Past or Future.

Awoke with a hangover and I sit outside the café Norteno drinking coffee.
Chuck ‘the canuck’ - his face retains its form in ashen grey of old age, an ancient Canadian who has been here since day one or so it seems. Every week we meet for coffee and conversation and he is continually being rolled by the indigenous youth that crawl over him in his beddings like aroused kittens. Uncounted televisions, radios, and other personal items have been lifted from this shriveled gentleman of leisure. He believes that there is no such thing as a bad boy...same as that fruit Father Flanagan. Both pedophiles by act of Congress.
But, I digress. Wouldn't you?
“He’s a good boy.” or “He’s such a thief - boy would steal his grandma’s dentures for a hit of ice.” He mumbles from endless coffee at the endless parade in front of us.
Bum kicks wrack my form. I am drowning in depression and under the sky, that fucking shattering blue sky of Mexico. The plaza is especially designed for containment of lost ghosts like me: precise, prosaic impact of objects - I watch as the boys and locals pass - this is it...nothing beyond. A Dead End. And the Dead End in every face.
I pulled a peso note out of my pants pocket pay the jovencito for my breakfast. Adios to my company and I stroll out of the Plaza lighting a cigarette - the way is strewn with broken condoms and empty prescription bottles in the glaring sun. High adobe walls are pocked by dwelling cubicles and cafes, some a few feet deep, others extending out of sight in a maze of dirty rooms and dank corridors. Bored of this tripe, I repair to my small blue room and undress, I fall asleep.
Broken images explode softly in my head...I am living in my parents’ house and can’t leave my room to look for a job on account of viscous black guard dog roaming the halls - argue with my father - long tableau of quarrels that had last a lifetime. I realize what I have come to accept - I loathe and hate the old monster. Pure white hate.
Wake up flesh dead, toneless, bitter, jet to corner taco shop for a couple of carne asadas. Waitress notices my funk: “Don’t worry about the past or the future. Live for the moment, live for the now. Life is good!”
I take a walk down the strip and ignore the barkers pass the sparkling casino under the watchful eye of The Man into the Plaza for a coffee and a smoke. Fags pass outside in droves as I sit and think and think hard. Radio plays national program in Spanish about catching lice. The bar across thumps where fraudulent rentboys put the make on you in favor of The House and there is no health in them clap boys rotten to the core.
Yawn and sigh I head back home...

Visited my friend Saul. He lives in the Old Colonias. Walking through the north-west side of Tijuana, that area favors anything for sheer poverty and filth. The sidewalks are garbage strewn and cracked, sad beat people shit in the street, rummage and eat from steaming mounds of rubbish, entrepreneurs cover all corners cooking up hideous, stinking messes of food that they sell to passerby. Old men blink in the sun, prostitutes look furtive and sad and the dark brown loin of the sleeping pimp swells rotting in syphilis.
As evening fell, Saul and I both were bored and I came up with the idea of visiting every bar we could and at each bar take a shot of tequila and move on to the next bar. We got pretty ripped up. Saul and I stumbled down Calle Primera, home to many seedy bars and whorehouses.
Ambivalent transvestite hookers drifted under yellow street lamps, eyes bright with methamphetamine, lean against outcroppings of crumbling red brick walls, talk in silent, catatonic gestures, frescoes of delicate depravity, flat two dimensional howls drift into the night: “Orale! Joselito! Carlos!”
Stagnant patter of commerce: “See the show. Naked lady.”
“Nice girl, meester?”
A hideous soiled mouth blows smoke rings into the night, “Wanna fuck me, baby?”
Saul and I went into the bar Kin-kle, a tacky queer joint in the Red Zone with a big over stuffed bullhead above red metal double swinging doors where guys would show you their erections for a beer. In the dark alcove booths of Kin-kle, drunk and horny, Saul and I made out under the watchful eye of a waiter with a hard on. Patrons passed us with indifference as I masturbated Saul to a climax under the table, his lanky body entwined with mine.
Later that night, Saul and I committed crimes against nature in the Hotel Coliseo, finding myself lying on my stomach with Saul on top thrusting into me, boy did I get the better end of the deal - slapslapslap - went his brown hips against my white ass. Lean arms wrapped around my torso and neck. My back is bitten passionately. My face pressed against the pillow - I feel Saul’s hot breath against my left ear as he gets closer to his climax. Closed my eyes and with clenched teeth felt his hot semen squirt up into me. Afterwards we shared a joint, our shoulders touching under the covers. Saul mumbled that he had to go and I watched as he covered his smooth brown frame with his well-worn clothes. After he left, I dressed listening to the whore earning her rent down the hall. At the corner, we shook hands and Saul went to do whatever Saul had to do.
Walking up from that cesspool of Coahuila - the Red Light District, Zona Norte, ignorant asshole - I turn the corner into Plaza Santa Cecilia accosted by screaming queers on all sides - and, man, they were out in force tonight - when a truckload of Tijuana fuzz gang fucks me.
Encircled by these menacing black uniformed stormtroopers, the little fat one asks where am I going and before I can answer barks for my identification. Tall, smooth cop explains in English - now get this: “We had a report of a white American that fits your description of buying drugs here in the plaza.”
“My description?”
“Si, senor - light hair, glasses, black clothes. May I have permission to search your person?”
Why not? You’re hot. So, up against the adobe wall and goosed - asked if I ever take drugs.
Never. Never? Never.
“We are just doing our job, senor - we are here to protect el turistas like you.” Says hot cop, giving me his One Adam 12 production as he empties my pockets, placing items on the filthy concrete. Opens wallet fat with peso notes all the colors of the rainbow.
Can kiss that wad goodbye, I thought. However, the troopers took nary centavo one and let me be with a cuidado and roared off in their Keystone Cops paddy wagon.
Casually lit a cigarette and walked into the darkness - teeming with the perverse and sexual predators, the thumpthumpthump of the queer bars rattling in my skull. Cute Aztec Indian lad smiles hand out for the soft touch. I drop a fist full of coins into his calloused hand. Have always been a sucker for a pretty face. Stopped in a cantina and downed two quick beers - nasty hooker cooch eying me and I give her the leave me the fuck alone back.
Shuffled back to Carlos’ trap on case that my stomach was aching. Hope it ain’t ulcers.

