Nesting

For a while now, I’ve been meaning to go to Ikea and buy curtains. I guess it’s a nesting instinct. Winter’s coming; time to make my home a cosier place.

 Portland Ikea: Visible from space

So on a sunny day last week, wanting to get out of the house, I hopped on a bus and then a rush hour train out to the Cascades station, which exists only to serve a brand new, big box retail ghetto. There’s a Ross and Marshall’s and Staples and Sports Authority and, of course, an Ikea, which sits alone in its own sea of parking spaces. The doors of the train used to stay closed at this stop, and you’d look out the glass at vast, empty fields and wonder why we were even sitting here. Now, just two years later, there are streets and lights and banks and restaurants and an all-you-can-eat buffet of American binge consumerism.

And there I was, ready.

 Välkommen

 Träsh

Browsing through the example living rooms at Ikea, it at first seems like an affordable version of that most cruelly named modern furniture store, Design Within Reach. How exciting! Good, modern design actually within reach! But as everyone knows, a closer look reveals that virtually everything in the place is made of industrial glue held together with bits of sawdust. The stuff is cheap in every sense. And what I always forget to remember before I visit is that everything, but everything, is made in China. Basically, Ikea is just Walmart for city people.

Still, there I was, ready.

But first things first. I had actually planned, as part of this little four dollar vacation, to eat at the Ikea cafe. On previous visits with other people, I would look over at the wall of glass with the airport view and sigh longingly. I figured that this time, if nothing else, I could get, I dunno, tea or something. Actually, though, I didn’t have to pinch pennies. I ended up with a fresh veggie wrap in a whole-wheat tortilla with poppyseed dressing, and for desert, an almond cake. Both were relatively wholesome, filling, and enjoyable. Not bad for under five bucks. If I were a sales girl over at Dress Barn Woman, I would definitely walk here for lunch.

 Dinner

 The million dollar view from the Ikea Cafe

At the next table was a young rock hipster, all self-consciously cool, with furry mutton chops and a vintage suede bolero jacket. He was sitting with a much older couple who seemed quite conventional and very clearly Midwestern. I assumed they were his parents and that they would soon be footing the bill to decorate his apartment in a style to which he would like people to think he is accustomed. Later, I saw them all shopping. The son had a big bag bulging with goodies, and the parents walked passively behind him, side by side, saying nothing. I wondered what they thought. Did they get a vicarious thrill helping their son look cool? Or did they just philosophically accept more money down the drain?

Ultimately, I didn’t get any curtains; nothing was right. I just got a blanket (or is it a table cloth?) from the “As Is” section for three bucks. (Made in India.) And I got a box of imported Swedish cookies for one dollar. Clearly food is the best deal in the place; the lingonberry preserves ($3-ish, Sweden) are less than half the grocery store price. I made a mental note.

The trip wasn’t a total wash, though. I got a 2G XD memory card at Staples ($24, Japan). And at Ross, I walked away with a two pack of black Levi’s boxer briefs ($5, Dominican Republic) and a eight-piece placemat and napkin set, much needed, I assure you, and a steal at $7 (India).

(After writing about it just now, I feel the way I felt when I was actually shopping — kind of gross, like I’d just eaten fast food.)

 Ikea bike parking, 100% availability

It was dark when I left. The station was eerily quiet; the train, which was packed full of cell phone chatterboxes on the way there, was almost empty. All the way home, I stared at my sad reflection in the windows.

 Cascades Station

 Empty MAX

 Self-portrait

Back at the house, I knocked on my roommate Will’s door and asked him to give me a hand. With considerable effort, we slid open the dining room table and put in one of the leaves, transforming it from round to oblong. I placed the new placemats, neatened the centerpiece, and put the high back chair at the head of the table. Will and I both stood back and admired it for a while.

Growing up, all of our family meals were taken together at a dining table (and beginning, yes, with bowed heads and a prayer) — no eating alone in your room or over the sink or in front of the TV at our house. That place to sit and eat together has always been for me the hallmark of a healthy and stable home life. I had been wanting a real dining room table for a long time. Now, finally, here it was.

Another Sunset

It’s that time of year again, when the skies are cloudless, the blackberries are ripe but almost gone, and the apples are just beginning to turn red. I’ve been going on lots of rides to enjoy the last of the good weather, and my legs are whooped. I’ve picked gallons of blackberries up on Mount Tabor for making into jam then watched the sunset while people made out on the benches nearby.

 Sunset over downtown Portland from Mount Tabor

I recall writing about the very same things last September. Clear skies, blackberries, Mount Tabor, even the couples kissing. Now here it is again.

Growing up, I lived in a hot climate that required 24-hour air conditioning for eight months of the year. My memories of summer were of looking out the window at the glare and quietly reading books inside a sealed, climate-controlled house. It was always, always, 72 degrees, and there was always a quiet tssssss sound coming from the vents. It seemed like living in a space station or an isolated pioneer settlement on a far away planet with an inhositable atmosphere — like Moonbase Alpha, but without the sexy people.

Now in Portland, there are seasons, and my life changes and orders itself according to them. It’s cool. I plant in the spring, water in the summer, harvest in the fall, and hibernate in the winter, reading books and doing crafts. My activity level and my weight both fluctuate regularly and predictably. Without me really trying to make it happen, a natural rhythm has given structure to my entire year, year after year.

I like it. It’s good for the mind and the soul. I’m thankful to live this way, and routine helps settle the details and frees our mental energies to focus on the important stuff. But being me, I can’t help feeling uncomfortable with comfort. What experiences am I giving up to have a life so neat and predictable? What accomplishments will remain undone because they don’t fit into my orderly schedule? When I’m ninety-nine and on my death bed, will I look back and think, “Thank goodness I made jam that year intead of…?”

… instead of what?

East Side, West Side

East Side

We’ve finally — Finally! — settled into the daily sunshine and pleasantly warm temperatures of a Portland summer. It’s an old joke here that the end of winter is the 4th of July, which was pretty much true this year. Now I’ve got to cram three seasons worth of activity into the next two months.

The 4th itself was one of those infinitely long days, the kind that, at the end if it, when you look back at what happened in the morning, it seems like days ago. I started with tennis with a friend, Skip, then took no fewer than four seperate bike rides over the course of the day. My roommate Will and I had a cookout in the backyard, then watched fireworks on the Hawthorne Bridge, then went out to some bars and then ended up dancing on the steamy, crowded dance floor at Holocene until closing time. It was all great summer fun.

This past Wednesday, I was supposed to play tennis with a buddy, Elby, but he decided to bail and drive to the coast. Instead, I hung out with my friend Richard in his little garden at the Kailash Ecovillage. Despite the aspirational name, which refers to a sacred Tibetan mountain, the center of the Buddhist world mandala, home of the Hindu destroyer of evil and sorrow, it is in fact a generic apartment building in Southeast Portland, and if it were just a little bit neater and cleaner, it would pass quite easily for a cheap motel. Nonetheless, his garden is lovely, and I sat in a broken Adirondack chair, drinking locally-brewed (of course) beers while he watered. When it came time to gossip in earnest, we retired to his living room, and he played piano for me while we talked proper trash.

 Kailash Ecovillage, now renting

 Our own sacred mountain community

Eventually, when the beers had done their inevitable work, I excused myself to go to the bathroom. Richard asked me, if I didn’t mind, would I piss in the white jug?

Uhhhh….

It’s for the garden, he said, and I obliged. It was a little weird, I will admit. But then, what the hey, I was visiting the Kailash Ecovillage after all. When in Rome…

Not five minutes after I returned to the sofa, there was somebody at the screen door asking if we had any bottles. Great, I thought, a homeless person begging for recyclables — at the door, for goodness sake. But no, instead, it was Richard’s landlord. He was coming around to collect jugs of pee.

