So my dad got in touch with me for the first time in 10 years the other day. I was checking my email before work and saw one titled 'Father to Daughter', I couldn't read any more before I had to go, which was probably for the best because I couldn't afford the distraction. When I finally read it, I didn't react the way I thought I would. I thought I would be angry, but I wasn't. I didn't feel anything.

I was a little happy to read his profile, and see his favourite things. His picture surprised me, he's gotten so old... When I saw a book I didn't recognize I googled it and read the synopsis, then it all clicked. It was a book about being different, and transcendence. I knew his letter wasn't really an apology, he was looking for a way to get rid of his guilt without acknowledging that he'd done something wrong. I don't think he feels guilty at all, even if he knows he's done wrong.

So I won't be writing back. I wish he had never contacted me in the first place, he belongs in the past; better if he'd never happened at all.

What's eating John Steinbeck?

How screwed up can one guy be? Flipping through the reviews, it's always the same; people say what a great writer he is but barely mention his darker side. Personally, I think he's masogynistic. His women are cheats, control freaks, or isolated into an island within themselves. He shows such contempt for the cheating wife in his short story 'The Murder', that she's whipped raw and is then happily cooking breakfast for her husband in penance (even though he's been spending his nights as what I presume is a whorehouse). In another short story, 'The Harness', a husband is kept under the thumb of a controlling wife except once a year when he goes out to get drunk and go whoring for a week. She's the villain because she forces him to live a life he doesn't want to, but when he's left on his own he's self destructive to an extreme; drinking himself stupid, whoring every night, and gambling with everything he's got on unpredictable crops. If a woman did that she'd be written off as damn silly.

A lot of times I think he's battling sexism, racism, etc etc and then I think he's guilty of it himself. He's supposed to be a part of this major upheaval of modern thinking, out with the old and in the new and radical. But then he does something so god damn backwards I don't know what to say. In Cannery Row, his main character picks up a hitchhiker who proceeds to tell him off for drinking and driving. The point is supposed to be about personal freedom (guessing) because he pulls over and chases the guy away. How dare this upstart hitchhiker tell him what to do when he offered the guy a lift? Well, surprise surprise you can't drink drive any more, not because it's an infringement of your rights but because it's damn stupid and dangerous for everyone. And it's no more acceptable to beat women, cheat on your wife, or bum around and expect a woman to put up with it. In Pastures of Heaven, the guy gets married, dumps his job (or possibly the other way around) and then just does nothing. It's supposed to be inspirational, this guy gives up everything to lead a carefree life, just like the bums of Cannery Row. Like hippy communes, it sounds great in theory, but the practical side isn't so great. I suppose if he were just doing this to himself I couldn't argue no matter how self destructive he was, but there's always an attachment: a wife, a child, someone who will depend on him that he abandons. And I get that sense from him, that somehow he was abandoned and at the same time restrained. He must have gone ape shit crazy when he got out on his own, I'm guessing his home life was a mess.

At a guess I'll say he's got mother issues, although there may have been later problems with girlfriends, etc. He was married 3 times, surprise surprise. It amazes me that someone so screwed up can write so openly; people with issues usually try to justify or cover it up, which makes me wonder if he was aware of being screwed up or if he thought this was normal. Can't wait to read his biography...