Night falls black and starless. His eye is drawn to the cemetery. A chill runs through him. Young sees his breath in the porch light. He takes the air into account—the change. Things will have to be shut off soon and covered, other things will have to be turned on. He hears footsteps and the slamming of cabinet doors. Young thinks, are those snowflakes? I hope not. Trinity’s rusty black Chevy Cavalier has the trunk lid standing open.
In the trunk’s dim light, Young studies the change. Trinity better not be taking his winter coat. Did she ever return the black jumper cables? Did she ever return anything? Snowflakes dot the red suitcase. Her dumb hat boxes with green ribbons might get wet. Chelsea’s brown plastic horse, “Horsin Wells,” is in there, too. That is a bad sign. Trinity said it gallops from home to unhappy home. He lowers the trunk lid like closing a book.
Leaves are burning somewhere. It is time to burn leaves or the snow will cover them. A dog barks and other dogs bark. It goes on for a while. The entire neighborhood is barking. Young wants to scream, Shut up! But he doesn’t want to offend the neighbor. Gibson next door is very protective of his tornado of dogs, who run and bark at shadows, but enough, already. “Shut up!”
A gruff voice. The cigarette smoker behind the blank privacy fence says, “Don’t yell at my dogs, Bub.”
“Sorry, Gibson,” Young says, to the neighbor who never seems over ten feet away. He sits in a lawn chair all day and at odd hours of the night behind the wooden fence, with a Jesus icon shaking in his fist staring at the cemetery. Thin wisps of smoke drift from Gibson’s mouth. Like he’s already burning in hell.
Gibson’s daughter is jumping on the trampoline in the dark. Like an old bed squeaking, sounding almost obscene. Young sees flashes of her soaring stiff mannikin like body above the blank wooden fence in the yellow orb of his porch light. The dogs silently watch too, standing around the trampoline like spotters or pallbearers.
Young glances into his house. He sees his daughter Trinity’s slight shape dressed in a sun bursting yellow and orange tie-dyed shirt and jeans, moving back and forth in the light. Like a tropical fish. Is she looking for the car seat? Money? Pills?
Young rushes into the kitchen. “What are you looking for?” The rooster collection on the sellers cabinet anxiously watches. A drip-drip of the rusty faucet becomes louder. The cuckoo clock is waiting to say “Cuckoo!” Everything is cuckoo.
The toddler wearing a pink winter coat and nothing else is barefoot, sitting on the cold blue linoleum. She looks bewildered and sleepy. She reaches for her “Pop-Pop,” but Young doesn’t see her outstretched arms.
“I’m looking for my hairbrush. I’ll find it, don’t worry about it,” says Trinity, his pretty daughter, with the vampire eyeshadow and gold nose ring. Young thinks she’s the kind that would have ridiculed me in school. Her mother’s face comes up in his mind. She looks just like Renee with that snooty upturned nose, and she’s kicking dope and isn’t that great…Yeah—the type to get guys to buy her drinks at the bar—just like her mother did. Probably Black Russians or expensive Long Island Ice Teas—and shoot H on the toilet. Then OD or split with someone else. But here she is living with me, at least for a few more minutes.
“Sure we can’t work it out, Trin? Jeez, put some pants on her.” He half-hoped she would leave, then felt a wave of chagrin. Chelsea, his granddaughter, is who he wants to save. Trinity, he concludes, is unsaveable. Lost. Never to be found. He could go on—but doesn’t—because he might cry. Trinity was his curse just like he was his parents’ curse. Hers is heroin, and his was booze.
“See. Always on my back!”
“You can watch American Idol. You don’t have to leave, Trinity.”
“I don’t give a shit about American Idol, Frank.”
Young thinks, I prefer Dad, but whatever… “Stick around. We’ll get some Mickey Ds.”
“I don’t want to be here. I can’t stand… looking at that cemetery, and those damn dogs… always barking.” As if on cue, they went nuts like they had treed a raccoon or the mailman. She breathes out, “And your rules.” Her mouth gets thin and bloodless. The almond-shaped eyes with the heavy black liner narrows. Her straight little upturned nose, which the guys liked, flares. He could see the hateful face of her mother, Renee, like another face waiting to be born into a wrinkled mask of drug addiction.
“Hey-hey now. I just wanted you to come home—not stay out all night. I’ll still drive you to the methadone clinic.”
“You’re off the hook. Frank. I’ve got it set up with the Medicaid Taxi. They’ll pick me up at 5:30 AM. Seven days a week.” This is good news because Young hates getting up at 5:00 and driving, while she sleeps for 30 minutes to the grimy methadone clinic. On the way back after her cup of blue please get me through, methadone, she nodded out. Then she’s off to Briggs’ World Famous Breakfast House, while Young baby-sat Chelsea, which he liked.
“Why don’t you try Suboxone? I heard they give you take-home doses, so you don’t have to go to that hell hole every day with all those drug addicts.”
“That hell hole is saving peoples’ fucking lives! Would you rather I shot dope?”
“No-no. You’re doing good. Easy does it,” he says, recycling one of his best AA nuggets. Then quietly, “Wish you wouldn’t say the F-word in front of her.” She stares at him. He puts up his hands. His silver Seiko spun around on its loose jubilee band. He frowns and adjusts it to the right side, looking at the time, then moves the curtains. “God, not even six o’clock and it’s dark as Hades,” Young sees the graveyard, which is hard to un-see like the tombstones are bulging on a 50 foot-tall drive-up theater. Saying, SEE, you’re going to DIE, too.
