Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Demons

I'm sure I mentioned that in this writing class, we're digging for autobiographical material. And as a result of the broad-based topic I stumbled into based on some strong earlier in-class pieces, I'm in depressing-land here for all of my writing material. (I will certainly make a note of this for future in the next creative nonfiction class I take.)

Anyway, as part of this process, I wrote about PK (for those who knew him). I thought it would be pretty easy, given the distance and the subsequent expunging of the guilt, but it was harder than I thought. The piece that come out of it was relatively strong and cohesive, though. Naturally, this meant that my teacher picked it for me to read out loud tonight.

I'm kind of mortified that I choked a bit, and I also had some funny-to-me-only guffawing instances on the weirdness that he was. Jesus. It's like goddamned therapy in there, I swear.

13 comments:

Toby said...

About a year ago, I was curious to see what electronic traces of PK existed on the Internet. They are far and few between. I did find a piece written by his brother, however. It talks about how he had always been a bit in awe over his brother's intellect and his interest in books and writing, something he felt he never had within him. But many months after PK's death, he found himself coming up with stories and starting to write them down. It appears he joined up with some kind of writing group to try and hone his skills. I found it quite touching.

Laura said...

That is really cool. Good for him. I never met either of his brothers, but I heard a lot about them. Was this his older brother or younger one, do you know?

Part of me was thinking as I was writing this that he would probably completely approve. He used to say to me: "So. When are you going to do some writing?" and just give a look like I was shirking homework or something.

I still have a poem he wrote for me. I wonder how much material he left behind, because it seems like he was pretty prolific.

Laura said...

Jesus. I just googled and found his basketball stuff from 1987. Heh.

Toby said...

It was Kevin. Not sure if he's older or younger. Here's a link to what he wrote. I remembered it a bit wrong, but the spirit of it is the same.

Laura said...

Thanks for passing that along. I wonder if he's had luck selling his novel.

Laura said...

I do appreciate you sharing stories on this, though. It occurs to me that everyone I spoke to at the time either didn't know him or was weighted down by negative aspects. To them, he was That Which Must Not Be Spoken About. The only time I got to say stuff like, "remember that crazy time in the bar when he did that dramatic reenactment from Pale Fire?" was when, a zillion years ago, I met Alex for drinks.

The bad stuff was definitely there, but there was good, too. And I too found his intellect and writing inspiring.

Toby said...

I'm afraid many of my interactions with Patrick have been lost...what's that line from "Blade Runner"...all these memories will be lost in time, like tear drops in rain? I do recall how hilarious he thought George Costanza's father's line "what's taking her so long? You ask me for a piece of underwear and I'm back in a second." from the bra salesman episode was; his "an Asperger says what?" line; and that he was always a good wingman to have in a bar. ex. We were at Monk's one night and he had on a tee-shirt, a v-neck sweater, a cardigan, and a jacket on (he was bringing home all the clothes he'd kept in the office for cold days and for some reason felt that the easiest way to do that would be to wear them all. But that was all it took to reel in the ladies. One tipsy girl came over and said "wow, you have a lot of layers on". I ended up going on a date with her and her roommate (separately). You may recall that was the woman who went rollerblading with us that day around the Schuylkill River. I seem to recall that was the same night he stole a pint glass from Monk's and then got in a fight with some random dude on the street. The guy was arguing with his girlfriend and hit a sign over her head. We were looking at them and the guy turned to us and said "what are you looking at?" and Patrick responded, "An asshole." You can imagine the chain of events after that. So, the good and the bad, tied together. Hard to separate.

Laura said...

Oh, I didn't mean that you had to reminisce, or anything. I just appreciated that you piped to about the google. ; - )

That's weird. I do not remember any woman rollerblading with us on the Schuylkill. I do remember you and PK leaving me in the dust, popping back every now and then to make sure I wasn't on the ground.

I recall the fight on the street. He did stuff like that a lot, e.g., trying to chase assholes while driving. I'd be like, "AAHIIIII, don't do that!!!" I wasn't sure whether he would crash the car or get us shot by some loony.

And that's right, Monks was the bar in my block. I was trying to remember that big one by the office and couldn't remember. It changed a couple of times.

I have journals on the bad, but sometimes I remember dumb funny stuff, and it makes me smile.

And I think this counts as research for my class, so thanks. It's weird how ephemeral memory is, and how we can all remember a single event and come back with completely different stories. That street altercation I think you told me about (because I was tired and went home to bed), but in my head, I was a witness, or I at least heard it out my window.

erik said...

i didn't know PK nearly as well as either of you, but memory in cases such as this is really a collective effort, so i'll throw in what i have: i remember that he had a running gag about penelope pitstop (replacing random words in any sentence with her name--something like that) and that we had some great conversations about charles mingus.

break a leg tonight, cinnamon rolls.

Laura said...

I think when your mother is calling you something ("cinnamon rolls") it's officially a thing.

I'm still going with the Cinna. R.

Laura said...

If I haven't mentioned it lately, though, you guys are awesome. This is giving me lots of ideas on where to go, both with respect to this and more generally across my theme.

erik said...

your mother is now calling you cinnamon rolls? that's hilarious!

Laura said...

And it was unprovoked, via e-mail. You set the tone, man. Where you lead, we all follow.