Driving home on the freeway yesterday I eased on the brakes on the winding downhill connection between Highway 1 and the 280 because of all the flashing police lights stopping traffic from taking the freeway entrance onto the Southbound side. As I continued past I could see police lights flashing on the other entrance across […]
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************************ I wrote this essay a few years ago when I started to realize that wildfires were going to become a norm every fall in California. I saw the PBS documentary, “Leave It To Beavers” when it came out and I’ve been obsessed with getting the word out about how much they could help to […]
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Every California surfer lives for October. The bigger swells start to roll in, the weather is beautiful, offshore winds arrive holding up each peak perfectly and summer crowds go home. But for the past few years October has become a fiery hellscape for all Californians as every year we wake up one morning smelling smoke […]
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While jogging on the beach last week I noticed a seagull standing alone, further up on the beach than the other seagulls that were all eating big crabs left over from high tide at the water line. As I ran past I realized that he was holding his foot up, just resting his toe on […]
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I’ve been sucking it up and just getting on with things all week while I recover from ear surgery and it reminded me of a day where I was horrible and mean and terrible to Britt and demanded that he suck it up. Years ago we went on an early season snowboard trip. The mountain […]
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Everybody talks about fresh cut fries like they’re a good thing but in reality, almost always, they are just okay. Ya, if you get them seconds out of the fryer when they are still soft and piping hot then they’re fine but that is rarely what happens. Or, what if you’re like me and want […]
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I walked by an inspiring blackbird in a parking lot the other day. His foot was perfectly severed and had healed back cleanly, with no clumpy scar left over so his leg looked like a piece of dry spaghetti, except it was black. And he didn’t care at all. He was just hopping around in […]
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On New Year’s Day, my husband Britt and I drove our dogs out to San Francisco’s Ocean Beach. We parked next to a guy that was about to go surf the jumbly, stormy waves. Out of the back of his truck he pulled out an orange soft top board. Britt and I exchanged eye rolls. […]
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I recently watched the 2013 Academy Award winning documentary, “Searching For Sugar Man”, about an amazing musician named Rodriguez, that was discovered in the late sixties in Detroit and released a couple of albums in the early seventies. His music is played throughout the movie and I found it to be beautiful and gritty. Both […]
Read more »I saw this dad walking along Valencia street one morning. The giant toddler he was carrying was actually bigger than I drew him because I thought it would look like I was exaggerating. I don’t know if the dad was short or the toddler had exceptionally long legs but I swear to god his legs […]
Read more »I woke up to an orange sky and a heavy brown haze hanging over the city. Smoke from a fire a few hundred miles away was pressing down on San Francisco. For the second year in a row I dawned my dust mask every time I left the house and a coating of ash settled […]
Read more »I took a walk early one morning in a nice neighborhood up the hill from mine. Half way through, I came upon two crows eating a rat. Of course I was totally grossed out but also worried because maybe the rat had been poisoned.
Read more »A few years ago an historically huge swell hit the Bay Area. It was too massive for us to surf anywhere but Britt and I wanted to witness it. We drove along the coast oohing and aahing as giant mountains of water collapsed and rolled over on themselves, exploding into the shallower water inside. Highway […]
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