People I Think About From Time to Time

Including Joan the psychic.

There are people I’ll remember forever because they’re my people. Maybe you’re one of them. Then there are people I’ll remember forever because they winked at me once, or said my laugh was annoying, or had a special something about them that made my insides flutter. 

Those people cross my mind occasionally. Here are a few of those people. 

–

What was it, 2015? Two girlfriends and I were in Austin, Texas, and bumped into a trio of finance bros at a bar. Us girls were beautifully overdressed, and I’d bet at least $100 the dudes were wearing pastel polos. They were forgettable in every way, except one bro was nicknamed Marty the 24-Hour Party, and I occasionally wonder where he is and how that lifestyle fared on his complexion. I don’t think I made out with him that night, but Kara can correct me if I’m wrong.  

–  

Two days before Covid lockdown I drove too far to a suburb to see a psychic named Joan. Everything in my life felt unsettled, and all of earth was on the verge of collapse, so why not. Joan performed readings out of her canary-colored ‘50s rambler, with her little dog yipping from another room the entire time. I paid her $90. She only accepts cash. 

“You’d be the last person clinging to the Titanic – can never let go, huh?” Ouch. Other than a few bizarrely spot-on personality quirks that Joan either saw in the cards or lucked out saying, nothing she told me has come true. I still teared up when she said the fan – which was off, mind you – slowly spinning overhead was my dead grandmother’s doing. 

–

Not a person, but I briefly lived with a Frenchie pup named Felix who would get anxious any time he sensed he was about to be left alone. To calm his nerves, he’d sit upright in a lounge chair and masturbate. Never look into the eyes of a dog as he rubs one out. It’s unsettling in every way, perhaps most of all because it confirms we’re all animals. If TikTok had been around in 2012, Felix would have been famous, but fame would have made him more nervous, so it’s for the best. 

–

One night at Tilia, the incesuous restaurant I worked at for nearly a decade, my friend and coworker, an angel on earth, was serving two exceptionally handsome men. They made running plates of French fries every Wednesday night for 300 weeks in a row suddenly worth it. She started dating one of them, Nolan, somewhat seriously for six months or so when everything unraveled. 

Nolan traveled for work a lot – something to do with insuring race cars – but when they did see each other they were all in. There were plans to meet each others’ parents on the calendar. If I remember correctly, they went to church together. Then, one time while FaceTiming in bed, Nolan suddenly threw the phone under the covers. I don’t remember his excuse for that one. Another time my friend spotted baby toys in the background while FaceTime, and when she asked Nolan about it he fumbled his words. 

You know where this is going. During another phone call, Nolan told my friend he had a funny story to tell her later. They hung up, her suspicions got the best of her, and she did what every woman is inherently good at: being a detective.

“Is this the funny story you were going to tell me…?” she texted him, along with a string of his own photos, in chronological order: his engagement, his wedding, his first baby, and the grand finale of his wife very much pregnant with another baby, due any day. Did Nolan intend to introduce my friend to his parents before or after his second baby was born? 

He could explain, he told her. 

–

In my early 20s I met David Sedaris a few times. Delightful little man. He told me to sleep around and then write about it. Not the worst career advice I’ve ever heard. 

-

This woman, buried at Hollywood Forever. Iconic in every way. 

–

One Saturday night a lifetime ago, my friend Ben and a collection of others and I gathered in the alley of Liquor Lyle’s, waiting for a few to finish their cigarettes before moving on. Not everyone knew each other. 

After a pit stop at Ben’s apartment, where we dug into Cheez-Its and who knows what else, we moved on to another house in Lowry Hill. As that party died down, and people trickled out, everyone seemed to wonder about the tall, affable guy we all assumed was a friend of someone else’s.

“Who was your friend?” 
“We thought he was with you” 
“Oh, we thought he was with you.” 

I respect mystery man’s confidence in trailing a group of folks, eating a stranger’s snacks, following them to a second location, and leaving at an appropriate time without pulling anything weird. Other than, you know, the whole thing being weird.

And no, we will not be discussing how Liquor Lyle’s is turning into a pinball bar and how Minneapolis lets all of its institutions flounder. 

–

Tina Konkin, a relationship coach who had one scene on one episode of The Real Housewives of Orange County many years ago, because how do you forget a name like that. 

–

A long time ago (2013?), Ben and I were getting brunch at Barbette on a weekday. The two elderly women seated next to us ordered two bottles of rosé. At the same time. It was probably 11:00 a.m. 

–

Dave from Chicago, who took his tooth out on our first date. The first time I visited him, he was overwhelmed with the options of flowers so he presented me with an arrangement of decorative peppers instead. Because I’m spicy, he said. It was cute. A few weeks later, when I flew down to Chicago again, he arranged actual flowers with a small sampling of decorative peppers in the bouquet. 

–

A four-year-old girl once turned to me, seemingly out of nowhere, and said, “Why are you not crying?”

Good question, kid. I don’t know. 

Thinking of you all, and Tina Konkin too,
Megan

P.S. You know the drill. If you find some value in Night Vision, whatever that may be, you can support my heart-on-sleeve project in a little way by clicking the button below. Love you all. <3