The Church of the Open Road Press

A VIEW FROM THE TOP

2026-10-14T20:29:55.971-07:00

…thoughts while on a morning stroll…

The view from the front page is bad. It is of people doing things to people rather than people doing things for people.

A walk in the woods is nice. A balm. A salve. Somewhere there’s a line that includes “…it restoreth my soul.” Might this be about which the Psalmist was writing? Fresh air like the breath of God? The whisper of the dancing stream, his melody?

A crow or a raven speaks. Or maybe a jay. Sun rays pierce the canopy. The path cobbles up and down. Footing’s unsure. It’s a bit like work to get to the top.

But the view, once there, is bigger than one might imagine. Knolls. Vales. Cloudscapes. Distance. Mystery. There is comfort in not knowing everything. There is wonder in wondering.

How much better is this morning walk than the morning paper?

Dear Don: There is so much good in the world yet, seemingly so much evil where you reside; so many far more important things than monetary wealth, you poor man.

Might I propose this: Get yourself some Guccies ~ black or brown penny-loafers, whichever you please ~ with Vibram soles attached, and take a walk in the woods. Include time to pause. To look about. To breathe deeply. To pause some more. Perchance you, like I, will consider never coming back. At least not fully.

Or maybe you’ll just begin to see the upside of doing for rather than doing to. Either way, good strategies for avoiding that goddamned front page.

Church of the Open Road Press

‘AMAZON’ WILDERNESS

2026-09-15T12:58:56.898-07:00

or How We Killed Our Downtown

There once was a tidy small business,

Doing well in a long block of stores,

In a downtown of fun, warmed by acres of sun,

With open signs on all of their doors.

The inside was packed with some good stuff:

From hardware to toothpaste of mint.

The owner well spoke of this customer folk,

As their patronage paid all his rent,

And covered the cost of the pavement

For the broad shady Main Street outside,

And the cop on his feet greeting all on the beat,

And the park with the merry-go-ride.

Then corporate decided a big box

Would fit nicely just outside of town.

Folks could now shop by just making one stop,

At this huge corporate store of renown.

And the people all flocked to the big box,

Causing merchants on Main Street to frown.

The love they once felt lost by cards they’d been dealt,

And the little guy’s dreams crumbled down.

But another thing soon gained great traction:

Buying stuff with the click of a mouse.

Soon it became true: big box days, too, were through.

Seems that retail’d departed that house.

But the people delighted and reveled.

What they purchased came right to their doors!

No more would they greet that ol’ cop on the beat,

Nor visit those huge, big box stores.

The now vacant buildings stood empty.

No business, so no rent was paid.

The tax base did rupture, as did the town’s structure.

So the city could not but degrade.

Then appeared all the poor and the homeless,

Busting in to find shelter from storm,

Littering the floor with their trash and much more.

Impoverishment became the new norm.

As on-line big business grew wealthy,

Patrons found there was nowhere to go,

Save that damned old mouse click, that got stuff really quick.

Thus the wealth of the titans did grow.

A quick glance in what once was small business,

And who might be camped on the floor?

An old homeless man, we’ll recall if we can,

T'was the merchant we’d shopped with before.

The lesson is both bold and simple.

It should have been learned long ago:

Bigger and faster can lead to disaster.

So be wary ‘bout what we let go.

See, we cannot complain ‘bout our downtown,

Where drug deals and vagrants hang on,

If we don’t own our part in the death of its heart,

And continue to shop Amazon.

Church of the Open Road Press

TRESPASS

2026-09-08T10:55:41.082-07:00

…sneaking about a roadside attraction…

There’s an old barn tucked around the bend of a rugged two-lane road, just on the other side of a rise. It’s probably been there forever: plank sides aged to near black; shingled roof haphazardly covered long ago with corrugated metal. From astride the seat of the BMW, I see double doors agape, hinges frozen, perhaps. I could peek inside were I to choose to stop.

I choose to stop. Peering in, thin slivers of light pierce through flicker pecked holes in the tinder dry wooden sides and from the roof where the tin has shifted. As my eyes adjust, stalls come into view; stalls with remnants of forgotten tack hanging from nails, I suppose. And a loop or two of rope. The center of the space is swept clean and vacant save for a pair of wooden barrels, a couple of tall fruit picking ladders ~ three legged things fashioned so they could stand on uneven ground ~ and deep in the shadows a… what’s that?

A 40s era Ford Ferguson tractor ~ an 8N I’m thinking ~ more rust than color. Dad taught me how to drive on one when I was about eight. I remember the cold, bare metal seat he’d covered with a shearling jacket scrap, the ratchety hand throttle to the right of a Bakelite coated steering wheel, the shift knob that, in concert with the tractor’s engine, buzzed and vibrated like crazy and the lever I’d yank on to lift any disk plough or a spring tooth harrow or a land plane I might be pulling when I needed to turn around. Maybe there’s a disk out back, I think.

I close my eyes for a moment and inhale deeply. The place smells of dust and sweet ag filth, but mostly of yesteryears. I have to wonder if there’s a nasty old ratter cat hiding in the darkness somewhere, ready to scream a defiant scream and launch itself onto my face to claw out my eyes should I venture in.

So I don’t, nor do I go out back looking for ploughs and stuff. It just wouldn’t be right. The fence line that had marked the rancher’s property line long ago decayed and fell into the weeds and thistles, but I know shouldn’t be trespassing. Tiptoeing away, I glance this way and that, hoping the ass end of my motorcycle riding togs won’t be on the receiving end of some old boy’s birdshot pellets.

Riding off, I think about how I might feel if curious passers-by were to pause and peek inside my family’s barn from sixty or seventy years back. Hell, it was old when we moved in in ‘57.

I wonder if the thing is still standing.

Church of the Open Road Press

DEAD BIRD

2026-08-29T10:36:00.349-07:00

…things wished undone…

I’d not hung out with Tommy very much. A roly-poly high school kid who hadn’t yet lost some of his baby fat, he was a shirttail friend of some of my pals. Funny, rarely. Serious, sorta. Athletic, not at all. Down to earth? Yeah. Maybe that.

His major asset may have been a century-old cabin I’d been told about. It was located an hour away in the Sierra at a gold rush era encampment called Jonesville. Set amongst some towering pines and backed by a fresh, burbling creek, about six miles past where the pavement ended, I only visited Tommy’s place once.

My Honda Trail 90 was nearly new. Buddy John’s older Trail 55 had miles on it and John would have made it but his Saturday lifeguard gig cramped his schedule. Buddy Duane had a more powerful 125, but its configuration didn’t lend itself to gravel or dirt roads and when we got to where the pavement ended, he turned back. I motored on not quite knowing where I was headed.

Jonesville is little more than a collection of hammered together ramshackles, lit by candles or kerosene at night and warmed by cordwood in the woodstove that would also serve as the cook stove. Each place had an outhouse some distance away, old Reader’s Digests sometimes served as toilet paper. To find a particular cabin, one departed the main road that headed over Humboldt Summit. Every worn out two-track intersecting that main road looked the same. I found Tommy’s on the third or fourth try.

Dinner that evening would be hobo stew, a mix of ground beef, potatoes, bell pepper and onion wrapped in foil and tossed into campfire coals. Tommy had prepared four of ‘em, so there would be leftovers. He’d swiped some Brown Derby beer from his old man to wash things down a bit. With nothing to clean up, just aluminum foil to ball up, in the gathering dusk we set out so he could show me around.

We hiked a few yards to the end of his shared road, Tommy talking about the families that would be his neighbors. Most had owned their cabins for generations, many built by a great grandpa or grand uncle. None would ever be for sale. Past the end of the two-track, a single track waded into grasses and mule’s ear. Not far beyond, a tiny creek – Scott John, I think it was called – gave melody to the meadow. A sinking sun offered alpenglow to the eastern hills as a three-quarter moon slipped over their summit. We each took a moment to unload some of that Brown Derby and then toed up the fisherman’s path on this side of the creek. Kid though I was, I was struck by the beauty and the balance of it all. So peaceful. So right. I’m not sure if I then believed in heaven on earth, but on the banks of Scott John, I might have experienced it.

We came to a rounded outcrop of granite around which the little stream curled. There, the stream pooled. “We’ll catch us some trout here tomorrow for dinner,” Tommy said. “Cook ‘em the same way as tonight so there’s no dishes to do. You did bring that extra foil I asked for didn’t you?”

I shook my head. I think he must have asked John or Duane.

“Well, shee-it. I’ll have to figure something out.”

And I’m sure he did, but not that I’d remember.

Breakfast would be Cocoa Puffs or Fruit Loops, dry – “Just like the Indians ate ‘em” – then we were to go hunting.

“I don’t hunt,” I said.

“Doesn’t matter,” Tommy said as he slung a .22 over his shoulder.

“What’s in season?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Doesn’t matter?”

“Yeah. We’re just gonna do some target practice,” and he handed me a gunny sack with some empty Brown Derby bottles tinkling at the bottom.

He banked the fire in the wood stove and we headed out.

Walking up the track that led back to the main road, he told me about Robber’s Roost, a couple of miles over the pass where somebody name Black Bart robbed the Humboldt Stage that ran from Chico to Susanville. “Did it more’n once they say. And he always left a poem. Weird, huh?”

Across the road, we hiked on soft, scented duff through a stand of evergreens for maybe a half mile. We came to the edge of a glade where the white, barkless hulk of an ancient yellow pine lay in the morning sun.

