Author Archives: McPhedran

Tiny Door. Little Door.

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It’s a longish short story of a relationship that starts with a connection, direct and funny. And then an angry step daughter arrives, sexually taunting. “How did you get here? What did you do to be standing here? I knew how fucked up everybody was when I was a kid. And that never made sense to me. The world was huge. It was beyond anything I could imagine. And then I went out and realized that it wasn’t all that. Don’t fuck with my mother.”

After that, the story of the relationship isn’t as wise or wonderful as survival. “Life might be done with me, but that’s because I called it out on all of its bullshit.”

Liking People Less and Less

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I realize that I am getting older and less patient and all of that, but I am certain that people are getting weirder and more fucked up on some exponential scale. Masks are my proof. Why can’t people just wear a fucking mask? Isn’t this like wearing a shirt or pants? We figured that out when we were kids. Most of us anyway.

The point of wearing the mask to slow the spread. This is not about the people that ate paint chips on their Count Chocula. I am talking about people with brains, that accept medicine and science and humanity and all of that, and they still can’t seem to wear a mask. It’s either on their chin, especially when they’re trying to focus on their social media feed – be it dunks or pumps – or just below their nose.

How can they not understand that the issue of breathing is related to both the nose AND the mouth? Isn’t that, like, grade two bio? Anyway, I’m getting sick of these nitwits and it helps that the mask mandate is coming to end where the stupidity of the seemingly educated is so baldly on display.

Black Panthers: As Relevant As Ever

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The only culture worth keeping is the revolutionary culture. Black culture must not be something that the enemy enjoys, appreciates or says is attractive. It must be repelling to the slave master. It must smash, shatter and crack his skull, crack his eyeballs open and make water and gold dust run out. (George Mason Murray, Black Panther Minister of Education, 1968)

When we talk about becoming free, we have to talk about power, getting all the goods, services and land, and returning them equally to the oppressed and enslaved Mexicans, Blacks, Indians, Puerto Ricans and poor whites in the U.S. and to the rest of the oppressed and hungry people of the world. (Murray, 1968) 

The racist dog oppressors have no rights which oppressed black people are bound to respect. The oppressor must be harassed until his doom. He must have no peace by day or night. (Bernadine Dohrn, Students for a Democratic Society Secretary)

Dopple Bro

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I will myself to believe that there is someone who understands me, not a true love as much as a Dopple Bro.

I cling to the idea, a spasm in my thinking, as I call everyone I can think of from the fire escape, thinking this might be the way in through the razor thin thing to that other monstrous, astonishing thing on the edge of the galaxy, that somewhere that I know not to be true.

It can be imagined in a moment and maybe even felt, but it is nothing, like the dream of wholly loving your child and believing they might feel the same way back. Temporal is such a nice and refined way of saying fuck this place

Blog Post #1501: This One Should Be Big

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We live in a mess of a world. Nothing whatsoever points to anything working out for any of us. And, truth be known, we deserve come what may.

It isn’t Trump or Putin or Bolsonaro. It’s the evil of the middle road, making decisions to eke out a little bit for ourselves, convinced that no real harm is done by a trip somewhere nice or buying another bag of chips.

I don’t have a clue what I’m doing. That’s my shitty excuse. I’m always looking to get away, avoid responsibility. I move from one thing to the next with no genuine aspiration, nothing true or wise. I like to write. That’s it. I like to live in that pretend world so that I can think that I know things. Yeah, I’m a stupid kid.

A Childhood Hallway

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I remember turning down a street, going around a park, to get home. I think it was called Seyton Place. But I have no idea. The only way I can remember is not think about it. It comes into my head when I am writing about something else.

I can picture the route only at that moment. Not when I think about it. I can see the fence around the back of the baseball field. I can see myself driving. I don’t know why I remember any of it. It doesn’t mean anything, like a childhood hallway or smell, always there but not.

Vainglorious

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I remember something and let’s say it is real. Two girls stood there explaining why they had to go into quarantine. It wasn’t their fault. Someone had sat with them at lunch and later tested positive. They stood far away from me. I told them to go to the nurse, and they did.

What does it feel like to be nowhere and have nothing? I think I know that. And still…and still…no, I don’t. Vainglorious, even if it might be on the back side of things. But that edge, that feeling of doom, of relentless meaninglessness, yeah, on the slide of scroll and pause, that is it seeping badly in.

Life Isn’t Fair (Thanks, Mama)

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Okay, here is what I have gotten all wrong until now: humans are in search of fairness. I really did always think that. It seemed so obvious. I delved into the life of MLK, the Trail of Tears, anything I could find on this quest.

And then I realized, just now, older and all, that none of this is part of any goal. To vanquish. That is it. There is just this. The victor, smiling, lying, everyone else justifying. So simple. And sad. In other words, my mother was right when I cried foul. “Life isn’t far.” Nor will it ever be.

Anori: Receiving Editor Notes

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It took me two weeks to open my editor’s email. Even then, I was only able to scan them and fixated on one line: This is the point where my growing frustrations would cause me to close the book and not pick it up again. WTF?!?

The opening remarks were positive: I really love this book. So much of the writing is fantastic—clear, evocative, and crystalline. Dee is such a great character! And then…a descent into what he really wanted to say: The tone of the novel, as I’ve mentioned, is at times difficult to discern, at times seeming like realism, other times satire, and others as purposefully surreal.

I still haven’t been able to read all of the notes. It’s like a mild form of PTSD. I mean, I understand the essential problem is the narrative bouncing back and forth between Greenland and New York. What I wanted to do was to emphasize Dee’s indecision, but the audience won’t have it because she needs her motherfucking arc/ark.

I am getting to a point where I can call my editor and talk about it. I’m almost ready. Soon.