Saturday is the beginning of another month, perhaps the unofficial beginning of summer, and my turn to work. Going on 9 AM, I'm passing the big park between my boulevard and the bike trail. Jesus Christ! Waiting for me to pass is a grey-haired Caucasian guy on the corner. He's holding a couple of leashes, each with a Great Dane on the other end, waiting for their walk in the park. I roll along to the other end of the park, where a small recreational vehicle is parked behind a pickup truck. The camper has a peace flag over the inside of the rear window. On the tinted rear window of the truck is a decal which reads, "The LeThal." If I had to guess, I would say - two separate ethnicities/two different goals in life... A block later, a young Caucasian couple is waling their small sheepdog. After another block, a Caucasian couple in their thirties are walking their own dog. I hear a hooting owl. To my left, downtown rises up. Before me, in the distance, traffic glints along Interstate 25. Yet another block along, a Caucasian guy runs with his small black dog. Down the hill, I pass yet another Caucasian man/dog pair.
Before long, I'm at the doughnut shop before work. Today, this particular corner appears to be a throughway for homeless pedestrian men. I watch one guy, perhaps in his sixties, with no shirt. Inside is another scene entirely. A young dad holds a baby in his arms. The dad has manicured hair. He's in clean white shorts, a Polo shirt with the name of some specially designed product on the front, and brand new sneakers. As he chooses doughnuts, he appears to know the name of every last single kind of doughnut. Another Caucasian comes inside, an enthusiastic middle-aged guy in a black Under Armor T-shirt. He's followed by a trio of young enthusiastic hipsters. It's an enthusiastic weekend if you have the privilege to enter a doughnut shop. Outside, past the window quickly steps a long, grey-haired guy with a brown weathered face. He carries a can in a brown paper bag. Back on the inside, a customer asks the clerk what she recommends. A trio of young women come inside. The strike me as collectively on the same sports team. After a week of staying late at work, an hour or hour and a half, I end up leaving work this evening an hour early. I ride out of downtown through a former Hispanic neighborhood, along streets with some of the last Victorian-era homes. I spot one of the new very young Caucasian couples. Of course, walking the dog. The girl is tiny and wearing a halter and long skirt. With her white skin and red bob hairdo, she is magically beautiful in the evening air and light. I'm momentarily hypnotized.
The following day, I do grocery shopping before heading out to pick up a particular item which I am able to find only at a different supermarket. As soon as I step off the bus from the first grocery trip, the strap breaks on the big bag with the groceries. When I look inside, the items are unscathed. As I tie the strap back on the bag with a knot, a guy approaches me to ask for a cigarette. With the groceries soon in the fridge, I roll out on the bike with my rain poncho, as a developing thunderstorm approaches. When I arrive, it begins to rain before I go inside and is pouring when I come out again. Yet I want to go into downtown to see how much tickets are for something called the Denver Pop Culture Con(vention). It used to be a comics convention...and still is from what I understand. I arrive there just as the rain lets up. Inside, tickets for one day are almost seventy dollars. I contemplate what I will get to see for my money, and I elect to drop out. I have plenty to do at home. I head home the same way I go every day from work now, down the same streets I took yesterday. Instead of passing a mesmerizing redhead in her twenties, I'm passed by a pair of young urban guys on electric scooters. It almost sounds like the pudgy bearded one in the backwards baseball cap and jersey is giving the other one a kind of real estate tour of the neighborhood. "You can still get some real estate deals around here," the first one explains, "but there's still shootings and shit around here."
