On the Road
I was on the road at 6:00 a.m.
A Sunday. I'm going to The Red Bar
to listen
to Dread Clampitt. I'm driving east,
so the sun is in my eyes. Yesterday, at
my signing table
I read about going to the viewing of Wild Horse, at the funeral
home
in Milton. Walking the ground in Bagdad, Florida. "We support
our
troops. Out of business." I'm driving 55. Cars pass me.
The speed limit
is 70. Am I a living fossil or a moldy fig?
Facing the Music
Billy Childs' CD, Lyric, is available
exclusively through his web site.
He's
nominated for several Grammies
for it. I don't think you can do that
with
a book. He was interviewed on NPR,
and got to play his music. Also, he has
a
chamber music grant. The interviewer
asked him if 2006 was going to be a big
year
for him, and he said, "Yes." 2005 was
a big year for me.
But I shot my wad.
The tide crested, and started to recede.
2006 will be back-to-work.
If I can find
a job, with no tits and no veteran's preference.
I did what
I could with what I had. Soon it will be
time to face the music. Like a gopher
in a tub.
We want tunas that taste good, Charlie.
Bossman
Was my trip to Fairhope a success?
Yes, it was. I sold two books, I met
some
people, I was invited back,
in March, for an arts-day street-fair.
I might
have gotten a booking for Dread Clampitt.
I got some raw material to digest, or
process,
or transfer directly into type, without the intervention of
an editor,
a lawyer, an accountant. Finish of fools, Cézanne called
the finish the academy
sought, when he formed his Salon des refusés.
Salon of the Rejected. River
City Press informs me that,
"We can't publish your books." Strike that.
"We are not able to."
They are impaired. Exigencies of the service
having been such
as to preclude the issuance of competent written orders in advance,
the
verbal orders of the commander (VOCO) pertaining to the travel of
the following-named
airmen (FNA) are hereby confirmed: Jack Saunders to
Fairhope, Alabama, by privately-owned
vehicle (POV). I'm my own police.
My own bossman. If I want to do something,
I do it. If I can't, I don't.
Sunday Night
I got home Sunday evening at suppertime.
Good to be home, to see Brenda, to
be back
to my studio, my routine. Well, tomorrow is
Martin Luther King Day.
Brenda's off, and we'll pick Del up
at the airport, Monday night, and I am behind
on my typing,
but I see how it's going to end. Then I can end this book
and
start the next one, concluding with What I Learned.
The transitional books are
short. Beethoven alternated
between odd- and even-numbered symphonies.
Three
and five are more ambitious than two or four.
It's almost like he rested. So
AFTER BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK:
AN ONLINE JOURNAL (OLJ) is what came between BLUE-COLLAR
REDNECK:
WHY WON'T NOBODY HIRE ME TO BE A WRITER? and
THE CLASS OF '57 HAD ITS DREAMS,
BY JACK SAUNDERS,
THE SWINETTE-PICKER OF AMERICAN LETTERS.