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Tattered Coat has thoughts on several political causes and activities, both locally in Philadelphia, as well as nationally. Among these happenings, Matt laments the scaling back of Philadelphia's free library system, which includes not only fewer hours of operation at most branches, but also the eradication of qualified librarians at most branches.

Sure, some people may think anyone with a modicum of intelligence and interpersonal skill can fill a librarian's shoes, but consider the following recollection from my own experience at a local Borders store a couple years back:

I was looking for a copy of Charlotte's Web to give to one of my nieces as a gift. After looking through the sprawling children's section for a few minutes, I decided that it might be better to ask one of the customer assistance folks in that section for a little help.

I approached a fresh-faced young woman who was behind a computer station in the midst the children's material alcove. She was in the 18 to 20 range and had the look of one of those hip youngsters just quaint enough to be employed by a cool bookseller like Borders. Just as I approached, she was accosted by a young man about half her age, who asked her where he could find Around the World in Eighty Days. She asked the boy who wrote the book he was looking for. He didn't seem to be able to push the author's name to the tip of his tongue, so I chimed in the name of Jules Verne.

The book girl looked up at me, apparently surprised that a passing stranger would know such a thing. She then started typing into her computer workstation. A few brief seconds later, she informed the boy that Borders apparently didn't carry that book. Incredulous (not just me, but the inquiring boy as well), I leaned a little over her desk and quickly noticed why she couldn't find what the boy was seeking; she'd entered the words "Jewels Vern" as her search terms. I politely corrected her spelling and she proceeded to find that there were a whole bunch of different titles in stock that had been authored by this mysterious Verne fellow. She then pointed in the direction that the boy would have the most luck finding his book, and she turned to me.

She marveled at how I could know so much about books. Rather than say something to make her feel like a total idiot, I explained that I'd majored in English in college (a lie, but one told to spare her fragile, if naive, psyche). This made perfect sense to her, as she explained that she was only studying sociology. She thanked me for helping with the boy's book, and then she asked if she could help me find something. I gave a soft "no thanks" and went back to searching the children's section myself, not wanting to find out if she'd have similar trouble spelling E.B. White's name.

For days after, I wondered about the sorry state of professional bookselling, that we couldn't find college students familiar with names like Jules Verne to staff the information desks at major bookstores.

As if that wasn't bad enough, just imagine the horror that would have overwhelmed me if this episode had happened at the local library.

This isn't to condescend to anyone out there who would have been just as lost as the girl in the store, because to be honest, I grew up reading a lot of books; it's entirely possible I'd be more familiar with this information for that reason alone. The point isn't whether the typical person knows a lot about books, or even whether or not the typical person should. The point is that the person directing a city's knowledge-hungry youth around the local library should know at least this much.

And as Matt points out, in a city (and state) that sinks hundreds of millions of tax dollars into lavish pro sports complexes we should at least have few million lying around for something as socially redeeming as a decent public library system.

[personal/blog] [stories] 

"When you think you found something worth holding on to,
were reaching for attention, hoping she would notice you..."
-Fountains of Wayne

I met a girl years ago, and I fell for her instantly. Really, I'm referring to the first time I ever met her. This, despite the fact that she didn't seem to like me much at all.
It took me a long time, but eventually I broke through, I convinced her to go out with me. As near as I could ever tell, she both liked and disliked me intensely, and sometimes simultaneously. She always liked the way I kissed, but there were times she couldn't stand being anywhere near me.

I often wondered why she'd want me at all, given how much she told me I annoyed her, but I didn't question too much, so long as she stuck around -- having her around, after all, was my paramount concern. And there were times when she wasn't around, or times when she expressed the need to "just be friends", which I always went along with. After a couple bounces from couple-hood to friendship and back, I started to notice that we tended to end up back together before too long, which made our stints of "friendship" much more bearable (at least for me). I've always been patient that way; as long as I know what to expect, I can take the turbulence.

The last time this happened I had started to wonder if it wasn't really getting to me, this whole bouncing back and forth between different stages of our relationship. I started to realize that however easy it was for her to switch back and forth, it was actually starting to bother me, not because I wondered whether she'd want me back, but because every time I went around the roller coaster, it seemed a little less thrilling than the time before. Life was exciting and daring enough without us creating fake dramas to play out. While I had come to appreciate the predictability of her taking me back, I had grown very tired of the predictability of her asking for another break down the line -- it didn't strike me as any way to conduct a mature relationship, not that I'd had that much experience with such things.

Still, it's always hard to let go of something you've worked so hard to create, and I had put in a mountain of effort just to get her in the first place. I actually believed I had worked pretty hard to treat her well along the way too. She might say I shouldn't have tried so hard, but when we were together, I'd swear it was completely worth it.

