Thierry Sagnier's Blog, page 39
March 4, 2015
Testing, Testing...
So this is when I start getting scared, five or six days before the next cancer checkup. I feel good but I’ve learned not to trust my body. I’ve felt great in the past as, unbeknownst to me, the disease progressed.
After three years I should be used to it, but I’m not. My blood pressure will soar when I get to the doctor’s office (I’ve learned this is called ‘white coat syndrome’), and the nurse will admonish me gently, tut-tutting as she suggests I close my eyes and imagine a peaceful scene. I try. A morning at the beach. A walk though Paris. Breakfast with friends. Lying in bed with a loved one. That lowers the bp a little and the nurse feigns happiness.
I take my clothes off in the examining room. The nurse gives me a large antibiotic pill to stave off possible infection and slathers my crotch with sticky orange goo. The doctor—the surgeon who has operated on me—threads a tube up my urethra. It’s not pleasant. There’s a tiny camera at the end of the tube, and my innards are displayed on a large screen above my head. I don’t look, even though I’m invited to do so every time. I clench my teeth and ball up my fists. The procedure lasts a few minutes. The doctor renders his verdict. If I’m clean, he congratulates me and I’ll see him for my next test in three months. If I’m not, he says uh oh, which is something you never, ever, want to hear a doctor say. Uh ho means I’ll be back on the operating table within a couple of weeks and the entire process will begin again.
Bladder cancer is neither sexy nor high profile. It’s an easy subject for jokes, of which I’ve been both the originator (I’ve threatened to name my next band the Bad Bladders) and the butt. It’s not necessarily lethal, but it did kill my oldest sister, as well as the husband of a friend, and a few thousand more. And Andy Williams; mustn’t forget Andy Williams.
In the back of my mind, I always suspected I would get some form of cancer because my family has been riddled with it—mother (liver), father (prostate), sister (bladder), grandfather (lung), and great aunt (pancreas). I’d seen what it did to my dad, who recovered, and to my mom, who did not. Neither was pretty. So when I was first diagnosed and after the initial shock, I thought one of two things would happen: I would get operated on and be cured, or I would be operated on and not be cured, and I’d die. I’ve been operated on—eight times to date; I haven’t died; I haven’t been cured. I’ve been told three times that I was now cancer free and seven times that the cancer had returned. I am almost certain that the panic attacks that hit me with regularity are somehow related to pre-test and post-surgery anxieties. I’m pretty sure I’ve taken a hit square in the self-esteem. Cancer makes me feel soiled and terminally unattractive. Psychologists agree such feelings are common if rarely discussed side-effects of the disease.
I get to---quite literally---gird my loins.
Ha. Actually, that’s pretty funny!
I complained that I had no shoes until I met a man who had no hat.
March 2, 2015
And Still More on Writers
I know writers who write well. I also know writers whose works are, at least to me, barely readable. I know broke writers and wealthy writers, writers of novels, historical romances, science fiction and fantasy. I know a poet or two, and song writers and journalists, and flash writers whose stories are never more than a few lines at most.
Writing, I believe, is nothing more than a craft. We work with words rather than, say, wood. We learn the basic rules and apply them.
Grammar is important, as are sentence structure and clarity. We find ways not to overburden the prose and after a while we come to realize that very good writing often depends on what is not written or even alluded to. Good writing promises and delivers. Bad writing promises and does not.
Excellent writing, which is much rarer, has windows and doors that allow the reader to become part of the story being told. Excellent writing invites you into the house, serves tea and madeleines, and then, as you’re inspecting the art work on the walls, it delivers the knockout punch. You don’t see the punch coming, nor do you feel it. You simply and suddenly find yourself knocked flat on your butt, almost breathless, certainly stunned, and grateful for it.
It’s only after you know most of the guiding principles of your craft that you can begin to take liberties, and you’ll do this at great risks.
I once had the pleasure of meeting Hunter Thompson, the creator and best purveyor of gonzo journalism. Thompson, despite his massive success, would say he never felt totally comfortable bending the rules of reporting. He did it anyway because he had to. The traditional media, he thought, was largely spineless, uninspired, and seldom really interested in reporting facts. Thompson believed the only way to write and to pass on the passion he felt was to put himself inexorably in the epicenter of his story. He would become part and parcel of the tale, grab its audience by the scruff of neck and drag the readers—sometime as they kicked and screamed—into his writing.
He appeared to be an easy read but wasn’t. What occasionally seemed like the ravings of a deranged man was actually wonderfully composed and powerful prose. He stirred a new generation of writers, none of whom to date have even come close to achieving his level of sagacity.
At the other end of the spectrum are good writers who have dumbed themselves down to please a greater readership. That’s an art as well, though perhaps a less satisfying one.
Me, I’m nowhere near the level where I can go off the beaten track and establish anything totally my own. I still ape writers better than I am, and I still struggle with some of the most basic rules.
That’s okay. I’ll get there or maybe not.
Progress, not perfection.
Writing, I believe, is nothing more than a craft. We work with words rather than, say, wood. We learn the basic rules and apply them.
Grammar is important, as are sentence structure and clarity. We find ways not to overburden the prose and after a while we come to realize that very good writing often depends on what is not written or even alluded to. Good writing promises and delivers. Bad writing promises and does not.
