Blooming

Now the sky parts  and the veil of silence lifts.

The sakuras are blooming 

into the world, and the Saturday morning

wind breaks them in a flurry,

covering the path. Beauty lost on cement,

a tale of a city.

So many lives lost this year,

left us for the afterlife —

and here we are, alive,

walking over petals.

We are all strangers here,

how little we know of each other.

Your loss is lost to me.

But it is so bright on the

horizon, we can all share in that.

The other side of the pause, where

we can sit together again, breathe

the same air, watch the same trees

springing up from the earth.

Painting the world in color again, a flicker of hope.

Maybe now we can be more than strangers,

now that life is returning again. 

How I wish we could reverse time and 

speed past the sadness, so we never had 

anything we had to collectively heal from,

speeding forward to the days like today,

when we are all safe to sit nearby,

watching the flowers bloom.

Secrets

In Jonathan’s room, among the Lord of the Rings books, the nintendo 64, empty soda cans, fast food wrappers - crinkled up and thrown in the bin under his desk, among the hoodies in his closet, piles of records from artists from the 80s, a backpack with an eighth, loose lighters he always lost and found, among the everyday objects of his life, were secrets.

Except with Ian.

When Ian came over and they found themselves in various states of undress on his childhood bed, there were no secrets. When Ian came over, they liked to lay across from one another, smelling the other’s natural perfume mixed with sweat. Bodies like magnets, finger against belt buckle, unhooking, unzipping, undressing, until there was nothing left between their naked skin but air.

Ian came round on Saturdays after basketball. Let himself in the front door, took off his shoes at the entrance, and waved hello to Mrs. Roman like a proper house guest.

He always knocked twice at Jonathan’s door but never waited for a response before entering. When Jonathan was playing video games by himself, Ian always said “who are you kidding?” It became their thing. When Jonathan tried on high heels, when Jonathan stole a pair of his sister’s panties. “Who are you kidding?” Ian would say, and they’d both bust out laughing. Like, hysterical man.

“My mom would straight up kill me.”

Picture this: Ian playfully pushing Jonathan down until he was on top of him, straddling him, kissing his neck like he was ravenous for boys. Or a man.

The more time they spent together, the more Jonathan craved - not any singular thing but the sum of Ian: the storm of energy he caused when he busted in the bedroom door, the constant taste of cashews on his lips, the way he always order cheeseburgers when they got high, the bikes rides to Coney Island but really to nowhere in particular, the fact he never told him to be more masculine, more like a man. In fact, Ian was one of the few people who saw Jonathan for who he really was. Who saw him so far away from the boy he was born as and never unwished it for him.

“Bro, you gotta do something about this room,” Ian would say. “You can’t fool anyone with all this dude shit.” And then he’d tell Jonathan to stop laughing, stop smiling, to close his eyes, and as Ian turned off the light, just for a moment, Jonathan forgot his secrets.

Cauê

Cauê with a shaggy head of hair when he first wakes up.

Cauê awake before dawn, at his desk, drawing.

Cauê always studying, tracing, a pen in hand.

Cauê waiting for you to rise, languidly, and find him in his corner.

The start of a new life, a new view looking forward.

Cauê woke you up to you, a man like a bolt of lightning, a shock of bright light that pierces you with all of its force.

Who crossed oceans to be near you, whisper your name so only you can hear. Who makes you feel larger than the space you inhabit. Who, in a packed subway car, makes everything else feel like background noise.

Cauê who never complains that you always ride shotgun and reaches over to the passenger side to squeeze your leg and remind you you’re not alone. You’re not alone.

A man who likes roses and Sheepshead Bay and pizza extra late at night.

Thick thighs.

Strong hands.

Cauê who smokes a joint, inhaling until he’s asleep, dreaming.

Cauê who holds you close like it’s the most important thing he’s ever done.

Cauê with a painter’s hands, tools for excavating the world, drawing thought into form.

He holds you in those hands when other men wouldn’t. Always, whenever. He is not afraid.

A man who, arms and legs armed with ink, looks like he would start a fight, win a fight, but never fights.

Cauê who cries when the world knocks him

down

but always stands back up.

Who doesn’t eat meat, no way, not animals, never once in 16 years, who looks strong, tough, like a man’s man, but who is in fact soft, tender, patient. A stream, not an ocean current.

Cauê who looks like his father, if only his father could see him back. Look him in the eyes and see him for the son he’s become, but his world is dark morning, noon, evening, sleep. A dark world only filled with sound. When you’re blind, sound is everything.

Cauê who calls his father to paint him a picture of sight: the shadow of light falling in an open window, the size of a new table, the tree lined streets to reach the nearest grocery store. Cauê who became a caretaker, father and son trading places, surviving their whole lives because of the other.

Cauê, the almond-toned man who is yours forever.

But forever is a long time. You wonder: can a love this big really last forever?

Cauê who ran away, but really ran toward. Forward. Who chose to run toward you.

He chose your lips, he chose falling asleep next to you, he chose waking up next to you, he chose making the coffee in the mornings, he chose sitting down across the table and filling up two mugs—which is to say he chose inviting the ritual of your lives to begin.

