Met up with a longago friend. It tends not to enter the discussion but we were romantically involved for some time, off and on, for a number of years. We don’t talk of that anymore. She is married with child, as settled as one of her disciplines can be. She summarized other past romances, or rehashed them, rather, as I knew of them already. I gave a few accounts of my recent dalliances but did not go too deep or into too many of the encounters. My most recent attempt to be a sub to a dominatrix ended up being kind of a joke. She just was not serious. My lengthiest account involved the Japanese Waif who got deported for being a compulsive shoplifter. But even with that memorable and colorful story I left a lot out. She retold the account of a dude I got to know only before he died, how he took her to swank Hollywood parties and star-studded galas. She felt completely out of place at these type of events and as a couple they did not last long. I informed her last night that he died very wealthy. This surprised her given what she described as his poor self-image. She looked really good, and she said I looked better than ever. I don’t know if she was lying but I was not. We met at the Oyster Bar Saloon, not for love of the place but convenience, since she was shipping out from Grand Central. A native New Yorker she had never entered the Oyster Bar nor had she heard the whispering colums effect found outside that establishment. I knew another native New Yorker who never knew there was a Scrabble streetsign in Jackson Heights. I guess when you’re born here you don’t need to know these triviations.
Today I woke to news that smoke is in the air, smoke I think from Canada and New Jersey that could become a danger for a lot of people if no more rain pours through as it did a few nights ago. All it might take is one errant out of control private Cessna jet plunging into the Jersey grasslands to ignite a broad and unstoppable fire. The private plane that did plunge to the earth at 20,000 feet per second landed in fertile ground but it could have landed anywhere. The sun looked distinctive in the smoky sky today.
Going out after work is way out of character for me. I have not done it once, or more than once, since starting the job in January, 2022. My routines are pretty set. The latest I typically get home is 6:15 but I’m usually there by 5:45. Last night it was 7pm, which shouldn’t seem horrible but it has turned my morning into a slightly twisted pretzel. Without fail I still sit at the computer for a good length of time when I get home. Why this is I don’t really know. My ambitions toward building web content and such are not exactly extinguished but the time is not there anymore to fully thrash at it. Yet, for some reason, I’m making more money from the websites than in months past. It’s not enough to pay the rent but with a little bit of care and feeding I think it could be. This job has, surprisingly, raised its compensation to what could be considered a living wage. I didn’t expect that so quickly but it’s a post-Covid employee retention ploy which probably will not succeed.
