Shock Tea (5)- end of first chapter

Previous episodes (read these first):
1, 2, 3, 4

-All right, all right. Coyote, but that aint my real name, you understand. That’s just what I go by. Nobody uses their real names down here. People got names like Skeeter or Tink. Shit like that. So, Coyote... with a ‘Y.’
-...-
-Probably, because I’ve got Injun blood in me. Can’t you tell from the fucking blond hair?-
-...-
-Shit girl, I don’t know. They also call me the cannibal, but don’t you worry none about that. You know, you’re a pretty girl. Anybody ever tell you that? Huh? Did Gog warn you about me?-
-...-
-Alright, alright. Slam, huh? Yeah, I remember that fool. Who wants to know? You want to know how I met him? Shit, I get you. This is one of those, ‘what happened to you Coyote,’ sort of things, isn’t it? No, I didn’t go to his high school and no we didn’t hang out before I moved to the city. I know what you’re getting at. You’re looking at me just like his bitches used to look at me. You’re thinking the same thing his bitches used to think about me too. You think that I’m the bad crowd that Slam started hanging with. You know the one; the one that turned an upstanding young man with a good arm and a promising future into a junkie. Well fuck you. I wasn’t even there the first time he plunged, and if I know Slam, my bet is that no one made him do it. Shit, he probably came looking for it.
-Oh I know! Not Slam, not beautiful, decent, upstanding Slam. You want to know how I met him. I was over at Diva’s. It was me and a few others, you know, just getting high, when Diva gets a call that Slam’s coming to the city. Now, I don’t know him yet, but I’d heard talk about him, how he was all slick and shit. When he came to the door though, I thought I was going to a school dance or something.
-He had short black hair, kind of tall, bigger than me anyway. He looked real calm, even kind of happy, which was weird because he had on his football jacket, you know the kind the school gives you if you play sports. Fucking Opee’s dressed like this in the middle of the back alley in front of Diva’s. There’s like a bum behind him covered in his puke, the trash is overflowing out of the dumpster, and there’s Slam just kicking it with his girl.
-I didn’t know it was him. He just didn’t look like he really fit all I heard about him. I figured Opee was lost or something. His girl had to have on a sixty dollar shirt. Those jeans had to be a hundred. I was actually thinking about mugging them to tell you the truth.
-She keeps saying, "let’s just go, let’s just go, let’s just go," and she’s kind of crying these little tears. So he says, "we’ll just be in and out. I’ve got to hook." Then that fool turned to me and asked if Diva was home, and I was like, "what the fuck? This guy knows Diva?"
-So, we’re going up the stairs. He’s still cool, real cool for as whacked as he looked. His bitch was a wreck, and she didn’t get much better when we hit Diva’s. I thought she was going to die when he told her that Diva wouldn’t deal in front of her, and then he left her to go to Diva’s room.
-Don’t ask me why but I like seeing that fear in a rich bitch’s eyes. Like you could just nibble on them or something. She wanted to just sit in the corner and not really talk with anyone, like she was too good for us. So, I started talking to her. She didn’t really want to talk to me though, you know. She was all being shy and shit. Rebby started talking smack but kind of in code, and everybody starting laughing. I think she had some idea that it was about her, and it was only making things worse. I kind of wanted to be nice because...well, you never know. Not like I’d fuck a buddy’s girlfriend, but shit, I didn’t even know Slam at the time. So, I asked her if she wanted to get high.
-Now, you’ve got to understand how a straight person handles that question. When they’re around other straight people, they just figure that they’re talking about pot...fuck. But when they’re around guys like me, you know all fucked up and shit, they immediately start bringing up the hard core shit like they’re going to impress somebody, like they got a chance that they’ll fit in. So she asks if I got any coke, like I’d cut some rich bitch a line just because she’s got tits bigger than any of the street trash in the room. I hate bitches like that. Plus, I don’t know her. I don’t know who she is. She looks like a fucking cheerleader. Slam looks like a fucking quarterback. I think he actually was a fucking quarterback, now that I think about it. Straight up fucking narc material. Truth is I meant bud. I was going to smoke her out, but fuck that. I tell her all I got is speed, and then I load that pipe and give it to her. I didn’t think she’d smoke it, but I must have looked mean or something. She kind of looked around the room, and everybody was just smiling, you know like they’re going to bust up or something. She had to ask me how to do it.
-Now, I don’t know what the fuck Slam was doing in the other room with Diva, but they were in there a while. Sometimes that means something, sometimes it doesn’t, especially with Diva; you know how she is. Meanwhile, I’m kind of taking care of that little cheerleader. You know, trying to get my arm around her, sitting in real close, talking the talk, but she aint having none of it, and I’m all getting pissed off because I let that bitch smoke my tweak.
-So, I’m getting my arm around and just as she’s throwing it off, out comes Slam and Diva. Now, mind you, I’ve got my knife, but I’d never really used it. It’s just for protection, but Slam is big. I mean, he’s still big now, but he used to be real big in those days. If he wanted to kick my ass, he could have. No problem. But he doesn’t. He walks up to me, sits down on the side opposite her, leans over, and whispers, "twenty bucks," in my ear. I kind of nodded. He took her in the other room, and like five minutes later he comes out and says, "go on in." To this day, I don’t know what he said to her, but that kind of shit happens when you’re hanging with Slam. He’s just got this weird way with people.
-After that, she started coming by alone. She said that Slam wouldn’t sell her any more crank on account of her being broke all the time. She worked Diva’s, started staying there days on end, but after I stopped dealing for awhile I never really saw her again. I kind of felt bad for her. She was a real cutey... for awhile.-


