Reader Blogs: I Live in Linda Vista

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I Live in Linda Vista

By Kevin Six | Posted December 30, 2010, 9:05 p.m.

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When I went into the Reader's website to blog about my neighborhood, I was marketed ingeniously by the computer. Once I typed in my neighborhood, Linda Vista, the Reader showed me an ad that asked me if I needed to get off drugs.
I get it! Linda Vista is not all that cool. When I first moved here from Clairemont (more on that later), I told my friends I lived in Kearney Mesa or near Mesa College. Linda is Spanish for pretty; vista is view and mesa is table. So I's rather live on the table than in pretty view.
Linda Vista has a view if you're in the right part of it. I'm in the Village Woods condo complex, otherwise known as Nazi Germany. Our association president, Adolph Hitler, has a lot of time on her hands and it tightly wound.
Last week there was a knock at the door. No one ever knocks on my door because all my friends think I live in the Spanish version of Pretty Table. Call your neighborhood Linda Mesa and everyone in San Diego will feign comprehension. This knock was definitely on my door and not the someone who wanted drugs from my neighbor next door (much more on that later).
It was the cable guy with an emergency order to fix the stolen cable coming from the electrical box to my condo through the sliding glass door. The cable guy was as incredulous as I was when I showed him the cable running from my TV and into the wall, where it was legally set up and costs me a monthly fortune to try to watch a hundred channels of crap (but more on that later).
So the cable guy makes his note and I get a little crazy on Hitler - er - the woman who runs the condo association. I did research on the internet. I actually found an article on the Reader's website about condo associations. The news was not good.
I decided to go crazy and take everyone on the condo association with me.
The Village Woods condos began life in the 1970s as a swinging singles apartment complex named, as far as I can gather, The Village Woods. There are no woods and there's not a village for that matter. There is a pond, a bit of a waterfall, a nice pool and a clubhouse. That no one gets to use.
Hitler is in charge of who comes and goes to the pool. The association board, which has more power over the Village of Woods than the Nazis ever had over Germany, the Fascist Italy and the Communists over China and Russia combined.
Suffice it to say that the Association got electronic access control over the pool about the time my dues were in arrears enough for the Third Reich - er- the Board to make a rule that you can't use the pool if your dues are passed sue.
Thank god my mother died or I's never have seen the pool or sat in the hot tub!
Then there's the matter of the clubhouse. Now, in the Swinging Seventies (and believe me because I lived through them, they were only trying to find the magic of the 60s and failing miserably), the clubhouse and pool were probably choc full of hipsters drinking Margaritas, skinny-dipping and smoking God-knows-what all day and all of the night.
But forty years on, those swingers have become the owners of the sourest pusses you can imagine. I wonder if the same crotchety old codgers and angry old ladies are the self-same people who partied the illage into the Village Woods complex back in the day. Suffice it to say they have a complex now and that's just about it.
One old guy threw his walking stick at me as I sat in the hot tub one day. Granted, the word from the Reichstag - er- the management company had come that I was not supposed to be in the hot tub but, brother please. Throw a stick at me? While I'm behind a metal fence? I saw him later in the week and, oddly, he didn't want to talk to me. He just pulled outta Dodge as fast as his little dog would go. I pity that dog P.I.T.Y. that old wiener dog who will outlive his master by a good ten years judging from the size of the veins on his neck and the redness on his face.
But I was talking about the clubhouse and not all the neighbors who have and will soon die (more on that later). It would be easier for a nice Jewish couple to get married at the Latter Day Saint's wedding-cake-of a temple than for me or anyone else to get permission to use the clubhouse. And the Politburo - er- the Association Board spent a lot of money on paint, furniture and a kitchen. A kitchen that no one uses!
It's enough to make you crazy. But, as I have said, I am going crazy and taking the whole Fascist, Nazi, Communist, Sour-Puss, Spinning-out-of-control-old-board-biddy bunch of them with me. I have created a new political party. Some thing that will cause them to stay up at night. Something that will cause each one of them to doubt his or her sanity. Something that will place a turd in their carefully concocted and oh-so-out-of-touch punch bowl. Something that will cause them to sell their condos and move to - where?
Nazi Germany!
The Village Woods Fun Party!
The party advocated use of the pool by all Association Members even if they haven's paid their association dues. I advocates for the door to be taken off of the clubhouse -- hell you need a key and an electric thing-a-ma-bob to get that far; do you really need to call and ask for permission and pay a deposit ti use a room that, though it has been redecorated, is set in the timeless Seventies? No!
And you don't need to pay for electricity either. The Village Woods Fun Party advocates for large solar cells on all the roofs, a gray water system to water the plants and what's left of the landscape (don't even get me started on that) and parties every night until eleven o'clock. The Village Woods Fun Party wants to put sliding glass doors on the apartments -- sorry -- condos that don't sound like FA18 taking off when you close them; and we want your privacy to be protected even unto placing recycled Levis jean material in the walls where the contractor should have put insulation. Oh, and we want to let people paint their doors what-ever-the-hells-color they want to paint them.
That ought to do it.

• More La Vista

All The Signs Are There

Here are a few signs found around Village woods and what I think of them:

 This sign should say "Welcome to Village Woods" but that is not the sentiment of the powers that be, as evidenced by the next sign you see as you enter the complex...

This sign could re-establish the Third Reich and get it to last for a thousand years.  Yes, by all means proceed directly to the resident's unit.  But what if you are a real estate agent and/or a potential buyer?  This isn't going to make you feel warm and fuzzy about Village Woods - and it's the second sign you see!  Not a good, property-value-increasing thing!

What if you want to take a walk around the complex? If you do you run the risk of arrest?  On my (illegal?) walk I met a number of nice people and a few cute, friendly dogs, a good, property-value-increasing thing.

Speaking of dogs, it seems that some people with access to desktop publishing, time on their hands and, sadly, not a full command of proper English, don't want dogs to poop on the property.  To these people, I say: "your" means belonging to you as it "signs like this show your ignorance".  The word you're looking for is the contraction of you + are. 

Thankfully, this sign is hidden in the west laundry room, where it showed signs of being taped somewhere before being taken to the bulletin board by a Good Samaritan grammarian.  One more thought: If you understand that dogs sometimes poop without their owners' knowledge and spend a minute picking it up, you will save the ten minutes it took to make the sign, post it and slaughter our language.  Thank you.

Speaking of English, this sign was not written in that tongue.  Had it been so, it would read, "No skateboards, roller skates or bikes may be ridden on site."  Proper English is the least of this sign's worries.

It's rude; it blocks a nice view of the pond that no one may look at because they should "proceed directly to resident's unit" (see the red sign, also not printed in English, above) and it's written IN ALL CAPS, which sounds like yelling.

Don't yell at me!  Write a nice sign that says "There's a great park about two blocks from here, where you can ride bikes, skateboards and roller skates. For safety's sake, please don't ride those things here.  Instead, why not look at the cool pond over this low-hanging sign."

This is my all-time favorite crazy sign.  First off, it's right on the clubhouse door, where you couldn't get in with  blowtorch and a search warrant; second, it's printed on official someone's yellow stationary; and third, it extols us to rat on our neighbors.

It almost sounds like the tactics used by the Nazis, Communists and Facisti to foment fear and distrust of your neighbors. You never knew if your neighbor was going to turn you in to the Nazis, Communists or the Facisti.  Thankfully history has taught all but this sign-maker that those tactics only serve to topple your regime.

Note to Association Facists: your neighbors are talking about you.  We will turn you in to the grammar police; suggest you get counseling; and re-write your signs.  Although, I wouldn't rewrite this one, I think people who owe money to the association should still be able to use the pool.

Now here is an obviously deranged person who wants something.  The problem is we don't know that it is.  Anyone who can decipher this sign, please comment!

DangerHouse Productions presents "Three Plays of Grand Guignol A Night of Love, Death and Disfigurement”

The Grand Guignol (pronounced gran geen yohl) was to 19th-Century theatre what Law and Order, CSI and Bones are to you.  In the 1800s theatre took the place of webisodes, TV, film and books as not everyone could read in those days.  Today, competing for your time and attention from all these 21st-Century entertainments, comes a renegade theatre company that thinks you’ll like Theatre of the Grand Guignol as much as your ancestors did. 

So, what is the Grand Guignol?  Anne Rice fans will remember the Vampire Lestat stumbling upon the Théâtre des Vampires and a gothic Antonio Banderas as the Guignol-esque troupe’s leader.  DangerHouse, like the French theatre that was popular from 1897-1962, will present an evening of three short plays, two scary and one sexy, October 22-November 7 at Queen Bee's in North Park.

DangerHouse Productions came onto the San Diego Theatre scene in 2007 with an evening of Grand Guignol plays, in association with Chronos theatre company, at the prestigious Neurosciences Institute.  That evening of blood, gore, cheating spouses and violent revenge was a first on that stage, which usually features lectures on brain chemistry and not actual brains.  But is it relevant?  

