One of my first thoughts about literature was the lack of the happy ending. Happy endings were for fairy tales and sappy books and comedy. Drama started it all. There were comedies and tragedies. Then Shakespeare came along with tragicomedies, and he thought he was onto something. Genius that he was, he knew there had to be deaths because dying is just a part of life etc etc. But as everyone knows, a vast majority of great writers have had shitty lives, and if not shitty lives, they were born into wealth and the boredoms of wealth lead to excessive drinking and education. And writers in general tend to be alcoholics and addicts of some kind or another because writing to writers is an addiction, and when it is not going well, when the writing really sucks, it's time for a drink to relieve the frustration, and when the writing is good, it's time for a drink to celebrate the success. Despite not growing up rich, the working class introduced me to drinking, and God handed me some brains all over, and I got to go to school for free (believe it or not). It's the only good thing I can say about the state government of Indiana off the top of my head.
But I still struggle through tragedies (both in print and my own, though I think I've been pretty damn lucky so far; thus, I have to write excessively long, rambling parenthetical statements, which I guess are entertaining to certain readers who enjoy "cleverness, to make up for the lack of excitement that I have experienced so far in my life). I feel so helpless. I cannot do anything for the characters in print. Dramatic irony is a pain sometimes (I personally hate it). And sometimes I just have to stop reading whatever it is that I'm reading and walk away because I get so annoyed, and maybe it's a great work of literature and maybe I love it, but death death death seethes from the book, evaporates from the page and I breathe it in and it collects in the center of my chest. I start feeling more and more uncomfortable, and it's not even my asthma.
How can I combat this evaporation? I'm no dictator. I'm not going to burn the books in my great revolution, whatever this revolution is. I'm not going to stop people from reading great literature. But what can I, the average Joe College-Grad do for literature? What is there left to write? No no that's been said far too often. Stop that.
When it's springtime it's Clap Clap April showers bring May flowers and everyone is in love and kissing and hugging each other with new found optimism that had hibernated over the winter. The summer is hot; we wear less clothing; we feel more free. The more sunlight, the more smiles. Optimism and happy thoughts in full bloom. The green green velvet of the land rolls, and here in Indiana knee high by the Fourth of July sings through the southerly winds. Sometimes life is a furnace, but a movie theater can quench your thirst for buttered popcorn. And who doesn't have air conditioning around these parts anymore? And maybe we do stay inside too much, but at least we can open the blinds and let in all that fresh sunlight that warms the carpet under our bare feet.
But the end of summer brings the dying and death. It prepares us. When I was in seventh grade, my only living grandfather, the only grandfather I knew died of a massive heart attack while sitting on a park bench next to a nurse. It was September 3, 1997, and it was my first encounter with death. In retrospect I took it amazingly well, but it was the coming fall just around corner that I thought of (I don't even remember crying at the funeral, maybe getting a little teary-eyed, but everyone else was, and when the tide of emotions comes in, they are greatly contagious and the ocean of emotions is impossible, especially for a 13 year old, to avoid). We'd be mourning and singing the songs of death for the whole winter, I thought. What about Thanksgiving? What about Christmas? Nothing will be the same again, ever again was the refrain in my mind.
Clarence Earl "Jiggs" Scheive was born in 1931 in Hammond, Indiana. (No one ever called him by Clarence or Earl, he was Jiggs to everyone and anyone. It was even sewn into his GE repairman work shirts. No one seems to remember how he got the name Jiggs, though he was probably an ADD, troublemaker child.) He had nine other living brothers and sisters. He worked at General Electric for all of his adult life. I still remember riding in the repair truck he drove everywhere in. It smelled like a new car all the time. I always wondered how he kept it smelling like that. It was always so fun to look at all the random parts he had in the truck and in his garage. I'd play with what I was told was a part of a dishwasher for fifteen minutes or so before moving on to a part of a washing machine, then a part for a drier, and then a hose for a stove.
I'm sure he was a man that enjoyed to party. He always mentioned the jitter-bug. Let's do the jitter-bug, and I always thought it looked like he was doing the Charleston, but I still am not quite sure what either of those dances are. He had the jolliness of Santa Claus, and the fun times of a grandparent who spoils their favorites with random trips through the back roads of Lake County. A Santa Claus, without much hair and no beard, and who came down every weekend morning for coffee. There was a lot more love than I realized at the time.
