we named him Sagan, after the late Carl. one of my heroes.

everything has changed, kinda. yet i still feel like me, even as i type this one handed, infant human cradled in the other.

last night: we had the birth at home, in a large tub of water in the living room. joriel and i in the tub, me supporting her as she moaned and roared like a lioness, and the water turned red with blood.

then, hours later, there he was – our son, emerging from the water, ghostly white with vernix, we laughing with delight. later, the placenta emerges – i cut the cord, and he is on his way.

many years from now, he’ll be scattering our ashes, saying farewell. by then, i hope we’ve had time to give him all the love we already feel in this most wondrous of hellos. where this love comes from, and whence it goes, is just another beautiful mystery.

a conversation with my friend Amani yesterday inspired an idea for an altruistic service: a means for people who had taken something that didn’t belong to them to return the thing to the rightful owner, anonymously, through a third party (me). they would donate whatever they could afford to cover the shipping costs and any research time necessary on my part to track down the owner.

it would serve as an ethical and literal clearinghouse for those carrying guilt/bad karma/what have you associated with a theft, no questions asked. perhaps the thing in question isn’t around anymore, or was always somewhat intangible, and the person simply wants to send anonymous compensation to the affected party. for instance, a shoplifter who stole a candy bar for fun years before and now feels regret, or a rapscallion who committed vandalism and now wants to pay for the damage.

ideally, i would need to first make sure that i was legally immune in providing such a service. it makes sense to have rules on what i couldn’t accept – illegal drugs and body parts being some of the more obvious examples – and if everybody ends up sending me heavy or otherwise expensive objects to ship and never donates any money, the entire enterprise would quickly become impractical. i might do well to “vet” the objects first via email submissions before agreeing to accept them for return.

they wouldn’t necessarily have to be stolen things – i suppose they could be things that were borrowed and never returned. for instance, the so-called borrower is either too embarrassed to return them personally (such as a library book from 20 years ago) or can’t remember who or where they got them from (and for whatever reason is keen on getting them returned).

i’m imagining undramatic objects – things seemingly small and banal whose history is compelling. images of the things and their associated stories (however vague) would be told on the site. kinda like PostSecret, but directed towards a known party, or like Found, but “Returned”.

unicorns! mars! d&d! i actually enjoy getting associated with these sorts of things. though sometimes i worry that i don’t “do” these things often or deeply enough to justify the tags. so much of it goes on in my head, where others (i assume) cannot see it – but then, i’m not much one for a distinctive “inner” and “outer” voice – i kinda just say what’s on my mind as i’m thinking it, much to the continuing amusement/annoyance/alarm of my lovely wife.

like this “blog” for instance. i write random crap when i feel like it, while she carefully constructs regular missives that target a specific audience and theme. she’d never ramble on about coffee, science and fetishes like, um, i just did. i don’t know if there’s an intrinsic value to either approach – i’m just aware of mine, which is not so much an approach as a mad dash towards the exit. and i’m not certain this is really anything more than masturbation on my part, the kind few want to hear about and none want to witness.

that being said, i maintain a desire this space to *be* something more than what it is. so far, any related energy goes toward flickr and related photo projects, so maybe there needs to be more a bridge in that regard. i blogged with random precision for about five years on secret city, but it petered out somehow after a brief surge (which coincided with my unemployment in the early stages of 2007), as circle of irony has. i’m not giving up, though – i just need to find some focus, and decide what i want this to be, exactly. stay tuned.

i would have already assigned myself to having this all end in tears, if not for two things: one, “this” will never end; two, i barely know what “this” is.

how’s the old heart today? oh just great fucker thanks so goddamn much for asking

DONT TRY TO FRONT A BROTHER WITH A HEART OF STEEL I GOTS CLANKITYCLANK I AIN’T EVEN USED now that we’ve gotten that out of the way i think it’s time we had sex SMILE AND NOD

don’t think this changes anything. mine didn’t come with any instructions either but you don’t hear me flappin on like a fuckin idiot about some secret pain that NO-ONE-IN-THE-HISTORY-OF-PAIN-HAS-EVER-FELT. get over YOUR GODDAMNSELF ALREADY thx.

[The camera whirs for another 20 seconds or so of awkward silence, then stops with a subdued click. The audience begins to file out almost immediately, looking more relieved than confused.]

richmond lies sleeping
but in my secret city
something is waking.