A place of one's own

At year's end 2005, I became a nomad. I've stayed in hotels, guest houses, hostels, inns, private homes, and occasionally more exotic places. Seven years and twenty-five countries later, I am happy to report I have moved to a place. I arrived in Palm Springs six months ago. I moved into a fully furnished apartment on a month-to-month basis and put my belongings into storage. The original plan was to stay there through the tourist season and then find more permanent digs.

Last month, I found out my landlord was going to list the apartment. Not wanting to live in real estate limbo with a flow of unexpected guests traipsing through my space, I started looking for an apartment. I set the bar pretty high: mid-century, small building with character, quiet neighborhood, good light, and affordable.

At Palm Springs Pride, I ran into Alan and Norman, a couple I had met around town at various functions. I knew they owned a building. I didn't know where it was, or anything about it, but I mentioned to them I was looking for a place. They said there might be a unit opening up in their building. I won't go into the dramatic details here of how the unit became available, but suffice to say, it did. Today, I unpacked the last box and finished hanging all but a few pieces of art. What a treat to have all my stuff in one place, a place I enjoy being in, that has my name on the lease. And such a charming place: mid-century, small building with character, quiet neighborhood, good light, and affordable.

For three years before moving to Palm Springs, I lived in Sarasota, Florida in my cousin's guest house. I will never live in a more beautiful setting. As welcomed as I was, however, I was a guest. I loved the Palladian style villeta where I stayed, but it was my cousin's home.

Although I have been here for less than a week, I feel like I am home, surrounded by treasures accumulated over the years in my travels, admiring art and photography executed by people I love. I don't put much stock in the notion of permanence, nor do I have much experience of it. For however long it lasts, it it is comforting to have a base. So far, I have enjoyed my visit here in Palm Springs. I am beginning to think it is a nice place to live.

A Meditation on Pi

The closest I ever got to a tiger, Cambodia, 2007

I saw The Life of Pi on Sunday. I have not read the book on which it is based. I was immediately impressed by the visual beauty of every frame, the performance of Suraj Sharma, the young actor who plays Pi as a teenager, and how the story is such a perfect allegory about my personal experience of the spiritual journey.

In the days since, the end of the movie keeps coming back to me. I am astounded at how my life, like the lives of many companions, parallels the movie. And the ending haunts me.

You may well ask why, after of two hours of the psychedelic beauty of a pilgrim's progress on the high seas with a Bengal tiger, I was most moved by the scenes in the kitchen between the young writer and the middle aged Pi? The answer, as best I can formulate it, is that I know the heartbreaking challenge of putting together a life after you get off the boat and Richard Parker disappears back into the forest.

The light here is transcendent

The adult Pi, not an ancient seer but a middle-aged man, is played brilliantly by Irrfan Khan. At the beginning of the film he tells the writer that he will tell him his story, and the story will make the writer believe in God. Thus begins the stunning and terrible journey of the younger Pi. He is torn from his home, loses his family in a shipwreck where he and a few animals are the sole survivors, and endures over a year drifting on a tiny raft, attached to a lifeboat, inhabited by a Bengal Tiger that was once in his family's zoo.

Ang Lee magnificently recreates that wondrous tale in awe inspiring 3D images narrated by both the adult Pi and his younger self. Richard Parker, the tiger is a CGI evocation of divine force. It is a story of heartbreak, despair, thrilling adventure, and unspeakable beauty that ends in a suburban kitchen in Toronto. With a family, and a teaching position, and maple cabinets, and a deep sadness in the eyes.

On the Lyken Trail, late afternoon

The young Pi was fascinated by religions. Born a Hindu, he studied and embraced all faiths much to the exasperation of his father. He seeks to understand the soul in everything including the tiger Richard Parker in his zoo. When he is torn from everything safe and familiar and thrown into the ocean with a life-threatening companion that would have no compunction about devouring Pi. For a year they ride the high seas and Pi experiences the wonder, awe, terror, fear, beauty, despair, ecstasy, surrender, and finally, love. With side servings of sharks, storms, and immense physical suffering.

Miracle of miracles they eventually make land in Mexico. They get off the boat. Richard Parker walks into the jungle. He doesn't look back. He doesn't say goodbye. Pi goes on to create a life for himself in the real world. There is no witness to his incredible journey or his companion. And as seemingly benign and comfortable as that life is, there is no Richard Parker. Talk to Leda after the swan left. Or Ganymede after the eagle flew off. Anyone who has been touched by a god knows how Pi felt – but they can't explain it. You have to go there.

I am many years older than Pi. My dance with the tiger went on for over two decades. SInce the tiger walked back into the jungle, I have constructed (or let manifest) a comfortable, somewhat adventurous life. A lot of running around attempting to solve the conundrum, what do you do with the rest of the day? After the tiger goes back into the jungle.

