Raquel, taken on a date-night last week, or the week before, at Kruder & Dorfmeister and Thievery Corporation.
The connective tissue, of course, between my last two posts was me dying in my sleep. Now, a third - loose, dense, and adipose - completing the trilogy.
The night before last I went into the city (where I live that means SF, my NYC friends would laugh) to meet an old friend, coincidentally from NYC, and Florida before that. We left "the city" and went to a somewhat famous steakhouse that's been in operation since the Golden Gate Bridge was built - Buckeye Roadhouse. We ordered expensive cocktails and ribeye steaks, while we discussed the acquisition of either phenobarbital or pentobarbital. Our choices seem to be a Mexican pharmacy or a disreputable veterinarian.
We discussed other things, also. The conversation circled back to suffering and how to either face it or avoid it permanently. We came to very few conclusions. It is what people start talking about as they watch their bodies decay and lose their vitality. Well, men do. I don't know many women who discuss these things, or at least not in the same way. Women do yoga and brunch, this somehow allows them to stay connected to their lives. Well, some of them. Do you enjoy my categorical thinking.
I did a friend's radio show yesterday. It was fun. We talked about soul music and why it has such a powerful effect on the listener. I tried to convince CS to come to California so we can get him on the radio. It's what he needs, I think.
Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology.
I am still in bed. The coffee has been brewed. I can smell it from bed. It summons me upwards, but the body does nothing, trapped in this imaginary liminal space.
I have an odd foreboding that something terrible is going to happen soon. Something more, or something else. It is the feeling that something is going to happen to me... I have been filled with anxiety and dread; laughing less, sweating more, unable to relax. So much so that I had to stop drinking. I mean alcohol. It was pushing me towards madness. Into the maelstrom.
A friend passed away last week - an accidental heroin overdose. Or, that is the best information I have about it. I saw him recently in NYC. We had reconnected a little bit and had been sharing music back and forth. He was a nice, sweet guy in a dark world. His death surprised few people, though it filled many with sorrow.
There is not much difference, for me, between a suicide and an accidental overdose. They are a little bit different, I guess. One is an accident.
I recorded a song the day I heard the news for him, a favorite from Daniel Johnston. You may have to download it to hear it. Since Google's platform won't let me upload an audio file to this service, I've used one of their other services to trick them into doing what I want. They'll probably put this post behind a warning wall, community standards being what they are. Where would we be without a community?
I don't have very much else to say. I am feeling disquieted. Thinking that if I did die in my sleep I wanted to say something first. Can you believe that this was it. This was really it.
Fuck. I've had a very hard day at work. I made it difficult on myself; more than it needed to be. Have I mentioned how much I prefer leisure over labor? I must have said something about it, after all these long years.
Two forlorn lovers....
Can we not, at least, be kind?
What's that from? Some long forgotten poem, maybe Keats.
I think it went like this:
Can we, at long last, two forlorn lovers, at least be kind to one another?
But, I can't find any online matches. It was in a black book of poetry I have boxed away in storage, a couple purplish crushed petals staining two pages, the binding giving way so that the book must be handled carefully, not by a brute.
Maybe I've completely misremembered it - perhaps it was in truly ancient English and not this middling period of the 19th century; maybe I've confused Keats and Yeats, who I believe was the nephew of a filthy Irish scrivener; who knows; the phrase was foreskinned lovers and at long last, and thick... ; even the concept of lovers was more of a primitive physical endearment than what we have access to now.
I once read that what they loved to share most in the 19th century weren't memes but syphilis.
What I adore about the persons of the past is how defenseless they all are/is. They just sit there and take it, those monsters. Few surer signs of guilt than silence.
Keeps me writing.
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I have insomnia, so I may as well write here for a little bit. I've tried everything else. I have ingested all the elixirs, huffed the pharmaceutical equivalent of nepenthe, awaited the gentle arrival of the shade, imbibed visions of the abyss and its surroundings. There is only nothing.
