Q: There are only two plots in literature. (1) A man goes on a journey, and (2) a stranger rides into town.

A: That’s one plot, seem from two different points of view. All literature is one plot, seen from two different points of view.

Jack Saunders
Garage Band Books
Box 10501
Panama City, FL 32404

Copyright © 2006 by Jack L. Saunders, Jr.

Friday, January 6

I finished HONORS AND AWARDS today with two endings.

Either I was going to storm on in to LET ME SHOW YOU MY REDNECK RIVIERA: WHERE THE DEBRIS MEETS THE SEA, OR, HOW TO LIVE AN AUTHENTIC LIFE IN A CULTURE OF PHONIES or I was going to fall back and regroup, stop and smell the roses, pause, take stock, and not burn myself out.

I think I'll take the second option but write an online journal (OLJ) just to keep my hand in, and keep the members of the Buzzard Cult happy.

HONORS AND AWARDS was the third part of a book called BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK: WHY WON'T NOBODY HIRE ME TO BE A WRITER?

I like the way the book turned out.

Part I. Employment History. November 1 - November 25. 45,000 words. Marriage, the death of parents, the birth of children. Jobs. From laborer in a feldspar mine to senior information development specialist, Lucent Technologies. Born, died, in-the-service. Like Trollope's chronicles. Begin editing anthology Adventures in the Underground for Postcards From Pottersville series from Pottersville Press. Sign books at a table at Books-A-Million with three Pottersville Press authors. Relatives come to town for Balder and Jennifer's wedding. Gerald and Del are already here, staying with us, Hurricane Katrina evac from Slidell, Louisiana. Brenda bakes a six-layer wedding cake. I do a drop-in, meet-the-author event at a fan's house. I schedule a book-signing at Page and Palette in Fairhope, Alabama, for January.

Part II. Education. November 26 - December 21, 2005. 51,000 words. Public school, military training, industrial schools. University, graduate school, the College of Hard Knocks. Gerald and Del go to Mobile for Thanksgiving. They hope to have a FEMA trailer set up in their yard in Slidell. We eat Thanksgiving dinner at The Lake Place restaurant, and have their signature crab bisque soup. Brenda cooks a turkey the next day. Jodi eats with us and tells us about her trip to Paris. We watch a Korean movie, Oldboy. Gerald and Del come back a day early. Their FEMA trailer will be on site within 20 days. Might as well stay here for Christmas and New Years. We go to see the Seaside Rep production of Jacob Marley's Christmas Carol, starring Craige Hoover, directed by Laley Lippard. The last production we saw was Laley Lippard as Sylvia, directed by Craige Hoover. Teance Selfridge, who was Patsy Cline's pal Louise, in Always...Patsy Cline, is painting sets. Sam Bush sits in with Electric Dread at a private party. Sam and Balder tear it up. Brenda tapes Oprah on Letterman for Del. "You're so beautiful, your career's so hot." "You're so beautiful, your career's so hot." A love fest. I revise EMPLOYMENT HISTORY, making it a memoir, in the first person, taking out the dates, the query letters, some of the questions for the anthology. Like Charles Willeford, writing Something About a Soldier as a novel, then deciding it is autobiography, and changing the names back to the names of real people.

Part III. Honors and Awards. December 23 - January 6. 29,000 words. Attaboys and gotchas. Del flies to California to visit her grandchildren for Christmas. Gerald hears he has a FEMA trailer being hooked up in his yard. I send Dan Roth the first three pages of HONORS AND AWARDS. 2007 is the 50th reunion of our high school Class of '57. The Class of '57 had its dreams. Maybe by then a New York publisher will publish LET ME SHOW YOU MY REDNECK RIVIERA: WHERE THE DEBRIS MEETS THE SEA, OR, HOW TO LIVE AN AUTHENTIC LIFE IN A CULTURE OF PHONIES in hardback and publish the three books of Blue Collar Redneck: Why Won't Nobody Hire Me To Be a Writer? in paperback, as a boxed set. Like William Kennedy's publisher publishing Ironwood in hardback and reissuing the books of the Albany Cycle in paperback. That is, I am writing books I assume are going to sink, hoping that the next one I write will rescue me. What would lead a person to do that? Experience. Plus, I always like to have a book out under review, in manuscript, a book I'm writing, and a book I plan to write next. I'm a book writer. I write about what happens to my books. What happens is they sink without a trace and I go back to work. Who told me to write books? I write about how will I write LET ME SHOW YOU MY REDNECK RIVIERA: WHERE THE DEBRIS MEETS THE SEA, OR, HOW TO LIVE AN AUTHENTIC LIFE IN A CULTURE OF PHONIES if I don't sell Blue Collar Redneck: Why Won't Nobody Hire Me To Be a Writer? I'll write the next one the same way I wrote this one. Without any guaranty. On spec. Because it's what I do. What does success or failure have to do with an ongoing, 40-year process? Celebrate the process. Be happy in your work. Other people have job jobs, other writers have job jobs, don't turn writing into a job, it's a call. Celebrate the call. I didn't take a year off to write something commercial, I took a year off to write something noncommercial, anticommercial, to give myself a birthday present, I'm selfish, irresponsible, I have an attitude, I have frittered away my life telling the company to go fuck itself, why would the company give me a pension, a gold watch, a book contract, the company wants to drive a stake through my heart, as an example. The company can't keep it off the worldwide web. I'm where I am supposed to be, doing what I am supposed to do. You don't hire someone to be a writer. A writer writes like a volcano erupts. The writing flows, unbidden and unstanchable. Stand back! I write because I want to, not because I have to. And I can take a break, if I feel like it.

I think the three parts hold together as a book.

I'm going to go back through and edit it now.

I sent query letters about it out to River City Publishing and University of Alabama Press for their Deep South Books imprint. Haven't heard back yet.

It looks now like it's a long book in three parts, rather than a series of three short books.

But Freddy Riedenschneider's Uncertainty Principle states that you can look at it either way.

When I started posting my books at The Daily Bugle, in March 2000, there were a few online journals, but not so many weblogs (blogs). Now everybody and her brother has a blog.

I said the books I was posting at The Daily Bugle weren't just an OLJ. They were novels with journal entries as one component. Other components were poems, prose vignettes, essays, letters to friends, replies to comments I received like Joy Rothke's. "Jack: Please give it a rest. Your endless rants about the idiots who don't appreciate your art are so fucking tiresome."

After BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK: An Online Journal (OLJ) is just an OLJ. Like May Sarton's After the Stroke: A Journal. Except that people can (1) read it in real time, as it is being written, and (2) write to me about it, by snail mail or email, and read my response to their comments.

BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK: WHY WON'T NOBODY HIRE ME TO BE A WRITER? was a memoir, but as it was a memoir about a writer's life, it was also a meditation on literary forms, forms like the memoir, the novel, the journal.

A journal is a good form to meditate about literary forms in.

After BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK: An Online Journal (OLJ) implies that BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK was some kind of a turning point, a summation, a breakthrough
.
It was. I no longer feel like I have to write the great American novel. I did it. It was a memoir.

Now I can just keep a journal. About my thoughts and feelings, my pedestrian activities, my daily routine.

What happens to BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK.