San Francisco Shorts by Mike Bozart - HTML preview

West Portal

by Mike Bozart

© 2021 Mike Bozart

After a brisk-to-bracing, misty-to-spritzly morning walk from the MUNI Route 28 Welcome Center bus stop to the south tower of the Golden Gate Bridge and an uneventful-save-for-the-sudden-boarding-of-a-dozen-or-so-very-excited-giggling-and-screaming-schoolgirls California Street cable car ride, Monique (latent Agent 32) and I (overt Agent 33) find ourselves seated at a sidewalk dining corral on West Portal Avenue in the southwest quadrant of San Francisco. It is a sparsity-of-patrons,

earlier-engrossing-conversations-now-

dissipated, late-lunch hour. The large Goat Hill cheese pizza slices are filling our breakfast-skipped empty tanks.

Monique’s pumpkin-orange Juice Portal (the adjacent establishment) turmeric concoction gets a thumbs-up reaction. Life was merely – and mutedly merrily – passing by under the low, pewter-gray sky on this quasi-auspicious late October Friday, our 10th wedding anniversary.

“So, did you ever come out here in 1992?” [the year that I lived in the city by the bay] Monique asks as she rakes her slender, short, left-hand fingers through her medium-length, caramel-streaked, raven Filipina hair.

“No, never stopped here, hon. I just passed by this area many times on the K and M [MUNI light-rail] trains. Seems nice enough, though – not stratagorically [ sic] hip like the Inner Sunset.” Strata-gore-ick-ally? Huh?

“Did you have lunch here with any charming Asian ladies?”

“Just with you now, dear. I only dated – briefly – one enigmatic lass, a Vietnamese college exchange student.”

What was her name? Where is she now? Saigon? 29 years ago. Wow! Almost three decades. What became of her? Did she become a Forex trader? A Bitcoiner? [sic] Did she keep that small piece of neosurreal art? Or promptly trash it? Bet I’m long forgotten now. She’s probably happily married with two kids. A son and a daughter, I would wager. With a good, hardworking, faithful husband. Or, was there some tragedy?

A fatal mishap? A terminal disease? The things one will never know. Jeez, why does my mind always gravitate towards such grim thoughts? Old, jaded, downcast, and bitter. Sounds like the name of a Central Coast [CA]

microbrewery’s thick-as-molasses stout dark beer.

“Oh, how did the relationship end?” Agent 32 enquires as I catch her dark-chocolate-brown eyes. Will he tell me the real reason? Hmmm … I wonder.

“Oh, it just fizzled out after five dates. When she announced that she was leaving the U.S. for good in September, [1992]

I just thought: ‘Well then, there’s no future for us.’ It was kind of like she was politely ending it. Well, it appears that you liked the pizza.” That sure was a quick change of subject.

Hmmm …

“Yes, it was delicious. It was just what I needed: some carbohydrates for immediate walking energy. You can have the crust, bana.” [Filipino for husband]

I accept the 47° arc wedge of golden-crusty-topped dough.

“Salamat, [Filipino for ‘thank you’] Agent 32.” Hmmm …

‘Agent 32’? Bet he’s recording this conversation for a future short story. The last one [The Tray] was unnecessarily vulgar. Hope he keeps it clean.

“You look like you’re lost in thought, Agent 33. What are you thinking about?” Need to get the mental locomotive back on the neural tracks to synapsosis. [sic]

I rub a granule of sleep out of the inner corner of my left, oxidized-avocado-green eye, right-hand-brush my haircut-long-overdue, fading-crimson bangs off of my right eyebrow, and dryly announce: “There’s no earthly way for a square to be cut in half to yield two squares. The result is going to be either matching 2:1 rectangles, two right triangles, or a pair of mirror-image trapezoids.” Sheez … Why’d I ask? Only my dodoy. [a made-up-by-Monique Filipino slang term for me]

“Only you would think of such on our long-overdue, return-to-the- [San Francisco] Bay-Area mini-vacation,” Monique broadcasts. Bet he was thinking of that cute Latina housekeeper at the motel. [El Camino Inn in Daly City]

Caught him leering at her like a perv. So pathetic. 57 and trying to flirt with a 27-year-old. ‘Oh, my silly old kano,

[Filipino for American] give it a rest, please. You’re not going anywhere. And she has no interest in you. No high roller would ever stay in such a flophouse.’

