74 19 Jimmy made really good miso soup and we ate it all win ter long, with dif fer ent veg e ta bles we’d scrounge up at Rain bow Mar ket, the big co-op on Va len cia Street. One night it would be pur ple po ta toes, beets, and bur dock root with tem peh; and the next green cab bage, car rots, and acorn squash with tofu. The night fol low ing would be sweet po ta toes, zuc chini, mush rooms, and aspar a gus, with sweet mochi on the side. Jimmy’d di rect me like a mas ter chef: cut these, sauté those, run down to the cor ner liq uor and get us some salt. And off I’d go. I’d love going out on er rands be cause it meant I could come back, and I al ways liked com ing back to Jimmy, see ing him from be hind work ing the stove, the spi key hair and the way the steam floated through it. One time, he turned and his eyes were puffy with tears from cutting on ions. Jimmy who never cried. On week end morn ings we’d go for cof fee and sit for hours rid ing the caf feine high, dis cuss ing all man ner of top ics, from the al ien at ing hor rors of Re pub li can pol i tics to lit er a ture, mo vies, and art. Jimmy would look at some thing and he’d say, “How would you make art out of that?” He’d do this ran domly, re gard ing a plant, a shoe, a street sign, some ar gu ment between two peo ple on a side walk. He was point ing at a gaud ily painted Ed ward ian across the street. I hated all the quaint Vic to rians be cause they sug gested too much, had way too many sto ries com ing out of them. In fact, to me, they looked like stages—like 75 if they didn’t have a story they’d in sist upon tell ing one re gard less. They were self-consciously of an other time and too much had hap pened in them, much of it dis so nant to their ap pear ance; too many dif fer ent things. So I told Jimmy I’d gather to gether all the peo ple in one room who had lived in that house since it was built: top-hatted and cor seted Vic to rians, labor move ment dock work ers, giant Irish fam i lies, hip pies, People’s Tem ple and Krsna dev o tees, Raj nee shis, Chi nese peo ple who painted it green and red for luck, Mex i cans who packed each room with five young men—fi nally gay guys fuck ing each other with tubs of Crisco. “What is this, Shame?—a paint ing, a play?” “Uh, yeah, a play.” Over whelmed, I could only ex press my self in col lage or ab sur dity. He sat back and lis tened. “Or I could speed it all up, do it like a video, com press it so that peo ple get lost and dis oriented—I could call it ‘Time and Space Are Bunk’—and some dude in a top hat would be blow ing Jim Jones to a Grate ful Dead sound track, with every thing fall ing around them in an earth quake, Sir Fran cis Drake rid ing the ed i fice down like a buck ing bronco. And Dan White just blast ing away at the win dows from out on the side walk, kill ing Har vey Milk first, then Mos cone, then Fein stein, then War ren Hard ing, Ge rald Ford, Jack Ke rouac, and Jim Jones, Joe Mon tana and Dwight Clark in bed to gether, Bil lie Hol i day, Allen Gins berg—every one of any con se quence who ever stepped foot in this city, Dan gets them. Twink ies like snow fall ing. Or maybe some thing sex ier, more vul gar . . .” “More vul gar?” He smiled. “How about porn pic tures, like with lit tle Vic to rians in stead of pe nises going up guys’ butts or into girls’ puss ies? Or I could have like a dollhouse-scale Vic to rian and have guys fuck ing all...