We had driven...

I was once told that nostalgia is like a grammar lesson: one finds the present tense, but the past perfect. Today I found myself living an adventure that seemed all too familiar.

Back in high school, my life was rather boring. I read alot, I did my homework, I spent my weekends with my girlfriend (she lived a busy life in another city, far enough away that we only saw each other when we had nothing else to do), I schemed with, played or fought with my little brother and hung out with Mike. I had other friends, but I'd known Mikey the longest. He lived down my street a ways and around the corner. We had the same friends, carpooled to the same high school, were part of the same scout troop... I'd go on but it gets rather sickening. My parents both hold him up as their favorite son - and of course he would be. For the price of a meal (he had free reign of our fridge) he'd show up and cart me off and out of their hair.

The key to all this was my truck. In high school I drove my father's 1971 Chevy C10 long bed. It was red with a white cab top, and Mike in his infinitely strange system for naming things thought it appropriate to name this truck "Truck." Sometimes, I think he'd come by not to hang out with me, but with it. As I said, we were boring, so we had to make our own fun. With an old Chevy engine we had our fill.

The quintessential memory of this was during my junior year after our 'Red and Blue Scrimmage,' the showcase for all of our fall sports teams at Brothers. The football team would play itself and the cross country team would run a very boring 5k around the entirety of the school... a couple of times. Other teams did stuff, but I had developed tunnel vision to keep from going insane. After the race was over, I walked out to my truck and couldn't get it to start. It was still early in the morning and it was cold, I had tried to choke it with the accelerator, but ended up flooding it. I called Mike up, and woke him with the words "Dude, Truck's being a bitch." He came out to school and said a few hellos to the varsity football team, which by this time had finished the game and was clacking across the parking lot in their cleats. We had to open up the carburetor and rev the engine to get some air in and it took two hands in the engine and someone inside with a foot on the accelerator. Not a rough fix, but it was better to have him there. After this, he rechristened Truck to Bitch and we headed off with our oh-so-refined palates to the Taco Bell down MLK boulevard so I could buy him breakfast.

When the vehicle worked, we'd load up the bed with junk and head out to the dump. Sacramento county has a landfill at Kiefer blvd and Grant Line road, and with the bed full of crap (the kind hoarded by our mothers) we'd tune the AM radio to one of its only two stations that played music (country), roll down the windows, and drive 65 mph down Hwy 16 to pass the afternoon. The most memorable trip comes to mind with Mike sweeping out the bed after we'd tossed everything saying: "Wouldn't it be fitting if this thing wouldn't start and we had to leave it here?" Of course to spite him, when he got in the damned thing gave him hell; the starter clicking and straining, insolent and hurt at such allegations that it belonged with the hideous antiques we had just junked. We got out in one piece -without burning out the starter- and headed back to town singing along to Alabama's If you're gonna play in Texas.

My dad sold the truck while I was in Germany, between my Senior and Freshman years, and began his trooper fetish. In the past 6 years he's gone through an equal number of troopers. A 1986 Red (engine subsequently scrapped for the blue one)  a 1989 Red (my current ride),  a 1986 Blue (restored and sold, then wrecked two weeks later), an '87 Silver (blew it's engine), a '91 White (totaled) and his shiny, "new" 1996 green one. Me dad was a mechanic for the Air Force and hasn't quite gotten it out of his system. It was easy to learn the new engines (mine is actually a Chevy engine) but it wasn't quite the same as the lumbering, 10 mpg V8. 

Never content with only one engine to play with, my dad recently went out and found a junker of a yellow 1979 Chevy Custom Deluxe and restored it. I'd never driven it before tonight; it's his baby. Tonight however, Petey cooked up a meal for us all, invited our father over (he brought the beer), and we dragged Mike in as he got home from work (Maria's in Denver for the week). After dinner, he took my trooper home and Mike and I headed off to Davis with the truck to move our desks.

