In the Chair

I Vant to Drink Your Blood

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

BE CAREFUL OUT THERE!

Last week, I went to a monthly Book Club that’s held in a local library and facilitated by a brilliant and good friend. Can you guess the book we read for October? Dracula by Bram Stoker. Perfect, right?! It’s a very good read, but DO NOT read it once the sun goes down. Unfortunately, I had problems during the day as well because I have this weird floater in my eye and I would suddenly see a flash of black. Yes, I thought there were bats.

We all think we know the story of Dracula – Dark Shadows, wax teeth at Halloween, Bela Lugosi, Team Edward vs Team Jacob, True Blood, the Count on Sesame Street, Interview with a Vampire, Count Chocula cereal, Buffy, Dracula Daily, and I think there is a recent limited series on Netflix. But in reading the book, I learned a few interesting things that I never knew about Mr. Dracula.

He had a mustache. WTF – a mustache? And it was white. Gross.
He was actually a good guy before he became a maniacal killer and power monger.
He had a – you better sit down for this one – he had a scar on his forehead! I mean, he got it towards the end of the story, but, Hello! Harry Potter much?! Did she really write those books?
Spoiler alert: he dies in the end. I thought he was still wandering around somewhere. Probably isolated during COVID but otherwise still causing trouble.
When he finally got stabbed in the heart and was pretty much decimated, the look on his face was peaceful, calm, relieved. Killing a Vampire lets them die the way they were supposed to, so their souls can be free. I thought the Count was evil to the bitter end. But nope. There was redemption for that bloodthirsty creep.

If books had ratings like movies and there were lists warning you about content, here’s my warnings about the novel:

Violence

Blood and gore and blood (duh)

Smoking (Cigars, so not too bad)

Excessive politeness

Women in thin white nightgowns

A great deal of mist

A guy who eats bugs

So, there you have it. Read it, or don’t, but if you dress up as the Count this Halloween, mustache and scar please. Be authentic, for Pete’s sake!

A book to read: Dracula,by BRAM STOKER

A recipe to try: Monster Bunt Cake by CUPCAKE DIARIES BLOG

A question for you: What was your best Halloween costume ever?

Crushed It

Sammy Davis Jr.

My first celebrity crush was this guy. The summer before I started high school I read his autobiography, Yes I Can, and I just crushed hard. All the Hollywood glamour, all the pain and suffering and racial injustice. And the eye, oh man the eye!!! Plus he was Jewish, and as a weird Catholic teenager, I always wanted to be Jewish. (But that’s another story!)

He was an incredible showman and overcame so many obstacles, mostly white people obstacles, at a volatile time in history. He was an amazing singer, dancer and actor. And he was gorgeous and funny and smart.

Alas, it wasn’t meant to be. But it’s interesting that my first celebrity crush came about as a result of reading.

In high school I became a real reader. You know, the kind of reader who sits in a room where the TV is on and people are arguing about what to watch and the phone is ringing and the dog is barking and you don’t even look up. You are so deep in the book that the world around you doesn’t exist. It’s you and the story where the characters are more alive and real than anyone in the room you’re sitting in.

That’s when I started having author crushes.

My first author crush was John Irving. The World According to Garp blew me away and I wanted to write exactly like him, which of course I couldn’t even though I tried. I think the next author that I crushed on was Gloria Naylor, The Women of Brewster Place. I heard her read from her 4th novel at the Boston Public Library. After the reading (which was tremendous) I went up for the book signing and asked her if she ever taught writing and she said No, never, no – she was done with writing novels. She set a goal to write 4 novels and she did it so that was it. And she was dead serious. Although I think she did wind up writing one more. Never say never.

Later on I was enamored with Judith Katz, Running Fiercely Towards a High Thin Sound, Jeanette Winterson, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, Rita Mae Brown, Ruby Fruit Jungle, Blanche McCrary Boyd, The Revolution of Little Girls, Dorthy Allison, Bastard Out of Carolina and Carol Anshaw, Aquamarine.

