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not a morality play
Sunday, April 4 1999
For most of the day, I was wrapped around the task of transfering stuff from my old 4.4 Gig hard drive to the new one (which, though it claims to be 10.2 Gigs, is actually more like 9.7; a Gig is 1024 to the third power bytes, folks, not a lousy billion). As usual for such days, Kim was disgusted with me, even expressing her confidence that our relationship wouldn't work out, saying things like, "We've got five months left together on this lease, and then I guess we'll go our separate ways."
Kim ended up outside in the front yard taking advantage of the sun instead of dwelling on what a shitty boyfriend I am. Her first random big conversation was with the old guy who is about to move out of our courtyard community. I came out occasionally just to listen to him; evidently his talking to someone else in our courtyard is such a rare occurrence that the brunette girl across the way has never seen it once in all of her three years living here. The old man was full of tales with an appealingly strong geographic basis. For example, he told of a water tower out in the desert to the east sitting high upon a hill, and near its top is a line with the label "sea level." I found that highly-evocative for some reason, but eventually the old codger started to wear on me, so I returned to my computer.
Later I found Kim sunning herself upon the lawn with three other girls from our apartment complex: Jenna the German Girl, Lisa from next door, and the brunette across the way. Seeing such a collection of telegenic scantily-clad sun bathers all stretched out in front of the apartment-complex they share made me think of Melrose Place by way of Road Rules. In a way I was delighted. Community is always a good thing, and it's impressive how quickly communities form in California, especially in such a friendly, non-judgmental place as Ocean Beach. Not that aspects of our community aren't judgmental; Jenna the German Girl is a non-stop stream of judgments.
I went out to the Apple Tree and got some Pacifico Mexican beer while others in our community prepared food for a spontaneous barbecue which our community suddenly wanted to host. Suddenly random seemingly-unattached attractive females started showing up, friends of our community. I thought of all my unattached sexually-frustrated male colleagues and I gave Al a call. He said he'd be over right away.
Al, it turns out, had spent the bulk of the day in the custody of Mexican authorities after being caught drinking in public in the front yard of a Baja California restaurant. He got close enough to a genuine Mexican prison to hear the wailing of the imprisoned and see the dungeon-like stonework and iron. Somehow he avoided disappearing into this third-world hell, paying a $20 fine instead.
Unfortunately, the unattached females turned out to be the wives of navy guys whose imminent return from the high seas was being expected with moistened pussies. The one major joy in our lives, The Simpsons, was coming in via shitty reception on jerry-rigged antennas made of extension cords and bits of wire. But Jenna couldn't understand our interest in an animated show. "How old are you?" she asked as she snapped off the television. It did no good to protest that the Simpsons could be the single-most brilliant social commentary of the 20th century. For her it was animation and thus suited only for children. This is, you must understand, the same girl who has "JENNA69" on her California license plate and doesn't want to hear that it could mean something "unusual." "I was born in 1969! So that's what I want on my plate!" she insists. In Jenna's mind, the cultural implications behind "69" are insignificant compared to its significance as the last two digits of the year of her birth. Asks Al rhetorically, "Is Jenna the most annoying girl in the entire world or what?"
April in San Diego has been colder than any month so far, so all of us attendants of the barbecue ended up hanging out in my living room. But, owing to Kim's many shopping sprees, we had plenty of room and seating.
Towards the end of our indoor "barbecue," we were joined by the guy whom Kim met at Plan B in Pacific Beach a week before. He was the black guy who asked her to dance; his name is Kyle.
I've always been a little uncomfortable at the fact that all my friends are white. But, really folks, my culture is white; I like white music and I have interests that are largely associated with whiteness. Additionally, I'm mostly attracted to white (and Asian) women. So it's really no surprise that the circles in which I run are largely devoid of African Americans. But, given all my whiteness, I'm open to befriending non-whites. How else can I be? Anything short of such a position would be worthy of ostracism in this racially-uptight culture of ours.
If this journal was a late-90s morality play, then Kyle would have been charming, brilliant and ended up far-outshining everyone else present. But in the end he came across as a conniving and somewhat tactless social manipulator. He arrived with a bottle of booze and a joint, both as a present for Kim. Then, having placed her in his obligation, Kyle macked on her every moment I was out of sight. For example, Kim is about to go on a trip to Michigan, and Kyle requested that she call him once she got there. In most people's minds, it would be safe to say, he was overstepping simple friendliness into something else by making such a demand. Kim was further unnerved by a few of Kyle's other revelations. He admitted to not having either a job or a car. (Later, while attempting to dilute some of Kim's paranoia, I suggested that it was refreshing that Kyle admitted to being unemployed instead of fabricating a glamourous entertainment career for himself).
As Kyle was preparing to leave, he tried to convince Al to drive him way out of the way to a club in Point Loma. This sort of behaviour, along with his repeated requests to use our phone, left Kim with a largely negative overall impression of him. She saw him as a "user," someone not to be trusted. She (and this was probably rooted entirely in subconscious racism) even feared he'd try to break into our house on some later date. Though we'd tried, Kyle just wasn't one of us. To hang with us requires a subtlety and deference of which Kyle proved incapable. That's the raw truth.
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