Longworth

J. Russell Smith

Description

This is a coming of age story about a young man, Carson Longworth, who will come to discover he knows virtually nothing about what's happening in the world around him. In high school his life consists of music, dance, dating, and good times. Set in the 1960's early 1970's when the Vietnam War is beginning to heat up, Carson has not given a good deal of thought to anything beyond the here and now and much less to what is happening around him. Having grown up "under a lucky star", he just assumes that he merely needs to exist and good things will happen to him. Carson wrestles with his personal demons and the general inanity of the world. When he leaves high school and attempts to tackle the world at large, though, he finds the relative freedom outside the cocoon somewhat more than he can handle. Carson's "relative world of plenty" and his historical insulation from the "real world" contributes to the perception that he is aloof. In reality, he just doesn't know how to relate to people. He has no childhood memories of any close friendships, as he found himself in a new place every few years. As such, his outlook on life has been shaped somewhat differently from his peers. This holds particularly true for his relationships with women. He simply had little idea how to relate to women in any meaningful manner until he met Kathy Wilkerson. After high school, Carson spent two academically forgettable, but socially memorable, years in college. He was eventually drafted by the Army, but joined the Marine Corps, because he 'wanted to be a man', an experience that shaped him indelibly. His experiences in the Vietnam War helped create his antagonistic outlook. He could not come to terms with the intent of the war nor the manner in which it was being conducted. He found himself on the outside looking in. He became, contrary to most who join the Marine Corps, a liberal thinker and a skeptic who became increasingly frustrated with the inconsistencies that he observed in the conduct of his fellow man. He began, even while participating in the War, to question the intentions of his government and even those around him. He became very much a loner, as he simply could not understand what was happening nor could he reconcile the absurdities he witnessed. While in the Marine Corps, traveling from one duty station to another, he spent a night in Little Rock, AR. He met a young woman who would remain at his side, even as he tried to "find himself". She would come and go in his life, but in the end, she would be the one who would capture his heart and provide "true love". She had, for him, the "essential ingredient" that he had not been able to find in any person, male or female, his entire life. They would both exert a major influence on each other's lives. Carson would progress from a fanciful world of plenty to one of expected obedience, then to a position of constant questioning. As soon as Carson left the Marine Corps, he returned to college where he became an honor student, engaged in numerous causes, earned his PhD, then taught and wrote. He took it upon himself to instill the Socratic notion of constant questioning. He died a renowned author and lecturer. Those around him respected his formidable intellect, but were troubled by his sometimes commanding approach. One who was not, though, was Kathy Wilkerson ... his future wife. This supports the notion that this is as much a love story as a coming of age drama.

Sujets

• Coming of Age
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Outskirts Press
• Date de parution: 20 février 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781478731474
• Langue: English

Extrait

This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and are not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher. The author has represented and warranted full ownership and/or legal right to publish all the materials in this book.

Longworth
All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © 2013 J. Russell Smith
v1.0

Cover Photo © 2013 JupiterImages Corporation. All rights reserved - used with permission.

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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Chapter One
I suppose everyone has his or her demons. One does not navigate the waters of life, the hills and valleys of everyday existence without confrontation, indecision, frustration, and, on occasion, heartbreak. In fact, for many, life is one continuous struggle. For others, and there are a few, the challenges of life are welcomed like so much nectar. Those people are to be envied. In the case of our protagonist, the frustrations of attempting to understand and to make sense of the actions of his fellow man do, at times, take a toll; so much so, in fact, that the black of night can be a very Byzantine period. The out-of-body experiences--some would say dreams--are not always pleasant. In fact, they can sometimes be described as convoluted, fraught with graphic activity. Damningly personal, or so it seems. But all too often, these dreams are dramatic and intense. Yes, very intense, like they were meant to leave an indelible message.
Why do these moments of cowardly distraction invade what should be a period of gentle reflection? Why can he not have “normal” dreams like most everyone else? Why have his bordered on the descriptively grotesque? His dreams weren’t always this way--only as he grew more aware. As time moves inexorably along, driven either by circumstance or natural progression, and as it grows shorter for all of us, I suppose the sense of urgency becomes more acute. Is this a punishment for some unknown failure? Do we have to deal with our nocturnal demons to ensure the vivification of our waking life? Why, for some, must there be a wracking of the soul in order to discover what makes everything function…to make sense out of any or everything? Or is this simply a symptom of one’s inability to function in society? Who knows, but the trip to self-discovery can be very painful.
That should bring us to the point. How can one make the most of the opportunity given to each of us, as we inhabit this earth? Is it destined for the collective community to prevail and prosper and are we, as individuals, inevitably ordained to lead “lives of quiet desperation”? Or do we have choices on the individual level that can be controlled by our own desires and direction? Why do some of us accept our lot in life and others question everything? It seems that Carson Longworth is one of those fellows who simply cannot accept things as they appear. He wants to know why things are as they are or at least appear to be. Yes, indeed, Carson Longworth is one of those unfortunate souls who will have a gut-wrenching time trying to find out precisely how he fits into society. His will be a journey of sometimes torturous proportions that can be circumscribed only by his imagination.
By all rights, Carson Longworth should have led a storied and, for all purposes, accommodating life. There was nothing to suggest that he would be a contrarian toward the here and now, unless, of course, one knew him…and few did. He was intelligent, charismatic, fun-loving, good-looking (but, also a little eccentric); he “had it all,” as they say--all of the tools to lead a relatively normal and unquestioning life. Why did he insist on the “road less traveled”? Why not just get along? It is and would have been so much easier.
It has also been said that Carson had a “mystique.” Maybe these are precisely the reasons why he found it so difficult to put up with the nonsense that he encountered on a daily basis. Was he so different from many in his insistence on the notion of fair play in his dealings with others, on his appeal to logic in a world where greed and a self-serving attitude ruled the day? Not really! In fact, he suspected that others were just as unhappy and frustrated as he. He just happened to be one of those that, perhaps in a quixotic fashion, tended to attack those very ideas in people and society that were not based on any logic or a sense of fair play, but rather on something else entirely. Who was the Roman Catholic patron saint of lost or desperate causes? I believe it was Saint Jude. This was definitely his patron saint, for he unrelentingly championed the underdog. He was constantly challenging what he perceived to be the inanity of the unexamined, the accepted notions of the day. It was a tiring enterprise, but one he simply could not ignore. It was too important to be left unaddressed…or so he perceived.

