Lunch With Onewetleg

Wednesday, Nov. 05, 2003 - 8:18 a.m.

Monday night, I was in Yahoo Messenger with JJ, aka Onewetleg, and we decided to meet the next afternoon, since she had the day off. We spoke briefly on the phone Monday, and we figured that since we wanted to make plans for Tuesday, the weather would probably turn against us. We were absolutely convinced there would be rain or fog, because, well, frankly, I consider myself a shit magnet whenever it comes to planning something where good weather would be a bonus. I've just never had the luck.

But instead, the weather gods were good to us. It was gorgeous. I don't think I ever knew before what a Perfect Fall Day looked like before yesterday. If that -wasn't- one, it came as close as it ever could have.

Tuesday afternoon, I spoke with her just before I left to meet her. She told me what she'd be wearing, and I told her I'd try to be there as close to two in the afternoon as possible.

I have difficulties travelling alone. I'm always afraid to make a mistake, and I have very low confidence and no sense of direction to speak of. But after I finagled John's Oracle Of Transport from him (the Fast Pass), I hopped on to the bus and got down to the Embarcadero BART station, and it just seemed like the easiest thing in the world to accomplish.

I took BART to 24th and Mission, and as the escalator took me to the surface at about twenty minutes after two, I was hoping to recognize JJ without too much trouble.

Fortunately for me, she was standing at the top of the exit, and we recognized one another immediately. She's adorable.

An interesting thing happened when I met her.

Have you ever met somebody for the first time -- or seen somebody after a long time -- and actually had everybody and everything around that person except their eyes and their smile sort of get blurry for a few seconds? That's what happened when I met JJ. That's something that's only happened to me three other times in my life: Portland, Oregon in July of 1990, Disneyland in August of 1990, and Ogden in September of 2003. Each of those moments is indelibly etched in my mind like scrimshaw on whalebone, and for better or for worse, I am still bonded with everybody with whom this has happened.

JJ was wearing a grey hoodie, black capri jeans, black shoes, and PINK SOCKS just like the illustration on her diary. She has a kind face, beautiful brown eyes, and she's quick to laugh, which is always good. When she first saw me at the BART exit, we embraced, and she gave me a couple of things: a bottle of Bergamot scented essential oil, and a small clay goddess bead that she'd made. I gave her a small pewter pentacle on a black cord, and as soon as I can find what's become of my crochet needle, I'm going to crochet a bracelet for her as well.

We walked from the 24th street BART stop to the 16th street BART stop, and in between was her stomping grounds. Even though I've lived in San Francisco for over a decade, this was one area of town I had never visited -- and I'm wishing I had before now.

The Mission District of San Francisco is predominantly Hispanic, and it reminded me of where I grew up in Yuba City. I have not seen so much vivacity and life and brutal truth and truthful beauty per square inch in any other place I've ever experienced. The food smells were stunning, and another scent I can recall is the smell of leather, from a selling stand full of backpacks that we passed on the way to the store where JJ works.

We stopped there, and it was wonderful to walk through and meet her coworkers and see her resist the urge to pick up clothing and start placing it properly on the racks.

The next place we went was the Lawrence Bakery Cafe, where we obtained three great big made-to-order cheeseburgers and a Diet Coke for 6.75 - which is an unheard-of price for the service and quality of food we received. While we sat and ate, and exchanged bits of history, she took off her hoodie for a few minutes and showed me the artwork on her arms. Lots of spirals and dotted curves -- in a word, she's been filigreed. :)

As anybody who has ever smoked will acknowledge, the eating bone is connected to the smoking bone, so almost immediately after we finished eating, we stepped outside so JJ could indulge. Since we were closer to the 16th street BART, we decided to go ahead and walk there, where I'd get back on and get home.

When it was time for me to go, we hugged and hugged again. It was a GREAT visit. I wish I'd brought my camera, but the only other pictures on it were those of my grandmother's funeral, and I was too afraid of it becoming lost, so I left it at home.

I found my way back home, remembered which key fit into which hole, and got up the stairs at about half past four in the afternoon. A message light was on my phone, and when I checked, I was stunned to find it was P@ul Schu!tz, who hadn't called me on his own dime since mid-September. I returned his call and found out that he'd just called to check on me because I hadn't been online all day. I thought that was a nice thing to do.

Over all, I'd venture to say it was one of the nicest days I've had in a long time.

I think the universe takes care of me when I need it to. Sometimes the help shows up in the form of reading something inspirational online, or seeing something funny on television, or hearing a great song on the radio.

Yesterday it showed up in the form of a person.

Yup. Good day.

Oh. Almost forgot... Yesterday I had two songs in my head. "Hey Ya" by Outkast, which also has a wonderful video to go with it, and "The Remedy" by Jason Mraz.

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In other news, David Letterman has become a father at the age of 56. He brought pictures of his larva to share last night. Sigh. That made for a few moments where I just sort of had to deal with some internal things, but all in all, it's a really cute kid. Congrats.

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