The Golden Sickle no longer exists—other establishments and other homes now occupy its various rooms, offices, and strange little nooks and crannies. The building in which it sprawled has a longer history than the USA, and so from such a perspective, it’s only normal that a place as vibrant as the Golden Sickle would come, live out its mayfly lifespan, and pass on. In the waning days of that vibrant and eccentric place, I worked night shifts and discovered that I’d become a member of one of the world’s strangest, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural families. I drank beer and harder spirits with a teddy-bear of a guy named Olda, and discovered Štĕpán’s enduring fascination with “authentic American Rednecks” and monster trucks. I also discovered his discriminating tastes when it comes to a rarity in the Czech Republic: good peanut butter. Štĕpán loves the stuff and is willing to trade bottles of Absinth for jars of Jiff—smooth, not chunky. I discovered a women’s fashion line: Lady Moda, and though I never actually spoke to the Lady Moda ladies, I always saw them, always heard them on Friday nights when the weather was warm and they claimed a small portion of the common courtyard for themselves and their numerous bottles of wine. None of them spoke English and I learned quite a lot of Czech (the surly stuff) from them. Their store occupied the front of the building, while their store-rooms and other cryptic spaces occupied other parts of the building. I’d also discovered my favorite bar on Earth in the same building. I’ve written of U Sudu on many occasions, and many of the beer and Kafka pictures early on in my gallery involve the barrel-vaulted cellar of that bar. On the day that I took this particular picture, Kača had just arrived for work. She’d simply come bopping in, listening to the Ramones on her iPod. She carried a bag of grapes and cherries and a few rolls of bread with yogurt-based cream spreads, cheese, and something slices of something I could only describe as breakfast pork—not exactly ham, not exactly bacon, but some hybrid of the two. To this day I imagine it to be some obscure form of sausage as it seemed (at the time) to have been processed in much the same way as modern Central European sausages are produced. I’d spent the night maintaining order and watching Youtube, and undoubtedly posting and commenting here on Renderosity. I was probably listening to the Battlestar Galactica version of “All Along the Watchtower” which served as something of my theme song during my waning months in the Czech Republic. Kača and I would often blast it as we stood in the enclosed courtyard, singing along with Brendan McCreary: “There must be some way outta here, said the joker to the thief…there’s too much confusion…I can’t get no relief.” There were times when it seemed as if our lives were defined and confined by that courtyard, and the backside of the Lady Moda store. On the day that I had cherries, grapes, and strange pork and bread for breakfast, I decided to forego sleep. I wanted to capture something of my everyday life, and well…the first thing that grabbed my attention was a scraggly little weed-tree growing out of the cobblestones marking the corner where Lady Moda’s backside met the confining wall of a tiny little outdoor water closet. The sun had just risen and everything was still quiet, and the image you see here is the first significant moment of that day. I’d emailed this to Victor in Moscow, and as usual, he expressed his droll approval. For those interested, a common early-morning sound at the Golden Sickle can be heard HERE. If anything represents everyday Prague to me, then it's this image and the song that goes with it. Kača was the joker. I was the thief. The Golden Sickle is closed...we are no longer in that enclosed courtyard. As always, thank you for viewing, reading, and commenting