The Brain Dump

I added chapters 6-11 (the rest of Part One) of Duncan and the Heart of Aria to the sidebar. I actually wrote one (and a half) more chapters in order to meet my January quota, but those are in no condition to be read, so this finishes out all the progress I have made on my first novel. One hundred and eleven, single-spaced, letter-sized pages . . . one-third of the way there. I've continue to work on it, sporadically, as school keeps getting in the way, and I'd say I am approaching the halfway mark. Approaching . . . Still, it feels good to see them listed together (even if it is only in a sidebar).

I got my second story workshopped in class last week. I turned in a heavily revised version of "A Rat Problem"--what I have since changed to just "Rat Problem." Aaaaaaaand it filled the class with wonderful bewilderment--wonderful because they said my writing style was very strong and that I have a good sense of dialogue and action; bewildering because they had no idea what to make of the ending. A few of them got it, although they weren't certain in the conclusions they had reached. So I got things to clarify . . .

My professor says I'm "afraid of character." I told him there is a difference between being afraid of character and being much more interested in the systems that construct that character. This, evidently, is one of the last things you want to say to a literary fiction professor. I'm surprised he didn't burn me at the stake.

It really brings into focus how much I need to break myself away from the "literary establishment," for, if nothing else, my simple sanity. Part of me, naturally, really wants to be accepted in this incredibly exclusive club as they wield considerable cultural clout. But. The tradeoff is having to write very specific stories--stories that, frankly, do not interest me as an artist. Don't get me wrong. The literary elite are very good at what they do, and I enjoy reading (some of) their stories. But I have other things to say.

When I think about this stuff, I like to remind myself of my two favorite authors: Thomas Pynchon and Kurt Vonnegut. Pinny is shunned by most of the literary world because of his ontic antics and the sprawling, bloated, massive narratives that are his calling cards. Gravity's Rainbow, what is hailed by most as his masterpiece (no argument here), was in fact rejected by the Pulitzer Advisory Board as "turgid," "overwritten," in parts "obscene," and overall "unreadable." But I can say with confidence that he doesn't give a fuck what they think. The more I learn about him actually lends me to believe that some of the things he does, he does in order to disrupt their contented modes of reading. Kurt Vonnegut was similarly shunned as merely a science fiction writer by the literary world for much of his career. It wasn't until Slaughterhouse-Five that they realized how good science fiction can, in fact, be. But, again, he wasn't writing for those jackasses.

And neither am I. I have finally zeroed in on what it is I want to say to the world and I don't need anyone's approval to say it (though it is nice to hear that people are listening (Comments, please . . .)). Literary fiction is a genre like any other and grad school has showed me that I want to write something else. That's a hard pill to swallow when that particular genre is held up as the be-all-end-all of literature. But I need to accept it. And I think, slowly but surely, I will.

Let me tell you about last week.

OK, so it's Tuesday. At least it ain't Monday, right? I wake up and . . . oh, I can barely open my eyes without wanting to scratch them out of my face. Allergies, how I love you. But that's pretty par for the course (thank you, springtime), and I have medication for it.

I walk dogs this day, as I do all that week and did the two weeks before that (one reason I found little time to post here) and so I set out on Christina's bike, Calexico, which she was kind enough to lend me. It is not the first time I ride Calexico to the puppies, and I find the exercise, fresh air, and lack of four dollar gas needed to get from point A to point B refreshing. And so I pedal my way down Clark St, a busy road that runs much of the length of the entire city. Here I am, cruising down the bike lane, when a man in a parked car on the side of the street flings his door open without a care for anyone who might be biking up beside him.

A choked, "Whoa—" escapes my lips, then Calexico's handlebars collide with the door and I fly off, land on my back, and thunk the back of my head against the asphalt. Luckily, I am wearing Christina's helmet. Luckily, there are no cars driving in either direction. Luckily.