Miranda Halverson (aka Danger Daisy), who directs one of the three short plays, thinks so.  “When there is violence abroad affecting our population, the nation turns to more ordered, regulated violence closer to home – as an outlet, and maybe an analgesic. Horror will always be modern because what is more relevant than human suffering and the misery we can cause each other if we so choose?”

OK, relevant but will people like it?  Halverson thinks they will.  “My favorite part of the evening's experience is the contrast of the bloody dramas (Final Kiss and The Torture Garden) with the utterly ridiculous sex farce (Tics, or Doing the Deed) smack in the middle. Grand Guignol performances would heighten the feelings of dread by cleansing the palette between courses with a light, airy comedy…”  This is what the theatre’s management called the Hot and Cold Shower. 

The Grand Guignol defined the Theatre of Horror genre and was even involved in early silent horror films.  The theatre style borrowed from the late 19th- and early 20th-century realism and melodrama movements and took them one uncomfortable step further.  There was even an in-house physician to aid audience members who couldn’t take the scary and gory stuff.  Everything added to an uncomfortable feeling for theatergoers from the theatre’s location (in the Red Light District) to the theatre itself (a de-sanctified church), to the style of acting, the plays themselves and the artistry of the technicians.

It was a time before sound and color in horror films so we can’t be sure if people really fainted or took sick but it’s a pretty good guess that they had some willies scared out of themselves.  While earlier audiences may or may not have asked, “Is there a Doctor in the house?” San Diego audiences will have no such luck – no in-house doctor will attend the crowd at Queen Bee’s.

That’s not to say that there won’t be blood, gore, adult situations and stage combat.  In fact DangerHouse Productions suggests that mature teens and older come to the performances.  Says DangerHouse founder Marie Miller (aka Danger Domino): “There was a really fun question on the audition form: ‘Do you have any aversion to killing, maiming or dying on stage?’ I think that sets the tone from the beginning. But everyone who is in such a roles is actually pretty pumped about the horror they cause or receive.   I sure hope audiences are frightened, amused, then terrified.  In the past, we have given people nightmares, no one passed out in fright, but you never know.”

The plays (and their titles) are translations that can be found in Grand-Guignol The French Theatre of Horror by Richard J. Hand and Michael Wilson.  All are from the Grand Guignol’s heyday immediately preceding and following the First World War.  They are:

Final Kiss (1912)-A man, Henrí, whose fiancé has horribly disfigured him by throwing sulfuric acid on his face, decides to exact terrible revenge.  Directed by Danger Domino.

Tics, or Doing the Deed (1908)-A lusty romp where unabashed titillation meets uncontrollable urges.  Directed by Danger Daisy.

The Torture Garden (1922)- Helpless fascination with vicarious sadomasochistic bloodplay eventually becomes all too personal, bringing Clara's trip through China to a horrifying conclusion.  Directed by Danger Domino.

Starring
Damion Nowak, Justine Hince, Gregory Batty, Teale Bossen, Brian Burke, Javier Guerrero, Carla Navarro, Alfred Navato, Adam Freeman, Miranda Halverson, Mina Chuong, and Mary Cherwink. Fight Choreography by Rhys Greene.

Show times
Oct 22, 23, 28, 29 at 7:00 p.m., and Oct 30, 31, Nov 6, 7 at 2:00 p.m.  Doors open 30 minutes before show time. There will be live music after the first four performances, a special Halloween matinee and a Zombie Fashion Show.

Location
Queen Bee's, 3925 Ohio Street, 92104, in North Park

For more information or tickets
Website: http://www.dangerhouse13.com/
Email: Info@DangerHouse13.com
Call: 619-663-5652
Danger Monikers
DangerHouse is an actual dwelling in La Mesa, California occupied by artists, musicians, actors and containing rickety shelves in the bedroom closets, hence the name.  Miller, Halverson and a number of the DangerHouse inner circle have chosen (or been given) what they call “Danger Names.”  That is the word “Danger” followed by another D-word.  Miller is Danger Domino and Halvorson is Danger Daisy.  Is that a clever way to not take themselves too seriously or a way for otherwise respectable theatre professionals to remain anonymous?  Either way, Domino and Daisy have been duped into divulging their denominators and this writer lives in horror!  Those prop weapons look very realistic…
More history can be found at http://www.grandguignol.com/history.htm

This Romeo and Juliet

Working on a play is sometimes boring, sometimes exciting and other times evocative of every emotion you can conjure. And sometimes it's full of emotion you're having a difficult time conjuring. But whatever it is, theatre is a collection of people in the same boat.

We're all theatre geeks and proud of it. While other kids were playing we were in plays. We know more than is strictly necessary toknow about the history of theatre, contume repair, beats, timing and the status of the play moment to moment.

But, iff you're lucky, you land in the company of a show that has a magic blend. A show in which everyone gets along. A show that will change the lives of actors, designers and audience alike. One that it worth it.

Romeo and Juliet is such a play. Intrepid Shakespeare company came on the scene at the perfect time. The Universe opened up and allowed a group of theatre professionals to fill a void. The void? Try voids. Accessable Shakespeare; a resident company in Encinitas; the right people at the right time and I could go on. The result is that magic is being done and, for however long it lasts, you need to get on this ride.

We are doing arguably Shakespeare's most famous play. Have you seen it? If you're a fan of theatre it is your responsibility so see as many R&Js as you can. It is to the credit of directors (and Intrepid Founders) Christy Yael and Sean Cox that they knew this going in. We all know we're going to be judged - placed among the last, the best, the worst, the oddest and the coolest Romeo and Juliet people have ever seen.

We are lucky in our situation (if not that America is unlucky in this) that a number of the audience will be seeing R&J and the work of William Shakespeare for the first time. This is because of one of those great moments in theatre...

Sean and Christy were at a city council meeting, met the mayor and the mayor made the relationship with San Dieguito Highschool happen. If you haven't been to a highschool in a while you sholuld just see San Dieguito. There is always something going on there. The administration understands well their relationship with and responsibility to the community in which they stand.

There are all manner of adult classes, recreation activities, a dance and a debate competition -- and this was just last Friday. It goes on all the time. Truly refreshing. Just like Intrepid, its relationship with the school and this Romeo and Juliet.

Leticia Walker Reed Meets Julian Triton

9. An excerpt from the diary of Julian Triton

This day and age represents so many unique opportunities to create!  In my time there was music (if you were a member of the church), theatre (if you did passion or mystery plays), writing (if you were a priest), and art (if you wished to illuminate religious texts).  No wonder they called it the dark ages!

Now the whole world is made of light and not the kind of light one in my condition must shun.  The process of sitting in a darkened movie house for the first time was, to say the least, an immensely emotional experience – and I hate showing emotion; emotion makes one soft and the soft are subjugated.  So imagine my pleasure at seeing a sunrise for the first time in – I don’t even know how long.  How great is Mr. Edison and his machine for broadcasting light even as I sit her in darkness.

This book, this pen and this ink, ill gotten as I can make them, will be my confessional.  I will trust my agent to deposit it in the safest bank in the New World.  Trust!  Well, I trust as I will.  Do I not also have a key?

The confessional!  As in all literature, the antagonist seeks out his own demise, and what am I if not antagonistic?  He stupidly leaves clues for the powers of good.  The better the villain, the more worthy the hero must be.  Well.  I state here now – for whoever is able to find the source, defeat the security and crack the code – thank you for being a worthy adversary.  Now, please do your best to protect yourself because my secret cannot be told unless one of us is destroyed.

The last time I tried this everyone but me was destroyed.  That and a scriptorium and the town in which it was built.  Oh, the intricacies of building a library for the greater good!

But enough of this babble!  I ask you; do you have the courage?  Or will you become one of thousands and thousands of victims I’ve left in my wake throughout the centuries?

The coding was not a problem, really.  What kind of a linguist would I be if I hadn’t lived all these years?  Language is what defines all civilization and the language of any land is the language of the victors.  I speak dozens of languages and am partial to Greek, as you must know.  I can hardly remember my native tongue.  Only certain words float back to me – usually in nightmares.  Mine was a tough upbringing and the language was as tough as the land and the people who boasted that they’d never been conquered.  So the language was as rudimentary and crude as the landscape and its people.

Much later in my education was I to realize that in order to truly conquer you must not only impose your will on people – you must also have a culture to impose upon them.  So I studied the great civilizations of the great conquerors; the art, culture and language of war.  But that was to come later.

“And now do you understand the key to this code?”

And with a rush of air, that Leticia realized was her own breath, she was awake and panting as the library, the sun, the books and the dangerous, beautiful man faded into the distance.  All that was left was the smell of the book.  That smell and that diary she still couldn’t read, even though she was on page four.

“Wait.  How did I get on page four?”

“Are you all right Miss Reed?

And for the second time in as many minutes, Leticia Walker Reed started.  It was the librarian who’d shown her the books on Spanish and Caltilian dictionaries.

“I’m terribly sorry.  I must have dozed off.”

“I thought so too but you were turning pages…”

“While asleep?”

“I assumed you were squinting.  It happens a lot here.”

“I.. ah… thank you.”

