Thursday, April 12, 2007
Kurt Vonnegut
Dear Kurt Vonnegut,
You made it pretty close to the outside. 84. My grandfather’s 84 and seems pretty surprised about it. Last thing he said to me when I saw him was “Don’t get old!” and he laughed, maneuvering his stiff legs into the shotgun side of his car. He always used to drive.
But I want to get old, I hope to have a lot to look back on, and it wouldn’t be so bad if the further out I get the smaller everything else back here will seem. On the up, things to savor would accumulate. I’m an optimist.
I always hoped to meet you. You’d welcome me to Earth, you’d warn me about the weather and describe the shape of things. You’d say to be kind. My question would have been, does it get easier, this kindness, when things are farther gone. Do things get any smaller? Do they matter less, or do you just get tired or give in to pessimism? When I was a baby I believed that you couldn’t die unless you suddenly Knew everything, and were Ready, but that you could know everything in the moment it took to slip on cement stairs in your socks and feel the paralysis of wind knocked out. Either you got to Know at last, or you Gave Up. Living close to the outside seems like a better and more thorough way to start knowing anything.
I don’t know anything mostly. Thinking about you makes me feel young. Does that sound stupid? I’m glad you kept writing. I need to reread everything to try to see how you feel.
Felt.
I’m one of those. You would have seen me coming a mile away, of course. I’m embarrassed but not shy. If I saw you around town, I might have just left you alone, out of respect.
But you’re right. It’s crowded and round and cold in the winter. I’d have had a lot to ask you, but figured you might have answered like I was new here, needing to learn the rules. That would have been kind of you. It’s silly verging on greedy to want more. My questions don’t really need to be asked. Asking isn’t exorcism. I’m glad you wrote so much down.
~mia
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