“I believe when life gives you lemons, you should make lemonade…and try to find someone whose life has given them vodka, and have a party.”
―
Four Corners Brewery, Dallas, Texas
Have a Party
I’m the Turtle, Son
“What are you?’
‘I’m the Turtle, son. I made the universe, but please don’t blame me for it; I had a bellyache.”
― It
Delta Duck-Potato (Sagittaria platyphylla), Leonhardt Lagoon, Fair Park, Dallas, Texas
Short Story of the Day, Sticks by George Saunders
The first time I brought a date over she said: what’s with your dad and that pole? and I sat there blinking.
—- George Saunders, Sticks
Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth
Conjoined, Roxy Paine
George Saunders is a writer that amazes me. If I could write like any one person I would want to write like him (though I have said the same thing about Raymond Carver… so, well, maybe it’s a tie).
I’ve written about stories by Saunders before:
- Sea Oak
- Tenth Of December (with the eponymous story, plus Puppy, plus the amazing The Semplica-Girl Diaries)
- A Lack of Order in the Floating Object Room
Today’s short story is a one minute piece of flash fiction that contains an entire life full of frustration and regret. It’s funny and sad, in the terrible way that only funny things can be so sad. It’s called Sticks.
You can read it here: Sticks, by George Saunders
In the introduction to the published version in “Story” magazine he explains how he developed the idea for the story (if you follow my link above you can find out for yourself). That short explanation is as amazing as the fiction itself. We all see things along the road, especially along our commute to work, that become part of our lives so intimately that they disappear. Still, your imagination is filled with these things and the stories they generate. Only a genius like George Saunders can imagine something so poignant and unforgettable, so buoyant and unforgivable.
Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth
Short Story of the Day – Big Blonde, by Dorothy Parker
Men liked her, and she took it for granted that the liking of many men was a desirable thing. Popularity seemed to her to be worth all the work that had to be put into its achievement. Men liked you because you were fun, and when they liked you they took you out, and there you were. So, and successfully, she was fun. She was a good sport. Men like a good sport.
—- Dorothy Parker, Big Blonde
Deep Ellum Brewing Company – Dallas Blonde
Big Blonde is considered Dorothy Parker’s best, most literary work – as opposed, I guess, to her usual stuff that is considered witty.
You can read it online here: Big Blonde at Project Gutenberg Canada. It’s still under copyright in the US, so don’t print or distribute it.
Under the thin veneer of Dorothy Parker’s signature sparkling prose – this is a very sad story of a very sad and very hapless woman. It is a well-known work (it won the O. Henry award as the best short story of 1929) with a lot of discussion about it on the internet. A lot of modern discussion is about the story’s criticism of traditional female roles and, of course, its harrowing description of alcoholism (or at least drunkenness) and depression. It is these things in spades, but I think it is more.
Hazel Morse is a hopeless drunk that is used and abused by men – but I don’t think she is an idiot and I think she had some choices. She is depressed to the edge of suicide, but is she depressed because of her life or does she live that life because of her depression? Probably a little of both. It’s also more than a little autobiographical – though I don’t think Hazel Morse would inspire so many people after all these years as Dorothy Parker does. Hazel’s parties aren’t quite up to the intellectual quality of the Algonquin Round Table.
I have been reading a bit about how struggle gives meaning to life… to the extent that life is the struggle. A corollary of this is how having happiness as the main goal of life is a recipe for disaster. Hazel and all the people in her life seem to have moment to moment happiness as their only reason for getting out of bed in the morning and as a consequence sometimes don’t even do that. They avoid struggle at all costs and end up in a hopeless struggle against the ever-present void.
The story was written and is set in 1929 – the last year of the roaring twenties. I can’t help but think about how different the story would be if it took place a couple years later. How is the Big Blonde going to make it through the Great Depression? It’s not a pretty thought.
Here’s mud in your eye.
There Are Gooseberries
“Country life has its advantages,’ he used to say. ‘You sit on the veranda drinking tea and your ducklings swim on the pond, and everything smells good. . . and there are gooseberries.”
― Gooseberries
Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas
Music Used to Come Out of Those Things
“The only truth is music.”
―
Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas
The Lost Glory of Mammoth-Hunting Expeditions
“He’s a man,” Themla said.
“I guess that explains it.”
“Hairy, Neanderthalic,” Thelma said, “perpetually half-crazed from excessive levels of testosterone, plagued by racial memories of the lost glory of mammoth-hunting expeditions – they’re all alike.”
―
Fair Park, Dallas, Texas
Twiggy Boop
Being young isn’t about age, it’s about being a free spirit. You can meet someone of 20 who’s boring and old, or you can meet someone of 70 who’s youthful and exciting. I met Fred Astaire when he was 72 and I was 21, and I fell in love with him. He certainly was a free spirit.
Mural by Preston Pannek, Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas
Preston Pannek
Whatever Passes Through My Head
“I paint my own reality. The only thing I know is that I paint because I need to, and I paint whatever passes through my head without any other consideration.”
―
Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas
Like a Thought Trying to Form Itself
“Under the thinning fog the surf curled and creamed, almost without sound, like a thought trying to form itself on the edge of consciousness.”
― The Big Sleep
Fog in front of my house, Richardson, Texas
Bill Chance 