Monthly Archives: April 2024

04.30.24
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Achievements

(NOTE: The following offering is pure fiction. No chickens, roosters, donkeys, parakeets, or speckled trout were harmed in its production.)

I always figured I would wind up doing something remarkable, like disprove the Pythagorean theorem, or find a cure for chemistry.

Imagine my chagrin upon receiving in my mailbox a summons to show cause why I should not be disheveled for keeping more than six live chickens on a city lot.

Eddie Albert as Oliver Wendell Douglas. Fair use.

It would be mortifying to go down in history as a poultry scofflaw, especially considering I don’t even like Buffalo wings.

Surely they’ve mistaken me for the guy down in the next block who’s always playing Green Acres on his brown furlong. Many’s the bright morning I’ve spotted him standing out in his driveway in vest and tie, seeming about to sing a hymn of praise to The American Farmer. If you ask me, he’s just the type of enthusiast who would breed an egregious brood.

There was a time when the city fathers had too much on their minds to bother with a thing like this. It’s not as if I had a rooster for my flock. That is, if I even had a flock—which I most definitely do not.

I have not a single hen. Why would I get a rooster? Those things go off at four a.m. and can be heard for miles around. 

Gao Qipei  (1660–1734), Braying Donkey (1713). Public Domain. 

We once stayed at a vineyard in Tuscany where the vintner kept some sweet little donkeys. Each dawn, at the first ray, they brayed a paean to the sun god, demonstrating why they are called “mountain canaries.” At least they were cute, unlike any rooster you ever met.

But I digress.

Who You Gonna Call?

Æthelred the Unready. Public Domain.

The point is, I didn’t know what to do. So I called on Milo Bung.

My old schoolmate Milo—fourth cousin to Slats Grobnik and a direct descendant of King Æthelred the Unready—has a big reputation as the nemesis of all officials. He once reduced a building inspector to a heap of wilted artichoke leaves in under thirty seconds.

I don’t know how he does it, but in this hour of crisis, I want Milo on my side. Nonetheless, I hesitated several moments on Milo’s doorstep. 

Finally, I took a deep breath and pressed the button.

The great man himself flung open the door. He was clad in smoking jacket, ascot, and waders. In a brief second, he discerned my status. Milo always could read me like a book.

“Hmm,” he frowned. “Well, you’d better come in, then.”

He withdrew from the door and led me through endless dim corridors to his sanctum sanctorum. I mean, his den. 

Fly rods, woven wicker creels, hand nets, and all the impedimenta of the compleat angler lay strewn over every horizontal and vertical surface. 

“Sit anywhere,” Milo said.

“Going fishing?”

Milo smiled. “Thought I’d sneak up on a few of those speckly little trout things. Season opens on Saturday.” 

“May their finny tribe increase,” I replied. “Perhaps I could just set this tackle box on the floor for a moment.”

“Be my guest.”

“I am,” I reminded him. I shifted the tackle box and sat.

Down to Business

“Now,” Milo said. “What’s on your mind?”

I opened my mouth to speak.

“Don’t tell me. It’s the old excess urban fowl runaround, isn’t it?”

I stared at him. “How did you know?”

“Oh, they’ve got a little calendar down at City Hall. Last week in April, it’s time to hassle homeowners about hens.”

I whipped out my notice and brandished it in his face. “Look here!” I said with righteous anger. “I don’t even keep a parakeet, let alone a chicken.”

“Utterly irrelevant.”

“Is that so?” I huffed and puffed as he gazed on me with pity. 

“Well,” I said after a decent interval. “What should I do?”

“Ignore it.”

Briar pipe, maybe a Kaywoodie. Photo by Petey21. Public Domain.

“Ignore it? An official summons from City Hall?”

Milo nodded, fiddling with a vintage Kaywoodie briar pipe.

“How can I ignore it?”

“You’ll be a sucker and a fool if you don’t.”

“Explain.”

