Homework. A 650,000-word pile to read, sort, dispose of. That’s more than War and Peace or the Old Testament. Scrutinize to assess what, if anything, it’s “about.” Report findings pithily (even if you’re pithed off).
At my pokey reading rate this assignment will take me – I don’t want to know how long. And I’ve no choice. For the words are mine. A daily 600-word missive for three years (2022-2024) – do the math. And only I can do this, pronounce life-or-death sentences on all those sentences that sped from me hopeful as sperm.
Some write to be read, others to be reread. Not that I expect to be, it’s just, if it happens, I want the encounter to please. I’m like those ladies who dress prettily to grocery shop, “just in case” they meet a neighbor.
I read what I’ve written with dread. Often I groan. I’d intended better. Some concerns are fleeting – the latest Trump-thump, say (lot of good those did!) or my two bits on the topic du jour. Some pompously sermonize, making my skin crawl. Some require too much reworking to merit a reprieve. Some I’ve said better elsewhere – thinking, it turns out, really is progressive. Some baffle me embarrassingly. I do not so much reproach myself – who else spews at this pace! – as blanche at my inadequacy.
A smaller pile remains, imploring to be saved. I am proud of them at least in part: their point, passion, turn of phrase. But in what container might they be kept? These are not poems, characteristically preserved in tiny packets. Prose seeks to be housed in a book – but a book about what?
Henry helps me unexpectedly. He debuted on September 25, 2023, age five months, with a yip that surprised. I’d written copiously about Henry and our emerging relation in the three months prior. These effusions are OK, I suppose, only they sound like me, alas. Henry sounds like Henry. And he has a lot to say. Not that he needs to, like his psychopathic sidekick, only he notices stuff that confounds or convulses him – the fatuity of humanity, you might say. He’s already (almost) composed his own book.
Of the residue, I wonder, Who is this guy? What makes him tick? What’s he trying to accomplish with all this talk? Can I detect the soul beneath the text? Do I like him? I pose the same questions of any words on a page. Life is too short to fritter on jerks.
I pack my conclusion into a new mission statement for my Substack page:
I write to figure how to make the most of my time and of our time together: what to do, how to be, how to spend our precious span.
Our daily outings aren’t prescriptive or didactive but companionable. We may talk about headlines or Bach or Caravaggio or grandkids or who knows what. Our hectic angry moment leaves too little time for pleasant musing. It’s comforting to know that, in our confusion, we are not alone.
I’m expert in nothing. I have been a reader, writer, critic, editor, businessperson, dad, husband, granddad, traveler, patient. I’ve learned a little about a little but know nothing for sure.
Some folks board their lives like jets, buckle in, and arrive. Others go with the flow without much thought. Others depute their self-management and obey. Some try to dope out life on their own, defining themselves with every choice. These are my companions on our daily stroll. Robert Frost, a favorite poet, supplies an epigraph: “I sha’n’t be gone long./ You come too.”