California Portraitures

by

Jaye Beldo


  Dikolas tracked his sashsay, looking wounded, self conscious, caught in the shadow cast by his own path. I couldn't help staring at the blue Puppy Pad wadded up in his hand. His dog looked at him quizzically as well.

"Couldn't you have used some Oak leaves?" I asked. He fidgeted a bit, looking for a place to bury the thing.  "You've got to toughen up if you want to live in the mountains." I added but he still would not make eye contact with me.

He stared over a pine tree petulantly, sitting on a rock. He rolled an organic American Spirit cigarette but still no eye contact. Only an insinuating sigh and then after a few puffs, he resumed climbing. His dark hair shone in the California sun. Organic shampoo only, blow dried and brushed every morning while listening to Harry Potter audiobooks at high volume. Every day the same ritual. The brewing of the Yerba Mate in which no one was allowed in the kitchen. The controlled sulking out on the deck, brooding over the mispelled tattoo on his left arm or how he missed his mother, the sea, that very woman only a few mountain ridges away and fully visible from the top of where we were going, if he ever needed a visual shortcut to get there.

Its Dikolas with a K and not a C. But no amount of his patented brooding would erase that dermitological indemnification. So on he rocked and nursed his tea. And looked towards the sea some more.

He climbed on and did not see the fresh Mountain Lion scat on the animal trail we were following. I couldn't help notice how splayed his feet were. He wore thick glasses, eyebrows permanently supercilious, as if they too were tattoed on incorrectly.  When we reached the summit he took charge from a sandstone ledge.

"We should all be taking Tom Brown's seminar on how to be a man." He rubbed his hands on his brand new camo khakis and then looked at a mssg someone had texted him, while I caught my breath and fished my brain for a reply to his unsolicited admonishment.
"And remember... never, ever admit you are wrong to a woman." This Air Force flunky, Bay Area, switch hitting prima donna rejoined while I bouldered my way to the other side and closed my eyes, praying for the welfare of the ranch. We were on the verge of losing the whole thing.

After a few breaths, Great Spirit came to me. One of the elders handed me a peace pipe. When I opened my eyes, Dikolas pointed a camera at me and took a picture.  The malice was obvious. Then he produced something rolled up and handed it to me as he pocketed the camera. I opened the nylon scroll and instantly recognized the Tibetan letters.

"Wow, a prayer flag." I said woodenly, as if that was the only means to get out of a trap. I then wondered what he had done with his ad hoc toilet paper down below. I stared at the letters some more, then I looked up but he was already gone. His dog walked between my legs, a sign of ownership Dicolas once insisted, snidely referencing the book he gleaned the info from during one of his prissy, intellectual fits.

I then tried to commune with Great Spirit but she was gone. I gave the dog a few pets , then she too was gone. Thus left alone, I could do nothing but reflect. After all, this Moon Child on my hands bragged about growing up near where the Bohemian Grovers have their ceremonial shindigs. He bragged about seeing Fight Club over one hundred times. Viewings of the movie Princess Monoke not far behind this admirable viewing quota. And what to make of his Bonzai tree which he sprayed every day-the spray bottle magic markered with the words: Unconditional Love? He should have been spraying the stuff on himself.

But, all of my musings were moot, for down below, he insisted on me giving me a knife and then asked for something in return. I plucked a triangular piece of quartz out of the driveway dust and handed it to him. He looked me directly in the eye and placed his right hand on my shoulder, as if this would forever seal our friendship.

And sealed it did indeed, for now, after being struck in the head by his bastard brand of Greek lightning, I clutch the prayer flag in one hand and the knife he also had given me, reflecting on the double jeopardy goodbye. Our friendship really was sealed-not with organic beeswax, but with his suave and calculated betrayal. After all, he used the money he was supposed to give me to finance his 'Native American' sweat lodges,  pay for the gas during his ocean bound adventures and trips to San Francisco when he could no longer bear the demands of mountain life.

TBC

(C)2013-Jaye Beldo

The Shastafarian Family of 'Light'

by

Jaye Beldo

2-16-13:

A woman placed four chocolate covered coffee beans  to the left of my laptop in some Starbucks south of Shasta and then sat down at a nearby table and looked out the window. I was trying to acclimate to civilization after a couple of rarefied days in the alpine haven of Lassen Volcanic National Park where I was skiing and didn't know what to make of the gesture. I busied myself with posting some photos of the park on my Facebook page, all the while wondering what was in store for me if I ate the beans. I eventually folded them up in the pink, quaint little muffin cup she put them in and pocketed the gift, making sure to thank the troubled stranger as I left. She meekly responded "You're welcome." but still would not make eye contact with me.

