This site was inspired by Celine Nguyen's essay, "Take the Paranoid Reading Pill," about the process of revising her essay for the Cleveland Review of Books and remixed from the glitch site she created.
A locket shaped like a book, its metal pages empty, tarnished black ovals where someone—my parents?—should have been. The All New Fannie Farmer Boston Cooking School Cookbook, publication date 1952. In that same book, shoved between Jerusalem Artichokes and French-Fried Asparagus, a recipe card. Title in my mother’s cursive: “Green Walnut Preserves.” The rest: blank. The Ypsilanti Lutheran church bulletin, 1961. The satin heels I wore to prom, coffined in tissue paper, toes beaded with those green flowers I thought so elegant.
A letter my brother sent from summer camp in western New York, summer 1979, the summer my father was sick.
And now my father’s funeral program. September 1979.
In content, quite similar to my mother’s.
Her house has already sold, I have only days to finish. The First Lutheran Church of Ypsilanti Ladies’ Cookbook, 1972. I break the book’s still-stiff spine, flip it over and shake until a white blank curlicue falls to my feet. Filmy paper, what cash registers print, ink all faded away.
Another letter my brother sent from camp, July 1979. Enclosed: a sketch of a blue jay; notes on an Eastern kingbird. Replying to his birds was my job. My mother hated writing in English; she’d only learned it as a teenager; her grammar mistakes embarrassed her.
In all these boxes I know I will not find my first drafts, the ones covered in red crosshatch, excising the merest hint of distress until what I mailed was light, airy, almost blank. At the end of summer we drove in the powder-blue Buick to pick my brother up from camp. It was finally time for someone to tell him what had happened while he was drawing blue jays. We parked at a rest stop. I was sitting up front. In the rearview mirror I watched my brother’s face curdle, his birds now useless and faraway, all of us stripped of speech.
A locket shaped like a book, metal pages empty, tarnished black ovals where someone—my parents?—should have been. The All New Fannie Farmer Boston Cooking School Cookbook, publication date 1952. In that same book, shoved between Jerusalem Artichokes and French-Fried Asparagus, a recipe card. Title in my mother’s cursive: “Green Walnut Preserves.” The rest, blank. The satin heels I wore to prom, coffined in tissue paper, toes beaded with those green flowers I thought so elegant. A letter my younger brother sent from summer camp in western New York, summer 1979, the summer my father was sick. Now my father’s funeral program, September 1979.
After the funeral—my mother’s, I mean— my brother said he didn’t care what happened to any of this junk. I couldn’t read his expression to know if he really meant it. His face deliberately blank. I remembered how he used to to draw birds. When he wrote us from summer camp in western New York, the summer my father was sick, he liked to enclose sketches: bluejays, kingbirds, yellowthroats. It was my job to write back—my mother only learned English as a teenager, her grammar mistakes embarrassed her.I gashed my first drafts with red crosshatch, excising tumors until the page was blank. At the end of summer we drove in the powder-blue Buick to pick my brother up from camp. He was in a sour mood because no one had written him—did we not like his blue jays? We parked at a rest stop. I was sitting up front. My mother’s voice broke on the first syllable. In the rearview mirror I watched my brother’s face curdle, his birds useless and faraway, all of us stripped of speech.
A locket shaped like a book, metal pages empty, tarnished black ovals where someone—my parents?—should have been. The All New Fannie Farmer Boston Cooking School Cookbook, publication date 1962. In that same book, shoved between Jerusalem Artichokes and French-Fried Asparagus, a recipe card. Title in my mother’s cursive: “Green Walnut Preserves.” The rest, blank. The satin heels I wore to prom, coffined in tissue paper. My father’s funeral program, October 1988.
A letter my younger brother sent from summer camp in western New York, that same year. From its folds, a curlicue of paper, soft with smeared graphite, falls to my feet.
My brother always enclosed bird studies, sketches of blue jays, kingbirds, yellowthroats. My mother pinned them to the cork board in the kitchen. Sometimes I’d catch her in front of the board, feather duster or garbage bag or rag limply in hand, eyes roving over my brother’s pencil lines, the wings he evoked in a few quick strokes.
Soon I find more such drawings, and I call my brother—he lives in Berlin now—to ask if he wants them.
“I don’t want any of her junk,” he replies.
I hear a door slam. My cue to hang up.
When my brother was at camp, the summer my father was sick, it was my job to reply to his letters. My mother had only learned English as a teenager; her grammar mistakes embarrassed her. “When you write him,” she enjoined, “don’t mention the news.” The sour smell of my father’s skin, the hard plastic of the kidney-shaped basin by his bedside. “I want him to have his camp.”
I gashed my drafts with red crosshatch, excising tumors until the page was blank. None made it to the mailbox.My mother has to break the news on the drive back from summer camp. We park at a rest stop. I sit up front. In the rearview mirror I watch my brother’s face curdle, his birds recast as evidence of exclusion from familial crisis, the first of many grievances to come.In a few years, he will throw a porcelain platter at my mother’s head and shout that he hates her. But now we pass the rest of the trip in silence. My mother drives the speed limit exactly, brakes before every turn. She does not want to jostle us, crack us open, send us tumbling to the ground where there’s nothing to break our fall.
A locket shaped like a book, metal pages empty, tarnished black ovals where someone—my parents?—should have been.
The All New Fannie Farmer Boston Cooking School Cookbook, published 1962. In that same book, shoved between Jerusalem Artichokes and French-Fried Asparagus, a recipe card. Title in my mother’s cursive: “Green Walnut Preserves.” The rest, blank.
The satin heels I wore to prom, coffined in tissue paper.
My father’s funeral program, October 1988.
A letter my younger brother sent from summer camp in western New York, August 1988. From its folds, a curlicue of paper, soft with smeared graphite, falls to my feet. My brother always enclosed sketches. Birds, mostly: chickadees and yellowthroats. My mother pinned them to the cork board in the kitchen. Sometimes I’d catch her there, feather duster or garbage bag or limp rag in hand, eyes roving over the strokes of my brother’s pencil.
More sketches. I call to ask if he wants them.
“I don’t want any of her junk,” he replies.
That summer it had been my job to reply to his letters. My mother only learned English as a teenager; her grammar mistakes embarrassed her. “When you write him,” she enjoined, “don’t mention the news.” The sour smell of my father’s skin, the hard plastic of the kidney-shaped basin by his bedside. “I want him to have his camp.”
I gashed my drafts with red crosshatch, excising tumors until the page was blank. None made it to the mailbox. My mother has to break the news on the drive back from camp. We park at a rest stop. I sit up front. In the rearview mirror I watch my brother’s face curdle, his birds recast as evidence of exclusion from familial crisis, the first of many grievances to come. In a few years he will throw a platter at my mother and shout that he hates her. But now we pass the rest of the trip in silence. My mother drives the speed limit exactly, brakes before every turn—the slightest jostle could crack us apart.