I used to make friends with the artists when I started collecting, but that got weird. I mean, they’re weird, there’s that, just as people. Staying up all hours, making strange comments, never watching the right OLED screen shows because they’re too busy being involved in weird things nobody cares about anymore or never did—but that can be entertaining and funny sometimes. I guess the real problem is that they’re always broke. Which is fine if you’re hanging out and doing move in someone’s apartment and one of them needs you to spot them a pill because they’re not making any money off of their art yet. That’s okay. But when you want to go out and have a nice dinner, and drinks, and go to the clubs, and they show up in their weird secondhand clothes and can’t hang out all night because they’re too poor—that’s just sad for everyone. So I mainly only hang out with the artists that I know are from good backgrounds, or selling well enough. It’s less awkward that way.

The time I spent at my dad’s in-state house was pretty soul-crushing. I have friends all over the world, of course, from summers abroad and vacations and such, but even the appeal of going to the places they were was diminished. I mean, New York did its work in preparing for droughts with emergency water supplies, but lots of other places, like the Mediterranean, South Africa, and southern China, are all getting pretty dry. I have friends there. Well, a lot of them left, or have little compounds where things aren’t as bad, but it’s sad, really sad. And with the droughts come the fires. And if it’s not droughts and fires, it’s floods. The whole world’s kind of fucked, in different ways. So most of the traveling I do is to places like my dad’s house anyway, little places tucked away and stocked up for any emergencies and out of the landslides of the mountains and near enough water. I guess I felt safe at my dad’s place, even if I didn’t feel so happy.

Pollock was happy, and that was something. Once, someone suggested that he was an ornament for me, a pretty little teddy bear dog that I keep in a bag on my shoulder. I love Pollock so much; nothing could be further from the truth. I had him registered as my therapy animal a while back, mostly for travel purposes, but it’s also true. His little face has saved me from the deepest depression so many times. That he had space to run around in my dad’s compound was something.