Tag: uncertainty

Hawaiian Sunset

4 October 2024 / Editor

Nonfiction by Alice Lowe

“You’re going to Hawaii with your ex-wife?” It wasn’t a question, despite the upspeak. The question mark underscored my befuddlement as I woodenly repeated what he’d just told me. A statement of fact, offered up nonchalantly like a gesundheit after a sneeze.

“Yeah,” he said. “Cool, huh?”

Garrett wasn’t my boyfriend, but that’s where we seemed to be heading. We’d worked for the same organization for two years, but in different locations. We didn’t see each other frequently, but we became friends. I met his wife, Willie (can you imagine naming a child Wilhelmina?), on various occasions. We can’t know what any relationship is really like, but they seemed like a happy and compatible couple, so I was mildly surprised when he told me they’d separated.

He and Willie had drifted apart, he said, saw different directions for their lives. I liked that he spoke respectfully and fondly of her, that they remained friends. Over the following months we started spending more time together, hiking in the nearby San Diego mountains, exploring quirky rural towns with musty shops full of bric-a-brac, driving to Rosarito Beach for margaritas and shrimp burritos. We shied from the label, but we were pretty much a couple.

Willie was a flight attendant, and as her husband, Garrett could fly with her at no cost when opportunities arose. She suggested the trip, his last chance, since their divorce would be final soon. “Couples go on honeymoons—this can be our sunset.”

I shrugged off my apprehension. Worse case, they’d get back together, and if so, good for them. My ego might be a little bruised, but I wouldn’t be broken-hearted.

He sent me a postcard from the Kona Coast, “thinking of you.” It made me recall a story my boss at one of my first jobs told me when I made a terrible typo in a letter, one that could have cost us an important client. He tried to assuage my guilt and chagrin by telling me about the man who went to a tropical resort on a business trip and sent a postcard home to his wife: “Wish you were her.”

He brought me a puka shell necklace and showed me pictures of palm-lined beaches and ominous-looking volcanos, himself and Willie sipping rum drinks with orchid blossoms floating on top from shaded decks with ocean vistas. He told me how they were fussed over by amused and possibly envious passengers and crew on the trip over after telling a flight attendant about their “sunset” voyage.

Never very fiery, our relationship gradually cooled. Still friends, we formalized its closure over beers and popcorn at a beach dive. As I recall, it was an overcast day, the sunset barely visible through the clouds.

Alice Lowe writes about life, literature, food and family in San Diego, CA. Recent work has been published in The Bluebird Word, Change Seven, ManifestStation, South 85 Journal, Eunoia, Tangled Locks, MORIA, and Dorothy Parker’s Ashes. She’s been cited twice in Best American Essays. Read and reach her at www.aliceloweblogs.wordpress.com.

The Phone Call

25 April 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Laura L. Feldman & Stephen M. Feldman

I willed my phone to ring. The literary agent had scheduled the call for 2:00 p.m. Not yet late, still one minute before the hour.

I had dreamed of being a writer since junior high, when I’d written my first story for an honors English class. The A+ didn’t hurt, and neither did my mom’s encouragement.

My novel manuscript had consumed two years of writing and rewriting. Before contacting agents, I devoted a month to crafting a query that pitched the story and my writing background in three flawless paragraphs. I sent it to fifteen agents. Three requested the full manuscript.

A month later I received an email scheduling this phone appointment. Soon I would be talking with an agent who wanted to represent me and sell my novel.

I would be a writer. ‘Yes, I’ve published a novel,’ I would say. No longer a poseur.

I checked the time again.

Two minutes late. It didn’t mean anything. I needed to relax, act as if I spoke to agents all the time.

I glanced at my list of questions, lifted from several books about landing an agent. Prepare for the phone call, they all instructed. Don’t immediately say, ‘Yes, yes, yes! I want you to be my agent.’ Ask questions. What did she like about the manuscript? What were the weaknesses? What changes would she want to see before submitting it to publishers? Did she have a plan for the submission process?

Act like a professional writer.

Three minutes late.

Had I gotten the day wrong? Was the call scheduled for tomorrow rather than today? I opened the agent’s email.

I’d already read the brief message at least a dozen times. But I reread it again, twice: “Can you talk about your ms. this coming Thursday at 2 p.m., ET?”

No mistake. It was today.

The phone buzzed. I checked the screen and my stomach hardened into a knot. This call would change my life.

The phone buzzed again. I took a deep breath and answered.

“Hello,” I squeaked. “Sorry.” I cleared my throat and tried again. “Hello, this is Sara Klein.”

“Hi, Sara,” said a sweet lilting voice.

“Hello,” I said, for the third time.

“Just so you know, I’m not calling to offer representation.”

“What?”

“I want to be clear at the outset. So you’re not disappointed. Or confused.”

The ice cracked and I crashed through. Panicking, I opened my mouth to scream and freezing water rushed in. I was drowning in the darkness. Which way was up, which way was down?

