February 10th, 2025 - My Friend Pinocchio

Dear TNY,

I’m late again on this one, but that’s because I just drove across America (N to S), so now I’m sitting down to read “My Friend Pinocchio”.

And it’s okay.  Great first line. Very T.C. Boyle. Also, I like the wildness of the story.  I appreciate how disjointed the narrative is, almost like the narrator can’t figure out what he’s trying to say.  In fact, he’s so bad at figuring it out, he finishes with, “So, anyway, Kenny died.”  I found that humorous but at the same time I thought it took away from the ending.  For me, the real ending was further up in the story when Kenny was reading a section from a screenplay to Donny.  And he talks about the woman tucking the sheets in around the bed, making a tight, wrinkle free pyramid over her dying son. 

To me, this story felt like it was reaching for a classic Denis Johnson sound.  But it just didn’t make it. It wasn’t as vivid as Johnson so that wildness feels more disjointed than Johnson’s work. But I did think some of the phrasing was amazing. The bits about sex with his wife were super good. But not enough to elevate this whole thing to transcendence.  So it was, like I said, okay.

I would like to talk about the word aids (sic) used in this story.  It was in dialogue, but still, that shouldn’t matter.  AIDS is always fucking AIDS.  Some style guides say that you can call it Aids, but most don’t.  What I’m saying is that AIDS is never aids.  So why the fuck, DEBORAH, in 2025, in supposedly the best short fiction publication on the planet, are you using aids?  Because you and your suck-ass team don’t fucking care?  Correct.

Anyway, I drove the jewelry box from Tacoma to Phoenix.  And delivered it.  And she cried.  Twice.  And immediately started stuffing things into it.  Am I happy?  I’m happy that she’s happy.  All I see are mistakes.  But I’m proud of what I’ve done.  And I’m proud of Chuck, too.  For making it this far.  He started to get a hesitation on the way down so I did a tune up after I got here.  Turns out that plugs 1 and 3 both had their electrodes blown out.  So the hesitation is gone. But then I broke the dipstick off, again.  So I’ve got a little more tweaking to do.

What did I learn on an 1800 mile roadtrip that involved rain, pinball, buttons of pornography, a muskrat, a fat wet snowstorm, a dustbowl, a free hot springs with wild donkeys, vandalized petroglyphs, Taco Bell, a bar with 5% beer only, Mexican youths protesting our President, a shooting star, the last Blockbuster, wild wallpaper and a bathtub movie, both National Treasures, the most photogenic canyon in history, more wind, and a homeless spiritual guide calling Chuck a Starliner?  I learned that my life is fucking awesome and while all of you were at work or watching TV in your apartments, I was in a rowboat that was skimming the underside of the Milky Way, one hand up, right into the sparkleflow, causing eddies and swirls in the quarks and gluons that make up all of our fabric.  I saw God.  I cried.  And I remembered. 

I’m doing the right thing.  I’m usually doing the right thing, actually.  I’m on the right path.  And it goes where so many want to go, but won’t get off their asses and apply some courage. 

I was looking at old pictures of trips with my sons the other day and realized this year is the 10th anniversary of our first trip.  And I looked at other pictures and saw that time and time again we’ve pulled it out of the bag, as they say.  One magic trick after another.  And when they aren’t around, I do that too.  My life is one magic trick after another. I grew up to live. I became my father’s son. I tell stories and I fucking go go go. And my sons have more stories than you and the people you know. They don’t even know how to tell them yet. 

I tried telling my ex wife this and she said:  I’m happy in my life of quiet desperation. 

Yuck.

I remember once I dated a girl.  A long time back.  And I asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up.  And she said “a female Hemingway.”  And she asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up.  I said:  I want people to say when they are asked this question that they want to be a version of me.

I forget so often because some people try to fucking beat it out of me emotionally, but I am me.  I’m not trying to be something or someone different.  I’m not emulating behavior or subscribing to practices or communities or groups.  This ship set sail fucking years ago and here I am.  I’m not trying to find the adventure.  Or the magic.  I am the magic and the adventure.  And today it’s a privilege to be alive.

Later.

Nick