Billy Collins

How does he know when to break
at the end of the line then begin again
with the next simple, elegant thought?
I count the syllables and eye the stanzas
but it's all Greek to me.
I'll tell you how he knows,
he went to poet school, that's how.

He probably spent every waking moment
inhaling the classics, skinny and pale,
a preference for his father's upholstered
reading chair, legs dangling,
while I frittered away my youth
making up dance routines to the Carpenters
on the back stoop
of a neighborhood pal's patio
in bare feet.

Then perhaps his career really took off
with creative writing classes, his teachers
noticing a spark of genius, mentioning his wit
to one another over cobb salad,
while I nurtured my hand by passing notes to
friends during quizzes and wrote
ten page tomes to pen-pals in the same county.

All I remember from senior English poetry
was having to work too hard to figure out
what they meant. Underlining and re-reading,
I didn't care that Man had a thing against Nature.
I just wished my hair could look as voluminous
as that cheerleader's at the away game,
second to last from the right.

And that, in a nutshell, is why Billy Collins
is a U.S. Poet Laureate,
and I am not.
He was probably an English Major,
devoured the masters,
read and read and you-name-it-he's-read-it
while I ended up majoring in acting and film
but waited tables, mostly,
and fretted about men.

Then I learned to diaper and garden and spackle.
And maybe he has learned to as well, Old Bill,
but can he do the time step
and a pretty decent cartwheel?

Probably not and who cares because he
can write the pants off a poem
and not just because he has a drawer full
of heavy medals on thick, shiny ribbons,
but because his poems are fun to read and easy-as-pie and
feel as though you've just hung around a bit
with that wise older guy from up the street
who doesn't say much, and pretends to shoo kids
off his lawn in the summer,
but you know to be funny-as-hell when he invites you up
onto his porch for a beer, and you listen, rapt,
mostly because you love his lilting Irish brogue.

But none of that is true.
He was born in Manhattan and went to high school in
White Plains. He's friends with Bill Murray
which makes sense. Just a regular schmo
who likes to write
and does so with grace and aplomb,
so that some oaf like me can read his poems,
and feel smug while saying, "Do I read poetry?
Why, yes, love it. Why do you ask?"

But no one ever does, which is fine by me
because that's not the only reason I read them.

I'm able to understand and get a kick out of
his poems. I use them to get out of my head
when I haven't much time,
just a minute here and there
to whisk myself away, slow my breath, quiet my mind.
Anyone can. Many people do.

Then I close my book-- it's easy to stop--
and picture Billy Collins sitting, groggy, stubbled,
at his kitchen table,
a wreath of laurel balanced, askew on his bed-head head.
With one finger he moves the medal hanging
around his neck, just out of reach so that it
doesn't clink against his mug
then pours a smidge of milk into his morning coffee.

He starts to stir with his wrong hand then,
without looking, reaches the other forward
and gently slides all the awards out of the way,
groping for the sugar bowl.
Just another day in Poet-Laureateville.

Sex-y Spouses

Seems there are well-worn paths and covert plans of action that coupling parents must engage in in order to have clandestine sex when sharing the house with teenagers-- teenagers who are too drunk on their own hormones to question why they're miraculously getting another thirty minutes to stay out after curfew.

I have one very young son and no husband to speak of, so at a dinner party this summer, I was enlightened. We sat, thigh to thigh, six or so couples and myself surrounding a centerpiece of white, summer garden hydrangea. No strangers among us, we were all friends; old friends married to childhood friends. The comments grew ribald, the laughter rolled and crescendoed and I had little to add on the subject, so I listened.

I listened carefully to their tone and noticed when they reached for their wine glasses. I looked at their spouses and tried to catch the signals-- shifts in posture, the timing of their sips, small smiles lit by candlelight-- and took it all in. I scanned the long, rectangular table and looked at their eyes for traces of something that might tell me more than what was being said. But I caught nothing because there was nothing to catch. Their smiles remained genuine and no one snapped or scolded. Maybe they do at home-- in fact I'm sure of it-- but here, at this dinner party, they laughed. They were simply folks who'd married their best friends. Under a spectacular seashell chandelier, rubbing elbows as they carved their fillet, they were well-fed and contented, and at this moment, they were in love.

Not dewy-eyed in love or Hey-world-we're-in-love, these couples had logged twelve, sixteen, eighteen years of marriage. They weren't trying to get pregnant and they weren't in competition, they just enjoy having sex with each other and so they do from time to time. They drive each other batty and go through painful, dark, rough patches but they work it out somehow and eventually wind up giggling together as they sneak around, in the dead of night, to the far guest bathroom while their in-laws lay sleeping.

The candles burned down as their banter trailed off. Then one of them announced that they'd all gotten together and hatched a plan to fix me up with one of the local, universally-understood-to-be-closeted gay men. I reached for my wine glass, took a breath, then a sip. I asked them why, if this man is such a catch, didn't any of them snap him up? For ten years, while they were all single and dating they could have had him. "How did such a gem of a guy slip by every single one of you," I asked, "and why is he so perfect for me?"

