Celine

"The worst part is wondering how you’ll find the strength tomorrow
to go on doing what you did today and have been doing for much
too long, where you’ll find the strength for all that stupid running around, those projects that come to nothing, those attempts to escape from crushing necessity, which always founder and serve only to convince you one more time that destiny is implacable, that every night will find you down and out, crushed by the dread of more and more sordid and insecure tomorrows. And maybe it’s treacherous old age coming on, threatening the worst. Not much music left inside us for life to dance to. Our youth has gone to the ends of the earth to die in the silence of the truth. And where, I ask you, can a man escape to, when he hasn’t enough madness left inside him? The truth is an endless death agony. The truth is death. You have to choose: death or lies. I’ve never been able to kill myself."
— Louis-Ferdinand Céline

General updates

I finished the Brothers Karamazov last week. The first hundred or so pages were daunting but as I grew comfortable with his long speeches and the characters I started to really love it. Initially I was concerned that the religion would be a sticking point for me but it really wasn't much of a problem at all.

Ultimately I view the book as Dostoevsky's attempt at rendering the inner workings and struggle of a man's soul. Dmitri Karamazov embodies the most noble and deplorable aspects of humanity and through his trial we see the dangers of the lies we tell ourselves and see a very real and convincing portrait of a person.

The style itself is really impressive. Dialogue is the main vehicle for the story-telling, not so much conversations but these fervent speeches. I will be reading Anna Karenina soon but am taking a break from the Russian epic for a little while.

Right now I'm reading The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, Frost by Thomas Bernhard, and 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The way that Marquez uses adjectives in combination is really beautiful and is something I would like to incorporate into my own writing more.

I've been doing some research about my potential destinations and Argentina or Chile is looking more and more favorable. This of course means I need to learn Spanish, but I think having something to do during my dreadful commute will be useful. I am still reluctant to sell the car but perhaps I can keep selling art in order to raise enough money - I am set on going either way. I still need to look into a visa, but hopefully I can swing 4-5 months in Buenos Ares or Santiago. I'm really hoping both cities have a climbing gym so I can keep climbing.

With Patagonia right there I am going to visit and do some bouldering there but the main purpose is finishing a first novel, no matter how terrible it may be! I have nearly finished a climbing problem that I've worked on for the last month or two and am pretty excited about finally nailing it. One of my fingers is a little tweaked but it's on my right hand so I should be able to compensate.

The writing itself is going fairly well but I feel sort of stuck on this one spot, but I think with some sleep and thought I will be able to resolve the scene. I haven't been able to write the past couple of days thanks to extra work (actually thankful, need the $) but this week I'll be keeping track of writing time and shooting for writing before and after work.

I watched Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive recently. I preferred Mulholland of the two but enjoyed both. Apparently, when I was really young my parents dressed me up as the Elephant Man and I wandered around Hollywood saying I am not an animal! I will probably watch more, Lost Highway has been recommended to me, but I loved the dangers of false dreams in Mulholland. The film was described as a poisoned valentine to Hollywood and I thought that was a really beautiful, apt description. Watching these neo-noirs and a really bad movie, Brick, has me wanting to read some more Raymond chandler soon, and to rewatch The Third Man. I also haven't seen Chinatown so maybe I should finally get that out of the way.

In general I am very happy and directed. I have something like 20 books to read which I'm excited for every one and I nearly have enough material for a writing sample to send to residency programs. Obviously, this will change as I edit things down and make improvements but I feel good.

And finally I will post some quotes from the Paris Review's Art of Fiction Interviews:

Henry Miller
INTERVIEWER
Didn't you say somewhere, "I am for obscenity and against pornography"?

MILLER
Well, it's very simple. The obscene would be the forthright, and pornography would be the roundabout. I believe in saying the truth, coming out with it cold, shocking if necessary, not disguising it. In other words, obscenity is a cleansing process, whereas pornography only adds to the murk.

Julio Cortazar
INTERVIEWER
You have said at various times that, for you, literature is like a game. In what ways?

CORTÁZAR
For me, literature is a form of play. But I’ve always added that there are two forms of play: football, for example, which is basically a game, and then games that are very profound and serious. When children play, though they’re amusing themselves, they take it very seriously. It’s important. It’s just as serious for them now as love will be ten years from now. I remember when I was little and my parents used to say, “Okay, you’ve played enough, come take a bath now.” I found that completely idiotic, because, for me, the bath was a silly matter. It had no importance whatsoever, while playing with my friends was something serious. Literature is like that—it’s a game, but it’s a game one can put one’s life into. One can do everything for that game.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez

GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ
In One Hundred Years of Solitude I used the insomnia plague as something of a literary trick since it’s the opposite of the sleeping plague. Ultimately, literature is nothing but carpentry.

INTERVIEWER
Can you explain that analogy a little more?

GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ
Both are very hard work. Writing something is almost as hard as making a table. With both you are working with reality, a material just as hard as wood. Both are full of tricks and techniques. Basically very little magic and a lot of hard work are involved. And as Proust, I think, said, it takes ten percent inspiration and ninety percent perspiration. I never have done any carpentry, but it’s the job I admire most, especially because you can never find anyone to do it for you.

Tom Wolfe

INTERVIEWER
What denotes a “good” novel?

WOLFE
To me, it’s a novel that pulls you inside the central nervous system of the characters . . . and makes you feel in your bones their motivations as affected by the society of which they are a part. It is folly to believe that you can bring the psychology of an individual successfully to life without putting him very firmly in a social setting. After The Bonfire of the Vanities came out I was accused of the negative stereotyping of just about every ethnic and racial type known to New York City. I would always challenge anyone who wrote that to give me one example. I have been waiting ever since. I think what I actually did was to violate a rule of etiquette—that it’s all right to bring up the subject of racial and ethnic differences, but you must treat it in a certain way. Somewhere in the tale you must find an enlightened figure, preferably from the streets, who shows everyone the error of his or her ways; a higher synthesis is created and everyone leaves the stage perhaps sadder but a good deal wiser and a good deal kinder and more compassionate. Well, this just simply isn’t the way New York works. The best you can say is that New York is held together by competing antagonisms which tend to cancel one another out. I tried to face up to that as unflinchingly as I could.

Haruki Murakami

INTERVIEWER
What was the first book you read in English?

MURAKAMI
The Name Is Archer, by Ross MacDonald. I learned a lot of things from those books. Once I started, I couldn't stop. At the same time I also loved to read Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Those books are also page-turners; they're very long, but I couldn't stop reading. So for me it's the same thing, Dostoyevsky and Raymond Chandler. Even now, my ideal for writing fiction is to put Dostoyevsky and Chandler together in one book. That's my goal.