Hmmmm…..you see a similar thread there?!

Summer of 2000 I fell for Michael Cunningham (The Hours), when I participated in his writing workshop at Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. He is magnificent, spellbinding, and had just become famous (at least to us wannabes). The star-studded movie version of The Hours wrapped up filming only days before the workshop and he regaled us with stories from the set. Whenever he called my name I burst into sweat. I think he will be a forever crush.

Since then I’ve had multitudes of author crushes – you might say I’m a literary hoe. I think that’s a new species of bookworm. And I do read and tell, but the list has gotten crazy long as years have flashed by, so even if you are a die-hard reader you would soon be either snoozing or yelling at your computer. Instead:

A book to read: The Spinning Heart by DONAL RYAN

A recipe to try: Pasta with 15-Minute Burst Cherry Tomato Sauce at EPICURIOUS

A question for you: Do you have any author crushes?

My Sugar Boo

I am ever so fond of sugar…
M. Esposito

I have heard, although I don’t know if I trust the sources, that there are people out there who do not like sweets.

Seriously?

If these humans do exist I don’t know how I feel about them. Hate, envy, disdain, curiosity, awe, indignation? Where are they from? How were they raised? Is it possible, truly possible to kick the sugar habit?

I was raised with a snack before bedtime for years. There was no dessert after dinner (which I later came to adore), or sweets in the lunch bag, but there was “snack,” which we usually received while in our pajamas, sometimes watching a television show, and always, about an hour before bedtime. Homemade pudding, cake, cookies, caramel popcorn, and every Sunday a candy bar. My mother doled out snack like we lived during the depression and were standing in a bread line. She also tried to subtly give me less than my brothers. I was the only girl and I was chubby.

How is it someone can send you a message that they are purposely holding back so as not to hurt your feelings, and through this process wind up hurting you more?

Every night at snack time I asked myself the same question: Is there something wrong with me?

But the sweets brought relief, almost instantaneously. I loved them all and craved something sweet everyday. As I got older I spent my babysitting money on books mostly, but always kept the pocket change for a Baby Ruth Bar or a Snickers or my favorite – Heath Bar. I ate these treats away from home, without my mother watching, and savored every sweet sticky bite.

Still later I discovered bakeries – these amazing places where sugar is transformed into something deleriously delicious. Every time I’m in a new town I try to find out if they have a local bakery and go there. Have you been to Flour Bakery + Cafe in Boston, MA, Mike’s Pastries in Boston’s North End, Standard Baking Company in Portland, ME, Bread and Roses in Wells, ME (moved from that alleyway in Ogunquit that I loved!), Pastiche in Providence, RI? Bakeries are not quite as holy as libraries, but they come close.

I am now at a point where I’ve cut out a lot of sugar. I keep away from candy bars altogether (except at Halloween because I always hand out the big bars!), I don’t eat dessert as a rule. I still hang out in bakeries and I won’t pass up a slice of a good birthday cake. I am also insanely in love with Ben & Jerry’s, the only men I will let in my bed.

I know my love of sweets (and food in general) is a bit complicated from years of wondering what’s wrong with me. And I know they say sugar is a lot like crack, but I hope that’s not entirely true. I’d like to still have a treat now and then without loosing control and overdosing on donuts. I’d like a little more time to figure out what’s wrong with me.

Here’s a great baking book: Pastry Love by JOANNE CHANG

Here’s a recipe to try: Old Fashioned Peanut Butter Cake at food blog THE VIEW FROM GREAT ISLAND

Here’s a question for you: How do you do sugar?

Go Easy On Me

Sixteen months is a record for me. Over time I thought, why bother going back? It’s too hard, too embarrassing, too much failure, too exposing.

But then one Saturday morning when, honestly, I am fantasizing about going way back to when Saturday mornings meant I could stay in my pajamas watching cartoons and eating Captain Crunch, I make a cup of tea, put a piece of banana bread on a plate and sit down to the computer.

