MAILER AND ME AT AGE 84

Still working on the rewrite of Ghoul World. But I'm not
making much headway. Too many days, I get this sort of headache from sinus problems that blocks any clarity, and nearing the end of my life, I need clarity to go on. I don't really know what mentality it is that holds me back now or won't supply an adequate motivation to continue. I recall a visit to Mailer that someone made near the end of his life. The caller asked if he was working on anything. Mailer halfheartedly replied, "Yeah," but I didn't believe him. 

This photo is of Mailer at age 84, the same age I am as I write this. He's got more hair than me and more best sellers too, but I think I'm still handsomer and looking more fit than he does. Of course, I don't think he stopped drinking. I'm not sure of that, but not boozing can works wonders on your health.

WRITER'S BLOCK AND THOMAS JEFFERSONS

Last time, I reported twenty dollars were on their way for two poems. Instead, the amount will be 30 dollars. They await me in Paypal for three poems appearing in the current issue of Teach. Write. Literary Magazine. One of the poems was rejected 18 times over several decades before finding a nest to nestle in. As editors constantly report, "Thank you for sending us your work. Sorry, these do not fit our needs. Perhaps they will be a better fit elsewhere." Of course, I fine tune my poetry every time I send it out, and so it goes. Sometimes, I'll see a revision that totally alters the poem, its arrangement on the page, even its underlying analogy.

I've reported writer's block several times in this blog. Now I'm dealing with a different type of writer's block. Some of the drugs I take, now, to delay my death by a high risk form of prostate cancer create fatigue, prednisone for one. This morning, as I sit at my local Starbucks, I can barely concentrate. I'm working on a rewrite of a story that includes brothers, sisters, friends and brothers and sisters-in-law. For the life of me, I can't keep them straight in my head. It's impossible to write when my brain is dazed like this. At least, it's not a hangover these days. 

Keep at it my friends. I've had more success this year than at any time in my life, and I'll be 84 the 20th of this month. Still, three more sarcastic poems to come out in Sequestrum. I like the company I'll appear with in that fine magazine.

A CHECK FOR 20 DOLLARS

Not much time between this entry and the last, is there? But, hell, I got more promising news. Another submission has found success. Poetry again, a set of 3 poems accepted by Sequestrum, more poems published this year than stories. Yet, I'm still anticipating submissions to Fiddlehead and Prairie Schooner, each of which invited me to send another tale.  Writer's block still troubles me. I started a fresh story a few days back, but it died a quick death. Perhaps the check for $20 from Sequestrum for the poems will dynamite the blockage (that's right, a check).

 

Why, I wonder, does such a successful year as this come by as the news about my prostate cancer grows darker? We're into a new drug now, and if it doesn't work, then, I worry, my hoped for 4 to 5 more years of living won't happen. I'm trying to keep my thoughts in each day rather than in a future day. I'm surprised I worry so little. Still, I have days that are inexplicably darker, and I think it's a sign that my synaptic self is more aware of what I face than it allows my consciousness to consider.

By the way, fellow writers, I'm submitting more work, more often than at any time in my recorded history.

REJECTIONS I CAN ALMOST LOVE

What can I say? So close, yet so far. A story published last month, two poems forthcoming soon and this near miss, rejected with high praise. I knew as I wrote these recent tales they are fair to good. This one caught the eye of the very respected Fiddlehead magazine. All this happening as the battle with my prostate cancer moves from my urologist to an oncologist, a sign the disease is worsening. The visit with the oncologist, though, left me with hope for several more good and useful writing years. 

I want to visit Wales this year or next, the home of my ancestors and Dylan Thomas whose work I once upon a time could not get enough of. Those were also my drinking years. 

What a conundrum. I'm hesitant to submit something else to Fiddlehead that might spoil their good opinion of my skills. Ain't that a dandy form of writer's block?

 
 

SILENT BOOMER BEATNIK'S LAST HURRAY................MAYBE

Ninety-nine people recently looked in. Thank you. Three of my haiku may be found on the website Better Than Starbucks. They also appear in a hard copy edition that can be found here.
 
