| 9/17/2005 05:29:00 PM |
[ Sunday at the LoveStruck Maniac ]
Reading can be a form of rebellion, even in places where there are no banned books. It's something not everyone can do, but if you're so inclined I can tell you how to pull it off. Maybe you already know how. The secret is to think like the author. The characters aren't too big a deal; it's the face behind the characters that matters-- the unsaid speeches and roads not taken of someone real. The view through the eyes of someone who, we come to realize, is not a total stranger to us.
Once you start thinking like the author it's almost impossible to put a book down-- assuming it's not too bad. That's the rebellion: when you realize, consciously or subconsciously, that the author is a side of you in the same what that the characters are sides of the author, when you realize, consciously or subconsciously, that you are not always yourself when it comes to everyday life and, because of that, rebel against everyday life. That's how Meeks explained himself to me the first time we met.
It was my first time at the Maniac, and even though I was expecting a lot of strange things, I wasn't expecting to see someone reading. He was sitting by the window wearing cowboy boots and tattered jeans. His shirt was straining to contain his substantial gut, and what little hair he had was tussled, as though he'd been pulling on it in frustration. He had one foot up on the windowsill and was frowning like a parent who's child has just told them "grow up." I made an excuse of going to the bathroom to get a better look at this novel novel reader. And as I was walking back, without any provocation, as far as I could tell, he jumped up, slammed the book shut with his beefy hands, and tossed it to me. Well, he tossed it at me; he didn't seem too concerned with who he was throwing it to, as long as he didn't have to hold onto it anymore. He tossed it like he was tossing something into the garbage, something he was sure he would never need again because he'd committed it to memory or maybe because he didn't want to remember it at all.
Meeks maneuvered his bulk up to the bar, sat down, and put his head in this hands. Oscar, the withered old bartender, put a beer in front of him without a word, and went back to drying wine glasses. Two men in dark suits and a woman walked in wearing sunglasses. Oscar focused on his wine glasses, and Meeks took a big sip of beer. I looked at the dog-eared paperback, not quite sure why I was holding it. I was half-expecting it to be Sartre or, maybe, Camus, but there was just this line drawing of a tropical tree and lanky boy with a very determined look on his face-- The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. I could feel my face twisting into that same parent-who's-child-has-just-told-them-to-growup frown that Meeks was wearing. If it had been Sartre I could have dismissed the whole thing, even if a rotund cowboy didn't quite fit my profile of a jaded intellectual. It had to be Kipling, though, the witty Brit who put the gusto in "just so." I flipped through the first few pages to see if maybe the cover was just wrong. Three hundred dollar bills and an envelope fluttered out, melting my growup frown into just a plain-old look of confusion.
And that's the beginning of my story. Comments and injuries welcome. |
| 2 comments |
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| # posted by Jennifer Wang :
9/19/2005 8:08 PM |
i like all the subtle little magical things, like "just wrong" and "grow up" and... everything! except this sentence: "Two men in dark suits and a woman walked in wearing sunglasses." since you've got dark suits for the guys, you might want to dress the woman *ahem*. and are they all three wearing sunglasses?
it has a really cool rhythm, and moves along just right, and
anyway, it's great. gimme more! |
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| # posted by Francesca :
9/28/2005 10:07 PM |
I absolutely love all of this!!!
I also very much like the rhythm. I really really really love the logics and the general gluing together of the opening. Simply marvelous.
"I was expecting a lot of strange things, I wasn't expecting to see someone reading.'
That's honestly the only thing that I thought wasn't necessarily marvelous. It seems to interrupt the flow of the words, somehow. Otherwise, w00t! |
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Moosi
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