i would like to devote my entire life to answering this very thing.

fair?

i had an interesting convergence of events yesterday that led to an equally interesting thought experiment. I’ve decided to share. it’s a little long, but that should not be a surprise.

A coworker and i are currently reading the same book, so she and i were having a small discussion about it yesterday afternoon. In the course, she mentioned that, because she was a little farther than i am, she knew what was going to happen to one of the characters, a nice librarian whose had a tough life. (i’m not the type to get weird about spoilers.) I usually listen to my books to and from work, and while i was anxious to hear what was going to happen to the character, i opted to listen to music on the way home instead, unsure if i could handle the tension that would undoubtedly accompany putting that character in danger.

Also, i’ve been on a roll the last week and a half of writing everyday. The key has been this one stupid app that i have on my phone that lets me push a big orange button every day that i write, like a trout at the fishery learning to bump the button that feeds me. Also, i’ve been breaking up my projects so that i’m working on Venus a couple times a week, a post for this or another blog once a week, some stuff for the card game, the writing prompt short story, etc. So yesterday i worked on Venus, and i decided to stop writing on a part of the story that i know very well: where the leader of my merry group of thieves throws himself in harm’s way to save his crew, ultimately getting himself captured. I’ve written the part before, but this recent draft has been a near total rewrite, so i’m going to get to write it again.

What i realized, however, is that i left both of these characters in a state of suspension, from my own perspective. I know that the character in the book has already had her future written, and that thousands of others have already celebrated or mourned her fate. But for me, she’s still living in Reno, working as a waitress for the summer until the start of the school year, safe as houses. From where i sit, anything could happen: she could decide to stay in Reno for good, she could move to Japan, she could go back to Texas and live happily ever after, or she could die in a car wreck or a fire–i have no idea.

To an extent, the same is true of my character. In this moment, because it is not on paper, his future is literally unwritten. The next time i sit down to write, he could suddenly run away like a coward, turn on his crew, go mad and jump out an airlock, or turn into a fish and fly away. Anything is possible. Of course, most of that is out of character, off the story, and not practical, but i like the idea that these fictional characters, for this moment, are floating in an uncertain vacuum, just like the rest of us.

I don’t believe in fate in the sense that our destinies are written on some starry ledger just waiting to reach the correct milestones to create the correct convergences. It just doesn’t make any sense to me. This is why i don’t see god as a writer. i am not governed by a specific plot line: there have been a thousand inciting incidents in my life, some of which i have responded to, others i have let float on by. So, in my world, there is no way to know whether i will fall into another dimension on the way to the bathroom or live a long a boring existence in this accounting department. Some of that is chance, some of it is my own drive and ambition, and the rest is the will of the other individuals around me.

This is a quality that i like to attribute to my characters. We all have plans and dreams, and characters certainly have plans and dreams, but we all know that plans can fall apart and dreams can change or be crushed. And, while i, the writer, know which plans will work and which will not, my characters are ignorant to the future that i’ve laid out for them. This is why, i think, writers are always saying that characters guide us through our own stories: we give them life and point them in a direction, but sometimes they surprise us in how they handle what is, to them, and uncertain future.

How many more characters are suspended in the mental amber of a day-dreaming America, much less the world? Some where out there Moby Dick is still the torment of one mad captain; Neo has yet to realize that he is The One; Elizabeth Bennett is still allowing her prejudice to cloud her true feelings for Mr. Darcy; and Harry Potter is still living in the cupboard under the stairs of his aunt and uncle’s house, unaware of exactly who he is. And those are just the characters we already know about! Millions and millions of fictional people are just waiting to discover what life has in store for them. Who am i to hold them back from their destinies through fear and procrastination?

Henry David Thoreau, “Civil Disobedience” as heard on the audio recording of “Repent, Harlequin,” Said the Ticktockman, by Harlan Ellison

Annie is special. Not like Special Olympics or special ed., but special like those kids you see in horror movies. If I used a made up word to describe it, I would pick ‘hypercognitive.’ She couldn’t read minds or throw things without touching them or start fires with only thoughts and a disturbing stare, but she could tell when a storm was coming, sometimes days before it actually happened. Animals seemed to seek her out; trees and plants seemed to bend her way when she passed. It was a connection with nature that made her special, but that didn’t make it any less scary.

Once, she found a dead bird in the street in front of the house. I ran out to perform my role as protector and educator, but I also ran out to see how she would react. This was when she was eight.

Tomboyish girls will often react just like boys and poke a dead animal with a stick or try to roll it over with their foot. Annie wore cutoff jean shorts and large, round, thick glasses that sometimes obscured her eyes entirely. Prissy girls usually run away screaming in terror and disgust. Annie had worn large hoop earrings since she was three and had these bangles around her left wrist that didn’t even come off to sleep. It really could have gone either way.

But, no sooner did I arrive at her side as she bowed to the little crushed sparrow and blew it a flourishing kiss that was aimed more to the clouds than to the ground. Then, she turned around and ran back to the Saturday afternoon yard to continue her game, whatever it was. Later, over her favorite meal of bologna sandwiches and chicken soup from a can, I asked if she was sad about the bird’s death. “No,” she said, and took another bite of lettuce and mayo and bread and bologna.

“Why not?”

“Because she’s free for now, until she can fly back here anyway.” She said this with the kind of sincerity that only an eight-year-old can muster, but also with an unmistakable air of, “Duh, Dad.” I dropped the subject, not wanting to upset her, but also not wanting to step any further outside of my own comfort.

By the time Annie was ten, she was spending nearly all of her non-sleep and non-school time in the patch of pacific northwest woods that existed on the outskirts of our neighborhood. No matter how I tried to enforce a curfew of sundown, she always returned whenever she damned well pleased. It could be four in the afternoon or approaching midnight, and she always came back unruffled, looking like she had only just left for school. She treated these near-daily excursions as a non-issue. It wasn’t a secret to her what happened out there in the woods, it was just nothing she needed to share with her weary father.

For her birthday that year I got her a fishing rod, just as she had asked for. She kissed me on the cheek in her excitement and immediately ran out the front door without eating and without opening the rest of the gifts that waited for her. And I did as I ever did: I cleaned up and perched in my seat at the table by the window, waiting for her to return.

This was the way it was until six weeks after her birthday, when she came home, the broken fishing rod in her hand, running full pelt and crying just as hard. I opened the door, terrified, and she knocked me on my butt with the force with which she hit me, throwing her arms around my neck and sobbing into my shoulder. I couldn’t even remember the last time she had cried. I tried to talk to her: “What is it sweetie?” and all of that, but she wouldn’t speak, and I’m not sure she could have with as hard as she was sobbing. I held her, longer than I had in nearly 10 years, and waited for her to calm down enough to speak. If it wasn’t a half an hour, may lightning strike me.

Finally, she lifted her head and looked at me, her glasses fogged and wet. “I missed him, Daddy. I almost caught him but I missed him and now he’s never going to be there again and I’ll have to find him all over again.” This started a fresh round of sobbing, but not too severe.

I actually laughed. It was the kind of laugh that carried all of the anxiety and terror away from you. “Is all of this over a fish, Annie? Did you find your own personal Moby Dick?” I found the idea quite amusing. I did for that moment, anyway.

“Not a fish! Why would I want a fish, Daddy?” She had her eyebrows smashed down on top of her nose like i was some kind of simpleton.

“What else were you trying to catch with a fishing rod?” A chuckle was still in my voice.

“The Green Man, of course. He lives in the forest, and in the evenings he hides in the stream and tickles the fishes. And if you catch him when he’s there, Daddy, he gives you a wish. And I want that wish. I want that wish more than anything.”

There was that innocent sincerity again, and who was I to contradict her. For all I knew, she could talk to squirrels and fly with birds. Like I said, Annie is special. And though she never told me what she wanted that wish for, I think I know, and if there’s even the smallest chance it could work, I’m not going to stop her.

Go Fish by Monica Langlois

But that doesn’t mean that i didn’t try to make it significant. i thought about how repetitive number ages like 33 and 111 were significant to the hobbits in the fiction of J.R.R. Tolkein. Frodo, if i remember right, was 33 when he took the first steps on the journey that would ultimately save middle earth. I tried to use this to apply meaning to my own 33rd birthday–like how i’m embarking on a journey of my own in the coming year as a writer and whatever. You know what? It’s all crap. It’s just me trying to attach meaning to an anniversary because that’s what we do with anniversaries, right? It’s me trying to trick myself into action–into following through on the dreams and plans that i talk about here. The reality is that there are things i want to do, but i still, after everything, have trouble moving my feet. Not to the level that i used to, but it’s there: i’m still ankle deep in carmel sometimes. But, if i don’t get something done–if i have nothing to show for myself–i won’t be able to take advantage of the opportunities that i so desperately wish would come my way.

i’m done with contrived meanings and fake deadlines and mind hacks. my goal right now is just awareness–mindfullness. i am aware, in this moment, that i want more than i have and i want to be more than i am. i am aware in this moment that i have the ability and the tools to create the future that i want. i am aware that in order to create it, i will have to chip away at myself a little bit each day, that nothing comes overnight, and that it’s going to be really hard work.

