In Mission Valley where dairy farms and orchards once stretched from Mission de Alcala all the way to the sea, not even a small garden remains; but between the shopping center and the San Diego River at the bottom of our hill a few old olive trees stand as reminders of an earlier time. I particularly like the way the sun shines through them in the middle of the day and casts shadows that remind me of some of Van Gogh’s paintings from the time he spent around Saint-Remy and Auvers.  My friend Tom Fagan went there with me today.  He painted. I watched him and enjoyed getting another glimpse of the way an artist sees things.