Answering the Call

As people age and move various times to different locales, people tend to make new friends. That's what I hear, anyway. There are the friends that become surrogate families, the people you strive to see and feel so, so close to even if you see them every other year (at best), and there are the people you see regularly and socially that become that new social network, if you will, that sustains your need for social interaction.

The people outside my family that I spend the most time with are work colleagues. And these people, by and large, I like very much and with whom I am quite friendly. But, we don't make social dates very often, unless it's to a bar once or twice a year. Then we have the parents of kids my kid is friendly with, and, right now, this is probably our closest and most often seen social group. There are some couple friends that we met since moving to Long Beach that I at least see with some regularity, but that's mostly turned into Corrie telling me to go out with the boys every once in a while. They don't have kids.

There's Victor. There's Johnny Dang.

There're the buddies from college whom I love, but rarely see, and oddly, still consider them in the innermost circle of friendship.

And then, for us, there's even the couple we met at the pizza shop who have a daughter a little younger than our boy, and who, because of compatibility with us, have become somewhat of odd, interloping inner-circle folks. Because we're not from LA and have lived far, far away from "home," we tend to "get" foreigners. This particular couple was also not born in LA (he's from London, she's from Canada), but they felt the same love for our neighborhood that Corrie and I discovered. They're very similar to us in age, but a year older on both accounts (he's a year older than me, and she's a year older than Corrie); she works as an executive and he stays home with their daughter, an arrangement that Corrie and I mulled a decade ago.

This young lady, though is pregnant.

Well, was pregnant.

We've both moved in the last few weeks, and now we're even closer than before. We brought up in discussion that, hey, if necessary, if you ever need us to watch your daughter as you head to have the next baby, give us a call. They smiled and thanked us.

A couple weeks go by and we hang out again and they say, well, you know, there are a few days after my (the fella's) brother heads back to London and her sister won't quite be in from Toronto...maybe we could call you if we need?

Of course.

That window just closed. But...

Last night we got a text: "About 7-8 minutes between contractions. Not going anywhere until 3 min between, but if you can't help us, which is cool, now's the time to say so."

I responded: "Ready anytime. I even turned on my ringer."

That was acknowledged, and about two hours later, while Corrie was busy making brownies (don't ask), the text came in informing us that the contractions were at 3 minutes apart, and the time to come over was good.

I went over, had a few words with a paradoxically calm and flustered Londoner, and proceeded to chill on their couch, mostly sleeping, from 10 until 6 am, when Corrie and Cass showed up to spell me, so I could go home and get ready for work.

I was awoken a few times by the daughter, but everything was fine. Also, I realized that's the silver lining with having a child as difficult as the one we have: I FEEL LIKE I CAN HANDLE ANYBODY'S CHILD.

They had a baby boy before noon today, September 20th. I still don't know the new man's name. See, he's not even a young man yet, he's just a new man.

Congratulations Julie and Stephan!

As they were leaving last night, Stephan looked at me and asked, after he had showed me the important things, "So, you okay?" I assured him I was. He turned to Julie and asked, "You okay?"

She smiled and said, "I'll be fine for the next two minutes," with an eyebrow nod that said LET'S GO.

He turned back to me and said, "Hey man, seriously, thanks."

I said, "Thanks? I'm honored to be able to help you out like this. Thank you."

Sometimes it feels like we don't have any friends. And as we joked about the topic (before the Boy was born), we'd name nearly ten people that we would regularly see socially, or at least at parties, and feel comfortable talking to as if we were as close as would be the case had we known each other for far longer than reality states.

We left our hub for friends-as-family---San Luis Obispo---for Brooklyn. Surrounded by the country's largest city, and we essentially only had each other and Marc and Linda. The quick realization in Texas was that it was mostly just the two of us again, and here in Long Beach we'd just been accustomed to not having any friends.

Again, that's an exaggeration, and I know I have people I can rely on to hang out---if I ever called. Hell, my surprise birthday party this year brought out tons of folks from the LA woodwork.

It just felt nice to have people in our lives who felt close enough to us to ask us this favor, and trust us with their daughter.

At work today I beamed the entire time. I started my story with, "So, I slept on my friend's couch last night," and enjoyed the pensive looks and "What happened," line of questioning. I monitored my phone for news of the planet's new addition, and then I showed off the newborn's picture like an uncle. At that time, I didn't even know the sex.

I was not joking about being honored to be a part of their experience.

And I was honored to hold my nephew Norman on the day he was born, back in 2011, months after moving back to California. Sometimes the years between weird happenings helps sharpen the perspective.

Finally Made it Stateside

While in Rome I learned about a certain graphic novel. It was on the last day of the Pynchon Week conference when a speaker's time was spent discussing a German graphic novel that had recently been translated into English:

Named Miller & Pynchon, at it's core it's a graphic retelling of Pynchon's own novel Mason & Dixon. While M&D is nearly 800 pages, this is shy of 180, so what gets cut? How is it cut? Too much to mention, too much to figure out.

