Tag Archives: friends

Another Dad Idea

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I read this to my dad on the occasion of his eightieth birthday.

***

Edward “Murf” Murphy is a man who is not afraid to ask for directions. This alone says a lot about him. He doesn’t even need to ask directions to talk to strangers. Sometimes, it’s because they have Jersey plates. Sometimes, it’s because he has to tell someone something, and his family ran away while his back was turned. Sometimes, he’s just saying hi.

I don’t know much about my dad before I came along. He’s dropped hints about his past, like when he told me he’d been to jail more than I. He’s also writing his memories out for his kids, but it’s been a long time since the last chapter. Hurry it up, Dad—the clock’s ticking.

I’ve seen photos when I was very little, and my dad was a cool guy, with his hat and shades and an aversion to shirts. He had the bare minimum of fucks to give, through fatherhood, the empty nest, and retirement.

He had no idea what he was doing, but he took to fatherhood with the same focus that he put into everything. He worked a number of jobs to support his family, my favorite being the pizza parlor. When I showed up, we were living hand-to-mouth. Thanks to Mom and Dad, we always had clothes and stuff to play with. We never went to bed hungry.

I didn’t always like my dad. Like all young adults, I disagreed with how much I should be allowed to do. I never appreciated just how much I was he was allowing me to do. The kids I was arrested with pitied me because my dad was a tyrant, and I had been sentenced to fifty-to-life. Even back then, at my most rebellious, I pitied them because their parents didn’t seem to care enough for discipline.

A big part of our difficulties was mental illness, setting in at a time when we didn’t know very much about it. Poor Dad, our primary caregiver, had no idea what was happening. It must have felt like he was losing his son. The more time I’ve spent learning about my illness, the more I understand how hard it must have been to live with me. Bipolar disorder has taken a lot from me, but my teen years with my dad, when I needed him the most, might have been the worst.

I know everything I know about comics because my dad is a big ol’ nerd, and I spent countless hours going through his collection of Marvel books from the seventies and eighties. One of my favorite childhood memories was when the girls were all out, and Dad let my buddy, Alex, and me watch Star Trek from the dinner table, feasting on spaghetti and meat sauce. It was the episode with the alien who looked exactly like a plate of spaghetti with meat sauce.

Dad was at the forefront of the personal computer, and he was a Mac guy before Macs were cool. He tried out exciting new software and games and learned how they worked. He eventually built his own. I remember how awestruck he was when he saw Uncle Ralph’s Museum of Obsolescence.

During that same visit out East, when Uncle Larry and I waited for him to show up, Larry stressed the importance of not letting Dad get bored. “When Murf is bored, things happen.” For example: the furniture in the living room getting reshuffled every few months.

There were the home improvement projects, like how he converted a carport into a toolshed using an old fence and some plywood. When he couldn’t fix something, he repurposed it, meaning he had one of the only junk drawers in the country that actually saw use.

Dad has a sense of whimsy, which didn’t show up more than it did with our vacations. Yes, we visited family, and yes, we did take a trip to Disneyland and Universal Studios each, but mostly we hit the roadside attractions. I know they were Dad’s idea because Mom wouldn’t have dragged us to Tombstone, Arizona.

I could go on about how stole the show in Gallup Community Theater, or volleyball, or his affinity for old, foreign, working-class cars, or how he always has a book with him because you never know when you’ll be waiting, or how he’ll smuggle in a bag of hard candy to the movies, how he never accepts violence as a solution. or how there is never any doubt that he loves us and will do anything to give us a better life.

My dad’s not like other dads, and for that I’m forever grateful.

The Odd Couple

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A year ago, I was getting used to life without Newcastle. I’d retrieved his ashes, I put his food and water dishes away, and built a shrine. The hardest part was getting rid of his litter box.

I had bought him some steps because he couldn’t jump anymore, and they’re still there, fifteen months later, and I still ache a little when I see them. I don’t move them because I don’t want to the ache to go away.

I wasn’t lonely. It was almost a relief when he died because I didn’t have to give him several medications a day or clean his food bowls. I still miss him so much. I had decided not to get another cat. The loss of Newcastle hurt more than I could bear, and the last thing I wanted to do was replace him.

Life rarely listens to what you have to say.

A year ago, I was receiving a voice call, which was weird. It was from Noel, so I panicked. She asked if I could stash a feral cat for a couple of weeks. She and her partner were trying to corner a skeletal kitten who was licking a Reese’s wrapper. I said of course.

I still had Newcastle’s food and water bowls, as well as some of his food, so I whipped up a feast for my new guest. He arrived, and he was a friendly little guy who was pretty hungry. He also liked attention, which meant he had to stop eating for the ten seconds he got pets, and that was filling him with a lot of conflict. It was a bit of a roller coaster.

