Letter

My kid brother had a kid last week. More accurately, his wife, Lauren, did. I was an uncle once before for a brief time twenty years ago, but that was by marriage. This is the first child any of my brothers can claim credit for so far as I know.

Raya wasn’t supposed to arrive for another week but couldn’t wait. That’s a thing we have in common. I’m perpetually early too. I like to get on with it rather than procrastinating or waiting around.

When her father, Max, was born, I was halfway through senior year of high school. I made a couple sketches of him when he came home from the hospital. I’m old enough to be his father, though that’s not the type of relationship we’ve ever had.

There’s a flood of texts after the first announcement. Many from numbers I don’t recognize. Must be Lauren’s family. All reacting to photos I can’t see on my dumbphone. I turn the ringer off after awhile. Max emails me a couple pictures so I can share in their moment.

Baby pictures are strange. They mostly resemble other baby pictures except for when the baby is yours. I’ve never once recognized much in common between a newborn and either parent or grandparent. Only they themselves can see this. It’s okay. I have no feeling about it one way or the other. It’s not a life experience I will ever have so I have to believe those who are going through it.

After hearing the news, I made some breakfast, then went out into the alley behind the house and made a painting. I plan to send it to Max and Lauren in honor of Raya’s arrival once it dries. I don’t know if this is an appropriate present or whether it will mean anything to them, but this is how I react to and process just about everything that happens. I smear paint or pen marks across a flat surface about it.

I went through a bunch of old sketchbooks looking for those Max infant sketches and wound up throwing away a lot of shitty drawings. Throwing things away always makes me feel better. Maybe that’s in honor of my niece’s arrival as well.

I made a new page of old drawings from the ancient sketchbooks that I didn’t cull. These are available. Let me know if you’d like one.

I hope to meet Raya in person sometime later this summer. Maybe she’ll pose for a drawing.

I read a couple pages from Eugene Marten’s remarkable Layman’s Report into a microphone.

Listening to Myriam Gendron’s Ma Délire on repeat.

The play starts and so does the familiar dread. Whether I enjoy the play or not, no matter if I have any reaction to it or none at all, I will go home and have to write a review. I’ve done this to myself. Sometime after the first book came out in 2011, I started to get paid for my written opinions. Haven’t been able to stop since.

It’s not just the money, though that’s helpful. Somewhere along the line I convinced myself that sharing my takes with strangers was worthwhile and a valid use of my time. The timeline coincides with the rise of social media, which practically dictates that we all must hold forth on everything and everyone that crosses our eyes, ears, and noses. It’s built in. Hot takes, cold takes, but takes, one way or another. Silence is not an option.

When I was in elementary school the teacher would assign a book to read, then make us write a book report. I resented this beyond all reason. My gut reaction was: Fuck you, read it yourself. These decades later, it feels like that impulse was the right one all along.

In the past fourteen years I’ve amassed enough reviews, essays, etc to fill an entire book but they will likely never be collected or published that way. It’s not that they’re so worthless. There’s the occasional insight, the odd memorable turn of phrase. It’s that there’s no reason to reread one guy’s judgment on a thing that itself is likely long forgotten.

There are a few writers, very few, who make criticism into an actual art. I’m just not one of them. So I will try, not for the first time, to quit. There’s enough money between the bookstore, art sales, the odd bar shift, and the kindness of friends and family, for me to get by okay without rendering my opinion on the latest play, book, or movie. The world will be no less rich without that puff of hot air.

This newsletter, which has been going about fifteen years, won’t last forever either. Some weeks it’s like pulling teeth. I still think there’s some value in keeping it going for now.

I want whatever energy I have left for art rather than opinionating. Doesn’t mean I’ll stop spouting my dumb takes to anyone who asks; only that it won’t be in print.

We’ll see how long I can hold out.

Rainbo show continues through July 27th. Eight pieces sold; eleven still available.

Ringo was only around the first few months Tangible Books was open. He was an old dog. Joe said that on the farm in Arkansas Ringo went everywhere he went. At the store, he mostly sat on the rug by the New Arrivals, his paws crossed. He was twelve when he passed. A full life for a big dog. A came across a photo of Ringo recently and made Joe a painting. It hangs behind the desk in the new store.

After moving a big share of the 60K stock, we’re reconfiguring the sections to make the most of all the new room. Joe built four new 9-foot cases to make a wall of Biography in the back room, where the Cozy Crime and Mystery sections used to be. I moved those shelves to the back corner of the room.

When Lisa moved all the boxes of books meant for the internet in the old basement, she discovered ten boxes of unshelved Biography. These had to be incorporated into what was already six cases up in the store. It took a whole day and half of the next morning, but I made most of it fit. It’s amazing who gets books written about them. Sometimes multiple different ones by different authors. An actress I never heard of named Sarah Miles published three hardcover memoirs. How much is there to say about a young person’s life? More than I can imagine, clearly.

I like putting all these books in order but I think it’s making me not want to add to the ever-growing pile of publication. Once my art book comes out in a month or so maybe I’ll be cured of the habit. I need to find some other ways of sating the demands of my ego. Something that kills fewer trees.

The empty former Bio shelves cried out to be filled. For the entire time I’ve been at Tangible, people have come in asking where our Romance section is. There were a couple shelves full of historical fiction in the old store. Books set in ancient Rome or some medieval castle. Full of men wielding firm staffs and gushing, feinting maidens. The Fiction stacks were dotted with titles illustrated with sunny beaches and young women in tight dresses. Joe and I had many debates about what constituted Romance rather than just Fiction.

The newly-empty shelves made Joe cave and let me cull some beach reads and historical fantasies. I pull the red wheeled cart up to the A’s and start scanning book spines. I look for bright colors and pun titles. It doesn’t take long to fill the cart. Any writer with more than six or seven books is a prime candidate. I joke with Joe that my cart is like the one in Pinocchio that takes bad kids to Pleasure Island.

Most of these are written by and marketed to women. But there’s a mens’ version. These involve war rather than love but they’re often similarly rooted in a specific historical era. Whatever the time period, kink, or fetish, these are wish-fulfillment books. They’re for people who want to imagine themselves into other worlds and different bodies. In the hours I spend picking up, carrying, and arranging hundreds, not a single one has made me want to stop and read it.

I’m off from the store a couple days. I don’t know what project will grab me the next time I come in but I look forward to finding out. It feels more and more like the bookstore is where I want to be when I’m not making art. I can see it occupying me for years to come.

But no more Romance for the time being.