Brandon reading on the beach, 2019
Pictures of dirt
glass half-full, smooth brain, hardcore
I stare into the fire, trying to decide which ember I want to live under. I want to live where the flame is blue, I tell everyone. It's probably so hot it feels cold. Olivia nearly burns their finger showing us where they want to live. Daniel is excited about the idea of being neighbors. There’s a possibility a log could collapse at any moment, demolishing our imaginary village. We’re like kids playing house. I’m going to live out here––Dalton points to a spot on the edge of the fire pit––on the outskirts of town. It’s too hot in there.
It’s too hot everywhere. I go to Stories to escape this hell. Their cold brew makes me feel like I’m crawling out of my skin. Usually by the time I leave, my body is vibrating and I feel high but I’ve written something and that makes it worth it. Today, Katie and I are here to co-work. Instead, I end up drawing tattoo ideas on her arm with a pen––a crab on her shoulder, a ship on her forearm. Crab core. Too much giggling. I’m light headed. Need to go on a walk to disperse the caffeine. I roam the aisles, pulling books off the shelves. My body is humming. I absorb nothing. Smooth brain.
+
I take my chances by leaving for work later than I should. I drive like my NJ license plate suggests and parallel park in a spot so tight any South Philly resident would be proud and I still have one minute to spare. I tell Chance I’m a glass half full person. But why does it feel like the glass is twice as big right now? he asks. He shakes a wet pint glass in my direction and I feel the water droplets on my arms. The profundity of his question has me grinning all night while we spend the rest of the shift listening to Waylon and Merle.
+
I’ve become fixated on the fact that Henry Rollins and Ian MacKaye are the same age as my parents, whose interests lie far away from punk, hardcore, or anything adjacent. My mom tells me my 222 word essays are too short. Just when I’m getting into them, they’re over, she says. It’s an exercise, I tell her. My goal is to write two hundred twenty two, 222 word essays by this time next year. Later, I realise these 222 word essays are like hardcore punk songs: short, fast, compact. Even more than that, they are an exercise in discipline and commitment. Black Flag would be proud of that. Rollins is a Boomer after all.
+
I feel tricked when I find a book that has a cool title but the contents are just pictures of dirt. Photo books are the main offenders for this cool title/lame content dilemma. I’m about to leave the LA Art Book Fair when I come across a book of old photographs of people reading. The images have a calming effect and I want to look at this book forever. Eventually I put it down. It was the last book I looked at and the one that made me want to break the promise I made to myself to not buy anything, another exercise in discipline. That doesn’t stop me from buying a lemonade at Stories. I can’t handle the cold brew today. I keep losing my focus to anticipation––waiting for a reply about an apartment, a reply from my landlord, a reply from a job. I’m annoying myself with how much I keep checking my phone. It’s hot and I’m never hungry. All this anticipation is making me sleepy. I just need to go lay in some grass. I walk to Echo Park Lake and doze off for an hour with my hat over my face.
+
Why is the glass so big right now? The amount of effort it takes to keep this glass half full is draining. At work, a customer calls me babe. My coworkers hear and flock to my side and I feel like we are a pack of wolves. You can’t speak to our staff that way. What did I say?––the man plays dumb. You should never speak to anyone that way, ever, I tell him. I feel the rush of adrenaline starting to boil, so I leave to bus some tables. When I return behind the bar, he gives me a fake apology. I tell him to stop talking to me. He won’t let it go. I keep putting glasses into the glass holder, trying not to slam them or look like I’m affected. Can I at least know your name? HELL NO. I walk back to the kitchen while my coworkers kick him out.
+
I find three big, dumb, slow flies in my apartment and whip them with a towel. They all die. Rumours for the break up soundtrack. Stevie knows how it goes. Decision making in times of crisis is revealing. Sometimes I turn into a cold hearted unemotional detached b––
blessing in disguise––when this is all said and done. It is still August but it’s after the 17th so it might as well be September and because August signifies the end of summer it might as well be fall and because it's basically fall, it’s the end of the year and that’s fucked because my friends and I still won’t know what we’re doing for New Year’s Eve until the day of. But now I live in a place that doesn’t really have fall or winter and I find it hard to imagine life without the seasons. In fact, this summer has hardly felt like summer. People say there is no weather in Los Angeles but right now it’s pouring rain because there’s a hurricane for the first time in god knows how long.
When it rains it pours, everyone tells me. Yeahyeahyeah, I know. New friends and old friends come in and out of my life at the same time. Every so often, they collide like tectonic plates, loosening memories from the shelves of my mind. Lily says of course I can put her down as a reference for a job but only after roasting me about a stupid thing I said one time. Respect. I shuffle my tarot cards while I proofread this. Cards pop out at me but I don’t read them. I just want to contemplate. The word makes me think of an old friend who told me he was in a contemplative state once about a stupid thing we did together. These memories need to start paying rent. The show in the park across the street let's out. People roll in for last call or to use the bathroom without buying anything. The clock strikes midnight. Andy puts on Nails and turns the volume up. The room clears.
August 2023