I know that they just want to see me happy and that their suggestion comes with the best of intentions, but haven't I illustrated, quite dramatically at times, that being married to the wrong person makes me unhappy? Don't they get that being with Any Guy or Some Guy is not the solution to being single? And isn't the greater problem the possible issue that being single, in their eyes, seems to be something that needs a solution and must be fixed at all costs and right away? Like that adhesive stripping that people stick around the cracks in their window jams in the winter. Quick, do something, anything.

I put down my glass and collected my thoughts. I explained that if I were going to be fixed up with a gay man that he'd better be a big queen. He'd better be hi-larious, love to dance and do my hair for special occasions. He'd better want to cook for me, travel with me and stop at every single yard sale from here to Bora-Bora. He'd better be gay with a capital G so loud that it jumps out of a cake wearing pasties. Otherwise, I'll pass on the mearly whelming patch job, thank you.

In the meantime, I find comfort knowing that there are husbands who go home to their families on Friday nights or who dance with their wives the whole time. I relish the minutia, I'm thrilled it exists. I see husbands cross the lawns at bar-b-ques with a glass in each hand and wordlessly give their wives the drink they didn't have to ask for. "It's cold, take my jacket." "When you're tired, we'll go." I'm privy to their pleases, thank- yous and, "Great haircut, Honey,"s and I log these moments with invisible ink. They've been doing it for so long that it's rote now: the non-verbal endearments; their knee-jerk kindness; the quiet, faceless kisses. The love.

I have a friend who's so crazy for his wife-- after seventeen years-- so flabbergasted that he caught such a dish, that he'll tell you outright, "I'm the luckiest bastard." Then shake his head in wonderment. Another guy I know was describing his life to me a while ago. He said offhandedly, "I get to commute in to work with my wife every day." He didn't say, "I commute in," or, "I have to commute in," but "I get to commute in." With my wife. Every day. What fortune, what a coup, what a life.

I know that their arguments have been fierce and their venom can be strong. I know there is imbalance and want. I can spot a floundering marriage from fifty yards away now, so attuned is my misery-dar in light of it's recent recalibration. But when a man touches the small of his wife's back as they cross a quiet street with no car in sight, or burrows his feet under her warm thigh from the chair next to the couch, where she's turning the page, just to be touching her, just to be near, just because he likes her, I'm comforted. That's my goal, if I must have one, to like and be liked. The love is easy.

Back at the dinner party, birthday candles were being blown out. When given the chance to sit anywhere, my friends had all chosen to sit next to their spouses. And why not, (they don't wonder), this is the person I chose. So until some one chooses me and I them, until that some one finds that sort of comfort in me, I'll pass. The view from where I'm sitting has it's fair share of perks. It may not be my first choice, but it's my choice at last and my standards haven't been lowered. On the contrary. The bar's been raised by the very same childhood friends passing plates of cake counter-clockwise. I want my cake and will eat it, too. Until then, I'm just fine.

Baby Mamma

I misunderstood the invitation’s homework assignment which is so typical of me in my state—that of a newly single mother, responsible for all the household finances, navigating a divorce and finding a job while raising a son to love his father when what I really want to do is whisper all the jerky things he’s done into his precious little ear as he sleeps.

The occasion was a baby shower for my girlfriend, Celeste. We were supposed to write letters to her gestating daughter to be read aloud at Saturday’s cocktail hour and again, in theory, when she’s older. I goofed and wrote a letter in the voice of the baby to her mother, but was forgiven by the crowd who’d assembled in the hotel’s lounge, wearing sundresses and sandals-- too giddy to notice the whir of Thomas Circle and still high from the lack of humidity during our spectacular day in D.C.

All baby showers are special, but this was ultra-special in that there’s no father in the picture. Celeste-- a well-respected, headstrong broad with a bright mind and glistening career-- decided to forge ahead with her unexpected pregnancy as women have done for centuries-- some of their own choice, many without. After logging myriad hours as aunt and dear friend to so many children who adored her, Celeste knew that this might be her last chance to cradle her own, so, tentative family and steadfast friends flew in to Washington from all over the country to fete the bravest woman in the room.

I had been her staunch supporter from the get-go, knowing first hand that not all babies’ fathers are the answer to the wail of two a.m. feedings or five p.m. colic. Many fathers need to be coerced into getting on the same parenting page concerning breastfeeding and bedtimes, discipline and diapers. Some fathers I know work late, go online, you-tube and tune out while others simply disappoint and disappear.

My estranged husband had been pretty good in many ways but the thought of having ample means to provide for a baby myself alone sounded, I’m afraid to say it, a little dreamy to me. I couldn’t imagine my son’s formative years without the added stress of our incessant bickering and now that we were separated I was getting a taste of the simple life and it was sheer heaven. Save for squashing bugs, fastening bracelets and rubbing sun block on my middle upper back, single parenthood was a much smoother ride. Having far less money to work with now and needing to return to work just served as a reminder that the compromises we’d pledged in marriage don’t end when the marriage does. So I told Celeste to go for it although I don’t think it made a difference. She had made up her mind with steadfast calm and steely resolve from almost the moment the child was conceived. Almost.

