On "real" conversation

I read an article ("Small talk should be banned -- here's why" http://www.wired.co.uk/article/banning-small-talk) on the effect of small talk on relationships. The thesis of the article is that small talk is the lowest common denominator of social interaction with strangers in society, but that restricts the level of depth people can reach with each other.

Of the great many articles that I have read in various media, this one struck a personal note. By my nature, I am a retiring guy with a strong streak of social anxiety. Social situations are difficult for me; to wit, attempting to strike up a conversation with an interesting woman beyond what is required of a commercial exchange in a store is similar to tearing down a cement wall with my bare hands.

This difficulty in forging relationships goes beyond the romantic and into the area of close male friends as well. Social anxiety is relatively ironic for somebody who spends most of their professional life talking to people. The truth is, however, that small talk, or chit-chat, is a skill that I use to both acquire information and keep people at a distance.

Why should I personally want to keep people away? After all, I actually feel isolated a great deal of the time, even in a group. Simply put, I'm afraid of how I might be judged. Much of my instinctual conversation does deal with, as the aforementioned article states, "complex social issues" such as my evolution of perspective on sexuality, race, gender, and god (or gods, if you're so inclined).

And that is the crux of how I perceive my society; we are not allowed to be dynamic people, but rather to be static personalities. For example, as a younger man, I was, to put it mildly, homophobic and racist. It's not a simple conversation to discuss how I went from "it's tab A into slot B" to fully supporting same-sex marriage and LGBTQ rights. Neither is it a five minute discussion to full explore racism against blacks and Hispanics as an actual personal attitude (based on more than simple ignorance) that can be overcome, and not a "oh, there are still racists out there" vague concept. These are ideas that cause many people, myself included, a great deal of discomfort.

I am supposed to be, according to how we present ourselves to the public, as either all one way or all the other. Gray areas need not apply.

And yet, gray areas are really all that there are in life. But they do not lend themselves to small talk. So I have developed a skill with personal engagement that keeps things impersonal and wonder if the day will come when I actually have a conversation with somebody about more than the weather.

Paul Bunyan Days 2016 in Fort Bragg, California

Labor Day weekend came and went here in Mendocino County. That means that Paul Bunyan was in town and I made sure to catch as much of the festivities as I could.

Paul Bunyan Days is four days of "things to do" and is one of the great highlights of the year on the Fort Bragg-Mendocino Coast. There's the pie sale, the book sale, the logging games, the parade, a tricycle race, the gem and mineral show, a classic car show, an ugly dog contest, and much more. I managed to get to some of the events. You can watch it below.

If you just stumbled upon this, I hope you follow me on my escapades around Mendocino County.

Mendocino Coast fiber optic gets diverse

By Matthew Reed

The Mendocino Coast now has a redundant fiber optic and internet outages like those that occurred in 2014 and 2015 should now be prevented.

Sage Statham, business manager for Mendocino Community network, said he received confirmation from AT&T on Tuesday, Aug. 9, that the local internet service provider would now have access to the the South Coast fiber optic circuit.

"We like to call it a diverse circuit because redundant implies that it is not needed," Statham said. "This circuit would allow MCN telephone and data to continue to function even if the main fiber line was down."

In 2014, a break in the fiber optic line on Comptche-Ukiah Road interrupted service to hundreds of customers and businesses, including 911 service. In 2015, a vandal damaged the fiber optic line near Hopland, which blacked out service to much of Mendocino County as well as parts of Humboldt County.

Now, instead of a single circuit supplying all internet service, there is a second fiber optic circuit.

"The main path is the one that has had the two cuts and travels from Santa Rosa to Ukiah, Ukiah to Boonville, Boonville to Comptche, Comptche to Mendocino and finally from Mendocino to Fort Bragg," Statham said. "The secondary path runs Mendocino to Manchester, Manchester to Annapolis and Annapolis to Santa Rosa."

Statham said that AT&T refused to give MCN detailed information on the new circuit, but he was told that the secondary circuit should even be able to run along the Trans Pacific fiber line that goes to Hawaii and Japan.

In the event that the primary fiber optic line is damaged, there will likely be no interruption in service to customers, Statham said. The switch to the second circuit should be automatic.

"It is possible that current calls could drop while the traffic is re-routed, but we believe that they should stay active," he said. If the switch failed to automatically re-route, MCN can manually reconfigure with about 15 minutes of labor by an MCN technician.

"MCN has done it’s part to make sure our phones and data will continue to work and hopefully other companies and local officials have done the same," Statham said.

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The Great Depression and Baseball in Mendocino County

The Depression in the United States forever scarred the psychology of a generation of Americans and helped shape the course of political dialogue forever. At no other time was the national political and social continuity more threatened as capitalist commerce no longer kept thousands of Americans fed in the urban centers. Social, economic, and regional self-sufficiency was centered on rural towns where much aid was administered through informal neighborhood networks. These communities of self-sufficient and relatively self-reliant farming and logging families spent what little leisure time they possessed focused on social events such as picnics, restaurants, and sporting events, most notably, on California’s Mendocino Coast, baseball.

Baseball, both watched and played, allowed the coastal Mendocino public to forget for a few hours the uncertain economic realities that existed across the nation and were most evident by the intermittent closings of coastal mills for a dearth of buyers. 

