I Love Mountains Day - Wendell Berry

Nothing flashy. Just plain-spoken wisdom, as always.

Grand Cayman

Confession: On Wednesday April 23, 2008, between 7:15 p.m. and 8:30 p.m., I consumed four large lobster tails, a house salad, several rolls, an assortment of steamed vegetables and at least two glasses of sauvignon blanc.

Excuse: I was merely getting my money's worth on all-you-can-eat lobster night at a Grand Cayman restaurant that caters to American appetites. Besides, we were on vacation, damn it.

A diving vacation, actually. A well-traveled diver once explained to me the difference between a diving vacation and a diving trip. On a diving vacation, you mix a few dives in with your gluttony, lying about, and overspending. On a diving trip, you get off the plane, throw your gear into the rental car, and drive directly to the boat. Over the next few days, you spend as much time in the water as you can without succumbing to nitrogen poisoning. In other words, you dive the way I went at hunting and fishing back in my teens, twenties, and early thirties. I don't go at anything that hard anymore, including work.

Normally, Grand Cayman Island would be way too upscale for a cheapskate like me, but my alert and resourceful left-brained wife put together a great deal, one of those tedious and confusing arrangements involving points, miles, credits, discounts, and upgrades.

Given a choice of vacation spots, I'll head to some mountain range or other or back to Kentucky. Jane will head for the ocean. I'm a decent swimmer, comfortable in water. Jane is powerful swimmer, a former life guard, who'd rather swim a mile than walk a mile. I'm convinced that her ears double as gills.

So we left glorious spring weather here in North Texas - crisp nights and mornings, highs in the low 70s, bluebonnets, Indian paintbrush, tender greenery everywhere - to land on a Saturday afternoon in suffocating heat and humidity. Sweat ran down my sunglasses as I toted our gear from the little terminal to the rental car office. (Welcome to de island, mon!) I muttered something like, "I can have this shit in Houston in August." If Jane heard me, she held her tongue.

The intrepid divers head out to sea. We don't have an underwater camera, so we ended up with the standard ridiculous tourist photos ("...and here we are at Rum Point, standing next to the giant wooden lizard.")

* * *

When I was a kid, back in the early seventies, I did some diving with my father. Dad was a spear fisherman and volunteer diver for the local rescue squad. He and another squad member taught me the basics in the pool at tiny Campbellsville College, in my hometown. What I remember most from those lessons is the gentle amusement in Dad's brown eyes, behind his mask, as we passed his regulator back and forth in eight or ten feet of water during our "buddy-breathing" exercise. No doubt my eyes were big as silver dollars as I waited those few seconds for Dad to calmly take his two or three breaths before handing the regulator back to me.

After that, we did some shallow diving along the banks of Green River Reservoir, slow, easy diving, with decent visibility. We filled up a tackle box with lures that anglers lost to roots and stumps. The number of huge bass that hung around in six feet of water in the middle of a summer day astounded me.

Dad stored his personal diving gear in a small, faded army-surplus rucksack. I loved to go through it, and he didn't mind. He kept his mask and regulator in the main compartment, wrapped in rags. His compass and depth gauge went in side pockets. His knife, in its hard scabbard, was shoved to one side of the main compartment so that when the flap was closed the big orange handle protruded. The bundle smelled of old canvas, lake water, rubber, and a scent that I can only describe as "Dad." I relied on borrowed equipment, but I had my own rucksack, and I daydreamed about filling it with my own gear.

In his work with the rescue squad, Dad located and helped recover the remains of drowning victims. I asked him about it, and all he'd say was, "Usually you're right on top of the body before you recognize it. "

Then, on a cool, gray spring day, he descended into a deep, flooded quarry in search of a missing mother and her toddler and infant. He found the car in about thirty feet of water. The windows were down. He turned on his light and looked inside. After that, my unshakable father, a WWII combat veteran, lost interest in diving. I was too young to continue without him.

Years passed, and Dad seemed to get his second wind. Still vigorous in his early sixties, he bought a new bird dog pup - this first since his best old dog died a dozen years before - and regained his passion for old pursuits. He began to talk about diving again. By this time, a couple of years out of college, I could afford my own gear. We made some rough plans, noted improvements in equipment, looked at prices.

Then he died suddenly, and I let go all thoughts of diving.

