Ojai Quarterly - Winter 2023-24

$6.95

Ojai’s Designing Women FROM OPPENHEIMER TO OJAI NEW PERSPECTIVES ON PSYCHEDELICS ‘MORNING’ COMES TO OJAI NATURE WAITS TO BE SEEN

There's no place like home. Let me find yours.

EAST END MAGIC $5,200,000 FOR SALE

Built in 1922, this iconic Spanish home is part of the original Whale Rock Ranch famous for its giant outcropping of whaleshaped rock, considered to be the largest Chumash carving in the west. Nestled in the prestigious East End of Ojai up a meandering road, this compound of three separate structures is situated perfectly on a two-acre private park-like setting inhabited by majestic oak trees, exotic cactus gardens, hand-crafted stone walls and views. The two story main house is a 3 bedroom, 2 bath with Italian single stone carved marble sinks, AGA appliances, and loads of natural light. Vaulted beamed ceilings and massive rock fireplace complement the great room, a perfect mix of elegance and simplicity that creates a calming environment. A main house, pool house and a studio with bathroom and gas fireplace ready to become whatever you dream it to be.

PROPERTY DETAIL

3 BEDROOMS

POOL HOUSE

2 BATHROOMS

OUTDOOR DINING

& ARTIST STUDIO

www. donnas allen.c om

donna4remax@aol.com

DONNA SALLEN

THE OJAI LIFESTYLE

805.798.0516

$2,195,000 FOR SALE

Welcome to your dream Ojai home!

This downtown gem boasts 5 beds, 4 baths, and a perfect blend of indoor-outdoor living. Revel in vaulted ceilings, a fireplace, and a stunning kitchen with a six-burner Wolf stove and glass-front Subzero refrigerator.

The primary bedroom, drenched in light, opens to a private deck, while the spa-like bathroom beckons relaxation. With majestic Redwoods, fruit trees, and meandering pathways, the backyard is your private oasis.

Marvel at mountain views and revel in the seclusion. Your dream home awaits — seize the opportunity now!

Visit and make this slice of paradise yours today.

PROPERTY DETAIL

5 BEDROOMS

4 BATHROOMS

MOUNTAIN

ARTIST STUDIO

VIEWS

w w w.donnasallen.c om

donna4remax@aol.com

OJAI NATIVE Let me help guide you to your Ojai hideaway.

SOLD FOR $2,400,000

SOLD FOR $2,025,000

11400 Topa Vista Road, Santa Paula, California

4356 Grand Avenue, Ojai, California

Represented Buyer

Represented Buyer

CLINTON HAUGAN Realtor® | Cal DRE 02019604 805.760.2092 clinton.haugan@sothebysrealty.com

© 2023 LIV Sotheby’s International Realty. All rights reserved. All data, including all measurements and calculations are obtained from various sources and has not and will not be verified by Broker. All information shall be independently reviewed and verified for accuracy. LIV Sotheby’s International Realty is independently owned and operated and supports the principles of the Fair Housing Act.

Unique opportunity!

GABRIELA CESEÑA Realtor | Luxury Specialist GABRIELA CESEÑA GABRIELA CESEÑA 805.236.3814 Realtor | Luxury Specialist Realtor | Luxury Specialist GABRIELA CESEÑA 805.236.3814 805.236.3814 Realtor | Luxury Specialist Featured Property: 879 S. La Luna | $1,450,000 CAL DRE# 01983530 BHHS DRE# 01317331 805.236.3814 Featured Property: Luna | $1,450,000 216 E. Matilija879 StS.|La2,500,000

CAL DRE# 01983530 Featured Property: 879 S. La Luna | $1,450,000 CAL DRE# 01983530 BHHS DRE# 01317331 live in bliss BHHS DRE# 01317331 Featured Property: 879 S. La Luna | $1,450,000 CAL DRE# 01983530 BHHS DRE# 01317331

Mid-Century-Modern Mixed-Use Masterpiece in Ojai’s heart. Live and work in style with 750 sqft commercial space, 1,205 sqft private living quarters, chic design, and stunning mountain views. Seize it now!

eralta

Real Estate Team

THE TRUSTED NAME IN REAL ESTATE FOR OVER 20 YEARS

Savor the peace and solitude of casual yet refined ranch living ~ $5.65M

Find your escape with this unique Ojai opportunity ~ $2.4M

A beautifully remodeled home in a highly sought-after location! ~ $2.795M

ILiveInOjai.com |

@PeraltaTeamOjai | DRE#01862743

Best described as refined, yet casual with a myriad of possibilities in East End Ojai ~ $2.895M

Experience the epitome of Ojai upscale living ~ $1.895M

♦ 4th generation Ojai resident, voted Best Realtor in the Ojai Valley for 10 years ♦ Over a decade of Real Estate Appraisal experience ♦ Harvard trained negotiator ♦ Our team is recognized as America’s Best - Top 1.49% of Realtors worldwide (RealTrends) ♦ We’ve earned Top Listing Team, Top Listing Agent and #1 Team (Keller Williams Realty)

Tonya Peralta | Tonya@peraltateam.com | 805.794.7458

We tailor our services to fit your needs.

We can transform your property to be SALE OR RENT ready with local artisans and contractors.

Sales, rentals and management

Before

Ojaipropertygroup@gmail.com Ojaipropertygroup.com 805-202-4149

After

The Ivy rst opened its doors on Ventura Blvd in Studio City in 1993 and closed in 2011 as so many corporate stores were opening, and it didn't feel right for The Ivy a nymore. But now we discovered the magical town of Ojai and thought that this would be the perfect place for The Ivy to re-open. Our wide range of items includes antiques, ne estate jewelry, sterling silver, European porcelains and pottery, linens, and exceptional antique furniture from around the world. As always at The Ivy, tabletop a ccessories abound in ne dishware, crystal, and silver to nish off your table in style. Come see our newly expanded showroom featuring exclusive, very modern, and unusual furniture, art, rugs, and accessories. If you need to nd the elusive "perfect" gift, The Ivy in Ojai is the one-stop-shop for all your needs.

Come join us, after all: 'Everyone shops at The Ivy.'

theivyinc.com 805.272.8912

Art. Design. Furniture. Window Coverings

Down Home Furnishings downhomefurnishings.com 250 E Ojai Ave Ojai Ca 93023 805.640.7225

1221 FOOTHILL Unparalleled Luxury

OFFERED AT $10,525,000 Exquisitely landscaped for privacy and entertaining / Fully renovated, 5,200 combined sq ft./ 3 Bedroom Main Res / New 2 + 2.5 ADU / 1 Bedroom Cottage, Separate Gym / Writers Studio / Pool / Spa / Bocce Court

535 DEL ORO (CALL FOR PRICE) Single Level / 4 bedroom ranch style / 3 car garage / Detached workshop / Oak studded Acre / Popular neighborhood.

312 E MATILIJA ST $1,600,000 Rare Work/Live opportunity / 2 offices / 2 car garage / upstairs 3 bed 2 bath / Prime downtown property with Mixed Use zoning.

97 TAORMINA $1,175,000 Fresh and Upgraded Taormina Cottage. Remodeled Kitchen / New Windows, 2 Bedrooms / Bonus Room / Mountain Views, Enchanting Rear Yard w/ Rock Walls & Fruit Trees.

410 CHURCH #25 $739,950 Freshly Painted Interior / Cathedral ceilings and Fireplace / Two Patios / Two Bedrooms / Two Baths / Close to Shopping / Nature Trails / Hospital.

311 W SUMMER ST. #C $1,150,000 New Flooring / Fresh Paint / Newer Windows / Downstairs Primary Suite / Close to Town / End Unit with large yard.

MFWrealestate.com | mfwrealtors@gmail.com | 805 669 9933 DRE 00878649 | DRE 01708004 | DRE 01414001

OJAI VALLEY

12101 MacDonald Drive This classic sqftsquare home isfoot on 2.99 acres This classic4,397 4,397 home is on surrounded by stunningby oakstunning trees in the 2.99 acres surrounded oakgated trees in the gated community ofMatilija.

Rancho The Matilija.

The list of community of Rancho list of ameamenities is endless: an amazing 1,600 sq ft. nities is endless; an amazing 1,600 sqft garage garage (that has an RV bay), stunning pool (thatspa, has an RV bay), spa,guest and large one stunning bedroom pool andand office large one-bedroom and office guest house, three house, three fireplaces, vaulted ceilings, all bedrooms ensuites, bedroom is on fireplaces, have vaulted ceilings, main all bedrooms have the ground floor, a great home to ensuites, main bedroom is on the ground floor, a entertain in and the privacy and beautiful great home to entertain enjoy thecomplete privacy surroundings of thein and property and beautiful Fantastic location, the picture!surroundings!

Fantastic location, close to town, Ventura and Santa Barbara. close to town, Ventura and Santa Barbara.

Price Upon Request © 2023 LIV Sotheby’s International Realty. All rights reserved. All data, including all measurements and calculations are obtained from various sources and has not and will not be verified by Broker. All information shall be independently reviewed and verified for accuracy. LIV Sotheby’s International Realty is independently owned and operated and supports the principles of the Fair Housing Act.

Anne Williamson Realtor®, DRE 01448441 805.320.3314

Cassandra VanKeulen Realtor®, DRE 01929366 805.798.1272

W VOJ A I .C O M LIV Sotheby’s International Realty 727 West Ojai Avenue, Ojai CA 93023 805.646.7288

OJAI QUARTERLY p.23 Editor’s Note

p.24 Contributors

p.25 Ojai Podcasts & 2 Degrees

p.49 p.36

Art & Artists Section

‘MORNING’ COMES TO OJAI “Morning Show” Creator, Producer on Ojai’s Role in Hit Show Story by Bret Bradigan

p.53 Food & Drink Section

p.79 Yesterday & Today Section

p.95 Healers of Ojai

COVER Designing Women

p.109 Calendar of Events

Photo by Ojai’s Designing Women FROM OPPENHEIMER TO OJAI NEW PERSPECTIVES ON PSYCHEDELICS ‘MORNING’ COMES TO OJAI NATURE WAITS TO BE SEEN

p.80

p.56

ACROSS THE UNIVERSE

MARTHA & ME

David Bohm, Krishnamurti And

Holiday Entertaining

Their Famous Ojai Conversations

Lessons from the Best Story By Ilona Saari

Story By Mark Lewis

16

Brandi Crockett

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

FEATURES & departments

98 PASADENA, NOT JUST FOR OLD LADIES Th e Capital of Southern California Culture

By Jerry Dunn

p.96

p.86

OJAI RISING

HIDDEN FLORENCE

The Consciousness Revolution

“La Bella” By the Byways

Comes to Town

Story by Robin Gerber

Story by Jerry Dunn

p.110

p.102

SNOW PLAIN Carrizo’s Wilderness,

as a Rarely Seen Winter Wonderland

COMPLAINT DEPARTMENT IN HEAVEN The Ojai Vibe Creeps Into The Most Unlikely Place

Story by Chuck Graham

Story by Sami Zahringer

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

17

Steeped in a rich foundation of over 45 years-experience, Kerry Mormann & Associates is the Gold Standard for Ranch and Lifestyle properties along the Central Coast of California. Our team encompasses decades of experience in not only real estate, but the highest level of hospitality, community relations, and environmental conservation.

WASIOJA ROAD

POE RANCH

NEW CUYAMA 205± AC | $590,000

SIMI VALLEY 3,100± AC | $12,000,000

205 acres of rolling hills and dramatic viewpoints of both the Sierra Madre Ridge and The Caliente Mountain Range.

There are two parcels w/their own APN#s.

Over 3,000 acres of gorgeous, wild, wide-open land within the Marr Ranch Parkland surrounded by preserved open space with pristine grasslands.

FOOTHILL & ALISO CANYON

RANCHO MONTE ALEGRE

NEW CUYAMA 400± AC | $1,150,000

CARPINTERIA 2,862± AC | $29,000,000

400 acre private ranch property with a 360 degree panoramic views of Sierra Madre Ridge and Caliente Mountain Range. Ideal horse property w/ith abundant wildlife.

8 buildable lots ranging from 40-160 acres. Miles of hiking and horseback riding trails. Ag & Building envelopes in place. Panoramic ocean, island, and mountain views.

KERRY MORMANN & ASSOCIATES (805) 682-3242 | info@coastalranch.com DRE #00598625

coastalranch.com © 2023 Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties (BHHSCP) is a member of the franchise system of BHH Affiliates LLC. BHHS and the BHHS symbol are registered service marks of Columbia Insurance Company, a Berkshire Hathaway affiliate. BHH Affiliates LLC and BHHSCP do not guarantee accuracy of all data including measurements, conditions, and features of property. Information is obtained from various sources and will not be verified by broker or MLS. Buyer is advised to independently verify the accuracy of that information. If your home is currently listed, this is not a solicitation for your listing.

265 E. VILLANOVA ROAD OJAI, CA 93023 3 BED | 2.5 BATH | OFFERED AT $3,299,000 Introducing an exceptional property in the heart of Villanova!

This 2022-built modern ranch-style estate, nestled on 1.43 acres of pristine land, redefines luxury living with off-grid features and natural beauty. This esteemed property features a 2,408 sq ft main house with solar and a shared water well, a charming 552 sq ft guest house, with a renovated Spartan trailer and 120 sq ft utility structure. Surrounded by 24+ fruit trees and native flora, it seamlessly blends modern comfort with nature's splendor.

STEVEN SHARP BROKER ASSOCIATE

805.223.5315 StevenSharp@bhhscal.com SharpOjaiAgent.com DRE# 02139049

© 2023 Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties (BHHSCP) is a member of the franchise system of BHH Affiliates LLC. BHHS and the BHHS symbol are registered service marks of Columbia Insurance Company, a Berkshire Hathaway affiliate. BHH Affiliates LLC and BHHSCP do not guarantee accuracy of all data including measurements, conditions, and features of property. Information is obtained from various sources and will not be verified by broker or MLS. Buyer is advised to independently verify the accuracy of that information. If your home is currently listed, this is not a solicitation for your listing.

WINTER 2023-24 Columnists

Editor & Publisher

Living the Ojai Life

Chuck Graham Ilona Saari Kit Stolz Sami Zahringer

Bret Bradigan Sales Manager David Taylor Director of Publications Bret Bradigan Creative Director Uta Ritke

Circulation

Target Media Partners

Ojai Hub Administrator

Jessie Rose Ryan Contributing Editors Mark Lewis Jerry Camarillo Dunn Jr. Jesse Phelps

CONTACT US: Editorial & Advertising, 805.798.0177 editor@ojaiquarterly.com David@ojaiquarterly.com

Oriental Oil Body Massage 40 Minute $42

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90 Minute $90

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40 Minute $35

90 Minute $86

Hot Stone Therapy Reflexology

Walk-Ins Welcome!

