Coherence
Years ago, I stepped out of the public fiction-writing arena. Only recently did I figure out why.
First: some background.
As a child, I found that fiction writing served a useful purpose. It took me out of myself, gave me an emotional and mental place to escape to. If I'd only left it at that, all would have been well.
But, in time, I allowed this simple therapeutic pleasure to be corrupted by one of my worst character defects: grandiosity.
Grandiosity convinced me I had great talent. Was better than most, destined for big things.
Grandiosity kept me heartened, in the face of almost continuous publisher rejection; surely my triumph was a matter of when, not if.
Grandiosity prevented me from being deterred when AHMM took less than half my efforts, and few others took any at all. I was, I told myself, "on my way."
And it was grandiosity that gave me pleasure at publication of my first novel, even though (after three years of rejections) it was just a paperback original. To me this ominous sign was a major step up–instead of the clearest evidence yet of where I really stood.
Other signs abounded. Negative reviews from readers and reviewers. Compliments from friends that were, in fact, empty kindnesses. Bookstore appearances to which no one came. People who claimed to've read the books, when in fact they had not.
But grandiosity led me to alibi these indicators, paper them over, dismiss them. Relentlessly I cheered myself on, distracted by cliches and slogans like "persistence is all." Mistaking frantic activity for progress and success, conflating negative reality into positive fantasy, I was for years an alchemist turning real world dreck into imaginary gold.
I worked as hard as I could for as long as I was able, to get as good as I got: mediocre. Whatever it takes to be better than that, I lack.
It now seems so obvious.
Which finally prevailed. Inevitably. For Obvious is huge, dreadfully patient, and way stronger than I am. Obvious isn't interested in my opinion, and cares not how I feel. Obvious can be ignored for only so long. After 30 plus years, Obvious finally rode me down and toppled me off my horse. My high horse.
I still write fiction, of course, every day; just because it isn't read doesn't mean I don't have to write. But now, circling back to where I started, it's strictly an escape route to the safest place I know: comfortably within myself. Anything beyond that "is vanity, a seeking after wind."
Best of all, the death of this false premise has given me fresh appreciations. I have a decent job, good health, a home I love, a nice family–the list goes on.
And I'm grateful.
November 29, 2011
Sunny's final finish line
This week after eight years we'll say goodbye to Sunday Moolah. A few weeks ago, at age 27, Sunny badly injured her back. The vet, who came twice to examine her, said there is no hope. She's hurting and off-balance, struggling to walk. When winter's snow and ice comes she'll probably fall again and break bones. And then we'll have a real crisis on our hands, with poor Sunny in agony.
And so it's time to put her down.
Sunny is a registered thoroughbred who for years, we're told, was a race horse at Mt. Pleasant Meadows. She came to us by way of the late Tom Piper, our first farrier (who in fact also found us our other horse, Sammi Jo). Traditionally Sunny has been Deanna's horse – "the Cadillac," Deanna calls her, for her nice smooth ride.
Chocolate brown with white socks on her hind feet, Sunny has a long white face and watchful brown eyes and a regal bearing. She stands about 16 hands. She is, I've always thought, smarter than the average bear. I always feel like she sees right through me. When I work around the pasture or barn, she always hangs around close by me. Once, she somehow disassembled the stable gate and got into the tack room. With Sammi, her partner in crime, she ate 50 pounds of grain stored there, leaving behind in return several steaming manure piles. Why do I believe that it was Sunny, not Sammi, who figured out the gate? Because when I was fixing the gate, I looked up to find Sunny standing right next to me, looking me straight in the eye, as if to say, "I did this. I'm the smarter one."
Sammi had been the alpha mare when Bo, our first horse, was with us. Sunny briskly seized that role. She and Sammi have had a very contentious relationship. During one discussion, part of the stable wall was shattered. We've also had fence boards splintered, and I've seen Sunny nip at Sammi and hurl an occasional hoof at her. Sammi mostly steers clear, but still does little things (I think deliberately) to piss Sunny off. Theirs is truly a love/hate relationship. Separate them even for a few minutes and they whinny and neigh for each other. Of course all earlier separations were brief; we've always known they'd be back together again. Until now.
In a few minutes Sammi's new owners (who will turn out to be a wonderful family) will come trailer her off. Tomorrow our neighbor will dig the hole with his backhoe. The day after, the vet will be back to put Sunny down. I will be away on business, and Deanna and Winston will take a ride for a couple of hours. I desperately wish there was another way. But we've always acted in the best interests of our pets. We've striven always to keep them comfortable and safe and healthy. And the only kind and loving thing we can do for Sunny now is to end her pain as quickly and easily as we can. "If," always inherent in life with a pet, became "when," and has, with cruel implacability, transitioned from "soon" to "now."
The three acres of fenced pasture, and the corral and the barn, will seem awfully empty without Sunny and Sammi. I'll miss their silhouettes in the morning mist. I'll miss Sammi's neigh when she sees me come down the hill to feed them. I'll miss them jockeying for position in their feeding areas, and the rough feel of their lips as they delicately snatch cookies from my hand. I'll miss the power of Sammi beneath me as she charges across the meadow, head high and tail swinging and hoofs thundering. I'll miss Sunny loping elegantly across the fields with Deanna aboard, reins in one hand, smiling that smile. I'll miss the nickering and whinnying in the stable as I work upstairs in the barn. I'll miss the metallic clattering of raindrops on the barn's tin roof as I stage their week's supply of hay. Each time I reach home, no matter how long it's been, I'll automatically check the pasture for my two girls. And I know my memories will paint them in place, bent down to nibble the grass shoots, with a glance up for me, every time I look.
I don't know if there is any afterlife for horses in particular, or animals in general. On this I'm with Will Rogers: "If dogs don't go to heaven, I want to go where they go." If Sunny gets an afterlife, my hope for her is this: an endless pasture of deep green grasses with no fences, drenched with brilliant sunlight. A big grove of shade trees with low hanging apples, through which runs a stream of water that is always clean and cold. I wish for Sunny kindly companions, two footed as well as four, who love her. Though it's not possible for anyone to love Sunday "the Cadillac" Moolah more than I do–
And always will.
September 19, 2010
Everybody, but everybody. . .
. . .gets help. To the extent that I’ve made a dent in the world of fiction, it’s been due to a certain amount of persistence, an ability to type, and the active help, passive acquiescence, or tolerance of an awful lot of good people. In no particular order – importance, priority, chronological, or alphabetical – here’s just a few of them:
- Dorothy Fotoples - fourth grade student teacher at (long vanished) Horace Mann Elementary School. The first words of encouragement I ever got for my writing came from her.
- Ms. Scharf - sixth grade teacher. Gave an extremely troubled boy lots of academic and emotional room to breathe.
- Ms. Gaines - Eleventh grade composition teacher. Challenging, demanding, yet genuinely cared for each individual student.
- Gayle Goodin - Freshman literature and writing instructor at the first college I blew. A true character, Southern original, whose stamp is indelible: I still think of the novel as Crimen y Castigo.
- Chief Wood - Navy Chief Journalist, and the most important boss I had during my otherwise pathetic military career. He taught me a lot about writing short. He also taught me what "baby shit" is.
- Curtis Stadtfeld - street-tough journalist who’d been there and done that before becoming the single best writing instructor I ever had. Though I now live 175 miles from Eastern Michigan University, ironically my home is about 10 miles from his gravesite. R.I.P.
- Cathleen Jordan - Editor of Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine until her untimely death early in 2002. Bought my first published fiction, and always did a brilliantly caring job of handling the material as well as sometimes-cranky writers. R.I.P.
- Loren Estleman - who made introductions.
- Ray Puechner - my first, and best, literary agent. Part of a now-vanished breed of agents that put love of writers, writing, and the work ahead of the buck. R.I.P.
- Carolyn Marino - The best book editor I’ve ever had. Steady, calm, supportive, one for whom you’d go the extra mile and with pleasure.
- Ben Champion - who patiently sat there and listened to hours and hours and hours of juvenile fiction drivel.
- Jeffry Scott - great friend and a hell of a writer. Check him out at www.ajc.com.
- Deanna Heath - my sweetheart and most important audience: all for her.
- And finally, just a few influences: Shelby Foote, John Galsworthy, Flannery O’Connor, Winston S. Churchill, Leigh Brackett, Thomas Hardy - and the greatest of them all, Dashiell Hammett. Had it not been for Nightmare Town, I might never have wanted to come back.
September 2002