In a small osteopathic hospital in the southeast corner of North Park, Washington, a young woman screamed in agony as labor pains tore through her tender body. This was the third day and still the baby seemed reluctant to issue forth unto the world. In a less auspicious time, this birth might have gone unnoticed, but strange and unbelievable things were afoot in the far reaches of the cosmos and creatures, both real and imagined, were taking note of the spirit that was to impart its being on the small human form waiting patiently in his mother's womb for the right moment to appear unto the world.
At half past the hour before midnight, all of the meetings, plans, directives, and ministrations came to fruition as a boy child slipped out of that bloody enclosure and presented himself to the medical staff assemble for his delivering. He was small, yet quite robust. The tiny nubbin of his male identity foretold of an ambiguous identity far in distant future possibilities. His clear tenor voice, though, was most auspicious as he stated quite clearly, "It was quite nice in there. Can't I go back?"
The doctor was undeterred and promptly slapped the baby's behind eliciting a scream heard throughout the building.
And so, the boy who was to become Carl Holiday came into existence.
He was destined to be an only child, siblingless, alone in the bedroom, unable to blame little brother, or sister, for some disaster of his causing, and unable to look into the future to a time when nieces and nephews might huddle around the Christmas at Grandma and Grandpa's little hovel in the forest.
Carl grew up in a nondescript neighborhood south of Mallard Lake. He attended Mallard Lake Elementary, Bruce Bigedic Junior High, and North Park High School. At an early age he knew he had the spark of creativity within his soul, but was completely unaware of how to control it, how to express it, or how to go about learning how to focus creative energy in a meaningful way.
Art was, well, let's just say Carl had no artistic talents that were going anywhere. He could do art, but his projects were always grandiose and absurd. They were hardly ever completed and, if they were, they were marked by a complex simplicity anyone could see was simply crap.
Music had its possibilities; except for two small problems. Carl had no voice. No melodic tones rang from his lips. Worst of all, though, Carl had a poor sense of rhythm. He couldn't keep the beat, it alluded him, it snuck away little by little until he was horribly off. He wanted to play the baritone horn. It was big, noticeable, and obviously grandiose. His parents decided Carl should play the alto saxophone. It was after all a vital component of the Glen Miller Sound they remembered and they dreamt of a time when Carl would join the ranks of great big band jazz saxophonists. It became evident very early in Carl's musical training that Carl could no innovate on a theme. He would never play jazz.
Yet, the muse was there. She kept poking Carl, whispering in his ear, and promising him all the riches in heaven if he would only pay a tiny bit of attention.
In 1986, at the age of 36, Carl met Agnes Rutherford, Professor Emeritus, BA, MA, MFA, PhD, DDL; a distant cousin of the Fargo Rutherfords, but raised, unfortunately, by eccentric aunt across the river in Minnesota; cited, but not printed, in the 1953 Best American Short Stories; and, the roommate in college of a girl who was rumored to have been fucked by Hemingway, or at least she claimed to have been when a little tipsy from too much cheap lager. Although Professor Rutherford died barely a year after their first meeting, she would always be remembered as the person who had the greatest impact on his life, for she recognized Carl had the talent to string a few words together in such a unique way as to entertain another human being. Carl had found his muse.
Needless to say, at least ninety-six percent of the preceding is pure balderdash.