It is always awkward, getting up to make an effort at writing.  Hard to find a purpose, as with all athletic exercises.  You have to start slowly, without knowing what you direction you're going.   You have to warm up.  The only riches to begin with, the embarrassment of being a human who somehow found writing worth doing...


Fictional Self:

In his fictional self, he had grown tired of serving wine.  Tired of cocktails.  Tired of drinking it even, were he not in pain by the end of the day.  He was tired of getting into it, walking the edge, the whole mess of seeking the right kind of buzz, as if it opened his writing mind up somehow to reach his own truths.  He was tired of wondering what would happen, where creativity would take him.  And more tired of waking up completely without energy, without any sense of what he was doing with himself, this writer thing, all of it.  Life had become a matter of administering to hangovers and dehydration, aches from the physicality of work, hunger...  A matter of work and sleep.

At this point, now about the only things sustaining him were indeed the crucial ones, family, love, the fact that at least he had treated a lot of people, and strangers, with kindness, respect and hospitality.  But now, now there had to be some meaning, deeper, deeper than the sustaining ones of old.

He had always hoped meaning would show up at his doorstep, in a way.  He knew directions in which to look, but he had not taken the self-confident stride of finding that which he was looking for, within.  As if expecting someone to come along and tell him the story and meanings of his own life, rather than stepping up and doing it himself.

He had wanted to go off into a deep skeptical rest away from people.

The devil comes to prey, trying to distract you from the thing that will save you.  The battle between Satan and Jesus Christ is over the education of humanity.  You can take the cynical route, or the magnificent and rewarding one...

And somehow he knew, that if he sat down diligently, and sought out a few words at first, he stood the probability, as of quantum physics, of finding something to write.



Today is the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord on the Roman Catholic calendar.   Which means that the Forty Days of being out in the desert must be on the way.



Real Self:

There had only been a half a bottle of Madiran, in the night, as the snow fell in the cold night.  He made a Texas hot sauce out of ground buffalo, an onion, achieving the proper texture after browning in the green ceramic dutch oven, pulsed in a white Cuisinart, after using the food processor to cut up parsley.  Spices, allspice, cinnamon, dry mustard, chili powder, clove, paprika, celery seed, ginger...

The quiet of a Saturday night alone after the grocery store turning eventually into rising at an early hour.  He went out to shovel the front stoop, the steps down to the basement.  The sidewalk.  A heavy wet snow, an effort.  He called his mom.  He watched the Weather Channel.   He muddled half a lime, a dash of ginger, turmeric, Malden sea salt, hot water.  A tablespoon of hummus.  A shower, and then, for the first time since the holidays, yoga, Sore and slow.

Then slicing the cold duck breast, also from the night before, green tea, and out the door, early, and now the snow had picked up again, heavy.  The walk down to the avenue, independent contractor crews with outfitted pick-up trucks to spread salt, to plow side streets, a heavy wet snow driving at him, the minaret of the mosque rising.

Sore, walking up the long slippery road out of the woods of Dumbarton Oaks, families sledding up on the hill by old enormous tulip poplar..  Getting to work finally.

When the door opened, he had a small time to get set-up, as the old busboy chatted down in the kitchen, was gathering the sheet with the specials written on them, when he heard from the downstairs dining room, sets of footsteps up the stairs...  Jesus Christ.

Regulars.  A birthday.  We brought you an orange tort.   Goddamn...   Later:  what are you going to drink?  Me:  Nothing!

And then the British couple showed up, the Henry Mancini Pandora station seemed to please the crowd with hits of Bacharach, I struggled with the first cocktails...

And all night, I avoided wine.  Until the end, a glass of cheap pinot noir just to numb the pain...