Who was this makeshift anima figure? Some warning sent my way from another dimension or from the depths of my own soul? Or was a more pedestrian explanation the means to understand what she did?  A Meth casualty most likely or perhaps she got spun in some other way that would be impossible to adequately profile. Driving further north towards Shasta, I pulled over to check out some picturesque hoodoos just off the freeway. When I returned to the Malibu and pulled out my car keys, they were covered in melted chocolate, a  confectionery paraph of sorts from what I could gather or perhaps a bitter sweet sigil. Unable to scry the import at hand, I did my best to wipe the keys off with some Oak leaves and got back on the freeway. I was tempted to lick them, but didn't.

Surely I should have heeded the woman's arcane warning, for I ended up in a garish KOA kampsite for the night and pitched my tent on the border so I could see the mountain where Lemurian beings allegedly reside. My kamp host shared stories of New Agers from L.A. that would try to hustle her via the usual love and light lingo to give them free showers even though they weren't staying there. Her eyes brightened up considerably when I told her about my novel A Stab in the Light in which best selling New Age authors are murdered and she dutifully wrote the title down.  I've gotten similar responses from many others in California as well when I run the plot synopsis by them-definitely have found my market for the book out here.

.
The previous evening I had walked out of the Andaman Thai restaurant after ordering a $15.00 bowl of  Tom Yum because the young goddess wannabe that was my waitress served me so poorly-obviously not honoring the divine within me while I waited so long for the meal and water refills as well. I then sauntered off to Lai Lai Chinese Restaurant and the Chicken Chow Mein I ordered was barely edible-without a doubt the most mediocre food I ever tried to eat.  Bad dreams ensued that night and  I tossed and turned in my tent while freight trains roared on by, continually, until morning. The Lemurians had tunneled under the kampsite and were beckoning me to come down to where the sleeping would be much better. But I didn't really trust their transparent offering and opted for the above ground discomfort instead.

Some chalked graffiti on a coffee shop bathroom wall the next groggy morning beckoned me to become a 'Shastafarian' and join the 'Family of Light.'  But the light generated from this so called family only comes from the ample reserves of  fossil fuel stashed beneath the mountain- not some hidden, free energy spiritual dynamo. Perhaps this is what the Lemurians were doing far beneath my tent-mining coal so the Shastafarians could further fuel their familial, light filled illusion.  If I had eaten the coffee beans, I would have been able to see through all of this and avoided the place all together. Or perhaps I at least would have encountered a chiromantic Sasquatch and  booked an appointment with a her for a primal palm reading as well as some tips on how to benefit from the 11:11 portal activation that recently occurred at the summit or perhaps within the Family of Light's DNA. Either way I missed out on my chance to become enlightened on the mountain.

So it glows  in Shasta.

TBC



(C)2013-Jaye Beldo

Entropic Homage

by

Jaye Beldo

12-11-12: 

I had to get out of the Econo Inn quite early this morning.  The unusual cadence of the dripping shower head-one which only a seasoned Tabla drum player could appreciate made me uneasy. Was it Saraswati orchestrating it? I did sneak a peek at a little shrine to her tucked discreetly to the side of the front desk when I checked in last night, while a child beamed a smile my way from a doorway and his stern faced mother scrutinized my driver’s license.  

When  I gathered up my things to leave, my skin started peeling off in the morning chill outside just like the wall paper in the room- an entropic homage to the goddess herself. Maybe I should have daubed some Tumeric on her forehead when I checked out or burned some Nag Champa even though it would have set off the smoke alarms-for my skin still peeled. Or read more of Ecclesiastes in the Gideon's Bible I perused the night before because surely only the Old Testament God knows what the errant deity is doing to the franchise through her rhythmic subterfuge, which persisted en route back home for the battery light on the dashboard of my Malibu flashed on and off, lulling me into uncertainty for it was in the same beat as the water droplets- adding a new dimension to the peculiarities at hand..

 

What to do? A dangerous bit of road lay ahead of me desperado wise. Chancing it, I braved on over the 1.5 hours of switchbacks, then finally down into the valley. Opting to bypass the town's only mechanic, I got my car up the hill and after twenty minutes of the climb, the engine faltered at the summit. I coasted into my parking spot near my trailer and the car finally died and would not turn over. Was it the goddess herself that got me home safely? When I tried re-charging the battery, the horn went off...in the same odd  beat pattern as the shower head.  Then the emergency flashers too decided to become autonomous. I had to pull fuses out to stop it, all the while quite perplexed. In light of this, I'm guessing that something verifiably higher than the goddess, with a much more infinite and unconditional expanse oversaw my safe arrival home.  I guess I'll never really know nor need to other than I was being looked after on that day for who knows what would have happened to me if I had broken down out on the highway alone and quite the fair game for sure.

(C)2012-Jaye Beldo

 in the same rhythm as the water droplets. What to do? A dangerous bit of road lay ahead of me desperado wise. Chancing it, I braved on over the switchbacks, then finally down into the valley an hour and half later. Opting to bypass the town's only mechanic, I got my car up the hill and after twenty minutes of the climb, the engine faltered. I coasted into my parking spot near my trailer and the car finally died and would not turn over. Was it the goddess herself that got me home safely? When I tried re-charging the battery, the horn went off...in the same odd beat as the showerhead.  Then the emergency flashers too. I had to pull fuses out quite perplexed. In light of this, I'm guessing that something verifiably higher than her, with a much more infinite and unconditional expanse oversaw my safe arrival.  I guess I'll never really know nor need to other than I was being looked after for sure on that day.  

God knows what would have happened to me if I had broken down out on the highway.

(C)2012-Jaye Beldo

Gegen Hippies

                               

At least the Nazis didn't pretend to be something they weren't.

Telenovela du Jour

by

Jaye Beldo

The orange haired Flamenco dancer swirled about-some Country and Western song blasting on the jukebox.  I already knew there wasn’t a chance when she zipped through her pics on a camera across the street at the restaurant. I got the summary life montage in about a minute or so: cathedrals in Barcelona, Mexican desert, Fabio looking guys playing guitars near tropical fountains and the one she had shot of me barely able to muster a smile, with what appeared to be some wan hued greasepaint on my face. I couldn’t synch with her svelte moves and stepped on her toes quite a few times, thinking of what to do with my father’s cremains all the while.

It was the usual deformed lot at the bar. I made some comment to a friend about a chemical spill that surely must have occurred in the town so many years ago and he told me it was meth.  I couldn’t argue that. The pink hair, rotted grey teeth, moth eaten Metallica t-shirts and heads that sprung out from shoulders like side show dolls celebrating their own planned obsolescence still stick in my mind.

The chica’s hermanas also alienated me with their drinking and laughter, although I admired their defiance of America’s collective depression. They made a mockery of it –clapping out some sophisticated rhythms not apparent in the Merle Haggard they were dancing to. As they were closing in to complete their Iberian sarabande, I went out into the downpour, crossed the dark street to the Excursion, climbed in the back and picked wood ticks off of the dog we had to rescue because his legs and hips were too stiff and sore and he couldn’t walk back up to the top of the mountain after following us down earlier in the day.  He promptly ate the blood filled things while I continued to comb through his fur with my fingers and rip out more.

Back at the restaurant I tried out my Spanish soap opera monologue I’d been rehearsing for weeks on the trio. Amping up the dramatic effect wasn’t enough apparently-I was told I needed to be even more exaggerated in my delivery. But the applause received made the extra effort worthwhile and hugs and kisses ensued. One of the lovely ladies tried to convince me that I’m a ‘being of light’ and shouldn't kill myself as I had confessed in my rudimentary Spanish while clutching my heart, nearly falling out of my chair.  It could have been some subtle irony that got lost in her own stagecraft attempts to assuage me, but there was some genuine warmth which made me even more abstracted though and I only wanted to walk the five or six miles in the dark, back to the foot of the mountain and ascend in the rain and risk falling into the raging river we surveyed on motorcycles earlier in the day.  It really didn't matter. She would be off to Columbia in a few days and some ayahuasca experimentation in the jungle  with ‘Jivaro’ Indians  she told me–way out of my league from what I gathered on the dance floor as well as from the tentative squeeze of her hand when I tried to hold it under the table during dinner.

