what was that?

maybe the bus/train is the most exciting part of the first day of my last semester adventure experiment. the unexpected lurks at every bus stop. you never know what kind of queens or hipster jesus freaks are going to get on. the four queens who get on at West Portal are not really surprising except that they're so young maybe thirteen to fifteen and so loud which is probably more insecurity than confidence but still it's working. there they are, copying LeBeija's walk from Paris is Burning right there on the moving train. taking turns to see who can do it better. talking about his ex-boyfriend and why those bitches always looking at me. faux-hawks and purses, and maybe a couple of anne taylor sweaters. that's san francisco on the M Oceanview. but on the 29 Sunset, watch out, some jesus lovers talking about meeting the lord, loving yourself, the lord loves gangsters but the devil is punking them and then they're punking other people, but the have amazing energy those gangsters, there's so much to learn, and more of the lord, and something about the father. what? is this for real? they're sitting behind me. the woman sitting next to be is rolling her eyes and laughing under breath. we all get off at geary and i've got to get a look at these comedians. not what i expected. they look like san franciso funky, not conservative and bland, but ratty/earthy. now i'm scared.

plaid

i found that jacket, but it hasn't changed my life yet. maybe tomorrow. at least, i didn't buy anything new, made of synthetic fabrics, or from a giant corporation. instead i bought from a high-end vintage store where they treat you well and the clothes are already dry-cleaned and actually smell good. it was expensive-ish, even on sell, but it's my money right? i mean the government's money. i mean my credit card company's money. I just wanted it. Something to do. Why do I have justify it? But now Indian summer is here so I won't see it again for six months.
Victor cooked so much food, six different vegetarian dishes from Spain. It goes on for a while eating and talking and drinking. it's nice. i get horny at some point during the meal, but then it passes and by the time that it's time for sex I sort of just want to go home. but i guess this is how people do things. eat huge meals and then have sex? i don't know about that. he probably doesn't always cook six-course meals. maybe we'll just eat macaroni salad next time and fuck over the dining table. i feel sort of un-excited about the whole thing, but that's probably not a bad thing. it may be fabulous thing. when i get excited about a guy it's usually because i'm hoping he will save me from oblivion. but they're never interested in saving me. i can't relax, i'm anxious, i'm worrying. always. it's getting worse as i age. god, i'm aging now on top of everything else. i might have said this before, but here it goes,it's like dr. nina simone says, we're all gonna die and die like flies. i find this comforting. victor plays a joy division song for me before i go to get on that bus. he doesn't play love will tear us apart but still i can't stop singing love will tear us apart.

something like that

all i want is a new warm jacket. if i had one my whole world would be like - bam! you know, like on. like stepping out the front door and like ready to hit it. pret-a-porter and all that shit. but i couldn't find the right one at any of those dung heaps in union square. i mean dung heap city baby. but where's all the dung beetles to take that shit away?? instead there's only tourists. the stores seem almost empty except for a few rich-looking tourists. and then my broke, but credit-infused, ass ready to throw down. lay down. roll around. smoke grass. and get back on that bus! but first some coffee in that underground cafe that puts me right to sleep. i haven't done anything today and it's really a weight on my shoulders. i still have to stop at trader joe's. frozen berries, cabbage, red peppers, multi-grain bread, two cans of cuban black beans, lavender dryer bags, vanilla soy milk. i still don't have anything to eat. i make grits instead.

walk on by

i'm sitting in the church street cafe. tired from walking all the way from 24th and Valencia, but excited about new purchases. ha! superficiality doesn't go away after turning 30, let me tell you! but a new wardrobe is part of my reinvention project so it has some meaning beyond meaningless shopping. and can we really escape consumerism in 2009? i don't think so, mama. but back to the cafe and more importantly, this neighborhood. this neighborhood is like flashback city, honey. there's that i guy i always see on campus with the big purse and for some reason is always giving me shade or thats what it feels like. he's looking at porn on his laptop right now. is that straight porn? i can't make it out from here. but watching the people go by on the street is much more interesting anyway. i'm drinking my coffee. the old ladies next my are talking about the word "mama" and its universality. i'm looking out the big windows. i feel okay. and then and then and then. there he is walking by. my ex-boyfriend. the one that i haven't seen in three years. the last time i saw i slammed the door in his face with a cigarette hanging out my mouth. that was when i lived in that crappy apartment on market street and had that horrible job and was still going to city college. i mouth the words oh my god. i laugh. there he is just like that. i don't feel anything but oh my god. he looks the same. same black hoodie. walking with a forty-ish white guy which is good because i have no pangs of jealousy. and then he's gone. oh my god. and then there's ron walking by and that guy that i almost had sex with on sixteen different occasions at blow buddies. i just couldn't decide. and then that other guy. i've got to get out of this neighborhood. where's that 22 Fillmore?

late night dining

the week of lunches

oh no! cat puke on my bedroom floor. thanks, tiger! i scream when i see it. it's just a shock, you know. thank god i bought those latex gloves. clean that stuff right up and finally i'm ready for bed.

