On a day when you collide with reality…or maybe arrive at work late and collide with your desk…well, you can be pretty certain that all this is operating on the metaphorical level. Unless you're a quadriplegic. Then, nothing is level, Everything is uphill. And things may, or may not, be metaphors. Which explains why yesterday I collided with my desk. Vehicular collisions in the quadriplegic world are in no way confined to streets. In fact, they can involve furniture, vis-à-vis, desks. Not Read more [...]

Since the election…if it can be called that…I live with a generalized sense of paranoia and dread. The country has an authentically fascist contingent. And the new cabinet features some deeply authoritarian types. So where does that leave me? Well, it leaves me realizing that I have asked the wrong question. Where it leaves us it is a much more worthy question. It's also a more productive one. As a disabled person, I do feel a particular vulnerability…in general terms. Whatever. Where does Read more [...]

Do I dare to eat a peach? Prufrock's question resounded through my morning. Do I dare to drive up Van Ness Avenue? After all, it's raining. I'm a quadriplegic. Anything could happen. But in reality nothing much did. In fact, once I had arrived at the Episcopal church on Clay Street, it was apparent that this was the optimal time. Parking places were abundant. But in my mind the whole drive was a sort of dangerous slalom, with not an empty spot to be found for my van anywhere. Forgetting that in drought-stricken Read more [...]

I do acknowledge that it was one of those days, or certainly one of those times, when I had reached my wit’s end. The occasion was heightened by Bella, our aging and arthritic boxer (mix) who decided to burst into urinary full flood right on our hardwood floors…for reasons that will forever remain a canine mystery. Naturally, whether propelled by Sod's law or Murphy's law (precisely the same cosmic legislation), I was attempting to rush out the door to my weekly adult education class. And Read more [...]

Today's San Francisco Chronicle headline is all about the loss of federal funding for the city in the wake of the Trump election. Significantly, I can't find the same article on the Chronicle website. After all, the print edition is all of eight hours old and digital history by now. Things appear to be changing at an unprecedented rate even when they aren't changing at all. I'm too old for this. That's why after my weekly bodywork appointment, AKA, massage, I head up 18th St. in the heart of San Read more [...]

On this first day of Trumptopia I struggled out of a bad sleep and made my way down to San Francisco's Mission District for my long scheduled meeting at the local Social Security Administration office. Why? After all, my business could have been transacted on the SSA website. But I am a retired guy now, which is to say, wanting a schedule, and there is some pleasure to be had from experiencing the in-person world. With the ominous Trump still ringing in my ears and my stamina reduced to something Read more [...]