The Interview: You are Number Six

Jen took up the gauntlet of being "interviewed" by, and then "interviewing" me.

1. What do you like most about libraries?

Seems kind of obvious, but: All the books.

A writer used to say, "Beware he who writes more than he reads." Which means, put metaphorically, if you want to hear the music, you've got to listen.

I also have relatively little formal education but am heavily self-educated in this way. Actually, the same man who said that* about writers used to say he was "A self-made man--which demonstrates the horrors of unskilled labor."

*It was Harlan Ellison, if you want to know.

And I just like that if I have some enthusiasm I want to pursue--which happens, like, once a day--there's almost always at least one book I can get at the library with information about it.

2. If you could meet any fictional character (not created by you), who would it be, and why?

Someone from The West Wing. As for who, I'd have to flip a coin between Sam or Toby.

Sam, because he says things like this:

"...education is the silver bullet. Education is everything. We don't need little changes, we need gigantic changes. Schools should be palaces; the competition for the best teachers should be fierce, they should be making six figure salaries. Schools should be incredibly expensive for government and absolutely free of charge to its citizens, just like national defense. That's my position. I just haven't figured out how to do it yet."

--Sam, "Six Meetings Before Lunch."

And Toby, because he says things like this:

"If our jobs teach us anything it's that we don't know what the next President's gonna face. If we choose someone with vision, someone with guts, someone with gravitas who's connected to other people's lives and cares about making them better, if we choose someone to inspire us, then we'll be able to face what comes our way and achieve things we can't imagine yet." --Toby, "20 Hours in America."

And because they say things like that, we know they feel things like that, and because they feel things like that, we know they think things like that...and we know they write things like that.



Alternately a Pixar character, like Wall-E, Eve-A, or Remy, because they give me hope, love and inspiration.

3. What was your favourite board game when you were a kid?

I want to play a game...

...oh right, sorry, board game, when I was a kid...I don’t know.

When I was a real little kid, Candyland and Chutes & Ladders.
A little later I have fond memories of the Rescuers movie game.

I liked Monopoly like everyone else (for the record, my piece of choice was the car). Also a game called-

-that had cool shark fin pieces.

By the time I was like 11 I was hanging out in arcades (ah, Tron) more than I was playing board games at home.

4. Your favourite nickname for you?

To coin a phrase:

I can't tell you, but I know it's mine.

(In other words: It's something an ex-girlfriend used to call me; I also had something I called her. I've never said what it was to anyone, I don't know if she has)

5. Which is better: to have loved and lost, or never to have loved at all?

Well, let me put it like this:

You and I won't lose our heads the way some lovers do

Saying "This will last forever" when it's just a year or two

You and I won't be the fools that other lovers are

Thinking every silver bottle top potentially a star

still...


All the world loves lovers.

All the world loves people in love

Don't forget it. - LOVE

Don't forget it. - LOVE

Love whatever the price.