Breaking The Mold

So I read an article last night about a Heterosexual Pride Day being proposed in Brazil on Ultimate-Guitar.com.  I know--weird place to find it, right?  The article itself was about Judas Priest frontman Rob Halford's reaction to the parade/pride day, basically decrying it as childish.  Based on the information provided in the article, it does appear that the reasoning behind the event is suspect, as evidenced mostly by this snippet:

"In late June, the Washington Post reported that evangelical leaders in São Paulo were pushing a "Heterosexual Pride Day" after being unable to rid the city of its "Gay Pride" parade." [Emphasis not added.] 

(The article can be read, in total, at this link:  http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/rob_halford_says_brazils_heterosexual_pride_day_proposal_is_childish.html)

Now, it wasn't the article that got me thinking so much as the comments beneath it.  Surprisingly, the majority were mostly tame and thought-provoking (as opposed to the juvenile flaming that often occurs on such messageboards).  I saw a number of people defending the Heterosexual Pride Day and asking what would be wrong with having such a thing.  Some conversations turned to race or religion and, again, people proposed and defended the idea of having White History Month alongside other races or Christian events with other creeds.

Is there anything inherently wrong with having a Heterosexual Pride Day or parade?  Not at all.  Or a White History Month?  No, again.  The issue, though, is that it would be redundant and that is why such things are rare.

Now here's where it starts to get touchy, so take a deep breath before continuing.

As I see it, the problem is that whites, as a group, are mostly reluctant to admit or completely ignorant of the fact that they are the dominant culture and thus central source of power in the United States.  It makes people (again, mostly white) uncomfortable to discuss the idea that whites enjoy a level of privilege that is unavailable to most if not all other groups in the country.  There's no judgment value being placed here, it's just a simple fact.  Don't believe me?  Ask any non-white person and see what answer you get.

The truth is that whites enjoy an unconscious and perhaps even subliminal position of power in this country.  They are catered to in so many ways it is ridiculous and most don't even realize it.  The most obvious example would be major network television.  If you were white and born in the early '80s, the odds are that you watched some or most of the following shows:

The Wonder Years

Saved By The Bell

Perfect Strangers

Home Improvement

Charles In Charge

Cheers

Coach

Diff'rent Strokes

Doogie Howser, M.D.

Empty Nest

The Golden Girls

Family Ties

Family Matters

Full House

Growing Pains

Night Court

Three's Company

Mr. Belvedere

Murphy Brown

Roseanne

Step By Step

Seinfeld

Friends

The Cosby Show

The Jeffersons

The Odd Couple

Webster

Who's The Boss?

There are plenty of other shows but this is a representative-enough list for our purposes here.  Many of these shows dominated television during the height of their respective popularity.  Most were on during the weeknight-evening hours, some were part of that great line-up called "TGIF," and some appeared on the weekends.  What's the common denominator between 90% of the shows listed above?

They were mostly about middle-class, heterosexual, Christian, white characters facing typically white problems or situations, which, in turn, appealed to its mostly white audience. 

It might not have appeared obvious at the time but it's remarkably obvious in hindsight.

Some more food for thought:

How many Asian characters can you recall from Home Improvement or Saved By The Bell?

How many recurring black characters were there on Seinfeld or Friends--two of the most popular shows of all-time?

How many homosexual characters can you recall from Doogie Howser, M.D.?  (Okay, a bit of an inside joke with that one but you get my point.)

Whatever characters you do see are often simple stereotypes of that particular group; they embody only the most popular (and often inaccurate) conceptions of people.  Sure there is programming geared towards the oppressed voices but the master narrative of television is still the white experience; the counter-narratives of the essentially colonized people are relegated to single channels like Telemundo or Univision.

Television is just one example of many.  Music is another, albeit slightly weaker one.  Most of the radio stations that you will find play Top-40 pop music, country music (outside of the city), and rock/alternative music.  Of course you will find stations dedicated to other types of music but they will be far fewer in number.  One more quiz question for the road:

Why are so many suburban white teenagers attracted to rap and hip-hop when it stands almost completely at odds with the experiences of their daily lives?

Because rap and hip-hop represent black culture, which, to those suburbanites, in turn represents a counter-culture: a rebellion against the things that their parents or authority figures stand for or enjoy.

So the reason that there are such things as Black History Month, Hispanic History Month, and Gay Pride Parades is that they are opportunities for the voices and faces of these silently (or not) oppressed groups to be heard and seen.  The reason that you don't see White History Month or Heterosexual Pride Parades is because history, whether the subject taught in school or the programs on the eponymous channel, tends to refer, by default, to white history. 

So where does this leave us?  What's the point?

For me, the heart of the matter is this: there is too much attention being paid to differences between us and separations among us.  Do various groups--underrepresented or otherwise--deserve their own parades/days/months/recognition?  Undoubtedly.  But should they (including whites) have it?  I don't think so.  The problem, as I see it, is that we are loyal to labels.  We identify ourselves based upon our affiliations with various groups, each of which is inherently inclined to exclude and to create social rifts.  Ask someone "So what are you?" and they will invariably run through a litany of identifications.  They are Irish-Catholics from New York, African-Americans from the South, Orthodox Jews from the Midwest.  No one ever says, "I'm a person" or "I'm a member of the human race" even though they clearly are those things first and foremost.  Perhaps that's the reason why they don't make such qualifications for themselves--why state the obvious?

Group affiliations clearly help to establish some sort of cultural-religious-ethnic identity but, again, they force exclusions and produce only further differences.  Identifications based upon skin color are the worst because they lend automatically to the creation or perpetuation of stereotypes.  "I'm black" will bring about a string of stereotypical characteristics of that group for non-members just like "I'm white" or "I'm Asian/Hispanic/Native American" will.  Stereotypes, for all their misrepresentation, do have some truth to them...but only from a statistical standpoint.  The odds are that a number of people who are black/white/etc. behave in a certain way or like certain things...but it's strictly numbers.  When you take people individually you begin to find that these things are not necessarily true or, more importantly, that the stereotypes have nothing to do with their race/creed.

Take me for example.  I'm a white Catholic with a mostly Irish/German heritage.  The stereotype for white Irish Catholics is that they love to drink to excess or simply that they love to drink.  The syllogism for me would be:

Matt is Irish.

Irish people drink alcohol.

Matt drinks alcohol.

The problem is that it's not true as written.  I am Irish and I do enjoy consuming alcohol but, and this is an enormous but, I do not consume alcohol because I am Irish.  That's where the stereotype falls apart for me.  Now, that's not to say that other Irish Catholics don't drink because of their heritage but it's not true for me, even though I drink AND I am Irish.  On the other hand, the stereotype that all Irish people drink Guinness does apply to me.  Guinness is my favorite beer not only because of the flavor, texture, etc. but because of its cultural significance and importance in Irish history.  When I drink a pint, part of me feels like I am in communion with my Irish ancestry.  But, again, this isn't true for everyone and thus only at the individual level can such generalizations be assessed and evaluated.

Modern, Western organized religion is perhaps the second worst culprit of creating divisions among people, right after or behind skin color.  The "major" religions of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam revolve around precepts, not concepts and thus seek to establish what is "right" and "wrong."  The problem, though, is that, in so doing, they are creating separations between groups.  It becomes the whole "my God is better than your God" or "you're wrong because" scenario, excluding others by creating otherness and they-ness.  "They don't believe in the Ten Commandments (or whatever) and so they must be wrong."  Organized religion is, at its core, a popularity contest (or at least for some Christian sects hellbent on missionary work) that focuses on the for-or-against mentality necessary for such groups to thrive.  That's not to elevate Eastern religions, necessarily: those that are based on concepts of self-improvement through the idealization of spiritual states and ideas over historical figures and allegorical people, it's just that they tend to be a lot less severe about differences; there's far less judgment from a Buddhist towards non-Buddhists than there is between Christians/Jews/Muslims and non-members of their respective faiths.