But when he all of a sudden died, it signaled the end of summer, which was still three weeks away. I remember driving over the new road, the new part of 77th Ave (connecting regular 77th Ave with W. 77th Ave, the street I grew up on) that had been in the works for 25 years, after they were finally allowed to float the road over the marsh. I remember the first time I rode over it was on my way to the wake. It cut right across the marsh, split it in two. I didn't recognize the inconvenience for the cranes and Canada Geese. I remember it wasn't long, during the winter, before the road started to buckle and break up because they built the road over bio-friendly industrial strength Styrofoam. The town of Schererville even took down the little dedication monument for the 77th extension, obviously embarrassed that their great new bio-friendly material didn't work. Eventually the ineffective Styrofoam was replaced with a legitimate bridge, further distressing the wildlife.
In an amazing coincidence (or act of God if you're one for the Goddy's) and act of unparalleled symbolism, one of two huge evergreens in my grandparents' front lawn was blown over on an excessively windy night, the day of October 30, about seven weeks after my Grandpa Jiggs died. The two evergreens were planted soon after my grandparents were married and moved out to the boonies of Dyer, Indiana, to raise a family in the early 1950s like so many other baby boomer creating parents did. In some old, silent home movies that my own mother had converted to VHS at Wal-Mart, the two trees are shown in their young, rebellious, teenage years, while my mother ran around topless.
It's tens years later now, and fall is gripping the land (though more slowly than normal due to global warming). So many people notice the pretty leaves, but whether it was the science classes I took in high school or all the sad endings I've read, I look at everything that's dying or everything that is getting ready to sleep for the winter, and I already begin to miss it. Humans don't hibernate, though. The closest we get is a winter home in Florida or Arizona once we're too old to enjoy it as much as we would now (at my age). It's like the optimism evaporates in the drier, cooler air. The sun drifts farther and farther away from me everyday. It's almost 4:30pm and the sun has set (fuck you, turning the clocks back, fuck you), and there will be "nights" when I sleep through all of the daylight.
Winter itself is unspeakable. The cold feet. The blue and ivory feet.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Living with Titling My Third Entry "The Third Entry"
This is going to be a strange entry though maybe not so at all. Strange because I'm writing it in a notebook in a Borders (r) in Bloomington, Indiana. Strange because I live in Dyer, Indiana. (Please note that green, bolded, and italized Courior font means that there was a deviation from the original manuscript of this text, while the red Lucida Grande like you are reading right now will contains notes on the fonts used in this entry, usually parenthesed.) Strange because I don't know what an entry really is or should be. But I doubt I should be talking of revolutions.
I find that I get incredibly inspired to write when I'm surrounded by numerous books. This is what I want to do: write books. If I must write to the dancey Indian rhythms of Borders (r), whatever gets the job done.
Writing books: I used to fantasize about writing gigantic Moby-Dick sized books. I wanted to write a monster, but I think I've finally come to terms that writing such a thing would be a nightmare. I need to learn my style, my craft, and realize it may not be best for gargantuan books. Having been reading numerous short stories since I took Bob Lamb's short story class, I think it finally hit me that I am at least currently more apt to write to the short and sweet and occasionally finding my way to a convenient if not meaningful end. What to call these blurbs? Sometimes they are stories, sometimes who needs definitions?
My current readings are Bernard Malamud's The Fixer and Borges' collected fictions. Borges hardly wrote anything longer than twenty pages, most under ten. So I suppose it was a small epiphany that I don't need to write the 21st Century Moby-Dick. Let someone better qualified and more boring do so.
When I first arrived at Borders (r), I went straight to the Literature section and made a cursory list of books I'd like to read by the end of the year. Here it is:
A List of Book's I've not Read, but I should by the end of '07
A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf
To the Lighthouse by " "
Native Son by Richard Wright
Rabbit, Run by John Updike
Walden by H. David Thoreau
Zuckerman Unbound by Philip Roth
Everyman by " "
Despair by V. Nabokov
? by Dostoevsky
Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth
Notice that I started at the end of the alphabet and worked backwards, mainly concentrating on the middle, most easily visible shelves with apologies to Jack Kerouac and Alice Munroe. I've heard that left handed people often read magazines from back to front, but I hardly do anything left handed, except that.
I was about to make my way over to the cafe section when I stumbled upon a new David Markson novel titled The Last Novel. I read a few of his "novels" when I was a senior in high school. Much of the content consists of little facts about past writers, painters, musicians, etc. On page 7 I came across a poignant passage:
"It takes a lot of time to be a genius, you have to sit around so much doing nothing, really doing nothing. Said Gertrude Stein.
"It is not amusing, it is not interesting, it is not good for one's mind.
"Said T. S. Eliot -- re Stein's prose."
It remains to be seen if I buy this book (I did.) or something else from the list, or something else, or nothing at all. Such a decision will be made long after this sentence is punctuated.
I find that I get incredibly inspired to write when I'm surrounded by numerous books. This is what I want to do: write books. If I must write to the dancey Indian rhythms of Borders (r), whatever gets the job done.
Writing books: I used to fantasize about writing gigantic Moby-Dick sized books. I wanted to write a monster, but I think I've finally come to terms that writing such a thing would be a nightmare. I need to learn my style, my craft, and realize it may not be best for gargantuan books. Having been reading numerous short stories since I took Bob Lamb's short story class, I think it finally hit me that I am at least currently more apt to write to the short and sweet and occasionally finding my way to a convenient if not meaningful end. What to call these blurbs? Sometimes they are stories, sometimes who needs definitions?
My current readings are Bernard Malamud's The Fixer and Borges' collected fictions. Borges hardly wrote anything longer than twenty pages, most under ten. So I suppose it was a small epiphany that I don't need to write the 21st Century Moby-Dick. Let someone better qualified and more boring do so.
When I first arrived at Borders (r), I went straight to the Literature section and made a cursory list of books I'd like to read by the end of the year. Here it is:
A List of Book's I've not Read, but I should by the end of '07
A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf
To the Lighthouse by " "
Native Son by Richard Wright
Rabbit, Run by John Updike
Walden by H. David Thoreau
Zuckerman Unbound by Philip Roth
Everyman by " "
Despair by V. Nabokov
? by Dostoevsky
Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
Lost in the Funhouse by John Barth
Notice that I started at the end of the alphabet and worked backwards, mainly concentrating on the middle, most easily visible shelves with apologies to Jack Kerouac and Alice Munroe. I've heard that left handed people often read magazines from back to front, but I hardly do anything left handed, except that.
I was about to make my way over to the cafe section when I stumbled upon a new David Markson novel titled The Last Novel. I read a few of his "novels" when I was a senior in high school. Much of the content consists of little facts about past writers, painters, musicians, etc. On page 7 I came across a poignant passage:
"It takes a lot of time to be a genius, you have to sit around so much doing nothing, really doing nothing. Said Gertrude Stein.
"It is not amusing, it is not interesting, it is not good for one's mind.
"Said T. S. Eliot -- re Stein's prose."
It remains to be seen if I buy this book (I did.) or something else from the list, or something else, or nothing at all. Such a decision will be made long after this sentence is punctuated.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Why I Can't Write a Novel
I think this will give you a good idea of why I can't write a novel, not yet, maybe some day, but not now. I think this could be an ok analogy or metaphor but probably not.
For Martha.
George Washington is a double influence for my head. She, whom I thought was a he when I found her, was thinking about eating something that looked like a dead animal in a parking lot but turned out to be a plastic garbage bag, mangled horribly. You see, George Washington (the one that was president) was my childhood hero. It wasn't just the cherry tree and the I cannot tell a lie. That was bullshit. I'm talking about how George Washington was a great American leader, patriot, and someone who didn't really want to do anything but still did it anyway. He didn't want to necessarily be president, and I, too, could identify with this sentiment when I was growing up. The last thing I wanted to do was be president, but you know what? George looked around at all the old guys who had been busy writing and arguing and bitching over the Constitution and George said to himself, None of these guys will do a good job. None of them will actually do what they're supposed to do. Shit, why do I have to be the best? And so he said, Sure guys, I'll be the president.
