haikus from a year ago

I promised Prajna about a year ago I would share with her the haikus I wrote while walking around Eden Hall Farm last fall. It's taken me a year, sadly, to get them typed for her. I thought I would share them here, my own personal auditorium, because haikus are an interesting artform that have more to them than mere line breaks and syllable count. I'm not very good at them, but they are fun and can sometimes get out something we are burying, which is true I feel for most writing forms. As I am in perhaps not a writers block but a lifestyle block where I cannot seem to allow myself time to sit and write, perhaps in fear of what may or may not come out, it is good to go back and look at where I was a year ago. Looks like I was in about the same place, all things considered. Here they are:



Haikus inspired by a solitary walk in the woods near Eden Hall Farm. Autumn, '08.


Carolyne Whelan

whelan.writes@gmail.com




But what if I

don't want to head into

this wilderness



Life my bare belly

high into an unheard

ocean of a scream?



I yell at traffic

throw rocks at it, shout it

straight into phone poles.



My hat pulled over

my eyes still does nothing

to block the blaze.
*



Navigating trails

back to the farm, I hear

footsteps – everywhere.



Twigs crack under

the bruise of my bootstep, but

another prowls here too—



In the woods, coyotes

prey on the last drips of sun

dying on low leaves.



I think of poetry while

the birds chant migration songs

mantras of loneliness.



On the roof, a squirrel

gathers nuts against the sunset

and above – the hawk.


What was Eden but

a place of trees and prey

and humans, who chose The Word.



No matter how loud,

"Let there be light" will never

return to me the sun.



The birch tree is bare

but for the grey sky it surrenders

and the hawk nest, so high.

Ray

The other day, after the morning bikeride, Soupie, Major Tom, and I were in a rush to get to work but ran into one of many flocks of children on our block, along with their (grand)mother, Darlene. The kids don't usually live at the house, but nearby. A couple months ago, two of them were outside Ray's house (next door) visiting and met Major Tom and told me about their mother's dog and how their sister would love MJ. A few weeks later, the little girl met him, and now when we walk through it is all friendly hellos and no more being scared of the white people next door who dress funny or their hyper dog. So my family walked briskly with theirs, being friendly and making small talk. As we approached our car, Darlene stopped us and turned somber a moment.



"Hey, so I know we all don't talk all that much but you probably know I'm Ray's wife, Darlene. Well you know he's sick, and he's not doing so well and, well I know you all are friendly with him, and I'd like to invite you to his funeral when it comes. He's got this new medicine and he won't take it. If you hear us arguing it's nothing [laughs], just me trying to get him to take his medication and him being stubborn to the end."



Crushing. Ray's maybe not a "great guy" as is easily said in these situations, but he's certainly been a great neighbor and despite his problems and human flaws, is a good person who've I've really enjoyed getting to know and having the opportunity to share space with. I hope he lives a while longer, or else goes peacefully and painlessly in his sleep. I doubt either will happen, as he is still up and walking around, washing cars, flirting with all the women on the street. So it goes. Good luck in your journeys, neighbor.



The night we heard the news, the street was eerily quiet. The usual buzz was gone, the house on the other side of us wasn't full of its usual bubbling party or chaotic reverie. No one walked the streets. No one drove by with loud stereos. In the distance, no dogs barked or sirens heralded. Nothing. Once, Water walked by silently on the other side of the street, stopped once and merely stood for a moment facing forward, and continued walking to his house. Other than that, silent, still.



Tonight, we ate dinner on the front porch, played with some candles, and enjoyed the nice evening and the cool air the rain brought. We'd gotten a mountain bike ride in at Frick in the morning and felt lucky we thought to ride early again. Ray stepped out of the house and we made small talk about the weather, general happiness. A few neighbors next door wandered in and out of the front door. Everyone is treading very lightly these days on Trenton Ave.



I'm interested to see what happens to the neighborhood if Ray doesn't make it. He isn't the glue, so much as the vice grip that keeps us all on lockdown. There goes the neighborhood?

re-entering modern humanity

June is here, and its brought with it my ability to re-enter modern humanity in all its dumbfounded glory. Friends? I remember those! Fun? Sure, that rings a vague bell. Bruises and scabs? Got them back like muscle memory.



I graduated from grad school and now have my MFA in creative writing from Chatham University (finally). I was first runner-up for best poetry thesis, which is interesting because my thesis wasn't (solely) poetry, I got my degree technically in cross-genre/experimental, but maybe the poetry stuff was most prevelant? I dunno. Anyway as much as I would have liked to win best thesis, I am glad the person who won (Sara Reiss!) got it because her work is pretty fantastic. Since that's been over, including the stress and planning of the whole graduation ordeal, things have settled down a bit, thankfully.



I had a reading the other night that was PACKED. I was a bit nervous, did fine but probably should have been a bit louder. I set up my watch ahead of time to stopwatch mode so I could time myself and read accordingly (I had a whopping 15-20 minutes to fill up and I have very little idea what that feels like, as most of my readings are 5-10 minutes). After two beers and a few more runs to the bathroom (better out than in, right?) from the nerves, I was up there reading away and had forgotten to press the button. But the way I see it, better to leave them wanting more than have everyone feel satisfied enough to never come to another reading. Laura sold some books, lots of people who'd already read it came up to me and said they were so happy to see me read because they loved the poems in the book. Oh yeah, if anyone wants to purchase my chapbook, let me know and I will post my (work) address where you can send a check for $8. I'll even cover shipping! Although the photos of the event are pretty crappy as far as how I look (imo), the response was great and overall it was a fantastic time. there were a ton of people there who I didn't know, lots of new faces, and the other poets (Kellee Maize and D.J. Brewer) were also fantastic. We all brought our own crowds and it was great to see the blend of everyone in the younger Pittsburgh poetry scene(s) come together. I hope it marks the beginning of new collaborations and a more integrated and collaborative community.



I've also been trying to spend more time actively submitting to publications and (gasp!) keeping track of my submissions using Duotrope's submission manager, which is incredibly helpful in making sure you don't catastrophically screw up (helping you help yourself!). I hae submitted to about ten different journals in the past week, and hope to continue in the battle to not completely drop out of writing now that I've graduated.


M O U N T A I N B I K I N G ! ! On a beautiful day such as today, I feel it deserves such a headline. I won't go into every ride as many of you mountain bike and many of you live near nice parks just as I do and can jump in the woods when you have a spare moment (which is still rare for me), but just this morning's, which took place in Hartwood Acres, a rare treat for me. Soupie and I woke up at 7:30 and were out the door by 10 of 8. Were at Tazza d'Oro by 8 a.m. in time to see poor Braden's sleepy face while he made me their famously perfect iced Americano (the i.A. isn't famous, per se, so much as their espresso in general, amongst other things coffee-related and I could go on about Pittsburgh business ownership and community and whatnot, but this is about biking right??). Sipped those and listened to old episodes of Radio Schizo on cd and got hyped up. Arrived first of the pack, exactly at 8:30 - ON TIME?? Shortly, we saw Speck and then Adam Rosenberg. The four of us hung out for a minute, got situated, and went for a short ride around a trail. By the time we got back to the cars, Drew and Jen had shown up. I was excited and nervous because this was my first time riding with another woman, if you can believe that. It was also my first real group ride! I had ridden of course with Evan and a friend or two of ours before, like Ted or Dingle, or have caught on a ride with Allen and his buddy in the woods, but never a big group of people who all just love to ride. I was the only one on a fully rigid mountain bike, and only Adam was riding a hardtail - everyone else was riding full suspension bikes. While I think that's a bit overkill for a park like Hartwood, it did make me really want to get a hardtail bike especially since I mainly ride Frick Park. Anyway, we rode until 11 a.m. - it was a nice ride, no killin' it, but a pretty good pace the whole time. I would like to do a ride soon that goes all day, where we bring a lunch and hang out and make a whole day of like seven hours of mountain biking and hanging out in the woods. Adam took photos and hopefully he'll have them posted on the internet soon and I can share them. I was pretty happy with myself for the most part, as far as riding challenging things, pushing myself up hills, and keeping a good pace with everyone for the most part. I am still, as always, mad at myself for not doing some of the obstacles that I know I can do, and that are part of what make mountain biking so much fun! I am hoping that a hardtail will help me out a little with that, because it is so painfully obviously psychological for the most part. The point is, who wants to meet me in Frick Park tomorrow at 8 a.m. to get an hour or so of riding in before work?

Gettin' Old

I've been holding off writing a new blog because I keep waiting for a new thing to become come to completion, while another new thing is birthed.



I am re-listening to Obama's speech right now (and still, again, when he said "Ann Nixon Cooper is 102 years old" I could have sworn he said "Anderson Cooper" the journalist). While I predicted something like this back when Bush was first sworn in for presidency in 2000, it is still hard to believe. Driving through the suburbs of PA, OH, and WV over the past few months on my way to bike races and campgrounds, I thought perhaps we were just doomed. I hope now, that he is as good a president as we all think he can be. I was watching the election with some anarchist friends, and one of them said, "I don't vote, I'm an anarchist." And I thought about Bush Jr. before he was a president. We burned effigies of him in Boston Common -- I remember building a great one in an alley across from Finagle a Bagel with John Haugh and Ben Weiser, we must have been about 17 or so, maybe 16 -- before the execution of a teenage boy. The fire department came and kept putting them out, and we'd light them again, and they put them out. I skated home and by the time it was dark out, it was raining. A Krishna friend picked me up and we drove home to the sound of chanting and the smell of dead flowers and I watched the clock tick past the time they were to execute the kid who was younger than I was. Bush never saw those effigies, though, and he wasn't moved by them, wasn't compelled to change or rethink that maybe the whole world IS watching, and maybe they don't like what they see. The news only reported a bunch of pyros almost set the Commons on fire, and that was about it. Anarchists or not, I think there was an activism to voting in this election, a way to say to the people who have been running our country corporately or politically or ideally (with their own ideals), that no, we don't want that anymore. We want the exact opposite, in fact. And there are a whole fucking lot of us.



