I know, I know, I haven’t posted here in a while. This year has been a beautiful if not absurd bullet train that seems to have more stops than I ever could imagine. Some of them are small, brief stations. They hold a memory or echo a moment. Others are sprawling, and interconnected- they’re places to transfer, get caught in a layover, or just a spot that offers a moment of reflection.
This is how I’ve been thinking of 2024, my supposed railway year. Just a little over halfway through, it’s been bumpy, but it’s always fun to ride the train, and to see who gets on and gets off, and where.
This year I have made incredibly foolish mistakes, ones that raze my heart on fire in the worst way possible. As I get thrown in the fire, I’ve been happy to find resilience, and most satisfying of all, a desire to learn and be better. It’s after shaking off the flames of the previous arena that I can give myself grace, and even a little serenity. I have made mistakes but I have witnessed a surprising amount of growth in one of the things I struggle with most- being intentional. This cocktail of learning, being upfront with myself, and embracing the intentional has got me fucked up- this year, I’m drunk on building the life for myself I desire.
Within this year, as with all years, I’ve also done some looking. Some observing. Some mindful viewing of the world around me. These are moments, which I can’t help but to categorize in my mind, jot down somewhere, and share with whoever is curious. Some folks collect watches, or classic cars, I am much more simple. (And way, way less liquid.) Let me share some of my collection with you, a variety of classic you-just-don’t-see-this-anymore moments that aren’t big enough to constitute a whole piece for my column.
At the corner of an old timey bank in the Financial District, I wait for the bus that crisscrosses Chinatown, the one that gets me to the one Whole Foods I like going to.
It’s perched up on a hill above Van Ness, and I learned how to back into a spot in their parking lot. They also have the only good body soap I’ve ever used, some sort of bizarre looking slab of speckled brown glycinate called Dirty Hippie.
As I spot my bus a block away, I notice an unmistakable pair- a grandfather and his grandson. His hair is more salt than pepper, and he is decked out in Giants gear from head to toe. His grandson is dressed in the exact same manner. They’re at the adjacent street corner, and they’re playing peek-a-boo with each other, taking turns to round the corner and surprise the other. Each time, both the grandfather and the small boy burst out laughing at each other. This goes on for a few glorious, precious minutes.
As I walk onto my bus and glance out the open window, I no longer notice them. Then, suddenly, an orange hat pops out of the corner. The grandfather, it seemed, employed a strategy of crouching to avoid being seen. They disappear from view, but I do hear one last big, boisterous laugh as my bus screeches up the hill.
At Caffe Greco, the magnificently old school coffee spot by our apartment, things are simple, and in many ways, perfect. The sun is shining, it is nearly 70 degrees, and a light breeze makes its way to where I’m sitting outside. To my left, three hardened, casually suited men are (almost) yelling in Italian. They are all wearing sketchers.
Across from me, a man and woman sit sipping on their coffees, and splitting a single slice of tiramisu. The tiramisu here, in all fairness, goes crazy- but the last time I had it, I did what I always do, and cough immediately as I take my first bite. But back to the couple.
The man is wearing a bright red sweater, with the words “FERRARI” embroidered in the front, with their unmistakable logo woven in the back. He’s in a camo Giants baseball cap, faded blue jeans, and the most popular sneakers of the 2010’s; the Comme Des Garcon converse hi-tops. The woman is wearing a beige jumpsuit, some well-loved pastel pink air force ones, and a pair of eyeglasses with a 70’s flair that sit big on her face. They sit down and study each other for a minute before talking.
The woman goes first, and she does not hold back. “MY SISTER?” she yells. The whole cafe is now doing that sort-of looking, sort-of not thing where something unbelievable is happening in front of them.
“Well what about you! With my ROOMMATE! That makes two in a row babe!” he counters. The woman becomes quiet. The man is silent as well, seemingly stunned by his own ability to fire back.
There is no talking for a few minutes. The only communication that happens is between an accidental clang of two forks going for the same piece of tiramisu. The woman speaks up.
“Well, I guess maybe we should finally talk about having that open relationship.”
The man groaned.
The most beautiful home I’ve ever had the pleasure of staying in is also the most beautiful home I’ve had the luxury of being a complete goblin in. It’s a stunning Mediterranean style villa with an elegantly modern interior, mixing an Adriatic warmth with a Nordic, wabi-sabi sense of cool. It’s nestled in the rolling hills above Wine Country, in a small town called Calistoga- one of those petite, charming Northern California villages that has a “General Store”. Local old timers rub shoulders against a younger, more Patagonia-vested crowd. It is, in a word, an escape.
The home belongs to my one-time trainer & full-time friend, Paul Denmark. Denmark is not his last name, but it’s become an integral part of the shared folklore of our group, a motley crew of Bay Area natives who meet playing Dungeons & Dragons through the internet. Paul is kind, exceptionally so, although most know his calling card to be his wicked intelligence- I still don’t know exactly what he does, but it involves building robots, programming them, and then sending them off to high-end clients in Europe and Asia……. I think. In his room, he has the biggest monitor I’ve ever seen, and I recognize nothing of what’s open on the curved, 40-inch screen.
In this beautiful villa, on a perfect Northern California day, Paul Denmark, and the rest of our band of outsiders, decided it is time to indulge in a very special kind of fungi that is purported to do very special things to the open minded. The sun finally appears, behind the last of the clouds, as we do.
A few hours later, I am holding an onion in the living room of the villa, like Shakespeare posing with a skull at the Globe Theatre. The rest of the boys watch me from the couch, as if this is the most important performance of my life. Perhaps it is.
“This… is an onion.” I say, in a gruff, deep voice. The crowd bursts out laughing. This is my Oscar moment. I pause for a few seconds before going into the second line, the other half of this incredibly short monologue.
“Eat an onion if you want to boost your health. Just be careful, as they’re tear-inducing.”
The laughter became riotous, and because of that, I became greedy. One more line. An extra piece of this monologue I knew had to be missing.
“Let me know if you have any questions about onions.”
That was it- the silver bullet. Everyone, including me, was on the floor laughing. It must’ve been what heroin felt like. It was the perfect bit, there was no doubt about it.
The next morning, Paul Denmark picks up an onion while we make breakfast.
“This… is an onion,” he says, looking me straight in the eye. I start to laugh. First a little, then a lot. It felt nice to share a bit with someone so different, but at the same time, so similar.
God I miss Cafe Greco. I've never actually been inside, but I miss the bickering regulars who take over the outside tables.
the moments I wish my goldfish memory could hold onto and savor