CarrollBlog 1.1

On New Year's Eve around 8 before the fireworks and festivities start shouting hurray, I take the dog for a long walk around the neighborhood. The streets are icy and empty. I like to think it's because people are getting ready to go out to parties, or at home with friends/ family/food and a bottle of champagne for a nice night together. The display windows are still full of Christmas decorations although the larger stores have already started their January sales. Looking in, you see the messiness that always accompanies holiday sales. Tables piled high with scattered discarded clothes, stacks of plastic hangers on the cashier's desk... I walk past a large empty supermarket with all its lights turned on. It is so bright that half the sidewalk in front of the building is illuminated. Inside the market, a lone woman is slowly mopping the floor. For some reason she looks up and we stare at each other. Spontaneously I mouth the words "Happy New Year" in English. She smiles a little and throws up one hand as if to say she doesn't understand. I mouth it again, this time in German. Now she frowns and turns away, probably thinking I'm a nut or a weirdo or someone else creepy you don't want to talk to. Shrugging, I pull the dog to continue on our 'Adios- 2007' tour of the neighborhood. A breeze comes up and suddenly the air is acrid, smelling strongly of firecrackers.
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"A hat's not a hat till it's tilted."

CarrollBlog 12.31

For those of you interested in the art of book cover illustrations (one of my obsessions), here's a website just for us. Click on the various covers to see readers' reactions to them. They are informed, opinionated, ornery and often very insightful. Good stuff.
www.covers.fwis.com

CarrollBlog 12.30

Every New Year's I look for an appropriate quote to post here that's a good one to steer us all into the next 365 days. This time I'm going to repeat a stanza from Anne Sexton's poem SNOW that appeared on the blog earlier this month. Every time I look at the words I smile and nod because she's right-- there *is* hope, no matter what.
Happy New Year. Vorwarts!

CarrollBlog 12.29

On their first date they ended up back at her apartment kissing for a long time. Eventually she whispered, "Would you like to go into the bedroom?" He said, "No, let's be sixteen tonight and just make out."
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CarrollBlog 12.28

At lunchtime the room is packed at one of Vienna's most exclusive restaurants. From the street you can see in to the place through the many floor to ceiling windows, and from outside it appears that every table is occupied. But what catches your eye quickly is off in one corner are three enormous Golden Retriever dogs lying next to each other on the floor by one of the tables. An elderly couple are sitting there and with so much undulating beige around their feet, it almost looks as if they're eating on a sandy beach somewhere.

CarrollBlog 12.27

Quotes from Jack Nicholson:

CarrollBlog 12.25

Merry Christmas, Everyone. I hope that you are exactly where you want to be today, whether it's alone or with others who matter to you. I've gotten a number of emails recently from soldiers in Iraq. Of course they aren't where they want to be today, so I wish anyone in harm's way safety as well. May we all go to bed tonight smiling, full of good food and memories.

CarrollBlog 12.24

Across the street is a building which for years housed a fur coat store. The man who ran it was a well known Viennese character who was always on TV at the most prestigious balls, the openings, the chicest parties of every season. What made him stand out is he is physically huge-- I would say he is six foot ten or more and must weigh close to three hundred pounds. He has flowing white hair and always dresses beautifully. In the winter he wears a floor length black overcoat and brightly colored scarves. I know this because for years I watched him go in and out of the store, often with rich looking clientele hanging on his every word. We used to see each other so often on the street that we nodded hello and smiled. Last year a sign appeared in the window that the store was closing because he was retiring. For weeks they had a big sale and slowly the shop cleared out until there was little left inside. It looked like he was there every day watching the end of his small empire. And then they closed and soon after an advertising firm took over and redid the whole space. It looks very different now. This afternoon, Christmas Eve, as I was walking home I saw a giant figure in a long black coat peering in the windows of the building. It took me a moment to recognize him but when I did, I was touched and saddened. The first thing that entered my mind was Dickens' story THE CHRISTMAS CAROL. It was like the ghost of Christmas Present staring in the windows of the life he had once lived. I cannot imagine what he was thinking as he went from window to window, shading his brow so that he could see better. Here he was on Christmas Eve peering in at his place and what they had done to it. It was so poignant to see him there that I hurried to get into my building before he saw me.
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My Xmas present to you-- the TECHNO ViKING!

