Author Archives: JimArnoldLA

The Forest Dark — Outtakes

Sometimes you just can’t include everything in the final, finished book. So it is with this passage — which goes into more detail about Ronnie and Noah, a relationship that still haunts me from “The Forest Dark.” There is nothing like love and lust in your 20s. This does diminish as one ages, unfortunately. But you can resurrect it in your imagination, and in your writing.

From “The Forest Dark” (left unpublished as part of the final draft of the book):

Ronnie Perkins was only the third man Noah Baldock had ever had sex with, but the two of them together tried to make up for any lack in this department. Ronnie was, in many ways, the surprise answer to all the hopes Noah had through those years when he mostly lied to himself that he was straight, and that all would be well once the right woman came along for him to love.

He was pretty sure no one saw them trade blowjobs that afternoon, out of sight but just yards away from one of Silver Lake’s major streets. When they were finished, Noah, now buzzed, grabbed Ronnie’s hand – calloused and warm, tough from his weights – for the few steps back down the alley toward the RTD stop. A little Latin girl in a frilly, bright pink skirt skipped by unexpectedly and he disengaged, the years of denial a much more powerful driver than his new-found lust.

“Turning Japanese, I think I’m turning Japanese I really think so,” Noah sang quietly, but Ronnie had already nodded off against his shoulder on the short, hot bus ride to the apartment. Later, there was enough in a Tequila bottle for almost two full shots apiece, considerably more sex and an alarm clock that rang way too soon for a Monday morning, rousing them both out of a dead sleep.

* * *

After a shared bowl of Wheaties, half an orange and black coffee, Noah walked Ronnie down to the express bus stop, which would take him the ten or so miles to the beach. He worked at Equipment out on Channel Road, a store that sold T-shirts, suntan oil, umbrellas and snacks. As fun as the job was hanging out at the ocean with all the cute guys and other people on vacation, Ronnie’s position didn’t pay enough for him to have wheels. He spent an enormous amount of time on the RTD.

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Fifty Years Ago Today

— Underneath the chilly gray November sky
We can make believe that Kennedy is still alive and
Were shooting for the moon and smiling Jackie’s driving by

– lyrics from Andy Prieboy’s “Tomorrow, Wendy”

I can only imagine that Andy Prieboy (who is the same age as I am) lived somewhere in the Midwest, somewhere in the regional vicinity of Milwaukee, because November 22, 1963 was indeed chilly and gray, and also, at least where we were, raining.

It was a day of tears, that’s for sure.

The blogger in 1963.

I was in third grade at St. Sebastian Catholic School on Milwaukee’s west side, on Washington Boulevard. We lived just a couple of blocks away from the church and its nearly overcrowded, baby-boom elementary school. Back then, of course, our moms — everybody’s mom, basically — was a homemaker so most (though not all) of the kids went home for lunch.

St. Sebastian

I remember coming back late that day — which was really odd, because I was the Best Little Boy in the World, and certainly, never late for school. We were due back at 12:45 p.m. and I so remember looking up at that tower and realizing I was late. It must’ve been because the bells were going off, as they did every quarter hour. For years I remembered looking up at a clock on that day, but as you can plainly see in the photo, there is no clock on that bell tower. So we realize memory is an unreliable narrator. It was, after all, 50 years ago.

How is it possible I can remember things that happened 50 years ago?

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I remember hearing later on that the president had been shot in Dallas, also in the Central Time Zone, about 12:30, and I figured I was just finishing my lunch or putting on my coat or something like that (like I said earlier, it was raining/drizzling there, and it was cold).

In the third grade class I was in, we had a nun teacher in the morning and a lay teacher in the afternoon (the morning nun was ancient; I don’t think she could have gotten through an entire day — and in fact, she died later that school year!)

What they did in those pre-internet/pre-ubiquitous TV days was to put the radio on the school PA system. But it was horrible quality – you couldn’t understand much of anything they said. Static and yelling. I do remember some of the kids crying – the girls of course, because the boys don’t cry. Soon the decision was made to herd the entire school into the church for a prayer for the President, and then they let us go home, early. (November 22 was a Friday that year, as it is again in 2013.)

My parents were both home, on the couch in front of our little black and white TV. It was really odd to see my father home in the middle of the afternoon. Both he and Mom were crying, which was much more disturbing to me. I believe that’s the only time I’d ever (to this day) seen them both in tears at once.

We spent the next few days watching all the horrible events of that weekend unfold in front of the TV. I had a new baby brother, David, born just a couple of weeks before, so I remember taking my turn holding him on my lap. Without reservation, the assassination of President Kennedy was the most profound event to ever happen in my young life.

