Erica Ferencik's Blog
April 25, 2019
Q & A: Into the Jungle
Q&A with Erica Ferencik about her new novel, INTO THE JUNGLE
1) What is the book about?
Into the Jungle is a thriller about a young woman who falls in love with a Bolivian man and follows him to his remote jungle village in the Amazon rain forest where she must call on all her wits and resilience to survive. It’s also about the decimation of the rainforest by poachers and land-hungry corporations, and the desperate situation of indigenous tribes who are being driven to extinction.
As my friend Jude Roth put it: “It's a journey not just into a jungle, but into our wildest journeys to find ‘home.’"
2) Why did you pick this story?
For me, finding a story worth telling is like falling in love. All the gears in my head and heart go click-click-click, and I know I’m doomed to do nothing else but live inside this idea for the foreseeable future.
That’s what happened when my friend Pamela Rickenbach told me the story of her time in the Bolivian Amazon. A troubled foster kid, she made her way at age sixteen to Cochabamba, Bolivia, where she fell for a local man, married him, and followed him to his ancestral home, the remotest in a series of remote river villages in the Amazon rainforest. No roads, no electricity, no running water. Just a crescent of land carved out of wild jungle where pit vipers snapped and hissed in the manioc gardens, electric eels as long as limousines coiled in the river, and jaguars slinked in the shadows.
She didn’t return to America until she was twenty-six years old.
3) What elements of your own life do you share with the protagonist and narrator, Lily?
I relate to her “lost-ness” as a young woman. I didn’t have it as bad as she did, but I left home at sixteen, traveling aimlessly around Europe for a couple of years, at times getting into some really dangerous situations via my own youthfulness and naivete. I know that I was looking for a home, because my “home of origin” never felt like one, and it was one I couldn’t wait to leave. It just turned out to be harder than I thought to find a place where I felt at peace, where I felt loved, where I had a community. I’m still working on that, as perhaps many of us are.
4) What research did you do for the book?
I read every book and watched every movie I could get my hands on and conducted countless interviews. I also took a month-long trip to the Peruvian Amazon. I stayed at Amazonia Expeditions, a lodge about a six hour boat trip and a hundred miles deep into the Amazon from Iquitos, Peru, a landlocked village surrounded by swampland. I had my own guide, a young man who had grown up in a small river town nearby and who had begun hunting at age nine. I had a mind-blowing time. I went on three trips a day: morning, afternoon and night; hikes through the jungle or canoe trips through the floating forest.
5) How did you manage your fear about this trip?
I’m only somewhat braver than the average person. Beyond that, I just make sure I always have an escape route, a plan B and usually a Plan C. This was the case when I interviewed off-the-gridders in the Allagash wilderness of Northern Maine for my first novel, The River at Night.
In the jungle, I found myself living each moment – even the time spent in my room - at a heightened state of awareness. In the woods of the Northeast where I live, I feel pretty comfortable on a hike – I know what precautions to take. Except for getting lost, ticks, and mosquitos, I’m pretty blissed out and confident. In the jungle you can’t let yourself go like that – there the rules are very different. Multiply any anxiety you might have about walking through the woods behind your house by a hundred, and you have a trek through the jungle. You are walking food for countless predators: insects, snakes – even the plants wouldn’t mind slicing off a piece of flesh with their spines. Everything is either hunting or hiding or both.
It was the nighttime canoe trips through the floating forest – chocolate-colored water up to the waists of tress - that were the most terrifying for me. I tried to buck up and say yes to everything – Come on, don’t hide in your room – where it isn’t safe anyway and - when will I ever be here again? My patient and knowledgeable guide asked me each evening, so what is it tonight? The river or the forest? To my credit I only bagged the night trip once; I huddled in the lodge happily drinking lukewarm beers and listening to the crazy chorus of frogs and insects outside. But the next night and every other night I couldn’t say no.
With only headlamps for illumination, we made our way in a dugout canoe along narrow tributaries. We were moving through 360 degrees of danger: above us poisonous snakes lounged in huge tangled tree limbs; below us, the thick brown water hid countless perils. One night we watched as an electric eel, disturbed by our boat, leapt from the water. Six feet long, thick as truck tire, it twisted in the air before splashing down in the brown soup. These creatures pack enough electricity to stun a horse. Moments later, the shadow of a seven-foot long pirarucu, the largest freshwater fish in the world, passed under our canoe.
Even with all these adventures, the longer I spent with my calm, yet alert guide, the more I became at peace with my fears about this place. After all, millions of people call this place their home, live in harmony in their surroundings, and love it for what it is.
6) What was the hardest part about writing this story?
Trying to tamp down my fascination with the jungle/rainforest and focus on the story I was trying to tell. To make matters worse, initially I felt quite sure about the story I wanted to tell, until I realized - after writing a 100k word first draft - that the real story was still buried in LOTS of entertaining scenes that just didn’t gel. Two more grueling to-the-studs rewrites and things got a lot better.
I was also dealing with the fact that in the jungle, the adage truth is stranger than fiction is never more apt. I had to make what was true believable. For example: yes, certain indigenous people can call wild eagles out of the sky; yes, there are plants that grow only in the Amazon that can cure all sorts of terrible diseases; and yes, there really are thirty-foot anacondas, dinner-plate sized spiders, and caterpillars – with a flex of their muscles – that can mimic the head of a pit viper, thus discouraging predators to attack.
7) Who is your favorite character and why?
I love them all, and feel empathy for them all, because they’re all little lost pieces of me, let’s face it: who I’ve been, who I’ll be, who I’d like to be, who I’m afraid I’m a little bit like. If I had to choose it would be For God’s Sake, because he’s so charming and conflicted and actually pretty sweet and honest.
8) What was the easiest part about writing this story?
There was nothing easy about writing this story. The most seductive part was falling madly in love with research – all I wanted to do was read about the Amazon’s tortured history, the amazing animals and plants – I had to keep reminding myself that I had to come up with my own story, and focus on that! Once I really did that, I was better able to focus my research.
9) What was the most fun part about writing this book?
Probably when – on rewrite number three – the story started to make an appearance and I felt like, finally, I knew what I was doing.
Into the Jungle
1) What is the book about?
Into the Jungle is a thriller about a young woman who falls in love with a Bolivian man and follows him to his remote jungle village in the Amazon rain forest where she must call on all her wits and resilience to survive. It’s also about the decimation of the rainforest by poachers and land-hungry corporations, and the desperate situation of indigenous tribes who are being driven to extinction.
As my friend Jude Roth put it: “It's a journey not just into a jungle, but into our wildest journeys to find ‘home.’"
2) Why did you pick this story?
For me, finding a story worth telling is like falling in love. All the gears in my head and heart go click-click-click, and I know I’m doomed to do nothing else but live inside this idea for the foreseeable future.
That’s what happened when my friend Pamela Rickenbach told me the story of her time in the Bolivian Amazon. A troubled foster kid, she made her way at age sixteen to Cochabamba, Bolivia, where she fell for a local man, married him, and followed him to his ancestral home, the remotest in a series of remote river villages in the Amazon rainforest. No roads, no electricity, no running water. Just a crescent of land carved out of wild jungle where pit vipers snapped and hissed in the manioc gardens, electric eels as long as limousines coiled in the river, and jaguars slinked in the shadows.
She didn’t return to America until she was twenty-six years old.
3) What elements of your own life do you share with the protagonist and narrator, Lily?
I relate to her “lost-ness” as a young woman. I didn’t have it as bad as she did, but I left home at sixteen, traveling aimlessly around Europe for a couple of years, at times getting into some really dangerous situations via my own youthfulness and naivete. I know that I was looking for a home, because my “home of origin” never felt like one, and it was one I couldn’t wait to leave. It just turned out to be harder than I thought to find a place where I felt at peace, where I felt loved, where I had a community. I’m still working on that, as perhaps many of us are.
4) What research did you do for the book?
I read every book and watched every movie I could get my hands on and conducted countless interviews. I also took a month-long trip to the Peruvian Amazon. I stayed at Amazonia Expeditions, a lodge about a six hour boat trip and a hundred miles deep into the Amazon from Iquitos, Peru, a landlocked village surrounded by swampland. I had my own guide, a young man who had grown up in a small river town nearby and who had begun hunting at age nine. I had a mind-blowing time. I went on three trips a day: morning, afternoon and night; hikes through the jungle or canoe trips through the floating forest.
