Some Things About Me — Mark Tulin

From therapy to becoming a writer

I told my wife to make my obituary short and sweet. A haiku would suffice:

A crow of mischief

Born out of brotherly love

Retires to the sea

No one knows me completely, not even my mother; rest her soul. I'm too cryptic for words. The best I can do is offer a sketch of my existence from one book to another.

Some of us are born writers. It's in our DNA. Our life is the road we take from one story to the next. My life has taken a circuitous route from a Philadelphia psychotherapist to a California writer and picture taker.

I had asthma, scarlet fever, and celiac as a youngster and needed to consume twenty pounds of bananas a week for potassium. People mistook me for an accordion because I wheezed so much. That hasn't changed, as evidenced by the X-rays of my lungs, which look like burnt-out Dresden (an elusion to a Kurt Vonnegut novel).

Two German shepherds attacked me in my driveway when I was a kid. They left my face bruised and swollen. Back in the '60s, physicians made house calls, so Dr. Louis, with his black medical bag, treated me in the privacy of my home. I experienced pain from that incident, but my parents found the humor in it, calling me their Cyclops Kid.

I am an only child and never felt that I missed having siblings. My family was the kids in the neighborhood. Making friends was easy for me, and we often got into mischief, which I allude to in my short story collection, The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories. The first story is a novella in which I describe my guilty conscience, dysfunctional family system, and my yearning for a particular girl with knobby knees named Sandy.

Despite my chronic asthma, I was an active kid. I rode a bike, hit baseballs, and played tackle football on a vacant lot in Northeast Philly until it was too dark to see. And I only went home because I was hungry or The Monkees were on TV.

Philadelphia sports was in my blood growing up. I often refer to my love of baseball and basketball heroes in short stories. But I can't follow my teams on TV anymore because it raises my blood pressure. Philadelphia sports teams have had a long history of losing, which has left me traumatized to this day.

Despite being sixty-eight, my religion remains undefined. I was born into a Jewish family. I love some aspects of the culture that produced some great writers, entertainers, and scientists, but I am lukewarm about Judaism as a religion. I had a bar mitzvah, but that was pretty much it. I delved into Buddhism and was baptized a Christian in a two-foot pool in the back of a church, but I've become jaded with Christianity since it has been associated with right-wing politics.

I probably became a Christian because my first wife was one, and she made it sound inviting. I sometimes believe in God, but other times, I lean toward atheism. One thing is sure: I don't like preachy people or those who hide themselves behind the bible.

I had a dream when I was eight years old that I was walking on a California street with palm trees and Birds of Paradise. The dream came true almost fifty years later when I moved to Santa Barbara, a beautiful coastal town called the American Riviera. I had started doing yoga in Philly, but my practice blossomed in California with some fantastic instructors. My first poetry chapbook, Magical Yogis, was about my experiences as a yogi and my two-week retreat in the Santa Ynez mountains.

A thumbnail sketch of my parents.

My mom was the sanest schizophrenic I had ever met. By that, I mean she didn't let her mental illness affect her daily life. She had a routine and was independent. Although she talked to herself and rarely filtered her words, she functioned better than most sane people I know. It was because of her that I studied psychology and became a psychotherapist.

My father was a produce man. He had a fruit store in upstate Pennsylvania and later in Philadelphia. People called him "Uncle Miltie." He had a charming personality, was social, rational, and everything my mother wasn't. He taught me about the value of work and how to structure my time, which would come in handy as a writer.

Together, Mom and Dad didn't mix and became more argumentative than Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. They were the reason I became a marriage and family therapist. If I couldn't fix my parents, I might be able to heal a family of strangers.

I could have been a stronger student in high school. But once I got to college, I couldn't stop learning. I earned two master's degrees and three post-graduate certificates. My areas of specialty were family and sex therapy. I was a practicing therapist for over thirty years before moving to California in 2012.

I dabbled in writing for years, getting published in various local Philadelphia papers. But it was when I settled in California that I began to excel. I took an online course in "truthful" writing, which was my jumping-off point.

I developed a fascination for the Santa Barbara homeless. I would often see homeless people living on the streets, under bridges, and in the parks and be fascinated by their survival skills. Homelessness was the theme of my second chapbook of poetry, Awkward Grace.

Also, in Santa Barbara, I appreciated the crows perched on my apartment's wires and tree branches. They woke me up in the morning, both literally and mindfully. I began to take photos of them and observe their habits, amazed at their intelligence and resourcefulness. I named my blog after them — Crow On The Wire. It includes most of my stories, poetry, and links to published works.

Now, I'm in my sixties, go to the beach every day, sit in my office for eight hours, and write. I'm not always productive, but I show up. I have been published in over a hundred journals, magazines, and anthologies. I have had three of my stories read on podcasts, a Pushcart Prize nomination, Best of Drabble, and an honorable mention from Glimmer Train.

Junkyard Souls is the title of my eclectic poetry collection. In this book, you can see my range and development as a poet, from serious verse to the humorous and absurd "Grandpa Drinking Tea" to "Sandpipers in the Bright Sunlight."

Lastly, I've been lucky enough to be married twice. My first wife gave me two beautiful children. She was a brilliant writer who helped me with my craft. We drifted apart and divorced but remained friends until her death. May she rest in peace.

My second and final wife is a Mexican angel and the cream of the crop. She rescued me from Philadelphia and single-handedly smuggled me into California. She loves me, laughs at my jokes, and encourages my writing. Her name is Alice, and, like me, she enjoys sports, old movies, and going to rock concerts. Together, we live by the sea, do yoga at the beach, and wear C-PAPS to bed at night so we don't hear each other snore like wild boars.

My fourth poetry collection is called Rain on Cabrillo, about my experiences on the beaches of Ventura and Santa Barbara. Check it out at Amazon.com and Cyberwit.net.

My latest book is Uncommon Love Poems, published by Cyberwit.net. It is a poetry collection filled with quirky love poems that seek to define love. It is available at Amazon.com and on my website, www.crowonthewire.com.

In my second marriage, I finally found someone who loves me and who I trust. How could I not love a person who demonstrates her love daily? When you feel secure in love, you can see it all around you. Uncommon Love Poems are the many ways I see the passionate, the unrequited, the motherly, the agape, the spiritual, and the quirky forms of love in the world.

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© 2021 Mark Tulin

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