Noel needed me to hang onto him while he got tested for bugs, germs, and parasites. He couldn’t come home with her because he might have leukemia, or something, which could kill Henry. Henry was the love of her life.

Newcastle was the love of my life, and this creature, who I called Potato, looked exactly like he did when he was a teenager—less like a cat and more like an otter. The big difference was the white patch. For Newcastle, it was on his belly, but for Potato, it was on the tip of his tail.

He stayed with me for the next several days, eating, exploring, eating, napping, and eating. Noel was paying for all of that food and the vet visit. Her partner and I went in together, got all of the appropriate samples taken (except for, ugh, stool), a quick check of his coat and vitals. I pointed out to her partner that they probably thought we were a couple.

Because of the starvation, it was tough to get an accurate estimate, but he was about twelve-to-thirteen months old. Other than that, he was in perfect shape. That meant he belonged to someone, but there were no missing posters in the neighborhood.

Noel asked if I wanted to keep him, I said I’d think about it, but I’d definitely let him hang out for two weeks or, like, whatever. At the end of the two weeks, I concluded I didn’t know how I felt, but I did like having a roommate again.

Did this mean betraying the memory of Newcastle? I was still in mourning. I still am. I wasn’t supposed to get another cat. All I have of Newcastle is a stuffed animal, and now there’s this creature demanding all my attention.

I welcomed him into my home. Newcastle’s automatic feeder, food bowls, and so on, were getting used again. I set an eating schedule and have failed to live up to it, by which I mean I keep feeding him earlier. Soon, I’ll be feeding him yesterday. The cat tree hammock Newcastle never seemed to enjoy was now helping a young cat lounge.

Noel came by to get my final decision. She was disappointed because Henry needs a friend. He was mourning Newcastle too, and still is. While she was here, we discussed names because she was violently opposed to Potato. She also, shot down my preferred nom de guerre of Shenanigan. She’s right, that would have been a terrible name. Meanwhile, I vetoed Reese before she could even finish saying it. That didn’t stop her from suggesting it several more times.

While the little guy divided his time evenly between us, she and I tried several names on. Nothing made sense. Nothing fit. He was too young and too feral to have a personality, but I wanted to give him the exact right name. All I knew about was that he was friendly. She took out her phone and scrolled through baby name websites.

I remember she read “Oscar,” and we had kept going, but it sunk in, several names later. He did look like an Oscar. I got him a collar and a cool lightning-bolt tag.

This is really hard to say, but I don’t love him. I’d do anything for him, but I don’t feel the same way I did with Newcastle a few months into our friendship. Maybe it’s a different kind of love. I don’t know.

I do know that I like having him around. This place was too quiet. Even after all this time, we’re still getting used to each other.

I have someone I can say inane things to and not be judged. I have someone to pet. I have someone to take care of. Those things mean a lot. It’s good to share this space with something alive.

My mother thinks that Newcastle, in cat heaven, sent Oscar to me so I wouldn’t be alone. That’s a really good thought, and I like thinking it.

Playgrounds New and Old

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When Kate and I first moved to the DMV area, we lived in Alexandria. I liked Alexandria because it was a quick Metro ride to DC proper, and it was a big enough city of its own. After we returned from Doha, she made the unilateral decision to move us even farther from the District, and I had no reason to go to Alexandria anymore.

If you’re pondering Alexandria, you might think of it as the home of the best sushi in the world. You might think about the other Washington Monument erected by the Masons. You might think of how the Revolutionary War was planned in a pub there (which explains a lot). That pub, still serving ale, is in Old Town.

The spring following my return to the area in, my friends, Steve and Mere, joined me as we ducked in and out of the quaint shops that line the walk from the Metro station to the Waterfront, about a mile and a half. We explored an interlinking series of cemeteries, as well as the Torpedo Factory (more on this later)

It took six years to return, this time by myself. Even though I’m working on a project this weekend, I wanted to enjoy the weather and crank out a few portraits in a spot where I’d see a lot of tourists. That place was ESP, which stands for Espresso, Snacks, and Pie. I had neither snacks, nor pie, but I did enjoy an Americano, along with a sticker. Every store and café in Old Town sold stickers.

I occupied myself with my weekend project because there was only one interesting person. There was also a deeply plunging neckline, but I only observed that through my strained periphery.

Later, with one eye on my sketchbook and one eye on foot traffic, I spied an older woman, her hair long and wild, looking as if she were going to tear that hair out. To my horror, she approached me, out of breath and panted, “I know you probably can’t help me because you’re a man, but I’m going to ask anyway.”

