doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Misguide hate 4 Californians not to far off topic

CB, I appreciate your patience and willingness to take a broader view. However, I have to question your devotion to the business ethos. Of course we all benefit from those who found and run enterprises, but as Obama pointed out, they didn't make that all by themselves. Everybody's work contributes to what each of us is capable of making.

....We all obey nature's laws -- sooner or later. To be a survivor requires the sooner option. Despite its kookiness, California is trying to be on the sooner side. There is an objective reality....

I was born in the San Joaquin Valley just over 62 years ago. My parents bought a house in San Jose for 15,000 in 1957, taking me and my two older siblings there from the Central Valley. There were whispers many decades later that living with my paternal grandfather was no longer possible, my mother insistent on getting my sister away from "that wicked old man." They would have two more boys there, and the four boys shared one bedroom, as the only girl had to have her own room. 5 kids shared one bathroom. The house payment was 144/month. Dad was an alcoholic and philanderer, working as a self-taught electrical engineer with Pacific Telephone, having started by climbing poles. It was a real struggle for him to afford the sturdy lineman boots he needed, that seemed to wear out all too quickly. We got new clothes once a year, at the start of school. We got a few at Christmas from my maternal grandmother, though of course we boys viewed it as a great letdown to get clothes for Christmas. I did get a shiny red bike that I asked for one year, and had to stand on the brick planter to get on. Dad always found a way for a regular family vacation when we were young, usually involving water skiing at one of the many reservoirs with camping facilities.

With all the bad, there was so much good. I loved where I grew up- the climate, topography, plentiful work, and the prettiest girls in the world. With three brothers we always had an instant sports team of some flavor. I walked to elementary school through the orchards that became Silicon Valley. I went to a great church that was located within walking distance of where Netflix is now located.

I hadn't been home in a few years (it will always be home, and I will always be a native Californian. I still correct people who call me a Texan, though I love this state and its independent streak), but last summer I flew back on my birthday to spend time with my younger brother. We drove around to all the old haunts, and stepping outside on to the hotel balcony, catching a whiff of Gilroy garlic in the air brought on a torrent of memories that caught me off guard, and shook me to my soul. It was the smell of, home. Many of you know what smells can mean and do to memory.

It was so good to be home, and the land/air/ sea and golden light are the same. I was shocked at the shanty towns and tents- encampments on the side of the highway and the sidewalks of businesses that sported tall chain link fences topped with razor wire.

We went to the small reservoir in the foothills of the Santa Cruz mountains at my request, as I wanted my brother to check the actual distance from the house to the dam, a ride I took many weekends with an old Rawlings baseball glove resting securely at the base of butterfly handlebars, a pump action Daisy bb gun lying in my lap. A small creek runs hand in glove with the narrow blacktop that leads to the dam, and at the beginning of the climb I noticed some children walking in the creek. They were not playing. Without saying a word I turned my gaze from them to my brother. "Homeless family. Been there a couple years."

I thoroughly enjoyed the time with my brother, and viewing through older eyes many of the places that shaped my life. I left in 1985 for good, and have no desire to leave my adopted state. But to the point of the OP, there are many there who choose to stay and fight, and if we are inclined to support them, so be it. They may be polishing the brass on the Titanic, but perhaps the nobility lies not in the futility of the effort, but in the ship of state itself they see worth trying to save, even as she appears to be slipping beneath the waves.

Mike