Claremont and the Squeakin’ Wheels Perform.
I’ve been gone for a little over month now, with over 6,000 miles behind me, and many thoughts. I’ve been having an interesting conversation with Mark, who most certainly is dealing with and addressing his own thoughts about life and death, and how to live life in the face of mortality.
Mark’s general thrust is, essentially, a Buddhist-sort of radical acceptance, or letting go and embracing the now, the moment, and envisioning and creating a future filled with possibility, rather than embracing and holding onto grief. I see what he is saying and do not disagree in any way, yet do not feel able to let go, or want to let go. But the radical approach, which is more-or-less accepting situations outside of our control and without judgment, leading to reduced emotional and spiritual suffering, says forcefully that my not wanting to let go is in part a cause of the emotional aloneness and distress I feel and by letting go I can lead and experience a better life, which is what Bev certainly would want for me. But I cannot, and suppose therefore that I don’t want to let go. Maybe later. I’ll be thinking about this some more.
But, for now, I’m going to take a walk into Claremont. Which I did… and pretty quickly got sort of lost. I made it into town, walking though the very pleasant streets of Claremont, but despite walking and walking, I never quite made it to downtown Claremont, which perhaps will wait for me until Friday, when I’ll take another shot.
Really, it was coming back to the house that I sort of got lost, sort of. I will say now, for the record, I prefer Google Maps for driving, but Apple Maps is superior for walking. I initially was using Google Maps, which was difficult to follow… until I switched to Apple Maps. Anyway, my 2 mile walk turned into a 3½ walk, which was fine, except I had to get back to the house for 3 pm as the Squeakin’ Wheels had a gig in Redlands, about an hour away, and had to get going. And then – to the very nice town of Redlands, about 33 miles east of Claremont.
The band had to get set up and get ready for their 7 pm show, so I headed out into Redlands for a walk, just heading toward what I thought was the downtown area, and this time I was right. 😊 I walked around for maybe 75 minutes, covering a little over two miles, and enjoyed the clean streets and buildings in this very nice looking community.
The historic downtown part of the town was a single, nice tree-lined looking street with plenty of places to eat and shop.
And then onto the Squeakin’ Wheels show, part of the Smiley Library concern series.
The band – and I was pleased to say I’m With The band – wasn’t sure what quite of a turnout they’d get, as they’re not especially well-known out this way, and it was a good size auditorium filled with seats. But, it was a stellar turn out, not quite full, but pretty close, and a great, enthusiastic, and welcoming audience. I will say, looking around at the band and its groupies (me, for one, but as I helped bring in and carry out the equipment, I think of myself more as a roadie), and the age of the band members, the audience matched the band in age (and wisdom).
It was as if the class of 1976 had stayed together until 2024. Nice to see, but also an interesting look at what happened to all those hippies from the mid-70’s. Why, they’re here tonight, 50 years later, some still in hippie garb (well, almost). The band played, and the Squeakin’ Wheels – Marguerite and David on guitar and vocals, Mark on bass, David Brock on fiddle, Steve Cahill on Mandolin, and stand-in drummer, Cougar Estrada – were great, and wowed the audience with a great show.
