Remembering Franz Jahoda, 1930 - 2012

“We know how the sky is blue, but we don’t know why,” Franz said while marveling the glowing blanket of atmosphere above us. With a career in theoretical physics, specializing in light and optics behind him, the statement not only had profound dimensions in and of itself, but was telling about the man who made it.

Franz and his wife Pat and I were having lunch, perched on the rim of a canyon in the backcountry of Bandelier National Monument. It was a beautiful fall day in northern New Mexico, the air and light so clear if it could make a sound it would ring like a bell.

Franz possessed the rare brilliance of an open mind and humble nature, able to embrace and find inspiration in the fact we do not and likely will never have all the answers. And so, it was always a delight to be in his company. We shared many lively, wondering conversations, many high summits, and other slices of life including the trials, as friends do.

For all his humility, Franz once revealed a flashy side. Curious about his lifelong passion for downhill skiing - after all, you get yourself hauled up a hill to simply slide down over and over again - I asked him what was it about the sport which held him. Without hesitation he exclaimed, “I can show off!”

Many of us now feel the hard ache of missing Franz Jahoda. I do. Fortunately he has left us with uncountable fine memories, and a big blue sky above to look at and wonder about.

Gordon Bunker

Toast

This past Saturday morning R wanted toast. When she pushed the lever down on the toaster to get things started, it broke. I put up a silent cheer. Finally, the cursed thing quit. It was a yard sale purchase of R’s and had been the bane of my every morning. No matter how much fiddling with the controls, it would offer up either warm bread or burned bread, but never toast. And first thing in the day I don’t need anything to make me a grouch, or rather, grouch-ier. Just ask R.

For some time I’d been dreaming of a proper slice of toast, crispy on the outside and still a bit chewy on the inside… slathered with butter and jam, without drama or trauma, a balm for my grumbling soul and a giant leap toward starting out on the right foot. So with the toaster’s demise I hesitated not one minute, yanked the cord from the socket, grabbed the unit and marched it out to the trash. Before slamming the lid shut on its tomb I gave it a squinty-eyed glance and uttered the last rites, “There, you miserable son of a …” never to be seen or heard from again, “good… Bye!”

We set priorities according to our hierarchy of needs, so what would it be for rest of the day? Clean the garage or find a new toaster? Without a second thought a toaster, one which actually worked, shot to the top of my list. I was determined to do everything I could to ensure a future of happy toasting and was quickly hot on the trail of a “Lift & Look Touch,” by the Australian company Breville. The Aussies apparently are big on toast; they must be to come up with this juggernaut.

Bakeries here in Santa Fe are into “artisan” breads. They can call them whatever they like, I call them delicious. But the loaves, round domes baked without pans, produce big oval slices in the middle and tiny ones from the ends. The star feature with the Lift & Look is its “extra long” slots, promising to toast anything I can throw at it in one gulp. And then its straightforwardness; this toaster has buttons labeled, “Lift & Look,” and “A Bit More.” I get it, no secret decoder ring required. In this world so enamored with icons, the meanings of which not always readily apparent, there’s something quaint, even charming about the use of simple English.

As an aside, for the swashbuckling guy like me, getting excited about a countertop appliance may appear a sad commentary on what life has come to, but climbing the highest peaks or plunging the depths of the ocean look like just too much effort. Left to my memoirs perhaps are tales of high adventure, but as I slip into older doghood, the lack of pressure in getting a kick out of a toaster comes as a relief.

Now we get down to the proof which is in the pudding, or toast as it were, and so far so good. Having got the gist of the browning control, the Lift & Look shines. Let there be toast, light, dark, any way you like it, and after years of violent spring loaded toast launchings the gentle motorized lowering and raising of the slices, while a bit superfluous, is a nice Zen touch. We have yet to try the “Bagel” setting wherein the unit toasts the inside cut faces more than the outside surfaces. When you’ve come this far toward toasting perfection you wouldn’t want to overdo your poppy seeds or bits of onion and garlic now would you? Bagels are on my grocery list.

Gordon Bunker

With Wings It Would Fly

A few days ago D and I make tentative plans to have lunch. When he calls and says, “today will work, how about The Mineshaft?” I hesitate. The Mineshaft is a dive tavern in Madrid, about 25 miles south of town. I like the place, but driving way out there, having lunch and then driving back will take a big chunk of time from the day, and there are comparable burgers to be found closer to home.

When he adds, “we’ll take the 911,” I do not hesitate. To heck with everything else. I’ve only seen a 911-ish shape looming under a cover in the corner of D’s garage, and there is without question something very seductive about a veil, and then… lifting it. The opportunity to ride in a Porsche 911 Turbo Carrera 4 is not to be missed.

