Always Scribble, Scribble, eh?

Many, many years ago, I was 3 days away from starting my first professional gig, out of college for a year and fleeing the Round Table Pizza nest. I was, in fact, leaving sedate and predictable Sacramento for energetic and dynamic San Francisco, where I would work for just over 4 years before (now regretfully) returning to that same city of sedation and predictability. It was the best job I ever quit, and I have to count it as among my major mistakes. As someone whose mistakes continue to accrue and are seldom minor, this says much.

I spent the first year in San Francisco trying to figure out what, exactly, a corporate technical writer was supposed to do. One of the first things I learned was that such a writer had to learn to endure with corporate reorganizations, one of which took me away from the woman who'd hired me and into a group of people who knew less about what to do with me than I did. The second year, though--things changed! I applied for a job with a different group, got hired, and ended up working with some excellent people and writers. My new boss turned into a wonderful mentor, the boss after him is still one of my best friends, and I learned more about writing in the following 3 years than I think I've learned since. It was an exciting time, and we were enthused about what we did. Perhaps I was just less cynical and jaded then, but I like to think that we were a group of people who thought we could write anything. I wish I had that same confidence today as I now work with writers who make me look anything but professional.

I left San Francisco for a job as a writer in a small consulting firm, and about the same time started graduate school. The job itself turned out to be terrible (or, at least, I was a terrible fit). But, one of my coworkers there turned out to be a very good friend, and he gets extra points for introducing me to the Yosemite Valley. I made other friends there, but I pretty much let them slip away. Getting laid-off from that job is one of the best things that could have happened to me for a number of reasons. Oh, it wasn't an easy time when I lost that job: My mother had been sick for awhile and would die just 5 months later, and my father would die only 3 months after that. Damn--what a year that was! The next job was at a distant Air Force base, and I stayed there longer than I should have. There was no stress at that job, but after awhile a 100-mile-per-day commute gets tiring and expensive. The next company was young and vibrant and growing, but it was soon purchased by an old, stodgy, static financial institution. And the next company after that was another fun place--lots of energy, wonderful co-workers, a dot.com enthusiasm that, unfortunately, was squelched when the company was bought by another boring, conservative corporation.

Now, for just over 2 years, I've been employed by a company that was once small but has also been bought by a larger entity. There's always a bigger fish, I guess, but I am happy now because I work with people who challenge me professionally and aren't afraid to tell me when I'm not doing something right. Actually, it's their job to tell me such things, and they are good at their jobs.

So, where does all of this come from? Partially, I suppose, it comes from thinking back to those feelings of excitement and fear that followed me on the train into San Francisco that first day so long ago. The title here was, from what I remember, spoken to Edward Gibbon after (or maybe before) he wrote The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. I'm not thinking of Gibbon's work, however. Rather, the title itself is included in a collection of sayings and quotations gathered by the writers I worked with when I started my second year in the city. (I'll have to check with Kominski, but I believe we then sold that collection, entitled Almost Human, to raise money for one thing or another.

Finally, I am not much on New Year resolutions; I'm more the type to make adjustments as I move along. But, as I remember when I first ventured into San Francisco, I also now sense impending changes in many areas of life, though for the life of me I can't imagine what they'll be.

Winter Solstice 2011

Not much cohesion here, but who'll notice?

When I was a kid, I spent a lot of time learning how to be alone. And I have to say that I got pretty good at it. When I was in the navy, it became a great skill in an environment where privacy, if you were lucky, was a few moments alone in the latrine. I think about this--being alone--now because we are finally in winter, which is arguably my favorite season. Winter seems to be a time when expectations and requirements are few, though that might be a self-imposed illusion.

Also when I was a kid, I had a small-town paper route that required me to physically collect money from each of my customers so that I could, just as physically, pay my bill to the paper's publisher. It was when I learned how to deal with money: The publisher gave me a bill every week, and I was responsible for getting the money. I had to pay the bill on Saturday morning, so I would go out on Friday night and gather coins from the subscribers. Winter nights in the Midwest can be quite cold and snowy, but I would simply dress for the occasion and trudge through snow and darkness. It was great fun, really. Between my house and the streets that made up my route was an open field in which I spent many, many hours, and on those winter nights I would often perch myself on a large granite boulder and stare up at the stars. Or, I'd sit there as the snow fell and simply enjoy the silence.

The boulder itself was, in fact, always a mystery, and as I look back I wonder if it was an erratic left behind by one glacier another. In subsequent visits to my hometown, I believe I have found that boulder near the Little League fields I played on. Now that I think about it, the boulder also plays a role in my first novel, a terrible piece of work that starts with the line "Neil Armstrong broke my heart in 1969."

Where I live now there is no snow, and I must travel into the Sierra backwoods to experience such a thing. My favorite days there include not cold so much as gray skies and falling snow--a diminishing of sight and sound. There are few experiences as nice as this. For the last several years I've spent a couple of January nights snow-camping with friends in Yosemite Valley, and a couple of those times we've lucked into fairly heavy snowfalls. Those days and nights are wonderful.

After today, the days get longer in small increments; life tends to speed up, and soon enough I'll think about getting the spring garden ready for planting.

Words Like Love

Something old until something new comes along (fiction)

After six hours of what started out to be aimless driving, I ended up in Bridgeport in front of a combination café and bar called Little Clancey’s, though I was probably headed there the moment I left home. The “Little” on the hand-painted sign had faded, but “Clancey’s” in red letters was bright in a sunrise diffused by thin clouds. I’d traveled through California’s dry central valley, then turned east through Yosemite and finally north on Highway 395, just like we sometimes do when we visit our daughter Becky and her husband Ron in Carson City. By the time I reached Mono Lake, the eastern sky was crimson and I knew that Bridgeport was just north and would be the place to stop.

All four windows of the Impala were open when I rolled onto the gravel in front of Clancy’s, and a cool breeze brushed gently against my bare arms. I used to drink a lot, and when I did every window in the house or car would be shut tightly. The voices, the ceaseless wind, the smells—everything used to bother me. Now, though, working my way through sobriety, I welcome the fresh air and keep at least one window open wherever I happen to be.

“You’ll catch cold,” Nora, my wife of twenty-five years, says when I keep both bedroom windows open all night even in winter.

“Viruses cause colds,” I say as she pulls the heavy quilt closer to her wide chin, “not open windows or even getting your feet wet.” But after awhile she gets up and shuts the windows, caught up in one of my old habits.

I sat in the Impala and thought that Nora would be wondering where I had gone. She’d given up actually worrying years earlier, when I was drunk most of the time and hardly found my way home anyway.

“You could call me if you’re not coming home,” she would plead. “A little respect is all I ask. Just the smallest bit of consideration. Is that too much?”

It was too much, as far as I was concerned at that point in my life, in our marriage. “I’m an adult,” I’d tell her. “I don’t have to check in with you.”

We went on like that until one day Nora quit asking questions. But she would always wonder, even when I left the house last night with her yelling at me. We’d been watching television and a beer commercial came on. I told her that a beer would taste good, a nice cold beer in chilled mug, just like on television.

“A what?” Nora said very quietly. “God damn you, Brian. You go this long without a drink and after all that’s happened and you can still say it so easily, as if it meant nothing to either one of us?”

“I didn’t say I wanted one,” I said loudly. “I just said it would taste good.” I looked down at the worn carpeting in front of the couch, where our feet spend so much time.

And then she yelled about how my father had been drunk for so long that nearly his whole liver was eaten away by the time he died. About how close my drinking had come to killing both her and me, that if she hadn’t been in the car on my last birthday I surely would have died. She stopped yelling when she ran out of breath. Her chest was heaving beneath her lightweight pink blouse. Nora’s eyes were dark with disappointment like they were after Sam Tinker threw me the surprise birthday party, when she came to see me at the hospital. It was two days after I’d lost control of the Ford wagon we owned and Nora and I went bouncing into a large stand of aspens.

“Jesus Christ,” Nora had said after pulling me from the car and cradling my face in her hands. She got only a few scratches across her chin, but I caught the steering wheel with my sternum and then the dashboard with my forehead. For months afterward it hurt even to breathe.

Lying on the grass, I’d looked up at her, feeling her kiss my mouth time after time. Everything was confused, but I didn’t know if it was because of the accident or the pitcher of martinis I’d helped Sam drink earlier that night. It was raining, and drops of cool water were falling from Nora’s hair onto my face. Then everything turned a dark purple and I shut my eyes as Nora’s voice disappeared.

After Nora finally got her breath back last night, she stood from the couch and started in on me again, using words like responsibility and trust and love. So I took my keys from their hook beneath the phone in the kitchen, and I walked out the front door, letting her yell from the front porch as I started the car and left. At the Shell station I filled the Impala and got a cup of coffee, then drove away.

When I stepped into Clancey’s, Maureen was doing the beer orders for the week; I was the only one in the place. I’d met her years earlier, one of the times I’d driven alone to see Becky. Nora travels on her job selling pharmaceuticals to hospitals, so sometimes when she is away I wander. This morning I asked Maureen if she remembered me, but when she said she wasn’t sure, I told her that it made no difference.

