tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79524982825856011522024-03-13T10:46:09.961-07:00Eaten By WolvesEatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.comBlogger36125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-54355691584990513442013-06-22T22:27:00.000-07:002013-06-22T22:27:15.676-07:00Going home and it bringing to mind your family members' mortality and thus your own. long time since last post. what, a year? dammit. i should either give up or be much better at this by now.<br />
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this is another sort of call to arms, writing-wise, to myself. i don't know what it'll accomplish yet.<br />
<br />
this weekend--friday, saturday--my middle sister and i left springfield to visit our family in cassville, a very small town an hour away and where we grew up. we'd set aside the time a month in advance because going home is sort of important to us, in various ways difficult to verbalize.<br />
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the reason for our going was--if we ever need one--was to see some obscure relatives of our mother's who'd be down for this weekend only. a death in the family prevented them from coming. so it goes. we came down anyway.<br />
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home-going's always weird and lovely and sad. and that's what i want to address, here. the concept of home itself is tricky: i call cassville home, sometimes, usually to close friends. But it doesn't seem right.<br />
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i heard there's a saying that goes a man knows where he's from when he knows where he wants to be buried. i don't want to be buried in cassville, or springfield, or maybe missouri, for that matter.<br />
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we went out to fast food restaurants, like always. even when my parents come up to sgf i can't get them to go to a decent, real restaurant. we bought booze and s'mores makings and set up for a campfire. before we did that, a friend of mine and my sister's from that older time visited and the three of us visited an old haunt, changed now just so as to be bothersome a little, but the smells were the same, the view. something's always different and something else is the same. we walked back through our odd little town, how odd especially now, from a perch outside, and the highway smelled new but stretched the same, houses empty now but subject to the same projections. <i>that house, i've always associated with Halloween, or </i>the devil and god are raging inside me, <i>or when grandma was really into gardening. </i>highways in small towns, my city friends, are uniquely spooky places. i've written about it before, and damned if the subject won't turn up again sometime. one of those things i think about.<br />
<br />
we got back to the bonfire and told ghost stories, things i've never been good at telling. i get nervous i'll give away too much so i go for laughs. it was a great time. dad told us about his ufo encounter.<br />
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when the people who raised you are preternaturally smart but are open to impossibilities, i love that.<br />
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so eventually we left, which is good, because staying too long would turn me soft. being there for any amount of time makes me drowsy, in a land-of-nod sort of way. things are too easy, dreamlike.<br />
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***</div>
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distance and death work together. it's weird with your family, and it was vague, nebulous, in my head until my sister articulated it on the drive home. (car held together, thank god.) part of the sadness about returning to your parents' house is that the span of time and distance has mortalized them. being on your own brings you to responsibility, to adulthood, so on, and this weaves a web of understanding about the vulnerability of your people. i realize that this works especially for me because my life hasn't been touched by much death. obviously, i've never lost a parent. </div>
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or maybe it's not death, so much as it is this: in establishing your own adultness, the narrative of your life is no longer parallel to that of your parents, it breaks away, and so their narrative line is vulnerable without your attention. the danger of initiating change in you life is in the realization that things have been changing all along. the power of it is (hopefully) the coping mechanisms you get along the way, the adaptability. </div>
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anyway you spin it, i suppose:</div>
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death = change = death = change...and so on.</div>
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going home is a realigning with the narrative you grew from, in which you return to the hub from which so many directions were open to you, and are closed now, but still offer something. i just don't know what that something is. </div>
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***</div>
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Bury me at a crossroads. </div>
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EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-85684702005251681622012-06-05T17:06:00.001-07:002012-06-05T17:06:21.558-07:00ThingsYeesh, the blogging interfacey thing's all different now. My inspiration can't keep up with technology, apparently. This is a burgeoning problem for three-sentences-per-year-of-my-own-accord type guys like me. And it's been even longer since my last horror story thing. Oh well. Society's loss.<br />
<br />
Here are the haps now: two semesters after this summer left of undergrad, so a year left in SGF (that's what folks down in <i>el centro </i>call Springfield), which I've taken a new appreciation of since losing my wheels and taking to the streets hobo-style. I walk six miles a day, to and fro my Spanish summer class. There really is a niceness to walking through the residential parts of the city, especially early in the morning and especially if you don't mind the inexplicable "Fuck you!"'s some people feel inclined to shout at you with a really unreasonable-seeming anger. I've seen a bunch of gorgeous flowers thick with biology dangling from a large kind of tree I've never seen before. I've appreciated as never before the miracle-affirmingness of a breeze on a blistering afternoon. I've established--weirdly--a stronger sense of my personal identity than I've ever had before, and it all has to do with some sort of dynamic in being a slow-moving human being in a realm of faceless, ridiculously fast machines. This new-refound identity I think has a lot to do with rekindling my fantasies of vagabonding: in the next couple years, barring dramatic and unfortunate life changes, I'm gonna hit the road on a motorcycle into South America, and I'm not going to stop til I hit Cape Horn. (That's Cape Horn, not gay porn. Not phonetically emphasizing this distinction is a fun conversation starter.) Ireland, too, in the near future. Simplification is going to be the key to making this all happen: the realization that experience, and not material is the fundamental driving force of happiness, and a generator of psychic (meaning w/r/t/ the psyche) awareness established within me this idea, and it feels good to know that its almost certainly true. And I kind of have my car breaking down to thank for allowing me to realize all this. All of which being said, I can't wait to get the bitch back up and running.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-16212724564729897732012-01-04T10:00:00.000-08:002012-01-04T10:00:36.685-08:0001/04/2012First post of the New Year, less than a couple weeks out from starting the new semester (my third-to-last as an undergrad) and actually doing some writing. Revising my story written in class last semester, then submitting it to a few hopefuls, then I'm planning on trying out a couple ideas that've been fermenting in my head for the last few months. For the first time in a long time, I'm looking forward to the future.<br />
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Part of it has to do with acclimating more or less to Springfield; a personal (not New Year's) resolution to try and be a tad more social (read: go outside a couple times a week, and not just for work); waking up on January 1st in an amazing mood (it's gotta mean something, right? I all but hopped out of bed, made a huge breakfast, opened the blinds, listened to joyful music, <i>and </i>I even had to work that day. Weird.); and discovering that my ex is happy with someone else. Maybe I can begin to move on a little more smoothly now.<br />
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This Summer I'm planning on hitting the road for a week. Either heading to L.A. to see a dear friend or up to Duluth to spend a few days by myself in somewhere I've never been. I'm going to attempt some songs.<br />
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This Fall I'm submitting apps to as many grad schools, in as many places, as possible. Iowa, Florida, Oregon, New York, New York again, North Carolina, Montana, California. So many possibilities. I feel like I'm actually getting somewhere in my life. Maybe it's an illusion, but I'll take the placebo.<br />
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I've been reading more and more in depth than I've been able to in a while. Bee tee dubs, I strongly recommend Francine Prose's <i>Reading Like A Writer, </i>John Jeremiah Sullivan's <i>Pulphead, </i>and Bolano's <i>The Savage Detectives. </i><br />
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</i><br />
This year, I'm also hoping to start an online (and maybe eventually print) literary/arts journal with Jerika.<br />
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Off to lunch, then to continue writing. Better, more in-depth blog soon.<br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
Here's hoping this isn't one of those phases:<br />
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Much love, MatthewEatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-24869857705107090062011-12-01T12:59:00.000-08:002011-12-01T13:22:56.310-08:00Start something that means somethingYes, I've not posted on here in some time. Reasons are myriad, but mostly have to do with too much college, too much work, too much pressure to talk about things I knew I'd feel compelled to address, after so long.<br />
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I'm at the end of my first semester at MSU; three more, at least, to go before moving on to grad school at god-knows-where. Iowa, hopefully, Wash U. a strong runner up in hopefulness. Syracuse, Cornell; I aim high. <br />
<br />
Lots of things learned this semester. Did some of the best work of my literary career, short and punctuated by unproductive, awkward silences though it may be. Met some amazing people in the move to Springfield. Lost some amazing people in the move to Springfield. Lost the girl I thought was going to be my future and first it was all right because I thought I understood, but then I didn't and it was a monstrous hurt. Suffered through black periods that drained the very color and sound from the world, it seemed. Halloween and my birthday passed in a curious, almost guilty silence. I just remember early, gray darkness. Did things that make me question my essential decency as a person (Amanda, I'm sorry: things should've been different from the beginning) and discovered things, thoughts, books, and people that lit the world back up, reignited the countless noise-machines that joyously keep me up at night. I knew and know still what it's like to have, literally, no money. I'm both okay and not okay with it. I'm the 99%, bitches.<br />
