| 1969 Brianna throws on some scruffy brown dungarees and grooves down to the Pink Whale grocery to buy some milk. We haven't been eating well -- gaunt, disheveled with stale breath, I sway down to the phone booth on the corner to order a Moo Shi Pork and spare rib delivery from the Panda Mart. Two reefers on the bamboo table, pitiful, we smoke them on the orange shag and laugh, our eyes drooping with relaxation: blood-shot, puffy, even while we were listening to Arthur Lee spin his psychedelic spider-webs, or letting the Incredible String Band send us off in dreams through quiet woods sweating mist. The dog recoils from Janzen, no surprise, the kid stumbles in at all hours smelling of Indian, hyperventilating inside a cruddy poncho. We suffer him hits, adjust our wire-rimmed glasses and wait for him to announce some party deep in the Haight -- we won't hear from him again for weeks. The kids are cool, sure, but ridiculous; sometimes the belly laughs erupt as some flower child from Evansville quotes Donovan like Auden. We keep her flying on saccharine tunes, place her in the corner with Janzen and a phonograph, let him tell his Christmas story about the West Side Laundromat while she flips over Sagittarius and the Yellow Balloon. Ten years from now she'll be hanging someone's underwear on a clothesline and realize her favorite songs were Columbia studio tricks tweaked in some uptown buzz box. Fifty bucks at the monthly producers' convention. Maybe she'll light that cigarette up, flash a faraway smile, and down another pot of coffee. We slide through Thursdays; January we missed when Janzen burst in, winded by a single flight of stairs, arms cradling a plastic bag. First time I saw him cry; he told me he was scared of cars. I laughed hard -- couldn't stop -- and later we watched Beetles of every shade motoring towards the corner and dissolving into rush hour. The Airplane provided the soundtrack; we all agreed Jesus was playing bass. We awoke to organ music, a lilting voice on the radio; we'd left it on, snoring. Janzen twitched in his sleep, eyes scrunched up, lips parched and mouthing, dreaming of sharing a joint with his parents, no doubt. Brianna and Janzen and me; the dog, with hair spilling over his eyes, wrinkles his nose as Janzen tosses and turns, burrows into my armpit with a whimper. We're out of milk again -- but Syd's mumbling the second coming on vinyl; I'm sure someone will be along soon. |