the napkin project

I’m a latecomer to the Esquire Napkin Project, but I love it nonetheless. Writers, writers, and more writers have scribbled a story on a napkin. Luckily, their handwriting is transcribed beneath photos of the napkins because not everyone had two elementary school teachers for parents. Andrew Sean Greer actually has very nice penmanship and can tell a good story to boot:

The cold pressure you feel under the table is a gun. A real gun. I am a desperate man. I am a novelist. Don't look at me, just keep on drinking. Now what I want you to do — slowly, no sudden moves — is tell me a story. A true story, make it good. Maybe you woke up last week to a black sky and thought the world was ending. Maybe you called your girlfriend and said, I'm sorry about everything, and she said, Why? And you said, The world is ending, and she said, You idiot it's 3 in the morning. But thanks. I'm sorry too. And you know what? Let's get in my car and get out of here, I mean drive off and not look back. What about our friends, you ask. Screw them. I can't, you say, the world's not really ending. Well I am, she says, and that is how you lost her. Maybe a story like that. And when you're done, I want you to walk away. No funny stuff. Just walk away like nothing ever happened. Sit back and think. Order us both another Manhattan.

All right, begin....

I only wish there were more women represented. I remember when I spent a lot of time in bars scribbling on napkins, there weren’t too many women around.