A Poetics

I have this routine I follow on days I can’t—or won’t—write or read. I venture outside, across the street, past the vile-smelling fish and chips joint, past the new office building, past the high-rent luxury apartments, past the old newspaper office, past the retirement home and the old Baptist church, to the Imperialist Coffee Purveyors. I quit drinking coffee a few months ago, and then began drinking it again last month, albeit less regularly. I order a triple Americano, sometimes flavored, sometimes not.

The ICP is comforting to me for a number of reasons. Back in 1993 or so, before they had taken over the world with their uniformly decent coffee, I almost bought a bit of stock in the company. They had just issued an IPO, and stock was eight bucks a share. I was prepared to soak three thousand dollars into this still-smallish (or it seemed smallish, anyway) coffee company that shipped me a pound of coffee every week to the tiny desert town of Lemoore, California. I ended up gambling the money away in a series of weekend junkets to Reno. I spent the change in San Francisco on Ethiopian food, music, drugs, beer, and assorted trinkets. Of course, I don’t have to tell you what happened to the ICP stock. I’d be practically retired by now. So all this should upset me, but it doesn’t. I like ICP also because of the employees. They’re generally very good employees. Everyone looks normal (unlike those fuckers over at Dutch Bros. who only employ drop-dead gorgeous people—to make up for their generally bad coffee, I suppose). In fact, everyone at my corner store looks like someone I used to know, or might have known when I was younger, thinner, more carefree. Of course I don’t know any of these people. After months of coming in, they still don’t even know what I drink, which is very odd. I forgive them, though. They make good coffee and are generally cheerful.

After coffee (in a to-go cup with a little sleeve), I usually cross the street and stand at the entrance to Café Zenon, reading the daily menu. I rarely eat at Zenon these days; their food hasn’t been good since about 1999, but their menu is always interesting reading. I then walk past the House of Noodle, up the alley to the square where Saturday Market is held, and into downtown. Sometimes I walk past the Ken Kesey statue, sometimes the Enormous Pit in the Middle of Town that is surrounded by high Cyclone fences and barbed wire, but mostly I stick to the alleys. Over the past few months I’ve begun taking photographs of my walks, and this is, I suppose, an important part of why I walk. I want to document what’s there, what’s good about this town that I so frequently slander. For years I’ve talked about getting out of Eugene, about moving to a real city, going somewhere that’s not 96% white, that’s not fake-hippie-faux-liberal-redneck, but as of this writing I’m still here. I feel better about my decision (or non-decision) when I take pictures.

The “ugly” things in town, the back alleys, the dumpsters, the paint-peeling walls, take on a certain beauty when captured on a little digital card, printed out on my super-cheap HP printer, and taped to the walls of my apartment (which is also run-down, beaten, like the town). Photographs lie, distort, remake the truth. For proof of this, turn to pop music. Paul Simon’s “Kodachrome,” fIREHOSE’s “In My Mind,” Jay Bennett and Edward Burch’s “Like a Photograph.” This is, I suppose, why we write, too. Or why I write, even when I’m not writing what I’m supposed to write. Aaron Belz, in introducing me at a reading last December in St. Louis, the gloomiest of towns, borrowed someone else’s words (I forget whose) in describing me (and Shane Seely and Arielle Greenberg) as part of the “beaten generation.” This seemed entirely appropriate. I write because I hope to create something better than reality. Taking pictures is much easier, though. The gratification is instant. If you don’t want to look you can simply turn them over. For over a year I kept a picture of Beatrice on my desk. It was black and white and of the side of her face and shoulders. We hadn’t been friends for awhile, but just knowing that I could keep intact a little piece of what we had (or what I thought we had) was comforting. I eventually took the picture out of the frame and put it in a shoebox. Now it’s a photo of me (full beard, long hair) with my brother and my father a couple Christmases ago. Dad looks healthy, even though he’s not. He is, in that picture, less than two months away from another bypass surgery. Now, months later, he’s much thinner than he’s ever been—probably 130 pounds. His hair is grayer than before, his face gaunt. I’ve never seen him visibly disturbed or depressed. Even when he spent nearly two weeks in the hospital last February, he was always in good spirits, even when in pain. I’ve often wondered if my father isn’t hiding something, if, like me, he is gravely unhappy.

I was born—to be “poetic” about it—with a melancholic temperament. I resigned myself many years ago to the fact that I probably wouldn’t ever be really happy. Oh, sure, I have happy moments, but I attribute most of them to chemicals—naturally occurring, and otherwise. I’m frequently happy when I take my walks, ingesting caffeine along the way. When I get home and settle in, though, the dread takes over. I’ve never really discussed this with anyone. That’s a lie. I saw a counselor a few years ago but I quit going after I decided that she wasn’t helping me. People tell me it takes more than a few sessions. That seems pointless to me. Coffee, booze, even fucking cold medicine works more quickly.

My biggest fear isn’t dying alone, which I imagine must be a big fear for someone somewhere. I don’t mind the thought of dying alone. My biggest fear is disappointing others, or having others think I’m a bad guy, that I’m incapable, that I’m untrustworthy, that I’m selfish, that I don’t know how to love or how to be a friend. I’m afraid that my father will die without ever knowing me as a friend, that my family doesn’t really care much for me, that my friends will keep moving away. For a supposedly “smart” person, I have a lot of seemingly irrational worries. Brian Wilson wrote “they say I got brains but they ain’t doin’ me no good.” I don’t think staying in bed for a year is an option for me, though I’ve been sleeping as late as possible during this new year. I think I’ve got a book in me. And pictures to take.