It was last Thursday night at a local townie bar, Franklin House. The area’s oldest bar has been around since the 1860’s. Creaks and warps in the establishment’s flooring gives testament to the joint’s age, but the square footage, high ceilings and circa 1900 ceiling tiles add to the spacious feel – which is a commodity for bars in the Region area. Flat panel TVs adorning the steep walls prove that well-placed technology makes anything look nostalgic. In translation: it’s a favorite. Here’s some of the occasional silliness that can be found at Franklin House:
While listening to friends, neighbors and college students try to bellow their horrific karaoke crucifixions of Mellencamp, disco classics and pop audio retail over the thundering rush of several freight trains, our table starts to notice an unnatural buildup of suits and ties congregating in the center hall between the dueling main rooms. We start to think they’re going to have a private party in the cigar room in the back, but as we watch them get sloppy drunk and partake in some electric slide-like dance with coeds, we (“we” as in “I”) start to just pass them off as white collars and start to get a little annoyed because they’re making it increasingly difficult to do drink runs because they’re making better walls than windows.
A little more watching and we (“we” as in “I”) start to feel glad they we don’t have to wear those getups everyday. I work at a place where potential hirees get a little confused in interviews because their interviewers are often in open-toed sandals. I let the annoying feeling go and start continue to come up with new and inventive paths through the white collars to the bar, and back.
It’s on a trip to the powder room when I started to feel like an ass. As I’m standing in front of one of the urinals, I asked a couple of the white collars the reason they were all dressed up.
“Y’all just get out of a meeting?”
“Naw, man,” the one standing next to me said, “We’re hear for a buddy.”
“A wedding?” I ask.
“Nah, man,” said the white collar on the end as he’s zipping up, “The other way.”
“Oh, a divorce,” I surmise.
“Worse,” said the zipped-up white collar,”We lost a buddy.”
“Aw, man,” I empathized as I slinked through the doorway and back to my seat.
I told my tablemates the reason for the buildup of white collars. My table took a quick moment to reflect, then went back about their day. I, on the other hand, proceeded to watch the white collars a little further. As the buzz of the evening wore off, the white collars’ cheers started to turn to sobs and lots of consoling. I don’t have the funds at present to pay for the tabs of parties, but if I did I would have paid for that whole group. Part guilt, part penance. I raised my glass to them and toasted them instead.
Whatever metaphysics applies to the situation made sure my penance was thorough.
I dropped my supervisor back at the hotel after our evening at Franklin House. He was hungry and had me stop at White Castle on the way. I had but a couple and he had but many. Long to short, he saw me at work the next morning and said if I needed to go home because of food poisoning, he’d understand without question. I almost did, but he was in significantly more pain but couldn’t leave because of the responsibilities of the day so I felt that, not matter how bad I hurt, I was finishing my day. I went to bed at 8pm Friday night and slept hard for 14 hours.
It was this kind of perception I wrote about in Book of Blues: stereotyping without knowing all the facts. It was the same sh*t I fought against while at Denominational University. I was definately damned to reremember the lesson. I thank you, White Castle. Don’t be suprised if I don’t look to visit again any time soon.
I finally got the iPhone 3g WordPress app working. As a co-worker told me, “The thing can be tempramental.”
I don’t think I can get to the plugins, the spellchecker is left to be desired and, by God’s Holy light, be careful about closing out the app in the middle of a post because the recovery doesn’t always work – hint: save right away after recovery because no matter HOW much you write after you recover, it’ll save back to the recovery point. So yeah, if you’re going to slip out of the app and pause your ipod or check a text, save before you close or you’ll have to go through my present hell of having to rewrite half of this. Grr.
But, yeah, the limitations come at a better-than-fair trade for what a user gets in return. And what the user gets in return is – as William Wallace would have said, “Freeeeeedom!”
I find writing paradoxical. Like Alaadin’s genie might have said, “Great big powers; itty-bitty living space,” (Robin Williams in Disney’s Alaadin). I hope I quoted that right. I’d double-check, but I already had enough fun with the recovery. I’m not quite in the mood to dance with that devil again.
