If you're planning to read The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai, it may be best to skip this entry. Even though the end is hinted at at the beginning, the end isn't as vague, and it's what I quote from at length here because it imparts the truth about what books can do:
"Because what it's come down to, after that whole messy spring, that whole tortured summer, all the time since, is this: I no longer believe I can save people. I've tried, and I've failed, and while I'm sure there are people out in the world with that particular gift, I'm not one of them. I make too much of a mess of things. But books, on the other hand: I do still believe that books can save you.
I believed that Ian Drake would get his books, as surely as any addict will get his drug. He would bribe his babysitter, he'd sneak out of the house at night and smash the library window. He'd sell his own guinea pig for book money. He would read under his tented comforter with a penlight. He'd hollow out his mattress and fill it with paperbacks. They could lock him in the house, but they could never convince him that the world wasn't a bigger place than that. They'd wonder why they couldn't break him. They'd wonder why he smiled when they sent him to his room.
I knew that books could save him because I knew they had so far, and because I knew the people books had saved. They were college professors and actors and scientists and poets. They got to college and sat on dorm floors drinking coffee, amazed they'd finally found their soul mates. They always dressed a little out of season. Their names were enshrined on the pink cards in the pockets of all the forgotten hardbacks in every library basement in America. If the librarians were lazy enough or nostalgic enough or smart enough, those names would stay there forever."
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Rosh Hashanah and Furlough Days Off - Day 6: Everybody Should Have a Day Like This
One of my most prized t-shirts in my collection is of the comic strip character Andy Capp, my favorite, hoisting a wooden case of three bottles of booze on his shoulder, clearly happy to have his favorite thing in life with him, wearing a sprig of holly behind one ear, and giving a thumbs-up. It's no wonder I wore that t-shirt today when I went out with Mom and Dad and Meridith. I had exactly that kind of day, one of the greatest of my life.
It began before I woke up, an e-mail in my inbox at 10:05 from the Warner Archive Collection. I woke up at 10:33, which I can do easily whenever I'm not working as a substitute campus supervisor, which seems to be often so far this new school year. In that case, I don't go to bed until after 2 a.m., but before 3, since I've either got books I want to read or TV shows I want to watch on the Tivo and I enjoy the silence of the night.
I found the e-mail from Warner Archive a little after noon. I looked at every single one that came in for the past few months, hoping for the day that Travels with My Aunt, starring Maggie Smith and based on the novel by Graham Greene, would be released on DVD through the Warner Archive Collection, which had to happen since Warner Bros. owns countless MGM titles from way, way back, including 1972.
I opened the latest e-mail, spotted the words "'70s Cinema," and my heart started going a little faster. I scrolled down a bit, to the images of the DVDs to be released and...OH MY GOD! I excitedly called Meridith over and showed her. Travels with My Aunt was now available for purchase! And I had e-mailed them about three months ago, asking them when it was going to come out, and to please, please, please release it soon. I bought it on VHS about a week after the Valencia library pulled it from its circulation. It's one of those rare instances in which I like the book and the movie equally, and both can easily stand separately, with the end of the movie a clever and necessary change from the book.
I went right to the Warner Archive site, ordered it, and so what that it came to $24 total? This is going to be one of the grande dames of my DVD collection, and I've no qualms about tossing my VHS copy because Warner Bros. has remastered the movie, and the clip provided on the site (http://www.wbshop.com/Travels-With-My-Aunt/1000239737,default,pd.html?cgid=ARCHIVENEW) shows a pristine picture and clear sound. And it'll be nice to see my favorite parts over and over without having to rewind a videotape.
Barely a few minutes after I ordered it, I received a press release from a PR firm (I'm still on the e-mail lists of many, despite being a former film critic) announcing that owing to the success of The Lion King 3D, Disney is releasing Beauty and the Beast 3D on January 13, 2012, Finding Nemo 3D on September 14, 2012, Monsters, Inc. 3D on January 18, 2013 (a few months before the prequel, Monsters University, arrives on June 13, 2013, in 3D), and The Little Mermaid 3D on September 13, 2013. Meridith is especially excited about the latter, her favorite movie. I'm happy that Disney is converting Monsters, Inc. into 3D, because the climactic doors sequence will look stunning like that. Plus, the East Australian Current in Finding Nemo will reap the same benefit. But despite its failures in theaters and on home video, I wish that Disney would take the risk of converting Treasure Planet into 3D. It's Treasure Island in outer space for the most part, the ships are mostly computer-animated, Long John Silver is a cyborg and is half-hand drawn animation and half computer animation, and there's a lot of galaxy scenery that would be awe-inspiring in that form. I hope that these future releases do equally as well and possibly better than The Lion King so these opportunities continue and possibly lead to Treasure Planet getting the same treatment. It's worth a try. But of course I say that without being an investor in Disney or running the company. So I can.
Mom decided to go back to Fry's in Woodland Hills to return some key rings that it turns out she didn't need, and to look at the others they had, to see if we needed any more for the net in the trunk, rings to latch onto the hooks there. And then came Walmart in West Hills, a surprising one, not because of how it looked in the front, with curved signage, but because of a store nearby, in the same shopping center, which seemed strange because despite the "Crown Books" banner at the top of the building, the store below was selling Halloween costumes and related accessories. Perhaps Crown Books had once been there but didn't take down the sign?
Meridith went with me to see if there was a discount book store, and we rounded the corner of that building, and I found heaven. In two ways. First with the tables full of books I spotted on the inside, and a sign against the glass that said, "Book Heaven - Every Book for $1". That section was on the other side of the store, a lot of square feet of space for books.
I looked over as many titles individually as I could. I stood against tables with the spines of paperbacks facing the ceiling and I pulled out whichever ones seemed interesting, read the back quickly, skimmed the first page if my interest went that far, and pulled to me what I really needed, what I could not leave Crown Books without. This included a book called Do Bald Men Get Half-Price Haircuts?: In Search of America's Great Barbershops by Vince Staten, who visited 300 barbershops across the country. I also found, by Jane and Michael Stern, Dog Eat Dog: A Very Human Book About Dogs and Dog Shows. I'm a dog lover, so that immediately went into my stack. There also came a novel called Bed Rest by Sarah Bilston, about a pregnant woman confined to her bed for the final three months. And State of the Arts: California Artists Talk About Their Work by Barbara Isenberg, which I picked up at the very end of my long exploration and needed it because there's a piece by opera director Peter Sellars, one of my heroes because of his true uniqueness, that you look at him and think that it could only be him. He lives according to what he loves. That's all that matters.
At the end, I came away with 10 books for $19. And even so, there were some books I picked up, like The First Rumpole Omnibus by John Mortimer, thinking I might try Rumpole of the Bailey again, but decided not to. The Supreme Court of late is the only interest I have in the law.
And Meridith found a book I absolutely needed to buy and did: Wayside School is Falling Down by Louis Sachar, which I read as a kid and loved, and this edition from the '90s by Avon Books is the original cover I remember, as well as the original illustrations. This will be snug in my permanent collection.
Then came the Sherman Oaks Galleria, a mainly outdoor shopping, dining and entertainment center. Fuddrucker's is there, and Mom wanted to go there to eat. We walked in, and I looked at the back of the place and found a Galaga arcade machine. But before that, I ordered a chicken cordon bleu sandwich and chili cheese fries. Then, once we found a table and I got my drink of watered-down Hi-C fruit punch, I asked Mom for a quarter (I didn't have any) and went to play. And it was pure bliss. I like having it on Nintendo DS as practice, but it doesn't compare to standing at that machine, slapping the fire button as fast as I can, eliminating as many aliens as I can before all of them stack up and begin flying down, firing their weapons. I ended fairly quickly at 20,000 points, owing to a dumb move that eliminated one of my ships right away, and then went to eat. After I was finished, I opened to where I left off in The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai, and Mom, noticing that I was done, asked if I wanted another quarter. I first said no, because she was still eating and I didn't want to interrupt, but out came another quarter, and a better game, reaching 50,000+ and the ever-reliable level 10 that I can never seem to get past, and I didn't this time either.
But this was perfect. A lot of my favorite things so far during the day, and it continued with a small pumpkin pie I found on a circular tray under a plastic cover at the counter when Meridith was ordering cookies for Mom, Dad and herself. I love pumpkin pie and I got it. It was mild pumpkin pie, reliable enough for the flavor, but nothing notable, though that was ok. I was living fairly low-key pleasures throughout the entire day, so this tied into it very well. But as I told Dad before we left the house for Fry's, I couldn't wait for him and Meridith to go back to work so I could eat normally again. I know that it's my choice with what I eat, but given the opportunity to indulge in really good chili cheese fries at Wienerschnitzel, and so-so ones at Fuddrucker's (The chili used for these fries is just a salty dark brown covering, with meat to show that it's chili, but with little enthusiasm), and a chicken salad melt and curly fries at Jerry's Famous Deli in Woodland Hills, I grabbed it over and over. Six days with Dad and Meridith home, there were obviously going to be changes in eating habits, but I look forward to getting back to my usual eating, my regular diet.
After Fuddrucker's, Walmart in Panorama City, which has a heavy Hispanic population. We were the minority of that Walmart, but I was envious of those who shopped there. First, it was the standard Walmart we once knew before they made all the changes that turned it into a slick operation. It's a true neighborhood Walmart, with a major difference being that it's two floors, accessible by escalator or elevator, which we've never had in any Walmart we've been to, here in Santa Clarita or in Florida. The Lion King was playing on DVD on flatscreen TVs across from the electronics department, and it was at the part before Scar's "Be Prepared" number, so I had Meridith watch it with me so I could point out to her where Jeremy Irons drops out and Jim Cummings replaces him (because Irons blew out his voice after shouting, "You won't get a sniff without me!"), and the differences in their voices if you pay attention closely. Meridith noticed.
And once we got back down to the first floor, we unexpectedly found the entrance to the Panorama Mall, which looked comfortably worn. Everything was on one floor, all the stores across from each other were close together, and it felt like a community gathering place, evidenced by those who were playing chess at small tables outside La Curacao, an Hispanic electronics store. We went in there too, and man, if only Santa Clarita had felt like this for eight years, had felt like a genuine community like this was. I don't know a great deal about Panorama City, but this part at least felt like people gathered often, that there's more closeness. All we've got in Santa Clarita is plastic to bounce off of when you try to get close enough.
