Posts Tagged: fresno
Memory Dresser
My dresser for my entire childhood.
This was my dresser for my entire childhood — from day one until the day I moved out as a young adult. It contained many memories. I remember digging in the bottom drawer for shorts to wear on the first hot days of summer; and the top left drawer with socks, folded in the special, partial inside-out way my mother used to fold them that made it easier to put them on. I remember hiding cigarettes in the bottom back corner as a teenager. And some other stuff, too.
One particular memory I have is of the time when I was about 13 that my friend Les Wood damaged the dresser. Les was a strange sort of friend. He was in 9th grade when I was in 7th grade. Les was a little scary. He had a streak that was half thrill-seeking and half sadistic. So, periodically I would have to endure some harrowing experience like being being burned on the forearm with a red-hot butter knife while cooking together, or being hiked on the back of a paper bike and plowing through a row of rose bushes.
On the occasion of the damage, which was around the Fourth of July, Les showed up at my house one day with some fireworks. While I was not looking he dumped out an entire box of snakes on to the top of the dresser and lit them. Within moments the room was filled with a choking sulfurous smoke. The snakes curled out into a monstrous heap of twisted ash and burned through the top layer of the dresser, leaving a shallow crater and wide burned area on the top. I was pretty damn mad; even as a teenager, I had a sense of propriety and pride of ownership. My parents, needless to say, were furious. Les just laughed his little sadistic laugh, his small teeth peeking through a thin-lipped grin.
Les’s attitude and behavior never really improved. Two or three years later, when I was about 16 years old, Les had been kicked out of the house and was living around with different friends, or just in the Chevy Vega he drove, and selling drugs for money. During this time, he gave away or sold almost everything he owned. He sold me his once beloved stereo system for about $20. That was my first real stereo, and I set it up on the top of my dresser. One night, I saw Les and Greg Baker, who had been hanging out together, at Geno’s Pinball Palace. Geno’s was a stoner kids’ hangout in Fresno in the mid-70’s. I saw Les outside in the parking lot drinking an Old English 800 Malt Liquor and extremely high on LCD. At one point he was sitting on the curb holding is head in his hands like a vice, his face red and sweating, trying to not freak out.
A few minutes later he was fine, walking around and laughing. Not many people tended to laugh with him. He asked if anybody wanted to go for a drive, go out to the fig orchards that were once plentiful in northwest Fresno and “go figgin'”. That meant driving out into the powdery soft dirt in the orchard and spinning the car around in circles, raising plumes of dust in a whirl of teenage entertainment. The only taker was Greg, who was probably equally high.
They next day we found out that the Vega had hit a giant fig tree at a high rate of speed and exploded on impact. Les and Greg died nearly instantly, we were told. We never really knew whether this was a drug-fueled accident, or Les’s intentional, final act of defiance against a world he didn’t like and that didn’t much like him back.
In any case, we had a yard sale last weekend, and while the dresser was not for sale, it was out because we used it to display other things that were for sale. I had started to refinish it over a year ago, and simply never got the momentum up to finish.The knobs were off, and only the drawers were really done. Three people asked me if it was for sale and offered to buy it, and by the third, I was starting to think that it probably made sense let it go, and do what we were out there to do: lighten our load. The other furniture had not even gotten a second look. I sold it to a woman for $50.
I guess I’ll have to find something else to keep my childhood memories in.
Fastest Mailbox in the World
I’ve been going back to Fresno every couple weekends to fix up my mom’s house and get it re-rented. Driving from the house to the hardware store I passed by this mailbox. Each time, I was in a hurry to get something and get back to work. But by the third time, I could not stand it anymore. I had to stop and snap some shots.
I can understand the flames. I can understand embellishing the mailbox. But I just can’t quite grasp the exhaust manifold. Wheels? That I could see. Wings? No problem there. Conning tower? OK, maybe. But exhaust manifold? I guess I’ll just chalk it up to another aspect of the Fresno aesthetic that makes it such a strangely alluring place.
