Chapter 39 – Not What They Thought

First Nap

They’re living at Carol and Denny’s in Swisshome now. They’ve moved out of Berkeley for good. It is so peaceful and quiet here, with a river running right by their home. Maybe now their life will calm out a bit. It’s December now, and they don’t know it yet, but they won’t see the sun at all for the next four months.
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Ariana is almost six months old, and she has never taken a nap on her own. She will fall asleep when they hold her, especially when Sam is moving down the road, but the minute either he or Karen try to leave her, she wakes up and cries.

They’ve given up on her ever sleeping on her own, but today when he puts her down to sleep and then gets up to take a leak, she stays asleep. He’s amazed. She doesn’t even wake up when Karen comes back from visiting Carol. She sleeps for hours. She’s very sensitive – this is probably the first place she has felt safe enough to let go to sleep without one of them here to protect her from whatever it is she fears.

Now both of them can get something done around here. Karen’s been feeling lucky if she could get just one thing done each day, even brushing out her hair. Neither of them are very traditional or sexist, yet they’ve had to act out the traditional roles because of Ariana’s dependence upon them, and especially because of her nursing on Karen so much. Karen has been getting a bit uptight about this. They’re hoping Ariana will nurse less now. She doesn’t just nurse for the nourishment – she doesn’t even suck most of the time – but for the security it affords.
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Ariana quickly learns about the wood stove in the middle of the living room, learns without ever getting burnt. Maybe the heat is warning enough, or maybe she feels their concern when she crawls too near. One of their cats isn’t quite as smart and jumps onto it while it’s really cooking. Now he knows what the expression “cat on a hot tin roof” means. The cat doesn’t stay on the stove for long; that’s for sure.

He spends most of his day either reading or crawling around on the floor behind Ariana. He doesn’t try and direct her. He just follows along behind her. They’ve baby proofed their new place well enough so that they can relax and let her be.

Karen’s still nursing Ariana, but she has also bought a “happy baby” food grinder, and is already making tastes of food for Ariana. She’s also making yogurt and baking granola and bread. He and Karen are just like any other new parents – focused almost entirely on their baby.
Only occasionally does he stop to realize that he doesn’t have any life at all outside of being her dad – his dad side having pushed out all the rest of him for now. He wonders where Wanderer has gone.
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The Rain

The rain never stops here. Carol says that it rains steadily from November until sometime in June or early July. He had trouble believing this at first, but now he’s coming to see it’s true.

Growing up in Southern California, he’s used to staying inside when it rains, unless he really needs to be outside. However, the folks here are outside all the time, acting as if it weren’t really raining, as if they weren’t really getting wet.

He and Denny spent the other day out in the woods, cutting dead trees into rounds, then carrying and rolling them down to the road below, near to where Denny’s truck was parked. He would be lost up here now without Denny’s help. He doesn’t even own a chainsaw, although Denny has one he wants to sell to him. They were cutting the wood together so he could have some of it. Denny said if he helped him, he would split the wood with him.
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Actually it can be fun here. He gets used to being out in the rain and begins to enjoy his days. It’s beautiful here, with all these big trees. The only problem is the underbrush, so thick that you can’t hike anywhere in these coastal mountains except on the many logging roads.

It’s fun the next day too, when Denny takes him fishing for the first time. They’re out in the pouring rain, and he’s having the time of his life. Denny shows him where to cast, and he tries to do so, but each time he’s slightly off. Finally Denny takes his rod and makes a cast, just inches away from his last cast. Then Denny hands him back his rod. He immediately feels a strike and sets the hook. He has hooked a salmon! He’s too excited though, and plays her too tightly. Soon she’s off the hook and swimming free.

He hooks another one soon after, and this time he keeps his cool. It takes almost an hour before he can bring her close enough to net. She’s a giant! He has never caught a fish this big before. He doesn’t have a scale, but Denny thinks she weighs over twenty pounds. He does measure her length, and she’s slightly over thirty inches.

She’s a mother salmon, heading upstream to lay her eggs. At first he feels bad taking her life and the life of all her children, but later Denny shows him how to preserve her eggs so he can use them as bait to catch more salmon. It seems weird to use their own eggs to catch them with, but he’s hooked on salmon fishing now and will do whatever it takes to catch more.