Broken

She’s always crying. My god, this girl is always crying. Tears falling from the corners of those piercing black eyes of hers. Like a river that never dries. Like it’s her full-time, god damn job.

Shoulda known. Shoulda told her I don’t like cry babies like her. I’m almost 40, for Christ’s sake. Don’t date an older man if you can’t deal with reality, I tell her. People get busy, I tell her. Deal with it.

She’s melting into the couch, swallowed by her sadness. Stiff like a statue. Her eyes glued to the floor like they’re having a starring contest. It’s hard to believe this sadness really has everything to do with me. I tell her I have nothing left to give. What more does she want from me?

Her lips in a quarter moon, turned upside down. A pout. I tell her she’s gonna get wrinkles if she stays like that too long. I laugh and she doesn’t and the echos of my laughter fade into silence.

She waits for me to say the right thing - that it’s okay that she’s crying, that I’m sorry for not trying harder, that I actually want to be here. But I don’t say anything.

There is nothing left to say that hasn’t been said, except to finalize it. Put a punctuation on the end of ‘us.’ Set us both free. My god, please set me free!

Her leg jumps up and down, up and down, trembling like an earthquake. Her lips part and she asks me what I want. I don’t know what she’s asking, I tell her. What kind of question is that?

Her annoyance grows in all directions. Her bottom lip quivers. Oh, hell, man, I’m tired. She’s waiting for me to revive what never was. We sit like this for a while, not meeting each other’s eyes on opposite sides of the couch. A couch that once held intimate moments: sharing food, our bodies entangled.

I wait for her to say something but she’s frozen in time. This is ‘us.’ Broken from the beginning. I get up and bend over her, my lips touching her forehead. I tell her I’m sorry, and I’m sorry my sorries are empty now. We’re too far gone. She doesn’t speak, she stays frozen. I tell her I’m going to leave now, I’m going now, if she has nothing left to say I’m sorry and I’ll leave her be.

Returning

How strange to love a city

With every ounce of your Being

How strange to dream of Elsewhere

In search of Foreign

A map, the object of desire

The object of you life

So small in scale

But so large in possibilities

Always

seeking,

Expanding,

Remembering

The world is calling

To move is to be alive

Travel as existence

What freedom,

What joy!

To go forth in the world

And meet yourself in it

Traversing inner

Worlds and

Outer worlds

The landscapes of life

Reinventing,

Growing taller,

Growing whole

Going, going, going

But at the End

there is nothing better

Than the feeling of Returning

Hands

How strange to think that hands are the vehicle to life. Two extremities capable of doing things without any conscious knowledge. Even as you write these words, they move on their own. The most simple functions that give our lives meaning; hands as the avenue to pleasure, art, service, errands, joy. Perhaps they are calloused or colored or decorated with rings. Perhaps even a single ring to inform the world that you have found your Great Love.

Most hands tell stories of their own; cracked hands worn down by years of labor, or a handshake so firm and confident it's like they have something to prove. An artist lovingly calls them his tools and strives to protect them from danger. (You wonder: how does one actually protect hands from danger?) A trained chef works by intuition, hands that move, like writing, without command.

When you are in love, you can recognize the hands of your lover with eyes closed. This is the best kind of intimacy, when a lover’s touch is so delicious, so delightful, that you can recognize them even in your dreams. A lover’s hands: the way they fit in your palm, or dance up your back and fit around your neck the way only a lover’s hand can find its way so perfectly into the crevices of your body. The hands of pleasure. Yours: soft, and delicate. His: warm, yet masculine. Hands you like to kiss, they're so beautiful. Your favorite thing about him.

Ah, hands, yes. They help us get through life. You hold your hand out to a stranger to say: I see you. For without hands, how would we show our affection?

Those 10 fingers — if you’re lucky — have and hold the most inconsequential of objects: subway doors, pencils, door handles, a coffee mug, forks, knives, new and used books, flower vases, the refrigerator door, your own hair, your own face, your clothing as you put it on and your clothing when it’s already on, bike handles, countertops, restaurant doors, cocktail glasses, fruits that come from trees — apples, bananas, pears, remote controls, credit cards, printed concert tickets (maybe?), your cell phone (put it down), the handle of a frying pan, the New Yorker in print, the vacuum cleaner, your metrocard as you slide through the turnstile, among others.

For a writer, hands can be the source of inspiration. When they dance to their own rhythm, moving across a page, flowing with lightness over a piece of paper. Words traveling from the subconscious and shooting out the tip of a pen. How glorious these moments are!

Like your lover, but much unlike your lover, you know your family’s hands. A sister’s whose are petite like a child, so small and delicate you forget she is older when you hold them. A birthmark directly below the left ring finger. Hands that used to paint, and now enjoy other pleasures: puzzles and cooking and turning pages of books.

Your mother’s have been with you through everything, tenderness in moments of celebration and sorrow, and also everything in between. When you were younger, hands that made you cave into yourself and slither out of reach. Stop touching me! Now you know all she wanted was to hold you close, hold you tightly, because you are her baby. Her Child. She once held your heartbeat within her, her hands touched you before you were you. Later in life, as you become a woman, you walk in the streets and wrap your fingers around hers for a warmth that makes you feel instantly at home, instantly like her child again. Ah yes, a mother’s hands, there are nothing like them.

