Category: Thinking, thinking

The Course of Love

He was pleased to be going out with her. He’d met her at the coffee shop. She was a barista, and he was a regular. Three years older than her, it turned out. She was a student in her final year. He’d just graduated and was taking some time off in the area. Her eyes, gleaming jade and almond-shaped, felt like a laser cutting through him when she looked at him. She is it, he thought, with a wildly hammering heart. It turned out she was very funny and intelligent, studying English Literature, with plans, she said, “To be a CEO.”

They went to Louie’s for dinner, a safe place, none too romantic, with plans to zip over to Aqua to hear LEFT and dance after dinner — “We’ll see,” they told one another” — but then, sitting opposite him, laughing as she brushed a strand back off her face with a thumb — isn’t that endearing? — and her nails lack polish or gel, interesting! — he looked down at the table. She put her hands down, palms first, on the table, moments later.

She was speaking, but it was like light and sound left the room. Her hands on the table looked like giant spiders with long, slender legs. Thereafter, he couldn’t look at her without seeing her hands and noticing their resemblance to spiders. He didn’t understand at all, but it made him physically ill. It was easy to tell her, “I’m sorry, but I think we might need to call it a night. I’m not feeling well.” Then, as if his body felt that his declaration needed validated, he slapped a hand over his mouth, raced to the bathroom, and violently puked.

Looking at himself in the mirror as he washed up, he wondered, why? Perhaps he’d been drugged.

The next day, he went in for his usual coffee. She served him, concerned about the previous evening. He couldn’t look at her. All he saw were her spider hands. When he saw them, he immediately felt like he was going to be sick. Sighing, he left without drinking his coffee. He’d need to find another coffee shop.

It all saddened him. He’d liked that coffee shop, and he thought he loved that woman. A few days later, at The Roasting Company, he met another young woman. He felt madly in love with her, which shocked him – what kind of fool was he, falling in love so quickly and easily? – and he was leery of dating after spider hands, but she asked him out, telling him with a smile that he thought as intriguing as Mona Lisa’s, “Don’t worry. You’re in my hands now. I’ll take care of you.”

Her words startled him. He wondered if there was connection, but then dismissed it as silly, and accepted with pleasure.

1

The Disconnect

He walked through the neighborhoods of circa 1940 and 1950 bungalows and craftsman houses. The newer neighborhoods were ranches built in the 1960s and 1970s, larger houses with smaller yards.

Throughout were large oak, sycamore, and maple trees, along with cars and RVs filled with belongings parked up against the curbs. Some cars had people sleeping inside. Others had windows or doors open with people lounging by their vehicles, smoking cigarettes, talking to others, listening to music, or reading books.

Churches occupied every third block, churches with an acre or more of vast asphalt for parking with signs stating, “Church Use Only. All Others Will Be Towed.” 

Somehow, seeing those cars and RVs of homeless parked on the streets and the vast empty church parking lots, he thought there was a disconnect, but he just couldn’t connect it.

2

Not the Same

“I don’t believe in the Holocaust,” he said with a challenging, simpering smile. 

“What’s that mean?”

“I wasn’t there, so I don’t know that it happened.”

“It’s a well-documented historic fact. Millions of people died.”

He waved that away. “Papers. Photographs. That can all be faked.”

“And bodies in graves?”

“They can be faked, too. I wasn’t there, so I can’t confirm that it happened, and I don’t believe it did. Just like slavery. I don’t think it happened, either.”

My mouth fell open. “So you need to be there to know if something happened.” As he nodded, I said, “Are you a sports fan?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“How do you know that a game took place if you weren’t there? You can’t watch every game on television. Even if you could, that can be faked.”

He laughed. “Oh, that’s different, because I’m alive now. I’m experiencing it.”

“You were born, when, the early seventies?”

“Exactly nineteen seventy.”

I set my cup to focus on him. “The Moon landings began the year before, nineteen sixty-nine. Do you believe in those?”

“No, I don’t. There’s a lot of evidence that the entire space program was faked.”

“Then World War II was probably faked, too, right?”

“No, because my grandfather fought in World War II in the Pacific. He confirmed it was real.”

“But only in the Pacific, right? He didn’t serve in Europe.”

“But he had friends and other relatives that fought in Europe.”

“But not you.”

“Of course not. I’m too young.”

“Then you must not believe in Jesus Christ. You weren’t there when he was alive, were you? Or the first SuperBowl or any of the other football championships? You must not believe in Babe Ruth, either, or Columbus coming to America, right?”

He was shaking his head. “No, no, you’re wrong. Fake news to control the people is a modern pracitice that the United States government developed. Things that happened hundreds of years ago are true because people told the truth in that time. See, it’s just not the same.”

 

 

7

Unforgotten

Memories,

I make them now,

so far my brain hasn’t forgotten how.

Time shoots by in a quickening blast

and I recall with fondness a nebulous past.

Starry-eyed and glittery mind, I used to look ahead.

Now, sometimes, it’s wearying getting out of bed.

My oceans of thoughts seem dark but calm,

a prelude, or harbinger, of a once-remembered song.

I seek comfort, I seek reminders, I seek the past,

even though I know, like the future,

it never lasts.

 

 

2

The Fourth Time

Finished the novel-in-progress’ first draft back in June. Turned out to be a hot mess. So, after a few days of sulking and withering under the glares I gave myself in the mirror, I tried again.

Yeah, finished that draft and choked on it. I went into a hard work & focus mode that I’d discovered in myself about forty years back. Went to work on number three. Number three was a third of the way through when I realized, no; not working. Still not finding the root issue.

Damn it. My frustration levels were rising and hadn’t peaked. But with each draft, I narrowed down issues, and fixed problems. Come number four, and damn it, I remained dissatisfied. I kept thinking about what the problem was. Then, once I realized and admitted what it was, I began addressing how to fix it. The challenge haunted me through everything I was doing.

A possible answer was found this morning. Warning myself not to overthink it, I resumed work with draft number three as the basis, but designated as draft number four. I warned myself not to get my hopes up; I thought I could fix it twice before.

I did end up satisfied with the changes today. Need to sustain the effort, though, focus and keep the pressure up until I finish a draft that satisfies me. This might well take all summer. I could be writing about draft number twenty by autumn’s first day.

Done with writing like crazy for the day. Cheers

6

Laurel

I met a woman named Laurel today. She’s young and pleasant. I began wondering about her name. I’ve never met anyone named Oak or Maple as a first name. No Pine or Spruce. I’ve heard of Willows and Magnolias but have never met them.

What about Spruce? It’s in use, but way down at #12,611 in 2018 according to BabyCenter, and it’s a boy’s name.

I can imagine a female named Spruce. “Hello, I’m Spruce.”

“Oh, pleased to meet you, Spruce. Lovely name, by the way.”

We shake hands. “Thank you. I’m named after a tree.”

Works for me.

2

Contracting and Expanding

The mid-year cusp finds me contracting and expanding among multiple spectrums, like my psyche is inhaling and exhaling, troubling and calming itself, encouraging and discouraging. All’s well, it’s not looking good, but it’s looking better even if it looks like crap.

July is beginning. I’ve completed the first draft of the novel begun in January (April Showers 1921). The first draft strikes me as abysmal. The things that I thought I needed to write and I thought were so perfect make me want to hurl now. Wading through them is like walking naked through a chest-high pool of liquified feces.

It’s wonderful.

This is writing’s essence for me. It’s the matter of thinking on topics and characters, needling the imagination into pulling concepts out of my ass, and then tinkering with it all, hunting the story, wrestling with understanding, and coping with how to tell it, and what I’m telling.

I began a new draft and reorganized the structure. That’s another phase in progress. I’ve edited and revised the first twelve chapters in the past week. Several of the chapters required five or more passes. One chapter remained unsatisfying after six or seven hacks at it. I marked it for more work and continued, remembering that the story being told is the sum of all the separate pieces, and only come together for me when they’re all known and understood. Then, working on another chapter, I went back to the troubling chapter. Eureka! I saw the issues troubling me, clear as a full moon on a cloudless night. Slash, slash, slash, slice, slice, slice, cut and delete, cut and delete, rework, rework. Ah; better. More passes are needed, but it now works.

Others have noticed my focus and intensity. They only see the outer panel. Inside me, it’s as intense as a hot, bubbling cauldron. I noticed the impact on other aspects of my life. Phone calls and emails that are promised are postponed to keep from interfering with my progress. My focus on this novel causes me to forget to do things that I’ve planned, errands to run, et cetera. I know this is the case, but my wife thinks I’m being forgetful because I’m getting old or something. I don’t bother to attempt to correct her, because there’s no value in wasting that energy.

Above and beyond, after reading interviews with authors, I’ve ended up with a long list of books to read. The ideas found and presented are spectacular. I want to go read those stories. It’s far from an altruistic plan. While it’s born in the enjoyment I find in reading and the admiration I have for their success in going the path that I follow, there are more books for me to write. Reading these others will help unleash these book ideas. That excites me.

That thought reminds me of the danger of tastes and preferences. I tend to read science fiction, thrillers, historic fiction, a few ‘literary’ books, mysteries, some non-fiction about science, economics, and politics, but I need to expand that circle. It’s a decent size, but it’s too small for the size of our existence. I’m hungry to find more, learn more, imagine more, and write more.

One thing that I learned while working in the military, startups, and Fortune 500 corporations is the value of pacing. There will be ups and downs, but to finish, I have to manage my intellectual, emotional, and physical energies so that I can be there at the end. That requires introspection and meditation, but my dreams help me.

It’s a different path for each of us. I’m jealous of being who stumble onto their path early and who manage to navigate it to their satisfaction, but I can’t deny that I’m happy to be on this path.

We’re cresting mid-year. I hope you’re all doing well on your paths. Press on.

Cheers

 

0

Writing Madness

First, some acknowledgements were required. Then decisions, followed by introspection, and finally, action. Yes, it was a typical writing day.

I’d finished writing the first draft of April Showers 1921 and found it a hot mess. Part of that were unreasonable expectations (who, me?) about how the first draft should read, along with unreasonable comparisons to published novels being read. I know that one author comparing their work to another author’s work has never been happened before, but I couldn’t help myself. It probably had to do with a bad moon rising, a hormonal surge, or general malaise.

I’d also begun hearing editors, publishers, critics, and readers in my head. It was a crowded damn place, and they were a damning crowd. Foolish, I know, to consider anyone else while you’re writing the first draft. It’s one of my problems with being human.

Third, I was over-thinking every aspect of everything that I was writing. I know, writers never do that, and yet, I was, for some reason.

Fortunately, I was able to intervene with myself.

I have a habit of hunting for quotes about writing, writers, and the process and curses. I’ll often hunt for interviews with authors to find these quotes. It shouldn’t surprise many that I focus on quotes dealing with whatever issues are vexing me.

This week, I found quotes from Jane Bardam and Anna Burns that helped me get over myself. Jane’s quote, “We never know what we’re writing about, even when the book’s over,” first struck me. Becoming overwhelmed with my concept, I felt like I’d become trapped in blackberry bushes and couldn’t escape. I’d become paralyzed trying to analyze and understand what I was writing about. That was just shutting down my brain.

Likewise, over-thinking what was going on undermined my writing process. I then came across Anna Burns’ comments. She was all about how the characters turning up and telling their stories. That’s exactly what I normally do, when it’s all going well. Anna continued about it being a messy process, and that it’s sometimes told backwards.

Yes, and yes. Those were true for me.

But the last part was what saved me. Anna said, “Eventually, though, the book cleans itself.”

That reverberated through me. I’d gone from trusting my muses, the convenient label I apply to the thinking that comes out of my subconscious spigot, to trying to think my way through everything. In other words, I’d suddenly begun approaching this creative process backwards.

Those interviews and their insights helped me re-balance myself. “Relax,” I said. “Trust yourself. Trust your instincts. Trust the process.” Those calming words pulled me out of my funk and put me back on track.

None of this is like splitting the atom. It’s basic writing process. Of course, your experience will probably vary. For me, it’s always about finding and losing myself, trusting and questioning, struggling, and then succeeding. It’s about being willing to fail, recognizing that failing isn’t permanent, and that there must be a way to go forward; it just must be found. That can be daunting.

Been a good day of writing like crazy. Time to quit and pursue other crazy. Cheers

 

 

2

The Hot Mess

Dreams wrecked my sleep like booming thunderstorms. While the dreams went all over the place, often with multiple storylines and settings, and frequently anxiety fraught, one theme stayed true: the leads were missing or broken. I kept hunting them or trying to repair them. In one example, others brought in a large and heavy broken motor. “Know what we found in this?” one man that helped deliver the heavy electric motor said. He was affable and burly, curly-haired and sunburned, a little dirty and greasy in his blue uniform with its red and white name tag with “Mike” in script, and a gap in his teeth.

I grinned. “Broken leads, right?”

Mike grinned back. “Yep. You got it. The leads weren’t working.”

Stepping back, I’d finished the first draft of April Showers 1921 a few days ago. I found it a hot mess. Good writing, yes, but shitty storytelling. The concept had over-excited me, and I’d peed all over the place. It’s my big friggin’ writin’ weakness. The first draft had become six hundred Word pages and one hundred fifty thousand words. The last quarter and ending were weak. The beginning and middle were confusing.

When something goes wrong, I try to figure out what to do. That’s been try for me for as long as I can remember. Sometimes, the process requires me to walk away from the project. Grant my mind some space and let it work. This isn’t one of those projects, though. I felt an urgency to keep working on it.

The writing hadn’t been a waste of time, of course. One, it entertained me. Second, I learned more about the concept, and then the story. As I’ve quoted Terry Pratchett before, “The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.”

Now I knew the whole story, and it needed to be re-worked. Many hours of thinking and walking were conducted in search of what to do. Well, I roughly knew what to do: revise and edit. Sure, but I thought, more structure was needed than to proclaim revise and edit and go forth. I needed a better, more solid plan. I just wasn’t satisfied enough with this draft to begin considering revise and edit. I was thinking, write again.

I didn’t wanna write it again, I whined. I know, I answered. That’s writing.

Decisions were made. Each decision took me down a tangible plan. I began seeing how and why I’d concluded the ending and last quarter were weak. Glimpses of what to do began emerging.

Wasn’t easy to get there. The journey from proclaiming hot mess to saying, okay, this is what I’m going to do, took hours of thinking and plotting. It was intense. I was not a good person to be around. Fortunately, I was mostly on my own.

Then came the dreams.

The dreams were beneficial. They didn’t dictate, “DO THIS,” in a deep voice that might’ve been Jehovah or James Earl Jones. No, the dreams were more like a thundering rain storm with strong winds, blowing out the mess.

Now, it’s been accepted. The first hot mess was done; work is required. The path has been defined. Jaw is set. Coffee is at hand. I’m in position.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

0

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