Off my feet but still distant

The water started to wash away the salt from sweat and tears, along with the dust that had begun to mix with it. I breathed in deeply and did my best to release the lingering tension I felt. I told myself it was going to be okay, I’m doing the right thing. I thought about creating some excuse for us to go out to dinner tonight, but I knew it wouldn’t be easy to convince them at the last minute. I rinsed off the soap and shampoo, imagining I could somehow leave my doubts behind circling the drain before finally falling down into the terrifying Los Angeles sewage system. I stepped out of the shower and kneaded the bathroom rug with my feet as I dried myself off with a fresh white towel. I hung the towel and walked into the bedroom. I dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, and lay down on the bed. I looked up at the linen white ceiling and stared at the small bumps, ridges, and ravines that made up the texture of it. Since this house was the product of years of my mother in law’s considerations, obsessions, and moods I was certain there was a reason for this specific texture. For the most part it looked like any other ceiling, but at various family occasions during the years that Lauren’s mother, Elaine was alive, I would ask her about a particular nook or corner’s purpose or why the garden had been placed immediately upon the backdoor of the house. She would say, “Jonathan, I can’t just explain why there is a triangular corner behind the guest’s bathroom door. That decision is tied to everything else in this house. If you really are interested I can explain, but it has to do with the stairway and the particular steps I chose. I had also intended to have a fireplace, and the chimney would have needed a way to reach the roof, so it was designed to pass through that portion of the wall and lend the hallway character. I don’t like blank hallways and it seemed too much of an invasion of my privacy to put a large window at the end of the hall. You look bored! See? I told you that it was tied to everything else, and I haven’t even gotten started.” Usually around then someone would change the subject or Lauren would pull me away to help with the preparation of our meal. Despite the many holidays we shared in this home, before it was inherited and after, while Elaine was still alive but not healthy enough to live on her own and feeling like she was wasting the potential of her masterpiece, I still do not feel like I have any clear idea of why our home was made the way it was. It is a yellow-orange color, with a wavy chocolate fairytale of a roof, the floors are maple which has been well-maintained, and it has two stories. As a boy I had a fleeting interest in architecture, but remembered hardly enough to be able to identify who inspired her to make this home, or if there even was anything quite like it. It was a comfortable and Anna’s school friends loved it, calling it a gingerbread house. When guests visited they inevitably made some sort of comment, but at times their eyelids tightened and a cringe might flash momentarily betraying their judgment that the house was too playful or modern. I heard the sound of tires in the driveway and the familiar sound of Anne slamming the car door and running to our front door along the stone walkway, but then being called back to bring her violin inside too. I rubbed my eyes and stood up, just as Lauren opened the door and said, “We’re home!”
“Mommy since I played so well today can I have extra dessert? Please?”
“We will see. If you do the rest of your homework while Daddy and I make dinner, maybe you’ll have an extra scoop of ice cream.”
I walked downstairs and Anne ran to me, setting her violin case down carefully before wrapping her arms around me. “Dad! I played Adagio all of the way through. Even the hard parts!”
“Good for you. Go do your homework and we’ll talk about it at dinner,” I said.
Anne went upstairs to her room; I stood in the entryway looking at Lauren already at work in the kitchen. The kitchen had chessboard marble tiles, and very white cabinets accompanied by soft blue walls. The rapturous feeling of young love had been replaced by a calm, comfortable knowledge and trust in her, with spikes of intermittent desire. I was still in love with her, and she looked just as attractive as when we first met years ago when I was playing pool in a bar here in LA. She was wearing somewhat tight jeans that showed off her long legs and a black sweater of soft fabric of an origin unbeknownst to me. She was a tall woman with dark hair, and blue eyes that sparkled with intelligence and occasionally hurt.
She turned her head over her shoulder and said, “You going to help or stand in the hall?”
I walked over and kissed her cursorily and started to cut some vegetables for the salad. “How was your day?”
“It was good. She really is getting much better. What about yours, Jon?”
“Went for a run up at the canyon after work and then you guys came home, remember that house up there? The Spanish villa we wanted to own?”
“Of course. How could I forget, you said that if we ever lived there I would have to dress up as some sort of heroine. It’s far too big for us though, out of necessity with that kind of space we would have to have ten other kids.”
I stopped and turned to her doing my best to smile, “I was thinking about those walks we used to take up there.”
“Feeling nostalgic about me already, huh? I’m still here we can go for a walk this weekend.” She said as she walked over to me and nuzzled against my shoulder.
I didn’t reply at first and savored the slightly nutty but sweet smell of her skin. She smelled like her coconut moisturizer and the aroma that was distinctly hers. I have revisited this memory many times and I can’t wholly trust that I haven’t embellished or idealized portions of it, but truly throughout my life with Lauren I was happy with her.
“You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah,” I said.
We finished preparing dinner, fusilli with meatballs and salad. I had worked as a line chef through college and she was something of a gourmet, we worked well together in the kitchen, she generally chose the menu and I helped prepare the food.
“Anne, come down and set the table for dinner. Before it gets cold!” I called from downstairs.
She rushed downstairs and began to set the table, I was told that she was still young enough to look forward to eating with us, but I also liked to think that it was a product of the functional family we had created. I sat at the head of the table, with Lauren to my right and Anne to the left. We passed the bread and salad around the table, asking politely for butter or dressing, and enjoyed a peaceful meal. I imagined what this scene would look like without me here. Would they sit alone together at the table, or would I be stealing even this simple ritual from them as well? Picturing the world without me in it was very difficult to do. Some nights I wasn’t home in time for dinner, work ran late, or I had some event to attend that I spared my family from, so I’m sure Anne and Lauren had a routine for when I was gone, I just had no way of knowing it what it was. Plus, that was different from dining alone together indefinitely. I sat and made routine conversation about Anne’s day in school, her violin lesson, Lauren’s day at work teaching, and my run.
At the mention of running Anne chimed in, “Daddy, you aren’t too tired to take Marlowe on a walk are you? I’ll even come with you too.” Marlowe was our golden Labrador that I had bought Anne two years ago for her birthday. He was energetic and as he had gotten older better behaved. I had replaced several pairs of shoes of Lauren’s in an attempt to conceal his puppy mischief since she wasn’t much for dogs, but I had failed to find a suitable replacement for the last pair and had had to confess. She wasn’t vain or terribly attached to shoes, but she didn’t like being inconvenienced and I had bought the dog without consulting her—so accordingly I did most of the dog-walking, but after she grew used to the idea I began catching her playing with him and quickly stopping when she noticed I was watching. So in the beginning, Anne and I did most of the walking, and I think this was time that she enjoyed spending with me. Dogs are an excellent way of being alone with someone without feeling alone. Instead of reminiscing about my family I should have been paying attention to them and carefully remembering that last dinner, but instead I went off deep in thoughts of what could have been, and what was, precious days that had been spent in familial bliss, and felt pride in my success doing what my family never could do; being a family. They deserved a fate better than being my accomplishment.
Lauren and I cleared the table, saving what was leftover for next day’s lunches. Anne helped by loading some of the dishes into the dishwasher and getting Marlowe excited.
“Daddy! Marlowe is ready to walk, let’s go.”
“Annie, we don’t run things on Marlowe’s schedule. If you do that you’ll have an impossible to handle dog, remember?”
“Daddy let’s just go walk and not talk about schedules, they’re borrring.”
I grabbed the leash from on top of the refrigerator and put it on the already jumping Marlowe. Anne started for the door, and we began our walk down the street on that hot autumn evening. Our particular stretch of Highland Ave. isn’t as busy as the rest of the street, but it isn’t an ideal dog-walking street, after a block or so, not that this unplanned city really has many blocks, the street merges with La Brea, a much busier, wider street populated by stores, gas-stations, and food chains that are uninviting and seem unlikely to attract any buyers, the quality of the neighborhood sharply drops off further down La Brea, so Anne and I took a left and walked down a quieter side street.
Marlowe could probably walk the route himself by memory. I handed Anne the leash and watched to make sure she wasn’t pulled around by our dog. She had dark shoulder length hair like her mother, that would likely be chopped off soon as she started to rebel against us. Despite my certainty that I was her father, she looked like a younger version of Lauren, with large green eyes that could focus for impossibly long or frustratingly short periods of time depending on Anne’s moods. She was wearing a summer dress, pink with flower imprints, and quite small black shoes. As was our habit we didn’t speak much during the walk, just enjoyed each other’s company and watched Marlowe strain against the leash for one last whiff of whatever imperceptible scent had caught his attention.
I didn’t have anything I could say. As a child my father burdened me with his confessions and that was the last thing I would do to my daughter. She had a mischievous side but was still completely innocent, her jokes were non sequiturs or predictable punch-line jokes she had heard, she could be stubborn but I saw no sign in her of my selfishness, or tendency to lie. Of course until that next morning, she really had no reason to be anything but our perfect little daughter, and here I was, quietly walking her dog with her before hurting her in a way it would take her years to even understand. These unseen wounds would linger on within her, unnoticed, or aggravated, like an undetected cancer which she would someday have to acknowledge or be destroyed by, that was the gift I was giving her. I hoped that I would be able somehow to write her after I left, and to explain things when they became clear to me. I wanted to spare her the confusion and hurt that may be inevitable parts of becoming a grown-up, but even as I reached out to touch her soft, relaxed hand and hold it, I knew there was nothing I could do to shelter her from the reality outside of our gingerbread home, that would be further encroaching upon her life as she grew older, inevitably suffering a thousand minor disappointments and heartbreaks, all without me to comfort her.
“Dad… Thanks for taking me and Marlowe on a walk.” She smiled eagerly at me, already trying to cheer me up without acknowledging that I was somewhere far away.
“Thank you for coming.” I squeezed her small hand that I was still grasping.
“Why can’t you see stars here? When we were at Joshua Tree we could see way more stars. I miss them.”
“The city lights are too bright, so we can’t see all of the way to the stars.”
“Can we go back sometime?”

