One of the Most Tragic Anecdotes I Ever Read

"John Hemmings had spent thirty years of his life in the public eye, his days a whirlwind of committee meetings, press briefings, and constituent demands. When he finally retired, he envisioned a pastoral second act. He and his wife, Eleanor, had a quaint cottage with a sun-drenched library, its shelves holding all the classics he had promised himself he would read "someday". That day had finally arrived.

"But the silence was jarring. In his old life, his brain was a constant triage of information, his focus a sharp and deliberate tool. Now, in the quiet of his library, that tool felt blunted. He would open a weighty biography of Winston Churchill, his idol, and read a page, then another. Soon, his mind would drift. He’d find himself mentally tallying the votes for a bill that was passed years ago, or replaying an old televised debate, thinking of the retorts he should have made.

"He tried to force it, reading the same paragraph three times over. He moved on to a lighter, more modern thriller, but his attention still sputtered. The words on the page were like a dull political report; they lacked the urgency and stakes that had defined his professional life. The thrill of a high-stakes negotiation was gone, replaced by the gentle hum of a house with nothing on the agenda.

"Eleanor found him one afternoon staring out the window, a book resting unread on his lap. "What's wrong, dear?" she asked.

"It's just... I can't," he sighed, gesturing to the book. "I spend so long thinking about what I'm reading, only to realize I haven't actually read a word in five minutes."

"It wasn't a sudden cognitive decline, as his mind was still sharp for strategy. It was more of a re-wiring, the kind that happens when a high-powered machine is suddenly idling. His brain, accustomed to constant stimulation and the pressure of public life, had forgotten how to simply sit and absorb. The discipline of reading, for all his good intentions, was a different kind of work entirely. He had retired from one profession, but he was struggling to find his way into a more peaceful one." --? (found with AI)

I'm not sure where I read this story; it might have been The Oxford Book of Literary Anecdotes or An Irreverent and Thoroughly Incomplete Social History of Almost Everything. I also can't quite find out exactly which John Hemmings this is supposed to be, although I'm fairly sure it wasn't Thomas Jefferson's illegitimate son. I fear I'm beginning to lose some of my concentration when it comes to reading, but perhaps I've been inflating my abilities to myself all this time. I'm reminded of Pop's saying for years that when he was retired he'd be fishing all the time, which he almost never did when the time came. Still bought tackle and poles, though. Just like I buy books I'm not sure I'll ever read.

The Shadow Library: The Vicar of Wakefield

The Vicar of Wakefield by Oliver Goldsmith was much touted in its time as a novel of suffering virtue rewarded. Here is the anecdote surrounding its publication that Samuel Johnson related to James Boswell:

“I received one morning a message from poor Goldsmith that he was in great distress, and, as it was not in his power to come to me, begging that I would come to him as soon as possible. I sent him a guinea, and promised to come to him directly. I accordingly went as soon as I was dressed, and found that his landlady had arrested him for his rent, at which he was in a violent passion: I perceived that he had already changed my guinea, and had a bottle of Madeira and a glass before him. I put the cork into the bottle, desired he would be calm, and began to talk to him of the means by which he might be extricated. He then told me he had a novel ready for the press, which he produced to me. I looked into it and saw its merit; told the landlady I should soon return; and, having gone to a bookseller, sold it for sixty pounds. I brought Goldsmith the money, and he discharged his rent, not without rating his landlady in a high tone for having used him so ill.”

About Mike ... Concluded

 Now Mike never drew a whole lot, but when he did it had a strange, savage power. I remember a very early drawing by him of Omi, shown from the side, of her with a cigarette clamped between open teeth. He made rather devastating caricatures of us all, and this sketch by him of Mom, while rather stark, shows a strange talent for capturing a facet of reality.

An Autobiography, by Anthony Trollope.  Mike had this copy of the life of the prodigious and hard-working English novelist I remember reading it while Mike went in to get a Hunt Brothers pizza for us at Pic-n-Pac. 

If my memory is not completely playing tricks on me, one of the first DVDs I ever watched was Hellboy (2004) on the first DVD player our family ever owned over on Cottage Street when Mike and John were living there.

It is odd to think that today a child born on the day my brother Mike passed away would be eighteen years old.

Interview with the Vampire, by Anne Rice. Mike bought this at Pic-n-Pac, the first of what became the Vampire Chronicles. 

I found this copy [of Witches, Witches, Witches] totally by accident when Mike and I went into a San Antonio bookstore where I had located a copy of The Visitors from Oz, and I had to have it.

Mike had that [Killer Shark] magazine during the great Jaws craze.

The International Wildlife Encyclopedia – 20 Volumes. Hard to pinpoint exactly when we got these; somewhere in the mid-70’s, I would estimate. They were a family venture, but I imagine they were mainly purchased to feed Mike’s interest in nature, and probably at his urging. 

Last Contact: I was rather pleased with the results (after all, I had finished a story!) but I remember my brother Mike dismissing it with the equivalent of a snort and a ‘Heavy handed and derivative!’

We never had the Tom and Jerry book, but it looms large in our memory. Mike had read it in 1st Grade (or perhaps his teacher had read it to the class) and he retold it to us later. He MAY have given us the impression that he was making it up; I recall I was a little surprised to find it in the class library next year.

