1/10/42

Today is The Amazing Bob’s birthday. Had he lived, he would’ve been 75. Obvs he should’ve lived *DUH* but not in such pain, fear and misery. Like my recent dreams, he should be here and in fabulously, sparkling good health. Yup!

He shuffled off this mortal coil a hair over six months (189 days!) ago and it still feels like no time at all – as though he just left. This grief shit is hard fucking work, I’m tellin’ you!

Following my friend Kevin’s prescription for this very heavy day, I’m celebrating my beautiful beloved’s life. Mourning? Well, shit mon ami, that’s a constant but today? On this day I will jubilate the fuck outta the joint. I had 30+ years with this wonderful man. If that ain’t cause to revel, I don’t know what, the fuck, is.

I’ll hit my fave bookstore, Brookline Booksmith, and maybe even buy NEW versus used. TAB always tut-tutted my book-spending guilt. I’d sheepishly walk in the door after a wee binge, confess my crime and then show him the evidence. His reaction? A thundering GOOD followed by They make you happy, aren’t expensive and, HEY, at least it's not crack! (from one of his great T-shirts).

So, with visions of TAB dancing in my head, I’m gonna have a little fun at Booksmith. Then, on the way home, I’ll stop at Saint Fratelli’s for CAKE – of course! Later, there’ll be a wee party – just me, Jen, Oni and Hillel. We’re gonna watch Westerns (TAB’s movie genre of choice), snarf Chinese food (also a TAB fave) and CAKE.

Perhaps I’ll reread The Dharma Bums today. TAB loved Kerouac – all the Beats really. He introduced them to me.

 One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.
~ Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums 

TAB read Gregory Corso’s poem Marriage at our wedding. It was perfect. A snippet:

But I should get married I should be good
How nice it’d be to come home to her
and sit by the fireplace and she in the kitchen
aproned young and lovely wanting my baby
and so happy about me she burns the roast beef
and comes crying to me and I get up from my big papa chair
saying Christmas teeth! Radiant brains! Apple deaf!
~~snip~~
And when the milkman comes leave him a note in the bottle
Penguin dust, bring me penguin dust, I want penguin dust-

Go read the whole damn thing – it’s awesome and SO very much TAB and me!

You and me could really exist
~ Lawrence Ferlinghetti, from A Coney Island of the Mind
 
Follow your inner moonlight; don't hide the madness.
~ Allen Ginsberg

We are actually fourth dimensional beings in a third dimensional body inhabiting a second dimensional world!
~ Neal Cassady

I enjoy inventing things out of fun. After all, life is a game, not a career.
~ Brion Gysin

And...not a beat but a solid, numero uno, Shakespeare or, as TAB referred to him, "Willy the Shake."
 
Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break.
~ from Macbeth