Zona Norte

Was bored so I went for a walk in the Zona Norte of Tijuana - found myself on the off-off district were even the well to do Mexicans would dare not tread after dark. It was the lowest of the low - rock bottom. Nevertheless, the Great White Explorer was looking for adventure and risks were part of the territory. Can you dig it, pendejo?
Walking along that small strip at dusk, I received a feast for the eyes; the buzzing, flash of glaring neon, putrid drunks lying on the grungy broken sidewalk in their own waste - ugly, mangy dogs eating out of rubbish piled in dark doorways, catatonic and filthy Mexicans dressed in rags glared at me as I walked by. The smell of cheap greasy fried food mingled with the stench of sour beer, piss, and shit.
I was buffeted by ugly forms of hookers on all sides.
“Psst. Psst.”
“Wanna fuck, meester?”
“Twenny dallah make you hallah.”
“Watch me fuck my brother?”
“Plo chob?”
What was next: Me so horny?
I was badgered several times by some scary looking tattooed covered cholos if I wanted to buy any heroin or crystal. I said no, just smiled like the stupid gringo, and moved on.
An ancient bent over gnarled man approached me from the passenger side of a cab. “Senor...just a moment, Senor.” He pleaded.
I stopped. “Yeah? What is it?” I asked looking down on that shriveled thing.
He put his hand on my arm and whispered through yellow decayed teeth, “I got the biggest pussy in Tijuana.”
“You!?” I asked incredulously, lighting a Lucky Strike.
“Yes!” He cackled.
“Man, you're in the wrong line of work as a taxi driver.” I laughed.
“No! No!” He chuckled, realizing his mistake of words. “No, I take you to the big pussy!”
I declined, walking away smiling to myself.
In Tijuana, female prostitution is mostly restricted to licensed houses. On the other hand, male prostitutes are everywhere. They assume that all visitors are homosexual and solicit openly in the streets. I have been approached by boys who could not have been over twelve. That aspect appalls me - I loathe pedophiles.
I stopped at a taco stand and ordered three tacos carne asada and a Sol cerveza. There I struck up a conversation with a Mexican named Roman Torres. A slender well built guy from the state of Zacatecas. He dressed all in black - and was hot. Tall with a shaggy goatee. We talked for a while then Roman invited me back to his apartment. With a stirring in my nether-regions I agreed. Wouldn't you?
We took a taxi libre since he lived up in the hills, stopping first at an all night market for fruit and groceries, with the taxi waiting patiently outside. Once at Roman's place, he did not have money for the fare and neither did I. The angry taxi driver chased us up the stairs to Roman's flat with a steel pipe and banged viciously on the metal door until eventually giving up and going away. The two of us laughed at that juvenile act. Roman grabbed me and kissed me with his tender lips and hot tongue. Next thing I know, we are in the back bedroom. He didn't say a word, but the stiffening of his penis under his black jeans spoke for him.
Breakfast was a wee bit yummier the following morning I tell ya.
Roman invited me to stay the day with him and I obliged. He lived in a small one-room efficiency and the entire apartment building shared the same bathroom and shower - the restroom was a biological horror. I never agreed to the fact that Mexicans wiped their asses and tossed the used paper into the trashcan instead of the toilet so that shit stained paper always littered the floor.
Roman lived in the Old Colonias - and is all that you expect it to be: a maze of narrow, sunless streets, most of them blind alleys. The smell is incredible and it is challenging to identify all the ingredients - marijuana, seared meat, and rotting sewage are well represented. You witness filth, poverty, disease, all endured with a curious lethargic indifference.
Roman and I spent the afternoon in and out of intercourse until he had to go to work. Roman was a security guard that worked the graveyard shift for some computer store. I expected to be hit up for some money, but the subject never came up. He walked me to the corner, we shook hands, and said our goodbyes. Once home, I lit a joint and chatted with Carlos. I laughed my ass off. Carlos is a comical wizard.

