La Jolla in Early Summer: A Pause

A 'vacation' is just that: a removal of oneself from known areas, from paths too-well trodden. Seen in this way, it can be a physical trip, the usual definition, or it can be a cleansing of the mind and entirely mental.

As part of one type of meditation which I have used and enjoyed for many years, I have the opportunity to travel in my mind to a 'Special Place', where, by myself in a known site of comfort and plenitude - mine is a favorite camping spot - I can have a Talk with myself, reviewing stressful or interesting parts of my life and Making Plans. There are several other meditative techniques I learned when life was more open to new experiences and I was wandering around the University with a loose net of coursework to define my purpose to Others but spending my weeks reading, writing, living in the University library, getting cheap food from the local cooperative (trying tofu for the first time and not knowing it is better if cooked with something else) and walking on the weekends. At that time, meditation was a vacation I learned to take at any time I needed or wanted to. Some would say my whole life at that time was a vacation, an adult man with a small job and no connections, ranging about a beautiful and interesting city, using 'shank's mare' as my main means of transportation, riding centuries on Saturdays on my ten-speed and night-skiing on Wednesdays in season and generally having a Hell of a good time.

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I am writing this from La Jolla, California, a few miles north of San Diego. My daughter, a (?) Junior/Senior in Neuroscience and Physiology at UCSD, is living what I hope is a very interesting life. She called me one day a few years ago in her Freshman year and told me she might graduate in five years with a BS and be well on her way to her PhD. I told her that I expected her to call me some morning from Treviso, Italy, where she would be having espresso and biscotti at a trattoria where, at 28, she was working on her thesis. I reminded her that clear-minded longevity is present on both sides of my family and no sign of Altzheimer's Disease on either. 'Take your time,' I advised. Enjoy life. The course is important, not the speed.

To (finally!) get to my point, I am here after my wife told me to be up and dressed by Eight-O'Clock a few days ago, after which she rented a little car and drove us here, to celebrate our 27th Anniversary. She caught me completely by surprise but I was ready with chocolates and a pair of nice earrings. So, we are here and a wonderful place it is. I will try to include a pic of the place if I can figger out how to do it. It is small, two rooms and a BR, very eclectic and with surprisingly comforting road noise at all hours. Like Manhattan in that regard..

This, for me, is an unexpected physical vacation. Ideal, cool weather, mildly breezy, simple food ( fruit, cheeses, waters), lotsa Diet Coke and sojourns to nice spots for dinner. The Pacific is part of the view, of course, and the breezes consequently change their direction a few times each day but always mild, always cool. Living in Scottsdale has re-defined my personal definition of heat forever. This is blessedly cool.

My dear wife, the Founder of the Feast, has just returned from an afternoon out. I prefer to be allowed to be by myself to read, to blog, to deal with a world closed in physically but,because of this wounderful abundant Century we are living in, at one electronically with the world. But my wife returned, so the physical world takes over for a while and I creep down the steps to the casita patio, which is on the second floor of this house, and relish the Spanish motif (I would italicise here but the computer refuses to let me continue typing normally without a ten-minute fight), the above-mentioned gentle breezes, the sun-dappled cumulus sky, the wonderful chiaro-scuro outside environment with the warm/cool effect of the sun and clouds.. I love vacations.

Being in cosmopolitoland for a few days, we had mideastern chicken Kabobs with samosas and rice with parsely, covered with a lemon/jalapeno sauce also infused with parsely. She had also gotten me a cup of Starbuck's iced coffee, which, through the melting of the ice, delivers a cool cup of just the right strength. Light, simple, surprisingly cheap, very tasty, indeed. Then back into the casita itself, for a late afternoon of naps, quiet conversation, blogging, all overlain by the white noise of traffic. What a vacation.

Some would say these few days in La Jolla are a waste of time, that no work is being done. I would just answer that a huge advantage of a non-fatal debilitating disease is that The Work Has Been Done and that no deadlines remain. As I told my Too-Ready-To-Assume-Her-Responsible-Adult-Role daughter, the path is correct; don't let the speed ruin the trip. From this vantage point I can see an open expanse which is the rest of my life, which I am only beginning to realize is a blank page on which I might write the best completion of my life.

My next blog segment may take a few days; I hoped I might include a few views of this very nice place we find ourselves in, but it will require a couple of days figuring out the connection between my laptop and my I-Pod. Fortunately, I have several thousand pictures on my laptop and have been able to use these effectively to back up my points. This blog segment is more like what I'd imagined my wide-ranging conversation to be like and all due to an unplanned Vacation.