Dear Friends,
In a few weeks I’ll be 77. I don’t wish I were a different age. There’s no one gone to miss. I’m still an owl in a tree, minding my own business. The other day, I looked in the mirror and said, “What would happen if you became the opposite of what you are?” I tried it, and I could see it would take practice, but not bad for a beginner. Instead of acting out of hurt feelings to a friend, I acted the opposite way. The opposite feeling was fake. The intention to flip myself was real. Nothing about 77 means anything that predicts how stuff is going to go in a life. Nothing, I promise you.
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Two Incidents of Love
Manny
Manny said, “I think about you sometimes.” I thought, how tender. Then he said, “And I’m afraid I’ll wind up like you.” His girlfriend had fallen in love with a younger man, and there were noises she would leave. A part of him thought it was time to move on. Not really. There was no part thinking that. It’s something we say when the other toothbrush is gone.
I said, “It’s not so bad.” To him, alone was a bad hair day, your mother pointing out the pimple on your chin, chipping your tooth on a walnut. He said, “I want to know someone is thinking about me. I like going to bed with a person and waking up in the morning and talking about nothing in a cozy, sleepy-eyed way.”
I remembered my last whatever you want to call it. I kept waiting for when we’d talk in the morning in that sleepy-eyed way. I thought I would be so happy I’d race out and buy whatever he wanted for breakfast and then clean the pipes under his sink. After he called it quits, I thought it was better to be alone than to wait for morning talk. Waiting soured the rest of the day. I thought that for a few weeks, and then I went back to thinking something else.
I said, “If you’re alone for a while, it doesn’t mean you will stay alone.” I once knew a man named Zel. I liked having sex with him. When I thought about sex with Zel, tears welled in my eyes. It was probably not the sex I was thinking about. I didn’t think Manny feared missing sex. I thought he’d have more sex if he were alone. I said, “You can see yourself with someone else, right?”
There was a worn look in his eyes and his shoulders slumped. His neck was thin, and his glasses left marks on the sides of his nose. He had thick, dirty-blond hair, and his fingers were long and tapered. He could have been a model for gloves. I once knew a man who modeled gloves. His nails were manicured and clean. His palms were warm. His hands were exotic cats I didn’t want in my mouth. I didn’t want Manny’s hands in my mouth, either, but the sudden thought of them made me wonder how they would feel. It takes almost nothing to imagine anything.
We passed a shop on Broadway with a dot com in its name. It was new. It sold fresh air in the form of purifying machines that cost a lot of money. It sold other things, too, but I wasn’t sure what. We went inside. In the back were kitchen appliances, everything white and gleaming. A woman I once knew was there. Her name was Nancy. She would call me to talk about her boyfriends. She was dressed in white, too. A chalk white blouse and cream-colored pants. Her hair was platinum. She was wearing a white apron, standing behind a counter offering samples of hazelnut meringues, filled with whipped cream and raspberries. In the days when she would call me, she worked as a trainer in a gym.
Before I could say her name, she lifted a meringue in the air, and Manny moved forward, a mink in snow. Nancy didn’t say hello to me. Whipped cream spilled from her fingers. She held the pastry up to Manny’s mouth, and he bit into it. She waited while he chewed before offering him more. Everyone stopped to look at them. Manny took smaller and smaller bites. When there was nothing left, he licked her fingers.
A feeling moved through me I didn’t at first recognize. Looking back, I can see it was hope. I felt an impulse to stretch out on the sidewalk in front of the shop. I would lie there, and thoughts would enter my mind, waiting patiently in a line. Nancy would call me to talk about Manny. Could he be trusted? I’d say, “Of course, he can be trusted,” even though no one knows what anyone will do. Ever. Including ourselves. We may think we are as dependable as time, but that is absurd.
On the sidewalk, I would look for a man in sandals, a man with a Band-Aid on a toe fresh from a bicycle race. I’d admire the twin brains of his calves. He’d be carrying The History of French Cinema under an arm, a book with a still on the cover from Godard’s film Weekend—the one with the pileup of cars on a forlorn road in France. I’d touch the man’s ankle. His eyebrows would be shaped like the eyebrows of my dog. His face would look more soulful and philosophical than he actually was. I would know that and not care. I’d wait for him to extend a callused hand to lift me up, and I’d take it.
May
May and I were in a café near her loft downtown. She ordered a napoleon and an espresso and said, “Multiple orgasms are easy. You could post the instructions on the back of a cereal box.”
I thought about the way humans had stood up on two legs before our haunches were strong enough to support our weight. That’s why we had backache. We still longed for the old days. We still remembered when our noses were level with other people’s tails.
The waiter brought May her order. She sipped her espresso and took apart her napoleon. She was afraid of food. I smelled her boyfriend on her skin. Bits of matter were always interacting. Particles were even escaping from the mouths of black holes. There really were no coincidences if we could understand the connections.
She dipped a finger in pastry cream and licked it. She said, “There isn’t much talking before we have sex, and it makes me happy. Who is ever happy?” I said, “Whales and dogs.” She said, “In our species.”
I thought about the way, in sex, you have no history. You follow strangers and shiny objects. You pick berries at an upstate farm and make jam. You adopt a longhaired dachshund and name it Nell.
May said, “Sammy can’t love women, I don’t think. He idolizes men.” I said, “Everyone loves men. They’re so pretty.” She said, “Whales and dogs don’t bow down to idols.” I said, “I meant in our species.”
I took her hand and said, “Don’t ever leave me.” She said, “Where would I go”? I said, “You’re an unstable element.” She said, “You’re a magnetic field.” Her hand felt sticky.
She said, “I’m going back to see Sammy. We agree about nothing.” I said, “It hasn’t proved fatal.” She said, “Happiness has no half-life.” Maybe she said, “Shelf life”? I saw worry around her eyes. Maybe it was the worry she saw in my eyes.
She squeezed my hand and said, “I won’t remember anything. It will be as if it didn’t happen.” I said, “Then something else will happen.” She said, “Dogs know how to love.” I said, “They didn’t stand up too fast.” She said, “You’re not at war with anything.” I said, “I’m not having sex.”
Like fine pastry: sweetly rendered and delectable. Left wanting more but satiated until the next.
"The twin brains of his calves"! Your precision with detail is delectable. A writer's writer for sure, but also any reader's. I discovered you at the Voice way back when, and was thrilled to re-find you among the quick, still doing it. Lovely, bracing work, like cold water in the face, peppermint in the throat.