A winding road of rediscovery
When we arranged a Road Scholar trip to Glacier National Park, then rented a car for a two-week drive down the Pacific Coast Highway, I saw it as a half-year birthday celebration.
I’ve been fully retired a year and it was to be my first “real” vacation. No work. No writing. No TV or newspapers. Several weeks ago I’d written about dropping out of the social cacophony and hand wringing over our roads, education system, Obamacare, Congressional gridlock, Putin and Ukraine, Tea Party extremists and sociopaths calling themselves Islamists on killing sprees.
I wondered if I could stay “unplugged.” To ward off temptation to peer into the fray, I took a small book, On the Mend, and my iPad with a dozen books on it.
In Glacier, we had guided tours in spectacular scenery. Once we backed off a trail to make way for a Mama Black Bear and her cubs. McDonald Lake Lodge fireplace always had a crackling fire. On an aimless wandering in the gift-shop I purchased two books: Blackfeet Indian Stories and Pioneer Doctor, about a woman physician who migrated to Montana to work for a mining company.
The journey down the Pacific Coastl Highway was miles and miles of miles and miles of breathtaking scenery and scary driving, with 15mph hairpin turns, often without barriers. Missing a turn meant landing in the ocean or a steep ravine hundreds of feet below. All views were the same. Each was unique.
When we reached the Monterey area of the Central California Coast we’d left the jagged-mountainous coast. Steinbeck’s Cannery Row is now an upscale collection of stores, galleries and eateries in the wharf area that romanticizes the gritty commercial fishing industry that obliterated sardines from Monterey Bay before the mid 1950s.
I hadn’t read Cannery Row, so I downloaded it. It’s a story about “Doc,” a marine biologist, and the lower-socioeconomic class community living on the Row. There’s a bordello, a Chinese grocer, various men and their dog living in the Palace Flophouse, and occasional others.
The plot revolves around the community’s attempt to show their love for Doc by throwing a surprise party for him – at his place.
Given each others’ quirks, preparing for the party is a series of calamities, frustrations and heartbreaks. Nothing goes as hoped. I was doubling over with laughter and welling up with tears.
Then I stopped short. Practically nothing in my own life has gone as I’d planned. I’ve often been as feckless as they. I’ve been hopeful, angry, frustrated and heartbroken, like the ne’er-do-wells in the book.
The community’s ethos is living and letting live. They’re tolerant, generous, forgiving and understanding of each other, and come together for Doc’s party.
It ends with Doc reading an excerpt of a Sanskrit love poem, “Black Magnolias.” The message is, regardless of outcomes, loving and being loved are sufficient rewards in themselves. I reflected on my many loves. Indeed – loving and caring are supreme values.
We arrived in Santa Barbara a day earlier than planned and rested. On our final, long travel day home I read On the Mend.
Midway through our journey I crossed over the “pass” of being closer to 82 than 81. It was great fun and, like a 14-year-old anticipating driver’s training without understanding the implications, I’m ready for being a year older.
I’m still a drop out from the social maelstrom. I glance at current headlines and read to learn new things. I trust that sooner or later others will muddle through improving our education system, roads and Obamacare, and find ways to limit damage done by psychopaths, the misinformed and ill-intentioned.
I’ll continue contributing to society by voting and building social capital through modeling love, tolerance, understanding and forgiveness. I gave Pioneer Doctor to a friend who is interested in history and women’s issues. And I gave On the Mend, describing how a Wisconsin health system adapted Japanese models of quality assurance and efficiency, to another friend who is President of a health care system.
I was anxious to get home to see Ray, my dying friend. He told me his 50-something niece just married her long-time lesbian partner in their church. Her father, a retired minister, and his bishop finally consented.
How sad, we thought, that loving well isn’t sufficient in itself
Absolutely beautiful and so interesting! Love your descriptions.
I needed this.
”
regardless of outcomes, loving and being loved are sufficient rewards in themselves. I reflected on my many loves. Indeed – loving and caring are supreme values.
Got to run to work. Love you.
Helen