We decided that for these next two days we would rent a room just twenty miles South of Legget. Give Kate a break she hasn't slept in her own home in over a week. Though she would sweetly insist otherwise that we stay with her.

We rumble into Laytonville California and choose (of three) a motel with character.

The dirt driveway leads out behind a yellow building. There a big cirle of a driveway is lined with dainty yellow cabins. Cottage's really. A great oak in the center keeps them in a precious and unusual shade. How much for two days?

Trevor gets the key and we find it is next door to the main office. Can we have one in the back please for quiet? Surely.

A miniature house it has an attached wooden garage. Big enough for one car. We unpack for real. Clothes and food and everything. What a cute place.

Ceiling fan and a kitchenette. Formica table and a microwave oven holy cow. A kitchen sink and a toaster oven and there are dishes and pots and pans under here. The softest easy chair and angular wooden bathroom. And the beds are just huge. And deep. Pull those shades the room is dark and cool. One movie channel. A VCR actually in the main office. This place is heaven. Ours for three long days.

Back at Kathryn's she is home and finally rested. Just is on fire to see us as if we had just arrived. Velvet blue twilight and in time for dinner. Sweet smoke burns and lingers and the Christmas lights are stars. Funk like thunder from the old stereo. Here, look what we brought. Brown speckled pasta and have an orange.

Kate has a magic power with food. She knows intuitively how much of an ingredient to add and what might just be perfect with it. I don't know for sure but believe she learned this from Gregory. I would have the luxury of sampling some of their out of nowhere feasts this long summer. Hardly anything could not be improved enhanced or gladdened by Garlic, Ginger or Honey.

So while we supped on wheat linguini with a spicy to stinging tomato sauce, we attempted to recount our adventure to Kate. Impossible to do so. Hit the highlights as best you can. This takes more or less all night. On and off this Story.

She told us of her Aikido Camp adventure where she and Gregory (of advanced ranking) trained and danced for a week with others from everywhere in this beautiful mountain retreat. Throwing and being thrown by gentle but powerful family members they had never even met. Exhausting and Enlightening. And of the sorry we missed it groovy Jazz Festival at the lake the other night. The mystic Siamese Cats are here. Lovey and foolish over Kate's affections. She seizes them and cooes in their elfin faces.

"When are you leaving?" she sings at Trevor direct like a sister.

Two days and she is saddened. Can she show us around though? Sure and what about her Aikido class tommorow night? Will we come? Yes. Goody new stuff to do. That pasta was great. We are full with the day and must turn in – twenty miles south or so. Promise to be back tommorow afternoon of course.

A short drive down dark curly One Oh, One to our tidy old cabin. Cold white sheets and plump matress. Ah.

The next few days have run together in my mind. Like three cups of beautiful stones poured into one pile. There features exact and distinct but I am unable to remember which came from which cup.

During the days we spent time at Kate's making ourselves at home. Brewing too dark coffee and reading and watching those cartoons. Learning the ways of Aengus and Honmi and eating eggs with garlic and onion and potato. California home fries. Napping and watching the Sun move across the sky. Listening to the breeze in the trees and the odd California birds. Cleaning our dishes and reading and trying our hand at the art of spices. Spent hours pecking at a hanging tin can with my old BB gun. Waiting for twilight and Kathryn's whirlwind of evening.

At night we would sneak south through the darkness to our yellow cabin and sleep like bears.

In the hot afternoons we walked by the river at the swimming hole. Trevor told me stories from his first visit to Kate's. It rained for the whole month he was here. Soft spring rain promising May. I looked around and thought that would be something to see.

We reflected on our Journey. We didn't want it to end. For me it wouldn't but I could see Trevor wanted to stay. But that was just impossible. He hadn't left for good but for ten days. Plenty of affairs at home to tend to. Plenty more if he had intended to full blown move to California. And our time seemed all twilight now. Like the Heart of a Sunday afternoon. Enjoy it, here it is and almost gone.

One afternoon Kate took us to her Aikido Class.

Held n the long dance studio of the town hall, Kate's Aikido class is more like Dance Practice or a Council Meeting. A family of souls conveined to train. Their Art a Supreme blend of Medicine and Form it is the Magic of Energy and Balance and our Center. I have in my lifetime never known anything like Aikido. I watched them whisk and slam one another against the blue mats rapt. I might have joined in but did not how truly welcome they would make me feel until sometime later.