CarrollBlog 12.23

When someone has never read my books, they often ask which would be a good one to begin with? Today I thought what if we asked a version of that question to people who interest us: I want to know who you really are. If I could magically wander around in your life, what would be the best year (time, day, period...) to visit to see the essential you? Were you Jonathan Carroll-pure when you were 19, full of equal measures of hope and bullshit? Or when you were thirty and well on your way to who you are today, only with more hunger to succeed than now because your first book had just been published and you were eager to write others to show the world what you could do? Or this minute-- are you the real JC right now, more than at any other time in your life? I know-- some will say we change as we age and we're never just one person. An ever-changing mixed salad of selves, depending on how old we are. That's true. But humor me a few minutes and answer the question as best you can-- If you could freeze one time in your life and say THEN-- look at that person, *that's* the real me.
When would that be?
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CarrollBlog 12.20

WITH HER
by Pablo Neruda

CarrollBlog 12.19

The small side street art galleries. Streets that should never have galleries-- plunked down between a failing electrical appliance store and a postage stamp store that looks like nothing in it has changed since 1953. These galleries--do they ever sell anything? I never see anyone inside except the person who runs the place. They are usually sitting in the back in front of a computer screen or staring forlornly out onto the street, waiting for anyone to come in and take a look. I get the feeling that in about half these places the owner is the artist. In my neighborhood at least, some of the "shows" in these galleries never change, or at least the artist never changes. There is one nearby that always displays figurative nudes in weird positions painted on newspaper. The pictures are pretty good but they are all mostly the same. Only once or twice a year are the windows changed and different nudes painted on newspaper go on display. What optimism these gallery owners have. What courage to open a little place like that thinking they're going to survive somehow. That the world will stumble onto their treasures and buy enough to keep them going. I've never seen anything in their windows or on their walls that I want to buy, but I love these galleries in the middle of nowhere and always stop in to at least have a look. Just the expression on the owners' faces when you walk in is a gift-- Oh boy, a customer!
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a beauty from Leonard Cohen that he later turned into a favorite song:

CarrollBlog 12.18

Us Together
by George Johnston

CarrollBlog 12.17

On a pre-Christmas shopping Saturday, a car sped the wrong way down a normally very busy street. Miraculously no traffic was coming in the opposite (right) direction. The car drove the whole length of the one way street, eventually turned off and pulled away. The people who saw this looked at each other and either smiled or shook their heads, all of us probably thinking the same thing-- what a lucky guy. It led me to think how many times in our lives do we make mistakes like that-- metaphorically driving the wrong way down a one way street without knowing it--but nothing happens to us? We don't get hit or caught or penalized or ticketed or hurt or ruined or *killed*...
When bus doors close in your face at the last second because you were a half step too late, or you get splashed by a wall of water on a rainy day when the truck drives through a puddle nearby, you often complain "Why does this always happen to me?" But you never think how often have I gotten away with stuff? How many times have I narrowly missed trouble, danger or disaster simply because I lucked out? In my lifetime how often have I come "this close" without ever knowing it?

CarrollBlog 12.16

Graffiti from the British artist Banksy:

CarrollBlog 12.15

Lines from a notebook:

CarrollBlog 12.14

GB sent me a link to the latest Pirelli calendar, with the teaser line "something that many desire to have." For those unfamiliar with it, the Pirelli tire company in Italy once a year hires the world's greatest photographers to shoot a theme calendar (usually artfully posed nudes) using the most famous models in the world. But I have never understood peoples' interest in this calendar or, when they do nudes, why they think they are erotic. Yes, famous photographers make the pictures, but the women and their bodies are so perfect and the pictures so obviously staged that it all reminds me of high class pornography. IE no one has ever had sex like that with a person who looks like that in a situation even remotely like that, so why would you ever think it erotic? Some would say because it is a fantasy and that's the attraction. But fantasy should be based or at least touched by reality (as all great fantasy is, even when there are dragons). The Pirelli calendar and things like it don't even have a sprinkling of reality, ergo nope.

CarrollBlog 12.13

A great letter and link from BL:

CarrollBlog 12.12

On a rainy December afternoon around 5 pm, I walk past a small brightly lit neighborhood hair salon (friseur). On display through the picture window are four old women sitting in the chairs having their hair done. Every one of their heads is pure science fiction-- one of them is all purple from some mysterious fluid or shampoo being used, another is all straight- on pointy punk spikes with white shampoo, another is covered with aluminum foil strips draped over it like Tibetan Buddhist prayer flags. The hairdressers are working their separate tonsorial magic on these heads. Each of the four old women look either like serious punks or characters from distant planets in that famous bar scene of the film STAR WARS.
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Success loves a witness, but failure can't exist without one.

