This Year You Write Your Novel (2007)

     That's right, I am continuing in the reading of books on the subject of writing rather than actually writing.  However, I avoided these books for so long with little reason  – unless simple arrogance is a reason and not just a cause.  There is a lot of this attitude in regards to politics, where people feel they know enough on the subjects to forever avoid actually learning anything.
     I picked up Walter Mosley's This Year You Write Your Novel (2007) at the Forest Park Public librbary without knowing who the author is (which makes me feel nearly illiterate) because I assumed that it would have some advice on how to budget time towards writing a novel.  Unfortunately  – at least for me  – Mosley's advice is to write every day, every week, for the whole year.  Sure, some of this writing is actually reviewing, revising, and full-on editing, but Mosley wants the aspiring author to put in between 1½ and 3 hours per day on the novel  Every single freaking day..  I think that would lead to a fair amount of burn out if it is all dedicated to the same story.  On the other hand, one of the major reasons I have this blog is to keep myself in the habit of writing something (usually not fiction, and almost never very time consuming material) on a regular basis, and from that I can attest that writing regularly makes it easier to find the rhythm for a story.
     Mosley, however, tends to view the novel as many smaller stories within the larger, connecting story.  Since he has been quite successful as an author, I am going to defer to his judgment on the matter.  Time spent with the smaller bits informs the bigger structure, and that can always change as the writer moves forward with it.  He also discusses the intuitive method (something all of us self-proclaimed smart people think is real writing) versus more structured, planned approaches.  How one spends time on the book is going to differ with each, and I'm appreciative for how Mosley covered this.
      There is also a small section dedicated to the value of the classroom, both in terms of academic study and writers' workshops.  I have long been too [insert one or more of the following: shy, timid, stubborn, arrogant, cowardly] to invite a crowd of people who are also authors (aspiring or published) to have access to my work just so they can point out all of the mistakes I've made.  Yes, I like being overly critical of the work other people do, but I don't want that same spotlight shined back on me.  But if an author is going to be serious about finding the flaws in his or her writing, then workshops seem to be a great tool.  You can find the errors you makes in the works of others (where they are easier to spot) and have others highlight the problems that you never see because you are just too damn close to your own story.
     By itself, This Year You Write Your Novel isn't going to be of much help.  As a supplement to knowing something about writing and a real desire to finish a story, it can be a great aid.  Mosley's acknowledgment that the first draft is going to be terrible (accept it, would-be authors) and that the real work comes from turning the rough story into a readable novel is encouraging.  On the other hand, he doesn't have much to say about how to get published other than to make contacts – another reason to workshop – and figure out who is likely to publish your type of material.  And then be ready for a steady stream of rejection, one that isn't likely to go once an author has had a few books (or more than twenty) published.

Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy (1998)

     If one were ever curious as to the magnitude of difference between the educators at the community college and university level, he or she should pick up Crawford Kilian's How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy (1998, though there is a more recent revision that should avoid some of my criticisms).  Kilian manages to spend 160 pages giving information that could just as easily have been conveyed in a pamphlet. 
     Part of the book is wholly worthless.  Information about how to set one's Netscape browser or using AltaVista as a primary search engine seem damn near laughably ancient 14 years after publication.  Formatting instructions so that manuscripts can be read by Macs and PCs also seems redundant.  Worst of all, Kilian dedicates a mini-chapter to a rushed overview of basic English grammar.
     It is a little difficult to take an author seriously when his books are almost entirely out of print.  Does he know scores more about writing, marketing, and publishing novels than I do?  Absolutely.  Ashton Kutcher has more practical experience in terms of television and film acting than I do, but I wouldn't go to him for advice on the subject matter; I would seek out someone I believe can act at a professional level.  Where Kilian lost me was in his deep and abiding love for Orwel's heavy-handed 1984 (1949) – a fine, but far from excellent novel – while completely misreading Niven and Pournelle's Lucifer's Hammer (1977) as a manifestation of a white suburban fear of urban black men.  Talk about not understanding the time and setting of the book, and that the racial tensions in Los Angeles did not end with the Watts Riots.
     But to the material itself.  Kilian expends a fair amount of effort to display that he is well versed in the genres of Science Fiction and Fantasy.  He name drops constantly – revered authors become his lifelong inspiration, lesser authors are acquaintances and peers with whom he has debated at workshops, and the truly obscure are mentioned to prove that he isn't just familiar with the most successful titles in print.  Kilian calls out those who write licensed fiction – what he terms formula fiction – as not being real authors interested in telling real stories.  I don't know if this applies to the more recent authors who create their own setting and characters that go on to be licensed; I would assume so as Robert E. Howard is viewed as a real author for his Conan stories.
     Unfortunately, Kilian is very interested in providing a formula for writing a novel.  In his estimation, all Science Fiction and Fantasy novels are about power.  That may be true; the ones I have wanted to write are about political and economic power.  But it reads as overly restrictive to announce that all of them must be.  He provides a blueprint for moving the story forward, something that seems much more valuable as a workshop or classroom tool than a means to work on anything other than formula fiction.
     I found this book to be a waste of time.  Well, not entirely, but I would have preferred he had written a much more concise book that didn't feel the need to be constantly self-referencetial.  From what little example Kilian gives of his own works, he doesn't seem like somebody I would want to read, but I have one of his books on order from the library that I intend to read to give me a better idea of his ability as a fiction writer.  He certainly seems well versed in what it takes to get material published – that section felt more honest than the rest of the book. 
     I cannot say that I am eager to read anything more from this series.  Not just because Kilian did not address "how to get the science and magic right" ('read science journals' and advice on keeping magic internally consistent isn't informative by itself), but because the target audience seems to be much different from me.  What Kilian illustrates well are the following two points.  First, devotees to a genre may harshly judge works by authors who are not as familiar.  Secondly, waiting for inspiration to write is an invitation to being something other than an author.

