out on the town
computer drawing by me
Friday night at 7:30 the downtown pedestrian mall is bustling; women in skinny jeans and high heels click past with men on their arms. Cars troll for spots, their windows down and music streaming out; their low beams click on as the light falls from the sky.
The air is that perfect temperature where you barely notice it, and people want to be outside: at X lounge and Miller’s, all the outdoor tables are filled. High school kids sit and smoke in front of the movie theater, looking affected and lost.
Then a group of woman closer to my age sweep past, in flip flops and soft hoodies, their hair down, talking and laughing. For a moment I keep pace with them, and anyone would think I was out on the town, too. Then I peel off at the pharmacy—open til 8:00—pick up our prescriptions, and hurry back to the boys at home.
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Filed under drawings, family matters, motherhood | Comment (1)bye-bye summer
Photos by Billy
It’s hoodie cold at 8:00 am, when we go out to walk the dogs. Their breathing makes puffs of fog. William totters behind them on the gravel driveway.
He is a practically a new kid each morning: piercing bits of red pepper on a fork, or playing bongos, toy piano, ukulele. Clapping, singing, closing doors, and climbing steps; saying words like “doggie”, (ba)”nana”, “baby”, and especially “bye-bye” with an increasing sense of meaning, as if he is beginning to understand absence.
Everything inside us and around us is changing: the houses on the hill are framed in, leaves are floating down onto the overgrown lawn; Billy is writing love songs and I am writing stories about loss.
It’s hot out at noontime. The pools are all closed, but our lone tomato plant has one red fruit. Its yellowing leaves still smell exactly like summer.
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computer drawing by me
She heard a few paragraphs of my short story Pseudocyesis, read shakily at Tin House, and introduced herself afterwards. “I’m a scout for a literary agency,” she said. “What are you working on…I’d like to see more.”
Back in Virginia, I learned a bit about the agency then, with help from Billy and Sarah B., I polished up three middle school stories and sent them off. I was excited, but I expected nothing; short stories are not particularly marketable, and I am still learning so much about lining the words up right.
At any rate, I heard back, and miracle of miracle, they wanted to represent my collection. So I’m repped now, meaning I have an agent who will try to sell my work to a publisher. Pretty much I feel giddy as one my characters: a thirteen year old with a crush, except—just this once—my love has been returned.
One of my essays, Our boy Powhatan, has been republished this week Sure Woman.To receive notices of new posts on Jocelyn’s Stories, click here
Filed under drawings, writing | Comments (8)tick-tock
Photos by Billy
I’m having trouble staying in the moment—
Before day break, I wake to William wailing, and even before I reach him, I am thinking of what he can eat. And as I feed him, the dogs yowl and step on my feet with their uncut claws. Letting them outside into the darkness, I remember things I should have done weeks ago: checking the oil in the Subaru, taking the library books back…
It’s the same even after Billy takes the baby. Coasting down I-64 to work, I am lost in my head; I turn off on Ivy, brake, and follow the road that winds through trees. All the while, I am organizing my lesson in my head, practicing the order of the words I will say to those eager, restless students. As I rush back to pick up William in the afternoon, I drink hot water distractedly from Will’s sippy cup left in the car.
Don’t get me wrong, I realize that my life is good: I work part time, have lots of help from Billy, and get to spend much of the day with my baby boy. Most weeks I still make it to yoga even, I just find it hard to actually be there. As my teacher demonstrates poses, I marvel at her poise, move with her, but at some point, I am just copying blindly. My mind is already barreling forward, lining up one word after another, imagining the stories I hope to write during these last days of summer.
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