I made a list

I made a list of all the people i knew better than, and it was a short one, comprised mostly of sober drunks and drunk sobers and, even worse, drunk drunks and sober sobers. But though it was short, I was told I had to revise it downwards--demands from upstairs to economize, save paper, save ink, save souls, etc. So I did, I forgave. 

The teachers went first, the fourth period gym teacher who made us run right after drinking our milks, I knew better than him, but, then again, not at handball--cross him off. And the seventh grade science teacher who trusted Michael Crichton, of all people, about global warming, of all things, I knew better than him, sure, but you know what, his spaghetti bridge did hold more weight than mine, it was the triangular trusses, and so, off he goes. And off too with the bus drivers and the cabbies and the late night semis, off with hosts and with hostesses and waiters and waitresses, off with pizza delivery men and Digiorno ad men and with wedding photographers and twenty year old hucksters--off with all the professionals--I used to know better than them, but now I know better and I don't know how they did it. 

With these cuts, I'd met the bosses' expectations, exceeded them even--the list was down to one sheet, double spaced--but still I was zealous. I was carried away. These were easy to eliminate, known unknowns, if you will, but there were unknown knowns, too, and so I stayed late. I put parentheses around the bullies and the dictators, and the bosses, and the liars and the thieves, I knew better than them, but it wasn't worth knowing what they knew, so I forgot it and now I don't know a thing. I put asterisks after the victims and the survivors and the brave and the wonderful, I knew better than them once, but of course i fucking didn't; I mistook knowing what to say for knowing what to do, and this is a correction that must remain in the paper of record. 

I was left with two names--the bare minimum for a list. I took it home with me. My dad, after a few ones, as he's teasing my auntie, I knew better than him and to tell the truth I still do. He's still on the list, but I called him and we agreed on eight point font and invisible ink--my aunt's idea, no less--and so I still know better, but I might know worse, too. I found a concoction to erase the invisible ink, apple cider vinegar and smelling salts, and I mixed it up and knew a little better how worse I now knew.

So the next morning I was down to one, his name in bold face. The friend who took something that wasn't his and hid it in his attic. He never told a soul, just watched, watched as the family he took it from suffered, as they looked for it, as they cried for it, watched in a mirror, as he fell apart, too, as veins began to pop and as his hair went knotty. I can't tell you what it is that he stole because I still don't know, but even then I knew better than him and i still do, I know better than him. And this is cold comfort, but it's comfort all the same. I made a list, and all it had was his name. 

It wasn't a list anymore, my wife told me, and I couldn't bring it back to work. She was right, of course, so I sewed it into lining of my jacket and I wore it every single day, even after it ripped, long after the jacket had fallen apart, the list kept me warm. It saved me the cost of a tailor, saved thread, saved cloth, saved souls, etc.

i'm not cold

you are late to everything and so
you don't get to say anything
when winter is early.

it is not all you've made it out to be, anyway;
all that has changed is that if you want to go outside,
you will have to do it on purpose,
and the view from over here is that
you could use some purpose.
what did you do all summer,
with those aimless privileges, anyway?
i never saw you use them,
except once or twice to smoke a cigarette in peace;
if summer really is your favorite season,
wouldn't you be able to explain why?
let's not get into where were you in autumn.
inside that body of yours, probably,
doing god knows what
for not even he knows why--
who the hell did you think you were fooling
in indian summer,
barely holding on?
what did you think the warmth was doing for you?

dig out your jacket and your father's gloves.
you get an early winter,
but not as a punishment, nor even as a wake up call, not even for shock value--
it's being scored as a second chance.

it's a common misconception, not every snowflake is unique,
but most of them don't last that long, anyway,
in these mid-november flurries.

1 Nov 14

Halloween was won this year by the blond girl wearing a University of Michigan cheerleader outfit, except it had the word “sucks” written in cursive in the appropriate places, to express her displeasure with that academic institution. I didn’t like her handwriting. But the costume is not how she won. She won because she showed up to my old house, looked in at the party, and said, “I don’t know about any of these people, and I am leaving.” Then she left. I could have applauded. 

