Los Angeles 16

                                                                                1.
She suggested going out on the creaking sub-par balcony. He said, "I think you are trying to kill me." When she returned she spilled, "Actually that was pretty scary."

2.

He said, "I'm in a condemned building. All I want is an English Muffin and Law & Order."

                                                                             3.

3.

Know Your Heroes: Gregor Von Rezzori

An Ermine in Czernopol 

“We very soon found out his name as well, because from then on we saw him over and over, although the empty days in which we were denied the joy of his sight often stretched out unbearably. Please don’t consider this exaggerated and extravagant. I think that every childhood has such secret passions, images in which we lose ourselves completely, with all our unbridled emotion, whether we encounter them in a person, a landscape, a book, or some object we may desire—and the chance of subsequent encounters lies outside our power. Perhaps life uses these images as lessons—to help us realize that the fulfillment of desire is not a matter of will, and to show us how much we are at the mercy of fate—or whatever other truths might be derived from the sheer power of incontrovertible truisms. In any case, back then we viewed our encounters with the hussar as the fervently longed-for proof of our special understanding with secret life powers, which, though it could only be established for a few moments, nonetheless consistently reinforced our belief in a higher reality of life; and the interludes between encounters, when our beautiful, courageous impatience gradually fermented into patience, seemed designed to lead us to insights, which, like all precocious knowledge, was filled with a sadness that shaped the foundation of our souls forever.” 

Los Angeles 15

Roadie hotel, Burbank

[waiting outside]

Across rat-heavy banana palmed parking lot: shampoos and conditioners backhighlighted in a square of grey window

No free wi-fi

Later, Good Times: "Worst Load In Ever" and somehow, always charming, Blues Brothers quotes.

Los Angeles 14

Hello!

How's it going?

I had the feeling about a for-sale house in Angeleno Heights. I’ve had it before...it is a real thing that took hold of me in Denver 18 years ago with a great old space called a “territorial style” by the Coloradoans. In that place I felt watched but protected because I was still growing up and needed a talisman the size of a large rambling house. And also it was haunted. The haunters just seemed to like us although the dog got unnerved in the middle of her first floor naps.  But I knew I had to have it instantly and it changed my life, making that decision and moving in. And I was walking through this other place yesterday and thinking, this is nuts, I really have to live here, I may never leave, and I saw all its beauty and glory and also the rotting porch and weird mail slot that went right through with no barrier, the attic stairs that are open to a bedroom and wildly uneven, and 100 years of layered paint and I didn't care, I had to have it. Wandered around in a trance not in the prescribed way, fighting the other circling potential buyers, like you do when you meet an actual person you love, you don't do the right things at all, which is so clear because you have efficiently implanted these new rules for correct behavior. And I had blue gum on my shoe from the inside of my car, and I have no idea who left it there, not me, which made me think that I’d have to be super careful not to get any on the floor of my special new house.

   

The pocket doors and the open unscreened windows. Love. Then I quite imperfectly walked into this vision and saw the bay window featured in the technicolor dream I had right after I met you although there wasn't a wicker thing in the dream [oh wait, you probably don't remember! remind me never to tell you] but something else entirely. The straight up ballsy emptiness, the superhigh ceilings, the quality and integrity of the space, the fireplace, the pantry, the square metal knobs that are attached in the most unwiggly way to the greasy gorgeous wood cabinets. Trees and vines. If I were a ghost I’d haunt the hell out of that place. Then the realtor asked what we thought.

And I said the thing never ever to say to a realtor: [long pause] "I think I love it" and she said there are multiple offers but they’d consider another if it was quick. She had glossy black hair and a sweet face like a sister from another lifetime. I wondered why this wasn't mentioned on the way in to the open house...and yes, it does matter...my desire would have been parametered all normal and nice and I'd be writing you about something else, who knows what. I don’t really want to explain it here but there won’t be a serious backup offer from me in 12 hours. 

I forgot about this feeling of lightning bolt love for a building. So I stumbled out like a sad Peanuts character as a joke but it was actually real. I'm spoiled, I don't feel heartbreak very often or there aren't things I want this much and in this way. I felt this foreign thing turning softly but alive a little lower than my heart. The same place that feels pressure when you can't get your breath from nerves. But a little lower. And I had to face this other thing: a fortune cookie paper in Latin I got in Italy ten years ago that said, "Nulla Tenaci est via invia"

                                            for the tenacious no road is impassable

which I've deviated from or have finally run up against another type of challenge.  The only thing that helped was chicken mole in Boyle Heights. And Led Zeppelin. And a nap. A visit from a friend. The total recall that I'm really lucky and I've still got those talismans following me around every day, I can feel them. They are here right now.

Hope you are well,

R

Los Angeles 13

1.

Urth Cafe, Downtown.

Biscotti colored sheepdog shaved like a lion.

Girl with a Detroit shirt.

2.

I ask, are you a Lions fan or what?

She says no, but the dog is named Bo Schembechler, do you know who that is?

Yes.

Cuz, I went to Michigan.

C mutters, “Easier than shaving him like a wolverine.” Which I repeated but gave him credit.

Bo wanders up to C who is drinking his coffee and hasn’t turned around to look at the girl.

He gives the dog a sideways glance and says, “Why did you lose all those Rose Bowls? Broke my dads heart…”

3.

Then Bo wandered back to his owner.