Tuesday, March 18, 2008
well
Stuck trying to come up w/ a title for something, what do I find, entering the word "least" into the search field of my generally trusty online 'cliche finder,' but this:
at least it was a very interesting experience
Huh.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Good game
EKG: Way back in that other lifetime, we shoulda thunk up these (you know)!
Friday, March 07, 2008
Home is here
Last week I visited this place for the first time, went to hear Heidi Julavits read from her latest, and Peter Cameron from his. Bookstore's a winner, and so, it seems, are those two books. True to that review (and from the little I heard read), Cameron writes his precocious main character into a likable guy (you know, he sortof reminded me of the Rushmore kid), really nailing the dialogue: conjuring an 18-year-old's bitterness in a way that's just transparent enough. I'd def read the whole thing. Julavits--I wasn't as instantly taken by what she read, but I've enjoyed her in the past, so chances are.
Anyway, not the point of this. The point (I think) was how perfectly (sap coming) Brooklyn the whole night felt. From the BK writer-heavy stock to the small assembly of people to the cat that kept brushing up against Heidi as she read... Things felt measured--like a town. Then afterward, choosing to walk home rather than put up w/ the finicky F, I took my time, strolling past closed retail and softly lit pubs, stopping for a quick bite of yum. Subdued Court/Smith Street activity at my back, there were (are) several residential blocks en route to the cave, housing broken only by the occasional parts shop, small warehouse, empty lot, the Gowanus Canal (which, incidentally, has all sorts of charm come nighttime/the complete absence of clarifying light). All around, silence, encouraging attention to strange, arbitrary detail--the nonsensical tagging, questionable art projects, ornate carvings in wood/building architecture... And it felt, I don't know, bittersweet, knowing I'd be leaving it all behind for mayhemic Manhattan in less than 24 hours' time--and for two whole months. (Longest I've been away.) Yet there was a confidence, too, a sense of trust that everything would settle back out again upon my return. That the relationship would wait.
And so it happened that the following night found me plopped in the backseat of a cab, my poor driver at the mercy of my 'whoa, I've lived here three years but it sorta feels like I'm moving here for the first time all over again--it's the heading-back-to-Manhattan thing, ya know?' commentary. It really was kindof disorienting, though, as it's been, I guess, a year and a half since I did the East Village thing. I think the adrenaline kick was partly due to the just-prior, whirlwind appearance of my own subletter--sweet girl originally from Seattle, of all places. Her NY newness ended being a little infectious, I suppose.
Anyway, as we neared my W. 11th destination, the energy, human energy, started picking up, and my recollection of the previous night's activity expanded in light of the--contrast? I don't know, but it acted like the best old memories act in your head--full and perfect w/ the right distance. Only there was very little distance this time. Instant nostalgia. Weird.
So yeah. Following a (very) short bout of homesickness for some unrecognized place/date, I spread myself comfortably across 150 square feet. It's where I've been since. And I'm not so sure about leaving, either. Arg.
xo.
p.s. I have a personal roll of toilet paper now. And a shower caddy. And coming soon: a hot plate. (Not really.) All I'm missing is Sarah on repeat, doggles. Oh wait, I had that the other night. Uff.
commitment
An excerpt from Lawrence Osborne's "Riding in Red Hook," which is one story of many. While his account of an unraveling relationship sorta left me wanting (though, I don't know, something tells me a re-read might deliver more), I love his RH commentary--all of it, though the last few sentences rank highest.
Here the skies are always brilliant, crossed by soaring trains and by the tracery of dead trees. Strange little companies have their quarters here, things like Fireproof Door Company and Cyberstruct. As we went round and round, we passed the formidable mass of Treasure Island storage on Center Street, which asks you to "Store Your Treasures Here" and offers you a large painted palm tree as an incentive. Hardly exchanging a word, we sailed down Bay and Bryant until we were in the shadow of one of the buildings I love most in New York, the abandoned grain terminal. It looks like a Crusader castle in the Middle East, Krak des Chevaliers perhaps, w/ the mysterious graffiti word BARONE painted across it. Beautiful in its sinister hugeness, it silences the passerby. And on the far side of it one comes to the humble finale of Court Street, little more than an alley running past loading bays for the Hass oil company and ending at the prickly barriers of the U.S. Coast Guard.
