One dozen destinations #12: The Grand Canyon

     Well, that's it. Thank you for indulging me over the past two weeks. Or, if you didn't indulge me, thanks for circling back. I've enjoyed revisiting these places and like to imagine that, maybe, you did too.

      Hey, it's possible. Either way, I'll be in the paper with fresh material Monday.

      One thing that struck me plucking destinations out of "The Quest for Pie" is the short shrift I sometimes give places that deserve better. The Grand Canyon for instance. That's the trouble when you're focused on your interior life and your relationships. You can skip past far more significant phenomena. Then again, as I tell writers, or used to tell writers back when anybody asked, is that Rule #1 is you have to be who you are. And, obviously, John McPhee I am not. Here is my complete treatment of the Grand Canyon in the book.

     The Grand Canyon? Having Edie aboard made it easier for us to split up. Kent could barely be coaxed to get close enough to the Grand Canyon to gaze into it. Ross appeared as if he wanted to leap into the abyss. So Edie and Kent lingered over their breakfast, while Ross and I marched dutifully along the rim. We took pictures of each other. Ross would stand at the very edge, where one more step backward and he would tumble off a cliff and die. I opened my mouth to alert him, but didn’t want to scare him. That’s where he was standing. My fingers tingled just to look at him. 
     I would stare across the vastness and think, “The Grand Canyon. I am looking at the Grand Canyon.” 
     Words fail me; it would be laughable to even try. “The Grand Canyon is very … ah … grand.” Go see it yourself. I was 49 years old, and never considered going, and might never have gone except for the accident of this trip. Stupid of me. But you know better, now. Go see it.

Northshore Notes: Accidentally Perfect

     I'm back, after a pleasant break overseas, just in time to read this lovely ramble into Chicago by EGD's Northshore correspondent, Caren Jeskey. (I wonder if your takeaway will be the same as mine: "Joan Cusack has a store?") One of the delights of Chicago is there are always new things to learn about it.

By Caren Jeskey      

 

    Keeping up with professional licensing boards is one of those joyous tasks of life. For those of you in regulated professions, you know what I mean.
     Every two years, LCSWs (licensed clinical social workers) must acquire 30 hours of continuing education units. Required CEUs are a good thing. Therapists such as myself ought to be keeping up with education. It connects us with experts in the field and helps us keep up with the times. Attending these classes with fellow clinicians reminds me of the importance of our vocation. It also gives me cutting edge information that I can use to enhance my own well-being.

     Eight weeks ago, one client felt they were spiraling out of control and had hit rock bottom. Just a couple of weeks later, they were feeling less depressed and more hopeful. This past week they shared feeling “a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I am feeling ease. I am not all the way fine, but I have some peace.” Yes, a plug for therapy. There is no shame in asking for help. Not only does it take a village to raise a kid, it takes a village to care for ourselves sometimes.
     I dotted all of the i’s, crossed the t’s, and paid the fees for my Texas license. (Illinois’ comes up next year). Renewed for two more years. Yee-haw! Or so I thought. Late last Friday afternoon I received an email, letting me know that my TX license was delinquent as of the next day, October 1, pending fingerprints and a criminal background check. This a new requirement, which I had missed.
     I panicked briefly then pulled myself together. I put on my big-girl (work from home) comfy lounge pants and read through the instructions. I was given one option —  IdentoGO on Roosevelt Road, just east of the river, with a boastful 2.4 star rating and lots of scary stories about rude, disorganized staff.

     I cleared my Monday morning calendar and headed out down Hunter Road in Wilmette, which turns into Crawford Avenue. The road where “a streetcar conductor who announced ‘Crawford Avenue’ was slugged by a Polish passenger” in the 1930s. Oh, Chicago. You’re so scrappy. At that time a battle between those who wanted the street to be named after Casimir Pułaski, and those who wanted to preserve the history of the road, which was named after pioneer Peter Crawford (who founded Crawford, Illinois— now known as Lawndale), ensued. It’s nice to see that both sides kind of won.