Nevertheless, this was the kind of day that everyone should have, in which a great deal of what you love is threaded throughout. It's why I believe in hedonism. I remarked to Meridith in Walmart that it was amazing that I had enjoyed many things that I loved in one day. Just one day! Reading, ambient music, and my favorite TV shows such as Jeopardy! are part of my daily life, but not usually to this extent. And this was incredible through and through. For me, all this was the definition of living.
Dad and Meridith will be back at work tomorrow, and I'll have my diet again, which I need back badly. But most importantly, I'm going to aim to have more days like the one I had today. I'd like those feelings constantly. It's wonderful! What better way to live?
(Addendum at 12:31 a.m.: I just pulled out of my bag of 10 books Like I Was Sayin'... by Mike Royko. This was from the Book Heaven side of Crown Books, and was a dollar. The price sticker is still on the book, and it was affixed on September 25, 2010. Maybe it had been moved around somewhat since then, and maybe some people had flipped through it, but it's been there until today. Over a year. Among many reasons I love discount book stores, this is one: Nowhere else that sells books will you find price stickers with the date of origin on them.)
It began before I woke up, an e-mail in my inbox at 10:05 from the Warner Archive Collection. I woke up at 10:33, which I can do easily whenever I'm not working as a substitute campus supervisor, which seems to be often so far this new school year. In that case, I don't go to bed until after 2 a.m., but before 3, since I've either got books I want to read or TV shows I want to watch on the Tivo and I enjoy the silence of the night.
I found the e-mail from Warner Archive a little after noon. I looked at every single one that came in for the past few months, hoping for the day that Travels with My Aunt, starring Maggie Smith and based on the novel by Graham Greene, would be released on DVD through the Warner Archive Collection, which had to happen since Warner Bros. owns countless MGM titles from way, way back, including 1972.
I opened the latest e-mail, spotted the words "'70s Cinema," and my heart started going a little faster. I scrolled down a bit, to the images of the DVDs to be released and...OH MY GOD! I excitedly called Meridith over and showed her. Travels with My Aunt was now available for purchase! And I had e-mailed them about three months ago, asking them when it was going to come out, and to please, please, please release it soon. I bought it on VHS about a week after the Valencia library pulled it from its circulation. It's one of those rare instances in which I like the book and the movie equally, and both can easily stand separately, with the end of the movie a clever and necessary change from the book.
I went right to the Warner Archive site, ordered it, and so what that it came to $24 total? This is going to be one of the grande dames of my DVD collection, and I've no qualms about tossing my VHS copy because Warner Bros. has remastered the movie, and the clip provided on the site (http://www.wbshop.com/Travels-With-My-Aunt/1000239737,default,pd.html?cgid=ARCHIVENEW) shows a pristine picture and clear sound. And it'll be nice to see my favorite parts over and over without having to rewind a videotape.
Barely a few minutes after I ordered it, I received a press release from a PR firm (I'm still on the e-mail lists of many, despite being a former film critic) announcing that owing to the success of The Lion King 3D, Disney is releasing Beauty and the Beast 3D on January 13, 2012, Finding Nemo 3D on September 14, 2012, Monsters, Inc. 3D on January 18, 2013 (a few months before the prequel, Monsters University, arrives on June 13, 2013, in 3D), and The Little Mermaid 3D on September 13, 2013. Meridith is especially excited about the latter, her favorite movie. I'm happy that Disney is converting Monsters, Inc. into 3D, because the climactic doors sequence will look stunning like that. Plus, the East Australian Current in Finding Nemo will reap the same benefit. But despite its failures in theaters and on home video, I wish that Disney would take the risk of converting Treasure Planet into 3D. It's Treasure Island in outer space for the most part, the ships are mostly computer-animated, Long John Silver is a cyborg and is half-hand drawn animation and half computer animation, and there's a lot of galaxy scenery that would be awe-inspiring in that form. I hope that these future releases do equally as well and possibly better than The Lion King so these opportunities continue and possibly lead to Treasure Planet getting the same treatment. It's worth a try. But of course I say that without being an investor in Disney or running the company. So I can.
Mom decided to go back to Fry's in Woodland Hills to return some key rings that it turns out she didn't need, and to look at the others they had, to see if we needed any more for the net in the trunk, rings to latch onto the hooks there. And then came Walmart in West Hills, a surprising one, not because of how it looked in the front, with curved signage, but because of a store nearby, in the same shopping center, which seemed strange because despite the "Crown Books" banner at the top of the building, the store below was selling Halloween costumes and related accessories. Perhaps Crown Books had once been there but didn't take down the sign?
Meridith went with me to see if there was a discount book store, and we rounded the corner of that building, and I found heaven. In two ways. First with the tables full of books I spotted on the inside, and a sign against the glass that said, "Book Heaven - Every Book for $1". That section was on the other side of the store, a lot of square feet of space for books.
I looked over as many titles individually as I could. I stood against tables with the spines of paperbacks facing the ceiling and I pulled out whichever ones seemed interesting, read the back quickly, skimmed the first page if my interest went that far, and pulled to me what I really needed, what I could not leave Crown Books without. This included a book called Do Bald Men Get Half-Price Haircuts?: In Search of America's Great Barbershops by Vince Staten, who visited 300 barbershops across the country. I also found, by Jane and Michael Stern, Dog Eat Dog: A Very Human Book About Dogs and Dog Shows. I'm a dog lover, so that immediately went into my stack. There also came a novel called Bed Rest by Sarah Bilston, about a pregnant woman confined to her bed for the final three months. And State of the Arts: California Artists Talk About Their Work by Barbara Isenberg, which I picked up at the very end of my long exploration and needed it because there's a piece by opera director Peter Sellars, one of my heroes because of his true uniqueness, that you look at him and think that it could only be him. He lives according to what he loves. That's all that matters.
At the end, I came away with 10 books for $19. And even so, there were some books I picked up, like The First Rumpole Omnibus by John Mortimer, thinking I might try Rumpole of the Bailey again, but decided not to. The Supreme Court of late is the only interest I have in the law.
And Meridith found a book I absolutely needed to buy and did: Wayside School is Falling Down by Louis Sachar, which I read as a kid and loved, and this edition from the '90s by Avon Books is the original cover I remember, as well as the original illustrations. This will be snug in my permanent collection.
Then came the Sherman Oaks Galleria, a mainly outdoor shopping, dining and entertainment center. Fuddrucker's is there, and Mom wanted to go there to eat. We walked in, and I looked at the back of the place and found a Galaga arcade machine. But before that, I ordered a chicken cordon bleu sandwich and chili cheese fries. Then, once we found a table and I got my drink of watered-down Hi-C fruit punch, I asked Mom for a quarter (I didn't have any) and went to play. And it was pure bliss. I like having it on Nintendo DS as practice, but it doesn't compare to standing at that machine, slapping the fire button as fast as I can, eliminating as many aliens as I can before all of them stack up and begin flying down, firing their weapons. I ended fairly quickly at 20,000 points, owing to a dumb move that eliminated one of my ships right away, and then went to eat. After I was finished, I opened to where I left off in The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai, and Mom, noticing that I was done, asked if I wanted another quarter. I first said no, because she was still eating and I didn't want to interrupt, but out came another quarter, and a better game, reaching 50,000+ and the ever-reliable level 10 that I can never seem to get past, and I didn't this time either.
But this was perfect. A lot of my favorite things so far during the day, and it continued with a small pumpkin pie I found on a circular tray under a plastic cover at the counter when Meridith was ordering cookies for Mom, Dad and herself. I love pumpkin pie and I got it. It was mild pumpkin pie, reliable enough for the flavor, but nothing notable, though that was ok. I was living fairly low-key pleasures throughout the entire day, so this tied into it very well. But as I told Dad before we left the house for Fry's, I couldn't wait for him and Meridith to go back to work so I could eat normally again. I know that it's my choice with what I eat, but given the opportunity to indulge in really good chili cheese fries at Wienerschnitzel, and so-so ones at Fuddrucker's (The chili used for these fries is just a salty dark brown covering, with meat to show that it's chili, but with little enthusiasm), and a chicken salad melt and curly fries at Jerry's Famous Deli in Woodland Hills, I grabbed it over and over. Six days with Dad and Meridith home, there were obviously going to be changes in eating habits, but I look forward to getting back to my usual eating, my regular diet.
After Fuddrucker's, Walmart in Panorama City, which has a heavy Hispanic population. We were the minority of that Walmart, but I was envious of those who shopped there. First, it was the standard Walmart we once knew before they made all the changes that turned it into a slick operation. It's a true neighborhood Walmart, with a major difference being that it's two floors, accessible by escalator or elevator, which we've never had in any Walmart we've been to, here in Santa Clarita or in Florida. The Lion King was playing on DVD on flatscreen TVs across from the electronics department, and it was at the part before Scar's "Be Prepared" number, so I had Meridith watch it with me so I could point out to her where Jeremy Irons drops out and Jim Cummings replaces him (because Irons blew out his voice after shouting, "You won't get a sniff without me!"), and the differences in their voices if you pay attention closely. Meridith noticed.
And once we got back down to the first floor, we unexpectedly found the entrance to the Panorama Mall, which looked comfortably worn. Everything was on one floor, all the stores across from each other were close together, and it felt like a community gathering place, evidenced by those who were playing chess at small tables outside La Curacao, an Hispanic electronics store. We went in there too, and man, if only Santa Clarita had felt like this for eight years, had felt like a genuine community like this was. I don't know a great deal about Panorama City, but this part at least felt like people gathered often, that there's more closeness. All we've got in Santa Clarita is plastic to bounce off of when you try to get close enough.
Nevertheless, this was the kind of day that everyone should have, in which a great deal of what you love is threaded throughout. It's why I believe in hedonism. I remarked to Meridith in Walmart that it was amazing that I had enjoyed many things that I loved in one day. Just one day! Reading, ambient music, and my favorite TV shows such as Jeopardy! are part of my daily life, but not usually to this extent. And this was incredible through and through. For me, all this was the definition of living.
Dad and Meridith will be back at work tomorrow, and I'll have my diet again, which I need back badly. But most importantly, I'm going to aim to have more days like the one I had today. I'd like those feelings constantly. It's wonderful! What better way to live?
(Addendum at 12:31 a.m.: I just pulled out of my bag of 10 books Like I Was Sayin'... by Mike Royko. This was from the Book Heaven side of Crown Books, and was a dollar. The price sticker is still on the book, and it was affixed on September 25, 2010. Maybe it had been moved around somewhat since then, and maybe some people had flipped through it, but it's been there until today. Over a year. Among many reasons I love discount book stores, this is one: Nowhere else that sells books will you find price stickers with the date of origin on them.)
Monday, October 3, 2011
Rosh Hashanah and Furlough Days Off - Days 4 and 5: Wienerschnitzel's Social Strata and Steinbeck at Fry's
Yesterday, after an hour and a half with Mom, Dad and Meridith at the Walmart Supercenter on Carl Boyer Drive that netted me the hardcover edition of Just After Sunset by Stephen King for the bargain price of $6.97, we drove to Canyon Country, to Wienerschnitzel, near the Edwards Canyon Country Stadium 10 movie theater.
Wienerschnitzel became our go-to hot dog place after the disappointment that was Cupid's, adjacent to Edwards Canyon Country. We knew Cupid's when we lived in the apartment in Valencia that first year (It was in the shopping center in front of our apartment complex), and Meridith went there so often, every afternoon, that one of the women who worked there (Not sure if she was the manager or fairly high up), had Meridith's order ready right when she came in from the bus stop. And the hot dogs were reliably good, right up to when there were changes in the personnel there and things went downhill, though it took a few years after we had moved to Saugus, but still went there occasionally. Eventually, it went out of business at that location.
We're not sure how long the location next to Edwards Canyon Country has been open, but not only did the prices not match the quality of the hot dogs, as in being higher than the hot dogs were worth, but they forgot my fries, which was rectified by us going to McDonald's later for dessert, which included my fries. Therefore, we decided to try Wienerschnitzel, a few blocks from the movie theater.
The first time we went presented us with a reliable place for decent food. Not always healthy, hence why we don't go very often, but well worth it each time. I don't go overboard with what I order there, but I do chuck aside any dietary concerns for the treat of eating there. Such as it was with their ultimate chili cheese fries, which is their regular cheese fries with diced onions and a generous glop of sour cream. It's enough sour cream to play along with the chili and cheese.
The first time, I had an Angus pastrami hot dog, which was very good. This time, I had a pastrami sandwich, rye bread, pickle slices, and mustard. My kind of sandwich. In the box it was placed in, it had been sliced in half and each half was wrapped in individual paper.
The first time I had the ultimate chili cheese fries, I was pleased to see the diced onion there, but whoever had made it had put in too much onion and it became annoying toward the bottom of the fries. This time, there were not as many. I know that the guy who had been behind the counter taking our order when we were there the first time was the guy taking our order this time, but would he, or anyone else working with him, have really noticed my displeasure at too much diced onion, and remembered that in case we came back a second time? It doesn't seem possible, and yet, when we were there both times, there was no one else there. And it's not because Wienerschnitzel doesn't do good business. That actually brings me to something I and Mom and Meridith noticed.
If you want an accurate view of the population of Santa Clarita, don't go to a supermarket and don't go to Walmart. Go to Wienerschnitzel. We were the only ones there. We don't put on airs. We're regular people, regular lives, just living each day. Our goals only go as far as getting to Henderson, and then we'd see from there what happens next.
But those getting food at the drive-thru, there may be a few who are on errands, who have other things to do, who don't have time to sit inside and eat. But when a few shiny Chryslers sit at the window, when there's an equally shiny Mustang, and one or two other expensive-looking cars, you get the feeling that there are those who believe that they are above eating at such places, who don't want to be seen there. It's bad enough that Wienerschnitzel has to be located in Canyon Country, what they might consider the dregs of the valley. They don't like the reality of others; they prefer the reality that they have created for themselves with possibly gated communities and all-leather interior and the advanced ability to ignore those who aren't them, who aren't part of their blessed lives. There's a lot of posing that goes on this valley, a lot of snobbery. To me, no one is above me and no one is below me. We're all on the same planet and we're all headed for the same exit, so why be that way to others? Why feel like you're above everyone else? I've never understood it. You'll find genuine people at Wienerschnitzel. The guys and women behind the counter are some of the nicest you'll find in this valley, and guaranteed that those who eat there are straightforward, real people. No posing, no positioning.
Today, Meridith stood over me in my room at 10:10 this morning when I woke up, asking if I was going with her and Mom and Dad to the Fry's in Woodland Hills, because Mom wanted to return the latest in a string of clock radios. She hasn't yet found one that will suit her, though she's eyeing a few possibilities on eBay.
Dad had said last night that he was thinking of leaving at 10 to go to Woodland Hills, but knowing Dad and his time spent on the computer, that's naturally delayed. So I brushed my teeth, got dressed, and grabbed a banana, a few blackberries, and Silk dark chocolate almond milk for breakfast. No time for my usual Cheerios and Silk Very Vanilla soymilk. Plus, Mom said that she wanted to leave right away, not half an hour later after I've used the computer, so no time for that either, and I understood. All I needed was my books and one of the two issues of Slightly Foxed that I received in the mail two weeks ago.
I've come to like the Fry's in Woodland Hills better than the one with the alien invasion theme in Burbank. It could be that it was nearly empty because it was a Monday, and therefore the start of the workweek (save for Dad and Meridith's furlough days, like the rest of the Hart School District), but it felt more relaxed, perhaps because of the theming being more spread out, because there was less of that feeling that if you were not technologically inclined, you don't belong there. Plus, the quarter machines that were near the exit, with Disney trinkets, and candy of many kinds (including Reese's Pieces), and other tiny toys, were vastly more interesting than the Burbank selection. I looked closely at what was offered and was thinking about a small zoo animal plush toy in one of the machines as I went to look at the DVD selection there, first seeking more Dragnet DVDs, but only finding the Dragnet 1968 and Dragnet 1969 season 2 and season 3 sets. There was nothing else I wanted to look for, nothing I need. I don't feel the pull for more DVDs anymore as much as I feel the pull for more books, which shows where my passions are now and forever.
And that pull for more books led me to the bargain book sections, which I first thought was only one side. On the left were bargain computer books which I would never read. I had my own website on Geocities when I was 14, a Calvin & Hobbes comic strip of the day page, but that's as far as I went in anything computer related. I've only always used computers, and never looked deeply into them, although, because Geocities HTML code was easy enough to use, I updated the site through that code and not with visual aids.
Then in the aisle behind that one were cookbooks and bargain science books. I realized that the bargains were mixed up within all the books. To find if you were getting a good deal, you had to look at the price on the back of the book.
After I asked Meridith to find where the music DVDs were, I found where the other books were, the novels, the biographies. And I looked at each title closely. I first found The Missing Golden Ticket and Other Splendiferous Secrets which features a missing chapter from, and the original ending of, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, along with what some characters were originally called, as well as various insights into Dahl's life related to the writing of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It was $4.99, and so I held onto it. And then I found Cannery Row. John Steinbeck. In hindsight, I wish I had remembered the photo and the name of whoever had stocked these shelves, because at the end of each aisle, there's a laminated sheet of paper that says, "This aisle has been proudly stocked and managed by..." and it gives a name. Maybe it was just a way to stock the shelves, but someone thought to put Steinbeck there, as well as Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, which had been reduced to $2.99, but I didn't buy it because I didn't feel like it was time for it yet.
This paperback edition of Cannery Row was $9.99, and I wondered if I should get it. The price made me hesitant at first, because I could certainly find it cheaper on abebooks.com, but here it was. Right now. No additional shipping cost. I could buy it and it would be mine. And besides, if I like it, that value is multiplied millions of times over the original cost. I had checked it out of the Valencia library once, but never got to it. I carried it around with me, along with the Dahl book, while Mom looked at bedside light fixtures, and I read the copy on the back, and that was it. I wanted to know more about "...Doe, a young marine biologist who ministers to sick puppies and unhappy souls, unexpectedly finds true love." I wanted to know more about this world Steinbeck clearly loved and lived.
I like to buy things from unusual places, such as when I bought Murphy's Romance on DVD for $5 during one of Pavilions' $5 Friday sales before the summer, which had Sony DVDs for $5 amidst other items. Buying books from a store known for electronics and computers and computer accessories ties into that. I didn't even notice until after I bought it that I had paid full price for both books. On the back of the Dahl book, under the Puffin logo, the list price is $4.99. $10.00 on Cannery Row. I didn't mind. These books were mine now. I would get to read them soon. That's all that mattered to me.
Wienerschnitzel became our go-to hot dog place after the disappointment that was Cupid's, adjacent to Edwards Canyon Country. We knew Cupid's when we lived in the apartment in Valencia that first year (It was in the shopping center in front of our apartment complex), and Meridith went there so often, every afternoon, that one of the women who worked there (Not sure if she was the manager or fairly high up), had Meridith's order ready right when she came in from the bus stop. And the hot dogs were reliably good, right up to when there were changes in the personnel there and things went downhill, though it took a few years after we had moved to Saugus, but still went there occasionally. Eventually, it went out of business at that location.
We're not sure how long the location next to Edwards Canyon Country has been open, but not only did the prices not match the quality of the hot dogs, as in being higher than the hot dogs were worth, but they forgot my fries, which was rectified by us going to McDonald's later for dessert, which included my fries. Therefore, we decided to try Wienerschnitzel, a few blocks from the movie theater.
The first time we went presented us with a reliable place for decent food. Not always healthy, hence why we don't go very often, but well worth it each time. I don't go overboard with what I order there, but I do chuck aside any dietary concerns for the treat of eating there. Such as it was with their ultimate chili cheese fries, which is their regular cheese fries with diced onions and a generous glop of sour cream. It's enough sour cream to play along with the chili and cheese.
The first time, I had an Angus pastrami hot dog, which was very good. This time, I had a pastrami sandwich, rye bread, pickle slices, and mustard. My kind of sandwich. In the box it was placed in, it had been sliced in half and each half was wrapped in individual paper.
