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BS: The Writer's Corner
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Donuel Date: 07 Jan 08 - 09:26 AM I see, then Cultex is probably a subdivision of Borg Technologies. 'We change good life to things'* * After GE won the right to patent life they began their slogan campaign 'We bring good things to life' |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amos Date: 06 Jan 08 - 11:13 PM A prosthetic cognitive device is a non-native thought process created by artificial means and exported by the maker to be used in a damaged entity as a substitute for his normal cognitive processes -- meaning those he generates himself. In recent years the market for these artificial ideational processes has grown tremendously as more and more people succumb to the unbearable pain associated with original thought once their natural cognitive structures have been infected by certain invasive memes. Artificial hierarchies are systems of importance, or deductive implication, based on false fundamental premises and containing mis-weighed attributions of importance, distorted information, synthetic or artificially distorted goals, and the like, all of which lead to large complexes of ideation leading to errant conclusions with unintended consequences. Sorry for the thread drift... A |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Donuel Date: 06 Jan 08 - 08:35 PM Cultex is a subdivision of Disney Inc who, in the future, owns the copyright on God. It all started with the virgin birth by the Disney show character Zoey aka Britany's sister. Disney proclaimed the ofspring the new Messiah and in no time God was incorporated with all the superior rights that a corporation has over a real individual. After several large donomination acquisions by Disney, deals were struck behind the scenes with the Vatican and Isreal. Almost all the diverse modes of religion were consolidated in less than 20 years. Everyone will eventually be either "belong to" the God Inc. mode or the Allah mode. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: katlaughing Date: 06 Jan 08 - 08:30 PM Thank you, Donuel. Good places? I am sure there are some. It would be intriguing to write about, though I think most things do have to have balance. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Donuel Date: 06 Jan 08 - 08:26 PM very detailed and colorful kat. Its something we all can relate to since most of us probably live on some kind of Indian burial ground and/or ancient atrocity. How about those rare places where, against all odds, only good has taken place. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Donuel Date: 06 Jan 08 - 08:20 PM artificial hierarchies aren't clear to me, could you elucidate? prosthetic cognitive devices however seem relatively straight forward: reading glasses cochlear implants the internet blackberries internet implants full borg makeover temporal lobe insight stimulator I almost forgot... that bump on the back of George W along with an tiny earpiece whenever he had a debate. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amos Date: 06 Jan 08 - 07:19 PM Thank you for listening to this evening's program. This segment of "Writer's Angst and Mumblings" has been brought to you by CultEx, makers of fine prosthetic cognitive devices and artificial hierarchies of existence for over two million years. Call us today!! Or visit our website at www.cultexworld.whacko.com to find out how YOU can contribute to the madness of existence in the comfort of your own home. Cultex!! We do it all for you!!....." |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amos Date: 06 Jan 08 - 06:49 PM On The Battle of Building Characters: "So I jump into his head, or her head, and I stumble around and blurt out, through his or her mouth, the next thing he or she would say in the evolution of the situation. It is most bizarre to do this while knowing more about the plot than they do, and having to turn off anything too far forward in advance of their present knowledge, and to generate in them the emotions of that present knowledge, even allowing them hopes and possibilities that I know will never happen in their lives, because I am the Author and my Plan will lead them away from those things. Yet, to create him or her in their own moments, with their limited data of what lies ahead, is almost like counter-creating myself, since their personal sovereignty at that moment might lead to a different future. Not that I want to fight with them -- I would rather that the seeds of personality I have invested blossom naturally and ineluctably into the fate the novel holds for them. I know from my readings of other writers that this fate may or may not be what I intellectually have sketched out in advance, including many things they themselves as characters do not yet know. I know that it can flip around the other way, and the seeds of the character's beginning can start getting all uppity and informing me what must happen next and thus drive the writing of the book as much or more than my own best-laid plans. But when this is the dynamic of it , it is just as hard to peer into the gloom of the unfolding future and see into the next phase of things as it is in one's own life in "real" space time. All of this reflects in a miniature scale the strangeness of our own minds, with their layers of cognitive clarity sandwiched between the impenetrate darknesses of the compelling past and the impenetrable possibilities of the unrevealed future, hanging like leathery wings off the frontal lobes of the thinking, deciding present. Shessh, what a rotten metaphor. Anyway, there is so much torque going on as I run or jump among these characters and each of their knotty cognitive architectures, each with their own compelling tendrils from the past and their very different dynamic drives into their own futures--it's a wonder I can get the two of them to sit still in the same room for five minutes!!!!!! Especially since he is presumably a talented, competent, successful and compassionate man, a professional in the hot crossfire of New York, and she is a mentally unstoppable high-powered intelligentsia with her own strength in her own profession, seeking her own professional breakthroughs in the understanding of language. With both of them representing present Western culture in a successful, high-energy incarnation, and one of them representing the best we know about the mind and the other the best we know about language versus reality and experience, you can see where building the bridges and creating the transactions between them might become problematical." I thought y'all might enjoy this segment from a recent letter to a friend. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 05 Jan 08 - 06:59 PM Wow yet again. Impressive stuff and has it been published? Best wishes, Mike. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: katlaughing Date: 05 Jan 08 - 06:32 PM Oh, okay...*blushes and scuffles the dirt at her feet* I've got one more from that same timeframe...also may need some more editing...are you ready? Have a seat, get comfy, here goes... A NATURAL RETRIBUTION Kat LaFrance As she drove onto the high grassy plain, Kyt Palyn gazed across the canyon to the far hills of red clay, sagebrush and endless sky. She felt like the last person on Earth; it was so empty and vast here. Of course, no humans in sight didn't mean an absence of life. Climbing out of the 4-runner she'd rented for this trip, she continued watching as a small herd of antelope ran across the distant slope with an ageless grace. With each turn, the band moved as one, their white underbellies and sides glinting in the brilliant sunshine. Feeling the wind tease around the edges of her jacket, she was glad her long, auburn hair was braided and tangle-free. Shielding her eyes with her right hand, she glimpsed the silhouette of an eagle above her. Sinking in lazy fashion, the bird watched her with feigned indifference. Scanning to her left, she saw a jackrabbit escape into its warren, running from under the huge shadow cast by the prey bird. In the endless expanse of prairie, it was easy to slip back in time, imagine shots fired, anguished screams as Native Americans fought to save their way of life against the Great White Encroachment. Kyt remembered the sorrow and pain in her grandma's eyes as she passed her grandmother's stories down to the next generation. Even though Kyt could only claim to be one-sixteenth native, she always identified with the way of life and spirituality her "gram" had taught her. In her mind's eye she saw her ancestors struggling to survive not only the takeover of their lands, but also the decimation of the buffalo herds that sustained their daily lives. Even though they, too, killed many bison, they honoured their slain animal brothers and sisters through spiritual ceremonies, through moderation and selective kills, and by using every ounce of their huge bodies. In contrast, she remembered the photos she'd seen of mounds of dead and rotting buffalo, stripped clean of their trophy heads, horns and skins by the white men who hunted them almost to extinction. A hundred years later, with large herds established once again, the government was stepping in, killing any bison which strayed from their allotment of land within Yellowstone National Park, a few hours northwest of where she stood. The powerful livestock industry was demanding protection for their cattle lest they catch the dreaded brucellosis from wandering buffalo, even with no documented cases of such transmission. While that was of interest to her, she'd mainly driven seven hours north and west of Denver, two days ago, to investigate some eerie rumours about what might happen on the hundredth anniversary of the day the old West town of Dry Wash was wiped off the face