     What a great way to start the week — rolling down the street in my trusty steed (aka Cosmica, the Honda Civic), windows down on a sunny day, with the sights, sounds and smells of the city. Orange vested construction workers and cement trucks peppering the road. Cars with thumping bass overtook me from the bike lane. Men on bicycles with white buckets bungee corded to their two-wheelers, off to find windows to wash for a buck or two.
     Entering the city from the north on a diagonal street is exciting. I followed Elston past the iconic Morton Salt warehouse that’s now slated to become a music venue. As I rounded another bend, there she was. Lady Chicago. Glass skyscrapers sparkling with mid-morning sun. I almost stopped for a hot dog. Taking DesPlaines Street is the perfect antidote to the bumper to bumper traffic I’d have found just a bit east in the Loop, which dead ended me to “the only national furniture store that started because of a motorcycle crash” on Roosevelt. I turned east. Once over the river, I turned north on Delano Court. I felt I was on vacation somewhere new, no idea the area had been so developed. After an hilarious venture into IdentoGO, where there seemed no rhyme or reason to the “system,” I now had hours to roam.

     Walking over the Roosevelt Bridge made me feel small, in a good way. The skyline view to the north is impressive, and the steel bridge to to the south speaks to the power of the iron and hard work that has built the bones of our town. I stumbled upon a blanket in a plastic bag, tucked away behind the piss soaked watch tower and decided not to spend too much time back there, alone. I headed to the well-stocked Whole Foods and got a snack, contemplating my place here in this big city.
     After day-tripping for long enough, Cosmica and I headed north down Michigan Avenue, then skirted onto the inner drive. I realized that Joan Cusack’s store was close by, a place I’ve always wanted to go. I popped in, and there she was behind the counter. I resisted fan-girling— she is one of my all time favorites — and said “hi! I am looking for a rubber chicken.” Without missing a beat, she said “I may have some in the back.” I told her that I wanted to buy a small gift for a friend who works around the corner at the Latin School. They had a bomb threat a few weeks ago, and I wanted to bring her a little pick me up to undo some of the stress.
     Joan came back out with a small bag of mini rubber chickens. Perfect. She also handed me a bag of orange jelly candies, the kind my grandma always had. Just the right touch to add to a small paper goodie bag. I suggested that she carry Neil’s new book, and she seemed interested. (I embarrassingly fan-girled a bit, took my bumbling leave, and headed to Latin). A very nice day in our very cool city.

One dozen destinations #11: Pie 'N' Burger

    Spoiler alert. We are getting toward the end of my unpublished and probably unpublishable memoir, "The Quest for Pie." And yes, we find it.

    The sun was high. The day felt torpid, silent. The boys were wilted, staggering along, supremely bored. Edie didn’t complain but her expression said it all. Maybe, I though sadly, they wouldn’t be going to Caltech after all. 

     The halls of science let us down. But Caltech was redeemed by Pie ‘N’ Burger, a landmark diner on California Boulevard we just happened to pass on our way out of town, as luck would have it, about noon. It was one of those spots you just love the moment you walk in, catching sight of the pie clock with “Pie ‘N’ Burger’ in orange neon. 

      We ate burgers — buttery buns wrapped in white waxy paper — and big mounds of hot fries. The plates and cups had that thin green line in the china that let you know you are in a Real Place, or at least someone’s sincere approximation of someplace real. 

      We almost considered passing on the pie — Ross had already drank a milkshake. But we were at the “Pie ‘N’ Burger,” not the “Burger ‘N’ Pie.” The pie came first. And we were on a pie quest, theoretically. We sorta had to. 

      Are the pies homemade? I asked our waitress. 

      “Everything from scratch; nothing comes out of a can,” she said. “We’ve been making pies here for 45 years.” 

      What kind of pies do you have? I wondered. 

     She handed us a sheet of paper titled: “Pie ‘N’ Burger Pies.’’ The choices were: Apple, Boysenberry, Cherry, Pecan, Dutch Apple, Blueberry, Pumpkin, Rhubarb and Custard, for $3.65 for a slice, $16.50 for a whole pie. 

      That was just the start. The next section was “Meringue Pies,” and those included Coconut, Banana, Chocolate, Lemon, Butterscotch, Peanut butter. Then came “Fresh Fruit Pies,” which cost 70 cents more: Peach, Strawberry, Ollallieberry. 

