2013 Wailing, Dancing, Love

"You turned my wailing into dancing;...

Lord my God, I will praise you forever." Ps 30: 11-12

What a year 2013 turned out to be! It certainly shook my foundation at the start. I was betrayed and rejected in my deepest relationship. But throughout the year incredible joy came my way. I got closer to God. My friends and family loved on me. I met new groups of wonderful people and had amazing adventures. It was actually a great year!

My top experiences from 2013:

• Cambria trip with my church Neighborhood group in February

• Visits to friends and family in Texas 

• Paris vacation with my Mom in May

• Reno bus trip with line-dancers in October

• My friend’s first stand-up performance (which I opened for)

• My brother’s 4-day visit in November

• Christmas party with line-dance group in December

The year started with my wife telling me she didn’t want to be married anymore. She didn’t miss me while I was away (for a week). She loved every minute without me. Actually, she never wanted to get married in the first place. (So why did she?) She just got caught up in the whole marriage thing. For the last 12 years she was just deceiving both of us. 

I never saw it coming. OK, a few days earlier something didn’t seem right. I sent her a note reminding her I would do anything, change anything, try anything. I was committed to her and our marriage. Her response? “Oh good, you’re just as unhappy and want out too.” (What?)

The next few weeks I woke up sick to my stomach. Every day. I really wanted to just drink until I was buzzed enough to drown the pain and shock. OK, that’s a bad idea and I knew it. Instead I went running. Physical activity got rid of the shakes. Cool air and the beauty of the river calmed my mind. Giving God an earful reminded me of His love. And yeah, I sobbed, bawled, and wailed - especially looking through 15 years of photos.

My only community in California was my wife and her family and friends. That was all gone. I had to build new community, and fast. Enter meetup.com. It’s a database of social groups. I jumped in and attended a running group, a French language group, and a board-game group (the latter meets at the Yahoo! cafeteria, which I think is cool. Nerdy, but cool.). I saw new-release movies with a movie-goer group and spoke Spanish with a Spanish-speaker group. I sampled delicious restaurants and hiked beautiful trails with a foodies and hikers group.

My family and friends in Texas were a huge support. I flew to Texas a lot. I took my buddy’s kids to try sushi for the first time. The 10 year-old boy and I explored a cave in Cedar Park. I joined in his birthday celebration: an all-nighter of movies, video games, pizza, and root beer. (OK, I crashed out at 2.) We went for runs and we walked the dogs and we talked about how school was going and what they wanted to do when they grow up.

My Austin friends encouraged me to find a church community. I visited Garden City Church and was amazed right away. I had three friends before the service started. A few days later I was in a neighborhood group. Soon I was on that retreat to Cambria. I helped people move. I helped a church buddy reach his goal of trying standup comedy on stage. Within six months, I was a member, I was baptized, and I was serving on the sound set-up team and the greeting team. I belonged.

My church group constantly encouraged me as I worked through my emotions and had a few meetings with Marianne. The most powerful advice they gave me was around forgiveness. “Christians are the most forgiven people, so we can be the most forgiving.” 

Divorce wasn’t the only change. Besides that there was:

• Moving to Mountain View

• Finding a new church home 

• Trying new social groups 

• Buying a car

• Getting a new team at work and a new organization to support

• Getting a new manager and a new VP

The other group of wonderful people God led me to are the local “dancemonsters.” Remember meetup? There was a listing for a Monday Night line dancing group that meets at a Mexican restaurant in downtown San Jose. I hesitated. Who goes out on Monday Night? Is downtown San Jose safe? How do you dance at a restaurant? (Fun folks in their 20s through 60s. Yes. They have a dance floor, duh.) It took eHarmony to convince me to go.

Wait, what? Yeah, I joined eHarmony. Don’t judge. It’s the internet age. After a week of it I realized…I had to meet more people in person. On-line dating is like on-line job searches. You read through a lot of job/relationship postings. You write a resume/profile. You fill out applications/questionnaires. Then you wait to be contacted for an interview/date. I never got a good job online, why would dating be any different? So I committed to go to the next line dancing night. On a Monday. At a Mexican restaurant. Best. Decision. Ever. 

I had no idea I was walking into such an amazing group of friendly people. Or that they were going to welcome me in so warmly. After the lesson they kept encouraging me to get on the dance floor and try the other line dances (the easy ones, anyway).  That led to a Reno dancing trip and Friday nights at the Saddle Rack country dance club. (And some Saturday nights.)

2013 is done. I’m single again after 15 years. That sucks. I miss sharing experiences with someone special. But I’m thankful for God’s blessings. I love my friends from dancing, church, work and Austin. Thank you for everything you did for me this year! 