Except for your father’s — hands that have played the soundtrack of your life. They travel up and down the piano, open and close holes on the saxophone and harmonica. Hands that make music that gives life meaning. These hands in particular — the two that belong to your father — used to brush the knots out of your hair until you were 10 years old, and then taught you how to play poker like the boys, and at 15.5 years old, how to drive a car. You trust those hands with every part of you. How lucky your mother is to hold them through life.

Small Wonders in a Big City

I always knew that I would eventually leave New York or that New York would leave me, though I never knew when. When I was 28 years old, over coffee with a neighborhood friend, I announced that “If you told me that in five years I will be living in Japan with a Japanese lover I met in the streets, I would believe it. I have no idea what comes next.” At this point anything could happen; I could end up anywhere with anyone or somewhere with only myself. My life was in continual motion without an agenda, following the wind or the cheapest flight to Mexico City, where I often frequented on solo trips to find weekend lovers and awaken my spirit. But Mexico is not the point of this story—New York is, at least for this moment in time when she doesn’t feel so terribly, awfully hard and concrete and fast-paced. Then again, I am still young, and Joan Didion has taught us that New York is a city only for the very young.

I was even younger when I moved here for the first time; It was almost a decade ago. My God I was wide-eyed and eager and I loved those bright lights and those taxi horns that sound like they do in the movies and the cobblestone steps leading up to West Village apartments, especially in the fall, and the fact that every bar was so damn cool (at least if only for their novelty), and the fact that no doorman really cared that my ID was totally fake because I was cuter then—19 and always smiling—and not yet worn down by the persistence of life. 

My parents paid for me to live in a one bedroom studio in Murray Hill. It had peach-colored walls and no windows. I rented it with a girlfriend I had traveled abroad with in Paris who also had a summer internship. For $1200/month, she slept on the bed and for $1100, I got the couch. I rarely pulled it out into a full-size bed because it was easier not to deal with the hassle of setting it up each night and packing it in every morning. The Rodeo Bar on 3rd Avenue is my only reference point of the apartment’s whereabouts because it was always our last stop on the way home to eat free peanuts around 3AM. Which is all to say I had the best summer of my life outside of that apartment, meeting new people six nights a week, sleeping very little and living very much. 

After the summer, I returned back to California to graduate from college and set off traveling, but New York lived within me. Her energy had made its way into my veins and found my soul. I landed in Australia for some time, but remember intense waves of homesickness for the city flooding my subconscious so I flew for nearly two days to find my way into her arms once again. This time, a wealthy person from my hometown who had a cat and own West Village apartment (unheard of for her age) invited me to stay while she left town for six weeks. I committed to another summer in New York. I was older and wiser. 23 years old then, and full of possibility.

My memories of that summer are fragments; snippets from the places I frequented with my sister and her friends and the people I met out in the streets. The subterranean dance bar on Kenmare Street that was very cool for a very short time, Fig 19 and on occasion downstairs at Home Sweet Home, fancy restaurants with my Uncle who was a successful lawyer and loved a strong G&T at the end of the workday, sitting on the 2nd floor at Barnes and Nobles in Union Square reading a tall stack of magazines (though I still do this now). Of course there are a couple of memories that stand out vibrantly, like seeing mom’s cousin Lou give a book reading at The Strand for his book The Raven, or the night I locked myself out of the six story walk-up and had to climb through a stranger’s window to reach the fire escape to break into the house I was watching. The stranger was a neighbor in the building and the one who recommended this, of course, because despite what they tell you, the people here are mostly good and they will have your back when the world has you down.

The final time I traveled to New York, I flew from California for a 10-day vacation and never left. That was five years ago. I brought a small suitcase to my sister’s apartment and she offered to let me crash in her room while I figured it out. We shared a space about the size of a large walk-in closet for over a month, but we both loved the coziness of her room: the way the magazines stacked up on the floor and the morning light flooded in to wake us up. She lived on 7th Avenue between 8th and 9th Street in Park Slope, directly above a wine shop and the 24-hour diner. I was 24 years old at the time which would have made her my age now (28); I assumed because she was older and had a job and have lived on the East Coast for over a decade that she had everything figured out. Being 28, I know that time and money does not necessarily equate to figuring it out. But she took me in because that’s what sisters do, and because she knew that New York can be tough even for the toughest people. Plus, I still only had a little money at the time and no real plan. 

Every morning she would travel by bicycle into the city for work and I would walk aimlessly around 5th Avenue and 7th Avenue and sit in coffee shops and write and write and write—and I’m sure the writing was terrible as it often is when you are very young. And at night, she would cook a feast of vegetables from Mr. Lime, the neighborhood bodega across the street, and tell me about her day. I envied the life she already had, not knowing that my own New York story was just beginning. Sometimes during those dinners I would cry or have panic attacks wondering out loud what the hell am I doing with my life? And she would comfort me all the same, telling me it was going to be okay. I was going to land on my feet. I would figure it out because this city had always been a part of me, and I had friends and I had family and part of the magic is that when you stay open to it, New York will shape you into the person you are. 