      Ollallieberry? 

      Our waitress, Emily, explained that ollallieberry was a blend of loganberries and youngberries — a hybrid, I later learned, developed by the USDA and Oregon State University 1935. A type of blackberry, the ollallieberry — “ollallie” is Chinook for “berry” so really it’s called the “berryberry” — never took off, and you won’t find them beyond the West Coast. 

      Edie had to try it. Slave to habit that I am, I chose cherry, along with black coffee. The ollallieberry was excellent — I stole a few forkfuls from Edie’s plate. The berries were hauntingly delicate, dissolving at a touch. This was, we decided, the best pie we ever had, and briefly considered buying a whole pie to take away, balking only when we visualized that pie slowly jostling in the back of the Honda as the hours passed and we headed east, homeward. But we had done what we set out to accomplish: found a small place with good pie. So the trip was a success.

One dozen destinations #10: The Exploratorium

     I'm on vacation, which means ... well, you've grasped the point by now. Adjoining San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts, which we visited yesterday, is the Exploratorium, and it makes sense to peek around there next.

     Next door is the Exploratorium, a huge, clangorous hall filled with scientific exhibits, puzzlers and optical illusions, like the classic skewed rooms where the objects on the left seem much smaller than at the right, due to the design of the walls and floor. I stood, arms folded, scowling, the boys enormous, seeming to tower over me, heads scraping the ceiling. 

     No need draw attention to the symbolism here. The children magnified, the parent dwindling. Sometimes I will see some other parent kowtowing to their kids — it’s easier to notice in others — and worry parents nowadays are too accommodating. We need more of the toughness of the past, more Great Santini, less Carole King.* 

     But that passes, and looking at my own flailing attempts, I’d say they got plenty of sternness and plenty of indulgence, hopefully not in too confusing and random a blend. 

     The Exploratorium folks tried to inject a sense of menace to keep the kiddies on their toes—a grand piano, suspended directly overhead by wires. One of the more arresting exhibits was a drinking fountain set into a toilet bowl.

     “The water in this drinking fountain is perfectly clean,” a sign read. “And the toilet has never been used. So why do people often hesitate before taking a drink?” 

     Kent took a drink. So did I. Edie couldn’t, Ross wouldn’t. The sign delivered the lesson, as if it were necessary. 

     “Strong emotional associations with objects or people can make it difficult to act rationally around them.” 

     Ya think?

* A reference to a passage early in the book where I discuss parental style:, concluding: 

I try to respect my boys, but you do your kids no favors by continually buckling before their will.  Sometimes they’re wrong, and need to know it.  There is a song, a sweet lullaby by Carole King called “Child of Mine” that contains the line, “You don’t need direction, you know which way to go,” that always makes me wince: I consider it the nadir of squishy, free-form, over-indulgent bad parenting.  Kids need direction, big time. They don’t know which way to go, and if they aren’t to turn into feral animals you had better show them. Demanding that your children stand up every five hours on road trips is not too great of an imposition on their personal freedom, even if you have to threaten bodily harm to get them to do it.  

One dozen destinations #9: The Palace of Fine Arts

       A dozen disparate places from my unpublished travel memoir to distract you while I explore new places I will no doubt later share.

     My favorite place in San Francisco is the Palace of Fine Arts, a rose terracotta dome and attached colonnade left over from the 1915 Pan-American exposition. Why? It has that beaux arts, Little Nemo in Slumberland quality of idealized architecture, of materials made ornate and space glorified for no particular purpose. Though for me the icing on the cake is the enigmatic, almost disturbing caryatids, enormous statues of women, 18 feet tall, forming the corners to the dome’s planter boxes. Not facing outward, as would be expected, but turned inward, heads bowed, as if weeping, displaying their broad backs. I’ve never seen anything like them, anywhere in the world. They were originally intended to convey a certain fashionable melancholy. Guards at the 1915 fair were told to inform curious visitors that the statues were “crying over the sadness of art.”

One dozen destinations #8: The Redwood Forest.

