But here is the thing: physical intimacy or potential intimacy is only a device for opening the floodgates to what really matters: words. What I want from my friends, male or female, are words. Great torrents of conversation, ramblings, monologues, infinite confidences, stories, anecdotes, confessions. I know that there are silent friendships out there just like there are platonic ones. I don't hold to those. I like my friendships warm, fleshy, verbal, sensual, sensorial... (50)
Me too, Mr. Codrescu. I think some of my prior relationships were gotten into mainly as a ruse for trapping people I admired into endless conversation. That said, I do enjoy the other aspects.
As the written depends only on the written, a poet finds himself inside a vicious circle of substance sucking by his own products' products. What was once living becomes Naturalism, Realism, Surrealism, Modernism, Postmodernism, etc. The speaker diminishes and the speech becomes all. But this is not the same speech as the sacred speech of the beginning: this is the even speech of machines, not the unpredictable story of the gods. This is speech turned upon its own devices, speech about speech. The cosmogonic myth and the fairy tale are replaced by the novel and television. The ritual-sacred utterance becomes a bourgeois commercial proposition feeding endlessly on the demands of a self-perpetuating market that is not an audience but, precisely, a market. Who reads? Who watches? The reader and the viewer have been replaced by the Spectator. Utterly different creatures these three: they vary physically. The body of the Spectator is a strategic map for the deployment of cultural products. The reader and the viewer used to touch. That is now forbidden: art is produced for the sake of production, which is to say for the sake of storage. It is made to be noted, credited and put in resumes, not to be actually read. In fact its message may be exactly the opposite: NOLE ME TANGERE, DO NOT READ ME. Art pour l'art is art contre l'homme.
The poet today is like Scheherazade: he must tell a story each night in order not to die. (130-131)
The workshop writers masquerade as non-mainstream writers but that's only an illusion; they simply cater to the surveyed needs of a different class of consumers, namely academic institutions. Notice I said "consumers," not "readers," because properly speaking, these workshop writers do not have readers: they produce their materials for resume-building in order to fill the self-generating slots of a growing bureaucracy. These writers do not even read other members of their resume-building subgroup. ...These writers are institutional insiders disguised as outsiders. (135)
What is prompting me additional thought, and which I don't feel adequately able to speak on yet, is the alignment here of resume and commercialization. The selling and the selling. While I agree to some degree, to some degree there are differences. Part of why I read like a pig, snuffling through the muck of everything I can lay my hands on, is to avoid this sense exactly. That no one reads. I read you. I read you all, provided that you never cease to entertain me with something I can't find anywhere else. This, too, a steep order. The business.
Also why, thus far, I'm happy to have avoided cogging in the machine of the academy. Or so I think. I don't have (as much) the anxiety of gross production.
To believe this entirely would be to lose hope. So I don't. But there's something to it certainly. I'm also always shocked by how many creative writing students are so resistant to reading. The grumblings about how much reading instructors are forcing on them. How they don't read for pleasure. (What is pleasure? Vacancy?) But then, in my experience anyway, they don't tend to be the most engaging storytellers.
*
The weather continues to consume me. Sun and warm that calls for my blanket on the beach. Sand, rock, grass. I used to go to Lake Padden a lot to read, after a bike ride there, after a run around the lake, after a swim. My own triathalon (taken slowly). I haven't been there in a while, not since I moved and the bike ride got tripled. There're closer shores. The bay is just down the street.
Last weekend a young man drowned in Lake Padden when the canoe he and a friend were rowing capsized. The lake is so manageable. Like a bathtub is how I've always thought of it. I swim across, I swim back, I swim across. It's three miles on the trail around. I don't know what the diameter is the length I swim across. But I just can't imagine anyone dying there. People in boats die young in this town. One boy was drowned, the other was saved. When the authorities pulled up the canoe from the lake bottom, the two life jackets, unworn, were still in it.
Showing posts with label drowning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label drowning. Show all posts
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
A few cases of which means I wouldn't have been here.
I know I’ve mentioned it before. My life could have stopped at age 14.
But it started with this: when my mother was 8 months pregnant with me she was in a head-on collision. At relatively slow speed, but there were injuries. My brother's forehead shattered a corner of windshield. He had a concussion, had been standing in the passenger seat. My mother was scraped up as well and had internal bleeding.
Today I watched a documentary about languages and the way the voice explodes out of the head in all directions, how two sound waves coming together create something different. Propagation, sinusoidal, interference, diffraction. When I’m writing or speaking I get snagged on some words. I can’t say Ibuprofen without slowing considerably. With some words in their similarity (perhaps only similar to me), I get frozen for a moment waiting for the word correct to the usage needed to step forward. Vocabulary and documentary are like this for me. Just now I wanted to say I watched a vocabulary.