5) How did you manage your fear about this trip?
I’m only somewhat braver than the average person. Beyond that, I just make sure I always have an escape route, a plan B and usually a Plan C. This was the case when I interviewed off-the-gridders in the Allagash wilderness of Northern Maine for my first novel, The River at Night.
In the jungle, I found myself living each moment – even the time spent in my room - at a heightened state of awareness. In the woods of the Northeast where I live, I feel pretty comfortable on a hike – I know what precautions to take. Except for getting lost, ticks, and mosquitos, I’m pretty blissed out and confident. In the jungle you can’t let yourself go like that – there the rules are very different. Multiply any anxiety you might have about walking through the woods behind your house by a hundred, and you have a trek through the jungle. You are walking food for countless predators: insects, snakes – even the plants wouldn’t mind slicing off a piece of flesh with their spines. Everything is either hunting or hiding or both.
It was the nighttime canoe trips through the floating forest – chocolate-colored water up to the waists of tress - that were the most terrifying for me. I tried to buck up and say yes to everything – Come on, don’t hide in your room – where it isn’t safe anyway and - when will I ever be here again? My patient and knowledgeable guide asked me each evening, so what is it tonight? The river or the forest? To my credit I only bagged the night trip once; I huddled in the lodge happily drinking lukewarm beers and listening to the crazy chorus of frogs and insects outside. But the next night and every other night I couldn’t say no.
With only headlamps for illumination, we made our way in a dugout canoe along narrow tributaries. We were moving through 360 degrees of danger: above us poisonous snakes lounged in huge tangled tree limbs; below us, the thick brown water hid countless perils. One night we watched as an electric eel, disturbed by our boat, leapt from the water. Six feet long, thick as truck tire, it twisted in the air before splashing down in the brown soup. These creatures pack enough electricity to stun a horse. Moments later, the shadow of a seven-foot long pirarucu, the largest freshwater fish in the world, passed under our canoe.
Even with all these adventures, the longer I spent with my calm, yet alert guide, the more I became at peace with my fears about this place. After all, millions of people call this place their home, live in harmony in their surroundings, and love it for what it is.
6) What was the hardest part about writing this story?
Trying to tamp down my fascination with the jungle/rainforest and focus on the story I was trying to tell. To make matters worse, initially I felt quite sure about the story I wanted to tell, until I realized - after writing a 100k word first draft - that the real story was still buried in LOTS of entertaining scenes that just didn’t gel. Two more grueling to-the-studs rewrites and things got a lot better.
I was also dealing with the fact that in the jungle, the adage truth is stranger than fiction is never more apt. I had to make what was true believable. For example: yes, certain indigenous people can call wild eagles out of the sky; yes, there are plants that grow only in the Amazon that can cure all sorts of terrible diseases; and yes, there really are thirty-foot anacondas, dinner-plate sized spiders, and caterpillars – with a flex of their muscles – that can mimic the head of a pit viper, thus discouraging predators to attack.
7) Who is your favorite character and why?
I love them all, and feel empathy for them all, because they’re all little lost pieces of me, let’s face it: who I’ve been, who I’ll be, who I’d like to be, who I’m afraid I’m a little bit like. If I had to choose it would be For God’s Sake, because he’s so charming and conflicted and actually pretty sweet and honest.
8) What was the easiest part about writing this story?
There was nothing easy about writing this story. The most seductive part was falling madly in love with research – all I wanted to do was read about the Amazon’s tortured history, the amazing animals and plants – I had to keep reminding myself that I had to come up with my own story, and focus on that! Once I really did that, I was better able to focus my research.
9) What was the most fun part about writing this book?
Probably when – on rewrite number three – the story started to make an appearance and I felt like, finally, I knew what I was doing.
Into the Jungle
February 1, 2018
Mileage
Though I am turning sixty this year, something about me continues to be irresistible to the opposite sex. Men approach me in Target parking lots, walk up to me on the street, accost me in parking garages; seems like no place is safe. It’s terrible, but perhaps it’s just a burden a woman like me has to carry. Each time it happens I ask myself: What is it about me? What draws these men to my side like bees to honey? Has the diet finally started kicking in? Has changing my hairstyle after all these years worked some sort of magical trance? Could it be that my new $60 an ounce moisturizer made from pregnant sea urchins and the rare pununu plant from Brazil is worth every cent?
All kinds of men are drawn to me: short, tall, teenagers, married men – their wedding rings gleaming as they approach – all smiles; geezers, drop dead handsome guys, guys I normally wouldn’t look twice at, working men in hardhats or Duluth, white collar types, all of them stumbling toward me like the undead, all of them with this dreamy, lost, lovelorn look on their faces…
And each of them uses some variation on the same odd pickup line: “How many miles you got on that thing?”
“What thing?” I say, entranced with their entrancement.
“Your…uh, car.”
“Oh, you mean, this?” I turn to, uh, my car, wondering what could possibly be so fascinating about my 2000 Toyota Avalon. A source of some embarrassment mixed with pride in that after eighteen years, it still runs down the road. Not caring what I drive if it can get me from point A to B, I’ve hung on to it all this time.
I peer in the window to have a look at the odometer. How many miles? Uh, who cares…oh, I guess he does. “190k, more or less.”
The man usually whistles, shakes his head, sometimes even glances at my undercarriage. I blush. Demur. Fix hair.
“I got close to 375 out of one of those,” is what I usually hear. “You take care of her, change the oil on time and all of that, you could do the same.”
Then comes the inevitable lingering gaze – at my car – as they turn to leave, perhaps followed by a low wolf whistle – car again – before drifting off toward home to their wives or girlfriends.
And I head into Target.
The truth is, I feel sorry for other women driving other cars. The highly forgettable Subaru Impreza, the sleep-inducing Ford Focus, the downright offensive Dodge Dart. Because obviously, these women are not getting the love I so randomly earned by buying the big slobbery car I thought I needed oh so long ago. So, sorry ladies, it’s simply too late for you. And don’t even try looking for a used car like mine. All the men own them.
***
All joking aside, I’m proud of my own mileage, not just my car’s. Sure, part of me misses the days when men made excuses to talk to me, not about my car, but that feeling is dwarfed by the part that is relieved to be free of all that drama and distraction. Freedom from that subtext is rather relaxing, I’ve found. And maybe the men feel it too, when they step up to talk to me, to tell me about something they genuinely love, something we can laugh about, just as people. They’re finally – after all this time – seeing my car’s inner beauty. It’s about time, don’t you think?
All kinds of men are drawn to me: short, tall, teenagers, married men – their wedding rings gleaming as they approach – all smiles; geezers, drop dead handsome guys, guys I normally wouldn’t look twice at, working men in hardhats or Duluth, white collar types, all of them stumbling toward me like the undead, all of them with this dreamy, lost, lovelorn look on their faces…
And each of them uses some variation on the same odd pickup line: “How many miles you got on that thing?”
“What thing?” I say, entranced with their entrancement.
“Your…uh, car.”
“Oh, you mean, this?” I turn to, uh, my car, wondering what could possibly be so fascinating about my 2000 Toyota Avalon. A source of some embarrassment mixed with pride in that after eighteen years, it still runs down the road. Not caring what I drive if it can get me from point A to B, I’ve hung on to it all this time.
I peer in the window to have a look at the odometer. How many miles? Uh, who cares…oh, I guess he does. “190k, more or less.”
The man usually whistles, shakes his head, sometimes even glances at my undercarriage. I blush. Demur. Fix hair.
“I got close to 375 out of one of those,” is what I usually hear. “You take care of her, change the oil on time and all of that, you could do the same.”
Then comes the inevitable lingering gaze – at my car – as they turn to leave, perhaps followed by a low wolf whistle – car again – before drifting off toward home to their wives or girlfriends.
And I head into Target.
The truth is, I feel sorry for other women driving other cars. The highly forgettable Subaru Impreza, the sleep-inducing Ford Focus, the downright offensive Dodge Dart. Because obviously, these women are not getting the love I so randomly earned by buying the big slobbery car I thought I needed oh so long ago. So, sorry ladies, it’s simply too late for you. And don’t even try looking for a used car like mine. All the men own them.
