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I owe you an apology
I’m sorry to my followers, all 8 of you, or at least that’s how many hits I had today.
This week has just been horrible for my writing. Work decided to take over my life this week. I know that’s no excuse, but wanted to post this, my first chapter, or part of it anyway. I’m already behind, but I’m hoping I can put enough time this weekend to catch up.
Thanks for your patience and support. Specially to my daily visitor. You know who you are. ILY.
Chapter 1
Oh my god, she plucked all of her eyebrows off. Michael thought, as he sat down with his date with Amanda. After a few weeks of talking through email and passing the dreaded first phone conversation he finally won a real date. I’m not so sure I really “won” anything. She actually looks like an attractive girl. But painted eyebrows he would never get over that.
How come I didn’t notice that before? He wondered as his mind flashed back to the pictures from her online profile. He has been in his shared of bad dates, but he thought he was getting better. Obviously there were some parts he needed to freshen up. All he could think was of the picture taken at her work, it showed her face and body type, but it was from a few feet away and she did a nice job of painting her eyebrows in that one. But now up close the natural look of them was long gone, and if he paid enough close attention he could actually see the red bumps left from all the plucking. He felt some shivers down his spine. He suppress his goosebumps so that she didn’t notice or at least didn’t react it to them.
Why do women do this to themselves??!!!! Couldn’t help but wondered. As his mind started too wondered off t run adrift for a few moments. Thinking of his upcoming 29th birthday and what his friends might do to surprise him. Spending the date with Felicia wasn’t a possibility anymore, at least something good came out of their break up. With his family back in the West Coast, he had to depend on his girlfriend (now ex) for family. Problem was that he never got along with them. He never really thought too much of it, he didn’t plan on spending time with them and they seem pretty happy with keeping him at arm’s length too. Except on birthdays, they would gather and make him feel part of the family, in a way that never felt quite so inviting.
Now with his new found freedom Michael thought about the possibility of having a simple nice birthday party with friends there. Celebrate with a few bottles of wine and beer, going over to a friends house, he wouldn’t offer his, since he knew he would have to do all the cleaning later on and he wasn’t up to that task, and dance the night away with all the ladies of his life. Specially if she showed up. Which the way his life was going, it definitely meant she would be there. Damn it Michael, pay attention here. Maybe something can be save here. She does have a nice body after all.
He tried his best throughout dinner to laugh at the right moments and ask all the right questions. Conversation was constant, but not natural, at some point he felt like an FBI agent asking questions and hoping for a crack on the case. He knew this date was going to end with a hug and one “I’ll call you soon” before the entrée was delivered to the table. At this point his only question was who was going to be the one to say it. She seems amicable enough that she might say it, but he thought of himself as a gentleman so he would also try to say it. Well, he still had most of the meal to figure it out. The reviews of the restaurant where great, so at least something good can still come out of this. Medium well, anyway.
Day before the storm.
Here we are in the eve of the start of National Novel Writing Month.
I’m excited about it. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the next few weeks. But just wanted to let you know a few things. The story that I’m trying to write this month, has nothing (as far as I know) with any of the other premises I have currently written. Is a story about love.
Someone told me once to write about what you know. And if you knew me, you would say….so you know about love? And after both of us stopped laughing, I would tell you, that no. I don’t know much about love. But this story is not about what I know, but the story that feels the biggest need to come out.
The basic premise is we are going to see two sides of a love story. Told from the point of view of the two main characters. I think I know what’s going to happen. But then again, I don’t know anymore. It has all become conjecture at this point.
30 days, 30 posts. While I love the idea of NaNoWriMo, not sure I love the actual MONTH they chose. Don’t they realize that Thanksgiving is this month? My own birthday? And I have to write on weekends too? Plus maintain my relationship, my friendships, my outside life? And a full time work?
I was looking around my house, and realized that my computer is attached to my T.V. and I really don’t have a desk to work and to think. I wrote a post last night, and while I was able to make it, it didn’t cover the whole ideas I wanted to reach. Heck, it was the smallest post to-date. I’ll have to do some changes very quickly.
The challenges I’m facing, are not any worse than what most of my fellow NaNoWriMo writers will be facing. So, is not like I’m at disadvantage, and this is not a competition (that I know of). And I’m not hiding from mortal enemies. But it will be interesting.
On the week before I started this blog, I was talking to a friend, and asking me what am I going to write about? And it took me a few days to figure out what exactly I wanted to write, because my first inclination was to NOT write my book in the blog. There’s just so many plot holes that would need fixing, so many re-writes it would need to pass by, and it would show all the naivete I think about what it takes about writing a book.
There’s research behind every book, there’s timelines, there’s character development, minor characters, settings. I don’t know any of this shit! I’ve never taken a literature class. I’m just a fool with a keyboard.
That’s what I wanted my blog to be about, trying to come up with this “world” where my characters would be living. Setting the boundaries if you allow me to say, of what this characters can/can’t do. I know they live in this world, 21st century. So there wouldn’t be random acts of sword play. Or magicians. Is not a supernatural story. So, the first incarnation of this blog, before I ever wrote down, would had been to:
Day 1 of Blogging: Talk about the main character, his past, his goals, his life, catching him up to date, when the book starts. Giving him a background that I would be able to draw from.
Day 2: Talk about 2nd main character, same as first day but of second person.
Day 3: Talk about the town they live, NYC, Boston, Rome?
Day 4: Minor characters
Day 5: etc., etc.
But now that I’m so close to embark on my odyssey. I have now change my mind, and write, write everything that comes down the pipeline. Tell you their story the way I see it, and see if I can tell it they way they want me to. And if I can do justice to their lives. It will be ugly, and it will be inconsistent. Don’t really want to put you off of your reading, but I want to set the expectations to a level of understanding.
With that all being said, I’ll do my best, and I’ll give it as big shot as I want, and I know that at the end of November, I will be closer to the end, than as we stand here today, and for that I’m grateful of this opportunity.
BRING IT ON!!!!!!
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Shit, I just realized that for me to keep up with the goal of 50,000sh words, my posts will need to be at least DOUBLE the length of this one. Still….
BRING IT ON!!!!!!
I name thee…..
I have always wondered how do writers name their characters. But I think that it has to do with another question. Are writers really creating the story? or telling the story?
And I think that, that subtle difference is what is so amazing about people that write for a living. When you are creating a story, it just feels so hard (at least to me) because I feel like it’s so difficult, like the charachters are just looking at you and judging you. I’m being judge by my own characters, and they are looking back at me with disappointment.
That’s the part then, that makes me believe that is about telling the story, and not force it out of yourself, if is a true story. When I was telling the story in my previous post about Premise Vs Story. The names Matt and Jon, I didn’t create them, this characters, this son with an ailing father, and this childhood friend told me their names. It was a revelation for me, because I have always fought, what to name him, always wondered. But on Wednesday, when I was just letting the words come to me, his name also came.
This has now let me to believe, that the whole story is there, in my head, buried among all the crap my brain has gathered. Now the time has come to see if I can tell you a story, and if you want to listen to it.
Influences…part 1 of ?
In my first post I talked about how I never really liked reading til after college. In fact in middle school I wouldn’t read the assigned books, I would just hear what my classmates would say, and then use that as the base for the story. In high school I would get out of reading books, don’t ask me how, I don’t remember. I guess my school wasn’t big in reading. Parallel to my school life, this is when I actually started reading, but never school books.
I was fairly smart, so I would be able to do well in the rest of the class and other classes, that I would just remember the discussions and answers, and teachers didn’t ask me for deeper analysis, since I gave them the answer they gave the day before. Quickly realized that MY teachers (can’t speak for all teachers) weren’t really interested in listening to my ideas, if they didn’t match what they already lined up for their ideas. I think it was this thinking the reason why I didn’t like reading, what was the point? of it? if you never got to talk about your ideas, but tell the ones they want to hear? I remember reading a few books actually, 3 books actually, and excerpts of a 4th one. 2 of them I remember, and the 4th one I want to read the whole book, not only the excerpts. So I guess I did read some, but it was like pulling hair out of my nose. Specially because I would read this other books, that seemed that much more interesting.
Of the three books I read for school, the one that made an impression on me was by far: “Flowers for Algernon” I loved the story and it was the first time I cry while watching/reading something. I didn’t realize of the power that a story can bring you to tears. It was also the first novel I read in English. Like I said, English is not my native tongue, though the one I have assimilated best by now. Even my thoughts are in English now.
Even with the impact of this novel, I wouldn’t really grab books for a few more years. Don’t even ask me how I survive college without reading. I guess I was a writer before I even knew it, because all the bullshit I wrote and try to pass as my understandings of this novels was amazing. Would like to get my hands in some of those tests now to see what the hell did I say that it was good enough to pass the class. In all fairness my major was in Business, so not a lot of reading (book reading that is) was expected beyond my freshman year.
So what changed? When did I started liking reading? That parallel life of hating school books but looking for some outside of school? Of course I’m a guy, and as a young guy, there was nothing better than the destruction of the world. So I would rent movies about death and killing. But one of them I REALLY liked. It was a mini-series “The Stand” written by Stephen King, and produce for ABC. I didn’t see it on T.V. Didn’t even know what “ABC” was at the time. But I rented it latter on when it was on video and with subtitles.
Liked it so much, a story about a virus spreading quickly and deathly, and the survivors would be divided into two camps? Good vs. Evil? God, Devil? that’s just what the doctor order for me!!!! I knew about Stephen King, but didn’t know a lot about his writing. Like I said reading wasn’t a big priority at this point in my life.
