Howdy,
A snowmobile races towards sunset while three desperate icicles hang in crooked desperation on the tiny porch railing thats a looking point for eleven thousand foot peaks out our lodge window. 48 inches of new powder in 48 hours,arguably the greatest snow on earth here in the land of salt and lake. Amy and myself are pretending, like we get to, once a year, to be rich. There isnt much pretending to be rich. I can really be myself when I'm rich. Like a ugly rock star who takes his picks from the beautiful groupies, I can act like my wallet is switched with diamonds and no one knows its full of Washingtons instead of Franklins. It the same kind of game I use to play when sitting in first class: I'm a bad-ass and you have no idea why i'm as goofy and carefree as I am and sitting next to your day-planner and tie and I know you wonder about my story. The thing about perception is you practice a particular way of being long enough and you become.
My mind remains full of promise from last night's group. I like hanging with writers. Writers are like music: voices instead of notes on sheet music. You share your thoughts and i am,
song..
nek amezor
Friday, March 27, 2009
E=MC What?
From Becky
Here's something we can all relate to from NPR
E=MC What?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102388795&ft=1&f=1060
All Things Considered, March 26, 2009 · I've never had much luck with epiphanies, which is why I'll always remember standing in the middle of the Museum of Natural History in New York and seeing the universe open up wide in front of me.
Through a serendipitous and fortuitous series of events, I was getting a guided tour of the Einstein exhibit by an Italian nuclear physicist. She pointed casually at the exhibits, using them only as starting points, but using her own words to explain Einstein's insights about time and space and gravity. There was the din of hundreds of people chattering and scuffling around me -- a flow of humanity and energy that exhibited its own demonstration of chaos theory and random systems.
I don't now how many times I've read about the theory of relativity or had someone explain it to me. Every time it was explained to me, I understood it ? kind of. I would always nod. "I get it. I get it. Kind of?"
And I was doing about the same thing as she explained.
And then it happened.
I can't tell you what she said.
Maybe it was because she really, and I mean, really, really understood what she was talking about. But there was some trigger in her words. Suddenly, the floor fell out from beneath my feet. Something in my head expanded. I was, for an instant, adrift and free in the universe. And out there, I saw that nothing was like I thought it was. All the rules I used to walk across the street and brush my teeth and eat vegetables were only approximations of what was true. What was true was something else entirely. Everything else entirely. It wasn't anything like I thought it was. I caught my breath. My eyes dilated. My skin bristled.
OMIGOD! I said out loud.
And just that fast, the door to the universe shut.
I was back in a noisy exhibit at a museum, surrounded by hundreds of humans.
But she saw what had happened to me.
"Did you get it?" she asked.
I nodded. "But now it's gone," I said.
"That's the way it is," she said. "You just keep coming at it from different angles, and after a while you spend more time there."
Einstein said the math was easy after he saw what the universe was like. For him, maybe. And my Italian physicist. But all I got was the feeling -- which I've never gotten again.
But I carry that memory of what it's really like, if only my head and heart were big enough to spend more time there.
One more thing, though.
When I look back on that day, seeing the universe as it is may not be the most amazing thing that happened .
What is truly amazing is that I saw the universe because of someone's words.
Words can do that.
They can change your world.
There's an epiphany I can use.
Just words, they say. Hah. Just words.
Bill Harley is a storyteller, songwriter and author who lives in Seekonk, Mass. His latest recording of songs for families is Yes to Running.
Here's something we can all relate to from NPR
E=MC What?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102388795&ft=1&f=1060
All Things Considered, March 26, 2009 · I've never had much luck with epiphanies, which is why I'll always remember standing in the middle of the Museum of Natural History in New York and seeing the universe open up wide in front of me.
Through a serendipitous and fortuitous series of events, I was getting a guided tour of the Einstein exhibit by an Italian nuclear physicist. She pointed casually at the exhibits, using them only as starting points, but using her own words to explain Einstein's insights about time and space and gravity. There was the din of hundreds of people chattering and scuffling around me -- a flow of humanity and energy that exhibited its own demonstration of chaos theory and random systems.