***
All joking aside, I’m proud of my own mileage, not just my car’s. Sure, part of me misses the days when men made excuses to talk to me, not about my car, but that feeling is dwarfed by the part that is relieved to be free of all that drama and distraction. Freedom from that subtext is rather relaxing, I’ve found. And maybe the men feel it too, when they step up to talk to me, to tell me about something they genuinely love, something we can laugh about, just as people. They’re finally – after all this time – seeing my car’s inner beauty. It’s about time, don’t you think?
June 22, 2015
I Want to Live a Great Life, But Hell, I'll Take a Great Obit
I used to be jealous reading about living people in the newspaper – you know – the ones who win awards or actually get things done, but at this age I’ve ambled over to the obits to become pissed off and obsessed.
Just this morning one of them caught my eye:
Leaving the life of a top model wasn’t an easy decision for legendary philanthropist Fifi Lipshitz Bergerdorf, but her heart told her that ‘modeling beautiful clothes of my own design, though it brought me to the pages of Vogue, had ceased to make me happy. It was time to put a life of luxury aside and change the world.’ Ms Bergerdorf spent the ‘70s in Ghana rebuilding schools for thousands of children before embarking on a career in medicine, winning the Nobel Prize for cancer research just as she summitted Everest for the fifth time without aid of sherpas or oxygen.
Back home, she continued to shed the trappings of her earlier success and concentrate on community. In an urban park once the domain of drug dealers, Ms. Bergerdorf organized an annual Christmas tree lighting along with hip-hop performances, choral programs and movies projected on makeshift screens. ‘Just by being there,’ she noted, ‘we have moved the drug dealers a few blocks away.’ Her famous ‘meals on drones’ program, though years before its time, promised to change the lives of countless seniors.
My God, I thought, who are these people? Where are all the ordinary dead shlubs who just shlubbed along, pretty terrified about life most of the time, kind of fat and binging on Netflix every night? Are those the deadies in the small print who just get a puny column and bad head shot?
Inspired, I took a few moments to imagine my obit:
55-year-old old Erica Ferencik died from eating too much cake one night after guests had not taken it with them as instructed when they left for the evening. Friends have since commented that she died doing what she loved: eating frosting, but that she will be sorely missed by those who knew her.
A striking presence who could light up a room especially after three or more glasses of chardonnay, Erica’s day-to-day existence was marked by an almost pathological resistance to actually finishing anything. This included projects large and small, sentences, and thoughts. A chronic runner up, purchaser of the ticket one digit off the winning one, and raffle loser, she became philosophical in her dotage, preferring to look at any sort of participation, including beating herself at solitaire, as a winning hand.
In essence, her life can best be summed up as: eclectic. A writer, an average dancer and a reluctant realtor, she touched countless lives during the one time she volunteered at a homeless shelter for a couple of hours one Christmas but left early because ‘it skeeved her.’ One observer at the shelter said they would ‘never forget that day,’ noting that Erica did the work of ‘ten people who didn’t really know what they were doing.’ But the spotlight was one place Ms Ferencik never wanted to be, always preferring to talk about those she helped – the lives she changed that day – not the fact that she drove into Boston on Christmas for crying out loud to volunteer.
Famous for freaking people out by remembering their birthdays long after she’d lost contact with them, Erica never revealed her birthday to anyone, preferring to say that every day was her birthday. Hence the cake.
So okay, I need to get going on the ‘life’ part of my life but I think this has promise. Meanwhile, feel free to use the above with a photo of me at age twenty-five.
Just this morning one of them caught my eye:
Leaving the life of a top model wasn’t an easy decision for legendary philanthropist Fifi Lipshitz Bergerdorf, but her heart told her that ‘modeling beautiful clothes of my own design, though it brought me to the pages of Vogue, had ceased to make me happy. It was time to put a life of luxury aside and change the world.’ Ms Bergerdorf spent the ‘70s in Ghana rebuilding schools for thousands of children before embarking on a career in medicine, winning the Nobel Prize for cancer research just as she summitted Everest for the fifth time without aid of sherpas or oxygen.
Back home, she continued to shed the trappings of her earlier success and concentrate on community. In an urban park once the domain of drug dealers, Ms. Bergerdorf organized an annual Christmas tree lighting along with hip-hop performances, choral programs and movies projected on makeshift screens. ‘Just by being there,’ she noted, ‘we have moved the drug dealers a few blocks away.’ Her famous ‘meals on drones’ program, though years before its time, promised to change the lives of countless seniors.
My God, I thought, who are these people? Where are all the ordinary dead shlubs who just shlubbed along, pretty terrified about life most of the time, kind of fat and binging on Netflix every night? Are those the deadies in the small print who just get a puny column and bad head shot?
Inspired, I took a few moments to imagine my obit:
55-year-old old Erica Ferencik died from eating too much cake one night after guests had not taken it with them as instructed when they left for the evening. Friends have since commented that she died doing what she loved: eating frosting, but that she will be sorely missed by those who knew her.
A striking presence who could light up a room especially after three or more glasses of chardonnay, Erica’s day-to-day existence was marked by an almost pathological resistance to actually finishing anything. This included projects large and small, sentences, and thoughts. A chronic runner up, purchaser of the ticket one digit off the winning one, and raffle loser, she became philosophical in her dotage, preferring to look at any sort of participation, including beating herself at solitaire, as a winning hand.
In essence, her life can best be summed up as: eclectic. A writer, an average dancer and a reluctant realtor, she touched countless lives during the one time she volunteered at a homeless shelter for a couple of hours one Christmas but left early because ‘it skeeved her.’ One observer at the shelter said they would ‘never forget that day,’ noting that Erica did the work of ‘ten people who didn’t really know what they were doing.’ But the spotlight was one place Ms Ferencik never wanted to be, always preferring to talk about those she helped – the lives she changed that day – not the fact that she drove into Boston on Christmas for crying out loud to volunteer.
Famous for freaking people out by remembering their birthdays long after she’d lost contact with them, Erica never revealed her birthday to anyone, preferring to say that every day was her birthday. Hence the cake.
So okay, I need to get going on the ‘life’ part of my life but I think this has promise. Meanwhile, feel free to use the above with a photo of me at age twenty-five.
April 21, 2015
The House That Ate My Soul
If only my couch had kept quiet, I might have been able to get some writing done in my living room. But apparently, it had a lot to say.
“There’s distressed, and there’s, um, distressed,” it said.
I looked up from my laptop for the hundredth time that morning.
“Perhaps it’s lost in the annals of time,” it continued, “but I did arrive with a leather maintenance kit. These scratches on me can at least be worked on,” it added poutily, “but I guess, when the muse calls....”
I rolled my eyes, got back to work. “You’re a couch,” I said. “Zip it. I’m writing my novel.”
The couch snarked, as couches do. “I’ve been hearing that for quite some time now.”
The rug cleared its throat. “Excuse me. I hate to bring this up, but do you realize I still have Cheerios ground into me from 2003 when your little niece visited? I believe she’s in college now, majoring in…what was it?”
I slammed my pc shut. “Film theory, for the love of God.”
“Sweet kid but what a little maniac. I also detect remnants of a former pet in my fibers….what was that cat’s name? Piddles?”
“Cuddles.”
“They have this product called rug shampoo…”
“Knock it off.”
“What if you’d NEVER had a shampoo?”
I harrumphed, gathered my papers and stalked off to the kitchen. Settled in at the counter. Took a deep breath. Clicked the machine alive.
“Excuse me, Shakespeare,” the microwave said. “But I’m feeling a little, I don’t know, crusty?”
“Aren’t you, like, self-cleaning or something?”
“Uhh, not so much.”
The refrigerator hummed, then piped up. “Don’t get me started. I’ve got frozen leftovers in here from the Reagan era. Maybe time for a purge?”
I jumped to my feet. “Good lord, will you all please shut up? I’m going to the basement.”
I swear I heard tittering as I gathered up my stuff and headed downstairs. I settled into an old desk and plugged in a lamp I hadn’t used for years. For a few minutes, other than feeling a little chilly, things were going well.
Until the lamp said, “Hate to read over your shoulder, but maybe cut back on some of those adjectives?”
“What??”
“And seriously, have you given any thought to your audience?”
“You know, I never liked you. Didn’t my ex pick you out?”
