Portland

I arrived to Portland weary, six days into my journey. After pleading with the oven that is Western Idaho to send me a saint in a pick up truck, I found evening in Baker City and attempted to scout a campground. The mosquito molestation drove me back indoors to a truck stop with a Greyhound station. I plead with the driver to accept my last forty dollars as fare to Portland and we made it at five in the morning. I had a couple bucks left, quickly hustled away for cigarettes. Later a tweaker harassed me for mean-mugging him but a schizophrenic warded him off. so I shared my last cigarette with him and he explained to me that an immigrant married him as a baby for a green card then stuck him in a mental institution to prevent him from claiming the half of Portland that belonged to him by his right.

What instantly struck me about Portland were the cliques. I remember cliques from high school but as an adult I found Logan split between Outcasts and Mormons. Sure, there were brands of style like Bro-dudes and Hipsters, Gwangstas and Crusties, but fashion style caused only those who wanted no friends to judge each other. A city like Portland is large enough you could disappear down any crazy lifestyle you wanted and never come out.

As a traveler I found myself at home. A family willingly greeted me and aided me in every way possible. A mumbling, bearded alcoholic in his fifties named Old Man took me under his wing and taught me how to crack spange. My favorite sign to fly read "Verbal Abuse only $1." A shabby orc named Jesse James and I solicited people to relieve their frustration by giving verbal abuse to the homeless. During special desperation Jesse James would ask people to punch him in the face for a dollar so he could buy a bottle. I found myself more inclined to make people laugh for a couple hours and buy a six pack of tall boys.

I witnessed the best spange from a dirty kid named Mason whose sign read, "Not gonna lie, need a beer." We sat together outside 7-11 and he taunted people with "Bumbity bum beggity bum bum beg panhandle!" I gawked as people instantly emptied their pockets for him. My own signs grew more honest and as I write this I currently sit outside the same 7-11 with a sign that simply says "Beer." Mason has gone, I was supposed to go with him but something happened to cause me to stick around.

I found myself sleeping at Occupy. When Old Man went to jail for the weekend I had to watch his shit. I got plastered and lost it. The next day I ran into a bum named Aaron who I remember hanging with the day before and he said he left it there. I found it untouched and decided Occupy was a relatively safe place. I noticed one particular hippy cleaning up garbage and decided to pick up the trash surrounding me and help him out. He embraced me and told me to call him Q. When he asked for my name, Wizard popped out. I don't really know why, maybe because it was the only nickname anyone gave me I actually liked. I fell into it easily enough with my tarot readings and magic tricks, along with my knack for vague yet profound little statements.

I met Portland Girl outside a convenient store I liked to spange. Pretty girls walked by often enough I'd grown used to saying stupid things to them like "Beautiful girl says what?" and "I think you're pretty. Now you're supposed to say I'm pretty too." I said something abundantly stupid to her but it caught her attention. With a little token hesitation I got her number. She was a photographer, and left to bring back her portfolio and show me. While she was gone, Mason walked by and told me he was leaving, inviting me to come along. I bid him farewell, another one of those major life choices I had to make on the fly.

Portland Girl and I hung out for the next six days. The first two days I felt cock blocked by an old permafry named Todd and his cancer ridden cat. The first night he actually helped us hang out by making all the propositions I didn't have the balls to. After she left I got wasted with my buddy Oddball and passed out on the water front. In the morning my backpack was gone but the thief left my magic and tarot cards. Not sure why. The second night I invited her out and Todd found us and tagged along. She never mentioned a boyfriend to me but when she got hit on the second night she mentioned one to him. I'm sure she would have answered affirmatively if I asked, but I considered it positive that she didn't bring him up on her own.

On the third night I got drunk and Jesse James choked me out right in front of her. What happened later, you'll have to ask her because I don't remember. I do remember trying to make out with her though, and I remember the way she pulled back, mentioning her boyfriend. On the fourth day I met her at a drum circle. Like the nights before, we mostly smoked and talked. I ran into my friend Spike at the drum circle and invited him to smoke with us. But on this particular night, as she left I told her I loved her. On the fifth day, I was on mushrooms. And it rained. I lost my jacket earlier but she scored an umbrella so we huddled under it smoking and talking. She asked me about the most romantic moments of my life, and she told me hers but my focus couldn't sustain itself. Eventually Spike stumbled drunk and rambling down the street and accosted us. We must have looked picturesque on the Waterfront huddling together in the rain. He forced me to confess me deeper feelings for her. I didn't know what to say. He asked if I loved her, and she answered yes for me, that I had already told her so. I liked the way it mattered to her. I only realized it was true when I said it, but being pressured to come up with poetry on mushrooms caused my brain to go blank.

At the end of the night she asked me to write a poem for her. That moment... well it obliterated me. At her request I was somehow supposed to splash ink around a page and recreate in words a worthiness to this troubled, injured drop of radiance. I couldn't touch it. I wrote trash. She loved it. Later that night I texted her something slightly better.

On the sixth day she moved into her dorms but came back to visit me. Like before, all we did was smoke and talk. And like before, I don't even remember what we talked about. Everything I suppose, and conversations blurred between days. I left a week later.