I Got Me the Gout

Long-time readers of this blog (and possibly my old zine The Inner Swine) might recall that a decade ago I was diagnosed with old-timey disease Gout. Gout is a pretty awful affliction, but it’s manageable, and there are much worse diseases out there—specifically, diseases that will kill you. Gout is painful, but with a good prescription and some discipline it can be dealt with. Although it does make you feel Old, with a capital “O”.

What really makes me feel old is the word “rheumatologist.” My grandmother had a rheumatologist. Young, vibrant people not on the verge of dementia and death do not, as a rule, have rheumatologists who greet them by name, so simply by making an appointment to see my doctor I feel instantly 1,000 years old. Unfortunately, it’s not just the gout and the rheumatologist making me feel old: It’s also my tired, malfunctioning brain.

The Somers Curse

My brain has always failed me. My memory is terrible, and I forget things about five minutes after learning them. And I often think I understand stuff, and get irritated and impatient when people insist on explaining stuff that I clearly understand, only to realize hours later that I totally did not understand. You might think that that at my advanced age—and age so advanced I can be diagnoses with gout, for the sake of Pete—I’d be aware of my limitations, but no such luck.

For example, last week I was heading into Manhattan to see my rheumatologist so they could evaluate the broken glass-and-bubble gum that comprises most of my gout-ridden joints. I know that my wife, The Duchess, is partial to baked goods, so I offered to pick something up for her while I was in the City. A good husband, after all, knows just how to suck up and curry favor.

She said she wanted a slice of cake from Magnolia Bakery, and proceeded to explain to me where the most convenient location was in Penn Station. I waved her off. “I have a smartphone and a brain,” I declared. “I’ll find it.”

Yes, you see where this is going.

Cut to two hours later, and I’m sweating and panicked on 33rd Street. My smartphone is telling me I am more or less inside Magnolia Bakery, despite being clearly on the street. I can’t call The Duchess and admit I’m confused, so I spend the next forty minutes desperately exploring Penn Station, trying to find the god-damned Magnolia Bakery, because I cannot—can not—return home without cake. To do so would be admitting I hadn’t paid any attention when my wife explained the details of my mission.

I suppose I take some comfort in the fact that my brain has always been this way: I think I understand things when I really don’t, and my confusion usually turns to rage at the people who have failed me, then, quickly, shame. If this was a new development, this combined with the gout would be a good excuse to put me away in a nice, comfortable home until I died and my organs could be harvested (except my liver, which has been used badly). But since I’ve always been this idiotic, the fact that it took me an hour to locate a bakery and buy a slice of cake is cause for mockery, not worry.

So, the upside? My confusion and difficulty with simple tasks isn’t likely to be the first sign of an age-related decline. The downside? This is who I am: A sweaty man who spends 45 minutes circling the same spot in Penn Station, completely confused as to the location of a bakery. And yes, dammit, I eventually found it. No thanks to you.

The Dubious Connection

This stuff always makes me think about writing, because I don’t know about you, but my inspirations—my ability to think of new ideas and shape them into stories—is a bit mysterious to me, and so I live in daily terror that one day I’ll wake up and it’s gone.

The worst part is, I might not even know it. There are plenty of artists working who continue to put out new material, but it’s lost that spark, that certain something that made their prior work interesting. And I wonder; are they aware that they’ve lost it? Are they haunted by it? Or do they think they’re still killing it? So moments when my brain isn’t working too well make me worry that I might have already entered into that period of decline where my writing is no longer all interesting, and I’m not aware of it.

That’s the worst part of being creative, sometimes: Your lack of control over your own ability. It’s like a random light shined on you, and it might go out at any time, without your permission—or even your awareness.

On that cheerful note, I’ll conclude by letting you know there’s no need to worry: The Duchess got her piece of cake, and I was not physically punished for failure. Not this time, at least.

Artist’s Conception of Your Humble Author as a Child Writer

Here in 2017 we’re all basically waiting around to be woken up at 2AM to the news that the missiles have launched and we’ve all got about five minutes to say our goodbyes or go crawl into our bomb shelters with our cans of Dinty Moore and our gold bars. It’s hard to soldier on and try to write novels and such when you’re pretty sure the morons we’ve elected to the government — suddenly not simply an outsize insult, but rather an accurate description — are either stealing everything not nailed down or eager to destroy everything.

But soldier on I do, mainly because civilization has not crumbled yet to the point where the whiskey reserves are free for the stealing, right before they dry up completely because civilization is sort of necessary for things like whiskey.

So, I’m in a contemplative mood. And I am contemplating the fact that Christopher Paolini is 33 years the fuck old.

The Child Author

I wrote my first real, actual novel when I was about fourteen; there were “novels” before that, but they were very likely just novellas or even long short stories. Cravenhold was a short novel, but I wrote it. And promptly began trying to sell it. And telling everyone I met that I was just fourteen and I’d written a novel, as if that somehow warranted special attention. Like the president of Ballantine Books was going to call me up and congratulate me for being a super genius after offering me a million dollars.

The reason I think about this now, when I am withered by age and practically on death’s door with a whiskey in one hand and my smartphone in the other, is because it’s not unusual, believe it or not, to see kids posting to various Internet writing forums and announcing, smugly, that at the tender age of (14, 15, 16) they have written a novel. And I want to tell them, with all affection and sincerity, to go fuck themselves, because it doesn’t mean anything.

I sort-of, kind-of sold my first novel when I was 16; this wasn’t Cravenhold, but a subsequent novel titled White Rabbit. And believe me, I told everyone and more or less dug a hole for myself, so that when the deal dissolved like tears in the rain I had a lot of explaining to do.

Look, writing something recognizable as a novel when you’re still a kid is an achievement. And if, like Paolini, you manage to sell that novel and publish it to strong sales, that’s amazing. But simply writing a novel as teenager isn’t anything to shout about. Writing a novel at all isn’t something to shout about, actually; people write novels all the time — and routinely write them in a month or less. Sure, writing a novel is an achievement. But it doesn’t mean you’re destined for greatness or anything. Heck, I did it, but I didn’t sell my first real novel to a real publisher until I was 28 years old.

I always assumed that when editors read about my tender years they would be impressed; of course now I wonder if they didn’t immediately stuff the manuscript into the return envelope, rolling their eyes. Which, come to think of it, is pretty much what I imagine happens now.