I was 15 years old when I went to the Embassy Theatre with my friend Jean Burr, and we both sat there sobbing to watch poor Moira Shearer dance to her death in “The Red Shoes.” I remember looking up at the stars on the ceiling of that beautiful place and thinking how my mother had described the ceiling of the Cocoanut Grove, designed to make you feel you were under a warm summer sky, even on the coldest of nights. I held on to Jean’s arm and thought how my mother would have loved that movie.

We stood there on Moody Street afterward, still wiping our eyes and blowing our noses, laughing at how we must look to those passing by and around us on the sidewalk. The streetlights were on, and we hugged before parting ways, and I remember I lied to my father when he asked about the movie. I said it was something silly based on an old fairy tale; I told him that he wouldn’t like it at all but that there was a film coming soon that starred Johnny Mack Brown that I bet he’d want to see.

Then I’m on that wintry platform waiting for the train. I smell the river. I see the lights. And when the train approaches, the ground vibrates beneath my feet.

November 28, 1980

Every November 28 at 10:15, I stop and take a long inhale of my cigarette, and then I hold it as long as I am able. Some years, I have driven and parked there near Shawmut Street or sat in the lobby of the Radisson. Sometimes, I just walk outside to be alone. A lot can happen in 12 minutes.

November 28, 1991

Something I have never stopped thinking about: fate?