Standing shyly to one side are two freaks... [American] West Coast freaks are something else again - not to be surpassed. ...why they've come to Canada... "Just getting out, just can't handle it anymore." We are exiles, they are emigres - we are all refugees from an oppressive country. ...this office may never close down...long after the war is over. ...truck and van loads of Americans. ...on the Trans-Canada highway...right out of a Steinbeck epic. I...ask if they were exiles and half the time they were not. "We're just leaving, it's got nothing to do with the draft." "The Vancouver Liberation Front and the Maoists held a...demonstration...demanding the release of drug offenders..." ...American activists...chose to stay in the U.S.... Few would feel imperialistically ordained to help lead the struggle elsewhere. - Williams
Maybe it's the urge to discover our authentic voices, to unearth a sense of freedom or to connect more deeply with higher power... ...experiential gathering...to co-create an experience... ...a heart-resonant community... ...art, metaphysical processes, crystology, movement, writing and co-creative processes. ...heat-full caretakers...known as "weavers" plan and hold space...a safe, sacred, resonant field... - natural awakenings, 5/2019
Tired, I grabbed the railing of the truck, and felt something wet. I froze... I...wrote in my notebook: "Pieces of people on the railing of truck." More than a hundred and forty people had died... I had seen more death - the tsunami, two different earthquakes. But I could somehow understand natural disasters. This was a human disaster, and I couldn't make sense of the hate. ...the Red Mosque...in the heart of Islamabad, a city known more for its ability to incite sleep than jihad. Young men...burned piles of...videos like "Free Willy"...supposedly against Islam. Young female students...kidnapped alleged prostitutes and dragged them to the compound for deprogramming. ...Pakistani security forces stormed the Red Mosque compound. More than a hundred and fifty people, including women and children, were killed. I talked to a top medical official [about the raid.] I asked my test question, the one that I had started using in Pakistan regularly. "So...do you think any Jews were killed in the World Trade Center?" [He replied,] "I don't think so." I stood up. "I'm out of here." "If Jews died, why don't they put it on the internet?" "Right after 9/11, I talked to the families of dozens of Jews who died." "Maybe you should put up a website," he said. ...I kept telling myself. I wanted to see how the story ended, even if I had to live in Islamabad, a manufactured capital built in the 1960s with wide boulevards, lots of grassy medians, and the vibe of Sacramento on tranquilizers. People joked that Islamabad was a thirty-minute drive from Pakistan. The sold-out hotel was the only one not set on fire the previous night. The pool was filled with trash and dead leaves - a BBC correspondent, talking on her phone while walking with her computer, accidently fell in. ...roadblocks of burning tires and slogan-shouting men. broken glass carpeted part of the road. Trucks at gas stations were set on fire; so were some gas stations. ...the wreckage of grief could be seen everywhere... - Barker
Monday. Cruising past the park down the street from where I live. A middle-aged Caucasian couple is out with their dog. A Caucasian mom jogs into the park with a stroller. I'm down the trail, over the bridge, and at the gym faster than I thought I would be. Four grade school aged kids happen along. A flatbed truck backs in. A couple of guys are hauling a cement mixer, a wooden palette and a couple of bags of concrete mix onto the bed. One guy tells a younger one to put the cement bags on the mixer to hold it down. It appears as if they are preparing to get the outdoor swimming pool ready. One kid asks me what time it is. I tell him it's twenty to ten AM, and he does not appear to comprehend. The kids continue to ask both the guys what time it is. They are waiting for the pool to open. One kid repeats a line from a popular hip hop tune. "I got murder on my mind. I got murder on my mind. AK-47..." he raps. A rec center employee comes outside. He tells me that the outdoor pool opens today. This pool cost over a million dollars to build, and at the end of last season, they couldn't drain it. The drainage system collapsed. They had to use a garden hose for two days to drain it into the street grate. It becomes apparent that the kids think the pool opens at 9:30. Family swim is at 11 AM. They can't swim without their families. Open swim begins at 12:15 PM. The following evening, it's after work and I'm riding up a street headed for home. Along comes a Caucasian guy running with a stroller. If he's the same one, I saw him running last week some streets away, during the morning when I was headed to work. He was previously running with a dog. I wonder if he has a job, or if he just stays around home and runs. The next morning, I'm rolling past the park on the way to work. The same guy has made it across the street with his Great Danes. On the way back home, having rained earlier in the afternoon (as it has been doing), this evening I am watching a huge streak of lightning arc across dark clouds over the mountains. I will see more of the same the following evening, in the sky over my home.