So I find myself sprawled on my back in the middle of Clark St. staring at the sky, thinking such Zen thoughts as, "That's the sky," when the man scrambles out of his car saying, "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I'm from New York. I'm sorry. Are you OK? I'm really lost . . ."

Somewhere in there I think to pick myself off the ground and realize with joyous glee that I still can. So I do. My right leg stings, along with my left elbow and my right shoulder, my head doesn't feel great, but Calexico's OK and all I can think is, "Well, it could've been worse." Plus, there are cars coming. I seem relatively fine so I tell the guy to be more careful and continue down the street.

In the coming days I will find all manner of happy bruises across my body allowing me to recreate what actually happened. As far as I can tell, the force of the handlebars jerking sharply to the right pulled a muscle near my right shoulder and I think that shoulder hit the door, giving my a huge bruise there. The handlebars hit my right thigh hard enough to give me a big scrape (and bigger bruise) and making it a little difficult to walk. I twisted in flight so I landed on my back, probably whacking my left elbow on the asphalt, along with the back of my helmeted head. That's what I've pieced together. I felt like shit the next morning.

But Tuesday isn't over. Oh no, no it isn't. I continue to the first two puppies, explain my tardiness to the owner, and walk the two dogs. I lock Calexico to her gate and when I return to him afterwards, I pull out the lock key, insert into the keyhole and twist . . . only to watch the key snap in half. Glorious. So now my girlfriend's bike is locked to this woman's gate and I still have four dogs to walk with no bike or car to get to them. It also hurts to be alive.

I call my boss. I explain what happened, everything that happened, and tell her that I'm stranded in Lincoln Park with no bike or car. She's very nice. She tells me I can use her bike but I have to take a cab to the office because she's late for an appointment. The office is on Irving Park, which is . . . I think seventeen blocks north of me. So I get a cab. She gives me her bike and I have to ride her bike all the way back down to Lincoln Park. I'm loving life, I'll tell you.

My boss's bike: In some circles, this bike is known as The Most Annoying Fucking Bike in the History of the World. First of all, it is smaller than Christina's and hurts my back to ride. Second, the chain constantly wants to jump to the neighboring gears, regardless of how carefully you set the gear shift. Third, it has this fucking bell on it that ding-a-lings every time you go over a fucking bump. This is what I rode for the rest of the day.

I ride back down to Lincoln Park, taking Lakeshore this time, a bike/jogging path on which cars are not allowed, even though it adds a few blocks to my journey. I go to my next dog (number three of six—halfway done). She's excited to see me, jumps up on my aching body, etc. I give her a walk and take her back. My boss had warned me that this dog "gets fussy" when people leave—abandonment issues, I guess—but not to worry because she's all bark.

Wrong.

Bitch fucking bites me! Clamps right down on my right forearm. Luckily, I'm wearing a coat, and so it just hurts like hell and doesn't actually break the skin. Luckily, I let go of the doorknob out of shock and the dog, upon seeing this, lets go of me. Gets fussy, does she? All bark, is she? She'll growl when I try to go? Jump up on me? Fucking bite me?! AHHHHHHHH!!!!!

I beat her back with Christina's helmet and scurry out. Gahhhhh. It is then that a thought I occasionally have pops back into my head and causes me to pause and ponder the metaphysical nature of our universe. The thought is this:

Maybe there is a god after all, and, in addition to many other things, it is and ever shall be omni-mischievous.

To recap: My eyes are raw from allergies, my body aches from getting thrown off Calexico, Calexico hates me and is locked to a gate in Lincoln Park, my boss's bike blows, this one dog is a super-bitch, and I'm tired and hungry and all I want to do is cuddle into the fetal position with Christina.

I finish the day out, my body growing ever-achier over the course of the remaining dogs. I make the twenty-seven block bike ride back to my apartment and collapse on my bed, falling into the merciful hands of my subconscious. I wake up a few hours later and take the train to a pizza place called Crust where I meet Christina and my two friends, Anthony and Richard, for dinner. The pizza is good, the drinks, sedatives, and I'm able to vent about the events of the day.

That was Tuesday. Wednesday was a confrontation with the brutally fragile nature of the human body. I ached, I was bruised, the scrape on my leg opened back up. But I didn't get bit by that dog, so I guess it was a pretty good day. I also drove my car to the dogs. Thursday was much the same. Friday finally saw my body getting some relief. The bruises turned yellow, like someone spilled highlighter all over me, and my shoulder and elbow hurt a little less.

All in all, I'm gonna say it was a pretty good thing I didn't have access to an uzi.

My friend, Nic, introduced me to Dinosaur Comics, and this week's Pic o' the Week is one of them.

Dear Readers,

I wanted to thank you for taking the time to read my inane little blog. I know that you have lots of other things that you could be doing with your time, like reading a book or solving our geo-political problems. However, I noticed that because I have started posting so often, my posts have now overtaken in number the comments left on those posts, and that makes me a little sad. After all, I'm doing this . . . well, mostly for me but also a little for you. My statistics page tells me that I've had one hundred and seventy unique visitors to my blog this month alone, and yet so few comments . . .

I'd like to hear what you think of my little operation. So I wanted to ask: Whatcha thinkin'? Have you been reading any of my short stories? Do you like my Pics o' the Week? Should I just shut up already?

If you can answer any of the following, or comment about anything else, in a respectful manner, then I'm sure we can be friends. And if you have a blog I promise to read it (at least a couple times) and leave comments of my own just for you! Then we can make a little blogosphere all our own! Doesn't that sound fun?

Anywho, I should get going. But I hope to hear from you soon!

Bloggity-blogging,

Chris

So I really dropped the ball on posting last week, didn't I? I blame school, and to a lesser extent society. Four more weeks to go before I'm outta here!

Speaking of outta here, it is official. Christina and I have signed and mailed the contracts--we have a job in China! We'll be teaching at Anyang Normal University (nice to be normal) in the city of Anyang in the Henan Province. We need to be there by the middle of August. Our correspondent, Marvin, tells us we will have a newly renovated four-bedroom apartment waiting for us. Yay! He also apologized because Anyang is such a small city. The metropolitan area only has five million people in it . . .

Speaking of fiction writing (hmmm, not as smooth), my story, "Dick and Jane: A Love Story" (found in the sidebar) was workshopped in my fiction writing class last last Thursday. You may remember me wondering how my professor would respond to it. Well, now I know. He, in a word, didn't. Yes. No comments. All he did was tell the class that whenever he reads a story with metafictional elements he feels like he doesn't have the vocabulary to talk about it. So he doesn't. Part of me can respect that, but then another, much larger, part of me wants to grab him by his writing utensil and yell, "Your the damn teacher--find a way to talk about it!" . . . I'm working through it. Actually, I set up a meeting with him this Tuesday to make him talk about it. 'Cause that's how I roll.

Speaking of rolling on and on with no clear end in sight while the entire country wants to pull its collective hair out and making the hurting finally stop . . . Hilary is still in the race! Y- . . . yaaaaay . . . ! But she's not actually who I want to talk about. John McCain was recently on the Daily Show, and a few things he said really gave me pause. The first thing was how he spoke about Hamas. Jon brought up a comment that he made, saying that Hamas endorsed Barack Obama. Whether or not he was taking out of context, whatever a Hamas endorsement would mean, it was what he said next that really stopped me. He called them a "transcendent evil" who want "to destroy everything we believe in." Now . . . I was under the impression that Hamas was a Palestinian resistance group fighting against their perceived occupation by Israel, which is continually supported by us. I didn't realize that they aren't really people, they're just an abstract evil that needs to be destroyed. That's cool, whatever. He continues, saying, "I think they think that I'm their worst nightmare," something that he is proud of, and I wondered what kind of appeal he was trying to make by playing off xenophobic, anti-diplomatic, sentiments in the American people . . . Don't we want peace in the Middle East? Maybe the ability to respectfully address one another and come to a resolution that fosters harmony between two suffering peoples? Maybe I was wrong again . . .

The second thing that got me was when Jon Stewart suggested a running mate for him. Hilary Clinton. After he overcame his shock, Johnny-boy stuttered that that was something that he had never considered before, but I thought wouldn't that kinda be awesome? What would be a stronger show of bipartisanship than taking someone from the other side as your running mate? It reminded me of the early presidencies, when the vice presidency was given to the runner-up. Have we fallen so far from a common ground that that notion is seen as both ludicrous and disastrous?

Speaking of disastrous, Myanmar sure is turning out to be a shithole, ain't it?

That's all for now. I'll be better about posting. I promise . . .

This Pic o' the Week comes from Chicago's Looptopia Festival, an annual cultural celebration presented by the Chicago Loop Alliance. Ryan Robinson's exhibit was a series of comic book fans dressing up as their favorite superheroes (as only comic book fans and other mega-nerds can). This one happened to be my fave:

T. S. Eliot called April the cruelest month, and every year when it comes around I’m inclined to agree.

What does April mean to me? The rebirth of life from winter’s cold death. And with their new lives, the Earth’s creatures bring with them spores. Dander. Pollen. Fungus. April is itchy eyes. A burning throat. Sneezing fits that last minutes at a time. I—hate—the spring. There is never a day when I can’t be on medication. Claritin, Mucinex, Flonase, Benadryl, Zirtec, Allegra. I never see the green, green fields because when I approach them my eyes flood with tears till I rub them raw or run away.

My allergies woke me up the other day, because my twenty-four hour medication ran out during the night. My nose was a mucusy mess. I could barely open my eyes. I sneezed somewhere in the area of fifteen times with no more than three to five seconds between sneezes. When I stumbled to my feet to get more medication, I nearly fell over because my equilibrium had been obliterated by the massive sinus pressure. I had no idea the body could produce so much phlegm.

“Allergies?” people ask. “A little sneezing never bothered anyone. Can’t you just get over them?” But they don’t understand. If I do nothing—if I merely live—my sinuses will become infected. Sinusitis can set in. Just from allergies I can migraines, fevers, blurred vision, aching teeth. This is what spring is for me: an extended cold season. I never know when I might wake up with the roof of my mouth raw and pockmarked because I had been rubbing it with my tongue in my sleep. I never know when I’m sick in the spring or when it’s just my allergies. And so I engage in a never-ending, and often fruitless, battle for control of my body.

April is finally over, and I survived. Will May be any better? Probably not—I have no illusions. I won’t be able to relax until August, September, when the Northern Hemisphere begins to cool again. I don’t particularly like the cold, having to bundle up under as many as four layers. But if this is my only alternative then I will gladly don the heaviest coat, face the most biting winds.

During the spring, the world comes alive, and, on my worst days, I wish I were dead.

I added two more short stories and two more chapters of Duncan and the Heart of Aria to the sidebar. The short stories are "A Rat Problem" and "Blame Game." The draft of "Blame Game" is a really rough second draft, and I am in no way happy with the title. That said, I think it's an enjoyable story and one of my better ideas.

My "Dick and Jane: A Love Story" is going to be workshopped in my Fiction Writing class tomorrow. The professor makes no bones about his literary preferences, leaning towards the literary minimalism of Ernest Hemingway, Raymond Carver, and Tobias Wolff. My being generally rejects this kind of writing, preferring rather the wandering postmodernist investigations of genre and form. Thomas Pynchon, for instance, one of my favorite authors, has been deemed a maximalist by many. The ol' Prof hates postmodernism. He says it's "anti-art," which makes me giggle. We'll see how he responds to my deconstruction of the love story.