Li-Young Lee

I went with Chelsea to attend a reading by Li-Young Lee. I know his older stuff a bit better, but looked forward to hearing him read, old and new alike.

Chelsea and I met up after work, around 5:15 PM. We walked a ways, and went into some fancified bar/restaurant place for a beer and a quick pizza. We were both pretty nervous on time, and slugged down the food and booze fairly quickly.

The actual location (the Ballroom of the School of the Art Institute) was jaw-droppingly gorgeous. I was really taken aback and now I regret not taking a picture of the space to show you. Curtains in the stairwell fancy.

To be honest, I didn’t find the reading all that compelling. I found his asides and stories in between the poems to be much more interesting and cool. Funny note: in the space of two minutes, he referred to his mother as his "wife." Twice! He caught himself and exclaimed "Man, what’s happening?" It was pretty funny. :)

Later on, I joined Chelsea in line and while she got her book signed by him, I asked him for a photo:

I’m the Asian guy. :|

I was really taken by some of his comments, during the Question and Answer period. He talked at length about order and randomness, and how there is a constant struggle to stay between both. More than that, he spoke about how, at the extremes of order and randomness, each one operates as a sort of tyranny. "True randomness," he was saying, "is its own form of tyranny."

And based on this, superstitious freak that I am, I was convinced that I’d get tapped for that damn contest. Mainly because the poem I submitted ends on the world "tyranny."

After the reading, I talked with one of the volunteers, Laura. We talked a bit about what I was interested in doing with their audio files (and they’ve got recordings of a lot of readings they’ve sponsored. This organization has been around since 1974 [another good sign, since that’s when I was born]). The idea of all those recordings made me shudder with happiness. They’re using RealAudio currently, and I’m convinced I could make something sexier and better through Flash.

Before I left, Laura wrote down her name and e-mail on a postcard and handed it to me. After I took it, she said "Oh, wait" and took the card back. She put her phone number on the card and handed it back to me. I looked at it and asked her "Is this your work number?" She replied with "No, that’s my home phone."

Now, I have a tendency to overanalyze things and presume too much. Laura struck me as really interesting and, in the brief time that we talked, I wanted to talk to her more. But I’m uncertain whether the phone number thing was a professional/volunteer gesture, or something else.

I want to be excited by this, but I also don’t want to set myself up for disappointment. Just because a beautiful girl decides to talk to you… it doesn’t mean she’s interested in you.

I guess this is, really, a moot point. I plan on calling Laura and talking with her more about the organization, about poetry,and about writing in general. And I think I’m going to ask her to do something – coffee maybe, or a drink. Sometime Sunday, or maybe early next week after work. Based on our quick chat, I’m finding myself curious about what she does with The Poetry Center, and just curious to talk to her more overall.

I got a call today from Kent, and agreed to sign on to a freelance Flash project. It’s pretty interesting, and the delivery deadline is set for Monday. The pay is good, but I agreed to do it partly to help Kent out, and partly because I hope to generate more work from his employers in the future.

That said, my whole weekend seems booked. Which makes asking Laura to do something Sunday slightly problematic. Hm…. maybe I’ll just pull an all-nighter on Satuday. :)