There was a moment when I thought that one child was more than enough. Clara was about two-years old, she was cute as a button, and I thought our family was just right.
In fact, had it not been for Elysha’s desire for two kids, Clara might be an only child today.
Can you imagine how terrible that might have been?
I cannot bear the thought.
A couple days ago, one of my colleagues pointed at the #21 on my classroom door and said, “Are you going to remove that number at some point?”
For the 18 years that I’ve been in my classroom, the room number has never been #21. This is a number from a bygone day.
But here’s the strange thing (but also not-so-strange):
I’d never noticed the number on my door. In the almost two decades that I have spent in my classroom, I had never taken notice of that number.
Sounds crazy, I know. Maybe even impossible. But I’m also the person who once argued with his wife over the color of our house on the way home from the store, insisting that our house - one that we had been living in for years - was yellow. Unquestionably yellow.
She claimed that it was tan. Light brown, maybe. But nothing even approaching yellow.
As we turned onto our street and our house came into view, I realized that our house is not yellow.
Not even close.
So failing to notice a number on a door for almost two decades sounds ridiculous and yet is also not surprising. Elysha is fond of saying that if we lined up ten brunettes of approximately her height in a line, I could not pick her out from the group.
This is not true, of course, but there is truth in what she says.
What does this say about me?
I’m not sure, but it’s not great.
While visiting friends in Washington two weeks ago, we stopped by Sprinkles, an ice cream shop decorated in nostalgia. Sitting along one wall of the store were the monoliths of my childhood:
Video games.
I spend many hours and many thousands of dollars playing Defender, Pole Position, Pac Man, and many, many others. There was a time in high school when my friends and I would vacation in Weirs Beach, New Hampshire simply because of the quality of the Half Moon Arcade and Fun Spot.
I like to think that there was something special about those coin-operated video games. By having to pay 25 cents to play, the stakes were higher on those games, and thus, the gaming sessions more important and more memorable.
In later years, I spent an enormous amount of time playing computer-based games like Warcraft, Diablo, and Madden, and it was unquestionably fun. But those days in the arcade - when every game required a financial investment- those were very special indeed.
On the flip side, Sprinkles was also selling candy cigarettes, which struck me as an incredibly stupid idea. While nostalgia is something I adore, there are certain items of nostalgia that should never be brought back into today’s world.
“Irish Need Not Apply” signs
Mercury thermometers
Leaded gas
Segregated drinking fountains
Asbestos
The General Lee from The Dukes of Hazard
The Macarena
Lawn darts
Chlorofluorocarbons
Birth of a Nation
Candy cigarettes belong on that list.
What the hell are you thinking, Sprinkles?
Last night I received an email from myself.
Two years ago, I apparently wrote a list entitled “What's Next? Brand New Challenging Life Goals.” Then I attached this to an email that was set to land in my inbox last night with the instructions from my past self to review and update.
I have no recollection of doing this, but it would seem that Long Ago Matt was a pretty smart guy because this was an interesting exercise.
It’s also not the first time that I’ve received an email from my past self. It happens more often than you’d think. I’m constantly thinking about future Matt and sending him stuff.
This particular list appears to be comprised of “big dream” items that are too difficult or too obscure to include on my yearly goals but still doable enough to keep on my horizon. Some of these “big dream” ideas were actually accomplished. Some had been forgotten, but I still love the idea today. A few fall into the category of “What the hell was I thinking?”
Here is that original list with the annotated updates that my past self demanded.
Perform my one-person show in a theater (DONE! Several times over!)
Spend a summer at Yawgoog Scout reservation (Still a goal)
Write and direct a short film (Still a goal)
Launch a podcast featuring the kids and me (DONE! Just 4 episodes but a real-life podcast!)
Learn to make an outstanding tuna avocado melt for Elysha (Failed many times)
Try curling (A forgotten goal but one I would love to try)
Teach a college class for new teachers about the things that are really important (Still a goal)
Officiate a funeral (What the hell was I thinking? Yet I’m still willing…)
Become a notary (DONE!)
