Huntington "Lake" /  by Brian Beck

You know that feeling you get sometimes when you need a vacation from your "vacation"?  Well, after the blitzkrieg of Paris, Hawaii, Man vs. Machine III and the party planning, I was wiped.  After I returned the party rentals at the end of September and took down the lights, the forward momentum stalled out and what took its place was a combination of homework, school drop-offs/pick-ups and housework.  It's not exciting stuff, certainly not compared to the whirlwind that was the summer.  Not exactly blog-worthy either, so I took a break and turned my attention to some of the domestic tasks that I had been neglecting.

Never one to be without a project, I noticed that the pergola that sits behind our guest room had rotted to the point that I could stick a screwdriver through the 2x6's that held it up, and in an ill-considered moment while cleaning up from the party, I decided to give it a shove to see if it was still structurally sound.  What followed was a sound not unlike breaking styrofoam and then the entire structure twisted its way to the ground in a heap of rotten, mouldering wood.  I wasn't totally surprised that it came down, but I confess that I wasn't really looking forward to tackling this particular project first.  Nevertheless, you do what's in front of you and so I took some measurements and then retrieved my circular saw from the garage and began cutting firewood.

I have a bad reputation at 570 E. Glenarm for underestimating the time these little home improvement projects will take.  It's a combination of hubris and a failure to account for the sinkhole of time involved in just running the inevitable errands that these little projects require.  You need wood screws?  One trip to the hardware store has a way of eating half your day.  You know what I'm talking about.  When combined with the relatively small window of time (it seems) that lives between the school drop-off and pick-up, days have a way of turning into weeks.  And so a project that I estimated would take a week turned into almost three, but I'm pleased to report that it's nearly done, and tomorrow I'll drive the last screws and sweep the sawdust out of my driveway.  I'll do some work on the kitchen next, but I'm vowing to try being more realistic this time.

During all the sawing and painting, Samantha turned 10.  She usually has a party, but this time when I asked her what she wanted for her birthday she didn't skip a beat.  "I want to go camping," she said.  Notwithstanding the fact that she SAID she was having a good time on our road trip this summer, I had to wonder whether she was really enjoying it or was simply "managing upwards."  Let's face it--4300 miles in a vintage car, sleeping on the ground and eating road food that can test even the most ferrous of intestinal constitutions is not everyone's cup of tea.  And yet, when offered an open ended wish list of gifts or activities, the fact that she chose more of the same brought a smile to my face.  I made a reservation at a campground in the high Sierras near Huntington Lake and asked one final question: "Should we take the Pontiac?"  She considered it for a moment and then raised her eyebrows, "Well, we could... but air conditioning would be pretty nice."  She's 10 and already has more common sense than her dad.

So last weekend, we hit the road again.  You've no doubt heard about the drought we've been having in California.  For those of you living elsewhere, I can assure you it's serious.  It's been several years now with precipitation far below the average.  Farmers in the Central Valley, where much of this country's fresh produce is grown, have been drilling deeper and deeper wells to access water.  This spring I drove by Folsom lake south of San Francisco and was amazed to see the level far below the usual water mark.  I knew it was bad, but upon arriving at Huntington Lake, a man-made reservoir covering 1,441 acres, I was shocked to see a barren moonscape containing nothing but hundred-year old tree stumps normally covered by fifty feet of water.  It was a sobering reminder that if it doesn't rain this winter, or more specifically, if it doesn't snow enough in the Sierras to provide snow melt to feed California's water needs next summer, 2016 is going to be pretty interesting.

Huntington "Lake".  Somewhere out there, I suspect still covered in the deepest part of what remains of this "lake", is said to be a B-24 that crashed shortly after World War II.  If there was ever a good time to recover it, I suspect it's now.  About a quarter of the way in from the righthand side, where the sand meets the treeline, you can see what used to be the marina, the boat slips now lying deflated.  iPhone 6.

Late afternoon sun streams through the pine trees at Rancheria Campground, on the shores of Huntington Lake, Sierra Nevada, California.  iPhone 6.

My pergola project is nearly complete.  Lifting a 20' 2x6 over my head was worth a month at the gym.  iPhone 6.

Fifty /  by Brian Beck

A few weeks back, Quimby turned fifty.  The big five-o.  Half a century (I've gotten in trouble for my repeated use of that phrase).  I threw Quimby a surprise party ten years ago for her fortieth.  I rented out a room at Campanile, one of our favorite restaurants in LA, and invited about 15 of Quimby's closest friends.  It was a memorable night, and it so happened that it was just a few weeks before Samantha was born and the day before my 15 year high school reunion.  I caught a flight back to Pittsburgh just a few hours after we closed the restaurant and then flew back to LA the following afternoon to make sure I was available if Samantha decided to jump the gun.  

Thinking back to that day ten years ago, it seems more like twenty or thirty.  When you have kids on the later side, a LOT happens in your forties.  In Quimby's case, we had Samantha, moved to London, traveled more than anyone has a right to, had Parker, moved back to LA and started the kids in school.  Quimby experimented with being a stay at home mom, gradually returned to work as a contract attorney, then moved to part time and changed firms.  Quimby's forties had more plot twists than a comic book and more than an equal measure of heroics.

When Quimby suggested that we should throw a party for her fiftieth, I pointed out that logistically, the timing was difficult.  I was going to be gone all summer, which meant that the whole shindig would have to be planned in two short weeks when I got back from the epic road trip.  She cajoled me a little bit and pointed out that we had never hosted a party in our house (we've been here five years).  "We used to do it all the time," she said.  "And besides, you don't have a job now."  As usual, she turned out to be right.

For the last two weeks, the party planning ran frenetically on a parallel track alongside the redecorating.  To be fair, I used the party as a deadline to force my own hand.  It worked, and I'm pleased to report that on Saturday night the whole affair came together in a flurry of 1960's cocktails, Mad Men inspired outfits, lava lamps and swirling cigar smoke.  The crowd drank so much that the bartender ran out of whiskey for the old fashioned's at about 10 o'clock and from there on it was martinis all the way, olives bobbing in pearlescent vodka under the string lights.  Quimby glowed all evening, looking every bit as glamorous as Betty or Joan.  She may be fifty but I think you'll agree that she doesn't look a day over thirty.  I wish I knew her secret. 

Wow.  The exposure info doesn't matter on this one.  I just pointed the camera in her direction and she took care of the rest. 

P.S.  I have to give a shout out to Camille Renk and her whole staff at Camille's Kitchen for helping us bring a magical evening to life.  They were exceptional in every way.

Best of Show /  by Brian Beck

I'm a klutz.  I've denied it for years, blaming it on the fact that the houses I lived in were too small, or the furniture was arranged in such a way that made it impossible for me to navigate our household shoals without turning my legs or hips or elbows seven shades of seawater.  While there was a kernel of truth to my defenses, the sad reality is that even in a padded room, I'd probably still find a way to injure myself.  Let's review the evidence...  I cut the tip of my left ring finger off a few years back chopping basil.  I sliced my foot open on the Indian Princess boat trip last weekend.  It needed several stitches (I'm fairly experienced in assessing these things) but I let it go lest I interrupt a good time with a wound that would inevitably heal.  Now that my hair is cut to a zero on the clippers, the cumulative toll is evident on my scalp as well--it looks like a tree trunk on lovers lane.  Case in point: I gave myself a mild concussion yesterday leaning into the passenger's side of my car to get something out of the glove box.  Every bone in my neck cracked and when I stood up, there was a momentary and unexpected solar eclipse.  Maybe I need new glasses?  There I go again.

As you know, my father has been showing my 1955 Pontiac Star Chief this summer, a car that I restored over several years working almost exclusively in stolen hours late at night.  It was a labor of love and more than a little blood was shed in the process.  I gave willingly though because it's part of the bargain.  If you take a 60 year old car apart, there will be blood.  There were more busted knuckles than I can remember and I vividly recall the odd sensation of my rubber glove filling with pulsing warmth after smacking the edge of my palm on the side of a polished cylinder wall.  The edges were scalpel sharp and the glove was no match.  All it did was prevent another trip to the hospital.

If you're wondering why anyone would do it, especially an accident prone, walking disaster area like me, I probably can't explain it.  There's a feeling when it's all done that's indescribably potent, not unlike (I imagine) what a climber must feel when he plants his feet on the mountaintop.  It feels really, really good.  And if you're the least bit competitive, second place is just first loser (right, Martin B?).  So I'm pleased to report that I finally got number one--best of show.  And do you know what's better?  It was my father who took home the trophy for me in absentia.  The guy who showed me how to bend a cotter pin, taught me how to ring an engine, inducted me into the secret society of shortcuts to which every mechanic belongs.  In a larger sense, it's his award.  It just took a little time to collect.

Fourteen Days in September /  by Brian Beck

We arrived back in Pasadena on the Sunday before Labor Day.  I knew that the kids would need a full day of decompression before starting school so we left the schedule open other than trying on backpacks, setting aside clothes for the morning and maybe a dip in the pool (time permitting).  We did little else, and after three months that belong to the ages, the last day of summer passed peacefully.