Yes, I struggled at work today. I openly argued in front of... what should I call them? they're not superiors, but neither are they subordinates, they are only colleagues in so much that we work together.
Jesus, colleagues it is.
What the fuck am I even doing here? I promised myself that if I ever used the word colleagues un-ironically I would scrape my nutsack off, and all of its future contents, with a plain white plastic spork. I feel like colleagues is a word that James Taylor probably liked to use in the 70s, and people would take him seriously.
It is for this that I must self-immolate. I linger in this abyss. There is only nothing.
Here we are, locked in this singular stalemate, looking down at both of them, unable to act, unsure which one to start with. Acts of self-barbarism are menacing. If I were a hero I would shave myself.
Twenty-seven years of nothin' but failures and promises that I couldn't keep
Oh Lord, I wasn't ready to go
I'm never ready to go
His rather enviable baseball hat (never thought I'd write that, either) is a cooly psychedelic reference to Daniel Johnston. If you love me then learn to play Johnston's song, True Love Will Find You In The End. Well, love yourself, and learn the song. It's only four simple chords, but holds one of the strangest, and most oddly sincere melodies ever written.
Only listen to it once by anybody else, then learn and play the song from memory. Every time I go back and listen to the original, or any body else's version, I get further and further away from what I love about playing the song myself. That's the way it goes, sometimes, I guess.
I have a toothache that seems to be moving into my jaw. I'd be okay with it if I died peacefully in my sleep tonight. I've come to terms with feeling the same about you.
Well, here we go again. I'll try not to write about death or being beaten as a child. My favorite subjects, it seems.
Madame, all stories, if continued far enough, end in death, and he is no true-story teller who would keep that from you. - Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon
Though, I believe I may have left out the true-story telling portion. There is so much to tell, and as CS has pointed out, I can not safely hide behind anonymity. I have the alternate curse of identity.
The pic above was a long open-shutter capture, taken while camping over the summer. We went many places, 3000 miles of driving, out to the deserts around Moab and back - Grand Canyon, Sequoia, Arches, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zion. We stopped twice in Henderson to visit with friends and enjoy air-conditioning and a swimming pool.
We did a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon and hiked down into it for a couple hours, turning around at just the right point, when our water supply was at its halfway level. The boy thanked me afterwards for convincing him to turn around when we did. He had miscalculated the difficulty of hiking uphill. He desperately wanted to report to others that he had hiked all the way down, but it was out of the question.
We also hiked the Narrows at Zion for several hours. This was a highlight of the trip for both of us. They had only just opened the slot canyon up for visitors a couple days before we arrived. The snowfall had been so great over the winter that the rapids were too strong to allow hikers. The last thirty minutes or so of the hike the only other human we saw was an unlicensed repeller who had come down the canyon wall and was trying to get his backpack to descend also, but he had no luck with it. It was still suspended there about a hundred feet up when we returned, but he was gone. Perhaps he tried to recover it from the topside.
Tioga Pass, which we had planned to take back home across the Sierras, was still closed from the heavy snow drifts. We skipped Yosemite, as it was July 4th weekend and was apparently too crowded to be pleasant. Instead, we drove home and surprised mom. She had never been away from the boy for two weeks before. You know how moms get.
I will be in NYC for about 3 weeks, beginning October 20th. I will be cat-sitting for a friend. A new neighborhood - Fort Greene - for me to discover. I know the Alamo and the Brooklyn Academy of Music, but that's about it. I've been to the park a few times, though I might be confusing it for Prospect Park. I may rent a bike while I am there. A real bike, not those Citi Bike monstrosities. Though, I suppose, in a pinch they might be useful, perhaps as a comedic getaway vehicle.
I hope that Autumn is the actual season by the time I am there. You can never predict very much any more, and no true-story teller would keep that from you.
The city is sinking. Well, the island of Manhattan is, I've read. It is the curse of the natives who once lived there. A hundred years passed between its first European visitors and its first settlement, four hundred more have lapsed since then. You can really tell when you look at the skyline. It reaches so high into the sky you might not notice that it's sinking.
