Orwell Observations from Life on the Margins: Down and Out in Paris and London

Life at the bottom is no piece of cake. This is one fact you notice from reading George Orwell's memoir Down and Out in Paris and London. The book details what a life of menial labor and poverty consists of. 

The book is divided into two parts, the first being Orwell's experiences in Paris and the lessons he learned, such as how the starving manage to subsist, as he was one of them. In the latter part of his Paris life, Orwell works as a dishwasher in a hotel restaurant kitchen and lives in a slum. He also writes about the conditions at a charity hospital in Paris. 

Much of the book features stories about the array of characters he meets along the way along with details of the squalor and indignities people endure to survive. Occasionally, however, he steps back to interpret what he's seen, sharing conclusions he's drawn from his experiences. What's fascinating, disturbing or discouraging (depending on yout point of view) is how relevant these matters remain,

In chapter 22 he questions how there has come to be such a disparty between rich and and poor. More importantly, why do the middle classes side with the rich and separate themselves from the "vermin" who slave away all their waking hours doing work that is demeaning and sometimes useless?

Orwell concludes: I believe that this instinct to perpetuate useless work is, at bottom, simply fear of the mob. The mob (the thought runs) are such low animals that they would be dangerous if they had leisure; it is safer to keep them too busy to think. 

A little further on he elaborates.

They (middle class) side with the rich because they imagine that any liberty conceded to the poor is a threat to their own liberty. Foreseeing some dismal Marxian Utopia as the alternative, the educated man prefers to keep things as they are. Possibly he does not like his fellow-rich very much, but he supposes that even the vulgarest of them are less inimical to his pleasures, more his kind of people, than the poor, and that he had better stand by them. It is this fear of a supposedly dangerous mob that makes nearly all intelligent people conservative in their opinions. 

Fear of the mob is a superstitious fear. It is based on the idea that there is some mysterious, fundamental difference between rich and poor, as though they were two different races, like negroes and white men. But in reality there is no such difference. The mass of the rich and the poor are differentiated by their incomes and nothing else, and the average millionaire is only the average dishwasher dressed in a new suit. Change places, and handy dandy, which is the justice, which is the thief? 

Everyone who has mixed on equal terms with the poor knows this quite well. But the trouble is that intelligent, cultivated people, the very people who might be expected to have liberal opinions, never do mix with the poor. For what do the majority of educated people know about poverty? In my copy of Villon's poems the editor has actually thought it necessary to explain the line "Ne pain ne voyent qu'aux fenestres" by a footnote; so remote is even hunger from the educated man's experience. From this ignorance a superstitious fear of the mob results quite naturally. The educated man pictures a horde of submen, wanting only a day's liberty to loot his house, burn his books, and set him to work minding a machine or sweeping out a lavatory. "Anything," he thinks, "any injustice, sooner than let that mob loose."

* * * 

What. are your thoughts about Orwell's observations? How are things different? And how are they the same? One thing that appears to have changed over the past century: we seem to have a lot more bread and circuses.

I'm interested in your thoughts. Comments welcome.

* * * 

Related Links
Orwell-related blog posts

George Orwell's "How the Poor Die": Exploring Themes of Inequality, Neglect and Other Grim Realities

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2024/09/george-orwells-how-poor-die-exploring.html

George Orwell on Wells, Hitler and "Patriotism vs. the World State"

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2021/07/george-orwell-on-wells-hitler-and.html

Orwell on Media Mischief

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2021/11/orwell-on-media-mischief.html

Orwell's Homage to Catalonia Is Instructive on Many Levels, Plus a Good Read

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2021/08/orwells-homage-to-catalonia-is.html

Public Introspection: George Orwell's Why I Write

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2016/08/public-introspection-george-orwells-why.html

Shooting an Elephant
https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2011/05/shooting-elephant.html

David Blackmon Explains How Our Current Energy Crisis Was Created

This is the beginning of an article titled An Entirely Government-Made Energy Crisis.

Make no mistake about this: The world does not currently face any real shortage of crude oil. There is no real shortage of natural gas. And certainly, there is not remotely any real shortage of coal, for goodness’ sake. By the same token, the uranium required to supply nuclear power to societies in need of zero carbon emission energy all over the world exists in overwhelmingly plentiful reserves.

