Tales from California: Monsters at the Marina

“Nobody lives on their boat,” Elizabeth told me as we walked to the 34’ sailboat she calls home. “That’s the official story around here.” And thus, Mary and I were introduced to the unique community of a marina, a sort of floating trailer park where everyone insists with straight-faced seriousness that there is no neighborhood here— just a bunch of boats with owners occasionally showing up to take them out for a sail. 

For most of the time Mary and I were at the marina, we both sensed a presence of wildness that haunted the creaking corners of the docks, a spiritual disturbance that made us none too eager to walk the quays after nightfall. In Elizabeth’s boat, we were wrapped up in the goodwill of her and her friends, as we crammed as many as eight people into a tiny space to eat, drink, and swap stories. I was inspired to be more hospitable when we stayed with Elizabeth: she didn’t mind stuffing people into the space, feeding us delicious food, and sharing generously of her time and energy. I loved the way she smiled and laughed, and the way she accepted anyone who showed up. Her hospitality was not without downsides, though, and that is how we met Carrie.

The first time I saw Carrie, I just assumed that she was your ordinary pothead who had just had too much to drink: she stumbled into the boat one evening, so sloshed that her eyes wouldn’t focus. Her hair was bleached, her skin was dark with sunshine, her eyes ridged with black liner, her shirt attempting to display cleavage that wasn’t there. She lit up a joint without asking, waving her head side to side as if trying to shoo away a fly. When Elizabeth finally convinced her to leave, she nearly got off the boat on the wrong side, narrowly avoiding falling straight into the murky water.

However, soon we learned that she was not just a pothead: she was doing other drugs as well, living in a constant blank stupor. One night she wandered onto the boat and passed out on the couch before anyone could stop her. Sighing, Elizabeth said there was nothing to do but leave her there. The two of us moved her further onto the couch so she wouldn’t wake up with a horrible crick in her neck. She was dead weight in my hands. Elizabeth asked her friends which boat Carrie was staying on. A guest, they said. Elizabeth’s eyes widened as she said with authority, “She has to go.” Everyone nodded in agreement.

That night, I surfaced from a deep sleep to hear a primeval howl rising like a beast from the darkness. One massive shiver raced down my body as my heart lurched into my throat. The howl rose to a wail, trapping me against the bed in terror, and then it trailed off into a long, barely human-sounding expletive. Now shaken awake, I realized that Carrie was crying out in her sleep. 

Silence fell. I lay in bed, tense, hugging my sister in her sleep, feeling suddenly afraid that a monster would seize her from me.

Again, the wail. It crept from Carrie’s throat, but it didn’t sound human. It was ragged, tortured. Insane.

Without one desperate movement, I shot out of bed and flicked on the light. Mary murmured sleepily and rolled over as I stood by Carrie, staring at her face, which was twisted as if in pain.

“Hey,” I whispered, touching her forehead. “It’s okay, Carrie. It’s okay. We’re here. You’re safe.” 

Her forehead smoothed out, and her body relaxed. She mumbled something and then turned her head, sinking into deeper sleep. I felt cold all over, shaky. I returned to bed.

The last time I saw Carrie, she was sitting on the pavement outside the marina restrooms, soaking up sunlight and smoking a cigarette. She was staring into space. I walked right by her, and she didn’t see me.

If Elizabeth and her friends prevailed, Carrie is no longer at the marina. Wherever she is, whatever she is doing, I continue to pray for the lost girl who wailed in the night. That memory will give me a chill for as long as I live.

~~~

Tales from California: Why I Let a Stranger See Me Naked

Written on 2/8/2012

I’m mad at myself.

I’m mad at myself because, despite all my convictions about privacy, despite the way I railed against the new security systems when they first came out, and despite my absolute hatred of them, I stood for one second in a full body scanner today. The security guy told me to, and for half a moment I hesitated. But my politeness surfaced, my desire not to cause waves, my desire to make things painless and to avoid conflict with authority at all costs. I obeyed. I stepped in to the harmless-looking glass case. It scanned me for less than a second, and then I stepped out. If I didn’t know what it was, I could pretend that it was just a fancy metal detector, rather than a highly-advanced computer that just stripped me naked for some guy in a tech booth to analyze. It wasn’t that I didn’t have enough time. I certainly wasn’t running late or risking missing my flight. I just didn’t want to upset the smooth flow of passenger traffic. I didn’t want to cause a scene.

I am a coward and a hypocrite. I’m trying to let it bother me just enough that I will never do it again, in this or any other issue. I believe in taking a stand for something on principle, and I hate it when I don’t live up to my own standards.

Being brave means not just doing the hard things I’m accustomed to, but to be a little rebellious every once in a while. Challenging the status quo. Making waves. Refusing to be plowed under after they wear you down.

I’m zealous about a lot of causes. Perhaps someday I’ll learn how to be zealous about them on a long-term basis. So far, I’ve not been terribly impressed with my own staying power, but I also believe that the important thing is not to beat yourself up, but to keep trying.

