My Take

In reading this weeks material, I have really attached to the lesson in chapter three about using sensory detail that matters.  The main summary of what I read was that when we write about a situation we should not tell the reader what to feel and think, but instead guide them there by showing them the necessary detail.  It is almost like asking the right questions to elicit a certain response in someone. 

If I were writing about a floor fan covered in dust from sitting there for months without being cleaned, to the point where the white plastic was turning a dirty dust color -- this would give you a good description of the fan, as well as the person it belongs to.  If I simply said that a white fan was covered in dust, the images would be very different and the reader would not gain any new info on the owner of the fan, most likely an important character in the story. 

A line I read that was really good said that we strive in fiction to say what we mean and mean more than we say.  How powerful!  If those are the standards we write by, than we would reconsider a lot of what we write. To use the least amount of words to say the most is no easy feat to accomplish. 

After reading that part of chapter three, I automatically began to be conscious of how I write my stories and different ways to think about how to say things in those stories.  One thing that I can see being a big help is to sit and think for a moment what my desired outcome is for the reader.  What do I want them to feel, see, hear, and how I can get them there without telling them what to feel, hear,and see.  The results could be very interesting and I look forward to writing and trying to work through this new pattern of writing process. 

Cockroaches and Life

From Fiction Packet Three I liked the last story, "The fifth story." This story was broken up into the author telling us how he would write there different stories, apparently about the same instance.  The author is also the character, who I will refer to as "her/she" here forward.  She began by talking about how if she had 1000 and one nights to write, she would write 1000 and one stories about this topic.  Cockroaches, that is the topic.

She hates cockroaches and they are taking over her apartment.  She describes how they come from a few units below, and belong to that unit, but once she kills them, they become part of her unit, she says.  I felt that the way she went through the three stories was really cool.  They all began with her being overheard complaining about roaches.  The detail in the writing is just enough that you feel like you're there. 
"An angry fear and my own evil guided me.  Now I coldly wanted one thing only: to kill every cockroach in existence."

That was from the first story, in which a person who overheard her suggested she make a mix of poison (that the person provided) and kill them that way.  The first story is her making the mix, and getting really excited about killing the roaches, and enjoying their deaths.

The overall story then continues to go through the same scenario, but with different small things happening and different focus'.  All three really captured the momentary connection that she had with the cockroaches, as if killing them was preceded by an odd bond.

This story was the one that stuck out to me the most from the packet, sadly it was at the very end.  I think, like anything, that this story can be metaphoric to life in other ways.  Anytime we have an issue that keeps recurring, we find ourselves telling a story.  The story might be why it is the way it is, or how it is we cannot fix our problem.  Some stories blame someone else, or something else, but we all have a story for our problems.  The story changes, even though the source of the story, the problem in your life, does not.  How strange, to think that cockroaches can be compared to procrastination, or chronic lateness, or overeating.  Ev en though we cannot prevent cockroaches like we can prevent these other things, once cockroaches exist in our domain, the process to get rid of them is the same. 

To get rid of the cockroaches, the author dedicated her passion temporarily to their demise.  This dedication was sparked by a decision to kill them.  This decision cut off any other possibility.  These cockroaches were going to die no matter what.  With procrastination, or some other habit we hate but maintain anyway, we must dedicate the same passion to 'kilking' it.  It is something that we do subconsciously anyway, like in this story with the cockroaches. 

I think that is all we can learn from that story, for now. 

Mysterious Ways

        Mysterious Ways

SARAH         

“Another day of working for nothing” Sarah said laughing with her friend Christine.  Sarah is a medical student at Aspire University in Acer Michigan.  She and her friend are in the break room at Acer Hospital, where they are doing an internship for school. 

            “You think we will get any crazies today?” asked Christine.  In the past few weeks they have both worked with patients who were strange and mentally off. 
            Sarah sassed back, “You know me, they just fall right into my lap.  But that’s talking about crazy guys, who for some reason all like me!” The two laughed for a second, “…But I kind of like that, you know?”

            “I guess if that floats your boat, Sarah.”  The two laughingly continued on talking, when the secretary from the department walked in and asked Sarah to step aside with him for a moment.

            “Sarah I just wanted to say that you have been doing a really good job here, so don’t take this the wrong way,” warned the secretary, “but we need to move you to the coma unit for the reminder of your internship with us.  A student had to leave the program and we really need someone who can fill that spot.”