Yet, there is no question that the world today is in the midst of a serious energy crisis, one that grows increasingly severe by the day. Why is that? The answer is obvious: Government policies designed to restrict the production and distribution of these plentiful energy mineral resources, policies that have emanated most prominently from the governments in the Western world that dominate the discussions held and agreements entered into at the global climate conferences that serve as gathering spots for huge fleets of carbon-spewing private jets and massive yachts in places like Paris and Glasgow each year.

                                                                        --David Blackmon

Read the rest of David Blackmon's article here: 
https://blackmon.substack.com/p/an-entirely-government-created-energy

One key takeaway from this article is Blackmon's statement, "We have the wrong class of people making these vitally important energy policy decisions for the rest of us."

This statement brought to mind an observation made by local school board watchdog and writer Loren Martell. Martell has been a thorn in the side of previous school board administrations because of the detailed sleuthing he's done in the past regarding a controversial Red Plan that was pushed through a couple decades ago. The decision to adopt the $100 million-plus Red Plan was voted on by a school board with many members having never made a financial decision bigger than buying a house. Martell was treated like a boy crying wolf for the fun of getting a reaction. His well-founded concerns were dismissed as alarmist and disregarded. 

So it is that any criticism of Green Plans is considered ignorant. What's disturbing is that real science has been co-opted by Machiavellian power politics. Today, "Trust the science" only means, "Trust our interpretation of what the science is saying." I fear that on this and a number of other fronts the worst is yet to come.

Related Links
You can follow David Blackmon at his substack Energy Transition Absurdities. 
https://blackmon.substack.com/

Joe Heffernan on Nuclear Energy
Meredith Angwin's Shorting the Grid
Seven Quotes About Stupity

Talking New York, Dylan and More with Peter McKenzie (Part II)

Includes recent Peter McKenzie interview

When I heard this spring that Peter McKenzie's book Bob Dylan: On a Couch and Fifty Cents a Day was coming out soon,  I asked for an introduction in hopes of obtaining an interview. I'd heard that it contained new insights into young Bob Dylan's first year in New York. After we'd spoken a couple times, the interview was delayed because he'd made a promise to ISIS that he would wait till they'd published an interview he'd done with them. 

By the time my turn had come I'd purchased and read the book. Ironically, all the questions I'd initially prepared to ask during the interview were answered in the book. I set about to adjust my game plan and just follow our conversation wherever it went. 

Peter was 15 when 19-year-old Bob Dylan took up a form of residence in his home. There's a sense in which they were like siblings who shared a special bond. Peter admits, "Yes, I idolized him. He was like the big brother I never had. He treated me like a kid sibling. He talked to me about a lot of stuff." 

What follows here are a few anecdotes about Peter's Harvard experience, his career, Bob's songs and insights about the choices we make. At the end there's a link to the book and the first part of this two part interview.

School Days

My senior year at Harvard I had a solo suite with my own bathroom. I was painting, and had a window overlooking the Charles River. Right next door to me were two roommates with whom I became good friends. We used to have breakfast and dinner together a lot. One was Al Gore and the other Tommy Lee Jones.

When Tommy Lee was shooting the first Men In Black, they were doing a scene right outside my now wife’s apartment. I went downstairs and they were on a shooting break. I tapped him on the shoulder and he almost choked. He turned around and said, “Hey Pete!” and I said, “Hi, Tommy, how are ya. I see how well you’re doing. I don’t want to disturb you while you’re at work.” 

Peter's Career

Illustration for Joseph Papp, NY Shakespeare
Festival; Peter McKenzie

I went to the Harvard Graduate School of Architecture. I was going to become an architect. I didn’t like it, so I left. Then I went to Europe and I wound up meeting a couple people in France who were Dutch. I had my harmonica and harmonica holder with me. We went and played on the streets of Paris. They had a guitar with them, so they gave me the guitar and it was the most money I made in an hour, playing on the streets of Paris. “Bob Dylan! Bob Dylan!” It was very funny.

They invited me to visit them when I went to the Netherlands (they lived just outside Amsterdam) and I wound up playing for a couple months in their rock and roll band. 

I came back to the states and embarked on a career as an illustrator and a graphic designer, which I did for many many many many many many years. I had my own little company. I worked for myself designing books, illustrating books and illustrating book covers. That’s what I did. 

Bob always liked to talk to me about my art. It’s the one subject he never challenged me on. You know, he’s the musician of the family; I’m the artist in the family. And I make no comment about Bob’s art other than to say I think he has a great color sense, a great sense of color. God bless him that he likes to draw and paint. 

As the musician and writer, that’s his thing, his talent.