I don't now how many times I've read about the theory of relativity or had someone explain it to me. Every time it was explained to me, I understood it ? kind of. I would always nod. "I get it. I get it. Kind of?"
And I was doing about the same thing as she explained.
And then it happened.
I can't tell you what she said.
Maybe it was because she really, and I mean, really, really understood what she was talking about. But there was some trigger in her words. Suddenly, the floor fell out from beneath my feet. Something in my head expanded. I was, for an instant, adrift and free in the universe. And out there, I saw that nothing was like I thought it was. All the rules I used to walk across the street and brush my teeth and eat vegetables were only approximations of what was true. What was true was something else entirely. Everything else entirely. It wasn't anything like I thought it was. I caught my breath. My eyes dilated. My skin bristled.
OMIGOD! I said out loud.
And just that fast, the door to the universe shut.
I was back in a noisy exhibit at a museum, surrounded by hundreds of humans.
But she saw what had happened to me.
"Did you get it?" she asked.
I nodded. "But now it's gone," I said.
"That's the way it is," she said. "You just keep coming at it from different angles, and after a while you spend more time there."
Einstein said the math was easy after he saw what the universe was like. For him, maybe. And my Italian physicist. But all I got was the feeling -- which I've never gotten again.
But I carry that memory of what it's really like, if only my head and heart were big enough to spend more time there.
One more thing, though.
When I look back on that day, seeing the universe as it is may not be the most amazing thing that happened .
What is truly amazing is that I saw the universe because of someone's words.
Words can do that.
They can change your world.
There's an epiphany I can use.
Just words, they say. Hah. Just words.
Bill Harley is a storyteller, songwriter and author who lives in Seekonk, Mass. His latest recording of songs for families is Yes to Running.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Something Left Behind
Dear Karen,
About those cockroaches.
Do you know you have cockroaches?
I've been living in your basement now for a few months, and honestly, before now, I only knew they existed in theory. But as you and your husband have been preparing for Armageddon--stocking up on staples like grains and flour and such--well you should know that the cockroaches are busy depleting those provisions.
They only come out at night.
I'd heard this was true, in theory, well in a literary sense, because one of my mother's favorite books was Don Marquis's Archy and Mehitabel. Archy is the cockroach who types free verse poetry late at night on the boss's typewriter, but of course, since he's a bug, he can't shift and capitalize words and his punctuation is a little funky, too.
At any rate, they do come out at night. Confirmed. They do not type free verse poetry. Also confirmed.
They scuttle. In the dark.
I know I'm only a renter. I know that in my desperate financial circumstances I should be grateful to have a roof--well two roofs, technically, since I'm in the basement--over my head. But please. They scare me.
Your several children, god bless them, they annoy me, but they don't scare me. They scuttle, too, visiting me rather frequently in my basement room uninvited to try on my shoes and report on their daily activities and such. But they do so with the lights on. And sometimes they are charming. Not often. But sometimes.
The cockroaches, though, not so much, I'm afraid. And again, there is the issue of them freeloading on your foodstuffs. What if the End of the World came, well, right now? Have you checked those boxes of granola lately? Not a pretty sight.
All right. I'll admit it. I've been into the boxes of granola recently. I have this slight, well, eating disorder myself. I get hungry, especially around two when I can't sleep. When the disasters that led to this reduced circumstance march into consciousness and demand to be fed--with guilt and remorse and what not. But they, the thoughts, seem seem to respond quite well to Quaker Oats Honey Granola, as luck would have it. I've been known to consume an entire box. Dry. In one sitting or lounging. (I am trustworthy, I hasten to add; I always replace what my conscience steals, so, no harm no foul, right?)
But foul is, I'm sorry to say, these...creatures. It must be a primal atavistic response of some kind. I hate them. I hardly hate anything, except myself at the moment.
So I'm doing us both a favor. I'm killing a few of them. I can't stand it, killing. I mean, we're all working on survival skills down here. But.
Ewwww.
