Sat | June 03, 2006
Puffs
On 8th Street in the village there's a cream puff cafe called Choux. Like Puff & Pao and Beard Papa's, it has a crisp white interior and a line of ceiling lights that lend a clean iMac feeling to it. Actually I think this look has existed in Japan for some time, and has only been recently introduced in the U.S. It therefore appears to follow the iMac.
Choux is narrow-- it has just enough room for four small wooden tables to line one wall. Opposite the tables is a counter behind which four twentysomethings operate.
I walk in because it's empty and I prefer my cafes zero to 20 percent full. I order the first thing that I see in the glass case and sit down. After all, I'm only incidentally buying a cream puff and coffee so that I can legitimately stay there for what becomes two hours.
The puff comes on a plastic silver platter with a plastic fork. I consume it in a minute.
My coffee is black and as I approach the counter the woman literally runs towards me. "Yes?" she says.
"Do you have milk and --"
"Over there!" she gestures at the setup by the door. She's got a round cute face.
While I add 'sugar in the raw' to my paper cup, I meditate on the thought that there is too much urgency, eagerness, and need for approval emanating from behind that counter. They haven't caught on that the best attitude is one of mellow near-indifference.
All the workers wear yellow bandanas in their hair and white chef jackets. One of them stands at the next table stapling coupons to palmcards. She's wearing an animal print dress underneath her jacket. Soon she's outside under the awning, her skirt billowing in the post-drizzle breeze.
In just a few minutes she comes in, stamping her feet, and says, "these people don't understand! The coupon's good for one month!"
She walks out and then walks in a minute later. She is now pacing in and out the door. "People don't want to save money!"
When I got my green tea cream puff and coffee, I saw the same coupon on the counter -- it was for fifty cents. What was she saying out there, I wondered-- "Save fifty cents!"?
This place'll tank if there's too much of that girl, I think. She's got nice legs, but she's cranky and insecure, and it comes through in the way she tries to hand out those cards. She leans against the door every time someone doesn't take a card. Which is pretty much every time. She also bounces her knees like a child who has to go to the bathroom. She's apparently under the impression that people walking by can understand what she's saying. The truth is that you can't understand most of what a person is saying while you're passing on the street. You get three words at most. From the wordiness of what she says when she peeps in, I realize that she might be saying some long phrase like "cream puffs, and there's also a coupon for fifty cents off your order and it's good for an entire month!"
I focus exculsively on reading for awhile, but have already begun an experiment, one that I've conducted several times before, in various situations. It begins with my doing nothing, or as close to nothing as possible, since the presence of a person sitting comfortably inside is something. Then I try to draw people in a little. Every few sentences of reading, I look up and catch glances of people on the street. I also make eye contact with the antsy girl, and try to telepathically adjust her mood until the right note of relaxation is in the air.
My "technique" sounds bogus but the fact is she stops pacing. And in a few minutes people begin to come in. It's Saturday, after all, and the village is full of pedestrians with undefined or infirm purposes, just waiting to be swayed. One of the people is a tall guy in a grey army camouflage t-shirt.
"How old is she?" he asks.
Confusion from the two guys behind the counter.
"Is she 45?" He orders a green tea slushie which involves ice loudly crushed in a blender.
The girl comes in from outside. "I'm really old, I'm 21," I hear her say, inbetween blender noises.
He stands outside with her while the drink is made. She comes in. "There's a guy who's really hot," she says to the plump girl with the round face- who looks at the guy in the army shirt coming in behind her.
"Not him!" she says, "the guy on the cell phone." They skittle outside, and she points down the street. They are framed by the open doorway. I feel like I am watching a movie.
The guy in the grey shirt says something in French to the guy behind the counter, who replies in French. Poor guy. He sits in a chair by the wall.
Suddenly the plump girl and the French dude are shouting at each other. Actually it's just the Korean girl shouting at him, her peevish criticisms snapping like snare drum beats. He looks at me for sympathy and I smile. He has dark hair and dark eyes.
"Sorry," she says, turning to me. But I smile at her too. And then she's yelling him again, and it's English but it's so quick and abbreviated, slurring over certain sounds, that I don't make out what she's talking about. I think it's about something he didn't do, or forgot to do. A few minutes later the guys are putting balls of dough on large baking trays. They sprinkle powered sugar over them and put the three trays in the silver oven behind them.
I think maybe this place will be okay after all.
Posted by Lily at 06:06 PM
Mon | May 15, 2006
Dogs
The Britts next door got a dog. In about five months it quadrupled in size. The dog's name is "Amber" because of its reddish brown fur, but I think of it as "the dog."
A couple of weeks ago they had a black metal fence built around their backyard and now the dog capers outside all day, and seems at times to be eating the dirt.
When anyone appears, the dog barks incessantly. He doesn't stop until the person is gone. He doesn't even vary the way he barks. It's four staccato sixteenth notes, then two quarter notes. It's in three-four time, the four sixteenth notes in the first beat and the two quarter notes on the second and third downbeat. The first of the two quarter notes is staccato and the second is accented and forte. It goes mezzo forte, forte. Or perhaps mf, ff. That last beat is much louder than the first two.
There are no rests anywhere and the whole thing goes at an andante. It's in major key and one note, perhaps a high C.
At the panel about religion, during the PEN world voices "festival," a woman-- I think it must have been "Mary Gordon" because the only other woman there would not have had that voice-- said, "if we can't be pro-dog, what can we be?"
Everyone laughed. Civil white laughter. Now that I am thinking about it, I wonder if she intended a palindromic pun with god and dog, but I think she pretty much meant "no one agrees on religion, can't we at least agree we all like dogs?"
No we can't all like dogs. We can't all like either cats or dogs either. In response to the question "cat person or dog person" I say, "I dunno, cat sometimes, but not entirely, and dog in some ways too, but..."
Which is why I don't do well on textbook first dates.
Dogs represent a culture based on dominance and hierarchy. As part of training them, the owner must "show them who's boss" and be unwaveringly stern with the dog.
I like to give people chances, make exceptions, and be indulgent and forgiving. I want chances myself. I don't want a tug of war in which the other person just tries to get his or her way, and resolves conflict by being mean to you until you do what they want. Dog culture fosters this type of mentality.