My mind struggled against this torrent of twitchy desperation like someone walking against a hurricane.

“Are you ready?” she demanded.

No. “Yes.”

“Do you know Call Your Momma?”

I sat there, and a number of thoughts rattled through my skull. Did she want me to call my mother? Was she talking about the bagel sandwich chain Call Your Mother? That would make the most sense. And yet. What was it about being a man that would handicap me from knowing a bagel shop’s location? It didn’t matter because I had no idea where it was. Just like a man.

It took about twelve seconds to put all of this together into one coherent thought, while she waited for my answer, quivering in impatience. “Sorry,” I replied, “I don’t live here.”

She stormed away, shouting over her shoulder, “Of course you wouldn’t know! You’re a man!”

Despite being the victim of misandry, my journey of nostalgia went on. I loved coming here when I was younger. But so much had changed. The only comic-book store in Alexandria is now a spa. The coffee-and-pastry place we liked to go to is an empty, gutted building.

One thing hadn’t changed: the Christian bookstore and the sex boutique are still there…

… separated by a tiny Thai restaurant.

That restaurant is a hero.

Eventually I arrived at the Waterfront. When I lived here, this was a parking lot. Now it’s families enjoying their freedom from the latest cold snap.

The reason I took the hour journey, which included two trains and a twenty-minute walk, was the Torpedo Factory. It was once a literal torpedo factory, and now it serves as studios and shopfronts for over a hundred artists.

I was able to make it through the whole building in a short amount of time because most of the studios were closed. A lot of the open ones sold jewelry, which I am not interested in. A lot of the remaining was just not my style. And yet, even though my interests were whittled down to such a small percentage, I saw a lot of great art Saturday.

I have an expensive philosophy when I go to art fairs: if you talk to me about your shit, I will buy something from you. All you have to do to start such a conversation is say hi. You’d be amazed at how many artists don’t get this.

I had four good conversations, and I bought something from three of them. (The fourth was out of my price range, but he gave me a post card.) My longest conversation, however, was not with an artist. It was the hippy at the art store was very chatty.

As soon as I walked in, she asked, “How’s your last day before martial law?”

I asked her why Easter, and she laid out a pretty good case. She also pointed out it was Hitler’s birthday, which was less convincing. We talked more about a lot of stuff while she flipped through my portrait sketchbook and observed that I must be straight. She thinks asexuality is hormones. She is also an atheist, a bit more militant than I.

Ordinarily, I don’t like to talk about politics. It makes me sick to my stomach, and it doesn’t fix the world. For some reason, Candace made it easy to vent. She then assured me that Trump’s days are numbered. She says that the Republican party will impeach him in a few months, July at the latest.

She’s never wrong about these things because she can see the future. She wasn’t talking about any of this “woo-woo shit.” She had a talent for pattern-recognition. Take her word for it.

I enjoyed chatting with her, but I wanted to find a table in the Waterfront and work on some more art. I saw two more interesting people, who I planning on drawing when I’m done with my project. Enriched, I journeyed home.

When people say you can’t go home again, it’s usually with regret and heartbreaking nostalgia. I certainly felt it today. However, nobody talks about the new, exciting stuff that replaces our old loves. Time moves on, nothing’s ever the same, and that’s how life stays fresh.

Grave Matters

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I woke up directionless On Saturday. I wanted to draw, but nothing was coming to me. You can imagine what a relief it was when one of the most influential people from college shared with me his very good artwork. Dude’s got an eye for color and chaos. We chatted all morning, mostly about philosophy—not like two guys in togas, but rather about the decisions and circumstances that led to where we are. I picked up a lot of insight into my friend and into myself.

I wanted a café near the Metro so I could hop the train over to Union Station and see if Ember was around. I settled on Ididos, nearish to the Metro station, and would leave when I was good and ready.

Just as I was about to eat what I knew was going to be a fantastic, Ethiopian breakfast sandwich, my phone made a noise. It was an unusual noise. It was telling me I was getting a phone call. The only people who call me are the robots at the pharmacy, so I pulled it out of my pocket with sweaty hands.

The caller ID told me it one of the most influential people from New York. Immediately my mind said, “I can’t lose another one.”

There is nothing wrong with my friend. She was checking in because she had some precious, precious time, and she thought she’d spend some of it on me. She was such an amazing friend because she was a hilarious and filthy (and really professional) degenerate, and she was also the most loyal, sincere, protective, Mama B you’ll ever meet.

Energized by my friends and the four golf caps I saw, across all demographics, I decided not to go looking for Ember. Instead, I walked south. It was miles to the next station, and I had no idea how I was getting back home, but I didn’t care.

