Reunion I

I just returned home from a week celebrating my 40th HS reunion in the San Francisco Bay Area. These two long (what do you expect?) essays reflect on the journey down, the time there and the return to Salem, Oregon...

The Hottest Day of the Year--and Driving

I went down to Menlo Park CA last Tuesday, August 24, stopping first in Eugene to visit my son. The journey is about 640 miles and it began, as the Chinese say, with a single car tread (or was it a step?). August 24 was probably the hottest day of the year and, because I had a serpentine belt in my engine that had been acting up, I decided not to use the air conditioner (when I used it, I heard a kind of rattling that kind of rattled me). So, it hit 100 degrees by the time I arrived near Medford OR, but from Ashland OR to about Dunsmuir CA (nearly two hours) it "cooled" down to the mid-90s. Then, the heat returned with a vengeance. My consternation grew as I saw my thermometer rise from 95 to 96 to 97 etc. I figured it would stop around 102, but it kept rising, until it hit 111 degrees between Redding and Red Bluff. It was about 4:00 p.m., the heat of the day in those parts, so I just hunkered down and drove. I stopped for a lemonade in Orland; I remember it was 108 degrees at the time, since the lemonade cost me $1.08 and I remarked to the sales person that the cost matched the temperature. She was, like totally unimpressed, ya know? Can't you see my eyes rolling?

On I continued, imagining that by the time 5:30 arrived things would dramatically cool off. Then there were, indeed, signs of relief. Just north of Dunnigan, where you take the 505 West to Vacaville and onto the Bay Area, the mercury had gone down to the low 90s. It felt a bit chilly, I mused, and so I relaxed, smiling inwardly to myself, telling myself that it wasn't that bad. But then, I was clobbered again. Though it was past 6:00 p.m., I saw the mercury climb until it was 105 in Vacaville. I forgave Vacaville for its discourtesy because I knew it couldn't help it. On I went, refusing even to stop for gas because, as I muttered to myself, I sure as hell was not going to pump gas when it was more than 95 degrees outside. This bravado is admirable, I suppose, if one has enough gas to travel. I thought I could make it to the Bay Area, where I just KNEW it would be so cold that I would have to put on a parka, so I continued driving...Vacaville..Fairfield...Vallejo.

Arriving in The Bay Area

I arrived at the Straits of Carquinez at Vallejo, the official entry into the Bay Area, and it was still 102. On I went. I went past the Cummings Skyway and the little town of Hercules. On I went, and the mercury, for some reason, seemed to be stuck at 100 or 101, despite the fact that it was now about 7:00 p.m. But still my faith was strong. I positively knew that I could outlast the heat. I was coming perilously close to Berkeley by about 7:30, but still it was 100. Finally, in El Cerrito, the thermometer began to fall. With each lowering degree, my entire body relaxed. Finally, by the time I arrived at the University Avenue exit (Berkeley), it had cooled to a pleasant 79 degrees. I exited to look for gas and a bite to eat. I also wanted to walk around the campus and the area around the Graduate Theological Union for a few minutes. I had spent a few weeks in the summer of 1989 at the GTU; I wanted to relive old moments--moments in which I jettisoned the topic for which I was there (the study of modern African Christianity) and picked up another (reading the Hebrew text of the Joseph story--Gen. 37-50).

I was back in the car by 8:00 p.m. and speeding on toward the Bay Bridge to my ultimate destination in Belmont, CA. I was broadly smiling now, believing that the 79 degrees I saw near the water in Berkeley (it had warmed up to the mid-80s as I got to "holy hill," the location of the GTU), would soon be replaced by a temperature in the mid-60s or below as I crossed the fabled bridge. But as I looked West, I was greeted with a most ineffable sight--a completely clear, cloudless, even luminescent city by the Bay, jutting up with impressive grandeur, flanked on its north by the Golden Gate Bridge and girdled by the chilly waters of the Bay, leading out to the Pacific Ocean. It seemed almost human in its scope. It reminded me of the full view of Seattle I saw from the front of my daughter's condo ten days previously or the dramatic full view of Cincinnati that breaks into a traveler's view when coming up on it from the South.

The Last Leg of the Trip

I entered the toll booth area of the Bay Bridge, and the mercury had fallen to 77. Great, I thought. Just preparing me for a plunging thermometer! I could barely wait to be buffeted and blustered by the wind and the bracing air on the Bay Bridge. Then, with a consternation that exceeded that which I felt going from Dunsmuir to Redding about four hours earlier, I saw the mercury begin to climb. It was, mind you, 8:15 p.m., and it climbed. Back to 80. I said, "Oh, no, this CAN'T be happening." But it was. Up to 85. I said to myself, "Ok, I get the point. It is hot. Now you can cool down, after we pass through Treasure Island." But the wind and weather were deaf to my pleas. Up went the mercury until it reached 94 degrees just as AT & T park was coming into view. A Giants game was going on at that time, and I later learned that it was the warmest that anyone could ever remember at the park.

Not to belabor what has already been belabored, it was still in the low 90s when I arrived near my destination just before 9:00 p.m. It didn't fully cool down until two days later but, by the time I left on Monday, August 30, the mercury sat at a chilly early-morning 53. Everything then was well with the world.

I still need to talk about the reunion--which is in the next essay.

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