Possibly Epic Fail

It's one of those nights where you're walking home from the coffee shop and you're passing an unlit streetlight and you spit and the light flickers, flares and joins its brothers and sisters in consistent illumination and it shocks you for a minute but you keep going. Then, a few minutes later, another unlit streetlight and perhaps coincidentally, perhaps through some subconcious reflex, you spit again and that streetlight, too, flickers and flares and lights.
This time you're less shocked and more amused at the absurd parallelism. So the next time you see an unlit streetlight, about a block from home, you spit again. And that streetlight flickers and flares and lights. And then you start to think you can light streetlights with your mind--figuring maybe that your brain configures itself in such a way when you spit to send electric impulses to the fuse or whatever and you're something like a god. A god of streetlights, sure, but in this day and age where society seems to be relentlessly searching for new gods, who the fuck is gonna split hairs?
So I figure now is as good a time as any to tell you all something that'll humble me a little in immediate and obvious ways; and in more subtle ways that will only become apparent as the days and months and years pass.

The room is dark and it smells like cigarette smoke and cinnamon. You can't see it but you can picture the whisp of smoke still coming off the Christmas candle she just blew out.
"I just get bitchy and discouraged when I read something that I don't think is as good as what I write," I say. She's annoyed with me because I criticized the book she was reading to me from. "I mean, it's ridiculous to me that something that bland and shapeless could get published."
"Well then why don't you get published? Bitching about other people's work won't do it. Get yourself out there."
I snort and say, "You have no idea how hard I've tried."
"Okay, okay. Don't get defensive. I'm just saying, I've never seen you try so..."
She's got a point.
I roll over and close my eyes, picturing pages and pages of manuscripts I've turned out over the years and I have to admit, yeah, a lot of them are bad. Worse than bad.
There are the stories I write and the sotries I talk about writing. Probably the most famous of the latter group would be the novel that has gone by titles like Fucked Up!, How Could Hell Be Any Worse?, So Much Worse, Those Wretched, Those Doomed, The Doomed Ones, The Cursed Ones and The Book of Anathema among some other painfully cheery names. (And I swear it only occurs to me now how dreary and depressing those titles are.)
This is the book I've told people I intend to work up to. The magnum opus, my sure-fire materpiece. The epic dystopian satire weaving the first-person life stories of six semi-related people. The novel that begins on or around September 11th 2001 and ends some fifty or sixty years later. I imagine something in the nieghbourhood of 600-800 pages at least, despite my commitment to minimalism.
When I describe my idea to people they ask why I don't start it now. My response is usually some variation of this:
"I'm smart enough to know I'm not ready to take on something so big yet. I don't have the skill to tell it, the focus to research it or the simple ability to fix it when I fuck it up--which I will."
But lying in bed with nothing to show for years of honing my craft, studying the conventions and tricks and traditions, I have to admit that the reasons seem flimsy when sales of novels like the Twilight series are surpasing other lousy books like the Harry Potter series.
Seems to me I'm just scared that my best idea won't be good enough. And that reason, well, it's definitely not good enough.

The concept of this novel started with a loose collection of ideas that seemed related in some way. Ideas that actually, over the ten-or-so-years since they first came to me, have made friends of newer ideas and become my personal philosophy. A philosophy that, while I haven't the arrogance to call finished, doesn't take up as much of my time anymore. Less time is spent trying to piece it together and turn it over in my mind to check it for holes. Now it functions more as a backdrop to my life. Or better still, as a lens through which I view the world. A lens that helps me understand myself, the world and my relationship to it much better.
The philosophy seems to be ready to go. And this book was always supposed to be that outlet for me, a means of expressing my worldview sort of like Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead (except, you know, comprehensible and well-written). So why not start it? It was a question I couldn't answer without making sorry excuses that did little but veil the afforementioned fear.
So start it I shall.
As of Monday I begin the considerable research period that will be required to make this story work. I've got a reading list a mile long that will take me at least three or four weeks to work my way through (and this is ignoring the very real possibility that those books will bring others to light that will also need to be read).
I've written things before that required research. I think the longest I've ever spent researching a single story was somewhere in the nieghbourhood of two weeks. This is an entierly different animal. There will be much note-taking, cross-referencing and mucking about with unwieldy volumes on topics ranging from Existentialism to Native story telling to corporate law.
I also believe I will need to do something I said I would never do: plot the story in advance. This will be my first attempt at writing something big enough to lose characters in, to tear holes in the plot or to suffer from any chronological errors. While I've always said one shouldn't know where a story is going until it's been told, I don't think it could hurt to plot certain check-points along the way to make sure my characters don't get lost, wind up in two places at once or die and return fifty pages later.
Also, I need to decide who my characters are. I have six of them to tell the story and they all have important parts to play in it. But I think it would be a mistake to give them life before I really know who they are. This is the first time I will write more than one character at a time and I don't want to make the mistake of playing favourites or giving too little time or attention to any of them. I may go so far as to fill up a notebook on each character so I know them and have reference material on them when I begin.
All in all I figure the prep-time on this beast will take me well into the New Year. I also think that once all the research is done and the plot drawn up and the characters fully realised I'll want to take a break. After that, there's a very good chance that fear will hamper my ability to begin the novel for a couple of weeks.
By that time I'll probably be back in school or getting very close to it so that will obviously slow down the writing process a great deal. Granted, in the past when I had ten or more hours a day to dedicate to writing I could crap out a novella in a couple of weeks. (Which, I know, seems fast. But consider the fact that I am a minimalist and I don't cut things out--I write fiction that way naturally so revisions are usually pretty short because even novels are pretty short.)
I don't harbour any illusions that this will come as quickly or even be presentable after the first draught. Even if I were to find ten hour days to work on it, this is a more involved piece of writing than I've ever attempted. What I'm saying is, I'll consider myself successful if I manage to finish a first draught before the apocalypse my story will attempt to predict occurs.

But I will begin it. I won't give it a name. I won't talk a lot about it--maybe I won't talk about it at all. But I'll do it. I'll work on it. And maybe it'll take years to finish, maybe I'll write other things in between and during breaks. But I'm not going to put it off anymore.

