Summary of my conversation with a fellow who recounted to me his first meeting his father in prison.

Last night I was walking into Berkley center and I decided to go a different way and wouldn’t ya know it I was accosted by a new friend. This guy is a Jewish man in his early thirties who is homeless but looks perfectly normal who I ‘d met the night before, when I’d been eating an oversized salad in a restaurant. I had been sitting there eating looking out at him and finally thought what the heck. So I go out and ask him if he wants to help me finish it. So he comes in and we made friends, his name's troy. So I’m telling him to do certain things to get the magic working and that I’m gonna check up on him next time I see him. Well that's who I ran into last night. We walked over to this organic foods restaurant and he tells me he did ten years for shooting someone and while he was in jail in Oregon for doing that who does he meet for the first time in his life? Guess.
Here’s an email conversation that begins with the question above and the command to my friend to "guess"…

commence: Jesus
commence: A Hassid
batova: No. Now guess darlin. No a personal connection to himself.
commence: His brother
commence: His father, I mean

batova: HIS FUCKIN FATHER.
batova: His father's a Native American who met his Jewish mother by stealing the Yeshiva van and she was in it. They fell in love, had him, divorced. Turns out his dad once killed 3 people in self-defense says this guy, Tray. !! insane or what.
commence: Yes, and dangerous.
batova: so what do they do when they meet? they argue about why dad wasn’t there for him all those years. in the courtyard every day after lunch they see each other. don't tell people they're related till it's found out and one gets transferred. arguing not about killing people, but about being negligent dad. like that guy in that movie, what was it? Doctor Evil, working it out with his son?
batova: right. so I sat way back and started asking him about himself. jeez. that was something. This kid’s just done ten years and he's trying to straighten himself out .
so THEN. we walk back towards where we came from and pass this college like thing: Psychic institute. says they need people to come in for 2-hour free readings so we did. I had a two hour reading and you know what? it was right on. The psychic says I been walking everywhere, need to stay dryer. In fact I’ve been walking everywhere and have gotten a chill from the damp air on an adventure last weekend to Big Sur. Yada yada. Welcome to the West Coast, where anything can and does happen….