Anatomy of a Coda

This is the preface I wrote a million years ago to a essay compendium called THE PLEASE CATALOGUE. I've been told it describes "Star Wars", but it basically applies to any story in the world worth telling.

This is a story of wishes and exonerations. A story of cosmic retribution. A story of arrivals and departures. Of disappearance. The belief in magic. Of small-tales, tall-tales. The search for paradise. Of half-lives and the flight of angels. Of past, present and future converging at a streetlight. Of infidelity to deadlines and time zones. Of freedom as an anesthetic. Of friends. The music of an accident. Of foiled rivals. Of lightening storms. Of rain on the rooftops. Of requiems. Of reckless premonition and its cataclysmic blunders. Of trains and boats and planes. Of big cities and small towns and put-upon accents. It's the story of the big balloon that missed Dorothy, and the man who gave up trying to save the world.

It's a simple story, really. You probably know it already.

And this is not what happened, but it's how I remember it...