Become an instructional coach (If I ever leave the classroom, my dream is to teach teachers in the first three years of their career)
Design and teach a competitive yoga class (What the hell was I thinking?)
Launch a storytelling podcast. Try to get Elysha to partner with you. (DONE!)
Land a weekly column in a major newspaper (This has been a goal for a long, long time)
Become an unlicensed therapist (A ridiculous idea but I think I would be exceptional at this)
Try stand up comedy (DONE! Many times over!)
Trademark “Homework for Life” (DONE!)
Not bad. Quite a few “brand new challenging life goals” weren’t as challenging as I originally thought. I was thrilled to see that quite few had been accomplished. It’s an exercise that I like a lot. It adheres to my belief that in addition to setting realistic, measurable goals for ourselves, we should also have new things on our horizons. Big idea goals. Things that might someday become a reality.
The horizon is the place where dreams are formed. It’s where we need to point ourselves. Too many people, I fear, never look to a horizon of new possibilities and instead remain fixated on their small, contained life.
In the spirit of looking to the horizon, here is the updated list that I just emailed to myself and scheduled to land in my inbox in two more years:
Spend a summer (or perhaps a week) at Yawgoog Scout reservation
Write and direct a short film
Learn to make an outstanding tuna avocado melt for Elysha
Try curling
Teach a college class for new teachers about the things that are really important
Become an instructional coach
Land a weekly column in a major newspaper
Become an unlicensed therapist
Build to a solid, 20 minute stand up comedy set
Publish a picture book
Break 45 (or 90) on the golf course
Visit with my father
This is one of those moments when I’m going to apologize for complaining about something that really shouldn’t be a complaint.
While visiting Pike Market in Seattle a couple weeks ago, we stopped in a great, little bookstore called Lion Heart Books, where we were thoroughly entertained by the owner, David Ghoddousi. His store didn’t carry any of my books, but it was small and eclectic. I was willing to forgive him.
Of course we bought some books for the kids (and a few for me). Clara and Charlie love books, and I’m always willing to spend a little money on the written word.
But for the next hour, Elysha and I had to demand that the children stop reading their books and “Look around!”
“Pick your heads up!”
“You can read anytime! You won’t see this place again for a long time!”
At one point Elysha popped into a Starbucks, so the kids immediately camped out on the corner, opened their books, and pretended that I didn’t exist.
I surrendered. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll look at the big, beautiful world and you can stick your noses into your dumb books.”
I know. I should be happy, and I am.
But still… look at them. What a couple of giant nerds.
On episode #62 of the Speak Up Storytelling podcast, Matthew and Elysha Dicks talk storytelling!
A little bit.
In our follow-up segment, we explain the tragedies that caused us to be absent for the last three weeks. We also congratulate our friends in Australia on their first storytelling show!
Next we offer a new strategy that Matt has been using in the classroom for a decade and recently brought it to his storytelling instruction with great success.
Finally, we each offer a recommendation.
We were visiting Deception Pass State Park in Washington when I saw this sign along a trail leading down to the turbulent waters of Puget Sound.
I’m not sure if it’s the guilelessness of the text or the clarity of the image (or perhaps a combination of the two), but I love this sign so much.
I love the its directness. The way it doesn’t pull any punches. It’s a sign designed to justifiably frighten people.
If someone was to fall off the edge of the trail and plunge to their death, I could see the person’s final thought being something like. “I can’t say they didn’t warn me.”
I love that.
On Wednesday night I’m standing at baggage claim in Bradley International Airport, waiting for the luggage carousel to begin turning,. It’s 10:00 PM. We left our friend’s home on the west coast at 5:30 AM, so it’s been a long day. I’m mentally urging my bags to appear when Clara sees a girl about her age off to the right and asks if she can go over and chat.
My first thought:
That’s weird. While waiting for luggage at an airport, you’re going to strike up a conversation with a stranger?
But we allow it, of course. Clara walks over to the girl and says, “Hi, my name is Clara. What’s your name?”
I cringe. I also worry that my daughter will be rejected. Embarrassed. Saddened.
