hey,

those are good questions. i’d answer them all but this would be too long so i’ll just pull out the most compelling one and see if i can answer sufficiently.

here it is:

i’m terrified of spending the rest of my life without her and she’s terrified of spending the rest of her life with me.

that’s it in a nutshell, but let’s orbit the hairball for a while and try to get a better view.

blast ahead 15 years.

i’m pushing 50 and famous as fuck, but i’ve got nothing else. i never married as that would be too big a lie. i skirt by with the women i’m with. their names are never the same but their features rarely change: short hair; wicked laugh; a way with words; confident touch; great at keeping secrets; horrible at hiding flaws. i short change them often. i still don’t dream when i sleep and still wake with sentence fragments in my head. i have a kid who’s 9. i have a short list of regrets and her name’s at the top of it. i drink to forget.

she’s just past 40. loaded. she’s where she wants to be and is headed towards where i knew she’d always get.  she still eats peanut butter off a spoon and still cries herself to sleep more often than she should. she’s nobody’s wife, nobody’s mother, and nobody’s fool. she’s not one to have regrets. instead, she has this little noodling in the back of her brain. she names it after me. she drinks to remember.

we live in different countries on different continents

we phone each other, but not as often as we think about doing it. her voice still makes me hover and i know her touch would still make me shake.

once a month or so, while waking, my arms mistake my pillow for her and it makes me cry.

one day i’m at the market. i see a woman that looks like her. i approach. i put carts of fruit and vegetables between us and look past pineapples and bunches of grapes, trying to obscure the parts of her face that aren’t Jenny. to sustain the fantasy, i stay far enough away that i can’t hear her speak to the vendors or laugh at their jokes.

i imagine she’s shopping to surprise me. i’ll come home and she’ll have prepared the table with a tacky red and white plastic table cloth. there’s four chairs stacked neatly in the corner so that tonight the table for six only sits two. lighted candles in mismatched holders. red wine mixed with fruit in that hideous pitcher. bowls of foods we love to feed to one another. orange and black licorice ice cream waiting in the freezer.

it’s spring. the sun pours through the window. she stands at the counter washing strawberries. i embrace her from behind, kissing her neck and cupping her breasts…

Notjenny sees me staring and says hello. she introduces herself as T----. “Celebrity always brings me out of my shell,” she says. she wants to know what i was thinking about. “what’s behind the goofy look?” i offer to share my thoughts if she’s got the time. she doesn’t. at least not tonight.

she gives me her number. tired of temporary guests, i never call.

one night a few days later, my kid is full of questions. they’re all about dating and sex. she wants to know what to look for in a man. i tell her it’s a long list. “the top three, then.”

“patience. humility. good hands. but if you ask me again tomorrow my answer will be different.”

she finds this funny, calls me “silly,” and runs off to play with the dog.

i watch them roll around on the rug in the next room. i think it’s great that he lets her have the upper hand.

it wasn’t that long ago that i was full of questions and innocence--at least not so long ago that i’ve forgotten. like in a good book, it’s easy to pinpoint the exact moment things change and the protagonist’s life divides. for me, it wasn’t loss of virginity, the death of someone close, an education at the school of hard knocks, or the birth of my daughter.

it was the middle of may, 2006. i’d just opened a birthday letter that arrived in the post. it had a photo and a short note on white paper, folded in half length-wise. it read:

lotus garden
mojave 3
miller’s crossing
the word, hover
root beer, your kind
tiger tail
red shoes and tailors.

i took a good look at the picture. it wasn’t of her. nor had she taken it. it looked like something she’d found. it was older than both of us. black and white. rounded corners. it was of a brownstone. there was a bicycle (red?) to the left of the front door. in the foreground was an old woman sweeping leaves off the walk with one of those old straw brooms. her head was cut off by the framing. her hands were wrinkled but strong, spotted with brown and streaked with veins. she wore a shift dress and sneakers. no socks. i wondered what it meant. fall is her favorite season; black and white is her favorite color; straw brooms always make me think of weddings; bikes always make me think of summer; brownstones equal new york…

i flip it over.

unfamiliar handwriting, small and delicate. black ink: “5 May 1962. Chester. 300 block.”

under it, in the same lettering as my note:

‘it may take more than love to keep the poison down.’ —J.

the quote’s from Arlie John Carstens. no doubt i’d said it without attribution one drunken night.

i put the picture and the note back in the envelope and place it on the table. i go to the bookcase and pull out one of my diaries.

i flip thru it and come across one of our conversations, scribbled down after i hung up the phone.

*** 4.23.02 ***

d: i don’t want to be yours when someone else can be. i want to be yours when you won’t settle for anyone else.

j: you have a way of making me feel feminine.

keep tolerating my patience and i’ll be ready when you’re on the same plane.

what if i decide to travel by boat?

boat’s fine. if you get tired of rowing, yell. i will swim to you.

if you told me to castaway and never look back, that might be more effective. you know how girls are.

yeah, i do. but i only recently figured out what women are like. and i know that’s saying a lot. ya know, i’m betting my patience has more stamina than your denial and self destruction.

(long pause)

j: i’m smiling like a fucking retard.

d: glad to hear it. now what?

you’re too sweet to me.

you haven’t seen the half of it.

i know. this is what frightens me

is there a hint of truth in that?

more than a hint

you talking sex? you talking life? you talking love?

all of the above.

see, now i’m the one smiling like a retard.

good. now i am off to the store.

alrighty. have fun. feel free to skip.

****

i closed the diary, sad, but smiling that we never closed the book…

and you? what’s your answer to the same question?

dobbs