But my brother purchase a translated copy of “The Stand”. The first book I read without really putting it down. And after that I was just hooked. I tried finding another of his book, translated, because at this point my English wasn’t bad, but far from perfect, and reading a full novel in English it just seemed daunting.
“The Stand” was followed by “The Dead Zone” and I knew I have found something I really liked. Now this is the mid-90’s, so this books are at least 10 years old. But then luck is on my side, and Stephen King (my mind is rusty about the details, so take it with a grain of salt) is challenged about pushing himself to write a story in six installments from scratch to finish and publish as it comes out, with only like a 2 month turnaround. He starts writing and publishing “The Green Mile” and is being translated almost simultaneously!!!
So I’m able to read his current stuff now, in time, as he’s producing it. So I buy the first two installments, but when the third one comes out, is only in English, my version is sold out! I buy it in English, and read it, I surprise myself how much I’m able to pick up in English, when the fourth one comes out, I buy the translated version because this time it wasn’t sold out. But that’s when I first realize, that, while the story doesn’t change with the translation, there’s something missing anyway. Not fault of the translator, I think is just some sould is missing, that is there in English. So I finished the 5th and 6th part in English. Even since then I try to read the book in it’s original language. Kind of hard when I don’t know any Japanese and I like Haruki Murakami. Murakami almost deserves his own post at some point.
Back to King though, while his theme and not all his novels are hit with me. I fell in love with his afterwords, in them he would explain some of the writing process he went through each book. Because I started reading so late in my life, I don’t read in order of his writing, I might read one of his new stuff, read other authors and then come back to an older book. So one of the last book I read from him when it came out was “Under the Dome” the book overall is just OK, not his greatest writing, but in the afterword he mentions how a version of this book idea has been with him for almost 30 years.
Some time later I’m reading “Cujo” and in it he’s talking about conversations with his editor, and how he’s going to be characterized as a “Horror” writer and if he’s OK with that title of horror writer. He said he really didn’t mind, and being in the company of Poe, is an honor in itself. But the part that caught my attention is, that as he’s writing about “Cujo” he has this idea that almost 30 years later DID become “Under the Dome”. Is like you traveled in time. He also talks about a horrible book he wrote with a character named Blaze, he would also release that book under his pseudonym Richard Bachman “Blaze“.
Get to the point fucker, I’m getting bored here. – Ok, ok, well, obviously sometimes stories need time to fester and mature, and I guess that’s what I’m hoping I’ve been doing during this time that I have been thinking about writing but never really done it. But I’m trying to change that, and this is why you are reading this. Is never to late to start writing. Like I said, I’m not expecting to write “The Divine Comedy”. For one I’m not an Italian poet, nor have I experienced the many levels of hell. But I can write about my stupid observations in current life, and hopefully put my spin on things.
I thought I would write more, I can actually, but I’ll stop here for the moment, give you a moment til tomorrow when I write who knows what. I think that if there’s something that this week is showing me, is that I can write, is not polish by any means and it still needs structure help, but I have the vocabulary and the mindset to keep writing. And if you keep reading, well that’s just my cherry being popped. 🙂
Thanks.
-RM
Premises vs Story
Everyone has an idea, of what would be a good book. But they don’t follow up through with them. I’m one of those people. And even my premises seem lame. If that’s something to be proud of. But let’s see how much we can extract from as little information as we have. And see where does that takes us.
An old friend stops by his former best friend once he’s back in town….unannounced. (This is my premise)
That’s the original line I had at one time. But then you need to start asking questions to know who this people are. And I’ll tell you how far I took this idea (not far).
They are young, early 20’s. 21, or 22. Senior year of college, or recently graduated. This is the dialogue scene I have had in my mind since I came up with this idea, I’ll try to write (finally asshole, I’ve been reading now for 2 WHOLE days!) this scene and see what else (you know, besides, plot, character development, turning point, resolution, etc.) is needed to make this specific scene work.
This is my resemblance of a story, read at your own peril:
Jon has had a long day, taking care of his dad, has been specially difficult this last few months. Pops is not the man he once knew anymore. Trying to get this haunting thoughts of his mind, he surfs through the channels looking for a distraction, til he turns off the T.V. Whatever it is he’s looking for, is not playing right now. Flips the remote into the couch, before remembering to pick it up and put it back on the table. Easy access for his dad to find. Funny how is this little changes, the ones no one would notice that proves to himself, that he’s maturing. In a different era he would be already old, and with a family, hell, even in some cultures he’s already behind the eight ball. This thoughts follow him through the kitchen. He doesn’t have any answers, just more questions. Walking around his house helps push thoughts away, however the moment he stops, they catch up to him, This monkey is fast. He Thinks.
