Monday, October 27, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
One of the great conventions--and also one of the virtues--of the old novel was its suspensefulness. Suspense seems to make us ask "What will happen to Tess next?," but really it emerges from the writer's conviction of social or cosmic principle. Suspense occurs when the reader is about to learn something, not simply about the relationship of fictional characters, but about the writer's relationship to a set of ideas, or to the universe. Suspense is the product of teaching, and teaching is the product of mastery, and mastery is the product of seriousness, and seriousness springs not from ego or ambition or the workings of the subjective self, but from the amazing permutations of the objective world.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Smoke & Monlogue
It was dark by the time I reached Brooklyn, and I forced myself not to give in to the series of mechanical actions which had become my companions in, what, two years . . . two years of traveling back and forth and forth and back . . . down the station steps, up the station steps . . . past the headlines and go-go dancers . . . the go outside and wait . . . for what? A bus? Autobus? Only sometimes. Mostly I felt like the little tobacco wound up in the cast off cigarette, the one burning over there.
I came to America . . . I came to America, New York City . . . because of a great story told to me by my Grandfather, jug of wine by his foot like a bass drum to punctuate some song he sewed into my blood . . . He bounced me on his knee, bounced it into me . . . He was a poet, they called me away from him, but he spun smoke that looked like a stairway . . . I ran up when no one was looking.
If the smallest pebble is worthless, then everything is worthless, and . . . Is that really what you want to tell your grandchildren?
If the largest love is broken, small as a pebble . . . and it is worthless . . .
if what is worthless is worth no more than a pebble . . .
Surely you have remembered to catch snowflakes in your bare hands, to fly the greatest kite . . .
Let me tell you a joke, let me try one on you. Wait, wait. This is not a joke like that. I would never joke about comedy.
A very old lady at a party of cocktails . . . she seems to be wealthy and certainly they pay attention to her. The politicians, the important people. You know the kind. And at once, a group of honor students from the local high school approach with their guide. They are the guests of honor. She begins to apologize, she says, for not being Italian. Oh yes, I forgot to mention . . . it was an event to honor a famous, Italian construction worker. She says to the young people, I’m not Italian, but my first husband was named Luigi. He used to bring me cannolis from a store called La Strada. I used to say, “I’m Italian, but only by injection.”
By injection! I love the American spirit. When my grandfather went to America, he met a beautiful woman. He married her. He went to war. Wrote her a letter every day. And when he came back, he walked right past her, walked right through her almost. He was looking for the letters. And when he found them . . . ah . . . when he found them he took them out back. He burned them and then kissed her on the tears. He said what I will always remember: I will never leave you like the smoke that leaves you now.
I came to America . . . I came to America, New York City . . . because of a great story told to me by my Grandfather, jug of wine by his foot like a bass drum to punctuate some song he sewed into my blood . . . He bounced me on his knee, bounced it into me . . . He was a poet, they called me away from him, but he spun smoke that looked like a stairway . . . I ran up when no one was looking.
If the smallest pebble is worthless, then everything is worthless, and . . . Is that really what you want to tell your grandchildren?
If the largest love is broken, small as a pebble . . . and it is worthless . . .
if what is worthless is worth no more than a pebble . . .
Surely you have remembered to catch snowflakes in your bare hands, to fly the greatest kite . . .
Let me tell you a joke, let me try one on you. Wait, wait. This is not a joke like that. I would never joke about comedy.
A very old lady at a party of cocktails . . . she seems to be wealthy and certainly they pay attention to her. The politicians, the important people. You know the kind. And at once, a group of honor students from the local high school approach with their guide. They are the guests of honor. She begins to apologize, she says, for not being Italian. Oh yes, I forgot to mention . . . it was an event to honor a famous, Italian construction worker. She says to the young people, I’m not Italian, but my first husband was named Luigi. He used to bring me cannolis from a store called La Strada. I used to say, “I’m Italian, but only by injection.”
By injection! I love the American spirit. When my grandfather went to America, he met a beautiful woman. He married her. He went to war. Wrote her a letter every day. And when he came back, he walked right past her, walked right through her almost. He was looking for the letters. And when he found them . . . ah . . . when he found them he took them out back. He burned them and then kissed her on the tears. He said what I will always remember: I will never leave you like the smoke that leaves you now.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Letters to Someone Else # 1
Dear M.,
Your talk of prayer dizzies me a bit. I think about how hard you’re praying and how hard you’re thinking about prayer, and I realize that my prayer life is in shambles. Which is an interesting thing to consider.
Prayer shambles . . .
I started praying when I was very young. . . It started with my father’s words, after story time. We said the “Our Father” and the “Hail Mary.” Then, my favorite part… we said the “Thank you dear God” prayer, a family specialty, I believe, like my Grandmother’s meatballs. In this prayer, we made a long list of all the things we were thankful for. In the early years of this prayer, it was so wonderfully exciting, inventive, spontaneous, improvisatory. . . We would start down one train of thanks, and end up dredging up memories of old aunts and cousins, of good cars, long since traded-in, of dead pets and shrubbery. The world was wonderfully alive with thanks and praise.
At a certain point, my father stopped his nightly visits, as all fathers must, I imagine. And at that point I started praying alone. Prayer began to resemble calisthenics at this point. The words became mechanical, quick, efficient. The “Thank You Dear God” prayer ossified into a list. Same list every night. No more discovery.
To be honest, my biggest problem at this point in my life was this: when should I think about girls? I remember monumental struggles about this. Should I think about girls before I pray and then ask God for forgiveness, or should I think about girls after I pray and hope God doesn’t notice?
. . .
And now I don’t pray much at all. Why? The fact is simple. I don’t know how to pray when I’m not alone. I think I can honestly say that I’ve prayed just about every time I’ve been in bed alone. But when I’m in bed with somebody else—my wife—I just don’t think about it, I don’t know how to get into the proper position. Which raises other questions, one in particular. . . the romantic notion of the solitary monk. I’ve carried it around in my head, in one way or another, since high school. First it came from Jack Kerouac, whose writing is often tinged with spirituality. He ran away from society to pray, meditate…
And so there’s something here that does speak to life and against death. We can, I think, equate prayer, true prayer, spontaneous prayer, deeply considered prayer, childlike prayer—with life, a way of living, a way of staying alive as the body does its death dance.
Prayer in the ultra-modern age!!! Now that’s a great problem, isn’t it. I’ve noticed that my students have very little concept of inwardness, of stillness, of meditation, or reflection. Why? Well, there’s a simple answer. Technology. They don’t spend time alone, in their own heads. They communicate with each other, socialize, avoid boredom at all costs, build identities on Facebook, keep track of where their friends go on the Internet, text, talk, etc. . . and most of the kids that I teach, when they’re not doing that, are working their asses off, reading books, doing community service, learning math, science, playing the violin. So, at what point do they nurture their inner life. How does a technology addicted, action oriented, boredom averse generation learn to pray? I leave that to you, my friend.
-Merton
Your talk of prayer dizzies me a bit. I think about how hard you’re praying and how hard you’re thinking about prayer, and I realize that my prayer life is in shambles. Which is an interesting thing to consider.
Prayer shambles . . .
I started praying when I was very young. . . It started with my father’s words, after story time. We said the “Our Father” and the “Hail Mary.” Then, my favorite part… we said the “Thank you dear God” prayer, a family specialty, I believe, like my Grandmother’s meatballs. In this prayer, we made a long list of all the things we were thankful for. In the early years of this prayer, it was so wonderfully exciting, inventive, spontaneous, improvisatory. . . We would start down one train of thanks, and end up dredging up memories of old aunts and cousins, of good cars, long since traded-in, of dead pets and shrubbery. The world was wonderfully alive with thanks and praise.
At a certain point, my father stopped his nightly visits, as all fathers must, I imagine. And at that point I started praying alone. Prayer began to resemble calisthenics at this point. The words became mechanical, quick, efficient. The “Thank You Dear God” prayer ossified into a list. Same list every night. No more discovery.
To be honest, my biggest problem at this point in my life was this: when should I think about girls? I remember monumental struggles about this. Should I think about girls before I pray and then ask God for forgiveness, or should I think about girls after I pray and hope God doesn’t notice?
. . .
And now I don’t pray much at all. Why? The fact is simple. I don’t know how to pray when I’m not alone. I think I can honestly say that I’ve prayed just about every time I’ve been in bed alone. But when I’m in bed with somebody else—my wife—I just don’t think about it, I don’t know how to get into the proper position. Which raises other questions, one in particular. . . the romantic notion of the solitary monk. I’ve carried it around in my head, in one way or another, since high school. First it came from Jack Kerouac, whose writing is often tinged with spirituality. He ran away from society to pray, meditate…
And so there’s something here that does speak to life and against death. We can, I think, equate prayer, true prayer, spontaneous prayer, deeply considered prayer, childlike prayer—with life, a way of living, a way of staying alive as the body does its death dance.
Prayer in the ultra-modern age!!! Now that’s a great problem, isn’t it. I’ve noticed that my students have very little concept of inwardness, of stillness, of meditation, or reflection. Why? Well, there’s a simple answer. Technology. They don’t spend time alone, in their own heads. They communicate with each other, socialize, avoid boredom at all costs, build identities on Facebook, keep track of where their friends go on the Internet, text, talk, etc. . . and most of the kids that I teach, when they’re not doing that, are working their asses off, reading books, doing community service, learning math, science, playing the violin. So, at what point do they nurture their inner life. How does a technology addicted, action oriented, boredom averse generation learn to pray? I leave that to you, my friend.
-Merton
Letters to Someone Else # 2
J.
I figure you’re not going to have a hell of a lot of time to read an email, so I’ll try to carve my thoughts into short paragraphs.
Your trip sounds strange and beautiful and makes me realize how far I’ve come from the thing I used to call life. I certainly have a life, and work myself as close to the bone as I can, but I don’t often feel a sense of ragged glory.
My recent international experience amounts to a slightly legalistic online negotiation with a French experimental jazz musician whose music I want to use in a film. Last night, listening to his music, I thought about you. It’s not surprising that I heard from you today. It’s possible, in fact, that when I was thinking about you you were typing to me. Time zones might create miraculous coincidences like that. It’s hard to figure.
The process of acquiring children and family and layers of fat is also the process of forgetting to dream about the self that you once thought you could be. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. That self was probably not worth much, but the dreaming . . .
H. can speak about nineteen words and is learning how to tell jokes. He also likes it when the puppets attack each other.
I last made art about a month ago. Since then, dribs and drabs. Tiny mouths are yawning.
This weekend is a thing called the Superbowl. People are pretty excited about it. I thought it was last Sunday, and I’ve been telling people that for the past week. It allows them to laugh at me and me to practice being humble and making jokes at my own expense. But also, it tells me that I’ve lost more than just the thread of my own, old self. I’ll split the difference.
I was driving in the rain today and I realized that I want to climb a mountain. I put out some feelers. Already I’ve been hearing back from mountains in need of climbers. I guess they’re pretty desperate. When transcendence happens along your spine, I imagine you feel its opposite, which also must be kind of amazing.
Take care, my friend. And write!
B.
I figure you’re not going to have a hell of a lot of time to read an email, so I’ll try to carve my thoughts into short paragraphs.
Your trip sounds strange and beautiful and makes me realize how far I’ve come from the thing I used to call life. I certainly have a life, and work myself as close to the bone as I can, but I don’t often feel a sense of ragged glory.
My recent international experience amounts to a slightly legalistic online negotiation with a French experimental jazz musician whose music I want to use in a film. Last night, listening to his music, I thought about you. It’s not surprising that I heard from you today. It’s possible, in fact, that when I was thinking about you you were typing to me. Time zones might create miraculous coincidences like that. It’s hard to figure.
The process of acquiring children and family and layers of fat is also the process of forgetting to dream about the self that you once thought you could be. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. That self was probably not worth much, but the dreaming . . .
H. can speak about nineteen words and is learning how to tell jokes. He also likes it when the puppets attack each other.
I last made art about a month ago. Since then, dribs and drabs. Tiny mouths are yawning.
This weekend is a thing called the Superbowl. People are pretty excited about it. I thought it was last Sunday, and I’ve been telling people that for the past week. It allows them to laugh at me and me to practice being humble and making jokes at my own expense. But also, it tells me that I’ve lost more than just the thread of my own, old self. I’ll split the difference.
I was driving in the rain today and I realized that I want to climb a mountain. I put out some feelers. Already I’ve been hearing back from mountains in need of climbers. I guess they’re pretty desperate. When transcendence happens along your spine, I imagine you feel its opposite, which also must be kind of amazing.
Take care, my friend. And write!
B.
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