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Throw open your doors. The air is here.
Just before dawn it came peeping in my window, sliding above the sheets along my bare upper arm. It tugged at my shirt while I walked to the market for butter and avocados. It all but hid for my afternoon tennis game, leaving me damp around the temples and alone on the cracking blacktop courts. Maybe it had a lunch date, or waited until I left to sneak through the screen and sample the scones I’d left warm and defenseless on the counter. But it’s Saturday evening and the air is back, just in from the ocean and looking for a place to stay the night.
I have known other airs. The crisp blast of a January wind, careening through the back alleys of the District of Columbia, a wind that powers through the seams of your jacket and the weave of your sweater. The indolent drift of a North Florida afternoon, which, in September, turns a porch swing into a porch sludge. And spring picnic air, settling across your shoulders like a silk scarf, already imperceptible by dessert. But today’s May air is barely related–a third cousin once removed–to these other airs. It flirts with the hairs at the napes of our necks, but does not demand our attention. It lingers in the lilac bush on the corner, then suggests we pull on a sweater.
Today’s May air is a little bit coy, but she knows she can get away with it. And it is a she, quite clearly, so let’s despense with the gender-neutral pronouns. After all, we’re the ones on the patio, begging, even now at dusk–or especially now–please, if you want, please come in. She is hot and cold, and we can’t commit to socks or sandals, but she is intoxicating with her evening perfume, the way she breathes behind our ears.
Yesterday was a bad day. As far as bad days go, I thought, “this is a doozie.” Someone said to me, “we’ve hit a new low.” And I thought it was true.
But then I drank beer with some good friends. Drank beer and ate chocolate. And I felt like the new low was not really so low. Because I have good friends and beer and chocolate.
As I was riding my bike home sometime after midnight, I rode past a figure lying face down on the sidewalk, a man in a blue parka. I stopped a few feet away and called out, “Are you okay?” He tried to move but couldn’t. “You don’t need to call anyone,” he said, his voice muffled against the pavement. As he lifted his face to me, I saw a pool of blood collecting in the brim of his straw Panama hat, where he’d been resting his head. His glasses were cracked and bloody. “You don’t need to call 911,” he said, “but if you could just watch me. For a minute. I am very drunk and I’ve fallen and I am close to my house. If you could just watch me stand up.” I waited as he rolled over and then over again on the sidewalk, seemingly unable to even move into a sitting position.
“I don’t think you can stand up,” I said. “I think I should call someone.”
“Let me explain,” he said. “I appreciate your concern. You are very nice to watch me. I understand that you are worried, but I was at a party for some… very good people. Who died. Let me explain. I am not having a good day. But I can make it to my house, if I can just roll over here.”
And I waited. Finally, some people came along, stumbling home from the bars on 4th Avenue–a man and a woman. “Are you all okay?” they asked.
“He’s hurt,” I said, grateful for some company. The woman said, “Grandpa, are you drunk? Homeless? Are you okay, old man?” (though he was not that old). She said, “Let’s get you home, gramps,” and she and her friend went to him and grabbed his arms. “Don’t do it like that,” she snapped her friend, assuring the man was uprighted with the utmost gentleness.
“Let me explain,” he said. “I am very drunk. And I’ve fallen. It’s my fault.”
“I’m going to get you to your house, and take a look at this cut you’ve got,” she said. I waited until it was clear they’d take care of him, then I pedaled up the hill.
Typically, I’m not one for unsubtle symbolism, but I’m not sure I’ve had a more conveniently symbolic moment than biking home on the “new low” day to find a man who is literally face down in the gutter on Easter Sunday. The gutter—our symbol of emotional lowness—on Easter—our cultural celebration of resurrection. As symbolic moments go, this one is so unsubtle that I almost talked myself out of writing about it. The obvious lesson from this story is that I cannot possibly be at a low of any sorts when my basic needs are so plentifully met: I have not only bread and water but also beer and chocolate. I live in a city of kind strangers, but I am also surrounded by generous friends. I am not in the gutter, but instead I am riding by, sober enough to see myself into my cozy bed. If we are here to talk about small things, my low is very small.
I think sometimes, as perhaps most people do, about the limits of my kindness. I do not want to ignore someone in the gutter, but I do not want to pick him up and walk him home. I have been taught to fear blood, and drunken strangers, and men on the streets when I am alone late at night. Perhaps this symbol is better understood in the less obvious way: a sign of my limits, of what I am not willing to give to someone else. This symbol is less convenient and lends itself less willingly to life lessons. From it I can understand that, most of the time, we have no perspective on our own lives. Surely this man, passed out on the street corner, had no more perspective than I did. But today we are both reminded of something complex about ourselves, something we probably don’t prefer to consider. We all want our lives to be easier.
When I was seventeen, my friend Lisa and I spent hours discussing twenty-seven. We loved imagining the lives we would have in ten years’ time. When we were twenty-seven, we thought, we’d have some things figured out, we’d be the best version of ourselves.
