by Robbie Imes
Last night it rained and it reminded me of New York. Of old beer and whisky, of cigarettes and subway stops.
Last night it rained and I felt cold. I always forget how much I love the rain. It comes at you hard, no cares, and goes the same.
Sometimes the blinds in my room move, the air from the fan rustles them. I wake up and think it’s the rain, but it’s just another sunny day.
The rain reminds me of the past. Of being little, and later, walking under an umbrella on my way to work. Up and down the stairs, inside out.
Read Moreby Robbie Imes
Smoking is a headache before you open your eyes
That ocular throbbing, snooze button lies.
Smoking is thirsty, cotton mouth grumble,
The wrong shoes on, down stairs stumble.
Smoking and bourbon, the night before
Early night promise, but home at four.
Read Moreby Robbie Imes
I’ve hated you from the beginning.
When I woke up at three o’clock in the morning with a slight pain in my back. When I awoke again at four-thirty and looked outside, the still, dead tree indicating another cold day. Nothing had changed. Spring had come, but it was you holding it at bay.
The night before I feared you. As I went to bed, sayonara social media friends, the pit in my stomach grew. I knew you were there, wicked. You waited for me in the dark. You wanted to devour me. And I sort of wanted to die. I shut my eyes.
Read MoreBack in July, I wrote at length about my hopes and fears for the first student reading I’d be hosting at The New School. The story was published with Slice magazine, and I ended it on a relatively positive note, saying we’ll have to wait till September to see how it goes. Well September happened and my followup essay never saw the light of day (my Slice column was transformed into a monthly Q&A). So here, at long last, is my follow up. I hope you’re ready for a tale of gut-wrenching humiliation, because spoiler warning, that’s exactly what happened.
Read MoreImagine you’re sending some personal emails between busy Monday meetings, casually describing to the recipient your recent and brutal knife murder of both a dog and a man. The ads generated in the subsequent email chain would likely be relevant to knife sharpening, or maybe animal care. However, if you use a racial slur, Google would serve you no ads at all.
This is what happened to Patrick Bateman, the infamous killer from Brett Easton Ellis’s much loved and hated anti-consumerist, 80s bloodbath, American Psycho. Well, it’s what would’ve happened had he been real and in 2014. Oh, and sending emails regarding his depravity.
Read MoreI always try to give the warning: I only listen to about half of what people say only about half of the time. It’s not my fault, though, and I have no ill intentions whatsoever. It’s just the way it is. I’m made this way. I’ve tried to remedy it, I’ve tried to be a more careful listener, but this is who I am.
You understand, right?
The upside of my condition is that I’m seemingly free from having to process the minutia of many things, mostly conversations, and I can focus on the important elements of the situation: the happiness, the anger, the frustration, the hand gestures and vocal intonations, the jubilation, the sadness, or the crusted booger on the upper lip. Whatever feeling is being expressed, and the vulgar humanity associated with it, I’m there. I’m present. I understand. It’s when I have to remember key narrative components like the names of the parties involved, the times of day, the color of the hair, or, especially, follow some sort of timeline, that’s where I falter.
Read Moreby Randall Lotowycz
The first time Penny was pinched, she was on the men’s floor in a crowded department store mere days before Christmas. Dozens, if not hundreds, of shoppers were buzzing by her, heading to the registers or some clothing rack. She was looking for a particular type of tie for her boyfriend, Morris. It didn’t need to be a specific brand, pattern, or color; Penny was in fact searching for a tie of a specific length and width to suit her boyfriend’s occasionally obsessive-compulsive tendencies. He preferred his ties to stop precisely at the middle of his belt buckle when tied in a Windsor knot and insisted that the widest part of the tie be no wider than 2 3/4 inches.
Read MoreOne of the paragraphs in this NYtimes.com article about the writer Franz Kafka begins, “We all know how he ate his food: he “Fletcherized” it, chewing each bite a hundred times before swallowing. He was almost six feet tall, meticulously groomed and preternaturally self-absorbed.” That got me thinking on the topic of writers, and creatives in general. We are a crazy, neurotic bunch.
Read MoreThe term “hipster” has out-stayed its welcome across all media and casual conversations alike. I’m all for labels when they apply. Sometimes, stereotypes exist for a reason. Clichés can be nice and comfortable. Streamline and standard is just a-ok. Categories are nice and neat. But other times, it’s just a simple lack of creativity. It’s also lazy and cringe inducingly inane. Every time I hear or read the term “hipster,” it’s like someone’s right-wing conservative parent saying “those club drugs,” “homosexuals,” “that rock music” or “blacks.” It just sounds…stupid. So please, writers, cultural commentators, casual observers and the general public, stop using it.
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