|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Update on Ed and Rick
There hasn't been much in the way of updates on this page, nor have the blogs exactly been coming fast and furious.
There's a reason for that. I've been busy doing what I'm supposed to be doing: writing.
I've been making amazing progress on the follow-up to The Handyman's Dream, and if all goes according to plan
it should be available before summer '07. Yeah, seems like a long time away, doesn't it? Book publishing is a
damn slow process.
So if this page appears rather stagnant for the next month or so, know I'm busy doing what I promised to do -- getting
more Ed and Rick stories out into the world. Or I'm distracted by the cat demanding attention. The catnip-stuffed
squirrel toy just ain't cutting it this morning!
Once again, a huge THANKS to all the folks who have taken Ed and Rick to heart, and are eager to read more about them.
I'm not about to give away any secrets, but I promise some surprises and plenty of new Porterfield adventures in the next
book. Curiosity among local friends is getting a little intense; I'm tempted to lock up the manuscript when I'm not
home! Yeah, I'm talking about you, David!
In the meantime, an early Happy Halloween to all. I've got the trick or treat candy (Milky Ways, Reeses, and Snickers
at our place; we just moved here so we gotta look good for our first Halloween), and I bought The Fog on DVD to
watch after the beggars are through for the night. Mind you, I'm talking about the ORIGINAL movie with Jamie Lee Curtis
and her mom. I understand there was a remake featuring that tarty, bitchy blonde chick who was killed off Lost
last season. That's not even worth the words to comment!
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Music To Soothe the Savage Writer
A few months ago I was in the car with the radio tuned to one of my favorite Oldies stations. A syndicated show
dedicated to the music of the '70's was playing. They were playing a portion of an interview taped I-know-not-when with
George Harrison. He was talking about what he felt was the difference between a good song and a good record.
"Right on, George," I mumbled. "I couldn't agree more."
It's true. A good song will always be a good song, but a good record is pure magic. I've always been fascinated
by the idea that a group of people (producers, songwriters, musicians, and singers) can take a good or even a fair song into
a studio and come out with a brilliantly produced piece of music. Whenever I stumble across a book that retells
the stories of my favorite records being created in studio, I'll drop everything to read it.
Less fascinating, I think, is the process of a different group of people taking that same song into the studio
and, inspired by the original brilliant recording, making a total hash of it. There are passable cover tunes, a few
extraordinary ones, and there are those that should have been erased the moment they were recorded. (Gloria Estefan,
I'm talking to you, girl. I still haven't even come close to forgiving you for the mess you made of "Everlasting Love."
What were you thinking? Did anyone involved with that project even listen to the Robert Knight original
from 1967? Ugh! But I digress. Sorry.)
Anyway, those perfect productions, locked in place forever thanks to recording technology, really are magic
to me. The other night I was sitting in front of the computer killing some time before a theatre date with some friends.
My Itunes were playing, and as it moved at random through "Brandy (You're A Fine Girl)" (Looking Glass), "Sky High" (Jigsaw),
"Hold On Loosely" (.38 Special), "Tighter, Tighter" (Alive 'N Kicking), and "How Long" (Ace), I sang along softly, loving
those old productions as much now as I did when I first heard them. They comfort me. I've drawn from and depended
upon the comfort of recorded music my entire life, and I tell you, I give thanks for everyone involved in creating the
music that somehow releases my emotions in both good and bad times. (Ah, I need to click over to the Itunes and pull
up "Bad Time" by Grand Funk! I sure picked a bad time to be in love / A bad time to be in loo-oove...)
See? That's how my mind works. I can be happily chatting with someone, or writing a story, and something
clicks in my brain and pulls up a record, like some sort of mental Itunes jukebox.
I've found myself apologizing occasionally for allowing that mental jukebox to drop so many records into my writing,
especially The Handyman's Dream. I've heard from readers who absolutely loved the music in the story, and those
who hated it. As I continue to work on the next book about Ed and Rick I find myself fighting that jukebox, trying to
find a way to unplug it, but so far it hasn't happened.
Some people say to me: "why do you rely so heavily on music to express your characters' feelings?" Good question.
The best answer I have is this: "Because I rely so strongly on music to express my feelings." Is that
a writer's copout? Maybe. I do know that each and every writer is unique, and whatever wires our brains towards
fiction is different for all of us. As I've written before, and will again here, recorded music has been the soundtrack
of my life, and I simply cannot conceive of writing sympathetic characters with ears deaf to the music that shapes our days,
our memories, our shared histories, and our entire lives.
