D

I know a lot of very fascinating and, well, just plain cool, people, one of whom is a first cousin. I've been trying out different approaches to talking about him, running through various sketches in my head, but nothing seems to work, to really portray the person he is. I'm still not entirely convinced that the fashion in which I will now proceed is the most ideal, and I'm sure it will not be the last I write about him. Nevertheless, here is a list of random facts and fables about my cousin Darren.

D:
-plays a mean guitar, and I grew up thinking he sang like Eddie Vedder.
-prefers traveling by bike or on foot in the interest of Mother Earth.
-keeps a composition notebook in his back pocket for recording ideas, etc.
-bakes a cake for himself about once a week.
-got his degree in English and now works professionally at Planet Sub in Kansas City.
-has a map of the world hanging in his bathroom, courtesy of Doctors Without Borders.
-speaks more softly than I do.
-was once accused of plagiarism by a college professor because an essay he wrote was just that good; rather than fighting him, D turned in a different essay, proving that the best revenge is to live on and prove yourself.
-prefers texting to phone conversations and always remembers to text me on my birthday (or on the one-time occasion of my college graduation).
-sacrificed booze, cigarettes, and a fairly large number of friends during college to better himself on the soccer field (but was back in full force beginning with our shared high school/college graduation party at our Mudd family farm).
-is always modest about all of his talents and doesn't like being the center of attention.
-drinks green tea brewed with loose leaves.
-walks like our grandpa used to.
-tries not to grumble too much when another one of his high school friends gets engaged.
-has a wicked and unassuming sense of humor.
-lives in Kansas City with his older and preppier brother, Chris.
-consistently made appearances at any Red Water Revival shows in Kansas City, and "Rattlesnake Babies/Seafoam Earphones" was his favorite song.
-always outplays our cousin David on the ping pong table at family gatherings; the ease with which he does drives David crazy.
-once gave some money to a homeless man and then agreed to drive him across town (when he still drove).
-has Ani DiFranco and Pearl Jam posters on his bedroom walls and works by Jack Kerouac and Hermann Hesse on his bookshelf.
-self-educates himself in literature and, at least at one point, in Spanish.
-prefers driving long distances in the middle of the night, setting out around 2 AM typically.
-types his poems and stories on a typewriter and travels with a tweed suitcase, both courtesy of the flea market.
-is someone I will always feel slightly intimidated to be around while also being someone I will always admire.

photo courtesy of Stacy and Zac Mansker

Skit Scat

I am a fine gin and

an apartment overlooking the

lake (ocean?). Take a

rifle to the bathtub and

cozy up to homemade drugs

(alcohol?), a vibrator and

a pin cushion (a vibration

in a pin cushion?).

My hat on your mantle and

your checkers in my oven

tell the tale of days

spent in the cow pasture.

Tell your grandmother I'll be

late for Christmas dinner but

I'll come dressed in my

Sunday best. Rearrange the

flower arrangement on my

grave and set out a

plate of pancakes for the

postman, an orange for the

milkman. Borrow my

grandfather's pilot's hat,

but cover your

eyes at takeoff.

A Thanksgiving Sketch, Courtesy of My Old Friend Jack

"The poor little Mexican
gal in Calexico, writing
on Oct 1 1952 to Manuel
Perez in Watsonville whose
clothing & belongings I found
intact on the Pajaro levee
dump, wants money to
buy a tablecloth—can
you picture an American
woman asking money for
such a humble, useful
purpose—“unos manteles
para la mesa." "Honey,"
she says, "dime porque no
me has escrito”—“tiene
tan...pensamientos para ti."
She loves him—I am
wearing all his clothes not
knowing whether he's alive or

dead-or in the Army?
I found several of her
sad letters on that dump,
in October,—in the dry
dust, just before the rainy
Season,—"

Belfast Rememory

9 November 1968

Ciao, S—

(I fancy saying that. Relish it really…)

Anyway, you asked me once how I met my wife. I remember that night and the things to which we admitted. But I couldn’t then talk about her. But I owe you this one. So, in answer to your question, I met Katherine in Belfast…

That was right after I’d finished university in the States and decided to go back home to continue my studies. I was up North at Queen’s, and I found a nice place within walking distance. The elderly proprietress had never rented to a man before, and I think she finally did to me under false pretences. I gave my name as Dr. Brannan—in anticipation of the fact—and she must have thought that meant 'medic.' She probably hoped I would be able to treat the whole house if any Orangies tried to bomb us out.

The day I moved in, I hadn’t slept any the night before. I’d been at the library with my head between the pages of some Elizabethan author, and all I could think to do was collapse onto my bed once I’d gotten a few things moved into the flat out of storage. My flat was in the basement, dark and damp, but it was good enough. But that bed would not do. It must have belonged to the woman’s eldest son about the time he was in grammar school. It was short and narrow, and it had to go. Some boys from the college helped me carry a new double bed through the streets of Belfast all the way to my flat. (We put the old bed out in the coal shed.) When we showed up with that bed up on our shoulders, the old lady could not have looked more scandalised. ‘What use does a single man have for a double bed?’ It was mostly an accusation. She probably imagined loads of evil snogging was going to happen in her basement. She would have been right. That’s where I met Katherine afterall.