Calling Him Priest Does Not Make Him Priest

The trouble is that the nieghbour dropped off an extra-large double-double at 1:30am and, being oblivious to how my body has changed since I was eighteen, I figured I was cool to down the whole thing and still nod off immediately. Before that was the other nieghbour and his girlfriend coming over to watch a werewolf movie (which prompted the question: "Hey, when's the last time we watched a movie that wasn't a horror?"). Before that was waking up at two in the afternoon because I'd gone to bed at five in the morning.
So I'm still awake at 3:30am, fully aware of the fact that I will be awakened in something like six hours by a three-year-old ruckus in the next room, fresh from two nights at her dad's house and forgetful of all the rules of this one.
Yay!
And what am I doing at 3:30am? Reading Cities of the Red Night and discussing with Steph whether or not I believe losing Amy Winehouse to her addictions would qualify as a tragedy. And if you're having trouble guessing which side I'm taking, maybe this will help: I'm citing great musicians, artists and writers who died young and asking whether or not Amy Winehouse can properly be compared to them.
And it's as I'm listing names of more and less obscure talents that I surprise myself by mentioning Kurt Cobain.
I look at the book in my hand and depart from the topic completely (Hey, it's 3:30am, I've got the sleep schedule of an over-caffeinated cat and, like, zero attention span) and start talking about The "Priest" They Called Him--a nine minute and forty-something-second ep featuring W.S. Burroughs reading a short from his collection Exterminator! while Kurt Cobain plays some dissonant guitar in the background.
I heard it on CD way back when Kurt Cobain was still mentioned by everyone everyday. By that point I was more interested in Burroughs than in Cobain, but I had to admit that I was really into what they were doing.
Apparently the track was also released on a one-sided 10" picture disc limited to 50,000 copies. That sounds like a lot to a hardcore kid, but when you consider the followings that these two guys had, well, it doesn't seem like near enough.
Of course the recording is out of print. It's still available online at Amazon and, no doubt, eBay; and yet I find myself hoping instead to one day find it while rifling through bins in some dusty old record store in some major metropolitan centre. Maybe because that way there's a chance that I won't have to pay upward of $60 for the 10", or maybe because that's just how I've always done it.

In other news: I seem to have a couple of leads on amps, I'm just about ready to sit down and start writing something serious, I'm going to be listening to both Blue Train and Yanqui UXO tonight if it kills me and I've decided to forgo buying a motorcycle until after London (unless a stupendously good deal comes up in the meantime).
By the way, the link to my nieghbour's book does not constitute an endorsement--I have not read the novel. In fact, I feel compelled to warn you that if all I've read about Publish America is true, they'll publish anything. Nonetheless, there it is. Take it for what it's worth.

Clarification and Whatnot

THE ENGAGEMENT
So I'm sure I've inititiated some cognitive dissonance out there for folks who have known me for a long time. I can picture one or two people scratching thier heads and saying, "Can he be serious? Or is this some sort of social statement?"
I'm serious. Also, it may be some sort of social statement.
For years I eschewed the idea of marriage. It seemed an unneccessary arrangement entered into half-blind by most people; all too frequently resulting in shit like heartache and financial insolvency. A good solid coke habit, I reasoned, would probably turn out better. Or a self-administered lobotomy. (Which, by the way, are the same thing, really.) I figured marriage was looked at one (or both of) two ways: Either it was a social contract issued by a society that I had nothing in common with and whose institutions mean very little to me; and/or it was a religious contract and, as you are all aware, religious contracts are not high on my list of priorities.
So why this socio-religious institution? Why now?
I've settled into relationships in the past. They were fulfilling in a certain sense since I wasn't looking for permanence. This is not to say they lacked depth or passion or love. But they were ephemeral, fleeting things and most of the time I realised this going in.
The thing is, when you're not looking for permanence, you start courting the transient, seeking it out. Probably because if you know at the outset that it won't last, it will hurt less coming out the other side. This is precisely what happened in my last relationship. We talked about marriage in a half-hearted, jokey way but we always said that there was no such thing as forever. "It's a word designed to give hope to a hopeless culture," I said.
So coming out of that relationship I felt good--that is to say I felt like I'd been made a better person for my involvement in it and like I'd salvaged a real friendship for knowing when it was over. I felt ready to take on the world. There was no protracted period of healing, no fear of getting hurt again. And it is in this mindset that, as chance would have it (if you believe in chaos or unbound freewill which, let's face it, are far from certainties), I happened to meet what may very well be the only girl with whom permanence seems possible.
The component lacking in all my past relationships that kept them momentary was understanding. An understanding of who I am, why I believe (or don't believe) as I do. An understanding of what is most important to me and why. A respect for the deepest foundations of my character.
Stephanie seems to understand. She doesn't always agree, but she gets it.

All that being said, I am practical about this. Because I have accepted so many temporary relationships as temporary, I go into this with eyes wide open. I know what kind of work will be neccessary to make permanence happen. I know it won't always be easy and fun.
But I suspect it'll be worth it.

LITERATURE
In other news, it seems that I'm starting to feel a bit writerly again. I'm getting small story ideas and my fingers seem to be moving over the keyboard with a modicum of grace and ability once more. I'm not sure when I'll be able to tackle a novel again. With something like three failed manuscripts in various drawers I may just be a little gun-shy. However, Broken Pencil has a short story contest coming up. Perhaps if I submit something I will find the old confidence--and should I gain any recognition for it, all the better.
I've also found that engaging in reading material of the sort which I would normally decline has helped. Genre fiction, pulp paperbacks and such. Not that I'm rushing to write the next horror novel you'll find on a rack in an airport and forget after your flight--but reading those types of books is an interesting experiment that seems to be exercising my creative muscle.
Another helpful factor seems to be my place of residence. Maybe it's because artists tend to be shit-poor most of the time, but I seem to be reading quite a few manuscripts by aspiring writers (not to mention listening to songs by aspiring songwriters and critiquing the fruits of other sundry artistic pursuits) since I moved to Taylor Ave. Some of them are really good. Some of them are really, really bad. But it helps to know that there are others out there pushing thier way through the muck and slime of anonymity.

