Escape (not the pina colada song)

Last week I was in France, England, D.C., Vermont, and South Carolina. Or maybe just one of those places, where I landed on a very comfy couch and watched many movies that took me elsewhere. If there is a vicarious experience I enjoy more than reading books, it is watching movies. Sometimes I wonder if I should be troubled by the fact that escapism is my primary mode of entertainment. Still, I am not guzzling books or shooting films into my veins, or believing Dungeons & Dragons is real life, like the kid in that extremely scary 1980s after-school special, where -- maybe I dreamed this? -- he prowls around the sewer system in a trench coat, years before trench coats on young people were ominous. So there's that.

Let me simplify by combining all the films into one: an old maid (at age 27!) has been persuaded not to marry an unsuitable man, who of course returns to show her what she's missing (plus honor, valor, rank and status, etc. etc.), then the sister comes home from prison but we don't know what she's done until nearly halfway through, and everybody is gathered for their friend's funeral and some kitchen dancing, and a semi-mysterious corpse is buried, dug up, buried, dug up, and so on, for a variety of reasons that mostly serve to complicate the plot.

Now I am returned to the Unironic Heartland, where we wear our earnestness on our rolled-up sleeves. We (that would be me, royally) are probably better served by avoiding the DVD extras where actors and directors sit in their canvas-backed chairs and talk about how splendid everyone was to work with. Know what would be more splendid? If only we'd maintained the illusion that the world on the screen was real. If only we'd stayed in that dream state a little longer. A place where, venturing out between movies, my thoughts resembled something like this:

New fiction for the reading

My new short story, "Marv's 11 Steps," is now up at anderbo.com.

Anderbo.com is edited by Rick Rofihe, who was generous with his time and comments on this piece. I cannot vouch for whether he is like an owl, as this interview attests, but if that means wise, then yes.

This character, Marv, appeared last summer during the Advanced Institute of the Hoosier Writing Project. I spent a week with other writing teachers, and each day we wrote, discussed writing and teaching, and learned a million and one new things. And we wrote. Whatever we wanted. For hours on end. Which to some may sound like pulling teeth, but to me is like getting to eat candy all day, every day, with no dental repercussions.

The squirrels mean business

This happened a few weeks ago. I am apprehensive about mentioning it, even now: the squirrels bogart the wireless from out back, up high in the trees that may soon crash through the roof. They hack my e-mail and agree to transfer funds to BANK OF LAGOS. They have grown as big as cats. They slam into the storm door, scrambling upwards to the decorative gourd display. They stash dirty magazines in their obscene nests. Sometimes they look pretty at sunset, silhouettes balancing along a branch as they scurry home. They look pretty until I remember the pumpkin dragged from the porch and halfway down the walk, seeds everywhere, stringy guts tangling around my shoe. The squirrels are preparing a list of demands. I keep looking for the note.

Sarah Layden is not the first person to speak in third person, you know

Sarah Layden thinks there are compelling reasons to speak of yourself in the third person. In terms of point of view, it's a distancing mechanism, a means to evaluate and take a breath outside of the self and turn the subjective into something objective. In third person, one need not take any sort of real ownership over a statement. After all, Sarah Layden said the thing. Not "I," said the fly. But you still get credit, even if you're quoting a song or a movie, even if you're getting messy and incorporating second person, which you and your second cousin know can bring a reader close while pushing him away; bit of a tease, second person.

Sarah Layden will stir fry you in her wok.

Sarah Layden observes that the social networks are like the high school auditoriums of nightsweat dreams, where everyone you've ever met is in the same echoey chamber, commenting on various aspects of your life as presented by you or others. Sarah Layden considers the addictive quality of this experience. Like. Dislike. Become a fan. Start a war.

Sarah Layden wants to throw all the cell phones in the river.

Sarah Layden didn't mean your phone, silly. She knows you need it in order to text important messages to God in a desperate prayer to save you from an inevitable car accident while swerving into her lane. Hello! That was close. Sarah Layden currently contributes to the public record with full knowledge that someone, a reporter, will dredge this blargh up when she is maimed or killed by a driver who is texting. Or WORSE: Sarah Layden will text while driving.

Sarah Layden rages against her own machine.

Sarah Layden's parents tell her things about herself she never knew.

Sarah Layden does and does not want to tell you things. About herself, but also her observations about you. Big things, little things, medium-sized things. Mountain-sized things. Some nights, she thinks about the next morning's coffee. She has had some houseplants for a decade. Facts can take the place of feeling. We all need help; we don't all get it.

Sarah Layden drove her car into the navy yard just to prove that she was sorry.

Sarah Layden should give Sufjan Stevens credit for the above line, a line which runs through her head often, o the beauty of music. O the beauty of distance, words on a screen, the power to push the button that turns off the power.