A Quiet Easter Weekend In L.A. County
Thirty miles east of Los Angeles lies the village of Claremont, parts of which resemble New England. Last night, responding to a tip in the L.A. Times, we suffered the Friday evening traffic between Los Angeles and Orange Counties to go to this unfamiliar place and experience an art walk. (Claremont has many art galleries in a three-block radius, as well as a Folk Music Center and many other wonderful shops I had heard about.)
The paper was unambiguous about the date and time. Upon arrival, however, when the rain mercifully stopped, the streets were dark and the galleries shut fast. Hunting and gathering, we came upon a tavern on Harvard Avenue offering live music and a menu that is remarkably friendly for vegetarians. I asked the hostess about the art walk. “The only art walk I know about is on Tuesdays,” she said. The food could not be beat, and it was pleasant enough to walk around and enjoy the gardens and trees – some of the oldest trees I’ve seen in Los Angeles County that are not on mountains.
The website for Claremont’s Chamber of Commerce claims that this elusive art walk takes place on the first Friday each month (not on Tuesdays), at a time different than what was reported in the Times.
Now it has become a mild mystery – a weekend sort of mystery, and there will be more weekends. Don’t know if I’ll ever catch the art walk; it could be a ruse to lure the curious into town. I expect I’ll be back, even if it’s just to explore the Folk Music Center. (They have ukeleles.) If there is indeed art in Claremont, I will report in.
Today, Cardinal Mahoney has performed his annual blessing of the animals – the latter represented by unwilling domestic creatures dressed up in colorful outfits by their sadistic owners. Tomorrow’s paper will document the travesty with photos on the front page. Instead of witnessing their humiliation, I was up in the sky helping my friend John repair the roof at Dharma Zen Center. I painted no eggs – but John is a good egg, and he did a fair job painting himself with tar.
We’ll see how well that roof holds up, with more rain coming in to swell the rivers and worry the levees up in the northern part of the state. Perhaps the Cardinal could have left our pets alone this year and done something about that.
