An Old Laugher, 04-27-2025

Here's something I found among old papers. Back when almost everyone was on dial-up AOL, they had a feature called TikiChats that was basically a set of pre-drawn cartoon cels that you could add dialogue to. Beverly and I shared an email address then and that gave me the idea for a non-binary, two-persons-in-one-body cartoon strip called "You Shoulda Been There." Here's the first one of the set I found, I'll present the few others over the next few weeks. I hope you get a giggle or two out of them.

Sunday Sermon on Saturday, 01-25-2025

it's just another day

the new Gestapo

now in play
sing your song
most quietly
learn to suck
the poison orange
fruit that ripens
in winter's freeze
a bitter pill but
don't worry be happy
this too will pass
just pray it
passes fast

with as little

collateral damage

as possible

- Bob Loomis 01-22-2025

Ukulele Bob's New Year Update, 01-05-2025

It's been an unsettling end of 2024 and beginning of 2025. If I wanted to be morbid, I'd call it "Death Takes (Steals) A Holiday."

About midway into December, a dear neighbor passed away. 

On Christmas morning as we prepared for guests, we got a phone call from an old friend and newspaper colleague, Andy Jokelson, that his wife Susan, my partner in our book of haiku and art "One Set of Footprints," had died that morning. 

A day later, we got word that another old friend, Barre Phillips, a noted jazz bassist who recorded for ECM and lived in the south of France for decades, had passed at age 90.

Meanwhile, one dear friend whom I managed to reconnect with in 2024 is in hospice and another is having very serious long-COVID health issues. Both were band mates in the second rock band I was ever part of, Jack Ruby & The Romantics, circa 1978. The fourth member, the late, great George Estrada, died some years ago of pancreatic cancer. 

So, it became a darkly shadowed holiday season with unavoidable undertones of life's big truth, that we are just passing through and our only earthly immortality is the love we pass along to succeeding generations. In that vein, I rediscovered some cassette tapes of the band that I am digitizing and sharing with my fellow survivors. I hope to share them more widely before 2025's end.

Concurrently, I'm thankful that our band Blue-Eyed Grass completed its self-titled album for Save Mount Diablo. Our album release party at Luigi's in Martinez was a success and huge fun. It looks like we'll be playing at Two Day Town in May in addition to our private, volunteer dates for SMD. Thanks to band mates Ted Clement, John Gallagher, Dave Schneider and Rich Silveira for all the work and fun. Thanks also to my Irish Newsboys band mates for keeping our regular bit of monthly joy alive!

There was some holiday cheer. On Christmas Day, after the stunning news about Susan, friends Dave and Chappell Holt and our son Devin helped relieve some of the shock of the string of passings with a warm and loving Yule visit and dinner, complete with great food, lots of good stories and laughter.

Currently to the good, my scalded right foot seems to be healing well as does the lingering sinus infection I've had since just before New Year's Eve.

Beverly and I have been taking this one day at a time. We embrace the New Year with as much hope and enthusiasm as can be mustered under the weight (and we'd like to think the wisdom) of 80-plus years of life in this miraculous, but often harsh world. Music and art and good books and movies help. Friendship helps. Laughter helps. For me, primarily so does the companionship of Beverly Byrd Loomis, my wife of 62-plus years, and the presence and assistance of son Devin in so many ways as we age.

We are not able to get out and around as much as in younger years, especially if it involves driving at night, but we have many fond memories and want to thank and express our love to all of you who have been a part of the fabric of our lives. We look forward to the rest of the New Year! May it improve with age, especially for those caught in the turmoil of war, violence, poverty and famine. 

I'll close with the cover of my and Susan Jokelson's book. Copies may still be available at Mrs, Dalloway's books in Berkeley or from Red Moon Press at:
https://redmoonpress.com/product/one-set-of-footprints-haiku-of-bob-loomis/

Prayers for Mother Earth and Father Sky and for all of us. With Love and Thanks! 

