redemption.

December 23, 2013September 4, 2014 / mscharlies / 2 Comments

Today’s wordspiration courtesy of Kim Guidone, wildlife conservationist, book-to-film interpreter, inveterate optimist.

Lobsters scuttling in the fridge, par-fried potatoes resting on sodden paper towels awaiting a final oil-dunk to crisp into golden fries, oysters shucked and chilling on ice, cheeses slumping on a wooden board, ready to ooze at the slightest touch. White tulips — her favorite— lounging in a low vase.

Christmas Eve repast, Old School.

Oyster experimentation at Apartment 13 (avenue c, east village)

His first holiday as an adult not spent sweating in an industrial kitchen or slinging drinks behind a bar. Sure, he wishes he had the cash to take her out, but scratch is scarce during this in-between — quit a job without another lined up, stupid prick — but he’s sorted now, new gig starts New Year’s and he’s conjured an ideal meal, complete with champagne, the real stuff, a bottle comp’d by an ambitious beverage sales rep, new job congrats.

Ringing in the New Year with a new job, celebrating Christmas with the right girl. It is as though the universe has deigned to smile upon him.

After many years of not.

She was adamant about the no gifiing. In deference, he assumes, to these recent unemployed weeks. Touchy weeks, he went to a few dark places, all the historical stuff burbling in his gut. Lost it a time or two, after a drink too far. He didn’t go mean, though, not to her, he’s been on both sides of mean, he will not perpetrate mean, again. Long steeped in therapized psychobabble, he is well-versed in the typical trajectory of abused to abuser. He will not to become another psychological statistic.

unseasonable window seat weather, bluebird coffee shop

Their first Christmas together, his first holidays with anyone other than hospitality comrades coming off of late shifts, blowing the night’s tips. This anomaly year — his, forced, hers, choice — a Christmas like normal people. A normal couple. A couple with normal expectations: cohabitation, marriage, kids. Or a dog, at least. Unfathomable expectations, but she brings out his most optimistic self.

He is even embracing kale, at her behest. Raw kale.

His most chivalrous self, too, outlaid more cash then ever to squire her around — her friends, too — treat her in the manner to which he assumes her corporate lawyer self is accustomed. She is quick on the uptake, her laugh contains more notes than most symphonies, her breath-taking breasts enticing, consoling, terrifying by turns. She appreciates his puns, even the worst ones. Soul mates, she says, eyes sparkling, sparking a stirring in some unused part of him to believe in something beyond tangible, like fate or destiny.

Now he knows he was right, that time, years ago. Dodged a bullet. Wrong girl, right decision. Her choice, of course, but he pushed. Hard. Her indecision, her disavowed but deeply ingrained Catholicism, holding them both hostage. Someone had to make the hard call, shoulder the blame.

Somehow, despite the odds, he held out for something — better, more — and it is here, within his grasp. As long as he keeps himself from fucking it all up.

His own personal Christmas Miracle wish: That past, atoned. This future, possible.

“Redemption” initially handwritten with a Happy Hour Oyster Pairing (I did the sherry-and-oysters) at the bar of the most amiable Apartment 13 (east village) and edited over a nutty Americano at Bluebird Coffee Shop (east village)

redemption story, revised

What word has recently struck you? I’d love to know. Drop a word into WordBowl using the form below:

patience.

December 12, 2013March 18, 2014 / mscharlies / 2 Comments

Our Word-of-the-Day is one of the very first suggestions submitted to WordBowl, delighted I drew it at last. From the indomitable (and patient!) Amy Willstatter, media-maven, Moxie-Mom, early-edge entrepreneur.

My mother gave birth to two boys as we idled in Houston waiting for my father — retired from MLB at twenty-seven, in need of a new vocation — to plow through pharmacy school; she gave birth twice again as we settled in Mississippi, waiting for my father to inherit a family business.

Great Uncle Ted and Great Aunt Myrtle instigated this scheme for their retirement, for my father to assume his “rightful” role. They oversaw the construction of our new home, a symbol of our no-longer-peripatetic, now rooted life.

Weighing options at The Wayland

My parent were no BabyBoomHippieCommuners, but the virgin backyard evoked some dormant bucolic dream, they drew up plans, tilled vegetable beds, planted snap bean bushes instead of hedges along the chain link fence. They selected saplings to supplement the towering, spindly pines, these new trees would grow, they claimed, to shade the bay window in the kitchen, Japanese Maples and Magnolias would in time cast dappled shadows on the terraced walkway, a willow would one day weep majestic in the back yard.

Between gardening sessions, my father taught me to throw a baseball, insisting I throw from the shoulder, like a boy, none of this girly from-the-wrist business. Hours we spent throwing, pitching balls to imaginary batters, or, one season, to knock slugs off the tomatoes, the year of an infestation no pesticide proved powerful enough to kill. We planted watermelons that year, too, which grew round as bowling balls and tasted just as sweet.