I haven’t met half as many people as he has, and if I lived to be 200 I wouldn’t. Who hasn’t he met? He’s met everybody. That can change a person. That’s his life. As for me, I’ll always look at him different from anybody else. He used the gifts he had to get the life success he could. He had a great way with words and he was an excellent musician. And he was pretty cool at the stage that we were really close. That’s what I can say about him.

Bob’s Songs

1962. Photo credit: Ted Russell. 
Courtesy William Pagel Archives

You have all these people analyzing his songs.    I mean, I will give you two songs that I will tell you about. Obviously, most songs that a songwriter writes are going to have some kind of personal touch and say something about their life, but I will tell you two songs–and I want you to listen to them again. A lot of people know about them but they don’t understand the depth of his connection.

If you want to listen to two songs to try to understand Bob Dylan – and there’s also an earlier song – but if you really want to know the personal Bob Dylan, that’s real with no bull, (listen to) "Girl from the Red River Shore," and "When the Deal Goes Down." Listen to those two songs. You’ll understand what I mean after reading the book. That is personal. That’s feeling. 

So’s the one about Suze very personal, "Boots of Spanish Leather," but I’m talking about later on in life when he’s had all these life experiences. 

Those two songs… and they’re not angry songs, but I’m talking about when he’s sitting and reflecting about life, trying to make sense of it all. They mean a lot to me, because they really do reflect what’s going on in his head. It’s absolutely 100 per cent personal.  You don’t have to analyze every line. You just listen to the song and you get a sense of where he’s really at. They’re amazing.

Luckily, there was a tissue in my pocket the first time I heard “Girl from the Red River Shore.” It’s a knockout for me. I’m just condensing them down to a sensible core of what’s within his soul. It’s just unbelievable to me.

I’m sure there’s part of him that absolutely loves being famous, and loves to be adored the world over, but man, when he said that he walked into a diner and “everyone recognized me, that’s when it all changed.” That’s a horrible price to pay. He’s paid a big price. I couldn’t tell you, in all honesty, if he knew what was in store for him maybe he would’ve decided to just be a teacher. You know what I mean? I don’t know. I couldn’t tell you. 

His dream was to be as big as Harry Belafonte. That was it. He had no idea what was ahead. That’s why those two songs... that’s him away from the rest of the world. The reason he can say stuff like that is because most people don’t know the person he is. It shows what he’s gone through. And some of the longings he’s had and some of the loneliness and so forth.

We All Make Our Choices. 

I never thought of it this way, where people say he wouldn’t have made it unless he had the drive… I don’t think of it that way. I think of him as someone who had a dream, and had the guts to go out and try to fulfill it. 

The only thing I wrote about in that book were my experiences, my past experiences or maybe an experience that was told to me by somebody very close to me. For example, my friend Eric Herter went to a concert that I didn’t attend and told that funny story about the curtain almost knocking Bob over and he made that comment about leprosy. I’m sure I could read a million stories in books about Bob that I don’t know. That’s his life, not my life. There’s plenty about Bob I don’t know, but that wasn’t the point. 

Historian/author Sean (Wilentz) told Peter, “What you’ve done with your book is showed a big foundation of what made Bob who he is. Rather than trying to analyze every song or why he did this or why he did that, you’re showing a fundamental grab of the root of the person, and then the career happened." 

When I say what’s in that book is what all these people have been looking for, I meant it.

Links

BOB DYLAN: On A Couch & Fifty Cents A Day

A Visit with Peter McKenzie, Author of Bob Dylan: On A Couch & Fifty Cents A Day (Part One)

Backstory on Aphrodite and the Trojan War

The Destruction of Troy -- J.G. Trautmann

Though most of us are familiar with the story of the Trojan Horse, I'm willing to bet most of you do not recall--or ever knew--the beginning of this historical event, which took place over three millennia ago.

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans (Greeks) after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, king of Sparta. The impetus for this impudent act occurred on another plane, at the wedding of Peleus (a sea-nymph) and Thetis (a king), the future parents of Achilles.

All the gods of Olympus were invited except Eris, the goddess of discord. Angered by the snub, Eris gets her vengeance. Despite being uninvited, she shows up anyways and places a golden apple on the banquet table. The golden apple has an inscription: "For the Most Beautiful."

Naturally there are a lot of beautiful goddesses present, this being Mount Olympus and all. Three of the goddesses claimed the apple was intended for them. As a result, there was a beauty contest for which a judge had to be selected.