Schizo Bebop

The Red Zone for my Dear Readers who are ill informed is a little patch of street blocks on the north side of downtown just south of the great rusted red iron wall separating the haves from the have-nots. It is everything that you would think of "Seedy Tijuana". Under the glaring buzzing neon, an entire block of hookers line up shoulder to shoulder grabbing and goosing you as you walk by. Shabby, smelly bums beg for change as hawkers scream at you to enter their bars and strip clubs.
“Titty girls!”
“Pussy women!”
As I pass by, tired and petulant hookers breath smoke out of chapped lips, teeth plated in silver, “Wanna fuck me, meester?”
So, I head over to one of my favorite dives called, Kin-kle. Thieves, deported criminals, junkies, pedophiles, cholo gangsters, fags and lezbos - a good watering spot. I enter the dark, smoked filled den as a Spanish version of Achy-Breaky Heart warbled out of a multicolored jukebox. I take a seat in the back at a dented and rusted iron table with plastic lawn chairs. The cadaverous looking waiter came to my table and I ordered a Sol beer.
The place was more or less empty for this time of the day. Only an old guy sat at the bar and in the opposite corner a fat cowboy was groping and finger banging an old whore at his table. She wiggled and giggled brown teeth at his advances. He smiled red eyed with a hard on.
Suddenly the light was blocked at the entrance and everything came to a screeching halt. Standing in the door was a four hundred pound six foot three black man. His head shaven bald with puffs of grey lint here and there. He wore a skintight one piece white spandex minidress, blackened and spotted with food, mucus, and God knows what else. He stood there a moment, tottering on his plastic see through platform pumps. His sunglasses were crusted with rhinestones with little pink flamingos on top - dark lenses were missing - he was monstrous.
Gazing around the room with bugged out eyes; flying high on God knows what kind of psychotropic drugs, his glare settled on me. His yellow eyes bulged out even more.
“Ooooo-shit! Baby!” He bellowed in a Southern drawl. He clomped over to my table. “You is fine! FINE!!” He smelt like a stopped up urinal.
He reached my table and bent over, breathing halitosis into my face from that gaping toothless hole, “Let Annie sees them soup coolers!”
I looked at up at him, baffled and at a loss, “What? My what?”
“Your soup coolers, baby! Soup coolers!” He cooed pleadingly. He then puckered his massive crusted lips an inch away from my face and blew as if he was cooling hot soup and then husked, “Pucker up fo' Big Annie with the innerestin' fanny.” He wiggled his massive dimpled buttocks.
We blinked at each other and a moment of silence. Finally, Annie stated blankly, “I gotta pee.” And lumbered into the men’s room. He was in there for some time. I finished my beer and left.

Everyone - fag and breeder alike - needs a gimmick for some short con lovin'. Take the Mad Russian - cheapest sugar daddy in the plazita - there he is, toothless old woman face and canceled eyes. The Greek Chorus squeals that this old fart used to troll Plaza Santa Cecilia in search of rentboy in full regalia of the American Air Force back in the day - and he heralds from some Soviet bloc, mind you - grey cap and hunka plastic pinned to his shriveled and milkless teat.
Was a good con until like many of the old time queens that haunt the place, was burned so many times he is now a charred bitter old thing. Trick now is he lures some virile and sticky fingered boywhore to his lair and is said that if the sexworker's cock is too short and not up to snuff, the evil old fuck locks the boy penniless in the room and returns with another more suitable to his tastes.
However, the word is out - rentboys of the Plaza are hip to this character - your dry goods had better be what are promised or you lose to the Mad Russian. Now like a desperate vampire - night after night this polyester clad phantom shuffles the concrete way, licking of dried lips, shifting rheumy eyes searching for his next victim.

Forbidden Fruit.

