In the Permanent Collection

You're in the Picture

27 YOU’RE IN THE PICTURE The characters are outside in the courtyard where they perform enjoyment for the sun, appearing as lively as people should— but the people are inside, just eating, sleeping, or taking showers. They display murky reasoning, serve unclear purposes. My old roommate is a person, but married to a character. They have a child who might, for all I know, be either. He likes trucks and trains, watches his father drive, wonders what it means to control this mover that acts both like and unlike an animal. A memoirist I met calls himself a character, both a necessity and a danger in his line of work. He should know that characters have bigger stories, but people have more of them. For whom am I a character and for whom am I real? As I ask this question, there you are, making a very small story at the window, where you look out to see a pickup clip a dog’s leg and the dog vanish between houses. ...