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My future is entirely realigned, and it looks beautiful. I'm no longer chagrined, as long as I get it right, this time. I think I will. <br />
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I still miss the ocean. I still feel empty on certain levels. Am I still confused? Fuck yes, I am. But things are looking better. Two more years and perhaps I can leave the sorrowful Midwest. See that ocean again, and let it wash my bones anew. <br />
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Love, love, love,<br />
<br />
MattEatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-32602100994779546612011-08-06T18:45:00.000-07:002011-08-06T18:53:43.977-07:00HowlerWerewolf novels, good ones anyway, are pretty few and far between. I can think of, let's see. . . <i>Cycle of the Werewolf, </i>by Stephen King. David Wellington's adequate but wanting <i>Frostbite </i>trilogy. (I really shouldn't leave out Toby Barlow's epic poem <i>Sharp Teeth, </i>incredibly beautiful as it is.) Ben Percy's werewolf novel <i>Red Moon </i>is slated for release next fall, and looks promising, based the strength of his past work. But as a whole, people typically have trouble writing about werewolves, or they're written about but tragically misrepresented; I can think of those dubious books about the female werewolf mechanic w/ tattoos. (I've never read them, but they look awful; if I'm wrong, by all means, set me straight,) and werewolves-lite of <i>Twilight.</i> Maybe, as a genre, the werewolf story works best in a visual medium; werewolf movies outnumber novels by surely an impressive ratio, and even SK's <i>Cycle </i>would lose about 50% of its charm/power if one were to toss out Bernie Wrightson's chill-inducing illustrations. Maybe the werewolf concept works best as a metaphor; King as pointed out pretty efficiently that <i>The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde </i>is more or less a werewolf story. So is the history of Nazi Germany, the Salem Witch trials, etc. (the werewolf being the symbol of the unleashed, uninhibited beast-within.) Perhaps with such potent examples of vile transformations in human history, most writers feel it is unnecessary to rewrite the tale, so to speak. <br />
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For whatever reason, werewolves are somewhat neglected fodder for horror writers. Which is a shame really, as they can be terrifying and tragic all at once, and if that isn't a recipe for drama, I don't know what is. People are perhaps drawn to them for this reason. Lon Chaney was a victim more than a villain, etc. My own fascination with werewolves probably stems from the hand that Fate plays in their appearance on the scene. They seem to simply occur. Out on a foggy moor, or across a shadow-strewn lawn, etc., without apparent design. They're waiting out there, a metaphorical catastrophe when we least expect or are prepared for them. This is sort of the spirit of my own werewolf story (see <i>A horror story, </i>the blog I posted last February, a few posts down.)<br />
<br />
Anyway, a new book that creates some interesting new perspectives on werewolves was published a few weeks ago. It's called <i><a href="http://the%20last%20werewolf/">The Last Werewolf</a></i><i>, </i>and it's written by a gent named Glen Duncan. It's basically a thriller, a hardcover thing meant to be peddled from the best-seller racks from major retailers. But it's also incredibly well-written; it's literate yet thrilling in a way that only certain British books can be. The protagonist is a 200-year-old werewolf by the name of Jacob Marlowe, a well-read, cool in a Ricky Gervais sort of way, philosophizing, tired guy who's killed hundreds of people over his, er. . . career. He's the last of his kind, etc. after an international paranormal police organization has killed of every other werewolf. So now he's in the cross-hairs. There are the usual conflicts; firstly, he's tired of life and would more-or-less turn himself in as a soon as not. Then later, after goings-on, he decides he'd like to live. Even later, that he'd <i>really </i>like to live. There are vampires, who of course are the werewolves arch-nemesis. Yet, the vampires want him alive for their own purposes (werewolves apparently hold the secret to allowing vampires to strut around in daylight.) The plot is as tightly-wound and as expertly constructed as any you'll come across. The differentiating thing is the writing and the moral issues raised. The writing, as I said, is as intelligent and irony-tinged as it comes. It's entertainment literature of the highest caliber. Jake is also a terrible hedonist; some of the most carefully detailed scenes involve anal sex with prostitutes. (Also, the most irritating error on the part of Duncan is an ill-advised description of werewolf vagina. I just didn't want to hear about it.) But Jake makes things interesting with his too-cool sense of humor and by waxing poetic about the meaning, or lack thereof, of it all. As in life, moral implications of killing and devouring people, etc. I wish I had some passages to illustrate here, but I'm too lazy to dig them up (also, I didn't use a highlighter on the book as per usual; the book is just too pretty, and I couldn't bring myself to besmirch the pages. You'll just have to buy it, gentle reader. [Oh wait, I do remember something: Jake is captured at one point, and is left in a cage, in wolf-form, with a "snack" provided by his captors. The snack, of course, is a bound man who's shitting himself in diarrhea-inducing terror. Jake, in an effort to appear nonchalant to his captors, tries his darndest to abstain from slaughtering the poor man. The chapter ends. The next begins, simply, with, "Reader, I ate him." Dry, cool wit, etc.]) All in all, it's a cheap, predictable book that's super smart and as fun as anything you'll ever read. <br />
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Wells. That's all I have to say about that. Let me know what you think, if you read the book. Give me suggestions for other books or just input on werewolves in general. (BTW, for another excellent genre-mashing book, I really recommend DeWitt's <i>The Sisters Brothers, </i>a super-unique take on the western. It's recently been nominated for the Man Booker, which is incredible.)EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-65879440850972903842011-07-29T10:03:00.000-07:002011-07-29T10:03:50.736-07:00Why I'm huddled in a fetal position 87% of the time.Perhaps if you were to see me lately, you would ask the question that would be answered by a blog titled what this blog is titled.<br />
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Lord. Here it is, late late July. No apartment for sure. Haven't contacted other Wal-Mart yet, out of fear of jinxing our apartment-getting chances by offering cruel fate an opportunity for mischief. I'm covered in stress-related hives all the time and have about $80 to my name. If I had more money I'd be less worried, or equally worried but with the alcohol to deal with it.<br />
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I've been trying to escape from this potential killing-spree-inducing stress by voiding my emotional bowels and entering into a kind of psychic purgatory. Or lavatory. No, no, it's purgatory. I've also escaped into literature.<br />
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In the past week I've read three entire books. Not bad, considering I've been stuck on <i>The Four Fingers of Death </i>and <i>The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris </i>since their respective release dates. For those of you who don't keep up with such things, it's been a while. Anyway, I thought a decent way to further distract myself is to write about what I read:<br />
<ul><li>This Monday, I needed to get cash out of my account, so instead of going to the bank or ATM, I figured I'd help the economy a bit and buy something and then get cash back with the purchase. So I went to Wal-Mart and bought a seven dollar paperback copy of <i>The Hunger Games. </i>The reason I needed cash soon dissolved, so I was stuck with nothing to do for the whole day. So I read the book. It's surprisingly quite decent; thrilling, even, in a not-put-down-able way. There's something about YA books: namely, they remind me of my young adulthood, but also, they're refreshingly well-plotted. Plot is something not marketable to adult-adults, so they throw 'em in with the YA crowd. I myself have always been a reluctant (some might say; defective) plotter of stories, so I felt <i>The Hunger Games</i> was a healthy read. Recommended, if you have a free day. </li>
<li>Thrilled that I actually not only finished something I started, but all in <i>one day</i>, I looked for other short books to read in, similarly, one day; this is my new high. So I plucked Daniel Woodrell's <i>Winter's Bone </i>from my overburdened shelves and speed-read away. I'd read the novel years before, and it left quite an impression on me, but I ended up forgetting 90% of the action. E.i., when I saw the incredible movie version, it was more or less like a totally unfamiliar story line. I figured it had to have been highly modified, but the reread corrected me: the movie's pretty much word-for-word. I just don't remember too good sometimes. But anyway, a near-perfect book, full of whiskey-drenched poetry and winter inimical. PS: Bit o' trivia, recently discovered that Jennifer Lawrence of <i>Winter's Bone </i>film fame is playing the lead in the movie version of <i>The Hunger Games. </i>Crazy how dat shit works eh?</li>
<li>Wednesday afternoon I received Hill/Rodriguez's <i>Locke & Key </i>v. 4. If you've never read or heard of this comic series, hang your head in shame. Then log onto some indie-cred-bearing online bookseller and buy all four volumes. It's the best thing you'll ever have linked to your name. I'll devote an entire single blog to it soon, so I won't give to much away, except to say that the series is better-written than 97% of all literature written between 10,987 BC and now. </li>
</ul>Other than that, I've recently discovered Spotify, and am diligently using the bitch for all it's worth. Two words: Wye Oak!!!EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-26275142046885638502011-07-13T21:49:00.000-07:002011-07-13T21:49:15.526-07:00Homeschooled Twi-tards unite!!!Well, I'm not proud to say it, but on the last two consecutive evenings, I've--willingly, non-regrettingly, even,-- set myself down in an easy chair, popped the top on a ginger ale, and hit play on a <i>Twilight Saga </i>DVD. Please, let me explain. <br />
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Pop Culture Phenomena have always held a certain fascination for me. As much as I can't stomach most of them, I hold a respect for them that seems to be lacking in most of my irony-drooling peers. Surely, by their very nature, PCP's tell us something about ourselves, our culture, our standing at this point in history, etc. Many times, what they indicate about the masses is somewhat discouraging-- Kesha, say. Other times, they represent reality in a skull-numbing way that higher art would never even begin to imagine representing, because it's so disappointingly <i>un</i>romantic (I'm thinking of <i>The Bachelor/ette</i>, here. As David Shields points out in <i>Reality Hunger, </i>this show "tells us more about the state of unions than any romantic comedy could ever dream of.")Anyway, close attention to PCP's can give one a glimpse at various profundities in play within the current <i>zeitgeist. </i><br />
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Anyway, <i>Twilight, </i>certainly falling into the PCP category, has always particularly held a sort of intrigue for me, an appeal that I've never been able to verbalize in any satisfying way. I've mentioned this before, always in an offhand, defensive kind of way. The other person, hitherto more or less thinking me mentally competent, struggle to keep a straight face or else <i>tsk</i>s<i> </i>openly concerning my feeble failing at life, never really understands what I mean. <br />