That is all, and that is enough.

Notwithstanding what the voices in my head tell me, i really haven’t been slacking off all this time. i’ve actually been trying to focus on some work. Q, my brother, and i have been working on creating a card game in the hopes that we can market it through some back channels that we have open to us. While it’s been a slightly painful process to iron out, it’s also been a good deal of fun, and i think we’re really close to a working prototype.

i’ve also been focused on my characters for Venus. They really are the most important part of any story, and the more i understand that, the more i worry about the ones that i’ve created. This is one area where my propensity to distract myself with ‘tips and tricks’ really gets the better of me, and while i keep telling myself that i need to just get on with it and write, i’m terrified that i haven’t built my characters enough to serve the writing like they should.

Lately, however, i discovered a neat little trick that has not only helped me, it’s injected a lot of FUN back into my writing. A gentleman that i follow on twitter, mr. nate cosby, is an ex-comic book editor and now comic writer. He’s been posting these short character monologues, usually for well known comic characters. What i love about these little snippets of character is how much voice and personality can be packed into just a few sentences. And, as sure as anything, when i started to use this same method on my own characters, i suddenly discovered their passions, their histories, and their points of view. i’ve decided that i’m going to post these monologues for the next few weeks, covering all of my major characters.

First up is Sarah, the over-critical, motherly member of the crew of The Pope Of Fools. i hope you enjoy!

I did everything they wanted me to do, though it was never good enough. I took the piano lessons and the ballet lessons and the tutoring job. I pushed myself in school and and life, as hard as they wanted and beyond. It would be petulant and adolescent for me to say that I hated every minute of it, but I always felt like I was doing it for reasons outside myself.

I spent 6 months running with the Flippers. The things we did I will not admit to anyone outside of my own head, but by the time I walked away I made enough money to put myself through a decent school. I did that and graduated, but the past caught up to me before the ceremony. I skipped it, and ran into Eddie at the docks. I needed a ride; he needed a pilot. Done and done.

Applicant: I am Ferroman!

Receptionist: uh huh….

Applicant: I am Magnetic!

Receptionist: uh huh….

Applicant: I… I can scale buildings!

Receptionist: metal buildings

Applicant: Yes, right. I can pin bad guys to walls like fingerpaintings to a fridge!

Receptionist: metal walls

Applicant: Yes, well… I… I’m very good with finding keys….

Receptionist: uh huh. we’re now closed for the day, sir. [she slams down a metal shutter on the teller window.]

[Ferroman lowers his gaze in dejected defeat. The top of his becowled head is is immediately attracted to the metal shutter and pulls him forward, sticking him to it like a magnet. His shoulders heave a sigh.]

i realized yesterday that i’m approaching a year of the experiment of the new me. i am healthier, stronger, happier, and more productive than i’ve been since my oldest son was born, but those are the symptoms. the one thing that i’ve actually gained over the last year is a comfort with the idea of dissatisfaction. My days now are marked with this nagging feeling that something isn’t altogether copacetic. Whether it’s that i haven’t written, or that i’m still not my ideal weight, or that i’m not happy with how i perform my job, or whatever, i feel like i’m constantly finding things that need improvement. That was probably always the case, but the difference now is that i’m not as afraid to address those things and figure out what to do about them: grab a notebook, look up a new diet, try a standing desk, etc. i’m a little afraid that this dissatisfaction will lead to some Mr. Toad complex where i’m constantly jumping from one new thing to another, trying to fix things that don’t need it, but at the moment there is plenty that is still broken.

Today has been something of a train wreck, full of disappointment and difficulty. Some of it i’m trying to heal as the days goes on, the rest i’ve set aside and decided to have a better day tomorrow. Here’s to hoping that it works.

“This is a culture that never forgets. It remembers everything that it’s been told was good, all the way back to the birth of the internet, back to the beginning of the television, back to the first radio show, back to the first telephone call, back to the first photograph, back to the first novel, back to the first painting, back to the first cave drawing. We’ve scanned and digitized and catalogued and stored away all of it, made it all available to anyone with a connection and a subscription fee. Jeff looked around in the store, at the towers of stacked comic books, at the cases upon cases of fiction and cookbooks and role playing game books and self-help books, at the rows upon rows of cards that represented disks that represented digital files that represented the sounds of musicians playing instruments into computers that represented music, and thought, ‘Dear god do we ever need a case of Alzheimer’s. We need a lobotomy.’”

thanks for reading.

But lately i’ve been thinking a lot about the end of all things. It’s hard not to with the rapture passing us by and 2012 right around the corner. And, as always with these types of musings, i turn to the stories that i know for inspiration, insight, and context. It seems–”seems” because i don’t like making broad statements without doing the research, and i’m really not in the mood for research–like there have been an increasing number of books, movies, video games, and other entertainment that have been focused on this idea of the end of the world. most zombie movies classify, and those have been more prevalent, as well as some science fiction, and also speculative fiction–which is my new favorite name for a genre. But why? Why are these types of stories more and more popular? Why are we so eager to watch the world burn? i have some ideas.

We live in an age without a great war. Not that there aren’t wars and there aren’t tragedies, but there is no Great War; no Us against Them, no Good vs. Evil. It seems like every conflict from that in Vietnam forward has been a divided issue, politically and morally. Vietnam has been a rich arena for fiction and nonfiction because of the internal conflict that it caused, but there are very few strong protagonists in those jungles. it’s really hard to root for the men depicted in those stories. And that’s really what it’s about, having someone to root for. it’s what we’re all looking for in every story. Maybe we get it and maybe we don’t, but we always want a hero. There will be people who will argue, and they have every right to do so, but i think people like that are still trying to rebel from the mainstream, when really, the idea of the Hero is so much older than that. The reason that WW2 stories are STILL being told is that it was a time that was ripe for heroes, in no small part because we have clearly identified an antagonist and agreed that what they did was Evil.

But what if you don’t want to tell yet another WW2 story? What else is left? The vast majority of Americans have not been in that kind of peril for their entire lives. Most of us will never be. But, i think we all want to be, in some animal part of ourselves. How many people talk about the zombie apocalypse and believe they would be the shotgun-wielding, smirk-wearing protagonist, unable to admit that they would more likely end up as food? Most, in my experience, and yet, when you watch those movies, it’s generally a 1 to 1000 ratio of heroes to horde. We all want to believe that we could rise to that occasion; that we wouldn’t panic and do something stupid like David does in The Winchester Pub; that we wouldn’t be one of the “fatties” or the guy who forgot to “double-tap.” Most of all, we want to feel alive and empowered in that way that rising up from a tragedy or some other impossible circumstance can bring. Lord knows, i would rather be rigging spikes to the front of my Subaru than sitting in this office chair begging the clock to go faster so that i can go home and do laundry. In one of my favorite brain-candy-movies, Constantine, the angel Gabriel explains his/her motivation for attempting to loose the son of the Devil on the world: “It’s only in the face of horror that you truly find your nobler selves.”

And so we imagine what we would do if the dead rose up against us, or a bomb wiped out the majority of life in the world and we were the only ones left, or the world has just crumbled and our resources are scarce. We don’t have a catastrophic event to unite us, to cause us to rise to the occasion, and to bring out our nobler selves, and so we have to make up stories about people who do, and we make them look like us. We all want to be more than we are.

i think there is a certain aesthetic to the end of the world that is very popular right now, especially in video games. There is something beautiful and post-modern in all of that destruction and abandoned overgrowth. It’s a landscape that allows us to envision life on the ragged edge, where men find out what they are truly made of. It’s funny to me, though, that so often the reason behind our destruction is our own hubris, but what could be more arrogant than to believe that we will survive our own disasters?

i really enjoy cooking. (i promise that this will be relevant.) I prescribe to the Robert Rodriquez mentality about cooking: we’ve all got to eat: might as well try to be good at it.

The History

i’m not the type who used to cook with my mother, or even my father, when i was younger. We ate out quite a bit, truth be told. My mother worked very very long hours, and my dad’s repertoire of culinary dishes was limited to about 4 or 5 items, some of which i can’t even stomach anymore. My mother is and has always been an excellent cook, with an inherent gift that i will never have. The problem is that it was easier and faster for us to just go out to dinner than for her to try and cook something after she finally got home.

The biggest influence i had in terms of my family is my grandfather. He was the type who worked very hard throughout his entire life–a child of the depression–and all of his jobs were hard physical labor. By the time i was cognisant of it, however, he had retired. He was home all of the time, and he didn’t believe in going out to dinner. He also grew all of his own vegetables during the spring and summer, and his garden was the stuff of legend. When my bother and i were young and spending our summers with him, he was tending a garden on an acre of land that belonged to a friend of his. He still has racks upon racks of jars in his basement of canned tomatoes and pickles–also legendary–and though his garden is considerably smaller these days, it’s still more than most people would ever care to undertake.

He was the cook in the family. I’m not sure how it came to happen since, according to my mother, my grandma was the one who prepared all of the meals for mom and my aunt and uncles when they were young, after she got home from work. Something seems to have happened after the children left, after they both retired but before my bother and i were on the scene, that caused my grandmother to abdicate and my grandfather to take up the mantle. Maybe he was just bored, maybe she was exhausted; i don’t really know. What i do know is that the old man is a damn good cook. He was also tenacious in his pursuit of his goal, be it the perfect recipe for pasta sauce or the best pizza. I will never forget the summer when he decided to perfect barbecued chicken, including his own sauce. We ate very very well for those few weeks.

But, making food for myself didn’t really become a relevant thing until i moved into my first apartment. Before that i was living in a duplex with a girlfriend, the mother of my oldest son, and our life together was such a mess i sometimes wonder how we even carried on without daily domestic disasters. I lived with my parents again for a while, but my son and i moved into an apartment together shortly afterward, seeking some small independence.

Living with my ex, the most cooking i had attempted was Hamburger Helper and failed attempts at frying bacon. They were the types of experiments that a child would make, trying to understand the world around him by destroying mama’s favorite perfume bottle. These were dark times for me personally, not just for the food, but all around. i was happier living on my own, me and the boy, but there were still many steps to take before i started to understand the preparation of food.

We all know how that first apartment looks and feels; how life is while you’re there–broke and messy, ambitious in all of the wrong ways, trying to keep up with it all. I found myself alone one night in particular (my son was at his mothers) hungry and completely without money. So i started to scour the kitchen–which was not much larger than a walk-in closet–looking for whatever i could find to make myself for dinner. In the process, my desperation turned around, and i found myself looking for things that would compliment and augment my main ingredient, which i believe was ground beef. if i remember right, i think i ended up with a pepper-crusted hamburger. What i will never forget is the feeling of satisfaction that came with creating something that was entirely from my own mind and experience–and that actually tasted good. i’m hard on myself sometimes when i cook–this was overcooked or that was not seasoned correctly–but that sense of satisfaction still glows in my chest everytime a dish i make comes out right. Especially when i’m making food for someone else.

The Inspiration

i wish i could point to the exact moment when i turned on the TV and discovered the idols upon whom i heap my culinary worship, but my memory doesn’t really work like that. i do remember what i found there, however, because that persists: Inspiration bolstered by information. I found myself inspired by people, regions, ingredients and recipes that i would have never been exposed to otherwise, but also the information that i had been so hungry for: the why and the how of food and heat and how they react together.

i went through an Emeril phase, a Bobby Flay and Mario Batali phase, even a Rachel Ray phase, but the constant throughout my makepiece training has been Alton Brown. His approach helped me understand how food works instead of just cranking out recipes. It’s the difference between teaching a man how to cook his own fish and serving it to him already prepared. It’s an approach that i’ve struggled to maintain in all of my personal experience and experimentation. I want to know why this spice and not that one, this technique and not the other, this ingredient and not another. I want to be able to recreate the dishes that i make as many times as i want, as effectively as i can. I also want to know what went wrong when it does (and oh boy does it.) Inspiration and instinct are wonderful, but this is also a science, and i want repeatable results.

My days trolling the Food Network are mostly over, however. i’m not a fan of most of their game/reality, contest-type shows, and those seem to be taking control. But, about a year and a half ago, i found another idol, one who has had as much influence on me as a writer and human being than as a cook: Anthony Bourdain.

He’s not just an admirable chef, but a wonderful writer. i’ve never actually tried any of his recipes–french food is a bit out of my context–but i think he would be the first to say that is okay. His perspective on food and on the world lights a fire in my chest dwarfed only by that i feel when i read/hear his lyrically blunt and harshly awestruck prose, especially when augmented by his world-weary New Yorker voice. i’ve recently found myself trying new dishes, searching for better ingredients, and trying to strip back my cooking to it’s basest components. I want to know, even if i can’t really understand, what a pineapple or asparagus or fresh basil taste like at their most minimalist level. This then informs how i choose ingredients to go together, each one playing a part in the overall piece that is a dish. i credit this quest to Mr. Bourdain and his similar search around the globe, and even more so his beautiful verbal depictions of his experiences.

The Point

Cooking and writing share some similar rooms in the Bradbury-esque mansion of my mind. There is the element of creation: the drug that i will never be able to kick. But also, when i make food, i do it best for an audience. If i’m alone in the house, i can eat just about anything and i’m okay with it. But, even if it’s just my wife and i, i work to impress (she is, after all, my ideal eater as well as my ideal reader.) The only thing in the world that gives me more joy than hearing that someone liked my food is when i hear that someone liked my story. But, there are differences between these pillars of my life, and some that i would like to overcome.

I feel like i am more natural a storyteller than i am a cook. I still struggle all the time with the dishes i make, and while i have some instincts that i’ve developed over the last 10 years or so, they’re not deep in my personal fabric like they are for my mother and my brother. When i write, ideas, characters, and stories come to me from nowhere, like little gifts from the gods that i just have to open and they are mine. Cooking is work, no two ways about it.

However, when i cook, i fall into a trance-like state of mind that i only wish i could find when i’m holding a pen or at the keyboard. i’ve described it to people as “meditative,” which i think is accurate. The nuts and bolts of it is that i have to spend so much mental power thinking about what i’m doing–how hot the pan is, whether i’ve gotten all of the ingredients ready, not cutting off my finger while i slice something, which spices do i need to grab, did i salt this already?, etc–that everything else in the world just slips away. It’s a state of mind that i crave if i go without it for too long, and it’s the best remedy for a bad day at work.

i see the world differently as a cook than i ever was able to before. Nothing is ever so scary as it used to be, because no matter where i am, i can at least feed myself. Coupled with the fact that i can sleep just about anywhere that i’m not likely to be struck by a car, and i am secure in the knowledge that i will survive, no matter what. But, what i really love about cooking, about the world, and about the human experience is that i am able to elevate that simple act of survival to a form of artistry, one that i can share in such a meaningful way with other people. i could draw metaphors between writing and cooking for the next three weeks without stopping, but what really interests me is this: what would my writing be like if my readers could consume prose in the same way that they can the food that i prepare? There’s a thought that truly lights that familiar fire and spurs me to craft and prepare better stories.

this is something that i’ve been working on for a long time. eventually, it will become a serialized novel, and it will have it’s own website. I just really felt like i needed to get it out there. For now, i’m going to plan to have the next part out in a month. there will be other regular updates between here and then.

i’ve uploaded a pdf version of the piece which should be readable by just about anyone or anything. please let me know if this is not the case. It’s available here.

feel free to leave a comment if you wish. overly negative comments will be ignored and/or deleted.

It’s also been about two months since i’ve written anything here. Nothing has changed, broken, or relapsed to cause this–not really. Maybe that’s part of the problem. i don’t have a reason for the hiatus, though, good or bad. i’ve been working, slowly, on a post or two as well as the “novel” that i hope to begin distributing in the near future, but production slowed to nearly a halt in March and i’ve only recently gotten some momentum back.

The only explanation that i can offer is this: i’m not used to being responsible for my own high. In those halcyon pre-psychopharmacological days of the recent past i had to wait for inspiration to strike me like a heroin withdrawal–i had to wait until my need was so great that i couldn’t deny or ignore it. i don’t feel like that anymore. i still have the drive and the need and the passion, but at any moment i could easily pick up and just do whatever it is that i am wont to do. That part of me that was too scared or too depressed or too sedentary to move forward with the things that i desire is gone. Now there is purely me, filtered of the hang-ups and disease that kept me silent for so long.

However, now i actually have to make the time to work–not in spite of the weight of my self-loathing or the freezing chill of my anxiety; just time, as though that were such an easy thing. i’ve suddenly found my days filled with other things that i had walled off a long time ago. i’ve found myself craving interaction and socialization. i even got a Facebook! i’m collecting all of the life that i missed for so many years into myself and swelling up with it, and i’m having to learn how to make time for anything else.