* * *

A few years back, Jane announced that she wanted to go diving in the Caribbean. I told her she'd have to take lessons and get certified, and that I'd need to go through the training again. She let it drop, and I figured that was the end of it. But this past January, we saw "Bucket List," the movie starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, about two cancer patients determined to do all of the things on their list - their bucket list - before they kicked the bucket. So they jumped out of planes, drove race cars, reconnected with family, and so on. A very funny and touching movie. Jane decided we'd get an early start on our bucket list. Next thing I knew she'd signed us up for scuba lessons. We finished our academic and pool lessons here in the Dallas area. We'd finish our certification with four successful training dives in the waters off Grand Cayman Island.

It all came back very quickly, though I had to adjust to major equipment improvements. For one thing, the old style of buddy-breathing is out; today's diver is equipped with a back-up secondary regulator for emergencies. Modern masks are far lighter, more comfortable, and easier to clear than the older models, though they lack the satisfying heft. No more confusing dive tables. A dive computer that attaches to your BC or wrist crunches the numbers for you.

Sunday morning on the island, we rigged up our gear, and, along with five other students, followed our instructor, Dave, down the ladder, through the rocks, and into water too clear and blue to be real.

Trouble, right off. This being my first saltwater dive, I underestimated the effect of the additional buoyancy. Twelve pounds of weight, I discovered, would barely get me under water. I worked way too hard maintaining reasonable depth as we worked our way out to the remains of an old cargo ship sunk by the British Navy in the 1920s. Jane kept looking back, motioning for me to get with it and keep up. It seems that descending thirty feet has little effect on a relationship. Still, I managed to get to the designated open spot on the bottom where we demonstrated a few necessary skills.

A bit later, as we switched out tanks in preparation for our second dive, Dave, a very reserved, patient young Brit, who'd said not a word about my struggles during the first dive, walked by and placed a four-pound weight in my hand. The second dive went much better.

* * *

It seemed to me that despite its posh restaurants and hotels, gorgeous beaches, rising financial prominence, and well-deserved reputation as a top diving and snorkeling destination, Grand Cayman Island hosts a high concentration of unhappy tourists. Eye contact was rare and fleeting, unless I happened to say "hi" or "good morning," which usually elicited a a startled glance and quickened pace. Grim or bored visages nearly everywhere, even on the beach. A typical breakfast scene: Jane and I are sitting at a table, sipping coffee and orange juice, enjoying the morning view of the beach. In walks a striking young woman, thirty-something with patrician good looks, followed by three or four young children, an uncomfortable-looking nanny and well-dressed and tonsured husband. The kids' eyes never leave their video games. The father's eyes rarely leave his Blackberry. They order without looking at the waiter. Other than the nanny' s corrections of the children, no one says anything. We noticed this sort of thing right off and saw it every day. Only in the tackiest tourist traps near Georgetown or out at Stingray Island, where crews from tour boats feed the stingrays to keep them around and tame, did folks seem to be having a big time.

Then there was the disappointing lack of birds. Maybe we were there at the wrong time of year for birding, but I expected lots of songbirds, gulls, and the like. Instead, I saw mostly white-winged doves, a few swallows, and lots of grackles. I don't believe I saw a single gull or wading bird. Maybe that's as it should be; I haven't checked into it. But I'll pass along a story. One night we were sitting in Sunset Grill, a hamburger and taco joint that became our favorite restaurant, (incredible fish tacos!) when a plane flew over so low that Jane thought it was about crash on the beach. I said it reminded me of a crop duster. The manager overheard our conversation, and said, "That's the mosquito plane. It comes over about this time every night. You've probably noticed that we have absolutely no mosquitoes." Actually, I hadn't noticed, most likely because, sure enough, there were no mosquitoes. Jane said that she was glad we weren't dining outside just then.

The life of the party. Your faithful correspondent in Paradise. Tired, sunburned, grouchy, and ready for supper.

* * *

The next two dives really were spectacular. We spent time about 70 feet deep, demonstrating proficiency with a compass and convincing Dave that we could take off our masks for a few seconds, put them back on and clear them without freaking out. Mostly, though, we eased along above the coral, watching turtles, tarpon, and schools of fish I couldn't identify. One of my regrets is that I didn't do more reading on the ecology of the island and its waters. Earlier that morning, a group of divers saw a hammerhead, so we kept an eye out, but didn't see one. Jane didn't seem especially disappointed.

