Giant Lecture #6: Acoustics

Lecture #1 is about openings. Lecture #2 is about ways to keep the fiction moving forward. Lecture #3 is about some ways to get yourself to sit in the chair and write. Lecture #4 is about story and plot. Lecture #5 is about language and sentences. Lecture #6 is about acoustics.

Inanimate Object Week: #100 Jonathon Bender (Fictional Character)

1966 Conceived, probably on his father’s birthday, in San Clemente, California.

1967 Born during The Great Midwest Blizzard in Lansing, Michigan.

1968 Cannot do much for himself.

1969 The birth of his brother, Robert.
Jonathon asks for him to be returned to the hospital.

1970 Fears taking baths.

1971 Fails to blow out the candles on his birthday cake.

1972 Breaks a window with his face.
Thinks he has gone blind.

1973 Falls in love with his babysitter.
Beaten by his father for leaving a door open.

1974 Cannot stop hiccupping.
Runs away from home; returns the same day.

1975 His father teaches him how to fight.
Thinks he is crowned the Burger King.

1976 Wears red, white, and blue clothes every day for a whole summer.

1977 Tries to stop his father from choking his mother.

1978 Runs away from home again and hides from his father in the neighbor’s garage.
His blackouts begin.

1979 Thinks cancer is contagious.

1980 Begins high school.
Worries he caused his grandfather’s death.

1981 Finds his father’s pornography and begins to learn about women.
Feels he is beginning to rot after getting a cavity filled.

1982 His first visit to a psychiatrist.

1983 His first sexual experience with a girl who is not in a magazine.

1984 Loses virginity; does not want it back.

1985 Breaks up with first real girlfriend.
Graduates from high school.
Leaves home to begin college.

1986 Tries to hug his father, but his arms are not long enough.
His mother worries about him being away at college.

1987 His parents separate.
Considers suicide after reading depressing novels.

1988 Stops going to class or studying.
His parents divorce.
An airplane explodes over Scotland.

1989 Graduates from college.
Cuts off contact with his father.

1990 Disappears for a year.

1991 Chases a tornado.
Lies on resume to get weatherman job.
Gets camera time in a small market.

1992 Meets Sara Olson, who recognizes him from television.

1993 Starts living with Sara.
Gets distracted by airplanes.

1994 Attempts to make it rain; fails.
Marries Sara.

1995 Attempts to conceive a child with Sara; fails.
Buys a house with a cracked foundation.

1996 Committed to a mental hospital by Sara.
Months pass; gets himself out.

1997 Sara separates from him.

1998 Begins looking for his childhood.
Loses job.
Refuses to sign divorce papers.

1999 Tries to remember his whole life.
Commits suicide in his car in the garage
at his home in Jefferson City, Missouri.

[Note: This piece was originally published in No Colony #1 and then in Dear Everybody.]

60 WRITERS/60 PLACES at Eyedrum in Atlanta

There is an enthusiastic review of 60 WRITERS/60 PLACES by Wyatt Williams at Creative Loafing, which calls the documentary "a clever and surprising experience" and ends like this: "You start wondering which writer and place will come next, only to be confounded by each marvelous and gem-like revelation."

60 WRITERS/60 PLACE will be screened on Friday, May 14. at 8 pm, at Eyedrum in Atlanta, after a reading by Zachary Schomburg and Ann Stephenson. Event starts at 8PM.

If you can't make the screening, DVDs of 60 WRITERS/60 PLACES can be gotten at Little Burn Films.

