Happiness is all about spinning plates.

I think it's time for a rebuttal to a post I made closer to the beginning of this year. There aren't that many, and I think it's even on the same page, so if you want to go back and read it, please, go ahead. I'm not even going to link it because, seriously, scroll down with your scroll wheel. It's right fucking there. You want me to feed you, and work your mandible for you too? No, you shitcogs. Do it yourself. Lazy fucks.

Any-who. The post in question is the one in which I thoroughly railed on authors for being, usually, so far up their own asses so as to never make true human connections because we are, quite literally, far too pleased with ourselves to see anyone beyond ourselves. Even others are there only as a reflection of ourselves. I think that I would like to revisit that, and maybe even say that that was an overdone idea… perhaps not completely extirpate the ideology all together, but at least to add an addendum.

Since that was written, I have looked back on it a few times and wondered if what I wrote there was actually true. Did I mean that, or was I just being morose and grim? I think that there was definitely some truth in it, but for the most part, I overplayed the sentimentality inherent in a writerly life and mistook my need for fans to be above that of friends. I think that’s my biggest problem with the piece. That was inherently stupid and wrong. I want to make you laugh, and I want you to like me for it, but I also want people to like me and I want to like them. There's a looot of likin' going on there, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if I scrawled a "I like you. Do you like me? yes [] no []" message more than a few times.

We are all looking for that human connection. That one person who you feel more strongly connected to than anybody else – or at least a bunch of people that you are comfortable around. The older I get, the more I realize that’s what this life is really about. It's about those connections. And even as I write this now, it sounds like a bad motivational poster, but goddammit, it's true. What we want more than anything else is to feel like we are, in some way, impacting others. We want to feel like we have made a difference in someone's life for the better, and I'd go so far as to say, it's really not about other people affecting ours. That's perhaps the magic of friendship… or at least true, heart-felt friendship or love. You are in it because you want to make that other person happy, and in so doing, you have heightened your own existence as well.

So, am I inherently the cold, sociopath that I made myself out to be? I actually don't think I am. I think that I want to please my friends with any modicum of skill I may have, whether that be through words or whatever other skill I may or may come to possess at a later date (spinning plates has always been a talent that I yearn to master). My existence, your existence, and everyone else's existence is all contingent on the fact that there are others that exist. And I think that's what is most important -- we brush up, feeling and testing our weight against the presence of others. How we affect others is not only our legacy, but our quantifiable and qualifiable happiness as well.

The Reasons Are There, Don't Say I Didn't Warn You...

20 Reasons to Not Date a Writer...

I think that my ex would find most of these to be especially conclusive. We don't make good dates, people. We just don't make good company as we probably will not find you nearly as interesting as what our characters are going through at the time. If you don't buy that, then what's more interesting (two examples so as not to be labeled 'sexist,' always a lovely adjective that I find 'feminists' like to affix upon me with a fanfare usually left for parades and New Year's Eve galas):

1. Girlfriend is talking about her day in which her and her bestfriend got in a fight lasting approx. 23 minutes in which only two words were actually spoken and the whole thing ended when that especially hot guy from Twilight showed up on VH1. You are erstwhile thinking about a ridiculously harrowing scene from your sure-fire breakthrough novel in which two friends must fight to the death whilst the third friend is hung upside down and slowly lowered closer and closer to a Vlad The Impaler-esque spike.
2. Boyfriend is letting you know of the most recent heart-rending defeat of his local college and/or professional sports team, and can you believe that call? Bullshit! Meanwhile, in your mind, you are busy fine-tuning the technical aspects of armies about to run down into a trench to start an epic battle you labeled in the first chapter as "The Battle of Red Trench" where the ground must literally flow with blood. Who cares about football?

And there. I mean, what are we really talking about here? Obviously that writers are inherently vain and self-serving. Possibly assholes that find themselves much more interesting than they find you. This says one of two things (and note that the second solution is quite possibly just because, me being a writer, I see myself as just incredibly fascinating):

1. Unlike other people who kind of figure out what their "self" is by the time they turn, you know, 12, writers are the metaphysical equivalent to that kid in first grade who still has "accidents" and whose undergarments crunches while s/he walks.
2. We really ARE just that much more fascinating. We don't have a lot of friends because we are wayyy too busy trying to nail down why we are different from you, and how come a 30 minute discussion on the principles of 'friendship' don't make other people giddy in contemplative exaltation.