When I was 14 I lived in Holland, Pennsylvania. Bucks County, not far from Joan Rivers’ place, though we lived in a townhouse, nothing like her stately affair. Every Friday my mother drove me to George’s Music in Feasterville, a few towns over for guitar lessons. The man who gave me lessons had hair like Slash from Guns n’ Roses. He smelled like sneezes or new blossoms before they take on fragrance. I don’t remember his name. I can still see him sitting close, in grave concentration, his Les Paul on one knee, lines just beginning to form around his eyes. I thought he was old, but he was probably 30 years old. Too old to be teaching stupid kids the guitar.
When the lesson was over Tim would drive me home. He taught drums, was in his early 20s, and lived fairly close to me. I’d been taking lessons for two years and had gotten a ride from him every Friday for the better part of a year.
The way it would go: I would finish my lesson and wander the store for awhile looking at strings and at sheet music (which I couldn’t read). I would listen to the end of the drum lesson, muffled thuds from the soundproof room that sounded like small fists punching a feather bed. When the punching stopped I would stand outside. In a few minutes, Tim would come out and we’d get into his car, a Buick, once his mother’s, bought cheap. We’d chat about nothing, music, he’d tell me about girls he would date. We’d stop at the gas station a few blocks up on E Street for him to buy beer, then turn left and head back the way we came, down E Street, to Buck, to Old Jordan and then home. He’d drop me off in front of my house and say “next week?” as though I would ever say no.
I wasn’t in love with him. He never left room for that. There wasn’t any question of clean divisions. I’d never hugged him, had only shaken his hand once or twice after meeting. The one Friday in two years I missed my lesson, I had strep throat. I’d had it all week. That night the six-pack was in the passenger seat where I would have been. Tim turned out of the gas station and someone speeding struck the back of his car. Because of the speed and how he was hit, the car spun a half turn into the on-coming lanes. A truck coming from the opposite direction hit the passenger side hard enough to cut almost the whole way through the car. Tim died instantly.
Tim’s organs, harvested, went to 17 different people. This included eye and heart transplants and skin grafts. There was an article in the paper about it. I took it out regularly when I wanted to cry about him.
We moved six months later, six hours away. My mother told me no more lessons. Money was tight. I’ve never gone back.
I’m writing this for a particular purpose, but I’m not getting there fast. Those who know me know I’m fascinated by almost deaths. This accident made it easier for me after we moved. I didn’t care to fit in. I didn’t try. I read a lot. I wrote. I drew pictures of cities I’d never been to. I taught myself about trees, taught myself Roman history, then Italian, ucello, ragazza, prendere due piccioni con una fava, about painting, sculpture, a lot of things.
Memorial Day weekend 2005 I got into a fight with Lynnea. From the time I started walking out the door, had I not hit traffic, I would have been precisely where a truck pulling a travel trailer went left of center, crossed the grassy median and hit a few cars heading northbound. Two hours later they were still cleaning up. It took a long time to get through Marysville, the accident was just north of there, within sight of the casino. There was paper all over the road. I wondered if someone was a writer.
My father tells a story of falling asleep at the wheel on a road like the one up to Mount Baker. Switchbacks, steep drops in elevation, nothing but rocks and trees and bears, lots of looking off in the distance. He was with a girlfriend who would leave him after the accident. He woke with the car more than half way to vertical, trees whipping past the windows, fast, growing speed, a branch snapping into the windshield, shattering, then the forward thrust being stopped by a large Douglas fir, the back end of the car rising from the force, falling sideways, coming to rest against another tree. From their perch they could see there was still a long way down. Though a tow truck was called, the car is still there today. The man took one look at it and said, no.
There’s a difference between my story about Tim and looking death in the face. Surely I would have died had I been there. But I can take nothing visual away with me, except the idea of what the car used to look like and what the paper said it looked like after (they wouldn’t show pictures on the news).
