April 2006
Chorus of frowns – For years my family had a really awful garage band, The Critical Consensus. I was so embarrassed to have people over. The tiniest hint of a captive audience and they'd roll the TV out of the way and s
Garbled speech and nameless fears – How am I going to get this book project off the ground, Fish Ladders of Oregon: A Typological Survey, when it hurts to take a deep breath? This one small part of me is spasming. My trunk makes a fist.
Inanimate – I'll let my magnetic unvitality draw people toward me, like when curious onlookers encircle a corpse. Invisible people suddenly become visible when you remove the life element. This might attract init
Never reborn – In the smoky aftermurmurs of a surprisingly graceful fuck it struck me that I'm ready to become a full-fledged something, to have some aspect of myself clearly betoken something, rather than merely su
Surges and tingles – What will happen next? Tomorrow is more interesting than today. So is yesterday for that matter. People who scold you to live for today are themselves living for any other day than today, that much is
The Chillicothe trombonist – Not only do I have a friend with benefits but he recently upgraded his coverage, tantalizingly, to include death and dismemberment. He's a Chillicothe trombonist. We met cute after I misfingered him
The Frontage Road – This first appeared in Harness in 2005. From the interstate, the frontage road is liable to appear suddenly. There it is, a little companion road running parallel to the highway. You might see a pick
The revolutionary drywall sanding tool – After a few low blows I found myself yet again in reduced circumstances and an '82 Chevette. My familiar me needed a brain-crackle and pronto. A chuggling voice on talk radio told me to seek out profe
April 2005
20 questions – What about my plans for the weekend? What about the disquieting premonition? What about the unopened ten-ounce Lindt milk chocolate bar with whole hazelnuts in my top right desk drawer, next to my wal
Brain basket – Did you see the article describing recent research about the risk association between pessimism and dementia? Apparently there are indications that pessimistic feelings, depression, and anxiety might
Everything that could happen – As a connoisseur of disappointment, I've often wondered what it would be like to disengage my expectations from the world of people and redirect them toward targets more predictable in nature, maybe
In seclusion – It's not true that in high school I was voted Most Likely To Contract Multiple Sclerosis. The other day, however, I came down with a sudden inexplicable headache after watching television for nine con
Laughter in the rain – A couple of months ago B and I went to a gay bar downtown for karaoke night. You can just imagine. Why did I think of this now? Don't misunderstand me, I love being gay, after all what's not to love?
Less than nobody – I lost my wallet somewhere today, maybe in B's car, or in B's apartment, or in public someplace, which would be trouble. I've never lost my wallet before. I am usually hyperaware of personal items onc
My identity wasn't stolen or even borrowed – B has my wallet, so I can stop eating Oreos and pacing. My identity was not stolen, so I'm stuck with it for the time being. Anyone want it? While I was eating Oreos and pacing, in a state, I called C
My mind is made up – People have beliefs and this is really where the problem lies. I have a few beliefs myself, not many. In 1998 Cher asked me over and over and over again if I believe in life after love and I still hav
Phantoms of volition – Parts of me fit together poorly. I am somewhat loosely constructed from poor materials. A rickety quality, a let's-throw-this-fellow-together-any-old-way feel. For instance my jaw. I've always known t
Sparking time – To the best of my knowledge I've never sparked a public outcry. I'd like to, at least once. I've made a bad situation worse, oh my yes, I've further destabilized an already volatile situation, no ques
The least I can do – I gave my office a makeover, as previously described. There's now room for even more books. The sill-height bench/shelf practically begs for houseplants to sit upon it, and the whole bench-sill-plant-
Visiting hours – The extraction of J's diseased, stone-laden viscus went well, and when I left his hospital room he was repeatedly clicking the button of the self-administered morphine drip. What a champ. Invasion of
Waiting room – Today I accompanied J to his medical appointment, a post-surgical exam. People want other people to go with them to the doctor, for moral support, even though they can't actually go in all the way, in