That is two lists in roughly a paragraph. Obviously I have no idea what I'm trying to say here or I would actually work these into a real paragraph. (Although I read somewhere that making lists is better in blogs, or some such nonsense? I don't think I will ever have a very good blog following.)

But maybe I'm being a little too hard here. I really do find my girlfriends interesting, I'm usually just off on my own planet, doing my own things. This draws a thoroughly depressing problem that writers are usually inept at human contact, and yet we yearn for human contact through our literature. Does that not strike you as inherently sad, and perhaps a little destructive? We want that human contact only after it becomes somewhat base, where you want to talk to us because you like what we wrote, and not because I am, let's say, me. I want your adoration and praise, but that's much easier for me to take than being really really good friends, or significant other with you. In short: it's much easier to have fans than friends, because I don't have to really export much of myself into our relationship. Instead, you see what you want to see through my writing, and then you draw a (perhaps unrealistic or false) view of the writer. Now I am whoever you want me to be, and that won't change because I probably won't hang out with you, because I am probably busy, y'know, writing. And even if we did, I probably would decline, because then you'd see me for what I really am, which is an incredibly shy, yet superficial person who would rather have you as a fan than a friend. And no, you can't have a friend who is also a fan. Friends tell you when you suck, fans just smile.

So, am I lonely? Yes. Very. Would I change it if I could? Probably. But I can't. My demeanor is inherently secluded and standoffish. I want to communicate with you through my literature, and then I want you to really like it and then come to believe that you therefore inherently like me, even though we have never met. I have my friends that exist in my novels. The characters are my friends, and they are diverse and all hilarious and fun. I hang out with them daily, and really, that takes up an awful lot of time and energy. So much so that by the time I'm done, sleep comes quickly.

I just realized that this has become a rant about why I am lonely as opposed to a nice link to a nice list on someone else's website. Funny. But not really.

More on this in a later post, I think. There's more here.

-Ken

Twenty Minute Oil Change

I began writing this essay while I was going through this stuff, but it took me another two days to get it to where it is somewhat publishable. I think that there is still some stuff that I would like to add, modify, and subtract, but for the sake of a 1.5k word essay, it will do. The title of this essay is "Twenty Minute Oil Change," and it is a recounting of my time at the hitherto named carshop "Qwik Lube". I have changed the name to avoid any sort of legal recourse, and all information regarding the specific sale has been changed.



I am writing this from inside an incongruous amalgamation of various states of disrepair and failure. Qwik Lube is an anachronism, surrounded by hulking bodies of lustrous steel beams and girders that hold within them, like some titanic filigree, lambent windows that reflect the sun, causing the structures to shine like great, princess-cut gemstones. I, on the other hand, am in a squat white, slap-dashed tin structure, marked with the tincture of years with rust, grime, and dirt that pock its outside walls and corners like liver spots and furuncles on an old drunk. A veritable rough amongst diamonds, he looks to be either on his way up, or way down from another epic bender, attempting to forget his embarrassing lot in life. Cast to the gutter, and sleeping off a roiling hang-over, he lays, prostrated among the benthos, carrion, and detritus that swirl and scurry about him, to which, he simply mumbles, “let me be, let me be.”

As a general rule, I try to make it a rule to avoid places anthropomorphized as a miserly drunk. Perhaps that is both shallow and vain of me — if you said so, I don’t think you would be wrong — but I am an indelible creature of comfort. The way I see it, humanity created beds, roofs, air-conditioning, and plumbing so that I don't have to live out in the wilderness among all the shit and dirt and gadflies. Camping is uncomfortable, and so are thirty-year-old rust buckets that are visibly deteriorating, and I am willing to fork over a few extra dollars for the creature-comfort of knowing that I will not be lanced, decapitated, or otherwise crushed by an oxidized girder. With this in mind however, there is a radical difference between “few dollars” and “twenty.” Thus, I approach the double garage doors with a feeling of apprehension, spurred on by the promise of diminution.

The front wheels of my car roll over the black rope sensor laid out in front of the adit, and a bell rings from inside the garage. From somewhere, I hear the muffled sound of a moan, followed by the emergence of a face from underneath a car. The face scowls at me. He looks pissed; he looks like he’s ready to get home. I can’t say I blame him either. It is five-thirty and the shop closes at six. It is kind of a dick move on my part.