Also, I sold the Olmo. Harold the bike, named upon his death to me. I sold him to Matty Smith in New Mexico for $1,000 (well, shipping was $50 so really $950 I guess). I loved that bike. But as all things change, it was finally time to pass on that part of my life, a generation of myself into the hands of another. I bought a Bianchi "San Jose" for $350 with the money: a single-speed cyclo-cross bike. The gear is still high, but it has brakes, can hold a water bottle and fenders, and I can ride it in the dirt. I love this new bike and think we will have a lot of fun together over the years. Jose reminds me to enjoy the ride, pedal hard but don't wear myself out because what is more important than me? It reminds me to get up on that curb and ride through that field, commute through the woods and coast, baby, coast.



In the meantime, Soupie's been having a real hard time riding lately. He can tell you about it in his blog, it isn't my story to tell. But it is in that we cannot ride together so much anymore. There is a horrifying potential for no more late-night rides to the north side to look at the city from afar, no more rides through Bloomfield and Greenfield in the wee hours of the morning for a great view and a cup of coffee. No more day trips far out of the city, 75 miles in the dead of winter just for the hell of it, just to feel our legs move and that gruff whir under our bodies. He's finally started stretching, and I suggested adjusting his pedal clips on his shoes. Hopefully with the combination of the two, he will be back in action in a week or so.



So I have been riding by myself. I went for my first solo mountain bike ride ever, just a few days ago. It felt great, actually, riding by myself. Riding my speed, the trails I want to ride. I even did a lot of things I don't have the courage to ride with other people. I fell a few times, but it was rewarding. I met up with Alan, one of Evan's older co-workers, after I'd been in the park for about two hours. I rode with him and his friend for another hour or so. We re-road Nature Trail, my favorite, and I endoed at the bottom of the big descent at the bottom. My right leg it swollen to all hell. A section of the trail i usually perilously walk down with my bike, I had ridden it for the first time earlier in the day with success. I was starting to chicken out again with people watching, but knew I could do it. I'd done it before. I do more dangerous things on my roadbike, and out there in the woods there are no cars to run me over afterwards. So I tried again and wiped out at the end. It was getting late, so I ended my ride and headed home to the dog and iced my leg until it was time to pick up Evan and go to the South Hills to take care of some paperwork regarding a new car (more on that in a second).



On top of that, the Camry broke down. Fine for me, as an individual. I love riding my bike, I can ride it everywhere I need to go. I work almost 15 miles away and commute the 5 big hills by bike most days unless I am running real late. But now we also have the dog and can't leave him alone fall day while we ride our bikes over an hour into the suburbs and hang out for another few hours and then ride the hour home. We need to take him to the vet, or to Evan's mom's house, and the car helps pick up his giant bags of dog food and our groceries. We could probably even get away with not having a car for this reason, especially since we have the baby trailer and could get a bob trailer for a lot less money than a car is. But we also love road trips. The reason I loved my bike so much as a kid was that I could hop on that little black demon and ride to the playground at school, or to a friend's house, or to that killer icecream stand in Weymouth. I liked my bike and my skateboard and my rollerblades because I could just GO. I didn't need to wait for a ride, or ask and hope for a ride, or worry about parking or anything like that. I went where I wanted to go, when I wanted to go there. Now, we are older. Sometimes we want to go places further away and sneaking on a Greyhound is a lot more expensive than it used to be.



Really, the world just isn't the same anymore. One day, a person wake up and thinks, Hey, I'm old. Or was it, Hey, I'm not so pissed anymore. A number of things. When we fall in love, a part of us dies to create space for this new thing that suddenly seems more important. Only years will determine what had the right to house itself in me all along. The anger I dismissed, or the affection I let in. Hopefully, it's the latter, even though it means settling. Not for something less-than, but a settling in, like a sore back into a comfortable chair. There's that part of me that still relentlessly wants to keep walking, but that comfortable chair, just like the San Jose, says, it's ok, sit for a while, relax.



So we got a 2004 Scion xB. Traded in the 1994 Camry for $1200, and now Soupie and I will have this car together, paying it off little by little, knowing we can use it to help us carry our loads, and we can count on it to start when we are too tired to ride, or too impatient to walk. It gets 35 miles per gallon on the highway, and 31 mpg in the city. It can go 100mph (at least) without feeling vulnerable. We are happy with it.



While I lament, seemingly endlessly, my old life of galavanting and wrecklessness and chaos, I am exhuberant about this life every time I go to class and talk about writing. My poems are critiqued and I feel like a human or more. I can't be a teen forever, but I can be a poet and resist in a way that still fits me.



I don't want new material things. I don't want gadgets, or new clothes, new fashions, technology, hype. I don't want to spend my money on all that garbage. I don't want to spend my money on hairstray and makeup either, whether punk or not punk, and I don't want to go through the hassle of stealing because getting caught is such a drag and I've been done with that crap for years now, practically a decade. I don't want to wear uncomfortable shoes or anything else that makes life hard for me. I want to wear cargo shorts and a hoody and ride my bike around in the woods. I want to nap with my dog and eat pizza with Soupie and go to a show every so often with all my friends together, dancing.