Nothing. We have nothing for a First. How exactly are we expected to precede to Next from here. How are we supposed to assume the precursors by which Broken Bobby breaks. Slam’s vicious ability to toss people aside almost doesn’t work well for our Next, because we have no idea why he would save Bobby instead of just laughing at the poor bastard after he falls to his death. Furthermore, we’ve left whole segments of the back story behind. If we start with Slam than what are we supposed to assume when Bobby leaves his mother and Phil to go to the city? That he’s better off? Please.

Sure, we’ve introduced Urial, but her introduction is so partial that we cannot assume that it plays into the whole angel theme at all. Furthermore, Coyote. Where the hell did that come from? Forget the assumption that the scene fails because it is not bound intrinsically to the "reality" of the story. At this point, it would be best to settle for a First that exists in a meta-reality, or even a meta-meta-reality, as long as it works. As long as we are finally delivered the First, the break, the reason Bobby doesn’t get a job at working construction instead of dropping out of the "norm" (and boy we’re really pushing that point aren’t we). Why this Next? Why? Why? Why?


Phil begins screaming immediately.
-You were supposed to be home three fucking days ago. Where’s my car?!-
-It got stolen. I got mugged. Took everything and then the diesel heart of the city chewed me up and spit me out. I fell in doubt. I fell in love. I fell into a stinking pit of bodies and I had to crawl my way out back up to hell. No one had a car and no one snorted a line and played Bobby to pass the time, and the sidewalks led to places other than parking lots. I left four phantoms in a pounding club past closing time and to make amends I gave them the car though they never asked.-
-Are you on drugs? Are you on my drugs?!-

The hand comes down slap. Tears cannot come or else the...slap, slap...slaps get harder and turn into...slap, slap..punches. Don’t show weakness...you little mother fucker...to Phil because he knows how....hit hit...to make the tears come in...push to the floor, kick...the lone places, in the bad places, in the...kick, kick...strike anywhere places.
-Phil! Stop it! You’re going to fucking kill him!-
-That’s fucking right! Your little fuck here stole my car and sold it to buy drugs.-
Rag doll lifts off of the cold linoleum and tries to huddle itself into a ball pulling itself inside, devouring itself to make a smaller target, but punches still come, until Phil pulls a broken ragdoll across the hall, opens a closet, and throws it in.
Are there angels mommy?

