Author: punchwpadmin

The towering elm is on the right side of the lawn near the street at my childhood home in Amarillo; it is, if you will, perfectly positioned to take on the role of first base. Its bark is etched with deep grooves and winding, circuitous paths. The mature tree’s solid trunk supports a large canopy of branches and leaves that blow and sway with the strong Amarillo winds.

The elm trees were planted about every 50 feet on the street lines when Charles Wolflin first thought to develop the area. He started with a flat, barren, dusty prairie, and saw that trees would block the Panhandle wind, provide shade on hot summer days and create a park-like atmosphere. He was smart, thinking that trees define a neighborhood, so before he even thought about building any homes, he planted thousands of Siberian elms. More than 80 years later, aside the stately Southern homes and the brick streets, those trees have honorably done their job.

When I last visited my home, which had been inhabited for almost 70 years by Citrons, but now is being enjoyed by a young family with several children, I noticed that they had done work to the home and landscaping. What had not changed was that towering elm, just as majestic and stately as ever. It got me to thinking about the role that tree had in my life.

Growing up in Amarillo meant that you didn’t spend much time inside your home. We were lucky to have a neighborhood full of kids, enough so that year-round we were outside playing football to basketball to anything that we invented ourselves. In a matter of minutes, we could assemble six or more kids, all ready for action.

When I was quite small, we played the forever popular Hide-and-Seek, and the elm was the perfect spot to hide since you could dart out from either direction if the seeker got too close. In the evenings we played Kick the Can, and the elm again served an outsize role in our efforts to, well, kick the can before being tagged.

Soon, the front yard became our baseball diamond. Although not deliberately, my Mom’s landscape plan had created the perfect baseball infield, with the elm taking the role of first base and two other planted trees correctly positioned to be second and third bases. “Home” was right in front of a bed of plants that curved around nicely to complete the field.

Our stadium was perfect for all iterations of ball, depending on the season and the number of kids playing. Sometimes it was kickball; other times it was bunt ball, where you could only bunt to get on base. One rule that made so many games possible was the home rule that you only had to throw the ball—whatever kind it was—at the elm and if you hit it, the batter was out. With this rule, we could even play one-on-one baseball.

In the wintertime, when we had a good snow, we often had great snowball fights. We might build some snow forts, as we called them, but when running wildly around the yard, the elm was the perfect defensive position. You could stand behind it making a couple of tightly compressed snowballs and then jump out from behind the tree and attack your opponent.

In the summertime, the cicadas screeched from early evening until nightfall, and we would find their empty shells all over the trunk. Sitting beneath the elm—with its graceful cover shading us from the hot Amarillo sun—was the perfect place to have private conversations. Sometimes it would be me and my brother Dan—our German Shepard, Tamby, panting on the grass next to us—talking about baseball or the vagaries of life. Our heart-to-heart talks under that tree, our backs leaning up against it just so, helped create the wonderful relationship that we share today, still having long talks about baseball and life’s challenges.

I was also known to have some sweet girl sitting with me beneath that tree, chatting about our teachers and our friends and the other nonsense of teenagers. With the sun slowly going down and the wind abating, it was a bit of magic to be there with a pretty companion who had my heart all aflutter, our backs pressed up against the solid tree. 

But it was also under that canopy of our elm on one frightful day that my girlfriend Armanda and I came riding our bikes back from Tom Maynard’s home and saw two girls standing beneath it in the shade, crying. When we asked, they told us the tragic news that my buddy and next-door neighbor David Ramsay, part of our neighborhood sports gang, had been struck and killed by a car. I can still view that scene under the tree with great clarity.

When I return to my hometown now, I park my car and walk the brick streets of the beautiful neighborhood that defined my childhood. And there in my old front lawn, just as strong and graceful as ever, stands my elm tree, as though patiently waiting for my return to remind me of the times we shared together, having given so much and never asking anything in return.

Hailing respectively from North Carolina and Washington State, Ken and Victoria first crossed paths working at Acuson in Mountain View—Ken in sales and Victoria on the clinical side. “I moved to Montara because I liked to surf there,” Ken recounts, “and I just thought it was a beautiful place.” Victoria agreed, and when they married in 1991, they purchased four acres of coastside land so they could spread out a bit more: “We didn’t have any notion that we were going to be raising alpacas until the grass grew six feet, and we had to find a way to keep it down.”  

They first tried goats and then moved on to alpacas. “The goats were fun,” Ken recollects, “but once Victoria met the alpacas, she fell in love with them.” And, as the saying goes, one thing led to another. “Once we learned a little bit more about alpacas, we really got excited about them,” summarizes Ken. “We started breeding them and raising them and it took off from there—we started small, but it grew very rapidly.” 

Being early adopters of alpaca ranching led the Hibbits family into further expansion including boarding, showing, fiber processing and production. Victoria trained to become one of five people certified to screen alpacas being imported to the U.S., leading to assignments in Chile, Bolivia and Peru. Having studied alpaca phenotypes, Victoria applied her expertise to help other breeders make decisions about their herds. The pair also used insights gleaned from their research to advance practices on their own ranch—along with doing extensive consulting with folks just getting started. “The bottom line is that people just love alpacas,” Ken says. “When you have them and people see them, many times they want to own them, and so we’ve worked very hard trying to support people getting started in their own alpaca endeavors.” 

For the alpaca curious, Ken and Victoria represent a local treasure trove of helpful tips and experience. Like their larger cousins, the llamas, alpacas are in the camelid family, and their domestication began in pre-Incan societies in the Andes over 6,000 years ago. While llamas have primarily been used as beasts of burden, alpacas have been bred for their fleece. “They are descended from the vicuna while llamas are descendants of the guanaco. Both of these camelids still exist in wild herds in South America,” relays Ken. Victoria gestures to an alpaca with a soft peach-beige wash of color in the far paddock: “Do you see her? That’s the vicuna coloring. And her fleece is the absolute softest.” 

Alpacas come in a range of 16 shades from auburn to brown to cream but beyond their coloring, they generally look the same to the casual observer. Once Ken points out the differences, they become easier to discern. “There’s the Huacaya and they look kind of cottony while Suri fleece is corded and hangs off the alpaca parallel to the body,” he clarifies. Ken further illustrates the variations by comparing strands of yarn: “See how the Suri yarns really shine? Whereas the Huacaya is softer. Huacaya fleece is used more for garments worn close to the skin and Suri is used more for coats or shawls.” The yarns made from Alpacas by the Sea fleece are labeled with the name of the alpaca, the kind of alpaca and the number of animal shearings. Alpacas are sheared once a year in the spring to allow time to grow back their coats for warmth in the winter. 

Ken and Victoria have lived with alpacas for more than a quarter-century, and it’s clear that they have successfully expanded the definition of family. “The alpacas are woven into the fabric of our lives,” reflects Ken. “Our kids have grown up literally in the paddock with the animals and they’ve seen every phase from start to finish—breeding, life and death, full circle.” Assisted by their two children, McKinley and Sunny, and some local help, the Hibbitses describe alpacas as “easy keepers,” requiring little more than fresh grass and hay. Rather than tearing up grass roots as they graze, alpacas gently clip the tops, leaving a surprisingly even surface in their wake. As Ken explains, one of the reasons for this is that alpacas don’t have top teeth, only a soft palate, which creates that adorably characteristic split when their mouths move. Noting the dirt patches in the field, Victoria points to a white alpaca folding her legs under her. The bare spots make sense as the alpaca suddenly begins to roll. “Dusting is a way to dry out their coats,” narrates Victoria. “You can see where they create bowls in the ground; it’s their way to clean their coats and dry out any moisture.” 

As far as bad habits, alpacas are often gentler than their larger llama cousins, who are habitually labeled as more likely to spit when they are irritated or displeased. The Hibbitses are quick to set the record straight. “There are many, many llamas with absolutely wonderful temperaments,” Ken says. As for alpacas, spitting is mostly a matter of establishing dominance or defending territory, and they rarely spit at people. However, Ken advises, if you do see an alpaca draw her neck back and pin her ears to her head, take a few steps back—lest you get caught in the crossfire. 

Alpacas aren’t entirely defenseless, though. When they feel threatened, they take to the highest point in the pen and sound the alarm. “It’s sort of like a donkey bray,” describes Ken. “It really sounds more like a yell or a scream,” amends Victoria. “It’s an old behavior from nights on the Altiplano. When they hear that sound, every alpaca will stop and look.”

Ken and Victoria have also been deeply involved in events held by the Alpaca Owners Association (AOA) and Ken is a certified AOA judge. When their children were old enough, they participated in showing alpacas in obstacle courses that included walking up and down steps and ramps and around cones. “It was a joy to do as a family,” Victoria says, gazing out at a paddock holding Vega and Pandora, a couple of alpaca gals who have become best friends. Though the couple is modest about their accomplishments, their walls are lined with photos of alpacas with blue ribbons—a testament to their success.

Even as they worked full-time jobs (Victoria is now VP of federal accounts for Change Healthcare and Ken is a product sales specialist for GE Healthcare), the couple kept as many as 95 alpacas on the ranch before scaling back in recent years to a tidy herd of 16 favorites. “We had it as a business, but now we’re really in it for the enjoyment,” Victoria explains, as she walks down the fenced corridor between the carefully designed paddocks they’ve tended for decades. “When our kids got older and went to college, it was time to downsize.” 

Even with the years of intense alpaca ranching winding down, the pair can’t imagine life without the furry friends that have been at the heart of their existence. “They really are a part of our community,” Victoria says fondly. “In the evenings, alpacas run around to get their blood up before the long, cold night. Our neighbors will come out and watch them jump around. When a baby is born, everyone wants to know if it’s a boy or a girl and that it has arrived safe and sound into the world.” 