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I found myself recently with time and an inclination to rewatch the movies. Brittany and her family are vacationing, and I'm serving as their (quasi-) house-sitter for a week-ish period of time. I spend a couple to four hours at their house daily, feeding the animals and keeping them company, taking messages, getting mail, fending off intruders, etc. The work doesn't really require my being there for more than like half an hour, but I get to where I like the quiet and the aloneness. Then I start missing Brittany terribly, her absence apparent everywhere. As I lay on her couch the other day, I suddenly started jonesing (yes, actual, factual, <i>jonesing) </i>for <i>Twilight, </i>which up until that point I'd only seen in her company. It'd be a way of connecting with her from afar, and also, I came to realize, an oppurtunity to sit in an environment without walk-in awkwardness-potential, with a notebook, and finally figure out the mysterious pull the film has for me. <br />
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Let's get some things straight firstly, though. I do <i>not </i>think the <i>Twilight </i>films are great, or even very good, movies. They're full of cheese. Aching, anus-clinching dialogue. The action scenes (especially in the first movie) are somewhere around made-for-TV-caliber, and the scenes featuring the acting of T. Lautner will give you a horrifying skin condition. Close-ups for actresses not prepared or conditioned for close-ups. First takes that needed retook. Etc. I'm indubitably not infatuated with the films.<br />
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But, how bad are the films, really? Take them away from the malls-full of shrieking 12-45-year-old women. Keep in mind that unconditionally hating the films means being sucked into the same mindless cultural blackhole as obsessing over the films. You might see that they hold their own, honestly. They're unique. The cinematography is staggeringly great the vast majority of the time. Immediately recognizable. The sets are beautiful; the scenery is occasionally jaw-dropping. The movie makes me want to live in coastal Washington, in its gloom and snaking black, lonesome highways and moody sea and beaches and people coping with, interacting with, and loving even, all the above. Little scenes with regular people can be touching and subtle. Aesthetics. Just needs better dialogue and much fewer close-ups.<br />
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What maybe appeals to me the most is the small-town high-school interactions. It's something that I, being homeschooled but raised in a surely similar-to-Forks, WA- small town, with the Regular Folk and football games and conservative values, missed out on but was basically close enough to taste. High school with all of the bullshit and drama and aches and loves that linger the rest of your life that I'll never really know and can only construct in some weird, misconstrued facsimile. The thing with <i>Twilight </i>is that the high school and teenager stuff seems so artificial, so lacking in something key, yet beautiful in its misunderstanding. It's something similar to the images that play in my own head. It's a representation that I need to be real, so as to feel that maybe I didn't miss out on so much and didn't need the experience. Don't say Hey, Matt, trust me buddy, feel lucky you missed that bullshit, because if you say that, you've missed the point. Because what I construct is sort of beautiful and miserable and I kind of need it. <i>Twilight </i>nails it to the little details, even. For example, no one in the movies texts or ever logs onto a social networking site. Not once. How beautiful is that? When someone wants something from someone else, they call them or go see them. It's just great.<br />
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So, there it is. I knew I'd understand it better when I got to writing about it. <i>Whew.</i><br />
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<i> </i>EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-37594698297738055772011-06-27T18:52:00.000-07:002011-06-27T18:52:10.430-07:00I was never meant to be an adequate human being and other things.Despite all odds, step 2 of the Big Move has been completed; I have a car. (The first step, by the way, was registering for classes. <i>That </i>stress lasted for a single day. The car stress was week-long and is not entirely over.) The whole ordeal was long, delay-ridden, embarrassing, and expensive. I ended up learning a lot about myself, though, either directly through the experience or in some dazed perspective mode induced by it. To wit:<br />
<ul><li>I get depressed by things that wouldn't probably depress most people. I realized this when I began the stages of getting the car, and I realized that dealing with salespeople depresses the very fuck out of me. That most people are frustrated by the salespeople-interaction phase of car-buying seems obvious, but for me, it was emotionally bleak and filled me with mind-numbing, exhausting despair. Looking at my phone flashing the number of the dealer and suddenly I was half in love with easeful Death. My dealer (that sounds unseemly) was a decent enough guy. Waiting (in vain as it more or less turned out) for the bank to call, the dealer and I sat outside and shot the shit. Here, he adopted a more down-home persona, littering his speech the dread eff-word to show how much he related to me and telling stories about work intended to achieve the same: "I'm loving this Droid X. I can download porn like so much fuckin' faster than my friend; we had like a duel with it." "Oh." "And, like, there it fuckin' was, some chick gettin' the dick right there on the screen while his phone was still loadin' up." "Yeah." And also telling me about how the whole financial enterprise in the US was pretty fucked. He was basically a good guy, though. Anyway, after the encounter was when I realized how depressed the whole thing made me, and how that depression wasn't the result of spending so much money on a vehicle with 144,000 miles on it but rather it had something to do with the interaction and proximity to Salespeople (not necessarily that one salesperson who was really an all-right guy but Salespeople as a species) having to do with some really existential soul-scrambling that I can't fully intellectualize but that I certainly can feel like almost spiritually. Philosophically. It's so low-level and mysterious that I may not have even caught it if I hadn't been slightly caffeinated and in a certain state of mind anyway. This all lead me to realize that many mundane things depress me, mysteriously.</li>
<li>Such as: the aforementioned Salespeople; shopping alone in Vintage Stock-type stores (but not with other people); shopping with other people in bookstores (but not alone); driving north-south routes (but not east-west); attending concerts; attending, actually, anything spectator-type event; watching music videos. There's more, but this pretty well gives you a gist of what I mean. I wasn't able or inclined to meditate on <i>why </i>any of this should be, though I'm sure I will in the future. I just realized all this sort of at once and was interested in listing the weird things that depress me. </li>
<li>In looking at the east-west thing, I also realized that I gravitate towards towns that run on an east-west axis. Like, arguably, Monett. Wheaton. Pierce City. These towns are just as staid and quotidian as any other town in SW Mo, but I always have fond memories of them that are somewhat vague and apropos of nothing. When I run, it's the north-south routes that give me the most trouble; I catch my second wind on the east-west roads. This is just really weird to me and like even <i>more </i>low-level and subliminal than the depression things, and I was sort of proud of myself for even catching this.And I have no idea why this should be. </li>
</ul>So, none of this is the slightest bit useful or interesting to anyone but me, but it's certainly odd stuff that I don't know how to think about.<br />
<br />
In good news, I'm writing a couple stories (including a new Gnawingly) that have a certain potential, if I could just find the time to finish them. I've read a few books that blew my mind (The Good and the Ghastly; The Sisters Brothers; Lighthead) and listened to an album that beat every one of my expectations (Bon Iver's new one) for a change. It's been escapismy and nice to dive into. Well then, tally-ho<br />
<br />
MatthewEatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-71239024938253833712011-05-23T15:23:00.000-07:002011-05-24T16:32:59.808-07:00Joplin MiserySo the most familiar twenty-five or so percent of Joplin, Missouri, has been flattened by tornadic storms and it happened while I was eating hot dogs and baked beans. By the end of the evening I was sitting at my girlfriend's parent's house watching images from somewhere I'd surely never been, and the sky in the northwest had this look like a spent light bulb. Beauty of after-storm calms, et al.<br />
<br />
I've read poems about Joplin, poems by someone from Joplin, and have heard it mentioned passing in song. "Route 66." Joplin a place for passing through, is the gist.<br />
<br />
I'm trying to find, maybe, what Joplin meant to me. Which is pointless. What it means to me has nothing to do with what happened there last night. Yet part of me won't accept it because the relationship to me is unclear; what damage is there until I quantify it by what it means to me? This makes me feel shitty and weird. Thousands of peoples' tragedy becomes fodder for my solipsistic musing. <br />
<br />
At least one hundred dead, they say now. Nothing looks familiar and breezes are free to toss about in the homes still standing.<br />
<br />
"...atomic bomb went off..." etc.<br />
<br />
"...war-zone..." etc.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-4964139420624360722011-02-28T12:52:00.000-08:002011-02-28T12:53:09.236-08:0028 February 2011 (Poem for Highway 12)The farthest I've ever been out to sea or from home<br />
<br />
involved being suspended meters above water on<br />
<br />
a bridge that looked like a centipede<br />
<br />
that had collapsed and been reconstructed<br />
<br />
mere years before. I was listening to carefully<br />
<br />
considered music (months of planning, thought-<br />
<br />
experimenting, to find that one song to hear<br />
<br />
as the ocean cleared the horizon) laughing<br />
<br />
nervously through the construction zone (whistling<br />
<br />
through the cemetery)<br />
<br />
and holding Brittany's hand when in the home<br />
<br />
stretch.<br />
<br />
Then we were there.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-31987328888671355472011-02-27T10:31:00.000-08:002011-02-27T10:31:24.194-08:0027 February 2011 (Where is my Mind?)I awoke with a massive stress-induced (what else could've induced it?) headache and an empty feeling and a small feeling, and these feelings were strong enough I felt they merited a day off work. I called in, vague and tacit as possible about my symptoms, as though they were nebulous even to me. Which is not inaccurate. I don't feel a need really to justify my absentee, other than I've just been too angsty and over-fucking-whelmed with life to even contemplate another day in existential denial at WalMart.<br />
<br />
My headache isn't actual so much as imminent. It keeps peeking at me from under my prefrontal cortex. I feel doomed. Maybe my headache is more spiritual or emotional. An existential headache, literally. <br />
<br />
God fuck.<br />
<br />
I want to go on a walk except I never have time. Something slow and nice with a breeze that smells seminal and my feet and joints don't scream at be from overuse and I know what direction I'm going in, one of four or a combination of adjacents. To know in what direction you're going: that's a hell of an underrated sensation.<br />