Maybe it was just March–the last month of winter, the six month anniversary of my life-transformation, crunch time at work, and another month closer to having my prose available for all to see, like i’ve dreamed. i took March off, to a degree, and a good friend told me recently that, with everything that’s happened in the last year, that i shouldn’t be ashamed of that. So i’m not. i’ve since taken April to regroup and decide what it is that i want from all of this. What i learned is that nothing has changed, i just had an off month. So May is the triumphant return: two posts per week to Twitter, one post per week to the blog, continue working on the novel and now i’m tinkering around with some old side projects that may have some wonderful new developments. i feel alive with creative energy right now, and i finally feel like i have the power to use it.

i have everything that i need. If we really want to be honest, i always have, but for the longest time i thought there was some secret that i was missing. i kept looking for the magic feather, but we all know that story. The magic was in me all along, right? There is no incantation, no ritual, no artifact. i have everything i need to begin, to continue, and to succeed or fail as much as is due to me. i’ve taken on a totem, but that’s less of a magic feather than a reminder of how to find my way back to Neverland.

i begin today with a story on my finger tips and all the world to tell it to.

i decided the other day to take one such divergence and run with it for a while. I’ve been toying with a story titled Forgive Us Our Tresspasses for many years now. i had always envisioned it as a comic book series, but after 10 or so years of not following through with that idea, i thought i would make it the next “book” after Venus to try on the short fiction website idea. Well, i had an idea the other day that brought Tresspasses to the forefront of my mind, and i really wanted to write some of it. My desire was mostly born of a fear that the story would not lend itself to standard prose, but i found the motivation none-the-less and went with it.

i’m really happy with how the piece turned out. It’s much more clipped and minimal than what i’ve written for Venus thus far, which is something that came out of the moment. The piece is below.

This would be the first part of the first part of this story.

The first assignment was due this past Saturday by midnight.

The assignment was to write or rewrite a dramatic scene using the dialog techniques that the instructor outlined in the lecture. i’m not going to talk about them all here, but it’s things like turning a cliche phrase by changing some of the words, using exaggeration and understatement, using parallel construction and certain words as triggers to create rhythm, etc.

I used a scene that i had already written in screenplay format, but i’m not to yet on the rewrite. I was terrified to send the thing in, and honestly, i’m not sure that pre-medication me would have done it, but i REALLY wanted to get an opinion on my dialog. i mean, that’s what i took the class for. if i just wanted the information, i could have bought the guy’s book. i sent it with my heavily chewed fingers crossed.

Monday morning i checked the messages and his comments were there. All positive. He said that i have a good grasp on the concepts and was even using a couple without realizing it. i can’t tell you the uplifting feeling that i got from that one little bit of validation, but it’s definitely going to carry me through the week.

It’s also given me the courage to post the scene here, for all to read. consider this the teaser trailer for the upcoming story. (PS: yes, Jack is a girl.)

it’s been a rough week for writing. i woke up on Monday morning with the urge to quit. It was a line up of all the usual suspects: i’m not good enough, the premise is ridiculous, no one will take me seriously, no one will even read it. i could feel the spiral winding below me, ready to swallow.

One thing that i can say is different about my moods since i started the medication is that i have both the insider’s and outsider’s view of these events. i feel the weight falling on my shoulders, but i can step back and realize that it’s happening. Once i realized it on Monday, i started to search my mind for reasons why i shouldn’t quit. Part of it was a dare, part of it was a cry for help.

What came to mind was a song. i recently picked up the new Decemberists album The King is Dead, and i’m rather taken by it. The song that i latched onto right away was “This is Why We Fight.” It’s a good, if somewhat all-purpose anthem, but the chorus really struck a chord with me as i was standing in the bathroom dangling above the abyss.

“This is why, why we fight, why we lie awake. This is why, this is why we fight.
And when we die, we will die with our arms unbound.
This is why, this is why we fight.”

i don’t want to live with my hands tied anymore. granted, for the last several years i’ve been tying them myself, but that doesn’t mean that i’m happy with it.

it took almost all that i have, but i’ve finished a huge chunk of my upcoming project in the last two days. it’s important to me that i finish something this year, that i start making my mark. Yesterday, i decided that 2011 is the first year of the next 10 years of my life, and those 10 years will be spent honing the craft that i have chosen.

This is why i fight.

Thanks.

i was a runner in high school. Not in the way that some people are runners–i was short and chubby and not all that fast. i told people that it was my way of getting off the couch. The real truth was that there was this girl who was a friend of a friend that i had a minor crush on, and she was a runner. i ended up running cross country in the fall and track in the spring all four years of school.

i hated running. it hurt, it can be ridiculously boring, it hurt, the uniforms were embarrassing, and it hurt. “Meets” were a terrible waste of time, and i never did get up the courage to ask that girl out. The only positive thing that i remember is that sort of “zone” where there is no pain–when the endorphins tip the balance back in your favor. The world looks different than it does in any other context, and you’re floating around five and a half feet off the ground, like a deathmatch when you’re waiting to respawn.

i ran all through high school, and never again after. Now, a decade and then some later, i’m seriously out of shape. Stairs are difficult. playing with my kids is almost out of the question. chasing after a lost note in the wind or jogging to catch up with someone will leave me panting for longer than can be laughed off. Up to a couple of months ago, that was the status quo that i lamented but could never find a way to change.

i’ve mentioned my diet and my fateful doctor’s visit here before. since then, i’ve been eating better and i’ve lost about 20 lbs. i still need to get better about exercising, but the one thing i started to do was take a short walk a couple of times every day. at first it was just around the parking lot, then i added the hill, and recently i added a lap.

i didn’t run the other day. my conscious mind took over and shut down all of those readying systems, but the elation that came with that instinctual coiling of rusted springs was impossible to deny. i was a wounded bird whose wing was almost healed and could suddenly imagine the wind raising me up again to fly. the world seems less insurmountable now than it did a month ago, and a thousand times less than it did this time last year. of all the things that i lost that i thought i’d never regain, the ability and the desire to run was near the bottom of the pile. but, if i can find the strength to chase myself again, what else is possible?

i’m very proud of it.

that is all.

i’m not drawn to the internet for the society of it–i’m here for the self-publishing. i’m not looking for friends; i’m looking for readers. I never had a Myspace page. i’ve stayed away from Facebook and OKCupid entirely. I used to have a Livejournal, but the focus there was always comments: how many comments did i get, who commented to who, etc.

But, I do have a Twitter account, and i absolutely love it. On the surface, it’s more self-publishing. i tend to have a lot of odd little thoughts during the day. Some become stories, some become essays, some have no other purpose. Once upon a time, those little homeless ideas just sat on some piece of paper or floated off into the ether. Now, i can tweet them, and they gain their own life and place out there in the digital soup.

The deeper reason that i love Twitter is the inspiration that i find there. The people that i follow are almost all people that i admire, many of them somewhat-to-very famous. They are all creative people; people who make for a living. i can read right there on my feed when they are working, i can see when they are taking a break. i can see when they are struggling and when they are celebrating. They post pictures from their lives. Sometimes, someone will go off on a rant about being creative, making art, the nuts and bolts of creative business, etc. And in all of this, that thing that i want more than anything–to create and make a living at it–seems that much closer.

They have become my contemporaries, even though they are all so far ahead of me. They are my fellow Beats, driving down the same highway that i’m trying to hitch a ride on. This one, ridiculous little idea–140 characters of a thought fired out into the world like a t-shirt from an air cannon–lets me listen in to the conversation in the boxcar while they all trundle across the country. In a way, it’s everything i’ve always wanted. Now, i have to find my way onto the train.

This is more like the schedule i want to keep. i would like to think that i have something to say on a weekly basis that’s worth putting in writing. Then, the only question is whether anyone wants to hear what i have to say. But, that’s kind of my life-question right now….

Some of my favorite things in the world are podcasts. i also have a deep love of webcomics and the adjoining community, and so one of my favorite podcasts is Webcomics Weekly with Kris Straub, Dave Kellet, Brad Guigar, and Scott Kurtz. Why i feel a kinship to the webcomics community is something of a mystery, even to me, but i think it has to do with the independent spirit that they represent when it comes to owning, controlling, and distributing creative work on the internet. i take a lot of my ideas about where i want to be with a writing career from them, and a lot of my inspiration to keep going, also. So, when Mr. Kurtz started talking about the idea of scarcity in terms of his webcomic in the most recent episodes of Webcomics Weekly, i was very intrigued.

It’s not the first time i’ve thought about the topic. I also follow the work of Merlin Mann, who speaks quite often about the topic of scarcity in how we work and how we live. But, what was interesting about Mr. Kurtz’s ideas on the subject is that he doesn’t reject the idea of scarcity in merchandise or even creativity wholesale, as many of the gurus of the internet have wont to do. I’m not sure where my friend Q stands on this issue specifically, but i have a feeling that he would also view the American capitalist perception of scarcity as so much dinosaur shit. But, where the value in scarcity lies, as so many things in life, is in knowing when to use it and when to let it go.

So, i’m listening to the podcast and trying to figure out how it applies to me and what i’m doing and where i want to be. There is a part of me who feels like an idiot even contemplating these things because i’m so far away from any of it, but i know that there is some value in thinking about it now so that i’m ready if the time comes when i need it. So here i go: here’s the blue-sky version of where i would like to be a year from now.

I’ve been giving a lot of thought to serialized novels. i miss writing prose because of the freedom of voice it affords as well as the fact that–unlike a screenplay, which still needs to be produced–prose is it’s own end-goal. That being said, in the early part of 2011 (hopefully by my birthday) i want to start posting a piece of a story each week. I’ve written a couple thus far and they’re turning out to be about 1500 to 2000 words each, so for a novel of about 30,000 words (on the short side, but so am i) that would take me the better part of six months. If the first one works out well and i start getting a few more readers, i have two more ideas that would work well in this format. I’ve also been kicking around the idea of doing a podcast version of the episodes read by me.