Players were also workers in the woods and in the towns’ mills, as well as grocers, gas station owners, and dairy farmers. They played hard and worked harder, when there were jobs. Multiple leagues existed on the Mendocino coast, not including high school teams that would play against the various town and association teams in exhibition and pre-season games. Baseball was played in every town on the Mendocino coast in some fashion. The home field of the Fort Bragg Seals also hosted concessions operators and ticket sellers who earned a small wage.[1] The teams were for entertainment and meant little in relation to greater issues, such as the mills’ operation. However, baseball was a vivid expression of coastal Mendocino County’s culture of mutual aid and support.

Baseball interwove other communities together with the greater Mendocino Coast community. The local Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp at California’s Russian Gulch State Park maintained a very competitive baseball club as a part of their recreation program and was a part of a larger Northern California CCC baseball “sub-district” league. The Russian Gulch camp was established on November 17, 1933 with the express intent of developing Russian Gulch into a state park for California. Immediately, crews “started on road and trail construction, camp ground clearings, stream improvement, eradication of poisonous plants, general cleanup, and many other approved projects.” Eleven months later, federal work crews had constructed “three miles of road, forty individual camping units consisting of stoves, tables, cupboards, and water. One Recreation Hall fifty by sixty feet, one Custodian Cottage of five rooms, eight latrines (Chich Sales type) and ten miles of foot trails...”[2] Initially only fifty crew members began the work, but that number soon swelled to over two hundred enrollees.[3]

In addition to conservation work, the CCC provided opportunities for a number of athletic activities including boxing, basketball, and baseball. The CCC baseball teams played their games on Mendocino High School’s field.[4] The high school also opened its doors to hundreds of CCC enrollees to finish their high school education by hosting night classes twice per week with, a CCC reports adds, “the entire school staff and the school’s facilities and equipment at their disposal.”[5] A CCC educational report for Russian Gulch camp in 1938 noted that “[t]he healthy relation existing between the people and high school and the men of this company has improved the moral of this company.”[6] The “people” of Mendocino included Auggie Heeser, editor and publisher of the Mendocino Beacon, who declared “Hail to the boys of the CCC!” at the opening of the Russian Gulch camp.[7] Mendocino’s embrace of the CCC was likewise illustrated by the invitation of local families to enrollees for holiday parties and dinners.[8]

This seeming unconditional acceptance of the strangers in their midst was possible because the area was isolated and rural, but self-sufficient. According to Emery Escola, a member of a long-time Mendocino County family, during the Great Depression the area was relatively protected from the more harsh effects of widespread starvation or malnutrition. He said he “didn’t really know it was the depression.” He continued,

I wasn’t old enough to know about finances and money like that. My whole early life was during a low economic time. I didn’t have too much idea about what value was. When the depression came it didn’t make too many changes to us. Everybody shared their food. If somebody killed a pig and had too much left over, they’d share it with their neighbors. Never went without something to eat. We had it pretty good compared to in the city. Most of the people raised their own food anyway.”[9]

Escola described the coast as dotted with farms that provided many of the essentials, such as eggs, milk, and butter. During the Depression, Escola and his brother built a trapper’s lodge to trap fur animals along the Noyo River to earn what cash was necessary for survival beyond food. Escola sold raccoon, mink, and otter skins to chain retailers such as Montgomery Wards.[10] Perhaps it was such abundance in isolation that allowed leisure activities such as baseball to proliferate.

The natural abundance did not necessarily translate into financial abundance. The Fort Bragg Seals practiced and played games at their primary field located at the corner of Madrone and Main Streets, now occupied by CVS Pharmacy, Coast Cinemas, and a strip-mall. Located on the same block, just outside the first base side fence, was the twenty-seven room, three-story Piedmont Hotel, built by the Andreani family in 1914. [11]

In this undated photo, Fort Bragg's town team squares off against Albion. In the background along the first base line is the Oak Manor Hotel, on Oak Street, and the Catholic church, originally located at the corner of Main and Oak streets. The church is now called Portuguese Hall, on Stewart Street. Note the absence of the Piedmont Hotel, built in 1941. The baseball field was torn down in 1955. Photo courtesy of the Mendocino County Historical Society

From this matrix of regional abundance and communal generosity Mendocino Coast baseball gained its roots. One of the locals, C. Louis Wood, played third and first bases, as well as being the manager at the beginning of the ’37 season; Wood also owned a gas station on Main Street in Fort Bragg. His ownership of the gas station was his connection to the community as evidenced by the Mendocino Beacon’s declaration that “[t]he Fort Bragg Seals, under the sponsorship of the Junior Chamber of Commerce, have been having regular workouts the past week…C. Louis Wood, who has the Associated Service Station on the corner of Main and Redwood avenue, will manage the team this year… Woods [sic] has had considerable experience with baseball teams and is well qualified to handle a team.” The Associated Service Station owned by Wood was located two blocks from the Seals’ ballpark, certainly a convenience to a business owner who was a part-time slugger. [12]

But just because Fort Bragg’s hometown nine were part-time did not mean they were not serious hitters. Another set of local part-time sluggers were the Galletti brothers. The Galletti’s were from a Point Arena dairy family, one of the many farms and ranches that produced such regional abundance.

On June 9, 1937, Leo Galletti illustrated why small town baseball during the Depression was as magical as the legendary teams of Major League Baseball. In an error-free contest, the Seals’ Tilio Pavioni energized the home crowd when he safely hit three times in four at-bats, walked once, and stole second base twice; he did not, however, score a run. In the home half of the sixth, third baseman Galletti, previously a catcher with the Point Arena Dairymen baseball team, clobbered a pitch over the fences for the game’s only run.[13]

In the bottom of the sixth Galletti watched from third base as Fort Bragg’s defense took its turn in turning in a gem play, in particular catcher Waddy Lawson. Lawson brought fans to their feet when he picked off a runner at second base. With a runner on second, and anticipating an attempted steal of third, in a play that foreshadowed in technique modern Major League Baseball catchers, Lawson called for a pitch-out from pitcher Johnny Matson and threw from the kneeling position to second base to eliminate Santa Rosa’s scoring threat.

