Winter and spring are going at it tooth-and-nail outside. Warm air pushing its way into winter's stronghold has kicked up a wind that's nudging this old house around and making me worry that something's going to fly off. I've already been outside once, in a charming ensemble of bathrobe and winter boots--tres chic!--to see if I'm missing anything. You know, like shingles, gutters, my dish, or the upstairs.Every gust makes the windows creak. Upstairs in the kid's room the floors actually whistle when the wind rushes through the bones of our 150-year-old house.
The skies are clear, a rich blue. When I went out, nothing froze and fell off. The wind, for all its Clash-of-the-Titans rage, was close to warm. It's been a long winter, all the New England charm of it gone as the accumulation rose up over 30, 40, 50 inches total. Now spring, armor-clad and singing Wagnerian arias, is taking the frost giant to task. It may be too early for her--this is New England after all, when snow in mid-April is greeted with a resigned, "It figures." But right now, spear in hand and packing a Valhalla-or-bust attitude, she's in it for us.
Go, spring. Kick winter's ass.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Scent.
The cat completely gets it. She can smell spring from here. Every time I walk through the mudroom she follows, lingering by the door with the most pathetic mew she can muster. I understand. The cellar is no longer the happy hunting ground slash killing floor it used to be. She's done her job down there. There's no more game for her, no more partially eviscerated presents for us. But she's waiting. A few times recently she's made a break for it as I come in or go out, taking advantage of the ice-damaged screen door's slow closing. She rushes out to the deck, senses piqued, huntress blood stirred and waking--only to get about five good kitty-bounds out before she realizes, Sweet mother o'feline, I'm freezing my paws off! At which point she double-times it back into the house.
But oh, the urge is there. She can't wait for that door to open onto a cooling evening, the air ripe with scents, the big lilac bush hiding fresh birds, the unmowed grass promising bunnies. She's ready to race across the deck once the Ice Age glacier that's consumed it has disappeared, vault over the back fence and into the tangle of brambles beyond, gone for days doing who-knows-what, reveling in the release and return to the girl she wants to be--not shut behind doors and napping in a dank basement, but roaming and stalking, sleeping the day away on a sun-warmed deck, being in the world, under the sky, and content.
The cat completely gets it.
But oh, the urge is there. She can't wait for that door to open onto a cooling evening, the air ripe with scents, the big lilac bush hiding fresh birds, the unmowed grass promising bunnies. She's ready to race across the deck once the Ice Age glacier that's consumed it has disappeared, vault over the back fence and into the tangle of brambles beyond, gone for days doing who-knows-what, reveling in the release and return to the girl she wants to be--not shut behind doors and napping in a dank basement, but roaming and stalking, sleeping the day away on a sun-warmed deck, being in the world, under the sky, and content.
The cat completely gets it.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Trove
It was one of those days when the mass of clutter on my small office desk dangerously threatened the faux-Zen sensibility I ostensibly try to wedge into my life. Mail, envelopes from music review submissions, the music review submissions themselves, just all manner of crap and clutter had reduced my (ahem) workspace from two feet down to about two inches. I purged.
And then I cleaned my desk.
ba domp bomp. I'll be here all week.
As the detrital tide receded, I found a couple of 3 1/2" floppies tucked back under the monitor shelf. (If you are under the age of 18, I'll wait a moment while you Google "floppy disc" and catch up with the old timers.) One was marked "Misc." I popped it into my computer--after a moment where I lamented that I currently work on a computer that shows it age by even having a 3 1/2" drive in the first place--and took a look.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear but a handful of fiction pieces I thought had been lost to the ages. Or at least to moving three times in five and a half years. Here was a horror story that has always been in my head, written right to the point where it kicks into high gear; here were 80-plus pages of a fantasy novel (naturally the first of a trilogy, right?) from the late 90s or very early 00s, I don't recall which; and here, perhaps best of all, were nearly 50 pages of the novel, written in the early 00s, based on the radio soap opera parody I'd written in the late 80s--the novel I have always wanted to get back to and actually began re-writing a few months ago. (Naturally, I haven't gotten far...)
