I am a...VERB

COMRADES IN ART Around 1972, seven or so of us local Ojai painters got together to regularly chat, organize art shows and market our paintings, critique each other's work, and form a network of like-minded souls---everyone a free-spirit. It started as a group just to see what other Ojai artists were doing and, if we felt like it, to analyze and critique the work.  We would meet in Richard's studio for an occasional evening.  Most of us were showing our work at the 'Art Sunday' weekly outdoor art show at the bank parking lot on Ojai Avenue. THE ADVENTURE TO OREGON One of the painting group was Sue Gerding.  I had met Sue before, in a totally different context, while I was teaching...and driving the school bus...at Happy Valley School.   I went out one day to climb into the bus and when I opened the door, I found a note lying on the driver's seat.  The note simply said that the writer and I had friends in common...my high school buddy'...

PAINTING AGAIN After leaving graduate school, I immediately began teaching at Happy Valley School, and after that, worked full-time at the Scripps Clinic.  Painting was essentially out.  During that year and a half, I had no time or energy to paint.  On top of that, my energy was focused on learning about life rather than thinking about painting. However, after returning to Ojai, with my part-time odd jobs and limited hours working for Beatrice Wood, there was time to paint once more...and to think about painting... WHERE TO GO FROM HERE...? After Jon moved to San Francisco, I cleaned up and ordered a two-room, cabin-like outbuilding on the Dieges property and it became my studio.  In painting again, I started where I had left off in graduate school... ...continuing my abstract TAKO (kite) paintings.  This time, however, rather than continue the series in watercolor, I switched to oil, using a painting knife to pile on the paint in rich textu...

RAPT ON THE LAWN OF THE OJAI PUBLIC LIBRARY Richard and I soon became fast friends and constant companions, often ending a hot Ojai afternoon lying on the grass surrounded by the Ojai Public Library and rapt in conversation. We thoroughly enjoyed each other's company... Hot afternoon after hot afternoon we would spend together in the shade of the library lawn, conversing endlessly, often about spiritual matters...Richard about Ramakrishna and Vedanta, I about Krishnamurti and his teachings...or we would talk about Lao Tzu and the Tao Te Ching, or about the many strange, ironic, funny, and enlightening stories about Zen masters from Paul Reps' little book, or perhaps something about Saint Francis or some other saint and how all of these insights affect, or might affect our lives. Inevitably the conversation eventually would get around to questions of creativity and the creative process. One day, I found in the library a wonderful and concise little volume entit...

THE MAGIC PEN It happened that everything changed one day when I dropped into the local Ojai Village Drug store and surveyed a shiny glass counter case full of pens.  My eye landed on a fancy box with a beautiful blue fountain pen inside!  It was a Sheaffer Snorkel pen (so named because it had a retractable metal snorkel in the nib through which the pen could be filled with ink). It was one of the most beautiful pens I'd ever seen...and it was glistening in a delectable rich blue with which I could not do without...and the fact that it was a fountain pen in an age of ballpoints made it all the more enticing. And the drug store itself was of a different era and definitely in a different time zone...the Twilight Zone.  To give you an idea of how fast merchandise moved in this display case...this pen was brand new...but Sheaffer had stopped manufacturing the model ten years before.  It had been waiting for years for me to come in and find it! ...

THE 'MAMA OF DADA' Beatrice was sharp, quirky, and interesting...fun to be around and, consequently, people naturally were drawn to her. Beatrice was known to many as 'Beato'.   She took that name after her close friend Rosalind Rajagopal’s daughter, Radha, was unable to pronounce ‘Beatrice’ and so, called her ‘Beato.’  Beatrice began signing her work that way and it stuck... I never once called her 'Beato'.  Perhaps it was partly out of respect, but I always preferred to address her by her given name, 'Beatrice.'  To me, that name fit her perfectly.  And she always signed her letters to me...'Beatrice'. Beatrice had a wonderful shaded garden with a koi pond.  She had chaise lounges, chairs, and umbrellas in several sheltered areas that visitors could languish in if they chose...though Beatrice herself never seemed to.  I enjoyed going into the garden and doing pen & ink drawings of it. To the right of Marcel Duc...

These were golden times.  Left to myself, my days were my own.  I studied, relaxed, and took many walks.  I went up into the nearby hills to lie in the warm sun when it wasn't too hot. ODD JOBS Though my situation required very little income in order to live, I did need a minimum to get bare necessities as well as what little luxuries I might want.  And so, I took on various small odd jobs.  And they happened to be interesting. My first job was just in the evenings...I sold and collected tickets as well as took care of the snack bar and anything else that needed doing at our local cinema, The Glasgow Playhouse.  That also allowed me to see movies for free.  The job left my days free to do my editing work and study. Later on, I took on a job helping a local craftsman, Roy Patton, paint faux wood grain on metal garage doors as well as do detailed cabinet painting in enamel.  Roy was a local fixture and a superb, sought-after ...