of the earth. Glancing at her wristwatch, checking the date one more time, she knew this was the day a Native American elder, one hundred years earlier, predicted would come again: the Day of Retribution. Once again, she went over the past two days she'd been in Dry Wash, trying to find a clue to what might actually happen. TWO The modern-day Dry Wash that confronted Kyt was small and dusty; a has-been kind of town, with a posted population of 152, and an unpaved, main street four blocks long. It was eerie and quiet. The only stop for travellers, weary or otherwise, was a worn-out looking motel which boasted five separate "cabins" side by side facing a gravelled parking lot. Kyt thought they looked like the "whores' cribs" she'd read about, from the days of various oil booms in the region, when men worked long, hard hours and women were few and far between. Though small and mean looking, her assigned cabin was surprisingly freshly scrubbed, although, like everything in Dry Wash, a little dusty. Spending her first night there, she'd tossed and turned, unable to relax. Contrary to what she'd heard about small town hospitality, the handful of people she'd seen was taciturn, with a furtive look in their eyes. The streets had Oregon Trail-like ruts and were pitted with dried up mud-holes. Main Street was lined with boarded up buildings most in need of paint. A couple of signs, hanging by single strands of chain, creaked back and forth each time a breeze stirred. Other than the motel, the only other business open was a combination post office/gas station and grocery store. The day before, Kyt noticed hers was the only out of town license plate in Dry Wash. Giving up on sleep, she opened the drawer in the night table beside her where she found a small booklet of historical facts about the region. In addition to catering to the buffalo hunters of the 19th century, Dry Wash was an important stopover for many of the military scouts, and later, the troops, who were headed to the northwest to overcome and relocate the "noble redman". As she read about the notorious buffalo slaughters of the 19th century, she drifted into a restless slumber. Images of men and animals, a pounding of hooves, raced through her mind. Seeking to escape the seeming reality of the screaming rage and terror that filled her mind and quickened her heartbeat, she struggled awake, startled by the normality of the motel room. Her green eyes widened and she shivered at the memory of the scant details she'd read about "old" Dry Wash. Typical of its time, Dry Wash had nonetheless surpassed its counterparts in debauchery and irreverence for American Indian ways: more rotting bodies of dead buffalo and more unexplained losses of government-issued provisions meant for native peoples, among other things, made it the unofficial capital of wild West "free" enterprise. The stench of Old Dry Wash was said to have fouled the air as far as a hard day's ride away; some said even farther. Even hardened pioneers felt horror at reports of native women, children, and men being tortured and murdered. They were also stunned when the town fathers of Dry Wash completely destroyed the nearby sacred Indian grounds at Sahpah Canyon. Graves were smashed; circles of stone flung about in disarray; any holy relics, medicine bags and the like were completely destroyed in a huge bonfire. Most early settlers avoided Dry Wash. Some thought of settling there, but an unwelcome air of uneasiness always prompted them to leave. Lying awake, Kyt thought of what this assignment meant for her. Usually relegated to local school board and town meeting reporting, she'd talked her editor into this chance to prove her skills. After hearing about the story from her grandma, digging through a dusty and obscure, old reference book, and more research, she'd sold him on the idea with a promise he'd have no regrets. Her editor hoped there was some kind of tie-in with the present day buffalo slaughters. Getting out of bed, she looked out the motel room window. The cold sky sparkled with starlight. Across the street, a dog slinked from shadow to shadow looking for scraps of food. In the distance, she heard a faint roar that sounded like an angry crowd. Stepping outside, she listened. With only her nightgown and robe on, she shivered in the cold of late night. She hugged herself, shaking back her unplaited hair. Holding very still and listening, she could make out a few words coming from a building across and down the street with light spilling out of every window. "We're not safe! Let's close our houses and leave! Before it's too late!" As she strained to hear more, the lanky motel owner moved out of the shadows, startling her. Leering down at all five feet, two inches of her, he said "You'd best get back inside, miss. This ain't the kinda night ya' wanna be out in." Kyt stared up at him and asked, "What are they talking about?" She went on with a nervous laugh, "If it's a town meeting, they sure do carry on! He warned her again, "Don't you meddle, miss. Ain't none a' yer business." Giving her one more warning glance, he turned and sauntered away. Shivering with the chill of the night and the menace of his words, she turned back to her room. Shutting the door, she locked the handle, then slid the safety chain into place. Mentally giving herself a shake, she thought, "Get hold of yourself. You've got research to finish and a deadline to meet!" Sitting down at the chipped Formica table, she looked over her notes, reviewing the strange reports about Old Dry Wash being mysteriously wiped out right after the American Indians were conquered. According to what few sources there were "the only warning seemed to be a storm, with huge dark clouds." Reading on, Kyt was reminded of an old newspaper story of eyewitness accounts from a band of buffalo hunters who came through a few days after the mysterious storm. What they saw was total destruction. Everything was crushed, torn apart, with mangled bodies left to dust among the rubble. Kyt spoke out loud, "In two days, it will be the one hundredth anniversary of the destruction of Old Dry Wash." THREE Now, on the Anniversary, here she was at beautiful Sahpah Canyon breathing in the fresh air, watching the wildlife and trying to clear her mind. She'd been a little unnerved when she parked her car at the edge of the Canyon. It made her feel lonely and vulnerable. The gloomy atmosphere, with the late night goings-on in town had frayed her nerves. With little or no sleep since her arrival, she was tired, anxious to complete her research. Watching for another glimpse of the frightened rabbit, she thought, "Next thing you know, I'll be diving into a rabbit hole!" As she took another deep breath of fresh air, she let go and felt the solitude and beauty of the canyon calm her mind and fill her heart with peace. She felt a sense of closeness to her ancestors, here, on their sacred grounds. With one long, last look at the wide open spaces, so different from the suburb where she lived, Kyt climbed in her car, started it up and drove back towards town. The wind was much colder. Storm clouds moved in from the northwest. Her experience as a cross country skier told her she'd be safer in town, even in Dry Wash. Knowing the bentonite clay road would turn to slick mud, trapping even the 4-Runner like quicksand, she pressed the gas pedal down. Impending doom roiled her stomach; she clenched her teeth, whispering, "Come on! Go!" Headlines filled her head, "Investigative journalist, Kyt Palyn, dies in blizzard", "Writer's research ends in death". A conjured, anxious Urgency, wraithlike, wringing its hands in worry, looked over her shoulder. Dust trails were visible for miles behind her car. She felt the wind pick up, howling across the prairie with a vengeance. It rattled at her doors and windows; cold, thin tendrils twisted in her hair. Frantically, she checked the electric door locks and windows making sure they were tightly closed. She could see the main highway. Slowing only enough to turn, her vehicle fishtailed across the pavement. Fighting the wheel, tires screeching to gain purchase, she returned to her lane and stomped on the accelerator. Only a few miles left to go. The wind came at her directly. She had the gas pedal all the way to the floor. Losing momentum, she watched as the speedometer fell from 45mph, to 30, to 25. She braced herself. The engine lurched, sputtered and died. When she turned the key, the only response was a sickening groan. Trying to still her shaking hands, like a mantra, she kept telling herself, "At least I'm prepared. I'll be okay." Before driving to the canyon that morning, she'd added a few groceries to her standard travelling gear, which included a sleeping bag, candles, and matches, in case she decided to spend the night. She told herself, "I'll just wait out the storm. I'll be okay." She zipped her parka and put on her wool cap. The clouds were low, enveloping the prairie around her. Fat flakes of snow whirled across her windshield. She could see Dry Wash. The wind was ripping off roofing shingles, tossing them high above the houses; trees were bent in seeming supplication. She saw a few people, clothing whipped tightly to their bodies, struggling to reach their homes. One or two automatic streetlamps shed their bleak light in the dark turmoil. FOUR In horror, Kyt watched as a cloud of swirling snow and massive forms moved in on the outskirts of town. "Always from the northwest", her grandma had told her. An Indian elder had warned the white men one hundred years ago. "Our brother, the buffalo, will rise up. There will be balance. It is the way of our Mother, the Earth." Kyt felt as though someone had just spoken those words out loud. She could hear voices surrounding her. She listened carefully, heard a chanting, softly growing in volume, until she was enveloped in a cascade of sound. Drums beat out a rhythm, setting the ever-increasing pace of the now deafening chants. They sounded defiant, sad, and infinitely ancient. In a fascination of dread, what Kyt had glimpsed in the swirling snow became horrifyingly evident: a band of giant buffalo were stampeding the town, tossing their heads with furious abandon, their breath a chilling fog. Shoulder to shoulder, heads down, they tore at buildings, toppled cars, and trampled those still struggling for shelter. In awe, Kyt realised the minute the herd reached Dry Wash the chanting stopped. An eerie quiet descended. Cautiously opening her car door, she stepped out to watch the continuing destruction. That's when she knew: it wasn't just silent in her car. The wind, though dying down, was still blowing towards her from the northwest. Any sound made in town should have reached her ears. She heard nothing except an occasional scream or the screeching tear of a building collapsing. The herd of shaggy beasts was silent as a ghost...white, ethereal, silent....as a ghost. Then gone. © 1994 Kathleen LaFrance All rights reserved |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 05 Jan 08 - 06:14 PM OK, I give up..no takers eh? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 04 Jan 08 - 06:55 PM We need to keep this thread going Folkies.......any more great stories? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: katlaughing Date: 04 Jan 08 - 11:41 AM Thanks, Pete and Georgian. It's been so long since I've read it and done any editing, I was hesitant to post it. I appreciate your comments. Donual, excellent! I wanted to read on! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Donuel Date: 04 Jan 08 - 11:36 AM The Myth Box Forward: Right now, unknown to each other, there are probably a dozen people working on their myth box. It is a computer plug in, much like video capture software that can comb and filter data. A myth box could filter out embedded codes that would disallow copying any file format or password protection. Even more important, the reverse use the box allows the user to slide undetected under any door of any website Most of these people were merely hoping to record their favorite HD movies or shows with their myth box but there is one among them who is guided by her dreams to build a box that would penetrate and change more than data streams. Her name is Maxine aka Macy Windu on the net as well as at school where she was the finest computer graphic artist who could write new 3D software. Macy, she didn't like being called Maxi, shared her dreams with me. Most people would call them nightmares but she called them her other selves. Despite the bizarre places she dreamed herself she was as calm and objective in describing the experiences as a trip to the Mall. Something about her dreams of at least 8 different lives felt familiar to me and sparked my own childhood memories. I don't know where she is now, but that is why I believe she finished her myth box. It started 2 years ago when the always flirtatious and gregarious Macy asked me with a rare uncertainty and hesitation if I had ever seen globes of light simply float through walls and hover. I said I don't know but lets see what others say. We googled balls of light and found articles on earthquake lights, earth lights and a bunch of photos people took in graveyards at night which were clearly just soap bubbles and were nothing like what Macy described. Then at her apartment I saw them too. Two globes of nebulous light six inches across followed one another right through a brick wall and glided silently about a foot from the ceiling. Her cat fluffed up and hissed at them while I jumped up on the couch and brought my fingers to within an inch but I could not bring my self to penetrate the first lobe of light. Macy yelled "touch it touch it" but I could not, and merely watched the second globe follow the first through the far wall. We ran out of here apartment hoping to see them in the ornate hallway with a stained glass sky light but they were gone. I felt like a coward and failure but Macy was delighted and even more emboldened than her usual. She made some perfect computer depictions of what we saw right down to the ipod stereo player in her apartment playing the same music that was playing at the time. Soon after that she told me of the dreams that were like landscapes of monumental strangeness. What scared me was when she said that sometimes these dreams happened while driving or when she woke up late at night inside the dream and worked on a computer hardware project. Chapter 1. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 04 Jan 08 - 10:05 AM ...and...if I've counted correctly.....100! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 04 Jan 08 - 07:38 AM Yes Wow....! is about all we can say. Great piece of writing. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 04 Jan 08 - 04:35 AM Wow.......! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: katlaughing Date: 03 Jan 08 - 10:13 PM Well, it's old and I need to edit it some more. It started life as a sweet story, but one friend said it gave her such a creepy, Poe-like feeling at the beginning, I decided to make it into a sort of horror story instead. Reader beware: if you don't like creepy stories, don't go any farther!:-) SHADOWHEARTS One As she entered the room, a cold crept through her bones, deep into her muscles, tensing them and making her teeth chatter. The walls glistened with slow-dripping moisture, falling onto sideboards, books, and tables scattered around the room. She felt, rather than heard, a faint anguished scream in her mind. Clenching her jaw, with her arms wrapped around her, step by step she returned to the door. Not wanting to turn her back to the room, she watched for a presence, of any kind, which might be waiting for her to turn and flee. Finally, pulling the door with her, she backed out of the room, praying silently that whatever was in there would [NOT] (proofread, kat, proofread!)pull the door from her hand, coming after her. Just as she stepped over the threshold, in a sudden rush of air, the door was slammed shut from her grasp. She felt a flood of relief wash over her followed by a bone-chilling cold and uncontrollable shaking, yet, she was dripping with sweat. She was alone. No one to talk to, to confirm her sanity or lack of. Something kept her from closing up the room forever; something kept nagging at her to get to the mystery of the room. With high ceilings, luxurious drapes, and beautiful antiques; mullioned windows and deep windowseats, it really could have been her favorite. Walking up the stairs, she went to her bedroom. A soft "meow" greeted her; Sasheen, a blue-eyed Siamese beauty, yawned and stretched on top of her desk, greeting her in a sleepy, unhurried fashion. Just what she needed: the calm, warm love and dignity of her beloved companion. Lying down with Sasheen under the velvet draped canopy of her bed, she closed her eyes; imagined a circle of white, protecting light around her room; and slowly relaxed her tense muscles, blowing out long, deep breaths, sinking into the deep warmth of sleep. Two The room shifted focus. The wisewoman was gone, again. What had it done wrong this time? It tried to let the sunshine in, straining to reach beyond the grime and neglect of years. Dimly, a past was remembered, before its residents fled; when fires were lit in the cavernous fireplace, when books were read, songs sung, children played.... too long ago. Memory faded, replaced with confusion, sadness and anger. Flashes of raging fire lit the walls with eerie shadows of twisted limbs. Through the focus of a distant past, a great rage built up, overcoming the melancholy and confusion, blinding it to anything but desire to harm, vent its frustration, blend with the horror of past deeds. The heavy drapes began to sway, twisting violently as though a great storm raged in the room. Tables were toppled, scattering books all over the floor. The walls ran with moisture tinged a faint red. A visible wind raced across the room. All in a silent rage; no sound was heard; just the eerie destruction could be seen in a vacuum of silence, devoid of any living being. Three She awoke to Sasheen's insistent paw, gently, but urgently touching her eyes, nose, mouth, softly mewing "wake up!" She felt startled. The energies of the house invaded her room with an uneasiness. The cat's eyes were wide, dilated with panic. Stilling her emotions, willing herself not to react to the building cone of fear, she checked the protective circle. Darkness lurked in the far corners, devouring the light as she watched. She quickly gathered the strands of protection, strengthening the power, repelling the murky evil. Intact, she drew the bright halo to her, wrapped it around her and Sasheen like a cloak. Leaving her bedroom, she reached the landing of the grand staircase which led to the front hall. Dark clouds passed across the sun, leaving wavering shadows in every corner. As she started down the stairs, a chill wind blew past her. Shivering she continued, sure the "room" was once again in turmoil. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, she turned to the right, walked to the door of the room, reached out but could not bring herself to open it. Sasheen leaped from her arms, yowling, dashed across the hall. Cold seeped from under the door and brushed her toes. A breath of pure evil ran up her legs, clenched her in the stomach, making her gasp with the suddenness of the assault of fear, cold, and confusion. She turned from the door, moving with the slowness of underwater across what seemed to be a wide chasm, to the library. Sunlight drifted across the room in fits. Shutting the door, she took a deep breath and patted Sasheen. She stoked the embers in the fireplace until they glowed with warmth. Hoping to find an explanation to her dilemma among the shelves of musty tomes, she began to search for clues. Feeling a sudden swelling of unbridled fear, she scrabbled her fingers across the books, tossing likely ones onto the sofa to be looked at later. She vaguely recalled a strange epithet on a plaque in the garden. "Within the hearts, mystery drops its veil". None of the book titles seemed to tell her anything. The chill of the room across the hall seeped under the library door. She shivered. Realizing her frenetic search would yield nothing to panic, she slowed her breath and heart; built the circle of protection, again. After rekindling the fire, she methodically walked around the room, looking for any hint of what haunted the house she'd recently bought. The anonymous former owner wanted none of the contents, so, feeling fortunate but puzzled, she'd added the ridiculously low payment requested to include their purchase. Perhaps now she might discover why it had cost so little. Floor to ceiling bookshelves formed opposite walls, with a window in between at one end, overlooking the garden. At the other end, was the door to the front hall, with smaller shelves on either side. In the expansive space were comfortable sofas, chairs and two large library tables. In a corner by the window, she came upon a book cupboard with a locked, glass front. Pulling out her ring of household keys, with a triphammer beat of anticipation within her heart, she tried key after key. Finally, the latch clicked open. The musty, old books with their quaint titles of long ago offered nothing. Reaching the last shelf, she noticed a small locked drawer in the center. Using a penknife from her pocket she jammed it into the lock, breaking it open. Inside was a small, cracked leather book. The pages were gilded, as was the hand-lettered title: Rent Asunder: the Poor, Sad Heart of Lewis Dunosh. With a trembling hand she reached for the book. At that moment, Sasheen let out a terrified, yet defiant howl. She looked around to see the door flung open by unseen hands; her cat stood in the doorway, looking at the room across the hall with wide-open eyes of terror. She set the book aside. Long shadows began to spread across the room. She felt a return of the chill to her heart. The sun was setting, bringing with it darkness. Lighting a lamp, she called to the cat. Getting no response, she walked over, gently touched Sasheen, spoke to her in a low reassuring voice. Hissing and puffing with false bravado, the cat seemed not to hear or see her for a few seconds longer. Then glancing in her direction, she let out a pitiful mew, crying like a kitten demanding protection from her mistress. Gathering the trembling animal in her arms, she buried her face in the soft fur, blinked back tears of anger, fear and frustration. Feeling hungry and knowing a cup of warm tea would help, she carried the cat with her to the kitchen. Returning to the library, she noticed a mineral collection under glass on a table in the hall. Stopping to examine the fine gemstones, her eyes were drawn to a large piece of rose quartz. Putting down her tray of food, she opened the glass case, lifted the stone and held it up to the light of her lamp. She was startled to see a dark spot in the center which seemed to lighten at her touch. Suddenly, she let out a cry and dropped the stone, as she felt a burst of heat. In a state of terror and dread, her heart racing to be free of its confines, she ran to the kitchen for cold water. When the pain had subsided, she lifted her hand from the soothing balm of water. Looking at the damage, she felt a chill seep through her bones, as she saw perfect shadow outline of a half-heart branded into her palm. With a coolness born of conflict, she calmed herself with deep breaths, a gathering of the arcane forces she relied on so often. After bandaging the burn, trying not to give way to total panic, she went back to the hall, retrieved her tray of food, and settled in the library with the book she'd found. A faint uneasiness quavered in the back of her mind. She noticed the room across the hall was completely silent with moisture frozen on its door. Darkness had quelled the last bit of sunshine. Now, all was in shadows of silence. Four With a growing fascination she read about Lewis Dunosh, the wealthy landowner who had built the house she was in. Mr. Dunosh was a succcessful businessman. Through application of the esoteric forces of good and light, his accomplishments were many. The anonymous author told of the jealousy of Dunosh's former friends as everything he turned to accumulated great wealth. Their endeavors withered on the vine of commerce, through their collective desire to succeed with little effort, save that of dark promises. Having shared his knowledge, but not his understanding of the ancient truths, his friends began to doubt his sincerity and their own abilities. They began to blame him for their troubles. The chronicler of his life committed to page, the eventual demise of each of his former comrades. Death visited some in bizarre, unexplainable ways. One died from drowning in a vat of molten gold, the very source of his gilded existence; another was stomped to death by the wealth of his stables, sire of his racing colts. In a dreadful compulsion, the woman read on, feeling repugnance for the macabre happenings. Finally, suspicion had its way with the few remaining members of the mysterious group Dunosh had belonged to. Gathering their forces, they met in the deep of the forest, under the midnight shade of a giant oak tree. The woman's eyes began to close; she was having difficulty reading on. As she fell into the sleep of exhaustion, her mind envisioned the horrible circle of men. She imagined, in that twilight state of sleep, the men commanding forces of evil to do their bidding. In dreamstate horror, she watched as they made their way to the house she now slept in. Five The room began to darken; something had shifted the forces. Lewis Dunosh lifted his eyes from the page he was reading. Sensing a disturbance, he looked around the room. Where there had been the calm and peacefulness of a quiet evening of study, he felt and saw a silent creeping of darkness and turmoil steal over the room. Silently repeating the words of power he'd learned through his many years of metaphysical study, he struggled to identify the force coming at him. Suddenly, the front hall door was flung open! A group of ghostly images gathered in the room. Dunosh rose from his chair, frantically inscribing symbols of light in the charged air before him. One of the figures was flung against the wall, howling in despair with pain and anger. With great concentration, Dunosh made his way towards an inner door of the room, hoping to escape the evil before him. Too late, he realized he was surrounded. Now he knew his attackers. Hands of suspicious men, mad with greed and disappointment, grasped his arms and legs; held him down on the flagstones before the fireplace. In terror, he mumbled prayers of deliverance and pledges. The last he saw was a ring of eerily lit faces, former colleagues with arms raised, each holding a dagger of great length and surgical sharpness. He felt a powerful rush of air as his spirit rose up. The horror was still with him, as he watched the mutilation visited on his body by the demented minds of those who'd attacked him. With vicious joy they rent his heart from his corpse. Still warm with pulsating blood, they held it aloft, passed it from one to another, jumping in devilish glee. Terrible words of darkness were uttered in a vain attempt to usurp his power of light. As he continued to watch in horrid fascination, they cleanly cut his heart in two. Drawing halves of a whole piece of rose quartz to them, they encased the pieces of his heart into each half. In a crucible of unearthly fire, his poor, kind heart was sealed forever within the stones' pieces. Six The woman awoke, startled, tears running down her cheeks. She shuddered, realizing a shift in time had called her to witness the ghostly reenactment of the criminal madness which had taken place so long ago. She flung the book aside and began to pace around the library. Now that she knew what events were replaying in endless fashion in the room beyond the hall, she wondered if it were possible to free the restless spirit without succumbing to the pervasive evil which still lurked in the darkness. Just at that moment, she felt a lifting of concern; as though time and space had shifted to an easier stance. She still felt the weight and menace of evil, but she also felt a renewed gathering of forces of light. Sasheen twined around her ankles, nudging her toward the door of the room. Taking up her wick-trimmed and brightly burning lamp, she once more went into the hall. There she reached down, trembling in fear, to pick up the rose quartz which had burnt her. As she touched the stone, a shiver ran up her spine. She faintly heard a laughter of insane menace. Quickly drawing her hand back, silently calling on the help of all that is good, she slowly reached out again. The gemstone felt warm, instead of hot; the form within it no longer looked so dark, a glimmer of light shone now and then. She turned to face the door of the room. Silvery ice crystals were running down its face; the air seeping from under it was not as cold as before. Holding her lamp aloft, she slowly eased the door open. The lamplight cast shadows across the room, failing to reach the dark, upper corners. A force of air made the light flicker; she felt icy fingers of breath upon her neck. Striving for a concentration of faith and power, she noticed the stone in her hand had begun to glow with an inner light of a warm, rosy hue. She could faintly see the shape of a "shadowheart" within its concave surface. The drapes of the