            Sarah was happy that she was not in some type of trouble, but disappointed she would have to work away from her friend Christine, who was inconspicuously trying to listen to the conversation for across the break room. 

            “Would it be possible to also move Christine?  We work really well together, and I would hate to finish this without her.” 

            The secretary looked at Christine, who looked away trying not to get caught listening, “Christine, I’m really sorry that we have to move Sarah, but from a personnel prospective we have no choice.  You two will be fine, I’m sure.”

            It was that day that Sarah began work in the Coma unit of Acer Hospital. 

ROLLAND

            “Rolland “Roll-Kill” Killcline was 22 when he killed three people in an alley on an average night in Quicken, a town about 10 miles west of Acer, Michigan.  He was a grown man, capable of making decisions for himself.  He chose to walk down that dark alley that night, and chose to kill those three men, and that is why he deserves to die in the name of justice, your honor.” 

            Gerald Pesta was the prosecutor who sold the jury the sentence of death for Rolland three years ago. Today, Rolland sits in his cell waiting to be fed his last meal and then to be lethally injected and killed in the name of the law.  He was given a piece of paper to write on to help collect his thoughts before he was processed.  He sat in his cell at day break, just writing. 

“36 months I have sat here in this cell, alone with my thoughts.  Speaking to nobody who will listen.  Who would listen to a murderer, right?  The sunlight hits the walls as I write this, painting them soft orange.  I look out of my cell and see other inmates rolling around in their beds, unaware that this inmate will not wake up again tomorrow.  I wonder if they will think twice about it, after all it happens once every few weeks.  I arranged for my meal to be a hamburger and fries, my favorite meal since I used to go to the local diner as a child and eat classic style burger and fries.  Little did I know that it would be my last meal, funny how that works out.  Thinking of the smell of those fries I sadly also notice that my cell smells like dirty concrete floor.  The memory of my mother and me at that diner brings me to tears.  I can only cry before other inmates wake up, for obvious reasons.  I miss my mother, she died thinking her son was a murderer.”

GLEN

           

“The court will now hear the final appeal of Rolland Kilcline, represented by Attorney Theo Hasting.  Theo, go ahead.”  The Judge motioned to Theo. 

            “Your Honor, today I bring to the stand a man named Glen Hubbord, who was in the alley the day that Rolland walked down it.  Your Honor I am aware that this witness was not present for the trial three years ago, but Glen has testified that he hid out of fear, and has come forth today to tell us what he saw.  I think that the jury would appreciate his prospective.”

            Glen Hubbord was a short heavy set man who looked 40 but was 32 years of age.  He swore in before the Judge, sat down, and began telling his story. 

            “It was my night to take garbage out to the back in the alley.  I work at the Coney Island on Sill Street.  I had just thrown the trash into the dumpster when three men grabbed me, threw me on the ground and began taunting me and kicking my face.  I yelled out for help, but my voice was weak because my throat was being hit.  It was the scariest moment of my life.  I remember thinking that I was going to die, and started to ask God to forgive me, and to take care of my two daughters.  The men were laughing, and seemed high on something, and kept talking about how this was just a fun thing to do because they were bored.  I heard one of them yell in pain, and fall to the ground. I looked up when the other two were distracted and saw that a man had showed up with a knife and was helping me.  I got up and ran as fast as I could home to protect my family.  I didn’t see the second two men die, but I can say that they deserved it.  I was going to die that day, and Rolland Kilcline saved my life.  I didn’t testify because I didn’t want to put my family in danger.  We had been through enough.”

            The courtroom was quiet, and the air felt as though a major shift in opinion was happening.  They had all been happy to put Rolland on death row, now they don’t know what to believe.

DAREN

            Daren North is a 27 year old college student at Aspire University in Acer, Michigan.  He is convinced that mediocrity is the most evil thing in the world, and cannot stand the thought that he would ever succumb to it.  He does, though, and cannot get himself to escape it.  This gives him incredible fear and anger that his life will never be what he wants it to be.  He fears that he will be mediocre and is angry that he cannot get himself to change it.  Sitting alone at his apartment he is depressed and considering taking his own life.  He sits, rocking back and forth crying in pain.  He begins to write down his last thoughts, a suicide note. 