So after the first four years, they still didn't have nobody who would be a good president so they said, Hey, George, would you be our president again? And George was like, Shit. But eventually they got him some pretty clean bitches, and he said, Whatevuh, guys, as long as I get the bitches. So that's how George Washington became our president again. This guy had the chance to chill in his Virgin home with his main bitch Martha for the rest of his life, not doing shit, but he stood tall and made sure this new paradise of a country got off to a good start so pimps and their hoes could be safe for centuries to come.
I mean George was just the most stand up guy there could be back in those old times. Towards the end of this life he said, Fuck wigs, because wigs were fucking hot and itchy. He shouted, Fuck wigs. They're too fucking hot and itchy. Why the fuck do we wear wigs when it's fucking 90 degrees up in here and no damn AC? And that is why we do not have to wear wigs today. Because of motherfucking George Washington.
All right, so I was telling you earlier about my dog George Washington. She is my bitch, but not in that way you sick fuck. No, she is so damn loyal, just like George was back in the day. My bitch (but not that kind of bitch) has got my back. She represents, for sure. I wanted to write about her and tell the world that it don't take some tall dude in a powered wig to change someones life for the better, though as I said, George Washington said, Fuck wigs. And my bitch George Washington, she said, Fuck trash. Of course, she didn't really say anything, but she was smelling that plastic garbage bag in that parking lot that looked a hell of a lot like a dead animal and said, Nah, fuck that. Right then and there I knew I had a new best friend. But what I also realized is that this parking lot was fucking dirty as fuck. So what I did was pick up all the trash and throw it away. I was thinking that if someone came to my room and started throwing trash on my floor, I'd be all up in their face. I'd throw their ass out of my room. That shit is not cool. I hope you all agree. Pardon me being on my soapbox.
Now, I'm not saying that everyone should go out and pick up a random stray dog. No, I did that, but I got the dog some shots, and it said, Thank you. I love you. And I said, I love you, too, George. I know that sounds weird, but it's what I said. George Washington not only inspires me, she also keeps me company. When I'm in my room, she's there too, resting her golden head on my lap and sometimes she looks up at me with those huge brown eyes, and it looks like she's actually smiling. She taught me that animals can have some serious emotions. Sometimes she's stubborn, sometimes she's loving, like when she's resting on my lap looking up and smiling at me, and sometimes she's really happy. When she's really happy she jumps all around and gets me off my ass so that I get some fresh air, air that is made fresher because I've been going around and picking up trash when I take her for walks. George Washington is a great leader, she leads me straight to all the trash be it a plastic garbage bag that looks a hell of a lot like a dead animal at first or beer bottles filled with cigarette butts. Sometimes I even find some used condoms, which is just sick. If someone came in my room, like literally came in my room in a sexual fashion and it wasn't me, and they just left their mess there on my floor, if that happened, I would freak the fuck out. But apparently the floor of my room is not a parking lot or the side of the road or a playground with swing-sets and merry-go-rounds.
Sorry about the rant there, but you see, this is what happens because of my dog George Washington. She gets me wanting to actually do stuff even if I don't want to do anything. She is like the OG George Washington because she has also been a big influence in my life and how I live my life. I think that's basically what I wanted to say. I also want to thank a Mr. Jason Compsin for proofreading this here entry for me. Thanks, man.
For Martha.
George Washington is a double influence for my head. She, whom I thought was a he when I found her, was thinking about eating something that looked like a dead animal in a parking lot but turned out to be a plastic garbage bag, mangled horribly. You see, George Washington (the one that was president) was my childhood hero. It wasn't just the cherry tree and the I cannot tell a lie. That was bullshit. I'm talking about how George Washington was a great American leader, patriot, and someone who didn't really want to do anything but still did it anyway. He didn't want to necessarily be president, and I, too, could identify with this sentiment when I was growing up. The last thing I wanted to do was be president, but you know what? George looked around at all the old guys who had been busy writing and arguing and bitching over the Constitution and George said to himself, None of these guys will do a good job. None of them will actually do what they're supposed to do. Shit, why do I have to be the best? And so he said, Sure guys, I'll be the president.