1002 East Ojai Avenue, Suite B Ojai, California 93023

805.299.5899

60 Minute $50

Gift Cards Available!

The contents of the Ojai Quarterly may not be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written consent of the publisher.

SUBSCRIPTIONS: To subscribe to the OQ, visit ojaiquarterly.com or write to 1129 Maricopa Highway, B186 Ojai, CA 93023.

Subscriptions are $24.95 per year.

You can also e-mail us at editor@ojaiquarterly.com.

Please recycle this magazine when you are finished. © 2023 Bradigan Group LLC All rights reserved.

O Q | E D ITOR’ S N OT E

OF THE OJAI PERSUASION “Thaw with her gentle persuasion is more powerful than Thor with his hammer. The one melts, the other breaks into pieces.”

— Henry David Thoreau If I ever felt like I had any advantage over many people I meet in Ojai, it’s that I’ve lived nearly all my life in small towns. In fact, Ojai is the largest city in which I’ve lived except for a couple years in Denver and Boulder. If you’ve been here awhile, you know the feeling; the ten-minute errands that turn into an hour’s-long coffee klatsch, the schmoozapaloozas at the bank or post office, understanding there are no quick trips to the market, the smiles, the looks of recognition, as well as watching people cross over the street to avoid you or swerving their shopping cart down a different aisle. Or is that just me?

To be seen is what is what brought many of us here — to escape the anonymity of the crowds and to find a place of human scale where we can see the results of our efforts and service. That we do this in such astonishing natural beauty is key — it inspires us to reflect inwardly the beauty that surrounds us. If we don’t like what’s going on, we don’t have to shout. We can talk to each other and figure out something together that forges closer connections between us. This angry divisive energy around town lately is not who we are. It is the opposite. In the old days (not to sound like a cranky old man; I am, I just don’t want to sound like one) we got angry at external, existential threats — gypsum and uranium mines, landfills, giant subdivisions, freeways — not at each other.

Facing and defeating these threats, we became a closer community, trusting and familiar to each other. Lately, though, it feels nasty and polarizing. I urge you to consider the source of these attacks and the vicious gossip that attends them.

Gossip, though, often gets a bad rap. If you define it as two or more people talking about someone who isn’t present, then most gossip is actually positive. People really do care about other people. A 2007 study by Matthew Feinberg, Robb Willer and Michael Schultz discovered that gossip can “promote cooperation and deter selfish behavior within groups.” It serves as an informal information-sharing mechanism. Small-town people rely on personal interactions to gather information and make decisions. Positive gossip can provide social support, helping people navigate challenges and crisis, creating a ripple effect of empathy and advice. It is how we persuade each other. You can see this in our vigorous arts organizations. Music, theater, visual arts thrive here, because the arts provide a critical role in persuasion. They are a medium for conveying our emotions, ideas and insights. In Ojai, we build our identity around the arts.

We try to convey those values in your Ojai Quarterly. You can see that at work in Mark Lewis’ story on the unlikely rapport between our Krishnamurti and physicist David Bohm, or Robin Gerber’s story about the renewed interest in plant medicine and psychedelic therapies, where we are high above the rest of the country, and even in Ilona Saari’s story about holiday entertaining. It’s about bringing people together. Kit Stolz once again brings in a gem, this issue about Charles Hood, author, naturalist and photographer (his Audubon birder life list contains more than 5,000 species!) Those values range widely, from Chuck Graham’s stunning story and photographs from neighboring Carrizo Plain after a fresh snowfall, or further afield to our own Jerry Dunn’s insider’s account of hidden Florence.

Even our debut Shop Local promotion, the Gift Guide of local products just in time for the holidays, is integral to that mission.

Our cover story is a case in point; here are two women, Janelle Kandziora and Erin Bernthal, who forged their partnership through the casual interactions that define small-town life and creating a thriving business from it. And then there’s Sami Zahringer. If anyone defines Ojai life with her manic wit, astonishing verbal flow and generosity of spirit, it’s her. There’s a reason why we give her the last word.

If you’re a visitor to the Little Orange, keep all this mind as you read through our quarterly offering. And support the advertisers who support us, and our community. Maybe someday you will know the joys of having people avoid you at the market. As Mark Twain said, “In a small town, gossip is a renewable resource.” Amen to that. I hope this modest note got you thinking, and reading.

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

23

OQ | C O N T RI BU TO R S

BRANDI CROCKETT is an Ojai pixie tangerine peelin’ native and an editorial and destination wedding photographer. Check out her work at fancyfreephotography. com

CHUCK GRAHAM’S work has appeared in Outdoor Photographer, Canoe & Kayak, Trail Runner, Men’s Journal, The Surfer’s Journal and Backpacker.

24

JERRY DUNN

ROBIN GERBER

is the author of four books and a playwright.

Check her out at robingerber.com

worked with the National Geographic Society for 35 years and has won three Lowell Thomas Awards, the “Oscars” of the field, from the Society of American Travel Writers.

MARK LEWIS

UTA CULEMANNRITKE

is a writer and editor based in Ojai. He can be contacted at mark lewis1898@gmail.com.

ILONA SAARI

KIT STOLZ

is a writer who’s worked in TV/film, rock’n’roll and political press, and as an op-ed columnist, mystery novelist and consultant for HGTV. She blogs for food: mydinnerswithrichard. blogspot.com.

is an award-winning journalist who has written for newspapers, magazines, literary journals, and online sites. He lives in Upper Ojai and blogs at achangeinthewind.com.

is an independent artist, designer and curator.

She is a member of Ojai Studio Artists and runs utaculemann.design.

SAMI ZAHRINGER is an Ojai writer and award-winning breeder of domestic American long-haired children.

She has more forcedmeat recipes than you.

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

OQ | ojai p o d ca st BILL MOSES & OJAI’S ENTREPRENURIAL SPIRIT Thornton Wilder, author of “Our Town,” was a student at The Thacher School, his first experience with small-town life. Though set in Grover’s Corner, New Hampshire, the time frame, specific details, and even the people in “Our Town” were reminiscent of Wilder’s experience in Ojai. His first play, “The Russian Princess” was performed at The Thacher School in 1912.

Bill Moses, with a long record of successful enterprises that he’s shepherded from initial conception to multi-million dollar deals, brings his diverse experience to talk about how Ojai can fuel creativity and prosperity.

He talks about his path from small-town boy to Wall Street trader and back to smalltown life in Ojai. Moses also talks about the importance of his stewardship of Casa Barranca, the Greene & Greene masterpiece.

(Ep. 162)

IN BRIEF: OJAI TALK OF THE TOWN PODCASTS A PIRATE’S LIFE WITH DR. SIMON

JB DYAS, PH.D. ON LEADING WITH JAZZ

Dr. Rebecca Simon, author of “Pirate’s Code: Laws & Life Aboard Ship” and “Pirate Queens” shares her insights about the Golden Age of Pirates and how it influenced the American Revolution, and generations of readers and film-goers. The Oak Grove School teacher also talked about her experiences deep into the stacks at the British Museum & Library and what drew her to history as a career. (Ep. 163)

Dr. JB Dyas is the VP. for Education and Curriculum Development at the celebrated Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz.

He is a bandleader and has played with jazz world greats Hancock and Dave Brubeck. He talks about Ojai’s role in jazz, and his popular seminars, workshops and Youtube videos on what jazz can teach us about leadership, teaching and developing better, kinder and more productive and effective organizations. (Ep. 157)

MATT LAVERE ON SUPERVISING THE OJAI VALLEY & BEYOND The attorney and former Mayor of Ventura talked about projects around Ojai, especially Mesa Farms, which he has helped develop with Dan Parziale, (Ep. 132) to support children who age out of the foster care system and often end up homeless and hopeless.

County Supervisor Matt LaVere learned a lot growing up in Ojai and attending Villanova Preparatory Academy. Those lessons have stood him in good stead as he navigates the challenges of leading the 160,000 residents of Ventura County’s First District.

‘CORCOVADO’ AND OJAI’S QUIET NIGHTS

2

LaVere was on the front lines of the pandemic response, working closely with Ojai city and hospital officials. He was elected in March 2020 just as the lockdowns went into effect and took office in December of that year. (Ep. 152)

TWO DEGREES

of SEPARATION BETWEEN

OJAI

ONE: The much-covered and beloved song, ‘Corcovado,’ written by Antonio Carlos Jobim, and especially as sung by Astrud and Joao Gilberto, was released in 1960 and covered by Tony Bennett, Andy Williams and Queen Latifah among many others.

until his death in 2010. He also wrote lyrics for Tony Bennett’s “Yesterday I Heard the Rain,” and Charles Aznavour’s “Venice Blues.”

Among Lees’ books were “The Singers & The Songs” and “Jazz Lives.” He was a regular on Fred Hall’s Ojai radio station and kept busy with his popular newsletter, “Jazzletter.” He also helped Hall produce the “Jazz At Ojai” concert series at Libbey Bowl. His obituary was featured in the New York Times.

TWO: The English lyrics were written by Canadian jazz critic, historian and writer Gene Lees, who lived quietly for decades on Foothill Road OQ / WINTER 2023-24

25

shop Home for the HOLIDAYS

Ojai Gift Guide 26

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

THE ART OF

— SHOPPING LOCAL —

E

mbracing the spirit of the season in Ojai, California means more than just festive wreaths hung with care along the Arcade arches, or the twinkling lights in our shop windows — it’s about supporting our vibrant community by shopping local for the holidays.

Ojai is a chain-store-free haven of local artisans, boutique shops, and family-owned businesses. By choosing to shop locally, you’re not just finding unique and thoughtful gifts, but you’re also fostering the strong sense of unity and sustainability that keeps our town special and sustainable.

And your dollars live on in surprising ways. Do you ever wonder why our local sports teams are so enthusiastic and well-equipped? Because local stores sponsor them.

Do you ever wonder why the Chamber of Commerce, Ojai Music Festival and Ojai Valley Land Conservancy and other non-profit organizations are able to host such incredible events throughout the year like the Ojai Music Festival, Pixie Tangerine Month and the country’s oldest amateur tennis tournament, “The Ojai?” Because these events rely on the sponsorships and volunteers that local businesses provide. Our merchants have “skin in the game.”

When you shop local, you’re also investing in the dreams of your neighbors and friends. Our local businesses are the heart of Ojai, providing jobs and enriching the local

economy. Every purchase you make from a small store or a local vendor directly impacts the lives of those who call this place home.

In Ojai, you’ll discover an array of one-of-a-kind treasures, from handcrafted jewelry to artisanal foods, and unique home décor. These locally sourced products carry the warmth and authenticity of our town, making your gifts even more meaningful.

But it’s not just about the gifts; it’s about the experience.

When you shop locally, you’re greeted with a smile, and you get to know the people behind the products. The friendly faces and personal touch you’ll find in Ojai’s local shops are priceless. The stories our local merchants can tell about their products adds great value that you can’t buy from a website or catalog.

If that isn’t persuasive enough, choosing to shop local reduces the carbon footprint associated with long-distance shipping and large corporations. You’re not just celebrating the holiday season; you’re also helping to preserve our beautiful environment.

This holiday season, let Ojai’s distinct charm and sense of community inspire your gift-giving choices. Make a conscious effort to shop local, and you’ll be supporting our beloved town while finding unforgettable gifts that will bring joy to your loved ones and to the heart of Ojai.

THIS MESSAGE BROUGHT TO YOU BY KARIELLA // DANSKI // PIXIE’S GENERAL STORE // MINGLES COCONUT // OJAI ICE CREAM // FRIENDS’ RANCH // SUNDAY’S // OSO VINTAGE & MODERN OQ / WINTER 2023-24

27

SHOP LOCAL

BLANCHE SILVIA

212-A E. OJAI AVE • 805-798-0177

Hand-Made fragrance oils, $48 each @blanchesilviaojai @wrenceramics

FRIENDS RANCH

15150 MARICOPA HWY • 805-646-2871

BLANCHE SILVIA

212-A E. OJAI AVE • 805-798-0177

DANSKI

321 E. OJAI AVE • 805-646-1927

Tata Cups Available. $48 each. Designed

Ilse Jacobsen Tulip Shoes. Comfort and

and Hand-Made by Wren Ceramics

style, with a wide variety of sizes and

@blanchesilviakitchen @wrenceramics

colors. “Like walking on clouds.”

MINGLE’S COCONUTS

MINGLE’S COCONUTS

625 N. VENTURA AVE • 805-393-4282

625 N. VENTURA AVE • 805-393-4282

Mail order is available online; fruit ships in

Mingle’s love for coconuts comes out in

Purveyor of fresh Thai coconuts in Ventu-

Local citrus sells at $5+ per 2 pound bag

you to thrive!” instagram @minglelicious

instagram @minglelicious

the New Year. FriendsRanches.com.

OSO VINTAGE & MODERN

212-B E. OJAI AVE • 805-798-4769

every product we create. “It is alive for

SUNDAY’S

307 E. OJAI AVE • 805-766-1366

ra and Los Angeles counties. Follow our

SUNDAY’S

307 E. OJAI AVE • 805-766-1366

BLUNDSTONE Boots. Built with the

Sustainable Gift Boxes. Our approach is

Sustainable Gift Boxes. Our approach is

Mention this ad for 15 percent off!

support the community. Thoughtfully

support the community. Thoughtfully

distinctive look & feel since 1870.

to create high-quality, unique gifts that curated & free local delivery

to create high-quality, unique gifts that curated & free local delivery

Visit our new store to explore select goods from more than forty local artisans, makers, and farmers.

307 East Ojai Ave, Ojai CA (Upstairs) We specialize in high-quality, unique, and affordable gifts and home goods from local and global sources.

The shop’s items are carefully chosen with an emphasis on environmentally sound and ethical practices.

CURATED HOME GOODS | UNIQUE GIFTS | BOTANICAL ESSENTIALS | CUSTOM GIFT BOXES GIFT WRAPPING | LOCAL DELIVERY | SHIPPING

805-766-1366

SUNDAYDESIGNS.CO@GMAIL.COM

SUNDAYDESIGNS.CO

30

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

gifts for her

gifts for him

SCAN TO SHOP

Need Ice Cream for a party?, the ultimate hostess gift!?