REally.
So maybe I'll come back as one of them, a nameless part of a reviled mass, scuttling and feeding, or maybe as an inspired cockroach like Archy. Either way, I deserve my fate: shortlived fame or perpetual infamy. In the meantime, I'm leaving my murder victims, i.e., five cockroaches, conspicuously displayed in the hallway in hopes that you will do what is right. Evict me or evict them. Your call, but I pay my rent on time.
Thank you,
Dawn
About those cockroaches.
Do you know you have cockroaches?
I've been living in your basement now for a few months, and honestly, before now, I only knew they existed in theory. But as you and your husband have been preparing for Armageddon--stocking up on staples like grains and flour and such--well you should know that the cockroaches are busy depleting those provisions.
They only come out at night.
I'd heard this was true, in theory, well in a literary sense, because one of my mother's favorite books was Don Marquis's Archy and Mehitabel. Archy is the cockroach who types free verse poetry late at night on the boss's typewriter, but of course, since he's a bug, he can't shift and capitalize words and his punctuation is a little funky, too.
At any rate, they do come out at night. Confirmed. They do not type free verse poetry. Also confirmed.
They scuttle. In the dark.
I know I'm only a renter. I know that in my desperate financial circumstances I should be grateful to have a roof--well two roofs, technically, since I'm in the basement--over my head. But please. They scare me.
Your several children, god bless them, they annoy me, but they don't scare me. They scuttle, too, visiting me rather frequently in my basement room uninvited to try on my shoes and report on their daily activities and such. But they do so with the lights on. And sometimes they are charming. Not often. But sometimes.
The cockroaches, though, not so much, I'm afraid. And again, there is the issue of them freeloading on your foodstuffs. What if the End of the World came, well, right now? Have you checked those boxes of granola lately? Not a pretty sight.
All right. I'll admit it. I've been into the boxes of granola recently. I have this slight, well, eating disorder myself. I get hungry, especially around two when I can't sleep. When the disasters that led to this reduced circumstance march into consciousness and demand to be fed--with guilt and remorse and what not. But they, the thoughts, seem seem to respond quite well to Quaker Oats Honey Granola, as luck would have it. I've been known to consume an entire box. Dry. In one sitting or lounging. (I am trustworthy, I hasten to add; I always replace what my conscience steals, so, no harm no foul, right?)
But foul is, I'm sorry to say, these...creatures. It must be a primal atavistic response of some kind. I hate them. I hardly hate anything, except myself at the moment.
So I'm doing us both a favor. I'm killing a few of them. I can't stand it, killing. I mean, we're all working on survival skills down here. But.
Ewwww.
REally.
So maybe I'll come back as one of them, a nameless part of a reviled mass, scuttling and feeding, or maybe as an inspired cockroach like Archy. Either way, I deserve my fate: shortlived fame or perpetual infamy. In the meantime, I'm leaving my murder victims, i.e., five cockroaches, conspicuously displayed in the hallway in hopes that you will do what is right. Evict me or evict them. Your call, but I pay my rent on time.
Thank you,
Dawn
Way to be brave, Tiffany! As a woman who feels exactly the same way about having children, it was deja-vu of conversations with my mother. I think it will get easier for you as time goes on. At some point she can blame it on your being "too old" to have children. So you've got that to look forward to :-)
Here's my response the prompt for this week. Like Tiffany, I welcome comments, "first takes", etc.
Becky
Father & Daughter Prompt
“Do you want a frosty mug for your beer?” Sometimes he does. Most times he opts for his proprietary technique of wrapping a paper napkin around the beer bottle, sealing it with a lick of his tongue. He swears it keeps beer colder than any other method. I pour mine into a frosty mug.
“Cashews or pistachios?”
“Oooh, pistachios sound good!”
We carry our nutrients to the porch swing on the brick patio we built together in the backyard. The patio & swing are strategically shaded by the 100-year old pecan tree. Locusts buzz in humid heat, cooled by the usual southwest breeze. Our tree and its neighbors use that breeze to speak their welcome to us. We settle into the swing, and veerry slowly move forward and back.