Excellent writing, which is much rarer, has windows and doors that allow the reader to become part of the story being told. Excellent writing invites you into the house, serves tea and madeleines, and then, as you’re inspecting the art work on the walls, it delivers the knockout punch. You don’t see the punch coming, nor do you feel it. You simply and suddenly find yourself knocked flat on your butt, almost breathless, certainly stunned, and grateful for it.
It’s only after you know most of the guiding principles of your craft that you can begin to take liberties, and you’ll do this at great risks.
I once had the pleasure of meeting Hunter Thompson, the creator and best purveyor of gonzo journalism. Thompson, despite his massive success, would say he never felt totally comfortable bending the rules of reporting. He did it anyway because he had to. The traditional media, he thought, was largely spineless, uninspired, and seldom really interested in reporting facts. Thompson believed the only way to write and to pass on the passion he felt was to put himself inexorably in the epicenter of his story. He would become part and parcel of the tale, grab its audience by the scruff of neck and drag the readers—sometime as they kicked and screamed—into his writing.
He appeared to be an easy read but wasn’t. What occasionally seemed like the ravings of a deranged man was actually wonderfully composed and powerful prose. He stirred a new generation of writers, none of whom to date have even come close to achieving his level of sagacity.
At the other end of the spectrum are good writers who have dumbed themselves down to please a greater readership. That’s an art as well, though perhaps a less satisfying one.
Me, I’m nowhere near the level where I can go off the beaten track and establish anything totally my own. I still ape writers better than I am, and I still struggle with some of the most basic rules.
That’s okay. I’ll get there or maybe not.
Progress, not perfection.
And Still More on Writers
I know writers who write well. I also know writers whose works are, at least to me, barely readable. I know broke writers and wealthy writers, writers of novels, historical romances, science fiction and fantasy. I know a poet or two, and song writers and journalists, and flash writers whose stories are never more than a few lines at most.
Writing, I believe, is nothing more than a craft. We work with words rather than, say, wood. We learn the basic rules and apply them.
Grammar is important, as are sentence structure and clarity. We find ways not to overburden the prose and after a while we come to realize that very good writing often depends on what is not written or even alluded to. Good writing promises and delivers. Bad writing promises and does not.
Excellent writing, which is much rarer, has windows and doors that allow the reader to become part of the story being told. Excellent writing invites you into the house, serves tea and madeleines, and then, as you’re inspecting the art work on the walls, it delivers the knockout punch. You don’t see the punch coming, nor do you feel it. You simply and suddenly find yourself knocked flat on your butt, almost breathless, certainly stunned, and grateful for it.
It’s only after you know most of the guiding principles of your craft that you can begin to take liberties, and you’ll do this at great risks.
I once had the pleasure of meeting Hunter Thompson, the creator and best purveyor of gonzo journalism. Thompson, despite his massive success, would say he never felt totally comfortable bending the rules of reporting. He did it anyway because he had to. The traditional media, he thought, was largely spineless, uninspired, and seldom really interested in reporting facts. Thompson believed the only way to write and to pass on the passion he felt was to put himself inexorably in the epicenter of his story. He would become part and parcel of the tale, grab its audience by the scruff of neck and drag the readers—sometime as they kicked and screamed—into his writing.
He appeared to be an easy read but wasn’t. What occasionally seemed like the ravings of a deranged man was actually wonderfully composed and powerful prose. He stirred a new generation of writers, none of whom to date have even come close to achieving his level of sagacity.
At the other end of the spectrum are good writers who have dumbed themselves down to please a greater readership. That’s an art as well, though perhaps a less satisfying one.
Me, I’m nowhere near the level where I can go off the beaten track and establish anything totally my own. I still ape writers better than I am, and I still struggle with some of the most basic rules.
That’s okay. I’ll get there or maybe not.
Progress, not perfection. I complained that I had no shoes until I met a man who had no hat.
February 24, 2015
A Star Is Born
I’m a rock star. I have now joined the likes of the Beatles, Beyoncé, Michael Jackson, Milli Vanilli and Shakira in lip-syncing a tune—one of my own—for the camera.
Let me start at the beginning.
In January, Jim Ebert, the founder of Cancer Can Rock (CCR), suggested I do a turn for his organization. Jim created CCR a few years ago. He gets musicians who have cancer into a sound studio to record one of their tunes for posterity. Jim got the idea because he was diagnosed with brain cancer fifteen years ago and told at the time that he had a year to live. Obviously, he outlasted the prediction. He’s now cancer-free, but one of the things he considered while undergoing chemo and radiation treatments was how impermanent life was. He wanted to leave something behind for his family and friends…
Since Jim’s a music producer, he is surrounded by singers, musicians, songwriters, and recording engineers and it struck him that a recorded song on a CD would have permanence. If worst comes to worst, the CD will outlive the performer and be something the family can hold onto.
Back to now. I am at Cue Recording Studios in Falls Church, Virginia, where CCR records. I was here years ago when the band I played with did a CD and had it finalized here. Today, I have a song I wrote when I was first diagnosed with cancer. It is not a happy air; it’s an equal-opportunity-offend-all-deities tune, maybe a little angry because cancer is supposed to happen to other people, not to me.
