“George fucking Saunders!,” I yelled across the house.
I wrote to him yesterday, querying if there were any creative writing seminars or courses in the near future. “Even an online class, if available,” I begged.
Let’s be honest, I could use all the help I can get if I’m hoping to make the New York Times Best sellers list. Fortunately, that is not my goal, nor my motivation, since I know the amount of lashings it’ll take to see my books in print traditionally, so I’ll continue writing and see what happens. I wonder how much of my beard would fit in the miniature rectangle frame on the back cover? My author picture would be 75% facial hair, leaving the upper portion to carry the weight. Luckily, my filthy glasses are broken with personality to make up the rest of the portrait, resting on my rosy nose from years of drinking. I’ve since quit booze to rid my life from the tedium of day drinking and bartending to pay my open tabs from multiple bars. But I’d piss my three years sobriety away if it meant a conversation at the bar with George1.
For those that don’t know, George Saunders is a best-selling author of twelve books, as well as a creative writing professor in my abhorrently charming hometown of Syracuse, New York. If you like snow, you’ll love Syracuse since it receives the most snowfall than any other city in the country, minus Erie, Pennsylvania every now and then. The dental chair was created in Syracuse, as well as serrated knives, and both were utilised on me as weapons in my childhood, in the wintertime.
The dental chair haunted me, and still does to this day from things that I’ll share in a different post. Side note. I wish they’d hurry up with decent Virtual Reality headsets. It would be the kindest thing that the dentist could do. While they’re drilling chunks of bone from my face, forcing me to look at them while doing so, they could at least offer me a virtual escape. With a VR headset on, I could watch a UFC fight to emulate the pain, or play a round of golf with Tiger Woods to calm my nerves. And at times “pretend” that I’m being whipped in the face by a dominatrix, with a bat.
After one of my dentist appointments back home, I drove across the street to the Wegman’s grocery store and exited my truck at knifepoint. Still freshly numb from the Novocaine, I declined the abberent mans request to, in his words, “Give me all of your fucking money or die.”
He caught me at the wrong time. I was already dead. I’d just lost a 5-round fight with my dentist across the street, and didn’t expect a confrontation backstage, especially with a fresh opponent, who was brandishing a knife. No fair.
“Naah,” I exhaled, my lifeless jaw hanging. Like a donkey.
Too cowardly to stick me, or, scared of my complacency with death, the coward walked away, presumably to try his luck elsewhere. Unshaken, I walked into the store and grabbed a case of beer, and a pint of ice cream as a reward for surviving my dentist appointment. I also plucked a pack of peanut M&M’s standing in the checkout line as a reward for surviving the stickup.
Back then, I’d have died first if the zombie apocalypse ever came. Living in Syracuse will do that to a person. That said, Saunders might single-handedly be the best thing that the city has to offer besides inventing the streetlight. Then again, I haven’t been back to my birthplace since Dinosaur BBQ was a mom-and-pop restaurant.
After writing George, I waited in anticipation for a reply and to my astonishment, he responded! Pretty quickly, I might add. This must be how it feels when a concertgoer is given the opportunity to go backstage to meet the band. He invited me to join Story Club on an app called Substack, which I am ashamed to say that I have never heard of until today. I’ve reduced my social media to only Instagram as of late, so I suppose I have the headspace for another, but do I? At my age, technology is something that I buy, rather than something I choose to study, or grasp in any sense of the word.
Get an Internet router hooked up without having to call support, or throwing a chair through a window? Nope!
Send a text message to a friend blindfolded, because I was kidnapped by a babysitter club? Nope!
Download an App and figure out how to use it before frustration makes me feel worthless as a writer, and also as a person at the same time? We’ll see.
The way a seal would make a great woodworker, I would make a proficient technologist. It’s a real word, look it up. Navigating a new website and interacting socially might give me a starting point to my writing career, or offer a new perspective on life itself. Then again, that same road could take me to a Wegman’s parking lot where I’ll be held at knifepoint just trying to get some ice cream to hold against my bruised face. Either way, I’ll have something to write about, I suppose.
Kevin, the kitten that Ash and I are babysitting, chews her food in huge bites like the cookie monster, bits of dried meal falling out of her mouth onto the counter. Not sure why the owner named her Kevin but it works somehow. She’s the size of my outstretched hand in length, minus the tail, and with her current eating habits, she’ll fill out like a tigress and rule the house soon. Even Iggy will be doing her chores, and favoring her over the rest. Perhaps I’ll create an eating schedule to keep her fed, but not enough to weaponize her with an appetite where she could swallow me in a single chew.
Like a shark dislodging its jaw to grab some grub, Kevin snatched some dried chicken from the paper plate, most of it falling from her face as she chewed. I could physically see her body bulging with every bite, her midsection expanding like a handball being blown up.
Still hungry, Kevin whimpered and paced around the now empty plate. I opened a can of wet food to see how fast she could eat it and with her eyes closed, her head plopped in the can, spilling food over the sides of the dish. Imagine a competitive eater in a canned salmon chow down. She finished in record time, an impressive feat given her diminutive size, and somehow I imagined she’d still ask for seconds.
Without a meow, she licked the can clean and took to the countertops for the leftovers. The gumption. The drive. If only I had that motivation without the eventual tummy ache, I thought.
*Also, thank you to
for allowing me to find this wonderful escape, from the noise of the outside world. I’ve since been fulfilling my dreams of becoming a writer and have no expectations of ever making it, but it’s fulfilling in itself. When I’m dead and gone, people can still laughBreaking news: 5 people onboard a sightseeing submersible are missing somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean. They launched the exploratory watercraft off of the coast of Canada, and lost contact about 150 miles out. Ironically, their destination, The Titanic.
Some billionaire paid $250,000 in hopes to witness the remnants of, “The Unsinkable Ship,” only to enfold himself in an unmarked grave. What was once the largest, most prestigious boat in the world, The Titanic is now a rusticle covered piece of food for underwater bacteria. An algae covered memory. A movie prop that is so tantalizing that it needs to be seen up close apparently. Had I, a quarter of a million dollars to waste, I would’ve at least tried to buy Wallace Henry Hartley’s violin, or a life vest if that were all I could afford. At least, I’d have something to hang on the wall or put on a. shelf. Hell, I’d take a lunch date with James Cameron if it meant that I could feel the weight of $250,000 dollars in my pockets.
Thinking about it now, I’d rather watch Titanic every day for a year, rather than give somebody a life’s worth of pay to navigate the ocean in a soup can with 4 strangers, all in search for a movie prop. I’d be pissed if I paid that much to die.
Is that too forward?