Life in progress

Tag Archives: writing


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Proof

It is done – my final assignment for the last of the courses I am taking this semester. A few extra grey hairs later and more than a few late nights of agonizing over words and sentences and paragraphs and I can finally breathe again. And blog. Speaking of blogging…

As of this moment (that is before I publish this post) I have had a grand total of three visitors to my blog in the eighteen hours that have passed since midnight. This shows me that in order to have anyone visit my blog I have to visit others and comment on them – two things I have had little time to do these past days.

Proof positive that if you want an active blog you need to be active in the blogging community.

…or you need to put hashtags in front of trending words in your title…


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Adventures on my Paper Route – Ice

Ah, the pleasures of living in southern Ontario.  Instead of the forecasted mountain of snow, we’re having an ice storm. Power is intermittent. If it wasn’t so pretty it would be intolerable.

Ice 4 Ice 3 Ice 2

It took a bit of bravery to deliver my papers today. Having to listen for cracking from above and dodging falling branches.

Ice 5

Timber!

Living in an old part of town is pretty, but it’s also pretty dangerous when the ancient behemoths come crashing down.

Ice 7

My backdoor neighbour’s tree

I didn’t expect to post two of my adventures in one week, but today certainly deserves honourable mention.

 


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Adventures on my Paper Route – Spring is … bent

Well, the good news is my laptop didn’t get stolen. Right, I should probably start at the beginning.

Upon stepping out my front door this morning with my papers I was pleasantly surprised. Not only has it warmed up a few degrees, the sun was coming out and … YAY! so are the flowers at the front of my house. I went back inside to get my sunglasses and my camera and, newspaper bag over my shoulder, set my glasses down absentmindedly to take a few shots of the new spring blossoms.

Spring

Lovely, yes?

So, both satisfied and happy with myself I stood up and reached into my pocket to find my sunglasses. Not there. Feeling a little sick I looked around my feet. Noth…. what’s that under my foot?  Oh look!

Ouch

Bent sunglasses!

So, cussing along my way, I finished off my paper route, but not without stopping by one of my customers – a dry cleaning business where the TV is always on – to find out that we’re to expect 15cm of snow Thursday and another 10cm on Friday.  That’s a total accumulation of 10″ for my friends who haven’t caught up to the rest of the planet. You know who you are 😉

And then, to top it all off, I arrived home, put the key in the keyhole and…. locked the door. In my giddy glee I forgot to lock the house up.

The good news is… yeah. I have something to blog with.


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Third Person About

Nothing against the writers and artists who do this but, what is it with people who write their ‘About’ page in the third person? I’m assuming they are the one actually contributing to their own blog so why do they either a) not write their own ‘About’ page, or b) write it as though someone else is narrating their personal story? If it is a writer’s blog surely they are able to write about themselves.

Maybe there’s a stage one gets to when they don’t feel the need to connect personally with those who read their work. Perhaps they are afraid if they do let anyone feel that connection that they will have more of a responsibility to respond to everyone who writes to them. Or, and I suppose this is true, it’s easier just to copy and paste a bio…

I don’t know, is it just me who is a little put off by this? Is there anyone out there that has a third person ‘About’ who can explain to me why they did it?


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Inspiration

Why is it that the harder you look for inspiration the less likely it is you’ll find it? I think that’s what separates the wanna be writers from the actual writers. ‘Wanna’ just doesn’t cut it.

Today I want to write. Okay yes, I was inspired to write this, but could I come up with an idea for a story? Not a chance.

Distractions don’t help. Which is why I get antsy when I know I have to entertain people – even my kids. Don’t get me wrong, I love my kids more than anything. But writing isn’t just a past-time for me, it’s a need. Particularly when I do get inspired by something. But today it’s the worst of both worlds.

I want to wanna…


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Published on VenusBlogs.com

I had an article I wrote published today on VenusBlogs.com.

Flying the Coop

I remember the day he was born – or rather the week he was born. He was my first. My water broke slowly over the period of that week and I slept so little that I was able to read a 1700 page novel in three days. When it was time to push (sans epidural – they didn’t offer them in the province of Quebec at the time) I did so for hours before they told me a physical defect in the base of my spine would make it impossible to deliver naturally.

