This painting, done around 1993, tells a lot about my childhood. I loved sunlight on the water, big waves, waves coming over the beach, pelicans, bricks, flowers, warm sand, cars (road trips) and no people... It's called Journal From 1959. (See the journal on the porch. I didn't start my first journal until 1961, but '59 was a big year for me.) This image is available as a limited-edition print by the way--see it in my print gallery.
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The next several posts are going to be about growing up on the coast, primarily in Sunset Beach in Orange County, California. That's where my mom, my brother Dave and sometimes my dad were living when I was born.
Dave still lives nearby in Huntington Beach. He's never lived more than 5 miles from where we grew up, except when he was in the Navy. He's always loved the ocean, surfing, his friends, his cats, the beach and an occasional cigar. His company is called Wave Electric and he's on a campaign to promote solar power.
Dad lives in Corona CA about 50 miles inland. He has always loved fishing, particularly commercial tuna fishing. He was a Marine for many years and spent much of his duty time diving into and cleaning WW II ordnance out of tropical lagoons in the Marshall Islands. Ever since then he's had an affinity for the Marshallese. He also fought in the Korean War, where he saw a lot of shit.
My mom died in 1978. She left Rhode Island for California in 1938
and never went back. She worked as a waitress and sometimes a restaurant manager all her life, except for a few years there where she
had her own gift shop selling decorated wicker purses and other gifty
things she made herself. She wanted to be a doctor once (her mother put that down as unladylike) then an artist (she went to RISD briefly)
but I think she was lured by the social atmosphere (lots of guys) and
the good tips to be made by working in fine restaurants. She raised
Dave and I mostly on tips!
Somehow she was able to buy our house one block from the ocean in Sunset Beach in 1946. I was born the next year.
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