Way to Break My Balls, David Foster Wallace

David Foster Wallace hanged himself in 2008.

There is really no awesome way to talk about this.

I was not shocked or upset, and here's why: despite my enrollment in the creative writing program at the University of Washington, I wasn't at the time aware that DFW existed at all.

My Introduction to DFW

In 2010 I heard about this book called Infinite Jest which I was told I would enjoy.  Early in 2012, I was told about it again.

I did enjoy that book.  How I was able to enjoy it and why seemed obvious- it's pretty great.  I mean, if you have the patience to sit through whole essays squirreled away in footnotes that you must flip to the back of your book to read, and are okay with open endings, it's an extremely rewarding book.

Infinite Jest (published 1996) predicts a pretty-much 2012 that is stunning in it's accuracy re: the status of entertainment in America.  It's also a pretty run down version of America, one that failed to re-invent itself but find redemption through humble veins, such as AA or junior tennis.

A main character in that book also kills himself (not a spoiler, this fact is pretty clear from the beginning), and one characterizing question w/r/t this character is how he was able to turn on a microwave with his head inside it.

This character also creates a movie, called "The Entertainment" by secret government organizations and terrorist groups, that removes a person's will to do anything else but watch the movie.

I'm oversimplifying the book here, big time.  I'm not trying to give it a critical review here.  My goal is more along the lines of bringing DFW back from the dead.  Not in this essay though.  Not a chance there.  More like this essay is my proposed set of guidelines for doing so.

I want to bring DFW back from the dead for a few reasons:

• His contributions to the thought and shape of today's literature are incomplete
• I want to ask him "why you gotta break my balls?"
• I have a big literary crush on the man.  He is the Sean Connery of writers.

Some Ideas DFW Seems to Be Getting at:

• Irony Is Annoying

Or has at least outworn it's usefulness.  While irony has been used in the past to point out injustice or as a survival tactic, television has subverted irony for it's own ends: viewership ratings, advertisement dollars.  You can read DFW's full essay on this just by google-ing "E Unibus Pluram" (I'm not going to do all the work for you), but a large part of the gist of the essay is summed up in this statement of the problem that today's writers face:

How to snap readers awake to the fact that our televisual culture has become cynical, narcissistic, essentially empty phenomenon, when television regularly celebrates just those features in itself and its features?

• Why should an author care enough to want to snap readers awake?

Hmm, well, I'm not finding a terribly persuasive argument within DFW's essay.  He personally wanted to, I think(hearsay, I know).  "E Unibus Pluram"(published 1993) seems to be just the kind of manifesto an author might reference while writing Infinite Jest, that's for sure.  Here's a relevant perspective from a recent article in The Stranger's A&P quarterly:

I want to read books I need to read. I want to read books that feed me, that go in my mouth and throat and down in my guts and nourish me or mess me up but feed me that way too.

-"Shut Up: A Manifesto Against Irony" Rebecca Brown

Rebecca seems on board with this "New Sincerity" thing, though she also claims that language can save your life, which is clearly, in some cases, untrue.

• Entertainment has/is/will changed/changing/change

The worst thing about being a writer these days is probably that nobody really seems to enjoy reading anymore.  Seriously, if you've made it this far in the essay, leave a comment or something so I know you exist.  Also, marry me(family members are excused from this, but may still leave comments).  

Rather than cry about it, DFW simply continued to produce literature and essays that really get right down to the meat of how we (Americans, mostly) entertain ourselves, how that effects how we think of ourselves, and how all of that bends and shapes the forms of entertainment we prefer.  If you're this far in the essay and haven't yet googled "E Unibus Pluram", well, for fuck's sake.

• Ditto for communication

For being the prescient/excellent writer that he is, DFW comes off as a bit of a Luddite, explaining that he doesn't really get eBooks in his preface to "Up Simba", always portraying himself as scribbling in notebooks rather than clacking at keys.  All those freaking footnotes, which is a style well suited to HTML, but, as I mentioned above, requires a lot of patience in the reader when abused in DFW's trademark style and on paper.

