Seven Wheelchairs off and rolling

Dear, dear Gary Presley has made his debut as an author on the talk show circuit and has done spectacularly!

Who knew he had a sexy drawl and looks pretty flashy in red! Listen to the audio interview recorded on October 3, with Ben Kieffer of The Exchange on Iowa Public Radio. Gary also did a reading at Prairie Lights Bookstore in Iowa City.

Seven Wheelchairs, his memoir, currently ranks at 77,822 on Amazon.

Way to go Gary!

Here's a copy of the review I posted at Amazon:

"I've been fortunate to read bits and pieces, essays and writings of the author's for several years as a fellow member of the Internet Writing Workshop, including much of what is his memoir. But it wasn't until I sat down to read the finished product that I realized what an emotional and insightful read it would be. It is a given that this is stellar prose. The writing alone is enough reason to buy the book and read -- and reread it.

But the truth and power of those words. He answers the questions I never thought to ask beginning with the memory of those last steps before polio took away his legs. He told of being confined in an iron lung, not with pity or melodrama, but through the eyes of a devastated, angry teen age boy who was confused and frightened. A boy who had gone from working on his lay up shots to a non-entity swallowed up by a machine. And we move forward with him. We see him making an independent living, but more than that we see him coming to terms with his physical limitations, learning the landscape, what it means to live with disabilities in plain sight, in mainstream culture. We see him moving beyond the anger to find something we all wish we could find -- his true niche where he belongs and can accept and be accepted for the man he is, not for the equipment he must use.

Since this is written in connected essays, much of the problem that arises in first memoir and fiction is left behind. No awkward transitions, no tap dancing to get from one important moment to the next. It is a tightly written, powerful book that takes readers inside of the world of disabilities as none before. And inside of the life of one very human, but determined man.

I met Gary Presley when I joined the Internet Writing Workshop. His writings, his self-deprecating sense of humor, his truth, and his generous supportive ways drew me to him. When my husband became disabled, Gary jumped right in and helped us find our way through that alien culture called 'disability.' Who knew better this new landscape than a man who had been wheeling through it for nearly a half-century!?

He's never maudlin nor melodramatic. It is a book that can be read in pieces or as a whole and the writing itself stands strong alongside the best. A must read for anyone who knows someone living a life fraught with disabilities. A must read for anyone who has ever seen a person in a wheelchair and looked away."

The photo was taken by Ruth Douillette's husband.

The many lives of Dawn

My name has a more exciting life than I have. It is true. For proof, just google my name and see what you find. Melissa Ursula Dawn Goldsmith speaks at symposiums concerning music in a way I can't begin to understand. There's a grad student who shares my name and surveys natural springs. I mostly talk to my cats and stare out at the lagoon behind our house.

Lyra Dawn Goldsmith is new to the world. The blog where I found her is more than a year old, so I suspect she's beginning to do some serious exploring about this time. Another Dawn lives in Twickenham, Middlesex, United Kingdom. Ahhhhh, man, I wish I could visit her! My idea of exploring is finding my way home from the town ten miles north of here. Thanks to whomever invented Map Quest!

There is a Dawn Goldsmith on Face Book. I have yet to figure out what Face Book is, so it isn't me hiding behind something in that photo. Apparently this Dawn has several friends. That's always nice to have. If any of you remember Gilligan's Island -- MaryAnn was played by Dawn Wells, shown here in a mug shot taken in Idaho.

Another Dawn has a listing with Amazon for her reviews. I admit that I have written several reviews for Amazon, but the one that pops up is most definitely not mine. It is a review of Rick Steve's travel book to England -- see above about my 'explorations.' And besides I would hope to never mistake Whales for Wales as this reviewer did. Makes me shiver to think that one of my editors might see that goof. She's from St. Louis, but I don't think that should be an excuse for not knowing the difference between a mammal and a country. Good thing she isn't going to Whales, she'd be so disappointed!

Melissa Ursula pops up quite often between the listings for my writings. She probably isn't as excited to see my contributions under a name much like her own. Mine definitely do not weigh as heavily as her academic contributions. She even writes about the Doors musician Jim Morrison.

My nephew is studying to become a nurse anesthetist. I found a Dawn who has already graduated and is hard at work. Not sure I would want to trade places with her -- blood and bodily fluids and all that yuk. But a part of me feels more connected to health care, just knowing my doppelganger works there. Another Dawn is a biology student. It isn't quite fair -- me being so weak in math and science and so many Dawns excelling in those fields. I guess that shows there is a balance to the universe.

I've always enjoyed sharing my last name with Olivia and Oliver Goldsmith. Sadly both are dead, but their contributions to literature gave me hope that maybe there would be room for a Dawn on the list of published authors. Maybe Melissa feels that way about Jerry Goldsmith when it comes to music....

And then I see Dawn and James Goldsmith are married. I think of young love and new beginnings and sigh, having been married to the love of my life for decades. I wish them well.

