Thursday 11/23/23
The other day in the late afternoon I went down to the harbor after getting a hot chocolate. I often regather this way around that time of another day after dealing, as always, with the abuse and discrimination. I sit. I be. I am readying myself for the next day. Enduring that as I create, until all of this has passed because it has been overcome. And all that needs to be done has been done and taken maximum effect. I say to myself, "Strength. Courage. Faith." I did the same today here on Thanksgiving morning as I lay on my back on the grass and looked up at the cold, clear sky between sets of my workout. "Strength. Courage. Faith."
I have assorted spots, most of them near the water. At one of them, there's this small furrow behind a rock that doubles as a bench, though I've never seen anyone else sitting on it, now that I think of it. There are a couple threadbare plantings, shade if you're very small like the baby mouse--it couldn't have been bigger than a half dollar--that was there the other afternoon when I was, and which came right up to my shoe. I chased it off, but gently. I don't think it had figured out yet that a mouse ought to be clandestine, and while I am friendly, there are many others who are not.
I began work this morning at 1:15.
I wrote two fine Thanksgiving op-eds.
"Finder of Views," for Big Asks: Six Novelettes About Acceptance, is now over 10,000 words.
I wrote the preface to the baseball book, and returned to the Carlton Fisk portion to make changes, and am doing so with the Dave Kingman part, which should be done today.
Last year I set out to write a Christmas story better than A Christmas Carol, something unlike anything has ever done or could do, and I did that with "Best Present Ever." I'm doing the same thing this year, and I began work on that story, which is called "Eye of Green."
Most days in terms of fitness of late have been comprised of 3000 stairs ran and 100 push-ups. Last week I did 2000 push-ups, which is the most I've done since I started doing them properly, which makes all the difference. Weeks end for me on Fridays, and I was at 1500, so I just did another 500 on that day. Today I ran 5000 stairs and did 300 push-ups. It was supposed to be more.
Listened to the 1939 Mercury Theatre radio mounting of A Christmas Carol for something I'll be writing. That's the one that featured Lionel Barrymore as Scrooge. He was unable to play the part the year before, so Welles did it. That's the better one. Not because Welles was Scrooge. Different reasons.
Downloaded every Pink Floyd recording--every live and studio tape--of Pink Floyd from 1976 and 1977.
Got yesterday's mail, and the nightmare saga that is entirely The Wall Street Journal's doing continues with the Massachusetts Department of Revenue. This, after the saga with the IRS, in following from The Wall Street Journal misreported my income by hundreds of thousands of dollars to the government. Which then became my problem, going on three years now. And you know what's amazing about that? This massive, stressful, time-sucking cock up that has created all of this tribulation and work for me, is the least of the bad experiences I've had with The Wall Street Journal, all of which will be documented in these pages when this government matter wraps up.
Someone read "Words for Air #57," which is one of the shortest works I've ever done, word count-wise, and opined, "Words is amazing. That's what I always say of course. I read it 3 times. Nothing like it anywhere. Genius."
It is very good. I expect myself to come up with things no one else could--it's a given for me--but as I look at it I imagine another version of myself wondering, "How did you come up with this?" But here, within myself, that's just who I am. The person who does that.
There is much to be done today. Let's resume. Photo from on my back here. The granite of the Custom House came from Rockport. And I thought of that, too, as I reminded myself what I need to do.
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