“Why do you think I’m down here with the spider webs?”
That nailed it. I packed it all up, got in my car and headed for the library. After I pulled into the parking lot and just before I took out the key, my car cleared its throat and said, “When you wrap up, maybe think about swinging by the car wash? It’s called detailing. Hellooooo…..”
I slammed the door shut and sprinted for the stacks.
“There’s distressed, and there’s, um, distressed,” it said.
I looked up from my laptop for the hundredth time that morning.
“Perhaps it’s lost in the annals of time,” it continued, “but I did arrive with a leather maintenance kit. These scratches on me can at least be worked on,” it added poutily, “but I guess, when the muse calls....”
I rolled my eyes, got back to work. “You’re a couch,” I said. “Zip it. I’m writing my novel.”
The couch snarked, as couches do. “I’ve been hearing that for quite some time now.”
The rug cleared its throat. “Excuse me. I hate to bring this up, but do you realize I still have Cheerios ground into me from 2003 when your little niece visited? I believe she’s in college now, majoring in…what was it?”
I slammed my pc shut. “Film theory, for the love of God.”
“Sweet kid but what a little maniac. I also detect remnants of a former pet in my fibers….what was that cat’s name? Piddles?”
“Cuddles.”
“They have this product called rug shampoo…”
“Knock it off.”
“What if you’d NEVER had a shampoo?”
I harrumphed, gathered my papers and stalked off to the kitchen. Settled in at the counter. Took a deep breath. Clicked the machine alive.
“Excuse me, Shakespeare,” the microwave said. “But I’m feeling a little, I don’t know, crusty?”
“Aren’t you, like, self-cleaning or something?”
“Uhh, not so much.”
The refrigerator hummed, then piped up. “Don’t get me started. I’ve got frozen leftovers in here from the Reagan era. Maybe time for a purge?”
I jumped to my feet. “Good lord, will you all please shut up? I’m going to the basement.”
I swear I heard tittering as I gathered up my stuff and headed downstairs. I settled into an old desk and plugged in a lamp I hadn’t used for years. For a few minutes, other than feeling a little chilly, things were going well.
Until the lamp said, “Hate to read over your shoulder, but maybe cut back on some of those adjectives?”
“What??”
“And seriously, have you given any thought to your audience?”
“You know, I never liked you. Didn’t my ex pick you out?”
“Why do you think I’m down here with the spider webs?”
That nailed it. I packed it all up, got in my car and headed for the library. After I pulled into the parking lot and just before I took out the key, my car cleared its throat and said, “When you wrap up, maybe think about swinging by the car wash? It’s called detailing. Hellooooo…..”
I slammed the door shut and sprinted for the stacks.
November 2, 2014
Nostalgia Porn
Looking for me this fall?
I’m right over here at the Yankee Candle display, holding the “Silver Bells” candle up to my nose. And I’m not just smelling it, I’m crawling inside it, swooning with the pinesap scent and the memory it retrieves:
As my large, close-knit family warms our hands around the fire, a tinkling is heard outside in the snowy dusk. On tiptoe, little sister Suzie turns back the handmade lace curtains. It’s Grandpa! – a dead ringer for Santa Claus – laughing merrily from his perch at the helm of a horse-drawn sleigh festooned with SILVER BELLS. We scramble outside to snuggle under the heavy wool blankets that cover the seats, readying ourselves for a sleigh ride to Grandpa and Grandma’s farmhouse for hot cider, homemade pie and lots of holiday cheer.
I’m telling you, Yankee Candles make me insane. The truth is, when I linger too long at the display I begin to miss other people’s families.
But I can’t help myself. I stand with my head in jar after jar like a true psychopath, trying to discern the subtle differences between Summer Fresh and Sunwashed Linen, (it’s that whiff of grass), or Harvest and Moonlight Harvest (it’s the moonlight, silly!) Sure, there are the obvious ones like Apple Cider and Sage and Citrus, but who except the olfactory fiends at YC know the difference between Mountain Pine and Sparkling Pine, (sparkles and stuff?) Christmas Wreath and Christmas Tree, White Christmas and Sparkling Snow? Besides, who knew that Deck the Halls, Be Jolly and Over the River could be put into jars with wicks?
Don’t even get me started about Blueberry Scone. Left alone, I will eat this candle. Buttercream? Needs police protection.
This is nostalgia porn I tell you!
The word “nostalgia” heralds from the Latin: “algae of the nose.” Kidding! According to Wikipedia, it’s from the Greek “nostos” meaning “returning home” and the Homeric “algos,” meaning pain, or ache.
Ah, yes. Pain + returning home = Yankee Candle. Yours for a mere $26!
Change: I know we’re supposed to embrace it, some say even lunge for it, but who (over 40) can deny a pang of nose algae when we capitulate and dump the land line?
I liked my land line! It was tied to the land and stuff! *sigh*
I even like to get a jump on my nostalgia. I’m sad in advance about a million other things. Take stamps. Soon they’ll be history, we know that. I still think it’s a miracle 49 cents gets a letter clear across the country. I even miss licking them. That comforting gluey taste.
Oh yeah, like I’m the only one!
Sick as it may sound, I LIKE mailing the Netflix movies back; how the red envelopes arrive in the mail and then become the mailer. I miss wandering around Blockbuster in my pajamas and winter coat ogling DVD covers and running into my neighbors, also in their pajamas, sleepily looking for something the whole family could enjoy watching. Which makes me miss the days when a new movie coming out was truly a big deal. Which of course makes my nose ache for drive-in movies, where, again in your jammies with blankets and snacks, you hook that heavy, awkward speaker onto your car window in anticipation of pure joy. The speaker which itself seemed oddly from another time.
I miss that sense of awe over the sheer effort that goes into the making of a beautiful thing: a book, a movie, a painting, a dance, an invention.
I even miss nostalgia sometimes.
Oh Yankee Candle, free me from this yearning for some perfect past no one ever had, I thought this past weekend, cruising the display at a local country store. As I took in a lungful of Autumn Lodge I glanced over at my smiling husband waiting patiently for me at the exit. As I watched him balance a bushel of apples and half a dozen ears of corn in his arms, I got this big whoosh of the future. I thought, today is the yore I will miss ten, twenty years from now, so why not go now and join him in the joyous, present moment?
And then I wondered, is there a candle for that?
I’m right over here at the Yankee Candle display, holding the “Silver Bells” candle up to my nose. And I’m not just smelling it, I’m crawling inside it, swooning with the pinesap scent and the memory it retrieves:
As my large, close-knit family warms our hands around the fire, a tinkling is heard outside in the snowy dusk. On tiptoe, little sister Suzie turns back the handmade lace curtains. It’s Grandpa! – a dead ringer for Santa Claus – laughing merrily from his perch at the helm of a horse-drawn sleigh festooned with SILVER BELLS. We scramble outside to snuggle under the heavy wool blankets that cover the seats, readying ourselves for a sleigh ride to Grandpa and Grandma’s farmhouse for hot cider, homemade pie and lots of holiday cheer.
I’m telling you, Yankee Candles make me insane. The truth is, when I linger too long at the display I begin to miss other people’s families.
But I can’t help myself. I stand with my head in jar after jar like a true psychopath, trying to discern the subtle differences between Summer Fresh and Sunwashed Linen, (it’s that whiff of grass), or Harvest and Moonlight Harvest (it’s the moonlight, silly!) Sure, there are the obvious ones like Apple Cider and Sage and Citrus, but who except the olfactory fiends at YC know the difference between Mountain Pine and Sparkling Pine, (sparkles and stuff?) Christmas Wreath and Christmas Tree, White Christmas and Sparkling Snow? Besides, who knew that Deck the Halls, Be Jolly and Over the River could be put into jars with wicks?
Don’t even get me started about Blueberry Scone. Left alone, I will eat this candle. Buttercream? Needs police protection.
This is nostalgia porn I tell you!
The word “nostalgia” heralds from the Latin: “algae of the nose.” Kidding! According to Wikipedia, it’s from the Greek “nostos” meaning “returning home” and the Homeric “algos,” meaning pain, or ache.
Ah, yes. Pain + returning home = Yankee Candle. Yours for a mere $26!
Change: I know we’re supposed to embrace it, some say even lunge for it, but who (over 40) can deny a pang of nose algae when we capitulate and dump the land line?
