That was the trouble with being a writer, that was the main troubleโleisure time, excessive leisure time. You had to wait around for the buildup until you could write and while you were waiting you went crazy, and while you were going crazy you drank and the more you drank the crazier you got.
Charles BukowskiIt was too much. The comfortable people made comfortable jokes about weather and things but I sat mostly silent saying a word or so when necessary a word or so trying to hide from them the fact that I was a fool and feeling terrible And I was numb, numb again, numb again again and again, numbness and pain swelling in me.
Charles BukowskiThey have no idea that it can be done by a bus driver, a field hand, or a fry cook. They have no idea where it comes from. It comes from pain, damnation and impossibility. The blow to the soul of the gut. It comes from getting burned and seared and slugged. It comes from...new and awful places and the same old places.
Charles BukowskiThis is a world where everybodyโs gotta do something. Ya know, somebody laid down this rule that everybodyโs gotta do something, they gotta be something. You know, a dentist, a glider pilot, a narc, a janitor, a preacher, all that . . . Sometimes I just get tired of thinking of all the things that I donโt wanna do. All the things that I donโt wanna be. Places I donโt wanna go, like India, like getting my teeth cleaned. Save the whale, all that, I donโt understand that . . .
Charles BukowskiThe trouble with these people is that their cities have never been bombed and their mothers have never been told to shut up.
Charles BukowskiI was naturally a loner, content just to live with a woman, eat with her, sleep with her, walk down the street with her. I didn't want conversation, or to go anywhere except the racetrack or the boxing matches. I didn't understand t.v. I felt foolish paying money to go into a movie theatre and sit with other people to share their emotions. Parties sickened me. I hated the game-playing, the dirty play, the flirting, the amateur drunks, the bores.
Charles Bukowski