A Living Magazine - Day 13 - The Unforgettably Forgotten

A Note About This Post

I read through this a few times examining my tone. At first I thought I might revise it to sound more diplomatic. But, ultimately, I decided that it was better to leave it as I truly felt than to amend it. I ask the reader to please keep in mind that my opinions (even the strong ones) are a work in progress. They are shifting all the time. THIS post represents my attitude on this one day.

* * * * * * *

I slept fairly well. The guy on the other side of the fence, by the apartment complex, was cleaning out his car and dumping things into the trash bin. And, though I probably could have squeezed in another half hour, I didn't know when the business beside me would open.

The pack up was quick – 5 minutes – and, before it went in its pocket, I checked the sleeping bag for wet spots from the drizzle the night before. It seemed fine. I had duct taped 2 pieces of blue foam that I found on the road way back in Petaluma, around the straps of the backpack. Anything found along the road that I can use, will be used. Later, I found white foam packing, formed to fit a TV. It would have been better. I'd even cut it with my knife to replace the blue foam. But I couldn't fit it in my backpack so I carried it with me. When entering a store at some point on the way to Napa, I left it on top of an ice machine and forgot it there. Now some other dude has my nice foam. There is plenty of other trash out there to exploit.

I found a road called Fulton Avenue, and saw a bunch of stores and restaurants lining it. I needed a charge for the Nextbook, if possible. But, what I really needed was some new map screenshots of the area. I walked all the way down to the end, where there was a driving range and golf course called, Higgin Oaks Golf Complex. It seemed to me - in my unusually bad mood - like all the local yellow, argyle-sweater wearing, black-socks-pulled-up-to-their-knees, BMW-driving, 5%-ers were out there at 6:30 in the morning, pretending to be Tiger Woods. But, they were just folks having fun. It was all good... Yet, I did find about 5 golf balls along Fulton Avenue—about 500 feet behind the range, which I dutifully threw back over the fence.

Sunrise Over the Car Dealership

Now, I'm not ripping on a town's pride, but... There were large obelisks erected in between the lanes of this street, trumpeting “The Fulton District,” as if it were a cultural landmark of Sacramento's historic tradition. True, two great citizens are associated with the area.

Robert Fulton, the avenue's name sake, designed a new kind of steamboat and was the first one to 

successfully navigate it.

Guglielmo Marconi - an Italian immigrant, for whom the perpendicular street was named, as well as a small strip mall - at the age of 21, sent the first wireless signal, leading to the first transatlantic signal in 1901. I thought it particularly poignant that I should be wirelessly sending this post all over the world in honor of him.

These are great men, worthy of recognition. The area certainly deserves to have their names associated with it. Nevertheless, as I scanned down the grand avenue, I saw not one single store or business that existed before the year 2000 there--it was just all the same fast food joints, box stores and car dealerships that occurred in every other town across the US, every 3 miles throughout California. I just couldn't get into the hyper-commercial vibe of it. Where was the mom and pop store, the old saloon, the horse hitches, even a classic motel from the 1950's? What does Kohl's have to do with the great citizens of the town?

History was being used to promote something entirely unrelated. "Consumers" were being drawn in – not that they even knew or cared – to an area trumped up to rest on the shoulders of minor giants, so that $100 handbags, over-sized SUV's and overpriced restaurants could provide the same thing that was available every 3 miles everywhere else. I don't blame the city for doing this. And, I'm not trying to be critical of any of the people who either shop at or own these businesses. My only point is this: Our culture – in general – is willing to be disingenuous in order to make us feel like shopping is the paramount achievement of our cultural history. Enough about that. Maybe, I doth say too much...

Walking back to McDonald's, I noticed another thing that I'd been finding odd. I'd been seeing billboards around Northern California presumably funded and posted by "non-profit" fundamentalist Christian groups. Many of these boards have shown up right here in Sacramento. One I saw the day before talked about how by the 17th week of pregnancy fingerprints have formed on the fetal hands.

I'm not precisely sure what that has to do anything. Even children born without brains, are naturally miscarried or still-born, have finger prints. And it said, "Life begins at conception." Actually, technically, both the sperm and the egg were both alive before conception. So, life doesn't begin there. In that sense, human life never begins. It does end though. There is an unbroken chain of living protoplasm going all the way back to when we were one celled organisms. But I know what they're saying...I guess. Ideology doesn't ever have to be logical or consistent to be effective.

Here's one I saw on this day...

A good use of Christian money?

I just did a basic search for billboard advertising costs and found that it is about $5,000.00 for set-up and printing, plus ~ $1.50/sf (or, about $200 for the size seen above), and approximately $2,000 to rent the space each month. It depends on location, and I low-balled this to be conservative. The least expensive amount for the billboard above would cost: > $17,000 for 6 months. I would estimate that prolifeacrossamerica.org has about 12 billboards in the city. That is $204,000 for six months--minimum.

