Category Archives: Columns

Willy Wonka’s Golden Tattoo

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

*

“So, how Irish are you?” the bartender offered in greeting, his brogue thick as lamb stew and suggesting his own blood pulsed shamrock green.

The question was posed to an American tourist in Dublin, in a celebrated pub now named Kennedys (no apostrophe) but called Conway’s long ago when literary luminaries Oscar Wilde, Samuel Beckett, and James Joyce frequented it, and perhaps insisted on the use of an apostrophe, with the latter even featuring it in his epic novel “Ulysses.”

How Irish am I? Rather than offer a long soliloquy about my third great-grandfather emigrating from County Cork two and a half centuries past at age 14, forever leaving behind everyone he knew while fleeing famine for fertile farmland in Ohio, I answered succinctly by lifting my pants leg above my left calf.

The bartender nodded appreciatively and a moment later placed a pint of Guinness before me, proclaiming with enthusiasm: “On the house!”

The kindly reaction was attributable to the tattoo above my ankle, a fist-sized harp, Ireland’s national symbol—and trademarked logo of Guinness. I was inspired to get the body ink a decade ago while visiting my ancestral home for the first time and sensing the echoes of my distant relatives in the emerald hills of Cork.

Next evening at a different pub, this time unprompted, I wordlessly ordered a Guinness by displaying my tattoo and promptly received another free pour.

A third pub, a hat-trick complimentary black nectar, and I realized I had Willy Wonka’s Golden Ticket in my pocket—in my skin, rather. Indeed, for the entirety of our weeklong stay in Ireland, most everywhere My Better Half and I had drinks my initial Guinness was happily served gratis.

The best part of flashing my golden tattoo, black though it be, was not the free flow of stout—it was the conversations that flowed following the inked ice-breaker.

At Smithwick’s brewery in Kilkenny, for example, a bartender named Eoin affably asked if I had any Irish heritage. In reply, I showed my harp and shared the emigration story of my third great-grandfather James Dallas. Eoin poured us each a pint of a private reserve blonde ale not yet marketed and then surmised the surname Dallas might have originated from Daly’s Cross about an hour’s drive north of Cork.

Alternately, a barkeep at The Palace Bar in Dublin told me the Irish surname Daly is derived from the Gaelic Dálaigh, and that either version might have been “Americanized” to Dallas.

At the Irish Emigration Museum, also in Dublin, my inked harp gained deeper meaning when I learned this: on December 8, 1891, Samuel O’Reilly, an Irish-American, received U.S. Patent No. 464,801 for…

…the first electric tattoo gun.

Famed Irish poet William Butler Yeats once said of his motherland, “There are no strangers here; Only friends you haven’t yet met.” So it was in a lively pub, again in Dublin, when MBH and I accidentally crashed a 40th birthday party. No sooner had we found two empty stools at the far end of the bar when the husband throwing the celebration for his wife sidled over to us.

It was my birthday as well, a coincidence I shared, and instantly we were guests of honor as Liam introduced us to his wife, Marie, and their comely daughter and strapping son. After we had chatted like old friends for a good while, Liam told my wife: “You’re husband is the most American-looking American I’ve ever seen.”

With that, I revealed my ankle art.

“By god!” Liam sang. “You’re actually an Irishman! Sláinte (health)!”

* * *

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn.

Serendipity Smiles at St. Andrews

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

*

At St. Andrews Golf Club serendipity smiled and the normally gelid seaside weather on Scotland’s east coast grinned warmly as well.

That is to say the sun was out and the wind blowing off the Black Sea was only strong enough to steal a hat, or snap a kite string, not carry away big dogs and small children as is the norm. Nonetheless, even wearing a zippered pullover pulled over a sweater, my teeth chattered and I felt pity for golfers who play here when half-frozen raindrops blow sideways and sting faces like angry bees.

By happy chance, My Better Half and I visited the iconic “Old Course” on a Sunday. Turns out that the original church of golf, established 1554, is closed to golfers on the Sabbath and open to the general public, even tourists from America, to stroll at their leisure.

The Swilcan Bridge on a wind-swept (as usual) day at St. Andrews.

