Viva La Tropicana – Leonard Michaels

 (January 2, 1933 - May 10, 2003)

What a fun story.

Michaels wrote in the Contributor’s Notes, that this story wrote itself.

You can feel it even before you read that. 

This story is written with such authenticity but contains such fantastical imagery in almost a double negative of reality that you have to believe that most of it is…not fiction.

Make sense?

This is the type of story that pulled me back into this anthology – at least for awhile – and I could be so fortunate that the rest of the stories in this volume measure up to its brilliance. 

I see that Moore, Munro, Oats, Prose and my favorite, Updike remain – so perhaps there is hope. 

I hang my hopes that my ability to write again can be ignited by these five authors.

You see, I have found myself saying to myself many times over the past year that “I struggle with original thoughts.”

I believe that I have them but I have a very difficult time voicing them. 

“How could this be?” you may ask as you read my original thoughts.

The struggle is real.

Take this project for example. It’s 2019. 

When I started this project and laid out a rough schedule of how many stories I needed to read each week from the 1978 edition to the latest edition of the anthology, it seemed very “doable”. 

I figured that out roughly 4,000 days ago – yup, almost 11 years ago. 

So now it’s 2019 and I’ve only covered 1978-1991.

A rough calculation of stories from 1991 – 2019 lands me at around 570 stories. 

Ooouufff.

That number hurts. 

Is it out of reach? 

No.

So why did I circle back around to writing about this project and the mountain I must climb to catch-up (Do I even need to catch –up)?

Perhaps this story reassured me that anything is possible. That even the most fantastic, off the wall, schemes can work – if you have the drive and will.

I suppose time is a factor too – which plays in this story - and I do have time. 

Time is one of the most valuable commodities in my life right now. I have found that I was wasting portions of it on meaningless tasks/pursuits. 

Evaluating this project, I see the value in investing my time in reading these stories. 

So, with that, I thank you Leonard Michaels and Viva La Best American Short Stories!