{"id":25951,"date":"2022-12-16T11:45:52","date_gmt":"2022-12-16T16:45:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=25951"},"modified":"2022-12-16T11:45:55","modified_gmt":"2022-12-16T16:45:55","slug":"the-watches-of-the-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2022\/12\/the-watches-of-the-night\/","title":{"rendered":"The Watches of the Night"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

[Image: “The Watches of the Night (Newport, Rhode Island),” by John E. Simpson. (Shared here under a Creative Commons License; for more information, see this page <\/a>at <\/em><\/em><\/em><\/em>RAMH.)<\/em><\/em><\/em>]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From whiskey river<\/a><\/em> (italicized lines):<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Night Walk<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The all-night convenience store’s empty
and no one is behind the counter.
You open and shut the glass door a few times
causing a bell to go off,
but no one appears. You only came
to buy a pack of cigarettes, maybe
a copy of yesterday\u2019s newspaper—
finally you take one and leave
thirty-five cents in its place.
It is freezing, but it is a good thing
to step outside again:
you can feel less alone in the night,
with lights on here and there
between the dark buildings and trees.
Your own among them, somewhere.
There must be thousands of people
in this city who are dying
to welcome you into their small bolted rooms,
to sit you down and tell you
what has happened to their lives.
And the night smells like snow.
Walking home for a moment
you almost believe you could start again.
And an intense love rushes to your heart,
and hope. It’s unendurable, unendurable.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Franz Wright [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Why is it that so many ghosts prefer to travel the halls of night? Ask the living and they will tell you that these spirits either have some unquenched desire or an unaddressed grievance that stirs them from their sleep and sends them out into the world in search of solace. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the living are so self-centered. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course they would judge a spirit\u2019s nocturnal wanderings as the product of earthly memories. When, in fact, if these restless souls wanted to harrow the bustling avenues of noon, there is nothing to stop them from doing so. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

No. If they wander the halls of night, it is not from a grievance with or envy of the living. Rather, it is because they have no desire to see the living at all. Any more than snakes hope to see gardeners, or foxes the hounds. They wander about at midnight because at that hour they can generally do so without being harried by the sound and fury of earthly emotions. After all those years of striving and struggling, of hoping and praying, of shouldering expectations, stomaching opinions, navigating decorum, and making conversation, what they seek, quite simply, is a little peace and quiet.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Amore Towles [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…and:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

The moment we find the true reason for some feeling that has an irrationally powerful hold on us, whether it has to do with body image or anything else, the spell is broken.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

(Gloria Steinem [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “The Watches of the Night (Newport, Rhode Island),” by John E. Simpson. (Shared here under a Creative Commons License; for more information, see this page at RAMH.)] From whiskey river (italicized lines): Night Walk The all-night convenience store’s emptyand no one is behind the counter.You open and shut the glass door a few timescausing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25954,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Franz Wright, Amor Towles. Gloria Steinem: 'The Watches of the Night'","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[247,1393,4701,250,5,4878,251,4159],"tags":[371,3615,4634,5626,5628,5629,5630,5631],"class_list":{"0":"post-25951","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ruminations","8":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","9":"category-my-photography","10":"category-art","11":"category-06_writing","12":"category-fiction","13":"category-poetry-writing_cat","14":"category-essays","15":"tag-epiphany","16":"tag-franz-wright","17":"tag-hauntings","18":"tag-amor-towles","19":"tag-night-thoughts","20":"tag-nightowls","21":"tag-gloria-steinem","22":"tag-turning-points","23":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/thewatchesofthenight_johneimpson_med.jpg?fit=2048%2C1538&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-6Kz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25951"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25981,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25951\/revisions\/25981"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}