Unsettling Coincidences
The characters from my novel seem to be springing out of the manuscript and into the real world. I've seen at least four men who look like my character Frank, an old suburban hermit with a shriveled apple head and a propensity to wear large, recycled spectacles and trucker caps. The weirdest happenstance of all these visions? When I was driving down Kedzie, and the false-Frank cycled by on an adult tricycle, in exactly the same way as a pivotal scene from my book.
Last night I was writing the scene where a strange man approaches my other protagonist Charles, and engages him in friendly conversation in a public place that swiftly becomes bizarre and threatening. This morning, while trying to read the Times on the crowded El, a strange man sitting two seats down tried to engage me in a friendly conversation about the Super Bowl that swiftly took a turn for the bizarre. It was probably just his thick accent, but it sounded like he was saying that Brent Favre's team (honestly, I have no idea who he plays for, that's how much I know about sports) would lose, because Favre was seen in a toilet stall uptown doing... something unpleasant, I assume. I found myself simply nodding and saying, "Oh yeah?" a lot, which is exactly what my character does, to his detriment. Fortunately, the old man didn't address me by my entire name, as happens in my novel. That would have freaked my shit.
Maybe I need to get rid of this Nova Clark typewriter.
Last night I was writing the scene where a strange man approaches my other protagonist Charles, and engages him in friendly conversation in a public place that swiftly becomes bizarre and threatening. This morning, while trying to read the Times on the crowded El, a strange man sitting two seats down tried to engage me in a friendly conversation about the Super Bowl that swiftly took a turn for the bizarre. It was probably just his thick accent, but it sounded like he was saying that Brent Favre's team (honestly, I have no idea who he plays for, that's how much I know about sports) would lose, because Favre was seen in a toilet stall uptown doing... something unpleasant, I assume. I found myself simply nodding and saying, "Oh yeah?" a lot, which is exactly what my character does, to his detriment. Fortunately, the old man didn't address me by my entire name, as happens in my novel. That would have freaked my shit.
Maybe I need to get rid of this Nova Clark typewriter.