People are starting to ask me if Maria and I are... well, you know. Sometimes I say no, not yet; sometimes I say no not yet. It's all in the pause for the comma, you know. No? Not yet? Let me put it this way: I won't worry about pesos per hour here, oh no! We go out to dinner and sit for hours, talking and talking over salad, and then coffee after....
Oldies rock on the laundramat luncheonette radio. Doors' Light my fire. But is it the long version? No. I finish my breakfast of scrambled eggs, salad, and tortillas. Love eating here. Good food, with coffee, for only 25 pesos. Except by the time you get here it may be thirty. Such is life and inflation, eh?
Go move the clothes from washer to dryer. Come back and write some more. You don't know this, but this is really yesterday. Today I am rewriting at the computer.
No more writing? Have another cup of instant coffee and chat with Brian in the lavamatica loncheria. He's very apologetic that they didn't have beans yes-today to accompany my breakfast.
Nina comes into the back room where her computer is. Watches me type away. "Ah, you really can write, eh?"
I laugh, "But yes!" ("Pero si!")
Her administrator pops in, nodding, "Not like so many others who say they are writers, or that they want to be writers, but... they don't write."
"Ah," I say, shaking my head, "You know what they are, then? (Saben que son ellos entonces?) Conceptual writers, eh?" We laugh. Dear reader: Art is not always easy. And even if I do write and write, I swear to you, (te lo juro) that I know a lot of my work is, well, garbage (basura). The trick is to No Tire Basura -- Don't Throw Trash -- only post something I have some regard for... and this means you are NOT seeing All.
It's time to go. As I save & close files, then shut down the machine, Nina and Adriana remind me: "You are coming back tonight for our student exhibition?"
"Of course."
But even as I leave I know I'll get there late, since I want to cook an early dinner and then take a nap. What I don't know is how very, very late it will be when I wake up, and then....
Oh yes, it will be late, and then later, and then latest of all....
After midnight with the art students:
que llegan las quatro horas
y todos sentados
piensen de dormir
thinking of sleep.
.
en la ballena
bailando
cantina
in the whale
@ 03:33 a.m.
con/with
los artistas
dancing
toman cerveza
tequila
y cigarros
de cual
time
la horaof what
ofrece
offers
.
la barra
sala de
room of
the barya
sillas
chairs
nowprofesa
y mesas
and tables
shows
.
la cantina dice
welcome
drink
bienvenidos,
toma
.
Todavia está
joven
la madrugada.
The after-
midnight
is still young.
.
03:53 that
increible
hora
unbelievable
hour
.
not yet four
when they
shuffle to
their seats
seven beers
14 tequilas
and 20 dances
later
the norteño
still rolls
todavia rueda
el norteño
that four o'clock arrives
and everyone sits
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