Dillenger 4 came through recently. I missed their show with NOFX, but the next night there was a cover show for them and they showed up and played a set and it was one of the best nights I've had in Pittsburgh. Certainly the most fun I've had at a show since leaving Boston. I missed that feeling in me, and was ecstatic that it could be sprouted in me here in this city where I've formed a home.

the little squash

I was supposed to race in the women's crit today. My first race ever. I raced once in second grade and came in third, but it was one of those races where you have to balance an egg in a spoon and jump around in a big itchy sack without getting pissed and calling quits to go eat more pb&j, and I raced a few times in fourth grade when I was the new kid at the public school in my town, and when we got in from recess I would jog towards the door and these stupid kids would try to one-up me, which if you haven't understood by now is impossible, so of course some days I would just plow through the field of kids and make it to the door first, and then once I found "cool" (I actually remember the day I became cool, it was late in fourth grade and I was sitting on the swing set telling stories and just got on a role and everyone started gathering around me to hear my tales, and then this one girl started giving me a hard time because she was one of those friends who also hated me, I hate those people, but anyway I stopped her in her tracks by telling her, her name was Jill, to "go suck an egg" which I'd heard in Dick Tracy, and everyone laughed and I was able to carry on with my lessons of fate and morality) they would occasionally run after me to try to beat me, but then I would just stop running and maybe would just turn around all together because I didn't even give a care.

I have also pushed myself to go faster than arroyo mutts or Liberty Ave cars. But other than that I've never really raced in my life. Today it started raining through, about an hour before the race, and it's still raining now, and I figured the last thing anyone needs is a rookie showing up to ride with all her might and no skill or plan of attack, in a big pack of women, on a slippery-ass track, thus wiping everyone down and perhaps gouging someone in the throat with a handlebar or a chain ring.

So I stayed home and napped and made calabasitas for Soupie when he gets back for winning the big bicycle race, or at least the version of it I could make with the ingredients I had at my disposal. Zuccini, corn, muenster cheese, red onion, garlic, jalapenos, oil, salt, water. I thought I had a hooknose squash, but I don't. It's all steeping in a pot now, drained and trying to not cool too quickly before Evan gets home.

The last time I made calabasitas was with Anita, at Jaime's house in Belen, just outside Albuquerque. It was a great night. Anita and Cedar and I made food, Jason and I hung up tarps to help keep the music from blowing away. It sounds crazy, but unless you've been to the desert you may not understand the winds there and how they can suck away sound. (Insert awkward story that begins with a bottle of rum, intercepts with being put to sleep in a truck, and ends with Krispee blueberry pancakes, and perhaps a few nods in the direction of friendship love. It's for another entry.)

In the kitchen, however, it was sort of the first time I saw Anita as not a partier but as a caring person who took drugs because she was in pain, and who did not abuse them and saved her party drugs separate from her pain drugs. She was good at making calabasitas, and good at teaching me, and at giving me things to do to keep me from feeling as awkward as she instinctively knew I was capable of feeling. She wasn't drinking that night, and she wasn't wearing a two inch long skirt or a tiny made-to-fit tank top with a ton of belts. Just shorts and a tshirt and a black denim vest. She looked comfortable, which meant she was sore. This is when it clicked to me that Anita was dying.

The first time I met Anita was at Jason's house when he and I first became friends. She came in wearing the tiny outfit mentioned above, small even for her teeny body, hyper and ant-like. She made comments about gross movies she'd seen and bands who'd traveled through who she'd recently acted as groupie for.

"Woooaaahhh, who was that?" I asked Jason, not knowing yet how I felt about her.

"That's Anita. She's my best friend. She's going to die soon, it's sad." He explained to me the gout she had bulging out the side of her arm, how her kidneys have been failing, how she is the most beautiful person he knows. "She can just sort of do whatever she wants, because she has to, because she doesn't know how much longer she has. It's inspiring but, fuck, you know?"

"Yeah."

So Anita and I, both being Jason's good friends, became friends ourselves. She lived in Albuquerque, and every time we'd head down there we'd stop by her place. She always had some story that is too much to explain on here, and anyway not my story to tell. But the thing about Anita that I always forgot at the punk shows where she'd play games such as "smell my finger" was that she was a genius. She read books on math and quantum physics for recreational reading, while she was just sitting at home, and tutored kids in math for money.

I dunno. This story isn't really going anywhere, by now the calabasitas have long been eaten, and she was right that the nonvegan recipe is much better than the vegan recipe Jason and I used to make (he wasn't vegan, just a sympathizer). Of all the friends and relatives that have died, though, her story feels the most tragic. She died young and there wasn't much she could have done to prevent it, at least as far as I know. Most everyone one else was in charge of their death in some way, even if it had to do with actions taken a long time ago. My aunt, although her death was of an illness she'd come down with as a child that had nothing to do with her own judgment, also lived much longer than anticipated, and got to see her daughters grow up, meet some of her grandchildren, die peacefully in her rocking chair while her loving husband was upstairs.

