Julie

I keep this image behind my eyelids, which occasionally resembles who I am in the mirror, but never in pictures. I cannot swear that the two have ever converged, if I have ever looked in fact as I do in assumption.

I read that the milestones of age come at forty-four and some year in one's seventies--I did not pay attention to which, though I have a vague feeling it was seventy-three; anyway, far enough off that I can be permitted the sacrament of not paying attention. Forty-four, however, was pressing and present.

I focus on physical ailments and slips of memory, fearing one will become something chronic. Does my back hurt because of the strain of moving for a week or because I have become Old? I take a twenty-minute, maybe two-mile run through my new neighborhood (some less upscale houses than I wished), and I feel the effect for days. I am no slouch when it comes to exercise, doing it daily, but sore muscles come as a surprise.

I understand averages and clickbait, having attended college and written my share of sensational articles for too few cents a word; I know forty-four is not the prescription for senescence, that I am in good health according to my doctor and smart scale, aside from some cosmetic imperfections. Still, I look at my rollerblades and imagine how perfectly goofy I would look using them outside the roller rink (possibly there as well) and how the wrong collision could give me knee pain that could be used to predict storms. I can rattle off detailed nuances and jokes about paranormal cases. When Amber looks at me askance because I've forgotten something they told me, I feel borderline senile. Is this how it starts?

The sun returns a bit more each day and, with it, typically the majority of my intellectual prowess. My mood has been balanced. This does not obviate the concern that I am a stock character in my life.

I dress not so much for my style — I'm not sure I have a style at present — but because it's comfortable at my job. I used to wear at least a sports coat there, but that was a disguise that fooled incarcerated tweens, who only knew the look of authority but not its reality. They responded to slacks as a conditioned response. My murderous students now may look at shoes--inadequately expensive--but they would not care to perceive anything about me. When I get a bad haircut, no one realizes it for weeks.

I see myself beyond the physical. I am an underread fantasy author. I am a middling teacher — or I have students who do not challenge the skills I have in reserve. I collect enamel pins and fountain pens. I try to rid my comedic repertoire of direct references to media (in contrast to my coworkers, who recite the same five Jeff Dunham jokes every day). I do not feel like some unique being in all the world, merely another forgettable iteration of a theme.

Does that make me a cliche or an archetype? Neither is worth coveting, though the former is more pejorative. Neither are discrete people, just familiar shells. Their actions are stereotypical and predictable.

If I am so by the book, there are a few surprises left. I will persist in my job, feeling mildly superior to more than half of the other teachers, who are broken, and I fear that it makes me broken that I think that. I will keep writing, and I will continue to be unread, as that is my lot in life. I no longer have fear about my writing. Still, I am aware that I am likely relegated to being a talent largely ignored. Even posthumously, I don't have great hopes of being a writer of interest. I will not cease to be quoted, which is somewhat interesting, but that hardly makes a legacy.

I can list things that twist the basics, but they do not make me an original character. I am well versed in witchcraft and the paranormal--and the latter is presently the subject of my most popular book--but so what? If you encountered that character in a movie, you would not lean forward, looking forward to his adventures. He could end up collateral damage before the end, but that's what happens to his type.

It may be a matter of where I want to put my energy.

I live in a development of little concrete boxes, some of which are rundown, though Red Hook does not have a bad area. I have a spouse and a few cats. Granted, Amber is a nonbinary genius, but we still aren't far enough into making me something special, and that would only be seizing upon a loved one to give myself uniqueness by proxy.

Perhaps it was always this way, from an anxious, gifted kid too panicky to assert his needs to the goody-two-shoes in a biker jacket he would never fit to the twenty-something nag who couldn't let himself participate in his life while imagining he was a free spirit to the thirty-something trying to wrangle mental illness and an early-onset mid-life crisis. And yet, as my teenage rebellion was so mild and guided by what I bought at Hot Topic, I was sold a cliche in black pleather. So much of what made me different comes off as so stock that the casting notice would not need a predicate.

But I am coming to love my concrete box, and I may die there someday. I have love. I have my literary talent, which I will insist is not cliche. In the personal, I am irreplaceable. In the world, I am one in a million, so there are about eight thousand men who could fill my shoes without anyone much noticing.

Even in my angst, I am trite. How dare I think that I'm the first man to be insecure about his hair loss or his impact on the world, especially as I cannot promise my concern is not weighted toward the wrong one.

I don't know how to shake myself out of being so usual. We all want to feel that we are special, even when one of our highest aspirations is fitting in. As I grew, I understood that there were enough things about me that were odd, so fitting in was never going to be my forte. In elementary school, a kid called me weird, and I thanked him, which is a peculiar thing to do, but it essentially set the course for my life. If I was weird, I was not like them.