(I'm excited about 2014. I’m taking vacations to Argentina and France and I’m working on Spanish and West Coast Swing.)

78 Hours In Silicon Valley - My Brother Comes for a Visit

My brother Josh came to see me a couple of weeks ago. I wanted the optimum mix of novelty, conversation, and beer. I came up with enough to fill a week. Or two. Complex Excel spreadsheet were involved. Here’s how it went down, a la the New York Times “36 hours in…”

SATURDAY 

11 am.

1. Lunch For All Tastes

There are over 50 restaurants on Castro Street in Mountain View. By definition, the entire Silicon Valley is a Mountain View. Castro Street has multiple Mexican, Italian, Indian, Irish, Chinese, Japanese, Greek and American restaurants, to pick a view. We chose a greek restaurant called Ephesus. It was quiet on a Saturday afternoon and the food was delicious. While our food was prepared, I made Josh fill out some complicated questionnaires so we could start planning our days.

After lunch we walked the length of Castro street just to get some fresh air and exercise. Josh took photos of Le Boulanger, a bakery chain in the bay area. On the way back we passed Bier Haus - a favorite beer garden of mine - and saw we had just missed the free beer they were serving to celebrate their new name. Or not. The co-owner in - lederhosen - informed us the free beer was still flowing. I had a half-liter of delicious WinterBraun from Lost Cost. We realized we were sitting next to a guy I’d met on a previous afternoon at the same place. That’s a beer garden!

After the free beer we sampled the espresso at Red Rock coffee. If you like your expresso sour, this is the place for you. I needed chocolate truffles with mine.

1 pm

2. Nice to Mead You

We took a 30 minute ride on the light rail to the Rabbit’s Foot Meadery. Mead is anything brewed from fermented honey, whether it be wine, beer, or cider. Josh had the tasting flight: 2 wines, 2 beers, 3 ciders, and the Chocolate Raspberry Love port. I had a couple pints of Death By Raspberry, which is Raspberry Cider with a splash of Raspberry Mead wine and the Chocolate Raspberry port. The tasty room staff are as eclectic as the hip office park location.

7 pm

3. Hot Hot Pot

If you have to wait 30 minutes for a table, it must be a good place. Shabuway on Castro Street did not disappoint. The thin-sliced lamb that you cook yourself in a boiling pot of miso broth is a delight on a cool evening. Maybe we shouldn’t have made it spicy, since they’re serious about it. At least it cleared out our sinuses.

SUNDAY

10 am

4. Grown Here

There must be a dozen Farmers Markets in the bay area, with vendors coming from all over California. Campbell is known for having one of the best.  Josh took photos of the stands and their arrangements as research. I took photos of colorful stuff. We hadn’t eaten breakfast before the market, so it was nice to get lots of samples: grapes, apples, and pluots (plum-apricot hybrids); cookies, hummus, and pie. Mmmm…pie. The bakery had a sign that read “I’m pie-curious”. At another bakery we had to ask what an epi was. (A denser baguette, baked to look like a wheat stalk.)

As the samples wore off we needed real sustenance - aka brunch. We decided on Aqui Cal-Mex. Josh got a fancy burrito. I had the turkey meatballs with mashed sweet potatoes and a polenta cake. And a mimosa with frozen margarita in the center.

Noon

5. Honky Tonk Blues

Up until the ‘80s, the entire Silicon Valley was orchards. Entertainment was Honky Tonk bars, like Saddle Rack. It has since moved out of the valley to Fremont, and is usually filled with city-folk celebrating a birthday or bachelorette party. Today there was a country dance lesson event. We met a couple of my Reno trip friends. After a line dance lesson, Josh worked on the beginner 2-step while I tried my hand at the intermediate class. After the lessons we stayed for a few hours dancing to whatever songs the DJ selected.

4 pm

6. Garden City

San Jose was once known as the Garden City. There are several new churches springing up to minister to the vast and divers population. Josh accompanied me to Garden City church and met all my church friends, who were all really excited to meet him as well. 

6 pm

7. House of Yards

The Yard House has a huge beer selection and gets its name from the half-yards of beer they serve. The six of us from church stuck to pints. Josh got to try some new dark beers that he really enjoyed. After dinner we walked past the fancy shops that make up the Santana Row outdoor mall.

