Where I Found Gold

I grew up moving around a lot, mostly from place to place in California, but also for one year abroad in Europe and Central America. As a boy, I longed for stability in the form of a big yet cozy house enclosed by a white picket fence in a suburban neighborhood of other nice homes with white picket fences. That never materialized. What did come forth, though, was a touch-stone, intentional community my parents made sure to be a part of pretty early on: the San Juan Ridge area and, by extension, Grass Valley and Nevada City, all in historic gold mining country of Northern California. We were part of a network of great people, knitted together by love of poetry and the other arts and a solid set of values, including caring for the land, equal justice for all, and many other principles. A lot of people from that community I knew growing up and still hold dear have passed on, most of them, it seems, cut down too soon. It’s part of the natural order of things, I realize, but it still feels very sad. However, over and above this live a deep understanding and gratitude inside myself that I was part of an interconnection of families rich in backgrounds, love, and shared values, truly a community in every sense of that word. There was indeed a lot of gold to be found, the gold in so many hearts of people who I had the great fortune to know.