The Bear Came to San Anselmo

 

May 15, Saturday 2021

The Bear came to San Anselmo. The Bear left San Anselmo.

 It is still morning as train 710 from Emeryville to Bakersfield
rolls along. I have begun my Train ride across the country (ultimately destined for the Hudson Valley and then Maine) it is a marvelous experience even the
the great flat Central Valley, as we head further south having passed Merced and now paused at the station in Madera.  I can see the distant Sierras to my right (I must have been sitting facing the rear of the train as I review this post)  a hazy darker blue against the California Blue sky.  Cumulus clouds some small some maybe very big, seem to run North and South over those distant peaks. To my left is the wide valley already getting to the more arid southern valley. The Almond groves amply watered have passed.. I remind myself that once upon a time the Central Valley would flood every Winter. Once upon a time many things have happened.

‘Ladies and gentlemen Fresno is next!’

I sit with my computer on a table facing the back-end of the train. There are three unoccupied seats here and the car is perfectly filled with the right amount of space for the masked passengers. Patiently masked passengers.

 The thought of the Bear, his visit to my small town, a small town not known to be very popular with Bears still vibrates/echoes.. lingers.  I don’t want his memory to fade out without giving him his improbable story, his frightened magnificence, his due.

https://www.marinij.com/2021/05/13/bear-roams-into-downtown-san-anselmo/

 Bears are real but Bears are mythic too. The previous inhabitants of California had a powerful  relationship to all the Wild animals that were part of their natural surroundings. We, us people riding this train of Euro/American civilization. We have only been here in California only a relatively short time, but we are all here to learn. Interesting that the first Spanish Boat set anchor in Richardson Bay within the SF Bay a little inlet part of a town in my County, Marin known as Mill Valley that happened in the year 1776…

‘This is Fresno.. coming up!’

The Bear and encounters with a Bear were a big deal back in this culture that existed here before us.
I do not know the name of what we term ‘indigenous’ peoples who lived in this area of the Central Valley around Fresno. California had a remarkable diversity of tribal peoples. Where San Anselmo people live now lived the people called Miwoks or sometimes Coastal Miwoks and there was another
branch of this tribal linguistic culture called Mountain Miwoks that seemed to be separated by other
different people with different languages…. Now as I look out at modern California right now I see piles of Concrete Rubble and now Parking Lots of Trucks and now a passing BNSF freight train carrying more trucks…. And on and on in our amazing civilization. But still a visit of a Bear is a big Deal to a little town that I sometimes call San An’slo-mo’ …  We are all fundamentally just People and though we know nothing of (most of us) what life would be like to be one of the these historic residents who had not the technology nor even perhaps the desire to control or live outside of nature. We are all just people and we all have the power to take in any experience particularly an encounter with a major Predator  on the food chain ( as this poor be’wild’ered, outsider up in a tree on a small street in San Anselmo is .. <identified as adolescent.. thought to be about 200 lbs.>) make of it what we will, to get a dose of inspiration, a dose of wild connection, even spirit connection.



 Today is Saturday, the Bear was found in the tree two days past, Thursday …

 More Almond Trees.. now grape vineyards.. and now a golf course off on the right…

‘Hanford is your stop!’

The Bear. You might then bear with me.. (Yess Guy. Good one!) You might bare with me as I share some of my spirit connection with the Bear. As you might have noticed this blog, web log,  (I prefer. Bears love a good log,) you know is titled California Times as is my famous TV show (someday soon) and this show has a beautiful logos which is of course thee California Bear.

On Wednesday I had a Zoom interview with a guest as part of this series regarding housing in CA it did not go as well as I wanted. Thursday I was due for another one.  I seem to have a great deal of self-consciousness issues that do not necessarily make it easy for someone who decides to put oneself in the eye of the public. I won’t bother you with any thing deep here except that sometimes I just get up in the middle of the night after not being able to sleep and I go for a walk. This can be anywhere from 1 AM to 5 AM… sometimes it works and I fall asleep fairly easily afterwards.

At about 3AM or so Thursday I went for a walk. I live on Tamalpais Street a block from downtown just a few houses down from the corner of Cedar and Tamalpais where I always head and turn left end up with about a 30 minute walk past the Post Office, a loop. I turned the corner at Cedar as I always do, a corner that has a particularly beautiful Live Oak tree, as this variety of Oak is called. It is very tall, and very graceful and it took many walks past it before I stopped and appreciated it (there are so many trees in SA you take them for granted)… I walked past it I am not quite sure how far past I was but I heard something. ‘What’s that!’ I told myself as the sound of something from behind me triggered this ! exclamation point in my brain. I don’t know what I heard.
I kept walking.

 I got back home. Anyways Insomnia did not let up I took a melatonin tab which does not always work… I roused myself that AM feeling terribly sleep deprived and sub-human. I wanted to postpone the PM interview, my producer wouldn’t let me! I had a rendezvous with a female friend at Robson Park, I can’t reveal much of the details of this friendship but…. In a tight schedule where I could have been studying a script which I am always have been a stranger.. I texted my friend and used the words ‘pain and suffering’ to describe my plight… Guy get to the Bear!

Under the Redwoods at 11 AM in Robson Park we did some meditation breathing thing… seemed to work. Felt strength! Even peace.

Somehow later that day. Surrendered to the Redwoods and Nature and then mid-afternoon to the wisdom and discipline of a script and a Producer I think we had a great interview.

‘Wasco will be a very brief stop, ladies and gentlemen Wasco is next!’

So I got back at the end of that day PG& E had Tamalpais closed off all day for electrical work replacing a pole down at the town end of the block. I didn’t notice much but they PG&E people said electricity is back on. I went home oblivious to PG&E and whatever else. All I could do was lie down and sleep. An hour later got up.. internet Gmail .. Headlines Bear in San Anselmo.. ! What??  What??? What??!!

   On Tamalpais Street!!  

  Walk out What! Police Cars up to the Cedar Street intersection, Police Caution tape… I walk up to it! A woman police officer says sorry you must go inside your house and shut the door and windows! What! Well I go back to my yard… that much I can do.

  She described the situation briefly… police cars lined up to barricade Tam Street, up in the Tree I could not see the Bear but could see the Tree… (turned out I was looking at the wrong tree)

   Bakersfield in a few minutes.. transfer to an Amtrak bus to take me to Union Station LA. Looks like Almond Trees to my left and right and another BNSF freight passing on the right.

  So I decided to go back in and comment on the Bear on the Marin IJ post … be the local reporter,
the local gossiper, the local internet wiseguy.

  I went back and forth to inside desk and outside look a few times. Gratified to see a MMWD Park ranger show up. Definitely worried afraid of the potential for a bad outcome no jokes about BLM please. Bear Lives Matter!
Heard a loud Beep Breaahh (?) !!  of a Police Car and dashed out again… He’s down someone says.. The police cars start moving off towards Robson Park. Nothing left to do… but talk to the neighbors… Dude with young daughter walks by on phone what did I overhear?! 

  'My wife just called to say a Bear just ran through Robson Park… !'   

   Go Bear Go!

  All passengers going to LA bus number 1!