_everyone_is_here crOwl everyone_is_here eveeryone_is_here_ once the surfliner train neared the city of ventura, the ocean and pier were visible off the right side. the beach was a mess from the recent storms. tons and tons of branches, tree trunks, old boards, and pieces of plywood poured into the sea from the mouth of the ventura river and washed up on the sand. i could already see the creative had been at work fashioning sculptures from the sticks. "look, there's a driftwood horse!" the ventura amtrak train station is nothing but a stop with benches, but it's located at the county fairgrounds, which is the first place that i worked at when i came to california right out of high school. they gave me work as a grunt to help set up for various agricultural events, but the majority of my labor was horse-related, that is with the rear end of the horse. i became an expert at cleaning soiled pine shavings from the long lines of stalls, even though the overwhelming smell of ammonia from the piss nearly made me pass out. i eventually got fired because some fellow worker stabbed me in the back and told the boss i was drinking beer on my break. i learned my first lesson about trust: don't ever trust people you work with. better yet, don't do anything on the job that can get you fired. my brother kerby was waiting for us when we arrived. he's been living in ventura for 26 years. he came out right after college at the university of pittsburgh, got a job with an oil company, and eventually bought a house. he comes back home to pennsylvania once a year for christmas. the first thing we did after stuffing our luggage in his bmw was drive to the beach area where i used to ride my old cruiser bike, surfboard under one arm, down from our tiny rental house in the hills both morning and evening. it's also the last place i went when we were a young family ready to leave the safety of my good job and return to pennsylvania. i sat on a bench and looked out to to the water knowing what we had here would definately come with us. 050413 ... crOwl whoa, sorry about that typo: should read...everyone_is_here_ 050413 ... . everyone_is_here_ 050413 ... crOwl kerby had reservations made at his favorite restaurant in ventura called cafe fiore for 73o, so we had just enough time to shower and change our travel weary clothes. his little cape-cod looking house on eva street is like coming home. most of our family has signature deposits in the little, cozy blue house that permanently link us to it, like my dad who used to come out every year and paint somewhere. kerby has a foto of him on his fridge. dad's on the ladder with no shirt, jeans, and a paintbrush. he's all tan and his butt crack is showing. that was him. completely. then there was the year kerby flew me out to install an irrigation system in his front yard, renovate with several tons of topsoil, and then plant sod. he took me out to dinner every night. this night we took him out. when we walked in to fiore, it was like he was a celebrity. the owner, maria came up to him and hugged him and there were friendly shouts of his name from the bartenders. it's his regular place. he even gave marie suggestions for her menu that she adopted. as we finished, another friend of his, named laya, appeared out of the throng of revelry and sat down at our table with us. she is a swimsuit model/ women's surfer/ waitress at another one of his spots/ and roomate of his best friend. she was drunk on sun and something else, but added a sense of what was to come for us: quite a week of frolic. we indulged a bit over the top so uncle kerby gave his niece, greta, the keys to his beemer. she drove us the few miles back to his house, which quickly sobered us all up. halfway there we realized she never put the lights on. 050421 ... crOwl kerby has an awesome television, one of those 55" flat screen plasma deals that hang on the wall. it's pretty much the center of attention, especially on our first morning with the l.a. marathon being televised live. his long-time friend, cathy, who had joined us for dinner last night had trained for months and was participating in it. she said she'd be wearing a yellow hat so we could find her, but there were about a thousand people wearing yellow hats. she finished in about four hours. it was nearly 70 degrees and sunny by 8:oo, as i sat in kerby's backyard and picked an orange from his tree for breakfast. it was a saturday morning and our plan was to go to the farmer's market, the same one we used to go to as a young family 15 years ago. it hadn't changed at all. there were still flats of wheat grass and cherimoyas, even a tamale stand. the strawberries were as big as fists. i took several fotos, one that i use as a screensaver; of sunlight illuminating piles of lemons and avocados. when we used to live in ventura, avocados were a staple food for us. i used to climb the glossy-leafed trees, pick the shiney green fruits and drop them to the ground below. once i had enough to fill two five gallon buckets i'd take them home. we'd line them up on the kitchen window sill and let them ripen. once they turn purple and get soft, they're ready to eat. usually we'd make guacamole with salsa fresca. sometimes we'd just cut them in half, remove the pit and give them to the girls with a spoon. the skin was its own bowl. we have a foto of hilary as a baby and we're giving her a bath in the kitchen sink. behind her is a whole line of cados, as she used to call them. "want cado, daddy." kathy was eager to hook up with marie, an old friend we knew from our early days in ventura. we weren't even sure if she still lived in town, yet kathy found her through marie's sister and we were surprised she lived walking distance from the market. so, we went looking for her and eventually met her trying to find us. when we first met her, she was 21 and a young mother, married to a hippy preacher named byron whose sermons used to touch my spirit so much