Does anyone see the smoke, the fires, the little spiders, the endless sidewalks, the flashing lights of forgotten clubs, the bodies laying on each other like in mass graves under roofs of graffiti, the slap slap punch of fake smile Phils, the pill popping wishes, and the white powder dreams? Does anyone hear the tears and the screams? Does anyone see that the sky’s turning orange?

A strike anywhere boy locked in a plotting closet attempts to cry himself to sleep as Telley Vee sings him a lullaby.

-Patrons of the Tantrum Traveling Circus received a shock today when a young adult bull elephant broke loose and rampaged it’s way across the county fair grounds. Onlookers watched as the animal stomped its way through a ticket booth and across a circus barker’s stage.

-One eye witness commented that one moment the animal seemed fine, the next moment, it had broken its chains and was moving violently through the crowd.
Sources within the circus commented that they found the animal’s behavior surprising. According to the Tantrum Circus’s publicist, the animal was treated well and professionally trained. He added that the circus has a long history of animal acts with no past occurrences of this type.
-Though the circus has claimed innocence, County animal control claims otherwise citing numerous examples of neglect and abuse on the part of Tantrum’s management and trainers.
-According to officer Mathew Gog

-It’s a common problem among these traveling animal acts so we knew what to look for. The animal’s pens were unkempt, and most of the animals seemed lethargic, undernourished, or injured. Ultimately though, the evidence of mistreatment is best seen in the animal’s escape. Trained elephants are broken young to prevent them from testing and breaking their chains during adulthood. Once broken, it takes great trauma to aggravate these animals into a route. They don’t try to escape.-

-The animal has yet to be apprehended and is thought to be loose in the city. Animal Control warns that, if found, city goers should keep a safe distance from the elephant as it is thought to be dangerous and capable of grievous harm.
-Though nobody was directly injured by the animal during the escape, a power line was broken by the elephant which resulted in a fire. The inferno claimed the lives of two of the animal’s trainers.-

Bobby dreams of the city. He dreams of bungee cords. He dreams of oily rags. He will never remember his mother frantically testing her gag. He will never remember the look of resignation in Fake Smile Phil’s eyes, which promise retribution from beyond the grave, before they begin to pop and whistle in the fire.


What First? Slam or Bobby, Bobby or Slam? Can there be a God without the faithful, can there be a faith without a God? So many Firsts, so many possible beginning points. In the beginning there was the word, but what word? They don’t tell you because they don’t know. It’s a fucking cop out. Or maybe in the beginning there was this bit of matter floating somewhere near reality’s central point made up of all the stuff in the universe just waiting to explode, and then it just went BANG! And boy how that explains everything. What a great first... until someone starts asking stupid questions like what happened before that, and then even that is a Next. Start. Something start. Something, anything, start.


Done with the past, the Hotel Pacifica is much as it was left. Japanese flags now gone, religion changing bums now absent and unaccounted for, and the balcony of the Presidential Suite in no danger of being struck by chromatic lightening, Slam and Bobby ride the come down of their prospective drugs in the cool night air.
-Bobby, you ever get the feeling...-
-...-
-....-
-well, are you going to finish the thought?-
-You ever get the feeling that you’re the only one alive, you know like, uh, really alive?-
-...What do you mean?-
-Eh...nothing, I suppose.-
-I guess that you’re still high, huh?-
-It’s not that. It’s...It’s just that. I mean, do you ever get the feeling that you’re the only one alive and that everybody else is just kind of robots?-
-Robots?-
-Not like, you know, movie robots or something like that.-

The sky above is orange. There are no stars, nor any proof that there ever had been. There are still cars honking in the distance, but there are less now. Soon there will be more. If Slam is right, soon there will be armies of robots driving their machines down freeways to destinations that may or may not exist.