How Not to Write a Novel (2008)

     I don't know if I have had more laugh out loud moments with a book than with Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman's How Not to Write a Novel (2008).  There is something special when authors can make 'bad writing' much more entertaining than what passes for acceptable fiction these days.  Sure, such prose really only works in small doses – nobody wants to read 180 pages of rapid-fire absurdities, unknowingly self-denying characters, and logical inconsistencies – but because there are so many real mistakes that writers can and do make, Mittelmark and Newman have no problem keeping the examples short and extremely pointed.
     Some of the fun in reading this comes from the liberal recycling of character names from all the fake, flawed fiction.  Melinda may be a waitress who obsesses over her boyfriend not remembering to celebrate the anniversary of their third date or a woman sold into sexual service to a ruthless terrorist.  Maybe it is the same Melinda; that would be an odd mash-up novel. 
     One of my favorite moments – and one that actually could work given a truly gifted author who could give it deep contextual meaning...well, some of it could work – comes from the sub-section "Linearity Shrugged" (p 124)

           Melinda would have never guessed that she would find true love in the arms

          of the ruthless terrorist to whom she had been sold like a hardware fixture 

          by the man she had trusted with all her most intimate papers and 

         documentation.  The beans were still too hot to eat.  In the early 1900s, 

         Tripoli had been a small market town, where goats could be seen not only 

         the streets, but making themselves at home on the Persian rugs of 

         fashionable homes.

I must have laughed for about a minute at the abruptness of "The beans were still too hot to eat."  Not only does it seem to have nothing to do with the establishing sentence, but its curt, very masculine tone stands in complete contrast to the overlong romantic sentence that proceeds it.  Where "The beans were still too hot to eat" could stand as a metaphor – a clumsy sexual one, or a clever one about reigning in one's passions, or something more mature than I can imagine on my own – it reads here as a complete distraction.  But more than that, it conveys more meaningful information to the reader on its face than the one exploring Melinda's journey into being the property of a terrorist or where goats slept in early 20th Century Tripoli.  It takes an insane amount of understanding of the craft to structure a paragraph (and it goes on for some length in the example) that both showcases the mistakes authors and wanna-be authors can and do make.
     Likewise, Mittelmark and Newman have great advice about the dangers of indulging the desire to soften the villain by giving him or her some likable qualities.  First, there is the issue of what the would-be author may consider sympathetic may not play as such with a wider audience.  But more to the point, some villainy is beyond redemption.

          Jack robs and cheats and beats his kids—but still pines for his first love.  

         Adolf introduces Fascism to Germany, spreads war throughout Europe, 

         murders millions in concentration camps—but he's a strict vegetarian and 

         loves his dog.  Tossing in a touching scene with his German shepard 

         Blondie and a dish of lentils won't make Hitler "more balanced."  Hitler's 

         character isn't balanced.  The only way to avoid caricature is the hard 

         way: making the bad guy's insane behavior and motivations believable. 