I haven't written anything for days. I'm tired a lot. The memoir languishes. Poetry is hiding out in my synaptic self somewhere beyond my prefrontal cortex. I'm not certain, but I fear my writing days may be over. I have ideas but not energy to get to work. Only time will tell. I'm now reading The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. I took a course in Chaucer as an undergraduate and read the work in its original Middle English. 

My bathroom reading is Ray Carver's Will You Please Be Quiet Please. I met him once in a coffee shop at Eastern Washington University. When I asked him where his stories came from, he replied, "I don't know. I just hope they keep coming."

BLUEBERRIES ARE GOOD FOR WHAT AILS THE BEATNIK BOOMER

Find photog here:

Thanks all who have checked in here recently. My continuing exhaustion means that imaginative writing is still some distance in future, but I visited a new urologist today and, again, a scope was shoved up my little urethra. The good doctor found nothing abnormal in my bladder except the scar tissue one expects to find after the application of high doses of radiation aimed to defeat a "highly aggressive prostate cancer." Turns out the Flomax generic I've been taking does not treat the condition that's been depriving me of sleep and comfort for the past 5 to 6 weeks. Flomax only works when there's a blockage in the system. There appears to be no blockage, and my problem is nerve damage associated with the high doses of radiation that were needed to treat my prostate cancer. The new drug he prescribed will hopefully calm the nerves that are sending too frequent and intense messages from the nerves in my wounded bladder to my brain. Hopefully, the urgent and continuous need to pee will lessen, and I'll catch a few more winks per night. I was near tears with feelings of hope as we talked. I cry at the drop of a hat these days. Where did Mr. Masculinity disappear too? Somewhere between the doses of hormone, I suppose. Maybe by end of next month, I'll get back to the writing projects I've put on hold. 

REMEMBERING A CHILDHOOD WITH TIGE IN THE BASEMENT

"That's My Dog Tige, He Lives In A Shoe. I'm Buster Brown, Look For Me in There Too" When I was a kid, I had to do chores in the basement frequently, and I listened to a radio show as I worked. Buster Brown shoes advertised on that show. Froggy the magic frog who twanged his "magic twanger" was also on that show. No double entendre intended. 

HO HUM, HO HUM, IT'S OFF TO REWRITE HO HUM I GO. I must admit that my writing energy is at low ebb. Part of the decline is because we were out of town over the Christmas holiday, and I'm trying to get myself back into harness, but it keeps slipping off my back. Some of my lack of interest is a hangover, I believe, from the cancer scare. For many months, I lived in a bag or sack, a psychic state of existence for sure. No certain future lay ahead for me.  

To compensate for my low energy, I'm enclosing a poem I wrote for the poetry chapbook Up Your Ass about my prostate cancer. Perhaps the last piece of original writing I've done. I'm not happy with it so it ends with an ellipsis that suggests future work? Perhaps also I need to rethink the title.

BEATNIK BOOMER FEELS HAPPILY BLAH

Yesterday my wife and I visited my radiation treatment doctor, and he declared, "Your body's free of cancer." My wife's ecstatic, but I continue in my present calm state of one day at a time. Now, all I've got to do is concentrate on my bucket list item, but, wouldn't you know? After several days not writing that included Thanksgiving's pleasant visit of my daughter, her husband and my youngest son to eat ham and everything else vegan and to play board games, I've lost the impulse to continue writing. Even the happy PSA reading hasn't brought a poem, and the poetry contained in Up Your Ass inspired by my prostate cancer seems dull and silly. I see no opening ahead, no light of inspiration streaming in through the tunnel walls I'm walking in. I'm 79 years old and, interestingly, a hand-written rejection note from Fiddlehead was penned on my October 20th birthday, a birthday gift I just received in yesterday's mail. Will this period of writer's block pass? Who knows. I'm getting old, but the bucket's over a distant hill now, and I've a far piece to walk ahead.