As we took turns reading our letters full of love and support for Celeste and the life-altering choice she’d made, I secretly siphoned off a bit for myself to fortify the life-altering choice I had so bravely made. We would both be on our own, now, to boldly go where millions of women have gone before us and we would do our best because that’s all we can do. There would be no pats on the back and few words of encouragement from our respective peanut galleries. It was up to us, now, to tell ourselves we were doing a good job. We were it.

I thought the letter writing was a good idea and wondered if it was too late to ask my friends to write letters for my first-grader to read about me, years from now, when he’s surly and hormonal and blames me for the divorce. I could sneak them into his smelly duffel bag as he’s stomping out the door to go live with his father. Or I could post them on his Facebook page. Or decoupage them to his nightstand.

Celeste’s nameless baby kicked in her mother’s itchy tummy as my guileless, young son kicked a soccer ball with his father somewhere in New Jersey. I rose to stand, squared my shoulders, and read my letter from a baby to her mother, when it occurred to me that in too many ways, I had written it to me. Which would account for my choking up towards the end. Either that or I was just tired.

Mom, You’re Beautiful When You’re Tired

I know you’ll look at me and think, jeeze, what do I do now?
I’ve changed your diaper, tried to wipe your tears and made a solemn vow
That if indeed you do stop crying, I’ll do anything you want
I’ll feed you all day, rock you and sway while remaining nonchalant
As passers-by and women (not shy) who will stop you on the street
Following questions with suggestions, “How’d you and your husband meet?”
And when you nod and smile demurely, thoughts of strangling with wire
Keep in mind I love you so and think you’re beautiful when you’re tired.

There may be nights that I’m not sleepy and you’re teetering on collapse
Put me to bed, earplug your head, I’ll fall asleep and then perhaps
I’ll learn to trust you as you’ll trust me to still love you in the morn
Because forgiveness, pure forgiveness beats a path to hearts well worn
So I will wear your silly outfits, I’ll roll over on command
I’ll learn to talk; I’ll not stop walking toward you, craving for your hand
You’ll guide me gently, bruised and bloody, let me slobber with desire
I’ll look a wreck but what the heck, you’re beautiful when you’re tired.
Yes, beautiful when you’re tired.

I may not thank you right away for letting me try then trip and fall
I will grow bolder as I’m older—I’m your daughter after all—
I’ll push the envelope quite often, challenge you to make me think
Of ways to get my way all day but deep inside I may be sinking
Wanting boundaries and your guidance, yearning for the tantrum’s end
So discipline me, time-outs give me— you’re my mother not my friend
And if you’re wondering if I love you bet I do with heart afire
You are my sun, my moon, my stars and you’re beautiful when you’re tired
You’re so beautiful when you’re tired
You’re amazing, you’re incredible, and you’re beautiful when you’re tired.

Erma, Son and the Holy Ghost

There are about four or five sock puppets hanging around my shoulders at all times, sometimes whispering, sometimes barking at me to remember how to deal with the sudden loss of my dad, the savvy navigation of my divorce and boundaries to be maintained with my ex, the mindful single-mom raising of my only-child son, the finding of a job, the maintaining of all the household finances without said job, and the low-grade yearning I still have for another child which surges every time someone asks me how many kids I have. These puppets are in lieu of a best girlfriend-- something I am sorely lacking these days but am clearly not meant to have at this time-- and a husband-- something I have chosen to do without. So my sock puppets fill in. They hover at ear level and say things like, "Let go," "Accept," "Be Strong," and "Forgive." They whisper, "Be there for yourself," in one ear while cooing, "Reach out towards others," in another. They keep me from throwing all of my estranged husband’s belongings onto the front lawn and kicking him in the shins. Like me, they're doing the best they can.

Last night it was vaguely suggested to me that life is unfair, bub, and I'm welcome to go jump in a lake. I had just that morning been to therapy and yoga and found myself in a swivet that church was days away. Who would mollify my whiny prattling in the interim? Who would soothe me with balms of reason? My kitchen cabinets were bespeckled with self-help post-it notes but suddenly, they seemed lackluster and dusty. My sock puppets lacked pith.

There was one thing left to do, I thought. (Actually, there are the drugs and prostitution cards I'm still keeping close to my chest.) But before I play them, there's this other thing I keep hearing about. They call it praying.

I know. I make a slight squinchy face every time I say it, too.

People I know talk about it and others I would never suspect slip it into conversation. I figured I’ve got to try it. I know I probably should have been doing it all along since jumping back on the church bandwagon last year, but I haven't. Not in a person-to-person sense. I've chimed in for the rote-learned religious limericks that are the mainstay of every organized service. I take heart the messages embedded in the little stories that we mumble in unison reminding us of Jesus and his father and friends, and the epic Spanish soap opera that was their lives, but alone in my car, in my room or my head? No, I don't. I don't "do" praying.