Rather, that is the attitude towards dogs in the U.S. My dad looks at the dog and doesn't think of controlling or dominating it. He wants to give it the bones from dinner.
Posted by Lily at 08:40 PM
Wed | May 10, 2006
Bums
Yesterday as I was eating lunch in Bryant Park, I heard a man asking, "spare some change, change for lunch." I was eating a carnitas burrito from Chipotle, and there is no way to eat one of those without feeling that you are gorging yourself, due to the way you have to take big bites and due to the fact that they're drippingly delicious.
So I felt guilty, and also it didn't seem like anyone was giving him anything. When he got to me I gave him some change from my wallet. However I regretted it because as I turned and put the change in the paper cup I saw that he was a white guy wearing a red windbreaker, a nice one, like North Face, but not. There are a lot of bums in New York but I've never seen one in something like that. The jacket was kind of dirty but it wasn't that shabby. He looked in the cup to see how much I had given him. Real bums, or good bums, don't look; they just say thanks. He didn't say thanks. Most of all he just seemed like -- and I know this would sound racist to some but those people don't know the first thing about racism-- he seemed like a white asshole. It was in his look, in the type of connection that happens in the air between you and him when you make eye contact. It's something you know from the experience of meeting people like that and subsequently getting to know them and hearing what they say.
I have been meaning to come up with a set of "rules" for whether I will give a bum money. In New York this is necessary because you are asked all the time, and you can't give to everyone or you'll be broke. New York will make you broke anyway but you'll be even broker, faster.
For awhile my rule was that I gave singing bums money, but I didn't think that through-- I made it up based on nothing. It was an easy way to decide based on whether I liked the music. But people who have instruments are better off to begin with-- there's a bit of classism there. I realized this when I gave a dollar to a violin player who was so good that I realized later that he must have had training. I played violin for two years and was in contact with it for years through my sister's playing, such that I can recognize a well-trained player.
The rule must be based on a principle-- and the principle must be appropriate. Having developed skill in music isn't it. It's okay to give to a bum who happens to be skilled in music- there is no reason to decide not to on that basis either. It shouldn't be the reason to or not to.
In the case of the red windbreaker guy, I gave change because no one else was and I felt some inclination to "equalize" this. I often feel an inclination to "equalize" or "balance" things, making sure everyone gets a fair share. This isn't a good basis for most decisions, this one included. Actually the fact that no one else was giving to him should have been a red flag, but my "equalizing" instinct got in the way. As a result I helped a type of person who has been responsible for a lot of my misery, and more importantly, the misery of innumerable others.
At least it made me realize what the basis for decisions should be. In considering bums, I had been thinking there are music ones-- ones who play instruments or sing, ones that talk or give a speech, ones that smell. I had thought to consider how shabby they are-- how much they seem to need it. Or to consider how hard they are trying-- to give an "A" for effort. Perhaps to give to a little of each type on an equalizing principle. I was categorizing them by what they do, or as black or white, women or men, bitter ones and ones with good attitudes. When it comes to bums there are only two types: ones who are oppressors and ones who represent the oppressed. Ones who are victims and ones who would be oppressors if they had the chance.
It's anyone's best guess whether a bum is one or the other. That night, after work, I got on the subway to go to a philosophy lecture. A black woman dressed in all black walked into the car. "May I have your attention please," she said, or some other starter. She said three or four things, of which I only remember one in the middle: "I have two daughters." I was half listening and half sizing her up. I decided she would rectify my earlier misjudgment. I gave her the rest of the change in my wallet, which was regrettably less than I had given the man. However the black man across from me took out his wallet and gave her a dollar. So I figure I was partly responsible for more.
Posted by Lily at 05:30 PM
Mon | February 06, 2006
moby and opium
On Saturday night I went to the release party for opium .print #2. Moby was there. I have no idea how Todd got him there, or if it was just coincidental. I doubt it was coincidental.
I was standing with Curtis and Tao and Curtis said, "he could walk out with any woman in this room." I think the topic of discussion was whether Moby was cool, and this was Curtis's reasoning.
"He couldn't walk out with me," I said.
But a few seconds later Moby looked at me (and I of course looked at him, though I have no idea what expression was in my eyes when mine met his). Thereafter he seemed to be keeping track of where I was. Then, at the break in the reading when I left the people I was with and made my way through the crowd and down the stairs to the bathroom, he appeared a half-minute after me at the bottom of the stairs. There was one person between us on line. The guy two people ahead of me had started a conversation with the girl behind me because she was wearing some Seattle-connected t-shirt. We were not standing front to back, but side to side, and it would have been easy to say something to Moby.
I really wanted to. I wondered what the etiquette was-- whether it was rude to talk to a celebrity. Everyone else was letting him be. I wondered if he would react negatively. If I should know more about him first. I have some of his music but I'm not sooo familiar with it. And I wondered what the point was, really. What could I possibly accomplish with a few seconds of chit chat. Then I went back to wondering whether he would be happy if I said something to him. I tried to think, if I were a celebrity, or if I were Moby, whether I would want to be bothered. Whether he would think I was pretty or intelligent or both. Whether he thinks anyone is pretty or intelligent, after all the women he undoubtedly sees. What his motivation was, what he could possibly get out of it. My motivation was clear. But I did not know what I could possibly give him. Certainly not insight on his career, since I had not followed it. There are very few, if any, celebrities to whom I could give informed advice to, or even make an intelligent comment about something they did.
Nigrash. My word for the mess of doubts and thoughts and what if's that jumble up inside my brain when I am considering some hypothetical action-- a maby bubble. Usually the maby bubble is something that I on some level know that I would be much better doing poorly than not at all.
This was definitely such a case. It had been awhile since I was ever in such a situation-- I did not recognize it at the time. And yet that's another excuse. I should have swept my doubts aside and just said something. Anything. I totally could have.
The question I never considered before last Saturday and that I am now turning over in my mind is, Would I sleep with a celebrity?
Whoa, how do I get from talk to sex? Partly that's Curtis fault for putting it in my head at the beginning. But I like to think all the possibilities through to the end. It informs how I am. I would say how I act, but I don't really act. I just am one way or another or another.
So I have been thinking, would I talk to a celebrity, would I talk to Moby. And if he said come hang out at this other place, would I go. And if he said come back to my place, would I go, and then if... I suppose the ultimate answer is yeah, if I wanted to. It all goes back to whether you're attracted to the person or not. At the end of the day (or night) it's a question of person, and not of celebrity.
Posted by Lily at 12:00 AM
Fri | December 09, 2005
the presumptuous white man
I saw him again last night. I am not sure if he was the same person because he was wearing a different jacket-- a blue puffy vest, instead of the black wool coat. But he had the same slightly epileptic energy. He looks like an Aztec totem pole, tall and rectangular, with a solemn face and broad sagging cheeks. He is old, but not weak.
--
On Wednesday night I wanted to go to the Asian American Writers' Workshop for a panel on publishing short stories. However I missed the train by a full two minutes. I watched it glide across the overpass as I walked down Hillside.
As I stood in the cold, reading the train schedule and resenting myself for not putting on my shoes and getting out of the house more quickly, someone walked by behind me.
He didn't stop, but as he passed, he said, "where do you buy the tickets?" I didn't know whether he was talking to me or not-- the voice was a distance away, and not in my direction. I can tell whether sound is coming directly at me. I didn't turn around.
He walked by again seconds later and said, "where do you buy the tickets, I'm asking you nicely." As I turned my head he concluded, "you don't speak English, you're from China."
I do speak English, I half-muttered, the words staying mostly in my mouth.
At the same time he had continued without listening: "I'm from Mexico, I need to get to Penn Station."
"You don't buy the tickets here, you buy them on the train," I said. "The next train is at 6:10, you missed it."
He started to say something else but I walked away.
I thought how he irritated me: "I'm asking you nicely." He had taken on an adversarial tone. I had not done anything and he had escalated things to a confrontation. I wasn't ignoring you, I should have said. He should have said 'excuse me' and then waited for me to turn around. Instead he presumed it was my fault-- it was that I did not understand English. He just kept talking; he didn't wait for me to confirm or deny anything he had said.
When he said he was from Mexico I started to feel that he was just saying lines. That he was an actor and that he was delivering lines. I think I do this sometimes to convince myself that something isn't real, so I don't need to deal with it. "I'm from Mexico, I need to get to Penn Station." It sounded like he was just saying it. And it did not make sense- if he really thought I didn't speak English, why did he keep talking?
He didn't seem like he was from Mexico. He said "I'm asking you nicely" and who says that except white Americans and perhaps British people? It was in his manner- he just seemed like this societal white guy, who has supper and calls his basement the cellar. And it was in the capitalist way he situated himself in relation to me- the way he thought of himself and the way he thought of me. Unless Mexicans are capitalists, but I suspect they are not.
--
I saw him last night on the 10:39. He was wearing a blue puffy vest and he had a blue bag from the Met. He had gotten up as the train pulled into Chatham. There was a moment- a mental skip- when I saw him. He had just skipped himself and I skipped as his finished. I walked by and he went back a few seats to talk to another old white man. I don't know whether they knew each other or if he started the conversation just then. At any rate they talked to each other -mostly the Mexican to the second man, rather than vice versa- and I did not listen.
Posted by Lily at 02:18 PM
Mon | December 05, 2005
Forgotten Things
I have a tendency to become blissful and turn my brain off like I'm on the drop of a rollercoaster. Tao isn't like this. Jan is like this. I am going to go through everyone I know and think of whether or not or how much they are like this and try to detect any patterns.
I must be more mindful. Last night I hung out with Sharif and we were both kind of vacuous. We went to a bad kgb reading and then improv. I asked him what he thought the difference was between a story in which people have sex and porn. When is it just, this is porn. He said you know it when you see it. I have never seen it, so it doesn't help. I have an idea that it has something to do with vocabulary and emotion.
Whenever I make resolutions it's to do bad things. Like that I should lie more and watch porn. You're such a liar, he said. No, you are the liar, I should take some tips from you. I don't remember how we got to talking about lying. I might have written about it in this blog. I forget whether I've told him about this blog.
Last night I forgot that it was Sunday. I think this has happened before and I started to write about it and then I thought forget it, why do I write about such trivial things. But then it happened again and now I am thinking I must examine myself a little and figure out why I forget. Forgetting is fantasy, is disconnection with reality. Being in a writing state of mind involves disconnecting with this reality in order to more fully inhabit another. I have always been annoyed at writers who embrace their faults like some badge of their genius. I must be more mindful, that is all. I must be aware of how much I can forget before I start to miss trains.
I could not do anything after I realized I had been erroneously waiting for the 11:49, that I had not missed the 10:39-- it did not exist, there was nothing to miss-- I could have caught the 11:11, and was now waiting for the 12:34. I could not do anything after these revelations but I could not do anything before, either. I sat and wanted to go home. I observed the bums at Starbucks. I called Sharif and told him I missed my train. Well do you want to stay here? he asked. He meant his place in Fort Greene. He didn't mean anything else. No, I said, looking at my jeans with the rips and stitches and painted flowers. I might be able to get away with wearing them the next day at Kap, but I thought I had better not try.
I sat on the train until Orange and then had the inspiration to lie down on the three seater. At Millburn the conductor came by and called me Miss. He said I could lie down but that he didn't want me to miss my stop. Also there was a man coming around. By the way he said man I knew he meant creep. Write me a letter, the creep said, as we were leaving Summit.
This morning when I turned on the lamp it flashed and then expired. I remembered again how yesterday I sent that email to Jim but it went to the whole damn group. I forgot my cell phone. I left it in the pocket of my other jacket.
Improv is temporal. I forget what they said.
Sharif smells like dust. Last night I wanted nothing more than to go to the other side of the table and sit on his lap. Not in a provocative way, but in a cozy, intimate way. Instead I got up to leave, and he took a long time to put all his clothes on. A sweater and then a sweatshirt, and gloves, scarf and hat. I cannot believe you are the fussy one, I said. I put on my jacket and I'm done. While we were walking down 7th St. I borrowed his hat. When we got to the 8th St. N/R station we grinned at each other and said,
-bye!
-bye!
