from sea to shining sea

i think she meant to say graceful, but instead she says gracious. you have such a gracious walk. she says it at least five times. i'm walking by that building on jackson street where the, mostly, pleasantly, insane live. i say thank you. she imitates my walk, and i think if that's really how i walk, then....i don't know how i've made it this far, or maybe i think, work, mama! but i can't remember now. i am wearing that new bright red jacket that's got gay written all over it, so i expect a little attention. i look at the hummingbirds. they're amazing. those wings are vibrating, girl. peter had just posted a blurb on facebook about how often he gets harassed in oakland. i was slightly offended, not that i need to defend oakland, but it's not accurate to say oakland is homophobic and san francisco is not. i've been harassed for being a fag all over this country, and world, for that matter, including san francisco, and including the castro. i'm not saying the gracious lady is harassing me, she's just drunk and and slightly crazy. she's bored, and she knows a hot walk when she sees one. i'm all about that shit.

facebook is gonna make me cry!

Sitting in the Breakroom in Oakland. The music is good, clubby. The guy next to me is trying to explain John Cage's experimental music to his girlfriend. I'm trying to read the Iliad, but who can concentrate? Apparently Patroklos and Achilleus were lovers. Is that supposed to excite me? My professor thinks so, but he assumes that all his students are nineteen and straight. More Thai food, this time with Geri. The economy's so bad that they're giving free Thai Iced Tea or Coffee with each entree. My coffee is gritty. Geri dilutes here tea with ice water to make it last longer because the economy's so bad. We look at the tuna strainers at Smart and Final, and we run the joke into the ground, as usual. My cousin from Louisiana calls. I'm nervous. He keeps calling me Kev and Man, with a southern accent that I wonder if I ever had. He sounds like such a sweet guy, really normal in ways that I never was. But he doesn't seem to think that I'm a freak which is surprising. Actually I'm worried about having to say the words, I'm gay. Not because I'm ashamed, but because it just seems silly to have to say it at this point. He doesn't ask, he's a hipster. He tells me about my father. Still lives in the same house, a hermit, worries all the time, does his own thing. Weird, weird, weird. In an even weirder, and perhaps beautiful, Facebook reconnection, I found one of my friends from middle school. She lives with her girlfriend in Armistead, across the river from Coushatta, and works at the truck stop/casino which is next to the Burger King. There was no Burger King when I was there. I've missed so much! It's not really surprising that she's gay, she was always kind of butch. What's surprising to me is that she still lives there. That she never felt the need to get away. I guess I didn't have to runaway, after all.