Here Comes Trouble Read Online Free PDF Page A

that he and others always fail is because of the systems you have in place.”
    “And because he had a nosy neighbor who called the cops,” I added.
    “Yes, that too.”
    I will not share with you the impact this had, at that time, on my personal life, but suffice it to say I would not wish this on anyone. More than once I have asked myself if all this work was really worth it. And, if I had it to do over again, would I? If I could take back that Oscar speech and just walk up on the stage and thank my agent and tuxedo designer and get off without another word, would I? If it meant that my family would not have to worry about their safety and that I would not be living in constant danger—well, I ask you, what would you do? You know what you would do.
       
    For the next two and a half years, I didn’t leave the house much. From January 2005 to May 2007, I did not appear on a single television show. I stopped going on college tours. I just took myself off the map. I wrote the occasional blog on my website, but that was pretty much it. The previous year I had spoken on over fifty campuses. For the two years following that, I spoke at only one. I stayed close to home and worked on some local town projects in Michigan where I lived, like renovating and reopening a closed-down historic movie palace, starting a film festival, and trying to sleep at night.
       
    And then to my rescue rode President Bush. He said something that helped snap me out of it. I had heard him say it before, but this time when I heard him, I felt like he was speaking directly to me. He said, “If we give in to the terrorists, the terrorists win.” And he was right. His terrorists were winning! Against me! What was I doing sitting inside the house? Fuck it! I opened up the blinds, folded up my pity party, and went back to work. I made three films in three years, threw myself into getting Barack Obama elected, and helped toss two Republican congressmen from Michigan out of office. I set up a popular website, and I was elected to the board of governors of the same Academy Awards that had booed me off the stage.
    And then Kurt Vonnegut invited me over to his house one night for dinner. It would be one of four dinners I would have with him and his wife in the final year of his life. The conversations were intense, funny, provocative—and they resuscitated me, literally breathed life right back into me, and brought me back to a place in the world.
    He told me he had been observing for some time “the crucifixion” (as he called it) that I was experiencing—and he had a few things he wanted to tell me.
    “The extremes to which the Bush people have gone to get you, they directly correlate to just how effective you’ve been,” he told me over his third after-supper cigarette one night. “You have done more to put the brakes on them than you realize. It may be too late for all of us, but I have to say you have given me a bit of hope for this sad country.”
    One night I went to his house and he was sitting out on the stoop by himself waiting for me. He told me that he had stopped contemplating the “meaning of life” because his son, Mark, had finally figured it out for him: “We’re here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is.” And that’s what he was doing for me.
    Vonnegut had, in his final years, turned to writing nonfiction.
    “This has been my greatest challenge,” he told me, “because the current reality now seems so unreal, it’s hard to make nonfiction seem believable. But you, my friend, are able to do that.”
    We went for a walk to meet his wife and some friends for dinner. I asked him if any of this—the writing, the movies, the politics—was worth it.
    “No, not really,” he replied in typical Vonnegut style. “So you might as well quit complaining and get back to work. You have nothing to worry about. No harm will come to you.” And then, realizing I might not be buying it, he added with the voice