OTHER
The amp I have been using has been returned to its rightful owner. I'm hoping to borrow one for a while to continue writing/recording some music.
My landlord is a jerk-ass. Though, I don't suppose that's news to anyone who has ever had a landlord.
Gwenyth has the energy of an atomic bomb and the discipline of a three-year-old. So I guess that's just about right.
George Carlin is, regretfully, still dead. Along with Johnny Cash, Bob Marley, Joe Strummer, Bill Hicks and a host of other erstwhile rebels. Dick Cheney is, somehow, still alive.
And so am I.

Struggle with the Medium, Continual Tedium

This is my favourite time of year. The cold, the rain, the unsettled sky the colour of faded denim--all this plus picking wet leaves off the soles of my boots before coming inside.
Woke up at six in the morning after falling asleep at three thirty--got out of bed at seven. Made coffee and smoked cigarettes and read the news. Sweeney Todd, the Demon Kitty of Taylor Ave decided to crash out on my lap while Queen Isis mewed at her empty food dish. I'm sure I'll miss the sleep I might have had if I'd stayed in bed and forced my eyes to stay closed--but really, will I miss it as much as I've enjoyed this morning?
Somehow, I doubt it.

Steph and I checked out Monkey Unit? at the Elephant's Nest the other night. A couple of pictures have been posted for your enjoyment. My personal favourite is J.D. doing the robot.
The band is a good time if you're looking for mid-to-late ninties modern rock covers. Not my thing but they're all swell dudes and they do what the do well. And hearing songs I heard on the radio and disdained when I was a fifteen year old punk kid make me smile now.
After the show we had taquitos and Pepsi, went up to J.D.'s apartment where he and I drunkenly discussed our writing over whiskey and water while Steph and Pike wrought audio havoc, playing the new Metallica album.

What does a writer who can't write do? He blogs the tedium of his daily life. What good is he? Not much, I suspect. But it might just get the old fire burning... if he can sustain the heat.

The ninth rule in the Thinking Person's Guide to Suicide is as follows:
Do what you do, suck it up and force yourself through. If you haven't tried you can't give up. (Anyone noticing a theme in these rules yet?)

Galvanized Corpses

Coffee: I'm heavily considering making the second pot of the day.

Rain: I keep hoping that it will wash away the vague uneasyness in my mind--to little avail, of course.

Cigarettes: Runnin' low.

Monkey Unit?: At the Elephant's Nest tonight. Maybe I'll take some pictures and post them here when I get back.

Top five works of art blowing (or about to blow) my mind right now: Endless Blockade's Blackprint Sessions (still); Mary Shelly's Frankenstien; Burroughs' Cities of the Red Night; a neat little zombie flick called Vanguard; and, last but not least, Gwenyth's laugh (I have officially become a sentimental jag-off).

I went for a walk in the rain earlier because Steph couldn't hear her game over my loud, screechy guitar playing. I had this moment (born, no doubt, of far too many horror flicks watched over the last month or two) of certainty that the hobbling form approaching me through the fog ahead was a zombie.
There was a pure, crystaline minute of anticiaption and joy. A moment where my brain said: Dude, it's finally happened. The world has cracked under the strain, the dead walk again. This is your time to shine. Get a shotgun, steal all the canned goods from the corner store, fortify the apartment and live out the end of days in exhileration.

Of course, it turned out to be a drunk. A drunk who wanted to borrow five dollars, no less.
Then it occurred to me how truly bizarre my moment of happiness was. I suppose it was the part of me--the enormous part of me--that's sick of looking at billboards and watching commericals and eating Big Macs and trying to find something worth looking at on the internet. The part of me which, when confronted by a happy little liberal who tells me Obama has won and the New Age of Reason can begin, says, "Yeah? So?"
I guess that part of me would rather deal with zombies who want to eat my brains than the ones who want to colonize it with unsavoury ideas and desires. Probably because I can shoot those ones without fear of reprisal.

And on that happy note... I'm off to the shower.

Taking a Big Fat Crap in the Blogosphere

I've said it before but: the sky is the colour of wet concrete and just as heavy. I've cracked the window to let the smoke from my cigarette escape and cold air creeps in from outside. I'm drinking soy milk in my coffee beause I know it's better for me. The words that used to come fast and furious now hobble in through the open door in my head one at a time, sometimes days apart. Do I need to tell you how draughty it is in here, in my head? How tempting it is to close that door? But if I do, what am I? Not a writer, that's for sure.
So how does a writer, who hasn't written in ages, start writing again? Well, apparently he begins by pilfering his own material and then degenerates into question asking. I suppose he could, if he were so inclined, fall back on that old writing axiom: write what you know. Though I have to confess, I've always thought of that as a fallacy. Who wants to read fiction about drinking coffee, job hunts and going to the bathroom? Not me.
Still, for our purposes it seems like as good a place as any to start. We'll start with non-fiction in the hope that it gets that cliched metaphorical ball rolling.

