Multiconstruct

there’s a lot of other stuff i want to write about so i am going to try to knock out the detroit trip so i can move on. its dark so the capitals are off. dad has dinner in preparation so we may not finish in 4.

Sunday we woke and enjoyed some cable and melon from the market. It was pretty good, the melon not the cable. Although on a note the porn was a unique addition to cable tv from my usual hotel stays. i guess that’s what you get with that second star. flipping through channels it would come up every 46th flip and it appeared to be big ass porn. i couldn’t remember if that was what it was yesterday and i wondered if that’s all they played. “popping the trunk” was my expanded horizon but i can’t say i was a better person for knowing that. interesting nonetheless.

We decided to venture out and see the world around us, see what ephemera might be cast about to be noted, collected. Right around the corner was the memorable Cesar Chavez Middle School gone feral. i had never heard that term but Tre’ explained there was a whole culture of folks exploring and documenting feral buildings. “urban spelunking”.

Coincidentally there was an open door on Cesar Chavez Middle School and an exercise bike caught Tre’s eye. We walked in and things were largely intact and empty with a musty smell. A coupe rooms back there was a room full of Alpo cans and there was burned area and  a pile of picture encyclopedias. Tre grabbed up the one that included Missouri in spite of the undertones of urine in the room. Huddled up with your dog, i hoped, burning picture encyclopedias for warmth. What a picture for the death of civilization.

We wandered up Trumbul and its environs seeing the grassy lot that was Tiger Stadium. I told Trevor about coming up to see games from when i was a kid to ’95 when I was living in the ‘D’ fighting nuclear power. What decline, closed yuppie restaurants. the old parking signs in yards but no one’s coming to park, free shuttle or not. sad and neglected i have never seen this kind of decline. ghosttownification right before my eyes.

We wander and look and walk-about in wonder at the change. more sardonic than sad seeing some hope in the possibility if we stopped being dumbasses. stranger things have happened. We talk about food deserts in the urban wilderness. in our neighborhood we have a cool looking cafe’ ‘le petit zinc’, french.

We sit on the patio and decide to have coffee. its a crepe and sandwich place with a bar. in france the hole in the wall bars had bars of zinc and hence the name. there are a lot of honey bees pestering the patrons. there’s a bit of garden, so i don’t begrudge the bees. flowers, some ‘maters, and a functioning herb garden. they use a lot of basil, rosemary doing great but they don’t use much.

the coffee is first class. small cups for america ginormous for a french cup but tasting like theirs. nice. friendly and laid back. we head back to the hotel. i pulled the trash out of the ‘mater patch, its doing pretty good. going in the clerk who checked us in gave us a message that Becky had called and let us use his phone so we didn’t pick up a charge. made plans to see Jeff at 7. trevor checked his email on the lobby comuter, as did i. it was quiet on the electronic universe.

We walked down to the festival and caught some jazz. sounded good. i brought my book and Doris Lessing goes good with jazz. its a bit warmer and we never break out our jackets. we get full of jazz and hang out in the park. i tell trevor about hanging out there in ’90 while my buddy chad osborne volunteered at the Focus Gallery. one day they tried to count me as a homeless guy in the census three times, trying to keep their million. didn’t happen. 700k i hear now in a city built for 2 million. we listen to more jazz. a big band. you can do a lot with 17 people. it is the largest jazz group i have seen except for schools. the school band was perfunctory.

we saw jeff who told us his friend Ed would be joining us. they are re-enactor buddies 18th century french explorers. jeff is pretty into it, quite a kit and bakes 18th century. we grab some beers and go back to the hotel and get to know one another. Ed has his partner with him whose name is escaping me. they live up in hamtrammick just bought a house.

we talk and trevor fades and the rest of us go out for more local beers at a barbecue place whose kitchen just closed. so we top it off at a coney island (my third if your counting and far and away the best). i get a first class gyro, man i wish i could get one close to this good anywhere in missouri. its a weird scene out late in the urban coney. a cook gets agitated. he sits down with us and takes our orders right after after a long long wait. the food is excellent and snappy when it happens. its a great evening of great fun. jeff crashes over, what a wonderful day.