Living to Tell

The Hum of Invisible Wires

2011-10-14T09:05:00.000-07:00

A number of years ago I read a book titled Fire in the Mind. George Johnson wrote it. At the time he was a science writer for the New York Times. He lived in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Maybe he still does. I may have lived there when I read it, but I live a long way from there now.

I had been interested in science in the same way I had been interested in a well constructed sentence. I'm certain there has to be at least a minor connection. An ordered thread connecting the two.

Johnson's book - maybe the whole idea of the book - was based on the seemingly incongruous conceptions of creation and the universe shared by the scientists at the Santa Fe Institute and the Tewa Indians who live in the the pueblos of northern New Mexico.

The Santa Fe Institute is a quirky thank tank nestled in the Sangre de Cristo's north of Santa Fe. Murray Gell-Mann, who discovered the quark was there, as were two fellows who thought they discovered the underlying laws that govern the rise and fall of the stock market. They also came up with a system to beat Roulette, or maybe it was Blackjack - I forget which. This is only to say that the scientists at the Institute were not your typical academics. For a time - perhaps he still does - the writer Cormac McCarthy kept an office there. He liked the science. The scientists, I guess, liked his sentences.

Much of the science Johnson described in the book, especially the quantum-mechanics, passed right over my non-scientific head. But I was able to to grab onto just enough for it to feel exciting, to fill me with wonder.

The Tewa natives I knew a bit more about. I'd been to the pueblos - Santa Clara, Santa Domingo, Tesuque, Taos, and San Ildefenso. I spent a good amount of time at San Ildefenso. I dated a woman who lived there - she was Hopi but had been married to a man from the pueblo, and her sons were young and living with her, so she was allowed to stay. For a pale guy from Chicago I ended up knowing a lot of Indians (they preferred being called Indians, trust me), and their Indian ways.

What attracted me to scientists and Indians was the sense that they carried the secrets. Secrets that explained things I felt, but could not explain. I imagined the universe to be layered in strata to which I did not have access. I wanted in.

My Hopi friend tolerated my questions. They were a game we played. I'd ask, and she would say, "I can't talk about that." And then she would, but in sentences that had their own strata for me to puzzle through.

From the science and my Indian friends, most deeply from my Hopi friend, I came to see what they held in common was their belief in connectivity. The living to the dead. Present to past. All of time the same time. How a person moves through it both as particle and wave which brings me to the hum. How could it not? My living proof of what the Tewa and the Hopi know from birth - before birth. What some physicists learn in other ways: the hum of invisible wires. Which for me is the invisible connection I have felt and sometimes still do.

I don't know the exact math, but I have met a good number of people. Some of them pleasant, some less so. Some just plain toxic. But with a few there is a hum. It can be with a man or a woman. It can be sexual or not. But there's the hum. The hum that connects. At the level of the quark, the big bang, the Hopi mother, the thread that is thrown out across space and time. And from time to time you get lucky enough to find what you have broken off from. You reform that invisible connection. And it hums. You meet someone and they can be so different - so unexpected, and yet there's the hum. Listen.

Steve Job's Sister Liked Me

2011-10-10T18:48:00.000-07:00

A friend who otherwise meant well, sent me an email to say she had been reading articles about Steve Jobs and his passing. She said an article in the Times mentioned his sister, the writer, Mona Simpson. And how seeing Mona's name made her think of me. What she meant was the me I used to be.

In 1994 I was living on Tulane NE in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I'd landed there after quitting a life I'd had in Chicago and decided one day to take a drive. The thought being not unlike the title of Simpson's best known novel, Anywhere but Here. I rented a casita from a daffy, bead-collector, who was a former-Chicagoan herself. I wrote stories. I did not work. The not working and the writing stories and and the much bigger sky forged for me a different me.

I sent out the stories to literary magazines and sometimes to the glossies. The stories, some quickly, some slowly, were returned with the thanks but no thanks. Sometimes an editor took the time and the care to write a few lines. Some of the lines were encouraging. The wildly eccentric Gordon Lish sent me a couple of bizarre notes from his The Quarterly. I've saved those. One I seem to remember began, "This starts good."

I digress.

That first summer was nearly over when I saw NPR was soliciting stories for their show, The Sound of Writing, which was sponsored by PEN's Syndicated Fiction Project. If a story was purchased it was to be read on the show and then having that pedigree, they would shop it around. I sent them two and one day my bead-collecting landlord brought me my mail, two of the manila envelopes I used to send out my stories. They had made their way back home.

Except one had found another home. A nice home. Mona Simpson, the final judge that year, picked my "Helpless" out of the slush and said, yes. I forget how many stories were chosen that year - twenty-something, I want to say - out of maybe a thousand submitted. Many were writers I'd read and admired. Writers with multiple books and New Yorker cachet. And me. And Tess Gallagher.

Tess Gallagher, the poet, and sometimes short story writer, and I had been corresponding. She had been married to Raymond Carver, a hero of mine, when I still had heroes. From him I learned some things about writing. What to put in, and more importantly, what to leave out. The power of the unsaid.

Carver had died six years earlier and I wanted to find Tess and tell her what he meant to me. I went to a reading she gave in Chicago at Barbara's Bookstore, but I was too timid to approach her. But after I settled in New Mexico I wrote her a letter and mailed it to a bookstore in Port Angeles, Washington where she lived. I probably wasn't the first to do so as the bookstore passed the letter on and soon I received one back. In it she told me that shyness was for cats, and should our paths cross again I needed to make myself known.

And now we had both been lucky enough to have won the PEN award. Luck meant a lot to Carver - he wrote about it often - the good and the bad of it. The crazy ways it shaped a life. Having my story chosen seemed, at the time, the good crazy. Mona Simpson had been a friend of Raymond Carvers- he had even written a poem for. She knew Tess well. And somehow I found myself a part of that circle.

I wrote Tess to say how great it was that she won, that I won. I wrote to her on my birthday - and she wrote back saying she hadn't heard, and to thank me. She said she had been out of the country but now she was back and was writing me from Ray's grave - it was the anniversary of his death. She liked to read to him, she said. He loved to hear good news.

Turn the Page

2011-05-05T09:43:00.000-07:00

It seems I've somehow started writing again. I finished a new story and immediately started another which I am five pages into. And here I am noodling again.

Last night noodling on this new story which as yet does not have a title - which is bothering me a little but not too much as writing anything is such a marked improvement. Then I noticed this.

The pattern is I will write long-handed (too often long-winded) in pencil. I'll type it up - print it - edit it, and try to move forward. Moving forward is the funny part. Rather than turn the page and start scribbling - I will scribble up and down the margins. Tentacles circling around the printed text. But almost never will I turn the page. Afraid, I guess, to face again all that white. The bright white abyss of a blank page.

Full Stop

2011-02-09T12:56:00.000-08:00

I almost always speak or write in truncated lines. Cutting off the end where it needs to be cut. My nephew finds this amusing, says, "You talk so funny". Where funny means different. Different, I hope, in not an entirely bad way.

I admit it is done for effect. Though I'm not certain what effect is desired. For someone who has spent so much time alone - and for whom those separate, wide-open spaces have made a difference, have, at times, been a lonely blessing, words still flow. I'll run off a text, an email, fiddle with a story. The lines stay consistent. The rhythm of the full stop.

I doubt that I always wrote and spoke this way. A lifetime of reading played its part. At some point in the '80s I stumbled upon, or was given, Raymond Carver. He, echoing Hemingway, showed me how a sentence could work. Do its verb and noun work (adjectives and especially adverbs very much off the reservation). Now, some twenty-something years later, I'm reading Carver's biography. Trying to write again myself. Twelve pages into a story that I've been writing for six months. For forever.

0%

2010-07-07T02:02:00.000-07:00

There are exactly eleven ways in which you can love a woman. Or as Richard Yates claimed, there are eleven kinds of loneliness. I'm just saying.

Let me put it another way.

Last night - almost all the night, I laid awake thinking: this is what it feels like to be 0%. It was a new sensation - mixed with what, just hours ago, felt like the whole wide breathing world.

Short breaths. Then long. Breaths that echoed don't stop. Breaths to take your breath away.

How to wrap your mind around that?

The sweetest teacher you ever had hands you the grade: 0%. All the while thinking you were the apple in her eye.

Tecolote on the Brazos

2010-05-19T05:49:00.000-07:00

Once alongside the Bravos River in southeast Texas I spent a night with a woman whose hair glistened black in the arid moonlight. She swore she was a native. I didn't believe her, to my dying days I'll believe I was right. She lacked the necessary passion. She talked too much. There was the question of the owl.

There's the particular scent of a woman. There's also the sound of a woman. Intimate sounds. Barely registered sounds. Sounds that sear. Sibilant Spanish S's that say yes. The just audible breath that catches with the moan of a dove. A sharp intake of breath, its urgent release.