Ken says he still gets several calls a day requesting visiting information. Alpacas by the Sea has never been open to the public, instead opting for special visitation days. “We’d like to do farm days again, maybe four or so a year, when folks can visit, as soon as it’s safe,” Ken says, as he opens the paddock gate. He mentions that their daughter, Sunny, is mostly running operations now. “She may want to breed some animals herself and take it in a new direction,” he shares, “so we’ll see where that leads us in the next generation.” In the meantime, they’ll just continue to enjoy life with these gentle creatures. “When you have a rough day at work and you come home, the alpacas are the same; they are pleasant and peaceful,” Ken says. “They give so much more than they take.”

Known as the Valley of Heart’s Delight, Santa Clara County was once the largest fruit-producing and -packing region in the world, home to millions of fruit trees and the world’s largest commercial orchard. Recognizing the potential of the area’s rich soil, mild winters and long, dry summers, in 1901, a Stanford student and carpenter named J. Gilbert Smith purchased five acres, later expanded to 15 acres, along the unpaved lane that became San Antonio Road. He pitched a tent, planted an apricot orchard and constructed a two-story farmhouse from redwood delivered by wagon from the Santa Cruz Mountains at $15 per 1,000 board feet. That Craftsman-style home and adjoining orchard still stand among the buildings on the site of the Los Altos Civic Center. During World War II, Los Altos Grammar School used the house and orchard for air raid drills. Migrant farm workers helped harvest the apricot crop, and local children cut them for drying. Gilbert Smith died in 1966, and after the death of his wife, Margaret, the home and surrounding 1.3 acres were donated to the City of Los Altos. When the house was turned into the Los Altos History Museum in 1977, the Historical Association furnished the inside to look like a Depression-Era home. Docent tours are currently on hold pending county restrictions, but visitors may still stroll the always-open outdoor agricultural exhibit, which includes an apricot cutting shed and an historical tank house and windmill used to pump water.

The museum is planning to debut a 3-D virtual tour of the inside of the J. Gilbert Smith House on its website at losaltoshistory.org/
smithhouse 

Here on the Peninsula, natural wonders come in all shapes and forms. Whether it’s in your own backyard or the habitats around us, you’ll find countless discoveries when you get out and explore. In honor of Valentine’s Day, we offer this timely tribute to “the birds and the bees,” along with some pro tips for capturing the action. 

words by Sheri Baer

The response to having your heart broken isn’t typically gratitude, but Menlo Park-based matchmaker Amy Andersen has a justifiable reason to thank an otherwise odious ex. Growing up in Mill Valley, she had never really ventured south of San Francisco, but meeting a venture capitalist at an SF networking event in 2000 broadened her perspective. “I started coming down to Silicon Valley and interacting with all his friends because he lived in Palo Alto,” she recounts, “and it dawned on me that there was something very strange and unusual with the social landscape here.” 

In short, she observed, there were a lot of eligible men and not a lot of eligible women. 

“His friends would beg me to set them up,” she says, even as her San Francisco girlfriends complained about not being able to find decent guys. “That’s when the lightbulb went off in my brain: What if I were to create these connections and bridge that gap?” 

The idea of professionally playing Cupid wasn’t a complete stretch for Amy. A self-proclaimed romantic, she drew inspiration from her parents’ long-standing marriage along with familial traits of business smarts and creativity. “I was always the connector type in high school,” she recalls. “I was never part of one clique; I loved to connect people casually—‘you two should meet’—just sensing that two people could be friends with each other.”

After earning a communications degree from USC, Amy explored paths in PR, finance and entrepreneurial ventures. The ex-boyfriend decamped in a brutal break-up, but the byproduct of the relationship—that scintillating spark of a business idea—clung tightly. In 2003, Amy decided to take the plunge, officially launching Linx Dating—with a name blending both aspiration and Silicon Valley practicality. “It represents linking two people together and the ‘x’ is like a big hug,” she explains, “plus, the domain was available!” 

Initially, Amy envisioned recruiting clients but then realized that a referral-based model was better suited for the discrete, highly-
personalized experience she sought to deliver. “When I look back, I had about five key people who were truly human connectors,” she says. “They referred key individuals who then referred more amazing people, and some very big names in Silicon Valley started contacting me; it became a spiderweb effect.”

Images of Old-World yentas aside, the simple definition of matchmaking, according to Amy, is connecting two people who would most likely not have the chance to meet otherwise. “There are so many individuals here who are looking for love and just haven’t found the right match yet,” she notes. As accomplished as her clients may be—including C-suite executives, academics, startup founders and even international royalty—there’s no guaranteed shortcut in the often elusive and frequently frustrating quest for love. “They are high achievers and have been very successful in their careers,” she says, “and they’re looking for that same success in their personal lives.” 

Through personal interaction, homework assignments and introspective exercises, Amy divines the must-haves for each client, what she describes as the core DNA or tenets of a relationship: “People share a lot about what they’re looking for and my process is extracting those fundamental things, almost like tweezing them out, ‘You need this, you need that.’” In the early years, Amy relied heavily on scientific metrics but after thousands of meetings, she fully embraces the intangible and less quantifiable aspect of love and attraction, crediting as much as 80% of a match-up to her highly-honed intuition and gut. 

Given Amy’s qualifications at playing Cupid, one might assume she’d be a ringer to score an easy win in the game of love. Not so. “Painful, it was so hard!” she recounts, when asked about her own single days. “I would think, ‘How ironic that the matchmaker doesn’t have a match.’” A consummate professional, she maintained strict boundaries with her clients, which left her to the online world of swipe left and swipe right. “I did Match. I did eHarmony. I did a plethora of different websites,” she says, “and as painful as it was, it was also very valuable. Even the heartbreaks were key because it’s what my clients go through, so I can say, ‘I got it, I get you, I’ve been there too.’”  

Coming from a pattern of steady boyfriends, Amy realized she didn’t really know how to date. “I was a klutz,” she admits. “I didn’t lead with the flirting angle; I led with business because I thought that’s what I should do to prove myself.” But she also encountered a good measure of turn-offs. “A lot of guys doubt themselves,” she says, “so I’d see a lot of peacocking, name-dropping and boasting.” 

After Amy purposely took a break from the dating scene, a friend reached out in May 2006 with an offer to set her up. She exchanged numerous emails with Alex Gould, a Stanford professor and Palo Alto entrepreneur, before they scheduled their “magical” first date. “I didn’t talk about work at all that night,” she recalls. “It was just easy and casual. No pretense. We talked about so many other things.” The couple became exclusive on their second date and Alex proposed nine months later. “When it’s right, it’s right,” Amy happily acknowledges. The couple married in 2008 and welcomed a son into their lives in 2014. 

From Linx Dating’s office in Menlo Park’s picturesque Allied Arts Guild, Amy remains committed to helping her clients find serious, lasting relationships. Representing both men and women, ranging in age from their early 20s into their 70s, Amy offers different tiers of membership (including packages starting at $2,500, $35,000 and VIP $150,000), along with a free “match applicant” level of participation. “This is an investment—not only financially but emotionally,” she points out, “and you need to be ready.” She doesn’t keep a full tally of matches made to date but clearly treasures her growing collection of wedding and baby shower invites. “I’m godmother to one of my Linx offspring, and I’m even going to be marrying one of my couples,” she says. “It’s just so sweet—it’s what I love.” 

However, Amy also emphasizes that there’s no guarantee—beyond the number of introductions she agrees to provide. “I can’t predict that I’m going to find you the right person,” she tells her clients, “but I’m going to do everything in my power to increase the probability of it happening.” After personally experiencing the challenges of online dating, she still encourages pursuing every possible avenue. “I tell them to put multiple irons in the fire towards that goal of finding somebody. You never know how it’s going to happen,” she says. “It could be from an app. It could be Linx Dating. Or it could be a serendipitous meeting at Starbucks.” 

As for final advice, Amy cautions against being too judgmental and quick to find faults. “My whole mission is to say there’s somebody really interesting across from you,” she says. “Slow down, pay attention and get to know that person so you can genuinely see whether that click, that chemistry, is there.” And even if your heart has been dealt some crushing blows, don’t give up—and don’t beat yourself up. “Those experiences are all stepping stones to eventually finding your right partner,” counsels Amy. “They make you wiser and give you clarity in terms of what you really need and what will make you happy.”

My name is Bubblegum. At just six pounds, I’m a small, sweet Terrier mix, utterly convinced that Peggy and I were fated to be family. We haven’t had an easy time of things, which is why we understand each other so well and know how to make each other happy. I’m about a year old now, and my earliest memories are of a shelter in central California. I don’t remember how I was injured, but I suffered a broken spine, sacrum and tail and was in terrible pain. Luckily, I was transferred to the Humane Society Silicon Valley (HSSV) where I got the care I needed to make me adoptable. After fostering me, Yvonne realized I would be the perfect fit for her mother-in-law, Peggy, who lives in Los Altos. Peggy uses a wheelchair and was afraid to get a pet because of her disability. From my own experiences, I understood that I needed to be extra cautious with Peggy, and I quickly figured out how to be playful and show affection without getting underfoot. Peggy’s caretakers, Finau and Paea, help take care of me too, and we have lots of fun together. Surrounded by so much love, I recovered fully from my injuries with one exception: my tail is crooked and sticks out straight. Even though it doesn’t really move, everyone around me knows I’m always joyfully wagging it in spirit. To find a pet that’s the perfect match for you, contact Humane Society Silicon Valley at hssv.org 

Walk into the lobby of SD Mayer & Associates in San Francisco and you’ll be greeted by John F. Kennedy, Walt Disney, Muhammed Ali and even the Beatles. Bigger-than-life photos of 15 historical role models surround visitors with inspirational quotes and stories. “A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives,” observes Jackie Robinson. “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new,” Albert Einstein asserts. “You cannot fail, if you resolutely determine that you will not,” counsels Abraham Lincoln.