Wondering what Mike would think about my literary endeavors.

APRIL 11, 1981: Mike came back [from Southwest Texas State University, after the end of the semester].

Mike had a copy of The Andromeda Strain, which I remember reading, a tale about the threat of a viral apocalypse, as was the fashion of the 70’s. 

Star Trek occupied many of our imaginary adventures, and in the ‘real life’ versions Mike always appropriated the coveted persona of Mr. Spock, which was ironic because technically the Vulcan was the second banana to Captain Kirk, though superior as a character.

Makes me want to spit when I consider [Breece D’J Pancake’s] assured "immortal fame" compared to Mike's struggle for meaning amid the backwash of literary ennui.

There was Mike or Michael Wayne Babel as he was formally charged when Mom was particularly angry with him, born some eighteen months before me and always very definitely the senior partner in our relationship, with all the good and bad that that implies.

The buffalo (for Mike), the bear (for me), and the German shepherd (which we called a wolf- for Kenny) were all from a company named Breyer and are hollow molded plastic.

I checked the other hidey places as best as I could (they were all predicated on how hard they were to reach) but came up with nothing, and Mike (the biggest kid ahead of me) wasn’t sticking his head up or down any holes for me. 

Extraterrestrial Visitations from Prehistoric Times to the Present, by Jacques Bergier. A purchase from the early 70’s, instigated by Mike but passed around by all us boys and much discussed.

I remember how Mike and I cracked up as I read [Richard Armour’s] take on David Copperfield aloud.

That it takes place within the milieu of the Lost Generation in Paris gives it added interest, as Hemingway was my brother Mike's particular literary mentor, and I therefore know a little bit about it.

We Babel boys were caught up in the fear and frenzy of the shark craze in the mid-70s. It was then that Mike developed the ambition to one day be a marine biologist, and he became quite knowledgeable about the science of sharks. These books were in his library, but we all read in them.

It came to me that none of us had even a fair approximation of Pop's voice or could produce one, and John and Kenny both have great powers of mimicry. Mike would sometimes do Pop, but it was a mockery, and not so much a mimicry.

There is even a figure of Paul Teutul Sr. (sans sunglasses) from the TV show, American Chopper, which I gave Mike as a present.

1975 Yearbook of Jehovah’s Witnesses, by The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania. They can try to re-write their history as much as they like, but I got the evidence! The year of (one of) their grand failures of the prophesied end. Actually has Mike’s and my “Speech Counsel” forms from the Theocratic Ministry School.

Besides which, this book is where for years I kept that picture of me and Mike as dog-trainers.

E-mail from John:  He [Mike] has been showing up a lot in my dreams lately as well.  He's a busy man for someone who hasn't walked the face of the earth for over thirteen years. 

[Climbing Enchanted Rock] The whole prospect was so redolent of filmdom that Mike began to joke around with the movie cliches: "You got us into this mess!," etc. As we began to climb higher it started to rain. We were still a good way off from the top on a huge, exposed slope and in fear of lightning. Not only that, we were worried that the slope when wet would become too slippery to climb either up or down. Now Mike's comments about "You got us into this mess" to Will though still jocular had something of an edge to them. 

 Mike wore an old black-and-stripes shirt, green fatigue pants, and a black cap to Enchanted Rock.

When John and Kenny came back we made some potato soup, and Mike went out and bought some bread, jalapeno Cheez-Whiz, and Coca-Cola. He also rented a movie from Hastings, Murder--No Apparent Motive. 

A book was always a good choice for a birthday present for Mike, as it pretty much is for any Babel. Money was always good, too. But one thing that was essential was a good feed, and Pop's BBQ was always Mike's choice. I can't recall a specific flavor requested all the time, I do know Mike loved pineapple upside down cake, and anything strawberry. Mike was usually in ebullient spirits on his birthday, and weather permitting, walking and talking would sometimes follow the festivities.

Time has a way of throwing things into different lights, but for me, the thing I still miss the most about Mike is the laughter. There was no situation that was too heavy that it couldn't be lightened by a well-timed Mike-ism, and being of a highly original and creative mind, there was no guessing what might come out of his mouth. Sometimes it was a sharp wordplay, most times an acidic observation, sometimes at my expense, sometimes at his own. He was usually pretty good about laughing at himself, but only after a suitable period of time had passed and the freshness of a sting had faded. In that spirit, and out of no disrespect to his memory, I'd like to recount something about the man that we both talked about and laughed about many times over the years.

One of the physical peculiarities about Mike was his propensity to need to defecate in the worst way (i.e.=torrential diarrhea) when in the worst possible place to do it. I remember one time when he and I were hiking around far afield from our campsite at Knodel's, he was hit with the dreaded urge. After some "battling" he finally declared that there was no possibility to hold back the flood tide until our return to camp. The immediate problem was the paucity of poo poo paper. A plan was hastily devised to use leaves of the local vegetation. He found a spot along an old fence choked in big, green-leafed tobacco plants and let fly with a thunderous slap. Upon attempting to wipe, Mike found the sensation of the broad bristly leaves so disagreeable that he was forced to switch to plan "B". He wiped his arse with his underwear and hurled the soiled garment far into the foliage after its final sacrificial service. I tried to choke back the laughter at the time, knowing how uncomfortable the whole episode had been for him, but I couldn't for long and we both often laughed at it in years after; wondering if any poor Knodel or unsuspecting armadillo had ever come across the evidence of his secret shame.