MONDAY

9 am

8. Just Peaking

The Bay Area has tons of parks, “open spaces” and other areas to hike full of forests and mountains. Mission Peak in Fremont offers a well traveled path up to an amazing vista of the bay, the valley, and the Santa Cruz mountains. It’s 3 miles to the peak, and the weekends can be crowded, but the weekday was much quieter. We saw - and heard - cattle on the way up. Then we saw a fox. I still don’t know what the fox says. Then we heard the chirping of a smoke detector with a dead battery. Turns out it was actually a ground squirrel - probably on sentry duty, warning about the fox. Later on we saw a falcon perched on a fence post. It looked like it was in the mood for some squirrel meal. The 6 mile round trip took just under 3 hours, giving us plenty of time for a range of conversation topics.

Noon

9. Ramen Without Styrofoam 

For lunch we chose an authentic Japanese Ramen spot called Dohatsuten. It had good reviews on Yelp and lived up to them. Exceeded them, even. Afterwards we got espressos and chocolate-covered madeleines at Mission coffee shop. Still sour, but only half as much as in Mountain View. Enough to give me some extra energy for the hour-long drive to Josh’s farm.

2 pm

10. We’re Farming and We Grow It

The farm turned was a 10-acre organic oasis sheltered from the surrounding open-field crop rotations by a wall of Eucalyptus trees. Their main crops are figs, rosemary, and green garlic. An entire section was just rosemary bushes growing wild. Josh got tons of info. I got some good fresh air time. We stopped for another espresso before heading back to the South Bay. 

7 pm 

11. I Dance the Line

A local Meet-Up teaches line dancing in the bar area / dance floor of the Mexico Lindo restaurant in the middle of San Jose. It’s called Mojo Monday. Everyone was excited to meet Josh. He had a blast and we stayed until the place was about to close down. 

TUESDAY

10 am

12. The Monarchs Will See You Now

Natural Bridges park in Santa Cruz is an over-wintering station for Monarch butterflies. We made the drive over the winding highway 17 and stopped at Emily’s bakery for a hot turkey and cheese croissant a cheese scone and some lattes. Fueled up, we headed to the monarch grove. At first we only saw a couple monarchs flying around and I thought the trip might have been a waste. Then we read the signs explaining that the clumps of dead leaves in the Eucalyptus trees were dormant monarchs. Sure enough, a Stellar’s jay showed up and munched on one, ripping off the poisonous wings first, and causing several of the monarchs to scatter. Visit after noon and they’ll be more active, having soaked up the sun’s rays.

A bus load of school kids showed up and we took that as our cue to move to the beach. We listened to the waves, watched the pelicans, and admired the rocky “bridge” formation. A while later the kids followed us, so we headed back to the car. We pulled around for a different view of the natural bridge, and then cruised the oceanside drive. The rocky banks leading to the beaches are covered with an “ice plant”. It’s a succulent that a native of South Africa. Introduced to keep the ground cover, now it’s considered a menace, like kudzu in the South.

Noon

13. Sweet French Cookies and Celebrity Mug Shots

We stopped at a charcuterie and - another - bakery, where I got macarons, which are soft french cookies that form a sandwich around a sweet creamy filling. Yum! Then we went to a burger shop called “Burger.” We sampled about 10 beers each before deciding on some juicy dark pints to go along with our burgers. When we placed our food order, we were given a mug shot of Matthew McConaughey. Classy!

1 pm

14. Cruisin’ the Pacific Coast

W drove highway 1 all the way to San Francisco. Locals call it PCH - Pacific Coast Highway. Josh was fascinated by the farms along the ocean. The ocean views didn’t disappoint either, despite the grey, cloudy winter weather. We stopped in Half Moon Bay for even less bitter espresso, then continued up to San Francisco.

2 pm

15. Foodies in the Mission District

We had been given a mission to accomplish in the Mission District. Reconnoiter the bakery called La Tartine. We arrived after a perilous parallel parking performance. Research photos were taken, and a massive Lemon Meringue cake was purchased for a party that evening. From there we walked to the Yelp-recommended chocolate shop called Dandelion. They specialize in single-source chocolate beans from tropical destinations like Madagascar and Belize and you can see the entire production area. It was like a Krispy Kreme for chocolate bars. Next door is another artisanal bakery called Craftsman and Wolves. I ordered one of everything. Then I canceled my order because my stomach wasn’t big enough, nor was my wallet.

THE DETAILS

I'm not going to spell it all out for you. You can use Google to find the addresses and websites on your own. I won’t baby you like the New York Times does

LODGING

Josh stayed with me in Mountain View. The fold-out couch is always at your disposal.

Food, Friends, and Murrrder!

How’s that for a title? Here’s how it went down. Thursday night I ate dinner with five church friends from Mountain View. One of them is moving back to the East Coast, and had a craving for Ethiopian food before he left. So we carpooled all the way down to San Jose, where we enjoyed a delicious Ethiopian meal, family-style. No utensils, just our hands.

