Jack Burns Lives!

Journey to The Shasta Nation

Pics are here.

So, the big California trip is nearing an end. As I peck, tap, tap, tap…I’m trapped on a missile moving at 500 miles per hour with several dozen other tourists, peering over the edge into the abyss, contemplating my recent journey into the Shasta Nation. NorCal.

An inaugural trip for everyone but me and my daughter. A vacation I felt would offer something for everyone. Nature and all sorts of cultural curiosities. Food, literary sites, parks, oceans, mountains, trails, museums.

We spent two days in what’s left of the real San Francisco, four days in and around posh Carmel and the spectacular Big Sur coastline and the last day in the primeval, awe inspiring redwood forests of Big Basin.

Overall, a good time, though tiring. And if there is a weather goddess, she was on our side, blessing us with seven straight days of sunshine and reasonable temps. Pretty much the norm for NorCal in summer, but I like to think luck was finally on my side.

We buried our toes in warm sand, were awed by 300 foot redwoods, watched lizards “posture” on rocks and saw the fog roll in off the bay. The Museum of Modern Art was a highlight, featuring Picasso, Matisse, Warhol and interesting new art from artists like Felix Schramm. We drove across the Golden Gate Bridge for the first time and enjoyed stacks of hot pancakes at Mama’s and at Katy’s. I finally made it Tor House, only to be disappointed that it was closed. Not to be deterred, I jumped the fence and explored.

Jeffers would have approved by rebellion.

Made our way to the Beat Museum, an exploitative disappointment decorated by blown up Wikipedia-like biographies, photos and copies of original book printings. Perhaps I’m too harsh, and it will improve. City Lights Bookstore was what I expected and more. I read Snyder, Welch, Ferlinghetti and Kerouac and imagined what it was like to be there when all the cool stuff went down. Listened to The Momas and The Papas driving through Haight-Ashbury, thought about what is was like during the Summer of Love and why we don’t have more Summer’s of Love.

We laughed and loved and completely wore ourselves out seeing all that we could see.

We saw friends, made new friends, scampered up hills and communed with the locals, human and non-human.

I was often moved to tears, simply from the joy of knowing my wife and kids were having a good time and that I was able to provide such a vacation before the children moved off, married and started their own families. I wanted so badly to do something nice for all them. In the end, I believe I achieved my goal.

Allison speaks of living there. A real shocker. Something I never thought I would hear from my deeply Southern rooted soul mate.

They mean everything, and without them, my life is nothing. So, I give thanks to the Shasta Nation for allowing us safe passage and blessing my family with its awesome sights, smells, sounds and tastes. It’s truly like no other place on earth.

Live there? Another visit? Not so sure about either.

Thanks to the airline, hotels and banks (corporations), I spent a good portion of the trip in emotional turmoil. Lost luggage, a lost and subsequently stolen jacket, erroneous charges, overcharges, ridiculously high parking rates and a lost credit card often made it hard for me to relax. I thought I was going to have tip someone just to take a shit. Everyone had their hand out.

A firm reinforcement of something I’ve known for a long time: corporations simply don’t give a shit about people and are fueled by greed. Too many people are fueled by greed and are hostages to the pursuit of wealth. And it’s such a pity, because life isn’t about money. Why can’t we just try to live full lives characterized by love, compassion and generosity?

Georgia, please send me that quote on your ice box, as I’ve paraphrased poorly….

Human nature? Bullshit. There’s no greed gene. It’s all learned behavior in a world where we too often teach our children all the wrong the things.

I’ve made a vow (that I’ll promptly break this September) of no more planes, no more chain hotels and no more banks. My wife can manage the money, because I’m removing myself from the “system.” If I don’t fly, the airlines can’t lose my luggage. No credit card? Can’t be charged for things you didn’t buy. Think I’ll even close the checking account. Adios banking system.

Future travel? I’ll drive. Pay with cash. Be in control of my fate.

The Shasta Nation? That is, by the way, a term used by some to describe the bioregion that extends from southern Oregon down to about Monterey Bay, due a commonality of flora, fauna and cultural characteristics. There’s definitely a different attitude there, one that agrees with me. An abundance of tolerance, passion for nature and a zest for life. Not that those characteristics don’t exist in other places. Certainly they do. But it’s the dominant life way in Shasta. The complete antithesis of the life way in my own community, known for its religious fundamentalism and monoculture.

