The First One to Speak Loses

Epigraph is from one of my favorite books.

What we, or at any rate what I, refer to confidently as memory—meaning a moment, a scene, a fact that has been subjected to a fixative and thereby rescued from oblivion—is really a form of storytelling that goes on continually in the mind and often changes with the telling. Too many conflicting emotional interests are involved for life ever to be wholly acceptable, and possibly it is the work of the storyteller to rearrange things so that they conform to this end. In any case, in talking about the past we lie with every breath we draw.

—William Maxwell, So Long, See You Tomorrow

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Countdown: 2 days to go . . .

"Packed yet?" my friend asked. "Started," I said. Books, books, and more books. How to choose between Munro and Chekhov? Between Cheever and Updike? Oates and Wolff? If I were traveling by airplane my baggage bill would be a small fortune. But traveling by car allows me the luxury of not only a mobile library, but also a portable pantry. All I need to do (TOMORROW) is pack it up.

But before I do that I need to complete the revision I worked on today to make the 6/30 deadline of a fiction contest. Why do that now? Because I can. Because I want to. Because the process sweeps the remnants of this past academic semester and quarter from my brain. Because it sits my rear-end in the creative chair. Because I have to start somewhere.

So tomorrow you know what I'll be doing: sitting & packing.


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