The Heck You Say

Living Large at Oyster Point

2010-08-31T09:11:00.000-07:00

Oyster Point sits on the hip of South San Francisco’s blue-collar neighborhood; a small harbor docking boats that sport a five-month growth of barnacles, complemented by the come-hither scent of motor oil. Candlestick Park is the side yard, highway 101 the wraparound porch. Beyond the harbor’s dubious shelter lies San Francisco bay and past that, views of the Port of Oakland and her giant loading cranes, perched like storks fashioned from an erector set. The boats have names that sound like they were thought up by some horny old salt during an acid flashback or drunken rail or quite possibly experiencing an acid flashback during a drunken rail: Groovederci, Liquid Medication, Nauti-Gal.

Full-time living on a craft tied up at Oyster Point Harbor is against the rules. Taking refuge on the boat while the ruckus over that tiny incident involving the Jeep and accordion player with “squeeze me” tattooed on her thigh dies down is acceptable. Residing on a boat is a whole new kettle of scrod. There are insurance issues, harbor master rules, City of South San Francisco laws to be obeyed. Letting people live on their clapped-out buckets, away from the mainstream, invited trouble. All the live-aboards knew it.

“Wow! Thanks!” Vick beamed while ripping open the boat/house-warming present I brought her. Indian summer is in full-feathered powwow, rendering the afternoon in amber, turquoise, silver. It’s a day boats live for, and even the sludgy sand’s flatulent smell has wafted off to other harbors. She opened the brass telescope and trained it on a low-flying flock of pelicans, watching as they trundled over the water’s even surface. “Arrr,” she growled.

“I knew you’d like it.”

“Arr, it’s farrrrbulous.”

“Can I see it?”

“Nooooo,” she rumbled, the glass now trained on a boat a few docks down. “Tharrrr’s a good view at land’s end.”

Blame Saturn Returns. Vick Does.

2010-05-24T23:11:00.000-07:00

It didn’t seem right that after six years of marriage, not to mention the work I put into landing the guy in the first place, that it would boil down to something as simple as a coffee cup platitude. "You gotta do what you gotta do?" My pronouncement was meant to set off long looks and a dark night full quarters in the jukebox. No lonesome whippoorwill or low-whining midnight train? Guess not. Hell, it didn’t even look like a second beer was in order. Vick pushed a red plastic, paper-lined basket full of mottled yellow popcorn towards me, and I gnawed on a couple of foamy kernels. More disappointing was the lack of a Patsy Cline-and-Wild Turkey sobfest than the notion of becoming a 30-year-old divorcee. But damned if she wasn’t right.
“How?” I asked, too surprised at her forthrightness to be defensive, and relieved at her utter lack of judgement.
“Couple of things. First off, you’re in your Saturn returns.”
I had no freakin’ clue what she was talking about. “Oh, but of course. Saturn returns. I don’t know how I ever missed it in the first go-round, and now it’s back.”
“Being sarcastic is unattractive in a single woman.” She took a deliberate sip of her beer, looked straight ahead, placed the bottle squarely back on the cocktail napkin, and continued. “You’ll end up bitter, and no one will date you.”

About That First Marriage . . .

2010-05-17T21:00:00.000-07:00

Lots of people are surprised to find out I was married once before. It's true, and it was when I was teething, I believe, so I had a lot of off-days during the marriage. Reflecting and writing about it has been a challenge, even though the whole thing ended fairly quietly. My very brief, very superficial take on why the first one didn't work:

Tacit and overt. There’s symmetry there, a yin yang quality in which the opposites do their flowy thing, the universe is balanced, and the Big Ohm is achieved. However, when yin’s notion of reckless abandon is trying the peach syrup at IHOP while yang is back home in the basement trying do-it-yourself taxidermy with roadkill, the dynamic is seriously out of whack. Yang will act out just to be a pill, yin will pull in to avoid the unwanted side effects. The curve is warped, and in our case, it was beginning to throw the entire circle off.