Stocking stuffers? Home town Sweet treats are here! \

@ojaiicecream

210 E Ojai Ave

GIFT CARDS STOCKING STUFFERS

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302 W. Matilija Street | 805-646-3755 OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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‘morning’ in ojai

Nature Waits to be seen

“Morning Show” Director Reflects on Ojai’s Role in Hit Show

Charles Hood’s New Work Joins Humor With the Environment

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Boutiques & lodging

artists & galleries

Where to Stay, Where to Shop

The People, Places That Make Ojai an Arts Destination OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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STORY BY BRET BRADIGAN

you find yourself stuck in a global pandemic, and need to rewrite on the fly a hit television show featuring two of America’s biggest stars, tossing out the entire second season’s scripts, trying to keep the show relevant to the most intractable and ever-shifting issues in America — mask-andvaccine divisions, abortion rights, the decline of legacy media, sexual harassment, insurrection and Big Tech’s threats — then having a sanctuary in Ojai comes in handy.

MIMI LEDER ON SET WITH JENNIFER ANISTON

Mimi Leder, director and executive producer of “The Morning Show,” now wrapping up its acclaimed third season, guided Apple TV’s flagship show through the tumult of the past four years. The show follows the team of the fictional United Broadcast Association as it produces “The Morning Show,” the country’s highest-rated morning show.

Ojai’s natural beauty, relaxing pace and close network of friends and family were well suited for her to hunker down and adapt “The Morning Show” to the uncertainties of a global pandemic. “The people here, they lift you up,” Leder said during her podcast appearance on Episode 159 of Ojai Talk of the Town.

And that was necessary, she said, with all that was happening professionally, and personally.

“We were so fortunate to live part-time in Ojai. My mother, a Holocaust survivor, had just passed on March 23rd at age 97. I

felt my world was falling apart. It was. We lost the matriarch of our family and we were living in that grief.

“I bump into people I know here. But it’s also nice and quiet.

And a lot of my friends here, are in the (show) business,” she said. “But I have friends who aren’t. I love that.”

The third season of “The Morning Show” recently wrapped with a Mobius twist of an ending. Leder has been closely involved with getting the show made since its inception, based on Brian Stelter’s 2013 book, ”Top of the Morning: Inside the Cutthroat World of Morning TV.” The timing of Season 3 was fortuitous, wrapping as it did before the Writers Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild went on strike in the Spring of 2023. With the strikes settled, Season 4 has been tentatively approved.

The hit show stars Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon as atmosphere and sleek design, as well as its superb acting and

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It was an extremely weird, complicated and challenging time to say the least,” Leder said. Preparation for restarting Season 2 started in August 2020; shooting resumed in October.

“Being a show that’s workplace-centered around a morning news show we decided we had to center our storyline on the early days of the pandemic as seen through our characters’ eyes,” she said.

Season 3 introduces a new character, enigmatic tech billionaire Paul Marks, who promises to either save or swallow UBN after developing a proposal with beleaguered UBN executive Cory Ellison. The pivotal roles are played by Jon Hamm and Billy Crudup, respectively. Leder has nothing but praise for both. “In our show, Paul ( Jon Hamm) comes in as an accelerant. He makes everybody look at who they are. And take sides and you know, he’s not what he seems to be — a big savior coming in with all the money,” Leder said. “Is money going to save our souls?

PHOTO CREDIT: RYAN SCHUDE

high-stakes stories. Its characteristic design was established by Leder to create even more dramatic tension in this already highwire act of a show. “It’s like an actor putting on a dress, a pair of shoes and they walk, they talk and now, all of a sudden, it helps them become who they are,” she said.

“And Jen’s character, Alex, wears those blacks and grays, and (Reese Witherspoon’s) Bradley does a little bit more floral and as her character evolves, so does her costumes,” she said.

“Design isn’t just a character. It is an important character. Absolutely,” she said. “It’s one the actors are playing off against all the time.”

In that sense, Ojai as a retreat and refuge, may qualify as a background character on the show itself. “Ojai gave me the space and mental clarity that I needed,” Leder said.

Season 2 of “The Morning Show” shuttered March 11 after 13 days of shooting, when the contours of the threat were still emerging. “I believe we were the first or one of the first (major television productions) to shut down. We felt an obligation to protect each other. It was a time of great fear and uncertainty.”

The show’s crew met starting in June via Zoom with epidemiologist Dr. Erin Bromage to figure out how to put in place safety protocols, which included masks, face shields, social distancing, avoiding human contact — which was particularly difficult “when telling stories is all about connection and human contact.

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Speaking of money, while Apple is worth close to three trillion dollars, that doesn’t mean executives weren’t keeping a keen eye on the bottom line. “We do have a budget, and we do have to stick with it. And sometimes, in most times, that is super challenging,” she said. “And sometimes when you don’t have the money, it forces you to really think ‘How do I get this shot? How do I make this work? How do I, in this one frame, make you feel something?… That’s what’s exciting and challenging.’”

Working with tight budgets is a family tradition. Mimi’s father, Paul Leder, was a film director, producer, writer, editor and actor, known for “ultra-low budget” films “My Friends Need Killing” and “Dismember Mama.” Born in New York City, she moved with her family to Los Angeles, and became the first female graduate of the American Film Institute’s Conservatory, before going on to work as a script supervisor for the legendary Steven Bochco on “Hill Street Blues,” where the writers’ room included David Milch, “NYPD Blue” and “Deadwood,” as well as Ojai resident Mark Frost, co-creator of “Twin Peaks.”

After screening her short film, “Short Order Dreams,” Bochco and his partner Greg Hoblit hired Leder to direct an episode of “L.A. Law.” She worked steadily as a director for years, winning two Emmys (“China Beach”) before becoming a key member of the “E.R.” team, where she won another two Emmys. Leder directed feature films “The Peacemaker” with Steven Spielberg, and “Deep Impact,” and “Pay It Forward.” She also worked again with Milch on his HBO series, “Luck,” starring Dustin Hoffman. And again at HBO for their Damon Lindehof-created supernatural drama “The Leftovers,” where Leder directed and was a co-showrunner.

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

She then directed “On the Basis of Sex,” about Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s formative years fighting sex-based discrimination laws, which arrives at a dramatic final scene with Ginsburg herself climbing the stairs to the Supreme Court building. (For more on Ginsburg’s career, listen to episode 96 of Ojai’s podcast with Judith Hale Norris, who served closely with Ginsburg on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals).

All Mimi Leder’s varied and award-winning career did not dull her excitement shepherding “The Morning Show” from concept to reality. “It’s fascinating to create a world and to go into the world of live television, live television news, and watching the director work the producer, all the technicians, and you know we tried to get it right. I think we’ve got it right,” she said.

entirely different order of challenges, Leder said. “I’ll tell you taking care of a kid today is much harder than directing a crew of 200 people.”

She said that keeping a busy schedule through the worst of 2020 and the lockdown was a saving grace.

“We were telling a story that we’re living through. It is very strange and weird,” she said. The opportunity to keep working was helpful, she added. “It was like going to therapy. Yeah, it really was. It’s therapeutic.”

“And I think it’s a really smart season. And I’m really hopeful that people respond to it.”

With the already formidable challenges of creating a high-concept show, the pandemic heaped on more obstacles. Especially when shooting resumed. “When we started filming again, we were tested and retested eight times a week, and everything is locked down in the city,” she said. There was one upside: the lack of traffic. “You could get anywhere in Los Angeles in minutes,” she said.

One big downside was the “social distancing,” she said.

“We couldn’t hug, but we were working and our minds were working. They were not focused on Covid, they were focused on the story.”

“And it was a very interesting thing that happened, where I was able to go to work, and I was able to really function and be in my creative mind,” Leder said. “But I’d come home to Ojai and my husband who’s an actor, MIMI LEDER AT HOME IN OJAI. PHOTO CREDIT: RYAN SCHUDE and writer, he was more much more isolated … And so “THE MORNING SHOW’S” JENNIFER ANISTON AND REESE WITHERSPOON I was with my other family, my set family. It was just a really awkward and strange and emotional time, I think for the world.”

Her daughter Hannah also played a key role on “The Morning Show,” bringing those two families together.

Hannah is also a writer and director, as well as an actor. The mother was especially proud of Hannah Leder’s independent film, “The Planters,” which she made with her partner, and which was an award-winning hit on the festival circuit in 2019. “They were these young filmmakers, and they said, ‘No one’s going to buy our script,’ so they went out and co-wrote, co-directed, costarred and were the crew.” (Seems much like an Ojai do-it-yourself project.)

Being a grandparent of a two-year-old presents an OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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STORY BY KIT STOLZ

OQ | OF F T HE S HEL F

A

uthor pictures on the back of book covers tend to feature poses of sitting people staring into the camera lens, sometimes displaying what appears to be a snooty attitude. Not Charles Hood’s author pictures. Though Hood has published no less than 17 books over the past 30 years, from birding guides to essays on natural history to poetry and novels, Hood in his recent books looks more like an explorer than a distinguished author and poet.

Here he stands in a Texas river at night in his hiking pants, a flashlight piecing the night, grinning crazily. Here he stands in a frozen white landscape in a bright orange safety parka, smiling cheerfully into an icy Antarctic wind. Here he displays a large spider inside a datura blossom, consuming its unwary prey in search of pollen.

He’s an adventurer in words, not an austere authority, and fittingly his Curriculum Vitae reads more like an explorer’s than an English teacher’s. Hood has worked as a bird guide in Africa, a translator in New Guinea on a Fulbright scholarship, and as an artist in residence for the National Science Foundation in Antarctica. He has birded in all of California’s 58 counties, and routinely explores the Mojave around Antelope Valley, where for decades he taught English and creative writing at Antelope

Valley College.

Hood has a considerable writerly pedigree. He went to graduate school at UC Irvine in the late 1980s with many notable writers to be, including future poet laureate Robert Haas and future Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Michael Chabon. He was taught by the late Nobel Prize Winner Louise Gluck, among other noteworthy poets, and yet — despite publishing more than one book of award-winning poetry, and innovative experiments in writing — his writing life now focuses on the natural world, where his life-long birding practice turns out to have a surprising future.

A 2019 book published with three co-authors and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, called “Wild L.A.,” proved to be a hit, and recently went into its fourth printing. Hood said

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OQ | OF F T HE S HEL F LEFT: CHARLES HOOD’S BACK COVER IMAGE RIGHT: PHOTOGRAPHER JOSE GABRIEL MARTINEZ-FONSECA

he wrote that book in large part to empower people to get out into nature, people of all sorts, in all places in the city. Not just the privileged folk with expensive birding binoculars. For people without cars, “Wild LA” included a field trips possible via public transportation, such as a beach trip to see sea turtles. For single women, the authors thought carefully about where it would be safe to go out, including parking at night, and they worked hard to find walks within 20 minutes of nearly everyone in the city, and tested every one of their field trips thoroughly.

“People are now afraid of nature, they’re hesitant to go there,” Hood said. “I see a younger generation now finding their community in online games and TikTok and Facebook and such, and I really wonder about that.

I don’t think it’s really good for people, personally, and I think people who learn how to read and find wonder in nature are living potentially richer, healthier and more productive lives.”

In that vein, despite the long title, “A Salad Only the Devil Would Eat” reveals itself to be a book of essays in charming but straightforward language that find surprising beauty and delight in the sort of “hidden nature, ugly nature, abandoned nature, holy nature” one encounters often in Southern California, and especially in the deceptively empty-looking Mojave.

One of Hood’s favorite nature moments, he says, comes when meeting with the completely unexpected, as when he and his collaborator on “Nocturnalia,” photographer Jose Gabriel Martinez-Fonseca, come across an eyeless Texas snake at night, a blind snake that looks like a giant, juicy earthworm.

“The surprise created one of my favorite moments in nature study,” writes Hood. “An instantaneous collision of “Wow, how cool,” followed by “What the heck is it?”

Hood lives in the Antelope Valley, when he’s not traveling, and because most of the book is set in the desert, it features plenty of vacant lots, crows and coyotes, palm trees and concrete. Hood sees it all, clear-eyed and without any sort of “High Church” 46

wilderness rhetoric or gauzy sentimentality. Hood grew up in working-class Atwater, which is near the Los Angeles River, and part of greater Los Angeles, and though well-acquainted with the city and its ferocities, he sees as well the generosity of its environment — for people and for wild creatures.

In his cheeky essay “Fifty Dreams for Forty Monkeys,” Hood points out that “it may seem impossible, but the birdiest place in all of North America, at least during spring migration, is Los Angeles County. Not Florida, not Alaska, not Monterey.

In a single weekend, in a nation-wide competition, Los Angeles County ends up with the most bird species tallied — often exceeding 270. As a site it can cheat in the sense that it has a mountain range and a desert, but it also has something on the order of 20 million people driving 60 million cars or whatever, and so to achieve hundreds of bird species in one weekend, finger snaps for the collective productivity of urban jungles, vacant lots, stony ridges, and muddy culverts.”

In conversation, Hood again and again returns to the idea of reaching out with gifts from the natural world to ordinary people — people who haven’t had the experience of nature, not because they don’t care, but because they’ve never been shown how to find it. That’s why he chose, he said, to teach the night shift at his college, to reach people who didn’t know English growing up, and to teach them to use English professionally for power in their own lives.

“I hope I can be the voice of the disenfranchised,” Hood said.

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

SOME OF CHARLES HOOD’S PUBLICATIONS

“The reality is that, by conventional standards, I grew up in a very disadvantaged community. There was a lot of food insecurity. There was a lot of abuse. I was sexually abused. At one point I was homeless and living in my car — blah blah blah. The reality is that nobody expected me to go to college in my family.

So I want to tell everybody that you get to have a slightly better life. You may not be able to afford a house in Ojai, but you can always go to the park.”

When it comes to Ojai, where Hood had a reading at Bart’s Books in November, he points out that residents now “have experienced both fire and flood. So you’re seeing a system that is out of balance. That phrase now is a cliche, but it’s true. We once had Native American stewardship of the fire ecology in California, and when we did, we didn’t have the fires that we’re having now. That’s just a reality, but it’s also a reality that the land is not ‘destroyed’ by fire. A house may be destroyed, but not the land.

That is the narrative we often hear, but all the fire does really is rearrange the pieces of the puzzle on the land.”

Unlike a lot of nature books today, Hood — an enthusiast for all that can be seen around us right here right now — avoids any discussion of possible grim futures.

“As somebody engaged in a public conversation about nature, I really am tired of the entirely negative narrative,” he said. “I gain nothing by using the phrase “climate change” in my books —it will just make people uneasy. Add that to the already existing insecurity about nature and you have fear. And one thing I can promise you, is that nature will be here next year. There will be plenty of nature here long after we’ve moved on to the Happy Hunting grounds.”

well that invasive species are anathema to biologists, he points out that parrots, to cite one example of an invasive species, have escaped and formed colonies in places such as Telegraph Hill in San Francisco, causing no apparent harm. Hood suspects that such “blended ecologies” may be an important part of the future of nature around us, and maybe that might be okay?