Think about it: the white Irish Catholic from New York.  What do those designations really say?

If you're pigmented, you're different.

If you're a non-Christian, you're different.

If you're from a rural, small town, you're different.

And what do those differences imply?

We cannot relate.

And THAT'S the problem.  There is too much difference in the world.  Do you know what two of the ugliest words in the English language are when paired together?  Racial tolerance.  Is that really the message that we want to be spreading?  Tolerance?  Think about a small party that you're attending at a friend's house.  There are maybe ten people there, all of whom you are acquainted with.  Your friend's brother-in-law was invited--you know, the creepy, obnoxious one who makes everyone feel uncomfortable, especially the ladies.  You'll stay at the party because you can still have a good time...but what do you do about the brother-in-law's presence?

That's right.

You tolerate it.

Pretty shitty message to be conveying when you're attempting to forge unity among groups.  Although, I take pause with that term too: unity.  Unity implies otherness, separateness, two things that seek to be joined but are not because they are different and thus are detached from one another.  There is a void between them, a gulf, that needs to be crossed so that they can be "united."

Again: the focus is on what is different--on the things that are separate instead of shared.

I had many conversations with an awesome, awesome woman when I worked at Baruch.  She worked in another department located in the same office as mine.  There would often be groups of people congregating around her desk, almost always engaged in some thought-provoking conversation.  One day, the conversation was about race and how people identify themselves and each other.  Someone argued that you have to identify people by race; she called bullshit.  She used me as an example.  She said something along the lines of:

"When someone comes into the office looking for College Now, I don't tell them to go over to the white guy in the back.  I tell them to look for the man in the hat, or the green tie, or the tall guy."

That always stuck with me.  Never the white guy in the hat or green tie, nor the tall white guy.  Sure the hat/tie/height are still descriptors...but they lack the weight--the gravitas--of a racial/skin-tone-oriented identification.  As soon as I become the "white guy," I am immediately categorized in that person's mind as whatever collection of stereotypes and experiences that they have had with caucasians.  Sure that could still happen when they eventually find me and see that I am a white guy...but maybe they won't?  Maybe they'll hear the music I have playing at my desk, or see the photos I have up on my cubicle wall, and thus that will alter their perception of me.

Perception trumps preconception every time.

And thus my overarching point of this rant: we need to stop focusing on stereotypes and on designations and identifications that seek only to foster separation and "otherness" among us.  You know how you end "black and white" racism?  You stop identifying people, first, as either black or white.  We are more global now than at any point in the history of the human race.  In a way, racial and even ethnic identities are becoming obsolete.  When you play a video game online, you might be playing with someone in Vietnam, Russia, Ecuador, and Australia--Buddhists, Muslims, Pagans.  But when you're playing those games you're playing with, simply, other people.  That's all that matters.

The problems in this country stem from a dogged persistence in perpetuating the histories associated with skin tones and cultures.  The concept of white guilt or certain racial groups deserving special treatment for things that happened in the past is ludicrous.  Whites engaged in slavery over one hundred and fifty years ago.  Was it a terrible thing--something inexcusable to the modern, cosmopolitan mind?  Absolutely.  Have whites committed heinous acts of violence?  Things so reprehensible that they would make even a hardened criminal cringe?  Without question.  But these things happened in the past; there's no changing them.  The only thing we can do is to learn from them and use that knowledge to influence the present. 

Should I feel guilty because my great-great-great-great-great-grandfather might have been a slave owner?  Absolutely not.  I have as much control over that man's actions and beliefs as I do over Alexander the Great's or Cleopatra.  Should a black person claim that he or she is oppressed because his or her ancestor was a slave?  No way.  That genealogical fact has no influence over his or her present condition.  Whites are often made to feel guilty for the crimes that they have committed historically (ignoring recent activity, of course.  We're looking at you, President Bush) but it's ridiculous and it's caused whites to become so skittish when it comes to discussing race that it's almost comical.  Go and talk to the Aztecs or Mayans about whether or not they feel guilty for committing genocide, see if the Ancient Egyptians become abashed about their slavery practices.

So much emphasis is paid to the stereotypes of being white, black, or whatever, and to the historical horrors that have befallen those races or been caused by them...but there's no way we'll be able to move forward, as a race, if we keep looking back at the past.  You can't demonize a group because of the things that they've done, only for things that they continue to do.  Hating white people as a group because of what a percentage of the white population did sixty, a hundred-and-sixty, or six-hundred years ago doesn't accomplish anything.  Ditto for hating on blacks, Hispanics, Asians, or any other group.  We have to stop prejudging people that we have never met based upon the history of their skin color, and start judging people based upon our personal interactions with them.  Stop viewing them as part of a larger group and allow them the opportunity to be the individuals that they are!



Now, there is still plenty of white/black racism in this country but it's because (in part) each group still chooses to look at the other as just that: other.  The biggest contributing factor to racism is simply ignorance--not knowing about another group of people.  The reason for that lack of knowledge and experience is, in part, the fact that they are viewed as different (being afraid to go to a "black" neighborhood, or to eat at a "Hispanic" restaurant for example) and are thus set apart.

There's that void again.

Without question there are other factors that contribute to racism: socio-economic status, personal history with particular groups of people, previous upbringing if raised in a sheltered culture.  Still, though, most, if not all, can be tied back to two things: ignorance (which I would define as a lack of knowledge or simply accepting gross generalizations about a group of people without seeking any factual basis to back them up) and a lack of personal, hands-on experience.  The former tends to break pretty quickly when the latter is attained but it's taking that leap of faith, of actually seeking out that new experience with a different group that prevents it from happening.  This, in turn, is due mostly to fear: fear of the unknown, perhaps fear of rejection.  But the easiest way to overcome that fear is to stop focusing on the differences!  Start thinking of people simply as people and not white people, black people, or whatever kind of people! 

When I'm on line at the DMV and I strike up a conversation with someone, I don't assess the crowd and look for only one type of person.  Usually it just happens to be the person closest in proximity to me.  I never say to myself, "Gee...I can't talk to that black guy about the heat wave or that Jewish woman about how crowded it is here today."  To me, they're all people, stuck waiting in the same godforsaken line that I am, all tending to various errands, seeking to achieve a multitude of goals.

And at the end of the day, isn't that what we are all doing?

So the next time you go to describe someone as something other than just a person, or find yourself inclined to judge someone you've never met personally with a generalization, take a step back, stop for a moment, and think of the hierarchy.  We're human beings first, part of a global species, and individuals second, unique personalities that will fit some but not all of the molds. 

Everything else is just unnecessary nomenclature.

POST SCRIPT

My boy Adrian Vaughan Scott is a wise, perceptive man and he wrote an excellent piece on the state of Bed-Stuy in Brooklyn.  The core of his argument pertains to what I am trying to say; we're speaking to the same issue.  In a way, his piece is microcosm to my macrocosm.  Scope it out below:

Newcomers and a Kinder Gentler Racismcopyright 2011, Adrian Vaughan-Scott

“Number three is the unconscious racist

Not knowin' they're racist they invade your spaces

They say, ‘I'm not a racist, I'm not a bigot’

Yet they allow it to go on and won't admit it”