The Seals won 1-0, with Matson throwing a complete game to earn the win.[14]

There were times, though, that fans left disappointed without even the satisfaction of watching a game at all. In local contests of “town teams,” games were often cancelled because visiting teams failed to show due to inclement weather, automotive breakdowns, or plain discourtesy. Mendocino County’s roads during the Depression were poorly maintained and the primary method of getting to Fort Bragg until 1936 was by steamer; after 1936, automobiles were at best questionable conveyances over the coastal mountains.

Coastal Mendocino area’s very geography was a deterrent to outside teams playing in Fort Bragg. On July 24, the Mendocino Beacon reported that the California Colored Giants of Oakland failed to appear for a game because the axle of their team bus broke only seventy miles from Oakland.[15] 
Then on August 4, the newspaper reported that the Winters team had failed to arrive for the game because the team car had broken down.[16]

For four consecutive Sundays, the Seals refunded the fans’ money. That meant that, in addition to games versus Winters and the Oakland Colored Giants, games against two additional out-of-area teams had also been cancelled. The Fort Bragg Junior Chamber of Commerce, responsible for scheduling games and advertising, announced that it would not schedule any more games that year. The season would end for the Seals with two games against Scotia and one game against Talmage. [17]

The Fort Bragg Seals’ 1937 ended prematurely. The local newspaper did not report detailed statistics for the players. The Fort Bragg Seals were not the New York Yankees or St. Louis Cardinals. They did not play 150 games or more per season; barely a dozen games were played during that season. They committed errors that were “inexcusable” to the local press. They did not have a Joe DiMaggio or Joe Medwick.

But individual players often demonstrated a remarkable athletic ability, especially considering they practiced but once a week. The players for the Fort Bragg Seals were known well enough to the town that only their last names were used to identify them to readers. Men like Pavioni, Lawson, and Matson played as if they were on the Boston Red Sox or Detroit Tigers, but they could only dream of salaries matching that of Lou Gehrig and DiMaggio.

The Seals, to appearances, were a “bush league” team that was staffed by part-time players. But town baseball games were consistently attended by relatively large crowds of spectators and individual players could often demonstrate a remarkable athletic ability, especially considering they practiced but once a week. In those moments of competition and athleticism, the Seals and the other local teams transported their friends and neighbors out of 1937 Mendocino County, away from labor unrest and economic strife. For that ability alone, the Fort Bragg Seals were professional.

Mendocino County was rich in natural resources that mitigated the effects of the Depression. Baseball was an escapist luxury that allowed residents of coastal Mendocino County, as well as other towns across America, to forget for a few hours the uncertain economic realities that existed during the Great Depression. Within Mendocino County, though uncertainties were held at bay by natural wealth of resources and wealth of community spirit. Baseball was only one visible expression of the Mendocino coast’s history of cultural richness.

---

[1] Louis Andreani, Fort Bragg Remembered, 21-24

[2] “Superintendents Monthly Narrative Report,” United States Department of  the Interior, National Park Service, State Park Division, Russian Gulch SP-11, Mendocino, California, October, 1933

[3] Mendocino Beacon, October 14, 1933

[4] Mendocino Beacon, June 26, 1937

[5] “Summary of Camp Facilities for Education, Job Training and Recreation,” Russian Gulch Camp SP-11, September 2, 1937

[6] Civilian Conservation Corps Educational Report, Camp SP-11, Company No. 219, Fort Bragg, California, October 28, 1938

[7] Mendocino Beacon, February 19, 1934

[8] Mendocino Beacon, December 23, 1933

[9] Emery Escola, interviewed by Jonathon Matlin and Khalil Robinson, Mendocino Middle School Oral History Project, CD, November 15, 2000

[10] Emery Escola, interview, November 11, 1989, pg. 4, qtd in Robert Winn, “Bridges, Huckleberries, and Robin Stew: The Depression and The New Deal in Mendocino County”, Mendocino Historical Review, Vol. 14, Winter/Spring 1989-90, pg. 13

[11] Andreani, Fort Bragg Remembered, 21-24

[12] Mendocino Beacon, April 24, 1937.

[13] Mendocino Beacon, June 12, 1937

[14] ibid

[15] Mendocino Beacon, July 24, 1937

[16] Beacon, August 7, 1937

[17] Beacon, August 21, 1937

[18] Mendocino Beacon, March 22, 1968

OPINION: In opposition to Measure U

Measure U is the wrong tool for the wrong task. It implicitly targets a group of people in need of assistance and the underlying logic of the text of the measure is flawed.

Measure U forbids social service organizations from operating in the central business district of Fort Bragg "under any circumstances" unless that organization was already there before January 2015. Proponents are engaging in a classic case of Not In My Back Yard, as known as NIMBY. They don't want to see the members of their community who are suffering or who are disadvantaged. They want to close their eyes to the homeless, the disabled, and the poor and pretend that Fort Bragg is still a vibrant small city with more jobs than people.