He turns around in time to see Trinity snatch something off the table and jam it into her jeans pocket. “Look, I got to go.”
“What did you put in your pocket, Trin?”
“A Kleenex.” She showed him a wad of Kleenex. “Want it back?”
“No-no. I was just curious.” He sees the twenty-dollar bill on the floor. Young smiles, but nothing is funny. He feels relieved about her leaving again because he is sick of her. Young rubs his hands together like Pontius Pilate. Washing his hands of her. “Where will you go?”
“Mom’s.”
“Will he be there?”
She smirks. “Donnie? I think so, it’s his house.”
“Don’t take Chelsea to that sex offender’s house!” Young knew he shouldn’t have raised his voice. Things never go well when he raises his voice. The rooster collection concurs. The Cuckoo clock bolts out and rips one-off, “Cuckoo!”
“God, I hate that f-fricking clock!” says Trinity, jerking. The sex offender comment drifts away—WW3 avoided—saved by the Cuckoo.
The little girl starts crying. “Pop-Pop. I want my horsey. I want Horsin Wells.”
Young laughs. “Come here, you little ding-o-ling.” Young bends to her level. His knees snap. He thought Trinity might laugh and everything could be okay. But…
Trinity grabs Chelsea’s arm. Chelsea fights, “I want Pop-Pop!” It made Young feel good. He thinks you’ll see when Chelsea grows up and becomes you. Then, No God, I don’t mean that.
“I don’t think you should take Chelsea around that pervert.”
“She’s my little girl. I’ll do what I damn well please! Settle down, Chelsea.” Trinity grabs Chelsea’s shoulders and shakes her hard. Young wants to say, hey don’t do that, but just stands frozen in some kind of foggy inaction. Chelsea stops fighting, looking up at her mother with big china blue and almond-shaped eyes. She has the same upturned nose. Trinity guides her toward the door like a little stiff legged robot.
“Sure, while you’re doing God knows what with your lowlifes! What will Chelsea be doing with him? Donnie.”
She whirls around, “You’re a drunk! You don’t want us here, anyway!”
“Go. Don’t come back!” She was leaving anyway. “You got my damn jumper cables?” He says to Trinity’s back as she is lugging his barefooted granddaughter and a red Wilson’s gym bag.
Young watches Trinity rooting around in the trunk and out comes his puffy yellow Columbia winter coat. The red taillights tip over the hill. Like red eyes closing. Young thinks, some people don’t make it. Didn’t he hear that in AA? He sits on the porch and watches a flock of Canadian geese honking low and swiftly flying over the cemetery and up over the black trees. The girl on the trampoline bounces and it squeaks in its profane rhythm. He sees glimpses of her behind the fence. She was looking at him, her hair floating up, smiling.
Young stares at the tree in the yard with the low hanging tire swing. He might have to cut it down. This makes him even sadder. The roots are coming out of the ground, gnarled and ancient. Like clinched fingers holding itself upright. Leaves catching inside them. Young gets up and walks down the short driveway and gets the paper. He stares at the house. He expects the roof to be gone. It felt like a tornado had touched down and took his granddaughter. A drink comes into his mind. It had been a while…A long while.
Young gives in to the night. The kind that turns cold and black at 6:00. Things will have to be turned off soon, other things will have to be covered. His gaze falls onto the cemetery like it often does.
Image by Schanin from Pixabay – the springs on a garden trampoline in a semicircle around the rubber.
literally stories 
Christopher
Perfect description of life on the outskirts of Hell. His realizations are pefect. Especially when he realized he was sick of her.
I know these people in the larger sense. They are caught in a pattern that they will repeat over and over. Outside actions placed them into the cycle of abuse, addiction, anger and pain; and they keep waiting for another, fuzzily conceptualized, outer force to rescue them. Here, the cliches are true: you have to save yourself.
Beautifully written and layered. Another top notch story from you!
Leila
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Hi Leila
Yes indeed, addiction takes people down. There is a breaking point. Ironic, how the disease is passed down, either by genetics or learned behavior, or both. What was the saying (if it is a saying)… My parents ruined the first part of my life and my kids ruined the rest of it.
Thanks for your stellar comments!
Christopher
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Hi Christopher,
He fought to maintain his parental instincts but at the end of the day the selfishness won over. Now, that selfishness could be one of them or both of them. Maybe that is unfair saying that because a lot of behaviour is due to a want but it’s always interesting that that want overtakes any other priorities.
Leila mentioned cliche and I will throw in ‘Stereotype’. Only an excellent writer can use these. The thing is when anyone has an addiction they should always be treated as a person to anyone who comes across them. However if they are the stereotypical type, then they are hard to like, excuse or forgive. And to throw another idea into the mix, society sometimes blames everything on what is in them but let’a be honest, you get good folks and you get arseholes…No matter what they have or haven’t taken!!
Brilliant.
A very thought provoking piece of realism!!!
Hugh
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Hi Hugh
Well said! All of those things are true about addiction. The alcoholic and drug addict are sick but they are who they are, too. The debate still continues, disease vs morality.
I read “The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe,” in seventh grade English class. CS Lewis talks about “Turkish Delight,” it sure sounds like heroin… “Edmund”was all about it–very selfish. It really screwed up their family for awhile, including a terrible betrayal, but there was redemption.
Thanks for your great comments!
Christopher.
