assignment:
Find Arthur “Bobby” Harrison.
Find G.B. Smith.
both living somewhere in upstate New York.
Ask them about 1971.
Then ask them about Attica.
They will be expecting you.
But, first
go to Albany.
to pack and wear:
2 skirts
2 house dresses
2 t-shirts
2 sleeveless shirts
1 pullover sweater
boots
soft socks
bra
nightgown, robe, slippers
cigarettes
bourbon
bag with:
shampoo
toothbrush and paste
lip salve
aspirin, prescriptions, tampax,
face cream, powder and baby oil
to carry:
mohair throw
2 scarves
laptop
2 legal pads and pens
list of telephone numbers
house key
This is a list that is taped inside my closet door on the third floor of my mother’s house for the past two years as I have lived there more or less steadily. The list enables me to pack, without thinking, for any piece I was likely to do.
Notice the deliberate anonymity of costume: in a skirt, a sleeveless shirt, and boots – articles of clothing that would allow me to pass on either side of the socioeconomic bed.
Notice the mohair throw for truck-line flights (i.e. no blankets) and for the motel room in which the air conditioning could not be turned off. Notice the bourbon for the same hotel room. Notice the laptop for the airport, coming home: the idea was to call my mother, check in, find an empty bench, and start typing the day’s notes.
It should be clear that this was a list made by someone who prized control, yearned after momentum, someone determined to play her role as if she had the script, heard the cues, knew her narrative.
There is on this list one significant omission, one article I always needed and never had: a watch.
I needed a watch not during the day, when I could turn on the car radio or ask someone, but at night, in the motel.
Quite often I would ask the desk for the time every half hour or so, until finally, embarrassed to ask again, I would call someone, gather up an excuse as to why I called in the first place, then kindly ask them the time.
In other words I had skirts, t-shirts, a pullover sweater, shoes, socks, bra, nightgown, robe, slippers, cigarettes, bourbon, shampoo, toothbrush and paste, lip salve, asprin, prescriptions, tampax, face cream, powder, baby oil, mohair throw, laptop, legal pads, pens, telephone numbers, and a house key, but I didn’t know what time it was.
This is perhaps a parable, either in my life as a writer during this past few years after college or of the period itself.
