Thursday, August 16, 2007

Relief

I couldn't stand to watch any longer Sally's valiant attempts to cope with the Summer itch without taking steps, which meant Dr. Macdonald and the Sumer Itch Special, consisting of a serious bath, then a brushing, then a more temperate-smelling bath, then a shot. The trouble with that is that I was dogless from eight until about three-thirty. It was good to get her back.

The mysteriously departed Lumix FX-30 was replaced yesterday; it was a relief to get the new one, because the one day without seemed memorable in terms of missed opportunities. I could have had a neat shot of the milk thief in action at Peet's Coffee; there was a man who, no doubt because of the shower of ashes from the fire, wore a bandanna over his nose and mouth. Before the advent
of the ski mask, he'd have been assumed to be a bank robber. There was a man who became quite tangled in his attempts to untangle his dog's leash. Simply put, everything looked funny and/or interesting.

Yes, I know; the camera is merely a device to keep you focused on small wonders in the behavior of people and/or inanimate objects, the better to inform your writing with a sense of landscape which you then enhance with subtext-laden dialogue, and doesn't that sound academic.

Having another camera was a great relief because I found this: which I cheerfully admit would not have been at all interesting without that strip of cloth that holds the entire panel in place. I thought for a time of captioning it Root Canal.

Another sense of relief borders on being anticlimactic if it was ever indeed climactic. Along with other parts of the country, we have been troubled with a fire whose intensity ebbs and flows with shifts of w
ind and moisture in the atmosphere. At one of the waxing surges, there was a scant possibility that power sources could be attacked. It was lovely feeling the duality of some danger and of a near decadent pursuit of one's daily routine, causing a wonderment: did those Pompeians or residents near Mt. Etna suffer the same surges? It is one dreadful thing to live through flood, earthquake, fire, avalanche, and the like, seeing people swept away like spilled popcorn at the Cine-Plex. It is something else to live in the imminent potential of a disaster than never comes. The former fills us with the awful closeness and impersonality of death ad destruction; the latter allows us to feel dramatic.



I caught the morning sun at about seven-thirty, near the Eucalyptus Hill section of town, looking red and raw as opposed to its normal buttery hue. The marine layer, for which we have some fame, is responsible for a portion of the red, but the flaky ash from the fire bears most of the blame.

There are many more things to tell about rejection slips, like for instance John Milton, the editor at the venerable South Dakota Review, who after accepting the third story from me, ventured that I was one of his regulars now. But that can wait for another time.

4 comments:

John Eaton said...

I remember "a string of interesting though unrelated quotations," on a litcrit piece that thankfully died a painless death.

A great story, and the root canal's cool, too.

John

Anonymous said...

As you know, since it was my balcony from which you took that shot of the sun, I've been in Chicago these past few days, and there has been something missing. Something other than you and Sally and Jack. I knew immediately what it was when I read this: "It is one dreadful thing to live through flood, earthquake, fire, avalanche, and the like, seeing people swept away like spilled popcorn at the Cine-Plex. It is something else to live in the imminent potential of a disaster than never comes. The former fills us with the awful closeness and impersonality of death and destruction; the latter allows us to feel dramatic."

You've articulated for me what I couldn't articulate for myself about why I so love California. The Midwest, despite the occasional tornado or snow storm, is generally a safe place. California is on the edge, literally and figuratively. There is drama in California, the result of that "imminent potential of a disaster that never comes." California has its share of disasters, of course, from earthquakes to floods to Paris Hilton, but most of us are lucky enough to escape them, and to feel "decadent," as you put it, for going about our lives in such a place. Though I'll be sad to leave my sisters behind on Sunday, I can't wait to get home. I love, and miss, California.

lowenkopf said...

John, thanks for the notes. Good looking blog you've got. See you around.

ENK, As you've noticed, California is a place where things are likely to happen because, well, things have happened, not only i recent years but well before the Spaniards set foot ashore, just at the Rincon. We could almost consider California's motto to be Anticipation!

Lori Witzel said...

The title that sprung to mind when I saw your too-dang funny Root Canal was:

"There, that'll learn 'er."

Thanks for the Latin, BTW -- and who among us are as we were, especially after the reign of artichokes?

;-)