A Sense of Place: The Mulberry Patch

          (Updated June 14, 2023)            

                                                                                                                          by: B. Marie Jarreau

         Like tendrils, no like ribbons, no like fingers or ladders reaching up through green clouds – the shafts of sunlight that shone down through the leaves begged me to climb up and to see what secrets lay amongst the mitten-shaped foliage in the crown of the Mulberry trees. 
         I was somewhere between 10 and 13-years-old and this was my favorite space in the entire world. As number two of six children, it was important to me to have a favorite, private, special place filled with secrets. A shy, introverted child - it was sometimes crucial to my mental well being to escape the crowd. The Mulberry Patch was mine, and they all knew it. My older brother didn’t care, at 14 or so he had his own worlds to conquer and my younger siblings obligingly did not disturb me in my little green forest place.

Secrets Through the Windows

         It was mine and it was magical! Well, it was ‘sort of’ mine. The thick green expanse of berry-filled trees, vines, natural treasures and mysterious creatures were actually on the next-door neighbor’s side of a wooden slab fence that ran the length of the two properties – but the mulberry trees at the very back of their yard, refused to be contained inside the man-made boundary and spilled over the top of the five-foot tall fence over to our side of the fence. There were open spaces in the boards of the fence and lovely rounded knot-holes that served me as inconspicuous windows to the natural secrets of the woodland.
        My four-foot wide domain was marked by the wooden fence on one side, the solid side of a cinder-block storage house, about four-feet distant, on the opposite side. Another higher, thicker, wooden fence behind it all marked the rear wall. A concrete sidewalk that surrounded the building provided a solid, dry floor on which I could sit and contemplate the world of my little corner forest.  Unless the rain fell heavy, I was protected in my special place even from the warm summer showers by the thick canopy of leaves draping from the trees completely over the sidewalk area and onto the building’s roof. I loved being there in the rain. The sound of raindrops filtering gently down through the leaves, against the fence or the roof of the building was my own private symphony.
        The environment that surrounded me was, in my own mind, like a friend or like a teacher with the secrets it offered up, or like a comforter when I was depressed about one silly thing or another. Situated at the back of our own yard, some 50 yards or more from the house, I could go there and feel completely on my own; I treasured those times.
A good deal of my love of being outdoors, of learning, and of the natural world was fostered and nurtured by that little postage stamp space of a natural setting.

See, Hear, Feel, Smell, Taste

        There was so very much to see and feel and hear and smell and taste within that exotic space: where the sidewalk ended a richly organic area of soil separated the concrete from the wooden fence. Layer-upon-layer of seasons-and-seasons of fallen leaves, bits of branches and berries and bug body parts had been deposited beneath the mulberry canopy for years.
            Lying belly-down on the cool shaded concrete sidewalk in the summer heat, I would spend great expanses of time rummaging through the moldy leaves and debris with a stick or other piece of hand-size dried branch. Carefully, I overturned the bits of leaves and other organic ‘fluff and duff’ watching for anything that moved. The top layer of the ground was littered with leaves and bits of leaves in various earth-tone shades; green, yellow, brown, gray, wet-black; depending on the degree of decomposition that had taken place. Peering deep into the decomposing material there - my nose usually only inches away to focus as close as I could for ‘crawlies’ - I took in the earthy aroma of rich healthy organic soil. I still love that smell.
            Some days brought me luck in finding little pearls hidden beneath the moist, smelly material. Less than half an inch in diameter the little off-white colored orbs actually bounced as some were (first: accidentally) dropped onto the concrete walkway. I learned from my frequent visits to the local library that they were probably snail or salamander eggs and larger ones - snake’s eggs. That was intriguing, I had seen small snakes around our yard and garden; and snails - with their little spiraled backpacks - hurrying along in slow motion, but I had never seen a salamander! With the very idea that       
salamanders might inhabit my little woodland patch I spent many hours silently, immobile watching carefully, waiting to see a salamander. I did eventually get to spot what looked like a yellow-spotted brown salamander. The fleeting glimpse was enough for me. I was not quite up to handling  ‘slimies.’
        The woodland floor could be noisy with insects and birds also digging through the duff for a tidbit to eat. I could sit for hours just watching, listening and focusing on the colors and the slightest movement, but sooner or later my attention would be drawn to another angle. Dark gray, oval segmented pill bugs were everywhere. They could cover a dead bird or a piece of rotting fruit like an army of mini-armadillos. My younger sister called them “roly-polys.” There were occasions when she and I would spend time rolling them back and forth between us in imitation of the boys’ game of playing marbles. Colorful spiders, beetles, slimy-shelless-slugs, green-jeweled or fuzzy brown caterpillars, folded green or brown tree-frogs with golden eyes were all among the treasures that fascinated me as I focused on the floor of my private forest.