If the “60s” really ended the day Saigon fell (which was actually in 1975), then perhaps the “60s” really began that day in Dallas. Nothing was ever quite the same after that.

Not Knowing What to Write Next – Some Strategies to Try

Wish I had a beauty like this again. Photo copyright shordzi (Flickr)

I’m not sure if it’s lack of motivation, just not knowing where the story goes, or some other malaise – but I’ve been suffering under it lately. As I was lying awake in my bed early this morning fretting, I remembered a tip from my excellent writing teacher Claire Carmichael.

It was on the order of how to “get from here to there” – when in actuality, you DO know where the THERE is, and you might know what comes before the “here,” but you’re not grounded in what’s happening right now and have basically zero idea of how to get to THERE.

Claire envisioned this process as beads in a necklace, some of which you probably do know. Say, for instance, you’re writing a subplot about a character with cancer, and this character ultimately survives. You know that much. You don’t want to reveal that outcome to the reader as that would negate any suspense about that part of the story. But there are things you do know, or can guess, that would be part of this.

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There’s going to be a diagnosis, there will be decisions to be made and treatments to be dealt with. For a good story, things should get worse before they ultimately get better. Perhaps there’s a family meltdown over this. Perhaps there’s a bankruptcy. Perhaps there’s a wrenching, startling and totally unexpected scene about the consequences of chemotherapy. Perhaps there’s a visit by a ghost, a deity, or a demon! Perhaps there’s an incompetent medical character who tells the patient, erroneously of course, that the situation is hopeless, and all is lost.

Get the picture? Then these known stops on the way to THERE become the colored beads in our necklace, and we just need to fill in the empty spots with the lesser gems. We can write our way to THERE, as if we were fingering beads on the necklace and stopping to touch the larger ones we knew were coming.

I like to think of this as stopping for a bit of gas on the way stations along the highway on a road trip, the ones you already have circled on the map. This often helps me — hope you find it useful too!

And, Just Like That, It Ends (unemployment)

Hey, I’ll work for sex, too. Feet, not really but thanks.

I haven’t posted much in the last few weeks, and the reason behind that is (as well as my usual procrastination issues, but beyond that) that I’ve started working. That’s right, working, on a regular basis. Like in permanent, reliable part-time, something I’ve not seen in my economic life for the last four years.

I wanted to document it as part of the posts on the blog regarding my unemployment experience, or my underemployment experience.

It’s odd, it ended as simply as it started. How did it start? A phone call to meet a boss (who is now dead, btw, not that it’s pertinent to this part of the story. But. She is. Dead.) at a coffee shop near the airport, a mere 20 0r so miles from where I was living at the time, for a meeting to discuss, well, exactly what? So it was a ruse, the only agenda for this meeting was to fire four people in our tiny communications department (so they just axed the entire department and outsourced the function – sound familiar?).

If it sounds like I’m resentful it’s because I still don’t understand why this simply could not be done with an easy phone call or an email (or even a text – do people get fired by text now? They must). No, instead, we’re going to make you suffer on the L.A. freeways, on a Friday, pointlessly, to do this horrible thing. Grrrr.

Anyway.

What happened was I’d been posting semi-regular reminders on Facebook, of all places, that I was looking for a seasonal or part-time position and one of them actually came through. Shocker, right?

So I’ll try not to say anything bad about Facebook for a few minutes. What am I doing, work-wise? Well, part-time, working 3 days a week, doing some selling, some blogsite maintenance, some communications, right here in L.A. Don’t want to be more specific than that, but indeed it looks like it could be as permanent as I’d like it to be.

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Some final thoughts (for now) on the past four years of unemployment, underemployment, self-employment:

It really is all about networking. All of the good freelance gigs I’ve gotten as well as this permanent job came through friends or work contacts – nobody posted a wanted ad for any of these. So what everyone says, including all the advice gurus, is true.
I believe the world of work and of looking for work has fundamentally changed. We have not recovered much at all from the crash of 2008. I still cannot believe how hard it’s been to find a job, any kind of job, really, with 40+ years in the work force and a pretty decent resume. Kind of unbelievable, but that’s what it is.
Not everybody needs to have a job anymore. We can now produce everything we need with minimum workers, so many of us don’t have to actually work. We, as a society, have to figure out the economics of that. Productivity gains have all gone to the top, and are not shared with the workers. In the future, eventually, this will change, one way or the other to a more equitable footing.
It could all happen – the crash – again, tomorrow. I hold no illusions that things will ever go back to the way they used to be. It’s good to be resilient, and I’m glad I’m pretty good at frugality.

That’s it for now. I’m sure I’ll think of more and add to the list.

Photo copyright by beep beep.

