In the Times of Our Lives, Let's Live!
A lively update on the latest news in the spirit of the great William Saroyan
Good day and good news, everyone! Luisa has her test date.
Remember our July 4th citizenship quiz, Do You Have What It Takes To Be An American? Luisa is the Cuban-born mother and grandmother who has lived in this country for five years with permanent resident status. She is helping me learn Spanish, and I am doing my best to help her with English and her upcoming American citizenship exam. Word came last week that her test is now set for early August in Sacramento, California.
“Twenty more days!” she said, brimming with excitement, when she greeted me Monday. Send a little prayer or a positive thought her way. America will be a better place when she becomes an American.
As for how the rest of us did on the civic and history questions she must answer correctly in order to become a citizen, it appears we have some studying to do. Gary Horstkorta, a history buff who wrote the fascinating account of flying in a WWII bomber for Tilting West last month, spoke for many of us when he dropped us this line: “Now this test almost spoils my holiday. I came close to 50 percent correct so I guess that means I need to study more and in the meantime, apply for a temporary visa!”
Jeff Brinkhaus also had his problems: “Wow! Takes me back to my high school history classes. I didn’t score too horribly, but not great either. Thanks for the refresher course. I will save, review, and hopefully very soon, I too can ace this test.”
If it’s any consolation, I didn’t do so hot either until I started learning the answers from quizzing Luisa. I mean, really, the current Speaker of the House? Who he? And the U.S. Senators from California? They could have threatened me with hard time in San Quentin and I still could not have named one of the U.S. Senators from this state.
The Correct Debby
Yes it’s true and although it may come as a shock to regular readers of this publication, I do indeed make mistakes. One doozy occurred when I recently posed the question, Can You Name the Kids in Your First Grade Class? The premise being, that if you were presented with a photo of a class of yours from elementary school, how many classmates could you identify by name? To illustrate this idea, with the help of a friend I posted a photo from our second grade class at East Avenue Elementary in Hayward, California, wrongly identifying, however, one of the girls, Debby (Burks) Morey. For reasons of accuracy and to forever correct the historical record, I am now presenting our fifth grade class picture with Debby in it.
She is seated in the second row on the far right and helpfully circled in yellow by my photo archivist friend. And to get a sense of what I was like as a boy, and why I have turned out to be the person I am today, take a gander at the young man standing in the back row on the far left. That’s me. Explains a lot, doesn’t it?
By the way, there were two fifth grade classes at East Avenue in those years and if we were running a group shot of the other class, it would include Gary Hilbert, who became school president the following year. Gary went on to achieve even bigger and better things in life and is now a Tilting West supporting subscriber. Welcome aboard!
Lake Tahoe Celebration
More than 100 people showed up last week in Tahoe City, California to celebrate the life of Steve Glazer, who died suddenly at the age of almost 71 in March. Glazer, a friend to many including myself, was a fixture in Lake Tahoe where he had lived and worked for nearly half a century. Many remembered him fondly including his 95-year-old mother Irma who gave a lovely, short speech thanking everyone for coming and paying tribute to her son.
One of the attendees was Brian Fidler, a resident of the lakeside town of Kings Beach and another long-time Tahoe fixture. He came to know Glazer through the West Shore water company that Steve owned and operated and that delivered drinking water to Fidler’s home in Tahoma and many others along the West Shore. “He was a guy who was always there,” said Fidler. “He helped everybody.”
Looking Back, Looking Forward
Two issues ago this publication celebrated a mini-landmark: our 30th issue. It has been six months since we started publishing (originally, under our previous name of “Favorite Things”). Not one to look back too much on past issues—nor track too closely the statistics provided by Substack on readership, subscribers, and so forth—nevertheless I thought it might be interesting to share a few things about this growing, still very young publication.
The most popular, widely read post we’ve done so far was about Steve, who himself once lived in Hayward and attended Hayward High where we met. The third most popular piece so far also had Hayward ties. It was the final installment in our three-part series on high school basketball in the early 1970s, A Burden Shared Is a Burden Lifted. This was the one in which Hayward High basketball coach Joe Fuccy makes a memorable and poignant admission that helped to ease the burden of one of his former players.
But, in a perhaps shocking turn of events, in that it had nothing at all to do with my old hometown, the second most popular post we’ve done was Tracking the Wild Condors of Grand Canyon Country. In it we embark on a wide-ranging adventure travel odyssey through California and the Southwest that begins with eyewitness coverage of a beachside pub in San Diego—
Goes for a truck ride across the vast inland reaches of Anza-Borrego State Park in eastern San Diego County —
Visits the Scottsdale Museum of the West for a retrospective by Tom Gilleon, a former Walt Disney Imagineering illustrator who now makes wildly inventive and colorful paintings of Native people and life in the Southwest and elsewhere—
And finally, a trek to the real-life Navajo Nation in Arizona—
The most unique photo in that piece, perhaps, was our rare close-up of wild condors in their native habitat below the Navajo Bridge on the Colorado River. But another unique picture that also drew comments was that of a mid-March rocket launch by Elon Musk’s Space X company from Vandenburg Space Force Base in southern California.
I happened to be in the right place at the right time that night. While camping in the hills above San Diego, I quickly grabbed my phone as the Falcon 9 booster shot across the sky.
I described this sight at the time as resembling “a comet with a glowing tail, easily the most spectacular fireworks show I’ve ever seen.” The photo inspired Dave Nelson to do a deeper dive on the terminology. A better name for this phenomena, he noted, and one used by scientists, is an “atmospheric jellyfish.” And the picture shows why. The rocket’s vapor trail does indeed resemble the tentacles trailing behind the bell-shaped, backbone-less body of a jellyfish.
My brother’s comments reminded me, yet again, of how many people have contributed to this column over the past six months with emails, likes, shares, texts, comments, restacks, helpful suggestions, and more. Thank you, all!
Based on the number of hits and views we get—about 2,000 per month—I know there are lots of people who read Tilting West who never bother to subscribe. That is okay with me, if that’s your preference. I get it. I don’t subscribe to everything I read online either. One advantage for me when people do subscribe, though, is that it gives me a better handle on who is reading these posts. Then I can shape the content to better fit the audience—give people what they want, in other words.
All right, that’s enough from me for one day. Next week we will return with sizzling new content. How about a travel piece set in the desolate back roads of central California involving a doomed charismatic legendary young movie star? Until then, and always, to paraphrase the playwright and author William Saroyan who wrote so notably about the Armenian community in Fresno, California and so many other things: In the time of our lives, let’s live!
That 2nd grade photo of you is priceless! I laughed out loud.
You’ve always had a way with words, old friend! Continued success!