So, what's happened lately?
Well, Canada has elected another Conservative minority--that was pretty stupid. The most shocking thing about that, at least from my perspective in my riding, is best illuminated by information gleaned from candidate profiles in my local newspaper. What gave me hope before the election was that the Liberal, NDP and Green Party candidates for Chatham-Kent all said that the important issues facing Canadians were jobs and the environment. All three suggested creating "green jobs" in a fabulous bit of two-birds-with-one-stone philosophy. Imperfect? Yeah. Better than nothing? For sure.
The Conservative incumbent, on the other hand, said that the issues that most concerned him as a Canadian were crime and our nation's role in Afghanistan. I remember reading the relevant passeges out loud to Stephanie and laughing. I figured that if the candidates' views reflected those of thier respective parties the Conservatives had no hope. Crime? Our role in Afghanistan? Most of the Canadians I know realise that with the economy the way it is, crime can only get worse and that the answer to that is jobs.
The answer to Afghanistan is even simpler (I recognise that job creation is easy to say and difficult to do--but why else to we elect these cats?) and it goes a little something like this: get the fuck out. If we were doing some good there, if the country was truly stablizing, if terrorism were actually evaporating I might sing a different tune, but at this point we're just doing our continental nighbour's dirty work. And let's face facts: we're doing it badly.
So a record low 59% of registered voters came out to elect the wrong party. And, if I'd not let optimism get a stranglehold on me, I'd have been able to call that. It all has to do with this book I keep joking about writing: How the Right Ruined Canadian Politics by "Uniting".
The trouble is that there are three parties on the left for liberal-minded folks to divide thier votes between and only one party on the right, monoplozing the conservative vote. Of course, I use the term "conservative" loosely. When you examine thier fiscal moves since coming to power they actually appear to be very liberal--or rather, neoliberal in that horrible Milton-ian sense of the word.
As far as the piss-poor turnout goes, it's not hard to understand why Canadians are disillusioned at voting, particularly the young. It's easy to feel detached from our political process when Stephen Harper petulantly changes his position every week or so and Dion prances about posing for pictures trying to create an image for himself as the ultimate environmentalist--I mean, a husky named Kyoto? I'm sure there's a "wag the dog" joke there that my writer's block won't let me make.
Then you have Jack Layton, jockeying for position between the two; the leader of the party that was supposed to be about everything but playing politics doing nothing but playing politics. And for the record, I'd prefer not to discuss Elizabeth May or her party because my mom always told me that if you can't say anything nice you should keep your damn mouth shut.
Despite my stand on Afghanistan, is it wrong of me to wish Ignatieff had been elected Liberal leader?
Let's see what there is to be said after the first week of November when the shape of North American politics will be a little more clear.

So I suppose some people are going to want a review of the punk show I went to on Saturday. And I guess I ought to say a little something; even though what I can say is limited. At a show with three poppier punk bands and two ska bands this embattled veteran of hardcore finds little to say. I will, however, do my best to review the show quickly.
First off, I can't comment on the opening band at all. Any criticism I offer, constructive as it may be, would be viewed as a vicious attack. I will say that it's bad form for a band who has no original songs to sell T-shirts. I remember the old maxim: songs before stickers. These cats have obviously never heard it and jumped well beyond the sticker stage.
So be it.
The next band, Cambridge, was definitely not my cup of tea. A little on the poppy side, a bit boring to me. I suppose they were tight and talented, but that doesn't mean much when you're just ripping off the Lawrence Arms.
Up next was The Rucks who, as usual, tore the roof off. Truly they are a blazing band in a scene still struggling to find some fire. Thier upbeat, singalong streetpunk (while not my thing) still managed to get me into the pit--somewhere I haven't been in eleven years. These three guys manage to mix up the sound of something like the Swingin' Utters with just enough of a classic Sham 69 sort of feel to make them pretty singular and noteworthy.
At this point I pretty much stopped listening to the music and focused on drinking. I did manage to stand up and take in a couple of songs by The Corporation who closed the night with some ska-core that would probably please fans of Against All Authority. Again, not at all my thing, but well done nonetheless.
All in all I didn't feel like I wasted my seven bucks, but I long for the day when Sarah of Death Rattle Industries brings me some hardcore I can sink my teeth into. Hey, Sarah, if you're listening: The Endless Blockade, Reprobates, Black Ships, Black Birds... oh hell, just gimme a call.
That's all folks. I wish I'd had the will or the time to do a little eulogizing on George Carlin, but fuck it. That piss-poor novella of crap above is all I can manage today. Maybe things will get better tomorrow.

How Great Things Happen When You Give Up Hope

Hate and anger and jealousy--these are things that come so quickly. Probably because they’re so easy to feel. They demand nothing of you but your time and a constant fear of the unknown. Forgiveness, understanding, love--these are significantly harder to feel. They require you to trust, to respect, to stick your neck out and let it be cut if necessary. And once you’re cut, they require you to go on and stick your neck out again.
They require bravery; whereas I am convinced cowardice is the natural human state.

We make decisions every day. Every minute. We do them, sometimes, without a thought: chocolate or vanilla? paper or plastic? soup or salad? vaginal or anal? Daily we suffer this onslaught of meaningless options and we move forward.
We rarely, if ever, make big decisions. When confronted with a real choice we generally stare at it until the choice is gone and then pretend we made up our minds. It’s easier that way, because deep down we can tell ourselves we didn’t have a hand in our own failure. We can say, “I had no choice.”
Again, cowardice.

There are people reading this, I know, who will say that they are the brave sort. That they make their decisions in a timely manner; that they trust and love and understand. That they never let fear get the better of them. That they are not cowards.
These people are liars. Which is also a mark of cowardice. We’re all cowards sometimes. We’re all flawed beyond repair. We’re all damaged, we’re all fuck ups. So it’s okay. I suppose what I’m hoping here is that we can be brave enough to forgive one another of this all too human flaw.

I made a decision recently. Actually, to be accurate, another person and I made a decision together. We weighed the options, considered the consequences, examined the relevant issues from every angle.
It took days.
We sat facing each other on the couch. Outside in the sun. On the phone. Over the internet. In bed. We talked endlessly about what to do, how to do it. We talked about why we were doing it and whether anyone would or could understand.
What became clear pretty quickly was that no matter what we did, someone would get hurt. We also came to realise that even the best-case scenario would be a fucking nightmare.
I wish, in making other difficult decisions in the past, I could have had a partner who made it as easy.

So what’s happened?
I’ve damaged at least one friendship beyond any hope of repair. There‘s a chance, I suppose, that one day we’ll be able to look at one another again without feeling mistrust or guilt or anger. But I know it can never be like it was. I also know that it was never quite what I thought it was.
I’m not sure which of those realisations hurts more.
I am sure that if I regret anything about this decision; it will be how I failed that friend, how his accusations felt and how our friendship simply wasn’t strong enough.
What else?
I destroyed something fantastic. I salted the earth where I’d only just sown the seeds of a relationship that could have been amazing. Probably because I mistook that relationship for something like salvation and destiny. Which was stupid, because I don’t believe in either of those things.
There’s some semblance of a friendship there now. But we can never be as close as we might have been.
Then there’s what it’s done to us--to her and I. Me and my fellow decision-maker.
It’s brought us closer than I would have thought possible. It’s renewed our confidence in something we’d both recently lost all faith in. It’s landed us in the middle of something we never asked for…
…something we never asked for because we never would have thought to ask for it.

So was it worth it?
Yes.

In So Many Words

Have you ever read a story and thought to yourself, I need to know the person who wrote this?
This is how I felt after reading New blues song by Lauryn Mutter (link to her blog at right). It was a pretty new feeling. It’s not that I’d never felt like I wanted to sit and have a conversation with an author whose work touched me in some way. But there was an urgency to the desire this time around--one that I wasn’t prepared for and couldn’t have prepared for if I’d known it was coming.

When other writers ask me how to get better I usually do everything I can to help. I have thirteen rules composed of the little bits of writing knowledge I’ve garnered over the years and which I frequently hand over, piecemeal, to other aspiring writers.
For example, one is to practice writing Haikus. Because if you can pack all the heart-rending, the most bleak, the most exciting and the most emotional moments of your day-to-day life into seventeen little syllables without losing any of the ooey-gooey-goodness that made those moments worth writing about; then you'll never need to write another unnecessary word again.
Here’s another good one I lifted from Kurt Vonnegut: "Every character should want something, even if it's only a glass of water."
Another one I put a lot of stock into is that a storyteller should learn the basics of journalism. Yes, an MFA in Creative Writing will teach you all sorts of tools you can use to write a fantastic story--but you don’t necessarily need those tools. What you need is to be able to deliver the facts of the story to your reader--everything else is just pomp and circumstance.
Another thing I tell writers to do is read. A lot. To take apart the stories they love, figure out how they work and use what they learn in their own writing.

Lauryn Mutter majored in journalism in college--not English, not Creative Writing. She’s never taken a course in CW or been in a workshop. What she has done is read every short story in the New Yorker, the Atlantic’s Fiction issues and Harper’s for the past few years.
This is a fantastic start--and the beginning of a pedigree that I have to admit, gets me just a little hard. Especially given the skill with which she delivers her stories--stories that shake me to the core.
In short declaratives, Lauryn unpacks the details of her stories. Each little fact, each sad truth, soaked in so much feeling that your heart can’t help but chip and crack as each individual word hurtles into it, assailing it in a way that you really don’t want to end. She takes peculiar incidents in the lives of her characters and distils the events down to an emotional truth so compact and so complete that you can’t help but relate to completely.
Amy Hempel is one of Lauryn‘s favourite writers and, like Amy, Lauryn Mutter manages to take the mundane and elevate it. She makes masturbation into an atheistic prayer and converts the image of two people on a street corner into a vignette about youth lost. Like Amy, she holds your hand while she breaks your heart.
And like Amy, you will notice a few themes, a few personae, a few events, that come up repeatedly in Lauryn’s work. And just like Amy, you’ll know that these are things she’s lived through. And this is where Lauryn really shines. Because when she tells you about her life; even when she just uses some small, personal truth as a mere aspect of an otherwise fictional character’s life; the effect is severe. She does it bravely, with complete honesty and a heartfelt earnestness that sends me to my knees with tears in my eyes. And, where Lauryn and her work are concerned, it happens more often than this Black Bejeaned Prophet of Doom cares to admit.

I have gotten to know Lauryn. The desire was too strong to ignore. I know her by two names, we talk on the phone, we plan to meet one day (soon, I hope). We’ve shared stories with one another, discussed the craft. What amazes me is how much she loves my stories--given that I think of her raw talent as miles ahead of my carefully cultivated and learned style.
She loves my voice as a writer--she calls it “distinctive.”
I love her voice as a writer--because it disappears in the story, cuts to the quick and makes you forget that it’s a story you’re reading.
Here’s something else she said about my writing:
“You have an aesthetic that allows you to feel sympathy--actually, empathy is a better word--for things and people that are downtrodden, neglected, flawed, sad.”
Which is, I suppose, a really good thing to be able to do. It’s something I’ve tried to do. But to me, what Lauryn does is so much fucking better.
What Lauryn does is, she takes the personal and makes it universal--and really, is there anything bigger or more fantastic that an artist could ever hope to do?
Somehow, I doubt it.

Recently, in an IM, Lauryn said to me, “Sometimes the most important, profound stuff is so hard to get across right…”
Truer words were never spoken. And yet, I have nothing but faith in her ability to do it. And I hope to remain close enough to her to watch her do it; again and again and again. I’ll put my heart into her hand and let her break it--in so many words.

Get Well Soon...

I longed and I waited for something with teeth…
- CURSED

When I step out onto the porch to light my cigarette and feel the small, light flakes fall cold on my neck something occurs to me--that this can all end very badly. Not just in broken bones and torn flesh, but in ways neither of us can predict.
Maybe this is just the spectre of doubt looming in the shadowy parts of my life, as I have always allowed him to do. Or maybe experience has left me raw and I flinch a little easier than I let on. Or maybe I’m just acknowledging that I won’t be satisfied with mere disappointment anymore. Maybe I’m trying to tell you that I’ve got the gasoline and you’ve got the spark and if we’re going to do this we better burn the whole damn thing right down to ash and black dirt. Because enough of the structure of my life has been seared and singed and no fucking way am I replacing these beams again.
I told you: I got this thing for fire.
What Im saying is, you might want to get yourself nice and wet before this thing goes up.

I’m not trying to scare you away.
Or maybe I am.
You see, my whole life I’ve waited for something that could open up new wounds and make me bleed again. Maybe that’s why I’m so eager to expose myself to you. Because the pool of blood I’ve stood in for years now has gone dry and sticky and rancid and it’s doing nothing for me anymore.
And I feel like these abrasions are starting to get serious. These welts you’ve raised--the ones I told you about--they’re starting to cause me some serious discomfort. And you should know better than anyone that, to a writer, this isn’t the worst thing that could happen.
Your stories, dear, cut me. Tear into me with teeth so well concealed I’m surprised at the sudden pain. But I know it‘s happening.
I know it’s happening because it’s leaking slowly out. Onto the page. Every day a few more words. A few more sentences. A paragraph. A verse/chorus/verse. I long to lose myself in the deluge. To bleed out and to hell with the consequences.

And if this was just about fire and blood, maybe I wouldn’t feel the need to say all these things. If this was just Dave being dark and ugly like Dave always does, I’d let it go without recording it.
But it’s not all dark. And it’s not all ugly.
I have these images…
Of an armchair arranged suggestively near a bed in a room designed for sin. Of flimsy red fabric crawling all over you--of you crawling all over a canopy bed. Of red lipstick, second-hand boots and quilts with poppies on them. Of words on a screen in a darkened room that won’t let me close my eyes, that drill into my chest and make a permanent home there.
Of you, walking backwards against cool, Northern California winds. Of wild daisies in the field adjacent. Of unopened packages of men’s briefs. Of how you look when you write. Of how your hand looks holding a cell phone. Of how your lips move when you talk.
Of how scared of me you might be if there weren’t miles between us to protect you from a man who can go on and on like this--about blood and fire and beautiful images he can’t seem to shake from his head.
Of confetti on the bathroom floor…
I see these things like someone has lit a roman fucking candle in my head and I can‘t help but smile as I search out the culprit. And since you were the one with the spark at the outset of this…

Have I scared you? I hope not.
I’ll never ask for anything more of you than what I think you can give.
And maybe I’m just trying to find out if you’ve got the stomach for this--if you’ve got the guts to burn me up and bleed me dry. And maybe, just maybe, burn and bleed with me for a while.

Entirely Human

I am one of the walking wounded who lights his way through this absurd void with a perpetually burning heart.

There’s a point when you run, a point when your body finds its rhythm--your meat is contacting, your tendons are pulling and your bones are obeying. Your breath comes deep and even. All your hot blood is pumping and the whole machine is working marvellously. You feel strong, you feel righteous, you feel animal and unstoppable and utterly alive.
And if you’re anything like me, this is about the time all the bullshit drops away. All the crap we built up over the centuries. All the people who’ve convinced us that they’re our betters and the towers we’ve erected for them to rule us from come crumbling down. The clock stops, the bills fade away, order and religion and anything inorganic or unnatural just don’t exist anymore.
The whole fucking edifice of modern life just topples.
And if you know me, then you can understand how appealing this is.

And so it’s as I reach this point--this sublime, primitive moment--that some things begin to occur to me.
Like to simultaneously curse and praise all the walls that came down when the wires went up. And where that lead me. How good and bad things happen when you can connect with a person you’ve never met.
To love and disdain the human element of the edifice I only moments ago watched fall away. Because for all the time I spend lamenting an urban sky obscured by telephone wires; they brought me to someone that, no matter how it plays out, reached through this blighted webscape, pushed through the digital abyss, and made me feel something totally and completely human.
At precisely the point when I wanted to stop feeling anything.

My sneakers scrape gravel and my lungs fight for every breath. Blood rushes through me, my heart is audible to everyone in a one mile radius--I’m sure of it. The sweat lashes off of me, my calves turn to rubber. My eyes stare straight ahead, watching the road cut a swath between frozen, snowy fields.
I grunt, I groan, I let out a short sharp bellow and force myself forward. My body, my mind, will not get the better of me. There’s no quit in me. I’ve never felt this before. My heart burns for a dozen reasons and still I go. I suck cold air through gritted teeth, I taste wood smoke on the air.
And still I go.

Last night was the end of something for me. A shift, a transition, to something else. There’ll be those of you who know what I mean, there’ll be those of you who don’t care.
There are a million and one reasons for it. And the best one I can come up with is that it was time. Time for two people who still care very deeply about each other to separate themselves while they still care. Time for two people who’ve been through everything to face what’s ahead on their own.
Time for two people to be two people.

My feet throb, sweat pools in the soles of my cheap sneakers. My chest feels like a tire with a slow leak. I grind my teeth and watch the sweat fall from my brow, soaking my sweater. I’m running on emotion now. There’s nothing in the tank. I left it all out on a country road.
I spent it all.
In the snow and mud of my backyard I collapse. I fall to my knees, pressing them into the cold earth. I raise my torso, point my chest at the sky.
Across the backyard my neighbour sees this all. He sees this--this sweat-drenched, gasping man kneeling in the mud in shorts and what he says is, “Looks like someone had a spiritual experience.”
And I say, “No. Nope. Entirely human.”
And I get up and go inside.

And you--yeah, you; you know who you are--you’ve come into my life at a very strange time. I guess we’ve come into each others lives at a very strange time--and if I believed in things like fate and destiny I’d probably be very afraid.
But I do believe in coincidence, and happy accidents. And now, in very happy accidents.
You’ve helped me realise some things about myself. And I hope you’ll stick around while I sort through these things I’m feeling and experiencing.
I hope I can make it worth your while. I imagine I can. I hope I’ve already demonstrated this to some extent.
It doesn’t feel wrong anymore.

CURSED III: Architects of Troubled Sleep... a review

“Kill the bosses, kill the priests, kill the shepherds--save the sheep.”

I don’t usually write about music in my blog. There’s a few dozen reasons for it but the best I can come up with right now is that a good deal of the people reading it don’t give a fuck how I feel about some basement-dwelling powerviolence band from Iowa who put out one EP and then fell into the void while attempting to fill it with their own jizzum. And really, in that context, I can appreciate and understand the lack of interest most people would have that sort of entry.
But, because I spared you all my insights on the last WORLD BURNS TO DEATH record and my lengthy comparative analysis of the discographies of RECENSION and OXBAKER, I figure I’m within my right to review the third album by Toronto’s metallic hardcore heavyweights. If this isn’t your cup of pee, I suggest you mosey, cowpoke. Because this is as likely to bore you as the actual album is to tear a strip out of you.

I could start where most reviewers, interviewers and other writerly sorts start when discussing CURSED. I could perform a run-through of the scene credentials and list the bands these guys have played in before. But if you’ve decided to keep reading then you either already know, or will listen to the album and take great pains to find out how far back the great hardcore goes. (It goes way, way, waayyyyyy the fuck back.)
But where I’d like to start is here:
I’m playing an Epiphone SG that hasn’t been restrung since I moved to BC. Those three year old strings are down-tuned a full step. I play with a Rat distortion pedal through a Crate amp about fifteen years past its prime. This amp has a speaker cone that rattles like Bea Arthur with a lung infection receiving earth-moving oral sex. And my guitar doesn’t sound half as evil, dirty or heavy as Christian McMaster’s.
Not. Even. Fucking. Close.
From the first notes on the eponymous introductory track, through the blast beats of the opening of the album proper right until the final strains of “Gutters” have seared themselves into your battered brain, the guitar never lets up, never sounds weak. In fact, it never sounds like anything but a raging conflagration bent on consuming every available source of fuel.
The guitar overload of the second album isn’t here (suggesting to me that CURSED should always operate as a four-piece) and I figure when you have Dan Dunham of--y’know, that heavy band from Hamilton with the really cool name--playing bass you want his noise as high in the mix as you can get it. Which might have something to do with (what turned out to be) the band’s brilliant move of getting their sound guy, Donny Cooper, to produce. Who knows better what the band is supposed to sound like than the guy that’s been making them sound like them night-in and night-out on tour?
Another boon of the departed guitar overload is the fact that the drums never once get lost in the mix (which, truth be told, is my only real complaint about Two--why have a drummer like Mike Maxymuik if you‘re going to hide his talents behind a wall of feedback? Good drummers are damn hard to come by!). In fact, at times, like at the end of “Friends in the Music Business”, the drums shine in a way they never have on a CURSED record.
And of course, through all of this you have what I’ve come to regard as the razor edge of CURSED’s musical attack--the lyrical and vocal ability of Chris Colohan. I warn you: this might come off as hero-worship with just a touch of homosexual longing--but the dude is a solid word-monger. I remember way-back-when, listening to a 10” by a band that contained three-quarters of CURSED (man, it’s hard to write this without mentioning the bands they were in before) that ended with a spoken-word track by Colohan that thoroughly blew my mind and was responsible, in large part, for my return to writing.
Things are no different on this album. Take, for example, the opening quote of this review, taken from the album’s third track, “Magic Fingers.” Is there any simpler expression of just what punk is about? Probably, but does it rhyme? Probably not. And it probably doesn’t have Colohan’s gravel-throated delivery to back it up.
Or how about on the song "Into the Hive," where Chris, in a rage against Toronto’s condominium-culture, expectorates this little gem: “Show me a man with that much faith in concrete and I'll show you every self-starter that ever put torch to building.”
What amazes me most is that Chris seems to get more and more disgusted and disillusioned with every release. Some three bands ago I figured Chris had peaked as far as total rage went. But here, on CURSED’s third record, he manages to plumb new depths of anger and frustration. If he didn’t come off as such an affable, funny guy in interviews I’d implore his friends to put him on suicide watch (though a homicide watch is not entirely out of the question).
All this ass-kickery comes with a neat little bow on it: this is easily CURSED’s most cohesive record. There were moments on the first two records where I found myself taken out of the flow--for example, listening to Two and asking myself, “Wait, are they covering War Pigs?” and then checking the track listing and realising that it was indeed and original called “Model Home Invasion.”
That’s not to say that there are no surprises on Architects…. In fact, just wait until you get a load of “Unnecessary Person.” Not only is it a huge departure for CURSED, it might just be the finest vocal performance Colohan has turned in since “Nineteen Seventy-Four” (the song, not the year).
But I suppose the big thing people are going to want to know is how III: The Architects of Troubled Sleep stacks up against One and Two.
See, the great thing about One is that these dudes didn’t care if it came off as too metal or too heavy or (G*d forbid--too SABBATH). If you thought that the breaks were too “tough-guy” sounding or the music not tuneless or atonal enough (this, of course, at a time when everyone was doing their damnedest to sound like LÄ RM) then fuck ya. CURSED was doing CURSED.
Two, I’ll admit, I didn’t get right away. I thought the production was muddy and everything seemed muffled to me. I had to listen to it while running to figure out what made it great. The sound of Two is the sound of your heart pounding in your ears; of blood pumping at insane volume through your head. It’s the sound of your body on the brink of total exhaustion.
If One was the dark cloud, and Two was the rolling thunder, then Three is the storm. Three is the total devastation that leaves nothing in its wake but wrecked landscapes, decimated cities, mourning families and utter waste.
I worry, sometimes, that there won’t be a Four. With the turnover rate in underground hardcore being as insanely high as it is, it’s rare to find a band that has staying power. It was easy in the early days, I suppose, when what was “punk” was less rigidly defined. If BLACK FLAG had been forced to release Damaged over and over again instead of being permitted to evolve, well, we might not have gotten a third album from them. Luckily, they were permitted, for the most part, to explore new territory. And while In My Head might have been taking the experiment a little far, at least they had the opportunity to make that record.
I realise that CURSED will likely be vilified in some quarters for the few departures on this album. Hell, look what happened to their fellow Torontonians in FUCKED UP--a band that could do no wrong while they were releasing two-song seven inches. When they released Hidden World a major split occurred amongst fans that the band, thankfully, survived and which helped to rejuvenate their fan base.
Let’s hope the reviews are kind to CURSED. And let’s hope Four comes quickly.

Being a Good Person is a Thankless Job

I have this history with so many people’s fingers getting tangled up in my dreams and “real men” throwing punches at my glass-jawed aspirations. There are so many nights in my memory that reek of stale air, heavy with nicotine and sweat and beer, nights where I didn’t believe I’d wake up the next day and didn’t care if I did. I’ve sought refuge from the disappointments I’ve had to face--that I’ve retreated from--in so many wasteful ways. Laying my tears to rest with so many rotten, wrecked people.