So after the first four years, they still didn't have nobody who would be a good president so they said, Hey, George, would you be our president again? And George was like, Shit. But eventually they got him some pretty clean bitches, and he said, Whatevuh, guys, as long as I get the bitches. So that's how George Washington became our president again. This guy had the chance to chill in his Virgin home with his main bitch Martha for the rest of his life, not doing shit, but he stood tall and made sure this new paradise of a country got off to a good start so pimps and their hoes could be safe for centuries to come.
I mean George was just the most stand up guy there could be back in those old times. Towards the end of this life he said, Fuck wigs, because wigs were fucking hot and itchy. He shouted, Fuck wigs. They're too fucking hot and itchy. Why the fuck do we wear wigs when it's fucking 90 degrees up in here and no damn AC? And that is why we do not have to wear wigs today. Because of motherfucking George Washington.
All right, so I was telling you earlier about my dog George Washington. She is my bitch, but not in that way you sick fuck. No, she is so damn loyal, just like George was back in the day. My bitch (but not that kind of bitch) has got my back. She represents, for sure. I wanted to write about her and tell the world that it don't take some tall dude in a powered wig to change someones life for the better, though as I said, George Washington said, Fuck wigs. And my bitch George Washington, she said, Fuck trash. Of course, she didn't really say anything, but she was smelling that plastic garbage bag in that parking lot that looked a hell of a lot like a dead animal and said, Nah, fuck that. Right then and there I knew I had a new best friend. But what I also realized is that this parking lot was fucking dirty as fuck. So what I did was pick up all the trash and throw it away. I was thinking that if someone came to my room and started throwing trash on my floor, I'd be all up in their face. I'd throw their ass out of my room. That shit is not cool. I hope you all agree. Pardon me being on my soapbox.
Now, I'm not saying that everyone should go out and pick up a random stray dog. No, I did that, but I got the dog some shots, and it said, Thank you. I love you. And I said, I love you, too, George. I know that sounds weird, but it's what I said. George Washington not only inspires me, she also keeps me company. When I'm in my room, she's there too, resting her golden head on my lap and sometimes she looks up at me with those huge brown eyes, and it looks like she's actually smiling. She taught me that animals can have some serious emotions. Sometimes she's stubborn, sometimes she's loving, like when she's resting on my lap looking up and smiling at me, and sometimes she's really happy. When she's really happy she jumps all around and gets me off my ass so that I get some fresh air, air that is made fresher because I've been going around and picking up trash when I take her for walks. George Washington is a great leader, she leads me straight to all the trash be it a plastic garbage bag that looks a hell of a lot like a dead animal at first or beer bottles filled with cigarette butts. Sometimes I even find some used condoms, which is just sick. If someone came in my room, like literally came in my room in a sexual fashion and it wasn't me, and they just left their mess there on my floor, if that happened, I would freak the fuck out. But apparently the floor of my room is not a parking lot or the side of the road or a playground with swing-sets and merry-go-rounds.
Sorry about the rant there, but you see, this is what happens because of my dog George Washington. She gets me wanting to actually do stuff even if I don't want to do anything. She is like the OG George Washington because she has also been a big influence in my life and how I live my life. I think that's basically what I wanted to say. I also want to thank a Mr. Jason Compsin for proofreading this here entry for me. Thanks, man.
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Small Beginnings, Vast Implications
I have had one or two blogs before. I was encouraged to make another. I got an idea to start a revolution years ago, but to say the least, starting a revolution is a daunting task. But a start is a start. Snowballs don't happen by themselves (though avalanches do . . .), and I am telling myself that this small, insomniac inspired effort will prove fruitful not only for myself, but for my adoring fans as well.
I could go into a detailed account of my personal background, but that's not very post-modern, that's not even very epic poetry. While I'm neither Vonnegut nor Homer, I'll make an attempt at some medias res, and I'll hopefully find something more random than introductions because they are arguably pointless. Just tell the story and let the reader figure things out.