The fact that some of the juiciest stuff appears in those footnotes is reason enough for readers/editors/printers alike to ask in unison, "Why you gotta break my balls, DFW?"

See for example, the kick-ass essay (excerpted near the bottom of this linked page) disguised as a footnote in Infinite Jest regarding the evolution of the video-phone.

By the way, the first iPhone was released in June 2007.  Skype's been around since 2003, though Wikipedia is pretty useless at reminding me when the ability to use video was released.

Before I try to jam these ideas together to describe the kind of change I'd like DFW around to help out with, let's take a look at some things that have changed since DFW's death.

Some Things That Have Changed Since DFW's Death

• Late 2010: Skype releases video calling client for iPhone (thanks, Wikipedia!)
• Okay, well it looks like Netflix introduced online streaming in 2007, so let's call this one "online streaming becomes popular".  Theoretically, DFW could have had a Netflix account.
• Hulu came out in March of 2008.  Damn.  Okay, how about this one: Disney purchases 27% stake in Hulu - 2009.
• Man, okay, I'm striking out here.  Facebook has been around since 2004(ish)  Facebook claims a positive cash flow for the first time in 2009.
• Rockstar Games releases Grand Theft Auto IV in 2008 (In April, but shut up).  Critics are like "whoa, there's some serious writing behind this game"
• With the release of Red Dead Redemption in 2010, Rockstar Games proves that video games are capable of dealing with themes, philosophy, and good damn stories well, not to mention in a way that only Choose Your Own Adventure brand books could approach and never surpass.
• One of my all time favorite poets, Bill Knott, who is mentioned a few times in "E Unibus Pluram" leaves a comment on my blog in response to basically a very callous comment from me regarding his personality, which I know nothing about. November 2011. Considering that the Knott poems DFW refers to are from 1975, i.e. before my birth, this is a surreal moment for me.

This list has turned out pretty pathetic.  For that I apologize.  Strange that all these modes of communication and entertainment that I have found fascinating and perverse and revolutionary in the last decade all got on the path to where they are today before DFW's death, but really kicked into gear only afterwards.

Picture if you will DFW as a lone centurion, the last of an ancient order of illuminati, fiercely defending the earth against the aliens that have taken over the bodies of Alec Baldwin and Seth MacFarlane.  The warrior falls, and the earth will never be the same.

-Elevator pitch for what'll turn out to be a really bad movie.

So here's some bad logic for you:

• The markets for entertainment and communication influence what we choose to consume.
• What we choose to consume influences entertainment and communication technology and content.
• In benefits E & C tech to promote it's own use.  Like the way rabbits benefit from getting it on.
• For some reason, E & C tech has become incredibly personal.  Probably because you can sell more units and because we like our privacy.
• Small, discrete E & C tech is popular with manufacturers and consumers.  See iPhone, see Tablet, see Laptop, see Google Glass, which is turning out to be less popular with consumers than manufacturers thought, but it's probably just a matter of time.
• These E & C techs enable anti-social behavior i.e. more time spent with the tech/product/content.
• E & C content enables anti-social behavior i.e. more time spent with the tech/product/content.
• Technological advances in entertainment and communication tend to promote further extremes of anti-social behavior in their users to remain competitive.

That's basically my way of re-phrasing the interesting bits (to me) of "E Unibus Pluram", except expanded to include the last five years of my experience as an entertainment consumer. It is the same set of ideas that once again inspires the question, "David Foster Wallace, why are you breaking my balls?"

Essays like these are not exempt for this tendency, obviously, for example I'm writing this in my living room while my roommate plays his Xbox360.  He shouts at the game, I mutter to my notes.

