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He said, "Blanket statements are generally false."  
 
Then he waited.  
 
I think it was his version of an argument and so I played along as best I could.  
 
"I hate people who say things like that," I said. "As a rule."  

Today is Eric's last day. 
 
I don't know which one of them is Eric and so I'll probably write "Which one of you was Eric?" in his farewell card. 
 
If he knew me better he'd understand.

She said, "I never know when you're being serious or when you're simply a sarcastic ass." 
 
More often than not I'm both at the same time and so it puzzles me that she shouldn't know that by now. 
 
"Then one of us needs to try harder," I replied, tapping my fingers on her desk. "I'll go first." 
 

She carried a sign that read "END THE WAR" and she handed me a pamphlet containing the same, simple message. 
 
"Which war are you looking to end?" I asked as I accepted the paper. "There are several, as I'm sure you know." 
 
"Every war," she replied without hesitation. 
 
I wondered aloud if she might not then want to consider changing her message to an even more elegant "END WAR." It struck me that she wanted to go after the concept more than any particular implementation. 
 
"No-one would ever talk to me if I did that," she explained. "Plus we've already printed the signs." 
 
And so that's how we agreed to keep it to just the one war for today. 
 

"Shall I bring the guacamole out first or would you like me to wait on that?" she asked in a pleasant tone. 
 
"Whatever," he shrugged. "Just it bring it out, honey. I don't give a shit." 
 
She left their table and stopped by mine on her way to the kitchen. 
 
"I'll give you twenty dollars if you put a booger in their guacamole," I offered. 
 
"Thanks just the same," she replied with the hint of a smile. "This one's on the house." 

I'm traveling with fashionistas who stink of chocolate and magazine perfume.  
 
One asked if she could read what I was writing. 
 
"I doubt it," I said. "But we should try that." 
 

I ordered the lamb and she lingered on my face for a good three seconds longer than I would have thought she might. 
 
Risks and causalities.  
 
We'll assume both when we pretend to know what we really want. 
 

I once followed an opera singer's voice through the side streets of Paris. 
 
I found her perched on the sill of an opened window that might have just as easily been closed on that given day. 
 
I watched and listened. She smiled and sang.  
 
This was the day an angel sang to a stranger.  
 
A most unlikely private audience indeed. 
 
 

I often go for weeks without pondering the things that I'm advised to take as the gravest of matters. 
 
This is either a quality or a condition. 
 
I've not yet decided who should make that call. 
 

People share their tales of near-misses with death enthusiastically; recklessly even. 
 
These are easy. 
 
Talk to me about your near-misses with life. That's where poetry lives.

I carry a small, ruled Moleskine with me nearly everywhere I go.  
In the back I write these random thoughts. In the front I jot notes for my memoirs.  
 
By the time I reach the middle I suspect I'll no longer need either.

People were very upset with me yesterday. Then I remembered that they let George Bush be president here twice. So now I'm upset with them. --C.W.

I saw a pelican eating a hot dog in Central Park. This obviously means something. More to the pelican than to me, of course. But something. --C.W.

I was as shocked as anyone by my ouster from Mrs. Liebowitz's water aerobics group. Somewhat relieved, I won't lie. But it surprised me. --C.W.

I spent $40.00 on a bag of food for a dog that eats extension cords. That's still probably cheaper than a bag of extension cords I suppose. --C.W.

It was probably the worst possible time for her to discover her latex allergy. 
 
"It could be worse," he thought. "I could be allergic too." 
 
He never shared that with her. 
 
They're still friends, or at least they claim to be. 
 
I'm not buying it.

She's worried. She says I'm going about this all wrong. 
 
"I know," I told her. "That's fine." 
 
"Well that's part of it," she added. "The not caring, I mean. It's all a part of doing it wrong, isn't it?" 
 
"Sure," I said. "Not caring is part of it." 
 
We'll talk about this later.

Looking out across the city she said, "The world seems so small on foggy days like this, doesn't it?" 
 
"I can't say," I admitted. "But I might suggest that you run your thoughts by the men sleeping on cardboard in the alley. You know - for validation." 
 
Perspective is easy. Especially when you don't need it.

We flew in to San Francisco as we've done a dozen times over these past few months. 
 
