Ceci n'est pas un blog

"Some studies find that both the older and younger siblings tend to describe the firstborn as more disciplined, responsible, high-achieving." said an article not too long ago.

My oldest circle of friends is made up almost exclusively of first born of two. Even in high school we noticed that a lunch table of 7, five of were the first of two, one was an only child, and I can't remember the other. Of that circle several married other first of twos.

Yesterday was my little sister's birthday. I say little but she is a mother of two teen-age kids but I think she would agree with the statement above. She might say that she is more street smart, that she's tougher. I am the square and she's the rebel. She may be thirty something, listen to Gypsy Kings over dinner, and be a good mom but she's still clearly the same tough rock'n'roll chick I remember standing in the smoking section at school with the teachers, the punks, and the bikers.

One of my closest friends began dating a girl back in the 80s who lived in a tiny nearby town/suburb with only one stop light. They are married now with two kids. The town has been basically absorbed into Austin and it's one-time open spaces filled with look-alike track houses and look alike people. But her litlle brother, a skinny kid with rock star dreams back in 86, wrote to me yesterday.

He's a dad with silvering hair now. He was our realestate agent when we sold our house. And he's an avant garde musician with a strong academic background in composition. His website references Cy Twombly and Jean Cocteau. Even though I've seen him perform at an Austin Museum of Digital Art event and have heard him talk intelligently about John Cage, I still sometimes find myself surprised that this suburban kid whose conservative family watches college football the way evangelicals go to a tent revival is involved in some of the most challenging minimalist and experimental music going on in central Texas.

Those second of two kids. They grow up, put their children in Old Navy clothes, move to the suburbs, but that wild risk-taker streak never leaves. Wish I had a bit more of that.

Speaking of Cocteau and first borns, several of us from that high school circle of friends (ok, one is the youngest of three) are still very much in touch and there seems to be a coincidental push to write a book among several of us (yes, I have to admit to having started an outline some time ago). We have all at various times in our lives aspired to being men of letters. For about 6 months when I was 19 might have listed my career goal as "Romantic Poet and Mystic". We have at various points in time had writing circles where we each brought something to Sunday brunch for reading and comment or written exquisite corpse style stories together ... but that's been, well, a long time ago now.

So why now? I think it's 40. In the same way that there was a mad rush of babies as our friends approached 30, there is now a feeling that, I'm speculating wildly here, that we want to have achieved something literary, be it genre or memoire or nonfiction, by 40. I don't know, just seems like an odd coincidence that four of us that I know of have book plans and another regularly writes book reviews and commentary.

Hopefully in a year or two, you'll see us gathered together on the New Releases table at your local mega book store.