Finally, consecutive days of sweet, rejuvinative Spring weather. It's getting hard to want to go to class, it's getting markedly more difficult to even contemplate going to work (ugh, saying the mere name of that association strikes fear and loathing into my heart) and music seems to fill my ears everywhere. My dad is playing his home-made banjo, a gentle, soothing sound drifting through the house even if I don't like bluegrass and even if my dad hasn't mastered the thing yet. I've rediscovered hardcore and heavy metal (major Mastodon jags, and I'm looking into the Dillinger Escape Plan's new one right now) and feel of the sweet air pushing through the open windows never fails to remind me of Manchester Orchestra's Mean Everything to Nothing. So I've given that a couple whirls.
Spring. The season of lost and found. The season of the cruellest month. The season of Green. Of plans. Of hope, maybe. The hope and the planning are the things that brings the music out, I think. Or maybe it's not that the music was ever gone, but that it means something different in Spring than it does in other seasons. It serves mainly to keep you warm and unalone in Winter. In Summer, it's (unfortunately, sacriligiously) a mere soundtrack. In Autumn, let's see, what poetic yet sort of true thing can I say here...In Autumn, music keeps some fire alive. It keeps you moving so you don't slip into hibernation. But in Spring... That's the season when you discover songs that mean something to you and always will. Maybe it's a part of the rebirth. I wonder if the pagan's pulled out the instruments more in Spring, to chase away the emotional havok wreaked by Winter.
Who's to say? All that is meaningless, except music. Music is life.
So what's new with me? Started a comic (again) with my sister illustrating. A zine is in the EARLY, early stages of planning. Restarting my alt-history story, which has been playing hard-to-get with my mind since I started on it months ago. I think I've been using the wrong perspective all along. We'll see how it works out. Enjoy your music.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Sunn O)))
I'm not a metal fan by any stretch of the imagination; too lugubrious, even for me, too much association w/ local meth-heads, etc. I can hold a vague appreciation for the instrumental abilities of the practitioners, and I have some nostalgia for the days of my early teens, before I discovered punk rock and the Pixies, when I actually did listen to Godsmack, Metallica, and Tool on a regular basis. But aside from that, I usually forget that the genre exists.
Except. . .some reason I bought a Sunn O))) album on Amazon. (I think I'd read that John Wray, a favorite writer of mine, listened to them or something.) And I can't fucking stop listening to it. They sound like an H.P. Lovecraft story. Like something huge coming up from underneath. I feel an unusual sense of anticipation when I hit PLAY, something I don't even feel when I put in Grizzly Bear or Radiohead. It's. . . exciting. Not that those other bands aren't exciting. Both are filled with ur-talented musicians who write insanely great, original music. But, as original as it is, one grows to expect it, to intuit the next move, like a that of a friend with whom you've played chess for years and years.
I guess it's just time to change it up a bit. Sunn O))) will never be my favorite band (still Radiohead, I'm afraid,) but they'll always be the sip of something hard I keep hidden in my desk drawer.
Except. . .some reason I bought a Sunn O))) album on Amazon. (I think I'd read that John Wray, a favorite writer of mine, listened to them or something.) And I can't fucking stop listening to it. They sound like an H.P. Lovecraft story. Like something huge coming up from underneath. I feel an unusual sense of anticipation when I hit PLAY, something I don't even feel when I put in Grizzly Bear or Radiohead. It's. . . exciting. Not that those other bands aren't exciting. Both are filled with ur-talented musicians who write insanely great, original music. But, as original as it is, one grows to expect it, to intuit the next move, like a that of a friend with whom you've played chess for years and years.
