King of the Road

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By Bill Browning

I’d like to preface this piece by saying I don’t believe life is as hard for most everyone as it it is for me. Please read on:

Two weeks ago my roommate/writing-partner/bff, Paula had to attend this training session for a job she was starting, a 10 hour seminar that began at the butt-crack of dawn. It’s getting to be supper time and figuring she’s gotta be wiped out I volunteer to drive to Papalino’s near the U of L campus to get us each a slice of pizza.

Standing a few feet away from me Paula considers my offer. “Pizza sounds good and I am tired. But I don’t like the thought of you trying to navigate that corner, Bill. There’s all those college kids and I think it’s supposed to rain…

“Oh, I’ll be fine.”

“I don’t know, Bill. You can’t parallel park for shit and…”

“I’ll just find a place where I can pull straight in, Paula. A block or two away of necessary. Just sit down and relax. Hell, I’ve accomplished some pretty spectacular feats in my day. I’m sure I can manage getting some pizza.”

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Should Win/Will Win

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By Bill Browning

It’s Oscar season and I’m excited — not because I have a favorite movie or actor  this year, but because I love all things movies- and celebrity-related.

I haven’t seen Amour and likely won’t. I still need to see Les Miserables, too, though I’m certain it won’t get a lot of Oscar attention. No. I believe, the night of February 24th, the world’s gonna see a slugfest play out between the historical drama Lincoln and the 3D adventure/drama Life of Pi.

Ang Lee and me have been pissed at the Academy for giving a best movie Oscar to the headache inducing Crash a few years back when it was clear his perfectly executed Brokeback Mountain should have won. But we have more or less gotten over it. With that in mind, I’m sorry to predict Lee’s Pi won’t win best movie this year, either. Lincoln will take home that prize. But Life of Pi’s gonna snag statues in a lot of the lesser categories.

I don’t think my movie partner, Paula, enjoyed Life of Pi as much as I did due to the fact that she is a heathen, while I am a good Christian.

Argo seems to be gaining momentum and could come in with an upset victory, but I don’t think so. Academy voters don’t really like Ben Affleck. I don’t either, though I should. I want to like him, I do, but for reasons I can’t put my finger on, I just don’t.

Silver Linings Playbook, Les Miserables, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Django Unchained, Zero Dark Thirty and Amour haven’t got a chance. The movie that should win this year is Wes Anderson’s not-even-nominated Moonrise Kingdom. I predict the film that will win is Lincoln.

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Rockin’ Chair

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By Bill Browning

This poet, Sheri Wright, hosts poetry readings at The Bard’s Town on the last Sunday of every month, around five in the afternoon. Sheri reads her own work at this Stone Soup series and elsewhere, and if I know about it you can bet money I’ll be attending. It’s a treat to hear her read. Wright’s poems, in my humble opinion, have meat and flavor. Each one is cooked to perfection. Often they thrill and always they satisfy.

Sarabande Books puts together the 21C Reading Series each month, featuring interesting and talented poets from all over the country. I attend that one, too, when I can.

I go to other, similar programs from time to time around these parts, but I find more to like from Sheri Wright and the Stone Soup participants than I do anywhere else.

It’s shocking to me how many poets aren’t good. How many are simply full of themselves — blown away by their own brilliance. I mean, if you’re gonna use the word “alchemy” in a poem, I’m likely thinking, “Fuck this.”

Good poems do not brag.

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Street Corner

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By Paula Burba

There is a “Y” intersection where Baxter crosses Highland and splits in two: veering to the left as the much-loved Bardstown Road, continuing on the right a few more miles as Baxter.

On foot there the other day, I passed by a man and woman sitting on the coffee shop patio, probably in their late 30s — not-quite-hipster, not-quite-punk, but some other brand of fashionable and relevant. I was crossing Highland carrying a Trenta Iced Black Tea, unsweetened, I’d bought minutes ago before dashing over to the post office. No mail. Waiting for the light to cross the street, I became preoccupied with this apartment on Highland where I once lived.

A few steps down the street and short climb up a narrow flight of stairs to the gigantic second floor of a stately Victorian could deliver me right back to my late-20s. Not really, of course; nothing’s the same now. I couldn’t even remember what was on this corner back then. Wasn’t there a dingy little grocery we walked to for overpriced cigarettes when we were desperate? Whatever it was, they tore it down years ago to build a new retail strip: Walgreen’s on one end and a Starbucks already due for a remodel on the other.

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Momma Tried

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By Bill Browning

My roommate records a show called Sunday Morning that we sometimes don’t get around to watching ‘til midweek. A recent taped episode we watched on a Thursday featured a segment on typewriters and people who love them. I watched with a smile on my face recalling a typewriter I once loved: a portable Underwood Model 319 with a beige plastic snap on case.

It was exactly like this one.

I was 12, and it was my very first typewriter. My mom got it for me with S&H Green Stamps, stamps she hoarded for months. It took a whopping 22 filled books, but she knew I wanted to be a writer more than anything in the world.

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