Chaparral Wisdom
To celebrate the magic and beauty of Nature & the chaparral
What Champagne and Chaparral Have in Common
An Irreverent Look at Chaparral Illiteracy
“Chaparral in France? Sacré bleu!” Arthur quickly downed his remaining Champagne and poured another. He stood up in the tub and raised his drink. With steam wafting up from his naked torso in the evening air, his words became infused with surreal, mythical energy. “The maquis is southern France?! The maquis gave cover to the French Resistance as they sabotaged the Nazi war machine, hence their name, the Maquis! Long live the Maquis!”
Buyer beware. Counterfeits abound.
True Champagne can not be made in California, and a lush forest is not chaparral, despite claims to the contrary.
It was getting late and we’d been in too long. Our bodies were beginning to overheat in the simmering tub.
Dangling his left hand in the pool to cool down, sipping French Champagne with the other, Arthur turned toward me. “Once, if I remember rightly,” he said as his eye lids began closing slowly like heavy, velveteen bedroom curtains, “my life was a feast where all hearts opened, and all wines flowed.”
“And now?” I asked.
He took another sip, then began slipping into the abyss, telling of his discovery that life is not as simple as he once thought. “One evening I sat Beauty on my knees – And I found her bitter – And I reviled her.”
I don’t recall much more about that evening. Arthur’s life over the past year or so had been what one could best describe as a season in hell, so I suspect we talked a lot about that. However, I do remember how Arthur became irritated with me for handing him a bottle of California sparkling wine and calling it champagne.
We’d run out of the French Champagne he had brought, so I ran into the house to gather more to drink, another baguette, and the last chunk of chèvre cheese.
Upon my stumbling return, Arthur smiled his Mona Lisa, ripped off a piece of bread, then sneered. “That,” he growled, waving away the offending bottle, “will certainly not help me seek the key to the old feast, where I might perhaps find my appetite again!”
Thus began my education on Champagne.
Some California vintners have tried to appropriate the Champagne name over the past couple decades and slap it on their bottles of sparkling wine, but the 2006 Agreement between the United States and the European Community on Trade in Wine slaps them back. Violating the agreement is an international crime.
If it’s not from the Champagne Region of France, it’s not Champagne. Unfortunately, thieves prior to the agreement were grandfathered in.
As is normal fare during discussions in the wee hours at the Chaparral Institute, the conversation eventually wandered into the infinite complexities of the chaparral. “Ah, the maquis!” Arthur declared as he began describing the wonderful days he had as a kid, wandering through the Mediterranean shrublands back home in France. “At least you Americans haven’t tried to steal the maquis.”
“I’m afraid it’s worse,” I replied with a sense of melancholy. “Some have completely erased the name maquis in France, classifying it as chaparral. Do a search on the web. The Americanization of Mediterranean shrublands all around the world is pervasive.”
“Chaparral in France? Sacré bleu!” Arthur quickly downed his remaining Champagne and poured another. He stood up in the tub and raised his drink. With steam wafting up from his naked torso in the evening air, his words became infused with surreal, mythical energy. “The maquis is southern France! The maquis gave cover to the French Resistance as they sabotaged the Nazi war machine, hence their name, the Maquis! Long live the Maquis!”
“Yes!” I proclaimed with my own raised glass, standing up to meet Aurthur’s. “Long live the Maquis!”
We both sat back down, but this time on the tub’s edge. The neighbor slammed shut their bedroom window.
“And if I may add in response to the blasphemers,” I said. “The chaparral is California! If it’s not growing here in the Floristic Province of California, it’s not chaparral. Long live the chaparral!”
We continued discussing all things chaparral, all things French, until the eastern sky began to brighten with an orange glow and the Spotted Towhees colored the morning air with their calls.
Read MoreThree Easy Ways to Live Longer, Happier
By Listening to Nature, Embracing your History,
and Engaging in Conversation
Part I: # 1 – 3
1. Listen to Birds
In a new study, four German scientists demonstrated that listening to bird song reduces depression, anxiety, and paranoia (Stobbe et al. 2022). It is yet another confirmation that being in Nature provides positive psychological and physiological health benefits.
