the tricks of memory

Cities and Memory #5 (from Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino)

"In Maurilia, the traveler is invited to visit the city and, at the same time, to examine old postcards that show as it used to be: the same identical square with a hen in the place of the bus station, a bandstand in the place of the overpass, two young ladies with white parasols in the place of munitions factory. If the traveler does not wish to disappoint the inhabitants, he must praise the postcard city and prefer it to the present one, though he must be careful to contain his regret at the changes within definite limits; admitting that the magnificence and prosperity of the metropolis Maurilia, when compared to the old, provincial Maurilia, cannto compensate for a certain lost grace, which, however, can be appreciated only now in the old postcards, whereas before, when that provincial Maurilia was before one's eyes, one saw absolutely nothing graceful and would see it even less today, if Maurilia had remained unchanged; and in any case the metropolis has the added attraction that, through wat it has become, one can look back with nostalgia at what it was."

An absolutely stunning paragraph brought to my attention by one of my new teachers here in Richmond. Richmond, which felt so awkward and awful, like an ill-fitting shoe, when I first came here over a month ago now. Richmond, which now feels pretty okay, even though it's been raining for the past twenty-four hours. Actually such gloom might be the perfect thing for not making me feel like a shut-in as I stay home most of the weekend, reading and writing.

Had my first short story workshopped this week. So intense! I came home and fell asleep right away--couldn't do what I always did in San Francisco and read everyone's comments on the train ride home, since I bike home here and I was too, too tired.

Our first real party in my house last night. It was actually thrown by my roommate's girlfriend to raise $$ for a great cause. Amazing though (even if I was in pajamas and avoiding direct contact with any new people) to have the house full of bodies and warm food and voices. After they left sipped overly sweet wine (like nectar) out on the porch, happily talked about nothing, about the past, and watched the incredible lightnight shock the whole world around us almost as bright as day and listened to a rumble of thunder longer than I've ever heard. Thunder is just clouds bumping into each other, right?

(The picture at the top of this post was taken in Richmond near 1900. The young boy front and center is a newsboy, who lied at first when asked his age. He said eight first and, when prodded, went down to six.)

Men on Bad Mood Day

Yesterday, in my regular comings and goings, I came across a few men who stick in my memory:

1. A block from work in the morning, after I turned the corner of Montgomery and Pine, in San Francisco's financial district, I found myself walking behind a man. I think he had dirty blond hair, was middle-aged, white. As we both kept walking, I got closer and closer to him. This meant he was going slower. He wore the clothes of someone who worked in the neighborhood, gray slacks, black leather shoes, some sort of sports coat. But as I came closer still, I noticed colorless stains on his pants and then he leaned towards and then against the building we were walking next to. And as I passed him, I turned to look at his face, eyes almost closed, mouth open, tongue sticking slightly out. He fell against the building then, but somehow kept his legs moving forward and so did manage a few steps before I turned away and walked into the building where my office is.

2. On a happily empty train going to school midday, I was seated facing the profile of a man seated across the train's width from me. In his hands he held paper sack which seemed to contain a can, though he never drank from it, but instead kept it between his legs, holding it tightly. Every once in a while he would lean over and spit an unbelievably huge amount of clear liquid onto the ground in front of him. Over the course of the ride, he managed a small pool of his own spit-up at his feet.

3. Coming back from school that night, I noticed a man waiting with all of us home bound sfsu students on the outdoor train platform. He stuck out because he had with him two large clear plastic bags, each filled with many smaller bags, those bags filled with trash: empty bottles with a few drops of liquid inside, folded and smoothed piles of paper, and other things. He gracefully weaved his way up the platform, and as I passed him I noticed a stick-like thing in his hand. A cane? The train took forever to come, and so when it did, there was a sizable crowd gathered and we all crammed our way through the two tiny doors, everyone eager for the perfect seat. I took one in the middle of a five-seat row and opened my book to read. A few seconds later, the man with the bags came and sat down next to me. As he was carefully arranging all his things and turning to sit, I had the impulse to get up and move away, but something kept me there. He sat, and his sleeve brushed my arm and I think he apologized. He kept to himself, crossing his legs carefully as not to disturb his bags, under which, I noticed then, he had laid two pieces of cardboard, to keep the ground from getting dirty where he set them down. Then I turned just a few more degrees to see the stick he held and noticed it had a handle on end and pinchers on the other. There were no unpleasant odors and he was by far one of the best stranger seat companions I've had on the muni since I moved to San Francisco just over a year ago.

Yesterday, I was in a bad mood, all day coming and going as I regularly do, but with thoughts swirling, mouth down turned, little gray storm cloud just two feet above my head.