Cliches haven't lived; they just played out a script because it's easier than writing originally. This isn't to say that the people who I felt stepped outside of the stream are not now leading banal lives. The blessing of social media is knowing how many of the iconoclasts are now paunchy insurance agents and MLM hausfraus.

I chose well-trod roads, blaming the woman in my bed for that. The truth was, I was scared to try anything outside that. I was afraid to break free from the perceptions of others and what was considered safe. I was jealous and a scold. I feared external judgment until I reached a point where I had sanded off the edges that might have led people to think of me. Sharp construction fills out a person.

Julie, Amber's mother, requested in September that Amber and I escort her to see the Irish sketch comedy troupe Foil, Arms, and Hog in New York City. I had no interest in the group — I have seen their like with more convenience — and it would mean burning up two of my personal days. Still, I would otherwise squirrel them away to use in May before they expire, likely only staying home on a Friday or Monday or prolonging a state holiday. Going on this adventure would at least constitute something out of the ordinary, perhaps even weird. (When my supervisor saw my request in September, she did question why I would do this.)

The Amtrak train to the City is already packed, making it impossible to sit together. Amber and I sit across an aisle from one another, them next to a Black teenager with AirPods who utterly ignores my wife to their cell phone games, me next to a white businessman who ignores me for his spreadsheets until an hour into the journey. At this point, he starts complimenting the neglected patina of my Doc Martens. I try to write on the train, but it's a futile effort of scribbles until I give up reading a book I'm meant to review and then take a brief nap. I will not be getting proper sleep for many hours, but it would be mainstream to care about such things.

As a teenager, I dated a young woman from the other end of the train line. I took it every weekend to her until I got my own car, coming to relish the midnight freedom and the lull of the tracks, reading Kurt Vonnegut and Anne Rice, feeling guilty when the conductor asked for my ticket (though I almost always had one), and knowing I could go to a different world if I stayed on the train rather than letting it bring me home. (I suppose my parents picked me up from the train station. How else would I have gotten there?)

Julie, Amber, and I exit at Penn Station. A man directs us to a line, which leads to a constant row of taxis. Ours is a yellow Tesla. Amber insists I sit in front to give them and their mother more room in the back, though there is enough room for three if I inhale before entering.

The driver, smelling pleasantly of cannabis, looks at a screen that shows every pedestrian and vehicle as ghosts in gray. We are going only a mile or so from the restaurant. Amber and I would have gladly walked if we had come down on an earlier train, but that is not feasible at this hour if we want to make our show. When the driver stops (or I think he is the driver, but the car may be partially self-driving), all the people on his screen vibrate as though about to explode.

The City provides such a startling phenotypic diversity that I step outside my archetype. (I do not fall into the cliche of tourist, especially in New York City, the grace of being largely nondescript.) Eating at the Carnegie Diner and seeing a comedy show is not the height of exhilaration. Still, it is something more than being in bed at nine, asleep by nine-thirty after reading a book, happy to be awake before six because it means I can get steps in before leaving for work, there to do paperwork to fail to teach juvenile felons while trying to steal a few minutes to write or edit. Also, the platter I am served when I ask for a chicken sandwich is so massive that I assure Julie I have just eaten more than a day's worth of calories and might genuinely die if I try to finish her fries. I could sit and watch a single person for ten minutes straight to get their mannerisms down and render them into something that I can recall in prose. I would spend all day falling in love if I lived in New York City, too scattered by options to ever be heartbroken.

At one point, a young woman leaves the restaurant. She could be anywhere from fifteen to twenty-five. That's the way of these things. She is a teenager trying to look older or a woman already trying to look like a teenager. She's outside with her friends, who are also in this nebulous between, wearing a tartan skirt, implying a Catholic school but not shouting it. The clothing is too fashionable for that. She catches my eye and holds it through the window. It is not a look of opprobrium as though I'd been checking her out--she can tell that I wasn't--but of her interest. She looks at me as though I, too, am something fascinating. It feels almost like a compliment that we looked at each other and shared an intimacy that only exists between two people who are wondering what the other is like, aware we will never ask. I vividly remember decades ago being on the subway for a few stops while this punky woman and I openly studied each other when the etiquette might have been a sideways or diverted glance, especially in this paradigm. It could have been attraction, but we were both on the subway beside someone else, so it was only intrigue and wondering. (I have never been on the subway alone. I do not know how I would do that or why.) Had we been unaccompanied, we would have spoken to each other. I cannot say it is better that we didn't, that this is some holy memory because it was unspoken, only that I remember her now and might not have otherwise. (From fourteen to [redacted], I approached more women than I care to remember, and almost every interaction was pleasant or, at worst, neutral.)