This motivational meet-up with iconic figures is a window into the mindset of founder and managing partner Stephen Mayer. “I have all of their sayings in my head,” explains Steve. “They’re a great source of common sense and wisdom.” 

That internal soundtrack of stirring words keeps Steve on task as an author, entrepreneur, restaurateur, volunteer and Books Inc. owner, while maintaining his day job running an accounting and wealth management firm. “I never quit,” he says. “I just don’t know what it means and I can’t imagine quitting anything.” 

Steve’s attitude is the wind in the sails that propels Books Inc. to continue serving the community as one of the few independent bookstores left on the Peninsula. A San Mateo resident for over 25 years, Steve has a passion that extends beyond just selling books—he aspires to promote literacy and engage readers of all ages. 

Stories are the thread through Steve’s own life that have motivated him to dream big and do the right thing. “I am inspired by people making a difference,” he relates. An author himself, he has recently written a collection of narratives tapped from history and his own life: The Toughest Guy I Ever Knew and Other Short Stories, along with two other books passing on his financial expertise. 

Early in Steve’s career, a mentor advised him to “plant palm trees,” couched as a reminder to embrace the long-term view. Steve took the suggestion seriously. “I was asked, ‘Have you ever sat under a palm tree?’” Steve recalls, before adding the follow-up query, “‘Do you think the guy who planted the seed ever sat under it?’ You have to do these things and they last a long time.”

This aphorism must have been on Steve’s mind when he met with Lew Lengfeld, the owner of Books Inc. since 1946. With origins dating back to a small Shasta City bookshop in 1851, Books Inc. had evolved into a sprawling chain and Steve could see that Lew needed help. ”I showed up at his warehouse and Lew was wearing pajamas, a tie and smoking a cigar,” remembers Steve. “I said to Lew, ‘You have more books in the warehouse than in the stores. We have to close the warehouse and get the books in the stores.’” Steve partnered with Lew to save the business and consolidate locations. “We moved from big shopping centers to neighborhoods and got very involved in the community,” he says, citing the nearly 1,000 author events staged every year. 

When asked why he continues to operate bookstores, Steve explains that it’s not about money. “What happens when everyone buys everything online and shops at the big stores and the neighborhoods become nothing like they used to be?” he questions. “When I go into Books Inc. and see a young mother and father picking out books and grandparents reading books to kids, it just makes sense.” 

Growing up in San Francisco with three siblings, Steve recounts how everyone in his family had summer jobs—washing cars, mowing lawns, delivering newspapers—working from eighth grade through high school. As a student at Archbishop Riordan High School, he remembers walking into the gym and encountering large bold letters stenciled on the wall: “A winner never quits, a quitter never wins.” The quote stuck with him and he strives to exemplify the sentiment. Case in point, he recently opened Scott’s Chowder House in San Jose despite the current challenges facing the restaurant industry. 

Steve’s strong work ethic persisted through college at UC Berkeley where he helped pay for school by working the midnight shift at UPS. He kept at the full-time work and school routine as a young CPA, also earning his MBA from Cal. “I obviously didn’t sleep much,” he acknowledges. 

In his book, The Toughest Guy I Ever Knew, Steve weaves together lessons about business and life. Including selections about legends such as Vince Lombardi, Steve Jobs, Johnny Cash and Rosa Parks, he also shares advice gleaned from his father David Mayer, a veteran and San Francisco police officer who inspired the title of the book. Steve recalls many family dinners with his father in uniform while on a break from walking his neighborhood beat. Another chapter describes the night Steve played high school football alongside Bill Blanchard, who was tragically paralyzed in the game. The principal’s advice that what matters most is not what you do for Bill in the next few weeks but over the long haul became a call to action for Steve. As a result, he stuck by Bill’s side until his recent passing.  

Taking his initiative further, Steve hopes to make an impact by promoting free financial literacy in schools through his foundation, 5 Buckets 4 Shovels. The foundation is named after Steve’s book 5 Buckets, 4 Shovels, a Beach and a Map, a practical guide in which he gives simple tools and advice for achieving financial security. In another recent book, he targets financial literacy for the younger generation. “People would tell me they wish they had a book to give them basics of personal finance when they were in high school,” says Steve. He answered the call with Adulting 101: A Guide to Personal Finance, which covers everything from getting a car loan to investing in stocks and creating a budget.

Steve credits his wife Patty and three grown children, Dylan, Kenzie and Nicola, with providing support for his many endeavors. In their San Mateo neighborhood, the Mayer house is known for the most elaborate Christmas light display every year and the family applies the same enthusiasm to local schools, nonprofits and sports teams. When Steve made the difficult decision to leave the CPA firm he founded to start his next company, he compounded the challenge by training for an Ironman Triathlon at the same time. Training up to 30 hours a week and working full-time, he began to doubt he could complete the event. It was Patty who convinced him that he had trained hard enough and he pushed himself to cross the finish line. 

After proving his Ironman mettle at 60, Steve doesn’t plan to do another Ironman—although he might consider a half. He continues his annual backpacking trips in the
Sierra, which he has done for the last 45 years, having traversed 3,500 miles over 375 nights. Moreover, his internal moral compass continues to guide him successfully through any bumps and curves on life’s trail. With a nod to former UCLA basketball coach John Wooden, he can’t resist sharing a final influential quote. “What’s important is what you do when no one is watching,” he imparts with a smile.

For Renee Clark of San Mateo, no other spot on the map conjures joy quite like Poplar Beach. “When I saw a low tide coinciding with sunset,” she says, “I grabbed my trusty iPhone and my lensball and headed over the hill.” By getting low (Renee’s favorite angle), she captured this reflective Perfect Shot with “lots of bokeh,” referring to the soft, out-of-focus background created in photography. 

Image by Renee Clark @reneetakespics

I stopped at the top of one of the steeper hills and saw a beautiful white-tailed hawk circling above my head. I watched the sleek bird silently gliding for 10 minutes, somehow assuming that my wife and daughters were doing the same thing. But they were not, and had continued their fast-paced walk. They were out of sight so I saw no reason to try to catch up. 

At one point on the way down there were two paths to take and à la Robert Frost, I took the path less traveled. This was a mistake, as when I made it back to the entrance at Junipero Serra Boulevard, the rest of my family was nowhere to be found. Since I had left my cell phone in the car, I was stuck—the result being that this particular outing is now permanently etched in my memory as the time I walked the five-plus miles home from The Dish.

For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, you should. Colloquially known as simply “The Dish,” the more accurate name is The Stanford Dish, which specifically is a 150-foot-diameter radio antenna located up in the foothills above the Stanford main campus. The nickname came about because it looks like, well, a dish. It was built in the 1960s with funding from the Air Force to help collect information on Soviet radar installations by somehow detecting radio signals bouncing off the moon. In more recent years, The Dish has been used to undertake such NASA functions as communicating with the Voyager craft. 

While this is all very interesting, today, when you say “The Dish,” you really mean a system of trails that provide—with some steep hills—a good solid workout. Once, it was just dirt paths with no restrictions, but a decade or so back, Stanford put down some parameters for using their land. This got some people upset, but it was, after all, their land. They put up fencing, paved the paths, prohibited dogs and developed some parking areas. 

On any day, rain or shine, hot or cold, people of every shape and size and age do The Dish. Some run it, others can barely walk it; some do it every day and others only occasionally. The terrain is beautiful and from certain spots you can see across the Bay; on some especially clear days, you can make out the familiar outlines of San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge.

The Dish is part of the culture of my family. No one does it with any religious zeal, but some of us end up doing it at least a few times each month. While we boys in the family enjoy it, it is really the women who are more devoted. The guys mostly tag along, when we are permitted and/or invited. I’m in good shape but my female compatriots prefer to do The Dish at a rapid clip and sometimes I hold them back. I don’t understand the hurry, preferring to saunter a bit to take in the smells and sights of the area, always hoping to see a fox, a hawk or at least a lightning-fast jackrabbit. 

But I keep my ears open and when I hear something about “The Dish,” I perk up and make it my business to find out who is going and when and if I can join them. Almost always, they let me come along, although I always remember to keep my cell phone with me now.

I don’t love the “exercise” part of The Dish as much as I like spending time with my family and being outside. But it is a workout. Whatever clothing I start with is not what I end up wearing in the end. I do relish the slight burn I feel after completing the almost four-mile trek, up and down the hills. I immediately think that I can have a second helping of dessert that night.  

Of course, things are a bit different now with all these little third-generation “Dishers”  to push or carry up and down the steep parts of the trails. A couple of weeks ago, my son Josh and his wife, Adara, and their two-year-old and their six-month-old baby came with me on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. They brought their double-wide stroller, some serious snacks and all the other things needed for two little ones. 

We approached the hike with a bit of trepidation given the size and weight of the stroller. The first hill, which is modified now, was fine. But over the next hour, things got a bit tough. That stroller got heavier and heavier as we pushed it up and down the hills. It was a real effort. Sometimes I carried my grandson on my shoulders, and sometimes he walked, although I’m afraid that if he had walked the entire thing we’d still be out there.

