River Teeth: A Journal of Nonfiction Narrative

I might say: I am working on fifty first sentences.

Or, I am working on a list of titles for the next thing I will be working on.

Really, I am alphabetizing the books that I have moved into the room that used to be my daughter's room. She is grown now, living in another city. I am removing the nail polish from the carpet. I am working on making her room into something other than her room. Guest room, sitting room. Room for lying on the floor with the cat and looking up at the mobile I bought at an art museum gift shop, orange and yellow and red paper birds rotating around and around whenever the floor vent emits a gust of heat. Small birds connected to larger birds by invisible threads.

The window blind slats are bent, from my daughter's impatient raising and lowering of the blinds.

Otherwise, I have mostly painted over the room's problems. I paint the walls while listening to reality shows on my laptop, a show about restaurant disasters, a travel show whose host recently killed himself, and another show starring a holy man with three wives who is considering taking on a fourth. Partly, this fourth wife is the decision of the existing wives. They make it sound like a love-challenge, like it's something noble that elevates them above the rest of us, like let's see how far we can push this thing. Pretty far, as it turns out. [End Page 67]

I am working also on hope. I am working on peace—my own, not the world's; the world is, it seems, doomed. "It's a wrap," my son says. "The planet is done for. We messed up bad." One feels this, every day, this too-lateness. It is late indeed.

When I see photos of myself I always think, Wait, is that how I look now? Like one of those Older Ladies. I am one of those Older Ladies!

I am working on being patient with the literary magazine that has had my story for over a year but will still probably, inevitably, say, No thank you and sorry for the long wait! A year seems like a long time to read a story or even to read many stories.

If they ask what I am working on I could also say I am working on avoiding the pitfalls involved in teaching students who are poised to pounce at any moment, ready to point a finger at you and say THERE! YOU SAID IT! THE THING YOU WEREN'T SUPPOSED TO SAY! which might be different from the thing you weren't supposed to say yesterday BUT YOU ARE CLEARLY NOT SUPPOSED TO SAY THAT. YOU ARE CLEARLY NOT SUPPOSED TO.

Nothing is clear, my dears.

Their anger, their fragility. All these young people with anxiety disorders, migraines, depression. They are suffering from past and present traumas. I am working on saying the right thing so we can understand each other. They, also, don't always understand. They, also, don't see that their lack of understanding of what came before, and those of us who lived through it—that is also A Thing.

If they ask you what you are working on, shrug and say, I am working on A Thing.

I am also working on keeping the finches in finch food, until I discover that the finch food is attracting rats to the backyard, pairs of rats [End Page 68] with pairs of eyes that glow when I shine the flashlight on the birdfeeder at night, and then I can't feed the birds at all anymore.

The cat, declawed, is no help.

I am working on keeping my mother's antique grandmother clock running. She forgets sometimes to wind it, or winds it too much. I am working on keeping the kitchen counters clean, the laundry folded, the newspapers read. I have stacked sections of the Sunday Times in my daughter's old room, convinced I will read the sections later. The Style sections alone will take me...