"Look, try Henry Volkening at 522 Fifth Ave. My agent. A very good one, too. Best of luck. And forgive my having the mss. so long. I should have read it at once. But I don't live right."
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
i don't live right
letter from saul bellow to philip roth upon receiving a story from roth, 1957
Sunday, March 28, 2010
we walked home from the mission
and it was my idea! can you believe that.
it took about an hour, 3.6 miles, as i mapped it later. there was no wind and barely any cars or people out at 2:30 a.m. the 17th street/divis hill felt like no effort at all, and i could have walked straight out to the marina. the fresh air on my face was so energizing.
"look at that light," he said. "does it seem really bright to you?"
---
i asked the cabbie what his favorite street was in san francisco. he was of some sort of slavic descent. he said he liked pacific heights, the sunset, and the richmond. he said the people were nice. he sounded sincere, and i believe him.
---
before we watched clueless, we watched reality bites with the sound muted, and a girl pointed out so many details i had never noticed before. and this is a film i think i know better than any other. she knew each word and even the words to each song. she even knew the message lelaina's dad leaves on the answering machine at the very end of the movie. she knew the words to the ditty troy is singing in that scene. it was like doing a critical analysis of the film from all these other angles, these nuances i'd never considered before. in the last scene, when lelaina's finds out where he is, she runs home and grabs some clothes and then a brown paper shopping bag to put them in.
she was willing to seek him, with her things just this paper bag.
"i have this...planet of regret sitting on my shoulders..."
---
mike called his white coworker "justin" by accident. his name is paul. mike kept apologizing. i think that made it worse.
---
dom made fun of a bartender's suspenders at flora, an oakland bar where suspenders are part of the uniform. he didn't return with our drinks, so we had to ask another bartender, who had a curled-up mustache and tattoos and thick-rimmed glasses. later at the concert, i saw dom almost get into a fight with a white girl and a over-6-foot-tall white man who were mad that we had taken his spot when he went to the bathroom. she also told me she had gotten into a quibble with someone via google buzz. #firstworldproblems
dom also showed me three post-it notes where she had drawn stick figures mapping out the dance sequence from lady gaga's "bad romance."
it took about an hour, 3.6 miles, as i mapped it later. there was no wind and barely any cars or people out at 2:30 a.m. the 17th street/divis hill felt like no effort at all, and i could have walked straight out to the marina. the fresh air on my face was so energizing.
"look at that light," he said. "does it seem really bright to you?"
---
i asked the cabbie what his favorite street was in san francisco. he was of some sort of slavic descent. he said he liked pacific heights, the sunset, and the richmond. he said the people were nice. he sounded sincere, and i believe him.
---
before we watched clueless, we watched reality bites with the sound muted, and a girl pointed out so many details i had never noticed before. and this is a film i think i know better than any other. she knew each word and even the words to each song. she even knew the message lelaina's dad leaves on the answering machine at the very end of the movie. she knew the words to the ditty troy is singing in that scene. it was like doing a critical analysis of the film from all these other angles, these nuances i'd never considered before. in the last scene, when lelaina's finds out where he is, she runs home and grabs some clothes and then a brown paper shopping bag to put them in.
she was willing to seek him, with her things just this paper bag.
"i have this...planet of regret sitting on my shoulders..."
---
mike called his white coworker "justin" by accident. his name is paul. mike kept apologizing. i think that made it worse.
---
dom made fun of a bartender's suspenders at flora, an oakland bar where suspenders are part of the uniform. he didn't return with our drinks, so we had to ask another bartender, who had a curled-up mustache and tattoos and thick-rimmed glasses. later at the concert, i saw dom almost get into a fight with a white girl and a over-6-foot-tall white man who were mad that we had taken his spot when he went to the bathroom. she also told me she had gotten into a quibble with someone via google buzz. #firstworldproblems
dom also showed me three post-it notes where she had drawn stick figures mapping out the dance sequence from lady gaga's "bad romance."
