February in Cave Junction

Here in the rain forest, today is a good day to have a 30 year roof . Cozy in my perch, food in the refrigerator, dry firewood stockpiled, eight dollars cash and the bills paid, I remember not long ago how hard life was in the pursuit of the little comfort I enjoy today. Today the wind picks up every so often and the skies darken, a hard rain follows until the wind again picks up and the skies lighten, The rain then becomes a sprinkle until the next dark minute\hour\day of hard rain.
I'm rooting for the dark clouds. Even though the water is turning my lower driveway into a river and the upper switch-back into an obstacle course of muddy ruts, I love the coziness of the shack when its raining. The hell with the driveway, I don't have to go anywhere. When I do I'll waddle down the road with muddy, unbalanced tires until I can get to the car wash. Mud is still part of the deal here. Maybe this year I can get some rock and road done. Maybe.
Ain't that the way it is: Used to be I didn't mind running around with muddy tires and rims, I was mountain man-in' it, but enjoy a little success over and above warm, dry and fed, and like all fools I want some bling,.....can't be running around town with muddy rims on my new jeep ( with only 154,000 thousand miles on it). I can hardly stand to let the dog go everywhere with me now; Leather interior.
Speaking of living high on the hog, a good friend of mine switched shirt sizes and gave me upwards of twenty something of his old shirts. Most better than all but my best, so now I look better everywhere I go. His shirts never looked so good either. I hope he has to switch slack sizes soon . Is that gratitude or what? Thanks Gman. Every time I go off the property and look half way presentable I'm truly grateful. I wish I could bring myself to spend the money on some new shoes.
Oh well, it's February in C.J. and it's wet. In town the Chevron is slow. Tourism is light this time of year and at twenty five cents a gallon more than the Chevron in Grants Pass, smart travelers drive by with full tanks. Still the station is doing some business, and as always the attendants have biscuits for the dog. Here in Oregon it's illegal to pump your own gas, so there are always attendants and they most of the time have biscuits. Tells you something about how many people in southern Oregon drive around with their dogs.
Watching the news today, I see they want to add a suicide prevention net on the Golden Gate at a mere cost of fifty million dollars. What I want to know, besides whether or not these people are nuts, is this; After a suicidal person jumps and hits the net (really a chain link barrier as it is described) what keeps them from crawling to the edge and jumping again?????????? So they throw themselves in front of BART instead. It's no wonder the place is bankrupt.
More and more, Obama looks like a one term disaster. It was fun while it lasted but the bill for this president is becoming horrendous . The scary part is: Creditors want to get paid for the balloon even though the air is gone and the collapse is on. The ugly truth: The race downhill is picking up steam. Throwing false economy in front of the ball in the form of "stimulus money" is like adding fuel to a fire to stop it. Get ready to bite the bullet; In my uneducated , occasionally newsclip informed, save yourself the world don't wanna be saved world, it still looks like America needs to severely rein herself in.
And our elected officials need to be voted out. Every one of them. All that money for war while the country falls apart. C'mon man.

"You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it." Adrian Rogers

Blue Jays

The stray cat is quickly becoming my partner cat. Grey, with an extra heavy coat, and big light green eyes, one can look at him and see he is not tame. Except when he lets me scratch his ears. Or at feeding time. Which for him, like the dog, seems to be every time I pass by. The Cat still sleeps outside, and isn't friendly with other people or Shep, but he doesn't bother to get up from my motorcycle seat when I drive up now either. Friends.
The blue jays recognize my whistle . When they hear my special screech the trees in front of the shack become a waiting ground for hungry birds. I like to throw a couple of pieces of broken bread down for them, then go behind the long mirrored window in the Octoberfest room to watch the show. After that it's on.
The Bluejays come in cautiously at first, swooping down from the oak trees, to the shoulders of the wooden people in front of the shack, to the ground and sour dough love. Once the first, and bravest birds, successfully grab bread and fly, the rout is on and birds approach from everywhere. Free Bread Birdie!
Winter. I have other things to do then talk to the animals. Returned from down south last Thursday. When I arrived the cabin looked like a Swiss chalet. The windows were frosted, resembling store window decorations, but the ice was real. Uh-oh. The five days I was gone temperatures were well below freezing. The plastic plumbing in the house froze. All the pipe split. The Toilet froze and exploded. The faucet on the kitchen sink broke. Five days of plumbing later I'm still trouble shooting leaks and replacing pipe. I don't know if the water heater has to be replaced. I may have a shower tonight, it may not be an option.