There was also the infamous "Red Yug" episode that occurred while we were swimming at the Lot. Mike, losing his battle again, imagined pooping while waist deep in the river would yield naught but unseen turds, sluggishly drifting unseen to the river bottom. Instead, an intense explosion of reddish, foaming diarrhea engulfed the area all around him, sending everyone flying in horror for the riverbanks. Furthermore, the horrid issue went NOWHERE. It spread lazily out to cover our entire swimming area and put an abrupt end to our day at the ol' swimming hole. We would have been pissed if it weren't so funny. The entity that spewed forth was dubbed "Red Yug” and was immortalized in a song sung to the tune of Peter Gabriel's "Red Rain". ("Let the Red Yug splash you/ let the Yug fall on your skin-" you get the picture.)

My last (and favorite) anecdote along these lines occurred on a day trip to the Enchanted Rock State Park. After having conquered the dome and descended into the remote wooded valley area Mike was again hit with the urge. We knew from previous hikes that there were no bathrooms to be found on this side of the park, so the only question became where to do what had to be done. Mike chose a small crystalline stream that flowed through the valley. The water would serve as a bidet and the problem that had occurred at Knodel's many years prior would not be repeated. Mike pulled off his deed flawlessly and our hike resumed with relief and a spring in our steps. Then we saw the sign on the bank of the spring upstream. "PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH OR STEP IN WATER-EXTREMELY FRAGILE ECOSYSTEM". Our hearts sank. Images of rare salamanders doing a hideous danse macabre in the billowing clouds of Mike's excrement went through our suddenly troubled minds, and then turning around the bend we saw it--a newly built, sparkling, and vacant public toilet.

Kenny: this post had me both laughing and crying hysterically. I must look like a lunatic right now with the tears and the guffawing. Sometimes I miss Mike so much I can't stand it. He was the most proud and the most humble of us all. And I love you, Mike. As you feast right now in Valhalla, know how much you are missed by your legions. Happy Birthday, Mig.

[For playings] We all had our specialties. My older brother Mike was good at setting up conflicts and major characters. We all took Creative Writing in high school. We all wanted to tell stories. Our differences were in how we wanted to tell them. Mike wanted to write novels, John to draw comics, Kenny to do plays.

My older brother, Mike, had finished his own rather monumental novel and was in the process of trying to find a publisher. In the meantime, he took it upon himself to encourage me with my own efforts. Mike made me buckle down. We had many discussions on how to proceed, details about characters, and backstories. He even wrote me a batch of notes of how he thought the story [A Grave on Deacon’s Peak] could be fleshed out, even as a screenplay. In the end, I used very few of his ideas, but he was certainly an influence; he sharpened my process. Then he suddenly passed away in 2006, his own dreams of publication unfulfilled.

And in its pages were announced the existence of three other works: the books of The Lord of The Rings. They weren't in middle school, and there were no local bookstores at the time. But when my elder brother Mike advanced to high school and told me they were there; I bartered a whole year's worth of chores if he could get them for me. And he did. 

The clipping is dated May 24; the fact that Mike is in 6th Grade makes it 1974. Mike the Viking, draped with Mom's leopard skin nightshirt .

Notice mood ring on Mike's finger, and his hauteur.

Among my earliest of memories is, of course, Mike going off to school for First Grade. We would stand at the dining room window and watch as he "disappeared around the corner" every morning, and then in the afternoon when Mom would tell us to be on the lookout for him coming home. Mrs. Bilnitzer was his First Grade teacher. I always think how stalwartly he went. I was really lucky that I had him to take me down to the stop sign the next year. He was the Fearless Leader.

To see so much all-to-once is a little overwhelming, but it kind of emphasizes the two sides of Mike, doesn't it: the hard, bitter, I can't help but think of it as posturing or at least a stance or response to irritation (though sincere) outer shell, and the sensitive, insightful, noble, easily wounded (and yes, horny) man within. I can't say I like the use of numbers for words or the whole AL thing, though it must have meant something to him or his online followers; it has the whiff of trying to be poetic-like.
I remember his fascination with all the Crucified Snake pictures. He wanted to get a tattoo of it once.

The only surviving piece of the naked paper doll of Kenny. Mike had a rather peculiar sense of humor, but a surprising skill at capturing a likeness.

It's just like Mike to "spice up" an adventure with a little personal unpleasantness. Let me refresh your memory: Mike wanted to go to Yen's bachelor party, I was bone tired by this point and really wasn't interested in driving all the way across town for the party. Mike couldn't drive himself because he had allowed his DL to expire. He called me a 'bitch' and said he'd like to kill me and dump my body in a swamphole somewhere where they'd never find me. He also came after you for your snoring. Very unpleasant, nerve-frazzled point of the trip, in a crappy Hojo hotel room after the awesomeness of Summerfield Suites.

