Tonight’s commute sucked rancid, hairy swamp water. A commute that would normally take me an hour or so, and by 50 minutes in, I was maybe 2/3 of the way home.

At times like this, I do what any sane individual would do: I get off the freeway, find a place that serves booze and food, and hang out until the traffic eases up a bit. It’s usually a much better way to spend my time.

Tonight, I washed up on the shores of the Applebee’s in Fremont, right off 880 at Mowry. I think I’ve been there before, but it’s been a while. I bellied up to the bar, ordered myself a rum ‘n diet, and checked out their happy hour food menu.

One of the first things I noticed was that a fair number of the bar patrons seemed to know each other and the bartenders. While this isn’t necessarily something I’d expect from a chain restaurant, I adjust fairly easily. So I paid attention to the various conversations, and managed to contribute the following:

• A lady next to me was on her way home from the hospital, where she’d left her husband for a knee replacement surgery. It sounds like he’s likely to turn out well, as this isn’t his first rodeo there, and we talked a bit about local stuff (I lived in Fremont for about five years) and the area in the Sierra foothills where she actually lives, where I got to spend some time about 15 years ago.
• I met a very young (about a year old) and well-behaved man named Joaquin, who was supervising his dad while dad got himself something to drink.
• A nice couple about four seats down apparently get there regularly, and were enjoying their evening.
• A gentleman between them and me was away from his wings and beer more than he was enjoying them, because he apparently had to keep taking phone calls. I got a smile from him when I suggested he might suffer a “battery failure” until he got to finish his food. And his beer.

And so, half an hour or so later, after enjoying the company of a half-dozen total strangers, I was on my way again. Traffic had thinned out, and I got home in a reasonable amount of time.

Adventure and fun are where you find them.

As a writer, part of my job – both of my jobs – is finding the right words for things. As Samuel Clemens once said, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is like the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.”

One of the great joys in my life, these past few years, has been driving through the Florida Keys and enjoying the many colors of the water on either side of the highway.

One of the great frustrations in my life, the past few years, has been trying to describe what color(s) that water is. And the blessed stuff keeps *changing* on me, with the weather and the tides. I mean, what color is this:

Blue-green-turquoise?

Or this:

The “commute” down the Keys

Sometimes it seems as though the water almost fluoresces from its own inner light. I don’t have a good picture of that one. And most of the time, no matter what I do the pictures I take don’t look like the water I see.

Then again, occasionally someone else gets it right, such as during my “catamaran cruise” gig this past trip:

This is the way I want to go to work every day.

I got to be out on a sailboat in water that looked like that for several whole hours. I was short on sleep and therefore not entirely awake…but it was one of the best times of my life so far.

There’s something about being down by the water that I find extremely healing and renewing. I can be dead tired, short on sleep, borderline sick, frazzled, overloaded…but put me in a chair where I can watch sunlight dancing on the waves and hear the water flirting with the shore, and I relax. And I’m happy. It doesn’t seem to matter where that water is.

I’ve enjoyed the Keys water from a seat in the Key West McDonald’s:

Beauty is everywhere.

I’ve sat and watched the water several times from the deck outside the Postcard Inn, formerly known as the Holiday Isle, in Islamorada:

I’ve been calmed standing or sitting by the San Francisco Bay, whether in San Leandro near my house, or up in Emeryville:

For that matter, it doesn’t have to be an ocean or a bay. Listening to the water in a fountain or stream calms me as well.

I don’t understand why or how this all works. I’m guessing it’s something primal, that somewhere in my genetic memory is a time when we hairless apes lived by the water and were content. Perhaps it’s an echo of the primordial ooze from which our ultimate ancestors emerged, billions of years ago. I don’t know.

I just know that I love being by the water, and try to spend time there whenever I can.

It’s my fourth day in the Keys, and I’m taking advantage of a spare hour to jot down a few random thoughts that have been floating through my brain as a result of this time here.

First: I really like being in Key West. I’m not sure it’s at a “time to move here” level; it’s certainly at a “I really need to figure out how to spend more time here” level. How I’ll manage that is, as they say, an exercise for the advanced student. 🙂

Second…being here when most of my Parrothead friends aren’t is a very different energy from when they are, and I like that energy. I love hanging with my friends – just spent the morning at the Casa Marina, getting registered and catching up with various and sundry good people. But for lunch, I tried out a local fried chicken place on Flagler, partly because all the shady seats down by the Casa pool were full.

This is my tenth Meeting of the Minds (MOTM), and each one has been interesting and fun in its own way. I remember a moment back in 2005 when I thought, “Oh, am I just going to keep doing the same stuff over and over and get bored?” Well, that didn’t happen. I started trying out different places and exploring more. I still haven’t seen it all. And i keep finding new places to try, and new things to see. Because I decided I *wanted* to. And my intention created this very fun reality.

I’m also playing a fuller schedule of gigs this year, which has been way cool. I’ve been making notes on what I need to do differently next year, of course…but life is an iterative process. And I enjoy having the ability to tell people where to find me. I forgot to print up reminder cards with the schedule this time…but I trust that people will show up where they need to.

The feedback I’ve been getting on the new album has been very positive and encouraging. According to several people, it survives repeated listenings. 🙂 And those folks who’ve made it to my shows have been having a very good time, and hopefully telling *their* friends.

And the best part is, I’m only halfway through the week. 🙂

On another, more serious note, I almost feel guilty having such a good time here when so many people in the Northeast are without power, and some without homes. My prayers continue to go out to those people, and I hope that life returns to normal there soon. It feels funny to be sitting in Key West watching hurricane damage in New York and New Jersey. Fortunately, most of those who were trying to get here for the week are here, and others are getting out today and tomorrow. And those of my friends I’ve talked to seem to still have homes to return to, and this is good. Then again, if things are worse for someone, odds are I won’t hear from them for a while. 🙁

I love my life and love my world, and I am very thankful to be in this place with so many wonderful people.