304 lines
8.2 KiB
Plaintext
304 lines
8.2 KiB
Plaintext
From slcpi!govt.shearson.com!mjohnsto@uunet.UU.NET Mon Jan 7 17:20:10 1991
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To: wordy@Corp
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Subject: chapter-22
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SONOMARIN SNAPSHOTS
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#22 in the second online CAA series
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by
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Steven K. Roberts, HtN (WORDY)
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Sausalito, CA; 11,565 miles.
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(c) February 5, 1987
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Suddenly there begins another mad macrophase. The changes struck with our
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last wild descent, an abrupt transition at the dusky end of an exhausting
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50-mile day. BMW's and solar-heated redwood hot tubs. Vanity plates and
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chocolatiers. Evidence everywhere of treats turned de rigeuer, of expensive
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toys, of the Good Life. We're in (where else?) Marin County.
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As I write in this wooded suburban oasis, a dog named Stony goes mad with
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frustration (her tennis ball is imprisoned beneath my Birkenstocks). Two
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little girls, flawless, frolic about their two- story playhouse, intent on
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adult-simulation. Birds chirp in gentle cacophony, the coffee smells exotic,
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and a distant murmur from Sir Francis Drake is the only clue that I'm not
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really far out in some idealized image of "country." We've been living a sweet
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laziness for the last week: plenty of space, good food, redwood sauna,
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separate phone line, bright kids, music, foamy fragrant margaritas, and yet
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another new circle of friends.
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My foot healed, more or less, in Healdsburg. I still gimp about on my
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nifty collapsable aluminum cane, but I can ride OK -- and it took three
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pedaling days to make it to the beginning of our Bay Area adventure.
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First: a flat, easy trek to Santa Rosa. I visited Lemo, one of my
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equipment sponsors (they make ultra-high-quality water-resistant connectors),
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and now have a 12-pin medical-grade interconnect on my brain interface unit.
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While there, we did the obligatory interviews, yielding a nice full-color story
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in the Press-Democrat and a mediocre TV spot. But the article, in this
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New-York-Times-owned paper, triggered a succession of radio mini-features
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across the country -- significantly simplifying my recent quest for more
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sponsors. (This is such a strange business.) Life's events range from
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unexpected strokes to unexpected insults: the Wells Fargo Bank in Santa Rosa
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insisted on charging $5 to cash a $10 check drawn on one of their local
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branches, but there's no charge for me to mail it to Ohio and have it processed
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back across the country. Mystifies me...
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Second: a mildly hilly, picturesque cruise to Sebastopol, on a day so
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beautiful that we almost pressed on past our new host and into the rural hills.
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But we stopped, yielding a delightful afternoon of bike work and bike talk at
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the world headquarters of Ibis Cycles. Quality stuff here: these folks build
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TIG-welded Chrome-Moly mountain and "trials" bikes, having discovered that the
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temperatures reached through traditional brazing lead to eventual frame
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failures in the brutal off-road environment that attracts the fat-tire set. We
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hung around for a day, watching their new house get built, risking my ankle
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trying to balance a trials bike, and making the obligatory pizza run.
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Third: a big one. 50 miles of up and down -- up to the sky and down to
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Petaluma, then back up, past countless Arabian ranches, down past the
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reservoir, past Nicasio, and finally up over one last hill to the sudden
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profusion of rush hour imports and the unmistakable signs of City instead of
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Town. Through it all, climb after climb, the ankle grumbled and complained,
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never quite disabling but always very much THERE. Robbed of my natural rhythm
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and doing most of the work with my right leg, I tired easily -- arriving almost
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delerious at the home of our Kentfield host.
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San Francisco, the City, the traffic, the frenzy of the next phase... all
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are very close. No hurry. This home, complete with 6- and 9-year-old girls,
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has been a place to gather strength, play telephone tag, play tickle-monster,
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and line up business meetings. We have babysat, dogsat, and sat around. We
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have planned grand video productions and rapped into the night. We have thrown
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the tennis ball for Stony, gotten our host onto GEnie (welcome MWANGER), and
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taken lazy afternoon saunas. And, most recently, we rode over to the girls'
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school and presented ourselves as the ultimate show-n-tell to about 300 kids,
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grades K-5.