But last weekend, two unsuspecting friends, a Christian and a Jew, both told me that they drop to the floor in the mornings before brushing their teeth. One hits her knees and thanks the good Lord for all her blessings. (The Jewess) The other slithers onto the rug against her bed and meditates for a full ten minutes. (The lapsed Catholic) I was surprised at both of these revelations. I wouldn't have pegged either woman for the type. You know, the praying kind: the Wal-Mart-shopping, bible-meeting-attending, teddy-bear-collecting, scrapbooking kind. In other words, not me.

Maybe it’s the lexicon. I could call it meditation. That would be socially acceptable to the others in my 30 Rock-watching, Target-shopping, NPR-listening demographic, but then I’d have to actually meditate. As far as I can tell, praying is different from meditation. Meditation, from what little I've learned from my kundalini yoga teacher and from reading “Eat, Pray, Love” only once, is the emptying of one's thoughts so that the mind may be clear and hollow enough to allow one's own strength and wisdom to bubble up from within. It's the act-- or, non-act, as it were-- of listening to one’s inner teacher or honing your intuition but only after emptying the head of all its administrative and emotional pablum.

Sound easy? It is and it isn’t.

The sock puppets get in the way, interfering, as is their wont. They leap into my head with all the subtlety of a Mexican hat dance, reeling off lists of phone calls to make, emails to return, chores to do and permission slips to sign. Most importantly, they remind me not to obsess over things out of my control. It’s loud and crowded in there. Asking them all to leave with an alamand left seems like a worthwhile pursuit but one that might take a full lifetime to master and monks don’t get health care benefits.

So, always one to explore the easy way out, I thought I'd give praying a little go round. Praying is more like a little chit-chat with your supreme being of choice, your own personal god or what have you. I liked the idea of it because I could just keep talking and complaining, as if I were on the phone, to my imaginary friend, who, I'm told, is always listening. When I've said my piece and explained my side of the story, I can wrap up the conversation with a closing sentiment akin to, "So, there you have it. Please give me the strength and guidance to see this through in whatever manner you see fit. Ball's in your court." And then I would sign off with pretty much the same panache as hanging up a phone. No stillness or time to reflect on the solution. Gotta run.

I remembered Carolyn's advice. "As soon as you wake up, get right onto the floor and pray. If you don't do it first thing, you'll never do it." Easy I thought. If I can remember to put a thermometer in my mouth the moment after opening my eyes, still supine, which is what I did for all those years while trying to get pregnant, then I can do this. I called her a few days later.

I said, "Carolyn, I just wanted to tell you that I thought and thought last night before bed about praying in the morning."
"Good," she said.
"I went to sleep with it on my mind. I even visualized doing it the next morning," I said.
"Excellent," she said.
"It was the very last thought I had before slipping into unconsciousness," I went on.
"Fantastic," she said.
"And do you know what happened the very next morning?" I asked.
"You forgot," she said very matter-of-factly.
"I forgot," said I, "how did you know?"
"Because it's hard to start. It's hard to get in the habit. Keep tryin' and keep me posted."
"Alright. Seeya," I said.
"Bye," she said and hung up.

Then, this morning, I visualized my conversation or my prayer if you must. I thought about praying to Jesus, who always looked a bit too much like a Dead Head for my comfort zone, but praying to him seemed dishonest-- too fake, too Grammys. I envisioned Mister God with his fabulous, white Grizzly Adams hair and beard, all tumbling down and well groomed. But what does he know from girlfriends and husbands, mothers and pregnancy? My god needed to be a woman, at least to start with. I know there are a bazillion goddesses out there, but I'm not familiar with them and didn't want to feign familiarity. I was already on thin ice in that department. So I thought and thought. Who would I cast as God if I could cast anyone?

I started with Madeline Khan, of course. I pictured her draped in white silk, very Dior, cut on the bias, her auburn hair fluffed up around her face like a halo but she seemed too young and flip for the job. It’s imperative that my God have a great sense of humor, but also the gravitas to take her responsibilities seriously. I needed someone with a little heft, a little deity-esque bravado. I considered Bea Arthur. She's got the seasoned age thing and the white streaks in her hair so she certainly looks the part. I would put her in something long and loose with bell sleeves and a golden rope belt. She'd want to wear one of those long-to-the-floor vests she favored on "Maude" which would be fine with me as long as it was white, too.

But my god is a benevolent god and Maude was tough and cutting. I needed her to have warmth and compassion, the scathing remarks I could do without. My own local reverend fit the bill, but I was wary of deifying anyone mortal and refused to have her in the running. She was politely asked to leave the audition.

Then a face came to mind; female, wizened, kind and forgiving, with a great sense of humor and a warm, comforting smile. My God would be Erma Bombeck. Or at the very least, have her face. I put her in something scoop necked with pleats and long sleeves because, like my mother, she is mindful of the loose skin under her forearms dangling. A shimmering white, cotton-poly blend would be most flattering and breathable and she may chose to belt her robes or not depending on how fat she feels that day.

