"Is it true?" He puts the manuscript back down and pushes it toward me. He's grinning. He's giving me that deadly gorgeous grin that tells me he's into it.
You can only take so much from other people.
But really, it's not up to you to decide.
Really, it's all too much to ask. What's yours is yours.
And you never want to know better.
"I really like the lead character. I felt myself rooting for him. I finished reading this days ago, and it's like he's still with me." He gestures towards his chest as he smiles. "He's real isn't he. You know this guy."
Yeah, I know this guy.
Sometimes it hits a point in the story where I cant take anymore. I just can't take any more. I have to turn away and turn it off. I have to end the story for myself right there, because I can’t take anymore.
Sometimes it just has to stop. Because, what does any of us really know. What's true. What's real.
It's all real. It's all true. And I know.
And then after some time and space, I can go back. I go back home. And I sink back in.
He hooks his thumb onto the belt loop of his jeans and he leans back against the counter. "This inspired me. But you already knew that. You knew it would."
There comes that point in the story where the hero finds the strength to break through to the other side. When he believes. When he sees the way... for the very first time.
Finding that place is hard enough. Getting him to find his courage, that's something different.
And making you believe it? Yeah. That's something entirely more.
There's the place you look back on. That moment where you figured it out. And life suddenly held the ability to make sense.
They don't have to be explosions. That can be small. Sparks. A single flame. A flicker inside of the darkness.
He's waiting for me to say something.
It doesn't have to be the best thing ever written.
It just has to be magic.
He taps the manuscript on the table in front of me. "I like it, but, I don't know what's good. I mean, I think it's good." He grins again, "Is it good?"
I don't know. I don't know what's good anymore. But I do know one thing : It's magic.
And that's all it had to be.
He nods. He knows I don't write to be published. He knows this may never see the light of day again. The one thing he doesn't understand, is why.
He wipes his hair back off of his face. "I don't know what you want me to say, Veronica. I'm not sure why you do this. But that character is going to stay with me for a long long time."
I want you to remember these Words forever.
And this is the way.
August 30, 2008
August 26, 2008
Overheard Heard Me
Overheard in the Office posted THIS little gem today.
Thank you, Morgan.
I overheard that one in the orthopedic surgeon's office, who was handling my mother's surgery.
Thank you, Morgan.
I overheard that one in the orthopedic surgeon's office, who was handling my mother's surgery.
August 23, 2008
Overheard in Duane Reade
I'm always trying to eavesdrop.
But I only submit the damn things for the link.
Otherwise, I'd just post them myself.
So here's one, posted today on Overheard in New York, and Morgan didn't even fucking link me.
Grrr, I could give him such a pinch.
But I only submit the damn things for the link.
Otherwise, I'd just post them myself.
So here's one, posted today on Overheard in New York, and Morgan didn't even fucking link me.
Grrr, I could give him such a pinch.
August 16, 2008
Little Freak
I was 14.
I know I was 14 because it was after we moved, and before I got my first car, which I got when I was 15 even though I wasn’t legal in it until I was 16. So, I was about 14. I was on the subway heading to Port Authority to catch the bus home when I had one of those flows. One of those writing flows.
The Words were coming and coming and I had nothing on me, no book no paper, no purse. But I had a pen in my pocket. Because I always have a pen. Then, and still. I looked around for something to write on: an abandoned newspaper or brown paper bag or flyer.
Nothing.
I didn’t want to lose it, not one Word of it. I had to start getting it down before it was gone. It's like a wave when you're surfing. You have to get it underneath you. You only have a certain amount of time to catch it. If you miss, it's just gone.
They come like breezes sometimes, and other times they ride in like storms. But they can always get away so easily. They can always just get away.
So I started writing. I smoothed the denim on my thigh with my hands and began writing on my jeans. At first it was just the key Words so I could ride it. So I could keep it, and then flesh it back out later. But it kept coming and coming. Like a storm. And it was sweet. Really fucking sweet… I forgot where I was, I forgot where I was going. All I could think about was writing. Getting all of it down. I worked my way line by line down one thigh, down the calf, onto the dirty white canvas Converse high tops, and then up the next leg.
Minutes were turning into the better part of an hour. I was enthralled. It was good, and I was loving each and every Word. I was quiet, I was inside of myself, inside of that empty black hole of Venus Descending. I was in it. I was completely in it. And when I got to the top of the other thigh, I was out of room again. I twisted to see if I could keep going, if I could write on the back side of my jeans, but I couldn’t. So I went to my arm, and had that covered in moments.
And I was making my way onto the bottom of my t-shirt, when for some reason, I looked up.
Everyone in the subway car was looking at me.
Everyone was looking at me the way New Yorkers look at lunatics. It’s a combination of things: concern for their own welfare, a little trepidation, a little curiosity. The stare is mainly peripheral to avoid accidental eye contact. Some had concern on their faces, some had fear, some seemed amused wondering what I was on.
I froze.
I realized, and I froze in the stares, in the self made but completely unintentional separate world where I seemed to live alone in the midst of them all. At 14 it was hard to be that different. It was hard to be outside, not one of them, and those moments where it felt painfully apparent were embarrassing.
I felt like a little freak, like the outsider. Like all the things that were whispered behind my back by the preppies in school. The subway reached the platform and one by one everyone left.
I took those jeans off when I got home and hid them in the closet, crying. And I forgot about them for years.
I know I was 14 because it was after we moved, and before I got my first car, which I got when I was 15 even though I wasn’t legal in it until I was 16. So, I was about 14. I was on the subway heading to Port Authority to catch the bus home when I had one of those flows. One of those writing flows.
The Words were coming and coming and I had nothing on me, no book no paper, no purse. But I had a pen in my pocket. Because I always have a pen. Then, and still. I looked around for something to write on: an abandoned newspaper or brown paper bag or flyer.
Nothing.
I didn’t want to lose it, not one Word of it. I had to start getting it down before it was gone. It's like a wave when you're surfing. You have to get it underneath you. You only have a certain amount of time to catch it. If you miss, it's just gone.
They come like breezes sometimes, and other times they ride in like storms. But they can always get away so easily. They can always just get away.
So I started writing. I smoothed the denim on my thigh with my hands and began writing on my jeans. At first it was just the key Words so I could ride it. So I could keep it, and then flesh it back out later. But it kept coming and coming. Like a storm. And it was sweet. Really fucking sweet… I forgot where I was, I forgot where I was going. All I could think about was writing. Getting all of it down. I worked my way line by line down one thigh, down the calf, onto the dirty white canvas Converse high tops, and then up the next leg.
Minutes were turning into the better part of an hour. I was enthralled. It was good, and I was loving each and every Word. I was quiet, I was inside of myself, inside of that empty black hole of Venus Descending. I was in it. I was completely in it. And when I got to the top of the other thigh, I was out of room again. I twisted to see if I could keep going, if I could write on the back side of my jeans, but I couldn’t. So I went to my arm, and had that covered in moments.
And I was making my way onto the bottom of my t-shirt, when for some reason, I looked up.
Everyone in the subway car was looking at me.
Everyone was looking at me the way New Yorkers look at lunatics. It’s a combination of things: concern for their own welfare, a little trepidation, a little curiosity. The stare is mainly peripheral to avoid accidental eye contact. Some had concern on their faces, some had fear, some seemed amused wondering what I was on.
I froze.
I realized, and I froze in the stares, in the self made but completely unintentional separate world where I seemed to live alone in the midst of them all. At 14 it was hard to be that different. It was hard to be outside, not one of them, and those moments where it felt painfully apparent were embarrassing.
I felt like a little freak, like the outsider. Like all the things that were whispered behind my back by the preppies in school. The subway reached the platform and one by one everyone left.
I took those jeans off when I got home and hid them in the closet, crying. And I forgot about them for years.
August 13, 2008
I'm Telling
It made sense in the nature of things,
Like the composition of a snowflake makes perfect sense.
But the average human eye doesn’t perceive in fractals.
The snowflake knows what the sunshine doesn’t.
First it’s summer,
Then the fall.
And then it’s colder.
Like the composition of a snowflake makes perfect sense.
But the average human eye doesn’t perceive in fractals.
The snowflake knows what the sunshine doesn’t.
First it’s summer,
Then the fall.
And then it’s colder.
August 10, 2008
Regret. Rethink. Rewrite.
“What are you writing?”
I flip the pad over and push it away. “Something angry. And I don’t want to do that.” At least I knew that much.
He leans on the arm of the couch and finishes buttoning his shirt and fixing his tie. “Why don’t you want to write angry?”
I watch as he looks down at his fingers, at buttons finding holes and dry cleaner pressed cuffs that hold their shape even after being fastened, and unfastened, and on the floor, and fastened again.
“I always look back later at things I compose in anger, regretting them. Rethinking them.”
He doesn’t know these Words were for him. He won’t ever know. Because I will regret and rethink and rewrite. And I hope he doesn't. I hope he never ever knows.
“Anger is just as good an emotion as any other.” He goes to the mirror to guide himself in reverse to tie his tie.
“Anger is a coward’s fear.” I finger the edge of the pad with my eye. I retouch it. “I know it works as an emotion, but I consider angry writing to be a research stage. Not the finished product. I just have to get it out. Then I’ll separate from it. And come back to it later with perspective.”
He looks at me over his shoulder and smiles. “That sounds a bit contrived.”
Where the sun still shines I guess it is. But where the darkness grows it isn’t. It’s just the right filter. It’s just the right anti-venom. It's just enough to make you non toxic when you look back. Years later I would understand that wasn't criticism on his part. It was an exchange, it was a conversation.
He sits to put his shoes on. They probably cost more than my rent did at the time which seemed to matter on some level. And I’m not sure why but there was an insult to it. And I made a mental note to look back on this day twenty years into the future and remember exactly what that felt like. And I have. And I still can't explain it.
And with separation and perspective I now realize the only one insulting anybody in that room that day, was me. With regret I rethink it, and rewrite it.
Wishing it wasn’t just on yellow legal pad aged and acid pages pressed in a binder in a box in a closet.
Wishing I could rewrite that moment, not just my perception of it.
He finished dressing and got ready to leave. All the things that I thought made distance at the time drifted between us in that apartment. He had kind eyes. And a tender voice. He was smart and successful and at 21 that seemed like some kind of sin or sell-out. He would hold me by the small of my back when he made love to me, and I would close my eyes. The coward wasn't the one with his hands open.
“I’ll call you later, alright?” He looked at me knowing he was fading away. I let go. I don’t think I knew how not to. But even then I saw the flaw in the framework. Even then.
“Yeah, I’ll talk to you later.”
He looked at me knowing he wouldn’t. Knowing. Even then. Rethinking. Rewriting.
I gestured to the upside down pad and the upside down anger. I don't know if he saw. I don't know what he knew. But I knew. I had to say something. “Years from now when I regret this afternoon, when I rethink this, you’ll be the hero of the book.”
He needed no explanation. His eyes told a million secrets that I’d never hear. He let the pause hang for a lot longer than comfortable, a lot longer than necessary. And he kept that smile. “Do me a favor. When you re-write, make sure you mention that when I left, I didn’t close the door.”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. And I saw how truly beautiful his smile was. And most likely, still is.
And he didn’t close the door. He walked down the hall and out into the afternoon. He wasn’t the coward. He wasn’t the 21 year old. He wasn’t the regret.
I flip the pad over and push it away. “Something angry. And I don’t want to do that.” At least I knew that much.
He leans on the arm of the couch and finishes buttoning his shirt and fixing his tie. “Why don’t you want to write angry?”
I watch as he looks down at his fingers, at buttons finding holes and dry cleaner pressed cuffs that hold their shape even after being fastened, and unfastened, and on the floor, and fastened again.
“I always look back later at things I compose in anger, regretting them. Rethinking them.”
He doesn’t know these Words were for him. He won’t ever know. Because I will regret and rethink and rewrite. And I hope he doesn't. I hope he never ever knows.
“Anger is just as good an emotion as any other.” He goes to the mirror to guide himself in reverse to tie his tie.
“Anger is a coward’s fear.” I finger the edge of the pad with my eye. I retouch it. “I know it works as an emotion, but I consider angry writing to be a research stage. Not the finished product. I just have to get it out. Then I’ll separate from it. And come back to it later with perspective.”
He looks at me over his shoulder and smiles. “That sounds a bit contrived.”
Where the sun still shines I guess it is. But where the darkness grows it isn’t. It’s just the right filter. It’s just the right anti-venom. It's just enough to make you non toxic when you look back. Years later I would understand that wasn't criticism on his part. It was an exchange, it was a conversation.
He sits to put his shoes on. They probably cost more than my rent did at the time which seemed to matter on some level. And I’m not sure why but there was an insult to it. And I made a mental note to look back on this day twenty years into the future and remember exactly what that felt like. And I have. And I still can't explain it.
And with separation and perspective I now realize the only one insulting anybody in that room that day, was me. With regret I rethink it, and rewrite it.
Wishing it wasn’t just on yellow legal pad aged and acid pages pressed in a binder in a box in a closet.
Wishing I could rewrite that moment, not just my perception of it.
He finished dressing and got ready to leave. All the things that I thought made distance at the time drifted between us in that apartment. He had kind eyes. And a tender voice. He was smart and successful and at 21 that seemed like some kind of sin or sell-out. He would hold me by the small of my back when he made love to me, and I would close my eyes. The coward wasn't the one with his hands open.
“I’ll call you later, alright?” He looked at me knowing he was fading away. I let go. I don’t think I knew how not to. But even then I saw the flaw in the framework. Even then.
“Yeah, I’ll talk to you later.”
He looked at me knowing he wouldn’t. Knowing. Even then. Rethinking. Rewriting.
I gestured to the upside down pad and the upside down anger. I don't know if he saw. I don't know what he knew. But I knew. I had to say something. “Years from now when I regret this afternoon, when I rethink this, you’ll be the hero of the book.”
He needed no explanation. His eyes told a million secrets that I’d never hear. He let the pause hang for a lot longer than comfortable, a lot longer than necessary. And he kept that smile. “Do me a favor. When you re-write, make sure you mention that when I left, I didn’t close the door.”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. And I saw how truly beautiful his smile was. And most likely, still is.
And he didn’t close the door. He walked down the hall and out into the afternoon. He wasn’t the coward. He wasn’t the 21 year old. He wasn’t the regret.
August 04, 2008
Don't You Remember?
He described the games we played, like the massive hide and seek marathons we’d have with the lights out in his house when his mom wasn’t home. He would capture the feelings as he retold the events, relaying the immediacy and the be-all end-all importance with which we viewed every moment back then. He described not only the event but also the motivations and the peripherals. He validated us, and fleshed us out. It was better than fiction. He was one of many kids that played those same games in that neighborhood, but he made memories not everyone would. He kept those memories alive with his enthusiasm and accuracy. Even now, I am astonished by the details and the feelings he can conjure with a few excited well-Worded sentences about a time thirty plus years ago. He gives it back the reverence and significance that perspective and priority have removed over time.
