times like this

If I could move my house, like dorothy's in a tornado, I would have it spin into the air and land somewhere in California, near Halfmoon bay. Once the dust had cleared I would look out from my sun room to a sweeping view of the hills to the beach to the pounding surf where I've spent so many hours picking up sea glass.

I would cruise down the coast to walk the pier in Santa Cruz where we were married and ride the Cyclone over and over until I was so dizzy I would stumble down the boardwalk laughing. A sea gull would hover, it's wings spread wide to catch the wind in a balancing act. Not moving forward or backward - still - time passing without change, until a tasty morsel brings it streaking down with a shriek. I would treat myself to a tart carmel apple with nuts on the bottom. I would remember. I was 17 and my little sister and I ran into the surf there with our Dad. He did his best to teach us to body surf in the cold water. He told us of beaches in New York and Virgina. He bought us unlimited rides and we rode the ups and downs and ins and outs till we could not bear another revolution. I would remember. The smells of the steaming pots of crab and shrimp - mixed with the scent of the sea - and the barks of the huge sea lions resting on the boards under the pier. I would remember the walks in the sand and the fried squid I slipped into your hand as we walked away from the patio of the cafe. You screamed, just a bit, and pretended to be mad, but really you were thinking of a way to get me back.

I would hike though the hills and redwoods and ride my bike along familiar roads, drifting with the sense of home and permanence. I would stop at Alice's or Goat Rock or Skyline or the water temple off the road closed off for only bikes. I would insist we visit Flioli and tell the story I've told so many times that "Heaven can Wait" was shot there.

I would cruise into Niles Canyon on my way to visit my son in Davis - stopping first in Niles to look for collectibles in the stores that claim Charlie Chaplin as their own. Coffee. Yellow hills. A sense of place and time. The bigger picture of "home."

I would shop at Whole Foods and Trader Joes and eat sushi and burritos and drink wine and laugh with friends. So many friends - all so different - all loving and open. I could call anyone and get the same welcome. Their homes, their lives open to me - whenever - where ever. Stanford - walking the dish - riding through the quad - remembering. My kids on skates, weaving in and out of pillars. Chalk on my hands - buildering the arch in the same way we went bouldering. The smells of eucalyptus near the mausoleums. The burrs that caught in my bike tires and caused a flat near the shopping center. The paths. The pasts.

I would walk through the Zoo and buy plastic animals in the gift shop. I would spend hours lost on the trails through Golden Gate park. I would remember. The concerts we stumbled upon. Skating through the trails. Skates on Haight. Tea in the Japanese tea garden. The koi. I would remember playing disc golf and the desire to stop each time I drove through the park from one end of the city to the other. Twin peaks. Castro. Mission. I would remember the Musee du Mechanique. The bread, the bay, the sellers lined up with cheap beads and leather. The chowder.

I would remember. Everything. Everyone. I would remember why I called it home. Why I said I never wanted to leave. I would remember why I did.

It is logical, why we moved. I would not give up this house, this perfect home. I would not give up your family or the millions of new memories we've yet to make here. But my heart's home will forever be 2400 miles away.

I can smell the sea.



4/22/17

Update:
http://fiveminutememories.blogspot.com/2017/04/into-garden-of-earthly-delights.html

No place like home

I would sit cross legged on the floor transfixed by the small TV as Dorothy clicked her ruby slippers together and repeated the magic words "There's no place like home."

In a heartbeat she was returned to her family's farmhouse in Kansas where it appeared that all she had experienced was just a dream. "You were there, and you and you!" Each would laugh and stroke her head or shoulder, she'd been through a whirlwind and returned to her life forever changed.

No place like home.

I grew up in a small town the the middle of Kansas. I believed if I wished hard enough I would be picked up and taken to the magical world I must really be from. Kansas could not possibly be my home. Yes, I lived there with my parents and my sister and my dog Prissy. Yes, I had grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins and friends, but where was my destiny? I could sing like Dorothy and knew every song by heart. I could walk a block to the cornfields that surrounded our little town and when the tornados threatened, I dreamed of running out to be lifted up into the world of my dreams. Somewhere over the rainbow - where dreams come true.

I would climb trees and play structures and roofs to be as close as I could to the blue Kansas sky. I would lay in the cool grass and read the signs in the ever changing clouds. And I grew up.

We moved to Colorado where in some places the mountain tops seemed like stairs to Oz. I imagined if I just climbed high enough - through the clouds - the magic would explode around me. But we lived where it was flat. And when I finally got a trip in a friend's father's plane - I saw that the clouds above are only air.

I left home at 18 to go to college, came back briefly to get married, then off again and into my own life. It seemed to me that maybe it was the leaving home that would bring my Oz to me. But no. My life just changed and grew to fit me like a glove. And when I finally arrived in California, if felt a bit like Oz. San Francisco glittered like the Emerald City and there were wizards behind every innovation. It was so easy to believe I had found my place.

I built my business and my life there - I married, divorced - married again, divorced again and finally settled in with an unlikely partner. A boy - just 19 to my 41 living his life in his mother's basement in Ohio. Like the scarecrow, he danced into my life to point the way to happiness. Like the Lion, he helped me find the courage to walk a different path. Like the tin man, I was the oil can that freed him to walk the path with me. Together we found we shared a heart and a dream  - to make our home together.

We've lived in our Oz for 14 years. It's been a rocky road because a dream is not enougth. As one child flew on, and then the other - homesickness  slipped over us like sleeping poppies. The dream of snow falling outside out bedroom window made us to realize there is nothing behind the curtain.

Hand and hand we are clicking our heals now.

And you'll be there. And you. And you. And all of you.