I woke up at 4:30am after one of those weird make out dreams, one where you are making out with some semi-random person, and proceeded to pick up my laptop off the floor and play some poker. I was breaking one of my cardinal rules of poker: never play unless you are awake for at least an hour. Regardless, I had a decent but fun session. I won one [1] of four 55+5 turbos on FullTiltPoker for a small profit, along with a 5th place finish in a $3 turbo multitable with only a few over 100 starting. Let's just say a first place finish wasn't going to break the bank.
I then said hello to my parents who were getting ready to go to work. I then went to Krispy Kreme. I then thoroughly enjoyed their cinnamon bun doughnuts. I then decided to make a blog. On my way home from doughnuts, I started thinking of writing a little bit in a new blog I'd create about some of my favorite books which I'll call something like "Kyle's mandatory reading list."
Kyle's Mandatory Reading List:
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut -- This novel was suggested to me back in my sophomore or junior year of high school. It was unlike anything I had ever read. It started the proverbial snowball rolling on my eventual degree in English. English, what a great language.
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller -- This novel was the second book suggested to me back in my sophomore or junior year of high school. It was unlike anything I had ever read, though it had World War II in common with Slaughterhouse-Five.
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hem(one [1] "m")ingway -- This novel was later suggested to me in my senior year of high school, along with his Nick Adams stories. Hemingway not only revolutionized writing, he revolutionized the still relatively young genre of short stories. "Hills Like White Elephants" while not a Nick Adams story, appears in just about every anthology that is moderately related to either short stories, the 20th century, American writers, or the greatest literature ever. "Indian Camp" is a Nick Adams story that is cool. "Big Two-Hearted River: Parts I and II" are a prime example of Hemingway writing his pants off. How sexy.
There are a shitton of amazing books out there. It occasionally gets me into a panic thinking about all of those books I haven't read. I was once or twice told that I shouldn't worry because I'm ahead of the pack when it comes to books read. I just think I'm lazy and not nearly motivated enough. Hopefully something as small as this internet blog can spark something inside me to start working my butt off.
I could go into a detailed account of my personal background, but that's not very post-modern, that's not even very epic poetry. While I'm neither Vonnegut nor Homer, I'll make an attempt at some medias res, and I'll hopefully find something more random than introductions because they are arguably pointless. Just tell the story and let the reader figure things out.
I woke up at 4:30am after one of those weird make out dreams, one where you are making out with some semi-random person, and proceeded to pick up my laptop off the floor and play some poker. I was breaking one of my cardinal rules of poker: never play unless you are awake for at least an hour. Regardless, I had a decent but fun session. I won one [1] of four 55+5 turbos on FullTiltPoker for a small profit, along with a 5th place finish in a $3 turbo multitable with only a few over 100 starting. Let's just say a first place finish wasn't going to break the bank.
I then said hello to my parents who were getting ready to go to work. I then went to Krispy Kreme. I then thoroughly enjoyed their cinnamon bun doughnuts. I then decided to make a blog. On my way home from doughnuts, I started thinking of writing a little bit in a new blog I'd create about some of my favorite books which I'll call something like "Kyle's mandatory reading list."
Kyle's Mandatory Reading List:
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut -- This novel was suggested to me back in my sophomore or junior year of high school. It was unlike anything I had ever read. It started the proverbial snowball rolling on my eventual degree in English. English, what a great language.
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller -- This novel was the second book suggested to me back in my sophomore or junior year of high school. It was unlike anything I had ever read, though it had World War II in common with Slaughterhouse-Five.
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hem(one [1] "m")ingway -- This novel was later suggested to me in my senior year of high school, along with his Nick Adams stories. Hemingway not only revolutionized writing, he revolutionized the still relatively young genre of short stories. "Hills Like White Elephants" while not a Nick Adams story, appears in just about every anthology that is moderately related to either short stories, the 20th century, American writers, or the greatest literature ever. "Indian Camp" is a Nick Adams story that is cool. "Big Two-Hearted River: Parts I and II" are a prime example of Hemingway writing his pants off. How sexy.
There are a shitton of amazing books out there. It occasionally gets me into a panic thinking about all of those books I haven't read. I was once or twice told that I shouldn't worry because I'm ahead of the pack when it comes to books read. I just think I'm lazy and not nearly motivated enough. Hopefully something as small as this internet blog can spark something inside me to start working my butt off.
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