Sketchy Sunday, 12-15-2024

My old painting, Sunburst:

 

A tanka

This blustery wind
arrives just in time
to help the red oak 

cast off the last

of Autumn's leaves

Sketchy Sunday: 11-10-2024

 New Pens On Trial:

Psunday Psalms: 10-20-2024

This is an excerpt from a series of poems I was working on around 1975, Rapid Transit Poems, drawn from my observations and experiences commuting on BART to and from work at the Oakland Tribune. I envisioned a chapbook but never finished the project, a frequent occurrence in my literary strivings. It's a bit of a flashback to my younger days as a would-be Beat poet transitioning to the Hippie (or as the Mike in the poem loved to joke, "Hip Pie") mindset. There was a lot of stoning and droning in those dear days. It wasn't legal, so was partnered with a certain amount of accompanying paranoia, depending on how potent the pot was. Mike and I would repair to his apartment at the Alician on Alice Street on occasion after work and imbibe in (GASP!) Reefer Madness! This excerpt is about one of those afternoons, I hope you enjoy it.

From Rapid Transit: Poems to a World Transported

Stagger out of Mike’s apartment

stoned and droned again

down the old marble stairs

of the Alicia apartments

permeated with old-lady scents

and mentholated pain relievers

Did Mike ridicule me as I left?

Laughing because I said thanks?

~POT PARANOIA~

Too much to consider

Here’s the street:

walking past the Hindu fakir

with his laundry under one arm

and Vedic sutras tattooed on his brow.

and on to 14th Street toward BART

watching wary city faces floating past

wondering why I exist at all

feeling guilty for no good reason

just as I was taught as a child

I am a lost, a worthless sinner

heading down the stairs into the

the bowels of Hell, the BART station

and lo and behold running into

John the Printer from the Tribune

(UGH! Last thing I want now

is an encounter with a fellow wage slave)

and we discuss as though we’re sane

the wonders/horrors of automation

and John gets on his Richmond-bound train

and I wait for the Concord train

and then it’s here, I’m aboard

still feeling nagging PARANOIA

remembering how I freaked out

on the way home from Mike’s last time

fantasizing that the Filipino girl and her child

were Vietnamese refugees, homeless,

deprived, abandoned by their

Yankee GI lover/father

until I noticed a middle-aged tourist couple

staring at me strangely and I realized

I was weeping maudlinly

tears streaming down my face on BART

and now this trip today

two young men sit facing where I stand

discussing my state of mind 

~TERROR~

but no, their deliberations 

I realize

are not about me

and even if they are, so what?

Across from them a young woman sits huddled

over a textbook

working equations of her life …

two stops later a seat is vacated

next to a woman just past

her external prime. I take

the seat, ignore her

though she’s intrigued by the flutecase 

in my lap, my attention caught

instead by two young mothers, one with a baby,

the other with a boy of about 10.

The baby’s suckling on a bottle,

one foot wagging just as my own son’s did

when he was nursing.

These two mothers are happy

knowing everyone’s enjoying

one of life’s happier intervals, a contact high

from them and their kids. They’re not commuters,

not feeling weary and down after

another’s day’s drudgework

like most of the rest of us

on this rush-hour train. We all

smile and I may weep again,

this time for joy at these happy moms,

their sons, I love them

I love everyone on this train,

I love all, but there’s no way

for me to announce it, I’m too shy,

too high, too paranoid.

It suddenly occurs to me to wonder why

I told workmates today that yes, I saw

a UFO at age 18 at Manhattan Beach CA

(as if I’m not already considered weird)

but who gives a shit, I did see something. 

the beings if any aboard that cigar-shaped

saucer with shining light portholes

didn’t stick around or try to abduct me

into outer space for diabolical experiments,

they just whizzed off into the fog

in the blink of an eye

before I could even call Aunt Dorie

to come see.

Just before we get to Concord (at more earthly speed)

a guy asks me about the flute case (the

woman’s gone, I didn’t notice her exit the train,

didn’t talk with her … something sad

about her face and lonely, too).

This guy tells me he sings in a church choir

understands the joy of making music

and how it soothes

the savage soul.

Then we reach my stop, I get off the train

And drive

"Aaahhh, at last!" 

home.