Marble Agate... All agates stabilize the aura... Black Tourmaline is the go-to...stone useful in repelling harmful energies from others. Cleanse this crystal regularly [of] negative energy. Also deflects harmful electro-magnetic frequencies. Jef is...fossilized driftwood. Jef is...good for...stabilizing finances, and eliminating fear. It protects against psychic attacks... Snowflake Obsidian helps...in eliminating negative thought patterns...while enhancing the energy field. Labradorite...protects your aura, keeping it..."free from energy leaks," according to..."Love is in the Earth." It crates a wonderful force field... Spirit Quartz... Amethyst is a wonderful tool...dispelling negative attachments, entities and fear. - natural awakenings, 5/2019
...research the artists... Festivals are always more fun when you can sing along. ...for the main stages during the day, sunglasses are mandatory. The sun can be blinding - literally... ...chafed skin, misery. Bring along an extra outfit for that all-day fresh look. ...we recommend...writing down where you plan to be and when. ...musicians...will be...in the crowd with you. The 25th Westword Music...Showcase is all about forming community, and it's up to you to do that. ...share your festival schedule on social media. ...partying means...drowning in Breckenridge brews. ...show up with an open heart, and you'll get more out of the experience. ...sip on some...booze-and-fruit infused seltzer water. - Westword, 6/13-19/2019
His name was...on the bathroom wall at...Fort Collins' goth café. I looked down to see a chrome ring [piercing his] erection. When you're a 16-year-old girl being introduced to the world of sex...your desires are peripheral. ...the realization...that I should feel something about this. How does a condom work when you have a metal ring hanging off the front of your junk? ...I cringe... But...I wonder if I'd enjoy it... I woke up next to [him] the next day...with my friend Corinne straddling me. She was grinning... "So. You guys fuck?" - suspect press, spring/2019
...regulatory agencies, industries, Native tribes, learning institutions and farmers to sit around a table and actually develop answers. This is going to have to include interstate commerce... If a state doesn't want to run its own program, the USDA will do it for you... - CBD, etc., June 2019
Thursday. I am approaching the end of the park which I pass on my way to work. I stop at a stop sign as I spot a young couple running in my direction with their dog. The guy is Hispanic. The lady is Caucasian and in a T-shirt with a tie dye pattern of the state flag. Directly to my right is a small yard sign on the grass. It reads, "Yoga in the park." I'm frozen by its blatant assumption of itself. As the couple reaches me, I ask them if I am imagining this sign. Down the street from here is a Vietnamese population who are familiar with Buddhism...and the practice of yoga from which follows. The sign is in English... I am soon down the hill. As soon as I enter the bike path, I spot a homeless guy sitting cross legged on the concrete. He is surrounded by bags and he is grey from head to toe. I wonder if he is in balance, or at least if he brought his own mat and water as the sign suggests for the park. The following morning, I am not far across my boulevard shortly after 9 AM. Approaching me on foot are, one after the other, a couple of homeless men. Both are walking in the street. The first is younger and alone. The second is middle-aged, talking to someone else as he trucks down the street, and has his shirt off and slung over his shoulder. They are coming from the direction of the park down the street, where a middle-aged Caucasian couple have just crossed into the park with a pair of dogs. Before work, I stop at the doughnut place. I didn't realize that today is National Doughnut Day. Just inside the shop is a woman in a T-shirt with "National Doughnut Day" on the front. She is asking everyone who comes in the door if they want a free glazed doughnut. A few feet away, the same customers may purchase a doughnut of their choice. I'm convinced that I don't understand National Doughnut Day. The place is much busier than usual.