So here I am.

I don’t know how to catch up since I can barely remember what happened yesterday. I can say I’ve read a ton. I’ve cooked less than usual but also tried a lot of new recipes. I’ve downsized in a way I never thought I could downsize and now rent a tiny studio-ish cottage by myself. Yep, alone. I’ve rented out my house to my grown kids (22 and 26) and their friends. And it is weird, weird, weird.

To varying degrees, I’ve tried to face down three significant pieces of myself:

I am now officially a senior card carrying AARP person, rendering me invisible to approximately 99.9% of the population,
I regretfully can’t work anymore and have to figure out how to live with chronic pain for the rest of my life, and
I have textbook Inattentive ADD that has plagued me in various ways since elementary school but that I always chalked up to being somewhat of an idiot in disguise as a got-it-together person.

Sounds a lot more dramatic than it is. Basically I futz around like the rest of the humans, trying to be okay as the days pass by. I carry outrage on my back where it spits and grinds its teeth. Keeping it behind me is hard work – it persists in strenuous efforts to climb on my head so it can shout, see me, hear me, validate me! I wish it would leave me alone, but it’s fueled whenever I listen to the news or talk politics with friends or even think of that lunatic at large who we called a president for four years.

And the writing…

Well, let’s just say it sits on my heart squishing my lungs and making it hard to breathe (not sure if that is anatomically possible but it really is hard to breathe!). As usual, there are more journals than journalling, more pens and other writing instruments than words, more internal construction and destruction of characters, ideas, images, than there are visible, viable characters, ideas and images.

In other words, still blocked for now.

But here I am. So…

A book to read: How High We Go In The Dark by SEQUOIA NAGAMATSU

A recipe to make: Curried Chickpea Salad from food blog, THE VIEW FROM GREAT ISLAND

A question for you: What do you do with your outrage?

Avalon

My oldest daughter is an introvert. People tend to exhaust her, so she works with dogs. She’s a groomer, the kind of dog groomer that owners love because she is meticulous and kind and intuitive. She always gets the dogs that are extremely fearful or high strung – the difficult ones. She is tall and fairly strong and appears calm, so in general these dogs respond positively to her.

It’s taken my daughter a long time to get comfortable with her job (she has a lot of social and performance anxiety). But now that she’s been doing it for a few years she knows she doesn’t want to be a dog groomer forever. She’s trying to figure out what she can do to support herself independent of mom (she didn’t go to college and still lives at home). Like all of us, she wants to be financially secure and love her job. She wants to contribute in some way to help this burning down world. She’s looking for a place and purpose that match her personality, intellect, energy, talents and desires. That match her soul.

About a month ago, I think I got a glimpse of her calling. The true nature that lies within. Her place in the world. Only it wasn’t this world.

She heard some podcast or watched some YouTube video with a guy who insisted that salting popcorn should happen while the popcorn is popping by adding it directly to the oil in the pan (stay with me, this isn’t a popcorn promotion!). This helps the salt actually stick to the popcorn instead of winding up at the bottom of the bowl. The trick, however, is having really really fine, practically microscopic salt.

My daughter decided to try it using a spice grinder to get the salt to the right consistency, but it wasn’t as fine as she wanted (yes – a bit of a perfectionist). So she pored sea salt into a mortar and used a pestle and went at it. She was working on the salt for awhile in the kitchen and then joined me in the living room to watch TV, still using the mortar and pestle.

She was in her pajamas after a shower and had a towel over her shoulders to help dry her wet hair, which is almost to her waist. She smelled like the outdoors. Like greenery and cold deep blue sky and puffy white clouds. Like clean dirt and salty air and stars, brilliant and clear. She held the mortar and pestle with ease, circling around the bowl and steadily, slowly transforming the salt.