Copyright Bob Loomis

10-23-1975

 

Sketchy Sunday, 10-13-2024

 Counterpoint:

Sketchy Sunday, 09-29-2024

 This-A-Way!  Actually posted on Monday due to travel:

Sketchy Sunday, 09-22-2024

This one seems appropriate somehow for the Autumnal Equinox. New pens, new season? I know, it's a stretch. A stretch-a-sketch!

By Bob Loomis, 2024

Sketchy Sunday, 09-15-2024: Memoirs of a Marooned Duck

My masterpiece. A collage. The first Awed Duck perhaps.

By Bob Loomis 1988/1994

 

An Autobio Entry

As part of the endless sorting of old stuff we are doing, I stumbled across an old 12x18" newsprint sketch pad dating to 1966. It contains some early and often long-winded and pompous-know-it-all poetry and a few sketches. I'll reproduce some of it here. Alongside my more recent poetry it at least proves I've become less know-it-all-ish, if not less long-winded. I'll likely only scan the art with these entries because the tablet's just too big for proper scannig on my equipment. Herewith, the cover (partial) and one shorter poem, writ while Beverly and I were on our first road trip together up the West Coast to Canada and back:

First Impression

WOW! What a change!

Coming through the bridge-border

Oregon into Washington,

Longview

a preview of other 

bypassed 19th century

towns? 

"If this is Washington,

don't think I like it."

We'll find a motel soon.

Sketchy Sunday, 08-25-2024

"Yell 'Oh!' River, Grey Sky"

 

Sketchy Sunday: 08-18-2024

 I call this one "You Can Call Me AI" ... Have a wonderful Sunday!

Sketchy Sunday, 08-11-2024

Think I'll retitle this one. but not sure what yet ... Happy Sunday!

 

Sketchy Sunday, 08-04-24

This reaction to some new pens I tried could also apply to the Olympics. Finally got to sit and watch some of the surfing from Tahiti today on Peacock. Thanks to San Francisco Chronicle columnist Bruce Jenkins for pointing me to the best day to watch, Monday, August 2. Spectacular surf, terrifying surf! No thanks to NBC for treating surfing as a form of comedy relief, with NO actual footage of actual surfing. 

And by the way, whatever happened to "writes smoothly, erases cleanly"? I tell ya we're on a highway to grammatical hell.

Sketchy Sundays 07-28-24

 Just messin' around with markers ... another dabble by the dabbling diletante ...

Spring Is Sprung

Time for breakfast,
toasted dreams
on a bed of thistles.
Play some tunes
on penny whistles.
Check the mail,
postage due.
Political ads,
a pungent brew.
A beautiful day,
Spring has sprung,
and right now
this song is sung.

Rainy Tuesday Reprise from 2010

I first posted this in April 2010, made one tiny revision of it and since today is, like the earlier 04-30-2010, a rainy Tuesday, am reposting ... this time while in Cannon Beach, OR.

The Top 500 Poets List

The Top 500 Poets list
awaits mouse or muse,
not sure which …
Is my mouse
my muse?
Does my mouse
in da house
inspire me
or does my spouse?
Does my mouse
in da house
make my poems click?
And then there are
the Classic Poets
all waiting
at the corner of
Hubris and Pride …
or is it the corner
of Rhyme and Meter?
Or Words and Wisdom?
Or simply a tiny back alley
in the guidebook
of literary history?
Rhetorical questions
posed on a rainy Tuesday
when neither mouse
nor muse seem interested
in doing much
more than this.

(c) Bob Loomis
04-30-2010

Another New Year and Back to The Future

     As Jerry Garcia and Bob Hunter wrote in the good old Grateful Dead song, "The wheel is turning and you can't slow down, you can't let go and you can't hold on, you can't go back and you can't stand still, if the thunder don't get you, then the lightning will."

    Well, you can only try to adapt to whatever conditions life presents. Since it appears the gradual erosions of old age -- I'm 84, hope to hit 85 in July -- seem to be increasingly constricting what and how much I can do, I've decided to try to make this blog a bit bigger part of my life, hoping perhaps I'll gain a few readers and provide some entertainment, if not wisdom. It'll be less strenuous than some other pursuits that are now out of bounds.

