06.02.09

i love the way francis strand (of how to learn swedish in 1000 difficult lessons, a beautifully written blog about his life in stockholm) introduces people: on his site, they are "the pop star" or "A. the TV producer," and i'm always reminded of nineteenth-century novels, with their lady w------s and dukes of b------. nicknames aren't nearly as poetic, though they're certainly useful if, say, all of one's acquaintances are attorneys (perhaps especially if all of one's acquaintances are attorneys) - and my use of actual names is, let's be honest, not sexy at all. think of the possibilities, though...


a dirty dozen: people who've popped up in my life this year

01 the feng shui specialist who urges me to keep a little pig in the upper left corner of my desk
02 the vampire bat hunter
03 the hypnotherapist (who told great stories about both his office dog and mesmer)
04 the kinky sex writer who publishes under a pseudonym and appears at her readings in character
05, 06 the politician's son and daughter
07 the esperanto expert who passed around a hip flask full of liqueur
08 the environmental consultant who met his wife watching italian films at an embassy in indonesia
09 the iconic fashion designer's confidante
10 the classical violinist who organizes die-ins
11 the attorney* with an alter ego in a bluegrass band
12 the secretly evil celebrity chef


terribly mysterious, no? what characters have waltzed through your narrative recently?


*there's no escaping those attorneys.

1 comment:

Amanda Bruns said...

Nine is my favorite. It makes me happy to my toes.