That’s how I stumbled onto Rock Creek Cemetery. I had been there in 2011 with a friend, seeking out Clover Adams’s grave. I remember how haunting it was. While I was in the neighborhood, directionless, I thought I’d find it again.

Clover is how Marian Adams was known to everybody. In the late 1800s, she was married to famous writer named Henry Adams, and they lived in Washington D.C., near the White House. She was a prolific photographer, and, by all accounts, their marriage was a happy one. However, after her father died, Clover sank into a deep depression and drank a lethal amount of photo-developing chemicals.

When I first heard this story, I was reminded how my then-father-in-law coped with his wife’s death. He purged every photograph with her in it, every tchotchke she collected. He even remodeled the family into something completely unrecognizable. Likewise, Henry burned her letters and photographs. Neither Henry nor my former father-in-law ever spoke of their first wives again.

Her burial was ostentatious. He hired celebrated architect Stanford White to design a memorial to mark Clover’s grave. There is a grove of trees with steps leading into the center. There you’ll find a large, curved marble bench that could seat six comfortably. Across the expanse marked by small, tumbled stones, sits Grief.

The full name of the statue is The Mystery of the Hereafter and the Peace of God that Passeth Understanding, by Augustus Saint-Gaudens. The newspapers saw that title and said, “We’re going to call it Grief.” The subject of the statue is not Clover Adams. It’s neither male nor female. Its only purpose is to mourn because Henry couldn’t.

As a skeptic, I can’t explain the vibe of that place. It was sad, but it was also kind of frightening, requiring me to push through a lot of fear to get that close-up. Then I did the unthinkable. I stuck around with my sketchbook. I’m going to put a lot of time and care into this one.

Henry Adams built an actual monument on top of the final remains of his beloved wife. Her name is nowhere to be found.

Pi in your Face

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I’m a little more lighthearted today, because it is Pi Day. Pi, as you might remember from geometry, is a less-than-rational number, calculated by assuming the cosine of circumgourds to the numfloppens and divining them with the abacusometers, before estimating a riff based on the interginalist figure to the nearest taurudite.

The first three digits that result are 3.14. After that, it’s sheer madness. Apparently, there are human beings out there who can recite it to hundreds of digits because they have something broken in their brains.

14 March, or 3/14 to normal people, is considered Pi Day, when we, as a world, stare in awe at this number, stretching off into infinity. And then we get bored and eat some pie.

That is not why I am celebrating 14 March. I’m celebrating 14 March because of Stephen’s birthday.

The first time I visited Kate in Indiana, I met Steve. The most notable thing about Steve was that he had panache. He was a dork. He knew he was a dork. And he strutted around like Tobey MacGuire in Spider-Man 3. I was dying to be his friend.

By the time I had moved to Bloomington, he had moved onto Cornell with his future wife, Meredith. After law school, they relocated to Alexandria, Virginia, shortly before we moved there. Steve and Meredith helped me feel welcome in a place that was otherwise confusing and lonely.

The first thing you must know about Steve is that he’s always right. If something doesn’t jive, he makes it known. He has a brain the size of a planet, so he probably is right, but if you contradict him, he will give you the benefit of the doubt. He won’t rule anything out if you have evidence. If you don’t know something that is in his wheelhouse, he will tell you. If he doesn’t know, he’ll look it up.

Steve nitpicks like a professional. He pointed out all the flaws in an episode of Justice League as we watched it to the point that the only thing left of the DVD was a smoldering puddle of plastic. When we put in GI Joe: Resolute, and he couldn’t find a single thing wrong with it, I knew I found a new classic.

Somehow, and I’m not sure how, he beta-read one of my Urban Fantasy short stories and returned with a scathing indictment. Some of his criticisms were spot on, and some of them completely missed the point of the story (which means I probably didn’t communicate it as effectively as I could have). Too late, because it got published as is. Suck it, Poindexter.

Steve is also one of the most inviting, attentive, and loyal people I know. I had pushed away all of my friends when I was married, and all the couple friends I’d made disappeared when the marriage was over. Steve, however, assured me he and Meredith weren’t going anywhere, and they took me out to dinner the night I got the news.

Steve laughs at all my jokes. All of them. And on the rare occasion that he doesn’t find it funny, it’s because he doesn’t get it. When I explain it, he laughs. As a nitpicker, his expertise would be greatly appreciated on my latest novel because I think I might have something here. If I don’t, or if something’s not working, he will not hesitate to let me know.

Steve is vibrant, curious, generous, goofy, a little smug, and can beat you to death with a stick. If anyone can and will tell me the technical differences between barrister and lawyer in more than just the Atlantic Ocean, it’s him. I’m honored to be his friend.