Decided to go to a bar - took a cab downtown to Plaza Santa Cecilia.
Plaza Santa Cecilia is the meeting place, the central nervous system of gay Tijuana. A stretch of pedestrian concrete running diagonally from Revolution to Constitution Avenues and Second Street - topped off by that silver slash across the sky; the Millennium Arch, a bane to many locals.
There are the sidewalk cafes with their open tables - here the old American queer sits entertaining up to four or five boys at a time. These decaying fags giggle and shriek and roll their eyes at each other in vain attempts to impress their American associates at how popular they can be with younger men. The boys sit and smile and laugh at the right times, waiting to rob these festering old vampires for every penny they have.
The hustlers of Plaza Santa Cecilia are in a caste all by themselves - I have never seen their equal for persistence and all around obnoxiousness. They are without fail attracted to the uncoordinated movements of the American in a strange land - the least show of not knowing precisely where you are going, and they run at you from their lurking places in the side bars and cafes.
“Want nice chico, meester?”
“See bull fight? Donkey Show?”
“Want mota?”
“Nice boy? Show you a good time?”
“You like beeg one, meester?”
Virtually every fag in town shows up there at least once a day. Many a gay resident, especially the expats of Tijuana spend most of their waking hours in the Plaza. On all sides you see hustlers from all over the Mexican Republic washed up there in a hopeless dead end. Waiting for money orders from friends and loved ones, visas, permits that will never come - others wait in silent boredom to cross the frontier to a new and better life. Since leaving their hometowns, they have drifted on an unlucky current, always taking a wrong turn. Here they are. This is it. The last stop: Plaza Santa Cecilia.
The cruising fags would sit lounging in the shade and they would coo and screech, flipping wrists and rolling eyes, tearing each other apart with their gay double entendre.
There was a parade of hustlers to choose from. All circling the Plaza with the attitude of aroused Tomcats. One that I became friends with was a tall, handsome farm boy from the Mexican state of Sonora named Victor. Victor was one of those unfortunates who was confused about his sexuality. He claimed to have this mysterious wife and kid but because of his Adonis-like physique, he was constantly hounded by the Plaza Santa Cecilia queer sect. And almost all of them had tasted Victors Forbidden Fruit.
I recall, during my last visit to Tijuana, Victor and I lay in bed naked in a hotel room after a bit of Greek wrasslin'. Victor sighed, covered his face, and confided to me, “I don't know what to do. Everybody's talking shit that I'm a fucking faggot.”
I lit a joint, “Have you thought of stop having sex with men? That might help.”
In the Plaza is the notorious bar Villa Garcia - one of several gay locales ringing the square. It is well known for its seediness and blatant cruising homosexuals and rough hustlers. A hotbed of American pedophiles and drug addicts. The interior is a low ceiling room. On one side is a long bar tended by two tough lesbians. On the other side of the cantina are old rickety metal chairs and tables where sex and drugs are bought with indifference. There is a jukebox that plays the same tunes over and over again. And in the middle, the main floor where hustlers and queens stand and pose gazing out with probing creature lust. The restroom is a virtual bathhouse in which drugs flow as easily as the piss. Oral sex is openly common back there. There is a little dance floor that caters to strippers and tired drag shows - and you can dance on it if one felt inclined.
As I found a seat and settled in to a drunken stupor with a cold caguama Sol, I noticed a familiar face in the crowd. It was Hector, an old friend staring at me out of the smoke choked darkness. He smiled, got up and approached me. We shook hands. Hector was tall and skinny, sporting a thick black moustache.
“My, God, Hector! How have you been?” I blurted over the deafening disco beat.
“Bueno, amigo, bueno.” Hector put his arm around me and led me over to his table. “Please join me and my friends.”
He held my arm, looked me over. “You are looking good.” He said in a thick accent. “Are you visiting Tijuana?”
“No! I live here, old friend. Gosh, it’s good to see you again!”
It was good seeing Hector once more and he was as handsome as ever. I originally met him when I first visited Tijuana so long ago, it seems. I had a schoolgirl crush on him then. He always has a smile and never a bad word about anybody - was always a beacon of light in the darkness that enveloped me. He now owned his own beauty salon and invited me over someday for a haircut.
At his table was an assortment of the biggest transvestites I had ever seen. They ranged from six foot two and up. We had a ball; joked, laughed, and danced. The beer and tequila flowed and everyone got pleasantly drunk. One blue sequined dragged monstrosity who was flying on speed glowed that special glow and kept repeating “Soy Sasha.” - tottering over me in glittering menace.
Sasha was high and would not keep her hands off of me, which was a little annoying. Then, from the bowels of her costume, she pulled out a bag of cocaine.
I smiled at Sasha, lifting my wrist up to her, “May I sample your wares?”
Sasha tried to focus on me through fluttering fucked up overly mascaraed eyes. She handed me her little baggie. I sprinkled a spot onto my upturned wrist.
Snort - Wheeee!!!
The beer and tequila and cocaine flowed and everyone got pleasantly toasted. Around four in the morning, we all said good-bye and I took a taxi libre home.

