Hermosa is my Portugal. It is where I go when I cannot travel in the full sense.
As Beverly is a stylist, the breezy place here is transitional modern soft, with white barely-there drapes billowing in silent crossbreezey rooms. Portugal itself is here, too, everywhere—even in the cd changer, as Bev favors Mariza, the Portugese chanteuse, one name, like the soccer stars but also like the ordinary folk of the Portugese (among whom there are no ordinary folk), with a wicked quiver and haircut to match; I hope you’ve encountered her before. There is a wonderful photograph of the Parc Publico of Lamego, Portugal in the necessary room. It is a mezzotint full of busty statuary, empty benches, old world symmetry, and artfully obliging weeds—a parc much in step with my precious and declining life.
My sole responsibilities here are to feed an insensible cat named Isabella (more Portugal, see?) and to break inconsequential items only. I cook almost nothing, and drink almost nothing but Campari.
~~~
It is a good time for breezy drapes and weedy neoclassical photos. Earlier in the month, Lisa took a shot of Lynn, posing her as a hieroglyph. Lisa always pays haute attention to hands, especially in her art, but also when conversing, and the foto features hands that jut out laterally at the hips and thus enrich the negative space. Then we received a thankyou from Bev herself for some spurious reason (I cooked her an omelette and Lynn helped her choose colors for her house). Her card selection is always indicative of some place you never heard of before. This one was was a modern graphic tinting of a Mar Vista home. Number 193 on that page. Look familiar, or relevant to us?
Bev and Lisa are photographers. Bev is a photographer and sylist, Lisa is a photographer and artist. Or maybe it’s the other way around. Simply looking at whatever they drop in the mail—cards, photos, art, handwriting, exclamation points, parentheses—is is good reason to hate labels. Don’t tell, show.
~~~
Don’t tell, show: I am always looking for something forgotten to read in the book sale cases at the Hermosa Beach Library.
This time, found a few William Trevor novels. UK, King Penguin paperbacks.
Still not sold…often Trevor clunks at the novel length.
Opened one book, and out fell…
…an ancient, rotting Aer Lingus bookmark.
That sealed the deal. Now reading William Trevor.
~~~
How to get to Portugal from Los Feliz on a day-pass: Red Line, Sunset and Vermont. Hop off at 7th and Fig/Flower. A 440something bus south down the Harbor to the Green Line. Green Line west to Mariposa. The time honored 232 south. You need 50 extra cents for the 440something, but it’s worthy of half a buck. You do it in two hours, reading, perchance, a forgotten William Trevor novel the whole way.
~~~
The cat, Izzy, is unique as all good cats are. Only wants to be touched with a brush, and only under the chin. Could endure that for hours. Cannot endure anything else.
Likes open doors. Even when she doesn’t want to go outside. Will run to the door, wait for you to open the door, and stand in the doorway for a while, so you won’t close it. As soon as you leave—it’s back to bed.
Shows you exactly what she wants. Stands by fridge ever hopefully. Gets very chatty just before pointing something out.
Is operating on own private honor system. Will never exit the cracked balcony door, but will enter it whenever locked out.
Woke me up the other night at 4:30 a.m., wanting the door opened. Bugging me a lot. At 5:15 a.m. I finally complied. She snooped around as though hunting for five minutes, then went back to bed.
~~~
And yesterday, at midnight in Los Feliz—there to take care of a car problem—I saw four racoons.
