The Day I Have Dreaded Is Here.....

“Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies — ‘God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.’ ”

This is a quote from the book, God bless You Mr. Rosewater, by the now late, but always great, Kurt Vonnegut.

I discovered today, while looking at R. Kelly's blog, that he is no longer with us...

This is distressing to me for so many reasons, it may be hard even to explain... But I will try.....

I have had many people influence my life...

John Evans was the first bike messenger I ever met.... he helped to effectively ruin me for normal life...

My father, a very smart, and hard working salesman, who struggled with me and my issues the best that he could......

But almost above all, spurred on by a exploration through my mom's library, was Mr. Vonnegut...

My mind was never the same after reading his stories and books.

The crafty way that he wove in and out of his stories like they were one in the same...

The way his love for Indiana shown through everything.

The morality of his fiction also shown through, like a guiding light....

When I moved to Indianapolis for a while, I lived mere blocks from the house he grew up in.

I would ride my bike by slowly, hoping to see him coming for a visit. of course, he never did..... But I waited for the day..

I did see him on the sidewalk outside what used to be the Metro downtown one day.
I knew he was in town for a lecture at PSU.
I chose to say "Hi". He said "Hi".
And I moved on down the sidewalk.......

That is how I work.
Even though I had a thousand questions to ask, and I had his full attention, I knew the right thing to do was just say hello, and move along....

I have often thought that with my crazy mind, and his crazy mind, we may have had a hell of a conversation..........


The real thing I learned from his writings, is contradictory to everything I have been taught.
It is something that I hear about a lot, in comments about my writing.

This is using the word "I". And "You". And "Me". Not even just a little, but a lot.

Not what you are supposed to do.

Kurt put himself deep into his stories. As the ghost of a man who died building a cruise ship.

As a resident of Rosewater, Indiana, in any number of his books..

As the father of the atomic bomb, and creator of "Ice Nine", a crystal of material that has the ability to freeze the world in a half an instant...

He was never afraid to go against conventional thought.

I wonder what he even knew of it, having been a employee at a telephone company a lot of his early life, before turning to writing.....

I think that a huge life lesson could be learned here. A lesson about immersion.

Throw your all into what you do. Put huge pieces of yourself into whatever it is you do....Into everything you do...


The more I read today, peoples thoughts after his death, early reactions to his writing, etc., the more I identify with him...And the sadder his passing makes me feel.

This is a very sad day for free thought in America.....