san fransicso dispatch 3-15-10
the jet blue terminal at jfk is insanely crowded and chaotic but i make my flight. i try to sleep but i am mesmerized by the television. it’s been 7 months since i got rid of my t.v. and anytime a t.v. is even on i can’t take my eyes of it. i watch two law and order episodes simultaneously, twice. i watch the in flight movie - a not so bad picture about a guy who flies ten million miles. appropriate. i watch sportscenter not really giving a shit. i watch the news till i can’t stand it anymore. the cartoons nowadays suck so i skip those three channels. i watch a show about the loch ness monster i have already seen three times, one about a super flaming, asshole dude trying to flip some property and one about juveniles in detention. and before i know it, i am there.
i collect my golf clubs, meet ben who was on another flight and get my rental easily. first stop - a corner store were i can buy some papers or a pipe to smoke the weed i brought with me. i don’t know why i brought it. everyone i see will probably give me weed. i just wanted to make sure i could get high the second i left the airport. not that it matters. we go straight over to jeff’s who has strangely just called me. i didn’t know he knew when i was coming. but i’m sitting in the rental thinking we should go visit him when he up and calls me. weird. anyway, he lives in south city so we are there in minutes.
we hang for awhile, talk and smoke and have a beer. then we head out. from jeff’s it’s just a short ride around the hill, up bayshore, then through the sunnydale projects toe the holy grail of san francisco golf, glen eagles.
we have a beer at the bar overlooking the bay. the weather is perfect. it is a cloudless, spring day.
‘i can see why you like it here,’ ben says.
ben and golf are two. but while we are there a half dozen guys walk up and say ‘hi-how’ve-you-been’s’ and ‘where you playing?’ and ‘let’s play while you’re here’ and inevitably, ‘want to smoke some weed?’the golf course is awesome enough, but the community of golfers who hang out there is truly unique. and you don’t need to play golf to appreciate that.
we smoke some weed in the parking lot. pinkie’s always got that little bong in his golf bag, so we use that, each person insisting on filling the bowl for the next person. i mention i have some weed i brought from new york and everyone is curious to try it. except dickie. he doesn’t think it is as good as the weed we are smoking so what’s the point. he’s right. it’s not.
i call graham. he will be home in an hour, so we go down the hill to mission street and get a burrito at el farolito. i miss burritos. when i lived here i would stop here on the way to the golf course and one burrito would last me all day. ben gets a veggie. i get carnitas.
we go to graham’s. it’s the shortest drive yet. he lives in a store front and after saying hello i sit down at the piano to ask him about a tune i’m learning which he of course knows and has totally cool changes to. a bass player drops by to pick up some music. i know her from a jazz camp i taught at in la honda some years back. shit. a lot of years back. over ten. that’s a lot. not some. some is more like five. because a few is like three, maybe four.
i see a nord electro in the corner and remember i need a keyboard for two of my gigs this week. graham graciously offers to let me use it. he will be in baja all week and won’t be needing it.
after awhile, we split. ben is borrowing a bass from this cool symphony cat named larry we’ve known on the scene for years.ben is also staying with him for a couple of days so we go over to his pad. he lives in bernal heights and we are there in five minutes. larry is the coolest. mahler. miles. it’s all music. we hang out and talk about the symphony. where they are going next and what they are playing. he puts on this record by this french bass player. it was on ecm. totally vibey and cool.we leave larry and head over to my housing.
i’ve traded apartments with some friends for the week and am staying on 16th at dolores. it’s a fourth floor walk-up railroad. kitchen in the back. bedroom. bathroom. the bedroom i will use and the living room in front. my friends are in theater. he a director and she an actor and their apartment reflects a life in the arts in posters and books and lps. they have a roommate that apparently keeps strange hours. he’s gay and i am intrigued and wonder what he does at strange hours in this town that shuts at 2am. but during the few days i am there i never run into him.
it’s monday nite and that means jojo’s cooking in the bus. it’s past 6pm so i’m thinking it’s safe to try the bay bridge. the traffic isn’t lite, but it isn’t too heavy either and we get over to the 5th avenue marina in half an hour. dinner is excellent, as usual. he was doing an irish nite - corned beef and cabbage. he’s got some split pea soup, too, because it’s green. jojo is one of my oldest friends and we figure during dinner that he has lived in the caboose next to the bus for 21 years. it seems like no time has passed since i dropped him off after our last gig together the nite before i left for new york. we got drunk on the bus and played music all night and i cried when i left. it also seems so long ago at the same time.
we have to eat up and get out to make room for the next seating and i tell jojo i’ll see him again while i’m in town.
