Pebble Beach with Andrea and her new husband, Stanley—both of whom were also green-flash virgins—the flash was so big we couldn’t miss it. Since then we have seen it countless more times.
The scientific explanation goes something like this: As sunset approaches, the sun’s rays must pass through a volume of atmosphere much greater than when the sun is directly overhead. This thick layer of atmosphere acts like a prism and bends, or refracts, the light, separating it into the colors of the spectrum. As in a rainbow, the slowest wavelength, and thus the first to disappear, is red. Next to go are orange and yellow, their intensity weakened by their natural absorption by ozone and water vapor in the atmosphere. Then come green and blue. The blue is refracted more than any other color, its light broadly scattered by our atmosphere, which makes our sky blue but greatly reduces its intensity. Green is therefore the last color that we can usually detect. When, on a very clear day, the green is unimpeded, the sun departs with an emerald-green flash or glow.
Ansel and Virginia were lucky to have the services of Fumiye Kodani, a wonderful woman and a fine cook, for nearly twenty years, both in Carmel and Yosemite. Because she was of Japanese ancestry, she had been imprisoned during World War II at Poston, Arizona. There was one good thing that came out of that experience: it was there that she met her future husband, Seizo. We all treasured Fumiye’s peaceful spirit and her beautiful cuisine, and she, in turn, enjoyed cooking for Ansel, modestly saying, “It was easy to cook for him. He was good about eating anything.” Ansel’s favorite meal was probably sorrel soup followed by roast lamb with fresh mint sauce and hominy-grits casserole. He also loved to escape into Carmel in the late afternoon for a “meeting” with Robert Baker—actually an excuse for a root beer float. 3
Just as Ansel and Virginia had embraced me as family, they also became family to my own. Our children fondly remember Ansel as an unusual grandpa. The Adamses came to dinner at our home at least once a month through the years. The morning after one such occasion, I found a typed greeting from Ansel addressed to “Dear Little Mother of All,” followed by a list of appreciative adjectives ending with a burp.
Now that he was never camping, Ansel rarely cooked and never set foot in a grocery store. Because he had nearly always employed a cook, those kinds of responsibilities had never been a part of his life, except perhaps when he was on the road. I knew how much he had missed us when Jim and I returned from a rare two-week vacation to find our dining room table covered with jars and boxes of the most outlandish foods; Ansel had gone shopping because he knew our larder would be bare. We were all set with such staples as Bavarian mustard, pickled beans, bottled artichokes, hot-fudge topping, and a box of Hamburger Helper. It was an infinitely sweet gesture.
Thriftiness was a habit with Ansel. Our work area was walled with storage boxes, stacks of metal drawers, and cubbyholes. We were instructed to keep everything, including the rubber bands that bound the daily papers. Defective photographs were torn apart and then sent for silver reclamation. Ansel was thrilled when I followed his suggestion to reply to most correspondence using Adams picture postcards; seconds from Museum Graphics, the cards were free to Ansel by the boxful, saving on both expensive letterhead stationery and postage.
Ansel’s personal needs were simple. He always felt well dressed if he had doused his beard, bald head, chest, and underarms with his beloved Vitalis, believing that all women within his wafting power were now susceptible to his charms. When it came to dress, the biblical Joseph had nothing on Ansel, who used his body to display an amazing combination of colors. He had that one wool suit and a handful of sports coats, his favorite a maroon polyester number that he
The scientific explanation goes something like this: As sunset approaches, the sun’s rays must pass through a volume of atmosphere much greater than when the sun is directly overhead. This thick layer of atmosphere acts like a prism and bends, or refracts, the light, separating it into the colors of the spectrum. As in a rainbow, the slowest wavelength, and thus the first to disappear, is red. Next to go are orange and yellow, their intensity weakened by their natural absorption by ozone and water vapor in the atmosphere. Then come green and blue. The blue is refracted more than any other color, its light broadly scattered by our atmosphere, which makes our sky blue but greatly reduces its intensity. Green is therefore the last color that we can usually detect. When, on a very clear day, the green is unimpeded, the sun departs with an emerald-green flash or glow.
Ansel and Virginia were lucky to have the services of Fumiye Kodani, a wonderful woman and a fine cook, for nearly twenty years, both in Carmel and Yosemite. Because she was of Japanese ancestry, she had been imprisoned during World War II at Poston, Arizona. There was one good thing that came out of that experience: it was there that she met her future husband, Seizo. We all treasured Fumiye’s peaceful spirit and her beautiful cuisine, and she, in turn, enjoyed cooking for Ansel, modestly saying, “It was easy to cook for him. He was good about eating anything.” Ansel’s favorite meal was probably sorrel soup followed by roast lamb with fresh mint sauce and hominy-grits casserole. He also loved to escape into Carmel in the late afternoon for a “meeting” with Robert Baker—actually an excuse for a root beer float. 3
Just as Ansel and Virginia had embraced me as family, they also became family to my own. Our children fondly remember Ansel as an unusual grandpa. The Adamses came to dinner at our home at least once a month through the years. The morning after one such occasion, I found a typed greeting from Ansel addressed to “Dear Little Mother of All,” followed by a list of appreciative adjectives ending with a burp.
Now that he was never camping, Ansel rarely cooked and never set foot in a grocery store. Because he had nearly always employed a cook, those kinds of responsibilities had never been a part of his life, except perhaps when he was on the road. I knew how much he had missed us when Jim and I returned from a rare two-week vacation to find our dining room table covered with jars and boxes of the most outlandish foods; Ansel had gone shopping because he knew our larder would be bare. We were all set with such staples as Bavarian mustard, pickled beans, bottled artichokes, hot-fudge topping, and a box of Hamburger Helper. It was an infinitely sweet gesture.
Thriftiness was a habit with Ansel. Our work area was walled with storage boxes, stacks of metal drawers, and cubbyholes. We were instructed to keep everything, including the rubber bands that bound the daily papers. Defective photographs were torn apart and then sent for silver reclamation. Ansel was thrilled when I followed his suggestion to reply to most correspondence using Adams picture postcards; seconds from Museum Graphics, the cards were free to Ansel by the boxful, saving on both expensive letterhead stationery and postage.
Ansel’s personal needs were simple. He always felt well dressed if he had doused his beard, bald head, chest, and underarms with his beloved Vitalis, believing that all women within his wafting power were now susceptible to his charms. When it came to dress, the biblical Joseph had nothing on Ansel, who used his body to display an amazing combination of colors. He had that one wool suit and a handful of sports coats, his favorite a maroon polyester number that he
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