I was supposed to see Steve last night and get together and make more music but my bum shoulder decided to lay me flat on my back. So in apartment I sat for most of the night, making calls, answering e mails, and chatting on the phone with friends. My Doctor gave me bunches of drugs to take but they make me goofy and I just hate that feeling. I’d rather be flying than dragging. But since this pain has returned, I figured it was best to take the drugs. I was fairly loopy most of the night, but at least it made the reality shows I was forced to watch far more interesting.

At about Midnight, I noticed I was out of cigarettes. For most people this wouldn’t be a problem, but for a night owl, Midnight is just that: The Middle Of The Night. I needed more. So, off I went to the drug store down the street.

It was a beautiful night. L.A. in the winter is clear and brisk. There’s a familiarity for me here. I lived here for the first 12 years of my life, and there’s certain smells that I associate with being a kid. I remember my Mom and the way she looked when she was young. Her hair, her unlined face, and the way her smile showed most all of her teeth. Before alcohol began to ravage time on her forehead, and before the constant puffiness and redness appeared, she was a lovely, bubbly, funny, wonderfully pale woman. No one could believe we were related. Me with my brown skin and her being practically invisible. She always smelled airy. Never heavily perfumed, but like a long breath of cold air.

I remembered my Dad, and the way he looked when he would come back from his trips across the country. My Dad flew in the Viet Nam war and he’d be away for months at a time, and when he’d come back he’d have a toy or a prize for me and my brother. I don’t remember his face much, but I remember the way he smelled. Like a fresh shirt right out of the laundry.

I also remembered my brother Bob. His brown, sandy, misplaced mop of hair, his freckles, his tall, tall lanky stature. We were polar opposites. When I was younger he was my hero. I followed him around, I watched what he did and who he was with, and I wanted to simply be near him. He was four years older than me, and I believed he knew everything. I remember him teaching me Stratego, a game about war. I had, and still have, an aversion to anything violent, but I wanted so badly to be part of his world. Bob stayed in his room, always made good grades, and was the center of all the love and affection my Mom could muster. I wanted that. I wanted that more than anything in the world. But my brother, I wanted to be with my brother, and before he turned into something that was completely and utterly foreign to me, I worshipped him. And I remember going into his room and pretending to be interested in Stratego, and the smell that always wafted up through me. It was always clear and clean. Bob usually had his windows up, and I remembered that outdoor smell. Not a flowery, girly thing, but just new and cool. As if nothing had touched it. I remember it distinctly.

Like LA. Just like winter in LA

I got to the store, bought my cigarettes from the man behind the counter who always sells me my cigarettes and I guess I was smiling.

“You’re’ very happy tonight.” He said handing me back my change.

“Am I?” I said catching myself.

I wasn’t particularly.

“You’re’ smiling. It’s nice to remember things, isn’t it?”

I looked at him.

“How did you…….yeah, I guess so.”

I was a little freaked out. I don’t much like people who crawl inside me without a warrant. It frightened me a little. I’m not sure why, but I wanted to go home. Right then.

“You okay?” he asked smiling.

Suddenly, for some reason, when he smiled, I felt better. He’s a nice looking man. Tall, dark wavy hair, brown, brown eyes, and smooth hands that looked as if he wore gloves most of his life.

“I’m fine. Thanks.” I answered.

“Memories are better when they’re written down.” He said as I left. “People make them real.”

I couldn’t believe what the guy behind the counter said to me. It was very strange and to be honest, that was the most he’d said to me in the 6 months that I’d been here.

I walked home.

I kept looking up. I kept feeling the night whisk by me, and I bundled up a bit. It was pitch, pitch black and very quiet. My neighborhood, for the most part, is very neighborhood-y, and at night, most everyone’s in bed. Sleeping. I love this part of the night. I like to think of the other night owls and what they’re doing and if they’re remembering things as well. I turned the corner of my street, and watched the street lamps flicker, and the reflections of light in the left over pools of rain sitting stagnant by the curbs. I would occasionally still look up, and think. And then would come the smells and I cried a little. Not a big cry or a heaving cry, or even a cry of sadness or pain, but a cry of a memory that’s gone. Something I let go of that I couldn’t have but that still made me happy to think about.

I eventually got to my building, came upstairs, and laid down again. I flicked on the Golden Girls, they always make me happy. I looked out my living window, breathed in hard, and stared at the mountains looking so close I felt I could hold one of them in my hand.

I thought about what the man behind the counter said. I thought about what I had remembered. I thought about the fact that I was back home where my entire life began, and I’ve returned to figure things out, settle down and start over. All the things that have happened to me, and the people I’ve lost, and the things I’ve given up, and shared, and given away, and collected. I’m like a boom-a-rang that came back to its owner, damaged, but still flying. The first part of my life started here and the second part of my life is continuing here. I’ve spent what seems like an eternity wandering around needing other people’s approval and love and apologies and never once have I felt like I could turn around in the mirror and ask myself for any of that. I think, for some odd reason, the memories that are coming at me now are allowing me to let go. And do just that: ask myself for things.

And so I’m writing it all down. So I can make it real.