-What the hell are you talking about?-
-It’s just sometimes I think maybe I’m the only one alive.-
-You think I’m a robot?-
-Well, I mean if you were really well built, how would I really know?-
-Well, for one thing I don’t have metal skin, or wires.-
-I told you, not that kind of robot.-
-Man Slam, you get some crazy ideas when you’re high.-
-What the fuck is that supposed to mean?-
-Just that...you know.-
-No, I don’t know. You know I could still throw you off this fucking balcony, you little prick.-
They both laugh until Bobby interrupts.
-I bet I could do a somersault and land on that bike down there.-
-It’s not a bike, it’s a life raft.-
-Still.-
-I swear, you’re a fucking robot.-
-I am...I’m just not supposed to tell you about it...oops.-
-Fucking Bobby, goddamned robot.-
-Slam seriously.-
-What?-
-You need to lay off the drugs.-

Far above, in the orange sky, nothing stirs. There are no blue stars, no red stars, no white stars, and under no circumstances no day glow green stars. They don’t start to appear until chapter 3, and that is well beyond the joke about the paramount Last, the joke about the end of time, which does not really require a First.


Good, because we need to give this unhealthy obsession up and agree: there is no First. We can’t spend the last of these antediluvian moments talking about the present in cubits. We take our time wondering how this happened. Why, why, why? What First? But there is no First; no preliminary moment. Only a Last. Only Next. What Next?

Dear Amy

This blog is for Amy.

Hi. Now Amy, I have to inform you of some things since we have never been formally introduced, but if you comment on my blog, you should probably be aware of a few things about me.

First of all, chances are that I will also comment on your blog. This can be a bit unsettling, I'll admit, because much like my dear friend Avram, I write a lot, especially if I like what you've said. This is to say, that if you've said something interesting, don't be surprised if I write a Bible length response. Take this as a compliment. I found your blog entry on subjective language in the academy as a support system for totalitarian ideology to be very good. Thus my long winded response. Admittedly, I should have linked over to your site and written my response on my own damn blog. I'm sorry for that breach of ettiquette. Mia Copa (sp?).

Secondly, Amy I am a post-modernist. I don't mean that in a "I read and use post modern theory" sort of way." I've read and detest post-modern theory. When it isn't crap, it's overwriting only conceals its obviousness. Joy of joy, both Fuck-olt and Deride-a are dead. Take that, you rat bastards! What I mean when I say that I am a post-modernist is that I read post-modern fiction. You might say it's my specialty. Therefore, it's sort of a sore point for me when people read post-modern criticism, assume it to be holy scrit, and never read its most harshest critics--the post-modern writers themselves. I'm not saying you did this, only that your post seemed to be about the fact that academics authenticate this new way of thinking, without questioning its implications. I agree. Were they to read DeLillo as seriously as they read Said, they would not have that problem.

Thirdly, I have no great belief in reform. I think that people are who they are, especially after they've spent enough years to graduate with doctorates essentially cementing who they are, and that there is little chance that we can turn them around and let them know what's at stake, the implications of what they're doing, or even systems that have worked in the past. The academy of literature has become a place where no one talks about good books because no one can agree what constitutes "good." It is now impossible to read Hawthorne without wondering why we are reading Hawthorne. I believe that our attention should be focussed on the lessons inside these books (which over the centuries has proven an adequate demonstration of what it is to be human) rather than why we have to learn these lessons--which in the end, only makes us jaded and confused about what constitutes decent behavior towards our fellow men and women. But I don't expect these arguments to end until better teaching and criticism come forward to show them for the sham that they are and have always been.

The hard part for this is that there is an illusion of speciality in literature. For my own part, I believe that literature tells us what it is to be human, to experience the lives of human beings. We can only live through our own skins, but in literature, we are asked to try on the skins of others for awhile and to walk around in them. This isn't escapism, except from the limitation of the form of having only one life time, and that life time rarely escaping certain parameters of experience. That's what I believe literature to be.