Style. It's an Attitude.

2010-04-26T22:38:00.000-07:00

We were browsing Jest Jewels at the Embarcadero on our lunch hour, me on the hunt for something to make me look fetching for a date with a new man. Gravitating towards the hats, I tried on a little brown tweed number resembling the ones worn by English schoolboys; close-fitting dome crown with a short bill, and snappy gold buttons on each temple. In the right light and when I tilted my head just so, the best I could manage was a slight resemblance to the Monkees’ Davy Jones. With boobs. Which might be OK, if you're confident enough with yourself to carry off looking like a boy-bander in a dress. I'm not.
“I just don’t know,” I pondered, turning from side to side in the mirror. “Something isn't working.”
“Here, Just wear it like this.” Vick took the hat and put it on her head at a little tilt so it half-covered one eye. She framed her face with her hands, turned her head like a screen star from the 1920s, and batted her eyes. “See? Very Puckish. He’ll melt.”
Fine. Out-cute me. Puck this, sister.

Mean Vick and Loma Prieta, part 2

2010-04-22T23:56:00.000-07:00

Creaks belch from the walls as if the building ate something that did’t agree with it. And though we’re standing in what we’ve all read and heard is the safest place during an earthquake –a doorframe – that comfort is cold as a broker’s heart. We could fall. The floor could melt right out from under us we’d tumble through space, floor by floor, until we landed in a pile on top of the desks and credenzas and coffee cups of the previous 17 floors, and it’s gonna hurt. I’m struggling to plan a way in which to fall so it won’t hurt when I land. So far the plan's not coming together.
“It’ll hurt when we fall.” I inform Vick.
“I know.” She’s clutching Mosby’s waist, who’s doing a sort of shoulder hug with Tom the married guy, because even in the throes of a natural disaster that’s messing with the intestines of steel buildings, God knows you don’t grab the waist of the nearest warm body for solace. Word would leak out, and next thing you know they’d be calling you “Kitten” at the gym. “You know what’s worse, though?,” she aksed.
Brand me a loon—something about the half-light and creaking girders hinders my thought process. “I can’t fathom.”

Loma Prieta, Meet Mean Vick

2010-04-20T20:55:00.000-07:00

Working on a story, and remembering the Loma Prieta earthquake. Funny how the smallest details come back once all the distractions are (mostly) cleared away. Here's part of the tale:

She was telling me about her favorite college gig as a backup singer in “a cheesey nightclub act.”
“Yeah, that was fun. I played tambourine, which didn’t work out so well. I had no sense of rhythm.”
“Why’d they keep you?” I asked.
“Because I’m cute. Well, plus I agreed to wear a tube top.”
I nodded. “Ah.”
“The tops would creep down during ‘Proud Mary,’ so the other girl and I figured out that if we flung our heads down,” Vick dramatically threw down her head “our hair would cover our fronts enough that we could surreptitiously pull up our tops.” Vick really did use words like “surreptitiously” in conversation, even when she was upside down. “Then we’d throw our heads back up, and it looked really cool, and our tops were fixed.” She righted herself, holding her hands at her side, imaginary tube top back in the safety zone. Flushed and a bit winded, kept going. “Next time you go see, like, Pride and Joy, watch how the . . . “
A low vibration, and the potted fern quivered.
“Suppose that’s a truck?” I offered.
“Oh, sure.” Vick shrugged before continuing, “. . . watch how the girls in the back all turn or bend down . . . “
But the floor continued to rumble under our feet, jostling pencils in the cups and causing the fluorescent lights to swing.
“ . . . at the same time . . . shit, that shaking isn’t stopping.”
The fern’s quiver progressed to an agitated tremor. A message pad perched on the edge of Vick’s desk plopped to the floor, and we stared at it as if it hollered “Geronimo!” on the way down.

Nosey Question

2010-02-18T06:20:00.000-08:00

Have you ever gotten a feeling like the fates came around with a silver platter of toast points covered with warm brie, and you were too tired or distracted or some stupid thing to accept one?

