Thursday, June 25, 2015
Movie Review: A Most Violent Year
In the latest film by J.C. Chandor—a director now with a collection of three movies and three successes—Abel, a New York businessman in 1981, tries to expand his business. He is an honorable businessman, always obeying the laws, but a company consists of more than one person, and a city consists of more than one company. He struggles to succeed in his industry with everything around him pulling him down: a violent wife, insubordinate workers, gangs, and New York's statistically most dangerous year. Oscar Isaac plays the roll smoothly and believably, paying homage (intentionally, it seems) to leads from other gang-related films, such as Corleone in the Godfather: Part II. And even more on its spectacle, Chandor captures the story with style, the shots always fully depicting and explaining the scenes, everything rendered to perfection, often utilizing color schemes, and just generally seeming like art; nearly every shot could be a winning photograph, with or without the movie. As for the story, A Most Violent Year tells a story of choices, how they affect us, and how a right answer just depends on what we value. Choices might succeed in one area, yet fail in another, and so the best choice is simply whatever works best for each person's own personal value, which are always different from another's. Abel wants a legally successful business, and he doesn't care who he hurts in the way. Other characters want to be safe in New York's crime-crawling environment, and they don't care what laws they may need to break. The two of these constantly juxtapose against each other, nobody finds a healthy medium, and the film takes no bias toward either side. So Chandor constantly creates a tone of hopeless relativism, showing how there is no absolute right. A Most Violent Year guides the viewer through a very philosophical and thought provoking story, and it only enhances its viewing with an emotional, very personal, and always moving story. It always has the next objective in mind, and it never slows down. However, those wishing for a violent gangster film to match the title and advertisement will be very disappointed, and some might find its dry tone rather dull.
Tuesday, June 23, 2015
Movie Review: Jurassic World
In 1993 Stephen Spielberg directed Jurassic Park, an instant hit and never-aging classic, based on a novel by Michael Crichton. With all its success, Hollywood asked for sequels (go figure), and then came Jurassic Park: The Lost World, Jurassic Park III, and now Jurassic World. And as sequels trend, each installment gets less about story and increasingly about more dinosaurs, bigger dinosaurs, and cooler scenes. Jurassic World tries hard to revive the series' original theme of man playing God with science, and to bring back a compelling story. And trust me: you can tell. From blatant debates between characters, to forced emotional scenes (never created by characters depth or motivation, but only by relatable moments, dramatic music, and lots of crying), everything is so as obvious a narrator might as well have paused the movie, walked on screen, and said, "Pay attention, now, for this is where we talk about our message," or "Now you are supposed to feel sad." And when I said the sequels are about bigger dinosaurs, I meant that quite literally for this latest installment. This new dinosaur is so big and so scary the writers did not even know what to make it. But thankfully they resolved this by simply making him everything. Every time he does something terrifying, the scientists blame it on some peculiar strand of DNA they put in him. The dinosaur can camouflage, and so they reveal, "We gave him chameleon DNA." He can talk to other dinosaurs, and so they reveal, "We gave him velociraptor DNA." I was waiting for him to jump really high and for the shamed scientists to admit, "We gave him frog DNA..." The acting is equally awful. But at least it looks pretty?
Thursday, June 18, 2015
Poem: The Bear Chase
Abash me, abase me,
Come, bear, I am waiting.
Regard me as berries,
Be grizzly and hairy.
Chase me through the forest,
Rip into my storage,
My gore's red and orange,
Please sip it like porridge.
Yet, tell me you're not dumb
How big grizzly bear rumps,
Behind bears on trail-hunts,
Are still prone to snare-guns.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Fiction: The Box
I plan to turn this into a novella. But before writing the novella I decided to start with very short short story:
Once upon a time a man left his home for a stroll in the park, and little did he know a giant cube would block his way.
Well, all those things occurred exactly as so: A man left his home for a stroll in the park, and on his walk a giant cube appeared out of thin air and blocked his way, and he cried, "Dangit! What is this block that is blocking my way?" just for a man to step to his side and explain, "Why, sir, if I'm square in my head, I believe that is a block."
However, it seems impossible to know anything of walks in parks, random blocks, or knowledgeable strangers without first knowing about the man. So our story begins in the messy basement of a majestic house. Papers, pens, pastels, and half-painted pictures, along with notebooks, sport-shirts, blurry photographs, cameras, and cover-broken books—all of these things congested the cluttered bedroom of Clark—and all by his doing.
One day in March, he picked up a pen, wanting to craft the best book in the world. One day in June, he signed up for track, wanting to dash the fasted dash off all time. A wintery Wednesday, he peaked out his window and noticed the snow; from there on out he would pursue a career as the best scientist to rear his way into the world. The list piles and piles of tried-and-quit hobbies, and at the end of the day he still lived with his mom. Indeed: lazy, commitless Clark, twenty-two years of age, still lived with his mom. To add to that, he had no friends, except for Hank, whom his mom chose for him for his seventh birthday, for in the seven years preceding he had shown no interest in making friends on his own. He still did not.
"Clark, get dressed," his mom called down, startling him up from his wondrous dreams. Lumbering up from his bed and picking a shirt—baggy and gray as he liked them—he thumped and groaned his way through his bathroom door and grinned in the mirror at his explosive, shaggy bed-head; he kept it that way in the morning, and he kept it that way in the day, and so he had no need to bore himself with a shower. Then he emptied his bladder, pulled on his shorts from the day before, and on his way back out the door he nodded a "goodmorning" to—yet also kept his distance from—his old and crusty toothbrush.
As he walked up the stairs to meet her, he quickly regretted it, for she only wanted argument: troubling him with silly things like “work” and “usefulness” and “using time well.” Soon, raging from his annoyance, Clark stormed from his home for a walk in the park, but on his walk a giant, wooden cube—about the size of the park itself—appeared out of thin air and blocked his way. "Dangit!” he cried. “What is this block that is blocking my way?" So an old man stepped to his side and explained, "Why, sir, if I'm square in the head, I believe that is a block.” Clark flustered red in his face and hissed through his teeth, "Well this stupid block is blocking my way, but I don't think I really care anymore, because I have nothing better to do than dig through it." Yet while he spit his curses at the box, he slowly simmered down his raging tone—he realized the truth of what he said: he really did have nothing better to do than dig through that giant, wooden block. And just like that, he stepped into a new body; all of his stirring anger dissolved so fast he had no time to even notice the shift. So he found a shovel somewhere in the park, lifted it up, and whacked the block, leaving a chip in the wood. Once again he twisted his palms on the orange and surprisingly warm metal handle, and he swung it with even more strength at the block, deepening the gash by another chip. The knowledgeable old man suggested in Clark’s right ear, “It’s going to take quite a bit more of those to get to the center. Probably five million…cubed!”
Laughing at his own joke, the old man ambled off, calling Clark a blockhead and leaving him to face his new challenge. Clark squeezed his eyebrows at the box, more determined than he ever felt for anything in his whole life. For the rest of the night, onlookers could see his silhouette in the moonlight, smacking and splitting the box, trying with all might—for reasons even Clark could not understand—to reach the center of the block; it drew subliminal strength it drew him in, deeper and deeper. As the sun rose the next morning, Clark continued his carving, not even once having thought of sleep. Throughout the night he had dug a good five feet into the block, and he crouched in his wooden tunnel, the morning’s warmth livening his body. Eventually, though—and well into the afternoon—he reluctantly dropped the shovel from his blistered hands and exited the block. Many hours he lied in the soft grass, confused at what inspired him to break from his journey to the center. Yet as he noticed a blue burger stand on the edge of the park, he suddenly realized, ah, yes… I must be hungry. Clark could only laugh at himself for forgetting his favorite part of the day—next to sleep, of course. So he rested from his dig and wended his way to the stand.
“I’ll take a burger please.”
“Yeah, okay.” The cashier, a teenager with a pimpled face, seemed suffering to sell burgers on this day. With dry expression he poked the order into the register, and served Clark his burger.
“What do you think of that box?” asked Clark, surprising himself with is urge to start a conversation.
“Considering we live in the real world and many people have seen it, I’m surprised you’re the only person who’s paying attention to it.”
They both laughed at the possibilities of fiction.
Then the teenager continued. “Why are you trying to dig through it? That seems dumb.”
“I don’t know. Now I feel like there’s something in there, and I don’t know why… But hey, would you want to help me out?”
“Sure. When I get off. Don’t have anything better to do.”
Clark gobbled down his burger, washed up, and returned to his work. Deeper and deeper he dug, never stopping: never wishing to stop. Sweat shot from his brows, the muscles in his arms sprained and snapped and contorted in every which way, but he could feel the center of the block nearing with every strike. Never had he felt as alive as when he smacked the wooden block with a shovel.
Soon enough the teenager joined in, and with perfect timing, for the arms of Clark had started weakening into spaghetti strands. As they took turns digging, they chatted about this and that: their stories and their passions—they both called digging their first only passion, as useless as it felt. Although, they both knew beyond all doubt something must lie in the center. Something must.
Days passed and they tunneled deeper, living in the presence of each other, and always digging. When they cried from their arms aching, they cried together. More days passed, perhaps even months, and they had practically dug three hundred feet into the block, bodies convulsing and lives slowly draining from their eyes. In this time a street girl had joined their journey, whom Clark fell madly in love with.
At last on a chilly night, the three friends—Clark in love with the girl, the girl in love with Clark, the teenager jealous of Clark, Clark forgiving the teenager, the teenager awkward around the girl, and the girl amused by the teenager—they finally struck the center of the block. All of them gazed around the hollow sphere of the center with their phone lights to illuminate it. Much to their surprise, but not to their disappointment, they saw nothing inside but each other; they laughed, and then left to go eat dinner together.
Once upon a time a man left his home for a stroll in the park, and little did he know a giant cube would block his way.
Well, all those things occurred exactly as so: A man left his home for a stroll in the park, and on his walk a giant cube appeared out of thin air and blocked his way, and he cried, "Dangit! What is this block that is blocking my way?" just for a man to step to his side and explain, "Why, sir, if I'm square in my head, I believe that is a block."
However, it seems impossible to know anything of walks in parks, random blocks, or knowledgeable strangers without first knowing about the man. So our story begins in the messy basement of a majestic house. Papers, pens, pastels, and half-painted pictures, along with notebooks, sport-shirts, blurry photographs, cameras, and cover-broken books—all of these things congested the cluttered bedroom of Clark—and all by his doing.