Now, there are those who disagree. Literature becomes a sort of stockpile of cultural evidence. It is almost as if they are expecting someone to say, "that class of individuals over there isn't human." In which case, they'll show them the pile of books written by that class of individual and it will prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are, in fact, human. It's a ridiculous oversimplification of what literature is about, and in many cases, promotes the liberal versions of sexism, racism, and fascism. Nonetheless, there is a lot at stake in choosing to talk about the literature, rather than talking about the way we choose the literature to talk about, or talking about the way we choose to talk about literature. The first of that list is, for me, the most imperative in our post-modern time of uncertainty. Sadly, it is the last two in this category that get the most attention from the literary academy, and so by extension the language of the academy must devolve into arguments about defining and definition--Zeno's paradox must, of course, be ignored.

Is there hope? Yes, I think so. The majority of "smart people" up and coming in literature are jaded enough with theory to finally turn back to the books themselves. The old guard is either dead or dying and are being replaced by people like you and me. Remember, before his death, I believe it was Said who complained that none of his grad students had read Milton. If Said can realize the problem with his, and his fellow cronies, system, then there must be hope for us.

whaaah happened?

So, as many as you can tell, my last post well...didn't post. In fact, it didn't post twice. The first time my post was supposed to go up, Winamp asked me if I wanted to navigate from this site while the post was uploading, and for the thousandth time I was taken to the site of a douchebag.

Now admittedly, it was my fault for saying yes at the little prompt, but damn, that post was good. Anyway, so yesterday, I attempted to reproduce that spark of goodness. I even linked to the thing Jen sent me, which is, of course, Eminem's video for Mosh. Blogger went down and that was lost too. I simply don't have it in me to reproduce the post for a third time. Here it is in short hand.

My heater didn't work one morning when I woke up. I made reference to slipping on penguins, answering the door to elves who were looking for donations to help local business, and standing on the receiving end of a polar bears attack. All this to suggest that it was very cold. Here in Massachusetts, it is now fifty degrees.

Long story short, the heater was not broken, it was out of oil. Which meant that I went through $180 worth of oil in three weeks, having turned on my heater about five times.

Finally, I used all this for justification for my belief that we should shed blood for oil, if only to keep my broke un-draftable ass warm.

That's it. Work damn you, work!

blood for oil

Jen sent me

Shock Tea-disclaimer

Harsh language, adult situations, drugs, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah. One more post after this and I'll be done with Chapter 1. For those of you haven't been keeping up with the state of Shock, I recommend reading earlier sections before this one. Have at it Avram, my man.

Shock Tea (4)

Previous episodes: 1, 2, 3,

What makes monsters, the world or the womb? A pearl handle on a rusty blade. Green grass on a forgotten grave. A bright star in a cold vacuum. A time bomb ticking in a church. Lunatics know how to smile. Sometimes they laugh, giggle, have fun. Sometimes they are charming. Sometimes they run the whole gambit. Like deadly nightshade in a diamond decanter.

Apple pie comes hot out of the oven. Fills the house with warm golden goodness. There are toys strewn across the family room; the toys of the golden child. Legos, action figures, remote control ‘thises’ and some assembly required ‘thats.’ The toys of the beloved child, the only child, the medical science said it couldn’t happen child. He might as well be named Precious as he wanders around the house committing miracles with his every action.

When she was young, Slam’s mom would tell her friends:
-I’m going to have four kids. Two boys, two girls. Each two years apart, and I’ll marry a great man, and we’ll all get together and sing. He’ll play the guitar and love the outdoors. We’ll all go camping and fishing. I’ll tell my girls about boys and love. I’m going to be a good mom.-

She found him. He worked with his hands, played ball in High School. He went backpacking and rock climbing in the Summer, skiing in the Winter. A laugh like the bells of Christmas; giddy with the love of humanity. Handsome. Handsome and caring and loving and understanding. She waited by the phone, but she didn’t have to wait for very long. He played the guitar and...oh God! He had the voice of an angel, and he was going to make one hell of a father to her four children, two boys, two girls, spaced two years apart. Mellissa, Amanda, Johnathon (Johnny) and Gabriel. Their names like a chant spaced two years apart.