In the foggy light of the television she was smiling, calm, moving the pestle in a gentle hypnotic rhythm. Her long hair over the cloak of a towel, her legs crossed, her feet bare. She was a Tarot card, a healer, a mythic character. I pictured her in Merlin’s Cave, reading ancient tomes, watching Merlin’s every move, pouring her light into the magic and medicines she created. I saw her on the Isle of Avalon, collecting herbs and flowers under cobalt skies, conjuring celestial music with each circle of her mortar and pestle. It felt like her spirit belonged to another time, another realm.

I might be nuts or I read her too much Harry Potter when she was a kid or I was inventing reasons why it was taking her so long to make popcorn. And I doubt that anything I was thinking could help her find a job! But there she was. Time out of time. A daughter of Avalon. My daughter.

A lot of parents hope their kids become lawyers, CEOs, doctors, financial analysts, actuaries, ranchers, maybe even rock stars. But it’s not ours for the choosing. My youngest daughter wants to be a high school science teacher. I am so proud and excited for her! I know that an amazing adventure awaits her. But for my oldest, well, who knows. I just hope she finds work that allows her to be quietly mythic and magical. I hope she finds her Avalon.

Click here to hear Van Morrison sing the song that inspired this post – Avalon of the Heart.

I’m Not a Poet and I Definitely Know It!

**Nikki Grimes, Photo credit: Aaron Lemen**

April is National Poetry Month, a time of year I try to read poems, search for new poets, read poets I know about but never even looked at their poems, and yap about poetry a little. I should really do this all year round. I am in awe of poets. I’ve written about five poems in my lifetime, including an unmemorable haiku in Mrs. Kleeman’s 5th grade English class, so a poet I’m not.

But about a month ago I woke up in the middle of the night, grabbed my phone and in the Notes app typed a bizarre poem out of no where. Maybe I was having a nightmare about writing. Or, since I think about writing every single day, maybe it was a bunch of hyper-charged neurons sparking in my brain, possibly causing the lights in the house to flicker on and off like some supernatural movie scene. That would definitely wake me up because I get scared easily. I’m that person gasping (loudly) in the movie theater. Wait, do you remember movie theaters?

Either way, it was freaky to wake up in the middle of the night and write. That’s never happened to me before. Sometimes I wake up at 1:00 or 2:00 AM and go to the living room and read because I know I won’t get back to sleep. And maybe, I’m just saying it’s possible, I might wake up once in a blue moon and make a sandwich. That I eat. Because I’m too hungry to sleep. But I never wake up in the pitch black of my bedroom and jump out of bed to write. That’s like jumping out of bed for dental surgery. Or to watch Get Out again because it didn’t scare me enough the first time.

So, to show you just how bad of a poet I am, here’s my poem.

WANTED by Marie Esposito

Do you have the right amount of fear and fearlessness
Part magician part animal trainer part parent
A rebel with or without a cause?
Can you watch from the sidelines, read minds, play with your food
Take and make a joke?
Are you broken deranged haughty terrified stubborn weary rejected grateful
small and mighty?
Can you bear witness again and again
And again?
Can you travel going nowhere, sit for long hours
Lift 20 pounds and your own raggedy soul;
Juggle lawnmowers eggs large cats small children time?
Can you eat a peach, do your homework, expose folly motive madness evil beauty
Treat a fever, wrestle alligators, feed an army, cry a river,
Change a diaper
A tire
A dollar
Your mind?
Do you remember your dreams, see between the lines,
Embrace resistance ambiguity shadows strangers?
Do you know your enemies your history your figures of speech your broken heart?Can you show up day after day without compensation praise or fame?

Can you write? Can you write? Can you write?

Yeah, well, I told you it was bad. I can’t figure out the punctuation or where to break the lines and honesty, I haven’t a clue how to edit this poem and make it any more than what it is. But, it doesn’t matter, because here is what I believe to be a real poem about writing, captured beautifully by Nikki Grimes. Now she’s a poet, and you know it.