Though Zeus was asked to be the final arbiter of their beauty, he knew better than to get into that kind of situation. No doubt they were all beautiful, so let's just avoid that minefield altogether. He chooses instead to appoint a mortal, Paris of Troy, because of the wise manner in which Paris had handled a previous incident involving making a judgment.

The Judgment of Paris, by Peter Paul Rubens (1638)

Well, these goddesses were wily. As each presented herself to the young man, each also offered a bribe to help improve his ability to assess her worthiness. Hera, queen of the gods and wife of Zeus (you see why Zeus declined to be judge), promised Paris that he could be king of Europe and Asia. Athena--goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, law and justice, strategic warfare, mathematics, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, and skill--offered him wisdom and skill in war, her forte. Aphrodite--goddess of love, beauty, sensuality, pleasure and procreation--offered Paris the world's most beautiful woman.

Aphrodite

There was, however, a major complication. This most beautiful woman in the world happened to be wife of King Menelaus. This didn''t stop Paris from choosing Aphrodite, which resulted in his whisking Helen away to Troy, infuriating the Greeks as well as Hera, who was actually the most beautiful of the goddesses.

Obviously Paris should not have been such a dolt, allowing himself to be seduced by this last option. Unfortunately, his behavior was consistent with that of a lot of guys I suppose, but let's not go there.

The end result was a war that lasted 10 years and which produced some very famous sayings and stories while destroying a lot of lives as well as a great city. Helen was indeed beautiful, and when her husband sent 1,000 ships to Troy in order to retrieve her, this saying was born: "The face that launched a thousand ships."

The familiar story of the Trojan Horse became the final chapter in this war, the means by which the armies of Greece laid Troy to waste.* It's a story that itself involves audacity, subterfuge, courage and cleverness. Like all great stories it includes a memorable image, and a decisive act.

Rubens produced several paintings on this theme. Oil sketch on copper, 1606.

*Trivia: When I was young I read a book about this Ten Years War and the Fall of Troy. One of the characters in the story was Hector, a Trojan prince and Troy's greatest fighter. There was a baseball player at the time named Hector Lopez, who played for the A's and the Yankees from 1955 to 1966. I don't now whether I latched on to Hector Lopez as someone cool because of the story of Troy, or I latched on to Troy's Hector as cool because of the Panama-born Lopez. I've liked the name Hector ever since.

Related Links
The Fall of Troy
The Judgement of Paris
Images on this page are public domain.

Update: Yellow Vests Continue to Rock France

In December I attempted to draw attention to the Yellow Vest protests, in part as a means of understanding what was going on and, in part, in an effort to at least help make people aware of what had been taking place in France. Considering how few Americans seem even aware of these protests and have little to no understanding of the issues still, I am sharing this update.

Depending on your source, last weekend was the 18th or 19th week of Yellow Vest protests. It was one of the more violent weekends, the saddest part being the destruction that took place on the Champs-Elysees, at the heart of Paris.

If interested in following what is happening here, I recommend using Twitter as a news feed of sorts. Go to Twitter.com and in the Search button type in #YellowVests.

Here is a March 18 story from the BBC:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-47609978

Here is a story about Paris violence, from VOX:
https://www.vox.com/vox-sentences/2019/3/18/18271678/vox-sentences-yellow-vest-protests-paris-violence

Here's a Tweet I captured yesterday:

Here is a March 18 story from The Atlantic about France's "Rebels Without A Cause":
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/03/france-yellow-vest-protesters-want/585160/

Here is my original story in November with helpful insights from an Economics scholar in Marseilles:
https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2018/12/whats-all-this-buzz-about-yellow.html

Twitter Feed -- #YellowVests
https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Yellowvests&src=typd

This Mike Huckabee editorial expresses concerns about how the Green New Deal could backfire and produce a similar disruption here. It should be noted that the trigger event in France was a 12 cent gas hike.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2019/03/19/green_new_deal_would_spark_yellow_vest-style_protests_139779.html

Wikipedia gives an extensive overview of the backstory and current events.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_vests_movement

I believe that what is happening in France is of major significance and that leaders worldwide are paying close attention to the events unfolding on this world stage.

Adee Discusses Paris and His Bookmark to Life Worth Living

Yesterday I introduced readers here to New Delhi writer/poet/adman Adee Saini. What caused a connection between us when I first discovered his Delhi Dreams site was the emotive quality of his entries. Sometimes his words brought to mind the famous quote, "Writing is easy; just open a vein and bleed" which has been incorrectly attributed to Hemingway. Here is the rest of my exchange with Adee, plus his Bookmark to Life.