When I was six I tried to touch the bottom of the neighborhood pond while near the lip of it. I knew I should be close, but every time I swam in a little I’d feel around with my feet and still feel nothing. I swam a little closer in and tread the water, then threw my arms down in one big motion to lift my body up, then arms up to push my body down. The bottom was right there. And I was stuck in it, my eyes just above the water line, my mouth and nose below. If I stretched with everything I had I could get my nose out, breathe. I couldn’t get my mouth out in order to yell. Yelling underwater did nothing to get the attention of the boys walking away from the shore. My brother and his friends, a few older boys. There was a wind I hadn’t noticed until then making small ripples on the surface of the water. Small ripples became massive waves that entered my nose. The littlest bit of water. So close to the surface. I flapped my arms to splash and it made it worse and no one saw. Everything seemed quiet, except for my heart. Without even closing my eyes I can imagine this scene perfectly. I know what each of the boys was wearing. I know the placement of trees. I know the white look one of the older boys gave when he finally turned around. All of this watched while swallowing water, with water pouring into my nose. He pulled me out.
To repay, I had to take a shower with him. I remember this was quick. I think once we were naked he lost interest in me. I didn’t look like the women he’d seen in his father’s magazines.
It was like this Sunday. I can tell you the color and make of the car, a white BMW SUV. I can tell you what the woman was wearing, could describe her face and hair exactly. If I ever see her again I will know it is her. I will thank her for being no worse of a driver than she is.
We were driving to Oliver and Meredith’s for dinner, and to play with Lucas, playing with rocks. It’s 30 miles to get there on a two-lane road. I used to go to the mountain every weekend when I first got here, but don’t get out there much anymore. Traffic was light, as it usually is. There were horses and cattle, stables, farms, a place to pick berries, a place that will work with you on properly inseminating your horse.
She was probably distracted. Maybe texting, maybe answering a call, maybe grabbing her purse from the backseat. Her car dipped off the lip of the pavement onto the narrow shoulder at 60 mph. She overcorrected into my lane, right in front of me, then righted herself just in time. I felt my heart the whole rest of the drive. It wouldn’t slow down. Carol didn’t say anything, which is how I know she was scared. Five minutes later I said, “we almost died, you know.” “I know,” she said. I would guess that our cars, with possible mutual impact of 120 or so miles per hour came about three feet from colliding, which means it was probably at least double that, maybe more. It was close enough that I didn’t even react, which is probably good, considering I had nowhere to go.
But it started with this: when my mother was 8 months pregnant with me she was in a head-on collision. At relatively slow speed, but there were injuries. My brother's forehead shattered a corner of windshield. He had a concussion, had been standing in the passenger seat. My mother was scraped up as well and had internal bleeding.
Today I watched a documentary about languages and the way the voice explodes out of the head in all directions, how two sound waves coming together create something different. Propagation, sinusoidal, interference, diffraction. When I’m writing or speaking I get snagged on some words. I can’t say Ibuprofen without slowing considerably. With some words in their similarity (perhaps only similar to me), I get frozen for a moment waiting for the word correct to the usage needed to step forward. Vocabulary and documentary are like this for me. Just now I wanted to say I watched a vocabulary.
When I was 14 I lived in Holland, Pennsylvania. Bucks County, not far from Joan Rivers’ place, though we lived in a townhouse, nothing like her stately affair. Every Friday my mother drove me to George’s Music in Feasterville, a few towns over for guitar lessons. The man who gave me lessons had hair like Slash from Guns n’ Roses. He smelled like sneezes or new blossoms before they take on fragrance. I don’t remember his name. I can still see him sitting close, in grave concentration, his Les Paul on one knee, lines just beginning to form around his eyes. I thought he was old, but he was probably 30 years old. Too old to be teaching stupid kids the guitar.
When the lesson was over Tim would drive me home. He taught drums, was in his early 20s, and lived fairly close to me. I’d been taking lessons for two years and had gotten a ride from him every Friday for the better part of a year.
The way it would go: I would finish my lesson and wander the store for awhile looking at strings and at sheet music (which I couldn’t read). I would listen to the end of the drum lesson, muffled thuds from the soundproof room that sounded like small fists punching a feather bed. When the punching stopped I would stand outside. In a few minutes, Tim would come out and we’d get into his car, a Buick, once his mother’s, bought cheap. We’d chat about nothing, music, he’d tell me about girls he would date. We’d stop at the gas station a few blocks up on E Street for him to buy beer, then turn left and head back the way we came, down E Street, to Buck, to Old Jordan and then home. He’d drop me off in front of my house and say “next week?” as though I would ever say no.
I wasn’t in love with him. He never left room for that. There wasn’t any question of clean divisions. I’d never hugged him, had only shaken his hand once or twice after meeting. The one Friday in two years I missed my lesson, I had strep throat. I’d had it all week. That night the six-pack was in the passenger seat where I would have been. Tim turned out of the gas station and someone speeding struck the back of his car. Because of the speed and how he was hit, the car spun a half turn into the on-coming lanes. A truck coming from the opposite direction hit the passenger side hard enough to cut almost the whole way through the car. Tim died instantly.
