to play. Nobody ever gets in a fight about a pool game. It’s all concentration, finesse, cause and effect, and if your opponent makes a beautiful shot it’s never something you regret seeing. To the contrary, the aesthetic appreciation is universal. Young arrogant men seem to check the attitude at the door. I hadn’t really thought of it until now, but that’s true. Nobody swaggers about pool because the truth is there to see, and time and chance happeneth to us all. Anyone with a little experience knows not to get cocky because you will be put in your place sooner or later. There’s an atmosphere of reflection, held breath, satisfying chock sounds, punctuated by exclamations of dismay or glory at near misses, or lousy shots, or beautiful shots. A democratic game if ever there was one: You don’t have to be smart, or cool, or an athlete; you just need that undefinable feel for mass, inertia, momentum, and friction. If you do well, all eyes look at you with respect and when you eventually fail, well, it happens to everybody. I’ve seen the roughest biker dudes (in the days when biker dudes were biker dudes) stop and watch me make a lucky shot and then applaud. Step outside the door and I would have been nothing but a small town teenager, an insect to them.
Some of the exclamations I recall: ”Good leave!” meaning after sinking a ball you left the cue ball perfectly lined up for the next shot. Or, “Damn, swelled up!” meaning your ball bounced between the bumpers and popped out of the pocket instead of going in.
A friend of mine once made four of my balls in one shot, not making a single one of his. That’s without a doubt the worst play I’ve ever seen. I’ll bet Barry wishes I’d forget about that.
The best player I ever saw there was a paunchy guy who had a withered left arm, useless. He held the cue in one hand and made just about any shot he cared to. Closed one eye, lined it up, and nailed it. Nobody believes me when I tell them this but I’m sure somebody in Bastrop must have been there and remembers. I watched flabbergasted while he held a table for game after game. I never saw him again.
This started out being about the Rodeo Inn and ended up about pool, but they’re synonymous in my mind. I won’t lament the place too much because there are still plenty of joints just like it, and it was really abominable as a structure and reeked of stale beer and worse. I’m surprised it didn’t fall over by itself years ago. So I’ll remember the old place at its best, full of cowboys, and roughnecks, and tool pushers back in the oil boom ’80s flush with their Friday paychecks, local kids in their late teens and early twenties laughing and teasing each other, everyone having a great time in a ramshackle shed full of smoke and music and voices.
I spent part of this gloomy and rain-threatening Saturday sprawled on the couch with the cat, watching the tee-vee. We saw “The New World” on HBO and I decided it’s the most beautiful movie I’ve ever seen. Not necessarily my favorite; just gorgeous to look at. Ostensibly it’s the Pocahontas and John Smith story, but the minimal storyline is ancillary to the camera’s eye. I need to check out fellow Austinite Terrence Malick’s other work.
Next week brings the general release of “No Country For Old Men,” the second Cormac McCarthy book to be adapted to film. A big McCarthy fan, I was doubtful when I heard the Coen brothers were making it, but the reviews I’ve seen are overwhelmingly positive–some are calling it their best work.
“Chigurh” is evil personified and a powerful character, but I never pictured him with Javier Bardem’s funny haircut. We’ll see.
I wish Terrence Malick would adapt McCarthy’s most recent novel, the post-apocalyptic “The Road.” Now that would be cool.
Having just read Eric Clapton’s newly released autobiography, Clapton, I’ll skip ahead in my vacation narrative a bit. To the penultimate day of the trip, in fact, when we left Iceland for London.
We had been airborne a few minutes when I heard a familiar voice. Odd. A familiar voice on a British Airways flight from Iceland to London? The voice was answering a query from a flight attendant: “Just waw-tuh, thanks.” I looked across the aisle, two rows up, and saw a familiar profile. I thought, wow, he’s a dead ringer for Eric Clapton.
Of course it was Eric Clapton. I must admit I verified this later by a non-essential trip to the forward lavatory. I washed my hands and waited an appropriate amount of time so as not to be too obvious, then exited and headed slowly back to my seat. Yep, Eric Clapton. Staring right back at me with a sort of panic that said, oh no, is this bloke going to speak to me? He has a handy trick to discourage just that: puts on a pair of headphones and bobs his head to the music.
Oh, I thought about it. It was probably his one chance in life to have a middle-aged guitar player tell him how much they appreciate his music and how much they’ve learned from him (”Gee, Mr. Clapton, I have a black and white Stratocaster, too!”). But I decided, upon reflection, that it must be a major drag to be famous.Obviously heading back from vacation with a couple of friends (the book reveals that he fishes for salmon one week in Iceland every summer), he was relaxed and tan in jeans, a tee shirt, and tennis shoes. So I nodded, let him be, and sat down. He had the chicken teriyaki for lunch, and refused the free drinks. When we landed he was gone from the plane in no time and far ahead on the concourse, bounding with springy steps.
The book is slow to get started (immediate post-war England, in every account I’ve read, sounds like the most boring time and place in history) but picks up after our boy picks up a guitar. No ghost writer is evident: The book would have been too polished in that case, and the result is a comfortable, rambling monologue by a fellow who’s led an interesting life. To put it succinctly, Clapton was a spoiled child, hand in every candy jar, until his mid-40s when he came to his senses. (I often wondered why he was in so many bands that lasted for one album and one tour, and now I see that’s the maximum his attention span would allow.) He’s not afraid to share the most embarrassing details of his life, and the tone of the book is devoid of any massive ego. A few passages late in the book describing acts of kindness on his part might seem self serving, but they really serve to illustrate just how far he’s come. The coked-out Eric Clapton of 30 years ago wouldn’t have given a damn.
Guitar players might be disappointed because there’s little shop talk; the emphasis is on the Oprah stuff. There are of course the obligatory drug-use horror stories and subsequent redemption, along with some psycho-babble and all the 12-step buzzwords. But what works, works and I certainly won’t knock him for sharing it. He shouldn’t be alive today. It’s a lot more interesting than all those old VH-1 “Behind The Music” stories that followed the same arc of so many minor talents. Because this is Eric Clapton, and he’s telling us in his own words. I recommend it.
On a glorious spring day a few years ago we walked a favorite path in the West Texas desert, a pilgrimage across a flat plain of creosote and yucca to a wall of prehistoric pictures etched in stone. An easy hike out in the pleasant cool morning, I knew it would be less enjoyable walking back, but worth the trip. The trail led straight to an enormous boulder, curiously flat on one side, which served as the ancient canvas. Hundreds of images adorn the flat surface, light in color against a darker background of “desert varnish.” Some are recognizable animal figures but most are abstract: squiggly lines, concentric circles, small crosses, straight lines at opposing angles. It’s fun to stare at these things and try to discern a meaning, but the meaning remains a mystery. “Behold my works, ye mighty, and despair?” No, I imagine the symbols were a common vocabulary and had a ceremonial significance, located in that expanse of desert under countless stars. Experts say a cross represents a star; a jagged line indicates water, and circles with protruding lines denote the sun. The experts are guessing. I’ll remain ignorant and stare at them when I get a chance, without trying to understand what they’re saying.
In my ignorance I’m tempted to discount the “random” jumble of images as idle doodling, but it’s been pointed out by many who’ve tried it that this “doodling” turns out to be excruciatingly hard work. Just try chiseling a picture into that baked rock and see for yourself. Of course the occasional idiot has tried to etch his name on the stone, obliterating artwork thousands of years old, but fortunately the idiots soon give up. There are bullet marks in the rock.
We looked at the pictures a little while, then at the surrounding scenery while we ate peanut butter sandwiches. Time to head back to the car.
It was a long hike and the day was warming up fast. I had a skinned hand, some annoying fuzz thorns in the other hand from messing with a cactus tuna, and my feet were starting to hurt.
But it was early in the season and the breeze was cool, drying the sweat on my back instantly as we trudged, trudged. The only sound was the crunchy rhythm of boots on the trail, otherwise silence was ringing in my ears. Perfect blue skies daubed with brilliant clouds stretched in a bowl over the desert. The ocotillo were in full bloom, red-orange blossoms everywhere dangling above the desert floor. For a second, for an instant, I stopped seeing anything. Any thing. I was able to take in more, maybe all, at once. I don’t know how else to describe it. What had been a complex array of objects out there, millions of living things and dead things, was briefly a single breathing presence, not complex at all, all alive, its heart beating under the desert floor with a humming, thrumming sound. My feet connected with the heartbeat. Little currents of air rose from the warming earth and the faint smell of creosote drifted to my nostrils. The colors around me ran together and throbbed so vividly that I was embarrassed by them. Why embarrassed? I don’t know. Something akin to being a child and seeing your grandmother’s bloomers; that is, an intimate knowledge one knows not how to handle. I felt as though a shot of painkiller had hit me. I couldn’t even feel my feet, let alone remember that they hurt. I wasn’t really in pain before, but now I felt a warm blanket of good wrapped around me. No discomfort anywhere. Legs happy to do what they do best, leave the driving to them and enjoy the ride. I skimmed over the desert, levitated. Maybe I could fly.
We rounded a small hill and saw the parking lot in the far distance, the glass and metal automobile a tiny twinkle, still miles away. The moment crackled in the sun and disappeared. I forgot to lower the windows and that car’s gonna be hot when I get there, for sure. Wonder how much water we have left? Enough. Damn fuzz thorns are irritating the hound out of me. Gonna be staring at that car now wishing it would get a little bigger. Look at all those broken rocks, just lying there as they fell, wonder how many thousands of years ago? Bet there’s some rattlers in there. Whew, getting hot now. My feet hurt!