Leaning the rifle against a standing tree maybe twenty good paces away from the downed timber, Tommy told me to set some bottles “make ‘em a foot or so apart.”

By the time I’d lined up seven or eight, I heard Tommy rack a shell pointing the gun at bottle number one. And me.

“Hey!” I’m sure my utterance was involuntary.

Lowering the weapon, Tommy grinned. “Get back over here. Let me show you this thing.”

I’d handled a neighbor’s BB gun once or twice, and this didn’t seem much bigger.

Tommy explained how to put in the bullet and how to sight through the points at the end of the barrel. “Just make sure you point this” – he tapped the end of the barrel – “right at what you want to shoot. You should be able to hit it. It’s pretty simple.”

I tucked the rifle’s butt against my shoulder and peered down the barrel scanning each of the bottles I’d set on the log. Which one would I choose?

The Oregon Junco is a little black-hooded bird a bit smaller than an empty Brown Derby bottle. Looking like a miniature medieval executioner, Juncos flit through forests and clearings feeding on seeds and only saying eetle, eetle, eetle. I’d seen lots of them on hikes with my dad. Part of the balance, Juncos are prey for foxes and red tail hawks and others. Including, this day, me.

One lit at the end of the row of bottles. Tommy tapped me on the shoulder and whispered, “You think you can get that one?”

I didn’t think so, but I swiveled the .22 in the bird’s direction and squeezed off a round.

Looking back over seven-and-a-half decades, now, I am certain that there are acts I have committed that will justifiably condemn me to an eternity in hell. Lust. Avarice. Gluttony. But the sight of that innocent little guy simply collapsing out of sight off the back of that log without so much as a sound or a flutter must top the list.

Mouth likely agape as Tommy slapped me on the back and uttered words of congratulations, I handed him his gun, hiked back to the cabin, fired up my little Honda and – stomach hollow – headed home.

Church of the Open Road Press

DONATING THE GUZZI

2026-08-14T13:21:00.839-07:00

To everything, there is a season...

(Ecclesiastes 3:1)

In the summer of 1967, after moving on from Chico Junior High, Bill Reed*, my ninth grade English teacher, took a job managing the Channel 9 auction. He’d been a casualty of staffing cuts at Chico Unified. KIXE studios were then housed under the dome in the administration building at Chico State. Bill asked a few of his former students if we’d like to volunteer to help move merchandise on and off the set. I was the only one who bit.

The following two summers, Mr. Reed, then soon to be station manager (if he wasn’t already), asked me if I might volunteer to catalog donated items, manage inventory coming on and off the set and distribute merchandise to high bidders after the auction. He offered to double my pay but then reminded me that ‘Two times nothing is still nothing.’ Again, I bit.

The day we closed our distribution location in 1969, Mr. Reed showed up with an envelope. I’d seen a one hundred dollar bill once before, but I’d never actually possessed one. This one, I would put to good use.

With it and a few other shekels I’d cobbled together, I made a down payment on my very first motor vehicle, a brand new Honda Trail 90. Oh! The places I explored! I’ve been riding a variety of motorcycles ever since.

Fast forward nearly 60 years and I find myself less confident in the saddle. Aching joints and slowing reactions have told me it’s time to dismount for good. It is time to part with my beautiful, low mileage 2022 Moto Guzzi travel model that gathers dust in my garage.

Honoring William T Reed who progressed to much bigger (but perhaps no better) things with PBS and remembering our station’s earliest days, I have donated the Guzzi to KIXE.

...to everything, there is a season...

Church of the Open Road Press

* One summer evening after the auction had concluded, Mom invited Bill and Marianne Reed to dinner. At the table over a couple of Lucky Lagers, Mr. Reed and my dad discovered they both spent some years of their youth in the Mojave; both attending Barstow High. Dad shared that during his senior year (about 1935), he played center on the Barstow Bulldog football team. It was the first time the Bulldogs won the Desert League championship. Bill shared that he, too had played center and during his senior year in the late 50s. That was the year the Bulldogs won their second Desert League championship.

Reflecting on “The Russians are Coming! The Russians are Coming!”

2026-08-07T09:18:25.315-07:00

…history, as they say, repeats…

As kids, my folks would pile Beebo and me into the Ford and venture from a simmering Chico over to a naturally air conditioned coastal Fort Bragg for some summertime cool to visit a friend’s vacation beach house. Located on the north bank of Pudding Creek, the abode was a cozy affair, cinderblock downstairs for dorm-style sleeping and a redwood upstairs with a well-stocked kitchen, a futuristic funnel-shaped fireplace (very Jetson’s) for heat and expansive west facing windows that offered sunsets over surf more glorious than anything Disney’s “Wonderful World of Color” could ever produce. (Our family had a black and white Admiral TV, so what’d I know?)

Each day, a bunch of us would climb down the bluff to play in the sand, make structures out of driftwood, swing kelp round and round over our heads and play tag with the surf. On one of those trips, we were beyond amazed to see two US fighter jets screaming across the ocean, almost skipping on the wave tops, plumes of black exhaust billowing from their twin-engines. They roared by three, maybe four, times. Maybe more. Awe-struck and petrified, steeped in the ‘Red Scare’ of the ‘50s and ‘60s we couldn’t help but wonder: Was this going to be it?

The little get-a-way house is long gone, replaced by a pair of motels. But everything else seems the same. The rugged Mendocino County Coast, lashed by waves and currents has yet to erode away. Gulls still circle and light on white poop-frosted sea stacks a few yards offshore. The occasional doe stands knee-deep in the prairie grasses. Morning fog eventually melts while a crashing surf offers soundtrack for a week or two of upcoming dreams. Always cooler than summertime inland, the drive to the coast always pays dividends. Quaint shops. Cozy B&Bs. Pretty good dining. And those wind-blown bluff trails with all their recollections.

A recent predicted 100 degree day in Cloverdale prompted us to escape to a 72 degree Mendocino Coast. Candi and I enjoyed the drive that coursed from vineyards to redwoods, ultimately out to that coastal prairie and the sea. This day, after a bluff walk on the Mendocino Headlands, we wound through the bergs that dot the distance up to Fort Bragg. Tiny streets and homes that seems to have withstood a century of weather’s greatest abuse stand behind crippled fences that once held paint now twined in thistle and blackberry vines.

Returning home, we rented “The Russians are Coming! The Russians are Coming!” The flick was Norman Jewison’s 1966 send up about the Red Scare and what might happen on Nantucket should a Russian submarine, getting a bit too close, run aground. Except Jewison didn’t film in Massachusetts; he filmed on the Sonoma Coast. Carl Reiner, Eva Marie Saint and Alan Arkin (best actor nominee for the role) lead a cast of character actors we’d seen countless times; each playing with comic seriousness the roles of people who’d allowed a mishap and misinformation to become a credible flashpoint for world destruction.

Though the circumstance seems eerily similar to today, we laughed at the absurdity of it all. I enjoyed the peek back at my early days visiting Fort Bragg and the old cars that were not old cars then -- one was a near mirror of our ’54 Ford Ranchwagon. The inlet at Noyo hasn’t changed. Nor has Caspar village. Nor some of the old Fort Bragg downtown. Nor the seascape we’d hiked along only hours before.

In a tension-wrought, tongue-in-cheek conclusion, two very real US F-4s scream over the ocean seemingly intent on doing what fighter pilots are ordered do. In that moment I am back on the beach with my buddies, swinging kelp, constructing something with driftwood, paying tag with the surf and wondering if this is the end. Of course it wasn’t. It was just Norman Jewison pulling our leg.

Perhaps related? After 60 years, the movie holds up.

Church of the Open Road Press

THE GARBAGE MAN. THE GARBAGE MAN.

2026-07-29T14:05:43.515-07:00

The Garbage Man. The Garbage Man.

circa 1956

Before there were cul de sacs,

we had dead end streets.

I lived on one.

We’d play baseball swinging a stick at a stolen avocado

or flinging a pie plate Frisbee across the way

or hiding-n-seeking behind the hedges in neighbors’ yards.

Then we’d hear it.

The groan and grind and growl of an old International truck,

rusted to a dusty olive gray.

Or maybe it was a GMC.

Or a Diamond Reo.

Whatever it was,

it carried music in its note of approach

and a Quonset on its back

with open sides beneath a rounded top.

The garbage man. The garbage man.

He rounded the corner

from the boulevard to our street

spewing that delicious blue exhaust.

We waved at the driver

And he waved back.

And we stopped our play to chase after the beast,

never quite catching up

but always marveling at the biggest thing --

the biggest event --

we’d likely see that day.

Grinning and yelling:

“The garbage man! The garbage man!”

The garbage man had a helper man

who hung on the back of the truck,

hopping off to tip refuse from our rusty cans

into a monster bucket slung on his shoulder.

Every few houses,

he’d climb up the truck side

and dump his burden

into the depths of the Quonset,

never waving back.

His hands were full.

Little tykes that we were,

we didn’t understand --

thinking he was mean or maybe grumpy.

So we all dreamed of one day being…

The garbage man. (The one who drove.) The garbage man.

circa now

Three score years plus a few

I now live on a cul de sac.

The garbage truck,

now shiny and white,

(but sans helper – a mechanical claw took his job),

weaves through our neighborhood.

I -- and the fellow next door -- wave at the driver

who waves right back.

The garbage man. The garbage man.

