A Christmas moment, slowing into the 14th St subway stop, the light coming back. As Is, James Galvin:
I peeled the Prairie Lights sticker from the back and stuck it to that pole to the right of As Is. Is that littering? I think it's a message to the future. Putting James Galvin there and I'm imagining some young person on the subway noticing, seeing, peeling back that note in a subway tube bottle.
"The farthest way
Ive ever been
Is inside my own home.
My daughter's room.
Today." ~ Pg 40.
...and it's been dirty out here. A White Christmas, us bike riding splash-covered ones nodding to each other as we pass by:
The park in our part of town, Tompkins Square:
And in the upper right of the park, the field of snow just right of center in this photo, that's the blacktop baseball field where Ripton took us and we met the other, slightly older boys who would become our sons too, and spent so many days:
I met Jessica Hall walking on Avenue C last week. I was pedaling the wrong way on a one way street, the light was turning as I was flowing through the yellow, she stepped into the intersection and I did stop. She said I should tell the story of my most awkward bookstore moment of these past traveling months. I do have a couple photos. Mine was in a nearly picture perfect river town in Lower New England, near an enormous white wooden opera house on the water, a steel bridge spanning big space. I'll tell the story quickly - excuse me for not truly editing. Maybe I can tell it again else where better. In late autumn I receive an email from a bookstore lady saying she's been looking all year for a book that was socially inspiring. She found mine. She asked me to drive the couple hours to her store. She'd have 30 or so people there. She'd ensure a good group. I looked at the store website. It seemed fine. Nothing odd. We scheduled a time. I didn't hear back again. Except my reading was posted on her website, at 3 PM on a certain December day, with a 1:30 reading of a novel earlier than mine the same Saturday. I called the day before and spoke with the proprietor. She told me everything was fine. She was going to host a reception first, explainoing that was a good way to meet people, to warm guests to "the author and the book." I've had that experience. I thought she was right. BUT, she didn't have any of my books. She said she'd ordered them, but the books hadn't arrived. No problem, I told her. I'd bring some. She suggested 30 or so.
I drove up to the river town. I arrived a half hour early. I drove back and forth along the main street, looking for the bookstore. I couldn't find it. I saw a small sign and turned down a steep driveway and parked on the flats by the river. There was a small, stand alone cabin with a sign for an art store and another for the bookstore, and the door was locked. I walked up the driveway, up on the big porch to an art store sign, a folding up book-cover sign and no bookstore sign. I was carrying my box of books. A man came out, mid-fifties, pullover V-neck sweater, thin tie, chinos. Lace-up leather shoes. White. He asked what I was looking for. He told me I'd found the bookstore. The room in back, a door open to a porch overlooking the parking lot, lower building and river, was set with a large table; a large, clear plastic bowl held an unopened bottle of champagne cradled in ice, rows of wine glasses, a round plate of miniature sized deviled eggs and cut up triangles of croissant. A counter was on the left, one large caldrone of coffee, one large caldrone of hot water, a stack of coffee cups, tea bags, milk. A smaller table on the right had cut pieces of Dunkin Donuts. Two other men were with me in the back room, a couple, Southern accents, mid-30'ish. I wondered why they were in the bookstore early. Local neighbors? Speaking easily with the man who'd told me I was in the right place. The back room had a few shelves and a few books.
I carried my box of books to the front room. A round woman was sitting behind the front desk. The proprietor, a circle of a person, a pulled down winter cap, wool stockinged thin legs in black shoes. She was built of twisted balloons pushed together. I told her I'd brought the books she'd wanted. She asked who I was - her afternoon reading, I explained. The front room had a few shelves and a few books. She stood up and the balloons came apart to form a perfect "S", a short woman. African-American. She introduced her mother, a kind woman grown up in Triadelphia - a West Virginia coal mining town. The man in the V-neck was her husband, an English teacher in a high school a town or two over.
Three o'clock came. No guests. 3:15 then 3:30. The other two men there, the couple - one was author for the 1:30 PM reading, the other his mate. A self published novel about an adolescent girl. set in the South. Today was his first reading, the pull-up book-cover stand on the porch his marketing (MUCH better than mine!) and no one had come. He and his guy were New Yorkers via Louisiana.
The proprietor suggested we pull up chairs in the front room and read to her...
It would be good practice, she suggested. We needed to explain our books to her, so she could sell them to her customers. I needed to run away. We formed a circle in her front room. The novelist's partner was sitting in the chair the proprietor wanted her mother to sit in. The novelist from Louisiana read a segment from near the end of his book, the young girl protagonist looking at holiday gifts under her family Christmas tree. I read a section about Jesus and my sons answering the bigger boys whether we Jews believe in G-d - a William question, I think. Page 30 or so of my book. Whether we Jews can get to heaven, whether Jews are White?
The proprietor announced that our two books were so different. Fiction and nonfiction. I begged to differ. I did differ - dialogue is made up. Dialogue is fiction. The arc of a narrative is fiction. What we choose to frame makes fiction. Transcribing the spoken word wouldn't read as dialogue. The Mother got angry. She wanted to read fact. Fact was fact. Truth was truth. The proprietor agreed. They wanted to read nonfiction books that were real. The mother spoke to me about truth and Satan. She told me she prayed everyday for everyone, and therefore for me. The proprietor was nodding in agreement.
The couple from Queens, via Louisiana, said they needed to get back to their dog, who would otherwise pee in their apartment. I said I had to go. The proprietor asked the novelist how many books he was leaving. I started to leave with my box of books. The proprietor asked I wanted to leave any of my books. She was operating her store on consignment, it seemed. I said, "But you ordered my books, right? They're arriving Monday?" She said they were. "But if anyone wants one tomorrow [Sunday, before Monday's book delivery?], your books won't be here." I told her I didn't have many books left.
These are the photos. Some unfortunate tourist did walk into the bookstore while we were reading our Tennessee Williams reality: but the guest fled.
This is when I need to get back to NY, get back to Everyman...
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