The alarm went off Tuesday morning at 6:40 and the next hour and a half was pure chaos. Missing socks, no cereal, missing combs, pictures in the backyard.  One might expect that having both kids finally going to the same school at the same time would produce some synergies but it hasn't worked out that way.  In some ways, it's worse--it's the same madness, but now it runs in parallel.  We managed to be on time for the first few days but have slipped back into the old rut.  Notwithstanding the fact that all the clocks in our house are set almost a quarter hour fast, somehow we're still late.  I know we're not alone, but it's still demoralizing.

The first Friday home was special though.  The Indian Princess tribe in Samantha's class have been doing an annual boat trip to Catalina Island the past few years but I've either been too busy or too distracted to focus on it.  Samantha let me know in no uncertain terms last year that I let her down by not taking her, so this year I righted the wrong.  It was a pretty amazing three days.  We both had a fantastic time, but I'd venture to say I at least had as good a time as she did.  Without the tunnel vision I had been experiencing, I dove into the mai tai's as deeply as the gorgeous blue water east of Avalon.  It felt good.  Very good.

In contrast, the past week has been all business.  When we moved into our house in Pasadena five years ago, it was a merger of two lives--our pre-children existence on the westside of LA and our slimmed down, ex-pat life from London.  The shipment from London arrived first and on the following day, we were reunited with the items that had been in storage in LA.  The movers didn't do us any favors, in some cases emptying the contents of carefully cataloged boxes into massive piles.  When I realized the disaster that was unfolding, I had them deposit all the boxes in the driveway and sent them on their way.  From there, we moved what remained into various hiding places and in some cases, into corners in plain sight.  They have remained there for years.  Of the two of us, I'm the one with the artistic eye and Quimby has pleaded with me for years to focus my energy on sorting the mess and decorating our house.  And so finally, this past week, with no viable excuse, I decided to stare down the iron curtain of cardboard.

When I take on a project, I'm relentless.  Monday and Tuesday, I ripped our family room apart, filling and emptying boxes, filling our trash bins and stuffing the trunks of both cars with Goodwill donations.  Several pieces of furniture went to the curb (they were gone within an hour--LA can be a weird place that way.  The mystery movers will collect just about anything you put by the curb, sometimes within an hour, and I've never once seen them).  It was a ruthless purge Stalin would have been proud of.  I spent the whole day Wednesday at various furniture stores texting pictures of pieces to Quimby for her approval and bringing a smile to the faces of more than one salesman.  And then, shortly after dinner, I bought paint, rollers and brushes and got to work painting our family room.  After cutting in and two careful coats, I dropped the roller at 4:15am.  Thursday featured a run to Ikea (a hateful place) and more organizing.  And this weekend, between the Tyson-Holyfield bouts of my children, Quimby and I installed light fixtures, organized books, moved rugs around the house and directed the delivery people.  It was a lightning offensive, shock and awe, and I can say that one room is more or less done.  My running joke for the past few years to anything house related has been "I don't know, I just sleep here."  It feels good to finally live here.

Avalon Harbor from the Keli Kei.  iPhone 6.

Family room before.  I had already cleared out eight or nine boxes from the lefthand side of the frame, so it doesn't fully capture the state of decay.  iPhone 6.

Family room after.  It's not totally done--there's still a box or two that will be removed plus some junk on the credenzas that need to be dealt with, but it's more or less there.  Next up: entry, then kitchen, guest room and guest bath.  The kitchen and bath will take more time because there will be some demolition involved.  Nikon D800, 24-120mm lens @ 24mm, ISO 2000, f5.6, 1/20th sec.

The Circle Won't Be Broken /  by Brian Beck

I slipped him a $20.  "If you wouldn't mind, please park it up front," I said.  A gleam appeared in the valet's eye as the bill disappeared into his pocket with the skill of a magician practiced in the art of slight of hand.  "Of course, sir," he said in a professional tone that suggested the gratuity was wholly unnecessary.  He stepped back and admired the car while I started my post-flight procedures.  "What is it, a '58?"  He was beaming now, eyeing the sleek lines and stepping back to take in the entire view.  "It's a '60," I said, almost before he could finish the question.  My daily drivers are nice enough, but they've never been worthy of the prime real estate in front of the hotel.  This was my chance, and I was determined to see it done.  For twenty bucks, it seemed like a steal.

The valet brought me a trolley as I gathered up the luggage, discarding the mountain of flotsam that collects in the back when you're traveling with kids--candy wrappers, empty juice boxes, a couple receipts and old napkins.  Samantha and Parker were dead to the world and my rummaging through the back seat did nothing to disturb them.  When the trolley was loaded, I gave Samantha a nudge and she opened her eyes, blinking at the light.  "Where are we? Are we there yet?" she said slowly as she began to slip her shoes on.  "Yes, sweetie, we're there," I whispered, "I need you to walk so I can carry Parker."

She obliged, and staggered off ahead of me into the lobby.  I performed a dead lift on Parker, getting him onto my hip and then positioning his head on my shoulder so I could remove him from the passenger's side of the coupe without hitting his head.  Sedans are far more convenient when you're trying to extract sleeping children, but as Billy Crystal was fond of saying on Saturday Night Live, "It's better to look good than to feel good, my darling." 

I pulled my credit card out with one hand and managed to sign God-knows-what using my wrist to keep the paper from sliding all over the marble counter.  The man at the front desk seemed oblivious to the fact that I was holding a corpse and had a zombie in tow.  I would have thought that in such circumstances the formalities could be suspended until morning, but apparently the sleep-and-scurry crime is a common occurrence in Las Vegas. To be fair, my sweaty t-shirt did nothing to add to my credibility.  Parker lifted his head up and looked around briefly, then planted it into the small of my neck, nearly knocking off my glasses, which had slipped down to the end of my nose.  The man at the front desk offered me a water.  "Um, no thanks," I said.  Obviously this man had never carried a 48 pound sleeping six year old; it's not something a person does with a bottle of water in one hand.  "Ok," he said, "your room is 35132.  The elevators are at the end of the corridor on your left."

I shifted Parker to the other hip and reached up to slide the card off the counter, summoning Samantha with an awkward wave of my head.  She had sprawled out on a large leather chair a few feet away.  We made it upstairs and I fumbled with the electronic lock, then staggered into our dark air-conditioned room.  After thirteen hours driving through the desert, the air smelled like fresh linens and I breathed it in, feeling the coolness caress the inside of my chest.  I pulled the kids' shoes off and shoveled them into their beds just as the bellhop arrived with the luggage.  I gave him a five and then confirmed that the kids were both sound asleep before slipping out of the room in search of a drink.  A Pepsi clunked heavily out of the machine.  I grabbed it, twisted the cap and then headed back to the front of the hotel to relax outside and check my messages.

The valet saw me emerge and struck up a conversation.  As promised, the Pontiac was parked proudly beside the door, flanked by a gaggle of Maseratis, Bentleys and high dollar Mercedes.  We chatted for a few minutes and I regaled him with stories of our epic road trip that was now nearly complete.  We talked about how beautiful the country is when you get out in the wilderness and he volunteered that he had spent some time in Alaska.  Apparently he had worked on a fishing boat in the Bering Sea for six years, a boat called the Intrepid.  For the second time on the trip, I found myself talking to someone who had first hand experience with the insanity featured on the television show "The Deadliest Catch."  He scrolled through pictures on his phone of a younger version of himself in a rubber suit surrounded by crabs and icicles the size of jackhammers.  I mentioned the other guy I had met, who had been on the Cornelia Marie at about the same time.  He didn't recall the name but said he knew the captain fairly well.  I marveled at the photos and the coincidence.  There are some damned interesting people out there when you get out of your office.   

*  *  *

This road trip had been a dream of mine almost from the minute Samantha was born.  In August of 1982, my parents, my sister and I piled into a '78 Dodge Omni replete with a rooftop carrier and headed west out of Pennsylvania to see America.  Of course there was no a/c.  We went as far north as Yellowstone, down through Utah, into Colorado, and then headed back east across the Great Plains, traveling some of the same roads my father traveled as a boy in the back of his grandfather's late-'40's Olds.  It's the only way to see America.  When you fly over it, you get a sense of the immensity of the continent, but you don't see the diversity.  You don't smell it, you don't touch it, and you don't interact with the people that make it go, the people who pay the bills.  Only in the car do you get to see the scenery roll by like a flip book animation.  It's a non-stop Vaudeville variety show out there.  It's beautiful, and this time, I got to act in the role of Dad.  I killed it. 

 

August of 1982, Devil's Tower National Monument.  Kodak Instamatic.  The awkward kid on the right went on to become the first person to dribble a basketball and fly a fighter jet at the same time.  

The circle won't be broken.  Nikon D800, 24-120mm lens @ 24mm, iso 320, f5.6, 1/250th sec.

The kids are sacked out in our hotel in Las Vegas.  We logged 4,278 miles in three weeks.  They deserved the rest.  Nikon D800, 17-35mm lens @ 22mm, iso 3200, f2.8, 4/10ths sec.

Relaxing at the Four Seasons.  Nikon D800, 24-120mm lens @ 100mm, iso 1600, f4, 1/125 sec.

First day of fourth grade and kindergarten.  Nikon D800, 24-120mm lens @ 44mm, iso 500, f5.6, 1/125 sec.