26 Hours in Palm Springs

Jim Arnold (r) signing “The Forest Dark” at the Palm Springs Pride Author’s Village, here with fellow author Alan Chin.

Author’s Village at the PS Pride Festival, sponsored by our friends at Q Trading Company.

Gay Pride Parade Kickoff point.

How does he do it? Amazing.

Crowd favorite and Palm Springs megabooster Bella da Ball.

The rainbow flags were flying, that’s for sure.

Just got back from about 26 Hours in Palm Springs – a whirlwind, but a fun one.

Among the activities, I:

went to Elmer’s Diner (a must on any visit to Palm Springs)
saw some friends, old and new and potential
had a nice cuppa froyo, not once but twice
shopped at Target (yes, I did!)

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saw a Big Parade on a beautiful sunny morning
met Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti
saw Richard Simmons walking down the street
went to a birthday dinner for my friend Tim
and signed copies of “The Forest Dark” and “Benediction” at the Palm Springs Pride Festival Author’s Village.

Thanks again to Rick and all the good people at QTrading Company, who support gay writers in a big way. Love being part of that event and look forward to future years!

Jim Arnold Communications November 2013 Newsletter: Tips for Better Newsletters!

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Actually, I Don’t Want or Need to be CrossFit

and neither do you!

Or, as Susan Powter used to say: Stop the Insanity!

I guess nothing says “maturing” so well as just looking incredulously at new fitness crazes that come, then invariably go.

But I’m indulgent, usually. The key word being usually. In a former life (like, the late 1990s) I was a certified fitness trainer and had a small side business as a personal trainer in Los Angeles. I stopped doing that at the point where I discovered that, while I really liked keeping myself fit and healthy, I had less interest in counting your sit-ups or trying to convince you to eat more apples.

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However, I continue to be greatly influenced by my training to be in that business, however briefly, and have long been an enthusiastic supporter of lifetime fitness activities – basically, exercises/activities you convince large numbers of people to do that they will actually ENJOY and make part of their lives for like, you know, FOREVER.

CrossFit is not one of these activities. A good number of the exercises I’ve seen in the list of CrossFit workouts of the day (WODs) are things contraindicated for many people, perhaps even most people other than the exceptionally fit and young. Among these are what they call burpees (which we learned as squat thrusts in high school), handstand pushups, L-sits, muscle-ups, pull-ups (which I’ve seen done totally incorrectly in the CrossFit videos, using momentum to complete the movement, a total cheat as this exercise is supposed to strengthen the back muscles that actually pull you up), deadlifts, and kettlebell swings. Any and all of these exercises could result in injury – mainly to the back, but also to shoulders and even to abs. And then there’s that awful heavy metal music they do their routines to. . . gag me.

Shouldn’t people do this if they want? Well, sure, of course! If you want to do it, go ahead, knock yourself out. Perhaps literally. But my point is that it’s not something you’re going to be able to do for very long, consistently. This is just not what the body is designed to do and sooner or later it will rebel. I’m also deeply skeptical at the level of fitness you’d acquire by doing these odd exercises, and how that would benefit you.

So what does Smartypants suggest? Get ready, cause it’s really boring, but really good for you and you can do these things forever: walking – what your body is absolutely designed and evolved to do – and it’s free; dancing – fun, think faster walking, usually involving other people, perhaps in very close proximity; and bicycling – perhaps the most efficient form of personal transportation every devised, a great aerobic and strength workout that’s also easy on the joints and, once you buy the bike, cheap. I’d also include yoga in this list, as a yoga practice can be soft or challenging, endlessly adaptable to age, body type, level of energy, etc.

Daily Routines of Writers (and other artistic types)

Truly enjoyed reading about Mason Curry’s book (Daily Rituals) on the various and odd habits of those artists I’ve admired or adored – although I did avoid reading about those who drank as an inspiration (though I’m sure I’ll get to it to gloat).

Been there, tried that – it didn’t work for me. Longhand was illegible the next day, and when it was typed, it just didn’t make any sense.

What does work for me (for writing, anyway) is the early to rise routine – and so it was nice to see that so many artistic types found it easiest to work first thing in the early morning. Try as I might, especially as I’ve gotten older, I just can’t be a night person.

In fact, I can’t do much of anything cerebral after about four p.m. That’s nap time, then socializing time, then some mindless activity time till blessed sleep and the next morning.

I do have my own rituals: coffee first thing, then I go for a walk, every morning. I try to get up around 5:30 or 6, but it’s often later. I do love the world at dawn and at pre-dawn – it’s so quiet and where I live, in Los Angeles, there’s fewer cars on the streets, making it much more pleasant.

