A Chance Meeting...

"Not greatest, thou-- not first, not last-- but near."
(Hart Crane)


A few weeks ago, I turned 31, and without thinking I posted a "call for presents" on this site.


I expected (almost) nothing...


But oddly, a package arrived, with no card. Just a package addressed to me, Laurel "Birthday Girl" Snyder.


Inside was a book called "A Chance Meeting."


I just started to read it tonight, and it's all about the intertwined nature of writerly lives, about the ships passing in the night... the six degrees of Henry James, Mark Twain, Zora Neale Hurston, Norman Mailer, etc.


WAY cool, and THANK YOU to whomever sent it...


But it gets me to thinking about the intertwindedness of my iown nterlife, my blogoshpere, and my "real" world too.


And beyond that, it gets me to thinking about my absolute need... to pass occasional ships in the night, ships that resemble my own hull. My own late-at-night, early-thirties, kid's-book-reading, word-play ship-self.


Thank you for being a ship, whomever you are. And to all of you who can't keep your clothes looking nice, who drink too much wine and wear slips and listen too closely to lyrics and correct ad copy when you read magazines... who think about going back for another degree and make soup and cut your hair on impulse...