Daniel recommends Nathan’s Conscious Cup for the
best coffee in Vallejo! (They let me park there.)

Every photo is a link. I urge you to click on any picture that strikes your fancy and view it full-size. I don’t know how every browser works, but in Firefox the photo is automatically sized to fit the screen. When you click on it again, it expands to full-size. I hope you have good computer speakers, so, if you wish to listen to my little piece, it will sound good. I hope you enjoy my little perambulation.

Oh, and if you wish to e-mail this cellphonographer, just click on the frog:

Cheers, Daniel

Welcome to VallejoCellphonographer.com, home of my daily perambulation. (That’s me with the original Tree of Peace, which my father, Abraham planted next to the chapel on the old Concord Naval Weapons Station, from a cutting of an olive tree from our front yard.) I am an enthusiastic amateur cellphonographer living in the Napa River-side town of Vallejo, Mare Island Bio-region, California.

This is the view I see from my fourth-floor apartment: the Casa de Vallejo “Tower”, with a slice of the Napa River to the right. The breeze it affords mitigates the summer heat.

I’ll kick this off with a shot I took just today, a rather unusual selfie.

There is a house in Berkeley that once had perhaps the largest collection of hubcaps in captivity, due to its position at the apex of a turn just south of Cal which is one of the busiest residential commute streets you will find, where for decades cars would lose their hubcaps to overly-enthusiastic cornering. I was reminded of it when I saw a solitary hubcap leaning up against a sidewalk wall, presumably having happenstacially just landed there.

I lined up the shot on a whim, then noticed a shadow. At first I moved my cellphone to get it out of the way, then realized that it was me! I borrowed the classic “Man Bites Dog” and titled this: “Shadow Shoots Hubcap!”

Here you can see the tool I employ, an LGMS769.

They’re called “selfies”, but a more descriptive spelling would be “cellphie” since now most are taken with a cellphone. I in fact have a domain called CELLPHIE.US where you may view a gallery of photos of moi, should you be so inclined.

Here’s my cellphie, taken in the law office where I have been temping for decades, since the 1980s. Whenever the Cokers go out of town, rather than board their parrot, as they used to, they install Hearsay in John’s office, and he rides on my shoulder while I work.

The reason they call him Hearsay is obvious — he could never testify against them because anything he would say would be hearsay.

A brief histerical … er, historical note: Sometime back in the Spanish colonial era I sang Blue Spanish Eyes in the Solano Mission for the wedding of historian Martha McGettigan, great, great granddaughter (photo below) of Francisca Benicia Carillo de Vallejo, wife of Comandante General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo (also below). The cake was cut with the General’s sword, and the bridal bouquet was tossed out of the small plane that took them on their honeymoon. Imagine, a score of young, single hopefuls sprinting after the bouquet, across the airfield, dodging cow patties as they ran!

My adopted town and I have a history!

From time to time I am convinced that the universe exists solely for my amusement/entertainment. The other day this proved true once again.

I was walking along the riverfront and began musing … wouldn’t it be cool if I had a vehicle I could pedal around on and into the water if I wished. I love canoeing, and maybe a frame could be devised so that I could pedal while sitting in the canoe. A system of gears would connect the pedals to the wheels on the frame, and the wheels would have vanes on them so that they would propel the canoe in the water, and steer as well.

Note that the operative word here is canoe.

That evening I had been working on my laptop in Nathan’s , and as I walked out the door, what should drive up …

There can be no other explanation for my having first thought of a canoe, then a canoe actually driving up to me at the moment I was leaving Nathan’s than that I manifested this vehicle. The universe has a quirky sense of humor, nu?

You know this is a work in progress, right? Things are a bit jumbled up right now, as I add photos from time to time, and usually out of sequence. So just come by from time to time and see what’s new. In fact, eventually I'll have a link to new photos, with links to the next, and so on.

Meanwhile, this is one on my new route. My original route was approx. a mile-and-a-half. Now, when I go half-way across the bridge to Mare Island, it adds a mile. Eventually I intend to go all the way onto the island and cross the taller span at the north end. I've not idea how long that will be, but I’m guessing it could triple my mileage.

It’s not actually on my route any more, as it involves a killer hill that has no real redeeming quality, save for its viciousness. But there’s this delightful, whimsical example of public art, with which Vallejo is absolutely filled. At first it looks like a creature, like a cat. But, on closer examination, it proves to be … what? A butterfly lighting on a fireplug I thought at first, but then I showed it to someone and they said, “Lungs.” What’s your guess?

Just one more photo ‘Above the fold’, so to speak, one that sets itself apart from the pack. It’s cool how the name of the company appears three times — in shadow on the roof of the cab.

“HAAS CONST”

This is where it starts …

This pic may have been taken on a gloomy day, but this is absolutely the most adorable vic on my entier route.

“Barns, and noble”

As I would step out onto Sonoma Boulevard, across the street on the next corner is the 160-year-old United Methodist Church, a progressive beacon the Vallejo faith community. Below is the view I see as I come down the hill from the barns.

As I come down Curtola Parkway, I hit the riverfront.

“Sentinel”
Below, life imitates art.

One day I took a series of shots of seagulls on a railing. I had noticed them taking flight as I approached them, and so tried to capture that in “Flight of Fancy”

Overheard on the set of a re-make of Hitchcock’s The Birds: “I’m calling my agent. The craft service here sucks. They call this f---in’ sh-t birdseed?”

The one day I forgot to bring my cell with me I saw a very cool event, a tugboat pushing a platform a few yards upstream. The platform was anchored by two pilings sunk into the muck of the Napa River. Preparatory to its moving you could see the pilings being raised. One of them created a mini-waterfall over the collar the piling went through. (Click on image at right, with the collar circled in red, to enlarge.) It was a rather prosaic event, but I really wished I could have videoed it. Here are a series of stills I took the next day:

Above, two views of one of the many nautical artifacts peppering the Vallejo landscape.