Healthy snap bean plants (in no way indicative of ours)

One year begat a bumper crop of snap beans, our family jammed around the kitchen table, snapping beans until our fingers reddened, an endless parade of beans at dinner, beans swimming in stewed tomatoes, beans glistening with butter and Morton’s salt, beans slathered with cream of mushroom soup, beans with diced frozen carrots, their uniform color and symmetry in sharp contrast to the beans snapped by fingers of varying sizes and strengths, beans boiled, frozen in plastic bags, thawed, cooked limp.

Trees grow more slowly than children, my city-bred parents discovered, and in order to weep, willows must be planted near water. We had maples only slightly taller than the snap beans or my young brothers, magnolias that bore a single blossom, and what we forever dubbed The Happy Willow, branches reaching uproarious to the sky.

The passion for gardening faded, beans supplanted by proper hedges, tomato beds replaced with flowers, sapling-sprouted trees watered and pruned with more prayerful hope than confidence.

Great Uncle Ted staved off retirement for another year, and then another, my father his second-in-command. My brothers grew, eager for their presumptive baseball birthright, my father taught them to throw, to hit, to catch, the proper way to slide into third, games in which they took turns as pitcher, batter, catcher, shortstop, The Happy Willow serving as second base.

I graduated from college before my father assumed ownership of the family business, inherited the family home with its stoic, stately trees shading the bay windows, just as my parents once envisioned growing for themselves.

“patience” was handwritten with a Deep South-evoking Sazerac at The Wayland (east village, nyc) and was edited at the NYU branch of Think Coffee (nyc)

Do YOU have a word you think could be a story? Feel free to drop it into WordBowl!

conundrum.

December 4, 2013September 4, 2014 / mscharlies / 2 Comments

“conundrum” is from the brain of Jan Ostegard who profiles musicians/actors/authors/filmmakers, writes about all manner of creators/creation, and is a “Phantom Creations” co-conspirator.

These executives were presented as important, but none wear ties. Confusing, business-makers dressing same as artists. Do they want to be artists? No one handed him a business card, which prevents him from addressing anyone by name. None of them have been to Japan, one says he has not left California except for tripping a road to Mexicali.

Rhythmic, mexxxxicaaallleeee, a word for Satoshi to stretch-beat-pulse into a fight sequence soundtrack. He wishes Satoshi was here. His producer only agreed to send him, alone, after many requests from the film festival — hinting, awards — and calls from studios.

He wants to ask these movie executives why interest in his film. Hollywood is big movies, big explosions, big stars for global audience. Japanese film is for Japanese. They discuss remake, “Americanize”, colonial word, to make something not from America into an American thing. The conversation whirls, smiles stretch across faces, English whips through his head before he can fully translate, they interrupt, overlap, agree, agree, agree.

He struggles with the order of the words, multiple negatives, questions within a question. Any answer may offend his hosts.

Perhaps he misunderstands, his many years of English inadequate preparation. He has not slept on this side of the globe, the elastic hours snap him awake.

They keep turning to his film festival escort— Reena, difficult for him to pronounce — who speaks a bit of Japanese. His English is much more, but she is native-speaker so they are reassured.

Mizubasho Sake at Wasan (east village)

Important he does not make a mistake. Making a U.S. film changes everything. He looks around at expectant faces, laughs a moment after everyone else. The room nods. Smiles, handshakes, laughing bows. Exit. Reena hugs him, says they never meet with anyone that long, ever. Time for drinks with naked women at hotel pool. Did she say this? She says, this is just the beginning, of the night or his U.S. career, uncertain.

Their arrival greeted by an aquarium-lounging, bare-breasted mermaid blowing kisses through scarlet lips; they join a parade of ropey women in flimsy dresses, led by the trajectory of their impossible breasts. Hollywood, hard masquerading as soft, or the inverse. Poolside, everyone smiling at their barely-sipped drinks, scanning potentially prettier parties, whispering names of spotted celebrities. Thumping music impairs his hearing, he surfs waves of laughter more easily with every florescent cocktail.

Sushi appears, the rice is wrong. A man as indiscernible as any American waves over a Taiwanese Toy Tycoon who orders shochu, which this bar does not stock, settles for a bottle of premium tequila. They converse in English, their common language.

No one is attending the festival, but all are impressed Scorsese is introducing his film. Their party swells, lights shimmer, bright-haired, big-teethed girls spill across laps, mermaids all.

Reena is with him again, skin glowing, her American breasts inviting his admiration, as big and welcoming and possibly insurmountable as America itself. He asks, again, if Scorsese-san watched his film before agreeing to introduce to American audience. Reena laughs, what did you say?

“conundrum” (which started out as a much longer story and required considerable whittling before it was suitable for you to read here) was written with a gorgeous sake and perfectly pickled vegetables at Wasan (east village, nyc)

Do you have a word just begging for a story? Send it in!