He’s learning to live with the rain and the life here in the coastal range of Oregon. He seldom thinks of his life in Berkeley anymore. He still wants to do some acid, but not until he’s completely well.
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Flu Fire

As he has done every evening since they moved here, he builds a fire in their wood stove. Soon it’s cooking, and they’re all warm and toasty in their little home.

But then Karen comes screaming out of the bedroom, saying that the closet is on fire. There’s no fire extinguisher here. Denny said he was going to get one for them, but he hasn’t yet. He grabs a bucket of water from the sink while Karen runs over to Carol and Denny’s for help.

Denny comes running over with his big fire extinguisher, and soon the fire is out. God, he was scared. It would have ruined them, being homeless and cold in the middle of winter with a new baby and almost no money.

He and Karen look at the mess left by the fire and water and the foam from the fire extinguisher. Some of their clothes are burnt, but they don’t care. It’s enough that they still have a home. He realizes that the water wasn’t putting out the fire because the electrical wiring was burning too.
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Just then the fire truck comes. Carol called them when Karen ran over. He realizes that if Denny hadn’t come running over when he did with his fire extinguisher, their whole place, including Denny’s shop below, would have gone up in smoke long before they got here.

The firemen explain about flu fires, about how when there’s debris in the flu, if the fire is hot enough, the debris will catch on fire in the flu and then ignite the nearby wood. The firemen also say that the flu wasn’t insulated enough and ask why the flu hadn’t been cleaned. He asks himself the same.

He has never had a wood stove of his own and has never been around one where the flu went up right next to a wall. He has never heard of cleaning out a flu either. He has counted on Denny telling him things like this, things that he has to know in order to survive here. When Denny and Carol invited them up here, they did say they would show them the ropes.

Somehow, without him even saying anything, Denny becomes defensive, or maybe it’s just his way. Denny acts as if the fault were somehow his. But he’s not even thinking in terms of blame. He’s more in shock, yet relieved that they still has a home for Ariana.
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They can’t have a fire tonight of course, so after they clean up the worst of the mess, they climb into bed under their down bags. They’re scared and lay here, holding each other and Ariana, glad to be here snuggy in their bed. The stress really hurt him. He’s feeling sick again, just as he was becoming well.
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Chapter 40 – The Landlord Blues

Denny’s Problem

He’s beginning to realize that Denny is like his dad – overly developed in his one-sided masculinity, yet almost completely disconnected and fearful of anything he sees as feminine. Carol and their son Scott suffer greatly because of this, as his mom and he did when he was growing up.

He was in the kitchen helping with the cooking when he and Karen were first here, and Denny and his friends made fun of him for being with the women. He was supposed to sit with them in the living room, getting stoned and watching the TV. That’s what real men are supposed to do here.

Carol has to carry all of Denny’s femininity, and, in as much as he’s scared of and closed to it in himself, he’s scared of and closed to her. She fakes it a lot, pretends she isn’t hurt, and pretends that being a mother is enough. But he listens to her play the piano when Denny’s gone, and he can feel the energy that she puts into her playing. She’s very lonely, very sad, and very scared.

She doesn’t have a real emotional connection with Denny – so, as his mother did with him, she has asked Scott to be her secret lover-son. No wonder Scott is so confused and scared. Being so close to his mother, Scott is very feminine himself, much more like him and Jim than like his dad.

He can understand all this intellectually, yet he knows better than to become involved. Denny, for all his masculinity, is very scared and wouldn’t want to hear anything he would say. Carol might, but she’s like his mother, willing to deny herself a real life just for the fragile peace between herself and her man. He could tell her that it won’t work, that pretty soon, no matter how hard she tries; she’ll turn into a cold and whining bitch, just as his mother did. But what’s the use?

He doesn’t know why, but his karma has led him to these two folks who are so similar to how his parents were when he was a young boy. Maybe this has happened so he can see this potential in himself to end up like them so that he can see it and reject it consciously, seeing it so clearly in the mirror that is Carol and Denny.