Maureen had dark, curly hair and the smooth facial features—thick cheekbones and a mouth burned down at the edges—that I’d found myself falling love with for as long as I could remember. She reminded me of a waitress, a good dancer, that I’d known when I was in the Navy. But then, it seems every woman I’ve either had or desired has reminded me of someone else or the lover before.

“Why’d you come back?” Maureen asked when she filled our mugs with coffee. One coffee pot had DECAFFEINATED stenciled on it in bright orange letters. Some of the letters were partially scratched away, as if the pot had been in use for a long time.

“Restlessness,” I said, wondering if I should say that maybe it was because of her that I’d stopped there.

“How does your wife feel about that?” She gestured with her mug toward my ring finger.

“She understands.” I looked at the ring and tried to think of the last time I’d taken it off.

“You mean, she puts up with it.” She looked at me as if she’d heard lies from men for a long time.

I left the bar after two mugs of coffee, after Maureen got busy with other customers. Wandering around town until lunchtime, I finally stopped at Cleo’s Drive-In, where I ate a chicken-breast sandwich at one of the redwood picnic tables. I watched Maureen come out of the bar across the street, walking toward Cleo’s. She smiled when she noticed me.

“Still restless?” She said after ordering at the walk-up window. Her hair was neat and her legs thin, and I knew that she was the type of woman who took care of herself.

“Yeah,” I said. The Sawtooth Ridge was visible over her shoulder.

“At least you’re eating,” Maureen said. “I haven’t had a customer so early on a Saturday for quite some time.”

“I like coffee after a long drive,” I told her.

She took a bag from the girl at the window just as I finished my sandwich. “You feel better, now that you’ve eaten?”

“I feel good,” I said. “I feel almost....” I paused and looked up at the gray, ragged Sawtooth, trying to think of the right word, the right feeling.

“Almost what?”

“Almost human,” is what I told her. It was the most fitting word I could think of.

She nodded slowly, then followed my gaze up to the Sawtooth. “It’s going to rain. Come over later and I’ll buy you a beer.”

“Thanks,” I said, again thinking that a beer would taste good.

Maureen smiled as she turned and walked back to Clancey’s. I sat at the table and stared at the mountains. The ridge was high, nearly eleven-thousand feet, and I had spent a lot of time hiking in the area when I was younger. Below the ridge itself was Matterhorn Canyon, where a combination of ignorance and exhaustion almost killed me and Sam Tinker both. Just as after the car wreck, it was an experience that left me changed, though it changed me into someone who drank heavily. Though I never figured out why, it was after that when I started believing that nothing I did in life mattered. Most people would have reacted differently, but I just stopped caring about a lot of things.

After Maureen left, I decided to drive to Carson City after all. Becky always appreciates it when her mom and I visit, since she’s so far away from us. She and Ron have a small hardware store, and more than once I’ve helped them stock conduit or boxes and bins of nails.

“Oh, Daddy,” Becky said when I called her from a payphone at Cleo’s. “We’re just on our way out. We need some stuff from a warehouse in Reno, so we’re making a long weekend of it.”

“That’s fine, Becky,” I said, and it really was. “Enjoy the weekend. Maybe Mom and I will drive up next month.” If I had told her how far I had driven that morning, she might have changed her mind.

“Give her my love,” Becky said, and I told her I would.

I hung up the phone and looked at clouds covering the Sawtooth and thought back to when Sam and I got caught in the autumn snowstorm and nearly didn’t make it out. We were carrying neither a tent nor warm clothing, and for a full day we huddled around a small fire and waited for the storm to pass. We never told anyone about it, either, because we knew we’d been fools for being so unprepared. But several times in the years that followed, when Nora and I weren’t even talking to each other, I thought that the mountains might have been the place to die when I had
the chance.

The wind had grown colder, and the clouds had dropped over Bridgeport. I smelled rain as I pulled my windbreaker from the Impala’s trunk. When I got back to Clancey’s for the last mug of coffee, Maureen wasn’t surprised when I said I was leaving.

“I had a feeling you would be,” she said. Her hands were wet from washing glasses in the small sink behind the bar. “I could still buy you a beer.”

“I have a long drive,” I told her. “But I might be back, if you want to save it for me.”

She smiled, showing teeth that were white and straight. “You’ll be back,” she said, though I wasn’t sure how she meant it. I stared at her, but she turned away before I could tell her that she probably was right.

I got home late that night after driving slowly through rain most of the way. The weather didn’t break until I stopped at a mini-mart to buy cherry Lifesavers. Outside the store I saw stars winking through small gaps between clouds sliding across the sky. As I parked the Chevy in the driveway, I slipped a Lifesaver beneath my tongue. Candy had once been a way to hide the smell of what I’d been drinking, but now it just tasted good. When I stepped quietly into the house, I let the last sliver of a Lifesaver drop down my throat. Nora was watching television, and I smelled her lilac perfume, my favorite, as soon as I shut the door behind me.

“You came home.” She didn’t look up. Her feet were propped up on the large footstool we’d bought just a week earlier.

“Yeah. I had some things to work out.” I took off my shoes and wiggled my toes on the carpet.

“We were supposed to go to dinner,” she said, and I noticed then how she was dressed up, still expecting to go out. That was why she was wearing perfume. “We were supposed to eat at someplace nice, and that’s all I’ve been waiting for. I thought you’d be home, so I never cancelled the reservation.”

I didn’t remember anything about dinner, but I didn’t doubt her. “Tomorrow,” I told her. “I forgot. I’m sorry. We’ll do it tomorrow and make it special.”

“Have you been drinking? You’re eating candy.” It was the first time she looked at me since I’d come into the house, and her stare was cold.

“I’ve been driving,” I said, fingering the single remaining Lifesaver in my pocket, wondering how she had noticed the candy from twelve feet away. I thought that even after twenty-five years of marriage it would be nice to have at least one secret, to have something that Nora did not know.

“Nice way for you to show your love for me,” she said plainly. “Skipping dinner for getting drunk. You could have called and then at least I could have eaten here. I could have fixed something instead of sitting here and waiting.”

“I do love you,” I told her. “And I’m not drunk.” But she’d been drinking—a half-full bottle of gin and a glass with ice were on the floor beside the couch. I wondered about the Sawthooth, about whether the ridge was now covered with snow. And I wondered about Maureen and her beer orders, even about what she’d bought for lunch at Cleo’s.

Nora had tried to hide the gin, and I wanted to say that it didn’t matter to me what she did or whether she believed that I was sober. I didn’t care if she was drunk then or drunk for the rest of her life.

“You do love me?” she asked. “You do?” She wasn’t convinced. But she was drunk and nothing would matter by morning. Her perfume was strong, and I wanted it to be stronger yet, to envelope me and the house and all that I knew in its silky embrace.

“I do,” I said, “I really do. You’re a princess.” I thought then that one day soon I would tell her about nearly being frozen in the mountains, about what that experience had done to me.

“Yeah?” She came over to me and took my hand, holding it to the side of her face.

“Yeah,” I said, and I sat down beside her to watch television.

Endings

As I try to dedicate some time to this blog-stuff at least every other day (recently motivated in part by woman I knew in graduate school and who has become quite successful), I intended tonight to sit down and continue writing about my latest trip to Europe. But, after several false and boring starts, I'm moving on to something else.

For the 2 novels I've written over the previous half a decade or so, I've discovered their respective endings relatively soon in the writing process. For This Far West, I had the final scene visualized after only about 50 pages were done, and I was able to write to it. For The Golfer's Wife (the opening paragraph of which is embedded here), I needed a bit longer to figure things out. When I was able to write short fiction many years ago while working in San Francisco, a line--often a phrase but sometimes the title--would pop into my head and then, WHAM!...the story would get done.

Now, much less creative and prolific, finding even a germ of an idea is difficult. Personally, I think too many years in corporate cubicles and sterile suburbs have played a role, and more than ever I think I should live in either a large, vibrant city or an isolated, quiet forest. Suburbia is to life as agnosticism is to religion.

But, to the point. I can generally tell when something I've written is done or not. Example: The screenplay that's stuck inside this computer is not done, but while I know most of the ending, I can't seem to figure out how to get those final 15 pages written. It may never be finished in a literary sense, though it might someday have a beginning, a middle, and a conclusion.

Things We Couldn't Say Yesterday, which ended here, was fun. In the world I gave them, though, the characters had done as much as they could; actually sitting down and planning their lives and the storyline might have helped things move on further.

So, what do do next? Void of fresh ideas, doing some rewriting might be a viable outlet. Take the screenplay: Actually printing it out and then working with the characters and plot might help me figure out how to both get to the ending and then create it. The novels, too, need some attention and, I'm sure, feel neglected. The Golfer's Wife especially requires work since it never got developed much beyond a complete first draft.

Perhaps I should see if I can find a printer tomorrow.

Things We Didn't Say Yesterday #13

In the end, not everything stops

He thought Brussels would be a good place to start--a city more ambiguous than London, not a place where people hide. Years ago in New York City Chris had met Sharon, a Canadian who worked her way through and around Europe sometimes as a waitress but usually as a busker who specialized in juggling and magic. "You learn to work the crowds in one place, you can do it anywhere," she had said. She had told him that the trick was to get the crowd involved physically and engaged mentally. "You get a couple of men in the show," she'd said. "You have them hold something or help in a magic trick. Sometimes I do some stand on their shoulders and juggle, and I try to get them to look up at me. The smart ones, they noticed that I'm wearing a short skirt, and if they look up, they might see something. Sometimes the husbands and fathers look up and I can tell by how they suddenly drop their eyes and look into the audience that they think they'll be in trouble with their girlfriends or wives later, just because they looked. Once when I was drunk during a show--I was a lot younger then--I wasn't wearing anything. It was a stupid thing to do. I'm not afraid to show a little tit now just to keep the guys looking, but I'm not over the top about it. I mean, I am Canadian."

Everything was packed again, though this time he would be putting the boxes and furniture into a storage unit. When he'd given his notice at work and told everyone how the divorce had shown him how he hadn't been happy in his job for a long time, most people walked away as though he'd said he hadn't been happy with them. Rebecca, who was in the initial throes of divorce herself, said that she didn't blame him at all, that if she wasn't taking care of her invalid mother, she'd join him.

Phillip had seemed exasperated about the whole thing. "This doesn't make a bunch of sense, Chris. Europe? Christ, you're not a kid, you know. You're supposed to be mature, contributing to society. That stuff. What the hell will you do in Europe?"

"I really don't know," Chris had told him. "People have been venturing away from home for a long time, haven't they?"

"What about Cindy--you told her?"

"Yeah."

"What'd she say?"

"She said that I should have fun. She said that in the end, not everything stops."

Phillip at looked at him. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know. But it's all she was going to say, and I really don't need her permission."

Phillip knew that Sharon spent part of the summer in Brussels and France, but he didn't think the odds were good at finding her. "Buskers are like gypsies, but we earn a pretty good living," Sharon had said. "We all stay with friends when we can. When I'm in London, I stay with Mike and Tracy. They're great jugglers, and they do tightrope tricks, too. We all go from festival to festival. Mike's the one who taught me about getting the crowd to get as close to us as possible, so we can see their faces. When everything's over and we ask for money, we want them to feel like they know us. Or, maybe that they owe us."

Chris figured that with his savings and the vacation and sick time he'd cashed in at work--not to mention what he'd gotten for selling Cindy's wedding ring--he could travel for at least a year before having to find real work. If he avoided the expensive cities, a year might even be conservative. Now, he looked at the boxes that held his possessions and wasn't sure if he should feel proud or sad at how little he'd accumulated over his lifetime. He had not yet given up the idea of leaving behind some type of legacy, but for the life of him he couldn't figure out what one might be.

"You hate flying, Chris, and you're headed to Europe," Cindy had said during their last phone conversation. "You hate living without a schedule, and you're doing this."

"I'll be okay, I think," he'd told her. "I really do."

Phillip would be taking the boxes to the storage unit, and he already had a key to the apartment. When the airport shuttle arrived and Chris climbed into the blue van, he tried to imagine what would happen next. The driver had his window cracked open, and the warm July air flowed through the van. He thought about what Cindy had told him, that in the end, not everything stops. He missed her, and he often thought that he still loved her. But as the van passed the park where they'd exchanged wedding rings, he barely noticed. He pulled the small Dutch dictionary out of his rucksack, and he leafed through the pages until he found the instructions for saying "good morning."

Carmelita and Bert

Having navigated my way via tram and train to Amsterdam's Schiphol airport, I spent my last remaining Euros on a small snack and sat down to wait until my plane back to London was available for boarding. I was eager to get back to somewhat familiar surroundings, but I was also regretful of not having spent more time in Amsterdam. But, things were as they were, and I had a bed in another Easy Hotel waiting for me in London.

Not long after finding what I thought would be a seat in which I could sit alone for awhile, a large black woman approached, said something in what I assumed to be Dutch, then sat beside me. Not long afterward I dug my Flip video camera out of my pocket and tried to get a few shots of the airport's interior. The woman said something else, and I said, "It's a camera." I showed her how it worked, and she seemed quite happy. In a matter of minutes we exchanged names (hers is Carmelita) and talked a bit about ourselves: She is Dutch; she was born in Suriname; she has 2 daughters; and so on. We talked about many things: her life in Amsterdam, the history of Suriname, where she lives, how we both like to read, what we do for a living, the history of white people enslaving black people. Soon, she told me that the next time I am in Amsterdam, I (and my wife) should visit her, and she took my pen and notebook from my hand and wrote down her phone number and address.

When we said our goodbyes, I thought it would've been nice to talk with Carmelita a bit longer, but my boarding time was near and I had, it would turn out, a very long walk to the gate.

In the evening of my last day in Amsterdam, I walked by a street artist and bought 2 postcard-sized watercolors showing different views of Amsterdam's architecture and canals. When I removed the watercolors from my backpack not long after liftoff, the man next to me pointed to one and said "I used to live right there." This was Bert, and he described the building beneath his fingertip as a place he'd spent nearly a year. He explained that the artist had taken certain liberties with the painting, but none that detracted from the work's quality. A Canadian, Bert told me that he had lived in Amsterdam for 2 years, and I learned that he is a civil engineer by education and is now involved with the oil and gas industry though he has also started several companies, 2 of which had failed. He was flying to Houston, a city that he said he enjoyed. I have been to Houston, and I suppose I missed the enjoyable parts. I did almost have fun there one night, but that's not something I talk about.

But Bert, he loved the place, and he told me that the best sushi bar and steakhouse there are in nondescript strip malls. For most of our journey together we talked--about politics, about Canadians and Americans, about the Olympics, about the world economy, about global warming, about living in Europe. Once again I enjoyed the perspective of someone who is not from the United States, and as with Carmelita, I learned some things simply--and mostly, actually--from letting him talk.

At Heathrow, we went our separate ways--he had to catch a connection to Houston, I had to find the fast train to Paddington Station and then to my next hotel room. I already missed Amsterdam, but I was also glad to be back on somewhat familiar ground. I had 3 more days to fill, and I needed to find something to do.

Dutch Treat

The next day, also early, I once again made my way to the Museum District, this time to the Rijksmuseum where Rembrandt rules. Not bad. Once while at the Art Institute in Chicago, I sat on a small chair and wondered if the disinterested security staff appreciated what surrounded them. And at the Rijksmuseum, surrounded by Rembrandt and the Dutch Masters, I thought that I'd be quite happy to sit there forever and let the art roll over me. Leaving Rembrandt behind,

That night would take me into a different culture, but before that I wandered, shopped for small gifts, and then got lost for several hours. The streets were full of more tourists than I could've imagined--hordes of people walking through a city geared indirectly to tourists. At one point I found and browsed a cheese shop, then left; hungry a couple hours later I managed to find my way back to that shop and bought some cheese and a small chocolate bar. I stuffed both into my backpack, took the tram back to the Easy Hotel, and there I rested and snacked on cheese and chocolate.

Toward dusk I retraced most of my steps but then detoured in the direction that I thought would take me to Amsterdam's Red Light District. The previous day I had been asked by a young, long-haired fellow, probably American from his voice, where the Red Light District was. "I have no idea," I'd said quite honestly, and I walked away. A minute later I saw him talk to someone else and then turn on his heels and trot away. So, seeking it out on my own and without a map or guidebook, I walked in the direction I'd seen him go. I have seen experienced many things in my travels overseas but other than what I'd read in guidebooks, I did not know what to expect from the Red Light District. I made my down dozens of windy, crowded streets as darkness fell, and at one point turned to my right to see a near-naked woman standing on the other side of a large glass door. Because I am an idiot, my first thought was, "That woman forgot to shut her curtains!" A few paces later I found another window and finally realized where I was.

I once had a college instructor who said that one defining characteristic of pornography is the lack of love. Neither prude nor judgmental about such things, I've nevertheless concluded that prostitution shares this characteristic. While sex and love certainly do not require each other, they do enhance each other. A former coworker who had given me hints on Amsterdam had also advised me not to make eye contact with the woman behind the glass. At one window or another, I found that when you do make eye contact, the women will tap on the glass and beckon you in--room after room of Sirens. Within each room that I did peer into was a display of simple furniture: a chair, a bed, perhaps some artwork on the walls. I couldn't help but think of Van Gogh's painting The Bedroom, which depicts a similar setup. I never saw anyone pass from one side of the glass to the other. I knew that even initiating a conversation--or negotiation--with one of the women had to be somewhat awkward, but I also figured that actually going through the door while so many people walked by would make things even more awkward. When I was in the Philippines many years ago, all you had to do was sit in a bar and wait; there were no doors. My first time there a woman named Narcie sat in a chair next to me and, in her fluent-enough English half an hour and a drink or two later, told me that her mother had been a prostitute, as well. I'm neither proud nor ashamed to say that I returned to the ship that night neither wiser nor more worldly. I have always been curious, though, as to why I remember her name.

Finally, I sat down in an uncrowded pub at the fringe of the Red Light District and enjoyed a couple glasses of Jupiler beer. Again, I was happy to rest for a time before, re-energized, I resumed walking before making my way back toward the tram stop, which in turn took me back to the Easy Hotel.

The day had been good, and as I cleaned up and organized my things for the next day's early trip back to the train station, the airport, and then London, I thought that I wish I had more time to explore not just Amsterdam but the rest of Holland. I felt that I was just starting to get my bearings and that my circle of exploration should be expanded outward. As I finished the remaining slices of cheese, I stood at the window, pulled the shade aside, stared into a dark Amsterdam, and for some peculiar reason contemplated how long a person can run from things.

Going Dutch

The weather on my second day in Amsterdam started out gray and misty. Not long after sunrise I left the Easy Hotel and finished an easy walk before it was time to...walk to the Van Gogh Museum in the Museum District. Though my map-reading skills would abandon me several times in the next couple of days, on this morning the map and I worked fairly well together as I pieced together my route: turn right, turn left, go over the canal, turn right, go straight for a bit, turn left, then do some squiggly stuff until I found the museum itself. On the way I also found the Concertgebou (concert building), which Paul McCartney mentions in one of his terrible songs (and, yes, I know that could be any song he wrote after about 1970).

Because we were smart tourists, those of us who were in line for tickets before the museum opened were proud of our "beat the crowd" mentality. We stood in what had become a light drizzle until opening time, and some of us were a bit deflated when those who had purchased tickets in advance got through the doors before we did. They were, I guess, the crowd that beat the crowd that beat the crowd.

Inside, of course, I was both overwhelmed and humbled, just as I have been while visiting art museums in London, Scotland, and Chicago. As someone with very little creative ability, I have always admired artists for their ability to, well, create. Beside each of the museum's pieces are brief descriptions of such things as where and when they were created, what Van Gogh was doing at the time, and where he was in his development. I enjoyed reading each description, though I also was further humbled when I read something such as "As is evident in the painting, Van Gogh had not yet mastered perspective," or, "Van Gogh was obviously still developing a style." I'd stare at the works and see nothing wrong with either the perspective or the style.

After nearly 3 hours of ambling from floor to floor and room to room, I headed to the exit and had to work my way through the main contingent of the daily pilgrimage: dozens and dozens of people lined up to get inside.

The day's hours of artistic Dutch high culture ended with a couple glasses of beer at a bar where the bartender pegged me as an American and then asked which team I wanted to wind the World Series. He was a Yankees fan, he said, and I told him there are worse things in life. We talked a bit about baseball and American hockey as he introduced me to a "genuine" Dutch beer that was also organic.

Outside, I sat at a small table and let the evening do what it had to do as I thought, "Damn--I'm in Amsterdam!" This wasn't an epiphany, by any means, but when I travel I sometimes get so caught up in movement I need to stay out of traffic and resettle myself. The night was cool. Bike riders jockeyed fearlessly and confidently down the street. Robert De Niro's character in The Deer Hunter repeats the line "This is this" when he's trying to make a point, and it's a good line to remember when you're trying to forget the past and future both.

The next day, also early, I once again made my way to the Museum District, this time to the Rijksmuseum where Rembrandt rules. Not bad. Once while at the Art Institute in Chicago, I sat on a small chair and wondered if the disinterested security staff appreciated what surrounded them. And at the Rijksmuseum, surrounded by Rembrandt and the Dutch Masters, I thought that I'd be quite happy to sit there forever and let the art roll over me.

And that night? A culture of a different sort.

Easy Living in Amsterdam's Easy Hotel

For my most recent trip to Europe, I stayed in 3 versions of the Easy Hotel, a no-nonsense kind of place with the most basic of rooms that are suited to those who don't spend much time in hotel rooms while traveling. I'd stayed in an Easy Hotel in London once before, and I found it clean and inexpensive enough. You want to watch TV at an Easy Hotel, you rent the remote control. Wif-fi access? That'll cost you, too. You want extra towels or your bed made? You pay extra for that. But, how many solo travelers need more than 2 towels or care about their bed being made?

The Amsterdam version had been open only a week or so when I arrived and was met by Charlie, a young Englishman who was taking a "break from university because I wanted to work." He let me know that as a sort of welcoming gift from Easy Hotel, I would have free television and wi-fi access for my entire stay. A nice touch. I'd find out that night that some of the movie channels in Amsterdam aren't quite the same as the ones I was accustomed to back home--a bit more, oh, graphic. Then again, maybe those channels are available on TVs in hotels all over the world and I'm just dumb enough not to have noticed.

I was proud of myself for having found the hotel in the first place. From the train station I'd taken tram line 25 into a new city, but I managed to get off at the correct stop and after a few wrong turns made my way to the hotel itself. Good for me. So, I was happy to get the key to my room, and even slightly amused when the key opened the door to a room that was already occupied. I think Charlie and I were both lucky that nobody was in the room. Charlie was quite apologetic, and soon enough I was in the right room and busy cancelling the credit card I thought I'd lost but would find shortly after getting off the phone with my bank.

Settled and eager to get outside again, I bid Charlie goodbye and began walking around Amsterdam. I walked as much as I could, trying to get oriented, and just before dark I found a restaurant called Der Pizza Kamer. The waitress/bartender told me that the menu was in Dutch and that she would translate, but "lasagna" seems to work in nearly any language and I ordered that with a glass of wine. The lasagna was fair; the wine was average; but I was happy to have actually gotten food and drink in a new place, a somewhat major accomplishment given my aversion to going into any kind of dining establishment alone.

The first day had been a good one: I'd encountered and solved a few problems along the way, and I'd found shelter and food. I was looking forward to an early morning and getting to the Van Gogh Museum.

Holland Days

While listening to Yo-Yo Ma....

Flying over the North Sea from London to Amsterdam, I remembered how I felt the first time I truly traveled on my own from California to Pensacola, Florida. I'd end up doing a lot of foolish things in Pensacola, but the night I landed at the 4-gate airport on my way to the school the U.S. Navy had found fit to send me to, I walked out onto the tarmac, made my way into the terminal, and found that my official orders were missing a piece of information: just where that school was within Pensacola. Though I finally solved the riddle with the help of some people who must have pitied me as I stood alone and confused in my dress-blue uniform, I didn't feel comfortable until I'd gotten to the school itself and could fall back on the training I'd received in the previous 9 weeks of basic training: Do what you're told and shut up. The military is good for people who need the type of direction that prescribes what to wear, where to go, and when to eat, and though I'd eventually find I didn't need that direction, on that first night I found comfort in it.

I'd been to England 3 times over the years, but this was my first trip to Holland. I was apprehensive about what I would face after getting off the plane, not only as I was nervous when I landed in Pensacola, but also the first time I went to London and exited the train in London's Victoria Station. Up until that point everything was easy enough--a couple of airports, finding my way from Gatwick to London--but in the expanse of Victoria Station, I realized that I was now truly on my own and had to figure out how to get to my hotel. A gentleman at the information desk in Victoria Station suggested that I simply take a cab, but being both stubborn and frugal, I opted to walk. I had my map, after all, and the distance did not seem great. Very little of London, however, is constructed on grid--streets start, end, curve, swerve, and sometimes simply disappear. Street signs themselves are often attached to fences, but they are more often attached to the sides of buildings above our line of sight. (Knowing this has made navigating London much easier in subsequent visits.) After a couple hours of walking that were interrupted by a brief rest in Hyde Park, where I sat on a bench in a slight mist and ate a bread roll left over from the plane ride, I eventually found my hotel and felt much more comfortable.

On my second visit to Europe, I spent 2 days in Brussels, and there in search of my hotel I managed to get onto the right trolley but went in the wrong direction. The trolley stopped, everyone got off, and I was again alone and lost in a city until the trolley started up again and headed back the way it came. Once more I had to search for my hotel, but also once more things worked out as they should have.

In Amsterdam, then, getting through Customs and into the terminal itself was fairly easy since nearly all signage is in both Dutch and English. I knew I had to take a train from the airport to Amsterdam proper, but after spending 20 minutes trying to get a kiosk to accept my credit card or debit card, I gave up and went to stand in a long line of people who seemed to be buying tickets from real people. (Aside: I had lost one of my credit cards somewhere in London before heading to Amsterdam, and I wondered if that lost credit card would've worked at the kiosk.) The woman who ended up selling me a ticket also told me that neither my credit card nor my debit card would work at kiosks in Amsterdam because the cards did not have the requisite security built into them.

