Perhaps I'll float too

I started off writing a blog about something but it has run away from me and now I think it's going to end up being a full-blown essay. I had to stop only two pages into it tonight because I've developed a throbbing case of carpal tunnel in my mouse hand this weekend getting The Road Trip designed and posted and it started flaring up as I was typing. So I've left it for now, but what got me going on it in the first place is the book I'm currently reading. It is, hands down, my favorite book in the world. It is, honestly, the book that makes me want to be a writer of fiction more than anything in the world. The book that I will one day credit as being my inspiration, the muse that I've been chasing. I read this book and I hope to one day create a work of fiction that even approaches it. And the thing is, I'm embarrassed to admit it. I'm embarrassed to say it's my favorite and my inspiration. Because I don't imagine this book has much, or any, weight or significance in "serious" writing circles simply because most people assume it's just a stupid horror book about a demon clown that eats children.

That's right, the book is IT by Stephen King. And for those who haven't read it, or worse, for those who have only seen the HORRIBLE miniseries they did of it back in the 90's, I just want to say that I have never read another book, or another author for that matter, who can break down the psyche of a child as well as Stephen King does in this book. Even a lot of really great authors out there simply don't understand children. They've been away from it for too long or something. Even books that are critically hailed as beautiful masterpieces, when I read them, I see the children as caricatures. Fake. A grownup's idea of what a kid is. But in IT, every single one of the seven main characters is a flesh and blood kid. They talk like kids do. And not just the way kids talk when they're around adults. They talk the way kids talk when there are only other kids around.

I love this book and if you've ever read my (essentially defunct) humor column you know why. I say in it that I've never really grown up. But that's not really accurate. It's more that my memory is very vivid and I remember PERFECTLY my childhood. I remember specific days, instances, feelings, conversations. I remember how I was and how others were. Which is why I can spot a phony kid so easily when I read another author's depiction of childhood. I feel cut from the same swatch as Stephen King because he seems to be the only other person on earth to not only remember childhood the way I do, but can express it honestly without screwing it up. And to be honest, while I remember it easily, I know I have a long way to go in expressing it. I read IT and I know that. But that is the level of expression that I aim for. I'm not sure what kind of fiction I will ultimately write and hopefully get paid and become famous for, but I know it will involve children as the main characters. And I only hope I can acheive the level of deepness that Stephen King accomplished in IT.

Crap, my hand is flaring up again. Gotta stop now. More on this later.