“Remember? Don't you remember? Sister Carolyn was teaching us about Galileo so we were all obsessed with dropping stuff from high places to see what would land first. Like Now and Laters, and then pink softies, and baseball cards. So we were all gonna meet after dinner at seven o’clock or whatever on top of Mikey’s garage. Not 'Crazy Mikey,' Mikey with the purple Huffy and the mother that made us those little tiny grilled cheese sandwiches on cocktail bread. And you know how you HAD to be there at seven, you just HAD to, it was the most important thing! And running out of the house, trying to get your Mark 5 sneakers on and flying down tenth avenue so you wouldn’t miss anything because god forbid you missed even a second! And remember we were all up there on top of the garage and Linda Federesi had a mad crush on Joey DeVito so she would always run home after she saw him so she could put on the same t-shirt he was wearing so they would look alike. So while everybody was sitting on the roof waiting for Linda to get back with her 'Corvettes Rule' T-shirt, Crazy Mikey got his foot caught in the gutter trying to kick out leaves and all the Rubber Deans, and Margaret tried to help him but the two of them fell. And we all ran like idiots! Until Linda Federesi comes running back up the driveway screaming ‘Margaret landed first! Margaret landed first!’ So we all ran back and for like the next two weeks we spent all our time finding places for Crazy Mike and Margaret to jump from at the same time to see who would land first, until Margaret broke her arm and then oh my god we were all in so much fucking trouble. Oh! And remember Joey actually telling Sister Carolyn that we were conducting gravity experiments and Margaret’s arm was broken in the name of science? I will never forget that look on her face while she called us all hooligans, and we were all sitting there in our little Catholic school uniforms at our little desks and we all started quietly singing at the same time, ‘I’m a Hooligan, won’t go to school again no no no’ by KISS, remember? Don’t you remember??”
I do, Chris. I remember.
I remember now.
.
“Remember? Don't you remember? Sister Carolyn was teaching us about Galileo so we were all obsessed with dropping stuff from high places to see what would land first. Like Now and Laters, and then pink softies, and baseball cards. So we were all gonna meet after dinner at seven o’clock or whatever on top of Mikey’s garage. Not 'Crazy Mikey,' Mikey with the purple Huffy and the mother that made us those little tiny grilled cheese sandwiches on cocktail bread. And you know how you HAD to be there at seven, you just HAD to, it was the most important thing! And running out of the house, trying to get your Mark 5 sneakers on and flying down tenth avenue so you wouldn’t miss anything because god forbid you missed even a second! And remember we were all up there on top of the garage and Linda Federesi had a mad crush on Joey DeVito so she would always run home after she saw him so she could put on the same t-shirt he was wearing so they would look alike. So while everybody was sitting on the roof waiting for Linda to get back with her 'Corvettes Rule' T-shirt, Crazy Mikey got his foot caught in the gutter trying to kick out leaves and all the Rubber Deans, and Margaret tried to help him but the two of them fell. And we all ran like idiots! Until Linda Federesi comes running back up the driveway screaming ‘Margaret landed first! Margaret landed first!’ So we all ran back and for like the next two weeks we spent all our time finding places for Crazy Mike and Margaret to jump from at the same time to see who would land first, until Margaret broke her arm and then oh my god we were all in so much fucking trouble. Oh! And remember Joey actually telling Sister Carolyn that we were conducting gravity experiments and Margaret’s arm was broken in the name of science? I will never forget that look on her face while she called us all hooligans, and we were all sitting there in our little Catholic school uniforms at our little desks and we all started quietly singing at the same time, ‘I’m a Hooligan, won’t go to school again no no no’ by KISS, remember? Don’t you remember??”
I do, Chris. I remember.
I remember now.
.
August 02, 2008
Phil Istine
“We watched from the sidelines, watching our enemies make mistakes. We mocked them when we thought they dug their own graves, later realizing that in those ditches they were digging strong foundations for their future endeavors.”
- Heath Saraceno
"I used to think you'd be a writer when you grew up." He gives me some kind of pity-grin.
"I am a writer." My voice is quieter than I would have liked. I sip my martini and throw the bartender a little dagger with my eyes. I said dirty. I said Kettle One. This isn't either. Another Grey Goose Nazi.
He raises his eyebrow and looks away. He's the kind of guy that measures success with infamy and dollars. He's the kind of guy that can't correctly pronounce Porsche even though he drives one. He's the kind of guy that would never understand why I didn't sell out.
"Well," he chuckles, "In the larger sense I guess so."
Is there a smaller sense? I guess there is. I guess I'm it.
I would have said I used to know him. I would have described him as someone that I used to know. But I'm not sure that I ever knew him. I'm not sure that I ever saw. A piece of my childhood melts away right there as the evening descends.
