Show #285

Hello Friends of the Garden!

I’m not a native Californian. I’m not even a native Texan despite spending the greater portion of my formative years there. I was born eight years after Tom Petty in the same hospital in Gainesville, Florida. I’m the first born of three with a brother and younger sister. My father was disappointed that I wasn’t born in his home state of Texas like my brother and sister were. Not so much so that he was openly mean about it. It just didn’t go the way he wanted.

It’s funny how it became a “dirty little secret”, an unmentionable fact, that my birth took place in Florida. It certainly wasn’t a plan by my parents that I was born there, it just happened that way. For some reason the place of my birth was of great significance to my father.  He never said anything in a derogatory way regarding the place of my birth. He was always proud of every other aspect of me, his first-born son, with the site of my birth as the only blemish.

My earliest memories were all about Texas. We never really talked about me not being a natural Texan. I always knew that I wasn’t! We moved a lot and we were always filling out forms of one sort or another for schools and the dreaded “Birth Place” blank would cement the origin of my existence!

I learned to be the Texan that my Dad wanted. It’s hard not to! Most language experts will tell you that “immersion” into a different culture with a different language is the best way to acquire another language. Immersed from near birth, I assimilated seamlessly. Just like other states, Texas has its’ history and I learned it in grade school. On trips to my Grandma’s house in South Texas I learned how big Texas truly is. We would pile in to the car and drive for hours and hours (seven) to her house.

I remember when we moved to Rochester, New York during my senior year of high school. I was seriously made fun of in school for all my acquired cultural attributes. My clothes, my accent, the words I chose were all as out of place as I was. It was kind of lonely really. The oddest part of the whole thing was that they believed I was a Texan! I knew I wasn’t! They even nicknamed me “Tex”! Suddenly being a Texan was a source of ridicule. I had just gotten good enough to be a believable Texan! Talk about being an outsider! I wasn’t even really a part of the group being disparaged and I wasn’t even accepted by other Texans!

Now I’m a “naturalized” Californian. Not that my friends would necessarily agree. I have lived in my house in Fresno longer than I have lived anywhere in my entire life. Despite the static nature of my latter years, my status as an outsider has never left me. It lingers deep within me with little subtle reminders from time to time. It feels like I’ve spent my entire life trying to fit in!

I have made some strides to embrace the amalgam of my experiences and influences. I have made a conscious effort to try to see how I fit in and what I can do. I can use that variety of culture and climate to my advantage to give me a perspective that would be impossible for many here and elsewhere! When my Mom (also not a Texan, born in South Carolina) told me I was special I never thought it would take so long to accept the notion that I was! It’s not too late to do something good with it!

Peace and love to you all!

Mike

Show #284

Hello Friends of the Garden!

Beautiful morning in Cambria!

I’ve determined that it’s time to get back on horse. I feel compelled to write again! It’s been months since I’ve been at the coast house and I feel its’ positivity almost instantly! My son has been recovering from his surgery and is well enough to take care of himself at least through the weekend. So, it’s nice to be back at the “Fortress of Solitude”. Time to embrace my inner Superman!

This roof should outlast me!

It’s such a joy to let go of being an amateur roofer. I’ve struggled with trying to patch my roof here at the coast for twenty years! One more example of the axiom, “A man must know his limitations!” The new roof on the house is so nice. It’s so easy to take something so simple as a properly functioning roof for granted.

Wouldn’t it be nice to see super heroes tackle home improvement projects! Like, would Thor get frustrated from constantly pounding nails through the roof?  I wonder if the tedium would be as big challenge as the physical effort? At least their average trips to the hardware store would be faster!

Sure he's powerful but he has no touch!

So, if Thor can’t roof his own house does he get somebody else to do it? What does he say, “I really thought I had this thing but I keep smashing everything and I only have this one hammer”? I can just hear Mike Gamez (a famous roofer) now! “Hey man, you’re great at saving us from intergalactic enemies and that’s all cool! Don’t feel bad about not being able to fix your roof! Don’t worry we have people that are good at this sort of stuff!”

Getting' stuff done for the planet!

I’m not just bagging on Thor! They (super heroes in general) all seem to have their issues just like the rest of us! It’s just fun to think what if The Flash and Superman were also skilled in construction? Dams, trains, hurricane victims, fires, earthquake victims, adequate housing, and hospitals would become a minor issue. Magneto alone could pound every nail in a roof instantaneously! No sense in these super heroes just sitting around waiting for maniacal aliens! They should be busy all the time!

I guess I could find new things to get
mad about, otherwise I'm
irrelevant!