Leticia was feeling so many emotions that she couldn’t get them straight and she knew only one person to talk to.  In a manner of speaking.  She exited the San Francisco Public library and crossed the street to her hotel.

She rushed past a display in the library’s atrium celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Pony Express.  Had the mail service been in existence that day, Leticia Walker Reed would own a per centage of its debt.

Darling Emily Chapter Eight

8. The Dream

Letty was in familiar rooms in the library at the University.  She was regarded as someone who appreciated books more than people and the library staff, cut from the same cloth, left her alone.  The smells were so potent.  The books dust and sunlight.  Perfect!  A beautiful, sunny early fall day spent indoors amid the rustle of old paper and the unmistakable rhythm of the man reciting poetry. 

This was how she knew she was dreaming.  No one ever spoke much above a whisper at the school library and no one ever recited poetry.  Especially her own!  This was a secret she’d not even told Emily.  A poem about poetry and dreams beginning.

“We never remember dreams beginning and
Forgetting them
They never end.”

“That’s –” she said and then they were dancing.  Like you can be in dreams.

With the sunlight streaming in through thick-glassed windows.  Now a waltz of some kind at just above a whisper and a man breathing in her ear.

“I know.”

“You do?”

“Of course I do.  All the words are yours and, because I have a library card, they are mine too.”

“You’re a – ”

“Thief.  Yes.”

“I meant to say you’re a borrower.”

“No.  I’m a thief.”

“Will you steal my heart?”

“Yes, Darling Letty.  That and more.”

“Will you steal me away?”

“I believe the verse is sung thusly:
‘Away he came
With book and chain
And evil grin
He came again – ’”

“’To steal my heart’,” continued Leticia Walker Reed.

“’Which was his art’,” added the handsome stranger.

“’He took it all
Left me in thrall…’”

“Oh, continue, Darling Leticia.  The song is in your voice.”

She continued.

“’I took it in
My only sin
To hope he’d see
My chastity’”

Then he sang the next verse of the tone poem she’s told no one about.

“‘And take it still
As was his will
Devouring me
Deliciously’”

And they both whispered, they were dancing in a library after all, the final lines:

“‘And totally
And totally’”

But before she could ask the handsome, dangerous man in indeterminate age, the diary was in her hands as it can be in dreams, and, as in dreams she could understand it.

“Read,” he said.

Darling Emily, Chapter Seven

7. The Book

It was old.  It looked old.  The binding had once been a custom leather job.  It looked like books she’d ordered from Europe, books she’d seen in libraries in large cities.  Like books that were published for wealthy, literate men of property and influence.  The book looked, smelled and sounded old and rich.  The smell was a sweet, tangy, mossy musk.  It smelled of leather to be sure but there was something else there, the smells combined to form a word on the edge of her consciousness, an ancient word.  Feardeath?

The book sounded like the breath of an old, infirm man who had once been a promising athlete but now had fallen on hard times. Flipping pages was like chasing an old man down an alley in a rich European neighborhood.  All of these effects combined to produce a feeling that was not entirely pleasant and he most bothersome feature, by far, was the handwriting. 

If the smell and sound of the book made a dark promise, the writing kept it.  The letters were written in a purplish ink with what could only have been a quill.  The ink and quill were undoubtedly expensive.  As was the paper, the leather and the binding.

Leticia could not make out many words.  She was familiar with Spanish and Latin but this seemed to combine both on occasion and, at other times, there was another language entirely.  And all of it in that bold, strong, almost egotistical handwriting.  Most of the language was probably an older Spanish dialect.  It was infinitely frustrating because she was sure she would have to write to her Latin professor at the University and then order several books and wait weeks for them to arrive before she could find out anything other than the obvious fact that she was holding a diary.

The diary belonged to a man with grace and style, a man who knew exactly what he wanted to say and who had much to say.  The book was the size of a traveling preacher’s bible, approximately six inches wide, nine tall and four thick.  It could fit in the pocket of a frock coat that a preacher would wear but Leticia didn’t know how she knew this: the book had never belonged to a man of God.

After hours spent trancelike, looking at, listening to and smelling the book – it smelled if not alive then very recently dead – she rushed to her secretaire, opened it, tore out a page of stationary and fired off a letter to Professor Greenlese.  After addressing the letter and turning a few more pages furtively, Letty realized that it was well after midnight and she was tired.  She wanted to tell Emily absolutely everything but it would have to wait until tomorrow.  And then she was asleep.

Darling Emily, Chapter Six

6. After Dinner

Leticia Walker Reed retired to her room on the second floor of Waterwood on the top of the hill overlooking Walker’s Mill.  She actually scampered, she noted, so full was she with girlish enthusiasm.  Her creek-side room offered a view five miles downstream, past the cattle range, over the fields and down into a grove of trees that ran into Walker’s Mill.  The Mill used to grind all the grain from the many farms in Placer County.  The railroads changed the business of the town – that and the fact that every acre of land was owned by a Walker or a Reed and had been for fifty years.  The Walkers, who owned the mill and most of the land around it, gave the property on which Waterwood was built to the Reeds as a wedding present.  This was before the Walkers died, leaving the rest of it to their daughter and son in law.

Except for six seasons at University, Leticia had lived in this room her entire life.  Now that she had taken all the University of California could give her, a Bachelor of Arts degree in Language and a Master of Arts in English, Letty didn’t know what to do.  She knew what her fantasy was: to run off with a handsome, intriguing stranger who would totally devour her.  She hoped that she wouldn’t end up like Darling Emily, too weak and too smart to do anyone let alone herself any good.  She thought she might like to work in the family business but couldn’t really get excited enough about any of it. 

Then she decided that she needed to go incognito, to hide out between the musty pages of a well-written book.  This is what she had always done.  She was 12 or thereabouts before she realized she was rich.  Just after she stopped being Clementine and right after she saw how deferentially the townspeople treated her, her mother and father – and anyone named Walker or Reed the first time she rode to town in her mother’s Brougham. 

Leticia Walker Reed rarely went to town.  Tutors had come from San Francisco to teach James and her.  She was always the favorite, he always trouble maker.  After studies, James would run wild on the property, ride his pony or get someone to take him into town but Letty would retire.  Sink into the depths of leather and language.  All her books were brought by the tutors, many of whom never lasted more than a year.  Then, during her fourth or fifth year of studies, she asked a question Miss Olson couldn’t answer.

“Well.  I’ll have to go into town the next chance I get and order a book on the subject,” said Miss Olson in response to a question on American History.  The fact that there were books that would tell you all you wanted to know – and that you could just go to town and order them – was a turning point in Leticia’s life.  She determined, from that moment on, that she would learn everything there was to learn from every book she could get her hands on.

Then, after an informative ride into town with Miss Olson, and, after she learned exactly how much money for books she had at her disposal, Letty went a little wild on books.  Finally, her parents came to understand how much money was being spent on books – it was after Letty had discovered such things as catalogues and newspapers and libraries.  It was Uncle James who had the idea of putting Letty to work to earn her book allowance.  She did sums for the bookkeepers, filed correspondence, took notes and, finally, wrote all the correspondence for her father and uncle.  When she left for University, Abolphus and James Reed had to hire two secretaries to handle the workload.

The library in Walkers Mill is named after Leticia Walker Reed who insisted, just before she was accepted to the University of California, that the other children in her community have access to the books she did.  Every purchase Letty made from the catalogues at the general store held the twin thrills that of devouring it’s contents and that of giving of the knowledge to untold thousands of people after her.  Her mother taught her that books can live on after she grew out of them and her mother oversaw the building of “Letty’s Library after she went away to school.  Sometimes Letty ordered two of the same book, knowing well in advance that she wouldn’t be able to part with it when the time came.  All of her books – even the duplicates – reside in “Letty’s Library” now.  All except the large black-leather-bound journal she now held.

And what a book it was!

Darling Emily Chapter Five

5. Dinner

After an hour of discussing finances and reminding the men the difference between debit and credit, Leticia Walker Reed had had enough.

“That’s all well and good but tell me everything you can about the book!”

The story of the book held what Leticia Walker Reed could already fell was a good, even perfect promise.  Like any good story, it began from the point of innocence.  The book was a complete mystery. 

“Mr. Pinkerton couldn’t tell us anything.”  Mr. Pinkerton was a little joke between Leticia and her father.  Each detective that Pinkerton Security sent to the house seemed to be a copy of the next one.  Leticia just took to calling any detective Mr. Pinkerton.

“Where did it come from?  I mean it had to come from somewhere.”

“We got all the assets.  We literally took possession of all the money and everything in all the deposit boxes,” said Uncle James.

“Some of the items on deposit were from failed banks that Wells took over before we came in.  The book’s owner – or the person who rented the box at a small bank near Fisherman’s Wharf – had been dead for years.  Spaniard fella, I think, by the name of Archangelo.”

“Is it important, Father?”

“All we know is that it’s old,” said Abolphus.

“No one could place the age,” said James.  We only know that the book could be hundreds of years old.”

“And what do you want from me?”

“You studied languages.  We want to know if it’s anything important.”

“Father, do you just want me out of your hair while you take over the banking business in California?”

“No.  I want you to find out what you can and share the information with us.  We have a man at Pinkerton you can write to.”

“Really!?”

“Yes and you have to call him Anderson.”

“Not Pinkerton?”

“I don’t think he’ll get the joke, darling.”

“I’ll do what I can,” said Leticia trying to conceal the excitement she was feeling.  It was all she could to do to keep from running up to her room and tearing into the book.  “I might need to do some research.  I might need to go to San Francisco.”

“Write to Mr, Anderson for all your needs, Leticia,” said her mother.

“You can go to San Francisco if you need to.”

“Wowee!” said Leticia.

“Yep,” said Adolphus and James.

“Language,” said Isabella.

Back to Darling Emily: Chapter Four

4. Before Dinner

Letty and her mother busied themselves readying for dinner.  This meant managing a houseful of servants.  Waterwood housed the immediate A. Reed family, Uncle James and his invalid wife – who took all her meals in her room – and 12 servants.  Uncle James occupied the third floor, Isabelle and Adolphus the second and Letty and her brother lived on the first floor, which was also the nerve center for the many family businesses. The house could house an additional 25 guests easily and could entertain over 200.  It sat on 10 acres and was surrounded by Old Man Walker’s Orchards to the East and the senior Reed’s Cattle ranch to the South.  The north was a working farm with chickens, cattle, dairy and an assortment of grains and vegetables.

Adolphus and James Reed did a lot of talking on their rides.  Always had done.  There was something about a long, dusty ride on horseback that lubricated the mind and loosened the lips.  The entire Reed Central California Trust was hatched on one of their last trips back from the shining city of San Francisco to the small town they loved.  It was not uncommon for the family to hear the details of an incredible venture after the men returned from a long ride.  More and more, those ideas were influenced by the Reed women who always saved their best business ideas for just before the Reed brothers saddled up.  On their last trip to the big city, after three hours in the saddle, Adolphus and James Reed had made a number of decisions.  A visit to the lawyers was in order.

The Walker Reed Company had bet 78 per cent of its total assets, no small amount, on a gamble that people in California would never know about.  They purchased The Union Trust Company outright and merged it with Wells Fargo.  They did not take ownership of Wells Fargo security or concerns.  The government had nationalized the carriage and railroads for the War to End All Wars.  Wells Fargo was too valuable a brand to have much fuss made and the only thing the Walker Reeds had left to distrust was the press.

The business plan was essentially Letty’s.  She was convinced that most banks in the United States were over extended – and especially in California.  All that “mining money” as Uncle James called it was tied up in a lot of shaky investments – much of it in the New York Stock Exchange, which had failed miserably in ’26 taking all but the heartiest banks with it.  Letty knew that the rest of the smaller banks would fail in the next three years and that they could be purchased for pennies on the dollar by a bank rich in cash and gold.  The only bank close enough was Wells Fargo but it would need a very large infusion of capitol, enough to make it the Wells Fargo Super-Bank.  What she didn’t know at the time was that the Walker Reed Company had a lot of money it needed to protect from the coming economic storm.

A bad American economy, Letty had said the last time she played the Business Game, was a compelling reason for America go back to war in Europe, it made the most economic sense.  Before that was done, she reasoned, money would have to flow into and out of this new Super-Bank as the best bank customer in the world –Uncle Sam – would need to fund a war bigger than the last Great War.

The best news was that the US would purchase raw material and foodstuffs with these guaranteed loans from the Super-Bank.  And that was just exactly what the Reed brothers invested the remaining 22% of their holdings on.  They were either going to be richer or fantastically richer in as little as 10 years.

She was right of course.  But, of course, she would not live to see her fantastic successes and the growing fortunes of her family.

Isabella had managed to keep the mysterious book out of her hands before dinner but Letty was able to get a glimpse of a few well-rendered words in a strong, intelligent and – she could only hear the word dangerous – hand.  The words, some Latin-based language, were fantastical.  Bloody and violent on the only page she saw while walking to the stables with her father and uncle.

Then, intercepted by her mother before she could ask one of the thousands of questions about Wells, Fargo, Pinkerton and the book, she was off to arrange the details of the meal with the staff.  The men shared a meaningful glance.

“Do you think we did the right thing, Jimmy?”

“We’ve been lucky, Dolfus.”

“Luck ain’t got nothin’ to do with it! We gambled millions on this.”

“The legal boys liked it, Dolphus.”

“Yep.”

“She’s smart.”

“Yep.”

“She just has a talent for reading all those articles and reports and books and coming up with a simple plan.”

“So simple!  That’s why I don’t know if – ”

“Dolphus.  It’s always been simple.  Working with Papa.  We pulled metal out of the ground and the men in San Fran gave us money for it.”

“Yep.  Hard currency, though, Jimmy.  Land, we can see.  Horses we can touch.  We gave hard money for hard things. This is just all just so much paper…”

“I know your guts as well as I know my own and we’re going to do well.  ‘Sides, we didn’t bet it all on the banks.  We saved some for commodities and such.”

“She thought of that too.  She didn’t even care one way or the other.  It was just like – what does she call it?  A theoretical exercise?  What the hell does that mean, James?”

“It means you got horse sense and your wife’s got book sense, Adolphus.  And that beautiful, crazy daughter of yours has both in spades.”

“Yep.”

My Mother

She was so big to me as to block out the very sun
Indeed, she was sun and moon to me
And ocean, too, for the first nine months

She could frighten, amaze, love and protect me
She was, is and always shall be a powerful woman
To me

Even though, at the end
She was
frail
calm
quiet
aloof
impatient

Many people thought my relationship with my mother was odd
But we seemed to make it work

Having gone through the drama and difficulty of power struggle
We settled, finally, into a respectful distance
In which we corresponded infrequently and often by letter

But it worked for us
Me, the little boy who became a man
With all she taught me:

Respect for women
Emotional combat
Tough love

Farewell lady
Mother
Protector
Teacher
Posessor of legendary stubbornness

Is it any wonder I became the son you loved and respected
From a distance?

Email Marketing Tips

Email Marketing Tips
How to get the best results with the least amount of money
By Kevin Six

What is Marketing?
To understand where Email Marketing fits into the big picture, we first must understand marketing. The first marketers would brand their work or mark it. They didn’t consider themselves marketers (or mark-it-ers) but rather artisans who made particular tools, implements, dinner wear, etc. The mark became a calling card and people came to look for a certain artisan’s mark, which ensures quality.

The mark these ancient artisans put on their work is still called a brand. From a hieroglyph on an ancient tool to a marked cow to Coca Cola, just about everything you purchase has been branded. Email Marketing is just another in a long line of tools used to make sure people know about your product or service – your brand.

All marketing is about collecting customers. First we collect prospects, and then we give them compelling reasons to purchase our products and services. After prospects become customers, we aim to keep them by occasionally communicating and offering something special because of their loyalty to our brand. Sometimes we want them to buy from us but other times we want them to feel good about our products and services – our brand. Sometimes we just want to thank them for being customers.

There are various ways to get the word out to prospects and customers. Traditional marketing includes print advertising in local or national publications; electronic media marketing is via radio and television; outdoor marketing includes billboards, signs and ads on busses; guerilla marketing includes posters, flyers, sandwich boards and the ubiquitous sign spinners; and direct marketing is all about calling or mailing clients at their home or place of business.

The dawning of the Internet Age brings new marketing techniques like web pages, E-commerce, pay-per-click, viral marketing and, of course, Email Marketing. But is it really new? Except for the obvious benefits to the trees, isn’t E-commerce like having a store and isn’t viral marketing like guerilla marketing? Your web page is nothing more than a billboard on the Information Superhighway. And of course, E-mail Marketing is the best, cheapest and most effective way to do direct marketing. You also get to know a lot more about your customers and – unlike any other marketing on the planet – about those who choose not to be customers and why.

Summary
• All marketing is branding
• There are many kinds of marketing
• Though the names have changed, the process haven’t
• The Internet Age brought new old technologies
• Email Marketing is like Direct Mail but better
• Email Marketing also saves trees

What is Email Marketing?
Email Marketing is direct mail without the mail. If done improperly, Email Marketing can turn into Spam but, with the right products (and sometimes services), you can actually make people glad they got an Email from you. See more on Spam below, but for now, let’s look at a cost comparison between traditional direct mail and Email.

You want to tell as many people about your products so you hire a telemarketing firm to call your prospects and turn them into customers. Or, you hire a telemarketing manager to hire a room-full of telemarketers. Either way, you’re paying for people, rooms, telephones, leads and commissions. Telemarketing works but the costs are high and with Caller ID, the Do Not Call List and cell phones, the numbers aren’t as great as they were in the golden days of telemarketing. Plus you’re calling a lot of people at home during dinnertime.

Instead, a less intrusive way is to send a postcard, a brochure or some other nice sales piece – even a personal letter. So you have to hire a designer, a printer, a mail house and pay for design, printing, processing and postage. A brochure could cost as much as $1 per unit of you go high end. A postcard could cost as little as half that.