 

The Great Lizard Escape

Even the old wooden fence could be crawling with life, especially lizards! They were truly my favorites. At any given moment a jade green anole lizard would brazenly stand on top of the wooden fence and with piercing beady-black eyes stretch upward on his front legs and dare me to come closer! Sometimes, besting his threat, I’d slowly reach behind him and grab his tail to dangle him high overhead. Usually, he’d simply and magically drop himself away and leave me standing their holding onto a wiggling piece of lizard tail! There was just something really ‘gross’ about holding a living, squirming, lizard tail between my fingers without a lizard attached to it! It was quickly added to the composting duff.

        From time to time on a summer’s afternoon, I could hear in a distance my brothers arguing over the proper size of folded, rolled-up newspaper-baseballs before they’d begin their afternoon game, but this was only background noise to the natural chorus overhead in the mulberry canopy. I could hear more clearly the “n`ack - n`ack” call of bright, blue jays.  Sometimes just a fleeting glimpse of a blue and black streak amongst the green leaves was all I saw, but I knew it was a jay. Hefty, raucous birds their big wings rustled the leaves, loudly - but they didn’t care. They considered the trees their own domain
        The ‘poof’ of bright red color against the jungle green was more usually seen in fall and I loved the beautiful crimson colored Cardinal birds. Robins and sparrows and an occasional wren, her tail stuck up in the air, and sweet singing warblers were all part of the chorus performing in the woodland stage. Sometimes a really unusual streak of orange would dart through the tree tops. I would learn later that this might be a Baltimore Oriole on annual migration to the Yucatan. The Yucatan, a far off place to which I was also destined to visit in years to come, had not yet crossed my area of knowledge.

Rare Winged Warriors

Another rare sighting in the New Orleans area in those days, and I didn’t see them often, were hummingbirds!  When one of these little winged warriors happened into my mini-forest I could barely contain my excitement.

            I remember the first of few sightings - first I heard the high speed buzzzzz.  Initially, I was annoyed thinking one of my brothers had thrown a rock at my head. Then I saw the tiny flying bird, just a bit larger than a cicada.  
The hummingbird, green-iridescence in the air, darted by with its wings moving about a million-miles a minute! I really wanted to call out to the boys and my sister so they could see it, but knew that my call or their loud and boisterous approach would only scare the bird away, or the boys would climb all over my woodland paradise bent on capture. In my quiet contained excitement, I simply enjoyed the sight and sound as the hummingbird visited several tall yellow wildflowers standing in the sunlight just outside the shade of the trees.  
            The cicadas were another species of fascinating creatures, whose ear-piercing screeches could be heard in the top of the trees. Their one or two-inch long clear, hardened, discarded larval  jackets left clutching onto the trunks of the mulberry trees could, in some years, be very numerous.

Slithering Snakes Not Slimey!

Along with crawlies, climbers, scratchers, flyers and even occasionally some nasty ‘stingers’ in the form of wasps, mosquitoes, horse-flies and fire-biting red-ants there were also slithering snakes in my neighborhood jungle.

            Though ours was a neighborhood of single family homes in the midst of the city we still were not that far from waterways and small bayous. That moisture supported lots of life forms throughout the area. Green garter snakes, striped garter snakes and what I think was an occasional mud snake – almost black on top with reddish splotches on sides and belly – could occasionally be seen sliding along a branch, under a log or even along the fence. I’ve always had a healthy respect for snakes and enjoy seeing their vibrant colors. They have reason for existing just as birds do, they are part of the scheme of things though we may not understand nature’s blueprint.
            I was intrigued however, when I finally gathered up enough daring to identify and capture a harmless green garter snake with my bare hands. I had spent a good bit of time watching them and I just had to know what their skin felt like! I had come to understand that snakes were ‘slimy.’ The fascination came as I was prepared for the feel of slime but instead felt a sensation from the skin of the snake - of tiny solid shiny scales. The movement of the scales as the snake used them for locomotion tickled my sensitive young hands so that I finally dropped the little guy to the ground. I could now understand how they moved with such speed. He was gone before I could focus on where he/or she might have landed!

World Travels from the Mulberry Patch

        There were times when I sat, perched on a fallen log beneath the tree canopy, not quite in tune to the sights and sounds of my private jungle but rather focused a million miles away. Aside from being my personal place of refuge, the Mulberry Patch was also my very favorite place to read and study.  Sometimes I was in the real Brazilian rainforest, or deep in the Pacific Ocean diving in the Mariana Trench studying rare sea creatures, or I might be traveling through Tibet. Sometimes from the comfort of my private woodland place I followed Marco Polo across Asia and into the darkest unknown reaches of China.  
        I first devoured a copy of a National Geographic magazine beneath the mulberry canopy, reading until my mother finally urged me to quite trying to read in the darkening, evening light.
That mulberry patch - I’m sure - is long gone by now, wiped clean of its historic inhabitants by Katrina some years ago if not ‘developed’ before that, but it will always remain in my mind as my first “window to the world.”
        I have since maintained the same curiosity as I had then - maybe not with the same drive but - a little like Marco Polo, “to know about all the things that are in the world."                                                         

 

Leonid Meteor Shower

(Updated June 14, 2023)

To Catch A Falling Star!!!