CarrollBlog 12.11

"When you're in bed with someone, you're seeing them as they really are. No masks or camouflage to hide behind because they're at their most naked and vulnerable. It's like seeing someone's face when they first wake up in the morning. *That* face is who they really are."

CarrollBlog 12.10

"There are books in which the footnotes or comments scrawled by some reader's hand in the margin are more interesting than the text. The world is one of these books."

CarrollBlog 12.9

http://dailycoyote.blogspot.com/
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"You do battle with the audience, watching. You never let them take control. As soon as they think they are laughing and having a good time, you bang them on the head and say, Hold on a second."

CarrollBlog 12.8

Once in a while something from your past-- deep in your past-- comes flying out of the shadows and hits you on the side of the head like a snowball with a stone in the middle of it. Today I was trying to invent an interesting name for a new character in something I'm writing. Out of the blue (and for the first time in decades) I remembered the interesting peculiar name of my seventh grade math teacher. He was probably the first openly gay man I ever knew and since this was way back in the early 60's, that was a brave thing to be and do. He was very Southern and a real gentleman in both manner and dress. Every day he wore a beautiful dark suit and tie and a different colored silk pocket square. I remember that distinctly. But what I didn't remember and which whacked me in the head today was he used to give us lots of quizzes which we naturally hated. When we'd complain about the unending number, he would jokingly say, "If you think my quizzies are bad, you should see my testies.'
So help me God, he used to say that all the time.
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interesting site/concept:

CarrollBlog 12.7

"You Learn Something New Every Day" department:

CarrollBlog 12.7

Leonard Cohen waltzes with Vienna:

CarrollBlog 12.6

After reading Tuesday's entry about Rilke on his birthday, SS sent in these two quotes which he thought applied:

CarrollBlog 12.5

It happens almost every Christmas. I'll pass a store window, look in, and grin. Oh boy there it is! The perfect present for___. Now I don't have to search any more. So I walk in and innocently ask how much does that cost. "That" once was a cool looking wooden stepladder. Another time a 1950's plastic toy truck that looked like something right out of an R.Crumb comic book. Then there was the year of the sleek steel pocket knife, and once an old wood and metal picture frame in a junk shop window in a bad part of town. With a straight face the salesperson says 100 euro, 500, or 1000 euro. Then follows the inevitable long pause while I digest what they just said. At that point I want to ask them aren't you ashamed to even say that price? It's a ladder, not a jewel or a rare artifact. But then of course they would counter with something like oh but it's entirely handmade of bingo-bongo wood by artisans and and and... But I would protest IT'S A STEPLADDER! Yoo hoo-- ladders (pocketknives, picture frames...) do not cost 750 euro. I don't care if they were made by Picasso. But I never have this discussion. I only smile sheepishly, say thanks, and walk out of the store thinking all right-- *now* what am I going to get them?

CarrollBlog 12.4

It's the birthday of poet Rainer Maria Rilke, born in Prague (1875), who made a career as a poet by seducing a series of rich noblewomen who would support him while he wrote his books. One princess let him live for a while in her Castle Duino near Trieste, a medieval castle with fortified walls and an ancient square tower. Rilke's room had a view of the gulf of Trieste, which he loved. In a letter from his room he wrote, "I am looking out into the empty sea-space, directly into the universe, you might say."

CarrollBlog 12.3

SNOW
by Anne Sexton

CarrollBlog 12.2

"It isn't easy to become a fossil... Only about one bone in a billion, it is thought, becomes fossilized. If that is so, it means that the complete fossil legacy of all the Americans alive today - that's 270 million people with 206 bones each - will only be about 50 bones, one-quarter of a complete skeleton. That's not to say, of course, that any of these bones will ever actually be found. Bearing in mind that they can be buried anywhere within an area of slightly over 9.3 million square kilometers, little of which will ever be turned over, much less examined, it would be something of a miracle if they ever were."

from A SHORT HISTORY OF NEARLY EVERYTHING by Bill Bryson

CarrollBlog 12.1

" 'Thou shalt not' is soon forgotten, but 'Once Upon a Time' lasts forever."
Philip Pullman