Up In The Hills (Close Encounters of the Weird Kind)

Another week, another birthday. Time flies when you are having fun. Got to spend time with our son and his son for a quiet gathering. It was sweetness. Finished up an art piece “Rubedo” (It is Shining, It is Shining) as well on my birthday. (See below). Thanks for visiting, please leave feedback if you so choose!

G

On The Menu:

Links:

New Piece of Art

Poetry: Three By Gary

Worakls – Elea

Up In the Hills/Close Encounters of the Weird Kind…

Parra for Cuva – Swept Away (feat. Anna Naklab & Mr. Gramo)

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Links: Hearing Voices? / The Ol’ Three Card Monte / Life Thrums with Music / She Can’t Forget / AI Slop: – John Oliver 

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New Piece of Art: Rubedo (It is Shining, It is Shining. Acrylic Pens, 3 weeks of work. I am hoping to be working again with my airbrushes soon, to take on some new challenges.

For Reference: Rubedo

Poetry: Three by Gary

Lay down these words

Before your mind like rocks.

placed solid, by hands

In choice of place, set

Before the body of the mind

in space and time:

Solidity of bark, leaf, or wall

riprap of things:

Cobble of milky way,

straying planets,

These poems, people,

lost ponies with

Dragging saddles—

and rocky sure-foot trails.

The worlds like an endless

four-dimensional

Game of Go.

ants and pebbles

In the thin loam, each rock a word

a creek-washed stone

Granite: ingrained

with torment of fire and weight

Crystal and sediment linked hot

all change, in thoughts,

As well as things.

—

Above Pate Valley

We finished clearing the last

Section of trail by noon,

High on the ridge-side

Two thousand feet above the creek

Reached the pass, went on

Beyond the white pine groves,

Granite shoulders, to a small

Green meadow watered by the snow,

Edged with Aspen—sun

Straight high and blazing

But the air was cool.

Ate a cold fried trout in the

Trembling shadows. I spied

A glitter, and found a flake

Black volcanic glass—obsidian—

By a flower. Hands and knees

Pushing the Bear grass, thousands

Of arrowhead leavings over a

Hundred yards. Not one good

Head, just razor flakes

On a hill snowed all but summer,

A land of fat summer deer,

They came to camp. On their

Own trails. I followed my own

Trail here. Picked up the cold-drill,

Pick, singlejack, and sack

Of dynamite.

Ten thousand years.

—

John Muir on Mt. Ritter

After scanning its face again and again,
I began to scale it, picking my holds
With intense caution. About half-way
To the top, I was suddenly brought to
A dead stop, with arms outspread
Clinging close to the face of the rock
Unable to move hand or foot
Either up or down. My doom
Appeared fixed. I MUST fall.
There would be a moment of
Bewilderment, and then,
A lifeless rumble down the cliff
To the glacier below.
My mind seemed to fill with a
Stifling smoke. This terrible eclipse
Lasted only a moment, when life blazed
Forth again with preternatural clearness.
I seemed suddenly to become possessed
Of a new sense. My trembling muscles
Became firm again, every rift and flaw in
The rock was seen as through a microscope,
My limbs moved with a positiveness and precision
With which I seemed to have
Nothing at all to do.

Dale Pendell, the renowned poet, writer lived with Gary back when, late 60’s and into the 70’s. They remained friends for years up to Dales passing. It was a deep honor talking with Gary and being friends with Dale Pendell.

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Worakls – Elea

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Up In the Hills/Close Encounters of the Weird Kind…

In the summer of 1969, I took to traveling and visiting various communes and communities in Northern California and Southern Oregon. One of these that I went to was on a headwater of a river up in the Siskiyou Mountains. The first thing that I noticed was that the camp/commune was incredibly orderly and respective of the land. (Many weren’t sad to say)

The man who started the camp, was an ex-marine, who went on the Boho, Beat path after leaving the military. He, to my young eyes was ancient; 36-37 years old. I liked him, he was straight forward and kind. We remained friends for years.

On my second visit to the camp, there were a new couple who were there. They struck me as odd, and I had a vague memory (possibly) of the woman. Their vibe was not as chilled out as the rest of the camp. The man was especially jittery. Folks seemed uneasy around them as well. They honestly gave me the creeps. After a day or so there, I packed up and moved on off to see other friends, folks, groups relieved to be moving on.

I didn’t make it back to the camp for a few weeks. When I showed back up, several folks had transitioned on. Among those gone, were the strange couple.

I asked my friend what happened. “They got incredibly weird, always suggesting group sex, or odd ceremonies. I finally asked them to move on, and they did.”

I forgot about this incident for years until September 5th, 1975 (as I recall) I was just getting myself together for the day, watching TV with my friend Mike in his Westwood Blvd flat in L.A. All of a sudden, this incident came on the screen in a news flash:

I yelled out “Squeaky”! as I saw the events unfold on the TV. It was 1/2 of the two up in the camp from 6 years earlier. (I held back the name for this reveal). There she was, trying to shoot Gerald Ford in Sacramento.

It was indeed Squeaky. I believe she was one of the women that I met in this episode of my earlier life: Darkness

Her companion, as I remember “Rabbit” (aptly named, jittery fellow that he was) had supposedly/mysteriously disappeared after angering Charlie up at Spahn Ranch above Claremont California. It was said that he was killed and buried on Manson’s orders. I have no way to verify this. It was the name that he was called by the folks up at the camp in the Siskiyous.

Funny how paths cross in life. Twice with Squeaky in the flesh, and then to see her on national TV.

Over the years I have had strange occurrences up in the hills. Some four legged, mostly two legged. I took to moving off trail when I heard folks coming my way. Although there are good people everywhere, there are some strange folks up in the hills. My ex-brother-in-law had a mining claim up on the Klamath, he told me that he always packed a pistol due to the encounters he had over the years.

I confess, this chance meeting was one of the strangest. I became much more wary as the years wore on. I still exercise caution in the woods.

Thanks for reading!

G

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Parra for Cuva – Swept Away (feat. Anna Naklab & Mr. Gramo)