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Confession | Oct 14 2003

Listen, I didn’t really stuff my new cell phone inside four pairs of athletic socks and stick it at the bottom of the hamper and then call it on my regular phone to confirm I couldn’t hear it ringing. I only said that because it made a better story. I’m not interested in telling the truth here unless the truth makes a better story.

Sometimes I think of writing all the lies in a special “lie” color so that everyone will know what’s true and what isn’t. But then it gets complicated because what about exaggeration? Is exaggeration a lie? Or what about the things I change to disguise who I’m talking about? That I do all the time. And what about the things I leave out, or the things I’m not sure about?

I’ve even thought of making each form of deception its own color. Red equals lie, blue equals hyperbole, yellow equals obfuscation, and so on. Only what about the things that combine several forms of deception? Do I mix the colors together?

Half a lifetime ago my friend Ross wrote a “From the author” piece for a play of his. You were given a copy when you entered the theater. All the words were in quotes. I mean individually. “What” “it” “looked” “like” “was” “this.” Ross will probably wince that I remember this, but I found it interesting. “It” “made” “me” “think.”

Anyway I apologize to anyone who is upset to learn that I may not have lost my orange juice or gone out with a lunatic named M or gotten beaten up or created an ill-fated snowperson. I may not have. Or I may have but in a different sense than I said I did. Does it really matter? The way I see it, it’s like what Norman O. Brown said: “Everything is only a metaphor. There is only poetry.” These stories are meant as a kind of poetry. Failed poetry, perhaps, but poetry.

Still, I really was beaten up. In fact there’s some weird thing in my nose—a piece of cartilage, I guess—that hasn’t felt quite right since. It makes a clicking sound when I push in on the side of my right nostril. Sometimes I sit around and absently click it.

Also, I’ve never really thought of making the lies different colors; I just liked saying I had. I’m totally sticking with black for everything.