(C)2012-Jaye Beldo

Some Pelagic Musings

by

Jaye Beldo

Arriving in Fort Bragg a few days ago, I got to enjoy a much welcome pelagic view after being mountain locked for over eight months. Benignly soporific waves far below cast their foam far up onto the rocks and a lonely gull posed for a few cliff side pics, some gnats flying around its head which didn't seem to perturb it in the least.  A guy in a pickup truck scanned the kelp ridden bay with some binoculars and I went over to chat it up with him.

"The herons are eating gophers." He said. "They pick them off on the fly. I watch them wriggle in their throats. Stomach acids finish them off eventually. Fishing isn't as good anymore."

I had heard the same while in Nova Scotia a couple of years ago during a boat tour of some bird islands near Stanley. The weary tour guide pointed out the anorexic seals warming up on the rocks-a hard to ignore reminder of the plight of our depleted oceans and the toll its taking on all living things.

Heading north I pulled into a deserted state park just outside of town and after setting up camp, soon found that the beach is not a good place to traipse with one's head in the clouds.  While examining a bit of flotsam that looked like a French tickler, a 'rogue' wave nearly pulled me out to sea in its undertow. Soaked to my waist and my boots filled with salt water, I slushed my way back to the camp site, musing on Fukushima, wondering if the sea flora was some mutant offspring of the disaster.

Awakening around two a.m., I turn on the flashlight and see my shoes floating in a pool of rainwater outside the tent. A cold ablution for my feet the next morning. None of the other campsites around me had any standing water. Perhaps something needed to dissolve in me via alchemical solutio. Victims of hurricane Sandy came to mind and then I laughed at how trivial my 'misfortune' was.

After drying my gear out, I headed further north and after much serpentine effort, road wise speaking, eventually arrived at Sinkyone Wilderness Area-still looking for some kind of  real peace. The camp host sat at a park bench reading and I walked over and joined her in the semi-sun, sharing an ad libbed synopsis of my blog travelogue and how I had come to arrive at this fairly remote place. She took me to my brook side campsite and after setting up, I walked along the Lost Coast-admiring how plate subduction had contributed to creating such a remarkably beautiful place.  Waves below seemed to rebuke my sky born thoughts and I found myself standing on the edge of an eroded bit of trail-the drop down to the beach would have been nothing short of fatal if it collapsed. Warnings given to me by the head of the Juneau search and rescue team in Alaska a few years ago came to mind and I promptly backed away

. 

The next day out on the porch of the visitor's lodge we sat. Rain clouds loomed and I had to be ready to evacuate lest I be stranded as the road was only navigable with a 4WD.  Sophia poured over a field guide to sea life, pointing to a pictures of some species of kelp she used to make a salad.  I couldn't get the island of plastic debris floating in the Pacific out of my mind. Eventually, the island will become a country once it melts into something more cohesive. Perhaps some protracted lightning storm will fuse it all together, rendering it into a gulag for NWO dissidents around the world. I reach for a geology book inside the lodge and page through it, a more bedrock endeavor IMO considering the surface plight at hand. The rains eventually came while we talked about aborigines and I stuffed my gear into the Malibu and sped my way back up the treacherous road and  to the highway, passing through a pot town called Garberville where all sorts of cannabis riff raff crawled about.

After more winding roads the next day and the day after, I eventually arrived in Calistoga and soaked in some hot springs.  While contemplating my feet in the whirlpool jets, a mish mash of different languages melded with the sounds of the  waters. A bald woman with Pierre Cardin sunglasses flaunted her buffed body, speaking with her cavalier friends in some eastern bloc language I’m guessing. A woman at a table read, The Servant Class,doing some vicarious  salt of the earth living while she flipped through the pages, munching on a cucumber sandwich. I’m reminded of a scene in the Bunuel movie Belle de Jour where one of the idle rich says, “I often think of the working class when it snows.”

Lulled by the bubbles, dreaming of netting some hippy heiress, I look up only to see a rather plump woman to my right wearing a tie dyed crepe gown stuffing her face with a salad at one of the tables. I wished I had had some flower child lens to see the world through at that moment. I wished even more I was at Lourdes, praying on my knees.

