Monthly Archives: August 2014

It was during a discussion about our top ten favorite musical performers—a merry debate Jay and I had wormed our way through numerous times—that I outlined my criteria for great art and great heroes: they must be flawed, I declared. I trod carefully, seeing the mischievous glint in my friend’s eye and knowing him as one who once delighted in finding flaws—flaws in my reasoning, that is; my faulty logic. Time has softened his position. Now aesthetics share space with his offbeat moral codes, Jay’s demand that people have courage, be self-sacrificing, even if otherwise behaving sinisterly.

As a result, Jay had issues with Chris Leavitt, my distracted protagonist of Crystal From The Hills, and redemptive support-player in its follow-up, The Situation. Jay was gingerly in his criticism: caretaking, self-deprecating (“…maybe it’s me”), yet quietly scathing. Among other things, Chris acts in ways that would not endear him to many readers. He behaves fecklessly, avoiding problems, especially this strange accident with a truck, his friend Bryan “Weed” Tecco, a lagoon in West Marin County, and some malevolent followers, possibly real, likely not, who are dubbed “Shadows” by the psychosis-sharing axis that is Chris and Weed. Over the following week, Chris retreats into the gritty streets of Oakland—a privileged, ill-fitting white male losing himself—rather than following a responsible, much less logical path. Over the course of CFTH, the reader is called to dally alongside Chris, enduring anomalous altercations with other lost, disturbed figures; surviving a more purposeful assault from local gangstas seeking Chris’ absent friend and their rival. Chris unknowingly emulates Weed, seeking to disappear, meanwhile hoping to grow down and not up; to lie about his age, not be responsible—to not be a hero, or even an adult.

Unacceptable. This is my guy, my hero, but more importantly, the carrier of secrets, pain, as well as the corruption of hierarchical systems, including families. What a burden. In order to understand, if not like him, the reader gets Chris’ back-story: the explanation as to why he is the way he is. Good enough? His near-salvation is his adjustment to reality, which happens slowly, serendipitously, and usually in spite of others’ strenuous efforts to help. There: a therapist’s idea of a happy ending. The efforts of Chris’ women seem particularly off the mark. His girlfriend, Jill, rather like his bossy Aunt Jenny, think haranguing Chris will lead to change. It doesn’t. Like many who are depressed, or addicted, or delusional, or all three, Chris avoids the messengers of prosaic yet worthwhile truths, instead preferring fantasies, the habit of meandering in between models of authority and mirrors of failure. In his mind, Chris half-listens to voices of reason, the present-day life-like figures, while ever keeping private counsel with the absent or illusory: his friend Weed, his hapless, deceased father; an elusive, affection-withholding mother; his “Shadows”. If characters like Jill, Weed, or the affable Sweet are in any way stand-ins for the departed or the ephemeral, it’s not clear. But it’s not implausible.

The flaws of my bi-novel narrative are surely plentiful, especially the flaws apparent through plain analysis of events: the point of view of reliable, rational human beings who behave logically, live consistently, and seem to know themselves. Damn you all. Regarding the accident that begins both novels, the even-tempered reader might wonder: is it realistic that Chris and Weed, separated due to the apparent sinking of a truck in shallow lagoon, would not find each other upon surviving and reaching the surface? Is the reader meant to believe that Weed’s fear of corporate followers, or Chris’ belief that a drowning Weed is beyond saving, would lead either of them to bypass the involvement of authorities? Would the reader further believe that such a traumatized figure as Chris would simply drift into homelessness, rather than return home, report the accident, the disappearance of Weed, and then resume work, relationships, and the general momentum of life?