            “I am sitting here, alone, and I can’t stop.  I have fought for too long to build in myself a successful attitude and a plan for my life that frees me from the conformity that is this sick society.  As I’ve sat through class after class of subjects that all seem to blend together, I find myself blended to nothing.  The sight of people, next to me, blindly following along “learning” new things, it scares me.  I hear their pencils fidget, and their identities diminish from their bodies with each tick of pencil to paper.  I occasionally look to my own notes to see that I have lost sight of who I am as well.  I quickly look back to the stale bored room of my peers, with the sounds of chalk hitting blackboard letter after letter pounding my identity into places I cannot reclaim it from.  Empty, surrounded by empty, I am filled with the professor’s words and embody their empty essence.  This essentially produces in me a self to which fits in with the rest of the class.  Together, we sit without self.  A false self.  The mundane sounds of chalk and the rustle of restless legs and tapping of pencils echoes in my heart.  All this fades, as we do, into the chamber of mediocrity, bolted there for all of life.  This is my greatest fear coming to life inside me. 

            I try to escape, only to find myself in front of a TV.  As the channels move through my mind as I flip through the TV guide, I catch myself being a procrastinator again.  I have at least 10 things to do but rather, I am here devoting time to finding the best show to waste my time with.  Time and time again I find myself off the path of my choosing which leads to nowhere.  A path to nowhere leads nowhere and on it one finds themselves nowhere with only hopes of getting anywhere BUT nowhere, fighting the reality in the back of one’s mind that tells of times to come when you finally get somewhere, and it is nowhere.  Ridiculous, I ought not to be on this path.  Enough is enough, I am running out of options, and only one is available to me now.  I must end my life.”

ROLLAND

            “Rolland Kilcline”

            “Yeah,” Rolland replied to the man who walked up to his cell and asked his name.  The man held a clip board and wore a very nice suit.

            “You need to come with me.”

            A guard opened Rolland’s cell and took him with the man to the head officer in charge of the floor.  The officer sat Rolland down and began talking with an emotionless tone, almost disappointed.

            “Rolland, a man came forth and testified on your behalf saying you killed three men in defense of his life.  The jury reversed your sentence and you’re free to go.  I don’t know who you paid, but I’m not convinced.  You’re a murderer to me.  Sign here.”

            Rolland didn’t care about the officer’s remarks; he only cared about the fact that he was free.  He felt his life appear before him like it had that morning.  This time it was his future, not his past.  He was free to live and to do all the things he had never done and thought he would never get to do.  He told himself that very moment in that chair that he would take no day for granted.  He would live life to the fullest every day. 

            After signing the paperwork, Rolland was given his civilian clothes back and sent out to the front gate to await a ride.  He had called a taxi and was headed to the diner where we used to go with his mother, and ate his favorite hamburger and fries.  He was euphoric about the fact that that morning the meal was his last, and now it is the first of the rest of his life.  He was ready to live a life of contribution and renewed sense of purpose. 

DAREN

            After finishing his letter of suicide, Daren went out to his old Ford Taurus to drive to the state park nearby.  There as large ravine there and his plan was to drive off of it.

Driving down the windy roads to the park Daren was crying.  He had truly given up on his life, and didn’t want to live another day of it.  He knew it would be his last drive, but didn’t care enough to soak any of it in.  All he cared about was ending it all, finally being free of the pain that he saw as his life.  Sick with skewed emotions, Daren was unable to stay in his lane consistently.  Coming up to a turn, he felt himself slipping into a sleep. He was having trouble staying awake, because he was so exhausted from the emotions he had been feeling all day of such a vast magnitude.  There was a road stop ahead, he figured he would stop there and calm down for a moment before continuing on. 

ROLLAND

           

            Telling the cab driver his story, Rolland was never happier.  He and the driver seemed to get along really well, and had arranged that they would both eat at the diner.  Being in a cell for three years with a parking lot to look out to, Rolland craved nature and being outside.  He asked the cab driver to pull off at one of the areas to look out at the hills of the valley.  A perfect day, perfect weather, Rolland and the diver stood there just watching the birds fly through the valley mist, smelling the pine and the fresh air off the water way below.  Rolland closed his eyes and imagined his mother, and prayed to her that she remember him as her son who made her proud. 