I sing the song a couple of times and the session musicians do an arrangement that is right out of spaghetti Westerns. In other words, it’s perfect. I sing some more. The hours speed by and the song comes together nicely. The clinker notes I hit, all sharps and flats, are fixed. A woman with a stunning voice does some really beautiful backup. My own voice is doubled so I sound, well, rock-starrish. The guitarist does a cool intro and a musical break in the middle. The guy is good! By the time the drummer packs up his gear, we have the beginning of something different and entertaining.
Meanwhile, a two-person video crew is taping all this for CCR’s website (www.cancercanrock.org). We do an interview. Jim asks questions about my situation; we talk for a few minutes on the impact cancer has on one’s life. We relate well because he’s been through the same thing as me. Truth is, it’s almost impossible to talk about how much cancer can affect every day existence unless it’s to someone who’s in the same boat.
After the interview, the video guys need me to lip-sync a couple of verses of my song. They’ll synchronize it later with the actual recording.
I have never done this before.
I’ve played and sang with bands, but whenever I did, words actually came out of my mouth. Not so here. I mouth the opening line of the song, “Jesus my friend, you weren’t here in the end…” I do it several times while the camera guy finds the angle that will make me look like an international sensation. I am instructed to look poetically to the right. Then I am told to put on a Clint Eastwood stare-at-the-darkening-horizon squint. I’m pretty sure I look like Jerry Lewis trying to look like Clint Eastwood.
Once more. This synching stuff is hard! I lip-sync, “Buddha you would’ve, if only you could’ve…” I’m pretty sure my mouth looks as if it’s saying something about butter and maybe Gouda cheese. I lip-sync so much my lips get sore. I get a new appreciation for Mariah Carey, who lip-synced Touch My Body on Good Morning America.
Finally, the video producer says, “We’re done.” With the acting through, we get back to real singing because unbeknownst to me, all the prior vocals were just practice. I am starting to get a little hoarse. Sean, who’s working the mixing board, keeps saying, “That was great! Awesome! Now do it just one more time!” He says that seven times. My delivery is getting better. When we reach the song’s final line, “God bless me!” I really mean it. And then Sean says, “Okay, take a break.”
And that’s that. We listen to what we have. I’m thrilled! My friend Rich who suggested the CCR gig, comes by and gives a listen. He says, “That came out different from what I thought!” He’s right, but that’s what makes playing music with others so enjoyable. You can’t tell what you’ll end up with. I didn’t know I had a spaghetti Western tune in my repertoire.
Jim will use his skills to finalize the tune, blending bits and pieces of track to make a complete song. The video guys will edit their footage and, I pray, not make me look too foolish. It will all come together within two or three weeks.
Folks, I have arrived!
Let me start at the beginning.
In January, Jim Ebert, the founder of Cancer Can Rock (CCR), suggested I do a turn for his organization. Jim created CCR a few years ago. He gets musicians who have cancer into a sound studio to record one of their tunes for posterity. Jim got the idea because he was diagnosed with brain cancer fifteen years ago and told at the time that he had a year to live. Obviously, he outlasted the prediction. He’s now cancer-free, but one of the things he considered while undergoing chemo and radiation treatments was how impermanent life was. He wanted to leave something behind for his family and friends…
Since Jim’s a music producer, he is surrounded by singers, musicians, songwriters, and recording engineers and it struck him that a recorded song on a CD would have permanence. If worst comes to worst, the CD will outlive the performer and be something the family can hold onto.
Back to now. I am at Cue Recording Studios in Falls Church, Virginia, where CCR records. I was here years ago when the band I played with did a CD and had it finalized here. Today, I have a song I wrote when I was first diagnosed with cancer. It is not a happy air; it’s an equal-opportunity-offend-all-deities tune, maybe a little angry because cancer is supposed to happen to other people, not to me.
I sing the song a couple of times and the session musicians do an arrangement that is right out of spaghetti Westerns. In other words, it’s perfect. I sing some more. The hours speed by and the song comes together nicely. The clinker notes I hit, all sharps and flats, are fixed. A woman with a stunning voice does some really beautiful backup. My own voice is doubled so I sound, well, rock-starrish. The guitarist does a cool intro and a musical break in the middle. The guy is good! By the time the drummer packs up his gear, we have the beginning of something different and entertaining.
Meanwhile, a two-person video crew is taping all this for CCR’s website (www.cancercanrock.org). We do an interview. Jim asks questions about my situation; we talk for a few minutes on the impact cancer has on one’s life. We relate well because he’s been through the same thing as me. Truth is, it’s almost impossible to talk about how much cancer can affect every day existence unless it’s to someone who’s in the same boat.
After the interview, the video guys need me to lip-sync a couple of verses of my song. They’ll synchronize it later with the actual recording.
I have never done this before.
I’ve played and sang with bands, but whenever I did, words actually came out of my mouth. Not so here. I mouth the opening line of the song, “Jesus my friend, you weren’t here in the end…” I do it several times while the camera guy finds the angle that will make me look like an international sensation. I am instructed to look poetically to the right. Then I am told to put on a Clint Eastwood stare-at-the-darkening-horizon squint. I’m pretty sure I look like Jerry Lewis trying to look like Clint Eastwood.
Once more. This synching stuff is hard! I lip-sync, “Buddha you would’ve, if only you could’ve…” I’m pretty sure my mouth looks as if it’s saying something about butter and maybe Gouda cheese. I lip-sync so much my lips get sore. I get a new appreciation for Mariah Carey, who lip-synced Touch My Body on Good Morning America.