Last night when I called him from the Starbucks where I was surrounded by bums and crazy people, he told me that he left his wallet at the sushi place. Because I threw my fucking wallet in my fucking bag, and it fucking bounced off the edge of the bag instead of going in. He said this all good-naturedly. Over dinner he told me about this girl he slept with a few times and then told her it was turning into a relationship and he didn't want one of those. Oh, I said sympathetically. You probably hurt her feelings. No, he said, we hung out last week, for the first time in a month. I thought she must have been hurt anyway because when Eric broke up with me I was hurt but continued being friends anyway. I started to think of how to show him that she might be more hurt than she seemed, how to change the way he was thinking about her so that he would be nicer and more considerate. Oh what do I care about her, I said suddenly. I hope she gets hurt. Sharif laughed. I like him because I can say anything to him.
I told him about how I had to email ~~ recently to tell him I wasn't interested. That he had kept trying even though I kept brushing him off. That he had said thanks for the clarification, and I was surprised he didn't know. I wonder if I should email all the guys I know, I said, and tell them exactly what I think. I think they know, but maybe they don't. I tend to think everyone must know exactly what I think because I know exactly what they think. Still, after all these years, I don't know what I think of Sharif. And now that I'm thinking about it I don't know what anyone really thinks of me after all. Maybe I should instead email everyone and ask them what they think. But I am already forgetting my recent email disaster.
Posted by Lily at 12:07 PM
Fri | November 18, 2005
at a reading
I am at the Opium reading. It's at Happy Ending, an unmarked bar at the border of Chinatown and the Lower East Side.
I am here alone.
I am sitting next to a balding white guy. Todd later gestures to this guy and says to the crowd, "C___, very talented, will be reading on December 5th."
In front of me is a guy with curly hair who is eating pork lo mein. He is C___'s friend. I am at the corner of an L and they are the ends.
They don't talk to me; they talk to each other. They meet the girls on the right-- three of them, along the wall.
"We're friends of Todd," the one on the right says. It becomes evident that they don't have much to say. However they will laugh at anything you have. The conversation dies. I am relieved. I hate being an innocent bystander to conversations like that.
The guys go back to talking to each other. I feel that they want me to hear what they're saying, or that they're aware that I might be listening and take that into account. But I am not listening.
There is tension about my being there. Their conversation turns to the subject of my presence.
"Awkwardness is the next best thing to wisdom," curly-haired guy says to balding guy. Balding disagrees.
I take out my cell phone and start re-reading and deleting my text messages. They relax.
...
Now I am at the Delancey F/J/M/Z station. I feel like I am sitting in a clearing. There is a mosaic of cherry trees on the wall opposite the track.
The advertising inside the F is green. Anheuser World Lager. The best of both worlds.
...
I write all this on a napkin and type it up on the train ride home. Then I wipe my nose with the napkin.
The people across from me seem inclined to talk. They are impressed that I have my laptop plugged in.
"That's really neat," the woman says, in her best imitation of a teenager.
"How do you know where you can plug it in?" he asks.
"Where there's an outlet," I say, with an unintended tinge of sarcasm. "You just have to keep your eyes peeled," I add encouragingly, to make up for it.
He is in jeans and a charcoal fleece. I try not to make eye contact. When I look up, it's at the conductor at the entryway to the next car.
I get the feeling that I don't use good sentence construction. I try not to care.
Posted by Lily at 12:54 AM
Mon | November 14, 2005
Tao Lin
Tao is applying to Kaplan. You don't need a job! I said, punching him twice in the arm. But he is like I was a few years ago. He wants a job; he won't feel normal until he has one. He is advanced of where I was; I burned a year in film and then another year or so at two ill-fitting jobs before landing at Kap. And hell, he knows he wants to be a writer. I didn't know that, or I didn't admit that, until January 2004. Then I didn't really do anything about it until January of this year. I mean I thought I was doing things, but I really wasn't. Maybe I'm not even really doing things now. But I think I am.
Tao is like chococat. He has this spaceyness about him. I barely know him, which is why I can write about him. I think once you get to know people it's harder to write about them, because there's something at stake then. Also, once you get to know someone, you forget them a little. You forget your first impressions and you don't see their physical features anymore. Or I don't.
Tao has hair like black grass. Like the grass in a wooden box that you can put on your city apartment windowsill. I didn't remember his hair being this way before, but the last time I saw him, it was like this. Maybe he styled it that way. But I don't see him as someone who styles his hair. I see him more as someone who wears the same navy sweatshirt and pants for days on end. Who wakes up and lets his hair be whatever it is. Yet I may be confusing him with myself. I do that sometimes.
His brain is mushy and poetic. This is why he is so spacey. He's really overwhelmed by the world, in a way. He'll say things that are basic observations, as if they are big revelations to him. One Sunday at KGB there was this old man sitting nearby, and Tao said, "he's so old," drawing out the 'oh' in 'old,' as if he were old himself. As if by being near an old man Tao somehow experienced his oldness.
I met him at an Opium reading. He read some poems. One of his poems was called "some of my happiest moments are on IM." Or something like that. Another one had a line like, "I'd rather be unhappy and honest than dishonest and unhappy." Or something.
On his blog he writes that the people he likes never like him. I suppose that implies that he doesn't like the people who like him. (Or maybe it doesn't. When I took philosophy of logic I nearly failed it.) At any rate, since I like him, he probably doesn't like me. But I think he meant "like" as in, "like like."
Maybe we will continue to be acquainted and grow into friends. But then I would have to delete this post. I don't think there's anything up here he would object to, though.
I wonder if he will work at K. It seems to be the fate of Kaplan to employ every lost soul between the ages of 21-25.
Posted by Lily at 10:08 PM
Thu | November 03, 2005
First Smoke
I tried my first cigarette last night. I had mentioned to Steve some time ago that I had never smoked a cigarette.
"Really?" he said.
"Nope."
"Have you smoked pot?"
"Nope. I've been in a room where people have been smoking."
I've been missing Steve. I saw him last May and we started talking on the phone every once in awhile, through the summer and early fall. Now I feel out of touch with him again. I don't have any reason to call. And yet I didn't before, either. I think one definition of a friend is someone you feel you can call for no reason, with nothing in particular to say. Or maybe that's the definition of a good conversationalist. A combination of both, I think.
Lynn, one of my few New Jersey friends, went to Vanderbilt with her boyfriend this past weekend. Brian had an interview for dental school. Lynn doesn't want to move down there. "I don't want to hang out with hicks," she said.
"I think they're all right," I said. Steve works at Vanderbilt.