    I'll post my ruminations and some poetry here, plus any new episodes in my autobiography-endlessly-in-progress, Memoirs of a Music Addict. And any new songs, as I've done in the past. I'll start now with a poem in the style of a tanka, the classic Japanese poetry form:

    Like everything else,

    even this back pain

    is only temporary.

        Unable to sleep,

        Ah, but this sunrise!

    That gives an idea what I've been experiencing lately: lower back pain. Pretty bad a week ago, then it let up and I carefully began walking again. I was about to bump the mileage up to my usual every-other-day level when it kicked in again yesterday, less painful than the earlier spasms, but enough this morning to wake me up earlier than usual. This is not suffering of the magnitude millions of folks in dire global political or environmental straits are experiencing, but it's more than I want to have to endure. According to a Google search, four out of five people have it at some time or other. The positive: it adds to my empathy for other seniors whom I see hobbling painfully at the supermarket, in crosswalks and elsewhere.

    Before you suggest it, I should mention that because of age and existing medical conditions, I'm not supposed to take Ibuprofen or similar medications. The recommended alternative, Tylenol, has never been effective for me. The pain was so bad one day last week that I just went on ahead and gulped down two Ibuprofen. It helped a lot. But I need to avoid regularly using it.

    I find that avoiding soft cushions like those on our couch -- it was a mistake to spend 3 hours sitting there for the 49ers game yesterday -- and doing a couple simple back exercises, even just standing and flexing those lower back muscles, helps. As do a very limited amount of walking (no uphill stuff, mind you) and a hand acupressure assist now and then from my spouse Beverly. Next I'll try  some form of CBD ointment or capsules, at least at night.

    These bad back episodes aren't just a product of aging. They started when I was about 16 and had a Los Angeles Times newspaper route to help pay for my car. It paid $110 monthly, a princely sum for a teenager in those days, circa 1957. I had 250 customers. This was back when newspapers were still a big deal, culturally and literally. The Sunday papers were so big that the rubber bands the advisor provided often broke when you tried to put them on, especially on Sundays, when page count was massive. This could be painful in winter's cold and the broken ends hit bare skin. When you threw one of those bricks out the car window, the band often snapped, scattering the paper's sections like playing cards across a lawn or driveway.

    It was a 7-days-a-week job. Get up at 3 a.m. and go to a small department store on South Central Avenue where bundles were delivered by truck and several of us sleep-deprived carriers folded and rubber-banded papers. One morning when I was running late and rushing to catch up, I lifted three bundles of papers at a time instead of the usual two. I felt something pop in my back but it didn't really hurt till the next day. I could barely move.

    My stepfather, Dr. H. Brinton Allison, provided the antidote. As an osteopath, he was trained in what they called manipulation, what others call chiropracty. MDs don't get that training and used to scoff at it, but I am here to tell you, it was a miracle cure for me. 

    Brint took me to his office, had me lay down on a treatment table. He stood at the foot, held each ankle and foot in turn, and pulled hard several times on each of my legs.

    Then he got me up and put me in a half-nelson, lifted me off my feet several times and shook me. 

    Presto! Almost all pain gone, and by next day, totally gone! Alas, Brint's not around now. Until now, though I've had other episodes over the decades, some triggered by as simple a thing as twisting to reach for a teaspoon, I've never sought chiropractic help. Usually, episodes have departed within a day or three. For some, I've used hot pads and ice. I have no idea how I tweaked my back this time, but this is the second week of it and I'm on the verge of seeking chiropractic help if other, simpler steps don't work. It doesn't hurt today as much as the first time, nor as last week.

    But it's caused me to once again interrupt and delay my return to performing music. I'd hoped to play at a couple recent open mics but had to drop those plans. I've also missed one of the monthly performances by the Irish Newsboys, in which I play penny whistle and flute. We'd already had a long layoff during the pandemic so this adds to my frustrations.

    I'd hoped to write something more humorous as the first post of the New Year, not an old man's complaining. Forgive me, and thanks for reading. If you enjoyed it, hit the Follow button near the top right of this page. I'll hope to return with some laughs next time. Meanwhile, I'll try to stay ready for the next turn of the wheel.