24 Hours

...was a theme this trip. First because I spent around that amount of time in the bookstore since I hosted two readings in two consecutive days in the same place, and secondly because Jon Ginoli, of Pansy Division fame, showed up to tell me that "Denny" (a song we wrote together back in '95) was chosen by Taylor Mac for her 24-Hour history of American Popular Music show (http://stannswarehouse.org/show/taylor-mac-24-decade-history-popular-music-1776-2016/): the section on songs you've never heard of, of course, ha ha...http://www.vulture.com/2016/09/taylor-mac-a-24-decade-history-of-popular-music.html

Anyway, here's the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X--7F1JVeHM
Meanwhile, back in San Francisco and my reading with Patti Smith.....



Not really, but it looks like it, no? :)

But for real, Thursday I read from Eros & Dust and Friday I hosted, along with Richard May, the Mark Thompson Memorial Reading, celebrating the life and lit of a giant of the gay movement - and a good friend, mentor and fellow traveler... below is a pic of Mark on right and his partner of 30 years Malcolm Boyd, another lifelong activist/author who passed away 2 years ago....farewell sweet princes(ses:)

Yes, the shirt says "Purrito" and has a cat wrapped in a tortilla - and it's way too small, but I always seem to find a new t-shirt to share for the book tour

 Next night at the Mark Thompson Memorial Reading...16 readers!

Most of the readers, from l to r: Justin Tanis, Trebor, Jim Van Buskirk, Carol Queen, Will Roscoe, Wow, Ken White, Sister Merry Peter, Baruch Porras-Hernandez, Andrew Ramer, Joey Cain, Ganymede, Rick May. An amazing group of people, and the whole event was streamed on facebook and videotaped:
https://vimeo.com/185184381
https://vimeo.com/185185603
https://www.facebook.com/tdubtx/videos/10209625056595743/



Is it a bad photo, or was this how dizzy I felt after 24 hours?
It was great to be back in this space - it's the same location where A Different Light used to be, so every reading here is going to be a kind of homecoming for queer lit lovers. I first read here from Beyond Definition in 1994. Please buy books here and keep it in business in a very high rent district that needs a bookstore!

In keeping with our theme, I then hopped on BART for yet another 24 hours with the folks. Long story, but my Dad and Mom like to laugh, and though Mom is a cleanfreak who married a packrat, my Dad has somehow managed to hide certain of his many collections from her through their 50+ years together .... and since my roommate deals in antiques (and I like to write run-on sentences:), together we went through my Dad's coin collection, and coin by coin, we've made $161 already, so I presented him with this publishers clearinghouse-style check and photo op:

They're sweet loving people, I appreciate them more and more....and frighteningly realize I'm both of them at once - she, the extroverted accommodator (until she isn't) and emotional Irish streetfighter, and he the introverted German romantic poet who keeps the 90% of his Irish blood well in check. Or, something like that. Oddly, he's way more of a show queen than I am (he sang me the lyrics to Moon River 3 or 4 times on this visit :) and she's way tougher than I'll ever be. Will be back for Mom's 80th birthday party in a few weeks.

Speaking of mothers and their children...love this outdoor work on a sidestreet in Bernal Heights

A little store on Divisadero, stocked wholly with used kitchen items. Only in SF...

I ended up here with Angus, after a shot of mezcal and some nopalitos around the corner. I met Angus through my annual writing workshop in Mendocino a few years back. This man is the definition of worldly, and he's also mischievous. I forget he's 79 as his energy is pretty much forever 25

Angus is a collector of art, and has several amazing paintings by Hubert Stowitts: http://www.stowitts.org/index.html

Angus is also a pianist and harpsichordist and played professionally in many capacities, and was even a friend of Leonard Bernstein. He told me an interesting story about how one summer he was hired by Bernstein's manager to make sure Bernstein made it to all his events at Wolftrap, Tanglewood, etc. Apparently, Bernstein, known to be a partier and loads of fun, also experienced long bouts of depression. That summer was one of them as this photo hints at (that's Angus on the right). Angus said as soon as the baton was in his hand, Bernstein's mood lifted for the length of the show, only to crash again afterward. 

Angus's lovely little flat in the lower Haight. He also owns an original Von Gloeden (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_von_Gloeden)

Lots of walking when I'm in SF...who needs uber, the bus, a car...San Francisco is one of the loveliest cities to flaneur about in

Paper or plastic? - or rather, latex

Artist Terry Cunniff...we had tea and a lovely afternoon. I simply rang her doorbell when I recognized her house. Love that she was there and available. Village life :) I miss this about SF

I stayed, as usual, with Tin Do, who, among other things, is a true epicurean (blueberry liqueur, candied wasabi peanuts, bean and arugula salad were a few of the offerings on hand this trip) ... Here he is in the back garden at Progressive Grounds in Bernal Heights

Unintentionally, Tin created this super queer pink triangle gin drink

We also had an anticipatory early celebration of California passing the marijuana legalization law and had one of our nights of belly laughs...man, I wish I could have these more often...rolling on the ground. Fuerza Tindo!