So the smokes. It happened last night after the event at the Brown club. As I was leaving, I ran into Bilal outside the building. Bilal was wearing a Brown sweater with a giant "B" on the front, and a Brown baseball cap. He has a pretty good sense of humor. "Let's get a drink," he said.
"I don't feel like it," I said. "I'm going to catch the subway."
"Let me say goodbye to this person," he said, looking through the glass at some people coming down the stairs. "And I'll come with you."
Out the door came a well-groomed Indian woman and a bald white man with a rim of white hair. His head was shiny and phosphorescent. We chatted for a few minutes. I don't remember what was said.
"What do you want to do?" the bald white man said to the Indian woman.
She murmured something indefinite.
"It's up to you," he said.
"I'm going to catch the subway. Where is it?" I asked the woman.
"I'm not a subway person," she said. She meant she cabs it everywhere.
"I think it's that way, where that "M" is," said Bilal.
"Thanks," I said. I bid them goodnight and left. I wondered if I should have tried harder to save the beautiful Indian woman from the disgusting white man.
I was swiping myself through the turnstile when Bilal appeared behind me.
"___ is so obnoxious!" he said. I do not remember the name.
"Who?"
"The bald white guy!"
"Oh."
"He spit in my face! He wouldn't stop talking!" Bilal exclaims everything.
I started walking over to the tracks, but he wandered to the newsstand. "Do you smoke?" he asked.
"Nope."
He got a pack of cigarettes from the vendor. "Do you want anything?" he asked.
"Nope. Well-- gum," I said. He got some gum.
"This is my favorite gum," he said. It was cinnamon, the kind that you pop out of the foil casing.
We got on the N. I looked over and Bilal was stuffing pieces of gum in his mouth like the cookie monster.
"How much gum are you eating?" I exclaimed.
"Just- four."
I took the empty foil package from him. "That's six!"
"No, it's four, you had one, and this one is in my hand, I haven't put it in my mouth yet."
We talked about his apartment in Tribeca, which he claimed was the size of six subway cars. It seemed preposterous.
"There aren't apartments that big in Manhattan," I said.
"Yes, there are. I live in one. Of course I will have to move out when I finish with it." He turns real estate, I think, for a living. I was somewhat taken with the idea that I wanted to see this apartment.
"Let me buy you a drink," he said.
"I'm going to K-town to check email," I said. "You can come if you like."
We got off at 34th Street. It was nearly ten. I walked in my usual direction. I had half an hour to check my email, and then catch the 10:39 train. "Where are you going?" he asked.
"To K-town," I said. As we walked down the street he pulled out his cigarettes.
"Do you smoke?" he asked.
"No," I said.
By this point Bilal had proposed a drink about a dozen times, and he was now waving to the Korean über-hipsters hanging out on the sidewalk at every storefront.
"Let me try it," I said, holding my hand out for the cigarette. He started to hand it over but then changed his mind. This began a discussion that lasted the entire walk to Net Zone. He did not want me to become addicted to smoking. I said I would not. He said I would. I said I would not, I would never smoke again. I just wanted to try it. He made me promise. I promised. He was not convinced. We stopped in front of the stairs.
"It would make my night," I said.
"Really?" he said.
"It would be like, I did something new," I said.
And so he taught me to smoke. Or, he gave me the cigarette and looked anxiously on as I figured it out myself, and asked him for clues.
"Like that?"
No answer.
"You didn't--"
"What?"
He took it back. He took a drag.
"I don't think I did anything," I said.
"You didn't," he admitted. I took it back. I felt the resistance as I sucked the cigarette this time. I let the smoke out of my mouth.
I gave it back to him. He had the look of someone who had gotten away with something.
"Wait-- do you have to inhale?"
I took it back.
"Like that?"
"Yes," he said.
He asked again about the drink. "Why are you so abhorrent to getting a drink?"
This started a conversation about the word abhorrent, and better words that might have been used.
"Oh, let's go to a café," I said. By this time it was too late to go up to Net Zone. I only had ten minutes. We went across the street and got a mini-cheesecake but they would not let us sit there if we did not buy drinks. Koryodang has weird rules.
We walked to Penn Station. The Dover train was already boarding. "I don't want this," he said, handing me the bag with the cake, "so I'm just going to give it to you."
"Okay," I said. It was my mother's birthday. She could use a little cake.
Posted by Lily at 12:07 PM
Fri | October 28, 2005
party city
Yesterday I got my Jedi costume at Party City. I don't know if it was just this Party City, or some sort of institutionalized bureacracy, but my visit went something like this:
I walked into the store and it was like a messy kid's room. I wandered around hoping I'd find a Jedi costume by myself, because interacting with store people can be somewhat exasperating. Besides, I had never been there and wanted to look around.
I became aware that everyone else in the store was relying on the staff to get them things from the back. So I got the attention of a man in a dark purple polo with an enormous beer belly. I wanted to say, "You should be 'pregnant movie star.'"
I asked him if he had any Jedi costumes.
"Adult or children?" he asked.
"Adult," I said.
He went into the back. Five minutes later he came back. "Nope, no more," he said.
"Do you have any children's?" I asked. "Sometimes I can fit into a large children's size."
He nodded his head and disappeared. Five minutes later he was back again. I wondered if he had a timer, to make you wait the same amount of time each time. "All we have is a medium," he said.
I opened it and it was a polyester print t-shirt and pants that were obviously the size of a seven year old. The pants were hopeless, but I tried the shirt on and it fit perfectly. I mean, it's not supposed to fit perfectly-- it's supposed to hang loosely. But, actually I think it looks better on me fitted like that.
The all-important light saber is absent from my costume because I had gone there a half an hour before a tutoring session and there was not time to engage the store person again. Notice how you can't just say, "get me a costume, everything I need at once." You have to ask for things one at a time.
At any rate I had fun because --well, the place was full of costumes. I looked around and tried on a lavender and white haired wig while waiting for the store guy. The place was full of trivial moms worrying about their children's costumes, but there were also a few guys just hanging around who smiled in approval of my wig. I think next year I will just be, girl in a wig.
The costume, which was not even a real Jedi robe, but a stretchy rayon shirt with the image of a robe printed on it, was a whopping $25. "Wow, that's really steep," I said to the cashier. She nodded.