“Some writers,” she said, her voice muffled and distant, “think this first phone call is to offer representation.”

“No,” I croaked. “Of course not.”

I glanced at my list of questions. Nothing there suggested an appropriate response.

“If you’re amenable,” she said, “I’d like to discuss your manuscript and some changes I’d like to see.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, holding in my tears.

“If you rewrite it,” she continued, “I’d be willing to take another look at it.”

“That would be great,” I managed to say.

“No promises of course.”

“That makes sense. You’ll have to read the—”

“I don’t want to mislead you. I plan to read the rewrite, if you do it. But at this stage, I can’t promise I’ll have the time.”

“Oh.” I squeezed my temples. What were we even discussing, then? “I understand.”

“Do you still want to proceed?”

“Please,” I wanted to hang up, throw my manuscript in the trash, and cry for a month. “Go ahead,” I said.

“Wonderful. The first thing I noticed was a problem with the plot.”

“The plot?” Shit. Shit. Shit.

“That’s right. After the first plot point—”

“Hold on,” I said, clicking my ball point pen. “Just one second.” I flipped the page where I’d jotted my useless questions. “Sorry. I’m ready.”

And she was off and running, tearing the manuscript apart. I couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t comprehend enough to ask intelligent questions. I tried to take copious notes, nearly transcribing the conversation. Later on, after I calmed down, I might be able to learn from my notes and benefit from this torturous experience.

If an agent, any agent, was willing to critique my manuscript, I should consider myself lucky—that’s what I reminded myself. Despite my disappointment, I would rewrite and send the manuscript to her again. Of course I could do exactly what she wanted, and she could still reject it. Or I might not even hear back from her. She hadn’t even committed to reading the next version.

As she talked, I decided to send the rewrite to other agents as well. Why not?

The phone call ended abruptly. She had another appointment. Maybe with an actual client? I didn’t ask.

Hollowed, drained of motivation, I riffled through my three pages of notes without comprehending them. My gaze shifted to the desk drawer on the lower right. I didn’t want to do it. But I couldn’t fool myself any longer. Neither this agent nor any other would likely offer representation.

I swallowed, my throat dry and raspy. Then I slid open the drawer and pulled out a stack of law school applications. I’d put it off long enough.

Laura L. Feldman writes and edits for the Wyoming Survey & Analysis Center. She has degrees and certificates from the University of Oregon, Stanford, and Harvard. Stephen M. Feldman is the Housel/Arnold Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Wyoming. He has published several short stories and nonfiction books.

Strategies for Defeat

9 March 2023 / Editor

Poetry by Erin Lunde

Are you mad at me? means: I’m worried about something I said to you/about you/around you a few days ago.

Are you mad at me? means: I’m waiting for you to be mad about the thing I said to you/about you/around you a few days ago.

Are you mad at me? means: You’re never mad at me, so I know I’m ridiculous.

Are you mad at me? means: You’re never mad at me.

Are you mad at me? means: Why aren’t you ever mad at me? Why aren’t you ever anything at me?

Are you mad at me? means: I feel like a child.

Are you mad at me? means: Take care of me like a child.

Are you mad at me? means: I’m waiting.

Are you mad at me? means: Something happened and I want you to know it.

Are you mad at me? means: Something happened and I didn’t tell you about it.

Are you mad at me? means: I am so mad at myself.

Are you mad at me? means: I should have told you about that thing that happened the other day and that it continues to happen every day.

Are you mad at me? means: I should tell you.

Are you mad at me? means: I probably never will.

Are you mad at me? means: Why don’t you ever ask me?

Are you mad at me? means: About anything?

Are you mad at me? means: See, it’s happening again, right now.

Are you mad at me? means: I’m mad at you, but you’ll never know because you won’t ask:

Are you mad at me?

Erin Lunde writes in Minneapolis, MN where she lives with her family of five. Her writing is published in Flash Fiction Magazine, The Bangalore Review, Intrinsick, Openwork Mag and others. She writes “Fiction at Five” on Substack; she’s on Instagram @everythingerinlunde, and at erinlunde.com.

A Lifeline

12 June 2022 / Editor

Nonfiction by Gail Purdy

The afternoon was grey with light rain. No different than any other day during the winter months. The world appeared softer through the rain-spattered windshield as I sat motionless in the car outside my mother’s apartment building. I felt the deep heaviness that had made itself at home in my body. What else did I need to do before I went home and cocooned for the night?

My cell phone rang just as I turned the key in the ignition. The woman’s voice sounded harsh coming through my car’s audio system.

“This is the Director of Care at Evergreen Baptist Care Facility. Is this Gail?”

“Yes, it is.”

“We have a bed for your mother. You have until tomorrow to decide if you want it. If you do, you must move your mother into the facility within 72 hours. Normally it is 48 hours, but you have an extra day because of the New Year’s holiday.”

