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Edge of the Storm

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Today, Los Angeles got its first real rain this season. Mind you, it was the far southern edge of a more serious storm that hit Northern California; but still it was enough of a novelty to one who has not seen any real rain for the better part of a year.

If you are not familiar with California, the south is the part that doesn’t get much precipitation. The boundary seems to be at Point Conception in Santa Barbara County. Weather forecasts usually read “from Point Conception to the Mexican Border.”

You will notice that the shore of California north of Point Conception is considerably to the west of the south shore. To go from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara, one travels as much to the west as to the north.

When I first moved to Los Angeles, we had more rainy summers, especially around the early 1980s, when one storm carried away part of the Santa Monica Pier. There would be whole days of heavy rain, one following on the heels of the other. Now it seems to have a few widely spaced rains, usually dumping just a fraction of an inch. If this trend continues, the water shortage will get serious. There is not enough of a snowpack in the Sierras any more, and the Colorado River is drying up. And these are our two main sources of water.

The L.A. Department of Water and Power is planning on re-processing sewage to return to our faucets. The unfortunate moniker for this procedure if “toilet to tap.” It doesn’t sound very appetizing, and I foresee a lot of problems in its implementation.

Rembrandt Laughs

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Rembrandt Laughing—Self Portrait ca. 1628

One thing about the later paintings of Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn’s later paintings: They were pretty somber. Not only somber, but Old Testament somber. Therefore, it was nice to see something he painted in a lighter vein when he was in his early twenties.

What made Rembrandt laugh? He must have seen me accidentally dump a bowl of clam chowder in my lap at the Getty Center. The original is a small painting, only 22.2 cm × 17.1 cm (8¾ in × 6¾ in).

I think that, as we get older, we sometimes forget to laugh.We look at the news and are dismayed. We examine the younger generation’s report cards and strange subculture and are nonplussed. We visit the doctor and realize we are not immortal. But we can still laugh. If we can laugh, I think we will live longer and better. The young Rembrandt knew that. The older Rembrandt? Not so much.

For Rembrandt to yuck so heartily while wearing an uncomfortable-looking steel collar is all the more remarkable. I like this Rembrandt. He is fun without being quite so Harmenszoon, and that is a good thing.

This is the first of a series of posts I refer to as gallery talks, based on my visits to various art museums. This particular painting is at the Getty Center.

How Not to Serve Clam Chowder

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Today, for the first time since quarantine began, I went to visit the Getty Center. There was an interesting exhibit of paintings by Hans Holbein the Younger, plus the usual permanent collection.

After seeing the Holbeins, I walked down to the café and ordered a cup of clam chowder. It was good and hot and tasty. I got up to get some black pepper, but when I returned to the table, I managed to dump most of the chowder into my lap, with some going on my shirt and other bits on my work boots.

There is no way to look cool when you are wearing a serving of clam chowder. I did the best I could to wipe the chunky bits off my clothes. Then I looked for a bench in an isolated part of the grounds and sat there to let the soup dry off my clothing.

On the plus side, I did see some interesting paintings. The idea came to me to write follow-up postings on individual art works that particularly impressed me—which I will start in a day or two.

I regret to say that I am off clam chowder for the time being.

English Lit—East

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Many people are unaware of the fact that some of the best English literature of the last hundred years or so comes from India. The subcontinent has some 22 officially recognized languages and dialects spoken within its borders. Most people know about Hindi, but what about Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Meitel, Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Santali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu? Actually, what binds all the various peoples of India together is, believe it or not, the English language, a holdover from British colonial days.

In this post, I will mention two writers whom I have read over the years with great pleasure. First, there is Rasipuram Krishnaswami Iyer Narayanaswami, better known as R K Narayan (1906-2001).

Narayan was brought to the attention of the English-speaking world by none other than Graham Greene. Like William Faulkner with his Yoknapatawpha County, Narayan created a fictional town in Tamil Nadhu called Malgudi and wrote numerous novels and short stories about the people who live there. My favorites among his novels are Swami and Friends (1935), The Financial Expert (1952), The Guide (1958), The Man-Eater of Malgudi (1961), and The Vendor of Sweets (1967).

Another excellent Indian writer writing in English is Anita Desai (born 1937), who currently teaches at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Several times, Desai has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Among my favorites of her novels are Clear Light of Day (1980), Baumgartner’s Bombay (1988), Fasting Feasting (1999), and The Artist of Disappearance (2011).

There are others I can name, but I have not read as many works by them as I have from Narayan and Desai. If you are interested in the many worlds of India, I heartily recommend that you give them a try.

A Warning to Urbanites

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William S. Burroughs (1914-1997)

Writing in 1959, the Old Junkie had a vision of Trump’s America. The following passages are from William S. Burroughs’s Naked Lunch:

The Old Court House is located in the town of Pigeon Hole outside the urban zone. The inhabitants of this town and the surrounding area of swamps and heavy timber are people of such great stupidity and such barbarous practices that the Administration has seen fit to quarantine them in a reservation surrounded by a radioactive wall of iron bricks. In retaliation the citizens of Pigeon Hole plaster their town with signs: “Urbanite Don’t Let The Sun Set On You Here,” an unnecessary injunction, since nothing but urgent business would take any urbanite to Pigeon Hole.

Americans have a special horror of giving up control, of letting things happen in their own way without interference. They would like to jump down in their stomachs and digest the food and shovel the shit out.

