November 6, 2014

November 6, 2014

It has become a tough year.  First and foremost, I lost the Nobel Prize for Literature, and also lost the translation prize for my publication of Boris Vian’s “Red Grass, ” as well as most of my fortune, that I have spent without any qualms about my security.  My refusal to work for a living, as well as my snobbish attitude towards my fellow citizens, has not made me “likable” or “presentable.” My once earned public has been abandoning me by the droves. It is like I’m a theater and someone in the audience yelled out “fire.” My car broke down, and I had to sell it part-by-part, to make money to eat.  All I have left is the steering wheel.  I used to eat well, but now pretty much have my dinner, lunch, and a light breakfast at the local AM/PM market.  I tried to grow some vegetables in my backyard, but due to the water shortage in our state, as well as the gophers, the greens are pretty much gone.

“A man can’t be angry at his own time without suffering some damage.” I figure if I just lay on the couch and not move at all, I will find some peace.   One thing I do notice is the passing of time, which happens slowly.  I pretty much wait for the darkness to take charge of the room.  I could put some lights on, but I want to save money, so I sit in the darkness and think about my soul.  Lately I have placed special emphasis on eliminating a lot of objects and things around me.  For instance, do I need to hear music.  I have heard a great deal of music in my life, that I can probably hum melodies by the hundreds.  So I will sell my hi-fi as well as all the vinyl.   I’ll discontinue the Internet service, and focus on the paper and pen.  To be exact, I can go to Muji to buy a cheap notebook (you can purchase five notebooks at a discount when it is shrink-wrapped together) a ballpoint pen, and one or two pencils.   I’ll get rid of my bed, and just sleep on the couch.  Or is it possible to rent out the bedroom?  Perhaps I could rent it by the hour to the young gentlemen who need a bed to have sex on.

I used to be a movie fan, in fact my hero was Thomas Ince, because he was one of the first people to actually put a movie studio together.  He saw film making as a factory business.  It takes a man with a larger vision to become something important.  Since my resources are dwindling to nothing, perhaps I should organize my life as a studio and not as an individual.  By the end of the day, or sometime before the room goes totally dark, I should finish something.  Right now, I guess it will have to be some sort of writing.   On the other hand, I should do something modest and not too grand.  A page a day.  To save paper, I’ll write in pencil as well as corrections, and re-write that page with ink.

Thinking right now, it should be a journal.  Not much is happening around me, but my head is full of thoughts.  Sometimes I can’t stop them.   What I need is a good old-fashioned editor, but I don’t know anyone who could do that type of work.  I just have to think like Ince, in that there is one compartment in the studio that does a certain type of work, and there is another office that will finish it.  If I can just project my couch as one space, and the small table and chair across the room as another space, I think I’ll be fine.