We both wear shorts and short sleeved shirts. We’re both barefooted. We both rock the heel of one foot to keep the swing in motion. His other foot is crossed over his thigh. Mine is propped on the seat next to my thigh, my knee folded at my chest. We look at the sky, the house, the blooming flower gardens that Mom meticulously cultivates. Silent reverie. Disturbed within moments by the not unusual thunder of a souped-up pick-up truck barreling down 14th street in front of our house.
He comments on the crumbling bricks of the patio.
“All that work we did. It’s only been 30 years, and it’s already crumbling. I guess we didn’t do a very good job, did we?” The number of years changes each time we sit here, but the sarcasm doesn’t. “Man! That was some back breaking work. It was almost as bad as working fields in the summer in Bownfield Texas. But not quite. I really couldn’t have done it without you, lovey.”
Doesn’t he know that I considered it a gift from him? I hungered for that time spent with just him, laboring, making mistakes and working through them, laughing, and tiring together. The first glimpse that we had reached a point of mutual respect: father and daughter; but not parent and child. It dawns on me that he’s telling me it was the same for him.
I think of all the questions I would like to ask. All the lost time I would like to make up for. I wonder what he’s most proud of. He’d probably give the typical response of “family” – his wife and children. At one time his grandchildren would have been included, but no more. I’d like to be able to exclude “family” as a response to that question. Would it be something he did in the wars? Something else in his career? Something specific he did as a parent – like telling my brother that he would support his going to Canada to avoid being drafted into the Viet Nam war? I wonder what his saddest moments were: When he had to stop flying? My brother’s death on a motorcycle? My sister’s back-stabbing divorce, and the following estrangement of his grandchildren? The deaths of his own parents? But right now, the answers to these questions are mere curiosities. They are much too serious at this moment. At this moment I imagine that we turn to each other and say simultaneously, “Do you know how proud I am of you?”
“Can I get you another beer?” I ask.
Here's my response the prompt for this week. Like Tiffany, I welcome comments, "first takes", etc.
Becky
Father & Daughter Prompt
“Do you want a frosty mug for your beer?” Sometimes he does. Most times he opts for his proprietary technique of wrapping a paper napkin around the beer bottle, sealing it with a lick of his tongue. He swears it keeps beer colder than any other method. I pour mine into a frosty mug.
“Cashews or pistachios?”
“Oooh, pistachios sound good!”
We carry our nutrients to the porch swing on the brick patio we built together in the backyard. The patio & swing are strategically shaded by the 100-year old pecan tree. Locusts buzz in humid heat, cooled by the usual southwest breeze. Our tree and its neighbors use that breeze to speak their welcome to us. We settle into the swing, and veerry slowly move forward and back.
We both wear shorts and short sleeved shirts. We’re both barefooted. We both rock the heel of one foot to keep the swing in motion. His other foot is crossed over his thigh. Mine is propped on the seat next to my thigh, my knee folded at my chest. We look at the sky, the house, the blooming flower gardens that Mom meticulously cultivates. Silent reverie. Disturbed within moments by the not unusual thunder of a souped-up pick-up truck barreling down 14th street in front of our house.
He comments on the crumbling bricks of the patio.
“All that work we did. It’s only been 30 years, and it’s already crumbling. I guess we didn’t do a very good job, did we?” The number of years changes each time we sit here, but the sarcasm doesn’t. “Man! That was some back breaking work. It was almost as bad as working fields in the summer in Bownfield Texas. But not quite. I really couldn’t have done it without you, lovey.”
Doesn’t he know that I considered it a gift from him? I hungered for that time spent with just him, laboring, making mistakes and working through them, laughing, and tiring together. The first glimpse that we had reached a point of mutual respect: father and daughter; but not parent and child. It dawns on me that he’s telling me it was the same for him.