The first time I had the ultimate chili cheese fries, I was pleased to see the diced onion there, but whoever had made it had put in too much onion and it became annoying toward the bottom of the fries. This time, there were not as many. I know that the guy who had been behind the counter taking our order when we were there the first time was the guy taking our order this time, but would he, or anyone else working with him, have really noticed my displeasure at too much diced onion, and remembered that in case we came back a second time? It doesn't seem possible, and yet, when we were there both times, there was no one else there. And it's not because Wienerschnitzel doesn't do good business. That actually brings me to something I and Mom and Meridith noticed.
If you want an accurate view of the population of Santa Clarita, don't go to a supermarket and don't go to Walmart. Go to Wienerschnitzel. We were the only ones there. We don't put on airs. We're regular people, regular lives, just living each day. Our goals only go as far as getting to Henderson, and then we'd see from there what happens next.
But those getting food at the drive-thru, there may be a few who are on errands, who have other things to do, who don't have time to sit inside and eat. But when a few shiny Chryslers sit at the window, when there's an equally shiny Mustang, and one or two other expensive-looking cars, you get the feeling that there are those who believe that they are above eating at such places, who don't want to be seen there. It's bad enough that Wienerschnitzel has to be located in Canyon Country, what they might consider the dregs of the valley. They don't like the reality of others; they prefer the reality that they have created for themselves with possibly gated communities and all-leather interior and the advanced ability to ignore those who aren't them, who aren't part of their blessed lives. There's a lot of posing that goes on this valley, a lot of snobbery. To me, no one is above me and no one is below me. We're all on the same planet and we're all headed for the same exit, so why be that way to others? Why feel like you're above everyone else? I've never understood it. You'll find genuine people at Wienerschnitzel. The guys and women behind the counter are some of the nicest you'll find in this valley, and guaranteed that those who eat there are straightforward, real people. No posing, no positioning.
Today, Meridith stood over me in my room at 10:10 this morning when I woke up, asking if I was going with her and Mom and Dad to the Fry's in Woodland Hills, because Mom wanted to return the latest in a string of clock radios. She hasn't yet found one that will suit her, though she's eyeing a few possibilities on eBay.
Dad had said last night that he was thinking of leaving at 10 to go to Woodland Hills, but knowing Dad and his time spent on the computer, that's naturally delayed. So I brushed my teeth, got dressed, and grabbed a banana, a few blackberries, and Silk dark chocolate almond milk for breakfast. No time for my usual Cheerios and Silk Very Vanilla soymilk. Plus, Mom said that she wanted to leave right away, not half an hour later after I've used the computer, so no time for that either, and I understood. All I needed was my books and one of the two issues of Slightly Foxed that I received in the mail two weeks ago.
I've come to like the Fry's in Woodland Hills better than the one with the alien invasion theme in Burbank. It could be that it was nearly empty because it was a Monday, and therefore the start of the workweek (save for Dad and Meridith's furlough days, like the rest of the Hart School District), but it felt more relaxed, perhaps because of the theming being more spread out, because there was less of that feeling that if you were not technologically inclined, you don't belong there. Plus, the quarter machines that were near the exit, with Disney trinkets, and candy of many kinds (including Reese's Pieces), and other tiny toys, were vastly more interesting than the Burbank selection. I looked closely at what was offered and was thinking about a small zoo animal plush toy in one of the machines as I went to look at the DVD selection there, first seeking more Dragnet DVDs, but only finding the Dragnet 1968 and Dragnet 1969 season 2 and season 3 sets. There was nothing else I wanted to look for, nothing I need. I don't feel the pull for more DVDs anymore as much as I feel the pull for more books, which shows where my passions are now and forever.
And that pull for more books led me to the bargain book sections, which I first thought was only one side. On the left were bargain computer books which I would never read. I had my own website on Geocities when I was 14, a Calvin & Hobbes comic strip of the day page, but that's as far as I went in anything computer related. I've only always used computers, and never looked deeply into them, although, because Geocities HTML code was easy enough to use, I updated the site through that code and not with visual aids.
Then in the aisle behind that one were cookbooks and bargain science books. I realized that the bargains were mixed up within all the books. To find if you were getting a good deal, you had to look at the price on the back of the book.
After I asked Meridith to find where the music DVDs were, I found where the other books were, the novels, the biographies. And I looked at each title closely. I first found The Missing Golden Ticket and Other Splendiferous Secrets which features a missing chapter from, and the original ending of, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, along with what some characters were originally called, as well as various insights into Dahl's life related to the writing of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It was $4.99, and so I held onto it. And then I found Cannery Row. John Steinbeck. In hindsight, I wish I had remembered the photo and the name of whoever had stocked these shelves, because at the end of each aisle, there's a laminated sheet of paper that says, "This aisle has been proudly stocked and managed by..." and it gives a name. Maybe it was just a way to stock the shelves, but someone thought to put Steinbeck there, as well as Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, which had been reduced to $2.99, but I didn't buy it because I didn't feel like it was time for it yet.
This paperback edition of Cannery Row was $9.99, and I wondered if I should get it. The price made me hesitant at first, because I could certainly find it cheaper on abebooks.com, but here it was. Right now. No additional shipping cost. I could buy it and it would be mine. And besides, if I like it, that value is multiplied millions of times over the original cost. I had checked it out of the Valencia library once, but never got to it. I carried it around with me, along with the Dahl book, while Mom looked at bedside light fixtures, and I read the copy on the back, and that was it. I wanted to know more about "...Doe, a young marine biologist who ministers to sick puppies and unhappy souls, unexpectedly finds true love." I wanted to know more about this world Steinbeck clearly loved and lived.
I like to buy things from unusual places, such as when I bought Murphy's Romance on DVD for $5 during one of Pavilions' $5 Friday sales before the summer, which had Sony DVDs for $5 amidst other items. Buying books from a store known for electronics and computers and computer accessories ties into that. I didn't even notice until after I bought it that I had paid full price for both books. On the back of the Dahl book, under the Puffin logo, the list price is $4.99. $10.00 on Cannery Row. I didn't mind. These books were mine now. I would get to read them soon. That's all that mattered to me.
I Didn't Like It, But I Liked This
As soon as I spotted The Child That Books Built by Francis Spufford in the paper catalog provided by Slightly Foxed (http://www.foxedquarterly.com/), a quarterly periodical devoted to the pleasures of reading and the vast discoveries that come with it (It came with my order of the current issue and the second issue of its existence), I ordered it. I wanted to read about the journey of Spufford's childhood reading, what he found, what he latched onto, what nourished him, what made him curious about all kinds of things in the world. I might have gotten that if I decided to read past page 50, or I might have not, because skimming through the rest, being that I didn't want to read the rest, I found more of Spufford tangling with research he had done on the word formations of very young children, how they don't associate words with certain meanings right away, a gradual process. For many, many pages in the first chapter, he spent so much time with others, analyzing their works that explained all that, that I was waiting and waiting for him to get back to himself, to tell me more of becoming a reader. When I'm flipping the pages of the second chapter to see how far along I have until the third chapter, when there seemed to be more promise of what I was looking for, what the book seemed to have predicated itself on, that's an iffy sign.
In the car on the way to Woodland Hills today, I decided I had had enough of trying to get to what made me want to read Spufford's book, and switched to that second issue of Slightly Foxed, summer 2004. But one passage in Spufford's book remained in my mind:
"I'm thirty-two years old as I do my little performance in the bookshop, which means I've been reading for twenty-six years. Twenty-six years since the furze of black marks between the covers of The Hobbit grew lucid, and released a dragon. Twenty-six years therefore since the primary discovery that the dragon remained internal to me. Inside my head, Smaug hurtled, lava gold, scaly green. And nothing showed. Wars, jokes, torrents of faces would fill me from other books, as I read on, and none of that would show either. It made a kind of intangible shoplifting possible, I realized when I was eleven or so. If your memory was OK you could descend on a bookshop--a big enough one so that the staff wouldn't hassle a browser--and steal the contents of books by reading them. I drank down 1984 while lotering in the O section of the giant Heffers store in Cambridge. When I was full I carried the slopping vessel of my attention carefully out of the shop. Nobody at the cash desks could tell that I now contained Winston Smith's telescreen chanting its victories, O'Brien's voice admitting that the Thought Police got him a long time ago. It took me three successive Saturdays to steal the whole novel. But I have not ceased to be amazed at the invisibility I depend on. Other people can't see what so permeates me, I accept that, but why can't they? It fills me. The imbalance between what's felt and what shows means I carry the sensory load of fiction like a secret. Perhaps like all secrets it leaks in the end, but while I'm still freshly distended with my cargo of images, while I'm a fish tank with a new shoal in me, with one aspect of myself I enjoy the power of being different behind my unbetraying face."
I've done what Spufford did. Mom generally spends enough time in Target that back in June, I spotted Medium Raw by Anthony Bourdain in the books section. I read an excerpt of Kitchen Confidential back in March in Best Food Writing 2000, edited by Holly Hughes, and felt like I had been violently shaken and slapped around, and I wanted more. I was hooked on Bourdain after that, picked up Medium Raw, and began reading it as we walked through that Target. On the next visit to Target, not long after, I got to within 30 pages toward the end. I decided not to finish it, hold it until the next time, since Mom and Meridith were done looking around, and I didn't want them to wait any longer. Bad timing, because the next time we were at Target, it wasn't there anymore. And not the time after that either. I was ticked because I had only those 30 pages left in that wonderful trip through Bourdain's experiences. I was entranced by his profile of the fish-portioner at Le Bernardin, who receives the fish that's going to be used in the kitchen and portions it out for cooking, in a room all his own with a metal table and equipment all his own. The touching climax comes when Bourdain invites the man to eat in the restaurant he's only served from his place below.
I doubt Medium Raw will reappear in Target, but on the off-chance that we go to Barnes & Noble again for whatever reason (and dammit, I should have thought of it when we went a few weeks ago!), I'll find it and finish reading it there. Or I'll wait until we arrive in Henderson and I get my Henderson and Clark County library cards.
In the car on the way to Woodland Hills today, I decided I had had enough of trying to get to what made me want to read Spufford's book, and switched to that second issue of Slightly Foxed, summer 2004. But one passage in Spufford's book remained in my mind:
"I'm thirty-two years old as I do my little performance in the bookshop, which means I've been reading for twenty-six years. Twenty-six years since the furze of black marks between the covers of The Hobbit grew lucid, and released a dragon. Twenty-six years therefore since the primary discovery that the dragon remained internal to me. Inside my head, Smaug hurtled, lava gold, scaly green. And nothing showed. Wars, jokes, torrents of faces would fill me from other books, as I read on, and none of that would show either. It made a kind of intangible shoplifting possible, I realized when I was eleven or so. If your memory was OK you could descend on a bookshop--a big enough one so that the staff wouldn't hassle a browser--and steal the contents of books by reading them. I drank down 1984 while lotering in the O section of the giant Heffers store in Cambridge. When I was full I carried the slopping vessel of my attention carefully out of the shop. Nobody at the cash desks could tell that I now contained Winston Smith's telescreen chanting its victories, O'Brien's voice admitting that the Thought Police got him a long time ago. It took me three successive Saturdays to steal the whole novel. But I have not ceased to be amazed at the invisibility I depend on. Other people can't see what so permeates me, I accept that, but why can't they? It fills me. The imbalance between what's felt and what shows means I carry the sensory load of fiction like a secret. Perhaps like all secrets it leaks in the end, but while I'm still freshly distended with my cargo of images, while I'm a fish tank with a new shoal in me, with one aspect of myself I enjoy the power of being different behind my unbetraying face."
I've done what Spufford did. Mom generally spends enough time in Target that back in June, I spotted Medium Raw by Anthony Bourdain in the books section. I read an excerpt of Kitchen Confidential back in March in Best Food Writing 2000, edited by Holly Hughes, and felt like I had been violently shaken and slapped around, and I wanted more. I was hooked on Bourdain after that, picked up Medium Raw, and began reading it as we walked through that Target. On the next visit to Target, not long after, I got to within 30 pages toward the end. I decided not to finish it, hold it until the next time, since Mom and Meridith were done looking around, and I didn't want them to wait any longer. Bad timing, because the next time we were at Target, it wasn't there anymore. And not the time after that either. I was ticked because I had only those 30 pages left in that wonderful trip through Bourdain's experiences. I was entranced by his profile of the fish-portioner at Le Bernardin, who receives the fish that's going to be used in the kitchen and portions it out for cooking, in a room all his own with a metal table and equipment all his own. The touching climax comes when Bourdain invites the man to eat in the restaurant he's only served from his place below.
I doubt Medium Raw will reappear in Target, but on the off-chance that we go to Barnes & Noble again for whatever reason (and dammit, I should have thought of it when we went a few weeks ago!), I'll find it and finish reading it there. Or I'll wait until we arrive in Henderson and I get my Henderson and Clark County library cards.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Where I Go When I Write
"Funny how you could be in one place and, a split second later, be in another place entirely, I thought, pushing my hands deeper into my pockets as I picked up my pace." - Lindsey, The Opposite of Me by Sarah Pekkanen
When I read books in middle school, I wasn't in Atlanta at the time of Gone with the Wind nor in any of the locations set forth by other novels. Inexplicably, in my mind, I was always at the P.E. fields at Riverside Elementary in Coral Springs, Florida, where I attended the second half of second grade to fifth grade. There was the kickball field at the back, the basketball courts next to it, separated by high chain link fencing with an opening in the middle, and miscellaneous fields near the outdoor area that had concrete flooring, with a roof over it. If this was an office building, that area would have been the loading dock. Behind that building was the playground with tetherball poles and monkey bars.
In high school, all that was gone. When I got into a book, I was wherever the characters were, whatever the author was describing. I imagined it all.
The quote from The Opposite of Me by Sarah Pekkanen is Lindsey thinking about where she's gone in her life, from being fired by the prestigious advertising firm she worked for in New York City to being one-half of a dating service with a woman named May, intent on making her a full partner so she can travel to India as she's always dreamed. Lindsey is obviously thinking about the split-second impact of life, going from the life you thought you were supposed to have, to a life you never even envisioned. But for me, that quote is about where I am in my head when I'm writing. Not like I am now, but when I'm deep in my writing projects, working to hopefully be published again by the time I'm 30.
When I co-wrote What If They Lived?, I was always on the second floor of the now-formerly-named "M" building at College of the Canyons, the media building, near the door to the screening room that served many film classes, especially when I was writing my James Dean essay. I think that was because even though I enjoyed those film classes that I took only for credit (and which were always easy A grades), I was always on the outside, being that most of the movies shown were ones I had already seen many times, and when the teacher (who was also the golf coach for the girls' team) left for the period after putting on the movie, I left for the library, preferring to spend my time amidst worlds I didn't yet know.
So now I'm thinking of where I want to be in my head with the writing projects I have stacked up, and especially a new one that cropped up over the past week, which will tap into what I partly learned about the machinations of the studio system while writing What If They Lived?, but examined differently. I need a place that's full of good memories, that is relaxing all the time, that puts no pressure on me. A safe haven, where I can just walk around in my head, unsnarling problematic passages, mulling over what I've found in my research, figuring out how best to tell the stories that I've thought about.
And I've hit upon it. Before it was known as the 9th grade campus of Flanagan High, the campus of portables in Pembroke Pines, Florida (near the condo I lived in in Grand Palms) was home for a time to the 7th grade class of Silver Trail Middle before the school was fully built. We were there for the first half of the school year and then, over winter break, Dad and the rest of the teachers moved everything necessary into their new classrooms on the permanent campus. I spent part of my winter break with Dad doing exactly that, so I got a preview of the campus and knew where all my classes would be before the other kids arrived for the second half of the school year and tried to figure out where everything was.
But my fondest time in those portables was in 9th grade. Flanagan High had the 9th graders there because the main campus was overcrowded. In my first weeks as a 10th grader there, I thought I saw parts of the buildings bulging.
It was amidst those portables that I met Sara Mangan, who was my first serious crush. She was more mature than a healthy majority of the girls on campus, and I was impressed by that. She was incredibly smart, and I could sense a fellow voracious reader, and it was no wonder that there were many others during that year who gravitated to her. Unfortunately, she let me down easy when I got to the point where I thought I could let her know how I felt, because she was in a long-distance relationship that she wanted to stick with. It was worth the hug, though.
Nevertheless, we remained friends, still are, and she's a most trusted voice when I'm batting around writing project ideas. Currently, she's in her first year of law school at Florida State University, looking to fight human trafficking, and I think she's going to be one of the greatest lawyers the profession has ever witnessed. In a recent e-mail, I asked her what jurisdiction cases were, since she mentioned on her Facebook profile that she was studying them in class, even as the "FSU plague" made its way around the school (Colds and all), and she explained it so clearly to me that it was as if I was taking the same class alongside her. Back in late August, she sent me the first page of a story she's writing, a hobby to keep during the "madness that is the first year of law school," as she expressed it, being told that it's important to keep hobbies during that time, and I want more of that story. What better inspiration to have as a writer than a fellow reader and writer? I also remember her friend Stacey (or Stacy) back then, who let me borrow her VHS tapes of Tomorrow Never Dies, which introduced me to James Bond and set me on a course of the entire series becoming my Star Wars, and Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, taking much of its comedic inspiration from the Bond series.
But it's not only those events that make me go back to that campus with this new project and the other projects still in play. It's because of the peace I found there, of those wide-open fields, of those walkways between clusters of portables. There, I don't worry about what books have already been written about the subjects I want to cover (I don't worry about them anyway, but they are something to consider, finding what wasn't answered and attempting to answer it on my own through what I find), I don't think about my goal to be published again by the time I'm 30, I don't think about anything dealing with the book business. I just set about writing the book I want to read, which is possible since I have much more fun editing than writing. I enjoy writing, but I love playing around with words while editing, moving sentences around, deleting what doesn't work and replacing it with new words, sentences or paragraphs. I find an all-encompassing peace by being on that campus again in my head. My world is wide enough as it is right now, but it's even more vast over there again. I stroll over those walkways often, thinking about what I've written, wondering what more I can add, or what I don't need in my book. It's a constant inspiration.
And this is coming from someone who partly grew up going to Walt Disney World every weekend and sometimes during the week just for dinner.
When I read books in middle school, I wasn't in Atlanta at the time of Gone with the Wind nor in any of the locations set forth by other novels. Inexplicably, in my mind, I was always at the P.E. fields at Riverside Elementary in Coral Springs, Florida, where I attended the second half of second grade to fifth grade. There was the kickball field at the back, the basketball courts next to it, separated by high chain link fencing with an opening in the middle, and miscellaneous fields near the outdoor area that had concrete flooring, with a roof over it. If this was an office building, that area would have been the loading dock. Behind that building was the playground with tetherball poles and monkey bars.
In high school, all that was gone. When I got into a book, I was wherever the characters were, whatever the author was describing. I imagined it all.
The quote from The Opposite of Me by Sarah Pekkanen is Lindsey thinking about where she's gone in her life, from being fired by the prestigious advertising firm she worked for in New York City to being one-half of a dating service with a woman named May, intent on making her a full partner so she can travel to India as she's always dreamed. Lindsey is obviously thinking about the split-second impact of life, going from the life you thought you were supposed to have, to a life you never even envisioned. But for me, that quote is about where I am in my head when I'm writing. Not like I am now, but when I'm deep in my writing projects, working to hopefully be published again by the time I'm 30.
When I co-wrote What If They Lived?, I was always on the second floor of the now-formerly-named "M" building at College of the Canyons, the media building, near the door to the screening room that served many film classes, especially when I was writing my James Dean essay. I think that was because even though I enjoyed those film classes that I took only for credit (and which were always easy A grades), I was always on the outside, being that most of the movies shown were ones I had already seen many times, and when the teacher (who was also the golf coach for the girls' team) left for the period after putting on the movie, I left for the library, preferring to spend my time amidst worlds I didn't yet know.
So now I'm thinking of where I want to be in my head with the writing projects I have stacked up, and especially a new one that cropped up over the past week, which will tap into what I partly learned about the machinations of the studio system while writing What If They Lived?, but examined differently. I need a place that's full of good memories, that is relaxing all the time, that puts no pressure on me. A safe haven, where I can just walk around in my head, unsnarling problematic passages, mulling over what I've found in my research, figuring out how best to tell the stories that I've thought about.
And I've hit upon it. Before it was known as the 9th grade campus of Flanagan High, the campus of portables in Pembroke Pines, Florida (near the condo I lived in in Grand Palms) was home for a time to the 7th grade class of Silver Trail Middle before the school was fully built. We were there for the first half of the school year and then, over winter break, Dad and the rest of the teachers moved everything necessary into their new classrooms on the permanent campus. I spent part of my winter break with Dad doing exactly that, so I got a preview of the campus and knew where all my classes would be before the other kids arrived for the second half of the school year and tried to figure out where everything was.
But my fondest time in those portables was in 9th grade. Flanagan High had the 9th graders there because the main campus was overcrowded. In my first weeks as a 10th grader there, I thought I saw parts of the buildings bulging.
It was amidst those portables that I met Sara Mangan, who was my first serious crush. She was more mature than a healthy majority of the girls on campus, and I was impressed by that. She was incredibly smart, and I could sense a fellow voracious reader, and it was no wonder that there were many others during that year who gravitated to her. Unfortunately, she let me down easy when I got to the point where I thought I could let her know how I felt, because she was in a long-distance relationship that she wanted to stick with. It was worth the hug, though.
Nevertheless, we remained friends, still are, and she's a most trusted voice when I'm batting around writing project ideas. Currently, she's in her first year of law school at Florida State University, looking to fight human trafficking, and I think she's going to be one of the greatest lawyers the profession has ever witnessed. In a recent e-mail, I asked her what jurisdiction cases were, since she mentioned on her Facebook profile that she was studying them in class, even as the "FSU plague" made its way around the school (Colds and all), and she explained it so clearly to me that it was as if I was taking the same class alongside her. Back in late August, she sent me the first page of a story she's writing, a hobby to keep during the "madness that is the first year of law school," as she expressed it, being told that it's important to keep hobbies during that time, and I want more of that story. What better inspiration to have as a writer than a fellow reader and writer? I also remember her friend Stacey (or Stacy) back then, who let me borrow her VHS tapes of Tomorrow Never Dies, which introduced me to James Bond and set me on a course of the entire series becoming my Star Wars, and Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, taking much of its comedic inspiration from the Bond series.
But it's not only those events that make me go back to that campus with this new project and the other projects still in play. It's because of the peace I found there, of those wide-open fields, of those walkways between clusters of portables. There, I don't worry about what books have already been written about the subjects I want to cover (I don't worry about them anyway, but they are something to consider, finding what wasn't answered and attempting to answer it on my own through what I find), I don't think about my goal to be published again by the time I'm 30, I don't think about anything dealing with the book business. I just set about writing the book I want to read, which is possible since I have much more fun editing than writing. I enjoy writing, but I love playing around with words while editing, moving sentences around, deleting what doesn't work and replacing it with new words, sentences or paragraphs. I find an all-encompassing peace by being on that campus again in my head. My world is wide enough as it is right now, but it's even more vast over there again. I stroll over those walkways often, thinking about what I've written, wondering what more I can add, or what I don't need in my book. It's a constant inspiration.
And this is coming from someone who partly grew up going to Walt Disney World every weekend and sometimes during the week just for dinner.
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Rosh Hashanah and Furlough Days Off - Day 3: I Didn't Know Sweden Was a Dictatorship
Dad was antsy enough yesterday that he and I ended up going to Vons, Ralphs, and Albertsons to pick up many things, including six bananas at Ralphs, in anticipation of a promise to go to Sprouts by Sunday (where the really good bananas are) and ice and bread for Mom at Albertsons. It took up most of the afternoon, but didn't compare at all to today.
I woke up to Kitty on my second pillow, a pink ribbon bow on her collar. She and Tigger had been picked up by the groomer to be taken to her house, groomed and brought back, as it has been for a few years now. Dad and Meridith saw them out when the groomer arrived and picked them up, and Mom and Meridith were outside when they came back. It was the first time in a few months that I had been sleeping when the groomer came.
And then my day began. Not long after Tigger and Kitty got back, all groomed and Kitty especially happy at spending time being pampered, Mom decided she wanted to go to Fry's in Burbank to see if there were decent clock radios there. The one she's had for a time stopped working and so far, it's been a fruitless search to find a reliable one. And this tied right into my desire to go to IKEA for Swedish meatballs, since we'd be nearby. In fact, it was decided that that's where we would go for lunch.
The Fry's in Burbank has a 1950s alien invasion theme, with some of the ceiling over the TVs being the underside of a landed spaceship. Aliens in spacesuits are all around, shooting at soldiers, and there's a huge alien in the computer department. This is also the Fry's where Bill Prady, the co-creator of The Big Bang Theory, shops often, so as Mom, Dad, Meridith and I walked to the entrance, I told Meridith that I hoped he'd be there. I know what he looks like, and though I didn't bring either of the first three seasons on DVD for him to autograph, just to meet him would be an honor.
I like Fry's for the store design, but the major reason I like it is for the DVDs. They charge market prices for many of the DVDs, like Barnes & Noble, but the selection is far better than what Barnes & Noble offers, much more fun to look at than what Best Buy has. You sometimes find movies you haven't thought of in so long, or didn't think they'd sell because you and maybe three other people know about it, but there it is. I didn't have that experience this time, but once Meridith and I got to the DVD aisles, and we looked through TV DVDs first, I looked for anything of Jack Webb and Dragnet. Webb was very plainspoken, and episodes of Dragnet only conveyed the most essential information to understand what was happening. That was it. It's a style I admire and study not because I want to emulate it, but because it teaches me to just get in there and tell whatever story I want to tell.
I found Dragnet 1968: Volume One, 10 episodes of the second season of Dragnet in the late '60s, co-starring Harry Morgan as Sergeant Joe Friday's partner, Officer Bill Gannon. $6.99. Reasonable. I found the full second season DVD set for $33. Too much to refamiliarize myself with Jack Webb and his historical television work. But 10 episodes from this later Dragnet series was a good start.
In the comedy section, I found Morning Glory, which I had really liked when I first saw it, and considered whether I should buy it. $14.99 made me stop short. Did I really like it that much? I don't normally buy single DVDs at that price. But I decided to hold on to it, carry it around with me while we were there.
We walked Fry's front and back and left and right many times. Dad wanted to look at power managers for the main computer, Mom looked at the clock radios, and told Meridith of the small mp3 speakers she'd seen, so we looked at those too. And we looked at the magazines stocked there, and the bargain bins, and it was tiring. It wasn't because of all of that activity, all of that walking that I decided to get Morning Glory. It seemed to meld into me, and I remembered how sunny Rachel McAdams had been in it, how this contained one of Harrison Ford's best roles, and how Ty Burrell of Modern Family showed that he could be a strong supporting player in feature comedies, making so much entertaining sleaziness and smarm out of his relatively small role here. You cannot find Phil Dunphy. Burrell's got the knack.
And I also thought of the movies I'd seen this year. I'd looked forward to the remake of Arthur because I like Russell Brand, and I laughed in parts during it, developed a film-length crush on Greta Gerwig, and admired Helen Mirren for performing the roles that she apparently liked. But a few days later, a few weeks later, now? I didn't, and don't, remember a great deal from it. I don't have the fondness for it that I do of the original Arthur, starring Dudley Moore. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides fell far short of what I had hoped for after the bloatedness of At World's End: A more streamlined, more fun adventure. Not much of that, with 3D not contributing much to it. Larry Crowne, starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts, and co-written/directed by Hanks, was a nice, warm comedy, but I don't feel the fondness that I did for it when I saw it, beyond seeing it with Sy Richardson, who had a part in it as one of Crowne's fellow employees at that big box store, and I hope his scenes are included in the deleted scenes section on the DVD.
We left Fry's without a Bill Prady sighting, with Mom's clock radio, my DVDs, a few candy-related items near the registers (and why in the hell, with such a wide path to the line for the registers, do people stand behind us, assuming that we're in line when there's such a huge space between us and the line up ahead? They have eyes, and yet they don't lose them. Their brain doesn't connect in those moments. Six people did exactly that), and stopped at Office Depot, right near IKEA, because Mom wanted to look at pens and Dad wanted to look at power managers there. I'd eaten breakfast towards 11. It was 3 p.m. Now it was my turn to be antsy. I wanted to get to those Swedish meatballs, to that lingonberry sauce and that lingonberry drink. And we were in this Office Depot again, as we had done the last time we were in Burbank.
We finally arrived at IKEA, and the line for food was long, but fortunately, as Mom and Meridith looked around at one of the remodeled areas, Dad found a table and sat there. I went for the Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes, the gravy and the lingonberry sauce, and spinach and cheese crepes. Mom and Meridith got their Swedish meatballs with macaroni and cheese, and Dad got his with mashed potatoes too, along with chocolate cake. I found an almond cake torte with chocolate buttercream and a few other attractive details that I've forgotten by now, but they were good enough for me to want a slice. And after collecting the dishes, and putting them on trays that were in a tray cart we were rolling around, I was thinking about the roll I usually get in order to mop up the rest of the gravy and the lingonberry sauce, but then found that they had garlic toast. First time in all the times we've been to IKEA. I wanted that!
After paying for all of this and getting our drinks, Dad, Meridith and I sat down and a question immediately came to mind: When did Sweden become a dictatorship? When did we, as customers of IKEA, lose the right to have the tray cart right at our table? An employee came to our table and took it away, along with the empty trays that were on it, which we would have used to put our dishes back on there and wheel the tray cart over to where the trays are placed on racks for employees to wheel to the kitchen once they're full. What was so wrong, so vile about having the tray cart right there? It wasn't blocking anyone. The people at the table next to us were facing the soda dispenser, silverware, and condiment area anyway, so they had no problem. And yes, it was busy, but it was still our tray cart and there were more than enough tray carts for other people. I have hands, so I didn't mind carrying the dishes over to those racks with the trays on them, but it was nice to have the cart there as a matter of convenience. I don't think it's worth writing to IKEA about because we don't go there often anyway (The last time we went there, the Swedish meatball dish was $3.99 and this year it's $2.99), and by the time we got out of IKEA with a few things Mom bought, including towels, I just wanted to go home.
But that wasn't all. Sprouts was next after we got back to Santa Clarita, and so I got the bananas I want, along with my favorite lemon yogurt, Casacade Fresh lemon chiffon. I eat the Yoplait Greek blueberry and peach yogurts from Walmart and other stores because it's what's there, it's what we can get, since we also don't go to Sprouts very often. But when I can get that lemon chiffon yogurt, I go for it, as I did this time, buying four of them, even though I have five Yoplait Greek yogurts in the fridge.
And then the Walmart on Kelly Johnson Parkway, which overlooks Six Flags from the parking lot, and I spotted two noticeable worklights at Superman: Escape from Krypton, being that they are building Lex Luthor: Drop of Doom on both sides of the Superman tower. Or they seemed like worklights anyway. I'm not sure how far along they are to the beginning of construction at the sides of the tower.
Mom got another Dial pear foaming handwash for mine and Meridith's bathroom, and Meridith got small compartmenalized tray of apples, cheese and caramel dip. I found one with grapes instead of the dip, and got that too, but as to whether there was anything else besides those three things, I don't remember. I'm completely worn out. I'm not dragging as much as I was when we got home, but I'm hoping to make it through at least two episodes of Dragnet 1968 before I conk out. But still again, in order to do anything different in Santa Clarita, you have to leave for the day.
I woke up to Kitty on my second pillow, a pink ribbon bow on her collar. She and Tigger had been picked up by the groomer to be taken to her house, groomed and brought back, as it has been for a few years now. Dad and Meridith saw them out when the groomer arrived and picked them up, and Mom and Meridith were outside when they came back. It was the first time in a few months that I had been sleeping when the groomer came.
And then my day began. Not long after Tigger and Kitty got back, all groomed and Kitty especially happy at spending time being pampered, Mom decided she wanted to go to Fry's in Burbank to see if there were decent clock radios there. The one she's had for a time stopped working and so far, it's been a fruitless search to find a reliable one. And this tied right into my desire to go to IKEA for Swedish meatballs, since we'd be nearby. In fact, it was decided that that's where we would go for lunch.
The Fry's in Burbank has a 1950s alien invasion theme, with some of the ceiling over the TVs being the underside of a landed spaceship. Aliens in spacesuits are all around, shooting at soldiers, and there's a huge alien in the computer department. This is also the Fry's where Bill Prady, the co-creator of The Big Bang Theory, shops often, so as Mom, Dad, Meridith and I walked to the entrance, I told Meridith that I hoped he'd be there. I know what he looks like, and though I didn't bring either of the first three seasons on DVD for him to autograph, just to meet him would be an honor.
I like Fry's for the store design, but the major reason I like it is for the DVDs. They charge market prices for many of the DVDs, like Barnes & Noble, but the selection is far better than what Barnes & Noble offers, much more fun to look at than what Best Buy has. You sometimes find movies you haven't thought of in so long, or didn't think they'd sell because you and maybe three other people know about it, but there it is. I didn't have that experience this time, but once Meridith and I got to the DVD aisles, and we looked through TV DVDs first, I looked for anything of Jack Webb and Dragnet. Webb was very plainspoken, and episodes of Dragnet only conveyed the most essential information to understand what was happening. That was it. It's a style I admire and study not because I want to emulate it, but because it teaches me to just get in there and tell whatever story I want to tell.
I found Dragnet 1968: Volume One, 10 episodes of the second season of Dragnet in the late '60s, co-starring Harry Morgan as Sergeant Joe Friday's partner, Officer Bill Gannon. $6.99. Reasonable. I found the full second season DVD set for $33. Too much to refamiliarize myself with Jack Webb and his historical television work. But 10 episodes from this later Dragnet series was a good start.
In the comedy section, I found Morning Glory, which I had really liked when I first saw it, and considered whether I should buy it. $14.99 made me stop short. Did I really like it that much? I don't normally buy single DVDs at that price. But I decided to hold on to it, carry it around with me while we were there.
We walked Fry's front and back and left and right many times. Dad wanted to look at power managers for the main computer, Mom looked at the clock radios, and told Meridith of the small mp3 speakers she'd seen, so we looked at those too. And we looked at the magazines stocked there, and the bargain bins, and it was tiring. It wasn't because of all of that activity, all of that walking that I decided to get Morning Glory. It seemed to meld into me, and I remembered how sunny Rachel McAdams had been in it, how this contained one of Harrison Ford's best roles, and how Ty Burrell of Modern Family showed that he could be a strong supporting player in feature comedies, making so much entertaining sleaziness and smarm out of his relatively small role here. You cannot find Phil Dunphy. Burrell's got the knack.
And I also thought of the movies I'd seen this year. I'd looked forward to the remake of Arthur because I like Russell Brand, and I laughed in parts during it, developed a film-length crush on Greta Gerwig, and admired Helen Mirren for performing the roles that she apparently liked. But a few days later, a few weeks later, now? I didn't, and don't, remember a great deal from it. I don't have the fondness for it that I do of the original Arthur, starring Dudley Moore. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides fell far short of what I had hoped for after the bloatedness of At World's End: A more streamlined, more fun adventure. Not much of that, with 3D not contributing much to it. Larry Crowne, starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts, and co-written/directed by Hanks, was a nice, warm comedy, but I don't feel the fondness that I did for it when I saw it, beyond seeing it with Sy Richardson, who had a part in it as one of Crowne's fellow employees at that big box store, and I hope his scenes are included in the deleted scenes section on the DVD.
We left Fry's without a Bill Prady sighting, with Mom's clock radio, my DVDs, a few candy-related items near the registers (and why in the hell, with such a wide path to the line for the registers, do people stand behind us, assuming that we're in line when there's such a huge space between us and the line up ahead? They have eyes, and yet they don't lose them. Their brain doesn't connect in those moments. Six people did exactly that), and stopped at Office Depot, right near IKEA, because Mom wanted to look at pens and Dad wanted to look at power managers there. I'd eaten breakfast towards 11. It was 3 p.m. Now it was my turn to be antsy. I wanted to get to those Swedish meatballs, to that lingonberry sauce and that lingonberry drink. And we were in this Office Depot again, as we had done the last time we were in Burbank.
We finally arrived at IKEA, and the line for food was long, but fortunately, as Mom and Meridith looked around at one of the remodeled areas, Dad found a table and sat there. I went for the Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes, the gravy and the lingonberry sauce, and spinach and cheese crepes. Mom and Meridith got their Swedish meatballs with macaroni and cheese, and Dad got his with mashed potatoes too, along with chocolate cake. I found an almond cake torte with chocolate buttercream and a few other attractive details that I've forgotten by now, but they were good enough for me to want a slice. And after collecting the dishes, and putting them on trays that were in a tray cart we were rolling around, I was thinking about the roll I usually get in order to mop up the rest of the gravy and the lingonberry sauce, but then found that they had garlic toast. First time in all the times we've been to IKEA. I wanted that!
After paying for all of this and getting our drinks, Dad, Meridith and I sat down and a question immediately came to mind: When did Sweden become a dictatorship? When did we, as customers of IKEA, lose the right to have the tray cart right at our table? An employee came to our table and took it away, along with the empty trays that were on it, which we would have used to put our dishes back on there and wheel the tray cart over to where the trays are placed on racks for employees to wheel to the kitchen once they're full. What was so wrong, so vile about having the tray cart right there? It wasn't blocking anyone. The people at the table next to us were facing the soda dispenser, silverware, and condiment area anyway, so they had no problem. And yes, it was busy, but it was still our tray cart and there were more than enough tray carts for other people. I have hands, so I didn't mind carrying the dishes over to those racks with the trays on them, but it was nice to have the cart there as a matter of convenience. I don't think it's worth writing to IKEA about because we don't go there often anyway (The last time we went there, the Swedish meatball dish was $3.99 and this year it's $2.99), and by the time we got out of IKEA with a few things Mom bought, including towels, I just wanted to go home.
But that wasn't all. Sprouts was next after we got back to Santa Clarita, and so I got the bananas I want, along with my favorite lemon yogurt, Casacade Fresh lemon chiffon. I eat the Yoplait Greek blueberry and peach yogurts from Walmart and other stores because it's what's there, it's what we can get, since we also don't go to Sprouts very often. But when I can get that lemon chiffon yogurt, I go for it, as I did this time, buying four of them, even though I have five Yoplait Greek yogurts in the fridge.
And then the Walmart on Kelly Johnson Parkway, which overlooks Six Flags from the parking lot, and I spotted two noticeable worklights at Superman: Escape from Krypton, being that they are building Lex Luthor: Drop of Doom on both sides of the Superman tower. Or they seemed like worklights anyway. I'm not sure how far along they are to the beginning of construction at the sides of the tower.
Mom got another Dial pear foaming handwash for mine and Meridith's bathroom, and Meridith got small compartmenalized tray of apples, cheese and caramel dip. I found one with grapes instead of the dip, and got that too, but as to whether there was anything else besides those three things, I don't remember. I'm completely worn out. I'm not dragging as much as I was when we got home, but I'm hoping to make it through at least two episodes of Dragnet 1968 before I conk out. But still again, in order to do anything different in Santa Clarita, you have to leave for the day.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Rosh Hashanah and Furlough Days Off - Day 2: Screw World Peace! I Want Decent Plumbing!, or: Who The Hell's Been Eating Big Slabs of Pork?!
(Warning: The following post is vastly different from what I usually write, but being that my parents and sister have experienced, and complained about, the exact same thing, this is the next best place to vent.)
When I was vastly overweight, I blocked toilets. There were very few instances in which I actually examined what I was eating. It had cheese, it had some kind of meat, it was either nachos or quesadillas or occasionally fettucine alfredo, or it was deeply unhealthy for me, but I loved it and I wanted more of it. And because of that, what ended up in the can at times seemed bigger than the can, making me take hold of the plunger just in case it wouldn't go down yet again. We have crappy plumbing here in Saugus, but back then, I also contributed to it.
Now, being a much thinner me, my business back there isn't as big. I'm still happily losing weight, so there is some result of that, but it isn't as bad as it once was. And yet, today, what in hell happened?! I didn't even give that much for the demon toilet to be blocked yet again. I flushed what little there had been, but while I was washing my hands, I didn't hear the comforting sound of it fully flushing out. I opened the lid, and the water in the bowl had risen up to a level that first made me freeze and think, "Oh shit. Not again!", before realizing that I probably should reach behind the bowl and cut off the water supply to it.
