That is always an invitation to trouble. This was the first pic I took and printed out on my new pocket-sized zinc printer and pasted into my journal at the Cafe Strange. One day when there isn't a bunch of text that I don't want to share on the page, I'll make a pic of my journal and post it here. That wasn't the case yesterday.
The bar was full of young hipster girls. Chock full. The two kitchen girls who I wanted to photograph so badly the other day were hanging out with two of their friends. The four of them looked like a team, kinda crazy looking, hipster-style. Funked up hair, punk fashion, piercings. I could have asked them to pose standing side by side by side by side, arms loosely draped over one another's shoulders, slouchy in posture like an East Village club band from the early '70s. That's what I thought.
That's what I only thought. It woulda been something.
A real artist woulda . . . .
A cute young couple went into the Photo Booth and in a minute were sitting together in front of me giggling and marveling at the strip of photos.
"Let me take your photo and I'll print one out for you right away."
That is not what I said. I shoulda. . . .
It's better that I didn't. I mean, I can still go to the cafe this way. But. . . .
I had a real scare for quite awhile yesterday. I went back to find Miya's emails to me. I couldn't find them. Turned out I was looking for the wrong email address. After a long while, though, I figured it out. Reread some of the correspondence. Oh, my. So sweet, so sad.
8/12/09
You were like God for me the day..I really needed a friend and I think you were the present of god to save me
I am deeply appreciate you listening my stroy and being my friend
If you write my stroy, It would be a big honor to me and thank you very much for the very nice phtoes
They are the best photoes in my life, I am better in person I think ..hihi : P
However, I have nice pictures now I'll set them in frame . I mean it
Thank you
I really hope that we send email to each other and see each other someday
I wish them
Then take care and be healty
So. . . I went back to my blog posts from 2009 to see what I had actually written back then while it was fresh, but it wasn't there. Nothing from 2009 to 2015 was. I panicked. I searched wildly for a long time. They had apparently just disappeared. Had Google done it? Had I been hacked? I had a lot of conspiracy theories but no luck. Despondent that I had lost six years of writing, I got dressed and went to the gym. Driving there, I tried to reconcile myself. Life was ephemeral, I said. Everything dies, everything disappears. Every thing, one day, is gone. Be zen. Be like the tree. Be like the rock.
When I got to the gym, a woman whose husband died a few weeks ago came up. She is one of the two retired nurses I talk to there. The other had told me about her husband's death, but she told me on the down low, said she wasn't telling people, so I thought I had better not say anything about it.
"How are you doing," she asked?
"Oh. . . I'm good."
"Really? I heard you were sick."
"Yea. I'm better now."
She was staring into my eyes.
"Really?"
"I just have things on my mind today. My roof leaked in the terrible storm last night and I lost a bunch of writing. . . . It doesn't matter."
"Oh. . . did you call the roofing company?"
"Yea. They haven't called me back yet."
"How'd you lose the writing? What. . . ."
"It doesn't matter. It's nothing."
She was being too concerned and overly friendly. I had to get away.
The YMCA in my own hometown is pretty social. I call it the Club Y. It is not at all like a body builder gym. That is why I come here. I worked out in a steroid gym most of my life with maniacs and the criminally insane. Oh, don't get me wrong. . . I loved it. But not now. It is all pretty silly.
As are most things.
The Y is silly in a different way. I am a slum dog there. For the most part, everyone is someone and they all know one another in some form or fashion from business or socially from the racquet club. There are cliques. I try to stay away from it all, but as you know from this blog, I do have a group of gymroids who talk to me. I don't know why. It just happened.
"You're not going to get much done today," said my friend the retired nurse. "It's a social day."
"Oh, really? I'll talk after I finish my workout," I said.
I was wrong. Tennessee came in, then the Shock Jock. I got caught up between sets in multiple conversations. It took me longer than it should have to finish my workout, but when I left, I was in a better state of mind.
Back home, I made a quick lunch and sat down to the computer. I tried searching for the lost blog posts again. Then something occurred to me. There were thousands of posts in "Draft" status. I looked. They all had the same date. I opened one. It was from 2009. OH SHIT! There they were. All of them, all six years of posts.
At least there was that. Things were better. I looked for the post about my day with Miya. There it was. It was a little different, but by and large my memory was correct.
I went back and looked at the texts between Miya and myself. I read the last one we shared.
5/28/13
How have you been??
I am so happy to hear from you. I have been waiting for your reaction since i posted my wedding pictures. I hoped you see them and be happy with me. I dont know you believe or not, i think of you a lot. I always remember you when every happy event happen to me. I feel like you would be one of the happiest for me. There is still the one who had sad story and drank beer with a special and nice guy in the West village in NYC..she is still in my heart. She will be always there in your memory and my memory. I hope so..Its the mostBut she's made more happy memoy since she met a nice french guy. I dont know how you live these days but i hope you are happy and healthy always:) I hope we see each other someday soon. Please come to Korea to see me or come to France in August to see my another wedding ceremony. Thank you for sending me message..i was so happy during writing this mail to remember you and NY...
Thank you~ take care:)
2013. Wow. Eleven years. I wonder how she is doing now. I'm tempted to see if her email is still active. I'd love to know now.
So. . . after my shower and a trip to the cafe, I drove to my mother's house for the daily visit. We talked about the usual things. She'd had an appointment at the cardiologist's office that morning. We talked about that and about the fixit fellow who replaced the seal under her toilet. She had decided to call him rather than have me do it. And it was a good thing. I was right. What can be an easy job can also be full of complications. The bolts WERE rusted as I predicted, and Mr. Fixit had to work a long time with "special tools" to get it all apart and put back together.
"Well. . . aren't we glad I didn't try?" I said to her.
"Yes," she grinned. She knows I'm not very good at such things. I was glad to be off the hook.
It was Friday. What would I do? When I left her house, I did what I often do on a Friday night. I took myself to dinner.
Sake and tuna kobachi. I am nothing if not predictable. A Rain Man. But. . . wait for it. . . .
I was told that the restaurant had a great bowl of ramen. And it was true. But. . . I had over ordered. The soup came after the tuna, and it was a big bowl. There was no way to get it all down. But oh. . . what a meal. What a night.
All about me, as always, couples sat enjoying meals together, laughing, talking close. Should I go somewhere, I wondered? Should I go sit at another bar and see what happens? In the past, of course. . .
But I knew what would happen. And I knew what I was going to do this night from the very start. A whiskey (or two) and an early bed. There would be no Miya 2.0, not this Friday night. Nope. I was going home to wait for the knock on the door, for the unexpected phone call or message. . . .
Maybe the roofer will call me back. Maybe that, anyway.
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