POEMS by Nikki Grimes

I am hardly ever able
to sort through my memories
and come away whole
or untroubled.
It is difficult
to sift through the stones,
the weighty moments and know
which is rare gem,
which raw coal,
which worthless shale or slate.
So, one by one,
I drag them across the page
and when one cuts into the white,
leaves a trail of blood,
no matter how narrow the stream,
then I know
I’ve found the real thing,
the diamond,
one of the priceless gems
my pain produced.
“There! There,” I say,
“is a memory worth keeping.”

Source: Poetry (March 2021)

But if the World Was Ending, You’d Come Over, Right?

Did someone remove the heart already?
Surgery on Grey’s Anatomy

I was driving on the highway in a decent amount of traffic today and I heard these noises. First it sounded like Harry Potter’s Moaning Myrtle, but then it was more like howling, screeching, weird animal sounds. Maybe I ran over a coyote? Then, I swear, I heard cursing. Words that would make a salty sailor blush. I fiddled with my radio, unrolled my window and then rolled it back up, looked at the cars around me and realized the sounds were all coming from me.

It was my heart, getting pulverized again. Turning to bloody shreds, unrecognizable. Even the good doctors at Seattle’s Grey-Sloan Memorial Hospital (formally known as Seattle Grace) couldn’t put this heart back together. They would try mightily, cracking my chest open, plunging their hands inside and pulling out a liver, a spleen, a lung, a bladder, a large intestine, and a garbage bag full of jello-like muscle and tissue. But no heart. The heart is gone. Ka-put.

Maybe you’ve been there – you’ve loved someone deeply who promised forever but instead broke your heart. You could hear it breaking, feel it disintegrate inside of you, useless and impossible to repair. And people said, time heals all wounds. And people said, this too shall pass. And people said, there are other fish in the sea. And people said, God only gives us that which we can bear. Well it doesn’t and it won’t and there aren’t and I can’t. I can’t bear it.

If I could run I would start at the end of my driveway and go miles and miles until every fiber of my being is burning through and beyond pain. If I could drink I would buy a bottle of bourbon, tequila, whiskey and limoncello and go through all of them until I am blind and numb and unconscious. If I could have casual sex I would sleep with the first person willing to have me, and the second and third, ad infinitum until I am stretched and howling and finally invisible.

But instead, when I’m fully vaccinated and the COVID numbers swing downward, I will hang my handicap placard on my rearview mirror and shuffle into Target to buy hand lotion, Q-tips, cheese and deodorant. I’ll buy a candle that smells like my Aunt Lottie and an organizer for a desk drawer that may or may not fit. I’ll stand in the check out line 6 feet away from the family of 5 and the teenage gaggle of 4 and the new parents and baby of 3 and the couple of 2, holding hands, looking tired but steady, feet on the ground and the days folded over and into their bodies like origami swans. And I’ll look like 1 but be minus my heart. So less than 1.

Eventually I’ll look more like me, sound more like me, joke and laugh more like me, but believe me when I tell you I will never ever ever feel like me again.