Now, what if you could send something as pretty as a brochure at about 2% of the cost of a postcard? And what if that postcard had a lot of cool things that a piece of paper is simply aren’t capable of? Like what, you ask? Like this.

A piece of paper can’t keep delivering itself until it makes it to your house, you only get one shot. A piece of paper can’t bring people to your store or even your warehouse. A piece of paper, no matter how pretty, can’t tell you who read it, how much time people spent reading it, or how many of those people went on to purchase something because of it. But something a piece of paper will never be able to do is this: it can’t tell you who is almost ready to purchase and just needs a phone call or another Email to get them to commit to your company. One other thing paper can’t do is ask a person to save both parties the trouble and expense of communicating by having the prospect Opt-Out.

You know who’s not receiving your cards and letters because you pay for each one; the mail man to return them, the clerk to delete the addresses and the recycling firm to take them away. With E-mail Marketing, this and many other tasks are automated and each step saves you money.

All this can be done without making the receiver of Email Marketing think ill of you. In other words, by not creating spam.

Summary
• Email Marketing is a way to send several types of marketing pieces
• Email Marketing costs pennies per Email, much less than Snail Mail
• There are a lot of things that paper can’t do that Email
• Some Email Programs can tell me who reads my Email
• Email Marketing Programs keep me from sending Spam.


What is Spam?
It’s important to understand how Spam works so you can avoid it in your Email Marketing efforts. So here goes… Spam was developed during World War II to get the most out of animal products as most of the meat was going to serve the troupes. Canned meat became popular because it could last longer, tasted pretty good and no one knew what was in it, really. It is this icky-not-knowing-what’s-in-it feeling some people have about Spam the product that gave Spam the bad Email its name.

In other words, Spam is associated with marginal products that have been delivered without regard to who may get them. The odd thing about Spam (and circulars in your mail box too) is that if they didn’t work you wouldn’t get them. So even though you won’t consume pills, personal aides, titillating websites and off-shore gambling websites, someone does. But because the costs are so low, a very low return rate still makes Spam profitable for the sender. But Spam should be avoided and there are several ways to do this.

Your very own Email program is the best Spam producer in the world. Because your Email program works both ways, and doesn’t want you receiving scatter-gunned Emails, it has smart and powerful filters to only give you what you want to read. If you send Email to more than 15 or so of your friends, even if you Blind Copy them, most Spam Filters will dump the entire load of emails to your senders’ Spam Folders. This is why no one reads your Emails – it’s not you, it’s how you communicate.

Blind copying is a way for Emailers to hide the recipients of Emails. This is good if you don’t your recipients to get everyone else’s Email Address. This also works because nobody gets anything. Not good for Email Marketing though. So, for a little bit more than you’re paying your Internet Service Provider (the company that connects you to the Internet and probably provides you with Email), you can get a powerful software package that sends everyone an individual Email. This is what you always wanted to do but just didn’t have time to do. Like a mail-merge document that costs pennies to create, deliver and – again to tell you who’s reading it. Pretty cool, huh?

Email Marketing Programs, like Jugglemail, help you defeat Spam in many ways. First off, they won’t send Spam. Email programs will tell you what kinds of words and phrases in your outgoing Email will be caught by Spam filters and what kind of Email Addresses are Spam Traps (address that have a much lower threshold for Spam). Email programs send individual messages to your important list of clients or potential clients, as if you sent the same Email 100-10,000 times (depending on the size of your list).

Summary
• Email Marketing is inexpensive
• Spam is bad for 90% or more of the people
• Your Email program is great for one Emails and horrible for anything past 10
• Proper Email is easy to produce and send
• Email can do many things that plain paper can’t and costs hundreds of times less

Email Links, Tracking and Opt-In
Some of the things that Email can do that paper can’t have already been discussed. You can send individualized Emails that tell you what people are doing with them. But there is so much more that can be done with the proper tools.

Email Marketing Programs (like Jugglemail) can help you create emails in many ways. They come with pre-designed templates that you only have to fill in. They send each Email individually. They use bonded, White Listed Servers (a way of making sure that your Emails are delivered properly). They also attempt to deliver Email to clogged receiving servers at least 100 times before giving up – and then they tell you why your Email bounced (came back as undelivered).

This would be enough for many people to use an Email Marketing Program but there is so much more to it. You can include photos, videos and sound in your Email Marketing messages. But the most important thing that Email Marketing can do for you is compel people, who are already on their computer, to buy online. This is done by including Links in your Email to your Website where your products and services are designed to sell. After reading a well-written, sophisticated Email Message, many people will purchase your goods and services with only a few clicks. And the best thing is, your Email Marketing Program can tell you who did what and how many times. Yet another bunch of great things that paper can’t do.

This is world of Analytics, in which the more you know about what your people are doing with your Email, the better you can market to them. For example, if people aren’t reading your Emails in large amounts, you can spruce them up or tone then down. If a lot of people are reading them but not making purchases, you can make a more compelling argument for them to buy. Analytics provided by Email Marketing Services (like Jugglemail) can help you track Emails Sent, Emails Read, Links Clicked and, if you want to go that far, where people go once they reach your Website. You can follow an Email from in-box to Shopping Cart if you want to.

People who aren’t interested in your products and services can tell the Email Marketing Program not to send anymore Emails. This is referred to as Opting-Out. This is good because you can save each other’s time and your money by not spending time on someone who doesn’t fit your demographic. The same program that lets people Opt-Out also lets people forward your Email to friends (and gives you those Email Addresses) and lets people Opt-In as well. More on that later.

Summary
• Each Email you send with an Email Service is track-able
• Each Email has Links to your Website, where people can make purchases
• You can tell what people are doing with your Emails with Analytics
• You can tone your Emails up or down or re-mail to your Hot Prospects

Email Marketing Pieces
So far it’s been all about why but now we can get into what. If you’re still reading, you are probably excited about how to put them to use, so thank you for reading this far! Now, here are a few tried and true Email Marketing Pieces that you can use to great affect.

Sales Introduction
The Sales Introduction is a great way to get a soft sales message to potential customers. The Sales Introduction can be as simple as a letter or a postcard and shouldn’t be much more fancy than that. People who don’t know you and your products/services well might shy away from an Email Marketing piece that is too flashy. By all means, however, do place your logo and at least one high-quality photo in your Sales Introduction. You also want to invite people to see your products and services by linking to your website. The idea behind a Sales Introduction is to say: “Hello, this is who I am and what I do. I don’t know if you’d be interested in my products/services but, if so, here’s a way to find out more.”

Direct Pitch
The Direct Pitch is a way to get people to purchase what you’re selling. It is designed to get the person, most likely someone you know a little better than one you’d send the Sales Introduction to, to make a purchase. The Direct Pitch works well with Hot Prospects (this is what Jugglemail defines as people who’ve read and/or clicked on a previous Email but haven’t made a purchase). The Direct Pitch can have better graphics, more photos and a more direct way of speaking. Something like: “Because you know me, you know you’ll get something of great value from me. Here are a few pictures (and possibly a video) of my products (or me serving clients) in action. If you order today, you’ll not only get the benefit of the product (or service) but you’ll also get a discount. You can even return it for a refund if not satisfied.”

Above the Fold
You want to put your sales message Above the Fold. This is an old newspaper term meaning in the top of the page (or in the case of Email Marketing the screen) before anyone has to scroll down to make a purchase. It’s the place where a reader’s eyes naturally go. And, because people read left to right, guess where your sales message should go? Right! Right and just Above the Fold.

Email Newsletter
An Email Newsletter is a great way to give your customers and prospects a look at the human side of your company. You can spend more time and space giving information and insights because you’re not rushing anyone to a sale – and people like that kind of change-up. The Email Newsletter is more about why a person should do business with you than what you do and why a person should buy today. It’s a much more laidback message that says: “I’d like you to get to know me and my people better so that you can rest assured that we create the best products and/or services. We are a group of people with friends, families and interests inside and outside of the things we sell. We have fun together and we just know you’ll have fun working with us too.”

Tips
Tips are a great way to gain clients – especially through Opt-In efforts and Auto Responders, which will be talked about later in this Piece. Speaking of this Piece, you’ve probably already realized that you are reading the perfect example of a Tips Piece. It gives the reader valuable information about a product or service that they want to know more about. You either signed up to receive this or an associate who knows you and your needs forwarded it to you. Either way, it comes to you from an organization that is a specialist and can most certainly help you with your needs through advice and a subtle sales message. The Tips Piece says: “I specialize in just what you are looking for. I am willing to give you a vast amount of my experience in exchange for you allowing me to briefly describe my product or service when it relates directly to what we are talking about.”

In this case, the product is Jugglemail and it provides all you need to send Marketing Emails to 100-10,000 clients. It also offers you the opportunity to gain clients who Opt-In to your Email List and automatically responds. Yes, we’re about to talk about more features.