To borrow a phrase: My whole life I cheated days. As if I were the blank tape recording moments for safe keeping.

Once alongside where the Rio Grande and Red Rivers meet in the high desert of northern New Mexico, I heard what sounded like - because to compare is to record - an owl. I swear to you she sounded like an owl.

A Book and a Chair

2010-05-11T20:39:00.000-07:00

For over a year now - maybe as long as two, I'd lost the connection to words and sentences and the necessary life they provide. Losing the sweet rhythms of language, I lost a part of myself. I wanted it back, but I didn't know how to find it.

And then a friend gave me a book. It doesn't matter the title, the author, but it was a book that slowed me down, put me in a chair, and embraced me. Teased out the what I'd been looking for. It made me take pencil to paper, now fingers to keys, to write this and thank her.

Book Snob Rides the El

2009-08-12T14:04:00.000-07:00

My mother has made the claim - all right my whole family has, that I am a snob. Perhaps, but is that such a bad thing? If I am a snob it is more along the lines of a very particular, slightly screwy take on culture and what's right and what's just plain wrong. For example - back when I frequented bars a fair amount I held strong opinions on what made for a great bar and what didn't. Weeds, O'Rourkes, The Old Towne Ale House (the early years), Cassidy's all made the cut. Butch McGuire's definitely did not. I could tell you about movies and places to live and music but I won't bore you.

I'll just mention this: Books and the writers who write them. Surprisingly enough people still read books. Every day on the El I see people reading books. I'll admit that I almost never approve of what they are reading, but at least they are reading, they are holding a book in their hands (ah, and I mean a book made of paper). And every once in awhile, like today, I will see someone reading a book that gives me hope and makes me smile. Just across from me I eyed Birds of America by Lorrie Moore and it was being read.

RIP CSF

2009-06-05T06:59:00.001-07:00

She said that if I belonged there, the place would embrace me. Being from Chicago I thought her ideas were a bit squishy. But this was New Mexico and wild horses were neighing on the mesa - the moon appeared bigger than I'd ever seen it - we'd toked up some. I was open to something new. And she was right. The place did embrace me and the College of Santa Fe was a big part of it, and now it's effectively gone.

When I first settled in New Mexico I rented a guest house from a crazy woman in Albuquerque who rented to me even though I didn't have a job - but she was from Chicago and had worked at DePaul as well, so how could she not trust me? Eventually she tossed me out, but that is another story.

That first year in New Mexico I had enough money where I didn't have to work so I would explore around and every afternoon at 1:00 I went to a coffee house called Uncommon Grounds and sat outside on the patio where I drank coffee and wrote. I wrote eight stories in as many months and met some writers who invited me to join their group and six of those stories eventually got published and one won a PEN Syndicated Fiction award. I felt good. The squishy thinking woman had been right.

The money eventually ran out and I scrambled to find a job. It turned out that the College of Santa Fe (CSF) needed a Circulation Supervisor and I applied. The interview went well, I thought, and when I was walking out of the building one of the women who interviewed me came running up and offered me the job on the spot. I felt that embrace again.

CSF was a great place. It was an arty school in an arty town. Writers, painters and sculptors - the whole arty lot were around. It was in the air - in the pores. I met great writers and became friends with some of them - Greg Glazner, Arthur Sze, Julie Shigekuni, Jon Davis and many others. Some of them read my stories - I house-sat for Greg. And some of the students I met there - some who worked for me, went on to be published writers - Gabe Gomez, Danielle Deulen, Eddie Chuculate.

But it didn't end as well as it started. Not much does. The library director who I was close to died, and the school always on shaky financial footing got shakier. It felt a little like a broken heart when I left for California, and to watch it go under now, tugs at the heart again.

All Jittery

2009-04-26T03:30:00.000-07:00

It's not caffeine - or even 5-hour. No, it's the scent of the coin. A free-roll into a $3100 tournament. What a beautiful country. Harrah's decides to shoot up something they're calling the Chicago Poker Classic with a $3100 buy-in. Harrah's wants to own the Chicago-land Poker market, and now they do. And in their corporate big-hearted way they decide to give up 50-something seats on the 3 and the 9, both p and a m for like two weeks. And who but our hero is sitting in on Monday night when he has to go work on Tuesday - but, hey, it's only 7:30, an hour-and-a-half to the next draw. What's there to say, but I'm in.

The pm 9 rolls around and the kind lady pulls the lucky table. Which is 21 where the hero is sitting his should-be-at-home butt. 21 the table hollers and the kind lady walks over says, deal. (The deal here is the lucky seat at the table that draws the high card wins a free seat into the tournament). Hero sits the 3 seat. Dealer deals 3, 4 ACE. Hero shoots dealer a big thumbs up and the ACE of clubs holds up.

Now what? Play aggressive - cause, hey, it's their money ($). Can you say free-roll? Or, do you play Lock-Down-Poker (LDP) because, hey, if you just make the money ($) you're probably going to make $4000, and depending on turn out, 1st might pay out like $120, 000.

Buckle-up boys and girls.

Me and Viet

2009-04-17T08:06:00.000-07:00

I first became aware of Vietnam when I was in high school and the folks I ran with generally thought the war a bad thing. It defined the group politically and it was a good way to take a stand against parents and authorities of all types. Oh, and the draft. That was a bad thing , too. Scary bad.

But I got lucky. Real lucky. 18 and eligible and draft ends. How about that for variance? Peace-out, as they say.

Jump forward - quite a bit forward. Late 80's or something and I still don't know what I want to do. But I'm a reader, always have been. So I'm reading, and suddenly I think I can write. Blame Carver, blame LdG who turned me on to Dubus. Blame Anshaw who said there was something there and made me believe I should apply to Sewanee, which I did.

Which is where I met O'Brien who had just published the best fiction ever written about the war. Read: The Things They Carried. No really, I mean, read it.

And O'Brien played poker, though not all that well (Kent Nelson did - believe it- little can full of coins and bills - tough dude) - plus he drank less than me which made us even, I guess. Which oddly enough brings me around to D D who is now doing her PhD at Utah the same place where M S did hers and she brings us around to Sewanee and O'Brien and bottles of gin in the trunk - god, can the world be that small?

And why is it that, proportionately, there are more great Vietnamese poker players than any other ethnic group?

Which brings me to D, my own private Viet - who hates poker - but allows me to play so long as I don't bore her with the stories. Too much.

A man of the cloth?

2009-04-13T07:40:00.000-07:00

In my profile here I list Religion as the Industry I am part of. This is, I had thought, an exaggeration. But a funny thing that happened on the way to work today has given me pause. Is it possible to be a man of the cloth and not even know it? Was an Industry listing meant to be humorous really an unconscious leap into the truth? Have I entered the twilight zone?

It happened like this:

I'm waiting on the corner for the bus when a car stops and its horn beeps. I peer in and an Indian man sporting a long beard is motioning to me. He looks vaguely familiar as so many Indian men do. He continues to motion and I am unsure exactly what he wants so I open the car door.

"Come in," he says. "I give you a ride." He says this with an accent.

I am surprised because an Indian man with an accent has never before stopped and offered me a ride to the El. There have, of course, been numerous cab rides with similar sounding and looking men, but those were business transactions and while those men may have looked Indian, they were for the most part Paki. I digress.

"I always see you on the bus," he says. "I often thought that some day I would sit and talk with you."

I'm thinking, WTF? But in a friendly manner I say, "Well, thank you for the ride."

And then he asks, "Are you in the clergy?"

When I explain that he must have mistaken me for some other holy man, he says again, "Yes, I always see you on the bus. I thought I could talk to you, and now I am."

It's a short ride to the El, and a less lazy man would leave a few minutes earlier and walk. But that man is not me. I am the man who is mistaken for the clergy and the clergy are given rides.

When we get to the El I thank the Indian man for his trouble. He says it is no trouble at all. I nod. He nods. Then I call D to share this story. She says, "Weren't you scared?"

Scared? Of a Gandhi-like Samaritan? He and I are cut from the same cloth. There is nothing we fear.

Trust the Russian?

2009-03-16T10:52:00.000-07:00

A brief example of how I continue to run bad at the tables: Saturday playing 1/2. Within the first hour of a ten-hour session I am dealt a set three times, one straight, and quads. Pretty sweet, huh? Good start. Should be up - Something. Except I am down $160! Don't ask.

Much later in this roller coaster session, where after hours of playing tight, tight, tight - I finally claw myself back to even when this hand comes up. In middle position I limp in with 8, 7 (but it was SUITED). Three of us see an un-raised flop that comes 7, 7, Q rainbow. Check, check, I bet $20 - and get one caller. I'm thinking, nice. A, Q, maybe. Turn is a 2. I reach for chips and the young Russian (or Eastern European - hard to tell - they all sound the same, and are starting to menace the tables with their tough-as-nails play) whispers to me, don't do it. But I do. I toss in another $20. He calls.