`etoiles

i returned two half-used bottles of pro-biotics to the whole foods on franklin and california, no receipt required. $32.17, woo-hoo! i was elated as i bumped into yuppies in the crowded aisles, finding things to spend that extra cash on. grits - i've been missing those!, kiwis, enzymes - help!, gingko biloba - help!, cabbage, toilet paper, bananas, strawberry preserves, frozen blueberries, tomatoes, brown rice, dark chocolate with mint crisps - all for $37.07. so i'm really loving whole foods now, right? i mean as much as i can love such a hideous place. i used to work here, sort of, as a personal shopper, so i know what a mainstream masculinity machine it really is. but then, i'm reading the huffington post and there's an article about the ceo of whole foods and his op-ed piece against obama's heathcare plan and now i really loathe whole foods, no matter their return policy.

the professor comes over to see my pink room. everybody loves it. we go to this taiwanese place on clement for lunch. he orders beef ligament. so you actually eat that, i ask. what is it exactly? not really ligament, right? but yes, really ligament, and lots of people love it. they cook it for days, so it's very flavorful. i was thinking we were probably going to have sex later but do i really want to kiss a mouth that had just had ligament in it? no, but i do. the adventure, lady, the adventure. we go to green apple books and i find jean-philippe toussaint's The Bathroom. and then i have to go to the bathroom. the sex is fine and i'm alive.

routine

it's warm tonight on clement street. i just want to get out the house. headaches and naps and nightmares. neck pain, stomach aches, ejaculate. i finally do my sun salutations in the morning. all of my routines are askew since moving back. fuck i want some crack! no kidding, but maybe something sweet. the blue danube is too bright and crowded. same for toy boat. i need dark and dirty cafe. oily, sour, bitter, and blah. at the library i return a slighty read book in the after hours drop. two guys sitting outside with their laptops, the wi-fi is on all night. on craigslist, a human urinal is looking for dom piss tops. i think about responding. i mean, i am in the neighborhood, so maybe... i take Henri to mountain lake park, but then i have to go to the bathroom. what is it with me and lakes? walking past green apple books, i spot michelle tea's novel Rose of No Man's Land in the discount bin, marked down to $2.98 and finally, i feel like smiling. not because i'm happy that her book is unloved and unwanted, but because i just read it, a library copy, and it's funny to see it sitting there on the dark street, waiting to be discovered and for such an amazing price!

the zoo

Sitting on the steps on the east side of the building, my usual spot, waiting for lunch break to be over, counting down the minutes, the seconds, until I can escape the unsupervised teen aged hillbilly masses -- there's that one who thought that To Kill a Mockingbird was pro-racist when I started to describe the book to him, I hear you man, kill them all he said, and there's that one who's always shooting me with with a water gun, and that one who calls me sexy, thanks! Just a sampling of the really cool people that I go to high school with. I'm counting down the minutes until the relative security of the classroom where homophobic teachers are the norm, but still they won't let me be blatantly harassed in class, or usually not,anyway, it's more of an of off-handed harassment in which they participate fully with comments like doesn't it make you sick to see those men holding hands in Natchitoches -- I've never seen them but it is a college town and Steel Magnolias was filmed there so it is like gay mecca for Northwest Louisiana, or asking some other students if it's true that I'm gay, and they're all certain that it's true. This is Coushatta High School in Coushatta, Louisiana -- the other mecca of Northwest Louisiana, of backward thought, redneck style and the perpetuation of every negative stereotype of the South that ever was. That's why a crowd starts to form while I'm sitting on the steps, counting down the endless minutes, around two new students who just appeared seemingly out of nowhere standing uncertainly against the red brick walls. Brother sister, Jose and Rosa. You get the picture here- Jose and Rosa are from Mexico, the children of migrant workers here for tree planting season. Apparently, they're planning on sticking around long enough to have their kids go to school here, but what a depressing thought. Jose and Rosa are cornered now, pushed and prodded like petting zoo animals, real excitement for these hillbilly children who never get to go nowhere, never get to do nothing. I want them all to die except for Jose and Rosa. I already feel solidarity with the recent arrivals. They're the only Mexicans, and I'm the only fag. I'm sure we'll be friends. I have a hard-on unrelated to the recent arrivals and now break/hell is over. I rearrange my stuff discretely and proceed towards some version of education.

bib

high-speed internet is fabulous, but just a little too tempting. i wanna check this, look at that, once more, just once, and then again, and then in an hour, and once more before bed. and that's not including facebook. i only really like about three of my friends on facebook. i don't even know half of them and some of them i just down right hate. but i've got my pink room and i'm feeling happy-ish and it just different. i hope it lasts. maybe i'm not lonely anymore. could it be? moi, not lonely? i'm not lonely and not looking for sex. bizarre times for sure. i found a pink jacket at american rag to match my pink room. gotta pull that wardrobe together before the semester starts. statement of style, girl. statement of style. i want this semester to be different. i want to approach it differently. i don't want to miserable there anymore. maybe style will help. it's one approach. and well reinvention never hurt anybody. except maybe anne heche. i used to think what a crazy bitch. but now after reading about how she was abused by her father and her denies and trying to convert gay people to heterosexuality, i can see why she had a breakdown. i hate my family. sometimes. going to temple was fun-ish. i like going out with m. because there's no expectations to have a good time and no one pressures me to drink seventy-three cocktails. he doesn't drink at all and i do sometimes and only a couple max. i didn't drink anything at temple because i wasn't sure if my body was up to it. one screwdriver would have helped me loosen up though. i like the music and managed to dance a little but couldn't relax with all the people standing around just looking at the dancefloor. i need everything to align for me relax and have fun at a club. the perfect amount of people on the dancefoor-crowded, but not too crowded which means enough room to move around in but also surrounded by enough people that you don't feel like you're being examined. at least on cocktail. amazingly addictive music. mixed crowd. cute clothes. comfortable shoes. i was lacking a lot of those things at temple. but still, the bitch is back and she's pink.

the walls

statement of style

so i painted my room pink today. a new color, a new life. it's a happy color. the same pink you find on some houses in florida or some place like that. you can find one or two in san francisco, too. maybe that happy color will rub off on my personality. it's the first time i've ever painted my own room in any of the fifty odd houses and apartments i've lived in over the past thirty-one years. i guess i'm looking to settle in and stick around. and i never wanted to stay too long in any of the other places. except for when i lived by buena vista park. i lived there for three years, but my room was already a gorgeous shade of green so i never thought about painting. now i'm settling in and doing so in style. of course, of course, of course.

the neighborhood

I'm looking for the Real Foods on 20th and Geary. At least I think there's one around here. I ask someone and she points me to a Russian produce store. No, that's not it. I keep walking. I like this part of Geary. There's a funky old ice cream place. And that place that's a diner and video store in one. The booths are occupied by solo senior citizens eating pie and drinking coffee. I want to hang out there in the future. I ask another person about Real Foods and then the adventure really begins. She doesn't think there's a Real Foods around here. But she know all about Rainbow and their twenty percent off coupons in the Yellow Pages. She tells me at least three times. She tells me about the Tokyo Shop on Clement which has cheaper green tea than in Japantown. The Chinese restaurant with a happy hour. A sushi place. She's third generation Japanese. She keeps all this information inside her for when someone needs it. She tells me to always bless my food. I say okay, but I won't. I thought this would be a five-second conversation but it must be more like ten minutes. After the eighth time I say thank you and wave good-bye she offers me orange. are you sure? Yeah, it's from the senior center. So I take my orange and get back on the 38 Geary.