I suspected that at twenty-seven I’d be living in Charleston, South Carolina, working as a curator at an art museum, married to my intellectual family-man husband (who I’d married at twenty-five), and pregnant with our first child–a girl. We’d go to parties–gallery openings–and drink champagne with our young artsy friends. We’d live in the city but by the beach, in the carriage house behind an old sprawling southern mansion. We’d sit on the porch and drink mint juleps (not that I knew what a mint julep was).
Today is my last official day of my twenty-seventh year, and I think the close of such a momentous year deserves a moment of reflection. Twenty-seven was the year of powder skiing, and noticing creases that don’t quite go away when I stop smiling, and setting up a home in what my sister calls “the love nest.” It’s not quite what I envisioned for myself. At seventeen, having lived my whole life in one small town in southwestern Virginia, I could hardly imagine a life outside the American South, much less outside the country. And perhaps you noticed that alcohol as status symbol plays a major role in my fantasies, though who drinks a mint julep I don’t know (my one attempt at making some went terribly awry when, in the absence of simple syrup, we tried to sweeten it with maple syrup–it goes without saying this did not take place in the South). Now I’m a beer girl, something my seventeen year old self might find a little disenchanting. And I’m no where near ready to start a family, though to keep things in perspective, you should know that in southwestern Virginia twenty-seven is pretty late in the procreation game. At seventeen I’d never tasted tofu or seen Thai food, but, to perpetuate certain Appalachian stereotypes, I had been driving a tractor for at least six years.
Still, I don’t think I’d look like a stranger to my seventeen year old self. I was ready to get out of my home town and I think she’d be pleased to know how far I’ve taken it. And even though I’m not a curator, a writer-slash-professor is a pretty great runner-up. My rock climbing and sushi eating habits, however, would’ve seemed awfully bold to her.
Mainly, though, I think she’d be a little worried to hear how un-adult twenty-seven can feel at times. As Lisa wrote in an e-mail last year, “I thought I would be more tied down or closer to having it figured out or a least closer to looking like an adult.” Seventeen year old Mandy would be unimpressed by my craigslist futon (we all know twenty-seven year olds invest in proper sofas) and the fact that I still wear my scruffy yellow Chucks. But despite the charms of the fantasy, I don’t think I’d fit into the life she imagined for me. This life is richer than her fantasy, full of experiences (salmon sashimi, for example) that are beyond the borders of her map. Justin says I see too many limits, that I make arbitrary rules about what I can’t do (like ride my bike in the rain or climb 5.11 or ski in -15C), but I prefer to think of it as easing into a world that was once beyond my conception. I eat more chocolate chip cookies and make more mistakes than I did at seventeen. I’m no longer afraid of A minuses, but that’s an easy thing to say when you’re the one with the pen in your hand. In one way, though, twenty-seven has been what I expected: I feel at home in the life I’ve made for myself. Fantasizing about that feeling, about a life I fit into, was what made the whole exercise so appealing in the first place. I don’t know what I imagined I’d become after twenty-seven, but, starting tomorrow, I’m looking forward to finding out.
(twenty-seven year old’s shoes)
(in the city but by the beach–on a different coast)
Today was a crummy day. Today was the kind of day people who are afraid to move to the Pacific Northwest cite as their primary excuse: gray, gloomy, slow. Today feels unsorted, as if it’s been wearing mismatched socks and just ran out of coffee. Today stubbed its big toe on the kitchen stool, then forgot to pack a cookie in its lunchbox. Today accidentally ran into and practically knocked over an old lady on the crosswalk. I’m not the type of girl to use the word crummy, mainly because I don’t live in the Andy Griffith Show, but today was totally, totally crummy.
It wasn’t supposed to be crummy. Today I was meant to have coffee with one friend, dinner with another. Today I was meant to wear pajamas all morning, to play with a baby, to eat a homemade chocolate chip cookie for breakfast. Well, I did do those things, but today didn’t right itself until an old friend showed up unexpectedly. I was in the Capers, buying produce with Matti when I heard him in the store. Crooning, or was it cawing, but still, so distinct, and it was, the way things are only in movies, perfectly timed. The voice went like this,
Singing in the sunshine, laughing in the rain
Hitting on the moonshine, rocking in the grain
I know what you’re thinking, Robert Plant is not your old friend, Mandy. You do not know him personally, nor do you really have any intimate connection with him, artistically or otherwise. And sure, you have a point. But in that moment, standing there beside the overpriced organic swiss chard, it was just right.
Singing to an ocean, I can hear the ocean’s roar
Play for free, play for me and play a whole lot more, more!
Don’t you hear it? His voice scratching against the back of his throat, his lungs, expanding, forcing the lyrics out, nearly raw? Roaring like the ocean before a storm? I know a warm cup of chamomile and a good book are supposed to turn a bad Sunday right side up but I am here to tell you that sometimes that just doesn’t do the trick. Sometimes, baby Lucy’s thighs, in all their glorious chubbiness, don’t pull the heartstrings into tune. Sometimes today needs to rock; today needs big hair, skin tight stonewashed jeans, and an unbuttoned belly shirt that was perhaps borrowed from a ten year old girl. Top that off with some chest wax and a gold chain and, well, things are starting to look up. Admit it: sometimes, you need to rock.
