With arms wide open

Under the sunlight

Welcome to this place

I’ll show you everything

That is the chorus to Creed’s song “Wide Open”, a song about a father’s joy of welcoming a child into the world.  My Dad didn’t get to be part of the original Welcoming Committee on the day of my birth, but he and the rest of the family are making up for that. They have been busy ’showing me everything.’

I just got back from a long weekend with him, although it was packed, so it seemed short. I made the seven hour trip to Richmond, broken up by spending the night at “the Halfway House” (my grandparents’ house in Santa Maria) and arrived at Grandma Betty’s around one o’clock Saturday.  We spent the afternoon comparing our likes and dislikes, and we did the grocery shopping together, laughing all the way about our quirky similarities.

“Do you think you two will you want salad tonight?” she asked me.

I laughed. “Cameron says the only reason I eat vegetables is because I’m afraid God will punish me if I don’t. So no, I don’t want salad.”

Naturally, she also hates vegetables. Except for corn, which we both love.

She was shopping for the ingredients to make gumbo which I have been eager to try.  I can’t exactly call myself Creole if I have never had gumbo. Plus I just like the word.

I got to spend the afternoon with my cousins Alyana and Tamaya who came over to swim at Grandma’s pool. We talked about dancing, writing and art; they too have inherited the creative gene.

I was a little worried that my Dad would be tired after his week of teaching music camp. He said they usually stay up late every night, so I thought he might be too exhausted to see me.  I thought I would let him know I could stay with Grandma if he needed some time to wind down, so I called him when I thought he was on his way home.

“Hi!” he answered and then said, “I love you!” like he had been holding that in all week and couldn’t wait to let it out.

I smiled with relief.  He was just as excited about seeing me as I was about him.

He finally arrived, and so did his cousin Gail who lives nearby.  We ate our gumbo, which is a delicious but messy business that offers a certain freedom from proper manners. There is just no ladylike way to fish a crab leg out of your soup with your bare hands and crack it open while the juices fly into your fellow diner’s hair. 

After dinner Grandma showed us a video of the Treme district of New Orleans.  It showed what it was like both before and after Katrina and gave a history of the city.  It was very sad.  The struggle of the African Americans has never let up since they reached this country, and Katrina has made things much worse. I am, however, happy to have a better sense of my roots.  I’m also more excited than ever about next year’s family reunion in New Orleans.

At one point during the documentary someone made a comment to the effect of “In order to move ahead, you have to know where you came from.” Dad and I turned and looked at eachother simultaneously. Funny how he knows what I’m thinking.

Black Cowboys?

Sunday we had a lazy morning, which included a spontaneous songwriting session, until David called about meeting up with us for the Bill Pickett Black Rodeo.  We got in the car and met him there, along with his girlfriend Betty and his kids.

Here was a side of American culture I was totally unaware of: black cowboys! And not only that, the event started with a rider carrying a flag I had never seen before, the “Black American flag”.

The Black American Flag

Then everyone stood for the “Black National Anthem”. (Fortunately I had read about that on Grandma Betty’s blog, so I didn’t feel completely ignorant.)

The whole experience was completely new to me. It was hard to wrap my mind around. If I could have looked into the future a few months ago and seen myself sitting in that crowd, I would have asked, “Rosie Funk, what in the world are you doing at the Black Rodeo? Have you lost your mind?!”

But this, apparently, is part of my heritage.  And I must say that I used to think that the mystery of not knowing my biological father made me interesting.  But no, this is way more interesting!

I thoroughly enjoyed the rodeo, although my own words kept ringing in my ears, the ones I spoke to my sister last summer when she signed up her daughter, India, for horseback riding lessons.

“Our people are not Horse People,” I had insisted.

But watching all those beautiful horses at the rodeo reminded me that for a short time our people were Horse People.  We had friends in Winchester, California, who used to let us ride their horses. We kids even had a horse club, and we were each identified by a different kind of horse.  Monica was a Palomino, I was a Shetland pony, our friend Denise was an Arab. But then my mom got thrown from a horse and was badly injured. Shortly after that Lilly and I were riding together and our horses got into a fight.  Lilly fell off and got kicked black and blue.  I escaped without injury, but our dad was furious, and that was virtually the last time any of us ever got on a horse. I never got over my fear of horses after that.