New start

Every evening I take a run after work. We live nearby the Hollywood hills and like many people in Hollywood I often run up and down Runyon Canyon. As I ran up Fuller my calves started to burn a bit, the incline is steep and the concrete is uneven. Usually I’m sweating a bit before I even enter the park, but it was hot today so I felt droplets of sweat begin to bead on my temples and by the time I reached the small gate into the park by an unsupervised table filled with granola bars and bananas I was really sweating. It was getting darker earlier, so it was nearing dusk as I started up the canyon, trying to not breathe in too deeply the smog, or occasional smell of dog shit. I took the left path which is initially steeper, but would help ensure that I would reach the top before it was completely dark. I felt the pleasant sensation of my shoes sliding along the dusty dirt and rock path and began to forget about why it was important that I take this run.
The trails were not empty but much less full than on a Sunday morning, when a mish-mash of aspiring, would-be, and successful actors who looked like they could have successful fitness model careers took shirtless runs up and down the trails, accompanied by actresses, producers, and people hoping to sight celebrities, oh and not to forget the dogs. This small idyllic, in comparison to the swath of unplanned city, patch of nature was home to more than fifty dogs on weekends who for a brief hour or two had their chances to feel like unfettered animals. When my wife and I were younger, we would go dog watching on the weekends. Sundays we would wake up lazily, make love, and after a quick breakfast we would walk up this dusty, relatively natural canyon and look at all of the different dogs and their owners. At the time we wanted a dog and we would have little arguments over which dog we saw would have been perfect for us. I was partial to Australian Shepherds at the time; she wanted something small, a Pomeranian.
Fortunately, the hill is steep and there are pebbles and rocks scattered in some areas, so I still have to pay attention to my footing, otherwise after having been up and down this path over a hundred times I would simply be on autopilot and not enjoy this brief respite from everyday life. My calves had stopped hurting and I was keeping good time as I rounded one of the bends that overlooks the ravine below. The path is very wide and I can pass the people walking their dogs easily. There are two obvious draws to the Canyon, its own benefits, the dull green foliage that leads me to feel I’m not in the middle of a sprawling city, the views from the summit, the multiple paths and ridges to explore, and the convenient as well as interesting location of it, and then the people it attracts.
Of course amongst the crowds drawn to this collection of hills that overlooks some of the richest and nicest homes in Hollywood are families, dog walkers, the aforementioned aspiring actors, agents talking deals, and tourists, but what has been fascinating to me is almost everyone is beautiful. I haven’t reached some sort of blissful runner’s high that has deluded me into thinking this; that usually happens on the way down. Some of the most attractive men and women in Hollywood can be found putting themselves on display every weekend here, while tourists gaze upon their wet finely honed bodies and think to themselves “Ah, that’s what a Californian looks like,” these statuesque bodies that are the product of countless hours of dedication and strange California dieting techniques. I had always wanted to take a series of photographs of this attractive milieu, but I never will. I am not a photographer, and I have a busy life here.
As I get closer to the top I start to slow down a bit, I don’t want to come to a complete stop suddenly when I take my last look at this city that has been my home for the last twelve years. At the top of this popular path is a bench that overlooks Hollywood, and on a particularly clear day past Santa Monica to the Pacific Ocean. Those sorts of days only come right after there is rain which clears the air of the haze, the lingering, unvanquished remains of smog. Countless couples sit on this bench and find where they live, or shop while quietly admiring the vast expanse of single to two story buildings that make up the majority of Los Angeles. To the left of that bench there are multimillion dollar homes with bright blue, well-lit swimming pools and winding roads that connect steep driveways to the rest of what we accept as civilization. I stared down at those massive opulent homes and looked at the house Lauren and I had finally agreed on years ago, during those naïve, heady puppy shopping days, as being our dream house. It was far too large for our needs, a three story Spanish inspired home that my minimal architectural vocabulary cannot do justice to. It was the sort of home you imagined Zorro would retire to, not that either I or my wife were particularly Zorro-like, but it was regal, gorgeous, and a dream home that we reached compromise on. I struggled to fight back tears. This was another dream of ours that would never come to fruition. It wasn’t the money, I suppose over time I could someday afford that house, but it was my failure as a husband, a secret failure that would only become clear to her tomorrow.
I loved Lauren, her bright blue eyes, long legs, her knack for a bon mot, and her way of saying goodbye that was a breathless sigh. She was the mother to our nine year old daughter, and tirelessly dedicated to our family. I felt sick to my stomach and pushed these thoughts of her out of my head. I squinted and tried to see the ocean, glanced at the lonely skyscrapers and began my descent. At first the path is too steep and the dirt slips out easily from my feet so I walked carefully down to the massive slabs of stone that make up a small staircase. After I walked down those steps I began to run again until I reached my car, for a couple minutes I think of nothing and feel like a running boy. I reach my car and drive home, crying in the driveway before showering for Anne and Lauren’s return from Anne’s violin lesson.

Who's Robert?

Her eyes watered as she thought about what was lost forever. She pushed her hair out of her face and resolved to never think again about what had changed. This was her new life sans Robert. She would not think twice about how it was her fault or how she had lied. She made her decision and unlike so many others would not allow herself to feel a pang of regret.

She sobbed into her pillowcase and pushed thoughts of sharing a home and dog with him out of her mind. She thought maybe now he could do something with his life instead of just wasting it on me. He has so much potential. She thought about him and how she had always felt like charity around him. He could be stubborn and standoffish but he was the most dedicated lover she had ever had. No one had made her feel quite like he did but for some untold reason she betrayed him. The sex had died off, and she felt dull next to him. Never feeling like she was the beautiful one in the relationship had its consequences. He had large lips, a dimpled chin, and guarded eyes. So much of her day to day life was spent in pursuit of beauty. Her life and hope was sacrificed to the fickle god of appearances. Hours spent in front of the mirror complaining about her nose or stomach were forever lost.

She couldn't quite put her finger on it but there was something about this man that was different. He accepted so much of her and would give anything he could, yet she felt uneasy about him. She didn't want to be made into anything or pushed into growing into a person someone else saw within her. Drinking and comedy was enough. She would tell herself how ugly she was, but this was likely an accumulation of guilt. Never feeling right about herself had taken its toll. Relationships overlapped easily and names were mixed-up. Running is a full-time job but her life had been a series of trials that had her well-prepared.

Alcohol was her ace in the hole. If new shoes, new men, and new TV shows couldn't drown out her pain she turned to margaritas, cranberry vodkas, and Irish whiskey. She would wake up in the morning with missed calls and a snoring half-naked stranger next to her. Quickly she would take aspirin and then wrap herself longingly in her newest detour. Its hard to say whether she ever was capable of loving someone else. Beneath whatever infatuation grew there was always a lingering suspicion of other people and their intentions. She would think how it would be impossible for someone like him to love her.

Life went on as it always did. There was an emptiness in the space around her but nothing oppressive. It was more of a fog than a wall, and given the right combination of male attention and alcohol she could wade through this troublesome condensation without paying it any heed. It came in fits, some mornings she wondered what her life would have been like with the other man but most days there was no time to think. Waking up late and hungover she would jump into the shower, criticize her body and admire her breasts, and get dressed as gorgeous as she possibly could. Day after day was a ritual of body worship without much attention paid to actually maintaining health or spirit. If her butt sagged a bit she would do squats for a couple days, and if her stomach seemed larger she skipped food and only drank.

Counseling dad, age 5

As a young boy when things wouldn’t go my way I would threaten suicide. “Fine! I’ll just kill myself.”
This seemed to be effective in infuriating my mother, which is strange since I was five years old. We were in the kitchen in the upstairs duplex we rented on Tinker Bell St. I was upset because we had gone shopping for piñata party favors and was jealous of the prospective winners. There was a king Arthur book that I wanted, but I think at the time I had my eye on one of those neon-colored Koosh rubber balls with strings flying out at every possible angle.
“Don’t say that! That’s terrible. Why would you say that? It’s just a toy, stop being so ridiculous.” What confuses me is why she would even bother getting angry. I would just laugh at my kid if he threatened suicide. This of course is a judgment call based on age and I wouldn’t recommend it as a blanket strategy.
“No one cares! I’ll just kill myself.” Oh the ennui of a five year old, but how did I know about suicide? That was a lesson from my sterling example of a father. Dad alternated between a thin veneer of happy go lucky attitude and the pits of despair.
Generally a phrase such as “the pits of despair” is hyperbole, here it is not. David was capable of curling up into a ball and asking existential questions to anyone who would listen. The apartment was a one bedroom since mom was the only one who worked. My younger sister and I shared the bedroom, and my parents used half of the living-room as their bedroom, with a futon on the floor in the corner nearby the television and bookshelf. On hard days Dad would lie on the futon in the fetal position and ask me why life was worth living. This was a frequent enough occurrence that it didn’t trouble me to answer these questions thoughtfully and also that I was comfortable pretending that I would kill myself over a rubber toy. “Why should I even go on buddy?”
“Because things change. Tomorrow is going to be different.”
“Nothing changes for the better. Things just get worse.”
“You had one kid before and now you have two. That’s a good change.” Reminding him of his responsibilities was a misguided attempt in inciting some sort of lingering maturity but most likely reminded him of his feelings of hopelessness.
“You ever just want to curl up into a ball and die?”
“No. I don’t think about that. Sometimes I get really tired of waiting for a friend who is late.”
“But what if you knew that friend was never coming and that you were going to wait there forever?”
“I’m gonna go to school dad. Feel better.”
“You should stay home, we can play Rad Racer.”
“Thanks but I can’t miss more school.”

Teepee continued

I am not sure whether I will be able to fully describe the overwhelming fear I experienced. From all that I can recall these are two of the most terrifying moments I've been through in my entire life. Neither one is particularly eventful but during both the sensation of fear was palpable. The first is simple but the combination of a climactic moment in a book and the dark teepee came together to scare me out of my five year old mind, and the second was my father yet again including me in something I wouldn't want to be involved in even today.

As I mentioned in the first part of the teepee adventures for my fifth birthday I was given a boxed edition of The Lord of the Rings books by Tolkien. I was reading those and Jack London on my own a year later but in the teepee when we sat around the fire my mom would read Tolkien to me. I am sure this treatment would intensify the experience of any book but at times in my young mind I was half-ready for Urakai and Balrogs to run out of the woods into our camp. To be clear, I knew the difference between fantasy and reality but could find myself becoming very immersed in the story.

The movies do an adequate job of capturing the scene that overwhelmed me, after fighting the creature that guards the entrance to Moria and after opening the door, Gandalf and the party make camp inside the long abandoned dwarven cavern. I forget which Hobbit drops pebbles into the well, maybe Merry or Pippen, but after dropping several stones into the dry well he awakens the orcs that live below. After they camp and discover the fate of the dwarves that had been sent there, they hear drum being played and are attacked.

I distinctly remember sitting by the fire as my mom read this scene to me. As a young boy Gandalf was my favorite character and this scene is expertly written by Tolkien, who can often drag on into his mythology without any apparent purpose, he manages to build the tension gradually and incredibly. Before ever heading to Moria the Fellowship is warned not to use that passage and that it is not safe. After fighting the Watcher in the Water there is a feeling of relaxation as the party escapes into Moria. Then there is the dropping of stones, and later they read the diary of Balin, the dwarf who was sent into Moria in an attempt to reclaim it from the orcs and Balrog. Just as Gandalf reads the final entry, where it is clear Balin died in a terrible fight and drums are mentioned, the party hears the first dim sound of a drum. From then Tolkien builds the tension to a frenzy before the orcs attack, but he manages to maintain the tension even after - as the party tries to escape and Gandalf seemingly sacrifices himself to the Balrog so that Frodo may survive. Like I said, I can remember this stuff!