Clock goes tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, takes away Mellissa’s name. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock takes away Johnathon’s name. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock Amanda. Each tick, each tock drops the corner of the mouth a little more. Each brings a bit more loneliness, a little more hopelessness, a few more tears. The ticks teach terms like low sperm count. The tocks teach words like uteral condition and invetro fertilization. They teach odds like one in ten thousand, and they make Moms and Pops huddle together in hospital rooms wondering whether the darkness of a barren womb can make a heart numb to love. Pop watches children play in the park and mom kneels next to her bed at night and prays to the almighty. She takes to saying grace before meals, making her non-religious friends a little nervous, as she tries to earn a chance from the powers that be; the biological clock going tickety tock.

The spaces between their laughter grow longer, deeper. Mom’s tears begin to soak pop’s shoulder until, and he never said anything by way of complaint, she senses that she’s drenched him right through; sort of drowned him in impotent saline. He says nothing as she screams, "why, why, why," at no one in particular. He says nothing when her eyes come to the conclusion, "You. You. You," while they glare directly at him. And in the absence of his voice or laughter, in the absence of her willingness to adopt, there is a horrible pall that stretches over the house as they grind each other up desperately to conceive under the glow of the orange sky.

And then one gray day, it happens. The little test comes out blue. Maybe it is because the whole of the decent world has disappeared along with those little tick tock names, or maybe mom just isn’t sure that a bad marriage without children could really be turned into a good marriage by one little baby; one little Gabriel, but when she goes to the doctor, not knowing what to do if the little blue test has turned out right, and he tells her she’s pregnant, she feints. Pop is called at work, and quite suddenly, the future is set in stone. She cannot turn back, even if she now wants to. There will be a Gabriel. Tick...

Which brings us back to where we started. Apple pie coming out of the oven, toys strewn across the floor, miracles committed with every action, and all that. Remember? Which, in turn, brings us back to Slam. There he is now, only five years old, and bouncing up on his Opa’s knee.
-Well, Gabe what do you want to be when you grow up?-
-I don’t know.-
-Do you want to play ball like your father?-
-Yes Opa.-
-Good, we’ll teach you to play some football. You’re going to be a star quarterback.-
-Teach me good Opa. I want to be good. I want to be so good that everyone will be my friend.-
-Oh don’t worry Gabe, you’ll have lots of friends.-
-I like that Opa. I really like that. I want to have so many friends that I can’t even count them all. I want to have so many friends that I don’t even know them all. I just want to pass them in the halls and they’ll shout out GABRIEL, and I’ll wave back, but I really won’t know them and they won’t really know me. I want to cross gaps. Hang out with the ‘in’ crowd, and then turn around and hang out with the ‘nowheres.’ I want envy. I want lackeys and toadies. I want a veritable army who’ll hang on my every word just for a chance that I might notice them. Just for a chance that a little of me might wear off on them. I want girls to line up with smiles on their faces and words on their lips like, "don’t tell my boyfriend." I want those that think they have me to be lined up to forgive me when they find out the truth. Or at least part of the truth. I don’t want anyone to know all of the truth.-
-I have the face of an angel. Don’t I, Opa?-
-Yes Gabriel, you most certainly do.-
-Well I plan on using it. I’m going to go into the city. Meet all the right people, hang out at all the right places, and bring all the right drugs back with me to sell. People will line up to take what I deal, and who Opa, who will suspect that bright boy Gabe is a spider at the center of the web? You’ll be cheering touchdown passes and conversions while my handiwork breathes its last overdosing breath, and later that night, I’ll fuck three different chicks, two at the same time, come out of that room to a keg bought in my honor, body licked by the adoring glances of everyone around me. You know what Opa? I’m not even going to notice. That’s going to be business as usual for me. People will say, "That Gabriel is a great guy," or "that Gabriel is incredible," or, "I want Gabriel to fuck me hard and I don’t care who knows it," or
-That Gabriel sure knows how to party. The other night I saw him and he was fucked up-
-Yeah, I heard he’s not just smoking it anymore.-
-What do you mean?-
-I heard he slams. You know, shoots up.-
-No shit.-
-And no shit Opa, they’ll be right. You want to know what I want to do when I grow up? I want to move to the city. I don’t just want to end up there like I was forgotten or thrown away. I really want to go there and prey on all those poor little nobodies who are hiding. Because I won’t be hiding Opa. I want it all. I want that ‘who knows what the next day will bring’ lifestyle. I want to see the things that other people shudder to think of. I want to be Hades, Pluto, the devil himself, king of the dead, lord of the underworld. Because Opa, who really needs it? If someone’s good to you, does it feel any less fulfilling if you’re fucking them over. And if you fuck them over in just the right way, don’t they have to keep being nice to you. I mean sure, they’ll say you’re breaking their heart, but they have to forgive you once they come to rely on you. And who would suspect? Who would suspect that I care so little for them, that I only want their adoration, that the little slipknots I tie for them will end up around their necks.-


