— yes — at the corner table, tracing carved table-graffiti with your finger. Self-serve refills may or may not be free, butifa tree falls in the forest and no one hears it… You slept together once, but is it love? Looking across the harbor at her rolling with the waves, I thought that just might Evasion be the case. Forgotten and neglected, I would return Old Musty Boat to grace. And she would lift my dignity and pride to that of ahum- CrimethInc. ble man with an angelic beauty of the stubbornly unemployed with an entirely rent-free home. Somewhere between the two- story suburban palace no longer my own, and my one-wall- and-a-roof gem on the roof of that university library There’s a lot of shelter in this country and sometimes the owners forget it’s there! Then we show up, break in, sleep there, put up afew posters, etc. etc. … It’s sort of complicated. 50c coffee, the big city paper, real artists, and boat guys.I drank the 50c coffee, read the big city paper, and wondered if I was a real artist or a boat guy. Swallowed by fog on the deck of the sole hangout in town, I pioneered my role among this crowd of regulars, the woven handbags and sketch pads. “Kid in art/boat town”… had more soul than “Kid in big city” lacked the beer-bottle-from-a-moving-car charm of “Kid-in-small-Midwest-town,” with a slower-moving plot than “Kid-stranded-in-dangerous-ghetto,” but demanded a more resourceful craftiness than “Kid-in-tropical-resort-town.” And when drops of liquid gold aren’t falling on exceptional public transportation, I know this isn’t “Kid-at-home.” This was all fresh and exciting, and like the other plotlines — I was obsessed. Such unhealthy admiration was akin to its human counterpart, where infatuation burns so red, you can be in- sulted by the person yet remain true … The absence of visibly free food was a stinging slap. But the coffee was rich and the mornings profound. No hard feelings. The others had abused me in their own cute ways — rain, poison ivy, 5 a.m. sprin- 2001 klers, urn, 1 a.m. sprinklers… but this… “Living-in-abandoned- 52 shops on the waterfront, the little park, and a general sense of ungovernable community. If there were laws here, certainly I agreed with 9/10 by way of general respect — and the rest, well, I still wasn’t going to pay for food. On the decks of boats and waterfront seats, everywhere I looked, proud people were plainly seen doing nothing. Eagerness for my own self-serving role in the spectacle flared. “Doing nothing” — I knew from on- the-job experience — equated to doing quite a lot, but lacking the paycheck stubs to prove it. Traumatic at tax time, but from my new favorite spot on the end of the pier — sort of poignant… With a bed, comforters, and little radio, this had to be some sort of record — in a strange town, bumping into furnished abandoned shelter inside of ten minutes. Though, having hurled myself into uncertain circumstances before — to be expected. Like gravity and the one person in the front of every bus talking to the driver — one of life’s true absolutes. A new town and a nervous smile: You’ve thrown yourself there, the town is of course flattered, and throws you a rope. We all knew this, rested on it, afraid to name it fearing to do so would kill it, or dissuade it from kicking down unlocked doors and bagels. Hippies call this faith “surrendering to the universe.” I like to think the towns know we’re desperate, and they’re afraid! Everything was falling into place. A boat, and now, hot cof- fee. From the deck of the coffeehouse, I could wave to my lit- tle boat bobbing in the waves. Maybe so much festivity had never been fit into one room and one patio. The coffeehouse biosphere: maybe you never have to leave. And with some — I couldn’t verify they actually did. This was “the island,” andI was partaking in an almost sociological study of it from my cor- ner table. Like, asking for coffee, and that’s it, only confuses people. You don’t place an order, you shout it, high-five ev- eryone en route to table, then sit down and paint a picture or something. Everyone knows everyone, unless you’re blonde, not wearing a sweater, and- 51 From the waterfront park, I scanned the little downtown. Looking it up and down, it would be nice to have been neutral in judgement, but the town was about to give me a free vaca- tion independent of its opinion on the matter, so you could say I was already in love. No slave to practicality I had chosen this Contents little town. The one where artists go to get away, so farout they usually can’t find their way back. Here, I would live a stripped-down and raw two weeks, with- five – the wrong train / free boats, retirement out amenities, and if my plan came through — without food. leisure, starvation etc 10 Yes, art. And when the artists doing Yoga in the park gasped as I stumbled from the bushes at 5 a.m., wet and scary they might four – memoirs of a dumpster diver / exposing in- not recognize it as art, but they should. I wanted a little credit. dustrial waste and eating it dumpster love pick- Rooftop sonnets and moldy bagel blues. A novel is borneach ing up what you want and running for it loss night in an unlocked U-Haul. Yes, I would show them art… prevention exposed gainful employment 61 It was after midnight. My options were to walk the dark three – making it up as I go / usa on a dollar a day 110 streets with lowered eyes in the misty rain, or … wait, that was it. My path was direct in an almost possessed fashion — two – gate crashing / all dressed up and nowhere to along the waterfront, winding through the floating web of the go (but out the door) / scam-trak 180 harbor in the rain, past the seedy old bearded guys drinking on the dock, to the abandoned boat at the edge of the world. one – deja-greyhound git on’em and go California A modest, half-sunk, floating house. It rested on the harbor at scheming 204 the furthest point from land, and beyond its rotted hull — only forbidding waves and doom-filled clouds. Shining my light in the window, I could see the old boat had a story. And after looking over both shoulders, I would sneak myself in as the next chapter… Waking up, the musty blankets felt glamorous, the disre- garded property law a sinister pleasure, and exact reasons why I wouldn’t just stay forever weren’t yet clear. I could see out my window what the darkness and rain had obscured the night before — a misty old boat town. Thick evergreens enveloped the wooden staircases and rows of old boats, old boat guys played guitars in the fog, and everywhere rough sailors and young artists in knit caps stretched and drank coffee and read books on benches in the haze. There were the cool old wooden 50 3 collected my books, and my maps, and reconstructed my travel research office in the backseat. There were two types ofsmall towns — those people escaped to, and those people escaped from. Ashland and Salem. Cannon Beach and Minot. Areata and Pine Bluff. I chose the former — to be a struggling artist amongst struggling artists, and not pig farmers. Probably strangers would screech up, insult me, and drive away just as often, but the insults would be more refined, philosophical even. And instead of throwing beer bottles, maybe I’d be hit with, like, sandals and wet clay. A warm thought, enough to narrow down the list. Lines were drawn, harsh judgements made, and entire states denied my tourist dollars with one pen stroke. My vision was coming into focus. At home, at my supermarket chair by the espresso counter, I often endured head-in-hands despair in my quandary over the correct choice for that day’s adventure. No small decision, perhaps none greater. Two weeks was, like, the weight of the world — fourteen of them! I was sort of traumatized over this. At the exact point my list had been beaten down to two, I threw the question to Penny and went limp. Which one? “The one you haven’t been to.” Pure poetry And the dumbest question I’d ever asked. One thousand miles later I stood in the rain, at the ferry ter- minal. In 30 minutes the last ferry for the night would leave for the obscure and foggy little island, where herbalists in sweaters weaved baskets. And where — surrounded by water on all sides — I couldn’t betray the theme if I wanted to. Consistent with my “struggling artist” role, I had almost no money. Poverty I felt, would really legitimize my art. So when the boat docked, I circumvented the ticket booth, blended in with the bikers and boarded on the car deck. Like a warm hand- shake from a new friend… Stepping off the ferry I could almost hear the property values plummet. Rain fell, and I stood in it. 49 stumbled to the door moments after the greatest band in the It was a romantic life, maybe to be looked back upon as the world had played.