The 17th of every month is brings something intense to me.

This morning before I woke up I had a crazy dream. For some reason it was St. Patrick's Day (the worst holiday ever) and I was in church. The first Presbyterian Church in downtown Portland, to be exact. Now this particular church is pretty formal -big stained glass windows, velvet pews, gigantic organ up in a loft (not a drum-set or electric guitar to be found), preachers who wear doctoral robes and bifocals and lecture from the podium.


So, in my dream, I was in this church, but instead of being in my regular place -- house right balcony -- I was in a little room behind the Chancel -- not a Sacristy, but like a focus group observation booth. I could see the backs of the preacher's chairs. A bunch of Irish guys came into this room to sit with me and lit up a joint. They started smoking up and I was really appalled. "This is CHURCH - maaaaaan. -- not too cool" "Chill out." one of them said with a devil-like smile. So I waited.


Instead of the organ prelude, a little man in a suit came out and started playing some kind of a jig on a calliope. I thought this was weird and decided to try to sneak out of church. The bells rang, and the acolyte came in to light the candles followed by the preachers who took their places on the chancel. Instead of doing the call to worship, however, Dr. Tom chucked an M80 or something into the nave. Suddenly the congregation all had sparklers and fireworks -- and holy hell was breaking out in the sanctuary.


I tried to sneak out -- through the frenzy -- and found my self in the church basement. A typical sterile place with a kitchen and a bunch of church ladies with pies and cakes and urns of coffee. And Bo was there.





I knew I had to get him back to Boston. Away from Portland -- so I told him to get in the baby backpack carrier so I could carry him out and somehow get to the airport. He argued with me about that, but I forced him in to the carrier and hoisted him up on my back. When I got outside, the entire downtown had changed. The Church was on an island, surrounded by deep cracks in the earth that revealed molten lava. There was no way to get out and get to the airport. I kept looking at my watch -- worried about missing my flight, and frantically calling people on my cel trying to reach someone who would get us out of this mess. Bo was getting so heavy that I could barely lift my legs from the ground.


So I went back in the chruch and tried to find some church lady that I could pay to take me to the airport. None of them wanted to help. Frustrated, I sat down and began to cry in the basement of this church. That's when I woke up.







Bo has been dead for 10 months today

Bo's room was hellacious.








I mean it really drove me nuts how crappy he kept it. Periodically, I'd bust in there and scream and yell about the mess -- and tell him to clean it up for Chrissake!!!


He was pretty stubborn about that. He meant to keep a certain ambiance that I never understood. When I look at Ed's garage, it reminds me of this room. Bo created a sanctuary -- a place where no mother would ever want to go. In fact, when my sister Jana cleaned it and found a bunch of women's undergarments (presumably from women who had been in there) she wrinkled her nose and remarked that she could not imagine EVER getting naked in that room.




staticpoetboy

Today was an interesting day. I had coffee with my friend Jim and we talked about how I thought God put me and Ed in a cloud of oblivion while Bo was dying. The last thing Bo said to me the night before he died was "take some really good pictures of you and Ed in Hawaii. Get a lot of pictures of you guys. Don't let Ed take those stupid scenery shots. I love you Mom."

So Ed and I took pictures of each other the whole day -- wanting to bring them back to show Bo. Every time we took a picture I thought about how Bo would like to see us here in this place.



The strange thing is that Ed and I both look really contemplative in all of our photos even though we were having a totally relaxing time not arguing -- nor worried about anything. You can see even see a hint of the famous "Booth smirk" in this picture of me.





Ed is contemplating the universe here. We found a fantastic feather for his hat on one of the beaches where we stopped off.

This is Bo in the last picture I took of him a few weeks before he died. He was posing for a headshot so he could be an extra in Gus VanSant's Elephant.

Ultimately, Bo was cremated in this very outfit.



He used to smile so much as a baby and little kid. When he hit 14 though, he decided that smiling was not cool.... so he perfected this esoteric -- bored gaze that used to drive us crazy. You can see the tiniest hint of the famous "Booth smirk" on his lips in this shot.

When we shopped for the the red shirt in the picture, Bo dragged Abra and me all over downtown to find the perfect THING to wear for his MLC prom. He wanted it to EXACTLY match his hair. What a pain-in-the-butt afternoon. We looked everywhere and FINALLY found it at Magpie on 9th and Washington. I was pissed off, but would do it again a million times to have him back.

Bo was so cool in this shirt. This is one of my favorite pictures. Ed took it in our garage. The image is the "BlueMeanies" from Yellow Submarine. Ed and I picked it up at the Experience Music Project during a trip to Seattle. Bo loved the Beatles. It totally cracked me up when he "discovered" The White Album. We'd sit in his room and listen -- and he'd interpret the lyrics.

I'll never forget how excited and thrilled he was -- not that you could see it in this shot -- to get this shirt.