LOS ANGELES, CA-

Author’s Note:
My very first Nervous Breakdown post was for my  dear friend, Jett, who passed away a year ago. On this anniversary, I’d like to take a moment and say a few more words to him…

Over the airwaves, under the skin
God is a beat machine

But the song he’s playing
Ain’t for you, my brother

It’s for the preacher man standing over your grave
Shouting “Hell Mary Full of Rage…Hell Mary Full of Rage”

(more…)

BEIJING, CHINA-

The diagonalness of this photograph is important without being intentional. More on that in a moment, but for the time being, this: I am not a great fan of puppets. I am, however, a fan of puppet emperors. Or, rather, not a fan of them as such, but intrigued by their lives: the gilded cage, the symbols removed from all practical context–absolute powerlessness in the guise of absolute power.

(more…)

PUGET SOUND, WA-

Writing caregiving essays recently, has put me in the mind of my first marriage, and its disastrous conclusion (recall the surfing Buddhist who happened to be my best friend), which in turn got me to thinking about its disastrous beginnings, which got me to wondering how we ever made it six years in the first place. 

(more…)

Washington, D.C.-

At the time of his death in 1795, Scottish lawyer James Boswell, author of The Life of Samuel Johnson, was considered a literary one hit wonder, a kind of 18th Century Buffalo Springfield. At that point the “Life” was Boswell’s only publication, and everyone just assumed it was the only thing he ever wrote.

(more…)

CLEVELAND, OH-

I hate my job. Don’t tell my job that—they are paying me right now while I write this. And I am writing this on a company computer, and will post it while in my office, connected to the company internet line, so what kind of ungrateful asshole am I?

(more…)

GRAND BLANC, MI-

Don’t ask me why, because I’ve long ago stopped asking that question when it comes to anything related to publishing, but Don DeLillo’s Falling Man has been critically raped and murdered. The charge that will stick: Unaggravated murder. The last time I’ve seen a novel delivered this level of inaccurate critical response was (not-at-all ironically) DeLillo’s Underworld.

(more…)

TORONTO, ON-

A book is published somewhere in the world every 30 seconds. Less than 1% of books sell 1000 copies or more. My first novel, The Line Painter, joined the fray on April 7th. Since then, I’ve learned a few things.

The first lesson is that truckers generally prefer to wear sneakers, or something equally comfortable, while driving. This presents a problem, however, when they get to the warehouse to deliver a load.

(more…)

PARIS-

French people don’t like to work.

That was the first sentence of one of the first stories I published on The Nervous Breakdown last July.

Nearly a year later, I can safely say nothing has changed.

Even the word they most commonly use for work, travail, literally translated to ‘travail’ in English means not just ‘work’, but ‘painfully difficult or burdensome work.’

To combat this blight on the people of France, the government infamously reduced the official French workweek to 35 hours in 2002.

Of course, this was not done in an attempt to give French people more time to read Rousseau and eat cheese.

It was in reality an attempt by Prime Minister Lionel Jospin’s government to reduce the high level of unemployment.

Less hours, more workers. (more…)

AUVERGNE, FR-

Years ago my friend Liz and I had a conversation.

It went something like this:

If Belgium has beer, Ireland has music, France has wine, Spain has tapas, Italy has gelato, and New Zealand has kiwi fruit…what exactly does the United States have?

Our little make-your-own-country forged from immigrants has everything from everywhere, but nothing of its own.

Well, maybe we can offer the world high-fructose corn syrup and gas guzzling cars, but again this is not that kind of post. (more…)

Warrenton, VA -

In television shows and the like, digging through someone’s medicine cabinet is the ultimate invasion of privacy.  In sitcoms, the action invariably results in the digger getting dumped by the person he/she is dating, who also invariably happens to be the person whose medicine cabinet is being dug through.  In dramas, the action invariably results in the digger finding out that the digee (as it were) is addicted to oxycontin or something.  Either way, as soon as that mirror is opened, shit is about to happen.

(more…)

UNITED KINGDOM-

I have to admit it: The Lord of The Rings was one of my favourite reads as a child. By the age of thirteen I’d ploughed through it three times in total. I can still remember the pure escapist bliss of reading it while lying in a hammock beneath the fruit trees in our Essex garden during the summer holidays (no school!), following the hobbits on every step of their travels through Middle Earth.

(more…)

BOSTON, MA-

St. Patrick’s Day has come and gone, as have the hordes of drunks, decked out in green.

There were drunken girls in green.

There were drunken guys in green.

(more…)

PARIS-

James Huth seems to have made Hell Phone just so France can say to America, ‘See ? We can make incredibly sophomoric teen films too!’

As if this were a good thing. (more…)

BOUNTIFUL, UT-

In 1992, Gail Andersen Newbold published On New Wings: Mormon Women Rediscover Personal Agency and Conquer Codependency.

(more…)

SACRAMENTO, CA-

As I look through the glass window on the observation deck I count 26 workers sorting through discarded paper, plastic bottles, soda cans and wine bottles as they whiz by on a conveyor belt.

I’m watching this and wondering how they can possibly be sure they’re getting everything sorted into the right slots, but then my tour guide tells me that each person on the sorting line is assigned one item so they don’t have to concentrate on too many things as the mounds of recyclables pass them.

One person frantically searches for colored glass, while another one looks for #3 plastics (PVC, found in your household through food wrapping, blister packages and vegetable oil bottles). (more…)

GRAND BLANC, MI-

First it was chick lit and now dad lit. Kill me twice in case I return from the dead. These categories, which I can only guess appeal to those who want to read about others with lives much like their own, gleefully reduce fiction to a mirror that doesn’t even offer an accurate reflection. If it did, why would anyone need to read it? No, this “lit” does not exist to illuminate; rather, it reinforces the reader’s sense of identity, like a bumpersticker that proclaims certain drivers’ worship of fish. It’s nothing of which to be proud, worshiping fish, and even worse to read or write what the bones have been or will be wrapped inside.

(more…)

LAFAYETTE, CO-

Sometimes I think my wiring might be a bit screwy. I just can’t seem to synch up with the stuff I’m supposed to synch up with. Upward mobility. Status quo. Home ownership. Decent credit score. Dress for success. A new car. 2.5 kids. Investment strategies. A good name for oneself. Retirement.

(more…)

OTAKO, JAPAN-

As part of my training, I observed Trevor tonight. It was my first time watching an 8^th grade class, which will be the 2^nd oldest group of kids that I’m to teach.

(more…)

MADRID-

“First, a man takes a drink. The drink takes a drink. The drink takes the man.”–AA refrain

We order some tostas and a couple cañas (6 oz draft beers).

The tostas are topped with a tender cut of red meat, grape jelly and leafy greens.

Toast, flank, and purple preserves.

We’re nestled into the corner of this tiny, crowded bar, trying not to look like assholes.

(more…)

LOS ANGELES, CA-

The initial separation is the hardest thing.

The tearing away from flesh, bone, and old habits.

A corrosion of loss clots in my still unformed wings.

Somewhere a woman’s kiss lingers in my ghostly remains of memory.

The kiss smells of gardenia.

(more…)