It was a stunning victory, a real triumph, because so many of us could have said the same thing, but none of us did. 

It’s not that I didn’t go for it. I had my best costume ever; what I did was I told people that this year I had my best costume ever and then I didn’t dress up at all. I went as “a disappointment.” I couldn’t decide whether to be self-satisfied or self-loathing about the whole thing; I guess I really was a disappointment. Every year I pick a dumb but kind of smart joke and tape it somewhere to my person, and I hope that people will think I am clever for it but understand when they do not. This year I didn’t even use a post-it. 

Halloween does not tend to be a favorite time of year. My mask has shifted over the years, I’ve gone from confused to contemptuous, from cynical to indifferent, from slut-shaming to slut-shaming-shaming to just plain ashamed, but the constant has been “kind of sad.” I’ve never known what to do with the lawns full of Solo cups and the yells in the street and silhouetted orange glow of the parties on Gunson. It isn’t my scene, and the way all this fun hangs in cold October air makes me sick. 

This year was better, or maybe it was worse. The party was at Hariet Brown, a place I used to call home but wisely weaseled my way out of this year. It’s a charming place, a dark red two story shithole with the bare minimum required for college student living, and from the right angle it looks like the cover of that American Football record and it feels like it, too. It has a two car garage that we use as a concert space and has been converted into memory, by way of globular mood lighting, hundreds of holdings of hands, and an out-of-tune piano in the corner. The number of people who truly matter to me who I haven’t seen in that garage during an emo set by too-loud assholes is not zero, but it’s probably less than I can count on my hands. Halloween was no different. 

I sat on the couch and I loudly made jokes that made one of the blond boys laugh and made the other feel stupid. This was a feeling worth shaking off; I wanted attention, and that’s not a good sign. An ex-girlfriend walked in, and we did a pain-free version of our ritual, this time with podcast recommendations. It’s always hard to know what to say with someone that you used to be intimate with but haven’t been for years. You want your “How are you?” to count as more than it ever does. You want it to count as a hug, kind of, although even if it were a hug, it wouldn’t be enough. The idea is something warm and encompassing and brief, but better than a hug. Anyway, I never have the words for it, but I was happy to see that she had gotten herself a dog, and I contented myself to casual betrayals that once we knew each other very well. The music started. 

The music was not the point. I walked inside, visited my old room, Andrew’s current room, which I was told was the VIP room, which turned out actually to be a place to hide from your feelings or at least from your friends’ feelings. There Andrew and Mike and Carly and my sister sat. Mike was drunk, and Carly was hungry, and we ditched the party for a minute and ended up at Woody’s. We discussed how good of a crew we were, we charged cell phones from a jangly pocket, we ordered too much hummus. I don’t know if you’re supposed to like the lighting at Woody’s, but I bet that you are. I don’t like it. We headed back, Andrew and I in a hurry. The show was over by then, but of course it lingered. Hariet loomed, well-guarded. 

It was a confusing crowd to take in. There were so many friendly faces, a few of whom even meant it. There were people I didn't know intermingling with people I didn't recognize. There were old exiles regaining their sea legs; familiar faces missing that shouldn't have been. This does something to a man's heart. It goes without saying that the Spice Girls were there. My crew went inside, but I stuck around in this crowd. I showed off my costume to preemptive groans, and took candy from my former friends. 

I was glad I stuck around: Faith’s mom got married and her joke about it was on point. It involved Ruffles. She had stopped by for a minute to see some but not all of us. We spent a few minutes talking about this; for once, I was listening well. I couldn’t avoid the strangeness of it, there was a time when this would have been an uninterrupted group of best friends, but now Faith and I are standing outside the shed while the girls inside avoid eye contact and the friend she’s with waits in line to pee. But I’m listening: Everything has gone to pieces, but Faith said that isn’t surprising. It’s senior year, everyone is anxious, and well, these things happen. This is undramatic and probably correct, but part of me still thinks there are a few particular king’s horses and men who I think are to blame for Humpty Dumpty’s state of disrepair. I suggested to Faith that she use a plotter printer to express her how over it she is, and this gets the laugh I was hoping for but that doesn’t necessarily mean I should have said it. Faith and Michael disappeared into the night, and I was thrust inside. 