By B. Marie Jarreau

 

 Leonid Meteor at point of ignition 
across the handle of the Big Dipper. 
                     Photographed from atop Wright's Point, Harney County, 

Burns, Oregon. Nov.19, 2001

For my two teenaged daughters and me the historic Leonid Meteor Storm provided  

a magical night of  "raining meteors!"

Leonid PUBLISHED!

Smoke Trail that resulted after ignition

                                                                                                          

Star Trails circle Polaris

B. Marie Jarreau

Listen to the Noise!

(Updated June 17, 2023)

Detail from old postcard by Jim Lynch

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Listen to the Noise

                                                                                                                                by: B. Marie Jarreau

                                                                                                                                                                                               

        A jambalaya mix of offbeat notes and loud-thumping-bass-beats peppered with high pitched clarinet calls and wailsome saxophone sighs floated, danced and barged their way around our 1950s-60s, New Orleans 7^th Ward neighborhood.

 

Traveling on the warm night breezes, the sound carried with it news that there was Cajun food to be had and spicy music to be heard. 

Some residents were not as fond of the sounds that lay upon the otherwise tranquil environment: “Listen to that noise!” could sometimes be heard filtered through the loud music.

Those residents simply tolerated the weekend’s intrusion since the event was often a fund raising activity for the local church or perhaps for a recent high school graduate’s college fund - and it was a rarity that any ‘trouble’ ever occurred around these events.  This was a time when parents and neighbors had much more control over maintaining a peaceful environment than we experience today.  However, whioe that ‘noise’ brought some objection, others couldn’t wait for each lively jazz-filled fund-raising, fun raising ‘Supper’ event. 

 

What’s Cookin’?

We had only to follow the sound or the aromas to purchase a plateful of delicious home cooked fried chicken, soft-shell crab, seafood gumbo, potato salad, po-boy sandwich with all the ‘trimmings’ or whatever the ‘ladies’ had been cooking-up since early in the day.  Gentlemen delighted in entering that kitchen doorway with a hearty, “Hey good-lookin’ what’s cookin’?”  

“Red-beans and rice and everything’s nice,” the familiar reply.

There might be six to eight ladies, young and older, working together in colorful cotton aprons, to make sure the food they offered would be talked about with great admiration throughout the coming week.

 

                 But oh, the music!

Fedoras and English Driving Caps

Wives, daughters, grandmothers and sweethearts worked in the kitchen preparing and selling plates of food through the screen door while husbands, sons, grandfathers and eligible bachelors gathered in the backyard gardens to add the musical spice to the honeysuckle-scented evening air.

Even in the warmth of the New Orleans environment it was not uncommon for these backyard musicians to sport Fedoras, English driving caps, derbies; silk vests with pink or yellow shirts – starched and pressed; and fine jacquard-patterned tweed-like slacks – sharply creased down the center of the pant legs, front and back!  Even the footwear told a story about the style of its musically inclined wearer: oxblood Brogues with decorative 'punching' over the toe or stylish wingtips in three shades of leather finished off the ensemble.

My memories of these events seem to go back to about age 8 to 11.  We (siblings and/or friends) might walk over to purchase a supper with or without an adult escort with no concern for safety (oh! the good ole’ days!).  The location might be one-city-block away or even four, rarely more than that.  We were not allowed to stay for the music. It was an ‘adults-only’ area.

Often there was a solid-wood fence, separating the musicians from those approaching the kitchen door to make a culinary purchase. We were in awe of the music; but also very curious about what else adults might be doing in the privacy of the backyard.  Occasionally, we were able to catch a glimpse through the weathered boards or knotholes of the fence, or maybe a quick look when someone entering or exiting didn’t immediately close the fence-gate. 

 

Don’t You Dare Go Back There!

We might see the tables dotted with fine crystal glasses, wine or other interesting bottles, ashtrays; and cigarettes caressed in long slim feminine ivory or Bakelite holders, the smoke swirling around like ribbons dancing with the rhythm. This was enough indication that the music area was off limits to youngsters – no one had to say, “Now, don’t you dare go back there!”  We knew better!

Our enjoyment of the music was easily-had just sitting on the front steps as the sound traveled throughout the neighborhood and into the late hours of the night. The music began playing around sundown, after the men arrived home from work and donned their ‘sharp’ evening-attire and gathered their instruments. Some arrived later. We all knew the best music would be played a few hours into the ‘session,’ perhaps when more musicians had arrived from farther away – or after they’d passed the initial blending of the players. Perhaps after a shot or two of bourbon.

Front Steps, New Orleans - 7th Ward, 2001 - (Not exactly me :o)

 

Listen To The Noise!

