Valentia Island, County Kerry, Ireland. November 28th, 2009

Tuesday,

The best thing about Ireland is the smell. I like to open all the windows in this cottage and let the scent of grass and rain permeate it. It smells clean and pure and perfect. I think I will remember the smell more than anything else. It is morning now and I’m sitting by a window, watching the sunrise. The sun is orange, the sky is coral, the clouds are violet-gray. I can see a cow in the field. There are cows and sheep everywhere here. I think there’s more sheep than there are people. It’s quiet here, too, very quiet. It disturbs me. I miss my record player.

I’ve been sitting here for about an hour, drinking Irish Breakfast tea. I keep staring at the paper, running my hand across it. I think about hands. I think of the hands that touched the tree which made this paper. The hands that roamed its trunk, caressing it like a lover. The hands that cut it down. The hands that manufactured it into something for me to write on. My own hands, and finally, your hands. We might touch the same spot. You might hold the letter the same way I held it when I re-read it. This paper is the only thing that really connects us.

I don’t understand how people could tire of you. I, for one, don’t think I ever will. Thank you for sharing that poem, for trusting me with something so personal. It was indescribably beautiful. In return, I’ll send you my own pathetic attempt. Be warned: it’s the first poem I’ve ever written. Don’t laugh too hard at it. It was heartfelt. As for what it means, I’ll leave it to you to interpret. I’ve never liked people interpreting poetry for me and I must assume you are the same.

Writing it was a little like being possessed—as though some other force took hold of my hand and wrote those words. That’s the only way to describe it. It’s addicting though. I’ve written three other poems since then. I can’t say if they’re any good. But now I find that words are constantly swirling in my brain, bumping into other ideas and making it hard to concentrate. Like what I wrote up there about hands. I’ve been thinking of that for days now. Images would flash in my mind, like your hands holding the paper. It’s as though—oh God, this will sound so cliché—but it’s truly like something has opened inside me, as though I’ve discovered a part of me I didn’t know was there before. I can’t believe I just wrote that. I sound like an ass. I am an ass. I wish I could write like you. You have this way of taking the mundane and making it fantastic. You see the world like no one else I know.

Then again, the people I know all see the world in the same stupid way, the same way

I’ve always seen it. The most important thing to us is getting. Getting someone, getting somewhere, getting something. We give nothing. We clutch our lives to our chests. It makes me think of the final scene of Breakfast at Tiffany’s, when Audrey Hepburn is standing in the rain holding that cat. We’re like that with our lives. We hold it close, though we hate it and don’t understand it and don’t even want it. Yet we need it.

I don’t know what I’m saying. Your letters do this to me. They make me think, hard and differently. I think I’m just trying to see the world the way you do. Maybe your way isn’t the best way but I like it.

As for Claire, I told her the truth the other night, over the phone. Surprisingly, she didn’t laugh. She kept insisting that I continue to write to you, as though there were some danger that I’d suddenly stop. She also asks if she might be able to write to you occasionally. As she puts it, she’d be “a shitty correspondent who will ignore half your letters and ramble through most of hers,” but she’d like to write anyway. She greatly enjoyed your first volume, as I thought she might, and has already gone out and bought the rest of your work. If you’re okay with her writing to you, I’ll pass on your address. Be forewarned: if she has your address, and is ever in the neighborhood, she’s more than likely to visit you unexpectedly. I won’t take responsibility for anything she may say or do during this hypothetical visit.

Maybe she shouldn’t have your address.

I think I shall take your advice regarding women. I’m not going to pick up a prostitute and lock her in my mansion, no. But here’s what I will do: hang around the section in the library where your books are, wait for a woman to choose a copy, and ask her out. I swear I’ll do it. I’ll do it if she’s sixty-three or married or so ugly that it hurts to look at her. Just once I will step outside my box and see what happens. What do you think? It’s like an adventure.

However, I’m still in Ireland. And I don’t know where the nearest library is, let alone if they carry your books. I wish I could email or call you and ask you what to do in lieu of the library idea. As it is, I’ll have to think of something on my own.

