"i am looking at an old, vintage-blue motorcane. a guy just walked outside, needing his presence known, uttering a quick, staten-island-clad word or 5 about the chill. but i like it. the chill. i am at saturdays. looking at that old motorcane makes me think of uc santa barbara, the honda passport i hijacked from my dorm-mate, my favorite form of transpo. i think i pseudo-crashed on that thing 1 time, shifted the wrong way at a stoplight into town & tanked. not so cool as i'd wished i was. seems a long time ago, probably because it was. nearly 23 years ago, in fact. so many reflections of late, reminders of all the lives i've lived. & oh, how i've lived. high school years, delinquent, driving around in that little brown turd-ball of a '76 honda civic, always speeding, always cutting class, calling in as my mom, saying i was sick... trouble. and the ducky boys parties, the hangouts in crusty theatre seats behind the empire cinema parking lot in west portal, or sitting on the benches by the station, "not graffiti-ing" but mugging for the camera or each other. asymmetrical haircut and badly-matched clothes. then the clubbing. gotham city, do not sit on the furniture, 5-foot tongue, das klub (barker!?!), dna lounge, paradise lounge, the kennel club. i guess the kennel club came a little later? or the i-beam in the haight, going to shows, rocking out, the chi-chi club... on the scrounge, out late, hitting the underground until the sun came up, breakfast at sparky's & start all over again. north beach living, snob hill/chinatown loving, north beach living again, soma barely-living -- showering at friend's places... dave. wow. i need a minute for a stogey. all that writing i was doing. writing and painting, day & night, the trips for cappuccino & the bottles of red flip-flopping their time-share. the motorcycle rides to walnut creek (walnut bleak), down the coast, big sur, the henry miller memorial museum and nepenthe. laundry & fighting & parties & drinking & school & drugs. dennis & roth, our crime spree with loretta... when was that? what was the name of that cafe? the north end. loretta always lighting a new cigarette every 5 minutes because she couldn't remember where she set hers down. the bar really wasn't that big. sangria, the ministry, stealing vicodin from my parents' closet - a pharmacy - and giving it away to friends. i had everyone doped up. waiting at the bottom of grant & green for a taxi to take me to the top of the hill: "it's exactly $2.30 to go 2 blocks up, i'll give you $3, let's call it a night." square one with frank & hitting tosca after - we'll have a booth, please. specs for homework and sketching and writing, safe from harassment, i lived there. then nathalie and the war between me & dave.
holy crap there is a total loss of chronology, here.
fuck it.
the war. their games, that foul, abrasive lezlee and her subterfuge. shitty college of sf. laurence rca. 2 pg's on pine street. 21 & 22... fuck fuck fuck." (this section has been altered, necessarily.)
"transferring to cal, my salvation in art history, jasmine & belles. belles' wild nights, events for the books, champagne fountains and grapes in abandoned churches. bacchanal. her photo projects, adjusting the light @ four walls. breaking up with nathalie, the first time i'd ever been able to tell someone that the way she was hurting me was ending. that i was ending it. i ended it. and the rumors and bad-talk that ensued. not the best streak of luck, usually, my love life.
retreating to the mission, nearly 8 years on valencia street, we be sushi and boogaloo's. the latin american club, babar, the lone palm. wait. where did brainwash fit in there? kim & mickey? before the mission. oh, that was a dave period, as well. somewhere back before there was the summer of love. time. rolling around in the grass, serenading friends, driving in dennis' van like maniacs. pj & the boys & me, fighting in the streets. pool games at gino and carlo & the international.
damn i've lived. this one life full of so many lives.
woops, i'm stuck.
i need a minute.
perhaps it's the presence of a new person outside @ saturdays. on his bberry. shiny shaved choco-caramel head. they need heat lamps out here.
maybe this is all out of order because i, essentially, am out of order. always have been. this new foray into "my forties" gets me thinking way too much & my thoughts run wild through the reeds of my memory. tracking swamp & refuse behind me, a trail too hard to follow, too hard to make sense of."
(am leaving a section out, here. some things are better left unsaid).
"ok, that was more than 10 minutes of writing. this time w/ a pen. not bad. almost zero editor. maybe 5-10% but mostly lover. and all from looking at that old, vintage-blue motorcane.
back to the office."
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