i could'nt move for ten minutes afterwards. she wore sun dresses and told us she was born in africa. their son brandon was the only child in a communal house they shared with about twenty other new lifers. a few years later, byron left her for her best friend which sent shockwaves through our pleasant little fellowship. they had three sons. her best friend had a son and daughter with her husband. it made all of us take a good look at our foundations. what were we building on? what makes a good marriage? it made us realize that god can be found anywhere and everywhere and that the church is not a man made building. it is two or more people who believe in god. she hadn't changed much. we hugged and smiled. she introduced us to eddie her boyfriend, who works in the offshore oil business. she's a nurse in santa barbara. they were off to the indian casino for the day but wanted to have a bar-b-que on sunday. so we went back to the market to buy some lettuce. 050423 ... crOwl we also bought tamales for lunch and took them back to kerby's house. we ate them in the backyard in the warm sun, thinking about other friends of ours from our early days that we wanted to see who lived within walking distance. we first saw teri spiker, kathy's best ventura friend, before we ever officially met her. she was a visual fixture in this beach town for her ubiquitous presence on the network of city roads riding her schwinn beach cruiser barefoot, her sun-bleached blonde hair, wet from swimming laps, her suntanned face determined. and so, when we actually met her at a small christian coffee house, leaning up against her new husband, ron, both of them in the afterglow of an intense worship experience, we instantly recognized her for her minor celebrity status. it didn't take us long to become friends because we all enjoyed the same things. we would spend many hours together walking the beach, hiking in the hills of ojai, attending waldorf school festivals, or sitting around doing art projects, talking about starting families, or the mysteries of god. we would share vegetarian meals and play board games, always working around teri's relentless schedule of running, swimming, and biking. when our first daughter, bethany, was born in 1983, their son, joshua, followed two weeks later. he seemed to be permanently attached to his mother-on-the-go, first riding with her on the bike in a front pack, then a backpack, then a rear bike seat, then his own bike. he spent a lot of time with us at our little house at the base of hawk mountain, speaking in his hoarse voice, munching down cheeseless broccoli pizza that teri packed for him and when that didn't fill his growing hunger he would sneak chalky cherries from a bush that grew at our house. i guess they weren't poisonous. his sister emily was born ten days after greta. josh turned out to be a star cross country racer for ventura high and won a scholarship at wisconsin university. emily, who is a junior in high school, is running in his footsteps. greta, who used to play with her when they were babies, was looking forward to reuniting. we used to push them in strollers side by side along san nicholas street, on our way to church. we'd stop at the florist shoppe and teri would scramble through the dumpster to find discarded flowers that were still good and give them to all of our little girls. of course, kathy couldn't wait to see teri again. the last time they saw each other was in a tearful departure back in 1989. we had to peel them away, velcro-like, from each other. since then, they've written back and forth, chatted on the fone, and to this day kathy just hasn't been able to find anyone whose heart is as soft as teri's. after our lunch, we decided to take a walk over to evergreen street and see if we could find them home. 050425 ... crOwl as we entered their street, we weren't sure which house was theirs, but when i saw a man mowing his front lawn, i recognized ron immediately. "hey spiker!" i called out. something my dad would say. ron's always been a voracious reader. subsequently, he's fascinating to converse with for he knows a lot about many things. he's been a school teacher for a long time in camarillo, at a private school. we got to see him about five years ago when his school went on a field trip to washington, dc. we met at mount vernon and hung out for much of the day, waking around the place where george washington used to live, looking off to the potomac river. ron invited us in to their little house, which appeared almost exact to what they used to live in when we knew them. family fotos, books on shelves, dogs sniffing crotches. although kathy hadn't seen teri in fifteen years, little had changed with her except for some sun induced wrinkles. she still works at the same pre-school and still rides a cruiser bike. they basically picked up where they left off and it wasn't long until we were doing what we would typically do on a sunny saturday with them. we gathered their two dogs and headed to arroyo verde park for a few hours of hiking in the hills. this particular park holds several memories for us. it is the same place we celebrated hilary's fourth birthday, back in 199o. it's also where kerby and i entered a freestyle frisbee tournament, which he took first place. when we left ventura, it is where we gathered our friends to say goodbye, and when i first returned on a visit, it is where i did a clown show for emily spiker's birthday party. it was funny to watch ron and teri's dogs. the boston terrier, named spikes, loves to fetch and when we threw him a small stick, he'd come back dragging a larger one to show off his strength, practically three times as big as him. greta was thrilled to walk the sage lined paths with their sweeping vistas and ocean views. there was a pungent aroma of eucalyptus in the air which is unmistakeably characteristic of ventura, especially when a breeze blows off the ocean.. it was good to catch