All of my relatives who live in New York were ecstatic about the official news of my move. “Welcome, darling!” “We can’t wait to have you with us at Thanksgiving!” “We all knew you’d be back for good.” Almost all of them wished me luck, which I didn’t understand then like I do now. The city requires some intelligence, a decent sum of money, a warm wardrobe, but mostly a lot of luck on your side. 

And now half a decade has done by. I’ve done a few things I’m proud of, and many I’m not. I have a home that is also my sanctuary with eleven plants, a colorful rug, a large kitchen for hosting, and a set of ceramic bowls that I love deeply. But nothing compares to my ever-growing library of books which I could once name on two hands and is now surely close to 100. These are small emblems of my material life that would make it hard to get up and move away. Though I am emotionally and spiritually connected to the city, too; My favorite memories are not necessarily memories at all, but the rituals that make up my life. Sunday dinners, Thanksgiving at my Aunt and Uncles, bike rides with good friends, watching the snowfall from my coffee shop windows, monthly book club, walks through Greenpoint on the weekend, long and intimate conversation with my Grandpa. And then there is the ritual of possibility that someone could walk into your life at a single, random moment and change the course of it.

So would I tell people to move to New York? If you are 20 or 21, maybe. If you want to expand your mind to the curiosities that live within the human spirit, and if you are okay with the occasional outburst of tears (your own) on a crowded subway and if you are also okay with not sleeping too much and eating very little. Or if you never really felt like you could be your true, strange self growing up in a suburban neighborhood, then yes, New York is inviting you into her arms. But if you are my age, perhaps I would recommend you learn French and move to Paris or go somewhere close to the beach or to the mountains or somewhere that one day — if children are in your future — you can have a backyard and a garden and an alleyway for them to dream and play. Somewhere you can teach them to ride a bicycle in the streets, instead of how to fill up their metro card.

But here I am. All these years later, with pages and pages filled with handwritten notes trying to figure out the person I want to become. Dozens of boarding passes (now bookmarks) with return flights to LGA or JFK. Sometimes it seems the map of my life all point back to New York, even when I am tearing out my hair trying to get back to nature, to my true essence. In many senses, these handwritten notes are a window to my soul; The observations I wrote down must have felt important or significant to me at that time (3 pages about a coffee shop conversation with my friend, Alexi; a portrait of a random Sunday logged with timestamps; the people I dated; the people I slept with; the friends I loved; the city scene at 7:38PM from the 8th floor window of a building at 38th Street and 7th Avenue in Manhattan). 

There’s also a note about new strangers who came into my life one weekend at a festival upstate. We all rode the train back to the city, bought bodega beers and sat in the backyard of Saturdays surf shop. And for those in the know, Saturdays was once SoHo’s best-kept outdoor secrets. I don’t remember how tired I was, or the type of beers we were drinking, but I recall with great clarity the peacefulness we all felt in the company of strangers. We were all just trying our best. Trying to be someone who embodied New York: effortless, creative, indefinitely curious, slightly irresistible, unforgettable. But with these people, none of that really mattered. What mattered is that we were slightly hungover and had come across this quiet oasis in the middle of the city and these beers tasted so good under the shade of the trees and the conversation was flowing and fluid, and mostly that I felt home. And in that moment I realized this was no longer a life that I wanted; it was my life.

My Writer's Desk

As a traveler, I write in many places. In coffee shops. On subways. In parks and museums. Always on buses and trains and airplanes. In fact, I never leave home without a journal. But my writer's desk is more intimate than any of these places that pass through my life briefly.

My writer's desk is my home. It is a part of me, or at least an extension of me. It is where my world comes to life through words. It is where I come on Monday evenings, exhausted in anticipation of the week ahead, to find energy. It is a healthy place for my mind and for my soul.

My desk looks like any ordinary wooden desk, but it tells many stories: of my relationship angst, of my most inspired New York moments, of my deepest and most heartfelt fears. It is simple and lightly sanded. It is large enough to hold my colorful momentos collected from countries around the world and small enough to tuck perfectly into my nook, a cozy, attic-like room in Williamsburg that sits at the corner of Bedford and North 5. Above it, colorful images from around the world and dried-out sunflowers that remind me of my Father. On it, an hourglass timer to keep me accountable, stacks of half-read New Yorkers, and a photograph of my sister and I in Paris. These considered decorations give meaning to my work.

Unlike desks of my past, this one faces a wall rather than a window. At first, I imagined this to be deeply suffocating, but after nearly two and a half years of showing up here, there's a comfort in knowing I have nowhere to focus my attention except down, where my pen touches paper. Rarely do I use a computer here, but there are many journals whose leather-bound backs have rested gently for days on end, waiting patiently to be filled with ideas.

Some days, my desk is my greatest companion; it is in these moments that the words come pouring out, like there is nothing more affirming than the fact I am a writer. On others, it is my deepest enemy. These are the days when I write for an editor who is not myself, for people who challenge me to the core for the sake of improvement and I must step away from my desk many times over because it does not reveal itself as a place of solace or pleasure.

Minimalists have told me that objects don't add value to our lives, or at least we as a species give objects too much weight. I might say my desk is an exception: this object is sacred. It is my treasure; it cost me nothing but it is priceless. It's simple presence as a place to give myself to my thoughts is the ultimate luxury.