I remember being so afraid for these imaginary characters and completely enthralled but also simultaneously hoping that somehow I could stop listening to the story. I don't remember if I could fall asleep that night but I was mesmerized by that moment of the book for a very long time.

Later that summer my father started to work at a store several miles away. He would walk or hitch-hike his way down the mountain in order to get to work. At night he would come back with food for dinner and a proud smile. During some of the time in the teepee my dad was the happiest I ever saw him. He was always more at home in nature than the rest of the world, even behind his drum set. Those idyllic moments didn't last long. On his walks he took to exploring the woods and streets around us. One evening he came back with pans but they weren't new. This raised some predictable questions that he gracefully avoided answering, but a couple of days later he asked me to come with him on a walk. That wasn't anything out of the ordinary, aside from reading, running through the woods with a stick, and watching my sister try to crawl there wasn't much to do in the teepee other than walk around the forest.

"I want to show you something buddy," he said and we crossed the stream. Then we walked up the hill to the main road and walked along the shoulder for a mile or so. The road itself was fairly quiet with a house alongside it every couple hundred yards. Eventually he stopped and walked up toward a dilapidated, run-down, white two-story house. We walked up the driveway and he said to be quiet. There wasn't any car in the driveway and it didn't look like anyone had lived there in awhile at least from the outside. Even at my age I could tell my Dad had been there before. He was comfortable and opened the side door that opened into the kitchen. I have no idea what he was thinking bringing me there. Maybe he was lonely, maybe it scared him too, but regardless he brought me into an abandoned house. It wasn't the sort of abandoned house that pervades television, with junkies passed out everywhere and graffiti on the walls, although that would have been terrifying in its own right. Instead it was a fully furnished, mildew smelling, abandoned house with no signs of the occupants having any idea that they would be leaving.

I am not a superstitious person so do not misinterpret this as being a ghost story. All of the belongings to the family, or couple, or person that lived there still remained. I don't put a lot of value into material possessions, but with someone's entire belongings left behind I couldn't help but wonder why no one knew or claimed anything, or took care of the house. My father looked into the refrigerator and some of the drawers to the side of it, everywhere he looked there were clear orange prescription bottles. Whoever had lived there had been very sick or very old. I don't remember if he grabbed anything, I would imagine he had looted what he wanted before bringing me but maybe he was hoping he had missed some painkillers. Toward the front of the house was the living room which was dusty and dark because the blinds were drawn. For whatever reason David wasn't interested in the living room, but we walked through it to the stairs. Upstairs was darker because we were in a windowless hallway, but we went into the master bedroom. It had a four post wooden frame and a queen size bed made with a floral comforter, in front of it was a medium sized television and I remember standing as close to the door as I could while he went through the television cabinet and later went into the master bathroom to look around. I knew we weren't supposed to be there and I knew that places like this weren't really supposed to exist. Families were supposed to take care of things like this after someone died, or moved, or went to the hospital, but here no one did anything. The power was shut-off so this had to have happened awhile ago, and yet no one had been into the house except for my dad and I. I had all of these questions, why wasn't anyone there? Why didn't anyone care? Didn't someone want this house or these things? What had happened here? Why were we here? Could we leave? But I didn't ask anything. I implicitly understood that what we were doing was wrong and that it was best not to mention anything about it. When I stood there at the threshold to someone's abandoned bedroom, where they may have died but had surely once lived, I wanted more than anything to get out of that house. The terrible unfinished reality of it was suffocating. I didn't say anything, I wasn't very good at standing up for myself then. I stood quietly, trying to look brave and waited for my dad to find whatever it was he was looking for. Thankfully he either found what he had wanted or realized how terrified I was and we left. We walked back to the teepee and I pretended we had gone on a normal walk, I didn't mention what had happened to anyone for years. I had no idea about his drug-use then and even through all of the grotesque scenes that he put me through, this one was the most lasting and shocking to me. I think of it differently than when he overdosed, or was drunk and angry, under those influences I could make excuses for him - but on his own to bring me somewhere like that without any consideration for me was a huge mistake. I honestly don't believe my father was being neglectful or careless.. unfortunately, I think this was a misguided attempt at showing me something exciting. His notion that I was special and therefore didn't need the coddling protection afforded to normal children allowed him to thoughtlessly hurt me without any malicious intentions. This one simple misunderstanding of me led to painful, strange drug-fueled discussions of fate, love, and saving the world.

My father's dad was absent most of his childhood, using his job as a shield from his wife's ongoing descent into dementia. I do not think David had any idea what it meant to care for and protect another person, because of this I learned quite early how to protect myself as well as how to care for those who couldn't care for themselves. What is interesting to me about these two different stories is that even then the world of books offered something that was sorely lacking in my minimal experience of the world: clarity and resolution. I never learned why we went to that house. I guess he was looking for more drugs, but really past that I have no idea what happened there or why nothing was fixed. Life is messy like that.

I personally don't have a deep love for neat parenthetical clean books but I loved the safety and logic behind novels. I wasn't versed in literary criticism but I intuitively knew that every word was chosen, every scene crafted with a purpose in mind. This vision and direction was deeply reassuring. In the midst of a chaotic, careless world people were creating beautiful, captivating people, places, and stories that had a reason for everything.

Teepees and house pets

My sixth birthday I celebrated in a tent during a rain storm in Phoenicia, a small town near Woodstock in Upstate New York. My parents gave me a cupcake with candles in it to blow out,a boxed set of The Lord of the Rings, and a small ornate jeweled dragonfly statuette. I am not sure what happened to the dragonfly or even why I had wanted it or if I had a desire for it in the first place. I honestly cannot give an accurate accounting of how long we spent living in the teepee but it was to my knowledge almost a complete summer.

Ostensibly we lived in the teepee to experience nature and test ourselves. I think that the true motive for our living situation experiment was to see if such a drastic change could help my dad clean up his act. When I was very young, four or so, we lived in a house near the Highschool I would later attend. The family that owned the home had split it into a duplex and rented to us. I remember watching Thundercats and some of the Disney channel there, and making a snow triceratops in the winter with my dad. The house itself was an older home with tall ceilings. It could easily have been two stories but instead had lofts at the ends of a large living room with vaulted ceilings. This was before my sister was born so it was just my parents, our cats, and I. I don't think we had kitty boy yet, my first cat, but we had Muskrat who was a pretty terrible cat at times. I remember he didn't like me and would intentionally use my bed as a litterbox.

In that home I have some of my earliest memories of my parents fighting. The kitchen was immediately to the right as you entered the home, to the left was the living room and dining area, above the kitchen was the loft my parents slept in, across from that on the far end of the living room was another loft that my mom used as a studio, and below that off to the side was my bedroom. I am sure the house is smaller than I remember it being.

At the time I didn't piece everything together, but this particular night was so confusing and troublesome that it has stuck with me my entire life. I think it was a night in the late summer when my mom didn't come home. David, my dad, asked me to come up to the loft with him and keep him company. He was an expert at asking me questions that children should not be asked. As a baby I had answered some of them remarkably well which I think gave him reason to continue this habit throughout my entire life. An anecdote about my precociousness as a toddler (?) was that once I came to him and asked what was at the end of the universe.

"I don't know, bud, what do you think?"

After a short pause, "The past."

Who knows if this is true. I also had a very convincing story that I told them about my other family. I invented a black family that I lived with in San Francisco. I said that my father was a poor trumpet player who drank all of the time and that my mom had to work so she could feed me and my 5 brothers and sisters. This was not so different from my future.

On that strange night my dad asked, "Do you know where your mom is? She's with another man tonight. Do you know how that makes me feel?"

I am not sure I would have an adequate response to this even today 22 years later. I didn't know then nor did I know for years but apparently my parents had agreed that when they got married if they felt like they had met someone who they had a special connection with they could pursue that without betraying their marriage. This experiment was a huge failure.

"I don't know dad, maybe she'll come back. I know mom loves you. Its going to be okay."

I spent the night upstairs with him and mom didn't come home. We talked and he showed me the book he cherished, it was some sort of ancient Rosicrucian book, small leather-bound and gold leafed. After he died that was one of my two requests that I receive from his possessions but it was no where to be found. The other is a piece of the Golden Gate Bridge that sits on my dresser as I write this. What I've learned is that this isn't a true piece of the Golden Gate Bridge, but it was used as a promotional material for a book by the same name by Alistair Maclean. The novel is a conspiracy thriller about the President being kidnapped in plain-sight as his motorcade crosses the Golden Gate. I'm sure my dad knew what it really was but he let me go on thinking that it was a real piece of the bridge for most of my life. It is fitting that the one thing I wanted from my dad was something used by a writer. I stayed up very late with him and did my best to comfort him.

The next day my mom came back and immediately they were screaming at each other. My recollection is hazy but I remember David putting a hole in the wall with the shillelagh, how is that for Irish by the way? A shillelagh is a club used to cudgel people and wild dogs. For most of my life at home we had it in place of an American baseball bat, you hear a loud noise you grab the shillelagh. I think ours was made from blackthorn sapling. Its bark was pitch-black and the wood beneath it was a deep red. It felt deadly and looked intimidating despite its relatively small size. It was probably no longer than two and a half feet. As a terribly small and innocent child I stood in the middle of their screams trying to calm them down. I remember being shocked at how angry and careless they could be while I hoped with all of my heart that something I was saying would make them stop fighting. Nothing ever did. The fight would escalate until my mom would become afraid for her safety, then she would take me and leave. I believe the subject of this fight wasn't only her sleeping with this other man (who knows what really happened) but also that my mom was threatening that we would leave.