(an impromptu story)

I stepped up to the counter, 9:15 on a Saturday night. Not having eaten since early that morning, I was unusually hungry, and I probably should have been somewhere other than the local McDonald's with the kind of hunger I was feeling. But I was in a little bit of a hurry, with less than a half-hour until I was supposed to meet a couple friends at the local cineplex.
The girl behind the register was unusually pleasant. At least that's what I thought on my first glance, so I greeted her smile with as much of a pleasant tone as I could find. I ordered my food, she recited the cash total to me, after which I handed her a ten. She informed me that she was out of fives, but that she happened to have a two dollar bill, in case I didn't want all singles for my change. I told her that was fine. Then she gave me my change and my order, and I sat down to eat for about ten minutes.

While I was finishing my food, she made her rounds in the dining area, wiping off table tops. She was at the table next to mine and she asked how I was. I said, "Fine, and you?"

"I'm good. What would bring you to a fast food restaurant alone on a Saturday night -- if you don't mind me asking?"

"I'm on my way to meet some friends, but I'm starving a little too, so here I am."

"Oh, what are you gonna' do with your friends?" she asked.

"We're gonna' see a movie," I answered.

"Which one?" At this point she may have sensed herself intruding a little too much, and she continued by disclaiming her curiosity, "Oh, you know what? You don't have to tell me your whole life's story -- I didn't mean to pry..."

"No, it's okay," I responded, because it really was okay with me if she wanted to keep talking. I was actually enjoying the attention, and to be honest, she was very attractive and I had no personal reason not to flirt with her a little bit. I went on, "We'll probably see some stupid comedy, you know, the kind that's best enjoyed with people whose company you can enjoy even if the movie sucks."

At this point, I noticed her name tag, and unsure how to pronounce the name, I asked, "Your name, U-M-E -- how do you say it?"

"Oh, just say 'you' and 'may' together quickly, and you'll pretty much have it nailed," she explained.

To confirm her pronunciation lesson, I repeated it for her,"So it's 'you-may', right?"

"Exactly," she smiled back. "What's your name?"

"Oh, I'm Bill," and almost unconsciously, this response was followed by my outstretched hand, which she promptly shook.

"Well, Bill, it's really nice to meet you, but I should probably get back to real work before my boss thinks I'm harassing patrons."

"Okay. It was nice to meet you."

Then she paused and turned back to me before walking away, "Do you want my number?"

I was slightly surprised at this question, but extremely pleased also, "Um, sure..."

"Here, I've got a pen," she pulled one of those blue and white BIC's with the four different ink colors from behind her ear (I hadn't noticed it before that point, probably because it had been obscured by her long, dark hair. "Do you have a piece of paper? A receipt or something?"

I didn't have one, of course, and before I could put even that much into words, she said, "You still have that paper money from the change I gave you. How about the two dollar bill? That way you'll be less likely to accidentally spend it." She winked as she said the word "accidentally", and she went on, "Besides, I always see phone numbers on money, especially working at a cash register, but I've never actually written my phone number on money before -- so this could be a first for me." She said this smiling, as she reached her hand out, presumably for some paper money on which to write.

I fumbled into my wallet for the same worn two dollar bill she'd given me earlier. I handed it to her, she took it and scrawled her name and phone number on it, folded it, handed it back to me, and smiled. Then she walked away.

I left the restaurant, feeling quite full of myself, having extracted a beautiful girl's phone number without any forward effort on my part, and I went to meet my friends at the theater. The movie, as I had half suspected, was bad, the company was good, and all night, I couldn't shake thoughts of my encounter with the inexplicably pleasant girl whose number graced the two dollar bill in my wallet.

I managed to wait all of a day and a half before calling that number, at which point I was somewhat relieved that she actually answered the phone. Upon realizing who was calling, she expressed mock anger that I didn't call her sooner, closely followed by a brief burst of laughter.

We spent a good bit of time together over the next few months. During that time I learned a lot about her, like the fact that she wasn't a local girl, but rather a college student who'd be going home at the end of the current semester. Knowing this probably kept me from enjoying her company as much as I might have, but still, I enjoyed the time immensely.

She explained that "Ume" wasn't her real name, but it was what people called her. She tried to explain the meaning of the name to me. Apparently it was a somewhat informal name, and of foreign origin to boot, so the explanation was imprecise to a certain extent. As best I can recall, it meant that she was like a pleasant dream that was easy to forget -- or something like that. The pleasant dream part made perfect sense, though I remember wondering how she could be thought of as forgettable in any way.

In the time since, though, I've noted to myself how I still remember her with extreme fondness, but I do find it harder to remember details about her -- whether it be her face, her playful smirk, the way her eyes made a modest squint whenever her expression turned to smiling or laughter.

And maybe this gradual amnesia regarding the details has been helped by the fact that I have no photographic evidence whatsoever that she was ever here; that was the one strange piece of the whole experience to me, that she didn't like having her picture taken. Whenever I asked her about this, she expressed such displeasure with her own appearance that I was always left dumbfounded. I wondered exactly how she could have maintained such a positive persona while having such a poor view of herself. I never saw whatever it was that made her feel this way about herself, but for the most part, if I avoided talking about her appearance, she seemed able to ignore the topic as well. And aside from that, I rarely found her to be anything less than infectiously spirited.