Back story - this same whispering Russian-Eastern-European-whatever, has been caught running three fairly big bluffs. He has been heard to say, okay, no more bluffing. The river is an A. There are no straight or flush draws. If indeed he had A, Q, he just made two pair. As I reach for chips, I hear his voice in my head, don't do it. But there is exactly one hand that beats mine - and come on, this is Poker - I'm supposed to trust a whispering Russian-whatever is looking out for my best interest and is warning me I'm beat by the only possible hand that can beat mine? That he doesn't want all my chips? Right. And when in an unsure voice I say, same bet his reply is, of course, all-in. Whatever. I push in the last of my stack. He turns over pocket Q's. Nice hand, sir.

On a semi-cheerier note: The next day I had a free-roll into the Poker Stars $200,000 Sunday Guarantee. There were only 29,000 entries. They paid out to 4270. By a miracle , I survive to the money. We get down to 3120 players. I have an average stack. It's become shove-city when I wake up with A, A. The blinds are 2400, 1200 and I make it 10,000 and the BB shoves. I get it in great against his A, J until he runs down a straight. Still, I cashed - survived 26,000 players. Whatever.

ed. note: the author is aware that 7, big would also be a winning or chopping hand against his, but the case 7 was inadvertently mucked face-up pre-flop. the author regrets the omission.

That virtual yet tactile touch

2009-03-07T01:14:00.000-08:00

It must have been a phone company. AT&T? That had the tag line, "Reach out and touch someone". It was a Great line if only because I still have it lodged somewhere deep in that part of the cortex that believes and believes deeply in such nonsense. Reach Out. Touch.

Because I'm so easily touched.

You move away and you move away. Just for the sake of moving away. Sometimes. Just the other day at the WORK I less than love, I counted up at least three - count 'em - 3, jobs that most people would never leave. Yet.

And so you stay up too late and in between virtual poker hands you get a virtual touch on the shoulder, on the heart, asking why Roth and not Updike. Good question. Thanks for asking.

The Rhythm of the Absent Saints

2009-03-05T07:01:00.000-08:00

It's as if a switch got switched. Off. The one that controls my appreciation of sentences that sing, sentences with dead-perfect stops. Interior rhymes. I'm just not reading as much anymore, and when I do it's all hit-or-miss. Hard to find something to really hold on to. The Roth book I'm currently on, "Everyman", has its moments, but it's the first in awhile.

It's a muscle that needs to be worked again. I'm thinking all the Poker has made it all dull, made much of the rest of life dull. When you're into it, it consumes you - elbows everything else aside. Which is okay. For awhile. But I want both. Salter and Brunson. Carver and Ivey. A well rounded life. A (poker) room of my own.

Deflation

2009-02-08T23:30:00.000-08:00

Feeling it. A sense of deflation - in everything. The economy, the government - that huge post-election bubble. Press up close, listen to that air run out. And Vegas, I hear, though I haven't been back since August which is about when I - maybe we, or most of us, started running bad. Real Estate - forget about it. Ain't nothing real about it. But man, the Shoe's room is packed. Thirty on the 1/2 list - ten tables running. Maybe two in ten running good. Everyone playing tight. Except the drunks and the new boys. Drunks win. Go figure. Breathe out. Breathe in.

Almost Ready

2009-01-10T00:14:00.000-08:00

Almost ready to post again - the new year - impeachments - maybe a gym in the future. The president of a formally un-electable race. So much to talk about and that doesn't even include Poker (note to ed: cap intentional). And is Axelrod who I'd always thought he was?

Questions - maybe answers to come.

Soledad on the Blue Line

2006-11-28T14:27:00.000-08:00

Soledad rides the Blue Line from her apartment in Logan Square to the Loop where she works in the lobby of an office building selling coffee and the kinds of things you might want with your coffee - bagels and donuts and muffins. Sweet, doughy things. I haven't been to her stand - I know the building, I walk by it on the way to work but I haven't stopped in. The only time I have talked to her is on the train - on the Blue Line that I've recently switched to while the Brown Line is under construction.

I've been curious about her age. She has grandchildren - three, I think. But that doesn't help me much with her age. I'm guessing she's around sixty but I could be off by ten years. There isn't much gray. It's just hard to tell. One of her grandchildren's name is Marie. Next year Marie will start high school and Soledad is worried because it won't be one of the better public schools where there is hope for college and a better job than selling coffee to the office workers who can afford it.

I think if I save a little more she can go to a Catholic school, Soledad told me. But Marie wants to go the public school with her friends. Maybe she doesn't want to take her grandmother's money. Maybe she has a boyfriend. Maybe he's a banger. I hope not.

Catholic schools are better, yes? she asked me. I didn't know what to say. I could have said that I taught for a year in a Catholic high school in Chicago (I won't mention its name). I went in as a sub teaching English and typing. My major wasn't English and I couldn't type - I could peck around a bit, but I couldn't type. When the teacher who I was filling in for decided not to return from her nervous breakdown, the principal asked me to finish the year. I explained that I didn't really know what I was doing teaching those classes but she pressed on saying how much the students liked me which since I didn't know what I was doing was probably true.

So I stayed. I still remember one student, a boy who was disruptive and never turned in his work. I spent a lot of time out in the hall with him. After a few weeks of this a teacher pulled me aside and said, You know he can't read, don't you? Well, no, I didn't know that, but it explained a lot. They keep passing him through because they need the tuition. That's just how it is, she explained.

My teaching career didn't last very long. I guess I wasn't cut out for it. But I survived that year in the Catholic high school. I guess the students did too.

I told Soledad that, yes, Catholic schools are better. Maybe some are.

The Jig is Up?

2006-10-03T12:56:00.000-07:00

Last week the Honorable Rep. Jim Leach of Iowa attached his Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 onto an unrelated port security bill that was being rushed through Congress. Late Friday night it passed. The Honorable President Bush is certain to sign it.

And just when I was starting to get good at the thing. The thing being no-limit poker. Just when I was starting to make some money, the Republicans decided to piss all over the parade.

It's gotta be about the dollar. The right people aren't getting their slice of this particular pie. We're talking about a 12 billion dollar industry with 2300 gaming sites now on-line. But it ain't getting taxed and the usual fat cats ain't getting their piece of the action. You gotta bet that the big casinos have their clout all over this, too. They would love to have their own sites - a virtual Bellagio where players can play in their pajamas. A whole lot let less overhead involved. If they can't play, they don't want anyone to play.

A prediction - two actually. It ain't gonna work. American players will figure out a way to get their dollars in off-shore banks - and buy-in from there. And when the government and Vegas catch on, they are gonna find a way to regulate and tax all these American dollars flying across the ether.

After Mr. Bush signs the bill, banks have 200-some days to get in line. Until then, I'll keep playing, hopefully keep winning. And then we'll see. You'll probably see me more often in the brick and mortar card rooms honing my skills, waiting for the day when I can play in my pajamas again. If I wore pajamas.

Marriage, Divorce and Poker

2006-09-13T14:13:00.000-07:00

When I lived In Chicago the last time I was part of a farily regular poker game. Now that I'm back, I'm back in the same game with mostly the same group of players. We're older now, and they are all married - most of them married with children, so the games are less regular, but we still try to get together at least once a season. The spring, summer, fall and winter seasons - not the basketball, baseball and football seasons, which in a sports town are sometimes more vibrant (although in Chicago, not so much - not counting last fall with the Sox).

We had a game a few weeks ago, and after it struck me how this group (not counting me) is bucking the odds. The marriage/divorce odds. Almost all of them have been married for 10+ years and they are all still going strong. Sure we can never really know what goes on in a marriage, but from the outside looking in, they all seem pretty together.

And I was trying to figure out why. By the national average, at least two of them should be kaput by now. I was thinking that maybe it's because most of them got married after 30 - so they had a slightly better grip on things, or maybe it's that the group of them hold each other together with some kind of a social network glue where no one wants to be the first to jump ship.

Or maybe it's the poker. I'm thinking it's the poker.

Mea culpa or semper fi (my Latin isn't what it used to be)

2006-08-22T07:57:00.000-07:00

I need to apologize to my legion of loyal readers - or anyway the couple of you who stop by on occasion. I've been diverted again. By - surprise! - poker! It's just been vacuuming up the time. The watching it on satellite (I especially like Mike Matusow and Daniel Negreanu), the playing it on-line - lately at Poker Stars, where I've been doing okay - but, God, the time. What's happened to the reading, the writing, the meeting and greeting? Well, they're all gone.

One of two things is going to happen. Either I'm going to get so good and win a satellite to the WSOP - win that and then go completely crazy.

Or, I will bottom out and return to the quiet life.

But first - yes, we need to do this first. We need to beat the one whose handle is Jr. Get him in a tournament and crush him. But he's afraid - cautious to a fault. But I'm holding out hope. People say (at least one does) that people change. Me, I'm not so sure.

Jr. - if you're out there - log-on. See what's what.

The End or ###

2006-06-30T08:16:00.000-07:00

There comes a point when you're writing a story when the ending becomes inevitable. The sensation is a little sexual. At least that's the closest sensation that comes to mind. The last few nights while working on a story that I've been working on for at least three months I've had that feeling. You suddenly realize that the scene you're writing is going to be the last scene in the story. You see right where the end is going to be - maybe not the exact last sentence, but it's in this scene. That much is clear. Except the characters won't stop talking. One or another just has to get another word in. And so you let them talk, at least for a little longer. Who knows, maybe they'll say something interesting. Even if they don't, you're the boss, and you can always go back and cut. It's a little like being God. God and sex. And hope it works out in the end.

A Poet Looks at Family

2006-06-21T11:03:00.000-07:00

I'm sure for all of you well read readers this doesn't need repeating, but I was thinking about the rather dour British poet Philip Larkin today. Below is his poem about families. It's perhaps a bit harsh.

This be the Verse

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself

Where the Thumb Takes You

2006-06-20T07:56:00.000-07:00

The other day at an on-ramp to the Kennedy, I saw a youngish couple waiting for a ride. They had a sign and they had a dog and the sign read, "Texas". I was trying to remember the last time I'd seen a hitchhiker and I couldn't. I used to see them all the time especially out west, especially in California where at on-ramps in Berkeley and Santa Cruz and San Francisco the lines of folks waiting for rides were ten or twelve deep but the rides usually came quick and off we went. The same in Boulder. The same in Eugene.

The first time I hitchhiked any distance was from Chicago to Ft. Lauderdale. I was fifteen and I was with a girl a year older. Call her Mary, I think that was her name. We had less than five dollars between us and less than a full pack of cigarettes. We didn't have a whole lot of sense and only a vague idea how to get there but people picked us up one after another (later I learned it's easier with a girl plus they're nice to have around) and two or three days later we found ourselves on a bench by the beach eating from a bag of oranges that someone was kind enough to leave behind.

The trip wasn't an entire success. The girl we'll call Mary neglected to tell me she was on antibiotics and she neglected to read the instructions where it would have told her to stay out of the sun. I still don't understand the chemistry or is it biology that made her puff up after a day in the sun. She didn't look good - she looked like an over-inflated balloon person and this made her cry and it frightened me and we were a long way from home. Plus, our cigarettes had run out.

She called her mother (collect) and her mother and big sister who didn't have much to do and who didn't feel all that favorable about me decided to drive down and retrieve us. I should have stayed behind. They were nice enough but the mom had a plan and I hadn't yet learned how devious and mean people can be. When we got back to Chicago (I say Chicago but really it was a suburb - but who wants to hear about a suburb) the mom made us something to eat - and while this Mary and I were feeling good about eating a nice home cooked meal, mom was calling the police to let them know she knew right where a runaway was sitting and could they come by and pick him up.

While this didn't end our relationship (at the time we wouldn't have used a word like that) but it probably opened up a crack that eventually tore us apart. But what it didn't do was turn me off from hitchhiking. Hitchhiking with other girls and with guys and even alone - but, you know, never once with a dog. That might have been fun. Folks seem to like folks with dogs. Speaks to their character.

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

2006-06-07T12:21:00.000-07:00

The answer to that question has never been difficult for me to answer. The answer has generally been go. The last couple of days I've been trying to do the math - if it's been a gain or a loss. Clearly if I had stuck it out in one or the other places I would have more security than I currently enjoy, but in other ways I'd be poorer. Poorer for all the people I would never have met, the different cultures who let me in and in some cases embraced me.

Yesterday AC, an old friend of mine in Santa Fe, sent me two Cuban cigars. He and his wife had recently been down there and he was able to smuggle out a couple of boxes. He thought I might enjoy one. AC is something like 5th generation New Mexican whose family traces its roots back to Spain. We became friends when we worked together at The College of Santa Fe and
he and EG showed me the deep Spanish side of Northern New Mexico that I never would have found on my own.

Later I became close to an Indian from San Ildefonso Pueblo and because I was close to her I got closer to her people than most Anglos are allowed. I spent Christmas and Thanksgiving on the pueblo where we ate turkey and posole and green chile stew.

To a lesser degree the same was true of people I met in Northern California when I lived there. It was the natives (and in California they are harder to find) that I wanted to know. To know what they know. An 80 year old woman who worked for me became my friend under the pretense of inviting me over to help her with her computer. What she really was was lonely and she soon had me over for dinner. We ate in her dining room from where we could look out the windows and see across to San Francisco and out the others to the hills of the East Bay.

I guess writing this down is my way of doing the math. One of these days - maybe when it gets cold again, I'll light up one of those cigars AC sent me. I'm hoping the smoke will smell as sweet as the pinon that perfumes New Mexico's winter nights.

Hush, Hush - Voices Carry

2006-05-31T08:58:00.000-07:00

I'm sure most of you can relate to the following. You're in a small-time, Indian-run casino in the northwoods of Wisconsin or northern New Mexico or nowhere Montana - okay, let's just call it Wisconsin so you can better imagine the landscape. You're somewhere between hangover number one and the one that follows - but that's all right because you're on vacation in big gulp country.

You find yourself at a blackjack table where the cards aren't falling your way and at the other end of the table are a He-and-Mrs. Jones you vaguely remember from some other casino or bar. They seem to remember you, too. Because they are talking and, among other things, what they are talking about is you. Two things make this clear: One - they try very hard and very poorly not to appear to be talking about you and Two - when one says "Shhhh - he can hear you" the other replies, "He can't hear me way over there." It makes things a little weird, a little uncomfortable. Plus, it's killed your buzz.

So you're out of there. Off that table where the cards are ugly and weirdness prevails and you wander the floor shaking hands with the bandits who break you one twenty at a time.

Police: Officer Smelled Alcohol on Kennedy - Aw, Come On, You're Kidding

2006-05-05T09:36:00.000-07:00

Perhaps not the best insurance risk, but the Kennedy's are still being looked out for as ABC reports:

Police: Officer Smelled Alcohol on Kennedy

Police said Kennedy exited his vehicle, was observed to be staggering, and identified himself as a member of Congress. He said he was late for a vote, though the last vote had been hours earlier.

A higher-ranking Capitol police officer instructed the other officers not to administer a field sobriety test, Cannon said. Kennedy was then reportedly driven home by police.

"I would say within law enforcement that there is probably concern that consideration was given to a member of Congress that would not have been afforded a normal citizen on the street," Cannon said.

Living With War

2006-05-01T11:57:00.000-07:00

In the spirit of Ohio and the spirit of the massive immigration marches going on around the country today, take a listen to Neil Young's new anti-war album here

In the Land of Cheese and Brats

2006-04-27T08:58:00.000-07:00

My family who all still live in Wisconsin (it's a long story) took a collective sigh of relief when this story broke Hope Springs Eternal.

It's a land of dreamers and heartbreak and when the leaves once again begin to fall, the faithful, the ones who wear cheese on their heads, will sit in their rec-rooms (don't ask) and in between bites of brats and swigs of Miller, they will belch and they will hope. Soon the dark months of winter will come. Out will come the brandy.

Come on People - Get Out the Vote

2006-04-27T07:05:00.000-07:00

Voting is such an important tool - not to mention a right. That we as Americans (no offense to non-American readers) need to make the most of every opportunity to take part in this - dare I say, sacred right. So, here I give you Vote Now!.

The Writing They Asked For

2006-04-11T13:41:00.000-07:00

"They" actually being my father, but I decided to post some of my fiction on the web because Google was giving out free real estate and I wanted to see how it would look and it didn't look terrible so, for now, I'm leaving it up.

There's probably copyright issues involved - and I've been too lazy to go back and fix that. Some of these stories have been already published, and at least two are currently making the rounds. The stories listed under "linked stories" are ones that all share at least one character in common and for the most part they are set in New Mexico. I'm half-way through the 6th one and when I finish I'll probably put it up as well. My intention is to get at least 10 of these linked ones and shop them around as a book of linked stories.

Oh, yeah - the web site can be found here

The Name Game

2006-03-29T15:30:00.000-08:00

Here in Chicago where the expensive new voting machines don't work nearly as well as the old ones and where two weeks after having a stroke the probably not ever to fully recover President of the Cook County Board is re-elected anyway and where after spending many millions of dollars on the trial of former governor George Ryan who until proven guilty remains only indicted for official corruption the Chicago Tribune finds out that two of the jurors lied about their past - had to be excused and replaced, surely setting up grounds for appeal if Mr. Ryan is judged to be a crook, here in this ever the same, always amusing city of Chicago, I received a phone call from my friend M- who sits snug up in the mountains north of Santa Fe to tell me his wife recently delivered their third daughter.