‘yeah, dredly,’ he says. ‘i’ll see you.’
in 10 minutes we are getting off the bay bridge and heading up to north beach.
ben has never been to specs so we start there. i see vesuvio’s across the street. i never liked it much in there. maybe because kerouac used to drink there. after a round at specs we go up the street and i run across to city lights to see if my friend, scott, is working. he’s not there so i leave him a message. scott introduced me to the grimy pulp of james ellroy and is a huge cecil taylor fan. i cross back over columbus and meet ben on the corner across from big al’s. we decide to go over to enrico’s but at the next corner i suggest we go down to the lusty lady and check out the talent. ben is not interested in looking at naked women and says,
‘meet me at enrico’s in five minutes.’
that’s a line from the steve mcqueen movie, bullitt. i laugh and say.
‘i’m sure it won’t even take me that long.’
dick jokes. the gold standard of comedy.
he doesn’t miss much. unless you like chicks that look like they’ve been competing on survivor for two weeks. they were all very hairy, heavily tattooed, pierced (everywhere) and favored the banshee hairstyle. maybe it was modern primitive nite and i missed that. i’m not much turned on so i head up to enrico’s where my old friends, lavey and chris are playing with san francisco saxophone legend, jules brussard. i played a gig with jules once and the bread was not right at the end. i overheard him complaining to the band leader,
‘man, this is bullshit! i could’ve been home fucking my wife!’
the first time i ever met jules, i had been in san francisco for just a few weeks. he was hosting a jam session and i and the other guys i moved to san francisco with (jojo being one of them) went to check it out. jules played a one note solo over some tune that blew us away. one note held through 2 or 3 choruses. it was awesome. till he did it again the very next set. we thought he was still cool, though, the way he sat down when he played. he had a very blase attitude like he didn’t give a fuck about anything.
he doesn’t remember any of that. ben and i sit in. lavey sounds great and so does jules. i am very nostalgic about enrico’s. less so now that the old timers are gone and ward is no longer behind the bar. and i am no longer married to the girl i met there. and the piano that bill cosby gave enrico back in the day has been replaced by some piece of shit that won’t stay in tune or that the new mangement won’t tune. like the song says, you can’t go back. i guess it’s true. i like it here anyway and we stay for awhile and have a bite. the food is also not what it was. there is barely a menu. but it is great talking to chris and lavey. they have the same two swing dancers i remember seeing years ago still dancing around the room while they play. it’s a little surreal. they are very good dancers.
there is a session happening over at the grant and green so we go over there. we pass the saloon, an old blues bar that i peek into and see is exactly the same. i’d rather go in there, i think, but there are a lot of new players on the scene and i want to hear them and meet them. some of them i met last time i was here at this same session.
and it’s fun. good players all of them. except the crazy dude who was actually pretty swinging on the drums. you know the guy who always comes and stays the whole time and you have to let him play a tune at some point but he’s just missing something. like he’s crazy. everyone’s nice and i am flattered dudes know who i am. i guess if you hang around long enough….ben and i play a couple of tunes and it’s a good time.
before long the bar shuts and we are walking back to the car. ben decides to walk thinking it safer on the streets of san francisco than the drive in my car.
‘well then you drive.’ i offer.
‘but i’m drunk, too.’ he says laughing.
‘oh yeah. and you’re not a very good driver in the first place.’
it’s a nice nite. he’ll be fine walking. and i’m not that drunk.i get back to the mission in five minutes. park. climb the stairs and crash.
