Not Still Lifes by Dawn

N OT S T I L L L I F E S

Still life is boring. Never stand still! Catherynne M. Valente

Keep on truckin’. Blind Boy Fuller and Robert Crumb

Photos by Don Graydon and by family and friends

Yellow Submarine Press Index, Washington 2021

The dancing man is me, pouring something (water? kerosene?) on a pile of burning debris down by the river. My heavy-equipment guy, Denny, dropped several cedar trees to create an open space by the stream — and I caught hell from the state forester for that. This was June 1991, about a year after I bought my property in Index. 1

Andy walks on water (or above it) at Bob and Roslyn’s pool in Glendale, California, in August 1981. A tragic event brought Andy and mom Sharmen to Glendale: Ryan, the 3-year-old son of her sister Roslyn, had drowned in the pool and Sharmen came to help the family. 2

The two sons of Cosette and Ken Harms churn up the waters along with Andy. The Harms family lived across the street from me when I lived in Juanita in the 1980s. Photo is from July 1985. 3

Here I am with a successful leap from rock to rock at Utica Lake, California. Jonelle and I canoed to a campsite along the lake, visiting to attend the wedding of Bill Poulson and Bobbette Budworth on the last day of July 2004. 4

Michael Knoll takes a leap of faith during a hike to Gothic Basin, one of 38 mountain outings by the Usual Suspects in 2016. Kurt reports, ‘The spring melt and runoff were going full on. We passed spectacular waterfalls and splashed through several sporty creek crossings.’ 5

The Graydon kids love frisbee. Jim leaps high to snag a frisbee thrown by sister Anita in Tuolumne Meadows in July 1990. 6

Dan was the premier frisbee player in our family. This is one of his jumping behind-the-back catches, probably in the mid-1970s. He could throw farther and more accurately than any of us. 7

Flying through the air with the greatest of ease, Anya leaps for a landing in the north fork of the Skykomish River, a quarter-mile upriver from my place. Lisa and Cocoa are the spectators for this summer 2006 jump. 8

Summer 2007 and Anya does it again, a high-flying leap into our magnificent swimming hole just upriver from me. Changes in the river eventually took it away. 9

Jennifer Graydon (now Jennifer Maydan) took up riding in the 1990s. ‘This was probably 1995,’ she says. ‘We’re at Maukalani Stables up Olinda Road. That’s my horse Waikoa. And yep, that’s an English riding outfit.’ 10

Michelle Graydon and her mount, Prince, on a training run. ‘I was learning how to race horses around barrels, not for serious competition, just for fun. It led to me eventually buying my own horse and getting smart by wearing a helmet when I rode.’ 2015. 11

Father’s Day, June 1967, kids being kids. My brother Jim is at the far right. The four boys in the middle (starting at the bottom) are my cousins Larry, Jerry, Ken and Ron. (Boy at left, not sure.) The fun took place at my Grandma and Grandpa Graydon’s place on Bethel Island, California. 12

Jonelle has two daughters and here they are. Dana and Lisa are wrestling on the floor at home in Richmond Beach in June 1991. 13

How did she do it? Lisa’s daughter Anya was under the water and then sprang up, creating this huge curlicue of hair and water. She was playing in Jonelle’s pool in August 2005. 14

My brother Dan has lived on Maui since about 1975. In his prime you could find him bandit-hiking in Haleakala, boogie boarding at Hookipa, canoeing around Molokini, bicycling or hang gliding down from Haleakala — or swimming underwater. He made this dive in 1997. 15

Here’s Jonelle, having the ride of her life. ‘We were dropping like a rock. I was thinking, boy that ground looks kinda close. And then it was total silence. I was careful not to do anything weird.’ The tandem parachute jump was at Harvey Airfield in Snohomish in August 1993. 16

My brother Dan takes to the air in a tandem hang-gliding flight in 1993. ’We launched from 10,000 feet,’ Dan says. ‘I did this three times, and this time we landed at 1500 feet in pastureland above Pukalani. The other two times we also jumped from the summit of Haleakala but we went all the way down to the ocean. When we came in for a landing, we had to yell at people on the beach to look out, here we come.’

A small beach and lots of rocks and water to play in at a spot near Paia that we called Grandma's Beach. Kids at play in March 2007. 18

Talia takes a flying leap into the waters of Keiki Beach at Spreckelsville, Maui. This leap in September 2005 was propelled by Nate Maydan. 19

Blanca’s just a streak of white as she chases Boca through Dana’s yard in the spring of 2015.

Marissa dances. She’s at home in Castro Valley, about 2015.