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A look at a tainted life from a different angle with the truth woven in, which takes it beyond melancholy. Excellent tone and a thought provoking and sobering (no pun meant) piece. Thank you – dd
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Hi Diane
Thanks for your kind words! Glad it came across like that. I was hoping to convey the night atmosphere and the graveyard…
Christopher
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So accurate in atmosphere & tone, restrained & gritty. The man Gibson sitting at odd hours of the night, “Thin wisps of smoke” drifting from his mouth “Like he’s already in hell” . . . the “wrinkled mask of drug addiction. . . ” Young lowering “the trunk lid like closing a book . . .” The mundane made hellish. And that graveyard which is “hard to un-see like the tombstones are bulging on a 50 foot tall drive-up theater. Saying SEE you’re going to DIE, too.” Powerful stuff.
Geraint
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Hi Geraint
Glad those details came came through! I had some trouble writing, “wrinkled mask of drug addiction.” It was one of those phrases that wouldn’t come together, but I resisted the writer’s advice of “Kill your darlings.” Then it came to me, almost like it was floating to the top. If that makes sense.
Thank you for your great comments!
Christopher.
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Christopher
When obviously scary, cheap scenes and images come my way, written by less imaginative writers, they are more likely to make me laugh. Your visions and images are so original they truly haunt and change how the story grows. That little girl on the trampoline, surrounded by dogs like “spotters or pallbearers”, with her head squeaking over and under the fence-line like a metronome is an image worthy of Poe or Rod Serling.
I’ll not forget it. Brilliant. — Gerry
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Hi Gerry
Wow really happy you liked the story! I’m glad the girl on the trampoline worked! She was central to the story. Even though she was literally on the periphery.
That was a cool way to describe her as a metronome! I think subconsciously I wanted something like that to happen, but I didn’t have it exactly formulated in my thoughts, but that’s what she was doing.
She came from real life… I have a neighbor that is always jumping on her trampoline. And when it’s raining at night, we’ll hear her squeaking.
Thanks for your comments!
Christopher
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Christopher
Your missive makes me wish to quote Tom Petty’s great song “Rebels”:
“Even before my father’s father/ they called us all rebels / as they burned our cornfields down / and left our cities leveled. / I can still feel the eyes / of those blue-bellied devils / when I’m walkin’ ’round tonight / through the concrete and metal. / Hey hey hey! I was born a rebel…”
Too many people forget that the Lost Cause was about fighting off Industrialization and Its Evils, too. THE CARPETBAGGERS WERE WAITING IN THE WINGS.
The Horror of Slavery needed to fall and it was destined to fall eventually from Day One in 1619 when the first judge said you could own a human BEING because of the color of their skin.
And I’m a Yankee so I’m an admirer of Grant and Sherman but I can still understand that Lee was a noble person caught in a bind just like George Washington was. And I know that Thomas Jefferson tried to get rid of slavery as hard as he could – it was the society itself that wouldn’t let him do it. (He eventually wearied of the struggle and gave up.)
The amount of poor white folks who suffered in the South during the Civil War is a topic that rarely gets discussed these days.
As The Band sang, “He was just eighteen, proud and brave / but a Yankee laid him in his grave.”
The entire situation is massively complex because it’s REAL LIFE and simplifying through Political Correctness does no one any favors.
Lincoln himself was a Southerner transplanted a little further north.
Vonnegut reminds me of Lincoln as much as he reminds me of Twain. Vonnegut was a writer and not a politician but his social conscience was far, far, far, far, far, far, far greater than any US politician probably since Lincoln himself (or maybe FDR).
He called himself “a Christ-loving atheist,” and he understood most of Jesus’s teachings far better than 97% of the people who go to church. (Or maybe the number is 93%.)
For me, his two greatest books are Slaughter-House Five and Cat’s Cradle. God Bless You Mr. Rosewater also good and all his stuff has redeeming things in it, sentences here and there that are gonna last.
Also love how he combined a kind of science fiction with realism, or meta-fiction with realism too.
A great great great great great writer to be admired, with a cool mustache and great hair and he liked dogs. Also relatively fearless and I believe he was a good father too.
Also an Environmentalist of massively important proportions and a Marxist but NOT of the authoritarian stripe, of the stripe that hasn’t existed yet.
His style comes STRAIGHT, no chaser, out of Indiana and the Midwest. (He lived in Chicago for a while, too.)
Finished any new stories lately??
Dale
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Hey Dale
Wow that was impressive! I wasn’t sure how my bouncing into the south (and the cancelling of such) might invoke, but you did not fail!
I had to look up “missive” (truth on the table). Love a new word!
Wow I didn’t realize Tom’s song was so charged with the Confederacy’s fight. That’s a very good point about the south being against industrialization. The mechanization of the world is killing every living thing. They were right about that…
The way the south applied slavery based on the salient skin pigment is forever shameful and horrendous, but it started in the North–go figure. It’s bad enough to have slaves, but to use a racial definition is truly evil. 400 hundred years of jamming it down people’s throats, infecting us–no wonder why race relations are nuts. It might take another 400 hundred years to get back to non bias sin.
All for the rich. “the love of money is the root of all evil” 1 Timothy 6:10. People overlook that its the love of money not money itself. The rich (besides Abe and a few others) always seem to take charge but now it’s in our face like no other time.
The Kennedy’s were rich as hell, (at least Joe Sr.) but they were truly public servants of the highest order. And killed. Such an extreme contrast between the current regime and JFK and Bobby. I think JFK’s murder killed some bright shining light in this country.
You really got me thinking about the origins of slavery. The law of it.
That said.. Most people in the south never owned any slaves. The poor picked up the rifle and died for their homes. Just like in Tom’s song. The North is lucky the religious Stonewall Jackson got killed by his own picket.
