California Trip, Part 3.

[Note: The formatting is probably fucked. So is the spelling. And the quality.]

     The last day! We reach Palo Alto today! Hooray!

     There is a cat in the parking lot at the Motel 6. It's wandering around and it has an ID tag on its collar. Kathy has run to the office to check and see if they know who checked in with a cat. They don't. She goes around door to door and after a couple of tries she finds a tired looking woman who looks at the cat and nods. The woman shrugs and takes the cat.

     I am very tired. My Dad signals that he is going to stop in the office and get some coffee. Kathy tells him no, and like a child denied a snack he puts his head down in resignation and climbs into the car.

     "Are you serious?" I say.

     "I don't want to make waves."

     We actually drive over to the office to drop off our keys and update them on the status of the cat. After some goading on my part, Dad hops out and runs to refill coffee. This is a moot but financially sound choice, as our next stop is across the street at a Starbucks. I grab a copy of a Texas Hold 'em magazine and order a Large Mocha with no Whip Cream. I actually work next door to a Starbucks, so this is a drink I am used to ordering.

     "Venti no-whip Mocha," I say.

     "Okay," they say.

     The day is fairly uneventful. We drive over hills of dark red and brush, passing small communities that bear many signs of "WARNING! PRISON AREA! HITCHHIKING IS PROHIBITED!" and we talk about what it would be like to share such a small area with convicts. We stop in Winnemucca for breakfast and it is good. I get Orange Juice, Toast and Pancakes. It is a feast.

     Reno is the scariest event of the morning. Kathy almost turns down a one-way street and almost flies through a few red lights. Once we get back on the highway it's smooth sailing all the way to a small town near Lake Tahoe. There, we stop at a Dairy Queen to use the bathroom and stock on caffeine. I take over driving and wind down the 6% grade to ocean-level. I'm glad that I am driving.

     Around Sacramento Kathy insists on driving again. We hit heavy traffic and she does not pay close attention, accelerating towards lines of stopped cars and cutting people off to merge into the carpool lane. She talks about an accident she had when she slammed into a stopped car in the fast lane, and she talks about it as if it was that person's fault that traffic was halted. She drives with a sense of looking about seven feet in front ofthe car, and several times I yell for her to "Stop!"

     We come in over the Bay Bridge on I-80, getting onto the 101. I would enjoy it if Kathy weren't already doing so. Instead, I decide one of us should probably watch the road and I make this my role. Several times I have to shout that there is a car in the lane she's merging into, and several times I have to point out that traffic is bottlenecking in front of us. A point comes where she has to merge several lanes and I am terrified.

     Eventually, traffic begins to clear and we make it to Palo Alto. I still don't feel that I can untense. Even after we reach her house and are unloading the car, my heart is racing. At one point my Dad and I are alone in Kathy's kitchen.

     "We made it," he says, breathing a sigh of relief. "We actually made it."

*

     Palo Alto is a very strange place. Actually, Silicon Valley is a very strange place. The Valley seems to extend from Palo Alto and San Jose all the way up to Washington, and they have Silicon Valley 'local' magazines that focus on cities hours away from you. There are places where you can indoor sky-dive against a massive air current, and a lot of their school systems look like military housing. Kathy explains that Palo Alto didn't have much of a need for schools until the tech age began. That was when young people came into money and could afford to settle down and buy a house in the area, start a family. They uprooted most of the retirees and culture seeped it.

     Palo Alto is still in the process of upgrading itself.     

     The first night there we drink whatever we can find. Gin and Seltzer Water, Gin and Orange Soda--largely, Gin.

     The first day there we relax. Kathy and my Dad go to a few stores to stock up on food, soda and alcohol. I request Orange Juice. I sleep in until 10 and then I get up and walk a mile or so down to a local Cofee Shop, Peet's. It's in a strip mall that promises a liquor store and video shop, but I can find neither. There's a market there and I'm tempted to buy bread and such, but I hold off in hopes that I'll find beer first. Not for the morning, but for later. I will want a beer.

     The Mocha is foamy, a thick lather that settles into a liquid. This is apparently more normal than not for the coffee out West. I mean, there are several places in Milwaukee that do it this way, but this... this is not the Starbucks way.

     While walking back to Kathy's I keep an awkward pacing behind a small, older asian woman. The pace that I want to walk is just ever so slightly faster than the pace she wants to maintain. I eventually catch up to within a few feet and she notices. I can tell that she is increasingly aware of me, and as I get closer and closer she finally just stops and turns to a house. Out of my peripheral vision I notice her glaring at me as I keep walking and turn at the next block.

     Awkward.

     We swim in Kathy's lagoon-like pool and I try to sit on the bottom. I can't quite make it, and I can only hold my breath for 10 or 15 seconds before resurfacing for air. We invent a game called "Bash Ball" with two paddles and a floatable ball. The game is that you bat it back and forth, working cooperatively, but as soon as the ball is dropped blame is assigned. Whoever is blameless earns a point, and the first to 14 wins. I make it a point to return volley's to my Dad's left side, as he is right-handed. He works more towards letting me get over-zealous and return too hard, sending the ball flying out of the pool and netting him a point.