Jane loves diving; she's thoroughly hooked. I like it. Actually, I took more pleasure in her delight than in the actual diving. Although I was quite comfortable, save for mild ear squeeze that forced me to slow my descent and equalize more often, I couldn't help but feel like a foreign object. Maybe it was the Darth Vader hiss of breathing from a tank. Maybe I prefer the mystery of something coming from unseen depths to take my fly, lure, or bait. Maybe I'm just getting old and cranky and prefer to spend my time where I feel I belong. Or perhaps the world's best diving can't match the wonder of being a kid six feet deep in a Kentucky lake, easing along with Dad, looking at schools of largemouth bass and bream, keeping an eye out for lures tangled in the brush.

More Excuses and an Upcoming Trip

My apologies for my lack of blogging and commenting, and thanks to Mike for the nudge to my already guilty conscience. I've been buried under work, but then everyone else works too, and they still manage to keep their blogs current.

Jane and I blast off on a short diving vacation tomorrow. I promise a full report with photos when I get back home. I'm taking along James Howard Kunstler's new novel, World Made by Hand. Expect a short review sometime in the next few weeks.

In the meantime, thanks for your patience, and please keep checking in.

Once again, the Onion nails American culture

Sometimes there's more truth in satire than in the best reporting, as this piece from the Onion clearly demonstrates.

Computer Crash

My not-so-old computer quit for good this past Friday. I finally got up and running with a new one late last night, but after jumping through all of the Internet configuration hoops, I seem to have dropped some email. So if you commented on my blog posts or sent email and now think I'm a rude SOB who ignores his friends, rest assured that I'm merely a clumsy SOB (Senile Old Birdhunter) who sometimes loses email. I hope you'll re-send your comments.

My Amazon/B&N Problem

Last Thursday I logged onto Amazon.com and ordered Coal River by Michael Shnayerson and two books in the Oxford University Press "Very Short Introduction" series. Even with the typical heavy discounts, the order qualified for free shipping. The following Saturday morning, I received an email from Amazon saying that the books had been shipped. Yesterday, (Monday) shortly after lunch, the books arrived at my front door.

How can any independent bookstore, other than those dealing in very rare, specialized, or antiquarian books, compete with that kind of service and convenience? Of course I love to browse bookstore shelves and racks, and I rarely leave without buying something. But for the past several years most of my book purchases have gone like this: A review on a new book or an essay about a writer's work catches my eye, or I'll need a book or journal for reference. Instead of heading to the bookstore, I click over to Amazon. But not without a twinge of guilt.

In most ways, I was crunchy (Jane would say cranky) before Rod Dreher entered high school, though I'm very grateful for his articulation. I can't help it; I'm wired that way. My preferences are based more on my upbringing and inborn temperament - the influences that shape my sensibilities - than on politics or even moral reasoning. Certain things just feel right while others feel cheap, vulgar, or exploitative.

So I want to support independent bookstores. I would go well out my way to do business with a good independent bookseller if I could find one within remotely reasonable driving distance.

Or I like to think that I would. There are a few small issues that make me wonder.

Yes, independent bookstores are increasingly rare, but I've visited several in various Texas cities and towns, and, with rare exceptions, they don't stock my books. Oh, they'll be happy to order them for you, but books by a minor regional novelist don't justify shelf space that could be more profitably occupied by the works of better-known writers. And of course that's perfectly reasonable from a business standpoint. Independent booksellers have limited shelf-space and they're fighting for survival. They can ill-afford to placate every neurotic writer who comes along.

Then there's evil, predatory Barnes & Noble. They stock my books, especially here in Texas. When I have a new book out, community relations managers from various B&N stores around North Texas call to schedule book signings, which means that my books get time in the front window and on front tables - space that Texas Tech University Press, my fine little publisher, could never afford. Throughout the year, B&N recognizes local writers through author of the month promotions. B&N can afford these little outreach efforts whereas the independents need to score very popular local writers or big-name literary writers from elsewhere in order to justify the time and expense required to put on a worthwhile event. Of course independent booksellers do get behind works by new or obscure writers that would otherwise be overlooked, but their numbers are small, and they can do only so much.

I understand the independent booksellers' predicament. I also want people to buy my books. Whenever readers send me email, I always ask how they found out about my book and where they bought it. Nine times out of ten, they read a review in a newspaper or magazine. Then they ordered the book from Amazon.com or picked it up at B&N.

So, despite the convenience of Amazon.com shopping, I still find myself browsing amid flocks of teenagers drinking five dollar cups of coffee. Maybe I'm petty or mercenary.

On the other hand, I have to say that my frequent business with Amazon.com isn't totally inconsistent with my natural crunchiness.

