June 28: Pressing the Button, Stephen King, Making a Choice

"If you know this," said Billy, "isn't there some way you can prevent it?  Can't you keep the pilot from pressing the button?"

"He has always pressed it, and he always will.  We always let him and we always will let him.  The moment is structured that way."

Tralfamadorian logic.  You really can't argue with it.  It has already happened, is happening, will happen.  There's no reason to change the moment.  It's simply another link in an M. C. Escher universe.  One hand draws the other, if you get what I mean.  There's really no beginning or end.

Of course, that's a fairly interesting dilemma that has played out in most science fiction/time travel narratives.  Given the opportunity to stop something really catastrophic from happening, what would you do?  Stephen King has written about this a couple of times.  In The Dead Zone, the main character tries to stop the villain from starting a nuclear war in the future.  In 11/22/63, the protagonist is attempting to stop the assassination of John F. Kennedy.  These kinds of stories never end well.

I think about the gift of foresight in my own life.  For example, if I could travel back in time about five years, I could possibly save my sister's life, get her to the right doctor to get an early diagnosis.  If I could go back ten years, I could help my brother avoid the stroke that eventually killed him.  Would I do these things, given the opportunity?  Of course.  Anybody would to save the life of a loved one.

Unfortunately, I don't live in a science fiction, time-traveling universe.  I have to live with the past.  I don't have the Tralfamadorian personality, though.  I can't accept the bad things that happened in my life so cavalierly.  They're still painful.

Vonnegut wrote Slaughterhouse to somehow deal with his experiences in World War II, and, in particular, the bombing of Dresden.  To do so, he creates Billy Pilgrim, a person unstuck in time.  By doing this, he is able to somehow gain some perspective on a really horrific personal experience.  Perhaps Vonnegut sort of feels like an alien because of this experience, both human and nonhuman.  He has no other way to deal with such tragedy than to become a tentacular visitor to the Earth.

I'm not sure what I'm trying to say tonight.  Pain and tragedy will always be a part of life on this planet because human beings are inherently flawed.  We live in a broken world, filled with broken people.  Sometimes there seems to be no meaning when bad things happen.  Maybe there is no meaning.

Or maybe the meaning isn't in the experience, but in the way that we deal with it.  I could let the death of my sister from brain lymphoma ruin my life,  Sink into a pit of grief and disappear.  Or I can create my own meaning.  Help other families who are dealing with loss.  Raise money for cancer research.  It's my choice.

Saint Marty is thankful tonight for that ability to choose.

August 21: Beechnuts and Truffles, Perfect Nights, Books for Perfect Nights

"Well, I'm sort of sedentary myself, I guess," said the pig.  "I have to hang around here whether I want to or not.  You know where I'd really like to be this evening?"

"Where?"

"In a forest looking for beechnuts and truffles and delectable roots, pushing leaves aside with my wonderful strong nose, searching and sniffing along the ground, smelling, smelling, smelling . . ."

Wilbur's idea of a perfect night is pretty simple.  All it takes is a forest and some nuts, roots, and fungi.  And a pig snout.  That is pig paradise.  Certainly, the rest of the animals in Zuckerman's barn would have different perfect nights.  The sheep's perfect night would probably involve a lot of pasture full of clover and alfalfa.  Templeton would need a garbage dump full of rancid chicken and maybe some moldy bread.

Yes, perfect nights are relative.  My son's idea of a perfect night would involve ice cream and computer games.  My daughter would probably need an iPhone and some YouTube videos.  My idea of a perfect night would involve an 80 degree night, a five-mile run, and then a really good book.

At the moment, my night is not going to be perfect.  I am going to clean my bathroom and clean some clutter off my kitchen table.  Then I may read the current book in my book bag, Frog Music by Emma Donoghue.  I am not ready to review the novel yet.  Give me another week.  But, since today is book bag Thursday, I have decided to list a few books on my list for my perfect night:

• Barolo by Matthew Gavin Frank (haven't read it yet, can't wait)
• Pot Farm by Matthew Gavin Frank (ditto)
• Any poetry collection by Sharon Olds (yes, I've read them all already, but who cares?)
• Dickens by Peter Ackroyd (an almost one-thousand page biography of Charles Dickens, what's not to like?)
• Any book by John Irving (Garp being at the top of this list, followed by The Hotel New Hampshire)
• Early Stephen King (Carrie, The Shining, anything pre-drug-addicted, pre-alcoholic Stephen King)

So, there you go.  A glimpse at my beechnut and truffles.  Of course, I wouldn't turn down a pizza and a bottle of wine to go along with my book.  And that list of books is not inclusive.  I did love Stephen King's 11/22/63, but the last couple of Irving books didn't really float my balloon.

Saint Marty isn't going to have a perfect night tonight.  But, his daughter is going to help him clean, and tomorrow is Friday.  That counts as a reasonably lovely evening.