room began to sway, chilling voices sounded in her head, speaking of the horrible torture her body would endure if she went any further. Images of Dunosh's heinous demise kept flashing through her mind; her own heart beat in a rapid staccato of fear. She felt ghostly hands of evil grabbing at her, pulling her toward the empty fireplace. The destruction of the silent ragestorm had toppled every piece of furniture but one: a table with a glass case on top. She fought with all of her will to reach the glowing chest. Drawing in a deep breath, she blocked out the voices and images. Humming a vowel of ancient power, she felt a lessening of the tangled limbs which clutched at her. Struggling, she crept one step closer to the case. There she saw a similar gem, with a convex side and a shadowheart of its own. With shaking hands, she set the lamp down and picked up the matching stone. Holding the pieces close, she felt a healing warmth seep into her hands as they slipped into place, hugging each other, staying fast in their embrace. An audible, anguished howl of rage and sadness permeated the house, shattered the glass of the case, rocked her back on her heels. Finally, the angry screaming faded away. As she looked down, the heart within the crystal became whole, no longer a shadow, but a perfectly whole heart shape. The light from the gem spread across the room, lighting the walls. The moisture tears were gone, the rage let go; no more anguish was felt. A peace stole over the room. She thought she heard a sigh of relief, a prayer of thanks. Sasheen began to wash herself with the purr of a contented rumble. Epilogue Again, the room shifted focus. The wisewoman had prevailed. Finally, it could rest, secure in the heart of its first dweller, once again whole. It had waited so long for a wiseperson to reunite the gemhearts; let its beloved master rest. With a silent sigh of relief and contentment, it bid the soul of Lewis Dunosh a fond and belated farewell. © 1992 K.L. LaFrance all rights reserved |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 03 Jan 08 - 06:34 PM Come on Folks, there must be some more literature out there somewhere. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 03 Jan 08 - 04:46 AM Two worthy additions to the thread! Nathan...I hope you were not reflecting your own seasonal festivities! Eleanor's story would make a great script for TV or radio! Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 03 Jan 08 - 04:06 AM Refresh |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 02 Jan 08 - 08:25 AM A while since I visited this thread so thought I had better contribute something. 'The Price of Integrity' is a short I wrote last year:- Flying was one of her favourite modes of transport and here she was, yet again' over the Atlantic and on her way back to Heathrow from South America. The trip to Bolivia had been a harrowing one because of the effects of the street childrens' plight. They were poorly clothed, lived in holes in the ground and under bridges, in railway tunnels, where they were available, and in derelict buildings if they could gain entry. Eleanor had gone to Bolivia, as part of her Church group which involved itself with 'missions', to see first hand what conditions the people, particularly the street children, were living under. This trip had a deep effect on her future plans and made her vow to do what she could for those poor unfortunates who lived so many thousands of miles away. The ride over the Atlantic in that huge plane had taken hours but at last, they were coming in to land in good old England. It would be so good to get her feet back on terra firma she was thinking. The landing was one of the smoothest she had experienced in spite of all her travelling, which she loved. However, there seemed to be some hold-up to leaving the plane and they were asked to be patient as the hold up was due to technical difficulties. Eleanor decided that at least she would stretch her legs whilst she waited for the doors to open and stood up in the aisle of the plane. At last, after about twenty minutes, the doors opened and everyone collected their belongings together from the overhead racks and under the seats before departing the plane via the portable tunnel. Eleanor and her best friend Marcie made their way to the luggage carousels and established that their luggage would be arriving on carousel six. They stationed themselves next to the carousel in readiness for their luggage coming through the plastic curtains and chatted merrily about the joys of being back on land and home in England. The luggage arrived and the girls made towards passport control where they passed with no problem, then on to Customs where it became obvious that they were going to be stopped as the customs officers moved towards them. They smiled at the customs men and said that they had nothing other than the wine and spirits they had bought in the duty free shop at the airport in Bolivia. The Customs men decided to open their cases and asked them to hand over their hand luggage. The sniffer dog became frenzied after sniffing Eleanors case and the officers made a point of checking everything in it. On moving his hand over the lining of her case, one of the officers exclaimed that he had found something and asked his colleague for a knife. He cut open the lining and lo and behold, there was at least a kilo of white powder. "I don't know how that got there" said Eleanor but the officers asked her to accompany them to the ante-room where she was ordered to sit down at an old formica topped table, one of those reminiscent of the 1960s. She again protested her innocence but was told to "Shut up" so sat with a bemused look on her face. How on earth had that stuff, whatever it was, got into her case. It had been in her room for the whole trip and only the cleaners/chambermaids had been in to clean up and change the linen. "Where did this come from"? demanded one of the officers. "I haven't a clue" she replied with conviction and a calm attitude. "No…we know you don't know" said the officer which made Eleanor sigh a huge sigh of relief. "We know which Hotel you were billeted in and we have had similar amounts of the drug turning up over the last few weeks. What we need from you is help in catching the people who are expecting the drugs at this end…the big-boys. Eleanor was so relieved now that she said "I'll do whatever I can to help" and was given instructions to carry on as normal with the now replaced white powder in her case. "You will be under surveillance the whole time until this business is sorted and someone or ones are behind bars" she was re-assured by the officer. "O.K thanks" she said and was led back to the exit by a young smiling officer who she found quite attractive. Two days later, she answered her telephone at work to be told to bring the suitcase to a specific part of a local park but that unless she did it without the Police and customs knowing, she would die. This was an eventuality she had not allowed for or been primed for and she decided that she should do as she was told…for the first time in her life feeling real fear of violence or death. She sneaked out of the back of her house and arrived at the location in the park where she sat on the bench as instructed and waited for the next move. Almost out of nowhere, the young officer that had smiled at her as he led her to the airport exit appeared and said "How are you"? She told him she was fine. "Have you brought the case"? he asked her and she now twigged that he was one of the so called big-boys. "Yes it's here" she said. Almost as she said the last word, a silenced gunshot silenced her for ever and the young officer disappeared quickly with the case and the drugs. She could no longer identify him. MH April 2007 |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amergin Date: 02 Jan 08 - 01:58 AM Another Year Passes Another year passes, into the mists of an Oregon winter, trees stand naked in the breeze as the nightly frost drips from their stripped branches, brown and white entwining over the frozen splinters of bark The grass crunches beneath your stumbling feet as you amble home, pissed and lonely. Another year passes, as you ponder, over the half-empty bottle of foaming amber beer, the failures and accomplishments of the dying year. It could be the first moment you held your crying child to your breast, and sang their eyes asleep. It could be the trepidation, crawling it's spindly fingers up your back as you at the lightly tanned desk, in a room full of unknown faces, on your first day of class. It could be the turmoil and anxious heartbreak of a failing marriage slowly gasping its final breath as the hopes and dreams of a lifetime together are shattered and ground to dust by warring partners, unable to communicate without anger spilling into their words, unable to acknowledge the love they once shared. Or it could just be the fact you survived another year, toiling through boredom, desperation, and depression, as you work day to day with a job you increasingly despise, and not really knowing what else to do but drink away your sins. Then you toss the empty bottle to the side of the road, hearing it fragmentize into a thousand pieces, a fitting end to another year. Yet another year passes, you realise as you collapse on the cold empty bed barely taking the time to remove your black jungle boots, you lay your head onto the pillow, and reach for your book, and you vainly attempt to read more than a word or two, but do not go passed the first line. Your eyes slowly close from alcohol streaming in your blood, and exhaustion the exhaustion caused by a late night drinking away your pay cheque, as you think to yourself that another year is passing, so happy bloody new year…. Nathan Tompkins |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 09 Nov 07 - 03:46 AM Poignant imagery Jack, Thank you for sharing it with us. Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jack Lewin Date: 08 Nov 07 - 10:19 AM Very nice Peter, to keep the thread going how about a poem about remembrance day. To See What Those Eyes Have Seen I took a walk down to the park in our town To watch the parade go by. With their medals and barets, this was our day To honor them and those who have died. The bands were playing, the flags were waving And as they made their way past me. I stood there and stared and wondered what it was like To have seen what those eyes have seen. Did those eyes see a friend die in his arms His body twisting and writhing in pain? Did those eyes see things that he'd pray to God That he'd never have to see again? Every day there was a constant struggle To follow oreder and try to survive. And after all that they still think they're lucky Because they came home alive. Did those eyes have the eyes of another man In his sights as a battle began? Knowing full it's him or it's me As he squeezed off the trigger again. After all of these years he can still see his face He can still hear the shot and his cries. Innocence lost in a fight to the death That will haunt him till the day that he dies. So as the crowds gathered 'round and they laid the wreaths down The band played songs in the rain. Then for a moment the brothers in arms Were reporting for duty again. Then the band fell silent, we all bowed our heads And the last post was all you could hear. Then I thought why don't we honor our heros More than one day a year? Thankyou to all veterens of all conflicts Jack |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 08 Nov 07 - 06:53 AM Hello, Although I have posted this on another thread, in response to a challenge laid down by Liz the Squeak (no less), I though it ought to be part of this one too. I was sad to get your letter. You have clearly felt the pain. But it's good to hear you're cheerful And improving once again. We spent such times together Under wide savanna skies We had such hopes, made promises, But real life made us wise. Chorus: I don't have a flamingo to send you, Nor yet a sausage tree But dream sweet dreams of Africa In your convalescence by the sea. We achieved so much together. Traveled many miles. Encountered many dangers Laughing all the while Until that day you told me That you had to go away. It was on doctor's orders That sad October day. Two thousand miles between us Only a heartbeat apart I know you will have Africa Centred in your heart. I never said I loved you Though I'm sure you must have guessed Now obey your doctor's orders, love And let nature do the rest. Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 06 Nov 07 - 07:25 AM See that chap...2nd from the right? He's got mis-spellings on his banner! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Donuel Date: 05 Nov 07 - 08:07 PM this thread is on strike |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amergin Date: 30 Oct 07 - 02:38 AM 60 Years Ago-for my grandparents 60 years ago, you held each other tight, sealing your vows with a kiss, both tender and hungry. 60 years ago, you walked your first tentative steps together as a young wedded couple, full of dreams and fears, longing for the endless joy the companionship will bring. Your lives were permanently altered by the magic words you uttered before your god, binding you to this contract for a year and a day. These promises reaffirmed each time you held your children and grandchildren for the first time, your smiles beaming down at their sleeping forms, as you cradled us to your breast. Now the spring has passed and winter is upon you. Do you still gaze upon him and see the young man who made you giggle and wrote such loving words to you when you were parted? Do you still see the sweet young girl whose lips blessed yours and whispered in your eager ear, "I love you"? Do you look in each other's eyes and see the cinematic reels of your life together? Do you reflect on the things that may have been, agonise over the moments when it seemed that all was lost, the road washed out, jagged edges of broken pavement overlooking the crevice below? Or do you merely accept the trials that were placed in your path along with the gifts of love and happiness? When the silence falls upon you and the gods take you home, rest assured that your love and comfort will have earned a place by each other's side as you journey from this life to the next. We can all only hope that we will someday find a love as enchanting as the one you both have held for each other these past six long decades. The kind of love most of us only hold in our deepest dreams. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jack Lewin Date: 26 Oct 07 - 10:24 AM Thanks everyone!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 25 Oct 07 - 06:45 PM Some wonderful stuff here. I thought that this thread died. Glad to see that people are still adding posts. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 25 Oct 07 - 04:04 PM That is a heartfelt poem, Jack. What a lovely way to say goodbye. Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: GUEST,Janie Date: 25 Oct 07 - 09:24 AM Jack, How lovely. Janie |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jack Lewin Date: 25 Oct 07 - 08:32 AM I grew up on a small family farm. There was always something to do and we all had our chores. In the evenings, though, things would wind down. One thing my mother liked to to was to sit out in front of our house and have her tea. The view was beautiful, there is a large hay field in front of our house, a harbour beyound the fields that the train tracks wound along, and a high tree lined ridge in the distance the the sun set behind. My mother died of cancer. The night before she died, I wrote her this poem. The Calm of the Setting Sun Come sit with me, out on the lawn In the calm of the setting sun. Relax, rest easy, enjoy the view Your chores of life are done. The air is still, the harbour's calm And I know that we'll meet again. Just as a whistle from a far off train Is surely a sign of rain. But until then, I'll miss you mom And when every day is done. I'll look to the west and think of you In the calm of the setting sun. It was cloudy the day of my mother's funeral. After the buriel, we all met back at the farm. As dusk came, my sister yelled out "The sun is setting!" and we all found a window facing west. As I was looking out a window in the room that my mother died in with one of my brothers we saw the cloud cover lift on the horizon. The sun then appeared between the horizon and the clouds and gave us a breathtaking sunset. The clouds then seemed to follow the sun as it set, making it overcast again. My dad then came up behind us, put his hands on our shoulders and said "Your mother just said goodbye, boys." |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 24 Oct 07 - 01:34 PM It's a worrying time for all of you. We are with you in spirit! Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amos Date: 22 Oct 07 - 01:28 PM Along the safe east-west route, the traffic is thicker than usual; the sky, normally blue and benevolent, is a faint pumpkin hue, a sheet of stress over the worried drivers. They say the fres may reach the coast before this is all over, and already 250,000 people have been evacuated from their homes. There are four active fronts where homes are being lost. The north-bound freeway has been closed over a seventeen-mile stretch and the warm, dry Santa Ana winds are herding the flames even further west, toward the coast, toward our home, if things do not change. We are home, instead of at work, listening to the endless discussions about the major fires in Los Angeles, and on down the coast to our area. The Governor is coming to town in response to the emergency, and the children suppose this is a very exciting thing. They cannot wait to see him, not for any political or social reasons but because they remember him as a movie actor. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Waddon Pete Date: 22 Oct 07 - 12:24 PM Nice one Amergin Best wishes, Peter |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: GUEST,amergin Date: 19 Oct 07 - 02:02 AM Drunk and disorderly, he staggers out on the decaying front porch, black combat boots thudding against the brown unvarnished wooden planks. He gazes up at the autumn sky, the white clouds rolling across the rare glimpses of blue, and deftly rolls himself a fag. His silver coloured Zippo lighter clicks sharply as he opens it, and flicks the grey wheel, stroking it gently against the red flint, and then snapping the lid shut. He inhales, breathing bluish grey poison into his lungs and lightly leans against the wobbling barrier, for fear of plunging into the green overgrown lawn below. He reflects on the jumbled half pissed images of the night before. Fractured pictures of laughter, flirtation, and steady drinking. Then he recalls how he sat suddenly alone at a table in the corner, drinking and smoking fag after solitary fag, watching the beer ion his pint glass descend with each eager sip. He hears her slurring laughter and the muffled strains of her voice busting through the static of the chattering crowd. He feels she is sparing not a thought on him, as the joy flee his body, leaving but a vacant breathing shell devoid of all emotion, as he watches the strands of smoke float from his lips with each angry drag. Till he feels the draining weight of his lonesome soul wearing him down as he lifts the cigarette to his mouth, picturing his hand holding a serrated blade and a hundred jagged edges kissing his flesh as he saws down the length of his arm. The red drops pattering on the floor, painting gruesome watercolors on the white tiled canvas. He angrily flicks the fag into the rain sodden yard, and stalks back into