So, where’s the scarcity? Well, that’s what i’m trying to figure out. The content is not the scarcity. The content is the content, and as far as i’m concerned it will be free as long as it makes sense for it to be so, maybe forever. I’ve always said that i’ve got pleanty of ideas to go around, and it’s still something that i believe. In Mr. Kurtz’s example, he’s still planning on doing his strip for free, five days a week. For him, the scarcity comes into play with merchandise. Limited edition vinyl figures, out of print editions of books, limited print runs, etc. For me, the first step is to build some kind of reader base, but i would love to offer some things like this. Signed and numbered books, posters, maybe even an illustrated edition are all possibilities, and well within my reach if i can get my work to the level where readers and referrals are the norm and not the exception.

For me, the scarcity is on my end. Time to some extent, sure, but mostly attention and motivation. The happy pills are working well for me so far, and i’m definitely writing more than i ever have, but the goal now is to keep going. Writing begets more writing. And i hope that writing begets more reading, also.

It’s now November.

What i really want to talk about, though, is September, so we’re just going to assume that July and August fell off a cliff. It’s not too far from the truth anyway.

On September 2nd, i wrote on the pad that i keep next to my computer at work, “i feel like i’m being rewritten.” I was the guy in those movies who is turning into something else, screaming at the ceiling as my face stretches and my fingers distend.

On September 1st, i was at the doctor for the first time in a long long time. i went primarily to take care of a little problem that i’ve been having my entire life–it starts with a “d” and ends with “epression.” I was tired of feeling like a failure and not having any motivation to do any of the things i need to do, much less those i want to do.

Like Write.

The term that i came up with for this is “Knowwhere.” i know what i’m supposed to be doing and why, but i cannot find the power to make myself do it. The end result was always driving myself into an even deeper and more disgusting hole.

So, i went to the doctor. i tried not to think of myself as a five-year-old child, “i’m sad. Can i have a pill, please?” But that’s what it felt like. Fortunately, the doctor only asked me a few questions, told me about the side-effects, and wrote me a prescription. Unfortunately, they also took my blood pressure while i was there and wrote me a prescription for that, too. My BP was so high that the nurse and doctor treated me like a dead man for the rest of the visit.

So, on September 2nd, i had two new drugs in my system–a system that has never endured steady medication or illegal drugs at all, ever. And on that day, i felt like i was dying.

On September 3rd, i was one of those people who has a terrible accident and suddenly has to learn how to walk again, except i was learning how to eat, how to sleep, and how to have sex like it was my first time for all.

I’ve been trying to write this post since that day when i wrote my epitaph on that pad, trying to mix it into all of the other things that have happened over the last couple of months, but my days have been unpredictable. It’s been over a month, and there are still days when i feel the Knowwhere creeping up behind me, but for the most part i am happier and much more productive. i’ve also started exercising and dieting in order to combat the blood pressure, and i’ve lost almost 20 pounds. i have been getting more writing done, but not yet to the level that i want to be.

Not yet. But i feel it coming.

Writing has become a nagging need in my chest, instead of a guilty weight in my guts. It’s become a need that i must slake, not just another item on a to-do list of shame. And the ideas are still coming, clearer and even more exhilarating. I will not say that September and all of its madness was not an ending, but it was most certainly also a beginning.

i hope you all realize that this is not really the last word on this subject, but hopefully the last for a while. i learned way too much and i am still working on the project, but the event itself is over.

The sad fact of the thing is this: i did not finish. i may have said it before but i’m sure everyone got the impression. However, here are some of the things i’ve gained.

i’m 13 pages into a screenplay that i really enjoy (here in about 45 minutes i should be farther.)

i’ve learned a lot more about how i work and the process for that (see previous post.)

i’ve gotten much more used to posting to this blog, for better or worse.

and hopefully, i’ve gained the confidence to get a little farther next time.

thanks for reading. i should have something new to talk about later this week.

For a long time now, i’ve been looking for ways to make this Writing thing a habit. Habit in the sense of compulsion. i can’t tell you how many ways i’ve tried to create this habit. i’ve always felt like the habit should include some kind of warmup, but i’ve tried so many different types of warmups and what not that i’ve very literally lost track. Some of them had to do with writing down lyrics to certain songs every time i sit down to write. Others involved special playlists of certain music. Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

Also, i have so many ideas for so many things. For the most part, i can split them into either short-form, essay-type things, and long-form fictional work. i have many ideas in both areas, and while working on only one large project at a time makes the most sense to me, trying to strike a balance between the shorter ideas (most of which become blog posts) and the bigger stuff has been hard for me to wrap my head around.

But then, a couple of things came together at nearly the same time to create a process that i might actually be able to turn into a habit. First, i saw a blurb on Lifehacker postulating that it takes the brain 15 minutes to adjust to the task at hand. Second, Script Frenzy: since i had committed myself to at least give SF a shot, i was going to have to come up with something to keep myself going.

Now here’s where all of these things come together. Based on the information in paragraph 4, i started with the idea that i needed to write for 15 minutes before i really started to get to the meat of my project, in this case the screenplay for Script Frenzy. But, what the hell was i going to write about for 15 minutes? For the answer, see paragraph 3: short subject posts. These include ideas about movies that i’ve seen, all the stuff that i ramble on about on this blog, plus other stuff even more random than that. i have several long lists of stuff like this.

So, step one: work on short subject idea for 15 minutes, and then move onto my main project.

This is a magical thing–not in the same way as an iPad or a trip to Disney World; we’re talking mind altering. Every time i’ve sat down to write and used this approach, a similar sequence of events takes place: first, i get my mise-en-place all setup and ready; then, i doubt whether i’m actually in the right mindset to write; then, i decide maybe i’ll check my email or my RSS reader; then, i realize that i just need to get started and actually write; THEN, i finally get started with my warmup. Usually after the first 30 seconds i begin to doubt again that i am actually in the right head space to write. But after five minutes of plodding, hen-picking, him-hawing, and assorted various types of staring off into space, i start to come around. my typing gets more fluid, my thoughts more refined. i find myself searching for words less and getting more onto the page. And, after my fifteen minutes, i am in the zone.

Again, to recap, FUCKING MAGICAL. (also, i like doing my warmups in something web-based, like google docs, because then i can easily access it later to post.)

Then, step two: i actually write. Really, once the warmup is done, this is just as simple as looking at where i left off the last time and getting started. I’ve found that i can work steadily for about 45 minutes before i start to lose my focus, which puts this whole process at about an hour. Not a bad amount of time for an activity that i’m trying to make a daily habit.

I did notice one thing: when i’m stuck, especially with something like the screenplay, i find it helpful to start this larger writing session with pen and paper. the nice thing about this is that i don’t really have to worry about format or word choice. i can add notes in margins to my heart’s content, scratch things out, and work closer to the speed of thought. HOWEVER, this cannot go on for more than one or two pages. Once i feel like i’ve gotten back into the groove of the story, i have to switch back to the computer. Otherwise, i have this handwritten thing which now requires translation into a digital format, which derails any forward progress. The short screenplay that i was talking about several months back is entirely handwritten, and still has not been typed because somewhere in my lizard brain, it’s just too freaking hard.

So there it is, for the few people who care. This is how i’m going to be working for the foreseeable future. If anyone else decides to try it, i would love to hear some feedback on how it worked or didn’t for you.

Have a productive day. Let’s relight those fires, eh?

Step 1. Turn on Music
Step 2. Get to work

Have a productive day!

i’ve always felt like a pop-cultural vampire. i feel like i only ever catch on to something when someone else tells me about it. Maybe everyone is like this, but that “ability” to discover something new has never really been something that i’ve been good at. As such, my taste in music has always been influenced by those around me. Fortunately, i’ve come into contact with some amazing people over the course of my life, and their influence has infused my life with music in ways that have saved my life more than once.

to say that i had terrible taste in music when i was younger would be a serious understatement. I’m sure that there is still evidence of this somewhere, but i’m just going to say two words to you and leave it at that: “The Jets.” Wait, here are a couple more words: “The Jets Christmas Album.”

Like i said, though, my taste was influenced by those around me. When i was in elementary school–this is kindergarten through 5th grade for anyone unfamiliar with the structure of American mid-west schools–i hung out with a group of kids who were way outside of my comfort zone. Almost all of them were hispanic, they were all ten times “cooler” than i ever was, and they kept me around as a glorified punching bag. They were all listening to R&B around this time, and this was where my cassette money went. The names that stick in my head the most are Boyz II Men, Shai, Color Me Badd, and the Backstreet Boys. A lot of this was late in my elementary school career, as i still remember 6th grade–in middle school now–decrying The Backstreet Boys as a group that i “liked to listen to,” but didn’t like “their image.” Or some such nonsense. (i remember saying almost the exact same thing about Marylin Manson several years later–and recognizing the irony.)

