Tonight the lamppost on my street corner played mind games with me.

Again!

So you know about this boy at the gym I’ve been writing about?

Well, most nights we take turns playing cat and mice.  Some nights I pursue him a little more, other nights he follows me to the bathroom and pees in the urinal next to me.  I tell you, it’s all a yarn ball so full of confusion.  I try to untangle the mixed messages in my nightly walks home from the gym.

I can’t recall when was the first time the lamppost fucked with me, but it must have occurred on numerous occasions for me to finally catch on.

One night as I walked home from the gym I couldn’t help but notice that the lamppost turned off right as I was crossing the street.

And the next night it did it again.

And again.

Right as I crossed the street and came directly underneath it, the light goes out.  It makes a little clicking sound, too.

I’ll be honest: I don’t believe in god but I believe in a bigger, indescribable force called the Universe. 

And I swear the Universe talks to me!

Because sometimes, but very rarely, the lamppost turns ON! as I cross the street.

No fucking kidding.  YOU try deciphering that message.  Did I *win* that day?  Did I make the right move with Gym Boy?  Should a light-bulb be coming on in my head? 

Well, tonight I went out to the bars even though my heart wasn’t really in it.  I thought that, since it was the last day of the work week before Christmas, a lot of people might be out drinking.  I might see gym boy in the bars and finally work up the balls to start an inebriated conversation.

And as I left the house and crossed the street the streetlamp came ON! 

Yippee!  Hip Hip Hooray!  My light is turned ON, bitches!

I was a little bit stoned and a little bit buzzed from alcohol.  It doesn’t make it any less real.  The marijuana and the Shoju are just conduits to make me notice the lamppost.  Life is kind of like that.  You need to be a little off kilter to converse with God Almighty.

We’re all looking for signs that give us hope.

Then, later in the night, I come home.  I didn’t see gym boy out, but I’m not down about it.  It would have made my night, though.  It could have given me so much material to write about.  But I also got other inspirations from being out and about – inspirations that drove me home in the first place.  I had to write it down before I forgot.

And as I crossed the street to come home the lamppost fucking WENT DARK on me.  Again. 

I’m intrigued.  For the first time, I stand underneath the lamppost.  I look up at it. 

Wow, there are stars up in the San Francisco skies.  I never look up.  Do you?

And it’s a beautiful shot.  A dark and starry night.  Constellations right behind the lamppost.  These stars certainly don’t look millions of light years away.  Black telephone wires in parallel lines supersede it.  The universe is calling me out: slow time down.  I sat down on the fire hydrant underneath the lamppost.  I look up.  But it’s a cold night and soon I felt my butt freezing onto the fire hydrant.  People will find me crazy if they saw me like this.

And then the light went ON! again.  Right as I was sitting underneath it!  I saw the lamppost very clearly for the first time.  It had the number 15 on the lightbulb.

All of a sudden, I thought: what if it’s just all my imagination?

What if this lamppost is just a lamppost: pre-programmed to come on and off every 15 seconds? 

Or maybe just a faulty lightbulb? 

And, here I am, the crazy transvestite hooker, thinking that it’s God’s way of communicating with her.

Tags: life