Patrick and Stephanie

Nobody said everything, or anything, for that matter, but we all tried. Fred, Zen, Robert, Milo, Barbara, Tony, Ruthven, Barry, Eivin, Alastair. Certain encounters change the course of one’s life. You might not recognize that until much later, but eventually, upon reflection, it becomes obvious. Such was that moment in the faculty room of the […]

Phil Anders

Phil Anders, now entering his eighties, often wondered whether his name had predestined him to the life he had led. Of course he was already in his late teens when he recognized the implications, but since then he had lived up to the meaning of the word philander. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. patrick-meadows.com

Maybelle and Mr. Bob

| Autobiographical

I’m danged if I can remember how I met those two old drunks, Maybelle and Mr. Bob. Maybe hitching on the highway from Oak Hill to Fayetteville. It was the summer I quit school in Florida and took off for Oak Hill, homesick for my girlfriend. She was by then a mother, made pregnant by […]

Stephanie and I

Stephanie and I made a little world and we lived in it. A long goodbye. My life is in tatters. Yours has ended. So sorry. This short poem is from a collection Patrick called Scattered Notes.odt dated from 2014 to 2016. I’ll continue to add other segments as time allows. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. […]

Bulent

| Autobiographical

It was inevitable, thought we didn’t know it at the time, that we should meet Bulent. Mari and I flew from Izmir to Ankara where we spent the night. Then the next day by bus to Adana. Sounds like a simple statement, but it was not so simple. The two-propeller plane took off from what […]

Sawing Trunks

Thursday I am pointlessly staring at my tea, now only a stain at the bottom of the mug. So I glance at my reflection in the glass door of the dish cupboard opposite the table where I am sitting already quite a while. Reflected is the window behind me, through which I see that the […]

The Joy Had Gone Out of Her Life

The joy had gone out of her life ten years ago already. Why pretend? Her friends tried to cheer her up, but stubbornly she held onto her empty life and empty house and empty bed. In fact she came to resent the happiness of others. Only the firmest of old acquaintances persisted, inviting her twice […]

Marvin Introduced Me

| Autobiographical

In this excerpt, set in Tampa in the early 1970s, Patrick describes how he first learned of Dr. Weightnovel, which turned into a writing project he worked on for the rest of his life, but never finished. I’ve made only minor edits, primarily fixing typos and punctuation. Caution to the reader: this story includes a […]

Mem-Mari

| Autobiographical, Patrick's Family

Create a montage of those events that most often recur in memory. Mari got a a job teaching elementary art in Centereach. We found a cottage in Lake Ronkokoma to rent. Since she was teaching under the name on her teaching certificate, we lived under that name – last name Irvin. Her sister Nancy and […]

Pension Reiss

A couple of loose pages I found that describes Patrick and Mari’s arrival in Germany. This would have probably been 1962 or ’63 I think. I found this in the folder titled Bohemians of the Tramatura although the story has nothing to do with Spain. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. patrick-meadows.com

Honey Bees

Here’s a sketch about growing up in West Virginia, found in the Bohemians of the Tramatura folder. Patrick mentions his brother Jack, who had a combination safe at the age of 11. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. patrick-meadows.com

People Came to the Bar in Shifts

Another story, incomplete, from more loose pages, torn from a spiral notebook, found in the Bohemians of the Tramantura folder. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. patrick-meadows.com

Merry Christmas (2014)