It only takes a couple hours to drive to Limerick from here. There’s a place there called The Sage Café with the best chocolate cake I’ve ever had. I think I’ll ask out the first woman with red hair that I see. I’ll spend an evening with a stranger and see what happens. Would you like to come along? Of course you would.

I’m now sitting at a table with my chocolate cake. There’s a girl with bright blue eyes smiling at me, and I’m doing my best to ignore her. I’m not here for her. There is a woman with red hair, but since she’s with her husband and children, I don’t think hitting on her is such a good idea. The waitress has just refilled my coffee. I wish you could taste this coffee and cake together. It’s amazing.

Tuesday, you’ll never believe it. A redheaded woman just walked in and sat a table only a few feet away from me. She’s pulled out a book. Oh, God. It’s Emerson. Can I please back out of what I said? I can’t possibly spend an entire evening with a woman who enjoys Emerson. She’s put her book down now and is talking on the telephone. She’s older than me, late thirties maybe. Pretty smile, but not exactly beautiful. Sort of…organic-looking.

I have finished my cake. I will keep my promise. I will ask her out and will continue this letter later, after an evening of God knows what. Emerson, probably.

Moments later: she turned me down. She claims to have a boyfriend already. Usually that’s not a problem for me. Maybe the girls in Ireland have better morals than the ones in America?

Don’t despise me for this, but I got the phone number of the pretty girl with blue eyes. Old habits die hard, right?

I hate to argue with you, I really do, but have you ever really watched any silent films? Not Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton. Try “A Fool There Was” starring Theda Bara and tell me that’s pure, untainted, or virginal. If you’d like, I’ll send you a copy. It’s about a vamp who seduces and corrupts a businessman. You’ll love it.

I’m coming home soon. I almost wrote “I’ll see you soon” but that’s not right. I’ll hear from you soon. I hope. I’m sorry if this letter has sounded disjointed. I feel a bit all over the place. I look forward to hearing from you. And let me know if Claire can write to you.

Simon

Speak—
I see an answer, something shrouded.
I’ve gone to the end of the hill,
Traveled not far and not wide,
But close to a home;
Home—
What does the traveler say
To your eyes?
Nothing, he’s seen more.
The significant is lost on him,
The subtle grace of your mouth
Lost—
Don’t speak of finding,
Or of unsure truths,
Clearest truths.
I know my heart.
I know my life.
It is a vanity.
Speak—
Your answer is illicit,
Unfounded, untrue.
The clearest truth,
And near to my home;
Not to my heart.

New York City, December 2nd, 2009

Simon,

The end of the year already? My life is going down the shi—well, never mind, I’ll save that speech for New Years, when I’m so pissed drunk I’ll come knocking on your door, asking where you put the fireworks and where did those past years go? Either that or slump in a pile of old robes in the space between my bed and the wall and go to sleep till next year.

My book comes out on the twenty second, just in time for Christmas. I’m sure that’ll maximize sales and all that, which will be nice; I’ve wanted HBO for a while now. But I kind of feel bad for anyone buying my book to, like, epitomize the holiday spirit for a widowed aunt or med school nephew. There’s a poem that talks about Christmas cards, and a metaphor about baubles, and you could possibly imagine a mentioned “string of lights” to be red and green—oh, now I feel guilty. My publisher said don’t worry about it, that my established fans would expect nothing less than my typical life-gore, and I know that’s true, I just fear for those people who buy it just because the cover looks pretty.

It’s actually a picture of me, the cover, though you can’t really tell. I’m on the other side of the dead tree…those are my arms you can see through the branches. And my red, thumbless mittens. They originally had some shitty, pretentious “Yuletide Casket” idea, with a Salvation Army Santa in a coffin on the cover, but I pitched the picture and they loved it. It’s from back at my old house, when I was eighteen, and we were about to move to the Village. The boxes lining either side of the trunk are all marked “Tuesday’s Dormitory Bed Linens,” or “Tuesday’s New York University Clothing” because my mother could never abbreviate. She uses twist-ties at the grocery store, too. I think I was arguing with my dad, and that’s why my arms were out to the sides like that, but here, away from time and place, I look like such a martyr. The title’s “Anti-Gone.”