Then, in Amsterdam, I once again walked out of a large railway station and into a new city filled with large crowds and unfamiliar terrain. I felt, though, less nervous and lost than I had that night in Pensacola, the first morning in London, or when arriving in Brussels. Still, I had to figure out 2 more things: how and where to buy tickets for the tram to my hotel. Across the street from the station I located yet another ticket office, where I once again had to bypass a kiosk and speak to a person, a woman who was very helpful and patient. Since leaving London I tried to focus on one thing at a time, and this helped me solve the small problems I'd encountered. Not many years ago while traveling to the Midwest, I lost my wallet, which contained my money, my identification, and my debit/credit cards. As I sat in my hotel room and tried to reason things out, I knew that I had relatives not too far away who could lend me money, and I would soon be meeting coworkers for a training course we were attending, so they could pay for my hotel room and meals with their company credit cards. I also knew that my wife could FedEx my passport to me so I would have the identification I would need the following week when I was to fly home. I went to a local bank to see if there was any way to get money transferred from my bank in California, but the people there said it just wouldn't work out. I happened to say, "If there were a Bank of America around here, maybe I could get help there." I was lucky then that one of women I spoke with told me there was such a bank about 20 miles away. I found my way to the bank, and after proving that I was who I said I was by logging onto my bank account there, I was able to withdraw cash. The stupid thing? An hour later when I was back at my hotel, I once more searched through my luggage and found...my wallet. After I'd cancelled my debit card and credit card. I'd wanted to panic the entire time, but focusing on solving each problem (the money, the ID, the logistics) helped me stay fairly level-headed.

One of the first things I did at my hotel room in Amsterdam was call my credit card company to let them know that I'd lost my credit card in London. Then, not a minute later, I reached into my rucksack and found...the credit card I'd just cancelled. The problem I still faced, though, was how to pay for things using my debit card or remaining credit card to buy such things as food. I had enough Euros to get me through most of the trip as long as I didn't eat or do anything fancy. But, on a whim, I returned to the train station the next day to see if I could use my credit card to get a cash advance at one of the currency exchange windows. And, for a fee, I was indeed able to. So, money problem was solved.

Not much in this post, though, is especially meaningful, but I've been thinking about writing and writers lately, and even more than ever I'm convinced that anyone who calls him- or herself a writer needs to get into the world a little bit, that we can't be realistic unless we do. I think this might be why Dickens, Twain, and Hemingway resonate with so many people: They didn't simply write about what they knew, they wrote about what they lived. And if I were more of a writer, I'd probably be able to back that all up.

Things We Didn't Say Yesterday #12

At some point you have to remember I'm not that kind of person.

Everything--and everyone--was now neatly divided. The objects had been easier than the people, some of whom might have struggled when deciding. Looking over the list of guests who had attended her wedding, Cindy found few surprises among the friends she and Chris had once shared. Her friends, naturally, had swung easily to her side, and Chris' friends had done the same. Their mutual friends seemed to have taken one of two routes: Some abandoned her and Chris all together, while others declared allegiance to one side or another.

She and Chris had not spoken in months; they had not even crossed paths though they still lived near to one another. The morning of his birthday she woke up and, still drowsy, found herself considering what type of cake to make. She wondered if she would ever forget his birthday or their anniversary. But, she was happy that the "daze and malaise" had passed, though with her wedding guest list on the table in front of her, she knew she had not severed everything completely. And in the box at her feet were the wedding pictures, the major part of any archaeological record that she and Chris had been married. He had not asked about them, and she did not know what to do with them.

Their last encounter had been in front of Stiller's Ice Cream Emporium. It was a place they'd both frequented before they'd even met, so she did not find it odd that they would meet there. Chris was sitting at a table on the patio, and she had seen him from inside. It would have been easy for her to leave without talking to him, but she no longer felt that she needed to avoid him.

"Vanilla?" she asked. He seemed neither surprised nor perturbed by her presence. She sat across from him.

"I'm a vanilla kind of guy," he said. "Strawberry?"

"Habitually," she said. "How are things?"

He shrugged. "Things are things. My mom died."

"Oh...Chris! I'm sorry. When?"

"Last month."

"Why didn't you call me?"

"Why should I call you?"

"To be considerate. I loved your mother."

He didn't say anything, and she didn't think he was especially pleased by her presence.

"How's your dad?"

"He's fine," Chris said.

"You sound bitter."

"Bitter?"

"Yeah. Bitter. You finally angry with me?"

"Which do you want me to be--angry, or bitter? Take your pick."

"Can't we be pleasant, at least?"

"We could be. We could be pleasant. But I don't know if I'm ready for that."

"That doesn't make any sense, Chris. You told me a long time ago that you weren't angry, that you were doing fine. Why the change?"

He wiped ice cream from his fingertips. "Maybe you've convinced me that I just need to start being honest."

"With you, or with me?"

"Both."

"It sounds like something that counselor told us."

"It could be. I'm seeing 'that counselor' again."

"Why?"

"Just to talk. To have someone tell me that I'm not the reason for all this. At least, not the only reason."

"I never said that you were. Did I? Did I ever say that?"

"No. But it's what you thought--I could tell. I know I wasn't a good husband in a lot of ways, and maybe now I'd be a better one. Little things don't bother me as much as they used to, and I think I understand you more now than I did when we were married."

"Good lord...you really have been getting counseling, haven't you?"

"Yes."

"I've thought about a lot of things too, Chris. I told you all along that you are not to blame. Why didn't you believe me. Why couldn't you believe what I said?"

She watched his eyes as he seemed to consider several answers. His face had changed.

"You never told me that. You should've told me then. I might've believed you then," he finally said.

"Maybe I didn't use those words, but I said it in different ways. At some point you have to remember I'm not that kind of person.

"Which kind of person?"

"The kind of person who would blame you for everything."

"You chose to end things."

"Oh, stop."

"And maybe you should go talk to someone."

"I've got friends to talk to."

"So do I, Cindy. But maybe you need someone to tell you things you don't see and don't want to hear."

"It sounds as though you're blaming me for something."

"I'm not."

"I wish that I hadn't come out here to talk to you. I didn't want this. I don't want this again." With that, she finished her ice cream cone and left.


She dropped the guest list into the box that held the wedding album, set the lid in place, slid the box back into the closet. She thought that she would send the entire box to Chris, that he could carry that burden for awhile. Things had to change some more; she saw that now.

Serenity in Yosemite

I often think that, when it comes to writing, procrastination is really just figuring out what to say. So, having sold myself on that, I'm putting off what I should be working on and instead spending time here. What the hell.

Taking advantage of a loose leash late last week, I packed some cold-weather clothing and headed the car south and east to the Yosemite Valley. My friend Tom introduced the place to me not many years ago, and I've been returning as regularly as possible. And because I'm getting fatter and older and lazier, I opted to rent one of the tent cabins at Curry Village, a shelter from potential storms that meant I wouldn't have to set up my own tent and sleep on the ground.

Arriving at Curry Village around noon after a long but enjoyable drive that included the discovery of a small coffee shop in the small town of Mariposa, which I found not because I was looking but because I saw 2 men walking up from a side street, a paper coffee cup in their hands. I parked the car and walked down that same side street, found the shop, and walked away with something called an Oregon Chai. Maybe it's similar to Starbucks chai latte. Tasted good enough that I would also stop on the way home 2 days later. I talked to the owner about how long he'd been there (6 years), about the science of advertising his business (his wife says he has "sign anxiety"), and the number of people he employs (5). Amazing how much a person can learn in a 2-minute conversation.

Anyway. Arriving at the desk 5 hours before the official check-in time, I was given keys to a tent because "we just happen to have one available." I had to wonder just how many unheated tent cabins would actually be occupied that night (though it would turn out to be quite a few, including the one beside me, one in which an man older and fatter than I slept well and snored loudly). The desk-clerk asked if I was there "for the conference," and I assured him that I was not. After stowing my pack of clothing I simply started walking--I'd say "hiking," but I'd be more accurate saying "strolling." All of the walkways and common tourists areas were filled with visitors, and most of them had white nametags hanging from their necks.

I love cities, their commotion and energy, but I also very much enjoy being anywhere else. The air was cold and fresh, and that first night was cold enough that 6 wool blankets laid over me weren't enough to keep me warm. But, warmth would've cost me $65 more a night, and I thought it was a fair tradeoff. The next day got a late start but managed a hike (certainly not a stroll) to the top of Vernal Falls where several months ago 3 young people walked around a guardrail, slipped into the water, and tumbled over the falls: a 25-foot float that led to a 300-foot fall that ended in a sudden stop in the rock-filled pool of water below. I looked at the waterfall and tried to imagine their terror at realizing what was going to happen. If we're lucky we die without such terror, though perhaps if we take our time dying that terror is longer.

