Bottle caps like bread crumbs

We ended up at The Green Door Store, a bouncer's recommendation, dancing to music from the 50s or 60s, maybe 70s (I'm bad at matching music with its era). 

One day till June. I couldn't stop thinking about June, and wondering what he thought about June. 

He abruptly decided he wanted to leave. I felt insecure, uncomfortable. I still feel uncertain quite a bit as it relates to him. Both his remiss and his regard come out of nowhere.

Eighteen days into June. I can't stop thinking about June, and wondering what he thinks about June. 

A journalist friend and fellow wanderer said I should travel with carnies and I mentioned I've tossed the idea around. In college I decided to write a piece about the carnies that worked the fair in my hometown. I became friends with the niece or daughter or cousin's kid (something like that) of the owners. I was introduced to her for a tour and further introductions to the mostly South African "exchange students” working the rides. She quickly started flirting with me. I quickly put her in the friend zone, albeit with a smile. At one point she left me with a couple guys that were manning a game—I can't remember the rules or object now—the one where rubber ducks float around in a small pool. I was asking the normal questions: where are you from, how long have you been traveling with the fair, why do you do it, when one interjected, “There's a party tonight. We always throw a party before we pack up. You should come.” I'm not sure why people divulge information to me.

Close to 10 pm, I walked into the fair grounds with my photographer. We could hob nob with the worst of em... we were the worst of em... Under a red and white striped tent, Daisy Duke, newly impregnated midriff showing, was double-fisting strawberry wine coolers, cigarette hanging from her lips. Alice and the Mad Hatter passed around a fifth of rum (once the kegs were tapped) in front of their trailer. When asked to see inside, through the crack in the door Mr. Hatter slide hallucinogens in the nightstand before opening the door a bit wider. Batman was sweating because of “the meth.” And the adults eyeballed us newbies,  not with disdain but with corrupt smirks, hoping for “fuck me” eyes back. 

Surreal is a carnie costume party in small town Missouri. 

"I don't usually meet people that like such weird experiences, where nothing is strange enough."

"I think, it's like, I feel more comfort when I'm uncomfortable." 

"I do too."

"I think that's why I'm always leaving."

A girl between 10 and 12 years old got on the M 15 bus towards South Ferry, waving as it pulled away. After one stop, she got up and asked the bus driver what stop was next and where she needed to get off for her destination.

“You travel by yourself?”

“My mom is waiting for me.”

You'll get curious looks when you travel alone. Most people forget what it feels like to be waited for. 

My friends ask me how it was and I say something like, “It was amazing.” Period. How can I put five months into a coherent statement? How can I explain why I'd rather still be in London? ...Love is probably an appropriate word here, huh?

I'd like to call someone--not him--to recount to someone the quirks I particularly miss. Things always feel more real when said out loud...

He would open my cider bottle with the bottle cap of his, and then as we walked he would scour the streets for sharp corners on trash bins or fences. It reminded me so much of Missouri. Turns out, South Africans and Missourians aren't all that different.

Thou Shall Not Be Redeemed

Money and its Redemption
Forum on Religion and the Department of Anthropology public discussion
Can "bad money" be made good? Leading economic anthropologists will debate the morality of money, philosophies of philanthropy, and the lure of redemption.
Date: Thursday 7 May 2015
Time: 6:30-8 pm
Venue: Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House, London School of Economics

The first speaker makes her way to the podium, and I notice a white-haired man in the front row. From my position in the row behind him and one seat off to the left, I watch as he strokes his hair down in the back, touches his beard, wipes his mustache, puts his fingers to his forehead, strokes his hair down in the back, touches his beard, wipes his mustache, puts his fingers to his forehead, strokes his hair down in the back, touches his beard, wipes his mustache, puts his fingers to his forehead... The fidget was constant, but the quiet, though audible mumbling was intermittent.

The lectures and discussion commence without interruption, an hour and a half.

Then for 30 minutes, during the Q&A session, the white-haired man hurriedly sticks his hand up when the priest (moderating the panel) asks for other questions. And each time, the man is skipped, noticeably. Noticeably. Noticeably.

What's worse:
A priest of the Church of England deciding not to allow the man to ask his question out of indifference or apathy?
Or deciding not to allow the man to ask his question out of pity, thinking the audience would make fun of him or get annoyed?

The question "Can 'bad money' be made good?" starts a conversation that focuses on the impoverished in society, and how a collective, altruistic "we" can spread the loads of money people in power make (commonly with the assumption that the people in power got their loads of money by being "bad" or keep their loads of money by being knowingly or unknowingly socially irresponsible) to the lesser in society.

I'm not saying this is a senseless goal or an incorrect assumption. I'm saying that, if you want to speak, you should listen... If you want to know, you should be... Otherwise you come off sounding pompous.

And after all that talk of economic inequality, you're not going to allow the economically unequal to have a say?

Dirty money can be redeemed, not dirt under the nails.

I can't tell you what was "wrong" with this man. Maybe it's biological. But I'm going to assume that the things he's been through psychologically have only exacerbated any issue.

This man has likely spent several decades being ignored, not given a chance to ask a question, much less give an opinion, excluded from seeing a directed smile or even brief eye contact.

Were you looking for a cleaner hand, Father?

Sitges, Spain - 3/1/2015

At one time people looked out over the water
and thought it ended out there,
falling over an edge
into space.

Sometimes I wish it were that way,
and when we were 97
we could lay back in the water
and float out to the edge
looking up at the sky.

After months of floating...

We wouldn't even notice
dropping off the end.

But we'd watch the stars, which were also thought to be part of a flat plane,
get swallowed by the night
as we fell farther from them.
And we'd feel the water
on our face
not drenched but more than a mist
like when we stood under the falls near Lake Superior.

As we opened our eyes
We'd see the underbelly of the Earth
see it bubbling and toiling
with the weight of us homosapiens.

I thought of this as we walked the boardwalk that first night in Sitges
and I saw a light,
I assume from a ship,
blinking out there.

But I wondered if instead it was a family
set sail to plummet over the edge.

Maybe it wouldn't be that bad to drink the kool-aid,
to watch as they put the poison
to their lips.
Throats rise and fall
and you swallow and look around,
The warm feeling that you're surrounded by people that would give up so much for you
that would die
for you...

or at least with you.