Notes, Marginalia, Ephemera

I am moving offices, from larger to smaller (of course).  Thus I have had to deal with books, of which I clearly have too many, even though they are my life’s blood.  Okay, moved the books.  Now for the papers, which have proliferated apace with the books.  Multiple drafts of published works, multiple drafts of unpublished works.  Notes.  Meeting notes.  Notes written on meeting agendae.  Notes written on conference programs. Notes written on the backs of file folders.  Ephemera. Marginalia. Most of this stuff I have just tossed (recycled) but I saved a few notes, because, well, once I found them to be noteworthy.  Unfortunately, some are unattributed.

•“I don’t see the difference between a flash flood and a story.”  ­––unattributed, but most likely a Padget Powell-ism, written on an MFA residency schedule

•“You are living your life and you have your pen in your hand.”  --unattributed, but sounds Craig Childs-ish, written on MFA residency schedule

•Within five minutes of meeting my surgeon for the first time, he told me I had a large cancerous tumor on my kidney. And nearly simultaneously he explained that he would simply remove it and I would be fine.
         This was surprising news because I was without symptoms, but I believed him, that I would be fine.
         I was 51 years old and just a few weeks earlier I had made a long difficult ascent of an obscure peak in the Teton Range. At the time I would have denied this, but I know now it was my unstated assumption that I was more or less invincible.
        The moment that illusion began to crack was upon breaking the news of my impending surgery to my mother over the telephone. I was casual but she broke into tears and put the phone down
       After a long pause my father picked up the phone and I realized that my attitude with my mother had been all wrong.  I realized that age 51 is a late date to understand that I was no longer 17.

––Written (unedited) in margins of conference handout, “Vital Signs” by Natalie Kucz, and pictured above

•“Headboard-slamming sexfest.” ––unattributed, on the back of file folder. 

•“She said the worst thing: “You have a novel here.” I said, “I hate you.”

                        —Unattributed, on a Kachemak Bay Writers Conference program

•“It’s easy to be sloppy when you know you’re delivering what people already want.” ––Rich “Yoda” Chiappone

•The lawn is infested with dandelions.  What’s wrong with that? You secretly wonder.

The numbers on the fertilizer bag describe the nitrogen levels, you think, but all you care about is the weed killer.
You fertilize the lawn with a spreader.  You hold the spreader open with your left hand which begins to strain and cramp before the fertilizer is all dispersed.  To make the fertilizer actually spread you spin the cranking apparatus with your right hand, similar to a fishing reel, but more precisely like the winding of a toy Jack-in-the-Box.
The fertilizer covers your shoes and you wonder how much of it you have inhaled.  You wonder if your sons will really keep the dog out of the yard as they have promised.  And then you think of the three incidences of cancer that you have survived.  And how not once did a surgeon or oncologist speculate as to their causes.

––unedited, written in the margins of an essay by Scott Russell Sanders

•“Experience is abundant.  Language is scarce.  Poetic language is more scarce.”––unattributed, on a Kachemak Bay Writers Conference program

•“Crevasses must not yawn or gape.”—note to self

 •“I was groupie, and then . . . I found out I was bipolar.” ––unattributed, how

  not to write a memoir

• “In order to embark [you must first believe]: ‘I am worthy of an exception.’”