And so it was we joined a hundred people or more wandering the famous links, and a couple dozen dogs too, the latter all off leash and free to do their business with nary a plastic bag in any owner’s possession, raising the question: what’s the lift-and-clean rule for a terrier tainted Titleist?

MBH and I walked 12 strokes worth of holes out and back, three par-4s, including crossing the landmark Swilcan Bridge on the 18th fairway. Walked them in even par, I suppose, considering neither one of us lost a shoe—or one another—in the carnivorous gorse.

The fairway grass, fescue to be specific, is as hardy as steel wool and thus the weekly Sunday stampedes cause no visible damage. Too bad, perhaps, because anything that makes the Old Course play more difficultly is “brilliant” in the Scots’ minds.

All the same, traipsing around—even the putting greens are not off limits—seemed as unimaginable as touching the Mona Lisa. It was like enjoying a picnic on Wimbledon’s venerable Centre Court.

Speaking of lunch, the clubhouse is also open to the general public and so MBH and I grabbed a bite at the Tom Morris Bar & Grill where we enjoyed a picture-window seat overlooking the course and I savored a “Tom’s Burger” with grass-fed Scotch beef that was second to none I have ever tasted. Its juicy messiness proved a stroke of good luck as it necessitated washing up…

…which I did, I kid you not, in the locker room used by legendary golfers during the British Open. The dark wooden lockers are numbered with polished brass plates and an attendant kindly guided me to those specifically reserved for Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer and Tiger Woods.

One final unexpected thrill presented itself. The Old Course runs adjacent to the Black Sea alongside the very beach, West Sands, where the quintessential scene in “Chariots of Fire” was filmed showing the British Olympic track team running in slow-motion, barefoot all, splashing through shallow surf.

Although I had gone for an 11-mile run earlier in Edinburgh, in shoes, I was inspired to add a bonus mile just for the memory of it. Up the beach once and back I jogged, not barefoot but seemingly in slow-motion thanks to soft sand and hard blustery winds pushing me sideways. In my mind’s ear I heard the unforgettable Oscar-winning musical score by composer Vangelis Papathanassiou.

Despite the biting chill, I had company. A rookery of novice surfers, wisely wearing full wetsuits with hoods and booties, was taking a group lesson. Their instructor, however, apparently half-Scot and half-seal, rode the waves attired in boardshorts only.

Next week: An Irish version of Willy Wonka’s Golden Ticket.

* * *

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn.

Angel’s Share and Titanic Tears

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

*

Contrary to its worldwide catchphrase, Disneyland is not, according to one kilt-wearing tour guide in the Highlands of Scotland, The Happiest Place on Earth.

Leaving Loch Ness, which seems The Remotest Place on Earth almost, our tour group drove along a road so narrow that whenever we passed a vehicle coming the other direction our bus had to suck in its breath like a person trying to button a familiar pair of pants after gaining ten pounds.

The Highlands of Scotland en route to Loch Ness.

Along this breath-holding drive we passed breathtaking scenery and passed through a small town and in doing so passed by a wee little whisky distillery—no “e” in whisky’s spelling in Scotland as apparently “whiskey” also sucked in its breath.

Directly across from the distillery was a neighborhood of timeworn cottages all built of sandstone blocks, all with stone fences so ancient they leaned off balance as if having consumed too much whisky. Despite the visual suggestion of hardscrabble lives within, our guide told us the residents were The Happiest People on Earth.

“Every day they open their windows and get drunk on the air and sunshine,” Callum said. Noting the steady rain coming down, he added: “Or they open their windows and get drunk on the air and Scottish mist.”

After requesting we open the bus windows a crack, he explained that as whisky ages in oak casks about 10 percent evaporates annually and this is called “the angel’s share.”

Sweeping a hand towards the humble houses Callum went on: “So you see, they are The Happiest People on Earth because they are stealing their fair share from the angels.” He inhaled through his nose, deeply, as if cookies were baking—smiled—and added with a wink: “Now before we all get drunk, close the windows.”

Continuing his playful sommelier’s soliloquy, Callum said: “In Scotland whisky is distilled twice while Irish whiskey is distilled three times. Three times might sound better than twice, but this is not the case at all—the Irish do one extra because they can’t get it right in two tries.”

A mist of gentle laughter floated through the bus and days later similarly did so in the tasting room at Jameson Distillery in Dublin, Ireland, when its tour host buoyantly reversed the punch line: “The Scots are too lazy to do it the right way which is three times.”

Helen Churchill Candee’s flask.

There was no laughing inside the oppressively somber and, fittingly, impressively gigantic Titanic museum and shipyard in Belfast where the infamous ship was designed, built, and launched.

Among the heart-wrenching artifacts on display, and echoing the whisky-and-writers theme that emerged on this trip, was a silver flask belonging to Helen Churchill Candee. On fateful April 15, 1912, she was a 53-year-old American author and journalist.

While Candee would live to 90, her story, as related on a placard, caused an angel’s share of tears to well up in my eyes: “As ship was sinking, she was helped into Lifeboat No. 6 by her First Class companion, Edward Kent. She did not have pockets in her coat, so entrusted Kent with her hip flask—a cherished family heirloom. Tragically, Kent did not make it to safety and died in the icy waters. The hip flask, however, did find its way back to Helen. It was recovered from Kent’s body, and returned to its owner after the authorities traced her family through the Churchill family motto engraved on the flask—”

Here, fact proves far more creatively perfect than fiction.

“ ‘—Faithful, but Unfortunate.’ ”

Next week: Serendipity smiles at St. Andrews Golf Club.

* * *

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn.

Bacon and Eggs and a Side of Serendipity

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

*

Breakfast out already had been perfectly wonderful, delicious food enhanced by savory conversation with a dear friend, and then Serendipity pulled up a chair and the morning wonderfully became even more perfect.

St. Nick, as I nicknamed my pal because his heart is as big and giving as Santa Claus’s, was telling me about a “god wink” he recently experienced, that being what he calls serendipity, when the check arrived. Quick as a human wink, he snatched it and refused to split it, so in altruist defeat I slipped away to the washroom.

Upon returning to the table I was greeted by matching Cheshire grins from St. Nick and our waitress, Autumn, suggesting my fly was down. Fortunately, it was up.

What else was up that had them so delighted? Autumn’s well-used black folder for holding customer orders had caught St. Nick’s attention. Specifically, he eyed a strip of masking tape on the front cover. Torn off raggedly at both ends, the tape was not there to repair a crack. Rather, it bore a name, hand-printed legibly but hurriedly, in black marker. Not Autumn’s name, nor that of a co-worker she might have borrowed it from, but the name “John Wooden.”

St. Nick naturally asked about it; Autumn answered she writes Wooden’s name on her folder before each shift to remind her of his life lessons, no matter that she was born long after he retired from coaching basketball in 1975; and St. Nick then told her, in my continued absence, that I had been blessed to know Coach for more than two decades and even wrote a memoir about my friendship with him.

Autumn and me and Coach Wooden’s Wisdom

This name tag god wink was followed by another and a third, like blinking dry eyes in need of Visine. Firstly, I had considered asking St. Nick to brave the freeway traffic and meet me all the way in Tarzana at Vip’s Café because that was Coach Wooden’s regular breakfast spot. With luck we might even get Table 2, a booth actually, that was always reserved for Wooden and is now memorialized with a plaque.

Vip’s would have been especially meaningful on this occasion on account of the birthday gift I had on hand for St. Nick: a small card featuring Coach Wooden’s “Two Sets of Threes” – Never lie. Never cheat. Never steal. Don’t whine. Don’t complain. Don’t make excuses. – displayed inside a thick acrylic block.

The small keepsake elicited unexpectedly big emotions from St. Nick, who shared with me now that when his grown daughter was young she put the “Two Sets of Threes” on the refrigerator where it remained for a very long time. To this day, daughter and father still recite all six.

With Coach Wooden’s spirit having joined us at our table across from Serendipity, and imagining what he would do in this god-winking situation, I asked St. Nick if he would mind if we gave the “Two Sets of Three” to Autumn now and I would give him a replacement later.

