Fare Forward: Letters from David Markson

Feb 3 ’08

Hey — Simsy—

Writing this for your return out there.¹¹³ How great to have seen you. And I’m excited as hell that you’ll be here in the fall.¹¹⁴ (Or, as you suspect, in Brooklyn.)

But, dammit, I owe you a lunch. I started to pay, and you made us split it, and I never thought about my two wines as opposed to your single lovely pale iced tea. Next time on me.

Next time, also, shut me up once in a while, will you? Three hours after I got home all I could still hear was the sound of my own voice.

Incidentally, on the reverse here, now that’s the girl of my dreams.¹¹⁵ Brooklyn who?

Hey — love to you both—

David

113 He means my return to Madison — I’d gone to New York for a reading. Again I’m not sure why there’s such a long break here between cards, but it could again be because we were talking on the phone more frequently.

114 We’d just learned we’d be moving back to New York, for teaching jobs.

115 He’d uncharacteristically sent me a picture postcard, that iconic close-up shot of a beautiful, green-eyed Afghan girl, taken by Steve McCurry in 1985.