"Everything's upside down," he said in his sweet way, between hummed bars of old Broadway musicals. My grandmother twitched in her seat. And you and I, we looked at each other smiling, nervous but happy.
Bubs drove on.
Friday, April 29, 2011
Friday, April 8, 2011
We Are Smiling And Talking But I Am Sinking
The last time I saw L she looked old. Scrambling across the library quad with a heaping stack of books and folders in her arms, constantly shifting and readjusting herself under their weight, with milky blue eyes around which her face had gracefully crumpled... she was all smiles.
18 years earlier, she had asked me why I never spoke up in class when I clearly looked engaged and thoughtful. I had assured her I was neither. We became friends.
I remember sitting in her office a year or two later watching an old girlfriend's new boyfriend walk by the window while I argued that the pen she was holding might not exist.
And here we were. And she looked old.
I was full of memories and nostalgia and had a hundred little details buzzing in my head. But she only remembered me vaguely, and left me with a faint sadness as she fluttered away into the night.
18 years earlier, she had asked me why I never spoke up in class when I clearly looked engaged and thoughtful. I had assured her I was neither. We became friends.
I remember sitting in her office a year or two later watching an old girlfriend's new boyfriend walk by the window while I argued that the pen she was holding might not exist.
And here we were. And she looked old.
I was full of memories and nostalgia and had a hundred little details buzzing in my head. But she only remembered me vaguely, and left me with a faint sadness as she fluttered away into the night.
Friday, April 1, 2011
Travelogue Excerpt: From La Closerie des Lilas, Montparnasse, 2/7/11
"Hemingway and Henry Miller drank here. Neat. I went to the bathroom here a few days ago. A beautiful red room with a golden hook to hang your sweatshirt on."
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Monday, March 7, 2011
Opposite The Mountain
Bob had gone rogue. Tramping awkwardly away from the relative security of Happy Valley toward the slope, he left half-cocked, too sure of himself for anyone’s comfort. Jim seemed frustrated, maybe offended… though it was hard to tell. I guess we were all a little shaken.
Brenda and I redoubled our efforts. A lapse in focus now could be disastrous.
Okay. So Bob was gone. So what.
It was later, after a slow, unsteady trip up the Magic Carpet that I saw him again… in his jeans and unstylish winter jacket… poles stabbing, chopping, slicing wildly around him as he tumbled off-balance through a pair of teenagers resting with their backs to him.
Later still, Jim would relay with great patience and little detail the final chapter of the saga, in which Bob, falling with tremendous momentum, sends them both flying to the ground, helmets clacking, halfway to the bottom. Jim, his knee injury re-aggravated in the accident. Jim, who said I was cheerful and made me realize I was smiling. Jim, whose guidance had been forsaken that day, but whose tenderness had never faltered.
And all the while, across the frozen river and the road, a thin, steady plume of fog moved over the hills opposite the mountain. Though in all the commotion, we barely noticed.
Brenda and I redoubled our efforts. A lapse in focus now could be disastrous.
Okay. So Bob was gone. So what.
It was later, after a slow, unsteady trip up the Magic Carpet that I saw him again… in his jeans and unstylish winter jacket… poles stabbing, chopping, slicing wildly around him as he tumbled off-balance through a pair of teenagers resting with their backs to him.
Later still, Jim would relay with great patience and little detail the final chapter of the saga, in which Bob, falling with tremendous momentum, sends them both flying to the ground, helmets clacking, halfway to the bottom. Jim, his knee injury re-aggravated in the accident. Jim, who said I was cheerful and made me realize I was smiling. Jim, whose guidance had been forsaken that day, but whose tenderness had never faltered.
And all the while, across the frozen river and the road, a thin, steady plume of fog moved over the hills opposite the mountain. Though in all the commotion, we barely noticed.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
In An Elevator, On A Rainy Day
Me: Sucks.
Stranger: Yeah.
Me: It'll clean everything off though. It's been so gross and dirty outside with all the dirty snow and the dirt and such.
Stranger: Yeah, really.
Me (getting off at my floor, thinking to myself): Man, I'm a tool.
Stranger (as I exit, thinking to himself): What a brave fellow to speak with such honesty and conviction.
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