If one moves around a lot in life many things can, and often do, happen. Some good, some not so good. For one thing, one sees the world differently than others who have lived in one place their entire lives or have ventured barely beyond their horizon. Peregrinations, be they short in duration or a permanent relocation, can be, in the estimation of some, very beneficial, as they tend to broaden one’s outlook. On the other hand, there are no real memories of “playing in the sand box with little Johnny or Susie.” That, as has been noted many times, by leading authorities, is not so good. There are some who think it’s important to have reference points in life. There is something reassuring about remembering a particular incident with a particular person. It helps to define oneself, at least at that moment. If the names and faces are a blur, then the people are less important than where you lived or what you might have done. Most think that people and relationships are important. If you don’t have that reference, your interaction with people tends to be less fulfilling, or at least more challenging. Perhaps you simply don’t allow yourself the beneficial feeling that comes with opening the heart, in trusting people. That, most would agree, is not so good.
Carson lived in a world of relative plenty. To quote the famous adage from Calvin Coolidge, the 30 th President of the United States, “the business of America is business.” In fact, Carson believed this to be true, at least in the beginning. That, in his eyes, was both sad and generative. It was sad, because, he believed, one needs more than just the quest for money to satisfy one’s life. On the other hand, it can be very productive if the political system allows for (and it does) the unfettered thirst for economic production that permits a better material lifestyle. It can also allow for creativity in the arts. Now that was good, he felt. So what does one do? If there are too many freedoms, it’s easy to justify most anything. If there are not enough (whatever that means) the creative juices cease to flow. Then again, most of the truly creative art is born out of deprivation, pain, suffering, or generally a feeling of “not being with the program.” In essence, Carson was constantly at odds with both himself and “the system”…increasingly so as he gained his majority.
Carson’s life had been punctuated with journeys to a great many places. He had traveled and lived throughout the United States. He had fought in a war far from home. He had traveled and lived in places as far afield as Asia, Africa, Europe, Australia, Canada, Central America, and the Caribbean. He had a broad knowledge of the world and, quite frankly, bathed in that knowledge. From his vantage point, having come of age during the 1960s, he became embittered by what he and others saw as the downward spiral of America toward some bottomless abyss of non-caring folk who felt nothing for their fellow man. They would, in his estimation, rather reach for that illusory “American Dream,” which meant the acquisition of material goods and a nice house in the suburbs. Now, there might have been nothing inherently wrong with that picture, but at what cost, and at what sacrifice?
Being a child of the 1960s was not an easy thing to be. Carson, like many of his contemporaries, grew up thinking that he should pursue that “American Dream,” but tended to reject the outright pursuit of material goods in the absence of something more meaningful. Yes, it does sound like spoiled kids in this land of plenty, but his was the first generation ever in the United States that tried to turn the status quo on its head. That’s not to suggest that others did not rebel against their parents; they did. The American Civil War split families and this nation apart to the point where, it can be argued, it has never fully recovered. And that was over a hundred and fifty years ago! But that was fundamentally and arguably different from the experiences of the 1960s. While there was indeed a war going on, it served as a backdrop to what was happening in the homes, in the universities, and on the streets. Many have maintained that were it not for the Vietnam War, which, they argued, served as the catalyst for the ’60s, little of this would have happened. Perhaps so, but the point is that it did happen. There was a rebellion by the youth against established and accepted norms, not the North versus the South, like this country had never seen before.
Everything that happened in Carson’s life, it sh