While exiting Macy's the other evening, I had two strips of paper that you spray perfume on, one in each hand. The perfumes were Issey Miyake and Dolce & Gabbana Blue something. I was sniffing each strip alternately as I walked out of the store, in my own little universe. Out of the blue, a 20-something kid wearing one of those hooded sweatshirts that northern California surfers favor - the ones that looks like they were made from a nubby blanket - looked up from his iThingie long enough to offer, "Do you need a second opinion on that?" pause, smile a little, and keep on walking.

You see my allegory here. Or metaphor - whichever. The offer to help was the brie-covered toast point. I'm still not positive what prevented me from saying, "Sure, what's your vote?" Surprise, yes, but throw in preoccupation and some long day lag, and boom, you're wondering where your hors d'oeuvre went.

Bring It

2010-02-10T06:26:00.000-08:00

My new infatuation's open arms beckoned as I, sweaty and smiling, ran to its embrace. Sunlight fell like confetti through the eucalyptus, dusting my hair, kissing my upturned face. At this exquisitely turned arc in the journey, the flick between sojourn and realization, I raised my hands in thanks to the fair skies, sweet communion just at fingertips' end. Acting cool would have been effort wasted. We knew why I was there.

"Come on, Sarah!" ripped a lady watching from the curb, "bring it!" A goulash of permed hair spilled over her pink visor. The woman in the blue-and-faux lace tank top I'd been hopscotching since mile five—Sarah with the vocal fan, I presumed—zipped around me and sprinted to the finish line's embrace, a second ahead of me. Damn, she definitely brought it. Faster and in a cuter top.

But hey, I brought it, too—early morning alarm clocks and miles of iTunes, brought the crazy, brought the conviction that I would finish this humdinger and finish it strong. I didn't feel elation while crossing the finish line, because that was inevitable. But I did think to myself, "This isn't the finish. It's only the beginning."

Running the Numbers

2010-02-09T06:17:00.000-08:00

When runners aren't obsessing over their own optimum heart rates, BMIs, miles per week, kcals, and kilowatts, they love to pore over the race stats: splits, pace, time back, time forward, time sideways. They consult big geeky watches as if they were oracles during events, immediately after times are posted they hop on their calculators and average stuff, just for the buzz.

But now I get the fascination. I have one adorable little set of numbers in my roster, and I turn to that web page so often I've gotten it grubby. Want to hear the good parts? Chip time: 2.02; clock time: age group finish: 31 out of 181; overall finish, 1,081 out of 6,096; hey, where you going? It's just getting good: pace: 9:22; age-grade: 62.4%, which I kind of don't understand but I know it's pretty good for a first-timer.

Well, anyway . . .

A neighbor and fellow runner gave me a training log, so now I can start crunching my numbers on a daily basis. Do I know how to have a good time, or what?

The Foundation of Courage

2010-02-03T06:43:00.000-08:00

Every woman has an article of clothing or jewelry that makes her feel empowered. When my friend Lisa wears her vintage Fiorucci jeans with the distressed red belt, you'll take what she gives you and you'll like it. Steph rocks a sterling collar-type necklace when it's time to open a subliminal can of whoop-ass, and a former co-worker, Chris, went so far as to give her sartorial armor a name, calling a smashing body-skimming royal purple sheath her "results" dress, because when she wore it, sister, you better believe she got 'em.

Sometimes the bolstering comes from a more intimate piece of apparel; a cami that channels the sultry and dangerous Mata Hari, or a bra that makes you feel like Tina Fey's brain in, well, Tina Fey's body. My sure-fire, rock star, don't-stand-next-to-my-fire-or-you'll-get-burned item is a pair of undies printed with little purple scorpions, edged in purple lace. They were fished out of a sale bin at The Lingerie Shoppe near where I work, but their markdown status in no way diminishes their juju. Wearing them, I am Mother Nature's go-to gal - a force in Scorpio underpants.