     Kathy judges and she doesn't keep track of score very well. She nets both of us points that should have scored otherwise, often being fickle between what is out of reach and what is lack of effort. Either way, she is the judge and we bow to her whim. The worst offense one can commit is to argue against her.

     The same day we drove through Palo Alto. Kathy took us to the other side of the El Grande Real, where the more expensive homes are. Kathy's would go for around $1.5M, these were more in the ball park of $6M. We drive down through the business district and then through the college dristrict. We drive around Stanford's campus and Kathy gives us a guided tour of what has changed over the years, what has grown... Apparently Stanford does not have Sororities, and I think that it would be awfully disappointing to get into Stanford and be denied a full College experience, for those who feel belonging to a Greek Establishment is part of College. Stanford is the size of a small town, swallowed by Palo Alto. It's a beautiful campus and I am jealous of the people who can go there.

     We stop downtown at Kathy's former workplace, a Speech Pathology Center where she is still an Honorary Executive. We walk down a small shopping strip to a book store called "Know Knew Books". They are remodeling and clearing out old inventory, and I walk out several books heavier. One of their employees is making a show of citing off lengthy passages from memory from a wide volume of random books. It is impressive.

     Later that night we drink Moose Drool beer, and watch an on-demand movie called 'Ready to Wear'. It's an Altman film from the 90's and none of us have seen it. The plot is hard to follow and Dad and I are in good spirits, talking about the movie and poking fun at it. Kathy has her fill of it and goes to bed, Dad starts to download Big Brother 8 episodes and I go outside to talk to Kate.

     I lie on a wooden bench and gaze up at the stars. There's really not much going on there, being embedded amongst a hundred miles of city and light, air and noise pollution both. Rilo Kiley is playing a show some 50-miles away, and I wish I was there. I run over the trip thus far with Kate, sharing Kathy-isms and promising that in a day and half's time I will be home.

    The next day is San Francisco. We meet up with my Cousin, David. We go to Japantown. We stop at Ghiardelli Square. We drive down Crooken Road and my dad balks at the steep inclines San Francisco loves so much. San Francisco is easily one of the most beautiful cities I've ever been to. This is my fourth time there, technically, but really the third in which I got to explore. I felt more at home when I visited the Metropolis of New York City, but that's a comparison of a well-oiled machine to art.

    Later that night I present Kathy with three previously written checks to repay a debt. When I go into the guest room to begin to pack I find a card resting on top of a nice, black leather satchel. The card says that it was great spending this time with me but my penchant for carrying my life in plastic bags has to go. Quirks aside, I love Kathy--she's great. She's just a really, really scary driver. 

    The flight home in the morning is fairly uneventful. Kathy makes a few almost-swipes on the highway and looks as if she's going to fall asleep. We hug goodbye at the drop-off point and I knock on wood that she's makes it back okay. She had previously admitted that she's a much more distracted driver when others are in the car, and the fact that she gets around unscatched as she does seems to back that statement.

    For the first time, I make it through the security checkpoint without any issue. The queue to our flight is packed. I drop a few bucks on an awful machine-made cup of coffee and wait fifteen minutes in line to use the one unisex restroom they offer. We sit next to an older arab couple, and I am ashamed that I size up the man as he shoots me an irritated look that seems to say he's sick of being profiled.

    On the flight I read about 200 pages of Silent Bob Speaks, a collection of blogs and articles by Kevin Smith. I listen to my new 2GB MP3 Player that I picked up at the same Fry's Electronics that Douglas Coupland touts in Microserfs (which, strangely enough, I picked up a few miles away in Palo Alto) for $25. At our stopover in Minneapolis I buy a Mocha and a terrible all-grain hemp bagel, and also a Spin magazine for the flight. I had an urge to pick up a Men's magazine--like Maxim or Stuff--but I didn't really care to read about Lindsey Lohan or cars, so I stick with the indie rock magazine. There's a good article on the new Rilo Kiley album that explains very well the politics behind why they made such a bad, bad CD. My dad tries to jump in on conversation with a couple of jock-types sitting in front of us, but they seem to shrug him off.

     In Madison we walk past a tremendous update to an airport terminal I haven't seen in three years. They have a Great Dane pub now. We are tempted to stop. Instead, excited to be back, we exit through security and I bypass the escalator for the stairs, very much wanting to see my girlfriend and the rest of my family. Couples re-unite and old friends greet each other with an awkward embrace.

     There is no one for us.

     We go to the luggage check and spot one of our two items straight off. I see the other one about to disappear into a black curtain, and I run over and grab it at the last second. Still, no one is here for us. We exchange a disappointed look and walk outside. Our plane had arrived fifteen minutes late, but we hope someone might be waiting by the curb.

     We glance around. Madison is familiar. It's good to be back.

     It's quiet. We sit on the bench, alone, and we wait.