Recently I listened to a class on Hildegard von Bingen. She’s one of my favorite ladies, right behind my wife, mother and sister. Mystic, composer and a doctor of the church. At the end of the class it was mentioned that “modern scholarship” suggests that her visions were probably caused by migraines. Oh, poor academia, ye of little imagination, how miserly your lives and your loves must be.
Reviews are important and they can be fun. I’m not sure how the algorithm gods work but at some point a book has enough ratings and reviews that it grows its own legs and keeps selling. Ohio has done that. Ballard has yet to do it. (hint, hint) That’s why it’s important to rate and/or review a book. I even like bad reviews. At least I know that I touched something. Once someone complained that all the sex was “good”. I thought that odd. Isn’t all sex good? The old pizza analogy. But experiences vary and well… sorry man, keep trying. Anyways, I digress. Please rate and/or review Ballard Redoubt. It keeps fuel in the tractor and food in the kitten. Thanks!
As I come to the end of my Navy career I ponder some of the sketchy things I’ve done. The twenty year detour from writing is almost over… fingers crossed.
Grab a C5 with 12 of your friends and a shit ton of gear. Head to fun places. Leave the rest of the team in Bagdad and head up to Irbil.
After arranging a convoy for said gear, ride a thin skinned civilian bus into indian country.
Find some sweet sleeping accommodations at a firebase engaged in all night area denial missions. Meet said convoy in the morning.
Cross the Tigris on a pontoon bridge. Definitely a check on the war bingo card.
Act like you know what you are doing as turret gunner even though the gun isn’t charged.
When I was in a civil affairs unit our area of responsibility was Kenya and Tanzania so we learned Swahili. I’ve also studied French and Spanish. I can’t speak any of them. I can read French but the words won’t come out of my mouth. Despite this I find language fascinating. I really want to read Greek and Latin. Maybe someday I’ll use my GI Bill and go back to school. “Maji huonekana machafu?”
Like most writers I have notes scattered everywhere. Sometimes I can’t figure out what I was thinking. Other times they make me laugh.
Diagraming if Sartre and Nietzsche fought.
It’s sensual, it’s sexy. You can feel the air. You just know behind all those shutters on a hot afternoon…
My wife and I try to walk everyday. It’s an hour and a half without screens, just us walking and talking. We call it “counting cats”. That’s what we do. We count the cats we see along the way. They are mostly strays. New Orleans is a city of strays, both feline and human. Walking is not writing. Only writing is writing. But sometimes a walk can help you think something through or find an idea while looking at ships on the river. In 2022 we walked more than 500 miles and more than 600 in both 2023 and 2024. One foot in front of the other is a good way to live.
The dilemma of freedom- stray vs owned.
Recently I was in DC for a couple weeks attending a class at the National Defense University. The students were mostly mid-grade officers, Majors and Lieutenant Colonels. There were only a few senior enlisted. It was a great class with tons of good conversations and a lot of jokes. I always feel outgunned in a crowd like that and it often turns my mind to the paths of life. Every little choice can have major effects. Anyway, one morning I was lying in bed thinking about the nature of class. It’s a common thought in my work. After about an hour I got out of bed, made some coffee and started getting ready for class. Eventually I opened the curtains and was greeted by a naked woman in the building across the way. It was as if God or the universe had slapped me across the head and said, “pay attention to what matters stupid!” You have to recognize the signs. You have to be open to the gifts.
My dad has a theory that a significant portion of populace has never worn out a pair of work gloves. We laugh about it. “Mr. big pockets has soft hands.” But my variation on the theory is the question of how many wives wear out work gloves? I am fortunate to have married a worker. She is a coworker. I never have to worry if she is up to the task. Honestly, she outworks me.
My wife’s work gloves.
I think we should bring that back. Ora et labora makes a lot of sense.
Ballard recently got very similar to Ballard Redoubt. The F/V North American sunk while tied to the dock. Investigation is ongoing but I’m betting a sea strainer. Hopefully no Tommys are aboard.
Funny story- I know this boat. They were tenders for the SE salmon fleet. They had a Norwegian crewman that used to yell, “Kill Fish!” to motivate us. We loved it and ended up writing it on our gloves.
You never know when you’ll have to wait out a rocket attack. I prefer real books but a kindle or iPad gives you a ton of options. I keep “Against the Grain” by Huysmans on my phone for anytime I get caught unprepared at a doctors appointment or the DMV. Someday I’ll finish it.
One of the great joys of being a reader is the discovery of books and writers at the time in your life you need them most. But, alas, sometimes you miss the bus and discover those books and writers later in life. It seems to me that a young man’s life should be lived somewhere between these two books.
Alright, this one jumps to the top of my favorite reviews ever. So simple, and clean. Right to the point. Nasty!
My wife likes to tease me that through my twenties I only had three pieces of furniture: a futon, a rocking chair and a weight bench. It was all a young man needed. It covered all the main food groups, all the essentials. Now that I dabble in woodworking I think I might try building a rocking chair because because futons are for poor young men and wooden weight benches are sketchy.
A complete gym in the desert. The 463L pallet with the bricks on the left is the deadlift station. We never could get that level and you had to use the bricks to keep the bar from rolling off into the gravel and sand. Nothing is adjustable. It just is. Spartan in the true sense of the word.
I’m fairly comfortable with dangerous things: guns, large machines, war. What scares the shit out of me is a kitchen mandolin. I don’t even like making eye contact with the motherfucker. Someday it’s going to jump off the hook it lives on and trim my fingernails to the second knuckle. If it wasn’t such a useful tool I’d throw it in the river. Nah, I wouldn’t do that. It’d probably cut ten fish in half on the way down. Don’t even make eye contact.
Happy Labor Day from your favorite writer of labor. Okay I just made that up but it sounds pretty cool and obviously labor is one of my top three themes- the others being sex and love. But what is labor? Is all work labor? No. Unfortunately in the Navy I spend a lot of time on computers. That is work but not labor. Is writing a book labor? Absolutely not. Labor is physical and there is physical cost to the laborer. Labor transforms one substance into another- metal into cars, concrete into foundations, fish into food. For more insights into my thoughts on labor I recommend A Hell Called Ohio and Ballard Redoubt. In the meantime, enjoy some random pics of labor.
Driving through Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and listening to True North by Jim Harrison. It’s good but I wonder how much better it could have been had he read the book himself. It’s the same thought I have when I think of Shelby Foote and Larry Brown. Those wonderful voices gone from the world. What I would pay to hear them read their own stories, hear the inflections and accents, hear their words.
Do you remember the banana at Art Basel? We talk about art in my house a lot. What it means, what it should mean, etc. I know some painters who refer to themselves as painters instead of artists because of the total devaluation of the term. Well, that’s a conversation for another day. I was deployed in Iraq when the banana made its debut and I took my own take, or takes, on it. And no, I don’t believe it is art.
I always enjoy notes from my readers. Sometimes they point out mistakes in the book. Modern books are almost all print on demand. That means when a customer or bookstore orders a book, a book printing machine spits it out. This descendant of Gutenberg can print Hell then War and Peace then 1984 then Sundog then Hell. It’s truly a modern marvel and it allows a writer or publisher to fix or edit a book at any time. Of course, it’s even easier with ebooks. Did you know Leaves of Grass had nine editions? This technology might have driven Whitman insane. There’s a joke in my house- “Do you know what’s under a Michael Deas painting?” “Another Michael Deas painting!” Constant revision can be its own trap. Anyway, thanks to my wonderful readers who keep the book improving especially Ian, Roggan and Nada.