SILENT MAN'S SILENCE IS TROUBLING

It looks black when nothing inspires me.......

I'm sorry I've neglected this blog for so many days, but a couple of days I was in Spokane watching my youngest son, Patrick, perform with his improv group at the Bartlett. Sold out, lots of laughter. The Bartlett is an interesting venue. A bar, an espresso joint and a performance room in the back are interconnected. Later we walked Spokane's downtown streets, and it is a jumping place nowadays, people spilling out on the sidewalks. We couldn't find a quiet bar where we could talk so we ended up at the Onion where I got myself a bowl of their forever great onion soup. So delicious. My oldest son Sean and my daughter-in-law Sheila are coming over to visit, and Mertie and I are looking forward to visiting and maybe playing some board games.
 
On the other hand, many days these days, doldrums set in and nothing creative goes on in my head—"NOTHING," he shouts—and it's scary. These days I have to have a particularly sharp day in order to work at something. My inspiration is weak and faltering. I ask myself if it will completely disappear someday soon. 

On yet a third hand, I do sit down and submit poetry, short stories to magazines and queries to agents for the novel. Working at that does give me a sense of accomplishment. Currently, I have between 15 and 20 submissions out.

BEAT BOOMER'S BUCKET LIST BOGGED DOWN

In the last seven days I crapped my pants twice. Fortunately the accidents occurred at home as I rushed from my living room recliner to the bathroom. The accidents were distressing, and I've bought adult diapers. Aside from painful urination which I tolerate pretty well, the second side effect that troubles me most is fatigue, so much so as to soften my acuity and make writing nearly impossible at times. As a writer I tell myself I ought to be able to describe how these occurrences distress me, how they play on my mind and emotions. I finally summarized it to myself this afternoon as I drove to my radiation treatment. A month ago, I felt like a virile youthful—for 78—attractive male who still enjoyed sex with his wife and thought of himself as funny and comparably confident, happier than at any time in his life while looking forward to achieving his single bucket item. Yesterday, after the 2nd accident, I was badly deflated and imagined a much decreased enjoyment of my final years, however long that might be. It was a gloomy appraisal, one which I don't like and one I'm trying to resist. Just writing it down helps me a great deal.

The upshot of what I'm getting at is that until treatment is over on August 31, I will not push myself to write but will concentrate on limited exercise, diet and pampering myself, plus meeting my responsibilities at home. I will be drifting sideways and making little progress on my goal to get someone other than myself to publish a novel of mine before I kick the bucket. I'll write only when strongly moved and in a fairly alert state of mind. Following is a list of potential side effects of radiation treatment. Ain't they a kick in the pants?

• Frequent urination
• Difficult or painful urination
• Blood in the urine
• Urinary leakage
• Abdominal cramping
• Diarrhea
• Painful bowel movements
• Rectal bleeding
• Rectal leaking
• Fatigue
• Sexual dysfunction, including diminished erectile function or decrease in the volume of semen
• Skin reactions (similar to a sunburn)
• Secondary cancers in the region of the radiation

PREOCCUPIED, ANOTHER FORM OF WRITER'S BLOCK

It's been 10 days since my last posting and that's too long a span of time, but nothing much has changed as far as my bucket list item and the forces of nature working against it. Am including two pictures I scanned. One of a poem I wrote several weeks past and the other of the nice illustrative drawings Dr. Siddiqui did as he explained my options to Mertie and I. 
 
Mertie and I had our second opinion meeting today with Dr. Faisal Siddiqui who performs radiation treatments at Peacehealth and also the more focused radiation treatment called the Cyberknife. His recommendation is against surgical removal of the prostate in the same terms as Dr. Jason Smith. The best looking option appears to be a two stage radiation treatment. First 5 weeks of irradiation of prostate and lymph nodes with 40-45 on the grayscale (power rating), then 5 treatments of a nearly double amount of irradiation on the prostate alone. After our talk with Dr. Siddiqui, Merie and I felt very hopeful about extended life expectancy. The details of the after care are too involved to put in here. Oh ... I've already commenced working toward my transition to breasts and hot flashes. Dr. Siddiqui prescribed Bi-ka-loo-ta-myd, one a day. He says it will immediately block or slow spread of cancer cells in prostate while Mertie and I decide on course of action. Will need to put plenty of vitamin D and calcium additives into play. 

