Murder.....


I talked to the guy downstairs working on my computer and its worse than I thought. When I downloaded the programs first it knocked out my virus protection then, without knowing, I allowed it access to the internet. From there it let all its little friends in who spread like flesh eating bacteria and wreaked havoc. I was able to scoop the surface and take some of the little nasties out but my network card is fried and the entire HD may need to be wiped.
It's not so bad since I've only had it for three months and I'm able to save all the writing I did on it but it's still a huge pain in the ass.
Now I feel like I've been living in the colonial era. What did people do in the olden, pre internet days? I can't even go and write since I have no CPU. I've spent a lot of time writing in a notebook, like I used to do in high school and college. I try not to do that because it seems so pathetic- years later I found all these sheets of stories I had written in college and it seemed so sad. No one would ever read them. They weren't bad, I actually was impressed that I could write so well so long ago, but I knew they would go no farther than the paper. Still, there's something to be said for just writing, your words tiny and smashed together, knowing no one will ever see it.
I've spent a lot of time meditating as well. I imagine I'm injured and far away and alone and it's actually reassuring. When I had my accident years ago it was this time of year- grey and dismal and I spent most of the days in a dim room with only periodic checks by the nurse and hospital food (which I actually loved). I watched bad reruns of terrible shows and could only see the sky and part of the top floor of the hospital. Once in a while a bird would rest on the sill and that was a moment of excitement for me. In my memories I imagine it as a raven though it was most likely a pigeon.
Now I remember what it felt like, laying in bed for hours, feeling your body heal but too drugged to do anything else, wondering about friends, school, the world seemed so far away. It felt like I was removed from society. You could have dug a hole, thrown me in and buried me alive and I would have felt no different.
I've been writing a lot, which gets me to think that maybe I should get rid of the internet altogether and become the world's most prolific writer. In fact much of my work is reviewing bios of authors for textbooks and that's pretty encouraging. I had planned to do a long piece about how miserable most writers are or how much my life seems to parallel the lives of a lot of accomplished writers and I still may but right now I have to say how many writers are driven by loss. Most of it loss of love or family or sanity. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edgar Allen Poe, Harry Crews, Emily Dickinson, HP Lovecraft, all had difficulties in love that fueled their writing and made them such unique authors. Ambrose Bierce was a cynical, mean motherfucker that couldn't hold a job for too long before going crazy. I've become obsessed with writing and writers. It's seem to have taken the place of sex as my no. 1 interest, which is good because I got sick of thinking about sex all the time.

Now I'm reading The Willow Tree, one of the few books I saved from the fire that I haven't read. It's by Hubert Selby Jr. and it's still covered in smoke, though not burned or water damaged. It seems appropriate for one of his books. He's another one driven by misery but writes such goddamnfantasticstuff you can't imagine anyone well balanced writing anything so real. I'll have to do a piece on him when I get things back together. What a fucked up life. He died in 2004 and I just heard about it last week. Surprised he lasted this long.
I can't read any of his stuff without becoming very morose and incredibly depressed so I don't start any of his books unless I'm already in that state. Right now I'm not, I'm actually unnaturally happy, but it seems the perfect time to read it- on the train in the morning, passing by the abandoned projects, the sky grey and the air still wet from the night's rain. The woman next to me was reading Tuesdays with Morrie. I'm not sure why.
The Willow Tree is about a boy living in a tenement infested with rats who was beat up for dating a hispanic girl. The girl had lye thrown in her face and now her mother and grandmother, who can't speak any English are beside themselves with anger, fear, confusion, worry. Bobby (the boy) is slowly recuperating, his body bruised and too sore to move. It's a fucked up story but damn, can he write.