I guess it's just time to change it up a bit. Sunn O))) will never be my favorite band (still Radiohead, I'm afraid,) but they'll always be the sip of something hard I keep hidden in my desk drawer.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Butterfield, Mo
Let's say, as a description exercise, I describe the town in which I live, Butterfield, Mo., to all of you adoring readers. It's a physical microcosm of Cassville, centered on a bow-shaped offshoot of HWY 37, with administrative faculties (i.e., "city hall,") located in the northern bit. Actually, geography-wise, that's about all it has in common with greater C-ville. You could start walking through it from any side and be on the other side in about 20 mins. Politics overwhelmingly conservative. Across from my house is the sewage treatment plant, which is the source of much managerial pride and scoffing at any questions of pragmatism thereof, as well as the town's (village's, hamlet's, insignificant outpost's,) exorbitant water-billing. There's a baptist church smackdab in the middle of the town's anatomy that is probably the nicest building within metro B-field. (A swanky McMansion lies on the outskirts of town, there since before "McMansion" would've been used to describe it.) Outside of the church is a small basketball court on which white and hispanic children can often be seen playing. Venerable melting pot, despite oft-overheard rascist complaints of elder white-folk. (Bit o' trivia: according to rumor, a black man spotted in the town of Cassville after midnight can be legally lynched. It's a law that's apparently still on the books. Liberal mecca, this place.) I've been to this court late at night, and the air was still and cool and tickled every bit of my lungs. I've walked every bit of this town. I wrote an essay on this that got me a B in Eng 101. The most notable features of the town? Maybe the railroad that splits the town in two. I've written stories on that, too. Maybe the bridge that goes over the tracks on the "southside." It's a covered bridge. With beams the color of a river and riverbed. There's a plaque posted to one of the beams that I can never quite read when I drive by, and always forget on the few occasions that I walk to the bridge. Maybe it would explain why such an expensive bridge was built on such a minor road. There's a small wedge shaped park that is the subject of many a photo by me and my sister Jerika. Once we lay on the two picnic tables in the park and hollered Ray Bradbury stories at each other through the wind. Many plans made there, few fruitful ones. But late, the streetlight there is an orange teepe of illumination spotted with moths and when you sit inside it you can see all the ghosts of your childhood pass before your eyes and cast you a dismissive wave that reminds you that it'll all be over before you know it.
I can't seem to let it go. Writing I mean.
So what makes me so drawn to writing---as a career, as a past-time, as release---anyway? Was I born to do it? (Though if that was the case, shouldn't it be, like, way easier?) Does it appeal to some aspect of my nature? (I do like being shut up in my room, away from everybody and the world, quite alot.) Maybe it's storytelling that's in my blood, or maybe just record keeping.
I did enjoy making up scary stories to tell my siblings and cousins when I was pretty young, in keeping w/ my very early love of all things horror/dark fantasy related. The first books I encountered as a burgeoning reader? Goosebumps, baby, as well as the Time-Life Books Enchanted World series. (Anyone remember these gorgeously illustrated texts? Ye gods, imagine what effect those pictures had on the four-year-old mind. They were delicious.)
These were stories. Had something akin to morals in 'em. I ate them up. Made up my own. I can't remember ever trying to write any of my own down, just telling them in clubhouses and on Sundays down by the creek by my Grandparents' place, when my cousins and I would tromp out to explore after the family feast. I relished the moment, the climax of whatever D-movie-grade monsterfest I'd come up with, when my beloved cousins visibly squirmed and told me I was one sick customer.
So yeah, the storytelling part has always been there it seems. This is a proud tradition, and I'm proud to be drawn to it.
The exact moment I knew I wanted to write though, that came a lot later. It was simple. My family went to some cheap pizza place, and it happened to have a gorgeous west view. You could look down on the town, the factories (urban/industrial settings always put me in a creative mood. Another story,) and above it all, the sun was setting. It was, well, toxic-looking. But beautiful. Like the sun was burning out, and we were all just sitting at the bar. I felt like I had to write it down. In such a way as to make even someone who'd never seen a town or sunset feel exactly as what I was feeling just looking at it.
It took a while, to get it just right. It took the form of poetry, flash-fiction, longer fiction. I even dreamed about stories in which I could incorporate this scene. I finally wrote a good one down, though I'll be damned if I can find it anywhere now. But it was such a special experience, the act of creation. The failure and experimentation. Finally getting it right. Beautiful.
I did enjoy making up scary stories to tell my siblings and cousins when I was pretty young, in keeping w/ my very early love of all things horror/dark fantasy related. The first books I encountered as a burgeoning reader? Goosebumps, baby, as well as the Time-Life Books Enchanted World series. (Anyone remember these gorgeously illustrated texts? Ye gods, imagine what effect those pictures had on the four-year-old mind. They were delicious.)
These were stories. Had something akin to morals in 'em. I ate them up. Made up my own. I can't remember ever trying to write any of my own down, just telling them in clubhouses and on Sundays down by the creek by my Grandparents' place, when my cousins and I would tromp out to explore after the family feast. I relished the moment, the climax of whatever D-movie-grade monsterfest I'd come up with, when my beloved cousins visibly squirmed and told me I was one sick customer.
So yeah, the storytelling part has always been there it seems. This is a proud tradition, and I'm proud to be drawn to it.
The exact moment I knew I wanted to write though, that came a lot later. It was simple. My family went to some cheap pizza place, and it happened to have a gorgeous west view. You could look down on the town, the factories (urban/industrial settings always put me in a creative mood. Another story,) and above it all, the sun was setting. It was, well, toxic-looking. But beautiful. Like the sun was burning out, and we were all just sitting at the bar. I felt like I had to write it down. In such a way as to make even someone who'd never seen a town or sunset feel exactly as what I was feeling just looking at it.
It took a while, to get it just right. It took the form of poetry, flash-fiction, longer fiction. I even dreamed about stories in which I could incorporate this scene. I finally wrote a good one down, though I'll be damned if I can find it anywhere now. But it was such a special experience, the act of creation. The failure and experimentation. Finally getting it right. Beautiful.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Summer
You wanna know what I miss about summer? In the dead of winter? Here's what I miss about summer:
Having your window cracked open just a little bit, because you're suffering hot in your bed because your parents don't believe in air-conditioning and the little lazy, indicisive puffs of air that creak through that window-space are absolute Heaven. You can't sleep out of anticipation of the next of those little heaven-breezes and the sweet, sweet sensual smell of green that it'll sneak in with it. Eventually a train will go by (a wonderful thing to happen in all seasons, but especially summer,) and the dogs of town will howl and bark in agreement and you'll envy those dogs more than just a little because, well, they're free and they own summertime.
Having your window cracked open just a little bit, because you're suffering hot in your bed because your parents don't believe in air-conditioning and the little lazy, indicisive puffs of air that creak through that window-space are absolute Heaven. You can't sleep out of anticipation of the next of those little heaven-breezes and the sweet, sweet sensual smell of green that it'll sneak in with it. Eventually a train will go by (a wonderful thing to happen in all seasons, but especially summer,) and the dogs of town will howl and bark in agreement and you'll envy those dogs more than just a little because, well, they're free and they own summertime.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Old things,
While digging through all those blog posts I found these poems/story-things I wrote when I was still a teenager...They're not half bad for a kid I think.
The Plague is coming
Writer; front porch, sunset, the house faces east, so he's in shadow.
The tree behind the house casts a shadow, an oddly shaped one that
looks like crooked spokes without a wheel. Leaves and a dog play in and around
the shadows. (death is not the end)
Doctor; ah yes, don't doctors know how to do it? they don't fuck it up..
You put the barrel in your mouth, deep, suck it like you love it..
You taste it and it gags you, but how nice the cold and the solidity,
comfortable, even. The Plague is coming. Doctors don't fuck this up..
Salesman; be a talkshow host, because here you already got the desk
an' everything. All the glory of turning nothing into sumthin everyones
just gotta have, you are a god, man...at the end there will be only
salesmen, so you'll have all the best stories, you know, you'll tell them
in a bar in heaven, god'll be there and boy will he look sheepish when
you tell 'im of all the many red ways the women and children died. See
the way the sunset looks through the window behind you, nah, don't turn,
you've never cared for aesthetics anyway, man...
Nurse; Oh baby, you'll see the white lights and candy fights over in there.
Kids like the place, are drawn to it. And after the evening shift, so are you.
