So I'm driving towards Tarzana on Saturday night and Jack-FM plays Great White's "Once Bitten, Twice Shy." It's a great song - love the piano - and it rocks especially hard if you're flying along at 75 mph on the typically crappy 405 freeway.
But who can listen to Great White without thinking about 100 fans burning to death in Rhode Island? Not me. And given the news of the week, the mind starts juxtaposing the Station fire with the Virgina Tech shooting. Which is the bigger tragedy? I gotta vote for the fire. Since three times as many people were killed, isn't the fire three times as tragic? But the nation didn't lower it's flags to half-staff for the Great White fans. The President didn't address the nation. Nobody made posters that said, "Today we are all Great White."
I guess people think that the nature of the VT tragedy gives it more heft. I guess some nut with a gun trumps an ill-advised use of pyrotechnics. It's not the quantity of deaths, but what these deaths says about us as a society. We have too many guns - or not enough guns. There is too much coarseness - or too much pampering. Whatever. But if the death count were two, instead of thirty two, it would not have been front page news and America would still be focused on how Larry Birkhead was going to raise Dannielynn.
I would suggest that the Virginia Tech story had a greater impact on you if you went to college than if you didn't. And you felt it more if you lived in a dorm, went to class and minded your business. But you probably felt the Great White story more if you like big rock and roll at a small bar, where that same band you saw twenty years ago in a large arena now lets you set your beer on the front of the stage while you dance to their greatest hits.
It's human nature. Suppose I read a story about a middle-aged man gunned down at Trader Joes while trying to decide on a bourbon. You might not understand my weeping as I thrust the newspaper in front of you. You wouldn't share my despondency and outrage because you haven't been there. The Jack Daniels is a fine choice at $17. But for $5 more you can enjoy the mellower Maker's Mark. And five more bucks gets you the buttery smoothness of Woodford Reserve. There is no wrong answer, and choices like these are what make living in the 21st century such a blessing.
Anyway, I was headed towards the Pinkus estate. He was turning forty and his wife threw him a classy party. I weaseled my way onto the guest list and brought a gift, a painting of Dodger legend Sandy Koufax throwing one of his explosive fastballs.

If you look closely you can see the fastball emerging from the side of the painting. It's a metaphor for the way Sandy transcended the game, reaching a dimension beyond the plane of mere mortals.
Years ago, when Pinkus was trying to learn the game of golf, we were playing at Brentwood Country Club and found ourselves catching up to a foursome in front of us that included Mr. Koufax. On a par three hole they stepped off of the green and waved us to hit so that we could play through. It was a long hole, but Pinkus strung together three of the best shots of his life, earning a par in front of his all-time baseball hero. He was giddy and elated (Pinkus, not Koufax) and surprisingly speechless. Afterwords, he talked about wanting to shake Koufax's hand and tell him how much he admired his decision to skip Game One of the '65 World Series in order to observe Yom Kippur, but the giddiness of the par thwarted all that.
There were a lot of good people at the birthday party and it ran into the wee hours. It was challenging at times. I saw some folks I hadn't seen for a while, and when you're in a transitional phase, as I am, it's hard to answer "What are you up to?" I deflected some of the questions with empty phrases like, "Putting out fires." I suppose I should be thankful for the few people who wouldn't let me get away with that - it means that they actually cared for a real answer. I wish I had one.
It was almost 3 a.m. by the time I motored home and crawled into bed. But there was no sleeping in on Sunday - I was picked up at 8 for a road trip to Santa Barbara. My niece Lauren was accepted to UCSB, and I went with her and her father to look at dorms and other housing options and to offer my perspective on what it means to be a citizen of Gaucho Nation.
The grey drizzle that greeted us as we rolled into Isla Vista fit my mood nicely. It looks like the exact same kids are walking around, wearing the same jeans and sweatshirts that they did when I was their classmate. And now I'm a cadaver. What the hell happened? Where did those four years go? And what happened to all the years since?
The most underappreciated film of the 20th Century is "St. Elmo's Fire." People misunderstand it. They think that the message is about growing up, but it's about moving on - they're two different things. You never actually have to grow up. But you do have to move on. That space that you occupy now will soon belong to somebody else. The best scene in "St. Elmo' Fire"? It's the closing credits. It's a cold night, the cast is out front of their old college hangout when they finally decide it's time to start meeting someplace else. And they walk off. And that sad piano theme starts. The camera holds on the bar and the "University Bikes" shop next to it. A guy enters the bar. A couple walk out. A dog strolls by, sniffs, keeps on walking. The credits are rolling and that sad piano music keeps playing. The cast is gone, yet the world keeps on spinning just the same.
Well all of Isla Vista feels like St. Elmo's and I'm that dog, back in town decades later for one more sniff. First stop was a little apartment where we picked up Lauren's cousin, Matt, now a UCSB sophomore and our host for the day. Then we visit on off-campus dorm, Tropicana Gardens, where a future RA gives us a tour. The dining commons blows my mind. A chef is making omeletes to order over a beautiful grill. The kids shuffle around in their big shorts and baggy t-shirts. Son-of-a-bitch, I think to myself, I don't dress that comfortably for bed.
We bounce around I.V. for a while, stopping at
Freebirds for lunch. It wasn't quite noon, but since I'm a believer of "when in Rome..." I had a pint of beer with my burrito, a tasty Firestone Ale.
Matt calls Naveed, his roommate from freshman year who now lives in an on-campus dorm. Matt asks if it would be okay for us to come check out Naveed's room. It is and we do.
Son-of-a-bitch.

The arrow points to the white Mediterranean buildings that make up Naveed's dorm.
But my mood lifted as I started to breathe deep from the fresh salt air that crawled up from the damp bluffs. I hope these kids enjoy their time here. Soon enough, they too will have to move on.
Leaving the dorms we passed the commons where somebody had tacked up a cardboard sign. Handwritten letters, made runny by the rain, read "We are all Virgina Tech." And that got me back to being a little bummed out. It wasn't the thought of Virginia Tech, but the thought of some kid getting all emo about it. Sure, the bell tolls for thee. But whoever wrote that got to sleep in late just a few yards from the ocean. In the meantime, some chef waits to learn what that kid wants in his or her omelete. Of course no man is an island, but a UCSB student gets to live a few years on a pretty sweet peninsula.
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