Sixty-three years is long time to be gone from a place, especially if it’s Marin County. I left for good when I graduated from San Rafael High School and, as far as I can remember, I’ve never spent another night here. Until now.

We drove around for a while yesterday – went by the two houses I lived in here. One has been upgraded; one is now the parking lot behind the San Rafael City Hall. The high school is in the same place but is now a 33-acre campus containing seven buildings and a “gym complex” with several sports fields. It serves ‘about 1,000 students.’ That’s seven times as many buildings as in my day but only 300 more students. I wandered around until I finally found the front of the main building; it was the only part of my old alma mater that I recognized.

Goddess Marta

But it wasn’t until last night at the Corte Madera Community Center that I really felt my half-century (plus) absence. We were my step-daughter Marta’s guest at a solstice celebration. She was involved in the program – the Goddess of Capricorn. Or maybe the Goddess of Cancer. I’m not quite sure…

There was lots of music – it began with a drum circle and then there were Christmas carols set to a reggae rhythm with the words changed. We lit candles to bring good things for the coming year. We wrote what we wanted to rid ourselves of on little pieces of paper that Reverend Carol collected and made magically go up in flames. There was a bit of chanting and a fabulous slide show of heavens and stone monuments and the sun coming back to our neck of the woods.  Plus there was food (mostly vegan and gluten free) and coffee. It was more woo-woo that I can tell you.

You can’t go home again for sure. Not to Marin County, anyway. But it’s a fun place to visit…