The day after tomorrow I move into a new apartment here in Palm Springs. I am quite happy with the space and am looking forward to unpacking my things, at this point mostly art, and souvenirs from my travels. I will continue my efforts to manifest an interesting and sustainable life. In the absence of the tiger.

There are some people out there that know exactly what I am crypto-babbling about. I understand if you don't understand, or care to. The thing about dancing with a tiger is you and the tiger are the only ones who know what it's like or if it even happened. You can't properly put it into words, and the tiger walked back into the jungle never to be witnessed.  

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A few visual non sequiturs to close out the post, and an invitation to visit my facebook page (Like me, really like me) and my new website promoting my latest efforts to manifest an interesting and sustainable life.

A little shameless self-promotion

Malificent and the monster - Halloween on Arenas Road

Two months and no blog entries. What have I been up to?

Well, I've been dealing with my living situation for one thing. The condo I've been renting is going on the market so it's time to find more permanent digs where I can get my things out of storage and create my own space. Knock on wood, I found a lovely one-bedroom apartment in the Smoke Tree area of Palm Springs that is not in walking distance of the touristy part of Palm Springs, but very convenient to everything else. God willing, and if the creek don't rise, I'll be in the new place by the 15th of December. It will be good to have my stuff around me again.

Palm Springs Pride, 2012

I've also been wrestling with a few angels.

Another chapter missing from the non-existent Dummy's Guide to Subsistence Retirement is the answer to the age-old question, "what do you do with the rest of the day?" Truth be told, I'm getting a little bored with retirement and I could definitely use some additional income. My current cash flow covers the basics, but there's little left over to feed my travel addiction.

Doug Graham and Charles Herrera in Gender Benders at
Azul

This move, and the unplanned expense of a new car will just about deplete my mad money fund. In Sarasota, I was fortunate enough to pick-up the occasional freelance job doing computer tutoring, and writing. I'm hoping to do the same here while throwing photography and event planning into the mix. I am presenting myself as a digital scribe. To quote from my website: Throughout the centuries, scribes have provided a menu of services for those wishing to communicate effectively: writing, editing, and illuminating manuscripts, painting a portrait to send to a potential suitor, arranging celebrations. The the artist, the scrivener, the cloistered monk, the master of revels, the jongleur – all served an important role in their time – to help people present themselves and their ideas in the best possible light.

I have done event planning throughout my career. I've done trade shows, industrial shows, customer events, incentive meetings, parties, and even weddings.

I've been doing photography for years for my own enjoyment but lately I've done some event and performance photos that turned out well enough that I want to explore doing some work professionally.

Jerome Elliott in Standing on Ceremony,
The Gay Marriage Plays

Toward that end, I've created a website TCB Digital, that offers a few samples of my work and links to several other examples on the Internet. I've been accused of not being very good at putting myself out there, and I have always been more comfortable promoting others than myself. So, against my nature, I'm throwing it out to the universe - and anyone who reads this - that I am a digital scribe available for hire. In addition to the website, I've created a page on Facebook and have revamped my Smugmug site for people who might be interested in my photographic skills.

Does this mean that Wanderlust is going away? I don't think so. I hope it will evolve into a complement to my other ventures in communicating on the Internet. If you have some free time, I hope you'll check out my website. And, of course, should you need the services of a digital scribe, I hope you'll keep me in mind.

Our Town Part 1

Even a date milk shake from Shields
can't relieve the heat

Palm Springs in summer, especially August, is the best of times and the worst of times. It's the best time to get to know the area. The crowds are down, the locals take advantage of off-season prices in restaurants and clubs that are crowded with season people during the winter months. The local entertainment scene, which is considerable, is in full flower.

And then, there's the heat. You expect that in the summer in the desert. You expect a dry desert heat. This summer, my first summer living here, we've been treated to our own variation of climate change. The locals call it the monsoon, not because it rains, but because of the high humidity. It's normal to have several days of monsoon conditions in July and August. This year, however, we've had week after week of monsoon conditions. The kind of weather where you break into a sweat standing still outside (and standing still is about all you have energy for). At first, I would push through repeating to myself my mantra.,"It's better than being cold. It's better than being cold." As the weeks have worn on and the humidity has persisted, I have decided that travel during the hot months is a good idea in the future – and now I have a new car in which to travel.

The Yellow Mart in Indio which has
nothing whatsoever to do with this post.

Two weeks ago my car was stolen. My 2002, trouble from almost the first day I bought it used when I came back to the States three years ago, Chrysler Sebring was taken from the secured parking area of my building. The blue book value of the car was such that I carried minimal insurance required by law which translated to zero dollars in compensation. To add insult to injury, the kind people who relieved me of my burden, abandoned the car 5 days later having removed every scrap of anything from the interior and trashed the engine. So I had to pay to have the car towed back to Palm Springs. They took the registration too, so I had to deal with that as well.

