BEGINNING WITH M...

Marilyn Monroe postcard
Originally uploaded by Trevira.

Several weeks ago, Jonathan on CONNAISSANCES, was passing out letters of the alphabet to all takers. If interested, you signed up in the comment section, and he assigned you a letter, which you were to use for free association. I got M, (the Mercedes of letters in my humble opinion).

Anyway, the weeks passed, and I stored up my M like a personal treasure. Every now and then, I took it out and looked at it, considering what use I might make of it, what secrets it might reveal.

I turned it upside down and pretended it was a W. Will, wonder, wanderlust. I turned it on it's side and made a Greek E.

"Not yet," M said, and I put it away in its box for later use, while M words spun in my mind: miracle, Mercury, movies, Marilyn...how could I ever choose?

Then tonight, sitting in my study, I looked over at my bookcase and the M spoke, telling a brief history of my crazy life in the incongruous book titles I've collected over the years:


I MARY MacLANE: I bought this book (published in 1917) in a second hand store in Cambridge, MASSACHUSETTS when I was eighteen. For at least a year, I read from this diary of a young woman living in Butte, MONTANA, on a daily basis. I have no idea if Mary MacLane was heard from again, but her youthful longing and wild loneliness spoke to me like nothing else at that time.

Thomas MERTON: You can open his books anywhere, and find a passage of such complexity and truth that it bears returning to again and again.

Time MANAGEMENT. Never have gotten the hang of it, but I'm a sucker for anyone who promises to teach me.

MESSIES MANUAL: Yes, that's the real title. And I bought it. (Stored on the Good Intention Shelf right next to Time Management.)

Czeslaw MILOSZ: My favorite poet. Profound, earthy, exalted.

MARY Oliver: My OTHER favorite poet, for all the same reasons.

Henry MILLER: Known for his eroticism, but I read him for his exuberant spirit.

Edvard MUNCH. Another book purchased in the turbulence of late adolescence when I thought The Scream represented my changing emotions.

MOMENT magazine with my friend Susan MESSER's award winning story in it.

How to MAKE MONEY in Stocks: A gift by a well-meaning family member, and unfortunately the only unopened book in the library...but that doesn't really surprise you, does it?


Meanwhile, if anyone would like a letter. They're free; they have countless uses; and though Marvelous M is unavailable, I'm sure I have a letter that's just right for you...