November 26: Exceedingly Laborious, Back to the Grind, Water Essay, Writing and Rewriting

When in the Southern Fishery a captured Sperm Whale, after long and weary toil, is brought alongside late at night, it is not, as a general thing at least, customary to proceed at once to the business of cutting him in. For that business is an exceedingly laborious one; is not very soon completed; and requires all hands to set about it.

Back to the grind.  If I were on the Pequod, I'd be cutting in the captured sperm whale.  Instead, I was at my desk at 6 a.m., working through a pile of faxes, answering e-mails, and writing.  After a four-day-weekend, I found myself profoundly unmotivated.  I missed seeing my wife and kids in the morning.  Missed the warmth of my house.  All I wanted to do was continue the Thanksgiving weekend.

That being said, I have been fairly productive today.  I finished one of the three writing projects that have been on my to-do list.  A little essay about water that a friend of mine asked me to write for a local publication.  It has been a month-long process.  Starts and stops.  Long stretches and dead ends.  It finally all came together this morning.  I typed it up and sent it off.  Now, I wait for my friend's feedback.  As Truman Capote once said, "Good writing is rewriting."

I'm actually not sure how my friend is going to respond to what I sent him.  It's a little weird.  A lyric essay with some linguistics thrown in for good measure.  It's the kind of stuff I like reading.  Half poetry.  Half prose.  Flights of images.  And Jesus walking on water.  What more could a person want?

I taught this afternoon, as well.  Mythology.  We're finishing up our section on Grimms fairy tales.  It's been a long half-semester, and I'm eyes-deep in piles of grading.  Papers and quizzes.  Pretty soon, final exams and more papers.

On top of all that, I'm still waiting to hear whether I will have a job after December 31st.  There's an air of fatalism that seems to be hanging over the medical office where I work.  Everybody has already decided that the end times are upon us.  Now, I'm not wearing blinders.  I've got contingency plans.  Not really appealing contingency plans, but they will get me through until I find something better.

Work.  Writing,  Teaching.  Worry.  That has been my day.  I'm kind of exhausted.

Saint Marty isn't ready to rewrite his life anymore tonight.

May 20: Royal Wedding, Classic Saint Marty, "Place in the Forest"

I am really tired today for some reason.  I was up late last night, early this morning.  Church. Then, I got a new used oven this afternoon.  It's beautiful, and all the burners work--a departure from what I'm used to.  This evening, we are celebrating my sister Rose's birthday.  So, I just finished wrapping presents for her.

Now, while I'm waiting for my wife and son to return from a Boy Scout end-of-year banquet, I'm writing this blog post and watching stuff on TV about Harry and Meghan's royal wedding, which took place yesterday.  I didn't really get caught up in all the hype this weekend.  However, curiosity has gotten the better of me.

Perhaps, this evening, after the party, I'll be able to write a little.  Read a little.  Drink a little.  It's strange that my weekends often leave me just as tired as the rest of the week.  Of course, it's back to the grind tomorrow.

A few years ago, I was thinking a lot about part-time work and full-time dreams (and vice versa) . . .

May 20, 2015:  New Expenses, Part-Time Dreams, Dodo

Once settled in, Ives decided, having so many new expenses, to find a full-time job, and eventually began his long tenure with the Mannis Advertising Agency...

Working in advertising was not Ives' dream.  He wanted to be a serious artist, with paintings hanging in MoMA and the Met.  He wanted to draw for Disney, with his creations on kids' shirts and cereal bowls.  Yet, Ives has a wife and kids that he has to support, so he settles.  He takes a job that pays the bills and provides health insurance and paid vacations.  He never becomes Picasso.

My medical office job is a lot like Ives' job at the Mannis Advertising Agency.  It started out as a part-time gig while I was in graduate school, getting my MFA.  I was filling in for a woman out on maternity leave.  The woman never came back.  Part-time turned into full-time turned into 17 years.  It wasn't my dream to have a career in the medical field.  It still isn't my dream.  I've settled.  For my wife and kids.  For stability.  For a home.

I still have dreams of becoming a famous writer.  That's why I write this blog every day.  It keeps my dream alive somehow.  I know people are reading my words.  Maybe people are even being moved by what I post.  I write poems and essays.  I conduct writing workshops for community school programs.  I volunteer to teach poetry to elementary school students.