-      KRS-One, The Racist, 1990


Brooklyn has undergone changes.  It used to be the borough that the rest of New York City was afraid of, maintaining its criminology core well beyond the old 40-deuce and what once was Hell’s Kitchen.  This seemed to remain true all the way up until the tragedy of September 11th, 2001, after which all of New York would change forever – some for the better, some for the worse.  Without denying the fact that pockets of BK still remain nothing shy of dangerous, it’s in central Brooklyn (Bed-Stuy, Bushwick, Crown Heights, and parts of Flatbush) where the taming of the Borough of Kings has become the most insidious.  It is within the grasp of gentrification and the invasion of naïve hipsters not quite in the know that has turned the once infamous “Bucktown” into a bridled, muzzled amusement park for college kids, artists and European tourists, and it is under this shadow of whiteness that we find the most dangerous forms of racism.
Make no mistake, Brooklyn needed to change.  The level of poverty and street crime that became synonymous with neighborhoods like Bed-Stuy only developed out of a systematic neglect by city leaders, following a nation-wide trend where problems connected to black communities were not of great concern as long as they stay confined to black communities.  This was only further echoed by racial conflicts and confrontations in BK exemplified in the Crown Heights riots and the murdering of Yusef Hawkins in Bensonhurst.  Brooklyn needed to change.  Along comes gentrification in the wake of 9/11 and the acquisition of property in low-income neighborhoods.  The purpose of this… tangent… is not to blather on about the ills of gentrification because it’s simply too late for that.  And the excellent point was made on more than one occasion that the infusion of new ethnicities and new businesses have made neighborhoods like the Stuy safer for long-time residents who remember all too well the wild west it once was.  What is important to look at are the subtleties of contemporary, liberal racism as it further invades Brooklyn under the guise of artist communities and alternative lifestyles.  It’s no longer the blatant hatred of central Brooklyn’s surrounding areas that threaten the borough’s black and brown communities, but the kinder, gentler invading force of young white people and urban professionals who love to say that they live in Brooklyn, but never intended to be immersed within the communities they now find themselves occupying.
 Returning to the quote from rapper KRS-One above, it’s the unconscious racists that can often be the most perilous to communities of color.  Similar to what  Malcolm X would refer to as the liberal fox vs. the obviously dangerous wolf.  By no stretch of the imagination is it the intention of the unconscious racist to dislike people of color or cause any harm in the neighborhoods they move into, but their naïve disregard for the culture of the neighborhood can only be viewed as a symptom of their own privilege.  At no time in American history have people of color been able to move to a white neighborhood and not have to be acutely aware of what they are stepping into.  It’s one thing if an individual from outside the neighborhood purposely packs up and moves into the neighborhood to experience it, but it is altogether another thing if an individual only moves into the neighborhood because there are others like themselves already here.  This smacks of racism.  Not intentional, overt, cross-burning racism like Hollywood likes to relieve white people by showing, but rather a general xenophobia that would have prohibited that individual from moving to an area like central Brooklyn when there were next to no other white people here.  In its shortest form, that simply means that many hipsters, artists, and alternative heads (especially those from out of state) who would tout Brooklyn as the home of rebelliousness and creativity succeeded in doing the least rebellious and creative thing they possibly could, which is to surround themselves with people just like themselves… where it is safe.  This unfortunate set of circumstances shows itself all too clearly when the new white people in the neighborhood can never be seen anywhere with anybody other than other white people – on the street, on the train platform, and especially after dark.  They are polite, jovial, often considerate, and certainly liberal and well-read, but ultimately shielded by their unacknowledged fear and trying desperately to maintain the bubble they knew all too well before they ever set foot in Brooklyn.  But how is this insidious and dangerous, especially if they keep to themselves? 

Because they are catered to… and don’t even know it. 

White faces in urban areas make property values go up, and landlords know this.  Even grungy and strange white faces make property value climb more than black or brown faces, and the more that landlords can encourage white people to move in, the more they can charge for rent and the more their property is worth.  Not only has this resulted in many new residents being told lies about what neighborhoods they are actually in, it has also encouraged the city to try and rename certain neighborhoods that have nefarious reputations.  It’s often surprising how many people think Bedford-Stuyvesant is Clinton Hills or East Williamsburg (not unlike how the Lower East Side was dubbed the East Village a few years back).  So the insidiousness becomes two-fold.  On one side, the presence of new white people is desired and catered to, such to the extent that there are entire buildings in neighborhoods surrounded by people of color that are inhabited almost entirely by young white people, which inevitably means that landlords are ultimately discriminating against who they sign on as tenants and alienating the original residents of the neighborhood.  On another side, the hipsters and artists who move to Brooklyn to be surrounded by hipster/artist communities and succeed in finding near all-white niches in central Brooklyn, succeed in developing no empathy for the struggling communities they now find themselves in, let alone any sense of responsibility to participate and contribute beyond trying to turn a Hip-Hop Mecca like Bed-Stuy (home of Big Daddy Kane, Jay-Z, Biggie Smalls, and countless other emcees) into a rock and roll neighborhood.  This lack of empathy and involvement can lead to pure apathy when newcomers sit by and benefit from the actions of the city while long-time residents and communities of color are victimized by them (please read KRS quote again).  Sadly, Williamsburg, a once Latino dominated community is now the shining example of the worst of this in Brooklyn.  Counter-culture needs a home too, and America certainly needs counter-culture, but when counter-culture and hipsters become an unwitting invading force that ultimately changes the entire ethic of the community, then that by definition is simply colonialism – something a good many of the new white people have books on their shelves denouncing.
Brooklyn has undergone changes.  Many of these changes were needed, and the upside to gentrification is that communities of color are no longer isolated to the point of segregated.  New people have moved in, new businesses have flourished, and many parts of BK are safer than they were years ago.  Nonetheless, this is not the result of some revolutionary movement designed to unite people and build a multi-racial and economically viable utopia.  It is largely the product of property grabbing and slightly deceptive marketing, coupled with landlords’ preferential treatment and rent raising.  The new Brooklyn has the potential the be something amazing, even though many nostalgically reminisce over being the borough others feared (including yours truly), but not without honest interaction, which brings us to the point.  By no means is this tangent meant to evoke guilt, point fingers, or alienate the newcomers.  But maybe, with a little luck (and circulation), some of the newcomers might read this and reassess their interaction and involvement with the communities they are flocking to, especially as their privilege continues to benefit them while people they look in the eye every day are pushed to the back of the line, the back burner, and the back of the city’s mind.  Welcome to the neighborhood… if you know what neighborhood you’re in and you meant to come here out of appreciation for what the neighborhood is, not what you want it to be.  Don’t be afraid, history has shown that black and brown communities have always been more welcoming to whites than whites have ever been to black and brown folks.  But if you’re still uncomfortable, then maybe Brooklyn really isn’t the place for you.   

Summer Lovin'

Summer has represented the climax of the year for the majority of my life.  As a child, it held the promise of warm nights out with friends, family trips, and sojourns to the beach.  I had no responsibilities--nothing to keep me from nurturing every whim and fancy.  Time, in all its malleable glory, transformed from something measurable by the day (or the very second, during the school year) into an almost indeterminate entity governed only by the quantity of daylight.  It was, in a pair of words, potential incarnate.

As an adult, I have still been influenced a great deal by summer and all that it entails.  During my undergraduate years in college, though, it represented more of a reprieve from group work and finals than the time-frame of pure possibility of my youth.  Anchored down by the responsibility of work and the financial limitations of adulthood, I no longer found myself being thrilled by prospects of days wasted lazily on end.  Instead, I enjoyed three-day weekends courtesy of the CUNY-mandated summer schedule, looked forward to lunch breaks and the imminent return to my air conditioned office on warm days, and felt a general ease that had managed to remain from the days when the biggest concerns that I had were whether I should play with G.I. Joes or Transformers that day, or where I would be riding my bike that day.

I was fortunate to have still had a summer during my employed days; working in an educational field will do that.  I never had to worry about wearing a suit on a 97 degree day nor did I have to face the depression that comes with 80 hour work weeks in July and August.  Even in graduate school I was spared having to take classes during the summer, electing to do so only once for a course that proved to be more like a book club than an intensive seven weak academic endeavor.  And, of course, post-undergraduate years were always filled with a massive road trip ('05 Florida, '06 Cross-Country & Atlantic Canadian Provinces, '07 Hawai'i & West Cost, '08 Alaska Highway, '09 Ireland, '10 Cleveland & Detroit, '11 Chicago/Milwaukee/Minneapolis)!