<br />
Things so easily could be easier, but that would be <i>too </i>easy, right?EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-3491832593022561602011-02-02T22:02:00.000-08:002011-02-02T22:02:27.154-08:00A horror storyI wrote this, oh. About four years ago. I'd just gotten this laptop, and, toying around with the idea of becoming a writer, I hammered this story out over a couple October nights. I changed it a bit, before posting it here. Mostly fixing punctuation errors and the like. The story itself is untouched, and not half bad, I think. I wanted to be a writer because I wanted to describe <i>moods </i>to people. Not plots or characters; just a mood. I think I captured the mood I wanted to, here. So it's a success, basically. It's quite long, especially for a blog-story (comes to about 15 pages on paper). But tell me what you think if you read it.<br />
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========================================================================== <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Document found in a manila envelope in a nook in the wall of an upstairs room in a two-story home on the outskirts of Keeley, Missouri.</b><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
I wonder what you’ll make of this, whoever finds this. This is a record of something that happened to me and my friend and roommate Lisa D___ late last year. Last November. I have never told anyone about it; in fact, the thought of doing that is terrifying. To actually sit down in front of someone and let it out? To their face? Impossible. But this here doesn’t really qualify as telling, just remembering and typing, just like those what-I-did-during-summer-vacation essays in middle school. I do hope someone will eventually read this, though. What good does this do? Alleviate the confusion, I hope. Maybe I’ll find out soon. And this way I don’t have to look anyone in the eye. This is one of those things that doesn’t happen. Everyone knows this and so I can’t really tell this to most people. Not in person. Not if I want to make a friend.<br />
Lisa and I had this kind of ritual. This kind of thing you do because you did it once under innocent, beguiled circumstances, and then through nostalgia and aura and whatever you do it again and again, until it becomes a ritual, a habit that holds some kind of magic to break the monotony of life despite the paradox that habits and rituals are supposed to be monotonous. <br />
Anyway, our ritual was to simply walk through the town. That’s all. After we’d get home from our jobs on Wednesday, sometime around 7, we would walk from the house we were renting, Lisa and I, in lazy, roundabout fashion, through our little town and eventually end up at the unfortunately-named Gas & Dine convenience store down close to the highway. This is a ritual we started a little more year ago; almost exactly, actually, a year before this event that I’ve been aching to describe actually happened. But anyway, it’s just that one evening after work we started to have a rather serious conversation. We had been rooming in this smallish house in town near the railroad tracks for a few months by then, and it seemed appropriate to take this conversation along for a walk. It was a warm November that year, and we went to the park at first, we sat down at the table and there was a bunch of kids playing nearby. Lisa was having boyfriend problems, that was the thing. She talked about this, and I just listened and made consolatory noises and didn’t say much, because I’ve never been a good advice giver. The park became too noisy after more kids joined the initial bunch, so we left again. We walked along the railroad tracks for a bit, then got thirsty and decided to head to the Gas & Dine. It was pretty innocent, you see. We talked about our love experiences at first, then we talked about the varying shittiness-levels of our jobs, we talked about our individual plans for the future. We walked down, it was somewhat twilit by then, down the lonely stretch of blacktop, past the decades-closed steel mill, black and utterly massive, and came to the diner/store/gas station. We went in and looked around at our options and got some candy bars and sodas and sat down at the first little booth thing by the window and talked and laughed a bit. The window offered a nice view of the sunset and the highway and even the factory across the highway was beautiful and everything felt still for a moment, which was nice. Then after maybe twenty minutes we walked back to the house in relative silence. <br />
Thus our ritual. Usually Wednesday evening. Usually, not always, with a quick stop at the park before the serious walking begins. Sometimes we’d stop at the park after we left the store. But the thing of it, that sense of stillness, a pause, and a feeling of mutual comfort, this was the magic that the ritual conjured.<br />
<br />
This happened last November. About four months ago. The thing, I mean. This will sound melodramatic I imagine, but the thing just pretty much made me a mental wreck, I just want to say how odd it is that a person can experience this one day and still go to work and function correctly the next day. I think that that’s not the case with , for example, the death of a loved one or something like that. But like I said, things like this don’t happen, so maybe that means we can ignore them easier, to lie to ourselves about hallucinations and weary minds. Yet it’s also life-affirming. I can’t really explain what I mean by this, except that I almost wish that you could’ve experienced this for yourself so you can understand. But at the same time, it terrifies me. I know, this all sounds fucking incoherent and it is, maybe the best thing to say is that it pretty much fucks you up for awhile and you hide it pretty well and convince yourself you just went crazy for a second and then you get better and you feel better and yet you’re still scared shitless. And you’re still hiding it. These things aren’t supposed to happen and we all know this. I’m trying to keep this casual. <br />
Okay, like I said, it happened in November. It was a Wednesday early in the month and I had stayed home. I called in sick, not because I was sick but because I felt an unrelenting need to not be at work. I felt too good to go to work. This is the only reason I ever call in sick. I sat and wrote and watched TV all day. This makes me feel better. There was a fire in that place, as my Grandma says, and I was so comfortable and content in my pajamas all day. I prepared a nice meal for me and Lisa that afternoon, and she came in at 6:30 I think it was. She was a bit early anyway. This made me happy. I truly like Lisa, who’s pretty and smart and kind of sad and who I love to make laugh. But anyway Lisa was early and I love her company and so I felt pretty much even more content. <br />
She told me about her day at work and I told her about my day at home. I let her read what I had written, a funny bar story, Bukowski-ish , and she laughed and said she loves it and that I am so talented and this made me feel even better. We sat down to the meal and chatted a bit. We have a small table in the small kitchen and this is where we sat, and as it grew darker outside the weak yellow kitchen light grew more significant to the mood and pretty soon we were done. I asked, “ Walk?”, for this was a part of the ritual too, we never just went, we had to ask, and she said “Yeah!” Like I‘d just offered her a beer after a shitty day at work. We quietly pulled on our shoes and heavy coats, turned off all the lights but the porch, and away we went. Most of the houses we passed still had Halloween decorations and appurtenances out, not out of laziness I think but because of the way that moods seem to linger in small towns like this one. Jack-o’-Lanterns’ grins and sneers had begun to rot. It was just beginning to get noticeably dark now, and it was somewhat windy. This is tornado season in Missouri and there had been watches and advisories issued. The sky hung low and heavy, but there were patches where you could see stars just starting to be visible. You could also see the moon. It was full, and just rising over the trees to the east. <br />
Lisa and I had just begun our conversation when we hit the park. We made various observations about the people we worked with, talked about maybe going to the movies on a double-date with our significant others sometime in the near future. We only sat for a minute though. A rest only. Then we were off to the railroad tracks. The intersection where we hit the tracks is right on the end off town. On the left, the tracks lead into a more rural area, with fields on both sides, and the tracks are lined with trees, starting about twenty feet from the tracks themselves. On the right the tracks cut through town. This is the route we’ve always taken. We usually follow this for about half a mile and then hit the asphalt again at another intersection, then on to the Gas & Dine. This time however I was drawn to the other side, the side me and Lis have always said we should explore someday. I told her we should try this way tonight, and she didn’t argue. So we turned left. A ways down the line the town-sounds kind of faded, except for the engine noises of the occasional vehicle stopping and then proceeding at the intersection. There’re no sounds now, not even crickets, this late in the season. It was pretty cold, just shy of uncomfortable. As I walked on the ties I looked down. I could see the white bits of gravel stuck down in the hollow parts of the ties; they stood out in the darkness like little impish smiles. I could smell the oilish odor of the tracks. Really I don’t know why I’m telling you this part; it’s just that it seems necessary. Not important, but it seems to play a part, and maybe it did, under the fabric of things. I don’t know. This entire incident has taken on this special viewing lens in my memory; that may be an illustrative way of saying it. Through this lens every incident of the walk-- everything I saw and smelled that night, everything we said, -- it all seems to be linked and all important. I think about it late at night and it’s like I can almost grasp this underlying pattern, this hidden, tacit ritual whose requirements were filled inadvertently. Something I’m not supposed to sense but for some gap or tear, reality-fabric-wise. But then, this sort of thing never happens, really. ( I keep hitting these interludes; the annoying ones were I go, “These things just don’t happen.” It’s sort of a tic I have. And I think it’s kind of a survival mechanism, too. Either way, both ways, I apologize and will struggle to stay on topic. But here we go again; these things don’t happen. Maybe it didn’t happen, I think sometimes. But then I’ll look over at Lisa, and see something in her eyes. A thing that must also be in my eyes. It did happen.)<br />
So I’m not going to describe every fucking thing, but some of it needs to be told I think. For my own sake, please bear with me. At one point me and Lis came across this long narrow body of water, not a pond, not a puddle, running parallel to the tracks. So we sat down on the rail and looked at it for while, in silence. It was thick, with a skin of scum on top. We threw rocks into it for a while, being amused at the way this skin broke under impact and eventually rejoined. I think we laughed at it. Here’s something; when Lis and I stood up to get on our way, we heard this sound, at first we both thought it was a train whistle, a bit unnerving (despite our many walks along the rails, a train’s never actually gone by on our walks, as they seem to mostly run early in the morning) but harmless. We got off the tracks and walked as far from the tracks as possible, when we realized that the sound was organic, that some animal was making that sound-- god it seemed impossible-- but yes, at one point the noise began to take on this quality, this pain. It’s weird trying to describe this; it was a howl, a deep strange howl. It touched me to my soul. And not in the way being in love, or viewing a beautiful piece of art touches one’s soul; this twisted sound, it wrung my soul dry. <br />