It was like nothing had changed over the past 6 years. We hit the freeway, rolled down the windows and turned up the only station we could tune in, it was country of course.

Home.

Friday, 8.1.2008

When I returned to my house in Davis, I didn’t receive the overwhelming feeling of relief I had expected upon returning home. Davis had been my home for the last six years, but upon setting down my suitcase and flopping onto the couch, something was missing. Generally I define home as where my bed is. I grew up in Sacramento, but it hasn’t been my home since I moved out and my mom started using my room for storage. When I got to back from Buenos Aires, my bed was missing. My brother had moved it, and had been sleeping on it for the past month. My room was missing all furniture that didn’t require the bed of a truck to move, which was everything but my desk. My clothes were gone, either packed in my suitcase or moved by my brother and Mike, my house-mate (now neighbor) while I was away. Enough had changed that this wasn’t the place I had left, and it was no longer my home. Our apartment in Sacramento was no different.

My brother had been living in our apartment since the beginning of July, while I was away. I walked in the door and I had to question his standard of living. The living room furniture consisted of a television, two chairs (one a desk chair) and the top half of our grandfather’s recliner, on which Peter sat crossed legged doing his homework at an old coffee table. My room was filled with boxes and a few bits of furniture piled in the middle of the room, mattress and box spring stacked against the wall. My brother’s room was austere, lacking any furniture besides his bed. I came back out to the living room and asked him how he had been living all this time, if he even had dishes, how he could eat.
He replied: “Yeah, I’ve got dishes… well, dish. I had two but broke one…” I threw my palm up to my forehead and dragged my hand down over my face. I spent the last week furnishing the apartment, dragging things one load of my Trooper at a time, each day heading back to Davis and bringing one more piece to turn the place into a home. A dining room table, a coffee table that’s more than six inches from the ground, chairs, a media stand, stereo, dishes, cookware, spices. The place is looking more and more like someone lives there.

I have had to take a ten-day vacation from being a homemaker, however, as Mike and I are back in the Sierra honoring our annual commitment to our old scout camp, Camp Cody. This is our fifth year together running their climbing program; something no one else is qualified to do, so it guarantees us a spot at camp every year. This place is absolutely amazing, not just for the natural beauty that inspires reverence in anyone introduced to the area, but for the people who volunteer their time and allow the camp to exist for two weeks every year. The majority of the adult staff is made up of men whose boys once attended camp, but have now long graduated and moved on and away. Something special keeps these people coming back, and many are staples of the camp. Most of the adults were staff here when I was an eleven year old scout, caked in dirt and whistling idly by the campfire. I can’t really imagine this camp without them. From George Morrow, the septuagenarian cook who has returned every year to camp since before world war two, to Bob Hearst, the aged story teller and keeper of “Cody lore,” who introduced me to the constellations for the first time. I still can’t look at a summer’s night sky without envisioning it from the dock on the lake here at Cody. There’s Gene Domek, my cub scout den leader, role model, mentor and assistant scout master; this is the man who convinced me that I should run cross country in high school and has consistently pushed me to become an educator. There’s Jon Brozek, my old scoutmaster and four-time companion up to Pyramid Peak and John Allen Cann, the camp’s poet laureate, and finally, of the men who stand out, there’s the senior camp director, my father. When I was a scout, my dad was invited to camp to be a geology merit badge counselor. I graduated, moved on to college and my little brother had to deal with him all on his own. A year before Peter’s last year of camp my dad volunteered to go to National Camp School (or rather, camp camp) to become certified as our camp director. Maybe it’s because he’s a glutton for pain and project management (two things I consider synonymous) or maybe it’s just because he’s loud and can get people to listen to him, but he loves it and continues to be active in the camp long after both my brother and I have moved on from scouting.

Preparing for camp was an exhausting and stressful experience for both Mike and myself, and the closer camp gets, the less we look forward to it; that is, until we actually hit the road and head up here. We pulled off highway 50 at mile tract 42 and rolled down the windows. We could smell it. The pine and cedar, the clean mountain air, the traces of woodsmoke, they all roll together and the smells caused a flood of memories and smiles to cross our faces. We had left Sacramento at 6:30 or so, reached camp closer to 8:30 and hiked the three quarters of a mile from the parking lot to camp (Cody’s a backwoods camp, it’s not connected to any exterior plumbing or power grid, all the food, propane, sailboats, gear, everything needed by the camp and campers is hiked in down this 3/4 mile long trail). We found our tent, dropped our gear and joined the folks around the fire. After saying my hellos, I broke away from the group and walked out onto the dock. The sun had set, it was 9:30 or so, and the sky was full of stars. I don’t know if I can convey the sky at Cody, but I’ll try. We’re at 7,250 feet to start, no lights for miles, the closest being the light dome at south Lake Tahoe. The air is clear and calm, and this week there’s no moon. The darkness is total, but flashlights aren’t necessary because the stars envelope you completely.

Standing on the dock, focused on Polaris, just north east of Pyramid Peak, I just stood and stared. I let my eyes drift in and out of focus and the constellations seemed to draw a circle around the north star. I don’t know how many people understand why our galaxy is called the Milky Way, but here it’s obvious, there’s a band of stars running across the sky, so thick that they’re almost indistinguishable from each other. Other old friends that I haven’t seen in a year rose as the sun set; Cassiopea, and Cepheus, Delphinis, Boötes, Aquila, all constellations that can’t be seen from the valley floor. I sat there with the soft blue light slowly fading in the west, listening to the water of the lake lap at the shores and I smiled, sighing with relief.

It was good to be home.

Something Majestic

I've been pirating internet wherever I can find it recently, and it's worked out quite well. Sus and I found our way into the network at UADE, which we weren't supposed to, and although access is never guaranteed, we've found internet in our hotel's lounge from time to time. Combined with cafes sporting wi-fi connections, it really makes my post about the closed Locutorios slightly disingenuous.

Now that that's out of the way, I spent my weekend at Iguazu Falls. 

We took a bus with seats comparable to Business class on an airplane, fully reclining and plenty of space. This was a good thing as the bus ride was 17 hours each way. Upon our arrival, we were whisked away to a native village for a tour and then spent the evening on a catamaran on the river. Saturday we walked all over the national park, seeing waterfall after waterfall, then taking a boat and riding into them. I don't think I've ever been more wet, even when swimming or bathing. As we approached the spray, it was like being tortured by someone who is tickling you: you can't do anything about it but laugh. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.

Saturday night we went into town for helado and drinking. Several went to a club, but I already stank of cigarette smoke (I thoroughly appreciate California now) and was exhausted from all that walking. Sus, Ryan and Rae and a few others all agreed with me, heading back in a couple of cabs. After a brief bout of snuggling, Ryan and I were kicked out of the girls' room, the twin beds conducive to snuggling but not for sleeping two. Ryan (who had enjoyed some absinthe) went and passed out while I went down to the pool area and stared at the stars.

Buenos Aires has a light dome probably the size of L.A. The light pollution is horrible, even though many of the old lamps point down instead of up. This hotel was in the middle of no where and it showed. Stars filled the sky, each one twinkling in the humid jungle air. Every one of them was unfamiliar though; I'm in a completely different hemisphere. I had planned to study star charts before I left, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I had a conversation with a friend a while back about astronomy. I told her I loved sharing the sky with people, pointing out constellations and enjoying the stars with someone else as company. She told me it was the most humbling thing to walk out to the ocean on a clear night and sit silently in conversation with the stars. I'd never tried it, so I sat on one of those long beach chairs and stared out at the unfamiliar face of the universe.

I'd never felt farther from home, but it was an experience I hope I'll never forget.