platinum cum dump

I went to see the film Sex Positive at the Roxie mainly to get out of the house. I was supposed to see it with mattilda but the timing wasn't right. Timing, timing, timing. So I went alone. But before that I stop at Whole Foods and spend $19.73 on dinner. Macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes, pomegranate chana masala, tofu curry, and a dolma from the prepared foods bar, an acidophilus drink, a sweet and salty energy bar, and a gingerade kombucha. The movie depressed me more than I already was. I might never have unsafe sex again. Hell, I may never have sex again. I'm worried I aspirated some food into my lungs. Just had to throw that in. David Berkowitz invented safe sex in the early eighties as a response to AIDS. People thought he was crazy. Being gay meant you never had to use a condom. He also thinks that hiv is not the only factor that causes aids which leads him to classified as quack by some. He was an S/M hustler too. But he doesn't really want to focus on that. He gets really defensive talking about hustling and drugs at first but eventually opens up about it. Micheal Callen talks lists all of the STDs he's had and it's like every STD in existence and it's a little too close to home. I wince, I cringe. Syphillis, gonorheraa, shingella, giardia, claymidia-I can't spell them, but I know there horrible. He thinks having all of these diseases, taking antibotics, taking drugs, drinking, lack of sleep etc have led him and other gay to contracting AIDS. They call it the multi-theory factor which nobody in the mainstream believes in. When I walk out of the theatre I see Kyle. I'm already depressed, I don't that. But I don't think he saw me. He turned the corner on valencia otherwise I would have said hi to him even though he hasn't returned my call from three years ago. The last one where I said, kyle I can't believe you're not going to call me back. And he didn't. He looked very adult like. He must be like twenty-four now. He looks smart and employed and purposeful. Happy maybe. Then I'm thinking about how the last time I saw him on the street and how that was the last straw-I had to get out of san francisco. It was in the castro on 17th just past cala foods. I was walking with jeff and there he was walking past us. It just a flash but there he was. He was laughing I think. It felt like he was laughing at me. But maybe he was just happy to see me. It was a flash. He didn’t say hello. I looked back and he was laughing I think. Laughing at me for walking, for existing? Yes, I'm still existing even though you never called me back. I don't know, why but I know I just wanted to lay down and cry right then. But why? He's just a boy and so I am and if he wants to laugh or think that I'm a loser because I kept dropping my speech class well does it really matter? So now I'm in oakland. But I can't blame kyle. He went to stanford, he can't help but be an elitist cow.

mr. clump clump

My father drives some kind of Plymouth that was produced for about two years. It's gray, a hatchback. So economical. Frugal, not cheap-that's what he calls his lifestyle. I call it cheap ass cheap. We're driving to meet my Mom at the Bills Dollar Store parking lot in Ringgold-the mid-way point between Coushatta and Minden. This happens every Friday night-I escape from living with this sad clump of life called my father and enter the more lively but still troublesome world of my mother's house. I put Boy George's single The Crying Game into the cassette player. We whizzing by all the staples of Coushatta life on Highway 71. The Piggly Wiggly, The Dollar Store, Fausto's Fried Chicken, the Cheverolet dealership, a few gas stations, the Dairy Queen, the nursing home, the motel-but whoever stays there, I can't imagine. I ask him if he likes the song. I tell him it's Boy George. He says, if it's radical, you're all for it. You got that right. I'm bringing the Crying Game to Coushatta like it or not, Sag Bag. Of course, I know Boy George is far from radical, but there's no telling that to Mr. Clump Clump. We're out of the strip now, thirty miles to go to Minden. There's lots of pines trees and pastures along the way, cows and broken down farmhouses, long abandoned stores waiting for a fire and time, time, time. God, just step on it. I'm counting down the minutes now. I'm always counting down the minutes until this will all be over. We ride mostly in silence but sometimes we have political conversations. Never religious ones cuz he goes ballistic when I question his beyond scary beliefs. He thinks Boy George is radical from his early eighties days. But he has no idea about The Crying Game. First there are kisses, then there are tears. Jaye Davidson is cute, that's what I'm thinking about in my silence. I can't imagine what he's thinking about. Finally, we make it to the parking lot and there's my mom in her car waiting for us and what an amazing yet most likely momentary feeling of relief. I have escaped yet again. Drive like hell, lady.

skipping

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class

In the seventh grade is when I accept that I'm into other guys dicks. This is the year when they seem to be everywhere at school. Hard and soft, black and brown-that's right, none of the white boys were showing off- they're popping out all over the place and my eyes are glued to the spectacle. Most classes are a free for all where the teachers can only pretend to be in control. I don't think learning ever really entered into anyone's mind. We were off the streets and getting fed and that was enough. It was non-stop acting-up, cutting-up, beating-up, and yes, getting it up. In Science class, Richard is the most ready to get it up and I'm all too eager to encourage him. Maybe we don't even have a teacher at this point. Mrs. Leggit got fired-maybe for wearing slutty clothes-and then Mrs. Jones comes out of retirement to "teach" us, but I think there was a lag. I use my friend Joey as a ruse. Richard, Joey wants to see your pubic hair. He's all grin and instantly hard in his lose fitting pajama-style pants. He comes over, pants lowered just enough to show of his tight, neat black pubic hair. Joey's all giggles, screaming no, no! But I know she wants to see it as much as me. Show her your cock! But he doesn't and I'm so disappointed. At least I'll have good masturbation material this afternoon when I get home from school.