I get to D’s at the appointed hour, just as he is rolling the car out of the garage. Oh my, what a beautiful car and what beautiful sounds. There is nothing like a 911. And so I park the GTI, eagerly hop out and get into the Porsche. Correction: you don’t so much get into a Porsche as you put it on. Contrary to the minds eye - envisioning the greatness of the 911 and thus the car must be big - the car is diminutive and so is the fit.

The day is beautiful, clear as a bell, not too hot and there’s only a light breeze. Playing hooky with a friend and experiencing one of the greatest cars of all time, well, it just don’t get better than this. We drive at a moderate pace until the engine is fully warmed and the flat spots in the tires have a chance to work themselves out. Even with things toned down, I know this piece of machinery has goods not to be taken lightly. The Porsche is tight and quick. It all takes a while to get used to, especially all those wonderful mechanical sounds coming from the engine bay in the back of the car.

And then D puts his foot in it and Holy Mother of The Gods Of Internal Combustion! My torso and head crush into the seatback, my peripheral vision blurs and I can see D has his work cut out for him just keeping his shifts up with the engine bouncing off the rev limiter. I have never felt acceleration as intensely as this in a car, and this is only the prelude to what happens in the twisties.

Between Cerrillos and Madrid among hills and canyons the road becomes a snake and the pavement is in good condition. The Traffic Gods smile upon us and clear the way, and it is play time with all wheel drive and a horsepower to weight ratio of 1:8. Oh, and the brakes, which redefine how fast and deep you go into corners before thinking about applying them. Until I get accustomed to this, with every corner coming up real fast, I think I’m going to die. And into the corners I discover a flaw in the Porsche: the fully bolstered seat does not keep me in place given the lateral forces we experience. Small potatoes, it’s more a testament to how well this car sticks to the road. Things go by mind-blowingly quick and during a second’s reprieve afforded by a short straight, D says, “You’ll drive us back. That is, if you want to.”

My mind stumbles, I take a deep breath and consider the responsibilities to life and limb and machine and as we plunge into the next corner I grin a silly grin and say, “Sure!”

Lunch? Oh yeah. We have lunch. And we talk about - can you guess? - cars and other important guy stuff, and then D hands me the keys. So with some trepidation I put on the Porsche and manage to back it out of the parking space without crunching into anything and then get underway without stalling it. So far, so good. As we putter through the village I comment (with no disrespect to all the Grandmothers of the world), “I’ll probably drive like an Old Grannie.”

“Don’t worry about it… go for it,” replies D.

And so as we make our way back through aforementioned hills and canyons I ease into the car and sample (a fraction of) what it has to offer.

With windows open and the wail of the engine, we now need to raise our voices to be heard. Shouting, D reaffirms, “you’re doing fine… go for it.”

And I smile and in-between expletives undeleted, with hands firmly grasping the steering wheel which is giving me tons of feedback on what’s going on up front, I shout back, “Thanks, but… I can tell with this car… it would be easy to get in way above my head, and way too fast and… it’s decidedly uncool to wad up your friend’s car.” From the corner of my eye I see D swallow and nod.

“Thanks for that,” he says. The landscape and corners flash by and we get behind a slowpoke and when I pull out to pass, into the spirit of things D says, and this is a direct quote, “floor it.” My right foot follows his directive and the car leaps forward as the turbos come on with their insane hit of power, and momentarily stunned, I back off; the car calms a bit and D says, “you got him…” and I get back into the gas and we positively rip. The slowpoke fades into a time zone of history and we are gonesville.  Back in our lane I say something along the lines of, “holy shit.”

D says, “I may chip the car… there’s amazing potential in these engines.”

And I reply, “yeah, it feels a bit down on power.” Uh-huh, and we laugh and fly into three big sweepers and up and over a hill and… I decide to take a break and collect my thoughts and back off before the next curvy section. For a few moments we lope along and I give D my impressions.

Aside from the flat six and all the power it makes and all the music, oh, the music, I am most taken by the precise throttle and how easy it is to work in concert with the gearbox and shifter and clutch. Again the road tightens, and coming into the corners, downshifting, blipping the throttle and getting on the gas… the Porsche simply responds and puts me in a flow and it is addictive and I want to feel that rush. So I feed it and go faster, and faster…

It’s a great privilege to drive such a car. Many thanks, D.

Gordon Bunker

Redemption In Pi

The problem started in first grade with 0. For me it was the beginning of the end in proficiency with math. If 1 represents the presence of something and -1 represents the absence of something, why have this thing in the middle called zero? Something either exists or it doesn’t, there’s no in-between. Public education however made little room to accommodate pondering and so as I considered this mysterious integer the program moved on. Not paying attention to the new mysteries presented to class, pretty quickly I was lost.

