more pictures

Dan, the writing teacher beside me etc

today… Andrew breezed into Café Trieste for breakfast with his sweetheart, and Phil and I sat together with them, they went to the Houston Rockets/Warriors basketball game last night in Oakland.

I’ve sending out an e-mail re: renting the house

Enjoying all moments, music, had a lovely lunch with Kari Wrede on Wednesday in Point Richmond, there’s so many things to catch up on, just call me if you want more than the blog. Phil took me to a very cool place called Strings, private club since 1993 and we listened to a big, big band (Western Swing) called Lost Weekend, the Asian piano player wanted to know about my camera, we had a fun connection. I met what felt like 100’s of very fun great new people, musicians, artists etc, photo’s on site today will include Café Trieste, the telephone pole outside with the moon, (I’m doing moon themes for my photography/book) and the fire station in Point Richmond, to name a few.

I’ll be working most of the weekend to finish painting Myla’s living room, going away for three days with Phil south beach area. Trying to connect to Internet to post this, talking to the owner Pappa Gianni, 87, still sings in a band, comes in and smooches with his customers here and at original place in San Francisco, now we know each other too, he loved the inside photo of Trieste, the walls are graced with his pictures with the likes of Pavorotti, Bill Cosby, Pappa in Italy………call me or e-mail, though I have too little time to reply to e-mails. I love you, Debs

Friday and weekend coming

Tuesday's with Debs

ah just being in the moment and for some reason I lost what I loved writing just now, no need to try to recreate but it was such fun sharing with you, words and ramblings like molding, mending, making, musings, melding minds, there were many strings of them, oh well, I lost it all to pressing a wrong key, sometimes there is no going back, sometimes what? there's never going back, only moving forward, that's what I'm doing, and even though I lost the words to you now, you know me but my songs and dances and laughter, when you see me, Phil and I, playing, playing, playing together you will know all is well with me, and I am also finding some moments, hours to work, I think I may have found a studio and place to live, we'll see, I know something will come up. I must rent my house so that I can make this easier than what I've made it in the past........

to you all, Love Debs

behind in the now

Here's Phil and I leaving Andew's place, I like this one esp because we're not posing.
I've been doing it all except the paperwork, will be back soon
last nights music was sooo cool
today movie I can't wait
back in two weeks to pack up
and rent the whole house if that's the best move

so many things to share, "there's time debs, there's time
for everything"

more poetry

Thanksgiving... was... here in Mendocino with Andrew, his roommate Timmy, his girlfriend Rose and my amazing man Phil. Today he and I joined my friend Linda Holly, her husband and three other friends. The seven of us ate a laughing lunch out. They were here to spread the ashes of her friend, also called Linda's husband who a year ago fell of the cliff in Mendocino to his death by accident, on Thanksgiving eve. Now a year later his widow was here create new memories and celebrate his life and laugh with new people in her life. Also got to spend time with Holly and Johnathan, Harris kids and the Leeds. what fun.......on the road back to Berkeley one day later than planned

from morning to night they are e-mailing me and saying on the streets
you make a good couple
I remind him of Sarah
He reminds me of Bob

together we make well
we make love well
we make food well
we make funnies well

he keeps me on tracks when I go off so fast
but he does it without ever leading me anywhere and
everywhere I want to go
I want to take him to London
I want to go to where the Oxaca/Quichol Indians live/lived
with him

We want to go to maybe to Italy
it doesn’t matter
someone said he’s your soul mate
someone else said “you’ve got yourself a cowboy there”

and I say
yes yes yes yes yes

The Hat

I’ve got a hat that I don’t take off lately
except contradicting what Randy Newman said
I take that hat off to make love
take off the layers of stories
shed the layers of others
it’s the snake in me shedding