As for writing. One rejection of 3 poems returned this past week, and the rewriting of The Porn Writer has been slow going. I'm sure there's a subconscious blockage between me and my imaginative powers. I feel, I think I'd call it, "preoccupied". Good beginnings for poems about the cancer come to mind constantly, but the impulse to complete them doesn't follow.

BEAT UP OLD BRAIN FARTS

This old age thing is a bear. I have many days when a mild dizziness creates a curtain between the page I'm staring at and my ability to concentrate on the work I'm doing and bring words to that page. It's very discouraging to deal with. I'm having one of those days today, and I'm about to quit for the day. I'll give it one more shot after I take an AllerClear. Sometimes that helps. I also have exercises that help, but I need to be home on my bed to do them. Acceptance is called for in this situation.

THE HAUNTED BEATNIK WALKS THE COLUMBIA RIVER

Walked by the Columbia River this afternoon, a golden time, the sun slanting low toward the horizon and long shadows spilled across the grass. 

only 3:30 and looks eveningish

An old phantom came to haunt my morning as I was writing at the Torque. How do I explain it? It's a destructive little snot. I've no idea how to explain why it comes nor where it comes from. It appears in my consciousness unasked and carries with it a troubling sensation. The sum total of the sensation is that I don't feel like a writer. The sensation says: "Hey, who do you think you are, trying to write a novel? You're not a writer, silly goose." I deeply experience this sensation, so deeply that it convinces me momentarily of its undeniable truth. 

My father seems to haunt the edges of it when it comes. Could be that when I sent him a bound copy of my MFA poetry thesis, he told me he hadn't read it because he didn't understand it. Maybe that's why his image is always a part of the sensation that materializes within the synapses of my brain. The thoughts that become clear when I'm feeling this sensation is my middle class, working class background and my wage earning dad who, actually, was a self-taught tool designer, a pretty technically difficult job that he learned on the job. Anyway, I put my head down and kept at, and, finally, had a pretty good morning and early afternoon of writing.

BEATNIK SILENT(LY) FALTERS IN HIS SELF-DESIGNED HALTER

Maya Angelou

Woke this morning and my first thought was about Pat Sajak & China/India. The game show expert, in a recent denial of the idea of global warming, called those who support the idea that global warming must be halted, "Racists." A friend of mine, yesterday, wondered, "WHAT?" This morning, before I even arose from my bed to see what was the matter, I understood, the WHAT. If we don't allow India and China to develop their industrial might, millions will be doomed to poverty. Add millions in Africa too. They are peoples whose skin isn't tinted pink. Got it, friend? Those who use global warming as a reason to stop industrial development would, as a byproduct, become racists. Poor scientists. They come up with the facts and politics blindsides them with handfuls of shit. 

Sunshining Day

Then I get out of bed to find that Maya Angelou at 86 has died. Overwhelmed at 76, sitting with a paper before my eyes that blinds me to the sun-shining day outside my picture window, I feel old and tired but, mostly, sad. As I read Maya's lifetime of accomplishments, my petty goal to get someone other than myself to publish one book of mine before I die feels futile, impossible and, mostly, inept. A desire to abandon all thought, quit writing and sit in the sun, merely enjoying my continued existence, is overwhelming ... almost.

HARRY BERNSTEIN TICKLES A BEATNIK'S FANCY

Harry Bernstein

Late at night [it's 3:52 am] sleepless after a funeral in Spokane, I gained new hope for my project to get someone other than myself to publish a book of mine. Inspiration arrived in the form of the story of Mr. Harry Bernstein whose first book was published at the ripe old age of 96.