In the short time after class Trevor and I walked the sweet little Main Street to a coffee shop aptly named Sweets for of course strong coffee for the Sunset. Where in the hell is Jim Dove now we wonder? How about this. Trevor will leave tommorow and fly home and Somehow (though we know how) arrive home before Jimmy. He wants to meet him at the bus stop when he comes in. Wouldn't that be something?

Kate soon joined us she and Gregory flushed and glistening pink in their white gi's. Glowing. Let's head home they say. It sounds rosy from them.

I had a real feeling of peace for this town. I had no way of knowing how intimate I would become with it. But this was later.

As our time neared an end, Trevor requested that on his last day we make one last trip to Usal. He wanted to be baptized he said.

On that morning we grabbed our usuals and headed for the coast. The morning air was chilled and soft cold clouds overtook us on the road. It was the first time I had seen this weather here.

The dirt climb across and over the mountain was smooth. Cloudy weekday morning. We pulled off into a meadow just before heading down to the shore. Here I adjusted a black cap to hold all my hair. Sea wind no fun for tangles.

"Man," Trevor laughs. "you look like a kid in that hat."

Sure enough I did. We laughed. Below us armies of clouds in pink and white sheets coming in from the sea. Finding land at long last. Splashing us with mist. Around the car wild mint and red clover shiver in the fog. Collecting starry dew.

At the beach Trevor and I make our way South to a huge stand of stone. There will be no way to cross around them. Banks of driftwood and seaweed like a dam run along the beach. Must have been some waves. The millioned black sea stones shush and roar in undertow. I run up ahead as Trevor hunts for shells and treasure.

The smooth grey behemoths at the bend are molten soft from spray and foam. Once above the mist the dry stone bites nicely into the wet rubber of sneakers. A magic grip for climbing if there is no sand.

As I make my way around the bend I can see that you can go no further. Just twenty feet out a great hill sized stone sits. It's crest is watercolor white spilled with years of seagull and pelicans. As the water rushes back between the stone and the cliff an underwater sky of starfish is exposed. From maroon to orange white they spangle the green furry stones just beneath the water. My God look at them all. Must show Trevor. Back up the stones I see a small tidepool just below. Somehow I had missed it. Maybe Starfish. I am an old Starfish hunter from childhood but I can't bring myself to take a live one as I did when I was a kid. Scramble down and to it's edge. A perfect pool of stone the rising waves stop at it's edge and crawl back. Three Stars on that stone. Must be low tide.

Well I'll be damned.

Just below the stone and in neon green clustered in groups are the big lashed and eyeless green pipes of sea anemonaes. Here and there a bunch. Not just wonderous but downright alien. Soft and clutching their perch like a starfish or other starry clutcher the urchin. The pool is a little sky smooth and black encasing green stars like a childs painting. Here comes Trevor down the stones.

He too gapes at the anemonaes.

"Wow I didn't know" he says.

Me neither. Amazing. But I can't take one and I ain't taking a Star so let's.

As we make our way back to the sand we spot a Sea Lion on sentry duty. Looking for us perhaps. Trev and I sneak to a big stone in the spray just above the water. A wave for fun kicks some stones and soakes me to the bone. Trying to disuade me. Forget it I am wet and will wait. Now where did he go? In a few minutes our vigilance is rewarded.

Right beneath us the Sea Lion emerges. Shiny head above the foam. About ten feet away. He looks right at us motionless in perhaps fear but maybe wonder. His eyes are too big for his head and are pure black liquid. His face is black and silver flecked and he is many whiskered like a cat. My heart is racing and he is suddenly gone. Trevor and I decide that this is the crowning gem. We walk back toward the car in awe. Sea Lion completely vanished.

"Wait" says Trevor. "I have to."

He takes off his shirt and shoes and edges into the freezing water. Moans and shudders as it rises above his legs and then drops. Submerged. Rockets up and races to shore. Baptized Officially. We are Monks of our Own Order performing Religious Ceremony that we invent on the spot like children. The Holy Meeting with the Sea Lion, the Star Garden Sanctuary of Anemonae and the Baptism. Our Visit is complete. Now we can return to Kate's for another Last Supper.

Oh yes, and I found my sneakers burried in the sand by our fire.

Kathryn will miss Trevor terribly. Circumstance has made it hard for her to spend too much time with him these past few days. The wind chimes on the porch agree. Perhaps, we decide he can return in the Fall and accompany me home. Who knows. I feel almost as though I am intruding on their meeting as family. Trevor seems not anxious to return home but only because he wants to stay. I wish he could. Jesus Christ what the hell will I do without him?

