A Splendid Idea

I walk briskly uphill, getting my morning exercise and, from nowhere, I have absolutely the best idea for an essay. It often happens like this: when nothing else is on my mind, a premise bubbles up and I know I can bring it to life with all of the necessary logic, pathos, humor and irony. A piece of 1,758 words or so that sheds light, not on anything so lofty as the human condition, but at least on my condition.

But I don’t want to stop walking or slow my pace to record the idea, so I continue walking, silently repeating the idea over and over.

I crest the hill and cross to the shady side of the street, then travel about two blocks to the long stairway that leads down into the Morcom Rose Garden, a beautiful spot set in a natural amphitheater in the Oakland hills. Volunteers have been swarming the place for weeks, mowing down the tall weeds, churning up the soil around the rose beds, and, now that the drought is over, re-filling the lily pond at the bottom.

After walking half way down, I take the concrete path that circles around the bowl, then descend a few more steps to a sitting area. From a large stone pond, water cascades down the hillside in a series of pools and waterfalls. I follow the path downward, alongside the fountain.

The sound of laughter catches my attention, and I look to see a dark-haired young girl, wearing a frilly gown, posing for pictures in one of the rose beds as her family, wearing suits and dresses, looks on. I figure this must be her quinceanera. .

All she had to do was reach the age of fifteen and the whole family makes a big fuss about it. Maybe this celebration is to recognize that the hard part of her life is about to begin.  This may, in fact, be the happiest day of her life. If she’s like most teenagers, she’ll soon get her drivers license and crash the family car, and though she’s not badly injured, she always walks a limp after the accident. Feeling inadequate due to her physical disability, maybe she’ll marry some rough-edged kid not because she sees a lot of hidden promise in him, but because he shares her sense of having been cheated, plus, he rides a motorcycle. Twenty years from now, he’s be in prison, and she’s wishing she completed her AA degree, because at least now she’d be a paralegal instead of working at Wendy’s for minimum wage.

Of course, maybe none that will happen, but even so it’s good she’s celebrating now, because you never know. As I move further down the path, I think about celebrations, and the way we go through life almost in a haze, until these events we deem worthy of commemoration occur: birthdays, graduations, weddings; the things we consider worth remembering. But much is lost when we focus on the big events, and ignore the simple day-to-day things that, in fact, comprise most of our days.

I pass a bench, painted public park green, and on the backrest is a bronze plaque. “In Loving Memory of Bert Freeman, 1926 – 2008.” I didn’t know Bert Freeman, but people were apparently fond of him, and he must have really liked this park. Maybe late in life—despite his arthritis--Bert came down here early each morning with a cup of coffee and the newspaper, and sat on that bench reading, thinking about his day, remembering the places he went, and the friends he has, and, enjoying the rose-scented breeze, and the sound of the flowing water, and looking at the flowers, and watching the birds peck in the grass.

Bert’s already been gone for nine years, and in fewer than the 82 years that he was alive, everyone who knew him, along with all their memories, will be gone as well. Perhaps the bench will be gone too. I hope Bert Freeman enjoyed his life, but I’ve got to say that reading the newspaper can be depressing, because you can’t do anything about all the disasters that are reported. It’s probably better to ignore the news and just enjoy the park.

Anyway, not far from the Bert Freeman bench is a wide paved walk, and every four or five feet a plaque is set into the concrete, honoring Oakland’s Mother of the Year; a tradition that began in the 1950s, and continues today. I had a wonderful mother, to be sure—as loving, supportive, and good-humored as one could ever wish for—and I wonder what a mother would have to do not only to be a better mother than all her peers, but to gain public recognition for it, too.

I suspect that money is involved. Not that the chosen mothers pay for the honor, but that every time there’s a fund-raiser, or a performance, or a dinner to be catered for some worthy charitable cause dealing with children, these extraordinary mothers practically fall over themselves to volunteer, then drag their polite, accomplished, well-rounded, and physically fit children along to the event. But they don’t ever boast about their children or their wonderful accomplishments, because that would be obnoxious.

