Kill Two Birds & Get Stoned by Kinky Friedman

thing I never knew about you," I said. "How long has this been going on behind my back?"
    "Always," she said. "At least as long as I can remember. I've never believed in eating anything that has a face or anything that had a mother."
    I looked at her again and it was almost like seeing her for the first time. What a strange and beautiful sentiment, I thought, from such a reckless, fun-loving person.
    "Nothing with a face," I said, "and nothing with a mother. Maybe I'll try that myself sometime."
    "You will when you're ready," she said. "And I think you're almost ready."
    The truth was, I was almost ready to jump her beautiful, sensitive, vegetarian bones right there on the sidewalk. The truth was, I was thinking of becoming a vegetarian myself by having oral sex with a vegetarian named Clyde. I almost said something, but I didn't think it would go down very well, pardon the expression. I was actually quite pleased with that clever little turn of phrase and I took out the small notepad that I'd started to carry around with me. I scribbled some notes to myself rather furiously for a few moments while Clyde wandered off to engage in a conversation with a small Chinese boy carrying a little Italian flag. Maybe the cultures had begun to meet, I thought.
    When Clyde came back, she looked almost somber. I put the notebook away and took both her hands in both of mine. Suddenly I was looking into the eyes of a stranger. Just when you think you're getting to know someone, they turn into somebody else.
    "Don't write the book," she said.
    I was totally floored. Somewhere in the back of my alcoholic memory, a dark thought flashed. I had spent so many years keeping my ideas to myself. Keeping so many pages to myself for so many years. Not speaking my thoughts to others. Not sharing life with others. I couldn't believe she was telling me this.
    "I can't believe you're telling me this," I exclaimed. "You're the reason I'm writing the bloody book. You and Fox. Because of you, I have a story. A tale to tell. Characters. Real flesh-and-blood characters. And finally, after all this time, I have a desire to write. A need to write. My life was so empty and meaningless, I couldn't even have told this to anyone before. For God's sake, you're my fucking muse!"
    "That's sweet, Walter," she said. I was starting not to like it so much when she called me Walter. Like Van Gogh, I wanted Sunshine.
    "It's not sweet," I said. "It's true. I wouldn't be writing the book if it weren't for you. First you encourage my writing and all of a sudden you tell me not to write. Make up your mind, Clyde. Which is it going to be?"
    "Little Italy," she said.
    We had a quiet lunch in Little Italy at a place called Luna's.
    Clyde had some pasta and some minestrone soup. I had linguini with red clam sauce and meatballs, a bad start for my career as a vegetarian. I commented on it and Clyde responded, indirectly, as usual, yet somehow right to the point.
    "If you go ahead and write the book—”
    "I am."
    "—then I don't really mind your writing about the fact that I don't eat anything with a face or a mother. I just don't know about the other thing you're thinking of putting in there."
    "What other thing?"
    "The bit you scribbled down while I was talking to the little boy with the flag. It's funny, I guess, in a crude sort of way, and it might even come true if you play your cards right, but don't you think eating a vegetarian is a little bit trite?"
    Two things were suddenly in play here and, like any true novelist, I completely missed the second and far more important one, the one that wasn't about me. My work hadn't even been written yet and here it was already being criticized. And not just criticized, but being called the mother of all words that authors hate: "trite." Ho-hum, lackluster, predictable, pedestrian, all those we can deal with. But there's no author alive who doesn't bristle when he hears the word "trite." Any author worth his salt would far rather be