St. Nick not only generously concurred, he did so with great Enthusiasm which fittingly is a cornerstone trait on Coach Wooden’s famous “Pyramid of Success.” The impromptu re-gift certainly proved a success. Oh, I wish you could have seen Autumn’s face light up as bright as the springtime sun on this cloudless UCLA Bruin Blue-skied day!

Outside the café afterwards, St. Nick recalled one of his favorite Wooden-isms: “You can’t live a perfect day without doing something nice for someone else who can never repay you.”

It was indeed a perfect start to a masterpiece day.

* * *

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn.

Encore Excerpt From ‘The Butterfly Tree’

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

*

A good many readers in response to the column two weeks ago excerpted from my new novel “The Butterfly Tree: An Extraordinary Saga of Seven Generations” asked for more. Who am I to argue with taking the day off? And so, from the opening chapter, an encore:

Ka-BOOM!

Thunder exploded, its volume deafening, its lightning flash brilliant as the Biblical bolt that blinded Saul, shooting down from the heavens with the earthshaking power of a million hatchet blows. The blade of electricity cleaved The Black Walnut Tree as effortlessly as a honed hunting knife slicing a stalk of celery.

A life of 231 years ended in a split-second.

The regal tree was sliced cleanly in two, from leafy crown to grassy ground, the splayed halves as identical as a left and right hand. The newly exposed surfaces seemed as if a master cabinetmaker had spent endless hours sanding, varnishing, buffing.

In death The Black Walnut Tree had been a lifesaver, shielding a clan of Roma migrants from being lanced by the thunderbolt. The ensemble, encamped along the riverbank in March 1852, had sought shelter beneath the tree’s colossus canopy—most importantly, Aisha Beswick, who was in labor with her first child. Huddled alongside Tamás, the expectant father, was Dika, Aisha’s mother and a revered fortuneteller.

Half an hour before the fateful lighting strike, as moody clouds roiled ominously darker, darker, closer, closer, Dika bemoaned, on the edge of weeping: “The peril is great for Aisha and the baby. We must fetch a doctor or they shall both die, this I know.”

Without hesitation, Hanzi volunteered for the emergency errand. The teenager, as if a descendant of the wing-footed Greek messenger god Hermes, raced two miles to town with such swiftness that the falling raindrops seemed to miss him.

*

Aisha’s contractions became more frequent, more fierce, more worrisome.

The apocalyptic sky was having its own contractions, three-hundred-million-volt flashes of lightning followed by deafening whipcracks.

“Oh, Lord, please watch over my child,” Dika said softly, head bowed, “and keep safe my precious grandbaby.”

Dika’s prayers seemed suddenly answered with Doc’s hasty arrival, but just as he set down his medical bag—

—Ka-BOOM!

The fateful thunderbolt smote The Black Walnut Tree like a mighty swing of Paul Bunyan’s giant axe. Miraculously, no one was killed by the lightning strike, nor injured by the falling twin timbers. All, however, were dumbstruck with fright.

All, except Doc.

“Gentlemen, I need you to hold a blanket overhead—like a tent,” Doc calmly directed the gathering. “We want to keep our expectant mother here as dry and comfortable as possible.”

As this was being done, Doc removed his raincoat and favorite derby hat, dropped to one knee, went to work.

Another wave of contractions washed over Aisha and she wailed loud as a thunderclap.

“Omen bad,” Dika sobbed, staring at the felled tree halves. “Two sunrises this poor child will not live to see.”

Not a believer in prophecies, Doc was deeply concerned nonetheless. His heart raced like Hanzi’s feet had for this was the first baby—the very first—Dr. Lemuel Jamison would endeavor to deliver all by himself.

Only two weeks earlier, Doc had completed a nine-month obstetrics internship at Cincinnati’s Commercial Hospital that was affiliated with The Medical College of Ohio from which he graduated top of his class.

During his internship, Doc delivered countless babies. Always, however, there had been an experienced obstetrician by his side, ready to help—or take over fully—if things turned dicey.

Things were dicey now.

And about to turn dicier.

* * *

Excerpt from “The Butterfly Tree” by Woody Woodburn, BarkingBoxer Press, all rights reserved, now available at Amazon and other online booksellers, and many bookshops. Woody can be contacted at woodywriter@gmail.com.