The last time I saw Anita was at her mom's house. It was shortly before I left New Mexico, and she'd stopped really socializing, and had begun the process of weeding down visitors. I had taken a big spill the day before, and my leg was very infected and swollen to the point where I couldn't walk on it. I'd seen Jason that night after the show where I'd fallen, in the silk screening room of Warehouse 21. The next day we met up again for breakfast and I was still unable to walk, my kneecap swollen stiff. We were supposed to go on a hike or do construction or something, and I wouldn't say no because I was enamored, so Jason took me to Anita's to get pain medication. She gave me a couple pills and Jason gave me a beer to wash them down and boost their activity. Anita was in a lounge chair, and despite the New Mexican summer hear, there was a blanket on her lap. She looked little as ever, her ant-like cheeks puffed out, probably from all the painkillers. She had a bit of a belly, with such skinny limbs, the whole time I'd known her, but here in her house she just looked thin and dreadful. Jeer was with her, helping her move about and get things in the house. Jason and I left shortly. It was a bit much for all of us.

I moved away about a month later, and Jason didn't see her much after that either. She didn't want him to see her to weak and vulnerable.

It was a long process. I'd moved from New Mexico to New York, and from New York back to Boston, and from Boston I'd traveled around Europe and come back. I caught news of her death on the internet, via a post by Jaime of her obituary and the news of her wake. There was a show at my house going on in the basement. I ran downstairs screaming. No that's a lie. I walked downstairs to get a glass of water and there were people in the kitchen and when they started asking me questions and I tried to talk I collapsed and started screaming. I was ushered upstairs and just banged against the window with my head and screamed and wanted to die, the way I feel every time a friend dies but more intense and pathetic. I'm no good at these things. Anita's death made me miss so much that I could never have back. I still miss it, though not in the same way I suppose. Every time a person dies they take a tour van of experience with them. I can't enjoy metal shows anymore the way I used to, or grind, or calabasitas. Visiting friends in New Mexico is different, there aren't as many reasons to go to Albuquerque, and just another slapped on the long list or reasons to stay away.

When Anita died I lost my job for failure to show up, even though I called in. My friends in Boston turned to angels and threw a benefit show for me to go down and see friends. Devon had passed away that past November, I was a mess and was afraid the entire Santa Fe was just collapsing. It is a fear I have whenever someone dies. That someone won't be able to handle it and will kill themselves, thus pushing everyone else over the edge. It wouldn't surprise me, death is hard to overcome. So I visited. Shane, Sue Fury and I sat atop the Cross of the Martyrs and shared stories and reminisced. It was nice to hear their sides of things, to get someone else's stories. When you are by yourself on the other side of this vast expansive country, telling yourself the same stories over and over, you can start to worry maybe your memory is failing, maybe the person you remember isn't the person who existed. What a transformation. I don't care if I am remembered horridly, as long as I am remembered correctly.

But I am right in my memories, at least in the general feel of them. Maybe not the color of her hair on a certain day, but on the wideness of her smile, the way she made people feel, the fun she had despite it all, while everyone else was moaning off their hangovers, Anita was sucking up her breathes as fully as she could, knowing not to count them. I love her.

AHOY

Submarine
, for Laura Nelson





I hope it was a hard splash. A cold one—

even for New England docks. I hope it felt like rain

on stage at an outside amphitheatre,

like a worthy opponent.



I hope it felt like flight, vertigo, snow in June,

that you saw some god upside-down and vulnerable

right before you hit the sea. I hope you jumped

sideways, shouting obscenities like, "man overboard!"

to the gulls, and I hope they flocked to your wave.



I want to think it felt like sinking

into wood, absorption into a redwood tree.

I hope you could hear the crack.

Tell me about the voices you heard

going down, if all those other friends came

to life to see you plummet. It is miserable

thinking it was on purpose but still

I hope it was no accident—



That the summer bridge, the train tracks

were all planned, the oversized booze

and your favorite red shirt, all planned

and marked on some calendar tucked

in the breast pocket. I want to think it stung



but didn't hurt, that it was all crash,

splash, bullseye on the moon's path,

falling, never hitting bottom.

My Kingdom for an Unfamiliar Street Corner!

This past weekend I went to New York City for the annual AWP Writer's Conference. I sat through panel discussions of the Future of Environmental Writing, where famous writers discussed their views on the strengths and weaknesses of their genre and craft, and where the movement is headed and how it should be steered; a panel of young people who have careers in writing and are not teachers who discussed how they went about getting their jobs; memoirists discussing memory (though they actually all mainly read from their works, which was nice, but did not provide too much insight); independent publishers discussing funding, getting started, contests, marketing, layout, cover design, and other needed tidbits of information in a number of panels; and a few other panels that were fairly interesting at the time but not enough to really stand out in my mind after such a packed weekend of momentum, nostalgia, and motivation.



