Well, hello to anyone who might actually read this stuff. I used to post as Office Phantom. No more. I caught a bad case of the mother f…g flu and could not read very well or write at all for a few weeks and am still feeling the effects.
New post title is Bodega Train. A short explanation goes thusly: Several years ago, a friend of mine in Mexico rented his spectacular 2 story house to me , but accidentally made it also available to some Austinites who happened to be blowing through town.
A deal was struck. He cut my rent in half in exchange for my giving up the house and residing in the bodega (think cellar).
The bodega was about the size of a prison cell. Just to the right of the door was a glassless window that I could prop up with a stick. The window measured approximately 12” x 12”. I could look out upon the courtyard should the desire take hold.
I swept the place out and put in a twin bed. Flashing electric skeletons I hung above the file cabinet that served as my desk made the place warm and comfy. A sheet of plywood on top of a few boxes provided me with a coffee table. There was a van seat in there that served as a sofa. I was set.
There were some spiders on the ceiling that I decided not to bother. For all I know they were dead as I swear they never moved. At least not when I was watching.
The Austinites turned out to be a nice lot and I showed them around town a bit. They left and, oddly, instead of returning to the main house, I chose to remain in the bodega. Those three weeks or so were probably the most creative and inspirational days of my life. Solitude served its purpose in majestic fashion. Poetry flowed and short stories ran rampant.
I suppose all of us have a brief period in our lives where something to that effect takes place and sorry to bore you with mine, but there you go. That at least explains the bodega part of things. I do not think I have the energy in me at the moment to go into the myriad meanings of the word ‘train’.
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