Genius At Work

“When they send you a provocation like this, they mean for you to quail and quiver. It gives them shivers of joy, like a male grunion at the height of the run.” He tapped his Kaywoodie against the heel of his hand and dislodged a few shreds of stale tobacco into a large glass ashtray. “See, they want to get you on the run.”

“What good does ignoring the summons do?”

“It lures them into overplaying their hand.”

“How so?”

Milo chuckled. “They will descend on you with a flying squad of chicken inspectors, most likely backed up by a SWAT team.”

“A SWAT team?”

“Exactly. If you’re lucky, they’ll stage a three a.m. raid.”

“You call that lucky?”

“I should say so!” Milo packed fresh tobacco into the bowl of the pipe, tamping it down with his index finger. “If they make enough fuss, you’ve got them just where you want them.”

“I want them nowhere near my house, is where I want them!”

“Nevertheless, there they are. And no excess chickens to be found on said premises. You really don’t have more than six, do you?”

“I DON’T HAVE ANY CHICKENS AT ALL!!”

“No need to raise your voice. Now, it would help if you could arrange for Biff Brash and his Action TV News Crew to be there with cameras and lights—lots of lights—when the SWAT Team arrives.” 

“Must we go to these lengths, Milo? At last, sir, have you no shame?”

He sucked on the stem of his pipe. “They’ll be so worried about a lawsuit for false prosecution—you’ll be exempt from even mowing your front lawn for at least two years.” 

It’s All Upshot From Here

I stared at my old friend, not in a warm and cherishing way. “Aren’t you going to light that thing?” I asked.

His mouth twisted in horror around the stem of his Kaywoodie. “Light it? Start a conflagration in the house? Muriel would kill me.” 

This from the fearless facer of SWAT teams.

Guess my chickens have come home to roost. I’ll just quietly pay the fine.

NOTE TO POTENTIALLY CONFUSED READERS: What you have just read should have been posted on April Fool’s Day. It is pure fantasy, every bit of it. Not one scintilla of fact. Except the donkeys. I distinctly remember the donkeys.

Blessings,

Larry F. Sommers

Your New Favorite Writer

04.23.24
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Story

Storyteller near Cairo (1878) by Wilhelm Gentz (German, 1822-1890). Public Domain.

What is a story?

A story can be almost anything. We are so much accustomed to telling stories, stories are so ingrained in our psychic and physical makeup, that storytelling and storyhearing can be said to be an essential component of human-ness. 

What is a good story? Ah, thereby hangs a tale.

Second Thoughts

“Where there is no vision,” observes the Book of Proverbs, “the people perish.” 

Vision. Jewish Rabbi Reading The Bible To His Family (1816), by Alexander Lauréus (Finnish, 1783 – 1823). Public Domain.

But vision is hard. 

Revision is easy. At least, I find it so. 

Once there is something substantive down on paper, I can see that something is wrong with it, and I can fix that. Then, I can see that something else is wrong with it, and I can fix that. Eventually, by a painstakingly iterative process, I can get it down to where it’s pretty good.

But getting something substantive down on paper in the first place: that’s the hard part.

Where does that first thing come from?

A Deep Well

Some people believe that inside each one of us, there is a deep well of creativity just waiting to be released as a bubbling fountain of expression.

I find that is true, but it’s hard to get it started. The more I write, the easier it comes. But the pump needs priming.

Writing every day helps, because then you can just continue whatever you were in the midst of writing yesterday. But sooner or later, you finish that project—at least, you finish the first draft. Then, it is ever so tempting to lose yourself in almost endless revisions. That’s a lot more fun.

Red Smith, sportswriter. Fair use.

Red Smith said, “There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.” 

Perhaps you wonder, Gentle Reader, why Your New Favorite Writer bores you with all this drivel. 

Because I have to write something. That’s why. 

I keep telling myself that once I get the first draft out on the page, then I can revise it and revise it to the point where you’ll find it noble and inspirational. Or at least acceptable. 

Fellow writer Percy Dovetonsils. Public Domain.

“Aha! I’ve caught you out, O New Favorite Writer! You’re admitting, in black and white for all to see, that it’s all in the revision. In other words, writing the first draft is a mere formality. Perfectly trivial.”

Well, perhaps so, Dear Reader. But let me point out that if it were not for the every-Tuesday-morning character of this blog, I would not have written anything at all. Then where would my much-vaunted revision chops be, O Reader?

And it is the same across the board. I would not write this blog except for the deadline. I would not write a short story except for the need to prove I can write a short story. (The jury is still out.) I would not write a novel except for having gotten some screwball idea about a story I could tell in long form, and then feeling compelled to stick it through to the end.

“So, what are you kvetching about, O Writer? You impose all these deadlines and burdens on yourself.”

Yes, but complaining is half the joy.

Enough, Already

I’ll see you next week Fair Reader. After all, I’ve got a deadline.

Blessings,

Larry F. Sommers

Your New Favorite Writer

04.16.24
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Beast of the Moment

Great Pyrenees dog. Photo by Sharp16, licensed under CC-BY-SA-4.0.

A book came in the mail last month, but it was not one I had ordered. 

It was an anthology of short prose pieces and poems, WELL READ Magazine’s Best of 2023, Volume One. It came for free as a contributor’s copy, because I am in it. 

Or rather, ahem, my short story, “Beast of the Moment,” is in it. (Page 171, if you must know.)

I am proud of this story, because it was good enough that editor Mandy Haynes deemed it worth publishing. 

It has the three chief virtues of a good story: A beginning, a middle, and an end. (See Poetics vii. 2-3, by Mr. Aristotle, noted Greek philosopher.) It also has an interesting, and humane, subject: an old woman who loves dogs. So, yes, it’s a feel-good story—yet not pollyannish. 

“Beast of the Moment” appeared in the June 2023 issue of WELL READ online magazine. If you wish, you can read it for free here.

But it also appears now in print, in this paperback anthology of 2023’s best pieces. I’m honored it is there. On page 171. I’d strongly advise you to acquire a copy, for it has not only my story but 37 other great pieces by a variety of authors. I read my way through it last week and liked what I saw. There were short prose pieces, both fiction and non-fiction, and a good sprinkling of original poems. 

One piece that made a strong impression was “A Hard Dog,” by Will Maguire, starting on p. 20. It’s a story about a hard dog, and, well, it’s a hard story about a dog. It deals with the relationships between a forlorn man, his recent girlfriend, a stray dog, and the neighbors. There are points where it’s hard to read and you want to give up on it. But if you stick with it, you’ll be rewarded. Maguire tells a hard story, but he tells it with skill and a certain amount of grace. Dog lover or otherwise, I recommend giving it a try.

The next story up is “Evolution of Love,” by the talented and persistent Rob Grindstaff. It’s a romance for the modern era, and it tells its tale with depth and imagination. I promise you’ll get involved in the developing love between positivistic scientist Steven and the faith-based nurturer Dempsey. And there’s a neat little twist at the end that could be magical realism . . . or something else entirely. Don’t miss it.

There’s a flashy story called “Silver Sequins,” by Joy Ross Davis, that will make you think twice. I call it “flashy” because, for one thing, it’s short enough to qualify as flash fiction. It has that nice quality of flash fiction, the quality of not filling you in on everything—just giving you the drift of it and letting you fill in the blanks. But it’s also flashy because its author’s narrative skills are displayed with brilliance and panache. Yeah, I confess: That’s really what I meant. And, just like the stories mentioned above, it’s about—would you believe?—relationships. A well-wrought story, worth a read.

