The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin in the cradle. Although I have felt compelled to write things down since I was five years old, I doubt that my daughter ever will, for she is a singularly blessed and accepting child, delighted with life exactly as life presents itself to her, unafraid to go to sleep and unafraid to wake up. Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.

joan didion

m

I recall an August afternoon in Chicago in 1973 when I took my daughter, then seven, to see what Georgia O’Keeffe had done with where she had been. One of the vast O’Keeffe ‘Sky Above Clouds’ canvases floated over the back stairs in the Chicago Art Institute that day, dominating what seemed to be several stories of empty light, and my daughter looked at it once, ran to the landing, and kept on looking. “Who drew it,” she whispered after a while. I told her. “I need to talk to her,” she said finally.

joan didion

m

Two months after Back to Black came out in 2007, Valerie and I drove from Austin to the Grand Canyon to Los Angeles and blared Amy Winehouse the entire time. Earlier today, we called each other at the very same moment to see if the other had heard about her passing.  It’s a tremendous loss and I find myself increasingly annoyed with people’s rude and insensitive Facebook comments regarding her addictions, rehab, etc.  She may have suffered from her own personal demons, but she put forth fantastic, fantastic music that should – and does – speak for itself.

RIP

m

m

Lesson learned? When people say, “You really, really must” do something, it means you don’t really have to. No one ever says, “You really, really must deliver the baby during labor.” When it’s true, it doesn’t need to be said. Tina Fey

greetings from the new home,

m

m

Two years ago, I moved into the most special apartment, a place that quickly became my favorite home. I moved in and slept on a mattress in the middle of the bedroom and left to Vegas the next day. I painted my living room wall a pale sea foam, I climbed out the window onto the roof when I wanted air, I lounged and loved and had a very beautiful time in this dear place. I had a big Christmas dinner, a neighbor that hated me, pink ruffled pillows, and weekly meals with my mom. I spent four hours baking alfajores, endless time in my bathtub, and many, many nights pulling into my spot thinking: I love coming home. 

It is my last night in this apartment. It is my last time on this couch, in this spot, watching Friday Night Lights. It’s the series finale tonight for Coach Taylor and for me. Everything is changing.

Bless you little home, bless you for everything.

m

Maybe this is not a come-down-from-the-ledge story. But I tell it with the thought that the woman on the ledge will ask herself a question, the question that occurred to that man in Bagota. He wondered how we know that what happens to us isn’t good?

Amy Hempel, The Man from Bogota

m