[A] Crested Butte town council member [had to] step down...because the...gentrification...forces him and his family to move outside city limits, rendering him no longer eligible to serve... Mountain towns need to be fucking weird. We need...sexuality in the murmur of creeks like...a founder of the deep ecology movement, who made Silverton her home for years. - Elevation Outdoors, 6/2019
Although East Colfax has a wealth of diversity...the people consistently coming to the Registered Neighborhood Organization's meetings, did not reflect the demographics living there. ...40 percent of East Colfax lives below the poverty line and 70 percent are at risk of displacement... ...42 percent of Denver's neighborhoods have no plan to speak of and many others have plans created in the 1980s and '90s... ...the city is losing people as they move out... - Life On Capitol Hill, 6/2019
…"gentrification." It's a word whose time has come and gone... Community is...lost... ...duplexes have replaced the humble brick bungalows of working-class Denver communities [, two enormous duplexes have replaced a couple of bungalows which I lived in for 17 years.] ...the new places, "don't have a porch. They have rooftop patios..." [One Denver] old neighborhood - now referred to as "the Highlands" [- was originally known as Northside, and begs the question,] "Where do we go from here?" ...bidding wars to buy a home in a changed Northside besieged by inflated real estate prices [provides some] insights... "It's about the power of privilege over relationships. It's about greed, celebration, mourning. It's more of a conversation about who are the characters in the neighborhood, and how they navigate problems. Who are the winners or losers, the different and the indifferent? What's important to them? Is this a historical memory of nostalgia, or some sort of heirloom we're entitled to? I think we didn't see it coming. By the time it arrived, it was too late. There are very few places in the city I would be able to be 'saved,' preserved or rewired so the impact is not so huge so quickly. The architectural integrity is disappearing, along with the social fabric and sense of community. How strange that the white flight occurred, and then they bought round-trip tickets for their kids, who are moving back in." To better understand the incoming surge of young white professionals to the Northside... "I'd go into places like restaurants and bars to observe the new people moving in. I would eavesdrop on...a Friday or Saturday night...in Highland. ...on the roof at Linger in LoHi, while they sip their $15 cocktails? Some of it was jarring. Some of it was...cliche' - there were a lot of stereotypes." - Westword, 6/13-19/2019
...RiNo (River North) Arts moved in...transforming the neighborhood into a cartoonish playground for developers... ...tis area is the new Cherry Creek. WE have had some noise complaints... I try to go around and talk to the neighbors, but the trouble is I don't live here anymore. This neighborhood went from being a forgotten industrial wasteland to hot property and the gateway to downtown. And that's when they started rebranding it as an arts district. We've always had a problematic relationship with the arts district. ...a lot of people from the DIY [Do It Yourself] community don't want to have anything to do with them. ...they ask, "Why do we need to deal with the city? This is bullshit." - Suspect Press, Summer 2019
They would all return right now...to build a new nation if they thought there were possibilities...of a real future... It may be ten or twenty years before the fires have cooled enough to permit reconstruction in their homeland... ...a small group...will return with the ardor...of Che to the Bolivian hills... God help them. - Williams
...near Interstate 76...the...family...built two houses and a business on...one of the few private patches in the area that hasn't been swallowed up by highways or industry. "We've watched people's kids grow up." The Welby neighborhood was settled in the early 1900s... "When I get up in the morning...I smell exhaust and I hear traffic." - 6/20-26/2019
I rode an elevator to the top of a...poured-concrete lotus flower built to honor "Soviet-Egyptian friendship." ...the five lotus prongs looked more like a sword... The relief carvings were a Pharonic version of Socialist realism... Marx explained how "idyllic village communities...restrained the human mind" [and] provided no resistance to...overarching despotism... In Cairo, there was a profusion of boutiques, Mercedes-Benzes, cordless phones, and slums...a recipe for discontent. The Egyptian "state" no longer seemed sacred. Because of attacks against foreign visitors by Islamic terrorists, the Egyptian economy was losing more than a billion dollars yearly... Was such terrorism ephemeral... Or did the attacks suggest something deeper. - The Ends of the Earth, R.D. Kaplan, 1996
This Saturday is my turn to have off. And it's a busy one. I'm headed to a used book sale at the main branch downtown, hoe again, and then for a swim at the waterpark. On the way to the library I stop again at the doughnut shop. This particular place appears to be a magnet for Caucasian customers who, upon entering, feel as though they are suddenly imbued with cleverness and wit and homemade insight. They must interact with the staff as if they are mutual pals. Just beyond these walls is what appears to be an abandoned home where a couple of homeless are squatting on the covered cement porch. They think they are witty in their own way, shouting in reaction to something known only to themselves. In the alley between this home and the shop has a trio of street guys hanging out. The shop is full of enthusiastic customers when a female comes in. It's obvious she has no money. She asks out loud, "Does anyone have a lighter? Anyone here smoke?" I use the men's room and come out as she is asking, "What date is it now? Do I get a free doughnut?" She must have spotted the signs which announce "National Doughnut Day"...which was yesterday. I exit the shop and unlock my bike. I can see her through the window. She's pouring honey into a cup of water, which surely she is able to have for no charge.