I remember already
there has never been another
like him
of course they/we are all different
and all those words mean nothing
we like the luckiness of things

it’s how he makes me feel
lucky, free, accepted, whole, safe
I’m sitting in the sun
I know that I don’t need his love
I love his love
like I love avocados

it’s just like Robert Creeley said
love comes quietly, softly, falls upon me, about me
in the same old ways,
....but now it’s not in the same old ways
no, this time it’s laughing at me, with me, on me,
raining down, over me, awash me

freeing me of all the unwanted stuff

One day to cooking

while waiting in line at the amazing Berkeley Bowl market to pay for all the veggies for Thanksgiving dinner it was decided by Phil and I that rather than he cook dinner for all his friends down here, and I cook dinner for the kids up in Mendo, that WE would cook dinner together up there.
I got most of the hallway painting done yesterday
packed and ready to go today
stopping to get pipe compound to fix Andrew's kitchen sink
maybe go the slow boat to China via highway One, maybe 101
maybe a bit of both
looking forward to seeing my friend Linda Holly
from Houston days
and oh the Botanical gardens
you know me
you'll hear more later
for now
on the road again
can't wait to come back afterwards to go to Circ de sole

time, time, time, keeps on slippin' - into the future

do you remember that song...

well I'm in the present
here in my West B Cafe
last night
Marc's piano sat in the north corner
too close to the window
his mothers photo
she holding tito (sp?)
from her bed, tito hiding under the covers
I love this woman's spirit
she is gone but not from here
her piano is glorious a grand in facto
maybe rosewood, intricately
delicately carved, etched with flowers like
her etchings, paintings and art work that
grace the dusty walls
soon to be painted
Brother Dean you would do anything to have
Marc's equipment and instruments
I want to get drum lessons from Marc
they are not in my budget yet
maybe a swap for gardening or
I will coach him in photography
but he's good anyway
I covet that digital
oh I covet it
his father looks out from beyond
man of steel and velvet
like father like son
the sycamore tree in the back yard
is soft and silver in the moonlight
the magnolia in the front waxes
the moon into your face
with those large
glossy leaves
the back porch is divided
the left was a greenhouse
but Marc uses it for laundry
the right stairs go down
we joke, that this is the place to be
when the big one hits
second floor
below the hill
above the water
the stairs they do go down
into the crying for more
backyard, perfect to
start afresh, anew
no one's planted
that means
open and receiving
the house, shingled tastefully
underneath is the
sweetest thin wood siding
inside the woodwork
layered in what appears
as eons of paint
maybe 60-70 years worth
under the rainbow of colors
it's redwood, makes sense eh?
so many... many... many other things to share
time time time keeps on slipping...
Phil's coming for breakfast
Oren's here for lunch
I's must be paintin' the hall this afternoon
must finish the kitchen cabinets
must get the vegetables for T day
I won't be blogging for a few days
thank you for your love each and every one
thank you for the food we eat, thank you for the birds that sing
thank you god for everything
Happy Thanksgiving
I love you too, Debs

my Brother Dean wrote me last night

...slow down...

I'm not going to...life's too short as it is..

I'm waiting to figure out what/where in town to play today other than my 4 hrs of work.
Last night, sooooooo cool.

I went see Loudin Wainwright AND The Roches, at the American Music Hall in SF, Phil took and treated me, he got us in after it was sold out AND we got a free parking space right outside the entrance, the place is unbelievably beautiful, sound, audience, company, all ace, seeing faces from the past, we know each other, she and I, but can't figure how, we name places and people but it doesn't help, we give up and listen to the music, perhaps we all just know each other anyway..

I'm so busy haven't even read the news, newspaper beside me, ah still there, the War L the dying, 2300 dead from a cyclone in Bangladesh, as if they don’t have enough to deal with, hope for Burma, Ukraine dying in Meth blasts, Suadi has blast from gas lines, ah some good news, Jerusalem has just discovered ancient remains from the era of Solomon’s Temple on the holiest site for Judaism…..how can I make a difference? for now I give the homeless $ when they ask and buy those newspapers they sell on corners but I haven't read yet...I’m too busy being in the thick and thin of it......and I've been off caffeine since the Abbey with Rae
more love everywhere, more people to meet, places to go...I'm writing the book everyday, been putting in about 4-5 hours a day on the keyboard, too bad I haven't disciplined myself to touch type, want to add a photo from something, ah my monsta photo that I won 3^rd place in 1^st ever entry to photo competition, he’s called Monster eats lunch, it was taken at Sandy Bay Cove in Kingston Ontario area. gotta dash, don’t be afraid to add a comment under my daily blog, you don’t have to register, just hit the comment place!! Love Debs

lost blogs and moving through them

the tree is a Thanksgiving twig, to hang thanks onto, pre T day thanks...for mother, thought crazy, I thank you, thanks for new loving friend, thanks for hot pots of tea, thank you for all