It wasn't just finding the manuscripts that mattered, though. It was that when I read them, I was honestly struck by the language. This is going to come off as egotistical but...there's some good stuff in there. Sharp, descriptive, compelling, funny where it's supposed to be. I expected to read some of it and wince or slap myself with an occasional "Oh, John, what were you thinking?" Even though much of it comes from less than a decade ago, I had convinced myself that one of the reasons I had done so well with plays was that I wasn't all that great with descriptive writing--that dialogue was my forte. I have also long told myself that the odds are that I don't have a novel-length idea in me. Believe me, I've tried. I've tried since I was in my teens. Thirty years of NOT doing something can go a long way toward convincing you that you can't. Reading some of this, however... I daresay there's a slight chance I may have been mistaken.
Is it brilliance? Of course not. Everything's been held in stasis in an early, semi-completed/barely started state. If you write and you convince yourself that whatever drips out of the pen on the first pass is stunning, then you'll never get anywhere as a writer. (This applies to the next two, three, six, twelve passes, whatever it takes until you actually get it right.) Is it, on the other hand, a helluva start? Could be, should I choose to use any of it. What I found on this disc is a nudge. I have been locked in a state of I have nothing to say for a few years now. And while I still may not have anything to say--or nothing new, anyway--I have things I can knock around now. Things I believed in for a while, and could believe in again. Or at least use to whack some rust off the writing gates and see what happens when they creak open.
There is an essay in Ray Bradbury's excellent collection, Zen in the Art of Writing, where he talks about keeping a file-card box with index cards in it, each one bearing an idea. Sometimes it's a word, a phrase, a sentence. I recall him pointing out, for example, "the toy box at the top of the stairs." The ideas go into the box when they don't seem to be going anywhere, writing-wise. Then, when Bradbury is stuck, he can open this box, draw a card and maybe find inspiration. And here's the thing: the idea that went in the box is not necessarily the idea that comes out. The kernel, the seed that was planted there has the potential to sprout into something new and entirely unrelated. Or maybe it does reawaken the original idea, but it gets considered with fresh eyes and mind.
So what I found the other day was not a floppy disc, really. It was my 3 1/2" Bradbury box. It was a little box I'd tucked away, layered with possibility.
Let's see where it goes.
js
And then I cleaned my desk.
ba domp bomp. I'll be here all week.
As the detrital tide receded, I found a couple of 3 1/2" floppies tucked back under the monitor shelf. (If you are under the age of 18, I'll wait a moment while you Google "floppy disc" and catch up with the old timers.) One was marked "Misc." I popped it into my computer--after a moment where I lamented that I currently work on a computer that shows it age by even having a 3 1/2" drive in the first place--and took a look.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear but a handful of fiction pieces I thought had been lost to the ages. Or at least to moving three times in five and a half years. Here was a horror story that has always been in my head, written right to the point where it kicks into high gear; here were 80-plus pages of a fantasy novel (naturally the first of a trilogy, right?) from the late 90s or very early 00s, I don't recall which; and here, perhaps best of all, were nearly 50 pages of the novel, written in the early 00s, based on the radio soap opera parody I'd written in the late 80s--the novel I have always wanted to get back to and actually began re-writing a few months ago. (Naturally, I haven't gotten far...)
It wasn't just finding the manuscripts that mattered, though. It was that when I read them, I was honestly struck by the language. This is going to come off as egotistical but...there's some good stuff in there. Sharp, descriptive, compelling, funny where it's supposed to be. I expected to read some of it and wince or slap myself with an occasional "Oh, John, what were you thinking?" Even though much of it comes from less than a decade ago, I had convinced myself that one of the reasons I had done so well with plays was that I wasn't all that great with descriptive writing--that dialogue was my forte. I have also long told myself that the odds are that I don't have a novel-length idea in me. Believe me, I've tried. I've tried since I was in my teens. Thirty years of NOT doing something can go a long way toward convincing you that you can't. Reading some of this, however... I daresay there's a slight chance I may have been mistaken.
Is it brilliance? Of course not. Everything's been held in stasis in an early, semi-completed/barely started state. If you write and you convince yourself that whatever drips out of the pen on the first pass is stunning, then you'll never get anywhere as a writer. (This applies to the next two, three, six, twelve passes, whatever it takes until you actually get it right.) Is it, on the other hand, a helluva start? Could be, should I choose to use any of it. What I found on this disc is a nudge. I have been locked in a state of I have nothing to say for a few years now. And while I still may not have anything to say--or nothing new, anyway--I have things I can knock around now. Things I believed in for a while, and could believe in again. Or at least use to whack some rust off the writing gates and see what happens when they creak open.
