San Francisco and the City Fatigue

My dry cough will be the end of me. I sound sicker than I am but maybe I am sicker than I sound. My voice is hoarse but not cool sounding yet. But Two Hearts in Love, which I like to play on the guitar when I wake up and when I get home, now being sung in my almost raspy, almost breaking voice, is starting to sound more believable.

I am in San Francisco again today, waiting for lunch in the cafe, tapping out these important insights as they occur, on my Mactop. The scene is complete with the dread-locked dude sitting across the garage sale end table from me reading Dumas, twirling the hairs of his soul patch.

Correction: San Francisco in the 90s. I love it.

Also in attendance? Shaggy-haired men and ladies wearing tiny pink and pilled Fair Isle sweaters, skinny pants, casually eating depressed sandwiches. Hipsters do everything casually. Just walked in: black hipster cowboy, ordering latte; sport-ass wearing baggy 501s and a Mets cap, looking lost and stressed; heavily made up pair of girls, dressed in well-cut all-black rags, palming cell phones.

I have a battle going on right now. Sometimes I find myself in the middle of a personal cinematic moment, meaning the sound track is just right (I have been so obsessed with my new boyfriend Doug Sahm, I forgot about my old boyfriend Gram Parsons, who is singing over the speakers in the cafe right now), the extras are roaming in and out of the frame at a well-choreographed rate, my internal monologue feels razor sharp. The battle is about not writing a funny, "exquisite", carefully edited slice of my day/life email to the dude. It's rough, because I like to share these moments, I like this kind of writing (like a good postcard), and I like the sometimes volley that happens as a result. But when the volley doesn't happen, I feel bad and I don't wanna feel bad.

Yesterday, late in the afternoon, right about when it started to feel like midnight but the clock only read 5:15, I came down with City Fatigue. You know it. I felt like everyone was going out of their way to knock into me, trucks and cars were making a point of hissing and honking right into my ear, subway cars screeched on purpose. In Chelsea, some big burly man smashed right into me and didn't even look back. What a dick. All that, plus aching feet, vague hunger, aforementioned dry cough, erupting at any moment, and a general feeling of being run down by life=City Fatigue.

I had been out the day before in the pouring rain, showing a building I know to be good but not better than 1 University. The client was an overly intense financial consultant who makes six figures and travels quite a bit. Not funny, asking me dumb questions, thinks the unreasonably high app fees have something to do with his income. Should put in the app but won't because he thinks there is something better out there, which there isn't. And he doesn't HAVE to move, which means he won't. Dumb dummy.

I have the sweet, young, gay corporate attorney who wants the studio apartment belonging to the brother of YWM (Young Wacky and Married). He (the brother) reminds me of Greg Moore so much I can't stand it, except the brother is painfully shy and Greg Moore has the voice of an angel. Getting the attorney into this apartment should be easy except the landlord for the apartment used to be the landlord for my company and as DW says, "there's a grudge." This means we cannot go directly to management but instead have to go through the tenant, which means we lose control. Not ideal. Well, we will do what we can, and in the mean time I continue to show apartments to the attorney, which I did for an hour or so yesterday. Tiring, but necessary.

I just lost the battle. What can I say, something just happened I HAD to share with the dude. Oh well. Dumb dummy.

Back to the blog trenches. I am working with a Korean kid just out of Naval Academy in Maryland, transferred to NYU, living in a Jakobson. His parents have given him the OK to move ASAP, but have restricted his budget almost prohibitively. He needs a doorman--rather, his parents need a doorman one bedroom for $2800 or less. Unfortunately, this is the price of a studio apartment anywhere that matters. I (actually awesome biz partner sent the email) have asked for the paperwork required by most NYC landlords in hopes of eking out a decision and the response was favorable, but since I am not in the office today, I don't know if they have followed through. It was during my late afternoon tour with him that the City Fatigue really came on strong.

I almost didn't make it to my drawing class, but I powered through, with excellent and relaxed results. At least I can get lost once a week now.