Author: tuckova

Interests: Alfons Mucha, Archibald Leach, big words, Bob Hicok, Brian Eno, Cat Power, Charles Bukowski, Charlotte Masaryk, cheese, clarity, dark chocolate, David Byrne, David Foster Wallace, Dorothy Parker, Douglas Adams, Edna St. Vincent Millay, E.E. Cummings, Frank O'Hara, Fred Rogers, garlic, Gaudi, Gertrude Stein, ginger, Gustav Klimt, Iva Pekarkova, Jane Austen, Jaromir Nohavica, Jeanette Winterson, Josef Skvorecky, Joseph Campbell, Joss Whedon, Just a Minute, Kate Bush, Kurt Vonnegut, laughing until it hurts, Laurie Anderson, Leonard Cohen, little kids singing, Lloyd Alexander, mandarin oranges, making lists, Margaret Atwood, Miss Manners, New Yorker, Paul Simon, performance, P.G. Wodehouse, poetry, Rebecca Solnit, Rob Brezsny, Robert Anton Wilson, Robert Creeley, salt, Salvador Dali, secrets, silence, Star Trek, Stephen Dunn, Talking Heads, Terry Gilliam, things that stain, This American Life, Tom Waits, T.S. Eliot, vegetable juice, veiled cultural references, vinegar, water, wine, W.H. Auden

originally this was about eggs

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I've been reflecting on friendship a lot lately, partly because of literal visitors and partly due to people wandering in and out of my mind from 30 years ago, 20, 10, and dancing up along new people. How do we seek friends, what makes someone special, who gets in. I admit an attraction to misfit toys. I am thrilled to see a cowboy that rides an ostrich, a wind-up mouse at the center of the nesting dolls. I like the people who seem out of place, propping up the wall at parties, the people who laugh a tiny bit louder than they meant and turn purple with embarrassment. The pink fire truck, the bird that swims. I like the people who surprise me with their fearless defiance of convention, even if sometimes it makes them lonely, because they have learned to celebrate what they do rather than fold themselves into someone's expectations. A spotted elephant, a charlie-in-the box. I like people who wear their hearts on their sleeves and people who hold their love so tightly in their mouths that it cuts them on the way out. I find these people, or they find me, and the friendship that results is a mixture of pleasure in the simple things about each other and delight in the oddities that make us misfits. Some of us have not been loved yet. We inhabit the island and find each other and tell each other how we are lovable until we believe it.
 
To be clear, I get along fine with the toys that come out of the box and look and act like you'd expect, most of the time. But as a dolly for Sue myself, I find it easy to love my fellow misfit toys. And maybe this is the root of one problem you asked me about, and which I am using an American Christmas special to help me answer. I am smart as a whip in many ways but it's hard for me sometimes to tell the difference between the misfit and the broken. A water pistol that squirts jelly is something that doesn't work the way you might expect, but it still works and part of its appeal for me is in the surprise. A boy who is disruptive in school can grow into a man who teaches juggling, helps other children learn to manage their energy. A boat that doesn't float…I say "It's okay, you don't have to float, you can be really good at something else" and I believe that so much that it sometimes takes me a while to realize that while one broken boat might have a hidden compartment for storing treasures, just like a woman could be terrible at giving presents but great at keeping secrets, some broken boats only want to be boats, and they spend their entire time trying to float off the island and sinking and getting rescued and heading back into the water to sink and be rescued again before I finally get it: they are broken. The train with square wheels could have learned to be a story teller, a safe bed for a winged bear, but if all he's going to do is sit around and complain about how he never gets to go anywhere, he's broken. When I eventually figure it out, I'm gone, but sometimes it takes me a while to realize that broken that isn't trying to compensate or repair is … broken. And then afterwards sometimes it takes me a while to get over my disappointment, for which I must apologize to you, my metaphorical toy friend, as you have never been anything but super fun to play with.

cycles

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It feels like some kind of torture, some kind of crazy cruelty so perfect it would have to be planned. First, for one marvelous measure of time you glide across the globe of your mind, the depths of the oceans and the peaks of the mountains all equally beautiful and rich. Then it starts, and the pain pulls you so far into yourself you can't imagine a world beyond your skin and you reel inside this wail and claw, wish you believed in prayer so you could pray for it to be over but you have no breath to pray with anyway. It ends when it ends and you gasp out of it and shake your head and count your fingers and toes and blessings and make jokes, as you do. Then it sucks you in again, you blacken every thing on your mind's horizon and take a deep breath because it will surely be your last, this one, and you fall and you fall. With the distance you can manage, you try to be scientific and measure the pain on scales, measure the blood, measure the tears, try to put words on it, try to stay silent, try anything. And then it's over. You're losing your mind probably. In the sweet breaks between, you scour the internet, take online tests, talk to friends, change your diet, put on warm sweaters and take them off again in endless cycles, suck the sweetness and softness out of what you have by questioning why it isn't like that all the time, why the bitter and sharp tear. You assign yourself stoicism, after all you were the one who sliced through and set fire, and why not continue but then when the pain is there you remember that you cried then, too. Count your blessings. Count the people who have it worse. Count the length of the pause. Count how far you have come, how much less far you have to go. Count on your strength. 

