Early in the night I stop by at Trieste Cafe for an espresso before I go to the studio and work through the night. It has a beautiful atmosphere, the smell of nostalgia mingling with that of coffee, breaking through thick layers of conversations.

The wonderful machine still sits in the corner by the restrooms; the jukebox that has old 45s of Gigli, Di Stefano and Callas in it. I spend a long time choosing which arias to play. I put the coins in. Tick-tack and the music begins. It's a nice aria but not one of the ones I had chosen, they never are.

It always picks the ones that it likes, completely disregarding my choices. Yet I always pretend that I don't know what it is up to, going over the list again and again until I can find the selections that I want, knowing all too well that it does not matter and that it will play whatever it likes anyway. And I wait. Impatiently. To see what it has chosen for me this time.

San Francisco, 1992