While the Conference was helpful and inspiring, what was really so wonderful about the trip was getting to see all my friends. Here's a small story, much abridged:



When I was 18, I had a penpal. I lived in Santa Fe, and he lived in Atlanta. I don't know how we met, but we were very good penpals and very fond of each other. We talked on the phone, sent packages, wrote letters, made mixtapes. There was a certain romantic quality to it all, partly due to the comradery felt between each other, the sense of self found when talking to this other person so similar and so supportive of our own ideas and ideals, and also due to the mystique of communicating with this person with whom we've never met, writing letters, sending pictures with no faces, creating a bond that was purely based on personality and goodness, not on aesthetic or any carnal impulse.


At one point, though, he just stopped responding to me. I never received a letter back, never heard whether he liked my latest mixtape, never got another call or saw him on the internet again. He'd just disappeared from my prism.


Years go by and I move out of Santa Fe to New York City and start working at Bicycle Habitat. It is a hard time in my family, and a number of relatives die, and some of my friends are also going through a bad period in their lives, and I decide that it is best for everyone, including myself, if I move back home for a while to nurture and be nurtured. Mainly I had just come to a point where I really needed a really solid homebase where my connections with people were incredibly deep rooted and not based on interests but on fate and history.



I quit my job at Bicycle Habitat in the middle of the summer. They obviously need someone to fill my position, as it's a good bikeshop that remains busy even in the winter seasons. As I do have some friends in New York who are very good people and with whom I have never lost touch, they kept me updated as to the world I left 200 miles away. They told me about a boy named Josh who started working at the bike shop, how he is incredibly similar to me, how he is such a great person and it's a shame he was not in my life when I needed someone so soulful. Erin Nicole even made us Myspace friends, though I never really talk to anyone on the internet who I don't know in real life, so our communication was not a success. As time went on, I heard more stories about Josh, how similar our stories were, tidbits of information. I forgot about the Myspace account.


I heard that Josh was from Texas, and thought not too much about it. Then I heard he was from Atlanta. Small coincidence, I thought. More stories come about and finally I ask, "Is his last name Shaw?" And as it turns out, my penpal from so many years and lifetimes ago, had moved to New York and was living in my neighborhood for much of when I lived there, and then applied for my job when I moved out, and was now best friends with all my favorite people still in the city.



On Friday, I walked 60 blocks in the rain, fed up with the feeling of stuffiness and claustrophobia of the conference, headed Southbound but with no real destination in mind. I was of course headed to Josh. But After 60 blocks, soaking wet, hungry, I did not seak shelter and friendship, I got on the train and headed back to the conference for an hour or so, before heading back to Brooklyn to have dinner with Stu and Adam.



Saturday, though I finally built up the nerve to stop by. I was terrified. What if this person I was so fond of was nothing like I remembered? What if he didn't remember me, or resented that I'd tracked him down? People (ok, I admit it, I had "Men" written here first, but thought that it sounded too much like I think of my friend as a Man with a capital M, and not a person, or that women are higher than these bad things, but truly, if I were to be writing this essay on a different topic, I would keep the Man in there, without any bitterness, and no particular emotions directed any any particular individual. Just truth.) have done horrible things in the past, have resented the simplest and kindest of gestures, spat blindly to keep from having to process and adapt. I hestitated, got lost in familar neighborhoods, perhaps looking for something to show me a new direction of thought.



But ultimately I ended up at the bike shop, nervous, talking to everyone I saw who I could possibly convert with, and finally in the back was a face I'd never seen but that was oddly familiar. It said "HEY!" and I said, "Hey man, what's up? Thanks for the food recommendation, I haven't had the Crispy Soul from Veggie Paradise in a while." And there it was, we had never lost the friendship; we may have lost contact but we never lost touch in the metaphysical sense. After missing Frank McCourt's reading to hang out at the bike shop, I left with the promise of meeting up with Josh the next morning.


I met up with friends from college at their apartment, and talked about art and inspiration and how inspiration is already within, but they need to constantly write in order for the ideas to come up on the paper. We went to a party and after only a few minutes, I left Daniel and Pete and took off back to Stu and Jonathan's apartment to sleep well.



On Sunday, Stu and I met up with Josh for an hour or so until he had to go to work, then I hopped on a train and met up with Erin Nicole, Cassidy, Keith, Libby, and Zach for coffee at Gorilla. They all eventually left for breakfast somewhere and I sat and wrote about the importance of feeling lost in order to find a deeper part of onesself until Michael showed up, we sat and talked, grabbed lunch, went to his workplace.



On the walk home, we found these movie record things bundled up with twine in someone's trash. Michael took one bundle and I took the other to give as an offering to the gods of Habitat, spilling coffee all over myself, my laptop, and the records quite a few times along the way. When I finally got there, Jonathan told me they were called Selectavision and were virtually obsolete and not worth a damn thing. We checked on Ebay to confirm the value and as you can see from the link, nope, not a dime. Well, maybe a dime. Apparently their lifespan is too short for anyone to really care about them, because they get warn out so quickly and easily. I left them there. A shame, too, because there were Woody Allen movies, James Bond: You Only Live Twice, and a bunch of other classics.


Stu met me at the bike shop and we took the train back to his place, had a purposefully undramatic goodbye and I ran to catch my train and made it to my flight just in time for boarding, with a couple minutes to spare and about 8 cups of caffeine in my system.