Finally, the video producer says, “We’re done.” With the acting through, we get back to real singing because unbeknownst to me, all the prior vocals were just practice. I am starting to get a little hoarse. Sean, who’s working the mixing board, keeps saying, “That was great! Awesome! Now do it just one more time!” He says that seven times. My delivery is getting better. When we reach the song’s final line, “God bless me!” I really mean it. And then Sean says, “Okay, take a break.”
And that’s that. We listen to what we have. I’m thrilled! My friend Rich who suggested the CCR gig, comes by and gives a listen. He says, “That came out different from what I thought!” He’s right, but that’s what makes playing music with others so enjoyable. You can’t tell what you’ll end up with. I didn’t know I had a spaghetti Western tune in my repertoire.
Jim will use his skills to finalize the tune, blending bits and pieces of track to make a complete song. The video guys will edit their footage and, I pray, not make me look too foolish. It will all come together within two or three weeks.
Folks, I have arrived!
A Star Is Born
I’m a rock star. I have now joined the likes of the Beatles, Beyoncé, Michael Jackson, Milli Vanilli and Shakira in lip-syncing a tune—one of my own—for the camera.
Let me start at the beginning.
In January, Jim Ebert, the founder of Cancer Can Rock (CCR), suggested I do a turn for his organization. Jim created CCR a few years ago. He gets musicians who have cancer into a sound studio to record one of their tunes for posterity. Jim got the idea because he was diagnosed with brain cancer fifteen years ago and told at the time that he had a year to live. Obviously, he outlasted the prediction. He’s now cancer-free, but one of the things he considered while undergoing chemo and radiation treatments was how impermanent life was. He wanted to leave something behind for his family and friends…
Since Jim’s a music producer, he is surrounded by singers, musicians, songwriters, and recording engineers and it struck him that a recorded song on a CD would have permanence. If worst comes to worst, the CD will outlive the performer and be something the family can hold onto.
Back to now. I am at Cue Recording Studios in Falls Church, Virginia, where CCR records. I was here years ago when the band I played with did a CD and had it finalized here. Today, I have a song I wrote when I was first diagnosed with cancer. It is not a happy air; it’s an equal-opportunity-offend-all-deities tune, maybe a little angry because cancer is supposed to happen to other people, not to me.
I sing the song a couple of times and the session musicians do an arrangement that is right out of spaghetti Westerns. In other words, it’s perfect. I sing some more. The hours speed by and the song comes together nicely. The clinker notes I hit, all sharps and flats, are fixed. A woman with a stunning voice does some really beautiful backup. My own voice is doubled so I sound, well, rock-starrish. The guitarist does a cool intro and a musical break in the middle. The guy is good! By the time the drummer packs up his gear, we have the beginning of something different and entertaining.
Meanwhile, a two-person video crew is taping all this for CCR’s website (www.cancercanrock.org). We do an interview. Jim asks questions about my situation; we talk for a few minutes on the impact cancer has on one’s life. We relate well because he’s been through the same thing as me. Truth is, it’s almost impossible to talk about how much cancer can affect every day existence unless it’s to someone who’s in the same boat.
After the interview, the video guys need me to lip-sync a couple of verses of my song. They’ll synchronize it later with the actual recording.
I have never done this before.
I’ve played and sang with bands, but whenever I did, words actually came out of my mouth. Not so here. I mouth the opening line of the song, “Jesus my friend, you weren’t here in the end…” I do it several times while the camera guy finds the angle that will make me look like an international sensation. I am instructed to look poetically to the right. Then I am told to put on a Clint Eastwood stare-at-the-darkening-horizon squint. I’m pretty sure I look like Jerry Lewis trying to look like Clint Eastwood.
Once more. This synching stuff is hard! I lip-sync, “Buddha you would’ve, if only you could’ve…” I’m pretty sure my mouth looks as if it’s saying something about butter and maybe Gouda cheese. I lip-sync so much my lips get sore. I get a new appreciation for Mariah Carey, who lip-synced Touch My Body on Good Morning America.
Finally, the video producer says, “We’re done.” With the acting through, we get back to real singing because unbeknownst to me, all the prior vocals were just practice. I am starting to get a little hoarse. Sean, who’s working the mixing board, keeps saying, “That was great! Awesome! Now do it just one more time!” He says that seven times. My delivery is getting better. When we reach the song’s final line, “God bless me!” I really mean it. And then Sean says, “Okay, take a break.”
And that’s that. We listen to what we have. I’m thrilled! My friend Rich who suggested the CCR gig, comes by and gives a listen. He says, “That came out different from what I thought!” He’s right, but that’s what makes playing music with others so enjoyable. You can’t tell what you’ll end up with. I didn’t know I had a spaghetti Western tune in my repertoire.
Jim will use his skills to finalize the tune, blending bits and pieces of track to make a complete song. The video guys will edit their footage and, I pray, not make me look too foolish. It will all come together within two or three weeks.
Folks, I have arrived!
I complained that I had no shoes until I met a man who had no hat.
February 22, 2015
New Writers
New writers. I love them.
I’ve been privileged to meet a few, and one quite recently, who reminded me of the passion writing can engender. She was open to possibilities, eager to work, and so full of ideas and notions that they bumped into each other coming from her mouth.