I did a post two days ago but lost it in a disconnection, not with life but with the world wide web
i am still falling, in love, falling for new friends, last night i was talking to Marc, we wrote up a Blue Sky list here in Cafe Trieste, great jazz trio in the background, what fun, today i must do the same for myself, i need to work today, i played yesterday, saw Across the Universe, oh oh how i love it
today i want to create good paid future work, staying in the parameters of no more than 4 hours a day, that means i need to earn $50 hrly to really do well, i do want to rent my house in the new year, i will probably have to do that though a local realtor, but you know me, miss networking, please anyone in ff, keep your ears to the ground, i'm wanting big $$, i'll rent unfurnished because what i've got left i want to keep a hold of and not throw away while on this trip through the universe
so that leaves me driving to Mendocino by myself for three days, i'm cooking the turkey for the boys and girls, playing mamma again...seeing a friend Linda Holly from Atlanta who's in CA, she and I worked together in Houston 25 years ago
this morning i talked with a girl who said she sings like Billie Holiday and Norah Jones combined, beautiful 18 year old, brilliant writer
I met Phil :) two nights ago, he is opening a gallery, fun loving man. i'd love to work with him for said gallery, but there's not money for that now but i'm good not sure if he'd be interested in Danielle Sheirs work, Andrew has finagled a larger piece for me and I will bring it back to show off after t day, we haven't talked about what type of art he's showing, it is on main drag of San Pablo so i might be able to rep some stuff, who knows, certainly not me but taking numbers like Marc's for future jobs, he loved how I did the Blue Sky list, I earned myself his music CD.
ah jazz at night and now jazz in the morning, i love love love everything and everyone
i guess it's time to go back to the book and get that second pot of Jostaberry, wishing you the finess of the moment, love debs ah a name to add to Debs... creating myself into Debs Blackbird..

last of the travelog now onto freewriting

I'm having trouble this morning with the page, well maybe I'll figure it out...photo's are not going where they're supposed to, like the noses when you kiss...'where do the noses go?... Ingrid Bergman said in what movie?!
Good morning whoever is reading...
Brother Dean, or do I call you Brother Craig, I don't know what to call my brother, now that's plain weird...this is Lake Mendocino, not too close to the town of Mendocino but surrounded by the redwoods in CA. As you can see it's a tad misty, and as I told you when we were talking on the phone...this is Lucerne, small world eh?

There is no justice for the scene driving in on route 20 from Sacramento into the redwoods in the fog, mist and rain, no justice to the cape or blanket of fog that hangs on the shoulders of these hills, no justice to the hearing the windshield wipers slowly moving the mist off the glass in 3 second increments, smelling the redwood sawdust, of these ancient dinosaurs of trees, no justice to Peter Gabriel's Passion Of Christ soundtrack..opening my heart to all the senses I am driving into. At times this is lucid and at times it is menacing, maybe even maniacal, but never losing it's beauty, I am the long lost wanderer, California is now another home, unexpected like so many things are to me lately.

In Sacramento, while out taking a proof positive photo of Robin's Dad Bob and his wife Susie, I turned to see this rainbow? Only what was odd about this phenomenon was that there were no rain clouds, no rain, nothing. Peering over Robins family garage I couldn't resist taking the photo, it's not that interesting but then again what is it? It had more color than you can see here, it had the shape, so can who can/you tell me?

Robin tells me that this photo might be special. No one gets photo's of these two... Bob and Susie..
We had a blast, their hospitality was so fun and full, they waiting for me to arrive, late as I did everywhere the whole trip, to eat shrimp on toast with cream cheese and warmed like love and soup so sweet and we all stayed up until 1:30 AM talking the music, movies and loves of our life...as I rode off into the morning sun the were laughing the way they do together so well...

So finally, last but not least is Adele Bellmer who is Rick Bellmer's Mom or Shane's grandma, depending on your generation. She's holding the Strawberries by her blooming Camila tree. I'd bought them 15 minutes before and promptly got lost, thus allowing myself the scenic tour of Loomis, which is 30 minutes outside of Sacramento and Robin's family home...no Robin and Rick, I don't think hung out together in those high school days gone past...

back to Adele, who is the woman everybody wants to hang out with, and to prove it I will return, je rivien.. record on my small hand held the three stories she's concerned she won't get onto paper before they're lost and we will shoot the breeze under the persimmon trees that are laden with fruit. We exchanged stories for 2.5...
I hearing... when her mother was on the Scandinavian dock leaving for America, a former boyfriend bought to the dock a spinning wheel he'd just made for her, so intricately carved, stunningly beautiful...he challenged her to bring it to the new world and use it. After it's use it has sat in plain sight for those to see who cherish family heirlooms like me. And she listened with great intent to my stories too..
Well books to write, places to go, and Myla's kitchen to paint today

breathing things in

I am breathing in
breathing out
threads
connecting threads

today is a blue sky day
in writing that means lists
writing lists of desires

one of my desires today
is to get batteries
so I can post the photo's
and the writings from
the last days on the road

for now my car is full of laundry
and pillows will be sewn
maybe today I can start painting

My carpenter friend thinks
after I've worked for Myla
he can use me as an assistant
at his jobs

so another day, another $
for now I am on a mission
for myself
I must write away from the blog
the masses
free write - to be empty again

on the road again

Just outside of Hailey is Twin Falls. The photograph of the view is giving it NO justice,it is of Snake River Valley, this part of it has a golf course, it is unlike anything I've ever seen, to the right of the photo is what looks like to be a marina...amazing.
I didn't read a map on the way out so I drove out of Hailey the way I thought I was suppose to, same way I drove in from I-80...costing me all of Nevada...wha? you say, well if I'd driven out of Hailey on 93 west I'd be typing this in Reno or beyond the end of Nevada...but I went the slow boat to Ogden, down 84 towards I-80 which means I'm typing this in Wendover, Nevada, the beginning of Nevada...ah well...I did get to see the stunning show of the sun setting into the mountains while driving past the most surreal scenes of the great Salt Lake to my right. I wouldn't have wanted to miss that! I missed some Temple, which if you get a magnifying glass you might see it in this picture (sorry driving at 75, holding the camera up without looking at the view finder causes a rather blurred misty photo), after that it was just the dark of the Great Salt Lake desert, until I saw the sign for Bonneville Speedway, which until I saw the great movie, The Last Indian, meant nothing to me... my Grandad had an Indian, and I think the true story in the movie is inspiring, it's about living your bliss. Drove into the bright lights of Wendover, another weird pllace in the world, (home of nothing but girly shows and gambling). The clerk at the desk this morning said that he drove his Camino at 165mph and he knows what it's like to fly and blow the fount off your car, he won't do it again.

well time to do a little meditation, wha? you say, yepper, not full program but it's good to be there again..I missed so much to tell you while holing up for a few days of play, but well you'll talk to me sometime, right? Gotta go, places to go people (Rick Bellmer's Mom, near Tahoe, Robin Meadows Dad in Sacramento) to see before I end up in Berkeley Sat night...love ya, remember those incoming calls are free to me!

last night in Hailey

...mid evening and the fire is crackling in the wood stove, three beautiful men are sitting at a around table, Fred, J.C., and Michael, J.C.'s given me my homework on my new drum, Michael's told me I really got a deal on my 2nd hand Subaru - something about round tables and men - yes, well they are knights of this round table, the food is good- I cooked - great conversations and the best of laughter - and even wonderful, they do all the many, many dishes!