Yikes! Sarah leaps into the arms of daddy Paul at the Secret Garden up above the hut. This was September 6, 2003, on the occasion of the hutwarming party to celebrate completion of the Baring Hut on the cliffs far behind my house. 22

Kurt’s photography and some time with Photoshop gets Gil running through the clouds during a Usual Suspects hike up Umtanum Ridge in March 2014. 23

You can just see my cousin Gary’s face as he drops backward into the delta waters at Bethel Island, California. This was at Grandma and Grandpa Graydon’s place on the island in September 1957. 24

Beldon tosses the ball and a young man in Ben Lerner’s family makes a failed attempt to stop it. The water polo game was in Jonelle’s pool in August 2017. 25

My grandson Graham battles another knight, each with a blunt wooden sword. The medieval-style skirmish was fought in 2017, probably in Cambridge, Massachusetts. 26

A frisbee carrying some of Anita’s ashes flies out to sea, fulfilling one of our sister’s last wishes. Dan made a miracle throw in the face of strong wind, landing the disc on a distant sea stack along the Sonoma coast. Cheering spectators: ‘Oh yeah, oh yeah! Dan, how did you do it!? Unbelievable!’ Anita left us on January 5, 2016. 27

A wondrous moment as Jonelle lays her hand on the back of a gray whale. It was a spiritual experience to have the whales swim without fear up to our small boat, in Laguna San Ignacio in January of 2008. The whales migrate each winter from Alaska to the Baja California lagoon to mate and calve before returning to the arctic. 28

Satchi on the move. She loves the snow and she loves mountain hiking with the Usual Suspects. This dash took place on a hike up Railroad Grade by Mount Baker in July 2018. 29

In this classic photo by Kurt Smith, Frank Peschel-Gallee takes a big step during a Usual Suspects hike up Shellrock Peak. September 2017. 30

Michael Knoll scampers to the summit of Vesper Peak during a Usuals climb in June 2015.

Jonelle pitches a good-looking gutter ball. She and I joined friends and family at the bowling lanes near her house in Richmond Beach as part of my 80th birthday party. I entered this world on December 13, 1938. 32

Jonelle, Cocoa and I hiked to the Heybrook Ridge fire lookout in the early spring of 2008, and we obviously had fun in the snow. 33

Here I am, learning to ski, sort of. I learned this unusual technique in California sometime in the mid 1950s, when I was still a gangly teenager. 34

For some reason, Neil Modie leaped into the air as he was clearing a tent site during a climb of Mount Rainier, sometime in the 1980s. Now, in the year 2021, Neil is still climbing mountains as leader and spiritual guide of our hiking group, the Usual Suspects. 35

I’m at a Molokai beach with Tassa, our German shepherd puppy. Sharmen was a teacher at Maunaloa School in the little pineapple-growing town of Maunaloa and I ran the Molokai Reporter in 1969-1970. 36

My boy Andy, 6 years old and full of energy, races along Baldwin Beach near Paia, Maui. October 1977.

I love building rock cairns (or ‘ducks’ as we called them in the Sierras). I created a few land art projects at my place in Index and I called them menehune. This is Menehune #6, under construction in October 2006 on the river by Emily’s Park. 38

The first wall goes up at Bill and Glenda Jensen's house on East Kuiaha Road, Maui, in June 1973. The Graydon family, builders all, came to Maui to help build the house for Sharmen’s parents. I’m the one struggling at the far left, then Dan, Luann and my dad. 39

Dana got some river guide training, then treated the family to an exciting raft trip down the Wenatchee River. Here we go, in May 1999. Dana is in back guiding the raft. The others I can identify are Jonelle and Twila, in front of Dana, and Don and Lisa in the bow. 40

I don’t know who these guys are but it looks like they’re having a wild ride through the Boulder Drop rapids, on the Skykomish River just below Index. July 2013. 41

On the 4th of July 2009, a group of friends and family met at Emily’s Park to build the Serpentine, a 110-foot-long elevated trail built of flood debris that had accumulated at the park. Jordan Rabinowe is pounding a stake into the ground to help support the edge of the Serpentine. 42

Anya is on the run, on boulders next to the swimming hole just upriver from Emily’s Park on the north fork of the Skykomish. September 2006. 43

My mom was a classic Graydon, a super-nice person and always ready for enjoyment with the family, especially if it was outdoors. She is sliding down a snow run in Calaveras County, California, in February 1966. 44

Joelle Robinson, a typically exuberant Usual Suspect, glissades down the Muir snowfield on Mount Rainier in July 2013. 45

Behind Dan’s house in Castro Valley, California, was a small hill with eucalyptus trees. He attached ropes high up in one of the trees to create an exceptional rope swing and proceeded to carry out antics like this. 1967. 46

Dan’s rope swing attracted a lot of adventurous people, such as these two girls flying high in the air above Castro Valley. 1969. 47

Cyrus Maydan, age 3, enjoying an impromptu shower out under the Hawaiian sun. Jennifer and Nate’s boy is one of the lucky ones to be born and raised on Maui, just like my son, Andy. 2011. 48

Here are my son Andy and Andy’s son Graham having a good time in New York’s Central Park. Graham was almost 2 at the time, in July 2008. He was born in New York and since then has lived in Berlin, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and in Minneapolis, Minnesota — this boy gets around. 49

It’s November 2006, winter coming on, but the sun always shines in Cabo San Lucas. This jet-ski driver sprinted off his machine the second it hit the sand. Jonelle and I got our share of the sunshine as we took over the Carothers’ condo in San Jose del Cabo for a couple of weeks. 50

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