Other neighbors would either sit on their porches or stroll around the block taking-in the sounds. You might hear, “Listen to that awful noise! When are they gonna be quiet over there?”

Most often the dialog would be, “Maaaan, Listen to the Noise! Ain’t that a beautiful sound!” 

The wail of the sax and syncopated jazzy guitar notes danced round and round with the clarinet’s lofty lilt and the mellow buzz of a trumpet as fingers pumped the pistons. The ‘thump - bump - bump’ of the big fat bass kept it all connected – it was a noise to be savored; and free for the listening.

Music really does have the power to reach-in and touch the soul in places where little else does, regardless of your age. I remember being mesmerized by the soothing melodies and the rocking vibrations that drifted over the fence, following the old cobblestone city streets beneath the canopy of ancient old white-oak trees. The sound meandered-in - through our front gate then took an unrestricted path to embrace my senses.  I had no experience as a musician, merely a listener, but even then, I had a deep yearning to be part of the magic of music.  

Decorative New Orleans style front porch rought-ironwork.

 

A shy, introvert all of my youth, it seemed that that experience would never be part of my life.  Then the ‘Beatles came to town’ and expanded my interest in music even more. I was as goggle-eyed as all the other girls over Paul and John, but I listened intently and fell under the spell of the music and the lyrics as much as with those handsome personalities.

 

  Yearning For A Guitar

 I don’t recall anymore neighborhood ‘Suppers’ and associated jazz sessions after that. I don’t know if they’d ended or if the Beatles simply overshadowed that experience. I do know I yearned for a guitar. Our senior year in high school  (Joseph S. Clark Sr. High - 1969) my girlfriend’s parents gave her an acoustic guitar. As I remember it was a maple top Sears & Roebuck standard catalog six-string, acoustic.

They wanted her to play. She could not have cared less about music beyond the fact that we were all in love with Paul McCartney and we all enjoyed dancing to the mugic of the music makers. She had no interest in "making" music. 

 When I left home to join the Air Force shortly after graduation, she gifted me with that guitar as a going away present.  Not long after, I became captivated with the music and songs of John Denver. My own love of music became a real motivation to do something about that lifelong desire to take the leap from music appreciation to become a music maker.

Later, as an Air Force Air Traffic Controller, I was stationed at Mather AFB, just outside Sacramento, Calif. working odd shift hours. All of my spare time was spent teaching myself to play the guitar using song books and familiar recordings. Air Force boot camp and the ATC career field had helped to lessen the stress of my introvert’s insecurity and I even began to play a song or two for a few close friends when the occasion was right.

I continued to play off and on throughout my life, though I all but gave it up for a (now ex-) husband who offered only discouragement and ridicule.  Later, as a single mother, raising my two daughters and holding down a full time job, my interest in music was mainly restricted, once again, to that of - listener.  

Though I’d never envisioned myself a professional entertainer (that life seemed too wild and unstable for my interests) I did enjoy creating music with voice and guitar to share with friends. Many years later, I began to make time for the music I’d loved for so long: Beatles, John Denver, Joanie Mitchel, Bob Dylan, Emmy Lou Harris, Aretha Franklin, Willy Nelson, Hank Williams, various folk singers, even an occasional pop tune.  I played for small audiences of family and friends and sometimes performed fund-raising concerts for non-profit events where a few local ‘fans’ made sure they attended.

 

Fate Dragged Me Back Into Music

Now, let’s move ahead several decades where I find myself retired from the daily job of earning a living and, happily, as a first-time grandmother.  I breathe a sigh of relief when I think that upon making a recent move, from Oregon to Arizona, I toyed with the idea of getting rid of my collection of 4-5 guitars and settling down to the retired life to knit, crochet, paint, make crafty things and just become ‘grandmotherly.'  Instead, fate stepped in and dragged me back into music – not exactly kicking and screaming!

Having made the move to Arizona, I was once again gifted with a music connection. Not with a guitar this time, but with a great group of neighbors/friends who are supportive of my interest in creating and sharing music. The group actually began with a new next-door neighbor who had been involved in music for well over 50 years as performer and producer and operated his own small recording studio in Canada. A diversion for him from the rigors of the day-job as 'mild-mannered-tax-consultant' but, none-the-less, a passion. Kris Baldwin was the proverbial "music-producer-who-moves-next-door-and-turns-you-into-an-actual-singer-and-recording-star!"  You know - it's the stuff that dreams are made of!  On a small scale, relative to our Northern Arizona community, this is exactly what he - as mentor - did for me. 

He wrote songs that he felt suited my voice, coached me to find the richness that he felt possible there and motivated me to continue reaching for the very best my music talents might offer.  He then recorded the resulting music efforts and encouraged my own efforts in song writing. We spent hours in the small studio annex, recording tracks and used them to produce "my first CD" titled 'Coming Into Focus' – with potential for more! 