It was both wonderful and amazing to see the light in her eyes, and speaking with her I had the strange sensation of passing the baton to a new generation. It felt good, if somewhat scary.
I distinctly remember the very first time I was published in the Washington Pos. It’s as fresh in my mind as the last time I was published in Chrysalis, a wonderful magazine that, like many, fell victim a few months ago to online publishing. I can’t recall every story that has worn my byline, but I had a gratifying moment about a month ago when I found a briefcase full of long-forgotten clippings. My stuff, published long ago and now yellowing.
The enthusiasm I had in decades past for putting words to paper still resides somewhere inside, but it’s been tempered by the necessity of using those words to make money, and I have not done that particularly well.
In the years I’ve spent writing, there have been books, magazine pieces, documentaries, short stories, newspaper articles, and radio programs destined to be heard in developing countries. There’s even been the odd play or two, and dozens upon dozens of songs. Some have been performed; most have not, and none, not one, has brought fame or riches, or retirement benefits.
Yet every word typed was read and reread; every sentence was parsed. I still pore over each page I type and sometimes almost memorize it. I ache over dialogue. I have authored endless bons mots. I am totally enamored of creating characters and watching them grow. If I’ve built them well, if I have succeeded in imparting some humanity to them, then they sprout legs and walk away from me without once looking back. They become intent on leading their own lives, which I can only chronicle, much as a man watching the night sky might witness a comet. It has never been dull, or quotidian.
I believe in the paucity of words, and I am sure that over-writing is the eighth cardinal sin.
I have played fast and loose with grammar and have fought a losing war with the serial (or Oxford) comma—that little earthbound apostrophe that precedes the conjunction before the final item in a list of three or more items.
I have authored sentences that go on forever with minimal attention to punctuation, much to the annoyance of editors I’ve worked with. I have tried to paint with words. Sometimes, I am told, I’ve been successful in creating such imagery that the reader stops and savors the moment.
My new friend has a good start. She has word sense and sentence rhythm, and if she strings too many adjectives in a row, it’s an excusable fault. I still do it all the time, and I do not have the defense of inexperience.
I’ve promised to help her whenever she wants, but I wonder if that was wise. There are much better—and more successful—writers out there, and the sort of stuff I do is no longer as popular as it once was. I like to think I write literary fiction, but it may be a dying skill. Still, sitting across the table from her was a rare joy.
We writers are caretakers, and builders and architects. We are the memory of man and womankind. We may save the world, and if we fail to do so, we’ll be there to chronicle its ending.
What greater responsibility could we possibly have?
I’ve been privileged to meet a few, and one quite recently, who reminded me of the passion writing can engender. She was open to possibilities, eager to work, and so full of ideas and notions that they bumped into each other coming from her mouth.
It was both wonderful and amazing to see the light in her eyes, and speaking with her I had the strange sensation of passing the baton to a new generation. It felt good, if somewhat scary.
I distinctly remember the very first time I was published in the Washington Pos. It’s as fresh in my mind as the last time I was published in Chrysalis, a wonderful magazine that, like many, fell victim a few months ago to online publishing. I can’t recall every story that has worn my byline, but I had a gratifying moment about a month ago when I found a briefcase full of long-forgotten clippings. My stuff, published long ago and now yellowing.
The enthusiasm I had in decades past for putting words to paper still resides somewhere inside, but it’s been tempered by the necessity of using those words to make money, and I have not done that particularly well.
In the years I’ve spent writing, there have been books, magazine pieces, documentaries, short stories, newspaper articles, and radio programs destined to be heard in developing countries. There’s even been the odd play or two, and dozens upon dozens of songs. Some have been performed; most have not, and none, not one, has brought fame or riches, or retirement benefits.
Yet every word typed was read and reread; every sentence was parsed. I still pore over each page I type and sometimes almost memorize it. I ache over dialogue. I have authored endless bons mots. I am totally enamored of creating characters and watching them grow. If I’ve built them well, if I have succeeded in imparting some humanity to them, then they sprout legs and walk away from me without once looking back. They become intent on leading their own lives, which I can only chronicle, much as a man watching the night sky might witness a comet. It has never been dull, or quotidian.
I believe in the paucity of words, and I am sure that over-writing is the eighth cardinal sin.
I have played fast and loose with grammar and have fought a losing war with the serial (or Oxford) comma—that little earthbound apostrophe that precedes the conjunction before the final item in a list of three or more items.
I have authored sentences that go on forever with minimal attention to punctuation, much to the annoyance of editors I’ve worked with. I have tried to paint with words. Sometimes, I am told, I’ve been successful in creating such imagery that the reader stops and savors the moment.
My new friend has a good start. She has word sense and sentence rhythm, and if she strings too many adjectives in a row, it’s an excusable fault. I still do it all the time, and I do not have the defense of inexperience.
I’ve promised to help her whenever she wants, but I wonder if that was wise. There are much better—and more successful—writers out there, and the sort of stuff I do is no longer as popular as it once was. I like to think I write literary fiction, but it may be a dying skill. Still, sitting across the table from her was a rare joy.
We writers are caretakers, and builders and architects. We are the memory of man and womankind. We may save the world, and if we fail to do so, we’ll be there to chronicle its ending.
