Category: how to win the lottery

“i go for a walk around downtown and: steinbach, closed, kitchen etc., closed. of course, abernathy’s, closed! and you know i want, i really want not to just click on amazon, but what can…? because like amazon’s nowhere so they can be anywhere, and sure that’s handy but what i want, what i’m missing is what — here-ness, ok?, herity. damn, there isn’t even a word for it, not a one that gets close, it must be important… but that’s it, you know; the grace of the heart that comes from something being here, just, right, here. where you can maybe drag a finger across it. see it in a window reflection. not when i want it, not when i need it, but enduring, earth-solid, a part of—”

“the gods of the valleys are not the gods of the hills.”

“the solitude of vermont was weighing on me; the community was mythological; in reality life was isolating, each household its own entity.”

suck shit, sufjan stevens. (#4)

“the winter starts straight after all saints’ day. that’s the way here; the autumn takes away all her tools and toys, shakes off the leaves—they won’t be needed anymore—sweeps them under the field boundary, and strips the colors from the grass until it goes dull and gray. then everything becomes black against white: snow falls on the plowed fields.”

we talk to stephen markley, author of the deluge, about prescience, cynicism vs. optimism, and mutual friends.