I refer to "Coming Into Focus" as my 'training-wheel' music experience as I had no earthly idea of what I was doing, the process or what to really expect. With Kris' encouragement, my vocal efforts grew into a stronger and richer-fuller vocal sound. Soon we teamed up as a music duo for performances throughout the Verde Valley which includes the well recognized tourist-mecca of Sedona-Arizona. From coffee houses, backyard, bar-b-ques, wineries to concert halls we soon had a devoted following of music fans, a music presence on the world-wide-web (BroadJam, CopperDog Studio, Women of Substance Music podcast) and three more CDs of our music. For me this was trully a dream come true - that I never really knew I'd had!

 

Still Making Noise

My interest in music is stronger than ever thanks to that encouragement and I feel as though I had grown, musically, more in that first year of our association than I had in the previous 50 years. Yes, an exciting music involvement that didn't happen until I'd crossed into my 60s!  My interest in listening to and performing music now reaches much farther beyond John Denver and Pete Seeger. I finally came to feel that I was an active part of a well populated and active music scene in and around Sedona. With other participants - all of that 'certain-age' - we simply loved sharing the music as good friends, with little to no drama or personal upheavals. 

Friends/neighbors were invited to my home for an evening of cheese, wine and music as was the case with invitations to the homes of others on a regular basis. It was our favorite way to enjoy one and other's company. Music was always the catalyst.  It was an amazing era from my point of view - just having friends gathered together to share the music, which included some ‘gutsy’ guitar strains often from some "old" guys who'd played with well traveled bands in the 60s-70s, There were sambas and old ballads, jazz, sea chanties, rhythym and blues, country and even classical notes, It was a lively, intoxicating music scene and I was in the midst of it!

Still Making Noise

It was that: ‘life come full-circle’ scenario. 

At one point on an evening when the music event was held in my backyard I wondered if we might be disturbing other neighbors with the volume of our music. For a moment I wondered if someone in the neighborhood might be thinking: 

“Listen to the Noise!”

 



(Photos and illustrations by B. Marie Jarreau except where otherwise noted.)

 

…

For the Christmas Season

                                                                                                                                                                                                    (Updated June 17, 2023)

~ Once Upon A Christmas Moon ~

                                                         B. Marie Jarreau

Once upon a Christmas Moon

   The world was filled with joy

   For the blessings all knew

     Would be flowing soon.

  And from afar and many a-mile

With gifts of goods

    And heart of gold

            Came a gentle-man

                             With twinkling, jolly smile.

  Upon a flying steed this traveler be

Above the rooftops,

                   Over river, low and highland,

                            And above snow shrouded tree.

Bringing for all a gift or a giggle

From deep with-in his bag

                        A new blue bandanna or a shiny kazoo

                  Or a doll for ‘Sis made of rag.

      A Christmas tree, a brown fuzzy bear,

A pocket knife for a boy

                 A golden pup with stubby tail

                                Or a book for 'Aunt Bess' to enjoy.

         Snug on their pillows the children did wait

         But soon fell asleep in the night,

For no gifts are given

            Till the early magical hour

                   Of Christmas morning light.

Once Upon A Christmas Moon

            As quiet as a church-pew mouse

A gentleman, kind,

       On a carousel horse

    Brought hope and happiness

     To every heart and house

. . .

• 
  

Revisiting Mysterious San Nicolas Island

  Mystery, Intrigue & Historic Tragedy  

(Updated June 18, 2023)



The Golden Seal

 

San Nicolas Island:

Home of those Long Ago Lost

                                                   By Marie Jarreau

Island Arrival

I will long remember the day the twin-engine commercial contract airplane delivered me to the mysterious island on the latest of my US Navy air Traffic Control (ATC) assignments.
    The roiling water below was blue-green as the aircraft dipped ever-closer towards the 10,000 foot long runway.
The airport sat just inland of the little fish shaped island’s east end. 
    On final approach as the DC-8 propellar driven passenger aircraft dipped smoothly toward the runway, I could see white washed waves of water meeting below. It looked as though the waves were clapping into each other at the point of a sand spit that narrowed into the Pacific Ocean.
    My heart was pounding with excitement! While others stationed there would see San Nicolas Island (SNI) as boring, tedious, humdrum, and isolated, this would be the most intriguing and inspiring place I had ever seen!  Little did I suspect the experience would have me reaching all the way back to treasured memories from my youth for comparison and reference.

First View

    As we turned onto the final approach for landing my eyes peering through the wind scratched window, I could see dolphins in the deep blue water sliding through the waves that rushed toward the rocky and sandy shore. I’d been advised space on the island and the living quarters there would be limited and small, “Don’t bring a bunch of ‘stuff’ ” the assignment briefer told us.