upgrade

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There is a cabin in the woods somewhere, or maybe out in a wide empty field, maybe a rocky cliff overlooking the ocean. The point is that you are isolated there, no other people, only a landscape to interact with. Can you see it? No internet, no cell phone service. No luxuries really at all, just the basics. There's food somehow, and it's comfortable enough — not too hot or too cold for your taste. There's no particular danger, no attacking animals or whatever. 

Do you want to go there? 
How long do you want to stay?
 
Does it make a difference if I tell you that while you are there, time stops, and so if and when you return to "civilization" you will have missed nothing? What difference does it make? 
 
What if you could have books?
What if you could have music?
Or if not books or music, what things might make you want to stay there longer?
 
How often will you think about this now?

Poem For People That Are Understandably Too Busy To Read Poetry by Stephen Dunn

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Relax. This won't last long.
Or if it does, or if the lines
make you sleepy or bored,
give in to sleep, turn on
the T.V., deal the cards.
This poem is built to withstand
such things. Its feelings
cannot be hurt. They exist 
somewhere in the poet,
and I am far away.
Pick it up anytime. Start it
in the middle if you wish.
It is as approachable as melodrama,
and can offer you violence
if it is violence you like. Look,
there's a man on a sidewalk;
the way his leg is quivering
he'll never be the same again.
This is your poem
and I know you're busy at the office
or the kids are into your last nerve.
Maybe it's sex you've always wanted.
Well, they lie together
like the party's unbuttoned coats,
slumped on the bed
waiting for drunken arms to move them.
I don't think you want me to go on;
everyone has his expectations, but this
is a poem for the entire family.
Right now, Budweiser
is dripping from a waterfall,
deodorants are hissing into armpits
of people you resemble,
and the two lovers are dressing now,
saying farewell.
I don't know what music this poem
can come up with, but clearly
it's needed. For it's apparent 
they will never see each other again
and we need music for this
because there was never music when he or she
left you standing on the corner.
You see, I want this poem to be nicer 
than life. I want you to look at it
when anxiety zigzags your stomach
and the last tranquilizer is gone
and you need someone to tell you
I'll be here when you want me
like the sound inside a shell.
The poem is saying that to you now.
But don't give anything for this poem.
It doesn't expect much. It will never say more
than listening can explain.
Just keep it in your attache case 
or in your house. And if you're not asleep
by now, or bored beyond sense,
the poem wants you to laugh. Laugh at
yourself, laugh at this poem, at all poetry.
Come on:

Good. Now here's what poetry can do.

Imagine yourself a caterpillar.
There's an awful shrug and, suddenly,
You're beautiful for as long as you live.

rash decisions

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Im thinking about irritations, specifically my own irritability. I am more easily intensely irritated than most, and I am less able than I would like to blow it off, ignore it, move on. My irritation is irrational and thus does not heed logic, it is physical and pure and it hurts me and I cannot stop. I get irritated by someone more than a few times and I'm done with them, I can't move on so I move away. To a certain extent, this is logical. It's like my irritations with books: I will never have enough time to read all the books I want before I die so why would I waste five more minutes reading Pat Conroy or Philip Roth? Some books I will give a second try on the recommendation of a trusted friend but it only works out sometimes. Same with people. 

And so I have built a life that treats my irritability as something like an allergy. I've chosen a job where I rarely work directly with others, thereby minimizing the likelihood of them irritating me. My social life is predominantly one-on-one meetings with people who delight me. So reading is a pleasure because I don't bother to continue with books I don't enjoy. And eating is a pleasure because I manage to avoid allergens so my primary reaction is to be nourished rather than poisoned. My life is a pleasure because I have eliminated most of the encounters with people who irritate me. 

From time to time I read something horrible or eat something that causes a bad reaction. And from time to time I have to deal with people who are toxic to me. And because I have largely eliminated that from my life, it causes a pretty dramatic reaction. I have no tolerance. 

