West county highs

Favorite comment from the last blog (regarding Sebastopol landlords):
"I love the ads that say no pets, alcohol, illegal drugs or cigarette smoking.  Horses OK.  4/20 friendly.  Good, because my horses love to get high."

I was speaking to an acquaintance visiting for the weekend who was shopping for her nephew's graduation.  She liked the downtown shops but hadn't been able to find anything for him.  She looked around and sighed, "The divine feminine has kind of taken over this town, hasn't it?"

A month or so ago there was a woman stalker at Hop Monk who was asked to leave and ended up "peeling out" of Sebastopol (in a Prius) with a cop chasing her, resulting in an accident.  There were some funny comments on the webpage for the Press Democrat article:
"Don't bars usually have bouncers to throw out unwanted guests, you had to call the police to have this lady thrown out?"
"It's Sebastopol. They don't have bouncers they have people that ask you nicely to leave and offer patchouli oil as a parting gift. Haha"
"They offer patchouli oil and a zen buddhist mantra."

My friend and I met recently at a café for dinner.  She was laughing at the Himalayan salt on the table, observing:  "I know in Sebastopol this is really normal.  In other places people would be like, what the hell is this pink salt?"

Some more "west county" names from a first grade classroom in Sebastopol:  Quest, Juniper, Sequoia, Kairan, Kovanni, Mystic, Orion, Aurora, Jenner and Iris.  (I remember someone telling me, "In other parts of the country somebody is named Iris or Rose after their grandmother.  Around here it is after the flowers.")  I also heard from someone who grew up in this area that when she was younger, she had neighbors who named their twins Daydream and Deja Vu.

Quintessential Sebastopol bumper sticker:
This is what a goddess looks like 


Latest license plate sightings:
SOLRNOW
ZINOMA
{hand}2 BODHI
YOGA HI
HIGH 5

In full disclosure, I was not quite in Sebastopol, more like Sebasto-Rosa.  But a car owner after my own heart:
OVR IT





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Klm down and have some warm (hemp) milk

A local Facebook post:
Sebastospeak:  this morning at drop-off, I asked another mom how she was... her reply: 'Grounded.'
(And I like "Sebasto-speak.")

The same friend from the above post told me her young daughter relayed a story to her that began: "This morning when I was 'om'ing'..."
She added, "I don't know where she was taught that, she didn't learn that from me!"

A pre-schooler to her play mates by the sandbox at Ives Park:  "Don't come over here, you are going to step on my kale garden!"

A friend passed this on to me and it made me laugh:
Diva: $1000 Sonoma County Landlords @!(sebastopol)
"I have noticed that properties for rent in Sonoma County are so pet 'unfriendly', more so than other counties in the Bay Area. Why, with all of the open space these properties are sitting on, are pets not allowed?? These ads describe these 'jewel-like' settings, lots of land, we are peace-loving landlords, blah, blah, blah... Yet, they do not allow animals?? It is a given that all landlords are greedy, apparently they are soulless and void of any trace of humanity as well. Don't post how idyllic and peaceful and peace-loving you are, then write, NO PETS!! Just write what you mean: I am a greedy, money-hungry, cold-hearted waste of space, seeking the perfect, pet-free human being to occupy my janky shack for significantly more than it's worth . oh, and by the way: namaste, have a beautiful day."

A body worker who works with a group of holistic practitioners told me an email came to their office:  "I just moved here and am looking for a new massage therapist.  Do you have one there who is not into energy healing, who won't make me draw an angel card or talk to me about astrology or what colors I should be wearing more of to attract different energy, or that I should stop drinking espresso and try green tea, etc.?  Or do I have to go to another town?"


License plates around town:
KLM DOWN
CRZY LUN
GREYWLF

4 HEMP

  --which reminded me of talking to an older gentleman who owned a coffee cart that he would take to music festivals around the north bay.  On a particularly hot afternoon during the Sebastopol Celtic Fair my date and I were attempting to cool off in the shade next to his cart.  He told us there was a group of hipsters who were upset with him that he didn't have more non-dairy options for a chai latte.  He did offer almond, soy and rice milk.  I asked him what they had wanted, and he answered, "Hemp.  They really wanted hemp milk.  Never-satisfied hipsters."
The guy I was with replied, "Hempsters."




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The land of interesting names

While I was waiting for a chai, I overheard a gentleman to his friend (I don't know what the topic was):  "Well, it depends on which dimension you are in.  If you go into another dimension, it could play out very differently."

I was clearing some things out of the back of my car, most of them recycling items.  I asked my friend's daughter, who is six, if she could hand me a soft drink bottle.  "This is a pro-biotic drink," she corrected me.
"Yes," I said as she put it in my bag.
"Soda is not good for you," she added in an admonishing tone.