I’m reading Kurt V.s “In the Monkey House “So it goes.” I’m glad to be reading his work, so original–understatement.
Iv’e always thought Marx on paper had it going on. There must be some flaw in the power structure that creates a Stalin or a Mao. We are slipping in the direction of the authoritarian. I’m not sure if the judiciary can check the executive branch. It has never been challenged like this.
That’s cool about Kurt V living in Chicago. Midwest writers are great!
Iv’e started a few stories, but haven’t really found anything. S. King said stories are just lying around waiting to be dug up like fossils. Can’t say I’ve found any. But I think I understand my style better. I’m basically a writer of reality kind of a cigarette and beer writer that occasionally gets committed, but for only 72 hours.
Christopher
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Christopher
“Girl on a Trampoline” is another short story masterpiece from yourself that reinvents this form in a way that’s massively important for our times. Hemingway had a phrase, “cheap tricks,” he used to describe writing that falls back on tried-and-true plot devices, the usual characters we’ve all seen before, sensationalism, sentimentalism, and-or sententiousness in order to get its thing across. Your stripped-down stories which conjure up both Raymond Carver and Anton Chekhov do not have ANY cheap tricks in them at all, and at the same time, your stories are absolutely suspenseful, enthralling, and even entrancing in the way they quietly build these narratives which tell so much truth about the way Americans live now, from coast to coast. If I were to compare these stories to a songwriter and songs, two names that spring to mind are Bruce Springsteen and Johnny Cash, Springsteen for the way he writes about everyday Americans, Cash for the way he wrote about people on the edge like alcoholics and drug addicts and ex alcoholics and ex drug addicts (and I have been all of the above more than once so I know whereof I speak).
This story is totally ALIVE at every level. Joseph Conrad wrote, “A work of art must carry its justification IN EVERY LINE.” You have lived up to that near-impossible credo here. Your work reminds me of Conrad’s short stories and short novels in another way as well, in the way, that is, in which it combines both REALISM and SYMBOLISM.
Reading this story, I felt like I was in my own neighborhood while also being aware that every line and detail of this piece is ringing and singing in the lines of a pattern that are revealing a worldview both chillingly accurate and utterly original, foreboding and forbidding like Poe and magically realistic like Nathaniel Hawthorne.
There is something wrong, something very, very wrong, with the way we live now in America, and I do NOT mean just since DT took office again. This creeping wrongness has been getting slowly worse and worse for a long time, at least since 1980 and in many ways before. No one knows exactly what the real problem is, and there are many diagnoses from various specialists and experts. Your fiction deals with this WRONGNESS in an intimate, real, and true way that is paradoxically massively life affirming because IT TELLS THE TRUTH, the truth, which is never simple, never obvious, never easy, and never over.
Another theme in this story is the plain fact that: PEOPLE ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO LIVE WITH and yet WE MISS THEM ANYWAY, all the time and right up until the very end.
Almost “nothing” happens in this story, while at the very same time EVERYTHING that’s important about human life is happening in this story.
This story asks all the right questions while providing none of the false answers. That was what Chekhov said to do, and very, very, very few people have been able to do this except him since he himself did it. Your work can very much fit into this extremely rare category, and that makes it valuable beyond belief.
Inspirational, iconoclastic, individual, idiosyncratic, and universal all at once. (Everything that happens in America effects the rest of the world very much so, even, or especially, in places like Russia and China.) When put beside your other stories as a series or a collection in progress, even more impressive! Thanks for writing, American Literature very much needs you right now! Rock on!
Dale
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Hi Dale
Wow it’s always a great pleasure to read your comments/reviews! Not just of my work, (even though I appreciate them very much) but sometimes I’ll catch myself reading your comments from other writers. Your analyses are full of positives and enlightening sign posts for where our stories are going and/or aspire to go.
I’m humbled and grateful to the comparisons of my literary hero’s Carver and Chekhov. Their work means a great deal to me. Lately I have been reading Chekhov, again. Thank God he has so many stories! And I found “The Student” the one you recommended.
“The Student” is a tremendous work. How Chekhov captures the night is palpable. His retelling of Jesus and Peter is so real it seems Chekhov was there, too. So thank you for that tip!
I like this about Chekhov asking questions, and providing nothing fake.
Drugs and alcohol probably will be a sort of ghost writer with me. I don’t think you can throw yourself into the Maelstrom of addiction, (if you want to or not), and not have it control a huge part of your perspective on life. Either using or not using is the question, but there’s no “before land” in sight.
I liked what you said, “people on the edge like alcoholics and drug addicts and ex alcoholics and ex drug addicts (and I have been all of the above more than once so I know whereof I speak).” I can find myself in those words.
Joseph Conrad will be one for me to check out. I’ve read a few stories by Philip Roth, “Defenders of the faith,” that was good a one. I’m not sure why I’m equating these two writers unless its because they’re Jewish or something?
Your suggestions have been gold! I’m still lacking in the area Emily Dickinson so there’s work to be done there.
I agree with you there is something wrong in America. And it’s getting worse. The truth has taken a huge hit! They now can turn any lie into the truth.
Our enemies (our Foreign enemies) are poised for a civil war so they can clean up. But it won’t be that easy. If we lose it here. The rest of the world is going to pay and probably pay the ultimate price, too.