My writer's desk is my home, and in moments of darkness, it brings me great light. It is a place where I can be the truest version of myself. It is where my imagination takes shape when I invite it to. My desk is a part of me; it is life, joy and freedom.

New York's Bookstore

People travel to New York for the bookstores. Or rather, readers and writers travel to New York for the bookstores. There is The Strand, of course, at 14th and Broadway — 1 mile of books where the likes of Lou Reed, David Sedaris and Patti Smith have ventured for readings and for pleasure. There is bookbook, the West Village emblem of independent booksellers successful mainly for its location on Bleecker Street, which is a narrow home for both the classics and The New York Times' best sellers list. There was once St. Mark’s bookstore, on the corner of East 3rd and Avenue A, where the East Village folk and NYU kids gathered after hours until the rising rent prices led to its demise (RIP). But if you really want to read the city like a New Yorker and feel its literary charm, your destination lies at 52 Prince Street, the home of McNally Jackson.

McNally Jackson is downtown’s bookstore, the place people use as a reference point to meet their partners, or where they linger in anticipation of an 8PM dinner reservation with friends. My uncle, for example, always stops in to buy a new book prior to our weeknight catch-ups at Balthazar or Café Select.  

McNally Jackson is a place where the shopkeep relax into themselves and a visitor can find anything they need within the contemporary lit world. Sandwiched between the Mac and Cheese shop and shoe store, McNally passersby are seduced by something as small and familiar as a store window of colorful book covers. And while it might not be the largest shop nor promise the most diverse book collection, it has long been a city staple for thousands of people who enter through its doors every month. It was Bowie’s local. It has housed Zadie Smith for readings.  It is quintessential—a landmark—brimming with new and old authors. Magazines and cookbooks. Whispers and conversations. Secrets and inspiration.

Walking in its front door off of the chaotic streets of Soho, one is greeted immediately by the calm meditation that a bookstore induces. The short walkway between the front door and the bookstore itself houses the neighborhood flyers, a corkboard filled with local newspapers, meditation and yoga classes, and book readings. An aura of ease permeates. The front two tables are decorated in the season’s best sellers for any type of reader. There are collections of essays, fiction and non-fiction, short stories, long stories, poems, novels. The bookstore for all.

Upstairs, one can wander through shelves of travel literature, cookbooks, classics. Downstairs lends itself to the genres of self-help, children’s literature and business planning. My favorite spot is the long, communal table to sit and digest pages before making a decision to purchase or not to purchase. It’s where multiple times a week the bookstore provides newly published authors with an intimate audience of 30 book lovers.

The staff never hesitate to help you find the perfect read, wading from behind the front counter to locate their favorite book off of the shelf when asked for a recommendation. Or listen patiently as a customer describes their reading mood (non-fiction, with a strong plot and memorable characters, something I can’t put down, you know), and prescribe a book to the customer’s exact feeling. But they also encourage an exploration on one’s own: search the shelves, explore the offerings, and perhaps you will discover something all the more satisfying.

Like most bookstores, it is a place that gives me hope that one day I could be a writer. It is hope that being surrounded by shelves of the Greats — Gabriel, Virginia, Haruki — might somehow seep under my skin and fill me with a new knowledge of words and ideas. That is the profoundness of a good bookstore: that simply by existing, a writer in its presence can grow into a better writer herself.

I worked in Nolita for two years, and nearly everyday I would take my lunch break at McNally Jackson. I rarely sat down to eat in the café, but instead spent time flipping through the pages to collect ideas from some of the teachers I admire most—authors who have dedicated their careers to their imagination. To me, an author is one of the great professions that withstands time and cultures. What a glorious life, I would think, to write all the stories you want to read and share them with others. To be the source of relaxation, or comfort, or therapy for a reader who stumbles upon your words.

Many bookworms have dreamed of working in a bookstore — a place built out of ideas and filled with the world’s greatest sentences. A place that is renowned for being quiet and congenial. A shop filled with rows of books you are meant to read in your lifetime, tempting you to pick them up and finger through the pages. To rearrange the spines so that they look more ‘readable’, if there were a thing. McNally Jackson is one of those lovely places where I could work, where sometimes I consider quitting my corporate job with my generous salary and fancy title for something more soul-satisfying. Where I could look back five years past and think to myself: this has been meaningful work.

But for now, I’ll keep doing my best to get the word out about that bookstore in New York City you just can’t miss on your visit. That bold line on my “Recommendations when visiting the city” email, to which I'll write you and say: The restaurants are world-class, the West Village is full of charm and character, but there's nothing quite like arriving to the city and bunkering down in McNally's cafe with a stack full of magazines, and feeling instantly, delightfully at home.

An Uncertain Lover

G Disliked:

01: The uncertainty of the chord that hung from the ceiling

02: The unimpressive number of house plants in her living room

03: Spending money on anything other than his own hobbies

04: The idea of two lives intersected as one

05: Holding hands

06: Messing up the order of his album records

07: Books: their texture, presence, content

08: Labels (open to reader’s interpretation)

G Enjoyed:

01: The contours of her body

02: Mexican food on Friday nights

03: Silence that hung in the air between them

04: His dog, more than 01-03 & 05-08

05: Being lonely and also being alone

06: A stiff drink

07: A busy schedule to escape his own thoughts

08: The television: series, hockey, old cinema

What had she enjoyed so much about him?