    My ‘stuff’ went into a storage unit to await the end of my 18 month obligation and I’d head to my next duty station. Then again, I’d only taken this assignment with the understanding that I’d then be given a post at McMurdo Sound and the Navy’s Operation Deep Freeze on Antarctica. Ever since I’d fallen under the spell of photography years ago, I’d dreamed of one day capturing images of the Emperor, King and Adele Penguins with camera and lens – so who knew when I’d see my ‘stuff’ again! I considered this 18 month tour of duty just a stepping stone enroute to the photo-opportunities I might find in an Antarctic adventure and I had a feeling I might even want to extend my duty there for the photo opportunities.

    The official ‘check-in’ to the SNI Outlying Landing Field (SNI-OLF) was the beginning of the orientation process and also served to ensure that everyone new-to-the-island understood the rules and regulations of life there. Also part of the orientation was the safety briefing that specifically made note of the dangers associated with life on SNI. Jagged rocky cliffs, high tides and a lack of beaches dictated strict rules against swimming, greatly limited fishing activities and all but shut down ideas of ocean-water based recreation. Anyone leaving the compound after duty hours to tour the island or catch a sunset, etc. was required to use the barracks log book to sign-out and sign-in upon returning to the compound. No one was allowed outside the compound after dark.

      At three miles wide and just nine miles long, some considered San Nicolas Island a very restrictive, boring environment. The work week for most of the small population of Naval personnel and a few dozen civilian contractors, engineers, marine animal behaviorists and environmentalists was Monday through Friday at noon.

       By afternoon on Fridays the iisland and living compound seemed quite deserted as the majority of the work force flew home to the mainland at Naval Air Station (NAS) Pt. Mugu at, Santa Barbara to join their spouses and/or families, or simply to spend the weekend at what they called ‘getting back to civilization’. 

        Throughout my 18 month tour, I came to love Fridays simply for the quiet and solitude  brought by the exodus. I chose to remain on the island, along with the designated skeleton support crew, most of whom never left the barracks or compound area. Throughout the weekend I was free to roam and explore the island almost as if I were there alone. It was a priceless experience!

         

Danger on the Beach

    I had arrived on the island on a Monday.  It was just after dawn on Thursday morning, my first official duty day in the SNI Control Tower along with four other ATC crew members, that we received an alert: Search and Rescue would launch from the airport to search for two other newly arrived station members. They had signed out to tour the island the previous afternoon but had not signed back in. They had not returned to their barracks that evening, and were believed to have gone fishing in one of the coves on the north side of SNI. One of the two men had arrived on the same flight that brought me to the island. The other had arrived only a week prior.

        They were soon spotted by the crew of the Bell helicopter. One was still alive clinging to the body of the younger man and fighting to remain clear of the rough tidewater that had trapped them in the cove the night before. Both avid freshwater fishermen, they had been eager to try their hand at the big fish they believed might be available before high tide. Both were inexperienced with Pacific surf fishing or with SNI’s rising tide. They had apparently not paid enough attention to the information put out during the safety briefing about the island coves which can be inconspicuously closed off by rising tides.

        Suffering from exposure and exhaustion, the survivor was airlifted to the hospital at NAS Pt. Mugu. We learned from the report eventually filed that the anglers had been having a great time catching large fish and the high tide water had trapped them on a tiny beach area in the surrounding cliffs of the rocky cove before they knew what was happening. There was no way for them to climb out, and the rough waves were too high and too forceful for the men to swim around the rocks to safety. Their only chance for survival was to try to hang on to one another and to one large jutting boulder until the tide receded. This was early January, when even Southern California nights can be miserably cold. 

        They had suffered the cold and wet experience and prayed throughout the night. At some point a huge wave came crashing in, ripping them from the boulder on which they’d been clinging. The younger man had already drowned and been tossed deeper into the recess of the cove by the time the other managed to get to his body. As waves continued to pound into the cove the lone exhausted survivor was determined to not let the young man’s body be swept out to sea. In the report he attributed his own survival to that determination that they should both be returned to their families.
    The survivor of the fatal fishing trip did not return to SNI. It was said that he was able to return to his family and to a different duty station, but that event left us all with a truer understanding of why the safety edicts were so forcefully stressed. Throughout my 18 months of exploring the island those two sailors were often on my mind as a reminder to keep safety first.
        Using maps and aerial photographs available I familiarized myself with the landscape of the 3x9 mile island. A small but adequate library housed a number of books and periodicals offering photographs and information about the lay of the land, its seashore birds and animals and limited information about the mission of the military. Also of importance was learning about military operations area to be avoided. Different areas of the island had been used  and some areas were still being used as missile testing sites, etc. Some of those areas could contain unexploded ordinance, or even remote controlled live fire exercises.
        

Finally - Time for Exploration

        My real fascination with the San Nicolas Island came several weekends into my tour of duty when I finally was able to secure the use of a jeep to actually start touring the island. Sunrise couldn’t happen fast enough on Saturday mornings. My photo backpack sat prepared with my Nikon manual exposure camera, lots of 35mm slide and negative film, water and snacks to hold me over till near sundown.  My weekly log entries of departing the compound for specific areas on SNI became familiar entries even though the barracks staff became accustomed to my weekend treks. 

