Bad Popso

We stayed in town from Thursday until Saturday at N’s house. H was supposed to have her new baby and we were gonna take care of DZ. H, was on a waiting list at Cedars and was on hold to check-in, have her inducement done. Her doctor was going away Saturday and she wanted him to deliver – so they agreed on inducing the baby since the due date is so close - but the hospital kept putting her on hold, every day and every night because they had more emergency pregnancies and since she wasn’t going into actual labor, she wasn’t going into the hospital. So frustrating. I offered to drain 20 grand out of my bank account to have a medical team come to their house and deliver but H is a tough woman and told me to save my dough and STFU. Haha, I love her and obviously my son, N.

DZ and Popso had some fun times at the West Hollywood playground in the sweltering heat and mostly riding up and down the elevator inside the air conditioned park building. DZ likes to race through the library too and create a combination of joy and havoc. I got him a library card with his name on it and his favorite thing to do is go on the computer with his passcode (I punch it in with him) and watch ‘Pete The Cat’ from the Pete The Cat books. DZ loves the book and the animated series. He also loves to cruise the aisles and casually tip books over onto the floor so Popso can pick them up. Anything to keep him occupied when his mama is waiting for the new baby is fine by us.

We took him to LACMA also. He races around outside the museum, like all over the place; way faster than S and I can keep up with. We all get in for free so it’s nice to get him inside when he cooperates. Thursday, we managed to get him inside mostly because he was proud of his little entrance sticker on his shirt and he loved riding up the escalator three floors to the Broad Contemporary Art museum. We wandered around the summer crowded room - and while I was melting into a Rothko, and a, de Kooning, and a Pollock - S was following DZ into his latest obsession: The Central Meridian (The Garage) which is an immersive sculpture by Michael C. McMillen, where you enter through two old double doors and wander into a simulation of a mysterious, nostalgic mid 20^th century Los Angeles garage. DZ went through those doors and around the old garage with all the drawers and the tools and lamps and dust and the old, cut in half, 64’ Dodge dart; through the exhibit - out the doors and back through the doors, over and over and over. I had to catch him after his seventh exit and carry him outside because it was 6pm and the museum was closing and he had to get home for dinner.

No Popso! No! I don’t wanna go home for dinner! I wanna see the old car!

Again?

Yes Popso! Again and again and again!!!

We took him back to LACMA after a frustrating Friday waiting once more for H to be admitted to Cedars. There was a free outdoor jazz concert so the museum was packed. We got there about 5:45 PM. S told us to get out while she parked the car in the massive museum underground lot. She knows I hate mulit-story parking lots in malls or museums; something to do with a bad acid trip being lost in one of them when I was fourteen, so she is kind and lets me out of the car before she parks, haha…

So DZ and I were on our own until we would meet her by the concert stage because S has exposed him to jazz since he was months old and he actually loves jazz and all the jazz instruments which he can name by sight: sax, trumpet, piano, drums, all of them .

Well, when we were walking towards the stage, the escalator to the Broad museum was in view and DZ tore away from me - and up the past the guard who checks for your entrance sticker. The guard just shrugged when I ripped past him following DZ up the escalator. He didn’t wanna check a little kid and his grandpa. He had that - it was close to 6, who gives a shit, attitude. DZ was on b-line for the Central Meridian exhibit ( what a memory!)– but when he raced past this nerdy, 20 something security guard inside, with a big bags under his eyes and a bad haircut, beard and attitude, that watched me chasing him – the guard yelled out, “Stop! Where are your tickets?!! So now, the guard was chasing me who was chasing DZ. I stopped and faced the guard.

“I’m just trying to get my grandson. Gimme a break dude!”

“Do not call me dude,” he said. “Where are your tickets?”

This is where bad Popso told a little lie.

“I don’t have them. I bought them but I lost them. Can’t you see I’m chasing my grandson!”

“You have to leave this building now or I will take further steps,” he said.

DZ had disappeared into the crowded room.

“Take your fuckin steps,” I said.

“Look, I’m sorry,” he said.

“You’re not sorry, you’re full of shit!” I said – and yeah loud enough for people to turn their heads and get the guard ready for action.

I ran away from him and I noticed he was just thrilled to get on his little walkie talkie and call for back up. I got DZ just before he got to the Garage exhibit doors and whisked him into the crowd, expertly avoiding the bad attitude guard on the hunt for both of us, with a couple of real looking, bigger security guards. DZ was yelling, “ I wanna see the old car Popso!” as we snuck down the side stairs. I probably looked like I was kidnapping him but we got back to the concert area where S was anxiously waiting for us.

“Where were you guys?” she said.

“I wanna see the old car,” DZ said.

“He was just running around talking about the old car at that exhibit we saw yesterday,” I said.

“Okay….” S said… then I got saved as the jazz trumpeter began the intro to, Miles Davis “Freddy the Freeloader’. DZ was onto the next obsession.

“Trumpet!” he said.

S had the stroller with her. I hate the stroller but who is more sensible? We put DZ in the stroller and got closer to the stage. There was some ancient, ex-jazz dancer dude, dressed in white linen with a silk scarf over his head, doing bad dancing to the song as the rest of the band joined in. S asked him to move a bit so DZ could see the band. The bad dancer dude gave, S the finger and kept dancing. Bad Popso did not like the bad dancer. I confronted him.

“Why are you giving the finger to a two year old.” I said.

“This is a dancing area,” he said.

Popso just stared at him. Hard. The dancer looked scared and I was immediately regretful that he did.

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry,” he said. “I respect you. Take the kid out of the stroller and he can dance next to me.”

DZ heard and didn’t like what he heard or saw in the guy.

“I don’t wanna dance with you!” he yelled. “I don’t wanna!”

Well, we all had to laugh. I hugged the bad dancer and he was relieved that I was an old pushover and that he could get back to his bad sashaying to, “Freddy the Freeloader.”

We got to back to N’s house and had a solemn dinner. Poor H. Waiting, waiting, waiting. By Saturday morning her doctor had gone on vacation and she just said, “Fuck it. I will wait to have a natural birth.”

S and I hugged her and told her we loved her and were there for whenever she needs us again. I was so happy to go home though. I don’t do very well anymore with cities and crowds and polluted air and heat and AC in every building and home. I get a sore throat from AC. I thrive off open windows and ocean air. I surfed 4 to 5 ft glassy waves at Colony early this morning and had a conversation with a seal that swam up to my surfboard. I saw a bright green and blue spotted lizard on the straw parched Leo Carrillo trail later.

I am the king lizard of Leo, D! I am a survivor! This hot sun and scorched earth don’t bother me a bit! I spot sole flying insects and snatch them out of the air with my magic lizard tongue!

I am so grateful to be able to regroup here back in our trailer home by the sea. Bad Popso gets to take a nature break and he and will be ready to travel back into town and hang with DZ - when the little bun in H’s oven decides to come out on their own.