Walkin' with Joaquin

This year, for California Writers Week, I once again assembled a group of poets and authors to read out the works of early California Writers on behalf of the California Writers Club. I stood at the top of the Cascade, which finally began to flow again earlier this month, and oriented guests of "A Reading in the Redwoods" to the legacy of this wooded slope.  "It was not just a few famous writers who gathered, here," I said, sharing the image of a hillside swarming with seekers of inspiration that had filled my imagination just hours before when browsing the vivid Joaquin Miller archive . "This hill was a commune of creatives, nearly a century before Hippies were invented, a spectacle and a sanctuary."  Terry Tierney read first, choosing two perfect poems by Miller: Sea Blown (which seemed, to me, to be about an unpublished writer, a perfect companion to Columbus ) and Mount Shasta , an ode to the white mountain. He followed with a delightful poem called...

Excited to hit the trail with John Roberts of BTCEB Many if not most of the Friends of Joaquin Miller Park meetings and email threads include conversations about bikers at the park. On the one end of the spectrum are jerks from other cities who ignore trail markers, build illegal jumps, and zoom past or even insult hikers. On the other end of the spectrum are the park guardians. I asked John Roberts of the Bicycle Trails Council of the East Bay  if he'd show me the park through his eyes, or at least at his speed. We met at the Ranger Station and he unloaded an extra set of wheels. Mountain bikers are mostly men—but I know my way around a bike. My brothers, cousins, surrogate sons never thought to invite me on a mud run. But John loaned me his daughter's bike—he'd raised her on the trail. My husband bikes to work, but would begrudgingly load up for our own family trips along the shoreline. Once we started dropping our own son and his wheels off at Chabot Science Center (wher...

Today I'm writing from the Fire Circle. It's time for a makeover...because danger ! This sometimes sunny meadow was a soft green in the spring, but now it's full of dry, flammable foxtails, surrounded by trees full of tinder. Fun fact: The Golden Gate is not the bridge, but the hills the bridge connects. Before The Spanish arrived with their cows, those hills were green all summer, like this meadow would be if the native grasses weren't choked out by foxtails. The cows pooped out the Spanish hay, full of foxtail seeds, which are persistent hitchhikers with an incredible life force. Soon those hills were browning off in the summer. Or I should say blonding off. Turning that sort of soft gold that is not to be confused with the brilliance of California poppies. (Which really did used to crowd these here hills.) The picnic tables and concrete barbecue/stage were built, I learned recently, by none other than the devoted Juanita Miller, Joaquin's youngest daughter, a.k...

There's just a bit of green left on the hillside, turning brown for the summer. Poppies are blooming everywhere—in the medians of Joaquin Miller Road, in the cracks of the stairs. The poison oak is luscious and green. If I didn't know better I'd collect arms full of these glossy, bountiful leaves for a bouquet. I love the story that Poison Oak is the forest protector, that the Miwok would give it to their children tiny bites to eat, like a vaccine, to befriend it. But today I'm mad about deceptions. About those who appear friendly but are actually hostile. About poison pills .  Mills College has been intertwined with this park since before it began, and it is now. Mills produces women leaders—some of whom are on the FOJMP board. You don't hear about Jack London's wife, who went to and worked at Mills, or the honorary degree bestowed by Mills on Ina Coolbrith. The East Bay Hills open space exists because of president Aurelia Henry Reinhardt . The Mills Cyclones t...

Join The California Writers Club for a festival of outdoor lit in Joaquin Miller Park! On Earth Day Weekend, Sunday, April 24th, 2022, the Berkeley Branch will host a day of springtime activities and networking. All events are free except the meeting/speaker series, for which we ask that you purchase a ticket. (Free tickets are available for those who need them.) 10-12 p.m. Earth Day in the Park Come work with Friends of Joaquin Miller Park featuring a CWC Wolf-Pack write-in. A speaker will give an overview of the state of the trees in the Oakland Hills, providing focus points for literary and physical action. Participants can choose to: write letters advocating restoration of the Cascade or other needs of nature, grab some gloves and pull out invasive species tune in to the “minister of the woods” and free write among the Oaks and Redwoods. LOCATION 12-1 p.m. Picnic Lunch! BYOBOC (Bring your own Basket of Chow) / “Joaquin Miller Went Walkin” Bring a picnic lunch and socializ...

Today I went walkin' with Johnella LaRose, co-founder of the  Sogorea Te' Land Trust , an urban Indigenous women-led land trust that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people. Several years ago, when I first heard about Sogora Te', I was inspired by the whole idea of Indigenous land trusts , which create a breathing space in the madness around owning property. I'd been wanting to meet Johnella since I heard she was on the FOJMP board. Sogora Te' has been a member of FOJMP since 2020, and the Ohlone people who they protect were here, of course, long before Oakland, before Joaquin Miller, for some TEN THOUSAND YEARS. She was dressed in a bright orange vest so it was easy to spot her as I pulled into the Sequoia Bayview parking area. She carried a garbage grabber and a big plastic bag, and I thought for a minute she'd put them in the car while we walked...but instead I began seeing what she saw. She pointed down the hill where bags of trash bla...

You don't always want to hear the sound of chainsaws when you are taking a nice walk in the woods, but today it's kind of special. You may have heard about the Joaquin Miller Park fire on the news. Today I drove up into the fog, which shrouded the hillside. I went past my usual turnoff and emerged into sunlight. I turned up Skyline and parked at the Horse Arena, where drove as far as I could, until my way was blocked by...fire trucks! I went back and parked, and  heard the sound of a two-stroke motor. I walked up the path but was blocked this time by traffic cones, a truck, and a massive tree across the road. As I made my way back to the fire trucks, a pick-up full of yellow hoses drove by me. The three friendly fire-fighters told me they'd come up to collect them after soaking the fire area overnight. After posing for a victory photo, the one with "R. Johnson" emblazoned on his jacket led me through the jumbled forest to a pile of blackened trees on a high, hidde...