           (p 87)

Round out characters, of course, but there is no need to falsely "humanize" them.  The elements of character that don't directly relate to motivation should still inform the reader about the experiences that inform that motivation.  Furthermore, note that not everyone loves dogs (some of us harbor an intense fear of them because dogs tend to bite people) and vegetarianism isn't super-popular; see the lack of competing vegetarian chain restaurants as opposed to the massive profits of McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Taco Bell, and KFC.
     There is advice that I just assume real authors know.  Bold print, unusual capitalization ('his Beer was cold and Refreshing') and exclamation points (except when a the dialogue needs to represent a character shouting or screaming) should see little to no use in a novel.  Sure, I liberally abuse italics and bold print on this blog; I don't have an editor to tell me I can't do it.  And it is an overly easy cheat to try to put extra meaning (or note that I'm trying to be sly) with a word or phrase.  Serious writers should do the work.  If you are trying to be sly, then actually write something that conveys that.
     Because Mittelmark and Newman aren't interested in the proper way to write a novel, they can concentrate on the many mistakes that are waiting to be made.  Illustrating the mistakes makes for a much more enjoyable read than a dry treatise on the proper technique for writing a novel.  Indeed, there isn't really a proper technique.  How Not to Write a Novel could have subtitled sections "You are Not [insert author's name here]."  Aspiring, unpublished authors are not Hemingway, Faukner, Roth, Twain, McCarthy, or King.  There is an assumption on behalf of Mittelmark and Newman that the would-be author is aiming for a more commercial than literary product – more Grisham or Collins than Morrison or Mailer – something that I find a little odd.  As much as I enjoy Richard A. Knaak's Dragonrealm books or Michael A. Stackpole's BattleTech novels, I would rather my works be more meaningful; I would like to think I want to write something more than just an interesting yarn. 
     In making the case for remembering where a scene is set – to not ignore other character present entirely, or forget what the scene would otherwise be about if the characters weren't so self-involved and interested in being interesting – Mittelmark and Newman give a passage that draws together several other flaws.  It is also the example that convinced me that this book would work as a movie, though I don't know how large a market there is for a kind of Amazon Women on the Moon (1987) built around literary clichés, grammatical errors, and inconsistent point of view..  Still, I don't know if any film has captured this level of sincere absurdity:

          The meeting began with a few prefatory remarks by the Mayor.  As luck 

          would have it, Jane and Alan found themselves seated next to each other

          at the far end of the conference table.  Jane avoided looking his way.

          Alan took out his pen and began tapping it on the table, something he 

          knew got on Jane's nerves.

          Jane glared at him.  Alan smirked.  She darted her hand out and snatched

          the pen from him.

           Alan glared back, but his look soon softened.

          "Jane..."

           "I don't want to hear it."

          "Jane, don't you know how sorry I am?"

          "You should have thought of that before you and your cousin—"

          "Second cousin, okay?" Alan interrupted, his tender feelings forgotten.  "It's

          not illegal."

          "Whatever!" she said.  "If she was two months younger, it would be."

          "If you were a little more enthusiastic in bed, instead of bringing up your 

          so-called trauma every time I tough you, maybe you could complain," Alan 

          said, bitter.  "I get it, okay?  Seeing what your father did to Fluffy was 

          horrible.  Well, that was twenty years ago.  Time to get over it."

          Jane shook her head, angry.  "That's what I get for trusting a Neo-Nazi!"

          "Of course!  Blame my politics!"  Alan pounded the table with his fist, 

          nostrils flaring.  "You and your Jew friends would just love patriots like 

          me—"

          "Shut up, Alan!  Shut up!"  Jane shrieked wildly, grabbing his collar and 

          shaking him.

          When the meeting was over, they filed out with their colleagues, 

          comparing notes on the Carb-Free Detroit! campaign that the Mayor had 

          detailed.

            (p 142-3)
     It should be noted that one can make many of the 'mistakes' outlined and still get published.  A lot of them can go into the same book.  David Heinzmann's A Word to the Wise (2009; commentary on it can be found on this blog) has a stereotypical gay character who seems to exist to show how okay the main character is with homosexuals.  Too much attention is paid to the minutiae of details of clothing.  The main character is supposedly well-rounded because he still thinks about a college football game where he didn't score the winning touchdown (never mind that he is a former FBI agent turned lawyer, and not bad looking to boot) and likes to cook...no, he's a natural cook who intuits what makes a good meal.  But Heinzmann has had a long and successful career as a journalist – still does – and that is going to open more doors than perfectly crafted characters.
     I recommend this book not just for the frustrated would-be author, but for anyone who likes to read.  Mittelmark and Newman have an easy, conversational style.  More than that, it is clear that they respect the effort it takes to move a story from imagination to the page.  If the story is nothing more than a retelling of already established clichés and stereotypes, why bother?  And if one is going to bother, at least the easiest of errors can be avoided.