One day in March, he picked up a pen, wanting to craft the best book in the world. One day in June, he signed up for track, wanting to dash the fasted dash off all time. A wintery Wednesday, he peaked out his window and noticed the snow; from there on out he would pursue a career as the best scientist to rear his way into the world. The list piles and piles of tried-and-quit hobbies, and at the end of the day he still lived with his mom. Indeed: lazy, commitless Clark, twenty-two years of age, still lived with his mom. To add to that, he had no friends, except for Hank, whom his mom chose for him for his seventh birthday, for in the seven years preceding he had shown no interest in making friends on his own. He still did not.
"Clark, get dressed," his mom called down, startling him up from his wondrous dreams. Lumbering up from his bed and picking a shirt—baggy and gray as he liked them—he thumped and groaned his way through his bathroom door and grinned in the mirror at his explosive, shaggy bed-head; he kept it that way in the morning, and he kept it that way in the day, and so he had no need to bore himself with a shower. Then he emptied his bladder, pulled on his shorts from the day before, and on his way back out the door he nodded a "goodmorning" to—yet also kept his distance from—his old and crusty toothbrush.
As he walked up the stairs to meet her, he quickly regretted it, for she only wanted argument: troubling him with silly things like “work” and “usefulness” and “using time well.” Soon, raging from his annoyance, Clark stormed from his home for a walk in the park, but on his walk a giant, wooden cube—about the size of the park itself—appeared out of thin air and blocked his way. "Dangit!” he cried. “What is this block that is blocking my way?" So an old man stepped to his side and explained, "Why, sir, if I'm square in the head, I believe that is a block.” Clark flustered red in his face and hissed through his teeth, "Well this stupid block is blocking my way, but I don't think I really care anymore, because I have nothing better to do than dig through it." Yet while he spit his curses at the box, he slowly simmered down his raging tone—he realized the truth of what he said: he really did have nothing better to do than dig through that giant, wooden block. And just like that, he stepped into a new body; all of his stirring anger dissolved so fast he had no time to even notice the shift. So he found a shovel somewhere in the park, lifted it up, and whacked the block, leaving a chip in the wood. Once again he twisted his palms on the orange and surprisingly warm metal handle, and he swung it with even more strength at the block, deepening the gash by another chip. The knowledgeable old man suggested in Clark’s right ear, “It’s going to take quite a bit more of those to get to the center. Probably five million…cubed!”
Laughing at his own joke, the old man ambled off, calling Clark a blockhead and leaving him to face his new challenge. Clark squeezed his eyebrows at the box, more determined than he ever felt for anything in his whole life. For the rest of the night, onlookers could see his silhouette in the moonlight, smacking and splitting the box, trying with all might—for reasons even Clark could not understand—to reach the center of the block; it drew subliminal strength it drew him in, deeper and deeper. As the sun rose the next morning, Clark continued his carving, not even once having thought of sleep. Throughout the night he had dug a good five feet into the block, and he crouched in his wooden tunnel, the morning’s warmth livening his body. Eventually, though—and well into the afternoon—he reluctantly dropped the shovel from his blistered hands and exited the block. Many hours he lied in the soft grass, confused at what inspired him to break from his journey to the center. Yet as he noticed a blue burger stand on the edge of the park, he suddenly realized, ah, yes… I must be hungry. Clark could only laugh at himself for forgetting his favorite part of the day—next to sleep, of course. So he rested from his dig and wended his way to the stand.
“I’ll take a burger please.”
“Yeah, okay.” The cashier, a teenager with a pimpled face, seemed suffering to sell burgers on this day. With dry expression he poked the order into the register, and served Clark his burger.
“What do you think of that box?” asked Clark, surprising himself with is urge to start a conversation.
“Considering we live in the real world and many people have seen it, I’m surprised you’re the only person who’s paying attention to it.”
They both laughed at the possibilities of fiction.
Then the teenager continued. “Why are you trying to dig through it? That seems dumb.”
“I don’t know. Now I feel like there’s something in there, and I don’t know why… But hey, would you want to help me out?”
“Sure. When I get off. Don’t have anything better to do.”
Clark gobbled down his burger, washed up, and returned to his work. Deeper and deeper he dug, never stopping: never wishing to stop. Sweat shot from his brows, the muscles in his arms sprained and snapped and contorted in every which way, but he could feel the center of the block nearing with every strike. Never had he felt as alive as when he smacked the wooden block with a shovel.
Soon enough the teenager joined in, and with perfect timing, for the arms of Clark had started weakening into spaghetti strands. As they took turns digging, they chatted about this and that: their stories and their passions—they both called digging their first only passion, as useless as it felt. Although, they both knew beyond all doubt something must lie in the center. Something must.
Days passed and they tunneled deeper, living in the presence of each other, and always digging. When they cried from their arms aching, they cried together. More days passed, perhaps even months, and they had practically dug three hundred feet into the block, bodies convulsing and lives slowly draining from their eyes. In this time a street girl had joined their journey, whom Clark fell madly in love with.
At last on a chilly night, the three friends—Clark in love with the girl, the girl in love with Clark, the teenager jealous of Clark, Clark forgiving the teenager, the teenager awkward around the girl, and the girl amused by the teenager—they finally struck the center of the block. All of them gazed around the hollow sphere of the center with their phone lights to illuminate it. Much to their surprise, but not to their disappointment, they saw nothing inside but each other; they laughed, and then left to go eat dinner together.
Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Criticism: Restoring Literature
A problem threatens our literary world.
For this paper it seems unimportant to know when it emerged, but
merely the fact it exists and most savagely rips into the soul of our literary
world. Many people believe in this threat, and a few even rant in annoyance on
its presence; yet none, or at least very few, actually act out against the
beast: so it rages on. In this hour the reasons rise for why those who worry
about the literary future should amputate the claws of this creature before it
rips another tear in our already fraying form of art.
For years the attitudes towards literature have stealthily morphed form one point of view to another, drastically different yet similar enough for people to accidently make the switch. As an example we may use the case of horror: In its dawn, writers such as Poe would frighten readers for the purpose of unveiling things dreadful in a subject. However, readers—who became the next generation of writers—focused more on his scaring than his reason for scaring. Next they imitated the style of fright, finding it a unique feature, yet forgetting what esteemed the device in the first place. So they morphed it into a genre, similar to the happenings of romance, fantasy, westerns, science fiction, and so on, sinking libraries from treasuries of expression to shelves cluttered with genre fiction: fiction which strives for a certain genre-based persona: a story for the genre rather than a genre for the story.
So what does the future hold? Every movement since the start of Literature has pushed a new manner of expressing ideas; but in the contemporary movement of genre fiction, each innovation only pushes a new manner of writing genres. Sadly this only digs the art deeper into the ground, year by year, “innovation” by “innovation,” to where meaningful literature only appears every so often. Literature still moves as authors experiment with new ideas, but since the goals have changed, so has our tendency to move in a beneficial direction.
Although why does any of this matter? Can readers not read for the mere delight? Literature influences the time people spend. So would we not better ourselves from spending that time enjoying the books as we delight to do, yet at the same time benefit from them? Would not a person rather eat a delicious food which strengthens his health rather than an equally delicious food which turns him sick? After all, literature did emerge as a way of breaking down complex ideas and emotions in a fashion more approachable and engrossing than speaking of them directly; but what value holds the approachability an engrossment without the ideas? Without its valuable attributes, literature encourages only to seek pleasure over knowledge, and such a thing hinders deep thinking—it teaches us we work for pleasure, not for betterment. Societies which value all knowledge and no pleasure produce rigorous people, drained of joy; but societies which value all pleasure and no knowledge produce idle people, wasting moments which they could instead use for good. Yet if society pairs knowledge with pleasure as they may with literature, it produces a heightened culture, its people both merry and philosophical.
A problem threatens our literary world. Instead of continuing our restrictions and muddling of literary value, the time arises for goals to change, and change begins with the people—for works of literature mostly reflect the minds which wrote them. Ages ago in Greece and Rome, the children studied literature joyously, eager to learn of its deep nature, and such eagerness over great literature resulted in even more great literature. How has that morphed into an often grumbled-over required course? Perhaps instead of investing so much time assigning students to studying stacks of great works, the teachers should instead first help the students learn of literature as a whole: assist them in understanding its grand purpose, using the works as examples of the concepts rather than the concepts as examples of the works. Such an education impressions a deeper meaning into the students, producing deeper readers and more expressive writers—only for them to impression the next generation, and so on, each generation once again progressing in the right direction so we may finally regain our ground and restore the literary form.
For years the attitudes towards literature have stealthily morphed form one point of view to another, drastically different yet similar enough for people to accidently make the switch. As an example we may use the case of horror: In its dawn, writers such as Poe would frighten readers for the purpose of unveiling things dreadful in a subject. However, readers—who became the next generation of writers—focused more on his scaring than his reason for scaring. Next they imitated the style of fright, finding it a unique feature, yet forgetting what esteemed the device in the first place. So they morphed it into a genre, similar to the happenings of romance, fantasy, westerns, science fiction, and so on, sinking libraries from treasuries of expression to shelves cluttered with genre fiction: fiction which strives for a certain genre-based persona: a story for the genre rather than a genre for the story.
So what does the future hold? Every movement since the start of Literature has pushed a new manner of expressing ideas; but in the contemporary movement of genre fiction, each innovation only pushes a new manner of writing genres. Sadly this only digs the art deeper into the ground, year by year, “innovation” by “innovation,” to where meaningful literature only appears every so often. Literature still moves as authors experiment with new ideas, but since the goals have changed, so has our tendency to move in a beneficial direction.
Although why does any of this matter? Can readers not read for the mere delight? Literature influences the time people spend. So would we not better ourselves from spending that time enjoying the books as we delight to do, yet at the same time benefit from them? Would not a person rather eat a delicious food which strengthens his health rather than an equally delicious food which turns him sick? After all, literature did emerge as a way of breaking down complex ideas and emotions in a fashion more approachable and engrossing than speaking of them directly; but what value holds the approachability an engrossment without the ideas? Without its valuable attributes, literature encourages only to seek pleasure over knowledge, and such a thing hinders deep thinking—it teaches us we work for pleasure, not for betterment. Societies which value all knowledge and no pleasure produce rigorous people, drained of joy; but societies which value all pleasure and no knowledge produce idle people, wasting moments which they could instead use for good. Yet if society pairs knowledge with pleasure as they may with literature, it produces a heightened culture, its people both merry and philosophical.
A problem threatens our literary world. Instead of continuing our restrictions and muddling of literary value, the time arises for goals to change, and change begins with the people—for works of literature mostly reflect the minds which wrote them. Ages ago in Greece and Rome, the children studied literature joyously, eager to learn of its deep nature, and such eagerness over great literature resulted in even more great literature. How has that morphed into an often grumbled-over required course? Perhaps instead of investing so much time assigning students to studying stacks of great works, the teachers should instead first help the students learn of literature as a whole: assist them in understanding its grand purpose, using the works as examples of the concepts rather than the concepts as examples of the works. Such an education impressions a deeper meaning into the students, producing deeper readers and more expressive writers—only for them to impression the next generation, and so on, each generation once again progressing in the right direction so we may finally regain our ground and restore the literary form.
Saturday, April 25, 2015
Fiction: A Story of Two Protagonists and A World, Chapter 3
But Samantha could not sleep.
Yes, by the way: her name was really Samantha. Yet while it was her more accustomed name, she still found a spark of appeal in ‘Plink.’
She could not sleep because Willy—that adorable, poor man—was sound asleep next to her, completely zonked out like an Abghrjlakhxgnyojurldfao: a creature in their world that slept a lot. Admittedly she knew she was exhausted, but she could not submit to the will of her body. Even a basic yawn seemed miles away while her mind bustled like protons in a microwave. So much had occurred lately. She had been thrown out of Inside and left in a dark abyss of sadness and insecurity. And most of all, she was falling for an idiot—and not only an idiot, but an idiot who thought she was an ogre. How she found herself flailing at this man’s feet left her so puzzled. Perhaps she only liked him since he was the only man in her life at this moment, but she knew it had to be deeper than that. Much deeper. Still, she found herself shamed for falling for a man without a rational bone is his body. And all these crazy thoughts in her head about Willy made her emotions go up and down and up and down and sideways and backwards and off a ledge and into the river and into the mouth of a giant fish. It’s not as though she was a dramatic girl, like all the other girls from her home; Samantha merely had a tendency to easily fret at about 99% of situations she faced—especially, but not exclusive to, the undesirable ones.
At first Willy had seem rather cute, and the realization of his special disadvantage hadn’t come until they started wandering. But idiot or not, Samantha still found Willy jolly and welcome. She could even see herself staying with him for a really long time, even if it meant always listening to Willy ramble about her being an ogre—even if it meant going with him on these pointless quests.
But did Willy love her in return? Is he even capable of loving? And this is where her confusion started flying.
Cracks occurred throughout Samantha’s back as she flopped over to the other side of her body for a good look at Willy’s precious face. Do keep in mind, she hardly did this in the stalker-ish way—she simply did it because it pleased her to look at Willy throughout the night as he slept.
So cute and innocent. Sure, she may never receive gorgeous bundles of weeds or really anything one might receive from a normal lover. –But if he were to love her…
Oh! If he were to love her! Samantha’s moods swapped out as fast as her brain swapped topics –Her brain hopped around from one train of thought to the next as regularly as most women brains do. And to you feminists, trying with all your might to rip any and every story to shreds: this was not necessarily a bad thing. Of course, all you women have under-privileged brains and can hardly help bouncing around in no clear direction of thought, but I will not blame it on that—even though it is the main cause—because this tale is not a sexist tale. But back to the real story:
She fantasized for a long time of the two of them going for walks, looking down on the world from a mountain, kissing in the moonlight, and so on.
It was official. Samantha would talk to Willy as soon as soon the right moment came along. She was—at least to her standards—in love.
Samantha’s vision slowly faded off into darkness as she listened to the snaps, crackles, and pops of the fire while thinking of Willy and all of their wonderful—
And just like that, she was back in panicky attacks of thought. Samantha realized that sleep was no longer a possibility, and she stayed up all night thinking.
But we’ll just let her think for a while and in the meantime move on to our third and final perspective. Fear not: you did indeed read that sentence currently. I titled this tale “A Story of Two Protagonists and a World,” and yet I am now surprising you with a third perspective. This is nothing but trickery at its finest. I did not lie, but I also did not tell the whole truth; for really, if I had named the story appropriately, it would have been called “A Story of Two Protagonists and a World and Also One Conflict.” My tricky self has done it again, and you fools have plummeted head-first into my palms. And yet, in your hearts you will forgive me, for this scheme has ultimately lent this story to more shock; and with this third character, shock in the name of the game. However, the name of this man will not be revealed for suspenseful, eerie, and over-the-top terrifying affect. Even telling you he is a man is already ruining some of his mystery.
The mystery man crouched in the corner of the cave, acting villainous and creepy. So very, very creepy. So creepy that even the fiercest mammal would run to its mother to breast feed. The fiercest insect would hide in its environment.The fiercest sea critter would drown. And the fiercest alga would even be willing to call upon its lesser kind for assistance.
The creep had teeth which looked as though they could bite through steel—eyes that pierced through you like a sword. He had a uvula so sharp that it would slice you in two on your way down his long, long throat.
Now that we know how horrifying our menace is, we may move onto his thoughts… What he thought… The things he thought.
Mwahahahaha. So young these two. So naïve. They don’t know the terrible evil that will cast shadows upon their souls. Hehe. Haha. Mwahaha.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Yes, by the way: her name was really Samantha. Yet while it was her more accustomed name, she still found a spark of appeal in ‘Plink.’
She could not sleep because Willy—that adorable, poor man—was sound asleep next to her, completely zonked out like an Abghrjlakhxgnyojurldfao: a creature in their world that slept a lot. Admittedly she knew she was exhausted, but she could not submit to the will of her body. Even a basic yawn seemed miles away while her mind bustled like protons in a microwave. So much had occurred lately. She had been thrown out of Inside and left in a dark abyss of sadness and insecurity. And most of all, she was falling for an idiot—and not only an idiot, but an idiot who thought she was an ogre. How she found herself flailing at this man’s feet left her so puzzled. Perhaps she only liked him since he was the only man in her life at this moment, but she knew it had to be deeper than that. Much deeper. Still, she found herself shamed for falling for a man without a rational bone is his body. And all these crazy thoughts in her head about Willy made her emotions go up and down and up and down and sideways and backwards and off a ledge and into the river and into the mouth of a giant fish. It’s not as though she was a dramatic girl, like all the other girls from her home; Samantha merely had a tendency to easily fret at about 99% of situations she faced—especially, but not exclusive to, the undesirable ones.
At first Willy had seem rather cute, and the realization of his special disadvantage hadn’t come until they started wandering. But idiot or not, Samantha still found Willy jolly and welcome. She could even see herself staying with him for a really long time, even if it meant always listening to Willy ramble about her being an ogre—even if it meant going with him on these pointless quests.
But did Willy love her in return? Is he even capable of loving? And this is where her confusion started flying.
Cracks occurred throughout Samantha’s back as she flopped over to the other side of her body for a good look at Willy’s precious face. Do keep in mind, she hardly did this in the stalker-ish way—she simply did it because it pleased her to look at Willy throughout the night as he slept.
So cute and innocent. Sure, she may never receive gorgeous bundles of weeds or really anything one might receive from a normal lover. –But if he were to love her…
Oh! If he were to love her! Samantha’s moods swapped out as fast as her brain swapped topics –Her brain hopped around from one train of thought to the next as regularly as most women brains do. And to you feminists, trying with all your might to rip any and every story to shreds: this was not necessarily a bad thing. Of course, all you women have under-privileged brains and can hardly help bouncing around in no clear direction of thought, but I will not blame it on that—even though it is the main cause—because this tale is not a sexist tale. But back to the real story:
She fantasized for a long time of the two of them going for walks, looking down on the world from a mountain, kissing in the moonlight, and so on.
It was official. Samantha would talk to Willy as soon as soon the right moment came along. She was—at least to her standards—in love.
Samantha’s vision slowly faded off into darkness as she listened to the snaps, crackles, and pops of the fire while thinking of Willy and all of their wonderful—
And just like that, she was back in panicky attacks of thought. Samantha realized that sleep was no longer a possibility, and she stayed up all night thinking.
But we’ll just let her think for a while and in the meantime move on to our third and final perspective. Fear not: you did indeed read that sentence currently. I titled this tale “A Story of Two Protagonists and a World,” and yet I am now surprising you with a third perspective. This is nothing but trickery at its finest. I did not lie, but I also did not tell the whole truth; for really, if I had named the story appropriately, it would have been called “A Story of Two Protagonists and a World and Also One Conflict.” My tricky self has done it again, and you fools have plummeted head-first into my palms. And yet, in your hearts you will forgive me, for this scheme has ultimately lent this story to more shock; and with this third character, shock in the name of the game. However, the name of this man will not be revealed for suspenseful, eerie, and over-the-top terrifying affect. Even telling you he is a man is already ruining some of his mystery.
The mystery man crouched in the corner of the cave, acting villainous and creepy. So very, very creepy. So creepy that even the fiercest mammal would run to its mother to breast feed. The fiercest insect would hide in its environment.The fiercest sea critter would drown. And the fiercest alga would even be willing to call upon its lesser kind for assistance.
The creep had teeth which looked as though they could bite through steel—eyes that pierced through you like a sword. He had a uvula so sharp that it would slice you in two on your way down his long, long throat.
Now that we know how horrifying our menace is, we may move onto his thoughts… What he thought… The things he thought.
Mwahahahaha. So young these two. So naïve. They don’t know the terrible evil that will cast shadows upon their souls. Hehe. Haha. Mwahaha.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Fiction: A Story of Two Protagonists and a World, Chapter 2
Willy and Plink journeyed in many directions of north. They traveled for days, just wandering aimlessly wherever the dust led them. During this time, many interesting episodes occurred. The bucket crook had struck again on another rainy night, leading Willy to conclude those must be his ideal nights for operations, and the time of year came when a few overhead clouds crumpled up and drifted to the ground. Willy hated this time of the year, for the clouds were rather nipping. Also since the time they set off on their adventures, Plink started to view Willy as stupid and insane –but she was only a fatuous ogre, so Willy but snickered at her chuckleheadedness.