Inanimate Object Week: #219 Cubicle Wall (as written by Adam Robinson

At about three o'clock Central time, the cubicle wall was born at average height. The cubicle wall was happy about this, but before long he was laid flat and wrapped in cardboard. He was stacked somewhere. (He didn't know where because he couldn't see on account of the box he was in and also because he didn't have eyes or a brain.) He stayed there for several long days. He started to cry through his fabric. Then, earless, he heard a truck and felt himself lifted onto it. There was a rumbling. In the truck he traveled until the truck stopped, whereupon the cubicle wall was unloaded. He was elated when the box was peeled away and he was fastened to some other beige cubicle walls in the form of a box. Together with a computer and some pens they became a community. A phone came along and joined the group. The computer was friendly, but the pens were often short. The phone had a whiney ring. One day, and then repeatedly every weekday for three years, a good looking young man came and sat in front of the beige cubicle wall. He touched the computer, the phone and the pens. He rarely touched the cubicle wall except, occasionally, to stick some sheet of paper to it with a pin. The puncture didn't hurt nearly as bad as the feeling of being ignored. The young man seemed not to care about the cubicle wall. It was even as if the cubicle wall represented something hateful to the young man, or if not hateful, at least unbearably mundane. But the cubicle wall was resolute. He would be there for the young man tomorrow, too, and the next day, and the day after that. Oh yes, the cubicle wall would remain a presence in that young man’s life for many long years.

[Note: Adam Robinson's postcard life story is here.]

Alice Blue

I have tiny piece called Plots in the new Alice Blue. There is also fine work by Amelia Gray, Brian Evenson, A. D. Jameson, Susan Moorhead, Erik Leavitt, Julio Peralta-Paulino, Erika Kristine Bogner, Sam Schild, Timothy David Orme, Benjamin Buchholz, and Aron Block.

Inanimate Object Week: #98 Chair

Chair didn’t remember being a tree or being a part of something larger and growing. Chair didn’t remember the sounds of the chainsaws or the limbs cracking and breaking as the tree fell to the ground. The first thing that Chair remembered was being in pieces—the frame and the legs, the back and the slats, the contoured seat—and how strange it felt when the glue was squeezed into its holes. But then Chair felt so big, so sturdy, so grounded when he was standing up on all four legs. Chair thought: I could walk anywhere with four legs. But then Chair realized that his legs didn’t move independently of each other and that he couldn’t move at all without some help from Hand. Hands pulled Chair out and pushed Chair in, which made Chair feel as if he had no control over what happened. Also, Chair wished that he had arms. Sure, sometimes Chair stacked with other chairs, but that wasn’t the same as holding a person or holding another chair. At least, Chair didn’t think so. Chair couldn’t really know. Chair did know that there were others like him covered with fabric or cushions, something soft, but Chair soon realized that his life was going to be hard. Over the years, Chair lost count of how many people pushed him around and sat on him. Usually, it was the same couple of people, but sometimes it could be anybody. And all the people were so much bigger than chair, so heavy and so mushy. But Chair was strong. In fact, Chair was amazed that he could hold up over 400 pounds and not even get tired. And Chair always felt so light, such relief, when people got off him. Over the years, Chair started to creak. It was his back at first and then he got a little wobble in one of his legs. Chair started to come out of his own holes and nobody helped him. Nobody pushed chair back together or tightened him up. That’s when Chair got loose and Chair started making noises that made the people laugh. But Chair didn’t care anymore. Chair thought: Wood and glue. Chair thought: Next time, I’m letting go. And when Chair did, he broke one of his legs and then his back. Chair thought: That didn’t even hurt. Chair thought: I should have done that sooner.

Reading @ The Laughing Yeti

Shome Dasgupta has started a nice series over at The Laughing Yeti where writers write brief statements about reading. My few sentences are here. Andy Devine's are here. There is also Steve Almond, Roxane Gay, Stephen Elliott, Sarah Eaton, and a bunch of others.