Tricked Out Caddies

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Last Saturday, Martine and I stopped in at the Zimmerman Automobile Driving Museum (newly re-named) to see a show of Cadillacs.on display from private collectors. I am not generally interested in Caddies, but what caught my eye were the cars tricked out with hydraulics and fancy paint jobs.

To me, there was a lot of humor in this, as if the car owners were sharing a joke. I liked them more than the Cadillacs that were, so to speak, mint in box.

I was rather surprised to see so many Caddies on view and so many visitors. I guess they have maintained a level of popularity with aficionados that I never suspected.

Parking

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Talk About Something We Take for Granted …

In just about every movie I’ve ever seen, the hero never has any trouble finding a parking spot directly in front of his destination. And, moreover, if there is a parking meter, he never has a problem getting the exact change or running his credit card. As for myself, I usually find that most meters have either been vandalized or never worked right in the first place.

And that’s not the worst of it. To use a meter, I have to make an existential decision. Which is more important to me? Quarters for parking, or quarters for the washer and dryer in my apartment building? Rarely do the meters accept any of my credit cards: I guess it’s more difficult to vandalize the coin reader part of the device.

Today was a rare day for me: When I went to see my doctor, I found a good parking place on the residential street just north of Wilshire Boulevard. Usually, I have to hike from four or five streets away; and even then I have reason to fear getting a parking ticket. Then, when I went to lunch at Gilbert’s El Indio I got the coveted parking space right next to the front door. And I was able to order the excellent Enchiladas Suizas Monday lunch special.

Speaking of parking, I typically avoid parking garages. It’s a quick way to not only empty your wallet but get your car all dinged up. So I have adopted a practice which I abbreviate as PFAW—short for “park far and walk.” I need the exercise anyway, so if I have to walk half a mile from my parking place, it’s probably good for me, no? I always smirk at the drivers who absolutely have to park right in front of their destination, even if it means messing with the flow of traffic. There is a Trader Joe Market near where I live which always has a bunch of “parking playas” jockeying for the ten desirable spots right in front. I just turn on Granville and park about a block away.

Parking is one of those activities that people don’t usually talk about. Yet you will find that the time one spends looking for a parking place (not to mention the money) adds up when you look at a whole year’s time.

Here’s hoping that the magical parking spaces will suddenly be available to you. If not, may you be philosophical about parking far and walking.

Desert Critters

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Bighorn Sheep at the Living Desert

It’s always a bit frustrating to look at zoo animals. They seem to be hyper-aware of the human gaze and prefer to avoid it. It reminds me of a former trip to Nova Scotia, where Martine was determined to find a moose. So we went to the Shubenacadie Wildlife Park north of Halifax to see their moose. Well, the moose was there, but didn’t want to be seen; so he hid behind some plants. When we tried to circle around to see him, we found the route closed. Not only closed but guarded by a determined naturalist. So much for that!

I have seen bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis) only two or three times in my life: once at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park in San Diego County, and the rest of the time at the Living Desert Zoo in Palm Desert, CA. And not all the time, either. This particular day, they seemed to congregate in full view of park visitors.

Another Bighorn Sheep Right by the Fence

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I wasn’t particularly upset at the animals that were in hiding. I had visited three or four times before, and I was more interested in just taking it easy in the shade during a typically hot desert day. Still, it was nice to see the bighorns come crowding down from the hill.

A Botanical Garden Plus …

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The big tourist attraction in the city of Palm Desert is the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens. On my last day in the desert, while the male members of my family hiked Andreas Canyon, I decided to re-visit the Living Desert. Instead of frantically trying to see all the animals—many of whom, typically, were in hiding—I concentrated on the gardens, which are restful and lovely.

So I spent some time in the shade of a palm tree reading Philip K. Dick’s The Zap Gun, with a bag of popcorn and a bottle of water at my side.

There have been changes since my last visit. For one thing, there is a whole Australian section; and, in future, there will be a major rhinoceros exhibit in the African section.

Shown above is a Boojum Tree or Cirio from Baja California’s central desert. The scientific name is Fouquieria columaris, but the English name is taken from Lewis Carroll’s poem “The Hunting of the Snark”:

“But if ever I meet with a Boojum, that day,
⁠In a moment (of this I am sure),
I shall softly and suddenly vanish away—
⁠And the notion I cannot endure!”

Tomorrow, I will describe some of the animals I saw at the Living Desert.

Two Generations

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Me with My Niece’s Oldest Son, Ollie

While many of my family members cavorted in the pool at a rental house in Indio, I sat reading James Boswell’s Boswell in Holland, 1763-1764. I had had a vicious siege of blepharitis that lasted for the better part of a year, so I was not about to subject my eyes to pool chemicals.

As I was eating my sister-in-law’s excellent orzo salad with olives, orange bell peppers, and feta cheese, my niece Hilary’s son Oliver came and sat down next to me. He had matured considerably since the time when, while rough-housing, he kicked me in the head. (Fortunately he was barefoot at the time.) Since that time, I have resolved never to rough-house with children. I could get hurt. Or worse, I can turn into my father and deliver an angry swat.

When my brother proposed I look after three children while their parents went elsewhere, I answered “No effing way!” Some people are not meant to be parents: I am one of that number. But then he knew, and he was only jesting with me.