Did you always want to be a writer— How old were you when you decided that you wanted to do it? JC I don't know I was probably about 12 or 13. I remember thinking that once I wrote something on the page that it would always be there and I was somehow fascinated by the idea that if you wrote it and told the story it would always be preserved. It would be like a snapshot. Yes at a young age, I was bitten by the literary bug, for better or for worse. I did it for the sheer craft and joy, and as you know the older you get you have to see things through the business lens. But I don't ever remember wanting to be anything else.
Never wanted to be an astronaut huh? No, but now I want to be a weatherman be- cause you never have to be right. I should have been a weatherman probably. It didn’t rain today, so sue me. (Laughs)
That’s right, you would have been a good one. I would have been a good one.
I think that every weather man should drink a few adult beverages before he goes on the air It would make it much more interesting. Yeah, ‘cause some of that language man, I studied that in high school and I almost went down that slippery slope as a Meteorologist myself, cause I was so fascinated for a while. Then I got to thinking, what is the most bor- ing thing I could ever watch on television, Oh yeah, the News and Weather.
Every good writer I find is also 9.9 times out of 10 is also an avid reader, I’m sure you are, I know for a fact you are. Absolutely.
Who are some your favorite authors also tie in any of said authors you feel
have influenced you as a writer. Well, I would say that is a long list. I would say, Stanley Booth, Cormac McCarthy, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Harry Crews, Sam Shepard who just recently passed as we all know.
Yeah, Yesterday. Those were, I know I am leaving someone out, but those were sorta my, I read all of that stuff. Jack Kerouac was a huge influence at one point. I would say those guys were al- ways at the top of the list
So you had a lot of southern author in- fluence for sure. Yeah. I mean, I really like John Steinbeck. . . the southern writers for some reason I identi- fied with, like Larry Brown, he was another one.
Oh my gosh, yes. The characters were more familiar and every- thing resonated with me on that level of the social backdrop of the south, and that was in- fluential. It is really something else to know that where you are from is only 50 miles from where Harry Crews grew up and the Okefeno- kee swamp is 40 miles away, so it was that was influential.
Of course. It inspired me to raise the bar and to try to beat the clock. If you gonna set the world record at the mile you obviously have to beat the guy next to you, but you have to beat the clock. The world record is this time, and you have to do it. So that is sorta how I always op-
erated.There’s a lot of great stuff one needs to read to learn how to do it.
Now, you've done all different types of writing, we know that, but one I've seen you do time and time again, not only interviews, but reviews of albums and reviews of shows, reviews in gen-
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