I stand surveying the party from my favorite place in the world, the threshold of my old room. I wonder what it is about leaning against a door jamb that makes me feel so safe. I don’t think it’s earthquake-related. I think it’s the idea of being able to leave, or rather, of never quite entering in the first place. Out there in the open, one hundred percent in the room, people are dancing and it almost looks normal. But there’s something sadder in it than there normally is, and this time I know it’s not me. There are missing faces and there are strange divisions and everyone can see this, and you can hear it even in shouts to Avril Lavigne. I think we were all haunted by ghosts of Halloween past, by former friends or more to the point by former friendships. You don’t owe anything to anyone, but you owe something to friendship, I think idly. I don’t know if I mean that. 

I wrote a speech up in my head, enjoy a fantasy of shutting off the music and telling them all what I think. There are long-winded versions all the way down to haikus, but the gist of it, and the one I whispered in Andrew’s ear, is: “Remember that, at least sometimes, it is probably you in the wrong. Everyone has a moral code and no one lives up to it.” Then I would shut it off and leave. Instead I just stand there and frown, trying to figure out if it’s cowardice or just a healthy skepticism of my own damn self that’s keeping me from flipping the switch. There’s no rule that says it can’t be both. 

I stood there leaning for a while, playing around with this in my head, watching things take a mercifully typical descent into the absurd. I’m interrupted only by the drunk girl whose face I know. Conversation is never quite possible in these situations; I am so far from knowing what to say I enter fight, flight, or freeze. Andrew deals by insisting she is dressed as a basketball player. I smile at this but mostly freeze for a while and get pawed at a little, get the buttons of my shirt undone, and stare blankly. 12:36, I made it longer than normal. It’s the part of the night where the music becomes intolerable, even the stuff I like, and it is time for me to leave. 

I did not win Halloween. Right before she left, our hero the cheerleader pointed off in the distance and turned to me. “North!” she said, not asking so much as demanding. I complied with a nod and yep. Then she did the same for “South.” but more solemnly and, after a moment’s consideration, “East!” and “West!” We locked eyes and she laughed at whatever it was I said to her, but only as she walked away.

Questions I didn't text to my ex-girlfriend

and was right not to, but
that doesn't mean weren't worth asking like:
Big ones, like:
In your opinion, do men ever change?
(women, too, I guess, but that interests me less because
~~some things never change~~)
Is the world going to be there in the morning?
Is a good man really so hard to find?
(because I thought I had mine but
I'm not sure what he looks like.)
How have you been dealing?
Or practical ones, rapidfire, like:
Do you like what I have done with the place? or
Did you know that I broke the banker's lamp? or
Do you have any tips for y-chromosome maintenance? or
Do you know what I am supposed to do with all these shadows?
(because I have just been cramming them in my pants pockets but have heard
that off-site storage units can be affordable,)
Do you know of any that are reasonable?
Or the real little ones, like:
Why do I pretend that these moods started with you?
/////
Questions I didn't text to my ex-girlfriend,
I didn't have the heart to text them
so instead I put them on Wikipedia
using her log-in
and then flagged them
for review

6/19/2014

I am walking home through Central Park and I am doing so intentionally.  I am trying to savor, whatever that word means.  This is my final commute home, and I am trying to make it last.

The sky is salmon and with all the the violence that an upstream fish suggests, it is saturated and colorized and something has to give.  It should not surprise you that I am thinking of prologue, of delicate equilibriums and their inevitable destructions.  When I reach the Harlem Meer, when I climb those rocks overlooking the water, I get what I asked for, or at least what I predicted.  The salmon gives in and the rain begins, almost apologetic in its victory, large, atom bomb raindrops, sure, but only the minimum amount to get the job done.  It prevents further movement but it accepts your surrender.  I stand under an oak and I lay down my weapons.