Last summer was the first one that ever really felt different.  It was a time of enormous change in my life--change that was welcome but theretofore unexperienced and thus not without a certain degree of fear.  My son was growing and my wife was going back to work full-time.  I was not daunted by the task of caring for Timmy as I had already been assisting Heather for four months by that point.  What I was afraid of, then, was the uncertainty that surrounded my new role.  Would I like taking care of Timmy by myself?  Would Heather want to continue to work?  What changes would be coming that I hadn't been able to predict?

I bring up all of this because of some reflection that I had done recently on a walk with Timmy.  I try to walk a few miles every day--usually no fewer than three and no more than five or six, depending upon the day.  He will sit quietly in his stroller munching on some kind of snack and sipping his juice or ice water contentedly.  Though I do occasionally speak to Timmy on these walks, either pointing things out or just conversing with him in a general way, the vast majority of the time I think quietly to myself.  Indeed, this is a habit that I have had for quite some time.  It is how some of the most important elements of my writing have come into existence and some of the most critical decisions of my life have been made.  Sometimes the thought is purposeful and directed at a particular problem or situation but other times it is relaxed, wandering freely from whatever surfaces from the ever-bubbling cauldron of my subconscious.

Earlier in the week, I found myself thinking about the summer and how this was the first time that I wasn't looking forward to it the way that I had done previously.  Though I always enjoyed varying aspects of the other seasons (the crispness of the swirling autumnal breeze, the sensation of snuggling beneath a plush blanket to avoid the frigid bite of winter, and the welcome warmth of the return of spring), summer was the one I looked forward to most, primarily because of the slowing down that would occur with work, the lack of academic responsibilities, and the (generally) comfortable weather.  I realized that, for the first time in my life, I was viewing all four seasons with equal excitement--that which was usually reserved for the central months of the year.

The reason for this sudden adjustment is linked indelibly with an event that will be coming up in six days: one of the final "milestones" of Timmy's toddlerhood.  On the 26th of this month, Timmy will be eighteen months (or 1.5 years as I have been wont to say) old.  Six months thereafter, he will officially be two years old and no longer a baby; he will be closer to being a little boy of three than an infant or newborn.  To me, this auspicious occasion marks the end of Timmy's "babyhood" and the true genesis of his growth and maturation into a true toddler and child.

Based upon earlier blog entries that I have made, one would think that I would be crestfallen over this momentous event...but I am not.  In fact, I am filled only with excitement for the future instead of yearning for the past.  In fact, just last night we were in the presence of a couple with a seven-week old little girl.  Seeing Timmy standing next to her as she was being held made me realize just how much he's grown.  Truth be told, I couldn't even fathom him being that tiny...but he had been--I have the pictures (and memories) to prove it.  I am encouraged by my reactions, both to the revelation that those days of him being a tiny, helpless infant and that he is becoming his own little man more with each passing day; they signify, to me at least, that I am approaching his inevitable growth with more acceptance than I had been doing previously, and that I am transforming whatever negative energy that would have been spent on ruing the things that I can no longer do with him into positive energy in the form of excitement for the future.

And thus the reason that all the seasons have become summer for me.  Now that Timmy is growing, there are more and more things for me to look forward to, all of which can be divided up by the seasons.  I am looking forward to future autumns filled with the wonder of the leaves changing colors, to Halloweens and trick-or-treating, to pumpkin carvings and Thanksgivings.  Winters hold the promise of snowball fights, igloo and snowman building, and of sledding.  Springs will yield the flourish of Nature's return, of hikes through forests burgeoning with life and color, and of preparation for future summers.

Indeed, there is so much to look forward to that the idea of looking back with disappointment now seems frivolous.  Timmy has his whole life ahead of him and, God willing, I will get to experience that life right alongside him.  That old adage about living life again through the eyes of a child is undeniably true.  I am not only re-experiencing things through my son--moments filled with remembrance of the past--but also experiencing them for the very first time as an adult and as a parent.  In this way I am afforded the opportunity to see things and to reflect on them through two different lenses simultaneously. 

I'm getting to live and to re-live every season of my youth and adulthood.  At least now I won't be dreading September or going through those end-of-summer blues!

My Story As A Writer

In light of my recent return to fiction writing (something that I have essentially eschewed since the very beginning of 2010), I have decided to post publicly for the first time the foreword of my second novel, The Walking Ghosts.  Hopefully, if anyone reading this blog is interested in writing, the brief essay below might prove beneficial in some way.  If for nothing else, though, it affords a deeper look into how and why I began writing.  Enjoy!

Author Foreword

 Inspiration in Unexpected Places

 As I sit and read through the final draft of The Walking Ghosts for the last time before I send it off to the publisher, I’m amazed by how much the story has changed from its infancy to its final form.  I remember starting out with the major points of the overarching narrative of Kosmogonia and then breaking it into three or four constituent parts.  Eventually, the first part became The Lion in the Desert.  Tim’s story began to take off and I was left breathless by the experience of writing a complete work for the first time in my life.  Out of the fear that procrastination would prevent me from ever continuing his tale, I started to write the second novel literally on the day that I submitted the first manuscript.  As many of you might know, the most frightening and daunting thing that a writer can face is a blank page.  Writer’s block, though completely mental, exists in its most powerful form when it prevents the writer from not only writing but from starting to write.  Now, I stand two-thirds of the way through my story and look back with relief and joy on the two novels that have been scribed and look ahead with excitement and anticipation towards the final work that is to come.

I have found the act of writing to be an experience unlike anything else I have ever felt.  As an athlete, I have had those moments of being “in the zone”—the time where your mind quiets and your body takes over instinctively.  You move fluidly, without hesitation, and perform things you never knew you were physically capable of.  Still, these moments are fleeting, lasting only seconds or minutes and resulting in nothing but a single moment or collection of moments that will be remembered only by those who have physically witnessed it.  When writing music, I have also found myself in a zone-like place; this is as close as I have come to the experience of writing literature but it still pales in comparison.  Most of the songs that I have written (from a musical standpoint) seemed actually to write themselves; my fingers moved from one note to the next, as if following some unseen map that I could not consciously follow.  Sometimes I would use my knowledge of musical theory to move the song in a certain direction, perhaps inserting a walking bass line, or using a particular chord sequence that I knew would make for a smoother transition.  Again, though, the experience of being in the zone is fleeting, lasting only a few minutes at best.  It is during this time that I can actually hear the music being born in my mind, though, if the truth be told, I feel like it already exists and is simply unraveling itself for me.  Though I will often spend hours fine-tuning a song, that magical moment of birth and discovery is evanescent.

Indeed, the act of writing offers the writer a chance not only to escape but to create and to discover something that has never before been seen.  When I achieve that stasis, that point of being in the zone while I write, I find that it is often overpowering and overwhelming.  There have been days where entire mornings and afternoons have passed seemingly in the blink of an eye, simply because I was so engrossed and absorbed in the act of writing; it was as if I was serving as a conduit for Tim and his friends instead of as their creator. 

A great writer once said that stories are like fossils and that the act of writing is like an archaeological dig.  I wholly endorse this perspective because it has truly been my experience.  My first attempt at writing what would become The Lion in the Desert was atrocious!  The reason was that I was trying too hard to force my will upon the story.  I had everything planned out and when the story tried to drag me to someplace unexpected, I didn’t know what to do and I pulled back on the reins.  It wasn’t until my second attempt at writing it that I realized that the story was truly telling itself and that I should allow it to go where it wanted.  Such is how the characters of Tenzing “Tony” Luu, Bob Brenley, and Vladimir Barintov came to be.  Without even one of those characters the complete tale of Kosmogonia would be impossible to tell, despite the fact that not a single one of them was created by a willful, conscious impulse on my part. 

