This week, we’re talking about influences. Find out our earliest influences–and what/who later influenced us to write. Discover our strangest influences, and what influences changed as we got older. We take a detour and discuss creating under the influence of alcohol and drugs. It’s easy to think about people and things that influence us, but we take time out to acknowledge that we all have the ability to influence others. Christopher shares a great story about somebody he influenced without ever knowing. And because not all influences are good, we talk about negative influences. Finally, we wrap up with our most recent influences.
As always, we’d love to know what has influenced you over the years; leave a comment and we’ll reply!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
As a kid, I was notorious for not doing my school assignments. Most of them just didn’t interest me. One day in elementary school, I complained to my friend about the assignment we had to do in class. He turned to me and said, “Just do it, and it will be done.” To me, that was a revelation! I did the assignment, and it was done. After that, I didn’t always “just do” assignments, BUT I did do some in each grade, enough to graduate. I suspect I never would’ve finished anything in my life had it not been for him. So thank you, What’s-His-Name. 🙂
Growing up, I was the shy, awkward loner, and I didn’t have a lot of friends. I also came from a dysfunctional family. My teachers, for the most part, were jerks. So books and magazines probably influenced me more than people. I was constantly reading my mother’s freaky psychotropic-influenced hippie books and magazines, and my grandmother’s “scandal sheets” (National Enquirer, Globe Magazine, etc.) TRHPS was transformative (I’ve lost count). I was “Columbia” with short red hair. 🙂 In high school, I was all about Boy George and Adam Ant. Even those I was reclusive, I was drawn to the outlandish. I’d sneak out of my room past my bedtime to watch “The Young Ones” on MTV. I *had* to watch it. In college I was transfixed by MTVs “Liquid Television.”
More recently I see I’m influenced by those 1950s campy monster movies and the like. Not “Citizen Kane.” Not even “2000: A Space Odyssey.” More like “The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra.”
CMS: The “just do it and it will be done,” advice is good. Sadly, I just accepted that homework was this thing I didn’t let creep into my life. Once I realized trying to remain invisible was silly and just saying, “I didn’t do my homework,” — wasn’t a big thing, it got easier to just not care. Not good advice 🙂
I find it interesting how many of the most intelligent people I know weren’t very impressed with their teachers. I had a few who were an influence, but outside of one old-guard English teacher (whom I didn’t always agree with), I can’t say anyone affected me until college. And even there, it was just a couple professors.
Like you, the Whole Earth Catalog and and some other counter-culture stuff in our home fascinated me. To this day, I would love to dig a house into a hill and be totally off the grid.
Music. We didn’t talk about it too much in the podcast, and music is a huge thing for Shawn and me. Adam Ant…yep! I knew I would never be remotely that cool, but DEVO gave me hope! The stories Rush told in their songs…even Iron Maiden doing the same thing…I probably wouldn’t be writing were it not for linking things like Rush’s “Xanadu” with Iron Maiden’s “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” and becoming a Coleridge geek. And then having that old-guard English teacher to show me so much more.
And aside: years after high school, I saw the old teacher in a grocery store when I was in college. We joked that she knew Old English and Beowulf so well because she was there when it was written! She didn’t remember me when I saw her in line and said hello. But true to her nature, she said, “Were you one who liked me, or were you one who hated me?” I told her I would never have a better teacher and she smiled and apologized again for not remembering me.
Even as an English major in a decent college, all my professors combined could not have stood up to Dr. Gladys Rios.
In grade school I was a chronic homework ignorer, even under threat of paddling by the principal. Day after day I’d get sent to his office for not doing my homework, and day after day he’d calmly tell me if I skipped my homework *just one more time* he would paddle me. It got to the point where he’d pretend not to see me sitting in his office. He never did paddle me.
I was and am a huge DEVO fan, but in high school, I wasn’t a full-on geek yet. More like a dork. lol DEVO was full-on geek, something beyond human, and I wasn’t fully (d)evolved. So they were more of a lofty aspiration that an outright influence. I’d watch their videos and get chills (the good kind). In college and after I was into The Smiths, The Cure, XTC, and R.E.M.
Most music today sucks. And these damn kids are on my lawn again! 😉
Yay! We all like DEVO!
I had a few really good teachers in high school, but even in college, most of them were just there for a paycheck. For the year or so that I taught high school, I attempted to be different. None of my former students has climbed a clock tower yet, so I’m counting that as a win. 😉