John vs. the World

Right in the middle of this lifelong battle, still swinging.

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. The Imagined Past

I have a dream. I had a dream. I don’t have it anymore. I remember it though. The image comes to me sometimes. I’m never sure what prompts it.

I’m very young, two or three, and I’m in a parking lot with my grandfather, my mom’s dad who died when I was eight I think. We’re in a parking lot that’s just off the road, and there’s a building, long and low, wooden. There are lots of trees around. If you’ve driven down certain roads in the woods of Pennsylvania you know the type of building. It’s a general store, or a restaurant. I’ts not the destination, it’s a stop along the way. I’m not sure where we’re going. I don’t know about the dream anymore, but the image is static, like a photograph So much like a photograph that I often think that’s what it is. It’s not a dream or a memory, it’s a picture I saw that my brain misplaced, and I’ll come across it one day.

I don’t look for it, thought. I’m worried if I held it it’d be meaningless.

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. ice cream

I wish eating ice cream didn’t make me happy.

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. Death Part 2

I named my first two sons after my grandfather. When I ran out of his names I started from scratch and named my third boy after no one. I couldn’t think of anyone else’s name I wanted to use.

My grandfather passed away last week. This is a list of things I should’ve asked him when I had the chance, because I could’ve.

-          You were successful in your career, and had a long lasting marriage. How do you define success?

-          What would be your advice for a lasting and loving marriage?

-          What do you wish you would have done differently as a father?

-          How do you judge me as a father? What would you recommend I do differently?

-          How did you deal with setbacks or mistakes?

There are a hundred others I can’t think of. He as a good man who helped me out of more jams than I’d care to admit, straightened me out once or twice, and was always supportive. He was at every baseball game and basketball game, driving me half the time. He laughed at us when we were funny, cheered when we succeeded, and was there if needed. I’m sure there are many versions of him, and everyone has their different perspectives and memories, but mine is him in his chair reading the paper, driving his van, teasing a baby, or laughing through stories and singing Cowboy Joe.  I’ll miss him, but I’m grateful for all that he gave me.

[johnvstheworld]

The Girl In The Rival Schools Tee

The Archetype. I’ve thought about her so much that it’s hard to tell what is real and what is a vision I’ve created. The Girl In The Rival Schools Tee. She is both of a certain time, and outside of time itself. She’s a dream, and like a dream, the details shift slightly.

At first I didn’t notice her. She was beside me, then in front of me, then beside me again. Her face in and out of shadow. It must have been 2000? 2001? I don’t remember who was playing, but when the lights went up she was there. She was blond. Maybe with highlights. I sometimes think she had orange streaks in her hair but it was probably the lighting. Tan. Freckles. She wore one of those necklaces with all the seashells. Sometimes I remember her in jeans, sometimes a skirt, but always the Rival Schools tee. She stood out. Was the prettiest girl I remember seeing – not in a movie star gorgeous kind of way, not in a most popular girl in school kind of way. It was its own thing, mostly indescribable like most dreams are. But she wasn’t a dream. I saw her. I could’ve approached her, but it wasn’t even an option in my mind at the time. That’s one of the things we’d all do differently if we could go back, right? Live with more confidence. But I wasn’t intimidated, just unaware that approaching her was possible, just focused on other things. I was sweaty, tired, full of adrenaline, and looking for my friends. That’s what mattered. It was only later that she became the Archetype, this dreamgirl before I knew what dreamgirls were, her myth growing as the vision came in and out of focus. I noticed her, but wasn’t struck by her. Or maybe I was struck by her, but not awed. At 16-17 years old, I was only interested in being awed in the most Romantic way.

Every show after that I kept half an eye out for the Girl In The Rival Schools Tee. I’d see parts of her. The freckles, the hair. Maybe I even saw her, but I never noticed because it wasn’t the same. I’d come across pieces of her essence later in life too, in the girl wearing boots in Medieval Studies, in the baristas. Hell, maybe they’re all her. They might as well be.

[johnvstheworld]

I Want Someone To Tell Me A Story

I want someone to tell me a story, something that is comforting, something that is warm on a cool day, or cool on a warm day, something pleasant that will make me feel good. Something perfect.

But I am the storyteller now. I am the one borrowing characters and plots and hammering them together. Frankenstein monsters that are supposed to delight. And I see the disconnect. I see the uncertainty or the concern or the boredom in his eyes, but he's kind and polite. If he wants another one or a different one he asks, using his good manners, holding on to my elbow, and eventually he falls asleep. I linger in his bed. Mine is cold. My pillows are at once lumpy and flat. My mind is not at ease. I want someone to tell me a story.

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. Moving

I’m moving, and I feel kind of sad about it. It’s not a sad move though. We’re not moving for financial reasons, nobody lost their job. We’re not ripping the kids out of school and away from their friends. They’re not even in school, and we’re just moving down the street anyway. I’ve just never moved before.

I did go to college, and after college I moved away for a few years for work. I had an apartment. I’ve moved like that, but that’s just moving crap. It’s taking stuff you have accumulated from a shelf in one place and putting it on a shelf in another. I’ve moved my stuff, but I’ve never moved myself. My roots were always planted. Home for the summer, home for the holidays, home to do laundry. Always going back home.

My parents have lived in the same house since before I was born, and I visit there at least three or four times a week now. It has the wall my uncle built, and the hillside I shot up with my bb gun trying to hit pop cans, and the window stickies my sister put up in the kitchen in 1996 my mom hasn’t gotten around to taking down yet. It’s living history. Things are never removed from that house, and if anything new does come in it just gets added. It’s living history and layered history. A chair from here, a table from there and hardly anything moves once it is in place. One of the only things that’s ever really moved in that house is a collage frame of pictures. There are two collage frames full of pictures of my parents partying the 70s, one of which my mom moved to cover a hole I punched in the wall when I was a teenager so neither of us would have to deal with the fall out. It’s never been moved back. I don’t know the status of the hole. Living history.

So I don’t know about moving. I don’t know about moving roots. When we bought our house I thought “this is our house” and went about making it so. Roots were planted. Floors were refinished. Paint was chosen. Old stuff was curated, new stuff selected, and everything put in their rightful places to collect their rightful dust. Most of that stuff will come with us, and maybe it’ll find a new place and maybe it won’t, but that’s okay. I’m not too worried about the stuff. It’s the history.

The memories will come too. The old deck going down and the new deck going up. Kitchen tile. Sanding. Scraping. I’ll remember those. There are pictures. But there’s the late nights, newborn on my chest watching Rio Bravo trying not to fall asleep while he gets an ohmygodpleasejustonehour of rest. Walking these halls in the dark bouncing and singing to a screaming boy hoping it was helping, maybe it was helping. Putting his bed together, sleeping on the edge so he could crawl into ours. Bringing home another one and being shocked when he slept. Bringing home a fish tank. Staying up all night to bake cupcakes for a birthday party. Eating the cupcakes at the birthday party. Someone driving through the neighbor’s yard and smashing our car in the middle of the night sounding like an explosion, then removing the tree, and pouring a new sidewalk, and the boy’s fucking handprints in the sidewalk. Netflix and blizzards on the couch. Breakfast at the table. My grandmother feeding a baby applesauce, sitting on the floor laughing and playing. Hearing my mom through the ceiling take the phone call that she’d passed while I worked in the basement. Building birdhouses with the boys. A million other things. Taking the stroller for a walk in the dark of the early morning up at the junior high. Counting garbage cans. Jumping over cracks. Counting bunnies in Bunny Alley behind the school. I can still go to the school whenever I want, but I won’t take the stroller on a five minute trip to get there at 5 in the morning.

Do these things matter? I don’t know. Probably yes and no. I have the memories, some burned into my brain. I have the pictures. But it won’t be living history. I won’t be able to point to a spot, to a corner, to a shelf. Does that matter? I don’t know. My best days and my longest nights were in this house. Hard times and happy times. The problems and the joys will follow us, like they do everyone. But this chapter will just be history. The boys are so young they’ll barely remember this place, if they do at all. But this place formed them. Running to the couch in the morning yelling about graham crackers. Singing songs as loud as we can. Racing down the hallway. Lightsaber battles. These things aren’t going away, they’re just going down the street. And I’m trying to remember that. I’m excited to move. I’m happy to move. But I’m sad to leave.

[johnvstheworld]

Book Review 2.17 Norse Mythology

The second book I read this year was Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman. When this book was announced – hell, when this book was released – I didn’t have much interest, and judging by the numbers that were shipped, Gaiman and his publishers didn’t feel there would be the mountain of interest and sales that there were. The book was #1. I’ll speculate that the real world was full of awful shit, reality was scary, and a book so obviously about made up heroes and gods by one of the world’s best storytellers was the kind of escapism people wanted and needed. No thrillers. No Netflix binges. Something light to dig into, and easy to digest.