On the way home the bus played an "in-flight" movie, The Bucket List subtitled in Spanish. Two things stuck with me from the movie (besides reaffirming my love for movies with Morgan Freeman in them): First was the Egyptian mythology bit about finding joy in your life and bringing joy to others. The second was the idea of witnessing Something Majestic.

Hopeless...

I'm waiting on some media for my next few posts, about my trips to see the most amazing Tango music, the street musicians on Avenida Florida and Defensa Street and Colonia, Uruguay. This is just something I wrote in my head walking home from a concert in Luna Park on Thursday (yes, I haven't seen the internet for three days. Amazing, no?):

Hopeless.

In the evenings, walking down the street with her, I found that I drift in and out of reality, our conversations only taking up a thin film of my conscious thought. The rest of me only dreams of holding her…

…Standing on the antiquated sidewalks under the once gas-lit lamps, surrounded by the old facades of European architecture and a fine, coiling mist. Her arms wrapped around me underneath my coat, her face buried into my scarf, my cap tipped back on my head as my own face is enveloped by her hair - shining bright copper in the lamplight, my cold glasses slightly fogging as my breath is reflected upwards.

That’s it, that’s all I can think about. No careful plots or intrigue, no schemata for building a closer friendship that has so often been my course in these matters. I can’t think when I’m around her, let alone try to impress her or hold an intelligent conversation; all that comes to mind is the scene above…

It’s been long enough since I’ve felt trapped and hopeless like this, so long that I’ve forgotten how miserable this sort of existence is, and how much I love it all the same.

See you again yesterday...

Two years ago at Christmas, I was curled up in a cabin in Arnold, California (think Sonora) celebrating with my father’s family. I have six cousins living on the west coast, all are siblings and together they comprise some of the smartest, wittiest and most talented people I know. My generation of my Aunt’s family includes, from oldest to youngest, a master sommelier, a blues guitarist, a writer, an actor, a geologist (this is considered somewhat of a genetic disease in the Cargile clan) and finally a singer. Sitting around their table for any holiday brings about a profound sense of family that I’ve never had growing up. With dinner, wit flows like wine, and the wine flows well… like wine, bottle after bottle. It was a mistake I now realize to put off reading the copy of Barrel Fever, given to me by one of my cousins that year.

Here in Buenos Aires, I’m surrounded by David Sedaris’ books. My room-mate has two, Sus has one, one which I’m currently reading, Me Talk Pretty One Day. I think my current situation provides an extra emphasis on the hilarity of the second half of this book. Part one is a collection of stories surrounding Sedaris’ life growing up in South Carolina, Chicago and New York. Part Deux (Two) is dominated (so far) by the author’s experiences surviving in France without really knowing the language. From the broken and useless vocabulary he acquires in his trips to Normandy, to his French classes where he only understands about thirty percent of what is said, I’ve found myself laughing at myself, imposing this lens on my own experiences here.

I spend the majority of my time carefully crafting sentences with correct grammar, and precise nouns gleaned from my friends, only to have the Porteños come back at me with strings of words that zip past me without any recognition. As long as the response to my query or order is “machina diez y ses” or “bueno” I walk away feeling some sense of accomplishment surviving in a country where I honesty can’t speak the language.

I do much better with written Spanish, as I’m a word nerd and can figure things out from Latin roots. Most of the time I’m ok, but plenty often I translate things completely wrong. My survival Spanish class is in Spanish, I think I mentioned that, but I really mean it. It’s in Spanish, a language I don’t speak, and I have to learn by interacting with someone who only speaks a language that I can barely comprehend. I now have much more empathy for ESL students. I’m motivated and can figure enough out in context so I only need my friends to translate a few words, but to ask any complicated questions, I end up having to talk through someone else.

Also, google.com.ar is celebrating Nueve de julio like everyone else here. That makes me happy.

Good Grief

I don’t know how many people read Peanuts anymore, seeing as the strip is just reprinted weekly from ages long past, but that right there is a testament to the strip and Charles Schultz. I hold a certain empathy for Charlie Brown - growing up it was really easy to identify with the character. No uncoordinated adolescent can deny ties to a character who can never for the life of him kick the damn football (though maybe to no fault of his own). More importantly I’ve found that the two of us share something more significant than athletic skill, that being taste in women. One of the prevalent story arcs in Peanuts is Charlie Brown’s inability to cope with his adoration of the Little Red Haired Girl. She’s never shown in the strip, and only worshiped from afar - reminding me of Quixote’s Dulcinea. The problem is, there are certain girls that I’ve found, and fallen for, that completely strip me of my ability to cope and flirt, around them I almost feel stripped of myself. If I catch ones eye across the room I can’t even smile to dissolve the tension, only bashfully look at my feet, caught red handed doing something I know I shouldn’t have done. What’s worse? They’ve all been amazing, fun, intelligent and gorgeous red-heads.

Two things started this post – first I found a document on my computer dated from October of 2004, it was a depository of quotes. Between quotes from H.L. Mencken, Benjamin Disraeli and Douglas Adams, I found a scene from a Peanuts movie or strip, I forget which:

It's stupid to just sit here and admire that little red haired girl from a
distance. It's stupid not to get up and go over and talk to her.
[stands up]
It's really stupid! It's just plain stupid; so why I don't I go over and
talk to her?!
[sits down]
Because I'm stupid.
~Charlie Brown

This ailment plagued me my freshman year and my sophomore year, with two different women, and thus the quote made it into my depository. I thought I had kicked the habit when I moved on to brunettes and the like, but I was wrong: she’s studying here in Buenos Aires with me, regretfully strawberry blonde. Yup, that’s reason number two.

I’m being good. I have to be mindful of how much attention I pay to her, purposefully ignoring her so as not to fawn. The fact that when I talk to her I feel witless and slow helps. Sometimes my thought process just freezes around her, sometimes this is a little less helpful... but something happened that threw me for a loop. Something frustratingly meaningless, but it sent me flying nonetheless.

Last night a group of us went to go see Rent in Spanish. The show was amazing, and the music was the same and as awesome as ever. Whoever translated did an amazing job keeping the lyrics in line, and relevant. For me it was an exercise in figuring out what was going on, but it was much like watching an italian opera (la Bohéme) with a loose idea of the plot and just going aloing for the ride. The fun part was watching them try and fit 525,600 minutos into the same space of time. Regardless, the girls I went with decided it’d be nice to dress up and I threw on a tie.

After the show we were trying to flag down a cab and walking to a bigger intersection for better results. Standing on the corner, she began to yawn and I hit her with my program in admonishment, telling her she couldn’t be tired as she had a long night of clubbing ahead of her. Our conversation fell into inanity and slowly died away as the others tried to grab a cab. This one has a bit of ADD and she absent-mindedly grabbed my tie to better inspect it for the better part of 15 seconds (Jerry Garcia = shiny). When she looked up at me she saw a dopey smile behind which raged a battle between elation and sheer terror. I don’t know if she realized it, but she certainly realized how close she had drawn herself towards me and had to awkwardly take a step back.

This sort of vignette is reserved for some romantic comedy and I’ve had to distance myself from it and come back to reality. I don’t need to be keeping a checklist to determine whether my life is comedy or tragedy as I’m not living in a narrative. My problem however, is that my brain is still buzzing about it behind my conscious thoughts, especially when it comes across other quotes from that repository. Specifically this one from Joseph Heller’s Catch 22 (and aptly so, considering how trapped I feel in this situation):

"His response to women was one of worship and idolatry. They were lovely, satisfying, maddening manifestations of the miraculous... too powerful to be measured, too keen to be endured, and too exquisite for employment by base, unworthy man. He could interpret their presence in his hands only as a cosmic oversight destined to be rectified speedily."