when the long hot days of summer are upon us......
blue....and white are the colors I turn to for some psychological coooollling off....
Blue, being the color of the sky, reflecting on the big water...well, we humans know that water is Life.
I always long to go for a swim in a lake, a pond or a crispy river. On Yountville Cross Road is a stone bridge ....and running under is it is a small trickling part of the Napa River. This is one of the cold lanquid swimmin' holes I jumped in and splashed around in my young days.
Across the street, just before the bridge, as you are leaving Yountville and heading towards Silverado Trail, is an Ecological Reserve. It wasn't there then, but it's there now and when I go for my next visit home, I will surely make the drive out there.
I remember one blistering hot August day so clearly......I was living on Monroe St, my 16th summer....a group of my friends dropped by and picked me up in an old truck and crammed about 6 of us in the open back.
The pretty girl, Adrian, I think her name was....got to sit in the front cab with the driver....She was so busty and so tan and so pretty with her dark curly hair and pearly white teeth. She smelled clean and fresh and seemed so much more mature than us. I knew somewhere there was another world...cold, clear and stunning.
That day at the River, I swam in my Levis cut offs (I still have them) and a tshirt...I layed on my back on the rocky beach and smelled the dark moss, the water and looked up at the wide blue sky through black branches of a tall oak. Soon, the cheap wine was passed around and the breeze was cooler. When it was time to go, Adrian sat in the back with us and different girl sat up front.Fame is fleeting, but memories last a long long time.
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Some beachy things from etsy sellers.......
I want to smell like this! Salty Mariner Perfume from solsticescents.
Sea glass necklace from lalucita.
Octopus t-shirt from Caustic Tee.
In my etsy shop, if you search 'blue'...you'll come up with quite a few blue things...
A psychedelic waterfull vintage Hawaiian dress...
If you're gonna get pushed in the pool, be wearing this!
Cool cotton and fresh soft florals in an easy fitting dress....
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Now, of course the Napa Valley is packed full of pretentious douchebags...and real people like me are in short supply. The native trout runs have been reduced because of "diversions"...ie:Wineries are sucking the water out of the Napa River,& its creeks and streams. I suppose wine is more important than the natives.
From a report in 2005, titled Historical distribution and current status of steelhead/rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) in streams of the San Francisco Estuary, California---
"Assessment: In 1962, DFG called the Napa River “the most important steelhead stream in the counties bordering San Francisco Bay” (CDFG 1962, p. 1).
Steelhead historically reproduced in most of the tributary and headwater drainages of the Napa River,although they now are reduced substantially in abundance. We are not aware of recent estimates of the size of the Napa River steelhead run. However, previous estimates place the historical run in the range of 6,000 to 8,000 individuals (Anderson 1972;
USFWS and CDFG 1968)......
Water diversions from the basin that affect over-summering habitat in quality or extent, therefore, would be expected to directly impact the Napa River system O. mykiss population. In 1963, DFG noted, “With the increasing water development in the
drainage, nursery areas are disappearing fast” (Robinson 1963, p. 1)."