I hit the sale and pick up a couple of good books, far less than my usual ten or fifteen. There's nothing unusual about homeless at the central branch of the library. I use the men's room again and a homeless guy is in the stall. He's speaking to himself, saying something about taking someone outside and beating the hell out of them. A security guard comes into the men's room and recognizes the guy. He tells him that he's banned from the library. The guy says, "I'm in the middle of pooping right now." I ride back to my neighborhood and grab lunch at my old deathburger before dropping the loot at home. I throw on some sunblock and I'm out on the trail to the waterpark. 'Tis the very same trail along the river, a section of the back of which was lined with homeless camps. This afternoon, they've vanished. I spend a short half hour at the park before I decide to ride down to the shopping center where I worked a couple of years ago. I put roots down working here. It's a long story. I pick up more sunscreen at a drug store I used to frequent. I head over to my old yogurt place. The register is manned by a young skinny stoner kid. The store where I used to work was purchased by the guy I work for now. I stop in to say hi to our employee. I make one last stop in the shopping center. I used to have lunch before work at one of three places here. One was an Italian place with a waitress who I haven't forgotten. Lately, I've had thoughts of looking her up after a couple of years, on the chance she may still be there. I come to find that the place itself is no longer there. It wasn't that long since I was getting emails about specials from the place. A storm approaches. I hop on a bus for a short ride through a shower, jump on the train, and jump out at a station with a bus back to my boulevard. At the gate is a guy in a Minnesota Twins baseball jersey. He has a rollaway suitcase and tattoos on his face and neck, including a couple of tears at the right corner of his right eye. He's murdered two people.
The following day, after grocery shopping, I head out across town to drop off black and white film at the only place which will process it. There is a tall female twentysomething employee who works there. During my previous visit, I was about to unload my film when she asked if she could rewind it herself. I also let he load the new roll. When I step inside this afternoon, I don't see her and I begin unwinding it myself, until she steps out from the back. I tell her she can finish unwinding it if she do desires. Desire she does. She asks me how long I've lived here. I moved here a couple of years before she was born. She's 25 or 26, good guess on my part. We converse briefly before she says goodbye. I don't like to reading into what isn't there. Whatever it is, I like seeing her. And then it's Thursday. After six months at this new job, it's now so busy, it's ridiculous. Which means that the money is good. Six months. That can't be right. Just yesterday I was taking two buses to and fro Arvada. This morning, I'm out on the bike, on the way to work, at the crest of a hill on a residential street. Climbing the hill are three thirtysomething Caucasians. A guy and two women are all wearing sunglasses as they walk a dog. I've stumbled into a magazine advertisement. It's not long after this that I am down the big hill, on and then quickly off the bike trail. I turn a corner up a busy thoroughfare next to the interstate. I stop at a red light, and there on the sidewalk is a middle-aged woman in a red sleeping bag. A wall throws some shade over her and a terrier. She and I look at each other through our sunglasses before the dog begins barking. "Stop that, Arthur," she says.
Saturday. My turn to work. It's also the weekend of the Pridefest. I arrive on my bike at my last corner to turn toward work. Down the bike lane comes a line of lesbian bicyclists. I join the line. At work, our lobby has a new panoramic photo of the downtown Denver skyline at sunrise. No one announced it's arrival in our lobby. In fact, I pointed it out to someone when I first noticed it a week ago. Today, in comes a guy who says to me, "Well look who it is!" I've never seen him before. He turns to the photo and says, "Look at my beautiful picture." After he picks up his order, I check the name on the card next to the photo, and it's his. That's one requirement for being a photographer I was not aware of: an ego. After work, I get home and run out of the door to grocery shop. These days, I have fewer groceries to purchase with the passing of my mom. I can bring home groceries on my bike. On the way back from the store, I come home over a residential street. In the evening, Mexican families are out on the front porches of homes after dinner. Climbing a hill, I pass one such porch. On it is a Mexican dad. His two young kids are running around, one on a scooter. With him are three Caucasian Jehovah's Witnesses. White shirts, black plastic name tags and black slacks. My money says they live across the street from me. One of them is trying to talk to the dad. The other is attempting to relate to the kid on the scooter. The following day is a busy one. Breakfast with the sister. She usually picks up the tab. With all the overtime which has been coming my way, I spring for it this morning. Then I put on the sunscreen and I'm out on the bike trail to the waterpark. On the horizon, an enormous storm is brewing between here and the mountains. I wonder if I will spend my weekends this summer racing storms to get some swimming in before it rains. Along the way I stop for lunch, and when I resume my ride, the storm appears somehow even larger. Then I'm at the waterpark. Not only do I beat the rain, but I swim for almost an hour. It's nice to be here this afternoon. The sun peeks out from behind the edge of the storm. It appears to be moving of to the east. In the water is a young adult woman with her little sister. The woman is gorgeous. Long red hair. She has a sense of humor and is having fun with her sister. I watch the both of them in the pool and on the diving board.
