His letters pull me from the sea like a line from a fishing pole: there’s a wrenching, a pulling back, a removal from the comfortable, from home, from an unthinking way of just being.
"It’s hard to stay present and stay open to the past. It’s hard to experience being here as a place I am in, and to remember that my father was also here all those years ago. Or, it’s not hard to remember—I always remember—but it’s hard to stay present to that memory in the moment I am in. (Is that ironic? That it’s hard to stay present to the past?)"
75–On the Rue de Rome.
"It’s hard to stay present and stay open to the past. It’s hard to experience being here as a place I am in, and to remember that my father was also here all those years ago. Or, it’s not hard to remember—I always remember—but it’s hard to stay present to that memory in the moment I am in. (Is that ironic? That it’s hard to stay present to the past?)"