the house. He lies down on the leather covered lounge to selfishly reflect on his depression and his attempts at self medication. He promptly falls asleep, dreaming of rage and rejection, silence, and finally oblivion. nt |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: katlaughing Date: 13 Sep 07 - 10:40 PM Reading along here, as I get the odd chance. Janie, beautiful stuff. You have a natural storyteller's voice in writing, as I am sure you do in person, too. Sometimes it doesn't translate to the written word as well as you have done. Congratulations. Here's the wee opening of the novel I wrote last November as part of National Novel Writing Month - it turned out to be a fictionalised autobiography from my earliest memories to about age thirteen: Prologue She spoke to the stars and they answered back, her child's mind having no conception of the physical distance between them. It was thus with all of the sagebrush, antelope, coyotes, eagles, and all other flora and fauna. She spoke their language; they invaded her mind, in a benign way, giving her comforts. The sameness did not bother her; in fact she noticed something new each day as she wandered among them. All was in silent communion; her lips did not move, her mind was agile. "Good morning, sacred Eagle," she would smile. Feeling a warm and safe glow from the dip of a wing, a piercing cry in the bright blue sky, she would continue with her morning greetings, smiling as she went along. She was small-boned, her baby-fine red hair lifted easily with any tiny breeze and her green eyes shown with curiosity. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Janie Date: 13 Sep 07 - 09:44 PM Wiping wine off the keyboard as I wipe the tears of laughter from my eyes! You are a gem of a storyteller, JH. Janie |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: John Hardly Date: 13 Sep 07 - 07:53 PM Well, he just knew he was losing her. You know? .....when you've dated just long enough for only one of you to lose interest. You get desperate... ...and, well, you know life. Here's my friend's story (we'll call him "Dave"): Dave wasn't exactly the picture of macho virility......his strengths were in the "sensitivity" department. But more than once on the college choir summer tour he'd noticed her gaze darting toward the ONE guy on the tour who had "jock" leanings. Dave didn't waste a lot of introspective musings wondering "What does she see in him?" It was time Dave showed her what a man he really was. But why did he choose then?? And couldn't he have found a test of manhood that wasn't quite so likely to.....er.....backfire? Like pissing his name in the snow for instance? OK.....maybe not that one. And not the walking on red-hot coals thing.... ...but this manhood test? "Here, punch me as hard as you want to in the gut........test my abs of steel!" Here's where fate steps in to keep the nerdy among us culled from the gene pool. Seems that the instant Dave chose to demonstrate his manhood, was the very instant that the ushers threw open the double doors to the sanctuary, into which the choir, including Dave, was to file in in an orderly manner. Trouble was, of the 50 or so people who were in the choir, the only person not distracted by the doors being flung open was the 19 year old girl who had just been given carte blanche to: "Here, punch me as hard as you want in the gut...", an invitation that was accepted with great relish. Problem: Dave's abs were no longer flexed as he was now intent on the choir's grand entrance into the sanctuary.....I believe the processional was "Onward Christian Soldiers", a regal march. Result: Seems there are two factors that determine the decibel level of flatulence; tightness of...er....well anyway, the other factor is the force with which the gas is expelled. All 50+ of those young singers were acutely aware that a new decibel level record had just been set (provided such records are, indeed, kept). As gamely as they may have tried, the "Onward Christian Soldiers" were suddenly "AWOL", dissolving into puddles of laughter. My friend, to his credit, told me this story on himself... I pulled the car I was driving off the road. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 26 Aug 07 - 05:44 PM Ya put it in the right place, janie. Weelittle.. competition? We're all on friendly ground here. Or a friendly front porch. I'm still learning. I can show you my Learner's Permit if you'd like. I started this thread to learn and grow. I've already read the stuff I've written.. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Janie Date: 26 Aug 07 - 05:37 PM Oops. I copied that last post to the wrong thread. I intended it for the Front Porch News thread. It is too long to put in both threads, so if it suits, I'll leave it here rather than ask a clone to delete it so I can copy it to the other thread instead. Janie |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Georgiansilver Date: 26 Aug 07 - 05:20 PM Just a short paragraph from my autobiography...not in competition Jerry.... "Langtree was to form a large part of my formative years and much learning took place whilst living there. I believe that most people do not place a whole lot of store in childhood as a learning area and consider that ones understanding and maturity comes much later. However, we learn how to smell, taste, hear, listen and feel as well as interpret all that goes on around us. We learn to respond to others, to make our own presence felt, to negotiate life with our family and friends and to handle what little independence (or lot of in some cases) we have at that age. The only thing that we might have had difficulty with was handling responsibility in spite of the fact that our parents might have had great expectations of us". |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 26 Aug 07 - 05:07 PM That's wonderful, Janie. Hopefully, everyone had a neighbor or two who seemed like family. Now, I've got to go rummaging through some of the dusty grooves in my brain to come up with the name of the man who lived across the street from us. He ran a delivery service with his small pick-up truck for many years. It's hard to understand now, because everyone has at least one car, if not two. But in the 40's, most of the people in my neighborhood didn't own a car (us included.) So, Ben Schultz (I knew I left that name somewhere) made a rather leisurely living picking up groceries or things that folks bought at a store that were too heavy to carry home on the bus. Back in those days, if you bought a bookcase it was already assembled. None of this pressed sawdust, plastic veneer stuff in a box. Most of the time, business was slow, so Ben was around the house and always willing to talk to a kid. I remember once that he made me a ladder by nailing a few peach crate ends together. I thought that he was a magician. Directly across the street, the .......... (back to the dusty grooves) lived in a forboding dark gray house with black shutters. The husband made fine carpentry in a shed behind the house but unlike Ben, didn't welcome kids hanging around. I was always interested in woodworking: an interest I have to this day. But Mister Neiket (there it is) never once invited me in. Mrs. Neiket sounds like a twin to your neighbor, wearing a sun bonnet on the rare occasion when she came outside. When we'd sit on the curb at night during the summer, playing Truth or Consequences, the unfortunate loser often had to pay the consequence of going up and ringing the Neiket doorknob. And running like Hell. Much like the scene in To Kill A Mockingbird. When I got married the first time, my wife at that time and I were getting into the car, when Mrs. Neiket came darting out to the sidewalk and shoved a couple of small items into my hand as a wedding gift for us. After we got in the car, we looked at them. One was a brass Buffalo from the Pan American Exposition of 1901 which is setting on a shelf over my desk. The second was a cast-iron Ku Kux Klan hooded figure. I felt like someone had just dropped a turd in my hand. I almost dropped it out of reflex. I dont' have it anymore. Thanks for the post, Janie. I was wondering if others are writing family memoires. A year and a half ago, when it became clear that my Mother was preparing to go home to the Lord, I set out in earnest to put our family memories on paper. It's something I've done sporadically over the years on paper and in song. I wanted to gather together as many memories as I could while my Mother was still with us, and it turned out to be a wonderful blessing. I ended up writing well over 100 pages, and a dear friend of my Mother's would stop by her room every night, do a bible reading and then read one of the memoires I had mailed. I sent copies to my sisters and some childhood friends and it was a beautiful, healing way to say goodby to Mom. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Janie Date: 26 Aug 07 - 04:32 PM When I was a girl, Grandma and Grandpa King had the only house in the neighborhood with an honest-to-god front porch. Their widowed daughter and grandson lived with them, as well as their spinster son. They were actual kin to no one else in the neighborhood, but all of us kids referred to them as Grandma and Grandpa King, Aunt Sylvia, and Uncle Kip. I have no memory of ever seeing Grandpa King. He was an invalid, a shadow presence lurking somewhere in the interior of the farmhouse. It was not the custom, in my neighborhood and at that time, to enter into neighbors' houses without very good reason. On rare occasions, usually when there had been two or three days of continuous rain so that playing outside was absolutely impossible, one child's parent might call another parent with a specific invitation to play indoors. Otherwise, going into the houses of the other neighborhood kids simply was not done. The adults didn't do it either. Two car families were rare, few Moms did public work, and anyway, the nearest grocery was about 5 miles away, so cups of sugar, eggs and sticks of margarine were borrowed (and scrupulously repaid) with regularity. The transporting of these goods between houses was usually a mission assigned to us kids, but a Mom would do it herself on occasion for a chance at a neighborly chat. Even then, the chats always took place on the front stoop. They did not invite one another in, nor did they expect to be invited in. So, while the big front porch at Grandma King's was like a home away from home, the house itself, and Grandpa King hidden away in it, were forbidden mysteries. Grandma King was in her late 70's or early 80's when we moved there in 1953, so she would have been born sometime in the 1870's or early 1880's. She wore long cotton gingham dresses with an apron tied overtop of the skirt. When she worked in her garden, she wore sun bonnets which she made herself. She made them for us girls too, so we could wear them when we played 'pioneer.' In fact, she dressed exactly like the pioneer ladies on the television show "Wagon Train", of which we never missed an episode if we could help. She was short and plump, with rheumy eyes, one of which wandered at will. That eye fascinated, and kind of scared us, but we were way too polite to ask about it. Grandma King and Uncle Kip, in particular, seemed to truly enjoy having us children around. Kip worked at a gas station up on the main road close by our neighborhood. When the school bus occasionally failed to show and all the Dads were already off to work, Kip would pile us all into his car, 6 kids crammed in the backseat and 3 in front, then drive us the 2 miles up the highway to the grade school. After he built his own gas station on of the highway near the intersection of our road, Mom would occasionally give us each a dime and permission to walk up to the station to get a pop (what we called sodas). Kip kept a goodly supply of Orange and Grape Neihi's on hand for us, and on slow days would encourage us to stay and visit with him while we drank our pops, assuring us as needed that our tongues were satisfyingly purple or orange from the sugary drinks. I remember Uncle Kip going with Daddy to tell the not-so-pleasant neighbors with the pet Bantam rooster that the rooster had to go after it cornered me for the umpteenth time. That little rooster terrorized my 4 year old soul. .Hot summer evenings and drizzly Sunday afternoons were when we were most likely to head for Grandma King's porch. After Grandpa King died, Aunt Sylvia would sometimes call Mom and ask her to send us over to visit when Grandma was feeling lonely, but mostly we went on our own. Their house, situated on a large corner lot, faced the main highway, so we couldn't tell from our own yard if anyone was out on the porch. When summoned by Aunt Sylvia, we passed through their back and side yard, rounded the corner to the front, then walked up on the porch and to knock and ask Grandma if she wanted to come out and sit with us. Sans a specific invitation, that would have been entirely too bold a thing to do. Even when we were invited and expected, I always felt a bit nervous as I stood at the door waiting for an answer. (All these years later, knocking on some one's door still makes me nervous.) When not specifically invited, we walked or rode our bikes up the street until we could see (and be seen from) the porch. If anyone was out there, an invitation to join them was usually forthcoming. If the porch was empty, we'd make enough noise playing in the street to be sure we were noticed, in the hope, often enough fulfilled, that one of them would come out to invite us up onto the porch for a visit. We kids preferred to sit on the long, squeaky metal glider. As I recall, so did Grandma. Uncle Kip liked the porch swing , but Aunt Sylvia preferred the metal garden chair near the front door, where she could easily get up to go check on supper from time to time. We could tell what they were having for supper from the smells that wafted out from the open front door. During high summer, Grandma King would often string half-runner beans or shuck corn as she sat. Sometimes she'd wrap some in newspaper to give to us to take home for our own supper. I don't remember much of what we talked about. I don't recall that Grandma told many stories of the place when it was all still their farm, before they sold off the parcels that were now our semi-rural neighborhood. I do remember a tale about a big snapping turtle that moved into the deep pool in the creek for a season, and how they turned that big fella into turtle soup after Louie nearly lost an appendage to it while playing in the creek. I remember listening to plans to get rid of the tent worms in the two big plum trees at the back of the property along the creek. I suspect we mostly didn't talk about much of anything. I think we just enjoyed each other's company. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 25 Aug 07 - 07:51 PM How's this for an opening sentence, Janie: "In later years, holding forth to an interviewer or to an audience of aging fans at a comic book convention, Sam Clay liked to declare, apropos of his and Joe Kavalier's greatest creation, that back when he was a boy, sealed and hog-tied inside the airtight vessel known as Brooklyn, New York, he had been haunted by dreams of Harry Houdini." From "The Amazing Adventures Of Kavlier & Clay by Michael Chabon. The book won a Pulitzer Prize. The opening sentence is so crammed full of images and information that you feel like you've read the whole first chapter. It's also a tip-off to the writer's style. He don't write nothin' like Hemingway. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Amos Date: 25 Aug 07 - 07:19 PM Ya know Janie, old Red talked just that way in real life, too. He had an eye for story, and he would tell it with zeal, and his one real eye would twinkle, and he'd sorta drawl and then he deliver the closing line with a little smile, his mouth half-open smiling and waiting for the flood of hilarity that would always come back to him. He loved telling stories. More than anything. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Janie Date: 25 Aug 07 - 06:11 PM This may be one of the longest oening sentences ever written, but it is still a favorite. From A Place to Come To by Robert Penn Warren. I was the only boy, or girl either, in the public school of the town of Dugton, Claxford County, Alabama, whose father had ever got killed in the middle of the night standing up in the front of his wagon to piss on the hindquarters of one of a span of mules and, being drunk, pitching forward on his head, still hanging onto his dong, and hitting the pike in such a position and condition that both the left front and the left rear wheels of the wagon rolled, with perfect precision, over his unconscious neck, his having passed out being, no doubt, the reason he took the fatal punge in the first place. (Can't help it, I gotta finish the paragraph.)Throughout, he was still holding onto his dong. It is just the way uncle Bubba might start his story-telling after all the family has settled out on the rockers and glider on Grandma's front porch after Sunday dinner. There is no mistaking that you are about to enter the rich tapestry of a well written southern novel. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Writer's Corner From: Janie Date: 24 Aug 07 - 08:18 PM Both the reading of posts and the writing of posts here on Mudcat is a value learning experience in writing for me. For a number of years I was a policy geek for the Dept. of Human Services in West Virginia. Mostly, I read federal regulations, directive memoranda from the applicable federal agency, the State code and legal decisions, synthesized them, then wrote West Virginia's policy and program manuals for stuff like AFDC and the Food Stamp program. I wrote long, and I wrote often. Every sentence, every paragraph, had to be contructed in a way that went as far as it is possible to exclude any possibility of misinterpretion or nuance. It was subjected to rigorous peer review for both content and grammer before it was finally released to the field. A sentence could be 300 words long provided all the commas were in the right place. God forbid, however, the period at the end of it should be immediately preceded by a preposition. (Believe it or not, I used to be able to spell and punctuate correctly.) It was an exclusively and excruciatingly left-brained activity. That indoctrination served me well when it came time to write research papers in graduate school. It also rendered me incapable of writing anything else, even a warm, newsy little note to a friend. When I first came to Mudcat, the conversational writing was a revelation to me. Slowly, as you teach by the example of your writings, my right brain has become unlocked and is daring to join the left brain. Sometimes, and it often ain't pretty when this happens, the right brain tells the left brain to go take a hike, and writes all on it's own. I observe my tendency to revert to left-brained writing when posting about social policies, mental health, etc. - stuff that intersects with my academic or professional experience or interests - but can not alter it. At least not yet. Some of the people who post here with some frequency are clearly 'writers', whether they think of themselves in those terms or not. Others are good conversationalists, or post with clear and discerning logic and rationality in clear and accessible language. Some are clever with reparte(e). Some 'speak' simply and from the heart. Whatever a person may post, I see that the most effective communicators with the written word access both halves of their brain in the process. All of you are valued teachers. Thanks. Janie |