What greater responsibility could we possibly have?
New Writers
New writers. I love them.
I’ve been privileged to meet a few, and one quite recently, who reminded me of the passion writing can engender. She was open to possibilities, eager to work, and so full of ideas and notions that they bumped into each other coming from her mouth.
It was both wonderful and amazing to see the light in her eyes, and speaking with her I had the strange sensation of passing the baton to a new generation. It felt good, if somewhat scary.
I distinctly remember the very first time I was published in the Washington Post. It’s as fresh in my mind as the last time I was published in Chrysalis,a wonderful magazine that, like many, fell victim a few months ago to online publishing. I can’t recall every story that has worn my byline, but I had a gratifying moment about a month ago when I found a briefcase full of long-forgotten clippings. My stuff, published long ago and now yellowing.
The enthusiasm I had in decades past for putting words to paper still resides somewhere inside, but it’s been tempered by the necessity of using those words to make money, and I have not done that particularly well.
In the years I’ve spent writing, there have been books, magazine pieces, documentaries, short stories, newspaper articles, and radio programs destined to be heard in developing countries. There’s even been the odd play or two, and dozens upon dozens of songs. Some have been performed; most have not, and none, not one, has brought fame or riches, or retirement benefits.
Yet every word typed was read and reread; every sentence was parsed. I still pore over each page I type and sometimes almost memorize it. I ache over dialogue. I have authored endless bons mots. I am totally enamored of creating characters and watching them grow. If I’ve built them well, if I have succeeded in imparting some humanity to them, then they sprout legs and walk away from me without once looking back. They become intent on leading their own lives, which I can only chronicle, much as a man watching the night sky might witness a comet. It has never been dull, or quotidian.
I believe in the paucity of words, and I am sure that over-writing is the eighth cardinal sin.
I have played fast and loose with grammar and have fought a losing war with the serial (or Oxford) comma—that little earthbound apostrophe that precedes the conjunction before the final item in a list of three or more items.
I have authored sentences that go on forever with minimal attention to punctuation, much to the annoyance of editors I’ve worked with. I have tried to paint with words. Sometimes, I am told, I’ve been successful in creating such imagery that the reader stops and savors the moment.
My new friend has a good start. She has word sense and sentence rhythm, and if she strings too many adjectives in a row, it’s an excusable fault. I still do it all the time, and I do not have the defense of inexperience.
I’ve promised to help her whenever she wants, but I wonder if that was wise. There are much better—and more successful—writers out there, and the sort of stuff I do is no longer as popular as it once was. I like to think I write literary fiction, but it may be a dying skill. Still, sitting across the table from her was a rare joy.
We writers are caretakers, and builders and architects. We are the memory of man and womankind. We may save the world, and if we fail to do so, we’ll be there to chronicle its ending.
What greater responsibility could we possibly have? I complained that I had no shoes until I met a man who had no hat.
February 16, 2015
Heat
When you live in an older house, and it’s winter, and the outdoor temperature is in the teens, the sound of God is the sound of the furnace turning on.
Today, just past 2 p.m., it’s 11° with a wind-chill factor nearing zero. The cold penetrates my home whose windows are not all double-paned.
Mine is a largish detached single-family cottage created in the early 1960s. There is a multitude of such homes—life-size Monopoly tokens—in Northern Virginia. Many were built for the blue-collar workers and GIs who populated the area a couple of generations ago, and many have been torn down and replaced with bigger and more modern houses, The homes like mine that have survived are thoroughly middle-class and growing in value. Their days are numbered. The migration of government workers from Washington, D.C., to the Virginia suburbs is constant and steady. The dotcom companies that have sprung up in my area employ thousands, and they’ve been buying up and tearing down.
The three-bedroom (small) two-and-a-half-baths bungalows plunked down on a third of an acre plot originally cost about $25,000. They were put up when energy was so cheap that trying to build a structure that did not leak heat wasn’t worth the cost. In my house, the windows that I have not replaced with more efficient models allow a transfer of heat that basically attempts to warms my back yard. The basement where I write is a good ten degrees cooler than the upstairs bedroom, and the only thing between me and frostbite is my ancient gas furnace.
By ancient, I mean about 25 years old. I replaced the heating/cooling system when I bought the place in the late 80s. I had a new roof put in and at about the same time I decided to insulate the basement myself, which helped, but only a little.
About ten years ago, we had a snowstorm that, though mild by today’s Boston standards, knocked down power lines and left tens of thousands of Virginians without heat or electricity. I took refuge in a local motel that reeked of stale smoke and considered myself lucky to find a room. Hotels were booked solid, and quite a few people ended up spending a small fortune huddling five to a room in suburban Hiltons.
I spent three incredibly depressing days in this noxious environment as I waited for the power company to restore service. The guests in an adjoining room had three kids, including a newborn that cried most of the time. They argued in a language I couldn’t recognize and slammed the doors often. When I got back to my home I spent another twenty hours waiting for the house to get warm enough to spend the night. The furnace kicked on intermittently and I held my breath while it did its job.
Now it’s almost a decade later and I’m holding my breath again.