Now get outta my way while I start on that novel . . .

Mean Vick and the Poet, Part 2

2010-01-28T06:50:00.000-08:00

When we last peeked in on Mean Vick, she'd courageously asked her Native American Poet-Hero-Heartthrob to dance. During a course of polite conversation, with Vick doing all of the verbal heavy lifting, he told her of his recent layoff, leaving Vick holding a big ol' bag of mortification.
"Don't be upset. How were you to know?" I counseled.
"I didn't." She gazed at him from across the dance floor. "But I can't help it." Another swoony look. "He's gorgeous. I want to drag him around by his ponytail."
"We should buy him a beer. That's what you do for laid off people, right? Load them up with alcohol?"
It was perfect justification. Vick bought a Miller High Life (nothing less than the champagne of bottled beers for our ponytailed poet). From my place by the bar, I silently cheered her on as she made her way to where he stood. She made a couple flapping gestures with her hands as he calmly accepted the consolation beer, adding it to the stash on his table.
Redundant Heartthrob Poet seemed to pop up everywhere we were that weekend - the impromptu jam session at Stockmen's bar, at the excellent fry bread lunch, at the casino late at night. A lot of people must have felt badly for his job loss, because a cadre of beers formed a sort of posse around him, effectively taking the bloom off cactus for Vick.

"Do you suppose those are all sympathy drinks?" I ventured.

"I don't know," Vick sighed. "But I still want to drag him around by his ponytail."

In Praise of Crappy Coffee

2010-01-26T06:46:00.000-08:00

The only thing better than taking a road trip in January is, while on that road trip, sipping coffee the color and taste of your car's tires from a styrofoam cup. Crappy coffee is going the way of the daily newspaper, and it's a damn shame. What's the point of a beautiful road trip with miles of highway to explore, a new atlas by your side, cooler full of cheez whiz and brunschwieger, if you're going to ruin the whole journey with predictable java?

The primo cup of road coffee isn't found at a place that sells CDs and tea balls. Truly fine fuel for your driving can only be purchased at a place that sells fuel for your car - the gas station. And to do it really right, find a gas station without a convenience store screwed onto it. The best road coffee, and I mean a cup of the stuff that's been sitting in a glass carafe on the burner for a couple hours, is a challenge to find, but so worth the search. Generally speaking, if the gas station is on a two-lane highway and has an oil drum for a garbage can by the door it's a good sign, and a grimy, hand-lettered sign by the drip brewer that says, "Coffee, 50 cents" means a bona fide barrista is at work.

When you pour the coffee into the cup, a few flakes of yesterday's dried-up remnants should float at the top. Packets of Coffee Mate, in plain (or amaretto and creme de menth for the BMW drivers) and a box of sugar cubes should be the condiment choices. If your lips inadvertently curl upon taking the first swig, and it leaves an oily coating in your mouth, you know you've found an honest cup of road coffee.

I like to chew my road coffee while driving, listening to any local AM radio station and watching the fence posts tick by. It tastes like adventure.

January Wanderlust

2010-01-15T12:14:00.000-08:00

January is my favorite. It's big, it's cold, it's boring. January is the cinder block of months, which makes it a primo time to hit the road, have a little adventure, give yourself something to remember fondly during those annoyingly long, warm days of summer.

This one time? My best friend Mean Vick and I? We drove to the Cowboy Poetry Festival in Elko, Nevada in mid-January. It was raining when we left the bay area and as we drove I-80 east towards the Ruby mountains, pewter skies pissed rain, the rain turned to sleet, sleet turned to snow by Elko, with temps hovering above booger-freezing. It was perfect. At the Saturday night Chicken Scratch dance, Vick downed a Bud and screwed up enough nerve to talk to her Native American Poet-Hero-Heartthrob, let's call him Jim Blackfeather. Things went fairly well through introductions—she didn't snort or stutter. But actual conversation jackknifed like a semi on black ice.
"How do you like your job at the college?" she asked him.
"It was OK until they fired me."
Crap. "Oh, sorry. Did that happen recently?"
"Yesterday."

