Spotlight On Writers
Craig R Kirchner
- Where do you originate from?
Three quarters of a century ago I was born in Baltimore, Maryland.
My father was of German descent and an electrician. My mother was German Irish, and her father was George K.O. Chaney, a famous lightweight prize fighter in the 1920’s. I was raised in a rowhouse neighborhood across from Herring Run Park which became a second home. I spent puberty and high school years, learning to write, attempting to understand poetry, and hanging on a drugstore corner. Northeast Baltimore had a large population of baby boomer guys. The group that hung at Cermaks were tight, developed a culture, and many are still good friends and get together often sixty years later.
- What do you cherish most about the place you call home?
I have lived in Baltimore, Houston, Jacksonville and Newark, De., in ten different homes, apartments and now in a condo. The accommodations have always been fine, appropriate, and important, but they aren’t cherished. I cherish the people I share these with and what I’m doing with myself to develop myself and these relationships. I raised two sons. There was a point in time when they were teens, we had a four-bedroom house that a girlfriend, a best friend, two dogs (one saved from the streets as a puppy) and a cat were all under one roof. It was great. I’ve lived for the past fifty-two years with my soulmate, Dee, which is who I cherish, and makes it home.
- What ignites your creativity?
I have been attempting to write meaningful words since high school. Early on I would have answered that ‘falling in love’ is what inspires me. Understanding that with youthful exuberance you can fall in love with any new thing or any person you meet, and for many different reasons. I find myself writing to clarify some of those moments and to reflect on the journey that got me to where I am now; being awed by the totality of it all, and what a small and yet intricate part we play. I enjoy trying to put all that into context and make the moments as real as possible for the reader.
- Do you have a favorite word and could you incorporate it into a poetic phrase?
I like spontaneous, spontaneously, spontaneity. I like all that it implies and even when its ugly or wrong, there is the honesty of it. I have two lines I have written that I like a lot.
“Watching pleasure, mouthing pleasure, knowing the play was us, the season was short, running head-on, spontaneously, through leaves of contempt, from eyes that have no autumn.”
“The end of his journey will be the subtlest of epiphanies – those small spontaneous glimpses, a nod from a stranger, moments of touch, words of awe, are the wisdom.”
I do not remember the class or the context, but a teacher in high school said there is no such thing as ‘spontaneous generation’ – and I am still thinking about that phrase.
- What is your pet peeve?
I like to think that I don’t sweat the small stuff, and in this era of crassness and truth bending it is hard to be bothered by anything else. I spent the last ten years of my work career as a sales and retail consultant and so inept sales efforts and rude salespeople tend to set me off. My pet disgust is that there are children dying and neglected, because of tyrants, bigotry, stupidity and immorality and we as Americans seem to be normalizing it. I am enthused lately with people in the streets of so many cities and towns protesting idiocy.
- How would you describe the essence of Craig R Kirchner?
If essence is the fundamental element of character, like many I would like to think mine is an empathetic desire to understand life. What are we doing here, how did all this happen, where does it go? When I meet someone, I don’t care what car they drive, what their pronouns are or how they part their hair. I want to know what they think about, how they think about it, and can they express that in a conversation with me. Are they willing to share? I try to give everything and everyone I connect with that initial opportunity to connect.
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