[And now, dear reader, I will pause to allow adequate time for you to absorb this quintessential Portland moment. The landlord collected his tennants' pee. ... ... ... Okay.]

The jug was handed off quite unselfconsciously. Some time later it was returned empty. Richard’s only comment was that he would prefer something with a larger opening.

West Side

Yesterday, I had some errands to run and buzzed over to Patagonia just before closing. I naturally ran into a friend at the farmer’s market in the parking lot there. She was with her gay best friend, with whom I have, of course, had sex. (Oh, the gays.) It’s something that is never ever mentioned, though it’s always there in our eyes. (Again, sigh, the gays.) My friend and I somehow fell into that seemingly inevitable I’m-getting-older, I-suddenly-have-all-this-gray-hair conversation. The guy and I just as inevitably fell into a long discussion about the cute fixie rider who works at the pizza shop and how well you can see his dick through his jeans. Is he massively hung? Or does he just display well? We both had many well-developed theories on this subject. (Yeah, again, gay guys.)

 Numbers. Trucking company. Northwest Portland.

Eschewing a beer on the roof garden, I headed for Food Front, the co-op on that side of the river, which seems to be patronized and staffed mostly by neat Yippies, as opposed to the dingy Trustafarians at People’s in Southeast. (It make me wonder: If you ultimately inherit your parents’ money, do you have to switch co-ops?) After buying my four bars of natural soap — a two year supply — I continued on to Forest Park.

 Thurman Street winding up up up into Forest Park

I was going to hike a trail out to the Audubon bird sanctuary, but I missed my turn and ended up cranking in low gears up up up Thurman Street to Leif Ericson Drive. I rode out the gravel path for a while with the passels of lycra-clad, pot-bellied, retirement-age coots on pricey mountain bikes, trying to prove to themselves that they’re not old. There was also an infinity of joggers, each and every one of them with at least one unleashed Labrador mix, running ahead, pissing on everything. Ah, nature.

 The gently curving Leif Ericson Drive. BIG

I will admit that, unlike the mountain bikers, the joggers were, to a man, incredibly fit and uniformly handsome. It was like they had all just come from a Navy Seals beefcake calendar shoot. Running shorts come right up to here, ya know, and all those iron thighs were in full view. I became distracted.

 Ivy-covered garages on Thurman Street

One tall, handsome Viking of a man in little red shorty shorts caught my eye in particular. Since I stopped to take pictures from time to time, he would pass me. Then back on my bike, I would pass him. It happened all the way up the gravel road, then down again, and then even down the street into town. He paid me absolutely no attention whatsoever, which must certainly be true love, right? I wanted to say, Dude, stop following me! Just ask me for my number already! But I guess he was just too intimidated. I have that effect on exceptionally good-looking men.

 Bike path under the I-405 / Fremont Bridge on ramps

On my way back through town, I passed under the ramps for the Fremont Bridge and took some photos. Yeah, it’s a total cliche, but with their dramatic swoops, taking a picture of them is practically a rite of passage for anybody with a camera in this town. I think there’s even a law.

 Requiste arty shots of highway overpasses

I went home to the east side of the river for a while, but wound up back in Old Town to go to a “queer night” and stroll between some gay bars, which, despite my six years in Portland now, I have never done before. I went out alone, but my (straight) roommate Joel got roped into being the designated driver for two gay pals. We all showed up in the same place then decided to make a night of it. First the Eagle Underground, then Boxxes, then Silverado, which has male strippers, another first for me and maybe a last. Not a fan of the shaved butts, thankyouverymuch.

It was all mildly creepy — all these places I never go (with good reason) filled with stereotypical gay guys. It’s a side of Portland I never see and have long imagined extinct. You’d think by this point that absolutely everyone would realize that that gelled swoop of hair in the front looks ridiculous, or that Abercrombie is now right up there with Old Navy in terms of quality, style, and social cachet. It’s like 1996 all over again. With all of the thousands of examples of male hotness in this town, all of the utterly sexy oddballs, all of the incandescently beautiful freaks, even all of the simply natural hunks, why would anyone want to be a generic mall-store clone?

