Hitching a Tow

Yesterday the van lost power while we were out in the middle of nowhere. I take that back. We were out on a dead stretch of San Joaquin Valley farmland on Avenue 7, which more or less marks the boundary between Fresno and Madera Counties from Highway 99 to Root 33. My father kept the van going by sheer force of will over a small rise, but even his oaths and flatulence couldn’t push it past the Avenue 7-1/2 Exchange, a y-intersection six miles outside of Firebaugh, California. Now that’s an ag town as tiny and forgotten as the one I grew up in.

When our vehicle was well and truly dead, we called the roadside assistance number on my sister’s auto insurance card, also with my name on it, and since the purpose of the drive was three-hours worth of work, I interpreted psych appointments from my cell phone between shorter exchanges with the road-side dispatchers who live in cities and don’t know how to transmit information like, “Standing out in a field next to a sign that says ‘Avenue 7-1/2 Exchange. Firebaugh 6 miles.’ … yes, we were heading westbound on Avenue 7 from Highway 99. … No, we’re nowhere near 99. We headed west. … Yes, it’s a field. … No, no fence: farmland. … right, no houses anywhere. … Yes, really, no houses. … Yeah, pretty empty out here.”

Of course, the tow truck arrived when I was working again, so I had to interrupt my rendition of “Any self-harming or assaultive behavior?” to deliver, “Ma, he’s asking if we want to ride with him or in the van.” Fortunately, my mother had the good sense to move herself, my father, and the tow truck driver up the road far enough for me to finish my phone call and observe HIPPA all at the same time.

The truck was huge. It had three foothold-like steps, each at least a foot apart, and two grab bars that were absolutely necessary for climbing up. The cabin ceiling was high, and the spaces between the seats were wide, except the one between the back of the driver’s seat and my knees (really my crotch since I had to sit with my knees splayed to be comfortable). Everything rumbled and rattled, and when the driver honked at lousy drivers or police officer friends, the bellow filled the cab and resonated in my chest. I was a little kid again, everything so big, loud, and exciting. Even the dull bong as the driver tapped his onboard computer’s touch screen with knuckles, elbows, and cell phone antenna gave me the same Wow! Neat! Sensation that children have, that I haven’t had since I was seven or eight and my parents would take us out to the local cherry orchard to pick one or two buckets of fruit.

I got so caught up in the shift in perspective that having to climb down those big grownup steps to hand over the insurance card and sign the slip felt like coming out of another person’s skin. I realized that one of the things that differentiates the adult point of view from the child’s is that ability children have of losing themselves in the sensory, without analysis, without agenda, without even the goal of escape. It’s a very different feeling from the desire to transcend or to saturate oneself. It’s so much more spontaneous than all of that.

Past and Present

Because one of the therapists I work with told me there’s a place in town that shreds crap for three dollars per cubic foot, I spent most of Tuesday cleaning out my office. I got rid of some of the boxes and clothes baskets on the floor and all of the kindling under my computer keyboard.

On Wednesday, I woke up with incredible lower back pain, which was mild when I was merely standing, sitting or walking, but excruciating the second I tried reaching, bending, or doing any of the things one does when shifting from one position to another—really an unfortunate set of limitations where the bowels and bladder are concerned. Dressing was a long slow process, and managing shoes and socks involved third party assistance.

I spent the day sitting in a plywood frame, knitting a sock, and finishing The Woman in White. I don’t usually take this long to finish a book, but this month has been a month of mood swings and distractions, so progress has been slow.

It was interesting to read a Victorian version of the sort of light reading I do now. Characters really haven’t changed much: the brave hero, the smart sidekick, the intriguing villain, the damsel in distress. Nowadays the smart sidekick would be the heroine and the damsel would be someone’s sister or dear but useless friend. I like the multivoice narrative and plan to use it sooner or later, and I was gratified to discover that such familiar motifs as evading the tail and the fruitless recourse to the authorities have been with us for over a hundred fifty years.

What was more surprising still was how much more modern the novel felt than the literary works of the era. This one talked about everyday things–like indoor plumbing, matches, the business of going out to work, the practical points of day-to-day etiquette—in ways that were far less ethereal than anything George Eliot or even the more commonplace Charles Dickens put together, and the characters themselves had a sense about them of being modern people that made them indistinguishable from their twenty-first century counterparts.

