Tuesday, November 20, 2007

No Particular Order

For the man and woman who brought me into the world.
For the sisters who taught me how to play tennis.
For the surgeon who removed my appendix before it burst.
For the dentist who capped my broken tooth.
For the master who taught me yoga.
For the mechanic who fixes my car.
For the singer who sings that song I like.
For the friends who lift me up when I'm down.
For the woman who still loves me after all these years.
Thanks.

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Don't Stop Now

We spread a blanket off to one side of the boat launch, under some trees. Island Lake, in Shelton, Washington, is surrounded by small private homes, and this is the only public access. Since it's still early in the season and the homeowners tend to take the lake for granted, there are no boats or skiers out.

It's 1972, and we're both seventeen.

That's how the story begins. The story "Don't Stop Now" in Hobart.

Hobart is one of my favorite literary journals, and the story appears this month in the online edition.

It's basically a distillation of a novel I started writing in 1972 when I was 17. Two hundred forty-four pages down to five. Reader's Digest, eat your heart out.

Like many first novels, mine was awful (embarrassingly so) and now languishes in the back of a closet, where it belongs. The short story, on the other hand, is pretty darn good. An editor at Esquire called it "a pleasure to read," even if it wasn't really appropriate for the magazine.

More importantly, Hobart loved it.

So, don't stop now; hop on over to Hobart and check it out.