“Keep on Keepin”
Christopher
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Hi Christopher
Just want to say again how every single line in this story seems to do a kind of double duty. On one level, each line is “just itself,” introducing the setting and characters, letting the reader know what’s going on, etc., and that all happens in an extremely clear manner that can definitely be compared to Chekhov and Carver. On another level, each line seems to have its own depth of meaning behind that is NOT on the surface but no less present for all that. The resonance of this effect is very effective as the tale progresses, and in retrospect (after one has finished reading) the lines of the story echo in the attentive reader’s mind. Like a dream of reality, or a dream and reality same time, and since life itself is so very often dream-like, these techniques really hit home. I also believe it’s probably something you both did and did not intend, which somehow makes it even more resonant. If we all understand our own work too well, it drains it of value. Story-telling, at its best, is both set in stone and fluid as a river, if that’s even possible, which it somehow is. The clarity of your tales is second to none while the mystery of it all is also intact at every level.
Also, ALL of the characters in this story are multi-dimensional and realistic at a very high level, not just the protagonist. Even the creepy guy behind the fence with his demon-like pack of dogs is somehow very much alive and real. His disembodied voice conjures up much more than just what it is in itself, somehow. Just like life!
Bravo!
Dale
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Hey Dale
Glad you did! Thanks!
Strunk and White’s “The Elements of Style made a strong case for clarity. When I first started writing fiction in a big-addictive way. I got lost and had to use training wheels, writing simple prose. Hemingway’s short sentence style definitely made an impact. And I was amazed by Carver’s style too and the founding father, Chekhov.
These points you make are helpful in trying to understand this process. I think it’s true that the writer (this writer at least) can write the story but they may not see the full effect, or specifically say how it was created. Sometimes, I’m not even sure if something I’m writing is good, except for a feeling of excitement, but I usually know when a story doesn’t work. A floundering feeling that’s a drag and it doesn’t quite slip away until something starts clicking. I think Stephen King called it “being in the monkey house.”
On this one I was hoping for a sort of Chekhovian night atmosphere. without even realizing it, until later. His story “A Dead Body” made quite an impression on me. He can make the night so dark it’s like the sun has never shined. Like a prison of darkness, containing the characters and the light is gone, but then he introduces Jesus’s last night. Like in “The Student.” The reality of Jesus being beaten (sadly, I feel bad even writing it, and probably shouldn’t) and Peter denying him, like Jesus predicted–Thrice. It was another sort of horror. Mind blowing artistry. I learn a new word every time I read one of his stories. Like “Scullery” A wash/utility room–didn’t know that.
Wow! What you said here, “Story-telling, at its best, is both set in stone and fluid as a river, if that’s even possible, which it somehow is.” That is so poetic and true. The concrete details, and the smooth telling of the story, without the writer’s loud clacking keys. Not easy.
I’m glad the characters came through! Characters are a huge challenge for me. It’s hard to create these entities of small symbols, to make them into living people. These supporting characters have to be real, too. That means a lot to hear Gibson behind the fence came through!
Not sure if I set out to write character driven stories that consciously seek conflict. But I know it has to be there. Life is so problematic that all one needs to do is transpose it to the page and the conflict will grow like raising hell. This life is full of it at every turn. I think writers who have a lot of problems can come up with something for either creativity or escape.
Thanks for all your kind comments! I’m grateful for your insight–much to think about. Truly inspiring!
Christopher
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Christopher
Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts, feelings, and history with writing, it’s both enlightening, and inspirational, to hear about how you’ve grappled with this process, how your reading has affected yourself and your writing, and how your writing is affected by life, by LIFE ITSELF. If writing isn’t connected to life, and so much writing in our time is not connected to life itself, it simply isn’t alive, obviously enough (but not obvious to so many). Writing should be part of life, and life should be part of writing, or the whole process is dead, and dead writing doesn’t live (in the long run, or really in the short run either). (This is one reason why writing by robots is so horrible – it’s a dead thing created by something that isn’t even alive.)
Here are a few examples of what I meant when I said that so many of your details in this latest story perform double duty, that is, are themselves while also remaining, or becoming, something else entirely.
It’s also very much worth pointing out how difficult this is to achieve, without beating the reader over the head with it, and thereby entirely ruining the intended effect. But you have achieved the right, exact balance for sure. This is sometimes called “finding one’s voice.” Again, thanks for sharing so many details about how this process has unfolded for you. Send more whenever you can. Totally fascinating!
A few things that do double duty in your story:
One: Young’s name.
Two: “Things will have to be shut off soon and covered, other things will have to be turned on.”
Three: “He lowers the trunk lid like closing a book.”
Four: “The entire neighborhood is barking.”
Five: “Like he’s already burning in hell.”
Six: “Young rubs his hands together like Pontius Pilate.”
Seven: “The Cuckoo clock bolts out and rips one off…”
Eight: “She was looking at him, her hair floating up, smiling.”
That last line becomes extremely haunting given the context in which it occurs, haunting in a human way, not a supernatural way, which is more haunting than the supernatural, and is probably the main thing that leads us to the supernatural (in our minds and hearts), too.
Another thing that can be said for your writing is its sturdy, grounded, and steady effect. You are great at creating suspense seemingly WITHOUT TRYING to. And, I believe, another way you’ve found the right balance is that you never STRAIN for any effect. It all seems to arise, or come out, so naturally. Paradoxically, that is probably one of the very hardest things there is to do.
Thanks again!
Dale
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Dale
Thanks for analyzing my story in such careful detail. Double duty is a good way to handle these images. That is a neat way to understand the weight of sentences. What they are really doing. It’s a strange process how a story comes together.
I’m more of a pantsing type. I’ve tried the outline attempt, but whatever skill I have seems to grow without striking down the woods first. If that makes sense. Though I could see why people might want to write like that. Find a direction in the wilderness of creation. That’s what lured me into trying to outline the work, but it doesn’t work for me. Something gets lost in the translation.