At once I am a kid again,

playing baseball with an avocado,

tossing that pie pan across the street,

hiding in the neighbor’s hedge,

and dreaming about one day being…

The garbage man. The garbage man.

Church of the Open Road Press

Selling My V85 tt

2026-06-18T14:31:13.318-07:00

Up for Grabs!

2022 Moto Guzzi V85tt Travel

Reticent as I am to admit it, aging forces my sale of this 2022 Moto Guzzi V85tt Travel model. With arthritis creeping in and a bit of a blood pressure circus going on, I fear I am losing my confidence in always being a safe rider. Having graduated from BMWs years ago, this is probably the best (for me) touring machine I’ve ever enjoyed.

Details of adventures on this machine (and other stuff)

may be found at www.churchoftheopenroad.com

· About 9,000 miles.

· Dealer serviced (until the dealer left town.)

· Never down: Never ridden on dirt. (Some gravel, however.)

· Extras include windshield extension, bag liners –

· and a very cool RKA Tail Pack (I love the thing for overnights!)

> Will likely need a battery soon and tires as well.

Asking $6500.

(Cash or Cashier’s Check)

Contact: dave@churchoftheopenroad.com – (916)580-8858

THE AUTOMOBILE IGNITION KEY

2026-05-03T20:30:00.000-07:00

The Automobile ignition key, long a staple of purses, front pockets and key hooks in so many households, has been replaced by the ‘remote,’ a techno-gem that allows one to start the car while still toweling off from the shower, unlock the vehicle with the mere touch of a button and open the hatch by waving one’s foot under the rear bumper. Quoting a wide-eyed Gomer Pyle: “Shazam!”

The downside to such magic is a) the cost of replacement – they’re, like, 400 bucks – and b) how easy they are to lose. These devises, generally about twice the size of a wad of bubblegum found under a third grade student’s desk, are, in general, always encased in black, molded plastic. Not sure why. In one’s pocket or in one’s purse, nobody’s ever going to see the thing so what difference does the color make? It’s not like a chartreuse remote will clash with the lady’s pink chiffon gown or the gent’s tan, suede Hush Puppies.

So why not make remotes some garish color like school bus yellow or pomegranate red or fly-eye green? The argument for is compelling: The damn thing might be easier to see.

Today, as our long-time friends rushed to depart – given the eight hour drive in front of them – one spouse queried of the other, “Do you have your remote?”

Response: “No, you have it.”

“No, I have mine.”

“Well, I don’t have mine.”

“Did you check your computer case?”

“That’s where I always put it, but it isn’t there.”

“How ‘bout your jacket? The black one from last night?”

The jacket in question was retrieved from the behind the front seat, unfolded and squeezed. No remote was found.

“Did you check your pockets? The ones in the pants you wore to dinner?”

“They’re buried in my suitcase.”

The ensuing five or six minutes was consumed with unpacking onto the driveway, groping in dark reaches of the grip, throwing things all a-heap back into the bag and grousing, while spouse rechecked the guest room looking atop dresser and side table, under the bed, as casting redoubtable stink eye toward the host’s adorable little mixed-breed mutt who might reasonably be accused of eating anything found on the floor that was about the size of a large wad of bubblegum.

“No luck.”

A feature of the vehicle to which the remote belonged is that the car cannot be locked if a key is inside. Quite the innovation! The scientist in me, observing the proceedings, suggested an experiment. “Close everything up and, with the one you’ve got, try to lock the car. If it doesn’t lock, then you’ll know it’s with you somewhere in the car – not actually lost, just not actually found.”

Our anxious friends looked at each other and chorused: “Brilliant!”

In the dim morning light, remaining remote in hand, as my pal’s wife was about to push the driver’s door closed, she spotted a molded black object – about the size of a wad of gum – sitting on the black leatherette console between the seats. Perfectly still. Perfectly camouflaged. Perfectly invisible.

How much more efficient might their departure have been if said remote was the color of any of about 56 of the crayons found in a 64-count box of Crayolas^®?

Just a thought, GM. Ford. Subaru. Mazda. VW group. Mecedes AG, Toyota, folks who make the Space Shuttle…

You’re welcome.

Church of the Open Road Press

CHARLOTTE

2026-04-14T11:25:00.000-07:00

I’ve named her Charlotte. I can’t say why. She lives in the housing behind the mirror on the driver’s side of the Subaru Outback. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her and she won’t come when called. I must admit I didn’t actually discover Charlotte, rather, I more or less deduced her.

We don’t often drive the Sube. Our little electric car handles most of our transportation duties. But about three weeks ago, I needed to use the utility aspect of the SUV and, as I was opening the door, I noticed a scant, silky network of threads suspended between the mirror and the window. With my ever-handy bandana, I wiped them away and resumed whatever task was at hand. Four or five days later, the construct had reappeared. Thoughtlessly, I again wiped it away.

In little time they appeared yet again. I spied them when stepping past the car on the way out for a walk with Jethro, the dog. This time I would leave the little structure alone. I looked at it again on my return. Checked on it the next day. Was it bigger? Not sure, but I did see a tiny knot at one point in their tiny universe. I peeked into the darkness behind the mirror and whispered Charlotte’s name. She didn’t emerge. Perhaps she didn’t know her name yet. I’d check again tomorrow.

That tomorrow, a quick run to the garden shop necessitated use of the Sube. Not clearing her work away this time – it wasn’t getting larger, just a bit more intricate and the knot had been wragged open – I was taken by the fact that it withstood the 25 to 30 mile per hour wind to which it was exposed as I motored though town. So I decided I would check every tomorrow – perhaps when I’m going out for the paper at the foot of the driveway. Maybe I’d be lucky and catch a glimpse of Charlotte at work.

Then came the day of a road trip entailing a couple of hundred slick and rainy freeway miles. Charlotte’s work had been in place when I shut the door and buckled in, but apparently the little web simply couldn’t endure the 70 mile per hour pelting of the precip. That evening, save for an errant thread or two plastered against the driver’s side door below the window, the construction site was as clear as it had been after I’d wiped it with my hankie weeks before. Immediately I found myself hoping Charlotte was somehow protected by the mirror housing.

I’ve been checking each morning and afternoon for the past week or so – thus far seeing nothing – always bending low to peer into the dark recesses of the mirror housing, gently, softly calling, “Charlotte…Charlotte… Yoo… Charlotte.”

That’s what I was doing this morning – shivering in my slippers and jammies – simply checking on her while out to fetch the morning paper – when they came out of nowhere – swooped in, I tell ya – and scooped me up.

With my one phone call I was supposed to ask Candace, my wife and life partner, to bring me a fresh set of duds to wear, but before I got to that I asked her to check on Charlotte.

That’s when the line went dead.

Church of the Open Road Press

(With apologies to E.B. White)

MOM'S ACCORD

2026-04-01T11:43:00.000-07:00

“You just never know what might happen.”

Mom’s last car was a two-door Honda Accord LX. A ‘78. Manual transmission. She wouldn’t own an automatic because “you’re not really driving.” She’d given up her ’69 Toyota Corona two-door hardtop because brother Beebo needed a car for his frequent commute up to Central Oregon and, although it was far from worn out, she’d pass it on and get a replacement. Mom didn’t like in four-door cars. It seems that decades before, some little kid was riding in the back seat of a big old Buick or Packard when the back door swung open rounding a bend somewhere near Pasadena and the kid fell out knocking his head on the pavement. The kid probably died. I don’t know. But that’s why she’d never let Dad buy a car with more than two doors.

The Honda was a pretty good car. Honda’s always have been. With gold paint and the upgraded LX appointments, this purchase may may have been the only time Mom, having grown up during the depression, splurged on much of anything. As a teenager, I recall her Hoover being older than I. And the ancient Sunbeam Mix-Master was still working when Dad purchased a shiny new Kitchen-Aid for her one Christmas – a gift for which he was roundly excoriated.

Mom loved the car. Long retired, she rarely drove anywhere other than to Safeway once a week and to Partridge Elementary School to pick up a grandkid when needed. Every month-and-a-half she’d take a six-mile round trip through town to the Chevron station between Broadway and Main Street on Eighth. There were countless gas stations between her north-of-town home and that Chevron, but this one was most convenient because she could turn left out of the little subdivision street onto the main drag that would lead a one-way that headed south though town; left into the station; then left out of the station onto the one-way leading north. She believed in filling up before it got to half-a-tank because, “you just never know what might happen.”

Once, I exercised some courageous temerity and asked Mom why she engaged in an eight-mile round trip for gas when there were so many other options so much nearer. She corrected me: “It is only six miles!” and suggested, “When you get older, you’ll understand.”

Indeed, I was a bit older when I came to understand. One day, shortly after that little Q&A, Mom gave up driving. “Macular degeneration,” she explained. “I can’t see well enough to drive anymore.”

“Macular degeneration. Yikes. That doesn’t sound good.”

“It certainly isn’t good.”

“How long has this been goin on?” I asked.

“Oh, for some time now.”

The question I didn’t ask was whether she thought she could see well enough when she was driving around that grandchild, but she volunteered: “I drove down to Eighth and Main for gas because I could see out of the driver’s side of the car better than the other side. Left turns always seemed safer.” My eyes still grow wide and my heart still skips a beat or two when I think about that statement. “At my last exam, Dr. Lott, my ophthalmologist, asked how I got to the appointment. When I told him I drove myself, he asked for my keys, which I gave him and then he called your brother Beebo, to pick me up.” She paused. “I didn’t like that he called me ‘crazy.’”

