Of course it’s hard to stay stuck in a tar pit when you have a little niece who looks like this. The first child of my only brother, Mallory and family are in town visiting, and I brought them in to see the Manly Fireplug at his hot new barbershop on Market Street. You can see she kinda digs him.

But what’s not to like?

I’m proud of the Fireplug and his new shop. He went from four chairs to eleven, and I now call him Big Daddy Barber Mogul. If you live in the city and need a haircut, stop on by. More barbers mean more walk-ins available, and I want him to make lots of money. So that he can bring it all home to me.

He’s having an opening party:

Saturday, February 21st
8 to 11 pm
2150 Market Street
(between Church and Sanchez)

I don’t care much for the term “depression,” as by now it’s been thrown around so often and so carelessly that it’s lost all its meaning. And for a long time I preferred Tennessee Williams’ term for that which ailed him, the “blue devils.” But even that term implies a sort of mischievous energy, and at least when I fall prey to it, there’s nothing energetic about it. This state blunts my mental faculties as well, so finding the right phrase may be beyond my reach right now, but it’s more akin to a tar pit, something I fall down into, something that slowly constricts me to the point where every movement becomes labor. And it’s only movement that saves me. But the things that would help me the most, when down in the pit, are also the hardest to do. Writing. Reading. Hitting the gym. Talking with friends. Inside the tar pit my compulsive tendencies escalate, and seize upon activities which don’t feed my spirit or my brain; they merely open a window wide enough through which I can escape for a few hours. Like Playstation 3.

I fall into the pit with frustrating regularity, though with the help of modern medicine, and with more thorough experience with its contours, the times I spend down there grow fewer and farther between. Which is progress. I used to live down there. I spent my whole adolescence and college years, and pretty much all of my twenties, down there. So I have a little gratitude.

Before the Manly Fireplug came into my life I’d been single for over five years. So I’d forgotten how much the tar pit affects not only me but those close to me as well, and it was his frustration, coupled with my own, with my absence, which led me a few days ago to start clawing my way to the surface. To be a tad melodramatic.

So my apologies to you, in case you’d missed me.

Another factor that led me to fight my way back to the surface was the simple desire for self-promotion. A while back I was asked to take part in another public literary reading next Thursday, here in San Francisco. The reading series is called Inside Story Time, and the curators do well at bringing in some great writers, so it could be a good one. This month’s theme is “What to Want, or the Lineaments of Gratified Desire.” The other writers will be Rodes Fishburne, Holly Shumas, Andrea Drugay, and Justin Chin.

Looks like they have a full bar, too, in case you need a little more motivation.

Inside Story Time
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Cafe Royale
800 Post Street (at Leavenworth)
6:30 – 8:30 pm
$3 to $5 cover