But it's been so long now since I've seen her or heard her voice, I have to confess that she has come to perfectly fit what she told me about her name.

And from that reverie I shift back to reality, where I find myself pulling up to a deserted turnpike toll booth at about three in the morning. The toll is $1.75, and I fumble through my wallet to find the cash for the toll.

"How you doin' tonight, champ?" The collector greets me in gruff but friendly voice.

"Fine, and you?" I'm tired, but I extend the banter as I hand him the ticket and the cash.

"Peachy -- hey, a two dollar bill! I haven't seen one o' these in a while. And look -- somebody wrote a name and number on it. I should call, maybe she's cute..."

"She is," I respond, "but she doesn't live there anymore."

"Oh, ain't that a shame. Well, have yourself a good night there."

"You too," I say as I drive away, leaving behind the last piece of physical evidence of a pleasant, but fading dream.

I don't know where this piece of storytelling fits in, but I observed the following scene on the way to work today, and it has stayed with me since.

I was sitting in traffic on a local roadway, with traffic being a little more congested than normal. As my fellow travelers and I waited in line at an intersection, I heard a siren's wail, followed shortly thereafter by a local police SUV passing us on the median strip just to our left. As we started moving again, I prepared to make my right turn at the intersection, which is when I saw it.

There were two cars juxtaposed in the right lane of the road onto which I was turning. Both cars were compact to sub-compact. One was a late model Chevy Cavalier, which had come to rest up against a concrete wall lining a roadside embankment. The other car was a Hyundai Accent (with the markings of a local auto parts delivery warehouse) sitting right in the middle of the lane. Both cars had significant front-end damage (which is to say neither car had much of its front-end left) and apparent airbag deployment.

As I was waiting to be waved around the scene by an officer, I then noticed a man lying on the ground next to the Hyundai. He was an older man (appearing to be in his sixties), and he was surrounded by two paramedics who appeared to be administering CPR.

I was thinking about this scene as I waited in traffic. The auto parts company that had its markings on the car was located less than a quarter mile up the road, and these companies are known to employ retirees. As I saw the man lying on the ground, receiving CPR, I wondered if, as he had left his home that day to go to work, this scene was even a possibility in his mind. If he had pulled out of the warehouse parking lot with even a hint that this could be in his immediate future.

How many people would even think about that possibility? Not me, at least not until I caught this scene as I waited in traffic.

The policeman waved me on after a couple minutes, and I said a short prayer as the car started rolling again -- just thinking of that man on the ground, any loved ones he might have, anyone else who'd been injured in the collision, and all of us who meander through our daily lives unaware and unappreciative of the grace that shields us from these tragedies.

I was watching the late night reruns of Democratic National Convention speeches on C-Span, when a story recalled itself from my past.

It was several years ago. I was dating a young woman. We were both getting our paychecks from the same employer, but we worked in slightly different segments of the company's operation. While I don't think there were any set rules about fraternization, it was not the best of situations to let other people in the workplace know if you were having such a relationship.

The woman I was seeing was extremely sensitive to this risk, which was probably heightened by her own awareness that she sometimes rubbed people the wrong way. So, for reasons of "office politics", she desired to not let co-workers know about our status.

I was compliant with her desire, and somewhat in agreement with it, though I didn't share her fear of us being discovered. Still, at one point, it became obvious that one of our co-workers had become privy to our relationship. What compounded the situation in her view was the fact that she and the person who had found out about us were in a sort of professional conflict at the time. She knew that the person who found out about us didn't like her at all, and she was certain that he'd try to use the information to make her look bad.

I remember kind of laughing it off when she came to me about it -- which I should have known would infuriate her. I tried to explain to her that even if she and the other person who'd discovered our little secret weren't getting along, I knew he wouldn't say anything. She said I couldn't know that.

Of course, I didn't actually know he wouldn't spill our secret, but I was extremely confident he wouldn't. She asked how I could think that way. I explained to her that I had always had a good relationship with the person who had found out, and I just couldn't see him doing this. She continued to try to express to me how much mutual dislike was brewing between them, and that he would try to hurt her any chance he got (this information providing him with said opportunity).

I told her, that while he may have wanted to hurt her, he respected me, and wouldn't do something like that if he thought it would be a negative. She scoffed, and stayed angry at me for several days after.
The bottom line? He never spilled the beans about our relationship. I was not surprised at all, but she always remained indignant about it, insisting until the day we broke up that he would eventually try to use it against her. (In fact, this paranoia weighed heavily in my decision to walk away from the relationship.)

In thinking back on this experience, and having spoken with the man who held this little secret, I now know that he did respect me, and no matter how much he disliked the girl I was seeing, he had decided to keep his mouth shut on the topic. I didn't hold any apparent or actual authority over him with which to secure his silence. I never even had to pressure him to keep quiet. It was simply a matter of the respect I had earned from him.

Sometimes, respect is all you need to ensure safety from those who have the ability to attack you. No, it isn't always enough, but as a supplement to other defense systems, it makes a pretty decent tie-breaker when others who could attack you are mulling whether or not they want to.

Now, to put this back within the political realms as it pertains to U.S. and world relations:

I'm not going to say that Democrats have a monopoly on how to gain the world's respect, but they have a point when they mention international disrespect as a factor that increases the peril under which we live our lives. It's not that we should wait for the rest of the world to give us permission to act in our own best interest, but that sometimes the vacuum approach to policy-making is externally disrespectful to people we call allies, even when, internally, we Americans are oblivious to that perception.

Respect can sway potential attackers, and it can also sway "friends" to come to our defense, even when they are less than enthusiastic about our policies. I find it interesting the talk that has been bandied about winning the hearts and minds of those in the rest of the world -- something that is hardly possible without winning their respect first.

"People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them."
-James A. Baldwin

I've always enjoyed a good story. I have stumbled, many times, upon the truth when I was simply looking to be entertained. When I was younger, somewhere in my early teen years, I found the book I have mentioned more than once over the past few weeks, a book called Remembered Days. When I first began reading portions of it, I didn't realized for some time that the book was about my own roots; I'm not even sure I knew that it was non-fiction. That was a time in my life when I looked for many different things to read (-a habit that has, unfortunately withered a little over the years).

I became fascinated by several poems/meditations in that book by a woman I later came to realize was my great-great-aunt Mary Agnes (someone I never met, as she passed on long before my time began). These writings were as formative to my early writing inclination as were the works of Walt Whitman, and yes, even Shel Silverstein.

Fast forward almost fifteen years -- It was Christmas in the late nineties, and my father pulled out a scraggly, handmade journal that was kept by my great-great-grandfather in the mid-nineteenth century. It contained different types of writing, from personal accounts of his days to a few drafts of poetry. I wondered, as I read one poem, if Mr. Henry White had been influenced by Whitman's earlier works, much like they had always inspired me.

At this point in my still young life, I had already scribbled in the better part of a dozen journals. As I read the handwritten thoughts of my ancestor, it occurred to me that this particular journal, with its amateur hand-stitched binding, had weathered a century-and-a-half, to be met by my eyes. I pondered for days after how I felt about the chances of having my own scrawled words read by my great-great-grandchildren. I wondered if, like me, he had written in many other journals as well. I wondered if he ever conceived of his words being read 150 years later.

I will confess these thoughts frightened me a little. My private prose was not nearly as elegant, nor was my penmanship form remotely as well-crafted as his. I probably didn't write more than a couple journal entries over the month the followed that discovery. But now I can think of it sometimes, the possibility that my descendants might stumble across my private journalism, and I hope maybe they'll be able to learn something about history that the school books will not be able to offer them -- gain a perspective that will give them the kind of value that I gleaned from the private diary of Henry White, as well as the published accounts in Remembered Days.

I have to admit I now relish the idea. Is it the desire for immortality, or is it just the need to try to connect with people I'll never meet? Is it the same reason I started journalizing online last year via this weblog? I don't know, but the thought of communicating, of perhaps offering something uniquely useful to someone who might not find it elsewhere, definitely appeals to me.

I have known several people along the course of my life who don't seem to be able to hold down a job, no matter how important it would be to do so. I often wonder about that. I'm not referring to those who get down-sized, but rather to folks who seem to have an almost ingenious knack for getting fired from some of the lowest paying jobs in existence. What makes me get up and go to work, even when there is no inherent desperation, that would be different in other people who desperately need employment, but can't seem to keep it?

I don't know, but I do know of one particular old (former) friend who was perpetually challenged on the employment front. In the time I knew him, he probably held over fifty jobs in under ten years.

He was one who made frequent requests for loans from just about anyone who might have a few bucks to help him pay his rent. I loaned him a few bucks once -- never to see it again. Then my parents, who also knew him, made the same mistake; which bothered me, because I had specifically asked him not to take advantage of my parents' kindness -- so he waited until I wasn't around, at which point he secured a $200 loan from my father, a loan for which my father was led to believe I had vouched.

Anyway, I haven't seen him in a few years now, since the last time he asked me for money. I recall it well.
He called out of the blue, told me how he had been at the same job for a few months (which sounded promising), and asked if I wanted to get lunch; I said sure. The next day we met up for lunch, and just prior to walking into the restaurant, he cautioned me that he didn't have any money to pay for his lunch because he had just lost his job. I told him I would pay, but I asked him what had happened with his job. By the time we were seated, he had relayed a story of how the manager had had it in for him since he was hired. I told him my employer was hiring, and that the pay was above average, with excellent benefits if he stuck it out a couple months. He said it sounded nice, but then he asked if I had a little money to lend him in the meantime. I told him I could probably give him $20, explaining that I only had a little bit on hand, that most of it was invested, either in a stock account or in 401(k) (meaning that I didn't have much disposable cash to lend him). He proceeded to ask how long it would take me to sell some of my stock.