By the end of the standard loop, Josh and Adara laughed and suggested that they didn’t imagine doing The Dish again soon with two children in tow. But The Dish is a seductive thing—the beauty, the air, the feeling of having accomplished something—and I just know that on a beautiful, cool day, the call to do it again will echo through their home and they will be back to enjoy its magnificent charms

If you’ve traveled Old Page Mill Road between Foothill Expressway and I-280, you may have noticed an unusual Gothic red brick tower with a crenulated roof standing about five feet from the edge of the road. Known as Frenchman’s Tower, this 30-foot structure was built by a wealthy French politician named Jean Baptiste Paulin Caperon in the 1870s. Escaping a shift in political power, Caperon fled to California from France and purchased 1,242 acres of land in what is now Palo Alto under the name of his deceased cousin, Peter Coutts. On his new property, Caperon built a dairy farm, summer cottage and this rather mysterious tower. Was it a library? Perhaps a water irrigation system? Numerous rumors swirled about the purpose of the tower—ranging from an armory to prepare for an enemy attack to a place to keep Caperon’s insane wife since there is no door. A more conventional theory is that the tower served as a marker for the property boundary. After politics shifted back to his party’s favor, Caperon unexpectedly returned to France and sold the tower as well as the land to Leland Stanford, who founded Stanford University on the property in 1891. In 1969, the tower was designated as a California Site of Historical Interest. Today, the still-visually-riveting tower is covered with graffiti and carvings and surrounded by a chain-link fence.

There’s nothing better than comfort food on a chilly winter day—coming to you in all shapes and ways.

Ladle & Leaf

Burlingame, San Mateo, San Carlos, Palo Alto, Los Altos

Inspired by the idea that soup nourishes the body and warms the soul, Jennifer and Steve Sarver founded the San Francisco Soup Company in 1999. When the company’s brick-and-mortar restaurants took a hit in 2020, the family-owned business pivoted to Ladle & Leaf, which offers an online ordering and convenient local neighborhood pick-up approach. Starting with more than a dozen signature soups including Grandma Mary’s Chicken Noodle, Organic Smoky Split Pea and Organic Southwestern Corn Chowder, Ladle & Leaf expanded its pick-up menu to include happy tummy entrees like Organic White Cheddar Macaroni & Cheese, Beef Short Ribs and Grilled Chicken Enchiladas, along with sandwiches/wraps, grain bowls, salads, sides and desserts. Visit ladleandleaf.com/pickup for the full menu, ordering instructions and Peninsula pick-up locations.

Proposition Chicken

Menlo Park

This choose-your-own-chicken adventure begins with a decision: fried or flipped? The choice between a slowly-roasted rotisserie chicken or the signature herb and spice blend counterpart is further challenged again: sandwich or salad? From here, it’s up to you to choose your sidekicks, from fries to honey mustard wings to the brown sugar-caramelized Brussels sprouts. This SF-based micro chain recently opened its first pop-up and chose downtown Menlo Park as its fertile testing ground. Located within the Shiok! Singapore Kitchen, Proposition Chicken wants to remind you that you’re the master of your own dining destiny. Call it bespoke bock bock. 1137 Chestnut Street. Open Monday through Friday from 11AM to 2:30PM; 5PM to 8:30PM; Saturday from 5PM to 8:30PM and closed on Sunday.

Cuisinett

San Calos

Au revoir to your hunger pains. Geoffroy Raby had a vision to bring a new style of French food to the Peninsula. Forget what you knew about the cuisine, Geoffroy wanted to bring back the neighborhood café that he grew up in. At Cuisinett, located centrally downtown, the nine-inch quiches talk first with the choice of the forestière (spinach, goat cheese and mushrooms), lorraine (bacon, onions and gruyere cheese) or the provençale (zucchini, goat cheese and fine herbs). Other favorites include the bœuf à la Bourguignonne, slowly braised beef short ribs with red wine, or the cheese and pork pate trays. Come for the food, leave with comfort. 1105 San Carlos Avenue. Open for pick-up and delivery Tuesday through Saturday from 4PM to 8PM.

Spend time talking with Tim Stannard, founder and managing director of Bacchus Management Group, and a pattern emerges. His life is a series of pivots. 

The seeds of Tim’s career in restaurants were sown growing up in San Francisco. He was raised by a single mother who worked for one of the first restaurant groups, Spectrum Foods, which morphed into the Il Fornaio chain of Italian eateries. Tim and his brother would often tag along while she worked.

As an undergrad at the University of California at Berkeley, Tim set his sights on a career in academia. But his early exposure to the restaurant business and the proximity to Chez Panisse, where he dined when he could save up the dollars, continued to tug at him.

He put off grad school and got a job working for Doug “Bix” Biederbeck, at his namesake restaurant, located in an alley near Jackson Square. Bix was—and is—known not only for its food but also for the art on its walls, a soundtrack of jazz standards and one of the best martinis in the City.

“I bussed tables, was a food runner and a bartender and really got to experience all aspects of the business,” Tim says. “Even though I continued to think I wanted to be a college professor, I stayed working for Doug. I loved every minute of it. Grad school got put off, and I completely got the bug.”

Call it the first big pivot.

After a stint with the PlumpJack Group in a variety of management positions, Tim formed Bacchus Management Group and opened The Village Pub in 2001, taking over from Ralph Oswald, who had managed a restaurant of the same name in the same Woodside location since 1958. 

But it was not without another pivot. While Oswald’s Pub fronted Woodside Road, Tim moved the new Pub downstairs, so to speak, where it fronts a parking lot across from a creek. That now-fortuitous decision made 20 years ago is yielding an unanticipated benefit. As the county issued outdoor dining mandates, tables sprung up where cars once parked.

The Village Pub was going to be the group’s only restaurant. “I was firm about that,” Tim recalls. But it didn’t take long to pivot yet again. “Sometimes creative itches need to get scratched,” he explains, “and I got the opportunity to open a neighborhood pizza joint at Santana Row.” Tim opened Pizza Antica in three locations in 2003, 2004 and 2005. He also couldn’t get an old garage in San Francisco’s Presidio Heights neighborhood out of his mind. In 2007, he launched Spruce, which has garnered a Michelin star every year since 2011. 

Tim and his family moved from San Francisco to Woodside in 2012. “My son was getting older and needed more space to run around,” he says. And Bacchus Management Group continued to grow. 

The current tally is seven restaurants, eight counting Selby’s, which offered a daily family meal through last fall before shuttering with an anticipated reopening in spring 2021. “Selby’s was built for big celebrations and large groups of people dining together,” Tim notes. “When it’s safe for people to gather in groups and safe for our staff to serve large groups of people, we’ll bring Selby’s out of hibernation.”

Other Bacchus restaurants include The Village Bakery in Woodside (with its adjacent bakery and outdoor dining in front) and The Saratoga in San Francisco. And now 2021 marks a milestone year for Tim, with The Village Pub celebrating its 20^th anniversary. His first restaurant was awarded its first Michelin star in 2009 and has held one ever since. 

That’s not the only thing The Village Pub has held on to. Many of its servers, bartenders and kitchen staff have been there almost since opening. “From the beginning, there was a strong belief in service and hospitality and an investment in people,” Tim says. 

The Pub interior may say “fine dining,” but the menu is more eclectic, including the eponymous Pub Burger. When Tim was planning the menu with Executive Chef Mark Sullivan, they agreed that they wanted to serve the entire community in as many ways as possible, whether patrons are stopping by to get a quick bite or celebrating a wedding anniversary or hosting a business dinner.

That meant having a burger on the menu. “I can’t tell you how many burgers I ate,” Tim recalls with a chuckle. “Ultimately, it was Mark with his house-made English muffin bun that proved the winner.”

While Tim is happy that the original concept has remained the same and that “The Village Pub has found its natural place,” he acknowledges that there has been incremental change over the years. Twenty years ago, the soundtrack was all about Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin and now it’s more skewed to his personal taste, “everything from The Rolling Stones to Louis Armstrong.”

A number of Tim’s pivots spring from personal lackluster experiences. A “really bad martini” was the inspiration for the ice-cold, served-at-the-table martinis at Selby’s. Then there were the repeated bad cups of coffee.

“There was a period when there wasn’t a lot of great coffee in the Bay Area,” he says. So, his longing for a “really, really good cup of coffee” led to the founding of Roast Coffee Company in 2006, which creates single-origin and blended offerings from farms around the world with master roaster Alex Roberts at the helm. Available locally at Roberts Market, it’s now served at all the Bacchus restaurants along with some high-end restaurants in the Bay Area.

Tim’s obsession with fresh, local and seasonal ingredients led to SMIP Ranch Produce, a 5½-acre farm located in the hills above Woodside. Everything is produced without synthetic pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers. Along with being served at the restaurants, the produce is available to the public through a weekly CSA program.

Pivoting extends to the art on Bacchus restaurant walls. “Look at the art at the restaurants and you’ll get a glimpse of my eclectic tastes, which evolve over time,” he says. “What I buy for myself often ends up on one of the restaurant’s walls.”

And it extends to Bacchus Events, which launched last November. “We’ve been planning this new catering company for some time,” he explains. “I’m very proud of how quickly the team shifted and is creating beautiful dinner experiences for guests to enjoy at home rather than the venues we’d identified.” Over the holidays, Bacchus Events hosted virtual cocktail parties, wine tastings and cooking classes. “You name it and we’ll Zoom it, until large groups can gather again,” he says.

Tim admits that it’s not always easy to pivot from one endeavor to the next. “I have two recurring nightmares,” he confides. “The first is that we hire, train and polish, and the opening day arrives and nobody comes. The other is that we open, and there are lines out the door but I’m the only one inside trying to do it all!”

With his exceptionally full plate, Tim does a good job keeping stressful thoughts at bay. That’s not surprising given that he named his company after the Greek god Bacchus, a symbol of revelry and chaos. “Managing chaos,” he muses. “That’s what it feels like to run a restaurant group.”