Although I hate it, or have hated it, I could see myself living in New York again, but only if I have a job there already set up, since rent is insane and I don't feel like dealing with any sort of rat race. I have a few connections. We can see what happens.

book agency pt. 2

Book Agency part 2
(1st rough draft)

Your man’s name was John Kelly. A good, solid name that tells ya nothing at all about him, and so tells you ever’thing. He didn’t grab my arms when we left, didn’t put his hand on my back to guide me neither. Just got up his heavy chair and hovered over his desk, moving his eyes between me and the door, willing me to move first. So I did. I stepped back and waited for him to pass me. He hadn’t made me scared, yeah, but r’member this is the man that killed my father, and anyway he had bodyguards to protect his peace of mind, an’ all I had was my wary self.

“Good man,” he said. He gave me a hard nod and smiled the way the school misses do when I do the right thing but not the correct thing, and they aren’t supposed to smile but can’t help it. Mr. Kelly moved around me like a soundwave, he kept his eye on me until he passed. I could be rabid wi’ mourning. But I wasn’t, not yet anyway. I had a job, to keep face and keep Mum’s name clear as it still could be. I kept my head held high as I followed him out, not looking at the goons sizing me up as I went through their barricade. The sun burned with an acidity I’d only feel once more in my life, years later, but Mr. Kelly seemed acutely aware of it but bluntly unphased. We walked like two blind men now. Only I’d just lost my sight, and he’d never bothered to have it.

“Can I tell y’something ‘bout your father, Eouin?” We were in the car now, a new smelling ’71 Pontiac. Rare in this neighborhood, a new car like that. It was a treat. I felt like I’d won something, before sinking back into the shadows of the car, realizing the greatness of my loss.

No, I shook my head. Then after a pause I understood to be his waiting for my honest answer, rather than his agreeing to not tell me what I ought to know, I leaned a bit out of the shade and said, “No,” loud as I could. He barely heard it, but did catch it. I know ‘cause he looked at me shamefully, concerned, until I turned away and looked out the window. Then he told me anyway.

“He was a good man. Not the best, but good. Don’t go ‘round thinking your Da was a scoundrel. He was a crook, but come a certain age a man’s got’ta be a crook to keep alive and feed a family. Y’understand?”

“Yessir.”

“Your Da, well, he got his hands a bit too wet for the winter. Over-estimated his own perseverance. Watch for that in y’self. Don’t ever be an eager man. At your age it’s ok to be eager sometimes. But watch it doesn’t become who you are, watch that you don’t turn youthful interest into aging urgency.”

I blinked at him and it was the only response I could think of, so I did it again. He blinked back, and this time it was he who turned ‘way first. But I followed his stare because I could not help it, and the car turned in the same d’rection, and we pulled into the tailor’s. Mr. Magoo, I’d always called him, ‘cause of his big bottleneck glasses. Ever’one knew him, he was one of two tailors in the area. One who did God’s work, as Mum would say, lookin’ a’ the dresses an’ suits in Mr. Magoo’s window, an’ one for the Prods, a town over.

Mr. Magoo’s real name was Padraic Finneran, and his shop was called, plainly, Tailoring Shoppe. He was small and serious, like me, only about 70 years older. He was made up of bodily accessories: big feet, long nose, wide flapping ears. But had the smallest, daintiest hands that looked like that could take a man dancing and woo him to fatherhood ── so long as the poor sap never opened his eyes, ‘course. I never talked to him really, though he didn’t say too much even to people who knew him well. Rumor was he was so smart it came out his ears in white tufts, but all I could see was old man ear hair.

“Hello John,” he said without looking up as we entered the shop, the little bell by the door jingling happily.

“Paddy! Good to see you as ever. I brought a friend, hoping you can help him out today. Eouin, meet a dear ol’ friend of mine, Mr. Finneran.”

“Tom’s boy?” he asked, not wanting an answer. He looked at me somewhat blankly, but with kindness, then shot Mr. Kelly a look to say, “What the hell you doin’ with this kid, an’ right now? Poor taste, Johnny.” But he paused for a second to bite his tongue, and said, to me, “’T’sa pleasure to meet ya, boy. A friend of Mr. Kelly’s is a friend of mine. What can I do ya for t’day?”

How could I tell this man who knew my father was dead, knew why prob’ly, def’nitely more than I did anyway, I needed a suit for Da’s wake? I turned inside myself for a second, searching for the right words, and found none. My mouth went dry and I could feel my face reddening, all them freckles gathering in arms.

“A suit, Paddy. The boy needs a suit. For tomorrow. He’s got none. You can put it on my bill.”

“Aye, son. We’ll make a man’a you yet. Let’s first take some measurements, and work from there.”

A few hours past, I was sitting in th’ Lamplighter with Mr. Kelly and his watchdogs, drinkin’ tonics and waiting for the proper adjustments to be finished on my new clothes. Already I was wearing a new set of drapes, real smart like, with cuffs that came right to my wrists just right, and then down past my ankles just so like they was a shell grown right from my own skin, to fit just perfect. It was just lying around waiting for me like a miracle. Still used, but clean, and sharp. Mr. Kelly was happy and impressed, and we ate burgers together forgetting all propriety, remembering only hunger, thinking only of possibilities.

