Come on! Hop in the Delorean, let’s go!

Whoooooooooooooooooooosh! pzt bzt pitsh bachowwwwwwrrrrmmmm

I decided it was time to finally sit down and tackle the problem a lot of us are facing. Debt. The cruel mistress and price of my greed for toys was piling up along with the anxiety of not knowing where I am at. So I figured it all out and figured out a reasonable payment plan to make it all go away. Every expense I have per month, what was left over, and what I had to live on was all planned out and calculated. So now I’m on the road to freedom.

Now, after a person figures out these things the last thing on their mind is spending money. However the hunger was setting in and I desperately needed some household items. So I turn out the pockets and the wallet to discover I’ve got $12 cash money, solid green backs, hard earned bones, mother effin’ doe ray mine. I look at my desk and scavenge the quarters from this weeks pocket change. I also open the junk drawer on my dresser looking for quarters; there were none, but I took a dime and two nickels just so opening the drawer was worth it. Tally before I left the house $13.70!

I decided to go to the only place I knew that could stretch money for days, Grocery Outlet. Trash bags took a solid chunk of the money at $6 bucks but I grabbed dinner and a loaf of bread anyway. The math in my head said I would be close but I should be alright. It isn’t like I don’t have any money in the bank but I wanted to see how far the cash I had would go. It was close! Way close!

So close I just had to say, “Thanks Universe!” You rock my world again!

The beauty of the memoirs is that I place no rules on them. Some of the text is just blind jibberish where I could not be bothered with corrections at that time. Essentially I have been able to capture a snap shot of my mind during some of the most important events in my life. Reading back I started to notice there was no pattern. It is as though each entry was written by a completely different person. If it wasn’t for the consistency and actual follow up to previous entries you would think it was some sort of anthology where every author just tore a page out of their own personal journals.

I’ve always been on the quest you see. The quest for complete self definition. Consistency in this pursuit is evident at the root of every action, relationship, conversation and intellectual pursuit I’ve ever undertaken. I will only do things in life where the reward for failure is equal to the reward of success. Chew on that carefully.

My memoirs tell me that I’m always changing. Five years is beyond habitual abuse or even addiction to change; it is now a part of who you are. I think there is only one thing to do and that is to embrace it. Be comfortable with who you are today and be prepared to meet the new you tomorrow. We are all suffering from the exact same mild case of personality alzheimers.

I pulled another cassette from the old box.  Things were beginning to go in slow motion for me now during these listening sessions.  I imagined the classical ambient musical score at the end of a war film.  The brave solider you fell in love with getting killed in a hail of gunfire.  Red mist exploding from each new bullet hole as the actor convulses from the supposed inertia of it all and you living that split second of life in minutes on film.

Bach’s Cello Suite One in G major suites me just fine.  I hear it, as my hand clutches the plastic  tape of the blind man.  Each quick pull of the cello’s bow resonates within me and I slow my breathing.  I rub my thumb on  the pattern of scratches in the plastic.  None of these tapes have numbers, just a series of scored  hash marks to indicate their order in the sequence.  I put on my headphones and push play.  Bach fades out and the black curtain descends as the blind man once again narrates our life.

“Eighteenth of July, two thousand four.  Today we will examine my interaction with the Vampire last night.  I’m fortunate to be able to interact with the true etherical nature of the beast.  Most sighted people are not able to focus enough to channel and grow their energy like I am.  My gift of blindness makes me an ideal source for the Vampire.  I let him feed off my energy to sustain his corpse  and he in turn helps me understand the other entities of the etherical .  He is desperate to not cross over and feeds much more than I would like.  It leaves me drained by dawn and I must sleep well into the afternoon to regain enough strength for the simple life sustaining tasks.”

I stopped the tape and took off my headphones.  The map of the city on my wall had many various colored thumb tacks but only one black one.  I reserved black for the blind man’s last known residence.  I walked over to the wall looking at the area around the tack.  Hide Cemetery was very close, not cut off  by any running water, and still very much in use.  That is where the Vampire would be buried.  If I was to contact the spirit I needed to know the name, for sure the Vampire would be a spirit by now.  If he had sustained this long, he would be very powerful, I needed to be prepared for that.

I grabbed my camera, notebook, cellphone, and a bag I pet named The Tool Kit.  The Tool Kit had everything I needed for dealing with Spooks.  I went downstairs in the dark and opened the front door.  A light flicked on behind me, it was Mom.

“Little late for band practice, where you headed?”

‘Shit.  Not now.  I can’t deal with this, I’m so close.  Have to think quickly, pacify the overlord.’

“Jake isn’t doing so hot and wants me to keep him company tonight,” I said.

“What’s wrong with him?”

“Look.  He just has a lot going on right now and needs me.”  Her eyebrows raised as if to say, ‘not that tone, not under my roof sonny boy.’  I had to cover my ass.

“Sorry Mom, it’s just personal stuff you know.  Its got me worked up.”  She curved one side  of her mouth and wrinkled her forehead down.  She wasn’t buying it, but would she call me out on it?  Don’t know don’t care.  But I do care.  I’ve worked hard to keep up my illusion, worked hard to only let people see my mask.

“Alright, well be careful.  Watch out for the ghouls and goblins.”

‘You have no idea.’

She smiled but looked scared for me.  Mom has been a worrier all my twenty nine years, that will never changed.

“Yea, I will.  Get some sleep, I’ll see you in the morning.”  I walked out and stood on the porch, she shut the door behind me.

‘I hope.  I love you.’

I drove my aging Ford Fairmont to the blind man’s old address.  It had become ritual for me now.  I start all investigations at his house and retrace the steps he himself might have taken.  I parked on the curb and took in a breath.  Starting to get scared now.

