Tom Robbins

As part of my holiday travels in nostalgia, I’ve begun rereading Tom Robbins for the first time in many, many years.  I don’t recall when or how I initially discovered him.  I don’t remember a person handing me a book of his, or even telling me about him.  I don’t remember that magical mystical moment of discovery in a bookstore.  It’s more like these works have always been with me, been a part of me.  It is revelatory to me to see just how much of my core belief system is reflected in this body of work.  Maybe these words literally shaped me, handing me parts and tools softly from the sidelines.  His books showed me freedom and my own potential, the potential of life, the world, the universe and beyond; the permission to glimpse and claim the ‘other’ – other paths, other options, other lives and other ways of writing, of reading. 

 

There are infinite concepts and amazing ideas here that I still find myself exploring, pondering.  And I am eternally grateful for the words, the magic, the possibility, the permission, the fun, and the ecstasy – the ride.  For the soul that exists, that created all this, that filled me, filled so much – lighted an infinite chain explosion that is still going off today.  These books helped inform and build that platform from which I can stand on tippy-toes and glimpse it all; the goofy, wonderful, miracle of life, of just being a being, and also the glimpse beyond, an open mind the only cost of the ride.  So vitally, critically essential, that vision, those options.  

His books are audacious exploits both in content and execution.  I didn’t even consciously notice his use of point of view.  Somebody recently
mentioned to me in passing his utilization of second person point of view, and it really took me aback.  Really?  I ran home and pulled them open, and sure enough – there it was in Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas, full frontal second person point of view.  I had registered his wonderfully personal style of addressing the reader directly (me personally!) but other machinations are done so naturally, so smoothly, so artistically – it never even registered.  It just worked.  Revered or ridiculed, second person is daring, but it either works or it doesn’t.  Tom Robbins is one of the rare writers that can successfully pull it off with seeming ease.

I’ve found myself wanting to meet him in person and I struggle with ‘why?’  I’m not a ‘groupie’ type of person.  I live in California, I’ve seen “celebrities.”  I don’t get it.  I think, “So what?”  There’s the larger than life action hero, macho character, tough as nails bad ass.  And here he is on the street, a tiny, short, old man with a brigade of burly bodyguards, scurrying back to his artificial world, an existence inside a rarified vacuum.  So what?  But authors – ah, authors.  I have gone to book signings, went through a pretty serious cartoonist phase, and had some really cool conversations, interludes.  But I do know enough to know that the writing is not the author.  The writing emanates then exists on its own.  The author is just a person.  It’s a horrid phenomenon to see the real person and discover he’s a rude arrogant asshole, she’s a snob of a bitch and ignorant.  The words they created are then tainted.  So I don’t care – I insist upon letting the wondrous work, the creation, stand alone.  But yes, there exists an amount of reverence for the author, the creator; how often I still stare into the eyes on the back flap.  They created something, something magical that touched me, is now a part of me, part of who I am.  But I don’t have any urge to meet them.  Who they actually are as a person is irrelevant.  I don’t really want to know. 

But – Tom Robbins – I have the desire to meet.  And so I’ve pondered ‘why?’  Why would I want to do that?  Yes, his creations are a part of me, have informed and helped form me.  That is no small thing.  In loneliness those books were there and are there still.  In alienation these lives and worlds and possibilities gave me hope, validation.  The words, the creations gave me a glimpse, my first glimpse perhaps, behind the magical curtain, lighting the way to other worlds, other ways beyond mine, if only I were brave enough, strong enough, had enough wisdom and humor.  They showed me I wasn’t alone.  I held them and I rode them wildly.  I stood on them when I needed strength and hid within them when I needed refuge and solace.  Somebody somewhere had “weird” thoughts too, and actually put them to paper, creating lives and possibility.  Somebody somewhere spoke to me.  Somebody somewhere said that I was ok to be so different, so ‘weird’, that not fitting in was actually a good thing, a treasured gift to fiercely defend.  

And that was enough.  Enough to create a lifeboat for myself to live within, hold on to all these years; always there to fall back into when I slipped or wildly leapt.  This is what they did for me, how I took the creations and built what I needed from them, through all my own idiosyncratic filters.  This too is no small thing.  And a man did create this, so bravely, so brilliantly.  I don’t want to know “why” or “how.”  I don’t want to ask what his “process” is, where he gets his ideas from, what he eats for breakfast, who his favorite Doctor Who is.  

But I do now know why I want to meet this man.  May my words here meet those words out there in that ether for this purpose.  I want to say ‘thank you.’  Thank you for your words, your magic.  Thank you for your bravery.  Thank you for having the courage to release your words, to allow them to leave you and be offered up as sacrificial objects to hoards of unknowns who will use them selfishly for their own purpose, as I have done. 

Thank you, from my lightened soul.