Memoirous

snips from The Rumpus   The Heroic Lie: A Brief Inquiry into the Fake Memoir Steve Almond     ·  April 20th, 2011   When I was about ten years old, I hit my older brother in the mouth with a baseball bat. We were standing around in a field, hitting pebbles with the bat, and I got him on my backswing. There was a lot of blood. Although the blow was technically a mistake, I’ve always felt that I was seeking revenge for his bullying. My brother remembers it differently. He was told not to step into the path of my swing, but ignored the warnings. Memory is not a recording device. It’s the past as filtered through the emotional needs of the present. In this sense, memory can be thought of as a creative act, though, crucially, an unconscious one. *** You will have heard, by now, of the curious case of Greg Mortenson, the author of Three Cups of Tea . As documented by the author Jon Krakauer, among others , Mortenson appears to have falsified vas...

*parental discretion advised I've thought about how to bring this up--and on a rainy, gloomy day, why not. The first time I read the word "fuck" I think I was in middle school. A precocious reader, I first came across it Catcher in the Rye , but never bothered to look it up. I read it again maybe a few months later at Christmas. Dad got a book from Mom and since I'd read all the books given to me for Christmas I picked up his, The Summer of '42 , about a group of friends, boys, who have one last summer before going off to World War II. It isn't a summer of innocence. I believe the book was a movie tie-in. One of the boys has a last fling with a neighbor lady who is missing her husband or sex or maybe wants to "help" the young man before he leaves. The plot was a one-night stand, about the time it took to read the book. But what really hit me was the word f--- used not as a strong curse word or boys shooting off their mouths in the schoolyard but ...

Half way decent photo of me taken this weekend in Andersonville in front of a house with tons of bric-a-brac statuary in the front yard. I pretended it was Audrey Neffinger 's house.

*hoo·ey <a href="http://dictionary.reference.com/audio.html/lunaWAV/H03/H0367100" target="_blank"><img src="http://sp.dictionary.com/dictstatic/g/d/speaker.gif" border="0" alt="hooey pronunciation" /></a>   / ˈhu i / Show Spelled [ hoo -ee ]    Informal . –interjection 1. (used to express   disapproval or disbelief): Hooey! you   know that's not true. –noun 2. silly or worthless talk, writing, ideas, etc.; nonsense; bunk: That's a lot of hooey and you know it! Origin: 1920–25, Americanism ;   origin uncertain It isn't that I've been so sick that I've JUST NOW picked up on this. No, I've been reading about it for atleast a week, but have found this NPR story puts it down pretty succinctly. It's an industry problem. Really? NPR link 'Tea...

I'm taking things easy this morning as I was taken down by a 24-hour flu. Classic. One minute I was perfectly fine, with numerous plans for my Wednesday when BAM! It happened that fast. It was the kind of sick that while prostrate and writhing you find yourself hallucinating, hearing things not there and conjuring up memories and half-memories. I kept thinking about being on a moving train--did I mention I was nauseous--somewhere in Greece, in a small closet bathroom (train bathrooms are incredibly small and compact). Actually this was my experience in Greece in 2007 where I found myself ill from a water-borne bug. There's nothing worse than traveling while sick, except if its in a foreign country and you're stuck on a train. There was nothing to do, but to keep moving and hope at some point to lay down in a bed. I think I'm better now after being knocked down and derailed. There is so much on the plate for today and tomorrow to get ready for the busy weekend. At le...

For memoir, and I've said this in my blog more than once, it really doesn't matter what REALLY happened, what matters is what YOU think happened, because ultimately all people want is a story. I've been thinking a lot lately about myth and personal myth-making. It could also be called campfire inspiration. When primitive man sat around the campfire did he ask himself--should I tell what really happened or just the juicy parts? Of course, in order to hook his listeners he told about the exciting hunt, the danger, the heroics. He knew that much and he was a Neanderthal. Not to diss Neanderthals too much. When Bob Dylan suddenly got big, when he made it and people wanted to know all about Bob Dylan and the publicist from Columbia wanted to put out press about him, they interviewed him to get his story. Bob told them exactly what they wanted to hear, because Bob Dylan was a storyteller. From his Chronicles I read that he told them he was orphaned or some such bullcrap and ...

I've just discovered a columnist I enjoy reading @ Salon--and no, it isn't Annie Lamott, who I wish still wrote for them. Well, I think she does sometimes. Anyway, Laura Miller wrote a review for Wendy McClure's new book, The Wilder Life--her memoir of wishing she was Laura Ingalls Wilder. It's like she's copped MY own fantasy. I was always playing Little House in Suburbia and wishing I had someone to call Ma and Pa. My own parents didn't cotton to such endearments. In fact they were about as far away from homespun as one can get--as they liked to say, we grew up during the Depression for Godssake! That experience alone gave them the right to consume and the fact that Dad had pulled himself up by the bootstraps--on the GI Bill--meant that all those other schmucks should do the same. They were and still are virulently anti-government--while they have enjoyed the fruits of the "greatest generation." Anyway! Again back to Laura Miller. Here is a link ...

I've been very busy I had a 2-week artist residency in New Mexico and fell in love with the southwest it was coincidental then that I'd been planning a trip to Utah with several women to go backpacking in Canyonlands National Park, so a week after coming home from the residency we left for Utah it was a LONG drive, but we were 6 people as far as Denver, where we dropped off 3 and picked up one girl flying in for the backpacking part and then drove on to Glenwood Springs, Colorado--all this in ONE day we had to drive through a snowstorm over the mountains, I credit my friend Julie with nerves of steel, actually there was very little traffic and we only found out a week later that the officials closed the highway later that evening. We got into Glenwood Springs before midnight never even seeing the mountains we drove through the next day we drove to Utah, south of Moab and to Canyonlands where after getting our backcountry permit it still took us 4 hour...

There were 2 things that use to evoke a sort of "that'll never be me" kind of response. One was menopause--sorry if this is too real for some of my readers. Me and my girlfriends use to laugh about our mothers, wiping their foreheads, back of the neck with potholders, napkins at the supper table, suddenly turning red and leaving a room. We use to say can you imagine in a few years all of us being like that. We'd laugh and say we'd all need to buy personal fans. But it never really sank in. Until we all NEEDED to buy personal fans. Until we woke up 3, 4 times a night, sometimes to take a shower, only to get back in bed between damp sheets. I mean what were our options. Medication on the market all carried disclaimers that sustained use could/would cause cancer. There are no options. It was a soul-draining slog where you feel like you're living a half life or jet lag--for years. Right when you're to the pt that your kids aren't keeping you awake at...

I contributed to Scotti's new book, Chicago Curiosities by recommending 2 curious places here in Chicago Check out the book trailer

I've been gone and am now back. I spent a week backpacking in Canyonlands National Park. What I need to do now is get organized. Sooo many good things have been happening lately. Right before I left I got a grant from the Il Arts Council, which I will officially accept as I'm now going to this . I'll try to post my pics from the hike where I an 3 other friends did the Salt Creek Trail and came out to Squaw Flat via the Peekaboo. I hardly ever use this word, but it was AWESOME. For right now I need to recoup. Gear up for a critique group meeting next week and this weekend leaving town for my nephew's wedding--where I'll be helping more or less with my parents who are declining healthwise. It seems now that once a month I see them and can access their current condition--which is always changing. But at least we all made it thru another winter. This is a BIG deal for seniors. So if you have an older parent, call them and congratulate them on making it to spring 2...