Bluesman's Blues

But he remembers that the fire occurred at 6:32 in the evening. "I do smoke, but I wasn't sleeping with a cigarette in my hand. I remember very distinctly putting it out as well as I could. Apparently, some of it broke off."

He went to the kitchen to make some tea as the flames grew. He then went to go wake up his roommate, who, Pena didn't realize, had left the apartment. "I spent a bunch of extra time trying to wake him up," Pena says. He dialed 911, then tripped over a chair and fell. At this point, he was swallowing smoke and was too weak to get back up. He spent four days in a coma at Moffitt Hospital and was released four days after coming out of it.

In the eight months following the fire, Pena lost about 100 pounds, and he still suffers from a lack of appetite, the pain of glaucoma, smoke inhalation, and depression. The glowing reviews for Genghis Blues have not relieved the darkness that has always been a part of Pena but now seems ready to envelop him entirely.

"I just haven't been able to bounce back," he says. "Whatever might have been wrong in my body at the time seemed to be exacerbated by the fire." Because of his physical ills, he does less performing and teaching, which cuts into his income. And he doesn't write songs.

"I write if I'm inspired, and there's not much to inspire me. I'm sick, and I feel shitty," he says, "and I feel tired of living."

Genghis Blues screens as part of the S.F. International Film Festival Thursday, April 29, at 10 p.m. at the AMCKabuki. See Page 74 for complete coverage of the festival. Also, Paul Pena performs Friday, May 7, at the Clarion Music Center. Call 391-1317 for more info.