Posted by Lily at 01:13 PM
Thu | October 27, 2005
the sushi place
Today I went to this sushi place for lunch, because I could tell it was going to be one of those days where unless I get out, I will do a little of everything all day, and thus do nothing. The best thing for me to do on such days is pick a book, pick a notebook, and leave the house. That way the only choices I have are read the book or write in the notebook.
The sushi place had tall booths made of bamboo and wood of the same tan color. It felt spacious and private at the same time. It was a great place to write and I was glad I went. I got there at about 2 and stayed til 3:30. I was a little uneasy about staying too long, especially since they had taken my order, brought the food, and given me the bill all really quickly. But I figured I was justified staying as long as I pleased, especially since it was the middle of the afternoon and no one was there. And so I stayed until I finished a writing exercise. I wanted to do another one but I thought I had better leave. It was my first time there and I thought, I will come back, and maybe stay a little longer next time.
I got up to go. As I walked by the other booths, I saw that there was one person sleeping in each booth. All the employees were napping. Well that is nice, I thought. Sincerely, I was happy for them that they had jobs where they could sleep in the middle of the day if there was nothing to do. There was also something surreal about it-- I felt as if I had walked into a private dormitory.
I looked back on the door as I left and saw a "closed" sign, and reading the hours, found that the place is only open from 11-2:30 for lunch and 5-9:30 for dinner.
Posted by Lily at 12:23 AM
Mon | October 24, 2005
City Life
I have noticed that I go through phases of what may be called cabin fever, though calling it that somewhat trivializes the state I am in at these times. I live in suburban New Jersey and I work part time for an income, and the rest of the time I am "trying to be a writer." I do not have nearly enough local friends and am always a bit socially hungry. However, most of my friends and acquaintances would be surprised to hear me say that, because I am fairly good at shelving this when I do see people.
These episodes of cabin fever come somewhat regularly, and I sometimes wonder if they may be attached to the third week of my menstrual cycle. At any rate I had the idea to intercept the cycle by spending a few days at my friend's place in Brooklyn. I called up my friend and he said, "sure!" and that he gets lonely going home to an empty apartment. I had told him that I wanted to try writing in a different setting, for a change of pace, or scene, to see if I would get more done that way. This was true, and was really just another way of stating the same problem. If my cabin fever did not result in distraction, unproductivity, and finally despair, with respect to writing, I would not mind it at all.
My friend happens to be my ex-boyfriend, and he happens to have absolutely broken my heart about a year ago. Because of this I do not feel guilty asking him for anything. Nothing short of a donated kidney could make up the balance sheet between us. That makes it sound as if I am not really over it, but I know myself pretty well, and I know the relationship even better, and I am well over it all. I have forgiven and forgotten-- but I have the archives should they ever need to be retrieved.
We sat on the couch in his living room-kitchen, after having gone to dinner, after he met me, much later than he had given the impression he would meet me, at the cafe near his apartment.
"Do you want to sleep here, or in there?" he asked, pointing to his bedroom.
"And you would sleep here?" I asked hopefully.
"No, we would both sleep there. I think we could manage it," he said, without the least bit of suggestiveness.
"I think I had better sleep out here," I said neutrally.
That night I woke several times to rustling. Was it the shades? The windows were closed. I could see the streetlight through the interstices of the venetian blinds. There was no movement, although I stared until it seemed there might be. I feared that great New York fear, the everyday fear, of vermin. It sounded like the rustling of plastic bags or foil. It took a few wakeups to think of this. My senses were heightened as I tried to localize the sound. I could only fall asleep by saying to myself, it's only the wind.
In the morning I got up and brushed my teeth. Eric had left his dishes in the sink. I washed them. Then continuing with the cleaning theme I took a look at the counter. He had left the cutting board out with crumbs on it, and more crumbs on the counter. I remembered noting this habit of his a year ago when I had been there last. I emptied the cutting board into the sink and then used the board to catch the remaining crumbs as I wiped them off the table with a paper towel. It was then that I noticed the unmistakable sight of mice droppings on the counter by the wall. They are like dried henna, as it chips off your skin-- except they are shaped specifically as tiny long thin pellets. I swept them onto the cutting board and considered whether I would tell him what I had found. He would question how I knew those were mice droppings and I would say, when I worked at A&G we had a mouse problem and it kept us engaged for a few weeks.
I did not come to fill lacks in Eric's domestic duties, and I knew I must stop or I'd be cleaning the whole apartment. I did one more thing-- I wet the paper towel and gave the steel counter a wipedown. The upturned towel was black with soot. I felt a renewed gratefulness for my mother's neatness at home. As well as my own.
The rest of the day was much like any other day, with writing alternating with what must be called daydreaming. The difference was that I took the subway into Manhattan at around 4, to hang about a different cafe, and meet with a friend for an hour at around 5, and then go to Kurt Vonnegut's reading at around 6:30. However the reading was cancelled and I only met with the friend.
That night during the course of our conversation I diplomatically related my findings of the morning. "Oh, I know," he said.
"I thought I was breaking bad news."
"No," he said.
"And last night, I heard a sound like rustling, of aluminum foil--"
"I had a roll in a plastic bag," he said, "and there was a hole in it this morning about this deep." He held up his hand with his thumb and forefinger about an inch apart. I was vaguely reminded of fish stories, wherein the teller brags about his catch.
He had gotten out two conjoined glossy styrofoam squares. "My landlord gave me these about a year ago," he said. "They smell like bananas and peanut butter."
"Your habits make the mice come," I said. "That won't really change anything."
"Well," he said, ignoring me, "should I put them out now or--"
"Wait until I'm gone," I said.
"Right."
Now I am back in New Jersey and the rain is clean and refreshing. I slept very late this morning. I might have had some catching up to do, because Eric's place also has a lot of street traffic noise, and I have never slept really well there, mice or no mice.
As I was thinking it all over I realized that he must have eaten the roll.
Posted by Lily at 10:47 PM
Sun | October 09, 2005
KGB
I ran into Todd at KGB. This doesn't happen to me, I don't run into people, mostly because I am not out that often.