Regarding the novels’ most prominent female character, would readers believe that the capable, head-strong, seemingly career-focused Jill would be in relationship with a character like Chris; would tolerate his immaturity, be anything beyond seduced by his dimpled face, lean body and puckish blue eyes; or that she’d be living in a derelict apartment in West Oakland, as opposed to one of its latter-day gentrified properties on Martin Luther King Street. As for Weed: having learned, albeit second-hand in CFTH, of his lechery, self-serving, and calculating nature, would the reader accept that he’d entrust the flash drives for an important and subversive video game (entitled ‘The Situation’) to Chris, who among other things, is known for losing belongings, especially electronic items like cell phones? And what of Weed’s penchant for procrastination: his three or four day break in Bolinas, wasting time with the elegiac Rosco, before resuming his cause? If he’d thought Chris alive and well, would he not concern himself with his stash, be chomping at the bit to get back and move on? What I’d hoped is that Weed’s latent heroism would vie with his dilatory, ambivalent nature, but ultimately yield a picaresque journey. That journey evolves like man: on foot, to car, ferry, and train. As a result, Weed belies his reputation as a mindless slob and criminal and gives meaning to that once inexplicable chase along a West Marin highway.

Love these flaws, hate them, or ignore them. Whatever you choose. Ignore CFTH. Ignore The Situation. Actually, I find it curious, this assignment of logic, or even consistency, to the constructs of character and drama. It’s as if readers think they know why people are the way they are. Jay does, and I know I do.

But seeing. In The Situation as well as its predecessor and best friend, Crystal From The Hills, much is made of characters’ eyes. Not the aesthetic qualities that art traditionally enjoys, but rather an expansion of a philosophical chestnut: that window to the soul thing. Or rather, it’s an attachment thing. Neurobiologists like Daniel Siegel and Allan Schore, and before them, John Bowlby, teach us that attachment is a biological imperative. Meaning, we will die without it, and therefore must attach at all costs. Those costs entail surrendering better parts of ourselves, those precious selves, borne of an archaic interaction, that carry the potential of growth.

Chris Leavitt learned early in life that secrets would keep him safe, if sick, and safe is better than sick…anyday. The truth is his parents should never have gotten together, so ill-fitting were they. Chris’ father, besotted by the elusive Nancy, pursued her obsessively, and she liked being pursued, but soon fell into a different role, one she didn’t understand but which carried her along. The momentum ebbed long enough for her notice other suitors, men who promised something better: maybe self-assurance, maybe reality. Young Chris started seeing visions of these men, and feeling their presence, but knew he should keep quiet. The truth: it hurts; has consequences. One of them was an altercation between Chris’ parents, a climactic frustration for his father–a likely rape of Nancy.

As a quasi-adult Chris he meets Jill, a would-be Nancy, a professional and habitual caretaker, and also a woman who falls into attachment for inexplicable reasons. Eyes. There was something in Chris’ blue eyes. They were sweet, beautiful, and seductive, but also dangerous, unreliable. Over a two day period, life collapses around a sequence of events: the disappearance of a friend, the exposure of his incompetence at work; an altercation with Jill that mirrors the violence between his parents. Accidents. Bewildered, Chris has the strange notion that all that has happened are just accidents he’s not supposed to talk about.

Speaking of accidents, Bryan “Weed” Tecco emerges from his, unseen. That fits his self image. So, too, does feeling unwanted, though the antecedent of that wound is ancient. He, too, has visions of important events that implicate the guilty, but until now, Weed has been content to live his own life, ignore secrets, and play out the role that appears to effect attachment in his life: villainy. And yet, it’s not good enough. These conditions of staying close–keeping secrets, caretaking, being bad–they just aren’t good enough. Something’s gotta give. Something’s gotta change. Weed’s day job is playing games, as a tester for a fictional telecommunications giant named Sahi, and he’s found a game that’s gone wrong, or will go wrong. It’s a special game called ‘The Situation’, which, on the one hand, seems like many others: it rewards quick thinking, fine motor skills, and ruthless decision-making…violence. But another level (literally) the game suggests ambiguous rewards for those who make different decisions; those who see into others’ souls, through the window of the eyes, and practice empathy. And this game, this new paradigm of play, is the creation of a Julian Assange-like figure ostensibly aiming to reach an apolitical, unattached constituency, by making it the unlikely recipient of whistleblower secrets.

The question is whether Chris, Weed, Jill, or countless others like them will hang in there as the adventure of their story unfolds. The question is whether they will settle for the way things are, versus staggering unconsciously along their respective trails, opening their eyes to what was previously unseen.