We couldn’t tell where the sound came from, only that it was mercifully far away. Lisa looked at me, her eyes so big, our faces were mutually drained of blood. We started back towards town immediately, our ancient rusty survival instincts having been fired up. We were panicked and scared, quite simply put. Once we were back in the glow of the streetlights, we apparently felt safe enough to talk again. Under a guise of rationality we talked of the possibilities, of coyotes and stray dogs, and minds addled by the somewhat inherent spookiness of the night. There was a fog settling in, Lisa said, fog can distort sounds, has strange acoustic qualities. The wind was getting stronger. And the wind howls. Have you ever heard a tornado? I asked her, They make these horrible sounds. We both knew it was not a tornado, however. It wasn’t that windy, and you could still see the stars at certain places. We were both uneasy, still. Haunted a bit.<br />
For some reason, we both decided to continue on the Gas & Dine. By then it was quite dark, the streetlights really making themselves known. The moon was huge and bright even behind the clouds. Suddenly we became excited and happy, out of terror. It’s another one of those weird things, how be scared for a bit makes you open up and really get excited (when said terror becomes retrospect). We joked and laughed and howled, but kind of softly. We got to the spooky old steel mill and we ran past it screaming. (After we pass the mill there’s this really tiny house before we get to the store. Just this real box of a house. It’s tiny enough to make us speculate about the psychological inclinations of the person, a single person, within. Me and Lis make up stories about this person. Like that his bathroom is wallpapered with newspaper clippings of obituaries and murders, or pages of the Book of Revelations or something. Or that he was abducted by aliens. That man has had many exciting adventures. His door was opened when we passed this time, making the place seem all the more odd to us. So we ran by howling.) Then we came to the fuel towers of the gas station. It was something like 8:20 at this point, the place closes at nine, and there were actually a few cars pulled up to the building, and one at the pumps. I always feel this nervousness at this point, because I feel like we’re going to walk into a hold-up or something. Which of course isn’t what happened. <br />
But the people that hung out there were nonetheless a somewhat dusky people, small town white trash. I’ve never minded this, not really. There’s something that can almost be called reassuring about the bromides of that kind of culture. But anyway. <br />
I held the door for Lis. Then I followed her in. There’s a handful of tables in the place, but it’s still first and foremost a gas station/convenience store. Racks of junk food, soda, diapers, and toilet paper. The actual diner food can be called Trucker’s Gourmet maybe. I imagine it comes in a can upon which is an image of a disgruntled, scruffy man giving the thumbs up. It’s all soaked in grease and is the root of the vast majority of heart attacks and erectile dysfunction in America today. We find some iced cappuccino and order some potato wedges from the desk clerk and sit at our table by the window. On the store side of the table is a rack of general automotive items like spark plugs and taillight bulbs. There’s a person buying a six-pack, and two older grease-filled-looking guys at the table in the far corner. The workers (there’re no waiters/waitresses, just employees) are doing their closing chores. <br />
We’re still in that odd mood where everything strikes us as hilarious. We giggle at our little table and the guys over in the corner glare at us like a couple of old bulldogs and we laugh harder. It feels like if we stop laughing, stop being this way I mean, it feels like if we calm down, the animal, the monster we heard will get us and gobble us up. This is our talisman. I think about this and I laugh and I tell Lisa this and she laughs. <br />
But we stop.<br />
We stop when the old man in the red truck pulls up to the station. He’d pulled in doing maybe like sixty and hits his brakes and the tires squeal. I realize that I’ve never really heard tires squeal up close before and that it sounds just like it does in the movies. This is really the beginning of the story. I’ll get to it now. Maybe you can see, if not now then later, why it took so long to get here. This guy pulls up right in front of the door and flings the door open and I think, what the fuck is this, and the guy kind of swings out with the door and falls out on his knees and stands up. I know right away that this man isn’t drunk, as he certainly looks, but that he is terrified. He is The Messenger. We are the herd. He has a Message. We have something to be had or lost. I seem to understand all of this immediately. I look at Lisa and see amusement draining from her eyes, and then seeing something wary filling them. <br />
The man runs to the door, a terror grimace on his face. When he opens the door he shouts, “It’s kilt me! Don’t let it kill me!” We see now that he is bleeding, quite profusely, from a wound on the left side of his torso. I’m thinking simultaneously about all that blood and that the guy actually said “kilt” instead of killed. I think I was still smiling a little. This guy had everyone’s attention, but still, no one moved. We were all just cemented to where we sat or stood. I think about this a lot. How no one moved at first.<br />
Nothing seems to move until the next thing happens, which was…well, this growl came from the dark outside. There is no other sound suddenly. The old guy is very still, and this metallic whining creeps out of his throat. I look outside and see no animal, but I realize that the old guy’s red truck has a shattered windshield and long like, claw marks down the side. I look back at the man and he’s still just standing there wide-eyed, like a rabbit that just gives up because it knows it’s been kilt. I consider how he’s not like a messenger after all, he was just a terrified hunted man that saw light and needed that light because the light’s a safe place. The growl, which is a low deep sound and hasn’t stopped, gets closer and I’m still staring at this old man’s eyes so it’s Lisa that sees it first and she screams. I jump then, snap out of it, and look outside. <br />
This is what it was; There is a werewolf out there. It walks like a man, on two legs, except it is hunched over enough to maybe use its terribly long arms if it were in a hurry. It lumbers into the lighted area under the gas pumps, it limps a little. I suddenly realize that I’m really seeing this and I’m propelled suddenly up off of my seat and I think maybe I scream a little too. The thing is kind of hurrying-- a weird, too-quick, arm-swinging gait-- over to the door, so I grab Lis by the arm and pull her towards the back of the store. When I look back the wolf had gotten to the old guy and was proceeding to pull him apart, doing so in an almost playful manner, making these sounds, like he was curious, a kid dewinging a fly. The workers and the six-pack guy are imitating me and Lis, pulling themselves as far back from the gruesome spectacle as possible. I see the little old desk clerk over behind the soda machine, sneering and gagging, as if trying to force a scream that became stuck. We are people seeing a thing we know is impossible. The two guys at the table are still sitting, unbelievably, staring at the thing as if it were a trivial curiosity. The old man is screaming silently. The wolf is twisting his arm around in the socket, again and again, the way you can keep twisting a wire or something to get it to break in two. Finally the arm gives and breaks loose, and the wolf gives out this victorious yap sound, extremely loud and sharp. He starts pummeling the poor old guy, who seems to be in some kind of understandable shock, with his own detached arm, tail wagging. The door, wall, and window are sprayed with little droplets of blood with each swing of the arm.<br />
In the light I can see the wolf better. If it stood up straight instead of hunched it would probably be over eight feet tall, as it was it came to about the height of an average man. It was covered in thick grey fur everywhere except it’s chest and stomach area, which is somewhat more sparsely furred. I can see its somewhat blotched flesh through it. The torso is thin and, well, dog-like, even if it is a massive dog. The legs are thick and powerful-looking though, the arms long and wiry and obviously terribly strong. The head is difficult to describe; it is obviously a wolf’s head, yet there are characteristics that are un-wolf-like. Maybe you’re thinking more human-looking, but that’s not quite right. In fact, there’s very little to suggest any relation to the human race in this thing, other than its bipedal stance. But there’s actually something almost cat-, or maybe even snake-like in it’s face, the way it moves and looks around, its expressions. I think it would be safe to say that maybe what I saw that night had never been a man, thus not an actual werewolf, but that’s entirely speculation, and I would no more claim to know this definitely than I would claim to know the hour of my death. It was simply a demon, from Hell’s heart or Man’s I pray I’ll never know. <br />
The thing is done with the old man now, so he bends down and bites his throat, ripping out a large chunk. There’s not much arterial spray, because of the already substantial blood loss I imagine. The wolf looks up suddenly, at me and Lis, and I feel warm fluid soaking my crotch and pant leg. There’s a long moment in a short one; it feels like we, me and the wolf, lock eyes for an hour. Its eyes are an amber color. I see sadness there, maybe another thing which suggests humanity in the thing. But actually, this is something that occurs to me in retrospect, and maybe it’s not true at all.<br />
I see the wound blossom on the beast’s stomach before I actually hear the gun shot. It yelps and sneers at the source of the shot, one of the corner guys. The guy was apparently packing heat, a fairly large handgun of some type. I don’t know guns. The wolf repositions itself to pounce on the guy and I can see the muscles tense up in its legs. At this moment I feel Lisa grab me, I look and see that we’re right next to the hallway that leads to the restrooms and storeroom, and Lis is indicating that we should run. I realize, later once again, that I was somewhat dazed. Understandably. So Lis kind of leads me down this way. There are horrible sounds, screams and gunshots and ripping sounds, but me and Lis break through the storeroom and find a small loading dock with a roll-up door. It isn’t locked but the latch is stuck so Lis kicks at it and I follow her example and finally it screeches open and we’re free. There’re still screams coming from inside and I actually am thankful for this, it means the wolf is distracted and that there’s a chance for escape. This is survival instinct and not inhumanity I believe, or want to, and anyway what the fuck could we do but try to live? <br />
We run so fast. We hit the road and this gives us a view of the front of the store but we don’t look back until we hear the screams dwindle down to a scream, a woman’s, and then finally stop all together. We stop and turn. At this point we’re maybe three hundred yards from the place-- we’ve passed the little box house anyway-- and we just stare wide-eyed at the Gas & Dine. It looks so still. Then a howl breaks the silence, that odd warbled sound from before, but a little different maybe. The wolf never appears though, for as long as we look. We turn and run.<br />
We didn’t stop for help at any house, even though, in retrospect, this would have been a smart thing to do. We just ran straight for home. Tromping along, in that miasmal terror, all I remember seeing are streetlights, house lights, how all these glowing orbs came together in that blur. I remember the moon. <br />
We came to our house and paused on the porch steps in the glow of the bare light bulb above the door. It hadn’t followed us it seemed, and we felt safe then, there at our little house. Surely a false feeling, not a mile from the attack, but oddly powerful. Lisa and I embraced like rediscovered friends. For a long while I simply kept my eyes closed. When I opened them the first thing I saw was the jack-o’-lantern on our steps, the only Halloween decoration we’d put out. It was crushed, its guts violently strewn around. I look at the neighbors’ lawns and see the same thing on their porch steps. Some kids I guess. <br />
Like I said somewhere up there, that was about four months ago. It’s odd how my mind will treat this whole thing when I reflect on it. It’s like being in a constant state of denial about the color of your eyes or something, how I just wish I had dreamed it or imagined it. Lis and I…how we just dance around the thing, even when we talk about it. We can’t say anything about it. Maybe there’s nothing to say. We don’t really walk anymore, of course, except to the park occasionally. In daylight. Around people and smiles. The Gas & Dine is closed; there was an investigation, they say it was a robbery gone wrong, no survivors. No leads, the videotapes for the security cameras being stolen, they say. Oh I wonder what the cops thought when they saw those videos. But then, surely this thing has attacked before. It scares me sometimes, thinking about how some people surely know. Thinking about missing children, missing animals. Not long after the incident I heard about a few cows in the fields a mile or so north of here, the direction from which we heard that initial howl that night, being found mutilated and partially eaten.<br />
The paper described those killed at the Gas & Dine as being murdered with a firearm. Gunshot victims all. Their guts on the inside and uneaten. I know different. Another thing, I know mine and Lisa’s faces had to be on those surveillance recordings, yet we’ve received no contact from authorities. No threats or bribes for silence even. This puzzles me. But there are lots of puzzled people around. <br />
We can’t stay here. Lis has made plans to move back with her family up north in the city. I need to go back to school. And city life has found a recent appeal to me. The moon doesn’t shine so bright there. The gunshot victims are gunshot victims, thankfully. Ha ha. <br />
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<br />
I went for a walk last night. It’s only recently begun to be bearable jacketless weather in the evening. Lisa was out and I was feeling a restless pull. So after staring blankly at the TV and seeing and hearing nothing and feeling suffocated by my own walls I left the house. Everything was dark or lit up yellow-orange by porch- and streetlights, and I walked to the intersection there where we’d turned left instead of right like we always did. Sometimes I get this idea that our walk really was a ritual, one used to chase away our daylight troubles before bedtime to let us sleep easier. But this turn was a bad ingredient, a deviation that brought this horror into existence. I know this is wrong. But maybe I walked last night to hunt a piece of something I left there by the tracks lined by trees. Maybe I chased after it; I know I must’ve looked like a man haunted by loss as I hurried down the street. Loss of precious banality. Of the quotidian. Every thought I’ve thought since that night is like a form of mental babbling, at best a kind of mumbling. There’s a lack of foundation on which to make a thought into a certainty, it’s like. So I walked until I got out of the town’s earshot and I found the swampy little pool by the tracks, this time of the year devoid of scum and just a black little glassy space. I sat in front of it and nothing came to me and I started to feel foolish. I sat and chewed the inside of my cheeks for a bit. The moon was waning gibbous. I stood and spit in the water and walked back. When I came to the house I paused in front of the door and pretended that this was the first time I’d been there. I opened the door and stepped into the warmth. I went to my room, God how comfortable the house, even the musty people-smell of it, sat on my bed for a bit, and decided to write the whole thing down. I’ll put the thing on paper and see what it becomes. It hasn’t become easier, I can tell you. I’ll put these pages in a manila envelope and I’ll leave it in some room in the house when I leave; not hidden, but not conspicuous. I don’t want my land lord to see it. I hope someone from out of town finds it. Maybe someone who knows what to do. Because I sure as hell don’t.<br />
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EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-25985866586535710432011-01-04T13:47:00.000-08:002011-01-04T13:47:36.023-08:004 Jan 2011First week of the New Year. So much looms ahead of me: this year, I'm moving to a much bigger city, attending a much bigger school, driving in much more frightening traffic, making choices that will affect the rest of my life. Family members and holidays and birthdays will be missed. Relationships strained. Self-doubt eminent. Resolves will be tested and anxieties will run amok. It's exciting and frightening simultaneously, all this inevitable <i>difference. </i>So much is at stake, too.<br />
I'm fine about it, mostly. Except at night when I find myself fading into sleep and suddenly my mind's eye is freight-trained by all the questions and realizations, all balled up because I can't face them individually, when I'm fully awake. Can I afford to live on my own? Have I grown complacent here in my parents' house in this little tiny town? Do I have what it takes? This last w/r/t writing, school, driving, socializing, determining a career, making a living, supporting my future hypothetical family, "Making It." Et al. All this comes at me, just as my body sleep-limps and my breathing becomes deeper. This anvil of anxiety. Then I get up. Shake it off. Read for half an hour. Then I'm okay. I know my family loves me, and so does Brittany. I know nothing can ever come between Brittany and me. I know this will give me strength. And then I sleep.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-43752095996766802592010-12-16T10:22:00.000-08:002010-12-16T10:22:59.054-08:00Best Fiction/Poetry of the Year Extravaganza!!!So, as promised merely yesterday (see how on the ball I am) here is the list of fiction/poetry books that most impressed me this year. Turns out that there was some pretty great stuff put out this year; who would've thought 2010 would be such an exciting year for readers <i>besides </i>the whole e-reader phenomenon (maybe we should face the music, though, and just call it the Kindle/iPad phenomenon)? And so well anyway, all these books, of course, are highly recommended, so give your eyeballs some exercise and check one out.<br />
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<b>Poetry</b><br />
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3. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nox-Anne-Carson/dp/0811218708/ref=cm_cr_pr_pb_t">Nox</a>, </i>Anne Carson, New Directions Publishing, Apr 27, 2010. This is sort of difficult to call poetry, or anything besides really beautiful. It may arguably not even be a <i>book. </i>It comes in a box and is printed on an accordioned strip of paper. It's made up of quotes, letters, photos, historical data, and jottings relating and dedicated to the author's<b> </b>late, globe-trotting brother. It's an elegy, and the work of a survivor, as Carson puts it; "It is when you are asking about something that you realize that you yourself have survived it, and so you must carry it..." <br />
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2. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Winters-Journey-Stephen-Dobyns/dp/1556593058/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1292518256&sr=8-1">Winter's Journey</a>, </i>Stephen Dobyns, Copper Canyon Press, July 1 2010. Dobyns is an old favorite of mine---in fact, it may be argued that he inspired my attempted literary career---and <i>Winter's Journey </i>is his first work in a long time. And it's different: the pieces are more like political essays than poetry (does it say something about me or about poetry that my favorite books of the subject have so far been rather unlike most poetry?) though Dobyns is as wordy and playful as ever. I'd give you a quote if I had the book on me, but I lent it to my sister, so there. Just suffice it to say that Dobyns has some of the most intelligent things to say about American politics that I've read recently, and the poem in which he fantasizes about being a rhino is pure gold. <br />
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1. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Human-Chain-Poems-Seamus-Heaney/dp/0374173516/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1292519177&sr=1-1">Human Chain</a>, </i>Seamus Heaney, FSG, Sept 14 2010. Before I get into Heaney's new book I would like to recognize the <i>Anthology of Modern Irish Poetry </i>published by the Harvard Press this year: it's great. Huge and full of everything. Heaney is, obviously, represented in the 1000-plus-page volume, which I didn't put on here because I want to focus on individuals rather than anthologies. Anyway, <i>Human Chain </i>has garnered quite a stir in the literary world, being the work of such a master, and this always makes me happy. Perhaps what I like about it is the accessibility, which is a terribly unsexy thing to say, but. Heaney writes about lost friends, remembers days past, reflects on simple daily occurrences, such as refilling a pen or taking joy in the sound of a gust of wind. I applaud the work of recent American poets-- like the Dickmans-- who really aspire to simplify poetry and take it away from the austerity of academia, but all you have to do is look at the Irish for a lesson of how to make poetry an everyman's passion. <br />
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<b>Fiction.</b><br />
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5. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Horns-Novel-Joe-Hill/dp/0061147958/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1292519923&sr=1-1">Horns</a>, </i>Joe Hill, William Morrow, Feb 16 2010. Joe Hill's work makes me so happy, what can I say? Everything from his<b> </b>first novel, <i>Heart-Shaped Box, </i>to his short stories and especially his absolutely great comic series, <i>Locke & Key. </i>Maybe it's just that there's finally a guy who's not Stephen King (yes, I know) who understands what makes horror work, or just his lovable personality (read his blog, follow his twitter,) or that he's actually getting <i>attention </i>while being a <i>genre-writer. Horns </i>is a horror/romance/surrealist romp that is unnerving and often very funny at the same time. One of my <i>other </i>favorite things about Hill is that he's not afraid to be absolutely surreal, and yet talented enough to not let this get in the way of the story. Not that any of this should be your concern. Just buy <i>Horns </i>and enjoy the hell out of it, pun intended and all. <br />