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

*   *   *  

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

The Celebrated Jumping Princes of Tennis

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

*

Some people favor “The Frog Prince” fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm while others more greatly applaud “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” by Mr. Twain, but a different frog tale is my favorite – but let me not get ahead of myself.

When I am asked, as still happens from time to time, who is my favorite athlete from my three decades as a sports columnist, my mind instantly fastbreaks to Magic Johnson, Muhammad Ali, and Arnold Palmer because they treated me with a grace and kindness that surpassed their athletic prowess.

Familiar pose: Bob and Mike holding a championship trophy.

A dozen more superstars earn hues in my rainbow of favorite athletes, but wisdom from John Wooden proves decisive in settling the matter. Asked once to describe his ideal basketball player, Coach Wooden replied: “I would have the player be a good student, polite, courteous, a good team player, a good defensive player and rebounder, a good inside player and outside shooter. Why not just take Jamaal Wilkes and let it go at that.”

Thusly, this description of my favorite athlete: “I would have him or her be a good role model, polite, courteous to fellow competitors, umpires, fans and media, a good teammate, sign every last autograph for kids, be good at every facet of their sport with no weakness, clutch under pressure, and possess charisma by the bucketful. Why not leave it at Mike and Bob Bryan and let it go at that.”

Actually, ever since I first started writing about them when they were barely taller than a net post, I have referred to these identical twins from Camarillo as Mikeandbob, singularly. This proved prophetic because in tandem as a single force they authored a singular career as the undisputed all-time greatest doubles team in tennis history.

Their resume of doubles championships, each punctuated with their trademark Bryan Bros. Leaping Chest Bump, is longer than Abraham Lincoln’s inseam but here is a Gettysburg Address-like summary of their greatness: Four score years ago, at age 6, Mikeandbob won their first doubles title – in a 10-and-under(!) event; dominated the juniors at the national level soon thereafter; won the NCAA doubles crown at Stanford; won a record 119 professional titles together and 1,107 matches overall; won a record 16 Grand Slam titles together; were ranked No. 1 in the world a record 438 weeks; named ATP Doubles Team of the Decade for 2000-2009 and 2010-2019; won an Olympic gold medal and bronze, too; and helped Team USA capture the Davis Cup.

For good reason Mikeandbob have been named Tournament Honorees for the upcoming 122nd edition of The Ojai Tennis Tournament and on April 26, three days before their 46th birthday, will be feted at a special dinner at the Ojai Valley Museum. (Tickets are available at www.theojai.net/events.)

When Mikeabdbob were 5 years old, their father Wayne took them to The Ojai for the first time and retells: “The Center Court is in a majestic park with huge oak and sycamore trees. When the stands are packed it is an incredibly inspiring setting. When Mike and Bob first gazed upon the scene they were breathless for what seemed like five minutes. Their eyes got big and you could almost hear their little minds thinking, ‘Wow. I want to play here someday.’ ”

Wayne laughs and continues: “It only lasted a short time, however, and the next thing I knew the boys had raced off to the nearby creek in the park to catch frogs.”

But the magic had already happened. The frog catchers would one day become “The Celebrated Jumping Twin Princes of Tennis.”

*   *   *  

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Excerpt from ‘The Butterfly Tree’

by Woody

Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is available at Amazon (click here) and orderable at all bookshops.

“Life imitates art,” Oscar Wilde famously asserted and his words proved eerily accurate a month ago when my 97-year-old father, a surgeon turned patient, was battling cancer to the courageous end.

One night, after Pop’s breathing had grown shallower by the day and more and labored by the hour, I read him the excerpt below from my newly released novel “The Butterfly Tree: An Extraordinary Saga of Seven Generations.”

*

“What I want you to promise me,” Doc said—breathe—“is that you’ll grieve only one day for me.” Breathe. “After one day, dry your eyes and focus on always remembering our good times together”—breathe—“and never forgetting how much I love you.”

Tears bathed his twin sons’ cheeks.

“There’s something I never told you”—breathe—“and probably should have,” Doc, now 83, continued weakly, pneumonia’s grip growing strong. With effort he proceeded to share the depths of his long-ago widower’s bereavement and suicide attempt, including the exploding ether bottle that awakened him the night his house burned down. “So you see”—breathe—“you boys saved my life.”