In addition to the NIMBY aspect of Measure U, it's a very expensive temper tantrum. Proponents of the measure fought against the city giving grant money the Mendocino Coast Hospitality Center for the purchase of the Old Coast Hotel building; they lost the argument. Granted, Fort Bragg's city government gave the community a short shrift in meetings, but that is not the Hospitality Center's fault. And yet, Measure U targets the Hospitality Center because of its mission to work with the homeless and plans to use the building for that purpose.

Proponents would rather the Old Coast Hotel building sit empty in perpetuity than have a business use it for helping people in need. It is intellectually inconsistent to target social service agencies because of their clientele, but not the drinking establishments that do actually contribute to social disorder. Social service agencies such as Hospitality Center serve the better angels of human nature while bars serve booze.

If the issue is how the City of Fort Bragg government, including City Manager Linda Ruffing and the city council, handled community concerns, the awarding of the grant to Hospitality Center, or the Old Coast Hotel ownership's willingness to accept less money for a private nonprofit instead of a private business, those are separate issues that must be the focus of a different initiative, referendum, or recall process. They don't need to result in a discriminatory law targeting those people in the community who might cause Measure U proponents to feel uncomfortable.

Measure U is an attempt to address the wrong issue with the wrong method. It completely misses what's wrong with the city; supporters are making Hospitality Center into a straw man.

The arguments in favor of Measure U are filled with even more fallacies. Proponents argue that the measure "...insures the preservation of our Historic Downtown business district-north  to Pine Street and South to Oak Street, from Main Street to McPherson." While this may be the central business district, it is not a cohesive historic district. Indeed, it is not actually a registered historic district in the strictest definition. Visitors to the coast would have to travel to Mendocino to find an actual historic district. The central business district is a hodge-podge of historic buildings and contemporary structures. Buildings from the 19th century are nestled against others from the 1920s and later.

Measure U proponents want voters to "Vote Yes if you want to preserve the historic use and structure of the Old Coast Hotel." The logic is untenable. The hotel was sitting empty. Community members who wanted to acquire the building and use it commercially were rebuffed by the property owner unwilling to negotiate on price; yet those same owners negotiated a deal with the City of Fort Bragg. The historic Oak Hotel across the street from the Old Coast Hotel is a seedy-looking collection of apartments once a notable lodging establishment comparable with the long-gone Piedmont Hotel. There is no hue and cry to restore the Oak Hotel to its historic use.

In addition, supporters of Measure U argue in the voter information pamphlet that "...the city's rich history should be celebrated and business's [sic] allowed to prosper." Fort Bragg's "rich history" is one of industry and jobs. It was a mill town with a thriving fishing harbor. The city has always been the commercial and economic center for the Fort Bragg-Mendocino Coast. If proponents truly wish for business to prosper, it needs to find ways to become collectively competitive with inland businesses. They need to fill the empty stores on Franklin Street and offer basic affordable necessities, instead of junk antiques and specialty boutiques.

Fort Bragg is not the town it once was. It is part of an area that is losing businesses and professionals. Cottage industries are not filling in the void left by the closing of the mill nor are they refilling the coffers of the schools that made this area so attractive to professionals with young families. If the business and property owners in the central business district want to better help the city, they need to address the issues that have contributed to the vacant storefronts on Franklin Street and the inability of the area to either build or attract large-scale employers.

It is not the purpose of public law or the initiative process to target specific groups or industries unless the case can be made clearly that the law will benefit the greater good. Laws that are exclusionary need to be so to serve the greater good, such as limitations on what businesses or individuals can be within a certain distance of schools. Measure U does not serve the greater good. It only serves the venal impulses of our human nature. It is in the same group of proposed social controls as excluding all Muslims from the United States or making law enforcement stops of people based on skin color.

I encourage voters in Fort Bragg to vote "no" on Measure U.

OPINION: In support of Measure V

I encourage Mendocino County residents to vote "yes" on Measure V next month.

When I was reporting for Mendocino's weekly community newspaper, The Beacon, part of my beat were rural fire departments south of Fort Bragg, California. One of those tiny departments was the Albion-Little River Volunteer Fire Department, an agency that covers an incredible geographic area that includes a lot of commercial timber land, most of it owned by the Mendocino Redwood Company.

In 2014, ALRVFD Chief Ted Williams became increasingly concerned about dead trees on MRC property left behind by the timber management practice known as "hack-and-squirt." Hack-and-squirt involves making a cut in an undesirable tree, such as tan oak, and then applying an herbicide to the cut. There are different herbicides used in the timber management industry, but one commonly used is imazapyr. The trees are then left to die and fall on their own.

2014 was also a year with record temperatures and low rainfall. In Mendocino, residents within the Mendocino City Community Services District were mandated to install water meters on their wells to help the district manage the limited groundwater. In the northern portion of Mendocino County later that year, over 12,500 acres burned near Laytonville when a wildfire was ignited by lightning.

In the early months of 2015, Williams had no reason to believe things would be different and there were hundreds of acres of dead timber bordering his fire district. He took his concerns to the Albion-Little River Fire Protection District board of directors, looking for a solution and then broadened his approach to include community members and fire professionals.

When I interviewed Mike Jani in March 2015 for a Beacon article, the issue of dead standing trees was quickly becoming a topic of concern for several coastal communities. Jani, the president and chief forester at MRC, attempted to minimize the dangers from standing dead timber.

“Our experience with the way fire reacts is it stays on the ground and doesn’t get into the canopy,” he said. “Albion-Little River Fire Protection District may have been ill-informed of the fire risk.”