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4. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Unnamed-Joshua-Ferris/dp/0316034010/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1292520443&sr=1-1">The Unnamed</a>, </i>Joshua Ferris, Back Bay Books, Jan 18 2010. I didn't originally think that I would put this book on here because, frankly, most of it kind of sucked. Or rather, the first third of it. Or thereabouts. The third of it from around page 5 to wherever the third ends. The point being, I didn't really start enjoying this book up until around just before the halfway mark. And then, it was only intermittently great and beautiful. So I returned it to the library, glad that I hadn't wasted a twenty on it. But then something happened. I kept thinking about it. It <i>haunted </i>me. The efficient prose that occasionally dipped into poetry was some of it; the man can <i>describe a scene </i>and<i> capture a mood </i>like a motherfucker. But it was also the story: a man is plagued by a disease that makes him walk. Compulsively. Come hell or high-water or marital stress or job-loss. The problems come in the execution, I think. Ferris doesn't lead the reader into the story as smoothly as he could have; we just aren't interested at the beginning. The really haunting thing about the story, I think, is the ideas it represents. Insurmountable problems, compulsion, addiction, the strength of loved ones. This is what makes the novel great: it <i>talks </i>about something important.<br />
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3. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Freedom-Novel-Jonathan-Franzen/dp/0374158460/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1292521548&sr=1-1">Freedom</a>, </i>Jonathan Franzen, FSG, Aug 31 2010. You saw this coming, no? For a while I was going to make some sort of statement (I imagined, as if anyone cares what I think) by not including this book on here. But I must. I'm compelled. If this book was terribly written, if the characters were stale, if the dialogue stilted or unrealistic, Franzen would still deserve credit for having the courage to tackle such enormous issues. I mean, this book is about <i>everything. </i>But of course, this book is incredibly well-written, and the opposite of everything else I hypothesized up there. I know, everyone who isn't Jodi Picoult or Jennifer Weiner absolutely raves about this book. Even Oprah. Hell, even n + 1 loved it, and n + 1 doesn't like anything. But I honestly believe that it deserves every bit of praise it gets. Yes, it <i>is </i>the most important novel of the decade, which is to say the century. So I'm not really going to say anything else about it because it's all been said already. (N + 1's symposium on <i>Freedom </i>is great.) Now, you <i>may </i>understandably be thinking <i>how can you say </i>Freedom <i>is the most important book of the decade but </i>not <i>the best book of the year?! </i>My answer is, the last person who tried to quantify me, I ate his liver with a nice Chianti.<br />
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2. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Autumns-Jacob-Zoet-Novel/dp/1400065453/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1292522284&sr=1-1">The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet</a>, </i>David Mitchell, Random House, June 29, 2010. Okay, so. Imagine Mitchell proposing this book to his publisher: "An' so, there's this Dutch bloke in the year 1799, yeah? [for Mitchell is British, and they all talk like that] And he goes to Japan. And then, goings-on ensue!" Because that is pretty accurate. And most publishers I think wouldn't touch it with a 39-and-a-half-foot pole. But then they read it. And they were blown away. Then they published it. It was a huge success, because the perhaps initially reluctant readers were blown away. Much like myself. Wow. What an amazing, unusual, and utterly beautiful novel. It's a hard book to talk about, because it covers a lot of territory, and isn't necessarily about anything especially. It <i>is </i>partly about devotion to a cause, be it love, God, country, money. Freedom. So, what's great about this novel? I think it has something to do with the fact that Mitchell couldn't write a bad sentence if he was drunk, high, and had to type with his toes. He does <i>everything </i>right, even the stuff they say you shouldn't do, like write dialogue in accents. But he writes the accents (working-class Dutch islanders talk like pirates!) and it's great. His imagination is limitless; he writes it all like he was there. This is historical fiction, and he writes it effortlessly and fearlessly. This is a beautiful, stand-alone work of art. A work of pure devotion to literature, and that's why I enjoyed it more than <i>Freedom. </i><br />
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1. <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Visit-Goon-Squad-Jennifer-Egan/dp/0307592839/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1292523187&sr=1-1">A Visit from the Goon Squad</a>, </i>Jennifer Egan, Knopf, June 8 2010. This one's going to be harder to write about than <i>de Zoet</i>, even. Read the jacket sleeve; it doesn't have a clue what it's talking about, it's pointless blathering. Basically, this novel is constructed of separate stories, told from different perspectives and formats (PowerPoint!) set in different time periods about related characters. Here's what it amounts to: people are lovable fuck-ups. The world is lovably indifferent. Things are always getting better and always getting worse. I'm not being glib, here. I love this book. The writing is terrific. Egan captures every voice perfectly. It's just a joy to read her. The book, despite a motley cast a characters, is sort of about hope, and this is a good thing. It ends on a hopeful note. A <i>really </i>hopeful note, as opposed to <i>Freedom</i>'s slightly sappy hopeful note. (I keep feeling the need to justify placing <i>Freedom </i>at third; I need to stop that.) But, great book. Great read. Read it.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-67928067137799915212010-12-15T16:24:00.000-08:002010-12-15T16:24:46.557-08:0015 Dec 2010With the last of my finals turned in, six-pack of Guinness cooling in the fridge, Mumford & Sons (perpetually) in the CD player, I should be feeling pretty great right now. Except I'm feeling kind of angsty, and I know what it's all about. I need to start writing again, and the angst is my conscience's way of making this apparent.<br />
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So here's some writing assignments, straight from my conscience to my shriveled creativity department:<br />
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New blog coming up about the better of the publishing industry's output for the year.<br />
Blog about this ri-fucking-diculuosly good album by Mumford, et al.<br />
Perhaps an explanation of why I'm endlessly stalling on my <i>other </i>blog, if there is one.<br />
A story before the beginning of next semester. <br />
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But for now, conscience, I just want to unwind. So go away.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-23781910729952015422010-10-29T11:11:00.000-07:002010-10-29T11:11:33.584-07:00Another book you should read.This time it's Jennifer Egan's <i>A Visit from the Goon Squad. </i><br />
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This novel---composed of a series of stand-alone stories related by character and interior depth---can and <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/15/AR2010061504751.html">has</a> been described as post-postmodern, something that came from decades of ultra-self-conscious text and literary stunt pilotry. Whereas postmodern fiction is mostly concerned with esoteric reference and characters as stand-ins for concepts and themes, Egan's novel revels in character, and offers a chance to relate to a strange cast of characters. It's readable, but doesn't neglect readers who demand a certain depth and intelligence from their fiction.<br />
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If the novel draws anything from postmodernism, it's a disregard for conventional structure. The stories all have an individual strength; they are rife with their own themes and symbols, and yet, they come together to make a powerful statement about aging, interaction with other people, and, surprisingly, <i>subtly</i>, love. There's a heartfelt humanism that permeates through each tale, as different as they all may be. The stories are written in first, second, and third person. Each works incredibly well, against all odds, even (especially, maybe) the story that's written as a power-point presentation. (Actually, that's what other reviewers call it. In the story, it's a teenage girl's "graphic journal," from a near-future that values visual content over verbal. As the narrator [director?] quotes school-endorsed slogans such as "Add a graphic, increase your traffic," and "A word-wall is a long haul.") <br />
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Sometimes the stories are absolutely heart-breaking, as in "Out of Body," about a disillusioned young man who drowns in a garbage-strewn river, and the final story, which takes place in 2020, and shows a world of ultra-connectivity, instant-access art, and pure hope. How beautiful and rare.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-74668681341429508512010-10-13T12:22:00.000-07:002010-10-13T13:00:33.607-07:00Couple books I'd like to write about:<br /><br />Firstly, Benjamin Percy's <span style="font-style: italic;">The Wilding. </span>Percy's the author of a couple books of short stories <span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;">(</span></span></span>The Language of Elk </span>and <span style="font-style: italic;">Refresh, Refresh</span>,) many of which deal with issues of what it means to be a man, what it means to be a boy growing into a man, what it means to be a man during a disastrous, fiendishly well-plotted, soul-baring hunting trip in central Oregon. Or so I've heard. I haven't read them all.<br /><br />I'm certainly going to make that change after reading <span style="font-style: italic;">The Wilding, </span>Percy's first novel, released by Graywolf Press late last month. I picked up the book after reading a smallish blurb about it in <span style="font-style: italic;">Esquire </span>and, sort of shamefully, I was mostly just drawn to the cool cover. But hey, I've discovered some great books that way and this time was no exception.<br /><br />The novel has received much comparison to good ol' <span style="font-style: italic;">Deliverance, </span>which I'm not qualified to build upon simply because I've never read it. I just know the reference, in which one character hums the infamous banjo line from the film version, is hilarious and rather obvious. I dig it.<br /><br />The book takes place in central Oregon (surprise) and deals with manhood (ditto.) The essential details how Justin Caves, a schoolteacher, and his son Graham go on a hunting trip with Justin's ur-manly father, Paul, before the wilderness is destroyed to make way for a shiny capitalism-symbolizing resort. The trip turns deadly as the hunters are stalked in the night by. . .something. There's a nifty and creepy side story involving Justin's disillusioned, unsatisfied wife, as well.<br /><br />Okay, so. The main story line is certainly nothing to go googly-eyed over, and it follows through fairly predictably, but the writing is absolutely superb. Percy writes like a more energetic, literary Stephen King and he keeps your ears perked for what may be hiding in the shadows. Certainly a good nighttime alone-in-the-house book. I hear Percy just signed a book deal to put out a <a href="http://www.tsweekly.com/news/features/viewed-from-afar-benjamin-percy-no-longer-lives-here-but-thats-not-stopping-him-from-writing-about-oregon.html">werewolf novel</a>, and this makes me very happy, as he handles an extremely similar theme with expert wordsmithery with <span style="font-style: italic;">The Wilding. </span><br /><br />Now for Book no.2: Kizuo Ishiguro's <span style="font-style: italic;">Never Let Me Go. </span>This book was published originally in 2005 and received tremendous acclaim; I'm ashamed of not having read it til this past week, when the movie edition of the novel was released.