sleep

All during the time I live in the matchbox house, I'm afraid to sleep by myself. Or at least from age four to fourteen. i can fall asleep in my bed as long as someone is awake in the house. Usually my father stays up to watch the ten o'clock news. And maybe my sister stays up writing in her diary. That's before she moved out. But I always wake up in the middle of the night, scared to close my eyes for too long. Or even worse-I don't fall asleep at all. I'm dreading the night as the TV is turned off and everything gets dark. Sometimes I pretend I'm sick so that my father will let me sleep in his bed. Having a sore throat works for a while, but one night he's just not having. There I am next to his bed telling him that I have a sore throat but really meaning that I need to get in your bed if I'm going to get any sleep. But tonight he doesn't understand, he thinks I've really got a sore throat and that it needs to be treated. Into the kitchen we go, bright lights, looking down my throat, yelling. Is there a flashlight involved? He has a stash of antibiotic samples because his boss's brother is doctor and because he's paranoid. He wants to give me an antibiotic for my sore throat. I don't want to take the antibiotic and then I'm crying. I just want to go to sleep. I won't take the antibiotic which means I'm lying about the sore throat which means I have to go back to my bed. For now anyway, maybe I can sneak back into his bed without him noticing. Fuck antibiotics, give me a sleeping pill! Maybe it's hereditary. My Mom was like that when she was a child and my uncle too. Now I can't sleep any other way than alone.

make my day

Technotronic's Pump Up the Jam is my favorite song to dance to in the seventh grade. This was before I discovered Tina Turner, but that's a whole different story. And it's before my Dad comes home, otherwise he would get pissed about me having my door closed and playing loud music. Oh, the things I did when that motherfucker wasn't there. I mean, I really cranked it. I would dance until I was sweaty and exhausted. I think there was a lot of bent over head banging. Not that Technotronic makes head-banging music, but it just feels good. Nobody would think I was a good dancer. I mean I probably wasn't a good dancer but I wanted to dance, I wanted to move, and people would have trouble believing even that. But I work hard at it. Make my make my ma-ake my day. Then I feel better. It's another small way of being connected to the rest of the world. Thank you Technotronic.

It's a red brick house in a dead-end all-white neighborhood just off of highway 7. We're in the low-rent section of the neighborhood closest to the highway. The bigger houses with the kids who go to private school are farther back. A matchbox with three bedrooms, it's badly designed. The door off the carport leads into the kitchen. White linoleum floors with an abstract pattern of black squiggly lines. Pink formica counter tops and some shiny-looking wooden cabinets. Girl, I'm ready to puke. There's a door to the left that goes directly into my father's room or one straight ahead which leads into the living/dining room and that's where things really get ugly. Forrest green shag carpeting and gold yellow walls, what were they thinking? It's a big room divided by a wood burning stove-that's for heating not cooking, it's cheaper than central heating. And I guess he likes to make fires, but I don't think he likes to chop wood. Linoleum floors, some pale orange color in the rest of the house including the bedrooms and ugly wooden sliding doors round out the full-on ugliness factor of the house. My father says the man who built it, built for a woman but she said it wasn't good enough and left the man, so he sold it. My father finds it dumbfounding that the woman thought it wasn't good enough, but I understand completely. But the mortgage is one hundred and thirty-three dollars a month, so hey. I wonder if I'll inherit it? And if I do what will I do with it? Go back and remodel it and reclaim my past? No I'll just sell it. There used to be five giant pine trees in the front yard by the street, but he cuts them down because he's worried about the roots messing with the water line. He's always worried. I was always afraid to sleep by myself in that house.

hill castle

The truth is my whole life is dependent on credit. Without my credit cards and student loans life as I know it would be over. But I'm not sure that would be a bad thing. I'm worried about running out of cash before I get my student loan money when the fall semester starts so I use my credit card to buy groceries. The cute one, the one with the reproduction of the impressionist painting "Paris: A Rainy Day." And that's fitting because that painting captures the time of the rise of consumerism. People say, I like your credit card and I say thanks. I can hardly take a walk without having a shopping goal in mind. And if I don't find something, anything, then it feels like a waste of time. That's why walking to Whole Foods is always a good option. I can always find something in that dump.

The fireworks are starting, it must be the forth of july. My neighbor, the one who can't call herself gay or even bi, even though she did have a relationship with a woman for six years, invites me to the roof to watch the fireworks with her friend from the east coast. They're both psych nurses. Scary, I say. What's really scary is that she's sixty and has absolutely no wrinkles. I didn't even know we could go on the roof. Isn't the roof slanted? This is a tudor style building after all but I guess the key word is style. The slant is just an effect, it's all flat on top. I can't believe I've never been up here. I adore rooftops. The views, the privacy. I'm way more excited about the rooftop than the fireworks. I mean I'm not at all excited about the fireworks but I'm trying to be friendly. More people arrive to enjoy the spectacle. We think we might have to hit the ground because of the errant rockets being fired from other roofs.