I reserved a booth at Folk Fest ’86 in
the queers’ national holiday, Halloween. Owen asked
to go with me. I left Thursday afternoon, after he got
home from school. He rode the bus. We took the family
station wagon, a Subaru. I played a tape of Doyle Lawson
& Quicksilver. In the book I wrote about the trip, Forty,
I mentioned that detail, and when, later, Owen joined the band,
and Doyle’s wife and sister asked me what I’d written, I gave them
a copy, and I was bragging on Doyle’s music in the opening section.
I tooled along at 35, like the Nerd’s father, in Revenge of the Nerds,
a line of traffic behind me, dog-cussing us. I had a folding table
and two folding chairs on the roof and boxes of books inside.
Screed, Evil Genius, and Open Book.