California Wedding

“True love
Is not the kind of thing
You should turn down.”
Avett Brothers, “January Wedding”

Toni, Alissa, Josh, and I flew to California Thursday for Jim Satkoski’s wedding. A limo took us to O’Hare and we flew nonstop to LAX via Virgin America Airlines, which provided plenty of seat space and individual TV sets. Alissa’s mom Beth met us with an SUV and drove the 180 miles to Avila Beach on California’s central coast. Beth had reserved us rooms at The Inn, a rustic place right by the Pacific Ocean where the sound of waves reached our room.

The rehearsal was at an apple orchard in a very nice setting. The bride’s parents were of German ancestry and very pleasant. One of Erika’s friends, who had vegan tattooed on her arm, obtained a certificate online that allows her to marry people, and she was nervous, as this was her first ceremony. Alissa was asked to recite a poem by e.e. cummings. At a chapel in San Luis Obispo Jimmy’s mother Donna read kind of a combination prayer and toast and then Jimmy introduced everyone. When he came to me, he mentioned that I had been his Little League coach and that our families were intertwined in many ways, including Phil and Dave being close friends. Then we went to a jazz club for dinner, a vegetarian buffet that was quite delicious followed by a performance by a trio doing what was billed as gypsy jazz. The five of us had a nightcap back at the Inn on an outdoor deck.

San Luis Obispo (Spanish for St. Louis the Bishop) was founded as a Catholic mission in 1772 and now is a college town (home of Cal Poly). The whole area is beautiful with rolling hills and wineries aplenty. We had breakfast at the Custom House, which has a history dating back a century although in 1998 the discovery of oil seepage forced the entire main street to be closed down for four years. Unocal agreed to settle for $30 million to rebuild the downtown and replace the oil-damaged sand. The wedding proceeded without a hitch. Old family friend Tom Horvath – in from New York with his wife and two kids - was best man. It was also great seeing Erick Orr and his family (Margaret and the twins). He’d been in the band LINT with Dave in high school and had come back, to NW Indiana for a reunion concert last year. Jimmy’s birth mother, who he first met about ten years ago, was on hand and got along real well with his parents Donna and Bob. During the dinner and reception afterwards background music included “January Wedding” by the Avett brothers. We topped off the night at a nightclub located at the Madonna Inn, a kitschy landmark hotel. A big band played swing music and the dance floor was filled. Maid of Honor Julie got several of us to jitterbug with her, including the bride’s 73 year-old father. The men’s room was reputed to be one of the top ten in the world and featured a urinal with an activated waterfall. There are several YouTube videos online for those who are curious.

Sunday was traveling day, but beforehand I watched a ceremony dedicating the Martin Luther King Memorial in Washington, D.C. Aretha Franklin and Stevie Wonder sang, and president Obama gave a stirring speech that provided historic perspective and mentioned the ongoing anti-Wall Street protests and said that MLK would have approved. On the plane I watched the Bears beat up on Donovan McNabb and the hapless Vikings. When Devon Hester ran back a punt for a TD several passengers cheered. Home by midnight, thanks to limo driver Dave. A good trip. It was great seeing Jimmy so happy, being with cool people, and discovering a part of the country I’d never been to before.

Now that Herman Cain has shot up to the top of the Republican Presidential hopefuls, he is getting lots of media scrutiny. It is interesting that Newsweek has “Yes We Cain” on the cover and Time’s latest cover story is “The New Silent Majority” by Joe Klein. Asked about something outrageous that he’d said on the stump, he claimed it was a joke. According to Ray Smock, his sugar daddies are the Koch brothers, the same rightwing billionaires that financed the campaign of the antiunion governor of Wisconsin. As Ray points out, Cain is the darling of evangelicals, who during the nineteenth century, in his words, abandoned blacks once slavery was ended, just like today’s evangelicals abandon children once they are out of the womb.
When we left for California, the weather was still balmy, like it had been for the first two weeks in October. We came back to autumn. When I rebooted my computer, Entourage was missing, but Velate Sullivan came over and found the application. Indiana Magazine of History sent me a book to review, “Thyra J. Edwards: Black Activist in the Global Freedom Struggle.” Thyra lived in Gary for 12 years and was the sister of Saintly Thelma Marshall, who was a social worker and head of the local antiwar group Women’s International league for Peace and Freedom, as well as the mother of actor William Marshall.

At lunch I mentioned that Gloria Steinem talked at a conference marking the twentieth anniversary of the Anita Hill testimony at the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings and mentioned that a high percentage of veterans suffering from PTSD were sexually harassed or assaulted. Psychology professor Kurt Nelson, who has done research at VA hospitals, agreed.