I don't think I should change; I think the logic of my decisions holds up generally: Don't read books you don't like. Avoid foods that make you break out in hives. Steer clear of emotional vampires. Nevertheless from time to time I am splotchy and red-eyed, swollen and in pain in reaction to one thing or another and I can't help but wonder in such moments if there isn't a vaccine, and if so how to get it. 

maybe all the rain yesterday offered some happy kisses afterwards

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This is a doll and this doll wants to make a nest with you. That is why it is called a nesting doll. You have heard some other reasons maybe but here we are talking about a nesting doll that wants to get cozy with you in the most homey way. This doll rolls into your life quite round and shiny, I mean it is not edgy or rough at all, it is just rolling along with whatever you want to do. This doll is agreeable. This doll is also lovely and just having it around makes things more attractive. Every day you look at it you feel a bit happier. The surface is so shiny that it reflects you. Like a spoon, except instead of a distorted pickle of a nose you look even better than in a mirror. One day while gazing at your reflection in the doll, you notice that there's a small crack in the shiny surface and when you run your thumbnail into the groove you find that the doll breaks quite neatly and deliberately in half and inside of it there is another doll. The second doll is pretty much exactly like the first doll, it is smaller obviously since it was fitted inside of the first one but it has the same happy smile, the same shiny surface, the same easy balance. The same reflective quality, although in this one your eyes are even more thoughtful, your smile more pleasing. And the fact that it's smaller means you can almost fit her in your hand now, hold her on your open palm,  show her to other people. Use words like mine. This one is also cracked and since you opened the first doll so easily and no harm came of it it's not long before you crack the second one open too. Inside is another doll, the same in most ways because this is a metaphor and metaphors involve a certain amount of consistency in order to earn your trust. But a little different, because obviously this is a metaphor founded in truth — each time you open the doll you have, you find another one inside, and each one is smaller and it is easier to imagine fitting her into your life simply from that point of view, but also, you can't help but notice that each subsequent doll is a little harder to open, that each one is rougher, less smooth. And each one is less perfect or to put it another way more flawed. The lines less straight, the paint wavery in places. It's difficult, probably, to paint really well on something so small, though you've seen drawings on grains of rice so it's more like poor workmanship. The third doll's eyes are just slightly smaller, but it looks almost like she's been crying, and your reflection as you look at her seems not quite so attractive; it seems more like how you really look. Still, eventually you get to a doll that fits right inside your pocket, part of your daily life if you want, there whenever you reach for her. You realize that the larger, prettier dolls were always rolling away from your fingers, more than you could hold, but this one is just the right size for you and you still like looking at yourself in that shiny surface and you like that this one seems more real, not quite so flashy as the first, like a doll you almost don't feel weird about loving. What happens next is predictable I guess, since even metaphors can't go on forever. You see the crack, you open the doll, etc. until you're at the last doll, the one that isn't hiding anything more. This doll isn't even a doll, it's a mess, a paint blob and a poorly lathed imitation of the others. There is nothing to love here. You can barely work up pity. You can't throw it away so you put it back inside the previous doll and try to pretend you didn't see it. But you did, you saw it because you looked, and now you know what's inside, rattling around inside the doll that comforts your fingers when you're nervous, inside the doll that reflects your better self, inside the doll that just rolled into your life and made everything, including you, more attractive. She opened because you broke her open and now you know. So what happens now.

syncopated thinking

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So it's the Ionian Sea and my love of cultures nurtured at a crossroads is getting satisfied. A group of children throwing globs of wet sand at each other, until one of them catches it in the eye and cries. At the canal of love either lovelorn women cure their sorrow or couples seal their promises, depending on who.you ask. Maybe both. A man out near the buoy teaching his daughter or girlfriend to float, the bright pink of her swimsuit flashing every time the water rises. Kalami was made famous by Henry Miller and by Lawrence Durrell, who was my introduction to Rashomon storytelling. The tops of my feet already have the unfreckled lines of sandal straps. Corfu Town is a UNESCO site. The beach umbrellas, spelled ambrela on this beach, advertise Ben and Jerry's and Nestlé. It's almost too hot for ice cream. I can see Albania across the water, dim in the heat haze. Once only noble families whose names were on the list could walk on this promenade. A man comes out of the water and stands drying in the evening sun, tells us he loves America, Al Pacino, Saturday Night Fever, Harrison Ford. One last dip in the sea and it's time for dinner, something with feta and tomatoes that taste like rich sunlight. It's only the first day.

Or when your hands are cold and you rub them together.

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Last night I went out with a friend and we talked about the things we used to do to amuse ourselves and why don't we do them anymore. Mainly I feel like my time should be spent on something Useful and I now know that the raindrops don't really care if I moderate their races, no matter how intense they seem to be. I did officiate on the bus window today, for old times' sake, and yeah, I still got it.

I used to imagine that somebody might be interested in my every thought. I imagined biographers following me about, intent on capturing the very fascinating nature of me. I developed the habit of speaking aloud as I did things if I was alone, in case the biographers were there but invisible, and I still have that habit even though obviously nobody is there, no biographers and probably not even Bruno Ganz. It has been largely a relief to realize that there is not and will not be anybody with a microphone curious to know how I wash windows or why my closet is organized in a particular way or any of the other things I've caught myself narrating aloud in the last while. I think at this point it's just habit, and maybe it's also to ensure that my mind doesn't wander off mid-task, as it is wont to do without some guidance. But I don't really think anybody's interested, even if somebody were there.