Whistling While I Work

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It was inevitable: I needed to return to the office. But first, my schedule: I wake up at four a.m. I know, I know. I catch the 5:15 train to Farragut North, followed by a four-block walk, a brief detour into the Wa-Wa for a breakfast sandwich, which for me is tuna salad on a croissant, and at my desk by 5:50. Take another five minutes to wake up the coffee machine (my ungrateful coworkers will never know what I have to endure being first in), and I have a solid hour to draw, not a minute wasted to get here.

So when I arrived at the metro station, a mile from my apartment, without my magical badge, my entire morning was fucked. I went back, grabbed the goddamned thing, disappointed my cat, and called an Uber, the only way I was getting a full hour in before work. As a man whose strict routines have kept him sane, I craved that full hour.

For some reason, the Uber GPS led the driver to the other side of the roundabout, and I thought he left, and then he picked me up, then he apologized and explained himself for over five minutes, and I didn’t need this kind of chaos. I was still twitchy.

I should have just worked from home. But I needed to be there. I needed to sit down in the breakroom, listen to podcasts and work on a piece of art for an hour. I needed to reset myself. I needed to be around people I knew. I needed to do this for myself.

The Uber dropped me off a few minutes after six. I did not get a full hour of art in, though I did finish one drawing. When you look at it, try not to think about the height of the counter. Like, what is she standing on?

A few minutes after seven, I dove right into the 171 emails I received, between the three inboxes I monitored, confirmed that my boss and my colleagues had already taken care of most of it, and moved onto where I was needed.

While I got caught up, the second person in was Work Dad, dressed in workout gear and looking like a Gen-X skateboarder. This was a side of him people who showed up on time never got to see. I weep for them. The third person at the office reminds me of a gray golden retriever because she is simultaneously shy and effusive, and she’s got a little slouch.

The fourth person who shows up is my Emergency Backup Boss. (She’s still a boss, but she’s not my main boss.) Before the vast office reshuffling, EBB and I were neighbors, and we’d check in with each other every morning. She is far away from me now, so we don’t see each other as much. But she dropped by to check up on me this morning, and I filled her in on everything.

I noted that I was talking very fast, and I was having a difficult time shutting myself up. That is a bad sign.

There was an employee luncheon that afternoon, and she and my boss talked me into going. When the hour arrived, we left with a group, but EBB and I got way ahead of everybody because it was cold, and we were hungry. I followed her around because either she knew what she was doing, or she was acting like she did, and I needed that confidence to hold onto.

There was too much chaos, but I had a plate full of boutique quesadillas I needed to shove into my mouth before I ran out, screaming, whapping people square in the face with my backpack. I found myself at the bar, sipping a mocktail called a DuPont sunrise, with Mr. Production.

Mr. Production and I are a lot alike. We’re both middle-aged white men with gray hair. We are both devoted to making our colleagues’ jobs easier. And we’re both really fucking awkward.

We had a lovely conversation, and I ended up staying almost a half an hour later as a result. He told me how he worked at the same society as the Loquacious One, but not at the same time. I told him that hemoglobin was a weird thing to select for in evolution.

Despite that fact that the chips and guac line was behind him, this turned out to be a great getaway from the hassle of the restaurant. I had a lot of work to do before I could call it quits for the day, so I finished my DuPont sunrise and left the restaurant calm and a little rested, if you can believe it.

How did I do? I think I talked too much, which is bad. I figured out how to tip without getting a bill, and I tipped the staff a lot. Throwing money around is bad.

On the other hand, my thoughts were under control, I was focused, and I was patient. I adapted to inconveniences more efficiently because I wasn’t resorting to violence.

I have an appointment with my doctor this evening, and we’ll see where it goes from there.

Eggsistential Crisis

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I love my apartment, and I love my roommate, but I have to say I miss the old place. The idea of separate rooms at all is one I once enjoyed, and we had a backyard for Newcastle to poke around in. We also had a great neighborhood. In the spring, all of the bushes became soft and colorful.

It’s a mile walk to the 7th Street Hill Café, which I’d long ago adopted. On Saturday mornings, I liked to sit in an easy chair, sip a latte, and watch them assemble the Eastern Market, a cross between a crafts fair and a Farmer’s Market.

I came to the 7th Street Hill Café, located on North Carolina Avenue, on Saturday to do just that. Riding high on bipolar disorder, I needed to get out of my apartment and experience the world. I settled into the chair, pulled my markers out of my bag and eat my breakfast sandwich, resisting the urge to devour the whole thing in two bites.

After I returned it to the end table, the old man in the opposite chair said, “You have egg on your shirt.”

