January 18th, 1989. Journal Excerpt. New York City

saturday afternoon. made a desk in my room using my hamper, a metal cabinet
that was abandoned in the hall, and a board.

looked at another apartment yesterday. a two room sublet in the village. it was a
total dump and they wanted $1,100 a month:
no doors on either room
tub in kitchen
no living room area whatsoever
wood slat floors with gaping holes

at least there were no mice running around this time

saw a taxi burning on 3rd avenue around 10th street. there was an explosion.
probably the gas tank. the fire department came.

ran out of cash so i tried playing in the subway station – see if i could collect a few
bucks. it was kind of depressing but i got enough for a meal

this desk is a little too high but it will have to do

August 2010; Journal Excerpt. Sacramento, CA

when i first saw my mom in the recovery room she looked better than i had braced
myself for. i was so relieved. her color was good, but it was hard for her to talk.
she hadn’t been allowed water since she first entered the emergency room the day
before, and her mouth was dried out

her hip and collar-bone were broken from the fall. the hip required surgery; they put
a rod through the ball and down the length of the femur, with a screw holding it in
place at each end. the surgeon described the bone as “crumbly”

the room she was in was very small. too small to comfortably fit the four of us (me,
erica, dad, rob). with no space for even one chair we all stood. looking. looking
away. trying to think of what to say or ask.

a nurse came in and we made way for her to approach the bed. she was cheerful
and efficient in her movements. she checked off some things on a chart and left

we stayed for a few hours. mom slept off and on. when she was awake she was
groggy, but she smiled.
erica fed her ice chips with a spoon from a styrofoam cup
then held the straw to her lips
she said drinking the water was just about the best thing ever

December 3, 2007. San Francisco, CA

for 10 years i impersonated a jazz musician for a living
at least that’s what it felt like half the time
it started when a friend asked if my band could play at a corporate party she
was planning. she thought we’d be a good fit – we sounded “jazzy”.
my band consisted of me on acoustic guitar and vocals, playing my originals,
backed up by really good jazz musicians.
nick drake, van morrison, rickie lee jones all played and recorded with jazz
musicians – it was part of their sound: upright bass, saxophone, a drummer that
knows what subtle means.

i accepted the gig and spent the next month learning a bunch of standards. the
party went well and soon after the caterer called wanting to book us for another
event. before long i was able to quit my desk job.

the guys in my band were all serious players who were dedicated to being the
best musicians they could be.
then there was me
my strategy was to play as little as possible; “first do no harm”
i sang a few standards, but mostly made sure everything ran smoothly.

performing background music at events takes some getting used to. for the most
part no one pays any attention to you. often we’d be set up in a corner next to the
large rented fern. like the fern, our job was to add ambience to the proceedings.

June 1966. Walnut Creek, CA

i don’t remember much about this day other than my parents giving me a dime to
go have fun at the fair or carnival or whatever it was we were at, and i came back
with a kitten. i was so excited to get a kitten for only ten cents – what a deal!
my parents didn’t have the heart to make me take it back
i named it friskie

1983. Davis, CA

both my older brother’s and i got business degrees in college. when we graduated
we got a suit. the interview suit. with it we were supposed to get a good job and
be off on our own.

when i graduated i had no idea what i wanted to do. amazingly i’d never given it
much thought. so i moved back to davis, and into my old room at my parents’
house. not exactly the next step they’d hoped for.

i got my suit and a haircut, and started signing up for interviews at the u.c. davis
career center. none of the companies interested me, so i picked ones that were
located in places i might like to live.

i did some interviews and pretended to care, while secretly hoping i wouldn’t get
hired.

one day i was listening to kdvs, the college station, and a song by true west came
on. i’d been in a band with one of the members before i went away to college -
i’d heard he had a new group and that they were doing well.
the music was cool
i was jealous

i ran into him shortly after that and he told me they were looking for a drummer.
they’d be making a new record soon, then going on tour
i auditioned and was asked to join the band

i canceled the rest of the interviews i’d signed up for
the suit went in the closet and i never wore it again

May 1970. Davis, CA

when i signed up for little league i knew i wanted to play first base. i thought it was
the coolest position; stretching for a catch with one foot on the base, getting the
runner out by a hair. but when the coach asked me i didn’t say it. i thought i might
not be good enough, so i said “i don’t know.” “how about catcher?” he asked. that
was the one position i knew i didn’t want to play. i’d play anything, just not catcher.
but i said “ok”, thinking it was what the coach would want me to say.