#86 Jen Michalski: All the Things She Is

Jen Michalski’s twin brother, Scott, came out first, but his nose and ear were all bent up. His nose still looks a little smashed. Of course, this early struggle just made Jen even more ambitious. When Jen and Scott were toddlers, their mom used to dress them up in matching outfits even though they were fraternal twins, one a boy and one a girl. Their mother would take them shopping to department stores and they would sit on the mannequin stands and sing songs from Sesame Street (today, Jen has a mannequin in her house). Their mother always knew where they were. When Jen was 4, she learned to say Fuck You from her father. But all the fighting in the family made her reserved in some ways. Jen’s filter became quite thick and sometimes she'd rather say nothing than risk what the response might be. Around this same time, Jen decided that she wanted to be an elephant when she grew up. She thought it was a viable career choice. She thought that elephants looked peaceful and that they must be brave (there aren't many hiding places for an elephant). Over the years, Jen wanted to be an elephant, then a writer, then a policewoman, then a writer, then a doctor, then a writer. She wrote her first short story when she was 5 and she read everything she could find--to try to find out how other people lived. She assumed that everybody else was happier than she was. By the time she started college, Jen had written six novels. In college, she wrote poetry. After college, she wrote short stories and two more novels, but she never tried to publish them. Also after college, she was in a relationship for eleven years, which was difficult to end. Jen doesn't like change. She doesn't even like going on vacation because then she has to get used to a new routine. She has lived in the same city for most of her life (B’more!). Now, Jen’s much much happier with her life and especially with her new partner, the wonderful Phuong. And Jen still reads all the time and runs an online e-zine, jmww, where she publishes other people's stories. She’s fascinated by what people write and why. And last year, Jen published her first collection of stories, Close Encounters (So New Media). Now she’s writing another novel and this one she’s going to publish.


[Update: Jen edited an anthology of Baltimore writers (from Douglass to Stein to Lipmann and Bell) that just published, City Sages: Baltimore. Even better, Dzanc just signed her up for a novella and stories, tentatively titled "I Can Make It to California Before It's Time for Dinner." You can find more Jen Michalski here and JMWW here.]

Screenings in ATL and LA

Atlanta: On Friday, May 14, at 8pm, at eyedrum, there will be a screening of 60 Writers/60 Places. There will also be readings by Zachary Schomburg and Ann Stephenson. Many thanks to the great Blake Butler for setting this up.

Los Angeles: On Thursday, May 20, at 10pm at Sunset 5 Theater, there will be a free double feature, both I Will Smash You and 60 Writers/60 Places. Many thanks to the great Ken Baumann for making this happen.

There is more information about both documentaries, plus stills and trailers, at Little Burn Films.

This Furniture

The great Luca Dipierro made a wonderful one-minute animation based on a single sentence from Dear Everybody.

Live Giants

I'm doing Live Giants tonight at 9PM at HTMLGIANT -- with special guest Andy Devine.

Each Moment of It Is Magical

The good Brian Allen Carr wrote a a great review of Dear Everybody that's up at Dark Sky Magazine. He says a ton of nice things. Here are three of them:
(1) "Each moment of it is magical."
(2) "Using smooth rhythms, polished tones and humorous observations, Kimball gives us a monster of a family that somehow the reader needs to know."
(3) "The explicit humanity rendered throughout, make Dear Everybody a truly great read. That Kimball is able to polish each element–each entry–in the collection to a high sheen evidences a talent not often seen."

