Category: local

Wrong side of the sunrise

It is just after 4 AM. I think I am going to go to bed soon, but I feel like there is something urgent lurking under the fog of my exhaustion and although I think it is unlikely that I will be able to get it out, I am pushing myself to stay awake for as long as possible in the hope that it will break through.

The last time I went to sleep was at 9 AM on Monday morning, after staying awake through all of Sunday night. I can’t remember the last time I pulled an all-nighter, but this time it felt good. Just after 6 o’clock, it occurred to me that the sun was going to rise soon, so I drove to Goldsboro as fast as I could and sat on the riverbank as the sun ascended past the horizon. Unfortunately, in my sleep deprived state I had neglected to consider the cloud cover, and while there was a small band of sky that turned a lovely pink color, the sunrise itself was less than satisfying.

Additionally, I’d forgotten how loud the morning can be. I savor the night for its quiet, and I tend to think of the early morning in the same way. While it was free of human noise, though, the cacophony of the birds this morning was enough that I had a feeling similar to that of being at a concert or a loud bar, when the volume is so great and the quality so discordant that it permeates your brain, destroying the capacity for coherent thought. This was no gentle chirping, but a full on aural assault.

To maintain the peaceful center I’d achieved during my night of solitude and had hoped to enhance through communion with nature, I focused instead on the soft and placid steam rising slowly, almost meditatively, from the TMI towers. I let it carry me up, sometimes curling around the flared edges of the concrete walls before fading into the less graceful clouds that covered the sky.

I noted once, in high school, that from certain angles, the TMI clouds were obtrusive enough to block the sunrise from view. I resented them for it. This morning, I was grateful for their calming presence.

New Poetry

As the title of this post would imply, I’ve updated the poetry section. Some of them are new, some of them are old. What they all have in common is that I read them last night at The Alley. They’re even in the order in which I read them.

As a side note, the reading last night went very well. Snow surprised me by having Sara Bozich come in to introduce me, which was very cool. Sara and I were very close in high school as we were both discovering a love for writing. While I cringe to think about some of the things I wrote back then, having friends who shared my passion was important (as, of course, it still is) and passing notes full of poetry back and forth throughout the day did a lot to keep me sane.

Maybe a year or two before Sara and I were passing notes in German class, the father of a friend of mine brought home a box of chapbooks by a co-worker of his named Gene Hosey. It was just starting to occur to me that maybe I thought poets were kinda cool when I saw that box, and though I don’t think I ever did read the chapbook, it was my first introduction to the idea that there were some of these kinda-cool-poet-folks in a world at least adjacent to mine, if not actually in my world. Last night was the first time I saw Gene read at any length and he very much reinforced this crazy idea I have that poets are pretty okay. His work is sharp, funny, human, and crazy. I spoke with him a bit last night, and my impression is that he is much like his poetry. It was an honor to be featured with him.

Self-promotion

Poetry at The Alley

I probably should have mentioned this earlier but, well, I didn’t.

I’m going to be a co-feature at Poetry at The Alley this coming Saturday, along with Harrisburg’s first Poet Laureate, Gene Hosey.

It’s a good venue and we’re going to have lots of fun, so come join us! If you’d like more info, send me an email or follow the above link and call the restaurant itself.

Poetry at The Alley

Last night marked the launch of Poetry at The Alley, Keith Snow’s new venue hosted, appropriately, at a small restaurant called The Alley on Second. The debut event was originally to have taken place on December 6th, but was cancelled due to snow, making January 3rd the premiere. Julia Tilley and Randy Gross, originally scheduled to read last month, will instead be featured at a special reading taking place on January 17th.

I got there late last night, as the reading started at 7:15 and I had to work until 8:00, but I arrived during the mid-reading break, so it worked out well. Snow has opted to assign a theme to the evenings, and this month’s was “Henna Tattoos & Haiku Too.” Henna tattoos were available for purchase from the proprietors of the restaurant and though I did not get one, guest host Emily Rice proudly displayed hers and it was beautiful. Few haiku were read, at least while I was there, but it was an evening of solid poetry, graced by many regulars to Harrisburg readings, a few we all love but don’t see nearly enough, and even some who I, at least, had never seen before. One of the last group presented so well that even the occupants of the table next to ours, there for the food and largely uninterested in the poetry, commented on how much they enjoyed him.