No water damage luckily, the pipes are exposed on the inside walls and everything was frozen solid.... I just swept up the ice and turned the main off before I lit the fire. Next time I leave in winter I'll take precautionary measures. The crisis gave me something to do anyway. Good training my brother said. Life is wonderful, Every miserable moment.

Happy Holidays

When Grey Consumes All

.............and leaves paint their seasonal masterpiece daily until Winter when grey consumes all. ( Shorter days 30AUG09)

The leaves have all hit the ground. In the end their bright colors desert them and they fall in the rain brown like the earth from which they grew. The grey of winter takes over Happy Camp road this time of year. No longer passable through the mountains and into California, traffic consists of visitors to the snow park eleven miles up the road whom return in grey cars covered with road spray, and my few neighbors.
Grey clouds cover the sky. The Sun don't shine, the birds don't fly. Blue is not a color now but an emotion.
Fog obliterates the view until only the closest trees stand distinct in their grey outlines. The surrounding ridges, furthest first, nearest last, have been swallowed .
On the north side of the ridge, at Bradland, direct sunlight will only reach the cabin for three hours a day, from Mid-November to Mid-February. The Grey of the shade.
Soon, grey snow will creep down from the higher altitudes to make it's seasonal two week appearance , and then retreat with the winter solstice and longer days. Winter's grey will be most dominant then; Colorless, Cabin fevered, lonely, secluded, Greeeeeey. Soon, but not now , Now it's Thanksgiving and time to be grateful for another year and rewards reaped with it.
I'm grateful the truck still runs, the house is built, the toilet is working, I'm healthy and maybe fit, my new teeth fit, that the world is still spinning, that the money goes to the bank, that the Chinese are still underwriting us, and I can still speak Chinese. I'm grateful for a whole bunch of other shit that I don't need to publicly acknowledge. AND... I'm most grateful that the miracle of life is still being enjoyed by all of you. HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Disclaimer: The Oregonian and Encyclical Letters‏

As a matter of clarification:
I am not an Oregonian.

True Oregonians, those born in Oregon, are a proud group and very exclusive and they could hardly suffer having a Smokey Mountain hillbilly from California like myself calling himself an Oregonian.
My mother (born in Pennsylvania and raised on my Grandfathers homesteaded property in Southern Oregon) was not an Oregonian to the Oregonians, she was a newcomer. I'm worse; I'm a Californian. The son of a Pennsylvanian, who was the daughter of a Smokey Mountain Hillbilly who came from a long line of North Carolinians raised in the Smokey Mountains. You can't divorce that kind of heritage in one generation, and I only try to make all this clear in effort to say that I only speak for myself, and that my blog, titled 'The Oregonian', is a misnomer in regard to myself.
It should not be confused for someone actually born in the state of Oregon, or a rural, backwoods thinking, unemployed lumberjack clinging to his guns and his religion in bitterness. Oregon is the most atheist state in the union. Halleleujah.

As a matter of further clarification:
I did not assume the title of 'The Oregonian'.