I do take audio notes when I’m walking so I have incorporated my own version of “story control.” A lot of times its phrases that wander into the work. Something sounds better, maybe a noise or smell. Sometimes the right ending comes up to the top.
There is the everlasting debate between plotting vs pantsing. I’m not sure the writer can make a choice. One way might just fit the brain better or the art. I think the important thing is to write. To be a human writer.
I have a process on deciding what tense to write in…After a few paragraphs. I look at the (ed’s) and the (s’s). The “says” and the “said.” If I see a bunch of words ending in “ed” I go with past tense. I don’t set the tense it sets itself. I gravitate to the present tense, but I think this story was set in the past tense. In drafting I’ve changed entire stories to an alternate tense. Sometimes I get tired and give up. Then the next day I’m right back on it or something else.
Friday I spent hours answering comments on this story (not that I had a million or anything). I think a lot can be learned from listening to what people say in these comments, and it puts a finer point on the writing. I consider this as a sort of class. Like what you said about the double duty of an image. That’s gold!
On this story, I switched between the first and third person, and decided on Young as the MC. Sometimes a character fits the story. And it’s nice to get away from “The Self.” Let another person handle these problems that really do exist.
“Things will have to be shut off soon and covered, other things will have to be turned on.” That kind of set a tone at the beginning and I liked how it sounded, so I sort of followed it from that point. I tried to build on it. Death shadowed the story. Also I think a story has to have a writer’s use of language. Something poetic instead of straight reporting. SK said something like that and I think he’s right. He seems to be right about a lot of things. And he might be one of these wise people that you spoke about. In his case he is pretty famous, but if he wasn’t he would probably still be someone you might want to talk to sitting on the porch with a cup of coffee.
Wow you really picked up on that girl jumping on the trampoline! On “Schindler’s List.” A train pulls into Auschwitz and a little Polish girl takes her finger and moves it across her throat as the people watch inside the cattle cars. I always thought that was haunting and terrible. There is always one of these guides that stands on the banks of the River Styx. They enjoy watching death and misery unfold.
I agree that machine writing is dead writing. And it’s plagiarism, since the algorithms use things that have already been written. I don’t like AI audio either for the same reason, or computer generated music. They have replaced the great session musicians with variations of old soundtracks. That’s why music isn’t really identifiable now, besides generic labeling. There are no music revolutions anymore. No Grunge coming out of Seattle, New Wave, 70s… It started happening around 2000. The musicians, (not all) don’t have the same reliance on actual instruments.
Man, I rambled on like Led Zepplin II.
Fight the good fight!
Christopher
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Ananias
THANKS for sharing these further descriptions of your writing process. It’s highly inspirational, AND it shows and tells the absolute dedication that is REQUIRED if one wants to produce anything good. It reminds me of the time I said in a poem, “Poets are soldiers somehow,” where I meant that good writing requires the same type of dedication that being a good soldier requires. Good writers are a rare breed just like good military personnel are. Good writers are nothing if they are not Happy Warriors, no matter how their work is treated by others or what happens etc etc etc…
Since it’s Sunday, I want to mention one of my favorite artists, LOU REED, because he died on a Sunday.
His song “THE LAST SHOT” is well worth checking out some time, it’s one of the most masterful (and serious, and hilarious) descriptions of ALCOHOLISM I’ve ever encountered.
A lot of people, their last words are made up later by other people, etc.
Lou’s last words are not made up. They are known, factual, and documented.
The last thing he said, right before he died on a Sunday morning, was:
“TAKE ME INTO THE LIGHT.”
Dale
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Dale
Yes indeed writing takes dedication. Working on something right at this moment that is starting to take on some weight. For me there are a lot of misses. To quote SK “The muse is a hard headed guy.” Have to keep showing up.
Yes the writer is a good soldier. They have to build up their wind. And the only way is by constantly doing it and reading. But as you say he is the happy warrior.
I liked Lou Reed’s intro to Jesus’ Son. “When I’m rushin’ on my run · And I feel just like Jesus’ son.” That was very strange and super cool!
“TAKE ME INTO THE LIGHT.”
RIP Lou
PS in the comments yesterday you mention “Different Seasons.” I also mentioned “Different Seasons.” I thought, Dale is going to think I got that from his post, but it was totally coincidental, but it shows how good those 4 novellas were in that book!
Christopher
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Christopher
Yes indeed about Different Seasons. And another wild thing about the King is how many figures (not sure if you can always call them characters) he’s been able to indelibly inscribe on the American mind.
One example would be Pennywise, who still gives me nightmares – well not LITERALLY but pretty damn near! And Steve has fired the imaginations of so many filmmakers it’s truly gigantic, titanic, and also pretty darn impressive!
With Poe it’s The Raven and burial alive (like watching his mother and wife suffocate to death with tuberculosis), with King it’s Pennywise and others of his creepy ilk. Every time I see a clown I get the creeps, plus I live not too far from the river where John Wayne Gacy, who sometimes dressed up as a clown for children in schools (unbelievably, not a joke) dumped bodies after his basement was full…
King is on to something that lies deep in the American soil. Telling stories about it somehow helps.
Dale
“The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic – and a killer,” said DH Lawrence in his Studies in Classic American Literature.
PS, I love the end of King’s story “The Answer Man.”
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Dale
Yeah SK is like a cottage industry. Actually heard him say that once in a video. I hear what you are saying about all of his influence. His wife Tabitha and his two sons are also writers.
Sad about Poe’s family suffering with TB. Creepy inspiration for the Raven and maybe the “Oblong Box.” I thought “The Fall of the House Usher” was complicated, but good. I liked his detective “C. Auguste Dupin” in the “Murders on The Rue Morgue.” cool dude. I can see why you related the two authors. They are both incredibly famous.
I think I like reading short stories more, but lately I’ve been reading novels or listening to them. Still on James Burke. He has a ton of them.
That’s spooky about Gacy and that nearby river. The Killer Clown. A real life Pennywise…
I’ll have to check it out, “The Answer Man.”
Thanks
Christopher
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Hi Christopher!
How’s the wind blowing over there in Indiana?
I had a good writing run, or spree, lately. Finished three separate essays for a total word count of around 7,600…
It was a total blast and the fact that it was followed by three days of catatonia was all worth it at every level…
Now I’m getting my mental energy back…It was firing on all cylinders during the writing and then it was like hitting a brick wall, LITERALLY…
Was also reading Chekhov again.
This time I really SAW why Bob Dylan always claims Chekhov is one of his favorite writers. They have so much in common that they’re almost like TWINS.
ESPECIALLY Dylan’s albums BLOOD ON THE TRACKS and DESIRE are much like collections of Chekhov stories…
The openings of the songs and the stories, the focus on romantic love, the music, the open endings, the sadness of life, the good simplicity, the humor, and more, are all very, very related in profound ways…It was an eye opener to see HOW MUCH Dylan is like Anton…
Dylan’s song “Simple Twist of Fate” basically IS a Chekhov short story in song…
Was also listening and relistening to THE BAND song “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.” It isn’t a politically correct song but it isn’t any less great for all that.
The lines, “You take what you need and you leave the rest / But they should never have taken the very best,” as sung by Levon in a Southern voice, can be compared to many situations, not to mention what’s going on right now…It isn’t simple, but it is true…
Hope all is well. Send updates when you can!
Dale
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Hi Dale
Yes indeed the wind has been non-stop! I had to bring the flag inside–the stars and bars. Didn’t want you to think I was rockin a Confederate flag. Even though I’m not down with cancelling culture or history. Especially not history as long as it’s written not only by the victor’s slant, but by independent writers.
7600 words and three essays that’s impressive! It’s great when the writing flows. Sounds like you were in the zone! Nothing takes me away quite like a good long writing session.
My usual comment to my ex-wife is, ‘My writing is at an impasse.” if it is or not, but most of the time that’s where I’m operating from, so I spend time on old stories or jump into some reading. Been on Kurt Vonnegut, lately. I like the idea that he was from Indianapolis, plus he’s great. Even so, I’ve never read “Slaughter House Five.”
That’s interesting and cool about Dylan liking Chekhov. Chekhov has a long reach influencing other artist.
That’s a haunting song by The Band. There are a few guitar cords that Robbie Roberson hits that I listen for and kind of saveur.
Glad you are doing well in the big city!
Christopher
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CJA
After his demise, Marx’s still-irritated mother-in-law quipped, “I wish Karl had made some capital, instead of just writing about it.”
True story! LOL…
Not only did Karl not love money, he never did much to get any for himself or his family, either (he left that up to other people and somehow it happened although they were always in poverty or more often near-poverty).
In the USA at least, Karl Marx has got to be the most misunderstood philosopher of all time (on both the left and the right). He was a philosopher first, an economist second, just like the great Adam Smith, and these two figures have far, far more in common than anyone in America has so far realized. (Probably an overstatement but not by much.)
Adam Smith called it “THE VILE MAXIM,” which is the principle which all the billionaires seem to live by these days: Worry about yourself and ONLY yourself. Smith was very very much against this way of living, as was (of course) Karl. (And you are right, JFK didn’t follow this maxim; he also put his life on the line during WW2.)
The way the world is being run now is simply NOT sustainable on so many levels. As a dreamer and an idealist (as well as a realist) I have to believe there’s a better way, and humanity will keep inching its way forward toward that better future…and there will always be set-backs, but sometimes set-backs are really LEAPS FORWARD in disguise…
More later on all your fascinating, brilliant and cool comments! Thanks for writing back…
DWB
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Dale
I’m not really that familiar with Marx, beyond knowing he was a German Philosopher. My capitalistic school history courses didn’t say much. Adam Smith and “The Wealth of Nations” was brought up, but not really satisfactory, either.
It is interesting to think how Marx came up with communism. But as a real person he seems to be just a doctrine, vilified by Stalin and the gang(s). But I’m sure Marx was much more. Funny how he had an aversion to money, but that makes sense too. I think he would chip in on a twelve pack and make sure four people each got three beers, but there’s always that drunk that will hog five! His theory was well meaning, I think. It just doesn’t work, but for a few.
Yes JFK `captained a PT Boat. A real bad ass with a lot of ailments including Addison’s Disease. He put his life on the line and now we have this administration. At least Hitler was a real soldier, even won the iron cross for bravery.
I think Marx was right about the failure of capitalism being monopolies. And Smith’s ‘limited resources for unlimited wants” may help prove it. At least in the over production of plastic–creating pollution–killing the world.
I’m not sure what we are inching our way to. I think sooner or later a mad man will set off those 100 megaton nukes just to watch it burn. Revelations (by fire)
Christopher
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Hi Christopher!
As it says in The First Letter of John:
“I write to you, not because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it.”
As it also says, “If we walk in the light as he walked in the light, we will be in the light.” (“Take up your cross and follow me…”)
Then they can do whatever the hell they want to, and it won’t matter!
