Reader Submits a "Guest Smoke Break"
Saturday, June 6, 2009 One of my readers wrote in and sent me their very own smoke break, I'm a day late but I've been shooting a lot of pics lately, and I'm super backed up with the editing! Anywhoo, this made me life a bit easier. Even though I didn't know who Jack Keruac was...now I'm intrigued. Thank you to Gary in Pheonix
"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."
- - Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Like all of us, Miss Quille deserves a day off – especially a Friday in Sandpoint now that the lakes of North Idaho are almost warm enough to not quite jump into yet….atleast not sober.
My nomination for surrogate smoke break is the late, great American writer Jack Kerouac.
He’s been on my mind a lot lately since I too was blissfully de-corporatized a few months back.
What would Jack do faced with the uncertainty of no pending paycheck?
Other then some short stints working as a railroad man and fire lookout tower
desperado, Jack wasn’t much for the 9 to 5 grind. He mostly read, wrote and drank so
when the girlfriend scolded me the other day about doing nothing for the entire month of May but reading, writing and drinking, I took it as a compliment. She was not amused.
I like this girl so she was either going to have to come to grips with my lifelong fascination with Kerouac or I was going to have to somehow get Kerouac added to Oprah’s Book Club. Anyone who has ever read his semi-autobiographical novels like On the Road, Dharma Bums, Desolation Angels, Big Sur, etc knows that Kerouac and Winfrey don’t run in the same circles….not in this life or the next!
Drastic measures were called for. I made her use up two sick days and flew us to San Francisco for a four day weekend crash course in all things Kerouac. We browsed City Lites Bookstore, ate cheap in Chinatown, napped on the grass of Washington Square, made love in the cute, little San Remo Hotel, enjoyed coffee and croissants at the smallest cafes’ we could find and yes, pub crawled through North Beach meeting an array of bizarre characters which could rival the best the 219 Lounge could muster on even its nuttiest night.
We’ve been back for a few days now. I still read, write and drink although some days I switch it up and drink, write and read. As for the girlfriend, she spilled her purse in the grocery store yesterday….a Jack Kerouac paperback spilled out too.
Thanks Jack! Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em.
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