The Angels Are Older

Jackson Browne had been touring for months and his schedule overflowed with worthy causes, but on a recent November evening he drove in from Los Angeles, changed clothes in a kindergarten classroom, and stepped onto the stage of Vista de las Cruces, our little rural school in Gaviota. He performed solo acoustic, on guitar and keyboard, taking requests from a repertoire of songs spanning three decades, and story-talking too.

The concert was the kick-off fundraiser for the Vista del Mar Foundation, an organization led by president and parent Ron Cortopassi that works to help fund performing arts, after-school programs for parents in need, and field trips and activities that take advantage of nearby cultural and environmental resources.

“This is an area of farms and ranches, and we’re trying to preserve our local heritage,” said the Foundation's official event producer, Jo Ann Brown, who organized the show, and whose youngest son is now in eighth grade at Vista. “I feel that our little treasure of a community is so rare and special that the more we share it with people who care, the better leverage we will have for its preservation. Jackson has been a great help, and the music is a common passion that brings us together on a very profound level. When people open their hearts to his songs, they are better able to see where they are and how special it really is!"

Preservation of local heritage is a big theme around here. Gaviota is a point of geography, a state of mind, and a time-blurred zone where yesterday seems to linger. The area lies to the west of Santa Barbara along El Camino Real, east of Point Conception, extending north to the first ridge of the Santa Ynez Mountains. It’s not pristine, but nature prevails: forested riparian corridors open out to wetlands and estuaries, sweet-smelling chaparral draws hummingbirds and bees, oak-lined canyons twist along like stories we yearn to remember, and familiar mountains beckon. The earth is worked and used and well trodden –– its grasslands, ridges, and creek-rich soil support farms and ranches that have quietly survived through a century of more aggressive progress elsewhere. The result is a refreshing anachronism, a precious pause, an old-fashioned world set amidst the unrestrained development and clamor of coastal California.

The school for the area, grades K through 8, is Vista de las Cruces, and it is nestled by the mountains and the oaks in a place that was once a miniature community with its own inn, garage, and a little store sustained by farmers, ranchers, and travelers to the Gaviota wharf and Santa Ynez Valley, all of which had long ago vanished by the time Vista de Las Cruces was built in the 1980s as part of a controversial settlement with the Chevron oil company. The old Vista del Mar School on the coast had been vacated to make way for a refinery, and many mourned its passing, but the new school had a spirit all its own. In its early days it was flush with oil revenues, but times got harder, and, as is true of many schools today, staff and programs have been dramatically cut.

Vista’s current enrollment is about 100 students, many of whom hail from nearby ranches; 25% are ESL, 27% economically disadvantaged. An active group of parents and volunteers, including a few whose families have been in the area for generations, maintains a school garden and farm stand, a wellness committee, a healthy foods initiative, and other ongoing projects that reflect the agricultural character of the region and its environmental consciousness. Rather than passively accepting the elimination of programs important to the kids and to Gaviota's future, they created the Foundation.

The pre-show gathering had the feeling of a wedding in a big community hall with old friends and relatives milling about. (”So this is what we look like now,” said the father of a boy I used to teach.) The walls were adorned with tiny white Christmas lights and paintings of the local landscape by artists John Comer, Tom DeWalt, and Michael Drury. There were tables of jams, goat cheese, and other edible sundries lovingly prepared by Erin Pata, Grace and Carla Malloy, and Lori and Cindy Henning. There was laughter, too, and a lot of hugging.

“As soon as I know I’m headed to Gaviota, I’m in a different frame of mind,” said Jackson. He opened, appropriately, with Barricades of Heaven, reminisced a bit, sang These Days, and reminisced some more, in a tone somehow both whimsical and wistful. There was nostalgia in the air and an autumnal kind of melancholy as he performed songs such as Farther On, Fountain of Sorrow, and Sky Blue and Black. (I cannot think of a better song of love and yearning than that last one.)

The mood changed with Your Bright Baby Blues, heavy on the base, with gorgeous, shimmering slide guitar chords, and Giving That Heaven Away, a nod to the free-loving sixties. Other songs included the classic Running on Empty, the romantic My Stunning Mystery Companion (which includes “best use of the word ‘notwithstanding’ in a song, ever”), and a rousing rendition of Doctor My Eyes performed with our neighbor Chris Pelonis.

He is justly famous all over the world, but Jackson Browne in Gaviota is a friend who’s come home, and despite the conspicuous adoration showered upon him, he is modest and gracious always. Basically we basked...in the poetry of his lyrics, the richness of his music, and the generosity of his spirit. In between shouted audience requests and songs performed, he offered musings, memories, and candid thoughts.

“There was something so touching about seeing those little chairs in that kindergarten room tonight,” he said. “Funny thing about being an adult sitting in a little kids' chair…it's a different perspective. You sort of see how far you’ve come. And how anything’s possible.”

Possibilities have definitely expanded for Gaviota kids through Jackson Browne’s extraordinary kindness. The show raised $25,000 for the Vista del Mar Foundation, and those funds will go directly and entirely to school programs and activities.We walked back to our cars carrying flashlights in the dark, smelling the crisp night air and grassy fields and even a whiff of skunk. Alive in the world.

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