Not all of the characters and events in Kosmogonia materialized spontaneously; some, including Tim and Marcus, were created consciously, having been born of personal experiences that I have had (I would argue that most characters are, in some small degree, biographical of the author).  Indeed, not everything in Kosmogonia is fictional; some things have actually happened, either to me or to those close to me.  That is what makes the act of writing and this story in particular so fascinating for me.  I don’t believe that a novel can ever be entirely fictional; it is made up of the personal experiences, dreams, desires, ideas and flotsam of the imagination of the author.  I might not have ever served as a personal guard for the leader of China nor have I traveled to the Middle East but I have experienced other things and, if I can find a way to meld these things together, then I have a fossil for a story. 

Many of the important moments in The Lion in the Desert and for Kosmogonia as a whole were laid out years ago when I first thought of writing a novel.  I had a cache of bizarre experiences that had left an indelible impression on me; I knew that I had to do something with the energy that had remained from them.  Having had success with writing in school growing up, I decided that writing a story about them would be the way to go.  Thus I sat down and tried to pen my tale, only to find epic failure.  As noted earlier, I tried too hard to tell my story; such was not my fate.  I had shown my preliminary writing to someone who I viewed as a far better writer than myself.  He was honest in his assessment of my work and spared nothing in his criticism.  I learned two valuable lessons from this experience: one—I had much to learn about the craft of writing and two—writers might make excellent editors but editors do not necessarily make for compassionate criticizers!  Writing is not for the soft-skinned and, since I was just that at the time, I pushed my work aside and turned my back to it.  It was a few years later that the spark of creation stirred within me and prompted me to reconsider working on the novel.  Having spent many late-nights discussing a range of topics from sports to science, from music to metaphysics, with a friend of mine, I thought back to the novel and began to feel something rising up within me.  Taking a chance, I decided to share with him my intention of writing a novel.  I told him what I wanted to do and gave him an overview of what I had written so far.  He liked what I had done and offered some immediate suggestions.  These suggestions led to further discussion about the story and, piece by piece, I began to put it together.  On one night in particular I tossed out to him what I felt were the most critical plot points and, ultimately, the end of the story overall; he loved them all and gave me the encouragement that I needed to return to writing.  This time, though, I held the reins loosely and allowed the story to take me wherever it desired.  The result was The Lion in the Desert.

I have found truth in the story-as-a-fossil idea but I still believe that there is something to be said for plot.  The first time around, I tried to drag the story from one point to the next but what I needed to do was to set the plot points down and allow the story to draw the lines between them.  In some cases, the points connected exactly as I had envisioned but in many cases they did not.  These were especially important because these were often the moments of creation (or unearthing, if we’re sticking with the fossil metaphor), the times when the true story was revealing itself to me.  Sometimes it would be only a glimpse and I would labor on one point for hours, days, weeks, or even months.  Other times though I would find myself in the zone, whisked away to a place somewhere deep within myself, watching almost through an out-of-body experience as I wrote something that I had not consciously concocted—something that was coming to life before my very eyes.  These new plot points would lead me to others still but I always managed to keep my original course of direction in mind.  The most important decision that I made though was to be flexible and to allow for unexpected changes. 

Writers (myself include) often develop attachments to certain story elements, characters, lines, settings—any number of things in their written creations.  They (we, I suppose) take it personally when we are asked to remove or to alter these things, either by an editor, a casual reader, or by the story itself.  What I have found is that I need to trust both the story and myself; after all, were it not for my initial nugget of story or plot, I wouldn’t be writing the novel in the first place.  I can’t let the story bully me around (thankfully my stories have been kind and gentle beings, at least thus far) because if I do I risk drowning in foreign waters in my mind; if I wind up in an unexpected place from which I can’t back myself out of, I risk running into the dreaded writer’s block and the fatal moment of turning away from a work.  Thus a harmonious balance must be struck between me and the story.  I will allow it to carry me to a certain point and then I will gently nudge it back towards the next important plot piece that I had prepared; the magic of writing on a computer is that I can always change it later on if I don’t like it.

Much like most writers, I have encountered writer’s block numerous times in my life.  More often than not it was during the writing of an academic piece but it has happened more than a few times while writing fiction as well.  Early on while writing The Lion in the Desert I found myself getting stuck frequently.  I got tired of being frustrated, of sitting and staring blankly at the words on the screen, and I was afraid of being unable to continue any further with the story.  I decided to make a deal with myself, a pact, if you will, just to write and not to think.  Being acutely aware of my habit of being overly critical with myself, I decided to accept the offer (it came with a no-trade clause that I couldn’t pass up) and sat back down to write.  What happened next forever changed the course of my writing.  I got stuck (again) but this time, instead of criticizing both myself and my work, I just typed.  And I kept typing.  I typed away, simultaneously plowing ahead with the story and silencing my worst critic—myself.  The “I can come back to fix it later just WRITE” mentality that I had adopted worked perfectly. 

Part of the problem was that I was not used to writing multiple drafts, to completing a work, and to analyzing it after it was finished.  When I wrote essays or other academic pieces for school, I edited as I wrote; it was an unconscious thing and was just how I did it.  I would edit and reread as I went along so that when I finally reached my conclusion, I would just look back and check for cohesion.  More often than not, the work was exactly how I had wanted it to be and was, I felt, representative of my best effort.  I always felt that if I didn’t say it right the first time, I sure as hell wouldn’t get it on a second or third attempt!  Such is the ignorance and arrogance of youth.  Ultimately, the point that I am trying to make is that if you find that you are your own worst critic, do yourself a favor and ignore your self-criticism and write through it; it will pay off in the long run.

I apologize for the unsolicited advice but I know how important it can be to the development of a writer.  I was fortunate to have taught an incredibly gifted group of high school students in the summer of ’09 and together we explored the process of writing.  We discussed the nature of writing and what it meant to each of us, individually.  For me, writing is catharsis.  It is expression, experience, and elucidation all wrapped together in a motley mix of thoughts, words, intentions, and emotions.  Many of my students experienced this and many of the things that I have mentioned thus far about writing.  They saw through their own eyes and in their own minds the incredible sensation of writing a story and then watching it tell itself through their fingertips; I saw through my own eyes the incredible sense of wonder and satisfaction that the experience gave to them. 

I cannot overemphasize the importance of the strong guidance and support that writers receive from their teachers; I can only hope that I have helped and influenced my students to a tenth of the degree that my teachers helped me.  There have been many, from elementary school all the way up until graduate school, each of whom helped me to hone my writing and to develop my abilities further.  My first teachers, of course, were my parents and I am indebted to them not only for the life that they gave me but for the time they spent with me early on, helping me to learn to read and to enjoy reading.  I remember sitting with my Dad and picking out my favorite letter B’s from the newspaper or reading things about the states.  I remember learning my bedtime stories and reading them back to my Mom when I was really little.  All of that time and effort that they expended on me resulted in a strong foundation that everything else that has come after it is based upon.

 When I began school, the first of my influential teachers was Mrs. Quinn, in Kindergarten; she fostered my bourgeoning reading abilities and stoked the desire inside of me to improve as a reader (truly the most important moment in my writing career—good writers often get their start as good readers!)  It continued with Mrs. Noto in third grade; she helped me to discover the talent that I had as a reader and writer, giving me extra credit for learning the spelling and definition of pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis—the “Mile Long Word” found in our reading textbook.  I’ve always been attracted to extremes and this was touted as being the longest word in the English language.  It was quite empowering for a shy eight year old boy to feel like he knew something special; it was even more reassuring to see the confidence that Mrs. Noto had in me.  In fifth grade, Mrs. Mail truly helped me to find and to develop my love of writing.  She challenged me to get better and to explore my imagination in ways that I never had before.  I still remember the stories that I had written in my creative writing notebook and the Egyptian Mythology project that I worked on with my friend Mike. 

