April 12, 2007

So it goes.

Kurt Vonnegut died, and that makes me sad.

I certainly never would have written Foop! if it wasn't for all that time I spent in high school and college reading Vonnegut's books. I can remember many a study hall and lunch period with me hunched over a dogeared copy of Cat's Cradle or Sirens and Titans, re-reading them for the third or fourth time. Sure I didn't have many friends, and sure my time could have been better spent chasing after girls, but hey...back then, sometimes, a Vonnegut book was the only thing that could make me happy. The guy was cynical as hell, and yet somehow his books always cheered me up and made me feel that things were going to be fine. Probably because he always seemed like someone out there who understood what was going on up in the 'ol noggin.

Reading a Vonnegut book for me has always been like picking up the phone and hearing from an old friend. He's one of the few authors who was able to really make me feel like it wasn't so much a book that I was reading as it was a conversation I was having with the author.

The above drawing by Vonnegut is from Breakfast of Champions. It's of an asshole. It's a perfect example of how he could create something so simple and seemingly trivial--like most of his characters were--and yet for some reason they would stick with you long after the story ended. The last time I read Breakfast of Champions was at least ten years ago, and yet I still remember that asshole.

I can only hope that many years after I die that people will say the same thing about me. "I don't know why, but for some reason I still remember that asshole."

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