He left a message and said her name was T -, although I couldn't quite make it out. When I called him back he said they changed the name to H - because the T - thing just didn't feel right. And names should feel right both to the giver and the bearer. I'm confident they made the right choice. The name choices for their first two daughters were right on - and the little piece of land they found for themselves and the life they've built for themselves (a life I'm more than a little jealous of) have been on the mark as well.

Back here, maybe we'll get our old voting machines back, and we won't elect officials who clearly won't be able to serve or ones who will end up costing us millions of dollars to put them in prison for lining their pockets and their friend's pockets with every last dime they can grab.

But probably not.

Enough with the bars, already

2006-03-08T00:11:00.000-08:00

And the smoking. And nostalgia. All that sordid business. Let's talk about churches. I like them and I'm not sure why. I'm not a Sunday church-goer or a Saturday church-goer, or any kind or regular attendee but there are certain churches I like to visit. Maybe it's the art or the architecture or the particular history of the place or maybe it's the way they seem to stop time like so few places do. Well, bars do that too - but this is not about bars.

If you're driving into Milwaukee from the south, just before you get downtown, you will see on your left the Basilica of St. Josaphat. It's in a neighborhood that used to be southside-Polish but now is mostly southside-Mexican, but the church remains in all its glory. The last time I was there, and the time before that, was Christmas Eve and the church was packed and the beautiful organ played and all the people sang.

My favorite church in New Mexico is in the small mostly-Spanish town of Chimayo which is on the high road to Taos. It's called the Santuario de Chimayo where people come (especially during Holy Week when the roads leading north are lined with folks making their pilgrimage) in hope of healing their ills. The dirt there is thought to be blessed with curative powers and it's in the room off to the left of the altar. The room is small and is lined with crutches and candles and pictures and prayer cards and in the middle is el pozito (the little well) where visitors get on their knees and scoop out a bag of the healing dirt. I keep a small pot of it at home. I'm not certain I believe in its power but it makes me feel better having it close by.

When the Poet Buys the Beer

2006-02-20T22:18:00.000-08:00

In Weeds the other night it felt like being inside a Robert Stone novel or a Robert Bingham novel set in the sixties or the early seventies but not the eighties or the nineties - forget the present or the future - it felt like that other time. That crazy time. That time lousy with good drugs and mostly bad poetry and bars that felt like Saigon or Bangkok or some other place where the end felt like a beginning and where the beginning never came.

In Weeds the other night it felt like that. There were four of us and a band that was very loud and mostly bad and a poet who stood in front of the band in his thread-bare red sweater and very thick glasses and eastern European accent who smoked up a storm and read what needs to be described as the most god-awful verse ever shared in a public space.

But, and this is important. The poet felt bad. Maybe this poet always feels bad, but that night he felt especially bad and in an attempt to make things right with the two remaining patrons (read: us) he bought us a beer. Together, in the finally quiet room we drank it.

Happy Birthday to Blank

2006-02-02T14:04:00.000-08:00

I met Sherman for lunch the other day - we both went with the pastrami the pickle the chips. We both were living large. I had wanted to tell him about the conversation I'd had with my mother and how Reagan had changed her and how she never changed back. How I had wanted to ask her how her nearly-socialist father her union-democrat brothers would view this abandonment of principles. Instead I mentioned birthday cards at the office and how they've ruined birthdays. If you triangulate it just right it's the same conversation.

"You mean to tell me you pay for your own birthday card?" Sherman asked.

"Yep, we all do. Boss lady collects the money - runs to the dollar store and buys half-dollar cards and we all get one on our birthday."

"Happy f%#@ing (occasionally I need to censor Sherman) birthday," he said. "That's just messed up."

"I guess it's the thought that counts," I said.

"You mean the thought you paid for."

"Well, if you put it that way."

"Man, you've gotta find another place to work. Somewhere normal."

I didn't have the heart to tell him that every day when I enter the building there are larger than life photographs of the president and the vice president. Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney smiling down on us as we walk in to say thank you for the birthday cards we bought for ourselves. He might not want to eat lunch with me anymore.

Molly

2006-01-25T14:15:00.000-08:00

My dog died. Her name was Molly and she was in part a yellow lab with paws that suggested a size she never quite grew into. She died yesterday, or the day before, the email wasn't clear. My dog died in New Mexico where she lived her entire life and now her ashes are to be buried in the sandy soil, in the chamisa filled yard where she ran when she was young and rested when she grew older. It's a fine spot. She was happy there. She'll remain happy there.

That Stepping into the Same River Twice: Again

2006-01-18T14:32:00.000-08:00

Someone said you can't even step into the same one once - nothing is the same very long. Which brings me to the other week when I took WC to some bars that used to be Chicago bars which now, except for one (to a degree: see title) could be bars anywhere - Cleveland or Denver, or even Des Moines. Jesus, Des Moines?

For instance the Old Town Ale House used to be a great Chicago bar - especially after 2:00 when the 2:00 bars closed especially O'Rourkes (there's another sad story) and Weeds, and those still standing and desiring another drink spilled over there. Now it's cleaned up and could almost be Des Moines.

And Sterch's a bar that my friend SW described as a place people went to die. Well, they don't anymore. It's suddenly Des Moines, in tonier clothes.

But Weeds, where I can't ever recall leaving sober, has changed the least, though it too is a bit cleaned up. Except for Sergio, the proprietor. When we first arrived there was a only a handful of folks at the bar and too very young bartenders and I was afraid to ask, "Where's Sergio?" I mean I wouldn't have been surprised to find out he had gone on to the tequila in the sky. So WC asked. "He'll be in soon," we were told and indeed he was.

I'm not sure what it says about me that after 10+ years he remembered me and asked after my writing, and of course poured us some tequila. And bummed a smoke. So some things stay the same.

If you stop in for a visit, here's some things you should know: Turns out he's an artist: a creator of fine religious boxes. Represented by a gallery in Santa Fe, NM. That while he wanted to name his son god (it's a long story, one he told me in The Old Town Ale House), he settled on Eden. Oh, and he likes incense and candles.

Next time you're out looking for a tequila, give Weeds a try. It won't be the same old brand.

Secret Santa

2005-12-14T13:01:00.000-08:00

I'm certain my grandfather didn't have them when he worked, and I doubt my father did either. In those days, especially my grandfathers' days, people tended to work for the same company for much of their working life. They lived and breathed that company and when they retired they had a pension and a fairly comfortable retirement.

What they didn't have at their workplace were Secret Santas. Just guessing, but I imagine they would have found the idea silly. Back then families were closer - extended ones within the same city. And work was where you did work - real work, on assembly lines in loud factories. My grandfather worked for General Motors in Milwaukee. On his lunch break, at least in the warm months, he and his co-workers would sit outside the plant - on the sidewalk. They ate their lunch and drank a pail of beer they got from the corner tavern. They smoked and they drank and they carried their lunches in pails and they worked hard. And, in most cases, the company took care of them - treated them fairly and didn't forget them after they retried.

Things are slightly different now. Most people work soft, dull jobs and they change them often. For most there are no pensions and life-long health care. There are IRA's, if they choose, and food courts that all serve the same sad fare. And nearly anonymous birthday cards are given and the holidays are observed with Secret Santas and over-stressed Visa's and mailing packages home. Wherever that may be.

Quiet, please. At least some of the time.

2005-10-21T12:18:00.000-07:00

Readers of this blog know that for a time - a time I thought would last, if not forever, then for a very long time, I lived in New Mexico. It's quiet there. It's one of the things I liked about the place.

Chicago is not quiet. At least not very often. I knew that, of course. I've lived here before, but I don't remember it bothering me as much. Or maybe my memory fails me.

It's not all of the noise that gets to me. I don't mind the sound of the El or the traffic - in fact the traffic is oddly soothing, an urban version of a river, or ocean. Sirens don't bother me, and car alarms seem to have improved greatly, I rarely hear them.

What I don't like are noises from the apartment above me or the apartment below me or people in the alley talking loudly in the middle of the night. D says it's because I don't like noises I can't control. I don't think it's that. What it comes down to is there are certain places where I want to be able to escape the racket and home is one of those places.

Maybe the solution is as simple as finding a new apartment. One where there's no one above me and only very quiet senior citizens below me.

Turning off the Spam

2005-10-03T13:52:00.000-07:00

Spam. It's evil and pernicious and it has found my blog. Recently I have been getting comments and when I go to see what the welcome reader has posted it all starts innocently enough: "Hi! I came across your blog and I agree with you" or some such nonsense and then it goes on to give me a link where I can buy a Hoover vacuum cleaner, a steel slide to better play my guitar, or slightly-used women's underwear.

Therefore, and immediately, I have commenced using word verification (you know where a window pops up telling you to type the slightly garbled letters that appear) and now the spam should spot. But if a real visitor is inclined to leave a comment, they can - after they verify.

