A noirish weekend in New York many Novembers ago comes to mind on this mysterious day, more suited to an evening post than Sunday morning, but these fall where they will fall, like the words escaping from my fingers and appearing on the screen before you now. Originally, this was going to be the day I posted our recent Virginia adventures, but in writing them they have taken on an extended life of their own, so they’ll be here in a string of posts slated for next weekend.
For now, the mystery of a mask worn by the elusive Mr. Oud, who was last seen lighting a candle and whispering a prayer or a curse – and when you think about it those two seemingly-opposed items are just the same thing with a different perspective: a wish.
Mr. Oud will return in a bit, at least a brief glimpse of who we think he is, who we think he might be, who we think of when we think of him. He spins spirals of words, of prepositional clauses, of teasing and tantalizing ends that seem to be about to happen and then never do, and when they do it’s so far from where we thought we were heading, and so far from where it all began, that we’re left breathless in anticipation of a still-not-quite-there period.
