Updates, in Brief

--Kip is making his famous Lemon Basil Orzo for dinner.

--We saw the movie "Moon," which was wonderful, except for the trashy radio transmission at the end, which really ruined the whole thing for me.

--I miss the characters from my second novel, which I've not looked at since Yield started moving toward publication. I should just read the sections again, just to feel a sense of them.

--Off to Tennessee for the 4th of July, which my mother now calls "my christmas," since it is the only time of the year when our whole family is together.

--We saw "9 to 5" the musical on Tuesday night. It was pretty bad, which is a shame, because the music is good, and the performances are great. The show is infected with Broadway dancing, do you know what I mean? Honestly, the opening imagery is so tacky and badly imagined that from about 8 seconds into it, I thought: "This is going to be horrible." It was still entertaining. God Bless the incredible talent that is Alison Janney.

--I ran into Ms. T at the market on Saturday, and we had a nice chat. It was nice to see her. She's off to "do another movie for Tyler," and then on an on.

--We met Michael Hicks at the Lavish Lounge last night. Lovely to see him. The go-go boy on the bar was nice to watch.

My Neighborhood, Circa 1991

I was inspired by my friend Ariel to make a personal Google map. I recommend changing it to the "satellite view" so you can get a sense of the ground better, the distances and the color.

Click here to view the map and see the points of interest.

Trunk, Vol 1: Hair

A short story of mine, "Activate Profile" is included in this lovely new art book from Australia.

About the book:
Trunk Volume One: Hair
edited by Suzanne Boccalatte & Meredith Jones.

This strange anthology of writing and art explores the cultural, historical, religious and social aspects of the evolutionary ambiguous outgrowth of protein known as hair.

About the series:
Trunk books will be a series of small, corporeal, personal, and sensual books. They are intended to be beautiful, coveted objects filled with fascinating content, much like an old trunk in an attic. These collectable volumes will be consumable and engrossing as a whole, yet filled with short pieces so that each book can also be flipped through or dipped into at random.

Buy the book here.

Some Angst

New York has been lovely of late. I've been doing a lot of nothing since we got back from Greece, taking my time before delving back into the novel for a few weeks (months? days? overnights?) of work to make it ready for publication. And, after that, of course, comes the waiting for it to appear on shelves. (Or, in remaindered boxes at the back of the store, which I have considered.)

I am both excited and anxious about re-entering it. Can I access that emotional place, that language, the energy that made the book what it is? This is the difference between inspiration and work, I keep thinking. Writing is so mysterious that I think we are often fearful that the magic won't take. It takes so much out of you, that it becomes to sacred. Of course, the big secret is that there is no magic, and nothing is sacred. And yet...

This business of art-making still eludes me. I realize more and more as I get older, that I am purely an instinctual writer. (Are there other kinds? Puzzle-y kinds? Character-y kinds?) I don't start with plots, or characters, or even "ideas." What always emerges first, are voices, and even more enigmatic forces, which I can only describe as "The Feelies." It's kind of like this: Say you are on a front porch somewhere, and miles away, the wind starts blowing, but you can feel it, even though it's not on you. You just know it. You just have to trust yourself more than you trust anything else. The wind will eventually reach you. Or something like that.

I can't put a finger on that distant knowledge-thing that creativity feels like. And, I guess the most ridiculous part is that I feel simultaneously compelled to understand it, (and to write about it in unclear metaphors about wind and porches) and also so completely indifferent to it.

Jean Gray, where are you to explain all this?

Poem with Holes

For a brief stretch of pavement on the Brooklyn Bridge,
the taxi fare was the same as the time, like the supreme
convergence of man and universe,
like every choice I ever made
had moved me toward those thirty meters.
I brightened at the thought of you.

A plague of Swedish Fish,
flopping over the armrests of chairs.
Grapes fermenting on high shelves.
Handstands in bathtubs.
Whiskey, and whiskey, and whiskey.