It was a gift from a man in Italy. The son of an American, he was raised in California to be a Smokey Mountain Hillbilly, who instead fled to Europe to live a life of culture and became a British citizen. Who am I to question a well rounded man of the world with heritage like that?
If he wants to call me 'The Oregonian' simply because my property borders on Oregon on all sides, so be it; I've been called worse by him.
However, I don't fancy myself to be an Oregonian because I own property in Oregon. Every landowner on the Oregon side of Happy Camp Road is a former Californian. Owning property in Oregon has nothing to do with being an Oregonian, really. The distinguishable qualification in determining a true Oregonian is that of having been born in Oregon. Otherwise, most of the Oregon residents I know are, well, like people in London, from somewhere else.
As a final clarification, should I need a 'true Oregonian's' opinion, I need go no further than to call my older brother and sister, both of whom were born here in The Beaver State. However, since they were both raised in California, disqualifying them in the eyes of people who were not only born here, but had to grow up here too, I could use one of a hundred other relatives that qualify for both prerequisites, should I be pressed to refine my research.
That said, I think it should now be perfectly clear that these letters carry no authority in regards to what other people in the state of Oregon might be thinking, and further from that still, what may or may not be the opinions of real Oregonians.
Quite honestly these letters do not even originate from Oregon state, but rather from 'the Shack'.

Days of Rain

Cabin fever season. I haven't left the house for two days. The dog and I had dinner about 13:45 today and I'll probably be in bed about 16:00. The dog only gets up to eat or 'go'. After days of rain, the creek behind the house is a bubbling torrent, polishing the rocks at it's bottom where it has eaten the soft topsoil away and now races downhill. Opening the door to the shack one is greeted with the sound of water gurgling by, and it is both pleasant and reassuring. I like the sound of the rain on the roof too! Cozy! Until the water torture affect comes into play.
The shack is completely closed up inside now, meaning the inside walls are built too, and the insulation is no longer showing. Where the rough edges of the boards meet I've used expanding foam insulation for the chinking. Not only is it attractive, but everyday the place has gotten one step closer to being as 'tight as an egg'. I have to be careful not to overfill the wood burning stove or the house gets too hot.
The rain continues to fall steadily. The creek widens and narrows with the fluctuations in the rainfall, and today the waterfalls have been at their full 12 inches. I need a life. I tried to have one, but the Kings are the worst team in the NBA.
It's a shame we can't know that when we agree to buy "NBA Pass". The hated Lakers are winners again. Life is so unfair. Of course, after the referee went to jail and (beforehand) admitted the 2001 playoffs were rigged (you know the hated Lakers were 'supposed' to win), thus robbing the Kings of their championship, I can't believe in the NBA anymore. It might as well be big time wrestling. Commissioner Stern should be tarred and feathered. Really!
The rain has stopped for a moment. The storm, or this storm, must need to take a breath. The Weather Channel says rain for another five days. I am afraid that life in the mountains is too slow for this urbanite. Is the redwood tree, stationary with nothing to worry about save sun and rain and nutrients in the soil, content to observe the world from its platform for thousands of years? It would be a thousand year torture to me. Thus, not having a thousand years, I no longer feel I have time to hermit in the mountains.
I looked at a large trimaran for the second time last week. I'm not getting any younger, it may be time to see the world. I'm not kidding. Every day I wake up and think, "life is so wonderful ...and so finite." There could never be enough time to share with my sons. There isn't now, and it decreases everyday. I need more freedom to be able to spend more time with you both.

I Could Return

Craig's List has a small house on a third of an acre on 67th street, two blocks from my old compound.

FOR SALE for $125k. That is a $150k difference from my California property selling price 2 and a 1/2 years ago. All the money that was needed to finance all the good and bad choices, extravagance and excess, substance abuse and self abuse that I packed into 20 years. Well, almost enough. Twenty years is a long time.
Now being of moderate income and having sold my residence in the city to retire in the mountains of southern Oregon, I never thought affording a house again in that city in the valley where the two rivers meet (especially one at least as good as the last) would be possible. It would appear, however, that returning to purchase equal or better housing at this point is entirely feasible.
That wouldn't look good to all the people who have read my various posts predicting flood and future deserts for the Valley (not that what others think carries great influence for me; I have watched others "think" while I have lived my entire life). Somewhere between locking yourself in a safe room and running headlong into the train, there is a style for everyone's life.
The winner shares the most love, has the most fun, and lives the fullest life (in my opinion). Since I am still enjoying life and living fully, there in itself is the argument for me. Though it would be better if I was most loved.
Part of me would love to own a home in California again. I love southern Oregon too though. Croco-dog likes the Shack and property.
Anyway, as luck would have it (only luck and the Housing Market moved me at the right time; enabling me to both catch the wave and return with the swell gone), I could return to California and buy a residence. The perk is bills paid, debt resolved, mortgage owed, systems cleaned, and adventure lived; I would be way ahead. Think of what I could have done if I had been on top of the game.
Choices.

Cross Eyed Fish

This last week I was in that large California city in the valley where the rivers meet, and it was hot. And the City; fast and furious with busy people, crowded, young and amped on testosterone, impersonal and hard, began to feel uncomfortable and dangerous to me. I felt old and slow and disoriented. I visit my friends and they seem old and tired and unsure of their footing. There are those that aren't disoriented though; they realize their world, and time, and life's opportunities approaching. These are the twenty-five year olds I know.
Those my own age I tell,"Get up and go!" At our age we're the ones that have less to risk. How long do the mortal live?
I feel good. I am on an adventure. Life is exciting, challenging, rewarding, and fun. Well... it isn't desperate anyway. Life is wonderful, every miserable moment. It is good living another adventure at fifty. It has to be; I'm here and the best course to stay appears the one I'm on. Additionally, the longer I live as I do the more comfortable my life becomes. Only affirmed more and more by the city's decreasing attractiveness as I become acclimated to the rural life.
Here, in the mountains, on a still day, Time stands still. Almost always Time crawls and life is elongated here, but when the forest is entirely still, time doesn't move at all. The world looks two dimensional, as if one is standing in a picture. Time to learn how to plane jump.
If the answers are in-between the parameters, then humans must be looking at the world wrong. Not in a philosophical manner, but in their actual vision.
Juggling supposedly increases Brain Mass three percent. Probably due to forcing the mind to focus on ones peripheral vision and reacting. I think looking at the world cross eyed to force one's mind to see, and mentally respond to one's entire peripheral vision might be the next evolutionary step. Like driving down the road with one eye on the rear view mirror and the other on the road, digesting both pictures and responding; building brain mass.
Be careful though... with everything to live for, watch your 'road'.
Next time I see you though, if you're looking cross-eyed and seeing everything, like a fish with eyes on different sides of it's head... well, I'll know that you know a good idea when you hear it.

Only the Bear does now

There's a Shower, Dishwasher, Sink, and Washer hookup too. The Shack was also water-sealed and insulated underneath this month, which should make Winter MUCH more comfortable than last year.

Say Good bye to the bucket.

Dogs

My nephew called me today. He said it was about time to bring his dog up here to live, that BooBoo (the dog) had shit on the floor for the third day in a row and he was done with her. I considered whether or not living with two dogs rather than one would make me less lonely. I decided not, so I made my nephew a better offer: I told him the dog could come and live with me if he came too!

On the surface it looks like a selfish offer, I know: I want company. Actually it is a very generous offer when you consider THE TURMOIL OF YOUTH, and that he has to find a new "place" in thirty days

See, I'd have company (probably be tired of his ass in three days, he's always tired of me after 72 hours), but he'd get to keep his dog, and he'd get free rent, and he'd get a stable home for him and his dog, and all without a deposit, first and last, and references. He wouldn't have to falsify income either. He would have to get a job. Remember all those hassles?

I got up today lonely. I'm tired of having nothing to do but work and no one to share my misery with. I've been home two days from Sacramento. I miss many things. Friends. Family. Wife. The weather: Sacramento is a paradise weather-wise. I think one has to live elsewhere from the valley to realize how comfortable it is. I discussed Sacramento with my mother. Her leaving Sacramento after fifty years and moving to Grants Pass was really a return to her home: She grew up on a farm outside of Myrtle Creek, Oregon. She's very happy with her move. I grew up in Sacramento. I'm lonely.