My head swirls a bit and a slender woman soaking in the same springs looks at me with calculated distance. I try to weave the steam into an invitation since there is not a varicose vein on her body. But she looks away, her ready eyes trained on some jet set retribution far beyond the spa.

The next day, I drive north of Calistoga and feel the presence of the living vine there. Is this some kind of soul recollection or a lost part of me that needs to be reclaimed?  Or echoes from the wedding feast at Cana? Only the lord would know, I suppose. Perhaps if I drank some vintage Chablis the region is famous for, it would evoke such a thing, like Proust biting into a Petite Madeleine and the remembrances the dessert inspired in him. Passing vineyard after autumn hued vineyard, it is all blue ruin to me though. Perhaps just a sip? It would have to be the rarest of vintages indeed, some private reserve locked away in a Rotshchild vault. The bottle has my real name written on it, that I can see, with all sorts of intricate filigree etched into the glass which serves to weave the circuitous travails of my life together. I would never cork it open though, but if I did, I’d embrace this place and the people here with my heart, wine holding the key to its unlocking. I’d embrace their BMWs and Porsches too. I’d even look at myself more objectively-opt for Botox injections, get the crow’s feet buffed away and my graying hair dyed into something more attractively conducive. Perhaps the wine, even if I spit it out like a  sommelier, will impart some healing powers and I’ll be able to erase all signs of weathering in the faces of the propertarians that have staked a claim to this region. How liberating  would that be? Cosmetic surgeons would be put out of business and have to move elsewhere. Yoga instructors too. As I speed down the highway with such prospects giving me some hope, a silk theater curtain woven by Tuscany handmaidens descends to the valley and once I'm ensconsced backstage, they siren call me into a 12^th century past, where my troubadour inspirations could stand a better chance, that is if they’re not dashed against the rocks of the wine inspired illusions written above.

Now my hands chill in this damp campsight as I type this out near my backpacker’s tent. Dark coming fast as we approach the solstice.

(C)2012-Jaye Beldo

The Road from Ruin: Some Real Peace

by Jaye Beldo

Lured by a panoramic array of sun dappled rocks, I got ready to sink but felt something scratching my back.  Righting myself, I instinctively dog paddled side by side with the visitor towards a rock outcropping.  Diving to the bottom and looking up, I watched her swim. She licked my face when I caught my breath. The love in her eyes made me quite grateful to have such unexpected company.

The lost souls on the beach watched our tandem swim and we drifted further away, the clear turquoise sluice carrying  us closer and closer to the rapids.  We even raced a bit, getting further out of earshot of the guy three beers into bragging about how much money he had and what kind of weapons he carried.  I had gotten the run down on the significance of the tattoos inked over his heart and smoked one of his roll your own American Spirit cigarettes in attempts to blend in. My response about Ezekial’s visions in the bible were ignored and he further pontificated on the skin deep significance of the tattoos instead- a closed Rose being a memorial to one of his unborn babies apparently. One guy, whose birthday it was, did a back flip off of some rock. He froze in mid-air on me, knees up to his chest, looking fetal, unsure of which way to go, can opener landing betraying any ready direction.  The beer he drank prior to his immersion seemed to solidify him into some kind of arcane caricature I could not decipher, making me glad to see him push off into the water towards the other shore.

Another guy had shown me his ghost knife-a strange looking affair he wore around his neck. He took it out of its leather case and made a slicing gesture, as if I couldn’t grasp how it could be used. Talk of hatchet and knife throwing, tasering some slob after offering him 500.00 to do it and how the tattoo dude could see the arcs coming off the victim’s fillings followed, as well as how the ghost knife guy shot and ate a rattlesnake that day. All this melded into a kind of desperate carnival barking that made me dizzy and yearn for the river.

I dove deep again, wishing the pooch could follow and that we could marvel at the smooth stones in the sand beneath for hours and hours, together.  She paddled in circles above, looking for me. I surfaced again and she got close and we swam some more until we reached the cusp of the white water and I had to guide her back to shore. Shaking off, she ran back to her owner, caught up in the glare before fading.

Perhaps she wanted to drift even further downstream with me and sink into the peace that we both got to share in some shaded refuge, shrouded by an eddy in which we could forever spin. The scratches she left on my back are my own tattoo memorial I suppose and that's all I have now.

©2012-Jaye Beldo