I call it iCar

It's a cruel wind that blows no good, as they say, and this hot desert gust swept a bit of karma along with it. They found a letter addressed to in the suspected perpetrator's double wide next to the meth cooker (OK, I made up the meth cooker part. I've been watching too much Breaking Bad). That led them to me and my car and evidence they needed to press charges against the miscreants. Now, here's my soap box: Every law enforcement person with whom I interacted was pleasant, professional, courteous, and uncommonly good looking (I think they must hire from Central Casting). Every day in the media I read unsavory accounts of misdeeds by the police but that is polar opposite of my experience. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Another sunset, another show

Occupying the secured parking space where once dwelt the Sebring, is a brand spanking new, white Hyudai Accent SE hatchback that drives like a sports car, comes geeked out with bluetooth, USB ports, XM radio (for which I have yet to see the point), and Eco shift. It gets 30 mpg in town, 40 hwy. It also has a brand spanking new LoJack installed. Definitely not in the short-term financial plan, but provided for thanks in part to my decision to euthanize Ondasia. 

It's the first day of autumn as I finally finish this entry. It's still hot, but the evenings are cool enough now that walking is possible. I feel like I've zeroed out here in Palm Springs. Not exactly starting over, but starting fresh. Next step? Stay tuned. I'm as curious as anyone about what slings and arrows outrageous fortune has in store.

Sometimes the magic works...

So, I had this idea.

Before Palm Springs, before Sarasota, I spent three years on the road, most of the time in Asia. I fell in love with so much of Asian culture. Again and again, in China, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, I was seduced by the home furnishings I saw in markets there – fabrics, lacquerware, decorative arts, and furniture. I saw hand-made, expertly-crafted, beautiful objects that would enhance any home (and brought home what I could given my gypsy status). Everywhere I saw things that I truly believed would sell in the US, especially the west coast.

When I was teaching in Chiang Mai Thailand, I had the opportunity to explore the woodcraft villages near where I was teaching. There, local craftsman produce a range of items ranging from back scratchers to dining tables. The styles range from traditional Thai, to sleek contemporary. There is also a huge inventory of Chinese antiques that entered the country fleeing the onslaught of the Three Gorges Damn.

Made in Phuket, Thailand

When I returned to the States in 2009, I parked my memories of the markets of Asia on my hard drive. I decorated my quarters with my souvenirs, and worked on building a post-travel, post-retirement life in Sarasota Florida, an environment that was unfamiliar to me. I have written enough about that chapter for now, but when it became clear that I would be leaving Sarasota and returning to California, I revisited those Asian markets in my memory bank and was captured by the idea of starting a business importing the things I fell in love with on my travels.

I won't bore you with the iterations and mash-ups the idea went through. Looking back, I think I was envisioning  a desert cities Gumps, and I truly believed I could find a sustainable niche in the California marketplace that would provide a modest income, pay for my travel back and forth to the countries I still carry in my consciousness, and introduce hand-crafted things of beauty to the American home (well, for the higher end American homes).

After much winnowing and some research, after socializing the idea to as wide an audience as I felt I could impose upon with my pitch, I refined the idea to hand-crafted, contemporary, Asian furnishings. Pieces that would look understatedly fabulous in the mid-century and contemporary manses of the Coachella Valley. Sleek contemporary designs executed in teak, rosewood, rattan, hibiscus grass, and stainless steel. Designs that echo Russell Wright, the Knoll catalog, with a soupçon  of Michael Graves. Craftsmanship is of the highest-quality. I was energized.

Hand-crafted, Asian, Contemporary

My soul-buddy, Jot, came up with a name. I designed a logo. I identified possible locations for a to-the-trade warehouse store in the right area, I gathered images for presentations, even contacted a few of the craftsmen (who now have a web presence)  to find out if they had distribution in North America.

Fiery clouds and lots of smoke,
a most unusual Palm Springs sunset

And then,  I did the business plan. It was an onerous task. I downloaded a template from the web, wrote mission statements and marketing strategies. I revisited my corporate communicator mode. I booked an appointment with a consultant from SCORE, the organization of retired business professionals affiliated with SBA. The consultant, a woman smack-dab in the middle of my target demographic, asked tough questions, shared valuable insights, and moved from skepticism to cautious enthusiasm during the course of our meeting. She assigned me a task: do a 12-month cost/income projection, something I knew I needed to do but had been putting off.

The organic rubber met the road. The That fighting cocks came home to roost. The proof wasn't in the pudding. The idea did not hold up financially. At the end of the first year, if everything went in my favor, it might pay expenses but there would be no surplus to provide additional income for personnel, or me, or pay back an investor (which I knew I needed). Not what I had in mind. Sometimes the magic works, and sometimes it doesn't. Perhaps, in a parallel universe, I am preparing for the opening. Not important.

The move to Palm Springs still feels right. I am happy to be back in California among fruit and nuts. I am curious about what's in store for me personally and for our troubled species. I'll probably continue to blog about it.