Almost exactly 10 years have passed since I sat down to write my very first short story. I had spent a few years filling my head with the words of Ray Bradbury and George Orwell, and I believed that I was ready to write some impactful piece of apocalyptic fiction just as they had. I'm really glad that, in spite of my lack of experience, I had the guts to take on a couple of the greatest authors of the 20th century. Their work inspired me to begin my own, and I was awfully proud of it... at the time.
What follows is as an early draft of that first story. It's fairly easy to see my attempt at Bradbury even though the story itself needs much revision. I am working on a drastic rewrite of the story to make it something worth reading.
And so I present to you "Until the Cows Came Home".
Ever so slowly the red sun rose on Lake Victoria. Two aged men sat in a small metal boat, fishing polls held loosely in their wrinkled hands.
"Fish don’t seem to be bitin’ much today, do they Lenny?"
"Well, we haven’t caught a single fish from this old pond in 10 years." Lenny looked out over the pond and the burnt skies reflected in its waters. He leaned over the side of the boat and looked at his own reflection in the green, muddy water—the same water that had been crystal clear when they were children. He took a deep, patient breath and let loose a soft sigh. "I remember when we were young kids… we would sit almost every day out here and fish till…." He paused for a moment at the sound of distant gun fire. "Till the cows came home."
An odd look came over Sam’s face. He was apparently perplexed. "Hmm…Cows…I can’t seem to remember the cows." He nervously fingered his fishing line.
"Sorry, it’s just an old, old figure of speech."
"Are we old, Lenny?"
"Yes, I’m afraid so, Sam." He spoke gently towards his senile friend. Lenny looked into the water and smiled to his reflection. In a way Sam had become a child again.
"Lenny?"
"Yes, Sam."
"Oh…nothing."
"Yes, Sam." Lenny looked up into the sky. He listened carefully to a far-off whistling noise, which after a few moments stopped. A low rumbling noise followed. The water beneath the boat slowly rippled outward.
"What’s that?" asked Sam as dark cloud rose over the horizon.
What was it? It was a tool of destruction, an element of war, a display of aggression: a bomb. "Why, that is our ride home."
"How much longer till it gets here?"
"Not long." Sam’s wristwatch began beeping. He looked at it confused, obviously having forgotten its purpose. A soft, melodic robotic voice spoke out from the tiny band: Time to take our medicine Samuel. It repeated itself. Lenny reached over and switched the tiny voice off. All the while Sam watched Lenny with child-like curiosity. He then reached into Sam’s tackle box and presented a small plastic bottle.
"What’s that?" asked Sam.
"This is your Alzheimer’s medicine." Lenny twisted off the top of the translucent brown bottle and poured the small blue pills into his hands.
"What’s Alzheimer’s?" asked Sam.
Sam had asked this question on several occasions since he began loosing his memory. Each time, Lenny got better at explaining it. "It’s a monstrous disease that lives inside of you, and without warning it destroys all of your memories and turns you back into a child. These tiny little pills hold your memories, and when the monster comes, they remind you of who you are. They re-acquaint you with yourself." With that Lenny lifted his hand into the air and threw the pills out into the blue water.
"Oh no! Why did you do that?"
"Don’t worry, old friend. Once we get home, you’ll not need them anymore." Slowly a whistling noise grew overhead, steadily growing louder.
"It’s time to go. Are you ready?" By now the whistling had grown deafeningly loud.
"Oh, yes." Sam’s attention was drawn from the sky back to the water. "Look!" He shouted over the noise. "I’ve got one."
The whistling stopped. "I guess so." Lenny whispered to himself. A split second later a blinding light surrounded the two old men and their tiny boat. "I guess so."
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Historical Omniscience & The Hard Days
I've been trying my hardest to devote a small bit of time to writing every day. I haven't really been successful or disciplined in my approach, but I figure that any small victory in my methods will result in me eventually becoming a better writer. And so, I persist.
There are days when the words flow naturally, and I end up producing something that is relatively interesting. When this happens, I feel the most profound sense of personal fulfillment. This is is an extraordinary feeling, and it motivates me to continue.
Then there are days that what I produce is almost entirely uninspired. I beat my head against the topic until I can coax the smallest amount of prose out, and even then, I'm left with something that I'm not at all proud of. These are the moments that I become intimately familiar with my limitations and weaknesses. I know that I must expect these sorts of days to happen, but they do nothing to feed the flames. Today was a day like this.
Here is my response to the following prompt from Brian Kiteley's The 3 A.M. Epiphany:
I always dreamed of sailing across the ocean. As a child, I imagined that there might be something on the other side of the water, perhaps some promised land where only the things that I wanted to happen would happen. I could run wild amongst the green hills until I found the perfect place to settle myself. Then I’d build a home, take a wife, and raise as many children as possible before my beard would grow long and grey. All I’d need is a big enough boat. The reality of travel on the sea is much less glamorous than I had dreamed of.
At the end of an exceedingly unsuccessful search for work in Spain—little surprise given that my ruddy hair clearly identifies me as a foreigner, I snuck aboard a ship headed for the fabled “new world.” This is a capital offence, for which I am luck not to have been tossed overboard immediately. The captain shouted something in his Spanish, and I was dragged, according to the least gentle method the ship hands could devise, to the bottom of the ship. Here I was locked in a room. The “bergantÃn” as they call it. Occasionally, they would bring me water and less often a piece of stale bread or spoiled cheese.
There are days when the words flow naturally, and I end up producing something that is relatively interesting. When this happens, I feel the most profound sense of personal fulfillment. This is is an extraordinary feeling, and it motivates me to continue.