Darkmatter

It was a typical sunny blue hot day and I strolled through the swanky upper end Gaslamp District of Downtown San Diego and ran into Tim Jones, an old friend who is head waiter at some fancy schmancy Persian Restaurant. We shot the shit for awhile as he gave me a tour of the two leveled eatery and after a quick whiskey shot at his bar I said my goodbyes and left.
I stopped at a Starbuck's on 5th and G and as I sat outside slurping on my Frappacino Mocha I saw that the guy next to me was reading Desolation Angels by Jack Kerouac. Ah, Kerouac...he alone opened a thousand coffee shops across America and influenced a whole generation of baby boomers to wear blue jeans. I took a look at the guy next to me, not bad. He was tall and lean with jet black hair and green eyes.
"That's a good book." I said behind my big azz Willy Wonkish Jackie-O glasses.
He paused for effect and looked at the cover. "It's a great book. I find his writing prose quite interesting. Such a free spirit he was. Some people were born to move from one place to the next, explore and then write about it. I wish I had the balls to do that. Never be tied down...always able to go where you want to go and do what you want to do. I lead such a boring life."
"Really?" I grinned. "I bet he would have traded places with you if he had the chance. Chaos always craves what it cannot attain and that is stability."
He studied me for a moment. I took off my glasses and slurped at my Frappacino. "You are a very interesting guy." He smiled.
Yes, chemistry.
I extended the glad hand. "Hi...I'm Luis."
"My name is Chris."
We then sat for four hours smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee and talked of literature, the War in Iraq, Flash Gordon, and the great household items at Target as tired tourist shuffled by under the blast of pale sun. As the sky turned dark navy and the stars began to come out, we visited Cafe Ole, a Spanish Bar and Restaurant on the strip. We laughed and talked. I ordered a Singapore Sling and he drank beer.
"So do you live downtown?"
"No...no, I live in Tijuana."
"Tijuana?" He gasped. Then the old I hate Tijuana routine spilt forth. The al-kee-hall started its effect and Chris gave me that look with those dreamy eyes. Or maybe the liquor was talking. What was certain we were both tore up from the floor up.
I decided to gamble with it, "I know of a cheap hotel nearby. Just a few blocks thataway."
He bit his bottom lip and mumbled something positive. Money was slapped on the bar, door flung open and we slipped out into the brisk night air. Into the Pickwick Hotel we strode and paid for a tiny room with a bed and a television. Bathroom down the hall. Paint flaking and roaches having a siesta.
First, it started with light kissing, then we undressed and I lay on top of him. Our organs stiffened as I rubbed my body on top of his, filling his mouth with my tongue. Condom was applied, lubed and Chris slid his long circumcised penis in me with slow circular motions. I held onto his muscular ass. He held my feet as I played with his nipples. Legs were stroked, toes sucked. The sweat started running down his chest as he rapidly drew in breath after breath. I started moaning through clenched teeth. The boy was quite pneumatic in the hips. Thrusting harder; his forehead touched mine and our wet hair stuck together, he gasped Oh God Oh God as I could feel the semen rush up through his penis and into the condom.
Later we lay under the ceiling fan and shared a Lucky Strike. We stared into the darkness and whispered nothings to each other. Then:
"Do you have a boyfriend?"
"No."
"Why?"
"It's a luxury my kind can't afford."
"Why do you always talk so esoteric?"
"To force people to think. Anyway...I'm leaving town in a few days. A Kerouac trip."
"When will you be back?"
"Never."
Afterwards, it was pretty anti-climatic. We slept in each others arms. Well, Chris slept. I don't sleep. When the sun broke over the horizon and the sounds and rumbles of the City started to clamor, I slipped on my clothes and exited the room leaving him snoring to him self. Cute and lovable. But, he snores too loud.
I returned to Tijuana and stopped at Cafe Norteno and had a cuppa black coffee and a cigarette. Why is it that I always meet someone who is perhaps my other half right before I leave town? You see, I have made a decision - my book is finished and I want to take a trip. I have purchased a ticket to Mexicali and then on to Guadalajara - all via bus. My goal is Panama City, Panama. No map, no hurry - just traveling at my leisure and experiencing kicks.
Son cosas de la vida, cabrones...

Ignorance is Strength

Woke up the wee hours of Monday, showered and donned a black suit with black fedora. Looking quite like a cog at the Ministry of Information in Brazil. Laptop satchel and cup of coffee in hand I dart to the subway - hostile glances from the transient population as I march by the homeless shelter spilling out predawn breakfast scavengers.

Shot underground and rode BART to Daly City station - early morning commuters gazing around like sleepy turtles. I find the ominous structure and enter the sterile lobby long shadows of cold prison bar windows stretch across the green tile floor and up to the cold glare of the ashen receptionist. "40th floor." He wheezes with out a flick of emotion.

"Do you want to see my identification? Call up, let 'em know I'm here?"

He doesn't look at me - continues reading his reports, "I know you're here, Mr. Blasini. 40th floor."

The silent elevator ascends yellow lights flash across my face. Enter the long windowless hall - silent as a tomb. Suite 436. Knock-knock. Loud buzzer shocks me into focus and I enter the cavernous office.

In the spacious granite colored office furnished only with desk, file cabinet and guest chair - on the far wall looked like some kind of medieval torture rack with tubes and dials growing out of it's foreboding rust colored form - my publishing contact sits behind black contemporary desk cluttered with files, reports, photos. He looks like a diseased lizard - thin, pale, small glasses perched on the end of hawk-like nose. He looks up to me and without a smile or any emotional warmth gestures for me to sit in the overstuffed green velvet chair opposite him. I sit, remove my hat.

His boney face contorts into a smiling skull, "Glad, you could make it, Mr. Blasini. There are several items I wish to smooth out in relation to your contract with us."

My head starts to swim, go foggy - I cough and mumble, "Uhm...sure."

Two hours of contractual haggling and screaming and pleading - at one point on my knees sobbing like a child under that cold predatory stare long streams of my saliva and snot drip to the floor and onto his well polished shoes. I black out under his harsh and relentless whining. I wake up in a fetal position in the corner glistening in cold sweat, he standing over me with a contract as thick as a metropolitan phone book. He juts it into my face, "Very well - glad you see it our way. Sign here...here...here...here...here...please press harder...and here."

I pull my self up, shaking and wanting to puke. He puts an icy hand onto my shoulder, "Don't you have a plane to catch back to that quaint slum you chose to dwell?"

I fumble with my things and quietly leave the office not daring to look back in case his face is superimposed onto my retina.

I leave the building and head back to the hotel, grab my shit, and return to the airport. I sit staring at a huge fresco of Buck Rogers amid the roar of rushing jets. I smile.

I am finally a published writer...

Twin Peaks

The sun boiled away in a blazing yellow mass as I exited my hotel and clodded out onto sidewalks teeming with the filth of the night. The smells of car exhaust and pungent homeless assailed my nostrils as I made my way to the subway. Past shopping carts crammed with memories broken alcohol bottles mingled with piss and vomit. Black pimps screamed at passing cars and hiphop hoods stood in doorways shivering waiting for The Man. Market Street and Minna is the skid row of the world. Gone are the Benzedrine fueled beat poets of legend replaced by the ever present glow of a crack pipe.
Jump the BART to a station and I head to Castro Street to see what all the fuss is about. Fairies flitter and coo in stylized ballets in leather and denim down sidewalks lined with Victorian buildings and I find a bar that i can relate to - Twin Peaks.