One of the best things that Mike ever did that I witnessed happened when we were driving home from work late one night, I mean about 2 AM. We were almost home, just about to cross the bridge, when we saw a family in distress stranded at the closed gas station there. A father, mother, and baby, trying to wave down some help. I was tired, and, to be honest, a little afraid that it might be a trap of some kind, but Mike insisted on turning in and seeing what was the matter. As it happened Mike gave them money for the payphone there and we waited until a wrecker could show up to lend them assistance. I was ashamed; I fancied myself to be religious, and they were in the same situation as the Holy Family themselves. But it was Mike who had the bigness of heart to help.

The last time Kameron saw Mike he was seven years old. Mike had dropped by Susan’s house, and when it came time for him to leave, Kameron burst into tears. Just deep, heartbroken sobs. He did not want his uncle to leave. This was not usual; it was like he knew this was the last time. Just a little while later, a day or a few days, Mike was dead. 

 

About Mike ... Continued

It was grocery day, a Saturday, and Mike and I (at least – was John there? Did he get his own digest?) were with Pop shopping at Baenziger’s. We were at the magazine rack next to the little checkout where they bought cigarettes, and for some reason Pop agreed to buy us each a Mystery Comics Digest. Once again, I put my money on the wrong horse, and chose the Boris Karloff Tales of Mystery #2 (well, it had exciting looking reptilian monsters on it), while Mike chose the Ripley title.

I   recall Uncle Remus Stories had one [a storied map], though we only saw the book one night when (I think) one of Mike’s friends loaned it to him and he barely let us touch it.

Looking back, I would have to say there were two features [in Walt Disney Comics Digest #6, bought when he was in 1^st Grade] that may have particularly influenced Mike. One was a “Walt Disney Animal Autobiography”, with a realistically drawn exploration of whales and their lives. Another was “Lotor Takes a Trip” (not a comic strip but a simple short story with a few illustrations), about a raccoon that escapes from the zoo and with the help of a young boy is returned to the wild, where he learns to live in freedom.  

For another thing, I was used to having a family support group, to running in a pack with my brothers, to being a follower rather than an independent unit of my own. True, Mike was in the Second Grade right next to me, but once class started, he might as well have been on the moon. I was on my own. And my teacher was an unknown quantity. I was used to hearing about Mike’s First Grade teacher, Mrs. Bilnitzer, but she had been moved to another class.

I think this is the earliest photo we have of Mike on file; it is labelled Mike, 1 year old. He would have been 63 years old today. As a tribute I post this story [By the Lake] that he published in the 1982 Persona when he was in college.

The reason I cleaned out the old shed was to have a personal space to hang out, away from my brothers. But one, at least, wasn't having it. "Shoddy construction" my eye. Mike broke that lock [on my diary] trying to pick it, apparently wanting to see what "mighty secrets" I might be keeping. I couldn't lock the diary anymore, but I saw that any attempt at privacy was futile anyway. It took me a while to forgive him. 

Dear Mike, 

It has now been ten hours since you have gone and already I miss you.  All of my life you have been there, almost never more than half an hour away, and now every minute carries you farther and farther away.  I look at my books placed in your shelves & am reminded of you, I type this letter on your typewriter and am reminded of you; every now and then something will occupy my attention, but then I think of you with a start and feel guilty for having forgotten for a moment.  

I have noticed something strange. Things do not have a past until they are gone.  I mean they have a past, but they are not in it.  It is awful feeling so torn, but I don't feel any despair.  I know from the past that things I think are gone forever turn up where least expected.  I hope you will turn up soon. [written when he left for Oregon; found in his papers ten years and more after his passing.]

Memory tells me that I was often annoyed by Mom and Pop and Mike, though it fills me now with rue. I would give almost anything to be annoyed by them again, if only for a little while. 

Little Rascal, by Sterling North, a cut down version of his larger book Rascal: A Memoir of a Better Era (1963). That better era was during WWI and the Spanish flu. As I said, it was a family book, shared among us kids, but I think Mike had the largest interest in it. I don’t remember ever reading it myself. Needless to say, at the end Rascal, a raccoon, has to be released into the wild. Mike also had a copy of The Yearling (by Marjorie Kinning Rawlings) years later. I think Nomads of the North (James Oliver Curwood/Disney) was his too.

I remember the first time I saw [Cyrano de Bergerac], back when I was in high school. Our creative writing teacher knew that it was coming on that weekend and suggested that Mike and I take the opportunity to see it. We did, not knowing exactly what to expect, but determined to give it a try.

Saturday afternoon came and we settled down to watch. Unfortunately, Pop (whose idea of a proper movie was a good Western) had settled down in his recliner and was determined to be a film critic for his idealistic sons, perhaps all the more so because we had hinted that he might want to do something else as it was probably not his cup of tea.

When in the first scene of the movie the slimy, posing actor Montfleury came on stage and began to declaim, Pop's scorn was loud and palpable. I think he thought it was all going to be like that. Mike and I tried to get him to settle down so we could hear the movie and give it a fair chance. He was having none of it.

Then Jose Ferrer came on as Cyrano and voiced Pop's exact opinions about Montfleury.  That took him by surprise, I think. And then? "Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles!" By the time the film was over, even Pop had to admit it was not the exercise in sissiness he thought it was going to be; in fact I think he even begrudgingly liked it.

As a joke, Mike persuaded Mom to send off for a copy of [Baked Beans for Breakfast] a Scholastic book from Weekly Reader (I think it was a bonus free book) as a burn on my bean-hate. I mean I’m sure Mom didn’t see it as a joke, but Mike knew how it would affect me. It came, and I was duly disgusted.