Efrosini Holding Neocles
Efrosini Holding Neocles, originally uploaded by neocles.
My earliest memories go back to the house my parents lived in when I was born, at 818 “S” St. in Fresno CA. We were Greeks on the edge of Armenian Town. I don’t quite remember living there, since we moved when I was about two years old. But I almost do. I remember being at the house, although I think it was when my parents were going back and fixing it up to sell when I was about three and half years old.
I remember the look of the old wooden house, the wood floors, the old door knobs, the pulley clothes line that stretched from a window to the far reaches of the back yard. I remember the feel of the hot, powdery dirt in the Fresno summer, and the way it smelled when the water from the bib fell onto it, making dusty explosions that turned to mud. I vividly recall, even now, the smell of the cellar we retreated to for lunch once the sun was high and hot. We sat at a card table and ate in near darkness, the only light streaming in from the cellar door at the top of the stairs. There was a certain musty smell of damp concrete that I encounter every few years, and when I do I am transported back to that cellar more fully than any sci-fi invention could ever achieve.
I toddled around the front yard and wandered into the yard next door. There I encountered the old Armenian woman who lived there. She was very old and bent over, wrinkled and gray. In my memory, she was wandering around her garden tending to her plantings, she wore nothing above the waist and her breasts hung low and flat. She spoke to me in Armenian and I understood nothing of what she said to me. I stood and stared up at her, a little afraid, but not too much, perplexed by the sound of this language. She smiled as she spoke and chuckled around the edges. My mother called and I turned to go, running through the powdery dirt that burned my feet. The smell of Sycamores wafted by as I scrambled up the front steps.
My Brother-Cousin
Tommy asked for forgiveness. Tommy Panos and I were first cousins; our mothers were sisters. Our families lived in the same city, Fresno, then on the same block, then right next door with a pass-through in the fence. Our families were close, and I am an only child, and so I always looked up to Tommy as my big brother. He was five years older than me.
I remember when I was about four years old, Tommy’s family would come visit ours on West Cornell Ave., and Tommy would push me around the block on my tricycle — me on the seat and Tommy standing on the step behind me, steering and pushing with the other leg as on a scooter. Typically, the ride started out fun, and then got exciting, then got thrilling, then got terrifying as Tommy jumped off and I frantically tried to steer until my trike slowed to a manageable speed. Then I was ready for another lap.
A few years later we both lived on Griffith Way. I would beg to hang around with him. Tommy would offer to hike me on his bike to go to the 7-11 to get candy or a slurpee. I would get on the handlebars of his Schwinn Varsity 10-speed. Tommy would take off and by half way down the block we would be moving pretty fast. That’s when he’d simply jump off the bike and see how far it would stay up with me on the handlebars before it went crashing over. He’d laugh hysterically, but then come and get me up and hug me, and then buy me some candy.
I would beg, beg, beg for him to take me on his paper route (Fresno Bee) with him. This meant he would hike me on the back of the heavy-duty Schwinn with the paper bags. I don’t know how he survived hiking me along with all those newspapers. Getting to go along meant helping too, and that was fine with me. He would ask for papers and I would pull them out and hand them to him as needed. We would always stop at the 7-11 and get black pepper beef jerky, some candy or a coke.
There was only one catch: Rover. The huge carmel-brown dog at the corner of Swift and College or so. I can’t remember if it was a hound or what. I just remember that Tom would miss that porch and I would be sent to go get the paper and put it on the porch. That meant facing Rover. That deep bark blew my hair back and set me to tears. Usually Rover was lying around right in front of the porch and I would start to inch my way toward the ivy to hunt for the paper, the dog bellowing at me the entire time. Tommy would laugh and laugh. Then, he’d buy me all kinds of treats at the 7-11. We’d sit around and he’d counsel me on bikes and cars and making paper airplanes, anything else that his quick mind conjured. Somehow, I never got bitten. I also never quit looking up to him, appreciating his spirit, sense of fun, and sheer coolness. But I never got over my fear of dogs. It was nice of Tommy to try to break me free of it. Sort of.