I was looking through old posts here yesterday and came across this image. The boy had face-planted at school. I had to go get him. He was very upset when it happened, or so reported the school's nurse, but he had calmed down considerably by the time that I arrived. By the time we were home and I took this picture he had a very matter-of-fact attitude about the whole thing. I worry sometimes that the boy has grown up too quickly, always being around adults. There is the imaginary curse of being an only child. The data suggests that the past was flawed on its opinions of children who have no siblings. Apparently it's just as healthy as every other parental lifestyle choice.
Before I veer too far into the collective wisdom of science, and the data that supports it, let me just say that there have been times that I wish Rachel and I would have had another child. When I go to other people's houses, I like hearing them fight in other rooms and slam doors. I try to place bets on how long it will take the older brother to bring the younger to tears. Nobody, of course, likes me for this. But gambling isn't about being liked or loved, it's about the thrill of losing the bet.
Several of my closest friends had no siblings, or distant half-siblings whom they hardly knew, my mother had none, my partner and mother of my child has none, my son has none. This makes it possible for me to use my own experiences to draw the contours of my biases both for and against having a single child.
The boy and I talked about it quite a bit on our camping trip. He brought it up a few times. I let him speak, assuming he had stronger opinions on the matter than I. When I felt that he had adequately expressed himself on the desire to have a sibling, I explained why it had not happened yet - that his parents are imperfect - and that this also decreased the likelihood of it happening now, or at any time in the future.
I tried to explain that adjusting to a sibling at his age - 11 - might be more difficult than he assumes. It's not like a close friend - of whom the boy has several that are also without siblings - that will eventually go home, and you can return to whatever relaxed state you most enjoy. Siblings can be pernicious, and even cruel. I remember things from growing up that terrorized me. I have some fears and anxieties that are deeply ingrained. My brother has apologized for these incidents several times, but they are powerful memories, not fond ones. There was regular violence in my childhood. It can distort a person. It's a tale as old as Genesis.
The above image caught my eye yesterday when I was scrolling through old pages, trying to figure out the date that I gave up my apartment and moved back in with Rachel. Seems like it was the Summer of 2018. I miss the boy being very young, a little bit. There is something that perhaps parents feel more poignantly than others. I suppose it might be a simple as personal nostalgia, but it feels like more than just that, as if maybe nostalgia had a brother and sister.
I'm back to playing around in my studio. Roland released a new drum kit for the modeling synth you see above (TR-8S). Well, the digital release of this older kit and its patterns is new. It is modeled on one of the oldest programmable drum synths ever made - the CR-78 (below). Made famous by Phill Collins on his track, In the Air Tonight, released the same year that the device was discontinued - '81. Collins moved on to using the TR-808, probably the most legendary drum machine ever released. Rivaled only by the TR-909, which he also used. Both of which are heavily featured in the drum synth that I have (above). Together - the 808 and 909 - form the basis of almost all dance music ever made.
Collins was a great friend to the drum machine, a heavy promoter, adopter, and spokesman for their value, which almost seemed out of step with the times. There were many guitar players that questioned the value of "synthesis" and having machines do the work that was clearly meant for humans. I think Phil Collins is a bad joke, of course, but there was a time when he was highly respected as being the drummer for Genesis, Brian Eno occasionally, and for the rock goddess Robert Plant's first couple albums. Hall and Oates also used the CR-78 on their track, I Can't Go For That (No Can Do). So, it has attained its pop pedigree. Radiohead also use them in their live performances. So, I am excited and will be playing with my stupid little toy again for a while.
A childhood friend died this week, heart attack. My age - 54. I try not to think of such things often. But you get the news and the ghosts await for late evening to launch their attacks. He lived on the golf course when we were kids, near a close friend who told me the news in a text. My memories of him have faded over the years, though I can still see his childhood face in my mind.
I lost my virginity in a house only a few doors down from his. I remember walking home. My father was puttering in the garage and I thought that surely he could tell, that I must smell differently, or the wet spots on the front of my jeans would be noticeable. Or, perhaps the incredibly absurd smile on my face should have given it all away.