Despite a very few minor hitches — trouble finding winners for the many door prizes and noise from the aforementioned table really being the only two that come to come to mind — the evening went remarkably well for a first time event, and was equally well attended.

Poetry at The Alley has room to mature, but if tonight is any indication it will do so beautifully as its relationships with the restaurant and the community become more defined and the reading develops and character and flavor of its own.

Poetry at The Alley takes place at 7:15 PM on the first Saturday of every month at The Alley on Second (entrance on Blackberry St). For more information, contact Yvonne Moosa, 717-233-7107.

Vietnamese Food

Thanks to Snow for introducing me to some excellent Vietnamese food at Pho Pasteur on 29th. I so enjoyed our Wednesday lunch that my mom and I went back for dinner the next day. Vietnamese bears a resemblance to other Asian foods, most notably Chinese and Thai, but is less greasy than Chinese and a little bit simpler than most Thai flavors I’ve had. Snow says he goes for the soups every time, but I very much enjoyed my chicken, onion, and ginger stir fry — with large quantities of hoison and chili sauces. The shrimp and pork rolls, ordered sans pork, were also interesting and delicious, encased in a rice paper with a consistency somewhere between rubber and flesh, but in a good way. Anyway, I highly recommend it!


[ Yahoo! Maps ]


Map of
Pho Pasteur
560 S 29th St
Harrisburg PA 17104

Art & Tires

I Gallery Walked my way through Harrisburg with Johanna today, in yet another example of Harrisburg being far cooler than I thought it was.

To be honest, there was not that much art I thought was overly impressive, and we saw only a tiny fraction of what was offered, but there were some beautiful pieces and it was a new and interesting activity that neither one of us had ever done before. I’m not an art critic so I won’t even try to describe what we saw, but some of my favorites were at the Gallery at Walnut Place and the Center for Women’s Creative Expression. I was surprised that I enjoyed so much at the Women’s Center, I usually find art that tries to depict the suffering of poor womynkind and the like to be contrived and whiny, but there was some powerful photography. There was also some crap, but that’s to be expected. There was also some great stuff in the atrium at Strawberry Square by “emerging artists”. I wish I still had the list from that exhibit so I could mention specific artists by name, but, alas, I was short sighted and threw it out.

Anyway, I had a good time, it definitely helped move along my mission to learn the city by the end of the year, and made me aware of some spaces I didn’t previously know about. It was also very good to spend time with Johanna, and, as always, good to hang out with the illustrious Snow family.

The other highlight of my day was the acquisition and installation of four shiny new tires. I’m actually kind of proud about this.

Before I was allowed to get my driver’s license, my mother required that I be able to change a tire. After I demonstrated that I could indeed do this, though, I hadn’t had to use my apparently uncommon ability in several years, thanks to a combination of boyfriends and AAA. Part of my single life and quest for independence/self-sufficience has been a desire to handle crises — bit or tiny — on my own. While I’ve handled everything without the help of a boyfriend, I seem to have always had to enlist help from either my sister or my parents, which is less than satisfying. Other than rides from and to the tire place, though, I handled this one without assistance. I didn’t think I was going to be able to, simply because of strength issues, but I finally got the hubcap off, loosened the lugnuts, did the jacky thing with the car, got the lugnuts (lugnut is a funny word) all the way off, and then (and this was the hardest part) pried the tire off the axle or wheel or whatever the part that the tire’s actually lugnutted to is called, which it was completely rusted to. Then I put the spare tire on, but that was the easy part. The whole thing is pretty basic and rather silly, but I’m pleased and feel a little more like an independent woman. AND I now realize just how badly I needed new tires — the car is a dream to drive now, smooth and easy to steer!