I had a very special moment just a second ago. I sniffed the paper, and I think I smelled Ireland, I really do. It smelled like fresh grass. I almost cried; I haven’t smelled grass for years. I held the letter up to my lamp, and I could see where your thumbs had smudged the paper from the oils in your hands. That’s what you get for using expensive stationary; I now know that you have a counterclockwise spiral in your thumbprint.

Thank you for letting me read your poem—I really, really enjoyed it. My favorite things were the genius line break between “the subtle grace of your mouth” and “lost—,” the way every line could be interpreted with the line after or the one before, and especially the line “I’ve gone to the end of the hill.” Love that image. Love that metaphor. Love that it might not be a metaphor at all. Have you considered taking writing classes? I always performed horribly with prompts and timed writes and all that, preferring to write when I darn well feel like it, but I hear it helps writers, the structure, the competition.

Simon, if you’re an ass, I don’t want to know what I’d be classified as. You’re a good guy. It’s neat you’re having these…epiphanies, revelations, whatever you want to call them. I hope they work out for you. I have an epiphany a day, and it’s always the opposite of yesterday’s. Today, for instance, I discovered through a little soul searching that no one gives a fuck about anyone and if they do, it’s for the wrong reasons. Yesterday I was pretty hunky-dory. Read your letter, ordered some Irish Breakfast tea online and told my mom to tip the delivery guy a little extra, sat sipping it in front of my window admiring the hardworking people below and hoping that at least thirty percent of them were having good days. Watched someone propose at noon exactly, right outside this little kebab place where I guess they had their first date. I even watched him spin her around and almost get her hit by a taxi and it was still the sweetest thing I’d ever seen. Yeah, I don’t know what my problem was yesterday, either. I even wrote you a letter that sounded along the lines of “Oh, Simon, look around you! The sun is shining, the birds are singing, there are Disney musicals in the streets, and Snow White is sweeping in the corner! Rejoice, rejoice!”

And then I reread what you said about Audrey Hepburn and her cat. I hate my life. I do. I say that in the least self-pitying way possible. But God, do I need it. I would sew it onto me like Wendy sewed on Peter Pan’s shadow, but that’d just be too easy, if I didn’t have to worry about it getting away from me.

Um, I guess Claire can write to me. I—okay, this is going to sound weird, but could you…not tell her about me? At least, not anything cynical I’ve said? I was thinking about it, and I kind of feel like…I could talk that way with you, but I don’t want to with her. I can’t explain it. I don’t mind if you know, but I just want to keep that side of me hidden from her. Maybe once I receive a letter from her it’ll be easier to explain this uneasy feeling I have about her knowing this side of me. The griping, moaning, morbid, generally unlikeable side. Maybe I’m afraid of judgment. I’ve never felt like you were judging me.

She wouldn’t really come and visit me, would she? Do you think she’d fall for me pretending not to be at home?

When you said “Would you like to come along?” I pictured you taking notes as you spoke. Initiated conversation by asking for time—admired her Swatch. Said she’d bought it in Switzerland; told her I’d never been to Switzerland. Could possibly pretend I’d actually been to Switzerland after this detailed explanation I’m getting. Et cetera. And then writing it down for me later. I’m almost disappointed you didn’t find an alternative to your library scheme—though I would have thought the red-haired-girl ultimatum would have been foolproof in Ireland. Shows what we know.

When you get home “soon,” you should try out the library shenanigan. I’m ashamed to admit I’m so curious what will happen when you inevitably are forced to take out a forty-six-year-old woman with cellulite and a face like a pug. In fact, if you find someone attractive when implementing this plan, I’m going to assume you’re secretly son of the gods or something, like Hercules, and your parents just can’t stand you with anyone not Aphrodite-beautiful and twenty-three.

I’d love to see the film. You’re right, I haven’t watched many silent films—certainly not enough to judge them. I just like having an opinion on everything.

I look forward to you coming home, so that the time between letters is shorter.

Tuesday.

