esme

This is very long. Only read it if you're super bored.

I think there's a fine line between karma and coincidence. When we meet someone who, for example, shares our birthday, we are eager to ascribe it some greater significance than it might deserve: "Oh, you're an only child, too? Crazy!" "You love banana ice cream as much as I do? It must be fate!" Yet, chances are, you've got /something/ in common with each one of those 18 million-ish people who were born on that day--but we're thinking animals, we love to make meaning where it might not exist. We forget that a world without coincidence if infinitely less likely than one ripe with it.

That said, it often seems as though there /must be/ something at work that cannot be explained by simple interaction. Maybe these folks are on to something. I offer the following example:

About six weeks ago, I forgot to go to work. Just plumb forgot. Didn't write it down, had a vague recollection that I'd scheduled a job for an upcoming Thursday but wasn't sure which one. I called Nona to find out, then turned my phone of and went to the event that /was/ on my calendar, had been for a couple weeks, a reading at Modern Times bookstore. I was going because it sounded interesting: readings by a half-dozen of young writers, most of them from my school, including one of my classmates in fiction whose work I adore. They are all members of a literary co-op which, among other things, sets its members up with a reading once a year. This particular program, a members-only reading, was sort of an anomaly. Normally, they book more seasoned writers and have a couple members "open" for them.

It was good times, good work, and after I left I turned my phone back on to find a message from Nona saying "Umm, yeah, you're supposed to be there right now. What's the deal?" By then it was 8:30 and the job had started at seven_in Oakland_so there wasn't really any point in trying to make it. I felt like shit, but for some reason I was also wildly convinced that "this happened for a reason." Like, there was a reason I wasn't supposed to go to Oakland that night, or a reason I /was/ supposed to go to the reading.

Fast forward a few days; I'm in fiction class with the boy (we'll call him Jack just to make things easier), telling him how much I enjoyed the reading and what an awesome group it was. "You should join," he said. "Really?" "Yeah, it'd be really cool if you did." "Um, okay."

So I send in an application. A couple weeks later and it hadn't arrived (according to Jack, who is the Events Coordinator for this group.) Lamesauce. In the meantime, I am telling him, for some reason, that I had gone to this open mic called Kvetsh in January and Michelle Tea was there and I'd wished I'd brought something to read because I am secretly in love with her and harbored this fantasy of blowing her away with my writing and making fall secretly in love with me. Haha. And he said, yeah, I think every writer in San Francisco is secretly in love with her. And probably some other people too.

The following week, still no word on the app, but Jack knows I'm good for it. Then he says "Hey, guess what? We were supposed to have Michelle Tea read for Ecstatic Monkey in May but she had to cancel 'cause she's going to be in Spain. So we're trying to reschedule her for June. But anyway, I was thinking you might want to read with her."

Um. Duh.

So we finally give up on the mail and I bring him another copy of the application to class. So that's done.

Slight pause.

Remember how ,publicAnemone, sixsixty and finkelstein went in on one of Roethke's artworks together? Glad you're keeping up. The show (at Tina's gallery, Femina Potens) was up until April 1st, which was Sunday, so we went to pick up the piece that afternoon. While we were there, we poked through the zines and stuff for a bit. As we were poking, a CD by Katastrophe caught my eye. I didn't know anything about his music except that it's hip-hop, but the title of the album is hilarious (Let's Fuck, Then Talk About My Problems) and he is Michelle Tea's partner/lover person, so I bought it. It's good.

So this was Sunday afternoon. So I'm sitting at home on Sunday evening, and for some reason that I cannot recall, maybe it had to do with Michelle Tea via Katatrophe and maybe not, I remembered that Kvetsh is the first Sunday of the month. For whatever reason (L Word? Homework?) I had missed it in February and March, but there as no reason I couldn't go that night. And read something to boot.

So pA comes along. Like the big dorks that we are, we arrive around 7:45. No one is there. Eventually Kirk Read, one of the hosts, who also goes to my school, shows up and announces that it's actually starting at nine this month (and that if were at all on the pulse of this little community we would have known that, duh.) (He did not actually say this.) So we sit around drinking, people start arriving, including Michelle and Katastrophe (Rocco), who know fucking everyone. Except me. Eventually we get to talking to this dude who I'm sort of confused by because Kvetsh is a queer night and he looked pretty unqueer but that is an incredibly prejudiced thing for me to say. Turns out he's there promoting this event that's happening on April 30th, this ginormous open mic at City Hall. Then Diamond Dave walks in and pA is all, hey, you go to CCSF! And he introduces himself and is just this wonderfully tangible person of history and presence. So he and Charlie, the guy we were chatting with, are behind this huge open mic project_this is its second year_and eventually come to announce that they're doing a drawing for an open mic spot_I think they want to be as egalitarian as possible, let everyone who wants to read read, but they also kept saying how they have "learned from last year's mistakes," so I can only imagine that one of their problems may have been too many people, not enough mic time. So the come around the room and have anyone who wants to fill out a sort of raffle ticket with our contact info. In the meantime, I read my piece. As I'm going up to the stage, Rocco goes outside for a smoke. This makes me sad. I want him to love me, too. Michelle stays. I am terrified. I compliment the girl who went before me, not just to be nice but because I thought she was really amazing. She did spoken word, which is simple not a skill I have. It starts off well, but then gets worse. I begin to believe that my story is awful and boring. I can hear a percolation of people chatting, not listening. My feet turn in; I stop looking up as I read. I finish, everyone claps but does not 'woo' like they did for the last girl. I feel sucky. I go outside to smoke. Rocco is still there. I tell him I just bought his CD. He says cool. pA tells me he thought my piece was powerful. I shrug. I realize it was simply too serious for this group, that when they say "Kvetsh," they mean it. I will know better, next time. I go back in. It's time for the drawing. They ask for someone who's not in the hat to pull a name. Rocco volunteers. He pulls my name. Everyone 'woo's. So, I get to read at city hall on April 30th. Stay tuned. Watch www.poemdome.com for my faux-to.

Moving on: Monday. I need to go to the bookstore at State to rebuy a book I left on the plane to Phoenix last week. I realize I have only ever read one whole book by Michelle (Rent Girl), and heard her read a bunch of parts of another (Rose of No Man's Land). I decide I should know more about the person I am obsessed with, so I buy Valencia. I don't allow myself to read it yet because I need to be reading the book I lost. A couple hours later, I get and email from Jack, saying "This is your official invitation to read with Michelle Tea on June 14th. Let me know if you want it."

Yes.

This time, I will make her love me