Eating an apple and drinking some water at the top of the falls, I watched some clouds move in and realized how cold I had become: the sweat on my layers of long underwear wasn't drying, so I started hiking down just to regain some body heat. (Every see the movie Body Heat? It's kind of old, a little racy; I wrote a college paper on the opening scene, which I must've watched 20 times.) When I got to the road, I found the bus stop, intending to ride to the Valley's small deli where I could pick up a sandwich. After a few minutes I was joined by a man who was toting a fair amount of good camera equipment. I had camera-envy. "You hike to the Falls?" he asked. "I did," I told him. "You here for the conference?" "No," I said, and I let it hang there for a moment. "Which conference is that?" He looked at me. "The Al-Anon conference," he told me. "Nope," I said. I couldn't tell if he was sad. Maybe he had camera-envy, too. "I didn't mean to imply anything," he said, and I assured him that no offense was taken and no apology was necessary. "It's called 'Serenity in Yosemite'," he said, and we talked about the Valley's beauty.

We both eventually got on the shuttle bus, and though I was still quite chilled, I got off at the deli as he continued on. When I got my sandwich, I came outside to find another shuttle that would take me to Curry Village. The man was still on the bus, and we exchanged greetings. It's sometimes nice to see a friendly face.

Back at my tent, I ate the sandwich and shivered. When the sandwich was gone I walked to the showers and let hot water warm me up. After reading in my tent for awhile, I started walking again, making my way to a bar near Yosemite Lodge where I was charged $10.50 for a simple gin and tonic. The bar wasn't crowded--at least, I didn't see anyone wearing nametags. Toward dark and wandering around Curry Village, I found that 2 buildings were full of people watching some type of video: Al-Anons watching that night's keynote presentation. I found a dark corner outside one building where I could hear the speaker through the window. She was a comely blonde woman who interspersed "shit" and "fucking" quite well into a somewhat humorous personal story about her own journey into the group. Finally, when my feet were called, I sauntered back to my tent, read some more, and finally went to sleep with my blankets over me and the tent-neighbor snoring happily.

That second night was warmer than the first, or I was more tired and more acclimated to the cold. The next day I awoke to a light rain. I packed my things and loaded my car. I walked to the cafeteria for some hot oatmeal, and as I sat among many Al-Anons again, snow started to fall--big, wet snowflakes. I drove through snow until leaving the Valley, then drove through rain, then drove beneath sunshine for the rest of the way home. There I settled into the sofa and turned my attention to my students' papers and questions, trying hard to not lose what I'd gained over the previous couple of days.

Home Again

That was fun.

Home again after 10 days of being outside the U.S. London was as welcoming as it always is, and this trip also included 3 days in Amsterdam.

Travel is a good thing, though "The farther you go, the less you know" (a slightly inaccurate bit from the Tao Te Ching) is always in the back of my mind whenever I venture beyond familiar terrain. Then again, at least parts of London have become familiar enough that during the last trip I was able to provide directions to a couple of tourists.

I am always surprised at people I meet and how willing they are to talk. Here are the highlights, some of which may be expanded upon at a later date.

• Charlie, the young Englishman who was working the desk when I checked into my hotel in Amsterdam. He gave me a key to a room that was already occupied, and when I returned from actually entering that room, he seemed relived that I was neither upset nor impatient.
  

• The bartender in Amsterdam who enjoyed conversing about hockey and American baseball (I forgave his being a fan of the Yankees).
  

• Bill, the Canadian I sat beside on the flight from Amsterdam to London and with whom I talked about economics; Canadian and American lifestyles; global warming; his favorite restaurants in Houston, Texas; snow skiing; and living in Amsterdam. Our conversation started when he glanced at the small watercolors I'd purchased from a street-artist in Amsterdam, one of which depicts an apartment building next to a canal: "I used to live right there," he said, pointing to the top apartment.
  

• Carmelita, the cheerful woman who sat beside me in Amsterdam's airport gave me a short history lesson of both Holland and Suriname, and who told me that the next time I am in Holland, I should call her and visit her small coastal town (with my wife, of course). We compared notes about our children, and she even took control of my notebook to write down her name, address, and phone number.

• The 2 docents at Christ Church in Oxford who seemed pleased that I could discuss a bit of English history with the, including history of the church itself.

• The young New Zealander employed as a bartender at Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese in London. He'd been working in London for 6 months and in a couple of days was on his way to Boston where his girlfriend lives.

• The Hungarian bartender near London's Covent Garden who pegged me as an American by the way I pronounced the "r" in "beer." She told me of how she learned English, which was actually quite good.
  

• The woman on the express train from London to Heathrow Airport, who was on the way to Kenya to work on disease eradication (and who was born in Kentucky, as was my father).

• The man I sat next to on the flight from London to Chicago, whose wife has Parkinson's and uses voice recognition programs to help her use computers.
  

• The woman I met in Chicago's O'Hare field who works for a California pharmaceutical company that is working on drugs to extend the lives of children afflicted with rare diseases.

• Dave, on the airplane from Chicago to Sacramento, who coaches trainers and other coaches around the world and who was on his way home to California. He sold a company at age 42 and found that retirement wasn't as much fun as he'd hoped. "Coach Dave" was embroidered on his rucksack.
  

For the most part, I simply found ways to ask these people questions and to let them talk, and when they asked things about me, I provided as few details as possible. It's better that way, in the end.

****

The trip wasn't just talking to people, certainly.

First, I owe Kominski many thanks, for instance, for suggesting that I take the accumulated episodes of "Things We Didn't Say Yesterday" along with me for some reading/editing. Not only did I find typos and inconsistencies, I also discovered that I'd basically written the same episode 3 times. How stupid. I'd written them all with no planning or thought, really, so I could've expected a recurrence of themes and language. But the same episode? Goodness.

Second, somewhere over the Atlantic I believe I found a solution to a problem with plot/structure in the novel I thought was done. So, this will, I hope, be addressed soon.

Third, though the Muse has not yet seen fit to allow me to see the ending to a screenplay I've been writing, I was allowed to see bits of dialog and theme that should be developed further. I am thankful for these gifts.

The Art of Dining Alone

During a recent 2-week-long stint working and living alone in the Pacific Northwest, for the first time in many years I had to both shop for groceries and prepare all of my meals. I've made my own breakfast and lunch for decades (and why not?) but have been fortunate enough to benefit from someone else's culinary expertise for most dinners ("suppers" if you're from the Midwest, as I am). And while I am certainly able to prepare many things other than oatmeal, sandwiches, and salads, doing so is not something I'm particularly motivated to do.

During my 2-weeks alone, however, I actually had to plan ahead: Breakfasts and lunches were both easy and consistent, but dinners were another matter. I tried to choose well: turkey burgers, fish, different turkey burgers, different fish. What was different about these meals, I think, was not just the food itself, but the fact that I was dining alone. Dinner is the only meal that I consume in the presence of other people; breakfast is always alone (and usually at the office), and lunches are most often taken in the dismal confines of my corporate cubicle. Dinner, however, more often than not finds me with spouse and children: an end-of-day commotion. So, without the family, I often communed with the television, which seemed to lecture me more than communicate.

This is not, though, a story of sadness. Rather, it comes to mind now because I will soon be spending a little over a week traveling alone, and during that time I'll be fairly itinerant without even a refrigerator to keep things cold or a stove to make things hot. Again, though, breakfasts and lunches will be easily managed grab-at-the-chance type of meals. Dinners will be different, and I probably will not even have a television set to keep me company. In previous journeys, as a rule I picked up a sandwich at a grocery store, then consumed it in my hotel room or in a park. During a trip to Brussels a couple years ago, I did force myself to dine at a couple of restaurants (sitting outside both times), but always had the feeling that breaking bread even with a stranger would have been nice. I have had good luck at bed and breakfasts: In London once I shared a table with 2 elderly English women who shared their experiences living during and after World War II, and in a pub in Edinburgh, Scotland, I shared a couple of beers with a drunk Swede who told great stories. On my first trip to London, I went into exactly one restaurant for dinner: a bright Italian place in which I first tasted Pinot Grigio. It had been a long day of walking, and the wine is what I remember the most.

On my upcoming trip, I will be heading into new places, and I hope to be brave enough to venture into more than one restaurant, for I've always advocated that we learn a lot about people and cultures through a couple of things: their cemeteries and their food. We'll see what I learn most from during this trip.

Autumnal Suite

Prelude

Out riding my bike recently while at the same time doing my best to avoid getting squashed beneath one motorized vehicle or another, I for some reason thought about The Grand Canyon Suite, something I remember listening to often while in grade school. Which means, of course, that I've not listened to it in many decades. Go figure. I recall only bits of the work itself, but with "suite" in mind I naturally thought of the song "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes," a slightly more contemporary work and one with which I can actually sing along.

It was just a few days after the start of autumn, a day on which the light switches from "changing" to "changed." Long bike rides--like long hikes and runs--are good for letting the mind open a bit, a coward's version of LSD, perhaps. Problems often resolve themselves when they are ignored for a little while. I only wish that drivers would not cut in front of me.

