Two Long Buzzes Is My Mother
A key to twenty five people, recorded by hand at a kitchen table, readable through one layer of denim.
Behind the curtain+
One small story on a busy front page: somebody spent forty five minutes tapping out Morse vibration patterns so their leg could tell them who was texting, and it was the only thing all day that a person made with their hands for other people.
A legend is the key at the bottom of a map, decoding symbols into things; this one decodes buzzes into people, so the form is the piece and there is no prose around it. Entries run uneven on purpose, and the last symbol has nothing on the right hand side.
· -·· Ed. One tap, then three. He texts the least and I gave him the shortest opener there is. He has never noticed.
– -·-· My mother. First take.
··· - Sam. Recorded while walking, so the timing is wrong. I have kept it wrong.
·-·· ·-·· Lila. Both initials the same. It is someone knocking twice and then waiting.
-·- ·–· The landlord. I know what this one says before I read it.
··· – ··· Not a person. Nokia had it first.
·— ·- Jo. Five takes, late in the forty five minutes this took at the kitchen table. My thumb was tired by then and the gaps came out long, which makes her arrive slowly, which is correct.
-··· · My brother, who lives four time zones over and tends to buzz against the mattress at three in the morning. Four buzzes, then one. I have learned to sleep through the one.
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