The sun set over LA yesterday with its slide over the horizon being cat called by the ocean and desert alike. It rained the other night and the small trees and shrubs lodged in mounds of dirt and mud in the river, were bent towards their concrete beginnings as if the river in its desire to conquer with purity said “I know where you came from”.
This was all wrapped in the dry cleaning bags and amazon packaging of a few weeks of spending. New new new.
I used to know these artists that lived in a run down building, in a run down part of town, where every corner of the stairwell up to their place seemed to be broom piles of broken teeth and concrete. Sometimes I’d pop in to check on them and the apartment was littered with used condoms and drug bags, but sitting on the side table of their bed would be a glass of fresh made orange juice (smashed carcasses of oranges would be laying in their bed and floor alike) and, in my memory, a perfect ray of sunshine came in that once knew these oranges and talked with them about who wore which dress best.
I thought about this couple looking at the LA river, because both seemed sort of like the same scene: a mixture of things we want to hide and things we want to celebrate, but in our manic state we maybe just wash it away.
(Most people look at a fixer upper and think “burn it down”.)
I rode my bike along this scene and grinned, only to have my face stuffed with storm clouds of insects that come during this particular time of day at the river.
Small bodies battered my face and I tried to remember exactly what it was I was thinking about.
