September 2006 | Archive

Pardon me

Posted on Sep 30, 2006 by jason.

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Perdóneme, por favor.

The lack of activity today is because I got tied up rather early with significant inspiration for the short story I’m working on. I hope to offer the first part of it either later this evening or tomorrow. Then again, it could be next year if I don’t get back to it and find some comfort in what I’ve put together thus far.

One thing I will offer here now is this: You, my faithful readers in blog-heaven, will be offered the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get in on the ground floor of what I intend to be the foundation for much of my fiction to come. The setting, a made-up town, will ultimately house a great deal of what I will write in the future, and that includes the vast majority of what I hope to publish.

“Write what you know . . .”

Those are the words so often thrown at aspiring authors. It’s for a reason. In fact, it’s for a very important reason. Lack of understanding is readily evident to the most casual reader, and certainly it’s blatantly obvious to those who regularly indulge in written works.

For that reason alone, I am utilizing this story to help me create a world wherein I have absolute authority to generate wondrous and horrible events that will not assault your suspension of disbelief. Details and environment you see here will be utilized for a great deal of my imagination as I move forward. That is the selfish part of this endeavor. It allows me to create—sans disassociation—my own genuine realism to be carried forward and expanded, a place much like Stephen King’s Castle Rock, Maine, capable of supporting whatever imaginative explosion my mind can generate.

So, I will refrain from additional ramblings and return to the text now taking shape both in my mind and in digital form. In the meantime, enjoy yourselves.

By the way, I’ve decided on a title for this little online excursion.

You’ll soon be engulfed, I hope, by “Darkness Comes to Kingswell” . . .

Oh, and yes, my new little Texas town, Kingswell, is a clear nod to my homeboy Stephen King.

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Random Thought

Posted on Sep 30, 2006 by jason.

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God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

— Voltaire

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Those warm wrinkled hands

Posted on Sep 29, 2006 by jason.

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Snow fell heavily around the house that day. It blanketed the world in loud quiet that my nine-year-old mind could barely grasp. Silence like that is hard to come by and was a new experience for me.

I could see Grandpa standing at the window watching me as I played in the snowdrifts that grew like wildflowers all over the landscape. I could barely see his wrinkled hands clutching the cold windowsill. Even if I couldn’t see them at all, I knew they were there. I loved his hands. They were always warm, gentle yet firmly reassuring, always ready to catch me when my latest endeavor to climb that enormous tree in the back yard ended like all the attempts before it—with me falling, although sometimes it was less of a fall and more of a skidding down the rough bark.

I stopped my play for just a moment when I saw him standing there. I waved and he waved back. Even through the heavy curtain of white air that separated us, I could see his loving gaze and the smile he offered in return for my own.

For just a brief moment, that picture of him mesmerized me. The fireplace behind him offered a reassuring glow that seemed to silhouette him against the windowpane with warm amber tones behind his dimly lit countenance glowing from the snow’s reflection. I was struck by the sight of his white hair and how it seemed to be a halo made of whispers and dreams sketched with gray sunlight. Even from where I stood I could feel his love for me. The watchful gaze was nothing more than a gentle reminder of it.

So I turned back to the snow and romped through the powdery wonderland completely oblivious to the fact that it would be his last winter. I’d never again be stricken by that view of him in the big window, safely cloaked in warmth as I dared the cold to stop me from having fun, and I’d never again be comforted by knowing he would be there in case I fell. I’d never again relish the embrace of those warm wrinkled hands, those living promises of safety that wouldn’t survive the day.

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‘Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk . . .’

Posted on Sep 29, 2006 by jason.

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[Kazon]

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Sympathy

Posted on Sep 29, 2006 by jason.

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This poem, “Sympathy” by Paul Laurence Dunbar, has been dancing in my mind and heart quite a bit lately.

I know what the caged bird feels, alas!
   When the sun is bright on the upland slopes;
When the wind stirs soft through the springing grass,
And the river flows like a stream of glass;
   When the first bird sings and the first bud opes,
And the faint perfume from its chalice steals–
I know what the caged bird feels!

I know why the caged bird beats his wing
   Till its blood is red on the cruel bars;
For he must fly back to his perch and cling
When he fain would be on the bough a-swing;
   And a pain still throbs in the old, old scars
And they pulse again with a keener sting–
I know why he beats his wing!

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
   When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,–
When he beats his bars and he would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
   But a prayer that he sends from his heart’s deep core,
But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings–
I know why the caged bird sings!