For decades Union Underwear, which made - you guessed it - underwear (for Fruit of the Loom) was far and away the largest employer in Campbellsville, Kentucky, my hometown. The town bent over backward to accommodate "The Factory." Working lives were spent in the bleach room or on this or that line. Women worked grueling shifts stitching together T-shirts as fast as they could feed material into the machines, then went home to help their husbands with farm work.

Then came the 1990s and NAFTA. The Factory shut down and moved to Mexico. Unemployment in Taylor County shot up to 18 percent. The degree to which the local agricultural and business economies had eroded became bleakly apparent.

A few years later, Amazon.com built a huge distribution center in Campbellsville and put a lot of people back to work. To a rural, Southern, non-union population accustomed to employment at The Factory, Amazon's work environment seemed downright progressive. Amazon.com, of course, saw a very stable workforce in a region where the cost of living is relatively low.

So when I place an order through Amazon.com, I tell myself that, in a minuscule way, I'm supporting old friends, former neighbors, and classmates. On my website and on this blog, I'll link to Amazon, despite the company's annoying practice of prominently hawking used copies just below the listed price of a new copy. (I certainly don't object to the used book market, and I'm thankful for every reader, but given a choice, I'd prefer to earn my tiny royalty.)

And until something changes, I'll continue to root for independent booksellers while doing business with the allegedly bland, heartless, soulless, predatory chain that stocks and occasionally promotes my books.

Townes Van Zandt - Marie

I stumbled across this and just had to share it.

Everybody loves "Pancho and Lefty," but of all of the songs the great Townes Van Zandt wrote and sang, "Marie" is my favorite. The song knocked me out the first time I heard it and has haunted me ever since.

There's an unfortunate audio synch problem throughout the second half. If you're inclined to be distracted by it, just close your eyes and listen. You don't have to be a lefty to be moved by "Marie."

Proper Beagle Work

Sure, Uno's a looker, but can he do this? My first hunting dog was a beagle, and I still love the breed. Back then, we rarely called them beagles. Usually, we just called them "rabbit dogs." Looks like this guy has some good ones.

It's Getting Colder

My Blackland Prairie piece, published in the February issue of Texas Parks & Wildlife, is now online. Meanwhile, even in our current recession or economic downturn or whatever it is, subdivisions and strip malls continue to crawl over the North Texas Prairie and creek bottoms. Where are all of these people coming from? What happens to the homes they're leaving? My part of Plano is full of empty strip malls.

I've been thinking a lot about Matt's recent post about "letting the cold in." That idea has stuck with me since I first encountered it more than twenty years ago in Vance Bourjaily's The Unnatural Enemy.

Warm spots are getting awfully scarce in northcentral Texas.

Sure-Enough Dog!

Donny Lynch and Ranger, his fine treeing feist, late last month in the Sabine River bottom. Ranger treed either a squirrel or 'coon in a hollow tree. He was climbing up the trunk, barking every breath, and had hung onto the hole for several seconds while I fumbled with my camera. Donny had just stepped up behind him when I snapped this photo.

With Ranger's help, Donny, our friend"Smooth," and I took seven squirrels in about two hours in very warm, windy conditions.

At only three years old, Ranger is one of the best all-around hunting dogs, I've ever known. He's fearless when facing outraged 'coons and is a deadly-accurate tree dog. He's also a delight in camp and handles beautifully in the woods. Donny rarely has to raise his voice.

Year before last, Ranger got stuck while chasing a 'coon into a hollow cypress tree. While Donny desperartely tried to call him out, he continued to bay his quarry. Finally, we could hear him struggling to get free and worried that the 'coon would chew him him up while he had no room to move. We ran a quarter of a mile back to the truck and were gathering the ax and saw (the chainsaw was out of fuel) when Ranger came huffing through the woods toward us.

Donny leaned on the truck bed and let out deep breath.

I said, "Wonder how he got loose?"

Ranger stood panting, awaiting further instructions.

Donny said, "He probably ate is way out."

When Editing Becomes Rewriting

First thing this morning I vowed that I would write 500 words for a magazine assignment before blogging or reading blogs or checking email - all of the normal and nearly irresistible ways of avoiding work.

So much for willpower.

I had been planning to wait until tonight to blog about the piece on Raymond Carver in the December 24 issue of The New Yorker. But then a tiny crack in the discipline dam quickly gave way to complete collapse. I gave in and listened to a short NPR segment on Caver's relationship with Gordon Lish, his longtime editor at Esquire and Knoph. Now, my creative juices are trickling in that direction, and I won't be able to redirect the flow to a more responsible course until I've posted a few thoughts on Carver, Lish, and the writer-editor relationship.