When I got my first computer, the on-again-off-again transcribing of 'Elf and Bear' was one of the many scattered projects I attempted. When I lost that file when my computer crashed, I was too despondent to try again right away, but by 2005, with Mike's help, I finally had a complete edited version of the book. And then Mike passed away, and the world was again turned on its head.

The Hot-Blooded Dinosaurs was Mike's book, although I did read it with interest. For a while it was more or less 'in the family'. Dinosaurs were always a hot topic for us boys, and this intriguing new theory (which has now come to be more or less accepted) was the newest wrinkle in an old topic.

What Mike’s lunch box was I have no clear memory. I thought it might be Peter Pan, and when I looked it up, I did feel a definite ‘vibe’. It seemed familiar to John as well. As Mike had no sentimental attachment to it, it did not particularly live in memory or reminiscences.

4/15/2018: Got up, wrote a little more 'Unbelievable', up to the part where Mike and I drive away from the Writer's Roundtable. It is odd; I think in a part of my mind, it is always There and Then, whenever I think about the past, as if it were a place that can always be revisited and might be redeemed.

In seeking for a new project, I revived the idea of the first strand, which I had dubbed 'The American Fantasy.' I wrote a first chapter, and my older brother Mike joined me as coach and advisor. Before we could get very far, however, he passed away and I again became bogged down in gloom and inertia. And there it stood for some time.

[In I, Claudius] I saw my brother Mike’s gloomy nature in Tiberias (George Baker), the second Emperor.

[For Halloween] that year I was a pirate, the brittle plastic mask, held on by a rubber elastic string, gripped a knife in its teeth. John (who must have been four or five) was a black cat, and Mike was a devil, if not THE Devil. His mask haunted the spare room closet for quite a while afterwards, probably contributing to the Legend of the Little Hoofer in years to come.

True, family photos from those days are rather scarce on the ground, but there are quite a few of Mike (as firstborn child).

A little planter/pencil holder like this was presented to Mom and Pop around the time of Mike's birth. For years it was a constant presence, either in the kitchen window or on the mirror shelves over the TV. It reads "Congratulations on Your New Little Tax Exemption.”

John called me; he reminded me that yesterday was the 13th anniversary of Mike's passing, and today was the 20th of Mom's. Now I understand all the butterflies. The anniversary of Mike's and Mom's passing is often marked by vast clouds of butterflies (and sometimes dragonflies). Perhaps it's just that time of year, but natural coincidences are often signs, too.

I have now finished Fathers & Sons, a very interesting book; Basarov and his fate remind me a bit of Mike. Poor Basarov!

I decided to finally order the Solzhenitsyn book for a variety of reasons. For one, Mike had always been interested in him since high school, realizing that he was a force in Russian literature, which was one of his areas of special attraction. I remember seeing his copy of The Gulag Archipelago and wondering what it was like. 

Mike supplied me with The Fellowship of the Ring and The Return of the King but could not get The Two Towers until a week later.

And, of course, this was mainly the time that I read The Hobbit, and The Tolkien Reader, and Mike brought me The Lord of the Rings trilogy from high school.

The Seventies was truly the age of cryptozoology, of UFO encounters, of demons and cults. With old certainties being questioned, old uncertainties began to gain more credence - or credulity. Mike, who always had an interest in the sea and ichthyology anyway (Jaws was already big at the time and the mystery and fear of the sea particularly potent) bought this very intriguing mag [about sea monsters] that was of deep interest to us all. 

I may have written (at least parenthetically) about my brother Mike’s obsession with marine biology, no doubt sparked by the impact of the movie Jaws. He came to have an interesting knowledge of the varieties of sharks, their habits and habitats. This extended peripherally to other denizens of the sea, and it seemed for a while that he might pursue the career of a marine biologist. But his growing vocation as a writer kind of pushed that out of the way.

But there was, briefly, in high school, a strange overlap, an idea that he toyed with for a while. This was to be a combination of whales and Watership Down, with a dash of Rudyard Kipling’s The White Seal: a story about a pod of cetaceans (mostly right whales, I think) fleeing the depredations of mankind and seeking a safer sea to swim in. They would encounter dangers and other sea life, from giant squid to orcas. I seem to remember they were joined by a grampus, or something, who envied their ability to dive deep and dreamed of being able to do that himself. A bit of a sub-plot of tragedy and self-sacrifice brewing there.

Anyway, I don’t think he ever wrote anything on it, though he thought and planned and discussed it with us, to the extent of maybe making up sort of whale words to sprinkle in their conversations, like Lapine in Watership Down. He soon abandoned the idea as too fanciful, however, and buckled down to more realistic writing. It would possibly embarrass him now to have it revealed as a step of his writing development, but I rather treasure the anecdote as part of his more juvenile stage, when the fantasy of Beast Fable still held a toehold in his mind.

 We might hold a meeting of the Black Cat Club behind the closed door of the bathroom, with Mike as President enthroned on the toilet while the rest of us lined up on the edge of the tub.

It was also here [our Half Price Books] that we brothers could indulge our growing interests, Mike his Hemingway and Faulkner, John his Bradbury and horror fiction.