There are pieces that may be fictional short stories but could be mini-memoirs, sprung directly from life. It’s hard to tell with “Choices,” by Robin Prince Monroe; “Waiting for a Signal,” by Jeffrey Dale Lofton; the sardonic “Obituaries,” by Rebecca Klassen; and “What We Keep, What We Throw Away,” by Phyllis Gobbell. Maybe it doesn’t matter whether they’re fact or fiction. Each of these little gems highlights a facet of life that feels as real and experiential as a dropped memory or a parent’s tear for a wayward child.

I fear that by mentioning certain stories I have slighted others. The truth is, they’re all good, all thought-provoking. And the same can be said for the many poems. 

By the way, did I mention that my story “Beast of the Moment,” about an old widow and her long-time canine companion, appears beginning on p. 171?

If you’d like to read them all, the price is certainly right: $15.00 paperback, $5.99 Kindle. Get the anthology here.

Happy reading!

Blessings,

Larry F. Sommers

Your New Favorite Writer

04.09.24
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Libraries

Kudos to my friend Jerry Apps for reminding me that this week—April 7-13, 2024—is National Library Week. The theme this year, according to the American Library Association, is “Ready, Set, Library!” 

Apart from the brutish verbing of an ancient and honorable noun, I endorse the sentiment.

Libraries, expecially local public libraries, are wonderful things. 

“Libraries connect our communities and enrich our lives in ways we may not realize,” says National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature and Newbery and Pura Belpré-award winning author Meg Medina, who serves as 2024 Honorary Chair.

Birth of a Bookworm

The first library where Your New Favorite Writer ever had borrowing privileges was the public library on Park Street in Streator, Illinois. I was astonished and proud to learn that, shucks, even kids in grade school could have library cards. I signed up and started reading books, one after another.

Streator’s Carnegie-built public library in 1903, still in daily use.

In those days, between the ages of six and twelve, I read what today we call kid lit. Adventures like Treasure Island and Swiss Family Robinson. Cowboy books like The Coming of Hopalong Cassidy. Horse books by Marguerite Henry, dog books by Albert Payson Terhune, Lassie Come-Home by Eric Knight. 

I read biographies especially written for children—thumbnail sketches of American heroes like Andrew Jackson, John C. Frémont, Lou Gehrig, and George Washington Carver. Casting my mind back to remember a children’s biography of a notable woman, I draw a blank. Sorry, dear—we just didn’t have them.

We had plenty of sports books, though, most of them written by Jackson Scholz or John R. Tunis. None of those books won the Newbery Medal or the Pura Belpré Award, but they were exciting and taught sportsmanship, persistence, self-respect, and consideration for others. 

And then there was science fiction. 

A great place to loiter. Photo from Streator Public Library website. Fair Use.

Dear Reader, when I was a boy, no actual human being had ever flown into space. But the feat had already been achieved many times over in the works of Robert Heinlein, Lester Del Rey, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke. 

My habit, when loitering—there is no better word for it—in the Streator Public Library, was to find a book that looked interesting, pull it off the shelf, and start reading. There in the cool stacks, I sat or squatted on the marble floor and read, sometimes as much as half a book before my stomach told me it was lunch time, or supper time. Then I would trot to the front desk, flash my library card, check out the book, and take it home to finish.

Carnegie Libraries

The library was a swell place to spend time, a temple of learning in its own right. It was one of 2,509 libraries built between 1883 and 1929 with money donated by Scottish-born steel magnate Andrew Carnegie—1,689 of them in the United States. 

According to its website, “The Streator Public Library is a US Landmark Carnegie facility that was constructed in 1903. The Fuchs murals that were installed, around the interior of the lower dome, were painted on leather in a local shop and installed in 1905. The original grand stair case, woodwork, shelves, and stained glass are still in place. Many of the original oak tables are still utilized.” 

Andrew Carnegie in 1913. Photo by Theodore Marceau. Public Domain.

Carnegie started his philanthropy by building a library in his birthplace of Dunfermline, Scotland. Then he gave a library to his adopted hometown of Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and another to Braddock, Pennsylvania, the site of one of his steel mills. 

