‘Something I Said’ Archives
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They
from the series Something I Said... By DWIGHT HOBBES Dwight Hobbes Horace McCoy’s Depression Era classic, They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (Simon & Schuster), may inspire you to get up on a drizzling, overcast morning and go slit your throat. Simone de Beauvoir lauded it as “The first existentialist novel to have appeared in America” and, sure enough, it’s a grim portrayal of man’s desperate inhumanity to man. And woman. It is a deftly crafted indictment of life, itself. We witness two down-and-outers trying to get a leg up in their hard scrabbled lives. Robert, dreaming of directing film, rakes and scrapes by, hired now and then as an extra. He comes across Gloria, whose best acting prospects fled with her youth. She sees the rose through world colored glasses. They end up unlikely partners in a grueling dance marathon, taking a shot at the $1500 prize. That amount of money is still nothing to sneeze at. In those days, it was a fortune. Along with, for these [...]
Having A Heart For Homeless Cats
from the series Something I Said... By DWIGHT HOBBES Dwight Hobbes Condensed from Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder If, as the Good Book says, the Lord gave us dominion over the beasts, birds and so forth, dominion doesn’t just mean being in charge. It means caring for. Even protecting. This includes homeless cats fending against the elements. They’re hungry with no roof overhead through no doing of their own. Fortunately, folk do what they can to help out. Feed and water them, leaving bowls where they can eat and drink, close enough to a make-do refuge that the cats needn’t scrounge in garbage cans and can scurry to safety at a moment’s notice. I did this for a clutch of felines. A neighbor ratted me out to animal control. When they came, I stood my ground. “Who is it hurting to give those cats a mouthful of food?” Which is how I learned food can be put down for three hours, then has to be removed. Hours? What I gave them was gone in three minutes. This [...]
Marcie Rendon’s Sweet Revenge
from the series Something I Said By DWIGHT HOBBES Dwight Hobbes What’s An Indian Woman To Do When White Women Act More Indian Than Indian Women Do, part of a prose-poetry reading at Jungle Theater, was my first exposure to the bone dry wit of singularly gifted writer, Marcie Rendon. Catching her irreverent theatrical tour de force, Free FryBread at Bryant-Lake Bowl. a take-no-prisoners satire cum indictment of the prison system, I sat back in my seat, thinking, ‘Scared of her: this lady ain’t nothin’ nice.’ Her play, Sweet Revenge, receives a March 20th stage reading at the Jungle and I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Between books Murder on the Red River, Girl Gone Missing and upcoming releases, Anishinaabe Songs for the New Millennium and Where They Last Saw Her, she pretty much has two speeds, asleep and overdrive. Rendon took time for an email interview with the alley. Marcie Rendon. Photo: JAIDA GREY EAGLE Dwight: Maggie’s the matriarch, nurturing [...]