The Sky is telling us that twilight is ahead. Though his flight doesn't leave till almost midnight, it is two hundred miles to the airport. We best be headin out boy. I'll give you a minute to make your goodbyes. Kathryn, I'll see you at the beginning of the next Chapter. You see Reader, sometimes at a turn in your life you can feel your own Story change. You can feel a Page turning or maybe even a Chapter coming to a close. A new one usually starts right up. Some times we come to the whole next Book in our life. The trick (if there is a trick to be had) is to recognize their comings and goings and go with them. So. This Chapter is coming to a close, you know.

It was sad to leave the sweet little cabin. I had unpacked to excess and it took time to gather everything up. Summer was not yet fully hear and there was a sense of Beginning in the air. Seemed odd to be Ending. Gather up your stones and shells and stars. Take some of those bars of soap and turn in those keys. One last look back and the sky is burnt streaks of cloud and coal and orange glow. The setting sun is the yolk of a great egg over easy. Gas and twilight joe were off.

It is dark in under and hour and just then Ukiah is on the right there. Look maybe we can see that bench we left Jim at. The hills are great lumpy darkness just like when we were coming out West. Guardians at night. Civilization is a myriad of sodium stars light pink and almost a blue white. A constelation on that hillside. The Seven Sisters a gas station and post office and five houses. Seventy miles of this. But the hills smooth out to a flat basin below. Industry and more traffic. Miles peel away and San Fransisco California is ahead.

We were silent and listened to music. Lost a little. The cool night air was becoming salty and damp. Water. Look at that map. No Bypass exactly or so it seems. Only 101 the main artery right into the center and through. We are ahead of time a bit so no worry. The navigation is enough to keep my mind occupied. No need to worry over what I'm going to do yet. What's that unbeleivable structure up ahead well I'll be it's the Golden Gate Bridge.

The fog in patches raced over the road on the bridge, it's unthinkable arches dissapearing in the dark and cloud above. Cables like a great harp of the Gods. Then the Heart.

Stoplights you know every block and five slow miles this then that away. Steep swooping hills and incredulous leaning houses. Blocks and blocks and people and The Pacific leaning in to the West. And of course at the center the ambitious towers of steel and glass. Tall and narrow like many sparkled lighthouses. But soon it is behind us and a few miles neatly away is the great Skyport. A massive imposition of a building. The airport centers fields of flat blackness all a glitter with light. Flashing green ones and neat rows of dark blues. Smooth simple path to Departing. Seems impossible what is about to happen.

Trevor will get on a plane and fly a few hours to Chicago where he will quickly hop another for Hartford. He will be home in the morning. Probably sleep and awaken as though from a dream. I suppose only in this way will it seem possible. As though it was a dream. Here it is and just about on time. Got everything? "Hey Tim you can have my sleeping bag too if you want?" he says bag shouldered. Dragonfly green nylon he had purchased it for the trip. Sure I do. We laugh at Jim's boots. He gives me a hundred bucks. "Get a room tonight. In town. Here." I had actually planned to drive the two hundred miles back. But not now my God thank you Trevor.

"Hey if you can, try to pick up Jim at the bus station." Says I.

He agrees but never does. Jim's bus eventually coming in almost nine hours late.

A quick hug and I'll call you in a few days. Good luck.

And then there was one.

And I was alone again.

He shuffles in through the automatic glass doors and is swallowed by the big building. Reflection in the glass of me and the red car.

There came sudden butterflies. I jump in and and get the hell out of the Airport. Immediately on the highway I am bound for the first hotel. I need to get out of the car.

I am comforted in Trevor's immediate absence by the fact that he is not really gone yet (though he is) but still lugging his stuff and administrating his seat on the big silver plane. I too am wrangling accomodations in the downtown blocks of San Fran. I'd like to sleep before his plane takes off.

A quaint but pricey hotel with the word Star in it's name. At a store across the street I bought the darkest cup of coffee I had ever bought at a store. I drank two cups. And then, despite the java, exhausted and unknowing of what to do next, sometime just about the time when Jim Dove was sleeping (or trying to on the rumbling bus) somewhere in the Heartland and Trevor's plane was lifting Eastbound from the Earth I fell asleep.

I slept like a bear.

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