Katie and Bob Hanson were at an impasse caused by the (out) growing pains of operating a flourishing business. Now the fate of their downtown Menlo Park shop rested on the outcome of a gyrating coin that had been flipped up into the air.

 This was around 2002 as their consignment shop, afterwards, was just beginning to add home furnishings and furniture into its stock after they had established themselves as purveyors of world-class labels in women’s and men’s designer clothing for the Peninsula since 1990.

 Their new inventory of plush couches and mid-century chairs required showroom space, which the Hansons sorely lacked in their prime downtown locale.

When the adjacent unit next to their store facing El Camino Real became available, they jumped to secure it—just as a neighboring business also expressed interest in acquiring the extra square footage. For the landlord, it was a conundrum.

“So, the five of us literally stood in the back parking lot and did a coin toss,” Bob recounts as he strides through the vast, expanded showroom. 

Which side of the coin did the noted sports enthusiast claim before the fateful toss? “Heads,” he says. “Always call heads.”

 When Bob and Katie opened the doors of afterwards 30 years ago, the La Honda couple was playing a hunch for a growing market in designer consignment clothing. Their premonition proved astute; gone were the consumeristic 1980s, replaced by households overinvested in nice clothing and items now in need of an outlet for secondhand sales.

 They were selling posh styles well before Poshmark and they weathered complications including several recessions, the advent of an online market and a rocky 2020 by relying on the aptitude of Katie and Bob’s salesmanship—and cemented by the rich relationships forged with their customers and consigners. 

“We’re very involved and love helping people,” Katie says. “They come in looking for a dress for their wedding or to wear at a Nobel Prize ceremony. Or maybe it’s a treasure hunt for them and they love to come in for the experience of trying things on and touching them. It is retail therapy.”

 The couple learned their trade after working as longtime managers and buyers at Ralph Lauren stores in the Bay Area, including the Palo Alto location, before deciding to strike out on their own in September 1990.

 “We were struck by the entrepreneurial spirit,” Bob remembers. “Gap started as a jean store and began small before growing the business. It wasn’t like they had a PhD in retail; we felt that after the market crash of 1987, it made sense to try.”

 The early 1990s was a fertile ground for consignment shopping, still a nascent concept for shoppers, especially in a well-to-do region such as the Peninsula. Speaking to the Almanac some years after opening afterwards’ doors, Bob described the shift in attitude and approach to buying clothes previously worn.

“It wasn’t acceptable to be seen in these kinds of shops, which were normally placed on back streets,” he’s quoted as saying. “We noticed our regular customers coming to sales. We began to see Mercedes and Rolls Royces at Costco and the Price Club.”

Speaking of their launch today, Katie remembers defending the usability of used clothing one customer at a time.

“There was no eBay, no internet; we didn’t have any of that,” she says. “The only thing you might buy used was maybe a car. I remember when a reporter came in one day early on and she was gruff and didn’t sugarcoat her opinion about secondhand—but guess what she walked out with? A pre-owned Hermes scarf.”

The Hansons have only enhanced their prowess with their expansion into furniture and home furnishings, attracting regional attention from interior designers and remodelers. 

 “I met a guy once whose specialty was marketing and he said that ‘value equals benefit minus price,’” Bob explains. “We’ve sold sofas for $8,000-9,000 dollars when the MSRP (or sticker price) was $20,000. Based on that formula, there was enough of a benefit to buy it. There are people who could order that couch for $17,000 and not blink an eye but if they see it here with our price, it’s a no-brainer of a purchase.”

 In the back of the store above the door leading out to the parking lot is a sentimental illustration of afterwards’ employee number one: Roland, a Bernese Mountain Dog who never missed a day of work until his passing in 2002. Katie met the breeder by chance one afternoon outside Cafe Borrone and it had been their dream dog breed since spotting a picture of a Bernese Mountain Dog in a Ralph Lauren press kit.

 Roland’s name is an homage to “The Song of Roland,” an 11^th-century epic poem based on the Battle of Roncevaux Pass in 778. It is the oldest surviving major work of French literature and a reflection of the Hansons’ shared passion for the written word.

 Both Bob and Katie were English majors who met one afternoon in the spring of 1983 in Palo Alto. 

Katie grew up in Bakersfield and graduated from Cal Berkeley with a degree in English. She was taking night computer classes while working at Ralph Lauren Palo Alto when they first encountered each other. 

Bob saw her from across the store on his first day ever stepping foot onto the Peninsula. Born in Kansas and graduating as an English major from Kansas University, Bob worked for specialty clothing stores before Ralph Lauren offered him a job. His options for relocating also included Hawaii and Arizona, but after meeting Katie in the Palo Alto store in May of ’83, he swiftly chose the Peninsula.

 The couple have much in common. “I used to kid that if you fell asleep in Kansas and woke up in Bakersfield, you wouldn’t know the difference,” Bob jests. “It reminds me so much of being home.”

 The Hansons live amongst the trees in La Honda where cats, rabbits, horses and dogs are part of the family. Their three children are now grown and live locally; their youngest son is 20 and plays baseball for Cañada College when he’s not helping his parents at the shop.

 Following 30 years of connecting sellers with buyers, the Hansons remain an indelible resource for the community.

 “We put a store in a prime location and by putting it here, we were saying that this is okay. This makes sense,” Bob points out. “Consignors bring in things that are no longer needed, we provide them to customers all while maintaining a business. It creates a win-win-win situation.”

Louis Vuitton Part Deux

A friend to afterwards for many years, Sue Milani handcrafts furniture made of authentic Louis Vuitton and Gucci materials she stitches together to repurpose into couture furniture. Always one-of-a-kind, no piece is ever the same.

 “I noticed the consignment industry was growing and I thought, ‘Let me see if I can find consignment that does furniture.’ afterwards is one of the very few,” Sue says. “We came together and it was the perfect marriage. I’m all about high-end and my craftsmanship has to be impeccable. When you are in this kind of work, people expect the best and I follow the guidelines of each particular brand. I know the expectation of Louis Vuitton—the dos and don’ts—so I make a great effort to be respectful to what is required from these companies.”

“The scenery and serenity of Woodside always lift my spirits,” says PUNCH reader Dennis Hancock, who enjoys exploring his neighborhood on foot. Dennis captured this Perfect Shot on Manzanita Way, where the treetops seem to form a natural tunnel around an equestrienne on the pathway. 

Image by Dennis Hancock 

My family consists of Abhiroop, Ruchika, Ayanna and Amaanya and I represent their attempt at ensuring some semblance of equity in two very important areas—gender and name. Abhiroop was tired of being the only male in our otherwise all-female Hillsborough household and Ruchika was tired of being the only “R” in the company of “A”s. Hence they have me: A male Goldendoodle named Rugby! I joined our pack eight years ago, and I’m proud to say I’m a natural (albeit a bit demanding) leader. I sleep on Abhiroop and Ruchika’s bed and when they stretch their legs and I get pushed, I make sure to communicate my displeasure. I love a good belly rub/scratch and know how to keep the spa services coming—I’ve perfected an expert blend of evil eye and pawing incessantly. Thankfully, my family thinks I’m adorable so it usually doesn’t take too much persuasion. That being said, I refuse to be treated as a 40-pound, four-legged, canine ball of fluff. If we have visitors and they try to relegate me to the backyard with the visiting dog, I make it amply clear that this is not acceptable. I wail, whine and telepathize, “WHY HAVE YOU LEFT ME WITH THIS UNCOUTH ANIMAL? I NEED TO BE INSIDE DISCUSSING POLITICS AND SHARING YOUR FOOD!” Next thing you know, I am back inside all cozied up where I belong. Every dog has his day, no doubt, but in our house I have every day

The things we own—the stuff of our lives—can be beautiful, useful for their own sakes or they can serve to remind us of a time or place or person that was an important part of our lives. I doubt that many of us keep things that bring back bad times, as what, really, would be the point? 

When we built our home, I designed a small study for myself with a built-in desk, bookcases and cabinets, a worn leather couch and an Oriental rug on the cherry wood floors. French doors look out to our side yard with a small fountain and a brick patio. It’s less grand than it sounds but it’s my space. The bookcase is reserved for my treasures, each holding a meaning for me.  

I only knew one grandparent, a grandmother named Beulah. She read to me, taught me how to play cribbage and was a refuge for me when my parents split up. One book that she shared with me was a slim volume called Just Like Everyone Else, a square red book that tells a delightful story of a boy who is just like everyone else until he isn’t. On its opening page is a simple note: “To Sloane. Love, Grandma.” I have this standing up in my bookcase and see it every day. 

Several pieces of art lie in the background of the shelves. One is a lion print created by my sister Shelley when she was in college; she gave it to me when I was a teenager and it has traveled with me ever since. Another is a small pleasing landscape etched by my favorite artist, Luigi Lucioni. There is also a precious watercolor, done by my then eight-year-old daughter Arielle, of our family at the park playing on a swing set. I think she captured the spirit of our family better than any photograph.

Several framed photos—black and white and color—tell their stories: my father with his mother and two younger siblings in Berlin when he was about seven years old before they escaped Nazi Germany; my mother at age four with her quarter-sized violin in a string quartet with three older boys; daughters Arielle and Talia as children with their arms lovingly wrapped around each other; an eight-year-old Josh scoring a soccer goal and a ten-year-old Coby throwing a perfect strike; and, finally, a sweet shot of my brother Dan, my sister Shelley and me when I was around two years old. 

There is the baseball I caught at Kenny Holtzman’s no-hitter in Chicago and then got Ernie Banks to sign the next day. Though the ink has largely faded, the ball conjures up one of the best two days in a young baseball-loving boy’s life.

I ended up with the kids’ Hanukkiah from my family—a rare perk of being the youngest—and it sits there waiting to be used for the eight nights of Hanukkah each year. It’s solid brass with two lion heads on either side of a large Magen David. Each year, my own kids light it and now my grandchildren will continue the tradition.

And then there are the books, lots of them, each with a story. In addition to Just Like Everyone Else, there are some first editions by Steinbeck, Kipling and Updike, mostly presents from my family. There are faded copies of Kidnapped, To Kill a Mockingbird and Adam Bede, and there is my Dad’s copy of Kon Tiki, the book that first showed me the joy of reading. 

There are several of the books written by my grandfather, Julius Citron, who was an early immunology pioneer, whose work is still relevant today. There are my copies of The Lone Ranger and Young Razzle, early books that have traveled with me, and Herman Wouk’s This is My God, a book that inspired me to live a committed Jewish life.

My Dad’s Ricohflex camera, with its big, boxy shape, forms an interesting design element up there on the top shelf, though few would recognize it as a camera today. I don’t actually remember him using it, but it is now its own piece of art.

One of my favorite items is a sand-powered box trapeze circus acrobat, a bar mitzvah gift. You turn the box around a few times and then the trapeze artist, in a manner similar to a wound grandfather clock, flips for several minutes. It is mesmerizing to watch the little guy silently swing over and over again, the swish of a few grains of sand pushing him forward.

These and other books and objects on the shelves weave together to tell my story, filling me with comfort and gratitude. But the adventures continue, and I am constantly editing the shelves to keep the things up-to-date and fresh; for the past is great, but the future is grander.

Motorists on El Camino Real notice something different immediately upon entering Burlingame. The road narrows and the fast food restaurants and businesses that line much of the highway suddenly give way to a residential street lined by towering 150-year-old eucalyptus trees. For over a century, these majestic trees have welcomed visitors to the
mid-Peninsula town. In the 1920s, a local newspaper declared: “The State of California, famed throughout the world for the beauty of its vistas, has no more inspiring portion of highway than Burlingame’s grand boulevard. In all the long stretch of highway from San Francisco to San Jose, Burlingame’s prospect of graceful sentinel trees is the one real beauty spot.” Planted in the 1870s by famed landscape gardener John McLaren, the tunnel-forming canopy of well over 500 eucalyptus and elm trees was designed to enhance the value of local landowners’ estates by creating a beautiful, wind-protected boulevard out of what was then a largely barren, dusty dirt trail. The resulting park-like, landscaped environment predates the earliest California Highway tree planting program by nearly 50 years. Despite development pressure—especially during the 1920s when newfangled automobiles cruised the highway in growing numbers—Burlingame residents continuously rejected commercial land use along their stretch of El Camino Real. By 1930, Burlingame had become the first city in the nation to enact zoning to protect a historic resource—the highway trees. The 2.2-mile grove, aka The Howard Ralston Eucalyptus Tree Rows, was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2012. To learn more about Burlingame’s famous trees, visit burlingamehistory.org 

A year packed with extraordinary circumstances and challenges, 2020 perpetually reminded us of the need to give back. Keep writing checks or making online donations, but also don’t forget that your own special skills, hobbies and insights can make a vital difference in our Peninsula community. Here’s just a sampling of the countless ways you can volunteer (both virtually and in person)—throughout this holiday season and into next year. For more ideas, check out volunteermatch.org 

1. Write Meaningful Messages 

Every week, through the Meals on Wheels (MOW) program, Peninsula Volunteers delivers over 3,000 hot, nutritious meals, primarily to homebound seniors and adults with disabilities in San Mateo County. In addition to helping seniors who are unable to cook and shop for themselves, MOW also provides critical “Are you doing okay?” safety checks. As volunteers quickly observe, combating loneliness is a constant struggle. With that in mind, Meals on Wheels needs your help to promote sustenance for the soul—by creating handwritten, inspirational notes to accompany deliveries. The request is for anonymous/unsigned missives, written in large print (not in cursive). Think kind, sincere and upbeat messages and images. Cards may be mailed or dropped to this address: Little House, 800 Middle Avenue, Menlo Park, CA 94025. Look for additional guidance on note writing and other ways to get involved at penvol.org/volunteer

2. Be a Sweet Volunteer 

If your language of love includes buttercreams, ganache and fondants, your culinary skills are needed by underserved and at-risk children, whether they’re in low-income housing, foster care, group homes or shelters. Through the nonprofit Cake4Kids, volunteers in San Mateo and Santa Clara County make and deliver birthday cakes, cupcakes, cookies, bars and brownies, custom-made and baked with love. No set time commitment is required—you can bake one or even 10 cakes a year. Choose which child’s request to sign up for, based on the theme, type of dessert, delivery time and location. What inspires you? Whether it’s soccer balls, superheroes or Mickey & Minnie Mouse, you can help raise a child’s self-esteem by showing them that someone cares enough to do something special just for them. Volunteer orientations are currently being held online. Register to get started at cake4kids.org/volunteer

3. Become a Blanketeer

As Charlie Brown once famously observed, “Happiness is a warm blanket,” and Project Linus is on a mission to provide gifts of love, snuggles and comfort to children who are seriously ill, traumatized or otherwise in need. Since the South Bay chapter was launched in 2002, more than 100,000 blankets have been donated to local hospitals, family shelters, school health clinics, social services and parenting organizations. Chapter coordinators request that donations be new, handmade and washable. All kid-friendly styles are welcome, ranging from baby to teen sizes, including quilts, tied comforters, crocheted or knitted afghans and receiving blankets. No need to be a professional seamstress. One of the most popular, high-demand patterns is a no-sew fleece blanket, which is also a perfect fit for community service projects. Find everything you need to know along with the closest drop-off locations at sjlinus.org 

4. Help Others Cope with Grief 

Dealing with the loss of a loved one is staggering, and it’s not always obvious where to find support. My Grief Angels, a nonprofit community network and mobile app, creates connections so that no one has to feel like they’re grieving alone. Through education and the sharing of experiences, My Grief Angels promotes the understanding of different types of grief, how grief impacts our health, families and work, how others have coped and even ways to turn grief into something positive. In response to the
COVID-19 pandemic, My Grief Angels launched free Grief Support Online/Virtual Groups in English and Spanish at a dedicated site,
griefsupportonline.com. After participating in online facilitator training, you can help guide group discussions, which requires compassionate listening rather than providing advice. Also needed is help in spreading the word through communications outreach. Put your phone and email skills to good use contacting local hospitals, senior care centers, public health outlets and other organizations to better publicize this free service. Learn more at mygriefangels.org

5. Make Time to Tutor  

For most, the idea of “distance learning” was a vague concept before 2020, but with schools switching to online learning and reduced schedules, many students from low-income and frontline worker families lack the tools and support they need to be academically successful. To help keep students on track and combat learning loss, Bay Area Tutoring Association partners with Bay Area organizations to provide the engine behind free and subsidized local tutoring programs. Spanning different grade levels and subjects, whether your speciality is math, computer science, digital literacy or grammar and reading, you can fill a need for 1:1 and small group academic support. Training is provided by the nonprofit, and with 90% of tutoring sessions conducted online right now, there’s plenty of flexibility to match up your schedule and skill sets. Go to bayareatutor.org/I_want_to_volunteer to find out how you can help. 

6. Care for Kittens 

Help turn a feral cat into a familiar one by caring for adoptable felines from the Peninsula’s Humanimal Connection. Started in 1988 by two local sisters, Humanimal Connection rescues homeless, unwanted, abandoned and sometimes abused and neglected kittens and cats. They need help in the morning and evening to clean cages and socialize with the cats and kittens. For the more ambitious, the nonprofit is in desperate need to expand its foster-network rescue group because they are currently at capacity. Typically, families foster a litter of kittens for at least two weeks. Each litter is different, some need socialization, some are without the mother cat and some require bottle-feeding. They will match your foster kitties to your personal capabilities. Humanimal Connection provides the food, litter, litter box, bedding and everything you need to foster the kitties. To expand your family by a few tails, email info@humanimalconnection.com to volunteer.

7. Lend a Library Box Hand

Access Books Bay Area is on a mission to level the literacy playing field—by transforming inadequate library spaces and providing high-quality books to students in low-income schools. But with many school and classroom libraries temporarily closed, Access Books is implementing a creative alternative: wooden lending library book boxes. Akin to a Little Free Library, these boxes are filled with inviting, gently-used books for school kids to borrow and return. So, calling all carpenters, artists and bibliophiles! Volunteers are needed to help construct, paint and install the library book boxes on Peninsula school campuses. You’ll be provided with instructions and a materials list. Since this is a hands-on assignment, you will need to have basic construction tools and expertise and cover the roughly $30 cost for materials. If you have the artist’s touch, volunteers are also needed to paint and decorate boxes. And, like-new or new book donations for children in grades K-8 are always welcome. Check out accessbooksbayarea.org to get all the details.