"I'm going to take him back to my mom and start a new life. This is wrong. David, you aren't listening, David I can't take this.. Look what we're doing to him. David calm down."

In all likelihood he was drunk by now, and my father was a particularly malicious venom-tongued drunk. At some point during her attempt at communicating David grabbed the shillelagh and smashed it through the wall. "You're going to take my son from me? Therese you weren't even here last night. Where were you? Who's going to watch him when you're off doing whatever that was?"

My mom grabbed me and left. We flew across the country to Los Angeles and her mother took us in. David soon followed. He tracked us down and somehow convinced mom to take him back. Shortly after my sister Emma was born. Later that year we moved back to New York and started this whole teepee business.

Rita and Chris were a lesbian couple that were family friends. Chris had a stable with an Appaloosa and was more handy than I will ever be. She had lived in a teepee for a couple months and loaned us hers to use. She helped us set it up but we didn't do a very good job of things. The top of a teepee is supposed to be very tight, in order to allow smoke to leave but not much rain to enter, our opening was about four or five times the size it should have been. The property where we made our semi-permanent camp was owned by an older couple that were friends of friends. I would lurk around outside their house, well as much as a five year old can lurk, until the woman would give me shortbread cookies. Because of our lacking teepee skills when it rained the water would put out whatever fire we had burning and collect inside the teepee, quickly turning the earth into mud. For this reason we kept our three person tent set up in case of rain.

That summer there were record rains. We spent entire days inside that tent. At the beginning of the summer we brought a small zoo along with us. I brought my turtle, Five Dollar Bill (his cost), my hamster (which ate all of its young and would readily attack even me), and a cat. Unlike the humans of our family, including my less than one year old sister who was learning to crawl on the forest floor, the animal family members quickly realized that there was no benefit to living with a family outdoors.

As unlikely as it seems, Five Dollar Bill was the first to escape. Our campsite was half a mile from a healthy river and the noise of rushing water could be heard during the night. On a night early in June, Five Dollar Bill slowly and purposefully walked out on me, right into that river.

The cat occasionally still came for food but had become even more aloof until one day it altogether stopped showing up. Most likely it replaced us with another family, a family with a house.

On warm, dry nights we slept in the teepee and took full advantage of the extra space. We kept some of our belongings in the tent, mostly books and things that had to stay dry. Among those things was the hamster's cage and in it the hamster. So on this night my sister and I were already asleep when my parents heard something rattling the cage. I must stress that this hamster was a terrible creature. Even at an age where I loved all living things and refused to eat meat, I knew this animal would never love me. It stood on its hind legs and hissed at me, barring its petite fangs whenever I tried to feed it.

So upon hearing this rattling, my mom says "Gee, it really sounds like something is trying to get into the hamster's cage.. Don't you hear it honey?"

"I don't think I hear anything."

"Are you sure? I sure wouldn't want anything to happen to her."

And as my parents feigned concern my last pet, although it was a poor terrible creature, was eaten alive by a raccoon.

Hope comes in the strangest forms

I've been mulling over doing what I really want to accomplish with my life and as usual have reached the standard conclusion: dedicating myself to writing. I'm very tired so this will probably be short. One of the concerns I naturally have about writing is that most people don't read and that the novel isn't a modern vehicle.

I don't mean to imply that I think that our other options are superior but that society as a whole spends most of its leisure time doing things other than reading. I'm sure this comes as a revelation. The whole issue of medium is sort of moot for me. I have no interest in writing something that I think is great only to see a lousy director or cast turn it into a radically different story. There are great TV series and great movies but when I think of the stories I want to tell I don't see them in pictures or as seasons, I see it as a book. I'm sure this partially has to do with the obscene amount of reading I did as a child and it being a much much better distraction from my at the time unpleasant reality than a movie or tv show could have ever been.

Much better writers than I have spent a great deal of energy explaining the advantages of the novel, and more talented (but also less hopeful) writers have felt heart-wrenching hopelessness for their literary endeavors(Jonathan Franzen for example)... I apologize I was looking for a nice quote from Franzen and started to get sucked into the abyss of an essay that is "Why Bother." He makes valid points and is very convincing about the death of the novel as our primary means of conversation, but he also easily captures the primary difference between a book and these other forms of media. The plot of a book takes place within the reader's imagination, there is nothing separating him or her from it.

Plus, I'm not entirely sure that there are less people reading today. We certainly spend less time reading but there are many more people today, what was a best seller in the 1940s would not be a best seller today. Regardless, yesterday I woke up in a sort of bleak mood. I had a couple realizations about lies I had been telling myself and wasn't quite sure where to go from there. I did my best to cut those pipe dreams off but I didn't account for them being my supports. The night before I had gone through quite a bit of old e-mails and old bits of writing. I was struck by how angry I was and also by how blind to guidance I could be. I read very direct e-mails with very clear advice to me that I completely ignored. I was younger but I'm still a bit shocked to see a fossil-record of my arrogance. I was completely cut off from my feelings and could easily ignore anyone whose flaws were apparent. I idealized everyone else.

I woke up feeling pretty uncertain about what I should be doing. Beneath my regret I saw some choice phrases and felt proud of myself too. One line I really liked was: "That simple night was worth the money it cost me, and the cold crying nights I spent alone in broken houses." Amongst these old e-mails was a list of residency programs from my friend Rick. Some of the deadlines are in two days, but others aren't until January. I am going to write something and submit it to as many January deadline residencies as I can find. I decided that, then as I looked over each programs' list of immensely talented authors. Well, I considered it, but I was still doubting this whole idea. I don't think that doubt is going anywhere. Deciding that you have something important enough to say is a pretty bold act on its own, but then you've got to dedicate years into refining and polishing whatever that is into some sort of cohesive narrative. It's impossibly daunting. Add to that the possibility or reality that most people just don't care and I think you have a good idea of what I was feeling at that moment.

So I drove to get my oil changed and brought the Brothers Karamazov with me. The man who set my appointment is there and he asks "What are you reading?"

"Oh, The Brothers Karamazov. I'm finishing it this time."

"It can be challenging but it is really worth it. I prefer it to Crime and Punishment."

He continued to tell me how the book was better in Russian but that he thought Pevear and Volokhonsky did the best English translation, and how happy he was to see a young person reading. I sat down in the empty business section, as far from the daytime soap opera playing on the television and happily opened the book while daydreaming about really writing a novel.

I am not a person who believes in fate but that day that man had a huge impact on me and his simple, polite question pushed me towards something that has been a desire I've been reluctant to acknowledge let alone grasp.

Earlier today an old friend linked me to this poem by our mutual friend's father who is a brilliant and successful musician. Dt had a brain tumor in the early nineties but it was removed and his skull was sealed shut with a metal plate. He continues to make amazing music and function at a level far beyond most people. Here's what he has to say:

very brief,
against the impossible
spun & spinning depths
of aeons & aeons & aeons of time.

play hard; play well; play forthrightly;
play as if it's the last chance
to chirrup like the smallest cricket
does for a single moment,
its particle of song
winking in, winking out,
the bulb just pops once
on this less-than-a-summer's-night
in our horizonless valley of cloud.

professional, student, teacher, hobbyist, whatever:
not one of us is guaranteed another tomorrow,
& every yesterday becomes
shadowier, unrealer
as it dissolves with & merges into
the intangibility of no-history,
no-traces.
play forthrightly; play well; play hard.
and,
enjoy the visit as ya can.

Good night.

What living in Poughkeepsie was like during bird season

In my first year of college I lived across the river from New Paltz in Poughkeepsie. Poughkeepsie once had the highest GDP in New York. It also has more recently had the highest murder rate. After IBM downsized majorly the city sort of fell apart. There are parts that are really nice but it isn't exactly somewhere you would want to raise a family. This being the situation rent is cheap and I moved into a nice studio with hardwood floors. I lived a couple blocks away from my good friend. We were probably the only white people in the neighborhood by choice.

My friend Dan lived across the street from a corner store. Due to the convenience we'd often stop by for food. It took the owner awhile to realize that Dan in fact lived there, but as soon as he did the owner said "You know to lock your doors right? Don't walk around outside a lot okay? This is a bad neighborhood." This was a bit shocking because we're fairly certain the business was used to launder money. The owner drove to work in a new Mercedes but the store was almost always empty.

A couple months later I stopped by that store while Dan was finishing a paper. A young thug was buying cigarettes at the counter while I tried to choose between Cheese Doodlez and Cape Cod chips. I hear a loud "What up son?" and turn around to see another man come in pulling out a pistol and saying "Bang bang you dead motherfucker."

Neither the store clerk or the customer react. The young thug says "Nah, dawg I got my vest," and pulls his hoodie up to show that in fact he is wearing a bullet-proof vest. Welcome to the neighborhood.

Most of the area was pretty urban but there were trees scattered through the cityscape. I unfortunately lived near several tall oak trees. At first you might think that would be desirable but you would be terribly mistaken. I'm not sure where the birds came from but they decided that for a couple wonderful weeks they would be my new neighbors. I shared my street with people who had no qualms about putting a car on blocks and taking the wheels, but these new neighbors were a much bigger problem.

My car was parked outside in a small lot for the apartment building. The tree branches hung above every possible parking space. This wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for two to three hundred birds living in those trees. The birds were sources of two unpleasant things, noise and shit. Every morning they would wake up at 6 and fight as loud as possible. This went on for two or three days until one morning while I rustled around in my bed attempting and failing to fall back asleep I heard, "Yo you bitches need to shut up. I ain't playing no more."

Like a good Irish boy I looked out my window and saw one of my neighbors pull a pistol out and shoot into the air. A couple seconds later a bird fell to the ground. The others grew quiet and I went right back to sleep. The next day they acted as if nothing had happened and I think my neighbor realized his strategy wasn't cost-effective.

Speaking of cost-effective strategies I needed to find one for the bird shit. Everyday I spent ten minutes scraping off my windows so I could safely drive. Initially I thought I could wait them out, but the shit accumulated too quickly. The roof was the worst but somehow they would always manage to hit my door handles and windows. There was a lot a couple blocks away that I could park in and did occasionally but given the neighborhood I thought it was worth the car-washes and extra time spent with an ice-scraper. The first car wash I purchased was wasted quickly, before the day was over I could hardly tell the difference so I started to shop around for the best car wash deal in Poughkeepsie.

I'm not a clean freak or anything but I maintain a certain standard of cleanliness and this battle with the birds became a bit of an obsession for me. I found a car wash on the commercial strip of Poughkeepsie that had an unlimited car wash policy. The idea was that if your car got really dirty the same day they washed it they would wash it again for free. I have no idea who came up with this concept, maybe they thought I would be purchasing snacks every time I washed my car. I'm not sure. The worst part of the car washing was that I knew every guy who had any part of washing my god-forsaken car would be miserable. If it weren't for my defeated expression I would expect them to think I was pulling some sort of prank on them, but I wasn't, this was my life for a couple of special weeks in October.

The first time I went to the perfect car wash place for my needs with its unlimited washes per day guarantee the man washing my car looked at me with a look of horror but managed not to say anything as he struggled to reveal the true color of my car. When I came back that afternoon he was no longer quite as patient. As he saw me drive up he said, "What the fuck? What the fuck is happening to your car? Where are you parking, who is doing this to you?"

He sounded like he was about to lose his mind. I could tell since I was half-way there. "I'm sorry man. It's these birds. They're outside and they won't leave. All they do is shit all day and fight. I can't take it anymore." He nodded and started cleaning my car again. I imagine that morning he had thought, well after this car everything is going to be downhill, no other car is going to be as filthy as this, and in a sense he was right. I doubt anyone else came in with a dirtier car, but he didn't account for the possibility of me coming back that very day. At least he got paid the first time!

Eventually the birds left and allowed me to start sleeping regularly but more importantly I could finally stop getting my car washed 3-4 times a week. I'm really happy that guy shot one of them though.

The Milstream

All my life whenever something really has troubled me or upset me I've gone to the same place. Somewhat deep in the woods behind a house I lived in a long time ago there is a stream. Its in Woodstock, past the Cuomo property and a couple miles upriver. We lived in that house when I was five after we had moved out of the tipi. I met Ayman and Aliya who were my best friends there, they lived below us and we spent hours of our lives playing Castlevania or Wizards and Warriors. Many snow days spent entirely staring at a television and mashing our thumbs frantically. When there wasn't snow on the ground we cut down saplings and made make-believe swords engraved with our initials.

Anytime I've peaked into the backyard of that house I am struck by how small everything is. As a young boy that backyard and the small thicket of woods behind it was a rich exciting world. Today I can see far past where I was allowed to explore as a kid. I remember walking along the frozen ice of the small stream in the winter. Anyways, back to where I go and why. Behind that small patch of woods there is a huge field, that extends far past our neighborhood to a place we called sled hill. I spent days in that field throwing boomerangs or wandering around looking up at the bright stars with my dad. Anytime there was a decent snowfall sled hill would be packed with everyone from the town.

Behind that large field was a soccer field where I started and finished my soccer career. At the age of six I was completely disgusted by parents yelling and screaming at us to kick a black and white ball in opposite directions on a field. I remember walking off in the middle of a game. I just didn't see the point. We had no idea what we were doing and the adults cared more than anyone on that field. Bordering the edges of that field was a thick forest. Paths led deeper into the woods toward the stream, along the way there were massive uprooted trees - which makes me think of my family covering ourselves with clay and posing in front of a massive tree's roots and my mom taking photographs. Eventually the path reaches the water but there is a steep drop and no safe way to get down to the rocks bordering the stream, there it splits in two and one can travel either to the right, upstream, or to the left, downstream. To find the particular place I prefer you take a right.

The forest floor is perennially covered in old pine needles. The path mostly follows the stream but draws closer and further from it occasionally. After awhile there is a tree that fell across the pathway. Someone cut a large section out of the middle and made each end of the tree into chairs for people to rest in. These makeshift seats are covered in carved initials of ancient young couples. The chair on the right side of the path is broken, its right armrest is missing. This landmark signals that soon it will be time to head to the riverbed. The river or stream itself is about twenty to thirty feet wide but not very deep. This of course depends on the rainfall. Sometimes I have visited only to find water dribbling between rocks. The stream itself is ancient. There are beautiful portions of the rock where the water has carved out pathways that run along the surface of these elevated portions of the riverbed. Small waterfalls appear here and there, or whirlpools where the water circles briefly before passing further downstream.

Generally here I would make my way further upstream balancing on rocks or walking along the trunk of fallen trees. I love the feeling of focus and calm as I try to jump from small rock to larger stone to the pebbles of the other side of the river. Sometimes I have to double back, but it reminds me of my fascination with mazes and labyrinths that I also had as a child. I would spend days navigating through the most complex labyrinths and then hours designing as intricate and massive a maze as I could painstakingly create. I think the reassuring thing about mazes is we know there is a way out.

I usually make my way upstream by crossing to the side most conducive for travel and keep my path on the stones of the river. The sound and smell of the water are really important to me. Moving water has always soothed me. After some time I reach where I think our swimming hole was. When I was young my parents made a small dam to trap water in a deeper portion of the river where the water ran slower. We would build rock sculptures and swim in the hot summer days. It always felt like my family was okay there. The water is cool and slightly green from the moss covering the stones underneath it. It is on the far side of the stream. I'm never positive if I've found the right spot but I don't fixate on it too much. A lot has changed over time, but the water is the same for the most part, and I walked on these very rocks long ago to find wherever our swimming hole might have been.

In my mental map of the river further up and on the side close to the path is where we released my father's ashes into the stream. I'm not sure if it was my mom or aunt's idea to bring him here but whoever thought of it, their reasoning was that this was somewhere that David (my father) had always been happy. Nature always seemed to help him fight his addiction. So after his funeral we had made our way here together, my sister, my mom, my dad's sister Robin and her husband Roger. The funeral was terrible. None of my father's true friends said a word about him. Everyone who was left had been stolen from and betrayed too many times to trust themselves to say only good. I had been estranged from him for three years when I found out he had overdosed and died. I thought about saying something but I couldn't. I didn't know what to say. I hated him for what he had done, and I hated him for leaving without fixing it. So instead of eulogies from people who knew him we had anecdotes from people who knew him as some sort of town character. I listened to how my dad had apparently always been reading and riding his bike through town with a smile on his face. Or how he was such a kind man. The truth was these people had no idea who my father was or what he was capable of. In all likelihood he didn't even like them.

My dad was always great with one or two people but anytime there was a party he was off alone. Maybe it was because he couldn't drink since my mom was watching but he never was gregarious. It also seemed very unlikely that all of these people had only seen my father do good things. He was an angry, violent drunk. He also was a heroin addict. The funeral was either an outright lie or a bunch of mindless strangers talking about someone they had made an acquaintance of. Being there was terrifying for me. I wondered what my funeral would look like and whether anyone would really be able to say anything true and wonderful about me, or if I would be alone with silent lost friends and vocal strangers. Or would anyone even be there? I didn't cry or feel like anything was resolved. There wasn't any release. I watched his girlfriend cry without any sympathy. She knew why we left him and yet she chose to love someone who was killing themselves.

Back to the ashes. I don't remember what we said but Emma, my Mom, Robin, Roger, and I all said something about my dad. For the first time in a long time I cried about him and felt relief. I was surprised by how much ash there was. It was stuck together and sealed in large plastic bags. We spread his ashes and left. All of the anger and disappointment I felt at his funeral was washed away. I felt like we had done exactly what he would have wanted and that for once we didn't have to worry about him.



I came back to that stream when I found out my girlfriend had cheated on me, I came back when I felt like I had failed and had no idea where to go, and every time I left feeling a bit better. Its a really special place to me but I have never shared it with anyone. I've had people who I technically could have shared it with but I've never brought anyone there. Maybe it is trust, but I also have felt an urge to bring someone important there, almost as though visiting this place would reveal something about me.

Four or Five years ago

I wrote this.. Has some interesting snippets from my life and it was informative to see how I used to write.