I told him I wasn't going to do that, but that I would gladly get him an application for an entry-level position with my employer. I'll never forget the look of disdain as he heard me say this, or the annoyance I felt as I observed his reaction. I was trying to help him, but I couldn't understand how he could just ask for money from people as if he was entitled to whatever they had, all the while forgetting he still owed me money. There was no "thanks for lunch," or "I appreciate the line on the job -- when can you get me that application?"

I don't know where this is going, but I guess it all had to do with wondering how people get to certain places in their lives, and what makes people behave differently. And after all this writing on it, I still haven't much of a clue...

"We're here and now, but will we ever be again?
‘Cause I have found all that shimmers in this world
is sure to fade away again."
-Fuel

We met in front of the north face of City Hall that day. It was late January, but not very cold. We decided to have lunch at the Reading Terminal Market. While we ate and talked, she combed over the movie listings for a decent matinee. There were several playing that I would have been okay with seeing, but she spotted the new Julia Roberts movie, Sleeping with the Enemy, playing in Old City.

Our preferred show time was not for another hour, so we settled on a leisurely stroll of fifteen city blocks or so, east on Market to Second, then over a couple blocks south to the AMC just a stone's throw from Penn's Landing. We bought tickets, popcorn and soda, then meandered into the theater with about ten minutes to spare.
The movie was okay, just like the food had been, but I was distracted by what I had been contemplating saying to her, hopefully before the day was gone and another opportunity was missed.

I couldn't figure out why I was so anxious to speak my mind to her; She was the first girl I had ever felt entirely comfortable with. She was the first person whose compliments I had ever believed -- when she told me she liked certain things about me, I knew she meant it. And when I shared the thoughts I knew anyone else would laugh at, she never even hinted at disdain or disgust. Her acceptance of me and my ideas was one of the reasons I started trusting myself more. Her influence was a great part of what shifted my writing content from teen angst to more constructive observation.

The first time we met was a strange meeting. She was returning a black spiral bound notebook I had "lost" (I would later find out that she'd facilitated my misplacing it). The black notebook was about three quarters full with poems I'd written in a longhand I'm not sure most people could decipher. Upon returning it to my possession, she confessed to reading a few poems. In leafing through the book a little while later, I found a note on the first page I hadn't written on yet. It was about a half page long. In the note, she apologized and admitted to reading the whole book, and she went on to write some very encouraging words. She referred to the poems as being "lyrical, almost like you could hear the music that would accompany them." But her note also chided me for expressing the feeling that nobody would understand what I felt. She suggested that if I trusted other people more, I'd notice I'm not so alone. She also told me she'd like to show some of her poetry, and asked me to show her when I wrote more.

That was the beginning. From there, we spent countless hours on the phone and exchanged many personal writings. I came to see that she was a lot like me, in that many of our youthful experiences were similar. I admired her insight, always relevant, the reason I could tell that she was really paying attention to me. I liked the way she listened to the most inane thoughts I could conjure, and she never gave me a disapproving look in response. We'd write letters, even though we didn't live very far apart and we saw each other often. I didn't know what she saw in my words, but I would marvel at the way hers inspired me. I often felt like she had a gift for reading my thoughts and giving voice to the ones I couldn't articulate, but perhaps that was more of a curse -- I'm not sure.

I sensed in her a kindred spirit, and we became what I could best describe as friends, though there were other aspects involved. And I knew I was in love, though I'm sure I didn't know anything about love at the time.

Our afternoon rendezvous in the city was a almost a year to the day from when we first met. I had decided I had to tell her everything she meant to me, but I was afraid, because I had never told any girl something like what I wanted to tell her. I sensed the risk inherent to my mission. So, I sat next to her in that dark movie theater, until the lights came back up, just trying to formulate in my mind how I should start my declaration.

But before the I could say much of anything, she asked if we could go walk along Penn's Landing. I said yes. It seemed like it would provide an opportunity to talk, and the scene seemed almost romantic in and of itself, there with the sun making its way down the slope of the western sky, slowly retiring behind the center city skyscrapers, casting a fiery shimmer east upon the river.

We walked the short distance to the landing, where my delusion shattered when we happened upon another young woman, one of her classmates from school. She asked if her friend could walk with us. I said of course.

When we parted company that day with me dropping off her and her classmate at the station, she gave a kiss and a hug goodbye, then I went my own way home. I remember feeling a little cheated, even though I knew I probably could have asserted my wish to talk with her alone. But I didn't, and anyway, there's always next time, right?

There was no way I could have known that would be the last time I'd ever see her, but it was. And it's sad now to think that I've written hundreds of poems about her being gone, but I never wrote a single poem about her when she was around. And not a day goes by, even now, when I don't spent at least a moment or two missing her, especially when I make the occasional trip into the city. It's almost like a phantom pain, to look to my side and expect to see her there -- I swear that's how it feels.

But I know better.

"...every now and then I'd swear I see you standing
on a sidewalk, in a restaurant, from a taxi passing by."
-Better than Ezra

I was sitting at a red light early in the morning. There were no other cars in sight.

It was a residential area, and as I sat in the car awaiting the green light, I looked over to the right and noticed a cat standing on the corner of the sidewalk -- just standing there, looking across the intersection.