(link)
I like everything about this video: the roaring crowd at Madison Square Garden, Page’s bling, and Plant–the way his pants looks airbrushed on (particularly from the “front row” camera angle); the way he air guitars on the mic cord; the way he wails “so good” at the end because it really is so good; but mostly I just love the sound of his voice, like ripping a piece of silk: gauzy and immodest and totally subversive. Forgive me, but I have to say it: Rock. On.
A note to sticklers/die hards: I don’t intend to defame Plant by suggesting he waxed his chest, maybe it was just that way, naturally hairless, pasty, gaunt… But, you know, you totally know, he was never able to button that shirt.
In our home birthdays are small things.
Perhaps this is because some folks take the world view that “it’s just another day,” (or maybe we could read between the lines to see that celebrating birthdays can be dangerous in its potential to make us temporarily forget our status–that of small specks of dust in a giant and impartial universe).
I was raised on a doctrine of specialness, the belief that holidays, achievements and, most importantly, birthdays should be celebrated with gusto and that gifts should be given at any opportunity. Our gift-giving was probably, to some extent, an expression of my parents’ faith in the American Dream. They were born into poor families, and worked hard to achieve the comfort and security of middle class life for their daughters, a status that they–unlike their own parents–could demonstrate with gifts. (Or maybe they’re just good old fashioned party people!) But, despite the ways in which my view of the world is notably different from that of my parents, the love of festivity and the desire for special treatment are deeply engrained in my approach to any and all holidays and occasions. If I had my way, I’d wear a “hug me–it’s my birthday!” banner across my chest all day long–and so would everyone else. When the last day of March rolls around, expect me to be waiting for your call.
Despite the conflict in values between me and the birthday boy, I still believe everyone appreciates a little special recognition on the anniversary of their birth. No, they didn’t earn it, and no, this 1/365th of our solar year does not grant them elevated status in the eyes of the impartial universe. But isn’t it nice, sometimes, to have an excuse to stop working early, pour a drink for your squeeze, and think about how rich life can be?
It is rich; we are lucky and I am grateful and happy. So, birthday boy, I hope you are happy, too. Today, and the other 364 days of your twenty-eighth year.
the master’s thesis writer in his element (the kind of guy who, when he dances, uses clapping to punctuate an important change in tempo or to enhance a hip gyration–what’s not to celebrate??)
Tuesday was the first day of school. I’ve probably had about twenty-three first days of school now, and I’m starting to feel like an expert. What I’ve noticed is that they all share a certain first-day-ness.
First, you open your closet and choose what to wear. Purple dress, gray jacket. Tights or bare legs?
Then, you put on your clompy shoes. See below:
Walking to the bus, the sound of my shoes on the concrete reminds me of picture day in elementary school. Single file, we’d march down the hall to the gym, the girls’ shoes–mary janes, patent leather with quarter-inch heels–clomping an irregular staccato beat.
In these, my only pair of clompy shoes, I still feel like I’m in the third grade, like I want to look just right for the photo and I can’t forget to sit up straight. Only I’m not posing for a yearbook photo and no one’s walking in a single-file line. I’m the professor. The professor!–and still not feeling quite myself in clompy shoes and a dress, but as my father says, “you have to dress the part.” He also says, and you may want to write this down, “I tell ya, when the iron strikes you’ve got to go like there’s no tomorrow.” In my writing classes, I use classic Dad quotations to teach metaphor and cliche. Even first-generation Chinese-Canadians understand a well-timed Appalachian aphorism. When I tell them our class will focus on student accountability, I punctuate it with, “You know, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”
On campus things are bustling. Frat boys sit on broken couches outside the Student Union Building, their giant painted plywood letters promising an enticing world of social opportunity. An orientation leader with colorful face paint and booming voice leads a gaggle of freshman across the quad with the confident stroll of a mother hen. And me, still, after two years, the youngest member of the English Department Faculty, getting reprimanded by a department administrator for snooping around the mailboxes:
“Can I help you?” she asks loudly, glancing up from her computer monitor.
“I have a package,” I say, looking down at the slip in my hand which indicates the presence of said package.
She looks at me dumbly. “Is it a book?”
I tell her I don’t know, referring again to the pink slip in my hand that notes my package.
“You student or faculty?” She seems exasperated.
“Faculty,” I say, finally looking her square in the eyes.
“Oh.” She pauses awkwardly, acknowledging that I’m in the right place after all. “Well, nevermind.”
I grab the box with my name on it and head out.
After my British Literature class, I’m feeling fully professional, pleased at how seemlessly our discussion of 19th century poetry progressed. A guy stops me in the grass on the way back to my office. He looks confused. I wonder if he was one of the quiet ones in the back of the room and I smile helpfully. Maybe he didn’t get a copy of the syllabus or wants to tell me he’s looking forward to the semester.
“Were you just in my French 201?”
Oh. “No, sorry,” I say, and smile as if I am just another lost student.
Maybe it’s a sign that I better get used to the clompy shoes after all. But I’ve got blisters and I’m already thinking fondly of my yellow Chucks.
