Oversea Highway

So this year I have two major resolutions. The first is to read one book every week, for a total of 52 books by the end of the year. I was inspired by a similar, but more challenging resolution made by a close friend of mine: to read 100 books by the end of the year. 52 is not 100, but it is still a respectable number. So far, I have been staying on schedule, and I am currently reading book number #5 (although I have experimented by reading sections of other books). Here's my completed list so far, with accompanying reviews (5 words maximum).

1) Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy: Beautiful but bleak, enjoyable, and troubling.

2) Pastoralia by George Saunders: Poignant, bursting with rhetorical questions.

3) Civilwarland in Bad Decline by George Saunders: Funnier than Pastoralia, strangely sadder.

4) Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger: Insightful, lots of cigarettes.

I feel exceptionally proud that I was able to shave an extra word down on that last review.

Here is a photograph I took of the Flagler Presbyterian Church in St. Augustine, Florida:

Silas watches the Pawnee scouts depart

Silas was angry and he did not know why. The Pawnee scouts had disappeared the night before, and there was much speculation about where they had gone. Elijah thought they were riding hard toward the camps of the enemy. The party knew of these camps, crouching, rimmed with embers, hidden beyond the shadowy veil of the horizon. Others thought they were pushing forward, towards a scrubby line of evergreens in the distance, sandy soil, perhaps clean water. Still others were convinced that they had been swallowed whole by that unfathomable western land, a terrestrial deity greater and more mysterious than any lingering in the skies of the old world. Silas had watched them depart during the night. Tall and lanky, their sheepskin shawls pushed up around their shoulders, the smooth brown skin of their backs twisting in the neurotic light of the moon. Their horses shuffled uncertainly and seemed to topple forward, gaining momentum, unshorn hoofs scraping over the dead Nebraska long grass until they were dots in a darkening expanse. Silas was half-crouched, his body tensed. To do what? He shut his mouth and swallowed, tasting grit. He breathed through his nose, and slipped back under his blanket. He closed his eyes and breathed in the smell of horse sweat and gunpowder.

Winter in Queens

Winter in Queens. I stand in the underground station, waiting for the F train. The world outside is bright and clear and the people of Queens stand apart, each made slightly larger by several layers of clothing. I used to stand at the edge of the tracks but there have been a number of train-related deaths recently, so I'm cautious. Last week a hispanic woman pushed an Indian man in front of a train. She thought he was a terrorist. I keep my eyes open for unstable women behind me. My mother would be glad to know that I don't stand close to the edge anymore. I should probably call her and tell her about the train-related deaths.

I'm listening to music, my headphones are banded over my winter hat, the wool scrapes against the ear pieces. In front and beneath me scraps of plastic and discarded food loiter next to iron stanchions. From the stair case a fetid wind blows and I breathe through my mouth. The garbage on the tracks begins to slowly move, pushed along by the wind and for a moment imitating the movement of sentient particles anticipating the imminent train. I shove my hands deeper into my pockets, I strain the seams. A blonde presence at my right elbow.

Turning, I look at her face and she is already looking at me and smiling. She smiles wide and her face looked tired and her smile is shaped in such a way that I am convinced it is genuine in this moment but is forced in most other moments. A smile that has been used in jest so many times in the past. That's okay, I have one of my own. I smile my sideways smile. The one where I show only a small sliver of my top teeth. I know all of this about myself. Hey, how are you? My headphones are still on.

We are sitting on the F train together and we are talking about work. She sits with her boots pointed slightly toward each other and her arms crossed and her upper body twisted slightly to face me. Everything we say is sarcastic, and I try to make her laugh. She has a habit of not looking me in the eyes, but looking slightly above. I wonder if I have something on my forehead.

We both stay on the train longer than we need to. I am late to my class in the Bronx. I think she is late to wherever she is going, but I am not sure. The air smells better in the Bronx. Dominican boys walk with Dominican girls, always in pairs. On my way to class, I pass the empanada trailer. This has been an immovable landmark since I moved to New York six months ago. Inside, swarthy faced women with kind eyes cook with their backs to the window. Red tubes of ketchup and hot sauce stand as frozen sentries on either side of the metal window. I shove my hands deeper into my pockets.

Here's a photograph I recently took of a cathedral: