When I set out to learn about my mother's bridge club, the Jewish octogenarians behind the matching outfits and accessories, I never expected to fall in love with them. This is the story of the ladies, their game, their gen, and the ragged path that led me back to my mother.
It’s been ages since I added a letter to ye olde asshole file, but two arrived today. That’s a first. Or maybe it’s my mood. Or The Mood. I think most people would think that these letters are really nice. Welcome to publishing 101. Of course they are meant to be nice. Or approximate niceness. Or nice adjacent. But they are really only meant to manipulate and I’ve probably sent a thousand just like them myself. So keep your own god damn file. I just hate the platypus. You know? These are sad dark days. Queen Esther blues. I get these faux invitations and so what, what do I care. Set it and forget it! I’ve always been too literal. Literally.
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Invitations to manipulations. Great.
ashes in the mouth
dust in the eyes
streets smell of rotting leaves and dog shit
(don’t you just love the city?)
(don’t you just love the city)
no one wants to look
anyone else in the eye
what might be seen there?
what might be seen there
Wonderful, Tetman. I love it.
Thank you, Donna. It came from not knowing what to say.
For a man not knowing what to say, you said it very well.
My parents just arrived for a visit. On the ride from the airport, in between chatter about the weather forecast, they updated me about the family grave configuration i.e. who goes where, who will be above or under whom, who’s now joining. Also, one of the caregivers at Grandma’s has one eye and wears a wig.
An old friend has had a stroke. It is time to be a friend.
I’m sorry to hear that Frank. I hope it will turn out okay for your friend.
In your last post, november mentioned wearing a safety pin as a way to show support for people endangered by the snake oil salesman who conned his way to the presidency. Yesterday I read how some people on social media are blasting the safety pin supporters as not doing enough. The sad thing is, people who feel the same way about a misogynist, racist asshole as president elect are already arguing with each other. And it’s only a week after the election! We’re all fucked up, we’re all fucked.
My friend Craig played and sang this one last night: “I’m a vampire, babe, sucking blood from the earth….”
-Vampire Blues, Neil Young, On the Beach
My favorite story about taking things literally happened when I was around eight. This little girl named Beth Ann was riding with me, my mother, and her mother, on a shopping trip somewhere. She made one of those “hilarious, things kids will say” sort of comment, and my mother exclaimed, “Oh Beth Ann! You take the cake!”
She said, “Okay. Where is it?”
Yes, Betsy, it’s true. These are dark sad days. Hell, like MikeD said, you can even get attacked for wearing a safety pin for being willing to step in and oppose Trump’s hate. WTF.
Maybe as writers we need to ditch the literal for a while and cling to metaphors, all the while watching for signs from the universe. Something. Anything but this…
Hate to say: I’ll take a faux invitation, any day, over the snarky sass spewing from my business partner’s wife. One would think that bringing four, good-sized projects to our little joint venture would be welcome. Instead, I get condescension and murky reasons why she can’t get me a check for my percent of last month’s invoices. Women betraying women is the ultimate, poor behavior.