“Prompted” by Dallas Itzen - 2019 Brooklyn Non-Fiction Prize Finalist

Prompted

by 

 Dallas Itzen

      From the shop window, five caged felines watched rush hour Slopers wasting their freedom. They laid stoically under fluorescence the color of a zested lemon as humans and dogs hurried at outer borough speed along dusky 5^th avenue near Union Street. The cats and I watched everyone heading away from us towards home. I stood munching street truck guac and chips, a snack that reminds me of my original home, Texas, that isn’t anymore since my parents died. The furry five and me were biding our time, waiting to be adopted.

      I was in serious author mecca, Brooklyn, nervously early for my creative nonfiction class. The upcoming writing exercise filled me with dread. I suffer from literary rigor mortis. Going rigid, I stare at my notepad like it’s an operating table for an autopsy where diseased innards will be uncovered. Instead of a scalpel, I use a pencil for quick removal. I act casual in my terror. My classmates, real writers and true locals, wildly type on laptops, excited to unleash their raw genius. I fumble for one cohesive thought and I’m a writer by trade but it’s not real writing. When I start, time’s almost up. Unable to erase the stupider words, I scribble over them in nearly unreadable scrawl. Thankfully the key-pounding covers my pencil scratch.

      What I call exercises, the literary crowd calls “prompts.” So much cooler. Our last one came from the New York Times: write about something underrated. Examples given by known authors were so clever, I became short of breath. My hands went numb. Oxygen and pauses were underrated but hard to explain quickly. My numb hand held the answer —  the #2 pencil. Yesss. My arms moved! I cleverly used my ad-writer skills to sell the faded glories of the wooden tool of yore. The  pretty, published teacher invited me to share. I decoded my scrawl aloud, preparing for applause. The response gutted me. Apparently there’d been a millennial movement to re-imagine the #2. My classmates schooled me on the sleek redesigns they cherished like “The Palomino” and “Blackwing.” Their comments were more interesting than my piece.

      So here I was up on the crest of Park Slope, already over the hill and drawn to this line-up of silky outcasts —  an almond-eyed blonde, a teen with a sly calico mask, a black cat, splotchy all-in-one and striped tabby. Thank you autumn early nightfall which concealed my messy snack consumption, something I’d never do on THE Fifth Avenue. The bench in front of hipster institution Brooklyn Industries had been removed. Perhaps they objected to a chip-chomping non-Sloper interloper, marring the view of  sustainable puffies and urban combat-style backpacks.

      Black cat with eyes the shade of my guacamole studied me as I shoveled glob in. Upon crunch, Tabby surveyed me. Guilt set upon me. They were my TV. Maybe I was theirs. When Calico stood up to poop, I felt their plight. Not easy to be on display. Not for me certainly. The street sounds soothed me — discernible footsteps and whirring wheels of cars, strollers, carts and walkers. Homier than the roaring din of Manhattan where I lived for two decades. How I had loved being swallowed by it. It was impossible to be a misfit since most were there to stand out not fit in. I was happy knowing no one other than cats, liquor store workers or those at work including a temporary husband and friends who stuck with me.

      Having lived in Cobble Hill for a few years as a human, no longer a work robot, I appreciated the sounds of individual lives though my footsteps still sounded impostor-ish. A Brooklyner  not a Brooklynite. Big difference. Especially visiting the Slope, the iconic Prospect Park-rooted community with involved parents, evolved co-parents, nurtured kids, charming shopkeepers, beardy artisans, big time writers and artists and many in multiple categories. They chat like it’s one big porch, so foreign to me, the outsider and former military kid. We moved eight times by the time I was ten. As soon as I belonged, it was time to leave. “Don’t get attached,” my parents would warn.  I was always borrowing home. When would I have to turn Brooklyn back in? Maybe when my rent went up. If I had kids, it might be different.

      The window cats were most unsympathetic and I admired them for it. A duo joined me in cat-gazing  — a tall 30-ish blonde white woman and a 40-ish black man with cool-nerdy glasses and a beret. She was drawn to Blonde cat while he examined Black cat. So cute.

      “Doesn’t his face look like the in-bred kid playing the banjo in Deliverance?” she chirped. Wow. No words. I looked at the golden boy. His face was narrow with close-set slanted eyes, maybe a bit similar to the character from the disturbing 70’s film, but come on. Don’t do that to this caged creature on a clammy night with no banjo. Dubious, I tested their cat love.