A Table for One

Dining out alone intentionally is an experiment. A challenge to simply exist in our aloneness. A discipline to not prescribe ourselves technology to ward off feelings of unease.

In youth, we learn the value of shared meals; dinnertime is synonymous with family time and coming together with loved ones at the end of the day. Children are encouraged to be independent, but not taught how to sit at a table alone. These long-established social systems have caused most of us to anticipate flagging down the hostess for a ‘table for one’ to be a mountainous feat, requiring courage, bravery, confidence and a stable paycheck. In our homes, with the comfort of familiarity and anonymity, idly listening to records while we cook for one, seems relaxing, but in a restaurant, where strangers can observe our vulnerability from every angle, we perceive loneliness. After all, restaurants are designed to be social environments. 

I remember the last time I took myself out for dinner. It was on a cool summer evening in Chicago three months ago. Having never been to the city, I decide the only thing I want to do on my overnight trip is eat good food and hear blues music. Roaming the streets without a companion, I take my time appraising options, in search of a bar top flanked by bustling city-folk and excited barmen. The Girl And The Goat, a restaurant recommended by a friend where patrons spill into the sidewalk, feels just right, with its tall ceilings, a molten-chocolate curved bar and open kitchen. I consult exactly no one on this decision. With a group, you’ll wait an hour to be seated. Alone, you take your pick at any available bar stool.

From the left edge of the counter, I take in the bustling sight of co-workers and birthday dinners in one sweeping glance, and feel the sweaty-palm anxiety of being female, alone and exposed. Armed with protection, the newest edition of Travel & Leisure Magazine rests on top of my belongings in case of emergency.  I wave down my waiter for a cocktail. A stiff one in a tall glass. As rarely as I nurture my independence by taking myself out to a nice dinner, even more rarely do I indulge in a drink alone. But at the bar, in a foreign city, I can be anyone I want to be.

The restaurant menu is decorated in share plates: small, large, specials. Portions for one, there are none. As I taste the first and second dish–a goat carpaccio with smoked trout roe and olive-maple vinaigrette and wood grilled broccoli with a smoky cheese and spiced crisps–a solo diner seated on a stool near me takes down truffle cheese for dessert. Together, without words, we indulge in our respective vices. Our presence alone is enough to acknowledge the other. I wash down bite after bite with my strong beverage until not a speck nor drop remains. With a day of travel behind me and anything ahead, I feel strong and self-sufficient. 

Through a conversational survey of friends in New York, I mostly found people aged thirty and above to be the ones who regularly partake in solo dinner excursions, seeking comfort and relaxation from such time. Younger friends, however, felt less excited and more anxious by the prospect of such an indulgence. My sister argues that the best time to go out to dinner alone is on a Friday night at a restaurant where you already know the menu, an adult nightcap to the work week. Return often so the bar staff know your name, and you will begin to look forward to feeling at home away from home. The older I get, the more frequently I find myself passing this wisdom on. 

Because without company, we taste more fully and our memory lingers longer. It’s been over one year since my first and only trip to London, and I’ve since forgotten the name of the hotel I stayed at and the pubs I stopped into. I’ve forgotten my reaction to various famous artworks at Tate Modern, and the bus route it required to get there. But no matter where I am, each time I catch a whiff of crimini mushrooms I am transported to that cafe tucked down the cobblestone alley, the one where the sky stripes the front table on a sunny day, where breakfast includes a table-setting for one. The treasure of this moment has nothing to do with travel and entirely to do with appreciating it in solitude. The pleasure of a partner would enrich this memory for different reasons entirely–perhaps the name of this restaurant would return to me, or I would be richer for time well-spent in thoughtful conversation. But certainly, I would not carry with me the sweet memory of crisp, juicy ‘shrooms decorated with salty, fried cubes of halloumi and fresh herbs. Satisfaction sweeps through me at the thought of it. 

In modern times, to protect our egos, we’ve become accustomed to ordering Seamless or Grubhub and eating on the couch: a meal that is sustenance over pleasure. I lament the days when being alone with only our appetites also granted us freedom from a wired, snapped, two-tap world. Maybe that’s why I cherish a spot at the bar top—a resting period from the cacophony.

Young or old, single or partnered, hungry or not, we can all use more self-indulgence in our lives. Once we move beyond the fear of sitting down alone, it is easy to find this: if you are ravenous, you can eat as quickly as you like; if you are thirsty, you need not company nor permission to order a second or a third round; if you are craving dessert—which you most certainly should be—you order a chocolate ganache for one and clean the plate. And that feeling of satisfaction of not having to fight over that last delightful bite, my friend, sticks with you for a long time and makes pick up the tab worth it every time.

The Road Trip Days

Family road trips are a favorite pastime of growing up in California. All four windows rolled down while 97.7 KFOG radio station hummed over the speakers. My parents in the front seats and my sister and I in the back. We’d drive from Los Gatos to Big Sur or to Big Basin or as far as Crater Lake during school holidays. 