Green Lantern (2011)

[So, I guess I am rather careless about spoiling some aspects of the film.  But I assume that anyone who really wanted to see it has already.]
     On one hand, Ryan Reynolds will always be Michael "Berg" Bergen from Two Guys and a Girl (originally Two Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place, 1998-2001)...and not just because he continues to bring that kind of faux-shy charm and gentle snarkiness to most of his roles - National Lampoon's Van Wilder (2002), Blade: Trinity (2004), Just Friends (2005), Waiting (2005), and X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009).  On the other, he is an actor who is willing to take chances with smaller films and less traditional roles - something that works in Chaos Theory (2008) and comes up short in Buried (2010) - and finds ways to take the appeal out of the managed charm in Adventureland (2009), where he gives the strongest and most honest performance in the film.  But in Green Lantern (2011), he seems to have been given the instruction of playing Hal Jordan as half Berg and half before he was crazy John Crichton from Farscape (1999-2003) as played by Ben Browder.  Given that I have an incredible man-crush on the Crichton character, this really works for me in Green Lantern.
     In fact, I could watch Reynolds be Jordan all day long.  As a regular human or in the suit.  And that would have been a good enough movie for me, because it would be giving me exactly what I want.  At the same time, I realize that this isn't the recipe for a blockbuster.  Still, if the producers wanted blockbuster, why go with a hero like Green Lantern? 
     Where Green Lantern disappoints – and it does – is in its heavy-handed, leaden handling of truly unnecessary exposition, leading up to a confrontation that is ultimately self-defeating.  The greatest threat known to the universe is defeated by a neophyte on his first real mission.  Seriously.  Too much is made of the alienness of the Green Lantern corps, and no attention is paid to Hal Jordan being able to breathe and speak in space because he now wears a fancy glowing ring.
     The other aspects of the film kind of work.  Reynolds is strong in the lead, giving Jordan charm and insecurities.  Blake Lively is surprisingly likable in a stock role of damsel in distress who has the emotional key to the hero's heart, though she is probably about five years too young for the details of her character's life; not a lot of 25 year old test pilots who also have MBAs and are set to take over a multi-billion dollar defense contractor business in anything resembling the real world.  Accomplished actors Tim Robbins, Jay O. Sanders, and Angela Bassett aren't given much to justify putting such recognizable faces in their roles, but they play them well.  Peter Sarsgaard goes beyond a soulless aping of Dale Midkiff (see my complaints about Orphan) and gives his character nuance and menace.  Truly, his character arc – because of how well it is played – felt like it was worthy of its own film.  Why not give a burgeoning super-villain his own movie?
     There is enough self-awareness of the ridiculousness of superhero convention to keep the movie from becoming dull.  Sure, the suit pops out of nowhere, because how else could the corps have the same outfit.  It isn't like the funding covers sending tailors all over known space maintaining the uniforms.  A simple mask completely obscures the hero's identity?  Well, not to those who really know him; Lively has the best line ever given in regards to this.  The power of the ring is dependent on the will and imagination of the wearer, but not much work goes into training Jordan how to extend his imagination or focus his will.  One would think that improv classes and some Tai Chi would be much more useful that dropping some heavy objects on his head, but it wouldn't be as funny to watch or visually stimulating.
     I would have to think that Green Lantern could have shaved off much of the backstory of the corps and the time on the alien planet of Oa without making the audience feel lost.  Let the story be about Hal Jordan and his coming to terms of what is being asked of him.  Having him have to save the planet within a month of getting drafted feels cheap and stupid, something that blockbusters shouldn't try to be...no matter how much money Michael Bay's Transformers movies make.  Revealing the Green Lantern universe – moving him further away from Earth and his loved ones – should be something that happens as the story evolves; it should have been saved for any planned sequels. 
     In the end, Green Lantern is enjoyable, but it is far from a masterpiece.  In trying so hard to launch a franchise, it hides what would give it life – the characters.  Still, it is a better payoff than reading through 50 years of comic books or enduring the animated Green Lantern products which require a fair amount of knowledge from the comic books.  But Reynolds is good in it and that is enough reason to see it.

The Pearl (1945)

     John Steinbeck's novella The Pearl (1945) was one of those books assigned in 6th or 7th grade (please excuse my memory; it is scarily specific on things that absolutely don't matter but failing on anything that pertains to my earlier education).  I may have read it completely back then.  I have an odd feeling that I read both The Pearl and Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea (1952) in the same year for the same class – and finished both – but I more clearly remember almost finishing The Grapes of Wrath (1939) in 7th grade and considering that an accomplishment at the time.  Anyway, I had some familiarity with The Pearl.
     There is nothing subtle or nuanced in Steinbeck's novella.  In that regard, it is proper fare to be assigned to 12-13 year olds – especially if the teacher giving the assignment is hellbent on the students finding and analyzing the symbols and tone of the piece.  However, for an adult – and one who doesn't have to give a detailed report proving that he gets what the author is saying – it is somewhat frustrating.   
     The Pearl presents Mexico, or at least its localized region, less critically than Graham Greene's The Power and the Glory did.  Sure, Steinbeck gets points for expressing the type of internalized colonialism that sets the elites against the natives, but that point seems lost in his greater picture of self-destructive greed.  Indeed, it is lost completely when the elites lose only hired hands and potential immediate profit – nothing real to them; there will always be more money to be made and people to be hired to do the dirty work that passes for business.  Steinbeck doesn't need a proto-Communist Revolution to place the well being of his characters in danger.  The danger is as real and as present as the human condition, but it is revealed along the way in such heavy handed prose that it doesn't read as those it was intended for a sophisticated audience.
     While making that criticism, I will fully own the fact that the least of Steinbeck's fiction is undoubtedly better crafted than the best of mine.  In this instance, however, too much of his is awkward.  The description of the action scenes seems to take the reader away from the story and its meaning.  The lack of familiarity between the pearl divers and the villagers, while plausible, doesn't paint the picture of two sets of beings inhabiting the same space.  Worst, the most important scene in the book is glossed over with no reasonable explanation for how it actually happened given that the description of where characters were before the event would render it impossible. 
     The Pearl presents an insanely simple story, but it takes a long time to tell it (for it being so simple).  Yes, greed is bad; it can corrupt a person if all he or she does is want for more.  But Steinbeck tries to play some false nobility into being so poor and ignorant as to not know that one is being exploited, that surviving and being happy with squalor is better than aspiring for something more if it means that there are moments of unhappiness and it restricts the gain of others. 
     Still, it is an easy and quick read.  I started it on my train ride into the city and finished it on the train ride home, with about 15 minutes to spare.  I would recommend The Power and the Glory over The Pearl, because it is a much better book and has more mature points to be made.  I prefer my tales not be structured so black and white, but I understand why Steinbeck wrote this that way.

Cedar Rapids (2011)

     I avoided seeing Cedar Rapids (2011) in the theater for fear that it would come off like a Will Ferrell film – that is to say, overly loud and decidedly unsubtle in its humor.  While it is largely the latter, the only offender in terms of tone is John C. Reilly, who plays his character (Dean Ziegler), too brashly to fit in with the other staid – and seemingly real – characters.  There is a problem with how disconnected the characters seem from the real world, which is to say the modern world, but that is played for charm rather than insult.  Indeed, had Cedar Rapids not taken an odd detour to the dark side of rural America, the entire film would have felt like an homage to the character of American goodness of character as contrasted with corporate (small as they are) evils.
     Ed Helms plays Tim Lippe, and he does a good job even when he is given questionable material.  Helms is really too old for the role – he looks every bit of his 37 years – but he manages a kind and believable aw shucks persona that allows the other actors room to work.  Reilly is much less giving, acting at the others; it feels like he was getting direction for a different film.  Anne Heche is fantastic and believable as a mother of two who uses the annual ASMI convention as an escape from the limitations of her life – marriage, children, responsibility.  Isiah Whitlock, Jr. is...well, I think he is great in almost everything he has done. 
     The plot involves a few too many crude elements.  This is not to say that I am not of fan of crude humor, but it feels like it was wedged in for the sake of satisfying people who know of Helms only from The Hangover (2009).  This could have been a gem of a subtle, adult comedy; the seeds are there and there was clearly an effort to make it happen.  However, there were too many distractions from the heartwarming material for cheap laughs, or attempts at cheap laughs.
     I liked the cast.  I likes most of the set up.  I just feel that somebody – at some point – felt pressure to go for the lowest common denominator in order to ensure a box office success.  Cedar Rapids should have been a comedy that avoided the pitfalls that have made the last decade's offerings largely unfunny.  It isn't cold and heartless – it is much better than that – but it just could not elevate itself to excellence.  If you haven't seen it, I would recommend giving it a chance.  Just realize that it could have been much better, or much cruder; it just should have chosen a direction and gone all in.

The Best Car (2012)

     This is some real-life inspired fiction.  While there is much about this that resembles my life, it is far enough from the real truth that it would be an unrecognizable accounting for anyone who was present to the era for me.  But the car was real.

