Last, next.

100: Leap of Faith (4,704c)
101: Kraft Plus (Wednesday Blue)

Two Field Notes memo books side by side: one used, one new

Now playing:

cover image for the Pauline Oliveros album, Ghostdance, showing a black and white photo of a bare room with a person moving near the far wall; the photo was taken with a long shutter time, so the room is saturated with light from the two windows, and the figure is blurred and indistinct, ghostly in her movements
A story is what remains when you leave out most of the action; a story is a coherent sequence of picture cards: One: Samson in the vineyards of Timnah; Two: the lion comes roaring at Samson; Three: Samson tears the lion apart. That’s a story but actually the main part of the action may have been that there was a butterfly in Samson’s field of vision the whole time. The picture cards don’t show the butterfly because if they did they would have to explain it. But you can’t explain the butterfly.

—Russell Hoban, Pilgermann (1983)

SA4QE

I exist, said the mirror.
What about me? said Kleinzeit.
Not my problem, said the mirror.

—Russell Hoban, Kleinzeit (1974)

SA4QE

Don’t drive angry!

📚 What I finished reading in January.

I wrote the last poems for Vessels in June of 2021.

But I feel like I finally finished the book this week when, after reviewing the galley proof, I submitted the last edits and my final About the Author and Acknowledgements drafts.

It’s all extravagant press junkets and groupies from here on out.

Three versions of a manuscript: One bound by a binder clip, titled Vessels December 2022; one in a 3-ring binder, titled Vessels March 2023, and a printout of the final galley proof as a series of small packets stapled together, titled Vessels with Dec 2023 written along the top.

Last, next.

99: Snowy Evening (15,903)
100: Leap of Faith (4,704c)

Two Field Notes memo books side by side: one used, one new

Screenshot of my deactivated Twitter account, with the message: This account doesn't exist. Try searching for another.

This was long overdue. I deactivated it last November, but turned it back on a few weeks later to save my following/follower list. Then it lay dormant & forgotten for most of the year, except for some DMs to people who were still nowhere else & who were seemingly impervious to email. It’s time.

My wife and I met thirty years ago today.

I was invited over to a friend’s apartment to meet her — and she ignored me the whole time. No hello, no eye contact. Absolutely nothing. She was utterly unapproachable. Instead, she spent the evening in the other room, forehead-to-forehead with her friend, discussing and analyzing a VHS tape of the modern dance concert she’d choreographed a few weeks earlier. And I could see instantly how smart, articulate, beautiful, and, most of all, strong she was.

We began dating eleven months later, and married eleven months after that. Twenty-two months that seemed, at the time, to span thirty years. And now, thirty years that seem, at times, to have spanned barely twenty-two months. Well, that’s time for you.

Some stories belong to the breath, not to the pixel and keyboard. Some stories need the counterpoint of digressions and indignant amendments, of interruptions to refill the wine glass or the bread bowl, or to choose more music, album by album. They need the bustle and patience of a long evening, the wood and steel rhythms of a well-provisioned table.

So: to hear the rest of the story, you’ll need to be seated across from us, favorite beverage at your elbow, and all the time in the world. And perhaps a story or two for us in exchange.