In college, Professor Davis wrote one simple line on a piece of writing that transformed the fire of my writing desire into an inferno, proclaiming that, “a powerful voice emerges!”  She made me feel like my writing was worth reading and that I was developing my own unique writing identity.  Later in my undergraduate studies, Professor Jordan exposed me to the realms of Gothic and Romantic literature, as well as the Great Irish Writers.  She rekindled my love of Irish culture and my pride in my Irish heritage, and helped me to develop a love of and appreciation for classic and modern Irish literature.  I began to infuse my writing with Gothic and Romantic elements as a result of her influence, helping me to strengthen my developing written voice and to clarify my identity as a writer.  More recently, Professor Taubman and Professor Wallach helped me to dispose of a number of bad writing habits that I had never been able to shake, to value and understand the intricate rules of written English, and to strive for perfection by ignoring the urge to engage in the trite academic language that is often praised by professors (and is thus unofficially required of graduate students) and instead to seek the simplest and most concise way to say what I have to say (I love the irony that that sentence was almost six lines long!).  Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, to the teachers and professors named above and the many others who helped me along the way!

To conclude my lengthy rant on writing, I’d like to explore a question that is often asked of me, both in relation to my writing and to the myriad practical jokes that I have played throughout my life: “Where do you come up with this stuff?”  For the latter, it truly is just a simple moment of, “Hey, wouldn’t it be funny if…” or an instance of seeing something done elsewhere and wanting to replicate or to improve upon it.  With regards to the former, though, I can say that I have often found inspiration in the most unexpected of places.  Homer had his muses, Keats had his nightingale, and Tolstoy had Napoleon.  Robert Frost had his forked road, Mary Shelley had a spooky night out with the guys, and Pablo Neruda had a lemon, a suit, his socks—hell, he had anything within arm’s distance to serve as inspiration!  I can align myself with all of them in terms of the sources of my own inspiration.  I have often prayed for it (I’m not much of a Muse invoker though) like Homer, I have found it in Nature’s song like Keats, and I have found it in the historically important moments of my life and the lives of others, much like Tolstoy.  I have found it in my travels, like Frost; I have found it as I walked in the darkness or sat by a campfire amongst friends, like Shelley; and I have found it in the most mundane of things, as Neruda has. 

I always try to keep two pens in my pocket and something to write on because I never know when inspiration will strike.  I have woken up in the middle of the night with the most profound line of verse, rushing out to my dining room to write it down blindly on a piece of paper in the dark, only to wake up the next morning and find that it was either not quite as good as I had thought or that it was even better.  The worst thing for me is to have an idea and to be unable to write it down and to explore it completely, whether it’s a riff for my guitar or a line or idea for my novel.  I have found inspiration for many story ideas in the craziest places: a burn mark on the ceiling of my childhood bedroom; a wild storm and the mental image of a frightened child shaking in his bed; almost choking on a piece of gum; and even my own shadow.  Most of these moments of inspiration paired my experience with an immediate slew of questions, especially those of the “What if?” variety.  Here are a few examples:

• For the burn mark: where did the burn mark come from?  What if the house is haunted?  What if the ghost was a person who died in a fire?  What if the ghost is trying to warn the person about something?  (“Ghost Fire”)
• For the storm: I saw the child shaking in his bed in my mind but it begged the question—what is he afraid of?  Is it the storm itself or something about the storm?  What if he was creating the storm himself and he was afraid of going to sleep because if he did, things might just get out of hand?  (“The Storm”)
• For the gum: I immediately wondered what would happen if someone choked on a piece of gum or a piece of candy and no one was around to help.  Then I pictured a man walking along a deserted rural highway with a huge gobstopper in his mouth.  What would happen if he started choking?  What would he see?  Would his life flash before his eyes?  If he passes out and opens up his eyes, is he dead or alive?  Where is he? (“Justin”)
• For the shadow: Wouldn’t it be wild if you could somehow step through your shadow and into another realm?  What would it be like?  What if someone could actually do it, and not just that, but be able to tell when people would die just by looking at their shadows?  What if he had to venture into that shadow world to save someone close to him? (“The Shadow Realm”)

 In each of the instances outlined above, the timeframe, from start to finish, of the story idea being conceived and then fleshed out was no more than a few minutes, at the most.  The most obnoxious question I get asked or the most asinine statements that get made to me when I share story or practical joke ideas are: “Wow, somebody has a lot of free time on his hands;” “Wow, you really need a hobby;” and “Do you just sit around all-day thinking about this stuff?”  Believe me, it gets old hearing that kind of stuff when the amount of time actually spent coming up with the idea and exploring it is less than the amount of time it takes to write it down or to retell it.  Regardless, the point is that any given moment, any given item, event, or idea can serve as inspiration for a story; there are fossils everywhere, it’s up to the writer to be open to finding them.

As for my biggest pieces of inspiration, I must start by first explaining my writing process.  This was something that I covered extensively with my students over the summer because it is truly of the utmost importance.  When writing, one must consider every aspect of one’s writing process: the location and writing environment in which one writes, the time of day that the writing takes place, what type of distractions are present, and what type of noise is present to name but a few criteria.  For me, I tend to write better during the day than at night and I write only at my computer (though the time of day has since reversed following the birth of my son Timmy!).  As such, my biggest distractions are largely computer-based (the Internet, Hearts, Minesweeper) although the guitar often calls out to me when my attention wavers.  The most important part of my writing process though, is without a doubt the music that I listen to.  I had a very specific set list of music that I listened to for the first novel and three set lists for my second.  Loreena McKennitt is the most important musician on my list; her album “The Book of Secrets” has transported me to faraway places innumerable times.  I find that that album elicits the best writing from me and serves to provide an awesome backdrop of mystical, ethereal magic when I write.  Some individual songs are on the first list as well, including Disturbed’s “Darkness”—a song that singlehandedly inspired an entire section of The Lion in the Desert and that gave birth to Vladimir Barintov—the novel’s ancillary antagonist.

For the The Walking Ghosts I had three separate set lists, each one corresponding with a particular set of characters and circumstances.  For the primary sections featuring Tim and Marcus the list featured “The Book of Secrets” songs again as its cornerstone but added a song called “Desert Guitar” from NorthSound as an integral piece.  This song reminds me a great deal of the American Southwest and conjures up the aura of the place for me every time I listen to it, without fail.  I also have some of Andy McKee’s work playing—the lack of vocals really helps the music to fill the room like a choral miasma when I write.  The last addition to the primary set list was W. G. “Snuffy” Walden’s soundtrack for Stephen King’s “The Stand.”  Some of the tracks on this album served perfectly in helping me to attain that feeling of wandering the empty highways of a decimated world and to experience the restlessness that such a traveler would feel. 

The second set list was for The Creature—the primary antagonist in Kosmogonia.  This time around, I knew that the Lusus Naturae was going to get his own time in the spotlight as you will come to see.  In order to write his part adequately, I really felt like I had to put myself into his lunatic mindset.  What would he be hearing in his mind while he was going around eradicating life?  Nothing captured that sound more than a Nine Inch Nails track called “1 Ghosts I” from their album “Ghosts I-IV.”  The first seven tracks really did a phenomenal job of creating that spirit but it was the first track that did so completely.  I would highly recommend listening to those seven tracks while reading through the Lusus Naturae section of this novel.  I also listened to the theme from the movie “The Ninth Gate.”  It is haunting and unnerving—exactly what I needed!  The movie itself is amazing and the soundtrack is a perfect complement to it.

