At some point, which is another way
of saying now, your tireless indecision
of what to do with your life
becomes precisely what you have done with your life.
From “Self-Reliance” by Dobby Gibson
After fidgeting, and scrolling, and checking apps, and trying to decide how to spend my evening, I settled on…
Above the bar, the paper sign yellowed with age read, “Reality is an illusion that occurs due to the lack of alcohol.” The quote is from the vaudeville comedian and actor, W.C. Fields. The bar, Specs’, is a well-known haunt in the North Beach part of town. It’s often associated with its beatnik neighbors across…
In one of those Proustian moments, I read the word windmill in a poem and was lost to the past. I drifted back to my first trip to Clarksdale, Mississippi. I had gone there with a woman I was dating, and where we stayed, a place with shacks and small grain silos converted into rooms…
Over the weekend, I went to a concert. I had a decent seat in the front row of the loge. For the duration of the opening act and much of the main act, there was only one other person in my row – another guy, about my age, and like me, drinking a tall IPA….
This morning, Saturday morning, sunlight filters through the leaves of the magnolia tree outside of my living room window. Sitting on my sofa with my legs propped up on a makeshift ottoman (a throw pillow on top of a hard, square storage cabinet), I’m awash in a mix of feelings: guilt for not dedicating myself…
Scrolling through abandoned drafts, I came across this: This morning I was up early. I had set the alarm for 5am. I woke up a little after 4, briefly considered getting up, then decided to maximize those last 4o minutes with sleep – which felt good but not good enough. I didn’t want to be…
January, that month in which people resolve to be better… that month in which people cleanse their bodies of alcohol, and start working out, and make lots of promises, was, for me, a lost month. I was sick twice – or maybe it was just once with two bouts. I barely exercised. I spent way…
Is my attention on loving,
or is my attention on
who isn’t loving me?
-From “Wellness Check” by Andrea Gibson
Sometimes, I have to remind myself to refocus my attention. The fragment from Gibson’s poem helps with that. Sometimes, I have to remind myself to loosen my ego’s grip on…
When I deleted my account/dating profile in early January and restarted it two or three weeks later, I was looking for a reset. I had told myself, “this time, I’m going to be more deliberate, more intentional.” For over a year, I had let my profile grow cluttered and weedy with likes and connections that…
Sometime in 1999, perhaps it was August or September, maybe as early as July, I took a trip with my father to the west coast. We came to San Francisco. I know the rough time period because in July of ’99 I met the woman who I eventually married, and I remember this trip taking…
Yesterday, Google Maps renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. My understanding is that the change primarily affects users in America. Users in Mexico will see Gulf of Mexico, and the rest of the world will see both names. For shits and giggles, I wrote a review of the Gulf of America…
Last week, my friend took one of his friends out for dinner. They went to a nice and well-known place in the neighborhood. It’s probably one of the fancier restaurants on the street – they’re said to have a great braised short rib. Almost every night since his dinner, he’s grumbled about paying a lot…