Over a year later, MRC has spent $197,000 fighting against the county-wide measure, Measure V, that would make dead standing timber a public nuisance. In late March of this year, at a public forum moderated by the League of Women Voters, the timber company, with other opponents of the June measure, argued against Measure V on the basis of cost as well as creating a beneficial environmental situation; opponents continued to argue against the danger of dead timber as potential fuel in wildfires.

And while MRC has donated plenty of time and money to Mendocino County communities over the years, in this issue the company is wrong. The risks involved with hundreds of acres of dead timber seem self-evident. It is essentially miles of firewood waiting to be lit. Those potentially burning trees put first responders at risk due to falling snags, to say nothing of the question of whether those dead trees create unusually toxic smoke when they burn because of residual herbicide.

Measure V is needed to ensure that the negligence of property owners such as MRC does not endanger communities or firefighters. While I can understand the argument of trying to limit expenses, there is a point when common sense needs to rule over commercial expediency.

No landowner, whether it is an individual or a corporation, has the right to put their neighbor at risk because of one or more dead trees. MRC needs to accept it's responsibility to the greater community good, not just its bottom line.

Finding Northern California

What makes Northern California an identity, beyond simple geography? What are the common ideas that forge such a diverse area together? What are the unique local traditions and events that are part of the tapestry of the region?
Northern California is large region, by itself larger than many states. Three of the boundaries of the area are easily discernible: The Pacific Ocean in the west, and the state lines in the north and east. But south, the end of Northern California is less clear. For a lot of people, it is a general line that connects the San Francisco Bay Area to Sacramento and on to Lake Tahoe. This may be simply the general area of influence these significant centers (San Francisco, Oakland, Sacramento, etc.) have on the less urban areas. However, there are certainly other people I have known from south of that arbitrary line who would argue. Certainly, the argument can be made that the southern line of Northern California aligns with the the southern borders of Monterey, Kings, Tulare and Inyo counties.
These are just lines on a map, however, I would like to take a few weeks and go find out how people view Northern California and how they define it, either as residents or visitors. I want to visit the community events, talk to the people and learn some of the history that makes Northern California an identity. Along with the interviews and narrative, I will include contemporary and historic photographs of this diverse region, from the coast to the Sierras.
Ultimately, the project is about the search for the meaning of community. Practically, it will allow visitors from out of the area to better understand the differences in regional identity in California (I'm looking at you, Germany, Russia and Greece). It will also be for the residents who live here and may see a different aspect of this fascinating place we call home.
"Finding Northern California" will result in a series of articles and a book for travelers and residents alike. I hope you will help. Use this link to donate or send me your thoughts on what it means to be from Northern California. Let me know where I should go and who I should talk to.
Writing is often a collaborative effort between two or more people. Collaborate with me in "Finding Northern California." Make a donation to my GoFundMe campaign through the button on the right or drop me a line here with suggestions or comments about Northern California.
Thanks for reading! ~MR

FICTION: Bully

“Hey, Donald!”

The boy stomped his foot. “My name’s Peter!”

“You look like Donald Duck!” The other boy howled with laughter. The boy sitting next to him chimed in with his own devious cackle.

It was a daily ritual for Peter, running the gauntlet past Kevin. All he wanted to do was sit down in a seat and get to school, but first he had to endure the Kevin’s reliable volley of verbal barbs.

“Hey, Donald! Who are you today? Bumblebee or Optimus Prime?”

“I’m not playing!” Peter tried to hurry down the narrow aisle, past Kevin, but the voice of the bus driver stopped him.

“There’s an empty spot right there, Peter.”

“But it’s in front of Kevin and he’s teasing me.”

“Don’t worry about Kevin. You need to sit down so that we can go pick up the other kids.”

Peter’s face flushed as he sat down, listening to the daunting laughter of the two boys behind him, his prized Transformers backpack on his lap. The girl next to him wasn’t looking at him; she was staring out the window at the trees on the far side of the road.

Peter couldn’t see his mother from where he sat, but it didn’t matter. She was at the end of the driveway to see his sister onto the bus. She was always grumpy and probably wouldn’t have bothered to walk down to the road with Peter and Lisa if it wasn’t a school rule.

Peter watched her walk back up the driveway, which was overhung with Bishop pine from both neighbors’ properties. It seemed like all his mother wanted to do was be somewhere other than the room he was in and whenever he wanted her to sit with him, she seemed to be too busy or too tired. 

He wished she got along with his dad.

“Hey, Donald. You run like a girl to first base.”

“No, he runs like Donald Duck,” said Kevin’s friend. They laughed.

“I do not!” Peter felt his throat close. “I don’t like what you’re saying to me. You’re hurting my feelings. Please, stop.”

“What? I’m not doing anything.” Kevin seemed to fade away into conversation with his compatriot.

Peter listened to the rumble of the bus’s engine and felt the rocking and jolting of the bus on the pothole-riddled road. The morning was crisp, but it would warm with the October sun, what his dad called an “Indian summer.” The sky was a brilliant blue in the early hour after dawn, but Peter knew that a couple of miles closer to the coast and it would likely be overcast. His dad said it had to do with the marine layer. Maybe they would be allowed to sit outside to eat at lunch.

Lisa sat in a nearby seat, quietly. She was the shy one. It wasn’t that she was antisocial, but she was very reserved. Peter knew that in class or on the playground, his sister only opened up to a select few other children. Yet, she never complained about being harassed by other kids. Peter, who liked to play with and meet other kids, had been forced to deal with one or two mean kids since the first day of kindergarten.

At least in kindergarten, his dad had been helping in his classroom and was available to also help Peter with problems. Now, his dad never came into class and Peter was alone.