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They filed in orderly and agape, floor-sitting in rows on the other side
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of a masking tape boundary. I spoke of travel and freedom, letting the bike's
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synthesizer speak for itself. "I tried growing up," I concluded, "but it
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wasn't any fun at all. Why not enjoy your whole life? Are there any
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questions?"
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A hundred hands shot up. I chose randomly.
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"Name some of the people you've met," said one little girl. Um... Jim,
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Laura, Jackie, Jerry, Dave, Duane, Ken, Michael, and Dave. And Rosie. And
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another Dave. And...
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"Where do you keep your toothbrush? How many clothes do you have?
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Where's your money?"
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"How do you two get along?" Fine, we met on Valentine's Day. Giggles.
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"What if you come to a river and there isn't any bridge? What happens if
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it falls in the river?"
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"How many hours does it take to go across the United States?"
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"Where did you get all the stuff to make that? Does it play video games?
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Is your stereo a Sony?"
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"Do you ever not know what state you're in?"
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And this one, from a third-grader whose parents are divorcing: "How long
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would it take a dad and a boy to build one of those together?"
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Every time I moved the bike -- or opened the console to display the
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circuitry -- the room erupted in a chorus of ooooohhhh!s One young fellow,
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clearly in a state of rapture, stretched across the masking tape line and gazed
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at the expanse of chips and cabling. Eyes wide, he cried, "Wow, it looks
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like... the whole WORLD!"
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When it was over and most were on their way back to a more traditional
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education, someone had an idea. "Um, can I have your autograph?" asked the
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small voice from somewhere below a proferred scrap of paper and a chewed #2.
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"Sure," I said expansively, not realizing what I was getting into. Within
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minutes the room was breezy with the flutter of old library catalog cards,
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notebook pages, and paper scraps -- all waving urgently in my face in a total
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abandonment of the order that had prevailed a moment before. I haven't signed
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my name so much since buying that house in suburbia, way back in those dark
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years...
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Lifestyle sampler. We clambered about Mount Tamalpais with 6- year-old
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Shannan, holding her hands, collecting manzanita berries and bits of
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serpentine, feeling very much like parents. That night, we tucked her and
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Corey in, telling them stories until eyelids grew heavy. Life has become a
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multidimensional catalog of realities, a wish book of cultural options.
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* * *
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Down the road -- last stop before the City. Sausalito tonight: in a posh
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townhouse with two thirtyish pretty single women working in big-city radio ad
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sales. Fine furniture, talk of men and occult and stock market, cozy hot tub,
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Duraflame logs making decorative flames while electric panels in the cathedral
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ceiling chew $250/month. Good art, good conversation, the kind of space that
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bespeaks comfort and success. The magazines, neatly stacked: Money, Business
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Week, Travel & Liesure, Vogue, Metropolitan Home, Bon Appetit. The books:
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eclectic best sellers, economic self-improvement, coffee-table art collections.
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This is the target culture of media-fed America -- the spacious decor of the
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American Dream, baby-boomer style. Very nice.
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Tomorrow the City, fast trip, straight shot to Silicon Valley. A layover
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begins -- the bike needs waterproof handlebar keys, installation of the new
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2-meter transceiver (Yaesu, joy of man's desiring...), packet system debugging,
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final helmet wiring, audio switching, a new speech board, console legs,
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hydraulic brakes, air horns, a new tent, electronic compass software, map case
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velcro, more memory for the Motorola supervisory processor, a CD player,
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touch-tone decoder, a cellular phone, and elimination of that irritating little
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buzzing noise that's been nagging at me since somewhere back up the roaad in
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Washington.
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That oughta keep me busy for a while.
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-- Steve
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