And now I'm just 24 hours away from leaving :(

This city is always an emotional ride and full of ghosts, from long lost relatives to friends who've passed away, moved away, slipped away. I think of my grandma, who used to take me to the movies in the Mission in her fur coat, my Uncle Tom who used to meet me for drinks out near the Palace of Fine Arts, my great aunts Ange and Bette who lived out their days in Vertigo-era SF...and of course all the mad beat poets, mad to live, mad to love, who shepherded my words Sunday nights at the Paradise Lounge, laying the foundation for all I've written since

...more found art

I'll leave you with a few songs about my city (call me cheesy!):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC73kdOL5hk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqfImBlOP4c

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I0vkKy504U

It's Raining Books

Actually it's not, since the book is a week late and there are no books for my Seattle trip. But no problem, I'm so thick with miles, I flew here for $5 roundtrip - and why not? Wanted to see my friend Robert anyway who'd invited me up months back, and Tombiehl, the other good friend of mine whose name has been gummed up into one word due to syllable-ic deficit disorder, the other being Tindo

Robert lives in a houseboat in a marina in an industrial section of Seattle along Salmon Bay opposite Ballard. You walk down three sections of the marina to the very end and there it floats!

Wrestling, as do we all, with customer service

Back deck with view of Ballard Bridge. The channel connects Lake Union with Puget Sound, so it's full of fishing boats and even cargo ships

The humble futon where I slept in college splendor

I went out for a walk, and flaneur that I am, no destination was on the agenda...a mile or so later, walking along the channel toward Puget Sound, I watched this railroad bridge open and close for a big boat and then strolled down this a final avenue and entered Discovery Park, which turned out to be a giant forest...

In a place with so many trees, all the roads are shady

The minute I spied a trail break, in I went, reminiscing about my boyhood days (I lived up here from 2-12 yrs old) here in the Northwest when everyday I walked through a forest on my way to and from school. No wonder I love trees and mountains and behave like an elusive woodland creature

Nettles...and did I brush my arm against them to feel once again the itch and sting I dreaded as a child? Oh yes I did

And then the forest opened up and there was this Native American museum and cultural center, with all sorts of amazing indigenous art

A depiction of orcas as creatures of the underworld

Below is about how daylight was kept in a box until they let it out. If you've ever lived in Seattle, you could easily see how such a myth might arise, since one can go months and months without seeing much light!

And some intriguing modern pieces on display as well:

And then I had an overwhelming desire to see the Puget Sound, home to orcas, otters, salmon, etc.... so through the forest once more I went....

Blackberries in the foreground, which I once again picked and ate as I was wont to do as a wee lad. I didn't know this before, but apparently Luther Burbank (he of russet potato fame) brought blackberries to the NW and then they went feral. They are originally a European fruit.

The northwest is a kind of natural paradise, one of two I've lived in - the other being Northern California

I circled for a mile or two all through this beautiful forest and its scattered meadows...sometimes I am permitted to return to a meadow as the wonderful poet Robert Duncan once said - and I say to myself often

I was blissing out, and grateful I'd come up here, and thinking about the expulsion from the garden - because humans may have been expelled, but the garden is still here, and if you put aside your pain and sorrow for just a moment and enter the munificent and dazzling present, paradise is regained

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCipKmyngLY

I knew and climbed maples like this as a boy

And firs like this!

And I felt like this (Chakraman from Phenomenal Love, a cool little spiritualist shop I discovered last week back home in LA)

Compare that forest to where I normally hike...lovely in its way, but I'm a forest creature at heart

Took the bus downtown to meet my friend David Mendoza, who I used to work with at LAANE. He now works for the governor handling the pot legalization process (he's an attorney who went to law school at Seattle U)

Seattle Library

A dwarfish Pope John XXIII...odd, as he's kind of a giant in pope terms, having liberalized the church considerably with Vatican II...at The Cathedral of St James where I made my three wishes

Here's a crappy pic of David on left because I can't get him to send me the good one he took! If you're reading this David, do the right thing and save the blog! :P

Que bien! David delivered...and now to introduce a pantheon of progressivism, from left to right: the progressive feminist political consultant, Tiffany...Trebor, econ justice fundraiser...Angelica, who also consults - on affordable housing issues...and David, who brings a kinder legal environment to all things weed. Really nice people, doing good work. Thx David for making this happen!

Angelica actually lives in LA, so I plan to see her soon :)

The inimitable Tom Biehl, who even looks younger than me, but is actually a year older, as well as a father of 3 and head of surgery at Virginia Mason Hospital. Amazing man, and he took me on my first backpacking trip (to Yolla Bolly wilderness in Mendocino Mts) way back in 1983, because of course, he was also an Eagle Scout. Anyway, for those who know me well, the man who introduced me to backpacking is basically guru status as the mountains are my soul if there is such a thing. Here he stands in front of his kiwi tree which, though it's never produced fruit, has taken over the side of the house. Tom says he needs a male plant to get things going, but the 3 he planted all died. Praise the goddess and get your kiwis elsewhere!

Robert and I in Tom's backyard...and later over at Barbara's. She's an amazing woman, in her 80s, and having lived in Europe, China and all over the country, she's settled back in the lovely NW where her kids and grandkids live. And she's a reader! She was actually Robert's drama teacher back in New Jersey in the 1950s and was instrumental in saving his soul, lost young alienated gay boy that he was - as have been many of us. Robert worked most of his career as a technical writer for Boeing and spent time in Europe and Iran as well. He reads EVERYTHING and we first met through my books and have since developed and wonderful friendship :) We just get along so well, probably because he's kind and authentic, and into thriftstores, books, history and manhattans, all passions of mine...

Fuerza Roberto!

Was a great trip overall and as we strolled around Capitol Hill before I left, we stopped in this used bookshop...

Robert found some anthologies where I had stories published, and sweet fan/advocate/booster that he is, he bragged to the manager who proceeded to gush (to my blush) and suggest a reading...so perhaps I'll be back before I run off to Mexico in February. Not sure I can swing it, and it will definitely be a rainier trip, but we shall see....

the lovely manager, Jamie...

Sad to leave the land of water and forest, but alas, the desert calls me back....

...still, I know where to find the trees and water upcanyon....