My father and I are playing Frisbee. It’s the only “sport” he’ll play with me. He loves it. His eyes light up while they focus upon the Frisbee as it nears his hands. He encourages me as I make a somewhat impressive catch. We’re playing in front of the library in Woodstock. The grass has been cut recently, spring is just starting. He’s almost fully absorbed by our game of Frisbee. A regular father would probably be somewhat distracted by the bills, or possibly whatever work he has to do tomorrow. My father isn’t pre-occupied with such bullshit. He knows what’s important; he’s planning for his next fix. He’s an addict. To the untrained eye, Dad appears to be the best father a boy could have. He loves the hell out of me. He always pays attention to me. He’s actually cool. He doesn’t sit around complaining about this “new” music, instead he sits down and enjoys it. He loves Frisbee, me, my mother, my sister, movies, books, music, and drums. I forgot one thing. Heroin. He over-dosed twice in my presence, at twelve and then fourteen. I think in total he overdosed at least ten times—eventually dying when I was nineteen. I hadn’t had any real contact with him since I was fourteen. I couldn’t see the point. I mean he loved me, but we didn’t have him, something else did. People were surprised by my cold reaction to his death. I cried sure, but that was only because I could finally express my love for him—it was safe finally. Before he died, if I loved him I thought that would mean that I would make him a part of my life. So instead I hated him. It was the only practical solution. Strangers would tell me “I am so sorry for your loss.”
And I would think, “What loss? I never even had him.” So for the first time in my life I am coping with real loss.
Aside from my relationship with my mother only one girlfriend of mine has ever shown me that sort of love. I had her. I don’t mean in the possession sort of way, I mean she loved me. Completely. She and I are in my car, a Buick Park Avenue with blood red interior, at the gas station. It’s our typical meeting place. We live about an hour apart, and we share the burden as equitably as possible—since her old Saab is theoretically incapable of such a great distance of travel. It’s raining: water pouring out of the sky, pouring like god is trying to drown us, again. She lights up another cigarette and complains about the broken passenger window. Her first puff of smoke is always so practiced and precise, just totally fake. It looks like an actress in an old black and white, those elegant women couldn’t pull it off and here time and time again she tries to do it, tries to look cultured right after she has complained about the stupid fucking piece of shit or some other equally charming description. Plus I haven’t eaten yet. When I’m hungry smoke nauseates me, otherwise it’s not a problem. So I get out of the car and walk under the canopy, safe from the rain, into the gas station. The fluorescent lighting is blindingly white, holy heroin colored, I pay the attendant quickly, slightly disturbed by the sterilized environment and walk back out to my car. She’s looking at me sweetly as I open the door. Then she has that look. No, not that look, it’s the, I have to talk to you about something look. We share everything like best friends, so if something isn’t shared it’s usually a bad idea. Only one seat belt plug works in the front of my car, so as we’re automatically jury-rigging ourselves into our seat belts she says as smoke escapes leisurely from her mouth, “I think I’m going to do mushrooms again with Rachel and Marissa.”
I respond quickly, lying, “Yeah, I have to do heroin at least once before I die.” The plan is innocent enough. I’m a selfish man. If instead of challenging her about it I escalate the situation then perhaps she’ll rethink her plan. I look at her and her eyes are shimmering with tears, her eyebrows are raised, and her mouth is half open. It’s a dopey, hurt, questioning look.
“Why would you want to do that?”
“To prove that I’m better than him.”
“But you know you’re better than him. I do.”
“So I know what could be more important than me to my father.”
She looks at me, like a pet just betrayed by it’s owner, and I cave. “I promise you I won’t do it.”
She says, “Don’t do it for me, do it for you.”
“Okay, whatever.”
And we drive off in the rain, her satisfied and enjoying her cigarette, me contemplating heroin use. It was a cheap trick but it worked. I couldn’t help it. I was worried about her. She is a dreamer, I guess like all girls. Girls used to impress me with their ability to dream in detail. To dream the color of their true loves eyes, tone of skin, brightness of smile. It’s a pretty standard dream but for a time it impressed me. Girls are taught to dream about these things. I don’t think boys are. I think we’re taught to nurture dreams of success or a job or something. I don’t know, it’s not like I *had* a dad. She dreamt about falling in love, and it working out. You know, love for real. Dreams are a vital component for addiction. Someplace better has to be imagined in order for a person to become so thoroughly dissatisfied with here. The true dreamer creates their own world, but the casual dreamer remains somewhere in-between and therefore vulnerable to addiction. I wasn’t aware that she was infected with other pre-made dreams. Dreams about college that I’m sure accelerated my loss.
I didn’t think she was dissatisfied with me, but the world was surely a source of dissatisfaction for her. She hated it, and I loved her for it. She didn’t ground me, she encouraged me to run with my madness. Since she was unhappy with the world I worried about her and drugs. She had a bad history with alcohol, her dad died driving drunk, and she drank habitually throughout what would now be called middleschool. I must emphasize my dangerous attraction to unhappy people. I wrongly associate an unhappy disposition with a person who sees the world as I do. I see so much potential squandered, and it drives me crazy. It’s not about my personal situation it’s about the way things are—but for some people nothing is enough.
Some people might say, “What if your family loved your father more?” Or maybe “What if you loved her more?” In my loneliness and solitude I am plagued by post-midnight anxiety and insecurities leaving me vulnerable to these kinds of questions that haunt me—but during the light of day, which warms my soul and summons my senses I know better. I know how little a difference more love would’ve made, such an awful truth. With my father it might have meant a couple more years of pain. With my lover it might have meant a couple more months of tip-toeing around. In neither case would a great change take place. I’m starting to think maybe I didn’t have her after all. For both of them nothing was ever enough. I still hope for her, but I’m through saving people. “Jesus Christ tried to save everyone, look what they did to him. They killed the poor bastard.”—Henry Miller, The Rosy Crucifixion. Sometimes I get caught up in worrying about the world, bogged down in it, but then I rediscover the beauty of the world, the enormity of sensation as my lips touch lips or skin or much desired food, the overwhelming beauty of the landscape assaulting my eyes, the texture of it all—and I forget about her. I stop second-guessing myself about her beauty and charm and realize that I was for once seeing clearly—and now I need to see everything clearly, not just her. Once I do that I won’t miss her so much.

Family

“The important thing to remember when meeting someone like Haley is that everyone has an agenda. Haley cannot be trusted simply because she laughs on cue, or listens to every word. She wants something; whether that is, simply to be admired or something darker only time will reveal. Don’t get comfortable,” were Shepherd’s last words before I boarded my flight to Los Angeles.

When I first met Haley I thought she was gorgeous. She was waiting at the airport with a small sign for me. She was tall, thin and insubstantial. Her blond hair hung loosely over her narrow shoulders. Even from afar her eyes were focused and bright blue. I wondered why Shepherd had warned me.

We hugged comfortably, “Oh it is so good to finally meet you, I’ve heard so much from Shepherd about you.”

“Shepherd and you talk? I thought he’d have told Rob.”

“They’re brother’s, I don’t think there is much to be said anymore. He calls but usually he and I talk longer. We’re really happy you’re here.”

She drove me to their large home in a nice neighborhood, did everything she could to make me comfortable and I lay down, listened to Iron & Wine for a bit and then fell asleep.



I woke up the next morning to the smell of eggs and coffee. Haley was making Rob breakfast. Rob is I guess my uncle too by association. He’d been working late last night so now was the first I saw him. He had whisps of silver in his stubble and bags under his eyes, but his smile was genuine and bright when he saw me and gave me a huge hug.

“I’m really glad you’re here.”

“Thanks for having me. It’s good to see you too.”

Haley quietly set the table and served Rob and I breakfast. She refused to join us, insisting it was her pleasure. “So will I be starting work today?”

“No, honey you have to recover from your jetlag. I’ll open up and Rob will go see about a couple of old books we might take on consignment. You’ll have the place to yourself.”

This was a dedicated, brilliant, intelligent woman – of course Shepherd was intimidated and wary. I suppose he was right to warn me, even with his warning I felt an inkling of the infatuation I had growing for her.

Shepherd sent me to make sure everything was being run properly at his father’s business. He is sort of my uncle, and with me having nothing to do this summer it seemed like a good idea for me to visit California and learn something about business. Los Angeles is a strange place for a rare bookstore, but they also carry original Hollywood posters and memorabilia, which I imagine is where most of their profits come from.

Time and Kali

"The form of Kali transmits the force of making a clean cut with the past, the edge of focused rage." - Coleman Barks, The Soul of Rumi

Years ago I first became interested in Kali. Kali and Shiva are the gods that comprise Shivaic tradition. Her name literally means "black time," and represents annihilation. In modern tradition she simply represents time, but in the past there is a violence to her that is unavoidable. She is the force that wants complete devotion and if she receives any less will destroy mercilessly. She is the embodiment of the consuming aspects of reality.

The quote above is from a collection of Rumi's poetry. When I first became interested in her I, don't laugh, wanted a tattoo of her on my body. Most likely just the sanskrit since she is depicted pitch black, with a belt of skulls, standing over Shiva with swords in her 8 arms with blood dripping from them. I'm not really the type of guy that would work for. I've meditated on Kali, I've considered why I'm drawn to her, and I've never been able to put it into words. I do love the reminder of time being finite and destructive, but that never seemed to be enough. I always felt unsatisfied as I explained the concept to someone. Generally their reaction was a feigned sort of understanding or worse, "Yeah that sounds sick!" Not that I've ever gone around preaching about Kali to strangers.

I am fascinated with the darker aspects of humanity and the world. I believe deeply that there is something to be gained from looking at what most people avoid. I think that being aware of your eventual death is a hugely valuable skill, one that our culture avoids. We are meant to be happy all of the time, yet deep down we know eventually everything we love will die and everything we build will be destroyed or forgotten. A superficial relationship with this fact means your response is well what is the point? Or why bother? A deeper understanding of it sees the potential and power hidden within this belief. Our existential awareness can lead to a sense of vertigo and the insurmountability of that fact, but I think within it is our greatest gift.

