date unknown

We had gone up to find the property and see the cemetery again, but either there was a locked gate, or we could not remember where it was. Just up the road we came upon this bridge–we could find no clue as to where it was relocated from. Maybe the road changed. Maybe there was a flood.

We hunted around for a bit and ended up downstream at the outflow of Haupt Creek on the Gualala River. We tried to hike upstream to the bridge, but the fallen logs and tangle made it too difficult. We decided to picnic on the wide flat beach, ended up staying for a while, just enjoying this magical place.

Steve and Betsy on Haupt Beach, on the Gualala. This is a small detail of a large photograph of the giant redwoods.

On the way up we had stopped in Ukiah to visit Aunt Bobbie. She was a pistol, a tiny thing. She really liked me, and gave me some good advice about life.

Last year I was visiting Occidental, and stopped at a little gift store. There was a vintage book on the history of Gualala on a table. I asked the clerk if I could take a few photos, and she happily agreed. For brevity, I have posted these in a grid. Click on any image and scroll through the series.

This spring I was devastated to fully grok the sequence of events of the last years of Steve’s life, particularly my sudden acquisition of the shop just two months after we got the Westfalia.  I almost don’t want to write about it, it is so painful to realize how free we were at that moment, and how quickly things went downhill.

That last trip, in the 4Runner, to Palmdale and Hot Creek, I can see how sick he was. Not here-  you can look back if you like.

These were good days, tho-

Pacifica, February 2012

I am grieving today, and not much use. Today-the 6th, 3:30 in the early morning, was the fourth anniversary of the moment I let them shut down the machine that was keeping him breathing-

I am not surprised, but the loss is overwhelming. I posted a favorite photo on facebook. I  put something up on the Possum Family blog, but I don’t have a recent photo, can’t get around the empty chair.

Suitably it is raining today, and I am glad just to paint and read my book, and nap.

I walked down to the corner today and got a double cappuccino, that was Steve’s morning drink of choice when we were first together. He would go out to get the paper and come back with two coffees, and we would have toast with peanut butter and jelly.

Today with the lost hippies, I will wear black.

My youngest brother died September 21, 2015, and I ended up with his laptop, where I now spend most of my computer time.  Xp is no longer supported by my anti-virus program, so I try to stay offline with this old hamster-wheel desktop.  Rather than making the transition, I just let things lie fallow for a while.

I am somewhat discombobulated by the speed with which I seem to have run out of years, if not trips, or details, way last summer.  I don’t know if there is a way to insert posts between previous ones, so additional information and trips are just tacked on and old posts updated or adjusted.  And then, there have been a lot of (unnecessary) changes on WordPress, which I haven’t spent enough time with to navigate comfortably.

I have been on a cleaning frenzy at home, having lost my access to two storage spaces where Steve and I had a lot of things packed away.  Now that I have emptied those out and gotten rid of most everything stored there I have continued to clear out my studio.  I am sorting through old photographs and lists of places we traveled, so I plan to get back to fine-tuning past trips.

Realizing that every edit causes an update for my followers, I am archiving information offline and only posting or updating after extensive rewriting.

On the return trip from Portland to get the 4Runner from Jo. we stopped to camp at Hart Mountain Wildlife Preserve, in Eastern Oregon, where there is a hot spring.  This is very near the Malheur Preserve which is in the news lately.  Here I am occupying the hot pool near the campground at Hart Mountain, with intermittent snowflakes.

July 18, 2015

Stevie is gone, I am still here.  A mantra I used to ground myself with during the darkest nights, when I thought I would lose everything, hanging onto the very earth by my fingernails.  I’m Still Here.

I’m Still Here.

The banner photograph above was taken by our friend Nancy at the Half-Muffin, (2007)  a small version of the Memorial Day tradition, the Meadow Muffin.  Art and I went this year (MMXL) and he wondered if I would be awash in memories of when Steve and I had gone.  Yes.  But no, it was no different, he lived here with me for 23 years, every day I miss him, he is gone every day.  Every day I feel his loss.  He is gone.  I’m Still Here.

March 26, closing party at the Vampire Albatross-  

The end of my show for La Wanda Ultan, “Portraits”.

Steve said it was the best Art Gallery Party he had ever been to.  He died ten days later.

In June I drove the van down to Palmdale for Elsie’s 90th birthday, scattered ashes on the hill above Desert View Highlands, and hiked the wash with the family. 

On the way back I visited my friend Rosie–here we are at Avila Beach.

Rick and Roxann took me to tiny beach for the rare super-low tide exposure.

Celu and I drove the Westfalia up to Jenner, stopping at the campground Steve and I camped at when we took the Electric Automobile class.

And then Moody Ridge, where Helen’s friend Nick lives, Labor Day weekend.  The fires near Yosemite had cancelled the Strawberry Music Festival, so many people convened here for a weekend of music, Phil’s Fish, and giant onion rings.

Thank you all my friends and family-  Without your loving kindness, I would scarcely be able to walk, or breathe.

My life had been taken over by the Vampire Albatross, and Steve and I were unable to get away except for Christmas in Palmdale at the end of 2011.  It was just down and back, and no side trip. In February we took a Sunday drive to check out waves and storm damage in Pacifica.  Here’s Steve at the beach wearing his favorite t-shirt I designed and printed in my shop from my own large pen-and-ink drawing.

In June we drove to Palmdale by way of the Eastern Sierras and Hot Creek.  I can see here his facial distortion from the new dentures-

Hot Creek overview and campsite

Stopping for lunch, I shooed him away from a jeep I wanted to photograph-  to this day it breaks my heart  .  .  .  such a little thing, but it hurts me deeply.   So many times I tried to get a candid shot of him–really, not to worry.

Then to Palmdale, to spend a few days at the homestead- where we rented a trailer to transport the 34 boxes of discovery that were the remains of the trial that put S in prison.  I wish we had taken it all to the shredder.

On the way home we stopped to camp at Col Allensworth State Park- a post Civil War all-black community frozen into a little park in California’s Central Valley. 

I spent my time off that summer of 2012 sorting books and original artifacts and shredding multiple copies of requisition forms and photographs of evidence and other ephemera.  I think this took a terrible toll on his psyche–All through 2011 and 2012 Steve faced a number of health challenges, and was having trouble finding work.  Several elderly clients had died, and he was loosing his agility on ladders and struggling to stop drinking in a milieu of playing music for beer  .  .  .

Here he is at Black Butte River Ranch, fourth of July Weekend, at the back of the Westfalia, after a wandering well-wisher came by dispensing a generous assortment of shots.   .  .  .

Late in 2011, after I had bought the shop, Steve and I  drove to my niece’s for Thanksgiving dinner, and her adorable children showed us their animals.  Raising and selling birds pays for feed for the horses.  They all loved Uncle Steve-

We spent Christmas in Palmdale, with Martha and her family, hiking in the hills where they played as kids, and where we later scattered his ashes.

Little Rock Dam