My Beamish, Bookish Boy

This entry's a bit cobbled-together, a little po-mo, a little like that Barthelme story "Thirteen Views of My Father Weeping" (or was that a Barth story, and is the title even right?). That is: short scenes, asterisks, underlying (or overriding) theme or themes. Which may or may not break down at some point during the entry.

I spent summers with my great-grandmother until I was 12 or so-- free babysitting, you know. When not playing on the rusting playground equipment in the overgrown park across the street from her house, or eating too much ice cream (which I was not allowed to eat before 10 a.m., which was the best Granny could do when it came to curbing my addiction), or watching USA Cartoon Express, I read her books. She had a guest bedroom that no one ever used, and in fact that room was her de facto library-- shelves upon shelves of paperbacks, almost entirely science fiction. Granny knew what she liked; Scott Card, Isaac Asimov, Greg Bear, Bob Silverberg, Joe Haldeman. I got my schooling in horror from Mom's shelves, and my core knowledge of sf from Granny.

Heh. I'm remembering all kinds of stuff, now, thinking back. Even the shelves in the dresser in that bedroom were full of books-- I recall discovering that with great delight. The closet, too.

My grandmother had a stroke a few years back (she has since died), and I remember what struck me the most about her condition, what really got to me, was realizing that she couldn't read anymore, that the words simply wouldn't make sense for her. I couldn't imagine such a thing, losing something so fundamental.

I miss that woman. She was tough and wonderful.

I am extremely bad at making New Friends, though when I go out on a limb it generally turns out okay. I can trace my entire history of friendship from one impulsive act-- going to Scott's house in ninth grade and knocking on his door. I knew him from school, lived down the street from him, had known him for years, but we weren't precisely friends-- but since I was lonely, and he was smart and appreciated my sense of humor, I took a chance. Had I not met him I would not have met Amily (long story of tangled allegiances and blind-dates-gone-wrong), and would have not gone to Appalachian State University (I toured it because Amily was looking at their music program, and I fell in love with the place). No ASU would have meant no D., no writing group, no Blah, no The Boys... no anybody. And it's not just that I would have made different friends-- if that impulsive decision to try and make friends with Scott had failed, I would quite possibly have retreated back into my introspective, walk-in-the-woods, write-adolescent-poetry, read-like-a-bastard shell.

Well, hell, that's probably over-stating the case. But with every new relationship I formed, I gained new confidence, and got more comfortable talking to strangers... but it's still a conscious act for me to be at all extroverted...

I am, frankly, reticent about physical affection... but only at first. One of my fondest memories of the Scott Card workshop in D.C. my Freshman year is when me and D. and Katherine Buccholz and Justin Rowland wound up cuddling all together on the couch, just taking comfort in each other. That was on day 4, I think-- we had been basically strangers before the workshop. The first night at the workshop the four of us wandered outside and wound up sitting together at a patio table... and somehow told our life stories to one another. We were inseparable after that, and remained close throughout college (and in the case of D., well beyond).

Jesus, what if I'd gone to bed early that night? What if I'd stayed up writing like we were sort of supposed to? The groups formed that night... Ah, life. This garden of delightfully forking paths.

Oh, yeah, my point-- I'm very physically affectionate once I'm comfortable with people, and know they like such things. D. had some friends in Raleigh, and eventually brought me into their fold-- those people were the masters of unconditional love. I wound up dating one of them, Leigh, for nearly a year (between Amily and Blah). They'd stay up late, play cards, and play with each other's hair.

I miss that good hair-playing-with action, man.

Okay, my treatise-in-brief:

"Horror" is a fallacious sub-genre of fiction (not always supernatural fiction, either). "Horror" stories seek to generate horror as an emotional response, horror breaking down, usually, into three sub-categories: Revulsion (the gross-out, which is a crude but sometimes useful tool), Terror (that pulse-pounding, monsters-chasing-me-through-the-woods feeling), and (best of all, I think) Dread (something awful is going to happen, and it's got me all twisted up in the guts just thinking about it). If the story does those things (or obviously tries to), it's "horror."

It's a dumb categorization because we don't have "joy" stories or "disgust" stories or "fury" stories, even though lots of fiction seeks to create those feelings in the reader.

I've said before, and will say again: I write fantasies (mostly). Sometimes they ain't happy.

"Dark Fantasy" as a category is a desperate marketing attempt to win back an audience that grew (for complex reasons) sick and tired of "horror" novels.

That said, it's kinda cool to be a Dark Fantasist. It doesn't mean anything, but it's a nifty name.

I've always thought it was neat, that water is adhesive while mercury is cohesive. Water will stick to anything, but mercury only sticks to itself.

There's a metaphor in there, somewhere.

I hope that wasn't too annoying.

Tune in tomorrow. Perhaps there will be Coherence, then. Or at least Cohesion.