Now that's hard to walk away from...harder still is walking away from the mountains, the soil, the butterfly, the view, ahh and lets not forget......the men...now I have to go back, I left some things :)

chasing shadows

the photo is bleary, i just hand held, the moon is on the right side of the twisty wood....Venus just visable on the left

Chasing...

chasing long shadows on the earth
chasing love
chasing dust, photo's and sky
chasing dreams
songs whirling
The Snowman's ...we walking in the air, we're walking in the moonlight sky, the people far below, la la la la la larrrrrr
eating well
hot tubs warm
laying on the mountain top alone
while the men try to make the chain saw work
to cut the wood they came for

she has walked a mile to be alone
the only wildlife that day was a
butterfly she saw flutter by
in the cool last Indian summer days
of November
she finds a Thanksgiving twig tree to bring back
she also drags the large rock down the riveted rough driving marks
...she'll be coming down the mountain when she comes,
she'll be dragging 'one big rock' with her when she comes,
la la la la la la la la la, la la la la la la la la...
she wanted it and when she wants something
there's no stopping her
she's sorry she ruined the cozy windbreaker
that Joyce gave her
but Joyce would be proud
of her ingenuity
to bring the mother load down

she didn't see herself falling in love with this place
but then one never does...

after the rest - day five

November in Hailey Idaho

I see myself here loving
with the glorious mountains and glorious men
now the seed is planted

Nebraska

4am

I'm too wide awake with having had more hours of sleep in one night than in other hours of sleep in one night in weeks, plus I gained an extra hour going into mountain time plus another extra hour from the clocks changing. So I'm two hours ahead and two hours behind...wha?? you ask.

The lazy late start yesterday didn't get me to Laramie, instead it got me to Sidney NE, home to the Carbella's sport store which also houses some amazing bronze art, though I didn't go this time I did appreciate it once before. Sidney is two hours east of Laramie. Last year I would have driven on in the dark, having to get to my destination, but this year I'm reminding myself that I'm semi-retired, so I stopped before dusk.

Stopping a few places along the way, taking a few photos, I made good time.

Impressions:
a lot of people think the prairie, i.e. is flat and boring. I'm not one, at least not when 'passing through'. There's something to a big sky, changing clouds and driving (as my first song played on the ipod) Across the Universe.... there's something in the way he moves me, ah now that's free writing for you, you can't resist the thought, there's something in the landscape, like the huge ‘haystack looking’ things, huge 8 feet tall mounds on the land. I found out along the way, from talking to the locals that they are not 'haystacks' but rather corn husk stacks, hence the NE nickname of 'Cornhuskers'. The stacks are very beautiful. I stopped in Elm Creek in a hotel and asked about the Coyote on the hill near Sidney but she didn't know where or what I was talking about. I took a photo of a replica stagecoach, pretty cool looking. Here on the plains I can feel how much smaller it would have looked to those first families rolling in those wagons on dirt ruts, the 12 foot tall prairie grass, mostly all gone for now, you can get a slight sense of it from the 4’ tall grasses on the highway sides, I do believe it will come back, there's too many people who want to see it again for it to go extinct. If you let yourself sink into the landscape, there's too much going on to call it boring.