Oddly, the two girls begin a legitimate conversation,. talking about where they began their day, their hometown, the upcoming school year, and more. I still think it’s weird, but it seemed to work out. I breathe a sigh of relief.
After finally extracting our luggage from the carousel, we begin heading to the airport shuttle when a man appears in front of me and says, “I just wanted to commend you on the parenting job that you’re doing.”
“Thanks,” I say. I have no idea what he’s talking about, but I willingly accept all praise of every kind.
“The confidence that your daughter has,” the man says. “The way she introduced herself to my daughter. Her conversation skills. That’s not something that happens in the world today. It’s special.”
By now Elysha has pulled alongside me.
“Oh,” I say, realizing this is not a compliment for me. “Most of the credit goes to my wife,”
The man turns to Elysha, introduces himself, and repeats the compliment.
And it’s true. Most of the credit belongs to Elysha. Yes, I’m sure that I’ve helped to instill some of that confidence in my daughter, but that’s probably a 50/50 proposition at best. Just a few nights before, Clara and Charlie sat backstage, listening quietly, while I performed onstage to a sellout crowd in Seattle.
But in the middle of my performance, Elysha took the stage and played her ukulele and sang a song for just the second time ever in public.
Watching her parents do these things has probably helped Clara to become a more confident girl, but the ability to approach a stranger, extend a hand, and carry on a thoughtful conversation… that’s all Elysha. That is the result of Clara spending enormous amounts of time with Elysha in this world, watching her mother interact with all kinds of people in every possible scenario.
It’s not only confidence that Clara possesses. It’s social grace. It’s the difference between seeing an opportunity to engage in a conversation as potentially positive as opposed to thinking it weird.
And yes, the fact that Elysha was able to stay home with the kids for almost a decade probably helped this process, and for that, I can take a little credit. My endless procession of jobs helped to make that happen.
But more important, Clara needed a role model of social grace, and she had that in Elysha. All the jobs in the world can’t create a child who is confident enough to approach strangers and engage in conversation. As I told that man, most of the credit belongs to Elysha. Clara has watched Elysha engage with the world, and now she’s able to do the same..
The man said a few more kind things to both of us, shook our hands one more time, and returned to his family.
It was the perfect ending to a perfect vacation. It was one of those moments that I will never forget.
It was also a reminder of the power of the kindness of strangers. Clara wasn’t the only person engaging in conversation with strangers that night. That man, whose name I will never forget, took the time to chase us down and say something that caused our hearts to soar.
I know we teach our kids not to talk to strangers, and most of the time, that advice is sound. But when the moment is right and the space is safe, talking to strangers can be a beautiful thing.
I’m learning that from Elysha, too.
And Clara. I’m learning it from her, too.
Elysha, the kids, and I had the absolute pleasure of spending a week on Whidbey Island off the coast of Washington with our friend, Plato. A perfect way to spend a week.
We miss it already.
Since returning from the Pacific Northwest a couple of days ago, a few things are immediately apparent to me:
It’s really humid here. The air has a physical presence that I hadn’t really noticed before. I’ve been out west many times, but never to the Pacific Northwest. Even places in the midwest like Michigan, Kansas, Illinois, and Ohio are incredibly humid in the summer. But not Washington. I’d forgotten how oppressive the humidity can be here on a daily basis. It sucks.
The crickets and peepers are incredibly loud when the sun goes down. Whidbey Island is surprisingly absent of both, making it so wondrously quiet at night.
People drive aggressively here in the northeast, and particularly in Massachusetts. It’s dog-eat-dog on the roadways, and blessedly so. Pacific Northwest drivers are the worst. So polite and deferential and observant of speed limits.
A twenty-something explained on a podcast that her generation doesn’t believe in allowing things to pass them by.
“You know,” she said. “YOLO. That’s where that word comes from.”
Just for the record:
YOLO is an acronym popularized by Drake in his hit song “The Motto,” but it’s certainly nothing new. “You only live once” is a sentiment that has existed for a long, long time. Simply because the current generation of young people have affixed an acronym to an age-old expression doesn’t make them any more daring than previous generations.