No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Yet another mistake in our attempt to track down the elusive First. What have we really learned? We find out something about Slam, sure. We even discover something about what sort of attitude drives Slam to take Bobby under his wing, to act as his mentor in the sick sick city, but we do not discover the power that he has. We are given Slam’s attitudes and abilities in such a roundabout way that we can’t take them very seriously at all. We certainly can’t attribute their effect to the breaking of Bobby. Again we find that the scene lacks reality given what we know of Next, it lacks detail, and above all, it lacks a direct relation to Bobby’s breaking.

What’s worse is that we have all but lost all reference to other characters. All we have is Slam’s attitudes towards life and his fellow human beings (which we can assume is not healthy), but it doesn’t really jibe exactly with what we know about Slam and Bobby. For instance, why does Slam save Bobby on that balcony? Why are Slam and Bobby alone in the Presidential Suite if Slam is expected to be some kind of self serving attention whore? Why does Bobby assume that he can run away and live with Slam in the city? As we are given nothing of how Slam truly treats people, we cannot assume that we have been given any sort of accurate description concerning how Slam will treat somebody like Bobby. Even the degree of strength in their friendship is called into question.

Maybe what we should do is exact our resources and send someone (perhaps even the as yet unintroduced Urial) to give us a little anecdote concerning what Slam is really like. Perhaps we could ask someone generally acknowledged as one of Slam’s near and dear such as Coyote. Well, at this point, I think we’ll all agree it’s worth a shot.

I said Viddie Well!

After my post about Writer's Block, I received a large amount of commentary and e-mails (well, large for my meager blog at any rate) telling me to buck up and all that.

Well, phooey!

To put it quite plainly, I really really really want to be a writer. I really really also would like to be a professor of literature. Notice the difference of one "really." Now for those of you who were around when I was attempting to enter a Ph.D. program, try to imagine what "really really" means. I studied, what?, ten or twelve hours a week for the GRE single subject, plus twenty to thirty hours during the final three weeks before the test. I invested every penny I could scrape together into sending out of applications. I wrote a twenty five page paper on Tasso. I drove to Sacramento to get transcripts together. I spent at least two to three hours a week just looking at the web pages of the schools I was applying to. I had to fly to Vegas to take my GRE general. This is all above and beyond my scholarship, and all the hoops I had to go through to get that, my G.P.A. which I had to keep to a level I never thought myself possible of attaining, my thesis which got me a graduation with distinction, and the graduate conference I helped plan (where Lynn and I met). I went through hell, man. I'm thankful I had Lynn around for the final steps of this process, or else I think they'd have locked me up by now. One of my friends, going through the same thing I was going through, very nearly had a nervous breakdown during the process. I still haven't quite recovered.