Then, I looked back toward the traffic light. I saw the light turning green, and out of the corner of my eye, I noticed movement. Before I stepped on the gas, I looked to the right again. There was the same cat, leisurely trotting out onto the crosswalk. All the way across...

"Honey, you are the sea
upon which I flow"
-Coldplay

Yesterday I was going to recount the first time I ever composed a poem about a girl I didn't know, and then actually gave the poem to the girl about whom it was written.

It was several years ago now. I can't quite recall the season, or the exact year even. I do remember it was late Sunday afternoon, and I was sitting in my favorite coffeehouse at a table with a cup of tea and a notebook, my favorite posture for writing.

Across the room there were three other people, all three approximately in their mid-twenties: a loud girl with long brown hair, a jovial spirit, and a voice as grating as her demeanor was cheerful -- to me at least. Near her was a young man who appeared to be with her specifically. He wasn't as engaged in the conversation, but not for a lack of effort. The third person was another girl with brown hair, but shorter than her friend's hair. Her face was graced with a pleasant smile, and she was wearing a yellow t-shirt with "Brooklyn" across the front in cursive lettering. As near as I could figure, she was the other primary in the conversation, but her responses were in a dramatically softer voice. The other thing that caught me, probably before I noticed all the rest, was the color in her eyes -- indescribably green, and I can't honestly remember them well enough anymore to even begin drawing them verbally. Suffice it to say, I was preoccupied by the eyes.

I thought about approaching her and introducing myself, but her loud friend was somehow intimidating to me, so I waited for an opportunity to approach, maybe in a moment when loud girl and her guy weren't so nearby. No such luck. After a few minutes more, they left the coffeehouse in unison. I stayed there for another fifteen minutes, during which I started scribbling a poem about the green-eyed girl.

For about a week after, I lamented to myself that I hadn't even approached to ask her name, much less tell her that her eyes were so beautiful I couldn't help but write a poem about them.

The next weekend, however, found me in the same coffeehouse with a friend of mine who lived near the establishment. I was slightly surprised to see green eyes working behind the front counter. I guess I must have been planning subconsciously for such an eventuality, because I had a folded up copy of the poem stuffed in my wallet.
I separated from my friend for a few minutes, and I introduced myself to the green-eyed girl and asked her name. Siobhan, she informed me, was her name (for the non-Irish reader, pronounce that "Shivvon"--and for the record, I had to ask her to spell it for me).

I told her I liked the name, and then I related a brief account of having seen her the week before, and having written a poem about her eyes. She seemed taken aback for a brief moment. I asked her if she wanted to see the poem. She said she would, as long as I didn't mind. I handed her the crumpled copy of the poem, I half apologized for the sloppiness of its presentation and I walked back to my table. I wasn't sure I wanted to see her response to it anyway. Business was brisk for the rest of the evening, and I ended up leaving without talking to her again.

The next time I was in the neighborhood, I tentatively stopped by the shop and saw her cleaning tables there. I got my tea as usual, and found a seat, where I began my customary scrawling. Within a few minutes of sitting down, she approached my table and said hello. She told me she liked the poem a lot, that it had almost made her cry while she was reading it. I told her I was happy to hear she liked it, and that I just felt she was entitled to read the poem herself because she had been the catalyst for it. We talked for a little bit (it must've been her break), and then that was it.

We remained friendly and had several other conversations after that, but it never amounted to more than friendly banter and the occasional free cup of tea. I'm not even sure if there was any flirtation going on -- to be honest, I was just recovering from an ill-fated (and mostly ill-conceived) relationship, so I'm not sure I would have noticed if she had been flirting. I hadn't even thought about asking green eyes out; like I'd said to her, I really just thought she should get to read what she had inspired.

I can no longer locate the actual poem, but I do remember I used the word "Brooklyn" as a title -- probably the only reason I can still remember that shirt she wore.

I have only presented a poem to one other stranger since then, and I had almost wanted to talk more about her than about Siobhan, but it's okay with me,

so long as something keeps me from writing yet another post about politics. I can save my Ume story for another time...

I have a girl; her name's Betsy. I don't talk about her much, but she's truly impressive. She's been with me for quite a while. People have asked me what I see in her, because they see her as plain and unappealing.

Sure, she doesn't glow the way she used to, but her beauty is, and always has been, beneath the surface -- a sort of quiet, steady strength she possesses that escapes the observation skills of most folks. I've been thinking about her recently because I know our time together is slowly coming to an end. Eight years, and I don't think I can imagine what life will be like without her.
Betsy's 16 now. While 16 may sound young, it's like 110 in car years -- especially nowadays. And while the younger, faster and flashier models on the road today might notice how she's a couple steps slower and her finish is more faded than ever, most of these automotive neophytes will be hemorrhaging fluids and spewing foul exhaust long before they ever reach 200,000 miles.

But Betsy, she just rolls on, ever graceful, if not so fast anymore. She's seen the hard times, and she's driven through them. She's got character you can't manufacture; it only develops over many years and thousands of miles. She was never a trophy car. She just gave what I needed, often more than I had any right to expect.