The idea of my mother moving into a long-term care facility was something I didn’t allow myself to think about. I didn’t want to hope. Was it possible that this journey of caring for my mother might soon end? Was someone throwing me a lifeline, and I just needed to grab hold of it? Could I grasp hope and not let it slip through my fingers?

It had only been two weeks since the case manager visited my mother to assess if it was safe for her to continue living independently. The regional health authority would decide if my mother qualified for a ‘subsidized bed’ in a long-term care facility. A decision that was weighted heavily on how many authorized services my mother was currently using. Any assistance I contracted privately to support my mother didn’t count. “I only gather the information and present it to the assessment team,” the case manager told me. “Every care facility in your immediate area has a six to nine-month waitlist. So don’t expect your mother to move soon if she is approved.”

What did live independently really mean? The only reason my mother had been able to live alone in her apartment over the last several years was because of me. She had fallen five times in less than four months, and each time I found her lying on the floor, not knowing how to call for help. When she stopped bathing, I arranged for someone to assist her. When she could no longer make sense of microwave instructions to reheat prepared meals, I hired someone to purchase groceries and prepare meals for her. Afraid of falling again, she had become reluctant to leave her apartment.

Fingers deformed by arthritis made it difficult for her to remove medications from the pharmacy-sealed blister packs. Yellow and red pills were found among the forks and spoons in the kitchen drawer, and a zip-lock sandwich bag containing a handful of pills sat near the toaster. Evidence of what had been lost and retrieved over time.

Each square on my mother’s large calendar contained the names of people who came to help her each day. Confusion set in each time she looked at it or when someone showed up to help her. “Why are you here?” she asked. “I don’t need any help.”

As the woman on the phone continued to speak, I heard her voice, but I couldn’t respond.

Frustration and anger had taken their toll. Trying to manage the needs of my aging mother was crushing me. As hours turned into days and days into months, I felt fragile. Feeling myself slowly breaking apart, I wondered if I would be lost in the shattering. Self-preservation was screaming at me. Responding to these needs had become a way of life for me, and I didn’t know how to be any different. And now I was slowly losing myself.

Anger bubbled just beneath the surface of my self-control. With a force and energy of its own, anger surfaced at will. I wanted to live my life, not my mother’s. She no longer knew how to keep herself safe, and I was anxious about what might happen when I couldn’t be with her. I was afraid of losing her, and at the same time, I wanted her gone. Fear and anger wrestled inside of me, each fighting to take control.

Only a few seconds had passed as images from the last year flashed through my mind. I slipped back into the present, aware of the rain on the windshield and the woman on the phone.

“Yes, we will take the room,” I heard myself say as numbness spread through my body. Fog descended over the streets as I drove home.

Gail Purdy is an emerging writer and multi-disciplinary visual artist living on the west coast of British Columbia. She is the runner up recipient of the 2021 International Amy MacRae Memorial Award for Memoir. Her story “The Parking Lot” was part of the 2021 Amy Award Anthology.

macro photography of tree — Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Because The Wind Is Rising And This Week There Was A Microburst

16 May 2022 / Editor

Poetry by D. Dina Friedman

Live in the layers/Not on the litter
Stanley Kunitz

Carcasses of trees severed from roots fog the forward path. We step over branches with browning

leaves, chilled in the poison breath of the wind.

II.

Soon the trunks will be shredded for lumber to keep the machinery of the world running. My friend

so desperate, he might send his daughter over the bridge alone to face the guards at the border.

III.

How do we hold ourselves up when we’re paper puppets in the wind? Where my friend waits to

cross, the river is rising and the litter swirls. On my beautiful side of the planet, the trees and wires

are down. I am helpless to help him.

IV.

I picture my friend and his daughter in my home between the mountain and the river, eating hot

tomato soup and looking out the window from their quarantine to admire the tree whose limb

plunged in the microburst, barely missing the roof.

The forked branch landed by the front door, its crown of red leaves blocking the path. We thought

we had an antidote for locked borders. We thought underneath the trunk of a uniform, a pathway to

a softer heart.

VI.

The children whirl through the muddy camp like litter between layers of heartless words that leave

no space for a sun drawn with a green marker on a scrap of paper grabbed from the gale.

VII.

Who am I to hug a dying tree? To smile because the sky is blue and the sun is shining? It’s shredding

day. I’ll make tomato soup and freeze it for sparser times, then march the papers to the truck that

splits them into litter, spaghetti in the wind.

D. Dina Friedman has published widely in literary journals and received two Pushcart Prize nominations. She’s the author of Escaping Into the Night (Simon and Schuster), Playing Dad’s Song (Farrar, Straus, Giroux) and one poetry chapbook, Wolf in the Suitcase (Finishing Line Press). Visit her website: www.ddinafriedman.com.

Tag: uncertainty

Hawaiian Sunset

The Phone Call

Strategies for Defeat

A Lifeline

Because The Wind Is Rising And This Week There Was A Microburst

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