One freezing afternoon, they were sitting on a log, doing absolutely nothing but just that. Footprints in the snow drew line for miles, ending where their feet currently shivered. All in front of them stretched a white field, almost blinding them as it bounced sun into their eyes. Behind them a patch of trees stretched above their heads, occasionally poutering some flakes to numb their faces.
“It’s p-pretty cold out,” trembled Plink.
“Yes, I agree.”
Off in the field a gust of wind swept a cloud of snow off the ground and blew it somewhere far away.
“W-we should find a place out of the cold.”
“We could always find a cave.” But as he twisted around to scope out a cliff, he realized there must not be one for miles. “We’ll have to walk quite a ways.”
“Thanks okay. At l-least I’ve got a new f-friend with me, r-right?” And though her lips were spastically shaking, she grinned in his direction—as if to suggest something more.
But Willy quickly snapped to his feet. “Now, wait up just a moment! When did that happen?”
Plink’s eyebrows jumbled. “Huh?”
“When did we become friends?”
“W-well, haven’t we been friends s-since we first started walking around?”
“If that were the case, would I not be friends with this snow? Would I not be friends with those who stalk me?”
“Well, n-no, b-because—”
“—Wait a moment, Plink. I do wish to be friends, but we have not done anything to become friends.”
“W-well then what do you suggest?” She looked most thoroughly befuddled.
A good question. Willy had not yet thought of it. However, it did not surprise him this situation had eventually risen to the surface; it was bound to happen sometime or another. So he trudged back and forth in the thick snow, thumping away at his chin.
“Is it th-that hard of a thing?” Plink questioned from somewhere in the background of his thought.
“I believe I have arrived at a way we may become friends,” he proclaimed as he took his last step into a sudden halt.
“What?”
“I will go hide somewhere in the area, and you will come find me.”
“H-how does that help us bec-come friends? Could we j-just get out of the cold?”
“Soon enough, Plink. We must first finish this. This is important because until we have actually done this, we may not be friends.”
“Wh-why?”
“Is it not obvious? First off, how could you be friends unless you have actually done something to become friends? Also, what better way to become friends than you to actually come find my friendship?”
Plink grunted. “Fine. But you better not make this take long.”
“Does that not depend on how quickly you can find me?” he teased, already shuffling a few steps back towards his hiding spot.
“Oh my. Fine, just go hide. Don’t hide anywhere too hard.”
“What? Do you think friendship is an easy thing?” He bolted off through the snow to search for a place to hide, and Plink waited until it seemed enough time had passed. Then she merely followed his footprints, laughing a bit at how simple this would be after all. While Willy was most likely exerting excessive energy to find the perfect spot, all she would have to do is retrace those exertions. Yet Willy was still way ahead of her, for he had moved quickly and she only walked, but after about thirty minutes she had traced his steps through the snow and ended at more snow: that is, a very large clump of snow. So she shooed off the top layer of the clump, and sure enough there he was, completely purple under the nippy cover. Still cold, but now at least enjoying herself a bit more, she assisted Willy out of the snow with a big pull and then dusted him off.
“N-now we really need to find somewh-where warm. L-look at you,” she said. He was clearly trembling, but he managed to only slowly nod as if perfectly fine.
“Yes. We will find somewhere.”
“D-do you feel like we’re friends now?”
“Well, I have always felt like shared a friendship.”
"Well then w-was that r-really worth it?”
“Yes. Because now I know we officially do.”
“Ok-kay. But l-let’s go find somewhere w-warm.”
They wandered off. At one point Willy peaked over his shoulder for just a moment at his new official friend.
Thankfully, being a vagabond in her ogre days, Plink knew the landscape quite well and managed to find a small tunnel in a mountain. After struggling up the cliff’s edge and resting for a bit at the front of the mouth, they searched for some sticks and set up a fire. The two travelers sat with their backs against the rigid rock wall, gazing into at the spastically dancing flames. Outside the sky had deepened into a dark blue. A soft orange from the fire flickered on their faces.
Neither of the slowly breathing travelers uttered a work for quite some time. But Plink eventually broke the silence. “You know, Willy, I didn’t ever think that I’d like living out of my village.” She sounded calm like the sky outside. Willy felt too close to her, but he did not know why; she was sitting on the other side of the fire.
“Your troll village?”
Quietly under her breath she chuckled with agreement. “Yeah, you can call it that. Can I tell you something?”
Plink had asked many abnormal questions in Willy’s time of knowing her, yet that had to be the strangest. She was already telling him something. If she had honestly wanted to know, she should have asked earlier. At this point, no matter what Willy said, she would have still told him something. He moved on, though, and removed his brain from its analytical tendencies. He had grown fond of this ogre and did not want to spend his time criticizing her. “Yes, you are permitted tell me more somethings.”
“I like it out here with you. I like being away from the monsters of my old village.”
“For what reason?”
“I don’t know, actually. I guess it was alright there, but out here I can…” She paused and took a deep breathe, thinking deeply. Poor ogre must have gotten lost on her words. The human language and the ogre language differed a great deal. But she suddenly recalled the right translation. “I can just do whatever. No rules or judgment. You understand?”
“The translation succeeded.”
“No, that’s not what I meant. Do you understand why I kinda like it out here?”
“Yes. ‘You can do whatever,’ was the reason you gave me. I am familiar with the concept. I myself have never experienced your situation, but I have heard derailing accounts of ogre cruelty.”
“Yes, Willy. Ogres are harsh, mean creatures.”
“Then why was it good?”
“What?”
“Not too long ago you took informed me that your old village was good. You stated, quote, ‘I guess it was good there.’ Why was it good?”
“Oh, you know...”
“I am afraid not. I would not have asked if I knew.”
“Well… ‘Cause my family and friends were there.”
“You said ogres were cruel.”
“Yeah, so what?”
“Were your family members not ogres?”
Nothing. No noise except the snaps of flames, which flickered a few inches shorter now. Once again Plink was struggling to find the right words. “Yeah, I guess they were ‘ogres.’ I loved them, though. Even if they didn’t love me back.” And then a dampness fogged in her eyes, which condensed into singular drops of painful tears to drop down her cheeks.
Willy refused to watch her cry like so. He scooted to her side of the fire and placed his left hand on her trembling leg. The leg still twitched and tensed under his palm. And Willy knew very well the pain she felt, for he had felt it many times before: the searing stings of an object stuck in your eye. He brought his right hand up to wipe whatever it was away. Anything—specks of dust, a small chunk of wood—those were all able to irritate the eyes, and nobody should have to deal with that.
On her own she rubbed away the rest of the remains from her eyes and sucked in a great deal of air, trying to calm herself back down. “Say, Willy, I’m feeling tired.”
“I’m feeling tired,” Willy repeated obediently.
She smiled at him, then said goodnight, nestling up onto the wall to ease her eyes shut. Willy did the same.
Chapter 1
One freezing afternoon, they were sitting on a log, doing absolutely nothing but just that. Footprints in the snow drew line for miles, ending where their feet currently shivered. All in front of them stretched a white field, almost blinding them as it bounced sun into their eyes. Behind them a patch of trees stretched above their heads, occasionally poutering some flakes to numb their faces.
“It’s p-pretty cold out,” trembled Plink.
“Yes, I agree.”
Off in the field a gust of wind swept a cloud of snow off the ground and blew it somewhere far away.
“W-we should find a place out of the cold.”
“We could always find a cave.” But as he twisted around to scope out a cliff, he realized there must not be one for miles. “We’ll have to walk quite a ways.”
“Thanks okay. At l-least I’ve got a new f-friend with me, r-right?” And though her lips were spastically shaking, she grinned in his direction—as if to suggest something more.
But Willy quickly snapped to his feet. “Now, wait up just a moment! When did that happen?”
Plink’s eyebrows jumbled. “Huh?”
“When did we become friends?”
“W-well, haven’t we been friends s-since we first started walking around?”
“If that were the case, would I not be friends with this snow? Would I not be friends with those who stalk me?”
“Well, n-no, b-because—”
“—Wait a moment, Plink. I do wish to be friends, but we have not done anything to become friends.”
“W-well then what do you suggest?” She looked most thoroughly befuddled.
A good question. Willy had not yet thought of it. However, it did not surprise him this situation had eventually risen to the surface; it was bound to happen sometime or another. So he trudged back and forth in the thick snow, thumping away at his chin.
“Is it th-that hard of a thing?” Plink questioned from somewhere in the background of his thought.
“I believe I have arrived at a way we may become friends,” he proclaimed as he took his last step into a sudden halt.
“What?”
“I will go hide somewhere in the area, and you will come find me.”
“H-how does that help us bec-come friends? Could we j-just get out of the cold?”
“Soon enough, Plink. We must first finish this. This is important because until we have actually done this, we may not be friends.”
“Wh-why?”
“Is it not obvious? First off, how could you be friends unless you have actually done something to become friends? Also, what better way to become friends than you to actually come find my friendship?”
Plink grunted. “Fine. But you better not make this take long.”
“Does that not depend on how quickly you can find me?” he teased, already shuffling a few steps back towards his hiding spot.
“Oh my. Fine, just go hide. Don’t hide anywhere too hard.”
“What? Do you think friendship is an easy thing?” He bolted off through the snow to search for a place to hide, and Plink waited until it seemed enough time had passed. Then she merely followed his footprints, laughing a bit at how simple this would be after all. While Willy was most likely exerting excessive energy to find the perfect spot, all she would have to do is retrace those exertions. Yet Willy was still way ahead of her, for he had moved quickly and she only walked, but after about thirty minutes she had traced his steps through the snow and ended at more snow: that is, a very large clump of snow. So she shooed off the top layer of the clump, and sure enough there he was, completely purple under the nippy cover. Still cold, but now at least enjoying herself a bit more, she assisted Willy out of the snow with a big pull and then dusted him off.
“N-now we really need to find somewh-where warm. L-look at you,” she said. He was clearly trembling, but he managed to only slowly nod as if perfectly fine.
“Yes. We will find somewhere.”
“D-do you feel like we’re friends now?”
“Well, I have always felt like shared a friendship.”
"Well then w-was that r-really worth it?”
“Yes. Because now I know we officially do.”
“Ok-kay. But l-let’s go find somewhere w-warm.”
They wandered off. At one point Willy peaked over his shoulder for just a moment at his new official friend.
