Scent of Home

The cabbie has inexplicably decided to take surface roads all the way back from the airport.

At another of the seemingly endless number of stoplights, Katie sighs, and I ask if everything's okay.

When she explains that the stop-and-go ride is making her nauseated, I suggest she roll down the window for a little fresh air.

She does, and the air smells like home, humid and cool and sweet, even on Atlantic Avenue in the middle of Brooklyn.

Social Realism Isn't Easy

They've turned the ruins of this old flour mill into a museum, and the exhibit we're currently admiring informs us that after the mill closed in 1965, it was abandoned, left to vagrants and the homeless, who sheltered from the vicious Minnesota winters within its walls.

Eventually, a careless campfire burned out of control, gutting the old building, and leaving the banks of the Mississippi in these parts bereft of industry. The rise and fall of the flour industry reflects in microcosm the rise and fall of of many industries in America, and this museum makes the wise choice of showing those changes through the eyes of the people who worked here.

"I want to write one of those historical novels, like those bricks that Michner wrote, about the flour industry, but I'm afraid I'd fuck it up," I tell Katie 

Two Men, One Skirt, and One Pair of Underwear

The man in the kilt waits with me outside the bathroom at the wedding venue, and my question about his tartan spins out into a discussion of the etemology of family names in old Ireland.

When the bathroom's current occupant finally vacates, I make to go in, but the man in the kilt asks if he might, too. 

It's kind of crowded, and there's no real separating barrier between the urinal and the toilet, but of course I say yes - as the saying goes, when you've gotta go....

So the man who sticks his head into the bathroom a few seconds later is a little surprised to see two men peeing, chatting about Welsh place names and the terrible state of the Isles since 1066.

Touchdown

As the wheels touch down on the wet tarmac, the plane shudders, and the plastic doors to the overhead compartments rattle deafeningly the length of the compartment.

No one seems alarmed, however, and the flight attendant's voice is calm, friendly, and mildly sedated sounding as she recites, "On behalf of USAirways, we'd like to welcome you to Minneapolis, where the local time is eleven... thirty nine."

As she continues her spiel, the mid-fifties aged man in the row in front of us remarks on the loudness of the landing to no one in particular.

The good looking, crew-cutted young guy next to him turns and says, "Yeah, but it's quieter than any landing in one of the army planes."

What They Really Think

I can hear them talking in the copy room, talking about me.

"... and I had eyeliner clumped all over my face, and he was like, 'Um, you might want to check a mirror,' but totally nice about it!"

The other one chimes in, "He's just so nice."

When one of them walks by a few moments later, I keep my head down and pretend to be engrossed in the document I'm editing, so as to avoid eye contact.

In Spite of Myself

I've all but determined I'm not going to go to the bookstore to talk to them about booking a reading. It's not that I'm lazy, just terminally insecure, worried they'll see right through me, recognize I'm not a real author.

Yet, my feet continue to walk, almost without any volition on my part, and before I know it, I'm at the door. 

"Well, since I'm already here," I think, stepping inside amidst the smell of books to speak to the man behind the counter.

Sponsored by Nobody

She says, "He's, like, eleven? But fancy eleven, like he's got, like, an iPad and stuff, so I don't know what to get him for his birthday."

I don't even look up from my typing. "Get him a gift card at the iTunes Store, so he can buy apps."