Then there are days that what I produce is almost entirely uninspired. I beat my head against the topic until I can coax the smallest amount of prose out, and even then, I'm left with something that I'm not at all proud of. These are the moments that I become intimately familiar with my limitations and weaknesses. I know that I must expect these sorts of days to happen, but they do nothing to feed the flames. Today was a day like this.
Here is my response to the following prompt from Brian Kiteley's The 3 A.M. Epiphany:
Historical Omniscience — Write about an event set well in the past, twenty or one hundred years ago. Write from above, as if by means of researched opinion (but I suggest that you do little actual research). By this I mean write about several historical characters or an interesting event, imagining any POV you want.
I always dreamed of sailing across the ocean. As a child, I imagined that there might be something on the other side of the water, perhaps some promised land where only the things that I wanted to happen would happen. I could run wild amongst the green hills until I found the perfect place to settle myself. Then I’d build a home, take a wife, and raise as many children as possible before my beard would grow long and grey. All I’d need is a big enough boat. The reality of travel on the sea is much less glamorous than I had dreamed of.
At the end of an exceedingly unsuccessful search for work in Spain—little surprise given that my ruddy hair clearly identifies me as a foreigner, I snuck aboard a ship headed for the fabled “new world.” This is a capital offence, for which I am luck not to have been tossed overboard immediately. The captain shouted something in his Spanish, and I was dragged, according to the least gentle method the ship hands could devise, to the bottom of the ship. Here I was locked in a room. The “bergantÃn” as they call it. Occasionally, they would bring me water and less often a piece of stale bread or spoiled cheese.
Monday, November 19, 2012
Something That I Strongly Dislike!
It's poetry.
That's right. I've never really been a fan of poetry as a medium. I think I've always viewed it as something of an inferior medium, which isn't really surprising given my obsession with plot arcs. I will always prefer the infinite effability of prose.
In my experience, most amateur poetry is only meaningful to it's author. Take for example this piece that I wrote on January 30, 2012, while on the road.
Aren't we all just pendulums swinging
Back and forth through the naked possibility
Today I am comfortable abroad
But one swing will render me a foreigner in the home of my father
I hope for the rhythm of our arcs to coincide with one another
Just one collision and the bliss of subsequent entanglement
Yet only a matter of time will find our lines too complicated
And the only way out will be to cut the ties
Then what do we have left?
Then what are we?
So what in the heck does that even mean? You tell me. And while you're at it, you should try to convince me that poetry is somehow equal in power to prose.
That's right. I've never really been a fan of poetry as a medium. I think I've always viewed it as something of an inferior medium, which isn't really surprising given my obsession with plot arcs. I will always prefer the infinite effability of prose.
In my experience, most amateur poetry is only meaningful to it's author. Take for example this piece that I wrote on January 30, 2012, while on the road.
Aren't we all just pendulums swinging
Back and forth through the naked possibility
Today I am comfortable abroad
But one swing will render me a foreigner in the home of my father
I hope for the rhythm of our arcs to coincide with one another
Just one collision and the bliss of subsequent entanglement
Yet only a matter of time will find our lines too complicated
And the only way out will be to cut the ties
Then what do we have left?
Then what are we?
So what in the heck does that even mean? You tell me. And while you're at it, you should try to convince me that poetry is somehow equal in power to prose.
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Reworking "Dark Days"
At one point, I decided that the best way to add value (read that with a dollar sign) to my work was to stop posting story drafts on this blog. I assumed that no one would want to eventually buy a collection of my short stories in print if it could all be read for free on my blog. One could say several bad things about that line of logic, not the least of which is that it makes me sound like a selfish sort of character that cares more about money than writing a good story. And that is not the spirit with which I created this blog.
Thinking about it now, I'm not sure what circumstance would make disappearing from this blog a beneficial move. Nothing good can be said about a blog that hasn't had a new post in over a year. Let's move on.
What follows is all that I have completed from a drastic reworking that I have planned for what may or may not be the very first "short story" that I ever constructed. I have some ideas about where I'd like to take the story but little idea of how to get there. I'm stuck.
I first met Dan after his girlfriend broke up with him. And when I say "after," I mean immediately after. Of course, I didn't know this at the time. I was reading a book in the park, a compact edition of the complete works of Edgar Allen Poe. I think it was pleasant outside, which is only important to know because the park is always a little crowded on days like that. Normally, I’d have enjoyed being around so many people on a beautiful day, but today I got the sad guy. Fantastic.
He was sitting on the bench next to me in the park. It’s not uncommon to sit next to a stranger in the park when the weather is nice, and I wouldn't have noticed Dan if he hadn't been weeping, but he was. Bent over in the seat with his head in his hands. Clearly, he was trying to hide his state, but I could hear the muffled gasps for breath that only occur when you’re swallowing a sob.
Thinking about it now, I'm not sure what circumstance would make disappearing from this blog a beneficial move. Nothing good can be said about a blog that hasn't had a new post in over a year. Let's move on.
What follows is all that I have completed from a drastic reworking that I have planned for what may or may not be the very first "short story" that I ever constructed. I have some ideas about where I'd like to take the story but little idea of how to get there. I'm stuck.
I first met Dan after his girlfriend broke up with him. And when I say "after," I mean immediately after. Of course, I didn't know this at the time. I was reading a book in the park, a compact edition of the complete works of Edgar Allen Poe. I think it was pleasant outside, which is only important to know because the park is always a little crowded on days like that. Normally, I’d have enjoyed being around so many people on a beautiful day, but today I got the sad guy. Fantastic.
He was sitting on the bench next to me in the park. It’s not uncommon to sit next to a stranger in the park when the weather is nice, and I wouldn't have noticed Dan if he hadn't been weeping, but he was. Bent over in the seat with his head in his hands. Clearly, he was trying to hide his state, but I could hear the muffled gasps for breath that only occur when you’re swallowing a sob.
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