It can do a number on you. When a frequently read author from your past passes away, it's a surreal experience. Brings back floods of memories about things like paperbacks stuck in bookbags and dirty denim hobo bags that smell like weed and incense. This is an author, I guess you've surmised, from my waaaaaaaaay past. I haven't read any Vonnegut in years. I bet I will now. Right now I'm reading riveting stuff like The Red Tent (which I just can NOT get through, ugh) and Extraordinary Knowing which I talked about and drooled over and that's what I got for Easter. I was thrilled with it, and thrilled that my sweet handsome hubby remembered that I wanted it. It's a killer concept and very exciting, (truly) but Kurt . . . . ohhhh, Kurt. You gotta love an author that looks just like Mark Twain. That's just warm and fuzzy and a sign from above that you MUST read him right there. Then he goes and runs a close second in pessimism with Twain as well, or at least it always seemed so. That's just weird. Maybe he was our Twain for this lifetime. Whoa.
What an imagination this man allowed himself to grow - the Tralfamadorians twarnt no Aunt Polly. But I digress. Anyone who writes about a place - no - a utopia of sorts where everything in the universe fits neatly together. Mm. Mm, mmm, mmmmm. Truthfully that's not a utopia at all, is it, cause where's the fun in that if everything fits just right? But it's soothing to think on it. Peaceful even, especially when nothing has fit together in your day, or your week. And the name of his utopia alludes to what a utopia it's just NOT.... the chrono-synclastic infundibula. INFUNDIBULA? Sounds like one of those things a horse gets when they can't walk anymore, or something you have to go to the podiatrist about, or something the financial analyst needs to fix, or ---zzzzzowie, I dunno, but it's summpin I dun want fer sher.
Anyway prayers for Kurt Vonnegut's family and circle of loved ones. Boy I hope they know how many people he reached with his talent and his skill, what an impact he made on thousands and thousands of people, prolly millions.
Next time you're at Barnes, pick up something by Kurt Vonnegut and read a few pages. He wrote at least a dozen books, maybe more; you have a fairly wide choice, and between the dozen of them the scope is wide. You may learn a new word. May not be a real one, but it'll be a GREAT one. It'll zhuzh up your day.
TTFN
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