Below, a commemorative plaque.

The Intintoli, recipient of an $8.6 million facelift, was named after former Vallejo Mayor Anthony J. Intintoli (1987–1994).

“VOTE”

Today I passed by the Vallejo Yacht Club and couldn’t resist the boats, from simple sloops to elegant trimaran. My brother, David, loved boats. I miss him, and am reminded of him today.

“Forest”

“What’s up, dock?”

Among today’s gleanings, “Victoriana”. Of course, most of them aren’t, but otherwise caught my fancy:

“Sea Captain’s Castle”

Beneath the east end of the Mare Island Drawbridge: hidden, whimsical gems!

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“Bird abandons post”

I’m at my half-way, turn-around point on the drawbridge to Mare Island. I had extended my walk to approx. 3.5 miles, and I now intend to cross all the way, then north to this span, which will take me back to Mare Island Parkway, then south to where I depart to go up into the hills.

The terminus of my current route (approx. 3.5 miles) is the west end of the drawbridge section. Looking up them is an exercise in vertigo.

“End of the line”

At the age of 14 in the summer of 1962 I walked with a group calling for unilateral nuclear disarmament, from the submarine base in Point Loma (San Diego), where Polaris nuclear subs were parked, to Mare Island Naval Shipyard here in Vallejo, where they were built. I only completed 500 miles or so, as I had to return to begin my junior year of high school, It’s nice to see Polaris is serving a more constructive purpose, still proud in dry-dock.

My new route takes me past this one of many monuments to Vallejo’s past.

WOOD STOCK ANCHOR MFD. 1849 WASHINGTON D.C. NAVY YARD CARRIED BY U.S.S. SARANAC UNTIL 1875

Colors

I’ve left Mare Island Way and hit the hills. These are the homes that make Northern California an architectual wonderland, and Vallejo certainly boasts its share.

“Purple”

“Bottlebrush Victorian”

“Triangle Vic”

“Geometry”

I just loved the unique sign on this truck — form and function.

“Post-Vic Monster”

My cellphonography odyssey began here, at the corner of Kentucky and Butte Walkway.

Below is the view that got me hooked on this new adventure. This is why you will see many of the following pics with date stamps.

The following photos, of bench and lamps along the steps, are more emblematic of me than you might imagine. As if happens, I suffer from inveterata melancholia. (Chronic melancholy). I realized today (11-27-2015) that nearly all photos here have been taken during the usual, gloriously sunny days — with the exception of these. As in all other aspects of the universe, this was not an accident, though not be design. This is just how many days appear to me. You will notice that, in the second two pictures, there are lamps which, presumably, light themselves what the natural lighting wanes.

Here’s the thing. I've been too distracted by the gloom to notice the lamps. They are my friends, my family, those who care about me, passably or deeply. This day I have been given a gift — the gift of recognition of something I habitually fail to notice, that throughout my days of depression I am flanked, like the bench below, by lamps which provide warmth, light, support.

This is not to say that the gloom is not real. It darkens many a day. In my decades of songwriting, one lyric has the distinction of having been set three times. It was the second song I ever wrote. Then I set the poem to a love song I’d written, perhaps my third or fourth. Finally, I gave it a more classical setting. It is the poem “Il Pleure Dans Mon Coeure” by Paul Verlaine. I have often joked about “If I Were a Rich Man” being my theme song. At one time my Datsun carried the plates REB TEVYE. No, this is my true theme song, and I embrace it.

My grandmother loved it, and the original recording was played at her funeral. I have temporarily misplaced it, but I did sing it at my mother’s memorial concert, simply and unadorned. And so I offer you this gift of melancholy. I am suddenly reminded of a painting a lover of mine once painted for me, of a hand holding a lamp. As I recall, there was a quote from artist Paul Klee, something about being “a lamp unto my feet” (she adored me, I guess), actually one from scripture. I will forever be more cognizant of the lamps than of the gloom.

“Il Pleure Dans Mon Coeure”, poem by Paul Verlaine;
music composed and performed by Daniel ben Avrám

“Bench and Street Lamps on a Gloomy Day”
 

“Neighbors”

“Yellow”

9/2015 8:37 AM  This is a two-shot of the Monsignor O’Neil Building and St. Vincent Ferrer Catholic Church (no relation to José, or so I’m told.)

10/29/2015 8:53 AM  This is Marin Street, the main artery of Vallejo’s thriving, vibrant art community. The sign advertises am upcoming event in 2015.

This emporium of “the Sweet Science” occupies a storefront between a medical supply house and a church, proudly and oblivious to the irony.

10/29/2015 8:54 AM

10/29/2015 8:55 AM  The old Federal Building

“Window Art”

“Consoler of the Lonely, Carrier of News and Knowledge;
Servant of Parted Friends, Enlarger of the Common Life”

“1932”

10/29/2015 8:57 AM  A Storefront Pentecostal church juxtaposed to a Tattoo shop. Don’t you just love it!

The Vallejo Naval and Historical Museum is a marvelous venue. My friend, Isadora Duncan dancer Lois Flood performed there, as has my Benicia Celtic Sessions Group, in which I play fiddle.

“Monolith”

10/29/2015 8:59 AM  The North Face of the Casa, where you can see the entrance to the gated parking garage, complete with security detail — the best extra twenty-five bucks a month I spend!

10/29/2015 9:01 AM  Home, sweet home.

There is a dangerous crossing on the northeast corner of our building, on Sonoma Blvd, where Lonnie was struck and killed. There is a crossing signal now. But we still cross with caution.

Here are some brochure photos I download from the Internet: