Well, that's a mistake I hope I never make again: I left a marking pen in a shirt pocket in the wash and now I have black ink stains on my clothes. What to do, turn them into rags? Give them away? There's decisions to be made as I look at the ink stains on the pajamas I'm wearing.
(It's a reminder what can happen with one moment of inattention, like that deadly house fire which recently claimed the life of one of our eccentric and creative neighbors. It doesn't matter that the old guy was a cigaret-smoking alcoholic with an unhealthy diet, and could have dropped off at any moment, he still wanted to live, on his terms, and fire was a terrible way to go. His neighbor had walked into his house recently and found him asleep on the couch with a lit cigaret in his hand.)
As a kid I did the family's laundry and when we were about to leave for a vacation was so excited I plopped the wet clothes in a basket and ran up the stairs from the basement without hanging them up, I don't think we had a dryer.
Living in New York at 533 E. 13th St for a couple years I must've gone around the corner to 14th Street but have no memories of any highlights or lowlights at the laundromat. (Though I did talk to Alan Ginsberg and Peter Orlavsky a couple of times on the street.)
For a season in the hills of Whale Gulch I put my dirty laundry in the creek running by the plastic house I was squatting in, with a rock on each item of clothing, gathered them up the next day, and hung them out to dry.
When I moved to Fern Hill I stood by the side of the road with my big duffle bag of dirty clothes and hitched to town and back, then when I got a car there were weekly trips to town to do laundry and buy food. (One memorable time in the eighties I opened the dryer door in Redway and a bunch of twenties flew out.)
I finally got my own washer/dryer setup and then I had no social life anymore. After about a year the dryer stopped working, I called Janet Branscomb at the Sears shack behind Murrishes (now Shop Smart) and she said, “Did you check the lint trap?”
“What's that?” I said. (It looked like a furry squirrel tail when I pulled it out.)
The washer is going now, it's nice to have one and I really appreciate it though I probably abuse the privilege by washing clothes which aren’t very dirty.
I also feel grateful when I'm taking a hot shower, even when I'm not that dirty. It reminds me of one of the reasons it’s said we're the richest country in the world: nearly everyone can take a hot shower and most of us have access to a washing machine. (I wish Paul Encimer were still alive to explain how our hot shower privileges are related to our 3750 nuclear warheads and the nearly 800 military bases we have in over seventy countries.)
More Tales From The Hills: Grape-nuts
I was feeling great in town but became immediately depressed when I got back to my dark little cabin in the woods. I poured milk into a bowl of Grape-nuts and it tasted a little stale. I looked in the bowl and saw mouse turds floating on top. I lurched to the sink and barfed. Just then my uncle came halfway down my trail to visit for the first time. I said I had just barfed up mouse turds and he offered to stick his fingers down my throat. I told him it was bad timing and he went back up the trail. I never saw him again.
Mites and Mold
The worse time was the greenhouse era with all the mites and mold. After predator mites, lacewing larva, and Pyrethrum didn’t work someone said they were vacuuming their plants. I’d go out there at 11am every other morning, climb on the ladder with a shop vac, and vacuum the webs off the colas with a long improvised attachment as the sun burnt down on me. I decided to remove the roof and glass and grow out in the open.
I unscrewed a batten but it was securely caulked and wouldn’t move. The tempered glass pieces underneath them were also calked tight. I threw a rock at it with no success. I took a hammer and slammed it into the glass. Nothing. Next I took a pickaxe and slammed the pointy end into the glass. That worked. I spread plastic around the edge of the perimeter and smashed about forty sheets of the tempered glass.
Buying Plants Fiasco
Way back in the day I went over to the goat shed in Briceland to buy some plants from Crazy Will. I picked out a group of twenty plants and said I’d be back to get them in two weeks. He agreed.
Two weeks later I returned. The plants had grown a lot and as I started to load them up he said, “No! Not those, these over here.” He pointed to some smaller ones.
“Hey,we had a deal for these over here!” I said.
“No, these over here!” he said.
“That’s bullshit!” I said. Will picked up a jack and lifted it up threateningly. I picked up a rock about the size of a baseball, cocked my arm, and aimed it at his head. We stood there like that for a few moments. Was this the famous Mexican Stand-off?
Finally we cooled down and I shrugged and paid him $400 for the twenty plants.
(I saw him a couple weeks later in town and he smiled and started over to greet me. I turned and went the other way and ignored him for months.
Massage Class
Whenever I’m driving to a big Gulch gathering memories of scenes out there over the years come flooding into my head in a pleasant wave of nostalgia. When heading to Beginnings for Nancy’s big 70th birthday party the other day I remembered a massage class that Joan had lead back in ’75 or so:
Upon arrival at the Tower House there were about ten naked people in the room. What could I do but take off my clothes too. Soon I was massaging a beautiful naked Star, although I remember having trouble focussing on her neck from above, necks can throw me. Then I was massaging Goat Don, and after a few minutes he opened his eyes and said “Will you stop dripping sweat on me?!”
It’s a Boy!
Births were often community events, they became like parties.
“Hey, Jan’s in labor, she’s having her baby!”
“Alright, let’s go over!”
Yerba’s birth of Sage in ’75 became one of those community events. Once I hitch-hiked to Willits three times within one month to be at the birth of a friend’s baby, it was the most amazing experience I ever had. Later people became a bit more private about it.
Last Tale From The Hills: California Shit Story
Back in the day it was often a cold rainy walk out to the outhouse so a neighbor, thank you Keith, came up with a brilliant solution: Shit on newspaper and burn it. Back then everyone had a wood-burning stove. This worked out well and we learned pretty quickly to push that bundle way back into the stove. There were some odd moments for visitors, like when during a dinner party little six-year-old Rosa, spread her newspaper in the corner and continued the family tradition.
So I burned shit during the long winter and then it was spring and I took a shit on newspaper but realized it was a nice day! Too warm to make a fire.
I put the package in a ziploc and stashed it up the hill behind my truck tire. Keith came by, glanced at it, and knew exactly what it was. I took it to town and settled on the Redway post office dumpster. Just as I was making my illicit drop-off the post master came out to confront me.
“Just this one time Jay,” I pleaded.