sonora2sonoma

by Tim Konrad

Chapter Thirteen

When I was a teenager I became fascinated with bottle hunting and collecting. Some of my friends were making discoveries by digging into old dumpsites and outhouses, and some were finding bottles worth money. In following suit, I soon came across a variety of beer bottles from different breweries, such as Buffalo Brewery in Sacramento, that I had never heard of. Some of these breweries were local, which only added to my curiosity. Asking my father what happened to these breweries, he told me they all went out of business when Prohibition came along. I remember lamenting the lack of diversity in the brands of beer available at the time–mostly Hamms, Pabst Blue Ribbon and Burgermeister. Back then, Coors hadn’t made it to the west coast, although I had seen it in New Mexico on visits there. (The first Smokey & the Bandit film centered on a wager over how long it would take a trucker to deliver a truck load of Coors beer cross country to Georgia).  How different it must have been, I thought, and how exciting to be able to taste such variety as apparently existed prior to Prohibition. Thankfully, changes in the law made a couple of decades ago made it possible for the blossoming of new craft breweries we are seeing today. Variety, it is said for good reason, is the spice of life.

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My father was living in San Mateo when Prohibition began. My grandfather had a still in the attic of their house and it was my father’s job to tend to it when he was home from school. One day, it caught fire while he was tending it. My Dad, fearful, and rightfully so, knew he couldn’t call the fire department, so he managed to extinguish the fire by himself. Years later, when he and I were walking on some property I used to own out past Phoenix Lake, he spotted my marijuana garden. Like any good father, this worried him, since it was before medical marijuana became legalized. I drew a parallel between my garden and his father’s still back in San Mateo, making the case that if having the still was an acceptable risk, so was the garden. He seemed to buy it and we never discussed the garden again.

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Prohibition was ultimately overturned in 1933 and the nation resumed legal drinking. Conceived as an effort to force behavioral changes upon people who hadn’t indicated any interest in changing, weren’t interested in changing, and weren’t going to do so simply because some idiots in Washington said they had to, Prohibition was fatally flawed from the beginning. Such efforts to stifle the human spirit have been attempted throughout the ages by well-meaning busybodies who ought first to put their own houses in order before trying to tell others how to manage theirs. We see this today in our politics. Despite the required separation of church and state in government affairs, the growth of the influence of evangelical Christianity over government matters these days is alarming. The reason the founding fathers wanted religion out of governmental decision making is because a man cannot serve more than one master at a time, no matter how you try to spin it.

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With the passage of time has come a rise in the population. The impact on the environment resulting from our increase in numbers can be seen in many ways, some more obvious than others. It used to be possible, for instance, to hike in the Emigrant Wilderness without a permit. Back then, you could camp in the forest in places other than designated campsites, and there were no fees involved. Turnouts near river crossings were places to pull off and park to hike down to the river. Nowadays, the highway department places boulders in those wide spots and constructs berms to prevent people from pulling off. As access has been restricted, controls have proliferated, all, or mostly designed with good intentions in mind, but the net effect has become a world with fewer opportunities and less convenience than before. And the funny thing about it is, if you hadn’t been around long enough to remember the way things used to be, you wouldn’t be aware of how much they’ve changed  What might seem inconvenient or limiting to an older person might appear normal and routine to younger folks. One’s attitude and perspective can make all the difference.