My Gorgeous Nothings

Posted on by sly

[Written while trying to move my life across the country]

I’m in the middle of what will be the fifteenth time I’ve had to pack up my life and shuffle it elsewhere. My spouse’s work called as work and mountains do, so we uprooted ourselves and moved north. We both welcomed this move. It aligns with his life goals; it aligns with my dream to have family closer to help wrangle a child at that dangerous age when kids are quick and rife with mischief (i.e., three).

Moving is fun if you enjoy purging things as my spouse and I do. We discovered if you set random items on your curb in Texas, people pluck them up immediately, regardless of what they are. Scrap wood. A seat cover. Dishes. An old grill. One person left us $0.31, and I’m still trying to find the symbolism in it. And maybe like most things in life and writing, it means nothing except the purpose I give it.

In the weeks before our move, my husband would arrive at my office door bearing trinkets for my judgment on what to keep or toss, and our sidewalk would fill up with our junk and leave as treasure for someone trawling the neighborhood. I purged some clothing and papers. My husband suggested I purge my books, which I ignored because I am a benevolent spouse and do not wish to be a single parent to a tiny dictator alone. Instead, I purged my iPhone notes. (Well, I tried.)

I use my phone notes for capturing story ideas, emails to people before they are emails, notes to self, strange sayings and quotes like a digital recreation of Emily Dickinson’s Gorgeous Nothings.* I review these with some frequency because I find some of them rather fantastic, though I sometimes cannot extract what words are mine or someone else’s (which I admire and do not use unless I am sure).

It seems silly to write all these things down, but they often appear when I least expect them. Some of the random quotes find their way into my writing. Sometimes I unearth things that find new life. And if you write or aspire to write, it’s a tool for your invention techniques.

Things found while cleaning out my iPhone notes

Amusements

I’m not asking for a lot. I just want to be there to watch his dreams die. [My spouse, being vindictive.]

My goal during this course is to inject references to cult classic movies in every discussion and reference them as “seminal.” [Me, commenting to my spouse about ways to keep myself engaged in professional military education discussions.]

It’s Thursday, and something is burning in San Antonio. [My spouse, every Thursday for the past two years; usually in reference to cars.]

I thought I had found the goddamned lost ark. [One of many quotes collected from Boise Mike the first time I met him.]

I was in the UN for a few years. Don’t do it. [Piz, definitely.]

Language and Style

Broadly: we need to ditch modifiers, like “total,” “expertly,” or “brilliantly” since it is assumed our people are holistic, expert, and brilliant. Also, too many modifiers detract from the substance, which is what needs to stand out in these PRFs. [Grammatical feedback on military promotion recommendation forms, which also applies to writing. My Good Art Friend would call this “gilding the lilies.” Power should come from the verbs, not the modifiers.]

The universe of human discourse always has backwaters. [From Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood – James Gleick]

Words and Phrases [abbreviated]

  • Fugue state – a temporary state where a person has memory loss (amnesia) and ends up in an unexpected place
  • Eigengrau – intrinsic gray; brain gray
  • Hyaline – having a glassy, translucent appearance like glass, a smooths sea, or a clear sky
  • Phocine – relating to or affecting the true (earless) seals
  • Skylark – to frolic; to sport
  • Alexithymic – unable to describe one’s emotions
  • Oubliette – a dungeon or basement only accessible through a trap door
  • Abulic – suffering from abulia; showing abnormal inability to act or make decisions
  • Verbum sap – enough said; no more needs to be said
  • Remora – an obstacle or hindrance

[I write down words I hear or read but have no idea what they mean so I can define them later. I had to do this in middle schooL. The habit comes and goes. A word to the wise: use complex vocabulary sparingly. For instance, my spouse, who likes to joke about his basic vocabulary, recently brought me an evaluation from one of his subordinates that attested to the individual’s “beneficence,” to which he said, “Why would you write that? Why the hell not say charity? It makes no sense. No one understands beneficence.”]

Quotes Considered for Epigraphs

When you are not fed love on a silver spoon, you learn to lick it off knives. [From Eden’s “The Lioness Awakes”]

I sat in the sun on a bench; the animal within me licking the chops of memory; the spiritual side a little drowsed, promising subsequent penitence, but not yet moved to begin. [From Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde]

Disgraceful if, in this life where your body does not fail, your soul should fail you first. [From Meditations – Marcus Aurelius]

If once you could have saved yourself,

now that time’s past: you were obstinate, pathetically

blind to change. Now you have nothing:

for you, home is a cemetery.

[From “Adult Grief” – Louise Glück]

* * *

These nothings spark joy and will endure until the next time I decide to rifle through one too many iPhone notes and provide my proverbial pollice verso.** May the odds be in their favor.

* * *

* While I am not well-read on Emily Dickinson, I adore the poetry she wrote on scraps of paper that were found only after her death—all of which form the source of her gorgeous nothings.

** That is, the hand gesture or thumb signal used by Ancient Roman crowds to pass judgment on a defeated gladiator. I learned this phrase while drafting my first manuscript, and while I literally just warned about using unfamiliar language, there is a time and place (if you make your meaning clear). So I pass it to you. May it spark joy too.

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