back page: cherry

VI.
cherry by mary karr

10/19/04
"yet another 'messed up girl grows up' memoir. i think it left me feeling sentimental and that 'cherry'-- [i think that's the main character]-- is really missing the point (of life). i guess i [just] find it hard to relate to her. it may have been well written [it seems that i was afraid to say one way or another] and includes some objectionable content."

i rarely mark on the front or back covers of books. it's unsightly and somehow discourteous. however, after concluding cherry i apparently felt free to scribble messages to past reviewers:

frank mccourt: "she's a poet and there are passages in her writing that glitter."
andrew david: "i probably agree."
sunday times: "...she writes with wonderful exactness and candour about sexual experiment and girlish desire."
andrew david: "...and this is probably why i don't relate."
caroline gascoigne: "this frank account of a wild texas girlhood is the most unbeatable read of the year...."
andrew david: "this frank account of a messed up texas girl is...."

if you read my blog as closely as i do, you'll notice that my book reviews tend to appear in alphabetical order by author's last name. today marks the end of that tradition. after unknowingly bumping into karr last week, i felt it was only fitting to conclude her time on this blog with a back page review. as my editorial marks attempt to highlight [i.e., these boxy brackets, the pesky pets of overly attentive editors], i didn't have much to say about this book. i'd just finished janet fitch's white oleander, so i was on troubled-girl-overload. still, i wonder if my response would change had i known that karr was a recent (?) convert to catholicism. would i have embarked on a wild goose chase, searching for a subtle message of redempton whereby i could exclaim, "ah hah! i told you she was a christian"? would i at least find some nugget to dissuade me of karr's pointless vision of life? maybe one of you will read it and tell me...

andrew david. 'wimps die 1 & 2' yelapa, mexico.
the guidebooks claim that there are no roads in or out of yelapa. however, any andrewesque wanderer who journies beyond the cemetary, up a dusty trail, and past the occasional clothes line may find a most marvelous sight: a nonexistent road. and maybe, if this window is particularly portentious, one may find this same vehicle, still waiting the return of its daring dead owner.

h2oj

everyone has morning rituals. i myself start each work day with a styrofoam cup full of orange-water juice. it's a refreshing reminder that i'm awake. this blog, the 17 point scale, is a lot like that orange-water juice.

point one: orange-water juice is a cheap alternative to full-on regular orange juice. it costs half as much! likewise, in contrast to other fine literature (which may require a costly visit to some used bookstore or online vendor), the 17 point scale costs half as much! well, actually, like most blogs, it's free.

as you may know, i'm cheap. but h2oj is the result of more than everyday economic obsessive compulsiveness. as much as i love orange juice, it has a decidedly acidic aftertaste. frankly, it's a bit much for my tastebuds. thus, i decided to go half-and-half, to combine fresh water from the VA fountain with low pulp tropicana.

there are many ways to relate this process to my blog. for instance, each post blends photos and prose. the blog fuses religion with art, literary commentary with mouth-watering recipes, pseudophilosophy with random goofiness.

better yet, the 17 point scale splashes somewhere between confessional and detatched. i share about my life, but i choose not to bore everyone with my daily activities (except making h2oj of course). this isn't a blog where you'll find sylvia plath with her head in an oven or --

holy goose! i hate to interrupt our regularly scheduled blog like this, but i just happened upon something a little bit crazy. you see, i was hoping to say something like: " [another famous confessional poet] poetically recounting the acrimony of her sex life," but i couldn't think of a good poet to fill-in-the-blank. so, as any frenzied blogger would do, i turned to google. there i typed "confessional poet sex." instead of finding robert lowell (did he write about sex?), anne sexton, or (thankfully) some strange and artsy porn site, i found mary karr...to everyone but beth (?) this may seem ho-hum-who-cares? but, beth, isn't this the girl that wrote that essay you were having me read tonight? the essay that some single-initialed literary type forwarded to greg wolfe at image? maybe not, but it sure sounds the same. and, if so, this is the girl who wrote cherry, that coming of age memoir that i was telling you about! crazy, eh?

errrrrrr...okay, so i'll write more about this blog's battle with confidentiality in some later post. sorry, good night.


andrew david. "view from our casa" yelapa, mexico.