Dear reader, you aren't reading this out loud, I suspect, but to yourself.  I'm not in the room with you.  I'm not reading this to you.  If I'm being really honest with myself, I have to realize that the only folks who read this will have followed the link from my Facebook post, or bless 'em, have followed my blog and/or are family. Hi Mom!

For another example, let's turn to another smart/sad guy, Louis C.K:

and this video has been shared by so many people on Facebook, which is cool because the content certainly seems less like the "cynical, narcissistic, essentially empty phenomenon" that DFW describes, but becomes annoying when you think about the fact that whether we saw this when it aired on TV or saw it on YouTube from a Facebook link, that's what we were doing.  Facebooking.

So maybe my problem is that I'm still thinking about this, that I'm still trying to escape all this damn irony all over everything.

There are ways to do it, I think.  One is to stop thinking about it and talk to more people.  Another is to get my thoughts straight about it so I can talk to more people without the distraction of this ball breaking confusion.

Some Examples of Social Entertainment

• Live Music
• Roller-Derby
• Watching Movies with a Lively Crowd
• Fishing
• Live Comedy
• Getting Out Of The House

Some Examples of Anti-Social Entertainment

• Watching Movies Alone
• Reading David Foster Wallace
• Pretty Much the Whole Internet
• Fishing
• Hanging Out while Picking Your Nose

I hope I'm not just hanging out picking my own nose here.  I don't think it's inherently bad to be anti-social, but damn is it really easy.

And while this essay might be a bit navel gaze-y, you dear reader can redeem it by taking advantage of the comment section to lend your own perspective on these ideas, anecdotes, rebuttals, or just some good ideas w/r/t getting out of the house.

Thank you.

More mash ups

Mashing up someone else's words is similar to the editing process you might go through on a piece of writing of your own. You take the parts you like, and you experiment with moving them around in different places. In my case, this fact was made all the more clear when I heard a mash-up my friend Jay did of three of my poems. I thought the result was much closer to the mark in terms of my own poem, and gave me some ideas of revisions I could do. You can see the mash-up Jay made here. I'm going to post the revision I made later, but first I'd like to point out that it is this type of shared creative process that I thrive on, and I think having other people around to help and inspire you is about as good as it gets. Anyhow, here's the draft that Jay used for his mash-up. It's a riddle, and I'm pretty sure I did a lousy job, because in this draft I don't really think there are enough clues to guess what I'm getting at. Can you guess? Here it is:

I am the worm.
My life occurs in cycles, from birth
as egg to blind hermaphrodite to death,
I'd eat my own tail if knew which end
of me was my head.

I am the star of a recent
film, Discover Earth, in which
I am shown chewing through
an apple. A worm
shaped halo of rot
trails after me, a seam, a worm
shaped tracer of a worm
reveals where I've been.

If you want to know
where I am going, it's easy.
Cut the film, place the frames back
to back, a stack laid on
its side, a tube, a worm shaped apple
I'm crawling through.

The film becomes the apple,
the apple becomes the worm.
Dissect it, within one cut
you can see what my annelid eyes cannot,
the fixed picture, stuck in a slice of film,
the poor solitary segment thinks he's me.

Which is almost true. I feel what he feels,
but I'm all allegory and he is almost real.

Mash up

I will preface this by saying that the choice to use these words was not entirely mine. Every word in the following poem is taken from one of three poems by a friend of mine. I didn't use every word from her three poems, but I did pick ones I like and organize them in my own way. This raises some interesting questions about originality, although none of these questions is new. How original do the following words sound to you?

Photo Factory: Mules Wanted

This friday, everyone you know
will feel comfortable. Worst part:
They almost believe it's possible.

The mime has an imaginary life,
robs airports at night. His heart holds
winter one month, another one moon,
he still hasn't kept his saddles smooth.

Lizard skin begins to steam.

A terrible black creature trumpets
bible seeds all over your bearskin,
lights a cigarette. Protect your headdress
please. Death comes to a rabbit.