He says he's happy to see me again and he finds it amusing that I kept in touch with Ted. He goes on about Ted. Everyone expected so much from Ted, he says, and what a disappointment that was. He shrugs and sips his scotch as if Ted is smaller, too. Ted, who works for an AIDS non-profit, and still lives in that same studio apartment on the East Side. Ted, who stopped returning his calls a few years ago. And Phil says, he has no idea why.
He says he was made partner, and goes on about his office that overlooks Central Park. He tells me about his car and his place in Hilton Head. And something else. I stopped listening and I finished the drink I didn't exactly order.
I woke up as I sat there. Because that's what it's about. Waking up. Seeing. Seeing what's going on and what isn't. Seeing what you missed. Seeing what you used to see, but lost sight of when you changed your focus. Maybe he really was someone I used to know. But maybe he never was at all. And the truth is he isn't someone I know now. Maybe this isn't him. Maybe, just maybe, this is the mask, not the ghost.
Everybody's scared. Everybody wants to fit in, some place. Every body wonders at least sometimes, if deep down all there is, is nothing. I have no idea how long I've been sitting with him, but I know it's long enough. And I don't know why I was expecting something entirely different.
I don't want to slide by. I don't want to be someone that forgets.
I ignore him as he says he's got this covered and I put a twenty next to my glass on the bar. I pick up my messenger bag and debate leaving without saying anything.
But I just can't do it. I look at him for what will most likely be the last time. "The 'e' is not silent. This is not my opinion, it's a fact. It's a German name. You have to pronounce the second syllable. Look it up."
Confused, he squints at me. "I don't get it."
I know you don't.
“It's not that our friendship was a front.
It's just that I can't see the real in you.”
- Midtown
.
- Heath Saraceno
"I used to think you'd be a writer when you grew up." He gives me some kind of pity-grin.
"I am a writer." My voice is quieter than I would have liked. I sip my martini and throw the bartender a little dagger with my eyes. I said dirty. I said Kettle One. This isn't either. Another Grey Goose Nazi.
He raises his eyebrow and looks away. He's the kind of guy that measures success with infamy and dollars. He's the kind of guy that can't correctly pronounce Porsche even though he drives one. He's the kind of guy that would never understand why I didn't sell out.
"Well," he chuckles, "In the larger sense I guess so."
Is there a smaller sense? I guess there is. I guess I'm it.
I would have said I used to know him. I would have described him as someone that I used to know. But I'm not sure that I ever knew him. I'm not sure that I ever saw. A piece of my childhood melts away right there as the evening descends.
He says he's happy to see me again and he finds it amusing that I kept in touch with Ted. He goes on about Ted. Everyone expected so much from Ted, he says, and what a disappointment that was. He shrugs and sips his scotch as if Ted is smaller, too. Ted, who works for an AIDS non-profit, and still lives in that same studio apartment on the East Side. Ted, who stopped returning his calls a few years ago. And Phil says, he has no idea why.
He says he was made partner, and goes on about his office that overlooks Central Park. He tells me about his car and his place in Hilton Head. And something else. I stopped listening and I finished the drink I didn't exactly order.
I woke up as I sat there. Because that's what it's about. Waking up. Seeing. Seeing what's going on and what isn't. Seeing what you missed. Seeing what you used to see, but lost sight of when you changed your focus. Maybe he really was someone I used to know. But maybe he never was at all. And the truth is he isn't someone I know now. Maybe this isn't him. Maybe, just maybe, this is the mask, not the ghost.
Everybody's scared. Everybody wants to fit in, some place. Every body wonders at least sometimes, if deep down all there is, is nothing. I have no idea how long I've been sitting with him, but I know it's long enough. And I don't know why I was expecting something entirely different.
I don't want to slide by. I don't want to be someone that forgets.
I ignore him as he says he's got this covered and I put a twenty next to my glass on the bar. I pick up my messenger bag and debate leaving without saying anything.
But I just can't do it. I look at him for what will most likely be the last time. "The 'e' is not silent. This is not my opinion, it's a fact. It's a German name. You have to pronounce the second syllable. Look it up."
Confused, he squints at me. "I don't get it."
I know you don't.
“It's not that our friendship was a front.
It's just that I can't see the real in you.”
- Midtown
.
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