"I wonder how harrying dating in New York City is," I ask the table, meaning I would not understand monogamy with such a sample set--not that many are stumbling over themselves to date a skinny, 44-year-old, bespectacled white guy. I would have a ton of competition even to be noticed. The diversity of styles is a form of self-expression, a desire to be seen, and the freedom that comes with knowing one will not be.

At Carnegie Hall, Julie buys me an enamel pin of the venue, as these are something I collect, and there are no fountain pens.

Julie knew this comedy group more than I could. I intentionally did not watch their material so I would not be tainted if they did any recurrent sketches. They tend to be active when it comes to audience participation, especially for those in the front row, so Julie wanted us to be well outside the ability for Foil, Arms, and Hog to select us for torment.

The first twenty minutes of the show are indeed them picking on people, taking wallets, and throwing coats on some woman. It's amusing enough, but they should start the show so we can finish it and I can go home. It's not entirely an act, how long this goes on. They're carried away with their jollity, reminding the others that they should get on stage, then falling into another bit.

There is something to be said for the tiny box seats at Carnegie Hall. One expects plush chairs, but instead, it feels more like entering a coat closet that overlooks a stage. The chairs are comfortable enough, but they're not fixed to the floor. We moved them around to be a little less close to the call of the edge.

The comedians' Irish accents are just strong enough that I struggle to understand them. I laugh at the gestures and the broadness, even though, at this distance, they are no bigger than the joint of one of my fingers.

I would not have gone out of my way to see this troupe, though it's impressive enough they are playing Carnegie Hall. The place is about as packed as it's going to be. Julie bought an extra ticket in case we wanted to bring someone but hearing her say this was the first time that it was suggested to me that there might be a fourth member of our crew.

At intermission, as I am leaving the bathroom, I see a man who looks like my cousin Jesse. Then I realize it is my cousin Jesse. It feels strange to be in such a distant place from my everyday context and run into my bluegrass-playing, actress-married, long-haired cousin. He is surprised to see me, too, and tells me that my mother and father had seen him the week before at one of his shows. He is here with some friend from Dublin, but not one who is related to the performers.

I've learned to be good at ending these interactions, so I say it is good to see him and return to my seat for another hour of almost comprehensible comedy. (They are better than most at their schtick; don't let this seem like I didn't find them hilarious, simply not "lose two personal days and take a train to the City" hilarious.)

We get out of the show and fumble at the etiquette of getting a taxi. (An usher tells us to take a left when we exit the door, but no taxis are waiting, and we do not think raising our hands will produce results.) The ambient haze clinging to the 15th floors of skyscrapers when we entered is now a proper, unrelenting rain. It is not enough that we will drown, but enough that the now inevitable dash to Grand Central Station will take on added indignity. Fortunately, Amber and their mother are not plagued by indecision, which would be intolerable now. Amber navigates by app. It doesn't feel like it will take long, but I enjoy walking alone when given the opportunity. With others, it's dicey, as I tend to dart ahead to scout and focus on the destination. Why are you talking? Why are you pausing? Why are you waiting for the crossing light on an empty street? We have places to be!

Julie begins to give up, saying we could wait until nearly midnight for the next train. As my journey home will add another two and a half hours, let us not prolong it.

We arrive a few minutes before the train leaves the station, manage to buy tickets and find seats together. After eleven, most people who want to get out of the City have already left, so the train has a smattering of riders, all of whom keep to themselves and are mostly quiet. I am still wired from the preceding day and cannot rest, though I ought to, given that I have to drive nearly an hour through the night once we return to Poughkeepsie.

One of my persistent concerns in the City is when I will leave. Usually on Metro-North, meaning I am beholden to a schedule with a dearth of generosity. Slipping onto the train always feels like relief and accomplishment, bringing me back to the paradigm of cliches. I would not have done well if raised in the City, though there is next to no chance I would recognize who I would have become. I am so much a product of my environment that I am neurotic about being a product of my environment. The sheer variety of New York City, the daily possibilities, might give me fatal choice paralysis or the necessity of a brightly colored carapace that would make it impossible to move freely.

"I have had a few friends who moved to the city," I say to Julie and Amber. "It was never for keeps. They would be here a year or two, then they would flee for better climes, never to return. I don't think the City is a place anyone stays for long, at least not if you didn't start there."

Neither of them contradicts this. I cannot fathom what either would do in the City in the long term except find a way to get out of the City as quickly as possible.

"It was a good night overall, even if I am damp from the rain," I say.

"That's what people do on New York City dates," says Julie, "walk in the rain. That's the trope."

Damn it, it is. I can't avoid the cliches.

last watched: Preacher
reading: Authors of the Impossible