Cliché.

1/14/18

So I went out to Iowa.

I thought it was heaven.

Cliché.

So here I am driving my beat-up second, third hand who knows how many times this jalopy has been bought/sold/banged up- Ford Pinto. There’s this girl hitching a ride, wearing little more than a smile and a smoke.

Cliché.

So I say to myself “too good to be true is an invitation to get killed or worse.” I drive on by, kicking myself for the other, happier possibility. 

I enroll in the famous Iowa Writer’s Workshop. 

My driver’s license says I was born 30 years later than I remembered it. Mirror says same thing. Ok, go with the flow.

First class: who sits down next to me, the girl with the smile- only now she’s got on more clothes, cowboy boots, jeans, white button-down shirt open a few buttons, not too much.

She hands me a note asking if I’ve read the Native American myth about the guys who meet a seductive woman on the road. So-happens I’ve read it. The guys take her invitation to have their way with her and she turns into a devouring monster. Only white smoke and skeletons remain of those Lotharios. Don Quixote be damned- be damned right that is. Only thing is Cervantes’ Lothario was actually a decent guy. The game of telephone through the literary ages... This chick was trouble. I could see that coming my way at 40 miles per hour out on that dust-encrusted road out of town.

Cliché.

Ok, so the prof gets up and his first sentence is:

“Once upon a time...”

We all laugh. He laughs with us.

He continues “Once upon a time Godzilla had a high life, Miller hi-life with his longtime frenemy the Don King Kong.”

He turns to the chick and asks what’s his point?

Before I can stop myself, I’m thinking he’s coming on to her and has a point in his pants - let him take her heat. I rationalize she’s too hot to handle-- for me. Maybe in a fantasy and then only maybe.

The young woman says, “I believe your point is that clichés can be used to good effect, for humor, surprise, change of rhythm.”

He nods. For a moment I see him as a cliché - tweed jacket with elbow patches, stroking his goatee. Actually, is a decent sort, comfortable in his own skin. He’s younger than I am- well about the same age as I look and what’s on my driver’s license.

Class ends with a preview of the next class’s readings from Don Quixote. Prof suggests also reading it in Spanish.

I start with the Cliff-notes, read the passages in English then Spanish then do some free-write free associations on the main themes. I’m enjoying myself; I like to write- so what the hell, I write.

Cliché?