Standing,watching. Spindley little brats. You know that a person died at this
intersection. Hanged himself from the traffic light.
An elderly couple drove through the minute he let himself swing. The tips
of his sneakers just scraped the top of their car. They didn't notice. The Plague
means nothing to the old.
High School Football Player;practicing on a desolate, washed out field, but nah,
this ain't practicing, this is the real deal, like those nights when you and daddy
threw that pockmarked foam football back and forth. It's almost night now,
and it's times like this when you almost understand what death is. It's moving
fast now...
Dog;where you are alone, there is no home. It takes more than one soul to
fill that shell, and even dogs have souls. There are hells and hells here, but
heavens are a bit more precious, more elite. No, you don't have to be good
or accept anyone into your heart, that's impossible anyway. All good dogs go
to heaven, though, and heaven is for dogs...
Ghosties
The boy was not to be engaged, tonight. As his punishment for deeds rendered the ghosts kept him in here, his grandfather's library, until their party ended. He could just hear it over the storm, the party, i mean. It was a dead thing to the boy, really, he just wanted to go so as to not be lonely for a change. Since the death of his siblings that past fall he had become ever more despondant, and this was beginning to annoy him, yet he tried to reach for something, something brighter and vivider, and was denied. He didn't wonder if it was himself doing the denying, as there was no other explanation, he just knew. This wasn't the first time things like this've happened.
But that is all beside the point, which was that there was a large bay window on the eastern wall of that liquid-black room, that in front of that window was a red velvet divan, that the boy sat on his knees, backwards on the seat, his knees sinking and sliding deeper into the cushions, facing the window, that the storm that night was glorious, the kind of thing that make you believe in gods, the old greek kind, the kind of glorious that only exists for men who believe in war, that there was lightning that lit the night as bright as midday, but no, because the sun never seared this whitely, for the sun was warm, that the sea was revealed in this light as an unrealisticly vast roiling darkling membrane of something that showed itself only to very small boys in liquid-black rooms as they sit staring out an eastern-facing bay window. That this sea, this beast was unknown to the ghosties in the next room, poor ol' ghosties never get to the end of stories, because they know what happens, too bad for them. Live as long as you can maties cuz in death there is only boredom and costume parties.
..>
..>
mean ol' buzzards...
Sam is in his dream town, a place scattered with buildings that meant something to him when he was younger, will when he's older, maybe. When he comes here he's always crouching next to the streetlight next to the house he grew up in, and he seems to have been studying the dust and various motes of something swirling in the spare drafts pushing the air. He is never able/never has enough time to figure out what, if any, significance this has. Buzzards circle, broken white-colored people congregate in sequences that mime the buzzards' lazy drifting. There is no traffic on these streets. When Sam stands up to do anything, he is dragged around by powers beyond his will, then he realizes that the buzzards are dragging him, are, in fact, dragging all of them, the strange broken white-colored people, as if they were all on puppet stings. Where are they being dragged? Why, to the cliffs of course. Where else would a buzzard drag someone? To the cliffs in their hungrily lazy aggresion. Sam wonders how the birds have acquired this power. With half-lidded eyes, Sam scans the peoples' features as they pass by him, nearly colliding, in fact, on several occasions. It is an amusing passtime, is all.
The Plague is coming
Writer; front porch, sunset, the house faces east, so he's in shadow.
The tree behind the house casts a shadow, an oddly shaped one that
looks like crooked spokes without a wheel. Leaves and a dog play in and around
the shadows. (death is not the end)
Doctor; ah yes, don't doctors know how to do it? they don't fuck it up..
You put the barrel in your mouth, deep, suck it like you love it..
You taste it and it gags you, but how nice the cold and the solidity,
comfortable, even. The Plague is coming. Doctors don't fuck this up..
Salesman; be a talkshow host, because here you already got the desk
an' everything. All the glory of turning nothing into sumthin everyones
just gotta have, you are a god, man...at the end there will be only
salesmen, so you'll have all the best stories, you know, you'll tell them
in a bar in heaven, god'll be there and boy will he look sheepish when
you tell 'im of all the many red ways the women and children died. See
the way the sunset looks through the window behind you, nah, don't turn,
you've never cared for aesthetics anyway, man...