In one sentence, along these lines, he will state plainly that it is bad — “very bad” — to release pets into nature. In the next, he will admit to enjoying the thought of a troop of wild monkeys living freely in California.

“I wish that the same careless dolts who let their parrots escape accidentally let their squirrel monkeys escape, too. Not hundreds, but enough so that they could have met up, formed a self-sustaining colony. Can you imagine the thrill of it?” he writes. “How utterly supercalifragilisticexpialidocious it would be if you were

by Golden Gate Park or the L.A. River, if you were out birding or walking the dog or doing a slow, struggling five-mile run, and suddenly you came across a frisky, scampering troop of 30 or 40 squirrel monkeys, feral and happy and chittering excitedly as they raided an abandoned orange tree.”

Hood in his exuberance might overlook the flaws in a possible California future with wild monkeys, but nonetheless he’s going to enjoy the vision, no matter what people say.

“Somebody’s gonna complain,” he said. “But I don’t care.”

Hood brings a playful quality to nearly all his writing. Though he knows OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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OQ / WINTER 2023-24

OQ | A RT i sts & GA L L ERIES Perhaps it was potter and “the Mama of Dada” Beatrice Wood’s influence, going back nearly 90 years. Maybe it even goes back further, to the Chumash people’s ingenious and astounding artistry with basketry.

It’s clear that Ojai has long been a haven for artists. The natural beauty

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framed so well by the long arc and lush light of an east-west valley lends itself to artistic pursuits, as does the leisurely pace of life, the sturdy social fabric of a vibrant community and the abundant affection and respect for artists and their acts of creation. Come check it out for yourselves.

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Krotona Institute Of Theosophy Centennial, April 2024

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OQ | W I NE & DIN E

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martha & me

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OQ | FO O D & D RI N K STORY BY ILONA SAARI

COCKTAILS...

I love them! (I am a food & drink columnist, after all.) I love cocktail parties. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking cocktail parties you may have seen in classic, black & white “Thin Man” movies when martinis reigned, or those 1950s cocktail parties featuring food fare centered around hors d’oeuvres of onion dip, pigs-in-a-blanket, deviled eggs, and numerous Kraft toppings on Ritz crackers, especially Kraft’s cheddar cheese. Brie on sliced baguette?

What’s brie? What’s baguette?

Couldn’t find those in a Piggly Wiggly or A&P back then.

Then there were the legendary party hostesses in that by-gone era such as Pearl Mesta and Elsa Maxwell who threw elegant soireés for royalty and the WASP 400 which were featured on the society pages with pictures laden with Beluga caviar on toast points. Toast points?

The ‘50s transitioned into the ‘60s and ‘70s … the culture began to change, but cocktail food fare remained stagnant, doomed to the dip dungeon. As a Woodstock generation budding writer in New

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OQ / WINTER 2023-24

York City, I admired the wit of Nora Ephron and the writings of New York Times Vietnam war correspondent, Gloria Emerson (full disclosure, both were acquaintances of mine).

But then Martha Stewart raced across my admiration radar with a bountiful blip. No, I never did jail time, (though I was paddy-wagoned twice in ’68 in Chicago), but before her stint in the slammer, Martha introduced America to a life and entertaining “style,” not for those ladies who held grand cocktail and dinner

parties for the glitterati, but for the average American woman (OK, men, too) who wanted to tastefully (literally and figuratively) host a memorable party at home on a middle-class budget.

Martha’s knowledge of home design, cooking, gardening and, yes, marketing still astounds me. Why, you might ask? Well, even if you don’t, I’ll tell you.

As much as I love going to parties, I love, love, love throwing parties! For 20 years my husband and I (in New York City, later Los

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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OQ | FO O D & D RI N K

Angeles) threw an annual Oscar party for 20-30 people. To feed the crowd cheaply (we’re both writers, need I say more?), I’d make big bowls of baked ziti and green leaf salads, with nibble sides like chips and cheese and crackers.This was pre-discovery of Martha.

But it was our annual Christmas Eve holiday party held for over two decades in Los Angeles that became a tradition for 30-50 of our friends and their families. That’s when I began to channel the marvelous Ms. Martha. Gourmet and design on a budget.

My husband during our (well, his more than mine) TV/film careers in LA had morphed into an incredible cook at the time chefs were becoming household names. Over the years, Richard did his own Martha-channeling and moved from making basic turkeys, honey-baked hams and simple salads, into French cassoulets, gourmet beef or turkey chilis, fancy pastas, and notso-simple salads, all on a budget for our open house (I did my Martha-thing by decorating every room). I even started a blog honoring his culinary growth — www.mydinnerswithrichard. blogspot.com – but I digress.

When we left the freeways behind and escaped to Ojai, our first months in town were lonely — we hadn’t met too many people and the thought of spending the holiday season without our LA friends was depressing. Had we met enough people to perhaps throw a little holiday cocktail party that would end early enough for folks to party hop elsewhere and take away my holiday doldrums? We invited 20-25 people we sort of knew and two long-time LA friends who had trail-blazed our move to this stimulating people-populated valley paradise. I decorated and Richard planned his cocktail food menu. Much to our surprise, every invitee came and a new annual tradition was started.

Whether the weather be warm or cold, a hosting trick I learned 58

from Ms. Martha is to always keep the bar separate from the food so guests don’t congregate in just one area. So, if it’s not raining, I set up our self-help, full self-service bar (or wine bar — depending on our budget) outside, with the cocktail food arranged inside on the dining and coffee tables. If you can’t put your bar outside, put it in another room or across the party room from the food.

Besides a crudités platter (now with brie and other “exotic” cheeses, meats, nuts and fancy olives), we have offered stuffed endive leaves, pate — not expensive French paté, but my family’s make it yourself, Paté Therese (mydinnerswithrichard.blogspot. com/2009/10/holidays-are-coming.html), or for your vegetarian guests, this faux chopped ‘chicken liver’ spread (mydinnerswithrichard.blogspot.com/2010/10/faux-chopped-chicken-liver-formy-faux.html) and new and improved deviled eggs, truffled (mydinnerswithrichard.blogspot.com/2009/12/welll-ill-be-truffled. html ), and other budget finger choices, plus Richard’s poached whole salmon filet, served at room temp with his homemade champagne or dill sauce to be scooped onto toast points (yes, we’re now “on point”), and a delicious creamy dilled shrimp hors d’oeuvre to spear with a toothpick and pop in your mouth (recipe below).

Always re-inventing herself, I still check out Martha’s latest cooking/design advice and think it’s cool she’s teamed up with Calvin “Snoop Dog” Broadus, which opened up a whole new smorgasbord of “edibles.”

This holiday season, channel your inner Martha, my dears, during this most wonderful time of the year. Throw a budget friendly cocktail party — your friends and family will eat it up.

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

DEVILED EGGS

‘ PATE THERESE

Dilled Shrimp INGREDIENTS: 1-1/2 cups of mayonnaise 1/3 cup lemon juice 1/4 cup sugar 1/2 cup dairy sour cream 1 large red onion thinly sliced 2 tablespoons dry dill 1/4 teaspoon salt 2 lbs. cooked medium shrimp

DIRECTIONS: In a large bowl, mix mayonnaise, lemon juice, sugar, sour cream, onion, dill and salt.

Stir in shrimp.

Cover and refrigerate overnight. Stir once or as many times you want.

We’re not stir-free here.

Serve with tooth picks, along with other nibbles, or even a few of Snoop’s edibles.

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RARE DOWNTOWN COMMERCIAL/RENTAL

These 3 separate, adjoining legal lots in the heart of Ojai have amazing potential as income properties or future developments. One lot is the current location of the Love Café, another holds a residential duplex with 2br/1ba and 1br/1ba units, and in between is a vacant lot that currently serves as a parking lot. The total acreage is approximately .55 acres with the possibility of separating the lots. Let this once in a lifetime prime downtown opportunity just a block from the Ojai Arcade and the Ojai Playhouse be your canvas for a creative vision.

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LUXURY DOWNTOWN OFFICE BUILDING

This 3900sqft commercial building is in the heart of downtown Ojai. Fully remodeled in 2017, it includes 10 offices, lobby, conference room, kitchen, and 3 bathrooms.

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This architecturally designed farmhouse sits on one of Ojai’s most coveted streets. The one-acre lot graced by sycamores offers a stunning mountain backdrop with no rear neighbors in view. There’s so much to love: Four bedrooms plus a large main floor office w/ fireplace. Sunken living room w/fireplace. Quarter-sawn wide-plank solid wood floors, hand-hewn exposed beams, and vaulted ceilings.

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W

ith architectural antecedents including Mead & Requa, Greene & Greene, Wallace Neff, George Washington Smith and Richard Neutra, Ojai has long been a laboratory in the art of living.

The spirit of openness and tolerance included black and female trailblazers Paul Revere Williams’ and Julia Morgan’s earliest commissions.

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STORY BY BRET BRADIGAN PHOTOS BY BRANDI CROCKETT

LEFT: JANELLE KANZIORA, PRINCIPAL DESIGNER, RIGHT: ERIN BERNTHAL, LEAD DESIGNER

After years of working amid Palm Springs’ Mid-Century Modern masterpieces, the variety and diversity of Ojai’s styles enchanted Janelle Kandziora of Janelle’s Interiors. Her and lead designer Erin Bernthal recently opened their showroom at 221 East Matilija Street, behind the Arcade and on the second story above Serendipity Toys.

“After working with Janelle for a few years, we partnered to create Ojai at Home, the home decor store and furniture boutique,” Bernthal said.

It gives them a place for clients to feel what their lives will be like in their newly designed spaces, to pick up fabrics, flooring and accessories. It is also a chance to balance her and Erin’s busy lives with two and three children each respectively.

“Erin’s strength is her keen eye for design,” Kandziora said. “I manage all our design projects and use her talent for selecting furniture and finishing touches.

She’s also wonderful with clients.” She describes their work as “house therapists. I say someday I’m gonna write a book about that.”

The two met at an Ojai bunco groups, a game of chance involving dice and teams of four with three or more teams. They also teamed up on the Ojai Women’s Fund and struck up a friendship.

While hiking one day, Erin said “I was expressing how I wanted to start working again, but wanted to do something different.

Considering that I loved working on my own home, perhaps something in flipping houses or rental properties would be a possibility? She asked if I had any interest in interior design? I

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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TOPA MOUNTAIN WINERY BAR

LIVING ROOM 74

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

KITCHEN

SHELVING

start to finish.”

Prior to the downtown location, Janelle’s Interiors was located at the old Ford dealership just east of the “Y” intersection. “I was there for five or six years, then I went to my house. And it was great, especially during quarantine, but eventually we found this great space and it was larger than we expected. And we wanted to curate our own home decor place because we had the space to have these vignettes and show off our design skills.”

“The idea for the store was is that when we’re working with design clients, we’re always scrambling at the last moment to do the finishing touches,” said Kandziora. “And with the store, we’ve curated our favorite home decor, and we can pretty much immediately grab from our inventory and finish the home.”

Kandziora grew up in Minnesota, and came into the design business through a circuitous path. “I was always going to be an art professor. Every art teacher I’ve ever had in my life told me ‘You need to be an art teacher.’ It just really came naturally to me.”

SETTEE — CORNER SPACE

boyfriend at the time, Chris Kandziora, now husband, the sales and operations chief at the Ojai Valley Inn, was working at a hotel in downtown Minneapolis, and asked his employer if they had any openings. It turns out the hotel’s designer needed help. “She asked a couple questions and says ‘I’ll hire her. Can she start tomorrow and I’ll pay her.’ When you’re in your twenties and all of a sudden this opportunity became a paid opportunity. I started working with her and I never looked back.”

Bernthal grew up in Pittsburgh, Pa. Was an ICU/Trauma Nurse and then CRNA (certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist) before moving to ojai, ca.

Kandziora has decades in the business and is not bound to any particular style of design. “A lot of people have asked me that.

And I’m always like ‘I think that if somebody says, I don’t like calamari, then OK … just like if you said you didn’t like a certain food. I would say you haven’t met the right chef. Let the client lead with their needs and preferences,” she said.

After Janelle earned her undergraduate degree, she could not find an internship with a gallery or an established artist anywhere. Her

That had led to interesting places. “I did a house for one client ago who lived out there (Palm Springs) and she hired me to do OQ / WINTER 2023-24

75

her house in Tel Aviv,” she said. “I really enjoy having repeat clients like that.” One of their clients is the Ojai Valley Inn with its 303 rooms.

Key to their process is close collaboration with the architect.

“You have to look at the architecture of a home and see what their (client’s) lifestyle is and figure out what’s right, but I never really instill my design preferences … just whatever’s right for that house and for that client.” For example, she cites that white kitchens are very popular right now. “There’s nothing wrong with white kitchens, but I like having a natural element with natural woods and a darker stain.”

“I do follow a lot of designers and there’s always a lot going on,” Kandziora said. “The way Erin and I like to look at design is that we hope there’s more conscious selection of furniture and getting more natural materials. Craftsmanship is an important element because a piece (of furniture) you’re gonna have for 50 or 60 years or more. You want to have a story to it.”

Bernthal said, “Janelle has been a great mentor. She really loves the early stages of projects, such as new construction, floor plans and material selections. I love the process of pulling it all together with moodboards, furniture layouts, furniture selections, rugs, art, lighting and accessories. We make a great team!”

After Erin’s third child was born, the family moved to Ojai. Her husband is the prolific actor Jon Bernthal (see Season Two, episode Six of “The Bear.”) That was when her interest in a career change was sparked. “We had many projects in our own home and I loved the process of coming up with designs, layouts, color schemes, and material selections,” she said.

It definitely keeps them on the go. Kandziora said, “Erin and I are very busy. So we wake up and we’re getting our kids off to school, going into the office running around till literally the very last second, till we pick up our kids … and then you get those calls from the school.”

For Bernthal, being involved with creative decisions is rewarding.

“I have always appreciated beautiful spaces and the little details that make these spaces unique,” she said. “but never imagined this as a career for myself, since I already had a career that I really enjoyed.” She delved deep into design literature, podcasts and online courses, design shows and markets and brings that curiosity into her approach to clients’ needs.

Kandziora incorporates elements of the ancient Chinese practice of Feng Shui in her work, the art of harmonizing people with their space. “Feng Shui brings harmony to your environment, home and most importantly, you!” she said.

Another favorite is Marie Kondo, an erstwhile Ojai resident, whose blockbuster books, “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying up,” and “Spark Joy,” made her an international celebrity.

“What I’ve learned from her is that sometimes it’s best to start with a clean slate. I think it’s a good approach to read one of her books, declutter things and then start thinking about a renovation,” Kandziora said. “Just let things go and then be a joy for somebody else.”

Speaking of which, living and working in Ojai has proved a joy for both of these Heartland women. “I say a lot to my friends back home that Ojai is a Midwest town in California.” Minus the subzero weather.

KANDZIORA AND BERNTHAL AT WORK ON THEIR SHOWROOM FLOOR 76

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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CONTACT US 805.640.0194 Showroom/Store www.JanelleInteriors.com 22 E Matilija St Unit B Above Serendipity Toys Ojai, CA 93023

OQ | y est er day & tomor row

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86 secrets of florence

102 winter comes to Carrizo

OffBeat Paths in Renaissance City

By Jerry Dunn

A Few Glorious Days in Carrizo Plain’s Winter Wonderland

By Chuck Graham

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96 ojai consciousness rising

Across the Universe David Bohm & Krishnamurti’s Earth-Shaking Conversations

By Mark Lewis

Plant Medicine Practitioners on Leading Edge of Scientif ic Rediscoveries

By Robin Gerber OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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STORY BY MARK LEWIS

DAVID BOHM & KRISHNAMURTI

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OQ / WINTER 2023-24

“AMERICAN PROMETHEUS,” ON WHICH THE FILM “OPPENHEIMER” WAS BASED.

AS CHRISTOPHER NOLAN’S much-praised hit film “Oppenheimer” marches toward a possible “Best Picture” Oscar, we reflect on a part of the story that Nolan left out. It concerns J. Robert Oppenheimer’s student David Bohm, a distinguished physicist in his own right who was barred from Los Alamos on national-security grounds, and who ended up collaborating with the Ojai-based philosopher J. Krishnamurti on an inquiry into the nature of consciousness.

“Krishnamurti had an impact on Bohm’s theory of physics, and Bohm influenced the way Krishnamurti articulated his insights into the human condition,” Ojai historian Craig Walker says. “The dialogues between the two men that form their book ‘The Ending of Time’ (which took place partly in Ojai) are revolutionary.”

DAVID JOSEPH BOHM was born on Dec. 20, 1917, in Wilkes-Barre, Penn. His father, a Jewish immigrant from Eastern Europe, hoped that young David eventually would take over the family furniture store, but the boy had bigger dreams. He was fascinated by science-fiction magazines, which sparked an interest in science, which diverted him from the furniture store to Penn State. After graduating in 1939 with a degree in physics, he went on to Caltech in Pasadena to begin earning his Ph.D. It was there that he met J. Robert Oppenheimer.

Oppenheimer, 13 years Bohm’s senior, had a similar background in some ways. Like Bohm’s, his father was a Jewish immigrant from Europe. But instead of growing up in modest circumstances in a backwater mining town like Wilkes-Barre, Oppenheimer was raised in a luxury apartment on Riverside Drive in New York City, amid a family art collection that included a Picasso and a Van Gogh. Instead of Penn State, he went to Harvard, and then studied in Europe with the world’s leading physicists.

Many of the people Oppenheimer encountered in Europe, such as Neils Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, were involved in the development of quantum mechanics, a revolutionary new approach to physics. At the time, quantum mechanics was little known in America, but Oppenheimer would soon change that. Returning home with his Ph.D., he accepted a professorship at UC Berkeley, which he turned into a mecca for physicists

exploring quantum theory. One of them was David Bohm.

They met at Caltech, where Oppenheimer taught a class each spring. Bohm was unhappy at Caltech, which emphasized the laboratory work associated with experimental physics, as opposed to the more purely intellectual approach Oppenheimer favored.

When Oppenheimer offered to arrange a transfer to Berkeley, Bohm jumped at the chance.

Arriving at his new school in the fall of 1941, Bohm dove into the Oppenheimer milieu, which embraced not only theoretical physics but Communist Party activism.

“We were all close to Communism at that time,” Bohm would recall to Martin J. Sherwin, co-author with Kai Bird of “American Prometheus,” the Oppenheimer biography which inspired Christopher Nolan’s film.

It is not clear to this day whether Oppenheimer was a party member; he later admitted only to being a fellow traveler. But Bohm and several of Oppenheimer’s other physics proteges did formally join the party. This is the point in Nolan’s film where Bohm in effect appears as an uncredited extra, one of the unnamed grad students who are shown trying to organize a union at Berkeley, and attending martini-soaked parties such as the one

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calculations that proved useful to the Manhattan Project. As a result, the thesis was classified as top secret and Bohm’s notes were seized, which left him unable to write up his dissertation.

He was awarded his Ph.D. in 1943 only because Oppenheimer vouched for him as worthy of the credential.

Doctoral sheepskin in hand, Bohm asked Oppenheimer to bring him to Los Alamos to join the A Team. But Lt. Col. Boris Pash, an Army counter-intelligence officer (played by Casey Affleck in the movie), was investigating Oppenheimer’s Communist associations. Pash focused his suspicions on four Berkeley grad students, including Bohm, whom he thought might be passing America’s nuclear secrets to the Soviets. Bohm was not in fact a spy, and he already had left the Communist Party of his own volition, in part because he considered its interminable meetings to be a waste of his time. Nevertheless, he was blocked from Los Alamos.

where Oppenheimer meets Jean Tatlock, a medical student and a fervent Communist, played in the film by Florence Pugh.

In real life, Bohm too had a dalliance with a left-wing graduate student. His was with Betty Goldstein, a psychologist-in-training who apparently was his first serious girlfriend.

Bohm “had a crush on me,” she wrote in a memoir. “I would look out my window on Channing Way at night and see him standing in the street, looking up at my window.”

Goldstein was less enamored of Bohm than he was of her, and the relationship soon fizzled. Later in life, she would become world famous under her married name, Betty Friedan, as the author of “The Feminine Mystique” and a leading figure of Second Wave Feminism.

When America entered World War II in December 1941, everything changed. Oppenheimer was tapped to run the Manhattan Project, America’s effort to develop an atomic bomb before the Germans did. Many of Berkeley’s leading physicists relocated to Los Alamos, N.M., to work on the project. Bohm stayed in Berkeley and worked on his doctoral thesis, which included 82

Bohm didn’t realize it, but Pash’s investigation almost cost him his life.

Pash proposed to kidnap Bohm and the three other grad students and take them out in a boat to interrogate them “after the Russian manner,” meaning they wouldn’t be coming back. That was too much for the FBI, which squelched Pash’s plan. Instead of ending up on the bottom of San Francisco Bay wearing cement overshoes, Bohm spent the rest of the war on dry land in Berkeley, conducting groundbreaking research into the nature of plasma.

In Los Alamos, meanwhile, Oppenheimer’s team designed, built and successfully tested “the gadget,” which the Army Air Corps used to destroy Hiroshima and Nagasaki, bringing the war to a close. Now Oppenheimer was a national celebrity, lionized as “the father of the atomic bomb.”

Nolan’s film follows Oppenheimer’s postwar apotheosis as director of the Institute For Advanced Study at Princeton, which counted Albert Einstein among its illustrious members. David Bohm also landed at Princeton in 1947, not at Oppenheimer’s Institute but in the university’s physics department. When Oppenheimer invited America’s top physicists to gather at Shelter Island in New York in 1947 to discuss “the foundations of Quantum Mechanics,” Bohm was among them – and found himself unimpressed by his former Berkeley mentor.

“He didn’t sympathize with what I was doing in physics,” Bohm later told an Oppenheimer biographer. “I wanted to question fundamentals, and he felt that one should work on using the present theory, exploiting it and trying to work out OQ / WINTER 2023-24

its consequences.”

At Princeton, Bohm was befriended by Einstein, who agreed with him that quantum theory was incomplete and needed a radically new approach. If anyone succeeded in solving the problem, Einstein predicted, “it will be Bohm.”

But most leading physicists rejected Bohm’s approach, even as they admitted that they could not technically refute it.

“If we cannot disprove Bohm,” Oppenheimer is reported to have said, “then we must agree to ignore him.”

IN THE LATER part of his film, Nolan focuses on Oppenheimer’s epic encounter with McCarthyism in 1954, which resulted in the famous physicist being stripped of his security clearance by the Atomic Energy Commission. Among the accusations leveled at him during that hearing was that he had encouraged known Communists, including Bohm, to become involved in the Manhattan Project.

In real life, Bohm by that point had already been through the McCarthyite mill. His ordeal began in April 1950 when he was subpoenaed by the

House Committee on Un-American Activities, which was trying to identify “Scientist X,” a Berkeley physicist who during the war had given information about the Manhattan Project to a Soviet agent. Scientist X turned out to be Bohm’s friend Joe Weinberg, but Bohm refused to testify against him, or against any of his other Berkeley friends. As a result, he was arrested and charged with contempt of Congress. He eventually was found innocent, but nevertheless lost his job at Princeton.

He self-exiled himself to a university in Brazil, then moved on to one in Israel, and finally settled in Britain in 1957 as a researcher at the University of Bristol. In 1961, he was hired as a physics professor at Birkbeck College, University of London. That was also the year he began his long and fruitful collaboration with Krishnamurti.

JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI was born in Madanapalle in South India in 1895. When he was 14, Annie Besant, leader of the Theosophical Society, proclaimed him the future World Teacher, a messiah-like figure who would enlighten the world. When he was 34, he formally rejected that role, but nevertheless he spent the rest of his long life develop-

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could solve the Cartesian duality of mind and matter and help us to conceptualize and understand the physical universe at the quantum level,” Walker says.

Later in life, some disagreements arose between the two men, but they remained in contact. More than 100 of Bohm’s conversations with K were recorded over the years, and 34 of these recordings were transcribed for publication, providing the basis for four books, including “The Ending of Time.”

After Krishnamurti’s death in 1986, Bohm continued to travel to Ojai each year to conduct seminars at the Oak Grove School. An edited transcript of the 1990 seminar became his book “Thought As a System,” published posthumously.

At home in England on the evening of Oct. 26, 1992, Bohm and his wife, Saral, watched the videotape of the last of seven dialogues he had made with Krishnamurti some 16 years earlier.

“The subject was death and what may lie beyond,” Bohm’s biographer F. David Peat wrote, setting the scene. “Afterward he turned to Saral and said, ‘We should have gone on talking.’”

ing his philosophy and sharing it with audiences all around the world. Britain was one of his regular stops, and when he arrived there in 1961, he received a message that a physics professor named David Bohm wanted to meet him.

Bohm had read Krishnamurti’s book “The First and Last Freedom,” and had encountered K’s idea that “the observer is also the observed.” This resonated with the physicist.

“Like Einstein, Bohm felt that ‘God doesn’t play dice with the universe,’” Craig Walker says. “He began to question the traditional scientific view that the observer is separate from the observed and that mind is somehow different from matter. He began searching for a new paradigm, and this search led him to Krishnamurti.”

The two men hit it off, and they met regularly after that – often in Ojai, K’s home base, where Bohm was an almost-annual visitor starting in 1979. Many of Bohm’s physicist colleagues were scandalized by his intellectual association with the non-scientist Krishnamurti, but Bohm thought that K could help him resolve issues that science seemed incapable of explaining.

“Bohm felt there was something in Krishnamurti’s view of consciousness that 84

The next afternoon, Bohm was at his Birkbeck College office putting the finishing touches on a book he was writing with his friend Basil Hiley that would sum up his lifetime’s contributions to physics. About 6:15 p.m., he called Saral to say he was heading home in a taxicab.

“His work with Hiley had gone well, and his voice was bubbling with energy,” Peat wrote.

“You know, it’s tantalizing,” Bohm told his wife. “I feel I’m on the edge of something.”

An hour later, as the cab pulled up to his home, he died of a heart attack, at the age of 74.

Peat devoted the last words of his biography to a eulogy Bohm had written for an old friend some years earlier. Here’s how it ends: “The field of the finite is all that we can see, hear, touch, remember and describe. This field is basically manifest, or tangible. The essential quality of the infinite, by contrast, is its subtlety, its intangibility. This quality is conveyed in the word ‘spirit,’ whose root meaning is wind, or breath. This suggests an invisible but persuasive energy, to which the manifest world of the finite responds. This energy, or spirit, infuses all living beings, and without it any organism must fall apart into its constituent elements. That which is truly alive in the living being is this energy of spirit, and this is never born and never dies.”

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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STORY BY JERRY CAMARILLO DUNN, JR

minute I set foot in Italy, I feel a rush of happiness. It began back in the 1960s when I got to live in Florence for a delirious, sun-splashed spring and summer at Stanford’s overseas campus. A new world opened before my blinkered California-kid eyes — one filled with warm Italian people, Renaissance art, the world’s best food, a musical language, and natural beauty. Over the years I’ve returned to Florence again and again.

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CATHEDRAL OF SANTA MARIA DEL FIORE AT NIGHT

Maybe you’ve traveled there, too? I’m going to assume some familiarity on your part and talk about places in Florence that first-time tourists never see — places only “insiders” know about.

THE VASARI CORRIDOR The first of these three little-known discoveries is the most cerebral. It offers you the chance to walk in the footsteps of the most powerful family in Italian history. (And there’s a bonus if you love secret passages.) This is the Vasari Corridor, OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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VASARI CORRIDOR ART

an elevated passageway that zigzags unnoticed above the narrow streets of Florence’s historic center. It was built in 1564 by those Renaissance bigwigs, the Medici family, links two of their palaces, and is lined with more than one thousand paintings and other treasures.

VIEW FROM VASARI CORRIDOR

Powerful Grand Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici commissioned architect Giorgio Vasari to design the hidden passageway, primarily so that he and the royal family could move safely and unseen between his offices in the Uffizi and their lavish residence, the Palazzo Pitti. In this concealed corridor, commoners — and

VASARI CORRIDOR CROSSING

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assassins — couldn’t get to them.

Small windows enabled the Medicis to see what was going on in the streets below — let’s just call it spying — without being seen themselves. They crossed the Arno River via a section of passageway above Florence’s iconic Ponte Vecchio, or “Old Bridge.”

Today non-Medicis are allowed in the corridor, but only on guided tours. (These are scheduled to resume in 2024 after a years-long closure for renovations.)

The tour begins in the Uffizi Gallery, one of the world’s great art collections. Our small tour group skirted around the tourists waiting to enter. (Ha! So long, suckers!) Soon we were rambling through the gallery with our guide, Lucia Montuschi, an enthusiastic art historian with a Ph.D. from the University of Florence. She turned a key in the lock of an unmarked door — and there we stood in the Medicis’ secret passageway! (True insiders ...)