In fact lately I have been thinking about attention and interest a lot. I am deeply and sometimes awkwardly interested in people. Partly it's just cause people are super interesting and partly because I believe that people enjoy and rarely get that attention so if I like someone I like to pay attention to them as a kind of gift. In the love languages TIME is my number one and so this is what I give out, time (sorry if you like presents; I just can't). I read people's facebook pages if I know I will see them so I am caught up on what they are presenting and I also will re-read emails so that they are fresh in my memory. Apparently this level of attention can be a little… intense? … but whatever, I'm closing out my 40s and I'm not wasting time changing anything I don't actively regret. 

Sometimes I feel so much that other people are interesting that I can't really say much about myself, nothing meaningful and definitely nothing meaningless. I can talk about how my day was but that's not what I mean. I mean I have all this crap in my head but how do I work it into a conversation. The closet is organized by color and then subcategorized by type of garment. In drawers, I roll socks, underwear, and pajamas; I fold jeans and sweaters. The Shack is one of the worst books I ever read but I kept a copy of it in case I ever meet somebody who wants to hate-read a book. I have not yet repaired the thresholds in this apartment because it's the last thing to do and once that's done I am afraid that I will have to move. I almost never kick the covers off no matter how hot it gets, because of, you know, monsters. Is this interesting? I'm not sure. There is a part of me, a small arrogant ugly part, that is a bit hurt when someone doesn't find it so, and covers my mouth with its greasy hand so we don't get hurt again. On the other hand, there is a better, growing, nobler part of me that has learned be pleasantly surprised if you read it and leave it at that. Hello, you, reading this. Thanks.

Next week I am going with one of my dearest and oldest friends to Corfu. I plan to eat basically a pound of feta drizzled in olive oil every day, and if I don't get relaxed enough to start writing interesting things again it won't be for lack of trying. 

brought to you by the letter b

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My friend is visiting and we are having adventures all over Europe. Bus from Berlin to Prague, its relentless beauty and complications. The exquisite detail in the stained glass window in St. Vitus representing the biblical disasters for which insurance can be purchased, turn of the century corporate sponsorship.

Train to the ghost town of Brno, stumbling over stepping stones and stopping at stumblestones. I love my town more than I've loved any place and it's a weird possessive feeling when I'm showing people around, but we spin in the square with our arms out and drink cocktails named Liza Doolittle, Mary Poppins, Alex Owens, and I think my love does not make mistakes.

In Budapest, I walk across Liberty Bridge and am unstuck in time. I am 26 after a night of hitchhiking and I am in my 30s, 40s, different visitors and reasons for coming to this diacritical city, but this is the first time I visit the thermal baths so it is new again, different, like every time you step in a river. Or walk over one.

And today, the view from an airplane window of clouds, fluffy and white, the blue horizon snapping in the distance. I experience the same irritations as anyone I guess, the man in line behind me kicking at my bag when the line moves forward, the rush and halt of travel. But here I am on a plane, going from one country to another, the beauty of waking up in Budapest, a cigarette on the balcony at sunrise overlooking the city, and knowing I will sleep in Berlin.

this town

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It rained last night, the kind of deafening, soul-clearing rain that I love the best. We watched the storm coming in from our bench outside the wine bar, the faraway blue sky gradually replaced by low gray clouds that grumbled at us and took flash photos. The waitress came out and set up an umbrella so we could continue drinking outside when the storm hit. Then the rain the rain the rain. When it stopped, it was past closing time and I wanted one more so we hopped across the street to the bar with more expensive wine and a later closing hour. The wine tasted like pear juice and after I spilled the first glass all over I felt like I could get pretty used to sweet wine after all.

I left the bread I bought for breakfast this morning in the first bar, apparently. Rice for breakfast, oh asagohan, how've you been.

Sometimes it takes a while to figure out how unpleasant someone is. It would be neat if I could spray people who come aggressively close to me, the way skunks can. Then other people would only need to be downwind of them and say, "Oh hey, this person gets aggressively into other people's spaces." Saves time. Once, I warned a woman when I saw her on a date with a skin-covered bag of excruciating boredom, and I have thought about getting cards printed that say RUN to hand to people on obviously toxic dates, but now what I really want is the ability to mark somehow, as a courtesy to the next passenger, the people who should be avoided.

Although of course then I want to code it, what kind of bad they are. Like my spray paint for cars — one color for people who get too close to bikes, one color for bad parking, one color for the ones who drive through crosswalks, my upcoming and certain demise. 

It's summertime officially now. One friend gone, another friend gone, and one more to go next week. Ghost town. I'm going to get my closet so organized. I might even learn to play The Specials on the ukulele.