Wandering Towards Fatherhood

Well here we are in the home stretch.  Two more months and our daughter will become part of our new family.

What gets me is so many people keep telling me that I am not ready and I have no idea of what I am in store for.  How I am going to be over protective and up to my ears in not knowing what to do.  In some ways they may be right.  I mean this is my first child, this will be my first time at actually being a dad.

But what they don't seem to get is that I am already comfortable with my limitations of not knowing what the future holds.  There is no instruction manual and there is no way of seeing the future that I am aware of.  So why sweat it really.  If she comes into the world healthy then I think we are off to a great start.

I would love to say I hope she is born happy as well as healthy, but think about it.  For nine months she has not had to do anything but sleep, be warm and move about a bit.  On that glorious day, she is going to be shoved out of the only place that she ahs ever known, for the first time she will see direct light and a bunch of strange faces and things swirling about her, and then somoen is going to slap her on her ass and then flush out her mouth and sinuses with saline.  I rather think I would be pissed with that myself.

I have five nephews, and two nieces and for three of my nephews I spent seven months having to help raise them, change diapers and help potty train one.  I dealt with them being sick, and my second oldest nephew lived with me for a year when he was born.  In truth I have a leg up over most people walking into this.

I am not overly optomistic, nor do I think I will know exactly what to do all the time, but I can fake it.  I will be wrong at times and I will even be guilty of making a few bad decisions based on what I think is best for my daughter and any other rugrats that I might have in the future.

I am not so much worried as I am anxious to get to meet my little RC and help her through life as best I can.  I even have a plan to help me do this.  It was the same plan I came up with as a twleve year old kid, who was going through what some might have called a mental breakdown back then.

The plan is: The world is seperated into Needs and Wants.  You need air, water, food and shelter to live.  You want things like Toys, diamonds, and gigantic luxury items.

I plan to, as best I can, make sure she has all her needs met before she even knows she needs them.  That part is actually pretty easy to accomplish at times.  In a selfish sort of way, I know if I need them then she does more than likely, you know save pain killers and medicine for what I am certain is going to be a bumpy ride for me trying to keep up with a small child.

Wants on the other hand are actually trickier.  A desire for something that you do not necessarily need will always be there.  But to completely eliminate a want just because she doesn't need it is not fair.  She does not need a lot of toys, but every once and a while spoiling her let her know that I do think of her.  As she grows older, her wants will increase in size and price.  Well if she was born a little adult I could reason with her.  But she will not be, or if she does some out knowing Newtonian Physics then she will still not have a complete grasp on the world at large.  Math is math, it is easy int he fact that it does not have emotions or its own opinion that you have to deal with.

At one point in my life I said I couldn't have kids because I was too selfish, and now I can't wait to meet my daughter.  Oh I plans to raise me a bad ass bitch.  Yeah I want her to take the world by storm, be rational and use logic, use emotion to drive herself and achieve what she wants.  Stand for herself and be strong and stand up for others.  Fight a good fight and even in loss be gracious and in victory be humble.

She does not have to be a nobel peace prize winner to make me proud, hell her doing her best and showing the world what she's got, is good enough for me.  Although I do hope she goes into Engineering because then that would mean I can make jokes with her about differentiation, and pass her notes for passwords using integrals.  But if not, as long as she is happy then that is great.  Although to be honest, if she decides her life calling is being a pole dance, I am probably not going to go visit her at work...EVER.

I hope she is a horror movie buff, because her mom and myself both are, and the family that kills together, can't rat on anyone because fuck it, we are in it together and the gas chamber can hold three in Texas.

I hope that she does not mind if I do to her what my parents did to me, and that was enroll me in Martial Arts and Fencing classes.  Being at peace with the world does not mean that the world is at peace with you.  So prevetative measures some times needs to be take.

I want her to speak the language and write it as well.  This is my want.  We can work around learning disorders and such, but by god do not say OMG or LOL to me.  This might result in soap in the mouth sorta thing.

Watch old Looney Tunes and not this touchy feely, come with a thousand warning labels and drop your IQ by ten points for every ten minutes of watching it kind of stuff.  Being popular and fitting in cartoons and tv shows piss me the fuck off.  Be your own person and not some fucking carbon copy of what a TV exec tells you you should be.

I want her Significant Others to understand one thing: I have weapons permits and I have friends who are forensic pathologist and a friend in the Department of Justice and another who is coming out of special forces.  I will end you, console your parents when you don't come home one night, end them if they ask too many questions and have people who will help me cover it up.  Do not screw over my child.  I hope to teach my little girl that feelings are important and playing games with them is stupid.  End the relationship if  you are than Priority and they are nothing more thna an option.  It hurts no matter what, but at least you do right by them.

You know I could go on and on about the things I want for my daughter and what I would want her to do, be and appreciate.  But blogs are meant to be shorter than this.

So I part on this, my family will be my life and my reason for being,  I will be there as much as I can and I woll do all that I can to make sure that the needs are met, and the wants are kept in check.  I will DESTROY any who seek to hurt my family, and I got the skills, friends, and family to do it with.  I want her to be a good person and only pick those who want to be good to and for her.  Sacrifices come and not all cna be avoided, but keeping a level head and showing the world that you are worth taking notice of goes a long way.

Until that time and that place

p.s.;
For those who might be wondering, I have written up to chater 10, but chapter 4 has quite a few typos, and chapter five is a train wreck in my opinion (Funny how it seemed so much better while I was writing it) so I have not posted the new chapters.  I plan on doing that something before this weekend, so if you want, check out the writing at www.thewritersblock.yuku.com

My Story

For anyone who might be interested or even still reads my blog, I posted four chapters in my section of the Writer's Block .  What I have submitted is the re-written and amended prologue and chapter 1, along with my semi edited versions of Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.

I actually have more written (well re-written as most of you know), but I have not actually done any editing on those chapters yet and I am certian they are pretty rough.

If you do read it, I wouldn't mind a little feedback in the replies section.  ANyways I hope those who read it enjoy it.  Sorry for taking so long with it.  I've either been busy or lazy this summer with doing it.  More on the busy side.

Well until that time and that place,

The writer's block

Just in case anyone from class missed it.  I created a forum page to which any of us can continue to post in a laid back, non-scheduled manner.

here is the link:
www.thewritersblock.yuku.com

All you need to do is:

1. Create a username for www.yuku.com.
2. Then go to the link above
3. post in the introduction section. 
4. Then you will get administrator rights to the board.
5. There will be a forum board created for you.
6. Write. Whatever you feel like
7. Offer feed back
8. Have fun with it.

Fare The Well

My sappy moment in the class,

I say this to you, fare thee well,

see you soon, you might hear me yell,

I never have liked to say good bye,

because good byes are for when we die.

We the warriors of the word may not be immortal,

but we create new worlds and our stories are the portals.

This isn’t the end of a chapter, but a story just begun,

create you new tale, enjoy it and have fun.

So I say until that time and until that place

jump some hurdles and run that race.

We have more stories to create and tell,

so I say this to you, Fare thee well.

brought to you by

A Pimp Named Vader

May da' force be in yo' pimp hand

 

Final Destination.... for now

Well here we are, and to be honest, I am happy for the fact that I reached the end of this semester, not because of my creative writing class.  No, my reason for being happy with the end of this spring semester has more to do with the amount of stress that I am under and no way to really vent at the moment, at least nothing that is constructive.

So as my final blog of this class I have to answer a few questions concerning what I have experienced during my time in this class.  So without further a due.

Will I keep blogging?
I probably will, but the thing is now I don't have a schedule to keep up with so there is going to be something I like to call a break.  My days are going to be a bit lazy until I have to return to my engineering regime.

How was the workshopping process?
I found that it was actually helpful and fun.  To be honest I never thought of working with a group of people on my writing, then again I never really considered being a writer for living before.  The feedback was useful and folks were helpful, and I thoroughly enjoyed hearing what people thought and what they thought was coming next.  It also helped to me understand that some of the things that I took for granted as knowing was not so easily understood by others.

Will you send out a query letter for real?
Yes, but not right now.  I need to finish my re-write and I got some editing to do.

Was it hard to find an agent/publisher for the query letter?
I thought it was going to be but to tell you the truth, the first agent I came across was the one that was the most interesting to me, despite the fact that I searched twelve different agents.  Imagine that, my first choice was the one who fit me the best.

Would I self-publish Create Space?
Yes.  I mean I like the idea of having an agent and what have you and so on and so forth, but if I did not fit into a genre, which is what I figure is really going to happen, then I would most certainly consider self-publishing.

Okay so that is it for now.  I imagine that there are going to be questions in the future, because you know, I am such an awesome author and what have you.  But for now, I am out.

Until that time and place, I will see you wandering the halls of our imaginations.

Wanderlust and the writers block

So almost two weeks ago I posed a question: Would you be interested in keeping up with each others progress on stories or just remain friendly after class was over?  Didn't get much of an answer, but I decided I would create a forum any way.

Here it is: http://thewritersblock.yuku.com/

My User name is Uncle Big Bad, and it is a Yuku board, so it is free, but there are advertisements on it.  I am not sure what they are because I usually have that stuff blocked.  I am more than happy to give administrative rights on the board.  That way you could create you own forum string inside the board , change the layout of it and delete and edit as you choose. 

I liked the idea of having a writing group and I could not think of any I would like better than my classmates who I have gotten to know.

Like I said nothing would need to be mandatory, and I think that it might be something fun to do when time allowed. Now there is no way to attach documents in this thing, once again it is a free site and to have that option would require spending money and that stuff comes in a limited supply.

Just post in the Introduce yourself forum(i.e.: I am Bob from Creative writing 2.  And I will pass out the admin rights.

Until that time and that place,
Later

So the mind was wandering and wondering

So a few weeks back I started wondering, if I wanted to keep reading some of these stories and see how they would turn out, how would I do it when the class was over.  To tell you the truth I am very interested in seeing how everyone's stories turn out.  Even if some people choose not to pursue the goal of getting published.

I like the class and I find my classmates to be enjoyable.  Sure we don't all have the same taste in what we like to read.  I mean I read books on math, engineering and physics (I am pretty dull at times I know).  But the truth is I like doing the peer reviews, and I enjoy reading other styles of writing, and I actually enjoy other peoples input into what I am doing.  I mean I still may not take the advice, but it is nice to know what others might think and see how they react to the things I put to text.

So I put up a poll to see who would be interested in keeping up with each other once the class was over.  And I thought that maybe since posting it in a public forum would not be the wisest of ideas, I thought a private free forum would be a good way to go.  Like a yuku board or something.

I imagine that most everyone would appreciate not having a set schedule of when to post things, as it is not a class, and let's face it, we all got real world shit to deal with.  Time is a valuable commodity and once we use it, we never get it back.  So I would say an informal environment would be in some order and what have you, but that would only be if anyone else was interested in doing it.

Tell me what you think.

Wandering through a Random House with Grant and them

As I wander along on the path of the King of the night

I look to my left, with nothing there and so I look to my right.

Oh my, oh my, do you see what I see?

It is a Random House with a tree.

At first I sought a penguin, because I think they are cool,

But this Random House, has a grill and a big ass pool.

 

Yeah I did it, I made a poem.  Nothing cutting edge, but it did make me smile and giggle as I wrote it.  Alright so I have been tasked in my ongoing misadventures of trying to discover my inner writer, to find a publishing house that I might consider a good fit for me.  Besides I couldn't choose Little Brown and Company.  They went against my ethics.

 

Truth is that I am fearful of most publishers simply because I do not want to change the nature or the makeup of my story.  I want to keep my diversity of people, cultures, and beings.  I do not want to change my world just because someone says it will sell better if I make my genre a little more traditional.

But I looked through a list of Publishers, and I couldn’t decide.  So I picked an author who interested me in the fact that not only did he write a little non-traditional genres, but he kind of set the model for things that are now considered traditional.  Stephen King was my choice in who I would follow to make my decision.

In truth I might have said no to this one, but I thought that maybe, if I chose someone big, and if I got lucky, I might be able to do something for others, that I never seemed to get as a kid who wanted to read.  I wanted to give them a hero who was not a traditional cookie cutter type.  Not the asshole anti-hero type, but a character who was like them in some way. 

Random house is huge, and get to a large audience, so my heroes could have a large stage to prance around on, and show the world that the mold for the hero does not require a magic formula of how they should be, but the formula of how people can look at them and their struggles.

I write what my mind tells me and I say what my heart says to say. I spent so much time trying to find a place to fit in in my life that I forgot at times what it meant to be me.  I know not the comical ending to the post that you might expect but it is the truth.  I wrote a world of many different cultures, ethnicities, genders and even races.  Not everyone is human in my world, nor are all the humans the good guys by default, nor are they all evil by their human nature.  Checks and Balances like the government are what I threw in.

So if I had a book published, I would want it on a big scale, so that everyone could find a character to love and say, you know that character is my hero! He/she was awesome and the world is cool.  It is big and drags me in so much so, I wished I lived in a world like that.

As I said before, I think that people should be allowed to fail or succeed based on their own merit, not because of their skin color, gender, sexual orientation, traditions, or religious practices.  I wrote characters in the story who are from all walks of life, and threw in what I thought to be some interesting twists that causes them to asks uncomfortable questions of themselves.

For my dream cast of characters, I want a big stage.  I think that Random house could be that stage, but then again I might be happy with something small like Donald M. Grant Publisher, who is a smaller company, but also has Stephen King as a writer in their ranks.  They Published the Dark Tower Series, which is an alternate look at a world of science fiction, and fantasy with some spaghetti western thrown in there.

I wrote a world that will not completely fit into any genre all on its own, but I hope that one day I can watch it either succeed as a change of the normal pace or genres.  Right now I am just dreaming and the world of being a successful writer is not the closest thing on my mind at the moment.  But I know I would be quite overjoyed if I were to see my work in a hardcover print run.  I might be so happy I would stand up and slap your momma.  Because my momma was a saint, and she owned a .357 magnum hand cannon.  I don’t know your mom, so yeah, no guilt.

Agents in my sights.

Ah yes, I have recently been asked to look into literary agents that I might find interesting or feel comfortable with using.  It is kind of like asking someone to decide who will be the first to behead you or sing your praise throughout the centuries.  If you happen to be Joan of Arc, you get both.

 

Every time I have thought about this particular part of the being published process, I try to be optimistic.  I imagine that my future agent comes in from a dreadful commute to the office.  It is raining, or snowing, or whatever bad weather outside.  They sit down at their desk and see my query letter.  They take a deep sigh and, just wanting to get the pain of the day over with, they open up my first ten pages and start to read.  The angel sing, the clouds part and rainbows fill the sky.  They smile as the words flow from the pages painting a beautiful picture in my mind.

 

But then there is my realist side that imagines it going a lot more like this

Then, if they do read it, they look something like this:

I am sure that my plight has been felt by many aspiring authors.  Of courseI may be thinking a little on the dramatic side fo things(or perhapsI am underestimating the true reaction of hysterical laughing and plots of my demise).

So I guess the plan that should be taken is go with the one who best fits what you think you aare going for (or be close personal friends with Stephen King and ask him to put a good word in for you.)With that said I have chosen three agents that have me interested.  Let's see if they are itnerested in me one day.

Jennifer Jackson:

Jennifer Jackson is the VP at Donald Maass Literary Agency in NYC.  She is particularly fond of Science Fiction and Fantasy pieces and one of her clients is Jim Butcher, the author of the Dresden Files.  Since she started working as DMLA she has workedto build the company and spread their interest into other genres of literature.  She seems like a good fit because it sounds like she is an open minded agent who likes to see more than the typical story roll across her desk.

Russell Galen:

Russell Galen of Scovil, Galen, and Ghosh Literary Agency is my second choice.  In his write up he mentioned that he enjoys reading Fantasy stories that take him to places he can't get to via a car, and I kind of feel like this is the way I like to right.  He represents Terry Goodkind and Mercedes Lackey, two authors who write in the genre I currently and interested in.  He has 37years of experience and he apparently likes to represent his clients for a good long time.

Eddie Schneider

Finally Eddie Schneider of Awful Agents.  Okay to be honest, this guy fits my style like a glove.  He seems very passionate about Sci-Fi and Fantasy books, as well as non-fiction science, which by the way, is my bag also.  He also stated that he is willing to fight for an author who wishes to keep their stories true to their visions and takes a stand against those authors who have been discrimnated against based on their sex, ethnicity or political views.  In truth I am sometimes worried about the so called "white washing" of my characters as I believe in a world filled with many people of different origins, ethnicities, sexes and race.  If I write something I want to be put in the book section I wrote it for.

Okay, so there is my stance on agents.  To be honest, I really wouldlike for people to wander by, see my book, pick it up on a whim and read it and put it down and say, "That was a good story."  Money is not my biggest thought when I write something.  It being a good story is however.

From the one who meanders through life trying to find his way, I am out.

Wandering Revisions

Revisions, hmmm... I could say that they are like the a never ending buffet, you try as many as you can, hoping that the next one is better, but ultimately you have to settle for one thing that suits your pallete.  I was once told that you could revise something until the end of days and still find something you could have done better.

When I write I throw everything I want to see in my mental image into a scene, and I look at the conglomeration that is sitting before me and I try to make it all make sense.  That sometimes doesn't happen.  Oh hell it doesn't happen a lot.

I forget a word here or there, because I said it either, in my head or out load, which is good enough right?  Well fortunately, people aren't mind readers, but unfortunately that means that without those words, the key to the sentence stays hidden and the meaning of it locked away.

When someone tells me that they have a problem with something I've written, I try to listen and hear what they have to say and take it into account, when I re-write something.  I pull out all my peer reviews and give them a quick once over.  If I find a pattern to which they all had a problem wrapping their heads around, then that is something that I definitely need to look at, otherwise...

Well probably not the ass stomping part.  Pretty harsh response for having an opinion, although I have heard of worse happening.  Anyway back to my wandering revisions.  My line edits, well let me just say that I am not the best person of doing a  lot of proofreading before I submit something, so yeah, things slip by.  No worries though, I am sure that I will either see it or be told about it later on.  Usually I feel like a fuqtard when see or am told about my typos/errors.

So my routine is usually put on some of my music, listen to the songs I feel best inspire me for what it is I writing and have at it.  I do try to write so that everyone can keep up with what is going on.

My experience with the peer review was fun and it did help me realize that I needed to improve on somethings, as to make them a bit more clear.

Book of the Tube of You

Youtube, the video frontier; this is the voyage of one man completing a Creative Writing assignment.  My mission:  To sort through the endless number of booktubers and determine in my opinion which dos not suck.

So as I begin my voyage, my meandering drive stalls and I procrastinate, with a cold bug nipping at my hind quarters and my mind set on Calculating derivatives, I felt little to no energy to devote to watching youtube for I need all my mental capacities to fend off the sniffles and the Calculus blues.

That was until I was faced with my arch nemesis: TIME!!!! 

Seriously though, I have to admit, this was not something I would normally be a big fan of.  I enjoy hearing others opinions but I usually can gauge from conversations about this that and nothing of what we might have in common.  Such as someone telling me that they like Twilight.  I can tell that we are not going to have too much in common when it comes to what we are going to read.

Call me strange, but for the most part I stopped reading young adult stuff when I was 14.  Guess what?  Booktubers love it.  I imagine that some might even marry their favorites novels.  Let this be a story about a shy young woman and some guy with a faux hawk and an eating disorder and apparently the legs of their imagination spread like some love starve harlot in a Super 8 motel.

Now before you get too terribly offended, let me say this: I am merely posting my opinion on the matter, I am hardly an authority on anything of the sorts and those who are writing these books have vivid imagination, a thought for young love, and a less jaded romance life than me.  I am more of a fan of body counts versus romance (sex) counts.  Yes I am speaking ill of the character Anita Blake (seriously is one of her powers the ability to avoid STD’s whilst engaging in numerous orgies in one night?), she just don’t love herself.

Also if I am to be completely clear and honest I feel this way about many books from different genres, but the first three Booktubers I watched told me about their young adult romance picks of the year.  Now call it the lack of oxygen getting to my brain, or the numbers that ain’t numbers running through my head, but somewhere it flipped the switch of oh dear god.

With a clearer mind now I say, enjoy what you enjoy, and be damned the grumpy guy who reads the art of war because it seems like a reasonable life strategy. Oh yeah whilst I am in a mood of oh dear god why, for those who actually read the Simarillion and enjoyed it, HOW?  Reading the Simarillion to me is like sky diving without a parachute to save a life; a daring and noble cause but ends up being a damn tragedy in the end.

Ah but I digress, onward back to the meander drive, wander factor four.  Fourth Booktuber; Danny “I’m a Smartass” Marks.  The first thing I watched from him was him vandalizing his own young adult novel.  In my mind I said, “Wil, this guy’s got some potential.  He just drilled a hole through his book and is painting it black.”  This man also referred to himself as a whore.  I laughed, I laughed a lot.  I had finally put my imagination out on the corner.

His book shelf tour was a tour of his shelf he labeled adult that he was promising to read for the New Year.  He had a lot horror books in his 24 book promise and some science fiction along with detective stories.  I heard a bell chime in the distance as an angel got its wings, or maybe it was the music I was listening to.

He never really mentioned any of his favorite characters, but he was quite prolific about his favorite book covers and book covers that he just didn’t like at all.  I think he has a thing against the color pink.  As far as wrap-ups went I didn’t come across those but he does do something call his weekly agenda which is basically ever two or three days he announces an agenda and he tells you of what books he plans to read and things he thinks about doing in the week.

 Didn’t note any book clubs he was a part of but then again I didn’t watch all of his videos either, but that seems hardly the point really.  What I enjoy is his ability to tell why he enjoys the books he does and make fun of himself and things that go with it.  I feel like that if you enjoy something then you can find a way to make yourself laugh at your own obsession.

There is not big productions to his videos, he has semi-neat book shelves behind him seems to really enjoy what he is doing.  However I have noticed that with a lot of the booktubers, they do these jumpy edits in their videos, that go on directly to the next topic without a transition or a lead in.  this is only slightly distracting to me, but I can deal.

Most booktubers seem to be about their hauls.  Their weekly book splurges that they intend to read, but as Danny Marks says he buys a lot of books and only reads some of them.  They are also big on waiting for their favorite authors to release books and how they look forward to seeing their favorite books be made into movies.  No harm in that I think.  Hey when they first said there was going to be a Lord of the Rings franchise in live action, I was more than a little happy.

Personally I don’t think I could be a booktuber.  There is that whole thing of time; I just sometimes don’t feel like I have a lot of it.  Then there comes the reviewing of books.  It is easy to tell my friends that I wouldn’t read something and exactly why and give it some choice comparisons with cleaning parts of a bulls anatomy with it, but to tell that to a few hundred or thousands of people that book sucks and why.  That is a level of truth that I feel like should not be served on a global scale.

All and all I think there is a general need for folks who do this sort of thing.  If you find someone who reads a lot of the same books as you then you are going to tend to gravity towards the books they read if they tell you that they are good books to read.  And sometimes a little push towards something you may not have heard of or may not have tried might deliver you to a new level of enjoyment.

Meandering Minds Want to Read

Goodreads.com and Shelfari.com; two websites with pretty much the same function and effect.  I kind of wished I had known about these two sites sooner, as I might have been able to avoid some books that made me toss the damn things across the room in a fit of rage and the burning question as to why did I pick up these intolerable pieces of flaming horse excrement in the first place.

Signing up wasn’t a terrible chore, just that sometimes it felt like it was going to take forever to get information on my friends who use Good Read.  Shelfari on the other hand went really quick, but seeing as how they are supported by Amazon, I am certain their tech staff and servers are a bit larger.

Currently at the pitiful hour in the morning there are 275 people requesting the book “Nellcott My Darling.” by Golda Fried; my current creative writing professor.  I am currently a member of mostly science fiction groups, because hey I am an engineering major and I really science and I enjoy sometimes poking holes in some stories, not always mind you, but there are those days when a mean spirited rant of how a 200 foot tall robot with a fox head man by British space marines just needs a proper jeering.  But mostly I like things that go big badda boom, and planet destroying space ships make a pretty nice size explosion. BOOM heh heh.

When I start naming shelves I might go with something like the Boom Factor, Pointy Things in major organs, because I was told it was good, I enjoy the torture of myself, Elves Must DIE!, And the big green thing eats your face, Too long, or Poetry: a moment of weakness, guilt, and pleasure.

I have to say I would definitely recommend this to friends, family, and the occasional acquaintance.  It is a good way to share what you enjoy reading, get ideas of what to read next and to delve into something you might not otherwise read.

The Measure of a Description

It can be measured but never truly understood, it is an enigma that has plagued humankind and driven some to simply accept it without question.  Its measure is boundless, yet it is appearance seems small.  It is felt but never seen, although we see it work all the time both in spectacular functions and in minor apparitions of itself. 

Many have sought to oppose it and yet it holds all things prisoner, including time.    It allows us to do great things, but always keeps us in its grace.  It is a prison without walls, yet it nurtures us.  Without it we would have no food to eat, no water to drink and no air to breath.  It gives us games to play, ideas to accomplish and many sleepless hours of discomfort.

We all feel it, every year, every month, every week, every day, every hour, every minute and every second, even in our deaths.  It warps our perceptions of all things we encounter.  It is so weak that a leaf can deny it for a time, yet it pulls down mountains and buildings in it grasp.  It is the measure of the severity of situation but its weight can be lifted.  It always works and never takes time off, without it we would surely die, but its efforts will be the undoing of all life as we know it.

Wandering Around the Workshop

While this is not my first workshop, it has been quite a long time since the last one I had been involved with. So let me begin by saying that I thoroughly enjoyed partaking in it.  It was a fun process and by following it, it actually offered me ideas of what I might be able to do better.

I often find that when most people think of a critique that associate it with the idea of ripping someone’s work apart making fun of mistakes and generally writing a scathing review or there is the lofty praise comparing a work to some other persons work that has won the affections of the person doing the critique.  If any of them had the chance to sit in on a true workshop critique then I think that there would be a very different opinion on the matter.

I believe that requiring a solution to every point you made in the story was a great idea.  I think is pretty easy for someone to say that you can do something better, but justifying how it could be done better is definitely a good point.  It also allows the writer to hear ideas that they may not have thought of.  I personally have a problem with thinking it out in my head and then realizing that because I said it in my head that I did not say it in my own writing.

The atmosphere of the workshop was relaxed, and that helps when you are on the receiving end of a critique.  When you are not on the defensive you do tend to be more open to advice, or at least that has been my experience.

I am kind of looking forward to my peer review; I am interested to see what people thought of my work and what they could suggest to offer my story a more character and depth.

Free Write: "Emergency" by Denis Johnson

"Emergency" is a story that leaves you wondering what it is that you are actually reading, Is this a story that is actually happening?  Is this a flawed interpretation due to a drug induced self exploration?  It is hard to tell at points, but I have to say that it was a fun read, following the misadventures of two drug users that are comical, but seems to be leading to a dark ending.

The character of the narrator is definitely an unreliable narrator indeed.  The fact of the matter that he is a person who is an avid pill popper by his own admission, his inability to remember what is truly going on and what he is really witnessing makes you question the events that are happening in the story.  Although, he does sound like he may be in better shape than his friend Georgie, but I get the feeling that was the intention of the whole story to begin with.