I do all these things because to not do them would mean that I have given up.  That my dreams have gone the way of the passenger pigeon and dodo.  I'm not quite ready for that.  I don't want my epitaph to be "Professional Clinic Office Clerk."  I would much prefer "Poet" or "Teacher" or "Thinker" or "Dreamer."  I could live with any of those titles.

Saint Marty doesn't want to be a dodo.

I wonder if he dreamed of being an ostrich

And I do have a poem today--an old one that I haven't thought about in a long time.  It used to be the poem people requested the most at readings.  It seems like it was written by a stranger . . .

Place in the Forest

by:  Martin Achatz

With one B-B, Paul took the squirrel down.
When it hit the ground, it screamed
A squirrel scream, high and long
Like a train whistle raised five octaves.
It scratched the earth
Like it was trying to dig its own grave,
A bead of blood flowering on its back.
Paul and I watched it spasm and slow,
A wind-up toy uncoiling its tense spring.
It raced breath in-out-in-out-in-out-in-out.

In school, we read about Vlad the Impaler
Who feasted on roasted pig in a field of people
On spikes.  The wood-cut illustration showed
Vlad sipping wine from a chalice
As a pregnant woman slithered down
A pointed pole, her mouth a black leech of pain.
Paul found a stick, skewered the squirrel,
Which writhed, scratched at the bark.
He lifted the stick, raised the squirrel
To the sky.  Its tail snaked and batted
The clouds.  Paul flung the squirrel
Into the woods, its scream cleaving the air.

Ten years later, he died of AIDS.
I thought of that squirrel when I heard
Stories of the red sarcoma blossoms
On his face.  I imagined him
In his hospital bed, his chest heaving,
His eyes seeing that place in the forest
Where squirrels wail and claw.

July 5: Back to the Grind, Another Reading, New Poem

Home town's fireworks

It rained last night at the fireworks.  For the first five or seven minutes of the show, everyone was huddled under blankets, watching the rockets go off.  After the rain stopped, the wind picked up, and then we spent the rest of the time dodging cinders falling from the sky.  I kid you not.  After it was over and we were back in the car, my daughter said it was the most exciting fireworks she's ever been at.

Today, I'm back to the grind after the three-day holiday.  It was a little rough getting back in the saddle, but I managed (with the help of a Diet Coke and a Diet Mountain Dew).  Mid-way through the day, I find myself thinking about tonight's poetry reading/panel discussion at the Peter White Library in Marquette.  I'm planning on picking out a few poems that I'm definitely going to share, but, aside from that, I have no idea how things are going to go.  That's kind of exciting, but also a little nerve-wracking.

I may have used this before, but it's still funny.

I was able to get a new poem written this morning.  It's inspired by my attendance of the fireworks last night.  I wasn't quite sure where I was headed with it when I wrote the first few lines.  Very quickly, however, it became obvious to me that I was writing a love poem.  It's a poem about the ability to sustain love and passion over the years.

After all of the struggles my wife and I have been through, many people don't understand our relationship--how we've survived the bouts of mental illness and various addictions.  I think, in a strange way, our relationship is stronger now than it has ever been, because it's based on honesty.  I don't hide my feelings over anything with my wife.  My wife, in struggling with her sexual addiction, has learned the necessity of complete honesty, as well, with me and with herself.  At this point in our marriage, we aren't blinded by fantasies of romance.  The romance comes from knowing each other deeply.

That's what today's poem is about.

Saint Marty hopes to see you at the reading tonight.

After the Fireworks

We walk to our car in the dark,

Blankets cradled in our arms,

Stars as distant as the morning

We first met, marriage and kids

Not even ingredients in the roux

Of our thoughts, just longing for

When we could come together

On a beach, wade into lake

Water, hands and lips weightless

As jellyfish on our bodies,

Stinging, pulling back, gliding

Over and in and around, skin,

A night sky on July fourth,

Full of comet, spark, tail, waterfall.

Peony.  Chrysanthemum.  Diadem.

Crossette.  Kamuro.  Bengal fire.

Afterward, as we dressed, we

Still smelled our combustion,

Tasted potassium, nitrogen, copper

On our tongues for hours.

Tonight, we load belongings

Into our Ford.  Books, sparklers,

Half-eaten bag of cotton candy,

Our daughter, still dazzled

By Summer Storm and Pyro Glyphics.

We drive home in silence

After the fireworks, think of how

We, on this Independence Day,

Depend on each other, how we

Still climb into bed each night,

Hungry to be blinded again.