Agent 32 then begins to watch a video in Tagalog on her refurbished iPhone 7 featuring a gay pinoy (Filipino male) comedian. She begins chuckling. Noisily. She really likes that guy’s jokes – a lot more than mine. We don’t seem to laugh together that much anymore. Nor talk as much. John Lezley [a pre-Trump-era acquaintance] said that that was normal at the 10-year mark. That that. This this. Pfft-pfft.

“He’s so funny!” she blurts after seeing my hand gestures to quiet down. “He’s a major YouTuber.” Über tuber. A hyper-hilarious mega-spud. Maybe I’m jealous. I have the charisma of a paperclip.

Monique then begins to review photos taken four hours earlier on the Golden Gate Bridge. “Wow! You caught me six inches [15 cm] off the sidewalk. Perfect lens snap, 33. Good job.” A new position for me: lens snapper. How much does it pay? Wonder how Kirk [my son] is doing at Carowinds [an amusement park on the NC/SC state line] tonight. Hope he checked the oil level in that old Honda [Accord] before rolling out. Sure hope he doesn’t get stranded on I-77 again. Well, his nearby [Filipino] cousins are on standby.

“Bridge security got very concerned when you started singing ‘I believe I can fly’ while doing jumping jacks next to the eastern railing, 32; you became a flashing blip on their radar screen; the cameras were all on you. ‘We may have a jumper here, Ed; send someone out to check on this loony pinay.’ [A Philippine woman] You probably ruined some poor guard’s coffee break.” What a ridiculous overreaction.

“Oh, please, 33. Enough with your paranoid fantasies.

Please give it a rest; it’s tiresome.” Is it?

Unfazed, I rub the stubble on my unshaven-because-I-forgot-to-pack-the-old-Norelco-electric-shaver chin. “I really miss the mild, foggy, overcast weather out here, 32; this is right in my atmospheric wheelhouse.” ‘Atmospheric wheelhouse’? Huh?

“Well, yes, no sun is great, 33,” Monique declares. “I love it!”

Still an area of agreement.

“We’re like vampires, 32,” I add. No, just you, bana; I don’t want to bite anyone’s neck.

“This is a day that I wish we could liquefy and funnel into a wine bottle, 33. And then pop the cork, tilt, and let it flow out ten years from now on our 20th anniversary.” Doubt I’ll be alive for that. My innards are shot. The casket countdown has started in earnest. In Ernest, too?

“Come back here in ten years?” I enquire.

“Not here, maybe somewhere else on the California coast.

Hey, how about Monterrey Bay? Have you been there?”

“Yes, but just once. A brief trip a long time ago.”

“What were you doing?” Monique asks with a raised right eye. Just know that he must have been up to something mischievous. Or downright illicit.

“Moving product. Cutting a deal with Clint Eastwood. No, just kidding. ‘Twas only sightseeing.” Scoping upper-class, drug-addled chicks, I’d bet.

“Alone?” Monique quickly asks with a deadpan expression.

“Yup. Another me-myself-and-I jaunt.” Hmmm …

A MUNI K tram then rattles down the tracks in the middle of the street. We both watch it pass by. The route remains the same. –Sled Zeppelin [sic]

“Where does that line go to, 33?”

“To Meta-Mentality Heights, 32. It’s quite a beyond-self-referential prospect of an exo-compoundment.” [ sic] Huh?

What did he say? Such an abnormantality [sic] now.

“Exo-compoundment? Puh-lease talk in rational terms, 33.

All of this was barely amusing seven years ago.” And not now? Or ever again?

“Ok, it curves back and winds up in Ingleside at Balboa Park

[BART/MUNI] Station. Bals vs. Boas at Balboa Park tonight.

‘Thad, those British anti-Lewisites better be up for it; the Boas can methodically compress and choke off a game.’

‘Ten in the box. How is that still allowed, Alton?’

“When we got on the MUNI train in downtown, [Embarcadero Station] you said that it went to a mall,” [Stonestown Galleria]

Monique reminds. She wants a [Golden State] Warriors jersey so bad.