I don't remember any details, a first-time blur, other than knowing that everything would be different now. By the next day we were having sex three or four times a day and it continued that way until she fucked a friend of mine, maybe six months later.I don't remember. I came over after school and there they were, guilty and visibly happy. Everything would be different, again.
She became a topless dancer, I heard, and worked at the titty bar that was somewhat famous for how many truckers would frequent it. There was a mile or so of mostly empty roadside surrounding it, which allowed for the 18-wheelers to easily park. I remained friends with her brother for a while. We worked together mowing yards for many years. Mostly I worked for him if I needed cash. Then, I started my own landscaping operation, and did that through college. He seemed to enjoy the work more than me. Though I think back to it fondly now, from time to time. I tend to romanticize things. Life is a euphemism for something else.
Am I at battle with misanthropy, I asked myself tonight. It is not a hatred of mankind, mostly only a desire to be left alone, a selective desire to be left alone. Perhaps I hate interference, the interferers.
I have so few moments of peace any more. I am looking for a place to find some meditative place inside myself. I have never been very good at achieving or remaining quiet. I have little to say any more, but that is not the same as being quiet. Or, not necessarily so.
I have booked my flights to NYC - a few weeks at the end of October and beginning of November. I will get to enjoy Autumn in the city that I love all over again. This time without the family. It will only be to visit with friends, read books, and work a bit during the day. The place I will be borrowing, cat sitting, and plant feeding is near Fort Greene. I also have rooms in Tribeca and Dumbo, if needed. Three weeks will go by very quickly.
I read an essay about living in Brooklyn Heights in the 1950s tonight. It was by Capote. It encouraged me that my trip was the right one to take. My copy ofIn Cold Bloodhas gone missing. I am prepared to launch a journalistic investigation into the crime of its unexpected absence.
When I return from New York I will turn around within a week and go to Texas for Thanksgiving with the family. This trip will give me time to ask for what it is I am grateful.
I need some space - from whom, I'm not sure, maybe myself, my own thoughts here. I know that I love her, and much. I am also subject to something deeply felt that cautions me to be by myself from time to time, or just to get away, to be away. To feel differently from a distance, not only as a fixed, habitual, chronic response to the presence of another.
A real Omega Speedmaster is beyond my price range, the Swatch version seemed inevitable as soon as I discovered it. These were apparently only meant to be purchased at Swatch stores, of which there is one in San Francisco, though I am seeing them used online for a slightly increased price. So, the pixie dust of catholicon capitalism might have a half life that exceeds its grasp.
Raquel and I went on a date night - we got a nice hotel room, went to a nice dinner, went to a nightclub and saw sophisticated acts perform live. We made love repeatedly. I took nude pictures of her in our hotel room.
These are atypical times. We are trying things.
This morning she and I walked to the Swatch store. I decided on Pluto. It was the best of the four planets and one local star that were still available. Pluto is perhaps not one I would have chosen without having the other options removed as possibilities. I felt pleased at stepping outside of the otherwise predictable choices I often make.
I am here now, writing this quick note, to remind myself what it is like to tell a little secret about my own life to unknown listeners.
The weekend is gone. I return to that other weekly sense of time.
I stopped posting here because the community moderators at Google believed my most recent post to be immoderate and possibly in violation of their exceeding and exacting standards. Where would we all be without mores and morals?
Fuck them, and that was my response, as you might have guessed.
I'm back now, where hopefully more fuckery will be the unimpeded and uncircumcised result.
Content scanners are notoriously coarse and unforgiving in their evaluations and determinations. I happen to know this as a byproduct of my own job, where content scanning is one of the most important aspects that help determine my personal success; likewise, failure. On a scale that I hesitate to relay, but it is in the magnitude of billions per month.
With a b.
Ok, just a note. Now that I have cleared the honorable Q6 name, I might be back. It's good for me to spill my god-damned guts here every now and them.