The real slap in the face came when I realized creative problem solving or being close enough were not worthy of credit. Along about fifth grade I was struggling with a test in geometry. It was all about the theorems we were supposed to memorize. To this day I dislike the word theorem. Just the way it rolls around in my mouth, I want to spit it out. So the problem was, “Using the theorem show how many degrees are within the triangle.” Not remembering the foolish thing I got out a piece of tracing paper, put it over the triangle on the test sheet, got my ruler and traced one of the angles. I moved the paper around and lined the it up with the next angle in the triangle, traced it and then the next until I had three angles together which I measured with my protractor to be 178 degrees.

When the test results came back, I learned this answer and quite a few others was wrong. Close apparently, only counted in horse shoes and hand grenades, but c’mon, I worked hard for those 178 degrees! I took a look at all the dreaded red X’s and thought, “to hell with it. This is dumb,” (public education that is, not math) and started my career as an artist by doodling my way through math class and most every other. Note to parents: Whether mathematicians are smarter than artists is up for grabs but they have been smart enough to convince society they should be paid for what they do.

The speed at which Earth orbits the Sun recently got my curiosity. It had to be a big number, but just how big? The formula to find the circumference of a circle is 2 π r. Hey look! My calculator has a π key on it, I can do this. In this case, r, or the distance between our planet and star is 93,000,000 miles. One orbit takes 8,760 hours and my calculations told me we’re traveling at approximately 66,671 mph. Which is bookin’ it. This gives a whole new perspective to the concept of “sitting still.” Good thing space is mostly vacuum, otherwise the leading surface of our little planet would have one heck of a wind blowing straight down on it.

But what about this ‘approximate’ business? Well, it has to do with π. For most purposes we think of it as 3.14, but in fact it is a number which in decimal form goes on and on forever and never repeats itself. Thus we do not and can not know what the value of π is - what we use is close enough. Even though the answer to any calculation involving π and a few other constants like it is more an opinion, it is worth some, perhaps even full, credit.

Huh. Close, in math, does count.

Gordon Bunker

Love

Love brings us together and true love holds us together.

In the past week I am reminded of this in a thousand ways small and large, as I gather with family and friends north of San Diego, for R’s niece’s wedding… and some serious hanging out and goofing around. Thank you so much to Lisa and Jay, the bride’s mom and dad, for hospitality the likes of which I have never before known.

Every evening we get together for dinner, no fractious groups here. It turns out cooking for twenty five (more or less) is not such a big deal. If you have help. When it is the New Mexico Contingent’s turn, that afternoon a few of us roll up our sleeves in the kitchen. Four giant pans of enchiladas materialize as do pots full of frijoles (bacon fat rules) and calabacitas and… When I ask, “what can I do?” Lisa has the nerve to request I make her award winning chocolate cake, that is, the one which so handily beat mine in the Chocolate Cake Throw Down. That she would entrust me with this is perhaps the ultimate compliment, nonetheless I give her a ration of grief and we all laugh and I make the cake. Except for sticking to the pan, I think it comes out better than when she made it for the Throw Down. Ha Ha! Not really, but I had to put that in there to get a rise out of you, Lisa.

The word dinner doesn’t do justice for what we had. Feast is more like it. Great spreads of food are set out family style. How else? Grilled steaks, steaming casseroles, salads, there’s enough for seconds and there is always dessert. There is Australian rum, and a selection of French red wines which may spoil me for life. Food is love. We dine and drink, stories and joking and laughter go on until the wee hours. Each of us knowing we are loved, goes to bed satisfied, tired, and happy.

Nine of us come from Australia, fully the other side of the world to be here. What a great thing. We’re all the same in the big ways and different in the small ones. Spending time with people who see and do things in a different manner opens our minds to the possibilities. Immediately we are friends, we are family. Thanks to you for the Aussie BBQ, full of familiar and new tastes. The sponge cake with strawberries and banana is unforgettable.

Early one morning I am the first up and the house is quiet. While making coffee I look out the window and see a hot air balloon, silent and ethereal, rising up from the hills. Another two or three appear, the kids wake up, “look! look!” they exclaim, and soon we are all out in the back yard, looking at, watching these colorful wonders.