“The M train does, 32. Three lines pass through that tunnel: the K, the L, and the M.” KLM to Amsterdam. Whew! What a trip that was. What year was that? 2002? Yeah, that was it.

All those stoned 20-something lovers … what percentage are still together now? How many mumble-bumble-stumbled into a canal? Hmmm …

“I know that the N Judah train goes through another tunnel.

[the Sunset Tunnel] The J runs along Church Street in Noe Valley. And the newest line, the T, runs along Third Street in the eastern part of the city near the bay. So, where are the O, P, Q, R, and S lines, geo-nerdo [ sic] Agent 33?” Yow!

Forgot about the S Shuttle. Not sure if I could explain that one in my current mental state. Will just let it go for now.

“I’m not able to determine that at this moment, Agent 32.

Please try again later this evening.” Oh, brother.

“You are functionally useless!” Monique is exasperated.

Aporia appends.

“I thought that I was hopeless. I’m only going to sign on to one ‘-less’ term at a time.” He’s so crazy. Now more than ever.

We finish our drinks and remain seated, taking in the casually-to-causally-unfolding, mid-afternoon tableau. Our minds silently meander. Financial situation sure is becoming bleak. Again. How I wish that I could go back in time and buy that damn Powerball ticket on February 10, 2016 – the darker-than-unmined-coal date never to be forgotten.

[chronicled in two short stories, ‘Powerballed’ and ‘That Day’]

Those six numbers, 2-3-40-50-62-(5). Ingrained in my brain forever. She picked all of them correctly. Dreamt them.

Skipped the wrong Wednesday. Severely punished. Not sure where our ship is headed now. For the jagged rocks it sometimes/often seems. / If he just would have done what I said, and not skipped the mid-week drawing, we could be living here instead of merely visiting for four days and three nights. And staying in a one-star motor lodge. Talk about dropping the ball. I often won raffles in Lazi [Siquijor, Philippines]; the neighbors called me ‘the lucky girl’.

However, he is cursed. Why? He must have done something evil. God doesn’t like him, or we would have a vault-load of cash. Instead, we’re living in a dank basement apartment in east Charlotte. Oh, what could have been? Think I am ready to just move back to the Philippines and look after mom. Will he want to come over, too, after he retires from the college?

[CPCC] His pension could carry us. The dollar goes so much farther in the Pinas. [slang for the Philippines] Only time will tell, I suppose.

“Ready to hop on a train now?” Monique finally asks, now feeling impatient; wanting to get moving mall-ward. Wonder what she was pondering. Could almost ‘feel’ her this-sure-

aint-2011 thorny vine of thoughts. Might she divulge later at the motel? 17:1 odds.

“Sure,” I answer. Bet she can’t wait to get into that store.

We walk all the way back to West Portal Station without talking. After waiting about five minutes on the masonry platform, we are boarding a scantily occupied M train.

As the tram passes behind backyards between Lagunitas Drive and Woodacre Drive, I look at Google Maps to track the train. I notice that Sloat Boulevard, Junipero Serra Boulevard, Ocean Avenue, and 19th Avenue form a trapezoid. Ah, another trapezoid: the shape of the day.

Trapped and voided in a zoid. [sic]

“Why are you staring so intently at your [cheapo android]

phone, bana?” Monique demands from my left side, looking a wee perturbed.

“The city streets form interesting shapes; I just spotted a glaring trapezoid,” I reply. ‘A glaring trapezoid’? What in the world?! Did the sly weasel take something psychoactive?

“Oh, why did I even ask?” Another eye-roll admonishment.

In the Eucalyptus Drive Muni M train right of way, there is another grinding slowdown. To a lunging stop. Our minds race ahead. Better write this up. Soon. Before I forget.

Maybe use the memo feature on the phone. This will probably be the penultimate psecret psociety adventure for us. Nothing lasts forever. Things change over time. Had a fun run with Monique. For the most part. No one is perfect –

certainly not me. Could have done much worse. / What’s he thinking? Hmmm … Ellipses? Hexagons? No telling. Seems we may be headed for a fork in our road. How I miss Lazi.

Endnotes:

I truly appreciate your mind-time. Mirthful mystery.

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