“We had no idea,” said Lemuel.

“We’ll still never say who really started that fire,” Jamis said, impishly.

“I have my suspicion,” Doc retorted, winking intimately at Jay-Jay.

Turning serious again: “As I’ve often told you, try to make each day your masterpiece. Breathe. If you’re successful doing that most days, day after day and week after month after year”—breathe—“when you get to the end of your adventure you’ll have lived a masterpiece life. Breathe. I’ve made some flawed brushstrokes, certainly, but all in all, I’m pleased”—breathe—“with my life’s painting. Yes, I feel happy and fulfilled. My only real regret”—breathe—“is that it’s all passed by so swiftly, in a blink it seems. Breathe. I feel like I did when I was a kid on the pony ride at the fair”—breathe—“I want to go around one more time.”

Jamis leaned over and hugged Doc, embracing his Pops longer than he ever had, and still it was far too brief. Lem, lightly stroking Doc’s left arm, suddenly realized the brushstroke-like birthmark resembled Halley’s Comet—The tail of a comet that Grandma warned us would bring tears, he thought.

Doc slept for most of the next two days, awaking only for short spells—including evening shaves from the town barber, Jonny Gold. Breathing became more labored as his failing lungs slowly filled with drowning fluid. During Connie’s illness long before, and again with Alycia’s not so long ago, Doc lovingly told them it was okay to “let go” rather than suffer. But he found it impossible to grant himself similar merciful permission.

Jamis and Lem gave it instead.

“Keep fighting if it’s for you, Pops,” Jamis said, his tone tender as a requiem. “But if you’re doing it for Lem and me, we’ll be okay—go be with Aly and Connie. We love you beyond all measure.”

“We’ll never forget your love,” Lem whispered, his lips brushing his namesake’s ear.

Doc opened his eyes, blue-grey like the ocean on a cloudy day, and with clear recognition grinned fragilely at Jamis, then at Lem, letting them know he heard their lovely words. His eyelids lowered shut as he squeezed his sons’ hands and whistle-hummed, almost inaudibly, before being gently spirited away.

*

When I finished reading, and then echoed the twins’ words with my own, my dad opened his ocean-hued eyes, briefly; smiled, faintly; gave my hand a tender squeeze, lengthily; and death imitated art before my next visit the following day.

*   *   *  

            Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Excerpt from “The Butterfly Tree” by Woody Woodburn, BarkingBoxer Press, all rights reserved, now available at Amazon and other online booksellers and many bookshops. Woody can be contacted at woodywriter@gmail.com.

*

‘The Butterfly Tree’ and enchanted Table

by Woody

“The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

A kitchen table, it has long seemed to me, is arguably the most valuable, regardless of monetary worth, piece of furniture in a home.

A fancy hutch, for example, is for displaying things safely out of harm’s way and itself not to be touched; a bed, where dreams are dreamt, is a private retreat out of sight; an heirloom rocking chair soothes mother and child, but is outgrown too soon.

A kitchen table, however, brings families together for years and decades, even lifetimes. It is where the day’s events are touched upon; where dreams are shared, and celebrated when realized; where tears are soothed. At a kitchen table we eat and talk, laugh and play board games, do homework and hobbies, have birthday and holiday parties.

I bet dollars to Sunday morning pancakes if you close your eyes you can see your own kitchen table from childhood, still remember the seating positions of every family member, with memories as warm as fresh-baked cookies.

Author E. A. Bucchianeri wisely observed: “There are times when wisdom cannot be found in the chambers of parliament or the halls of academia, but at the unpretentious setting of the kitchen table.” At the unpretentious kitchen table of my youth I don’t remember dreaming of writing a novel—but at a similar table in my adulthood, many years later, I would one day sit and write one.

Two bolts of inspiration occurred between these bookend tables. Firstly, Chuck Thomas, my late mentor, friend and predecessor in this space, two decades ago planted the seed by encouraging me to write a novel. Intrigued, I did not feel ready.

