Then

Now

It was the last week of May 2000. Memorial Day weekend was approaching and Mike and I had talked about going camping. Around the middle of the week I had the idea to go in search of a juggler we once knew in Tucson, Arizona that was supposedly living up in Arcata. His name was Blake Goode, but his real name was Sylver. This is the story of our quest to find Blake, and the synchronous events that lead us there. We first met Blake when he showed up at the University of Arizona campus in the fall of 1992 when Mike and I were freshman. He was in his late forties and had traveled down to Tucson for the winter. He did not have a steady job, instead he was a commissioned salsesman for Sunrider natural foods. He turned out to be the Obi-wan Kenobi of juggling for us. He taught us a lot and inspired us to be the jugglers we are today. Blake didn't start juggling until he was 34 years old, but had achieved an impressive level of mastery. He worked with up to five clubs and balls, bounce juggling, and was a skilled passer. He taught us to pass seven clubs, juggle mill's mess, do a ten-club feed, plus legion of tricks including the multiplex and the crotch rocket. He also taught us triple-singles in four clubs. He taught us so many tricks that it would be difficult to remember them all, let alone name them.

Then as suddenly as he appeared, he was gone and we never saw him again.

Seven years had passed and we are now living in San Francisco. I had been to a few juggling festivals and met some Humboldt jugglers who knew Blake and informed me that all of his juggling clubs had been stolen and he never juggled anymore. I kept thinking that I wanted to go find him and finally made the decision to do it. So, the search was on.

Mike and I left Saturday morning in his Chevy Astro van. We stopped for a coffee at Martha & Bros. down the street from my flat and a few blocks later Mike's coffee spilled all over when he accelerated up a steep hill. A bad way to start off the trip I thought. Mike said it was a good thing, though. It was getting all the bad things out of the way so our quest would go well.

We drove up Highway 101, a beautiful road through wine country. As we were driving along, a large bird swooped down in front of us, then swung back across the road. Mike said it was a bird of prey, a true sign of a quest.

Later on we picked up a hitchhiker, an interesting guy who was living on a farm and headed up to see a band play near Arcata. He smoked us out and he started talking about animal signs and asking if we believed that animals gave signs that could tell us things, which was weird because we had just been talking about the bird of prey.

We dropped him off and made it the rest of the way to Arcata. Arcata is a small town just north of Eureka and home to Humboldt State University. It was typical weather for the area, somewhere between fog and sprinkling, when we arrived. We parked near the town square and wandered a bit to explore. We tried calling Phyllis Chin, a math professor at Humboldt State University actively involved with the local juggling club, who we thought might be able to help us get in touch with Blake but were unable to contact her. We tried several times that Saturday, and missed her by only a few minutes on one occasion. Since there didn't seem to be much chance of finding anything out that day we went to the movies and saw 'Road Trip.' It was silly and fitting seeing how that's what we were on.

After that we went to a restaurant called Jambalaya to see a jazz singer. Her name was Valentine and she described her singing as 40's-style torch jazz. She was tall and beautiful and had an incredible voice. We ate good food, drank good beer (Eye of the Hawk), and listened to her sing for a couple hours. The trip was turning out well. We also realized this was another sign of our quest. Valentine is the name of the main character in a book that is a must-read for any juggler, Lord Valentine's Castle. That book inspired Mike to learn to juggle. The show was free but Mike was so impressed he made a $20 donation as we left. We left feeling great and went back to Mike's van to sleep. We were parked only a few blocks away.

Sunday morning we woke up to a beautiful day. We went to a bagel place for breakfast and then went to see a race we had heard about. It's called the Kinetic Sculpture Race and it's a race for home-constructed vehicles that have to be able to go on the road, in water, and through mud and must be human powered. Most of these contraptions are impressively decorated. One was an iguana about 40 feet long divided in segments with a rider in each segment; another was a kon tiki hut complete with straw roof, torches, masks, etc.; there was also a wild hog, a yellow submarine, Pegasus, and many others. We watched at the water/mud section and then decided to juggle just in case Blake happened to be around. We would let him find us, but no such luck.

Mike and I went back to Arcata and juggled in the square in hopes that we might meet someone who could give us a clue. Sure enough, a guy with huge earpieces through his lobes came up and asked to juggle my clubs. I asked him if he knew Blake and he had seen him before but didn't know his whereabouts. He did know someone that could help us though, a juggler named Walter. This guy gave us Walters phone number and told us that he worked for Round Table Pizza. He also said that he lived in a Victorian on the corner a few blocks away. We decided to just go to his house and see if we could find him. We went to the intersection we were told to go to but there was no Victorian. We knocked on one door but we knew it wasn't right. We went one block over and found a large Victorian where we were told that Walter lived around the back. We went to the back and some guy told us that Walter's room was all the way to the rear. We walked down a winding hallway that ended with two doors. We knocked on both then peeked in the first room and when we looked in the second, we knew we had found it. It was the room of a true juggler. There were eight purple Renegade 105mm clubs hanging on one wall, eight Todd Smith Satellites on another, and various beanbags scattered around. There was a can of white gas on the floor, a charcoal drawing of juggling equipment, a Karamozov Bros. poster, numerous juggling photos and articles, and a copy of Lord Valentine's Castle on an end table, but no Walter. We admired his collection and found a phone list on the wall but Blake wasn't on it. We looked up Round Table Pizza in his phone book and found out he'd be in to work at 4:00PM. We left him a note in case he came home first and headed to get some lunch.

We drove over to Round Table and saw some birds of prey circling. We were on the right track. We went in and asked for Walter who turned out to be someone I had met, or seen, at a juggling festival. He didn't remember me, though. We asked him about Blake but he hadn't seen him for quite a while and didn't have his phone number with him. He called around but couldn't locate someone with his number. He did tell us that Blake hangs out and plays chess at the Sacred Grounds Coffee Shop near the town square. Of course he does. Where else would a guru hang out but the Sacred Grounds?

Mike and I got back in the van and headed back towards the square. We arrived at the coffee shop and went in but didn't see him or anyone that might have been him. We asked at the counter but they didn't know anyone by name. They did point out a regular customer and I went up to ask him if he knew Blake. He told us that Blake had left about ten minutes ago. So close! The guy also said that Blake had recently moved to Eureka and he didn't have his new phone number. We were quite frustrated and didn't know where to go from there. Mike then followed the guy out and asked if he had any other information. Mike came back in with Blake's old phone number. We called it from a pay phone and got a recording with his new number. We were almost there. We called his new number with much anticipation only to get his answering machine. We left a message and told him we would try him again later. Since we now knew where he was and had his number, we decided to head to Eureka. Eureka is Greek for 'I found it,' which seemed fitting for the occasion.

Eureka is only about ten minutes south of Arcata. We weren't sure where to go or what to do but we needed to have a phone nearby to keep calling. We parked in Old Town Eureka and wandered around a bit and then juggled in an open area with a fountain. There were some locals playing footbag and a girl came up and invited us to join. I played for a while and Mike periodically tried calling Blake. Eventually Mike reached Blake and he said he would drive down to meet us. When he showed up I barely recognized him. He had put on a lot of weight and had a full beard with a lot of white in it. Quite a change from the person we knew seven years ago. Our quest was complete. We had a good juggling session with him for a while. He is still a very talented juggler. We went back to his place and caught up for a while and then Mike and I crashed in the van out back for the night.

In the morning we took Blake out to breakfast and then found a park and had another good juggling session. Blake was excited to be juggling again and wanted to start doing it more. Mike and I had inspired him to start juggling again. The students had now done what the teacher had done for them. We left Eureka feeling good and drove home accompanied by a bird of prey.