Summary
• Sales Introductions are heavy on information and soft on sales messages
• Sales Emails have the message Above the Fold
• Email Newsletters are about the people behind your products and services
• You’re reading a Tips Piece right now

Opt In and Auto Responders
Email Marketing Programs (like Jugglemail, the product we’re selling in exchange for you taking advantage of our expertise in this Tips Piece) can allow you to build your list of prospects and send them a Sales Introduction or Tips Piece automatically. The Marketing Program allows you to program what you want to gain (Email Address, Name, Address, etc.) in a step-by-step protocol. At the end of the process, the program produces html code that you can place in outgoing Emails, on Websites or on your Blog. This code becomes an Add Box for your website that collects information from people who are interested in your products and/or services. It also places them on a pre-designated Email List and sends them a Pre-Designated Email. For example, if you offer a product that enables people to market via Email, you would offer Email Marketing Tips. People who are interested in this would find your website, blog, or receive an Email with this promise. Then they would sign up and automatically receive an Email you have written and stored with your Email Marketing Service.

By Opting-In, your prospects agree to be sent an Email and, because they have Opted-In to an Email Marketing List, you can feel comfortable sending them Sales Emails. If you have other products and services, you might send them a Sales Introduction Piece about them to gage their interest. About three or four times a year, you would send these people an Email Newsletter about your company and its people. The interesting thing is that you can write and update this Email Newsletter and program it to go out in a set number of days after a person initially signs up on your Email List.

It’s like having a robotic secretary that collects Email Addresses, files them and sends correspondence at set intervals. You do a little bit of work in the beginning and some occasional maintenance and that’s it. The robot does the rest. The best news is that the robot doesn’t cost you anything and you don’t have to store it. But it’s still cool to own a robot. I mean, we’ve been promised them in Science books and journals for about 50 years.

Summary
• You can create an Add Box to allow people to Opt-In to your Email Lists
• They are already interested in what you have or they wouldn’t have signed up
• You can program Auto Responders to send them Emails after they Opt-In
• Robots are fun to own if you don’t have to pay upkeep or storage


Fulfilling the Promises Made by Your Email Marketing Efforts
In order to succeed with Email Marketing, you need a few important things.

A computer with Internet Access is vital. Your Email Marketing Program is Internet Based, meaning the software is created, stored and updated On Line. This gives you one less thing to worry about (purchasing software and continuing to purchase upgrades). Saving money is almost as good as having your own robot.

Another vital piece of equipment is a Website. Your webpage can be simple or complex depending on how much time and money you want to expend on it. The website should tell customers and prospects about your company, products and services; where and how to purchase them; the benefits of having purchased them; and a little bit about the people who make them. There should be high-quality, low-resolution photos, videos too, and lots of copy designed to nudge the reader to purchase. Remember that if you use a web designer, he or she might promise you the world and it might take just as long to create.

E-Commerce is also good. You can use several Internet-Based programs and services designed to take payment form clients and reimburse you after a certain percentage is retained for the service. The most popular is Pay Pal but several others exist. Look for links at the bottom of this document, go to their websites and see how they handle Email Marketing E-Commerce and Shopping Carts.

You also need a delivery system for your products. Many Fulfillment Companies take your products, ship them to your clients and bill you for the service. You can do it yourself but you should have some protocols in place – especially if your Email Marketing efforts are successful. Remember to have enough product or time to serve as you have potential customers. You can Email tens and even hundreds of thousands of potential customers inexpensively and might get high returns.

An Email Marketing Firm can help you develop Emails that sell well. They can even manage your Email Lists, through a program like Jugglemail for you. A full service firm will create ads, Email them and make sure you have the proper follow-up protocols in place – or create them for you.

Landing Pages are important. Once you send an Email, you want people to go to a place that is similar in design and feel. A landing page is a way-station between your Email Marketing Piece and your Website, E-Commerce site or any place else you want people to go. You can design your Email Marketing Piece to drive your customers to your own site, a Landing Page created just for them and/or right to your catalog.

Summary
• People need a place to go from your Email
• Emailed clients need to end up at Website or a Landing Page
• E-Commerce and Fulfillment Companies can help
• So can a Full Service Email Marketing Firm

Next Steps
What to do next? First, take stock. Ask yourself important questions designed to see if you can be successful at Email Marketing. Here are a few starters:
1. Is my Webpage designed for sales?
2. Am in involved in E-Commerce or can I get there quickly?
3. Do I enjoy communicating via Email?
4. Am I doing less effective, more expensive forms of Marketing?
5. Can I do away with those expenses and invest them in an Email Campaign?
6. Do I have the time to dedicate to Email Marketing?
7. If I don’t have the time, do I have the resources to hire someone to do it for me?

The answer to any question about the viability of Email Marketing is: “I can’t afford not to.” Your competitors are already doing it. You have been the recipient of it. The Internet and E-Commerce are here to stay and it’s time you started benefiting from them.

Second, become aware.
1. See if you notice how many times you are targeted by Email Marketing
2. Get yourself on a few lists, Opt-In and see what each company does. You can always Opt-Out later
3. Speak to your business associates, friends and especially younger people.
4. Take a class, seminar or a free Online Tutorial for a product you’re interested in.
5. Have fun.

Third, get in and do it. Many Email Marketing Companies have free trials. Jugglemail is one such company. And now for the wind up and the Sales Pitch: If you log into www.Jugglemail.com and go to the Landing Page we’ve designed for you (see the link that says Free Trial), you will be given 100 free Emails to send. If you have an Email database you can Email a random selection of your clients and see how they respond. We strongly advise you to take this offer AFTER taking the Online Tutorial. It may seem strange to you at first but remember, it’s just another way to do what you already do: communicate with your customer list, grow it and market to it.

Chapter 3. Before Dinner

Letty and her mother busied themselves readying for dinner. This meant managing a houseful of servants. Waterwood housed the immediate A. Reed family, Uncle James and his invalid wife – who took all her meals in her room – and 12 servants. Uncle James occupied third floor, Isabelle and Adolphus the second and Letty and her brother lived on the second floor, which was also the nerve center for the many family businesses. The house could house an additional 25 guests easily and could entertain over 200. It sat on 10 acres and was surrounded by Old Man Walker’s Orchards to the East and the senior Reed’s Cattle ranch to the South. The north was a working farm with chickens, cattle, dairy and an assortment of grains and vegetables.

Adolphus and James Reed did a lot of talking on their rides. Always had done. There was something about a long, dusty ride on horseback that lubricated the mind and loosened the lips. The entire Reed Central California Trust was hatched on one of their last trips back from the shining city of San Francisco to the small town they loved. It was not uncommon for the family to hear the details of an incredible venture after the men returned from a long horse ride. More and more those ideas were influenced by the Reed women who always saved their best business ideas for just before the Reed brothers saddled up. On their last trip to the big city, after three hours in the saddle, Adolphus and James Reed had made a number of decisions. A visit to the lawyers was in order.

The Walker and Reed Trusts had bet 67 per cent of its total assets, no small amount, on a gamble that people in California would never know about. They purchased all of the banking assets of both banks and affiliated branches throughout California. They did not take ownership of Wells Fargo freight, stage line or security concerns. The family had always preferred Pinkerton Security to Wells never leaked business information to the press.

The business plan was essentially Letty’s. She was convinced that most banks in the United States were over extended – and especially in California. All that “mining money” as Uncle James called it was tied up in a lot of shaky investments – much of it in the New York Stock Exchange. A minor run on California banks would topple all but those with the cash on hand to ride out an economic crisis. Letty knew banks with too few liquid assets would fail in the next three years and that they could be purchased for pennies on the dollar by a bank rich in cash and gold.

The good news, Letty lectured Uncle James, was that a bad economy was compelling enough reason for America to become involved in the war in Europe. Once that was done, she reasoned, money would start to flow into and out the surviving banks as the best bank customer in the world – our Uncle Sam – needed cash to fund a war. And most of what the US would purchase was raw material and foodstuffs. And that was just exactly what the Reed brothers invested the remainder of their holdings on. They were either going to be richer or fantastically richer in a matter of years..

She was right of course. But, of course, she would not live to see her fantastic successes and the growing fortunes of her family.

Isabella had managed to keep the book out of her hands before dinner but Letty was able to get a glimpse of a few well-rendered words in a strong, intelligent and – she could only hear the word dangerous – hand. The words, some Latin-based language, were fantastical. Bloody and violent on the only page she saw while walking to the stables with her father and uncle.

Then, intercepted by her mother before she could ask one of the thousands of questions about Wells, Fargo, Pinkerton and the book, she was off to arrange the details of the meal with the staff. The men shared a meaningful glance.

“Do you think we did the right thing, Jimmy?”

“We’ve been lucky, Dolfus.”

“Luck ain’t got nothin’ to do with it! We gambled millions on this.”

“The legal boys liked it, Dolphus.”

“Yep.”

“She’s smart.”

“Yep.”

“She just has a talent for reading all those articles and reports and books and coming up with a simple plan.”

“So simple! That’s why I don’t know if – ”

“Dolphus. It’s always been simple. Working with Papa. We pulled metal out of the ground and the men in San Fran gave us money for it.”

“Yep. Hard currency, though, Jimmy. Land, we can see. Horses we can touch. We gave hard money for hard things. This is just all just so much paper…”

“I know your guts as well as I know my own and we’re going to do well. ‘Sides, we didn’t bet it all on the banks. We saved some for commodities and such.”