But with this iPhone 3g and the Wordpress app, I can write and think from anywhere. No, I don’t write cell phone commercials. No, I ain’t gettig paid – that’s another site and then I’m only artificially flowery as i’m am paid, and even then I admit to it in advance. But with this iPhone 3g, I just like the ease of having this thing everywhere with me – home, work, play, travel… – being able to write, shoot pics (and video, once I figure it out) and publish when the movement is on my shoulder (“la, la-la, la, La / La, La-LA, LA” – Lennon/McCartney). Like Wolf Blitzen staying at the right hotel at the right time, every time I’m out n about.
Even when you’re chillin’ at your grandfather’s, watching the 2008 World Series. Oldold man Finn says, “Hi.”
You better believe the iPhone sleeps on its own pillow next to me at night.
Minnehaha Creek meets the mighty Mississippi River
So I looked forward to my trip to Minneapolis. This was going to be a crossroads for Book of Blues. Good and great stuff keeps being said of Book of Blues. I need to hear something harsh. I don’t care how much I put into the book. Someone has to hate it eventually. Those people are out there. I want to find them and find out why they think it sucks. If anyone will hate it, it’ll be my cousin. We have that sort of combatitive nature. The spirited competition keeps us on our toes.
So far, I get a bunch of these sort of comments:
“Wow, there’s a lot going on but I can really follow along.”
“I found I really miss the characters when I haven’t read it.”
“Book of Blues is actually like 3 books in one.”
“I just wish I knew for certain what happened to some of the characters.” – this was the harshest one. This complaint was fixed by assuring the reader that there was a “TBC” (“To Be Continued”). Closer to the truth, “Could Be Continued,” because, in the end, who the hell really knows. As Brainyquote.com just reminded me on my gmail as I await a confirmation email, that old blues god, Søren Kierkegaard, once said:
“Life must be understood backwards; but… it must be lived forward”
Soren Kierkegaard said a lot, but I take him at face value. You get spoonfed him enough in college, with his thinkings put on a pedestal and placed on high only to find this theologian’s biggest practical experience in love (relationship, not metaphysical and all those damned words he had for describing it…) was being engaged to a lady named Regine Olsen and then breaking it off because he felt it was his call in life to suffer a life of solitude to keep him focused on his dutiful, devout, sacred writing, you tend to grain-of-salt his wisdom at times. OK, now granted he’s from 19th century Danish high society and multiple cultures throughout history have had their own unique measurements on age-appropriateness including the sacred bar mitzvahs, but what 27 yr old PH. D. grad really wants to shack up with a 13 yr old? I mean, seriously, Liv Tyler wasn’t even thaaat good looking when she graced her first magazine cover at that age. Not that the poor boy died a virgin. According to the tale, his friends helped him with that by getting him shitfaced one night and taking him to a prostitute. The best sex he can’t be sure he remembers. Is it any wonder that he literally wrote himself to death by age 47.
So, anyway, I didn’t get that brawling debate of Book of Blues like I had hoped because my cousin had started Book of Blues in that not-so-much kind-of-way. He’s a newlywed, working a couple jobs to make ends meet. I let it go. The itch to get the book published still weighs heavy, but I can only be so many kinds of asshole about it.
So, I go back in three weeks, enjoy the drive through the Wisconsin countryside. The trip wasn’t a total loss by any stretch. I got to hang out with my cousins. My cousin’s wife and I walked down Minnehaha creek (yes, everything in Minnesota seems to start with “Minne”. Yes, a “Minne”-joke) and followed it out to the sacred Mississippi River. Great times, great, peaceful days.
And, by the way, if you end up out at the park and take the 46th Street Bridge over to St. Pauls and chill out at The ChatterBox Pub, mix their strawberry lemonade with their specially-brewed IPA. It sounds crazy, but I drank them all night. Tall, leggy waitresses can be that kind of inspiring – and despite what my cousin might have said to his friends in livejournal, I don’t “play a mean game of ‘pick up the waitress’.” I’m only so many kinds of asshole.
“No. Pride won’t be my fall. I’m a Cubs’ fan. My heart was coming apart before I was born.” – Nat Finn.