I’ve tried to calculate how many times the thermostat has sparked and started the small electric motor that pushes the heat into the ducts and into the rooms. I hear the click perhaps every three minutes. That’s twenty times an hour, four-hundred-and-eighty times a day, give or take a few. In the summer, the same mechanism that governs the heat starts and stops the air conditioning, so that in a given year, the heating system operates about 330 days. I’m no math genius, but that means the system kick on about 160,000 yearly. Over a decade, that’s 1.6 million offs and ons.
Jeez. The sheer number terrifies me. Replacing the system will cost approximately ten grand, so I’m holding off.
I’ve woken up in the middle of the night persuaded that something in the heart of my house had just failed. I listen to my heartbeat. Then I hear the welcome click, whirr, woosh. The furnace works.
I give thanks to the furnace god.
Today, just past 2 p.m., it’s 11° with a wind-chill factor nearing zero. The cold penetrates my home whose windows are not all double-paned.
Mine is a largish detached single-family cottage created in the early 1960s. There is a multitude of such homes—life-size Monopoly tokens—in Northern Virginia. Many were built for the blue-collar workers and GIs who populated the area a couple of generations ago, and many have been torn down and replaced with bigger and more modern houses, The homes like mine that have survived are thoroughly middle-class and growing in value. Their days are numbered. The migration of government workers from Washington, D.C., to the Virginia suburbs is constant and steady. The dotcom companies that have sprung up in my area employ thousands, and they’ve been buying up and tearing down.
The three-bedroom (small) two-and-a-half-baths bungalows plunked down on a third of an acre plot originally cost about $25,000. They were put up when energy was so cheap that trying to build a structure that did not leak heat wasn’t worth the cost. In my house, the windows that I have not replaced with more efficient models allow a transfer of heat that basically attempts to warms my back yard. The basement where I write is a good ten degrees cooler than the upstairs bedroom, and the only thing between me and frostbite is my ancient gas furnace.
By ancient, I mean about 25 years old. I replaced the heating/cooling system when I bought the place in the late 80s. I had a new roof put in and at about the same time I decided to insulate the basement myself, which helped, but only a little.
About ten years ago, we had a snowstorm that, though mild by today’s Boston standards, knocked down power lines and left tens of thousands of Virginians without heat or electricity. I took refuge in a local motel that reeked of stale smoke and considered myself lucky to find a room. Hotels were booked solid, and quite a few people ended up spending a small fortune huddling five to a room in suburban Hiltons.
I spent three incredibly depressing days in this noxious environment as I waited for the power company to restore service. The guests in an adjoining room had three kids, including a newborn that cried most of the time. They argued in a language I couldn’t recognize and slammed the doors often. When I got back to my home I spent another twenty hours waiting for the house to get warm enough to spend the night. The furnace kicked on intermittently and I held my breath while it did its job.
Now it’s almost a decade later and I’m holding my breath again.
I’ve tried to calculate how many times the thermostat has sparked and started the small electric motor that pushes the heat into the ducts and into the rooms. I hear the click perhaps every three minutes. That’s twenty times an hour, four-hundred-and-eighty times a day, give or take a few. In the summer, the same mechanism that governs the heat starts and stops the air conditioning, so that in a given year, the heating system operates about 330 days. I’m no math genius, but that means the system kick on about 160,000 yearly. Over a decade, that’s 1.6 million offs and ons.
Jeez. The sheer number terrifies me. Replacing the system will cost approximately ten grand, so I’m holding off.
I’ve woken up in the middle of the night persuaded that something in the heart of my house had just failed. I listen to my heartbeat. Then I hear the welcome click, whirr, woosh. The furnace works.
I give thanks to the furnace god.
Heat
When you live in an older house, and it’s winter, and the outdoor temperature is in the teens, the sound of God is the sound of the furnace turning on.
Today, just past 2 p.m., it’s 11° with a wind-chill factor nearing zero. The cold penetrates my home whose windows are not all double-paned.
Mine is a largish detached single-family cottage created in the early 1960s. There is a multitude of such homes—life-size Monopoly tokens—in Northern Virginia. Many were built for the blue-collar workers and GIs who populated the area a couple of generations ago, and many have been torn down and replaced with bigger and more modern houses, The homes like mine that have survived are thoroughly middle-class and growing in value. Their days are numbered. The migration of government workers from Washington, D.C., to the Virginia suburbs is constant and steady. The dotcom companies that have sprung up in my area employ thousands, and they’ve been buying up and tearing down.
The three-bedroom (small) two-and-a-half-baths bungalows plunked down on a third of an acre plot originally cost about $25,000. They were put up when energy was so cheap that trying to build a structure that did not leak heat wasn’t worth the cost. In my house, the windows that I have not replaced with more efficient models allow a transfer of heat that basically attempts to warms my back yard. The basement where I write is a good ten degrees cooler than the upstairs bedroom, and the only thing between me and frostbite is my ancient gas furnace.
By ancient, I mean about 25 years old. I replaced the heating/cooling system when I bought the place in the late 80s. I had a new roof put in and at about the same time I decided to insulate the basement myself, which helped, but only a little.
About ten years ago, we had a snowstorm that, though mild by today’s Boston standards, knocked down power lines and left tens of thousands of Virginians without heat or electricity. I took refuge in a local motel that reeked of stale smoke and considered myself lucky to find a room. Hotels were booked solid, and quite a few people ended up spending a small fortune huddling five to a room in suburban Hiltons.