Mom will be eighty years old this July. She's joined the Grants Pass garden club, a church, a widows group. She wants to make friends and have a full life. I am invited to meet people. I decline. I have no interest. I languish in my loneliness and make little effort to resolve the problem. It is not people I miss.

It has been below freezing every night here. I still build a fire every day to take the chill out of the air. There is a lot of work involved when one lives in the mountains. Especially in a cabin that still needs the plumbing and is heated by a wood burning stove. Spring is so wonderful.Summer will be better.

I think about my next move: Should I look for property in the mountains I can pay cash for, then rent a place in Sacramento? or re-invest in the valley and return to the city? or go to China and teach for a while? I'll have to SELL first, and China is out because I have a dog. I can't give Shep up, we're partners!

My nephew's call reminds me of why I moved to the Mountains in the first place: I could no longer afford my home in the city but I absolutely needed a base , a home, stability, a sanctuary with a yard for the dog. It terrified me to think of being a renter while I watched the rest of my assets disappear ( fools and money, I knew I needed to re-invest, quickly). I remember being homeless, money in the bank didn't negate the fears, Those six weeks before I found Happy Camp road were horrid!

Happy Camp road is still all it was before: I realize it's Hell Explained that is making life not worth living...............Google will take you there if you don't understand : It's really a question of here or her. And if it's not her then China may be the answer, in which case this will be a great place to return to. Maybe I should take BooBoo for Shep?

City-Lag

The frost on the ground is barely surviving in the warmth of a coming rainstorm. The thick fog that covers Illinois valley, a fog I normally look down upon like a white sea from my perch on the mountain, slowly is crawling up sleepy valley canyon, veiling the world with a sheer nightgown of mist. High thin clouds, pink in the morning sun, will soon give way to thick, dark clouds and rain .The slow, beautiful, serene world of the mountains.

Compared to the stimulation and excitement of the city; the fast paced, twelve lane highways at rush hour, fast food, all night everything, all those people trying to squeeze as much life as possible out of every moment as they scramble full speed through their daily routine. It is understandable why returning to the mountains can result in city-lag (society is not always really such a rat race).
Our next door neighbor in California, Darryl, had rats infesting the whole neighborhood from their base in the boxed-in eaves on his garage; one summer evening just before dark I watched them from the roof of the house exit from a hole in the eave and gather on the roof of his carport. It was like a Disney movie; old fat rats walking slowly and sniffing, young rats wrestling, playing, and all the rats in their prime racing from the carport roof to the pecan tree. It's limbs overhanging the roof, and all of the rats streaking through the neighborhood via the trees. It was a commune, not a society.
The ant world is more of a society, with the hill as the city. One ant out on an adventure, sees the sun going down and decides to head home. As he returns to the hill, other ants returning from their day join him. The closer they get to the hill, the more ants there are, until their lines get thicker, multi-directional, full of worker ants, foragers, scouts etc. The ant speed of movement increases proportionately in their distance from the hill. Suddenly there is a hurry. Movement more purposeful and straight. There is more control and supervision, larger enforcement ants and traffic direction, more societal requirements. The door is crazy. Ants bumping into each other. Ants bringing in leaves. Ants everywhere. Move or get walked on. There is no time to wander back and forth looking for grasshopper limbs, no time to explore cracks; one might get in the way, or an enforcer ant could get the wrong impression.

First of course is the drop in blood pressure and the natural lull after the rush. The senses relax without the constant radars up that are necessary in the city. Secondly is the realization that the party is over and it's back to cooking for oneself (two more weeks and it's Webber time). The convenience of fast food and restaurants, a poor man's fantasy. Reality can be depressing. Another realization is it's hard to be lazy in the mountains: find and cut firewood, move large rocks onto the driveway and crush them with a sledgehammer, keep the fire in the stove burning.
City-lag is like being lazy; depressing to know there are lots of things to do and all work! Work isn't exciting like the city. It's work, but without the work I'm bored. The city was fun. Fun takes money. Money takes work.
Finally, normally the second or third night back, you sleep fourteen or fifteen hours and wake up with your senses running at mountain speed. Akin to four or five deep breaths after a fast dash."There's no hurry now." The return to a world unobstructed with urban sprawl and strip-malls, devoid of traffic and people, and nary a neighbor I can see. I've been back nine days and not been once approached by a panhandler. The only company I've had is a friend and the neighbor's dogs on their passing stroll to the school bus stop. Plenty to sniff there before returning home. The good life.
My friend showed up two days after my return from the city. He works at the hardware store. He arrived with a six-pack of Corona and a bottle of Clamato juice. He loves my glass-shack. The shack has a certain lure to the cowboying, frontier male in all of us.
My friend owes a large mortgage, is 52, and has 28 years left on his mortgage. If not for his wife (I hear that a lot), he'd prefer to live in a shack next to the national forest, and own it in five years. He would like to retire in ten years. "Ten years is a long time," I tell him, "but something will happen. Have faith."
The evening view is spectacular. Still suffering from city-lag, as he talks I feel better; I remember to count my blessings. I think about that commercial, "You don't need a nip and tuck, you need a plan." Oregon has been my plan for twenty years. I'm here. At 51 I'm comfortable. The pace and relaxed state is good for me.
The city-lag releases it's grip. The clamato-beer is good. My friend leaves and I'm grateful for the visit. Suddenly, I remember with earnest again that life is wonderful, every miserable moment.
Be happy.

My Vision

...is much clearer then people realize; from my perch I see the world.
Aaahhhh.....but am I clairvoyant? Nothing special, like all computers of some sort I assimilate information and draw conclusions. Here's one; people in the California city in the valley where the two rivers meet don't think of it as low lying land. Like Bangladesh, or New Orleans, or some of the Gulf states, that valley is as susceptible to 'coastal flooding' as the coast. Additionally, unlike the coast (which has the sea rising on one side), the valley must deal with draining first. The valley city in question's official elevation is 17 feet above sea level. Is that the valley floor? I don't know, but the important measurement is the elevation of the riverBED. In other words: how many feet does the ocean have to rise before that river quits flowing? Or just becomes sluggish? Salt water is already invading the delta... Rivers flow downhill. It will not be a matter of channeling water, it will be a matter of drainage. That valley is an inland sea in the future. Who will see it? WE will! The future is now.
Those catastrophic climatic changes that will happen over fifty years due to a three degree rise in the earths temperature... well, we're already two degrees there; the last degree won't take the rest of those fifty years. Can I see this? Only because studies and scientists all over the world are pointing to the change. And some of the documented psychics foretold it happening around 2012-13. 'The world will end as we know it'. Which indicates to me that mankind will not end, but civilization might.
How you live, and whether you live, might come down to where you live in the near future. What's the near future? As long as I live must be considered the near future, so ok... fifty-four years, or 2061.
Now using my twisted mind to do some figuring (even if it takes until 2050) that valley is going to see a earth changing catastrophe in the near future! And believe me (which you don't) 2020 is a lot more likely as the outside date if global warming continues as it has. So far the warming rate is exceeding all expectations.
What am I stupid? Have I been looking into crystal balls? 12 years ain't that far away? Look at the rainfall records broken this year... records shattered all over the world, but that valley is exempt? Now is the time... Sell! Live there if you must, but take your money and re-invest out of the cities. Go somewhere you can buy land and pay cash. Somewhere safe in a mountains, where the weather is conducive to farming with a small town or city nearby. Do it now! Then, your Safe-haven will be waiting and paid for! Just rent till your retirement checks go to the bank.
Then, IF there is a catastrophe, or you have to wait ten years to retire, and don't want to give the entire 'baby boomer' generation a head start on you, you will already be set!

Of course I wouldn't be so Brazen as to tell you how to live, or what's good for you, or what you ought to do. And you'll be smart to remember; only a fool would take advice from a twisted mind seeing the world from a hermit's perch! I write this to everybody and once again am seen as the asshole wishing everybody to doom. DUM DA DUM DUM.