The way the book is set up is easy digest. The stories are short. It is the kind of book you leave by your bedside, or bring to the bathroom. You can finish a story, or half of one, in a few minutes. The morals and lessons are clear when they are present, and the characters are bold instead of subtle.

What struck me while I was reading was the writer’s voice. This isn’t a negative, but early on in the collection it sounds like Gaiman trying to be a storyteller of ye olden days, like he was trying to transcribe them rather than translate them. I can’t say if that was on purpose or not, but the Gaiman voice cannot be subdued for long. There are lines and sentences that are poke out here and there early on, but by about the third of fourth tale, the author erupts and the book really starts to have character.

I enjoyed the book for what it was and for what it did. It was a break from reality, from personal heartbreak, and international disaster.

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. Death

A few weeks before Grammie passed away it became clear the time was coming. I didn’t know how to deal with it or talk about it so I just opened an email draft and started typing. I kept that up for the past month or so. Some days I’d write two or three times, whatever came into my head or my heart, and sometimes I’d go days in between. I never intended to share these. Just getting it out made me feel better. That power has sort of faded though, and I felt a strong desire to share them. I don’t know if it matters or not either way. The entries aren’t dated, and this is mostly unedited.

--

 I feel mostly empty, but that's just the only word I can think of.

 I'm also trying to draw something out of me. Like I can't turn the music up loud enough. If my ears hurt, if the noise drowned out the silence inside, I'd feel better. It would be gone. 

 I've wanted to cry for a while, and it comes sometimes, but not totally. I haven't wept. I don't think I will. But I want to. 

 A shower is usually my place to clear my head. Instead I keep eulogizing people. I come out worse than before, and feel shamed because I don’t think it's my place to capture that. I know I'm not really capturing anything. I know I'm just trying to work through it, like I keep a diary. I should keep a diary. Sometimes I want to preserve all my thoughts and sometimes I want to burn them. I think both would be productive. But you can't do both. So I don't write it down. I commit it to memory, then bury it deep.

 I'm writing this right now because I don't know what else to do. 

 --

 Death should be quick. Accidents. I'm grateful that life can last long. Life should be long. Death should be quick.

 --

 I still don't wish death to be drawn out, but I am glad to have the chance to say goodbye and to reckon with it. My only concern has been how she is, if she is scared. It's strange that, I know she is dying, that she will never be better, but I want her to be okay. I want her to have no fear, no anxiety, no worry. I'm scared that because she wasn't able to really communicate the last few days/weeks, she's had to deal with everything on her own; that she hasn't been able to talk it out, or share her thoughts or feelings. And honestly, I don't know if she would. I think probably not. But at the end people can change; people can become more open, more willing, more raw. Or maybe she'd struggle silently anyway. Maybe she isn't struggling. Maybe she's been preparing. I know she's been preparing, but I also know she's been scared. 

 I'm thankful Pap has been able to be there so much. He fell and hurt himself, and has been halfway bedridden. I hate that he can't be by her side 24 hours. I hate that she worries about him.

 --

 Johnny started with the "why's" about a week ago. It has made reading small books, books we've been reading for ages, a new tedious adventure, extremely drawn out. I indulge his curiosity, of course, but it can still be grating. I'm glad he's started with the why's because when we told him Grammie was dying, and he asked why, it felt like he was really trying to understand.

 Johnny was Grammie's last baby. He was her baby. She taught him so much. He's been ahead of schedule, advanced in his vocabulary and his reasoning and identifying and whatever else, and that's all because of her. Nicki and I do okay, but part of me thinks she taught him everything he knows, that he is a product of her love and her patience and her care. When I struggle with him or with Archie I find myself wondering how Grammie would handle the situation. She loved him so much, and he loved her so much. He would stand by the window and wait for her and Pap to come each morning, and have books ready for them to read to him.

 I'm thankful and grateful for how much help they offered. I'm grateful and thankful to have had that relationship with them, a more adult relationship. The thoughtfulness and care she had. She was a wonderful woman. I hope she has peace and comfort.

--

I'm grateful I had the opportunity to tell her how much she meant to me. I wrote this in a card for her for Christmas 2014, the first after Johnny was born.

