Author name: Paul Edward

Journal 1.6.25

9:12PM

Yes it is 9:12PM if I allow the idea of time time TIME practical yes practical time. In my shed that is covered in snow the yellow glow of the hanging light bulb and my breath is visible in a methodical way over the notebook. Yes it is cold but strangely I don’t feel it today or tonight or anymore? And the fire has just started to roar I can hear it crackling I can smell it I can hear the flu pulling the flame but it is not warm and the log burner is hungry very hungry eating up whole pieces of wood in single bites and I gave myself to the snow today and it took me. And I don’t know if I see the little sparrows differently in the snow or if the little sparrows see me differently in the snow or if I’ve never fully seen them before but today I saw them I saw them. Fluttering up from bones of frost asters. Bones of black-eyed susans. Bones of goldenrods. Bones of Queen Anne’s lace. And I followed them into the meadow and I saw that things die but they don’t really die. They radiate. And went through me yes and I know all go unto one place (Ecclesiastes 3:20 KJV). The place where I came from and it came from the place where I will return and it will return. And I thought of these impossible dead but not dead flowers shriveled up in some quiet corner grasping but they were grasping all and I asked them how how HOW? And I asked myself then what? When you find all your answers? Do you change the way you live? The house you live in? What you eat with whom you eat? Trying to find all the answers have you considered the whole thing is designed so you don’t? And I let go and watched my feet trudge through snow between rows of headless corn. Beautiful corn. Yes I passed the “Tockwogh” trail so many Indian names we use to honor them or names we’ve taken from them or… I don’t know I can’t know it isn’t here to know but then I think yes they are here. I feel them in the land giving heaviness to my feet. All the people who came before me. They ate corn and fish and fowl. And I step into the empty hunting blind high on the cornfield and I look out over the thousands of black stumps toward the tree line. And I think about the story I’m going to tell with corn and fish and fowl. And so I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter (Ecclesiastes 4:1 KJV). And the doors of my shed are rattling they are rattling THEY ARE RATTLING the wind is howling through the windows the fire is being sucked from the log burner the walls are shaking the floor is quaking buffalo buffalo buffalo stampeding and I say louder THEN WHAT? WHEN YOU FIND ALL YOUR ANSWERS? DO YOU CHANGE THE WAY YOU LIVE? THE HOUSE YOU LIVE IN? WHAT YOU EAT WITH WHOM YOU EAT? TRYING TO FIND ALL THE ANSWERS HAVE YOU CONSIDERED THE WHOLE THING IS DESIGNED SO YOU DON’T? And the wind has softened. And the fire whispers. And a warrior crouches on deerskin feet. And with bated breath I wait to turn to dust again (Ecclesiastes 3:20 KJV).

Journal 12.30.24

The rainy season is here and I don’t mind. Though I could do without the mud tracking into the house. I’ve got a leaky shed roof. A hole I can’t seem to plug. So I put a trash can filled with paper under it and listen drip drip drip sitting at my desk I don’t mind no I don’t mind. I’ve been thinking about the new year and I’m not usually one for resolutions go on just get on with it but this one’s different it’s a good time to mark the time. Soon nothing will be the same it won’t be as it was there’s an open door and I’m walking through it but the other side will eat me alive. If I don’t prepare for it. There won’t be time to waste. I will not afford energy misspent. And my little girls have begun to see. They’re watching. I hear Mommy Daddy: we must Teach them. Capital T. I ponder the misspent energy. Children don’t listen they see. So have both ways. Be what you want to be yes? They’ll follow you. Isn’t that enough to begin to walk into the storm? To face myself.

Journal 12.27.24

Sitting here the pen hovering. Yes it’s been many weeks since I’ve… what exactly? Since I’ve spoken to you. Though this has its way of making me feel like we’re having a conversation, dear reader. You and me. This is no diatribe. No parade of ingenious thought. Though who among us is not a genius? Shriveled up in some quiet corner grasping. I know nothing and I’d like to keep it so. I’ll keep my sense of wonder that always has me on my knees. But things have begun to pass through me. Images I see. In the eyes and out through fingertips or camera or… I know nothing and sure you may push me and if I’m weak enough I may blather some opinion or other but I don’t believe it these words drooling from my chin I have questions only questions only questions an infinity of questions I have no answers only images. Considerations. They could not even be called provocations though how often do people accuse me of that? Yes often. Of course Art provokes life provokes what doesn’t provoke? But I don’t care about that. I see something I feel something I drink its pithy drips down down down and I lacerate myself it oozes back out back into the world. Can I separate my happinesses from my sorrows? No. It’s time for settling down. Like a bear. I think there are some people you can never really know.