I mostly remember Todd Zuniga for channeling Willy Wonka in a dapper suit. Or maybe that's what I envision because I friendster stalked him and he's wearing a velvet blazer in his photo. Or maybe he's not but this is how I envision him in my head. No, I'm not in love with him. I don't know him. I can count on my fingers the things that I know about him. One— if he won 3K, he would "go to Paris, ASAP!" That's what he wrote to me in an email. I had written, "if I won 3K I would throw a party. what would you do?" He had emailed me about a writing contest, which expired about two seconds after he emailed it to me. I mean, not me personally, but, me and however million people he knows.
Two, I went to his Opium reading and he is kind of effeminate and flowy in his movements, shall we say gay? without actually being gay, while being clearly straight. Which you know by the way he looks at you. That, really, is how you tell. Like my MCM TA in college. I knew she was gay because of the way she looked at me. I can still remember that moment when, after class, when a few people were standing around to ask questions/ discuss things, and I was waiting my turn, she looked over and winked at me. Twice.
In retrospect that was really obvious. But Chrissa disagreed, years later, when I told her on the phone that that had happened. Maybe she had something in her eye, she said. No, I told her, she turned her head and winked. It was very deliberate. Chrissa didn't think it necessarily meant that, but she wasn't there. I mean, actually, she was, right next to me, at the time, but she didn't notice it. I turned to her to see if she saw, but she hadn't. She was thinking about film theory while I was formulating personal theories about everyone. I did this especially in humanities classes, rather than science classes. I hardly ever speculated about the people in those classes. Except for Hannah, who seemed to hate me for no, fucking, reason. Like she hated me. I swear, I have no idea why. I have turned this puzzle around in my head for years.
I would have doubted it except that she did it twice. Did it once, went back to talking for about thirty seconds, then looked over again. Why did she do that? So that is my gay experience.
The reason I am perpetually single, perhaps fated to be permanently so, is that I live off of these snippets. If I had a real relationship, like with Eric, there would just be too much to analyze. so much would be happening at once, all the time. He could never keep up with me, in the number of thoughts being had about the relationship. I always had a million and he had none. I think, in a way, you are only evenly matched, well matched with someone, if you have about the same number of thoughts in your head about something. or at least certain things, that are very important to you. or at least, about the relationship itself. if you don't have equal amounts of thought, one of you gets frustrated.
I said goodbye without even talking to him. There's that part of me that doesn't want to admit that I want anything.
This is why when Nick said, "I hope to see you again," I said the alienating conversation stopper, "I hardly ever go out. I live in New Jersey."
I really said that, I swear. I didn't even mean it as a back off (as opposed to a come on). I just said what was in my head. Nick is this other guy that was there.
I am a writer because I always say the worst thing. And then I rewind and revise it in my head on the train ride home.
"I hope to see you again," he says.
"Well do you want my number?" I say pleasantly.
You know-- he said it casually. "I hope to see you again," while, like, moving, like already on his way out. There was no stopping for the collection or exchange of numbers. That's why I kind of said whatever the hell I felt like, which was completely the wrong thing to say.
And then he looked put off, about new jersey, and I said "it’s ok," because I really am ok with it, now, for the most part. and he said, "well denial is a stage," or something like that. He was putting on his jacket. "I’m past it," I said. we were still acting friendly. we had just started to say mean things. but they didn't feel mean. they only look mean on the page. I swear the conversation was pleasant and cheery. But he probably felt like I had put him off when I was just like, you’ll never see me again. God, the more I review it the worse that conversation was. This is why I never talk to people.
Real life isn't like Sex and the City (or any television show or movie I've seen recently). Sex and the City is this La-La Land, where people just say and do these impossible things and relationships start in these impossible ways. They start just like that. It's a snap!
Everything is snappy on television and horribly wrong in real life. If even writers can't say the right thing, how will anyone end up with anyone?
After Nick and Tao went, I put on my jacket and left also, immediately, like in the next twenty seconds. Then I realized I was inadvertently following them and so went in a deli and stood there for about thirty seconds, and then resumed walking. And then I regretted being so honest because I actually wanted to follow them, but knew that I shouldn't, but that they would never have found out.
I am not religious but I say, "oh my god," "I swear," all the time. I picked it up from growing up in waspy chatham.
I am a writer because I analyze what I just said, and say, why did I say that? where did those words come from? They came from my head. But they also came from everything I've heard previously.
It never ends.
Three, he's tall, reminiscent of string, and kind of a goofball. He is allegedly like, 30, which I neither believe nor disbelieve. It's a hypothesis to be tested. Shirley's friendster says she's 41, because that's how old she feels.
I am too old for him anyway. I gather he's two or three years out of school. He looks older. He looks like he could be my age. I look like I could be his age. If you want to see me again you must have my number, I say archly. At any rate I want more writer friends, they need not be love interests. They need not be older; I am young as a writer.
I would know if I were in love. I am just crazy, I replay all these things in my head for no reason. And now I type them out for no reason. They're not even important, they are a look, a glance, a movement of the arm. I look at them again and again. I am not in love with them, but in a way, I am, in love with all of them.
I walked briskly home tonight. I walked faster than usual because I felt happy. I wondered, is the pace that people in general, walk, in the city— you know, there is a definite pace, that people generally walk, en masse, on the sidewalk, and you run into trouble if you are walking slightly slower or slightly more quickly— is that a reflection of the city's overall happiness?
Posted by Lily at 11:30 PM | comment
Thu | October 06, 2005
come again
Who reads this anyway? I can see in my site stats that a number of different IP addresses visit the site, but have no idea who any of them are. The reason I ask is, I am about to tell about my little trip today. It was all in the name of writing, I swear.
I went to an 'erotic emporium,' for a book reading, which wasn't a book reading, but a book signing, or a prostitute (sorry, I don't know the euphemism for the word) sitting on a stool by the counter, surrounded by plastic penises and other sex toys that were mostly some variation on that same theme. And then there was a surprisingly steady flow of creepy men, just slimy, gross men, I mean who literally looked slimy-- moist, clammy-looking, with oily skin, or just, long-unwashed hair. and long hair. long and long-unwashed. ahh!
I'm fairly unadulterated and this was out of character for me. It was scary. But also silly and exciting at the same time. I felt like I was another person. I certainly had never met people like that, only ignored them, as best I could, on the subway, or wherever they lurk. Somehow in the context of the store they were talkable. Talkable meaning, I could talk to them. Don't tell me that's not a word.
