I Kill Hitler
I Kill Hitler
by Travis Hedge Coke
Chasing awards as an artist is weird. It is not more weird than chasing them as any other kind of competitor, but making art is not necessarily competitive. And, neither is playing tennis.
Nothing is.
And, even the curse for cancer will not cure them all. And, it don’t bring back the dead.
Give yourself some slack. It is not too bad if your short story or song or the doodle on the back of a receipt does not cure all the cancers and win you all the awards. Anyone expecting it to does not have your best interests in mind and they ain’t your friend.
Hasten
You deserve a nice book. You should get one.
Get one for a friend, too. Or, an enemy.
Why Don’t More Franchises Hire Fans to Police?
They will soften it by asking, “Why don’t franchises hire fans to advise?” or “Why don’t they hire fans to help maintain continuity?”
And, some franchises, sometimes, will.
And, those franchises that will, that do, they will break from the advice or maintenance as easily as they would from a technical advisor on medical terminology or documented physics.
Therein the rub and therein why what the people asking those semi-rhetorical questions do not want a seat at a table, though they, when they ask, dream of that fan as themselves and not someone they do not know nor can control, is not to advise or comment, but to control.
Why am I not running the show? but only so far as telling everyone what is what, not the work of producing, writing, performing, directing, marketing or worrying the legalities, finances, and particular needs of the crew, cast, talent, authors, pencilers, inkers, backup dancers, lead singers, et al.
Born Ignorant
As an ace person I've only been like hypnotically drawn to someone I didn't know twice and it was mutual both times, but one of those instances required her husband to clap & raise his voice to stop us from just staring nose to nose in silence & she later said she felt like Rachel in Imagine Me & You feeling the need to go home and rent gay porn to see if she's gay and I think DMing that to a total stranger you'd just met with your husband is actually gayer than anything.
Anyhow, when I say I'm entirely baffled by straight men, it's because I don't understand any of it.
The Critic Comes In
Criticism is not dependent on artists or any other to produce work for them to critique. The critic is an artist and their work is as interdependent as a painting or a poem; immeasurable and contradictory amount.
If we become concerned with the label, “fan,” and who qualifies, recollect that, “fan,” is short for fanatic. “Marked by excessive enthusiasm and often intense uncritical devotion,” says Merriam-Webster. Sure. Why not?
If a “fan” comes into a “fan group” and they actually despise the whole thing the group is a fan of, the press will still write them up as being fans. It is, by and large, only other fans who care.
It is fans who would have come up with “anti-fan,” though it is a useful term.
Most will see no difference.
Citizen Disappears Suspects
As far as I can tell, they never did find Vonnie Rickman’s bodily remains. What was last found of her included her personal ID, hidden away by her husband who was convicted despite her absence.
Close Enough for Baseball
Fan might come from “fancy,” instead, come down from general hobbies to boxing aficionados to baseball observers. The fancy, the fance, the fans.
Jean Shepherd, one of the distinct voices of baseball, some of whose recollections have become the annual tradition (thanks to bombing in theaters and being procured on the cheap for reruns, just like It’s a Wonderful Life and The Wizard of Oz), told many yarns that were untrue, and even the untrue ones were half-true, because half of any truth is wanted to believe.
Give’em a reason, someone will swing.
Will Continue
I am working on an ever-expanding story called Pal, based off an old newspaper headline, in which I pit a traumatized serial killer from New England against the North Carolina white supremacist think tank and treasure-hunting cryptanalysis club their husband belonged to before he died.
I tend to believe people are smarter and more special than they think they are, so it lightens the horror for me to write people who are not as special or smart as they believe they know.