Don't knock it 'til you try it

February 28: Book Club Times Two

Tonight, my book club is meeting at my house.  We're talking about two books this month, since we had to cancel last month's get-together because of bad weather.  So, we have Stephen King's 11/22/63 and Randy Alcorn's Courageous on the agenda.  It's going to be a busy evening.

For the first time in a few months, I actually finished the books before book club.  I love Stephen King, and I didn't love Randy Alcorn.  Two different styles, two different purposes.  I'm kind of interested to see what all the others think about these books.  If I had to choose two novels to read that are polar opposites, Courageous and 11/22/63 would certainly qualify.

Perhaps it's a good thing we have to double-up tonight.  At least there won't be any uncomfortable silences.

Unless Saint Marty's mouth is full of pizza.

No fruit tonight

January 31: Stephen King Postponed

No Book Club meeting tonight.  We moved it to next week Friday because of the weather.  While the snow has stopped, the wind is brutal.  When I got home, the temperature gauge on my car was reading four degrees.  Factoring in the arctic clipper rattling through the trees, I'm sure the wind chill was well below zero, and it's not supposed to get much warmer tomorrow.  Nobody wanted to brave that kind of weather, not even for Stephen King.

So, our discussion of 11/22/63 has been postponed until next Friday evening.  I'm glad to have a little more time with the book.  I'm still about 200 pages from the ending.  Usually, I read the final chapter of a book first, to avoid surprises.  I don't like surprises.  I'm resisting the urge to read ahead.  I desperately want to know if JFK dies. but I'm trying to follow the rules for once (possibly for the first time in my life).  I knew that Harry Potter died and came back to life before I even looked at page one of The Deathly Hallows.  I knew Mary Magdalene was under the Louvre before I met Robert Langdon in The DaVinci Code.  And I knew the perp of every Nancy Drew mystery before Nancy even had her first clue.

I'm finding little pleasure in not knowing the conclusion of 11/22/63.  In fact, it's causing a great deal of stress and anxiety.  I know most of the enjoyment of books is supposed to come from the twists and turns of the narrative.  That's why authors spend time on things like plot outlines and character development.  It's just not what puts wind in my sails.

Saint Marty prefers something non-chronological.  Something that starts with "and they lived happily ever after" and works its way back to "Once upon a time..."

Let's start here...

January 30: "A Farewell to Arms," War, "11/22'63"

...What gets me about D.B., though, he hated the war so much, and yet he got me to read this book A Farewell to Arms last summer.  He said it was so terrific.  That's what I can't understand.  It had this guy in it named Lieutenant Henry that was supposed to be a nice guy and all.  I don't see how D.B. could hate the Army and war and all so much and still a phony like that.  I mean, for instance, I don't see how he could like a phony book like that and still like that one by Ring Lardner, or that other one he's so crazy about, The Great Gatsby.  D.B. got sore when I said that, and said I was too young and all to appreciate it, but I don't think so.  I told him I liked Ring Lardner and The Great Gatsby and all.  I did, too.  I was crazy about The Great Gatsby.  Old Gatsby.  Old sport.  That killed me.  Anyway, I'm sort of glad they've got the atomic bomb invented.  If there's ever another war, I'm going to sit right the hell on top of it.  I'll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will.

Holden's older brother, D.B. is a writer.  He also served in the Army during World War II.  D.B. is always giving Holden books to read, and Holden dutifully reads them.  For the most part, Holden likes D.B.'s taste in literature.  In this passage, however, Holden can't understand D.B.'s appreciation of A Farewell to Arms.  Perhaps it's Hemingway's  bluster or style that turns Holden off.  Holden doesn't like anything that even smacks of pretension or falseness.  Lieutenant Henry and Hemingway join the long list of phony bastards in The Catcher in the Rye.

At the moment, I am racing to finish Stephen King's novel 11/22/63 for my book club meeting tomorrow night, and I'm not sure if I'm going to win the race.  It's a huge novel, over 800 pages.  I'm not pulling a Holden here.  I actually love this book and the characters in it,  It's just finding the time to sit down and get through the last 200 or so pages.  I'm trying.  Every spare chance I get, I read it.  It reminds me of the young Stephen King, the guy who wrote books I just didn't want to set down.  I literally could let my legs go numb sitting on the toilet reading this book.

That's my worry for this Wednesday.  Not sitting on the toilet with numb legs, but finishing the book.  Well, that's the worry I'm focusing on.  I have this free-floating anxiety plaguing me today, and I can't nail down what's bothering me.  Perhaps it's a collection of smaller worries ganging up on my psyche.  Whatever it is, I've got this nervous feeling like something is about to fall on my head and knock me out.

Perhaps I should join Holden on top of the atomic bomb and ride it down, a la Dr. Strangelove.