Working space – Today I redecorated my so-called office on a whim, which is to say I moved the furniture into a less-logical configuration for no reason at all and then smiled contentedly as if something worthwhile h
April 2004
An open letter to the person who rented my San Francisco apartment after I moved out – I imagine you've formed an opinion about me based on the junk mail addressed to me that slipped through, the stuff that didn't get forwarded, the "...or Current Resident" material. For months after I
Boredom of sleep – My first thought upon waking up this morning was one of dismal triumph for having managed to fall asleep at all. Achieving unconsciousness shouldn't count as a personal victory, I think that's aiming
Dishonesty, the social lubricant – Writing is superior to talking, and not only because I don't have to pretend to listen or make receptive, benign faces. When I write I'm never concerned with the boundaries of politeness and normalcy,
Fresh contempt – Being followed by documentary filmmakers can be very distracting. I am kept constantly aware of the intrinsic dullness of my actions by the mere fact of their scrutiny. The camera's glare is uncharita
Gnawing the drumstick, sucking the bone – When it comes to pleasurable situations I favor beginnings, and the period just before the beginning even more, that wonderful time when slack hope swells and hardens into concentrated anticipation, w
If you're feeling sinister – Now this is a beautiful day, a day of cute boys in short pants. I am consumed with Seasonal Affective Desire but I also want to read my Denton Welch book in the sun. Could Belle and Sebastian exist wi
My puppies won't stay in the basket – My mind has a back and a front, just like everyone else's, or so I assume. I am apparently not able to "put" something (idea, emotion, memory, what have you) in the "back of my mind," or rather I can
My vale of tears – Pollen has been making my immune system paranoid and oversensitive (bringing it into line with the rest of my personality), resulting in the usual tedious misery. How mundane it is, if my happiness is
Part of the crowd – One shameful pleasure I've never experienced is being part of an indignant crowd. Just once I'd like to find myself in a frightening mob under the spell of a single coarse sentiment. Down with this, h
Revolting hors d'oeuvres for nobody – I again went to that nifty little Morrison Street wine and tini bar the other night, what a comfortable place that is. That's a bar in which it's possible to permanently solve a host of stubborn perso
Smiling bag – This morning I awoke from a strange dream to find a weird gash on my right thumb. My cat Sam lounged luxuriously at my feet, so I gave him my best suspicious glare. He looked innocent, sure, but almos
Smoke and mirrors – My capacity for romantic attachment is so wanton that I could probably fall in love with a clever computer program or an unusually intelligent chimp, although realistically such affairs would only be
Sunday outing – Yesterday we drove to the coast, to Ecola State Park, and climbed down the rocky hill to the beach. I'd never been there, it was beautiful and reminded me of Monterey, but without the overdevelopment
The firmness of my intentions – Some words are commonly misused because people take them to mean the opposite of what they actually mean, words like "restive" and "nonplus" and "democracy." My official euphemism for you-know-what:
The naked truth – I'm connecting the dots, which I've learned is a lot easier when you're the one who made the dots and you remember where you put them. Coffee helps, and lots of it. Then later there's booze to take th
The price of fun – M and his chocolate lab were visiting for a week, and have now left. It was a time of debauchery and old movies, and the near-constant consumption of adult beverages. A real sex drugs and rock and rol
The worst that could possibly happen – In any happy situation I am prone to imagine the worst that could happen. It's a habit. When we're in the car I picture the gruesome particulars of a sudden collision, the moment of impact and bodies
Theater of cruelty – I have a distinct but false memory of a Dom DeLuise appearance on Dinah Shore's afternoon talkshow in which he slyly but cruelly made fun of her deformed leg, some vicious campy remark that froze her
Thwart the nougat donor – Terror is the chewy nougat at the center of my personality. I wish my chewy nougat were something else, like for instance love, or honor, or integrity. But terror it is, you work with what you've got.