About 12 feet wide, the corridor stretched ahead of us for a kilometer, winning the award for “World’s Longest Museum Room.”

Its walls were hung with paintings from the 17th and 18th centuries, along with self-portraits by famous artists as recent as the 20th century.

First came pictures of the Medicis and hundreds of their friends. “Sort of like the Facebook of its day,” explained Lucia in charming English with an Italian lilt. The corridor was often a parade of Medicis and invited guests — along with servants who sometimes lugged the royals on their shoulders.

The passage that crosses the river overlooks shops lining the Ponte Vecchio. Lucia explained that the bridge was originally occupied by butchers, who used to toss garbage and offal into the river. The Medicis disliked the smell, so in 1665 they kicked the butchers off the bridge and decreed that henceforth, below Medici feet there would only be workers in precious materials: gold, silver, and gems. To this day, jewelers’ shops fill the bridge.

Portraits we passed on the gallery walls depicted serious men posing against dark backgrounds, only their faces and formal white collars spotlighted. Among the self-portraits, though, a few artists set themselves apart from the murky traditionalists.

I was knocked out by Albrecht Durer’s portrayal of himself at age 27, painted in crystalline detail with shoulder-length blond surfer hair and a knowing expression that implied a quite modern sense of irony. Twentieth-century painter Marc Chagall, who ached to have at least one painting hanging in the Uffizi, donated his own portrait.

The tour ended when we passed through a doorway and found ourselves outside near the Palazzo Pitti, among gardens with flowers and espaliered orange trees. And so our walk through the secret world of the Medicis ended with sunny natural beauty.

THE FERRAGAMO MUSEUM Next up in my trio of surprises was a change of pace. In fact, you might well ask: “What’s a manly man such as yourself, all biceps

PONTE VECCHIO/VASARI CORRIDOR NIGHT

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SALVATORE FERRAGAMO WITH STARS’ SHOE FORMS

SANDAL, JUDY GARLAND 1938

and testosterone, doing in a museum devoted to women’s shoes?”

My answer: Growing increasingly fascinated. Salvatore Ferragamo made shoes into art — and isn’t art what Florence is all about?

I think we all admire works of art that turn out beautifully despite rigid formal constraints. Take the sonnet; it’s an inflexible verse pattern (14 lines, 10 syllables per line), yet Shakespeare soared within its limitations. The same applies to a shoe. Its constraints are dictated by the size, shape, and comfort of the human foot. Yet an artist who has “sole” can vary its design endlessly through materials, colors, textures, and workmanship.

FERRAGAMO PLATFORM

The Museo Ferragamo, housed in a private palace built in 1289, displays the impeccably made footwear of company founder Salvatore Ferragamo.

In 1914 he left Italy for America, working in Boston in a cowboy boot factory (!). He relocated west to Santa Barbara and then to Hollywood, where he became known as the “Shoemaker to the Stars.”

Troubled that women’s shoes were so often uncomfortable, he studied anatomy at USC, an education that led him to design a patented metal rod inside the sole that would securely support the arch. Ferragamo also invented cork wedges, classics of design you’ll see at the museum.

INDIRA DEVI SHOE

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Other shoes on view include Judy Garland’s 1938 platform sandals of colored suede with gold straps. As a fan of Audrey Hepburn, I liked seeing a pair of red high heels that her feet had actually touched.

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But Ferragamo’s most unforgettable client was Indira Devi, the Maharani of Cooch Behar. In the 1930s, the Indian princess ordered as many as a hundred pairs of shoes at a time, shipping Ferragamo her personal gemstones — emeralds, diamonds, rubies — to add sparkle to her fashionable footwear.

On a recent trip I figured the best place to start was the Etruscan wing of the town’s archaeological museum — but I was waylaid by the sight of fresh pasta in the museum café. My window table overlooked an ancient Roman amphitheater and hills covered with cypress trees and olive groves.

When I visited, a special exhibition hall was devoted to Marilyn Monroe, and frankly I expected a load of fluff. Instead, the show offered a penetrating look at Marilyn’s public image and private self, often through handwritten diary entries that were surprisingly smart, pithy, and poetic. I learned that her poses were sometimes based on famous statues and paintings, which she studied diligently in art books or learned from photographers versed in classical work.

This, I thought, is how Italy is supposed to look. Over the years, the same timeless view has enchanted everyone from Boccaccio to Marcel Proust and Frank Lloyd Wright.

In one inspired exhibit, a wall-size projected image of Botticelli’s famous 1486 painting, “The Birth of Venus,” faded back and forth with a photograph of Marilyn standing in an identical pose.

Spanning centuries, it was original and creative — like all fine art.

FIESOLE I discovered the third of my unexpected Florentine trio when I was a college student. We all lived in a former monastery that stood along the road to Fiesole. Since the 14th century, this tiny town in the hills above Florence has been renowned for its views and the elegant villas of wealthy Florentines. The site was first settled before Roman days by the legendary Etruscans, who arrived about 600 B.C.

The Etruscans were master artists, and in the museum I admired urns and a bronze she-wolf unearthed nearby, along with carved sandstone funeral columns, votive statuettes, and a tiny bronze owl. (Invading Romans would later “borrow” the Etruscans’ expertise in metallurgy.)

Under atmospheric clouds, I wandered in the Roman amphitheater, which once seated 3,000 people. I passed sunken baths from the 1st century A.D. — partly overgrown, as respectable ruins should be.

After a few days of elbowing my way through the modern throngs of tourists in Florence, Fiesole gave me breathing room, a sense of ancient days, a quiet pause among green hills.

And there you have it: three places that will make you a Florence “insider.” Please toast them with a glass of Chianti when you go.

(Getting there and more information, next page.)

FIESOLE’S ROMAN AMPHITHEATER

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COMPASS POINTS (aka Leonardo da Vinci) Airport. Once in Rome, catch a connecting flight or fast train to Florence.

and an illustrated history of Ferragamo and his shoes.

The boutique next to the museum sells reproductions of classic Ferragamo shoes as well as current styles.

GETTING AROUND ➞ If you plan to tour the towns and

FIESOLE ➞ The #7 bus departs for the 20-minute trip

GETTING THERE ➞ Flights from LAX go to Fiumicino

countryside of Tuscany or Umbria before reaching Florence, pick up a rental car at the Rome airport (not in the busy city itself, unless you’re Mario Andretti).

I usually reserve with AutoEurope (www.autoeurope. com) for price and convenience.

from Florence’s Piazza San Marco or from the bus station next to the Santa Maria Novella train station.

Tours, taxis, and limos also go to Fiesole. The Roman amphitheater stages summer concerts and plays.

VASARI CORRIDOR ➞ Has been closed for renovations

few steps from the famous Duomo Cathedral through vrbo.com, which has offerings in every neighborhood.

Rome: You’ll probably end up here before flying home.

For its handy location and Art Deco style, I stayed at the Hotel Mediterraneo (www.romehotelmediterraneo. it/en), a two-minute walk from Termini Station, whose Leonardo Express train makes the 32-minute trip to the airport every 15 minutes.

but scheduled (perhaps with Italian optimism) to reopen in May 2024. For updates: www.uffizi.it/en/corridoio-vasariano.

MUSEO FERRAGAMO ➞ Piazza Santa Trinita, museo. ferragamo.com/en. The web site includes virtual tours

WHERE TO STAY ➞ Florence: I booked an apartment a

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STORY BY ROBIN GERBER

PSYCHEDELIC HEALING MUSHROOMS

2012, Judith (not her real name) was engrossed in a business that suited her background in the arts. She had translated her creativity into pastries, and ran a cafe at the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco where her baked goods were inspired by the art on display. Children were on the horizon when without warning or any sign of the characteristic bulls-eye rash, Lyme disease took over Judith’s world. She gradually went from a high-energy businesswoman to near-total collapse.

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In 2019, after her two children were born, she and her husband moved to Ojai. But her disease kept getting worse. Her memory went haywire. Aphasia affected her speech, her ability to understand words, and even her writing. Fatigue overwhelmed her. Judith says, “I felt like all the beauty and calm went out of my life.”

Several years of failed therapy went by. “I was desperate,” Judith

remembers. “I took radical responsibility for my health. Diet, sleep, stress, mold.” Then one day, when a mold-test had forced her into an Airbnb, Judith found a stack of books that changed her life. They weren’t about Lyme disease. They were about human consciousness.

The quest for clarity, for spiritual one-ness with the Universe is as old as humanity. The Chumash natives who held ceremonies

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cybin, mescaline, cocaine, AMT and DMT fell under the inquiring minds of research labs, and into the party brains of a Sixties Generation reveling in sex, drugs and rockand-roll. After all, the Harvard psychologist Timothy Leary thought everyone should be on ‘acid.’

But Leary ended up in jail, and government crack-downs on psychedelic drugs began with LSD in 1966. The following year’s Summer of Love saw hippies taking psychedelic trips in Libbey Park and local teens banging their heads bloody on Ojai Avenue lamp posts after taking Jimson Weed. Then came the Controlled Substances Act, passed in 1970 on the heels of killer Charles Manson and his followers’ use of LSD. Research on psychedelics went into a cold turkey underground with many psychedelics labeled “Schedule 1” drugs. That designation tucked psychedelics next to heroin, methaqualone, and other drugs considered likely to be abused, and have no accepted medical use. By the 1980s no one was openly researching the uses of psychedelics for therapy. at Whale Rock in the East End believed, along with many indigenous people world-wide, that ‘medicine’ treated not just illness of mind or body, but also the spirit. Wellness for one person increased the wellness of the community. Healing came from native plants, as well as prayer, music, dancing and spiritual practices. The beautiful Datura Wrightii or Jimson Weed, with its generous leaves and striking white trumpet flower sent young natives on psychedelic maturation journeys

Enter the ‘third wave’ of psychedelic exploration, as one young Ojai entrepreneur calls it. Robert, (not his real name) a 20-something Ojai native became interested in fungi when a friend brought him along to forage for culinary mushrooms. He was inspired to learn as much as he could about the mushroom kingdom, and has made himself expert on their medicinal effects.

where visions of hawks or coyotes were prized.

Robert sees the future moving toward legal psychedelics. He has trained as a coach for people who are taking small amounts of psylocibin and other currently banned substances therapeutically.

Fast-forward to April 19, 1943 when Swiss scientist Albert Hofman discovered through an accident that a derivative of ergot rye fungus, lysergic acid diethyl amide, or LSD, provoked hallucinations. From there, other psychoactive drugs like psilo-

He works with therapists who refer him to patients who are doing “micro-dosing,” which involves a dose of plant medicine that does not produce a perceptual effect on the person’s state of conscious-

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COLLEEN REID AT WORK

ness. Robert has clients from Ojai to New York. He also supports “Decriminalize Nature,” an organization that hopes to make all plant-based medicines legal.

State laws in Oregon and Colorado have already made that goal a reality, although there are tight restrictions. Governor Gavin Newsom recently vetoed a bill to decriminalize psychedelic mushrooms, but he won’t be able to hold back the fungal tide.

Much like the marijuana industry, we’ll likely be seeing bars, gummies, pills and tinctures, made from currently banned psychedelics, in our future.

Chelsea Sutula, owner of the marijuana dispensary Sespe Creek, has vivid memories of being raided and jailed in 2016, the night before marijuana became legal in California. She sees micro-dosing, as “the new normal with mushrooms.” As she looks to expand her store she’s staying in close touch with the plant medicine underground that’s poised to go legit.

Richard (not his real name) is in a ‘psychedelic adjacent’ business.

He uses locally sourced legal plants for various products. Rumor has it there are also about half a dozen local underground mushroom growers who source psychedelics for therapeutic, ceremonial or recreational use.

Richard, carrying deep knowledge of the various plants that produce hallucinogenic effects, says, “We share 40 percent of our DNA with mushrooms, which are keystone plants. Their spores are throughout the universe.” He believes the plants demand respect, and frowns on recreational use. “Ego is attached to culture, self is attached to nature,” he explains. It’s a comparison that many in the plant-based medicine world make in various ways.

People in the valley who are using psychedelics mostly do so

through ceremonies. These happen in small groups, usually at local homes, sometimes overnight with a guide experienced in the use of the plant medicine being taken.

Colleen Reid is a Grof Breathwork® facilitator, which is a modality that uses specially designed music, a unique setting, and the breath to induce psychedelic-like journeys. She explains that,“there are three stages of the psychedelic ceremony: Preparation (which does not have a set timeframe, it depends on the person), Experience (which is what happens during the ceremony when the person is feeling the effects of the medicine), and Integration (which happens in stages, and can begin immediately after the experience, and continues for days, weeks, sometimes months afterwards, to help integrate the experience into the person’s everyday life).

‘Set and setting’ are also considered critical to successful ceremonies. ‘Set’ refers to the mindset, mood or mental state that someone is in when they take the medicine. ‘Setting’ is the physical environment, including everything from the objects in a room to the weather, social interactions and attitudes toward expanding consciousness. Timothy Leary’s “turn on, tune in, drop out” mantra” from the ’60s is not as simple as it sounds.

Sarah (not her real name) a gray-haired grandmother with dancing eyes and a bright smile, feels her work and life are transformed by plant medicine. She’s an artist who settled in Ojai 12 years ago, and creates work that can be seen in installations and galleries around the country.

In 2005, Sarah’s now ex-husband had been doing Ayahuasca. It’s a smelly, strong-tasting reddish brown drink — a blend made from the yagé vine and Psychotria viridis, a centuries-old plant-

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based psychedelic from South America. Sarah had no interest in it. She had never done drugs, but after she moved to Ojai a body worker invited her to do psychedelics. “I felt a calling,” Sarah says, “and I thought, ‘I’m ready to do this.’”

Her former boyfriend had been telling her she was critical and judgmental, and she didn’t agree. But in the grip of Ayahuasca she heard her voice in her head. She was being critical about seeing helium balloons in pastel colors. “I don’t like pastels,” Sarah says. “These were baby blues, and they were spinning and they were making me dizzy and I said ‘I don’t like this. I don’t understand what I’m seeing,’ and then there was a reptilian alienlike person who said, ‘I’m here to help’ and it was like he was teaching me a language, and the balloons had symbols like an ancient language. He was trying to teach me in the gentlest, kindest way.

When Sarah woke up the next day she wrote it all down. She realized she did have a critical voice and it was getting in the way of being present. “I was not experiencing what was happening because I was being so judge-y,” Sarah concluded.

Sarah has taken Ayahuasca 14 times, despite the discomfort of the vomiting and diarrhea it induces. “It feels like a purge, a physical reset,” she explains. She has been to other planets, saw her own death and had a hematoma on her spleen disappear after hearing during a session that she had “some surgery.” She remembers a moment of enlightenment where she felt she understood everything in the universe.

Sarah started hosting ceremonies in her house with a curandera or healer and seven to 10 women. “We had the most heart-opening beautiful things happen.”

ing modality that can be as powerful as psychedelics.

Colleen explains that it’s the non-ordinary state of being that is healing, not any particular method of reaching that state. She talks about the moment where, “the sense of a separate self dissolves into cosmic consciousness.” This ultimate mystical experience, and many other transpersonal experiences, can be accessed by means of countless modalities, not just breathwork and plant medicine. Meditation, yoga, drum circles, vision quests, sweat lodges and other native ceremonies can bring profound shifts in identity. It can even happen spontaneously.

With Colleen’s help, Judith began somatic and subconscious work to heal the trauma she was holding inside. She does ‘journeys’ every six to nine months and micro-doses three times each week, along with meditation and devotional chanting. “I’m finding God within,” Judith says. Her Lyme symptoms have disappeared.

Ojai’s fame as a place for healing, spirituality and unconventional approaches make it a welcoming home for this third wave of enlightenment work. Grof Legacy Training USA, the new gold-standard program designed to train facilitators in both Grof Breathwork® and psychedelic facilitation, has chosen Ojai as one of its primary training locations. Colleen Reid will be working with them in a teaching and facilitating capacity. Psychedelic coaching training is gaining popularity with programs across the country. As the world becomes more unstable and frightening, more and more people are searching within for expanded consciousness and healing. Plant medicine’s gradual legalization is sure to further shift and expand consciousness in our valley of the moon. Stay tuned.

(Note that many interviewees wished to remain anonymous because of the current illegality of plant medicines)

Sarah had been deep-diving into her consciousness years before Judith stood in her Airbnb shuffling through books on “non-ordinary states of consciousness” and still hoping to shed the effects of Lyme disease.

The owner of the house was Colleen Reid, the breathwork facilitator. She told Judith that we all have an innate healing capacity; we can heal from the inside.

“I had never used alcohol or done any kind of drug,” Judith says, “but I understood that what was being offered could be like 10 years of therapy in one session.” She started working with Colleen using breathwork.

Colleen was a student of Stan Grof, the pioneer of psychedelic psychotherapy who popularized holotropic breathwork as a heal100

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themudlotus.com

STORY AND PHOTOS BY CHUCK GRAHAM

abruptly at 2 a.m. during a heavy winter storm on February 23, 2023. Knowing the storm was coming, I anticipated its arrival leaving me sleepy-eyed but determined to get where I needed to be. I grabbed my pup Owen, food, water, sleeping bag and pad, and threw everything into my van. My camera gear was already packed and ready to go. I just had to figure out a way to get to the Carrizo Plain National Monument.

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MIGRATING SANDHILL CRANES CALIENTE MOUNTAINS — CARRIZO PLAIN — FEB 25, 2023

DARK-EYED JUNCO

BELDING SAVANNAH SPARROW OQ / WINTER 2023-24

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HIGHWAY 58 — FEB 25, 2023

ABANDONED CAR — HWY 58 — FEB 25, 2023

PHOTO RIGHT: TEMBLOR RANGE - CARRIZO PLAIN

The winter of 2022-’23 was a memorable season of many tempests, but this storm was like no other. Freezing rain on the coast where I live in Carpinteria, meant snow would blanket the mountains yet again. For this storm snow levels dropped to 500 feet in elevation, so I was banking on a decent amount of snow out on the grassland biome. I just had to get there, but how?

I wanted to experience winter’s fury at one of my favorite wild places, but reaching the semi-arid grasslands was going to be a challenge. My usual route is my most favorite; the slow, winding Highway 33 out of Ojai was closed. Earlier in the winter, storms had washed out lower sections of Highway 33, making it impassable just beyond Matilija. I always boast that I can drive from Carpinteria to the Carrizo Plain without enduring a stoplight.

Not on this occasion, so I was forced to drive north on Highway 101, hoping to access Highway 166 out of Santa Maria.

NARROWING OPTIONS At 2:30 a.m. there was hardly anyone on Highway 101. As Owen sat next to me, I could hear him whimpering softly due to the torrential rains pelting my van. As we approached Santa Maria, the signage for Highway 166 was grim. The road was closed, so I continued north.

When I arrived in Santa Margarita, I was shocked to see the sleepy town covered in snow. The beginning of Highway 58 was open, so there was a glimmer of hope. However, those hopes were quickly dashed where Interstate 229 and Highway 58 converged. The 58 was closed, so I had no choice but try the 229.

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After a few miles I was thwarted again by a fallen oak tree.

When I returned where the 229 and 58 converged, I told myself to “go for it and drive through the road closure.”

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SODA LAKE ROAD — CARRIZO PLAIN - FEB 25, 2023

CALIENTE — SELBY ROADS — FEB 25, 2023

It wasn’t long before I saw why the 58 was closed. It was completely snowed in, and yet, my new all-wheel-drive van continued plowing through the snow. However, Highway 58 was no more than a narrow single lane at that point. There were also plenty of abandoned cars alongside the road, huge snowdrifts

engulfing and even burying some hapless vehicles. Some of the blind turns I fishtailed through, but once I rolled past Shell Creek Road, I felt like the worst of it was behind me.

Still, after emerging from the La Panza Range, I saw the Carrizo

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THE HISTORIC SAUCITO RANCH AT THE BASE OF THE CALIENTES

Plain in the distance. There was lots of water, some of it fast-moving into the road. I wanted to drive faster but it would’ve been a mistake. I had to be sure on the road, so I slowed to a crawl. A snowplow vehicle turned onto Highway 58 just in front of me, but it was also heading toward Soda Lake Road. It was a gift as the snowplow literally scooped the road clean of snow, water, and debris. I got right behind him, driving faster toward Soda Lake Road, a huge sheet of moisture cresting like an 8-foot-tall wave off the passenger side of my van.

Soda Lake Road is the main road through the Carrizo Plain, but it was closed, too. It was 7 a.m. at that point, as I grew anxious.

No one was around, so I just moved a couple orange cones out of my way and continued southeast. The two-lane road, though, was under snow and water as well. It, too, was slow going, but it forced me to look around at the winter wonderland that was unfolding around me. Property owners living on the plain endured much flooding. The fortunate ones were living on “grassland islands” surrounded in water, snow, and that gooey, impenetrable alkali mud.

A POTPOURRI OF ATMOSPHERIC ELEMENTS Nature can be so unpredictable and ephemeral at times. I didn’t know what to expect on the Carrizo Plain, but I was thoroughly surprised. Those semi-arid grasslands just required a little weather. Once I reached Soda Lake, I had to stop and soak it all in.

The entire plain along with the Temblor Range to the east and the 106

PAINTED ROCK — CARRIZO PLAIN OQ / WINTER 2023-24

AMERICAN AVOCETS — SODA LAKE

TULE ELK — CALIENTE MOUNTAINS

Caliente Mountains to the west were smothered in fresh snow.

Tule fog hung below the Temblors, but above the plain. Still, dark gray storm clouds clung to the tops of both mountain ranges above the sweeping plain. There were moments throughout the morning when it was difficult to tell the mountains from the sky as they appeared to meld into one. Seventeen years of photographing these stunning grasslands, and I’ve never seen snow blanket this incredible habitat like this before.

Soda Lake itself had sheets of ice floating across its shallows. The alkali tarn was brimming, and despite how frigid it was, migratory American avocets foraged the shoreline, tiptoeing through crunchy snow. Not to be dismayed by the blanket of snow spanning across the grasslands, dark-eyed juncos, horned larks, and savannah sparrows probed a little deeper to gather seedlings for the winter. Ever-present ravens did the same, using their long black beaks like swords to pierce the snow, snowflakes flung in all directions.

The historic Saucito Ranch at the base of the Calientes appeared like a ranch on the plains of Kansas, and Painted Rock was utterly stunning to marvel at.

The gritty sandstone cathedral was splattered in snow, something I had never seen before. Above it all was a herd of tule elk browsing the rolling ridgetop of the Calientes. They traversed the ridge, steadily moving in a southerly direction. Twice, while walking out toward another herd of tule elk and a flock of migratory America

CALIENTE RANGE

avocets, I almost lost my trail shoes and sandals on each attempt.

The mud was so gooey, I literally came out of my footwear both times, nearly swallowed up by the dense mud.

By noon the snow had nearly vanished from the grasslands. Earlier in the day, it was difficult to imagine such lush green growth lying hidden beneath what looked like Arctic tundra. By late afternoon elongated shadows retreated into the mountains as sunset approached. However, cooler temps also arrived, allowing the Calientes and the Temblors to hang onto their snow a bit longer, elevations ranging from 3,700 to 5,100 feet.

I was hanging on as well, soaking in a rare, fleeting winter moment on the Carrizo Plain National Monument, one of the most extreme weather events I’ve ever experienced throughout the semi-arid grassland ecosystem.

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VENTURA County Fairgrounds

Swap MEET Every Wednesday 7am to 2pm

Free Parking $2.00 Admission Antiques • Collectibles

Farmer’s Market

Vendor Space Available For Information Call Sue Adams

818.590.5435

10 West 108

HARBOR www.snaauctions.com

Boulevard

OQ / WINTER 2023-24

OQ | EV ENTS CA L ENDA R december - january - february

MUSEUM’S ‘OJAI MYSTIQUE’ | TO MARCH 4 | OjaiValleyMuseum.com TO DECEMBER 10

Joseph Albers, Max Bill and John McLaughlin Exhibit Location: canvas and paper 311 North Montgomery Street Times: Thursday to Sunday.

Contact: canvasandpaper.org 805-798-9301 Free admission for this show of works by Josef Albers, artist and educator, who taught at Bauhaus and Black Mountain College, as well as Max Bill, Swiss polymath and minimalist pioneer John McLaughlin.

TO MARCH 4

Ojai Mystique Location: Ojai Valley Museum, 130 West Ojai Avenue Times: Friday to Sunday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Contact: 805-640-1390 OjaiValleyMuseum.org This special exhibit features 21 nationally renowned artists with their interpretations of one place, Ojai.

DECEMBER 9

MJ Lenderman & Karly Hartzman Location: Ojai Deer Lodge 2261 Maricopa Hwy Time: 8 p.m.

Contact: DeerLodgeOjai.com 805-646-4256 Karly Hartzman (of Wednesday) & MJ

MJ LENDERMAN & KARLY HARTZMAN | DECEMBER 9 | DeerLodgeOjai.com

OJAI PODCAST | THURSDAYS | OjaiHub.com

Lenderman share a special duo performance at the Deer Lodge. Presented by ((folkYEAH!))) & Tierra Sol.

from the area’s proudest collectors. Have a chance to learn from the owners about the history and importance of some of the world’s most incredible automobiles.

DECEMBER 28 Nick Waterman

Location: Ojai Deer Lodge 2261 Maricopa Hwy Time: 8 p.m.

Contact: DeerLodgeOjai.com 805-646-4256 (((folkYEAH!))) & Tierra Sol present Nick Waterhouse, a modern American singer-songwriter who recently released his new album, “Fooler.”

— RECURRING EVENTS — DEC-JANUARY-FEBRUARY

Historical Walking Tours of Ojai Date: Every Saturday Time: 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

Location: Ojai Valley Museum 130 West Ojai Avenue.

Contact: 640-1390 Come see why there’s so much historical hullabaloo about the “smiling vale.”

DEC 10, JAN 14, FEB 11

Coffee & Cars Dates: Second Sundays of the month Times: 8 to 10 a.m.

Location: Westridge Market parking lot Come check out classic and luxury cars OQ / WINTER 2023-24

MONDAYS Shakespeare Reading Salon — every 1st and 3rd Monday Times: 7 to 9 p.m.

Location: Ojai Main Library, 111 East Ojai Avenue Contact: Laurie at 805-646-3733 ojaibard@gmail.com Join our lively reading and discussion.

Whether you like to read aloud or just listen, everyone is welcome! Drop in and join the fun. We read and discuss Shakespeare’s plays. For beginners as well as lifelong enthusiasts.

THURSDAYS

Ojai: Talk of the Town Podcast New episodes come out Thursday evenings through the OjaiHub.com newsletter. Guests have included Malcolm McDowell on the 50th anniversary of “A Clockwork Orange,” and Sergio Aragonés on his 60 years as a cartoonist at Mad Magazine. With more than 170 episodes, the Ojai podcast has become an important part of the local conversation. Sign up at OjaiHub.com for a free newsletter of Ojai events, news, arts, entertainment, history and culture. And podcasts.

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THE BUS TO HEAVEN A Housewife’s Log

BY SAMI ZAHRINGER

date is today, but for some souls it is the start of all Eternity. When a soul gets to Heaven — and the truth is almost everyone gets into Heaven no matter what you might have heard — everybody automatically knows to form an orderly line at the Pearly Gates.

There is no unseemly jostling and nobody’s feet hurt while they stand and wait. Nobody’s feet will ever hurt again. Right outside the gates the souls will gather to be given leaflets by the Welcoming Angel Committee, and pick up the celestial instrument of their choice — usually harp or trumpet. Today, despite the fact there is no today (weird but you get used to it), there was a small contingent of souls in from the greater Ojai area. They didn’t know each other but nodded and smiled shyly.

“Dead, too, eh? Bummer. Ahahaha.”

“Well, here we all are!” said the soul formerly known as Arthurette McKechnie (67, ruptured-gall bladder) If you’ve been prone to say the bleedingly obvious all your life I’m afraid that doesn’t go away when you’re dead. “If I’d known I was going to die today I wouldn’t have done a big grocery shop. I would have had that donut though. I’d have had two.”

“Is this deadness then?” asked a small girl, Kimmy (age nine, swallowed a bee at a birthday party) “Do we get to meet God?” “Yes, child,” said a novice angel kindly. Standard issue angel: halo, wings, nothing fancy so as not to frighten the new arrivals.

The really freaky angels are inside the gates. “You will meet Him in due course.”

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“I have a lot of questions!” said Kimmy.

“Ha ha ha, I’m sure you do!” said the kind angel.

“Does God eat? Does he like pizza?”

“Ha ha ha!” ha-ha’d the angel.

“The creeping things that creepeth over the earth are gross,” declared Kimmy. “And I don’t think amoebas should be that small.

They should be plum-sized and friendly and not cause diarrhea.

