The Kit, Part 3, The Bag

I once walked from South Sacramento to Freeport. I walked along the river. I spent the night in the grass. I was blessed with good dreams. When I awoke, I walked back to South Sacramento. It was a certain time of my life, in my youth, when I could do things like that. I wandered around and that's just what I did. I did this for most of the 1990s. Everywhere I went I had my notebook and pen, and not much else. I often did not have money, or a change of clothes or a toothbrush. In my youth I cared only for adventure, no matter how that came about.

The Kit, Part 2, The Pen

I wore long hair for years. My mother called it nappy, “Nappy Anthony hair.” I always felt like she didn't approve, but it wasn't until years later that I realized that she didn't like her own hair, which suspiciously looks like my hair. Nonetheless, I wore long hair.

I always wore a pony tail. In the years I was a bartender, it was just better that my hair was back. During my shifts behind the bar, when my hair was pulled back, I had a convenient place to put the bar pens. These pens were the cheap disposable ballpoints. They were, of course, for signing credit card receipts. During the course of a ten hour shift I would collect a dozen pens in my hair. And my hair, being as nappy as it is, I could smuggle ten pens out and not be noticed. At home, I had a cheap pen collection second to none.

Why I Write Reprise

“I thought I already heard this song,” Janice said. On our toy CD player, we were listening to a Book of Love CD.

“You have,” I said. It's a 30 year old CD, who knows how many times she'd heard this song.

“No, I mean today,” she said.

“I don't know,” I said.

She picked up the CD case, flipped it over and started to giggle. “You know, this was recorded in the days of the reprise.”

“Reprise?” I asked.

“There's like four versions of every song on this.”

“Oh, yeah, right,” I said. 1980's electronica, yeah, as soon as she said it, I remembered that remixes and reprises, etc were the norm.

Just Because You Should, part 2

I feel like books just aren't fashionable anymore. I know it can't be true, not exactly. But I do wonder how likely it may be.

I just say books, and not reading. I think people are reading as much as ever. I hope they are reading. But books seem to be a medium not necessary anymore.

The Kindle, or Nook, or whatever app seems so much more convenient. You can have dozens or hundreds of books in your cloud and that bookshelf, well, you just don't need that heavy piece of furniture anymore.

I read Sinclair Lewis's Main Street recently. I read it on my Kindle. Yes, on my Kindle. I have entire rooms filled with books and bookshelves, and I read Main Street on my Kindle.