First no-smoking in bars (for which I was given a button today - while I was smoking, and happened to stumble upon a rally in Federal Plaza) and now spam on my blog. When will the madness end?

Up in arms, Up in smoke

2005-10-01T11:58:00.001-07:00

Let me say up front - I'm a smoker. Not a big smoker - less than half a pack a day, most days. Let me also say that I've quit a few times and when I was a non-smoker I didn't recognize myself as well. But we'll leave that for another time.

No-smoking in restaurants is a good thing. No-smoking at the office, on trains, on planes, even in your seat at Wrigley Field is, I guess, a good thing. But in bars?

As soon as April 1st, Chicago may very well ban smoking in any enclosed public building and this includes bars. This is not a good thing. Even if I were non-smoker this is not a good thing.

I understand the argument that people who work in bars are dying from second hand smoke. But these people are choosing to work in bars - I'm sorry, but I don't believe they are not able to find other means of employment.

Why couldn't it be as simple as having smoking bars and non-smoking bars. Then those who want to work in bars and those who want to smoke in bars will have a choice.

What the hell is this country about except having a choice? Geez, I might as well have stayed in California.

That Library Thing

2005-09-24T08:33:00.000-07:00

There's a fairly new, fairly cool site that some of you may already be aware of, but if you're a book lover who has a good size library and is as neurotic as myself and wants to catalog them then check outThe Library Thing.

It also let me put the library widget on the side panel here where my library is visible. Just remember anything borrowed must be returned.

Ring-a-ding-ding

2005-09-01T18:39:00.000-07:00

In the old days race tracks were different. The tracks I went to then had a certain unsavory flavor, but like so much in this world, they have been sanitized. Ring-a-ding-ding is a long time gone.

The track I go to now is the new Arlington Park where big corporations entertain suburban families. Recently I attended the Arlington Million where under corporate sponsored tents I was given samples of Armani cologne, Redken shampoo and a magazine named Cargo, which was appropriate.

But later, up in the stands where we hadn't paid to sit but sat anyway, I got a little taste of the old days. An usher who was 70-plus was talking to a co-worker who looked to be fresh out of high school. The youngster was asking his elder if he'd caught sight of the B-grade starlet who was in attendance. The old timer grumbled, "I'll give ya two nipples for a dime."

Ring-a-ding-ding.

Survivor in the Bedroom

2005-07-22T13:05:00.000-07:00

I'm not the best sleeper. I wake easily. In the summer months when the neighbors are out in the alley or in their backyards, I'll turn on the air conditioner to wash out the chatter. I need my sleep, and the littlest things will disturb it. For instance:

The other night I woke up and D was taking off the shorts she sleeps in. She appeared to be asleep. "What are you doing?" I asked her.

"My mom's on Survivor and she needs my shorts."

Of course.

Punctuate, please

2005-07-12T15:01:00.000-07:00

I've been having a problem. Not a big problem, but still. I'm talking about people's personal punctuation quirks. Let me get the first one out of the way since it's the one that gets me into trouble when I point it out.

Women and exclamation marks. They use them a lot! Multiple ones!!!! Sometimes in every sentence! In letters and cards and especially email. Let me be blunt - I don't like exclamation marks. I think they're silly and demonstrate a certain weakness, as if the writer doesn't have enough confidence to let the sentence carry its own emotion. A writer I knew or read said that he felt he was only entitled to one exclamation mark in his lifetime. That's a bit extreme but I like the sentiment.

And what about ellipses? Why can't people get it that there's three dots not whatever number they feel like typing that day? My brother, the last time I read an email from him, used five dots. I didn't point it out because he thinks I'm a snob and for him this would be further evidence.

Quotation marks in dialogue - I can live with their absence. If Cormac McCarthy (who has a new book coming out) can do without them, so can I.

Dashes - long ago I hated them, but now I tend to use them a lot. To my mind, and more importantly to my ear, they mean something more than a comma, although I can't define the difference, exactly. For me, commas and dashes no longer have much do to with traditional rules of grammar. It's more how it sounds in my head.

But let's be careful people. Remember, a period is a full stop.

Those Big, Funny Looking Things

2005-06-24T14:15:00.000-07:00

No apologies, but I've been thinking about breasts. The fake kind - those big, funny looking things. I've been trying to get my head around them, but I can't, quite. They're just not right. For whose benefit are they? The owners or the viewers?

They look so uncomfortable. If I were a woman, and was laying down, ready for a good night's sleep, I'd be bothered by these things that never relax.

Do the viewers who admire them suspend belief or is it like so many things in our culture where man-made trumps nature. Why go to the park when you can visit Nature World?

As far as I know, I've never touched one - but they can't feel right. Not for either party. But I guess, like most things, you get as good as you give.

Dinner Conversation

2005-06-07T17:02:00.000-07:00

She and I were having dinner the other night at Pasteur where the food and the atmosphere were both excellent. The bill was a little high but that was okay. Over dinner she said, I want to ask you a question, which isn't a lead-in that generally leads into anything good. She said, How come you never write about me in your blog? I mean, maybe just a mention?

The question was better than my answer which was along the lines of what I write about needs a context, or that I need to have a first line, or the idea of a first line. Some writerly crap like that. She seemed skeptical which I can't blame her. Except it's the truth - I do need an entry point - a way in which may lead who knows where, but at least I have my foot in the door.

And here it was. The context - the way in. Her question - over dinner. Why don't you ever mention me?

Except for newsy things, I tend not to write about things until years have passed and the events have had time to filter through into something that makes sense. I'll sometimes use a real event or conversation in fiction, but only long after it happened, and probably not at all like it actually happened except the truth of it is still there. Sounds like more writerly crap, I know.

So probably in three years or five years she will be all over my fiction. The way she sleeps with her arms and her legs all spread out - like she's flying or swimming - some wild movement a long way from sleep. Or the way she smiles when she finally wakes up, and waking up takes her awhile. And how that smile is big enough to light up the room as well as my heart. I'll have to get that smile in a story.

From Chicago through Tucumcari

2005-05-25T18:57:00.000-07:00

In the summer of 1993 I found myself in a motel room In Fayetteville, AK. I wanted to check the place out - thought it might be a place to live. It wasn't.

I had a list of towns I wanted to look at - but the process was a little vague and I wasn't sure where to go next except I needed to head West as I was eventually meeting up with a friend who would be vacationing in New Mexico.

I'd been reading through a list of writers' colonies and I noticed one in Vallecitos, New Mexico so I gave them a call. A woman answered the phone and said, Sure, come on out. When were you thinking of coming?

In two days, I told her, thinking I'd drive straight through . She paused for a second, but then she said, fine. They'd have room. You're a writer? she asked, sounding not at all convinced. I am, I told her because at that moment I wasn't anything else.

I headed west. I was driving a 1989 Nissan pick-up with a camper shell on the back and I was listening to Eleventh Dream Day's El Moodio. I was listening to it very loud and I was drinking a lot of coffee and when I saw the sign for Tucumcari I tried not to think of Little Feet.

The woman on the phone told me I should stop for groceries in Espanola as that was the last town with a store. I spent a night in Santa Fe and in the morning I headed north up 285 past Tesuque and Pojoaque and into the Espanola valley where it felt like I'd come some distance from Chicago.

I continued north, driving through small villages and for miles where there weren't any villages at all. In Vallecitos there was a post office and past it I turned down a dirt road where there were four or five houses and dogs in the road and children in the road and in the yards there were horses and goats and chickens. The dogs chased behind my truck and the children stared and the older folks looked up and I turned down El Moodio.

At the end of the road was a driveway that ran along an irrigation ditch that I later learned to call an acequia. The house was two story and there was a porch on the ground floor and one on the second. A woman was outside working on a truck and when she saw me drive up she waved and walked over.

The woman was friendly but seemed a little nervous. There's something I should have mentioned on the phone, she said. Oh, I said. What's that?

Usually we don't have men here.

How come?

Well, most of the women who come here don't like men. But you seem nice. I'm sure it will be fine.

She showed me to my room which was set off from the rest of the house. The room was large with a big bed and a desk and a chair and in the corner a fireplace with wood stacked alongside. Windows looked out across a meadow and soft shaped hills rose behind it. I ate a sandwich and drank a beer and then another and then I sat down at the desk and listened to all the quiet and tried to write.

But I had things on my mind. Chickens and dogs and dirt roads and a house full of women who didn't like men. I took another beer and went outside to have a cigarette. There were things chirping and there were stars in the sky and the stars looked closer than I had ever seen them. The air smelled sweet. I wasn't alone. A woman was standing off to the side of the porch and she said, hello. You must be the guy, she said.

She told me that she had been coming there for years. She didn't write or paint or do anything like that, but she once had a partner who did and it was the partner who had brought her the first time. I wish I could stay forever, she said.

