Mrs. Dalloway's Coffee Break

Sinister Alice in the morning Sinister Alice had some breakfast Sinister Alice lied to her mother Sinister Alice, crawling in a dark hole Sinister Alice cared not for her worrying parents Sinister Alice, with stars in her eyes Sinister Alice marveled at the snow falling Sinister Alice, under a cedar tree Sinister Alice drank some white wine Sinister Alice bought some souvenirs Sinister Alice drank some mulled wine Sinister Alice could not fit through the door Sinister Alice fell down to her knees Sinister Alice made some new friends Sinister Alice payed her dues Sinister Alice learnt to use new words Sinister Alice bought a new coat Sinister Alice figured herself some genius Sinister Alice laughed with her girlfriends Sinister Alice played with some big words Sinister Alice against the card deck Sinister Alice discoursed them to shame Sinister Alice got the Queen angry Sinister Alice fled the mad army Sinister Alice figured herself

I am, today, writing this in the middle of a snow storm. The weather is beautiful, very Anna Karenina, and I would love it even more, was I able to go witness the wind and the cold firsthand. Alas, I have been taken ill. So in I must stay. I, my fine fellows, am experiencing the finest of all headaches, the crème de la crème of the headache world, the mother, if you will. It has been going on for three days now. And not just that, but if you saw me, you would be horrified to find me with eyelids hanging on top of my eyes as if someone had just kicked the shit out of me. I look like Robert De Niro in The Raging Bull, without the black and blue, because my eyelids are red, not black. But otherwise the similarity is uncanny. Robert De Niro whose brain is about to explode through his nose and eyes. And not just that, but to add insult to injury, I am having one of those mornings. For starters, the migraine medicine the doctor prescribed is, so far, not working at all (the shark is

Many years ago, a friend of mine ordered an enormous Lego Millenium Falcon from some online Lego Star Wars store. It was extremely expensive and, as an added bonus, came with the entire crew; Chewie and Han and Luke and Leia, so, knowing he would never hear the end of it from his wife, he placed the order behind her back and had it delivered to our work place. Don’t tell anyone. Instead of smuggling it home, he began constructing the spacecraft during lulls and breaks, and managed to finish somewhat quickly. It was gigantic, about a meter in diameter, and surprisingly heavy. The Lego Millenium Falcon, with the heroes of the saga in the cockpit – sorry if I get the lingo wrong, I don’t know that much about spaceships, even the Millenium Falcon, although out of all the spaceships it is also my favorite – stood in the middle of the projection room, on the fifth floor, on a secure table, for years. The crew were all separate and movable, so many a time the poor creatures became the bu

Being part the accumulated identity of a borderline cinephile pop culture and otherwise consumer and connoisseur, at least if you ask her, with a heart made of letters and a mind of music. In alphabetical order. A for apples , a favorite, but also: Abbey Road . Somewhere in her smile she knows that I don’t need another lover. Alela Diane , the voice of alternative Americana. Adele , the voice . Also, antidote , as in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: “Where’s the antidote?!” There is always an antidote for the murderous mood, the somber, the depressed. Also, America . In both good as well as bad. Also, Nanouk , the sister. Included in A’s for her real name. B for Bill , as in Murray, and Evans. Big Chill, the . Every person should have her own Kevin Kline standing next to her in times of trouble, to whisper this to her ear: “It’s us. You don’t have to handle yourself at all with us.” Also, Barbery, Muriel , and her book The Elegance of the Hedgehog. C for coffee .

I am sorry for the profanity right upfront Just as I am sorry for having for a brain Tori’s famous comic book tattoo No, I am not sorry sitting up in bed at all hours watching the night go by the last of the handful of nights I spend in this house yes And Tori’s famous tear is in my hand now, walking my usual walk, picturing life without these trees and puddles picturing this path without me in it Madwoman I need not sleep but to witness every last detail of the old folks’ home the elementary school the beach where I died when someone proposed to me That was a long time ago I never married I put on music in my brain and do not cry I fondle books by my bedside and do not cry I put on pajamas and do not cry I wander out to the terrace and do not cry I touch the rough skin of the outside wall and do not cry I see the crushed spiders hanging on the door frame Died when they were trying to crawl inside to warmth And do not cry. I concur with prev

The way the autumn sun casts its rays and shadows of the houseplants on the wall above the writing desk, where the pictures of family and friends are sitting in vintage frames or pinned to the wallpaper with ancient pins from father’s old stack that has survived all the way to the seventeenth apartment of this adulthood, from this childhood, and even from father’s days as a young, beardless man, standing in front of his first car, a Trabant. He is standing next to his girl, a beautiful redheaded vision in white cotton shirt and shorts. That picture is not here, but at home, in a photo album, and it is black-and-white, but knowing she is a redhead is secret family knowledge. For a long time now, mother likes to dye her hair blond, but when the picture was taken, she still had her natural golden, strawberry blond hair. Hanging laundry to dry, underpants, the dozens and dozens of them, because this is the time of plenty. Hanging them neatly in rows, while being philosophical about th