I order a beer and sit staring out the large glass plate windows at the night that is picking up. I look around - old gentlemen of leisure sit and laugh and drink. Very few youngsters. A few quick beers and I am approached by an elderly white man and his young black friend - casual conversation and jokes and laughter that I live in Tijuana.

The black guy - who is named Daniel - invites me to his next destination called 440 Castro. We say our goodbyes and jet over to the next joint - upon entering I notice that it is a goddamn leather bar. Bloated, bearded queens coo and cackle with their hairy ass pansas falling out. I do not enjoy a crowd as such - however the people where quite the friendly sort. So, hell - I let my hair down. Several behemoths flittered at me and was commenting with lascivious grins, "Lookit that cub!" Cub? As in bear cub? Ugh. Thoughts of John Merrick passed in my head, "I am not an animal - I am a human being!"

Even after some shots of whatever, I even loosened up and was quite the witty one. One note: The wait staff is very prompt and courteous - the guys (Though rotund and hairy) were the friendliest queers I have met in many a moon. Almost - almost! - changed my view on American queer joints.

Liquor and booze always is a good combo and as the night progressed so did the advances of Daniel. Tall and thin, he is a handsome man, and I am not just talking through beer goggles. He invited me to some joint called Meat Rack - I thought what a cute name for a bar. It turned out to be sex club.

Okay.

Payed the twink at the door and entered the dim lit halls. Music pounded and 80's porn warbled from monitors. The sounds of gasps and grunts of random broken lust. Daniel sure likes the elderly - cause this place was crawling with wrinkled ashen queens doing their insidious business. Daniel and I - both still drunk were siphoned into a dark recess and again I was acquainted with the black myth. Long hard erection exposed and I kneeled down and did what I do best. Another African American sided up, took out his long and nasty and joined in. I was flopped around, pawed, man handled and liberties taken with my virtue.

Two hours later, I find myself alone in a 24hr coffee shop hung over and ass sore staring out the plate glass at the trolley cars rumbling by. An old bum, blackened gray by the dirt of the Metropolis staggers by on the opposite side of the street - he slouches and stumbles staggering on, blackened hand, shiny over the dirt leaves a grimy trail on the office windows...

Hurtling through the stratosphere - knuckles white and face of pallor. I hate flying - nothing this big should be in the air. With bumps and quivers screech to a halt at the San Fransisco airport. Queasily attain my small luggage and make my way to the BART system to acquire a room downtown. It is 3:30am and the terminal is crowded with weary passengers and pink faced drunk revelers. At the kiosk to purchase a BART ticket - I feel like a damn rube with this contraption and seek help from surly Filipino attendant. The subway is empty save for bloated smelly black hobo - grey beard a mess, clothes shiny over the dirt. On the other end sitting as silent and aloof as a statue an Asian man - dark eyes black as obsidian mirrors.
I check the stations via the on board map, make my way to Powell, Montgomery and my final destination Embarcadero. Up up up the silent escalator to the concrete surface.
Lit a Lucky and clomped down to Mission and 6th - old haunt of Jack Kerouac and Ginsberg. Trash lined streets with old liquor stores and porno shops and cut rate hotels. The throng of deviants that prowled the night were out in full force. Junkies squealed and meth addicts howled at the yella moon as prostitutes of both sexes did their stylized ballet back in forth of the Pussycat Theater. Florescent shadows played along cracked walls "Hey, man - ya lookin'?" White boy hip hop asks through bent teeth.
I find Minna St. and dash down the dank alley buzzed through metal gates at the Pink Flamingo Hotel under the bloodshot eyes of the passive Hindi. Slap forty dollars down and make it to my small foul smelling room - smells of mildew and dried semen and bleach waft with muffled sounds from radios, televisions, moaning whores.
Storing my shit, I head back outside and across 6th to the corner store for sweet cakes and coffee. From a bar next door the cocagraphy of yelps and shouts emit - decide to enter.
Honky tonk blares and I am eyed by aggressive locals like animals sensing danger. I order a Carona and lean up against the bar. Old hag with black moles and floppy tits asks for a drink and I mutter scattah. Scowls and leaves. I down my drink and cut, cause I'm beat, ya dig. I will tour this metropolis manana.
The reason - the goddam reason I had to travel here is the way of my publishing company all of a sudden getting shady and changing their agreement on certain royalties for my novel. Shyster bitches. Will attend meeting with said high muckity mucks lunes - er, I mean Monday and see the outcome if it outcome.
Will definitely check the gay scene here - I hear it is quite something...

Flying High on Blue Tommorrows

Didn't think being a literary agent was so much work. To sort out Kafkian red tape for said book of mine - that ravenous little monster - I will be hopping a jet to San Fransisco tonight. Ticket provided free and gratis from publisher - sweet old bitch. So, of course will file a full report on happenings on this third outing to the City by The Bay.

