in mid air

so sleepy
feel like i’ve been drugged
outside the window
is a pile of clouds
which looks funny
among the languidly rolling sea of its friends
i only slept a few hours last night
and this is my second flight of the day
i just ate a big burrito
the last one made by mexicans i’m sure i’ll have in a while:
i’m heading to New York
jersey first, really
for a few days
then i’ll walk into the city. . .
but what’s been going on?
little escapades…
tell the stories.
I arrived at Zuni Mountain Sanctuary August 21st.
i got a ride from a guy i had talked with on the internet down to St Helena to do a massage on thursday night before that
got another client while i was waiting for him to get home
picked some fruit
gave the other massage
came back to his house
ate and slept
massaged him in the morning
and he drove me down to town
where i met a guy i’d talked with on line for a while who lives at Gay Ground Zero
despite himself
(laughs)
sweet guy
nice cuddling and play
and then SF hit me as it always does with talks of disease and worry and distraction
and i did my best to hold course
after my little rest and romp in bed
i went out to meet a friend of mine i’d not seen in a while
really cute red-bearded bear who’d taken some pictures of me
there is an attraction between us
but we’ve not had sex
we have hung out as friends a few times, though
so we walked through town talking
to Delores park
to sit on the hill
and rest in the shade
(though i like the sun.. he’s a fair red hair…)
There
another friend called
big red beard, but more of a sun-bear
he isn’t so cute
i just find him astoundingly beautiful
he’s really sexy and hot and stuff
but his beauty de-rails me
i sometimes forget about sex with him
or get so nervous from his beauty
that i forget about how sexy he is
we
he met us
and there i was
between two adorable men
with red beards
walking through the park
through the mission
back to the first friend’s house
nice conversation:
i nearly surprised myself
by asking them about apartment prices and suggestions
as i felt tired of treating San Francisco like a Bath-house
all i did when i was down there was massage and sex
and Misha, the beautiful/hot one
made me feel almost cheap
(but more inspiring than degrading: that quality that makes me want to be a better person)
by his talking of all the events he did
the way he interracted with his sexual groups in other life-affirming ways than just CUMMING
also a certain level of trepidation and respect that i have been lacking lately.
of course
he then followed up a comment David (the other beautiful red bearded boy) made
when discribing his neighbourhood
“oh yes, a very nice bar.. and very nice resturants… and at the base of the building is the unemployment office…”
Misha says
“oh man, if i lived here i’d be standing at the edge of that line with a 40 ouncer and a pack of cigarettes asking the boys if they’d like to come up and watch some porn”
Misha and i walked back towards the Bart
but i reminded him that the Mex in the Mission don’t exactly take kindly to guys making out in the public space
(my friend Leo got chased around and spit at after i kissed him in the same place)
AND
i fully intented to burry my face in his arm pits before i left town
so we walked over to Rainbow grocery
even though it wasn’t really necessary
i was still feeling in love with the city
so i was happy to walk around
and it made for the perfect place
among the trees in front of the main entrance
for us to chew on eachother’s beards
breath into eachother’s mouths with hungry fiery kisses
sticking our hands into eachother’s pants to grab eachother’s furry asses
and fingers in the moist hair of the pit
to taste and smell
and be followed fully by the tongue and beard
we gasped and laughed
and straightened our clothes
and said good bye
and i walked towards the castro on Market
deciding, eventually, to go to RadioShack
because i was looking for a car-power-adapter for my mp3 player
… they didn’t have one
but the salesperson talking to me was in LOVE with me
totally jumping down my throat
and in 15 minutes had convinced me to buy a digital camera
… i flipped a coin
and it said NO
but i went along and did it anyway
only to find
a day later
that the camera didn’t do anything that he said it would
didn’t even take the kind of memory card he sold to me
and wasn’t compatible with the recharable batteries
SO
…
i met up with Trey
the friend i was heading down to New Mexico with
… it took a while of preparation
in which i began to feel tired
but realized i loved Trey more and more
(he had the first ever paper-back copy of John Crowley’s “Ægypt” i’d ever seen)
we got on the road at midnight
with the little suzukie sidekick packed to the gills
with an old cat in a box
and all of us kinda sleepy
— i needn’t tell that whole tale
but i ended up driving most of the way
munching esspresso beans and drinking an “energy drink” called
ROCK STAR
it was just a little over 16 hours of travelling
and i was pretty blown out buy the time we got there
we got incorrect directions to boot
and
this being monsoon time in NM
there was lightning and rain sweeping the mountains
the road we turned on was a mud pit
and i had to drive through fast in second gear with the windshield wipers running fast and spraying fluid so i could see through all the mud splashing on the car
and it ended up being the wrong road
no bother
we found our way
set up our tents
just as it started to rain
i walked down to the main camp and said hello:
joyous to see some of the kids i knew
and happy to just head back to my tent and crash
i wrote a good deal during the gathering and just after
and have posted it back-dated round the times i actually wrote them
they aren’t so much Events
as they are things i thought of while i was there
and after:
my time near Santa Fe with Wolf…
but there was one thing i meant to write about
that i didn’t get around to
so, seeing that it’s mostly story
i’ll tell it here:
the second day i was there
i was talking with a guy named Red Wolf who attracted me by the faboulousness of his being
and up to me walked a guy who looked a bit like Tom Hanks
and instead of having a strange ole faery name
he introduced himself as “Will”
(maybe that IS a faery name…)
after he said Hello
he turned to Red Wolf and said
“did you hear there’s a guy who wants to hike up into the Notch to find some Osha?”
