**Newsflash: I make it to NY fairly often, so do consider writing if you're there . . . **

If I were an animal? . . . Sea otter. Shakespeare character? The Friar Laurence. Of course I realize sea otters are nothing like Friar Laurences, but what can I say? I'm complex. Sea otters never worry, but likewise, never have to be incredibly brave. And Friar Laurences are pretty smart, but definitely can't build giant rafts of themselves and their loved ones tied together with seaweed. I have all these things, and more, inside me!

What else? I'm descended from the honorable Scottish outlaw Jamie MacPherson. I like: folks, words, roads -- country roads and city roads -- woods, mountains, bodies of water and my home. My home, and the desire to just drive. I've loved every home in which I've ever lived, even those that were not in nice places or easy times.

Teaching and learning, writing, working, cooking late dinners, listening to buses and birds.

Talking, listening, understanding. Shaking my tail in various genres (currently I enjoy salsa dancing). Getting into humorously strange situations . . . learning and not learning from my mistakes. Making fried okra. Sensuality in general.

Hopefully not some kind of scene I'm causing!

I'll just say it's very eclectic. I'm talking fresh brie and cheap beer, bluegrass and rap. . . the gamut.

Here's a very motley selection of favorite films that come to mind -- some recent and some from days of yore: Dodgeball, Secretary, Lives of Others, Happy Go Lucky/All or Nothing (and MUCH Mike Leigh), Jean de Florette/Manon of the Spring, Y Tu Mama Tambien/Bad Education (and MOST Almodovar), The Painted Veil, Dr. Zhivago, Old Boy, Frozen River, Carrie, This is England, Shrek, Kiki's Delivery Service/Porco Rosso (and ALWAYS Miyazaki), Atonement, An Affair of Love, Black Snake Moan, Cinema Paradiso, Death at a Funeral, The Sound of Music, Dances with Wolves, Toy Story, Edward Scissorhands, Hustle and Flow, An Ideal Husband, Somersault, Life is Beautiful, Love and Basketball, Nanny McPhee, Napoleon Dynamite, Princess Bride, The Orphanage/Pan's Labyrinth/The Devil's Backbone (and ALL del Toro), Red Road, Room with a View, Shakespeare in Love, School of Rock, Star Dust, Sling Blade, The Chumscrubber.

Favorite reads--many. . .All Stars:
Speak, Memory (autobiography of Vladmir Nabokov), The Autobiography of Red (novel in verse by Anne Carson), Of Mice and Men, In Search of Duende. I also have a huge sweet tooth for most Michael Chabon.

Shakespeare: Hamlet, The Tempest

Poets: Keats, Elizabeth Bishop, CK Williams, Larry Levis, Kenneth Koch, Lynda Hull, Lisa Lewis, etc. etc.

Single most life-changing poem: "At Pleasure Bay" by Robert Pinsky

Very important things include a bedroom window and comfortable shoes. But other than parking tickets and ignorance, I really wouldn't want to do without anything in this world. (Note: in this model, ignorance covers a whole lot of things, including many parts of what we call hate, and I think that's true).

I'm as green as the next guy, but I hate riding bikes. It scares me a lot and hurts my bum. When it comes to moving my unenclosed body through space, dancing is a great speed for me. (I also prefer the rush I get from my own heart on cross country skis in deep wooded silence to the rush of the slopes). All that said, I will and do both bike and alpine ski under very certain conditions, and in support of a great adventure with an awesome person (like my son). (But even he can't get me on a roller coaster).

You are my heart's champion. Or, you think we can have a good time. For the purpose of this experiment, you're probably frank, fairly sensitive and funny, but not self-consciously so (you're not so much about making jokes as expressing yourself with humor at the most excellent times).