The topic of mead came up over dinner. Mead is “wine” made from fermented honey. I mentioned the Rabbit’s Foot Meadery in Sunnyvale. So a few of us went there Friday afternoon. OK - I left work a little early; it was the beginning of a long weekend after all. I hadn’t been there in a month and I was missing my Death By Raspberry. That’s Raspberry cider + Raspberry mead + a dash of Raspberry Chocolate Love port.

Saturday I was double-booked for the evening. Mountain View friends invited me to a townhouse-warming event with do-it-yourself yakitori. I had no idea what yakitori was, but it sounded like food, probably Japanese, so I was in 100%. It looks like yakitori is Japanese for kebabs. I was excited about the scallops, intrigued by the chicken hearts, and easily sold on the spicy japanese sausage. On a stick. The scallops couldn't hang on the skewer, but they were delicious anyway. It was all really good.

Next up was Sunnyvale for build your own taco night. One of the guests that night was a very friendly pug named Frank. That’s right, just like in Men In Black. Except he was doing a great job keeping his cover; didn’t say a word. The hosts are heading off soon for a vacation to Italy - which makes me very envious.

So that’s the deal with friends and food. What else was there? Oh, yeah! Murrrder!

My Wednesday night church group put on a murder mystery night. It was a western theme, and the 20 of us had to act out parts and discover who committed the murder. (No guests were harmed in the making of this event.) I was given the role of a fine, upstanding US Marshal. As a bonus, I got to check the pulse of the victim, declare him dead, and then perform a few speaking parts related to the instructions, the evidence, and lastly the revelation of the murderer.  As a bonus, I actually guessed the culprit. I didn’t pick up on any of the clues; I just had a hunch about the guy. Isn’t that how it works in real life?

If all that wasn’t enough, I also went to Spanish conversation night on Tuesday, got my car washed for free and signed up for French wine tasting on the beach next Saturday. All in all, a really fun week. And it was just capped off by a rainbow! (Double rainbow!!)

Blueberries, Razors, Moving, and other Random Stuff

Blueberries are back! Yay! That makes me happy. Cherries will be here in a couple weeks, sending me to further fits of delight, followed by pluots (yummy, juicy, fruity pluots). Apples and mandarin oranges are gone, having kept me satisfied for the first 4 months of the year. I’m going to have to buy a pie dish so I can make a blueberry cream pie and eat the whole darn thing myself. Probably in one sitting.

We had a heat wave last weekend, meaning it got up to 88 degrees or so. There’s no AC in the house. It cools down overnight, or I’d be a puddle. I see a fan purchase in my future. Probably at 90 degrees.

I recently fell for an act of pure marketing genius. A product was reviewed on a money podcast I listen to. Now, a money podcast should make me more prudent about my spending. Oh, no. I paid $25 for a shaving set: razor, 3 blades, and shaving cream. The brand is Harry’s. You pay more for the razor, but less for the blades, because they cut out the middlemen. It’s not a good time to be a middleman. Only a front-man.

A few days later I tried the razor. (It wasn't delayed gratification; it's just that I only shave 3 times a week.) It was...amazing! It felt more like a face massage than a razor. The cartridge has 5 blades! (Take that, quattro!) It’s as big as those gummy hands we used to thwap each other with. And it’s flexible. So it exerts almost no pressure on your face. I was stunned. At the rate I shave, I’m probably set for the rest of the year.

The best part of my week was probably on Sunday morning. I got to help a friend from church move from Los Gatos to Campbell. You might think that moving is just exploiting free labor. (There were about 6 of us helping altogether.) But I really enjoyed being part of a fun team. (Extrovert!) And packing a U-Haul is like playing tetris to me, which is like catnip to a kitty. It was packed and unpacked in less than 2 hours and we were done by 10:30. Which gave me plenty of time to meet a friend - and her poodle puppy - for lunch.

Cocoa, the poodle puppy

Once again, I spent several hours each day looking at car postings on craigslist, trying to weed out the good from the rust-buckets. In the end, I gave up and joined a local credit union so that they can find me a car. I’m done.

I’ve been listening to recent sermons from Gateway Church in Austin about Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, and our tendency to try to fix other people. Or to change them. (How many psychologists does it take to change a lightbulb? One, but the lightbulb has to really want to change.) I'm trying to turn it around and think about what I need to change in me first.

Roses are growing like weeds all around: at work, in downtown, even along the walkway to my house. I stopped anyway to smell them. Ah.

Downtown Mountain View Rose-Weeds