When my friend, Bengi, and I decided to drive overnight from Fort Lauderdale, FL to Myrtle Beach, SC to avoid losing a day of vacation to traveling after having already been awake for nearly 24 hours (and ended up seeing identical delusional clowns on the side of the road in South Carolina), we certainly could’ve been shouting “YOLO!” through our car windows.
When I agreed to compete in an underground, middle-of-the-night arm wrestling gambling ring in Brockton, MA , I could’ve shouted “YOLO!” upon descending the stairs in that abandoned elementary school.
When I decided to dam a river to see if I could cut off the supply of water to The Basin, an ancient rock and water tourist attraction in the mountains of Laconia, NH (and succeeded), I could’ve shouted “YOLO” when the first tree fell across the river.
When so many of my friends decided that it was better to work two or three jobs, sleep on couches, and eat ramen rather than living for a single second more with their parents, they all could’ve been shouting “YOLO!” from the windows of their cruddy apartments.
Simply because my generation and the generations before me didn’t apply an acronym to the sentiment or speak incessantly about the importance of living your life like you only live once doesn’t mean we weren’t doing so.
So just stop.
Every year, Space Telescope Science Institute in Maryland fields thousands of requests from scientists all over the world to use the Hubble telescope to advance their research.
Only 200 proposals are accepted.
In 2014, the Institute realized that 21.9 percent of proposals written by men were being accepted while only 16.9 percent of proposals written by women were being accepted.
As a result, a double-blind evaluation method was implemented wherein reviewers couldn’t see the name of the person who proposed the project.
The results?
The acceptance rate leveled out. In 2019 the success rate for proposals was 8.7 percent for female researchers compared to 8 percent for male researchers.
This is an excellent reminder that it’s still incredibly hard to be a woman and that a man’s success in almost any arena should be discounted to some degree by the presence of his penis.
If that penis happens to be white, double the discount.
Important (and astounding) information on aging from NumLock:
Telomeres are protective caps that prevent damage to DNA. They also shorten each time a cell replicates, and when they get too short cells know it’s time to wrap it up and self-destruct. This plays a role in the aging process, and every year telomeres shrink by about 25 base pairs per year. Turns out that stress can seriously accelerate this process: first-year medical residents saw a decline of 140 base pairs, on average. Those who worked over 75 hours per week lost 700 base pairs.
Less stress equates to a reduction in aging.
This is very good news for me, as I tend to experience very little stress in my life. Why I experience very little stress is a matter of conjecture.
I’m sure that my daily meditation and exercise regimes help.
Perhaps I’m also genetically predisposed to less stress.
Maybe my aggressively optimistic nature protects me from the stress I might otherwise feel.
I suspect that perspective plays a role, too. Once you’ve been arrested for a crime you didn’t commit and subsequently become homeless while awaiting your trial, the problems of everyday life often pale in comparison. Add a couple near-death experiences and a violent robbery that led to decades of PTSD, and it’s hard to fluster me.
Here’s one other thing that I know:
There are people in my life who are often annoyed and even angry at my lack of stress. These are actual human beings who have told me (and others behind my back) that my lack of stress is inappropriate, frustrating, and ridiculous.
People have actually complained to me and others that I’m not experiencing enough stress.
I suspect that those people are aging rapidly.
My family and I have been in Seattle for five days now, and it’s been quite the whirlwind.
In addition to playing golf, walking beaches, eating delicious food, and visiting with friends and family, I have also been doing a bit of work.
On Thursday, I had the pleasure of visiting with a book club of about 17 ladies who had read a variety of my novels and nonfiction. The conversation was great, the questions were insightful, and I was once again renewed by the joy of spending time with serous readers.
On Friday night my friend, Plato, his daughter and my former student, and I attended a Moth StorySLAM in Seattle. It was just as fun and exciting as any StorySLAM in New York or Boston. Plato and I had the good luck to take the stage and tell a story - back to back - and I won the slam and Plato placed a close second.
Not the first time we have taken the top two spots at a StorySLAM.
On Saturday, I taught a storytelling workshop at the Taproot Theater in Seattle. Three dozen present and future storytellers gathered to learn some of the strategies and techniques that I have used for finding, crafting, and telling stories. It was thrilling to find such a vibrant and close knit storytelling community here in Seattle.
On Saturday night, I performed my solo show for a sold out audience in the same theater. I told five stories - all but one brand new and including a story that I had begun crafting during the workshop earlier that day. After each story, I offered some insight about the finding and crafting of the story in hopes that the audience would walk away with some strategies that they could use when telling stories.
It was a blast.
Just before intermission, Elysha also played her ukulele and sang in public for just the second time ever, and for the second time, she upstaged anything I did that night. She was sweet and charming, and she sounded beautiful.
And the kids sat backstage in the green room throughout the show, listening to the stories while pecking away on devices to keep them occupied. Just before Elysha played, they joined the audience to watch their mother do something hard and beautiful.
On Sunday morning, we traveled to Tacoma to attend a storytelling brunch called Homegrown Stories. Hosted by a storyteller named John and my agent, Taryn, folks enjoyed delicious food as names were drawn from a bowl and stories were told. I met a number of storytellers who I’ve only had the pleasure of knowing via our podcast and email, and I met some new folks, too. Clara and Charlie joined us, sitting at our feet and listening attentively. We heard stories about the challenges of running for office, hiring a professional cuddler, transitioning from female to male, and finding your husband back in middle school while writing a story together about monkey guts.
One storyteller had even told a story that used something I had done the day before in my workshop as the jumping off point.
But the moment I will never forget was when Clara took the stage before 30 or so adults and told her very first public story. She poke about being excluded from a game at summer camp, and though I am admittedly biased, her story was incredible. It was vulnerable and raw. It contained humor and suspense. She handled dialogue brilliantly. I had the good fortune of standing in the back of the room while she was telling, and I listened as the audience laughed, held their breath, sighed, and groaned at all the right moments.
Best of all, she stuck the landing. Her final sentences were perfection.
I hadn’t even known that she wanted to tell a story. I wasn’t sure how she would do. I worried that she might collapse in a bundle of anxiety and nerves.
Instead, she told a four minute story that was artfully crafted and expertly told.
I’ll never forget it.
This has been a glorious week, thanks in large part to our friends who have been kind enough to host us in their beautiful home and show us the town. But it’s also been a week filled with talk of books and stories, which has also been lovely.
But that moment when Clara stood before that audience and shared a story… that is what I will remember most.
I can count the number of things that I have purchased and then later returned in my entire life on two hands.
Maybe one hand.
I know that this makes me different from most people, but especially the Germans, who like to order stuff online and then return it at a rate unmatched by other Europeans. In 2018, a whopping 53 percent of German online shoppers returned an item.
This beat out the Dutch (52 percent), French (45 percent), Spanish and Italians (43 percent) and the British (40 percent).
Even those numbers seem enormous to me.
Here in my country, about 40 percent of Americans returned an online purchase last year. More than 8 percent of all purchases made online in America were returned. That is a lot of returned merchandise, and it doesn’t even begin to include the purchases made at brick and mortar stores.
28% of all Christmas gifts in America are returned.
I can’t say that these numbers surprise me because I’ve personally witnessed the plague of the returned item. I’ve seen and known people who seem to return half of everything they ever purchase.
I find all of this a little crazy.
I can count the number of items that I have returned in my life on one or two hands for a few reasons:
I’m not terribly discerning. I have no attention for detail, so I often overlook flaws that others will see.
When it comes to clothing, there is very little variance in my wardrobe or size. I wear the same things, so when it comes time to replace clothing items, I simply purchase the same things again. My waistline may be 34 or 36 inches depending on the number of cheeseburgers I’ve eaten in a given month and I might need the extra large version of certain tee shirts because of my large neck, but that’s about all the variance I need to worry about.
