There are two streams merging here to generate the Mondo 2000 History Project. In one stream, Morgan Russell… who was editor and publisher during the transition from High Frontiers and through Reality Hackers… has been expressing interest in doing something exactly of this sort for a year or two. And Alison Kennedy (Queen Mu) has evinced some interest in seeing it happen.

In an eddy off of this stream -- (do eddy’s run off streams? No time to research, just accept the metaphor) – a conversation with David Latimer led to the idea of a Mondo 2000 film project. Latimer was briefly a High Frontiers (pre Mondo 2000 edition) Publisher and also an important muckity muck in Res Fest and Res Magazine back in the day when digital filmmaking was avant garde… and he’s a long time pal. We’ve done various projects together.

But undergirding all this for me was an idea to write a memoir of my entire life as a stranger among the strangers from the point of view of a stranger. In other words, what if I approached my life like an outside journalist. Thinking about this raised all kinds of issues and thoughts…

about memory in a frantic, crowded, forward-focused lifetime. And, of course about the whole Roshomon Effect (a bit tired as a metaphor but could be dynamic in context). And then there are the colorful/pranksterish opportunities. Many of my friends are -- or have been -- great exaggerators. Shouldn’t they be encouraged?!! Or should they?
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about identity and the continuity or discontinuity of a person. To what extent are we made of other people… infected, occupied by their ways of seeing… and by how they see us? What is the emotional and narrative quality of taking in the perceptions other people have of you or have had of you at some point in the past? (How does it feel? What do I think? And the really big question when asking people to dig up your own past, or their past in the context of you… do they remember much and why should they bother?)

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about the things one is willing to say or report about oneself and about what one is willing to have said about oneself in public. And perhaps more to the point… about what one would prefer someone else say, so that you don’t have to.

Anyway, as you now know, I’ve narrowed my ambition from an entire misspent lifetime to the history of Mondo 2000 and its progenitors circa 1984-1997, although I must say that the people from my earlier life largely among the “freaks” of the late ‘60s and the ‘70s mostly in Binghamton, N.Y. were every bit as hip, intellectual/demented, and a whole lot weirder than the Mondo scene, which was plenty weird itself by most lights. (My friend, Steve Greitzer, has taken up the task of doing a movie about the Binghamton scene. If you were a Bingie (University included), I’ll put you in touch.)

Of course, the first thought here is that this would all be seen as an enormous ego trip. I suppose it is, although my sense is that this is likely to end up an exercise in self-deprecation (not just for me, but for at least some other MONDOids as well). I certainly see it as an exercise in self-exploration that could turn reasonably severe. In fact, I encourage all participants to explore as deeply as they are willing to, while also being playful and telling ripping yarns… each in turn or all at once.

OK, WAIT… this is what I really want to say. I’ve never done a book, collaboratively or on my own, that I’m entirely satisfied with… that I can point at as a sort of literary achievement. Some of them were pretty good, but they’ve all been pitches to book companies, followed by deadline-stressed realizations.

I think this is the one. So it’s going to have to be deep -- poignant, surprising, evocative, and reflective while at the same time being MONDO -- surreal, funny, provocative, playful, and colorful. It should have all the great stories but also lots of real gut checks, genuine adult insights as well as the usual heckling from the eternal adolescent id. It should be the reality about the Mondo 2000 experience, with enough lies thrown in to bring out the truth. And finally, it must bring everybody on earth to perfect enlightenment or make an awesome movie on late night cable. All this must be so.