Scary part is - and seriously the thought gives me the heebie jeebies - on the way back will be stopping off in Los Angeles - a concrete nightmare that I have not set foot in willingly in over 23 years - to deliver a couple of copies to two estranged constituents. Hey, the plus side is they are two men that know their drink and am looking forward to some good lush kicks...

And so....

MS13 times two.

Attended a house party with my good thugs Saul and Hector last night in the wilds of TJ - that's Tijuana in Mexico for you ignorant assholes - anyway much booze and mota y coca was consumed by gangstas and nacos like veracious ravenous beetles. Dark silhouettes in tepid grey smoke mill about the shadows in clots and groups passing plastic cups containing tasty beverages.

The hacienda - old Spanish colonial style trap that seemed to be crumbling under it's own weight - was nestled at the foot of the Great Mountain. The house was an obvious gangland hideout - rusted used cars piled in the yard home to filthy dusty dogs and the home itself covered in candy colored graffiti. The host was a member of the notorious MS13 - his face and bald head an kaleidoscope of arabesque tattoos. Broad smile and introduced me to several nefarious villains of the night. Smoke smoke smoke we did - not all tobacco - stood in the kitchen with lethal Amazonian transvestites concocting their brew like macho mamacita witches.
Anyhoo, the shack was packed with a myriad of Mexicans and it seemed I was the only gringo in the joint and, yup, was under constant scrutiny - however I also was under the care of the titanic transvestites that guarded the kitchen entrance. When everyone got pleasantly toasted - the anxiety level dropped - somewhat.
At one point, some naco pulled out a gun in the back yard and caused a stampede of flesh - but the jerk was subdued by soldiers of the underground - never found out what happened and didn't wanna. Several drunk cholos made faggot remarks - bad ones - but moved on under the imperious glare of my sequined protectors.
Hooked up with skinny curly haired named David, he says - he of MS13 by act of Congress - asks if I play around. Sure, I sigh gazing a gazeless gaze into them dark foreboding eyes.

He puts lean brown finger up to my lips and smiles, "Loose lips sink ships round here. Don't worry - later you get your cookies, guero."

Party continued - reggeaton bangin' blared as doe eyed cha-cha girls back their thangs up - puchecos hip hop and down caguama after caguama...snatches of dialogue concerning the six bodies found near here the previous night decapitated, mutilated. Chuckles and smirks. The lights play long shadows on grimy walls as street soldiers pass giving me that eye.
'Round four David and I skiddadle burracho to a fifty peso a night hotel and do all kinda filthy crimes against nature - doggy is a fabulous position...gasps and lusty moans permeate the misty still night under that big yellow baneful moon...
Sunday mornin' - head hurt, ass sore - nothing outta the ordinary. David says laterz and I high tail it back to Plaza Santa Cecilia in el centro for a scrumptious bowl of menudo.
Mexico is a dream.

The Heart is Decietful Above All Things

Clouds pass by over The City. I stand on the balcony puffing on my Lucky Strike - feeling guilty because in this day and age cigarette smokers are considered complete and utterly evil, ya know? Below the shoppers of Horton Plaza - San Diego's seven story monument to rampant consumerism - bustle from shop to shop. Happy clean assholes confident in their control of their little personal empires.

Standing - barely - next to me is a withered old man - a ninety year old sidewalk sleeping acquaintance from my Vinnie's days, he chose to live on the streets twenty years ago and never looked back - hunched, long nose droops over toothless mouth, his face a wrinkled paper bag, eyes black dark soulless. His dark navy coat is dirty - shiny over the dirt. He is smoking, too.

We are discussing life and it's worth. I had been wracked by insidious depressions lately and when I do - I always entertain the idea of pulling the plug. Waking up and not wanting to face what ever stupid shit God hurls at me. Wanting to end this life, because quite frankly - I am bored with it. I mention that I want to chuck the whole thing and just wonder aimlessly around the planet.

"Take Jesus Christ, for example." He states. "He was the King of Kings - yet he wondered all his short life homeless. Buddha, Muhammad - all your so called prophets - were transients. Do not put your worries on material possessions. They are nothing. Your soul - your spiritual happiness is the only thing that matters."

I confided that I had been thinking of ending it, again. I felt ashamed. I mentioned the only thing that has stopped me - had stopped me from previous attempts - is the belief that suicide was the one sin that God don't take any shit with. You're fucked in the eyes of the Lord in that sense.

"You realise." He croaks in his thick French/Canadian accent, "When we die - it is not the end."

"You're talking of heaven?" I ask inhaling another deep puff - watching a clunk of thick grey ash spiral down to the levels below.

"No." He wheezes like a broken accordion. "I am speaking of reincarnation." He waves his hand in dismissal. "I have been reincarnated many times. I remember some my past lives - on other planets, in distant galaxies."

I blink - taking this fodder in.

"You wanna coffee? I'm hittin' Starbucks." I ask, glancing at my watch. The Wrestler started in twenty minutes and I wanted to catch it. No was the reply and I said my goodbyes to this crazed street living hobo guru.

After the movie, which was quite good - I jumped the trolley back to the Mexican border. At a station, a large black man - well dressed and wearing flashy gold trinkets sat across from me. He held a laptop blasting funk as he harshly spoke to someone via his bluetooth ear piece.