Frankly, I can’t imagine any aspect of motherhood that would either draw, or be enhanced, by public attention. But maybe we’ve moved past idea that motherhood involves basic things such as nurturing, protecting, and guiding your children. Instead, maybe a good mother is someone who works in some vital and powerful capacity, and contributes to society, and in all respects sets a good example for her children in terms of economic, civic and cultural engagement, even if the children are reared more by their father, or by a nanny.

Well, I don’t suppose the criteria for this singular honor really matters, and in truth, if I actually cared to learn about it, I could take the time to do so, but the fact is, I prefer to blindly speculate about it. I find that much more entertaining, if not more enlightening.

As I consider the various means by which a mother of the year might be selected, and wonder whether the late Bert Freeman might have been depressed, and consider running back to tell this innocent fifteen-year-old girl that she should always her seat belt, and definitely stay away from boys on motorcycles, I cease repeating to myself the idea for the essay.

And it is gone.

            I leave the park, then continue down Jean Street, wondering whether Jean was perhaps the name of the family that owned this entire valley at one time and who, over the decades, were forced to sell it off piece by piece until all that was left was their name on a street sign.

Meanwhile, I wrack my brain, searching for some thread of memory that would help me retrieve that wonderful and timeless idea.

            I turn on Grand, and a few doors down I pass the hardware store I often visit, and I think about the particular smell that a good hardware store has: equal parts turpentine, galvanized steel, and wood shavings. How many glorious hours have I spent in hardware stores, searching for a tool to accomplish a particular task, or perusing the shelves of hinges, bolts, and pulleys, mentally engineering something of great utility that has not yet been invented.

            A couple of blocks later, I turn left on Linda Street. My sister is named Linda, and my first real girlfriend was named Linda, too, and whenever I walk on Linda Street, I think of them, and how lucky I have been to have them in my life. I follow Linda Street up hill, past the Egbert W. Beach Elementary School, and I have to wonder what kind of sadistic parents would name their child Egbert. In the very least, saddling her son with such a cartoonish moniker surely disqualified Mrs. Beach from consideration as mother of the year, no matter how many dinners she hosted.

But what about little Egbert? With a name like that, the lad almost had to be highly intelligent, and books probably offered a welcome respite from the merciless teasing he must have endured. Cruelty and adversity probably strengthened him, though, and I doubt he ever rode a motorcycle, or got depressed by his powerlessness against the events chronicled in the newspapers. He worked hard, and distinguished himself enough to have a school named after him.

Good for Egbert W. Beach! Now, on the playground of the school that bears his name, children dash around, screaming, and climbing on the safe and boring plastic apparatus that replaced the clanky, old-fashioned jungle gym, built of two-inch pipe polished by the hands of the young people climbing on it. Hearing the children play, it isn’t hard for me to recall being in elementary school myself, and I think about the things that were important to me then, but all I come up with is TV, and ice cream sandwiches. I loved them then, and still do. Occasionally together.  

I continue plumbing the depths of my memory, hoping to find some trace of the idea that was so promising. Nothing. I just know it was good, and I know it’s lost, so I quit thinking about it, and in a few minutes, I’m back at my little house.

It’s tucked behind a tall redwood fence, and is probably the smallest house in the neighborhood. There’s no yard to speak of, but there is a little deck, screened from the surrounding apartment buildings by tall bamboo. Sitting there, it doesn’t feel like you’re in a city at all.

I’ve often wondered whether koala bears could survive on that species of bamboo. I doubt it, but I’d love to be able to look out the window and catch a glimpse of the koala bear family, chewing on the leaves.

The house, with a population of zero koala bears, is just a few blocks from the hospital where I was born. Sometimes, in darker moments, I think that in my time on earth, I’ve traveled only this far. Other times, I realize that I am not giving proper notice to the multitude of events, people, loves, friendships, accomplishments, failures, heartbreaks, unexpected opportunities, misunderstandings, weird coincidences, revelations, missed connections, and fleeting moments of enlightenment that have shaped my life and brought me here.

But I suppose I’ll never remember that idea for the essay. It’s a pity. But it might not have been that great anyway.