The tradition was always the same. Dad carried our packed bags to the car while we piled in behind him. Mom made sure we went to the bathroom and had enough snacks to get us to our first stop. Then we started playing games: A My Name is Alice, Slug Bug (where you get to punch a sibling every time a VW bug is spotted), or tallying up the number of strangers who waved back when we flared our arms at them. My parents told us about the books they read as children, quizzed us on history, and repeated the story about the first night they met at the movie theater like we had never heard it before. With nowhere to go, we got to know each other in that time. We had no distractions except the mountains and the sky out of the window. Nothing to take us away.

Technology changed how we coexist.

Today, I often power down my devices an hour before bed and turn them back on upon arriving to the office around 9:30AM. I don’t really think I am missing out on information that can’t wait until then. That is to say I am considerably mindful of technology. But every time I travel home to California, to the backseat of our family Lexus, I pull out my iPhone and pop in my earbuds. The car ride for me is now just a vehicle to the destination; I am not required to be ‘present’. At least that’s what I tell myself when I want nothing more than to sink into my music and my thoughts. When we arrive to San Francisco or the restaurant for dinner or wherever we are traveling, I am back to the moment. But the time for conversation, for playful games and for boredom that leads to creativity is already lost. My device won. That hour will never return to me or live on in my memories. 

I am sorry, Mom. I am sorry, Dad.

When I was 10 I had a pen pal in Minnesota. My mom found her online in a forum that connected cross-country students via snail mail. Every month, I’d spring from the couch when mom said something arrived in the mailbox addressed to me. She’d use a knife to slice the envelope open and pull out a short story from another 10-year-old girl. I don’t remember her name, the content, or how long we stayed in touch, but I remember the sentiment of our relationship that would long be lost in the immediacy of social media. Today, I would have found this girl on Snap and followed her stories and maybe her friends’ stories and comment like I knew her. There would be no curiosity, no updates. What could she have written me that I didn’t already know?

I miss the road trip days.

I heard there are middle and high school kids who refuse to repeat an outfit once it has been posted of them online. This must pain working—and working class—parents. In grade school, I wouldn’t leave my house without my father’s approval of what I was wearing because I trusted his opinion over anyone else’s. (In the few photos that surfaced, I regret this horribly). I later learned he liked whatever I liked, even if that meant a mustard yellow top, corduroy brown skirt, purple leg warmers and a sea blue headband, all at the same time. But I cycled these accessories through seasons and never worried that my outfit would be commemorated by visits to my Instagram page.

I am glad I had a childhood before social media.

I’ve been friends with the the same group of girlfriends for two decades. We went to different colleges, moved to different cities, entered different industries, and started our adult lives as successful business women, wives, lovers, cooks, creatives. We have also stayed in touch. It’s easy to find each other in the same places at the same time, like in our hometown over the holidays or at a wedding. But when I see them today after three months away, there is inherently less to catch up on. From Instagram and Facebook, I know where they traveled, if they were promoted at their job, if they are engaged. The Internet has shrunk time and space. Nothing is a secret for long. I lament the days when I could call my best friend 3,000 miles away and ask her: what’s new; what has changed; how do you feel; are you happy; are you sad; are you in love? These are the things I want to know: what we keep in our hearts that we don’t curate for the rest of the world. For our “friends.” 

I am nostalgic for a time when friendship ≠ 1,000 followers.

Maybe that’s one of the reasons I don’t follow the man I’ve dated for a year on social media (and vice versa). I have no idea—nor interest, truthfully—in what he does online or what he “likes.” What I “like” is going out on a date or to dinner or to his house and not knowing what his feed says. Not leaving space for misinterpretation. What I “like” is showing up at his doorstop and asking what’s up, what did you do today and being genuinely curious to hear the answer. Unfortunately he doesn’t like letters, but maybe one day we’ll take a road trip together.

But you’ll have to follow me to find out.

Nostalgia for Youth

I’m filled with nostalgia like an adult who wishes to go back in time when the days were ‘more simple,’ ‘less serious,’ ‘carefree.’ My mind is that of Dorian Gray, searching for the playfulness, ease and innocence of forever youth.

During winter days in particular, nostalgia takes hold of me, like when I catch a whiff of a wood fire and remember my family home from childhood: my Father brushing a comb through my long hair, a puzzle on the dining room table, the sweet smells of my Mother’s kitchen. I remember the timid change of the seasons in California, of summer camp in Oregon in ‘97, of The Wonder Years on the TV set, and I feel a sense of longing for the years’ past.

I remember walking down my favorite street in Los Gatos with my parents, kicking autumn leaves off of the sidewalk, and wishing they’d slow down growing older or stop growing older altogether. I remember the first man I ever loved, and my god I loved him so; the way his words made my heart sing loudly in both pleasure and surrender. And I also remember the man who broke me down to a shell of myself, leaving me to feel so young and so alone in a country that was not my own.

I remember sitting around that tremendously red, circular table outside of the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris with Jean—my dear friend Jean—talking about the senate, American rock ‘n roll and poets. I remember reading his letters wistfully near the ocean years later: “you will always be my muse.