Reporting on the benefits of Nature is all the rage these days. The Washington Post discussed the German study plus another one last week. The research topic is exploding.
During a wine and cheese soiree at fellow Chaparralians Gregg and Maril Parker’s place in Julian last month, prior to the Volcan Mountain Symposium, we had a wonderful conversation with Richard Louv, the man who energized the children in Nature movement with his influential book, Last Child in the Woods. Over dishes of snacks and rapidly emptying bottles, we discussed some of the new research. When he first started looking into the subject more than 20 years ago, Louv said there were barely a dozen or so papers about the positive impact of being outdoors in Nature. Now, there’s more than 1,500. Maybe Nature is finally having its Renaissance.
Participating in that Renaissance is easy. Find a relaxing space in Nature, preferably between two different habitats, sit down and listen. If you’re lucky enough to have a yard, create your own space. Let wildness emerge. We’ve done this in our own yard à la Kevin Costner (If you build it, he will come); we ripped out the lawn three years ago and planted chaparral. It’s eight feet tall now in some places. There’s a patch in the middle that’s impenetrable. It could become prime bobcat territory; we’re hoping it will be adopted by one of the three kittens born in our neighborhood this year.
Every morning we have coffee on the bird deck, watching Spotted Towhees scamper about searching for the seed we scatter (a western regional blend of seed plus an extra gourmet fruit and nut mix for the Nuthatches), a pair Western Blue Birds raising their family (our next-door neighbor Dave built the nest box for us), and House Finches tussling with Mourning Doves on the feeder platform (we’ve named the pushiest Dove, Boudicca).
Bring your binoculars and listen. Feel the relaxation course through your body. The facts are in. You’ll live happier and longer.
Build it and they will come. Some of our new friends: a Spotted Towhee (ooooo-weeeeee), a Western Blue Bird on the nest box, and a House Finch dancing atop the feeding platform.
2. Building Your Intergenerational Self: Embrace stories from your people’s past, your history, your foundation
Lots of people roam the streets of Cambridge, England; any town, really. But oh, how much more there is than the snapshot images and must-see sights. Read, listen, and learn before you go. The places will speak to you as they did to us during our excursions to England.
As I placed my feet onto the dark, gray stone steps ascending a small corridor into a building where Isaac Newton went to think, to write, to talk, my mind imagined him there, worrying about the plague, thinking in numbers, and creating the mathematical language for the gravitational constant, allowing him to articulate the force that shapes the universe. I reached down and touched the worn curves in stone, curves Newton’s feet had contributed. I gently repeated his passage, one step at a time, talking with him along the way.
Read MoreHuell Howser – Choosing to See the Joy
The Light of California
There was no mistaking who he was that morning of June 13, 2005, when I turned my car into the Sweetwater River overlook parking lot off Interstate 8 in the wilds of eastern San Diego County.
He had on his signature, California-style tropical shirt and sunglasses along with that classic smile that lit up the entire landscape. He grabbed my hand with his US Marine grip, looked me in the eyes, and greeted me with his unforgettable Tennessee welcome. “Good mornin’!”
Huell Howser.
And so began the filming of the chaparral episode for his popular public television show, California’s Green. I’d been bugging him to do it for months.
Huell exemplified the joy of living, the magic of life, and the beauty of California in ways that will never be matched. His optimism and honest curiosity brought out the best in people, no matter who they were. His one and only music video with his friends at the Musicians Institute in Los Angeles is a testament to the infectious joy he offered so freely.
During the chaparral shoot, we visited four different locations: the Sweetwater River overlook, a stunning red shanks chaparral stand near the Sunrise Highway, a chaparral stand on the outskirts of Pine Valley, old-growth chaparral on Guatay Mountain, and chaparral recovering from the 2003 Cedar Fire in Cuyamaca Rancho State Park.
Each time Huell would tell Cameron his camera man to roll it, he knew exactly what he wanted to ask, constructing the entire shot in-process. Within a few minutes, Huell would declare, “That’s enough,” and we’d move on to the next location. We never re-shot a scene. When each clip is perfect, there’s no need to complicate the process with more film to edit.
Read More