She lived in the upstairs flat and took care of the proprietress’s books. I didn’t know that for a while, though. I’d seen her coming and going from the house nearly every day at seven, wearing an orange beanie. I could count on seeing her walking back up to the house just before eight on those mornings, usually with an armful of chrysanthemums and a piece of fruit, and sometimes an old library book. Between seven and eight, I would imagine her walking the streets of Belfast, picking up an apple from the market, smelling every flower the peddlers had for sale before picking the brightest mums. I was envious of those mornings, of the streets and the sky. They had her.

I was late to my eight o’clock seminar nearly every day, but it was worth it just to catch a glimpse of that orange cap. One morning I didn’t see her at all. It was a wet day, but that had never stopped her from going out before. I was concerned, but there was little I could do, so I gathered my things and prepared for class. On my way out, I heard Katherine speaking to the old woman behind the door of the flat one flight up. I froze, for how long I don’t know, but I stayed just outside my own door until the door above opened. I pretended that I had just arrived back at my flat. Katherine saw me, and we made some sort of polite greeting. I commented on the dreary weather and somehow managed to convince her to take tea with me. You know as well as I know that I am not a charming man, and I think she only agreed because she had it in her nature to be a compassionate person. And I was just the poor, bookish bachelor sequestered to the dank basement.

There was something about the way she smiled. Katherine had an illegible smile, indelible. I remember she was wearing periwinkle trousers and a cream-coloured blouse. She smelled just like ripe tangerines. I don’t remember what we talked about—or if we even said anything at all—but I knew. She had misty, amber-coloured eyes to match her chamomile tea. I never made it to class that day.

I miss those days, especially at this time of the year when the air is wet and cold like it was the day I met my wife. I miss her. And you. And Ireland. I’m getting away from myself now. This was probably more than you were expecting when you asked how I met Katherine. But I just remembered that I had never answered your question. I hope that helps explain a bit.


Dia duit,
J

Wheat Fields and Steel Trees

26

Dear Andy,

Don't tell the other girls, but I have the best big brother ever. Happy birthday! I love you.

-Becca

Carpet Squares, Red Balloons, and Other Things That Don't Really Go Together

The Red Balloon never made much sense to me, even then, sitting on a carpet square in Mrs. Seeger’s second grade classroom, behind Ben Daugherty and his pointy elf ear, lifting our chubby first two fingers up in the air as high as we could to quiet our peers. The tile floor would be a mosaic of carpet squares in baby blues and camels and the lone hunter green square that everyone fought over. When the carpet squares came out, that’s when the fun began: room switch.

That movie always depressed me—why did we watch it so often?? It left me feeling empty, scolded, and tired. Could this have just been the effect of sitting on a hard floor with only an 18” x 27” carpet square for nearly forty minutes in the midst of other mouth-breathing second graders? Or did the silent French film really have some profound effect on my tiny psyche? Or…not so tiny psyche after all…? For me there was something evil about it, something sacrificial maybe. That’s what I couldn’t get past, every time I watched it. Was I too sensitive? Or was I just too…old…for a second grader?

(Little boys can’t be lifted off the ground by balloons; I don’t care how many there are.)

Oh the joy of writing! I remember how easy it was for me and how fulfilled I felt after finishing a story (though I started countless more than I ever finished). My first story was an explanation as to why mice have long tails. My take? An elephant stepped on the mouse’s stubby tail just as he was trying to run away from the elephant, and his tail suffered the stretch. It was a fantastically neat and simple explanation, one I remember being proud of, most likely because it was so practical. Always a perfectionist, even first-grade Rebecca kept things nice and tidy without too much imaginative distraction.

I was so proud to see my story (with illustrations!) tacked up on the cork board tract outside Room 2 along with my classmates’. I eyed it with pride—my own cover drawing of the fleeing mouse waving at me, “Hello! Hello!”—either during bathroom breaks or on walks down to the office—but only when I was on mail duty, the most coveted job on the list. I loved school, still do I guess (or maybe just the idea of it). I loved how the last breezes of the summer would rush through the open doors and how the assignments and construction paper artwork on the cork board runners would flap like autumn leaves. I loved the look and smell of a brand new box of crayons and just how bright my white tennis shoes would be for the whole first week.

Kristen Miller lived up the street from us, and she and Andy were in the same grade. She gave me her clear jelly sandals, the ones with the little fruits appliquéd on the instep. They hurt like hell, even on my summer feet, but I was so proud of them. She showed me how to take out a lightening bug’s glowing bulb and stick it to my finger where it would continue to pulse. Even as a kid, I was slightly disturbed by such destruction of property. Kristen had a cousin named Tyler who was a year younger than I. She wanted us to be friends. I pictured a tire swing every time I heard his name.

I was a flower child growing up, whether I knew it or not. I remember spending summer afternoons with my dad, playing with the tadpoles in the puddle at the edge of the rocks. He showed me how to cup my two chubby fists around enough water for one to swim in my hands. Or I would dig up dandelions with my mom in the backyard, being careful to get all the roots out.

How strange it was to live a precocious childhood, to have been serious and shy, knowing that someday I'd make friends my own age.

(If I had a bunch of balloons, I would fly away too.)