Thankfully, being a vagabond in her ogre days, Plink knew the landscape quite well and managed to find a small tunnel in a mountain. After struggling up the cliff’s edge and resting for a bit at the front of the mouth, they searched for some sticks and set up a fire. The two travelers sat with their backs against the rigid rock wall, gazing into at the spastically dancing flames. Outside the sky had deepened into a dark blue. A soft orange from the fire flickered on their faces.
Neither of the slowly breathing travelers uttered a work for quite some time. But Plink eventually broke the silence. “You know, Willy, I didn’t ever think that I’d like living out of my village.” She sounded calm like the sky outside. Willy felt too close to her, but he did not know why; she was sitting on the other side of the fire.
“Your troll village?”
Quietly under her breath she chuckled with agreement. “Yeah, you can call it that. Can I tell you something?”
Plink had asked many abnormal questions in Willy’s time of knowing her, yet that had to be the strangest. She was already telling him something. If she had honestly wanted to know, she should have asked earlier. At this point, no matter what Willy said, she would have still told him something. He moved on, though, and removed his brain from its analytical tendencies. He had grown fond of this ogre and did not want to spend his time criticizing her. “Yes, you are permitted tell me more somethings.”
“I like it out here with you. I like being away from the monsters of my old village.”
“For what reason?”
“I don’t know, actually. I guess it was alright there, but out here I can…” She paused and took a deep breathe, thinking deeply. Poor ogre must have gotten lost on her words. The human language and the ogre language differed a great deal. But she suddenly recalled the right translation. “I can just do whatever. No rules or judgment. You understand?”
“The translation succeeded.”
“No, that’s not what I meant. Do you understand why I kinda like it out here?”
“Yes. ‘You can do whatever,’ was the reason you gave me. I am familiar with the concept. I myself have never experienced your situation, but I have heard derailing accounts of ogre cruelty.”
“Yes, Willy. Ogres are harsh, mean creatures.”
“Then why was it good?”
“What?”
“Not too long ago you took informed me that your old village was good. You stated, quote, ‘I guess it was good there.’ Why was it good?”
“Oh, you know...”
“I am afraid not. I would not have asked if I knew.”
“Well… ‘Cause my family and friends were there.”
“You said ogres were cruel.”
“Yeah, so what?”
“Were your family members not ogres?”
Nothing. No noise except the snaps of flames, which flickered a few inches shorter now. Once again Plink was struggling to find the right words. “Yeah, I guess they were ‘ogres.’ I loved them, though. Even if they didn’t love me back.” And then a dampness fogged in her eyes, which condensed into singular drops of painful tears to drop down her cheeks.
Willy refused to watch her cry like so. He scooted to her side of the fire and placed his left hand on her trembling leg. The leg still twitched and tensed under his palm. And Willy knew very well the pain she felt, for he had felt it many times before: the searing stings of an object stuck in your eye. He brought his right hand up to wipe whatever it was away. Anything—specks of dust, a small chunk of wood—those were all able to irritate the eyes, and nobody should have to deal with that.
On her own she rubbed away the rest of the remains from her eyes and sucked in a great deal of air, trying to calm herself back down. “Say, Willy, I’m feeling tired.”
“I’m feeling tired,” Willy repeated obediently.
She smiled at him, then said goodnight, nestling up onto the wall to ease her eyes shut. Willy did the same.
Chapter 1
Poetry: A Short Fuse
The light shines on my deck as I start riding.
'Sprouted ramose from earth and formed real fine,
For my delight.
It leads me places on its wondrous wheels.
And like the skies and seas it fashions me
To feel all things.
Contrast to your caging, baleful, snapping screen,
The tree with wheels's no master, but a friend,
So green and Real.
To swim and feel like flowing liquid forms
A better branch, more stalwart than your wire.
You'll look deformed.
Thursday, April 16, 2015
Photography: Up?
Continuing my works on our "better, advanced generation." I have taken an interest in this topic, and so you can expect to see many more poems, pictures, essays, and maybe even a short story on this subject.
For more, check out my posts "Poem: Growing" and "Criticism: Limitations and Modifications--An Argument Against Video Games."
Wednesday, April 15, 2015
Poem: Growing
A poem I wrote for all of our advancements on the earth. After all our hard work, will our "complicated" machines ever have either the complexity or beauty of nature?
Keep building,
But will your makings ever be
As beautiful as buds blooming
Fresh and pink on green trees?
Keep moving,
But will you ever reach when your
Houses sprout up from the ground?
Beauty where your hands aren't found.
Keep bragging,
Behold your sweat-and-tear-built structures,
Advanced in every theoretic best,
Built on never-worked-for earth.
Keep building,
But will your makings ever be
As beautiful as buds blooming
Fresh and pink on green trees?
Keep moving,
But will you ever reach when your
Houses sprout up from the ground?
Beauty where your hands aren't found.
Keep bragging,
Behold your sweat-and-tear-built structures,
Advanced in every theoretic best,
Built on never-worked-for earth.
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
Fiction: A Story of Two Protagonists and a World, Chapter 1
Once upon a time – or so I feel myself forced to say since this is a tall-tale; but, for the record, I do not know in which “time” this story occurred, if it occurred, or if this world even holds my same concepts of time – there lived a boy and a girl.
Many others also lived, but I find it terribly inappropriate narrate their lives, for this is not about them; it’s about the boy and the girl. The others would fit smashingly into another tale, but lousily into this one. Perhaps I will explore the others’ endeavors on a different day, for I know they too probably lived some very tale-worthy lives. But at this time I need only tell of a boy and a girl.
They lived in a distant world.
I could effortlessly tick away time explaining this world, such as its magical whereabouts or how to stumble across it - whether by wardrobe or rabbit hole - but I wish for the reader to cherish our time together, and so I will not. This world existed somewhere, evolved somehow, and our own world exists somewhere else. Enough said.
A peculiar thing which separated their world from ours is a name. Nobody, neither I nor the dwellers, named this wonderful world. However, contrary to what most of you would assume, this is not because I am lazy; in fact, I deliberately debarred the world from having a name. If the world deserved a name, I would have delighted in selecting one. But this world did not deserve a name. And even if I had seen this world fit for a name, who is to say for sure its dwellers would have seen the same? Am I in such a position to force thoughts into their minds? Of course not! The dwellers lived in their world, and they loved it, but none thought to call it anything because they never talked about it, nor to it. And let us imagine one did talk about it or to it: couldn’t he just use the words “my world?”
I hope I have addressed any question which might discredit this story’s setting.
Now, the districts in this world, for people did talk about them, had names – but please note, the inhabitants originally used alien tongues. I took the time to translate the original names so that any dweller of Earth could read this tale. The districts were called ‘Inside’ and ‘Outside,’ named by the powerful influence of logic, for one lied inside, and the other lied outside. A massive and unbearably orange fence divided the village of Inside from Outside, and Outside was any land outside of Inside. The smart and socially accepted idled about in cozy cottages and bustling town squares of Inside while the dumb, disapproved, and delirious did whatever such people like to do, and they lived in Outside. Their two districts never clashed - or, at least, they never clashed in the fantasies of the foolish dreamer. In reality, only half or less of Outside accepted their hilly home. The rest, as we say in our world, always saw the glass as half empty. Instead of accepting their Outside, they spent their days revolting without real reason. They wasted their lives yelling at the citizens of Inside, declaring how unfair and rude they were to deny them entrance: that all men and women should be able live wherever they want. -Yes, their uproars were regrettably as ironic as the word ‘sesquipedalian.’ These rioters tried with all their power to reside amongst the very people they spat on.
As stated, all dwellers of Outside were either dumb, disapproved, or delirious, but who I forgot to mention were the ones too dumb to know places called Inside and Outside even existed. And that brings our story to the first protagonist: the boy.
Willy sensed nowhere in life to go, nor a resolute thing to do, and so he tag-tailed wherever the wind took him – or, no, not the wind; I find the word “wind” too fierce and frigid. For the purpose of painting a narrative picture and winning awards, I must be careful to always use beautiful words for such a beautiful world. So I will instead say “breeze.” Willy let the warm, whooshing breeze lead him wherever it wanted. The wind suffused through green valleys which glittered as if glowing from within, over towering mountains which overtopped the valleys like enormous, nippleless beasts, and occasionally blew through deserts which, of course, were deserted. Willy enjoyed every moment of tittuping through the tulips and savoring every day -except for the ones he didn’t. Always he philosophized fervently about the birds, the beautiful skies, and nearly everything else.
Surely an artist, Willy reflected, created such a masterfully sculpted world. This inspired Willy to also create, and so he gifted the world with great ideas.
However, his daily wonts which he had grown so accustomed with suddenly changed one day as the wind guided him to a new and weird life full of socialization and co-existence.
The wind blew north, or at least where Willy assumed was north. To him, since north was straight ahead, and he was always looking straight ahead when walking, he therefore always traveled north. Each day, Willy found out which direction of north he would set his trails to by throwing his magical dust. This dust, when thrown like so, would always knowingly drift towards whichever direction his destiny called. The pointing power in this dust was so strong that even the wind longed to follow, and so Willy always explained he went “wherever the wind blew.”
His wandering never swayed, and so he bragged on his undivided devotion to the dust’s wishes. And Willy knew he was special to the dust. Not even the wind followed as loyally; it would easily bore of dust’s direction and, with a wintery chill, whoosh off another way. But not Willy. Willy stuck with the dust until the very end.
So the dust loved Willy, and Willy loved the dust. Whenever Willy whipped the last handful of grains into the air, he never worried he lost a friend, for the dust always skipped right on back and it hid itself under a layer of grass for Willy to dig out as the dust seemed to shout “Take me back! Take me back!” Chuckling at his loyal companion, Willy would always scoop it up in a loving handful and bring it home to its bag.
However, this all changed forever.
One blue and misty morning, Willy had been yodeling about in his yard when he noticed something strange. He took a slow step and another careful look. Without a doubt, he beheld a cactus growing, green and grizzly. Although for some suspicious reason, this cactus did not look like a cactus. It instead looked like a tree. Not every day did Willy spot such a suspicious trick, and so he knew something strange was coming.
It came that afternoon.
Willy busied himself, hunting for that pesky pest who filled his favorite bucket to the brim with water during the past night’s rainstorm. Unbelievable, Willy grumbled. Just one night he forgot to bring his bucket in, and this menace mauled it. The indecency! By waiting until a rainstorm, this murderous menace hadn’t even given Willy the chance to defend his poor bucket. For Willy had been inside, hiding from the rain. It was like forcing a limbless cripple into a sword duel.
But Willy suddenly forgot the bully. A new adventure lumbered his way: An unsanitary, muddy, and unbearably ugly ogre with teeth the size of large, sharp teeth, which were the size of a four-foot rock, which was the size of the most towering mountain. Guarding his ground, Willy never trembled at its terror. This ogre failed to even phase him. If anything, Willy swooned. For just as the cactus had been disguised as the tree, this ogre had disguised itself as a beautiful woman, blatantly trying to bombard him with trickery. Willy smirked and snickered to himself at the ogre’s schlocky attempt.
Yet fortunate for the feebleminded ogre, Willy decided not to slay it. He always kept his mind wide open, giving all creatures a fair chance. “Good afternoon, ogre. How goes you on this…” Willy forgot the rest of his sentence.
The ogre stiffened, seeming both offended and confused. “I’m already having a bad day. I’m in no need for insults.”
“Insults?”
“Don’t be stupid.”
“But I never knew my words as capable of offending. What hurtful slanders did I say?”
“Think about it.”
“I am.”
“Forget it.”
“But I cannot!” Willy then scratched his chin and thought. He knew this would not give him an answer, but was simply a useless habit. “I stretch with this guess, but when I called you an ogre… did that cause the offence? I did not consider that able to hurt, but it seems the only part of my speech which might have offended.”
“I said forget it,” she snapped.
Very strange. For the first time in his life, Willy met an ogre who was humble about its ogre heritage – not boasting on its sickening stench and slimy tongues as ogres normally do. In fact, this ogre had openly spilt its emotions – something which would make most ogres steam red. To the uneducated public, this ogre would have come across completely human. But Willy knew better. He always anticipated the abnormal, and he knew that a better explanation always existed. Even now many possibilities paraded Willy’s mind: maybe these sorts of decent ogres had always existed and he had simply never met one; perhaps it was the most normal obnoxious ogre in every way and merely a marvelous actor; or maybe - just maybe - even though the possibilities were improbable - even though its chances were slimmer than the possibilities, and the likelihood slimmer than both the chances and the possibilities - perhaps this was a pure-hearted ogre.
Willy was intrigued.
“I am greatly sorry. I will no longer refer to you as ‘ogre’ if that is the honest desire of your heart. I will call you ‘ma’am,’ for that is indeed your form, and a ravishingly beautiful one, at that. Whatever ogre lies within may be dismissed since the radiance of your beauty blinds it.”
“Oh, I get it. ‘Ogre within. Radiance of beauty.’ You’re just being poetic.” She swept out her tension in one long and soft breath. “Sorry for actin' all snappy. I actually needed a compliment like that.” Willy did not see how her jabbering had much to do with his apology, yet he ignored his puzzlement, hoping to extend the peace just formed.
“What brought you to these lands? –other than your feet, of course.”
“Just going where the wind blows, I guess.”
So the wind had brought her here, too. Was this a coincidence? No, it couldn’t be. The chances were too slim to be a coincidence. And so Willy knew he had finally found his destiny. The wind had loyally lead him. And finally face to face, he studied this strange womanly ogre – this unlikely destiny.
“This is joyous news, ma’am.”
“What is? That I’m wandering?”
“It is joyous news that the wind has blown you in this direction. I, too, have been brought here by the wind. We have been directed into each other’s path. You must somehow be my destiny, and I yours.”
She chuckled. “You know what? On second thought, you’re kinda cute.”
Once again, she spoke of odd matters. It was as if she always grabbed her gab from a hat. Ogres were the dumbest race.
Why had he been brought to an ogre?
“Perhaps we were supposed to find each other,” the stupid, ugly, beautiful ogre continued. “Wanna stick together and find out? Also, can I ask you what your name is?”
“You may.”
Even though Willy told her she could, she did not. Instead, she oddly stood there, looking as if she expected something, and Willy wheezed, so annoyed at her stupidity he could have exploded right there. He knew it would be a task to adapt to her manner.
And after more silence and staring it became apparent she meant to keep her mouth shut, so Willy finally spoke. “I am called Willy. That, however, is only my real name. But please feel the freedom to label me under whichever name you please. I will call you Plink.” Willy thought of what a Plink was, and although he could not remember if he had ever heard the word, he knew it meant something extraordinary since it was the name of such an interesting figure.
“Do you wanna know my real name?”
“I do not.”
“Why?”
“To me you are already Plink.”
At that Plink laughed yet again, this time more merrily than ever. It seemed possible now to Willy that ogre laughter could indicate something much different than human laughter. Remembering the times Plink laughed, Willy decided ogre laughter probably expressed agreement. For this reason alone, Willy laughed along.
“So in which direction do you assume the wind shall blow next, Plink?”
“I don’t know. Wanna find out?”
“I do.” Gripping a fistful of magic dust out of the bag, Willy flung it to the air. It blew nowhere but forcefully into Plink’s face. Willy’s jaw dropped as he saw that she really must be his destiny. And she was now completely unraveling in laugher, so she must have agreed.
“Well it appears to be a-fish that the wind is blowing us together,” said Willy.
“You mean a-fish-hole?”
“No, not unless you shot the fish.”
As Plink returned to her rips of rioting laughter, Willy began to bloom inside. Never had one person agreed with him so much. Ogre or not, he might learn enjoy her company.
“So where do you want to go, Willy? I’m ready to go anywhere. I don’t belong anywhere else, so I’ll just follow along wherever you want to go.”
Willy did not have to think at all before he brightly grinned and said, “We will travel north.”
Many others also lived, but I find it terribly inappropriate narrate their lives, for this is not about them; it’s about the boy and the girl. The others would fit smashingly into another tale, but lousily into this one. Perhaps I will explore the others’ endeavors on a different day, for I know they too probably lived some very tale-worthy lives. But at this time I need only tell of a boy and a girl.
They lived in a distant world.
I could effortlessly tick away time explaining this world, such as its magical whereabouts or how to stumble across it - whether by wardrobe or rabbit hole - but I wish for the reader to cherish our time together, and so I will not. This world existed somewhere, evolved somehow, and our own world exists somewhere else. Enough said.
A peculiar thing which separated their world from ours is a name. Nobody, neither I nor the dwellers, named this wonderful world. However, contrary to what most of you would assume, this is not because I am lazy; in fact, I deliberately debarred the world from having a name. If the world deserved a name, I would have delighted in selecting one. But this world did not deserve a name. And even if I had seen this world fit for a name, who is to say for sure its dwellers would have seen the same? Am I in such a position to force thoughts into their minds? Of course not! The dwellers lived in their world, and they loved it, but none thought to call it anything because they never talked about it, nor to it. And let us imagine one did talk about it or to it: couldn’t he just use the words “my world?”
I hope I have addressed any question which might discredit this story’s setting.
Now, the districts in this world, for people did talk about them, had names – but please note, the inhabitants originally used alien tongues. I took the time to translate the original names so that any dweller of Earth could read this tale. The districts were called ‘Inside’ and ‘Outside,’ named by the powerful influence of logic, for one lied inside, and the other lied outside. A massive and unbearably orange fence divided the village of Inside from Outside, and Outside was any land outside of Inside. The smart and socially accepted idled about in cozy cottages and bustling town squares of Inside while the dumb, disapproved, and delirious did whatever such people like to do, and they lived in Outside. Their two districts never clashed - or, at least, they never clashed in the fantasies of the foolish dreamer. In reality, only half or less of Outside accepted their hilly home. The rest, as we say in our world, always saw the glass as half empty. Instead of accepting their Outside, they spent their days revolting without real reason. They wasted their lives yelling at the citizens of Inside, declaring how unfair and rude they were to deny them entrance: that all men and women should be able live wherever they want. -Yes, their uproars were regrettably as ironic as the word ‘sesquipedalian.’ These rioters tried with all their power to reside amongst the very people they spat on.
As stated, all dwellers of Outside were either dumb, disapproved, or delirious, but who I forgot to mention were the ones too dumb to know places called Inside and Outside even existed. And that brings our story to the first protagonist: the boy.
Willy sensed nowhere in life to go, nor a resolute thing to do, and so he tag-tailed wherever the wind took him – or, no, not the wind; I find the word “wind” too fierce and frigid. For the purpose of painting a narrative picture and winning awards, I must be careful to always use beautiful words for such a beautiful world. So I will instead say “breeze.” Willy let the warm, whooshing breeze lead him wherever it wanted. The wind suffused through green valleys which glittered as if glowing from within, over towering mountains which overtopped the valleys like enormous, nippleless beasts, and occasionally blew through deserts which, of course, were deserted. Willy enjoyed every moment of tittuping through the tulips and savoring every day -except for the ones he didn’t. Always he philosophized fervently about the birds, the beautiful skies, and nearly everything else.
Surely an artist, Willy reflected, created such a masterfully sculpted world. This inspired Willy to also create, and so he gifted the world with great ideas.
However, his daily wonts which he had grown so accustomed with suddenly changed one day as the wind guided him to a new and weird life full of socialization and co-existence.
The wind blew north, or at least where Willy assumed was north. To him, since north was straight ahead, and he was always looking straight ahead when walking, he therefore always traveled north. Each day, Willy found out which direction of north he would set his trails to by throwing his magical dust. This dust, when thrown like so, would always knowingly drift towards whichever direction his destiny called. The pointing power in this dust was so strong that even the wind longed to follow, and so Willy always explained he went “wherever the wind blew.”
His wandering never swayed, and so he bragged on his undivided devotion to the dust’s wishes. And Willy knew he was special to the dust. Not even the wind followed as loyally; it would easily bore of dust’s direction and, with a wintery chill, whoosh off another way. But not Willy. Willy stuck with the dust until the very end.
So the dust loved Willy, and Willy loved the dust. Whenever Willy whipped the last handful of grains into the air, he never worried he lost a friend, for the dust always skipped right on back and it hid itself under a layer of grass for Willy to dig out as the dust seemed to shout “Take me back! Take me back!” Chuckling at his loyal companion, Willy would always scoop it up in a loving handful and bring it home to its bag.
However, this all changed forever.
One blue and misty morning, Willy had been yodeling about in his yard when he noticed something strange. He took a slow step and another careful look. Without a doubt, he beheld a cactus growing, green and grizzly. Although for some suspicious reason, this cactus did not look like a cactus. It instead looked like a tree. Not every day did Willy spot such a suspicious trick, and so he knew something strange was coming.
