A cluttered thought

Dick Hickock and Perry Smith,
the murderers of the Clutter
family and stars of "In Cold Blood"

The Clutter family before anyone
knew their names

Yesterday I met a man whose father knew the Clutters. That probably means nothing to you, unless you happened to have read the book that has turned out to by my favorite I've read all summer.

The Clutters were a family murdered for a handful of change in their farmhouse in Holcombe near Kansas City. Truman Copote--whose name is more famous among my generation for the title of a movie starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman than for his successful writing career--followed the case for six years and compiled what he called a "nonfiction novel" called "In Cold Blood." I had just finished the book the day before while lying on my bed covering my ears from Elle hurrying me up--she wanted to talk about Hawaii. (The last two pages of a book are crucial to your overall feeling of it. Don't let people ruin it for you.) Not only had "In Cold Blood" made me cry two distinct times, but I didn't exactly stop thinking about it since I had picked it up.

The next day, yesterday, I was ringing someone up while asking a fellow employee what he was reading. I like to try and include customers into the conversation, otherwise they get huffy and puffy about standing around as if in my living room while I completely ignore them and talk to the more amiable people in my life: the baggers. So I asked the middle-aged man in front of me, "Are you reading anything right now?" To which he said "no" but reciprocated the question.

"Yes, I just finished 'In Cold Blood' now I'm reading 'Wuthering Heights.' Have you read 'In Cold Blood'?" I asked.

"Yeah, I have. I was good."

"I loved it."

"My dad lived in Kansas City."

"What? Really? That's crazy!"

"Yeah and he knew the, what was their name? The people who got killed. The Clutters."

"He knew the Clutters."

"Yeah."

"Your dad knew the Clutters, Herb Clutter?"

"Yeah."

I was shocked and he acted like it was completely normal. Now, he most definitely could have been blowing smoke up my ass because, let's face it, some real freaks come into that store. (Just today a man named Hector came in, shook his hips, and sang a few bars to me and two other girls then carried on to do his shopping.) But I chose to believe he was telling the truth.

If you still can't understand what a big deal this was to me, imagine this. You just finished reading "The Fountainhead" by Ayn Rand. It took up most of your time and now it's all you think about. You are recommending the book to everyone. Then you recommend it to one more person and that person tells you, "Oh yeah, my mom went to school with Howard Roark and was neighbors with Dominique Francon." Or, let's see if you need a more pliable situation. You just finish the "Twilight" series and someone tells you his uncle knows Edward Cullen. Wouldn't that blow your mind?

The most disheartening moment when reading a book is knowing you can never meet the characters. I guess it's a little different when the story is true.