The cacophony of dozens of children and noises of the bus swept around Peter as he sat, waiting to arrive at his destination, his purgatory: school. The work his teacher offered was not difficult, in fact, Peter found it rather boring. He knew he read better than anyone else in his class and he also knew his math skills were superior to his classmates. Peter never held that against his peers, however.

He looked forward to recess and social play in class; there were plenty of kids he liked.

For some reason, though, they didn’t like to play with him as much as he liked to play with them.

They never seemed to want to play the games he wanted to play nor did they seem to play games that Peter understood very well.

Tag, particularly, was a grueling game for Peter. He liked being chased and enjoyed the chase, but he was slow. He was quickly tagged by the other players, and could rarely catch up to the other children when he was “it.” Kevin took particular delight in jeering and mocking the slower boy, always staying just out of reach during the game.

Then there were the times when Kevin led the complete expulsion of Peter from the game, leaving Peter dejected and hurt. On those days, he would try to chase off after other kids he knew, but they never seemed to pay attention to him when he wanted to join their games, even telling him that they were already playing a game and there was no room for him.

When Peter’s dad frequented the school and was able to watch him on the playground, Peter could take solace in his father’s company, sitting close with the man’s arm around him. Now his dad had a job that kept him from coming to school. Peter still got to see him on the weekends, but it wasn’t the same as when his dad was in the classroom every day.

His dad read a lot about presidents. One of his favorites was a guy named Teddy. Peter’s dad told him once that Teddy had a word for really neat things or events. When he was excited about something, he would say “bully.” Peter liked to listen to his dad talk about things or read to him and his sister.

His dad never read to them enough when they visited on the weekends, as far as Peter was concerned.

It was almost lunch time. He dreaded navigating the awkward situation, trying to find a way to not sit next to the other kids who taunted him. And then there was recess, yet another gauntlet he had to run daily.

The teachers and the yard duties didn’t understand what it meant when he tried to duck off to one side of the playground. They didn’t understand what it felt like when he was called names. They didn’t know what it meant to him when other children said they were his friends one day and not his friends the next.

Was there something wrong with him? Was that why the kids made fun of him? Was that why his daddy left?

In his crowded classroom he felt alone. On sunny coastal days, he felt sad. So isolated.

And when he failed to do his work in class, Peter’s teacher would call him out. She didn’t understand what it was he was thinking and why he didn’t do his work. He was such a brilliant child!

Peter didn’t care much for his teacher and had no way to confide in her that he still thought about the screaming match his mom and dad had just before his dad left.

He missed his dad. He felt a hole inside of him, like a chunk of flesh was missing. He wished his dad didn’t live in another house. He wanted to live with his dad, but his mom wouldn’t allow it. She said that his dad couldn’t take care of him and was too busy.

From across the classroom table where Peter was working, a skinny kid with a perpetual smirk stared at him.

“That’s a stupid shirt, Peter. Minecraft? That’s a stupid game. I play Halo.”

“It’s not stupid. My dad got it for me. And I don’t like it when you say that. Please, stop.”

“It’s a stupid shirt and a stupid game. Your dad’s probably stupid.”

Peter’s face flushed. “He is not,” he shouted, beginning to cry.

The smirking boy began to laugh. “What’d I say?”

The teacher’s aide came over.

“What’s wrong, Peter?”

“He called my dad stupid. He said my shirt was stupid.” Peter had reached his breaking point again. He laid his head on his arms and sobbed.

The teacher’s aide turned her gaze to the smirking boy.

“Did you call his shirt stupid?”

“What’d I say? I was just kidding with him.”

“You need to apologize.”

“Why? I didn’t do anything.”

“You called his shirt stupid and called his dad stupid. That’s not nice.”

“So?”

The teacher’s aide exhaled in exasperation. She rose and pulled Peter with her.

“Come on, Peter. Let’s go talk to Mr. Matthews.”

As the teacher’s aide passed a box of tissues, she handed a couple to Peter. He wiped his eyes and stood disconsolately as the aide spoke with Mr. Matthews. He looked at Peter with compassion, but Peter knew he wouldn’t, couldn’t, fix anything.

“We’ll move Jadyn to another table. Do you want to work by yourself, Peter?”

Peter shook his head because he knew it would only add to his loneliness. It was bad enough to feel alone, but then he would actually be alone. As if he was the one who did something wrong.

Why couldn’t his dad be here?

Lunch was as miserable was Peter expected. There was no way he could avoid sitting hip to hip with the other kids at the tables. Even outside, the seating was designed to fit as many children as possible at each table. Generally, each classroom sat at one long table. That meant regardless of where he sat, Peter was destined to be the subject of laughter and derision from Jadyn and one or two of his henchmen.

Sometimes he could get through the day without the jokes. Sometimes, all he wanted to do was run away from the school, down the street, to his dad’s apartment. Of course, his dad probably wasn’t at home and Peter wasn’t sure exactly where his dad’s office was located relative to the school. It seemed pretty close, but there were a lot of streets to cross and his mom and dad had told him to never cross a street without an adult.

A trio of flying peas struck Peter in the hair, breaking into his reverie. Jadyn snickered. He gestured to his shirt to remind Peter of their earlier conversation and grinned. Peter stuffed the rest of his lunch back into his insulated cooler bag, along with the trash, and got up.

“Hey, Peter. You need to wait to be excused.” Derek, a tall, lanky man, sauntered over. Peter wanted to obey the man, but he still couldn’t sit.

“I don’t want to sit there anymore. Jadyn’s throwing food at me.”