The Best Car

     I avoided getting my driver's license at sixteen.  There were several factors that contributed to that delay – I didn't want to take driver's ed at school, and quickly quit the Len Scaduto course in which my father enrolled me; I knew I wouldn't have regular access to a car, at least not until my mother replaced her rapidly aging '86 Ford Tempo with something reliable; I had no means of income for gas or insurance, and I was thoroughly uninterested in working to acquire money; I had friends who could and would drive me places – but none of them were the real reason I didn't get my license.  I avoided it because having one would have meant I could be pressed into service at any moment, wholly subject to my father's whims and his imagined state of health.  I bore witness to my older brother being awakened in the middle of the night – anytime from midnight to four a.m. – for a not so emergency trip to the hospital because our father had a headache and wanted drugs to make it go away.  By the time I was old enough to understand his need for injectable medication to combat his maladies I was also aware that he was being administered doses that would kill a regular, healthy person.  Moreover, he needed such treatment at irregular times; whenever was worst for everyone else would perfectly fit his schedule.  My father lived a life that was, without question, wholly about himself.
     Living in fear of having a strange dictate – to drive my father to the hospital or his doctor's home, which meant that he would be getting a dose so large that it couldn't be recorded without alarming hospital staff – was something that I knew was abnormal.  Every part of it, really.  I have to assume that most children, even in the heady years of adolescence with a need to establish independence from their supervisory adults, would not be alarmed by the call to be of service.  Children are supposed to love their parents, sons to love their fathers, and so there should not have been a reason for my very real need to not be made to serve as courier to wherever the drugs were stored.  Still, there it was.  I knew that if I could avoid the license I couldn't be forced to take him, and I should then have been able to get my license without any need of driver's ed once I turned eighteen.  I drove occasionally without a license, in the parking lot of the apartment complex and once to a job interview – a job in which I lost all interest once it was clear they wanted me to work forty hours a week while I was still in school – so I wasn't wholly unfamiliar with the operation of a motor vehicle.
     My father only tried to get me to drive him to the hospital once after my brother moved on to college.  He woke me up at one a.m. and told me I needed to get dressed and take him for some relief.  I was told that he had waited hours before deciding it was so bad that he couldn't possibly sleep, apparently unaware of the fact that if we had left at 10 p.m. we could have been back to the apartment by 2 a.m., and that would have allowed for some sleep.  Waiting until one was essentially a type of sleep deprivation, so long as one allows that the thirty minutes of sleep I may have gotten to that point would effectively be worthless.  To this day I think of it as a kind of terrorism, and I had no desire to bend to the will of a terrorist.  I told him that he had plenty of options other than me.  He could call a cab – roundtrip fare would have cost less than twenty dollars.  He had a friend in the building next door that he could have called and she probably would have taken him.  If he felt so bad that he had no choice but to go to the hospital, he could call for an ambulance – we had learned that the insurance United provided would cover the cost of the ambulance if he spent at least a night in the hospital and be a little more than one hundred twenty five dollars out of pocket if he didn't – and spend the night there. 
     Whatever it took to allow me to try to get some sleep, something that never came easy back then, that is what I suggested.  He pleaded his case for about fifteen minutes upon which time he must have realized I was not going to drive him; he had no winning counterargument to "I am not driving without a license" and so he simply went back to bed.  When I saw him the following afternoon, he was fine.  More than that, he never got so sick that he needed to be taken to the hospital or his doctor from his headaches.  His condition was, as I suspected without any cause, was wholly dependent upon his ability to have others service it.  I did not want to be tethered to it, made to serve without any attention directed back at me, and thus I decided to similarly rely on others when it came to needing to be driven places.  To be fair, if I couldn't get a ride I would usually walk or ride my bike.  I appreciated the efforts others made for me, but I was sure as hell not going to be helpless without them.  And I wasn't going to make it all about me.  Not always.
     That was a lesson learned while without a license.  In an effort to retrieve a hastily mailed letter, I got a friend to drive me to its intended destination where I could steal it from the mailbox.  When it wasn't there, I told him we would have to try again the next day.  He smiled and said, "Not going to happen.  You had your chance to get it.  If it that important, find another way to get there before anyone gets the mail."  Well, there was no way I could walk or bike there in time unless I ditched school to do it.  I missed a lot of days of high school, but never so I could commit a crime.  The letter got delivered, and the consequences of it fell much more lightly than I would have thought.  Still would have liked to have had the chance to get it back before it was read, but that is a bell that cannot be unwrung.
     The only reason I ended up with a driver's license before I turned eighteen was that my father got demoted at work and couldn't afford to keep us living where we were.  In actuality, that pay cut served as his chance to hand me off to my mother while – unbeknownst to anyone – he started squirreling money away for a Harley.  He went to live out in Winfield and I was shipped up to Oak Park.  Rather than transfer to the local high school – mine was so familiar with my brand of bullshit that I got away with most of the things that would cause them to expel other students – it was decided that I should finish where I started.  The first week my mother drove me to and from school every day, three hours sucked right out of her day; she tired of that by Tuesday.  The second week I was allowed to sleep at a friend's house but not really fed, and that was about as bad as anything I had experienced to that point.  The next week school was on break, but it was also when the road work for my driver's ed started. 