The title seems like a good one just because of the series of events that go on throughout the entire story.  In their own strange little drug induced world, they are beset upon by crisis after crisis, emergency after emergency:  The stabbing of Terence Webber, the squishy shoes, looking for pills, rabbits, snow storms, AWOL friends, and what not.  It is somewhat comical and also a sad state of affairs to find yourself in.

Georgie is a character that seems like he is headed to hard and fast burnout, a story of an ending that will be just as comical as it is tragic.  In my opinion, he seems like someone who sees what he is doing with his life as saving lives with every mishap he either creates or is a part of.

The language of this piece is a bit more on the poetic side of things and there is nothing wrong with that in my opinion.  But it is a bit flowery for coming from an avid drug user who loses track of when and how the events of the story take place.  I personally couldn’t think of a better way of saying things, as I often find my own work a bit more flowery than some might expect given what my topic may be.

On the other hand, the dialogue of this story was captured a bit more in the realm of believable.  The dialogue seemed like what it would sound like in a casual conversation, I have been known on multiple if not excessively, for using profanity and swearing when talking to my friends about mine or their problems.  I think that a lot of stories lack that simple form of conversation, straight forward and honest to how we speak.

I have to be honest on this one, I kind of got lost in the timeline after Georgie pulled the knife from Terrence Webber's eye.  Although I kind of got the feeling that this was meant to be that way.  I feel like that you are supposed to lose track of where you are and get lost along with the characters in the story.

The first line of the story makes it seem like that the narrator is either a: kind of lost, or b: just really does not care to be specific.  The last line of the piece comes from Georgie, it seems to be that he truly believes that he is a savior of lives, and this will lead all involved down a strange somewhat comical and somewhat tragic path of misshapen adventures.

There are a lot of themes in this piece about blindness and vision.  Take Georgie seeing blood when no one else can, while part of this may be due to his passion of chewing on pill; he is in the middle of an O.R. and the chances of there being blood on the floor are great. Perhaps Georgie always sees a bloody room when he goes into an O.R.  Then there is the part of Terrence Webber being stabbed in the eye: He was caught looking at something that was a considered forbidden, and when he was unable to see it coming, his wife stabs him to punish him for it.  There is also the lack of head lights on Georgie’s truck, which results in them getting lost in a blizzard, despite the fact that there are only a few miles from home.  And it seems, in this story, when you lose sight of something there is a dramatic change of events concerning that something.  Georgie disappears to prep Mr. Webber, and returns having removed the knife from Mr. Webbers eye, restoring his vision.  Georgie does not see the rabbit and runs it over, but as he is cutting it open to make a meal of it, he finds the baby rabbits inside their dead mother, thus saving them from death.  However when the narrator loses track of the baby rabbits, they die under his weight crushing them in his sleep.

Overall this story was a funny and morbid piece as we see the happenings of the world through the eyes of a drug user Narrator and his equally dope fiend of friend.  It is poetic in its language and vivid in its imagery, however this story seems to be a classic example of what not to do in you spare time in the 1970's while working in an emergency room with your best friend who has no headlights in his truck, while working in an ER.

Welcome to:

My Meandering State Of Mind

You are cordially invited to :

My meandering state of mind,

As previously cited,

You are most welcomed inside.

We have tigers, lions and bears oh my,

We have battle fields and ashes,

and heroes live and most certainly die.

There will be plenty of food and drink.

Poisoned candy and clorox, what do you think?

The glass will be half full, no

The glass will be half empty, no

Just kidding, it is mostly just piss.

You better be okay with this.

 Where:

In my sleep and when I day dream,

Just past childhood near the toxic stream.

When:

Oh that simple to see,

whenever I damn well please.

 Bring:

A sense of morbid humor , I hope you have a good time.
For in my meandering mind we call it operation mind crime.
I couldn’t help it, I had to make this rhyme.