I think I chose well when I chose Erma. It's been a few weeks since I started this essay and I would say that I remember to pray about half of the time. Curiously, I rarely conjure Erma’s face or anyone’s face for that matter. It’s just nice to have her on retainer if I need her.

I wake up and roll down onto my knees, my head and upper body flopping onto my folded arms on the bed because I’m too tired to hold up my spine. If anyone shuffled by at 6:30am they might think I was drunk. I begin by briefly thanking Erma for yesterday, and then ask her to give me strength and guidance for today. I acknowledge, with the nudge of a sock puppet, that I’m not in control and that I’m sure she’ll do right by me. A handful of times, I’ve slithered onto the floor and done a few deep breaths, clearing out the lungs as I attempt to quietly empty out my brain. This is my spine’s big chance to straighten up and fly right and my mind’s opportunity to shut down. It doesn’t. It thinks about the day, and I berate myself for being so inept. Then my sock puppets berate me for berating myself. So, up I get to brush my teeth and forget about the whole thing until the next time I remember.

I'm trying. Like someone determined to follow a diet, I'm going to try with all my might. Why is it so hard to fold this into my routine? The ground seems so far away. Do I think I'll get sucked under my mattress? Am I afraid of becoming a weirdo? I put toothbrush to tooth and these thoughts, too, fly out of my mind.

"Chicken," the sock puppets say, moving their heads side to side, eyes cast down. With a few muffled clicks of their wooly tongues they say again, “chicken.”

Blue

Ok. You need to hear about my divorce like you need a hole in the head, but there is one little morsel I'd like to share, a little sum-sum that bears repeating, and trust me, there is precious little worth repeating that you haven't read in a dime store novel or dozed through on the small screen about my divorce. It's your basic garden variety split laden with all the hack dialogue and cliche scenarios you would expect. Except for this:

Back in our salad days of love, when we were about half way through our seven month courtship, my soon to be ex-husband-- soon to be husband at the time-- let me paint his toenails dark blue. Once his size twelves dried, he galumphed proudly up to the beach and around the conservative little shore town where my family has spent their summers for generations. Some folks raised their eyebrows but most raised his glass and toasted the man who was presumably "made for me." He was smart, funny, creative, driven, then throw in the confidence of throwing caution-to-the-wind and he was a dream come true. Sound the trumpets.

So we did.

Months later, we were engaged. Ten months later, we were to be married. A grand wedding was planned. A lovely dress was bought. We were feted and fawned over until finally the big day arrived.

My father-- a memorable public speaker who reluctantly embraced the spot light-- had worked hard and surreptitiously on his father-of-the-bride toast and now it was his turn to speak. He stood there, beaming and be-tuxed, and told 180 of our nearest and dearest how pleased he was that Jim and I had found each other. He made mention of his first favorable impressions of Jim and how excited he was for our future. Dad had looked up on the Internet some phraseology from Jim's entirely foreign career path (my father was an artist, Jim was the opposite) and wove his newly-learned definitions into the speech with a panache that suggested how proud he was of his new son-in-law's impressive career path and smacked of his willingness to embrace him as family. Wrapping things up he said, "You know, there were some in this small town who clucked when they saw Jim's blue toenails, but I'm hear to tell you," and he leaned into the mic and steadied his voice for effect, "any son-in-law of mine who wants to paint his toenails blue, is okay by me." Then he stepped away from the mic, bent down, and took off his shiny black shoes and socks to reveal that he had, indeed, painted his toenails dark blue. The crowd went wild. My dad had brought down the house.

Fast forward eight years. Our marriage had reached the harrowing depths that marriages have to reach before something or some one gives. Jim and I separated with Jim moving an hour away to the big city-- city of dreams-- for the usual textbook last-gasp rigmarole. After a year of separation, my dream died and so did my father. By now I expect the marriage to expire, my dad's death, on the other hand, was a complete surprise. I was blind-sided. But after the year I'd had, I was almost used to this feeling of harrowing, moaning-groaning despair. Almost.

Six weeks after my dad died and a day after we scattered his ashes, my pending-ex-husband did something that necessitated that I retain a divorce attorney pronto. Time to get this ball rolling. And so with that, I headed into her office with calm resolution, empty tear ducts, and a sharpened number two pencil. My attorney was a whip-smart, toughened Jersey Girl in her forties-- her haircut, like her suit, was no nonsense. She laid it all out for me and explained the deal in the simplest of terms and then we set about disentangling our finances, which, for those of you unfamiliar to these waters, is really all a divorce is at the end of the day. The rest is emotional muckety-muck which should be directed at one's therapist or drinking buddies and has no business in the crass bureaucracy of divorce. When we were nearly through, she got up from the table to make a xerox. When she returned, I glanced at her feet.

She was wearing open-toed sandals. Her toenails were blue.

My conservative, beige-suit-wearing divorce attorney's toenails were dark blue. The same shade of blue as my ex and my dad. On this day of all days, of all seasons, of all time-- the same freaky shade of friggin' blue. Not green or purplish, light blue or mauve, or any one of a jillion shades of red which, lined up end to end could reach Pittsburgh and back again, but dark blue.


I asked her about it and she laughed and then told me in a clipped aside that no, this was not her usual shade. Her teenage daughter put her up to it. I told her the abridged version of my story and she touched her forehead to the table in disbelief. Yeah, you and me both.

The next day I told an old friend my story. She got goosebumps. She was convinced that my dad was sending me a message.
"And what message would that be?" I asked.
"You know, that you're doing the right thing," she said, "That your dad's still behind you 100%."

My dad had been my greatest advocate in my life's Spanish soap opera turn of events. Not because he didn't like my ex, but because he wanted what was best for me and my son and was convinced that I knew what that was. Remarkably, I did and I do. I think he was also secretly pretty relieved that I hadn't turned to drugs or prostitution as a result of my last year's undoing. Now, as I fill out the at-times overwhelming tsunami of paperwork, I occasionally imagine his particularly exuberant voice telling me how proud he is of me. Then I push away from the calculator and have myself a little cry.

I told my friend that I liked the idea that my father was sending me a message via my attorney's toes, but that I would prefer to think of it as a sort of cosmic wink. After all, I've known for months that I would have to make this decision myself, with no outside influence or encouragement. And that ultimately I am making the right choice, regardless of what signs or signals Dad sends me. Although, I do get a huge kick out of this sort of thing and hope they keep 'a comin'.

So there's a little full-circle fun for ya. The next time you get a pedicure, you can think of me and my dead marriage and deader father and my alive and well divorce attorney.

You know I will. And I won't be choosing dark blue.

Putting the U.N. in Fun

Recently I found myself hanging out at the U.N. bar with a bunch of Middle East dignitaries not named Michael.

The U.N. bar is not some hipster haunt in Williamsburg, and no, "middle east dignitaries" is not code for "other suburban moms." I was literally at the United Nations delegate's lounge-- a guest of my girlfriend, Dahlia-- chatting with foreign dignitaries who asked that, were I to write about them, they each be identified as Michael.

Dahlia's been my girlfriend for twenty-five years and working at the U.N. is the culmination of a string of global career moves she's made to keep herself engaged in foreign politics and the plight of the war torn and emotionally mending. For years she's brought me hand woven scarves, hand bound journals and beaded strands of beautiful craftsladyship that have made it all the way from Rowanda, East Timor, Nepal, India, or Hong Kong safely back to me in New Jersey. She travels alone, always has, and has never so much as batted an eye at narrowly evaded military coups, raucous uprisings or surly cab drivers. I've marveled at her unflappable gusto and wanderlust-- which blows mine out of the water-- ever since we met in Paris on a trip to Moscow all those years ago. And now she's in New York City, for another ten months (or ten minutes), until her next opportunity opens up and she flies out the window, leaving yet another sublet to store her bare-bones belongings in some basement in Queens. She's got boxes all over the world filled with the flotsam of sudden moves-- undeveloped film canisters, needless formal wear, letters and trinkets-- awaiting the day when she makes her global rounds to claim them. I love her because besides being ballsy and wearing all the world's hearts on her sleeve, she's funny and laughs at my jokes.

The Delegate's Lounge was located at the end of a massive room the size and scope of a large museum cafe. One wall was compromised entirely of windows-- an interesting safety choice for the U.N.-- and the ceiling was in another stratosphere, which was a good thing, because on the opposite wall hung the most exquisite and enormous rugs I'm ever likely to see.

I was immediately frustrated that I didn't bring my camera.

One rug had an Escher-through-the-looking-glass design that began broad at its edges and pointedly delved into such dizzying minutia that I couldn't help but picture the famous Iranian artisan, crouched on the floor with his forehead pressed against the fibers, a knotted carpet thread in one hand and a magnifying glass in the other. The other rug was also a gift, from China, and its topic was the great wall of. It was a breathtaking depiction-- just the sort of misty mountainous vista that I get lost in leafing through expensive glossy coffee table books or watching animated Pixar movies. It was so exquisitely detailed and so ridiculously huge that I felt for a moment that I was perambulating the great wall itself. Completely encompassing my vision, I followed the wall as it snaked and wound between enormous teal green mountains, low lying fog clinging to forgotten blackened trees, until eventually the wall, too, disappeared into it's own distant minutiae.

I'm no rug-hugger, but I was completely awestruck and I asked Dahlia, if this bar was open to the public. Everyone's gotta see this rug, I thought. Goodness, no, was her reply which I should have known as I recalled her having to meet me at a gate about eighty yards from the building where she presented me to a security guard only minutes before. Then Dahlia told me that this summer they'll begin renovating this 1950s vintage monument to Bauhaus Buck Rogers architecture-of-the-future and I felt an immediate concern for the rug. What if it doesn't make the new interior designer's cut? What if they go with flocked wallpaper and a nice arrangement of plates? I’m going to miss the wall-to-wall carpeting, hospital-blue formica and all that curved, blonde wood paneling. Where will they store these rugs and how did they get them into the room in the first place? My concerns gave way to introductions as I was lead to a table under the windows and introduced around.

