[Listen]
[Intro music plays]
[Woman’s Voice]
This is Behind the Cut with Christopher Gronlund. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.
[Music fades out]
Christopher Gronlund:
Behind the Cut is an in-depth look at the latest episode of Not About Lumberjacks and likely contains spoilers of the most recent story. You’ve been warned…”
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Early in the latest Not About Lumberjacks story, “Tin-Hearted Man,” a character recalls watching a fight between the protagonist and six strangers in a bar. By the time the storyteller squares up to help, the fight is over—the protagonist having destroyed six men with little effort.
While I’m a very peaceful person, violence features prominently in many Not About Lumberjacks stories (almost half of them, in fact). Some of it makes sense—tales about bullying are pulled from personal experiences of being picked on when I was younger. But I’m not sure why other violence, particularly stories featuring toxic masculinity, feature in many Not About Lumberjacks stories.
So, I gave it some thought…
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My father was a very violent man, despite how loving he was to my sister, half-sister, step-brother, and me. He never raised a hand (or even his voice) to us, but he did try shooting a guy in the face during a road rage incident! (Fortunately, the guy only suffered powder burns from the shot.) Another time, he returned home late. My step-brother and I heard tapping on the window at the back door. It was my dad. He handed us a wet work shirt and told us to put it in a bucket out back. The shirt was drenched in blood. Turns out, in another road rage incident—this one with two guys—my father’s head was split from just above his left eyebrow, all the way back to the base of his skull, by a tire iron.
My father loved boxing and reveled in seeing crushing football tackles. Bench-clearing hockey fights were reason to watch the game. He once planned to take me to a dog fight, and when I protested, he figured maybe starting smaller—with cock fighting—was a good idea. (He was also let down that I refused to attend that as well.)
I can’t tell you how many times, while driving with him, he got into screaming matches with others…with me in the middle!
Sharing these stories, my father sounds like a complete asshole. And make no mistake: in many ways, he was. But there was something more to it, and I used to spend time wondering why he was the way he was.
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My father’s father fought in Europe during World War II. He didn’t talk about it much—not even all the medals he had tucked away in a box. The only thing we know for sure was he was in The Battle of Hürtgen Forest, which saw 33,000 U.S. casualties.
Major General James M. Gavin described the carnage like this:
“All along the sides of the trail there were many, many dead bodies, cadavers that had just emerged from the winter snow. Their gangrenous, broken, and torn bodies were rigid and grotesque, some of them with arms skyward, seemingly in supplication.”
My paternal grandfather was a tough guy, and I’m sure my father tried being tougher than he actually was to evoke some kind of response from his quiet and short-tempered father.
(If you go all the way back to the second Not About Lumberjacks story, “Pride of the Red Card,” you’ll hear a story based loosely on time spent with my dad and his dad.)
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The United States has been at war for roughly 225 years out of the 246 since 1776. Some of those were major wars—others were short invasions—but violence is in our blood. Mass shootings are so common they often don’t make the news. Some people are quick to lose it in traffic; others attack the U.S. Capitol when they don’t get their way.
I grew up with more than a few friends who were raised by fathers who wanted tough sons. I grew up with some friends raised by fathers who tried beating manhood into them. The child abuse in the most brutal full-length Not About Lumberjacks story, “Purvis,” is loosely based on the homelife of an old friend. (And the mention of a dog being shot in a house because it had fleas in the micro-short, “Be a Man,” is based on a real incident a relative experienced.)
So, it only makes sense that violence finds its way into stories set in the United States.
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Among Not About Lumberjacks stories featuring violence, I’ve written slightly more tales without it. So, one might wonder, if I can write uplifting stories devoid of violence, why would I choose to include it in the almost other half?
It’s one thing to find hope in a situational story about a family just being a family or a person experiencing a hardship and overcoming it, but hope seems amplified when characters are presented with a violent existence and find another way. In that sense, I find stories where violence is shown to not be the way very hopeful and inspiring.
We live in a violent world, but if you look at the whole of it, each decade sees better days. Some areas might slip, like Russia’s current slaughter in Ukraine, but if you look at overall wars, life expectancy rates, infant mortality rates, and so many other dismal things…the bigger trend is more positive than negative. Progress is often painfully slow, and there’s no excuse for so many people to still suffer, but there is hope.
* * *
Back to “Tin-Hearted Man…”
Violence is thrust upon Nick Champeau since his beginning. When his father isn’t abusing him, classmates are. And he responds with violence to finally stop the pain.
But…the pain is still there.
He survives the The Battle of Kapyong in the Korean War by imagining his enemies as everyone who ever tormented him. He doesn’t lead with violence, but when confronted with it, he responds in kind.
Ultimately, though, he seeks to find kindness in an unkind world. Nick Champeau puts the pain of his life behind him and presumably finds a better life in the things that give him solace.
* * *
While my father was violent, he was not unkind. He was funny, an incredible storyteller, and quick to help anyone in need. He was charming, reflective, and wanted something more than life gave him.
Sometimes he worked hard for that better life, but when you’re raised to believe you won’t amount to much, it’s easier said than done to just put the past behind you and move on. Setbacks others can side-step seem like roadblocks when all you’ve known is pain and loss and struggle.
My father was a very tired (and often depressed) man.
Still, for all his faults, he did something so many before him couldn’t do. He might have tried killing another human being over a traffic dispute, but something in him decided, “I will not treat my children the way my father treated me.”
My father broke one of the heaviest chains there is to break: a cycle of abuse. He was a man of many faults, but he decided, at least where his children were concerned, he would not be like the men who came before him. He hoped my siblings and I would have a better life and find the magic of being alive.
That is the hope I write about…whether a story is violent or not…
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Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called “Reaper” by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, the episodes, and voice talent.
Also, for as little as a dollar a month, you can have access to a bigger behind-the-scenes look at Not About Lumberjacks on Patreon. Check out patreon.com/cgronlund if that sounds like your kinda thing.
In December, it’s the annual Christmas episode. When an estranged family member returns home for the holidays, he tells a group of nieces and nephews eager to unwrap Christmas presents four holiday tales.
Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!
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