            “Mother, please hear me.  I am free, and I am going to live a life rich with energy for the both of us.  I miss you, and I am sorry I disappointed you and couldn’t be there before you died.  I will see you again someday, mom, I love you so much and I want you to know I am a new man.”  

SARAH

            Christine and Sarah met after work on the first day that Sarah was moved to the Coma unit.  At a Starbucks in the Hospital, it was late and most people had gone home.  They both live nearby, so they stay there sometimes to have coffee and talk after work or do homework. 

            “So what was it like being in the coma unit?  I never really walk over there, but it always seems really sad, because you have to take care of them but you don’t know if they will ever wake up.  It’s like, really weird to think about working there.  What did they have you do?”  Christine listened to Sarah in shock as Sarah told her about her first day.

            Sarah began, “Well, it was really slow for the morning.  Just doing routine things to keep everything going, I was being trained by a really nice lady named Judy.  After lunch the saddest thing happened though, I was with Judy going over the equipment in an empty room when a patient was brought in who had been in an accident.  He was in a coma and they were not sure when he would come out of it.  He looked awful; really weak and then they told me about him.  You won’t believe this, but he had a note in his car about committing suicide and they think that is exactly what happened.  He drove right off the road and ran into a parked cab car on the side of the road, right up in the valley near that old diner, you know?”

            “Oh my God, that’s awful! I do know where that is, I drive by there all the time!” Christine said in shock.

            “Yeah, the worst part is, a cab driver and another guy got hit into the valley and both died.  This guy was trying to kill himself and ended up killing two other people, and he lived.  That’s really fucked up right?”

            “Yeah that’s fucked up! That’s terrible, I can’t believe this guy killed two people and survived.  It doesn’t seem fair.  What a first day, Sarah, damn.  I’m not sure I’m going to be coming over there to visit you. That’s’ too much insanity for me.”

            The two laughed, but then stopped and just thought to themselves about what had happened.    

           

The Birds who told the truth

The most notable part of  Bird by Bird that I received as valuable above all else, is the notion that one should write from the standpoint of truth.  Truth is not a finite thing, it is something that each individual can find within themselves.  Truth, to me, is what you believe deep down before you let it get filtered through your expectations of yourself in other people's eyes.  What do I mean by that?  I mean that if you believe something deep down, but don't want to share it with other people or certain other people because they will not approve and you care about that non approval, you change it.  The changed truth is not the truth we should write from.  Our writing should reflect what is deep down inside.

In my own experiences with writing, I have struggled in this regard to truth. I do not like confrontation, and from that standpoint i find that I like to change things from the point I feel them, to the point that I express them.  In my writing now, I try to not filter things like that.  Like suggested in Bird by Bird, I try to reflect the truth as best I can from within. 

The fiction packet is very cool, not so much because of it's contents but because of what it shows me.  From it I can learn that a short story is not always the same format.  There can be a short story that is only four lines long, or one that is bizarre in many ways.  The shorter stories in the packet, like the one about two red coats, are really cool!  They really show that you can inspire mystery in someone with only a few words. 

Something that I would like to try with my short stories is to inspire questions in people.  I want to make people ask questions, things that they may not want to ask but feel they have to after they read my story.  This is a lofty goal, but I think that I would enjoy trying to reach it.  The journey, after all, is the whole point of a destination. 