Actually, I was feeling pretty energized before the trip to Spokane, but finding Bernstein's story added a nice plot twist for this post to the writer's blog I, as the Silent Boomer, keep. Can't wait to get back and get to work again. After struggling for several weeks with a plotting difficulty, a solution appeared on the drive from Vancouver to Spokane which I jotted down and now carry in my hip pocket along with various bits of debris. 

SILENT BOOMER THRASHES THROUGH ANOTHER STICKY THICKET

The plot gets twisted....

This week has been a good week for writing, but I did learn a painful lesson about plotting. Awhile back, I jammed a different Chapter -7- into the novel, then renumbered all the chapters that followed. I added the chapter because I felt I wanted to complicate the plot at that point and, secondly, to add some danger for PI Manning for the purpose of hyping up the excitement. I thought the novel might be dragging. Well, the plot complication I added created other unforeseen complications that couldn't be resolved in a plausible manner. Each time I moved from one chapter to the next, I'd discover my Chapter -7- complication created many other situations that needed to be adjusted for. The adjustments piled up and each adjustment made other adjustments necessary until the plot became a bog through which my mind could no longer safely travel. This week, I've had to go back and remove Chapter -7- and another later Chapter that was dependent upon Chapter -7- for it's existence. I'm in the process now of rereading and reworking—where necessary—everything after the offending chapter to make sure that consistency prevails. The writer who said that writers must have their plots in order before beginning to write seems to have been correct. I did sit down this week and tried to lay out a plot before continuing, but, goshdarnitall, I just can't see my way clearly through to the end. I like the beginning immensely, and I know, roughly, the ending, but the middle steps aren't clear yet. I just can't imagine, sitting still and waiting to see the plot all the way through. If I do that, I could easily quit writing altogether.

Want to mention an interesting project that friend and poet/song writer, klipschutz, and his pal Jeremy Gaulke have begun. It's a pocket size poetry chapbook, they call fourbytwo. They are trying to develop a zine that is financially sustainable as well maintain a certain level of quality. I like the format, and the poetry, of course, is exceptional. Follow the link to see what it's all about. 

BEATNIK BOOMER CONTEMPLATES LIFE AS A DALAI LAMA

Wonderful day. Just completed 4 mile walk along the Columbia, the frisky breeze rumpling my hair. Notice the disarranged hairs on the hair line atop the bald football field of my head. I was going to say "bald spot", but, today, I eschew the ridiculous.

Who understands the mysteries of an unstable brain? Yesterday, and for a few days previously, despairing yet again, I gave up writing. I imagined myself throwing my consciousness into meditation 4 hours a day, becoming an ever-giving spirit. I imagined myself turning into a smiling Dalai Lama. I dreamed of becoming such a love-filled personage that I shit sweet-smelling begonias ten times a day. That's right! It wouldn't stink. Oh, it was a marvelous dream, filled with pain and wonderful highs after days of suffering. Then, today, I woke up, perfectly contented, and returned to work on the Manning novel as if there had been no yesterday and will be no tomorrow. 

I have no idea where my moods come from. Brooding thoughts of my mortality accompanied the writer's block. Negative thoughts about what a horrible husband, son, stepson, father, worker, intellect and friend I am. I don't know whether the negative thoughts produced the writer's block or whether the writer's block produced the negative thoughts. They come and go like ghosts in the outhouse on a cold winter's night in Southern Ohio or coastal Alabama. Much like the capricious moments that drive the newly sober Florida alcoholic to go back to searching for the elixir of life in the Fontainebleau of Life. 

BEATNICK SILENT DOZING ALONG WITH THE TUMBLING TUMBLEWEED

Not writing today. Too tired, and several implausible sections in the Manning novel have become obvious and must be changed or worked around, and, as I said, too tired for intellectual labor today. Why am I tired? Just couldn't make myself go to bed last night until 1:15 am. Then for some reason I awoke at 5:30 am and could not get back to sleep for worrying about ... guess what? The recent changes in format at the Portland newspaper, The Oregonian. They've gone from a broadsheet version to a tabloid version. Looks so crappy on the newsstand, I fear people won't buy it. It's folded so poorly the front pages overlap the back pages by 3/4s of an inch. Hard to open that way. 