Earlier that same day, I was told that I have a “disarming smile.” I try to disarm him. He does not disarm.

When he gets up to my car, he says, “oil change,” and I nod in agreement, but it isn’t a question. I believe that if I had asked for anything more complicated, he would have told me to fuck off. He stands in front of my car, guiding it into the garage. After I park, I remove my keys from the ignition and a hand darts through my open window, mere inches from my face. “Keys,” says a different voice, and I hastily relinquish them. The acephalous hand requests that I wait in the waiting room (where one usually does do the waiting).

I perform my task admirably, grabbing my notebook and tucking a black pen into the crook between my upper ear and temple and leap away from the harried action already taking place beneath my car’s raised hood. The door slaps closed behind me obdurately.

When describing the waiting room, we must use the term “room” liberally. It has four walls, and although the walls did not come into contact with the ceiling, it is essentially room-like. Perhaps the phrase “waiting cell” would be more applicable. The cell is, in itself, an interesting phenomenon partly because of the pungent odor of cheap cigars that entwines itself around the entirety of the dozen square feet of the enclosure. This strikes me as odd not only because of the incongruity of the idea of someone smoking inside a building lined with oil, but because the smell does not permeate any other part of the garage. I am happy to report that I am in solitary confinement in this waiting cell. For this, I am grateful. Although I wouldn’t say I am an agoraphobe, there are not many things as distressing as perfunctory small talk in a confined space with a stranger. Five chairs are backed against the near wall, and I sit in one, and slide another in front of me where I lay down my notebook, and begin writing.

I have discovered the source of the cigar smell. It is being generated by a small air-freshener sitting astride an ancient vending machine. I now find I have more questions than I had previously: What company would manufacture an air-freshener that smells like a Swisher Sweets? Furthermore, what kind of patron opts for the “eau de cigar” over, say, Lavender Breeze, or Vanilla Heaven? Finally, in what kind of musky hell is the aroma of a spent convenience store cigar an improvement over the original stench? These questions I dare not breach for fear of the answers.

I am beginning to realize how awkward I must look — crumpled overtop of a chair, partaking in the entirely emasculating task of writing in something that looks like a diary. The two mechanics are talking to each other, and, as if I am eighteen all over again, I am struck with the sudden fear of being called a nerd; back to the days of high school and college where being caught reading a novel not assigned by a teacher could get one relegated to the ghettos of the “Unpopular Table.” Where anything that you did was scrutinized, tested, prodded, and subjected to a litmus test of “brosimilitude.” Everything must feed into that man-ethos: video games, and slightly delirious, ball-grabbingly uncouth jokes that must be told over and over and over. I hastily tuck my journal away, and go about doing something more mind-numbing and drab: I turn on the boob-tube.

The TV turns on with the satisfying pop of cathode ray tubing heating up. The picture warbles, then the noise drowns out, and gives way to sweet undiluted picture. ESPN, baby. SportsCenter. What’s up with the Phils? In-depth look at the NBA playoffs. Gridiron. Steroids. Sex, sex, sex. Who’s going to win the west? MVP candidates. Stats, scores, analysis. Cold hard facts and figures. Pasty white guys in glasses and bad suits. Women in sex-kitten, business-chic. Sex. Commercials. Beer commercials. Here comes the Silver Bullet. Areolae perk beneath painted-on wife-beaters. Who needs a woman when you have your favorite lite beer? Nutri-system. Viagra. Guy stuff. SportsCenter.

I get lost in the programming. I am so inundated with OBPs and SoGs and triple-doubles and breasts that I almost don’t hear the hood to my car shutting. My car is done, but my mind is still riding the bibulous carousel of cleavage. I open the cell door and walk through, where my friend, the pissed mechanic, is frowning at the checklist in his hands the same way a doctor might check vital charts. I know what he expects — it is something of a ritual between man and mechanic — the obligatory “once-over,” pointing out obscure and seemingly irrelevant gaskets, cogs, and other whatsits. A sign of masculinity achieved and maintained. Cars, sports, tits: the trifecta of testosterone.

I duck from the obligation, ready to get on my way back home to read a book, and write a story. I thank him and enter my car without much more than what is deemed polite, but I would not even know where to start in this charade. I drive away from the waiting cell. I drive away from the drunk man, mumbling in basso profundo, "let me be, let me be," as he nurses his aching soul, drowned by cirrhosis, aching with priapism, and lost among vainglorious virtues that are inherently empty and mindless.