Eventually, it got out of hand.

As Carnegie began to realize how much money he had, he entertained library proposals from all over. In 1897 he hired a personal assistant, James Bertram, and put him in charge of screening all the requests. They developed a questionnaire to determine whether a town applying for a library actually needed and could support one. They made sure local officials were committed to funding the ongoing costs in perpetuity. 

Once a town was declared eligible to receive a Carnegie library, a handsome edifice was built—in any of several different styles, but with quality and elegance. It was almost always entered by a flight of stairs, symbolizing the elevation of the public mind through reading. There was also a lamp post or lantern near the entrance, a symbol of enlightenment. 

Carnegie pioneered the open stack library. Until then, most library stacks were closed. You submitted a request for a book, and then a librarian went and got it for you. Carnegie figured self-service would reduce operating costs for libraries, and he was right.

But open stacks brought a greater risk of pilferage. So the circulation desks at Carnegie libraries are usually large, imposing, and placed conspicuously near the main entrance. 

That Desk is a Friend of Mine

The new Endres circulation desk. Screenshot from Streator Public Library website. Fair use.

In 2013, a new circulation desk was installed at the Streator Public Library, dedicated to the memory of Oral and Dorothy Endres, the donor’s parents. As it happens, I remember Oral Endres. He was an insurance agent for Metropolitan Life. A nice man. When I was a boy, about seventy years ago, he spent time at our kitchen table often enough so I knew his name. He made sure we were adequately covered.

Mr. Endres’ son, who gave the new circulation desk, was not as big a donor as Andrew Carnegie; but it’s the thought that counts.

Visit your local library soon. While you’re there, take out a book.

Blessings,

Larry F. Sommers

Your New Favorite Writer

04.02.24
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A Metaphysical Conceit

The Zambezi River rolls across a vast plateau in southern Africa and falls into a deep cleft in the earth. This sudden descent is known as Victoria Falls.

Victoria Falls is twice as wide as Niagara, and twice as high. Though neither the widest nor the highest waterfall, when height and width are combined it is the largest sheet of falling water anywhere on the planet. 

Victoria Falls. Photo by Diego Delso, delso.photo, License CC-BY-SA.

Your New Favorite Writer visited Africa a few years ago. On takeoff from the airport at Livingstone, Zambia, our pilot flew a slow S-curve at low altitude, so passengers on both sides of the plane could get a good gander at the falls. 

It was an astonishing spectacle.

Another view of Victoria Falls. Photo by Diego Delso, delso.photo, License CC-BY-SA.

The trench into which the Zambezi tumbles is cross-wise to the river. It is so wide, so narrow, and so deep that the water seems to plunge straight into the bowels of the earth. There is an outflow stream at the bottom of the gorge, but it is narrow, dwarfed by the immense falls.

Victoria Falls—white horizontal line in center—seen from the International Space Station. Public Domain.

Wait For It

I have reached that point in life when old friends, whom I’ve known for ages, are dropping dead one by one. It concentrates the mind. One dwells on death.

Now here, on a different continent, an image presented itself: Picture all of us, all humanity, moving across a wide plain. And somewhere in that plain is a crevasse. But it can’t be seen from any distance.

Perhaps the crevasse is crooked, so you may reach your part of it it before or after I reach my part of it, even though we march abreast.

From my point of view, a friend or aquaintance suddenly drops out of view—yet here I am, still sauntering forward. Someday, without warning, it will be me—and people I know will keep strolling or marching along, wondering what became of me.

Now, Here’s the Payoff

Like the waters of the Zambezi, I may appear to have been swallowed whole. But actually, I will just flow out sideways, like everyone else, through new channels, into wide lakes, past twisty creeks and broad estuaries, to God’s eternal sea.

Christ is risen. Alleluia!

Happy Easter.

Larry F. Sommers

Your New Favorite Writer