For the third set list I had to get into not only the mindset of yet another character but into the essence of an entirely different world; I needed to find the pulse of a magical place that the story was creating for itself.  For this I relied solely on Nobuo Uematsu—the longtime composer of the Final Fantasy video game scores.  I had listened to some of his work with the previous set list (“Golbeza Clad In Dark” and “Those Chosen By The Planet” to name but two) but for this one I had a particular collection of tracks in mind.  The setting of Final Fantasy IX was quite medieval and, fortunately for me, so was the music.  I used songs like “Awakened Forest” and “Frontier Village Dali” to transport me to a different place and time, a place where knights and magic ruled.  As for the princess, “Garnet’s Theme” played more times than I can count.

If there is one song that captures the very essence of The Walking Ghosts, and perhaps even Kosmogonia as a whole, it would have to be “God Says Nothing Back” by The Wallflowers.  If you get the chance to listen to it and to read the lyrics before you start to read the prologue, or even while you’re reading it, I think that it will enhance the experience of reading the book and give you a keener understanding of where Tim is coming from during his confrontation with the Oracle atop the castle tower.

Reflecting back on the past two years of writing this novel I am amazed by how powerfully I have been inspired by some things.  For The Lion in the Desert, I was undoubtedly influenced by the literature that I was reading while I was in college, especially in my Gothic Literature course.  It was only this afternoon, more than eight years since I first thought of The Creature as a character, that I realized his connection to the tragic hero of Shelley’s Frankenstein.  Their sharing a nameless existence was purely coincidental (especially since I began writing about The Creature in 2001 and didn’t read Mary Shelley’s masterpiece until the Fall 2005 semester!) but in retrospect I find that they share the same yearning to be accepted and to be loved.  Shelley’s Creature, though, engaged in evil acts whereas our bad boy is evil incarnate (as you will come to see).  The other piece of literature that influenced The Lion in the Desert a great deal was William Butler Yeats’ “The Second Coming”; it was so influential in fact that it spawned the name of the section that it preceded as well as the eponymous title of the novel.

The first novel was influenced by a large number of things, primarily because it was written over a six year span; I experienced a lot of life in those intervening years.  During the past two, though, I feel as if I have experienced an equal amount in a condensed form and have been more profoundly affected by certain things.  To begin with, I’ve gotten married, traveled beyond the confines of the Continental United States, and am expecting my first child [as of the writing of this piece back in 2009].  All of those things helped me to mature and to gain a number of different perspectives both on life and on my writing as a whole.  Aside from them, though, I found that the television series “Lost” has influenced not only at times the content of my writing but the entire structure of my writing as well.  Looking back, I find that the many flashbacks that are scattered throughout The Walking Ghosts resemble the vignettes used by the writers of “Lost.”  They offer brief glimpses into the characters’ pasts, revealing some information about them but oftentimes generating as many new questions as they do answers.

The other major influences for The Walking Ghosts are the poetry of Theodore Roethke and H.P. Lovecraft.  Regarding the former, I read some of his work in graduate school and for some reason it really resonated with me and with the story I am trying to tell through the Kosmogonia series.  Due to copyright law I cannot include the text of these poems in my own work but I’d like to recommend a few of the more influential poems to you to read, all of which are Roethke’s work: “In A Dark Time”; “The Waking”; and “The Far Field.”  Each of these poems speaks to the emotions felt by Tim and Marcus and even to their experiences as they cross the decimated United States to points beyond.  They’re definitely worth scoping out.  As for Mr. Lovecraft—he is quite possibly the father of the modern horror novel and is truly an incredible writer.  His short story “The Outsider,” really encompasses a lot of what The Creature feels in the story—I’d scope that out too if you’re interested.

As a final point about my inspiration for these books, I must note that I try to be incredibly attentive to detail, more so than most and more so than I probably need to be.  I don’t do the research that I do for other people though—I do it to appease my own conscience; if I’m going to make a claim or to talk about something I want to be as informed as I can possibly be on the subject.  If it’s something completely fictional (like the hotel where the summit takes place in The Lion in the Desert) then I feel like I have complete creative license to write about it as I see fit.  If I’m writing about something that has an actual counterpoint in reality (like the tarot reading from the first book) then I want to know as much about it as I possibly can; among the worst things that a reader could say about my work is, “That doesn’t make any sense—it should be like this or like that” because that would mean I did not perform the due diligence that I should have.  Poor Kofi’s blood really would have boiled in that vacuum; I could have found this out only by doing copious research on the effect of complete vacuums on the human body. Calvin Brody’s apocalyptic plague needed to work in a rational way, thus I researched different pathogens that would achieve the effect I needed for the book (and probably wound up on some government lists I’d rather not be on).  Believe me, I understand that most people could probably care less about the accuracy of the tides or the weather during Tim and Marcus’ walk through the seaside neighborhood in this book (both of which I looked up for the corresponding calendar day in 2004—the year in which the novels take place) but I want to be able to stand behind my work as a whole and say that, yes, I do believe in the accuracy of what I’m saying.

In closing, I have included this introduction in response to a number of questions that I had received after writing and releasing The Lion in the Desert.  I encountered a number of aspiring writers who asked me how I began my novel or how I went about writing it.  They also posed a variety of questions about the nature of writing and how to improve upon their own work.  The most common statement I’ve heard is, “Man, I’ve always wanted to write a novel, I just never knew how to start.”  The second most common is, “I just don’t know how to go about writing a novel, like, how do you decide what details to include and what type of dialogue to write?”  I know from experience that the most frustrating thing with wanting to write is not knowing how or where to start.  For anyone who fits that bill, I wholeheartedly recommend reading Stephen King’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft.  The first part of the book is briefly biographical but the bulk of it is infused with important information about writing; it was the sole text that I relied on for the class I taught this past summer [again, 2009].  In truth I would recommend the book to anyone who is interested in writing, even those of you who might already have a few works under your belts, because it touches on some really interesting points about the craft and provides some incredibly useful and applicable suggestions for improving your own work.  For anybody who has a novel written already and is wondering what to do with it—there are two immediate options at your disposal.  The first is to self-publish using a publisher like Xlibris (the one I used for both of my novels).  The benefit of doing this is that you have more control over the design of the book and effectively have total control over its marketing.  The downside is that, from a financial standpoint, you won’t make nearly as much money from your book as you would if it had been published through a major publishing house (this didn’t bother me because my purpose in releasing my novels was to tell the story that I wanted to tell, not simply to make money off of it.  When you are publishing your novel through a typical publisher, an editor will effectively rip your work to shreds to morph it into what he or she feels is most marketable.  I just wanted to tell my story and thus I opted for the self-publishing route.)   Enter option number two.  The second thing that you can do is to seek out a literary agent who will then shop around your manuscript to the various publishing houses.  For anyone looking to make a career out of writing, this is the way to go.  The two best resources I have found for this route are a book called The Writer’s Market, which is released annually and serves as a comprehensive listing of every registered agent in the United States, and a website about the publishing process.  The URL for the latter is http://www.nicholassparks.com.  Click on the “For Writers” section on the bottom left side of the page.  There are three sections to explore—The Craft, The Business, and My Experience.  I’d recommend looking at all three; Nicholas Sparks is a great writer who offers a lot of practical and pertinent advice on writing.

I wrote this introduction because I feel like it paints a better portrait of me and of my interests (for those of you who don’t know me) and it offers an opportunity to get to know my novels better, on a more intimate level; I feel like we, reader and writer, will have a stronger connection if you know where my mind was at when I was writing, what I was listening to, and how I was feeling at the time.  I hope that the books are as enjoyable for you to read as they were for me to write, and that, if you’ve come this far in Tim’s journey that you’ll see it through to the end with me in the next and final novel of Kosmogonia.  Thank you for your support and for your belief in me!

--Matt Benecke

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: ALL artists, both musical and literary, mentioned above do not endorse this novel or any of the ideas or opinions expressed therein in any way, shape, or form, nor are they aware of the influence that they have had on me.  I mention them, especially the musical artists, solely for information purposes to elucidate my own beliefs, interests, and writing practices.  The opinions and attitudes held by the writer (me) are not necessarily shared by any of the artists and my mentioning of their respective works in no way implies or indicates a sharing of such beliefs.

