A Weird Agoraphobia

[mallorys_camera]

I always find it deeply weird that Poughkeepsie’s Social Services Dept is housed in this white marble, Renaissance revival building.

The building is so decorative!

And Social Services are so... utilitarian.

Of course, Poughkeepsie is just filled with things that are deeply weird.

Nobody ever notices because nobody ever looks up from their cell phones.

###

So, I went running right after I met with Samir yesterday. Early-ish in other words. On the Walkway, not on the grounds of the Vanderbilt estate.

And a weird thing happened.

I mean – not an unprecedented thing, it’s happened before. But one second, I was running from the trees onto the bridge and the next, I was running from the bridge into the trees.

I had totally stopped thinking!

And I ran fast, too. Well. Fast for me. Which is probably super-slow for most people, but hey! I’m old.

It’s good for me to stop thinking.

My mind has just been going round and round and round the past few days. My thoughts are like socks in the drier. Mismatched socks.

###

Dinner with the Prospective Squeeze Wednesday night. He is very good looking: Your basic Sam Elliott template with a touch of George Clooney and a Mephistophelean beard. And we had a pleasant time and agreed to go touring the local slave graveyards together at some unspecified future time. (My idea of a Hot Date! Which is probably why my phone is not ringing off the hook.) He walked me to my car in the rain. We embraced.

I couldn’t help feeling nervous, though, the whole time we were together.

Like I was a disappointment in some way.

Not a major disappointment. But somehow, I wasn’t pretty enough. Or I wasn’t conventionally liberal enough. I knew I was smart enough because at some point in the conversation, he leaned back on his side of the booth and chuckled, “You’re really smart, aren’t you?” So maybe I’m too smart?

This whole dating thing is just a colossal drag.

I can’t tell if I’m attracted to him – I mean, he is attractive, I do like him, but no little ember has yet announced, Yoo-hoo! I’m burn-ning! Nothing is threatening to catch fire.

Could it catch fire?

Oh, I don’t know. These days I suspect I’m made of asbestos.

###

Also, I’m supposed to be going to Connecticut tomorrow for a house party at Nathan’s. Nathan and his fiancée are actually flying Max in for the occasion! Nathan and John visited Max in Alaska last summer and that kicked the friendship back into high gear. Nathan and Max were official BFFs all through middle school and high school, and Max spent a lot of time with Nathan over at Nathan’s mother’s house – although I suspect a lot of that had to do with the fact that Celeste let Max get drunk and stoned over there, which I did not permit at my house.

Celeste always had this group of high school boys hanging out at her house. She palled around with them, which I found a little creepy. Kind of like the Denis Hopper character in The River’s Edge.

When I finally found out about Celeste’s permissiveness, I was furious and confronted her about it.

“They’re gonna do it anyway,” Celeste said. “I’m giving them a safe place to do it.”

“It’s illegal, Celeste,” I said. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re not in San Francisco. Monterey is a bastion of punitive conservatism. If one of the kids talks – and by the way, that’s how I found out about it: One of the kids wrote about it on a public Internet forum – you could be looking at serious charges. If they figured John was involved too, he could get disbarred.”

I did not add, Plus there’s no fuckin’ way I’m gonna let you imperil Max’s chances of getting hit by a dope charge so he can’t get into a really, really good college – not after all the sacrifices I’ve made.

And, yes. This is the same Celeste who approached me about ghostwriting her Taliesen memoir. About which I haven’t heard anything in weeks. Ball in her court etc. I think the memoir has real commercial potential, but I’m not gonna invest the slightest bit of energy in any project unless I get some assurance that it’s being taken seriously by all participants.

I don’t dislike Celeste, but I do think she’s a complete flake. And I always have to fight off the temptation to slap complete flakes.

Celeste will be at the party, too. As I imagine John will be. After the demise of John’s second marriage, John and Celeste started living together again although I don’t think they’re a couple; I think it’s more that John has this ginourmous house, and Celeste needed a place to live.

But really, who knows?

###

All this week, I kept thinking, I should be booking hotel rooms or something.

But I kept putting it off.

And then this morning I realized there’s a very real possibility that Max will not be at the party since apparently carriers are canceling flights out of SFO left and right due to poor visibility in the wake of the Napa and Sonoma fires.

So it’s a good thing I didn’t commit $$$$ since if Max can’t come, there’s no real reason for me to go.

It’s a weird kind of agoraphobia I seem to be developing. I’ll leave my house. But I get panicky at the thought of going very far. Though I generally have fun after I talk myself through the initial reluctance.