Several things started happening to me all at the same time in middle school. First and foremost, i was fucking tired of getting kicked around. At some point in 6th grade i stopped hanging out with those friends who had carried me on their fists through elementary school, and i remember spending some months as a general outcast. Unfortunately, not hanging out with those guys didn’t actually mean that they stopped picking on me, just that i didn’t have to pretend that i enjoyed the humor in it anymore. I spent some time floating, not really having much for friends, until sometime in 7th grade. This was the time when i met Q (qsucksatdrawing.com and feedingthemachine.com). He was in one of my classes and sat behind me, as i recall. I’m not sure how we started talking, but Q had much much different taste in music than my old friends, and for that i will be forever grateful. We hung out constantly, but it wasn’t until i got a CD player for christmas and then my aunt took me CD shopping for my birthday 2 months later that i finally started down the good and righteous path. This excursion took us to the Cherry Creek Mall–the poshest place in the city–and the godawful chain CD store inside (i think it was a Sam Goody, but i’m not 100% sure.) i was allowed three CDs, and here is what i got: Megadeth: ‘Countdown to Extinction’, Metallica: ‘Master of Puppets’, and Arrested Development: ’3 Years, 5 Months, and 2 Days in the Life Of….’ (what can i say, everyone has weaknesses.)

The last music related thing that happened to me at this time was the realization that my parents seemed to have this secret life. My mom was a huge Led Zeppelin fan, and my dad was into this weird, trippy music like Cream and the Doors. There was a cabinet in our basement–this horrible octagonal, dark wood thing that was also an end table–where they kept all of their old records. In here i found Aerosmith, Blue Oyster Cult, Iron Butterfly, The Doors, the Doobie Brothers, and many many other things that i just couldn’t believe. How could my parents be this ‘cool’? i stole several of their tapes and a few of the records even though i never really had a good turntable. What i started to understand was how my personal tastes in music were inextricably linked to the types of music that my parents listened to. My love for Tool was woven from their Moody Blues, Cream, and early Pink Floyd. Whenever i listen to Sun Volt, The Black Keys, or Ryan Adams i can’t help but think of The Doobie Brothers, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Wolfmother and The Black Crows should be obvious. I have some things in my musical life that are unique to me: Johnny Cash, Joy Division, Nine Inch Nails, Nirvana, Metallica, but even those have roots somewhere in that past that was tilled for me in a time i cannot remember.

What i find most interesting about all of this is that it is the birth of my individual identity. We nerds, geeks, and fanboys define ourselves by the things that we love, and this history illustrates for me, almost to the day, hour, and minute, the time when i started to formulate my own life. My tastes have wandered and waned over the years–my love for good hip-hop is still strong in my heart, heavy metal is still the shield i wear into the world, and indie rock and i are barely on speaking terms, but all of this is just more telling. It’s almost like mapping my own DNA and consciousness at the same time; shuffling nature and nurture into the same deck. Some parts my parents, some parts my friends, some parts my loves, and even some parts my children; Music is the vehicle for the outward expression of my identity.

On a side note, i still don’t know where my kids will end up when it comes to music. I wear my loves on my sleeve, and as such i listen to everything from Slipknot to Jonathan Coulton in their presence without hesitation (though i do skip through First of May when the kids are around.) I’m not the mystery to them that my parents were to me. The oldest has taken on much of my taste: he proudly wears his Master of Puppets t-shirt to 6th grade, is an avid Tool fan, is learning the guitar and plays everything from Johnny Cash’s version of “Personal Jesus” to some Led Zeppelin. He has started to diverge in his tastes, though, and thinks it’s funny to play Ozzy Osbourne and Weird Al around me because i just grit my teeth. The youngest, i think, will follow more in his mother’s footsteps, but his love for rhythm and drumming will, i hope, keep him interested in some of the ‘harder stuff’ (it’s really cute as hell to hear him ask for “Schism” in the car.) I’ve never found it beneficial to shut off my life from them, but there is a part of me that laments the alternate-universe moment where they find Dad’s stash of CDs from high school and realize that their old man was actually pretty ‘cool’.

post-script: this was a warmup–a couple actually–and as such has relevance to this blog (DON’T DISPUTE ME!) Also, i should be posting a Script Frenzy wrap-up soon. Thanks for reading.

and here’s a bonus kittie!

All of this being said, normally i would be a giant ball of stress and anger right now, and i would be all but quit, saving the actual act of quitting for tomorrow or maybe monday after an unsuccessful weekend. but that’s not me right now.

i’m not saying that i won’t quit or give up or give in at some point; maybe even sometime soon. But today, that’s not me.

there is a part of me that knows that if i spend a couple of days writing 6 pages instead of the mathematical 3, i could be caught up in four or five days. there is another part of me that just knows it’s not a big deal, either way. it doesn’t make me less of a man; it doesn’t make me less of a person; and it doesn’t even make me less of a writer. and right now, what i do on monday is not really important. what’s important is that i’m here now, sitting in front of the computer. This post is my 15 minute warm up, and then i will write my screenplay. i’m going to try to write 6 pages, but more or less than that is fine also. The important thing right now is that i’m here, i’m writing, and i’m not quitting.

i watched the Penny Arcade TV episode last friday, as i try to do every friday, and they said something that stuck with me. Why this one thing stuck with me when there are thousands of other inspirational quotes and quips from thousands of other respectable people, who knows. But, this one did: “…too stupid to quit.”

i’ve come to the conclusion that the only thing i’ve really been practicing over these years of practicing writing is how to quit. and i’m tired of it. i’ve decided that i want to be “too stupid to quit” too. i even wrote it on a card. Maybe i’ll take a picture later. right now, it’s time for me to write, and write i shall. with my card and my stupid right here with me.

Update to the Update: it is now bedtime and i’m up to 13 and a half pages and going strong. Feeling really good about this, and while i hope it lasts, the way i feel right now is enough to make me want to keep going all on it’s own.

i’m surprisingly calm about the whole thing at the moment. i’m not sure if it’s because i’ve truly hit bottom on this concept, in the Fight Club sense, or if it’s because i’m actually confident that i can get this thing done. my money’s on the later.

lastly, i’m a little concerned that i don’t really have a clear antagonist as yet. it would be easy enough to conjure one out of thin air, which might be what i do, but i’m not sure if that’s really the best way to go about it. More on this as it develops.

spent about three and a half hours today sitting in a game store on the other side of the city waiting for my son to finish a Yugi Oh tournament. while i was there, i managed to get some info updated in my Things inbox on my phone, as well as get another character sheet started for Venus. This was between listening to the guy who worked at the shop (who turned out to be very nice) and watching some Stargate SG-1.

it’s been an up and down week here in the studios. i was having some trouble early in the week, had a bit of a breakthrough and ended up getting a fair amount of writing done, and then had something of a break down yesterday. But, during that productive time i had the idea to post some pictures of what i’m working on right now.

i’m planning on participating in Script Frenzy this year. For those who may not know, Script Frenzy is a month-long script writing “competition”, not at all unlike National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo if you’re nasty.) It begins April 1 and lasts through the end of the month.

Now, Script Frenzy and i have some history. I’ve been trying to motivate myself to participate in this shindig for the past two years and never actually made it out of the gates. One thing that i had gained from those previous outings, however, was one of my favorite story ideas, something i call Venus. Without giving away the farm, it’s a blending of a heist movie and sci-fi. i took hold of the original idea because i figured that if i was going to write an entire script in 30 days, it was going to have to be something that i could pull off with minimal fits and starts. i’m a heist movie enthusiast, as well as a sci-fi fanatic, so these things seemed a natural to combine.

THIS YEAR, however… this year i’m ready. i’ve already made plans to join some other local writers right at the beginning of the month of April, and more important, the part that i’m the most proud of, is that i’ve actually done some prep work. I have a rough outline, i have a character break-down for my protagonist, and i am working with my good buddy and blog partner Q on a design for the spaceship where my characters live.

So these are the pictures i want to show you: pictures of my prep work. i still do a lot of writing with ink and paper, and i think it’s pretty damn funny how these pages end up looking when i’m done with them. so here we go.

this first one is the outline. As you can see, it’s not strikingly detailed. just enough to give me some ideas. i may get more detailed with the outline before i start the thing, but i also may not.

This second picture is of an exercise that my favorite screenwriting teacher in college put together. It 20-ish questions about the character, intended to make you think about important elements of the character’s personality. What i like about this is that it’s not as long and involved as some other character development processes, and in fact it’s designed so that you have to think in short, detail packed ideas.

this is my sketch of what i think the space ship should look like. this was mostly done as reference for Q, and for additional validation of why i write, not draw.

Last pic! this one shows the ridiculously convoluted way that i came up with the rest of the main characters who are the crew of the ship and the rest of the heist crew. the area in red is me mapping out heist movies that i remember off the top of my head, the characters involved and their roles in the team.

So there it is. i hope you all have enjoyed picture day!

