169. He believed her orgasms were authentic, but he suspected she was faking her compassion: “Oh. Oh. Oh. Yes. Yes. Yes. You poor thing, you!”
170. Within the past hour, how many people passed a stranger on the street whom they once passed on a street in another city?
171. The guy who used to sit on the bench is long gone. The bench is short gone. I miss him even more.
172. The softball team is coached by an English teacher and a social studies teacher. The English teacher misses an away game, the first I start at second base. The next day the two teachers huddle over a piece of paper. “How did the second baseman do?” “He did all right.”
173. At the flea market: “No, the Buddha by the bike, not the bike by the Buddha!”
174. The infinite wisdom of a circle.
175. The last phrase of Baudelaire’s “Dog and the Flask” (the title is also translated as “The Dog and the Vial” and “The Dog and the Scent Bottle”) is des ordures soigneusement choisies, which has been translated as “carefully raked-up mire,” “dung, chosen with care,” “carefully chosen sweepings,” “carefully selected scraps of nastiness,” “carefully selected garbage,” “meticulously selected garbage,” and “carefully selected crap.” And in Baudelaire’s “The Stranger” (also translated as “The Foreigner”), one of the speakers uses the familiar tu and the other the formal vous. It is impossible to capture this in English, though a Spanish translator would have no problem.
176. Part of me must be a damn genius or part of me a moron, because it’s oh so easy to outsmart myself.
177. Walking down the freezing street with a pizza box blanketing my hands, I've become one of those people I always envy.
178. My mother lies in the hospital bed with radium inserted into her abdomen, trying to kill the killer. She cannot move. Visitors cannot stay long because of the radiation. She tells us this story: “An older woman peeked in, wearing a volunteer’s outfit. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ the volunteer said. ‘Do you remember me? From when you were up on the sixth floor? I was just up there, looked for you, and something pulled me to come down here. I’m sure it was to tell you that everything will be all right.’ I asked her name. ‘Sadie.’ My mother’s name, and I never met another Sadie after she died. And she came down from ‘up there’ to tell me everything will be all right.” My mother laughs, for the first time in weeks, and for the last time.
179. In East New York we sit on the stoop waiting for the street fight. Not our battle—this one for the younger kids. From the next block comes the swarm, outnumbering our friends. We look at each other and attack screaming. “Look out, it’s the big kids,” someone shouts, and they run off. We are in third grade and I will never feel this big again.
180. In a gym class football game, I get clear in the end zone with the pass floating toward me. The closest defender—on the varsity football team—stops running and makes jinx signs. The ball slips through my hands. “That’s what you get for reading too many books,” he says.
181. I had some kind of intestinal bug that wouldn’t be snuffed. To make sure I didn’t have an exotic parasite, the doctor sent me to a diagnostic lab that specializes in feces. You need to get several negatives before they rule out parasites. The lab is a converted apartment. Every patient leaves a sample; often, chemical inducements are required. I could go on, but I don’t want to write it. And you wouldn’t want to read it.
182. My first recorded pun, in my journal of a family road trip; age 12: “We woke up early and hit the road. When our hands hurt, we got into the car and drove off.”
183. Manny Roth, owner of the Café Wha in the Greenwich Village heyday, is now helping to run the West End, near campus. I keep meaning to talk to him, let him know how much his club and his cohorts meant to me, but I am too shy. One day I see him in the lobby of the campus building where my office is located. He is going down the stairs to the exit. He looks old and alone, out of context. It’s now or never. “Mr. Roth,” I say, and he looks surprised to be identified. “Café Wha was very important to me.” He stares at me blankly and turns back down the stairs. Manny Roth grasps the door handle, then turns to me. “Take care of yourself,” he says. “There aren’t too many of us left.”
Great as always. What is the jinx sign?
I know I'll have use for it.
Posted by: mitch sisskind | October 14, 2017 at 06:35 PM