John Dickerson

This is the pencil sharpener on the tool rack next to the refrigerator in the basement where I was sent to get the country ham. It destroys to create the phone number of the helpful agent written on the insurance form, the part number on the lawnmower manual, apointment after apointment in the datebook, new phone numbers for old friends and tallies from the family’s particular kind of 2-pack rummy. At least a dozen pencils alone have given their lives for the splash of figures across a large piece of graph paper where he has planned out the back half of his life. He has marked down in careful figures the savings for their retirement, and opened it along its predictable creases over the years to make sure they’re going to have one.

This is a new location for my old personal blog. This is my book, On Her Trail, about my mother Nancy Dickerson. Talking to @jalithgow in his green room. He may be explaining in this picture his theory about what storytellers try to achieve with adults, as distinct from what they try to do with stories for children.