The Coolest Cowboy of All

But the rodeo wasn’t nearly as inspiring as what I saw the next day.

Working with Horses

Monday was our first ever “Take Your Daughter to Work Day” (although, as Dad pointed out, I’m old enough to take him to work).  He lives and works on a horse breeding ranch, so he literally walks straight out the front door and is at work. I sat on the ground outside the horse pens (What is the right word? ‘Corrals’, ’stalls’, ‘coops’?) and watched in awe as he began training the baby horses. Some of them were really tiny, just born last week, and they are skittish about humans. 

Dad starts training a baby by catching it, putting his arms around it until it calms down, and then strokes and scratches it to give it a pleasurable experience. He is very gentle and quiet. The babies are scared at first, but then they start to relax and say, “Ahhhhh! That feels good!” Then he puts a rope around them and starts to teach them to go forward and backward.  He spends time with each one, and gradually they start to look forward to his visits.

I had forgotten how beautiful a creature a horse is.  Even from birth they are so graceful and calm. And my heart pounded from the excitement of seeing those little babies up close. Maybe I still am a Horse Person.  I am certainly willing to give it another try. I told Dad so.  He made me promise to let him be the one to teach me to ride.  He wants to show me.

Big Sur 

There was something else he has been eager to show me, and that is where he used to live in Big Sur.  That place and the people in it changed his life, he said. We got in the car, and I put on the Eagles’ Greatest Hits, and we sang our hearts out all the way to the coast.

I have driven that coast on several occasions, but I have never seen it from the places he stopped at along the way: breathtaking views of the ocean, the coastline, the houses.  It’s a completely different world. Then he told me to close my eyes and count to fifty, and when I opened them again I was again altogether in another world. I gasped at the sight of towering redwood trees lining the sides of a lush, green canyon.  There were unique cabins all along the road, and I could tell whoever lived in them must be just as unusual as their house. There was funky artwork all around, and I had a strong suspicion there was no homeowner’s association to dictate the color scheme like in my Orange County neighborhood.

First we visited Norm Cotton, a friend Dad describes as “true blue”.  He invited us in and put off whatever he was working on to entertain us.  And I do mean entertain.

“Let’s play some music!” he said and got out a guitar and a fiddle.

Dad and I did “the Empty Room” for him, and then the two of them took turns switching instruments, Norm also alternating with the piano.

This was a revolutionary idea to me.  You mean you can just put on a performance on a Monday afternoon with no planning whatsoever?  You don’t have to send out invitations and agonize for weeks over how well you will perform? What universe is this? I don’t know, but I like it!

We walked up to see some more of Dad’s friends, Chris and Jerri.  Wow! Their gardens, house and studio were clearly an extension of their personalities. Their artwork was everywhere. It was all so funky and beautiful.

Dad says Jerri can do everything, paint, dance, sing, write.  She confirms for me that the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” should be replaced with “What do you want to do next?”  She has clearly not allowed herself to be pigeonholed.

one of Jerri's masterpieces

After visiting Jerri’s mom, Billie Masten, we went back and had dinner with Norm and his girlfriend Theresa. I asked how they met, and they told us how they met at a “contra dance” which is a sort of square dance.  Apparently it’s passed down from the Puritans and is still a big deal in New England. (Who says Californians have no culture? Black cowboys, contra dance, what else could you ask for?)

Lastly we went to see Ron and Deborah. Ron has known Dad since he was a little boy. We stayed until 10:30, and I could tell my Dad was savoring every moment.

I can see why this place was so influential in my Dad’s life.  It is all so spontaneous and laid back. Each house is funkier than the next. There is a spirit of acceptance here that allows the freedom to live and to create. It is so unlike the sterile environment I’m used to back home, where the only thing representing the fertility of my creative mind is growing in the bottom drawer of the fridge.

I look now at the pictures in my hallway, lined up in neat little rows, and wonder how my life would have been different if I had lived in Big Sur. And now I wonder how my life will be different, now that my father has shown me all this.
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