Malibu morning picture of the day - Thanksgiving Eve, Wednesday, November 26, 20124

Dear Family, Friends, and Gentle Readers,

Here's Wednesday morning at the coast. Looks pretty much like yesterday though.























There are two huge cargo vessels out there on the water, Probably waiting for a spot to open up down in San Pedro.

If you are reading this, it means you didn't take the day off to travel to your hometown. When you work for a Southern California college, as I do, practically everybody disappears on a day like today.

I mentioned the Eleanor Tree and the Jospehine Tree yesterday. I am told that in many agrarian cultures it is a common practice to plant a tree when a child is born. I'm sorry I never thought to do that when my kids were born, but if I had, there would be six more trees on this property that would suffer from neglect.



Since I also mentioned that I grew up (at least some years) in my house, you might wonder if there is a "Vincent Tree."

Gotta be my tree... old, bitter, shaped like a V for victory,
of course I look like an inverted V, but there you go...

Turns out there is a candidate. My dad bought this house in 1956 when my older brother was born and sometime thereafter his grandmother (we called her "Ty-Ty," which I am told means "Missus" in Cantonese) planted a Chinese grapefruit tree in the backyard. The year it went in is not clear since everybody who could tell me is dead or demented. So, it could be the "Randall Tree" or the "Vincent Tree."

Looks pretty horrible doesn't it? It's frequently overgrown with climbing fern and passion fruit vines. This last summer the kids pulled off the overgrowth and apparently it's main canopy went away.

Now THIS is a real turkey...I think this Mama's really cool

If you think that fruit might be good, no. There have only been a couple of years where it tasted any good--very rainy years, which are rare in L.A. I'm sure the bacteria, birds, rodents, and insects think it's just fine though. This is probably why it got written off, not just by me, but by my parents before me. And yet it endures with no care.

I'm sure brother Randy will not claim it, so I will. What better metaphor for a writer who has not mass-published yet--a tough, short, old tree, barren on top, spread out to the sides, that bears lots of fruit that nobody eats. Ah. Just the kind of character I like...

I won't be in Malibu the rest of the week, so the blog goes on holiday. See you back Monday. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Love,
Pops

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P.S. While we are on the subject of turkey-sized birds, to those of you who are reading my "Saturday serial story" who may be wondering what the so-called "soul birds" look like, here's an artist rendering of the type of bird I have in mind, but I imagine them being all black, and rather threatening looking.