Hope Street

Dr. Sandra Steingraber asks the audience to visualize breast cancer rates stretching back from the 1940’s to 2000 as a small girl walking along a scenic rural road. As the years pass, the girl matures and the flat road gradually begins to incline. The incline represents the increase in breast cancer rates, by the time the girl is in her late 30s she is practically climbing vertically.

Steingraber presents breast cancer as a human rights issue in her book “Living Downstream: An Ecologist Looks at Cancer and the Environment.” She cautions against despair asking anyone in the audience to stand if they are a breast cancer survivor. Half the room stands. Steingraber says “when you were diagnosed you didn’t say that’s ok I’ll skip the chemo resign myself to die.”

Steingraber is hopeful and wide eyed and the room erupts in a standing ovation.

A Tale of Two People

“The only people for me are the mad ones. The ones who are mad to love, mad to talk, mad to be saved; the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes “Awww!” – Jack Kerouac

Tiburon is the last place I would expect to meet a guy like criminal defense attorney Jon Rankin. I am parking next to boutique shops that quietly hawk overpriced glassware, jewelry and high end chotchkies. I enter his office at the bottom of the stairs in the middle of the deserted shopping strip.

I call out and he enters from an adjoining office welcoming me. I am immediately struck by his jewelry and the gurgling sound of half empty fish tanks. He ushers me into his office where I notice a corner dedicated to flamingos and even more fish tanks in various stages of evaporation. He says “I collect them,” pointing to the flamingos. Everywhere I look is vivid detail about this guy’s life. He’s an extrovert in this quiet Marin county hamlet and I have to struggle to pay attention to him as he’s talking to me.

He’s telling me about a guy named “Nazi Low-rider,” currently doing time in Pelican Bay in the SHU as they call it (Special Housing Unit). Mr. Low-rider wants to replace the Arian Brotherhood and sends Rankin artwork from time to time. Rankin tells me some of it he has to keep in a drawer because it is too offensive.

I get him to pose with a polar bear skin rug. He points at his ’58 caddy and that’s where we head next.

Imagine yourself buried in Concord, in a quaint house on a half acre lot and you dig in for 26 years. Later you find yourself squaring off against MediCal in a fight for your home with everything but the ONE you moved in with. Meet Donald Townes. He’s got garden gnomes scattered across his back lawn, roses adoring a trellis and a nearby thriving vegetable garden.

This 1,000 square foot home in the hot Concord baking sun is something worth fighting over. He’s a quiet guy, a sensible guy. Donald tells me he is heading out to Mexico for a getaway in the morning. He needs to clear his head with the trouble from MediCal.