On Sunday my Dad, Kenneth Hinds Chandler, passed away, and today I honor my “centurion:” a life that spanned our American Century. In addition to being a loving husband, father, brother, uncle, grandfather, great-grandfather, and friend to the many that loved him, he was a farmer, soldier, administrator, fisherman, hiker, artist and avid reader of history.
When I was six we began tramping together, sharing the spaces and places of American History from New England to Virginia: Plymouth to Williamsburg; Boston Harbor to Yorktown; and Gettysburg to Bull Run. Walking in his footsteps history came alive and helped guide me to my career as an archivist.
So, ‘tis not strange, in this time of sorrow to reach for Walt Whitman and his elegy to President Abraham Lincoln in the Spring of 1865:
And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the
night,
I mourn’d, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.
Ever returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.
Late Saturday afternoon, walking my neighborhood, and thinking about my Dad, I chanced upon a beautiful lilac bush blooming in the fullness of this Spring. And oh I shall mourn with ever-returning Spring. Farewell Dad. Thank you for bringing me into this world…for taking the risk of having a child…for taking the time to teach me about integrity…for devoting your life to giving me a home where I could grow and learn and dream of the person I would become and the worlds I would explore. You put me on the road of life and set an example for me as I met life’s challenges. Farewell Dad. I love you, until we meet again.
“In a world without forest streams from which to drink, where shall I find forest streams from which to drink?”
From the poem In a World Without Forests by Dick Allen, Zen Master
Tramping alongside the Maacama, I rejoice to still find water flowing towards the Russian River. End of September, the air is dusty; golden fields are baked; creeks are typically dry; and the fear of fire haunts all of us who love California’s rolling hills and rivers. Almost a year ago, firestorms besieged Sonoma County, this beautiful place, displacing and forever changing the lives of humans and animals. I am grateful for all lives saved and mourn for all who lost their homes and loved ones. I am grateful for this yet babbling creek. The cup is yet half full. Little daylight remaining, a great blue heron soars by me settling alongside the quiet creek bank searching for the last catch. In the East, St. Helena soars, sheltering the vineyards below where harvest has begun. Equinox. I whisper a prayer “may we live in balance and at peace for one year more.”
Borders deserve respect, but respect for asylum and respect for due process is deserved too. Danger lurks when we label others; people are not labels, they are human beings deserving dignity and respect. Human rights cannot be merely an abstraction, they must be the values by which we truly live every day. Human rights must be our primary colors; human rights cannot be whitewash. “The history of the Holocaust is not over. Its precedent is eternal, and its lessons have not yet been learned.”[1]
Living in the East Bay, our gaze draws westward, and this is not hard to understand. In the west looms San Francisco, our imperial city; our iconic bridges, the Golden Gate and the Bay Bridge; winter rainstorms are born there; and the sun, traversing the north-south longitude, sets in the west. And quietly, holding up the sky, Mount Tamalpais anchors my western horizon. Tamalpais is always there, grounding me; at times just in the corner of my eye, and other times commanding my full attention, whether near or far. My love for Mount Tamalpais has grown deep over the years – many chapters of my story feature this mountain. In the 19th century, the ukiyo-e artist Hokusai captured his love for a revered Japanese mountain with his famous series of woodblock prints Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji.
Inspired by two books, Opening the Mountain: Circumambulating Mount Tamalpais A Ritual Walkby Mathew Davis & Michael Farrell Scott and Tamalpais Walking: Poetry, History and Prints by Tom Killion and Gary Snyder, I persuaded my dear friends, to walk from Muir Woods to East Peak, the top of Mount Tamalpais. At the end of March, we covered a distance of approximately twelve miles, spanning a range of plant communities, including redwoods, mixed evergreen forests, grasslands and chaparral, as well as plants, such as ceanothus, endemic to the mountain adapted to the Serpentine soils. Our journey gave amazing views of the greater Bay Area and we saw Mount Tam’s sister mountains: Black Mountain (west), Mount St. Helena (north), Mount Diablo (east) and Mount Hamilton (south). The artist Tom Killion began his love affair with Tamalpais as a young man, and inspired by Hokusai, he created beautiful prints of the mountain from multiple viewpoints, many of them featured in Tamalpais Walking.
Last week, cycling from Oakland to Richmond on the Bay Trail, I travelled a diverse landscape featuring mudflats so alive with plants and animals coexisting with trucks and cars speeding by on asphalt and cement highways. This is nature – mankind a dominating part of a community of flora and fauna; this is not wilderness. Throughout the journey, there was my friend Mount Tamalpais, on the horizon, a guidepost measuring my progress, a signpost holding close my memories.
The room is charged. His eyes two points that arc, revealing his story. He has fought the pain. But there has been a price. He is so tired and there is so much he has forgotten.
“I sit with this room. With the grey walls that darken into corner. And one window with teeth in it. Sit so still you can hear your hair rustle in your shirt. Look away from the window when clouds and other things go by. [Ninety-seven] years old. There are no prizes.” [1]