I don’t concern myself with aesthetic imperfection. We purchased an outdoor grill, for example, which has a dent in it. We’re not returning the grill because it’s large and unwieldy but also because I don’t care if it has a dent. Years ago, when my brand new car was dented on day three by a child’s bike, I didn’t care because I knew the car would be dented eventually and a crease in the fender didn’t matter to me.
I always factor in the element of time when deciding if something should be returned. If I purchase a $10 item online and am dissatisfied, how long will it take me to return that item? Will I need to package it? Label it? Drive to the post office? Wait in line? It might be better in terms of time and material costs to simply trow the item away or give it away rather than return it.
Money is valuable, and $10 is not nothing, but time is our most precious commodity. That fact is always in the forefront of my mind.
At the very end of the song, “Light My Candle” from the Broadway musical Rent, Mimi and Roger exchange names.
Roger sings, “I’m Roger.”
Mimi responds, “They call me Mimi.”
Driving in the car, listening to the song the other day, I turn to Elysha and say, “I’ve always wanted to introduce myself to people like that. You know… ‘They call me Matt.’ What do you think?”
“No,” she said, flatly, immediately, and without an ounce of uncertainty.
I really like the idea, but I’ve learned that when Elysha is absolute in her opinion, she’s usually right.
Also, I had apparently brought up this idea in the past and received a similar response. More than once. Apparently I’m hoping for a change of heart that isn’t coming.
She’s probably right.
Still…
Last week, a listener to our podcast and a reader of my books wrote to inform me that he would no longer be listening, reading, or otherwise engaging in my work as a result of the way I write about Donald Trump and respond to him online, specifically via Twitter.
The man was polite and even sounded a little regretful, but he explained that even though he does not support the President in any way, he feels that my responses to the President are ignorant and childish. He explained that I was leaving behind a shameful legacy, and that the best way to defeat the darkness is through light.
I was sorry to see the man go. I had exchanged emails with him in the past and even answered some of his questions on our podcast. I found him to be interesting and thoughtful. But before allowing him to sail off into the night, I had to at least explain myself, and he appreciated my explanation and thanked me for not lashing out and taking the time to write a thoughtful response.
But then he still sailed off.
Oddly, I’ve also heard from many Trump supporters who are often annoyed with the things that I write to and about the President but continue to read and listen because they are sensible enough to understand that even although I may refer to Trump as a racist old horny burger goblin who literally steals children from poor people (credit Stephen Colbert), this is not an attack on them personally.
Simply a difference of opinion.
But this recently departed listener/reader not the only person who has asked why I would spend a scintilla of time responding to Trump’s tweets when there are so many more productive things to do. I also have friends who are quite certain that I am on an enemies list of some kind as a result of my responses and my participation and victory in the lawsuit that forced Trump to unblock.
So I thought I’d post my response to the listener/reader here in order to list the reasons for my actions.
__________________________________
1. Yes, being involved in the lawsuit that led to me being unblocked by Trump (and all the money dedicated to this cause) makes me feel like I should be shouting to the rooftops of the world whenever I feel it necessary. I owe it to the Knight Foundation to make use of this tool and deliver truth to power whenever possible.
2. It genuinely makes me feel good to speak to the powerful in this way. It warms my heart. And I know he's listening, because he's already blocked me once. It’s not all that I’m doing, of course. I'm a member of the ACLU, a subscriber to the New York Times and Slate, and I contribute to the campaigns of political leaders both monetarily and in terms of time and expertise. I call my state senator and Congresspeople frequently. I'm trying to do everything I can do oppose his hateful and ignorant administration. I really am. But telling Trump exactly how I feel in the kind of coarse language that he uses and seems to understand (while never swearing) makes me feel good. It might make me seem like a rotten person to feel good in doing this, but it's exactly how I feel.
3. I have heard from many, many people who thank me for tweeting like this. There are lots of people who are genuinely afraid of Trump and our growing authoritarian state and take great solace and even joy when someone they know (or sort of know through his writing, speaking, etc.) stands up to him. I have received dozens of emails from folks expressing appreciation for what I am saying. I'm sure there are also folks like you who see it as negative and childish and wasteful (and I have friends who are sincerely worried that Trump may have an enemies list of folks like me), but lots of people are also heartened by my approach.