We told all these stories before, when Tommy was my best man. We laughed and laughed, and ate and drank, and laughed some more. By then, he had gone off to San Francisco and success selling bond investments. He still had his sense of fun and his need to share everything he found and everything he enjoyed with those around him.
Once when I was about 17, i went to the Bay Area for a concert, and, of course, my friend and I stayed with Tommy. When my friend left the next day, Tommy had insisted I stay the weekend to hang out with him and said he’d get me home. Sunday afternoon came and no arrangements had been made. Tommy called an agent and arranged to fly me back to Fresno. The next flight out of Oakland was in about an hour. We took off from his house in Orinda, drove insanely fast to the airport, and ran to the counter. He slapped the ticket in my hand, and gave me a push. I ran through the terminal and got to the plane with the hostess impatiently holding the door open for me, the last person to get on, for my very first plane flight ever.
There were many other firsts for me and Sarah with Tommy. And Tommy always insisted on paying for everything. Our first time dining at Fourth Street Bar and Grill in Berkeley, back before anything else was there at all; our first time at Zuni Cafe in San Francisco, and at the famous Stars, and innumerable other restaurants, bars and theaters. My first, and only, show at ACT to see Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom. And to the Bammies, and concerts, and to nightclubs here and gone. He took me on my first hike up to Cataract Falls on Mt Tam, and after the hike, straight to Frogs Spa for a soak and a massage. He loved food, and loved to cook, and the list of foods and dishes he introduced me to is endless.
Tommy had keen senses and became a connoisseur of everything in which he took an interest, from primitive art to jazz music. But more than that, he could not really enjoy anything unless he was sharing it with those whom he loved. One of the things he loved to share was people. He introduced so many people to each other, and gathered so many smart, interesting, and wonderful people around him, he was the hub of an incredible 360 degrees without separation. He was the most generous person I have ever known or ever will know. He wanted to do everything for everybody. He wanted to at least do something for each person he ever bumped into.
Somehow, in a way we will never understand, this desire consumed him. His most selfish act was to take himself away from this world and all those who love him so much, in order to escape the feeling that he had to be there for everyone.
Tommy. Honey. Brother. I love you. I miss you. I forgive you. I hope your wondrous spirit will continue to teach me and guide me.
Obit in sfgate.
growing things
I live in Albany in the SF Bay Area. I like to garden, and I especially like to grow edible things. I am originally from Fresno, CA. Fresno is smack in the middle of the most productive agricultural region on the face of the planet. Collectively, these facts usually add up to some cognitive dissonance for me about this time of year.
In Fresno, you can grow practically anything and reap a bountiful harvest. In much of the Bay Area you can grow even more things, but the harvest part is much, much more challenging. This is often referred to as a “Mediterranean” climate, and to me, that brings to mind Greece. Note however, that Mark Twain did NOT say, “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in Athens”. The correct reference would be to San Francisco.
So while it is true that the climate in the Bay Area is mild and lots of things will grow, not everything fruits and ripens here. It just does not get hot enough for a sustained period for many fruit trees and vegetables like tomatoes and peppers to really produce a nice harvest. It gets frustrating because things do OK, but not great. Sometimes a plants, like tomatoes, just don’t look happy at all, no amount of feeding, watering, not watering, trimming, etc., cheers them up.
As with real estate so with gardening: location, location, location. I am still experimenting with varieties and locations. And admittedly, some things do just well. Lettuce comes to mind.
In the case of fruit trees, which no self-respecting Greek-American would omit from anything but the tiniest of gardens (for example pots on the apartment veranda), I began my efforts with a Blenheim apricot. But that is enough ranting for now; my experience with the apricot tree will be the subject of the next post.