Derek’s face turned serious. He didn’t tolerate friction between the kids and he really disliked any possible hint of bullying. He saw Peter’s tense face and the tears forming and pulled the boy in to a hug.

“Hey, it’s okay, buddy. Sit down and finish your lunch. I won’t let anybody else mess with you while you eat.”

Derek led Peter back to his seat. Then he crooked a finger at Jadyn. The boy smirked.

“What? What’d I do?”

“You threw food at Peter. You can move to a table and sit by yourself.”

Jadyn sighed and got up, taking his tray to another table.

“I was just joking.”

“Yeah? Well, it’s not funny. How would you feel if somebody threw food at you?”

“I’d think it was funny.”

“Well, not everybody thinks that way. It’s not cool.”

“Fine.” Jadyn drew out the word in an exasperated sigh.

Peter listened to the two. He knew moving Jadyn to another seat in class or in the cafeteria would change nothing. The boy would continue to smirk at him and make fun of him. Just like the kids on the bus. Going home would be a reverse of the morning ritual. It seemed that the other kids would never learn his name, would keep calling him “Donald,” and would keep making jokes at his expense. The adults tried to help him, but they didn’t understand.

They may say they understood, but they didn’t.

They had never been called names like he got called. They never felt his hurt.

They didn’t miss their dads like he missed his dad.

When he got off the bus, his mom was waiting.

“Hey, kiddo. Wanna go to your dad’s on Thursday night?”

Peter jumped at the chance.

“Yes! I do! I wanna go to Dad’s house.”

His sister chimed in. “Daddy! I wanna go to Daddy’s, too!”

“Okay. I’ll let him know and he’ll pick you up after school, okay? But on Thursday.”

“So we got two more days?” Peter felt crestfallen.

“It’s only two more days. It’ll get here quick. Don’t worry.”

“Bully.”

FICTION: Trees and Mushrooms

The two-lane ribbon of highway ran the length of the coast. On one side, the land rose up abruptly as the foothills of the coastal range. On the other, the earth dropped away to end in precipitous bluffs on the edge of the North American continent. A hundred years before, massive redwoods trees had crowded to the very cliffs. Now, grasslands were interspersed with chaparral interrupted briefly by the remaining protected groves of trees that were still being cut, but slowly, with more regulation now.

The scenic highway was one of the best to drive. People from all over the world traveled to see the sights and visit the towns here and there along the road. The main artery for the locals in the area, it was also a source of contention. It brought tourist dollars into town, but thousands of people drove the road, which was still narrow and in some places had no shoulder. Cyclists were often part of the traffic flow, slowing down vehicles that would otherwise have moved faster.

The corpses of skunks, raccoons, and deer were frequent testament to the speedy nature of the visitors. Some locals wanted the road widened to increase safety and visibility; other wanted it left the way it was, a rural landmark, characteristic of the area. Rancorous debate filled the letters to the editor of the local newspapers.

Two figures walked along the edge of the road, the man pushing a battered bicycle, the boy carrying a white bucket. The sun was hot today and the man could feel his skin burning. He cursed himself for not bringing sunscreen. Usually, the temperature on the coast never wandered far above seventy degrees. Today, the forecast had called for a high of eighty-one, but the man had disregarded the radio newscasters because the forecast was often wrong. The bicycle baskets were filled with trowels, sweatshirts, bottles of water, and a first-aid kit. In the white bucket were a trowel and a pair of gardening gloves for the boy, but, of course, no sunscreen. Who needed sunscreen on the coast?

A large truck laden with logs roared by, taking the turn wide. In a panic, the man grabbed his son, dragging the boy behind him and off the road. He could feel his heart race and he took a deep steadying breath. He heard his son protest his rough treatment and complain of getting hurt. The man inspected the boy. Blackberry brambles and nettles had scratched his arms and neck – a small price to pay for survival. The man lifted the bike from the roadside where he had dropped it and the continued on.

"Hey, Pa? Why do they cut down trees all the time?”

The man could tell it was going to be one of those conversations. While his son was not retarded, the doctor had labeled the boy “developmentally delayed.” The man was not quite sure what that meant; his wife seemed to understand, but he knew that his son did not seem to catch on to basic ideas as other children his age did. A house was a house and a tree was a tree. In the boy’s world, trees did not have to be cut and houses could still be built of wood. The man often wondered if the boy thought houses were like mushrooms and simply appeared after a hard rainfall.

"To build houses. Gotta build houses if you want people to have someplace to live, ya know?”

"But they cut down my favorite tree.” Wandering the hillside behind their home, the boy had found a redwood so large that even the man had not been able to get his arms around its trunk. The boy went often to sit at the base of the tree. One day it was gone, along with many others, and a new dirt road had been carved into the face of the hill to allow logging crews and their trucks better access. The devastation crushed the boy, who had cried for hours afterward.

“I know, son, but that’s their job. And it is their land. Remember, you were only visiting.”

“But it was a nice tree. And really big, too.”

“It sure was. Kind of a shame it was cut like that.”

“How come we gotta use trees to build houses? Is it cheaper?” The boy knew that money was often a source of contention between his mother and father. Cheaper was always better. Nobody ever yelled about buying cheap stuff.

“Sometimes. Sometimes it can be more expensive. I guess it depends on where you live in the world. Like here. Lumber is really expensive here.”

“But this is where the trees come from,” the boy said.

“They have to cut up the logs somewhere else and ship the wood back here. That’s a lot of driving. Makes the price of wood more.”

“What other kinda stuff do they build houses with?”

