reputation nation

This arrived in the mail Wednesday.

Notes:

(I’m 76 years old. I rent a room in a trailer. I work part-time on the front desk at the YMCA in San Luis Obispo, where I live. And about where, long, long ago, I dreamed of living, though I can’t tell which decade that was, or possibly why. Regarding Wednesday’s mail, I paid $6.90 on Ebay, plus tax. Who knew? Who knows? It’s resting on a pillow case covering an ancient pillow I’ve hauled back and forth 3000 miles over and over again. It could be my oldest personal possession, in a slow dance here with my newest.

My hope for today, Friday, is catch one of those meetings after dawn, and an early afternoon drive to Avila Beach to walk the Bob Jones Trail. My usual Friday now, though I’d never imagined it in September of 2001 when I lived in an apartment by myself in Lowell, Massachusetts, worked for a YMCA in Lawrence down the road, and moving then was running along the Merrimack River. So far from California’s central coast. Hiking cow-populated mountain trails. Mingling with Chinese poets.)