he asked me if i had a cup. i wasn’t sure what he meant. he explained that
catchers have to wear a jock strap with a plastic guard in it to protect their private
parts in case the ball hits them there
that was the most humiliating thing i’d ever heard

when we had our first game i left my cup at home on purpose so i wouldn’t have to
play. the coach asked me about it in front of my dad – they were both staring at
me. i said i forgot it. after much serious discussion they decided my dad would
drive me home and get it. i felt so ashamed. i just wanted to not be on the team.
forget the whole thing

we went home, got the cup, and went back to the game
i played catcher and hated every minute of it

1994. New York City

erica and i were newly engaged and were about to move to berkeley. i was
excited, but also conflicted; i hadn’t accomplished what i’d hoped to in new york,
namely getting a recording contract, so in some ways leaving felt like defeat.
i wanted to change that before we left. resolve things somehow
i also wanted to capture something about my experience there.
something visual and visceral

i’d been experimenting with a camera i bought, filming in my apartment and around
the neighborhood. i was a big fan of the jim jarmusch film ‘stranger than paradise’
and godard’s ‘breathless’. i loved the mood of those films – the feeling i got when i
watched them

i knew an italian bellydancer named lola that had done some acting. i decided to try
filming some scenes with her. see what happened.
i had an idea for a story about a writer whose girlfriend disappears one day. two
years later she returns – with no explanation – and moves back in with him.
they never discuss what happened.

the first scenes i shot went well so i recruited two other friends, and then i was
making a movie. i shot mostly on weekends. i edited it using the camera and a vhs
deck.

when it was done, right before we moved, i screened it at the anthology film
archive. afterwards we all walked to erica’s place on the bowery for a going away
party.

2002. San Francisco, CA. Photo: Jack Lemon, Cliff Osmond, Walter Matthau

i took a scene study class from cliff osmond, who is one of the best teachers of
any discipline that i’ve ever had. in re-reading my notes i realized that acting
is a lot like life:

know your weakness
you will always have counter productive habits. know what they are. know where
you hide and/or fake it. tell people – give away your secrets so you are forced
to be good

don’t leave the scene
don’t “check out”. stay in it. be with the discomfort. get comfortable being
uncomfortable

be vulnerable
always be vulnerable. you have something to lose – what is it?

dance
how can you set the words to motion. make a dance of it. be free and creative

sex and death
relate every scene to sex and death. they are what’s interesting. and don’t rush it.
both sex and death should never be rushed

1971. Davis, CA.

my dad had a wooden tray on his dresser where he kept his wallet, keys and
change. there were little compartments with fingernail clippers, paperclips,
matches. i liked looking at his things. one day i noticed a marble i hadn’t seen
before

it looked different than any of the marbles i had. a creamy white with pale watery
swirls in orange, green, yellow, blue. it was beautiful
it was medium size – about as round as a quarter
i really wanted it, so i put it in my pocket. i wasn’t stealing it, i just wanted to
have it for a while

our school had a great yard for marbles. a huge grass area with long boundary
lines burned into the lawn for football. the lines were like trenches that you could
roll your marbles in. if you were far enough from your opponent you’d risk putting
your marble in the trench; it would give them a good shot at you, since the marbles
tended to stay in the trench when you rolled them, but if they missed you’d be set
up for an easy shot

one day after school i was playing marbles with paul brooks. he was in sixth
grade, i was in fifth. i don’t know what i was thinking, if i was down to my last
marble, but i played the marble that i got off my dad’s dresser. and i lost.
as soon as they clicked i felt sick. what i would have traded to get it back.

1985

we were out on the side of the building. we had finished sound check and would be
getting fed soon. gavin was smoking a cigarette. when he was about halfway
through with it he rolled the lit end back and forth on the wall until the ember was
off. then he put the half cigarette back in the box
i’d never seen anyone do that before. it struck me as something a hobo would do.
then i realized we had a lot in common with hobos
going from town to town, waiting behind a bar for a meal, staying at cheap
motels or sleeping on someone’s floor if they offered

while on the road we were paid per diems. our daily stipend was $10 when things
were going well, $5 when money got tight. so we learned to get by on $5 a day.
if we had a show that night we would be fed dinner, so we could spend more on
breakfast and lunch. the guys who smoked had an added expense

the vast majority of meals were eaten at fast food places along the highway.
i remember one day when every meal stop was mcdonald’s
by dinner i was so sick of it i couldn’t eat there again
so i bought some fig newtons at the gas station
that was the only other place open