I dunno. I suppose everyone who claims to be a writer has either distractions posed as vices or vices posed as distractions. Many drink. Some just roll up in a bed and hide under the covers from the anxiety. RJ Reynolds accommodates many of the distractions/vices. Some have the more illicit substances, and then there are those with the more carnal approach to avoiding their literary goals / tasks. Lest we forget: there’s comfort food. I was at the Printers Row Book Fair in Chicago and during a session at Grace Place, I heard author Marianne Wiggins tell us that she gained 20 lbs. writing her last book. I wish I only gained 20 lbs. working on Book of Blues.
But, unfortunately, moreso than comfort food and sleeping, my biggest distraction / vice are those damned Chicago Cubs. My ability to focus on a task at hand is proportional to the performance of the northsiders. Needless to say, at the time of this post, the Cubs performance against the Dodgers in the first two games of the NLDS was enough to make me ADHD for life. Their second inning alone in the second game was a collaboration of past failures rolled into one. There was a Leon Durham, a Steve Bartman and an Alex Gonzales in one shot. At least every member of the infield (aside from Soto) shared and each took an error.
I try to channel the spirit of the ‘04 Red Sox went they down 3-0 in the ALCS to the Yankees after giving up 19 runs in game 3. Talk of the Curse of the Bambino was rampant. Instead of listening to the media, believing in the talk and letting the legend of the curse consume them, the Red Sox went out loose, played smart baseball, worked the counts, and won 4 straight before going on and sweeping the Cardinals in the World Series, giving the Sox their first title in many, many years. No Bill Buckners in that series.
I tried to remind myself and hoped others in Cubs Nation would remember that the White Sox just won in ‘05. How hard could it really be?
But, as I finish this post the following day, after watching the Cubs actually show signs of life in game 3, 2 games too late, I’m stuck back in the Nietzschean loop, waiting for next year like I have many offseasons before and will continue to do many offseasons later. It’s like giving up on your Children: against the nature of good people.
I watched an ESPN.com special where they interviewed Cubs fans from most every living generation on how and why they’re Cubs fans. The one that intrigued me was that of Billy Corgan. I’m not a Smashing Pumpkins fan. I don’t hate Smashing Pumpkins so much as I like a little soul n blues in my tunes. But as I watched (from the tv) the crowd reactions at Wrigley during game 1 and 2, seeing them boo at a moment’s notice and grumble the moment the Dodgers took a lead, I thought about Corgan’s interview. Billy Corgan talked about how since the ‘03 NLCS – Bartman, Gonzales’ little league error when trying to turn an inning-ending double play and the Marlin’s 8-runs in the 8th inning in game 6 that turned the Cubs’ fortunes of being 5 outs from the World Series into a nightmare – he has had to be a fan from a distance because it was too painful anymore. Now, you can dub part of the problem the “Stub-Hub” effect where the super-rich wanting to be a part of desired social event outbid the everyday die-hards on Stub-Hub for the tickets and the reason the crowd at Wrigley was so harsh was because the super-rich were looking down their nose at something less than aesthetically pleasing moreso than rooting, but no matter how you slice it, the negative atmosphere in Wrigley was from the same essential issue. “The water swirled around the same drain.” The drain was this: Cubs Nation is too afraid to commit to the Cubs. Whether it was the super-rich who didn’t really care or the diehards who’ve seen and heard stories of the agony which date back before World War I, the moment the Cubs looked lesss than perfect, Cubs Nation anticipated the worse. Now granted, only those in the 3rd base dugout in Wrigley can play and make decisions, but the all of Cubs Nation affect each other. They created their own destiny. We create our own destiny. We saw a semblance of failure, expected failure and got failure.
I had a buddy text me just now and ask, “When did Loney become Albert Pujols?” I wrote back, “Cubsdom made him Pujols.”
I’m going to root for the Cubs in ‘09. When things are good, I’m going to be happy. When things go bad, I’m going to have faith that they’re going to figure it out like I did during the ‘08 regular season. And when the ‘09 postseason comes around and things look a little down, I’m going to try something different: I’m going to commit to the Cubs and believe they’ll figure it out. I suggest others in Cubs Nation do the same or we’ll never get that World Series trophy. – Is it a trophy? I’m a Cubs fan, I haven’t seen it.