What's that, you say? I don't live in Oregon and don't subscribe to the Oregonian? Why worry, you say? Well I now know the Oregonian is owned by back-East moguls who have dictated the changes the Oregonian is undergoing. A major US city without local control of its destiny. I see its eventual demise as it struggles to cheapen the product. I know two people who say the news is cut way back, and they've quit subscribing. The end of print journalism will be one of the great forces that destroys American democracy. OK! So I'm fearful about nothing? Probably right, but this morning I couldn't talk myself out of worrying ... when I wasn't busy dozing....

My solution will be to spend most of the day, walking around in the sunshine, hoping to push myself back to writing tomorrow.

Hard to open that way. 
What's that, you say?
Why worry, you say?
[Well, I did write a poem today.]

BEATNICK SILENTLY FEELS BEAT AGAIN

I'm writing this moment at the Cascade Park Public Library after putting in two hours of writing at the Torque coffee shop and getting my third parking ticket in downtown Vancouver. See photo of Van. library over my shoulder.

Three nights in a row, I slept 8 to 10 hours yet still woke tired and discouraged. I wasn't able to write those three days, and all that ton of self-despising I carry around, waiting for me to tire and drop my guard, came crashing down, and I nearly gave up on writing for the tenth or hundredth time? I can't tell you how hard it's been during much of my life to get out from under the self-hatred and take a breath of air. It's there even when it's not there. If you understand me, you understand a lot. 

Exhaustion always carries with it negative thinking, and negative thoughts are like magnets. One negative thought attracts another. They collect together inside my all too human head and, collectively, they weigh tons. I'll feel that unrewarded writing is useless and worthless. I'll feel foolish and tell myself I'm too old to still be pecking away on a computer keyboard, trying to produce something that'll make me a little money. "After all these years, stupid," I tell myself, "if money for your writing was going to happen, it would have happened by now." To try to explain this to someone, other than my wife, also feels foolish. No one can imagine how much needless suffering I've felt over this obsession with writing and lack of monetary reward for it. I've carried it around most of my life. It sounds stupid to some more happily adjusted people I have not a doubt. I must add, that the angst is much reduced and doesn't appear half so often as it did in the past. Sobriety and much psychological work helps, but it waits, there, in the darkness, for its chances to return.

Then, last night I put in another 9 hours of sleep and, this morning, woke magically refreshed. The cloud of doubt and self-despising lifted for no good reason I can think of, and the sunshine of good spirits filled me. So today, I'm back at it, looking at Manning and trying to figure out "what happens next"—the constant voice that leads the novelist within me on the haphazard process of plotting a novel. 

BEAT BOOMER BEATS WAY THROUGH WRITER'S BLOCKHEAD

Four days pass and another entry on this blog overdue. Lately I've been battling the urge to give up on the Manning novel. Over the last 15 years, I've started at least 6 lengthy projects only to have them die off at 50 to 150 pages. I'm at the 150 page mark with Manning, and I've had to fight through the urge to stop each day for a week now. My brain tells me it wants to go back to doing algebra problems as it did for 6 years every morning after I retired from Mackay Manufacturing. I was happy enough, slogging through math problems just a few years ago, then I get something published in Work Literary Magazine, and the whole yearning awakes again. 

Homes like this one...

This morning, however, I fought through my drab feelings and wrote anyway. Once I got started, I felt much better. Then the sun came out from behind the clouds, the temps reached into the 50s, and after three solid hours of writing, I put on a light jacket to enjoy an hour and a half walk through a neighborhood of people whose successes have allowed them to own very nice homes. For all my blue collar anger at wealthy Americans, those I meet on my walks in this neighborhood are very friendly and welcoming, even if it's no more than a "howdy" greeting. In fact, both greetings this morning were exactly that: "Howdy!"  

Where do they come from, I ask myself with that greeting.