Or perhaps Saint Marty needs to do some deep breathing and get on with his day.

Just hanging on for the ride...

January 17: Slow Day, Slow Month

Today seems to be going on forever.  In a little less than an hour, I have to teach my last class of the week.  Then I have one more dance open house to attend for my daughter.  The first part of the week pretty much flew by for me, but today seems to be on a slow, frame-by-frame advance.  Each task I complete has taken forever, and my tongue keeps worrying my broken tooth.  I'm afraid to even chew hard.  I have this vision of the entire tooth splitting right down the center and falling out in pieces.

To be honest, January has been a very slow month, frozen to a slight trickle, time-wise.  Of course, mid-winter in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan doesn't really encourage the swift passage of time.  Life in the U.P. is basically movement from house to car to destination to car to home.  We shift from one heated environment to another.  This morning, the temperature gauge in my car read -7 degrees Fahrenheit at 4:30 a.m.  I think we're supposed to hit ten degrees for a high this afternoon.  Eventually, this cold snap will end, and our days will return to normal (20- or 30-some degrees above); when we reach 30, people actually walk around outside in tee-shirts and shorts.  It's practically balmy.  I'm not joking.

Writing this post has killed another ten minutes.  It has also made me realize that nothing of any import has happened today.  That's a good thing.  Things of import generally mean past-due bills or broken teeth.  I'll leave the import to Stephen King and 11/22/63, which is a fantastic winter read.  Long and complex, full of the kind of literary fat that makes it perfect for January days and nights.

Saint Marty will take boredom any day.  He'll leave the import to the professionals.

Baby, it's cold outside

January 7: A Stephen King Kind of Night

My daughter and wife are at a meeting right now.  My son is in bed.  M*A*S*H is on the TV.  Stephen King is waiting in my book bag.  As soon as I'm done typing this post, I'm going to dive into 11/22/63.  I'm one eighth of the way through the novel, about 100 pages.  That means I've got over 700 pages to go.  I'm hoping to get it done by the end of my vacation.

I haven't read a Stephen King book in ages.  I used to read everything he wrote, bu,t about the time I started grad school, I moved on to Flannery O'Connor and Dante and Chaucer.  This book is my first excursion into King country since Pet Sematary.  I remember reading whole King novels in one sitting, and then rereading them the following day.  That's not going to happen with 11/22/63, unless I want to develop a blood clot in my leg and soil myself.

Tomorrow, I have to spend some time working on my syllabi for this semester.  It shouldn't take me too long, but I always find this kind of preparation a little tedious.  I'd rather be walking through a wormhole with Stephen King than choosing between Slumdog Millionaire or Stranger than Fiction for Intro to Film.  (I'll be choosing Stranger than Fiction.  I already own the movie, and it's one of my favorites.)  At this point in the novel, I'm not quite hooked on the book yet, but I want to keep reading.

11/22/63 isn't typical Stephen King.  It's set in King country, Derry and Shawshank and Bangor, but it   has more in common with Quantum Leap than The Walking Dead.  For me, reading King is like walking into one of my old high school classrooms.  The desks are the same.  One of them may even have my name carved in it still.  However, the room seems a little smaller, the air charged with decades of unfamiliar teenage ions.  I'm getting used to the landscape of the book.

Saint Marty hears his daughter at the front door.  Time to slip into the King wormhole.

Be afraid.  Be very afriad.

January 6: Hobbits, Special Hot Chocolate, New Cartoon

It's Sunday, and I spent most of the afternoon in a movie theater, watching The Hobbit with my daughter.  I promised to take her to a movie while I was on vacation, and she wanted to see Peter Jackson's latest foray to Middle Earth.  Thus, it was popcorn and Bilbo Baggins.  My daughter loved it and now wants to watch the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy.  All 500 hours of it.  Thank God winter lasts until June in the Upper Peninsula.

I'm at home now.  My son is in bed, and my daughter is practicing her flute.  After I'm done blogging, I'm going to make myself a big cup of my favorite drink in winter.  I call it special hot chocolate.  It is  hot cocoa spiked with Bailey's Irish Cream.  Let me tell you, it takes the nip out of a January night.  Heck, it takes the nip out of a July night.  If you drink enough of it, it can make you believe a January night is a July night.  For tonight, I simply want to end my day with a warm, chocolatey hug.

I've started reading Stephen King's novel 11/22/63.  It's my book club's January selection.  I've been told once I start the book, I won't be able to put it down.  My wife loved it.  My best friend Wonder Twin loved it.  Even The New York Times loved it.  Well, I'm almost a hundred pages into it, and it's getting interesting.  It still seems like it's in need of about a 500-page edit.

Maybe Saint Marty is in need of a special hot chocolate attitude adjustment.

Confessions of Saint Marty