Things I Don't Tell My Wife
When everything gets dark and everyone goes to bed on Saturdays, I write all night. Well. That’s what I tell my wife. I might only write one paragraph. Some paragraphs need to be grabbed by the throat and strangled. At most, I write five pages. But then I might, for hours, sit in some weird stupor where I merely stare at the strangeness of my fingers. Or maybe I, for a good long time, gaze hard and intent at a pen or a coffee cup and try to move it with the bare focus of my mind. I believe strange things at night.
Sometimes I wander into the backyard and strip naked. Climb into the hot tub. It’s very dark and I’m always afraid there’ll be a dead body floating in the water. Or a clumsy drowned scorpion on the bottom that will sting my nervous foot. I don’t know why I’m so frequently bombarded by such creepy thoughts and images. I’m not sure what it means. I’m not sure it means anything at all. But I don’t find any comfort in believing it’s just my imagination.
Other times, I roam shirtless all around the neighborhood. The ability to write dialogue comes to me more freely when I’m walking. I mumble things aloud and use my hands for emphasis. Sometimes, I become aware of myself beneath a streetlight and try to remember how and when I became that man. The man who wanders the streets at night without a shirt, muttering to himself. I wonder if the neighbors see me, if the children whisper.
And then sometimes I roam into a densely wooded forest where I meet a little girl next to a big scary tree. She wears a red dress embroidered with yellow flowers and has no mom or dad. We sit together on a very big rock, drinking tea and eating monstrously sugared pastries. She says things like “You’re such a silly man.” and “Those bushes look like tiny little bears when the moon is just right.” I just nod and sip my tea. I almost always agree with her.
A cloud rips open like a torn stuffed animal and it rains pearls and coal. I am drenched to the bone with pearls and coal. The little girl is gone. She’s like that. I feel like something wants to kill me so I run, barefoot, along the shore of Lake Michigan, where I grew up. I see a church and I run right past. There’s a lone tennis shoe on the beach—the tennis shoe from the front page of the newspaper on the worst day of my life. But I’m still alive, so I keep on running. The sky is purple and the moon is still the moon. I feel like anything is possible. So much might happen. Anything could happen. You know?
There’s a small fire on the beach with six people gathered around it. A man plays a blue guitar and they’re all singing some moody ballad. I stop to ask them who they are and a woman asks me what page I’m on. “147,” I reply, and the man with the blue guitar tells me that they’re on page 148, to go home and write it. These are things that I don't tell my wife. This is what it’s like when I write all night.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Reader Comments (20)
Uh huh. I'm that person in the black dress with red grapes hanging from her ears who passed you in the forest. You looked like you knew where you going.
wow. just wow.
and thanks for introducing me to my hands, they are fucking awesome.
what is it with the apparitions that are not apparitions lately? what is the word for those goddamn things?
It's the paranoid delusion that makes great writers.
At least that's what I told myself as I ignored what I thought was a man walking down my hallway in the middle of the night. I figured he'd understand if I ignored him, being busy doing the dishes and all...
wow. I love this!
I write my dialogue in the car. It's the only time I mumble it aloud. I always wonder if people have caught me having weird conversations at stoplights.
Karl Jung's Red Book. He would go into his study in the evenings, and just kind of poke around inside his own head. And then he'd paint about it and write down the stories. His family was afraid it would destroy his reputation, because the stuff was so weird, stories of murder and snakes and who knows what all else. The world thought it would never be published because his family suppressed it for so many years. But it was published. Last month. Finally.
I haven't seen it yet, (it's expensive, I've asked for it for Christmas), but I don't think I'll find it weird. Disturbing, distressing, wonder-full, certainly. Mostly, though, I expect to derive comfort from it. From knowing that the places I go in my head are merely human and full of magic. I just can't put words to them the way you can.
Thank you.
It may be the Musinex I'm on, but I am right there with you. And I'm on page 239. You'll need to keep up with me.
Goddamn.
How much acid did you used to do when you were a kid? If only I could be so surreal...
This is why i'm not a morning person.
[ insert words here ]
I write poems, in my head, when I am in the shower, hiding from the world. They are mighty find poems. My showers are so long that If I was a a teenage boy, one would likely think I had some kind of masturbation problem.
Nice.
Growing up, I fell asleep each night to the sound of Lake Michigan lapping the shore. Maybe I've passed you on the beach.
Sweat lodge comes to mind reading this. Maybe you should find an old Native American and build a sweat lodge with him.
I always think there is going to be a body in my hot tub too!! I've never even told my husband about that twisted thought. Weird.
But I think that is about all we have in common. I really have no angst. errrr, except for the dead body stuff.
I wish I had something more articulate to say other than "Wow!" or "This is fantastic!" but you have the most amazing way of rendering a person speechless. You're an awesome writer.
Incidentally, I founded and maintain the site IndieInk.Org (www.indieink.org) and I would turn cartwheels if you were to consider sharing this essay (or, really, any of your writing) with the site. If you have any questions, please let me know. I'm at either my personal email included with this comment or stacy AT indieink DOT org. :)
I've always loved hands. Not my own so much, but everyone else's. I take pictures of my kids' hands, my husband's hands. Everyone else's, I just stare at when they're not looking. There's something truly amazing in them.
there's really not much more that can be added after something like that.
Came from Creepy's recommendation. This was so worth the click.