As long as I can remember there have been two people inside me: Nick the Writer and Nick the Disc Jockey.
I wasted too many years trying to separate them, or trying to dispose of one and keeping the other. Now they seem
to be peacefully co-existing in my writing, and for the time being I'm cool with that.
Now, for those of you who enjoyed the music in The Handyman's Dream, may I remind you that there
are two Imixes available at Itunes. The first one will disappear in a few weeks as it will soon be a year old, so check
it out while it lasts. Go to your Itunes Music Store, click on Imix, and then type in The Handyman's Dream. Original
Hits! Original Artists! Geez Louise, it's better than a K-Tel album!
You'll have to excuse me now. My Itunes just clicked onto "Ghetto Child" by The Spinners, and I have to take a
break, turn it up, and go to that wonderful place old Spinners songs always take me to. Wanna come along?
Tuesday, October 3, 2006
Some Thinking Before the Paint Can Is Opened
At some point in the very near future my housemate will hand me a paint roller and gravely intone, "it's time."
Until that dark moment arrives (painting is SO not one of my favorite chores) I decided to divorce my brain from thoughts
of home improvement in favor of some library books.
I'm currently reading There Goes My Everything -- White Southerners In the Age of Civil Rights, 1945-1975
by Jason Sokol. I thought it would make for interesting reading, and it has. I felt reviewing that era in U.S.
history might provide some insight into the current struggle for gay civil rights, and indeed it's allowed me to think a bit
more rationally about opponents of gay civil rights. Well, only so much, I gotta admit. Grabbing the nearest blunt
object and smashing in the heads of idiots is now my second -- as opposed to my first --thought.
Frankly, the whole gay politician scandal thing had been bugging me the past few days. I read the Advocate
interview with former New Jersey governor Jim McGreevy last week with a sneer on my face. I think the magazine's headline
biased me from the start: "Jim McGreevy, happy at last." Oh, that's nice, I thought. Happy
at what cost? He's still just another coward on the down low who got caught, and because of his public position,
is profiting from it.
And then there's Florida's Mark Foley. I was convinced the poor bastard was framed until today.
I mean, we all KNOW Republican politicians are ALL good Christian Heterosexuals, right? They certainly tell
us they are often enough. I read today, though, that he's pulling a Mel Gibson, blamin' it all on booze.
Oh, brother! Oh, the places I could go with that, but plenty of others will do it for me. I suppose in autumn
2008 Mr. Foley will be peddling a book and appearing with Oprah, following the path of former governor McGreevy.
And let's not forget Lance Bass, the amiable goof from 'NSync. Or is *N Sync? N-Sync? Christ,
they changed their already misspelled name so many times in my years as a radio music director that I still can't get
it right. I'd go check my music collection for the spelling, but I don't have any of their CD's. Funny, that.
Anyway, after the furor of the whole "I'm straight-acting" crap he was blasted for, and the jaded laughter at his relationship
with Mr. Gay Pin-up Boy, I realized that "straight-acting" is merely "passing."
Passing, for those who are unfamiliar with the custom, is a light-skinned black person "passing" for white. It
happened a lot in the years before, during, and after the civil rights movements of the fifities and sixties, and for
all I know, it still does. It certainly does in the gay community. Let's face: politicians McGreevy and
Foley were passing until they got caught. So did pop star George Michael, to some degree. So is a certain
American Idol runner-up, although what he's accomplishing by it is beyond me. As for Bass, well, the poor
drip obviously needed some publicity to jump start his career, so he could catch up with Justin. Good luck!
Lance, Lance, Lance: exposing a woman's tit on national television would have been a much bigger shock, and an obviously
superior career boost!
I keep wondering, why am I irritated? Why don't I just roll my eyes at it all, and go back to my writing?
I don't have anything to complain about. For a middle-age guy who smokes too much, my health is holding up
just fine. My first novel is finding a wide and enthusiastic audience, and my second novel is a work in progess.
I just moved into my dream house with a warm, wonderful friend and housemate, complete with a marvelously eccentric cat, who's
currently purring on my lap. So why am I bitching?
I don't know if it's justified, but I think it's because of my own long, hard struggle to reach this point, and the struggles
of so many guys like me -- guys who couldn't or wouldn't pass, and were forced to deal with reality. Perhaps
I'm just being a whiney-ass here, but somehow McGreevy and his ilk profiting from their downfalls seems to negate the legitimacy of
our experiences. To me, it sends a message I had hoped had been washed away in the 21st Century: Passing
is a gay man's best defense.
