Letter

I wake up and I’m fifty-two years old. Is there any significance to this? The only things I can think of in connection to the number is the card prank and the 1986 Frankenheimer flick with Roy Scheider and Ann-Margaret. Neither resonates much.

When I bartended and someone tried to get a free drink for their birthday I’d tell them to bring their mother and I’d buy her one. Do any of us deserve special attention on the day we were born? We did nothing that day except not die. I used to not want to acknowledge the day at all. Now I’m more reflective about it. Probably because there are fewer to come than I’ve already had.

I don’t mean to be a grim or a downer. Just noticing the time pass. It’s as it should be. I don’t want to overstay my welcome.

Bienestar Pharmacy texted me happy birthday like they do every year even though I’ve never filled my prescriptions there. They just care, I guess.

Tonight I’m going to Tufano’s for some Italian food, then to the Bottle to see Earth and Iceage. I’m looking forward to it. What else can you ask for than to have something to look forward to?

When I worked at Bite Café twenty-two years ago the Empty Bottle was like a second living room. I had drinks there after every brunch shift I worked and wandered in any night I was interested in the band that was on. I remember staying for only ten minutes of a White Stripes set. Why was that guy trying to sing like Robert Plant? I didn’t get it. They were one of the biggest touring bands in America within a year. Nobody would ever hire me as a talent scout.

But I saw so many shows I loved there. Even before the Bite gig I’d go to the Bottle regularly. It was just down the street. I even wanted to work there for a time before I met the owner and knew it would never happen. Still, the place has been a mainstay of my life for twenty-five years. If you look through the sketches in Music to My Eyes a healthy chunk of them were done at the Bottle.

Last week I went there two nights in a row. Tuesday my friend Adam was the opener and put me on the list. I hung out with him at the merch table, then watched him do his talking songs to a half-listening crowd. The show was sold out but they weren’t here to see Adam. I’d tried listening to the headliner’s record a few times but it didn’t take. So I left before they came on.

Wednesday I stayed most of the night. I liked all three bands. Each mixed rock, jazz, cumbia, electronica, and lots of styles I don’t have names for.

It’s been years since I’ve known any of the bartenders or doorstaff but I’ve known the soundman over twenty years. I painted his portrait for some album art long ago. He kept waving hello every time he passed me on his circuit between the stage and the sound booth.

I’ve made my peace with being the old guy at the show. When I come to the Bottle the median age is usually decades less than my own but I don’t care. I’m only here for the music.

I turn fifty-two in a couple days and I’ll be marking it back at the Bottle.

—Listen to my talk with Max Samarov, then tune in Wednesday for another with Azita.

—I wrote about a busker’s memoir, recommended some books related to my new one, and made an annotated playlist for the same.

—Bad review; so-so review.

The last two weeks this is what my days have looked like. Open eight frames in Photoshop. Resize each. Place them in a template. Copy-and-paste it into the next page in Affinity. Repeat two-hundred-fifteen times.

I don’t pay much attention about what’s in each individual frame. There’s action, violence, romance, and many familiar movie-star faces but if I start reading the story it will distract me from my task. If I lose track of which frame goes where the whole house of cards will fall like dominoes. Every now and again I have to backtrack because my mind has drifted off and I’ve repeated a spread or resized a frame incorrectly. It’s inevitable. I’m not a machine.

In the time I’ve worked on this thing I listened to the audiobook of Fleischman is in Trouble and tried and given up on a couple others. I want to give up on Fleischman at times but that would mean pausing the production line and starting it up again which is a process that feels more and more leaden as the spreads mount. I power through to the end of the story of a bunch of weaselly New Yorkers tormenting one another and unsuspecting passersby in their quest for the mythical work/life balance. It’s ridiculous but told just well enough that I can half-listen through my labors.

I’ve done this kind of thing for my own books but never for someone else’s. It’s an odd feeling. Because I’m self-taught in book-design I’m sure there are more efficient, better ways to do many of the things I do, but this is the only way I know. If I think about doing this every day for a living I doubt I’d last long. What it’s good for is a time out from my own thing. The mechanical repetition gives most of my heart and mind a break. They’re more engaged in the audio drama than what my eyes and fingers are doing.

I finish the first pass listening to Bronson Pinchot read Strangers on a Train to me.