The man pulled out a cigarette, then paused, chewing on his lower lip as he thought about his son’s question.

“I dunno. Different parts of the world use different things. Some places they use mud and other places they use skins and stuff." He lit the cigarette and sighed as he felt the smoke bite his lungs.

“Do we use that kinda stuff?” The boy thought a mud house would be the coolest ever.

“Nah. We use brick or concrete or steel. And wood, of course.”

“Oh.”

The boy pondered this for a moment. “So, if they can build a house with all that stuff for cheap, why don’t they?”

The man shrugged. “I dunno. I guess cuz it’s easier. People spent a bunch of years learning to build houses with wood. Maybe we got too good at it. Or may we’re just lazy.”

“Oh.”

The boy picked up a stick and poked the ground. “Is our house wood?”

“Uh, no.” The boy’s father flicked his cigarette butt into the bushes.

He could tell that one of the tires on the bike was getting flat. He’d already patched it twice. Maybe it was time to get a new one. Damn, tires weren’t cheap.

“Pa?”

“Yeah.”

“Where are we going?”

“Gonna pick mushrooms, remember?”

“Oh, yeah.” The boy paused. “How come?”

“Gotta make money. Need to eat and pay for stuff, ya know? Can’t steal it, and nobody’s gonna give it to us.” Amen, brother, he thought to himself. Wasn’t that the truth? In the man’s life, nobody, including his folks, had given him anything.

“Do the people who cut down trees make money?”

The man snorted. “Hell, yes! They make a lot of money.”

“Can you cut down trees?”

The man shrugged.

“I don’t know how. That’s a hard job and it’s dangerous and scary. People get hurt a lot cuttin’ trees. Especially if they don’t know what they’re doing.”

“They do?”

“Yep. You wouldn’t want your dad to get hurt, would you?”

The boy shook his head. “Uh, uh. No way.”

The man smiled. Sweat dripped from his brow. His hair was damp. He felt his shirt sticking to his back. What was this kind of weather doing on the coast? It was almost eighty.

Another truck sped by, this time on the far side of the road. Again, the man snatched at the boy’s arm, pulling further off the highway, his heart in his throat and his stomach clenching, testicles rising. The man felt sure he could touch the dusty steel of the logging truck, it was so large and road felt so small. All he could do was try to keep his distracted child out of their speeding path and hold up the rusty bicycle. They were like two deer waiting to become road-kill.

This was insane. Even when the trucks were in the other lane they felt dangerously close. The boy deserved to be in school, but the reality of children is that they are cruel without thinking and the words of the children who were not slow hurt the boy deeply. The man and his wife had seemed to go around in circles with the boy’s teachers and principal, but nothing seemed to change the special kind of hell that was school for the boy. So they had taken the boy out of school.

But the man and his son needed the money and there wasn’t any other way for them to get to where they wanted to hunt for mushrooms. It had rained the previous morning, hard enough to convince the man to look for the little nuggets of fungal gold. With luck, he’d be able to pay the rent all at one time. Maybe afford a tire for the bike.

“Pa?”

“Yeah.”

“Can we go home? I’m hot.”

“I know, but we have to find some mushrooms.”

“How come we pick mushrooms to make money?”

“Well, they’re worth a lot. People pay if we have good mushrooms.”

“Joe, at school, his dad builds houses. And they don’t live in a bus.”

The man had no answer for that.

“Pa? What do you do?”

“I guess you could say I’m a farmer.”

“But we don’t have a farm. How can you be a farmer if we don’t have a farm?”

“Well, we have all those planters and stuff. Not all farmers have farms like on TV, ya know?”

“Oh. I hate farmers. We’re poor.” The boy kicked the ground.

The man turned.

“Listen. Your mother and I do what we can. We both work hard to try to give all of us a place to live."

If it weren’t for the boy, the man and his wife would be splitsville. They lived for their son.

“I love you very much and I would give us everything if I could, but I can’t. I don’t know how to build houses or cut down trees. I do know how to find mushrooms and that makes us some money. And I grow what I can at home and sell that.”

"Like your plants that are way out in the woods?”

“How…?”

The man thought about those particular plants. Right around September those girls would earn them enough money to move into a real place. Thank God for medical marijuana laws. Unfortunately, the landlord was less tolerant. If he got wind of those plants, literally, they would be evicted quick. They started walking again.

“You know about those, huh?”

“Mom says I’m not supposed to talk about them.”

“She’s right. You’re not.”

“Why?”

"Well, it’s kinda like why people don’t talk about what moms and dads do after bedtime. Or going potty. We just don’t.”

"Oh.”

The boy thought about that for a moment.

“We’re not supposed to talk about a lot of stuff, huh?”

“Sometimes, it feels like that.” And sometimes, my son, we’re supposed to talk about things we don’t. Just wait until you’re married, the man thought.

The man looked up at the sound of a truck’s engine brake. Another log truck, taking the road too fast and too wide. The air brakes hissed. The man saw the truck swerve.

Turning, he saw his son standing on the hot black surface of the road, head down, swinging his white bucket back and forth in front of him, the toes of his shoes dragging with each step. The man had time to do nothing more than reach out his hand toward the boy.

Later that week, the local paper carried a letter to the editor. The reader suggested that the boy should never have been walking on that particular stretch of road, and his father should be sent to jail for neglect. Why wasn’t the boy in school? Why did the father thing that a child should be required to help earn money instead of playing with fireflies? The reader suggested the man think about finding a better way of making money and maybe find a better way of getting from one place to another. The reader never thought to suggest widening the road.