My way is now and always has been to remain the cynic. To be angry and frustrated and let that drive me to success or, more often than I care to admit, retreat. Because for some reason I’ve always found it preferable to failure.
But I’ve learned. And I’ve grown.
I’m not a perfect person. And there are times when I doubt I’m even a good person. My weaknesses have always been so much more apparent to me than my strengths. I don’t think I’ve ever seen myself through eyes unaffected by my own flawed understanding of the world.
But like I said: I’ve learned, and grown.
It’s so easy to take the people who matter for granted, the people who make us better human beings and who push us to, and beyond, our limits. It’s easy to take them for granted because they’re always there. It’s in their nature--they don’t run away.
It’s such a thankless fucking job.
Over time I’ve learned to be confident. And I’m still scared shitless of what lies ahead, and I still doubt my ability to make it through from time to time, and I’m still unsure and cynical and angry.
But I want to fight. I want to try. I want to make decisions and see them through. I want to face failure and know that I’ll live to fail again and not fucking care. And slowly--so painfully slowly--I’m getting there.

I want you to know (and I say it publicly in the hopes that others will see someone in their own lives that needs acknowledging) that I appreciate you for everything you are. That--whatever else happens, or has happened, whatever disappointments we‘ve shared or faced separately--I’ll always be here for you. Because you deserve no less.
You know who you are.
Thank you.
I love you.

Leave Mine to Me

Yeah, I’m back. Let’s not make a big deal out of it, okay?

A couple of weeks ago I got a piece of mail from Dave Van Kesteren, the Conservative MP of Chatham-Kent Essex. It was a mail-out that, for some reason, sought approval of the Conservative Government’s plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in an effort to curtail climate change. Luckily I know about the Harper government’s plan for Climate Change, because there was precious little to go on in that mail-out. It was light on information, asking only if I believed that curbing climate change was important and if I thought a plan that set fair targets across the board was favourable.
On the backside was a sort of ballot you could cut out and mail back, there were two little boxes you could check: Yes, I support the government’s plan for Climate Change or No, I don’t. Then there was a little space for comments, your name, address and so forth--presumably so that the Harper government could take note of the names and locations of its dissidents.
Dutifully I filled out the ballot and mailed it back. I checked the “no” box and included these comments:

Too little too late. The Conservative’s plan for action on Climate Change is an un-funny joke. Also, this mail-out campaign is a fantastic example of unsustainable, wasteful use of resources.

There are no points for being snippy with the government, but it is a lot of fun. I don’t expect them to listen, of course.

Two days ago I got a second mail-out from Mr. Van Kesteren’s office (maybe they do value my opinion after all). This time I’m being asked if I support the Conservative Government’s fight against illegal drugs in Canada. The idea here is that they’re introducing new legislation to impose mandatory minimum jail sentences on “serious drug crimes.”
Now, I suspect that the Harper government and I have differing views on what constitutes a “serious drug crime.” I certainly don’t like the idea of someone getting caught with an ounce of pot being jailed for any length of time--after all, the money spent on such an endeavour hardly makes it worthwhile.
My stance on drug use has always been pretty libertarian. If you’re using and not hurting anyone but yourself, well then, shine on you crazy star. This is natural selection hard at work.
And so, it should come as no surprise that my views on marijuana, specifically, have always been in the “legalize it” camp. I don’t smoke pot and haven’t for almost ten years. I found one day that it didn’t do anything for me but make my eyes burn and my cookies disappear. But I have countless friends who indulge from time to time, and even more who indulge far more frequently than that. I’d hate to see any of them go to jail for it--or for passing on bits of their supply to other friends for fair monetary compensation. That’s just good capitalism, and I was told in high school that anything else is utterly Evil.
So when I got on the treadmill yesterday afternoon I started to compose my response to Harper and his cronies. I was in the middle of trying to pare down an extremely lengthy argument regarding the amount of money spent on federal prisons and how in a truly sane society where smoking and alcohol consumption are legal, marijuana use ought to be legal as well. That was about kilometre number three, halfway through my planned work out when my brain went to a strange, new place.
Now, I’m not going to say that my relatively new, healthier lifestyle didn’t come into play in where my mind went next, but I will say that I doubt it was as big a part of my thought process as some of you will assume. Where my brain went was here:
“Hey, Dave, in a truly sane society, wouldn’t cigarettes and alcohol be illegal?”
To which I could only reply, “Well, brain, actually… yeah.”
I played with this argument for the remainder of my run, trying to find a hole. For three more kilometres I attacked it from all angles and got nowhere. In a sane society, no, marijuana would not be legal. And trans fats, cigarettes, alcohol, fossil fuels and American Idol would go with it.
So I put it out of my mind, resolving to work on the problem later.
After dinner I sat down in front of my computer with a beer (hey, I might have come up against a wall but I’m not ready to adopt straight edge just yet) and started to work out the argument in the written word; which is where I usually work things out.
Five pages into an argument with myself I wrote this line:

In a truly sane society we wouldn’t need to make laws to keep people from doing harmful things to themselves.

So, I won’t be taking a Sharpie to the backs of my hands just yet, and when I do my democratic duty (expecting, again, to be ignored) and fill out this mail-out for Mr. Van Kesteren, I will still check the box that indicates that I do not support his government’s plan. My hope for the future will just be a shade different.
In a truly sane society, it’s true, people would willingly abstain from the things that cause harm to themselves and each other. But we don’t live in a sane society. And sometimes one needs to numb oneself, sometimes one needs to escape.
Maybe one day--if we ever find ourselves in a world where fairytales aren’t justification to fly planes into buildings, where justice and vengeance aren’t directly equated, where George Bush isn’t elected to two terms, where people take sports and religion less seriously than international relations--people won’t need to medicate themselves with drugs or escape into the escapades of America’s Nest Top Model. But until then I beg the Canadian government to stop its bullshit, tough-on-crime, what-about-the-children posturing and let us get on with this dismal existence as best we can.
I’m holding out hope for a brighter day. Not much hope, and I’m not holding it out too strenuously. But that’s my escapism--that’s my meth-hit. And since I won’t take yours away, I’d ask you leave mine to me.