He tries walking past his parents bedroom, but thinks better of it, he checks on his Pops. Door is ajar, and he sneaks his head through the gap, he will always feel guilty walking into his parents bedroom, age be damned. Surveys the bed, nightstand, a clock that marks 4:42pm, the burrow til he finds him. Watching out the window.
“Hey Pops, how are you?” No response. His body follows the head into the bedroom, stepping a little harder, trying to call the attention of his father. No response. Clears throat. No response. Finally he calls again: “POPS!” a little harder than he intended, for a moment he thought it wouldn’t be enough. Dad turns around, he’s been watching out the window, lost in his own thoughts, is it?
“Hey Jon.” Words come out slowly, not quite a question, not quite a statement. Jon can’t help but think at least someone is in the house today. He mentally kicks himself, so much for maturity. “Pops, how are you?” he repeats.
“I’m good Jon, just watching for birds I thought I saw a cardinal today.”
“That’s nice. Just wanted to let you know I’m in the house, been here a while actually. I’ll be downstairs if you need me.”
“I’m fine son.” This time a little more alive, he even adds an old smile that breaks Jon’s heart. Haven’t seen one in a while. It’s a good day afterall.
********
Downstairs is just a never finished basement. An ongoing built, that even in better days, it wasn’t going to be finish. His bedroom really, without a formal bed, he has spent so much time down here, even the couch has the indentations to prove it. Black cushions on metal, with very little padding, a killer for your back, yet, is the most comfortable place there is.
He turns on the mp3 cradle, speakers roar to life, deafening loud, 311 is playing, it’s been a while since he’s been down here. He lowers the volume, the music goes through him, an oldie song but still very much so a goodie. Jon’s thoughts are drowned by the music, a very welcomed relief. The song jumps randomly to the next track. Something newer, Mumford? No, no, no, that’s Deertick. Time past as the tunes flow. One after the other, greatest hits of his life or even before his life. His musical taste exceeded his age, and like his father said: “A classic knows no boundary”.
By the time Journey comes he’s singing loud, the speakers are back to their original setting, this time without a bother in his ears. Some dance moves are encouraged, and the body replies back with movement. He’s lost in this moment, his problems cease to exist, by the time he’s singing about streetlights all inhibitions are lost.
“Nice moves Beyonce.” A voice breaks through the ending of the song.
Jon can’t quite place the origin of the voice, he let out a yell, and instinctively grab the closest thing he could use as a weapon. A pillow. Fuck! He searches frantically for the voice, and he notices a shape by the stairs. It takes him a moment to place the face with a name. He couldn’t believe his eyes.
“Matt?”
“Ah-hu” the voice replies back.
“Oh you, son of a bitch. You scare me!”
“Not as much as you scare me with those moves.”
“How long you’ve been there?”
“Enough to not sleep tonight after that display of UNcoordinated twitching.”
Jon flips the finger to his old friend.
“When you got back?”
“Just tonight, I came here to see you. Heard the music coming from down here, so I knew you were down here. I wanted to say hello to your dad, but couldn’t find him.”
“Well, is good seeing your ugly face ar…wait, Pops wasn’t upstairs?”
“No, why?”
“Fuck. Help me find him. He’s not doing well lately.” Moving quicker to the stairs, padding his friend in the back, as a hello as he climbs.
“What’s the matter with him?”
By then Jon is at the top of the stairs. “Let’s find him first, I’ll tell you.”
Matt looks confused, but follows his friend.
End of Chapter.
So, this is as far as I have thought about this story. This time actually, putting it down on paper help give it a little more shape, is not a finish product by any means, and in fact, might never be. But I guess that’s what makes it interesting for me. I have always wondered why Matt (just gave the name today) has come back. He hasn’t been in town in at least 4 years. I don’t know why he left either.
Another thing I have come to notice about my stories, at least the one from yesterday and today, is that, there’s no Mom figure in either one. Guess Freud might have a field day with that one, but is not done on purpose, that much I can assure you.
So, I guess this is how you build a story, you ask questions, and you try to find the answers. What’s wrong with Jon’s dad? Depression? Alcoholism? Does it matter to the overall of the story?
As far as Matt is concerned, like I said, I don’t know why he come back, but I know he didn’t go to college, or if he did, he didn’t finish. I know he smokes weed, so did Jon, but he also has experimented with other drugs. So I think that’s part of the reason for his comeback. Where is the rest of their respective families? Why come to Jon?
Another day of blogging, and all I give you are more questions. If you want the answers, well, good luck, because I don’t know them. That’s why this post is about premises. Is just an idea put in paper (or blog) form. The story is what follows and a good storyteller will be able to follow through those doors. Can I cross that door frame? We’ll know soon.
Thanks for reading. Comments are encouraged.
Don't Follow My Lead 