I am doing my best to avoid the cliches but essentially what is beautiful and unique about humanity is a part of us is filled with doubt, fear, knowledge of eventual failure, and awareness of our own imminent death. In the face of that we strive for whatever it is we believe in, be it social, artistic, political change, or just the pursuit of a life well-lived.

I think that at the time I stumbled upon Kali I was looking for a way to make a clean cut with my past. Again I think this is a moment in my life where this opportunity has re-presented itself. I want to take this time to step apart from my regrets, failures, and ideas from the past so as to make room and gain perspective for whatever life may come.

Among the ashes

Well, on the day I was born,
God was sick...
They all know that I'm alive,
that I chew my food...and they don't know
why harsh winds whistle in my poems,
the narrow uneasiness of a coffin,
winds untangled from the sphinx
who holds the desert for routine questioning..

On the day I was born,
God was sick,
gravely.

-César Vallejo

Young men in viking times were sometimes allowed two or three years of ashes. At the time Norwegians lives in long houses similar to Western Native American tribes and their beds were placed along the walls with a fire running down the length of the building. Sometimes young men would lie down between the fire, ash pile, and the beds. Occasionally they would stay there for years. They would do nothing useful but the older viking men accepted this as a sort of ritual lethargy. Our society does not accept this sort of behavior, drop-outs from college are shamed and repeatedly asked when they will figure their lives out.

In the eleventh century there was a Cinder-Biter (their name for these young men), named Starkad who lay in the ashes for years until he was asked by his foster father on an expedition. Starkad stood up, shaved, cleaned himself and went on to become one of the best warriors in the expedition. Later he became a great poet as well. In Nordic mythology Starkad is a man who is cursed and blessed by Odin. For each blessing he receives a curse accompanies it. To me this is a clear metaphor for humanity, we have such a great capacity for good as well as evil. Odin says that Starkad will live the life of three men but that he will commit three evil deeds.

Anyways, back to the ashes. In our culture there is such an emphasis on a Disneyland way of life. Ashes are the substance that remains after life has left an object entirely. Our inner dreams are ashes too. Eventually we all realize that no matter what outlandish luck we have there is simply no way we can do everything that we thought we would love to do. Yes, there is a great beauty to life and out of ashes things often grow but I feel that right now I need to keep in mind the ashes. It is without a doubt for the best that I'm no longer involved with my ex; we were entirely different people with very different values, but at the same time I am trying my best to look at the ashes of my life. Often after something like this I am excited and optimistic about the future frequently replacing whatever dreams I had of a life with her with other fresh new dreams. Without a doubt these broken dreams of ours are something we carry with us.

The idea of ashes makes me think of Hubert Selby Jr. Selby wrote Last Exit to Brooklyn, Requiem for a Dream, and The Room. Each of these books is a terrifying experience. He creates a dark world where there is no light. His intention is that in order for the reader to be able to fully experience his work the light must come from within them. There is nothing to nurture the reader as they read; their nourishment must come from within themselves.

Spend some time with the ashes.

Dream dreaming

Just woke up from a difficult dream. My ex and I were in a room in a house I grew up in long ago. We were trying to have sex, knowing that she is a nervous type I locked the door as a favor to her. As we would start to fuck, Latte - a female bengal cat, would open the door and walk in meowing over and over again. Despite me locking the door for my ex, she wouldn't notice at all. I would stop, push the cat out and lock the door again.

This happened several times until I felt like there was no spontaneity in the sex, we were simply trying to finish. Throughout this all she was completely unaware of what I was doing. Finally, I used a screw-driver to lock the door, sliding it through two hooks like a cross bar. This didn't work at all, Sally - my boss's friend from Trinidad was at the door and it had swung open. I got up, apologized without any shame and together she and I tried to lock the door again this time using two screw drivers. (mother figure?) This kept the door firmly stuck but there was an 8 inch gap and it wasn't long before Latte the cat was running into the room again and again.

At this point I woke up. Initially, I was a bit upset that I was dreaming about her but then I started to think about what the dream was saying. I was locking us up in a room, but it wasn't for her. She could care less. I equate this on one level to my attempts to protect my ex from herself but also on another level in that I trapped myself in a very narrow world, eliminating many possibilities to try to help one lost girl. I did it ultimately to protect myself from qualities within me. I projected certain aspects of myself - the positive female ones onto her, and the others kept sneaking into the room, in my dream in the shape of a cat and later Sally who is a very mother-like figure. The cat seemed to be trying to open the door, while the other was trying to help me keep myself locked inside.

I need to open the door and face what I have run from.

Looking at patterns.

I am about to finish reading a book by Robert Bly about the Human Shadow. I am reading this because I want to learn from my mistakes with Emilie and why I felt that she could change after all of the problems and warnings.

I am worried about going through this again with her. I just read back through some old posts, and this is a short quote from a post I wrote in January about the movie The Wrestler. What scares me is that if I replace Randy or my father with Emilie there is a very accurate summation of our relationship. At every turn I hoped that she could change, that she could for once feel like she was enough.

"This fucking movie brought back those moments of feeling betrayed and hurt very vividly. Just as in my life, I watched as Randy fucked up and wished that he could change. I always had this fantasy that one day my father would clean up and we could talk about our days spent playing frisbee or walking through the woods together. That never happened."

Of course she and I didn't play much frisbee or walk through the woods often but we had our moments like everyone does. I miss parts of our relationship but I don't miss the fear of her getting drunk and doing something stupid. I don't miss wondering where she is, or why she won't returns my texts. I am hoping that by exploring more of my shadow that I will be able to avoid this kind of projection. Emilie isn't a bad person but she is misguided and toxic to me. I feel as though I suffered from a bit of a Pygmalion complex and tried to make her into more than she was. I am a really sensitive, caring person but I think in day to day life I do not allow that part of my personality to show. This denial drew me to a relationship where I needed to take care of someone else instead of caring about them.

I am so furious that I blinded myself and gave her second chance after second chance. Every time the story is the same. She was drunk and didn't realize the guy liked her.. I have to thank my friend for pointing out that it is most likely not the case that Emilie doesn't love me or care about me but more that because she does such awful things she hates herself and is looking for reassurance from another outside male source.

One point that Bly makes in A Little Book on the Human Shadow is that express/deny is a very narrow means of coping with our unconscious urges. To simply express my hatred and hurt at being betrayed isn't going to do any good. I would and have momentarily given into it and been swept up in the current of emotion while completely losing sight of myself, and usually feel much more exhausted after. He uses the example of monks who will meditate on anger for hours and emerge with a choice about whether to express that anger and how to do so. A cutting remark can be infinitely more effective than letting loose in a moment of rage.

Bly recommends to keep a very close eye upon the people and habits that you hate, generally this is a warning sign that they are qualities which we repress within ourselves. I need to stop repressing my urge to be creative. I am hoping to take some time and create a list of all of the qualities I deny within myself.

What I have been thankful for is the people who have listened and helped me through this painful process. I also try to keep in mind people like Jeff Buckley who were tremendously talented, beautiful and still were treated like shit by people they loved. Hopefully for now on I can suss out those relationships and avoid them completely.

Anger super-deluxe

Yesterday, in an attempt to get my shoes I discovered my current girlfriend *we had been fighting and supposedly she wanted to work it out, cheating. I couldn't sleep and decided to get my shoes early from her house. I was even bearing a gift for this heartless bitch. I got to her apartment complex around nine. I had a key for the main entrance and usually enter through her bedroom door. For some reason it was locked.

I knocked on the door and she answered it by opening it only very very slightly. First words out of her mouth were "What the hell are you doing here?" She completely blocked whatever view I had of her room. I think I looked confused for a moment and my heart started to pound. I leaned into the door slightly and peered toward her bed. Lying on her bed was the thirty something, short, overweight, car-less supposed friend that I had nothing to worry about. Fortunately he was asleep. I cannot imagine what my reaction would have been if he had woken up. My most optimistic impressions are of extreme violence. I said "so that's how it is? I guess I had nothing to be worried about all of this time." Even writing about it right now I am feeling my insides turn.

As I was storming off I remembered that I had come for my work shoes. I stomped my way back to her window and said "I need my fucking shoes." I don't know if I heard a reply but I rushed down to her car to see if it was open so I could quickly escape this nightmare. It was locked and I sat vibrating with rage on her back bumper. I couldn't wait any longer and went back upstairs knocking on her apartment door twice. Eventually she answered and we headed downstairs. I said "What did I ever do to you?" "Here's the card I was going to give you, obviously I am keeping the gift."

Her reaction was nothing more than an ashamed "It's just something stupid."

I wasn't able to directly respond to that. I felt so betrayed and angry that it seemed woefully insufficient. Her face was closed off like she was a million miles away and the last thing she said was "Can I have my key?"

Immediately I thought about pulling it from my key ring and throwing it across the parking lot. I fought back and removed it. I handed it to her as coldly as I could manage, said something like fuck you and slammed the door to that painful chapter of my life.

What is terrifying is that had I not gone early this girl would have most probably taken me back or strung me along. In the meantime she would have been fucking this pathetic excuse for a replacement whenever I wasn't around or if she was bored. I have no idea how long this has gone on for, it easily could have been months. It is without a doubt better that I know now. I will never again have any more of a relationship with her than I have to in order to get back my things from her. The rage brought out by this was so palpable and overpowering that I cannot accurately recall parts of the experience. It was the first time I have really felt a blind-rage.

Hopefully the last.