Category: Uncategorized

  • Ghost of Kilgore Trout

    If you know who Kilgore Trout is, then you are someone who has read Vonnegut. If you have read Vonnegut, then you most likely love him, because he’s the type of writer you either love or hate; not many in the middle.

    I always felt that Kilgore was created as a character to reflect how Vonnegut felt about himself as a writer, and the fear most writers have. Thus by creating this embodiment, the fear becomes knowable, and therefore manageable.

    If you don’t remember, the Kilgore Trout character was a great writer who could only get published in the worst magazines published. This lack of publication status causes Trout to doubt his abilities as a writer, and lose his grip on reality.

    I think Vonnegut touches on a very interesting modern anxiety; achieving your dream, but you still don’t get the validation you seek.

    I think about Kilgore Trout often.

  • Note Taking, Not Writing

    Last Friday when I was at the park with the kid, besides keeping an eye on her, I did some journaling with the intent of reminding myself of the story ideas that I needed to work on. Total, I have about four good ideas I want to flesh out.

    And that’s all the work I have done on the for four days. Just notes.

    I am beginning to get very frustrated at myself and my situation. Maybe I’m too ambitious or not enough of a realist when it comes to the world I inhabit. I keep thinking I can get it all done. Each day that goes by and I don’t work on these stories makes me feel like I’m flushing away my creative potential.

    I’m also tired of using COVID or the election as the excuse why I can’t work. I doomscroll and keep checking polls, but I don’t live like they cause an atrophy to my drive.

    It’s not working the way it should, and I feel like I have to go back to the drawing board.

  • NYC Almost Back to Normal?

    I had a busy ass day in NYC again.

    I was up early to get the kid ready for school.

    Then I had to move the car for alt-side parking, but got my spot back after the sweeper went by.

    When I got back home, I help the kid with her remote learning.

    Next I made lunch for the family.

    Then me and a buddy went in my car to pick up our friend who had foot surgery from the hospital and got him home.

    Dealt with crazy drivers on the West Side Highway

    Parked the car, amazingly, right back in the same parking spot on the street, which never happens.

    Did some shopping on the way home.

    And now I am home, and exhausted.

    It almost feels like an old fashioned pre-Covid New York kind of day.

  • Anger Stage of Grief, Again

    This is a tough week for me. Two years since my mom died, and I thought I was dealing well with it. The 14th was the actual day, and it went fine as death anniversaries go. The 13th on the other hand, and I wrote about it yesterday, was just anxious to no end, as I was dreading the 14th. Today has just been anger. Not that I’m lashing out at anyone, but I have been arguing with a troll online about Trump. It’s not making me feel better.

    Just angry at the world and I don’t have my mom to talk to about it. I feel like I need to be keeping it all together because the world is falling apart. But I feel like I’m failing at that job.

    I am very fortunate to have a great wife that I can talk to about all of this, and I do talk to her. But the anger still happens.

    What I am wanting is to channel these emotions into something productive. That seems like the healthy thing to do, but right now I don’t feel like I have the energy to even start that.

    It is a process and I know that I am still grieving. I have to forgive my anger and accept that I have these emotions, and all of that is normal and healthy.

    But at the end of the day, I still want to give her a call.

  • Dance of the Parked Cars

    We have a car in the City. It is something that I thought we would never really do, but here we are. To be honest, it’s been great having the car. It has been our release valve with the pandemic, just allowing us to get out of the City, regardless if we actually get out of the car, and just drive around. It has helped in running errands, and we have even helped friends out when they needed a quick ride.

    But as with all good things, the is always a downside.

    And that would be parking on the street.

    I just dread having to park the car. Not only am I a horrible parallel parker, but it is a level of Lord of the Flies out there for a spot.

    But the bane, demon curse of my life is Alternative Side Parking! Here are the current NYC Rules, and I fear when things go back to normal. Currently, I have to go out once a week and move the car, and the dilemma I am in is whether to sit in the car, and wait for the street sweeper to come, move the car out of the way, and then back into my spot. That sounds simple, but it could mean that I have to sit in our car for an hour and a half. Or, I can leave my spot and see if I can find one where the sweeper has already gone through, which is a risk, as that could take five minutes, or one time took me an hour and a half to find a spot.  

    What is really interesting, and I should take a pic of it, are the people who line up their cars on the opposite side of the street, waiting for the sweeper to go by. There are guys smoking in their cars, or reading the paper, neighbors talking to each other, sharing coffee. It appears to be such a feeling of community and neighborliness fraternity on those blocks, that it does make me envious for their parking reality.