Denis Johnson – Car Crash While Hitchhiking

I've written before – several posts back – not quite sure at all how many, of a nice tight, what I feel to be an almost perfect – no – perfect story.  Perhaps it was Carver or Updike…yes, I suppose it was one of those two – and so, I think I've found another one to line up with the others.

This little story still has the taste of the late 80s (whatever that means to you) but I can feel it moving towards the 90s where my personal appreciation of literature begins to develop and mature.
I’ll note that it is through multiple readings of certain novels or stories that I understand and gain a deeper appreciation for the work.  This is the case here.
  
The multiple readings began not intentionally, as a way to understand the story – but because I've sat so long on this exercise and I was forced to refresh my memory as to what I had last read.

And as things seem to line up in my life, and the life of this project, I seem to be reinvigorated – ready to push forward again.  With this exercise beginning in the last days of May 2008, 6.6 years ago – or 2410 days and 321 posts I was a little burned out – I couldn't seem to find the words to string together anymore.
  

I had/have a lot on my plate now considering the free and easy days of 2008.  Two children later and I've passed through several incarnations of who I am today. I have issues with time management – as I written about so many times and the exercise suffered for it.
  
Perhaps, I can continue for another 2410 days and finish this little thing off.  I can only hope that the BASS continues to publish.

So – Car Crash While Hitchhiking.  There are so many passages that stand out and pulled me through the story.  Johnson in describing this story in the Contributor’s Notes section labels this as a sad story and I can agree with it and perhaps this is why I am drawn to it.

A beautiful nurse was touching my skin. “These are vitamins,” she said and drove the needle in.

It was raining. Gigantic ferns leaned over us. The forest drifted down a hill. I could hear a creek rushing down among rocks.

And you, you ridiculous people, you expect me to help you.

As touched on above, it reminds me of Carver and this is ultimately why I think I’m drawn to it.  Denis Johnson appears again in the BASS 1992 for a story that was published in the New Yorker.  I look forward to encountering him again.

Author Anthony Marra touches on Johnson’s story and the line I extracted above and offers a wonderful piece for The Atlantic. If you have the time I really encourage you to read it and then…read Johnson’s story.

   

You can read it here - The Atlantic 

   

Mr. Morning – Siri Hustvedt

I read this story a few months ago and am just now getting around to writing about it.

I have a new life now filled with responsibilities and distractions – enough to keep me from reading and doing any serious thinking about what I've read. Mindless fiction finds its way into the brief moments I have to read and I’m afraid that I've also developed a shorter attention span which kills any sort of extended periods of reading and writing. 

This was a beautifully written story and I was pulled through the pages.

I've been fortunate enough in my life, up to this point, to be spared being exposed to situations such as Iris, the main character.

Perhaps this is one of those stories that offers a lesson to the reader.

Of course, every day presents the possibility…of a situation.

Will I remember my lessons?

How to Talk to a Hunter – Pam Houston

Lately it seems that there has been quite a bit written about the role of literature as a teacher.  Perhaps I am just sensitive to it because I firmly agree with this and I intend to make it one of the many teachers of my children.

One of the appealing characteristics of this anthology is that reading these stories gives me the chance to jump into a different reality for about 15 minutes or so.  Then, as I sit and think about what I've just read, I slowly process what the stories could teach me – what lessons do they impart.

Perhaps it’s through the lessons of literature, stories of this type that have given me the tools deal with women throughout my life. 

 I enjoy reading stories by women authors with a woman as the lead character and I enjoyed this little story by Houston.

I thought about the relationships I've had over the years with women and certain feelings they may have felt as a result of my actions – or inaction.

 

The love, the questioning, the jealousy, the trust and distrust – the hate, the pressure the capture and the freedom.  I remember how I felt in those relationships, and to dial time back and think about how she, the girl in my life felt…and - well, it’s a little tough sometimes. 

This story had a nice minimalist feel to it (my opinion) –clean and sleek – impressively so and later discovering that Houston wrote the story in a burst – 10 hours at the computer – and she states that after those first ten hours – she never changed a word of the story.  She too recognizes the how special it is to drive all the words out into the world in one push and end up with something so perfect. 

The Secret of Cartwheels – Patricia Henley

I've put myself into W’s brain on several occasions and taken a look at my behavior through his eyes.  It’s a fascinating experience.  It’s an exercise where I have to primitivize my thoughts wrestling with the knowledge that I already have as an adult.

Children know much more than we gave them credit for years ago.  And reading this story by Henley, her ability to give a voice to a young girl, opens the door (at least it did in 89-90) to the hurt that a child feels as a result of the failings of adults.

Looking into Henley, I found a short story published by her (Rocky Gap) in Glimmer Train back in 2008.

You can see the full index of Glimmer Train publications here.

I also found a nice little interview with her on the Glimmer Train site where she references a piece by Ted Solotaroff – “Raymond Carver: Going Through the Pain”. 

Well…because she dropped this---then of course I must find it and read it.

Ah…the beauties of working in an academic library – gotta love JSTOR.

And so, with this story by Henley, I find that in this segment of my life I have a special sympathy for the viewpoint of a child.

I take add this to the life that my parents gave me and I wonder if I’m going to drive myself mad sometimes completely over thinking parenting.

And then there are what seems to be the constant reports of child abuse, neglect and murder.

Reading the accounts, I can’t help but see what damaged, imperfect creatures we are.  We have the potential for such beauty and love but at the same time, we destroy and hate.

The fracture in a person’s mind that takes them down this path often times are not self-inflicted – but due to the actions of another – and where did that originate?

Henley wraps the story up beautifully with this –

“I felt exhausted, not the clean exhaustion of after-dark softball but a kind of weariness; I was worn out with the knowledge that life would be different, but not in the way I had imagined or hoped.  I didn’t want to forgive her for being the way she was, but you have to forgive your mother.  She searched my eyes and tried to make some long ago connection, sweet scrutiny, perhaps the way she’d look at me when I was a new baby, her first baby.  I looked away.  Jan Mary gnawed delicately at her cuticles.  Christopher came around the corner of the house swinging his Mickey Mantle bat, his leather mitt looped on his belt.  The new spring leaves were so bring they hurt my eyes. “