Unstuck in my Own Brain: Tips on Writing from Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

I read several Vonnegut novels in quick succession back in the early 1990’s, and he sits in my pantheon of favorites as a result. For some reason, although I never memorize first and last lines from novels, I’ll never forget the bracketing words of Slaughterhouse Five: “Poo-tee-WEET?” The sound of the bird, having nothing to do with the storyline as I recall, appears at the beginning and end of this novel. (I think it actually appears at the end of the first chapter and then again at the end of the book but I don’t have a copy to check and somehow the meta-reality of memory serves me pretty well for the purposes of this post.)  

In a way, it defines the circularity and the infinite repetition that defines how Billy Pilgrim’s “unstuck in time” journey proceeds. The creative brain lives outside of time as represented by the story. Memories are in the now. I’m sure I’d have to re-read the novel to give a better idea of just why it stuck with me. It might have helped that I also saw the movie, similarly sometime in the ‘90s. And now, with these memories swirling in the Tralfamadorian bubble over my head, I struggle to find something, anything to write about. 

This is part of my attempt to overcome a stubborn and long-lasting block. This block has me questioning my sanity, intelligence and purpose in life. It threatens to throw me into a dark pit out of which I cannot climb. I always think that a good writer has to have had extraordinary experiences, just as Vonnegut’s being in the firestorm in Dresden in WWII must have fired up a burner inside his creative mind, slowly cooking up the magnificent piece of literature that is Slaughterhouse Five.
So here’s Vonnegut’s list; I intend to pick something out of thin air and apply these rules to it somehow. But the real trick is finding the sticking point. My entire life feels “unstuck” right now. Wish me luck:

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Advises the Would-be Writer of Stories

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things — reveal character or advance the action.
5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a sadist. Now matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them — in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.                                                 

Thanks, Kurt. I have some books that have suffered the cockroach attack (although it was mice in my case). So now it is time to ruffle the index cards in my dying brain, create a whole bunch of scenarios, and see if a strong character emerges. One of my projects is the 2012 Samurai Fiction contest  over at samuraiarchives.com . Please, folks, if you’re at all into Japanese culture, history or even into cheesy martial arts films, submit something to this contest. I’m tired of winning it almost every year with only 3-4 people to compete against. But I enter compulsively every year, just because I enjoy doing it.

Until next time….Poo-tee-WEET? 

Paralyzed Inside Old Man Willow: Caught in a Depression Trap

“Pippin had vanished. The crack by which he had laid himself, had closed together, so that not a chink could be seen. Merry was trapped: another crack had closed about his waist; his legs lie outside, but the rest of him was inside a dark opening, the edges of which gripped like a pair of pincers.”-J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring, Chapter 6: The Old Forest

I’ve been blocked. For months. That’s not to say I haven’t been writing. I’ve written lots of fragments, but they’re all crap. They inhabit my Crap folder (no, it isn’t really called that, but it oughta be). This is another attempt to actually explain my lack of output in the past few months. I’ll count it a success if anyone actually reads it. Of course, in order for that to happen, I have to actually POST it. And that’s hard to do when you’ve been swallowed up by Old Man Willow.

Where did this come from?

It is my speculation that one cause of my latest black depressive episode arises from a step I took back in May of 2012, when I finally told the story of my rape/home invasion experience of 22 years ago. It was a personal revelation, made in order to fulfill an assignment (ironically about depression) on Yahoo! Contributor Network. It seemed like it was time to tell that story and clear the air. Plus, telling it allowed my responses in other fora to pack more of a punch, the punch of firsthand experience. I got a few condolences (I’m not dead yet!) and some admiration (they must not know me too well!) but mostly it went unnoticed around the webz, since this place is so big. 

I’ve been trying to break my inability to post meaningful content for awhile now, and, for some reason, I have come up against a wall, a psychic pushback and has made forming coherent phrases and sentences nigh unto impossible at times. It has been very frustrating. It seems to me that the only way to work myself out of the depressive hole I’ve fallen into is to write, but I can’t make it work. So I try again, and again, and again. And the frustration rises. Now, the depression is kicking in hard. My favorite holiday, Halloween, is tomorrow, and I can’t even muster up the energy to find a costume. 

At home, life is busy and unforgiving, peppered with short quiet patches where I contemplate just how to achieve all the high-flown goals I’ve put forward for myself over the past year. And then I stare at the hoarder’s hell I live in and despair. I can’t even get to certain corners of my house. I could initiate a thorough cleaning session, but it would take at least 30 of these to make a dent, and of course, my chronic back pain and sciatica make even one 2 hour session a real challenge. (Oh yeah, and there’s all those regular duties I have to complete first).

Add to that that my current pain medication is becoming less and less effective. So there’s a physical mess, a mental blockage, probable PTSD, lack of a social support system in my area (which wouldn’t matter because I’m chronically schizoid and avoidant anyway), escalating chronic pain, and oh yeah, perimenopause, let’s add that in for colorful effect. So things don’t look so rosy in this neck of rural Tennessee right now. 

If you really want a description of how it feels to be in my head right now, think of the lowest level of the psychic construct concrete city in the movie “Inception.” I feel somewhat like Ken Watanabe looked after he had been caught in this matrix for what seemed like years and years to him but were actually mere moments in real life. I know this is a paralyzing illusion, but that doesn’t make it any less hard to escape.

If you’ve stayed with me until now, you deserve a prize. Really I’m just trying to get my fingers moving again and a coherent path to writing regularly going again. This too will pass, and, in the meantime, I think I hear Frodo coming with Tom Bombadil. Nah, I just imagined it. In real life, I have to dig myself out of the clutches of the ancient dark forest willow all by myself. Wish me luck.