     I'm still on vacation. And still observing the letter if not the spirit of my every goddamn day pledge by posting snippets from my unpublished and probably unpublishable 2009 memoir, "The Quest for Pie."

     The next day the family waffled up and headed to Davidson and the Redwood Forest. Enormous, ancient trees, wide enough that both boys could tuck into a cleft. One giant was labeled with a hand drawn sign that read: “BIG TREE. HEIGHT 304’ DIAMETER 21 ½ AGE approx. 1500 years.”
     Fern valleys, fat yellow banana slugs on bright green leaves. Ross and Kent were giddy, reverting to small children, running, laughing, free to caper and play in the lush prehistoric setting. Their parents strolling behind, in their wake. At one point they draped their arms around each other.
     “I like this hike,” said Kent. “It’s very beautiful.”
     At one point I got ahead of Edie, tracking the boys. I turned around to check on her, and she was looking up, at the treetops, sunlight in her face, golden hair streaming over her shoulders. I snapped a photo: she looks like a child herself, aglow in wonder.
     Since we could only get one night, the next day we moved from the Requa Inn to the Redwood Youth Hostel, a homey, 100-year-old institution overlooking the Pacific which, true to its communitarian roots had a guitar perched at the ready in a corner of the living room, a wicker basket holding tambourines and bongos, in case guests wanted to burst into song. The cabinets were emblazoned with what pots and utensils went where — everything in its place is the definition of utopia, for some people — and a call to action posted on the wall of the kitchen, an open letter from management, warning that the State of California is in the midst of a massive budget crisis and is debating whether to "close the majority of state parks, including the gorgeous Redwood State Parks."
     All those who love nature were urged to the ramparts in their defense.

One dozen destinations #7: The Bonneville Salt Flats

     The good news is this is half over ... what? You're ENJOYING this? Really? I suppose it's possible. Anyway, I'm on vacation, and while I'm gone, I'm force-marching you past one dozen locations cribbed from my 2009 travel memoir, "The Quest for Pie."

     Kent was asleep, lower lip puffed out, his head lolled onto his right shoulder, covered to the chin in his blue and orange fleece Chicago Bears blanket, when I passed the sign reading, simply, “Bonneville.” 

     We had left Salt Lake City and were approaching the Nevada border. The green sign announcing “Bonneville” set in motion some gears in the back of my mind that had not turned in a very long time. 

     I was not a fan of cars as a child. My father was a nuclear physicist who drove boxy Volvos, for their safety. I remember marveling that my pals — Paul Marciniak, Paul Zond, Rusty Perry — could actually tell automobiles apart by their shape, by their sound; they knew, almost instinctively it seemed, which one was a Charger and which one was an Impala and a GTO and a Firebird and such.  To me they were all cars. They looked like cars. They had four wheels. 

     But I had gleamed, vaguely, that there was this whole car culture out there. I pumped quarters into gumball machines, hoping for a plastic Rat Fink — Big Daddy Ed Roth’s anti-Mickey Mouse custom car mascot. My pals in junior high read “Car & Driver” magazine. It was a time of homemade dune buggies and hot rods. Every TV show seemed to have its own custom car — Batman’s Batmobile, the Green Hornet’s Black Beauty. The Monkees had their own special car. Even the Munsters had one, a Model T turned into a hearse. 

     And drag racers—long, thin vehicles with huge, fat rear tires and tiny front wheels, cars that sat in pairs, while lights counted down until the green flashed and they took off with an explosion of flame, their front ends rearing into the air like excited horses, shuddering as they picked up speed, tires smoking, blasting through the quarter mile and then, at the end, little drogue parachutes popping out of the back to bring them to a skiddering halt.

     These races, I remembered, often took place at the famed Bonneville Salt Flats. Here was where they tested rocket cars and set land speed records. And that memory was enough for me to ease the car off the highway and follow the access road for about three miles, to where it petered out to a sign, set up by the Department of the Interior announcing, “Bonneville Salt Flats International Speedway.” We got out of the car to read the sign. 

      “These salt flats were formed as ancient Lake Bonneville slowly evaporated...” it began, warning us that the flats were “often moist and unstable.” Aren’t we all? 

     The road around the sign blended smoothly into a fantastical geometric space, a white plain stretching to the horizon, where there was a dim blue outline of low rounded mountains. There was no barrier, no “KEEP OUT” sign, not so much as the lip of a curb or a lone orange cone. A rare spot where the constrictions of society suddenly melt away and you are free to do whatever moves you. It struck me as almost tragic that the occupants of the car already there when we pulled up seemed satisfied to photograph themselves next to the sign, get back in their vehicle, and leave in the direction from which they came. That seemed a stunning failure of imagination. 

     We got back in the van, and I eased it around the sign and onto the salt flats, and soon we were going 50 miles an hour, through blankness, no landmarks to track, the distant light purple hills barely moving as we raced forward into a void. 

     “You wanna learn to drive?” I asked Ross, as we blasted along. 

     “Yes,” he said, and I slowed to a stop and we got out and switched places. The ground was not hard, as I expected, but indeed wet, as the sign said — your shoe sank a 1/8 of an inch, and the car left tracks in the damp salt. As we switched seats, I looked all around us —a giant white tabletop stretching in all directions, with one vehicle, way far off, like a ship on the horizon, the fringe of mountains far away. 

     Ross sat in the driver’s seat, hands on the steering wheel, and I went over the preliminaries. The gas pedal is to the right, the brake to the left. Use your right foot for both pedals; otherwise you’ll hit the brake and the gas at the same time. 

     Ross turned the ignition and the car moved forward — my son was driving! He quickly gathered confidence and speed; soon we were zipping along — he was pushing 60, and I began to grow concerned. 

     “Maybe you should slow down a bit,” I said. It occurred to me that, not knowing any better, he could abruptly cut the wheel and roll us. I explained the basics of turning — ease the wheel to the left, and we go left. To the right and we go right, but gently. 

     Kent chose this moment to wake up. He looked outside at the surreal blank white landscape flashing by, his father in the passenger seat, his brother at the wheel. “Where are we?” Kent cried. “What’s going on?” 

     I explained to him where we were. I also realized that while the place is indeed very flat, it’s still a natural formation, and I couldn’t be certain there wouldn’t be a two-foot ditch somewhere ahead. With each passing second the conviction grew that we should Quit While We Were Ahead. The image that formed in mind was not wrecking the car and killing ourselves, but the grim prospect of the phone call home, explaining that the trip was on hold while we wait for a Honda transaxle and new front suspension to be trucked to Nowhere, Utah. I urged Ross to slow down, then stop, while we went over some of the less exciting fine points of driving, such as what the positions on the transmission stood for.

     “D” is for drive. “R” for reverse. 

     “It is?” Ross asked. “Are you sure?” He thought, charmingly, that R stood for “Rest.” 

     “No, it doesn’t. P is for ‘Park.”

     “Oh.” Time to end the lesson. I turned around to Kent. 

     “You wanna learn to drive?” I asked, smiling benignly. 

     “No,” he said. 

     That startled me. “It’s okay,” I said. “There’s nothing to hit. It’s like the largest parking lot in the world. You’re never going to have a chance like this again.”

     “That’s okay.” This should not be hard, I thought, this should not be an argument. 

     “You’ll always be able to tell your friends that you learned to drive on the Bonneville Salt Flats.” 

     “I don’t want to. I’ll wait until I learn in school.” 

     I looked at him hard. What sort of boy is this? 

     “It’s okay. Your father is telling you it’s okay. I give you permission. There’s nothing to worry about.” 

     “No.” 

     Ross and I changed places. I put the van into a large, looping turn and headed back toward the sign, a dot on the horizon. I didn’t want to leave this otherworldly space, but we had been there 20 minutes or so and it felt time to push on. A little cloud floated over my head. I couldn’t understand Kent — was he going to miss his whole life this way? What was he afraid of? 

      Easing back onto the road, I felt enormous gratitude that here, on this spot, there is a place where the grid ends, where the road peters away into freedom, and you can plunge forward into emptiness, at least to the limit of your daring, until the tether of your own timidity snaps taut and you’re pulled back to the road, to civilization and its rules. In Kent’s case, it is still a very short tether. But we could work on that. All people are unfinished masterpieces, or should be.