8. Organize a Donation Drive 

Be the leader of the neighborhood and the maven of NextDoor by organizing a campaign for one of numerous local drives benefiting our less fortunate neighbors on the Peninsula. San Mateo nonprofit Samaritan House is putting out the call for most-needed items, including breakfast food and cereal, kids clothing, baby needs and household cleaning items. They ask that you call 650.294.4331 before you make your drop-off. Catholic Charities needs help with baby items (formula, diapers and more) to give infants a safe and healthy start and snack & hygiene kits to provide essential necessities. To reach out for a complete list of needs and instructions, go to catholiccharitiessf.org/how-to-help/volunteer.html. And helping to break the cycle of homelessness is Life Moves, based in Menlo Park. By launching a fundraiser, you can help LifeMoves clients feel more at home for the holidays. Team up with family and friends to provide holiday meals, purchase gift cards and spread holiday cheer to our neighbors who need it most. LifeMoves makes starting a successful drive easy with a five-step approach at give.lifemoves.org/vf/LMHolidays

9. Be a Friend

Remember that someone who inspired you and helped you reach your potential? The Redwood City-based nonprofit Friends for Youth aims to provide our younger population with this crucial kind of mentorship. Friends for Youth organizes direct one-to-one, community-based mentoring services to low-income youth ages 8 to 17 in San Mateo County and Northern Santa Clara Counties. When local teachers and other youth professionals spot kids who are “at-risk” for academic or life skills failure, they refer them to the program. Friends for Youth matches you with a young person in need of friendship, and you set up your own schedule to meet. The current focus is on online engagement like virtual museum tours and video chats, with plans to return to sponsored activities once it’s safe to meet in person. Given that friendship goes both ways, the program takes pride in its 90 percent success rate of creating long-term mentoring matches. Check out friendsforyouth.org to learn how you can make a difference. 

10. Give the Coast a Hug  

Step aside, trees; there’s another natural beauty to embrace. Sea Hugger is a Half Moon Bay-based nonprofit focused on reviving our coastal environment by removing plastic pollution and encouraging systemic change. Sea Hugger’s goal is to create sustainable coastal communities that are no longer polluted by plastic—which clearly benefits all of us who bask in our Pacific splendor. On the second and fourth Saturdays of every month, Sea Hugger sponsors beach clean-ups at two beaches in Half Moon Bay: Dunes Beach and Surfer’s Beach. Looking at this month, that means you can join them at Dunes Beach at 10AM on December 12 or pitch in with the 1PM cleanup at Surfer’s Beach on December 26. The nonprofit knows how to find fun in picking up trash, like how they collected 1,272 cigarette butts last year and are now in the process of transforming them into a surfboard. Visit seahugger.org for a free parking pass, a link to sign a waiver and further information.

Author of four books. Attorney focused on poverty law. Unitarian Universalist preacher. Dean at two prestigious universities. Stanford Business School lecturer. 

Sitting down with the Rev. William (Scotty) McLennan in his Menlo Park backyard, that seems like a lot to unpack. Not so, he explains: “In my mind, they absolutely connect. I’ve tried to build bridges across disciplines. To me, the ministry is the arena that relates to all of life, that allows for the inter-relationship.”

Originally from Lake Forest, Illinois, Scotty had an early fascination with the law and his interest in ministry grew steadily during his years at Yale University. “They represent two separate sides of the brain,” he notes. “Result-oriented/rational on one side and emotional/spiritual on the other side. I couldn’t do one without the other—but I’m basically a minister. I’ve just done that in a variety of contexts over the years.”

It was at Yale that a group of housemates, as Scotty describes them, left a permanent mark on his life. “Seven of us stay in close touch, meeting every Labor Day for 35 years until this year when we’ve been gathering via Zoom on Saturdays,” he relates. “Cartoonist Garry Trudeau was part of the group. He was focused on going to art school but he started a comic strip, Bull Tales, for the Yale Daily News.”

What began as Bull Tales launched as the daily comic strip Doonesbury in 1970, with Trudeau drawing inspiration from familiar characters in his own life. “The character BD is based on Brian Dowling, who was the quarterback of the football team and a big man on campus, although not a part of our group,” says Scotty. “We called Charlie Pillsbury ‘The Doone,’ so he was the basis for Mike Doonesbury. He looks somewhat like the character.”

As for Doonesbury’s streetwise priest and Walden College’s unofficial chaplain, the likeness is an immediate tip-off. “I’m the Rev. Scot Sloan character with bright red hair and beard,” acknowledges Scotty. “Mixed in with the character is my mentor, Yale chaplain the Rev. William Sloane Coffin.” 

What’s it like to be forever immortalized in the funny papers? “Being a cartoon character is a great compliment,” he says, “but from time to time you realize you are a lifelong joke!” 

For the record, Trudeau did go to art school. But he also won the Pulitzer Prize for Doonesbury and figured out that “being a cartoonist was a profession he could genuinely be proud of,” as Scotty explains.

As a graduate student at Harvard University, Scotty did something that no one before had done. He enrolled simultaneously at the law school and the divinity school. “I would run back and forth between the two schools,” he recalls. “The law was narrowing. Divinity school was broadening. But I couldn’t do one without the other.”

The goal upon graduation was social justice work. “This was a period when peace activists like the Berrigan brothers, both of whom were Catholic priests, and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., were in the news,” he continues. “They were all religious figures; it was the sense of religion being connected to social justice.”

Scotty was ordained in 1975 as a Unitarian Universalist minister and admitted to the Massachusetts bar the same year. He immediately went to work in what he describes as “legal ministry” in Dorchester, a Boston neighborhood. “In our work, we’d ask, ‘What is the life problem that led to your legal problem?’ The people we worked with were frustrated with the legal process and often alienated. We’d explain the legal process, but we’d also pray with them when asked to do so.”

Scotty found great satisfaction working with low-income clients who could be helped in a wide variety of ways, maximizing their income, dealing with family issues, negotiating with landlords and helping with consumer issues. “What was frustrating was the amount of time I had to spend in law libraries and courtrooms arguing with other lawyers,” he says. “It was a kind of chess game over people’s real human needs.”

Following his work in Dorchester with the Unitarian Universalist Legal Ministry, he served as University Chaplain at Tufts University for 16 years. While there he was invited to teach part-time at Harvard Business School’s ethics program. He saw teaching business school students as an opportunity to reach people “on the other end so that they can understand the real plight of low-income people and people of color,” Scotty explained in an article spotlighting Harvard Divinity School alumni.

Scotty continued the tradition of preacher and professor when he became Dean for Religious Life at Stanford University in 2001, teaching both undergrad and graduate students. A highlight of his tenure was meeting with one of his spiritual mentors, the Dalai Lama. “It was my honor and great pleasure to be part of two visits by the Dalai Lama to Stanford,” he says. 

In 2005, Scotty moderated a public conversation with the Dalai Lama about the nature of nonviolence in the chancel of the Stanford Memorial Church. In 2010, he welcomed the Dalai Lama back to Stanford Memorial Church to deliver the Rathbun Lecture on a Meaningful Life. “In both cases he spoke in depth about compassion, altruism and the importance of nonviolence in all aspects of life,” Scotty recounts. “In my personal time with him I was amazed by his warmth, his down-to-earth approach and his sense of humor. He also seemed to be deeply attentive to everyone he met. He has a great ability to connect science and religion, modern medicine and spirituality, pragmatism and idealism and the sacred and the secular.”

Scotty retired as Dean in 2014 but continues to teach Stanford Business School students, making a practice of integrating novel approaches. “I love teaching and being with students in a classroom setting,” he says. “It’s just so much fun—and that’s been my retirement goal, to do things that are fun.” 

In one course, students explore the experience of respected business leaders who have been able to integrate their spiritual and business lives successfully. Another examines the deeper levels of attitudes and beliefs, often unconscious, which lie beneath the way business is done in various countries.

“You can’t really do business in the United Arab Emirates without knowing something about Islam and you can’t do business in China without knowing something about Confucianism or in India without knowing something about Hinduism,” Scotty explains.

Over the years, Scotty has been disappointed and frustrated that students were not more involved with social justice issues like institutional racism. “They’d spend time at a homeless shelter but that was making it a personal issue, offering a band-aid solution,” he says. “But in the last few years I’ve noticed a shift with students looking at the institutional basis of poverty, racism and gender issues. That’s been promising.”

In addition to retiring as Dean, Scotty also retired as an attorney and as a minister in active service including his association with the Universalist Unitarian Church of Palo Alto. “There were all these things I hadn’t had time to do in my life,” he says. “The first and foremost was more time with my wife, children, grandchildren and friends.” 

Although no longer on the pulpit, Scotty emphasizes that ministry remains at the forefront of his life: “Religion is about emotion and engaging with other people and about art and music and all those other ways of connecting with something grander than yourself.”

Through the ups and downs of 2020, photographer Mary Ries Fischer has found respite with her camera in the Baylands. She captured this Perfect Shot of ducks taking flight on a recent visit. “The Baylands has been my salvation,” reflects Mary. “I thought seeing Mother Nature at sunset could bring the best end to 2020.”

Image by Mary Ries Fischer 

words by Sheri Baer

Kelly Dixon is on a mission to save women from their yoga pants. As a fashionista and founder of a unique retail concept called Park Alley, Kelly cruises the Peninsula in a former food truck, helping women transform their style. Brimming with clothing, gifts, handbags and jewelry, Park Alley is “a mobile fashion truck with a stylist on board who can actually tell you what’s hot, what’s working and how to rock it,” as Kelly describes.

It all started when Kelly had the idea of applying her decades of fashion experience to a more flexible business outside the bounds of a traditional brick-and-mortar. She envisioned a mobile boutique inspired by the luxe looks of Park Avenue, combined with the notion of discovering them in a chic secret place, and thus, Park Alley was born.

To set her dream in motion, Kelly bought a food truck and customized it with wood floors, a marble countertop and a changing room to create a warm, inviting ambiance with seating and pillows. By bringing her specially curated pieces directly to customers, Kelly fills a gap she saw in the retail space.

“I know a lot of people who don’t like going to the shopping center or some of the brick-and-mortar stores because they feel like some of the sales associates don’t have the experience,” Kelly says. “I’m going to tell them that that product does not quite suit you, but I have something else that might. I want them to walk away, even if they don’t buy anything, knowing that I can find something for them eventually.”

