Patterson - Bermuda Shorts

Lovers of the personal essay should be rejoicing in the streets at the publication of Bermuda Shorts. Whether hes writing on politics, culture, sports, or the arts, James J. Pattersons work is full of an endangered resource - the magnificent, apparently inexhaustible fund of sheer energy that springs from every page. This is a tour de force performance by an immensely talented, engaging, and brilliant writer.

Rick Walter

Bermuda Shorts are, literally, a pair of pants. Not the colorful, lively printed trunks you associate with Hawaiian style beachwear, but a pair of slacks, just shorter, what one might call casual formal wear.

Bermuda Shorts is the perfect metaphor for James J. Pattersons fundamentally serious but playful literary style. And this casual approach to serious issues is what makes this writer so accessible. His advice for the lovelorn? Stay out of The Conjecture Chamber. What should we call mankinds sad inclination to destroy that which is beautiful? Beauticide. What has happened to American Culture? It suffers from Theater-Phobia. How to solve the worlds toxic waste and nuclear contamination problems? Throw it all at the sun!

Patterson writes like the lovechild of Henry Miller and Mary Karr, with all the contradictions that implies; a philosopher who thinks best over a fine bottle of wine; an ex-Catholic still haunted by the image of the crucifixion; an irreverent political satirist whose patriotism flies the flag of another iconoclast, Thomas Paine.

This isnt romance. Its a way of looking at the world

JJP

W hat is he looking at? It was a question lingering on the brain in nearly every editorial meeting for the late, great SportsFan Magazinea D.C.-based periodical that combined staunch sports fan advocacy with sublimely ridiculous sports coverage, symbolized by a logo that literally gave the reader a thumbs-in-the-ears, fingers-in-the-air raspberry.

The editorial staffers would sit in chairs of varying degrees of comfort, meeting agendas in our hands and earnest attempts to follow them in our hearts. James J. Patterson would be seated at the right hand of the Sonny Jurgensen photograph on the back wall of his cluttered office, behind an ancient desk whose surface was stacked with notions and whose drawers were jammed with reveries.

The meeting would go as planned: Story concepts thrown at the wall, cover stories suggested and then spiked, malleable deadlines established. Jimmy would participate as warranted, but he already had the next edition laid out in his mind before the meeting even begansomething that allowed him time to pursue other interests as we yammered away.

Seriously, what is he looking at?

It could have been a computer screen filled with the vital political news of the day, or a just-discovered website that labeled particular geneses of flatulence.

It could have been an essay on Gods place in the modern world, or liner notes to Blood on the Tracks. (Jimmy would argue theyre one and the same.)

He could have been glancing out the window, wondering how much longer a suburban Maryland town would need a vacuum cleaner repair shop, or checking out the business end of a blonde scurrying inside the line of the crosswalk on her lunch break.

What was he looking at? Life. Love. Liberty. Libations. The lighthearted and the ludicrous, the lewd and the lamentable. Hed witnessed so much, consumed so much, that his mind couldnt help but race to the next search for lifes fragile truths, or the next brief clarification of its mysteries.

His findings and philosophies, collected in these works, echo the words his band heard from countless radio program directors during their time making subversive politically incorrect (but surprisingly catchy) ditties: Theres no category for you guys.

This collection blissfully defies classification, which is a tribute to its impact and its scope. Vivid characters from his past teach him, guide him, frighten him, and entertain him, while doing the same for us. Its an expedition through temples of the mind to temples of worship, blurring the boundaries of both when parrying with a friends curious intellect about concepts of faith.

Hes got faith in his own concepts, too. Beauticide, or the unwavering urge for humans to destroy things that are beautiful. The Conjecture Chamber, where dread and insecurities cloud rational thought after the loss of a compatriot. Becoming the unelected mayor of an upper deck section in a sports arena. Hurling all the toxic and destructive materials man creates into the smoldering center of our universe, turning the sun into a kind of cosmic incinerator. An idealistic world where, he writes, boredom and cynicism are not mainstream expressions of cultural futility.

Bermuda Shorts is where nostalgia, art, humor, and perennial skepticism combine in a search for meaning, where philosophy can be found kneeling in front of a haunted crucifix, amongst the vibrating stands in a temple of sports, or in a prolonged tte--tte over a bottle of Wild Turkey 101 on a road trip.

Its about life: the whimsy of it, the losses that come with it, and the dutiful journey through it.

Its what James J. Patterson has been looking at; its a vision that deserves to be shared.

Greg Wyshynski is the editor of Puck Daddy, a Yahoo! Sports hockey blog, and the author of Glow Pucks & 10-Cent Beer: The 101 Worst Ideas in Sports History.