.'Till next week,

David Teague Jr

There is a beach far out of any radar, on an island not known to the modern world. This island has no name and no population. To walk on this beach is sareal and unlike anything in the world to experience. The beach is always sunny, heating up the white sand such that when you walk the warmth from the sand between your toes warms your spirit. The water is clear with a light blue tone, that goes on forever. The smell is a mix of sea water and palm trees. Ah, the trees. The sound of the breeze through the trees mixing with the waves of the water breaking, calms you. You're left with one option: to breath in and smile. This beach takes away worries, opens up your mind, and renews your appreciation for every moment of your life. On a normal morning there once appeared a man. He was in a business suit and had a black briefcase. Of an older age, you could tell by the wrinkles on his face that he fears something. He may explain that it is stress or anger, but it must come from fear. His dark blue suit is too much, he takes off his jacket revieling his white dress shirt. He looks around, becomes angry and begins to walk. We don't know what angered him, but it is likely that he is in an unknown place, alone. He sits down and seems to calm down. It is obvious that the beach is beginning to touch his spirit. As he sits, his life starts to shrink. He begins to realize all the things he has done. He realizes none of them amount to anything. As he reflects under the palm tree in The shade, he discovers that the only way to be fulfilled in life is to contribute to the lives of others. He breaks down and cries, understanding that he has feared failure his whole life and never aimed to help others. He breaths in and holds his lungs full. He smiles, still holding the warm beach breeze in, as if to let it Osborn his selfish nature such that he can exhail it for good. He breathes out, and the world becomes available to him. He sees himself as an instrument for good, a tool for the betterment of humanity. He sees his life as an opportunity to be useful to other's well being. He gets up and takes off his clothes, runs to the water and dives completely in. He swims until he needs air and surfaces from the warm clear blue water. He looks back at the island, says out loud, "Thank you! I am a changed man, I will change the world!". He swims back to shore, lies under the sun on the white sand, and falls asleep with a smile. He never felt more complete, more aligned with his life's purpose. He slept better than he'd ever slept, as if he had touched the very core of the Universe. On the 65th floor of an office building in a corner office in a cities downtown, he wakes up. He gets up from his desk, walk into the lobby and empties his briefcase onto the floor in front of everybody. Now with his office mates attention he walks to the elevator without saying a word. He never returned and never wore another tie.

I would like to write about "Engine" from the City Eclogue because it really stuck out to me.  This poem is scattered around, essentially by space being placed in the middle of many lines as well as above and below them.  The poem has the words, "Tear you apart" as a lone sentence.  This really tells us that this poem is touching on the point that sometimes we are all over the place internally, or torn apart. 

It talks about how "in the mirror     scatter" which once again seems to be talking about how it is within ourselves that we find most of the conflict in our lives.  Even conflict outside from without, we can often attribute to issues within.  I think that this is very useful to know, because when we are going through our daily lives we can so easily forget that it is us that has most control over the very life we are living.  If we find ourselves in conflict, as we almost daily do, then we can simply look in the mirror and adjust our perceptions of the world to  better accommodate the circumstances we have found our self in. 

This poem says, "strip you down     throw things into gear you didn't know would shift".  How cool is that?? This line says that sometimes life pushes us to places we didn't think we could go.  Things happen that we could have never predicted were possible.  Cliche, yes, but how astounding an idea are most cliche things?  I believe that the best advice we can ever get is to not be set aside by the fact that things are cliche.  The reason they are cliche is likely because they are true and have been said so often.  In regards to the poem, and this line in particular, I think it would be a good idea to address the fact that life has this power, or nature, if you will.  When we are stuck or in a place we wish we hadn't gone, we can have 'faith' in the fact that we may be capable of things we cannot consciously perceive at that time.  Always go forth with the belief that when you step, the ground will be there to catch you. 

This poem as a whole may not be meant to derive these ideas, but I think that it does non the less.

Sonnet 116, a 'new' look on true love

The poem that I chose to write about was "Let me not to the marriage of true minds" by Shakespeare.  This poem well describes what love really means and what to expect when you experience it.  I think that most people, including myself, get the wrong idea about love.  Love to most is simply really caring about someone.  Add lust to that formula and you have a very powerful dynamic between two people that can last for years sometimes.  Yet at some point, that may end, and two people are left without love for each other in time. 

What Shakespeare asked us to do in this poem, before really getting into what love means, was to 'admit impediments'.  I believe this was him asking us to set aside prior convictions about love, to come to a higher understanding that he then continues on to explain.  "love is not love Which alters when it alternation finds" is the next line, which I think addresses a great deal of opinion about love.  When two people 'love' each other and are then faced with something like a long series of fights, or a hurtful act like cheating, they often find themselves no longer loving each other.  When true love finds such alternations, it alters not, according to Shakespeare.  This is key, because it cuts out most of the 'non' true lovers out there.

In the rest of the poem, love is described as being the "star to every wandering bark" which is a great way of saying, love can take you from feeling lost  to feeling that you are always where you need to be.  Love is also described as transcending time, and even escaping death in the line, "within his bending sickle's compass come; love alters not with his brief hours and weeks..."

Something as incredible and confusing as love is difficult to capture in a poem, let alone a sonnet.  Many poets have tried to do so in many different forms, yet not many come close to how love is described in sonnet 116.  I really enjoy this sonnet, and couldn't wish for a better way to describe the complex nature of true love.