 "Sometimes a grandmother’s love may be taken for granted or assumed. It can be displayed any number of ways: through toys, smiles, hugs, snacks, back to school shopping trips, vacations, and even sanctuary. All of those things are appreciated, and often prized, yet because a grandmother’s love is constant, present all your life, it can be regarded as a given. It is a source of warmth that can take years to comprehend, because comprehending it isn’t really necessary or the point of it. It’s pure, and without compromise. Such things don’t need explained or defined.

 We cannot begin to thank you for all that you’ve done these past months. Your presence in our lives, and in our house, makes living easier and, many days, tidier. What is hardest to thank you for is what I have tried to describe above, your love. A grandmother’s love is special, and may be assumed, but a great-grandmother’s love is unique because it can be thrust upon the unsuspecting, and can be viewed from the outside as well. We appreciate that you watch the boy, but we’re thankful for the love he receives.

 For being Grammie, for the way you play your role as great-grandmother with such grace and enthusiasm, for the love you’ve always shown us, and for the love you have for Johnny, we wanted to say thank you.

Love,

John – Nicole – Johnny "

--

The way a baby's head smells like her perfume after she's rocked him to sleep. You'd always know if Grammie was over.

--

One thing about Grammie - and this might sound materialistic, but it's not meant to be and it isn't - she always gave good gifts. Not expensive gifts necessarily, just good ones. Things you would like. Nice sweaters. Not fancy sweaters or expensive sweaters, nice ones that you'd wear, that were your style. She knew you. Books you would like and would become meaningful to you. She didn't give many books, but the ones she did stuck.

--

I have images that I specifically burned into my head. Her walking with Johnny out to the flower beds to weed. Her in her chair. Her at my kitchen sink. The sounds are vaguer. I can hear her singing voice, softly to babies, but I don't know the words or the tune. I hear her yelling down the stairs from the kitchen when I was a kid. I hear her short way of saying bye and reminding me of something small but important where her voice trails and is cut off as she comes in for a kiss on the cheek.

--

I cried the other night. I cried last night also. When I try to say something I'm thinking out loud I get overwhelmed. I have so many things I want to say, so I'm just jotting them down here. I don't know if it helps or not, but I'm currently unable to say them, so this is the best I can do.

--

Everything is difficult. Like, the day doesn't make sense. It feels wrong to be doing anything. It feels wrong to be working. Wrong to be cooking. When we went to see her everyone was there. I needed to talk to her. I needed just a moment. I'm going to try today or tomorrow. I just want to tell her that she was a great woman and a caring woman and I want to be like her and I appreciate everything she did and we're all better because of her.

--

Grammie died yesterday, 2/27/2017, around 3:00 PM I guess. I think her being so close to the end the last week made her eventual passing not as hard. This sounds very mechanical.

--

Some Things I'll Miss:

Calling down there and hearing Pap yell "Sally!" when I ask to speak to her.

Her handwriting, smooth and steady cursive, not fancy. Her G's and P's and m’s I'll miss most of all. Maybe J's.

--

Grammie was also great because you knew she cared but she never pried. I remember Nicki and I had to live apart for a few weeks after we were married because of job stuff and she could tell I wasn't doing well with it. She didn't make a show of it, or buy me ice cream or a sweatshirt or anything. She just said, "You don't look too happy," and she was right and I said, "No not really, but I guess it's okay." She nodded that yes it would be, and I felt better. It was like two sentences, but just talking to someone about it for a second was enough, and she knew it was enough. She knew what was needed.

--

I've been doing much better about it over the last week. Small things were creeping up on me, and I guess they still will. I was washing the dishes and got a sad remembering her standing over the sink. I was sitting on the floor in the nursery and got sad remembering her sitting on the floor in the nursery stacking blocks. It was only a year-year and a half ago she was sitting on the floor and playing and reading to babies. 

The one that has overwhelmed me the most, and more than once, was having to sing a baby to sleep. I could hear her doing it. I remembered having to sing Johnny to sleep for a nap with her just out in the living room and feeling a little embarrassed, but also kind of proud she got to hear and see me do daddy things. And now she won't anymore, and that's okay. But it made me sad thinking about how happy that might have made her, and how happy it made me. But it's okay.

--

One reason this hurt so much, almost more than I thought it ever would, was that it was kind of unexpected. I never thought she'd be the first to go. I guess I never thought she'd go, now that I'm thinking of it. She was supposed to be here and be a rock through other losses, other tragedies, other life stuff. She was supposed to be the example, and be strong, and know the right thing to do, the right way to act. It's like there isn't an adult around. And I know that's not true, but that's how it feels.