You should secede from the United States, by the way. Save yourselves before it’s too late.

Relocate? Probably not. Too many damn people and too costly. Abbey wrote about it in his essay about Northern California in the eighties. In 2007, it’s exponentially worse. Going through airports, renting cars, staying in hotels and walking through the city gives you an idea of how really bad it is. Humans hurled and jostled about by Orwellian machines. Planes, escalators, moving walkways, trains, trams and trolleys. It’s all really mind boggling when you watch it and see how our machines move us about in a nightmarish world of perpetual, high speed motion.

One of my friends that joined us for dinner tells me that the children in the area are leaving. Not because they don’t like it, but because they can’t afford to stay once they leave the nest. When the natives leave a place as beautiful as this, that should tell you that things are out of whack. Time to take a step back, take a hard look and make some changes before it’s too late and your cultural base is eroded like poorly managed soil.

I suppose we should start with the real estate speculators, including the agents. The whole industry makes its profit off making land inaccessible to high numbers of people, mostly lower income people. How many people can afford a 2000 square foot home that costs $1.5 million dollars? It’s all built on infinite growth in a finite world, and it just can’t end soon enough for me.

Carmel illustrates perhaps the height of this greed, where $1.5 to $3 million gets you a 1500 square foot cottage. It’s a silver spoon community. A little too la-di-da for my tastes. Beautiful, yes. But full of rich folks that seem out of touch with reality.

Dealing with all my corporate caused woes on fourth of July, I thought a lot about freedom and concluded (again) that we really aren’t free. Despite what some like to think, we’ve never been free in this country because of capitalism. American Indians were free. We are not, and now, neither are they.

As the not as well known but incredibly talented Beat poet Lew Welch once said,

“Greed, then, and Usury have always been the carbuncles on the neck of America…and while you are here you must:

1. Eat and drink
2. Sleep
3. Piss and Shit
4. Die

Since we have to pay money for (1) our eats (there being no land not owned, anywhere, anymore) and (2) a place to sleep or we get arrested, and (3) pay dearly for the place we shit and piss in, it appears that only a drink of water is still free, most places. For we certainly (4) have to pay dearly for death and burial, unless we are very clever indeed.

We are not free…money is death.”

I might add that Lew Welch was very clever indeed and in the end, an untimely, tragic end, did not pay a dime for death and burial.

A solution? Some rational mix of capitalism and socialism. More cooperatives. Employee owned organizations. More mom and pop stores. Localism. Community gardens where people can grow food.

Back to the journey….

It was like The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. The Good? The mountains, rivers and small, locally owned shops. The food. Protected open space preserves. The ocean and all the critters that inhabit the Shasta Nation. A good number of humans, even. The Bad? Corporations and Greed. The Ugly? High numbers of people, interstates and high costs.

Overall, still a great place. A special place spoiled only by human greed. Lawrence Ferlinghetti is right when he says San Franciscans are in danger of losing the City. As it is in other parts of the country, the gap between the rich and poor is widening, and it’s damned near impossible for a hippie, a beatnik or a poet to live there these days. North Beach is dominated by tourists to the degree it’s beginning to look like Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. I felt guilty roaming the streets with my camera and adding to the overpopulation.

A tragedy, indeed.

And there are the cars the chain stores, what Ferlinghetti calls “chain gangs.” A hideous blight on all communities. A true enemy that must be defeated at all costs. Please buy local. Even if it costs just a little bit more.

And speaking of local, we’re beginning the descent into my own bioregion, the Lower Mississippi Delta. Time to save my work, shut down the machine and pray this missile its human payload makes it safely through the cotton like clouds and to the warm, dark soil of the Delta. Perhaps I should say the hot concrete of the Delta.

Thank you Shasta friends. Human, feathered, furry and scaled for having us. I love you and your home, and because I love you, I probably won’t return. One less human crowding your already crowded and stressed home. I’ll miss my friends, but when in love, the decisions aren’t always easy. Being unselfish is not always easy.

Better to stay put and be what I am, a Southerner, and not yet another person seeking a dream in a place that’s being loved to death.

HOWL