I was lying in the dark just now and I suddenly remembered how my friend Harmony once told me her grandparents were in what was essentially a cult, and how every week she would go with them to their “church” to help set up chairs and tables or something. The way she described it, she said it wasn’t nefarious or altogether deranged, but that it certainly fell under the definition of a cult. According to her, these people were brainwashed in a way that was different from other organized religions . . . almost in a sort of otherworldly way, like how Jehovah’s Witnesses come off. (If you’ve never had one come to your door, they speak robotically.) I asked her why she kept going, and she said it made her grandparents happy, and that she somehow got something out of it even though she know it was all horseshit. Harmony lived about twenty miles south of Oakland back then, so I imagine it’s got to be around there. Knowing that, I wonder if I’d be able to figure out where the church is . . . but maybe I don’t want to know.

Last time I saw Harmony, she had me drop her off several houses down from her grandparents’ place because, she said, if her grandfather saw her with a boy, it would be disorienting to him. Apparently it had something to do with his esoteric religion, and I reckon that means such a thing was forbidden. Men and women couldn’t be friends, is how I took it. This was a couple of years ago, and Harmony was probably 25 at the time, so I mean . . . I don’t know. That’s pretty weird!

Harmony had to flee the Bay Area because she got doxxed and I think Some Guy From The Internet showed up at her house. She was pretty shaken and went into hiding for a while. I wonder where she ended up. Well, I reckon that’s one way to escape the Grandpa Cult. . . .

mmhm

prescient

My friend Emma in Tennessee is so sweet! Look at this little package she sent me. Inside was a letter that put a warmth in my heart, and a pin of Cabiria from NIGHTS OF CABIRIA, which is one of my favorite movies. And the pin is from a scene in the movie that, if I thought about it for a minute or two, would make me cry all over again.

TO WIT:

Emma had asked me some time ago for a good movie to watch, and so I told her Cabiria. She said she cried at the end and I told her I had too. So now we got that in common, along with a lot of other things.

And see! She even included a stamp of Dante, FOR WHOM my cat is named. And the stanza on the envelope is from PURGATORIO. Here’s a translation!

do you not know that we are worms and born to form the angelic butterfly that soars without defenses, to confront His judgment?

Damn!!

I am lucky to know someone like Emma. She’s top-shelf, for sure. We met through unusual circumstances. I’m glad we did. My life would be worse without her.

Also: She informed me that her Co – Star account is “bullying” me because it keeps pumping out strangely accurate assessments of me:

A week? Uhhh . . . more like eight years! And I gotta say . . . I love it.

Thanks Emma!!

Good-night!!! ☆彡

monty pick up!!!

I have accidentally dated two painters . . . and I was thinking last night how much I miss sitting in a studio at three in the morning helping out with a painting. When I first moved to Austin, ten years ago exactly, I would meet Chantal every night at her studio on the UT campus, and I’d sit there and we’d talk and I would clean and sometimes pose, and things like that. I remember that fall she was in a litho class, and I would sponge the stone for her while she etched. There were always other artists around at night and I got to know all of them. We would all be in the studio until very late at night. Some time later, when there were gallery openings on campus, I would go and see the finished work of the artists I had befriended. They were good people and I liked knowing them. I don’t know . . . it felt like being a part of something back then, and I miss that feeling. You know?

my good friend emma sent me this

not that i needed further confirmation about the thing i will become though hey there it is in black and white!!!

I remember a couple years ago in Oakland, I knew A Girl From The Internet, though I had never met her in person. Her name was Simone and, like a lot of people I’ve known over the years, we pretty much only communicated in the middle of the night. It is good when two people like this find each other, because then you both feel less lonely after everyone else has gone to sleep. There was absolutely nothing romantic about it. We couldn’t sleep and liked talking to each other. That’s about as honest as it gets!

One night, maybe a few months after first speaking, she texted me at midnight and asked me what I was doing. I told her I was at Lake Merritt, by the little pavilion with the white columns. I don’t know how I ended up there, but I was watching a dozen or so people dressed in black juggle flaming bayonets and bowling pins and wands. It was surreal. There were maybe two dozen people there, and we were all standing around watching these people do things with fire in total silence.

After a while, Simone walked across the grass and stood next to me. She had come from the direction of Fairyland. I said, “Oh hey, Simone,” and she turned and hugged me. She reeked of liquor. I asked her if she was drunk and she said, “I mean, yeah.” I thought that was so cool for some reason. She told me she had seen a show at the Fox Theater and that it had blown her mind.

We split a joint and hung around the fire jugglers for a while. And then we did a thing I like to do, which is to walk a complete lap around Lake Merritt, which takes about an hour. When we finally got back to the pavilion by the water, everyone had left. I walked Simone home. She lived a couple of blocks away.

I said good-bye to Simone and she hugged me again. It was a nice hug. I reckon you can tell when they’re sincere like that. She went inside and I saw her go up the stairs.

I don’t know what ultimately happened to her. We talked a lot but I only met her that one night. She seemed to get a little sad there towards the end, and then I know she left for a while and went to the sea. She was always sending me these pictures she had taken from the hills overlooking the Pacific Ocean. And then one day she just sort of disappeared.

Something reminded me of Simone the other day and I remembered her. She was a cool girl. I hope she’s OK.