[The ornament’s] 'silk' is unraveling a bit and it lost its original little loop to attach the hook. That has been replaced with a yarn bookmark that belonged to Mike, one of his own sentimental Christmas presents, attached with a pushpin.

When I tell any scurrilous tales about my family (I might point to several stories about Mike) it is because I love them for being so them, even when annoying. 

It was the early Eighties, and my first year in college. I had entered a Creative Writing class with Mike, my older brother, and he was far more dedicated than I was.

I remember that at first, I was a pretty enthusiastic vocalist until my tuneless braying moved my brother Mike (who sat next to me) to rebuke me into virtual muteness. I do not blame him (although I totally do) for my continued stunted musical development.

The volume we had when we were kids was 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and that contributed to my older brother Mike's burgeoning ichthyology craze.

The other day, when Susan and I were discussing threatened suicide, and I said it's just something we all did to a greater or lesser degree, Susan said "He's a Babel, and we Babels just hate ourselves." It suddenly struck me, not as a surprising truth of course, but because it must be more than 20 years since I've heard her refer to herself as a Babel. It got me thinking about us and our perception of ourselves as People with a Special Destiny. It reminded me, or made clear to me, that we always have considered ourselves as not like other people. Even our ambitions were unusual: if Mike was to be a writer, he had to be a writer unlike all others; Kenny an actor not on the beaten path; even Susan wants the bourgeois lifestyle with a depth and a difference.

I've started transcribing Mike's work on his early novel, A Stranger and Alone.

JANUARY 13, 1981: Mike found (and rescued) a pregnant Siamese cat. 

 

About Mike ...

Memories of Mike (Extracts from The Niche of Time and Finder’s Keep)

On an impulse (no doubt prompted by my relating the anecdote about Mike and his proposed whale story), I decided to gather ‘every little factoid and reminiscence of Mike from Niche of Time and see what sort of biography it would make.’ I spent over four hours last night doing so, and two hours this morning getting stuff off Finder’s Keep as well, but it could be said to be years in the making. I’ve probably missed some things by sloppy labeling, but I’ve purposefully excluded stories where Mike is more of a peripheral presence and his own writings such as stories and poems and also mere notifications that ‘Mike used to own this book’ if no further anecdotal material is attached. But ‘the result is like viewing a portrait by flashes of lightning or a biography told by the cut-up method.’ Nothing is chronological; large elements of his life (such as his devotion to Hemingway) are only hinted at, but they are recognized. I was surprised how many times I’ve retold how he got me my first copies of The Lord of the Rings and how he helped me write my books before he passed. Just this morning John messaged me: “That sounds like an interesting biographical approach. I’ll be looking forward to that. It struck me this week while trying to process the imminent loss of Scott Adams – it is very similar (to a lesser degree, of course) to losing Mike. That very smart, funny, sometimes annoying but beloved older guy who always has something interesting to say. Damn it.”

 

"Walking around the corner" was a daily ritual when the younger kids kept an eye out for the others (just Mike at first) as they came around Loop Drive from the bus stop.

Mike recorded a special on [Thomas] Jefferson. -1997

On the 20th Mike and I went to the library. The best thing that happened today was Mike and I worked on supper together: chicken fried patties, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans. – February, 1997

On the 21st, about 1 AM at night, Nippy and Rocky got in a fight. Apparently Rocky was still hanging out in the back of the yard when Mike thought he was [penned] in the garage as usual. It's so dark you can't always tell. I was washing dishes, heard the fight, and went to tell Mike, meeting Pop on the way out; he had heard it from his bedroom. He and Mike went out; Rocky had Nippy by the throat. Each grabbed a dog, trying to get them apart. I ran around uselessly trying to find something to hit them apart. At Mike's suggestion Pop hit Rocky in the balls: this made him let go. Mike doctored and stayed up with Nippy for hours till the bleeding stopped. – February, 1997

Art Bell had the author of 5/5/2000 on to talk about upcoming world catastrophes, and Mike and I listened and commented as I washed dishes. – February, 1997

[Poe’s] struggle to make a living by writing reminds me only too much of Mike ... and his quest to find love, and the seeking relief in drink and drugs, and the compromises with the dirty devices of the world, and the constant rejection of what he had to offer. And the weird, vicious humor that animates his writing, not always acknowledged by his readers; Mike shares that too.

From John:  I know what you mean regarding Poe - both in terms of his Mike-ishness and his relative age. I had a dream the other morning with Mike in it- I don't remember any of the details except that he had been trying to get me to go along with some scheme or another and was putting on his full charm offensive.  I decided against it, and immediately his mask fell, and he turned hateful and vindictive - an occurrence that happened more than once for real- and it reminded me of that side of Mike - just a hurtful outrageous selfishness- usually the more nasty activities would bring it out of him.  A complicated, sometimes surprisingly mysterious person.  I guess it is healthier to consider the good and bad in everyone, ourselves included- painful though it can be, and know we are all weak and stupid about certain subjects and fall prey to making dumb mistakes. There would be no need for God's mercy otherwise.