I find the reasoning very unclear for spending this type of money on one single, divisive, philosophical issue. Is it religious? Political? Both? I understand the passion behind this belief system, and I'm not commenting on any stance of my own, only on the efficiency of helping people with real material problems, not soul-saving ones.

There are 300,000 homeless veterans alone in California (being just one group, for example). They fought for all of us. And, now their lives are uncertain. If "life" is so precious and sacred, should we not be preserving the lives we already have as well--perhaps starting with those who preserve ALL of our lives? Morality seems to start and end with the abortion issue in this case. Bring children into the world to save their souls, and then once they're here, send them off to kill people. When they return, throw them away. They are damaged now, they don't fit in. Where IS this "life" we should be "pro" about?

Furthermore, aren't there other, more practical, Christian obligations?

James 2:14-18

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.

Can't the same be said for "clothing the naked," "giving shelter," "giving water," "healing the afflicted"?

There are enough problems right here on earth. Solve those, and you will solve the population issues and maybe even some moral ones also, as a package deal. We have solutions. But, we place them so far down the financial priority list that they cease being solutions. Personally, I think it is the special responsibility of social religion (if we have to have it at all?) to help those who are suffering right here and now. But, hey, maybe that's just me.

As I passed four or five homeless people on my way to McDonald's I saw a very thin man picking up mustard packets, opening and eating them. I gave him $5.00. He didn't say thank you, but he looked into my eyes, and I heard it in my mind.

At McDonald's I joined the lonely retired men, the women dressed for office work and the more fortunate homeless, who were motivated enough to return cans or beg and save the day before for breakfast on this day.

In particular, I was distracted by one man and his dog. He arrived on the little patio outside and put a cup of water down for the dog. Then he went inside and bought them both a breakfast to share...

One thing that was becoming quite apparent was just how sociable these folks are. They aren't anti-social, though they may be anti-society's-game. Two other guys in the restaurant went out and sat with the dog and his man.

In the next two days I would see and then get to recognize the regular group around the I Street area of down town Sacramento.

There would be the guy with the beat up face, the old man who pushed two carts filled with stuff, the black dude who rode a black, fat-wheeled bike, the rail-thin woman with missing front teeth who approached me three times for a quarter (forgetting she had already received a dollar from me), for her "...mother's heart replacement surgery."

After my rather depressing breakfast scene, I walked to the local library, which was only a block away, on Marconi Street. Just walking to it, I saw three other slow-shuffling homeless folks. All of them with their faces down, as if all of the answers to their problems might appear in graffiti-drawn pictures on the sidewalk below. This stance did double duty, by also being a way of not having to see the stares of neighbors who had homes to live in.

At the intersection, a gold-colored Mercedes pulled up while I awaited the walk sign. The fat, shirtless, shaved-headed, asshole in the passenger's seat, yelled out, pointing to me, "Hey, it's Spice Mike! Look honey, it's fucking Spice Mike!! Ha, ha, ha!! How ya doing fucker?" His woman, who was driving, visibly blushed and seemed to reprimand him. He just thew up his arms and laughed crazily. She must have been very "proud" as they drove off.

The library didn't open until 1:00 pm, so there was more waiting. The sun was heating the day to upwards of 100º F. I walked over to Taco Bell (my first time ever visiting one of their restaurants) and purchased a drink. And, they had outlets and Wi-Fi! So, I stayed there until their router cut me off after 3 hours. By then, the library was open and I migrated back there. Definitely an underfunded building. But they had the fastest wireless connection I've ever used at a public space. My pictures uploaded to the blog at lighting speed.

They closed at 6:00 pm, and I made my way down Dos Pasos to 12th street and then back over the bridge to the Garden Highway, looking for a nesting spot. But there were a lot of people all along the 3 mile stretch in the woods and the slope would have been steep to climb down. Whenever I found a tunnel through the bush that looked promising and closer to the highway, there would be an enormous spider blocking the way with its web. They were absolutely everywhere. I realized that if the darkness had completely settled, I would have walked smack into any of these webs. I made a mental note.

Finally, I reached the Golden State Highway (Route 99). I was sufficiently away from the city now, so I checked out spaces around the clover leaf, but they were filled with foot-deep wood chips. My feet sank just walking around them. So, I walked back up the Garden Highway a bit and saw a vast field, I think it was part of the Notomas Park area. It was perfect.

There were no fences, nor signs. The grass was very short and the ground was level. I just walked right in and across it to a spot partially bordered by thick pines and small redwoods, and I watched the moon rise...

Moonrise over Sacramento.

I fell asleep and got a good rest.

Sacramento Sleeping Place 2