~~~

Last Day

Today is my last day in California. Tonight, I will be in Oregon, to stay for a while, done with traveling for the moment, but certainly not done with the adventure of being in a different city in a different state. Soon to follow on my blog: Tales from California, in which I shall relate all the exciting (and not so exciting) things that happened when I was in this crazy and breathtaking state.

In the meantime, I bid you adieu for the moment. I hope you are having a lovely day.

~~~

A Stranger on the Greyhound

Today I sat on the bus going out of San Francisco with the two seats all to myself. The bus wasn’t crowded at all, which was fine with me: the upholstery looked like it hadn’t been updated since the 70s, which meant the bus was an old one. Limited leg space, grimy windows, and passengers who have no concept of the invisible line between seats are typical on this kind of bus. I was glad to have the space.

As the bus rolled to its first stop in Oakland, the man in front of me got up and asked, “Can I sit next to you?” I sized him up quickly: Mexican accent, in his fifties, receding white hairline, sun-leathered skin pocked with moles, loose denim jacket, reasonably well-groomed, quart-sized multi-fruit juice carton in his hand. “If you want to,” I said without showing any of the hesitance I felt. He left to go to the bathroom, and I looked around uncomfortably. I saw plenty of open seats. Why did he want to sit next to me? Was he being creepy? Did he have something he wanted to talk about? Should I move before he came back? All my friends’ Greyhound horror stories kept flicking through my mind. Maybe it was best to move. No, I would wait, see what he wanted. If he was creepy, I could always move. Or yell at the bus driver for help…

He returned and started to move his knapsack to the seat next to me. In the politest voice I could manage, I said, “You know, there are still a lot of empty seats.”

He glanced around, then looked outside at the short queue of people boarding the bus. “Oh,” he said. “Not so many people boarding here?” That’s when I realized that he wasn’t being creepy— he had assumed a lot of people would board, and he was hoping to save us both from the Russian-roulette game known as New People on the Greyhound. I think he was just as afraid of sitting next to a creeper as I was.

The man quickly moved to his original seat in front of me, but not before giving me the most heartwarming smile I’d seen all day. “Thank you,” he said. 

I smiled back, and my heart felt light. “No problem,” I said, but what I really meant was, “No, thank you.” We both got the two seats to ourselves all the way to Sacramento.

~~~

Thoughts from San Fran

Writing a blog is similar to writing a diary: after a certain period of time, you either have to pound out a terse laundry list of what you’ve been doing, or simply skip ahead and fill in the holes when you have time. Today, I am choosing to do the latter.

As I write this, I’m sitting at a park bench, looking out at San Francisco Bay. Clouds stretch over the heavens like a veil of cotton, with riffs that show off the chalky sky. The Golden Gate Bridge spans the bay about a mile and a half to my left, and the white-and-silver skyline of San Francisco peeks above the evergreens to my right. Having left my sister to the mercy of LA’s smoggy metropolis yesterday, I am by myself, though not alone. 

The walk today up the bayfront and back has left me pensive, trying to process everything that’s happened the past several days. It’s hard to believe that in the past week and a half I have perched on the bow of a sailboat watching dolphins slip in and out of the crystal blue waves, walked along the glittering sand of Coronado Island, and chatted with an ex-Marine who received the purple heart and rose four times. Who knew that on this trip I would be clapping in time to the peppy music of the Fresh Beat Band, a Nickelodeon TV-show-turned-pop-concert getting ready for a tour of the US? Or witnessing the spiritual revival of a Christian who was renewing his faith in God? Or walking from Hollywood to Santa Monica through the green gardens of Beverly Hills without a map or directions, simply because Mary and I were too cheap to catch a bus? 

These memories are all jumbled in my head. I feel like I’ve been on the road for at least three weeks, even though it’s been less than two. I’m not used to traveling at such a breakneck speed. It’s been hard to get work done. It’s been hard for my thoughts to catch up. In three days, however, I’ll be reaching my place of resting after the long trip: Portland, Oregon. There I hope to recoop a bit, organize my ideas, and share some more blogs with you. In the meantime, here’s to San Francisco, the place that I am seeing through fresh eyes and a hopeful heart.

~~~

Too Many Things Happening

An eternity has passed since I last blogged. All that has happened in between is a blur, captured only by terse words and phrases on my iPod notes. I promise I will return to blogging soon, but I’ve spent most of my time with my sister and ridiculous amounts of walking with said sister. Perhaps when I get up to Portland everything will slow down. Perhaps soon I’ll be able to breathe. In the meantime, I must sleep. The Greyhound leaves early tomorrow, and it’s a long way from LA to San Francisco.

~~~

I Write Because Seals Are Just Too Cute

Writing has been hard for me lately. I’ve written so many letters home, talked to so many people on the phone, edited so many papers, that I feel as if words are dead. I just want to crash on the air mattress that our new host, V., has provided for us. But as that thought enters my mind, a little voice says, “You have to at least tell them about the seals.”

La Jolla has a little inlet along its rocky shore, a sheltered area where parents take their children to swim… until the seals move in. From a manmade levy, I saw harbor seals up closer than I ever have before. They lounged on rocks and sand, fat and shiny, on their backs or sides, occasionally moving to situate their blubbery bodies, rub their webbed feet together, or yawn with a great twitching of their long white whiskers. A baby, trying to nurse its mother, rolled her over like a sausage as it tried to find the teat. Nearby in the water, pups and adults alike played and fished in the water, their heads bobbing in and out of the sunset ripples. I wish my camera could capture their silly beauty. I wish that my words could describe them the way they deserve.

~~~

Sailboat Couchsurfing

When Elizabeth from couchsurfing said she could fit us into her 34’, I assumed she meant a trailer. It turns out she meant a sailboat. Docked in one of San Diego’s many marinas, she sets up camp in tight living quarters, and isn’t afraid to stuff that space with friends. When she first handed us a key to the docks so we could come and go as we pleased, I had no idea how intense the next few days would be.

Mary and I have a double bed on the boat with a narrow aisle beside us, and another couchsurfer (Joe, who just biked across America on a whim), crams into the corner berth. Our days have been spent rambling around various neighborhoods of San Diego. Pacific Beach has a McDonald’s with reliable wi-fi. Coronado Island has sparkly sand. A marine on the bus struck up a conversation. Elizabeth took us out sailing (that deserves its own blog, with pictures). Our evenings have been spent with Elizabeth’s friends.

These friends are intense and jovial. Long-haired Murph is a vegan chef who never wears shoes and searches people’s faces with piercing eyes. Tall Neeno, with the swagger and smarts of a con man, has jerry-rigged his smartphone to change the music on the juke box of a bar halfway across town. Spencer and Bill are weathermen for the navy who have traveled the world. Britney’s voice sounds like a cartoon character and she is trying to lay off the booze. Altu is a sweet-smiling Turkish immigrant who is trying to meet more couchsurfing people. And Carrie, not a friend, is a constantly-drunk-and-stoned foundling who wanders over to Elizabeth’s boat uninvited, just to make things more interesting. These people have been in and out through the evenings, bearing alcohol, guitars, joints, LED-light-up hoodies, vegan burritos, and countless stories of their strange sea-faring lives. It’s been a whirlwind. Elizabeth makes soup and spaghetti. I drink Coke and tea so I don’t have to refuse every drink she offers me. The weekends are for partying. I realize I’m not much of a partier. We cram into small spaces and talk about human connection in a world of technology. We talk about boats. We talk about how nobody can poop on a boat. We talk about beer and Europe and why there's not racism in Istanbul and the different kinds of seasickness. Every night I curl up exhausted.

At night the boat sighs and creaks and in the distance sea lions bark. When I’m on solid ground, I feel like I’m still moving, still snuggled under covers in the blackness of night, hiding from a terror I can’t put into words. The sea is close here. The people are restless. The nights are dark. I will remember this time forever.

~~~

A Poem

Looking in a mirror of selfless love is horrifying.

Realizing your own fear is horrifying.

Understanding what you feel is horrifying.

The boat creaks in the night. My body sweats beneath the comforter.

Dawn will never come.

Songs at a Hostel

This morning, I sat down at the worn upright piano in the hostel common room and began playing. After playing once through a medley of a Pirates of the Caribbean theme, Scarborough Fair and Greensleeves, I glanced behind me to see two middle-aged gentlemen watching eagerly. My plan to find someone to talk to had worked.

Stephen and Daniel were their names. Stephen wore a polo shirt and shorts, his face lined but his hair not yet graying. Daniel kept his sweat pants rolled halfway up his calves, walking barefoot, and had a grizzly white beard trailing down from his chin. I convinced Stephen to bring down his guitar, and when he had tuned his Martin to the woefully off-key piano, he played “Summertime” by Gershwin. He had a nice country voice without any annoying twang. We played “Amazing Grace” together, and Mary joined in, as well as Daniel. Mary’s voice was beautiful. Daniel’s voice was not (it reminded me of Louis Armstrong if Louis Armstrong couldn’t sing), but he was enthusiastic. We sang through some folky songs, some bluesy songs, some James Taylor, some Gershwin. Sunlight poured through the windows as bewildered Europeans walked in and out of the common room, some smiling at us, some picking up their plates and leaving to avoid the caterwauling.

Daniel and Stephen were disappointed to hear that we were leaving the hostel this morning. I do wish we could have stayed for two or three nights, but my current budget doesn’t allow that, even though it’s only $19 a night. Not having money does have its downsides. Still, I was glad to spend the morning with some fellow travelers, singing songs and sharing the gift that has no boundaries: music.

~~~