Slipping in underground scorpion pools
kills the most baby. Break down your
molecules to a great big silken loose
lazy firetruck, or everything is darkness,
maybe.

I'm feeling butter this afternoon, mamma bear.

The voice of the Sea wounds you
because prowling dreams come with it.
Nervous laughter at the bedside, like
breath stolen from a wood spirit.

Oh supernatural snake eater, serve me.

Part of the mind is faithful,
but the blood keeps lingering ghosts.
All's up with that, sure,
I'm down if not for don't.

A double brain, descended from seeds
can learn Iriqoui and Cantonese,
remind you to gut the whalemeat.

This is the most confusing scene in the act:
Two brothers disrobe.
We find out that one of them
is in fact Robert de Niro.

Turnip, turnip, turnip, turnip,
turnip, turnip, turnip.

Screen your pie before going to Brazil.
Daughter knows teepee life is difficult,
but it's harder in the garden, like
a hummingbird in heat.
Turkish souls don't sleep.

"Each Eternal I Turned In" a response to Robert

Here's the piece I'm responding to.

Here's my response.

Each Eternal I Turned In

Overheard on the bus:
"The complex structure of life
does not exist to override entropy."
I'm not sure what that meant, although
I asked the person sitting next to me
who shrugged, saying: "I'm a smart
architect. I know it's not this
simple, and yet I see my lust
for structure echoed everywhere.
What does that suggest?"

Effortless, we fall from text
to subtext, flaking away layer
by layer, a stack
of printed papers, a plate
of frosted glass, shattered.
Even as the axe severs synapse
from synapse, a phantom hand
rests behind the neck.

Books Books Books

Now that my work load has subsided somewhat, I thought I'd share with you what I have been doing down there at Ride the Ducks. Because the tourist season is severely over these days, I've mostly been reading. Here's my recent reading list:

White Teeth, by Zadie Smith

White Teeth is a story spanning generations of turmoil for two families. The families in question are those of Archie Jones and Samad Iqbal, two former soldiers, living out their twilight years in London from the seventies to the turn of the century. The stories in this book seem rambling, but if the tightness of Zadie's prose is any indication, there is a deeper subtext to the events depicted that suggests... What? I don't know. You'll have to read it find out I suppose. This is a novel about characters, and at the end of the book the greatest disappointment is only that you have can no longer live with these characters, the book is due back and you must hand them back over to the library. Not that I'm clamoring for a sequel, I only wish I could live my own life with the same delight in the strange world unfolding around me that this book inspires.

Inherent Vice, by Thomas Pynchon

Here's the premise: Doc is a private detective. He is also a reefer-loving hippie. Between his constant smoking of the herb and other reality altering substances he comes in contact with, it is very difficult to discern between evil plots and dope inspired paranoia. Other characters, from bikers to cops to undercover tenor sax players recovering from heroin addiction, are similarly unreliable, leading to a real mess of reality and super-reality that both enthralls and disorients the reader. It is hard to believe that this book, set in the late sixties, was published only months ago, but there are always little reminders, like characters predicting the future with alarming accuracy. Is Pynchon stuck in time, or unstuck? I don't know. Once again, read it if you want to find out.

Rant, by Chuck Palahniuk

This book is CRAZY. I guess you could call it science fiction, since it involves ports in the back of your neck and time travel, but these are all secondary details in a story that doesn't even try to make sense. The reality presented in this book is not fixed, but in flux, as the Doctor would say. Events are subject to change. Repeatedly. Am I giving up too much of the plot? Hell no. There's just to much going on to give away. Rather than discuss the plot, I guess I should just mention the brilliant style this book presents, that of an oral history. Every chapter is organized according to general subject, and anecdotes plus commentary are provided by a huge cast of characters who are each privy to a small portion of the bigger picture. Is there any better way to implement the old "unreliable narrator" device than by involving dozens of narrators, all presenting a different aspect of one story? I don't know. You know what you have to do to find out, though.

