What a year it’s been – highs and lows, folks, highs and lows. We are chewing the dregs of the year that brought us Hot New Publication Summer followed by the delights of What the Fuck October. We got fed up about flock at city hall but embraced flocks (of pigeons) at the lake. The Tamarack Poetry! people kept it up for a whole year and they’re going to do it again, the darlings. We got doused pretty good there by a torrent or two last week and look, new issues of Dispatch in Berkeley and a whole crop of short films in the West Bay are sprouting up already. El Timpano says you can text them a few more poemas – the last of the year. Also, Dogman the Musical is launching the Henry J Kaiser revival for 2026 this weekend, and my five year old is ready to review. The ORB revovovolves, and things are in the hopper for next year, not only the poems at Tamarack but also the Black Film Unscreened series and goddamned cool events at Bathers (I am positively jittery with delight at the thought of “artist-made souvenirs of Bay Area ecology lost in the future” aren’t you?) and at Local Economy, plus opera for the monolingual which I cannot promise ORB’s opera critic will cover, but maybe you will. Here’s to whatever 2026 can throw at us: there’s books in the future, and that’s a good future, the one with books in it. ORB might even review some of them one day. -MDS
Tuesday, December 30
BPL Book Club, 2:00pm, Central Library (Downtown Berkeley). A mostly literary fiction (what is lit fic anyway? Some would argue it’s a genre unto itself that the CIA meddled in making) book club. The book for January is Colored Television by Danzy Senna which is a solid way to start off your reading year. [BPL]
Also: hay nada
Wednesday, December 31
Great Gatsby New Year's Eve, 5:00pm, Book Society (College Ave). We read the same book right, by the same Fitzgerald, in which the parties are a glittery tulle of excess surrounding a wounded heart (the class system) that no amount of champagne or attention can stitch closed? But hey, they’re letting everyone in for FREE tonight only, so charleston it up! [Book Society]
New Year's Eve: Clio's Annual Gala with dj LeBron, 6:00pm, Clio’s Books (The Lake). Celebrate two years of the best book-selling bar slash drink-selling bookstore in town, and practice for the future by revisiting the last time we had a civil war: theme is 1860s, pull out the hoops and bonnets, or come as a stack of dynamite. [eventbrite]
Also: Steal our NYE tradition and have a literary game night with DICK (none of us have actually finished reading Moby Dick, it’s better that way)
Thursday, January 1
The Great Calendar Sale Begins, All Day, Pegasus Books (all locations). Time has begun again! Reality has rebooted! So you need a new calendar, maybe one with stickers! We shall corral a whole year once again, we’ll stick and fix it into boxes and clocks, and hang it up on a nail, helpless and at our mercy. The sale continues “until they’re gone.” [Pegasus]
Also: Staying very, very still until the world decides to stop swerving disobligingly about and making irresponsibly loud noises.
Friday, January 2
NO Poetry! at Tamarack but hang onto your hats, there’s some coming next week.
HOOT! Torch Songs Live, 7pm, The Back Room (Berkeley). HOOT! presents its first live performance of Torch Songs, a collection of songs about the dream of a promised land, the difficulty of pilgrimage, and the despair that may come when a sanctuary nation betrays its mandate. All proceeds from this performance will benefit the National Immigration Center. [Back Room]
Oakland Youth Poet Laureate Alumni Showcase and Application Launch, 7:00 PM, Chapter 510 & The Department of Make Believe (Old Oakland). Turn out for a performance by Oakland Youth Poet Laureate (OYPL) Poets from 2025 and years past! Applications for the 2026 OYPL cohort will open on January 2. Learn about the program & how teens can apply. [OPL]
Also: A work day? Seems suspect.