two days before leaving the Hermitage
i was talking with Leo about herbs
and got out my books
and was showing him stuff and encouraging him to investigate these things for himself
… my curiosity took me into reading about Osha: one of my favourite roots…
i found that it grows where Zuni Mountain Sanctuary is
in the mountains
above 7000 ft
and i made a decision that i would try and find someone to go pick it with when i got there
so
WHAM
here it is
presented to me
before i even needed try…
it was two days later when we went up to find it
Will and i… and Dream Eagle.. and a boy named Matty
the Notch is a part in the middle of a long mountain ridge
apparently caused naturally by water erosion
it’s been used for hundreds of years by local tribes for trading
the top of the ridge was above 10,000ft
so we set out shortly after 9am so we could be back by dinner: it was an all-day hike.
it was amazing
the slow plodding required by us all
not being used the elevation…
all the petrified tree we found
and other strange and beautiful agates…
four of us boys
and four dogs came with us
… whenever we split up
the dogs always split up to match the groups… it was odd
we found Yarrow and wild Rose, purple asters and wild strawberry.
and
eventually
at the top of the mountain
on the north, more moist slope, we found the Osha
not as big as we suspected it would be
but we did fine some big roots
and ate some fresh
(which i’d wanted to do ever since Bridget told me how amazing it was)
and it was!
it was like i was kicked by lightning
— i felt my body jittering and bucking
i’d try to talk or laugh or anything
but had to stay bent over against the hole in the ground i was digging
for about five minutes
just feeling it coursing through me…
Osha is called “Bear Root” by folk tradition
When Bears wake up from hibernation
they find this stuff and dig it up
chew on it
and it makes them cough up all the stuff that’s been settling in their body while they were sleeping…
and i heard that some of the tribes around where it grows
would wear it round their neck
so the bears knew they were friends
… i have carried a piece of root with me on most of my journies since i first discovered it at heartwood back in 2000…
so the bears knew i was their friend
(grin)
– – –
by the time we got back to ZMS
we were all pretty hungry and tired
and so ate
and rested a bit
… because i intended to do a Sweat that night…
an Apache Beardache sweat…
it thouroughly kicked my ass
i was so tired
but when i got there
i got all raucious
and started mouthing off
but half way through the second round
i was shoving my face in the mud and whimpering
— it was very powerful
but left me feeling run-over by a heard of bulls
(i’ll skip ahead to tell the rest of the tale)
i went into Albuquerque last saturday
and spent the night there with Will
got a ride up to Santa Fe
from a cowboy named Kelly
–he was going up for an artist’s supply show
and i wanted a ride to see my friend Wolf
… so i went with Kelly to the show
and ended up buying a bunch of pens and markers
and oil pastels..
the prospects of creating images from hand thrills me: i’ve not done it in ages
(mostly)
then met up with one of Wolf’s friends
who took me back to his place…
nice conversation
and interesting:
he had three head-dresses from the Fulnio Tribe from brazil on the wall
he didn’t even know where they came from
but that they were brazilian: someone had given them to him
(i had visited people from that tribe in Abadiania while i was down there)
then he took me over to Wolf’s for their Sweat
it was much kinder
and certainly helped me feel good
i gave Wolf a massage the next day
and cooked dinner for he and his husband, Michael
then we sat down to watch the Fasbinder film of Jean Genet’s “Querelle”
— i’d not seen it since i was 18 or so
it struck me pretty powerfully
i didn’t remember the importance of Passivity portrayed in the movie
how it implied the Strength of the character
but it makes sense to me now…
as that is what i’ve been trying to learn for years now…
the next day
Wolf gave me a session
— very different than anything i had ever received before
and during our drive back down to Albuquerque yesterday
he told me what he read in my body
he was quite surprised
though he didn’t read me this way before
during the massage
it was apparent that i was a control freak
it bothers me that i present myself different than how i really am
what a game!
me and my charms..
during my visit with the Sowinski clan back in indiana
it came up from many directions
that our family tended to deal with everything like that
“i must take control because no one can do it as well as i can…
and if i fuck up i’d much rather take responsibility for the mistake
than get pissed off at the faults of someone else”
it’s more acceptable to beat ourselves up than those we love.