P.S. Enclosed is a copy of my edited Author’s Blurb. As funny as I’m sure your face would look if you read it, unsuspecting, at the back flap of my book, I have no way of seeing the reaction so I figure I might as well give you a peek.

Tuesday Dennings is the author of four books of poetry, “Backshadow,” “ROFLCOPTER,” “Photo Manip,” and “Anti-Gone.” She lives in Greenwich Village with her imaginary cat, beautiful mother, and nine letters and counting from a man named Simon.

New York City, December 7th, 2009

Tuesday,

I’m home again. The difference between Ireland and New York is jarring. I don’t know if I’m happy to be home or not. You know what, I am.

I would be more than happy to see you New Year’s Eve, pissed drunk or not. Don’t hesitate to drop by. I’ll be throwing a party. You could come and insult all my friends. It would be wonderful. But really, Tuesday. There’s nothing worse than being alone on New Year’s. You and your mother are invited. You won’t come, I know that. But the invitation is genuine and that’s what matters, right?

I love the image of you sniffing the paper. I have a lot of imaginary images of you (I have nothing real to go on). I can see the two of us as teenagers, driving with our friends, blaring punk rock. Everyone is shouting for no reason and you’re just sitting in the front seat, feet up on the dashboard, a grin on your face. You’re smoking a cigarette and when we come to a stop sign, you flick the ash out the window. I scold you and you give me the finger. I can see that. It’s like I have this pretend history with you. I’m sounding like a stalker again, aren’t I?

I wonder sometimes if we’ve seen each other before. Did your mother ever take you to the park? Mine didn’t. We went to lessons: piano lessons, swimming lessons, French lessons. Never the park. And I remember sticking my face to the window as we passed one, watching this little girl swing. She was going so high and I thought for sure that she was going to take off flying. Maybe that was you.

I was walking down the street years ago and a girl tripped in the crowd, dropping all of her papers on the sidewalk. I stopped to help her pick them up. She thanked me briefly then took off without a backward glance. Maybe that was you. Was it? I wonder about these things every time I read one of your letters.

I hope you really enjoyed my poem and that you’re not just saying nice things to be nice. Then again, I can’t imagine you just saying nice things to be nice. If you hated it, you probably would’ve said so, wouldn’t you? I’m not sure. I never see you around other people, so I can’t decide if you’re polite or not. You can be so brash and sarcastic in these letters. But maybe that’s just the way you are with me. Maybe you’re like Miss America with the general public. My point is, either way, your praise felt genuine. So thank you.

I can’t imagine taking a writing class. I don’t think I’d fit in. And everyone in the class would tire quickly of my constant praise of you. I would probably buy your books in bulk and distribute them to everyone. And then wouldn’t allow them to criticize anything.

I can’t believe you classified me as a good guy. The girls I’ve dated (and I use that term loosely) would certainly disagree. I’ve been called everything but a good guy. I don’t even know how to respond to that. What about me is good? I’m not fishing for a compliment and I’m not trying to be “woe is me.” I’m just being honest. I lie and cheat. I commit to nothing and no one. My life is a twisted circle of sex and drinking. I’m not happy with the way things are but I do nothing to change it. A good guy. Sure.

I don’t mean to go off on you. Just a moment of self-loathing there. Sorry. But I won’t cross it out or start again. You’re honest in your letters and I’ll try to do the same in mine.

And you say you hate your life. What a couple of cheerful, satisfied people we are. I wish you had sent the Disney letter, even if the feeling was fleeting. I like to know what you’re feeling. I wish I could know what you’re feeling all the time.

Claire now has your address and will write you whenever the whim hits her. I told her nothing about you or what you’ve written me. I wouldn’t even know how to begin to share that with someone else. And yes, she would really come visit you. You’ve been warned.

Now that I’m home, I’m going to try out the library idea. I don’t know how to write while browsing books so I’ll continue this letter whenever I get back.

I stood by your books for a good hour before someone even showed up in the same aisle. It was a man and he did not choose any of your books. I waited another twenty minutes then gave up. I’m going back tomorrow after work. I’ll continue this letter then.

December 8th

Well, that was interesting. It is midnight and I just returned from a date. With Eugenia. Who is ninety-three. Let me explain.