I began to read Jason Sokol's book hoping for some insight into white southerners' attititudes during the African-American
civil rights movement. I have. I've also picked up some insight into my own attitudes, and I wouldn't say
they've been flattering. I realize that every gay person's struggle with sexual orientation is so painful that
some of the wounds never really heal. It's true for me, and for many others, I'm sure. Maybe that's why it's so
easy for me to sneer at the public figures whose experiences don't necessarily mirror my own.
Our experiences should unify, not divide us. That doesn't seem to be the case, though, and until it is, some of
the detours on the road to equality will be initiated by us gay folk.
|
|
When I'm Not Writing...
UPDATE: If you are on Facebook I hope you'll join the NICK POFF Author of
the HANDYMAN series group for discussions, updates, and more.
The sad but honest truth is that most writers need to supplement their income with something other than writing.
I've worked in the radio industry since the tender age of sixteen, and for the same two radio stations for the past fourteen
years. We call it The Hotel California -- you can check out but you can never leave! It's amazing how people go,
but then seem to come back at some time, including me. Radio has been good to me, and although there are still times
I regret not sticking with the writing thing at an earlier age, it's been an interesting ride.
|
|
|
Things I'm Enjoying....
In The Handyman's Dream Ed and Rick spend time at a cabin on a small lake in southern Michigan.
In a weird fiction-meets-non-fiction kind of way, John Sellers writes about just such a place in his latest
book, The Old Man and the Swamp. It is a must-read for anyone who, like me, has been intrigued by that strange part
of the world at the borders of Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio; fears and respects snakes, and has enitrely too much
memory space dedicated to the 70's & 80's.
I enjoyed Joyce Maynard's latest, The Good Daughters.
I still can't believe All My Children is leaving ABC this September. I was a SLAVE to this
soap opera for 27 years. Even though I stopped watching every day back in '01, I've checked in occasionally, and talked with
co-workers about what was going on in Pine Valley. I mean......a world without Erica Kane? That, to me, is scarier
than facing the end of the Mayan calendar! I have, of course, read Susan Lucci's recent memoir, All My Life.
It's a nice, breezy read, but for diehard AMC fans only. Still...Ms. Lucci is on my list of people I hope to meet someday,
if only to say "THANKS!"
The wonderful thing about "All My Children" is that it was, for many years, more than "just a soap
opera." It was a second family of sorts to its most loyal fans. We can thank the amazing Agnes Nixon, the show's creator for
that, but I also think thanks must be given to the entire production staff, and those incredible actors who made those characters
so special to us. Did I learn some basic facts about life from watching this daytime drama? Yes. Did I learn how to write
a good story from watching "All My Children?" You betcha. Anyone who reads and enjoys the HANDYMAN books can be grateful
for the hours I spent in front of the TV, absorbing the finest writing in daytime television.
Just below is the link to the YouTube video from the intro of the 20th
Anniversary special from 1990. It contains some brief clips from the first 20 years of the show. Although AMC soared wonderfully
into the 21st Century, I gotta admit the best stories were from the first 20 years.
This show ain't dead yet, but it will be in September. Yeah, I'll probably be watching those
final episodes. In the meantime, I want to celebrate some of the best creative writing classes I ever attended. Thanks,
"All My Children!"
And I'm truly finding a great deal of joy in producing and broadcasting my little internet radio
show on www.live365.com. I hope you'll tune in some Wednesday evening for some wonderful old music and chat.
It's all RETRO here at the House of Nick. I also love the occasional old game show clip on YouTube.
I'm all about the retro fun stuff. I'd like to think it reminds us not to take ourselves too seriously in the here
and now. I celebrate old pop music on my internet radio show, NICK POFF RADIO 45.
As most writers do, I love word games, so I always enjoyed the game shows dealing with words. I loved the
$10,000 Pyramid (and the $20,000 and the $25,000 Pyramid, etc.). For those with a short attention span, here's Billy Crystal's
record-breaking trip to the top.
"I can't even watch The New Treasure Hunt anymore because you give me so much shit about it!"
(The above line of dialogue was deleted from the final draft of The Handyman's Dream. Ed's enjoyment
of game shows and Rick's dislike of them would continue to be a source of irritation.)
|
|
|
|
|
|
Meet two potential victims of global warming.
If you want to save the bears as much as I do, vote wisely in each and every election, and check out the link
on my Favorite Links page.
Nick Poff
|
|
|
|