What It Means To Write a Novel.

In Rachelle Gardner's latest blog post, she talks about whether or not it is "fun to write." My response became something of a treatise, and I felt like it would be worthwhile to post it here since it formulated into something that resembled a blogpost of its own...

I think authors of predominantly short stories and short-shorts find writing a much more enjoyable thing. They can come to an end of a story in about a week or two, and then they can edit, and be done with it. This isn't to say that what they do is easy, because it is not, but I think authors who venture into the territory of novel-writing are intrinsically masochistic. Writing a novel will undoubtedly test your mental fortitude, and make you -- more than once -- have rather funereal existential breakdowns where you are your own worst enemy. Think you're up for it?

"I'm so bad at this."

This will become your imagination's calling card every day as you sit down to write.

"This is never going to get published."

This will follow you when you save your document for the night.

"All of my characters are thinly veiled interpretations of myself."

This will haunt you as you read it over with a critical eye.

"I didn't write anything AGAIN today."

This will become your own, personal cat-o-nine-tails that you flagellate across your own metaphysical back.

It is truly, as Colum McCann says in LET THE GREAT WORLD SPIN, "another day, another dolor."

And despite all these things, you have to, as Ms. Gardner says, love what you do. It's not ALWAYS fun (though I do find that most of the time it is), it's not ALWAYS an eye-opening experience (though there are definitely times...), and it's certainly not always artistic. A novelist is slave to the details. If you want a character to move around, you must get him there, one way or another. Bus, train, car, missle, rocket, submarine, alien transport, or sky bridge made out of crystal.

Novels are, ultimately, labors of love. You must love them, but there is no guarantee that they will love you back.

But you're okay with that, right?

-Ken

What Is This? (Or, Ken Flies off the Deep End)

To begin: This is SPARTA!!!!

Now, to the real post...

Recently, I've become a little fed up with a lot of blogs out there, claiming to purport the continuance and elevation of art, specifically within the realm of literature and writing. I have come to the conclusion that the majority of these blogs couldn't care less about that. All they really care about is growing some festering, gelatinous group of RSS followers to mindlessly accept whatever they eschew as canon. I'm not going to name names -- it doesn't really fix anything, it just turns into flame wars (which I would undoubtedly lose) -- but I would like to point out some of the irksome habits that the blogs, and its followers adhere to.

My Progress

Oy, lads 'n lasses!
No, no that was dumb... let me try that again...
Arrrr me hearties!
Shit, I don't like that one either....
Well, hi there Mr. and Mrs. Internet trolls!
Eh, too "Leave it to Beaver"...
Suuuuuup boiiiiiii?!?
Shit... no....
Hey guys, got a quick update on everything for y'all!
Perfect... perhaps without the y'all, but we'll roll with it.

Today is Friday (sweet, sweet, glorious Friday!) and I am psyched! I'm psyched because my girlfriend got into town last night (love you!) but I'm also psyched because writing is just becoming something that is part of me. After these last three months or so of writing damn near every day, I have become so accustomed to getting my one thousand words a day in that it becomes almost a second nature... let me explain with a little story.

On Tuesday, I put down my pen and texted E___. It said, essentially, that maybe I'm burned out on this, y'know? I write so much that maybe I should just give it a rest. Refresh my writerly well of creativity, and get a grip on my life beyond the strict confines of one-inch margins. I asked her what she thought of the idea...

I don't think she really cared, honestly. She said something about 'well, do what you want.' I can't blame her... I talk about it with her more than I should, I'm sure it's rather aggravating, but I know that she just wants me to be happy, and if taking time off would help -- then she would be all for it. So, I picked up a book I've been aching to read: Dan Chaon's you remind me of me (ostensibly all in lower-case as to make sure everyone knows that the book is a serious work of literary fiction... which it is), and read the whole thing in a period of two nights.

"Wow!" thought I, "what a tremendous book. I would like my book to be that beautiful!" So then, on Wednesday night (so I guess it was only 1.5 days of not writing) I spat out like, three thousand words without feeling the bottom of the well. It was like the whole thing was somehow magically refilled to the brim with silvery miasma that is... whatever it is you need to write. Is that drive, creativity, or something else? I don't know. I just call it like I see it.