I liked my land line! It was tied to the land and stuff! *sigh*
I even like to get a jump on my nostalgia. I’m sad in advance about a million other things. Take stamps. Soon they’ll be history, we know that. I still think it’s a miracle 49 cents gets a letter clear across the country. I even miss licking them. That comforting gluey taste.
Oh yeah, like I’m the only one!
Sick as it may sound, I LIKE mailing the Netflix movies back; how the red envelopes arrive in the mail and then become the mailer. I miss wandering around Blockbuster in my pajamas and winter coat ogling DVD covers and running into my neighbors, also in their pajamas, sleepily looking for something the whole family could enjoy watching. Which makes me miss the days when a new movie coming out was truly a big deal. Which of course makes my nose ache for drive-in movies, where, again in your jammies with blankets and snacks, you hook that heavy, awkward speaker onto your car window in anticipation of pure joy. The speaker which itself seemed oddly from another time.
I miss that sense of awe over the sheer effort that goes into the making of a beautiful thing: a book, a movie, a painting, a dance, an invention.
I even miss nostalgia sometimes.
Oh Yankee Candle, free me from this yearning for some perfect past no one ever had, I thought this past weekend, cruising the display at a local country store. As I took in a lungful of Autumn Lodge I glanced over at my smiling husband waiting patiently for me at the exit. As I watched him balance a bushel of apples and half a dozen ears of corn in his arms, I got this big whoosh of the future. I thought, today is the yore I will miss ten, twenty years from now, so why not go now and join him in the joyous, present moment?
And then I wondered, is there a candle for that?
May 15, 2013
Hot, Naked and Awake
Hot, Naked and Awake
My dear menopausal friends: if you’re hot, naked and awake and reading this, don’t despair. This l'il ebook will give you instant relief - not unlike like a cool, salt-kissed ocean breeze on a badass flash.
Q: Word is that one day you found yourself naked in Costco. Is that true?
A: Hmm, I guess word gets around. Here’s the story: I was standing in the bulk cheeses wondering just what to do with a 50 pound wheel of brie when a grand mal hot flash surged up from my nethers and engulfed me. I started stripping and people started screaming and that was when I knew I had gone too far. Crossed a line, if you will.
Q: Birthday suit?
A: Close. Some bouncy bits were out. Damned YouTube!
Q: Why do people say midlife is so great?
A: Because they hate it. They miss being young and gorgeous. But, finally, they’re smart, which totally is the cool part. But you look back at pictures of yourself at 20, 30, even 45 and say wtf! Why did I always think I was fat and ugly? NOW I’m fat and ugly! Why didn’t I cover myself with kisses and adoration daily? Why didn’t I worship at my own feet? I was the most gorgeous thing ever, but man, was I stupid.
Q: Any diet tips?
A: Hating yourself is a good jumpstart, but it doesn’t last. Well, it lasts, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t always translate into dropping tonnage. One thing you can do is chew ice till your teeth break off and you can’t eat solid food. But then the Oreo frappucinos’ll getcha. Recently I tried just eating white food: white rice, cauliflower, egg whites, vanilla shakes, and sugar. I lost my short term memory, I think. Did you just say something?
Q: Did you ever find a purse you like?
A: I have 47 purses and I hate every goddammed one of them. I’m telling you, they give me hives. I usually end up dragging around the one I loathe the least on any given day. The one I’m using now sucks my phone into another dimension. I have to call myself to find it, but I can’t find my fucking phone. Of fucking course.
Q: What do you think of reinvention?
A: I think it’s a crock of shit. It’s a term invented to give unemployed, clueless boomers like myself false hope. Yeah right, I’ll be a software developer! I’ll go back to school for biochemistry! In my dreams. I’m like Popeye. I yam what I yam.
Q: You have a story in this collection about buying your first dildo at age 52. What took you so long?
A: First of all, that’s gross. Don’t tell people that! Oh yeah, it’s in the book. Anyway, my first dildo. Whatever. I’m a Luddite. Plus I’m cheap. But you know, you have to keep your options open. New horizons and all of that.
To finally answer your question, I was busy. That’s what took me so long. But then I kept getting invited to all these sex toy parties by desperately reinventing women. So I began to feel that peer pressure. It was like high school. OMG, Shelley bought the spinning pleasure frog with the tickly tips! You have to have it or you are just NOT in touch with your inner goddess. Some dreck like that. But then after I got my spinning frog thingie the thrill was gone pretty fast. For me it was like inline skates. Would have given my right arm to have them in 1998 but after a few spins around the ‘hood it was like, meh.
My dear menopausal friends: if you’re hot, naked and awake and reading this, don’t despair. This l'il ebook will give you instant relief - not unlike like a cool, salt-kissed ocean breeze on a badass flash.
Q: Word is that one day you found yourself naked in Costco. Is that true?
A: Hmm, I guess word gets around. Here’s the story: I was standing in the bulk cheeses wondering just what to do with a 50 pound wheel of brie when a grand mal hot flash surged up from my nethers and engulfed me. I started stripping and people started screaming and that was when I knew I had gone too far. Crossed a line, if you will.
Q: Birthday suit?
A: Close. Some bouncy bits were out. Damned YouTube!
Q: Why do people say midlife is so great?
A: Because they hate it. They miss being young and gorgeous. But, finally, they’re smart, which totally is the cool part. But you look back at pictures of yourself at 20, 30, even 45 and say wtf! Why did I always think I was fat and ugly? NOW I’m fat and ugly! Why didn’t I cover myself with kisses and adoration daily? Why didn’t I worship at my own feet? I was the most gorgeous thing ever, but man, was I stupid.
Q: Any diet tips?
A: Hating yourself is a good jumpstart, but it doesn’t last. Well, it lasts, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t always translate into dropping tonnage. One thing you can do is chew ice till your teeth break off and you can’t eat solid food. But then the Oreo frappucinos’ll getcha. Recently I tried just eating white food: white rice, cauliflower, egg whites, vanilla shakes, and sugar. I lost my short term memory, I think. Did you just say something?
Q: Did you ever find a purse you like?
A: I have 47 purses and I hate every goddammed one of them. I’m telling you, they give me hives. I usually end up dragging around the one I loathe the least on any given day. The one I’m using now sucks my phone into another dimension. I have to call myself to find it, but I can’t find my fucking phone. Of fucking course.
Q: What do you think of reinvention?
A: I think it’s a crock of shit. It’s a term invented to give unemployed, clueless boomers like myself false hope. Yeah right, I’ll be a software developer! I’ll go back to school for biochemistry! In my dreams. I’m like Popeye. I yam what I yam.
Q: You have a story in this collection about buying your first dildo at age 52. What took you so long?
A: First of all, that’s gross. Don’t tell people that! Oh yeah, it’s in the book. Anyway, my first dildo. Whatever. I’m a Luddite. Plus I’m cheap. But you know, you have to keep your options open. New horizons and all of that.
To finally answer your question, I was busy. That’s what took me so long. But then I kept getting invited to all these sex toy parties by desperately reinventing women. So I began to feel that peer pressure. It was like high school. OMG, Shelley bought the spinning pleasure frog with the tickly tips! You have to have it or you are just NOT in touch with your inner goddess. Some dreck like that. But then after I got my spinning frog thingie the thrill was gone pretty fast. For me it was like inline skates. Would have given my right arm to have them in 1998 but after a few spins around the ‘hood it was like, meh.
February 14, 2013
One Day on the Grammar Hotline
ALEX: Welcome to The Grammar Hotline, our exciting new radio show where YOU get to talk about grammar. The phones are open: 1-800-PRO-NOUN. Give us a call!
STEVE: We’ve been so excited about this show, haven’t we Alex? I think there’s a new awareness of the importance of grammar – it’s just sweeping the country!
ALEX: It is, Steve. I mean, it’s not to say that other issues aren’t important – all the hurricanes and floods we’ve had this year, endless wars, the chronic fight against terrorism, but people have to realize there’s another, subtler, but just as life-threatening battle going on –
STEVE: The fight for good grammar!
ALEX: Exactly. And things are getting worse. How many more times do we have to read ‘its’ when we mean ‘it’s’ with an apostrophe!
STEVE: It’s criminal!
