I Knew You'd Be Lovely Part 16

THE LAZIEST FORM OF REVELATION.

A writer friend and I had just decided that the best way to write dialogue that didn't feel overly crafted was to put in everything you want, then go back and take out half of it. No sooner did we come up with this rule than I began to exploit its opposite, and found myself working on a story about a woman who couldn't stop talking. The more her painter-boyfriend ignored her (even as he studied her), the more she felt compelled to reveal.

I have some strawberry in my hair, and part of me has always wished I were a true redhead. In the middle of working on this story, I had lunch with my great-aunt, Corinne Black, whose college nickname was "Torchy." It was she who told me her mother would never allow her to sit as close to the fire as other family members because she was afraid Corinne's head would ignite. As soon as I heard the anecdote, I knew I wanted to use it (that's what the pocket tape recorder I always keep with me is for). I sure hope I was the one who bought the chicken-salad sandwiches that day.

THE SUMMER BEFORE.

"The Summer Before" was the first short story I ever wrote-not counting grade school compositions, including one about the adventures a baseball has after it's. .h.i.t out of the park. It languished in a drawer for fifteen years-my coming-of-age story, waiting to come of age. I think because the characters are so young, this story in particular brings to mind Irving Howe's wonderful observation: "The best art almost becomes sentimental, but doesn't." During one of my editing sessions, I cut a line in which a yacht pa.s.ses by with the words Writer's Block emblazoned across its stern. It didn't fit with the rest of the scene, and once I realized how bizarrely attached to it I was, I knew it had to go. Lifted from real life was the yellow outboard christened Lightning Bug, which belonged to Bruce and Mark Ashmun, who were part of a gang of friends who helped make summers at Lake Winnipesaukee the kind of thing you want to grow up and write about.

I'm the oldest of four girls, and if I were ever forced to watch a movie of my life-for the purpose of instruction, if not judgment-I'm certain there would be numerous scenes during which I would have to look away, for shame. I suppose this story was one way of trying to do penance. It is dedicated to my sisters.

Lastly: Before he met my mother, my father was engaged to a woman named Fran (Frances Marshall Watkins), who died of Lou Gehrig's disease. I'm glad she gets to play a small role in this story, unlike the rather large role she plays in my life: Had she not died, I would never have lived.

MOLLUSK MAKES A COMEBACK.

Some stories are born whole; they arrive almost seamlessly, and all you can do is humbly acknowledge them as the gifts they are. This was not one of those stories. "Mollusk" lived on my computer for twelve years before it was published, and had different t.i.tles and varying details. But its heart remained the same. To me, it's a story about a young woman's search for something to believe in, and her attempts to muster the conviction to live.

Katie has become a bit of a cult figure for my sisters and me. We still speak of "pulling a Katie" or "having a total Katie Day." Although we like to imply it's all other people's fault, usually it means coming face-to-face with the impossibility of staying on top of everything. A Katie Day is a day where everything goes wrong at once, typically in a sad, slightly funny way-the only upside to chaos being that it frequently spits out a joke.

I tend to be drawn to people like Katie, who lived through some period of aimlessness or recklessness before they found their feet. It seems I'm able to spot them across a crowded room. Or if I don't spot them, they spot me. Even though Katie is a mess in a lot of ways, she also has a lot to teach.

I KNEW YOU'D BE LOVELY I wrote this story while I was at the Iowa Writers' Workshop for a summer. I'd taken up smoking while I was there-it seemed the thing to do-and my old Mac desktop conked out mid-story, possibly from nicotine exposure. (The only Mac to ever fail me, and I don't blame the embattled machine one bit.) I had no car at the time, and I remember waiting with excruciating impatience for a bus to come and take me to the campus writing lab before I forgot everything. Once back at one of their computers, I feverishly tried to reconstruct what I'd written, which was utterly strange: I'm not used to working on stories with other people around, during normal business hours.

"Lovely" became my first published story when Joan Silber chose it to win the Inkwell Writing Compet.i.tion in 2007. I will always be indebted to her and to the other lovelies at Inkwell.

PROOF OF LOVE.

I wrestled with this story while writing it, keenly aware of the fine line between a character who has strong opinions and a story that has strong opinions, and the cosmic No-No of finding yourself on the wrong side of that line. (Samuel Goldwyn: "If you have a message, send a telegram.") I knew Kelly's persona intimately, so she was easy to write; and I hadn't seen her elsewhere, so I wanted to write her. But insecurity about the story endured. For that reason, I've been especially surprised at the warm reception it has received-one admirer made a PROOF OF LOVE T-s.h.i.+rt; another defended my own character to me: "She's not a Jesus freak! She's freaky for Jesus!" I love these people, and don't think my grat.i.tude can be fully expressed.

WE'VE GOT A GREAT FUTURE BEHIND US When I left New York City, I chose Pawling, New York, partly because of a wonderful live-music venue they have here called the Towne Crier Cafe. A few winters ago, I heard Jon Poussette-Dart perform there. He introduced one of his songs by saying it was the result of a collaboration between him and two friends; they'd promised when they were married that they'd write a song with him, and had honored the promise even after they acrimoniously divorced. I loved the idea so much, I don't think I slept that night. His song was not called "We've Got a Great Future Behind Us"-in fact, I don't recall it being self-referential at all-but nonetheless, a story was born.

I originally thought "Future" was going to be about an estranged couple airing their grievances with each other while writing love songs-through the lyrics of the songs-which just shows you what too much caffeine can do.

Around the time I wrote this, I dated a man who left me speechless when he said he thought women shouldn't be allowed to vote because we let our feelings distort our perceptions. It was a shocking statement from an otherwise decent man, and I can remember wondering whether I should tell him: "When you date the woman who comes after me, you might want to leave that little nugget in your purse."

DOUBLE-BLIND.

The inspiration for this story came from a pa.s.sage in a book Perry Mehrling wrote about my father, Fischer Black. In the fall of 1961, my dad shared a small apartment at 1560 Cambridge Street with three physicists and an historian. For some reason, the idea of sharing a kitchen and a bathroom with three physicists fascinated me. Perry's book also taught me that in high school, my dad and some of his friends had formed a group called the American Society of Creators, Apostles and Prophets-possibly named for the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers-whose stated purpose was "to try to work out effective methods of true discussion." These two things combined to create the initial spark for "Double-Blind." As is often the case, many of the original details never made it to the final draft, e.g., that the group read Scientific American and would then discuss Norbert Wiener's cybernetic theory of the human nervous system, or how Aldous Huxley's ideas on altered states of consciousness led them to try their hands at hypnosis.

Of course, the well-known line about b.u.mblebees not being able to fly according to the laws of physics is a famous mischaracterization; what b.u.mblebees can't theoretically do is coast.

THE FAR SIDE OF THE MOON.

This story was first conceived as an entry for an Esquire fiction contest, in which I was trying to write a story to go with the t.i.tle "Twenty-Ten." I didn't win, but I'm nonetheless grateful to them; if it weren't for their contest, I never would have written the story.

People sometimes ask if it's difficult to write in the male voice, and for whatever reason, I don't find it to be. "Moon" was one of my easiest stories to write; I think it took me only about three weeks (the contest deadline helped). I laughed appreciatively when a male reader told me it was a quintessential male-voice story, saying: "It could be subt.i.tled 's.e.x, drugs, rock and roll, and cars. And beer.' "

My uncle Carl tamed the squirrels when he was a freshman at Harvard and would then impress women with his authority over small woodland creatures. He also had a roommate on whom the character of Ace is loosely based. Ace was a writer's dream-what's more fun than a character who says yes to everything?-and in many ways, his spirit lives on in a new book I'm working on, The Lucky Brother.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

Heartfelt thanks to: Lee K. Abbott, Carl Allen, Miriam Allen, Ted Allen, Matthew Arkin, Lisa Bankoff, Blakeney Bartlett, Anne Bartoc, Anna Becker, Beverly Bell, Vilem Benes, Ashley Black, Christina Black, Fischer Black, Kerry Black, Lee and CeCe Black, Melissa Black, Mimi Black, Paige Black, all my friends at Bloomberg Business Week, Beth Boswell, Dennis Boutsikaris, Guy Boyd, Alexa Brandenberg, Aaron Brown, Suzanne Brownstein, Robert Byrnes, Bill Camp, Stephen Cavitt, Clay McLeod Chapman, Julia Coffey, Margo Crespin, Alice Elliott Dark, Aleta Davies, Sarah Davis, Alex Dawson, Danielle DeVine, Rebecca Donner, Peter Eicher, Marc Fitten, Cynthia Flaxenburg, Robert Fogarty, Elliott Forrest, Brian Frazer, David Gates, Anney Giobbe, Nicole Goguen, Natalie Goldberg, Peter Hayes, Randell Haynes, Joshua Henkin, George Herrmann, Robin Hirsch, Ron Hogan, Hillary Holloway, Emily Barton Hopkins, Tom Jenks, Thom Jones, Joy Katz, Jennie Kaufman, Celine Keating, John Kennedy, the Kiley sisters, Autumn Kindelspire, Valerie Leff, Alex Lindquist, David Lynn, Steve McCarthy, Perry Mehrling, N. Scott Momaday, Christianna Nelson, Jim O'Grady, Larry O'Keefe, Anne O'Sullivan, ZZ Packer, David Palecek, David Pengilly, Paul Plissey, Sharon Pomerantz, Spence Porter, Chris Power, Christine Pride, Patricia Randell, M. Z. ("Reb Zed") Ribalow, Joshua Roberts, David Rocks, Rick Rofihe, Diane Salvatore, Scott Sanderson, Alex Sapountzis, Jonathan Schorr, Campbell Scott, John Shea, Ian Sheehy, Isaiah Sheffer, Joan Silber, Bill Silverman, Linda Simone, Gerry Skinder, Robbyn Spratt, Scott Stossel, Jill Sverdlove, Jim Taibi, the Tawes family, Mich.e.l.le Toth, Grant Tracey, Brenda Ueland, Michael Voll, Eric Vrooman, Craig Wall, David Wallace-Wells, Susan Walter, Alexis Washam, Rob Weatherbee, Matthew Wells, Bob Whelan, Ron Witmer, Yeshua, Sarah Young, Steve Zimmer, and a standing ovation to Jeff Jackson.

The author wishes to thank the editors of the following publications, in which these stories first appeared: "That of Which We Cannot Speak" in The Antioch Review, "The Only Way Out Is Through" in Narrative, "Good in a Crisis" in The North American Review, "The Thing Itself" in Arts & Letters (winner of the 2008 Prize for Fiction), "The Laziest Form of Revelation" in The Kenyon Review, "Mollusk Makes a Comeback" in The Chattahoochee Review, "I Knew You'd Be Lovely" in Inkwell (winner of the 2007 Fiction Compet.i.tion), "Proof of Love" in American Literary Review, "We've Got a Great Future Behind Us" in Green Mountains Review, and "Double-Blind" in The Saint Ann's Review.

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