Old white man - slicked back white hair, blazer with patches on the elbows sitting a few seats away states that there is no radio playing on the train. All other passengers are quiet. Black man issues forth hostile comments to said white man, "Wut you muthuh fuckin cop? You don't tell me fuckin nuthin. Fuck you - fuck the cops! I'll say it to thier fuckin faces 'Fuck the cops!'" Stream of more hostile insults to the old white man.

Next stop, there is a patrol officer checking tickets with onboarding passengers. Tall handsome Latino in tight black uniform - he could have been a model if he wanted to change professions. Old white man sticks his head out the open door and explains the situation concerning the old black man. Trolley patrol enters and as he is passing us - old black man is sitting in front of me - their eyes meet.

"You gotta fucking problem?" Snarls the old black man.

Pissing of testosterone ensues, snapping insulting remarks by both - the cop has to keep control and save face, right. "Sir, I need you to step off the trolley at the next stop so we can discuss this."

"Fuck you! I ain't gettin off till my stop, muthuh fuckuh!"

Then it gets out of hand. The cop grabs the old black man and tries to throw him off the trolley with ill effect. The passengers are yelling for the cop to leave him alone, he didn't do anything, appalled at the abuse of authority that this young Latino is displaying. The trolley cop hurls the old black man off the trolley once it reaches the next station.

Outside as the trolley sits idle, the two erupt into a fist fight.

I turn at a young black kid - him and his friends jumping up and down excitingly on the seats watching the confrontation - the kid yells at the cop, "You just mad coz Obama is president!"

I smile and turn back to the fight outside. The young Latino is on his back with the old black man sitting on his chest pummeling him with his fists. That was until four squad cars roar up, swarm the old black man and beat him with their clubs.

The trolley continues on its route. This world is sick and evil. The things I do are nothing, I think, compared to the evil that I see around me. I stumble home in a bigger frump than when I awoke that morning...

Did my Part.

Warm sunny morning here in Putaville. Don my street clothes snatch up my cigs and hop the belching bus to el centro, ya know what I mean? Ya hear what I'm sayin'? Hit downtown amid mobs of locals shopping eating living. Arrive at Park Tiente Gurrerro - that arboreal cruising ground crawling with fluttering old predators and the boys who love them - searching for long lost and presumably incarcerated Saul. No such luck so I move on.

Stride past gawking sweaty tourist and aloof locals into Plaza Santa Cecilia - roving packs of mariachi and unrelentless army of hawkers that could and do work your last goddamn nerve. I search for Chuck the canuck but to no avail. Pass Hotel Nelson wafting in the smell of cervezas and seared meat when I am approached at the base of the millennium arch by a handsome ghost. My mind whirls in the direction of where do I know this character - so many, so many - thousands of faces pass my minds eye but I can't catalog the fucker.

He seems all smiles and quite familiar with Your Reporter - I just judge him as another sticky fingered rentboy lost in the puzzle. But, no! It is Luis! My cerebral hard drive burns and crackles in the nostalgic memories of this lad from my days at St. Vincent de Paul's. Yusta drink forties with him and other illegals amid garbage heaps huddling in piss drenched doorways of crumbling factories laughing the night away. Ah, yes - I remember him now.

He chitchats and hits me up for ten pesos for a phone call. Snatches the coin and cuts. I meander around the plaza scoping out the hotties - when minutes later Luis returns with a frown that won't quit. He batters my ears with his tale of woe on how a week previous he is toiling in some ranchero up Washington way and is deported by the INS who are very persistent and obviously takes their job seriously. So, poor Luis was booted back to Mexico - and to Tijuana where he - like scores of others stumbling down these cracked trash littered streets - knows not soul one. But me. The phone call he attempted to make was his contact in San Diego - but the asshole ain't answering the phone.

However, I cheer my good buddy up by inviting him to some toothsome enchiladas in which he ate with such voraciousness - not having a decent meal, he claims for a week. I explained that there was a small get together at my beach house that night and if he would like to attend. Got nothin else was the reply.

So, boarded that raggedy ass bus and headed beachward.

Once there was surprised and delighted to find two invited guests already planted on the porch - they being Manuel and Jose - with Chuck already in the kitchen cooking up a storm. Said howdy's and exchanged handshakes then Luis and I repairing to my room for a quick slurp and suck. We lay in the cool darkness of the room afterwards and I am told that he will attempt the boarder jump manana by way of Nogales, Arizona and Mexico respectfully.

"Stay the night here, then. Get a good night's rest." I suggest and we fall into a couple of hours sleep. Awaken by vicious knocks on my door and there is Eduardo and Gonzalo wondering when we are going to eat - both holding a case of cold cerveza Sol.

Much chatting and laughing and drinking on the back patio with present guests after the arrival of Abel and Saul - Saul was horded up in some hotel recovering from previous night of debauchery - and that Saul is one hella kisser. Later, the gang with Chuck and I, devoured the banquet prepared and then sat in the living room on big overstuffed couches and shot the shit picking teeth and guzzling more beer listening to Mexican top 40 on the radio.

Night crawls into morning and slowly the boys dwindle until it is just Luis and I. Round five, Luis showers and we part on the corner after hailed taxi. As I pass Luis a two hundred peso note, I wish him good luck jesting that I never want to see him in Mexico again.

Hungover, trudge the block back to my house and crash into a needed sleep...