Gods of Advertising

Every day you brought another load, chipping away at the boxes in your soon-to-be-former home’s crawlspace, from the jammed shelves in the garage, from your wife’s endless wardrobes. Every day you filled the car with possessions. Public Storage Works was off the 101, skirting the freeway in a dilapidated neighborhood of San Rafael. It loosely resembles the fabled production lots where you once made TV commercials, but drearier. Here stuff got put away and locked down, each unit a tomb for the diminishing lives of its owners. Staring at the numbered lockers, you observe a sad looking man creeping out from under a half-lowered gate. Like a gaunt bear emerging from his den. Squinting in the sun, he lights up a cigarette. You flash on a moment. A music video was being made in the studio next to where you were filming, for the band Linkin Park. In the merciless, midday sun you had smoked a joint with the guitarist. In Hollywood anything could happen.

To be continued…