And I didn't get in. Twenty schools--twenty rejection letters.

So, the next year, I worked in a woodshop sanding funeral urns with fellow workers who were ex-cons for dealing coke and crank. In between that, I taught classes at Butte community college, and oh yeah, prepared my application materials for 18 more colleges while planning a wedding. Tasso out, I wrote another paper of Gravity's Rainbow, and pretty much went through the soft side of the graduation process yet again (no GRE). Trying to become a professor of literature is hellish. Poor Avram is doing it for the third time this year, and all good things to him. Avram, I'll help you out any way I can.

I mean just imagine. You've got a phenomenal GPA, you're in the top 10% on the GRE. Your general GRE scores aren't too shabby either. You've got scholarships, teaching experience (4 T.A.ships, 5 by myself first round, 9 by myself second round), six conferences, and three lines of publication, and they still don't think your Ph.D. material. Talk books with Avram some time. He will blow you out of the water with how much he's read, and I'm not talking cursory reads--you don't come up with Hawthorne as comic book writer because you weren't paying attention. And Avram is on his third round. The system is pathetic.

And in my desire, my "really really," I have embraced said system with the full understanding that when all is said and done and I am on the tenure track, I can look back and know that I proved myself the intellectual that they hoped me to be, and then shocked the hell out of them by being even more than that--more than their stupid admissions system could account for.

Now, all that translates into that level of desire, that "really really want." Imagine, if you will, what "really really really want" must be like. Unfortunately, I am enamored with unfair and often ludicrous systems. I am drawn to them. Publishing makes Ph.D. admission look like Swiss clockwork. There is no order to publishing. At least with a Ph.D. program they give you an address to send your stuff. No such information exists for writers. Not even successful writers have that kind of information. That's why there's so many great books about how to write, and no great books about how to get published. Writer's Market is gigantic, monolithic, and impossible to use.

So, here's what I've got so far. You write your book. You contact an agent. He/she either takes you on, or tells you what you need to do in order for your work to be attractive to an agent. If he/she takes you on, then they figure out where to send your stuff. If they don't take you on, well, we'll see.

This process has created in me a stifling anxiety that, if you read my previous post you'll know, has affected my work. This is one of the hardships that I must overcome for something that I "really really really" want.

The e-mails and condolences, and all that, that were sent to me were in the nature of "don't you worry Monstro, you'll get your day." No. I'm going to be honest with everyone. No one "gets their day." Your day is made--by you. If you want your day, I suggest you begin preparing for it. And that is what I am doing.

The other subject brought up in commentary and e-mail is that Jason is Jason, and Monstro is Monstro...and that is true. I wish the best for Jason, and hope that he gets published. I hope that this woman acts as his publisher. And I hope that the world falls in love with his writing, because I have been privy to some of his stuff and it is great. I almost wrote genius, and didn't only because it seems a word thrown around too often, but if I were the type of person to say that a writer has genius while they are still in their larval stage, then I am sure I would say this about Jason's writing. It is for this reason that I consider Jason to be a worthy nemesis.

And as long as it keeps me writing, Jason will be my nemesis. I can just imagine him opening an acceptance letter and showing it to Ruthie. "Look at this honey, the New Yorkers going to publish my work. Oh...and 20% off at Bed, Bath, and Beyond." It's sort of like the Utah Jazz winning the championship. Yeah, they deserve it, but you know that their victory party will suck.

So, rest assured, I mean no animosity to Jason. I don't curse him the enterprise. I am not sulking, nor will I sulk if Jason is published before me. I am simply utilizing this angst the way I always do with my "art"--I'm using at as an impetus for action.

Because when all is said and done, "really really really" wanting something is useless if you waste all your energy on the wanting, and have nothing left to bring your desires to fruition. You might as well only sort of want something, and actually do the thing necessary to get it. I mean, yeah sure, you don't achieve the object of your most prized dreams or anything, but then again, you may be inspiring others to get off their ass and write their book.