So, Sidney NE became a great place to stop for the night. My hotel is perfect and the guy at the desk steered me, excuse the pun, to the vegetarian owned steakhouse for some good food, and a great crowd of people to hang out with for the evening. It's the best steak house they say in the state, not that I'm eating steak at the moment, but I got real tempted. I had the biggest plate of fresh green beans and good salad and ended up having some fish, the first animal meat in a couple of weeks, the Halibut was as amazing as the 'pipe laying' contractor from Vegas promised me. He and two friends kept me entertained until the Carbella’s crowd came in, and then I switched friends as the pipe layers went home. Now I'm not good with names, the bartender was a smart sweet guy, a sports coach, future teacher, and I know a good musician from our conversation, smart in every area we talked about, except you know where, when you're reading this...I told him he might want to drop the Mountain Dew habit if he wants to really lead a full life! Then there were the four others, they became other people for me, there was the Jack Nicholson wanna-be, who was very, very good, a kind man whose personally grew past the Jack persona, there was his best friend, the leader of the pack, who didn't wanna-be the look-a-like for Russell Crowe, but he couldn't help it, they're from the same stock. He moved, looked and acted like the good guy Russell Crowe is on screen, whose wife is about to have her third and they are happy together. His real brother and sister, (whose little girl was two yesterday) where there for the evening, just to hang together. She's a nurse, who I think will take up homeopathy, the younger brother, will stop living with their cool just retired teacher parents, he'll marry, when he meets ‘her’ and live happily ever after, between them we figured out that Grandma and Grandpa will have 12 or 13 grandchildren, we all laughed when I said, of course you're Catholic. They are the salt of the earth people here, they own and love the 1000's of acres of land, the Cherokee land that their families have owned for a long long time. They work the good life, play as family and welcome strangers, with humor and friendliness. I had fun and was honored to meet them. They have given me the information I came for. To stop in Potter Hill, take exit 38, drive up to Tim December's property, the brown house, and take me a close up picture of that Coyote, they say if Tim comes out, that, that Coyote ain't his Coyote, and if he's got a shotgun in his hand to say I'm a photographer for the local Telegraph newspaper, it'll hopefully be just the right time of day to convince him of that and get my prize winner photograph. Well I'll add some songs the list, thank you Richard H. they are the best, download those photo's and be on my way to Hailey ID via Potter Hill by dusk.

the peace, the quiet and the words

she’s trying not to hang
on the few words sent
thought they echo
just a few words
the humm sound
like the Stared Coverlet
quiet, precise
there are other things
to see and do also
she can’t help smiling

driving from Iowa to Berkeley

This poem is dedicated to Kelly Trueman, incarcerated in Mumbai, India

Kelly is known to my friend Radika Schwartz, who let me know of her plight, please see her free...

To Kelly, टू केल्ली (from Debs en-route to Berkeley)

She was in Lowe's today in Iowa City
returning a carpet she decided she didn't need
good job...she'd spent more than she had
she told the salesman that she wanted
to get onto Highway I-80 soon

He asked her where she was going
and she told him Berkeley
she's tired she said, she stayed up too late getting her ipod set up
and cleaning up her computer
and connecting with her son.

So today, together, they, the salesman and she made a plan
they figured out, after he called his brother in Omaha
that since there's a game there tomorrow
that getting a room off of the Highway will be hard
so he steers her to Gretna, Nebraska.

She drives west
the sun following her as she goes
she lifts her sunglasses as often as she can
the naked eye cannot take in all that light
all that bright, all those colors.

She looks to the left of her
and then to the right
listening to the Beatles
talking on her cell phone
of the transcendence
of the bliss, of the girl in prison in Mumbai
who lives a life of wakefulness
regardless of the outcome of the trial
she will write to her tonight.

For now all she can do
is drive, see the black Iowa soil
silver in the sunlight,
like tinfoil wrapping the earth
the yellow straw of the cut corn
like the yellow hair of Iowa girls
the green of the winter crops just in
like the green pastures of Harvard University that Dylan sang about.

She drives past signs like:
Atlantic/Audubon
where the little lake beside the sign looks just like
an Audubon calendar
shimmering like the Atlantic ocean
in the early afternoon light.

She drives past the tiered landscape
like Chinese rice paddies
past the English pastoral views
like those of her childhood
past the red peeling barns
like Ginger's garage
past the cattle and pigs
she's on her way through the mid-west.

She drives off the beaten track to Elk Horn
to see the Dutch Windmill
because there is a Windmill on Wimbledon Common
they all went there for tea
it was all theirs, all the villagers
when she grew up in London.

Now this landscape is all hers
and theirs
like a John Preston painting
like the tree on fire
that she couldn't stop the car to take
a picture/photo of all those reds
even though she's driving the speed limit

The fire reds, the yellows,
the greens, the browns
and all the hues in between
of the Maple trees lining the Highway
from Iowa to Nebraska

She tried to take a photo of a tree
and then tired another one, when she stopped later
but there just wasn't anything like that tree
that looked like it was on fire, leaves
rustling in the Iowa fall wind

she knows it's too hard to recapture
the divine eye, once you've passed by it
but she won't stop trying।

copyright November 2nd 2007