March 4, 2018

Opening for Works on Wood at the Flood last night. Sparse attendance, but good sales. None of the Group made it except Russell, and I was grateful for his presence. Met lots of strangers, and they seemed to like what they saw. Derek brought the entire family. Did a reading from Night Sleep. It sounded good to me, even through my coughing fit. At the reception had my first tamale.

Though they solicited me to have an Oscar party, though I had bought snacks and drinks, J called and said they wouldn’t be able to come. It sounded–fishy. Add that to New Years and we have a very odd record. Why would they ask me to have a party and then decline to attend it?

In trouble at school too. Informed that there was a complaint against me I learned that it was this: Last week several students in my senior seminar wore black turtle necks. Someone said they looked like beatniks, and that they should form a beatnik band. I said, into the general melee of the departing class, “You could be a go-go dancer.” I said this remembering the go-go dancers in the bands of my youth. One woman, to whom I had not even addressed the remark, took offense and asked to be removed from the class. Asked why she didn’t discuss it with me, she replied, “he’s a problem.”  Apprehension has turned to disgust.