Nurse; Oh baby, you'll see the white lights and candy fights over in there.
Kids like the place, are drawn to it. And after the evening shift, so are you.
Standing,watching. Spindley little brats. You know that a person died at this
intersection. Hanged himself from the traffic light.
An elderly couple drove through the minute he let himself swing. The tips
of his sneakers just scraped the top of their car. They didn't notice. The Plague
means nothing to the old.
High School Football Player;practicing on a desolate, washed out field, but nah,
this ain't practicing, this is the real deal, like those nights when you and daddy
threw that pockmarked foam football back and forth. It's almost night now,
and it's times like this when you almost understand what death is. It's moving
fast now...
Dog;where you are alone, there is no home. It takes more than one soul to
fill that shell, and even dogs have souls. There are hells and hells here, but
heavens are a bit more precious, more elite. No, you don't have to be good
or accept anyone into your heart, that's impossible anyway. All good dogs go
to heaven, though, and heaven is for dogs...
Ghosties
The boy was not to be engaged, tonight. As his punishment for deeds rendered the ghosts kept him in here, his grandfather's library, until their party ended. He could just hear it over the storm, the party, i mean. It was a dead thing to the boy, really, he just wanted to go so as to not be lonely for a change. Since the death of his siblings that past fall he had become ever more despondant, and this was beginning to annoy him, yet he tried to reach for something, something brighter and vivider, and was denied. He didn't wonder if it was himself doing the denying, as there was no other explanation, he just knew. This wasn't the first time things like this've happened.
But that is all beside the point, which was that there was a large bay window on the eastern wall of that liquid-black room, that in front of that window was a red velvet divan, that the boy sat on his knees, backwards on the seat, his knees sinking and sliding deeper into the cushions, facing the window, that the storm that night was glorious, the kind of thing that make you believe in gods, the old greek kind, the kind of glorious that only exists for men who believe in war, that there was lightning that lit the night as bright as midday, but no, because the sun never seared this whitely, for the sun was warm, that the sea was revealed in this light as an unrealisticly vast roiling darkling membrane of something that showed itself only to very small boys in liquid-black rooms as they sit staring out an eastern-facing bay window. That this sea, this beast was unknown to the ghosties in the next room, poor ol' ghosties never get to the end of stories, because they know what happens, too bad for them. Live as long as you can maties cuz in death there is only boredom and costume parties.
..>
..>
mean ol' buzzards...
Sam is in his dream town, a place scattered with buildings that meant something to him when he was younger, will when he's older, maybe. When he comes here he's always crouching next to the streetlight next to the house he grew up in, and he seems to have been studying the dust and various motes of something swirling in the spare drafts pushing the air. He is never able/never has enough time to figure out what, if any, significance this has. Buzzards circle, broken white-colored people congregate in sequences that mime the buzzards' lazy drifting. There is no traffic on these streets. When Sam stands up to do anything, he is dragged around by powers beyond his will, then he realizes that the buzzards are dragging him, are, in fact, dragging all of them, the strange broken white-colored people, as if they were all on puppet stings. Where are they being dragged? Why, to the cliffs of course. Where else would a buzzard drag someone? To the cliffs in their hungrily lazy aggresion. Sam wonders how the birds have acquired this power. With half-lidded eyes, Sam scans the peoples' features as they pass by him, nearly colliding, in fact, on several occasions. It is an amusing passtime, is all.
I'm not much one for dwelling in the past (who am I kidding? I love doing that) but here's an old post that I find interesting still. In thinking about where I was when I wrote this (on my currently mostly ignored myspace site) all I can say was, wow, what simpler, hectic times. I do wish I could go back and tell myself "get your act together, man," but that would be a hurtful insult to a person who was trying so desparately to get his act together.
Spooky Ol' Highway 18 July 2007
Just some thoughts:...
