Write like Amy Hempel

It was fun, and I may even come back to it, but I’m now looking at Joyce Carol Oates, Ian McEwan, and Ian Banks as my inspirations as much as Amy Hempel. It’s all a matter of content as to which style is most useful.

I feel guilty all the time now. Not for something I did, but for something I should be doing. Only I don’t know what it is I’m guilty of not doing. I have only this vague sense that the world needs saving, and I’m not saving it.

I read a book a long time ago by Kafka, where the main character has been arrested and is being tried for a crime, only he doesn’t know what it is. I really enjoyed the book, even though I didn’t understand the ending. But then I learned that Kafka never actually finished it; he gave the manuscript to a friend who finished it for him after he died. So maybe I wasn’t missing anything after all.

My car has a display which reports how many miles of range I have of gasoline. It calculates this based on the amount of fuel in the tank, and how many miles per gallon I’ve been getting lately. Some times I try to trick it by driving at a constant speed, to see if I can make the range go up.

Today, the screen said that I had 365 miles of range. I thought: one for every day. Then I thought: wouldn’t it be great to only use one tank of gas in an entire year? But then I realized that can’t be right; the gas must surely evaporate faster than that, and suddenly I’m feeling guilty about gas evaporating from my gas tank before I use it. And anyway, it’s a leap year.

One mile a day isn’t very much. A mile used to be pretty far. In the 70’s, I could only go to friends’ houses or stores that were within a mile of my house, so I got pretty good at knowing how long it takes to walk a mile. It was long enough to sing seven hit songs to myself, as long as I remembered the words.

In the 80’s I got a real bicycle and could ride all the way across town to my high school, and a mile was a lot shorter. It took about a mile to get into the feeling of freedom and peace that came with riding.

Now I drive everywhere and a mile isn’t very far at all. Starbuck’s is ten miles away, and so is Wal-mart, although Wal-mart seems a lot farther than that. The high school is only 3.5 miles from my house, but my children don’t know how to ride a bike, so I drive them instead.

I’m pretty sure I’m guilty. It sure feels like it.

I catch myself thinking like Amy Hempel in the shower. Today I thought about going to Simon’s Market in the middle of a Tuesday.

I didn’t know what to think of Theresa when I met her. That is, I thought two things which seemed contradictory. First I thought: Ah. Another bored housewife with no interests of her own, trolling for companionship. Then I thought about what she said: Hi there. I’m Theresa. I’m a crazy person.

She said it with such calm conviction, that it couldn’t be a joke. I was going to say “Aren’t we all,” but she didn’t seem to be inviting a reply, so I said nothing instead. After an awkward silence, I went back to my book.

Later I learned she was a painter, and it made sense.

_{ok, so I’m no Amy Hempel. But it’s a start. Besides, I bet she stinks at World of Warcraft…}

I don’t want to become Amy Hempel. I’m not even sure I want to publish anything that is written in her style. But of all the writers of modern short fiction I’ve read so far, she is the most remarkable to me. I want to be able to write like that, when the application calls for it.