I Discovered I’m 1/16th Killer
And my third Substack birthday
This street cat is inconsolable. She keeps telling me, “it’s cold”. And I keep telling her, “have something to eat”. She’s understandably upset. But I am celebrating dear reader. The cat doesn’t seem interested so I’m pushing it on you.
You see, 3 years ago I thought I might have a go at writing a blog shaped thingy. You know, to give back. To test my hand. Give myself some mental exercise, something that doesn’t involve anything destructive this time. And I had this idea that I’d keep it up - every week. And keep doing it until it became an unshakable habit, and hopefully replace some of those dirty habits. And after a while I couldn’t stop, even when the people of the street begged it of me.
In that time there have been over 160 articles. Stacks of stacks! Maybe even a good one or two. And I hope over that time, together, we have cultivated a great deal of pity for starving writers everywhere. You’ve seen them. They’re the ones with the footprint across their cheek - the mark of the gutter.
You may think 3 years seems like a long time dear reader. But it’s not. Not in storytelling.
Great uncle George (1878 - 1927) moved to New Zealand and changed his surname to White. He later told his family he had fled from Hill End, New South Wales, after a fight where he thought he had killed one of his brothers. But unfortunately no one could confirm this tall tale. A cold case. The family tree investigators went on holiday after they found this out, and never returned to the subject. All I can say - he didn’t kill my great grandfather. And it’s safe to say anything we want about George now, since he’s long dead himself, and all out of fightin’.
It never ceases to amaze me how a single short lived event in the family can become the only thing you’re remembered by. It earns but a passing mention, that he managed to have children; a crucial point, for without which, who would he pass his stories on to?
The other thing that amazes me is the behaviour that has become almost acceptable. Fighting your brother to the death has been softened by distance. The distance of a hundred or so years. And the dilution of genes helps too. I guess this makes me either 1/16th killer, or 1/16th storyteller. But when your mother dies of typhoid fever at a young age, the chances of you having to flee to New Zealand presumably increase.
And the last thing that amazes me is how this drama becomes one of the only stories interesting enough to tell about a whole line of the family; as if this story alone justified their existence.
All this seems important. But where does it fit? I mean, I have bills to pay. There are starving street cats to torment. And starving writers to mark. When all that’s done, will it will be first on my list?
And what makes it a story worth telling? And perhaps I ought take a moment to wish my brothers a peaceful time of it. What stories will my great nephew be told about me? A gonzo style street writer who reported very very non fiction from the street? That’s got to be worth a few skeletons in the closet.
Best of luck living out your stories worth telling, dear reader. I hope they’re more straight forward than mine was this week.
…wait…are you talking about removing the aforementioned non-Australianism, or are you saying that there’s a Fallibility Removal™ module that one can activate?
If it’s the latter, you’re prolly wise to leave it alone. We already have enough trouble with alleged infallible beings…or more accurately with the people who make them up, not to mention the ones we elect.
Or, if it’s not some kind of built-in mental module, could it be a surgical procedure? Wouldn’t that count as elective surgery? Is that sort of thing covered by your health care system? I’m not familiar with how it works.
For my part, I’m inclined to consider surgery only as a last resort, when other less invasive options have been exhausted. There are always unforeseen side effects. For example, what if they accidentally make you immortal, or omnipotent…or both? Could be big trouble.
No…it seems to me that you’ve chosen wisely on the fallibility issue. Staying fallible is the moral equivalent of staying relatable. If you were to abandon your fallibility, you’d undoubtedly attract an entirely different kind of reader. Is that really what you want?
Not that I mean to discourage you. Actually, it might be an interesting experiment. Plus, once word about your infallibility gets out, the sudden explosion in subscribers would surely break every Substack record for growth.
Not only that, but the demand for your infallible pronouncements would skyrocket, justifying subscription fees that would soon make you a gazillionaire. TV interviews! Newspaper and magazine coverage! (do they still have those?) The success story of the century!!
But then, who would write about The Street? To whom would you pass the torch? Pud? Dirk?
…wait, I know…the cat!
“All this seems important. But where does it fit? I mean, I have bills to pay. There are starving street cats to torment. And starving writers to mark. When all that’s done, will it will be first on my list?”
Here’s my problem…well, here’s one of them, for there are many. And tragic though they might seem to me, it’s likely that they might have high comedic value to others. So, the decision about whether to list them remains undecided.
But the immediate problem is deciding whether to ask whether “…will it will be first on my list” is a typo error (instead of “…WHAT will be first…”), or whether I’ve discovered a new (to me) Down-Underism. If it’s the former, there is always the concern about appearing to be picking nits, which is a behavior so tasteless and graceless that I’d rather be accused of nicking pits—whatever that means.
Hmmm…come to think of it, “nicking pits” is a sufficiently ill-defined activity that it at least raises some interesting questions, whereas picking nits could only be interpreted as a useful activity if it referred to, you know, the actual service of picking the nits off of one’s fellow hominids.
Mind you, I have no direct experience performing that service, but it’s my understanding that the procedure involves extracting the li’l critters from the nit-infested compatriot and then chomping them, in which case…eewwww!
Not that I don’t recognize the importance of maintaining one’s daily protein intake via a healthy varied diet, including the freshest possible ingredients. I’m simply expressing a certain dispreference for taking the concept of “omnivore” a bug too far. Of course, I’m always happy to help a fellow hominid, but I draw the line at such intimately detailed personal pesticide services.
Anyhow, if indeed “…will it will be first…” is simply an Aussie idiom, then I presume that it is not out of line to humbly request a translation. After all, it’s simply an instance of the same kind of phenomenon referenced by Mr. Churchill when he observed that Brits and ‘Mericans are “two people separated by a common language”.
Nevertheless, in an effort to clear the air of any misunderstanding before it occurs, I offer my heartfelt assurance that I am neither picking nits nor nicking pits, but rather merely seeking to resolve my uncertainty about the intended meaning of the “…will it will…” portion of your text, so that we might move on to the more fruitful discussion of resolving the vastly more important question of prioritizing bill-paying, cat-tormenting, or face-stomping us pesky starving writers…in the nicest possible way, of course.