      “Let’s hope the black cat stays here for now. Most places won’t adopt them out in October,” I lobbed. The man nodded. “Terrible that whole thing,” he said. She said nothing. So he knew about all the sickos who get black cats at Halloween for cruel reasons. “If I weren’t allergic, I’d have three.” he said. Aw. A cat man.

      “Three cats for three rats,” he added. The guac lost its flavor. “I’ve lived here 30 years,” he lamented. “The building next door was gutted to become condos, driving rats into our homes.” Poof went my cat kinship dreams. My Slope idealization soured. He continued despite my widened eyes and stranded chip. “I woke up, heard one scamper under the oven. My super caught three foot-long rats.” He glanced at me adding, “Not counting tails.”

      “Woah” I blurted. We’d hit that strain of stranger over-exposure. In unison like we’d rehearsed for a play, we shouted, “Have a good night!” and evacuated. Melting into the darkness, I headed for class. Fear of the prompt made me forget about homeless cats and strange strangers.

* * * *

      Wanna be local. Wannabe author. Though I’ve been a successful freelance writer, I’m a double impostor in these serious Brooklyn-to-the-bone classes. In lit circles no one cares that I wrote a branded content video featuring Nobel Prize-winner Malala Yousafzai. My ad credits don’t transfer. But I no longer let my misfitness keep me from trying. I don’t stuff emotion or hide in work or booze. I feel it. Hold it gently. Like a lost kitten.

      The classes are in adorable crafty local shops after hours on too-small wooden chairs, taught by terrific Brooklyn authors with MFA’s and huge Twitter followings who speak on panels and know famous other authors. They write blurbs for each other’s books. Everyone’s younger, published or close. Some write for  socially responsible magazines. Or they’re editors. Or activists or actors. Or secretly important ghost-writers. One has a memoir grant. From what I’ve picked up, trauma stories are the rage. We read these essays, oohing and awing over the searing truth, quirky symbolism and dark imagery. The latest winner of the “I Had it Harder Than you” Contest. The winner so far was a phenomenal now best selling writer, a scientist whose husband left her before she lost everyone in her office to a mass shooting. Not in Brooklyn, thank goodness.

      I’d had my struggles but now I was writhing and writing from run-of-the-mill grief in sloppy fits and starts trying to reconcile the illness and death I’ve seen recently. Inching closer to the grave myself and running out of time, I’m finally trying free writing — something people have insisted I do forever. I reminded myself that being a beginner, making mistakes, flailing, failing and trying is how I became a meditator, a sober gal, mindfulness teacher and intermediate skier. Learning from those who know. Fucking up, humbled. Taking classes. Embarrassing myself, crying, throwing jealous tantrums, practicing until I’m doing it.

* * * *    

      In class #2 on that dark evening with the window cats and strange strangers long forgotten (unlike the #2 pencil), I smelled the prompt coming and my mind promptly emptied. My arms went wooden. My neck hurt. The teacher asked us to describe a recent encounter with strangers. Hm. Can you get more recent than minutes ago? No but I didn’t know how to tell the nervous weird awkward randomness. I yearned to deliver dramatic hilarity. Something profound and haunting to inspire the teacher-author to grab me after class and whisper, “You’re brilliant. I’d like to include that piece in my anthology.” Cat-gazing, guac, rats and inbreds? Yuck. I couldn’t let it be just an exercise so I cheated. With a ditty from the ’90’s that always entertained people when I used to tell it (too much and usually drunk). I’d been on Houston Street near my Noho loft back when I was cool. Near where I adopted a deli cat. The story involved me  violently shoving strangers out of the way of an SUV flipping through the air towards us, action movie-style but not in slow-mo. It landed upside down where we’d stood. Shaken, we mumbled odd things and left. It was very New York, very Jarmusch. I knew how to tell it with flair. Knew I’d win the prompt.

      I took a breath. This wasn’t a competition. I was vibrating with desperation and uncertainty. I calmed my misfitness kitten. Were the window cats not worthy? Or fellow cat-gazing Brooklyners? I thought back to a breakfast table in Austin where a family friend, Marilyn had laid out a pad and pen after my parents died when I was brimming with stories. She’d asked me kindly Mama-Grandma-like n her Texas twang, “Well, can you just write out what happened? The way you’ve told me in conversation? Imperfectly?” Marilyn writes for her own solace and amusement.

