Song of Susannah - Stephen King [166]
Of course, I got drunk to celebrate…only these days who needs an excuse?
It’s a good book but in many ways it seems like I didn’t write the damn thing at all, that it just flowed out of me, like the umbilical cord from a baby’s navel. What I’m trying to say is that the wind blows, the cradle rocks, and sometimes it seems to me thatnone of this stuff is mine, that I’m nothing but Roland of Gilead’s fucking secretary. I know that’s stupid, but a part of me sort of believes it. Only maybe Roland’s got his own boss. Ka?
Ido tend to get depressed when I look at my life: the booze, the drugs, the cigarettes. As if I’m actually trying to kill myself. Or something else is…
October 19th, 1987
I’m in Lovell tonight, the house on Turtleback Lane. Came down here to think about the way I’m living my life. Something’s got to change, man, because otherwise I might as well just cut to the chase and blow my brains out.
Something’s got to change.
The following item from the North Conway (N.H.) Mountain Ear was pasted into the writer’s journal, marked April 12th, 1988:
LOCAL SOCIOLOGIST DISMISSES “WALK-IN” TALES
By Logan Merrill
For at least 10 years, the White Mountains have resounded with tales of “Walk-Ins,” creatures who may be aliens from space, time travelers, or even “beings from another dimension.” In a lively lecture last night at the North Conway Public Library, local sociologist Henry K. Verdon, author ofPeer Groups and Myth-Making, used the Walk-In phenomenon as an illustration of just how myths are created and how they grow. He said that the “Walk-Ins” were probably originally created by teenagers in the border towns between Maine and New Hampshire. He also speculated that sightings of illegal aliens who cross over the northern border from Canada and then into the New England states may have played a part in kindling this myth, which has become so prevalent.
“I think we all know,” Professor Verdon said, “that there is no Santa Claus, no Tooth Fairy, and no actual beings called Walk-Ins. Yet these tales
(Continued on P. 8)
The rest of the article is missing. Nor is there any explanation as to why King may have included it in his journal.
June 19th, 1989
I just got back from my one-year Alcoholix Anonymous “anniversary.” An entire year w/o drugs or booze! I can hardly believe it. No regrets; sobering up undoubtedly saved my life (and probably my marriage), but I wish it wasn’t so hard to write stories in the aftermath. People in “the Program” say don’t push it, it’ll come, but there’s another voice (I think of it as the Voice of the Turtle) telling me to hurry up and get going, time is short and I have to sharpen my tools. For what? ForThe Dark Tower, of course, and not just because letters keep coming in from people who readThe Drawing of the Three and want to know what happens next. Something inme wants to go back to work on the story, but I’ll be damned if I know how toget back.
July 12th, 1989
There are some amazing treasures on the bookshelves down here in Lovell. Know what I found this morning, while I was looking for something to read?Shardik, by Richard Adams. Not the story about the rabbits but the one about the giant mythological bear. I think I’ll read it over again.
Am still not writing much of interest…
September 21, 1989
Okay, this is relatively weird, so prepare yourself.
Around 10 A.M., while I was writing (while I was staring at the word processor and dreaming about how great it would be to have an ice-cold keg of Bud, at least), the doorbell rang. It was a guy from Bangor House of Flowers, with a dozen roses. Not for Tab, either, but for me. The card readHappy Birthday from the Mansfields—Dave, Sandy, and Megan.
I had totally forgotten, but today I’m the Big Four-Two. Anyway, I took one of the roses out, and I kind of got lost in it. I know how strange that sounds, believe me, but I did. I seemed to hear this sweet humming, and I just went down & down, following the curves of the rose, kind of splashing thru these drops of