Kelly traditionally hand-selects her unique merchandise by attending the big fashion markets in San Francisco, Las Vegas and Los Angeles. With shopping currently being conducted online and via Zoom, Kelly is disappointed that she can’t touch the fabrics and try things on herself like she usually does. However, her fashion expertise has helped her adapt with the times, and brands are coming to her with what’s hot next season.

“You still have to have your finger on the pulse of what’s happening,” she explains. “I’m on Instagram a lot. I follow certain bloggers and I’m ahead of the game; I get tips ahead of time. But I also follow my gut and I know my client.”

And who is that client?

“Anyone from the teenager to the 80-year-old woman,” notes Kelly. “I know that’s funny to say, but it’s true. I get them all.”

At this time of year, Kelly is usually helping customers prepare for holiday parties and festive dinners. In the past she’s even styled families for their holiday cards. However, it’s a little bit different now due to the restrictions on group functions. The result is fewer sequins and a greater emphasis on comfort.

“Right now I have a couple of ‘teddy bear’ coats that are just such a feel-good. That is what is really in, making people feel comfortable,” she says. “The sweater dress that I have is so cozy and warm and you can wear it a few different ways. Especially with people maybe gaining a little bit of weight in recent months, that’s why I bought it.”

Kelly recognizes the value in being nimble, shifting to meet market demand. After all, in 2020, staying at home is the new going out.

“I did a poll not too long ago asking if anyone is going to be dressing up this season while they’re staying home with their families or are they going to be hanging out in jeans,” she says. “A lot of people said they want to hang out in their jeans.” So Park Alley is stocked with a variety of styles you won’t find everywhere, along with other on-trend staples, like long, flowing dresses in winter hues and shirts in fresh plaids. 

“I’m still doing some really cute holiday outfits and also some incredible coats,” she adds, “because people still go out for walks and they are driving around and looking at holiday lights.”

Since launching Park Alley in 2018, Kelly has fully optimized the flexibility of a mobile shopping experience. The advantages of such a highly-personalized business model are even more apparent in 2020. She’ll drive up to a girlfriend’s house for a private shopping appointment or host a limited number of women for a public shopping event that she posts on Facebook or Instagram. A Park Alley visit is even the prize for a local school auction: “People are bidding on it and it’s by appointment only for a sip-and-shop.” 

As someone who’s worked her entire professional career in fashion, Kelly is well-equipped to find a solution to this year’s wardrobe challenges. She grew up in Atherton and Menlo Park and caught the fashion bug more than two decades ago while working for her mom and aunt in their former boutique, Gracious Jewels, off of Menlo Park’s Santa Cruz Avenue.

“I just loved it,” Kelly says. “Even as a little girl, I would literally lay my clothes out the day before school. I had this pink Polaroid camera and I would take a picture of my outfit and hang it on a poster board so I wouldn’t be wearing the same thing.”

After graduating from Notre Dame High School in Belmont, Kelly attended FiDM—the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in San Francisco—then worked for Macy’s West doing fashion shows as a stylist before styling on her own.

Now back in Menlo Park, she’s the proud mom of a college student, a high schooler and a middle schooler and appreciates raising a family in her own familiar childhood surroundings. She loves the area and says fashion moments often sneak up on her, even at the most unexpected of times.

“I was walking down California Avenue and this woman fell in love with my jumpsuit,” recounts Kelly. “I’d literally put it on 20 minutes before and she said, ‘I have to have that!’” So Kelly did what any savvy Silicon Valley business owner would do: She sold it right off of her back and won a new customer.

As Kelly tells it, fashion isn’t about a single look—it’s about the way you live, work and feel. “I want women to feel good-in-their-skin comfortable, to give them the best shopping experience possible,” she says. “Park Alley is really a celebration of self.”

I keep hearing about what a tough year it has been but I’m grateful to 2020 for giving me a new “leash” on life. To tell it straight, I had a bit of a bleak start in this world. I came from a litter of five born in July 2019, and Redwood City’s Pets in Need rescued me from a kill shelter in Fresno. Alicia, Andros, Giorgio and Jacques knew they had a lot of love to give a “trauma dog,” and on January 4, they picked me up and brought me home to San Mateo. (That’s why I’ll always be a big fan of 2020!) Alicia’s dad lived in Fresno and loved Fresno chili peppers, so she named me Chili in his memory. Alicia is also a chef, which makes my name even more appropriate. If you’re thinking I look familiar, I get that all the time. With my distinctive brown patch over one eye (a nod to my Jack Russell Terrier heritage), I look just like the iPhone dog emoji. When I first arrived in San Mateo, I felt safest under the kitchen table, but I got all the support I needed to build up my confidence. Now I am super social with other dogs (including my Central Park buddy seen here) and absolutely devoted to my family. Not to brag, but they’re always saying, “That Chili—he’s a lover!” Given that my nickname is “Chili Dog,” it’s not surprising that I still enjoy hanging out in the kitchen, but my new happy place is curling up right behind Alicia’s feet when she’s cooking. Here’s my tip for making 2021 a special year: Visit petsinneed.org to find a companion like me!

We have great weather on the Peninsula, but there are times when I miss having the four seasons that I experienced growing up. Especially the snow. People often are surprised that we enjoyed the full depth of seasons in Amarillo, Texas, my hometown. But we were in the northern high plains, closer to New Mexico and Colorado than to our Texas neighbor, Dallas.  

There’s a lot of weather in Amarillo, and I loved that about the place. 

In the winter you can wake up, unexpectedly, to an unbroken carpet of snow. With the silent, cold beauty comes dangerous icy streets, perfectly formed icicles hanging from the edges of your roof, and—best of all—no school, no work and hot, toasty logs in your fireplace. When those days happen, most people stay inside, warm and secure, sheltered in their homes from all the bad weather out there.

But for boys with ambition, those days mean opportunity.

On those mornings, my neighbor friend down the street, Scotty Watkins, and I would quickly eat our breakfasts and head out dressed in our heavy coats, galoshes, woolen gloves and hats, gather our big snow shovels and trudge through the snow, heading for the biggest homes with the longest driveways. We would make our way through the unbroken snow to the front porch and ring the doorbell. Someone was certain to answer.

In our still-high-pitched voices, we would ask, “Would you like us to clear your driveway and sidewalk?” 

We must have looked sweet to these generally older adults and they good-naturedly would smile at us. But we meant all business. Shoveling snow was a way to make some big money. And despite living in the finest Amarillo neighborhood and both our fathers being doctors, we lived very moderate lifestyles, far from the children of the affluent today. No trips to Cabo. If we wanted things, we had to earn them. 

“Well, how much would it be for both of them?” they would ask.

And we were not shy in our prices, given that without our services they could be shut in for days at a time. Our quote was as much as $20, though given the time and the luck we were having, we were open to negotiate. But mostly they met our numbers.

Once the dealings were complete, we went right to work. Even though we were both small, we were good workers. The first thing we would do was to discard as much of our clothing as possible. Shoveling snow heats you up good and fast, and we knew from experience to go ahead and shed the extra layers first. Often, even with the temperatures in the tens or twenties, we would be in short sleeves.

Sometimes our charge was to clear a whole driveway, but with the really long ones, we would usually just do tire lanes. We would ask the homeowner to open their garage doors for a moment so that we could see how to start and then each of us would take a tire lane and do our best to stick with it. Once we had taken care of a customer’s driveway, we would go to work on the sidewalk stretching from the street to the front door. 

When the snow was new, light and not full of moisture or ice, the work was not difficult. But if it were the second day after a big storm, and the snow and mush were frozen overnight, the shoveling could be very demanding. Whatever the conditions, we just stayed at it until we finished. We wanted
to get to as many homes as
possible before the temperature rose and melted our
business opportunities.

When we were done, we went back to the front door and rang the bell. Almost always, the residents approved of our work, though now and then there was a curmudgeon who told us that we had not done a very good job and to go back at it, which, of course, we did, though vowing not to offer our services to them after the next big storm.

When they paid us, they often added a couple dollars as a tip, something we were grateful for. And inevitably, we would get an invite to come inside for hot cocoa and cookies or cake. Unless it was our last home of the day, we would politely decline, wanting to get to the next spot. On a good day, we could do four homes—two before lunch and two after—which meant around $40 each. This was serious money to us. 

I always hoped for a snowstorm before Hanukkah, since I enjoyed picking out nice presents for my family and this meant I could up my level of gift-giving significantly. And that’s what makes a good holiday, isn’t it? Giving and making the people you love happy.

Amid the ever-changing landscape of the Peninsula, some historic treasures remain, iconic reminders of an earlier time when farm animals grazed in Palo Alto and the local water bill was just $1 a month. The century-old Palo Alto Tower Well at the corner of Alma and Hawthorne is one of those relics. The 78-foot-high cylinder also symbolizes the ingenuity and forward-thinking of a small town that became one of the nation’s first to purchase and operate its own water utility in 1896. In 1910, the Tower Well was built to store Palo Alto’s water supply, provide safe water for the growing population and protect local structures in the event of a fire. With thick, reinforced concrete walls and a 155,000 gallon tank, the Tower Well pumped and regulated water using a state-of-the-art electronic water capacity control system. Manufactured in the early 1900s, the Tower Well’s valve opened and closed in response to electrical signals. By the late 1980s, Palo Alto relied on water from Hetch Hetchy Reservoir and the Tower was abandoned. The City Council considered proposals to convert the Tower to a single-family home and day care center but ultimately decided to preserve the structure as it was originally constructed. Today, surrounded by native plants, interpretative panels and park benches, the Tower Well stands as a symbol of community roots.