4. Yes, I want there to be a record of my resistance when my children are older and wondering what the hell the country was thinking when they elected this man. It may not be the most eloquent record, but it's a permanent reflection of my anger, disgust, and refusal to allow him to go unchecked. And yes, I'll be proud of it. They will know that their father despised this President and his policies and made that abundantly clear as often as possible. They may wonder about my choice of words, but they will never wonder about how I felt, and that means the world to me.
5. I agree that the best way to fight dark is with light, and I like to think - sincerely - that as an elementary school teacher for two decades, a person who tells honest, vulnerable stories onstage that connect with others, as a person who writes stories that have traveled around the world and brought joy to people's hearts, a person who promotes and supports the ideas of making the most of every moment and being authentic and vulnerable with the world, a person who encourages others to be brave and tell their story, and a father and a husband and a volunteer... that I am bringing lots of light to the world. So yes, light is important, and honestly, I'm trying like hell to make a positive difference in the world.
Does all of this make up for the negativity that I fire off at the President? In your mind, perhaps not. I'm sorry to hear it. But I think that in terms of the balance sheet, I’m well into the positive column even after I call the President a nitwit.
Yes, it's true. I spend about 10 minutes a day telling the President how I feel, and for reasons that I think are justified. But I'd like to think that this very tiny part of my life is well balanced with everything else I do in the world. The countless hours I spend teaching and writing and supporting and building and parenting and loving.
__________________________________
It wasn’t enough to keep this particular reader/listener in my orbit, but I tried.
Another early review of Twenty-one Truths About Love from another important outlet - Booklist.
____________________________________
Dicks manages to create tension, pathos, humor, and some searing melodrama in a novel written entirely in lists. Daniel Mayrock, soon to be a father, quits a dull teaching position to open his own bookstore. Following the advice of his therapist, he starts making lists, and list-making becomes a compulsion as he submits all aspects of his life to enumeration. He ranks his employees, analyzes his interactions with others, and documents his many foibles and phobias.
Through lists, Dan’s rich, sympathetic voice shines, and as he organizes his opinions about music, his love of his wife, and his many vices and neuroses, he is funny and insightful. Like Benjamin Kunkel’s Indecision (2005) and Joshua Ferris’s To Rise Again at a Decent Hour (2014), this tale explores the struggles of a man attempting to navigate contemporary adulthood and his fear that he is unable to function like everyone around him. Often moving, sometimes shocking, always entertaining, this superbly crafted work emphasizes the incalculable variety of the novel form.
— Alexander Moran
You know those guys - it’s always a man - who drive in the third lane of the highway at high speeds, flashing their lights at any car that get in their way?
Who are these guys?
I’m serious.
In my entire life, I don’t think I’ve ever known a man who would do such a thing.
Not one.
Are these the same guys who smoke cigars at sunrise while playing golf? The same guys that park their car on the diagonal lest someone park alongside them? Are these the same guys who are chronically rude to waitstaff? Cat-call women on the street? Order bottle service and then talk about having ordered bottle service long after the night is over?
I don’t think I know any of these guys, either. I don’t think I’ve ever known any of them. I see them all the time, in restaurants, the golf course, my rearview mirror, and other places, but I don’t think I’ve ever befriended or even been friendly with any of these guys..
Do they flock together like geese? Move in herds like buffalo? Cluster like maggots?
I think they must. RIght?
Over the weekend, friends and I were discussing a recent revelation on social media:
There are couples in this world who do sleep on the same side of the bed every night.
When someone on Twitter revealed this last week - obviously a monster - Twitter went crazy. People couldn’t imagine choosing random sides of the bed each night.
Some of their responses included:
“I know what all these words mean but can’t make sense out of how you put them together.”
“I just want to add my voice here by saying yes, this is weird, but I’m happy you weirdos found each other.”
“So you have to keep moving your pillows back and forth? Exhausting.”
“I plan on marching on London to end this nonsense.”
