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July 5, 2005

On Writing (Badly)

…But if you only knew how distressing it is to spoil an idea that has been born in you, made you enthusiastic, of which you know that it’s good—and to be forced to spoil it consciously! —F. Dostoevsky

I’m hanging myself with that lament—that black rope which forms when the written word falls lengths shy of translating the hum and buzz and spit of something you know is true. It’s a real fucking struggle.
Looking back at my work, I see… what? Badly smudged carbon-copies of Hemingway, faint echoes of Brautigan—pale rhythms that communicate experience indirectly, the indirectness a result of some kind of Chinese whisper….
Sitting at my bench, reading Hem’s epithet “Write the truest thing you know,” I wonder how best to tell you the story of Anne and her father. It’s a story that demands to be written well—written with commitment and a steady eye to the breathy sadness of it. Ahhhhh, right there: “breathy sadness”. That does it no justice, eh? But I’ll try to tell you the story anyhow, and you can decide for yourself and to hell with that black rope….

It was a Sunday and I was in bed beside her. The stray cat she had rescued meowed from the laundry. She wore a white t-shirt and gym shorts. I was in a smoky shirt. We both had headaches and I was very sure that I was in love with her.
She was much more attractive than myself, if such things can be compared, and much taller. Her apartment was small and warm and sparse and held Simon and Garfunkel CDs.
“My father comes to visit next week,” she said, looking at the ceiling.
“For how long?”
“A week. He misses me.”
I too looked at the ceiling.
“He never knows how to be around us.”
“Who’s ‘us’?”
“Me and my sisters. There’s an awkwardness. He thinks he looks weak.”
I turned and looked at her. The cat meowed.
“A few years ago…”
She coughed lightly and I widened my eyes just slightly.
“He tried to kill himself once. Few years ago. He was up late one night, and feeling the weight… He went into the garage, fixed the gas and sat in the car, waiting. He was there for a bit, feeling it, you know? And then he realized he was leaving behind three girls. He turned the gas off and came back inside. Got into bed with mum. When mum woke in the morning she could see something from beneath his pillow. She pulled it out and it was a photo of us girls… she didn’t know anything until a few days later when he told her.”
We stayed in bed for hours, talking. I hesitated asking her “what now?” but I did and she told me she wasn’t interested in anything more.
She had a party to go to that night and when she was in the shower I let myself out and caught a cab back home. It was a very long trip and I thought of calling home on my mobile, but decided against it, and sat back and watched the buildings and smog become one and I thought hard, real hard, about nothing much at all. My heart was too hung-over.

Posted by Marty at July 5, 2005 10:44 AM

Comments

Posted by: panda at July 10, 2005 12:40 PM

Posted by: catherine at July 10, 2005 1:44 PM

Posted by: marty at July 14, 2005 3:39 PM