        Having focused on the history as well as folklore and previous archaeological reseach done on the island I fell in love with the environment and enjoyed sharing the information with those who might be interested but preferred to remain in the compound. Occasionally, I was asked to provide tours for newcomers and visiting dignitaries.  
        The first time I toured the west end of the island alone was an eye opening experience. Sitting on a sandy, high bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean, California sea lions barking far below me at the water’s edge, I discovered that I had been introduced to this little fish shaped island while I was still in junior high school. A sign, just off to my right and down towards the small cove displayed the words: CORAL COVE.
             It had been years since I’d read about Karana and Rontu in Scott O’Dell’s Young Adult book - Island of the Blue Dolphins. This had been one of my most favored of childhood books.  In an instant I realized that I was sitting on the very island from whose history the story of Karana had been taken.
         Racing back to the compound and to the library, I found more publications that confirmed my suspicion. Scott O’Dell’s book was there, as well as a number of publications from the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History that presented fascinating details of the island’s history and of the people who, down through the centuries, had inhabited or had visited the island.
            In O’Dell’s telling of the tale: a young Chumash Indian girl named Karana had been left alone on the small island for 18 years. Her people called the island Ghalas-at. Her people had sailed away from the island that, for generations, they’d called their home.  Karana was left behind while trying to save her younger brother, as told by Odell’s tale. Karana’s people had always feared the wild dogs on the island. It was this fear that caused Karana’s concern for her brother and caused her to dive from the boat as it sailed eastward into an approaching storm with the rest of her people. In her attempt to save her brother she would be alone on the island for eighteen years.
           Upon my initial arrival, the excitement of this new adventure had tingled inside of me as I stepped off the commuter flight. The small airport terminal was the same as others I’d seen around the country, but in making a turn around the island before we landed I’d already spotted rocky-beaches, coves, and sand-dunes that I was eager to explore.
            There wasn’t much air traffic to control, the commuter flight was the only regular air traffic to come near the island with an occasional aircraft fly-over on a training mission. With lots of time to spare, I eagerly took on the duty of island photographer and public relations officer.
            Most of my time was spent exploring the beaches that teemed with boulder sized great-gray elephant seals, sea lions, seagulls, cormorants, California brown Pelicans and whales ‘breaching’ off the west end!
            I spent hours watching massive waves of blue-green water, from strong currents that surround San Nicolas Island, being reduced to foamy bubbles as they settled into the sand in a continual game of  “kiss-the-beach.”       
            I sat one morning on a smooth gray rock in Coral Cove as I was basking in my good fortune to be on this beautiful Pacific island. While watching elephant seal cows nursing their new born calves I looked off across the deep water of the ocean and as if some spirit from the depths of the water leaped into my soul, the sunlight sparkled in the water and was reflected in my eye!  I realized in that instant that I was sitting in the Coral Cove!
         I was sitting on the same rocks where Karana might have sat to watch whales, dolphins, or otters playing in kelp beds! My mind raced as I tried to think back to reading the story so many years ago!
      Locating Scott O’Dell’s book on a trip to the mainland at week’s end, I read it again and devoured every word. I learned through extensive research that a young woman had been left alone on the island just as O’Dell’s story said. Santa Barbara missionaries later named her Juana Maria.

Over the course of the eighteen months that I was stationed on SNI I tried to visit every location that was mentioned in the story.

I went often to Coral Cove and to the cave where Karana and Rontu might have hidden when the seal hunters returned. I studied the slope of the headlands covered with yellow Coreopsis flowers as bright as the sun. I wondered how many times Karana might have sat here at Vizcaino Point while the sun set like a red-hot platter in the evening sky.

   The long sand-spit of  Jehemy Beach on the east-end was one of my favorite spots. The Chumash who were Karana’s people must have used this location for gathering  fish or shellfish washed onto the beach in the strong current. Here, the current from the north side and  the current from the south side of the island slap each other into great heights at the end of a long ‘breach’ of sand. The "sand-spit" is created as both currents race toward the mainland of California.

I discovered Chumash Indian ‘kitchen middens or refuse-mounds, filled with nearly 100 years or more of debris from broken abalone shells, broken abalone shell-bowls, beads and animal bones left behind from the time the Chumash lived on the island. Artifacts were easily seen throughout these middens. Small bits of abalone shell made into beads for jewelry, parts of fish hooks also carved from abalone shell glistened their iridescence in the sunlight. An awl, probably made of seal bone, lay wedged into the base of an abalone shell. Sharpened on one end, it must have been used for puncturing. Karana or another of her people might have used it to sew a cloth of seal skin or maybe for weaving a basket of reeds.