ALEX: Come on, it’s downright satanic! We’re waiting for your call.
FIVE MINUTES LATER...
STEVE: Bit of a slow day here at the Grammar Hotline, but I’m sure things’ll pick up soon.
ALEX: It’s been fun sharing all the negative impacts bad grammar’s had on my life, but while we’re waiting for the phones to ring, what about you, Steve? Any juicy stories from the bad grammar foxholes?
STEVE:…It hasn’t really had much of an impact on me, actually.
ALEX: That’s a shame…I thought you might have something for our listeners. By the way, the lines are open…
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER...
STEVE: I don’t think anyone’s listening to us, Alex.
ALEX: Of course they are. While we’re waiting, let me give another example –
STEVE: No one’s out there, Alex.
ALEX: What do you mean, I –
STEVE: This whole show was lame, I told you.
ALEX: But the death of meaning, the decay of communication –
STEVE: Since no one IS listening, maybe I should let you know what I think about this cockamamie grammar show idea –
ALEX: But –
STEVE: Alex, listen up, okay? People want Howard Stern, they want shock jocks, they want people to be humiliated on the air for laughs, THEY DON’T WANT GRAMMAR.
ALEX: You’re fired! Turn off your mic!
(SLAM, BAM, CRASH!)
STEVE: I wanted to do ‘Auto Talk’, but you said noooooooo, no one’ll be interested in CARS. We could be freakin’ millionaires right now except for you and this excuse for entertainment –
(BOOM, BANG, SLAM!)
STEVE: And did I mention I’m sleeping with your wife?
ALEX: I’m gonna KILL YOU!!!
(CRASH, KABOOM, BAM!)
PHONE RINGS...
ALEX: Hello, you’re on the air.
CALLER: I have a question. I’ve got a 2002 Volvo wagon, and my muffler makes a sound like rumph rumph rumph –
ALEX: Noooooooo!!!
bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
STEVE: We’ve been so excited about this show, haven’t we Alex? I think there’s a new awareness of the importance of grammar – it’s just sweeping the country!
ALEX: It is, Steve. I mean, it’s not to say that other issues aren’t important – all the hurricanes and floods we’ve had this year, endless wars, the chronic fight against terrorism, but people have to realize there’s another, subtler, but just as life-threatening battle going on –
STEVE: The fight for good grammar!
ALEX: Exactly. And things are getting worse. How many more times do we have to read ‘its’ when we mean ‘it’s’ with an apostrophe!
STEVE: It’s criminal!
ALEX: Come on, it’s downright satanic! We’re waiting for your call.
FIVE MINUTES LATER...
STEVE: Bit of a slow day here at the Grammar Hotline, but I’m sure things’ll pick up soon.
ALEX: It’s been fun sharing all the negative impacts bad grammar’s had on my life, but while we’re waiting for the phones to ring, what about you, Steve? Any juicy stories from the bad grammar foxholes?
STEVE:…It hasn’t really had much of an impact on me, actually.
ALEX: That’s a shame…I thought you might have something for our listeners. By the way, the lines are open…
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER...
STEVE: I don’t think anyone’s listening to us, Alex.
ALEX: Of course they are. While we’re waiting, let me give another example –
STEVE: No one’s out there, Alex.
ALEX: What do you mean, I –
STEVE: This whole show was lame, I told you.
ALEX: But the death of meaning, the decay of communication –
STEVE: Since no one IS listening, maybe I should let you know what I think about this cockamamie grammar show idea –
ALEX: But –
STEVE: Alex, listen up, okay? People want Howard Stern, they want shock jocks, they want people to be humiliated on the air for laughs, THEY DON’T WANT GRAMMAR.
ALEX: You’re fired! Turn off your mic!
(SLAM, BAM, CRASH!)
STEVE: I wanted to do ‘Auto Talk’, but you said noooooooo, no one’ll be interested in CARS. We could be freakin’ millionaires right now except for you and this excuse for entertainment –
(BOOM, BANG, SLAM!)
STEVE: And did I mention I’m sleeping with your wife?
ALEX: I’m gonna KILL YOU!!!
(CRASH, KABOOM, BAM!)
PHONE RINGS...
ALEX: Hello, you’re on the air.
CALLER: I have a question. I’ve got a 2002 Volvo wagon, and my muffler makes a sound like rumph rumph rumph –
ALEX: Noooooooo!!!
bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
January 30, 2013
Life Without Charlie
For weeks I’d been seeing signs around the neighborhood for lost cats. I thought of my black cat Charlie, and how he’d survived everything: busy streets, countless moves, vicious dogs, getting locked in other people’s garages. I’d had him for thirteen years and took his presence for granted. He would never succumb to the coyotes who roamed our suburban streets. I was cocky about his nine lives, sure that he was only up to seven max.
One day, he didn’t come home for dinner. Right away I felt sick. He had his routine and you could set your clock by it. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat. With tears in my eyes, I went around to all the neighbors: have you seen a sleek black cat, one ear a little beat up…
At home, our Siberian husky Sasha raised her ears every time I called for Charlie. She would whimper, tracing tight circles on the linoleum, then sit, watching me, ears up.
After a week of calling for Charlie, I went outside at dawn to get the paper. Sasha was loping up the walk, Charlie’s dirt-caked body in her teeth. He had been killed by a coyote, but Sasha must have found him and buried him. Unburied him to prove to me that he was dead.
We buried him one last time under a bed of wild catnip that he loved to sleep in on hot summer days.
Over the weeks that followed, I let myself remember him.
He was my own furry black heart. He was the prince of comfort, prince of the neighborhood.
I could still feel his weight, his perfect weight sleeping on my belly. How he stretched his arms out toward my neck like he would hug me if he could. I didn’t mind when he dug his nails in me. He could knead me to death, I didn’t care.
I would bury my face in his delicious fur that would tell me all about where he’d been that day: what ferns or flowers or sweet grasses, or tar, or just deep black dirt. He’d have bugs and seeds and gnatty things in his fur that I’d pull out and roll in Kleenex before we fell asleep. So happy and tired. It’s impossible that he never said a word to me. He would tell me about his day and I about mine, and we were comforted.
I would wake and find him holding my finger, one paw curled around it.
I wished I had taken more pictures of him, or drawn him, his infinite, gorgeous cat shapes. Light green eyes drowsily saying hello.
He reminded me of the importance of routine, how calming and sane it was. His complex maneuvers around his dish. The ever more elaborate ballets around the kitchen island, chair, table.
He was part of my reading of books. He would curl up around them, as if their hard corners were comfortable, to be close to me. How many hours had we lain together, both unconscious, both with total trust in the other.
His swagger. How he looked like a panther, only a small, ten pound one. His skinny little butt disappearing fearlessly into the woods.
A few hours later, his face at the door.
The things he killed and brought back for me: birds, baby bunnies, a garden snake. It’s true, I loved a murderer.
Even in winter he would venture outside, his black form like a cat-shaped hole against sparkling white snow, stories taller than him. He would explore the shoveled parts then scramble back, nose cold against the pane, and I would run to let him in and warm him in my arms.
The way he would show up in the epicenter of a room, or any strange place: on top of a pile of shoes, on a towel in the bathroom, on freshly folded laundry, curled on the warm DVD player.
He and Sasha like bookends on the porch in the morning, the sun warming their fur before they came in for breakfast. Charlie’s swagger coming in, like he didn’t really need to eat from a can, but since it was open...
After Charlie’s death, I spent more time with Sasha. Longer walks, better meals. But for months she would circle the place Charlie’s dish used to be, eventually lying down there with a little whimper. Then she’d look up at me, as if for some kind of answer.
Our new cat is white, fluffy, delicate. Completely different from Charlie. He presses his tiny pink nose against the screen, reading the breeze. I want to open the door and let him out into the world: of sinewy grasses, soft moss, insects and wild things, all the things that are his right to enjoy, but this time, I can’t do it. Sasha follows him around, snuffling him. He slashes out at her but she isn’t bothered by it, only curls up by the fire and waits, watching, for him to join her there.
One day, he didn’t come home for dinner. Right away I felt sick. He had his routine and you could set your clock by it. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat. With tears in my eyes, I went around to all the neighbors: have you seen a sleek black cat, one ear a little beat up…
At home, our Siberian husky Sasha raised her ears every time I called for Charlie. She would whimper, tracing tight circles on the linoleum, then sit, watching me, ears up.