<br /><br />This novel is gorgeous and heart-breaking. It burns through your mind like a slow ache. As you read the last paragraph, I defy you to not cry, or at least get that closing-throat feeling.<br /><br />I'll give away the plot, as it's something most readers have encountered a dozen times before, probably in grade school: It takes place in a re-imagined late-'90's Britain, in which clones are raised as organ donors for transplants. Like <span style="font-style: italic;">The Wilding, </span>the power comes not from the banal plot but from the immaculate writing and the loving handling of the themes.<br /><br />The novel is told from the perspective of clone Kathy, a 31-year-old "carer," or someone who comforts the donor clones between donations, before they, too, begin donations. She tells the story of her and her friends' live prior to donating: they were raised in a privileged environment at Hailsham, a school for clone children. Eventually they graduate and get to experience the outside world somewhat, before becoming donors. It is within these moments the Ishiguro's perfect pacing and gentle narration really grabs for you heartstrings. The novel deals with love, death, innocence, and the loss thereof. It deals with all these things beautifully and tragically. <br /><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span></span></span>EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-22110348059229164092010-09-29T18:52:00.000-07:002010-09-29T19:03:45.715-07:0029 Sept 10Just finished another couple paragraphs of the latest <span style="font-style: italic;">Hector, </span>though tonight's not a great one for writing. I'm feeling a bit depressed and zonked, for some reason. I'll stop promising that it'll be finished anytime soon, it's just ending up being <span style="font-style: italic;">pretty </span>long. I just got to the action and it's already got twice the word count of the first one. I don't know how the humor is. We'll see.<br /><br />Humor writing has got to be one of the most difficult things in the world. Humor itself is so fickle; a joke I'll tell will sound brilliant til I start deconstructing a few minutes later, then it just strikes me as puerile. Obviously, <span style="font-style: italic;">Hector </span>aims for the puerile, so I'm not too concerned there, the humor is easy and fun. But I get to wondering if I'm a one-trick pony, or that I'll become one, or that there's no trick at all; I'm just a jackass. I'm certainly not a funny person by nature. It worries me a lot, which is odd because I've never had intentions of writing humorous material. It just happens.<br /><br />Well, that's all I got. Told ya, I'm rather dead-eyed tonight. Ta.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-73648732499144663602010-09-01T19:19:00.000-07:002010-09-01T19:24:00.527-07:00Sept 1stI awoke this morning to the glorious sound of utter downpour. I forget how blessed the first September storm feels. I don't have a ton to share, except that school is taking up an obscene amount of my time, What the Hell is slowly coming along (it'll be a long one,) and "All Alone in An Empty House," by Lost in the Trees feels like a perfect song to me. Also, I may be going to see Band of Horses in KC next month. Nifty, eh?EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-5601250123256731102010-08-12T12:52:00.000-07:002010-08-12T13:02:40.009-07:00Lodi, it's been awhile.<br /><br />What a Summer; break-up, classes, assignments, new Arcade Fire, classes, no writing, getting back together, classes, Yann Martel, insane, dying, murderous sixty-pound Straight Talk customers. Classes. Possibility of Pell grant for classes, but we'll see.<br /><br />Started a blog on Tumblr, which isn't that great, so I'll probably stick to good ol' Blogger. Or probably both, rather. New What the Hell, Hector coming up, soon, I promise.<br /><br />Right now I'm at the end of week 2 of my three-week between semester break, watching the Simpsons on DVD, as is my habit during any sort of break, and am currently covered in mysterious insect bites that itch like a mother. Who, during pregnancy, can sometimes itch a lot, I heard somewhere. The bites are leaking some piss-colored liquid, and I wish they would go away.<br /><br />That's all I got. Have things to do. Out.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-33996070708704305132010-05-28T08:26:00.000-07:002010-05-28T08:52:43.230-07:00Conflict resolutionHere I am, the last day of my week-long vacation, and I'm writing a blog. I've been here before; the thought of returning to the incredible malaise and undirected angst associated with my job after I've been away for a little bit puts me in the frame of mind to simply emote. I look back and see the void left by everything I wanted to accomplish but didn't, I look to the future and see only dread, and withdrawals from my newly acquired video game addiction. Summer classes that are going to take up so much of my reading/moping time. Seriously, I'm gonna be either in class or at work <span style="font-style: italic;">all </span>the time. Balls.<br /><br />So.<br /><br />Here's what has happened on my vacation: Saturday was a day full of reading and hope for the rest of the vacation coupled with relationship-associated angst. I don't remember it a lot, except that I finished Lipsky's DFW thing. A girl named Jessica Pettengill was killed in a car accident Sunday morning. Though I never really "officially" met her, I knew <span style="font-style: italic;">of </span>her somewhat through her family and mine; the Wheaton part of my family. I had also helped her with something at Wal-Mart about a week before the accident. Her death has kind of cast this pall over the past week. I think about it a lot. When I went to Joplin a couple days ago it was hard to drive in all that traffic. Traffic stresses me anyway, and I've always had some anxieties associated with driving, which I'll go into another time, but here's the point: this dread associated with this 17-year-old girl's death has nearly put my car-related anxieties over the edge. I make stupid decisions while driving. I pulled out in front of someone at a light, changed lanes without looking. It's an awareness issue, essentially. There's a new block in my perception while driving.<br /><br />It's somewhat disconcerting.<br /><br />So let's talk about something else. Stuff I wrote, like I said I would. Did I write something everyday? I didn't keep tabs like crazy, but I think so. I wrote poetry, snippets of songs. Mostly I worked on a single story that isn't quite done yet. It's at about 6-7 pages and is probably going to finally run at least twice that. I may post it, I'm not sure.<br /><br />Songs. I've never written a full song. I need to, though. I can definitely see it happen.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-70317342426529020902010-05-21T21:30:00.000-07:002010-05-22T12:36:57.977-07:00Roaring seaward, and I go.I seek out encouragement everywhere. I crave it: I'm mostly Irish by blood, a heritage renowned for producing literary talent; Geoffrey Chaucer was my great great great great great great grandpa, or something; I get good grades in English class, I grub for them, get weird, possibly disingenuous notes returned graded papers; I'm a Scorpio, just like Kurt Vonnegut, Zadie Smith, and Colson Whitehead. This can't be coincidence.<br /><br />Occasionally I even write.<br /><br />(I just started a . . .what? A sister blog, maybe? To this one? It's called What the hell, Hector? and it strives toward overbearing, outrageous entertainment. Much fun, new story coming this week.)<br /><br />Who was it that said good literature is the product of a conflicted heart? Faulkner, I think it was.<br /><br />Maybe I can find faith in that, as I've been rather conflicted lately.<br /><br />So. I am on vacation. On each day of this week-long vacation I will complete some literary act. Or maybe the week will be one long literary act. Maybe it'll be performance art. Maybe I'll post blogs as I go; maybe I'll post them as one big blogsplat at the end of the week. I haven't decided yet.<br /><br />Here's what I've read this past week: <span style="font-style: italic;">John Dies at the End</span>, David Wong. <span style="font-style: italic;">Let the Great World Spin</span>, Colum McCann. <span style="font-style: italic;">Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself</span>, David Lipsky.<br /><br />All good in their own ways. <span style="font-style: italic;">LtGWS </span>especially, is heart-rending.<br /><br />I realize that this blog is pretty much directionless; I'll work on that in the future.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-28649153869894019382010-04-30T19:28:00.000-07:002010-04-30T19:57:18.001-07:00Maybe I should've just numbered my posts from the beginning: they'd be easier to name.New phone today, old one went apeshit. Some sort of divine miracle that I was eligible to upgrade very early. But. . . I learned things about myself that I sort of wish I could unlearn, in the quasi-panic brought on by that briefest interuption of cell-service. I'm not that person, I've always thought, in fact, I'm a venerable mountain man, sociality-wise. All self-delusion.<br /><br />Brittany's Grandpa had a stroke today. Everyone include him in your prayers, please. He's a very good person. He is, at last notice, recovering. Recently learned stroke statistics echo in my mind, unbidden. Something like 20% of stroke victims are more or less invalid for the rest of their lives, and a much larger chunk are never. . . quite normal. By which I mean, the same. I hope she doesn't read this, but I don't think she reads my blog. I don't blame her. Prayers. Pray.<br /><br />To my two loyal followers ;) sorry for the silence. It's been a busy, stressful time in my life. I've been writing some, but too little to bring me any satisfaction. But too little to make me crash, too, at least. Something I've noticed: When I write something good, I'm so fuelled and uplifted by the experience that I'm more or less on walking on air for the rest of the day, but the day after? I feel ashamed. Ashamed of not writing <em>constantly. </em>Of maybe letting too little of myself go. Maybe of pride. Proud of a short micro-story that's somewhat poetic but the only thing you've written in a month and the only thing you'll write <em>for </em>a month? Silly. Then when I lay down at night to go to sleep, in those in-between moments after sleep has teased me and now finally holds up the covers to her bed a veil is lifted and I see myself miserable, poor, and still working at fucking Wal-Mart in five years. I need this to be an addiction. I need to let myself go in it.<br /><br />The few times that I've done it right: the synergy of hard work, greasy creative process, and blank paper filling up with me. It's a drug I can't get high on quite enough to get addicted to. Maybe I need to up the dose.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-4540379458255114502010-04-06T15:10:00.000-07:002010-04-06T15:16:42.020-07:00Farm Boy ZedIs the name of the comic that I'm collaborating on with my sister. I just finished the script and turned it over to Jerika for actual drawing. Pretty exciting. Think Jhonen Vasquez's stuff; only a little less humor (though there's still some,) and a little more horror. I have no problem wearing my influences on my sleeve. It's all fun and games anyway. I'm wondering how hard it would be to publish electronically? Set up a free site (since we're not really planning on making any kind of profit anyway) and it can be viewed in full color.<br /><br />I do like the way a physical comic book smells though. We shall see.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7952498282585601152.post-51537175120986789552010-04-05T20:02:00.000-07:002010-04-05T20:03:36.412-07:00David Foster Wallace......wrote <em>Broom of the System</em> when he was younger than me. This is disconcerting.EatenByWolveshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986614346677489101noreply@blogger.com0