In Conversation

Beaver County Auction In Monaca, notices are taped four or five deep on the screen doors. Grass, knee-high, creeps up the leg. I watch for poison ivy and dog poop—peer through broken panes of glass for signs of life. I take pictures, report my observations, tell my investors what I find unless there’s a sign …

Running On Empty Sometimes, late at night when shadows whisper and the kids have stopped arguing and retreated to their bedrooms, and the dogs are fed and sleeping in the corner, and the lights have all been turned off, the dishes washed but not put away and coffee is prepared for morning the silence piles …

Facekini I was in this little corner convenience near Ossington Station when an ultra-skinny dude wearing a green facekini strutted in. I’m sure he thought it looked cool, that it was one of those Mexican wrestling masks or something. The guy behind the cash probably thought it was a hold-up, backing away from the register …

Collecting Collectors So, I had my book launch for Mister Joe’s Pirates last Saturday at the Seidr Brewery in beautiful downtown Arab, Alabama. Seidr boasts a Norse mythology theme, which is to say all the drinks are named after Viking shit and the bartenders are forced to cultivate aggressive facial hair. It’s not talked about …

Last Words Thoreau’s sister Sophia, who was reading to him from A Week on the Concord and Merrimack when he died, claimed his last words were “Now comes good sailing.” William Ellery Channing, a friend of Thoreau’s who was also present, said he heard only two words: “Moose. Indian.” My wife says I yelled “Run!” …

Condolence Book I’m sorry for your loss. I’m deeply sorry for your loss. I’m sorry I lost my manners that night we were drinking in Maine. Your whole family is in my thoughts, especially that little nymphet with the rust and stardust eyes. It was a terrible shock to learn that you ran off with …

The Profane Art of Staying Alive: The Book of the Dirty Poet from Roadside Press Early in The Book of the Dirty Poet, its pseudonymous speaker reduces the secret of life to two pieces of advice: get lucky, and appreciate things while they are good, because they will not remain that way. Then comes the …

A Week After 9/11 and we still needed all the things people who just bought a house need, and on our way to buy them at Walmart, I remembered the chain email forwarded to me at least 5 times, telling me that tonight how we were all going to go outside and hold up a …

Thoughts of a half-dead woman Since I was twenty-nine doctors have been telling me I am nearly dead. There’s a strange freedom in being a half-dead woman. Risks are not measured by what is lost— but whom. Regrets are not what I failed— but what I didn’t say. I remember the name of the man …

The Teeth of the Years The great machinery of life grinds in silence while everyone inside it disappears. Nobody hears the little bones of the years being chewed. We wake up, clock in, stand beneath the white lights of places built to keep us busy, then go home and call it a life. Soon enough, …