April 2003
Annual themes – I think it's important to have some semblance of structure in your life, and to aid in this I like to assign simple themes or mottos to each year. This can be done retroactively, to give some kind of
Brief encounter – I'd never set foot in a Ross Dress For Less before, and wasn't sure of the concept. I soon realized, however, that they carry overstock name brand clothes as well as junky offbrand merchandise, in sma
Bus trouble – When I lived in San Francisco I took public transportation just about every day. Since moving to Portland I've used it much less. So I've made this transition back to car culture after a decade in bus
Fahrenheit 415 – As a curmudgeon with a romantic streak, I always found the weather in San Francisco to be perfect for me, as it accommodated my leanings toward the lugubrious as perfectly as it did my occasional gurg
Fear of flora – James has gone to class, I've got coffee brewing, and I'm getting mentally ready to attempt (gasp!) going out for a walk. I wish this didn't have to be a big deal, but after the allergy woes of the la
Four things that aren't punk – A spray of jonquils in a cut glass vase The novels of Ronald Firbank A plate of assorted cheeses and Carr's water crackers Avril Lavigne
From the archive of rejected marketing campaigns – A group of four carefree friends (three whiter than white, the fourth a bespectacled African-American male who's apparently been shopping at Banana Republic) dine alfresco in the late summer sun, quic
Good Friday – Well, Easter is nearly upon us. I can tell because one of the supermarket aisles is now unduly pasteled. It's not so much that I was "raised Catholic" as that a few charming attempts were made to inc
Hash marks of idiocy – "Everyone makes mistakes," friends reassure you after you've committed yet another colossal blunder. "Making mistakes is better than not trying at all!" To which you must reply, "I wouldn't have beco
Head like a hole – Have I mentioned that for a brief time as a child I suffered from a peculiar anxiety about where the outside of me ends and the inside of me begins? To this day I've not heard of anyone else ever havi
Hello darkness my old acquaintance – It's the middle of the night, almost four A.M. as I write this. The house is quiet, the street is quiet, the whole damn West Coast is quiet. There is a sort of low electrical hum, but I suspect that t
In which screws are sorted – When I was a kid my stepfather would orchestrate "guy" projects for us to do together. This was something he'd never bothered with before, he'd always been more than happy to ignore me, until I reache
Infantile abacus of need – Human relationships require so much maintenance and care, you're forced to ask yourself why this should be so. If they were sporty foreign cars, know-it-alls on the sidewalk would cross their arms and
Little shivers – Every now and then the awareness that I'm not 23 anymore slices through me, I have a little shivery moment of terror and self-recrimination, like that instant where you've just said the most terrible
Look here – I am wondering if I know just what the hell I'm doing. There are times I ask my reflection in the bathroom mirror, "Do you know what the hell you're doing?" or "What are you doing? What?" Then I pause
Pitcher of margaritas – You know what I miss? Those sloshy eruptions of eloquence that happen when friends of a certain age and shared sensibility get together over drinks. I guess it's often a carryover from collegiate days
The great mall of despair – Malls really haven't changed too much since I last visited them periodically, over fifteen years ago. They're even more skewed toward a pimply demographic, brazenly so, but that's just the continuatio
The museum of phone gestures – With technological change certain things are lost. Many intelligent people have commented about sweeping sociological changes wrought by the advent of the cellular telephone, but I mourn something dif
The reproductive lives of trees – It never fails, one of nature's clever jokes (as with all jokes, timing is everything). Yesterday, the first nice day of spring after weeks of nonstop rain and gloom in Portland, and can I enjoy it? N
Waving or drowning? – I suppose it's a truism to observe that everyone wants to be noticed. Smart people suggest that it's a desire that's been perfected and honed to a deadly point on the gleaming whetstone of American cu
What is this really about – I believe I have mostly gotten over certain kneejerk feelings of suspicion or mistrust when confronted with ordinary kindliness in others. In the past, if someone volunteered to help me with (to me) d
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