I've been in London since last Wednesday - tomorrow will mark a week's time. In that time I've ventured to the 1940s during wartime, 2019 in the age of replicants and off-world promised utopias, the competitive ballroom dance studios of Australia, and the world of superheroes and villains you would find in printed paperback picture-books. I've had 3 different haircolors in the past week, and donned a variety of costumey bits and bobs. I've been arrested by the LAPD and told I was a Nexus 6 with 11 months to live, only later to be threatened with "retirement" by a crooked detective. I've worked undercover monitoring the Blackout movement, and played the Foreign Secretary for the United Kingdom. And all this while battling the worst cold I've had since the epidemic scale flu that took me out of all the ballgames on New Years Day. I lost my voice nearly completely in 1941, and still managed to make it back to the place where a love story that's been drifting in the abstract had begun 3 years ago. The wardrobe still leads to secret worlds I'd visited once before with a dashing guide at my side who I miss on the regular. It's a story I've told many times that's met with always the same starry-eyed whimsy by all but one who've heard it. On the way to drink my Love in Idleness the sky had erupted into blue-purple spectacle, soon followed by yet more summer rains. My favorite weather for a jaunt from the last to the first places my heart fell to my sleeve. How incredibly apropos. My world is nothing if not poetic. I wouldn't have it any other way.
And now, I sit on my hotel bed with fan oscillating the warm night air. Laptop placed in the proper position, I write of my journey thusfar in that same sing-song poetical way that the universe sings to me. I've been pondering the meetings that've appeared in this Transatlantic excursion - a sweet Chinese-American lass who joined me as a detective at the World Terminus, Los Angeles and spent the day touring much of the West of London, with a jaunt up to the top of the Eye. We live on opposite coasts of the United States, but have vowed to visit should we find ourselves simultaneously on similar shores. And a Scottish performance artist jack-of-all-trades I've known virtually for two years who suffered injured abs and 500 Harley Quinns for the opportunity to put a real-life face to our textual connection. I do hope to see him again, although I am well-acquainted with how generally intense I can be with my gaze and wonder if I won't have frightened him away. That and my coughing fit during our riverbank rendezvous painted a lovely image, to be sure. Ah well, the ones who stick around get all of it, even the crunchy coughs. But also the creative catalytic capers that are the crowning jewel of this curious creature that I am. Maybe. Que sera sera. I tip my hat to you, fine sir, even if we shall never meet again. Your stories are superb.
With only one day remaining in my adventure this time around, I have Dr. Frankenstein and the world of the somnabulist to visit. Lunch may be in order with an old friend I have much envy of for moving to this mecca of mine, and potentially more time with lads of the land of Scot, one of which became a father since last we've met face to face. But we shall see what happens. This seems to be my phrase of choice of late - We shall see. For now - relaxation and a cold Magners are the tune of the evening... And perhaps a shower to remove all signs of my Nexus 6 origins from my body. I thought this tattoo was temporary. So far, it's proven to have some staying power - just like this cold and quite unlike this Magners. The good things never seem to last as long as we'd like, do they? Maybe that's what makes them so good.
