Social tales

Thursday
Had dinner with one of the writers from the Sunday writing group. We stayed till closing time. She is so lovely and positive. I’m a little in love, and I told her so.
*

Raising baby goats

A dear friend from college has two children.
Another close friend from college is trying to have a baby.
My best friend from high school just had twins.
Yesterday, the young assistant said to me, “Don’t you want children? You’d make a great mother.” She said this in all sincerity.
But I’m more comfortable with the word aunt.
My biological [...]

The next great thing

An editor was in my office. I gently chastised him for passing on my friend’s manuscript. He felt remorse, and admitted that he couldn’t yet bear to part with the book (it’s sitting in his office at home) even though he and his boss decided in the end that we weren’t the right house for [...]

Yellow orchids

Editorial assistant is steaming mad. Three of us, women, are in the hallway listening to her. Two men pass by at different points and say, “I smell a revolution brewing.” The first man looks like he wants to lead us; the second looks scared.
*
Editorial assistant starts crying through her rant. Her boss is impossible. Her [...]

A story’s progress

Early Sunday morning, I sat in an east-side Cosí café trying to get a handle on a fragment of a story I was preparing for my writing group. Something clicked around 2:00 p.m., when the foundation at the beginning started to gel. Then I reread the rest of the fragment to see what there was [...]

Barfly

Last night:
JF: w, please have a sip of my wine.
me: Girl, I’m Asian. It’s like, two sips and I’m done!
*
“You look like you frequent bars,” says the editor.
“Not above Twenty-third Street,” I say.
“Don’t you ever venture above Twenty-third?”
“No.”
“Me either.”
“Why do you need to go to a bar above Twenty-third Street?”
“The author insists. It’s like he [...]

Unintelligible chimes

I never know where to set my stories—I’m always debating between New York and Taipei—but one thing I’ve decided on lately is to be confident in writing Chinese and Chinese American characters. I don’t know how to explain it on paper, however, because for me it’s more a feeling than any cultural signifier.
I’m Chinese.
Sometimes that [...]

“I get so shy.”

I met two Donnas the other night, both vivacious and impeccably dressed.
*
G ran away from the second Donna. I think G gets nervous around women kookier than she. I’d thought they would get along just fine, but G hopped out of the cab with me, at least ten blocks away from her own stop. Donna, [...]

Sunday still life

On Sunday
Lunch in a popular Union Square diner. I take a seat at the bar—that is, my proofreading job and I take a seat at the bar.
The bartender says, “I remember you.”
The last time I saw him, I also sat at the bar, also with a proofreading job, only without makeup and my hair in [...]

Year of the rat

I am in Flushing, in my parents’ apartment. I am messing up the Post-it notes on my mother’s desk. She comes over and puts them back in order. Then she picks up the pencil holder and sets it down an inch away from the corner of the desk. I give her a kiss on the [...]

“Don’t Read Books”: The Final Meal

When J asked me the other day what I would consider to be the perfect final meal, I found it both a simple and a challenging question—simple in that I don’t require fireworks on the plate to be impressed, as one’s final meal should just be one’s favorite food cooked to perfection, but difficult in [...]