     Knowing that I was to be moved twenty five miles north, there had been a real push to get a license in my hands.  I cruised through the classroom sessions, and the school decided to cut how much practical experience I needed because I would often be inaccessible.  I had four days of driving over two weeks time before the school said i was ready to get my license.  What did they care?  The check had cleared months ago.  I didn't feel especially confident, but I knew that I could not rely on a mix of commutes from my mother, accommodating friends, and simply not going to school to make it to graduation.
     My father cleared a day so he could be there when I took my test.  He had some work he had to do on the car, an '84 Subaru GL Wagon – the last of the non-boxy wagons – that had been handed down from my brother.  The red wagon had been replaced with a blue one, this time a stick, which made it somehow more masculine in my brother's eyes.  They were both little station wagons, so I can't imagine either dripped with masculinity.  And he traded the near burgundy red one for powder blue.  I didn't care, because what I needed was a car that would handle the sixty to seventy miles a day that I would put on it.  My father gave it a tune up, replaced the brakes, and properly inflated the tires before I arrived.  The car was at our old apartment where my father continued to rent garage space.  He wasn't going to abandon his collection of tools, but he also couldn't bring himself to package them up and not be accessible.  His tools were different from his son.
     He drove us over to the facility in his Jeep Wagoneer.  I'll never understand why he didn't want me to take the test in the car I would actually be driving, but in retrospect I imagine it was a sense of ownership that he needed to impress on me.  He would be fully in charge because it was his vehicle.  Anyway, there was almost no wait at the testing facility.  I got one question wrong on the written – I don't know which and it still bothers me that I don't know – and sat patiently waiting for a chance to go out on the road.  I was assigned a man who looked like he could have been my guidance counselor's ugly, angry older brother, which meant that he was thoroughly unpleasant all the way around.  He started off by barking "Horn singal!" at me, which apparently meant that he wanted me to sound the car horn to prove that it worked.  I lost points there, in parallel parking, and the three point turn, but was still set to pass.  Unfortunately, when I pulled into a space to park I was about a foot into the neighboring space.  So that was a fail.
     What to do?  I had a car sitting and waiting for me.  I needed a license so I could go to school and graduate and do something with my life.  Jesus, without the license I might have to actually finish at a different school and meet new people.  The horror of it all.  Normally – or so we were told – I would have to wait a week before any possible retest.  Fuck that.  My father and I pled my case, my need for a license.  Never mind if I might actually be a danger to others on the road, I had places to go and a means to get there; I just needed a license in case I got pulled over.  A younger, less angry man came out and agreed to let me retest right then.  I passed with no problems and got the damn laminated piece of paper.
     My father took me back to the garage.  He had to run a quick errand, but he would meet me up at the school and make sure I made it to my mother's in one piece.  That was fine with me.  I was young and stupid and eager to prove that I could handle unsupervised driving even though I had almost no experience and absolutely none with the car with which I was entrusted.  I pulled out of the parking lot and was pulled over about a minute later.  The officer said I had failed to signal and I pointed out, very politely, that I didn't signal because it was a bend in the road and there was no other way to proceed on it; who the hell wouldn't know where the car was going?  He grumbled a little and told me to "be more careful". 
     About a quarter of a mile later he pulled me over again.  "I ran your plates.  You aren't from around here.  Your car is registered up in Oak Park."  To him that meant I lived near black people and therefore crime.  I must be some kind of criminal.  I pointed out to him that I had lived in his sad little retail-reliant village for four years, my father maintained his garage there and it was where I had to pick up the car.  Furthermore, I went to the high school about five blocks west and one block north.  I showed him my school ID.  I had every right to be there, but officer asshole wanted to prove something.  He grumbled again and then said he was going to write me a ticket for the illegal turn.  I laughed at him and said something along the lines of suing him for wrongful prosecution – or something similar I could have borrowed from Ghostbusters – and waited for my ticket.  About a minute later he came back and gave me license and told me to get back to where I came from.  At least I didn't get that ticket.
     My father showed up about thirty minutes after I got to the school.  We headed north, me following him because despite making the trip innumerable times I had never paid attention to which streets I needed to use.  Somewhere after I exited on 1st Avenue I lost him.  Shit!  I crept along, terrified both by the prospect of being lost and the other, more confident drivers flying by on my left.  I made a wrong turn on Madison and thought for a moment that I had crossed the border with Chicago – instead of it just being Forest Park – because of all the signs for liquor stores and bars.  I got myself righted and made it to my mother's.  My father showed up about twenty minutes later.  He decided to stop and get something to eat.  Not a lot of concern about it, either.