It came that afternoon.
Willy busied himself, hunting for that pesky pest who filled his favorite bucket to the brim with water during the past night’s rainstorm. Unbelievable, Willy grumbled. Just one night he forgot to bring his bucket in, and this menace mauled it. The indecency! By waiting until a rainstorm, this murderous menace hadn’t even given Willy the chance to defend his poor bucket. For Willy had been inside, hiding from the rain. It was like forcing a limbless cripple into a sword duel.
But Willy suddenly forgot the bully. A new adventure lumbered his way: An unsanitary, muddy, and unbearably ugly ogre with teeth the size of large, sharp teeth, which were the size of a four-foot rock, which was the size of the most towering mountain. Guarding his ground, Willy never trembled at its terror. This ogre failed to even phase him. If anything, Willy swooned. For just as the cactus had been disguised as the tree, this ogre had disguised itself as a beautiful woman, blatantly trying to bombard him with trickery. Willy smirked and snickered to himself at the ogre’s schlocky attempt.
Yet fortunate for the feebleminded ogre, Willy decided not to slay it. He always kept his mind wide open, giving all creatures a fair chance. “Good afternoon, ogre. How goes you on this…” Willy forgot the rest of his sentence.
The ogre stiffened, seeming both offended and confused. “I’m already having a bad day. I’m in no need for insults.”
“Insults?”
“Don’t be stupid.”
“But I never knew my words as capable of offending. What hurtful slanders did I say?”
“Think about it.”
“I am.”
“Forget it.”
“But I cannot!” Willy then scratched his chin and thought. He knew this would not give him an answer, but was simply a useless habit. “I stretch with this guess, but when I called you an ogre… did that cause the offence? I did not consider that able to hurt, but it seems the only part of my speech which might have offended.”
“I said forget it,” she snapped.
Very strange. For the first time in his life, Willy met an ogre who was humble about its ogre heritage – not boasting on its sickening stench and slimy tongues as ogres normally do. In fact, this ogre had openly spilt its emotions – something which would make most ogres steam red. To the uneducated public, this ogre would have come across completely human. But Willy knew better. He always anticipated the abnormal, and he knew that a better explanation always existed. Even now many possibilities paraded Willy’s mind: maybe these sorts of decent ogres had always existed and he had simply never met one; perhaps it was the most normal obnoxious ogre in every way and merely a marvelous actor; or maybe - just maybe - even though the possibilities were improbable - even though its chances were slimmer than the possibilities, and the likelihood slimmer than both the chances and the possibilities - perhaps this was a pure-hearted ogre.
Willy was intrigued.
“I am greatly sorry. I will no longer refer to you as ‘ogre’ if that is the honest desire of your heart. I will call you ‘ma’am,’ for that is indeed your form, and a ravishingly beautiful one, at that. Whatever ogre lies within may be dismissed since the radiance of your beauty blinds it.”
“Oh, I get it. ‘Ogre within. Radiance of beauty.’ You’re just being poetic.” She swept out her tension in one long and soft breath. “Sorry for actin' all snappy. I actually needed a compliment like that.” Willy did not see how her jabbering had much to do with his apology, yet he ignored his puzzlement, hoping to extend the peace just formed.
“What brought you to these lands? –other than your feet, of course.”
“Just going where the wind blows, I guess.”
So the wind had brought her here, too. Was this a coincidence? No, it couldn’t be. The chances were too slim to be a coincidence. And so Willy knew he had finally found his destiny. The wind had loyally lead him. And finally face to face, he studied this strange womanly ogre – this unlikely destiny.
“This is joyous news, ma’am.”
“What is? That I’m wandering?”
“It is joyous news that the wind has blown you in this direction. I, too, have been brought here by the wind. We have been directed into each other’s path. You must somehow be my destiny, and I yours.”
She chuckled. “You know what? On second thought, you’re kinda cute.”
Once again, she spoke of odd matters. It was as if she always grabbed her gab from a hat. Ogres were the dumbest race.
Why had he been brought to an ogre?
“Perhaps we were supposed to find each other,” the stupid, ugly, beautiful ogre continued. “Wanna stick together and find out? Also, can I ask you what your name is?”
“You may.”
Even though Willy told her she could, she did not. Instead, she oddly stood there, looking as if she expected something, and Willy wheezed, so annoyed at her stupidity he could have exploded right there. He knew it would be a task to adapt to her manner.
And after more silence and staring it became apparent she meant to keep her mouth shut, so Willy finally spoke. “I am called Willy. That, however, is only my real name. But please feel the freedom to label me under whichever name you please. I will call you Plink.” Willy thought of what a Plink was, and although he could not remember if he had ever heard the word, he knew it meant something extraordinary since it was the name of such an interesting figure.
“Do you wanna know my real name?”
“I do not.”
“Why?”
“To me you are already Plink.”
At that Plink laughed yet again, this time more merrily than ever. It seemed possible now to Willy that ogre laughter could indicate something much different than human laughter. Remembering the times Plink laughed, Willy decided ogre laughter probably expressed agreement. For this reason alone, Willy laughed along.
“So in which direction do you assume the wind shall blow next, Plink?”
“I don’t know. Wanna find out?”
“I do.” Gripping a fistful of magic dust out of the bag, Willy flung it to the air. It blew nowhere but forcefully into Plink’s face. Willy’s jaw dropped as he saw that she really must be his destiny. And she was now completely unraveling in laugher, so she must have agreed.
“Well it appears to be a-fish that the wind is blowing us together,” said Willy.
“You mean a-fish-hole?”
“No, not unless you shot the fish.”
As Plink returned to her rips of rioting laughter, Willy began to bloom inside. Never had one person agreed with him so much. Ogre or not, he might learn enjoy her company.
“So where do you want to go, Willy? I’m ready to go anywhere. I don’t belong anywhere else, so I’ll just follow along wherever you want to go.”
Willy did not have to think at all before he brightly grinned and said, “We will travel north.”
Monday, April 13, 2015
Book Review: The Big Smoke
If you just take
a prose and break
it up into pieces I
don't think that you
can really call that poetry.
I am getting sick of the abuse of free verse I have observed explosively trending in contemporary poetry. Frankly, I have read many wonderful uses of free verse, and these uses were great partly because they were actually poetry. Poetry has more to it than looking like poetry. If you take a normal sentence and break it up to appear a free-verse poem, that is in no way worthy of the name "poetry," but rather "poorly formatted prose."
The Big Smoke by Adrian Matejka is yet another addition to the Jack Johnson collection, which by now could be placed in the mythology section of a bookstore. It is a collection of Johnson-inspired poems that hardly vary in style, tone, or themes. Almost every poem states something about black rights, perseverance, or Johnson's hardships with women, and yet Matejka somehow, in 100 full pages of poems, managed to never deepen the dimensions of these themes.
Now, to the deeper and more controversial issues, for those are truly the reasons I excite about literary criticism. What is the purpose of a poem? It has become commonly agreed that poems share an experience. However, I hardly believe it stops there, and this is where I often ram heads with other theorists. An experience is not worth sharing in a poem unless it unveils an idea worthwhile. Unless a poem adds something important to my life or has the potential to add something important to the life of another, I find it pointless and a waste of good time.
A few poems in this collection handed some interesting ideas for me to sort out, primarily Cannibalism and Battle Royal - the book's first two poems. I spent two hours breaking down the possible implications of these poems and their intricate symbols and challenging ideas. Quickly I swept the book back up, thrilled to rip another bite of its meat. But I found myself highly disappointed starting at poem three and ending at the last. All of the symbols and layers had been dumped out, and Matejka resorted to rapid-firing events, all of them failing with a capital F as stand-alone poems. None carry any meaning other than their face-value, and nary actually gave the world insightful ideas when removed from the collection.
"Belle & I returned after a fine supper
of roasted quail in the Crystal Dining
Room. Hattie was waiting in the mauve
hallway right outside our rooms.
She was angry & rigid like one
of those Buckingham guards when
it's raining. I don't know why she came
to San Francisco, but she wore the black
lace dress I bought for her in London."
¿.....profound stuff.....?
And let's not forget the protagonist of our story, Jack Johnson. Every poem is dedicated to him, and we learn many facts about his life. Matejka clearly did his research on Johnson's life, but he completely forgot to write him as an interesting character. Instead, he leaves the protagonist flat. Apparently when you devote an entire book to one single person, fleshing out his depth is hardly necessary.
The Big Smoke is doubtlessly a bunch of broken up prose made to appear like free verse, as well as random events; yet it is hardly poetry.
1 out of 5 stars
a prose and break
it up into pieces I
don't think that you
can really call that poetry.
I am getting sick of the abuse of free verse I have observed explosively trending in contemporary poetry. Frankly, I have read many wonderful uses of free verse, and these uses were great partly because they were actually poetry. Poetry has more to it than looking like poetry. If you take a normal sentence and break it up to appear a free-verse poem, that is in no way worthy of the name "poetry," but rather "poorly formatted prose."
The Big Smoke by Adrian Matejka is yet another addition to the Jack Johnson collection, which by now could be placed in the mythology section of a bookstore. It is a collection of Johnson-inspired poems that hardly vary in style, tone, or themes. Almost every poem states something about black rights, perseverance, or Johnson's hardships with women, and yet Matejka somehow, in 100 full pages of poems, managed to never deepen the dimensions of these themes.
Now, to the deeper and more controversial issues, for those are truly the reasons I excite about literary criticism. What is the purpose of a poem? It has become commonly agreed that poems share an experience. However, I hardly believe it stops there, and this is where I often ram heads with other theorists. An experience is not worth sharing in a poem unless it unveils an idea worthwhile. Unless a poem adds something important to my life or has the potential to add something important to the life of another, I find it pointless and a waste of good time.
A few poems in this collection handed some interesting ideas for me to sort out, primarily Cannibalism and Battle Royal - the book's first two poems. I spent two hours breaking down the possible implications of these poems and their intricate symbols and challenging ideas. Quickly I swept the book back up, thrilled to rip another bite of its meat. But I found myself highly disappointed starting at poem three and ending at the last. All of the symbols and layers had been dumped out, and Matejka resorted to rapid-firing events, all of them failing with a capital F as stand-alone poems. None carry any meaning other than their face-value, and nary actually gave the world insightful ideas when removed from the collection.