‘Doesn’t matter what happens Brandon.  You’ll have your proof one way or the other,’  I thought.

My cell phone vibrated in my pocket.  A text message.

‘Really Son, be careful.  I trust you have what you need.  Love, Mom.’

She couldn’t know, could she?

We are little people.

My Father never hesitated to point out the things we weren’t capable of.

The constant mental abuse battered against my Mother’s mental ramparts.

She might be a small midget, but her pride was as large as a full grown man.

Smuggling a syringe from her work, she would make him a special Hawaiian pizza that night.

I typed the word ‘arsenic’ into the WolframAlpha frame work after we got back from Dad’s funeral.

No results were returned about it killing anyone.

—————————————————————-

Danny says –

1) I’ll record the audio for this story later today.

2) Give Blood and Thanks is postponed until tomorrow night.

3) Working on a REALLY cool story that I need to get finished up for GreatHites.

4) I’m going to do NanoWriMo this year.  So the time  has come for me to kick around ideas and start outlining.  Click the link to learn more about NanoWriMo.

5) I’ve got so much crap in the hopper right now it is disgusting.  I need to get the word count up and that is all there is to it.

6) I love you guys

I wrote about 2,500 words for a piece I was hell bent on submitting for a contest and I scrapped it all.  It was about five hours worth of work and I got to a point where my story lost all focus, and got so far gone, there was no saving it.  Writers count words like the calories of a fad diet, every single one matters.  A few months ago I would have pushed forward with it, thrown my ideas down and called it good, words didn’t matter so much to me then.  While I feel that is extremely valuable for brainstorming and word vomiting ideas that are not quite flushed out, it has downsides.

As you grow as a writer you start to loath the tiresome process of editing.  Sometimes if you write something to horrendous and incomprehensible in the beginning, you will spend twice or three times as long crafting it into something readable.  I’ve discovered that the more I write everyday the easier it is to recognize bad writing as soon as it hits the page.  Just like with any skill, writing is practice, practice, practice, so hang in there.

This is the opening paragraph of what I wrote today, the rest of the piece didn’t carry this tone at all.  I thought I would be able to introduce my characters and come back to this, but it never happened, so it was cast into the ether to die.

“…The riddle of the century was asked of me when I was only twenty-two years old.  Smoke filled lounges, liquor stained carpets, and counter tops with sugary adhesive puddles were to be my world for the next two days.  Revolving bundles of fruit set in motion by hands on large levers make loud dings as eyes light up around the room.  Each one of those hands attached to an individual dream, a life without hardship, the new American Dream.  Faces beaming with smiles or barred teeth are illuminated by the flashing sirens of blue, red, yellow, and green.  What was that riddle? Where is the only place where you can be anyone but yourself? Where what happens supposedly stays for eternity?  This is Vegas baby, the new gold rush, land of the free, and home of the destitute…”

The battle was lost today, but victory was gained on another front.  I learned quite a bit about what it will take in the future for me to stay on track.  Onward!

I have missed you all, oh so dearly.  Life struck me the last couple weeks and I have had to move into a new apartment, which I am loving very very much.  I was also pretty sick for a few days but my immune system is winning on that battlefront.  Finally, I’m back into the swing of things and into the normal routines.  So I can write write write again, and get back to the gym.  I’m very much looking forward to hitting the Backpacking Trails in the spring and that requires more endurance training.

I’m working on some GREAT story ideas right now, so look for at least one of those this week.  Also this post wouldn’t be complete without a video tour of the new pad…. 3 – 2 – 1 .. ACTION!

It was a real eye opener for me that I need to invest more in my characters.  So where does one even start to get to know a person they made up?  It isn’t like you get to spend time with them and meet their family, it is all in your head.  I scoured the internet looking for character sheets, and they all list things that  make you see them as objects and don’t really ask the right “What is this person like?” types of questions.   I sought out some of the questions I felt would be more helpful, and I compiled them into this 12 page questionnaire – complete with box to sketch their portrait.  I’m going to try and use this as a tool to help me, and if you REALLY want to get down and dirty with who these people are in your Stories/Novels, than fill this out.

Download PDF of Character Development Worksheet

So I’m being challenged to write an Epic Poem in heroic verse using an iambic pentameter with 5 feet.  The kicker is that it needs to be 1000 to 2000 words which I find to be very intimidating but also EPIC should I complete one.

I used to scoff at poetry, mainly because all I was exposed  to were the ancient verses that made no sense and the useless rambles of the emotional self proclaimed poets of my teenage days.

example:

“… The knife cuts, oh so deep

My days blacken into night.

I can not even count the sheep,

Lord save me from my plight….”

Yea… whatever you say James err I mean “Dark Lord Con.”  Real poetry is very technical in nature.  That is the challenge of writing good poetry.  There is also the challenge of people not knowing how to read poetry and appreciating what you have done.  Now I’m rambling – better cut this off.

other notes:

My Week 2 Assignment in my Fiction class unfortunately had me writing a bit for my novel and I’m just not ready to show the world that yet.  So hopefully week 3 will yield something I can share.

*panic! gasps for air! WHIZ! BANG! POP!*

Normally in a given day I have about 10,000 ideas that I can pull from thin air.  If I’m given a prompt to write from I can easily generate all sorts of ideas for the criteria.  However tonight I’m drawing blanks and just can’t seem to get past a couple sentences before I run out of gas.  I think maybe my brain is just fried.  Anyone who knows me or can read the top part of this website knows I have been hitting the words pretty hard lately (everyday for hours), and I just need a break.

I can’t think anymore and I’m struggling to even finish this post.  I’m taking the night off unless by some miracle that one great idea comes to me but I doubt it will.