Jeff Suwak's Blog, page 4
October 23, 2013
Website being upgraded
I’ll be taking a short break from posting to my site as it receives an upgrade from http://emilybreder.com/.
Thanks. See you all soon!
October 20, 2013
One of my goals with “Beyond the Tempest Gate” was to wri...
One of my goals with “Beyond the Tempest Gate” was to write a fantasy work that paid as much attention to language and theme as works of literature do. So, I was really happy to read a review by Dr. Bob Covel, retired professor of English, and a damn fine poet. I consider this a great honor, and it’s just one more great experience I’ve been blessed to have on this publishing adventure.
Bob Covel’s Review:
Beyond the Tempest Gate: the Quest for Literary Excellence
As a child I was, like most boys, fascinated with the idea of heroes. I grew up with the comic book superheroes of the Justice League of America: Superman, Batman, Flash, and all the others. As my level of reading developed, I was exposed to more literary heroes, which led to the great epic heroes of the Iliad, the Odyssey, Beowulf, and Gilgamesh. Along the way, I also followed the heroic exploits in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, Robert E. Howard’s Conan series, the Star Wars series, and a number of other hero sagas. All of these stories have one element in common. They all reflect the archetypal quest hero. When I read Joseph Campbell’s iconic book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, all of those stories suddenly fit into a larger pattern. Suddenly, all of those stories and their characters made sense.
This rambling prelude of my own reading history is meant to introduce my praise of Jeff Suwak’s novella Beyond the Tempest Gate. Jeff says that his intent in writing his novella was “to apply literary sensibilities to a fantasy story,” a goal that he has admirably accomplished. The protagonist Gabriel fits well the archetypal elements of the hero. As in many of those stories, Gabriel has a supernatural quest to destroy the demon Elizear who threatens the human race. Gabriel’s mentor Nimphus fits the pattern of the archetypal mentor. Gabriel carries the requisite archetypal sword the Sword of Dunrabian (a la King Arthur’s Excalibur, Beowulf’s Hrunting, as well as the light saber of the Jedi and the sword of Gryffindor, among other magical weapons), which he wields to fight the dark forces that he faces, The Milanites and their leader Gogol . As he defeats the minions of Elizear, Gabriel proves his heroic qualities that lead him to face his dark foe.
The novella is well written. Jeff uses his extensive vocabulary to create a world worthy of the archetypal quest. The descriptions of the scenes bring the world to life. His characters fit the mold of the many types that are evident in all of the heroic legends. While we recognize the types, Jeff’s characters are not merely hodge-podge mix-ups of other literary figures. As with true archetypal characters, they maintain their individuality. Gabriel, Nimphus, Gogol, and even the demon Elizear are striking and interesting in their own right. The story has enough twists and turns (including especially the conclusion) that the reader is not bored.
Anyone who loves fantasy fiction with supernatural or archetypal elements will enjoy reading and re-reading Jeff Suwak’s novella. I look forward to his next foray into the world of literary heroic quests.
October 14, 2013
Author Frank A. Rogers’ review of “Beyond the Tempest Gate”
I’ve gotten to experience some neat things since my book was published, and this is one of them.
A couple days ago Frank A. Rogers, who is an author I respect and one that recently hit Germany’s best sellers list (which I find very intriguing because he writes American Westerns) left a review of my book on Amazon and on his Facebook page. It’s an honor and I wanted to include it here.
The best books seem always to be those recommended by a friend. Beyond the
Tempest Gate by Jeff Suwak is not a genre I usually read, but a close friend
gave it high praise. In stories past, the rubber-stamp knights of old seldom
captured my interest. But Holy Knight Gabriel is anything but typical. The
author used his exceptional skills to create a believable, likable character
with a unique mission, and forged a fascinating tale.
No matter what
genres you favor, if you enjoy a story set in a strange world, high conflict and
nonstop suspense – with an ending you will never guess ahead of time – get a
copy of Beyond the Tempest Gate. The hardest thing to believe about this book is
that it’s Jeff Suwak’s debut. The man has a future in
storytelling.
Author Frank Allan RogersTwice
Upon A Time
October 11, 2013
In Spite of Everything, Yes
I was a little bit bummed out to find out that “In Spite of Everything, Yes” is now out of print.
There are only a few books I’ve found in my life that have lifted me up and given me more joy than this one. It’s simply a collection of photographs of people dancing, people laughing, a dog stretching its chain to the uttermost limit in joy at the return of its boy…images of powerful simplicity that remind me of how beautiful life can be.
I carry the images from this book in my heart as though they were memories from my own life. They come into my mind sometimes when the days have grown a bit dark and worn around the edges. The images illuminate everything, and I can’t think of a more noble achievement in art.
In contemplating the book, I was reminded of a poem I wrote years ago that was inspired by this book. I figured I’d post it here.
Refutation
The cynical professor said:
grow up, give it up,
the soul is dead,
and it’s never coming back again.
Telescopes and microscopes have probed
the furthest reaches and
the deepest deeps and
not a scrap of evidence has been found
of anything sacred anywhere
at all.
Atrophy is King Law in this new, mathematically enlightened land,
no place left for sentimental hearts,
for lovers or dancers or garden strollers;
no, no time left
for poetry, poems, or poets.
I tell you now, listen and listen well,
this new world depends on the bravery of those willing to go
dreamless into the grim, smoke-mouthed future,
of days in the wake of faith.
There is no time left for trivial children’s stories,
(and they are ALL trivial children’s stories);
the equation is done,
the forensic evidence too strong to deny;
we live to die
and in dying answer no why.
Tell me, boy, tell me, what are we,
but candelflames dancing
against the storm
that someday will, that someday must
inevitably extinguish us
forever?
To which I respond:
I will argue not, professor,
the logic of your claims,
for numbers added to numbers can never disprove addition,
but I will say this:
every time an infant smiles a radiant, gum mouthed smile;
every time there is a first kiss
beneath a firework exploded sky;
every time, for the millionth time, some slobbering, ecstatic dog
outruns the length of its chain in excitement
at the return of its boy;
every time a girl catches a bouquet;
every time the blooming chrysanthemums rain;
every time the underdog wins the fight;
every time the doomed-to-die survives the night;
every time the broken radio plays;
every time some outcast kid hits her groove and stands up straight;
every time some arrogant bastard’s comeuppance comes;
every time an elderly couple polkas;
you, professor, are proved wrong.
No matter what evidence you
and your taut skulled, pale faced, spectacle fingered,
glove eyed, sneery mouthed, rubber spined
blubber hearted, mashed potato footed,
christmas-train-cancellation-suck-toads may accrue and submit,
so long as someone somewhere laughs so hard
that chocolate milk comes out their nose;
so long as the sun rises over wildflowers
in the graveyard;
so long as the neon stays lit in the dark countries
of dancing around the world;
so long as the diner waitress smiling pouring morning coffee asks
whether you’re working hard or hardly working;
you are, again and again and again,
proved wrong, wrong, wrong.
Candleflames dancing against the storm
we very well may be,
well, then, let the son of a bitch blow harder,
so that we may dance
more wildly.
Let us go laughing together dancing
into the end of all our smoking wick days,
and never forget that so long as a single candleflame remains,
there is always that chance that,
however small that,
the stormwind scatters the flame
and sets the whole hillside
ablaze.
October 8, 2013
The Privilege of Today
Some years ago, I vowed that I would never let another day slip by. I vowed that I would give all of my passion to my dream, that I would never settle for ‘good enough,’ and that I would never forget to let the people I love know how much I cherish them.
But, time marches on and distractions arise. Fear creeps in from the shadows and plants doubts inside my mind.
Then, every once in a while, something arises to remind me of my mortality. Today, that reminder came in the form of a news report about mass casualties sustained by the 3rd Ranger Battalion. I hope that the families of the fallen can find some peace. I hope that the injured heal. And I hope that those who were killed are in a better place. I hope for those things with all my heart. The fact is, hope and pray and mourn are the only things that I can do.
