Today's writing

Staci’s allergic to small talk. On planes she jacks into headphones, stares out the window. Open, friendly faces make her cringe, pull back into a human raisin, crumpled and wrinkled.

Today she turned to someone and said hello. Why?

She’d noticed this girl at the airport, standing in the check-in line, sitting on the floor reading a book before boarding. She looked different. She looked like she had something to say. That’s rare, you know, someone actually worth listening to.

Not that Staci’s a cynic. You can’t call her that, no. She believes in things like flowers and the Bible. She pets strange dogs on the street. At night she closes her eyes and for a second makes a wish for a better world, like a single falling star.

But there’s that people thing. Staci doesn’t do people, communication, social gatherings. If she could spend her life in a room adjacent to the rest of the world, curled on some cushions with a Michael Crichton book, she would.

Friday night, 11 pm.

A good part of the way into a bottle of wine, homemade aloo gobi on the table. We're watching Lost in Translation, the karaoke scene. Bill Murray takes a shot of something and we reminisce about wild, lost drunken nights. I spin out a few stories, many involving my college days.

"I'm starting to feel like the guy from Clerks," Adam says. " 'I was drunk with this guy, that guy ...' "

I laugh. But it's not like that, not exactly. These weren't nights of illicit sex. The good majority started in innocence and ended exactly the same way.

They were open nights, nights of possibility. I'm married now and those nights have come to a close. I don't regret the loss. I just remember the moments with a grin.

The Brick is Reluctant

By morning
the decision made itself:
Neat hospital corners.
This sheet
won’t forsake the bed.

But what-if?

What if
it fell
upon us,
that unreasoning brick
that breaks you
without chipping,
and you howl
with gratitude?

After we’d succumbed
to the fact
that there was an us
but before
we told the world,
there was a hike.

I took the downhills
slowly,
relishing the worry.
Come on, you said,
but your irritation
had soft corners.

Hesitation,
I wanted
to tell you then,
is a sign.

It means you really wanted it.

Douglas Coupland, "All Families Are Psychotic"

'Family's a good thing, Wade.'

'You should see my family. Every single one of us is psychotic.'

'All families are psychotic, Wade. Everybody has basically the same family -- it's just reconfigured slightly different from one to the next. Meet my in-laws one of these nights.'

"What Do Women Want?"

I want a red dress.
I want it flimsy and cheap,
I want it too tight, I want to wear it
until someone tears it off me.
I want it sleeveless and backless,
this dress, so no one has to guess
what's underneath. I want to walk down
the street past Thrifty's and the hardware store
with all those keys glittering in the window,
past Mr. and Mrs. Wong selling day-old
donuts in their café, past the Guerra brothers
slinging pigs from the truck and onto the dolly,
hoisting the slick snouts over their shoulders.
I want to walk like I'm the only
woman on earth and I can have my pick.
I want that red dress bad.
I want it to confirm
your worst fears about me,
to show you how little I care about you
or anything except what
I want. When I find it, I'll pull that garment
from its hanger like I'm choosing a body
to carry me into this world, through
the birth-cries and the love-cries too,
and I'll wear it like bones, like skin,
it'll be the goddamned
dress they bury me in.

- Kim Addonizio

"Transformation of the Heart": Class Two

Some good observations from Larry last night:

"The people who do know satisfaction are rich, even if they are poor."

"Ask yourself: Even in this moment, what is it that you don't need? Where are you satisfied and content? That is a foundation of your practice."

"Generosity is just stepping aside and letting your life be lived. ... Sometimes we have to walk protected, but is there a space where you can practice the unconditional?"

And I just can't hide it

I'm excited about this little project of mine.

I'm excited that I've gotten up the guts to do it. I'm excited that I'm a good deal of the way into the revise, and that it's apparently as clean as I'd hoped.

Most of all, I'm excited about what I hope to do for others with this. Writing is about communicating, and it's a hell of a powerful tool when you hold it right.

Sing it, Pointer Sisters.