Last evening my sister and i went a-strollin' through the merry ol' town of Butterfield, pop. 394, according to one sign, and 200 and some according to another, and as we walked home from the local fuelling concern/convenience store I began musing aloud about the seemingly inherent spookiness possessed by highways. If you miss what I'm saying, I mean take a walk down a fairly quiet highway at twilight and see if you don't start feeling it, kind of like...well, like I said to Jerika, it's similar to the creepiness of hotel rooms, a place where countless people before you have passed through. And you don't know anything about these people, what they think, what they've done, what they did earlier the day that they stayed...highways, or any kind of well-traversed trail or path carved by human beings, have a similar nature, i think. By the shear number of the people that use them they become stained or marked with the quotidianness of the commute, yadda, yadda, yadda. Thus imbuing said road with...not something as melodramatic as a consciousness or soul, but maybe with a mood...I mean how many of those countless,commuting, faceless people are bad? How many are crazy? How many are murderers, child molesters? How many are on their way at that moment with nefarious intent in their destination?
Jerika pointed out that roads are a daily feature in many peoples' lives, and that when people die, (some of them on the road itself), roads are just as likely as houses to become haunts for souls compelled to stay at places familiar to them in life...if you believe that type of thing...Is this the core idea behind the spookiness of roads? A road isn't a place, really, it's a transitional phase or system, a means to many ends, but not really an end itself. Something like Death, with a capital D? w/r/t that idea, get this; one of the more chilling scenes in Joe Hill's novel Heart-Shaped Box is when the protoganist Jude gets a midnight phone call from his assistant Danny, who says calling from a payphone on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere...he's suddenly realized the nature of his whereabouts and tells Jude that he killed himself a few hours ago and that this road in the dark, this is dead. The moment is very poignant, to me anyway, because it seems not only plausible, but true. Or valid, at least. Death as a road. It makes more sense than eternal paradise or eternal damnation merited by the mundane actions of one's life...
Well anyway, hope you enjoyed my ramblings, or at least understood them. Comment me if you have any ideas or anything you wanna add.
Spooky Ol' Highway 18 July 2007
Just some thoughts:...
Last evening my sister and i went a-strollin' through the merry ol' town of Butterfield, pop. 394, according to one sign, and 200 and some according to another, and as we walked home from the local fuelling concern/convenience store I began musing aloud about the seemingly inherent spookiness possessed by highways. If you miss what I'm saying, I mean take a walk down a fairly quiet highway at twilight and see if you don't start feeling it, kind of like...well, like I said to Jerika, it's similar to the creepiness of hotel rooms, a place where countless people before you have passed through. And you don't know anything about these people, what they think, what they've done, what they did earlier the day that they stayed...highways, or any kind of well-traversed trail or path carved by human beings, have a similar nature, i think. By the shear number of the people that use them they become stained or marked with the quotidianness of the commute, yadda, yadda, yadda. Thus imbuing said road with...not something as melodramatic as a consciousness or soul, but maybe with a mood...I mean how many of those countless,commuting, faceless people are bad? How many are crazy? How many are murderers, child molesters? How many are on their way at that moment with nefarious intent in their destination?
Jerika pointed out that roads are a daily feature in many peoples' lives, and that when people die, (some of them on the road itself), roads are just as likely as houses to become haunts for souls compelled to stay at places familiar to them in life...if you believe that type of thing...Is this the core idea behind the spookiness of roads? A road isn't a place, really, it's a transitional phase or system, a means to many ends, but not really an end itself. Something like Death, with a capital D? w/r/t that idea, get this; one of the more chilling scenes in Joe Hill's novel Heart-Shaped Box is when the protoganist Jude gets a midnight phone call from his assistant Danny, who says calling from a payphone on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere...he's suddenly realized the nature of his whereabouts and tells Jude that he killed himself a few hours ago and that this road in the dark, this is dead. The moment is very poignant, to me anyway, because it seems not only plausible, but true. Or valid, at least. Death as a road. It makes more sense than eternal paradise or eternal damnation merited by the mundane actions of one's life...
Well anyway, hope you enjoyed my ramblings, or at least understood them. Comment me if you have any ideas or anything you wanna add.
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