The one area where I have the power to do more is in my own life. I don’t want to forget the lessons that I learned while I was overseas so many years ago…the hard lessons and the wakeup call that this tragic news of the 3rd Battalion reminds me of today.
I don’t have any right to waste my days with fear and doubt. I’m alive. I’m here. I can still dream. And, so long as I’m here, alive and dreaming, it’s my duty to myself and to life to live the best that I can, to achieve my goals, to be the best friend and brother and son that I can be.
No more backing down. No more hesitation. Thank you life for the gift of this day…for the chance to prove that I will earn this privilege.
September 23, 2013
Bruce Lee’s Grave
A man with a bad spray tan and a gold chain dangling out of his sweater was flexing over Bruce Lee’s grave when I first arrived. The slightly rotund man struck bodybuilder poses while an Asian couple snapped pictures and tittered with laughter. The spray tanned man was not laughing. He did not even crack a smile. Another man, thinner and devoid of any conspicuous bling, stood off to the side of the scene contemplating a travel brochure with grave seriousness.
Spray-tan grabbed the thin man by the sleeve and pulled him into frame. “Get in the picture, bro,” Spray-tan said. Looking his friend squarely in the eyes, he added with an almost pleading sincerity, “Once in a lifetime, bro. Once in a lifetime.” The thin man lowered his brochure and struck a halfhearted kung fu pose. Spray-tan crouched low to the ground and grimaced threateningly at the cameraman, as though preparing to propel himself into the air and blast him square in the face with a flying roundhouse kick.
The photographer handed the camera back, winning a hard pumping handshake of gratitude from Spray-tan, and left the site with his wife laughing. Spray-tan looked at me with wide, bulging eyes, as if just noticing me, and came at me with his hand extended, asking if I wanted to have my picture taken.
“No thanks,” I said, and explained that I had not brought a camera. Spray-tan stopped dead in his tracks with an expression that I can only describe as shocked distrust, as though I had just revealed something fundamentally wrong with my character. A family of four approached the site and caught Spray-tan’s attention. “You looking for Bruce Lee?” he asked. The family said that they were and Spray-tan stepped aside, motioning dramatically towards the grave like a carnival barker in some children’s story. “Well, you found it,” he said. Within seconds he had the family’s camera and began snapping pictures, and within seconds of that he was passing off his own camera and striking Kung Fu poses over the grave again.
I had not expected to find a crowd at the Bruce Lee’s gravesite. Really, I had not expected to find anyone at all. It had not occurred to me that Bruce Lee still won so much attention. In a weird way, I think I had forgotten that he was a movie star and cultural icon. I had always thought of Bruce as the martial artist, philosopher, and creator of Jeet Kune Do. The movies were always peripheral to me. I had discovered Bruce’s work while competing in amateur kickboxing, and his celebrity never impressed me as much as his insane workout regiments. Thousands of daily punch repetitions, one finger pushups, two hour long core routines. Bruce Lee had been as unwaveringly devoted to his art any great painter or writer, and I had gone to visit his grave in the spirit of a pilgrimage paying respects to a personal hero.
The irreverent attitude of the other visitors irritated me, and I just wanted to get on my knee, say my prayer, and be gone. But I could not get myself to. I felt too embarrassed to show that kind of solemnity. The others finished with their pictures and started talking about the other sites they’d seen, the Seattle Music Project, the Space Needle, as though Bruce Lee’s eternal resting place was just another sideshow on their tour of Seattle.
The family man mentioned that he was pretty sure that there was another famous person buried in the cemetery, but he could not remember his name. The thin man’s head shot up out of his brochure at this news and he began frantically interrogating the family in a Polish accent asking for more information about this famous person. What was his name? Where was he? Where? Spray-tan looked unsure of how to proceed for a moment and then jumped into the conversation, interpreting his Polish friend’s questions before the Polish man had a chance to ask them.
I walked away from the gravesite and up a small rise into a copse of fir trees and burial obelisks. It was January in Seattle, which meant that the air was damp and cold and the sky was grey with no intention of changing anytime soon. It felt strange wandering around a graveyard, like some kind of weirdo lurking amongst the dead, but I did want to participate in the scene at the tombstone. It seemed absurd and trivial. I had not come to the Bruce Lee’s grave to meet people and have my picture taken. What’s so wrong with meeting people and having your picture taken? I asked myself. Nothing, but that’s not why I’m here. Well then why are you here? I wondered, and realized that my former answer was really quite inadequate. For the first time, my presence in the cemetery struck me as utterly absurd. There I was, a man who does not believe in an afterlife, wandering around a graveyard waiting for the privacy to say a prayer of thanks, knowing that no one will ever hear that prayer but me. I’d been thinking about making this trip for months. The urge had been on my mind like a finger tapping on my shoulder for a long time, so that when I had a free weekend, I leapt at the opportunity to finally visit the grave. Does that even make any sense?
Our relationships to our heroes are funny things. They embody the virtues of character that we most deeply yearn to achieve. Children are supposed to have heroes. Really, it seems cold and alien to imagine a childhood without them. As kids, we can look at our idols and expect that, if we hold true to their ideals, we too can grow up into someone as strong, brave, and true as they are. There comes an age, however, when a person is deemed too old for heroes. At this age, one can be a fan or an admirer, but is too old to openly court heroes the way children do. And yet, knowing this, my reverence for my heroes has only intensified through the years. Right now my computer desk at home is flanked by the watchful figures of Muhammad Ali and Albert Einstein, while my Bob Dylan poster looms on the wall directly overhead so that, as I write, I am always looking up to him like some sort of supplicant seeking wisdom at his teacher’s feet.
Dylan himself defined a hero as someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom. That obtuse definition always stuck with me. Dylan didn’t define heroes exactly by the arena that they lived in, or the nature of their accomplishments, but by a quality of their character. I look at Bob Dylan as a hero, though I have never desired to be a musician. I drove to Bruce Lee’s grave, though I no longer desired to make a career out of martial arts. The reason for my reverence is not that they were celebrities; it is the resolve they displayed in meeting the responsibilities of their freedom.
Every person has an ideal vision of what they want their life to be. Few ever go for that vision, and those that do usually give in rather quickly and succumb to the ambient forces of mediocrity. In these modern times, especially, we are expected to be devoted specialists in our career fields, but utterly compromising in character. Most of us start out with big visions and end up laughing at those visions over beers later in life, lamenting our stupid, lost naivety. Some people give in out of fear, some out of disgust, others because they come to buy into the popular notion that chasing dreams is ultimately a selfish thing to do. People are so quick to point out each other’s responsibilities to society that they forget about our deeper responsibilities, the harder ones that we owe to the universe, as free human beings.
To be alive at all in this universe is a miracle occurring in the face of unimaginable odds. To be alive in a time and a place where one has the freedom to pursue his or her own personal visions of life is something of such profound good fortune that it boggles the mind. Pursuing our deepest dreams and visions is not selfish or trivial. It is, in fact, a responsibility we are born with as beings blessed with life and freedom. Heroes exist to remind us of that. They do not become obsolete; we just become too jaded to look up to them.
In the end, my reasons for visiting Bruce Lee’s grave weren’t mysterious or unfathomable. Few things about myself ever are, no matter how hard I try to convince myself otherwise. I went to Bruce Lee to renew a pact I made because I was beginning to break that pact. Two years ago, amidst all the stupid death and destruction of war, I looked at my own responsibilities as a free being and promised that, if I made it through my military contract alive and whole, I would not shirk that responsibility. I would live fearlessly and go after my vision of being a bestselling novelist, but two years of rejections was beginning to break my resolve. I went to Bruce Lee’s because I needed to thank a hero, and that was nothing to be embarrassed about. There are many things we are forced to do in this modern life that are degrading and embarrassing, but paying homage to someone for living an inspiring life is certainly not one of them.
I walked back to the gravesite. On the way I came across the Polish man walking amongst the tombstones. He looked at me, held up his hands, and asked, “Jimi… Hendrix?”
“I don’t know,” I smiled and walked past him. I almost hoped the ebullient, spray tanned man would be back at the grave. He seemed like a good enough guy, paying his own respects in his own way. But he was gone when I got there.
There were only two people left when I got back to the gravesite–two well-dressed girls with gravity defying hairstyles sitting on a bench across from Bruce Lee’s grave texting on their Blackberries. I walked up to the tombstone and got down on a knee, not exactly sure what to say. There is an open book shaped from granite at the base of Bruce’s tombstone. Emblazoned in gold on the pages of the book are the words: Your inspiration continues to guide us towards our personal liberation. That seemed like a good enough prayer. I closed my eyes and thanked Bruce Lee for living an inspiring life.
Walking out of the cemetery and up the street to my car, I wondered if Jimi Hendrix really was buried at the cemetery (he isn’t) and considered looking for his grave, but in the end I just kept walking. A man can only go on so many pilgrimages in a single day.
September 22, 2013
Why Travel?
In this modern age of pop psychologists obsessed with analyzing everything human to the point of despair and beyond, every travel writer at some point in his story will eventually be required to confront the question of why he or she is travelling. The question is a legitimate one, of course, and in those cases where the catalyst behind the journey is a compelling one, exploration of the idea can add to the story. It seems to me, however, that at some point in history the demand for a psychoanalytical justification for every little thing that we do in life crossed over the threshold of reasonable restraint, ultimately becoming a pointless compulsion more often than an exercise in illumination. In reading the reviews of travel writing critics, or listening to friends disregard Kira Salak’s gutsy journey across Papua New Guinea as nothing more than unhealthy attempt to address psychological issues, I think of Albert Camus’ advice that, “You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.” Sometimes the inward journey prompted by questioning one’s motivations bears worthwhile fruits, and I definitely do not challenge the value of such a journey, but sometimes, I think, it may be useful to keep in mind that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and sometimes a traveler just wants to travel.
In this article I want to talk about the way in which four travel writers approach the question of “why” in their stories. Each author contends with the issue at some point, though each with his or her own degree of seriousness. On one extreme is the aforementioned Kira Salak who, in her book Four Corners, makes her psychological journey one of the cornerstones of the story, until the inward quest into her motivations becomes every bit as pronounced as the physical trek across New Guinea. Alain de Botton’s Art of Travel, in a less personal way, makes exploration of travelers’ motivations and experiences the catalyst for exploring lines of intellectual inquiry that weave together art history, biography, philosophy, and seemingly every other disparate area of knowledge available. In The Places in Between, Rory Stewart seems almost annoyed at the need for explaining his motivations, offering only offhand justifications, as though conceding to the unfortunate necessity but never really becoming willing to concern himself with it too much. Rolf Potts’ Marco Polo Didn’t Go There, meanwhile, openly embraces the existential absurdity of being a traveler in an increasingly homogenized world where cultures are becoming more and more difficult to distinguish from each other and almost no place is left that is more than a power switch away from everything else.
Kira Salak, more than any other author written of in this article, embraced the role of self-psychoanalyst in her book Four Corners. Indeed, she starts and ends the book not with dramatic scenes or images from New Guinea, but with childhood memory and psychological insight. At points, Salak’s walk across Papua New Guinea seems almost like a backdrop for her introspective musings. Her approach, in my opinion, does not diminish from the tale, and gives it an extra dimension. The confessional style of her book is, in some ways, more courageous than the actual journey she made. I doubt that Thor Heyerdahl would have risked his iconic status as an adventurer by exploring the childhood fears of inadequacy that drove him to board Kon-Tiki.
What I think did detract from Salak’s book was her penchant for reiterating how dangerous and miserable her journey was, and how brave and brash she was for making it. Salak tries so hard to remind the audience that what she was doing was fraught with peril that she ends up almost sounding silly, like a drunken frat boy telling football stories to pick up chicks. The final effect of her overly repetitive emphasis on danger is the exact opposite of her intent, so that by the time she writes, “I still travel, but I don’t go to the really dangerous places anymore because I’m no longer in the game of proving anything to anyone,” I didn’t believe her. Like an inverted version of Hemingway’s iceberg, Salak shows so much that the overall story loses depth. She ultimately answers her ‘why’ quite clearly, but the way that she presents her story leaves a little doubt as to whether or not she learned anything from it.
Alain de Botton takes an interesting approach to investigating the reasons we travel in The Art of Travel: he places them at the very center. His own travels become catalysts for his musings and he lets his meandering inquiries become the real adventure, placing himself all the way in the background and highlighting ideas and curiosity over physical danger or hardship.
My favorite essay in de Botton’s collection, and the one which I believe is most exemplary of his style, was On Travelling Places. In this essay, the author’s stop at a service station on the roadway between London and Manchester becomes the starting point for a journey into the value of those places that exist between destinations. The station, he explains, is “architecturally miserable, it smelt of frying oil and lemon scented floor polish, the food was glutinous and the tables were dotted with islands of dried ketchup from the meals of long-departed travelers,” but he sees a sort of lonely poetry in it, too, which launches him into an investigation on the appeal of the “liminal travelling places” of the world, an investigation which melds the life of Charles Baudelaire, the work of Edward Hopper, and de Botton’s own experiences. He weaves the threads together so gracefully that the three ideas end up seeming intrinsically linked, and not a product of his ruminations at all.
De Botton talks about how Baudelaire, immensely dissatisfied with his home life throughout his years, learned to love travel for travel’s sake. He became, “strongly drawn to harbours, docks, railway stations, trains, ships and hotel rooms, and felt more at home in the transient places of travel than in his own dwelling.” Baudelaire also loved “machines of motion.” From a recounting of the motivation of Baudelaire’s affection for travel places, de Botton moves into the story of Edward Hopper, a painter influenced by Baudelaire, whose work focused on those lonely places in between that de Botton is concerned with in this essay. Here, the author moves away from biography and delves into art theory, “The collective loneliness brought to mind certain canvasses by Edward Hopper, which, despite the bleakness they depict, are not themselves bleak to look at but rather allow the viewer to witness an echo of his or her own grief and thereby to feel less personally persecuted and beset by it.” It is this kind of offhand philosophizing that makes the essay, and the book as a whole, replacing the intrigues of physical adventure with the intellectual excitement of making new mental connections, an excitement which I think is, in many ways, more satisfying than physical adventure alone.
In The Places In Between, Rory Stewart writes, “I’m no good at explaining why I walked across Afghanistan. Perhaps it was because it was an adventure.” And that is about the extent of his explanation. He has offhand replies for the people he meets along the way, things such as “walking for peace” and being “interested in the environment,” but he never seems to take any of those explanations seriously. I found his approach to the “why” question interesting because, more than any other author read for this book review, Stewart could easily have made a case for some kind of grand, heroic purpose in his journey. A Westerner walking across the war torn landscape of Afghanistan has all the makings of a great martyr tale or heroic journey, but Stewart refuses to play either part, a fact which is doubly admirable considering all that he went on to do for Afghanistan after writing the book.
Stewart’s modesty is apparent in his writing style, as well, the final effect of which is exactly opposite to that of Salak’s in Four Corners. Stewart never emphasizes the danger he is in. After a run-in with the Taliban, who tell him he had been one slip away from being killed, Stewart replies simply, “I hardly took in the scenery over the next hour. My emotions seemed muted. It occurred to me that being threatened by the Taliban made a good anecdote, but mostly I thought about the conversation with distaste and frustration.” There is something powerful in that kind of understatement. Not to overuse the reference, but I am reminded again of Hemingway’s iceberg and the power of the unseen lurking below the surface. Stewart’s literary stoicism gives the book a ‘manly man’s’ feel, much more than any macho posturing or braggadocio ever could, and the way that he reserves his one display of vulnerability to pay respect for his dead dog, Babur, is both fitting and touching, “I don’t imagine Babur would have been very impressed to see me crying now, trying to bring back five weeks’ walking alone together, with my hand on a grizzled golden head, which is Babur, beside me and alive.” Stewart’s book was my favorite among those that I’m reviewing here. Having been in Afghanistan under different circumstances, I was envious of his journey and enjoyed reading it. I also have a great respect for the author for going on such an epic journey while refusing to even once admit that there is anything epic about it.
Rolf Potts, in Marco Polo Didn’t Go There, addresses the “why” questions of a travel writer in a kind of meta-travel-fiction. His book is a series of short travel stories supplemented with insights into the techniques of travel writing. In the first essay, Storming the Beach, Potts sets out to infiltrate the set of the movie The Beach, being filmed at that time on a Thai island. Potts makes little apology for the fact that he is basically making his trip just to see what happens. “In any travel story, there’s bound to be a bit of artifice when it comes to defining the quest,” he writes in his notes, “Nevertheless, some people harbor a sentimental notion of how travel stories ought to work.” With the story itself he is equally self-effacing in discussing the motivations for what he does, “Or, to put it another way–Regardless of one’s budget, itinerary and choice of luggage–the act of travel is still, at its essence, a consumer experience.” In reading Potts’ writing as a whole, however, it becomes clear that his irreverence towards the subject of travel’s motivations comes not from a trivial take on the matter, but from deep and heartfelt contemplation.
Potts is unapologetic in his approach to travel and travel writing, and why shouldn’t he be? It isn’t his fault that he was born into a time when the black spaces of the maps have all been filled in. Travelers today fly thousands of miles to compare their Nike sneakers with those worn by Tibetan Sherpa’s, and that isn’t their fault either. Potts refuses to hide from these facts of modernity, making them instead the core of his explorations. He laughs at the irony of The Beach’s crew planting no less than 73 trees on the island they were filming on, because its natural state did not look authentic enough for their movie. Potts swims right into the heart of this irony laughing, but in looking at his greater preoccupation with the current state of the world, it is a kind of noble laughter. When did adventure, he seems to ask, when did sucking the marrow out of life and sounding our barbaric yawp become something in need of defense? After all, if the question of why we travel is a legitimate one, then isn’t the question of why we feel compelled to ask why equally so? Potts faces the existential questions raised by living in a world increasingly devoid of the exotic, embraces those concepts, and then, like any good absurdist hero, goes running off into adventure, anyway. What the hell else is he supposed to do?
~ Jeff Suwak.
No different than a bird singing, really. I write because writing is what I do.
September 20, 2013
Philippe Petit “Cheating the Impossible”
Petit’s writing is as ebulliently precise as his high wire performances, achieving a level of such perfect control that it feels like reckless improvisation. From the start of the book to the end, surprises fill the pages, filling a madcap bag of tricks that ring of profundity when juxtaposed against his insights into life, success, and achieving the impossible. It should be no surprise, really, considering that this is the man that once illegally tightrope walked 1,350 feet in the air between the World Trade Center towers, with no safety harness. Such a man is incapable of the mundane, and anything he produces is bound to be unique.
Before each chapter, Petit recommends a song to listen as a backdrop to the story. I took the suggestion for one section and listened to Sting’s “Let Your Soul be Your Pilot” while reading about the essential virtues of patience and virtue in achieving anything worthwhile in life. The trick worked. The song combined with the text turned the experience into one of artful introspection an intellectual exploration. It’s a worthwhile idea that I’ve never seen done in a book before, and just one example of the many experiments he makes within the brief text.
The book is essentially a “self help” book, but the form of the text itself adopts the kind of joyful persistence he advises, contrasting with the businesslike tone of most such books. For Petit, solving problems and overcoming obstacles are things to be done for the sake of doing them, rather than for the external rewards they may bring. With each task achieved we are making our spirits wider, wiser, and more worthwhile.
Petit’s obsession with the realization of impossible dreams is infectious. I put the book down feeling wholly inspired.
No passage in the book communicated his intent more clearly to me than the story he told about a woman he saw cleaning the floor in a Bombay airport.
This woman was crawling on her hands and knees across the airport, picking up every bit of detritus, from cigarette butts to strands of lint, and then placing each handful into a trash receptacle. Petit watched her work at her task undisturbed for three straight hours.