I heard a noise coming from across the way - near where the hills began to rise. What's that? I asked.

Wild horses, she said.

I like it here, I told her.

You know, she said. This might sound a little new-agey, but New Mexico is a special place. If it likes you, it lets you stay.

I told her that I wanted to check out Bozeman, but who knows, maybe I'd come back.

Come back, she said. I think you should.

It took me another month of driving around and getting very cold in Montana and Colorado and then I headed back south. For a year I lived in Albuquerque and then I moved to Santa Fe. The place opened itself up and I walked in.

All a-glitter, all aglow

2005-05-19T11:40:00.000-07:00

Back then we went to parties. On Fridays and Saturdays there were parties to go to. Not every weekend, but often enough so there was always something on the horizon. At the parties there were couples and those looking to form one or recover from one. Just below the surface noise of the parties - the animated conversations, the laughter, the always-present, carefully chosen music, there was a hum or a buzz and for me the hum was the chords of the future.

I like to watch. I've always been a watcher. I don't recommend it as a way to live but there it is. And so at these parties I observed. At one of these parties I sat off to the side engaged in a conversation with a woman I knew and liked. I liked her because she was smart and sexy and interesting to talk to. She was always one beat ahead of me. But we weren't that way and that made the talking even easier.

What I want to say is that as we talked I watched her, though it felt more like absorption. It felt as if I was seeing everything she wasn't saying. And what she wasn't saying was this: more than anything she wanted to be married, and she had him picked out and it was only a matter of time. And it was.

In dreams begin responsibilities pt. ?

2005-05-13T12:25:00.000-07:00

I met Eddie when he was a student at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe. A school, some said, where Indians learn how to be Indians. Eddie was a good student.

He learned fast.

He was older, as many of the students were. He'd been a small-town sportswriter in Oklahoma. He dreamed of something more. He got it.

Schools need stars.

Indians have dreams.

Eddie hit the jackpot. He got a Stegner - at Stanford, which in the writing world is currency. Like Iowa, like the New Yorker. There were faculty connections - as there often are, and he was Indian which didn't hurt either. But he could write. It came together.

I wrote then, too. I knew the writers in town. It was a town for writers. A town for Indians. Eddie and I became friends. The way writers become friends. What they have in common. What sets them apart. The guest sitting alone at the party.

He found an apartment in San Francisco. The Tenderloin. Took the train down to campus. Where the writers were.

The rest I can only imagine. I imagine he felt he was in two worlds. The Tenderloin that seemed more like home. And the California-rich campus he'd been called to. He told me he spent most of his time in the city. He liked riding Bart out to Oakland to the see the A's play. The Giants weren't his kind of team. But he liked having two pro teams so close by.

He completed his first year at Stanford and returned to New Mexico to spend the summer. In that small world he returned a star. IAIA had him back to talk to a writing class - maybe he even taught a class, I don't recall, exactly. But I remember him coming back and hanging out at campus and going to the bars with the writing students. How they listened to him talk. How he liked to talk.

Then one Sunday morning I got a phone call from Eddie. He was at a motel on Cerrillos. He and his friend needed a ride. To Dulce. Dulce is a long way from Santa Fe. It's near the Colorado border. It's not a distance I'd ask someone to give me a ride. I gave them the ride.

When I picked them up they were somewhere between still-drunk and hungover. Eddie's friend climbed in the back and Eddie sat up front with me. Three or four hours later we were on the rez outside of Dulce waiting outside a trailer where dogs were lying about and a little girl stuck her head out the trailer's door to get a look - at me, I guess. Eddie's friend was inside getting money and when he came back out he gave me fifty dollars for the ride and I was on my way.

I don't remember one thing we talked about that day and I never saw Eddie again. Months later, a mutual friend told me Eddie never made it back to Stanford. He'd gotten arrested in Jemez for fighting with a girlfriend. A fight, it was said, where Eddie bit off a piece of her ear. A judge ordered probation as well as anger and alcohol counseling - but instead Eddie took off. Disappeared.

Maybe he went back to Oklahoma - where he was from. When I think of him, I wonder if he still writes - or if that is all over for him. But if he writes, does he ever write about that fight with the girl that cost him so much. I used it in a story once, a version of it. I don't think he'd mind.

Unfaithful?

2005-05-03T22:22:00.000-07:00

The fall I moved back to New Mexico, 2002, Susan's husband shot her multiple times and then he shot himself. These events aren't related, except they could have been. Their bodies were discovered by a friend.

I met Susan when I moved to New Mexico the first time. I thought I wanted to be a writer and went looking for others suffering the same affliction. I attended a meeting of aspiring writers - and Susan struck up a conversation. Not long after, she invited me to join a workshop that met in Corrales, a village along the Rio Grande where she lived. These were good people and good writers and I enjoyed being with them.

We fast became friends. We met for coffee, we went to a movie, we drove to Santa Fe. I proof-read her first novel, and we talked it through. Susan loved to talk. She called me most every weekday morning. She'd call from the small office she rented and where she wrote. I'd still be asleep when she called but I'd pretend otherwise and we'd talk. Mostly she talked.

Susan talked about her two daughters. They made her proud. She talked about her husband and her marriage. Some mornings she cried. There was intimacy. It became uncomfortable. I wanted to stop. I didn't want to stop. I stopped it like this: I sent her a card, or I left it in her car - I don't remember anymore, except that I did it in writing. A coward's way.

We never really talked again. I ran into her at a PEN Christmas party and we said hello. I saw her at another party and again hello. Later I moved to California. When I moved back to New Mexico, I moved to Corrales. The town where our writer's group had met, and where Susan still lived. A mutual friend mentioned to her that I was back and living in Corrales. She asked him to tell me to call. She'd like to say hello.

I never called and I never saw her around town. And then she was dead.

In the blood

2005-04-26T16:35:00.000-07:00

My grandfather played cards. My uncles Paul, Bobby and Don played cards. Paul wouldn't play with me because I wasn't good enough. My father plays cards and my mother and both of my brothers play cards. My sister doesn't, but she's adopted and apparently doesn't have the gene. I'm talking about playing cards for money. The games have been poker and gin and blackjack. Hold 'em's current popularity is shared by my family. My brother's son, and his two daughters play cards. They're old enough to play for money as long as the stakes aren't too high.

I've played in friendly monthly poker games. I've played gin with my brother for three days straight. I played blackjack in New Mexico's Indian casinos when they were still shacks. Once on a flight to Las Vegas I sat with a man who'd been to the newly opened casinos in Atlantic City. They were so crowded, he said, and the lines to get a seat so long, that when he finally got one, he pissed his pants so as not to risk losing his seat. Later I saw him at a table in Binion's and I sat down and played cards with him. In Laughlin, Nevada I played blackjack next to a woman who, as she got drunker, leaned over to tell me the length of her nipples. That particular information didn't help my game, and as I recall, I lost. I've played video poker in a scary bar on Montana's high-line, and on my computer at home.

My grandfather had a heart attack while he was playing cards. He didn't want to bother the other players so he folded his hand and made his way to the hospital. I don't think he was playing hold 'em. It wasn't as popular then. But if it were me, and I was sitting at a table and felt my heart seizing up, I'd want to hold on and see the flop. It's in the blood, I guess.

Quick, pass the Dramine

2005-04-21T18:31:00.000-07:00

When Daddy's Little Girl Starts Dressing Like a Ho

2005-04-19T16:51:00.000-07:00

Now that it's getting warmer I've been walking the five blocks to the El. It's good for my waistline, and good for my spirits. I walk past a high school, and that pass-by has got me thinking. Now I'm not a father so my parental insights might be skewed toward the romantic. I haven't been up half the night with a crying Johnny or Sally, I haven't seen my energy level flat-line - well, I have but for other reasons, and I haven't been held captive in my shrinking four walls wondering where my life has gone. So like I said I might be talking out of my ass here, but speaking of ass - Jesus, have you seen these kids?

I see these young girls with their not-so-young bodies and I wonder about dad. What's he thinking? Can he see what I see? Are there special dad-blinders? Is there some kind of quick-change that happens when the girls get outside? If he is seeing what I'm seeing does he weep for the Sally he once had - the one who didn't wear a thong so visible above her jeans? The one whose crayon drawings he still holds dear.

It's gotta be tough being dad.

Pantheon?

2005-04-19T11:50:00.000-07:00

My friend David emailed me the other day. He wanted to know about the Pantheon and if it still existed and why the heck it wasn't mentioned here. The answer is partly the blog's profile takes care of that - except I haven't spent much time working on it. Another reason is I haven't had those kinds of conversations lately - Pantheon kinds of conversations - who is currently in, who is out. David and I used to have those conversations - and I miss them as well as New Mexico where they took place, but I've found the sun shines in other places as well, if to varying degrees. David taught me a lot about writing, even when he wasn't trying. His books can be ordered here

But since he asked - an incomplete Pantheon would include (oh, we're talking about writers here - mostly):
Joan Didion, Sam Shepard, Andre Dubus, Graham Greene, Alice Munro, Raymond Carver, James Salter, Richard Ford (though he goes on and off), Jim Harrison, Tim O'Brien (even though everything after "The Lake in the Woods" is god-awful).