The Honda would sit on slowly flattening tires for years until she finally let it go. I think to Beebo. (I certainly didn’t need it. It only had two doors.)

Career necessitated my move out of town – two, maybe three hours away. That conversation took place during one of my once or twice-a-month visits. I would take Mom on errands and then to lunch at the Olive Garden. “Livin’ kinda high on the hog, aren’t we?” she’d comment as she stashed once-warm breadsticks in her ancient purse.

Mom learned to take advantage of a ride service called the Clipper. At her age, the pass was free or nearly so. With a mere phone call, she could arrange trips to doctor appointments or to Safeway. “It’s so convenient and so simple and the drivers are so nice. They help me in and out and load my groceries.” She smiled over her tepid cup of minestrone and looked at me through her dim brown eyes and smudged – because it no longer mattered if they were smudged – glasses. “Everyone should use the Clipper.”

“Everyone?”

“Well, everyone who gets to be a certain age,” she said. “You know, Barbara’s still driving and so is Grace. Tooling around town in those big old cars. Probably blind as bats. Ellie is too and she’s at least eight years older than I am.”

“So is their vision beginning to fail?” I immediately wished I’d not chosen that word.

“I don’t know, but they’re all far older than seventy-five and that’s just too old to be driving around. They’re just accidents waiting to happen.”

“Have they already been in accidents?”

“They’re all at least seventy-five! You know your Dad had to stop driving when he was seventy-one.”

“But Dad had a stroke and was suffering with dementia. Couldn’t find his way around.”

“And he couldn’t even find his damned glasses!”

I had to nod.

“I was seventy-five when Dr. Lott made me stop driving and I think that’s about old enough for anyone!” Adding, “You know, you just never know what might happen.”

Mom lived independently for at least another decade fumbling blindly around the house, and then in assisted living for about another ten years.

Like all mother's sons, I rarely reached accord with mom's announcements or encyclicals. I sip the occasional whiskey and smoke the occasional cigar. I like my steaks medium rare rather than well done. I listen to some rock n roll music along with some classical and some show tunes. I’ve long been registered a Democrat. Our Subaru has four doors as have most of our cars. Hell, my ‘91 Jeep didn’t have any doors at all and neither of our kids nor any of their friends ever fell out of any back seat of it or any car we ever owned.

So what I think I’m most haunted by is Mom’s ‘still driving at seventy-five’ decree.

You see, in May of this year, I turn seventy-four.

Church of the Open Road Press

CONVERSATION WITH A RATTLER

2026-03-20T09:22:00.000-07:00

“Hey! Why’d you bite my ankle?”

“You just stepped on me!”

“I didn’t mean to.”

“How was I ‘spozed to know that?”

“Well, what were you doing sprawled out on the trail?”

“Sunning myself. I’m cold blooded you know.”

“Couldn’t you find a better place?”

“Why should I? It’s a free open space.”

“Can’t you get warm some other way?”

“What do you mean? Like slithering down to Starbucks or the Plank for a cup of coffee?”

“Perhaps.”

“I don’t have any hands you know. So I don’t have the faculties to pick up a cup of coffee. Then there’s the whole money thing…”

“So you hang out on the trail to warm up.”

“I hang out in sunny spots to warm up. I can’t tell if it’s a trail. Besides, I warned you.”

“Warned me? How?”

“Didn’t you hear my rattle? That’s why you people call me a rattlesnake. My real name is Crotalus viridis. You could call me ‘Crotee.’ But no…”

“I didn’t hear any warning.”

“Didn’t you…”

“I had my earbuds in.”

“Earbuds? What are earbuds?”

“These things. You can put them in your ears and then you can listen to music or talk radio or podcasts.”

“On this glorious day? On a morning walk? With all this stuff to see and hear going on around you? Why on earth would you do that?

“Ummm… Because…”

“Because why? I’d shrug my shoulders if I had any shoulders.”

“Because…”

“Okay. I get it. You’re out here walking – listening to earbuds – and not paying attention when you damn-near crush me. Look, I’ve got a brain half the size of a green pea but I find it more than disconcerting that you people call me the stupid animal.”

“I never called you stupid animal. I might have called you mean, though. Even vicious.”

“Vicious? Because you stepped on me and I reacted the way nature intended?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, nature intended me to simply slither away from danger, but you didn’t give me the chance, Mr. Waffle-Stomper.”

“Sorry.”

“Look, I don’t have particularly good ears myself but I could sense you were coming.”

“How so?”

“My flicking tongue acts as a smeller and my belly can feel the ground vibrate. As soon as I felt you coming, I rattled. It’s an instinct. A reptilian instinct. Pretty basic survival stuff.”

“Well, I’m sorry I stepped on you.”

“Well now, sorry doesn’t quite cut it at this point, does it?”

“I suppose not. And now my is ankle hurting. A lot.”

“And you’re looking kinda clammy. You should wrap that tight with a bandana or something and hobble down the hill to get some help before you start to hallucinate.”

“Hallucinate?”

“Yeah, hallucinate. If you don’t get some attention real soon, you’ll begin to think you can talk to snakes.”

Church of the Open Road Press

2025 – CHURCH OF THE OPEN ROAD YEAR IN REVIEW

2025-12-30T18:01:00.000-08:00

…coulda done better;

coulda done much, much worse…

Escaping discordant discourse seemed challenging this year. But for a few glorious moments, we did just that.

The Queen welcomes us home from our bi-annual New Year’s trip up north.

Rugged Siskiyou County recalls California’s hardscrabble past.

Closer to home: Winter oak awaits springtime near Lake Sonoma.

One of Candi’s many lovely projects.

Clover Springs Security System: Keeping watch over the ‘hood.

Sunset on a Texas Hill Country sojourn.

Candi and treasured friend’s springtime exploration.

FOR SALE (and I'm not kidding): Aging self (knees, ticker) means this wonderful mode of transit’s days are tearfully numbered. 2022 Moto Guzzi V-85tt Travel; 8,000 miles; factory service up to date. Great touring bike loves two-lanes and twisties. $6900.00 (firm). Some accessories are included. [Italian art you can ride!]

Coastal walks are a delight any time of the year. I love my number one hiking partner. And the coast so danged close!

Return to Simpson Camp two years after the fire blew through. So many childhood memories; such heartache to recall what was. Yet, what was will be again. That’s how things work in the wild kingdom…

Meanwhile, out back of Cloverdale’s fabulous quilt shop.

Nature’s own redwood sculpture at Hendy Woods State Park. Had driven past this gem several times and never stepped out to explore. Shame on me!

Interesting things one sees while watching one’s step just outside our community’s lodge. In this case: ‘shrooms.

This little day-tripper came along late in my riding career: a rugged 411cc Royal Enfield that invites me to go danged near anywhere. Always good for a couple of hours of saddle time. It will not be on the sales block quite so soon.

At the Monterey Bay Aquarium, this fella kept a watchful eye on us.

Amazing! Finally – what you’ve all been waiting for – a photo of Jethro. He’s such a good boy! And never a pain in anyone's ass…

Book of the Year: Not simply because I spent time puffing on a tuba (which is still sitting right next to me – thanks Sister Sue) but because the author speaks to the importance of music and the arts in the public school experience. By the way: there are two actual perfect tubas – 30s era Yorks – each owned by the Chicago Symphony.

Second runner-up for the vaunted Church of the Open Road “Shot of the Year.” Rolled by this on that Royal Enfield and was taken by this tree’s efforts to defy the elements – and its fate.

First runner-up for the vaunted Church of the Open Road “Shot of the Year.” Rounding a bend somewhere along California’s Highway 1, I spotted a person sitting atop her vintage Land Cruiser gazing longingly (?) out toward the Pacific. I call this photo Le Mer.

Shot of the Year:

o0o

2025 was a tough, tough year. My beloved country is not what it can be; not what it should be. I can bitch and I can moan. But it is incumbent upon me to do more if I want experience better in 2026. However, there must be time made for what’s pictured in this post. Freedom. Beauty. Occasional solitude. Reflection.

Feel free to join me. I used to say, “Let’s ride!” But now I’m content to say “Let’s walk.”

Church of the Open Road Press

INCIDENT WITH A DOE

2025-12-20T09:51:00.000-08:00

She dares me to stare.

I return her gaze but blink

And she vanishes.

Church of the Open Road Press

Café Music

2025-12-07T09:28:00.000-08:00

Shaking off a dripping, deep autumn fog,

I enter.

The dining room is nearly silent:

No talk-television

No talk-jocks

No Muzak.

Just soft, sweet percolation

And, perhaps, the whisking of huevos.

The waitress calls me ‘sweetie.’

I call for ‘the usual.’

Giggles

– this being my first visit –

and banter.

The kitchen:

Clean, orderly.

Giant man with a subtle smile:

"¿Qué está tomando?"

head tilting forward.

“Esto es habitual.”

Lilting, hints of an aria.

“ —¡Pero si nunca lo habíamos visto! ¡Es nuevo!”

Basso profundo.

Melodious, harmonious, enchanting laughter

– a Julio Iglesias-Maria Callas duet sans Julio and Maria –

begetting thoughts of daisy fields in spring,

and fair weather clouds,

and meadowlark lyric.

And warmth.

Dispatch from a world

– or at least a season –

dreams away.

