Great Moments in 2005

Posted on January 2, 2006.

It started off with a siren: January 1. Confused over the place to meet for lunch, my father calls the police and reports me missing.

And went out in flames: New Year’s Eve 2005-6 was also the seventh night of Hanukkah.

Holiday discombobulation: July 4 spent reading poetry at a bar in St. Petersburg, Russia. Labor Day in Prague. The Katrina aftermath throughout Central Europe.

Regrets:

Not socializing more, at home or away
Leaving my eye blinders behind on my trip to St. Petersburg (where it is dark for only a few hours in summer)
Not giving money to elderly Russian homeless on the street (a rare time when I’m sure helping panhandlers is the right thing to do)
Not submitting poems for publication
Not working on my projects consistently
Not sailing from St. Petersburg to Helsinki. St. Pete’s airport is the worst I’ve visited.
Not doing any visual artwork the entire year

Brush with greatness: The funny-looking tall guy in the seminar group turns out to be William T. Vollmann, who goes on to win the National Book Award

Other brush with greatness: Contacted and interviewed by Nina Burleigh for a Radar article. (Will it materialize? There’s talk of the mag folding.)

Coolest travel souvenir: A compilation CD of Russian rock music.

Runners-up:

Russian chocolate
Russian toilet paper
Empty bag of ketchup-flavored Cheetos

Cheapest trick on vacation: Sitting next to a lactose-intolerant seminar peer at the complementary breakfast, then hoarding her yogurt in the hotel fridge for the next 2 weeks.

Best stupid human trick: Meowing for Russian hotel clerk (to inform her that the hotel cat had run out the door.)

Favorite (inaccurate) comment behind my back: “I think she’s a rich one.”

Favorite comment to my face: “You know, some people may be intimidated by you, but you’re my favorite D____ employee.”

Greatest accomplishment: Traveling for three weeks straight with all my possessions in a backpack. Accomplished by wearing all my packed clothes on the airplane, then peeling each article off one by one, rolling and stuffing them in the seat pocket in front of me.

Languages used this year:

English
Spanish (with a visitor in shul)
German
Hungarian
Czech
Russian
French
Yiddish
Hebrew
Italian

Coincidences:

Being laid off, offered a fellowship to a literary seminar in Russia, and receiving a call from a close friend I haven’t heard from in years – all in a 36-hour period.
Writer Josip Novakovich not only eats at my favorite Croatian restaurant in Eastlake, Ohio, but also mentions it in his book.
Meeting an American abroad who lives where I want to move – and who wants to move where I want to leave
The coffeehouse that inspired my novel-in-progress (many characters are based on people who’ve worked there over the past 10 years) made national news again when its beloved Nun Bun was stolen.
Needing to rush to the emergency room right after my health insurance was terminated.
In the year where my wanderlust, feeling of entrapment, and overall frustration was at an all-time peak, I am able to escape town five times.

Most pleasant surprise: A news clipping of a memorial ad my grandpa’s Communist Party buddies took out in his honor in the CPUSA People’s Weekly World. (You find out the interesting stuff after they’re dead.)

Least pleasant surprise: Stumbling upon a pit of rubble that had once been a historic house, my first home where I lived on my own. Across the street, two other 1920s homes were boarded up for demolition.

Most sublime experience: Reading poetry to a class of eighth-graders, a few of whom were slumbering on their desks right in front of me and the teacher. Watching the sign language interpreter translate my poems with her hands out of the corner of my eye. Whenever I stopped to take a sip of water, she stopped to take a sip of Coke.

Worst physical sensation: