This is the First Time I've Ever Mentioned Tao Lin

Apparently there has been a controversy (litroversy?) over a story published at MuuMuu House. “Adrien Brody” by Marie Calloway. I like Rae Bryant’s take. Super intelligent and just the right tone.

MuuMuu House is a Tao Lin production. Tao Lin gets mentioned an awful lot in the indie lit world. This is the first time he’s been mentioned here.

It seems people like to take positions concerning Tao Lin. My official position on Tao Lin is: meh.

My official position on “Adrien Brody” is: I’d have liked to have seen it as a 450 word prose poem.

Full disclosure: I didn’t read the whole 15,000 words. I found it not to my tastes.

This Caitlin Horrocks story in Paris Review is to my tastes.

As is this Robb Todd piece at The Fiddleback.

Both those stories take place in a normal kind of day and are written in clear prose. And yet, the voices are beautiful and the impacts lasting.

I got into a period last year where I moved too far away from direct storytelling. I blame Matt Bell. How They Were Found has some brilliant stories written in structurally innovative ways; I read it early in 2011 and was so impressed I wanted to try some formal experimentation, too. Turns out, I can’t do what Matt does. Or, perhaps, rather, my most true voice cannot accommodate too much fiddling with form.

Last year was mostly a lost year publishing wise. But I think it was a very significant writing year. Even if 98% of what I wrote in 2011 will never leave my file folders.

By all accounts, Marie Calloway is very young. I wonder what she’ll be writing when she’s 40.

I wonder what I’ll be writing when I’m 40.

I’ll be 40 in 2.75 years.

People tell me this makes me young, too.

This Other Thing

I should be revising a novel; instead I burned a week on one of the worst short stories I’ve ever written. That’s probably not true. I’ve probably written worse, but this one is closer so it feels uglier.

I do this a lot. Write bad stories. Sometimes I even submit them. Sometimes I submit them repeatedly. Then, one day, I read them and I see that they are bad and I feel ashamed about that, although, truly, there shouldn’t be anything shameful about producing bad art. Not giving up your seat on the bus to an old lady – that’s shameful. Failing at art? Hell, least you’re focused on something outside of your own personal comfort, right?

And yet...

I don’t know. I wish I could better identify a bad story early on – like before I even start writing it. Time trickles into this jar beneath me and I can’t get it back and more time just keeps falling and I know this shouldn’t make me all antsy, but it does. I believe I have some great writing within me, but it takes so damn long to extract that I could die before I ever hit the main vein. That’s what this is about, of course. Death being what everything is about. Even love, I think. Although that’s probably one of those simple statements that sounds profound but is really just simple.

I’m a bad reviser. I try to correct every little thing and I obsess on those things too much and just end up making things fake and inaccessible. I can’t seem to shake the belief that all things CAN be corrected with the right effort. I’m not talking writing, although it applies in full to that. I’m talking about my state of being. My mistakes ... well ... I don’t ever believe things are ruined. I believe, if I just work at it, I can fix what I broke. This, I think, seems admirable. Or, at least, that’s what I’d tell someone who told me they don’t give up on fixing what they broke. But sometimes shit is just broke. It’s trashed. And all the tape and glue will never make it anything more than this wad of tape and glue that somewhat resembles an unbroken thing.

I wish I had more time, or started earlier, which is the same thing in a way.

I wrote a story about a rainbow because I dared myself to. It’s pretty good, I think. Then I wrote a story about two women who are married and have no genitalia – because someone suggested I should write such a story. That’s the horrible one referenced above. I would’ve thought the results would’ve been the other way around. Then, again, I thought Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was going to better than 30 Rock. Sometimes premise and potential are nothing. Sometimes it’s just about knowing who you are and not trying to be this other thing.

This other thing. Whatever that is today.

Remembering the Ohs

I wanted to do a best list for the decade. You know, my picks for best movies and books and short stories and music and, I dunno, food trends. But I don’t really remember a lot of that – or at least I don’t remember it in any quantifiable way, in a way I can sort and post in a pithy list form.

So this is what I’m going to do. I’m posting my most memorable moments of the decade. Those personal moments that have stuck with me. Because, hell, it’s my blog. So, here we go:

I remember meeting my wife. A wine tasting. Too much wine but not so much as to dull. Not so much as to make that first kiss anything less than spinning, lost, thrown through time. I remember sitting on my stoop a week later and looking at her beside me and knowing I loved her. Knowing. Knowing, knowing.

I remember the births of both my children. The first long and fogged. Everything torn from me except love. The second like completion. Like fate.

I remember 9/11. I remember crouching in the bathroom at my office and crying because I could think of nothing else to do. I remember walking down 17th Street in DC that night and seeing all the bars full. I remember being able to talk about nothing else for weeks and singing the national anthem alone in my car.

I remember moving back to Texas. I remember my son, a toddler then, running circles in the empty living room and realizing this would be the first home he’ll ever know.

I remember poker. Which poker? I don’t remember. But I remember a lot of pocket aces and pocket seven twos off. I remember my heart beating my ribs as I waited on a stranger to call or fold. I remember the pride of a big stack. And the hollowness of a short one.

I remember a perfect double rainbow seen while in a traffic jam on I-95.

I remember my son reaching up and wiping a tear from my cheek as we laid my grandfather to rest.

I remember my dog falling through the ice in the middle of a lake and somehow living.

I remember a single bite of transcendent sushi from Bar Charlie.

I remember a lot more. New friends. Travels. All those kisses from my kids. All those walks. And all those nights spent awake into the wee hours as I tried to find that perfect word for that ultimately failed story. Hell, there is so much to remember. Just the other day I was joking with my wife that it’s a shame we didn’t do anything this decade. Really, I’m not sure we could’ve done more. Despite the troubles the world faced these past ten years, I’ll remember the ohs (the aughts?) for so many good things. So many personal things. Things that seem much more lasting than any movies or books or albums. As great as some of them were. As much as they deserve lists of their own.

Do Not Hit Delete

I used to write a lot of political commentary that appeared on various blogs of various acclaim. I did this for around four years before giving it up so I could focus more time on my fiction. But here’s the thing: if you looked at my opinions circa 2005 and then looked at my opinions circa 2009, you’d find a few inconsistencies. O.k., a lot of inconsistencies. That doesn’t bother me because those inconsistencies are really just a record of my political evolution. I like that I can trace my growth in knowledge and shifts in philosophy. So why do I sometimes feel different about my published fiction? Why do I occasionally want to delete the links to some of my older stories?

Here’s the truth: anytime anyone mentions they liked one of my stories and say they’re going to read all the stories I link to here, I get a palpitation. Seriously. What if they don’t like anything else I’ve written? What if they decide the first story of mine they read is the only worthwhile thing I’ve ever written?

But that’s stupid. And I know it. First of all, I’ve never submitted to a journal I don’t respect. So, if they published a story of mine (even five years ago), I gotta respect their decision. Sure, maybe I don’t write in that style that anymore. Maybe I think I write better now. Maybe a few of my stories now represent everything I’m trying to get away from in my fiction. Maybe, maybe, maybe. What’s the point of fretting? I wrote it. Someone I respect published it. Let it live as a record of my writerly evolution, right?

And that’s why every story I’ve ever published is linked to here. Because, after those palpitations recede, I really do want to keep that record.

No Good, Very Bad ...

I want to walk to the store to buy bread. And milk. But it's raining and cold. And in a couple of hours I have to go get a flu shot. Why do I feel like I'm in a children's picture book and should now threaten to go live in Australia?

A Fanboy Moment

Is it wrong for a writer’s blog to post about football? And is it extra-special wrong if that posting has no merit outside of fanboy blathering? Should I not leave such fanboyishness to the sports bloggers?

I think not. And here’s why: In the last six months, I’ve winnowed. One by one, I’ve dropped the distractions in my life, pulling everything inwards so that my entire attention is focused exclusively on my family, my closest friends and my writing. Except I can’t slice off every extraneous bit. There has to be something dangling free. And that thing is the Dallas Cowboys.

Why is this important today? Because it’s minutes from December. And while the rest of the world gears up for the holidays and parties and too many sweets, I’m bracing for the dreaded December Slump. Like the first cold snap of the year. Like mall Santa’s with fake beards. You know it’s coming and there’s no good way to avoid it. The team is 8-3 now. A 9-7 finish is not unfathomable. In fact, I can easily fathom it. If only I knew how to prevent it. If only the team knew how to prevent it.

Here’s my strategy: don’t be Charlie Brown trying to kick the ball. I’ll get excited if we’re still playing come mid January. Until then, Lucy can just hold that ball. I’ll watch but I got better things to do than get worked up. Because, hey, nothing says you’re indifferent quite like a late-night blog post.

Submission Realization

Was reading submissions this weekend for Splinter Generation and came to a realization:

Man, this generation is lonely. Story after story about lonely people looking for connections. Is there a reason for that? Maybe every generation feels cut off. But I can't help but think there's so much more to be cut off from nowadays. Like, maybe loneliness increases the more you're aware of how many people you don't know. One of six point seven billion.

I'm going to go pour myself a drink and think about that for awhile.

Fever Dreams

While sick, I went to sleep trying to think of the perfect story. I spent the whole night dreaming in colors, each thought a string of blue or red or green or orange flying away from me and then yarning up all around, out of my reach and yet somehow scraping against my head, pressing me inwards so that even more colored string burst out until I could see only shapes -- but not shapes like we're taught. Nothing measurable. Formless forms. A geometrical freakshow of thought baked at 103.

And Now ... Another Writer's Blog

I've blogged for years ... as a political blogger. But this is a new venture, a virtual home for the fiction writing side of my life.

Mainly, I'll post various thoughts and ramblings about writing and writers I like. And, of course I'll use this space to promote and catalog my published stories. Yeah, I'm not looking to revolutionize the genre of "writer blog". But I hope to provide some interesting thoughts from time to time -- and a way for people to easily find me.

Thanks for stopping by.