As for writing time, I try to do at least two hours a day six days a week. I don’t always get to that, but that is my aspiration, and I’d like to eventually do more. I do have the time in my schedule, just not the will power to get over the procrastination.

So I guess, according to the six rules, I have about four of them: early riser, strategic substance abuse (coffee), long walks, and sticking to a schedule (well, mostly, anyway). So I guess I’m not doing too badly after all!

Then there’s that day job thing. Now that’s a tough one.

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Why I Wrote “The Forest Dark” — If These Walls Could Talk (it would be Celebrity Mediocrity)

Forest Dark characters do some hanging at Bourgeois Pig

I’ve been asked why I chose this particular story to write, out of all the possibilities that are out there – certainly a fair enough question. Here’s a basic synopsis of “The Forest Dark:”

“The Forest Dark” is a quirky, family-of-choice drama about Eden and Noah, middle-aged friends who must find a way to reconcile their unresolved past with an unexpectedly strange present.

In 1984, conservative co-ed Eden von Eiff befriends young gay man Noah Baldock during L.A.’s frenetic Summer Olympic Games. Becoming fast and intimate, Noah offers Eden a solution to an enormous problem — which she can’t, in the end, accept.

Twenty-five years later, these two boomers struggle to come to grips with the choices they made long ago. They must navigate not only a troubled economy and professional failure, but also control a looming and violent threat to their future.

There are some twists and turns and some secrets, of course, and another major character who shows up in the second part of the book, set in 2009.

But back to the reasons I wrote the story. Basically, it was two things I was interested in at the time of the writing: 1) an “if these walls could talk” type of thing, focused around the Silver Lake/Los Feliz neighborhoods of Los Angeles and 2) an interest in what becomes of people who attain celebrity at a young age and then lose it.

I spent a good portion of my 20s and 30s in the Echo Park/Silver Lake areas of L.A., and have witnessed the changes in the neighborhoods and in the larger city, along with the important events of those years, most notably the AIDS disaster, but also several cycles of economic boom and bust, riots, earthquakes and fires (you know, the usual SoCal apocalyptic scenarios). The area now is going through an enormous real estate boom, that’s reflected in both the residents and businesses. I wanted to show in a fictional way what that might be like for someone who knew it and lived it at a different time, as well as younger people who accept it as the status quo (hence the generational focus of the book).

The other question that interested me was the phenomenon of early celebrity or notoriety – and one that doesn’t last. In my scenario, I was primarily concerned with political types, children of candidates who may have lost their race, or who won but then faded into relative obscurity. What is that like? Especially, what is that like if you turn out to be just kind of ordinary anyway?

I hoped to go into these things in a fictional way in the novel. Read it and tell me what you think!

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Los Angeles Without A Car – Update

Rapid Bus 720 to the beach

Yesterday, I had to get to an appointment in Beverly Hills, which is over the hill and far away from where I live, and also not terribly convenient via public transport – meaning in my case, at least, that there is no direct line there, there’s a transfer or two involved.

But never mind – I do take the Rapid 720 bus down Wilshire, and generally I find that it is pretty rapid, at least, when I’ve needed it to be. After my appointment was over, I decided – on the spur of the moment – to take the bus west all the way to the end, which in this case is the Pacific Ocean in Santa Monica. (We were/are having Santa Anas, which means the weather is hot and windy and full of fire danger – but it’s also quite pleasant if you like hot, dry weather, which I do).

So I loved being able to go to the beach on what was really a whim, and not have to worry about driving myself in traffic or about (my most hated thing) trying to find a place to park and paying exorbitant parking lot rates at the beach. (I saw one sign, it was a $12 fee. . .)

I got there stress-free and read my book on the way. I didn’t go in the water; it was about 5 p.m. when I arrived so I just walked down the strand and watched the gymnasts and yogis for a while. (see photos – not mine, but this is where I was, you get the idea)

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And yes, there was lots of eye candy there, though not as crowded as these pictures might suggest. I stayed down on the strand until it got dark, then had a small dinner in downtown Santa Monica before heading back home on the bus.

I can’t say that the return trip on the Rapid 720 was quick. There was a lot of Friday night traffic — I still have to remember to stay later than 8 p.m. to probably have the best chance of open streets.

To complete my journey I take the Red Line subway from Koreatown back to its end at the North Hollywood Station, where a crew was filming a scene for NCIS. Right – so we emerged from the subway to spotlights and extras. Just a very typical day in L.A., sunset at the beach and TV production — never a dull moment. Still grateful after all these years to all this place home, and can honestly say I don’t think I’ve ever been bored for a single moment!

I also love that my total cost for this entire day of travel was $5. No gas, no parking, no driving. Love that!

(these photos are from Flickr: thank you Dani)