#260 Shawn Theron: SOGH

Shawn Theron was born in 1972 in Baltimore, MD. He grew up in one of those modular homes that are trucked to the lot in halves. There was a huge backyard and Shawn played in the woods with his sister and his best friends, Jenny and Erin. They had their own Twisted Pine Nature Trail that they built together. When Shawn did go inside, he had to deal with his mother, a severe alcoholic, which was not fantastic. Long nights dealing with his mother meant that Shawn didn’t quite have the bandwidth for school. He always felt exhausted and teachers’ advice just seemed like criticism. Once, Shawn brought home a report card with grades that spelled D-E-A-D (the A was in art). When Shawn was 16, his mother and father divorced. After that, Shawn moved in with his paternal grandmother, Red (he named her this when he was 10 because she lived in a red house, drove a red car, and wore her red hair in a beehive). With Red, life became more normal and Shawn could finally breathe. Shawn loved their impromptu road trips (like going crabbing in Annapolis, which, with all the Navy guys around, was amazing for a super young gay guy) and how much fun it was to get lost together. He loved their late night conversations at the dining table while the quiet of the world wrapped itself around them. Red became Shawn’s mother and his best friend and his own personal movie star. Shawn finished high school, but only managed a semester at the local community college. Shawn suspects he has learning issues, but the schools didn’t really test for that then. After that, Shawn started working in Baltimore restaurants—everything from bartending to waiting tables to managing, eventually winding up at Joy America Cafe, which used to be in the penthouse of the Visionary Art Museum. This brought Shawn close to art, but he hadn't started painting yet. In 2003, Red died, cancer. Before she passed, Red told Shawn to do big and great things with his life. She also gave him the word SOGH. Shawn didn’t know what the word meant, but, in the beginning, SOGH was Shawn’s computer and his camera, which recorded the most profound moments of his life. About 3 years later, Shawn moved back into Red’s house, which had these huge shelving units that he dismantled and started painting. Those shelving planks were the first SOGH paintings. Not long after that, Shawn went public with SOGH. Shawn’s friend Rebecca (the visionary behind the Visionary) was a huge source of encouragement and his friend Ted offered him wall space at the museum store at the Visionary Art Museum. 30 minutes after the paintings were hung on the wall, 2 paintings sold (61 the first month, 1357 the first year). Shawn feels spectacularly blessed. Painting is his whole life and, to help, Shawn’s father spent his nights and weekends (for almost 2 years) building a studio so that Shawn could make even more paintings (just one way his father has been there for him). Now Shawn’s mission is to get SOGH to every city around the world. So far, over 10,000 paintings are circulating the globe—including Afghanistan, the South Pole, and one at the Eiffel tower. SOGH has changed Shawn’s life. SOGH is something meaningful that everybody can be a part of. No matter where it hangs, SOGH comes from the past and places a message in the future.

[Note: See, get, spread the SOGH.]

Live HTMLGIANT Reading

I'm doing a live reading at HTMLGIANT on Thursday, April 29th, at 9pm. Andy Devine will be opening for me.

The PRISM Index Is Coming to Town

The PRISM Index is coming to town and the show will be on Sunday, May 2, at 9pm, at Rocket to Venus. I'll be reading from the paperback of Dear Everybody and showing a couple of shorts from Little Burn Films. There will also be musical performances by David Heumann (Arbouretum) and Robinson Lee Earle, plus live painting troupe Root 222.

If you can't make the show, Issue #1 is now available. It's 80 pages/88 min DVD/72 min CD and has a huge list of contributors, including me: Belly Boat, Jeffrey Bowers, Jeffrey Brown, Jeff Brush, Castanets (Ray Raposa), Diane Cluck, William Fowler Collins, Josh Cotter, Jay Duplass, Jeremy Bradley Earl, Robert Earle, Theo Ellsworth, Steve Emmons, Fantastic Magic, Grant Falardeau, Chema Garcia, Golden Ghost (Laura Goetz), Lisa Hanawalt, Chadd Harbold, Trent Harris, David Heumann, Brent Hoff, Michael Hurley, Azazel Jacobs, Hermann Karlsson, Michael Kimball, Mike Kuchar, Michael Langan, Robbie Lee, Julia Marino, Daniel Martinico, Charlie McArthur, Colin McDonald, Gavin McInnes, Brian McMullen, Carson Mell, Mi and L’au, Adam “Meadows” Mitchell, Mr. Leg, Louis Munroe, Annelies Monsere, Ormo, Parker Paul, Bill Plympton, Bhob Rainey, Brett Eugene Ralph, Luke Ramsey, Dan Reeder, Jay Rosenblatt, Mick Rossi, Chris Schlarb, Chriss Sutherland, Justin Taylor, Thee More Shallows (Dee Kesler), Dustin Thompson, James Jackson Toth, Schon Wanner, Sarah Warda, Virgil Widrich, Women & Children (Kevin Lasting), David Zellner, Nathan Zellner.