Me: And I know what you mean about Mike. But then the dead all seem mysterious, once they are dead. When they are alive, they appear so obvious. They are what they are, and you think they are plain as pikestaffs, and then you find hints (sometimes from other people who saw other facets of them) that there are hidden corners you never thought to question, or perhaps never dared to, or that perhaps just couldn't be expressed. I suppose we all carry mysteries like that to our graves. … Mike appears in my dreams in pretty dubious and desperate situations, but seldom angry. In fact, in one he seemed rather pleased with my book.

John:  I dream of Mike a lot, a couple of times a week, most weeks- and he arrives in many different moods and modes, sometimes really great, sometimes like the other day's dream.

Today would have been my brother Mike’s 62^nd birthday. Whenever I set out to describe Mike in written words, I am stymied. There is no easy way to sum him up, and I get the feeling he would be angry with me if I even tried. There is no way of getting all of him into one portrait; the subject is just too tremendous, too complicated. Mike was a man of big ambitions, great strength and great weaknesses, big loves, big appetites, big temper, giant humor, giant sorrows, great tenderness, and great talent. I have heard him described as the soul of Lord Byron in the body of John Belushi. I recently asked one of my siblings if they thought Mike might have actually been insane, and they replied, “You’re only wondering that now?”

If you went through this blog and picked out every instance where Mike is mentioned, you might get the impression that Mike was a bully or a guy with an anger problem, and that is a certain aspect of his personality. But he was stronger and smarter than most of his peers, and that made him impatient with physical cowardice or submissive conformity. He was our Imperious Leader, going boldly where no Babel had gone before, and our guide and icebreaker whether it was into a new school or a new job. I know he was most angry with me when my oddity threatened whatever social progress he might have made.

He was a strong man, and nothing breaks harder than a strong man. He had hopes that his writing talents (editor of the school newspaper) and physical prowess (member of the football team) might overcome what he saw as his lack of good looks and social standing and win him the object of his affections (‘I love—and who? ’Tis Fate’s decree I love the fairest—how otherwise?’). Her final rejection after she toyed around with his heart was the first great break. There were other breaks to follow, and desperate measures to patch them up, but it was an uphill climb that wandered into many dead ends and byways. I think he was finally finding a measure of peace and accomplishment (he had recently finished writing a philosophical murder mystery that had helped him untangle some moral and metaphysical knots) when he passed away.

An anecdote: John and I got into Mike’s car soon after his passing and started it up to move it away. To our surprise the tape player was on, and it began to play one of Tom Petty’s latest songs, Wake Up Time. We listened with indescribable feelings, not moving an inch, to what seemed an eerily applicable final eulogy and call for our brother. “You spend your life dreaming, running 'round in a trance, you hang out forever and still miss the dance … Yeah, you were so cool back in high school, what happened? …You're just a poor boy, alone in this world … You’re just a poor boy, a long way from home … And it’s wake up time. Time for you to open up your eyes. And rise. And shine.” It may have been just a coincidence, but it shook me to the core.

Have I come any closer to explaining the enigma of my brother Mike? Hardly. In its incompleteness, this essay might well count for my Friday Fiction. I show a few pictures of me and Mike because the Mike I am describing is part of my Mike: I’m sure anyone else who knew him could tell many a different tale.  His boundless love for his nieces, his deep affection for his dogs, his complicated relationships with our parents, his uncanny marksmanship, his bizarre and sporadic talent for drawing, his occasional threats of suicide, his weird bid to be an internet cult leader … these are all aspects that would require infinite nuancing and are certainly beyond my power to adequately analyze. What can I say? I love the guy, and I don’t think I’ll ever get to the bottom of him.

Mike moved back into the house with me and Pop. By that time, I had a new computer and, in an effort to perhaps at last sell my book, Mike helped me to transcribe and polish the chapters, he being an editor of no mean talent and skill. We spent many hours with me reading the manuscript out loud to him and he tapping it out, making suggestions as we went along, until at last Elf & Bear stood whole and done. I made a paper copy and a thumb drive, and there it was at last, safe and sound. While we were trying to figure how and where to shop it around, I actually began the first chapter of “American Fantasy”, with Mike providing several ideas and notes on how it might proceed.

I partially moved into Susan’s guest house to help watch the kids and to cook for them, while Mike stayed at Loop Drive to care for things and struggle along with his job until something could be done about the water. Then Mike suddenly died, just short of two years after Pop, and without his impetus to help me publish, Elf & Bear as a project went into eclipse, and there it remains.

[In The Calf] I figure Mike was trying to process his complicated feelings about Pop, our father's fatalism and his discouraging outlook on life, his lack of vision or any interest in his children's future. Pop had made his own way in life and expected us to do the same. He had to actually struggle against his own father and had no other pattern to measure fatherhood against. Mike was desperately trying to come to terms with him, to some understanding. I wonder what both of their lives would have been like if they could have come to some sort of peace earlier. 

MAY 30, 1981: Went to the coast with Mike, John, and Phil. Swam, ate Snickers, listened to music [Beatles], ate at Mrs. Pete's, got souvenirs. Our visit to the coast was the only celebration of graduation I had. Phil, although of my year, was Mike's best friend. I remember we listened to the Beatles (a huge obsession with Mike, John, and Phil) mainly because some passing tools mocked us by chanting "I wanna hold your hand!" We answered, in chorus, "We wanna kick your ass!" Mrs. Pete's was a beach tradition. – 1981

The World of Star Trek and “The Trouble with Tribbles”, By David Gerrold. The second wave of Star Trek fandom hit us in grade school as the reruns began, and the mania hit us hard. Playings, MEGO dolls, and Mike got these books, examinations of the phenomenon by David Gerrold, who wrote the classic episode about Tribbles. Had photos and in the “Trouble” one, cartoons. When Mike moved on [from the franchise], they fell to me as conservator.