Oh and there was a book, which as far as I could tell was soft porn packaged in a cheery tone. It reminded me of that exercise we did in writing class, where we took a story, and wrote it in different tones: sad, happy, old, and young. I wasn't really great at that.
Actually-- it's not soft porn, it's just porn. I bought the book, it's right here, I've taken it out. I opened it and read just the first page. I don't even know what soft porn is, but this seems a bit too frank to be called soft. Anyway, the book is a manifestation of Asian obliviousness. Starting from this blissfully white cover with its yellow condoms that are the eyes in this smiley face, it's hard to describe, here is the amazon link, and block of magenta color at the bottom. And ending... well I haven't read it, so I don't know where it all ends. At any rate I'm sure it never portrays prostitution as the demeaning act that it is. The position is that they're respectable professionals. That's right, position.
But wait, she's Asian, yeah, that's why I was interested, really, because I want to save Asian culture from itself, and from the problems it gets into by being itself, and this is definitely one of the problems. This author is an ex-prostitute, actually (she's made a career change to writing, hurrah!), but why are there so many Asian prostitutes? I think they are unaware of how degrading it is. Things I will sort out later. Why am I writing so much? I have to go.
But wait, why did I buy the book? To be polite, really, because I hung around for so long, and because I liked her. And because I wanted her to like me. It would be nice to earn her implicit trust, and become friends. I would be a good friend. I told her about the Tale of Genji. And she wants to be more erudite, I can tell. Ultimately I'd benefit her more than she would benefit me. Currently I have a lot to learn from her about how to go about being a writer. She wrote for salon.com, she had a sex column. And I have nowhere to go but up.
If it did happen, it would be very gradual, a Jamesian progress, and over a long period of time, just here and there. It would be nice if I just met one really great person who would work closely with me and guide me along. They don't even need to be that great, or that close. They just need to be there. But I think what will happen with me is that I'll have to cobble it together from what little I pick up here and there. From many of these little appetizers I will try to make a meal.
Posted by Lily at 11:26 PM | comment
Mon | July 11, 2005
evil mockingbird
my father used to be a farmer-- or a farm boy, as he calls himself. he says they used buffalo to plow the fields. I think it was not the american buffalo but a buffalo of a different sort. after school he would take the buffalo out to graze and then sit under the shade of a tree to study.
it is a remnant of my father's agrarian past that he spends much of his spare time surveying our small plot of lawn. he walks around with his hands in his pockets and looks at the grass and the woodchips and the trees. sometimes I join him and he will point at certain tree branches and tell me they are dying. he will show me where he has dug out the edges of the landscaping.
on saturday we were thus engaged in this activity when we heard a squirrel fall out of a tree. or specifically, we heard the slapping sound when he hit the pavement at the end of his twenty-something foot fall. by the time we turned around to look the squirrel was walking away. not limping, or moving irregularly, but walking. squirrels, you know, usually hop and bound their way along, unless they are feeling cautious, or I suppose in this case, a little woozy.
overhead we saw the mockingbird flying away. I am not sure if this is the proper name for the bird but it's what we call it. it is a small grey bird with a white stripe on its tail.
it's the only animal I have actively disliked, besides perhaps rats and mice, which just about everyone dislikes, for being dirty house and apartment infestations. but I mean disliked for its personality, for just the way they are. oh wait there are oblivious pigeons-- the way they just walk around without seeming to know where they're going. they can be mildly infuriating. they are like tourists that walk in weird directions and disrupt pedestrian traffic flow.
anyway it is kind of interesting that the mockingbird seems to have a personality (as opposed to say, the robins or the bluejays). but it is unfortunate that it is such a rotten one. it is very territorial and it will take on anyone. it literally attacks other animals for no reason. I have actually found dead birds next to the mockingbird's favorite tree, which I suspect were killed by the mockingbird. and I have seen it chasing squirrels across the lawn. when sharif amin came to my house he called the bird by a different name, and said that it takes on dogs. which just seems so crazy to me, because some dogs can catch birds.
anyway the mockingbird is just really mean. that squirrel that fell out of the tree-- taking a bunch of leaves and twigs with it-- amazingly, walked away, but was probably bleeding internally and walked into some bushes somewhere to die.
Posted by Lily at 01:46 AM | comment
Sun | July 03, 2005
I think I killed a sparrow
on friday I was walking home, and as I got to the driveway I noticed a sparrow standing on the ground in the middle of the road. I noticed it didn't fly away even though I passed within a few feet of it. So I turned around and took another look. It didn't look injured or anything, but it still didn't fly away-- it just hopped. it spread its wings a little in an attempt to fly but it just hopped. it was really cute so I followed it a little more. it was just so cute as it hopped and chirped. then suddenly it hopped into a drain. I hadn't watched where I was going and I was just like OMG.
I felt so guilty. in retrospect I realize it was a fuzzy chick. it wasn't really fuzzy persay, but its feathers weren't as neatly patted down as an adult sparrow's. it was kind of fluffy. That was one thing I noticed during those few seconds that I menaced the poor thing. and it had started to chirp because it was scared. I thought it was cute but it was actually terror.
I told my dad about it and we got to talking about how he used to eat sparrows in taiwan. His uncle would put up a net maybe fourty feet wide. He would tie the nearly transparent net between two trees in the area where the sparrows were hanging out. Then he'd blow an eagle whistle. The sparrows would fly into the net.
My dad also used to catch frogs. The way he caught them is kind of neat. but I'll save that for another day. or perhaps never. I think any chinese person who knows how to do it would tell it freely, but I like to keep a few things to myself.
There is something nice about living in an environment/lifestyle where you catch your own food, and sort of find your way about using what is around you. It's like you have a real relationship with the world instead of this completely manufactured one. Or I guess it's just being connected with the natural environment, actually participating in this predator-prey relationship that all other animals do.
My dad has mentioned more than once that you can't eat anything in taiwan anymore (that is, you can't just go out and catch something to eat) because it is all polluted. When he went back for his father's funeral the river where he used to catch frogs was polluted and had no more frogs. His neighbor had a fish farm and now it is filled in and is a car dealership. My dad's farm grew rice and a bunch of other stuff. He says everyone grew everything, a few different things, whatever they felt like. And then they'd share with their neighbors.