The Old Crow Book Release (Part 1)
It was a Wednesday afternoon and I took a stroll through the neighborhood. The cherry blossoms craved to bloom, but the cold weather wouldn't allow it.
My mind felt cluttered with thoughts of all I had to do once I got the print run of The Old Crow Book Club back from the printer in McMinnville. Which was the next morning.
There was Mark, co-founder of the Old Crow Book Club, sitting on his usual sidewalk. The last time I'd seen him, about a week ago, he looked near death, but denied my urgent request to call 9-1-1 and the Street Response Team. Later, I regretted my non-action, but Mark was adamant and lucid.
So, it was much to my surprise and relief that I saw Mark reading a book while also smoking a Swisher Sweet and drinking a can of malt liquor.
I asked him what he was reading. He told me, The Odyssey (for the fourth time!), a hundred-year old edition he had rescued from the bookstore's recycling bin. It occurred to me that Mark was undoubtedly the only human being in world history who had read The Odyssey multiple times while smoking a Swisher Sweet and drinking malt liquor.
We briefly discussed the Greek classic. I then told Mark about picking up The Old Crow Book Club the next morning. He perked up. I told him I'd swing by and give him the first copy.
“It better be signed,” he said.
“I'll sign it,” I said.
I briefly told Mark I didn't know how he and other members of the book club might react to the contents of the book. I wasn't nervous about a possible negative reaction, but his opinion mattered to me, so I wanted the straight shit once he read it.
“I've always loved everything you've written,” he said, “especially that zine about Joe.”
Over two years ago, we had met because I saw him reading a book just as he was now. Then, a few weeks later, I saw him reading one of my books in front of the can/bottle recycling machine. He'd discovered it in a street library. We'd gone on to establish the book club and become friends. My discussions with him about literature were the most interesting ones about literature in my entire life.
“Mark,” I said, “whatever happens, if your reading the book changes your mind about anything related to your homelessness, like wanting to get into housing, I'm ready to try again.”
We had tried last summer and totally failed, but it wasn't Mark's fault. He was ready then; after that debacle, he was not.
“I'll let you know,” he said.
And with that I walked away. I'd see him tomorrow and the sequel to The Old Crow Book Club would begin to unfold on the very sidewalk where it had all started.
I knew something for certain about what happens when one of my books is released: the better stories related to the subject of the newly-released book, are always better—ALWAYS—than those that made it into the book. It is true as gravity and the heartlessness of the Republican Party.