I charged into the library, determined to find someone this time. Lo and behold, there was a woman already standing near your books. I tried to peek over her shoulder as subtly as I could. Apparently it wasn’t very subtle, because she snapped the book shut and turned around, saying, “Can I help you, young man?” Fortunately, with the book shut, I was able to see that she was holding a copy of Photo Manip.

She had silver hair with a leopard-print hat smashed on top, her eyelashes were black and spiky, her fuchsia lipstick bled into the wrinkles around her lips. This was the woman I would ask out.

I put on my best smile. I said hello and then told her I’d like to take her out. She laughed so loud that a library employee who was stocking books near us had to shush her. I explained our correspondence to her, and my idea to ask out the first woman I saw choosing one of her books.

“You’re bat-shit crazy,” is what she said. Then she agreed to go out with me, on the condition that I didn’t murder her at the end of the night.

After checking out Photo Manip, we drove (in our separate cars) to Central Park. We walked around and she told me about how she used to do dirty films (can you believe it?!) and wanted to be on Broadway but didn’t have the lungs for it and was in love with a boy named Ajay who came from India. He had married another woman (it was an arranged marriage) and she said she never fully got over it. She said she believed wholeheartedly in love and soul mates and that someday I’d find one of my own. She laughed at my jokes and told me that she’d marry me if I were older. We went to get coffee and I told her about you and your letters—not what they said, but how they made me feel. Then we opened up your book of poetry and I showed her which poems were my favorites.

When the coffee shop closed, we went to a bar. And of course, I ran into a group of my friends there. You can imagine the looks on their faces when they saw me walk in with a hunched-over old woman on my arm. I didn’t care. Eugenia was great. I introduced her to them and she told them they were all “bat-shit crazy” and then downed about four shots of vodka. Then told us about her adventures in Russia. It was fantastic. I can’t even tell you.

She gave me her phone number and said we should “hang out” again sometime. I wish you could have been there. It’s hard to explain what it was like. I want to say it was the most fun I’ve had in a long time, but fun isn’t a strong enough word. It was…enlightening.

So maybe I’m not going to have a lasting relationship with this lady. It was worth it anyway. I have an idea. This time, you tell me the place and the kind of woman to look for. Tell me if I should ask out the next blonde riding a bicycle that I see. Whatever you like. And I’ll do it.

Oh, and Eugenia wanted me to give her love to you. So here it is:

Love,

Simon

P.S. You’re including me in your Author’s Blurb. I’m speechless.

New York City, December 10th, 2009

Simon,

Just imagined my mother in a trendy cocktail dress schmoozing around, sipping a screwdriver, pretending she’s “all that and a bag of chips,” or whatever it is you kids say these days, at your New Year’s party. Laughed for a good three minutes before my mom peeked her skeletal head in, going, “Could you possibly be a little quieter, Tuesday? I’m trying to learn how to baste, but if I turn Rachel Ray up any louder, I might disturb the geraniums, and you know how temperamental they can get in this season.”

But thank you for the invitation. I think I’ll stick it out with my painfully unsocial mother, but if by some chance she has a hot date that night and I’m having a Disney-musical-in-the-streets day, then sure, I’ll stop by.

When did you ever stop sounding like a stalker? I’m teasing. That made me smile, that image of us piled in a car. I’m picturing my friends from way-back-when, Jennie sitting on Marshman’s lap, since she’s so small, Ralph fingering his handheld tuner, like he does when he’s happy. Your friend Cole hanging his head out the window and screaming, just because he can. Where are we going? Do we know? Do we care? We must be switching songs every few minutes, from one CD to the other, since my friends exclusively listened to opera (or they did six years ago, anyway), but I bet they’d endure punk for the sake of your sanity. A strange image of Claire being tugged along in a little red wagon attached to the bumper comes to mind, though I don’t know if we could pull that off.

You should calm down, by the way. The cigarette is full of carrot.