I think of all the questions I would like to ask. All the lost time I would like to make up for. I wonder what he’s most proud of. He’d probably give the typical response of “family” – his wife and children. At one time his grandchildren would have been included, but no more. I’d like to be able to exclude “family” as a response to that question. Would it be something he did in the wars? Something else in his career? Something specific he did as a parent – like telling my brother that he would support his going to Canada to avoid being drafted into the Viet Nam war? I wonder what his saddest moments were: When he had to stop flying? My brother’s death on a motorcycle? My sister’s back-stabbing divorce, and the following estrangement of his grandchildren? The deaths of his own parents? But right now, the answers to these questions are mere curiosities. They are much too serious at this moment. At this moment I imagine that we turn to each other and say simultaneously, “Do you know how proud I am of you?”
“Can I get you another beer?” I ask.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Difficult Questions
This is my response to this week's prompt. I have a couple other sketches that deal with Mother/ Child things. I'm thinking of putting them together and stealing Paul Simon's song title "Mother and Child Reunion". Thoughts, ideas, rotten tomatoes? Bring it all.
See you all on Thursday,
Tiffany
Someone asked my mother about her children. She told what each of us in turn was doing: the oldest, a doctor; busy with a new practice and five young children. Her second son, an architect; he heads up a branch of the company office, has three children, and his wife just started a charter school. Her oldest daughter, a teacher works in education running a private tutoring center; she is married to a professional cyclist—like Lance Armstrong, yes; no, he hasn’t raced the Tour de France.
“Oh. What about the younger children?”
Well, Jeff is married and has two kids—a boy and a girl; he just moved back to the city and works as an office manager for a prominent local company. Jenny is in
“Sure. Well, so, your daughters? They don’t have children yet?”
No.
“Why not?”
Well…I…they…they just don’t. We haven’t really talked about it.
We haven’t talked about a lot of things. My mom started to cry. She should know this. Why don’t we have children? Is it because of her? Was she a bad mother? She didn’t mean to be. It wasn’t easy having seven children so young. She knows she asked a lot of us. Never in her wildest dreams did she think her requests would turn on her in this way; if she had known, maybe she would have tried to do things differently. But how, she’s not sure. Money was tight. There was always so much to do. So much laundry. Not enough food, or time. Not enough of her to go around. Is this why?
Do you really want to know? Are you sure? You may not like the answer: I just don’t have it—the desire, the need, the craving. Babies don’t interest me. Motherhood doesn’t hold for me an inkling of curiosity. It’s not you. It’s just the way I am. Some people feel a strong maternal pull and know they will never be a complete person without that. I don’t. It’s that simple. I’m fine with just me. But more importantly, who is this woman who thinks she has a right to ask you such a personal question? I don’t like that she did this to you, Mom. Next time, lie. Tell her I’ve been trying for years, but I’m hopelessly infertile.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Can't sleep
I wanted to thank you all for your overwhelming support. I'll be spending the rest of my life figuring out why it is so hard to hear praise.
I woke up at 3:00 am with my mind swirling around all the things the group said that I can remember (many beautiful phrases went in one ear and out the other), oceanic currents, islands, intersticial spaces, Kipling, Virginia Woolf, the dark side, how to describe what the fever bird sounds like, all the people I want to write about and what exactly my stance is. Places, themes, smells, artworks, ruins, how to organize all this. It's exhilarating and daunting. And memoir itself raises touchy questions about how to handle discussing people who are still alive, or who are well known in some circles, family uglinesses or one's own uglinesses.
I mentioned Terry Tempest Williams' 'Refuge' as one model in my mind, as is Sandra Steingraber's 'Living Downstream,' both rich braided narratives, but the fictional model that keeps echoing in my mind is Marilynne Robinson's 'Housekeeping' which I think is one of the most perfect and beautiful books ever written. There are ideas about loneliness, loss, grief, memory, liminality and place in that book that have shaped me profoundly.
As the prompt goes, "It all runs together. . ."
Now, of course, though my mind feels alive and rich with possibility, work today will be a battle against fatigue and gravity.
Emily
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Now It's 10:30 p.m.
Truth: I usually retire at, oh, nine. Well, usually is different these days. Yes, when I teach, I'm up for three hours after. That's what being an introvert with a limited extrovert fuse is about.
But also:
A dear friend who lives mere blocks away--her husband is in the arms of Hospice tonight and leaving with the help of some morphine derivative and ice chips, and I sleep these days with the cell phone by my ear. In case. In case I get a call and need to throw on clothes and drive five minutes because: I'm called and I'm near.
This makes me sound more important than I am. I'm sorry. I sleep with the cell phone by my side because:
I'm a hesitant, failing Buddhist-wanna-be. I hope, someday, the bad karma I've (maybe) collected (maybe) will mean that someone (like me, failing, wanna-be?) will see through my PRACTICED RESILIENCE and SELF RELIANCE and show up when I need her/him most.
Cripes-- that's about me again. Back to the mat.
BUT: If it happens to be you who gets that call about me, about dying or ministering to the dying, bring a casserole and a poem and let me weep on your soft shoulder.
G'night all,
Dawn
But also:
A dear friend who lives mere blocks away--her husband is in the arms of Hospice tonight and leaving with the help of some morphine derivative and ice chips, and I sleep these days with the cell phone by my ear. In case. In case I get a call and need to throw on clothes and drive five minutes because: I'm called and I'm near.
This makes me sound more important than I am. I'm sorry. I sleep with the cell phone by my side because:
I'm a hesitant, failing Buddhist-wanna-be. I hope, someday, the bad karma I've (maybe) collected (maybe) will mean that someone (like me, failing, wanna-be?) will see through my PRACTICED RESILIENCE and SELF RELIANCE and show up when I need her/him most.
Cripes-- that's about me again. Back to the mat.
BUT: If it happens to be you who gets that call about me, about dying or ministering to the dying, bring a casserole and a poem and let me weep on your soft shoulder.
G'night all,
Dawn
Thursday, March 12, 2009
A test and A testament
I won't try to write an epistle, well, not tonight, but this is my test blog entry and given that I only know "twitter" in the word "twitterpated"--(and often feel that is false (I'm a cynic :))) this is an accomplishment for me.
I look forward to working and knowing you each more.
Nicole
I look forward to working and knowing you each more.
Nicole
It All Runs Together
I can never quite remember that day.
I flew to Washington, D.C. I was nineteen and he was thirty-nine and I still had the ring on my finger. I don't remember the flight. But I took the typewriter--that WWII steel grey Royal model that mom had given me, hoping I'd become the writer she hadn't--and I packed the set of Fiesta dishes, including the radioactive red ones, and all my clothes. Type, eat, dress. I had that much in the way of priorities. My mother must have driven me to the airport. I'd bet she didn't speak on the way. I don't remember the ride.
I took a taxi to his condo on C Street. I let myself in. Surprise! And since he wasn't expecting me, his voice sounded funny from upstairs but he flung me on the bed (or maybe not, maybe I just sagged) and there was sex and then he left. He made love the way a bee makes love to a flower. I'm sorry to say it wasn't very big. Not at all.
He left for work. He was a sportscaster at WTOP news. How he dressed for work usually: jeans and a NikNik shirt. (We had matching NikNik shirts; you'd have to have lived through the '70s to understand). When he went on air, he had a tie and dress shirt and blazer on. Only on top, though. From the waist down, under the broadcast desk, he was himself.
I cried all day. Or not. Maybe that was all night. All day I remember getting busy. Busy seemed good. I mowed the little lawn in back. I vacuumed. I changed the sheets. I found someone else's contraceptive packaging in the wastebasket. I found her barrette under the bed.
I also brought the article from The Washington Post. It was from that gossip column, "The Ear" and it was about us. I'd have to go really digging in the wayback of closets to find it now. Shortly after the article appeared we had lunch with an ex-astronaut's ex-wife at a fancy D.C. restaurant. She asked what we'd argue about when we got married. Everybody found something to fight over eventually. Best be prepared. I remember thinking she was awfully negative. Not much else. Maybe I had the Salade Nicoise. Something I couldn't pronounce: likely.