Putting words on pages, one after another, is not hard.

They’re just words; words made of letters. the same 26 letters over and over again.

Letters make words; hundreds of thousands of words.

Words make sentences; millions or more possible sentences: subject-verb, subject-verb-object, etc.

Sentences make paragraphs; billions of paragraphs, maybe an infinite number.

Paragraphs make stories; stories about morning coffee, a favorite unicorn, the 1997 World Series, birth, unemployment, a diamond heist, space colonization.

A million stories per person, per day.

Writing is not hard.

In the garden where he was cast out by the lord
Flames an Omni-directional sword
For he as ever failed to gather up the fruit
And thus was banished with his loot

He cantered aimlessly through endless permutations of night
Seeking a purpose and the meaning of kin
And when it finally came to him
You could’ve mistook it for the meaning of sin

The women wish him well
Every time he cast off marching to hell
Now if you’ve never seen a terrible sight
Stroll the garden of earthly delight
Maybe we can make it right – someday
I’ll see you high above the Fields of Mars

He knelt down before the unholy mob – who cried
“War is god!”
Gleaming outwardly with great pride – and
Prepared to die

The women wish him well
Every time he cast off marching to hell
Now if you’ve never seen a terrible sight
Stroll the garden of earthly delight
Maybe we can make it right – someday
I’ll see you high above the Fields of Mars

Who cannot fight anymore
Will never love any less
That kid inside of murder
Must be committed

To live a life of hostility
Never asking what it means
When mother nation
Blood and religion
Sanction killing upon the Fields of Mars
High above the Fields of Mars

the first word that came to my mind was ‘Earth.’ i have no idea why, but i went with it. what came out was a piece that is sort of a character summary for something that i’ve been wanting to write for a long time, called Venus.

enjoy:

My parents spent their honeymoon on the first civilian transport carrier from Earth to Mars. They met and fell in love during the company training program for the factory there. It was new; new factory, new colony. They got married 45 minutes before take-off by the new colony’s preacher. It made sense: married couples were given extra living and ration privileges because Universal Motors Corporation was looking for people to settle down in the colony. Families were more likely to stay.

They talked a lot about Earth. Mostly, they talked about how hard things were; no jobs left, no places to live, no money, no hope. I think they did it just to remind each other that they had nowhere to go. The factory was a hellish place, but when you have no options, you can tolerate anything. But, my mother would cry if anyone ever mentioned ‘river’ or ‘rain.’ More than once, I caught my father whispering to her as they stared at the glass dome of the public mess about clouds and wind.

They had pictures, of course, but so few that I had them all memorized before I could write my own name. I knew every tree and building; every face and color; every street and cloud. These were the only evidence I had of a place called Earth, but they lost their reality to me before I could ever appreciate them.

I left Mars a week after they died. The factory fire wiped out over half of the martian work force and the company wasted no time recruiting anyone and everyone already living in the colony to pick up the slack. I had spent 16 years watching them die, day by day, and I would have rather put a bullet in my head than follow them to that slow grave. To this day, i won’t even ride in a UMC scow. Some of the crews I’ve worked on–better crews than this one–I left after our first job, just because they were flying UMC. I know that once these freebooter crews get done with a ship they’re modified and patchworked together so bad that none of the original parts are left, but it’s a principle thing. And a paranoia thing. My dad used to say that he only caught half of the shitty workmanship that came out of that factory, and only half of that was ever corrected. I’m sure every other scow builder is just as bad, but at least Treq or Shiraberu didn’t have my dad to tell me for sure.

I’ve worked on a dozen crews and hitched a ride with a dozen more, but I’ve never seen Earth with my own eyes. Now that the sad wreck of the government has allowed corporate military forces to police beyond high orbit, it’s not safe for anyone who has bad breath, much less a criminal record, to come within half million kilometers. It’s more than that, though. Part of me thinks it’s fate. I just wasn’t meant to see it. It never fails that one crew just finished a job on Lunar Outpost before I jumped in with them, or another crew was in the middle of planning a high orbit smash-and-grab, but would get broken up before we had the chance. It was always something like that.

The other part of me knows that it’s my own fault. Somewhere in my head I don’t really want to see it. I’m afraid to. I’m afraid that I’ll get there and it’s nothing like my parents’ best memories. I’m afraid it looks sterile white and plastic, like the colony I left behind. More than that, though, I’m terrified that it would be more than what I’ve been told: more beautiful, more colorful, more peaceful. People like me aren’t welcome there. Not enough money for one thing; not enough respect for another. Not willing to roll over and take what I’m given and like it. Restless. Not willing to work in the ivory towers of corporate industry.

Eddie says that Earth is a prison planet without the prisons. He says that everyone there is enslaved. I asked him once why everyone is always smiling when you see picures or movies of Earth. Or even if you just ask someone about it, you can tell who’s been there because they always smile before they answer. “Brainwashing,” he said. Eddie’s the kind of guy who’s got an answer for everything, and most of the time he can make it sound so good that no one questions it. I question him all the time. He says that’s why he likes me, but I know it bothers the shit out of him.

He says after we pull the Venus job, we’ll have enough money to get fake identities and real passports. He says he’ll take me to Earth so that I can see the color and the shape of the jail cells there. I don’t want to go with him. He won’t understand why I want to see a river more than anything else on the whole planet; why I’ll want to stare at the clouds and the sky for hours and hours; or why I’ll turn my back and toss the pouch of ash I keep in my pocket into the valley wind.

• Your success in life must be earned with earnest efforts.

• A wise man knows everything. A shrewd one, everybody.

The first one may be obvious, but i feel the need to expound. First, i don’t believe i’ve had any real success in life. Fortunately, the fortune offers explanation as to why. It’s because i’m lazy! While i probably could have told you this had you only asked, it’s nice that the fortune wrapped it up so nicely for me. Bonus points for crappy alliteration!

The second may seem like a stretch, but this also feels like a personal admonition. I don’t know everything, and while that hardly seems like a revelation, i personally feel like i know very little. i’m three goddamn decades old and there are days when i have to sit and think and think just to remember how to tie my son’s shoes. Neither, back to the fortune, do i know everybody. Again, a hyperbolic statement, but again i feel like i fall far short of normal here. Of the people i “know” almost all are family, a few are friends of my wife, and my ONE good friend from childhood (who has his own companion blog, Q Sucks at Drawing, and will hopefully post some sketches here soon).

But, since i hate my own whining even more than i hate my laziness or my misanthropishness (which is actually misanthropy, but like this one better), i’m going to try to make this a bit more positive. If i’m not a wise man and i’m not a shrewd man, then what kind of man am i? I am an honest man. This is not to say that i’ve never told a lie or that i’m above a bit of fiction. Just that, by and large, i am the type of person who would rather tell the truth and face the consequence than tell a lie and have to live with it.

Relevance? Why sure, we’ve got some of that! Honesty is the one thing that people who write say that you need in order to tell a good story. Mr. King says “Tell the Truth,” and i will certainly try.

The moral of the story is that if i can’t be wise and i can’t be shrewd, at least i can be honest. And honestly, i need to put in some more of that earnest effort!

On a less negative note, “total failure” is not at all accurate. I have learned many things about myself and about my writing over the last month and a half or so. It started really when i went to PAX in early September.  During that trip I listened to the audiobook of On Writing by Mr. Stephen King. This text was and continues to be truly inspirational to me. In particular, his attitudes toward daily writing, what it should include, and how it should be practiced have really helped me move forward and get some goddamn work done. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to finish my screenplay in time, but that doesn’t mean it won’t get finished.

In my own defence, the project i took on turned out to be really fucking hard. On a personal level, not a technical one. I’m digging into dry veins here, and it’s taken more out of me than i thought it would. Still, this is what i’m here for. It is not to be shyed away from, but to be confronted and stomped all over. In compliance with the guidelines of Mr. King’s wonderful book, i am not going to talk anymore than this about the project; it’s still a private, door-closed, thing. Once the door is open, however, i will likely post a pdf here and let anyone who is reading have at it.

After all, there is always next year!

King talks about how he writes 2000 words per day. Knowing that this is a difficult goal for anyone who’s not a professional, he recommends 1000 words per day for the “beginning writer”. I’m actually going on a full week of 500 per day. Though it’s not the goal that had been set for me, i cannot even being to describe how good this feels. I’m writing again. and i’m not just writing any old thing. i’m working on my projects.

The first thing i finished, however, is a short piece based in the world of Stephen King’s book. I thought about what my ideal writing place would be like, and taking his ideas into consideration with that, this is what came out. Specifically, the idea of a “basement place” which is also a “far-seeing place” and the little muse who is a fickle bastard were all taken from Mr. King.

To some degree, this is the place i try to go in my head when i sit down to write. Here, let me give you the tour:

My shoes make a noise that is the mixture of a thud and a smack on the floor of the lobby. They make a distinct noise between them, but each makes the same, and so for the duration of the walk—which takes so long that I sometimes check my cell phone clock at the end of it—I end up creating a rhythm, which sometimes becomes a song, which sometimes gets stuck in my head.