Though it smacks of betrayal (especially considering her faithful companionship), I began seriously gathering a dedicated savings cache earlier this year, and by the time her current registration and inspection sticker expire at the year's end, I fully expect to finally bid her farewell, as I go on the ever painful journey of finding a new vehicle. But I'll miss her.

"I was just guessing at numbers and fingers,
pulling the puzzles apart.
Questions of science -- science and progress
-- could not speak as loud as my heart."
-Coldplay

"I just don't think you should have to wait around for me."

Yes, those were her words. I told her I didn't mind (again), but she insisted my patience just confused her more.
I can recall when I first declared my love for her, the three words she'd said she only wanted to hear in the right context. And when I used those words, her blank expression left me with the impression the context was somehow lacking.

There was a time I believed our problems were rooted in her failure to respond in kind. But even that didn't faze me; I was dead sure of the declaration, even as she avoided my gaze -- even as I sensed her slipping away. But that sensation was already too familiar, almost a theme in my life. So, I could handle the looming threat of loneliness, as long as I was still clinging to the hope that my sheer will could carry the day; that her doubt could be canceled by my faith.

In retrospect, it really was an insane belief -- my whole life hinging on the idea that the purity of intentions, the sincerity of love, made it irrelevant what anyone else believed, or even if they believed in love at all. I just knew that was enough, and to me, it didn't matter whether she believed like I did.

As it turns out, it did matter.

In the real world, infidels aren't always convertible. Sometimes the seeds of doubt are sown so deep in a soul that only major excavation will uproot them. To me, anything was possible; to her, too much potential heartbreak lay around the corner -- and she just couldn't be brought to believe anything was worth that risk. My optimism alone became an annoyance to her, and the divergent perspectives we held drove us in opposite directions.

Years have passed, and looking back I can now acknowledge that I may have been too optimistic. Perhaps I would have grown impatient, or even resentful, toward her if I had stuck it out until she was past her demons. Maybe love, at least the version I practiced, doesn't really conquer everything.

Or maybe as we went our separate ways, she stumbled onto another opportunity to believe, to take a risk -- and maybe the intentions I tried to extend played in her head the way her words still occasionally play in mine.

And maybe she took a chance this time.

(This is just the end of a thought process I was mulling over breakfast this morning -- I ended up scribbling furiously for about thirty minutes while my food got cold, and while the food didn't end up tasting too good, I was somewhat happy with about 20% of what I wrote.)

It was late one evening as Smedley lounged in his favorite chair reading a magazine. Mrs. Smedley disrupted his relaxation, demanding that he go out to get bread and milk. She asked him if he thought the local supermarket would have bread and milk; Smedley replied that he couldn't be sure, but there was good reason to believe the store would have these two items.

About twenty minutes later, as Smedley pulled up outside the store, he noticed a woman being assaulted in the parking lot. Being a basically decent man, Smedley intervened and chased away the woman's assailant. Once the woman's safety had been secured and he made sure she would be okay, Smedley made his way into the store, only to find that they were sold out of both bread and milk, and there were no other stores open at such a late hour in the surrounding area.

Upon his return home, Smedley was questioned by his wife as to why he didn't get the two items she requested. Smedley proceeded to tell her that he thought the store would have the two items in question, but as it happened the store had no more of either item. He went on to tell her what had happened in the parking lot, how he had rescued the woman in distress. His wife, seemingly ignoring his story, called Smedley a liar, because he predicted that the store would have bread and milk, but it did not (despite the fact the store had regularly advertised that both bread and milk were normally kept in stock).

Okay, enough with the story, and while my analogy may be lacking, I'm starting to tire of die-hard presidential critics harping on Bush's perceived dishonesty regarding WMD's. I don't know whether he knowingly misrepresented intelligence findings or not, but I do know that some decent objectives were accomplished in the recent war in Iraq, and it isn't as if the Iraqi regime never gave anyone the impression that they had WMD's, whether or not it turns out to be a big bluff.

There's plenty of solid ground on which to base criticism if you disagree with the President's political philosophy. All I'm saying is that being urged into a war under a somewhat suspect pretense is not the newest chapter in the history book. I was reminded recently that Woodrow Wilson cited the unabated worldwide patrol of German U-boats as a major reason for joining the fray in the first world war -- and we could probably get a consensus of the citizenry to agree that the eventually proven inaccuracy of Wilson's paranoia didn't necessarily make joining the war a mistake, much less a scandal.

That's all I'm trying to get across.

And thanks, by the way, to those who offered me feedback on the blog colors/legibility. (I made a minor cosmetic change to the blog page by lightening the shade of green.)

I spent Christmas with my family. We all gathered at my sister's house up in North Jersey. After hopping onto I-95 to start the trip, I passed what has become a familiar site every time I get on that part of the highway: a memorial arrangement of flowers that has been there for over two years.

