Last night I finished my “David Sedaris Phase II” in which I read just about all his published work since ^*“Me Talk Pretty One Day,” which means all his book-published work this Century, including two fat daily periods of his daily diary writing turned into books.

It has been an enjoyable and thought-provoking phase.

Why I waited all this time to get back to Sedaris after very much enjoying his early work up through ^**“Pretty” was based, at least in large part, on my tendency to stop reading anybody who gets as popular as David Sedaris. It was fine when he was only known at NPR and nerds listening to Ira Glass, but had to stop when it/he got too big. Sure, it was envy mostly, and I most definitely violated my Sedaris ban by reading plenty of his essays in “The New Yorker,” but no books, and definitely no diaries.

All that ended over the last eight weeks or so, including my month in Japan in which I read “Happy-Go-Lucky” over and over both because I liked it and because the only other book I brought was Herman Melville’s “The Confidence Man,” which I just could not get into. Mr. Sedaris and I share several things: we were both raised in the South, we’re both over 60-years-old now but not dead, and we’re both riddled with inadequacies and quirks that we don’t mind sharing and oversharing with others.

In Mr. Sedaris’ case, he has turned this latter trait, along with superpowers of observation, note-taking, and stand-up comedy level writing tightness into the sort of career that is not only lucrative but has others using phrases like “my David Sedaris phase,” ala “my F. Scott Fitzgerald period,” or that solid month I spent looking at all the old “National Lampoon” magazines online. Helped by our fabulous public library system, I was able, for free!, to check out all things Sedaris, including the big fat diaries, and here is my short review.

I liked them. All of them, including, and maybe especially, the big fat diaries.

Heading into the phase, I pooh-poohed the diaries, thinking the fact David Sedaris has published not one but two big fat diaries justifies my longstanding aversion to him. Who gets off being so famous they publish their diaries? But these diaries compendia turned out to be, for me, even better than the essay books. I’d explain more fully why, but doing that would require me to write, and you to perchance read, something close to a full review of Sedaris’ post-“Pretty” oeurve and I don’t think you want that, and I certainly don’t want that.

I was looking through old folders yesterday and came across some music reviews I wrote for long-deceased “alternative weekly newspapers” here in Albuquerque. Remember “Up Front”? Neither did I until I found my “clipping” yesterday from around the time I stopped reading David Sedaris. Remember “Crosswinds Weekly”? That one stuck around longer, so you might recall it. I fondly, for some strange reason, recall that publication because they still owe me like $50 for a piece I did in like 2003 on…okay, I can’t remember which musician or restaurant I was profiling. I’m sure it was a riveting piece of prose.

In fact, my riveting prose has played at least a small part in killing several publications over the years, including my biggest “kill,” The Albuquerque Tribune. Yes, I had massive societal and post-capitalism help in taking down the Trib, but I’d like to say I helped, at least a tiny bit.

All of which gets me back to things I share with David Sedaris.

Thinking back, I still haven’t figured out exactly why I wanted to write music reviews, op/ed columns, etc. back in those days and I seriously have zero idea why anybody would have thought my writing/thoughts were worth putting into print. Yeah, the publishers probably just needed something to fill the spaces between the ads and I was cheap. There’s that, but I’d like to both think I offered something more than space-filling and doubt that this was the case. I sure as hell did not read the music review I found yesterday from “Up Front.” No. Way.

Similarly, I don’t know why I’ve been compelled to “blog” for what is now coming up on 21 years. There have been big and small gaps, but between “Burque Babble” (K-12 education ranting, mostly, you can still Google it) and here at “Better Burque,” I’ve been doing what is the equivalent of public diary writing for over two decades.

I’ve never been drawn to private diary writing, and not just because my handwriting is exactly what you’d expect from a left-handed person taught in the Texas educational system in the second half of the 20th Century. I’ve always needed an audience and/or thought the writing didn’t count unless it was “published.” I’ve also always liked the informal/formal standards in place for “published writing.” For example, in a blogpost the links should all work, the facts should be facts, and the densely written prose should at least conform to some version of punctuation best practice. I’ve not always satisfied these standards, but trying to follow these rules has been a seriously fun part of the “job” for me.

In drawing these similarities, I am in no way comparing myself to David Sedaris anymore than I am comparing myself to F. Scott Fitzgerald or “The National Lampoon.” Mr. Sedaris is supremely talented and, as his diaries help point out, supremely persistent and eternally perseverant. I share none of these three qualities, frankly.

But it’s still been fun, even the $50 crap I wrote about restaurants long closed and forgotten, musicians who had the misfortune to have me ask them questions, and publishers who ghosted me on the $50. I think I’ll keep doing it.

*Apologies for the use of quotation marks for a full book, which is supposed to be underlined, but WordPress has evidently not invented the underline yet.

^**Except for “Barrel Fever.” Never got into the idea of David Sedaris writing fiction, really

^***Yes, I consider the Lampoon up there with Sedaris/Fitzgerald, with the understanding of its time and place in my life and American culture. Let’s face it, “The Great Gatsby” may arguably be timeless, but “The Beautiful and Damned,” for instance, very certainly isn’t. That said, it’s okay to not be timeless and not a deal-breaker when it comes to “phase” level authorship, imho.