4/11/03, San Francisco

Dear Phil,

i suppose you could call it a birthday, but i didn’t celebrate it. to be honest i forgot to. consider it more like finding out your clothes are a year old. a little worn, somewhat out of fashion, and, thank God, well past that break-in period. the earth waxes old like a garment, who said that? anyway it was eliot who said the world ends with a whimper, and i nearly got into a fight with someone who claimed that sort of ‘nonscientific’ attitude was responsible for most of the suffering in the world. realistic assessment of probabilities, bayesian posterior probability, doomsday paradoxes: stupid hubristic fucker.

well at any rate i did not beat the shit out of him because i recognize some of my own obsessions. musicians and scientists share a common psychology, not – as the stupid hubristic fuckers will tell you – because music is mathematical or some other likewise crap, but because in a world that is, let’s face it, made out of glass or better yet, frozen shit, it’s something you can do. add to that the welcoming arms of a silent, expectant audience and it’s no wonder people find their way into both of these most excellent strumpets’ cabinets.

i have, alas, been continuously drunk for most of the week. friends with birthdays. what friends? well, the same ones. odd how the most ridiculous conceits can be turned into sentences blissfully ignorant of everything but the most useless essentials. i mean, where is the metaphysical rose, the communication with the dead, the cherished lunacy of cutting oneself adrift in the explanation, “I traveled around the world”? Did any of it happen? What happened to that cigarette-bogarting lunatic in the gold dust? Did he just want my wallet? Only Mara seems convinced (if unrecognition is any kind of certainty) that I have turned into something else, but she, all likelihood, is something of a shade herself.

best, johnny