Q: In Hotwalker: Charles Bukowski and a Ballad for Gone America, Tom Russell writes about Merle Haggard.

A: Donn Pearce called Merle Haggard "a hick from Bakersfield."

Q: I like Merle Haggard.

A: WORKINGMAN'S BLUES NO. 2 was inspired by the family song, "If We Make It Through December."

I'm going to get laid off in October.

In time for Thanksgiving. And Christmas.

You used to could hear Jimmy Rodgers and Lefty Frizzell on the radio.

Bill Monroe.

Bill Monroe wasn't trying to invent bluegrass. He was trying to go on playing country music in the face of changed circumstances.

So were the Stanley Brothers, Flatt and Scruggs, Del McCoury.

Del McCoury has a new boxed set out with five CDs. 50 years of music.

Q: You've been writing almost 40 years.

Didn't you write a book called BOXED SET?

A: GREATEST HITS BOXED SET.

GREATEST HITS BOXED SET: A PRETTY FAIR COUNTRY WRITER IN A SUBGENRE FILLED WITH SECOND-RATERS. Covers 40 years in the life of an American writer, from the time he drops out of high school and enlists in the Air Force until he completes his magnum opus (and 135th unsold, or undersold novel), GREATEST HITS BOXED SET. Contains three parts: "Conditions of Production," "Daily Typewriting: Scenes from a Working Writer's Life," and "Tradecraft: The Way of the Pariah," which describe how he became who he is--America's greatest writer. He thought he was through, with the first part, which is longer than the other two. But they added themselves on. I drive to Chatsworth, to hear Owen play, on a bill with The Isaacs and Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys. I drive to Wewa for Thanksgiving. Brenda and I spend the following weekend at The Oaks, in Panacea, and I drive to St. Marks, and eat oysters-on-the-half-shell and smoked mullet at Posey's. I receive a salary merit increase and a performance bonus at work, which I spend on our two clapped-out Key West vehicles and for skirting around the bottom of Brenda's trailer. I get two drafts of maintenance manuals out at work on time. I drive to Wewa for Christmas. We go to Apalachicola to eat, with Owen and Jeannie, by way of Cape San Blas. Owen buys a bag of oysters. We eat Christmas dinner with Potter and Suzette in Santa Rosa Beach. I begin pitching book proposals to publishers and literary agents. I am sent to a quality Continuous Improvement workshop at the Gwinnett Marriott. I attend a Suent HONK Initiative Kickoff Breakfast. I comment on Florida's long-range statewide arts plan, FALCON (Florida Arts Leadership Conference). I think globally. And write locally. All genius is local. Particular. Tied to a time, and a place. I'm not an engaged writer, I'm an engorged writer. Raise the bridge! A recipe for rouge-gorge, or robin red-breast. A Wewahitchka, Florida writer will make do. The closest thing I can compare GREATEST HITS BOXED SET to is Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn, and Black Spring, rolled into one. Possibly Castle to Castle, Rigadoon, and North. Or--worst case--Watt, Molloy, and Malone Dies. It's that fine, that innovative, that shocking-in a world that titillates and shocks for shock's effect. It's just what we've been needing. A good scour. Strong medicine.

Q: What was that--ten years ago?

A: Yea, probably.

Brenda hadn't moved to Atlanta yet.

She was living in Wewa and working at the prison.

Mike Lister was the prison chaplain. He hadn't published his first John Jordan mystery yet.

Q: A lot of water under the bridge.

A: A lot of other stuff too.

Q: You seem sad today.

A: Duane died.

Q: Duane who?

A: Duane Moore.

The Last Picture Show, Texasville, Duane's Depressed, When the Light Goes, and Rhino Ranch.

Q: He had a good run.

A: I'll miss him.

Del McCoury has a wood stove in his band bus and a dog box on the back.

Q: You could subtitle WORKINGMAN'S BLUES NO. 2 BALLAD FOR A GONE AMERICA.

A: BALLAD FOR A LOST NORTHWEST FLORIDA.

Bill Monroe played Jay, Florida

The Stanley Brothers used to live in Live Oak.

I saw the Lewis Family in Blountstown.

In fact, I saw the Lewis Family in Panama City. In a Baptist church in Callaway.

Little Roy asked me how Owen was.

Q: BALLAD FOR A LOST PARADISE.

A: I would add Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen and Paradise to the list of Duane Moore books I enjoyed. Two memoirs Larry McMurtry wrote. Or meditations on writing.

Q: Is WORKINGMAN'S BLUES NO. 2 a memoir or a meditation on writing?

A: I don't know. What do you think?

Q: You're just getting old. Old men write SHIT USED TO BE BLACKER AND RICHER again and again.

A: We didn't keep Rowan this weekend.

Jennifer took him to Atlanta with her.

He's potty-trained, and easier to take care of.

And his other grandmother likes to see him.

Q: I wonder what that guy thought, who sat across from you and listened to you talk about writing and the writing life for 45 minutes.

A: I wonder.

What a treat, though.

To go to a writer's conference and have America's greatest writer talk to you one-on-one for 45 minutes.

Q: Or a clown in a suit made of Vienna sausages.

A: What is the correspondence novel?

Q: WORKINGMAN'S BLUES NO. 2: A CORREPONDENCE NOVEL.

You get it in the mail. Or read it at a writer's web site.

A: The adventures of Large Pyle.

Large Pyle goes to a writers conference. Wows the chicks.

Q: It isn't over until the fat lady sings.

A: Honor Carmichael got fat. In Rhino Ranch.

We all get fat and die.

Q: Are you going to keep writing this until you get laid off?

A: No.

No need to.

I didn't show my ass.

Q: The pod people.

A: Bless their hearts.

Finish writing my machinist's course, get laid off.

Watch the health care flap on TV.

Watch movies like Trumbo. Rented DVDs.

Q: Help Underserved Arts Communities--or I'll kill you.

A: Fuck the doomed. As Nixon said to Harris of the Post.

Turn on the TV and watch Pat Buchanan talk about how Nixon would have done it.

Q: We don't have Nixon to kick around anymore.

A: No.

Faulkner said the past is not dead, it's not even the past.

Q: It's the present.

A: Who controls the past controls the future.

Let me tell you what it was like. When Nixon got in.

I was an NDEA Fellow, at Tulane, majoring in anthropology.

He shut the federal money to higher education off. I was stranded in the pipeline.

That was the point. Nixon was punishing the hippies. For Kent State.

Q: You weren't a hippie.

A: I was for McGovern before Miami.

Q: That's bad enough.

A: People remember. People have long memories.

They remember.

Q: They have short attention spans.

A: You're born, you learn something to do, you work, you die.

If you enjoy your work you're lucky.

Blessed, as Carlyle says.

Blessed is the man who's found his work.