Just for laughs, wouldn’t it be a hoot to see the trailers for, “Avengers 12: The End to Worldwide Racism!” By appearances it seems easier to destroy an evil robot than to get people to get along! If these super heroes were really doing their job it would be tough on Batman and the Hulk. There wouldn’t be any criminals for Batman to face and the Hulk wouldn’t have anything to be mad about!

Super heroes are far too unreliable for this sort of work. I think I’ll stick with the regular super heroes like Mike Gamez, honest, fair, hard working people that care! And thank goodness that there are a lot more Mike Gamez’s out there too! There are more good people out there trying to make this world a better place than there are doing the opposite. The latter just gets better media coverage and goes to great extremes to get attention!

Thanks for your patience! I’m working through my own difficult transitions and the last few months have been a challenge for me. Fortunately, I’m surrounded by a host of “regular” super heroes and they have been at my side even when I didn’t see them! Believe it or not, all of you listeners are my super heroes too and part of my happiness! So many of you are so gracious in your appreciation for my radio show! I love my show and it’s so nice to know that many of you do too!

I'm easing back in to the writing. Hang in there with me!

Peace and love to you all!

Mike

Show #270

Hello Friends of the Garden!

I really haven’t written much lately, at least not much of substance. It seems a lot like that Bart Crow song, “Life Comes at You Fast”. The last few weeks have had a mixture of excitement, quiet reflective moments, responsibilities, driving, car problems, family issues, worry, hope and sadness, pretty much like regular life! Regular life can be a tall order sometimes, especially when a perfect storm of things come together to present their challenges.

A few weeks back I wrote about how my Mom wasn’t satisfied with making me like vegetables alone. She had to take it a step further by combining two or more of them in to a horrible concoction! Sometimes life is that way. I’m not sure if it’s a Karmic (replace with your own acceptable reasoning) thing or what. Do we always “reap what we sow” or are something’s just random acts of the human condition? Why is it that problems compound for some people while others appear virtually unaffected?

I recall years ago when we had trouble with our son (a long painful story no one wants to hear). I got a lot of well-intentioned advice at that time from plenty of people who had not and were not facing that same adversity. When I think about it I laugh to myself! Why would you want advice from someone that has little to no experience with what you are facing? Wouldn’t having someone that has had the experience to survive similar circumstances be more relevant? Success seems to have many different definitions that are so very conditional in their nature.

Of course, like the line from The Doors song, “Nobody gets out alive”, we all face difficult times in our lives. Shows like “The Kardashian’s” or “The Osborne’s” or whatever reality show, exist because of the drama in their lives, not the perfection! All the Pasteurized problems of the celebrities make us common folk yearn for their petty predicaments! Ha, I’d like to see how they’d handle my problems!

Truth be told, the same is true of me! I’ve seen my own family and friends struggle with issues I’d be reluctant to deal with myself! I know plenty of instances where I wouldn’t want to trade places with people and their circumstances! Still, your problems are your problems! I know many times I’ve felt completely crippled by the situations I’ve found myself in. I’ve been my own worst enemy more than any perceived enemy could do to me!

My wife and few of my friends have recognized my propensity to use self-deprecation as shield for acknowledging having done something well. I don’t really understand it myself. I think I want to be average so I can average problems. I want to believe that I’m not facing unusually adverse conditions just the average ones! I can deal with the limited success, just please don’t overload me with “character building” challenges!

Turning this whole thing on its head or for the “glass is half full” people is focusing on the positive! Finally, years in waiting, my son has had the first of many surgeries to address his Spina-Bifida. It has taken so long for this to begin (part of that story no one wants to hear)! He has had a cyst removed and has an open wound that is sizable and needs redressing twice a day. It is a difficult task for the squeamish and between my wife and myself I am less squeamish than her. The wound is of the sort that I needed to be trained redress. As loathsome as this task seems, I’ve learned that I’d rather face this than life without my son in it! Give me this job any day instead of the alternative! Yeah, half full is far preferable than half empty!

Meanwhile, all around me, people are dealing with their own demons. As my good friend Glen likes to say, “life’s rich pageant”! I’ve been fortunate to witness the kind hearts of good friends lately. I’ve seen real strength, enviable strength, in many of the people I know as they pull together to help each other. Being the “Spreadhead” that I am, I can’t help but think of a line from “This Part of Town”, ‘Where there is hope, there is love!’.

I’ll get myself up to speed here soon! Hang in there with me and I’ll try to do the same for you!

Thanks to everyone!

Peace and love!

Mike

Show #269

Hello Friends of the Garden!

My son Jeff's birthday! We
forgot how old he was so
we started over!

Not me, but like me!

Marine layer from the top of Hwy 46

At one point I had pie for
breakfast, nice!

Well, this week got way out of hand! Between vacation, birthdays, car trouble and road time my week was turned upside down! It was simply too much, too fast, and all at once. I figured why fight it, just let it go!