"Star Trek" began to be re-run when I was in 4th Grade, and it pretty much swept the school. I remember it was especially "a thing" with Mike and his friends, but it was just as big in our family as well. We bought Star Trek MEGO action figures to join our Planet of the Apes MEGOs. Mike got the first Star Trek Concordance with its special cover that had a wheel in it that you could turn to find when each episode debuted and its star date. That book disappeared, somehow; whether it was lost or whether Mike traded it or secretly gave it away, I do not know.

One day we were all sitting around in the living room, talking, and the subject turned to how we would like our funeral to be held when the time came.

Mike came up with something like this:

“When I die, I want my head cut off and my body cooked on the old barbecue grill, then served up to the whole family with sauce, potato salad, and all the fixings. Afterward, I want them to play a game of soccer with my head, and afterwards the bloody, bruised, dirty thing placed on top of the TV set, for all to forever see and remember me.”

Mom recoiled in disgust.

“I don’t want a filthy thing like that on my TV!”

Mike replied indignantly:

“Woman! Have you no respect for the dead?”

Mike’s and my [Christmas stockings] were decorated with glinting Santa Claus sequin appliques (with other smaller festive items).

[John and I] had a good but short talk; the most unusual fact was that Kenny told him that Berta, Mike’s old girlfriend, had contacted him and, after talking, was sending him letters, poems, and stories that Mike had given her, and that she was sorry about Mike’s passing.

Weekday dressing was pretty casual, usually a pullover shirt and a pair of shorts.  Our clothes were kept in a little green dresser.  Mike and I shared the top drawer, John and Kenny the next, and the bottom was for Sunday shoes and belts.

Today would have been my brother Mike's 59th birthday. This is a little collage I made with my computer in the early 2000's; the paper I printed it on got water damaged at one point. There is so much I want to say about him. There is so much I would like to say to him. When he passed away, he had just completed a large novel and was on the point of trying to get it published. Finances and other circumstances made that difficult; it was before the boom in electronic publishing became big and made sending your work over the internet easy. There is so much that could be told about him. This is part of the bare-bones obituary I wrote at the time:

Michael Wayne Babel was born Feb. 9, 1962, the first son of E.E. ("Buddy") and Patricia Babel. He graduated from Seguin High School in 1980 and attended Southwest Texas State University from 1980 to 1984.

A dedicated reader, writer, and editor of great skill, he was twice winner of the Gates Thomas Award for prose writing. In his time, he worked at KWED in Seguin, KGNB in New Braunfels, and at the Seguin Gazette-Enterprise, but perhaps enjoyed his work as a substitute teacher in the Seguin area best. His most recent job was at River Gardens in New Braunfels. He passed away at home on Oct. 21, 2006. 

He was a beloved uncle, brother and friend; a great wit, a scholar, and a deeply loving heart.

(End Part One) 

I've a Whale of a Tale to Tell Ye, Lads

I may have written (at least parenthetically) about my brother Mike’s obsession with marine biology, no doubt sparked by the impact of the movie Jaws. He came to have an interesting knowledge of the varieties of sharks, their habits and habitats. This extended peripherally to other denizens of the sea, and it seemed for a while that he might pursue the career of a marine biologist. But his growing vocation as a writer kind of pushed that out of the way.

But there was, briefly, in high school, a strange overlap, an idea that he toyed with for a while. This was to be a combination of whales and Watership Down, with a dash of Rudyard Kipling’s The White Seal: a story about a pod of cetaceans (mostly right whales, I think) fleeing the depredations of mankind and seeking a safer sea to swim in. They would encounter dangers and other sea life, from giant squid to orcas. I seem to remember they were joined by a grampus, or something, who envied their ability to dive deep and dreamed of being able to do that himself. A bit of a sub-plot of tragedy and self-sacrifice brewing there.

Anyway, I don’t think he ever wrote anything on it, though he thought and planned and discussed it with us, to the extent of maybe making up sort of whale words to sprinkle in their conversations, like Lapine in Watership Down. He soon abandoned the idea as too fanciful, however, and buckled down to more realistic writing. It would possibly embarrass him now to have it revealed as a step of his writing development, but I rather treasure the anecdote as part of his more juvenile stage, when the fantasy of Beast Fable still held a toehold in his mind.

A True Tale of My Brother Mike

One day we were all sitting around in the living room, talking, and the subject turned to how we would like our funeral to be held when the time came.

Mike came up with something like this:

“When I die, I want my head cut off and my body cooked on the old barbecue grill, then served up to the whole family with sauce, potato salad, and all the fixings. Afterward, I want them to play a game of soccer with my head, and afterwards the bloody, bruised, dirty thing placed on top of the TV set, for all to forever see and remember me.”

Mom recoiled in disgust.

“I don’t want a filthy thing like that on my TV!”

Mike replied indignantly:

“Woman! Have you no respect for the dead?”