      Channeling her, I wrote out what happened earlier. Nauseous, I forced myself to read it and was surprised to find the class nodding, smiling, laughing. Afterwards they looked at me warmly like they knew me better. The teacher asked, “All that happened just now? Wow! It’s so Brooklyn-quirky.” I gained confidence but something stickier occurred. The “unimportant” encounter once it was written and shared became part of me. I stopped by the window to see Black cat’s guacamole eyes before trekking  home through oddball Gowanus but the furry five were snoozing.

      “I’m sorry” I whispered. “For our gawking and bad manners. See you next week.” I headed down the Slope home, wishing it was under snow and I was on skis. I felt adventurous.

* * * *

      I visited them the following week. Black cat was gone. I hoped the rat-plagued man had adopted it despite his allergies. I assumed the blonde hadn’t either. Golden boy looked bored and ignored. I wished I could give him a little banjo, that he’d play it like a mofo. No one would ignore him or make fun of him then. I was near tears. What was panging me? Breathe. Pause. Feel. Ah. Last class’s prompt was still prompting me. To notice more. To take interest in the in-betweens. See stories everywhere. I was prompted to care about a missing mystery cat and now aware that I gaze at homeless animals, relating, then walk home, assuming someone else will rescue them.

      When I was eight, I insisted I was adopted. My exasperated Mom presented my birth certificate. There it was: parent & daughter names, birth time and place. I was a kid. Official documentation didn’t impress me. I was trying to tell a story about feeling out of place. A year ago, going through an over-stuffed but awfully empty house, I found my little girl hospital bracelet.

* * * *

      I refuse to say “woke” at my age yet I’m thinking of the Mexican man cooking in the truck feeding Slope beardies when I leave class at 9 pm.  I’m reflecting on the Brooklynite dealing with rats due to gentrification which I’m apart of, me and my white privilege. I’m rethinking belonging. I’m not an abandoned cat. I have a good home in a lovely neighborhood. Winston Churchill’s Mom and Fanny Bryce once lived on my street, Henry Street. I’m taking a page from caged cats but not by fear. I haven’t known many with low self esteem. They stretch, eat, sleep, and poop unselfconsciously. Exposure is their ticket to freedom.

       I even felt for the rats. Then there’s my least favorite character, the blonde with a penchant for Deliverance. I  once found that film fascinating and joked about it as a young blonde not understanding the implications of rape or stereotypes. I was prompted to google the boy cast as the in-bred. Billy Redden, who’s never been to Brooklyn, is a local man in rural Georgia. Discovered by a talent scout in the 70’s, Billy saw little movie money and ended up working at Walmart.

      Writing on-the-spot unfiltered nonfiction and displaying my truths had sliced me open and my owie was weepy.

* * * *

      Our next prompt was to write about a scar. I had several with dramatic looks and origins except for the invisible Brooklyn one since a plastic surgeon had been on ER duty. If a scar is defined as a mark on skin or within tissue where a wound has not healed completely, it seemed I had a new one in my mental tissue. Tender, I avoided writing about it even though it wanted me to. Afraid of any new literary lacerations, I whipped out an oft-told tale of my childhood scar strangely still numb. It concerns cutting myself while opening boxes in a new home. It has intriguing twists: bizarre panicked squeaking, loss of all intelligent communication (sound familiar?), bleeding on new shag carpet, a 90 mph drive on ice and a truck flying upside down (sound familiar?). Plus my big tough Lt. Col. dad nearly fainting when they stitched me.

      I wrote the old scar’s story which left me numb like it. I wasn’t exposing. My new scar throbbed, feeling cheated. After that me and misfitness kitten started laying our real shit out there, fresh, sometimes smelly. Like the cats do at NYC Pets on down-to-earth 5^th Avenue. Instead of wares in the windows, the shop displays animals and finds them homes. Slopers love ’em for it. Come cat-gaze. Get a taco from Morelo’s on Union St. Take a class. Sackett Street Workshop is awesome. Pick up my teacher’s anthology “What My Mother and I Don’t Talk about’ with her heart-breaking essay.

      I may never fit in here. Literary circles may never adopt me and trauma lit is but one. Its courageous expressers don’t need me judging them. They’ve been through enough. Besides, I owe them and Brooklyn. They’ve taught me a vital lesson: live prompted.