Happy Birthday, Dad

About a week after autumn starts is (or would be?) my father's birthday. Always since he died I've felt a slight draping of melancholy settle over me a few days before the date itself; often I don't realize why until I stop to think--or think while on my bike--about what's going on. Perhaps hat he died in the autumn of his life more than his winter makes me sense that I am in my own autumn, though it has been many years since I not only came to terms with mortality, but also stopped regretting senseless acts and stupid reactions. Understanding that I have moved from "aging" to "old" is somewhat liberating.

I am also glad to have come to understand that my father never needed to be forgiven for how he dealt (or didn't deal) with me. The more I have learned about his life and his father, the more I've seen that he did a damned fine job. My grandfather wasn't always nice to his wife and children, though he always treated me well. He, too, must have worked with whatever he was given, and I do not think my father ever spoke poorly of his own father.

"My son is a Marine, and he came home a mess."

One of my students didn't show up for class a couple nights ago, a week after letting me know that she had personal things to deal with. The day after missing class she sent me an email to let me know that she had to drop the course. I sent her a note in response and asked what I could do to help, that perhaps we could find a way for her to both deal with her personal life and remain in the course. Today we talked on the phone. She told me that her son, a Marine, is having trouble with things. Years ago I would have let her drop the course and probably would not have given things a second thought. The school at which I teach has rules, and we are always cautioned against treating students differently, against giving anyone special treatment that might cause another student to complain.

These days, though, I'm more willing to address such things head-on, to adjust the rules to fit the situation. My experience with this woman, in fact, comes just a day after a student in another course confided that he is a both schizophrenic and bi-polar. He said that he has never told his teachers this, but now feels that I should know. And, again years ago, I would not have offered to help, probably would not have listened. But these days I remember more of the people who in small and too often unacknowledged ways have helped me: Friends I have now, friends whom I've let drift away; teachers who have guided me; bosses and co-workers who have listened to my petty complaints and ignored my insensitive comments and overall aloofness.

The student who wants to drop told me that she will continue and finish the course, and I am happy about that. Things could change before our next meeting, I know, but at the moment I am hopeful she will indeed return.

I am comfortable with forgiveness, glad for hope.

Things We Didn't Say Yesterday #11

It's like happiness

But there were good memories, too.

He was driving toward the park--a neutral location--where they'd decided to meet to exchange rings yet again: his to her, hers to him. A simple reversal. They could then do whatever they wished with the rings. Final dusk was just minutes away, and the western horizon was clear so that long lengths of sunlight could enter through the passenger-side window and illuminate the dashboard. The moon roof was open all the way, and the cool air washed across his face and forehead. As he passed the high school, the cadence of a marching band became loud, then faded. He wasn't sure of how to feel as the high school dropped behind him, but he didn't feel anger. It was more of that post-coital feeling of blended contentment and melancholy. It was an odd feeling that soon enough was gone.

Now, driving, he remembered their first meeting, how a mutual but now-dead friend had thought it would be a good idea if they met at a local artist's showing of nature photography. And it was a good idea. Roxie, the friend who also owned the studio, had left them alone for a few minutes not long after the introduction. "Talk about something," she said.

Chris didn't remember what they'd talked about, but he remembered the first time he saw her. She was almost as tall as he was, and blond in a good way. One corner of her mouth turned a bit upward when she smiled, and he'd always found that attractive. Roxie returned soon enough, and she told them both that she hoped they hadn't talked about sports or the weather.

He'd often wondered at how easily the good memories had become subservient to bad experiences. Or, maybe they were simply subsumed.

He saw her as soon as he turned into the park. For most of the day he'd hoped that this exchange would be more difficult than he now realized it would be. She was sitting on top of a picnic table. Across the park a group of young men played soccer. She watched him walk from his car to the table, and he knew her smile was false because the corners of her mouth stayed at the same level.

"Hi," she said. She opened her palm to reveal her silver wedding ring and its single diamond.

"Hi."

"You ready to do this?"

"Yeah, I am. It doesn't seem as bad as signing all the papers, does it?"

She shook her head. "No, it doesn't."

He removed his wedding band from his finger. He looked at it and the indentation that it left behind.

"You never took it off?" she asked.

"A few times. It just seemed easier to keep the thing on my finger, you know? So it didn't get lost."

"A good idea." She stretched her arm and her open palm to him. "Here."

When he pinched the ring between his fingers, he felt the familiar softness of her hand. He dropped his ring into the same palm, and she closed her fingers tightly and withdrew her hand.

"A piece of cake," she said.

"I want to tell you something, Cindy."

"Are you going to yell?"

"No."

"Okay. What?"

"Your smile. I always liked it. It's what attracted me to you."

"You never told me that, did you."

"I don't know. I think I did. If not, I should have. It's like happiness."

She seemed confused. "It's like happiness? A smile is happiness, isn't it?"

"Maybe I didn't think it through, but it's what I was thinking nonetheless."

"That's a strange note to end all of this on, isn't it?

"How can the ending of 'all this' be any stranger than it started?"

She looked across the park to the soccer game. "I've got to go." She got down from the table, looked at the ring in her hand, then pocketed it and strode off.

Things We Didn't Say Yesterday #10

Bop, Bop, Bop

He remembered when they were in North Beach. The next day would be the first day of winter, but the night was warm enough that neither of them needed much more than a light sweatshirt. After dinner they'd wandered into the Tosca Cafe, having a couple of the specials--Ghiradelli Chocolate, steamed milk, brandy--served in small glasses. After a couple of drinks he'd gone to the men's restroom where he'd stood in front of several colorful posters of Marilyn Monroe. It was the only time in his life that he didn't want to leave the smell of urinal cakes behind. From there they'd gone to Vesuvio where they tried to channel Jack Kerouac, but the noise and the crowd became too much after a single drink. Standing on the sidewalk outside, he'd pulled her arm and told her they next had to go to the Condor.

"That's sick," she'd said.

"How do you know?"

"It just is, Chris. Would you want your kids to know you went to a place like that?'

He shook his head. "I don't have kids. And if I did, I don't think I'd be obliged to tell them."

"Pick someplace else."

"Larry Flynt's? The Hungri i?"

"Chris."

"Let's go back to Tosca, then. We can listen to opera."

So they'd gone back and found a booth away from the bar. This was supposed to be an attempt to get some spark back, but Cindy didn't seem eager to be anywhere, and she hadn't even seen that he wasn't serious about the Condor. Dinner at the Cafe' Zoetrope had been good, if quiet. He'd had the Linguine alle Vongole, while she had picked at the Penne all’ Arrabbiata. They'd shared a bottle of Coppola's Pinot Noir.

Chris knew that neither of them really could find that spark, just as he knew they seemed to have lost any sense of humor with each other, that everything had become literal. That's why she couldn't see that his suggestion of the Condor was a joke.

"Stop that," she finally said.

"Stop what?"

"That--that tapping on the table. It's opera--you don't tap your fingers to the beat."

"I didn't know I was doing it."

"I'm tired. I need to get to sleep."

"It's not even ten."

She looked at him, watched an elderly couple get up from their barstools and walk out the door, then looked back to him. "I'm sorry. I'm irritated, that's all."

"I know. We're both irritated. At everything."

"This isn't doing what we'd hoped for, is it."

"It's early. Maybe if we stay out awhile, something will come to us." He looked beyond her to the door to the men's restroom, and he thought maybe he should go see Marilyn Monroe for awhile. He wondered what Cindy would think if he told her about that.

"Chris! You're doing it again. Stop!"

"They're just fingers."

"It's not just fingers, Chris. It's you. It's this bop bop bop and it's driving me crazy. Every day it's like this, one thing after another. Bop bop bop. And if it's not you, it's me. We do these things to drive the other person crazy."

"Do you every wonder why?" he asked. "Why is it? I've been tapping my fingers to music since I was a kid. You used to find it endearing. Why does it bother you now?"

"I never did. I just let it go."

"You shouldn't have."

"Oh, I know. I know. Look, let's just go back to the hotel, okay? I'm tired. I don't want to end the night like this."

But they had let it end that way, he remembered. They ended the night when she returned alone to the hotel, and he stayed and listened to opera--music he neither enjoyed nor understood. Looking back, he should've told her that. But the next morning, as they were driving home, he kept the radio tuned to any music he could find, griping the steering wheel with both hands and not once letting his fingers keep time.

Practice

Writing poetry and being alone not only require practice, they also require that certain willing suspension of disbelief: Fictions have to be accepted for what they are. Writers of all ilks struggle with both--writing poetry requires such precision that it is easily abandoned, while solitude requires confrontations with demons and angels alike.

Being alone is the easier of the two when one gets beyond the initial realization that nobody's around to help. Writing poetry? One of the hardest things to do well. I have known many very good poets, and I continue to admire how they can be so precise, how their works can be multi-level structures built in just the right way.

