Accomplished and Enjoyed

I love blur and out of focus moments in photographs.  They are dream- or nightmare-like, ambiguous, uncertain.  

This one is so intentionally done it makes me crazy.  It is a simple picture, you might think, but it is not simply taken.  Effort.  When I saw the image, I had to look it up  (link).  That took a team.  It's like a fashion version of Robert Frank's trip with Jack Kerouac in the 1950s.  Nice inspiration.  

Envy.  Making up visual stories.  What fun.  

But you can do all this now with AI.  Isn't that something?  

I was a little productive yesterday.  A little, but it was satisfying.  I went through stacks of old papers that had accumulated, things I don't throw away for one reason or another, a hodgepodge of old bills or financial statements or small dividend checks, postcards and other paraphernalia.  It was a big pile.  Now it is considerably smaller.  

I went to hardware stores and to Home Depot for tools, fluorescent lights, and lawn care things.  Struck out on half of what I went for, but I still felt good.  Then I took my mother to her therapy appointment.  I was on the go all day.  

But. . . I am getting back to living the good life.  It was early, 5:30 or so.  I decided to eat sushi on the Boulevard.  It was a lovely end of the day, and I had a sidewalk Boulevard table.  I ordered sake.  Miso.  Edamame.  Some kind of spicy tuna roll.  Life was better.  I watched the Friday night crowd begin to build.  Men and women.  Boys and girls.  Stylish glasses, expensive sport coats.  Country Club College debs in camel jackets, boots, and cut off jeans like they fell off the page of Italian Vogue.  How do they do it?  I know it is money, but it is genetics, too.  Generation after generation of handsome people marrying pretty ones.  A hillbilly might get lucky once in awhile in the looks department, but there is an economic-genetic factory that builds this other model.  It isn't mere luck.  They are what the Hitler breeding program had in mind.  Looks and lineage.  

Pedigree.

I tried to feel lucky to be there, to be alive on such a fine evening eating a tasty meal on the Boulevard among the "beautiful people," but I was feeling like what I was, too, and worked to reconcile myself with that.  

When I finished my meal, I thought to order it all again, or at least part of it, the sake and the tuna roll, but I was prudent and merely sat for a moment as the streetlights came on after paying the bill.  

Refrigerator bare, I decided to go grocery shopping.  Grocery stores on Friday nights are strange.  You see your fellow non-celebratory bores getting ready for a night of television and snacks.  The store was nearly empty and almost spooky.  I found the lavash.  Other than crusty bread, this will be my only one.  Confession--I have only learned about lavash and what it is.  Yes?  I know.  I told you I was a hillbilly.  I passed up the wine and beer thinking I want to quit drinking again, or at least alone at home, and I passed up the ice cream, too.  No cookies.  I want to get skinny again.  While I don't agree with the "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" saying, losing weight does feel good.  So lavash and tomatoes and apples and yogurt. . . . 

As I was finishing up, I heard someone yell, "Hey!  Wait!"  It was my neighbor from the house I lived in in the 80's and '90s.  She was a heavy-set high school Home Ec teacher.  Her husband was some kind of engineer, plump and smooth, almost globular.  He was also, it was almost certain, a cross-dresser as was the lingo of the times.  I had cool, young neighbors all around, beauty couples, and we all would say it was true.  She would have fun dressing him up and putting on his makeup.  We'd seen him in such things from the distance, but never close up.  Where would they be going, we wondered?  His nails were long and shiny.  

"Do you remember me?  I think you were my neighbor." 

"Sure," I looked at her quizzically.  Why would I not know that.  She "thought?"  How strange.  I lived there for years.  

Her husband was in a motorized cart.  He'd had a stroke, she said.  I got the full history and prognosis.  He'll likely have more improvement.  They go to therapy for three sessions a day.  

Good to know.  

And so goodbye, old friend.  

"Tom!"

I looked up at a fellow in front of me.  

"How're you doing?"

Ohhh. . . . 

"Your name is Tom, right?"

"No.  You're thinking I'm Tom Nowicki, right?"

He looked embarrassed.  

"I get that all the time since he was on Bad Monkey and had that scruffy old boat captain part.  No . . . I know Tom.  Great guy, but. . . ."

He told me he had been a stunt man in the movies but hadn't been doing that for awhile now.  Show biz people.  

Back home. . . what the hell. . . I had the traditional worm killer.  I sat on my couch and watched the news highlights on YouTube.  That fucking Trump had been at it again.  If you watch the liberal stations, you'll know that people are turning against Trump, but you won't know if it is true or not.  MSNBC had assured me long ago that Trump was Toast.  I watched the first minute of stories, just the report or claim, then turned it off when the experts began what would be their endless, repetitive analysis of the situation.  

I wanted more whiskey, but I put on the water to make some tea.  Good lad. . . I was moderate.  So. . . I ate a gummy and drank my tea and watched "Formula One--Drive to Survive."  I wasn't up for anything else and knew I would be in bed soon.  It had, by and large, been a good day.  It had both accomplishment and enjoyment.  What more can a man ask for?

Oh. . . you know.  Maybe a little romance?  

But I'll try not to obsess.