I would think, let's aim this better; let's establish a linear plot, and what not. She would remind me how blessings sometimes arrive in costume. There was this, when we lived in the valley. I remember how the doughnuts could render you diabetic in a matter of weeks. We kept to ourselves and hardly left the bungalow during daylight hours, mostly because of the heat, but also because we just couldn't be bothered. Then one night we were out and this local gallery was stocked with an endless inventory of hopelessly expired pop-art. Can you imagine the playboys? Patrick Nagel was a prerequisite. Then, for some reason, Nagel's girls seemed to resonate. Those ladies were streamlined, something fierce. Spellbinding. I'd seen these girls before. I'd spent many hours, as a child, in some of the city's seediest nail joints. Those deco girls had been plagiarized and plastered on drywall for well over two decades. Maybe, I thought, I should reconsider my negative connotations and, coincidentally, I was in the middle of one of my experimental eras. We drained our finances and she giggled behind me while I carried that canvas over our heads up ventura.
