Memoirous

When I arrived in Eugene, OR with a bicycle and a suitcase, I had no plan. I loosely wanted to just figure things out. Two weeks later I had a job, an apartment, and a new grandson! Four days a week I cycle to the bike shop. At first I was in training for the front of the store doing retail. As opposed to what some folks might think during Covid with limited or disrupted supply chains: we have stock. We are a fully equipped bike shop and can kit folks out for a tour, a weekend ride, or a day trip. So it was a LOT to learn. Basically I’d just gotten to the point of organizing the over 50 kinds of helmets we carry when half the shop quit. To be fair, the guys moved on. After a pandemic it makes sense that there is some fluidity. People are now free to move around. So I went from clerk in training to being number 2 or 2 ½ as there is another part-timer, an engineering student juggling mechanics and school. To put all this in perspective: I’m whiffing a lot. For instance when I get...

The Impossible First Colin O'Brady Scribner January 2929  In the book The Impossible First, Colin O’Brady suffered from the cold, infinite whiteouts, and the startk loneliness. And, that was the everyday stuff. One day in particular was hard enough that he thought he might quit. His wife surprised him by arranging a call between Colin and the singer Paul Simon. Like O’Brady, I’m a fan of the Graceland album. I love in particular the conversational tone to the lyrics, as if we’ve been invited into his RV to hear him perform some new material. Simon for his part during the call was intrigued by O’Brady’s journey across Antarctica. He related that making art “is a process.” Much like O’Brady in the harness for 12 hours to achieve sometimes only 12 miles a day, the process is one step at a time, one word, or lyric, effort, attempts. It doesn’t seem like we’re making progress, but we are. I enrolled in Story Studio’s Novel-in-a-Year program withJames Klise . We’re working the proces...

Impossible First Colin O''Brady Scribner January 2020 I wrote earlier about the book The Impossible First by Colin O’Brady who wrote an account of his traverse across Antarctica in 2018. In the book he talks about a particularly hard day where he only made 3 miles. I had a similar situation on my Lewis & Clark bike tour last summer (—though to be perfectly clear it was no Antarctica). I had a day where I only made it 9 miles before the weather or threat of hypothermia shut me down. The day before had been beautiful following the Missouri River out of Great Falls into narrow canyons and the hush of high altitude birds gliding along. All day I was amazed by the ease of pedaling while knowing the Continental Divide was just around the corner. That evening I came into Wolf Creek, MT and looked for a campground or park, some place to pitch a tent. 1) the campground on Google maps wasn’t there and it all seemed kind of sketchy. There were old motels and gas stations boarded up li...

The Impossible First Colin O’Brady Scribner January 2020 Readers of this blog, both of you, and friends know that I love all things Artic or, the polar opposite, Antartic. Growing up I read journals and autobiographies of polar explorers. There must have been some curiosity already developing within me of what it means to live on the edge of extremes. It seems I have been walking that tightrope ever since. The Impossible First was an ALA youth recommended book= Alex Awards for the 10 best adult books that appeal to teen audiences. Colin O’Brady is a 30 year old guy from Portland, OR, a child of the Pacific Northwest. He was probably hyperactive and in the acknowledgements gives credit to his first grade teacher for putting up with him. If he got too busy she’d tell him to go outside and run off some of his energy. He excelled at swimming and competed for Yale University. Afterwards he traveled and was in an accident in Thailand leaving him critically mobility compromised. He had to ove...

 My roommate went on a walk last night brought home a plaque. He’d been walking past a house with a sign out front urging passers-by to take a sign. Even before Covid I’d been used to seeing Little Library or Corner Pantry or other pop-ups. Whenever I visited a friend who once lived in Charlottesville, VA there was a neighbor who had an outreach of original poems. She’d compose them and copy them and have out front in a Plexiglas container for people to take. It was a way to get her work out there and be a blessing. Recently I’ve had a run of acceptances. An essay taken by Quananzine, a humorous story by Funny Pearls also out of the UK, a flash in SCBWI-IL Prairie Wind, and another flash in Teach. Write. In addition, my daughter had something appear in Coffin Bell. In nearly all these instances neither of us were paid or offered payment. I’m beginning to see what I do as the equivalent as the workshop guy or poem lady. I’ve written here before—or should I say whined—about t...

Recently had a piece appear in Funny Pearls. This is my second time--the first time I published with them, Shelter in Place . The back story of Laundry Day is simple: ran out of clean clothes (or clothing as the UK editor wanted to revise until I said in the States that wasn't how we'd do it). One afternoon my daughter showed up wearing performance gear and I asked if she'd been running. No, she said, it's laundry day. That was a number of years ago and I held onto that anecdote until time to write it into a flash. I wrote it, revised it, and submitted it. It was taken within a couple of days. Not a lot of slushing around in slush piles. Now, this isn't always the case, but sometimes I get lucky. Laundry Day.

 Check out new work "Biking Through a Pandemic" at Quaranzine  (vever mind the subheading which states I cycled coast-to-coast. The UK doesn't realize 2,400 miles still is only half way across the United States. When Covid threw my life off-kilter and I lost my job(s) and all sense of routine I hit the road--" I knew my job: it was to pedal, to get somewhere. For 2,464 miles."

 My daughter Grace Hertenstein-Garvey has new work out at Coffin Bell --it's grim tonight  . . . The Heron and the Gravedigger Grace Hertenstein  is a 2013 graduate from the New School in New York City with a degree in music and writing. She has had nine short stories published, including one in  Bright Bones: An Anthology of Contemporary Montana Writing  and one on  Goreyesque —an online literary publication dedicated to Edward Gorey-influenced work. Currently, she lives in Eugene, Oregon where she works as a florist and is at work on several projects both creative and community-based.

His New Thing *Another Jack Post Almost every day there is a *new thing. Now to be clear his attempts at movement are not a big deal or technically new in the sense of “no one has ever done this before.” Basically he is trying to roll over. But, and here’s the kicker, every day now there is something *new. For instance, last night when my daughter and son-in-law came over for dinner (nevertheless, Jack was on the menu) Dad said, This is his new thing. Jack was on his tummy and when Dad placed his hand on his little diaper butt, Jack would stiffen into like a pizza tray or an airplane attempting lift off, leaving only his belly on the blanket. And this, Grace says is his *new thing: he stiffens every time she tries to put him in his car seat, making it ten times more difficult to maneuver his little 13-pound body into position. For now it’s cute and *new. After a week of this it gets old, and frustrating. Yet, seen through this charmed and loving parental lens everything he do...

I read a NY Times article about languishing, the forlorn stepchild of depression. If depression is the valley then languishing is the Slough of Despond (see Pilgrim’s Progress) both are no fun. According to the article “languishing dulls your motivation, disrupts your ability to focus.” It is described as the absence of well-being. Last year around this time after 6 weeks of intense lockdown I was wading through that swamp. Aimless. Lost. Without hope. It was then I decided I would take off on my bike and ride to the Pacific coast in Oregon. People say: You’re so brave! So athletic! Little do they realize: I was so desperate. For something, out there, beyond my reach. I wanted to snatch back the year I couldn’t have and regain a sense of control, a bit of well-being. I needed to feel like me. More from the article: So what can we do about it? A concept called “flow” may be an antidote to languishing. Flow is that elusive state of absorption in a meaningful challenge or a momentary bond...

My baby has a red cheek from where it rests against the breast His cheek is red when he wakes up from how he lays his head Jack’s rosy cheek is warm and dew-drop soft as I nestle my cheek next to his Baby’s one red cheek melts my heart bursting into tongues                                          of joy