Journal 11.26.24

When I begin work like this I quickly become exhausted—like exhaustion is in my bones. I’ve fileted three or four fish. But each time I lift the knife I’m aware of another possibility in the butchering. And another. An infinity begins to weigh. Of everything I do not know. Doubt sets in like forest fire. I know how to filet a fish and how to dry it on a rack for the day the whole tray wrapped in plastic for a crispy skin tomorrow. But what about raw? I slice a piece. Chewy without flavor I spit it out. Just shy of nauseated. Isn’t this sashimi? But it’s so bad… yes this I know. A fish fresh out of water sliced raw with no accoutrements is rarely good. Ok so what about tomorrow? Or in two days? Or three? Or seven or fourteen or twenty-one? But how thick to slice it and yes thicker when aged and thinner when fresh… what am I doing? Is this even the season for raw Rockfish? They bite in the spring and fall when the little fish are swimming in and when they’re swimming back out yes I know this with certainty because I’ve just found them in the striper’s stomach the scent of sardines and it was a pleasing scent like the fresh salt air of Sicily. But I don’t know when striper tastes best. I just don’t know. I don’t know so many things. But I’ve learned to keep my work area so very clean. Because frustration mounts and a knife out of line a crooked pair of scissors a spatula returned to the wrong hook a kitchen towel balled up instead of folded yes the slightest thing out of place may send me plummeting into an existential inferno I CAN’T DO THIS I DON’T KNOW ANYTHING yes I’ve faced this so many times alone hours and hours over the cutting board long before the sun rises and long before the staff arrives and over the cutting board long after the sun has set long after the staff has left. Doubt has become my closest companion. So I breathe in. I breathe out. With heavy limbs and heavy eyes. Yes during these times I still drink too much coffee. It’s like a drug. 13 in one day. I begin to set and break records for myself. Then I can’t keep track. I start drinking the concentrated cold brew straight. I buy it in bulk 5 gallon jugs. And I’m exhausted but I don’t sleep. I’m fileting fish in my half-dreams. And I’m angry. It’s become some sort of torturous game: once you filet three more fish you will fall asleep. But first you must separate the eyes and hearts and the swim bladders and the livers and the scales into different containers for later use. And you must keep the belly attached to the collar and separate these cuts too. And the filets must be wiped clean don’t you dare touch them with water. And wrap them in cloth and seal them shut. And the head must be removed from the bones and these must be stored in a fish tub and…

     My alarm rings it’s 5AM. And I get out of bed and tuck my little A. in nice and warm my little A. sleeping beside me an angel my little love my world my…I make my americano and I haven’t dropped the coffee tamper this morning so that’s a very good sign when I’m clumsy in the morning it is not a good sign. And I sit with my coffee beneath the lamplight and open a book on fish and I study the cuts and I study the cure and I study the marinade and Jiro says this fish is best in spring and that fish is best in winter and that people like this fish when it’s farm raised it’s more tender but he doesn’t care because the wild fish has more flavor and that sometimes a chew is nice with nigiri and… they put this book together in the 90’s. The master was in his 60’s. But he worked for 30 more years. He is 99. He retired only two years ago. And I think well there’s no competing with that. And I think I don’t have to know everything to serve something. And if I have 12 courses then maybe that’s just 12 or so things I need to know. And if I know those 12 or so things very well I can serve them to people and they will be happy. And soon I will know 13 things then 14 and yes yes. But I’m fileting Rockfish I bought so much of it and maybe I bought too much and I’m worried that I spent too much but I need to practice and what am I going to do with all of this Rockfish and I wrote a list of things: filet it, smoke it, age it, cure it, dry it like katsuobushi yes yes and no nothing will go to waste it will be preserved in such and such a manner I will sell it at the farmers market. But I must work quickly work work work quicky now and it’s too expensive for mistakes and this learning is very heavy.

     And I’m fileting fish and I’m thinking of the story that I’m carving into time. I’ve been looking into the past to find myself. But yes the past is filled with horrible things the horrible things are what the people think belong to me. And the good things maybe I’m not I’m not the right man for the good things because they don’t belong to me. And I’m in my head about it the touch and taste of vinegared collard greens the smoky hog the cornmeal fried catfish the buttermilk fried chicken. And I’m in my head about the thin slices of aged fish the sashimi the nigiri the rice… and I’m a respectful chap a good lad… so I can lean on the past but I don’t think it’s right to let it hold me up. The past does not belong to me. And so my identity is somewhere in the future. I’ll have to forge my own path to get there.