And there it is, a moment worth savoring, whatever that word means.  I look to the north, to Lenox Avenue, to the intersection of Central Park North and Lenox and Saint Nicholas, I look to that beautiful triangle of four story brick buildings and absurd liquor store neon and crowds running in rain and walking under umbrellas and that sky, that salmon’s northern battle with rainclouds, and the shadows of the drops which are large enough to name and it is a moment, that’s what it is, it is a dimming worth memorializing in, it is an apocalypse, and it deserves to last forever.

It won’t, though.  Even now, describing it to you, I lose some of it.  And even if I remain here in reverence, it will end, the rainclouds will win or the salmon will, or night will overwhelm the both of them.  And even if I shut my eyes and imagine it forever, preserve it on my retinas for the rest of my days, I will still lose it, I will be distracted by other things or else I will die.  This scene does not last forever and neither do I.

This is growing sappy, it is growing literary, even.  “The natural progression of time is happening to me, and also to my parents, just like it has happened to everyone and their parents from the beginning of recorded history, but this time it’s different.” Mallory is right.  But maybe this is different, or at least it’s mine.  This is purchasing my 1999 Chevy in 2009, it’s not new, but it’s new to me.  So I stare at this sky and this scene at these people, and I know I cannot keep them, and I look into my empty palm where I expected to see a fistful of sand.

6/18/2014

what follows is a selection of my notes from a community board meeting i attended.  i swore a lot more than i remember.  i'm not going to write about the context for any of this, but if you want to know, hmu.  i left the board room at 11:15 after Helen mouthed "go home."

Sails through, for obvious reasons.  They’ve moved 17 times since 1626.  This is kind of L.O.L.  This is very L.O.L.  I’m opposed to patents, zoning.  Fuck.  It begins with Helen reluctantly taking a seat.  The school thinks it’s a p cool school.  Again, fuck quiet on Manhattan.  Outlaw private schools.  I hate the very concept of private schools.  I want to outlaw them.  The argument that it’s the top school in the country hold literally zero water with me.  I hate the wealthy.  So that sucks, go to public school in Flint.  Fuck the idea of sixth grade work ethics.  WAIT,THEY PLAY JAI ALAI?!  that is a scandal!  I absolutely 100% refuse to go to a private school.  You paid a ton of money!  privileged kids who don’t know they’re privileged.  that’s the ballgame, that’s the goddamned ballgame.  I hate private schools possible more than anything else.  We did all of that at my public goddamned school--and I was privileged!  I went to a fabulous school.  If you’re still saying “differently abled” like it’s 2002, I don’t give a shit about the rest of your thing.  Stop saying you’re going to be brief.  So go to a public school!  Go to a public school, don’t under any goddamned circumstances send your children to private schools.  Okay, you’re evil.  Why.  I think my poker face is no good.  So the thing is that the wealthy people think that they already compromised but they didn’t actually listen to a goddamned thing the neighbors said.  Damn, you don’t have to have the good guys win.

on the way home, i wrote this on the back of a receipt:

Anyone who makes a noise complaint will be deported to Davenport, Iowa.

6/17/2014

Taking an inventory of the missable things, the creaky mattress, its renegade springs.  I find myself looking up at now-familiar buildings and leering, I expect something from them but I don’t know what.  I learned where the light switch was but as Helen said sadly, I didn’t really need to.  Seven weeks is enough time realize where you’ve left, I’m not sure it’s enough time to figure out where you are.  You get glimpses, though.  You get eternities at Morningside Park and evenings in laundromats and compliments from that woman at the Speaker’s office.  I don’t know what to do with myself, there’s so much to miss, so many bytes to process.  You know how many times I have decided my future here?  Maybe in another seven weeks, I’ll know what I left.  It’s like moving, you cram it all in boxes, you sort through it later.  I’ll do that with my feelings.  So I am taking an inventory of the missable things.