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Monday, February 08, 2010
brighton beach
i just finished "two lovers" and have been thinking about brighton beach.
we went there once on a sweltering day, to escape, to go to a beach. we took the subway just a few stops, an odd route, so different than the usual hourlong ride. riding the subway with a beach bag (towel, sunscreen, maybe a chair) felt odd, maybe because it was so opposite from the usual closed-off, urban-armor packings (walkman, book or magazine, backpack).
the beach was nothing special, very light sand, not crowded, not dirty. i think pristine beaches are quite overrated, actually. i'm sure i did what i always do at any water-abutting locale: immediately go all the way into the water, emerge, lie on towel until it's too hot to stand, repeat. you told me there were a lot of russians in that area, and walking among them, it felt nice to be part of another community, at least for a day.
i don't remember too much but the clearest thing i remember is we went far out into the water together and i clung to you face to face and we kissed and there was nothing in the world that could possibly bother me at all.
we went there once on a sweltering day, to escape, to go to a beach. we took the subway just a few stops, an odd route, so different than the usual hourlong ride. riding the subway with a beach bag (towel, sunscreen, maybe a chair) felt odd, maybe because it was so opposite from the usual closed-off, urban-armor packings (walkman, book or magazine, backpack).
the beach was nothing special, very light sand, not crowded, not dirty. i think pristine beaches are quite overrated, actually. i'm sure i did what i always do at any water-abutting locale: immediately go all the way into the water, emerge, lie on towel until it's too hot to stand, repeat. you told me there were a lot of russians in that area, and walking among them, it felt nice to be part of another community, at least for a day.
i don't remember too much but the clearest thing i remember is we went far out into the water together and i clung to you face to face and we kissed and there was nothing in the world that could possibly bother me at all.
Friday, January 29, 2010
on writing
To me the question of whether or not he continued to write strikes at the heart of the nature of writing itself. If he indeed wrote volumes and volumes about the Glass family, as has been claimed, it would be such a curious thing, given that the nature of written communication is social; language was created to facilitate understanding between people. So writing books upon books without the intention of sharing them with people is a proposition full of contradictory impulses and goals.
More here.
it's curious to think that writing is essentially a social act. for me, it's usually done in near silence and isolation, on a very small keyboard on a very small desk in a cramped bedroom in a matchbox-sized apartment. i don't listen to music. i don't talk aloud. i don't say little utterances like "ah!" or "mmm" or "huh."
it is one of the very few completely solitary things i do. having to write around other people as i do now for a living is both a privilege and utter torture. oddly it makes the act even more distant and surreptitious: they don't know but i'm writing something good right now. i look like i'm just sitting here with dead eyes but i'm WRITING. little do they know!
i've been thinking a lot about email lately. my inbox has been completely snarled the past two months, and as chinese new year is upon us, and things must be cleaned before then, i took this week to rein it in. filters and labels were created and color coded. things were archived. much more was deleted. and i actually responded to people, albeit sometimes almost more than a month late.
response. that must be the other part of the social component of writing that eggers is talking about. i write. you respond. in some way. large or small. positive or negative. hopefully in writing or words but maybe just in that small corner of your mind where you've stored me. it's a natural rhythm.
i've made a pledge to put responding near the top of my list this year. a female friend told me that a male friend thought he had been sworn off because she never responded to his email two years ago. i started thinking about all those emails i never responded to. those texts. the very least that you can ever do is respond.
to not do so disrupts the natural flow of communication, especially for someone like me for whom words are like breaths. not responding withholds acknowledgment - chai told me long ago that people just want to be acknowledged and i've found that to be so true. talking, corresponding, communicating. even the most lowly of animals do it. it makes us alive and part of society.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
u lookin good 2010
mike: "haha yeah right. more like 'on fire'"
margot: "wow that e-mail took me on a roller coaster ride of emotions."
philana: "reminder: don't let your men beat you!"
minnie: "also, lisa, you a b!"
chai: "are you wearing cool water"
vilar: "wow! that black and white cookie intro animation was mesmerizing."
emily: "mah momz is harassing me"
biff: "how does the carne asada stay on the fry?"
tan: "i don't want to eat that many cookies in a year"
nicky: "he's from stanford. he's never been to a city in his life."
margot: "wow that e-mail took me on a roller coaster ride of emotions."
philana: "reminder: don't let your men beat you!"
minnie: "also, lisa, you a b!"
chai: "are you wearing cool water"
vilar: "wow! that black and white cookie intro animation was mesmerizing."
emily: "mah momz is harassing me"
biff: "how does the carne asada stay on the fry?"
tan: "i don't want to eat that many cookies in a year"
nicky: "he's from stanford. he's never been to a city in his life."
best quote from all-staff meeting
"In art as in lovemaking, heartfelt ineptitude has its appeal and so does heartless skill, but what you want is passionate virtuosity." - John Barth
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