Saturday, January 3
Dimond Canyon Restoration Workday, 9 AM, Dimond Park (Sausal Creek Watershed). Remove invasive plants in Dimond Canyon. Ivy, etc. [Boomtech]
King Tides Walk and Talk, 10:00 am, Jingletown Native Plant Garden and Art Murals (Jingletown). Join Friends of Sausal Creek (FOSC) and I Heart Oakland–Alameda Estuary (IHOAE) forKing Tides Walk and Talk with Mary Spicer along the Oakland–Alameda Estuary. Learn how upstream creek health influences conditions at the estuary and observe the King Tide as it peaks during our walk and discuss what these extreme tides reveal about sea level rise and watershed health. I hear tell there’s a good book you can read on the subject. [Boomtech]
Observing the King Tide at Crab Cove! 10:30am, Alameda (The Beachy Part). The sun, moon, and earth align and we find out how much of the earth is water and what happens when it wants to come up on shore. Look for flooded areas, discover where some birds take shelter, take photos to submit to the CA King Tides Project, and discuss how urban planners hope to protect the future of our shoreline (a whole book you can read on this I say!). [EBRPD]
Snail Mail Storytime, 10:30 AM, Bay Farm Library (Alameda). Listen with your children to books about paper, stamps, postmarks, postcards, muted posthorns, and the long secret war between Trystero and Thurn & Taxis. Then mail a postcard and your overdue holiday cards. [Alameda Free]
Sewing Circle, 11:00am, Central Library (Downtown Berkeley). If you like sewing with machines collectively, today is your day. Some basic supplies (fabric, thread, etc.) and a few volunteers will be available to help (thread tension, it’ll drive you nuts). [BPL]
DOG MAN: THE MUSICAL, 11:00am & 4:00pm, Henry J Kaiser Center for the Arts (The Lake). Kind of literary from what I’ve seen of the books? Better this than a musical Captain Underpants, which would just be fart noises. Twice today and once tomorrow. [Ovation]
No One Cares About Your Birthday PARTY!, 4pm, Eli's Mile High Club (Where One Freeway Runs Into Another). Does everyone forget your birthday due to the holidays? COME CELEBRATE being overshadowed by Christ Jesus for two thousand and twenty five years with a free drink for birthdays between December 20th and January 5th. [Eli’s]
Poetry! 7pm, Bathers Library (Telegraph). Tamarack might be cleaning up their act this week but Bathers is here to keep the poetry wearing and tearing. Tonight: J.J. Mull (“interested in memory, group unconscious life, friendship, histories, the daily, and moods”), Joni Prince (Tamarack Poetry! host and occasional ORB vibe reporter), Turner Capehart Canty (poet and musician and chapbooker) [insta]
Sunday, January 4
Winter Wonders: Redwood, 9:30 AM, Reinhardt Redwood Park (Oakland). Walk the trails, look at all the plump mushrooms and slimy slugs, and wear good shoes. Light rain is okay. Heavy rain cancels (unless I am your mother in which case you get real wet while I remind you “there’s a difference between discomfort and danger and I can almost see the car so hypothermia is NOT a reasonable concern.”) [EBRPD]
Free First Sunday, 11 AM, OMCA (The Lake). Go to the museum! Stay as long as you like! [OMCA]
Mushrooms! 11 AM, TILDEN NATURE AREA,(Berkeley Hills). All it takes is a little precipitation and mushrooms begin appearing as if by magic (it’s cell walls made of chiton). “NO COLLECTING PERMITTED!” (emphasis in original). [EBRPD]
Time is a Mirror, 12PM, Bather’s Library (Telegraph Corridor). An afternoon of gratitude journaling & intention setting with jamayka & maya, current artists in residence at Bather's Library. Follow in the path of Octavia Butler’s committed journaling practice. This is the first event in jamayka & maya’s ongoing project Time is a Mirror. [insta]
Tule Boats Float, 1 pm, Coyote Hills Regional Park (Deepest Deep East Oakland, Keep Going). Build your own miniature tule boat and float it where Alameda Creek deltas into the bay. Learn how Ohlone Peoples have traditionally, and continue to, utilize this reed. [EBRPD]
No Separate Survival Film Screening, 4:30pm, The Freight (Berkeley). A short documentary film by the poet, artist, and filmmaker Shabnam Piryaei about asylum seekers across the U.S./Mexico border. The film gives voice to what it means to create home, seek safety, and make place and family. All funds raised support East Bay Sanctuary Covenant’s work providing legal and social services, Know Your Rights education, and cash assistance for immigrants in the Bay Area. [The Freight]
Also: Bridgeview Trailhead Workday at Upper Sausal Creek (East Lake) / Fern Ravine Restoration Workday in Joaquin Miller Park (The Hills) / Dog Man at Henry J (The Lake)