In the spirit of full disclosure, Vick stopped me from accidentally walking into the motel parking lot at 5:00 in the morning wearing nothing more than my Timex. But that's for another post.

So you see, these memories keep my spirits buoyed through July, when the stupid sun is shining well past 9:00 at night, and the birds won't shut up, and I miss bundling up in some great polar fleece and a goretex rain parka.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Let's Get Serious This Time

2010-01-11T13:49:00.000-08:00

Poor old The Heck You Say blog wasn't getting any love for a long, long, real long time. I blame a full-time job, I blame then-president Bush, I blame the dog (as in, the dog ate my motivation.)

But all that blaming is done, and things look differently from this side of the pasture nowadays. Let's have an adventure, eh? Starting with the Kaiser Permanent Half Marathon in San Francisco on February 7. I'm in it, my first half-marathon ever, and I'm ready. Seriously, I've been getting up in the dark, putting in miles while owls are still hooting in the oak trees, setting off motion detector lights - how I love setting off the motion detector lights - in preparation for this.

If anyone else is entered, give me a shout and let me know how you're doing. If you've run it before, this newt will take all the advice you've got.

Them's Fine Words

2007-04-06T10:51:00.000-07:00

I've been committing a lot of spare brain cells to pondering the eloquence of old songs, speeches, whatever. And not old like the 60s-I mean jeez, I got a puzzled look from a kid when I mentioned the TV show Bonanza - like I was a fossil or something. Rotten kids. I mean old like 1800s and before. I was thinking about the words to "Battle Hymn of the Republic". At the time it was a hotly political song, sung around the campfires of Union soldiers during the Civil War to remind them of their cause. Of course the Confederates hated it, and had their own anthem-"Dixie",

Where was I? Oh yes, not a fossil. Wait - no. "Battle Hymn of the Republic". I was thinking about the line that goes, "He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored". That is one powerful line. What's it even mean, exactly? Supposedly, the "vintage", or wine, represents the blood of the Confederates. The author is saying, quite vividly, that God is making wine from the disdain, or "wrath" the Southerners felt for the North. In other words, God and the North will be victorious.

My point is, that is one evocative, haunting, and imaginative line. We sing it all the time, but do we realize the power and history of the words we're saying?

This is how I amuse myself while I'm washing dishes, riding my bike, waiting in line at Andronico's - in short, whenever I'm doing something mundane. Geeky? I'm guessing yes. But it's nothing compared to my friend Mean Vick, who compiled an alphabetical list of war slogans without even using Google.

But that's another blog.

Marching to Your Own Accordion

2007-01-26T12:15:00.000-08:00

I saw a bumper sticker yesterday that read "I follow the beat of my own accordion." I love it when people really own their eccentricities. You know, if W owned his quirks rather than posing as the Biggest Dog of All, he'd be a lot more tolerable. Maybe.

This is one of my favorite pictures, taken at the San Francisco ferry building. I was way too much in my head, pondering writing vs. eating, how W got elected twice, if there would be a line at Peet's. Along comes this woman, so into the day she radiated. I wanted what she had. When I asked if I could take her picture, her ebullience completely took the scaly rusty stuff off my outlook. She made the skirt herself, she said, and she dresses like that all the time.

Talk about owning your accordion. Or marching to your quirks. Or whatever. I really loved that she was a walking party. She put me in a good mood the whole day. In fact, I still get a lift when I look at this picture. If leopard tights don't force you to get over yourself, well, you're in a mighty sorry state.

But What Does this Mean?

2007-01-23T15:21:00.000-08:00

True to her word, Lawrence Welk's assistant Margaret sent me not one, but two coffee cups last week. I was so beset with joy that I did the happy dance around the living room in my foundation garments, annoying the cat and my husband Patrick to the point where they both assumed the "I give you my back, you feeb" (short for 'feeble') position. Did I care? Nay, I did not care. As those of us with low-thrill thresholds know, their haughty demeanor belies the hurt child inside - the hurt child that aches to drink his Ovaltine from a Lawrence Welk mug.

When I stopped my caper-cutting long enough to look over my treasure, I realized … dear Lord in accordion heaven … that the image on the mug was the same image that I plucked randomly from dozens of web images to use for my blog post. I immediately showed it to Patrick, who gave it a cursory glance then resumed his "my back, you feeb" pose. Not daunted by his callousness, I pursued the enormity of the coinky-dink.

"Don't you think it's just … eerie?"

"No."

"I mean, of all the images I could have picked, I picked the exact same one they use for their mugs. That's just wild."

"Wild."

"I think it means we're connected somehow."

"As long as he doesn't bring Myron Floren for a threesome."

So I'm left to ponder the Big Issues myself. But that's fine, I'm used to it. I drink my coffee from it every morning and it makes me happy. But listen, if I ever see a Lawrence Welk mug on eBay, and one of mine is missing, I'm calling my wunnerful baton-wielding buddy in the sky to inflict a little whoop-de-do ass. Then we'll see who doubts our connection.

RIP, Art Buchwald

2007-01-18T10:35:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it takes an obituary to get a lesson on how to live your own life. After reading today's New York Times obit on humorist Art Buchwald, I feel like having a little cry and getting some fresh air, then revamping my entire MO. Everything he experienced, observed, imagined, was fodder for copy. And not just "here's what I did today, aren't I cool" copy, it was funny, generous, kind, Pulitzer Prize-winning copy.

His beginnings were difficult: his mother was declared delusional (this was back in 1925) and he never saw her after that. His father was a drapery and upholstery maker. When the Depression made it too difficult for him to support his five children, Art was shipped to the incredibly scary-sounding Hebrew Orphan Asylum (ew. Actually, it's way more - aaack.) In his late teens, Art escaped the orphanage, hitched to North Carolina, and joined the Marines.

To cut drastically to the chase, from then on his pen was his ticket to an amazing life. The part about how he wanted to be remembered as bringing joy to people's lives is … well, it's … it's a tearjerker, OK? Seriously, read the obit. If you're not moved, even if you're not a writer, you need to get away from the computer and get out more.

I mean it. Read it, then go. Scat. Skedaddle.

Wunnerful, wunnerful

2007-01-16T10:09:00.000-08:00

I had a brush with fame this morning that's got me all amped. That plus the pot and a half of Graffeo's dark french roast maybe, but I'm certain the light-headedness is from talking with … with … Lawrence Welk's personal assistant, Margaret. That is, she was his personal assistant. She's not really that any more. Because of his being, you know, dead.

Margaret, as one might expect from LW's assistant, is a very nice lady. Her memories of her former boss are warm, and listening to her gave me the feeling of being wrapped up in a toasty soft comforter. "The cameras didn't show him to his best advantage," she said. "He stiffened up around them. He was much more charismatic and funny in person. I saw him walk into a room and the place was electrified. He played Madison Square Garden in the 80s, and even then his numbers were huge, like a rock star. I bet most people don't know that."

Maybe I was a little too cool for Mom and Dad's Saturday night favorite TV show when I called, but I swear by all that's chiffon and sparkly, Margaret's sincerity melted my edges. She's even going to send me a coffee mug!

Oh, and I called because I'm researching a story. But I think I got an inspiration for another (can't … resist … saying it) wunnerful piece.

Bunny Ears Voodoo

2007-01-15T11:19:00.000-08:00

You never know when a little chunk of wonderful is going to work its way into your day.

Maybe it was his saucy wink, or his bunny ears, or possibly the way the faux fur trim on his Asian-inspired vest shimmied in the breeze. Alls I know is, I was craving a blender drink and Chesterfields the entire day after our encounter.