(My copy of The Times has slipped to the floor.)

Breakfast arrives:

“Here ya go, sweetie.”

Latina eyes glow.

‘The usual:’

Omelet, hashbrowns, rye toast.

Perfect this bone-chilled Saturday.

Command of two languages?

More perfect, any day.

Church of the Open Road Press

Motorcycle Dealership Mojo

2025-11-26T14:23:00.000-08:00

…and the lack thereof…

Disclaimer: The opinion I am sharing is based upon my limited experience visiting and dealing with motorcycle shops over the past five decades.

My local Moto Guzzi dealership just closed. The place also sold Aprilia, BMW, Vespa, Royal Enfield and a couple of electrics. Good selection. Not so hot as a dealership. Why? There seemed an element missing. Entering felt a bit like dropping into your nearest Ford dealership to look at the latest F-150 or the Chevy Man looking for an Impala or a Malibu. “What’ll it take to get you into this baby today?”

Motorcycles – particularly European ones – are different from automobiles. While many who ride motorcycles started out on a dependable Honda (I did)...

... Yamaha, or like Asian brand, some of us progress – or maybe evolve – into enthusiasts that might be looking for something more. Something that might defy definition.

My transition to a European marque happened nearly forty-plus years ago when I wandered into Ozzie’s BMW in Chico, California and eventually rode out on a beautiful black R65 roadster. Ozzie, with his thick German accent talked with enthusiasm about the area roads I might enjoy astride one even allowing me to take his personal R65S on a fifty-mile round trip run up to a foothill community. I was as much sold on the dealership as I was on the bike. Mojo.

Ozzie was famous. On a visit to a dealership in Seattle where I was drooling over BMW’s latest and greatest, when the salesfloor guy found out I was from Chico, he offered a light punch on my shoulder and said, “Hell, you’ll be buying one from Ozzie!” (I didn’t.) That said, more mojo.

I gave up riding for a decade or so, but upon a second or third relocation, stumbled into A&S BMW in Roseville, California. I’d never lost the itch and a lovely blue R1100 roadster, used, grabbed at my throttle hand and wouldn’t let go. On this particular Saturday, Candi, my beloved was catching up on schoolwork in her classroom, when I drove by, stopped and hailed her out of her classroom.

“Wow!” she said. “They let you test drive that bike all by yourself!”

“No,” I responded as I lit out for home.

What was special about A&S? Beyond selection, it was the enthusiast nature of the sales guys. They all wore riding boots and were eager to share their favorite Sacramento area route: Highway 49 north to Nevada City and Downieville, south to Placerville and Sonora, highway 50 over Echo Summit; 160 (?) out through the delta. The list I would travel on that R1100 was nearly endless and with each service visit I’d be asked, “Where’ve you been lately?”

Dealership mojo would prompt me to purchase the 1100’s replacement and a couple of other rides.

Eventually, I bought a used Moto Guzzi from A&S. Shaft drive, bullet proof motor, Italian elegance, my drift from the German to its European neighbor was unavoidable. I’d hankered for a Guzzi after having visited Dave Richardson’s Moto Internationale in Seattle with my riding buddy. Squeezed into a tiny showroom was a row of Guzzi’s limited models and a few Aprilias for the racing crowd Dave likely hoped to attract.

The visit with the owner proved to be less about buying a gorgeous 1400 California touring bike and more about where I’d could go on it. Knowing that I’d already played that card once, I didn’t come home with one.

Later, visiting the Guzzi dealership in Austin Texas, AF-1, while I sat on a white California, the sales guy, finding out that Candi was a quilter engaged in a forty minute discussion about fabric and stitches and batting and stuff. I wandered in and the fellow asked if I was ready to ride the California back home to California I came close to saying yes accept that it was the first week in January and I knew that the ride across the south and over the Sierra would be colder than a well-diggers instep in the Klondike. Still: Seattle mojo, Austin mojo.

Fast forward to life in Sonoma County. Roads to the coast are exquisite and there’s several of ‘em. Add to that, multiple ways through the Mayacamas range and into the Sacramento Valley or north or south on US 101 and I’d landed in a motorcycle enthusiasts dreamscape. My first purchase would be a classically styled V-7 roadster...

...which lasted about a year and a half when I became smitten with a more touring-oriented model.

Entering the showroom of this dealership – part of a small chain with showrooms in Reno and Vegas – seemed different from those listed above. They seemed lacking an inventory of don’t-miss-this riding destinations or stories from staff about their favorite routes. Videos of moto-GPs were not being shown. Displays seemed a bit perfunctory – except for their BMW selection in that BMW requires certain showroom attributes. Although I bit twice, the “what’ll it take to get you into this little beauty today" seemed not too far off, perhaps second only to the practice of not engaging the walk-in customer with more than “Hi. How are ya?”

Still, I’ve enjoyed all aspects of my Guzzi V-85tt except for a service issue – one perhaps NOT the responsibility of any dealer. It seems my sample came with a cracked fuel bladder, one that emitted the smell of gas when sitting in the garage. The part would need to be ordered from the factory in Mandello de Lario back in the old country. Might take some time. Figuring on a couple of weeks, my ride sat in the service bay for six. I’m not sure what the Italian version of laisse faire is, but the Maybe tomorrow, Luigi corporate attitude of Piaggio, Guzzi’s parent group, was doing neither the customer nor the dealer any favors.

Five weeks gone, with a trip to Oregon scheduled in but a few days, and recalling more than one story about a BMW rider who would have been stranded had the dealer not pulled a part off a new bike to install it on the customer’s, I eyed a new V-85tt that had been sitting on the showroom floor since before I’d dropped off my disabled version. “Isn’t there a tank bladder in that one?” I thought but didn’t articulate. A shop with mojo might have already seen that as a customer-oriented solution.

Ultimately, the tank was replaced under warranty and down the road I went just in time for Crater Lake and environs...

... however, after a time, that gas smell redeveloped and I returned to the service bay to have ‘em check things out. I didn’t know at the time that they had given up the Guzzi/Aprilia/Vespa franchise. “A couple of valves under the tank have fractured. We don’t have any in stock and can’t order them any longer because we’re no longer a dealer.” I turned to my pals at AF-1 in Austin who graciously accepted my order but informed me that the parts would need to come from Maybe tomorrow, Luigi in Italy.

Two months passed while I gingerly rode the beast and left it outside allowing the fumes to dissipate before parking it in the garage. The parts arrived – including a 50% tariff – and I hauled them down to my local dealer only to find the entire shop – BMWs and everything – boarded up. No mojo. No nothin’.

Dave Harris and Keli Litle operate a wonderful independent motorcycle repair shop in Point Arena, California called The Zen House. They sponsor touring rides for enthusiasts and host moto-GP viewing parties at a local eatery. Traveling enthusiast-renowned Stewart’s Point Skaggs Springs Road out to the coast is always a delight and David said if I had the parts, he’d eagerly install ‘em. (I knew of The Zen House as I had David rebuild my brother’s classic 80s era BMW R80RT. The results were awe-inspiring.)

My November ride started at 46 degrees, downshifted to 39 and fluctuated into the low 60s and back. The wait time – not two months – was but forty minutes and an interesting verdict came when I retrieved the bike. The valves were not damaged, but he replaced ‘em anyway. It seems the odor came from the line that was not securely attached to the O2 canister. A cost-free, two-minute fix that could have occurred during the ‘inspection’ back in August. [Thanks for your eagle eye and your always attention to detail service, David!]

Motorcycle dealers need competent mechanics and it helps if they have affable sales folks. But dealer personnel don’t need to be interested in where you’ve been or where you’re going or make suggestions of routes to travel. They don’t need to have motorcycle races running silently in the background. They certainly don’t need to entertain tag-a-longs with tips about threads or fabrics or quilting or pie making or how to puree tomatoes.

They don’t need to demonstrate that elusive thing that might be known as mojo. But successful dealerships do.

References:

Ozzie’s BMW – Chico https://www.ozziesbmwmotorcycles.com

A&S Powersports – Roseville https://www.aspowersports.com

AF-1 Racing – Austin https://www.af1racing.com

The Zen House – Point Arena https://www.thezenhouse.net

Church of the Open Road Press

ANOTHER SUNDAY RIDE

2025-11-10T13:43:00.000-08:00

…two hours

and a half gallon of gas…

I decide it’s finally time to give up on riding motorcycles – safety wise, aging, etc. – and then a Sunday afternoon like yesterday happens.

Lazing around after coffee and a three mile walk, the current novel I’m reading lacked pull, the New York Times crossword proved too difficult – as it always does – and a nap seemed a waste of an 80-degree November afternoon. Do I really want to go through the hassle of pulling on riding gear and heading out. Actually, no, I didn’t. But I do so, anyway.

The Royal Enfield at 411ccs is my other bike. It’s the one that requires little thought or maintenance. Lube the chain. Check the oil. Ride. The scant engine produces barely enough power for the thing to get out of its own way, but on hilly wine country by-ways, you don’t need power. Just wind on the helmet and associated fresh air.

