Post-Peter memorial, discombobulated, sad

Is it any wonder? I can’t focus, keep playing around with FB and email, skirting around the huge job I need to get done, curating the Visible Verse 09 screening.

I’m drained, keep listening to songs Peter and I wrote and sang together, going over it in my mind, all the things we *could* have done, the great potential we had, the promise, how we threw it all away. Well, I am apparently still trying to come to terms with it, never had to face it until losing him, our shared past. And I just plain old miss him! Hate the void…

Wednesday, Sept. 30

Lunch before I leave for the airport, Reuben sandwich in Beechwood Canyon with Teresa, right under the Hollywood sign. Odd how the fabled Hollywood came to be such a significant part of my life, moving here so young, playing in bands, hanging out with Hollywood punks. Like most of the rest of my life, I didn’t plan it. I’m no movie-eyed starlet. Certainly I arrived with ambitions but it just sort of happened, found myself in a band with Brad Kent who had played in San Francisco’s Avengers and had connections in LA, namely our drummer Karla Mad Dog of the Controllers.

Robyn Westcott, Byron and Maritza came by the hotel last night and we had a lovely visit. Robyn and I commiserated over those who were instrumental in Peter’s murder, those whose names make me gag, their warped view of the world and our respective dealings with them over the years.

Wow, this is amazing, BAIT cars, idiots trying to steal cars or stereos, man against machine and RUBY’s winning, at this point it might be easier to steal the entire car. Seems to me it’s going to get to the point where we are all always under such constant surveillance that committing crime will be nearly impossible, the premise of many science fiction novels. This is hilarious, it is a show called BAIT CAR. I cannot believe how many channels there are and how many reality shows on each one.

Just enjoyed a visit with Robin Carr, (very low flying black helicopter-sometimes you wonder if they aren’t zooming in on you-paranoia undoubtedly.) Robin and I knew each other way back when. We weren’t exactly close friends, more like associates or what is the term when you move about in the same circles of the same ilk, are friends of friends? Always admired each other though. She is a poet and played in a band called Animal Dance. I published one of her poems in the LA Weekly, she reminded me. I used to have a sort of Poet’s Corner, that publisher Jay Levin indulged me with. She gave me her chapbook, water makes me thirsty and I gave her a CD. I love the title; it reminds of that saying, “They talk of my drinking, but never my thirst.” She wrote a beautiful poem about her sister, which caught my eye immediately. I have only painful relations with my sisters, as much as I have loved them and still love them. We were definitely thrown together which ties in with my paternity issues documentary, a whole other story.

We recalled enjoying living alone, having our own bachlorette pads. Still Robin said when she *grew up* that she would live in a real house, not an apartment, or a duplex. Interesting, it kind of ties into my poem, Year Of The Monkey. “I’m evolving from an urbanite on all fours to a big, eagle eyed, straight shooting, cause committed, river of life channeling, chainsaw hung, 4X4 pickup piloting Homo Erectus islander.”

She also said, “Wow this would be a nice honeymoon suite,” and my response was, “What?” My idea of the ideal honeymoon suite would be a beach front cabana in the Bahamas or the Caymans or something, certainly not some bordering-on funky-suite in Hollywood. This place is cool though because it’s in the Hollywood Hills, and though it’s not exactly cheap, relatively a good deal because you get an apartment for the price of most hotel rooms, and a spectacular view.

Enjoying a spot of solitude as I search for the resident flock of wild parrots which is surely a search for meaning, as I am back here, in this place so familiar yet so out of reach most of the time, most of my time. I swear I can hear them but cannot see them. Or maybe I just want to see them again so badly I imagine I am hearing them.

Just made a swack of phone calls to friends, have decided to lay low today. It’s been a very stressful, emotionally draining visit so far, think I will receive people here at the hotel if they like. I’m fighting an infection and generally feeling fatigued. I miss my boys, my mutts.

I hate my brain. It doesn’t work the way it used to. Just had a nice chat with Byron. Celebrity spotting, ran into Stephen Baldwin. Not very bright. He pulled into the hotel parking lot in a black Range Rover, kept gesturing at me as I was attempting to get onto Franklin. Instead of just backing up to let me by he got out of his vehicle to come over and talk to me, presumably to ask where I wanted to go. I said, “If you just back up a bit, I can get by.”  😮 Teresa thinks he was all twitterpated and flirting with me.

So strange to be sitting in this same spot, the lobby of the Magic Castle Hotel where I used to hang with Jeff and Chris Issak, now trying to get online in vain. I feel like a ghost but then how could I know what it feels like to be a ghost if ghosts even existed? Of course, it’s a metaphor.

Saturday, Sept. 26, 2009

Big day, big stress day but ultimately a highly gratifying day. I made it to the poetry reading in Pasadena, despite everything—Gretel’s tardiness, a finicky GPS and my own confusion. The place was farther out than I thought. I kept screwing up, getting into the wrong lanes, exiting the wrong exits. Pure torture. Almost half past three, Robyn Westcott called me on my cell phone, thank God, because naturally I didn’t have the reading facilitator, Don Kingfisher Campbell’s number handy. She was able to report that I was on my way. As I emerged from the car, I saw Gloria! And Susan! And her husband Paul standing in front of the library. So great to see them! Gloria had a little bottle of tequila in her bag, gave me a shot, which really hit the spot in that moment. Other friends came—Doug Knott, Teresa, Suzanne Rush, Terry Durbin, Louise Blialick. I read from my forthcoming book, Three Blocks West Of Wonderland, dedicated to Peter, many of the poems containing references to Los Angeles and our old haunts, life together. Lots of old people reading their newly minted poems and the reading dragged on a bit but all good, all in all.

Traffic was a nightmare on the way back, due to the Sound of Music Sing Along at the Hollywood Bowl and I was certain the cabbie was taking the scenic route. Finally we arrived at Boardners and were able to faciliate the memorial, order food, etc. Gretl says she has inherited Peter’s friends. The gathering turned out to be a lovely and diverse gathering of friends from many different parts of Peter’s past and despite the last minute finegaling. Gretl in New York and I up in Canada had to scramble at the last minute to find a venue. We decided on Boardners as they were friendly and accomodating and the place is right across the street from the old Masque.

I met up with Robyn, Gloria and Suzanne, wonderful to reconnect with my LA Weekly comrades. We caught up, reminisced, and had some lively conversations. Gloria decided we shall be crones together and Robyn said something to the effect of “Yeah, well, we’re some pretty hot crones.” In a bit everyone reconvened on the patio out back, sat around the fountain and shared stories-Bob Moss, Doug Knott, Susan MacAdams, Bryon Baker, Tyler Waxman, Amanda Sherren, Liza Walsh and her sister flying in from South Carolina and Brian Donegan from Utah. Paul Cullum and Zuade Kaufman and Dorandra were in attendance as well and Peter’s sister Gretl was forced to speak up. Gretl is not exactly shy but can be self-conscious. We all miss him terribly!

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