“Gross.” I plucked the solid yolk and dropped it onto the plate, keeping it far from the last bites of my sandwich. I said, “Speaking of eggs, I saw a Cybertruck downtown. I’m gonna crunch some numbers, and I’m gonna get a second job, and I’m gonna go to the bank, and I’m gonna get a loan, and I am going to egg that piece of garbage.” (It’s one of the funniest jokes I ever made. I’m going to use it until I run out of people to say it to.)

“Or,” the old man, whose name was Glen, said, “You could fill up two—no, three—no, two coffin coolers with eggs and sell them at the farmer’s market. That’s what Dan did, you know Dan?”

It was 8:13am, and I accepted that I was going to be in this conversation until the Post Office opened at nine. “No.”

“Dan used to sell eggs here at the Eastern Market. I used to truck them in from his farm. So many eggs. Dan died of a stroke. Not kidding, he just keeled over and died. That’s why nobody’s selling eggs at the farmer’s market anymore. Do know that you can tell what a chicken ate by looking at the color of its yolk?”

I gasped. “No!”

The old man chuckled and looked a bit smug. “Oh, yes. If the yolk is this deep amber, orange color, it ate a lot of marigolds.”

He smirked at me through his beard and waited for my reaction. I had to formulate one, and the only way I could prove I was paying attention was to ask a question. “You feed them marigolds?”

The old man chuckled. “No, no, no, they’re free-range. They can eat whatever the fuck they want. And if I ever want to eat a chicken dinner, all I need to do is grab a rooster who’s getting too big for his britches and hold him upside down and slash, motherfucker! Decapitated! Heh-heh!”

I didn’t know what was going on, but I buckled the fuck up to see where it was headed. It was difficult to follow along, but not because it was a bumper car of thought. No, Glen stubbornly clung to one subject until he veered off into a completely different direction, like he was jumping from train of thought to train of thought at a crowded depot.

Glen once punched a “shepherd bitch” (a dog) in the head, and she was nice to him after that. He recounted why you should never piss him off through the parable of a tense standoff with the owner of the Eastern Market. He already had his Halloween costume ready to go. (Hooded cloak, Goblin nail extensions. A paper machê Satyr mask a friend in Venice made for him.) He couldn’t remember why he didn’t exchange a word with his half-brother for two years while they shared a house. He kept me up to date on the lifespans of his siblings, including his “bitch sister” (a person), who is still alive. For a coup de grace, he unloaded on me how people are always on their “fucking phones” all the time. He could tell you how to get from point a to point B. “You know how? Not through your fucking phone, that’s for sure. Not on a map.” He tapped his temple.

Suddenly, he was gone.

I finished my drawing in peace.

I packed up and wandered off, my first destination being the Post Office to mail a package I’ve been meaning to mail for six months (sorry, Donna). I made it halfway up the block before the generous application of the color orange, my favorite, caught my eye. I’d walked past it on impulse, but I yanked my emergency brake and skidded over to the side to see more paintings.

They were collages coated in a thick layer of shellac, and a figure, bald, faceless, and strangely sexy, appeared on many of them. She said, “I love watching people come in for a second look.” We talked about color, I told her everything I liked about her art, and I bought a piece. She told me her name was Quest, and she gave me a big hug. The visible part of Quest’s hair was made of gray feathers, and she wore a robe, not a dress. I don’t think she was human. In a good way.

I was in and out of the Post Office at the speed of someone who’s done it a lot.

Even though I have Ember’s number, I decided to walk the ten blocks to the House of the Devil to see if she was standing up for us. On my way, I acquired a lava lamp, and I attempted to take a picture of a street called Justice Ct. until a Latinx man accosted me. He knew English nouns, and that was it. He shouted at me an incomprehensible string of them that told the story of an immigrant succeeding in this country, and something about that was making him angry.

A middle-aged couple across the street, surrounded by Chihuahuas yelled, “Sir, can you help us with our dogs? Sir?” I realized who they were talking to me, and I separated from the loud man to join them.

The woman yelled, “Thank you for helping us with our dogs!” The angry man continued ranting, impossible to understand. I never got the names of the couples, but I thanked them profusely.

Ember was not at the Pit of Despair. She later told me she was taking the weekend off. She’s earned it for sure. I look forward to resisting next week.

Exhausted and overstimulated, I headed straight home. But first, there is a big sign at the stop before mine labeled “Arts Walk.” I’ve been meaning to go there for at least two months. I hopped off the train to check it out because I was still jittery. It was okay. It was no Eastern Market. I bought a belt made of an old bicycle tire.

Also this weekend, a relationship that lasted well over a decade came to an end. I’m not going into details because I like to keep it classy in this joint. Also because it was enormously frustrating.

