Has this happened to you? You’re on a subway platform, or in a grocery store, maybe at a restaurant, and you see some kid. Maybe he’s about twelve. He’s having a hard time. You can tell from the look on his face, or from the ill-fitting glasses he wears, or the church haircut that he doesn’t really want. A chasm opens up in your heart and you go diving in. You’ve plunged into a bottomless pit of melancholy. You’ve tapped into the collective discomfort and loneliness that everyone feels most acutely in late childhood, a pre-adolescent confusion compounded by the fact that it peaks at an age when you can’t quite express it. This poor kid in the restaurant or wherever he is has reminded you that you’re always alone, everyone’s alone, things don’t usually work out in your favor, and that life is a series of disappointing compromises. This is what you’ve lived through and what he has to look forward to. This kid has ruined your day. This kid could have been you or me, and definitely could have been Kevin Brockmeier in the 1980s. In his masterful memoir, A Few Seconds of Radiant Filmstrip, the acclaimed novelist chronicles his seventh grade year. -Nathan Gelguid, Biographile
Posted on: Thu, 03 Apr 2014 18:29:37 +0000