This is the quietest place in the city, so close to the sea but separated from it by a mass of chimneys, warehouses, and bright-red pipes and taps w/ fire-hazard warnings. Turn a corner and you hear the water lapping at ruins. I rode behind her, and all this time I followed the outline of the body, so familiar in the way it slanted to left and right, the violin form w/--so to speak--its tightened strings, and now untouchable, like something moving off in the dark. We stopped at Halleck next to the Keyspan yards, where we saw a row of chocolate warehouses swept by dried up vines, and I gave her a tense, squinted glance. It began to occur to me that this wandering was a form of farewell, one in which hands would not be raised or words exchanged.
There were moments to get off and sun, for example at the lovely corner of Sigourney and Otsego, where no one comes and where metal chimneys stand in shining rows. Further on is Coffrey Street, whose buildings have the liver-red oxide color of African roads. A drink at the Liberty Heights taproom, delightfully estranged as a pub can be, and then a slow meandering down Van Dyke, where one can see the Clay Retort and Fire Brick house, built in 1854 by the superbly named Joseph K. Brick. It looks like a small Tuscan church made of gray schist, which was how it was designed, and it reminds you that people once bothered to build brick factories in the image of Tuscan churches.
As the ride progressed, I began to feel happier, more curious about the place where I lived but which I didn't really know. The love affair lost its subtle preeminence for a while, and I let my eye drift up tall brick chimneys for a while, and I let my eye drift up tall brick chimneys slender as Egyptian steles, along lines of cemented windows and boxes of Fafard Canadian growing mix piled along a waterfront. There are moments when a city can suddenly acquire all the kinetic qualities of a human being, a person's moods and expressions, so that she becomes a character of some kind--like a large woman, I often think, half asleep on her side. You find yourself talking to her, asking her questions, pestering her. And living in such a city is a long, monogamous affair, or else a marriage one abandons from time to time. Cities are rarely casual flings.
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
All the way back
I mentioned that I've only recently come to know Raymond Carver as a poet. This was sent to me a few weeks back (thanks, Mallot), affirming the admiration.
Where Water Comes Together with Other Water
I love creeks and the music they make.
And rills, in glades and meadows, before
they have a chance to become creeks.
I may even love them best of all
for their secrecy. I almost forgot
to say something about the source!
Can anything be more wonderful than a spring?
But the big streams have my heart too.
And the places streams flow into rivers.
The open mouths of rivers where they join the sea.
The places where water comes together
with other water. Those places stand out
in my mind like holy places.
But these coastal rivers!
I love them the way some men love horses
or glamorous women. I have a thing
for this cold swift water.
Just looking at it makes my blood run
and my skin tingle. I could sit
and watch these rivers for hours.
Not one of them like any other.
I'm 45 years old today.
Would anyone believe it if I said
I was once 35?
My heart empty and sere at 35!
Five more years had to pass
before it began to flow again.
I'll take all the time I please this afternoon
before leaving my place alongside this river.
It pleases me, loving rivers
Loving them all the way back
to their source.
Loving everything that increases me.
Earth to Corrigan
I have a new blog obsession, name's Kimberly. She's the daughter of my ma's good friend, and she's in the midst of a journey (business and pleasure combined) that includes stops in China, Vietnam, South Africa, Zanzibar, Botswana, Greece, and South America. Her accounts bounce between informative and hilarious--and both at once. Case in point: a traveling w/ one person for a long time-/cramped quarters-induced fit of rage involving Playtex javelins (or cardboard-encrusted missiles--take your pick, K uses both), documented here.
Oh, and I should mention... Hippos! All her pictures are amazing.