Beautiful Images.

As I scan postcards and letters

from friends and lovers from

more than 20 years ago, the

notes and messages have the

same fresh intensity as when

they were written.

This one’s from beautiful Chris

who had a crush on me. I had

a crush on him too. Where is

he now? I slept with him even

though I had a boyfriend back

in Boston. He had a hand-

some face, chocolate brown

hair, and the solid boyish body

of youth. We spent the night

together at his college friend’s

house in Bloomington, Indiana.

I didn’t want my friends to

know that I was cheating. We

were quite nonchalant the next

morning.

Later, I wrote him and he wrote

me back. His message was so

flirtatious. He was living in New

York and had a summer intern-

ship. The image on the front of

the postcard was Blondie and

on the back, in his miniscule

– almost calligraphic – hand-

writing, he wrote in the margin,

“The one, the only, Queen of

NYC” (meaning Blondie, of

course). He gave me his ad-

dress in New York, but I never

wrote him back.

James O’Day

1.15.2010