Holding the ancient tool in my own hand gave me an eerie feeling! Who of Karana’s people had held this last? Might Karana herself had used the tool?

Walking through the middens, I kept hoping to spot remnants of a black stone necklace. Scott O’Dell’s story tells of an Aleut woman, who accompanied the seal hunters. She had given Karana such a necklace.

Often, on San Nicolas Island, the clouds were gray and the wind blew fiercely. At these times I thought of Karana especially, of when she and her people had lived their day to day life on their fish-shaped island home and of when she existed on the island alone. As I walked along the beach, the sounds that filled the air from the seagull rookery, the sounds of the seals and the roaring waves could be deafening. I tried to feel what Karana might have felt as she heard the same sounds in the mid-1800’s - loneliness, fear, sorrow, self indulgence or was it a sense of belonging? It was all here, whether you knew the story or not.

There were no longer wild dogs on the island, but on several occasions I spotted and photographed the elusive little island fox - like the one Karana once caught in a trap, then nursed back to health only to send it back to the wild. I watched blue dolphins still leap and play as Karana had watched them just beyond the kelp beds. Except for the two wild dogs that had become her companions, the blue dolphins were Karana’s only friends. They are animals of good omen and  watching them had helped her to feel safe on the island without her family. When she was out at sea with the leaking canoe, it was a pod of blue dolphins that swam along with her and helped her feel ‘not-alone’ as she fought the sea to return to the island.                

Sometimes standing alone at the headlands and looking into an orange-jeweled sunset, it was hard to keep the fiction of O’Dell’s story separated from the facts. Though I enjoyed the fictional account, I was even more intrigued with the historical information on the true account of the island’s Chumash Indian population and the young woman who was left on the island when her people were evacuated by Santa Barbara Missionaries in 1835.

The evacuation was an attempt to save what was left of the island’s Chumash inhabitants before California sheep ranchers took possession of the island, to increase their grazing opportunities. The population of Indians had already dwindled to about 30-35 people over the years through contact with gun runners who visited the island, pirates, Russian and Alaskan seal hunters.        

She was real. “Karana” was the name O’Dell had given her for his novel’s character, missionaries who later rescued the real ‘lost woman of the island,’ gave her the name ‘Juana Maria.’ Historical accounts note that, after discovering that her own small child was not on board, she jumped off the ship which was relocating her people to the mission to live. An ocean storm was brewing fast during the evacuation and the ship could not turn back for her. It was assumed that she was lost to the depths of the sea.

Sheep were brought to the island to graze, but the woman is said to have eluded those who came periodically to check on the livestock through all those years.

She survived alone on the island for 18 years. Juana Maria actually outlived her people who had been ‘rescued’. They were all dead of dysentery within 30 days after reaching Mission Santa Barbara because those who rescued them did not understand the importance of the traditional ‘wild-foods’ diet of the island natives. They were fed the same diet a the Santa Barbara folks, mutton, tomatoes, potatoes, etc, All foodstuffs foreign to the diet of the San Nicloas Island people.

I walked the rocky beach of  Coral Cove often at dawn and often  well into the gray light of dusk. Had she walked here? Her footsteps had long ago been erased by strong winds and high tides but I felt her spirit in the island breeze. At these times, I could sense the loneliness that Juana Maria might have experienced after all the people, her family, had been taken away; her only child perished. In the non-fiction account it had been her own child see thougt to rescue after jumping overboard of the boat.

Blue-green water charged into the rocks of the island when the tide came rushing in and I looked out across the sea at white clouds on the horizon, at least secure that no red-sails of the Russian seal hunters would come to disturb the island’s teeming sea animal population.

 The true story is even sadder than the tale of Karana.

 After 18 years alone on the island, Juana Maria was finally discovered and taken away to Santa Barbara. Like her people, within 30 days, she too had died of dysentery. The diet of the Santa Barbara community was too different, too rich, for the Chumash, who were accustomed to a diet of sea lion, whale, cormorant, tide-pool delicacies and native seeds and roots.

 Like the dolphins that Karana and I watched dancing along the kelp beds, her spirit lives on in the currents that caress the rocky shores of the island of San Nicolas.                After 18 months of searching for Karana’s footsteps in the shifting sand, I too had to leave the little fish-shaped island headed for Santa Barbara.  I was on to other adventures.

My 18 month experience on San Nicolas Island, and the strength and perseverance that I'd learned from Karana while exploring the Island of the Blue Dolphins, (AKA San Nicolas Island) is a jewel that I will always treasure. 

   

Ancient Deposits at the Sea Shore SNI

ELEPHANT SEALS BATTLING IN THE SURF !

The Blue and The Gray SNI Shore area

Tuna Crabs, Kelp, Anemone

"Hope you come back for more."

• For a 14 minute YouTube video showcasing my time spent on SNI visit this link: https://youtu.be/SQm8WzCFGCg

* All photos and written works copyrighted by Marie Jarreau unless otherwise noted.