The art is great, in its own minimalist and cartoony way.

One neat thing I thought was how they subverted the M&D characters in this piece. Mason is the "boss" and Dixon is the fun-loving Quaker, and here, Pynchon is the character with the Quaker hat, but he's also the "boss."

Another neat thing is how author Leopold Maurer weaves in many anecdotes from many Pynchon novels. This gentleman knows his Pynchon content.

Something else...

I ordered this book pretty much immediately once we got back. Weeks went by. I contacted the seller; they told me that international orders may take longer and to re-contact them if by X date it hadn't arrived.

It had not arrived by their stated date, so I let them know. They apologized and refunded my money.

Months later, after we'd moved to our new place, Corrie had returned from the old place with a tiny, book-sized package. "Did you order something?"

BINGO.

September's Summer-Selfie Spectacular!

When I was younger, and having been gifted a point-and-shoot Cannon camera, I occasionally turned the camera on myself. I did this to try and capture me in the frame with whatever stuff I also wanted in frame, like Mayan ruins or the sweeping forests of the Adirondacks from a high point.

This was back when point-and-shoot cameras were more of a thing, before smart phones killed that market.

Corrie would make fun of me when she looked through my pictures. "Sure gotta lotta pictures of yourself, here," with a hint of condescending malice in her voice. My only response was that it was only because she was off with her SLR camera taking NICE photos, which is insulting because now I'm blaming her like it's her problem.

The term "selfie" hadn't even been added to the common vernacular at that point.

When it did enter the lexicon at-large, I by and large stopped taking that type of picture.

Until I had a kid. And the phones make it so easy to take them. And my kid likes it. And sometimes the pictures turn out pretty nice.

I still only take that type of picture with my boy, but as I scrolled through my pictures to show an old acquaintance some of the Italy stuff, I realized that my and my son's face showed up a lot in my pictures from over there.

So...come up with an alliterative title, and a blog-post is born.

I am going to try and dump a bunch of them here, from our places in Long Beach to our trips to Italy and Florida this summer.

At the Colosseum 

Birthday on the Spanish Steps

AirBnB, Rome

Same; condo in Rome

Otygia Island, Syracuse, Sicily

Father's Day, Syracuse

Syracuse

Same as above, Syracuse

Inside Cave, Syracuse Ruins Park

It was about here that I got self conscious about the sheer volume of selfies...do I have a problem?

Temples at Agrigento 

Same, Temples at Agrigento

Palermo

NOT HAVING FUN, Palermo

Pompeii

Pompeii again

Finally done with the Italy selfies, and the embarrassment of the selfie numbers sets in...

Shady spot, Promenade Park, Long Beach

Ali mural, Long Beach

Newsies Cap, old Apartment

And then we went to Orlando...

Before breakfast, Gertie in the background

At lunch inside the outside at the drive-in

At breakfast, showing off his new Stitch cap

DINOSAURS!

At the arcade, waiting to fly to PHX and on to OKC

Airport chilling

Back to the shady spot at the Promenade Park

Our new apartment

At this point, beyond the mortification of showing all these pictures, I realize that they are tangible artifacts of my adoration and limitless love for my son.

Dispatch from Down the Street

So, we've upgraded our Awesome Tiny Beach Apartment.

We've left our little corner one-bedroom for a spot literally down the street. This is still a Tiny Beach Apartment, but it has two bedrooms, two bathrooms, two PARKING SPOTS, and air-conditioning.

The complex is three blocks away closer to the center of town, we're higher up in the building than before, which means it gets better cross breeze so the AC isn't as necessary at night as it would have been in the old place. We have a balcony and a loft space with some loft storage area.

The complex is even still pretty ghetto, so it matches our "I (Heart) Ghetto Long Beach"-sticker sporting ethos, and, more importantly, in our price range. Corrie can still walk to work, we're slightly closer to the Aquarium, and barely further from the grocery store.

Everyone we've met so far has been super nice.

This is looking at some of our downtown scene from the walkway to the front door:

This is fro our balcony looking west along third. I think I was trying to get the art-deco post office in the frame:

When I started this blog, we lived in the two bedroom place in Brooklyn. Then we moved to Austin and lived with Rachel. After eight months we moved to our own place in a nice complex. After another eight months we moved to Long Beach, and had been in that apartment for 8+ years.

We loved that apartment.

We also had been sleeping in the living room for two years, and had been having to store a bunch of shit in a storage unit. Why do we have so much stuff (Corrie's been asking for years)?

We have an elevator now. This is the first building I've ever lived in that has an elevator. Not my dorm, not my apartment building in Bed-Stuy, not the complex in Austin... This is also the first time since Palm St that we have a bathroom in our bedroom. Back at Palm St, though, it was the only bathroom.

Compared to what we had, our new place is a palace. For even friends and family who have plenty of space---and yards, and driveways---this new place would likely still feel pretty cramped.

And it is cramped. But we're weirdo urban-folk, and it will suit us until we can no longer handle it. And considering what we had been dealing with at the old place, that could be a while.