Now what? Find a cup of some kind that we don't need ever again and start bailing it out? I didn't want to do that because I was planning to get in the shower after I shaved and I didn't want toilet water in the tub. Plus, my first plunging attempt had splashed water on the carpet, and I need to explain this: The previous owners of this house, an elderly couple, had carpet installed in the bathrooms, presumably so they wouldn't slip like they probably would on tile. Folks, this is why tile should be law in bathrooms. Water rests on tile. It doesn't soak into it. You don't need to press toilet paper deep into it in order to soak up spilled water. You simply wipe it up. I used about a quarter of a roll to soak up what had splashed onto the carpet around the toilet. Yes, I am a moron in plunging when the water's that high in the bowl, but I just wanted a shower, and doubly moronic because had I bailed the water out into the tub, I could have just run the bath water on hot for over a minute, shepherded it back to the drain, and continued on with my cleanly intentions. But there I was, using toilet paper that has turned out to be much stronger than the tissues we use. We don't keep tissues on hand in our bathrooms anymore because toilet paper does a lot better work in nose-blowing too.
As I was soaking up the carpet as best I could, I heard a heavenly sound coming from the shut-off toilet. It was a slight draining noise, and the water in the bowl was slowly, slowly going down. As the water reached the halfway point, I realized I could plunge, and with enough thrusts, it could go down faster. I could turn the water supply back on, it would spread into the bowl, I could flush again, and things could go back to normal. Except the carpet for the moment.
So I did exactly that, holding the handle down after I turned the supply back on so the water would go fully down and then come back up, and it all eventually stopped. Water in the bowl where it should be. And I thought about how much I hated this, how we had lived with it for these 7 years (we spent our first year in this valley in an apartment in Valencia with plumbing that never gave us this much trouble, mainly because those overseeing the apartment complex actually gave a damn), how one day your plumbing works fine, and the next, you're hoping that it goes down, even though you put nothing more than a strip of toilet paper in after wiping yourself.
This extended to when I had cleaned up everything around the toilet and started shaving. The last time I shaved a few days ago, the water in the sink was nearly nil. It had collected around the drain, but that was about it. It kept going down as it should. When I shaved today, the water was a quarter of the way up the sink and growing a bit more than that. I wondered if my portly next-door neighbor had been eating pork or something equally greasy and that's what had stopped up the plumbing, because our set of houses (Ours, his, and the two next door to us) have plumbing that's connected. So if someone happens to be flushing weed for whatever reason (I'm just guessing; I know nothing about my neighbors beyond the big guy) or had a bad reaction to Mexican food, we all know about it because it screws up our plumbing.
This experience darkened my mood a bit when I got in the shower, because I just wanted to shave and get in the shower, and enjoy that refreshing, renewed feeling that comes from standing under warm water spraying on you. Eventually, I regained my equilibrium, but then when I got in the shower, I was reminded of the water still in the carpet, stepping on a section that still produced some, and so I soaked up more with more toilet paper. When the day comes that we finally move, and arrive at our new place in Henderson, I'm going to walk to each bathroom and flush each toilet with a wide smile on my face, grateful that I don't have to put up with this crap anymore. That dream is nearly at the top of my list of Henderson dreams. It's a long list.
Besides that, I'm on page 177 of The Opposite of Me, Sarah Pekkanen's first novel (I read her second, Skipping a Beat, and really liked it), and am anticipating her third novel, which will be published next year. If she keeps writing like this, one book a year, and if Barbara O'Neal of The Secret of Everything (Her best novel, and my favorite novel out of the three she's written so far) has another one out next year, I won't have any trouble finding any modern-day reads. I'll be deliriously happy each time.
In the mail, I received Distortions by Ann Beattie, owing to my writerly crush on her after reading in "The New Yorker" an excerpt from her Mrs. Nixon: A Novelist Imagines a Life that'll be out in November. I want to read everything by her, and my order from Daedalus Books (http://www.daedalusbooks.com/) includes The New Yorker Stories, a collection of every short story she's written for "The New Yorker" from 1974 to 2006. I like her writing because it's about all of us, about our lives, our loves, what we want, what we try to avoid, what shakes up our lives, what makes them whole again. When you find a writer you want to read more of, it's the clearest, happiest courtship you can ever have. You want to explore every part of them. That's the feeling I get with Ann Beattie.
We didn't go out anywhere yesterday, and with some rain coming in later tonight, probably not today either. Definitely tomorrow. Dad's getting antsy, as he doesn't like to be in one place too long. I don't mind it. I've been in the house all week, I've had my books, and it doesn't bother me, particularly because we've been everywhere that there is to go in this valley and in other Southern California cities. There were times we drove to San Diego for Sea World and Legoland. Those are necessary only once. In Henderson, I'll think differently. But here, I have my books, so I'm satisfied.
When I was vastly overweight, I blocked toilets. There were very few instances in which I actually examined what I was eating. It had cheese, it had some kind of meat, it was either nachos or quesadillas or occasionally fettucine alfredo, or it was deeply unhealthy for me, but I loved it and I wanted more of it. And because of that, what ended up in the can at times seemed bigger than the can, making me take hold of the plunger just in case it wouldn't go down yet again. We have crappy plumbing here in Saugus, but back then, I also contributed to it.
Now, being a much thinner me, my business back there isn't as big. I'm still happily losing weight, so there is some result of that, but it isn't as bad as it once was. And yet, today, what in hell happened?! I didn't even give that much for the demon toilet to be blocked yet again. I flushed what little there had been, but while I was washing my hands, I didn't hear the comforting sound of it fully flushing out. I opened the lid, and the water in the bowl had risen up to a level that first made me freeze and think, "Oh shit. Not again!", before realizing that I probably should reach behind the bowl and cut off the water supply to it.
Now what? Find a cup of some kind that we don't need ever again and start bailing it out? I didn't want to do that because I was planning to get in the shower after I shaved and I didn't want toilet water in the tub. Plus, my first plunging attempt had splashed water on the carpet, and I need to explain this: The previous owners of this house, an elderly couple, had carpet installed in the bathrooms, presumably so they wouldn't slip like they probably would on tile. Folks, this is why tile should be law in bathrooms. Water rests on tile. It doesn't soak into it. You don't need to press toilet paper deep into it in order to soak up spilled water. You simply wipe it up. I used about a quarter of a roll to soak up what had splashed onto the carpet around the toilet. Yes, I am a moron in plunging when the water's that high in the bowl, but I just wanted a shower, and doubly moronic because had I bailed the water out into the tub, I could have just run the bath water on hot for over a minute, shepherded it back to the drain, and continued on with my cleanly intentions. But there I was, using toilet paper that has turned out to be much stronger than the tissues we use. We don't keep tissues on hand in our bathrooms anymore because toilet paper does a lot better work in nose-blowing too.
As I was soaking up the carpet as best I could, I heard a heavenly sound coming from the shut-off toilet. It was a slight draining noise, and the water in the bowl was slowly, slowly going down. As the water reached the halfway point, I realized I could plunge, and with enough thrusts, it could go down faster. I could turn the water supply back on, it would spread into the bowl, I could flush again, and things could go back to normal. Except the carpet for the moment.
So I did exactly that, holding the handle down after I turned the supply back on so the water would go fully down and then come back up, and it all eventually stopped. Water in the bowl where it should be. And I thought about how much I hated this, how we had lived with it for these 7 years (we spent our first year in this valley in an apartment in Valencia with plumbing that never gave us this much trouble, mainly because those overseeing the apartment complex actually gave a damn), how one day your plumbing works fine, and the next, you're hoping that it goes down, even though you put nothing more than a strip of toilet paper in after wiping yourself.
This extended to when I had cleaned up everything around the toilet and started shaving. The last time I shaved a few days ago, the water in the sink was nearly nil. It had collected around the drain, but that was about it. It kept going down as it should. When I shaved today, the water was a quarter of the way up the sink and growing a bit more than that. I wondered if my portly next-door neighbor had been eating pork or something equally greasy and that's what had stopped up the plumbing, because our set of houses (Ours, his, and the two next door to us) have plumbing that's connected. So if someone happens to be flushing weed for whatever reason (I'm just guessing; I know nothing about my neighbors beyond the big guy) or had a bad reaction to Mexican food, we all know about it because it screws up our plumbing.
This experience darkened my mood a bit when I got in the shower, because I just wanted to shave and get in the shower, and enjoy that refreshing, renewed feeling that comes from standing under warm water spraying on you. Eventually, I regained my equilibrium, but then when I got in the shower, I was reminded of the water still in the carpet, stepping on a section that still produced some, and so I soaked up more with more toilet paper. When the day comes that we finally move, and arrive at our new place in Henderson, I'm going to walk to each bathroom and flush each toilet with a wide smile on my face, grateful that I don't have to put up with this crap anymore. That dream is nearly at the top of my list of Henderson dreams. It's a long list.
Besides that, I'm on page 177 of The Opposite of Me, Sarah Pekkanen's first novel (I read her second, Skipping a Beat, and really liked it), and am anticipating her third novel, which will be published next year. If she keeps writing like this, one book a year, and if Barbara O'Neal of The Secret of Everything (Her best novel, and my favorite novel out of the three she's written so far) has another one out next year, I won't have any trouble finding any modern-day reads. I'll be deliriously happy each time.
In the mail, I received Distortions by Ann Beattie, owing to my writerly crush on her after reading in "The New Yorker" an excerpt from her Mrs. Nixon: A Novelist Imagines a Life that'll be out in November. I want to read everything by her, and my order from Daedalus Books (http://www.daedalusbooks.com/) includes The New Yorker Stories, a collection of every short story she's written for "The New Yorker" from 1974 to 2006. I like her writing because it's about all of us, about our lives, our loves, what we want, what we try to avoid, what shakes up our lives, what makes them whole again. When you find a writer you want to read more of, it's the clearest, happiest courtship you can ever have. You want to explore every part of them. That's the feeling I get with Ann Beattie.
We didn't go out anywhere yesterday, and with some rain coming in later tonight, probably not today either. Definitely tomorrow. Dad's getting antsy, as he doesn't like to be in one place too long. I don't mind it. I've been in the house all week, I've had my books, and it doesn't bother me, particularly because we've been everywhere that there is to go in this valley and in other Southern California cities. There were times we drove to San Diego for Sea World and Legoland. Those are necessary only once. In Henderson, I'll think differently. But here, I have my books, so I'm satisfied.
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