I discovered Raymond Carver back the early nineties as I was beginning to read beyond hook and bullet and nature writing. I started with his short story collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Love and went on to read nearly everything he published.

Much has been made of his minimalism, but what struck me was the clarity and elegance of his simple language, and, even more important, the sense that here was man of decency, a man who had struggled and suffered, one who'd known failure and could understand and forgive weakness in others. Reading his stories about failed relationships, alcoholism, murder, and betrayal, I felt the gentleness with which he handled his struggling, absurd, often miserable characters. Here was an adult, a writer who could be trusted.

At times, though, his stories frustrated me, not because he failed to meet my expectations - a writer works under no such obligation - but because I felt that something was missing or that Carver was telling me something through omission, but I was too thick to get it. Some of Hemingway's stories leave me with the same feeling, as if he wrote much more, then went back and excised it. Of course critics and scholars tell us what we should infer from those silences, but I'm often left thinking, "Well, maybe."

Hemingway famously said that when chiseling stories, a writer should go back and "take out all of the good parts." I don't think he meant that at all. His related statement - apocryphal or not - that a writer should be prepared to "kill his babies" makes more sense to me. In other words, beware of your own "best" writing; it can get in the way of your story.

According to The New Yorker, Carver wasn't as severely minimalist at mid-career as critics have long believed. Manuscript drafts and correspondence show that Lish cut some of Carver's stories by more than 50 percent and literally rewrote the ending of the title story "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love." Furthermore, correspondence between the two make clear the anguish the heavy editing caused the newly sober and fragile Carver.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love met with critical acclaim, making a literary star of Carver and complicating his relationship with his old friend Lish. As he gained confidence, Carver began to stand his ground. His later, lusher stories earned high praise from critics, putting to rest (in my opinion) the notion that Lish propped him up.

These revelations jolted me because "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" has stayed with me all these years because it moved me and at the same time left me with the feeling that Carver was holding something back. Turns out, Lish held it back.

Carver's original (or very lightly edited) version of the story, under its original title, "Beginners," follows the article and selected correspondence.

Did Lish go too far? I think so.

Is the story better of worse for Lish's editing? I'm still thinking about it.

If you think that famous literary writers work with complete confidence, read a few of Raymond Carver's letters to his friend and editor.

And if you haven't done so, read Raymond Carver.

Carry the Damn Camera

Back in the early nineties, when I started writing for the bird hunting and gun dog magazines, I had to provide photos with my manuscripts - for no extra pay, of course. On every hunting trip, I tried my buddies' patience by holding things up to photograph a dog on point or by bringing everything to a halt if the light was especially good. I have never been a good photographer, but a bunch of my simple shots saw the light of publication. But constantly worrying about photos took some of the fun out of hunting. I vowed that if I ever wrote for magazines that work only with real photographers, I'd leave the camera at home and concentrate on my hunting and any stories that might come out of it.

Well, I'm happy to say that I haven't submitted a photo in a dozen years or so. My stories seem to read better accompanied by photos by Wyman Meinzer, Russell Graves, and other pros.

But these days, of course, digital photography is easy and fun, and the results are immediate. And of course I like to include photos with my blog posts.

Still, I'm usually too lazy to carry a camera.

I paid for that laziness earlier today.

I took Cate to a creek bottom a few miles from home. It's within the city limits, so I can't carry a shotgun, but the place is covered with huge pecan trees, several kinds of oak, hackberry, and Osage orange, and it's loaded with fox squirrels.

Cate is really starting to tree. She's been treeing and barking at squirrels that she can see for several weeks, but lately, she's starting to tree by scent only, and she's learning to follow timbering squirrels through the treetops, barking every breath - a nice, clear, chop, almost as deep and smooth as a coonhound's.

Cate struck about 50 yards away amid a stand of huge post oaks. For several seconds, I couldn't find her even though she was raising hell. Then I heard scratching up in the trees - a squirrel running up a trunk or branch, I assumed.

No, Cate running up the trunk of a big oak that had fallen against another old giant.

There she was, my seven month-old pup, eight feet off the ground, standing on the trunk of a leaning tree and reared up on the tree that held the squirrel, barking her head off.

And I had no camera and no gun. Nothing to do but cheer her on.

Directly, the squirrel timbered. Cate ran back down the leaning trunk, following the squirrel by sight. She lost it after a few minutes, but had that been a real hunting situation, that squirrel would have gone in the bag.

Next time, I'm carrying the damn camera.