In Santa Barbara

State Street, Santa Barbara

In Santa Barbara, we celebrated 30 years of marital bliss.  The less-than-blissful parts, we've edited out for nostalgic purposes.  Who needs to remember the occasional idiotic spats over god-knows-what?  Not us.  That time I got so mad I sat in another part of the movie theater?  Never happened.  That time he got so mad he went to bed early?  Really early.  Can't recall.  Those awkward moments dotting our life together?  All a convenient blur.  The secret to a happy union?  Amnesia. 
In Santa Barbara, we drank sangria, champagne and wine.  The hotel restaurant lavished us with attention.  At 7:30, we were the only ones in the place.  The maitre d' talked about his daughter and her college plans and his rabbi and many other random things.  The maitre d' talked a lot.  Other than eat, we walked, up and down State Street, counting the empty stores. We compared homeless people in beach communities.  The Santa Barbara homeless engage in animated conversations with themselves.  They seem crazier than the Santa Cruz homeless, a musical bunch of ancient hippies.  Back in Sherman Oaks, we hugged our sons and walked the dog and kvetched about the heat.  It was cooler in Santa Barbara.  Much cooler.  It didn't seem fair.  "What's for dinner?" someone said.  "Beats me," said the SJG.  "Ask the maitre d'.  He knows all the specials."