Sim Carter: Past Tense Imperfect

The Coleus under Roy and Martha’s front porch window look a little scraggly, nothing but tall leggy stems bending in their bed of dry cracked earth. The gardener would never let them go like that if Roy hadn’t been so sick. If Roy had been up and around, standing tall the way he used to, those plants would be standing tall too, their leaves firm and perky, the ground blanketed with a soft, moist layer of mulch. Well-tended. That was the best way to describe Roy’s garden and come to think of it, Roy too. I try to remember if I saw the gardener this past Wednesday, his usual day to mow and blow. Who will notice if Roy’s plants die now? Not Roy who is sick in bed. Not Martha who uses a walker and rarely ventures outside. Roy told me once that Martha wouldn’t allow him to get her a wheelchair. She couldn’t stand the idea of looking like an invalid. That sounds like Martha, the kind of woman that old-fashioned words like proud and stubborn apply to. Too proud for her own good. Martha’s se...

The Improv is a fairly famous LA comedy club on Melrose here in L.A. where hundreds—thousands—of comics have sometimes bombed and sometimes soared to new heights on its' stage over the years. I've been to the Improv countless times, but rarely for the laughs. For me, The Improv belongs to that period in the mid-eighties when I was in the last stages of a long, flagging relationship with an old boyfriend. For once, the nomenclature fits; I was twenty seven when we met, Ben was twenty five years older than me. Hardly a 'boy' friend, some might say. We were living together, fast approaching the suffocating, seven year itch mark, and I was twitchy, longing to find a way out, but lacking the guts to get out. Telling myself staying was the more noble course, that I didn't want to hurt him, that I couldn't leave after everything I'd done to get there, that he deserved better. What a load of crap. I was just a little coward. A passive aggressive whiner. ...

Tristram & Islolde: N.C. Wyeth  I ’ve been taking you back to Bandol with me lately. First came The Walk , then came Le Kiss. Here’s the final part of the story. The whole story is now available here and on Soundcloud and iTunes so you can start at the beginning if you like. Garlic & Gauloises It felt like we’d left Bandol and the beach far behind us. We had to be very close now, close to this place out in the middle of nowhere where Michel was going to take me dancing. Finally I could hear voices, shouts and real laughter; a boy’s hoot, a girl’s bell-like tinkle. Someone called out Veronique, Veronique, Vero! There was an answering cackle and something else, something in French that I didn’t understand. Whole words, snatches of sentences, floated through the still night air, loud enough for me to hear except that they were in French, and so, much like the sea breeze on this hot summer night, they fluttered and fell away before I could grab hold of...

Originally published Oct 2014: We were living on Tenth Street in Santa Monica, California when I turned seventeen in 1970, my friend Trixie was visiting from Canada, and boys were on our minds. It's #12 of the On the Street Where I Live stories.  I was a 17-year-old high school senior, he was a 23-year-old Vietnam Vet. Delaney & Bonnie (and Friends) via Delaney & Bonnie Tumblr Jailbait  Jailbait We were sitting on the sand watching the water when they walked by the first time; three long-haired guys who could just as easily be rockers, roadies, or badass bikers, smiling up at us from the shoreline. The one in the middle—I’d already decided he was mine—looked like Cat Stevens or the guy from Delaney and Bonnie or really, any of those musicians who had a beard, mustache, and dark wavy hair skimming their shoulders. From behind my sunglasses, I followed his faded green baggies as they disappeared in the shadows under the pier. Just before they faded ...