(Flowers look pretty)
To the city yesterday, into the early evening. Cato took me to a romantic sunset place so that we could take pictures of rocks. Everything about the day was perfect and special. Cato wore jeans, lipstick, and boots.
I should not joke, particularly about relationships, of any kind. I get myself into trouble when not adequately concealing the facts of my heterosexual feelings. Maybe I'm not quite ready to write a blog post today. For the purpose of this post we'll assume the structure of romance, or its absence.
Coffee, that's what I need, and to transfer pictures from mine and Cato's day honeymoon.
(Bridges are stupid)
That is the problem with yesterday: Cato is male.
Who hangs out with men?
Ok, be back. Coffee brewing. Get comfortable. I have today off.
Okay, I grabbed a couple pics, will need to go through those more, though I might not.
I had a little adventure into the city. Cato and I talked about relationships, past and present. It did not reveal much that either of us had not already known or thought about before, though it was not for a paucity of trying, mostly just retreading previous realizations and observations. Two men, building bridges for fish.
Ha, I had not meant the suggestion there. Fuck it, it's absurd.
Cato took me to a genuinely good pizza place, one that sells by the slice, on Haight. It was almost NYC. Similar to my beloved Artichoke on 14th. For an important date, Cato picked very well. It felt like I was young again, as if I had only been working for the first year of my life.
So, we walked into Golden Gate Park, around the little open air plaza between the museums, into the lobby of the De Young, then back up through the mud, the slice of pizza on Haight, to the sunset by car, by foot. Lands End is a cool place to go if you can get excited about being on a planet with tourists.
Hold on, let me find something.
(Humans love patterns)
And of course you take pictures of the sun if you're the two guys that bring cameras to the coast, to the very edge of what is considered convenient.
(Two guys, one sunset)
I am confident there are better sunsets trapped in a computer somewhere, perhaps my own.
Here, I like this one more, it represents the feeling of the way that the day was.
(Rocks have history)
To get away unexpectedly was nice, though. I was going to tell it as a story but am feeling too scattered now. It is for this that we are given days off. This feeling of inner contradictoriness in too many things at once. Not knowing can be a form of not feeling, depending on what it is that is not known.
Cato and I were discussing the use of conversation, the practice of prefacing an opinion with, I feel that... The imprecisions without which I would have few joys left in life. Though we agreed it was a bad thing, and it probably is, when used the wrong way. Who doesn't feel likewise? But... it's still fun.
We talked politics early on, but quickly agreed to save that for later in the day when we hate each other, though that time never came. I drove home just before bedtime, which was shortly after the picture above was taken. I am only a vampire from midnight onwards, before that I am a nun's kitten, napping.
So, he discussed the dilemma of the present tense and I found common ground in molten memory, of pumice and basalt. I had advice for him, but he's smarter than that. The in-loves of the world are crafty in their ability to find the set of statements that work best for their predicament. Anybody can do it. The only way to be a true friend to someone in love is to argue with them about everything. It is the most effective relationship salve. Create imaginary virtues in their partner and question them as to why they never noticed them before. It is how you help your friends see the light; pay it backwards.
No, I am kidding and that was not the nature of our conversation at all. We were quite clear and buoyant about things while on our special date. We each had positive things to proclaim, in spite of my efforts. We are the type of hopeless sustained by Romantic ideals. Both of us deeply baffled by women, the mysteries that orbit the magic.
Cato gave a generous gift to the boy, which I have - after my photo shoot with it - placed in the boy's room so that he can discover it upon arrival. Help being a cool dad never goes unnoticed. The boy will immediately understand its value as an icon, its relation to other oddness. Kids understand crazy stuff. He and I will do battle with Mickey and Buddha the warrior to see which form of lightenment will triumph.
For a laugh.
(Main Street, Middle Way)
Okay, I thought that I would write more here, with morning darkness everywhere.
I have a Salif Keita album playing in the living room. I want to go sit with my guitar and try to play complimentary notes along with it, to feel my way through the album as a quiet participant.
Impossible not to notice the patterns that humans love, and I also, for good or ill. All that it takes to recognize one of them is to point my camera and try to describe why to myself. The fixing and framing of things, then the things themselves, all of that.
I brought 35mm film, but didn't shoot a single image with it.
.
