Sad, sad, ruinously sad. Sputtering rain all day, walking with my hood up. Any little thing is too much for me, the hairy cat’s eyes across the street, the animal distrust from a window, communicating doors closing, I look back and the streetlamps are on.
I wanted to write something jagged, something that cuts.
The rain is coming down with great juicy smacks on the sidewalk. Sirens in the distance, so anodyne, the huddle of a wet neighborhood. My red slicker drying on the coatrack, and the puddle runs down the stairs. Sad- it’s like being happy, except I can think clearer.
All I can listen to is Debussy’s Claire de Lune on repeat, and two songs by Whatever, Dad called Death of the Phone Call and Warsh_Tippy and Zelda.
Anyway, please enjoy this story. I think it’s the best I’ve written yet this year; I think it slaps.
PS: even though it’s raining I would be remiss if I didn’t count my blessings:
- Spice House is going round 3 on our lease (I’ve been thinking a lot about the difference between friends and community and Spice House is the latter, shout out to the Spice Girls);
- first grade is ending but I’m set up for the coming school year to work with middle schoolers and sub in the district who knows, teach more, teaching first grade is my favorite job I’ve ever had;
- finally, the little blue cup-flowers that come from nowhere and are everywhere, Siberian Squills, invasive but honestly, if you ask me, not that problematic. And, because of the rain, the leaves on every tree are coming out.
Tl; dr: sorry this got so long. I became a writer, probably, because as a child I suffered from can’t-shut-the-fuck-up disease; after everyone went to bed I went to my journal and wrote, urgently, about wagons, for some reason, and also about the Mormon kid I had a crush on. Read the story; I think it’s good.
cdzhouse 