Sunday’s ride would be both wind and fresh air and more. Eight miles from home I venture west on Dry Creek Road toward Lake Sonoma, thence to Stewarts Point Skaggs Springs Road. This mythical route is sought out by fellas on big displacement rice-rockets and euro-sports. The 35 mile-per-hour speed limit signs don’t even rate as a suggestion. A pair of road racers scream eastbound around a sweeping curve – rider’s knees inches above the pavement – as I tootle west. They drop their left hands for the perfunctory wave, as do I, when we pass. I’m enjoying the autumn hills dotted with golden oaks, digger pines and early vestiges of winter grass. I wonder about the tradeoff between the thrill of awesome speed and precise handling versus the sublime beauty of the rolling coast range in mid-fall. See ‘aging,’ above. Another pair race by, low-hand wave.

I’ve driven this route from the Russian River drainage all the way out to the Pacific Ocean several times on several different machines. BMW(s), a Triumph, a Yamaha, Guzzi(s) and I find myself calling myself fickle. Oh! The money I’ve wasted on motorcycle turnover. Yet, each one was unique. Each with its own character. Each filling a particular ‘need’ at a particular time. Today’s need would be to get out and enjoy some fresh air but not be gone so long that the left knee gets too stove up.

There’d be no particular destination, though I knew it wouldn’t be all the way out to the coast.

Stewart’s Point Skaggs Springs is a relatively new iteration. Forty-plus years ago, as Sonoma County burgeoned, the long-planned Warm Springs Dam was completed, impounding Dry Creek and its tributaries for much-needed water. Prior to that development, Skaggs Springs Road followed Dry Creek into the hills to a 1900s-era resort and continued west from there to the Pacific. That road was lost as Lake Sonoma filled and the new route was created: Twelve miles of lovely, wide pavement over gentle crests and sweeping curves through eastern-most redwood stands and oaks. Why wouldn’t I ride this every day of the year?

A big BMW GS approaches – I used to have one of those – and a Harley and another Beemer. The riders are in no kind of hurry. They wave, as do I. Up ahead, I spot a silver trailer moving west along what will be my route. Within minutes, I catch up. It seems a Dodge Ram 3500 pulling a trailer full of about 15 head of cattle must be even more judicious on this road than I. So do his two associates. The bovine aroma isn’t at all offensive, rather, it is simply rural. I damper down to about fifteen miles per hour awaiting a section not curvy or hilly enough that I can safely pass the first cowboy. Don’t want to tangle with the next Ducati or Hayabusa, if any, screaming from the other direction. I’m noticing the fenceline, rotted posts suspended by barbwire strands; and skeletal evidence of a five-years-back wildfire – so many little details. Then I pass the second truck.

Perhaps two minutes after eclipsing number three, I come to a junction. Ahead, I know the lovely engineering will end, as the route returns to the original with broken, hummocky pavement, dips and cracks and conditions that will slow down those hotshots coming from the coast. The right turn, which I take, finds me on the western portion of the Old Skaggs Springs Road – a decrepit four-mile piece that didn’t get covered by the lake. Venturing along it’s clear that this section hasn’t seen repair other than the occasional sack of cold-patch asphalt in the forty-plus years since the dam was completed.

Folks live down this way. There are a couple of rustic residences and, somehow, a banjo starts to twang in my head. I’m following a creek’s mini canyon. Trees bending low. Occasional glimpses of sunlight reflecting off a tiny pool. Dodging some rockfall and attempting to avoid potholes that pock the surface, one’s that still await cold patch, likely in vain.

An industrial strength gate closes the road before I can get to the water. Dismounting, although less than twenty-five miles from home, I feel like I’m in a different state; a different world: quiet save for the murmur of the leaves as the down canyon breeze tries to lose them from the sycamores and black oaks; tiny, upper-range piano-like music emanates from the little brook.

Getting off the saddle is good for that game left knee. I ambled a few yards down the rest of the road to the water's edge; there thinking about those rich folk who frequented that resort a few miles east and now about fifty feet deep. Good life, 1900s version.

The return would be just as delightful. Sun, curves, scenery and no cows. At one point I approach four bikes on side stands at the side of the road with their riders milling about. Good member of the motorcycle community that I am, I stop.

“Everybody okay?” I ask.

The rider of a BMW has a grin that would light up midnight. “Yeah, you?”

His partner has a lovely Triumph Bonneville-based café style bike. Stunning red. He eyeballs my Himalayan. “What is that?”

“It’s my other bike.”

“Other bike? What else you got?” asks Beemer man.

“Guzzi. V-85.”

“Really? I have a couple of Guzzis. An original V-7 from the 90s.”

Seems as if everybody has owned a Moto Guzzi at one time or another – or wanted to. "I’m on my third Goose including a V-7 from the 2020s I had for a short time."

The Triumph rider repeats: “What is that?”

I explain that my Royal Enfield, though designed in England is built in India, “but every part that falls off represents the pinnacle of British engineering,” for which I receive a knowing nod.

I point at the engine. “Twenty-two horses.”

Triumph guy cautions: “Don’t wanna use ‘em all at once.”

Chuckles abound.

Before pulling away, someone says, “Well, have a pleasant day.”

Wind on the helmet, autumn sun and colors and knowing pavement that awaits, I respond, “How could you not?”

I’m thinking I’ll put off giving up motorcycles for a bit longer.

Church of the Open Road Press

MY CLASSMATE THE PRESIDENT

2025-10-20T13:57:00.000-07:00

…a ‘No Kings Day’ reflection…

This song of the schoolyard bully is really very sad

He earned lots of infamy by simply being bad

He’d push his way through other kids, sneer at them as he’d pass

But no one had the guts to cross this big pain in the ass

With impunity he’d needle kids and throw his weight around

Trip up the unsuspecting and laugh when they hit the ground

He always drove the fastest car and clutched the prettiest girl

Brag about his conquests after every single whirl

He ridiculed the exchange kid, at school for just one year

We’d always hoped that foreign kid would knock him on his rear.

And there-in lay the problem with which we’d not contend

We’d looked for someone else to stand, our honor to defend

The fact is really simple as has always been the case

To confront to a vile bully one must meet him face-to-face

But that simple tenet is oft tossed out due to angst and fear

Easier is always: “Step aside, make his path clear”

So because we all allowed it, junior tyrant had his way

No one displayed the courage to stand up to his sway.

On graduation evening there were many in the crowd

And I and many classmates received accolades aloud

But when the bully crossed the stage, the cheering it did stop

It typified the adage about hearing a pin drop

He slunk off in the darkness, no one else to push around

Until I’m sure, he stumbled on the new group that he found.

Fifty years have come and gone as quickly as a flash

Our class did meet and reconvene, our history to rehash

The bully did not make our fest, but he didn’t give a fig

In the interceding years, it seems, he’d found a better gig.

To the horror of his classmates, he’d became our President

Ensconced inside the White House where he wouldn’t pay the rent

His bully-ness did not subside, in fact it grew and grew

And though he was our President, he was still the creep we knew

He pushed right through our statecraft norms said he was much smarter

Than those who’d paved the road to peace with treaty and with charter

He took to subjugating folks with skin of different color

And deftly used the tools he had to divide each from one another

He gloried running roughshod over laws from sea to sea

And truthfulness and righteousness and basic decency

Surrounded by like-minded folks or those with none at all

He pushed our hallowed nation near a precipice to fall.

But time does what time always does and soon his days were through

We looked at one another not quite knowing what to do.

A Presidential passage is not a thing to cheer

But somehow this was different, relief exhaled far and near

A few of us decided we should go attend the wake

We’d do it out of honor for our alma mater’s sake.

The chapel was but empty as we peeked inside the door

Footsteps of fellow mourners didn’t scratch across the floor

The crypt to which they rolled his mass was deep and dark and cold

And soon he’d be forgotten like a story never told.

‘Twas sad indeed but sadder still is this dogged phrase complete

If his legacy stays unshared, damned history will repeat.

Let’s not forget the tragic life that brought such pain and pall

And redouble fearless efforts to encourage good for all.

Looking back, by backing down when he was just a kid

We underwrote the awful things he ultimately did

If one of us had glared him down then picked him up with song

Perhaps he’d have found the beauty in simply trying to belong.

Our nation thrives on good will and our care for one another

In joining hands with those disdained – embracing like a brother

So hold with your friends those needing love, the sad misunderstood

For only in so doing will this land be truly good.

Church of the Open Road Press

Chance Meeting with Arnold

2025-10-09T12:53:00.000-07:00

…people you wished you’d met on the road...

Lost to the dustbin of my memory is exactly why or when, other than Arnold Schwartzenegger was governor. Serving as the curriculum leader in a Sacramento area school district, and as an obligatory member of the Association of California School Administrators (ACSA), I found myself enrolled in a conference of educators focused on something-er-other and arranged for the ballroom of a hotel across from the state capitol. During a much needed afternoon break where perhaps 500 of us were milling about clutching store-bought cookies and sipping Coca Colas, the lights in the hall flashed on and off, on and off. The group quieted, someone took the mic and said, “Supes and Assistants, the governor wants a photo op with about eight of you.”

I shrunk to the back of the venue, but my name tag label “Assistant Superintendent Curriculum and Instruction” betrayed me. Tapped on the shoulder, someone herded me and seven others into an adjacent room where we were instructed to line up. “The Governor wants to see you.”

A near-silent buzz coursed through the assembly of colleagues that I’d never met. Seventh in the line of eight, I straightened the tie I was wearing, a black something decorated with images of Crayola crayons. Very elementary school.

