The Daily News
1 Four good winds: Everybody complains about the weather, but...Dept: There's a lighter side to all these winds. Yesterday at lunch I walked up to my truck. When I reached the parking lot, a wonderful windfall hit the trees, and a bunch of leaves suddenly drifted down on our children's center. Screams and giggles soared upwards as the children laughed and jumped for more. A second windfall hit, and still more leaves drifted down in a quiet, sweet moment.
2 The whole place laughed and screamed, and I burst into a bit of a smile.
3 It was a gentle wind that blue through the leaves. The sun shone. The children jumped up and down, screeching for more leaves. More laughter, giggles, and fun screams.
4 Sometimes life's just good.
5 Sometimes life's just really good.
6 I love moments.
7 Moving on, Part the First: For the first time in quite a while I actually don't mind the wind. When I was younger it used to blow my hat off. I used to have to fly my head like a WWII airplane whenever I'd want to go somewhere. I got my training at windy Candlestick Park.
8 The southeast end of the upper deck was arguably the windiest part of the windiest ballpark in baseball. In its final days as a home for the San Francisco Giants, my friend John Arnolfo and I had a stand around five feet away from where the corridors from the third-base side to right field intersected. I could see from our stand mini-tornadoes of soda cups, peanut shells, and leaves moving in brisk little circles in this small area next to our stand.
9 You could probably jump into the jet stream over the wall of the stadium and fly to Brisbane from that corner. Our stand, ironically, stood in the hot sun those very fun days. The hot sun was about five feet from the windiest place on Earth. That's Candlestick.
10 One of the best things about selling merch at the ballpark is goofing on people. And that stand, at that time, became a bit of a silent comedy show for John and me.
11 We would see a group walking towards us from the right-field corner, and as soon as they would turn the corner, the wind would inevitably blow off some guy's hat. It happened frequently enough that we really didn't have the time to warn people. Besides, there's something inherently funny about a hat suddenly popping off some guy's head.
12 Unless it's your hat, and your head! It was always good for business, and for a 1930's style laugh.
13 I still love wearing hats, always did. But I don't wear hats when I teach anymore. Used to. Always liked the Bogart/Sinatra look. From my days as a wee lad, I learned how to tilt a hat, how to crease a hat, and how to fly a hat in high winds.
14 Now it feels sort of nice not having to make all those suave turns and pirhouettes in order to look dapper. I just walk and allow it to blow all around me, like a billowy, blustery aura.
15 I reasonably sure that my dapper days are done gone anyway. The wind has now become a bit of a poem. and soars through my being like soulful words.
16 I still look pretty though.
17 That's part of my job; to sit there and look pretty.
18 Anybody knows me knows that.
19 People at work ask, "What are you doing today?"
20 And I will often answer, "Why, my job is to sit here and look pretty."
21 I used to tell that to my tech guys.
22 They knew I meant it, so they also always sat there and looked pretty.
23 It was the law. Jose, Sparky and Nhat will tell you that. Their job was to sit there and look pretty. It's show business at its most dapper.
24 Moving on, Part Three: Let's examine a third positive about the winds.These selfsame fierce winds bring life to the wind chimes in my yard.
25 We have these wonderfully melodic pipes that play musical medium-to-deep notes that all harmonize. I think it's an A chord, but it's too late in the evening right now to check. Keep in mind, I write the DN at all hours, so sometimes I'll break that fourth wall and jump into the moment. Sorry. But not. Anyway, I've climbed out of this mish-mosh for a second and looked up from these clacking keyboard keys. I really do want to know what chord the wind chimes make. But I fear the kind winds sometimes. Not now, naturally, but sometimes.
26 I'd go out there with a flashlight right now to check, but I don't want to muss up my hair.
27 It's a major chord, I know that, and it has also been swirling some lovely tunes all night. I hope they don't bother the neighbors. The chimes are reasonably calm and quiet.
28 And a lot of time they remind me of my Mom. She still has lovely wind chimes outside her window. Sometimes they play actual pop tunes, I swear to you. I recorded it in some DN about a year ago, but I can't remember what song it was. Something odd, like "Popsicles and Icicles", a hit song in January, 1964, and some say the last pre-British invasion #1 song before the Beatles wiped the charts clean with "I Want to Hold Your Hand."
29 I didn't mind throwing in a little trivia along the road here. Ah, the joy of literary social trails and daydreamy meanderings.
30 Anyway, for the record I did just go outside to check. I felt like Sir Edmund Hillary in boxers.
31 I still gave the wind chimes the once over with a flashlight. It just got zanier and colder, so I swiftly turned around and walked back into the house. No need for any of that.
32 Moving on, Part Four: The wind kept me awake last night, but in a mysterious sort of way. Sounds surrounded me, thoughts blew all around my neighborhood, and when I went out this morning to get the paper, all the leaves that had been all over my lawn and driveway had completely disappeared, saving me hours of raking.
33 I looked out on my neighborhood and the entire street looked like God, or Joe-the-Bear, or whoever had taken a cosmic leaf-blower to our street. I felt like running around the neighborhood like Jimmy Stewart, yelling for everyone to wake up and look at the leaf-blowing miracle. Then I got more sensible, which happens on occasion.
34 So there you have it. A lovely windfall, a swift lesson in how to fly a hat safely, a listen to some miraculous, melodic wind chimes, and a breezy sweep of the neighborhood by dint of miracles.
33 And right now there is a lull. No wind.
34 No wind.
33 No rain.
34 No rain.
35 Enjoy your Thursday.
36 A songbird just chirped.
37 Peace.
~H~
May the four winds blow you safely home.
~Jerry Garcia~
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