Past Meets Present

This past Saturday I had the pleasure of taking a trip out to Lancaster, Pennsylvania with my wife and my son.  Growing up, there were few things that I enjoyed or looked forward to more than my family road trips.  Some were north to New England and Upstate New York and a few were south to Washington D.C. and Virginia.  Most, however, took us out to Pennsylvania and, in particular, Lancaster County.  Many of my favorite pictures from my childhood were taken at locations in and around Lancaster, and many of my most cherished memories hail from there as well.

After deciding against driving up to Boston and then heading up to Portsmouth, NH and, ultimately, driving up Mt. Washington, my wife and I agreed to head out to Pennsylvania.  Our first stop was Harrisburg--a city I have been to only once but one that I enjoyed immensely while I was there.  Whereas this previous jaunt saw us photographing the capitol building (we were, in fact, taking a day trip to and through the four capitals of Harrisburg, PA, Annapolis, MD, Dover, DE, and, ultimately, Trenton, NJ) and visiting the Pennsylvania State Museum, this time we would be venturing only to a brewpub and a brewery; I can only imagine what memories my son will cherish from our family road trips!


After leaving the capital, we began our journey back east towards the land of the Amish.  I was awash with nostalgia as I began to see the sprawling farmland with silos stretching towards the bright blue sky; it was as if it had not changed at all (in a way, I suppose that it hadn't--at least not that much).  Seeing the Amish people traversing the roads in their horse-and-buggies still amazed me and I found myself taking pleasure in my wife's awe and excitement as well; this was a new experience for her--to witness such a vastly different way of life from our own.

The focus of our trip, though, was trains.  Timmy seems to enjoy his toy trains more than any other vehicle and so we thought it a good idea to take him to the Thomas the Tank Engine store and to visit the Choo-Choo Barn.  The former wound up being a bit of a let-down, though the latter was surprisingly worth the visit.  Inside was the world's largest model train set-up--a sight to behold, for sure!  Timmy seemed enthralled by all of the moving parts and all of the trains zipping by on their perpetual errands.  I hope to return when he is older so that he can enjoy the experience more fully.

From the small shopping area we headed to the Strasburg Railroad.  If there is one memory that I associate most with Lancaster County, it is taking a ride on the railroad when I was a child.  I believe there is a picture of me and my Mom on the train in a photo album somewhere--it is one of my favorites.  We had to scurry to make the three o'clock train or run the risk of having to wait another hour for the next departing locomotive.  Fortunately, we purchased our tickets with only minutes to spare.  We boarded the train and, once more, memories flooded my mind--warm recollections cascaded along, bringing with them the pleasure that only time can strip away.  Like all of the happy memories from my childhood, I will cherish these moments and the feelings associated with them for as long as I am fortunate enough to do so.

Timmy was exhausted, having missed his afternoon nap, and was fussy on the trip back to the parking lot.  Heather and I decided against going mini-golfing (something that I ALWAYS looked forward to during my family trips!) in Lancaster and eschewed the Bird-in-Hand farmer's market.  Instead, we perused the goods for sale at a few of the gift shops at Strasburg before heading back to the car.  I wound up getting Timmy a laminate street sign that says "Timothy Blvd" that we will be putting up in his room upstairs.  I smiled as soon as I saw it because, on one of my childhood trips to Pennsylvania, my parents got me a similar sign that remained on my bedroom door until the day that I moved out back in 2007.  I can hope only that Timmy will cherish his as much as I did mine.

After visiting the Lancaster Brewing Company and Stoudt's Brewing (places that I will be reviewing shortly on my other blog, http://www.thebeerwhisperers.com), I began the drive home.  With my wife and son sleeping peacefully in the back and the shadows of the fading day dancing all around me, I began to reflect on how the experiences of my childhood--so many of which I have always loved--are being experienced anew but from a different perspective through my relationship with my son.  I am now not only revisiting many of my favorite places but, rather, experiencing them again for the very first time.  I know that my son is too little to remember many if not all of these trips and so I wonder (and wondered, as I drove) what his memories will consist of, whether or not he will enjoy traveling as much as I did, and what impact such experiences will ultimately have on him when he, hopefully, one day fathers a son of his own.

I thought also about my first "big" trip.  My first time on a plane was July 8th, 2007--the beginning of my honeymoon and the day after my wedding.  It was a journey twenty-four years in the making.  Plane travel was something that my family never did when I was growing up and so getting onto an airplane and traveling a great distance in only a few hours was a new and exciting experience for me in my mid-twenties.  With any luck, our children will take their first trips when they are still quite young.  I don't know what type of impact this will have on them, if any, and it is something that I struggle with (and, more than likely, am making a bigger issue out of than I need to).  My first plane ride meant a great deal to me (as did my first trips to Hawai'i (the same trip as the first plane ride), Puerto Rico, and Ireland) and that is due, in part, to the fact that I had never flown or traveled terribly far as a kid.  Moreover, my quest to visit all fifty states and capitals is as fervent as it is because I did not accomplish it as a child.

So what of Timmy?  Will it be a bad thing for him to visit Europe as a child or teenager?  What traveling goals will he set for himself if he visits all fifty states with his mother and me?  Will he become jaded as a result of our traveling too much?  To elucidate my fear, I should explain that I am anticipating us traveling a great deal throughout the course of the next two decades.  My wife and I love traveling, especially by car, and are wont to take a day trip to Boston or other places that, as a child, were made the focal point of longer expeditions.  I am worried that my son will take such travel for granted or, worse, grow bored with it.  Traveling still bears a certain luster--an excitement with each new place visited.  I fear that he will lose that same thrill should he ever develop it in the first place.

I suppose that it all stems from an internal battle that I have always had when it comes to money.  I always had enough as a child--more than many--but money was never something that flowed freely: it was something to be earned, to be tended to with care and not frittered away.  I despised and, quite likely, envied my classmates who had more expensive clothing, who went to Florida or some faraway place every year with their family, and who seemed to be able to obtain whatever material object they desired, whenever they desired it.  The former-most item made me appreciate the clothes that I did wear because I felt like, in a way, it showed that I was standing for something other than money and materialism.  The trip-envy ultimately transformed into an even more fervent appreciation and respect for the substantial amount of traveling that I did as a kid.  At the end of the day, though, money was an important factor in such things...

...and, as my wife and I begin to look at the next big steps in our lives, we're fortunate to have more breathing room than either of us did growing up.  We were talking about going to Hawai'i again to celebrate our 5th Wedding Anniversary and 10th Dating Anniversary next year...but decided to wait so that we can go as a family when Timmy and any of our future offspring will be old enough to enjoy the trip.  In a way, I am becoming the person that I envied and hated as a kid--a have more so than a have-not.  It's a new role for me and one that I am approaching with caution.  It's very easy to go from the former to the latter but, with any luck, and given the careful regard my wife and I give to our finances, we will hopefully enjoy a sustained growth, which will thus afford us the opportunity to travel and to do things that were not available to us as kids.

I have always been motivated to work hard because of the example set forth by my parents.  Everything that we had in my house was earned through such toil and, as such, there was a certain level of respect given to our material possessions and family trips that I am afraid my son will take for granted if we are able to give him more than we (my wife and I) had growing up.  It was a big deal for me to go to each new state; I appreciated each trip because I knew that my parents worked hard for us to be able to go wherever we were going.  I hope that my son or my children will understand and appreciate how hard their mother (and I) work for what we have and will never take it for granted.  I suppose that it is my job as a parent to ensure that such is the case and it is a river that I shall cross once it is reached.

For now, though, I will just continue to enjoy the wonderful trips that I get to go on with my wife and son in our beloved sea-foam blue Echo.  I can reminisce about the past with each passing trip while I look forward to even more exciting adventures to come.