After a week of calling for Charlie, I went outside at dawn to get the paper. Sasha was loping up the walk, Charlie’s dirt-caked body in her teeth. He had been killed by a coyote, but Sasha must have found him and buried him. Unburied him to prove to me that he was dead.
We buried him one last time under a bed of wild catnip that he loved to sleep in on hot summer days.
Over the weeks that followed, I let myself remember him.
He was my own furry black heart. He was the prince of comfort, prince of the neighborhood.
I could still feel his weight, his perfect weight sleeping on my belly. How he stretched his arms out toward my neck like he would hug me if he could. I didn’t mind when he dug his nails in me. He could knead me to death, I didn’t care.
I would bury my face in his delicious fur that would tell me all about where he’d been that day: what ferns or flowers or sweet grasses, or tar, or just deep black dirt. He’d have bugs and seeds and gnatty things in his fur that I’d pull out and roll in Kleenex before we fell asleep. So happy and tired. It’s impossible that he never said a word to me. He would tell me about his day and I about mine, and we were comforted.
I would wake and find him holding my finger, one paw curled around it.
I wished I had taken more pictures of him, or drawn him, his infinite, gorgeous cat shapes. Light green eyes drowsily saying hello.
He reminded me of the importance of routine, how calming and sane it was. His complex maneuvers around his dish. The ever more elaborate ballets around the kitchen island, chair, table.
He was part of my reading of books. He would curl up around them, as if their hard corners were comfortable, to be close to me. How many hours had we lain together, both unconscious, both with total trust in the other.
His swagger. How he looked like a panther, only a small, ten pound one. His skinny little butt disappearing fearlessly into the woods.
A few hours later, his face at the door.
The things he killed and brought back for me: birds, baby bunnies, a garden snake. It’s true, I loved a murderer.
Even in winter he would venture outside, his black form like a cat-shaped hole against sparkling white snow, stories taller than him. He would explore the shoveled parts then scramble back, nose cold against the pane, and I would run to let him in and warm him in my arms.
The way he would show up in the epicenter of a room, or any strange place: on top of a pile of shoes, on a towel in the bathroom, on freshly folded laundry, curled on the warm DVD player.
He and Sasha like bookends on the porch in the morning, the sun warming their fur before they came in for breakfast. Charlie’s swagger coming in, like he didn’t really need to eat from a can, but since it was open...
After Charlie’s death, I spent more time with Sasha. Longer walks, better meals. But for months she would circle the place Charlie’s dish used to be, eventually lying down there with a little whimper. Then she’d look up at me, as if for some kind of answer.
Our new cat is white, fluffy, delicate. Completely different from Charlie. He presses his tiny pink nose against the screen, reading the breeze. I want to open the door and let him out into the world: of sinewy grasses, soft moss, insects and wild things, all the things that are his right to enjoy, but this time, I can’t do it. Sasha follows him around, snuffling him. He slashes out at her but she isn’t bothered by it, only curls up by the fire and waits, watching, for him to join her there.
December 20, 2012
Nostalgia Porn
Looking for me this holiday season?
I’m right over here at the Yankee Candle display, holding the “Silver Bells” candle up to my nose. And I’m not just smelling it, I’m crawling inside it, swooning with the pinesap scent and the memory it retrieves:
As my large, close-knit family warms our hands around the fire, a tinkling is heard outside in the snowy dusk. On tiptoe, little Suzie turns back the handmade lace curtains. It’s Grandpa! – a dead ringer for Santa Claus – laughing merrily from his perch at the helm of a horse-drawn sleigh festooned with SILVER BELLS. We scramble outside to snuggle under the heavy wool blankets that cover the seats, readying ourselves for a sleigh ride to Grandpa and Grandma’s farmhouse for hot cider, homemade pie and lots of holiday cheer.
I’m telling you, Yankee Candles make me insane. The truth is, when I linger too long at the display I begin to miss other people’s families.
But I can’t help myself. I stand with my head in jar after jar like a true psychopath, trying to discern the subtle differences between Summer Fresh and Sunwashed Linen, (it’s that whiff of grass), or Harvest and Moonlight Harvest (it’s the moonlight, silly!) Sure, there are the obvious ones like Apple Cider and Sage and Citrus, but who except the olfactory fiends at YC know the difference between Mountain Pine and Sparkling Pine, (sparkles and stuff?) Christmas Wreath and Christmas Tree, White Christmas and Sparkling Snow? Besides, who knew that Deck the Halls, Be Jolly and Over the River could be put into jars with wicks?
Don’t even get me started about Blueberry Scone. Left alone, I will eat this candle. Buttercream? Needs police protection.
This is nostalgia porn I tell you!
The word “nostalgia” heralds from the Latin: “algae of the nose.” Kidding! According to Wikipedia, it’s from the Greek “nostos” meaning “returning home” and the Homeric “algos,” meaning pain, or ache.
Ah, yes. Pain + returning home = Yankee Candle. Yours for a mere $25!
Change: I know we’re supposed to embrace it, some say even lunge for it, but who (over 40) can deny a pang of nose algae when we capitulate and dump the land line?
I liked my land line! It was tied to the land and stuff! *sigh*
I even like to get a jump on my nostalgia. I’m sad in advance about a million other things. Take stamps. Soon they’ll be history, we know that. I still think it’s a miracle 44 cents gets a letter clear across the country. At times I even miss licking them. That comforting gluey taste.
Oh yeah, like I’m the only one!
Sick as it may sound, I LIKE mailing the Netflix movies back; how the red envelopes arrive in the mail and then become the mailer. I miss wandering around Blockbuster in my pajamas and winter coat ogling DVD covers and running into my neighbors, also in their pajamas, sleepily looking for something the whole family could enjoy watching. Which makes me miss the days when a new movie coming out was truly a big deal. Which of course makes my nose ache for drive-in movies, where, again in your jammies with blankets and snacks, you hook that heavy, awkward speaker onto your car window in anticipation of pure joy. The speaker which itself seemed oddly from another time.
I miss that sense of awe over the sheer effort that goes into the making of a beautiful thing: a book, a movie, a painting, a dance, an invention.
I even miss nostalgia sometimes.
Oh Yankee Candle, free me from this yearning for some perfect past no one had, I thought this past weekend, cruising the display at a local country store. As I took in a lungful of Autumn Lodge, I glanced over at my smiling husband who was waiting patiently for me at the exit. As I watched him balance a bushel of apples and half a dozen ears of corn in his arms, I got this big whoosh of the future. I thought, today is the yore I will miss ten, twenty years from now, so why not go now and join him in the joyous, present moment?
And then I wondered, is there a candle for that?
I’m right over here at the Yankee Candle display, holding the “Silver Bells” candle up to my nose. And I’m not just smelling it, I’m crawling inside it, swooning with the pinesap scent and the memory it retrieves:
As my large, close-knit family warms our hands around the fire, a tinkling is heard outside in the snowy dusk. On tiptoe, little Suzie turns back the handmade lace curtains. It’s Grandpa! – a dead ringer for Santa Claus – laughing merrily from his perch at the helm of a horse-drawn sleigh festooned with SILVER BELLS. We scramble outside to snuggle under the heavy wool blankets that cover the seats, readying ourselves for a sleigh ride to Grandpa and Grandma’s farmhouse for hot cider, homemade pie and lots of holiday cheer.
I’m telling you, Yankee Candles make me insane. The truth is, when I linger too long at the display I begin to miss other people’s families.
But I can’t help myself. I stand with my head in jar after jar like a true psychopath, trying to discern the subtle differences between Summer Fresh and Sunwashed Linen, (it’s that whiff of grass), or Harvest and Moonlight Harvest (it’s the moonlight, silly!) Sure, there are the obvious ones like Apple Cider and Sage and Citrus, but who except the olfactory fiends at YC know the difference between Mountain Pine and Sparkling Pine, (sparkles and stuff?) Christmas Wreath and Christmas Tree, White Christmas and Sparkling Snow? Besides, who knew that Deck the Halls, Be Jolly and Over the River could be put into jars with wicks?
Don’t even get me started about Blueberry Scone. Left alone, I will eat this candle. Buttercream? Needs police protection.
