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Mon, 21 Feb 2005 21:54:10 GMT

this is not how i wanted to kick off my new journal. but the world gives you what it gives you and all we can do is write the about the truth of it (or as much of it as we care to reveal for legal, political and personal reasons).

hunter stockton thompson died yesterday. that's not news to anyone reading this.

the current story is that he took his own life. i believe it to be true, tho i know he'd love it if some rum-soaked theories were floated about it being a set up by government operatives (domestic or foreign), justifiable revenge from a disgruntled biker named tiny or an "accidental" shooting by a peacock that snacked on an old stash of adrenochrome left in the garage and was affected so that it learned how to handle a firearm with impressive accuracy, despite lacking opposable thumbs, or hands for that matter. those fuckers are vicious, and you know they'd be into thrill killing.

i'm not going to eulogize him. that's been done more eloquently and accurately than i could hope to do, by people who knew him and mostly loved and respected him, despite being inarguably scary and unpredictable. i am, however, going to try and explain why his death saddens me, and how his life and work inspired me. it's all about me, which seems kind of appropriate.

i came to hst's work late, comparatively. second year in college, taking my first journalism class, his name was brought up by a couple of alaskan transplants whose squinty red eyes sparkled ruby-like talking about his genius. some other classmates heckled them for their fawning fanboy love speeches about "personal journalism" and "gonzo reporting" and dismissed them as crazed by culture shock or possibly snow madness. i was kind of on the hecklers' side then. a weak attempt at writing in my own natural voice on my high school paper was discouraged (to put it mildly) by our advisor, and i figured she was right, and shut it down, and fell into the objective reporter/inverted pyramid lockstep. but these two northern freaks had such PASSION for this guy that i had to check him out.

i started at the logical place: fear and loathing in las vegas. i love to use hyperbole to make a point, but saying that it changed me is, if anything, putting it mildly. i was baffled and enamored. was it fiction? sports reporting? a hilarious drug romp? a blazingly intelligent political and social critique of the highest order? complete and utter bullshit? yes, it was. fucking brilliant.

i devoured his books. hells angels moved me in ways my housemates found disturbing and not a little annoying (i subjected them to glazed-eye rants about the GENIUS contained therein). the great shark hunt got me through my first major depression -- it kept my head out of the oven more than once. later, as a student journalist on the bone-dry campus "paper of record" i carried a ratty used copy of fear and loathing on the campaign trail with me whenever i was assigned to cover local and national politics during the '92 elections. i had to choose between two boys that year, and factoring into my decision was that one of them was from stockton and that HAD to be a sign (i still think it was). i got over my fear of psychedelics and tried mushrooms for the first time. i failed a geology class because i spent my research time in the periodicals section of the library reading old issues of "rolling stone" instead of geology articles. he impacted my life on every front.

i became one of those red-eyed ranting fanboys, and it was good.

as an intern on a local weekly, i fell in with journalists who encouraged me in this direction: dan, a fallen capitol city editor who introduced me to the three-scotch lunch and carefully-chosen adjectives; robb, whose humor leaked into every story, headline, caption and police blotter he wrote; even kevin, the publisher, whose obsession with surf culture shamelessly impacted every decision he made. i joined the staff of the aforementioned campus paper rather than the upstart gonzo publication because it had become my mission to change the staid non-voice of "straight" journalism into something more honest, that admitted its own existence and impact on a story, rather than denying itself and lamely hiding behind the stupid goal of "objectivity." i don't think i made much of a difference, but i sure tried. (i moonlighted for the gonzo paper, and slept with the editor-in chief, and became best friends and rivals with their head political reporter, tho, so it wasn't all hard work.)

hunter s. thompson's work made me a better writer. it gave me joy, got me laid, helped me pass classes (not just fail them) and taught me to trust that my own voice was as good a way as the dull, formulaic, traditional reporter's voice -- better, even -- to present information i thought the world needed.

i'm not a gonzo writer in the popular sense. i don't write like hst did, with the not-even-veiled violence and borderline insanity. i wouldn't dream of even attempting to imitate his voice. i write like i do, with my own voice, because i can and i must. and i thank him for that every time i write something*.

he'll be missed and his memory will always be more than a blessing to me.

this does not do him justice, but its honest, and it's me, and that's as good enough a way to honor him as any.

*tho not really when i'm writing technical documents, but that's a different story.

bugulator

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