Wolf also saw
that i was excellent at reaching up
… the sky energy
connecting with heaven
i could do it very easily
but was not so adept at dealing with the earth
which i had told him as much before the session
but he said it was very apparent in my body…
followed by…
staying with West:
a guy i had met back in 1999
when i left Robert with my Buddhist Chariot, Thubten
West is one of those Fellows…
Cancer
can feel everything going on around him
and works directly with the energetic nature of reality more than he does with the acceptable human story part of it
though he does his best to balance it
so we talked about an hour before he said he was ready to ground me
i lay down
and felt my body becoming heavy
and pain seeping into my consciousness
yes
the stuff i’ve not been feeling
we did a lot of work: reacquainting myself with my body
— i’d been abstracted for so long
through conversation
West said this
“ah, you’re pulling your energy up again… keep connecting with the earth!
from what i can tell
you keep pulling your energy out of your body and UP
because you regard your body as Dead”
‘yes, i regard the earth as dead, the whole human story as dead.
there is no such thing as the future
and we’re obviously hell-bent on destroying ourselves
the majority of consumption is based on empty plastic garbage
meant to be thrown away at a moment’s notice
this world is not alive: it’s dead…. i’m already withdrawing my life from it’
“yes, but the more you do that the more you make your body Dead
thus the more sick it becomes”
(which is something i figured out when i was 17)
‘ yeah, but i don’t want to just decide everything is OK and make shit up so i’m filled with life ‘
” the best lie is a half truth: you know there are many things in the world are dead.. but there is also Life in everything… and you only seeing one side isn’t really fair either ”
Ohhhh, yes.
Funny.
so i’m feeding through meet again
opening
doing my best to connect
and trying to work myself out of this place i’ve created from my anger
to appreciate the Life
a song by Pulp:
“i’m sure you had something to Hide
i took your bag and looked inside:
i was looking for Life. . .
there was Nothing inside but Merits
the same as those i keep with me
when i’m looking for Life . . .
but i’m Looking for LIFE. . .”
it’s very confusing to me
i went out into the city with West and a friend of his
into the dark city
for some greek food
and ice cream
and conversation
it was like dogs playing
biting and snarling round eachother
making jokes
Ha Ha!
you’re life is a mess!
i find things contradictory
and it’s hard for me to choose one over the other
but silly to choose both
yet it seems the only way to really be healthy.
The night went on with West going home
and his friend taking me out to one of the local bars
to drink
and talk about sex
another guy who needed a sister to talk about his attractions with
hear of my sexual escapades
i made it real for him right there
and went to play with a beautiful sexy mexican man in the women’s toilets
he was so excited to hear of my stories..
the Beauty of the Husband..
the things we suffer for love and sex and friendship
what’s better: to be free, but alone?
or to be with a love who holds you back?
smoke a cigarette and laugh
and back at the house with West
we talked until three or four, i don’t know
i was so tired
stories of re-creating the body
and why didn’t the buddha tell anyone his story for six months after he became enlightened
— he didn’t think anyone would get it
then
when he told them
he was made a teacher for the rest of his life
and the vedic master said
“any blessing i TRY to give you is a curse: all i can do is speak the truth for you to hear”
his brother who had noticed the Zen being of the world at age 4
had killed himself last year
with a sigh
he showed me pictures of him
saying
“he was a bear: you would have loved him”
and he was right: this man was SO beautiful…
and his father too
even in his late 80’s
a robust man with a big beard an a light in his eyes
eventually
i was falling asleep
and i did
drifting into dreams
as West explained to me the problems of the comming ice-age
and the re-birth of the world that will be poluted with toxins of ours
but i didn’t care at that point
i passed out
and woke after only sleeping a few hours
i’ve been feeling burnt out all day
so now
i feel better
for having written it down
in mid air
when i land i’ll be in New Jersey
and a step closer to understanding something about loving
armed with the memory of my body and existance
the rules of the game
and a little bit of my hearts desire
oh.. i’m so tired
see you when i wake up