That's enough for now. I am currently halfway through "Everything is Illuminated", another fantastic, chimerical, and extremely funny/emotionally fraught tale. I am loving it. Fans of butchered English and characters that express truth through lies should check it out. Especially people who are familiar with, and interested in, the Ukraine. Ahem.

Busy Busy Busy

Wow. The thing about working full time is that you can't get anything done. You work. You come home, try to relax, sleep, wake up and work again. Laundry piles up. Dishes pile up. My recycling bin has become a recycling pile. So when you get a day off, it becomes a day on. For the last four days I did nothing but work, punctuated by a show of brutal logistical proportions. Now I have two days to myself, to fill with all the stuff I used to do daily when I was unemployed. I emptied my recycling. I laid down vocal tracks for three songs and a bass track for one. I have four minutes to finish this blog post before my laundry is done and then it's off to work on my screenplay, which is shaping up beautifully, thank you for asking. Once I finish that, it's off to federal way to pick up all the equipment I left with Robert after the show, and record some more tracks, and hopefully rehearse for our next show.

Is this how real people live? I'm developing a tolerance to caffeine. And here I thought being a bard would be a relaxing lifestyle.

It might not be easy, but damned if it's not wildly exciting. I'll look forward to relaxing at work.

25 Random Things About Me

Lately, everybody is doing it. How are they doing it?

(Actually, nobody does any more. Too busy, I guess.)

Mostly, they post 25 random things about themselves and the rest is up to the incessant voyeurism Facebook breeds. Some people have hijacked this phenomenon and turned it into a "valid" literary form. Example: My brother's Facebook, where he parodies an SNL sketch and gives us as much if not more information about about himself as any of the rest of these things. Example: Eric McHenry, a fantastic Seattle based poet, created a cento of 25 random lines, rhymed and metered, that were drifting around in his head. The result was once again, just about as informative as a real 25 things post would be. I wish I could show you either of these examples, but when it comes to intellectual property, I guess possession is a little more than nine/tenths of the law.
So rather than show you theirs, I will shamelessly subject myself to the same experiment.

25 Random Things About Me:

1. An old school bus converted into a traveling home.
2. The cascade mountains, distant, huge and blue.
3. A girl walking down the street tugging anxiously on the arm thrown around her shoulder.
4. A pair of eyelash curlers left on a wall overnight, encrusted with dew-diamonds.
5. There is also a a single pink petal.
6. A rented Cello. I hear one of the strings is about to break.
7. A cannibalized soldering iron.
8. An old slice of cheese.
9. My Friend, on a couch.
10. Because a fire was in my head.
11. The hand that whirls the water in the pool, that stirs the quicksand,
12. That ropes the blowing wind.
13. My amusingly noisy neighbors.
14. Two crows, one sleek and black, the other a little the worse for wear.
15. The piece of sandwich they are fighting over.
16. A whole stack of old editions of The Stranger. Some of them are damp.
17. A girl walks out the door. "Oh it's cold!" she says, and goes back inside, locking the door behind her.
18. A crow, diving a couple feet before flapping up to altitude again
19. Barefoot vs. Bear foot. No contest.
20. I am the doubter and the doubt.
21. Electronic mail. Music. A resume.
22. The callouses on my feet migrate seasonally.
23. The consistent buzz of technology. Radiation.
24. A piano, acoustic guitar and bass guitar, electric guitar and bass guitar, ukulele, two saxophones, a banjo, a harmonica necklace, two harmonicas, a flute, a clarinet, a guiro, a conga drum, an afuche, an udu, wine bottles tuned to different notes, shaker, triangle, tambourine. Some other things I left out.
25. The most important thing about me is my skin. People have told me I have nice skin, and that's nice, but the most important thing is that it keeps my organs from spilling all over the place. If it weren't for my skin, I' d be a mess.