Tim’s organs, harvested, went to 17 different people. This included eye and heart transplants and skin grafts. There was an article in the paper about it. I took it out regularly when I wanted to cry about him.
We moved six months later, six hours away. My mother told me no more lessons. Money was tight. I’ve never gone back.
I’m writing this for a particular purpose, but I’m not getting there fast. Those who know me know I’m fascinated by almost deaths. This accident made it easier for me after we moved. I didn’t care to fit in. I didn’t try. I read a lot. I wrote. I drew pictures of cities I’d never been to. I taught myself about trees, taught myself Roman history, then Italian, ucello, ragazza, prendere due piccioni con una fava, about painting, sculpture, a lot of things.
Memorial Day weekend 2005 I got into a fight with Lynnea. From the time I started walking out the door, had I not hit traffic, I would have been precisely where a truck pulling a travel trailer went left of center, crossed the grassy median and hit a few cars heading northbound. Two hours later they were still cleaning up. It took a long time to get through Marysville, the accident was just north of there, within sight of the casino. There was paper all over the road. I wondered if someone was a writer.
My father tells a story of falling asleep at the wheel on a road like the one up to Mount Baker. Switchbacks, steep drops in elevation, nothing but rocks and trees and bears, lots of looking off in the distance. He was with a girlfriend who would leave him after the accident. He woke with the car more than half way to vertical, trees whipping past the windows, fast, growing speed, a branch snapping into the windshield, shattering, then the forward thrust being stopped by a large Douglas fir, the back end of the car rising from the force, falling sideways, coming to rest against another tree. From their perch they could see there was still a long way down. Though a tow truck was called, the car is still there today. The man took one look at it and said, no.
There’s a difference between my story about Tim and looking death in the face. Surely I would have died had I been there. But I can take nothing visual away with me, except the idea of what the car used to look like and what the paper said it looked like after (they wouldn’t show pictures on the news).
When I was six I tried to touch the bottom of the neighborhood pond while near the lip of it. I knew I should be close, but every time I swam in a little I’d feel around with my feet and still feel nothing. I swam a little closer in and tread the water, then threw my arms down in one big motion to lift my body up, then arms up to push my body down. The bottom was right there. And I was stuck in it, my eyes just above the water line, my mouth and nose below. If I stretched with everything I had I could get my nose out, breathe. I couldn’t get my mouth out in order to yell. Yelling underwater did nothing to get the attention of the boys walking away from the shore. My brother and his friends, a few older boys. There was a wind I hadn’t noticed until then making small ripples on the surface of the water. Small ripples became massive waves that entered my nose. The littlest bit of water. So close to the surface. I flapped my arms to splash and it made it worse and no one saw. Everything seemed quiet, except for my heart. Without even closing my eyes I can imagine this scene perfectly. I know what each of the boys was wearing. I know the placement of trees. I know the white look one of the older boys gave when he finally turned around. All of this watched while swallowing water, with water pouring into my nose. He pulled me out.
To repay, I had to take a shower with him. I remember this was quick. I think once we were naked he lost interest in me. I didn’t look like the women he’d seen in his father’s magazines.
It was like this Sunday. I can tell you the color and make of the car, a white BMW SUV. I can tell you what the woman was wearing, could describe her face and hair exactly. If I ever see her again I will know it is her. I will thank her for being no worse of a driver than she is.
We were driving to Oliver and Meredith’s for dinner, and to play with Lucas, playing with rocks. It’s 30 miles to get there on a two-lane road. I used to go to the mountain every weekend when I first got here, but don’t get out there much anymore. Traffic was light, as it usually is. There were horses and cattle, stables, farms, a place to pick berries, a place that will work with you on properly inseminating your horse.
She was probably distracted. Maybe texting, maybe answering a call, maybe grabbing her purse from the backseat. Her car dipped off the lip of the pavement onto the narrow shoulder at 60 mph. She overcorrected into my lane, right in front of me, then righted herself just in time. I felt my heart the whole rest of the drive. It wouldn’t slow down. Carol didn’t say anything, which is how I know she was scared. Five minutes later I said, “we almost died, you know.” “I know,” she said. I would guess that our cars, with possible mutual impact of 120 or so miles per hour came about three feet from colliding, which means it was probably at least double that, maybe more. It was close enough that I didn’t even react, which is probably good, considering I had nowhere to go.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