My COVID Nineteen

I have gained and lost the same 5 pounds two or three times.
After vowing to never let my dogs up on my new bedspread I caved and now have stairs next to the bed so they can climb up at their leisure.
Going to the doctors is my biggest social outing. I even shower and wear mascara.
I read over 80 books in 2020 and am probably going to beat that number in 2021. I console myself with this when I hate myself for not writing.
I’ve become a lousy friend. I see a text or email, get distracted before I respond and then forget all about it.
I’ve watched an embarrassing amount of Netflix and Prime and even the worst Hallmark movie ever made. I’ve watched so many episodes of Chopped that I’ve forgone my Oscar fantasy and am planning to become the next Chopped Champion.
I have always had just “meh” hair but COVID hair is putting me over the edge. Maybe it’s time to go platinum blonde.
I’ve really gotten tired of the TV shows and movies where someone says an innocuous line like, “We ran out of dental floss but I found some expired hemorrhoid cream when rummaging through the medicine cabinet,” and then a lightbulb goes off for the main character that helps her/him/they solve a crime or fix their marriage or figure out how to end a gang rivalry or reconnect with their estranged parent or the stop the mob’s next hit. Does that ever happen to ANYONE?!
I haven’t stepped into a store in over a year. I am now an Amazon ho.
Everything is sinking. My roof, my boobs, my humor, my faith in people, my marriage, my heart.
When I get really stressed I window shop online for dishes. Colorful plates made in Italy or Portugal, blue toile, coupe, ceramic, porcelain, Lenox, Fiesta, Emma Bridgewater, Royal Stafford, Ikea, Target, Mikasa, Wedgwood, Polish Pottery, milk glass, depression glass, holiday plates, serving dishes, teapots, bowls, Katie Alice, Pottery Barn, Williams Sanoma, Dansk, Pfaltzgraff, Syracuse China. I love dishes and get this from my mother. She scoured garage sales and filled a china cabinet with plates and bowls that my father now stares at praying to see her reflection in the glass.
I think about death and loss almost every day and have become more fearful, anxious, insular and mistrusting.
I dream more, sleep less.
I’ve written a few letters – remember letters? I want to write more – I like sending my words out there to find a home in someone’s heart. Here’s a great initiative that got me started – Dear Rhode Island. Sharpen your pencils, fill your fountain pen, find an envelop and a stamp and write. To a friend, stranger, neighbor, long lost love. It’s connection that for me surpasses any social media or email. Just think of it as old fashioned texting.
Two very important people in my life died in 2020 – neither to COVID. My dear friend’s wife and life partner of over 30 years and my sister-in-law. Regular death isn’t taking a break during COVID and it deeply truly sucks.
I’ve saved hundreds of recipes to a Pintrest account, including gorgeous cakes decorated way beyond my capacity. But with time on my hands I want to give it a go, so I bought a lot of sprinkles. That’s it so far.
I feel untethered in my home, my country. There is so much healing we have to do and it is not my strong suit.
I have a lot more dry and flaky skin than usual. There are days when it feels like I’m scratching off the cells of dead relatives. My great-grandmother a young girl on the dusty streets of Rome, my great-uncle a prisoner in Stutthof, laboring in filth and despair, my grandfather up to his elbows in mortar from laying bricks in buildings all over Syracuse, my great-aunt employed at minimum wage to sell floury loaves of bread at Harrison Bakery, bringing us day old frosted brownies and half moon cookies.
There are moments when I feel like the luckiest person on the planet, but not many.

That’s my nineteen. What about yours?

The “B” Word

At the end of December I sent a letter to the Big Man. I was hoping for an answer but you know how it is — crickets. Maybe he has an anal retentive elf at the front desk who screens all the mail or the weight and stress finally led to a cardiac event or he’s taken off to the Cayman Islands. I doubt he reads this blog but what the hell, here’s the letter. Feel free to share with others. Maybe he follows you on Twitter.

Dear Santa,

Well, it’s over. Your holiday came and went like it does every year, except it’s 2020. The worst year ever. The year we can’t wait to end. The year that Christmas was masked and narrow and virtual and challenging – like everything else this year. But expectations were still high and to be blunt, your involvement didn’t help.

Santa, in my opinion, you need to evaluate a few things, reconsider what you’re doing for a living. Yes, this is a personal matter. I know I have changed in ways I never could have predicted, but the world has changed too. I think it’s time for a come to Jesus moment, so to speak.

First, let’s talk about the “B” word. It’s everywhere, Santa. On mugs, cards, oven mitts, ornaments, t-shirts, gift cards, and those plush winter throws people buy every year even though they already have too many of them.

“Believe.“

That’s right. Your holiday tag line. Believe. No further instructions. Like who to believe in (you, Jesus, Rudolph, the person we married?) or what to believe in (the magic of Christmas, the birth of God’s only son, Amazon, kindness, greed?). And after the year most of us experienced, Believe is, well, harder to believe in.