Finance

Yesterday I traveled downtown on a bus. The bus ride was free with my U-Pass. Next I went to Westlake center and bought a Mango Lassie, $2.00 even. Outside Westlake, there were several street musicians, some of whom I recognized from the U-District. A friend of mine claims to have made $80 playing music in exactly that spot.

Next to the fitting room in Macy's, there is a small TV. It was playing CNN. According to some dude on CNN, the big govt. democrats are going to turn the federal government into a hulking behemoth that will devour all prosperity in it's path.

Obama, you are welcome to it! I doubt I'll ever know the difference.

Inside Nordstrom, I was already appalled, and so were they. I was wearing my cargo shorts and wool shirt(my clubbing gear, natch), they were all wearing suits and expensive cologne. How expensive? Too expensive. The man who was helping my roommate, Kevin, pick out a sportsjacket was quite helpful, though, and didn't discriminate against us just because we were poor white boys and he was a black man in a suit. He was pretty chatty:
"Here try this on.", "What do you need the jacket for?" "So you're musicians then?" "What's a bard?" "I dreamed I was a saxophone player once, in Jazz Alley, filled with smoke, I was just up on stage blowin"
Kevin picked a jacket he liked. 51% cotton and 49% linen. It looked good, and it was the right size. I noticed that while he held it up to the light I could see through it. We asked him what the price was.
You ever hear the phrase "If you have to ask, you can't afford it?" It turns out nobody actually uses that phrase, they can say it all with a look.
"I'm sorry" Said Kevin, "I can't buy a jacket that costs more than my rent."
Random stranger interjects here: "A suit should always cost more than your rent."
Kevin: "But how will I keep it clean when I'm sleeping on the street?"

Thank you, helpful suit man. Thanks to you I now know what size I should look for when I hit up the thrift stores on The Ave. And thank you for being willing to assume that either one of us could actually afford that jacket.
Or...
This is what happened next:
"Well sir, if you don't have the money now, would you like to open up an account with the store?"
No, no, no, get me out of here!
"If you open up an account..."
We (Nordstrom) will own you. And your suit.

No thanks. I want to look nice for my job interviews, not desperate.

Get busy

What is the difference between song lyrics and poems?

Let me tell you what I know:

In poetry, the idea of love must be treated carefully, so as not to overwork the concept or state the obvious. Generally, love poems are laughable. No, not generally, personally.

In song, love must be grasped by the neck and thrown around a little. No, not a little, it must be thoroughly thrashed. Successful love lyrics should result in a visit to the doctor to get a neck brace for love, which will be complaining of whiplash for weeks afterward.

And there you have it. Also, nobody will ever think that the word "aint" is inappropriate for song.

P.S. The distinction made above is also applicable to the cross media genres of "booty songs" and "booty poems" with the addendum that rather than thrashing, shaking is by far the more appropriate verb.

The Apple Capital

As I sit here eating my apple, I am pleased to note that this delicious fruit was grown from the soil of my home state. There's a lot to love about this place, this little region of the world. But you probably know that. For example, you probably know that we are the leading producers of asparagus for the entire nation. You probably know that we can grow wine grapes and hops so delicious that even German brewers are buying them up after a bad hops year across the pond. Agriculture aside, you probably also know that giant corporations like Boeing, Amazon, Microsoft, and Starbucks are here, granting our state a tasty bonus of several ridiculously wealthy people. Additionally, a large percent of trade with Asian nations comes right through our own Puget Sound.

So here's the deal. It has been quite a long time since we heard Abraham Lincoln quip "A house divided shall fall, a house united shall stand" or what ever it was he actually said. I'm not suggesting that this is no longer true, I'm not suggesting that we should secede from the union or anything, only that we could.

Why would I bring up such a ridiculous idea? Why do you think it's ridiculous? A while back Thomas Jefferson himself reminded me that peaceful revolution is always an option. Why should we need any such thing, though? Things are just peachy as they are, right?