The evening wound down in the same way they all do downtown, with a trip to Voodoo Doughnuts. I got my usual maple cruller. Sometimes I try something different but always regret it. Let this be a lesson, kids: change is bad.

 3 men, 1 nervous doughnut. Billy, Graham, Joel & a sweet little peach fritter.

It had cooled into the 50s; I put on a sweater. (And this is July, folks.) Billy, one of us gays, kindly offered me a ride and put my bike in the back of his mini-van (mini-van!), leaning well away from his own shiny, orange, vintage frame fixie. They dropped me off at home with slightly inappropriate hugs. Strings of Christmas lights cast the backyard in a timeless glow. I parked my bike in its place, turned off the lights, poured another drink and settled down, at last, for the night.

Sun & Rhubard

Finally, we had a beautiful day.

 Airport in the distance. Mt Hood on the horizon.

My housemate Will and I went for a long ride on the bike path along the Columbia River, right next to the airport. There were great views of Mt Hood. It was Sunday, and a families with children were everywhere. I keep forgetting those exist.

 Will taking a photo of Mt Hood.

Then when we got home, I made a crumble with rhubarb from my own garden. It was so tart, but with vanilla ice cream, it was absolutely perfect. (Here’s the recipe.)

 My long red rhubarb

 Rhubarb crumble

Every year, it seems to take forever for the sun to get here, then suddenly it just feels like summer.

Kombucha Creature

One of my new housemates, Wilbur, is quite a character, and he has the kind of ethusiasm that only a 23 year-old could. Everything is turned up to eleven. For example, he loves wine; so not only did he learn everything he could about it, he also became a somellier. And he moved to Oregon with the hope of someday becoming a wine maker.

When he gets excited about something, he really gets excited. So when he decided that he wanted to make kombucha, a sour, slightly fermented, vinegary drink cultured in black tea, I knew it was going to happen. I’ve been wanting to brew some up for years, but it’s kind of gross; and that put me off. Wilbur, however, was determined that we should try. Like, now.

Not at all surprisingly for this Earthy fucking town, one of the first guys he met in Portland brews kombucha and offered to give him a “mother” — the “symbiotic colony of bacteria & yeast” –which looks and feels just like a spongy pile of discolored sandwich meat. It’s kind of gross. Even people who love the drink refer to the “mother” not-so-lovingly as the “slug,” “snot,” and the “kombucha creature.”

 Big jar of black tea with the kombucha creature growing inside

So this past Sunday, Will & I brewed and sweetened some tea, thawed the large disk of frozen “mother,” and put it all in a big jar with a cloth over the top. Now all we can do is wait. It’ll take a couple of weeks to get going, but Will still visits the jar in the pantry, looking hopefully for changes. It’s as though he expects one day to find it has given birth to a litter of puppies. His enthusiasm is infectious though; he’s gotten me doing the very same thing.

I’m not exactly sure why I’m excited. Kombucha is basically spoiled tea with a giant glob of snot floating around in it. Nothing about it sounds appealing, yet people really love the stuff. It’s “good for you,” but no one seems to know how or why. Still, like cycling and infrequent bathing, it’s just what you do in Portland. So here I am, giving it a shot.

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Check out these basic kombucha making directions at Instructables.

And there are more elaborate instructions here.

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Happy Monday Extravaganza

Every Monday I post pictures of guys smiling. This time, I’m puting up a few extras to clear the decks here at YMA Studios.
 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 
This moment of overindulgence may be the perfect time to mention that for Lent, which begins at midnight on Tuesday night (Mardi Gras), I’ll be giving up two of my worst habits — homemade deserts and Flickr trolling. One is making me fat, and the other is wasting my life. Time to push the reset button.

God. Forty-seven days without new smiling guys. Wish me luck.