During a FaceTime call yesterday I asked my 8 year-old niece what Santa brought her and she told me she was “on to the jig.” She said the presents come from mom and dad and rolled her eyes like a teenager. She talked primarily about video games and said her house is turning into a nightmare. Why? Because it’s become both home and school. Because she can’t go anywhere else. Because her world is small and void of friends and experiences.

I think the real nightmare, for my niece, for me, for all of us, is Loss. Loss could have been your tag line this year. We can’t go places that help shape who we are and keep us sane. We can’t meet new people or visit with friends and family. We can’t touch people, hug them, feel their breath on our shoulders, smell their smell.

And then there’s death. The pandemic’s victims, almost 2 million world-wide and 336,339 as of today in the United States, where I live. Not to mention the usual suspects – cancer, heart failure, violence. Taking our loved ones in the midst of the chaos, making it harder to come together, to pay our respect, to mourn.

What I’ve come to believe in is Loss. It is seeping into our skin, flowing through our veins, burrowing in our bones. We are changing, and maybe you should too. Next year give us a break from the tinsel and glitter and hype. Slow it down, use a few less reindeer, stop hanging out on every corner and at every supermarket. We need a holiday that doesn’t add to our sense of inadequacy, powerlessness, indifference, and greed. We need a different kind of magic, Santa. Do you think you can deliver?

Sincerely, ME

I know it’s kind of late to post this but I figure we can apply the sentiment to other holidays and events and even to our big ideas about who we should be and what we should have. Besides, that damn Leprechaun is on his way and then the Bunny and there’s weddings and birthdays and weekends and mornings…Loss is with us just about everywhere. I’m staying quiet, going deeper, paring down. How about you? How are you facing the Loss?

Let the Dead Bury Their Dead

As if last year wasn’t bad enough, we lost a literary treasure in Randall Kenan, who died in August 2020 at the age of 57.

Randall was my writing teacher at the first residential week-long workshop I attended as an adult way back in 1993. I didn’t have kids yet, my job was easy to escape, and my partner at the time was very supportive. It was at Sarah Lawrence in Yonkers, NY, and I drove there with notebooks and pens (no laptops then – wow I’m old!) and a bunch of horrible stories I was tinkering with. It was a serious endeavor for a wanna-be writer and I was terrified.

As a gay black man born in Brooklyn and raised in the South, Randall offered a distinguished, often stunning perspective on family, race, community and love. He was extraordinary, really. And brilliant, profound, generous, thoughtful and thousands of other adjectives. But the first word that comes to mind when I think of him is lovely. He radiated grace and joy. I swear his eyes actually twinkled.

I was so lucky to have Randall as the first professional writer to critically read my stories. It was in his workshop that I discovered I knew absolutely nothing about writing. I didn’t know a story arc from Noah’s arc. Voice? Point-of-view? Pacing? Character Development? Plot? You mean we actually have to use those things – purposefully? But despite the mess I handed in for his feedback, he saw something in my writing that he believed in and encouraged. He thought I was a born storyteller, which according to Randall, was different from craft. The former wasn’t something he thought could be taught, but then later you could learn with hard work and drive.

I was ready to take on the world after a week with Randall, but by spring of the following year I had sputtered and stalled out. I wrote him a rather gloomy letter and he responded right away using an ancient typewriter on pale gray stationery. Remember stationery?!

He wrote about art and writing and, “inhabiting other people’s souls” and “wading into the water of transformation.” It was a gorgeous, healing letter.

He ended with this:

I have a signed copy of his 1992 short story collection, Let the Dead Bury Their Dead, and his 1989 novel, A Visitation of Spirits. You can read about people’s reaction to his death and get information on his publications and awards here, here, here, and I’m sure in many other places. As Black History Month comes to an end, I hope teachers, writers, activists, students, film makers, researchers, reporters, librarians, book club members, text books and more, remember Randall Kenan so we can keep his wisdom alive and his spirit burning.

For surely goodness and mercy followed him all the days of his life.

Go well, old girl. With love.