Poppa and his granddaughters hoot and tease in a game of “MY POOL!” where he plays a very convincing hot tub ruling sea monster and picks the girls up, all gangly arms and legs going in all directions, and deftly tosses them into the relatively icy waters of the swimming pool. There is shrieking and growling and slippery as seals the girls wriggle their way back for more and more. He plays water balloon with the girls and laughs; complete delight on everyone’s faces. Poppa naps on the sofa with his youngest curled in his arms. It is so rare men are allowed to be tender and affectionate and silly, yet it is so good for us to behave in these ways. Girls can bring these qualities out of us; we are all blessed with relationships and times like these.

George, the bridegroom’s dad, is originally from Greece. Having been at it for a millennia or three, the Greeks are pretty good at philosophy. We sit at the table after dinner one evening and talk. “The material things mean nothing to me,” he says. Pausing and looking directly at me he repeats with emphasis, “nothing.” George slowly points one hand around the room. All these people, our people, are together and having fun, loitering in the kitchen trading recipes, playing hot games of foosball, focusing on a challenging shot at pool and crying mock anguish at missing it. “This is it. This is beautiful,” he says. Tears well in his eyes.

Many of us have only met in the past day or two. It is remarkable but then it is not that the room is full of good will. “We all love one another.” I say.

We are quiet for a moment. George then says, “Life is simple. It is our expectations and perceptions that make it complicated.” He smiles and gives me a hug. Another thing the Greeks know about is cooking. Thank you George for that roast leg of lamb. Από τους Θεούς!

Missy and Dave, we have you to thank for bringing us together. You two who met and fell in love and decided to marry. It is plain to see, amid all the goings on and hustle and bustle you are immensely happy. Joy is infectious and thank goodness for that. Not often do I describe a guy as radiant, but on the day of the big event both Missy and Dave are radiant. You are beautiful, and an inspiration to us all. It is an honor to be among those gathered. Your vows touch our hearts. We celebrate, we toast and eat and drink and dance to your and all true love.

Gordon Bunker

The Haircut

My Dad used to take me to Seth’s Barber Shop on Warren Street in Concord. Being next door to the police station and city jail, an imposing brick and granite edifice full of cops and robbers, always put me a little on edge. Seth’s had big bevel edge mirrors in an ornate oak sideboard the entire length of one wall and a row of barber chairs facing them. The chairs were giant contraptions, made of cast iron with white enamel finish, nickel plated trim and black leather cushions. On the counter under the mirrors were bottles of Old Spice and bay rum and combs resided in tall glass jars filled with turquoise disinfectant fluid.

Tall back wooden chairs with splits in the seats were lined up along two walls. The splits would close as the seat flexed under your weight and pinch your butt. In the summer if you were wearing shorts this would be especially painful. Of course shorts were for boys… one more inducement to get to manhood as soon as possible.

Chrome plated ash trays stood on pedestals between the chairs and they got used a lot. Men would sit waiting and smoke cigarettes and cigars. There was no take a number thing. Customers knew when it was their turn and Seth only had to say, “next.” One winter day, while the giant hot as hell cast iron radiators clanked and hissed, while visible waves of heat wafted upwards, I sat waiting and got fooling with a ragged hole in one of the knees of my blue jeans. Having holes in your jeans was cool and the bigger the better. So I got pulling out tufts of thread and put them in the nearby ash tray, and with hot ashes in there they started smoldering. Sinuous wisps of smoke curled up and there wasn’t much I could do. The smoke had a nasty stink to it and then little flames leapt up. Nonchalantly, so no one would know it was my doing, I moved across the room and then a bigger flame broke out and then all hell broke loose and Seth ran for it and tossed the entire thing out the door into a snow bank. I don’t recall whether or not I got busted. Funny how that detail escapes me.

Seth was a nice guy. He wore a light blue smock, his silver hair was cropped into a short brush cut, he had a gravely voice and he smoked like a blast furnace. The cigarette dangling from his mouth was as much a facial feature as his nose; likely no one would recognize him without it. With scissors and comb and humming electric clippers he’d transform his customers from shaggy to trim. Watching Seth give a customer a shave with his long straight edge razor, all the while talking up a storm and the cigarette jiggling up and down always scared the hell out of me. He worked quickly and efficiently, swick, swick, swick went the razor, so close to the jugular, but never did he nick a customer’s face or neck.

This was a man’s place. Men would sit and smoke and read the paper and talk. Boys would sit and fidget and start fires and run around. Sometimes they’d run out the door in an effort to escape the impending doom of their turn or expend the cooped up energy within stomachs full of sugar coated breakfast cereals. We didn’t need Ritalin then. We simply ran around like Tasmanian Devils and no one worried about us and everything worked out ok. On the rare occasion my Mother brought me to Seth’s, everyone in the place would freak out. The whole vibe changed, it was awkward, no one knew what to do. It’s not as though it was an unruly, unmannered crowd. It was just, “Uh oh, it’s a woman.”