“She thought of that too. She didn’t even care one way or the other. It was just like – what does she call it? A theoretical exercise? What the hell does that mean, James?”

“It means you got horse sense and your wife’s got book sense, Adolphus. And that beautiful, crazy daughter of yours has both in spades.”

“Yep.”

Chapter 2. The Walker and Reed Trusts

The Reed Central California Trust was a newly minted mining company when Ulysses Walker proposed a marriage between Reed’s son and heir Adolphus and his daughter Isabella, long the secret to the success of the Ulysses Walker Trust. The RCC and UW Trusts combined to become as formidable a company were the two great families. Isabella kept her maiden name as a reminder that hers was an older and more valuable brand. The Walker Reeds had two children in quick succession: James named for his bachelor uncle and Leticia named after her Great Grandmother, wife of a Grandee of Spain. But business was what the Walker Reeds grew. Spawning dozens of smaller companies, the combined trusts took to buying up everything that California had for sale. Land, of course, and natural resources and, finally, the very foundation of all business: banks.

“Father!” shouted Leticia Walker Reed throwing her arms around her father. Because he was still astride his horse, Letty jumped into the saddle by placing her right foot atop her father’s in the stirrup and swing herself up onto his lap.

“Letty!” said her uncle James, is that the only way to get you to ride side saddle?”

“Uncle James, Father promised he’d return in a week and that was two weeks ago! And he promised to bring me all the new books from San Francisco.”

“They’re on the way from town now, darling,” said Adolphus Reed. “You know we’d never be able to carry all of them on horseback.”

“You want to kill old Charger?” teased Uncle James.

“I thought you carried gold and silver both on the sires of these very horses in ’49 and ’50!” she replied.

“Grand or Great Grand Sires by now. Great genes, all of ‘em. Could go straight over the mountain, too!” Uncle James was nostalgic for the old days. He and his big brother were born in a mining camp and had indeed carried millions of dollars worth of precious metals over the mountains on many storied trips across the high San Clemente range. “No these horses are gentrified now. Have to keep ‘em in a stable while we take a train.”

“You enjoyed the dining car and the bar car well enough, Jimmy,” said Letty’s father as he lowered her from the horse. She had manage to pick his pocket.

“You more’n me, Dolfus! I fear our old horses wouldn’t recognize us.”

“Oh Daddy! For me?” Though she was 23 years old and the owner of two degrees from the University of California, Letty Walker Reed could still sound like a miner’s little girl. This even though she’d only heard stories about the trails and camps from her father and uncle, Letty insisted upon being called Clementine until she was twelve.

“A book for you and a bank for your mother.”

“James!” Adolphus Reed was not an educated man but he was smart and the smart money didn’t believe women had any sense when it came to business. Mr. Red didn’t like discussing business in the open air, in the parlor or in front of the women – especially when other men were around. The Walker Reed women had been advising for years but mainly at the dinner table or, in the case of Isabella Walker Reed, the bedroom.

“Don’t worry, Dolfus. You’re secret is safe with me. You and your wife have made me a rich man indeed. I’ll never let on that she’s smarter’n both of us.”

“Not a tough task, Jimmy!” The men dismounted and walked their horses to the creek that ran from Waterwood to the mill in town. On the two-hour, ten-mile ride, the brothers traversed nothing but land they owned. The mill, Walker’s Mill, had long since evolved into the railroad and telegraph station and the Walker Reeds owned that too.

“A bank?” Letty was distraught. She followed the men and horses to the water’s edge. “I told the both of you that financial equity is a risky investment in the best of circumstances and a zero sum game in the tough times ahead. That damned dust bowl is still swirling towards us and what it means for the economy is largely unknown.”

Dolfus Reed didn’t like being lectured by his daughter and his face showed it. The fact that Leticia Walker Reed had spent twelve more years in school than her father was beside the point. “Letty, darling. You leave the business to the men –”

“Father! I’ll have you know that I will vote in the next election or at least the one after that—”

“Letty!” It was her mother. “Let the men water those horses. You’ll ruin that dress.”

“And don’t give advice unless you’re asked!” teased Uncle James. Before the trip to San Francisco, James Reed had spent two hours listening to his niece’s advice. What she said made sense to him. Good horse sense! They spent much of the ride into town three weeks ago discussing much of it. James Reed left Walker’s Mill comfortable about the purchase they were contemplating though Letty didn’t know the details. He was also determined to ask the advisors in San Francisco about something called soy futures.

‘We’re going to have a lot of hungry people in this state. We should invest in nonperishable foods, and farm land before—”

“Now Leticia,” said her mother, “run along and read you book if that is what that horrible thing you’re holding is.” Then to her husband: “I can only imagine what witchcraft she’ll learn next. These books and the ideas in them.”

“What’s in it Father?”

“That’s just it, Letty. No one can read the damned thing—“

“Adolphus! Language.”

“Unclaimed bank assets,” said Uncle James.

“Banks! There is only one solvent bank in this country, Daddy.”

“Don’t you want to know what bank you’ll end up owning after we kick the bucket?”

“James!” it was Isabella.

“Jimmy gets it all anyway,” said Letty.

“If he lives that long,” said Abolphus of his son. James Walker Reed had a taste for a life much sweeter than the uncle for whom he was named. He was currently traveling in Europe with a ne’er-do-well friend from school.

“Adolphus!”

“Besides, your ideas have been sound,” added Uncle James. “You already own thirty per cent of the bank. Don’t you want to know what it’s called?”

“James! What are you men talking about?” Isabelle was nearly beside herself. Talking business in the open was one thing but talking about business with women – out of doors – and including women in the asset distribution... It was nearly too much.

“Unless that name is Wells or Fargo,” interjected Leticia.

“How about both?” said James Reed.

The Walker Reed women could just stare, gate-mouthed. The Reed men smiled sweetly back. They had purchased both of what many of the brighter minds in finance believed the only two banks that would come out of the current financial crisis in tact.

No more was discussed out in the open. But there would be a nice long talk during dinner.

New story. I put the Cop Comedy on hold because Darling Emily took over.

Darling Emily is about a woman who adores Emily Dickinson, writes poetry and is convinced that she will be totally destroyed by a handsome stranger. She is right. Lemme know what you think of the first chapter...

1. Leticia and Emily

Leticia Walker Reed was considerably more attractive than she thought she was. She had trouble making friends, getting along in society, with self-esteem and, in a later age, would probably be diagnosed with some ailment on the higher functioning end of the autism spectrum. In short Leticia Walker Reed was odd. Always had been. Intelligent, in fact smarter than most of her tutors, teachers and headmasters. It was odd enough that she had been invited to the University of California and offer still that she was given a full scholarship: her family was one of the richest in eleven western states.

Her oddness was a good thing. Good for her that she was left alone to study. Good that she would find many like-minded individuals at University and good for her that she was a citizen of an entirely different America. The bad part was that women in the early part of the 20th century were rarely allowed to share their intelligence with the world. College was just a four year respite from family matters and a way to meet the well-bred sons of California industrialists. But the fact that she got a first-class education and graduated with distinction was a good secret.

Leticia Walker Reed, Letty to her few friends, kept many secrets. She was well-behaved and knew her place, she kept her council among the people she was smarter than and kept her secrets in a diary that was itself a secret. Letty was an intense correspondent with the poet Emily Dickinson. This was a one-way correspondence as Leticia Walker Rees only recently discovered Dickinson and, as the rest of the world did, only after her death.

As a woman of her time, Letty knew only too well that a woman’s career path could only be as a wife or a teacher. But she wanted intrigue. She loved eavesdropping on her father’s meetings with representatives from Pinkerton’s Detective Agency and longed to become involved in crime, either side of which offered more excitement than Walker’s Mill, California.

Even Darling Emily Dickinson had found intrigue. The toast of the literary world – a published and respected poetess! Even if it was nearly two decades after her death, at least Miss Dickinson’s case was published. Letty had nearly as many poems in her own diary but, after reading Dickinson, had grown in her knowledge of poetry to know that she simply didn’t measure up. Lately the audience to whom she wrote in her diary became the friend she never knew but with whom she had so much in common.

Letty shared many problems with her dear friend Miss Emily Dickinson of Amhurst. She was more intelligent than anyone in her immediate family; no one understood her poetry; she excelled at and enjoyed domestic pursuits like baking, sewing and gardening even though she wanted more out of life; and she believed she was destined to be swept up in an intriguing, devastating relationship with a handsome and dangerous stranger. Of all these fantasies, sadly, only two would come true for Letty. The first and the last.

Leticia’s diary read like a series of open letters, each of which began: ‘My Dear, Dear Emily,’ or sometimes: ‘Darling Emily,’ and, when something particularly vexed the diarist, simply, ‘Emily’. The diary, excruciatingly neat in presentation and correct in grammar, punctuation and spelling, was only exciting when it left the mundane world of Walker’s Mill, California and entered the illusory realm of the thoughts, dreams and, fantasies of the diary’s owner. Modern psychologists, if ever given the chance to read the diary of Leticia Walker Reed, would conclude that she was intensely intelligent, a rigorous grammarian, possessor of an immense vocabulary but sadly, totally and completely delusional bordering on psychotic.