I still recall the gaper delay that summer day in 2001. There was a light rain falling at around 2:20 in the afternoon. The sky was gray. As we passed slowly in the northbound lanes, we could see two cars (or what remained of them) on the southbound side. One, a station wagon with its front end practically sheared off, and the other, a sedan resting on its roof, about thirty feet away from the wagon.

We later learned through local news sources that the sedan had managed to loose control, leaving the northbound side and skidding across the sizeable grass median, colliding with the station wagon, which had been riding southbound. The occupant of the station wagon was killed instantly in the collision. Soon after that rainy day, I started to notice the tribute.

Since then it's been regularly maintained, despite laws prohibiting such roadside memorials (I assume the local powers that be, to their credit, have pretty much been looking the other way). A few times in the past couple years, especially on holidays, I've seen what I only assume are members of the victim's family as they visit and tend to the site. I saw them there last Christmas, as I was on my way back from my sister's holiday dinner.

And yesterday, I noticed the flowers were fresh once again.

I have no idea where this is going -- I didn't really have a point. I guess it's just a melancholy reminder of the importance of appreciating the people you love.

I had told the story of Smedley a few days ago in one of the posts that got accidentally deleted. It was a story I felt needed to be retold, if only to acknowledge the inspiration that was given to me by an old school chum.

His story begins in the September of my eighth grade year at an unnamed parochial (read that "Christian") school. Smedley was different from other kids. Smedley wasn't born in the sterility of a maternity ward. He wasn't even born in a cab or ambulance on the way to the hospital. No, nothing that happened in his life was what I would call normal. You see, Smedley was born in the first few minutes of our eighth grade physical science class.

We had a physical science teacher who was a little like a substitute teacher. You know the way kids mess with a substitute? Well, this guy was like a sub, but better, because he was there everyday -- begging to be messed with.

In the parochial school we attended, it was not uncommon for a teacher to begin a class period by saying a prayer. Some of the teachers would even ask the students if there were any special concerns that needed mention in the prayer. The poor permanent sub who taught physical science was one of these teachers. And one day, early in the school year, as he solicited prayer requests, one of my classmates (I'll call him Pat) raised his hand.

Pat proceeded to tell us all about his friend from the neighborhood, Smedley, who had been involved in a freak accident and was now in the hospital, awaiting an emergency kidney transplant (or something to that effect). Were it not for the beginnings of a smile forming on Pat's lips as the teacher sympathetically listened, some of us in the class might have believed the story also. But the teacher seemed to buy the whole thing.

As days went by, the science teacher would ask Pat for updates on Smedley, which Pat would willingly supply. As the stories got stranger, we in the class had more difficulty suppressing our laughter. At one point, the teacher scolded a few students for laughing at such a serious matter, but he never scolded Pat for the fantastic stories he was telling. To Pat's credit, he got better at selling the stories as he told more of them. One of Smedley's unfortunate incidents involved a transplant surgeon leaving a scalpel inside of him.

Thinking back, it was probably not that funny, at least the laughs were mostly in poor taste, but that's what often happens with a roomful of thirteen-year-old's. To our knowledge, the science teacher, who left the school after that one year, never caught on; but then, that may have just been the faulty perspective of our naïveté.

But Smedley isn't just important for the myriad injuries and illnesses he suffered. He shares a common thread with my first public poetry display. For the very young man who had breathed life into Smedley's myth was also instrumental in helping me "get published" for the first time, as a junior high"poet."

This event sprang from a short verse I had scribbled in a study hall. The subject of my rhyme was a girl in our class who was quite unpopular, and the poem was fairly mean towards her. Of course, I never intended for anyone to read it; I was just bored at the time.

But my buddy Pat changed all that. He caught a glimpse of the derogatory little limerick, and instantly saw potential, so he confiscated it. I was mildly shocked to later find my poem posted on the bulletin board of our homeroom, from which it became a short-lived favorite of most of my classmates -- until our teacher discovered it, and the handwriting was soon recognized as mine.

The funny thing is, I had gotten in trouble during my school years, but I didn't really get into trouble for this particular escapade. But I remember it better than most others. The principal only gave me a lecture about how I was making poor use of my ability (he also made me apologize to the girl who was the subject of the poem). And I remember feeling bad about it for a while.

To this day, I think about that episode, and I wonder about that girl. I often wonder if she remembers that poem, or if it just blends into the countless assaults I know she suffered at the hands of her classmates. I know I saw her in the mall years ago, with a young child. I almost said something to her, but I didn't.

I wondered if all the slings and arrows had faded into her subconscious, where she might prefer to leave them -- unstirred by an impromptu greeting from someone who had once been part of the assault.

I hoped that her world had changed, that the child I saw by her side was part of a happier life than the one a bunch of junior high students had done their best to ruin. (-It was around this point in my life that I first studied Richard Wilbur's poem "The Writer," which may have had something to do with my philosophical thoughts at the time.)

This is more than I had intended to write, so I'm not too sure where this is headed now. Perhaps I meant to declare this set of memories as a sort of "rainbow" reminder -- the promise that I will never again (attempt to) destroy someone with poetry.

But that just sounds silly...