     From that point on, the car was mine.  I owned that car – actually, my brother owned it until it spent a winter in an O'Hare employee parking lot letting its underbelly get salted away – and made myself powerful among my friends by being able to drive places.  More than that, I had to drive places.  I took the opportunity to give pretty underclass girls a ride home, girls who never would have spoken to me otherwise, and learned the dangers of treating parking lights as headlights.  I got to spend almost every Sunday with a girl I was in love with – never mind that she was dating my close friend with whom I would help work stuffing Sunday Tribunes on Saturday night – because I had a car and he had destroyed his.  The car allowed me to feel as though I were a real person and not subject to the threats and whims of others.
     It was, without question, the best car I will ever have.  It isn't just about its primacy.  I kept a bag of clothes in the back so that I could spend the night wherever I wanted – there wasn't any insistence that I needed to be home.  With the seats folded down it was like a miniature covered pick-up; it certainly could carry a heavier load than my best friend's truck.  While I was aware that it could also double as a fantastic 'fuck wagon', I had nowhere near the confidence to test it out in such an endeavor.  My relationship with that car was about me, and I don't think I would have wanted to invite anyone else into something so intimate and risk how I felt about the beast. 
     And it was a beast, a might monster hidden in a partially rusted out and neglected body.  That wagon drove over a tree and a mailbox in one motion.  It didn't even damage the car.  Never mind that that tree was about six inches in circumference at its thickest or that the ground was so saturated with rain that the wheels sunk three inches into the ground, tearing up the lawn like it was only an ephemeral covering for the soil.  It took some hasty work – and a pair of baseball bats wedged under the rear wheels – to free the wagon from that muddy mess.  As I drove my friends away from the scene of the crime – conspicuously close to where I had tried to steal a letter only a few months prior – me grinning and they in near panic, I excoriated them for not keeping their eyes on the road.  They knew my attention would be elsewhere, yet not one of them said anything until we had already laid waste to the tree en route to the mailbox; some twenty five feet of non-road and none of them felt the need to say a damn thing. 
     We were muddy, and scared, and exhilarated.  My car – utter perfection in a compact, unassuming form – had inflicted damage and remained unharmed.  It was beyond perfect for the feelings of an empowered adolescent; it was freedom to do anything, yet it never occurred to us that there was much more to do than use the car to drive.  Driving was both a necessity and an expression of freedom, and we were free.  When relating this story to the acquaintance who lived near the scene of the crime, she could not keep herself from bursting into a near hysterical laughter.  Apparently, all her neighbor had said when seeing the damage the next morning was an exasperated "teenagers".
     That wagon drove a thousand miles one weekend trying to keep a relationship together, and not one in which I was directly involved.  It made a trip to a Boy Scout camp just to rescue a friend to see the premiere of Jurassic Park on the big screen – but the friend blew me off – on my birthday.  It made two trips out to Iowa City while I was scrambling to get courses and a place to live, and three more while I was there for a year (not attending those courses).  It was my means of being something other than trapped.  My father was disengaged from my life for the most part and there would be no threat to be his driver as he saw fit.  My mother was content enough to let wander around with it so long as I kept her marginally informed and made appearances at home. 
     That '84 Subaru GL Wagon in near-burgundy will forever be the best car I will ever have because it was the only one that gave me a sense of freedom, a sense that I was something other than trapped and small.  No other car – and most that followed were absolute pieces of shit – can be that for me again.  Like the car, life has worn me down.  Instead of freedom, a car has become a responsibility, a necessity to travel to places not accessible by the CTA or Metra.  The subsequent cars became the beasts that bore me to and from work, which immediately lessens the value one can assign to it.  It was the freedom to continue to go to the school where I had a small band of intensely close friends.  It became the means to access pretty girls in high school, and if I had any confidence back then it could have been so much more.  It became to embodiment of what I wanted to be able to see in myself.  Small but tough, reliable, versatile, and efficient; with over one hundred fifteen thousand miles on it, the wagon still got about twenty seven miles to the gallon.  Neglected for a winter, it was destroyed.
     I would like to say that the lesson is that one cannot neglect oneself in a similar manner.  That is how time gets away from people, they get busy living the workaday and miss the moments that we think should define us.  It isn't, though.  I simply miss being able to sit behind the wheel of a vehicle and know – or be astonished by – it survive a run-in with a sapling and a mailbox and be no worse for wear.  I want it to be the metaphor for how the seemingly small shit that comes down on me like rain is nothing that I can't overcome, with nary a scratch (or smelling fine if I want to be consistent in mixing my metaphors).  I know better, though.  The little things are the ones that will kill you.  They will eat you away, piece by piece when you aren't paying attention.  They will die like that wagon, a victim of the services that made the lot accessible to those moving their cars in and out on a daily basis. 
     That wagon is the best car ever because at the time I was driving it, I was still full of potential and promise.  Never mind that it was well past its prime, it was new to me.  It was the vehicle that could help carry me forward, but it died an inglorious death.  And whenever I notice that its promise is gone, I feel somehow despondent over how I have accorded myself.  I have recaptured none of what I felt with that car.  That freedom is somehow gone forever.  The road is dark.  The trees are tall and healthy.  The mailboxes are wrapped over in brick and mortar.  There will be no second coming of that old hope, but the smallest remnant of its flame resides within me because I had experienced it and done so well.
     Even if, in the full accounting, it was just a car passed down to me because my brother had moved on to something better.