This old man, he played one,
He played knick-knack on my thumb.
With a knick-knack paddywhack,
Give a dog a bone.
This old man came rolling home.…….A Liverpool Song

You ever get the notion something’s about to happen? Like a cloud forming but still invisible. That thing you can’t name is the Eternal Unnamable.

That’s the Tao. The Tao that can be explained is not the Tao.

I know this guy, he likes to explain stuff. He explained to me what shit happens means:

“Man! Shit be happ’n all the time. There’s normal shit. Get up in the morning tie your shoes go to work sit on your ass all day doing everyday shit. The kind of shit where you just wish your life wad’n’t so boring. Then, kaboom, some real shit happens. The kind you expect could happen but you don’t expect it. Don’t want it. Wish to god you was back sitt’n on your motherfuck’n ass being bored!“

Kaboom Shit?

Yeah, I get it. Like what happened to this Old Man.

Sunday afternoon…yeah , 9th May, the day I rolled in off the street. I’m leaving Grocery Outlet on my way to Target where they sell cheap coffee that’s half-ass good. I’m feeling pleased about finding myself a temporary home. I’m strolling along. Cross the street that exits the mall. I hit the opposite curb just as this Old Dude glides by. He’s moving slow. Driving a silver beater. An old ass Honda, I think. He’s following a car he thinks is moving. Then, out of nowhere, Kaboom, he slams into the car he thinks is moving. Rear ends a double parked Marin County Sheriff’s car. Hit it at maybe 20 miles an hour. Slams into it, bounces off, smoke pouring from his hood. Cop off to the side is busy hand-cuffing a Hispanic Dude. Hears the crash. Turns briefly. Notices the Old Man. Goes back to handcuffing the Illegal Hispanic. While he’s cuffing the poor dude this Black Lady is screaming at him. “Damn you! He’s my boyfriend! He lives with me! Damn you!” A second Cop steps over to calm the Black Lady, allowing the first cop to conclude his business with the Hispanic. Now the first cop is done. He turns the undocumented individual over to the second cop. Steps around to the silver beater, wedged against the rear of his SUV. The Old Man’s got his passenger door open and looks to be on the verge of collapse.

“You okay?” The Sheriff asks.

“No.”

His answer precipitates the following scene:

The Old Man is gone by the time I snap this picture. Tucked into that ambulance parked next to the fire truck. Maybe a fire truck following an Ambulance is standard procedure. The highway patrol cars? They show up because, well, because cops like to congregate. What was the old man thinking when he hit the cop car? He wasn’t thinking. He was dwelling on shit. He shoulda been paying attention. Like the mynah bird in Huxley’s last novel, Island. The talking bird keeps repeating: “Attention!” As in, keep your eyes on the road, for Christ’s sake!

Thursday, May 15, 2025

My old ass has been off the street for five whole days. Shit. I’m getting by in a big old space (for me it’s a big old space) provided by this pal of mine, Kona Dave. I’m helping him prepare this space (a two bedroom condo) for the new tenants. You know, setting up painting bids, Handy man bids, etcetera, on account of the people who moved out of here left it with ten years of normal wear and tear. Nothing horrible like what Crack Heads would do to a place if you left them alone. No Kaboom Shit. Just everyday wear and tear.

All the walls have spackled holes. Dave’s been land lording forty years or more. “They always make a mess of the spackle.” Well, isn’t that better than holes? Maybe if they leave tiny holes. But they don’t. Heavy ass paintings with heavy ass frames leave big holes. The other thing tenants do, they paint the place goofy colors. Like the purple you see above the fireplace. And that grey. They never leave it just white. “So I gotta repaint everything the white it was when they first moved in. Re-spackle what they spackled. Then repaint.” Dave is not describing Crack Head Tenants. He tries to get normal people as tenants. One way he achieves his goal is by interviewing them and doing credit checks. The other way is by charging lots of rent. He’s not a gouger. He usually charges a little bit under the going rate. This place goes for around four grand a month…

Anyway, I’m helping him a little by setting up repair bids and handing out rent applications to prospective tenants. That way he can deal with the shit storm of his other properties, over in Hawaii, where a disgruntled former crony backstabbed him to the Building Department, leading to a string of red tags. That would be Kaboom Shit. What’s going on here in little old Sausalito is just normal everyday shit. Tenants come and go. This tenant lived here almost ten years. A SF police lieutenant. I met him not long after he moved in. Him and his lovely wife and their first newborn baby. Well, they finally bought a house up north somewhere. They needed more space. Space for Him and his lovely wife and three kids. Funny how time flies. Before you know it you got three kids.

Having kids. That’s kind of like everyday shit…unless of course you don’t expect it.

Me and my old ass can crash in this big old empty space until it’s rented. Not bad at all when you’re used to living in a van. It’s like my grandpa used to say, “Root Hog Or Die.” That’s right. He was a strange old dude. Me, I like to get by with the basics. I’m not terribly strange. I’m a minimalist. 1500 square feet of empty rooms is like a palace for me. Check out my master bath.

Nice if you compare it to the public bathrooms beside the tennis courts. Way better than nice. This one includes a shower. And privacy to boot!

See that little window above the bath there? That’s a vinyl replacement window. Retrofitted. I put in that window. 12 or 13 years ago. Back when I was a window salesman. That’s how I met Kona Dave. I was soliciting business one day and bumped into him. What was he doing here? He was fixing up this place for a prospective tenant. Not the SF Lieutenant with a wife about to have their first child. The tenants before the police Lieutenant. A couple who stayed a couple years. I never met them. Nor did I meet the lady who rented the place for over twenty years and vacated only because she died. That would be some definite Kaboom Shit. Dave needing to be here to prepare the place for a new tenant…that would be normal everyday shit.

Funny how shit goes around and comes around. Endlessly. It can drive you crazy, the drama it produces. Maybe the trick to dealing with all this shit is to learn to live like the citizens of Pala. The fictional Island in Huxley’s final novel. They lived in the moment. Didn’t dwell on shit beyond what was necessary to live justifiably humane lives. Well…but what happened to the citizens of Pala? Did they get along in peace or did some Kaboom shit roll down onto them? I’ll leave it to you to discover for yourselves. Check out the novel ISLAND if you feel like it.

As for me, I’m just gonna roll on home.

While I got one to roll into!