--

I wasn't really sure how much Johnny understood, or how much it affected him. As the days have gone on, it seems like it's done more than I originally thought. We went down there over the weekend and he asked where Grammie was and I had to tell him again that she died and the why's started and I said because she was old. He was sad. Later he asked Nicki if she was going to die. He found a sign he had made weeks ago and wanted to give it to Grammie and I said how sweet that was but gently reminded him that he can't, and he was upset, he was quiet. He didn't want the sign anymore, said he wanted to put it into the ground, and then he changed the subject. 

A friend of Nicole's got a book for him about feelings you might feel when someone you love dies and how it is okay to feel those. We've read it a few times. He asks questions. It seems like he's starting to understand the mechanics of it, that she's gone and not coming back. The feelings part he's still unsure of, and honestly so am I. The book has helped me though. It's for toddlers. Maybe I should talk to someone.

--

I saw her obituary today and reading it in print at first felt like a relief, like something official. There wasn't a regular service, there will be a memorial later, but I guess those things are important for having some kind of closure.

--

I cleaned the floors today and thought of her. Johnny was complaining his socks were wet and it reminded me of when she’d clean the carpets and you wouldn’t realize it until your socks were soaking wet so you just took them off and laid on the couch for like an hour because you didn’t want your feet to get wet again.

--

I guess I’m doing better. It’s not the first thing on my mind all the time, and that it’s not is kind of sad, but that’s the way it goes, and it’s ultimately for the best I guess. I still think about it often though, about her, but when I do it’s not with a heaviness; the memories have more joy to them. It feels positive.

--

I used to be scared of ghosts, of big dark places like my grandparents’ house at night. It was quiet, except when the grandfather clock rang out throughout the night. It sounded and felt like something from an old movie, like it would wake spirits. Old pictures lined the stairway, black, white, and faded, of people I didn’t recognize who were long dead. I don’t know about all eight year olds, but I could talk myself into being frightened or nervous pretty easily, and this imagery didn’t help.

I’m not scared of ghosts anymore. I used to believe in them but not anymore. All that fear has been stripped away because I welcome it. Now I wish I was haunted. Instead of rushing through a silent house late at night or lying in bed unwilling to get up to go to the kitchen for a glass of water, instead of having to shake off the dread from an innocent draft, I wish I was haunted. I wish I could feel her beside me as I rock a baby, or after I yell out of frustration. But there’s nothing tangible, no chills from the outside. The memories of her are starting to gather into an essence though.

I guess this is what people talk about when they say people will stay with you. I don’t feel her above me or beside me, but in my head I hear whispers of her voice and can guess at her advice or her reactions for different situations. I can try to use that, a combination of thoughts and opinions and attitudes all rolled into something internalized… I think I’m rambling now.

[johnvstheworld]

Book Review 1.17 Universal Harvester

I finished John Darnielle’s Universal Harvester a few weeks ago, and though I’m just getting around to writing about it now it’s okay because this thing sticks with you. I don’t like talking too much about plot so we’ll just say it’s about a kid who works at a video rental store and some weird things are showing up on some of the tapes. The story launches from there.

It is layered and full of unsettling revelations like a good season of True Detective. It bounces around, like someone trying to analyze a relationship that went wrong, the where’s and the how’s, weighing the good times vs. the bad. Threads dry up but then are revisited only to make sense to us again, like an old journal entry. The thing sits in your stomach like a ball of something you can’t describe, like stages of grief or depression that never really fade away, they just shuffle around. Eventually you don’t even want to remove it.

Anyway. Go read it.

[johnvstheworld]

2000s indie artists I’d like to see try writing books

I’ve been enjoying John Darnielle’s new novel, Universal Harvester, this week. And when I say “enjoying” I mean fighting squeamish and anxious feelings, taking breaks, questioning my place in life, and examining some of my relationships. Enjoying. I’ll give my full thoughts about the book next week, but the success of Darnielle’s first novel, Wolf in the White Van, along with this excellent follow up got me thinking about who else might give writing novels a try.

Darnielle’s primary gig has been leading his group The Mountain Goats, though that might start shifting if his literary career continues along the trajectory he’s set. From lo-fi roots of Darnielle singing into a boombox to classic indie album “All Hail West Texas” to the celebrated “The Sunset Tree” and beyond, it is safe to say that The Mountain Goats and Darnielle was an indie staple and tent pole through the beginning of the new century and remains so today.

So who else from the 2000s indie scene would make a good novelist? Who would I like to see give it a try? Here is my top 5 and I know there are some notable exceptions (I’ll defend the list if I have to!). Also, I realize there are no women on the list. At first I thought this said something about me, but I went back through the popular (and not so popular) indie musicians of the time, and well, there really aren’t that many women. If anyone has any recommendations, or suggestions for the list, please let me know.

5. Kevin Devine

Kevin Devine is a story teller. Indulging the singer-songwriter trope early in his career, Devine writes songs that speak to the loner in everyone. They describe the isolation and those uneasy attempts at connection – real connection – that defines our modern lives. Whether it is on a dark stretch of road, a late night/early morning on a city block, on a busy train, or in a tiny empty apartment, Devine paints pictures that captured the dreams, problems, and minutia of directionless twenty-somethings, and thirty-somethings unsure of the path they’ve found themselves on. Some albums can be more political, some more airy and some ominous. Either way, I’d like to follow some of his characters through more than the three+ minutes he gives us.

4. Forrest Kline (Hellogoodbye)

Hellogoodbye is in the running for quirkiest band of all-time. And it is a very specific kind of quirk. They definitely are of a specific time and place. Their most successful era is more akin to Napoleon Dynamite than, say, Juno. This is pre Michael Cera times. Heavily drenched in west coast. So why would I be interested in seeing the kinds of stories someone like Forrest would put down on paper? Despite the quirkiness of it all, the charm was always genuine and carried through to later, more mature efforts. The details of the high school (seemingly chaste) trysts are of a certain and brief moment, but the essence of them is timeless and I’d love to see that revisited. Much like how a John Hughes story is dressed up under layers of 80s mannerisms, references, and affectations, the core is still true today, and always was. A John Hughes story for 03-06 graduates? That’s something I’m interested in.

3. Phil Elverum (The Microphones/Mt. Eerie)

Phil Elverum may not have the cult status of Jeff Mangum, but his is the voice I hear when I think about lo-fi in the late 90s/early 2000s. The stories he tells don’t always have words, the characters rarely have names, the speaker not revealing many personal details but still willing to describe their inner lives. It is the atmosphere of wonder and mystery, the feeling that we are floating through a strange land while also having one foot planted firmly in the realm of reality, which is appealing. The best way I can think to describe the feeling some of his work gives is it almost like watching the darkest episode of Adventure Time on VHS, on a black and white screen, with real actors – faceless actors – playing the parts. I can’t think of any other way to really describe it, but I’d love to read about it and visit this place.

2. Tim Kasher (Cursive, The Good Life)

Tim Kasher is known most prominently as the head of Omaha post-rock band Cursive. He’s tackled subjects as diverse as infidelity, religion, infidelity, art, incompatibility, etc. “Domestica” tells, in both lyrics and sound, the story of divorce. “The Ugly Organ” is a masterpiece contemplation on art using wonderful metaphors, allusions, interludes, and again, sound. “Happy Hollow” tells the story of a small town full of characters like predatory preachers and high school sweethearts torn apart by wars halfway around the world. While most of the vignettes on these albums round out their intended themes nicely, the most compelling storytelling work Kasher has done is with his more stripped down group, The Good Life. Here Kasher takes on many of the same themes but has time to let them breathe and develop. Late nights. Six packs. Secret rendezvous. Old videos. Funny stories that aren’t so funny anymore. Men being men, in the traditional, clichéd, and basest sense. They are enlightened enough to be aware of their flaws and expectations, but not strong enough or willing enough to do anything about it. He namechecks John Fante and Charles Bukowski in a few songs, calling them “hopeless Romanatics,” but I’ve always seen Kasher closer to someone like Updike, just working 50 years later. Either way, I don’t see too many authors working like that lately, and it might be welcomed. Then again, maybe not.

1. John K Samson (The Wakerthans)

Every song by The Weakerthans is already a short story. Why not start putting them on paper? People have been wondering if John K Samson would start writing for over a decade, and even though he just released a solo album, the hiatus for The Weakerthans should provide enough time for him to indulge us, the waiting public. One of the most successful indie bands of the 2000s, The Weakerthans have done what so many TV shows, movies, and novels have rarely been successful at, especially lately (do they really even try anymore?): they describe and comment on the life and struggles of the middle class; the lower middle class; the sometimes educated lower middle class. The apartments are dirty, vary in size and location, and are full of meaning. The cats are our friends. The diplomas are useless. The city is sprawling while opportunity is shrinking. The bus is late. The beer is cheap. The car broke down. The cat said, “fuck it I tried you’re on your own.” The Christmas gifts are shoplifted. The club is closing down. But it’s not all sad though. Many times it is the opposite. Samson finds the hope in these situations, no matter how small, and focuses the listener there. Look! Take this and hide it somewhere! We need that sometimes. We need that always.

[johnvstheworld]

Books that shaped me: 9

A light in the Attic/Where the Sidewalk Ends

A classic known to just about everyone, Shel Silverstein’s poems were silly for a four year old, entertaining and enlightening for an eight year old, and still offer insights in both style and content for a 32 year old. I have all of Silverstein’s poetry collections, most with inscriptions like “From Grammie and Pap, Christmas 1992.” They were some of the first books I read on my own; the pieces are short, like literary cartoons. These poems seem to be written with children in mind, rather than *for* children, and that is appealing to everyone, especially a precocious reader. The subjects are things children would be familiar with but they weren’t always written from a child’s perspective. Roald Dahl books can be very mature with their subjects, but the narrators and main characters are always children (or animals). Many of Shel Silverstein poems are written in the poet’s voice. It felt like you were seeing your own world through the eyes of an adult, and one that was on your side.

How did this book shape me?

They were musical. Words have a rhythm. Lines have a rhythm. The world has a rhythm, if you’re open to it.  I wanted to be a poet since I was 5 and I attribute that partly to 3WS playing old pop songs, but mostly to my parents and grandparents giving me these books and letting me go. These poems were silly! And they were about… anything. These books showed me that anything can be put into rhyme, and anything can be art, and art can be fun while also being serious. There are a lot of shitty children’s books in the world, and most kids can pick ‘em out. These were good. I don’t think I had the vocabulary to know that these poems, while for children, were also literary, but I felt it. These books shaped my taste, my sense of humor, and my internal rhythm.

[johnvstheworld]

Books that shaped me: 10

Absalom, Absalom!

To be perfectly honest, I do not recall the plot. I read this over winter break during college, part in an effort to keep my mind sharp (a small part), and part as an excuse to lock myself away for significant chunks of time. Winter break can start to get long when you’re 21 and don’t have much to say to your parents.

How did this book shape me?

The language is beautiful. Even though Faulkner is considered by many as America’s finest novelist, and certainly the Souths, he also has a rep (and I won’t say if it is fair or unfair) as sort of gimmicky. He plays in dialect, and there are narration tricks. While the narrators here still aren’t entirely reliable and the prose still dense, it comes at you much straighter, and lovely. At a point in my life when story structure and gimmicks were impressive it was nice to be reminded of how important intoxicating prose can be. Character and theme swirl around in your head and the reader often has a large responsibility to fill in gaps and build those up on their own, but the words on the page, the readers direct connection and how the story actually unfolds is near the top of the list of things that are most important in a good book. It doesn’t have to be flowery. It doesn’t have to be simple. Just good.

I was also fascinated with religion and God at this time in my life. I was starting to sort some things out for myself. There isn’t much direct talk of God and the Devil or anything like that, but there were some characters and powerful images and passages that spelled out, for me, what it meant to be human. And that somehow made me understand God a little better. This story taught me that some people are enlightened in speech and in facts, and some people are driven or consumed by their baser needs and instincts. Both are natural, and we all have a little of both in us. Ultimately we’re all animals and we getting in touch with that part of us can bring us closer to a truth. That’s what all good books or stories or songs or pictures or whatever your art of choice is, that’s what they all have. Pieces of truth.

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. Reading

I wanted to read more books this year. After spending the last few years scrolling through memes or only checking the comments section I’ve started feeling a little… flat? The goal was to read 25 books this year. That checks into roughly two a month, and that is BOLD with boys running around. When they finally get to bed I usually only have enough energy to halfway pay attention to an episode of the Office.

But I’m trying. And I started off so well! I went to the library the second week in January! Before getting there I tried to make a little list on my phone of books people and websites I usually respect were over the moon for. I also wanted to start with something short. I wanted to start tallying them up, get a base before going for something meatier.

I brought home 99 Stories of God by Joy Williams. Was on the Millions list for months. Short. Super short. I was stoked to lay in bed read, and then dig into it and write an interesting review. But I didn’t get it. I read about a quarter of it. Some of the stories were sad. Some of them were cute. Some of them weren’t as cute as they thought they were. I didn’t’ feel God in many of them, anyway.

And now I’m discouraged. My plan is ruined! And it’s only January… Maybe my muscles weren’t ready for 99 semi-themed snippets. Maybe I should just keep rolling with Dr. Seuss.

I guess I’m going to try again. The library wants their book back, and I’m glad to return in. Hopefully I come back with something that I find a little more interesting. Until then, though, I’ll try to come up with some kind of top 10 or 5 list. Because my muscles need work.

[johnvstheworld]

Fuck em: NFL division round

My wife will often ask who we're rooting for when she wanders by the tv and there are sports on. She finds it hard to believe anyone would watch a game when they didn't care about the outcome, and I mostly agree. It's much more interesting if you're invested. She won't ask if she recognizes the Steelers jerseys. We live in the suburbs of Pittsburgh and have for most of our lives. That's our team, even if she really doesn't care. It's our team! (She has a Hines Ward jersey she got on sale 10 years ago. I'm pretty sure she knows he doesn't play anymore.) But if the Steelers aren't playing, who are we rooting for is a good question. Who do we want to see victorious. If it's going to be on, if she must tolerate it, endure it, she expects me to at least care about it. And that's fair. The problem, though, is that I never want to see another team victorious as much as I want to see one of them fail. She hates this. She thinks it's too negative and a cop out. There's no narrative. How invested am I really if the answer to why are we rooting for this team is always "cuz fuck that other guy"? Another fair question, but that's just the way it is. I'm a simple man. So here are my division round rooting interests, and maybe picks. Seattle v. Atlanta: Atlanta. Fuck Russell Wilson. Houston v. New England: Houston. Fuck Tom Brady and that entire region. Fuck Mark Wahlberg while we're at it. Green Bay v. Dallas: tough one... I hate Dallas, but it'd be funny to see them go far without Romo, and fuck Aaron Rodgers. Dallas. Pittsburgh v. Kansas City: Pittsburgh, go Ben.

[johnvstheworld]

So the Chargers are moving and everyone hopes they fail horribly. It seems that San Diego stood up to Chargers and the NFL and said they wouldn’t pay for a new stadium so the Chargers are forced (forced!) to move up to LA. In solidarity with the fans in San Diego the entire Internet has decided to shit all over Dean Spanos (the owner of the Chargers) and his team. That’s fine. I get it. He’s rich, wants to be richer, and doesn’t care about anyone else. He seems like a bad guy.

What I don’t understand, though, is the hatred for the new logo. What’s so wrong with this thing?

It’s simple. I know it is the Chargers because it keeps the bolt. I know where they’ll be playing from now on because it literally tells me, and also because it invokes the Dodgers. That’s branding baby! It’s not spectacular, but it’s not awful. It’s solid. It does its job. It’s a logo. How many sports logos, or logos in general, are good? Or great? Or awesome? Or cool? This thing is going to be stitched on ball caps and on polo shirts, and it’s perfect for that.

[johnvstheworld]

Best Mel Gibson Movies

10 --

9 --

8 --

7 --

6 --

5 --

4 --

3 Parts of Braveheart are okay.

2 --

1 Maverick

[johnvstheworld]

John vs. the Cold

Half of my Christmas lights are still up. I got started right after New Year’s but was chased inside by the Polar Vortex so there’s a strand of twinkly icicle lights hanging lifeless from my from porch like a deer carcass. Part of me wants to just turn them on and own it, but I don’t want to be the ugliest house in the neighborhood if I can help it.

Inside is no better. The windows let the cold air in and the warm air out so that the furnace runs nearly 24 hours a day. I’m wearing layers on the couch! T-shirt, long sleeves, sweatshirt, blanket. It’s a simple solution to a simple problem… except the problem isn’t so simple! The bedrooms in the back of the house hold the heat a little better so that I wake up at 1 or 2 in the morning sweating because I went to bed in pants. Is there a solution for this problem? Yes. Wake up at 1 or 2 in the morning and take them off.

The basement, where I work, is frigid because it’s a basement. And because I tore it apart in the summer thinking I would refinish it, except time gets away from you, and now it’s January, freezing, and the concrete walls are cold to the touch. I found the little space heater though, except, ah yes, another problem! The outlet closest to my desk is on the same circuit as the kitchen above me so if the heater is running and someone turns on the microwave the breaker trips and I’m sitting in the basement, in the dark.

All in all, the cold sucks, and everyone knows it. I am not defeated, but the spring seems so far away.

ADVANTAGE: World