Dawn Marie Goldsmith worries me. She's a young poet -- everyone who knows me, knows I do NOT do poetry. But yet, I cringe to think an editor might run across her poem, a spin on a John Lennon song. I think I heard a shriek from the other side when I read her poem. But we all must start somewhere. I send her my best reqards, but still wish she would use another name.

At one time I googled and found that a Dawn Goldsmith wrote for the Hong Kong news or something like that. It sounded so exotic and adventurous and so NOT me, but maybe it could have been me in another life. Another Dawn offered testimony in an assault case. I don't know if her side one. But I wish her well.

And then another site predicts: "Dawn Goldsmith: At age 60 you will be hunted by a strange apparition resembling Andy Griffith, and subsequently commit suicide after the stress proves to be too much." Oh my!

And then there is the wedding announcement David and Dawn Goldsmith's son Rhett is getting married. Obviously someone was a Gone With the Wind fan, so they must be lovely folk.

Then I find Dawn Goldsmith, the contact person for Poppit Sands Holiday Cottages in Wales (not Whales). I wonder if I could put together a tour and visit the various Dawns? Wouldn't that be fun? I could spice up my life at the same time. And maybe I'd have more to write about than just a google search for my own name.

Now if you get into different versions of my name, it turns up some interesting and shocking people including a porno queen with an amazing bosom. Sorry, no link provided for that one!

Where are you David Foster Wallace? Why?

Suicide.

I liked that song about suicide -- the theme song to the M.A.S.H. movie -- Suicide is painless, it brings on many changes....Mike Altman was 14 when he wrote the lyrics. Who better than a 14-year-old to know about angst and wishing oneself dead? It bothered my parents to hear the words -- I don't think hearing the word, discussing the topic or even romanticizing the afterlife will convince someone to participate. Suicide is, in my opinion, a get-even act. But, when I 'get even' I really like to be around to see it. Suicide, so far, has not appealed to me.

I also know too many who have chosen that as an exit strategy when life threw too much at them. It is if you will, a 'get even and goodbye' act. I can perhaps understand that a bit more.

If nothing else, my parents and I enjoyed the tune, written by Johnny Mandel.

I checked on Wikipedia, choosing that medium for lack of knowing where else to look, and found 50 other songs that refer to suicide. Euro Puppy Blog lists only 24 songs about dogs. Perhaps if more people had the love of a good dog, there would be less songs about suicide.

I wonder if David Foster Wallace had a dog.

He's dead you know. Wallace, not the dog. That sounds flip and I suppose it is because the moment I let myself feel the loss, I get angry.

How could he be so selfish to take himself, his truths, his words, his angst, his needs, his contributions, his self-loathing and insecurities and smile and potential out of this world? How dare he give up on being human?

He was in pain.

Well, aren't we all?

Didn't he know his words helped me deal better with the pain, at least to better understand what I was feeling? I didn't know him or his work, his story, his life, nothing until someone on the Internet Writing Workshop announced that he had died. I did a search for the name and found a voice that resonated with me, helped clarify the human condition, and shared the growth pangs as I strive for maturity.

He told a graduating class at Kenyon:

"The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day."

Or was he just tired of us? Maybe he was ready for the next plateau and he couldn't handle the mundane, mediocrity of this life? The lack of stimulation and interesting fellow humans?

His interview with Charlie Rose certainly gives insight into some of the pain and frustration he was feeling.

I'm not a member of his generation, at least chronologically, but I recognize truth when I see it and in an interview with Salon, he said this about living in America around the time of the millennium:

"There's something particularly sad about it, something that doesn't have very much to do with physical circumstances, or the economy, or any of the stuff that gets talked about in the news. It's more like a stomach-level sadness. I see it in myself and my friends in different ways. It manifests itself as a kind of lostness. Whether it's unique to our generation I really don't know."

We are all diminished by the loss of each life. Whether it is a child who has turned to terrorism and is killed in the streets of his hometown, a soldier killed by the terrorists, a woman dying in childbirth in Africa, a child dying of malnutrition or AIDS or drugs, or abuse, a child lost to abortion, or even if my 96 year old mother closes her eyes and doesn't awaken. We are diminished by the loss of each life. A life cut short, whether by his own hand, by accident, or by violence of some kind -- we all suffer the loss. Needless loss makes me furious.

I'm angry at David Foster Wallace and mourn him, regret not knowing him, and hope that his life and even his death will help others find their way -- a better way-- to living life fully and with joy and with understanding and yes, with self-forgiveness.


P.S. According to quotes in a New York Times article from his father, Wallace had been on heavy medication to fight depression and nothing was working. His father was quoted as saying, “He’d been in the hospital a couple of times over the summer and had undergone electro-convulsive therapy. Everything had been tried, and he just couldn’t stand it anymore.”

That kind of hopelessness -- soul killing hopelessness. I pray you've found a better place David Foster Wallace -- and peace.