And I am always looking for new poets, though this task is not easy. Visiting City Lights and Green Apple Books in San Francisco can be of great use, but I think I am now a greater fan of Powell's Books in Portland, where stacks and stacks of new and old collections of poetry are waiting for good homes. On my recent trip to the bookstore I selected two books: Ted Kooser's collected poems Flying at Night, and W.S Merwin's The Shadow of Sirius. Both have remained in the darkness of my knapsack for a few days. Merwin is less direct and often challenging; Kooser uses language accessible to anyone. Reading from Merwin's book, I am reminded of reading Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, Woolf's To the Lighthouse, and Morrison's Beloved--books that require a suspension of disbelief and a particular relaxation of the mind to be enjoyed.

Here's one from Merwin:

Rain Light

All day the stars watch from long ago
my mother said I am going now
when you are alone you will be all right
whether or not you know you will know
look at the old house in the dawn rain
all the flowers are forms of water
the sun reminds them through a white cloud
touches the patchwork spread on the hill
the washed colors of the afterlife
that lived there long before you were born
see how they wake without a question
even though the whole world is burning

And one from Kooser:

Advice

We go out of our way to get home,
getting lost in a rack of old clothing,
fainting in stairwells,
our pulses fluttering like moths.
We will always be
leaving our loves like old stoves
in abandoned apartments. Early in life
there are signals of how it will be--
we throw up the window one spring
and the window weights break from their ropes
and fall deep in the wall.

Of course, I'm no literary critic, and I don't know enough about poetry to discuss either of these intelligently (Shawn at These Rivers is one to follow, however). It's just nice to once again find poetry that I think is "good."

Navigation

For a full week now I've been residing in the Pacific Northwest, not too far from Portland. It's a wonderful place, Oregon--greener than most of California this time of year. I'm really doing little more than working my regular job in a different place for just over 2 weeks, with my commute lasting all of 10 seconds, a full minute if I go downstairs to brew tea before sitting at the computer. I have a dog and a cat to keep me company. The dog is friendly enough but misses its owners and knows that I am a mere interloper. When I leave the house, the dog greets me and then stares through the window to see if its owners are there. I take the dog for a walk each morning before work, before sunrise, and it seems happy enough. I allow it to spend much of the day on the bed I occupy at night, but we have agreed that it will sleep elsewhere at night. Dogs belong on the floor.

It is quite odd, this living alone even temporarily. Unlike travels or backpacking, I have no destination, no itinerary, no agenda. Not knowing my way around too well keeps me fairly close to "home," though I did figure out the mass transit system well enough to get me into downtown Portland and back again, and each day I pedal or walk ever-widening circles, and on a bike after work this afternoon I discovered great bushes of wonderfully ripe and sweet blackberries. I have also learned both the compass points and the sounds of local traffic patterns. Just knowing east and west allowed me to ride to places on a bike that I would feel lost in if I were driving a car. We often miss so much while driving--the sounds of things, how to tell east from west by the feel and sight of the sun.

Even walking around downtown Portland left me disoriented since I had no familiar reference points to work with. I knew a river was somewhere, and I knew that some streets divided the region into quadrants, but just as I was in Brussels a couple years ago, I was more lost with my map than I was this afternoon on a bike with only a sense of direction to guide me. And when I stopped for lunch at a brewpub in Portland, I considered such things: the feeling of being lost amid commotion, the lack of a true sense of direction. (It's not supposed to be a metaphor, though it perhaps could be.) I stared out the window of that brewpub and admired the locals' ability to turn down just the right street that would lead them where they wanted to go. Me? I needed a good hour to figure out how to find where I should catch the bus for my return trip.

Things We Didn't Say Yesterday #9

Everything's almost over, isn't it?

Light from the half-moon was bright enough to fill the yard. Movement through the leaves in the trees alongside the house must have been birds because whatever breeze there had been earlier was now gone. The chair she'd dragged from the shed to the patio was less comfortable than she'd remembered, but she had neither reason nor inclination to go back into the house.

She hated insomnia, how after so many nights of fitful sleep every small problem became large, how what seemed to be months' worth of events and conversations replayed and repeated in whichever part of the brain was processing things. Chris had left hours earlier after retrieving a few more boxes, but she still felt something of him nearby. For the most part she had let him work alone. Sequestered in the small room that had once been their shared office, she had watched through the partially opened louvers of the door as he and Phil did what they'd come to do. When the rented truck was finally loaded, Phil had driven away in his own car, leaving Chris to get a few small items. Cindy had watched for a minute as Chris looked around the room, his hands on his hips, and then she'd opened the door and made her way to the sofa that Chris was leaving behind.

"You done?" She had asked.

"I think so. I'm meeting Phil at the apartment. We've got to return the truck by five."

"The house seems so empty now."

"What'd you expect?"

"Don't be snide."

"Kind of late for that, isn't it?"

"And don't be an ass."

"What, exactly, should I be?"

"You could be civil. I wasn't trying to start anything."

"No, I'm sure you weren't."

She hadn't liked the tone in his voice. "Just stop, okay? Just let it go. At least for now."

"Let it go? What the hell does that mean?"

"Don't."

He'd turned to face her directly then, his hands still on his hips but his face full of the type of anger she hadn't seen in a long time. Even when she'd asked for the divorce he hadn't looked like this. "You play these goddamned games as though you know what's going on, that you always know how to win. You started all of this. You handed out the rules you wanted me to follow, and for the most part I've done just what you asked. We're almost at the end of things, aren't we? Everything's almost over. You think the house seems empty now, right? But you know what, it has been empty for a long time. I'm only now starting to realize it. And maybe I'm starting to see how empty you felt before this started. I keep thinking if I'd known, I might've been able to fix things. But I'm angry, too. So when you tell me you're not trying to start something, or when you tell me 'don't,' how do you think I'll react--just shut up and walk away?"

She'd stared at him, but she'd not been able to say anything for several moments. She thought about an earlier argument when she'd suggested the feelings they had for each other had been gone for a long time. This seemed like the same argument all over again. "Are you through?" she'd finally managed.

He'd looked around the house, finally dropped his hands from his hips, and nodded. "I'm through. You can have whatever's left. All of this emptiness is yours." She saw his face relax then, as though all of his anger was gone.

Now, on the patio, she listened again to the leaves moving. The moonlight seemed brighter. She leaned back in the chair, shut her eyes, and for some reason thought of the differences between "empty" and "emptiness."

Things We Didn't Say Yesterday #8

Who said anything about touchy-feely?

He awoke one morning to the realization that she hadn't touched him in a long time. She'd always been the one to touch a shoulder or brush the stray bit of hair that wanted to linger out of place over his forehead. Before breakfast that realization transformed into a thought, one that he carried for several days before bringing it up during the familiar tension that seemed to have become their evening routine.

"I realized something the other day," he said. He knew that this might go a couple of ways: She'd poo-poo the idea and they'd continue on, or the announcement would lead to something more than just tense. Recently, or at least as recently as he could remember, they were each ensconced in their respective singularities, and even the most trite of comments was dangerous. She had once remarked that she thought he needed new shoes, and he'd shouted himself nearly hoarse saying that he certainly did not need her to select his wardrobe. He'd sheepishly told Phil about that one. "Really, Chris?" Phil had said. "She said something about your shoes, and you started toward the deep end?"

To her credit, Chris thought now--and he always gave her credit for many things--she set aside her book of poetry and turned the face of her attention to him. "What did you realize?" She sounded neither uninterested nor perturbed.

"Well, I woke up one morning, and I realized you hadn't touched me in a long time."

"Touched you?"

"Yeah. Simple touches. I always counted on you for them. Just little taps to let me know you were around, maybe even thinking of me."

He thought he saw her hand twitch toward her book, but he could not be sure. She said, "I did that?"

He nodded at her false question, but he also let it fade. "Yes. It was always nice."

"Oh." She seemed to think about it, and he wondered if she was decided whether to stay reasonable or become defensive. "I didn't know I had stopped."

So, he saw, she had known that she "did that." He listened to the traffic passing by in front of the house but refused to let the noise come between them. "I just wanted to let you know that I thought it was nice. I liked it."

She didn't hesitate this time. "But you have to know that you're not exactly touchy-feely, right? There were times I wanted to be touched, but you never seemed to understand that. Maybe I got tired of things being so one-sided."

"Who said anything about touchy-feely? That's not where I was going. I simply wanted to share that realization with you. We can still talk, right? I'm not trying to fight." He didn't like how they were sitting there and simply looking at each other. There was something between them now--not the sound of traffic, but something he couldn't yet identify. He wondered what had happened, how so many good things could vanish so quickly, so quietly. "What are you reading" he asked. She seemed relieved to have his permission to return to the book, which she grasped and opened.

"Emily Dickinson," she said.

"Short poems, right?"

"Mostly, yes."

"Read me one."

"Why?"

"I just want to hear a poem."

"You don't like poetry."

"Maybe I could learn to like it."

She turned her face toward the window, and then to the book. She bit her lower lip. She leafed through some of the pages before stopping. "Here's one," she said.

He watched her read--not listened, watched. For the life of him, he couldn't hear a thing she was saying.