When I saw the headline last night, I was sad... a serious but short pang, like I would feel if I found out one of my high school classmates had died... one of the many I haven't kept in touch with well enough.I know, for certain, that I am not the only person around who has poured over Mr. Vonnegut's work again and again. There are simply too many people out there like me. I was a young kid, from a very small, midwestern town, raised in a conservative, religious home. When I read Bluebeard--my first Vonnegut book--Mr. Vonnegut became a bridge to a larger world of ideas for me. I think he was uniquely positioned to be that bridge. He understood the midwest, he understood religion, he understood the questions we all start asking when we're five and (for most of us), when we never get a good answer, stop trying on. Most days anymore, I wish I would have enjoyed the transition of that bridge for longer... kept asking questions. But at least I stopped for a while.
After that first book... and after exhausting my older brother's Vonnegut collection... I subsequently tracked down every single bit of his writing I could. I made it a habit to head to "Fiction," "Vs" whenever we traveled to a town with a bookstore. It's still a habit I have today, even though I've only been rewarded once in the past five years. Reading Mr. Vonnegut so intensely--and then expanding outward--I eventually switched my focus from biology and chemistry to english. When I went to college I majored in english & religion--two of the major themes of almost any Vonnegut book. I don't know if I should thank Mr. Vonnegut for the switch, but I certainly can blame him. And while I've lost touch with him--I try to read one of his books a year (Deadeye Dick & Breakfast of Champions are my favorites)--it is certainly the case that he affected my moral and intellectual development seriously enough to still influence the type of person I try to be today.
I think, in the end, the reason I felt a pang when I heard he died is because I felt like I had talked with him, not just because he had such a large impact on my life. That impact, after all, has dissipated over time, but the feeling of having talked with this stranger from Indianapolis hasn't. Mr. Vonnegut always said that a good writer should be the sort of person you would want to spend a lazy Sunday afternoon with, sitting on the back porch and drinking lemonade. And so, even though I never met Mr. Vonnegut, I feel like I did get to sit in on a few of his conversations, with a good lemonade or two... and so I feel a little sad.And so, one way or another, I owe Mr. Vonnegut a little something... for opening my mind, at least, and, perhaps, for bettering me too. I doubt I'm the only person around who feels that way, and for some reason... that pang and that debt... I feel the need to express it, just a little, to a few people. It's cold and rainy here, and I'm in that sort of mood. So, if you're a little down today... if you're in a mood to wear a black arm band or a shirt that says, "So it goes...", I'm right there with you. I feel strange about it, but I am. My favorite quote, and one worth sitting on a while:
“Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies — ‘God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.’ ”
