Those Places

Those days - set at a slow pace, with those small indulgences you keep to yourself, and others that take you out - can be some of the best. 

Today was one like that.  In the late afternoon I went to the gallery in Richmond to pick up my photographs.  Even though they have a fair cost, I am going to gift at least one.  

The artist had come to see me, but missed me.  I did not know.  It was kind of him to wait.  He is very generous.  I make my own pace.  

Then I went to another gallery who was hosting their opening in a large old gothic building.  Jon always gives me time, which is kind.  I wonder how he remembers me with those literal hundreds milling around and drinking his rider.  But then I count them up.  Six works I have bought from his excellent curatorship.  Half, again, I have gifted.  So perhaps that’s why.  I gave my whisky drink tickets back at the door.  It’s not about the free ride for me.  

And now I stopped at my favourite Fitzroy pub.  It’s in a back street.  I have come long now, and often, that they know me well.  They are almost like friends.   I have my own table here.  They ask, “Are you sitting in the naughty corner?”  It is here that I was reminded of you.  

Not the Dechamp bedpan, but that magnificent beast.  Men hunt these noble animals and make trophies of them.  They are men that shoot down something gentle or timid because they are too craven to meet their match.  People can wonder at misandry.  Although I have loved them, I do not. 

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