Things will settle down hopefully!

Peace and love!

Mike

Show #268

Hello Friends of the Garden!

The Flat Growlers minus Mike Witten

Last week was filled with anxiety! It was a good kind of anxiety though! Amongst other things, one thing stood out more than the others and that was the debut of “The Flat Growlers”, a band constructed from our “Flower Tome Companion” house band. The name for the band actually came from a reference to a line from that same play! The double entendre was too hard to resist!

One more Mike never
hurts! Glad to have Mike
with us! Cool guy!

I was as scared as I have ever been. The thing that took the edge off a little was the fact that we started at our home field, Sequoia Brewing. Even though you could feel the love throughout the room, I still felt the uncertainty of performing. I’m as self-conscious as anybody you’d ever meet. I even started taking voice lessons to assuage those fears! I found out that sometimes it’s better not to know too much because you begin to realize the full extent of your inadequacies!

Me, trying not to show the fear!
Believe me, I'm like that duck that
looks calm on the surface!

I’ve sung a song with a couple of bands thanks to some close friends that wanted to give me a shot at it. Other than that I haven’t had any other experience. Singing one song is scary all on it’s own but, not like being up in front of people for two hours. Fortunately, between 268 radio shows, writing 2 plays and 12 performances (one that was performed at the Tower Theater!) of  “Flower Tome Companion” had me prepared (kind of) for what was to happen!

Prior to our gig (it’s so funny saying that!) I overthought everything! The crowd was primarily all friends, family and a handful of strangers. I was concerned with remembering lyrics, should I look at people, trying to stay on key, what if they don’t like our song selection, all these things were whirling around my overactive brain. The other guys appeared to be as calm as could be which only unnerved me all the more (especially John Fowler)!

Silly fun with graphics!

What I found out was that once we started the whole thing flew by in a flash! Just like my radio show, which I claim to be the fastest two hours of the week, the whole “Flat Growlers” show was over before I could take a moment to breathe. As soon as that was done I jumped in the car to head to the coast. Those two and a half hours in the car I listened to my radio show as far as the signal would allow and spent the balance of that time in relative silence, no singing in the car, no music, just the sound of the road on the tires!

My buddy John Alden! We have done
some outrageously fun things already
with no signs of it slowing down! You
couldn't ask for a better friend!

A couple days after, I got an email from John Alden with an open microphone recording complete with crowd noise of the whole show. Upon listening to that recording I had a flashback to five years earlier. I had just started my radio show. It was show number four that required me to record my show. I was headed to the coast. I knew I’d need to learn to record my show any way because it was inevitable that it would occur.

So, I recorded it and waited on the deck for the show to come on. I called my buddy Chris (the main Texas Connection) as the show began and heard myself for the first time on the radio. I recall averting my head as if not seeing the source of the sound would alleviate my insecurity. Chris said, “This is so cool! It sounds just like you!” I thought, “Oh my God, this is what I sound like? Crap!” By the end the show I gave myself a little more credit, after all I tried my hardest!

I must be serious. I bought
my own microphone and stand.
The voice lesson haven't hurt either!

I’ve since gotten much more accustomed to hearing my voice on the radio. I no longer cringe when I hear myself; I even appreciate it to a degree now! I had those same feelings when I heard myself trying to sing last Sunday. I was more prepared to be objective this time. I really wanted to give this a try and my expectations are realistic. Having the faith and support of the guys in the band gave me the courage to accept the challenge. That endorsement counts for more than you could imagine!

 So, I guess I’ll ride this pony ‘til it bucks me off! I’ll try my hardest and treat it the same way I do my radio show! I’m proud of the job I’ve done so far with my radio show and I feel confident. I hope to feel that same way with my buddies in the band! How cool is that?

Here’s Show #268! Well, immediately after the Flat Growler show I headed to the coast. That means deck time with KPIG! I always hear some tune I have that I’ve totally forgotten about. There’s some cool stuff from Ryan Bingham to kick things off. There are a couple cool covers of Beach Boy tunes and a request for an original. There’s a cool set of female artists and little “Gardenerisms” sprinkled through the whole show. Some funny stuff which would include another request for a Lou Reed song in the second hour, which has all kinds of fun in it! Hope you’ll enjoy it, I know I’ll have fun in the studio playing it for you!

Well summer has us all busy like usual, but as always thanks to you both Jerry and Robin for all you do!

Thanks too, to all you faithful listeners out there! Sorry I didn’t hang with you Scooter and Moto-Rob after the Growler show, next time fellas! Make it your summer to plan to get together with friends and have a listening party and have a drink for me!

Peace and love to you all!

Mike