Then, still drawing from that well last night, I wrote a ~3,000 word short story about a man who suffers from batophobia, or, the fear of standing next to something really tall; which I just found absolutely fascinating. I stuck him out in the middle of the grasslands and put him in a small ranch house -- all alone and ornery.

And now it's Friday. I don't know if I'll write anything today, but I would imagine at one point, I'll pick up my pen and jot down notes that will get me really keyed up. Then by the time that work is over, I'll be so bursting with story that if I don't tell it, I'd be liable to burst at the seams. Now that I write that, it seems an awful lot like foreplay... odd.

Anyway! I'm signing off. I think I may start posting stories on this sight that I don't really think will make it to competitions or publications. I do a lot of character peices that are only to help me think of new characters that I might use later as a sort of toolbox. Anyway, if I do, you'll start seeing those on here. If I decide not to, you won't. Enjoy your Friday, and get ready for the fete that is the weekend!

-Ken

One of those Typical "I'm Not Dead" Headlines.

No, I'm not dead. Quite to the contrary, I've been incredibly busy since the last time I posted here. With my outline done for my Novel, I am taking a step back from that project to work on three other stories that I'd like to get out in time for some contests. There's a lot of little things going on, so I'm going to write a series of paragraphs completely irrelated [sic] with one another. (except being about writing and me, of course)

Over the last seven days I have written a total of 5,000 words... I don't know if that's a lot, but I am trying to write even faster. I feel like I write EXCRUCIATINGLY slow to the point of tedium. To give an example, I had a paragraph that was already completed on my longest short story (It's going on 34 pages. It's a monster and I don't know if any contests would want it. It's good, but the length is pretty epic for a short story piece.) and I went back and edited that fucker for about an hour. I rewrote the entire thing probably four or five times until it was perfect. This would have been fine, I think, except it completely fucked over my groove. I had nothing after that. Revisions are a dangerous animal, especially when you're just trying to get your story on paper... they're somewhat like a Grizzly Bear, but instead of sharp, flesh-rending claws, they have... well... okay so revisions are nothing like a Grizzly... maybe an Aardvark or Kakapo. Yeah, Kakapo. Since it FUCKS your HEAD. (see: link)

I filled up a moleskine this weekend. I was pretty excited about that. I bought one of those three packs at Barnes & Noble, and when I purchased it, the lady behind the counter had the "oh-God-another-one-of-these-wannabes-again" look on her face. As I said in an earlier post, my intention is to constantly fight through the prevailing idiom of "that guy"-ism and beat all the tried and true stereotypes of people like me. So in that way, I was thrilled that I could fill one up. It's hanging on my cork board now... along with everything else I'm doing. It looks cluttered, but there is some method to my madness.

I don't know if it's because I am a massive tool bag, or what, but people with normal jobs like accountants and lawyers are depressing me now. When I see them I want to ask "Is this really what you want to do with your life? Are you really excited about reading that dull, sterile professional writing?" It just seems like they aren't really doing what they love. "Love what you do, and you'll never work a day in your life." That's kind of the mantra I'm going for I guess. Jesus, I am just a vestibule for horrible, life-affirming cliches.

I've found myself futzing around more literary websites recently. There are about five or six that now inhabit my Favorites list, and I read them primarily because they update nearly every day. It's nice to be able to sit down and read about writing even when you are seemingly stuck in Corporate Town, USA. I'm going to make a blog roll to the right of this post. Please visit the sites, I think that they're some of the best sources around for writers... unlike this one, which may become a black hole of creativity and happiness. I don't mean for it to, but you can't control these things. Black holes form with or without my consent. I think I'll blame this one on Blogger.

Anyway, that's essentially it. For all the work I've been doing for the past two weeks, there is very little to show for it. I'm excited right now because even though what I am doing right now is more than likely drivel, I can look back at my previous work and see that my drivel has at least become better. Writing is not easy, but seeing improvement has been a source of joy and inspiration for me for, Jesus, over a year now! I never really celebrated my one-year-anniversary with my love of writing. Just kind of passed that one up. Oh well, there's nothing to be mentioned about my work yet. Still not even published in a magazine or website yet (besides the blog that I edit and contribute to - www.rawrcast.com ) but it will all come in time. When it does, you'll be the first to know. Yeah, you. Talking to you now. You have a little something hanging from your nose... might want to get that off. No, no... the other side. There. Good. Yay!

-Ken