((“In my end is my beginning.” – T.S. Eliot))
Funny how they stuck John all by himself out on the Isle of Patmos because he knew the truth…(If not the same John literally, in spirit the same…)…
You know how to think about the big questions, and that’s profoundly consoling…
More later
Dale
One more quote for now which I may have quoted before:
“Nero can kill me but he can’t harm me.” – a Stoic philosopher
Or just TERRIFIED of a nuclear war and trying to make myself feel better!…LOL
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((“In my end is my beginning.” – T.S. Eliot))
Good quotes! This life seems like, every breath is in the vacuum of death.
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Hey Dale
Got one coming out on Tuesday. Have to see what you think.
Been reading some Joyce Carol Oates. I think “Where are you going, where have you been” ranks way up there on the list for great short stories.
Also back on Denis Johnson’s “The Throne of the third heaven…” Very long title–a book of poetry. And a work of tinfoil art in the Smithsonian.
I’ve noticed I need silence to read poetry. It requires thought. I like Denis’s style.
Got any new ones coming out on LS?
Have a good one!
Christopher
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Hi Christopher!
COOL about Tuesday! I will be there! Totally looking forward to it…anything new by you is an event.
I have two LS things coming out in April (pretty sure), the month of poetry: the subject for these pieces being none other than LEILA ALLISON. Stay tuned! It’s good stuff…One is an 8,000-word interview with Leila! (not sure of dates yet etc)…My questions are amazing, and her answers are even more brilliant, inspirational and revelational in a Shakespeare kind of way…
I remember that Joyce Carol Oates story, I used to use it in some of my creative writing classes b/c I thought it was so good.
Also remember some of DJ’s poetry. I never read all of it, but I did explore some of it. I don’t remember if that included the book you mention. I do remember thinking that a lot of his poetry had the same energy, compression and worldview as JS – which = great.
I had a wild experience last night when I discovered a lost work I wrote two-plus years ago and then totally forgot about. An essay about Jerry Lee Lewis which I wrote right after he died (in October 2022). I was writing a lot of poetry at the time and the essay was penned quickly then put away and forgotten about until last night.
I have a closet full of old written things that I was assuming is just rough drafts and things that aren’t usable, etc etc., but now this is making me wonder how many other good things I may have written and forgotten about!
I deal with the anxiety of that just like I deal with all other anxieties…I’m not in charge, and fate (God) will take care of it…
More later!
Dale
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Dale
Thanks! Wow 8000 words that’s going to be an event! It sounds fascinating!
Yes the poetry I’m reading does sound like J’
Son, or I’m hearing it because I know DJ wrote it. I’m really interested by that fact alone. But that aside it seems like good stuff. I feel kind of good–attempting some poetry.
That’s cool that you taught that story by Joyce C O. It was published in 1966 early in her career.
That must have been a pleasant surprise to find that lost work about Jerry Lee Lewis and seeing the merit in it. That is a great feeling reading some old work and finding the value in it. Like at the time the shine is worn off by the labor and it is put aside. Then later the luster comes through. I find myself occasionally in that position.
I hear what you are saying about anxieties. I can kick up a storm of it about anything it seems. I have a sort of countering mantra that goes, ‘It’s gonna work out.” After watching “The Secret” it made me realize the universe delivers what we think it will. And God is definitely in charge.
Christopher
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Christopher
…AND Thank God KAFKA both diagnosed, and lived, The Age of Anxiety!
I was just rereading an old-time favorite of mine, a GREAT, Kafkaesque short novel: THE STRANGER by Albert Camus.
And the prose style in this novella is Raymond Carver before Raymond Carver.
A riveting, fast-paced, beautiful, nightmarish, ultimately liberating tale…the second half narrated from prison while awaiting execution right up to the moment they lead him out of his cell…Camus imagined this so well it’s shocking and it may as well be called “nonfiction” it’s so true.
Camus’ THE STRANGER is also like a companion book to Jesus’ Son…almost the same length too. The protagonists are like TWINS (French and American)…
More tomorrow…
Dale
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Hey Dale
Anxiety is so baffling!
That sounds like a great story “The Stranger” might look it up on my library app. Found it!
Anything that sounds like Carver is probably good and a companion to J.S. Sounds great!
“The Penal Colony,” by Kafka was a strange one– that machine–used for executions. Kafka was so great. I always feel like I’m missing something not rereading some of these authors.
Christopher
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Great work. The pacing kept me reading. Young is drawn very well, as is Trinity. A sad, true story, to me,.
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Hi EKRATZ123
Thanks so much! Glad you liked the story!
Christopher
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Raw and unflinching. Hopefully Chelsea can overcome a horrible start to her life.
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Hi David
Thanks for your comments! I hope so too.
Christopher
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Yikes
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Whatever that means. Not worried. I’ll take the good and leave the rest! You’re in the latter.
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The trouble is, nobody seems to have any long-term plans, except maybe to end up in the cemetery. I like the line “a tornado of dogs.” If it wasn’t for those darn dogs, the cemetery would be a peaceful place. Young’s trying to help Trinity but only she can save herself and her daughter, who she appears not to care about. Everyone’s going to hell in a handbasket. I would recommend Young buy himself a trampoline and get some bounce back.
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Thanks for your comments.
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There is great depth and observance in this story that works so well to make it so real, sad, and gritty in the way it does. The details and mini-vignettes are superb and this is a story that stays with you for a while.
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Glad you liked the story! Thanks for your comments and kind words!
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