Two views of (parts of) my apartment at Avant (photos by Opal Armstrong Zwicky), so you can see some of the things I’ve been writing about. And then can be used for a more urgent purpose: opposing death — I am on deathwatch for one of my oldest and dearest friends — by laughing in its face and by counterposing the power of sex against it. This will take us down some surprising paths, of parallels and analogies and loosely related circumstances. And then somehow it will all end in Latin, with Catullus, where I at least will find release and repose — cease, Galatea, cease to grieve. But in a lot of steps, and only a bit of it today.
The penthouse workroom. Penthouse because it’s on the top floor, facing the streets, with the foothills in the background. With the window wall, filled with a delightful tree and providing all that light:
(#1) Note the antic stuffed mammoth; Sam Gross’s mammoth cartoon; the rainbow flag; the Sally Thomason penguin doodles; the computer, tv, and phone center; books books books; and, yes, in the utility table, a urinal (everywhere a urinal), a jar of coconut oil, eating utensils, a blood pressure monitor, and slippers on call
The bedroom. My bed, with the gay — outrageous but not actually obscene — quilt on it. The nightstand with two urinals stashed in it and the clock on it. In the bottom of the window, the strip of flowers that prevents me from being overcome by vertigo when I look down out of the window (thanks to OAZ):
(#2) But, wait! there’s more! The five collages on the wall at the foot of the bed, the side table with piles of clean clothing that I can easily reach (roughly waist-high, as here, is best), the radio for getting KQED there too, and then back right by the bed, a startlingly XXX-rated collage (that you cannot make out in the photo) with me from 2003 in it (I will post on it very soon)
The parlor balcony. Not shown here; it seems to present insuperable problems for a photographer (in particular, for the one who also composed the display). But it has a richly floral mat on it, on which metal garden creatures (moved from the patio at Ramona St.) disport themselves: squat frogs and herons / egrets bent down to fish. But the beating sun makes all sorts of shadows that defeat good photo shots. (The balcony has no urinals, but the room it’s attached to does.)
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