Of course, the twin facts that a): every neatly-written, well-reasoned word was true and b): the diary had been purloined by handsome and dangerous stranger with whom she’d had a brief, intriguing and thoroughly devastating relationship, made Leticia Walker Reed’s disappearance a perfect crime. Perfect in that the handsome stranger, Leticia and her diary were never heard from again. In fact no one even presumed that that the unfortunate circumstance was anything but a disappearance. Poor little rich girl gives it all up for handsome stranger, one that no one ever saw.

Had the Placer County Sheriff been able to investigate, he would have uncovered the most sensational case in the County’s then brief history. The nearly limitless Walker and Reed fortunes made sure that those venerable names were kept out of the newspapers. The family’s more professional and infinitely better funded investigations shed no more light on the case than did the Sheriff’s.

Leticia sat on her bed in the mansion she called Shambala but that the family called Waterwood. She rote in her diary while waiting, impatiently, for her father to return, He was now three weeks late.

My Dear, Darling Emily,
Thank you, thank you, darling for your intense verse! I was kept awake late into the night by the thumping, no, the pounding of your magical, motoric, meter. It was as if the rhythm your verse took over my heart, mind and body and that your poetry commandeered my very soul and imprisoned my soul. It was a forced march through your visions, your words and your invention. I was a most willing captive. Thank you, darling Emily!

Thanks also for hiding your work until it could be appreciated! How dare that charlatan tell you you couldn’t write! How dare that man, impotent, crass and barbaric, destroy your creation – one that he was too simple to understand. Or could he? Was he, dear Emily, simply incapable of expressing his awe, as I have in these very pages, because of his stupid, inane and infinitely worthless masculinity?

How desperately I dare to dream that I can sequester myself, heart, soul, body and mind, from the machinations of men as you have! But I fear, dear Emily, that I mayn’t be as strong as you. Did you love (the guy who told Dickinson she couldn’t write)? Did he destroy you as totally as I fear I will one day be destroyed? I look forward to parts of it with a morbid fascination but mostly with trepidation as, Dear Emily, my cannon is nowhere near complete.

I would innumerate on my shortcomings at length but it seems that Father and Uncle James have arrived from San Francisco and are desirous of engaging me in a job for the trust. Imagine! Two months divorced from University and degree, and already earning my keep. More soon!

The household was in a flutter in anticipation of the arrival of James and Adolphus Reed. The dispatch from the telegraph office in Walker’s Mill had informed Mrs. Reed of her husband’s impending return. Isabella Walker Reed was a formidable woman. For years it was rumored that her father owned one half of California and her husband and his brother owned the other. It was a match made in the real estate office. There was love of a kind but mostly respect between these two California pioneers. Respect for each other, for decorum and, above all, for business.

Complex: Chapter One (some bad words)

Chapter 1.  North Inland

In which we meet a Detective and a Captain, each with an unfortunate name

It was a normal day at the San Diego Police Department’s North Inland station.  Everyone called it North Inland.  No one ever called it The Station like they do on TV.  Not the overweight assholes shuffling paper angrily because they were no longer wanted/needed on the streets.  Not the sworn officers and civilian staff alike who were just wishing/hoping for cause to grab a weapon and just shoot some asshole; just shoot and shoot.  Nope.  Normal.

Normal cigarette smoke filtering in from the patio.  A normal phone, not connected to voicemail, ringing and ringing.  Normal acrid, smoky coffee smell mingling with the smoke and the shouts.  And through this miasma of anger, failure depression and anxiety, and vocal calisthenics, sat Detective Dickstein trying to fade into the wallpaper.  A difficult exercise for, as anyone who’d ever worked or been brought in there knew, the walls were painted an institutional lime/puke green.  The term ‘into the wallpaper’ was just a taking of artistic license – one of many thefts to come.

Dicketein wasn’t his real name but a lot of civilians called him this – a rotten joke played on him by his associates at North Inland.  Detective Richard Steen was often introduced as Detective Dick Steen, with as little pause as possible between names, by his associates.  If he applied himself, Dicketein, as he was called, was twice the cop everyone at North Inland was.  So those associates, mindful to keep him down and from making them look bad by comparison, called him Dick to his face and Dick Steen in front of civilians.

He knew they kept him from applying himself but he quit mentioning it to the Police Psychiatrist in his mandatory sessions because she thought it was just paranoia.  Keeping quiet, Steen knew, was the best strategy.  Not that he could get a word in edgewise, Captain Cunt was a yeller.  But keeping quiet, fading into the background, was always Dickstein’s way of dealing with his Captain, Cunt, who had been yelling for nigh on about ten minutes.  This would be a long one, as most who knew Captain Cunt knew: this was just his warm-up.  There were three types of Captain Cunt dressing downs: Short and Horrible, Long and Really Fucking Horrible, and Oh God You Really Fucked Up This Time Horrible.

Steen, hands-down the winner of the most Oh God You Really Fucked Up This Time dressings down, was concentrating on quiet.  His quiet center, something he told no one about; the thing that was the source of his incredible power of recall.  He accesses his quiet center not so he could take in the content of the Oh God You Really Fucked Up This Time dressing down.  Not so he could hear something in the Oh God You Really Fucked Up This Time dressing down that would make him a better cop.  No, Detective Steen was quiet so he could tune out the Captain and concentrate on the grievance he would file with the union the very second he returned to his desk.

Steen tried to memorize everything Captain Cunt was saying (besides “Oh God You Really Fucked Up This Time,” the saying three times of which indicated the nature of the dressing down).  He tried to memorize the words so he could put as many of them as he could fit into the 50-words-or-less space reserved for this on the union’s automated grievance form on their website.

Captain Cunt wasn’t the Captain’s real name, obviously, and 50 words were never enough to describe an Oh God You Really Fucked Up This Time.  Cunt was just how everyone in North Inland referred to the Captain.  Not out loud.  Never out loud.  What are you an idiot or something?  Jesus!  No.  No one ever said it out loud but every time the Captain introduced himself, he said, “Hi I’m Captain Bolunt,” and everyone within earshot said, silently, “rhymes with Cunt.”

North Inland covered the crimes of a strange pancreas-shaped area of San Diego city that managed not to include all the cool spots for crime to happen.  Not the beach, not the mountains, not the valley or the waterfront.  Just the places where people seemed to be pissed off at their neighbors or doing really stupid things for really stupid reasons.  North Inland covered several middle class neighborhoods, like Manila Mesa, Linda Viet Nam, Old Geezer Town, The Dump.  All of those names were North Inland euphemisms except The Dump.  The Dump is just what everyone called the dump.

The cool places to investigate, but not solve, crime were in North Coastal (where the Cougars live), North (where all the rich people live even though the North Coastal assholes thought they were as rich as those in North), and Central (where all the good shit happened).

Not solving crime, in spite of what every cop show in the Universe would have you believe, is the rule rather than the exception.  No one ever solved a crime like they did, or in as little time as they did it, on TV.  And no one in law enforcement was that pretty.  Not even close.  The successes were counted in percentages and those were rarely double digit percentages of cases. North Inland was second best at not solving crimes.  North Inland was second only to South and South was near the border.  Even South East (where the formerly segregated neighborhoods and most of the gangs were) had more crimes solved than North Inland.  And this is why Captain Cunt yelled.

But the yelling would have to be put on hold as Radar entered with bad or worse news.  No one in his or her right mind would interrupt a dressing down for fear of having it turned on him.  There were only three events that would allow Radar to interrupt dressings down: a) a visit by a civilian (bad news); b) a murder (worse); or 3) a visit by brass (worst of all).  Everyone called Sergeant Raymer Radar not because he could read minds like the guy in the TV show M*A*S*H* but because he was the Captain’s lackey like the guy on M*A*S*H*and his name was Raymer so, close enough.  Radar did a knock-and-enter just as Cunt was saying, for the third time, “Oh God You Really Fucked—what is it Radar?”

This was enough to pull Dickstein out of his grievance-composing funk.  “Some President at a complex in Nam has a suspicious death,” said Radar.

“Murder?” said Cunt.

“Probably.”

“Well, fuck!  It has to be better than probably,” yelled Cunt, “or it won’t justify you’re coming in here!”

“Said someone’s floating in the pool and looks like there’s no skin.”

“That works.”

Radar left.

“I’ll just be going, then, Cap—”

“No, Dicketein.  This looks like much more fun than that Little League investigation you’ve been fucking up all to God Damned Hell.”

“But—”

“No buts, Detective Steen!  I need you to get over there and assess the situation.  You need to direct the Investigators, make initial inquiries and draft an IFR.

The use of his real last name by the Captain, not to mention the Initial Finding’s Report, was all Richard Steen needed.  Using his real name and all that FMJ (Force Mumbo Jumbo) meant that Captain Bolunt was already typing Dickstein’s Note-To-File in his head.  Anytime Cunt used real or official words, somebody was about to get rat-fucked.