And Thompson
It's raining this morning, hard enough to need an umbrella, not so hard you want to stay inside, so I drove down the way and parked near my cafe and had breakfast. Just a few people there who'd braved the rain, but nice. I wore the rubberized coat I bought from the Gap some years back over a Pendleton shirt. Warm and roomy enough to sling a camera over my shoulder inside.
I'm clearer headed than I've been since I can remember. I've been saying this, the head, the various physical symptoms improving, but it seems real. I knock on wood, the world is a funny place and it can change in a second. If this were a book, a character saying what I'm saying now, I suspect I'd invent a car turning a corner - clip! - just as the character was raising his eyes. I have no complaints. Now, what to do with it: today, this hour?
Complain about work? Iraq? Underexposed photographs?
Of course, of course. A tiger does not change its spots.
And you're a tiger?
I'm a guy with two weeks to kick around the house and I'm thinking of radically cleaning my living room and checking out the storage locker I haven't looked at in over a year to see if any of the stuff I have stored has floated away in the rain. Hard to justify paying the locker rent when all your stuff has floated away in the rain.
And this is your idea of "starting your life again"?
Well, you know, life is a story. If you're lucky, a not very interesting story. The attitude you take to your story pretty much determines whether you find it satisfactory or not - I'd say "happy", but I think satisfactory describes it better - it's only when you're younger looking for wider experience that you're out there actively seeking the bizarre.
Like Kerouac and Burroughs.
Like Kerouac and Burroughs. And Thompson.
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