There is an essay in Ray Bradbury's excellent collection, Zen in the Art of Writing, where he talks about keeping a file-card box with index cards in it, each one bearing an idea. Sometimes it's a word, a phrase, a sentence. I recall him pointing out, for example, "the toy box at the top of the stairs." The ideas go into the box when they don't seem to be going anywhere, writing-wise. Then, when Bradbury is stuck, he can open this box, draw a card and maybe find inspiration. And here's the thing: the idea that went in the box is not necessarily the idea that comes out. The kernel, the seed that was planted there has the potential to sprout into something new and entirely unrelated. Or maybe it does reawaken the original idea, but it gets considered with fresh eyes and mind.
So what I found the other day was not a floppy disc, really. It was my 3 1/2" Bradbury box. It was a little box I'd tucked away, layered with possibility.
Let's see where it goes.
js
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Aphorism
Sometimes the thoughts come out of nowhere...
I worked, for a regrettable stretch of time, in the collections business. My mid-20s were a vocationally wayward era for me where I worked in retail, food service, the mental health field and collections. I recall that I was drawn to collections by two things: the freedom from any sort of qualifications other than a willingness to tolerate abuse from complete strangers, and the chance to be an asshole to people on the phone--which, I guess, I saw as a character strength at that time. Considering that I now avoid talking on the phone in all but the most unavoidable of situations, I'd say I've progressed at least marginally in my self-image.
Starting off in general collections, I worked my way through auto loan collections, mortgage collections and classified ad collections. General collections was dull and depressing. Chasing people for the last $17 of an unpaid medical bill and having them argue about it wears on you quite quickly. Mortgage collections was just depressing. I'd gone into it blindly believing that when you're calling people to try to keep them in their homes if possible, they'd be a bit more receptive than Mrs. Jones when you call about the leftover balance on her goiter surgery. Not so. I was met with the belief that the debtor, not the bank, really owned the house. Or that the bank wouldn't really foreclose. In one instance a woman told me that she wasn't going to pay her mortgage because she was behind on her electric bill and "I won't have my children going without electricity." I opted not to ask her how she intended to slave the Nintendo to a utility pole when they were living in a box on the sidewalk. As for classified ads... Well, when you spend your days arguing with a business owner whether or not a typo was the cause for the lack of response to their ad, you learn to give up quickly.
Oh, but auto collections. Auto collections were, in a comparative sense, fun. Because auto collections had the benefit of involving repo guys, and repo guys had the benefit of being able to tell some fantastic stories. Believe me, I could regale you for pages. The lady who had two pit bulls guarding her car--one chained to the front bumper with enough play to let it run completely around the car once in either direction, the other living in the back seat, which the owner had strewn with hay. The repo guy who told a collector he would have gotten to a car if it hadn't been for the 20 dogs in the yard and the fact that "I only had thirteen shots." The repo guy who stalked a debtor who would drive from his garage, from where it's illegal to hoist a vehicle, to his job on a naval base, where the repo guy couldn't go, waiting until that one day when the debtor decided to stop at a bar on the way home. Which he did. And, of course, there was guy who just verbally abused me every time I called, practically dared me to take his car. One Saturday morning in the office, my phone rang. It was him. Called me "Mr. Shanahan" for the first time. "I was wondering," he said. "Did you guys come and repo my car?" I checked the record. No, I told him. No, we hadn't. There was a pause on the line, then: "Oh. Shit." The police report came later. More stories, more guns, more dogs, the occasional baseball bat....it went on.
My territory was the Georgia/Florida area. I worked with one repo joint out of Jacksonville. I can't recall the name. But I do recall, and always will, a guy named Wes. I never met the man, but I had a real rapport with him. We shared a love of the blues, and if I asked Wes how he was doing, he'd say, "Blues Dog"--okay, I had a nickname--"I feel like I'm tied to the whippin' post." From what I understood, Wes was either an NFL prospect or had played a little pro ball. He stood about 6'6" and had a 54" chest. And the man loved his work. Had all the best stories. Like the time a guy kicked open the door to the repo agency, waving a .22, demanding--with an appropriate flare of profanities--that they give him his car back. There were four or five repo guys in the office, Wes said, and each one calmly reached into his belt or boot or jacket and pulled out nothing smaller than a .38 and proceeded to demonstrate the concept of peace through superior firepower. The man put his gun away, apologized, and left.