The lesson he garnered from the experience as that no task was impossible. If we focus with absolute conviction upon the next minuscule task ahead of us, we will achieve any larger goal composed of those smaller objectives.
In that way, a woman can clean up an entire airport by hand; likewise, a man can fly across the ocean, break into a skyscraper, and walk a tightrope between them.
I put the book thinking about the things I have left to do to achieve my own impossible dreams. Following his advice, I let the larger obstacle fade away, and focused all of my attention and intention instead upon the next tiny task at hand, understanding that in achieving that tiny task I am moving steadily forward towards my larger mission.
I recommend this book enthusiastically to anyone that is trying to make a dream happen. It will leave you more inspired, a bit wiser, and more confident that the impossible really is only a few small, precise steps away.
Happy reading.
September 17, 2013
The High Wire Act of Dreaming
In literature and in cinema, there are those rare and special moments when we connect so deeply with the media that we experience the moment as viscerally as we do moments of our own lives. That is the greatest magic art of art, to introduce splices of someone else’s dream into our own existence. And when we look back on those shared moments, we remember them the same as moments from that daytime dream we call our real lives.
For me, no cinematic moment better expresses the magic of art than the moment in “Man on Wire” when Philippe Petit stepped out onto the high wire strung between the tops of the World Trade Center and seared an image into the collective human imagination forever. I actually cried the first time I saw it, privileged to witness this incredible feat, as a human being took the most insane of dreams and made it a reality.
At sixteen years old, Frenchman Philippe Petit decided to become a tightrope walker. Sometime later, he had a dream of two towers between which he was destined to walk. To add to the mystical feel of the scenario, the towers were not yet even built. He had no idea where they would be, or if they ever would be. He only knew he saw them in his dream.
Then came the day that he saw a story in the newspaper detailing the construction of the World Trade Center buildings in New York City. He knew at once that they were the towers from his dream. He also knew that there was an ocean separating him from those towers, and that no one involved with their construction would be crazy enough to let him walk a wire between them. Yet, he had seen his destiny, and set out to make it a reality, no matter what stood in his way.
As history knows, Petit eventually succeeded. It took great effort, great expense, and great risk to his life, but he did it.
To me, there is no moment in literary or cinematic history that has moved me more than the moment when Petit stepped out onto that wire in the documentary “Man on Wire.” I’m not a man prone to tears but I actually wept at the sight. There I was, very early in my journey to realize my own dream of being a professional novelist. A big part of me thought I would never accomplish that aspiration. A big part of me thought it was impossible. And there was Philippe Petit, who traveled across an ocean to walk a wire 1,350 ft in the air. I cried and I understood that not only could I achieve my dream, but I had no right not to. There is nothing in this life more inspirational than someone making their dream a reality. It is not only the greatest gift we can give ourselves, but the greatest gift we can give the world.
With perseverance, faith, and a touch of madness, we can make anything happen. There are no excuses. Perhaps we won’t all reach the ultimate end of our ambitions, but it’s the trying that is the high wire act, the thing that can move other people to tears of inspiration.
I love the moment in “Man on Wire” when Petit steps out onto that wire as dearly as I love moments of my own life. It inspires me to push farther, to work harder, to move closer to achieving my own dream. Thank you Philippe Petit for the life that you lived, and thank you for the moment. 1974, so long ago, yet still making grown men weep.
Petit gave a moving, humorous, and informative instruction on his life and his methods at TED. The video is below.
September 14, 2013
Damn, It Feels Good to Get Older
Can anyone tell me…is there a reason for me to be concerned? Is there a disease whose symptoms include just getting more and more awesome as time goes on?
Does anyone else have this problem?
P.S. as I was running I thought of Eric Thomas, best damn success coach alive in my opinion. Figured I’d clip it on here just for fun…like the rest of the post. This clip is more of a motivational piece but if you like his style, check out more of his stuff. This guy has some real useful information and some damn passion. Man, just listening to right now has me pumped up all over again.
Anyone who reads this, please share, what motivates YOU?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXJ1FZKwI7c