E: Your "Bookmark to Life Worth Living" is especially powerful. You draw attention to World Suicide Prevention Day at the end. It's a subject we generally evade, but is a serious matter in our world today. How did you come to be moved to make people note this issue?

Adee: The 'bookmark to life' was written in reference to a campaign my colleagues in McCann US did to spread awareness about the World Suicide Prevention Day. It was a difficult subject to write about. Though personally I've been untouched by it, it has always hovered in the consciousness as a question as to why or what drives people to commit suicide, what drives them so further down the line that they feel there's no sense in getting back? As I said, I've had difficult times in life, perhaps even moments when I could have contemplated it, but something in me never lets me go there. Perhaps I'm an optimist who wants to get up the next morning and see if anything could be done about the problem at hand. I wrote it because the best response that I could come up with on the topic was in the form of a poem.

E: How did you come to visit Paris? And what impressions did you bring back to India with you?

Adee: Paris? :) Paris was one of the good times in my life. I'd gone to Cannes to attend the first ever "Cannes Health" Lions and was chosen to represent McCann Health, India as a delegate. It was an official trip that I extended into a personal one. Since childhood I've been fascinated with Paris. (And Vienna and Prague.) I'm a romantic by heart and always look towards beauty even in not-so-beautiful situations. Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner has been sort of a talisman for me throughout my life. Whenever I've found the going tough, I've tried to pause and notice something beautiful in the world, in my life, around me. And whenever I've found it, I've also found a way out of the mess. And all said and done, Paris is among the most beautiful cities in the world. Unfortunately I could never synthesize what I brought back from Paris. I had to cut short my trip and rush back home as my father suffered a brain hemorrhage. The initial days after returning were all about his surgery and getting his life back on track so that somewhere I lost Paris and have not been completely able to think about it. As of now, it spells nostalgia, a sense of beauty and gratitude in me.


Bookmark to Life Worth Living

It’s just a bookmark! A simple piece of thick paper, printed replica of some really old Japanese painting. A couple of mornings ago, while rushing out to office, I put it in the book I was going to start and forgot how special it is.

Yes, it’s not just a bookmark. It is my time traveling ticket to Paris. More specifically to the hours when I was happily lost in the labyrinth that The Louvre is.

Traveling in the metro today, I pondered at a pause and used this bookmark to remind me where I’d stopped reading. And from the page I was on, I traveled back in time to my recent France visit, to Cannes, to the few wonderful days I’d spent in Paris.

That is when I realized (and not for the first time) how absolutely important it is to keep a tab on the good moments and memories in one's life. Far too often we focus on the negative, the depressing, the what-is-not-right in our lives and keep missing the little big things that are good, even great.

It is midnight in my corner of the world. Lemme see what can I feel good about from my day so far… sunlight filtering in through the window, my environment-friendly alarm app; giving last night’s leftovers to a stray dog, its joy was infectious; a meeting went well; stumbling upon a new music group and then it leading me to more and more songs that I loved; the bliss of a cup of masala chai; watching Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets; the very fact that I got up this morning ALIVE and that I have a bed to sleep in tonight... life is literally filled to the brim with blessings worth treasuring.

And yes, I know that life is full of troubles and trials. Yours is, mine is as well. That said, it doesn’t take much to keep the good memories closer to our heart… what we need to do is develop a habit, a strong will to change how we look at life. There IS a silver lining to every dark cloud we face, sometimes the most negative experiences are an act of grace, life just tells us again and again to have faith… because someday we’ll look back at it all and wonder, how in the world we made it so far.

So yes, as the bookmark monkeys show, hang in there and please start bookmarking the little moments you’ll treasure later on in life. Because it is these memories that make life what it is…worth living.

It’s time we speak out and raise awareness about suicide and its prevention. To honor the lives lost to this mental health issue, McCann Torre Lazur invites you to tag your images, videos, or words that represent the beauty and meaning of life with #worthliving on September 10th, World Suicide Prevention Day.

* * * *
Thank you, Adee. Visit Adee's Delhi Dreams and bookmark it. 

Enno (Part 4)

SHORT STORY MONDAY

This is the last segment, and a somewhat unkind conclusion. Next week: something different.

Enno
(Part Four)

It had been a long night. Together we ushered in the new year, drinking, singing, laughing. A purple ridge of clouds painted the horizon, awaiting the coming of dawn with a quiet patience. All above remained a crystal, chilled blue. The trees appeared decorated with powdered sugar and globs of white frosting. An unbroken blanket of fresh snow carpeted the hillside.

We drove carefully till at last we arrived at his apartment.

"Sit. You will stay for one more, won't you?"

"I've already had too many. Let me go now."

"It won't do. Open another beer. You know where they are."

I refused to take off my coat, holding my gloves in my left hand, unpocketed keys in my right.

"Oh go on, then. Look at you."

The day was already ruined. I knew that. But I was afraid that if I sat down I wouldn't get up.

"Have I ever told you the story about Jose Cordenio?" Here it was. Fresh bait. A new story, if I would stay.

He never admitted to loneliness. Never owned up to a human feeling at all on that score. To what great lengths he would go, however, in order to keep me around.

"Jose Cordenio the writer? Friend of de Unamuno and Bunuel?"

"The same," he said.

"When did you know Jose Cordenio?"

"After the war. In Zurich. A strange man."

"Spanish, right?"

"From Barcelona. Left his homeland when Franco came to power. Had a Jewish wife who was taken by the Nazis when he was in Paris. The war did him terrible."

And so it was that I removed my coat and remained with him for the duration of two more beers. I drove home in silence, accompanied by an image of Jose Cordenio painted in tragic hues across the canopy of my soul while the crisp, brilliant sun -- reflected with such brightness that my eyes were stabbed with it -- illumined my way.

Happy New Year.

•

Depressing above all is this: the feeling of futility associated with all my efforts to achieve something worthwhile. Is my labor in vain?

Now seated on the emerging threshold of a new year, I see the expanse of time uncoiling before me and I ask myself, What? Which? How do I determine what is worthwhile and what is futile? Is it for love or money that we pour ourselves out?

•

At certain times our conversations gave me the feeling that I was standing poised on the rim of a mammoth crater, a terrible cavern of the soul that had been left vacant through some diabolical and catastrophic event in a former era of this man's life. He gave me glimpses of it, in the way he held his head, the compressed line of his mouth, in his words, his mannerism, his stillness. Then there were the glimpses when the shutter of his eye flashed horizontally and I saw, with clarity, but for an instant, the terrain of his heart, the whole devastated landscape, my vantage point being the rim of this terrible hollow crater, immensely deep, wide.

I would never have asked him to speak of it, but it was evident the time had come when he raised the matter himself. Like all other topics we examined, he would begin falteringly at first, backing into it by accusing me of not being interested in yet another tale of his, chiding, almost childishly, my disinterest. When at last I would concede, he would put me off further still, until I was torn between begging and giving up. Crazymaker he.

Now here it was. He would tell of the scar which time had never healed. He would speak of it plainly. He would tell the story that had never been told. Together we would examine his sorrow.

•

"So what is the truth?"

"Oh. This again," I said.

"I want to know why you created me."

"I don't know. I had a need, I guess."

"And now you never visit me. You went away and haven't been back in more than a year."

"Life goes on. I have other friends now."

His hand ran up to the side of his head and over the top, mussing his hair. "Is it a woman?"

I stared at the floor, my palms flat against my thighs.

"I don't like the way this is ending," he said. His voice was soft, resigned.

"It's best," I said. "I wanted people to know you, but now... I have a life, too. I have to get on with things."

"Where will I go? What will I do?"

"Does it matter?" I said. "You've been captured on paper and you will live. That's more than I can say about my own life. You will be remembered. I will be forgotten. That's just how it is."

"Oh, you'll be remembered," he chided. "You get the byline."

"Get out of here," I screamed.

It sounds harsh, but it's a writer's right, isn't it? I created him. I had grown tired of him.

It could have ended differently. I didn't torture him or shoot him or hang him or have him suffer through a long illness. I suppose it was cruel to neglect him and I've been feeling crummy about it. At last, he's finished. No nursing home. No intensive care. No hospital bills.

I'm waiting for some other character now. Someone who smiles a lot, with a mouthful of nice teeth and a sense of humor. I'm a bit weary of heavy, complicated characters. Someone funny would be great. Or maybe a talking animal. Hopefully we'll get along. Writers tend to develop their characters better when they care about them.

In the meantime... Enno... wherever you are.... I'm sorry. You're part of my past now. I needed to move forward.

THE END