After my swim, it's off to downtown for the Pridefest. I decide to ride all the way. It begins to rain halfway there and I wait it out under a bridge. Along comes a young homeless guy in a blanket. We wait out a small shower and I'm on my way. Underneath another underpass along the way is a homeless woman with a shopping cart blocking one "lane" of the bike trail. She will still be there when I return back this same way some four hours later. I stop for a bite at the downtown deathburger homeless central. It's an uncommon mix of both glittery LGBTQ and vagabond homeless. It reminds me of the old joke. "Are you CIA or mafia? "Both." On the sidewalk, a couple of motorcycle officers are arresting a transient. The transient is yelling "Help!" And then, "I can't go to jail, they said they wouldn't let me out." Either the transient or someone else then begins asking, "Anyone have a cigarette?" I heard someone inside say that the fest will be over in less than an hour and a half. I grab a quick bite before heading there. There's some interesting art. One of the first vendors I see is a tall, thin, almost naked young woman with black stars painted on her bare breasts. She and her wife create tarot-looking cards. The young woman is absolutely beautiful and with an adorable soul. These are gay women who I never see anywhere else. They are unique in, as the US Marines say, in mind, body, and spirit. Well, this was an exhausting and time-consuming day, but I'm always satisfied when I still get the chores done at home. It's not over yet. I haul myself toward home on the old bike. I decide I don't want the same old Chinese food for dinner, and I turn toward my old deathburger. This is an old neighborhood homeless hangout, and I've seen social workers in here with their laptops meeting with clients, as well as homeless with their own laptops. This evening, there is a woman inside with her own laptop. She doesn't strike me as particularly homeless. She is softly playing music which sounds as if its from India. She quietly sings along as she plugs in the power cord.
Tuesday. I'm at work, where the occasional homeless wanders past the windows. Mostly they push shopping carts or pull rollaway suitcases. Today, one guy wanders past. From a quick glance, he almost appears dressed as a court jester. He's pushing an office chair on castors. On Thursday, I'm riding home from work as the sun goes down. Under the same bridge over the bike path is the same homeless woman. Same shopping cart. As I approach, she does what I've begun to see other homeless do out on this trail. She flashes a light so I see her. The following evening, I get home when I suddenly hear some kind of outdoor music behind where I live. The following day I will pick up a local magazine which explains what it is. Saturday is my turn to have off. I'm out at the Greek Festival for the first time in years. It's one hell of a rainy day for these parts. The merchandise at the fest is a collection of beautiful Greek clothes and furnishings. A shower begins and a bolt of lightning strikes. When the thunder roars, applause erupts from the crowd.
The "Friends of Little Saigon" initiative, led by WalkDenver and the West Denver Renaissance Collaborative, will be hosting Denver's first pop-up Asian night market on Friday, June 21 [a block away from my home.] The initiative is focused on community beautification and stewardship of the pedestrian environment along [my stretch of the] Boulevard... According to WalkDenver: "...we are working...to identify community-desired place-making enhancements...that support the dignity and enjoyment of people walking and accessing transit along [my] Boulevard." - asian avenue magazine, 6/2019
Monday of a new week. June is evaporating. The weekend was cold and rainy, shades of last year's miserable summer of days in the sixties, ruining my outdoor swimming. When I come home this evening, I will hear a weather forecast predicting warmer days. I hope this will include weekends. But this morning, I am coasting down the steepest hill on my way to the bike trail, through the neighborhood between my home and there. Crawling her way up the hill is an attractive middle-aged female cyclist. Her long auburn hair is tied back. She appears to be on a bicycle with no gears. She's ascending, if not the longest, perhaps the steepest hill on the west side. This lady is in a top which shows her shapely figure, designer jeans, and shoes with heels. I leave her to her sojourn as I turn one corner, then another which takes me down the rest of the elevation. Then a turn to cross some railroad tracks before I'm on the trail. A few yards from this entrance to the bike trail is another entrance off the next street along. Laying on the concrete at this other trailhead is a homeless guy curled up, his shopping cart (referred to as his "buggy" on the streets) beside him, piled high. The cart is red. It's from Target.
After the gym, I'm at work for a short time before I take my first 10 minute break. I run next door to the Greek grill. It's around lunch time, and inside are the usual collection of random Caucasian office personnel. Downtown Denver's too-cool-to-be-best and armchair brightest. I spot one Caucasian couple doing what they all do, attempting to decipher the menu posted over the grill. They are behind the end of the line, leaving a space. Which I attempt to sneak into. Until a couple of Caucasian guys come out from behind me, and ask the couple if they are in line. One of the guys then points to the end of the line, where he expects me to stay. Power to the white people. On Wednesday, I don't realize that today is Bike To Work Day. As soon as I walk into the rec center, it's obvious that one of the employees was told by his boss to ask every one of us, "Have you been downtown?" I'm caught off guard because I consider the rec center...to be downtown. It's actually in perhaps the suburb bordering the downtown center. So...what is downtown? I don't ask, but most likely city-sponsored activities. It sounds as if the events are at the train stations. I ride all the way without the train. I used to work the early shift, and ride to work on Ride To Work Day, and get to work before any special events even started.
I entered a dreamy gridwork of sand-colored apartment blocks...lined with refuse and...mud forever crumbling into choking dust...battered cars belching out the residue of heavily-leaded fuels. ...when concentrations in the Islamic world are now "developed" - badly industrialized block house towns of paved concrete and black fumes. Now people work, even during Ramadan. Privatization and...production weigh more heavily on religious Moslems than on secular ones... Merchants stood in doorways, dressed in...(homespun robes) and fingering prayer beads. ...groups of soldiers rolled by in...slow moving white Toyota trucks... The dull green uniforms didn't fit. ...their rifle butts knocked each other's foreheads on bumps in the road. ...hypnotic sermons...declared it wrong to touch the hand of a Christian. ...it was those with guns whose faces showed fear. They seemed the occupied... ...I saw very few well-constructed...(government) mosques, but many (people's) mosques, which served as local bases for radical clerics and extremist groups. ...in the face of...increasing urbanization...and foreign cultural influences...requires an increasingly conservative social glue... - Kaplan
This was my seventh embed...hanging out with U.S. soldiers, my seventh version of the same drill. "So can we shoot if they have a remote control?" one soldier asked. "Awesome," another soldier replied. Light 'em up. Awesome. Let's roll. Get some. Over the years, I had...slipped into...the lingo of the U.S. military... I had also figured out different categories of U.S. soldiers - the Idealists, the Thinkers, the Workers, the Junkies, and the Critics. They were talking about...a city I had driven around for years, a downtown I had walked around. I never wore body armor... I only worried about my security...when I saw a military convoy because of suicide blasts, overeager NATO gunmen, and Afghan drivers who disobeyed warnings to halt. ...this would be my first time seeing Kabul from a Humvee... Years into this, I was still hearing the same comments from U.S. soldiers... We had learned so little. "It's like the forth world here," said the gunner... "Dirt walls, blankets for doors. That guy's got one shoe, he's saving up for a second shoe." - Barker
Thursday. When I leave the house for work, I pass the stop where I used to catch the bus to work as recently as six months ago. This morning, a drunk couple occupies the shelter. As I approach them, I watch the emaciated female jump out and throw her hands in the air. She's wearing a tank top with a U.S. flag design. The guy has scratches on his face. Oddly enough, he's telling her something about bus stops. She replies, "Whatever. Whatever whatever." When I got to work yesterday, a couple of artists were in the alley painting the wall opposite to my place of employment. I work right next to, or perhaps in, an arts district. I suppose it's our alley's turn. Homeless continue to saunter through the alley. At work today, I peek out to see three homeless guys, one with a camping pack and bedroll. The very next day I pass the same bus stop. The drunk couple is long gone. In their stead 24 hours later are a group of children and their chaperones, all in pink T-shirts. Not long after, I arrive at work where more artists are at work on the wall across the alley, which is blocked off from traffic. I sneak over behind where I work, through a gap between a telephone pole and a wall. The