Culture doesn’t put as much value on a friend breakup as it does a romantic one, but they still hurt. You’re closing the door on all that history and intimacy, even if it ended badly. You have every right to mourn.

The truth is, we’d broken years ago, and I just wasn’t ready to let go. I already mourned.

Sunday, I dedicated my day to my project, the fruits of which you’ve seen yesterday. I’ve received no feedback on them from any of the St. Mark’s Players, and now I’m frightened to go to the show on Thursday.

My next project is finding a light bulb for my lava lamp.

Portrait of an Artist

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I still think of my friend several times a day. He’s been gone since the first week of November, and it doesn’t feel like it’s been almost four months. I can’t bring myself to look at a photo of him. I wrote a chapter about him in my premature memoirs (which he read) three years ago, and I can’t bring myself to read it or edit to include the conclusion.

However, I’ve included him as a secondary character in the novel I’m writing, and I’ve done my best to capture what made his personality shine. It helps fill the void he left. It breaks my heart that I can’t share it with him, because there are parts I know he’d laugh his ass off to, and I miss his laugh.

I have wanted to draw and/or paint a picture of him since his death, but it hurts too much. I did this last weekend, and it’s not great. I really screwed up the arms and the color of his hair. Baby steps.

Ranger Things

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I received a text from Maddy on Saturday morning, reminding me to watch the door to the auditorium when I worked the play without her that night. The reminder came not because she didn’t trust in my ability to remember, but because a woman almost got clocked on opening night.

They tried to warn her, but she didn’t listen (or hear at all), and she got lucky. With the first half of Maddy’s text, she was telling me that I might have to dive in slow motion to take the hit.

The second half hinted that the Olympic-level quick change at the end of act one almost failed. She put scissors on the prop table in case it came to that. I had a lot to look forward to in the evening.

I had a couple of awkward exchanges on the internet before I headed out for the rest of the day. I missed my Metro train, and I had to wait seven minutes for the next one, so I was almost on time to see my ex-roomie. This was bad.

A habit I had picked up from my Nebraskan ex-wife was to show up early. As they say on Letterkenny, “If you’re early, you’re on time. If you’re on time, you’re late.” I was running late.

After I bought a coffee for the lone protestor at the Heritage Foundation, I became actually late. I became even later when I walked down the wrong street, several blocks past our meeting place. I had a missed call and a text from Nicole, who was worried something terrible had happened to me.

My ex-roomie was telling me that she hadn’t been to the Suffrage Museum, where she volunteered for years, in an age. She is worried, reasonably so, it will be shut down by the president’s boss. I suggested we go this weekend.

We were met by a ranger, a friend of ex-roomie, who took us through the building and showed us everything that had changed since ex-roomie had been there last. They even had her old name-tag.

They were catching up, so I was a third wheel and kind of bored through most of it. While we were hanging out in the gift shop. The ranger pointed at one of their displays and mentioned that no one ever bought the Suffragette Soap. I have a habit of purchasing interesting soaps, so I picked up a bar.

The other ranger, an unusual person with an unusual accent and unusual glasses, cashed me out. I told her that I was excited to smell like oranges, and oh, my god, she loves oranges! I picked up a mini equal rights pin and told her that I want to start a gift exchange with a crow and explained what that entailed. She asked if I like birds, and I told her that I liked owls, and oh, my god she loves owls. I told her that the only owls I’ve ever seen in real life were burrow owls, and oh, my god, she loves burrow owls. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she was flirting with me. Her name was Jess

Upon the park rangers’ suggestions, ex-roomie and I went to the Folger Shakespeare Library across the street and looked over some amazing old manuscripts. They were always open to their illustrations. However, as with all medieval illustrations, I had no idea what was going on.

She and I tried to get lunch at the café, but it is apparently the most popular study place for college students. We found a seat, but she had to leave for an appointment before her food arrived, which meant I had to eat it.

Maddy had completely reset the props before she went home Friday, so there was nothing for me to do until it was time to relocate the weasel. I wasn’t needed until about a half-hour before curtain, so I sat in the Baxter Room with the cast, and I illustrated Jess.

Lisette and Lucille each breathlessly gave me their accounts of the costume-flip nail-biter. The issue wasn’t the corset, but rather the second dress. It had an extra layer, so Lisette and her petticoat kept getting caught in it. She hung up the dress in a way that she could step into it, and I asked her if she were going to practice. If she went down during the performance, it was all over.

What struck me about the exchange was that she was coming to me as an expert. I hadn’t done theater since early high school. I can barely dress myself. On the other hand, my façade of authority allowed me to talk her out of the hanger idea, which might kill her, and into something a little more reasonable, like safety pins.