I remember this one particular mountaintop where I sat in silence watching an infinite line of ocean and sky wondering softly to myself why oh why do I live in New York. I remember missing that moment before it even started. I remember my back garden in North Melbourne, the quaint Victorian home where everything always felt easy and made sense. Where there was no internal chatter, no questioning. Just simplicity and lightness. I remember I went there searching for nothing and left with everything. I remember taking endlessly long walks through Manhattan during summer nights in 2011, stopping only to linger in places filled with books and ideas.

That summer, I grew into myself. I remember that jazz club in Paris around the corner from Shakespeare & Co., the one underground where we drank whiskey and he held my hand like it was the most important thing he ever did. I remember the fear of forgetting these memories and writing them down to tell to you now, so we can share our nostalgia for the deliciousness of being young in the world.

Gateway to Another World

I always linger in bookstores. Not necessarily even reading, just fingering through spines of history's beloved authors and walking out with seven new books for my home library. This started in youth, and continued on through middle school, college years and as a young traveler. Then I spent all of my free hours devouring and marking them up, underlining sentences that I would later dream about and return to.

Each reading was always a process of both pleasure and learning, retracing my way back to paragraphs and passages as I continued onto the next chapters. The underlined areas were not necessarily the famous ones nor the one's recommended be closely examined by a professor, but they always spoke to me with great certainty and rhythm.

There are authors who have changed my world views, invoking a new way of thinking and moving through time and space. For them, I hold the highest admiration. Certainly, Oscar Wilde (Go forth into the world and charm it with your Youth!), Joan Didion (Buy a notebook and write down every detail you observe, even the woman in the fur coat in Vegas you think you'll never see again), and Haruki Murakami (There is chaos and beauty in worlds beyond reality). When I am lonely or uninspired, I simply return to them — their characters — and find peace. From this, I have learned that language has a powerful way of orienting us as readers. We can find clarity, release from our grief, deeper understanding of our family through their storytelling. 

Of course, the emotional connection to literature also comes by the way in which it was acquired and read. The Outsiders at 15 years old has different significance than any age past that. A novel by way of recommendation or exchanged during travel, when we are more open and embracing of new ideas, can stay with the reader long after the journey, not so much in the way if we picked it up spontaneously at our neighborhood bookshop. 

There was once, for instance, a man in San Marcos around Lake Atitlan in Guatamala who gifted me a book called "Don't Just Do Something. Sit There," which explains mindfulness as pure and relaxed awareness of our present experiences. With the book in my pocket, I climbed alone to the highest mountain top I could find, starred out at an infinite blue sky and lake, one of the most majestic sights I've ever found, read its contents like a private journal, and experienced the most profound silence I've ever known. It was as if the words unlocked something more nurturing than The Self or nature could do on their own. I never met the traveler again, but I still have his book three years later. It sits on my bedside table.

At home, I often dedicate entire weekend days to sifting through old newspapers and literary journals, allowing myself to be filled with stories of other: Other lands, other people, other words, other relationships. I find myself reading articles from 10, 15 years past from the archive of The Times, amazed by how life in New York has changed so much since then, yet besides the city-planning and gentrification, not really at all. The jazz musicians still play their spots; the deli in the LES has not lost its charm; the subway problems persist. In these moments, I catch an intimate glimpse into the city before it was was My City. I share them with my parents, my uncle, my friends — because the author's story is also, amazingly, our story. Our grief. Our tumultuous relationship. Our neighborhood deli.

For me, the process of writing is one of mountain climbing as a beach walker.  Many days include a journal where I decorate pages and pages with ideas that will never be seen. This is the ultimate freedom: to document the black man who sits at my neighborhood coffee shop, always in his colorful tunic, hiding behind his computer with everything but those olive eyes which follow me from the register to my seat near the window. Or Ricardo, in Mexico, whose strong hands found their way under my dress, into my hotel room, where we stayed together while his girlfriend waited unknowingly for him at home. Yes, these are the intimate moments that do not have meaning or significance to anyone but me — and sometimes not even to me. Like what it means when my journal simply states: "It felt like monsters were going to come out of the trees," or "food systems in public schools, or "the buildings were black with decades." It begs me to wonder: what tress, what about the systems, what buildings? But still, I keep writing. Don't stop, I tell myself. Keep climbing. Many days alone with only my pen and my thoughts is a slow ascend, but when I reach the top, the view is always glorious. When I get there, I stick my flag into the ground and lay claim to land I've never ventured before. Territory that is mine and mine alone, thought paved for me by multitudes of journalists and authors and novelists. 

My best work occurs when I read a lot and meditate on my ideas — without technology, off of social media, in my mind and no one else's. I'll read an essay, take a long, slow walk through my neighborhood, and watch as characters and entire paragraphs float to the surface, like they were patiently waiting to assert themselves. It is as if they are being narrated to me as a gift. Like an old friend who was there all along, waiting until I was ready to meet them again. It is both magic and fear, feeling the most like myself while knowing that this moment of creativity will retreat unless I am relentless in its pursuit.

But as a story comes alive, though each draft, each editor's critical eye, I become more in love with the poetry that is language. A symphony for my soul that I hope to hear forever.