With heavy heart and a bottle of whiskey...

Kurt Vonnegut Died today.

"Thomas Edison's Shaggy Dog" was the first thing I read by him. It was just another assignment for my high school freshmen English class. I was not too impressed but for some reason it stuck with me. The next year my Mom's friend Barb who, and I'll never really understand why, was under the impression that I loved reading about World War II gave me a bag of books that all had to do with the subject. Nothing struck me as interesting so I left the books sitting on a table and didn't pay them any mind. A few day's later my friend Pete came over, when he walked by the table he picked up the book laying on top it was "Slaughter-House Five". He handed it to me and said he'd heard it was good. That's when "Thomas Edison's Shaggy Dog" jumped into my head. So I gave it a chance.

I love those moment's so much. Those unexpected moments that you feel define you as a person. I was sold on the book about two paragraphs in. All the adolescent undeniable truths and existential crisis' were so easily summed up in the beliefs and ideas he put on paper. He asked the same questions I was asking and he wanted to meet the ones with the answers to hold them accountable as much as I did, that meant others did too. The place I went when I was reading his books was the closest to home I had ever felt. For a teenager that feeling was so foreign and comfortable that I never wanted to let it go. So I didn't.

Over the next couple of years I became obsessed I read everything I could find novels, essays interviews, introductions he wrote for other peoples books, and books about him. I even read Eden Express the book his son Mark wrote. Everything I read just proved to me over and over that he was hand's down the most important writer I will ever read. A few years after I had finished what I thought was everything, he released Timequake. It was o'kay, parts of it were amazing more importantly he did some speaking engagements to promote it. The closest he was coming to me was Chicago. I was not going to miss it.

I made the drive to Chicago. When I finally found where he was speaking I was about a thousand back in line. I heard someone say they had started seating people so I made a mad dash to the front trying to quickly explain to every person I pushed out of my way that I had driven from Minnesota just for this and that gave me every right to be a dick. I made it to the front in time to hear that there was not even standing room left. I explained my situation to one of the ushers who kindly let me and about fifteen others in. We were sat on the stage about ten feet from where he was sitting. I was so excited that I forgot everything he talked about by the time I left the auditorium.

Over the next few years I was lucky enough to see him a couple more times. Once In Madison and once In St. Paul. I was able to retain a bit more from those. I was never able to shake his hand and explain what he meant to me which I am thankful for. I would hate to have those moments tainted by embarrassing gushing.

In my obsession I even have a Vonnegut drawing of Kilgore Trout tattooed on my arm. The Illustration comes from the before mentioned Timequake even though the scene takes place during a very important part of Breakfast of Champions.

Throughout the last 17 years Vonnegut's books have gone everywhere with me from mental health to mental illness, love to heartbreak, Canada to jail. I even spent the loneliest New Years Eve reading "Hocus Pocus" in a hotel lobby while in Lawrence, Ks. after a failed attempt to interview Burroughs (that's another story for another time). When I started reading in the lobby I was the only one around but when the clock hit midnight a huge conga line of rednecks quickly took over. They were loud and drunk but they left me completely alone. Vonnegut was the only thing that made another year seem hopeful.

Kurt Vonnegut is dead. He's in Heaven now. So it goes...

So what now.

In 1999 a book of his old uncollected short stories came out called "Bagombo Snuff Box". I had not read any of these stories. I knew he didn't have much writing left in him and certainly not anything of this size. So I put it aside. Yep, it went on a shelf with all the other Vonnegut books. I decided not to open it until he passed away. So I could have that one last thing to celebrate his life. I wish it could have sat on the shelf several more years but he lived a long life. Longer than he ever wanted to.

With heavy heart and a bottle of whiskey I say goodbye and thank you.