Realizing this makes it much easier to stay here at their place until spring. They’re already making connections with the folks in Deadwood, a valley just up the road. The folks up there are freer and wilder, more like he and Karen are. They’ll be looking for a place to live somewhere up there in the spring.
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Ariana’s Long Night

It’s the beginning of April now. It’s not working out here at all. Denny has been very negative, acting always as if he wants them to leave. He certainly has made it very unpleasant for them lately – for Ariana especially, being as open as she is.
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In spite of his knowing what Denny’s problem is and where Carol’s hurt comes from, Denny’s defensive unconsciousness is getting to him. Karen feels it too. She can get along better with him than he can, but she’s bothered too.

It finally becomes too much for them. He and Karen can’t deal with it any longer, so they decide to travel south for the month of April. They’re actually looking forward to Berkeley again, just months after leaving there for good.
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On their last night in Swisshome, before they head south, Ariana begins to scream – and she won’t stop. Karen tries everything but even nursing won’t help. So he rises to the occasion – literally. He climbs out of bed, get dressed, and then spends the rest of the long night carrying Ariana, while walking around in their tiny apartment over Denny’s shop. She stops screaming as soon as he picks her up and is quiet as long as he’s walking. But if he stops, even for a second, she starts screaming again. He’s feeling really sorry for her and is giving her all the love he has.

In the morning, he tells Karen that he’s sure now that it’s Denny and the negativity that he’s putting on them that’s hassling Ariana. They can’t stay here anymore. They need to live somewhere else. After talking about it for a while, they decide to move out of here now. They walk over and tell Carol and Denny that they’ll pay them for the month of April and find another place to live when they return. It’s such a relief for him and Karen to make this decision.
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The minute they leave Swisshome and are on their way, Ariana relaxes and falls asleep. He wishes that he could too, but he’s okay. He’s just happy Ariana’s all right. She has always been their emotional barometer, but this has been extreme. He was very worried. They’re all feeling the relief now – it’s been like living with a repressed madman, someone who’s very dangerous without even knowing that he is.

They don’t know what the future will bring them. They’re sure they’ll come back to live in Oregon, but where they’ll live and how they’ll support themselves and all is a mystery that only the future will share. They’re on the road again, and he’s happy now. He knows he’s going to do acid soon.
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Berkeley Revisited

It was like coming home.
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The drive south is nostalgic, reminding them of all the times before. They’re enjoying being on the road and are actually looking forward to Berkeley and to visiting all the folks they know and love there.

They take several days driving down – there’s no hurry now. They have a month, longer if they want. When they finally drive into the sun somewhere in southern Oregon, after not seeing it at all since early last December, they spend the whole day rambling on the beach, carrying Ariana on their backs. He hasn’t felt this contented and peaceful in a long while
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On their last day driving down, several hours still from Berkeley, he gives the wheel to Karen and drops a hit of acid. He seems to have forgotten his last disastrous and damaging time tripping there. Anywhere would be better though, than tripping in Swisshome with Denny and the never-ending rain.
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They drive into Berkeley and decide to take a drive up Telegraph Avenue. They see Joe Shaker and stop to say hello and offer him a ride. Joe says he felt his high energy coming. They all go over to their old house on Grant Street to see who’s still there. Bobby’s truck is still out in front. It looks like he’s almost finished with it. Inside, the gang is hanging out, the same folks as usual, as if time hasn’t passed this way at all.

Almost as soon as they walk in, Karen freaks, finding a louse on Ariana’s head. Soon they’re finding them all over, even in Sam. They’re not sure whether they came from Joe or from the house. Whatever, they take all their things to a laundromat to wash and dry them to kill the lice. They also get some special shampoo for Ariana and Karen’s hair. He’s the only one who doesn’t have any lice at all. He tells himself that it’s because he’s tripping and has too much energy for the lice.
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Jim feels his vibes too, knows he’s here, and comes over to be with him. Jim tells him that the collective vibe here in Berkeley has gone way down since he left for Oregon. Jim’s sure he was keeping everyone up with his high when he was here. He’s not so sure himself, after having lived with Denny and the world of Swisshome, but it’s still good to hear this.

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