But the seed had been planted—a black walnut it would prove to be—and was later given water when a reader of my sports columns, someone I did not even know, sent me an out-of-print novel, a novella actually. “The Snow Goose” by Paul Gallico was instantly, and remains, one of my all-time favorite books.

Importantly, the gift-giving reader—shame of me for losing his name—enclosed a letter praising my writing for having the same heart and emotion as “The Snow Goose” and, echoing Chuck, implored me to try my hand as a novelist. Serendipity added this wink: Mr. Gallico was a sports columnist before leaving the press box to write “The Poseidon Adventure” and “Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris” among other literary gems.

And so I began thinking about writing a novel. Thinking, only, for a good long while. Until a few years ago when serendipity winked again and I happened to catch an episode of “Antiques Roadshow” featuring a handsome kitchen table that had been in a family for a handful of generations. It proved of only modest value, yet naturally was priceless to its owner.

The very next antique profiled was a handmade basket, two centuries old, and my thoughts transported back to a class on Native Americans I took in college. Specifically, I recalled that when deliberating an important matter they consider the impact the decision would have seven generations into the future.

Ka-Boom! A third lightning bolt. I would write about seven generations of a family that have sat around one kitchen table. Moreover, the Table itself would be a character, hence uppercase T. Too, it would have magical qualities, hence its wood must come from an enchanted Tree.

Fittingly, perfectly really, it was upon my current kitchen table this week that I opened a box filled with my newly published debut novel. Next week, an excerpt from “The Butterfly Tree:An Extraordinary Saga of Seven Generations.”

*

            Woody’s new novel “The Butterfly Tree” is now available in paperback and eBook at Amazon (click here), other online bookstores, and is orderable at all bookshops.

*

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Monstrous Beauty at Loch Ness

by Woody

Woody’s debut novel “The Butterfly Tree: An Extraordinary Saga of Seven Generations” will be published on March 19 and available at all online stores or ordered at local bookshops.

*

Like John Muir’s Scottish boyhood home-turned-museum in Dunbar, “The Writer’s Museum” on the historic Royal Mile in Edinburg was once a three-story residence. Dating to 1622, as Lady Stair’s House, the latter is now dedicated to the lives of three favorite-son wordsmiths: Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott, and Robert Louis Stevenson.

Time and again on our recent trip, My Better Half and I crossed paths with this famous literary trio—in parks with their statues, pubs with their portraits, even their footsteps in Edinburgh Castle where the 16th-century “Honours of Scotland” crown jewels are on display. Hidden from enemy forces, and lost, the priceless scepter, sword, and crown were found a hundred years later by Sir Walter Scott.

The Highlands, en route to Loch Ness, are gorgeous.

Mr. Stevenson’s words, meanwhile, can be found engraved on plaques and painted on public walls with commonplaceness throughout Scotland, including this popular quote: “To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.”

And yet, with apologies to the author of “Treasure Island,” I found the opposite to be true on our day of treasured travel through the Highlands to Loch Ness. To be honest, I had not expected much; certainly I did not anticipate seeing the famous monster; but I was awed by the ruggedly bucolic scenery and immenseness of the bottomless waters.

Loch Ness is nearly a marathon’s distance long, 23 miles to be precise, and so deep that only two humans, in a diving bell, have reached its bottom. That is 10 fewer people than have walked on the moon and here is an even more jaw-dropping figure: Loch Ness is said to contain more water than all the lakes and rivers in England and Wales combined.

Perhaps most startling of all is the color of the water—black, coal black, black as midnight even in daylight due to peat tannins runoff from surrounding foothills. Underwater you cannot see six inches in front of your nose, our guide Brian noted.

Speaking of water, no sooner had our Loch Ness boat tour begun when Brian informed us that “whisky”—with no “e” in Scotland, he emphasized—means “water of life.” He continued, with a wink and a raised flask: “The more whisky you drink, the better chance you have of seeing Nessie!”

Nessie, of course, is the celebrated Loch Ness Monster. Truth be told, even sober as a saint, for it was barley noon and neither MBH nor I had followed the wee impish Scotsman’s breakfast example from the previous day by adding a splash of “water of life” to our coffee, we did see Nessie…

…on T-shirts, ball caps, refrigerator magnets, tea towels and a thousand more items in the souvenir shop.