“I thought I was a tolerant and progressive sort. But you have found my limit. A stone throwing mob needs to run you and Amy far beyond the city walls before you spread this contagion.”
But for every thousand or so people who declared their allegiance to their side of the bed, there was the occasional person saying, “Yes, my husband and I also don’t have predetermined sides of the bed.”
The world is apparently filled with monsters.
While discussing this insanity, one of my friends said, “What about all the stuff you keep on your side of the bed? Doesn’t that alone force you to choose sides.”
“I don’t have anything on my side of the bed,” I said.
“Nothing?” she said.
“Nope.”
“You don’t have a single thing on your side of the bed?” another friend said. “A book? A glass of water? A phone charger?”
“Nothing,” I repeated.
“Not one single thing? C’mon.”
“It’s true,” Elysha confirmed. “He has nothing on his side of the bed. It’s weird.”
My friend concurred. They concurred far too vehemently for me.
Suddenly I understood how Steve O’Rourke must’ve felt.
For the record, it’s not weird. What the hell do I need on my side of the bed? I climb into bed every night - on my predetermined side - and fall asleep almost immediately. Then sometime between 4:00 and 5:00 AM, I awaken, often without an alarm, and I immediately climb out of bed.
What could I possibly need while I’m in bed?
I know. I probably sound like Steve O’Rourke now, except I bet that lots of people don’t keep anything on the side of their bed.
Right?
This past weekend, one of my stories was rerun on The Moth Radio Hour.
I’ve been fortunate enough to have eight stories appear on their show, and after every one, I am flooded by emails, tweets, and Facebook messages from listeners expressing words of appreciation.
Storytelling audiences are the best.
The story featured this week was about my father, my stepfather, and my time spent growing up in Blackstone, Massachusetts.
Yesterday, I exchanged emails with a listener who had an odd connection to me.
Like me, the listener grew up in Blackstone, MA, and was a friend of my late Uncle Harold. The two graduated together from the “old high school” on Main Street in 1967. That high school eventually became my middle school, and today it’s the site of the public library, where my high school friend now works.
Back in 1967, Blackstone was a tiny town where everyone was seemingly related, and she knew “everyone who lived on Federal Street,” which is where I grew up, too.
Later in life, the listener became the assistant manager of a group home in North Smithfield, Rhode Island. Her manager was my former step father, whom she and most of the staff reportedly (and rightfully) despised.
In addition to working for my former step father, she also went to elementary school with him at St. Charles Elementary School in the neighboring town of Woonsocket, Rhode Island.
My step father’s father was actually her family doctor when she was a small child.
Did you follow all that?
I told a story about growing up in Blackstone, Massachusetts with my father and then my step father.
Then a woman living on the other side of the country heard that story on the radio and just happened to know my step father (as both a child and adult), his father, my uncle, and everyone else living on the street where my father and I grew up, including, presumably, my father.
“Small world,” she wrote to me.
“No kidding!” I thought.
But this is not uncommon. When you tell stories to hundreds and sometimes thousands of people at a time, remarkable connections and ridiculous coincidences are uncovered.
I once told a story to a group of healthcare administrators about nearly dying in a snowstorm while driving my mother’s Datsun B210 on December 23, 1989. When I returned to my seat, one of the administrators sitting at my table (the organization’s President) told me (in stunned disbelief) that he was also in a serious car accident during that very same storm while also driving a Datsun.
I once told a story at a Moth GrandSLAM in Brooklyn about an encounter with my elementary school principal when I was in third grade. Someone in the audience knew my former principal (who I had assumed was dead) and reconnected us. We’ve since exchanged many emails. It turns out that a new middle school was built on Federal Street, about half a mile from my childhood home, and it was named after him. Miraculously, he remembered me, my siblings, and also my father and his siblings.
These are just two of many bizarre coincidences and connections that I have experienced after telling a story. Happily,. the world is far more connected than we could ever have imagined. We just don’t see those connections unless we happen to be a storyteller with large audiences of generous listeners who are willing to reach out and make that connection clear.
As I said, storytelling audiences are the best.