"Belle & I returned after a fine supper
of roasted quail in the Crystal Dining
Room. Hattie was waiting in the mauve
hallway right outside our rooms.
She was angry & rigid like one
of those Buckingham guards when
it's raining. I don't know why she came
to San Francisco, but she wore the black
lace dress I bought for her in London."
¿.....profound stuff.....?
And let's not forget the protagonist of our story, Jack Johnson. Every poem is dedicated to him, and we learn many facts about his life. Matejka clearly did his research on Johnson's life, but he completely forgot to write him as an interesting character. Instead, he leaves the protagonist flat. Apparently when you devote an entire book to one single person, fleshing out his depth is hardly necessary.
The Big Smoke is doubtlessly a bunch of broken up prose made to appear like free verse, as well as random events; yet it is hardly poetry.
1 out of 5 stars
Thursday, April 2, 2015
Poetry: Sudden Thunders
A poem I wrote this afternoon:
Storm, why did you have to strike?
'Twas the wrongest place and a wronger time.
Summer's ripening outside,
So why'd you strike your sudden knife?
A scene for film, your coming now,
Our twisting hearts with writhing clouds,
Dark and gray and turning spirals,
Insanity walks with your trials.
She's pacing, crying, my queen of smiles,
She's shaking, anguished, gagging bile.
Death, not one has tongued your taste,
Without others facing worst of pains.
Blue sky, if I could touch your cool,
Sooth my soul, sing her anew,
Stop your booming, quaking strikes,
Let my window bring us light.
Book Preview
Here is a preview from my latest story, which still goes without a name:
Why is the door so hard to open? Turn already, you stupid knob! Turn, or else I’ll rip you out! Oh great: my brand new house is broken. My first real house in seven years, the first real house I’ve ever had, and somebody was mean and broke the knob. Now I can’t go in.
“Hun, it’s not going to turn.” She steps out of the car and walks down the sidewalk.
“Who broke it?”
“Nobody broke it.”
Her hand chills me like ice as she brushes me aside. Sifting through her collection, she finds the right key.
Oh… I see. The door was locked.
Inside, I survey the room, and what a great place! My mom must devote her time to tidying each inch. She sorts out every speck, then polishes the specks themselves.
“Not much of a place, but I think you will enjoy your time here.”
“Living here?”
“Yes, living here. Oh, and here are your siblings.”
My gosh, I've never beheld a pair so odd. Are they even children? By their looks, they must be children. Their heights don't peak much higher than around four feet, and their faces appear to me so far from finished. And now they strut towards me with sophistication. They don't break out with excitement or skipping or joy; I bet they've never even dirtied those clothes. But, under their form, I really do hope that they're at least jumping to meet me inside their hearts.
Now, I do admit, I don't fancy their clothes much; at least not for me. But I also admit that they model them very nicely - the girl in a blue and frilly, flowing dress, the boy in a button-down shirt, tucked in his slacks. Did they dress in these fancy clothes just for me?
“Arthur, Beatrice,” my new mom gestors. “This is Gregory.”
“Hi!” I cheer. Do I look silly right now? I feel my cheeks on my ears. “It’s great to meet you!”
They nod, and I don’t quite know what that suggests, but I guess that means it’s great to meet me too. They strut off the way they came, like a movie set on rewind.
“We are glad to have you here, Gregory.”
“You know, you could just call me Greg and not Gregory, if you want. I like it that way.”
She twists her nose a bit. “Okay. If you prefer that.”
My attention teases me with its tongue when I ask it to quit bouncing all over the room. Honestly, how can it quit? How can it quit when somebody has crammed a ship into a bottle and placed it onto a table? How can it quit when an ancient vinyl player in the far corner hums groovy rhythm and tunes? How can it quit when somebody has decorated the walls with every painting I can imagine of war generals in blue jackets and kepi hats, and girls sipping Coca-Cola? How can it quit with that giant globe of earth that I just want to push with my fingers and watch it spin? The place is a treasure-trove!
“You have a lot of great stuff here. Where’d you even get all of it?”
“Well, the majority of these things are left over from when your dad – who you’ll meet later, of course – and I were kids. And a lot of the other things are from our parents: your grandparents. Shows a bit of history, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, it’s all so old!”
She chuckles to herself. “You know, most things the inventors ‘invent’ these days aren’t as innovative as they think. They’re really just improvements and combinations of all the old junk that already exists. You can never kill the old times; a bit of them always exists in everything, because everything comes from them.”
Wow, this is boring. I tap my toes a bit, and I play and dance somewhere else in my head. How can talking progress so slowly? But I gift her with a smile and pretend she rivets me; I feel I must because she treated me so nicely: She let me live in her house as her son.
But I intend to never mention the decorations again
Her lips curve to a smile. “Do you want me to show you where I set up your bed? I’ve been putting your room together all week.”
“Yeah! Let’s go!”
“I hope you like it.”
I trail behind her as she walks. She leads me far away from our boring conversation. She leads me to my room in the basement.
Later that night I stretch on the floor, centered in the room my mom made me. She decorated it so prettily. She gave me a bed to grow into, in the corner she placed an old dresser, she hid the floor with a rug, and painted the walls light brown. The bed hides under cozy sheets, the dresser is so old it might crumble at a poke, little x’s are stitched on the border of the rug, and the brown walls are painted just ordinary brown. She also put in a mirror, wrapped shelves around my walls, filled the shelves with models, and hooked some hooks on my doors. It’s a great room.
I push myself up onto my feet and shimmy out of my worn-out blue jeans. Why did I dirty them so much? I hope my new mom doesn’t mind. Maybe she wants me to dress like Arthur in his button-down tucked into his slacks. I pull my flannel off my arms and yank my undershirt over my head, both as filthy as my jeans.
Yawn! I’m tired. Maybe I’ll get some sleep. One day has felt like five.
Was I really playing this morning with twenty kids my age?
Am I in bed? How’d I get here?
What a pretty room.
A great house.
I’m going to close my eyes just for a mome…..........
Why is the door so hard to open? Turn already, you stupid knob! Turn, or else I’ll rip you out! Oh great: my brand new house is broken. My first real house in seven years, the first real house I’ve ever had, and somebody was mean and broke the knob. Now I can’t go in.
“Hun, it’s not going to turn.” She steps out of the car and walks down the sidewalk.
“Who broke it?”
“Nobody broke it.”
Her hand chills me like ice as she brushes me aside. Sifting through her collection, she finds the right key.
Oh… I see. The door was locked.
Inside, I survey the room, and what a great place! My mom must devote her time to tidying each inch. She sorts out every speck, then polishes the specks themselves.
“Not much of a place, but I think you will enjoy your time here.”
“Living here?”
“Yes, living here. Oh, and here are your siblings.”
My gosh, I've never beheld a pair so odd. Are they even children? By their looks, they must be children. Their heights don't peak much higher than around four feet, and their faces appear to me so far from finished. And now they strut towards me with sophistication. They don't break out with excitement or skipping or joy; I bet they've never even dirtied those clothes. But, under their form, I really do hope that they're at least jumping to meet me inside their hearts.
Now, I do admit, I don't fancy their clothes much; at least not for me. But I also admit that they model them very nicely - the girl in a blue and frilly, flowing dress, the boy in a button-down shirt, tucked in his slacks. Did they dress in these fancy clothes just for me?
“Arthur, Beatrice,” my new mom gestors. “This is Gregory.”
“Hi!” I cheer. Do I look silly right now? I feel my cheeks on my ears. “It’s great to meet you!”
They nod, and I don’t quite know what that suggests, but I guess that means it’s great to meet me too. They strut off the way they came, like a movie set on rewind.
“We are glad to have you here, Gregory.”
“You know, you could just call me Greg and not Gregory, if you want. I like it that way.”
She twists her nose a bit. “Okay. If you prefer that.”
My attention teases me with its tongue when I ask it to quit bouncing all over the room. Honestly, how can it quit? How can it quit when somebody has crammed a ship into a bottle and placed it onto a table? How can it quit when an ancient vinyl player in the far corner hums groovy rhythm and tunes? How can it quit when somebody has decorated the walls with every painting I can imagine of war generals in blue jackets and kepi hats, and girls sipping Coca-Cola? How can it quit with that giant globe of earth that I just want to push with my fingers and watch it spin? The place is a treasure-trove!
“You have a lot of great stuff here. Where’d you even get all of it?”
“Well, the majority of these things are left over from when your dad – who you’ll meet later, of course – and I were kids. And a lot of the other things are from our parents: your grandparents. Shows a bit of history, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, it’s all so old!”
She chuckles to herself. “You know, most things the inventors ‘invent’ these days aren’t as innovative as they think. They’re really just improvements and combinations of all the old junk that already exists. You can never kill the old times; a bit of them always exists in everything, because everything comes from them.”
Wow, this is boring. I tap my toes a bit, and I play and dance somewhere else in my head. How can talking progress so slowly? But I gift her with a smile and pretend she rivets me; I feel I must because she treated me so nicely: She let me live in her house as her son.
But I intend to never mention the decorations again
Her lips curve to a smile. “Do you want me to show you where I set up your bed? I’ve been putting your room together all week.”
“Yeah! Let’s go!”
“I hope you like it.”
I trail behind her as she walks. She leads me far away from our boring conversation. She leads me to my room in the basement.
Later that night I stretch on the floor, centered in the room my mom made me. She decorated it so prettily. She gave me a bed to grow into, in the corner she placed an old dresser, she hid the floor with a rug, and painted the walls light brown. The bed hides under cozy sheets, the dresser is so old it might crumble at a poke, little x’s are stitched on the border of the rug, and the brown walls are painted just ordinary brown. She also put in a mirror, wrapped shelves around my walls, filled the shelves with models, and hooked some hooks on my doors. It’s a great room.
I push myself up onto my feet and shimmy out of my worn-out blue jeans. Why did I dirty them so much? I hope my new mom doesn’t mind. Maybe she wants me to dress like Arthur in his button-down tucked into his slacks. I pull my flannel off my arms and yank my undershirt over my head, both as filthy as my jeans.
Yawn! I’m tired. Maybe I’ll get some sleep. One day has felt like five.
Was I really playing this morning with twenty kids my age?
Am I in bed? How’d I get here?
What a pretty room.
A great house.
I’m going to close my eyes just for a mome…..........
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