Almost all of my Father’s friends, whose with whom he’s had long lasting friendships, are dead. Those that remain among the living, are distant, predominantly geographically speaking. His parents died before my memories begin. His father died when my father was quite young, and on “Skid Row”, at that. His mother preempted dimensia with a script for Mama’s Little Helper. His brother, Tom, who practically raised him on account of the aforementioned and was the only longstanding figure of stability in his life died two weeks ago. My father has been grieving. He mentioned that he’s found himself traveling backwards in time frequently, recovering and replaying memories, so I bought him a copy of Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking.

When I saw my father this weekend, he said that the book was good, meaning helpful. He marveled at how introspective authors are, and I concurred, forever willing the universal in the particular. He then expressed relief that Quintana, Joan’s daughter, made it through. Imagine if she had lost both her husband and daughter in the same year.

I didn’t have the heart to tell him that Quintana died within a year of the book’s publication, and I hope that he never finds out. It’s just too damn sad.

Magical Thinking.

So Jonathan and I finally found the drama, the conniving behavior, at the heart of hartford’s rotting carcass. You see, Hartford is, in many ways, a city laid under siege by the cockroach viruses of poverty and roads leading no where. So there are some rough types running around, and finally, despite doing our best to carve up hartford to our own liking and needs, we finally stumbled upon one of these cockroach infested souls.

One of our spots is this establishment Cloud 9. Cloud 9 pours the healthiest drink this side of the Mason-Dixon–three shot cocktails. We usually get Cape Codders. The place has one of those lit up fake-slab-of-ice bars, neon lighting, etc. The owner may be found to say, “I wanted to bring NYC, nay, MIAMI!, to hartford.” We usually just watch sports at the bar, though every once and a while it becomes a good place to dance all nice hot and sweaty in the corner of the dance floor, some old school hip hop and no one to bother you. Mostly that.

Last night we show up to Cloud 9 for the first time in a couple of weeks. There’s this brother, wearing the Enlightened Black Man Package of cutoff fatigues, a beanie and some jacket with lots of patches (I think they sell these packages at Inner City Walmarts though I can’t be sure) at the door demanding a ten dollar entrance. Oh? Yeah, uh, we’re having slam poetry. Uh, okay. Usually Jonathan and I don’t pay to get into Cloud 9 either because we only go on weeknights, like last night, when hardly anyone is there, or because the owner lets us in for free when there’s a deejay cus we’re some of the only customers who (as i said) come in on weeknights when no one else is there. But okay. Slam Poetry. Support the Arts.

I go up to the man to do our bargaining. We tell the guy we have no cash. This is partly true, I have no cash. He says he needs cash, the night is a FUNDRAISER for his after school program. Well why didn’t he say that in the first place, you know? A donation for something local, well that’s alright by me. I mean, it’s the Marvin Gaye imperative: Save the Babies!

Fine fine fine. We cough up the cash. I should note here that Jonathan only wanted to pay five dollars and I was too much of a pussy to ask the guy, especially when he employed the Marvin Gaye Imperative, but okay.

We have some drinks. Show starts an obvious forty-five minutes late. Only five people read poetry. Three of them were really good. One woman was especially awe-some. She SPAT, straight up spat her poems, which she had yet to memorize, reading from her CELLULAR TELEPHONE, on which she writes her 100-line poems. She was sharp and incisive, bawling out clowns and Enlightened Black Men who write poetry cus they can’t make it in the rap world, etc. She was *very* funny.

Another brother there performing was kind of decent, but talked way to much about God for my tastes. I mean, he wasn’t even talking about the Church or anything, in fact he condemned churchypocrites, but still… “god god” “blah blah”. You say “god” I say “blah” “God!” “blah!!” “God!” “Blahh!!!!!” Okay, okay. and that too, he read one of his poems from one those classic interracial (black and white and speckled) journals, which was certainly a step down from Miss up top who read from her mobile.

After about ten poems, the show is over and Jonathan and I feel well satisfied cus there was some talent, and indeed it was good to see c-r-ea-tivity in hartford. Period. The artists shake each others hands, hug, give general buh-byes and we the audience of seven are encouraged to see the performance tomorrow night (which is my tonight) at the Russell, this other joint where apparently all of the hartford slam scene operates from. Everyone clears the area, except for Jonathan and I. You see, usually the VIP section at cloud 9 is off limits, but since no one was there we got to sit in it to watch the performances and we weren’t budging. I mean, hello?!, it’s VIP AT CLOUD 9!!!!!