Mr. Schwartzenegger – a bit shorter than I’d imaged – entered with an aide, a broad smile and an outstretched hand. This should only take a few minutes, I thought. But it didn’t. To the superintendents this would be their less-than-fifteen minutes of fame. Each one grasped the governor’s hand and would not let go until they’d offered more-than-two-cents-worth on some issue or topic I was sure the governor either didn’t particularly care about or about which he’d already made up his mind. As he inched closer, I realized his smile was pasted on, the handshakes perfunctory and that this was simply one of the duties an elected person had to perform if they wanted to stay an elected person. It seemed artificial, fake. I decided not to play the lobbying game.

Months, maybe a year, prior, the governor had been riding his glitzy ‘Wide Glide’ motorcycle along the Pacific Coast Highway though Pacific Palisades sans the required helmet.

The city cop pulled him over and issued the required citation. Rumor has it that Arnie thanked the officer for his service.

My turn came up and as Arnold Schwartzenegger grasped my hand, I looked him in the eye and quietly – so as not to embarrass him – said, “Jeez, governor. A Harley?”

His hand immediately pulled away and I felt a firm Austrian index finger pointedly poking my chest four or five times. “I bet you drives zee Bee Em Dawbue!” he said with a grin. An honest grin.

I nodded as he clapped my shoulder. Making a different kind of eye contact, together we laughed and he said, “You be safe, now.”

With a wink he was gone to whomever was next and I was left with the impression that, in that moment, Arnold Schwartzenneger was anything but fake.

I’ve always wished we could have done the Pacific Coast Highway together.

Church of the Open Road Press

A Visit to Hendy Woods

2025-10-07T13:08:00.000-07:00

Today’s Lesson?Visit those places you frequently pass by.

In countless times traveling State Route 128 to the Mendocino Coast, we’d passed signs for Hendy Woods State Park, but never pulled in. No more! Bordered on its north by the Navarro River, this gem serves as a respite from the normal cacophony of our so-called civilized lives.

A mile past the entrance station ~ nine bucks for seniors ~ a trailhead invites visitors to pad into acres of pristine Coast Redwood forest millennia in the making. Level and soft, the path tunnels under towering samples of sequoia sempervirens that filter what sunlight makes it to the duff-covered forest floor. Dogwood and madrone dot those rare sunny spots. Sword ferns trace tiny whispering streams.

Towering redwoods ironically have quite shallow roots. Many topple over leaving impressive natural sculptures for passers-by. The fallen giants are anything but dead as sprouts squeeze out of their bark, a century or so to become behemoths themselves.

There is nary a sound in this cool forest cathedral ~ on our visit, only a breath of air soughing above. The wide trail accommodated a chair-bound visitor (with pup on leash) who offered a soft and pleasant “Isn’t this simply lovely?” as we passed. Indeed it was ~ and is ~ well worth an hour or a day’s respite from the above-mentioned normal. It serves as a reminder to check out those places we so frequently drive right past, lest we miss something beautiful.

Getting there: West on 128 from C’dale through Boonville and Philo. About 2-3 miles past Philo, look for a state park sign alerting you to turn left on Greenwood Road (toward Elk). Hendy Woods is just over the bridge a half mile from the 128 junction. Pack a picnic and bring a camera.

WALKING TO MY FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

2025-09-04T09:39:00.000-07:00

the first of about 60

first days of school for me

My first day of public school would be my first day in first grade. Rosedale, my neighborhood elementary, was impacted for Kindergarten and Mom was told she’d have to cart me 20 minutes across town to Sierra View which she would not do because she knew with certainty, “All they do in Kindergarten is let kids play.”

So with Roy Rogers lunch pails at our sides, Mom walked Beebo and me to the confluence of Stewart and Bidwell Avenues, there rubbing both of us on our Butch-waxed, slick-backed hair, telling us to walk up Stewart Avenue because it was straight and it didn’t go along the creek which she deemed dangerous even when reduced to a September trickle, and that she’d see us when we got home that afternoon. Adding, “Now don’t tarry along the way.”

As soon as she turned her back, Beebo and I winked at each other ~ me with both eyes ~ decided to ignore Mom’s instruction and ambled along Bidwell Avenue, passing the muddy trail down the Chico Creek embankment ~ the one with the stinging nettles we braved when, during the just-ended summer, we went down there to wade; rounding the big bend and the pool in the creek known as the Log Hole where the bigger boys often drank beer and swam naked and probably peed in the creek; sneaking through the sinister tunnel of black walnuts and oaks that arched over the road and the stream; tiptoeing past Jim, the crazy man’s house ~ Jim, a shell-shocked World War II vet sometimes was found in the middle of Bidwell Avenue on all fours, coughing and spitting up something; turning onto Highway 32 at Chico’s original La Hacienda Mexican restaurant ~ a place that emitted aromas making my mouth salivate and water involuntarily (maybe this explained something inexplicable about poor Jim to my six-year-old satisfaction); crossing Chico Creek on the highway’s bridge ~ tossing pebbles and bits of glass and road debris into the water; descending into the parking lot of the Triumph motorcycle dealer where we placed our noses against the shop window so we could peer into the darkened showroom ~ Mr. Brownell also carried lesser-known brands like Honda and Lambretta; passing Smitty’s Hudson, right next door ~ though Smitty went out of business along with that make years before, his Hudson sign still attached to the old, vacant building; heading west on to Oak Street; spying the alley where the bracero gleaners who picked up culls from our almond orchard lived in ramshackle hovels; and pausing, finally, in front of the Hoobler warehouse where Dad took our almonds to market ~ Hoobler, we were told, once ran sheep on what would become our five acres.

Beebo and I waited there until a big man in a suit and tie on the other side of the Oak Street told us we could cross safely. The big man turned out to be Mr. Self, the Rosedale School Principal who drove a light blue Lincoln Continental and who would later sell a Siamese kitten to Mom for ten dollars.

Over in the parking lot, Mom sat behind the wheel of our ’54 Ford Ranchwagon waiting ~ making sure we’d made it to our first day of school okay.

Church of the Open Road Press

The Story of Peach

2025-08-07T11:04:00.000-07:00

History: unlearned

The wind was hot and fast and immediate. It kicked up right after the flash. In that instant, Peach knew what was up. At 74 he’d read a lot, seen a lot.

Eighty years ago, the Enola Gay dropped its payload and commenced ticking of something sinisterly ~ or maybe sincerely ~ called the doomsday clock, something that measured the metaphorical seconds between now and some presumed midnight oblivion. Twenty years later, two constructs became real, even common. One was a series of missile bases dubbed ‘Nike’ dotting every fifty or so miles across the American landscape. The other was the backyard-built fallout shelter, plans of which were readily available at the library or newsstand. Both John Hershey, who authored a book, and Slim Pickens, who starred in the final scene of an early Kubrick comedy, perhaps inadvertently reinforced the advisability of digging such a vault.

When the Nike base was nearly completed just north of town, Peach’s father broke ground on a fallout shelter positioned near the water well in his five acres of peaches. (Peach, the son, never forgave fully Papa, the papa, his little nomenclature joke.) The hole was deep and square and, initially smelled like Vina loam, rich and dark. Cinder block and mortar changed the odor to a minerally musk that would infuse the cavity for years. Entry to the shelter was gained through a circular, hinged lid like you might see on the deck of a submarine: crank wheel one way on the outside to open and the other way on the inside to seal shut the underground space. A neoprene rubber ring prevented the inward seepage of radon in the event of...

The unspeakable was often spoken.

Finished, the rust tinted metal stairs echoed with each foot fall. The space was stocked with a month or more’s worth of freeze-dried backpacking food ~ Papa being a hiker ~ and gallon glass jugs of water should the line jury-rigged into the well fail. The provisions bill from the Ski Hut in Berkeley, where Papa got his back country supplies, almost equaled a month’s wages. Mom had been appalled and said so many times, shaking her head and gasping exasperated gasps, as they drove north in the Ford Fairlane with their boys in the back.

Peach and his late brother, Charlie set up their S-gauge American Flyer electric train on the concrete floor, using one of the two duplex outlets to connect the transformer. The single pull chain light cast comic shadows that grew from foot to shoulder. Peach and Charlie’s neighborhood pals, the ones who didn’t make fun of Peach’s name in front of him, liked to trace their oblique shadows on the concrete floor with chalk and then laugh at their masterwork. Once, Peach started down the stairs to surprise Charlie as he attempted to move beyond first base with Yvette ~ secretly known by classmates in high school as Yvette the Corvette ~ and was told to knock, Goddammit, before coming into the shelter. Never mind that there was no place to knock on that heavy circular hatch door. Later, when Charlie shipped out to Vietnam ~ Charlie said he’d be the good Charlie over there shortly before he left ~ Peach plugged in an IBM Selectric, set it on a rickety desk made of two sawhorses and scrap of plywood and typed his college term papers.

There would be no Yvette for any kid named Peach.

Dammit, Papa!

Peach was standing next to the orchard pump house maybe forty feet from the submarine hatch when that wind blasted into being. He glanced at the opening which was now always open: too much a pain in the ass ~ and maybe too heavy ~ to push down and crank shut after each visit even though each visit had become less and less frequent. Besides, the neoprene had rotted off long ago so the place and all of its contents was always coated in a powdery film of loess. Peach faced the furious gale that was coming from just north of town.

Not so long ago, there would have been children to shepherd in. Little ones. Ones that toyed with Barbies and GI Joes; ones that played both house and Rat Patrol; ones that practiced violin and brass tuba because they liked the acoustics even though they didn’t know the word. Ones that needed the strong arms of Peach and the caring heart of Carah to find their way from time to time. How quickly those moments passed. And now: how well they were doing!