I don’t even want to think about what the floor is made of; about the resources destroyed to create the intricate patterns, about the rare marbles and minerals that will never again exist on this planet, all just to create the appropriate color contrast for the inlaid design.

I finally reach the other side of the lobby.

Here I swipe the card I keep on a lanyard around my neck and punch my four digit code into the keypad. There are days when I wonder—never really seriously, but it does cross my mind—how many fingers punch the keys on this pad. These kinds of things can make you crazy, but it gives me something to think about as I board the elevator and take the long ride to my floor. Being slightly claustrophobic, I have to think about something, but this little bit of hypochondria makes the whole thing feel like using i’m using one psychosis to quell another, like eating a piece of chocolate in order to get the taste of milk out of your mouth.

This is another place where even a few seconds feels like an eternity, and I find myself checking my only time piece often. This is also where cell phone service disappears entirely. The tiny irony of checking my cell phone for the time, knowing that’s all it’s good for here, doesn’t escape me. It makes me smile. I fidget with one thing or another: my lanyard, my cheap briefcase, my phone, that thing on my arm that I think is a wart but i’m not really sure. At one point I think I hear the scanners making their sweeps, analyzing the inside of the elevator car for offending materials. Like the security card, the key pad and it’s code, and the other measures yet to come, this is more a comfort than a nuisance. The fact that I swipe my card everyday, enter my code everyday, pass the scanners everyday, makes me feel validated. Obviously, these terrible instruments of mistrust and paranoia have decided that I belong here, so I must belong.

I reach my floor, which I like to think of as the bottom of the shaft, but in truth I don’t have any idea how deep this rabbit hole is. I exit the elevator into a small white room, which leads to another small white room, which leads to another. Each room is more nondescript than the last. I know that there are more security measures behind the walls of these rooms, but I’ve started to lose track of what goes where and for what purpose.

Another keypad with a different code. This door also has a pad where I have to press my thumb so that it can verify my print. The door opens into a fourth small white room. “‘Bout time you got here, boy.”

“Mornin’ Lou,” I say, giving the small satyr behind the reinforced glass a mock salute. He pulls the unlit cigar out of his mouth and points at me with the wet end.

“You finally ready to get some goddamn work done?”

“I made it this far, didn’t I?”

“That you did,” he says as he settles back into his ratty metal office chair. “Wonders never cease.”

He looks at me with a gaze more piercing than any scanner or sensor. I know that he’s checking me; not just my identity like the finger print scanner, but he’s checking that I brought all of me. ‘Come any way but lightly.’ So the saying goes.

“I guess you are ready,” he says, replacing his cigar. “Get in there and get to work. I’ll be in there in a little bit to check up on you.”

He pushes a button on the counter in front of him. There is a loud buzzer and the latch of the final door unlocks with a loud “clack.”

The sound of my shoes echoes here also, but not quite like the lobby above. This is much more epic. The sound bounces from the concrete floor to the metal ceiling 50 feet or so above me; from the wall behind me where I came in to the end of the room, wherever that is. I saw it once the first time I came here, but i haven’t bothered since. I’ll get there again someday, many years from now.

About 20 feet inside the door is my office. It sits in a solitary cone of light shining from the hanging fixture above, the kind with a cage over the bulb. My desk with the dark red finish is in the center, the small bookcase in front of me where I keep my iPod speakers, the large bookcase full of writing reference and personal favorite books a few feet to the left, the table where I keep my clutter–so that it’s not on the writing desk–to my right. There is a large newsprint pad by the table and a marker board by the small bookcase, both sitting on easels.

I set my case on the table and sit down at the desk. There is a white legal pad and a black gel-ink pen ready to go. I start writing.

As I write, there are two things that hang at the edges of my mind. First, there is Lou the Muse, sitting in his little room behind me. The blinds on the window that looks out at my desk are pulled, but I know that he can check up on me at any moment. He might come in to check on me, make a suggestion or two, whatever. He might not. That’s just the way he is.

The other is the boxes sitting right at the border of the circle of light around my office. There are maybe a half dozen of them and they are lined up in a neat little row. The are full of notebooks, printed pages, cocktail napkins and other scraps, whatever I’ve already written: things that are “done” in someway. These pages date back to freshman year of high school; the year I decided that I was a writer. They include stuff from my high school creative writing class, college creative writing class, four screenwriting classes, god-only-knows how many personal projects stopped and started and never finished. These boxes are the first of my collected works, which will fill this room one day. Like a warehouse full of forgotten antiquities, this cavernous place will be full to bursting with books, boxes, stacks, and crates of pages full of my words.

After taking a moment to stare into the farthest unseen reaches of this place–imagining it full with golden light, pine smell, and book dust–I hear the small crackling noise of the blinds behind me.

I get back to work.

Here’s the part where we bring it all back around again. The image i want–the image i have in my head that i would love to see on paper–is of the room, the giant warehouse with the copy of my home office sitting in the middle of it. It looks to me like the warehouse from the end of Raiders of the Lost Arc, except empty, like on the day when they brought the first dangerous artifact to hide away there.

i am an adamant reader of a website run by a man named John August. He is a screenwriter, and on his blog he is very very generous with his wealth of knowledge about both the craft of screenwriting and also the business of making movies.

Mr. August occasionally runs a small competition on his site. Generally, the idea is to write a scene with a few parameters given and post it to the comments. There are no prizes or anything, but just a chance to play and practice and learn. I have never participated in one of these, but with his most recent challenge, i decided to take a shot.

So, back to the point: why Mike sucks. Mike sucks because Mike wrote a scene for said challenge and gave it to his wife and friend to read. Then, Mike forgot that the deadline to post the scene to the comments on Mr. August’s blog was 8 this morning. So, Mike received very nice comments from his wife and his friend, but did not get the scene posted in time to enter the contest.

This is why Mike Sucks at Writing.

However, here is the scene for your reading enjoyment.

I just want to say a couple of words about this piece in relation to the point of this blog. I think, or at least i hope, that there is plenty here for reference to draw. Brickhouse as a character would be a great time, as would Built or any of the Mensavengers. I would love to see the Logan/Guy Gardner look of 146* immortalized in paper and ink.

this is another sci-fi type of piece, but very different. i’ve had the opening line on a list of proposed story titles for a couple of years, and just could never make it fit anywhere. a while back i played with the idea of turning it into a poem, and then later a villanelle, which is the current form. i still think there is a larger story here, which i will eventually write. my latest idea is of an editorial piece for a fictional newspaper– a father printing the last words of his son who bravely went off into the cosmos for research or military duty or something.

oh, the tragedy:

Bury me where the cyberlilies grow
In their light my grave will always be seen
Leave me at peace where they will always glow

Between the sidewalk cracks on Mercury’s Skid Row
Underground streetlights next to android trees
Bury me where the cyberlilies grow

On Venus, where lightening is the only light they know
The water is scarce but the sorrow is free
Leave me at peace where they will always glow

Searchlights in the night across the red plains of Mars show
That even the fugitives cower in the dark on bent knee
Bury me where the cyberlilies grow

Near Saturn’s wharf, the cloudships flow
Down to the ebb and tide of the petroleum sea
Leave me at peace where they will always glow

There is no light past Omega outpost, on Pluto
Nor as far beyond as our sensors can see
Bury me where the cyberlilies grow
Leave me at peace where they will always glow

(BTW, for those who might be writing nerds in the audience, no, this is probably not the EXACT villanelle format. the stanza configuration and the rhyme scheme are correct, but there is no particular uniform meter to the lines. the jury seems to be out on what the “traditional” meter should be, so i decided to bag it.)

Now, to bring it back around to the idea of this blog:  I have no idea what a cyberlily would look like. it’s just something that literally popped into my head one day (sounds like tiger lily) . so obviously i would love to see what Q comes up with for the visual. just as much, however, i picture cyberlilies growing in fields on harsh planets where nothing else will grow. i would love to see what a field of blue-glowing, metal flowers would look like in the green atmosphere of Venus at sunrise.

Q, of course, has no obligation to draw anything that i say, but these are the things that i think about.

this first is a description from the first lines of the first page of a screenplay that is kicking around in my head. my counterpart,the illustrious Q, already has this excerpt and is working on sketches, so i thought that i should post this for continuity.

The tentative title of the piece is Venus, and Q and i have also kicked around the idea of turning this into a long form webcomic, but that might be a ways off yet. enjoy!

i want more than anything to get back to a point where it makes me happy again.  so yeah, nothing to it but to do it, right? (eye roll)

This was someone else’s idea. He started it, i swear. But, the idea is that this is a test. He draws, i write. he posts, i post. as close to a 1:1 ratio as we can get. we will riff off of each other’s ideas, have some fun, learn some stuff, and practice practice practice.

he can be found at our sister site (i’ve been waiting all day to say that) Q Sucks at Drawing. please visit us both and see what we come up with!