I spent three incredibly depressing days in this noxious environment as I waited for the power company to restore service. The guests in an adjoining room had three kids, including a newborn that cried most of the time. They argued in a language I couldn’t recognize and slammed the doors often. When I got back to my home I spent another twenty hours waiting for the house to get warm enough to spend the night. The furnace kicked on intermittently and I held my breath while it did its job.
Now it’s almost a decade later and I’m holding my breath again.
I’ve tried to calculate how many times the thermostat has sparked and started the small electric motor that pushes the heat into the ducts and into the rooms. I hear the click perhaps every three minutes. That’s twenty times an hour, four-hundred-and-eighty times a day, give or take a few. In the summer, the same mechanism that governs the heat starts and stops the air conditioning, so that in a given year, the heating system operates about 330 days. I’m no math genius, but that means the system kick on about 160,000 yearly. Over a decade, that’s 1.6 million offs and ons.
Jeez. The sheer number terrifies me. Replacing the system will cost approximately ten grand, so I’m holding off.
I’ve woken up in the middle of the night persuaded that something in the heart of my house had just failed. I listen to my heartbeat. Then I hear the welcome click, whirr, woosh. The furnace works.
I give thanks to the furnace god.
I complained that I had no shoes until I met a man who had no hat.
February 14, 2015
Me (Moi) Part 3
I had to write a longish bio for an upcoming online book promo. Since I’m too lazy to write a blog today, I thought I’d offer a three-parter on me me me me me me. This is part three. That’s all. I promise.
I wrote and sold The IFO Report; the novel was optioned for a movie that was never produced. I was hired by a UN organization to help start up a magazine and given the opportunity to travel all over the world writing about the organization’s projects. I stayed there for more than a decade, and then decided to strike out on my own.
I returned to school and got the necessary creds to become a drug and alcohol counselor. I worked for several area rehabs and ended up in the world’s most depressing job—dispensing methadone to heroin addicts. For hours on end I sat behind a bulletproof plate glass window, taking in soiled five dollar bills and buzzing addicts in so they could get their daily fix. This gave me the incentive to write The Thirst (formerly titled The Girl, the Drugs, and the Man Who Couldn’t Drink), a novel dealing with the dangerous lives of recovering addicts.
Last year, I was nominated for a Pushcart Prize following a story published in Chrysalis magazine. I didn’t win but, still and all, it felt good.
I write because it’s what I know how to do, and what I do best. I don’t necessarily believe in God-given talent; in fact I’m pretty sure putting words to paper is nothing more than a craft. You become good and better at it by practice, much as a cabinet-maker gets more skilled the longer he’s at the trade. My favorite saying is, “Writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.” Mary Heaton Vorse, a labor writer, said that a century ago and it’s still true.
I write every day. I write blogs, novels, short stories, non-fiction books and the occasional play. It’s feast or famine with a preponderance of famine, but that’s okay.
I believe you need an enormous ego to write, and monstrous chutzpah to really believe that one’s thoughts and ideas will be of interest to others. Thick skin is a prerequisite; writers live amidst rejection—from agents, publishing houses, editors and readers. This being said, writing is also the only endeavor where I refuse to indulge in false modesty. I think I’m pretty good.
Three years ago I was diagnosed with bladder cancer. I’ve undergone eight operations and three courses of chemotherapy, and at this time I still don’t know whether I’ll be cured. It’s scary and has not been pleasant. I’ve written at length about it, because that’s what I do.
I wrote and sold The IFO Report; the novel was optioned for a movie that was never produced. I was hired by a UN organization to help start up a magazine and given the opportunity to travel all over the world writing about the organization’s projects. I stayed there for more than a decade, and then decided to strike out on my own.
I returned to school and got the necessary creds to become a drug and alcohol counselor. I worked for several area rehabs and ended up in the world’s most depressing job—dispensing methadone to heroin addicts. For hours on end I sat behind a bulletproof plate glass window, taking in soiled five dollar bills and buzzing addicts in so they could get their daily fix. This gave me the incentive to write The Thirst (formerly titled The Girl, the Drugs, and the Man Who Couldn’t Drink), a novel dealing with the dangerous lives of recovering addicts.
Last year, I was nominated for a Pushcart Prize following a story published in Chrysalis magazine. I didn’t win but, still and all, it felt good.
I write because it’s what I know how to do, and what I do best. I don’t necessarily believe in God-given talent; in fact I’m pretty sure putting words to paper is nothing more than a craft. You become good and better at it by practice, much as a cabinet-maker gets more skilled the longer he’s at the trade. My favorite saying is, “Writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.” Mary Heaton Vorse, a labor writer, said that a century ago and it’s still true.
I write every day. I write blogs, novels, short stories, non-fiction books and the occasional play. It’s feast or famine with a preponderance of famine, but that’s okay.
I believe you need an enormous ego to write, and monstrous chutzpah to really believe that one’s thoughts and ideas will be of interest to others. Thick skin is a prerequisite; writers live amidst rejection—from agents, publishing houses, editors and readers. This being said, writing is also the only endeavor where I refuse to indulge in false modesty. I think I’m pretty good.
Three years ago I was diagnosed with bladder cancer. I’ve undergone eight operations and three courses of chemotherapy, and at this time I still don’t know whether I’ll be cured. It’s scary and has not been pleasant. I’ve written at length about it, because that’s what I do.