You can find the entire article here.


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House of dreams

shadows

In my recurring dream there is a house. It can’t always be found. Sometimes it’s in the city, hidden like the one in Harry Potter, squeezed between two others, sometimes I can only find it from the back. Sometimes it’s a barn and sometimes it’s just a vacant old thing with beer bottles scattered everywhere. Sometimes it’s in the country, looking out over acres and acres of landscape through large picture windows on the upper floor. But always, it’s hard to find.

I’ve dreamed of it falling to ruin with years of neglect and transient beings and cats. I’ve dreamed of living in it and oh how grand it was, with huge sunlit rooms. Many times the rooms are hidden too. Or they will be one after another so that I have to go through one to get to the next. No privacy – never any privacy in this house. And it never quite belongs to me, but always I used to live there. And I want it back.

The house of my dreams is always sinister.

Last night I dreamed it burned. Not all the way to the ground, but there were holes in it and the damage to the upstairs was extensive. The people who owned it, with whom I was visiting, wanted to keep it but it was no longer safe. It made my throat hurt. It hurt my heart.

I want it back.


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Private Thoughts, Private World – Part 3

How much is too much?

It has occurred to me, partially due to a comment on Private Thoughts, Private World – Part 2 that perhaps there is such a thing as too much. While we attempt to convey our thoughts and our world to our readers, we, at the same time, need to keep at least a modicum of our ideas private, or do we? How much of ourselves do we wish to divulge? It’s fun every once in a while to have someone we are close to point at us and say, ‘HA! I knew you were going to say that!’. But if that were to happen more than occasionally it would get tired after a while. Particularly if strangers began to do it to us.

In our time of having the freedom to receive instantaneous feedback on the internet we are given equally the opportunity to hand ourselves over to whomever wishes to place us under their microscope. And as we all know, not everyone will treat us with the delicacy we deserve as humans. I have to wonder if the modern masters of fiction thought of this when they began. They are so good at their craft that they allow us to see into their souls, but at what cost?

tied hands


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Epilogue Rich Boy

Spotlights shine down like mother’s sun. Father’s love comes after in the form of drugs and liquor. Relive, rich man.

 

On stage, man raises his hand to the shrieking crowd, awed with humility at his fans’ adoration. Grasping the microphone, he thinks of father rolling in his grave.

He sips water from a bottle and shakes the rest over his head, a momentary reprieve from the lights’ insulating heat. Layers of clothing hide scars he openly speaks of yet never reveals. He laments mother’s death with his lyrics and thousands cry for his loss.

Father’s legacy follows him doggedly. Later, alone, man will consume that for which he distances himself from his own offspring. Let the child have his mother.

The boy within bows, singing of the love engraved in his heart.
To go to the beginning of this series click here

Disclaimer: This series is an unauthorized, semi-fictional story, based in part on the author’s imagination.


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A Letter to my Main Character

Dear Stephen,

You were a magician before I ever met you. Nevertheless, I handed you your tricks; your wand, your cards and your bunnies to be pulled from hats.  It was serendipity that you met the love of your life. I didn’t expect you to show up any more than she did. But oh, how I discovered you. We discovered you.

I’ve seen you through many troubles, frights and flights, I watched you dance and fall in love, I saw your joy and your pain. You surprised me and you caused me grief. Most of all I saw you grow as a man. You blossomed before my very fingertips.

Now you have outgrown me. You’re ready to move on. Though perhaps we’ll meet again in another tale, I have to let you go. I am happy to say it was a natural break. You have a life to live that doesn’t need me to tell it.

For now.

Giving away your smile
Your precious crooked grin
Fills me with pride and sorrow
In almost equal measures

Selfish is the heart who won’t let go
Allowing your wings to spread
You don’t need me
Though I created you from scratch

Grown and changed
You look upon me now with love
For what I have given
You have given me much more in return

Sakurai as Stephen Dagmar