Our tiny jet is more a floating foyer than a formal jetliner and, at 40,000 feet, the rules and conventions of commercial air travel simply do not apply. 
 
"I'll bet I could get that door opened before you could kill me," she said in a voice that she would likely have described as playful. 
 
I finished my scotch, turned my seat toward hers, and unbuckled my restraint.  
 
"Ready?" I asked. 
 
I'll bet we never speak of this again.

They've decided to start speaking to me now. I've been in and out of their lives for a year so and, in their defense, I've never really put forth the effort either. 
 
"And so I'm suddenly more approachable?" I asked the hairiest of the group. "How does that happen?" 
 
"You're neither more nor less approachable," he explained. "We've just grown accustomed to the fact that you're here some days. That's all." 
 
He didn't realize that he'd just described nearly every relationship of my adult existence. 
 
I'm not about to tell him either. 
 
Not just yet.

Janie's girl has moved to Brooklyn to chase her dreams of personal training and custodial services. 
 
So few people appreciate how well Vassar prepares Midwestern princesses for what the rest of us know as the real world.

A small hawk, with a rodent in its clutches, flew in to the picture window not once but twice and made quite a ruckus. 
 
That bird doesn't need my approval or respect nevertheless I have concerns for its well-being. I wonder aloud if I've just seen the worst hawk in the county if not even the whole world. 
 
It occurs to me that there have to be hawks who are simply better at being birds than others. Indeed, somewhere on the planet is the world's worst hawk. 
 
It's probably arrogance to assume that none of this matters to a bird.

As we jostled for position in the airport check-in mosh pit I noticed an older man in a wheelchair who seemed to have trouble finding his way. 
 
"I wonder if we might not want to make room to let this gentleman pass," I suggested to a frazzled stranger. 
 
"Screw that," he replied. "If God had wanted him to have special rights he never would have put him in a damned wheelchair, would he?" 
 
In that single, bitter capsule I tasted the seeds of book burnings, hate crimes, and the false prophets who have violated the trust of a generation in the name of nationalist entitlement. 
 
Special rights indeed.  
 
I'm embarrassed enough for both of us. Carry on.

It happens that, when I encounter colleagues in the hall, I open my mouth to greet them but no sound comes out.  
 
Invariably I over-compensate and, when meeting the next person, greet them explosively as I might imagine an angry Grover or Fred Sanford would do. 
 
I'm considering a new system of hand signals or glottal grunts to pass as hallway platitudes but have not yet settled on a marketing plan.  
 
And so my challenge for these trying days shall be to socialize the grunt. 

"I would rather spend an evening with my dog than with any of you," I told them. "No offense and nothing personal. I've known the dog longer and she clearly thinks I'm brilliant." 
 
"Perhaps we should have invited your dog instead," he replied curtly. 
 
"So I am correct in my assumptions," I continued. "You are addicted to rejection."

He held out his hand and said, "Help me, brother. Ain't nobody care about nobody or nothing these days. Show me you care, brother." 
 
I think that's what he said anyway. I was on the phone.

Something had her mind's eye. 
 
"Do you remember the time in the old house when my cello caught fire?" she asked. "You ran downstairs, slipped on the cat puke, broke your toe and burned away most of your hair. Do you remember that?" 
 
I'd spent eight days in a local hospital. The incident fits among my least forgettable. 
 
"Vaguely," I replied, peeking over my glasses. "Why do you ask?" 
 
"No reason, really," she said. "Hearing Yo Yo Ma always makes me think of that cello is all."

I met a man yesterday whose claim to fame was to have appeared as "The Virgin" on the American television reality show "The Bachelorette." 
 
I thanked him enthusiastically for his time and likely came across as somewhat star-struck. 
 
The truth is that he helped me along a certain path to a distantly vague inner peace. 
 
No matter how hopeless my situation may become today, tomorrow, or in an undetermined future, at least I'll never have to speak of my days as the unpicked virgin. 
 
Thank you Roger. Or Jim. 
 
I seem to have forgotten his name.

We were chatting about the big, square states in the middle and Nebraska came to mind. 
 
"Nebraska?" she said, thoughtfully. "Isn't that the one by Chicago? The one where your cat shat all over the front seats?" 
 
"It is," I confirmed. "And I'm pretty sure your recollection is precisely how the good people of the Husker State would prefer to be remembered."