Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
Monday o’memories – I stumbled across some ol’ Grand Funk Railroad stuff while browsing today, and remembered their first live album. It was my sister’s album, but I really enjoyed it, another step in my rock music education. It was a 33 RPM vinyl record that I played on Mom’s big Magnavox stereo that resided in the living room of our thirteen-hundred square foot ranch-style home in Penn Hills, PA. I only did this when I was home alone.
GFR was basic and almost primal in their early years before moving on to more of a pop sound. This first song, “Are You Ready”, epitomized their first year, I think – frenetic musical energy.
When I awoke from this dream, I held the last scenes in my mind’s hands and thought, wow, that was empowering.
Only snippets of dream fragments come to mind now. I remember struggling and coping through a morass of frustration and weariness. I don’t know the specifics of that dream’s chapter, but then I started rising. I grew taller, bigger, and stronger. I knew and felt that in the dream. As I did, I took control, because up where I was, I could see how everything connected, and how the mechanics and leverage worked. Up there, I could tell others where to find answers or how to see things. I kept growing until I was a giant. Then I used my fingers to move and show things, and help others. The last piece was that I, as a giant, was showing a young girl where something fit. By that point, the world appeared to be an enormous periodic table to me and I told her, “Forty across, and eight down.” It was then I woke.
The dream wasn’t a great surprise. Just as I fall into dark airless abysses or find myself in caves or tunnels about every twenty-five or -six days, I find myself rising, too, feeling invincible and empowered. When the dark side comes down on me, I hunker down and endure. I’m grateful when the light side lifts me up, re-igniting my hopes and optimism.
Floofductive (floofinition) – measures taken to reduce or control a dog or cat’s run of the house.
In use: “She used floofductives such as stern orders that the cat cannot jump onto the table or counter, and the dog could not sit on the sofa, but sometimes she came home to discover evidence that both events took place while she was away.”
Know these words?
We skipped the light fandango
Turned cartwells ‘cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
But the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
As the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
The waiter brought a tray
Procol Harum released “A Whiter Shade of Pale” in 1967. When I heard it, I thought, WTF? What are they singing about? What’s it all mean? Later, in my early twenty-somethings, out tasting libations with friends, the song made complete sense. It became then a song about feeling isolated and lost, not drunk or stoned, but confused and searching. I like that in music, art, and literature, I can find one meaning to what I perceive during one stage of life, and discover something vastly different at another point.
The other thing that I like is how some of these things pull me back to a very sharp point of a moment and feel it all again.
This exchange was profoundly validating to me. I chase my characters and grind my molars, dismayed by where they’re going, reluctant to accept their direction, and upset because I’m again proven not to be in charge. Finding I’m in good company comforts me a little, like an amuse-bouche comforts me when I’m really hungry for pizza.
I enjoyed their conversation, so here’s a link, so you can read it, too.
This song came to mind yesterday. I was thinking about lunch. What to do, what to do, what to do? Wanted something small, light, and easy. Just a little food, just a little food. Soon I was singing, “A little bit of food, yeah, a little bit of food.” With a little thought, I realized it was the tune to “Little Bit O’ Soul” by The Music Explosion. I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve last heard this song, but I’ll share it with you.
Infloofment (floofinition) – an accusation against a household pet such as a cat or dog.
In use: “Seeing the houseplant destroyed, its leaves scattered around the room, she turned to the cats and leveled her infloofment, demanding to know which was guilty. Both stayed silent but wide-eyed.”
I did the same thing that Scott said, buying Writer’s Digest and books on fiction writing, looking for the secrets before realizing, just read and write. It wasn’t wasted time or effort, though, because I glimpsed other writers’ processes and developed my processes and voice from thinking about what they’d done, trying to do the same, and then adjusting.
Michael Seidel, writer 