I’ve seen things. I’ve done things.
Spent some time in Florence youngish and ditzy eyed, before I knew to not let five years slip past without really meaning it.
Besides the obvious upsides there was an Eagles cover band comprised of a So Cal looking boheim and his rib cage skinny interpretive dancing vixen, who proformed nightly for mobs of gelato licking tourists. Like me. Shirt sweat heavy in the ochre piazza.
I was shy and awkward but reality hardly impinged. Every passing girl was a dream in the unchecked heart of privileged adolescence. If you asked me then, I could have loved and lost them all. You should have seen how still I sat. Perversions known for centuries were infinitely new in the noxious mind of teenage boydom. My how I pillaged the middle ground between fleeting eye contact and unspeakable deviance.
”Hotel California” is a real mindfuck when played sincerely by expatriated hippies at the ever decaying apogee of high renaissance ideals. You could buy tighty whities with David’s marble penis printed on the front. It was all so stupid and pretty and meaningless you just wanted to dissolve, I mean it.
Saw Radiohead that summer too, playing open air on the hillside overlooking all of the city. Kids were sipping from flasks and climbing trees and hugging friends and neighbors, themselves, lightpoles or any old thing. Some were drinky and glassy eyed. Some were smoked to the bone and proximity highs were common. Some were vomiting and laughing at the same time and some were just fine. Like me. I was fine just fine.
Glad I remember what I do. Most of the best moments in my life are made up. But this one happened. It really happened. I have no pictures to say otherwise. Thank god.