And couldn’t He have come up with a better waste-management strategy than everything just pooping all the time? Does He poo? Where?”

“Well…” said the angel uncertainly, looking around for help.

“Actually, that’s very interest… would you mind if I jump in here on that one, Angel?” said an older, hairier angel. “You see, my child, its all to do with conservation of matter and the circle of…”

“WHY,” interrupted Kimmy, “Why, that one time in the Old Testament did God purge people who were as nought in his sight by smiting them, burning their dwellings to the ground, OQ / WINTER 2023-24

The Ojai souls boarded.

“Whoa! Look what I scored!” said a young man (19, former dish-washing associate at a well-known Ojai vegan hang) who said his name was ‘Brian, Call Me Niff.’ “They let me pick out my own own heavenly instrument and I got a 1968 Fender harp with WICKED pick-ups!

He lurched, grinning, to the back of the bus and started shredding on his

harp.

“Christ!” said Arthurett, then quickly crossed herself hoping nobody had heard her blasphemy.

and salting the ground where they stood, yea unto the fifth generation?”

“Erm…”

“And while we’re at it,” piped up a louche young man called Lance (27, yogurt poisoning) “Going carbon-based with the life-forms seems a tad obvious, no?”

The hairy angel frowned and lowered his voice, “Look, you do know he moves in mysterious ways, right? His wonders to perform? And you are aware that Humanity’s tragic flaw is that it cannot overcome its narrow provinciality to act collectively and save itself. So it’s all your own fault! You’re hardly in a position to be nitpicking God’s perfect Creation!”

“But He set us up to fail with the Original Sin and Free Will!” said Lance.

And…” Little Kimmy again. “Why did He cause somebody to call Smokey the Bear, Smokey, when smoke is exactly what he’s trying to prevent? It’s like having Flatline the Surgeon or Cavity the Dentist or…”

“What? Smokey what now? Urm…” The angel, now frowning quite seriously, led the small girl away and slipped her an ambrosia lollipop to shut her up while he thought.

“Oh look, here’s the bus!” said the novice angel, in tones of clear relief. “Have you all picked out your instruments? Good. Now please board. You will be met at your assigned cloud by some demons. No, hahahaha! Just my little joke! More angels, of course!”

The hairier angel suppressed an uncharitable eye-roll. He’s been hearing that joke for 74,003 years now.

“Dude! Speaking of Christ, did you guys, like, see Him back there at the gates?” said Brian/Niff. “I mean damn, Gina, he’s high-key SNATCHED AF with these Air Jordans! He’s on fleek, no cap! Like, slaps, man! Realness!”

“Who’s Gina?” whispered Arthurette.“Why is he talking like that?”

“Whoa!” said Briony (38, former alive person and biochemistry professor. Fell in an experiment and drowned) “That was Jesus? In the white and gold tracksuit with the backwards baseball cap and the gold iPhone 15 Pro Max with titanium trim? Wow! I mean, yeah, he looks sharp and I know he’s going to be 33 for all eternity but I guess I was expecting something more, I don’t know, humble? He’s kinda hot! But heaven’s not what I expected at all. I thought it would be more like one of those parties where waiters walk around with silver trays full of champagne glasses and that I, wearing a sparkling full length gown with matching cigarette holder would solve the case when someone’s diamond necklace inevitably goes missing.”

Well,” piped up Eduardo (59) a small dapper former psychologist, “We will be taken clothes shopping when we get to our final cloud.

“The only choices are white and dark white, which is a blow because white’s always made my waist look thick but I believe everything is very well-tailored and easily adaptable to our wings.”

“Whoa, skrt! We’re really getting wings?” said Brian/Niff. “That slaps! I thought that was just some Sunday school shit to make

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us think angels aren’t boring and cheugy and, like, really basic or whatever!”

“Well.” said Eduardo, “Obviously, they don’t want to give them to us before we get on the bus because we wouldn’t all fit. They’re quite big apparently and you can get hypoallergenic ones if you’re feather-intolerant.”

The whole bus silently marveled at that for a minute. You had to hand it to Heaven. Everyone marveled that is, except Arthurette: “I don’t know about all this. These work-angels gluing missing pearls onto the Pearly Gates were not even using real pearls. I really expected more from Heaven. And, frankly, I’m not happy about the company. There are some people here that I’m amazed got in. Earlier, I saw Liberace for pity’s sake! I thought it would be much more exclusive. It looks suspiciously like you don’t even HAVE to believe in a 2,000 year old story about a virgin birth, and rising from the dead after three days with no apparent ill effects apart from some gaping wounds and being a bit pale.“This will all be going into my Yelp review.”

“Or Warty the Dermatologist!” piped up Kimmy, still annoyed about Smokey the Bear.

“Cost of living crisis, ain’t it? It’s hitting all over.” said a gloomy looking man. “Or cost of dying crisis ha ha,” he chuckled mirthlessly.

“How about you?” said Arthurette, peering doubtfully at the man the way a vegan might look at a half-eaten caterpillar in her salad. He had the battered look of a mislaid potato that had been kicked around a stable yard by a horse for a week.

“Well, I’m Don and I was an actor. I was on all the big soaps back in the day but the work dried up as my looks did so I took whatever I could get. In my final role I played a really happy person with mild to moderate urinary incontinence in a prescription drug advert, but the director kept urging me to be happier.

“No, we need more elation! Remember you have just been freed from a really bad case of mild to moderate urinary incontinence and now you can wear white shorts again and confidently ride bicycles and be free! I want to see all the glee of a man who is certain his undercarriage is under control. If you nail this I’ve got a toenail fungus pill advert for you next week.”

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“But don’t we risk giving false hope to people suffering from very real and distressing health problems, and anyway didn’t all the mouse tests show the pills don’t even work?” I asked. ‘“Look…” he hissed, his face so close to mine I could smell his Tuff Boi Alpha Facial Serum. Well, I suppose something snapped in me then. Snapped very quietly but very completely.

I walked off the set and, in an unemployed despair I have never known went to sit and look at some seagulls in Westridge parking lot. Then, out of nowhere, or Westridge, a miracle came into my life! Her name is Wendy. She’s a kindergarten teacher and was slightly nervous,because she’d been locked in the cupboard by some 6-year-olds earlier. We shared a club sandwich right there at the picnic table beside the trolleys and talked of life and love and sea urchins and stars. We both professed a dislike of religious fundamentalism and auto-erotic asphyxiation and a love of secular fundamentalism and corn and we agreed to have dinner that very night.

We parted, giggling and awkward, neither of us wanting to say goodbye and just then I was run over by a reversing S-model Tesla.

It’s really too bad because this was the year I’d finally started to take my writing seriously. I’d just self-published “Ponies of Chaos” on Amazon and then… unexpected death. Just my luck.

Who knows now if it could have ever been a New York Times bestseller. Studies say that the success of a book depends on its first three sentences, and, I mean, it starts out strong: ‘I am Vengeance! I am The Night! I am A Pony of Chaos!” in italics like that, and continues very much along that vein. You’ve got to admit that’s strong, right? I worked really hard on these. I also use “countenance” as a verb a lot and, well, that really works with the top literary prize judges, doesn’t it? So, in lieu of cards and flowers at my funeral, I have asked mourners to read my “Ponies of Chaos” (I do really think of them as MY Ponies now. I know!

Writers! So silly!) and leave me an honest review.

“You know you are just going to get pity reviews, don’t you?” said louche Lance (27, yogurt-poisoning) looking like a deep-sea fish that somehow got into a leather suit.

With his legs crossed and both arms stretched out over the back of the bus seat he projected “young, heedless 1920s playboy of ambiguous sexuality, cultivating an intense weariness of his shalOQ / WINTER 2023-24

low, dull bus-mates.” Everyone hated him on sight. Or wanted to but couldn’t because hate isn’t possible in heaven. Irritation however is rampant.

“Is scathing allowed in Heaven?” said Arthurette. “I mean I expected some bellowing from on high and a few Godly tantrums but I hadn’t thought scathing would be a thing. From God maybe. The Bible says he’s a jealous and vengeful God. Although also, weirdly, kind and loving? But I didn’t think we, the Saved, would be allowed to be scathing. Actually, that might be quite helpful. How did you die, Lance?” she asked coldly.

“Because life is an endless drudgery and struggle and the most brilliant people have their light extinguished by omnicidal capitalism,” said Lance, “I started cutting myself off from society and not grocery shopping and getting quite hungry. I had a couple of antediluvian yogurts left and, figured that as time is just an illusion anyway, that the out-of-dateness of the yogurt shouldn’t matter. Well, I hadn’t remembered to factor in the properties of our temporal plane which it turns out are actually quite real indeed.

Hours, maybe days of delirium passed but finally I crawled out to the street, fell into a coma, and was found by a postman who took me to the hospital. Apparently, my vitals made a weak hop the next morning but my end of life directive said “Do not resuscitate before Noon” so I missed my brief window to be brought back.”

The ensuing battle will no doubt be recorded elsewhere but over the coming weeks it involved Makita chop-saws, traffic cones, camouflage boxer shorts and Barnett Predator 415 titanium crossbow with StepThrough Riser technology.

Then the invitations went out for the birthday party of Paul’s daughter, Louisa (3). The neighborhood gasped as one when they saw the smoking, spitting fully operational model Vesuvius Paul had built in the suburban backyard. This is where I became a victim of dadding-gone-mad. I am — was — a Captain Jack Sparrow look-alike/balloon-bender hired for entertainment because the volcano was too unsafe for any of the children to actually get near it. All was going well right through the whiteglove service of the caviar and chocolate milk. But then the volcano started to make a dyspeptic sound of the sort you only really hear in tourist latrines in Bombay. Great gobs of boiling ketchup lava spewed across the garden threatening to cover the toddlers. With a massive bound I leapt from my balloon station to stand spread-eagled over the children and take the brunt of the blistering hot ketchup. I died right there in the garden of fourth-and-a-half degree burns.”

“Gee, Johnny, I mean James, that’s awful!” said Briony. “But you’re a hero, right, you know that? Listen, wanna get a nectar and maybe some manna after wing-fitting?”

The pale, haughty young man looked suddenly vulnerable and sad, like a leek with too many feelings. Arthurette regretted picking on him. Regret is real in Heaven too.

“Or Chastity the Sex-Worker!” chirped Little Kimmy and everybody felt uncomfortable.

Trying to break the awkward silence, Arthurette, now chagrined, gently asked the only person on the bus yet to speak how he had died. He looked very much like Johnny Depp.

“Hi. I’m James (43) and I was a victim of a birthday party arms race.

Competitive dadding is very real in Ojai but when it goes too far it can have tragic consequences. I am a tragic consequence.

It all started because Colin, a dad, had shared a picture of his

1-month-old-baby in a pumpkin for Halloween in the neighborhood instagram group. Paul, a dad from across the road, was irked because although he had spent $843 on fall decorations and put a massive rubber spider on the roof, he’d not thought of Instagramming his own much cuter baby in a pumpkin. (Point to Colin)

“Oh look!” cried Eduardo, “I think we’ve arrived at our cloud!”

Back at the Pearly Gates the hairier angel was still puzzling over little Kimmy’s questions.

“Do you think we need more training on the Welcoming Committee? Maybe we should have another group retreat to East Heaven. These souls are asking tougher and tougher questions every century.”

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ECLECTIC INSPIRATION The design of Pink Moment Estate is inspired by historic Ojai Spanish Colonial style, playful Balearic Islands villas, and modernist principles.

Clean lines, natural wood, neutral palette, arched passageways, monumental glass windows, and high ceilings create a home that is beautiful and bold. The oversize arches, walls of glass, and expansive wood beamed ceilings provide an almost monastic experience while soothing beiges, chalky whites, and all natural building materials throughout give the home a warm and timeless feel.

DRE# 01176473

(805) 340-3774

Over 25 years of experience matching people and property in the Ojai Valley

© 2023 Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties (BHHSCP) is a member of the franchise system of BHH Affiliates LLC. BHHS and the BHHS symbol are registered service marks of Columbia Insurance Company, a Berkshire Hathaway affiliate. BHH Affiliates LLC and BHHSCP do not guarantee accuracy of all data including measurements, conditions, and features of property. Information is obtained from various sources and will not be verified by broker or MLS. Buyer is advised to independently verify the accuracy of that information.

a Fe d re tu on Ba ck r ve Co

PINK MOMENT ESTATE

A luxury villa/vineyard estate providing the ultimate in architecture, design, craftmanship, and setting. Brand new construction of the 5100 sqft, 4br/5ba home is finished with the highest quality materials, appliances and fixtures. An H-shaped floorplan separates private sleeping areas from public social areas. The open living area includes a chef’s kitchen, a 2-sided fireplace, and a wine tasting room/library.

The grounds feature a 100% organic vineyard, pool/spa with epic views, and multiple courtyards and verandas to take full advantage of the spectacular natural setting.

2259McNellRoadOjai.com Offered at $10,750,000

I will help you find the home that brings peace to your mind and heart

www.pattywaltcher.com pattywaltcher@mac.com (805) 340-3774 DRE# 01176473

© 2023 Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties (BHHSCP) is a member of the franchise system of BHH Affiliates LLC. BHHS and the BHHS symbol are registered service marks of Columbia Insurance Company, a Berkshire Hathaway affiliate. BHH Affiliates LLC and BHHSCP do not guarantee accuracy of all data including measurements, conditions, and features of property. Information is obtained from various sources and will not be verified by broker or MLS. Buyer is advised to independently verify the accuracy of that information.

Over 25 years of experience matching people and property in the Ojai Valley

PINK MOMENT ESTATE

A modern, Mediterranean luxury villa and vineyard estate providing the ultimate in architecture, design, setting, views, and location. The brand new 5100 sqft, 4br/5ba, home is inspired by historic Ojai Spanish Colonial, playful Balearic Islands villas, and modernism. Includes marvelous landscaping, pool and spa, and a 100% organic vineyard. More information and photos available inside the magazine.

2259McNellRoadOjai.com Offered at $10,750,000 I will help you discover the home that brings peace to your mind and heart

w w w.patty waltc h er.com pa tt y waltc h er@mac .com (805) 3 40-37 74 DRE # 0117647 3

© 2023 Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties (BHHSCP) is a member of the franchise system of BHH Affiliates LLC. BHHS and the BHHS symbol are registered service marks of Columbia Insurance Company, a Berkshire Hathaway affiliate. BHH Affiliates LLC and BHHSCP do not guarantee accuracy of all data including measurements, conditions, and features of property. Information is obtained from various sources and will not be verified by broker or MLS. Buyer is advised to independently verify the accuracy of that information.