up on each other's lives. i found i missed ron and wish i had his friendship in pennsylvania. i know we would be close friends. it seems to me the friends you make in your early twenties are the ones you will carry in your heart the rest of your life. 050426 ... crOwl that evening we met two of kerby's friends at a small cafe on main st. called west side cellars. it started out as a small wine bar in the back of palermo's, an italian style and design shoppe, but its popularity forced it out to its own space in the trendy section of town. it's a cozy hang-out, dark and warm, with the owner's huge artwork on the walls and just enough seating to make it feel cozy, not crowded. it's another one of kerby's regular places, plus laya, the surfer girl we met last night is a waitress there and is also the roomate of kerby's friend rob, who was dining with us. he's from winnipeg originally and is one of those people who has a witty comment for every conversation. he lives in a beaver cleever house of his own making. next to him was sue, a physician's assistant from the midwest, who went to college on a basketball/volleyball scholarship. that's where kerby met them, some 2o years ago, playing beach volleyball. she's into women's folk music, so we became friends instantly with suggestions of artists she hadn't heard yet. i think she would be a perfect wife for kerby. kerby was in charge of the wine. i guess when you embark on a culinary journey the first bottle should be white, like a sauvignon blanc. then with the appetizer you move to a mild red, maybe a syrah or shiraz, a perfect compliment to a buffalo mozzarella/cherry tomato/organic spring greens salad. and then with an entree of seared ahi, duck, or medallions bring in the cab sav or pinot noir for the full effect. to do it proper, finish with an 85.oo bottle of zinfindel (that kerby paid for) and you will be glowing like the candlelight on your table and you will have to have your daughter drive you home again. the owner came over and schmoozed, and her boyfriend, red-cheeked and buzzing, sat down with us. he's an excellent joke-teller, spitting out dialogue with a lilting irish accent to tell them properly. here's the one i told him: a scotsman wearing a kilt ,walks into a bar and drinks himself into oblivion. two girls come over and sit next to him. "do you think it's true?" one asks the other. "i don't know. let's find out." says the other. so they lift up his kilt while he's passed out and tie a blue ribbon around his wanker. about a half hour later he comes to and goes into the bathroom to relive himself and spots the ribbon. "i don't know where you been or what you did, but at least you won first place!" he said. 050430 ... crOwl bearing a bottle of italian pinot grigio and a yummy salad of local greens, we went looking for marie's house on fir street, right around the corner from where we had our first apartment on santa clara avenue, where we tried to sneak a kitten we named dusty. he was a bad cat, who bit a little girl for no reason and his selfish streak was his downfall because the landlady spotted him in the window and we were forced to get rid of him. marie's little house was behind a lawyer's office. eddie called down to us as we searched in vain. he was lighting the bar-b-que and spotted us knocking on the wrong door. marie showed us her old toy collection which prominently features a wooden block amusement kathy and i made for our girls about twenty years ago. it consists of a 3"x6" piece of wood with four holes that have mini springs inside which are attached to little dowels painted to look like people. the object is to push them down and they pop back up. the whole thing is whimsically decorated. we gave it to her for her three sons when we left. we made all kinds of toys for our girls and ended up giving them all away to friends when we left. all we had was a volkswagen van when we departed, so there was only so much room. it was fun seeing it again and actually holding a solid piece of the past in my hands. i pressed down the little people and they still worked. the tiny smiling faces seemed to be happy for us. "you did good," they seemed to say. marie was busy cooking and casually reinvited us back into her life. she showed us her birth certificate from africa and kept trying to reach her boys on the fone. she has three; brandon, jesse, and forrest, 25,22, and 18. the last time i saw brandon, he was 8 and i had chosen him to be in a children's play that i wrote and directed. it was an allegorical form of the story of god sending christ into the world. i knew he would have remembered it so of the three, he was the one i was looking forward to seeing the most, but forrest was the first to arrive, looking incredibly like his father, byron. it's always amazing to see children grow up before your eyes. you have this mental image of the last time you saw them and suddenly the 15 years magically produce the man standing before you. it's basically mind-blowing. he's studying to become a chef and is also way into pimping his car. he took us down to show us what he did to it, even upholstering his girlfriend's name somehow into the ceiling. brandon and jesse arrived in an older convertible mustang. jesse was shy, as if he was sheltering a secret, but brandon was thoroughly engaging and made instant eye contact with me, sincerely reminiscing of times he spent with us at our home and of course, the play. he had been in a little recent trouble with the law but his time with the corrections facility as a forest wildfire fighter changed his life and put him back on the right path. marie was proud of them. they were all stunningly good looking and there was parts of her in all of them. so we ate and sat in the warm sun and looked out towards the sea, reconnecting ourselves with a family we had spent much time with, finding them with genuine hearts of acceptance. 050505 what's it to you? who go blather from