I know you’re probably going to shake your head and roll your eyes, but I look at our “pretend history,” and I think, this feels like another life of mine. One where I was stronger, I guess, and didn’t lose my friends. I meet you at some party or other, because you know, at one time, I too was a pro at mingling, and we just decide to go. I imagine reincarnation. I imagine some sort of parallel dimension where everything worked out how it should have. I see this branch off, some deviation in time’s plan, where I’m currently sitting, stagnating, breeding mosquitoes and bacteria, in a puddle of what was my life.

It’s ridiculous. I don’t even know you. But still, it’s nice to think. I guess I’m seeing our “pretend history,” too.

Not to burst your little “bubble of philosophical musing” or anything, but I moved to New York City when I was eighteen. We did have a swing set in the backyard, but I didn’t even touch it after I turned double-digits and became obsessed with being “cool.” So I doubt that little girl was me—though I’m sure she grew up into a wonderfully clever, eccentric woman, and all that jazz. Now, “years ago,” that could have been me, I’m not going to lie. I mean, the likelihood of me and you colliding in a sea of millions is slim, but why not believe it happened? If it was more than six years and less than eleven, then yes, let’s say it was me. I was foolishly carrying my portfolio for class in my arms and ran away even after you were kind because I thought you were handsome. It’s happened before.

I don’t know if I would’ve told you I hated the poem—truth be told, I probably would have avoided commenting on it altogether and hoped you didn’t notice. I can be scathing when I’m anonymous, but I’m not in the business to hurt people that I actually know and wish to continue knowing. But that isn’t the case with you. Yes, I really enjoyed it, and no, I would never say nice things just to be nice. “Nice” isn’t even in the top one-hundred words I’d use to categorize myself.

You either. Never said you were a nice guy, I just said you were a good guy. Nice guys lack pizzazz. Bad guys always rot and deteriorate into something unrecognizable, no matter how hard you try to keep them whole. Good guys, on the other hand, are never good or bad-intentioned. They aren’t in it to hurt feelings or soothe them, they just cross their fingers and hope things work out for both parties. They aren’t doormats, and they don’t watch where they step. They jump because they have to, fall because it’s physics, and hope to land somewhere soft, secretly bracing themselves for the worst-case scenario. Don’t take it as a compliment that you’re a good guy, necessarily. It’s a fine line, you’re constantly riding the cusp, and it just means my expectations for you have risen. And you know how I am with disappointment. (Here is where you imagine an over exaggerated wink.)

Oh, god. It would be a gross understatement to call me terrified of Claire. Would she check under the bed? The stairs? In the fridge? What if I had my mother pretend she were me? Then she could just teach Claire how to poach eggs and send her on her way, never to return. I’m over-thinking this and I know it. I should have just said no, right? You’re thinking that. But a part of me is fascinated to see what I’ll do. And the rest of me is just plan sick with anticipation.

Strangely, it never occurred to me that you work. Even if you told me before, it totally abandoned my mind. Where do you work? What do you do?

Ha! How I laughed. A ninety-three-year-old woman? That’s better than my wildest dream, Simon! The outermost reach of my imagination! Though, truth be told, Eugenia sounds incredible. Will she be at your New Year’s party? If not, she’s welcome to my two-person pity parade. She sounds like a pistol.

Talk about bat-shit crazy, Simon—pick a place and kind of woman? You’re lucky this amuses me, because otherwise, I’d chastise you for doing the exact opposite of what I meant. Though I guess this could be a twisted kind of learning process. You know what, you’re on. There’s a tattoo parlor called New York Adorned in the East Village. Find a woman with piercings covering at least thirty percent of her face, show her a good time, and report back ASAP!

My foot is tapping. I’m already anticipating your response.

Tuesday.

P.S. I thought the blurb gave “insight into my personality,” like you first wrote asking for. If there are anymore you’s out there, they’ll be satisfied and won’t have to write me. Or, you know, will take the fact that I’m corresponding with a man named Simon as an invitation to write me, too. I don’t actually know what I was thinking. I guess I just wanted people to know a bit more about me than some lie about a stupid cat. Which is a new feeling. Normally, I wouldn’t even tell them my sex or name, if I weren’t forced. I hope it doesn’t go away.

Rachelle. (Jules also approves this message.)