manager comes out and asks to see the artists' permit, which they produce. Later in the afternoon I take out the trash behind work. A young guy (they are all in their 20's) with long, straight hair, sunglasses, and a long-sleeved surf shirt is talking to an artist named Casey. He wants to interview Casey. "Just short clips," he tells Casey. Toward closing, I'm peeking out of the back door. I watch one artist on a ladder I'm sure I've seen advertised on TV. He's working on a two story wall, using a spray can as one would a pencil on paper. He's sketching out a figure to be painted. I recall the end of my own MFA studies in painting. There are familiar art types roaming back and forth in our parking lot. I think I see artists and older project coordinators. I watch as one of each give each other a secret handshake and a hug. There are artists hanging out watching the work. Others who appear to be family walk through with dogs, some who appear to be students take photos. It's like an art school student/faculty mixer. And it's all at the bottom of the stairs behind where I make my money on the clock. Thirty years after I was doing my own graduate studio work.
A couple of hours later, it's closing in on 8 PM. I'm pedaling through the neighborhood between the bike trail and my own. It's a balmy evening after a 97 degree F day. There's a slight breeze blowing. I pedal past a Caucasian couple in their twenties, sitting cross legged on the tiny walkway from their front door. The slim female eats something with a spoon out of a bowl. She waves at me and says, "Hi." She's barefoot in Capri pants, with her dark hair in a ponytail. There is something magical about her simplicity. Why is it I react to this couple as some kind of pioneers as opposed to interlopers? Perhaps because they are enjoying their lawn instead of treating it as a commodity. Pickup trucks rumble past. Around the corner comes another young Caucasian couple. The pair ride bikes, each with some kind of odd saucer inside the back rim. They appear to be avant garde. Another block along is a third Caucasian couple, also on bikes. The guy has grey in his hair and rides on a low seat. Up a street which I never take. Mounted next to a front door is a rainbow flag. The following day is my turn to work Saturday. I'm out of the door. Across the street at the renovated apartments are a couple of young bearded Caucasian guys. The lanky one has a man bun and tells the other that he worked "a security guard shift overnight last night."
Sunday is the end of another month. This month. It's been quite a beginning of the summer, waiting for different shoes to drop. After last week, the days have ventured into the 80's and 90's F. At work, we have a modicum of air conditioning. Either way, I'm used to working in the heat, and I appear to be the only one of the other two guys I work with who appears to be just too damned busy to notice the temperature. At least for now. One of the guys is impressed wit the artists painting the alley behind us, wondering if one in particular happens to do tattoos as well. The other guy I work with considers the work "hipster bullshit." Yesterday, I got grocery shopping done having made it out of work a half hour early. The week's laundry I did the day before yesterday, and my old dryer finally quit working. Far less of an issue than the washer not working. This morning, breakfast with the sister is once again a current event. My regular supermarket does not carry low fat cheese, so we stopped by another which does...but was sold out. On the way back from the swimming pool, I stop into a Natural Grocers. They have all the low fat cheese I could ever want. And they're not far from home. I wouldn't have guessed that, a couple of months after my mom's passing after her having lived with me since before we moved into the home I bought, that work would get busier. That I would not be short on money in spite of the lack of $500 she had been giving me every month from her SS check. That she actually left me in a stable position. That my own grocery shopping pattern would change. That not having to be here at any particular time of day would change how I plan my weekends. And the weekends now are funny. I worked this Saturday, and will work the next two after. This leaves Sunday as the single day during the week when I am able to venture to the waterpark. It's always a race with the rainstorm. And with a swim in, it's been raining in the late afternoon, and I don't have to water the flowers. Today, on the bike trail to the pool, one of the many cyclists who passed me from behind along the way was a female. She is the first to then stick her hand behind her back and give me a little wave. I like ending this month on such a note.