By Thursday I was well enough to help with the Thanksgiving Day preparations (i.e., slicing, chopping, kneading, tossing, and yes, dishwashing).

Today I’m almost sound of back. I’m reading something called The Labyrinth While working on the same sock. I’m hoping that tomorrow I’ll have finished the sock and feel well enough to write.

When I Consider How My Light Is Spent (continued)

My Miltonian sonnet has a title now, and excerpt from the original. At the moment, I think it’s hot stuff, but right now I have no judgment.

I’m bathing in the post partal effluvia of my own brilliance. Not arrogance: the cherished delusion that evaporates all too quickly. Why is it that whatever we write is perfect for about a month and only that all too fleeting month? After that, public bathroom graffiti is a goal to strive for. Alas, alack.

I read the sonnet again two days ago. I did a little tinkering, substituting words that don’t conjure images with those that do (harried whore to bony whore) and snipping a few function words (mostly articles) to help the images roll into one another. I spent a while on the last line, which sounded about as meaningful as the cryptic writing on the stall.

When I reread the poem just now, I’d forgotten about the last line. The changes seem to work though the image is different from what I had been going for. For my original idea to make sense, the reader would have to know what a talent is (a unit of measure in money) in order to get a really bad pun that isn’t particularly clever even at the most superficial level. The line as it actually reads, however, draws on the image of the houses like tombs and does something more complex.

Were I not floating in my own effluvia, I could never admit that poems really do write themselves. It’s a matter of getting the tool at the word processor to let them.

Catching a Spark

Avoidance seems to work for me. Last night, I thought the weekend would be about Ursula and her knitting, but today that seemed too hard to think through, so I pulled up a poem that was almost done last time we met.

Again, who picked out the brilliance to leave all the crap?

I wrote it the semester I took a class on form. The only real rule on this one is seven syllables to the line. As with the sonnet, I noticed a lot of flab (irrelevant detail, needless repetition, pacing issues). I was going for a feeling of frantic chaos that encircles a core of overwhelming isolation.

Emotionally, the poem is successful, but on a literal level the action is hard to follow. The language is vague; the images develop the mood, not the actual situation; and the lack of substance weakens the impact of the close.

The second I stopped reading, I started to revise. First it was fairly superficial stuff, cutting flabby words to fuse lines, but quickly I discovered I was adding detail, filling out the story of the poem, giving it the life of setting and of character motivation. The biggest thing is that I rediscovered it’s about the significance of losing a poem that wrote itself. I remember starting with that idea, but somewhere along the way, I lost it.

The changes go into the major overhaul category: whole stanzas will disappear to be replaced by others, and new characters and a new sense of what is missing will be added.

What does work well in the version of the poem as it stands is the use of nonflab related repetition. A few of the images and lines come up two or three times, evoking some of the circular unease of a villanelle. I’ll try to keep that aspect of the poem. I’m excited.

WDG Near Completion

Just a little celebration. I think I finished my Shakespearean sonnet last night. I had a breakthrough about some rough patches. A few words fell into place (at this stage, it comes down to words), and some of the flab dropped out of the final couplet.

Funny how a week ago I was still thinking that nothing could be cut without the poem losing its concreteness. Then last night I suddenly noticed words that added only syllables and places where the poem stalled in repetition or digression. Without conscious effort, I was able to substitute metric props for content and did more of the work I needed to do for the poem to reach its destination. This is one of those moments of possession that is almost as magical as the rare poem that writes itself.

When I read it again just now, the pacing of the poem surprised me a little, and the shift from the beginning section to the end worked well.

I’m still not sure about the last two words: they say what needs to be said, but they don’t mark the end of the journey the way a rolling pipe organ or a single stroke of the triangle does. As I write, I realize that the problem may be that I start with the unusual and move to the ordinary—serious flaw. Party canceled.

I vaguely remember that some of Willy S.’s sonnets don’t end up at Rhodes. I’ll have to read a few to examine how he gets from Point A to Point B and make it work.