Just a thought

 Life is cruel, if you allow it.

Keep on a movin

Been a while. I  choose to blame it on  getting older rather than neglect. Been feeling like nothing  I have to say is really important anyway, that or nobody’s listening.(smile)  Another thing about getting older is you tend to care less and less either way; a dangerous attitude. You can way too easily find yourself ghosting through life, observing but not participating. This is me trying to step back into it.
But all that is kind of off track.

 Today is about my van. I had the thing at least fifteen years and it was used when I bought it, the latest in a long line of vans dating back to my late twenties. More than a simple passenger van . It was symbolic of. a younger me, one that dreamed of conversions to camper and the ultimate freedom said camper would provide . With a wife and three kids, not to mention being eternally poor, said dream was never going to happen. But it was the dream.(smile) and sustained many a depressive phase.

It gave up the ghost last week suffering from a series of cascading system failures. Now he’s gone, replaced by a perfectly functional and competent econo 🚗. I’m actually okay with things. Just wanted to take a moment to say bye to another part of my youth.

 Bye old man!

The new kid.

01JUL2019 Hermitage Park

Waiting on Angela

Greetings from the tiny piece of nature preserved in old Gretna called Hermitage Park. It’s early enough that the heat hasn’t beaten me into submission and right here, right now; I am reminded of how good it feels just be out sometimes. It’s so easy this seductive multichannel television, air conditioned life. You soon cease thinking there was ever any good reason for being outside.

The above mentioned Angela, my daughter, has a neighbor and I swear, every time I go there the woman’s outside. Okay, then, ninety five percent of the time. I’ve speculated as to the reasons for this, said speculations running the gambit from there’s  something outside she’s afraid she’ll miss to “Them new-fangled devices like flat screen televisions are threatening my immortal soul and I’ll have no part of such going on!”

            Today I kind of get it. The birds are singing busily, life in the form of commuters  is crawling past at twenty five miles an hour and I’m guessing those poor folks are all unaware of the oneness, of the connection you feel when you shut your whinny  inner critic for a moment and just take things in. I am moved on this bright cotton cloudy day to share my feelings of joy. Oh, I’m sober by the way. Not sure now why I felt the need to mention that, oh well. I guess I’m saying some days it’s good to be alive on this earth, love in your ❤.

27Feb2019Updates

I posted a Charles Bukowski quote yesterday.I feel it deserves more than a simple posting, an explanation is more in order.

"I have no definite talent or trade, and how i stay alive is largely a matter of magic."

My usual motive for postings is obviously inspirational, for you along with myself, to keep me to the path. Though it pains me to admit this, at times I post things without giving them a through vetting. My reasoning is if it's positive and uplifting that's enough." I have been negligent.

"I have no definite talent or trade..."

 I graduated with my Master's degree recently; the culmination of a journey started, no shit, about forty years ago. I know right? Well since then I've done nothing but sit around contemplating the future; that and playing EVE. My fellow scholars, bright, shinning minds all, have gone on to teaching careers. Every one motivated to give something back to their respective communities while i mine and blow up computer generated ships.

I've come to the realization i'm not an educator. Despite my degree and training in other areas i have "no definite talent or trade." The only thing i feel strongly about, the one thing that refuses to give way to the constant threat of apathy is my writing. My  little stories that only i seem to want to read. (smile) I've no great message to impart to the masses no new perspective on fiction or literature. I just like stories.

This is me facing all that self doubt, telling myself even if i am the only one reading them its still a matter of magic. this is me acknowledging what a beautiful fact that idea is.

18DEC18 I tried

Well, this is me throwing in the towel yet again on the space story. After two months of my most recent attempt to bring it to life it insists on languishing in the no finish zone. I've changed voices and narrators and outlines and you name it. This fucking story! SmH. I hate stopping pieces. It's a bad habit, a slippery slope, but boy, sometimes you just have to pull the trigger.

21Nov18 Blocked? Maybe...

This story, SMH, I've covered the struggle so much even I'm tired f hearing it. Quit? the idea is never far from my thoughts. but, it will never defeat me. I will see it crushed and made humble by the slashing edge of my pen, by the sheer effort of my iron will!

As you've probably guessed, I'm blocked.

I mean kind of blocked.

I started the whole NOWRITMO thing full of fire and drive, wanting to fill those pages with text and damn the editing. I realize now this is not nor has it ever been my writing style. Writing down everything that comes into your head for cutting down later into usable material feels nonproductive to me. I am a write pages correct pages, correct those pages the next day kind of guy. Lesson learned.

Having achieved such miraculous insight i still wasn't happy with anything coming out. I would stare at text then delete it. This story has refused to do what I want for years. I have my outline, know where it's going; I should be hitting the marks and sending this baby home.

The problem was I envisioned deep introspective characters with fascinating back stories, clever subtext that makes the reader come back again and again for new insights missed on the first read. In short i was over thinking; bogged down in the details. I'd forgotten the number one rule which is to entertain.

I am tempted to blame higher education. I was warned my style and tastes would change those chickens may have come home to roost. But that's some weak shit. My education is more a blessing. The problem is my ego. I started seeing it as a story again and not some work of art and the words began to flow forth. I still re-write the previous days pages and once the project is done numerous re-writes of those pages are ahead but i remember why I'm doing it now.

05Nov18 Crow Calls

Today is one of those doubting days. I doubt all my previous words concerning "Found While Dreaming." The voices are all wrong; the plot both too simple and needlessly complex. Who's story is it anyway?

 Moments of doubt like these are normal. Actually I think they're a side effect of other issues I have goin on which are leaking into the writing process. School is done for all Intents and purposes. Im just siting on the results of the board but that wait is a dangling sword. This coupled with suddenly finding my time is now my own. This is a dangerous kind of freedom. All forms of mischief are posdible if I'm not careful.

I am focusing on the work, reminding myself it has always been the goal and my lack of confidence I delusion. I'm returning to the original first person narrative. It works better. Readers need to know his mind, share his feelings. There is a love interest that I'll write in third person. I was told to never mix narrative styles as its too jarring for the reader, time to break the rules, to remember what the Crow means.