Stories aside, the thing that's always stuck with me from talking with Wes is a line I still use now and then. Delivered in Wes' slight southern drawl, it was one of the best compliments I've ever heard and it always seemed to have a real ring of honesty. I'd thank Wes for a job well done and he'd say to me, "It's your world, daddy. I'm just livin' in it."
I worked, for a regrettable stretch of time, in the collections business. My mid-20s were a vocationally wayward era for me where I worked in retail, food service, the mental health field and collections. I recall that I was drawn to collections by two things: the freedom from any sort of qualifications other than a willingness to tolerate abuse from complete strangers, and the chance to be an asshole to people on the phone--which, I guess, I saw as a character strength at that time. Considering that I now avoid talking on the phone in all but the most unavoidable of situations, I'd say I've progressed at least marginally in my self-image.
Starting off in general collections, I worked my way through auto loan collections, mortgage collections and classified ad collections. General collections was dull and depressing. Chasing people for the last $17 of an unpaid medical bill and having them argue about it wears on you quite quickly. Mortgage collections was just depressing. I'd gone into it blindly believing that when you're calling people to try to keep them in their homes if possible, they'd be a bit more receptive than Mrs. Jones when you call about the leftover balance on her goiter surgery. Not so. I was met with the belief that the debtor, not the bank, really owned the house. Or that the bank wouldn't really foreclose. In one instance a woman told me that she wasn't going to pay her mortgage because she was behind on her electric bill and "I won't have my children going without electricity." I opted not to ask her how she intended to slave the Nintendo to a utility pole when they were living in a box on the sidewalk. As for classified ads... Well, when you spend your days arguing with a business owner whether or not a typo was the cause for the lack of response to their ad, you learn to give up quickly.
Oh, but auto collections. Auto collections were, in a comparative sense, fun. Because auto collections had the benefit of involving repo guys, and repo guys had the benefit of being able to tell some fantastic stories. Believe me, I could regale you for pages. The lady who had two pit bulls guarding her car--one chained to the front bumper with enough play to let it run completely around the car once in either direction, the other living in the back seat, which the owner had strewn with hay. The repo guy who told a collector he would have gotten to a car if it hadn't been for the 20 dogs in the yard and the fact that "I only had thirteen shots." The repo guy who stalked a debtor who would drive from his garage, from where it's illegal to hoist a vehicle, to his job on a naval base, where the repo guy couldn't go, waiting until that one day when the debtor decided to stop at a bar on the way home. Which he did. And, of course, there was guy who just verbally abused me every time I called, practically dared me to take his car. One Saturday morning in the office, my phone rang. It was him. Called me "Mr. Shanahan" for the first time. "I was wondering," he said. "Did you guys come and repo my car?" I checked the record. No, I told him. No, we hadn't. There was a pause on the line, then: "Oh. Shit." The police report came later. More stories, more guns, more dogs, the occasional baseball bat....it went on.
My territory was the Georgia/Florida area. I worked with one repo joint out of Jacksonville. I can't recall the name. But I do recall, and always will, a guy named Wes. I never met the man, but I had a real rapport with him. We shared a love of the blues, and if I asked Wes how he was doing, he'd say, "Blues Dog"--okay, I had a nickname--"I feel like I'm tied to the whippin' post." From what I understood, Wes was either an NFL prospect or had played a little pro ball. He stood about 6'6" and had a 54" chest. And the man loved his work. Had all the best stories. Like the time a guy kicked open the door to the repo agency, waving a .22, demanding--with an appropriate flare of profanities--that they give him his car back. There were four or five repo guys in the office, Wes said, and each one calmly reached into his belt or boot or jacket and pulled out nothing smaller than a .38 and proceeded to demonstrate the concept of peace through superior firepower. The man put his gun away, apologized, and left.
Stories aside, the thing that's always stuck with me from talking with Wes is a line I still use now and then. Delivered in Wes' slight southern drawl, it was one of the best compliments I've ever heard and it always seemed to have a real ring of honesty. I'd thank Wes for a job well done and he'd say to me, "It's your world, daddy. I'm just livin' in it."
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