That did the trick. At the end of the first act, after I rescued the weasel, Lucille and Lisette were a well-oiled machine. I got to hold the flashlight. Apparently, I did that well because Lucille gave me a double thumbs up as Lisette stepped onto the stage.

After the show, we had to break down the set and the seating so the Episcopalians could worship in their own damned church. Ernie from load-in directed us with military precision. Within forty-five minutes, the set was in the closet downstairs, the risers had been relocated, the prop table wrapped up, and the boulder put into a very large plastic bag. All the chairs and the piano had been restored to their original positions.

It was like we weren’t even there. It’s guerilla theater.

Also, it wasn’t until the fourth time I listened to this play that I heard Lisette say to Lucille, “All tits on deck!”

Taking the Bait

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When I was employed at the self-publisher in Indiana, a number of cool women worked the front desk. There was Leah, the Leah against whom all future Leahs have been judged. She was escorted from the building by security, and she cut off communication with anyone who ever worked with her, so that ended rather abruptly.

Then there was Isabella. Every photo of her I have in my mind, of her mocha skin and espresso hair, of the flowery sundresses she wore year-round, she is grinning. I don’t know what color her eyes are because I’ve never seen them. She loved meeting everybody, and she traumatized my introverted sister by tackling her in a hug and squealing in her ear, the very first interaction they’d had.

Everything was fun to this woman. She found something to love in everything she could see, hear, feel, smell, or taste, and in every person she met. Isabella was a genuinely sweet and happy person. She was a natural receptionist.

A side-effect of her exuberance was that she dominated conversations. I’m not much of a talker, but I do like to get a word in, so I didn’t hang out with her very much. Still, I loved her presence and her vibe.

That day, in the break room. Chris from HR was examining the crime scene, his assistant Stephanie at his side, poking at a PDA. The Phantom Puker had struck again, and Chris from HR was no closer to catching them.

The pukes had been happening all over both floors of this flat structure, and Chris from HR was going to crack this case. Too bad the Puker knew where all the security cameras were. I rose from my table and stepped out of earshot, catching the last bit of dialogue from that corner: “Find out who had ramen for lunch!”

Even in context, that was pretty messed up, but I was unprepared for what came next. In fact, my deathbed confession will be this sentence fragment, leading a long search for the person who doesn’t remember ever saying it.

Isabella hugged her can of Diet Pepsi and took a quick sip, creating a dramatic pause for her audience. I came in at the middle of the sentence, and she breathlessly said the words that oozed into my ear and soaked my brain.

Sheer momentum kept me going, and I couldn’t hear anything that might put that into context. I don’t remember how I made it back to my desk. Collapsing into my chair, the gears in my head were grinding together, as if you were driving a stick and jumping from first to third.

My Work Wife, Elizabeth, appeared, concerned. “What’s wrong?” she asked. “Do you need to go home? I can tell Dave.”

“What does it mean?” I moaned. “Tell me what it means!”

“What what means?” she replied.

“I can’t tell you,” I groaned. “I have a nosebleed!”

“Oh my God!” she gasped, plucking a issue from the box at her desk. “What did this to you? You know you can tell me anything, Jeremiah. What’s the point of having a work wife if you can’t?”

I hoped not to pass the madness along, but I could live alone with this no longer. “She said.” I breathed. “She said, ‘and then she went back into the fish.’”

“Who was she?”

“I don’t know!”

“What was she doing before she went back into the fish?”

“I don’t know!”

“What was outside of the fish that made returning to it so appealing?”

“I don’t know!”

“What was she doing in the fish in the first place?”

My bloodshot eyes fixated on her as I grabbed her shoulder and shook her. “I! Don’t! Know!”

She brushed my hands off of her. “We’re going to get through this. Just remain calm. Maybe we can ask Isabella what she was talking about.”

“I don’t want her thinking of me as an eavesdropper.”

“Jeremiah,” she said carefully, “this may be the only way you can go on.”

I worked my way downstairs to the front desk, my head pounding, and I waved to get her attention, just in case she was on the phone.

“What’s up, Jeremiah?” she asked, as if Jeremiah gossip was the one thing she’d been waiting for all day.

“I kind of caught part of a story you were telling,” I tried to explain without being a creep. “And you said something that I can’t quite understand.”

Her eyes were wide and eager.

“You said, ‘and then she went back into the fish,’” he told her.

She frowned a huge stage frown. “I don’t remember talking about fish at all today. Sorry!”

I returned upstairs, to my desk, and rested my face on the keyboard. I would never know why someone would return to a fish. I could only speculate. The truth had died that day, and so did a part of me I will always miss.