Out of the woodwork, that is, all the way from the front of the room Enlightened Black Man comes up to the stage now that everyone is gone to sort of clear up, you know. First thing that’s interesting about this is that EBM didn’t even watch the performances, he remained at the entrance the whole time, which is kind wierd cus why hold an even that you get know joy from, right? Okay. So Jonathan and I are chilling not paying much attention to EBM. We see him pop&lock on stage for a moment, which Jonathan tells me is real funny cus that’s always how the Russell Simmons Poetry hour ends, but also that EBM’s probably not joking. I assume it’s a Meme-tick–EBM popped and locked and didn’t even know why he did it. Burrough’s would call that Lattah, i think. Anyways, EBM looks through the chairs and finds the interracial notebook. He picks it up. He looks through it and reads a couple of pages as he starts to descend from the stage area, and then, HE PUTS THE NOTEBOOK IN HIS BAG. That is, he picked up someone else’s notebook, read a few pages, and then took possession of someone else’s notebook.

Yo, C, does the story stop here? No, not at all. Cus it turns out that the God-man poet, whose notebook it was, was just at the bar having a drink the whole time. Furthermore, when EBM–whose name it turns out is Camacho (seriously) and who isn’t even black at all (he’s puerto rican)–left he even greeted God-man poet on his way out, without divulging a hint of the fact that he had his notebook. But at the time when i saw EBM cop someone else’s notebook, I assumed his benevolence. I figured he had to also know all of the poets because it was his event, so i figured but of course he’d be returning the notebook to its rightful owner as is so obviously the appropriate thing to do when you are holding an event.

But no! God-man poet comes up the stairs and asks if we seen his notebook. And i say, oh yeah, EBM has it. And he looks befuddled. And then he looks pissed off. He doesn’t even know EBM it turns out, except for fairly vaguely from some years back and neighborhood. And here’s the real kicker. EBM charged God-man poet, one of the few who even read poetry, the same TEN DOLLARS that we were charged. Worse yet, he had told God-man that it was slam poetry COMPETITION. And God-man, like us, didn’t really want to pay, but that EBM spoke to him of the Marvin Gaye Imperative, so God-man coughed up his TEN DOLLARS even though there wasn’t even any competition. What the fuck??

And indeed this all begs the question, why did EBM take his notebook? Why??

It must be that EBM is a no good, no talent, sourpussss m-fer who can’t think for himself. Either that or he needed some knew jerk-jerk material, but i wouldn’t know much about that.

Bottom line is this: Jonathan and I are going to The Russell Tonight to the Slam Poetry competition where God-man poet, whose name is Quintillian, will be judging, and who knows, will EBM show up? And if EBM shows up, will i be called upon as a witness to look EBM, Comacho, in the eye and say “I saw you steal it, you little jack rabbit!!” And if I am called upon as a material witness, will Comacho call upon his own material witness, a Colt .22, and will my ass be grassed? Stay tuned and find out….

In honor of robbie’s beautiful new reconfiguration of endingthealphabet: a post.

I am currently dating a thirty-five year old african american male (son of a black panther, in case you were wondering). I am twenty-four, Caucasian (daughter of a marine, thanks for asking).

We decide to be adventurous. Thanksgiving weekend, the sunday of, we pick up and decide to go to montreal for the night. You know, hear a language not english, embrace an attitude not american, EAT CROISSANTS, etc. Perhaps even find a rave. Though on a sunday night… I’m not hip enough to know.

So we get a rental car from a friend of his who works at enterprise (yes, he picked him up) and we drive via albany. Only thing is it’s snowing. Messy, first snow of the year snow. The driving is slow. 40, 45, 55 if there’s enough tracks laid down, but most people are off the road. We’re mutherfunkin troopers is what we are.

Finally! We arrive at the border. It’s like 8:30 pm. We get sent inside. For those of you who’ve never been “sent inside” it’s not a good sign. They don’t like our story.

Once inside we speak to a hawkish border guard, who looks an awful lot like this brute-butt guy i knew in college. This is always a bad sign. Even worse, he “doesn’t understand why someone would go to canada for just one night.” This is a bad sign. This man clearly has no imagination.”You guys must not travel a lot huh. huh.” (Mind you, he has my passport which is stamped like a bus pass).

So we sit and wait while he performs background checks.

And then Jonathan gets called in back. Once. Twice. And this second time he walks out holding a piece of paper, “i’ve been banned from Canada.” I can’t believe it.

UH OH!

WHAT THE FUCK!!!

Well you see, Jonathan had once been arrested. Without charges. So when asked if he was arrested before he had said no, cus surely, what does it mean to have been arrested? Why would they want to know *that*. Anyone can be arrested, right? Like that time you were in a peaceful protest, or were in the wrong place (wrong skin color) at the wrong time?

And so we spent the night in a jacuzzi suite at the Days Inn in Plattsberg, NY.

Bottom line is this: the border guard did not like anything about us from the beginning. He knew our ages, saw our skin color, knew i had a masters… and well, he fucked us over. Especially dear Jonathan who has to write the consulate to get “unbanned” from Canada. Cus currently he is banned forever. That’s right, FOR-E-VER. And you should have seen the look on his face when he handed me back my passport. He squinted his eyes, at one reproving and suspicious, and slipped it back to me. A look so dirty i almost didn’t take the passport back. Wouldn’t wanna get any of that man’s scum on my hands, that’s for sure.

Goddamnit Canada. I hereby blame you.