“You clean up real good, kid. Real good.”

“Yeah, don’t I? Thanks ‘gain.”

“Consider it a trade. One future for another.” This bit harder than he meant it to. I winced and his eyes said sorry.

“Listen I got to get back to Mum. She worries. An’ her sisters have all been at the house since the news, and it just makes it harder with everyone around. Everyone with an opinion on Da, or tears shed that jus’ cause ‘er breakin’ a frenzy. She’s having a real hard time of it.”

“A’right. We’ll finish up here, pick up the suits, an’ I’ll drop you off. Maybe pick some flowers up for your mother first, yeah?”

As we were putting on our coats, one of the watchdogs, Winty, whispered in Mr. Kelly’s ear. They both nodded and looked near the front of the pub.

“They’re going to meet us around back, Eouin. There’s a street sweeping goin’ on.”

I followed because I had no choice. Walking through the kitchen, I heard a few muffled thuds coming through the walls and I stiffened. A few boys from school were working in the back washing dishes and they gave me uncertain looks. I shrugged. I was scared. Reality came in waves like a bad smell. I could forget who I was for moments at a time, keep parts of the day from molding together and fermenting under my nose. But here I was, looking boys my age in the teeth, walking with a murderer, hearing noises of God knows what. And my Da was dead. Dead. I trembled and began to weep, but fought hard to keep it in.

“Lets go, Eouin. It’s ok.” In the moment, I hated him. But still I followed. I needed him still and always. This stranger who could now be God or the Devil or my father. But never my Da. I stood with him in the alley and waited for the new-smelling car to pull up. I smoked a fag and gagged on the swells in my throat. I couldn’t say a thing, couldn’t focus my eyes.

But out of the corner, just out of sight, Mr. Kelly shivered, hard.

book agency

Book Agency

As soon as they pushed me into the room, I knew my Da was gone. I couldn’t see much besides the man in front of me, dissected by the light shining through the blinds like he’d been thrown into a meat slicer o’er at Jimmy Flynn’s. He was eyes to me, a crooked nose smashed into his face, red and swollen like ever’one else's his age. A smart grin and a cigar. Smoke rising and quivering in front'a him like a new girl in a brothel. Someone shoved a biscuit and a cuppa tea in my hands and I took it. I hadn’t eaten in two days ’n whatever poison they’d put in it couldn’t make me feel worse. I sipped, turning back and forth in the swivel chair but not taking my eyes off the bloke.

"Y’know what your man’s done to me, Eouin?"

"No sir. Da’s a private man."

“In his private life, I s'pose he was.” He knew I was lying 'bout knowing the story, but I knew it didn’t matter. I wasn’t there to give information, I was there to be informed. There was no more billy to rap on our door, tell Ma the news with all my li’l sisters cowering under her apron. No, we got instead the murd'rin' sonsa bitches settin' you down for a business conference, explaining the situation man to man. Maybe it was better this way anyway. Maybe this guy was a police chief in Italy, maybe even Little Italy. But this was County Waterford. The gov'ment had forgotten we even existed, or ’least tried hard to keep from being reminded. We needed him at least as much as we needed to hate him, maybe more. "Eouin." He paused. His bearish body leaned into the desk and I could feel it move slightly under the weight, pressing into my shins, stopping my swirling. "Eouin. Listen, Eouin."

I wanted him to stop saying my name. I wanted him to not know who I was but it was too late. His eyebrows arched and he brought his cigar down, held it between the fingers that cupped his fist. He took a deep breath and studied me studying him. I'm a good watcher, I got it from my mother. I could stare my teachers into giving me good grades in school, I memorized the color of every girls’ eyes in my neighborhood and dropped it in conversation with them and they’d fall in love.

"Do you know what grace is, Eouin?" I nodded. "A man’s got to have grace. Part of being a real man is learning a bit from our mothers. See what I’m saying?"

I nodded again. I felt completely empty. The biscuit I wanted to eat was only getting stale in my hand. I tried to nibble it like a rat.

"You’re father, he had no grace. No humility. Some of my associates even accused him of being a Proddy, but I know your mother would never marry like that so I paid no attention. Point is, he never learned from his mistakes or anyone else’s. Shoulda read more books. Do you read, Eouin?"

"No sir. No' really."

He reached behind him. There was a bookcase there I hadn't noticed before, like it just appeared as he'd wished it to. Full of titles I couldn’t pronounce, books I would never have to read in school. He dropped a copy of Siddartha in front of me.

"Here, read this. It will change your life. You’re due for a change, aren’t ya?"

I didn’t know what he meant so I nodded and flipped through the book.

"You’re a good kid," he said finally. "Right, you’re a good kid?"

"Yessir."

"You’re gonna need a suit for tomorrow, y’got one?"

"No sir."

"Let’s take a ride." He nodded to one of the potato sacks behind me and the door opened, soaking the room in stale daylight.