It's a partial list and the list changes with my moods - but don't get me started on that.

Revolution at hand?

2005-04-14T11:27:00.000-07:00

People ask me, in fact my friend Sherman asked me today. "Are they crazy or just crooked?" Sherman was talking about the CTA's latest shout-cast. We were having lunch. Sherman was eating pastrami, and while I wanted roast beef, I was eating turkey. Despite the topic at hand, Sherman seemed to be enjoying his lunch.

"Listen," he said. "You ride the Brown Line, right?" I do, I told him. Five days a week. On at Kimball, off at Quincy, and back again. "So you've seen the CTA graffiti then," he said.

I told him I thought they pretty much had gotten rid of it. Something I've given them credit for.

"No, not the tagging of the stations and the trains. The graffiti aimed at the CTA. People living along the tracks are defacing their garages - begging the CTA not to cut their service, not to close their station."

I'd heard that. But on the ride in I usually have my head in a book. On the ride home I nap. Sure, I told him. I've seen it. But isn't that about the CTA's plans to close stations while they do improvements?

"Right!"he said. "They have the bungalow crowd so pissed off they're spray-painting their gargages. Begging for mercy."

Begging?

"You bet. And now this," he said, slamming his hand down on the Sun-Times. "There's gonna be a revolt."

I didn't have the heart to tell him that he's wrong. How it will play out the way it always plays out. Fares will probably rise, a little. Service maybe will get cut, a little. Springfield will give, a little. And this summer, when the kids are out of school, and the fathers and the mothers want them out of their hair, block by block you'll hear parents yelling out, "Get off your butt and paint the damn garage."

Something in the air?

2005-04-13T09:40:00.000-07:00

It's early, I know. But there is starting to be a little stir. You can see it in the way the Trib and Sun-Times are playing it. The opinion pieces posing their what-ifs. And the way Mr. Daley's eyes are more furtive than usual. Still, it's early. But there are questions: is Jesse Jackson Jr really a viable candidate - does he even want the run and what it will cost him financially and otherwise? Is there anyone else who could even come close?

The city has a very different dynamic than it did when Harold Washington ran and won in 1983.

I worked on that election - doing canvassing in the precincts and working a polling place on election day. But what I remember most vividly is waiting for a bus on the Northwest side. I was wearing my blue Washington button (which I think I still have). When the bus pulled up and the white bus driver opened the door, he looked down and saw my button. He shook his head, and then he closed the door leaving me to wait for another bus.

It's a different city - in many ways a better city, and more than a little of the credit goes to Mr. Daley. Except the smell of rot coming off city hall is getting stronger every day, and Mr. Fitzgerald is not going away. So let's wait and see. It just might get interesting again.

Tom Joad?

2005-04-11T19:32:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know we live in a place and time governed by what the market will bear - and everyman and woman for themselves. God bless our lives - Glory Days. But still, does a man who is already worth more than a few countries - and chooses - feels compelled to write about the down-and-out - how economies can wreck havoc on souls - really need to stage concerts where the low-end ticket is $75. Maybe somebody should take Mr. Landau for a Meeting Across the River and have a little talk about roots and fans and what $75 - 100 means in My Hometown.

Hull House

2005-04-08T14:28:00.000-07:00

The University of Illinois recently put up a site detailing the history of Hull House. They have some great photos and they can be seen here.

Friday (Thank God, he said)

2005-04-08T13:19:00.000-07:00

On the elevator, on the way back from a smoke break (yeah, still one of those people), I rode with a man whose job I'm not certain of, but suspect he's with GSA, something about running the building. He's in his early 60's, I'd guess. Hair greased back 50's style - earring in one ear. This gentleman is tossing a pen up in the air and catching it - tossing and catching, tossing and catching. Says, "I'm in a good mood."

And I say, "Yeah?"

He says, "It's Friday. I'm going to the VFW and I'm gonna get bombed." The door to the elevator opens. Out he walks. "Maybe I'll even get lucky," he says, still tossing his pen.

'O Fridays. 'O hope.

Me and the Indians

2005-04-02T13:58:00.000-08:00

It was 1970-something. I was still a minor, but barely, so I'm guessing I was 16, which would make it 1970 exactly. I was a runaway - again. I was staying at an apartment building in Wrigleyville where my friend's father lived. I was staying on the roof because he didn't want me inside. No, this isn't Elliott redux. I was a runaway, yes. And sleeping on a roof - in Chicago. But this is about Indians. It just happened to start on a roof.

It was spring or summer and R -, whose father's roof I'd been sleeping on, and I were walking along the lakefront near Addison when we saw a man sitting on a bench. He was bent over, his head almost on his lap. As we got closer he looked up and seeing us, said, "Can you help me."

I didn't know he was an Indian. I don't know if I'd ever seen an Indian before, except in movies, and maybe once on a family vacation out west. This Indian didn't look very healthy. I wanted to keep walking. Then R - said, "What's the matter?"

"I need your coat," the Indian said.

He meant my coat. He was looking at me and the fringed leather coat my mother had given me for Christmas. "I've been shot," he said.

I didn't see any blood. Not then and not later. Maybe he was shot, but I never saw the proof.

"I gotta get back to the Nike base," the Indian said. "They can help me over there."

I recalled hearing something about a group of Indians taking over the old Nike missile base near Belmont Harbor. It had been in the news. I probably heard it on the radio, or seen a headline in a newspaper box.

"Give 'em your coat," R - said.

I wanted to say, Are you nuts? Give 'em your coat. But R - wasn't wearing a coat. It was too warm for a coat. Unless you liked the look of the one your mother had given you for Christmas. They were waiting, R - and the Indian. Both of them looking at me. I think the Indian smiled.

R- took a step to the side and motioned me over. "Come on," he said. "He's an Indian. We'll get it back."

I gave the Indian my coat and we walked with him toward the harbor. As we got closer we saw the crowd that had gathered. There were Chicago cop cars and Cook County cop cars and there were vans from the local television stations. It looked like the parking lot at a rock concert or Bears game. Cops waiting for trouble to start.

But these cops couldn't get on the base. It was federal land and not their jurisdiction. It was a standoff.

"Listen," the Indian said. "When we get to the gate tell the guy you're Onieda."

"Oneida?"

"Right. Tell him you're from Wisconsin."

Well, that part was true. I was born in Wisconsin. But I didn't look Indian. R - maybe, he was half Puerto Rican, maybe he could pass. But I was white, very white, except for my hair which I had dyed pitch black (trying to disguise myself because I was a runaway? because I liked the look? I don't remember).

There was a line of people waiting to pass through the gate where a couple of Indians stood guard holding baseball bats. I tried to keep my head down, not catch the eye of a cop. Under my breath I repeated, Oneida, Onieda and then we were at the gate and R - said Oneida and I said Oneida and we were in.

I don't remember much of what happened that day. I don't think we talked to too many Indians. I think we kept to ourselves. What I do remember is sleeping on the concrete floor of a building and I remember being woken up early in the morning. R - shaking my shoulder, saying, "Come on, we gotta go." Later I found out that some Indian who told R - he was a chief tried to put his hand down his pants. Chief or not, R - thought it time to go.

And the Indian who had my coat? Never saw him again. He disappeared as soon as we got inside. He disappeared and my coat disappeared. When we left the base that morning the crowd was smaller but the cops were still there and the television people were still there. That afternoon my mother received a call from a neighbor. "Your son," she told my mother. "I think I saw him on the news." My mother, being my mother, didn't believe her. When I finally returned home she didn't believe my story about the coat either.

Working for the Government

2005-03-31T13:57:00.000-08:00

Ten things to think about before accepting a job with a government agency:

1. Don't (obviously)
2. Seriously consider how you feel about security
3. American Splendor
4. Atrophy
5. The cost of medicating yourself
6. Seeing GW's portrait every day
7. Job Security (its downside)
8. The verb "postal"
9. Government-issued furniture
10. An exit strategy

My Truck, my friend

2005-03-30T19:13:00.000-08:00

Poker

2005-03-30T17:40:00.000-08:00

I didn't listen to Stephen Elliott stephenelliott.com and I played poker on-line and I had a beer and then I had another. In fact I'm doing it right now - jumping back and forth from there to here. Right now I'm out about ten bucks so I need to buckle it down. And now I'm back because I lost the fifty I went in with. It's fast -way too fast, and you can sit around in your boxers and your un-shaven face, and greasy hair and lose and lose fast. It's a bad, bad thing for compulsives. Bottom line - Mr. Elliot is right: Stay away.