Just Journal · Jan 8, 02:55 AM

Hello, I’m working on something now that takes all of my writing energy. And, I did some interviews in Chicago that I’m slowly working through. So, attention! I still want to post stuff but unless you know me and like me, basically, if you’re not my mom, (and she doesn’t even read this site because she doesn’t have the internet) you will be bored. You’re on the computer though, so you’re probably bored. This will probably be less boring than the state of boredom you’re in now.

“The blues ballad is a good example of what the blues are about. Almost always relating a story of frustration, it could hardly be described as a device for avoiding the unpleasant facts of Negro life in America. On the contrary, it is a very specific and highly effective vehicle, the obvious purpose of which is to make Negroes acknowledge the essentially tenuous nature of all human existence.”

-Albert Murray from his book, The Omni-Americans:Black Experience & American Culture

“Sometimes I’m like a white man, don’t trust me.
Sometimes I’m like a black man thinking like a white man
All you niggaz dis-gust me”

-Freddie Foxx from his song P.A.I.N.E.

Well, you know that I love to live with you
but you make me forget so very much
I forget to pray for the angels
and then the angels forget to pray for us

-Leonard Cohen from his song So Long, Marianne

These were a few of the thoughts floating around my head as I walked down to my mailbox. They stuck around. The Freddie Foxx lyric is amazing. I said it over and over, thinking about him as a kid, then in high school, then about myself and the primaries in New Hampshire.

I opened the mailbox and fished out the New Yorker, a letter that my friend sent with 3xD photos of us from the last time he was in New York. I guess there’s like one place in Canada that still develops 3xD film. There was a post card from a cabbie who drove me home about a month ago, gotta set up that interview. A letter of encouragement and a check from friends and subscribers in Chicago, and some junk.

I went to the local police station on Elizabeth Street to get finger printed. Two little Chinese women were in a room upstairs and they took care of the prints. I like things that you know are going to work. There was nothing technologically advanced about the finger printing process, as many of you readers know from experience. Ha, ha, not funny. Ink, a roller, and a human hand to hold my fingers, press and roll ‘em. Hanging out in that police station made me want to be a cop for the first time. No one was doing anything except for the women who helped me.

It was beautiful outside so I enjoyed a walk to work, made a power point slide, a few phone calls, sent out some e-mails, finished up my work and then stayed for two hours writing personal e-mails and doing research. It’s my dream to have a writing studio.

Here’s one of the highlights of my day, finding D-Nice.com. This website is on another level. Check it out; it’s one of those things that is so good it renewed my faith in a lot of things I’d turned off, i.e. the world.

Half the girls at the Prince Street station were in work out gear at 7:30 pm. And I saw a girl eating an apple on the train. I haven’t been seeing enough people eating apples. Nearby, I exercised and sat in the steam room…song lyrics always running around my head. This is my greatest difficulty in my daily meditation. One second I’m feeling Maranatha the next I’ve said, “I been a dog ever since I was young, saw the Mack and got oh so sprung…My bitch a choosey lover, never fuck without a rubber, never in the sheets, like it on top of the cover…buy a big brick house…get drunk each night and watch a color TV.” Then I come back and say Maranatha and then lose it again. But meditation is fun; it’s like my life. I’m getting better at it.

Ate two peanut butter sandwiches, celery, carrots and a protein shake today, shared some carrots with a girl at work.

The grand finale of the day was going to hear Rebecca Schiffman sing songs at Googie’s, upstairs at the Living Room. Dan Bruen, a kid I went to college with and who I used to skateboard with was working the door. I hadn’t seen him in years. He makes documentary films and goes to Jamaica to direct Dancehall and Reggae music videos. He’s living in Flatbush and he pays rent weekly, in cash—just hands it to a dude every Sunday at 4:15 pm. Rebecca was great. Find her music.

I walked home and ran into Tom McCarthy who was on his Vespa, had been out with friends, enjoying the night. It was a good one.

Thanks for asking about my day. Now, I’ve got some more writing to do.

— Albin

Comment

1. that was great! and interesting ams. no need for excuses or disclaimers needed. you’re doing great work.

   — joerime · Jan 8, 03:57 PM · #

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