Instead of a Brontosaurus-necked tchotchke, my favorite Loch Ness keepsake is a short story Brian, wearing long socks and a kilt, shared in a tartan brogue as thick as his build which was as stout as a refrigerator on which to put a Nessie magnet: “I had an investment banker on my tour, a bigwig successful guy, who scoffed at what a boring job I had giving the same tour day after day.

“So I asked him,” Brian continued. “ ‘Do you go to the same office every day?’

“ ‘Yes, with a corner view, for 35 years,’ he answered, proudly.

“And I said, ‘Well, this is my office…’ ”

Brian spread his arms wide, wide as the wingspan of the bald eagle we saw moments earlier floating on an updraft, then swept a hand across the stunning Highlands landscape.

“ ‘…and it gets redecorated every day.’ ”

Next week: The angel’s share and Titanic tears.

*   *   *

Woody’s debut novel “The Butterfly Tree: An Extraordinary Saga of Seven Generations” will be published on March 19 and available on Amazon and other online stores or can be ordered at all bookshops.

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Travels Begin With a Wee Side Trip

by Woody

“You gonna have a wee splash of whisky in that?”

There was no “e” in “whisky,” but perhaps four in weeee, for the question was posed in Scotland and thus a perfectly normal one even early in the morning.

Indeed, the sun was barely awake, My Better Half not much more so. She had walked to a café near our hotel in Edinburgh, in Old Towne to be specific, for her coffee fix while I was getting my caffeine-like jolt with a run. The query had come from a gentleman, weeee as a garden gnome and seemingly as old as a folktale, so Scottish his skin had a tweed texture and tartan liver spots. He was sitting on a stool at the counter and readily produced a silver hip flask with which he gestured warmly towards MBH. To the libations offer he added a wink that was purely playful, not full of flirtation, and MBH played along, quipping quickly: “Oh, not today, I don’t think…

“…but maybe tomorrow!”

The Scotsman, however, was personally having none not of this waiting until tomorrow business. As MBH shared in her laughing retelling to me: “The whisky on his breath almost made me tipsy.”

A trip, if you loosen the reins, will escort you to wonderful places you had not planned to go. And so it was that our four days in Scotland, followed by ten in Ireland, began with a side trip that was not on our mapped out Scottish itinerary that included Edinburgh Castle, the Highlands and Loch Ness, and historic St. Andrews Golf Course.

“Where’re you from?” the Scotsman with the flask asked in follow up.

“California,” replied MBH.

The Flaskman told her the most famous Californian he knew was John Muir and asked if she was going to go visit his birthplace and boyhood home in Dunbar, a quaint coastal town only half an hour away by train.

We had not planned to do so, an egregious oversight on my part for I always make a point of visiting famous authors’ homes when we travel. Indeed, we have been to Muir’s manor in Northern California, but I had not realized his birthplace was so close at hand. And so it was that on only our second day abroad, our trip took its first serendipitous detour.

Two fifteen-minute walks sandwiched around a relaxing train ride through beautiful countryside brought us to the center of town. Heading towards the North Sea on High Street we passed a towering bronze statue of Muir as a boy, one upraised arm pointing at three gulls in flight just beyond reach, and half a block later arrived at address 128.

The John Muir Birthplace Museum is much larger than I had anticipated, a boxy, three-story white building with eight front windows and a red-tile roof, a grand home in the early 1800s.

Within, we were greeted by a docent with eyes bluer than the clear sky on this day, a sunny smile as well, and an accent thicker than local Cullen skink chowder. The latter made it easy to imagine one was conversing with Muir himself. Upon learning from where we hailed, Mr. Muir-sound-alike noted, “This is the first bookend of his life story,” and proceeded to cheerfully regale us with some early tales.

 That evening, raising a whisky – sans “e” and sans coffee – I toasted our travels ahead with a Muir quote I had seen on display: “The sun shines and the stars, and new beauty meets us at every step in all our wanderings.”

Our wanderings continue next week…

*   *   *

Woody’s debut novel “The Butterfly Tree: An Extraordinary Saga of Seven Generations” will be published in late March.

Essay copyrights Woody Woodburn

Woody writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.