Monday’s Wandering Thoughts
My wife related that she and her coffee group were talking about their required high school reading.
There’s a background to this. They go to StoneRidge Coffee in downtown Ashand after exercising at the Y three mornings a week. Their favorite barista, Shawn (sp?), had been on a big reading kick, reading many novels that we consider classics, like Catch 22 and Catcher in the Rye. Today he announced that he won’t be working there any longer because he’ll be teaching high school in Grants Pass. My wife’s group wondered if that’s why he’d been on a reading tear.
They couldn’t remember what they’d read in high school, though. They did recall that they had to read The Pearl by Steinbeck and several of Shakespeare’s plays. The only one they remembered reading was Romeo & Juliet.
After being told this, I recalled reading MacBeth and Hamlet. I also recalled reading The Red Badge of Courage, Beowulf, Call of the Wild, excerpts out of Dante’s Infernal (as we knew it in school) and The Red Pony. I mentioned that what I most remembered reading, though, were short stories. I vividly remember reading A Jury of Her Peers, The Girls at the A&P, The Visitor, Greenleaf, and The Lottery. They each made quite an impression on me. Besides that, there was some Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allan Poe, and then poems by Frost and Whitman, and essays out of Walden: Life in the Woods.
It’s all a bit sketch, though. Because I enjoyed reading fiction on my own and read Catch 22 and Catcher in the Rye. Papillion was big as a novel then — this was before the movie — as was the Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit, and Stranger in a Strange Land. Besides that stuff, I was reading a lot of science fiction and fantasy, along with spy thrillers (think Fleming and Le Carre). Then there was Jaws by Peter Benchley, and other popular fiction like that, such as Fear of Flying, Portnoy’s Complaint, In Cold Blood, The Onion Field, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Bell Jar, The Drifters, Centennial, The Thorn Birds, Hotel, Airport, The World According to Garp, Cancer Ward, and Herzog.
I was also involved with the Junior Great Books program for several years, and was required to read their books, stories, and essays, muddying up memory a little more. Further complicating it are courses in French, Russian, Jewish, and American literature in college.
All those books and titles start running together after a while, you know? At least for me. I admire those who can keep it all straight.
Old History
When the Humans had finally done so much to anger the rest of the Universe’s civilizations, they were relocated. The small solar system which was now home to Humans had few planets and was part of a Forbidden Realm. Magic was cast over it to keep the Humans from leaving the solar system. Magic also kept them from communicating with others.
But worse things were done to Humanity. They were stripped of learning about their heritage. As far as they knew, they’d always existed on the third rock from the sun. Perhaps, though, the most malignant curses put on Humanity gave them a short life span and aged them quickly. Then, finally, they were kept from knowing the truth about death.
So it would be until the Forbidden Realm was breached and another race came to Earth. Unless Why could stop them.
The Writing Moment
Finished editing and revising the current novel in progress. It’s either the sixth or seventh iteration. Doesn’t matter.
My vision for it has clarified through the process of writing and then reading and changing it. One storyline was excised as meandering, dull, and convoluted. Firmer insights into relationships, terminology, and setting crystallized, leading to more slices. Explanations and clarifications were thinned. Characters and relationships found sharper evolution.
All good. I enjoy the manuscript and that means something to me. It is lengthy and meaty, and I wonder and worry about its length. But then I shrug, because nothing emerges for me to deliberately remove.
Now I’ll begin editing and revising again. This time I’m pursuing more of the novel’s voice and feel. I suspect — it’s a feeling — that this will be the last go around. And then I’ll begin pursuing publication.
A friend — another writer — asked me what titles I would compare it to. And gosh, I came up with nothing. I have some vague notions. Historic fiction, science fiction, and fantasy all combined in this speculative effort. And it has stories and characters embedded in it whose stories I’d like to pursue. Like Humans. Humans’ are in the book’s forefront and background, as they were moved to isolation in a forbidden zone long before events in this book. They are important to the novel because the primary antagonist is a Martian who loves Humans and conquers others to spread Human cultures. That’s one reason the rest of the civilizations consider her so dangerous. The other is that she’s proven difficult to kill.
There’s also the main character’s stepmother and her complicated story. I’d like to pursue exploring her and how she developed into the person she is. Then, there’s the main character’s relationship to his sister, and what happened to her in parallel to him, and where she is and if she’s still a cat.
But then, there are also so many other projects sitting in the wings, waiting for me to come back to them. And they’re all stories, concepts, ideas, which interest me.
It’s all fun, reading, writing, editing, imagining, thinking, the life of a writer.
Tuesday’s Theme Music
Mood: Coffeevescent
The spinning never stops. Despite this, activities on Earth shift and a new day arrives. This one is May 7, 2024.
In Penn Hills, PA, we all awaken to light rain and 50 degrees F. Rain is expected to command the day. Cloud cover makes me think, yes, that’s going to happen. But the weather seers say that it’ll be 79 F before Penn Hills is spun away from facing Sol today.
Mom had a rough day yesterday. ‘Bowel matters’, you know? Apparently drained her pretty well — that pun is totally inadvertent — as she napped through the afternoon. I’d ordered Echo Pops for her house so we can use her Alexa as an intercom. That will end the need for her and Frank to bellow across the domicile at one another. Alexa can also be used to call others, including an ambulance. As Alexa is voice activated, if they fall and can’t get up, they can still call for help.
The Pops were a breeze to set up. Three were added to the system. At less than $20 each, they seem like a simple and inexpensive intercom solution. Because issue will be conditioning Mom and Frank to use them.
I’m at the coffee shop now. I’ve established a basic routine. Up a 7:45. Mediation, exercise, dress. Out the door to the coffee shop. Back before noon.
Mom and Frank are usually sleeping until tennish. Incidents in the night frequently break their sleep. Mom gets out of bed, dresses and comes downstairs by noon. I relieve Frank. He takes off to visit his family and work out at the gym. I visit with Mom, make her ‘breakfast’, and help her with her needs. Breakfast is marked like that because it’s usually after one before she wants to eat.
It’s a crowded coffee shop today, so I’m in my spaceship fantasy, where we’re not a planet hurtling through space, but a human made machine destined for a new planet.
Today’s song has unknown origins in my morning mental music stream (Trademark confused). The Neurons ordered up “Little Miss Can Be Wrong”. They’re treating their reasoning for that song choice as double top-secret closehold information.
Not that I mind the song. Released by the Spin Doctors in 1992, it’s energetic and beaty. Not bad music to be revolving over and over and over again in your mind, right, right?
Coffee is being inhaled. Be strong, stay cool and positive, and Vote Blue n 2024. That’s my current plan. Here’s the music. Cheers
Monday’s Wandering Thoughts
The coffee shop was busy. Only a few tables were available.
But I found one with what I needed: table and seat, a smidge of privacy, ‘puter power.
I set myself up, turned on and tuned in. Then amused myself. When coffee shops and cafes are busy like this, I always entertaining a thin fantasy that we’re in a business on a starship heading to another planet.
No real reason for the fantasy except that I find it fun.
Wednesday’s Theme Music
Mood: refreshed
My jeans came off again.
The shorts went on. Officially, they’re ‘short pants’.
This is Wednesday, April 10, 2024. 66 F now, the warm end of our day will rise to 71 F. Everything is in bloom under blue, sunny skies. It’s bold with yellows, pinks, and white blossoms and blooms, people, against a fully backdrop of green grasses and trees — along with
Things are going well for me, thanks. A woman at the coffee shop told me, “You have nice legs. If I had legs like that, I’d be in shorts, too.”
She appeared a few years younger than me and had a perfect stage voice. I’m not one who enjoys attention. Baby, I was cringing inside. But I smiled and thanked her. She responded, “Wow, you have a great smile, too.” I felt like everyone was looking by now. I thanked her again, and she waved and went on.
Back ‘home’, Mom was discharged from Forbes Hospital after treatment for appendicitis. A day and night of diarrhea was endured. Now, after being up all night in pain, she’s back at the hospital for a CT scan to see why she has pain and a fever.
My sister, G, is on the scene, waiting for news. It’s a business day at the hospital. Parking is full. The parking situation and emergency responsiveness are hampered by a sinkhole in the parking lot.
A social worker came out and spoke with sis. No beds are available for Mom and they’re proposing to scan her at another location. Now they’re suggesting, take her home and bring her back tomorrow.
WTF questions arise. Sis is dealing with it. She’s intelligent, competent, and hard-edged at times like this, unafraid to question authority, and willing to stand her ground. In other words, she’s a good person to have on site.
I was thinking about my aunt J. She’s the one I previously wrote about with colon cancer.
I always admired her and enjoy her company. She always spoke to me like I was an adult when I was a child. I think she was instrumental in teaching me to think about matters from different perspectives. That’s a quality that I’ve often depended on, and which is responsible for whatever successes and achievements I’ve had. Good to have people like her in one’s life.
I didn’t learn about all her issues. She married and was divorced when young. One child. Then, another child from an affair. That child, my cousin, was put into an orphanage until my aunt could get her life in order. She finally met and married the love of her life, as she described him, and had three more children. She and I were together until brain cancer took him about a decade ago.
Update from sis about Mom. Fever is gone. Mom is in a bed in a hallway. Awaiting further developments.
Tucker goes back to the vet this afternoon. It’s a checkup on his thyroid, high blood pressure, and his gums after having his teeth removed. Fingers crossed that my old friend is found to be healing well and his issues under control. He’s gained weight, energy, and enthusiasm over the last few days.
Two thirds of the way through reading Kings of the Wyld. High fantasy variation, and worth reading if fantasy speaks to you. An interesting spin is that adventurers are ‘bands’, much like rock bands, and treated like rock stars. We readers are in on the idea but it’s not heavy handed. Our protagonist band broke up years before and have aged into normal lives. Now, yes, they got the band back together to save one of their daughters. I highly recommend this Nicholas Eames novel, even though I’ve not finished it. Still have about one hundred fifty pages left. My wife read it first, and then urged me to read it.
Today’s music comes straight out of 1966. After reading a Heather Richardson post, I thought, tell it like it is. One of our nation’s political problems IMO is that politicians on the right lie to their supporters, and the media goes along with it for the most part. Some journalists are beginning to seriously hipcheck some of the liars but too many get a free ride. I can provide substantial examples, if you need it.
Anyway, overhearing my thinking about Ms. Richardson’s post, The Neurons began playing Aaron Neville and “Tell It Like It Is” in the morning mental music stream (Trademark burning). A beautiful torch song, it’s a good song when you’re at a fork in the road, looking back on what’s happened while gazing ahead, trying to divine a path forward.
Stay positive, be strong, and Vote Blue this November. I’ll be doing the same. Now, riding on wings of coffee, I’m off to continue writing and editing.
Here’s the music. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 