Seth would boost me up into the chair and ratchet a big lever back and forth and kachunk-kachunk-kachunk, up I’d bounce. He’d then wrap my neck with a band of white tissue paper and then place an apron over me and fasten it around my neck with a clip, always a little too tight.

Seth had one hairstyle in his repertoire. Short. Bangs over the forehead were a big thing so he’d hold my hair down flat on my brow and snip it off straight across. This after refereeing a battle between my Dad and me where he would snip, and seeing how my Dad was directly connected to getting paid, Seth let him win. In other words my bangs were cut short. And because my hair on the right side of my forehead wants to bob up, when he let go… boing! the right third of my bangs would rocket skyward. Every time. And boy didn’t that look goofy. I never had bangs go straight across.

A few years ago I had it with getting my hair cut so bought an electric clipper with a bunch of comb attachments and every once in a while I’d mow my hair into submission. With a fresh cut, friend’s would look at me with a combination of concern and amusement, first wondering if something catastrophic had happened to my health and then settling into the realization I just looked funny. Sallie’s response nailed it: “you got peeled!” she’d say. Then I met my sweetheart R and she said, “G! You’re lucky you have hair. You ought to let it grow.” So I put the clippers away for awhile. At some point the shaggy dog look got to be too much for both of us and in my resistance to go to a barber, R cut my hair. Bless her heart she gave it her best shot, but, well, the result was a little… lopsided. What the heck, I’m not too particular in this department and it’d grow back and it did. No big deal.

As it goes, my hair got longer and longer and looking like a hard used mop. There’s a wedding coming up - gasp - I actually have to look presentable for a change. This kind of thing is always a shock to my system. “You mean I can’t wear jeans???” Which starts a cascading effect. If dress pants are required, then shoes follow. “Shoes? You mean my Lowa lows won’t cut it? How about my clogs?” I wore my clogs to the last wedding and except for dancing they did fine. Ok, well enough. I’m not going to buy shoes for a wedding. Use once and put in the back of the closet. But I digress. I needed a haircut.

This morning about quarter to ten my phone rang. It was R. “I’m at B beautiful. Steven has an opening at 10:30 - he’s great, fantastic - can you make it?”

I gave my calendar a quick look, “sure,” I said. “Thanks Sweetheart.” So I finished paying bills, put the checks in the mail and headed out.

B beautiful is nothing like Seth’s. It is a salon where haircutting is one small part of the picture. One of the great things about Santa Fe are the little gems tucked away in unlikely places. B beautiful is in a light industrial business complex off Early Street. The buildings are metal sided and the parking lot is well potholed. A climbing gym, car repair shop and yoga studio are neighbors.

The waiting area is equipped with comfy chairs and a cool waterfall. Steven’s assistant Leo greets me and leads me back to the cutting stations, sits me down and wraps a towel around my neck. Not too tight, “Steven would not be happy if we strangle a client,” she says. We go to a sink, I sit in a different chair and lean back and Leo shampoos my hair and puts conditioner in it. Then back to the cutting station and she combs my hair. I’m laughing about the fact this is the first time my hair’s been combed in years. Literally. Steven, dressed in all black, a sharp sport coat over a t-shirt and jeans, comes in and I tell him about my lack of grooming and he laughs and we talk about what I want and he actually listens. Then he starts to cut. He snips here and he snips there and he walks around me and gets his hands in my hair and draws it out and looks and snips and little bits of hair go flying in all directions and before I know it… it looks good! Like I’m a respectable human being or something. And we find motorcycling is a common interest so of course we talk bikes and tell tales of our two wheeled adventures. Leo comes by and asks if there’s anything I need. “Theatre tickets?” I wonder. No, more like a cup of coffee or tea, but I’m all set.

Steven is one of four partners in B beautiful and they’ve been in business five years. I congratulate him - this is quite an accomplishment. “Especially in this depression!” he says. He trims my beard and puts some stuff in my hair that smells vaguely reminiscent of peach cobbler and in short order I’m on my way. When I get out into the sunshine and fresh air I feel good. The man may make the haircut but getting trimmed up and looking good, or in my case, better, puts a spring in my step I didn’t have walking in.

Later in the afternoon R comes home. “Oh my God!” she exclaims. She fools with the hair around my ears. “Nice!” Then she messes up the back. “It has bounce!”

“It does?” I ask.

“Yeah. Do you like it?”

“Yes, I do.” I say. I’m not sure about the bounce thing, but I like the cut. Thank you Steven and Leo, I’ll be back. Five stars to B beautiful!

Gordon Bunker