I watched him on the 11 o'clock news. One o'clock. Three o'clock. Five. He didn't come back. I started going through boxes of clothes he'd put aside for the Good Will. I didn't know the man in those boxes. All those perfectly good clothes. Maybe they didn't look right to him anymore above or below the broadcast desk. Maybe I didn't realize that I wouldn't be wearing the clothes I'd brought with me when I was thirty-nine. Mostly it was polyester back then.
At six a.m. I made reservations to fly back home. I don't think my mother answered. I think my father did. I can't be sure. Someone knew what flight I'd be on with the typewriter and the dishes and the clothes. And, oh, I stole a robe of his. Didn't I?
Also on the way out the door I think I put a pair of shoes I didn't like anymore on top of the Good Will boxes. But I accidentally left behind a Panama hat that I did like.
Somewhere between D.C. and AZ I must have begun thinking about what to do next. Where to go next.
When I heard my mother say at the airport, Well, are you ever going to let another man do that to you ever again? I was sure I'd have to go somewhere else. That's how I got to Utah a week later.
Dawn Marano
I flew to Washington, D.C. I was nineteen and he was thirty-nine and I still had the ring on my finger. I don't remember the flight. But I took the typewriter--that WWII steel grey Royal model that mom had given me, hoping I'd become the writer she hadn't--and I packed the set of Fiesta dishes, including the radioactive red ones, and all my clothes. Type, eat, dress. I had that much in the way of priorities. My mother must have driven me to the airport. I'd bet she didn't speak on the way. I don't remember the ride.
I took a taxi to his condo on C Street. I let myself in. Surprise! And since he wasn't expecting me, his voice sounded funny from upstairs but he flung me on the bed (or maybe not, maybe I just sagged) and there was sex and then he left. He made love the way a bee makes love to a flower. I'm sorry to say it wasn't very big. Not at all.
He left for work. He was a sportscaster at WTOP news. How he dressed for work usually: jeans and a NikNik shirt. (We had matching NikNik shirts; you'd have to have lived through the '70s to understand). When he went on air, he had a tie and dress shirt and blazer on. Only on top, though. From the waist down, under the broadcast desk, he was himself.
I cried all day. Or not. Maybe that was all night. All day I remember getting busy. Busy seemed good. I mowed the little lawn in back. I vacuumed. I changed the sheets. I found someone else's contraceptive packaging in the wastebasket. I found her barrette under the bed.
I also brought the article from The Washington Post. It was from that gossip column, "The Ear" and it was about us. I'd have to go really digging in the wayback of closets to find it now. Shortly after the article appeared we had lunch with an ex-astronaut's ex-wife at a fancy D.C. restaurant. She asked what we'd argue about when we got married. Everybody found something to fight over eventually. Best be prepared. I remember thinking she was awfully negative. Not much else. Maybe I had the Salade Nicoise. Something I couldn't pronounce: likely.
I watched him on the 11 o'clock news. One o'clock. Three o'clock. Five. He didn't come back. I started going through boxes of clothes he'd put aside for the Good Will. I didn't know the man in those boxes. All those perfectly good clothes. Maybe they didn't look right to him anymore above or below the broadcast desk. Maybe I didn't realize that I wouldn't be wearing the clothes I'd brought with me when I was thirty-nine. Mostly it was polyester back then.
At six a.m. I made reservations to fly back home. I don't think my mother answered. I think my father did. I can't be sure. Someone knew what flight I'd be on with the typewriter and the dishes and the clothes. And, oh, I stole a robe of his. Didn't I?
Also on the way out the door I think I put a pair of shoes I didn't like anymore on top of the Good Will boxes. But I accidentally left behind a Panama hat that I did like.
Somewhere between D.C. and AZ I must have begun thinking about what to do next. Where to go next.
When I heard my mother say at the airport, Well, are you ever going to let another man do that to you ever again? I was sure I'd have to go somewhere else. That's how I got to Utah a week later.
Dawn Marano
Sunday, March 8, 2009
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