Maybe it was the Adderall that made you attractive.
The energy, the brightness, the quickness.
The disassociation that someone like me could
mistake for wit.

The way you peel your bathing suit down,
just a little bit, evading the tan line.
The way you disappear.
The way you never say goodbye, not really.

Open Letters, Vol. 9

Dear Dude on the Subway,

Get some new pants.

Sincerely,
Lee

Back!

Returned from Greece! It was a marvelous trip. Granted, the jetlag hit me really hard this time--most likely, I was also suffering from a real lack of sleep the three weeks prior. (Not, "most likely," but "actually.") One day, we slept until nearly two in the afternoon, which, if any of you know me, you know is completely unheard of.

We did not, as Laura begged us, go to an olive plantation. We did, however, eat lots and lots of fried cheese, tzatziki, and various grilled meats and other lovely items. The sad part was that, well, the Greek food in my very own neighborhood--across the street--is better. But okay, the restaurant across the street from me is an expensive, upscale Greek place, and we found those restaurants, but couldn't really afford to eat in them every night. But--you can't beat the places we ate for the atmosphere, and the view. OMG, the views. I am not complaining. I was happy with everything--when you eat at the tourist restaurant, you get tourist food. I was just so glad to be doing something else for a while.

I'm going to write up the trip, of course. One thing about my brain that I find a little annoying is how I have to process everything via writing. So, while I'm laying in the bed at 3:00am having insomnia on Santorini and starting at the tiny blinking light on the wall, I have to think about what I might write about the tiny blinking light. I can't ever turn it off. Last night, at my grocery store, I walked past the Greek aisle and had a weirdo freak-out moment. Where am I? It was all again unfamiliar, and yet familiar. Having had that alphabet, those shapes, all around me for so long--and then here I was back in my real life, and there they were again. There's an image, I thought. (This reminds me of what I always tell people about writing, that having ideas is not the problem.)

Bless being on vacation. Bless being home.

Greece!

--Currently engaging myself in the anxiety of feeling unprepared for my vacation to Greece. We leave tomorrow. I found myself, perhaps foolishly, reading a little here and there on various travel sites about what to do and see, and, not surprisingly, became overwhelmed. Luckily, I am not one of those people who needs to do and see everything to feel satisfied. Whatever we do, fine, hooray, it's not work and it's not my regular life! Success!!

--I have been so out of it, so tired with show and syrup and work and such that I managed to get on the train tonight, headed to see my friend Jamie in her dance performance and whoops, I went to the wrong venue and thus missed it. Oh well. Sorry, Jamie.

--On my walk through the East Village, (on my way to the wrong venue) there were two places, two separate street corners, where huge dumpsters had been set out to accommodate all the NYU kids moving out of the dorms. Parents with cars were tossing stuff into them at one end, and people were fishing through them at the other. "Look, Brian," said one young woman, holding up a tacky fake chandelier, broken and dirty, "I totally won this in the lottery that is right now!"

--I haven't seen the new Star Trek movie yet. I am contemplating going to tonight's 11pm show. Okay, I've talked myself into it.

See you when I get back from Greece!!!!!

Things My Upstairs Neighbors Must Have Recently Acquired

-Trampoline.
-Pony.
-Bowling lane.
-Half-dozen semi-retired Irish step dancers.
-Chain-gang.
-Carpenter stilts for a two-year old insomniac.
-Visit from the Harlem Globetrotters.
-Landmines.
-Sack of Anvils.
-Night School of Continuing Education for Overweight Men Majoring in Jackhammering.
-Balrog.
-Living-room parking spaces for earth-moving machines.
-Semi-precious stone quarry.
-French Hotchkiss H-39 tank.
-New dumb insults which you scream at your wife in other languages.
-Large heavy objects that want to crash to the floor over and over.
-Even heavier objects that you thought couldn't get any heavier.

Backstage Ladies