At the library I ran into the "Q is for Quan Yin" girl.  I asked her how she knew about Quan Yin, given that she is quite young and looked like neither a Sebastopol hippie darling nor a Waldorf child.  She informed me, "I just know."  Her mother overheard me talking to her and sat down next to us.
"Well, she did not 'get' Quan Yin from me.  And she definitely did not get that from my husband."
I asked if they had ever been to Milk and Honey.  The mom had, but she wasn't sure about her daughter.
A few minutes later the young girl murmured, "Jade."
"Of course!" her mom exclaimed.  Turning to me, she said a bit quietly, "I forgot about her babysitter from a while back.  Very into... counter culture.  When I ran into her a few months ago she had changed her name again, to Dawnlight.  Or something along those lines."

"What is Earth in Upheaval?" someone asked me.
"It's a mechanic place."
"To fix your car?"
I nod.
"What kind of a strange Sebastopol name is that?  It's a place to take your car??"

After the last post (mentioning a dog named Blissful), I got an email that read:
"When I was in college my parents rented out a cottage on our property in rural Sebastopol.  The woman that rented it had three cats.  I can't remember all their names, but two of them were Celestite and Lavender Fire."

In the parking lot at Whole Foods, a teenager in front of me was telling someone on her cell phone, "She is goth, but she is very balanced goth."

A woman I know went to a presentation regarding essential oils at a small store in Sebastopol. After a somewhat lengthy discussion about the positive attributes of essential oils, another woman interrupted the presenter:  "You're in Sebastopol.  We are believers.  You are preaching to the choir."


License plates of the week:
INTUIT
YOGAMOM (thanks Bryan)
MRLIN
SOUL LVL


And a humorous article about New York dudes channeling northern California dudes:
"If You Give a Dude a Kale Chip"
http://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/give-dude-kale-chip

Sebastopol tidbits

Returning from a walk, I saw someone I knew in the parking lot by the Teen Center.  It looked like a kid-friendly event was coming to an end, lots of parents and children walking to their cars.  I asked her how the event was, and her response:  "It was nice.  There always seems to be a number of Sebastopol feral children running around at something like this.  I don't know where their parents disappear to.  But it was fun."

Another afternoon I was walking by the Teen Center and a woman was asking about a class that was just starting.  Someone else, standing at the door, said to her pointing:  "It's in the room over there.  Just follow all those women with the long, flowy pants."

I was asked if I wanted to buy some Girl Scout cookies one day outside a grocery store.  I shook my head, as I can't have refined sugar or dairy right now.  But I was curious.  "Has anyone asked about gluten-free cookies?" I inquired.
One of the girls smiled and nodded her head.  The scout leader standing behind her started laughing.  "Gluten-free, sugar-free.  Somebody asked if we had organic ones.  I mean really, we are talking about Girl Scout cookies.  There's nothing special about them just because we're in Sebastopol." 

Waiting outside the library for someone, I heard a twenty-something complaining to her friend about texts from her "crazy landlord."  She started to read one and muttered, "It is probably something really important like which aromatherapy candle she ran out of."

Favorite pet name:
Blissful  (a small white dog)

From an email:
"You've got to love driving through Whole Foods at dusk and having a man dressed in tie-dye sweats from head to toe step right in front of your car and walk slowly just at the particular angle where you can't go to the left or right.  Just have to slowly follow him as he walks aimlessly nowhere." 

And my sister and I watch the Oscars last night in a bar.  Right next to a sign that said, "You Are Loved."


Favorite license plates:
IAMAGEM
RX YOGA
B NICER





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Oh Ganesh

I was standing behind a woman at Community Market who was returning a lunar calendar because it did not start in January, it began in July and had special designations for different moon phases. Several of us were joking about how untraditional this calendar was, and one fellow customer observed, "You know it is very unconventional if you can't even get away with selling it in Sebastopol."

In my yoga class I attend the conversation can naturally tend toward healthy living topics.  After a recent class one of the women said to me, "At this other class I used to go to this woman kept talking about - I thought - a 24-hour cheese cycle.  She would bring it up a lot, and I kept thinking 'What in the world is a cheese cycle?'  I didn't know if it was some weird digestion thing she was talking about.  I finally had an acupuncturist mention the body's 24-hour chi cycle and realized that is what she had been referring to.  Which of course made a lot more sense." 

While I was looking for some ginger tablets at Community Market:
Customer:  "Do you have something for stress?"
Worker:  "Yes, a few different supplements."
Customer:  "What about something for persistent cough?"
Worker:  "Yes... {explains several options}."
Customer:  "That's great.  Do you have something that will make my roommate stop talking so much about himself?"

At work I was sharing a story about (years ago) accidentally eating homemade cat food that my vegan roommate had prepared.  It was pretty strange and bland-tasting, and when I found the veggie casserole about an hour later I realized "Oh, that is what she had made for dinner.  What did I eat??"
As a good follow-up Sebastopol inquiry, my co-worker asked, "Was the cat food vegan?"
Good question.  I honestly couldn't remember. 

My friend showed me a key chain she got for her birthday:  What would Ganesh do?  She was explaining to her "rather puritanical" grandmother who Ganesh is, and her grandmother asked, "So this elephant god, do you pray to him?"  She told me, "I wanted to say to her, 'Well, I don't but there are people around here who may.  Or maybe have a Ganesha on their alter.  But I thought that was getting too Sebasto-complicated for her.'"

Another friend was shopping in the produce section at Whole Foods and heard a young girl ask her father what "conventional" means.  His reply: "Poison."


Favorite license plates:
ZEN BIZ
OGANESH

SeBASTopol cat

A friend who lives in a different part of Sonoma County was in Sebastopol for the day.  She had read a few of my blogs and was determined to experience some Very Sebastopol moments.  I explained that they just happen, you can't really force it.  She then decided, being much more extraverted than I am, that she wanted to ask anyone walking down the street what they thought about the alleged vortex. 
Her:  "I just want to ask people, do you feel the Sebastopol vortex?"
Me:  "That question in and of itself is actually Very Sebastopol."
Pause.  "Okay.  I see your point."
Her friend, who lived in west county years ago, pointed out that certain words have different connotations in Sebastopol.  "When someone is talking about alignment, they are usually referring to something spiritual."
"Chakras," I agreed.  "Or at the very least, a chiropractic adjustment."
"Right," he replied.  "In other areas if someone is talking about alignment, they are probably talking about their car.  My ex-girlfriend even used to say she was going in for a 'tune-up' when she got a massage."  He noted it is the same with the words:  light, transformative and someone being conscious.
I asked if there were any other differences he noticed between living here and where he currently lived.  He responded, "Discussions about spiritual topics were so common.  Now when I end up talking to someone and it goes off on a spiritual tangent it surprises me - hardly ever happens.  Here they were a dime a dozen."

At Milk and Honey a young tweener walked up to her mom holding a Bast stuffed animal.  Her mother asked, "Where did this come from?"
"Um, from Egypt."
Mom, laughing, "That's not exactly what I meant, but all right..."

My niece and I were at the library sitting at a game and puzzle table.  We were going through an alphabet board and I was saying words for the different letters.  We got to Q and I was stuck for a minute.  "Q is for...?"  A young girl piped up from the other end of the table, "Q is for Quan Yin."

My favorite recent text:
"I just saw license plate OHM M G.  I thought you made that up!  But I just drove up behind it, lol. It actually exists!"


License plate of the week (from my sister):
4ST GIRL

(p.s. I love that people have been texting/emailing me about amusing license plates they have been seeing...)  =)





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Need to find a good astrocartographerphysicistshaman

(From a friend:)  Man, sitting outside of the plaza coffee spot, talking to someone next to him:  "Have you noticed that the kids around here know a lot more about martial arts than in other places?"

Woman, talking on her cell phone in the Whole Foods parking lot:  "She said they are in a white Prius.  Which narrows it down to half the cars in the parking lot."

A man standing in front of me in line at Community Market was explaining why he prefers shopping there rather than at Whole Foods.  His reasons:  "The hot bar is much better and they are not serving the same food they served since the late 90s.  It is less manic over here.  And people don't step right in front of you as you are driving through the parking lot."  (I can attest to the last one.)

I was waiting outside the library and some people were crossing the street.  One remarked something about jay-walking, and another responded:  "I am not jay-walking.  I am joy-walking."

I overheard a woman saying to someone in front of Copperfield's, "I finally am visiting Sebastopol.  I have heard so much about it at Burning Man."

Favorite (local) FB post:
"I've overheard one too many conversations on chakras today.  Lord-- please help me relocate soon."

And several funny comments to the post:
 - Will have to tell Cami about this.  Not sure if she can see, even if I tag her if y'all aren't fb friends?? I mean we are all one anyway, right?
 - My Akashic Astrocartographerphysicistshaman told me during my last colonic that she could see that although Cami is not my FB friend that we are karmically intertwined through the Dolphin Moon Tribe of Atlantis.
 - Move to Brooklyn...  No chakras here.


Favorite license plates of the week:
SYRAAAH
SAGESSE
LUNAR {heart}





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