15 november 00

I found out tonight that one of my favorite neighborhood haunts is closing after December 2. I haven't been hanging out there much recently and now of course I wish that I had. I started thinking about the nights I spent there, sometimes alone and sometimes with company. I specifically remembered the time I passed there with you, just a handful of occasions really. I thought about the last time we were there, surprisingly close to a year ago now. I remember the sweater you we were wearing, I remember what you had to drink, I remember where we sat. You wore your hair down. As is the case with most last times, I didn't realize that this was in fact a last time of anything, that you were already in the process of vanishing right in front of me. Watch carefully, ladies and gentlemen, for when I open this box again you will see that my assistant is *poof* nowhere to be found! I was going to write to you tonight to tell you that this place is closing, but it's not as if you were going to come back, so what would be the point?

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Two nights ago I went to hear Jeanette Winterson read from her new novel, The PowerBook. That woman is one of the planets in my universe. I waited afterwards for over an hour to have my copy of the book signed by the author, and it was worth the wait just to stand face to face with her for a moment, however brief. While waiting in the line I wondered what, if anything, I should say to her when I presented my copy of the book. What do I say to someone who has had such a profound effect on my thinking? Someone whose words I've flagged and underlined and quoted and given to people I love, someone who has influenced the way I think about and experience my own life, and my relationship with language? I stood in front of her as she brought her pen to the title page of the book. "Thank you so much," I said. She handed back the book, smiled, and said, "thank you."