Peach and Carah had taken ownership ~ there was no one else in line ~ after the accident. Some moron driving on a frigid pea-soup morning without his damned headlights on crossed a center line. He couldn’t make out Peach’s folk’s station wagon tiptoeing carefully through the tule fog heading somewhere, nowhere. Peach was amazed at how many townsfolks knew Papa or Mom or both.

Kids and trains and tubas and term papers now gone, the cool of the underground made a good place for storing peaches before market. Peach’s peaches ~ perhaps that was the punchline Papa was shootin’ for all along ~ were renowned for their sweetness, delicate skin, and ample dimension. A robust pie would need but four of them. Wearing one of Mom’s old handmade aprons, Carah discovered she could reduce any recipe’s sugar allotment and did so before filling crusts ~ crusts she’d perfected. It wasn’t simply the fruit that gave rise to renown.

Inheriting the place was never in the plan. Once Peach earned his credential, he and Carah immediately lit out for a different horizon, one less agricultural, maybe a bit more foresty. Jobs for history teachers were a dime a dozen especially if the candidate could coach, so Peach claimed he could coach wrestling and maybe volleyball. Thus, he spent three or four years prowling the sideline of the mountain town’s football field as an assistant never quite figuring out the difference in the roles of a defensive guard and a defensive tackle. Then, one late-October evening, they received the call. Taking leave, Peach never returned. With a bit of a resume, some experience under his belt, he figured he could venture home and substitute until something came up locally.

The dime a dozen adage held. Teaching history at his old high school, now ‘Mr. Peach’ hired boys and girls to tend the orchard paying each a little in cash along with firewood and in-season fruit. When asked about the submarine hatch, he simply responded “Rumpus room.” High School curriculum mentioned little about Hiroshima and most years, Peach didn’t get that far in US history, which, he rationalized, was a good thing recalling the terrifying nights when, as an eleven-year-old, he had to crawl into bed with Papa and Mom after reading pages from John Hershey’s account of the world’s first wartime atomic blast.

Standing in the orchard with dust pellets and grit peppering his eyes, Peach wondered how many other US history teachers had made a similar miscalculation, leaving how many now in charge to pass off history unlearned as simply fiction.

Facing the wind and under a dust-cloaked sun, Peach struck out north toward the long abandoned Nike missile base and wondered who among the townsfolk would attend his memorial, knowing the answer would likely be none.

It being midnight and all.

Church of the Open Road Press

TESTIMONY OF A PEACEFUL PROTESTER

2025-06-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

I said, “You must do what your heart tells you to.”

The Guardsman lifted his goggles and looked at me with warm, not angry, eyes and said, “Yes.”

And that’s the last thing I remember.

Church of the Open Road Press

ANOTHER RETURN TO SIMPSON CAMP

2025-05-28T16:08:00.000-07:00

…a Memorial Day Tradition…

On or about Memorial Day in good years, I’ll make the trek up to Simpson Camp (western edge Glenn County near Mendocino Pass) with a loved one or a few to reminisce about 1960s-era visits to that old sheep camp with the sheepherder who worked the area forty years before. [Details are recounted in “Eden Indeed: Tales Truths and Fabrications of a Small Town Boy” pages 186-203] Our family reveled and relaxed in the beauty and solitude of the cool evergreen forests, velvet soft glades and clear starry nights.

In 2020, we fulfilled one of Mom’s final wishes and held a memorial for her at Simpson Camp, leaving her beloved shillelagh tucked beneath a fallen timber. Within months, the devastating August Complex fire roared through searing the trees, wiping out any sign of the camp, and leaving only a trace of white ash where Mom’s stick had lain.

Back in the sixties, a small cluster of oak trees grew at the top of the ridge, visible from camp. Dad said it looked like a Greek Chorus, whatever that was. On a clear day, standing near to those oaks, looking west, one could see the fogbank of the Pacific shore; looking east, Lassen Peak: the whole of my northern California growings-up. As we lunched after Mom’s memorial, I called a granddaughter and a nephew to visit that stand where they watched as I drove a wooden stake in the ground, observing the knowing nods of those from the next generation.

This recent visit found the old camp regenerating. Amid the blackened spires of standing deadwood, thickets of gooseberry and chemise were taking hold. The meadow was back and foresters were awork downing some of the standing deadwood and yarding it into piles for later care; all under the ever watchful gazes of a couple of circling red tails.

Curiously, that copse of tiny oaks had somehow survived the great fire. My stake in the ground was still my stake in the ground, confirming that, at some time-point in the future, I’ll witness ~ and be one with ~ the rebirth of Simpson Camp.

Photo Album 2025

Stepping out of the car at the top of the ridge.

Life returns to the meadow.

Someone has replaced the Zibe’s sign lost in the fire. (I had hoped to do this.)

Nail of particular importance (see page 201-02)

Jethro waits for Dad (me) who needed an 'alone-time' moment back at camp.

Final view of the road winding down the hill.

My stake in the ground.

Church of the Open Road Press

SOME BOOK MAGIC

2025-05-24T14:46:00.000-07:00

In praise of a good reference book…

…and a little kismet

For reasons I cannot recall, about a half century ago, I picked up a copy of Erwin Gudde’s California Place Names, the hardbound edition, at the used bookstore on Broadway in Chico…

…Maybe because new it was listed at $15.95 but this one was marked down to $13.50…

I’d probably picked it off the shelf and looked up Chico [page 62]…

…then Paradise [page 238], then Butte Creek [page 44] and learning useful trivia about the origins of the names of the places near which I’d grown up.

The wisdom of that purchase was confirmed a few years later when I served as a Fourth Grade teacher in Durham [page 96]…

…and kept it on hand in the back of my classroom. At the conclusion of my reading Scott O’Dell’s classic Island of the Blue Dolphins to the class, one of my students asked if the island was real and what was it really called. Pulling Place Names from the back counter, the kids learned about San Nicolas Island…

…and the Santa Barbara islands and a bunch of other one-thing-led-to-another- type stuff found in such a volume. After lunch recess, we always engaged in ten-minutes of silent reading. A little boy pulled the reference book from the back counter. He wanted to find out about the town where his grandparents lived. The next day another one picked it up.

Two or three years into my tenure as a fourth grade teacher, someone donated an aquarium to the class. (There’s a lesson here.) I gladly accepted it, and one Friday afternoon, set it up and filled it with water thinking that over the weekend the water would warm enough to be suitable for a goldfish or a guppy. Monday, I discovered not an aquarium filled with warm water, but a countertop backed with water-logged books. Including Place Names…

…Tossing out some, having to pay for others, I kept Gudde’s volume knowing it was still serviceable once all the pages dried out. Yet, over the intervening fifty years, I’ve felt a pang of disappointment every time I leave through its crackly pages. So much so that I was always on the lookout for a replacement. I even purchased the 40^th Anniversary edition (2004) in paper, but that fell short of relieving my angst.

During those Durham days, I was a regular attendee of the Bidwell [John Bidwell, page 28 (entry) and 376 (glossary)] Presbyterian Church in Chico. I even served on their Session ~ the elective body that oversees policy for the congregation. The session was comprised of long-time members, many upstanding members of the Chico community: doctors, lawyers, university types, educators. Not sure how I qualified.

John Nopel, decades my senior, was one of ‘em. He and his wife always sat a few pews in front of me and the family I’d married into during my first attempt at matrimony. In reviewing his lovingly prepared obituary, it became clear that Mr. Nopel garnered many claims to fame beyond being an elder in the Presbyterian Church. A life-long member of Scouting, in 1934, he worked on the construction crew building Camp Lassen, the Boy Scout Camp where 54 years later, I wed [See Eden Indeed: Tales, Truths and Fabrications of a Small Town Boy pages 210-15]. As a school principal, Mr. Nopel opened Chico’s Hooker Oak School in 1948 and later served as an associate superintendent for the school district before moving to the county office. Career coincidence found me a member of Chico’s Phi Delta Kappa educational fraternity with him, later employed opening two new schools (elsewhere) myself. But, perhaps, most significant, he was the heartbeat of the Butte County Historical Society maintaining files and photos of the earliest years of my old stompin’ grounds. His library of historic texts and references must have been exhaustive.

Why might I think this? A couple of weeks back, I engaged in another of those searches for a copy of my long-damaged book. To my surprise, AbeBooks so called ‘sellers of books, fine art and collectables’ had one listed. In excellent condition. Priced at thirty-five bucks! (AbeBooks, it turns out, serves as a means for individuals to market their wares to an online audience. Note: I normally avoid shopping for books online.) Confirmation of my purchase came with a bit of information about the seller. Enough to tell me to whom this copy might have once belonged. The Chico address rang a bell.

The book arrived. The cover, sheathed in plastic perfect. The pages pristine. Side-by-side, it was an exact match for my waterlogged copy. I can’t say my throat didn’t constrict a bit.

That evening, I settled into a favorite chair with a thimbleful of favored scotch and began to thumb through. All the listings I’d referenced before were there as, of course, were entries about the new places I’ve explored…

…and before I knew it, an hour-and-a-half and fifty years magically dissolved.

Mr. John Nopel (1914 – 2006): Perhaps your greatest calling was that of teacher. Know that even now in 2025, you’re still in the business.

Church of the Open Road Press