This is nostalgia porn I tell you!
The word “nostalgia” heralds from the Latin: “algae of the nose.” Kidding! According to Wikipedia, it’s from the Greek “nostos” meaning “returning home” and the Homeric “algos,” meaning pain, or ache.
Ah, yes. Pain + returning home = Yankee Candle. Yours for a mere $25!
Change: I know we’re supposed to embrace it, some say even lunge for it, but who (over 40) can deny a pang of nose algae when we capitulate and dump the land line?
I liked my land line! It was tied to the land and stuff! *sigh*
I even like to get a jump on my nostalgia. I’m sad in advance about a million other things. Take stamps. Soon they’ll be history, we know that. I still think it’s a miracle 44 cents gets a letter clear across the country. At times I even miss licking them. That comforting gluey taste.
Oh yeah, like I’m the only one!
Sick as it may sound, I LIKE mailing the Netflix movies back; how the red envelopes arrive in the mail and then become the mailer. I miss wandering around Blockbuster in my pajamas and winter coat ogling DVD covers and running into my neighbors, also in their pajamas, sleepily looking for something the whole family could enjoy watching. Which makes me miss the days when a new movie coming out was truly a big deal. Which of course makes my nose ache for drive-in movies, where, again in your jammies with blankets and snacks, you hook that heavy, awkward speaker onto your car window in anticipation of pure joy. The speaker which itself seemed oddly from another time.
I miss that sense of awe over the sheer effort that goes into the making of a beautiful thing: a book, a movie, a painting, a dance, an invention.
I even miss nostalgia sometimes.
Oh Yankee Candle, free me from this yearning for some perfect past no one had, I thought this past weekend, cruising the display at a local country store. As I took in a lungful of Autumn Lodge, I glanced over at my smiling husband who was waiting patiently for me at the exit. As I watched him balance a bushel of apples and half a dozen ears of corn in his arms, I got this big whoosh of the future. I thought, today is the yore I will miss ten, twenty years from now, so why not go now and join him in the joyous, present moment?
And then I wondered, is there a candle for that?
May 1, 2012
Still Hungry
This isn’t going to make me popular, but man did I hate Hunger Games.
I wanted to like it. Who goes to a movie not wanting to have a good time? Like a lot of people, I harbor a little flame of hope – still not extinguished by countless disappointing hours sitting in a darkened theater – to be taken up into another world.
It started with the book. Many, many people suggested Hunger Games to me. Actually, that’s the wrong word. They swooned, begged, sputtered; falling all over themselves to get me to pick it up. So I bought it asap, and settled in. I got through three chapters, saw where the story was going, and shelved it.
My first thought was that I couldn’t get through the book because it was written for young adults, and I am an adult.* I don’t read children’s books either, because I’m not a child. I also steer clear of picture books because I am not a preverbal infant.
The people who advised me to read the book weren’t young adults. They were grown up people, all on a mission to make me (and others of course) read this book. And just like the Twilight series, I had to check out the books to see for myself what I was missing, which, for me, wasn’t much.
So why did I go see Hunger Games? Same reason I (tried to) read the book.
Friends – as well as reviewers – adults I assume? – couldn’t praise it enough: “Thrilling and superbly acted” “Epic spectacle, yearning romance, suspense that won’t quit!”
Let me count the reasons the movie depressed me.
First of all, names like Katniss make me want to shriek. You and I know that 5 million people are going to name their kid Katniss. Twelve years later all the Katnisses are going to stream the movie and never speak to their parents again.
The movie – and the book – are jampacked with melodrama, which is the baby version of actual drama, where characters aren’t just pawns in a plot, but actually act out their fate based on who they are. In Hunger Games the plot is dropped from above, orchestrated for plenty of sequel ka-ching.
And for a movie with epic suspense, there was a lot of sleeping in trees, as I recall; lots of animatronic garbage dropped in to liven the dull stew. Handed their lot, the pasty youth of HG goes through the motions but none of it is convincing, even the violence.
So let’s talk about the violence. Here’s a movie about people forced to kill others to survive, but to keep the ratings open to the biggest audience, that part is toned down, with most of the focus on the so-called love story.
The fact that the badly imagined post-apocalyptic world was orchestrated by the real evil – the adults – was a missed opportunity for what might have been an interesting film.
Okay, so I’m the idiot here. I went to a young adult film with adult expectations, and left still hungry for a good movie.
So what am I really pissing and moaning about? I’m worried we’re all getting so dumbed down we’re going to forget to read actual adult books, with adult levels of emotional intelligence. That we’ll all become so lazy and dulled that we won’t even remember there’s a difference any more.
In the hilarious movie, “Idiocracy,” in the future we will all be so fat that we live in these separate little pods where we won’t have legs (won’t need ‘em – no need to walk any more!) but we WILL have our handheld devices and basically just eat and surf all day long. Sure it’s over the top, but somehow those images of fat, lazy humanoids resting in their pods day and night texting about the 45th sequel to Hunger Games (Katniss’ grandson Poppy Seed does battle with Clove’s daughter Paprika!) doesn’t feel a million miles away.
* I’m happy to eat just a few of my words here. I’m reading a brilliant young adult novel called “The Fault in Our Stars” by John Greene. Kudos to him for writing a true crossover novel.
I wanted to like it. Who goes to a movie not wanting to have a good time? Like a lot of people, I harbor a little flame of hope – still not extinguished by countless disappointing hours sitting in a darkened theater – to be taken up into another world.
It started with the book. Many, many people suggested Hunger Games to me. Actually, that’s the wrong word. They swooned, begged, sputtered; falling all over themselves to get me to pick it up. So I bought it asap, and settled in. I got through three chapters, saw where the story was going, and shelved it.
My first thought was that I couldn’t get through the book because it was written for young adults, and I am an adult.* I don’t read children’s books either, because I’m not a child. I also steer clear of picture books because I am not a preverbal infant.
The people who advised me to read the book weren’t young adults. They were grown up people, all on a mission to make me (and others of course) read this book. And just like the Twilight series, I had to check out the books to see for myself what I was missing, which, for me, wasn’t much.
So why did I go see Hunger Games? Same reason I (tried to) read the book.
Friends – as well as reviewers – adults I assume? – couldn’t praise it enough: “Thrilling and superbly acted” “Epic spectacle, yearning romance, suspense that won’t quit!”
Let me count the reasons the movie depressed me.
First of all, names like Katniss make me want to shriek. You and I know that 5 million people are going to name their kid Katniss. Twelve years later all the Katnisses are going to stream the movie and never speak to their parents again.
The movie – and the book – are jampacked with melodrama, which is the baby version of actual drama, where characters aren’t just pawns in a plot, but actually act out their fate based on who they are. In Hunger Games the plot is dropped from above, orchestrated for plenty of sequel ka-ching.
And for a movie with epic suspense, there was a lot of sleeping in trees, as I recall; lots of animatronic garbage dropped in to liven the dull stew. Handed their lot, the pasty youth of HG goes through the motions but none of it is convincing, even the violence.
So let’s talk about the violence. Here’s a movie about people forced to kill others to survive, but to keep the ratings open to the biggest audience, that part is toned down, with most of the focus on the so-called love story.
The fact that the badly imagined post-apocalyptic world was orchestrated by the real evil – the adults – was a missed opportunity for what might have been an interesting film.
Okay, so I’m the idiot here. I went to a young adult film with adult expectations, and left still hungry for a good movie.
So what am I really pissing and moaning about? I’m worried we’re all getting so dumbed down we’re going to forget to read actual adult books, with adult levels of emotional intelligence. That we’ll all become so lazy and dulled that we won’t even remember there’s a difference any more.
In the hilarious movie, “Idiocracy,” in the future we will all be so fat that we live in these separate little pods where we won’t have legs (won’t need ‘em – no need to walk any more!) but we WILL have our handheld devices and basically just eat and surf all day long. Sure it’s over the top, but somehow those images of fat, lazy humanoids resting in their pods day and night texting about the 45th sequel to Hunger Games (Katniss’ grandson Poppy Seed does battle with Clove’s daughter Paprika!) doesn’t feel a million miles away.
* I’m happy to eat just a few of my words here. I’m reading a brilliant young adult novel called “The Fault in Our Stars” by John Greene. Kudos to him for writing a true crossover novel.