Five relaxed, attractive, swarthy men in jackets and ties looked up to greet me as Dahlia introduced me around the table counter clockwise. "This is Michael, Mike, Mikey, Mick and Mack," she didn't actually say. Their true names were more colorful to me, but really they were the Tom, Dick and Harrys of the Middle East, or to be more current, the Dave, Steve and Johns of my generation. I found in them no trace of bravado or outward display of chauvinism. They each looked me respectfully in the eye-- something I'll admit I hadn't expected them to do-- and were modest and soft-spoken. I knew I had no business talking to these guys and I was smart enough to know that I'm not smart enough to engage them in any variant of meaningful political discourse that they haven't had a zillion times before. There was nothing so tedious to me, in the many months over many years that I spent in Europe, as having to have the same clichéd debate over and over with smug, humorless internationals, most of whom, had never been stateside. So, as they looked to me to inject new life into an hour old cocktail conversation, I threw them a curve ball.

"What kind of games did you play as children growing up?" I asked.
They looked at me and finally, one of them spoke up. Mike, I think it was.
"You mean games with other children?"
"Yes," I said, "Tell me about the games you played with your brothers and sisters and all the kids in the neighborhood where you grew up."
There was a bit of shifting in chairs but it was Mike again who spoke up.
“There was this one game we played where all the kids ran around while one kid chased after them and kicked them in the bottom. If you sat on the ground, you couldn't be kicked, but the moment you stood up to run, you were chased and kicked again.” I thought this sounded like fun. Also like something the Little Rascals would have played. I considered asking them if they wanted to play. There was certainly enough space. We wouldn't even have to push any tables aside. I smiled.
"Sounds hilarious and really fun," I said.
"It was," said Mickey. He was older, a friend of the dignitaries and a doctor now, but remembered playing it as well.
"What else?" I asked.

Michael told me about a game they played on a flat surface with round flat pebbles or thick discs. The object was to knock your opponent's to the corners of the table, (or out of bounds or off the table), by flicking. Each player took turns. I asked them what the flicking looked like. "Show me," I said. Michael leaned forward and moved his beer out of the way, then he held his bent forefinger back with his thumb and flicked it low against the table. I asked Mickey if he had the same flick. No, he said and he showed me his. He held his forefinger back by his index finger and the two fingers stayed straight while they flicked.
"It sounds a bit like pool or billiards," I said.
"Yes, it's very much like this," answered Mack.
"Did you all play this game?" I asked. They had grown up in different parts, mostly cities, of two separate but neighboring countries.
"Oh, yes. Everyone played," said Mick.
"Will you all show me how you flicked?" I asked, "I want to see everyone's flick."

They all sat up and moved their beers aside to show me their own individual flicking positions. Each one differed from the last and every finger was used to a unique effect. I thought about how these men must have learned their particular styles from their older brothers and fathers before them. Or maybe they came up with their own. For a brief instant I pictured these well-respected and well-comported men as excitable five-year old boys, studying the older kids and then racing off to perfect what would one day be their own signature style.

It was then that I heard my girlfriend say something to one of the Michaels about how she could fit six spiders in a matchbox. "What did you just say?" I asked. She grew up in the Philippines, raised, along with the chickens, by nuns. Electricity was available every other day. Easy Bake Ovens and Big Wheels were not.
She said, "If you sectioned off a matchbox you could fit six spiders perfectly in each compartment."
"To keep?" I asked.
"No, to fight," she replied.
"I don't understand."
She explained, "When I was a child we used to catch spiders and keep them in matchboxes. Then we would find a stick and someone would hold it. Then two people would put their spiders on either end of the stick and we would watch them fight until the death."
"I beg your pardon?" I said.
"They would move to the center of the stick and fight each other until one wrapped the other in its web around the stick. That was the winner." I didn't know there was an arachnid version of the cockfight.
"How long did this take?" I asked as I imagined this drama unfolding with the riveting speed of a six-hour cricket match.
"Oh, two minutes or so," was her answer.

Wow. Clearly it is not a small world after all. It's a big, big world and my slice-of-America ala mode upbringing looked nothing like theirs. All those childhood hours I logged making up dance routines to The Carpenters I could have been ass-kicking and spider-fighting. I suppose I can still teach my son these games. Of course I'll have to make him promise not to tell the other mothers where he learned them.

Our round table chat took on the feel of an intimate campfire heart-to-heart and the dimming dusk light softened our faces and defenses. Stories of childhood games turned to the re-telling of cherished lore: epics of romance and the quest for God and love. The men sitting around the table grew from boys to lovelorn teens in my mind and their eyes grew a bit lonely and remote. Years before they would find themselves eating take-out dinners with plastic forks and defying parking signs in New York City, they were gangly teens, at home with their families, craving the kind of unattainable romantic perfection they had only read about in school and whispered about in the dark. It's then that they began their grope for what they perceived as true enlightenment. Half way around the globe, I was doing the same.

