CHAPTER 21: The Forks interview folks in Redding, Sacramento, and San Francisco before taking some time in Monterey with the Steinbeck vibes on Cannery Row.

The gang enjoyed some pizza and a couple beers with Professor T’s relatives in Redding before getting a good night’s sleep ahead of the next grueling leg of the tour. Sacramento, and San Francisco would challenge Billie with their traffic. She learned a thing or two about urban congestion in Portland and the lessons stuck…they were no longer having to apologize for late arrivals. Of course smoothing things over would be much easier if Professor T could take his diplomatic approach up a notch or two, but it’s all in the rearview as Billie was getting real good at choosing alternate routes offered by Siri’s drunk sister now programmed with Rosanne Barr’s salty voice.

“Are you blind AND deaf?” Roseanne barked at Billie whenever she missed a turn. 

***

It took a full day to finish at State University in Sacrimento, then it was off to one of the most storied, cosmopolitan cities in the US. The interviews were to take place at the University of California, Berkley, and this was an eye-opener for the flatlanders riding in the Chool Bus…oh yeah. See, weather in the Bay area is famously mild, a fact that hadn’t gone unnoticed by the nation’s many…many unfortunates living out of cars, vans, and motor homes. 

Buck Wellstone could hardly get his jaw off the floor as the Chool Bus past block after block of hovels lining the sidewalks. Vacant lots filled with RVs and tents…small cohorts of unhoused individuals tightly clustered in pungent slapdash micro-communities. It’s a bit much for a Big Sky Texas cowboy to take in.

The mix of folks appearing for the interviews was as diverse as the city itself, and once the final round was complete, the gang was more than happy to be moving on. Not out of any fear or loathing for an overwhelming presence of the nation’s down and out, rather the unsettling juxtaposition of some of the best and brightest cohabitating a mere’s security door from the nation’s doomed, not simply there because Mother Nature’s wrath is less prominent, no…it’s San Francisco…one of the world’s most celebrated cities.

At the end of the day in Berkley, Billie met some of what she considered the most interesting people she had yet to encounter in all her years on the high plains. One was preparing an IPO for his artificial intelligence development company, another impressed Billie with wisdom beyond years, and nearly penniless. She and her rescue dog had been living in one of those tent cities for the past several months. Not sure what to do next, but inclined to hop a cargo freighter to Viet Nam. Clear-eyed about the downsides of life in a communist country, but at the same time, done with the zero-sum, social darwinist hunger games of capitalism. 

“Why Viet Nam?” said Billie. 

“Not one hundred percent sure,” said her new companion. “I’ve always felt we Americans should try to do something…anything to help folks in South East Asia recover from the devastation the American war did to their land. So, i signed up with an international NGO to help the locals plant a billion trees.  

“Trees?” said Billie.

“Yes, even though there’s no way for us to mitigate the human losses, we certainly can help to repair damage to nature’s oxygen-generating forests and urban greenspace. So… we’ll see. Right now looking to get myself and my dog, Buddy, vaccinated for the stay, however long it may end up being.”

Billie smiled, “That sounds like a worthy adventure.”

Billie’s new companion continued: “Proud to be an American, land of liberty within the confines of total freedom and absolute justice.” She went on. “And so, if total freedom ends in anarchy and absolute justice to tyranny, i choose a little of both…liberty. I plan to give way to contrition with mine, and not just for the people of Southeast Asia, but to the land we shredded with our bombs and weaponized herbicides.”

***

Later, on the road to Salinas, Professor T was reacquainting himself with John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row characters and settings as the gang agreed to spend the next day in Monterey soaking in the atmosphere, trying to overlook the touristy vibe and really get emersed in the world created by this great American storyteller.   

For one, Professor T, contemplating the tent enclaves in Berkley’s vacant lots, couldn’t ignore a sense of deja vu. How there must be similar stories in there. On Cannery Row the nation’s doomed found ways to thrive through interconnection and mutual support. Necessity giving folks on the waterfront row and in the Bay Area canvas-roof enclaves license to give in to the better angels of human nature. Prostitutes, drifters, iconoclasts, and rebels forming surrogate families protecting inhabitants from the devastating isolation of the modern world.

***

Presently, Professor T turned his thoughts to the brewing storm waiting for him back home in Kansas. His anger was beginning to temper a bit. He thought about the lessons taken from the pages of Cannery Row. Could he beat back the legal attack with angry defiance? Should he put his back into a fight against the natural flow of the universe, or could he defuse Abagail’s attack with acceptance? Regardless of the outcome, could he just simply let things be? He would find out soon enough as he was summoned to appear in court back home because Abigail’s attorneys had filed a suit to collect damages. 

The Zoom conference outburst had not helped his case at the University. He was written up for “chronic low performance,”  a bureaucratic prelude to being subject to an unfavorable post-tenure review, one step closer to being dismissed. Scheizer & Bok will use this bit of unfortunate news in their case for damages. 

“You have ARRIVED, dummy!” Roseanne Barr’s voice barked as Billie steered the Chool Bus into the Salinas RV park where the gang would spend the night.

NEXT WEEK:
The Forks head south (SoCal) venturing close to LA via Santa Barbara and Moorpark, then, a taste of the Bakersfield sound at the Merle Haggard Museum.

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