Tricked myself, powering through a good day on Not Enough Sleep, first by dressing up (asymptotically Ivy), then by treating myself to a pricey lunch. Noticed: fit and outerwear culls will continue; the Usual Treatment eating Someplace New; the mood lift after even my half-mile walk there and back.

It’s spooky to run the tips of one’s fingers over the edges of the world where you find them: carved into the backs of wooden seats in criminal courtrooms; rattling memory when a celebrity alert lands on a screen; uncannily driving through a stretch of road where bad behavior happened a day earlier.

I don’t know what kind of hang time other shoes get, but at some point I’m going to realize that I’m not playing the sport I’ve some experience with, let alone the field or the telestrator and play-by-play and color commentators to call out endorsements, quips and perspectives. Where’s my clock?

When I pull into the ramp, I’m watching for everybody who doesn’t know how to merge, those weavers, distracted types, people paying more attention to the music than what’s beyond their fenders, and I hold my lane, creep forward and leave the city behind me for my multi-lane highway roaring overhead..

I went from the Embarcadero uphill to the Castro, and thought about thousands who tested the terrain of the city on their own two feet, one in front of the other, and then the few folk who careen along roadways, reckless before their wrecks, leaving damage, repair bills and blood in their wild wakes.

Station to station with these errands, and now looking forward to a brief period of stillness, grinding out and uploading song demos for The Contest, and deciding on important stuff like whether to start the new book or go with the bright shiny thing on the streaming service. But also rest, because.

A necessary day, sitting mostly still and setting foot only as far as the market for delicacies, then straightening up just enough to play house and host folks. Other than a drive and an errand, tomorrow could likely be similar. By comparison, the rest of the weekend looks like an absolute footrace.

Sometimes you hit a lovely stretch of traffic only to run up against a couple of nasty potholes a half block from your parking space. Or you’re chasing a truck that turns out to be full of beer from a brewery now going out of business, until you remember you’ve stopped drinking. Yup, that kinda day.

The morning road reveals more than I realize. Which one of you had had your coffee? Which one did sleep well the night before, or is still up? Vehicle, condition, license plate, lane choice and speed: it’s like birding, while, you know, trying to be a bird yourself and get where you’re trying to go.

Not so strange to be in the room together again but strange to be there without zim, surrounded by zir art and stories of fights, dates, strong opinions, stronger creative and social drives. The host was wonderful, connecting us to zir family back home, letting us share and send loving out and home.