The barmaid took one last sweep of our empties and a security guard gave Michael a sideways glance. The room had darkened and I looked up to see that the rugs had lost a bit of their command. Rising from the table we wordlessly shook off whatever intimacy had been garnered over the last few hours. The men walked ahead, their faces out of view and Dahlia and I followed, arm in arm, a few steps behind.

That much I had expected. The rest was a pleasant surprise.

Hair Care

I went in for a haircut today. It’s a cozy, small-town salon with four chairs and a sink. And though the palette and décor is steely blue and cool, there is undeniable warmth to the vibe. The last time this woman-- the owner-- cut my hair, my marriage was on the skids. I’d been losing weight, sleep and marbles. As she draped the cape around my neck with the finesse of a lady matador, she asked me what I wanted in her signature bright and measured tone. I straightened my shoulders, tossed back my hair, and said, “Something that will save my marriage.”
“You mean the number five,” she said.
“Yes, give me the number five,” I said and we shared a tentative laugh. I added, “No pressure,” then took off my glasses and we relaxed into the business at hand. (Needless to say, that haircut did not save my marriage. I did not fault her or the haircut.)

Today I went in for a whole new do-- a different one from a year ago. She did her thing and then asked her question with the same earnest verve as ever.

I smiled impishly. I'd be dropping another bomb today, which some might think not only cruel but in poor taste, but I went for it. I need a chuckle, and if anyone could handle it, she could.
“What can I do for you today?” she chirped.
"Can you give me something that will bring my father back from the dead?”

“Oh, my goodness, I’m so sorry,” she said and she meant it as she touched her hand to her chest. I followed up quickly by saying, “It’s o.k.!” but I felt a bit bad for using my dad's recent death as material. I was pretty sure he wouldn't mind. He'd think it was funny. Then we laughed and I settled in to tell her my tale and we got down to the business at hand.

The more I talked, the more she listened, and she did that with finesse, too. She combed and cut and talked and listened and I imagined the compartments inside her brain whirring, like a jazz drummer using both hands and feet and smoking a cigarette while he plays. She wove strands of our old conversations into this one effortlessly-- her mind able to retrieve nuggets from my spotty client history without delay. This impressed me even more than the cutting hair/chatting, patting-head-rubbing-tummy thing, since I rarely see her out of the chair and only come in three or four times a year.

The things I've told her in that chair-- on and on as if there were soundproof walls separating me from the dye job next door. But there aren't. There's just hair and air. I don't even have the excuse of flimsy hospital curtains to act as a veil for my delusion of privacy. (And my payments have lapsed on my personal laser shield.) For some reason I'm able to carry on and on as if the other occupants, inches away, are stuffed mannequins, deaf or European. I've never, in my life, been able to recount someone else's conversation in the chair next to mine, so, perhaps they pump something into the air. I'll go with that for now.

My cut wound to and end and my dad did not materialize-- some things not even a haircut can fix. I complimented myself by complimenting my hairdresser then walked out of my haze and into the haze.

I thought about women and discretion, that little-spoken, much-considered notion of generosity.

All my life I've read and heard of a man's character described as great or strong. A man having good moral fiber or keeping his word have been germane to the great American novel and most black and white films since long before cable, but not enough credit is given to hairdressers and bartenders and the woman I've sat next to in waiting rooms. Not enough merit is given to women for discretion, most of whom, after all, are like walking skeleton closets-- reams and reams of personal information, available at the sip of a tea.

Girlfriends are forever coming and going as their distances are assessed and re calibrated. The concentric circles of friendships that ring every woman like so many hula-hoops, reverberate with confidences and data. And the onus is on us to not divulge. There are no meter maids for innuendo. The files of past friendships are thick and bulging with hardship, infidelity and sex. There are biological descriptions and renewed prescriptions and run ins with cops and his ex. Children and parents, husbands and neighbors, there's enough material there for a lifetime. But it's hard to read clearly the expiration date on a friendship. Like so many lines, it's smudged.

There's a powerful seduction at play with most women, to use this fodder to grow closer to another, newer friend. Confidences are currency and the strings that bind us become thicker and more cord-like with each moment two bodies lean in. But women have choices like the men who wear hats in the movies. They can say, "It's not for me to tell," or "You'll have to ask her." "It's in the vault," is a phrase I admire. Then they can lean back and change the subject or get themselves a refill. They can reconsider. They can stop.

It's not easy to do, and I'll admit, I'm no warrior. I've leaned in and recounted thickly veiled yarns mostly by saying, "this woman I used to know," or, "an old girlfriend of mine once," but there are times when I'm weak. There are times when I leak. I've eaten more than my share of dangling carrots.

At the end of the day, trust and discretion are a valuable portion of what amounts to a woman's character-- poorly lauded, perhaps, not as attention grabbing as other brassier traits, maybe, but no less valuable. And when you add a good haircut on top of that-- well, then you've got yourself a woman of fine character and considerable talent. What a find! And all too rare, indeed.