I’ve stayed in a few places where ghosts were purported to be roaming the passages at night, but apparently not the night I was staying.
And that’s something else that I have a problem with, why is it ghosts only come out at night, or is that just the perception I have got from reading up on the subject.
Maybe my view of ghosts is somewhat stilted, after all, I think my first introduction to ghosts was watching The Centerville Ghost, a movie I saw on t.v. when I was very young.
You have to admit Hollywood’s perception of ghosts is quite interesting.
But…
Do you think they are real? Do I think they are real?
I think I would have to be presented with some fairly solid evidence they exist, but perhaps not to the point of meeting one.
There are, it seems countless examples of ethereal forces, you know, wind blowing where there’s no wind or draught outside, room temperatures dropping for no apparent reason, knocking, rattling of chains, strange noises like low moaning.
And yet…
There are hotels you can stay in such as the Chelsea Hotel in New York, where it’s possible to run into Sid Vicious.
Sorry, not staying there any time soon.
Then there’s the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in Los Angeles where it’s possible to run into Marylin Monroe, who lived in room 229.
That could be an interesting encounter.
Another is the Westin St Francis in San Francisco where the actress Virginia Rappe died while attending a party held in Fatty Arbuckle’s room, Arbuckle’s room, who was later accused of assaulting and murdering her, and whose career tanked after the incident.
Her ghost is seen moving about the hotel tearing her hair out. It seems all of the spectral activity occurs on the 12th floor.
Good to know if I decide to stay there. I wonder if they have a 13th floor?
Perhaps in too old to be running the gamut of paranormal experiences, the old heart is not as strong as it used to be.
Our hero has survived the crash, now he’s stuck in enemy territory.
…
This was supposed to be a milk run. There had been no reported activity in our zone and the pilot had decided to go up just the log some more air time.
He was hoping after reaching a 1,000 hours so he might be able to move to fixed wing aircraft and then move on to becoming an airline pilot. Unfortunately, he was not going become anything now.
That didn’t explain why we encountered a convoy out in the desert, especially one with a rocket launcher and English speaking soldier types.
Did we stumble across another outfit running a secret operation and mistook us for the enemy? It didn’t seem the case, our helicopter was distinctively marked just so we wouldn’t be mistaken, and then there was the fact the man knew my name.
How could that happen? It would need someone back at the base to tell someone of the fact the helicopter was going up and who was in it, and there weren’t too many people who knew that information.
And only one who knew exactly when and where we would be. Unless, of course, the pilot had strayed into a no-fly zone. There was only one that I knew of and it was nowhere near our flight path. Of course, it wouldn’t take much to bamboozle me in the air because I had no sense of direction.
Unless the pilot had another agenda. I could hardly tell where we were because desert all looked the same to me, and navigation wasn’t my strongest point.
After the first few miles of very bumpy road, I managed to get into a sitting position and look in the direction we were heading.
More desert.
Ten minutes later I could see an encampment in the distance, literally an oasis in the middle of nowhere. A secret base camp or something else?
As we got closer I could see it was mostly covered by camouflage so it couldn’t be seen from above. Clever. Chances were we had no idea this place was in the desert.
I am painfully reminded that I need to have Social Media presence.
Marilyn told me that if I was on ‘Facebook’ I would have been able to follow her ‘adventures’. If I was on Twitter I could acquire reading followers, and Instagram, to share photos of book covers and my travels.
I drag out the dusty laptop computer, the one that had an email account that goes back to the early days of the internet, and used a VT52 mainframe interface, or at least that was what I think it was called, and fire it up. The operating system is out of date, error messages on top of error messages. Thankfully the desktop works, but it too, is out of date, running Windows 97.
Even my mobile phone is more powerful and sophisticated than both my boat anchors.
Time to get into the ‘real’ world!
My writing is now on hold. Shopping for a new computer, and updating operating system software, is a priority.
I am pleasantly surprised at just how inexpensive reasonable good laptop computers cost. I looked at tablets from Apple, Samsung, and the Surface. All very nice, but a computer, as big and cumbersome as it is, is still the cheapest option.
My afternoon is taken up with installing windows 10, setting up a Gmail email account, investigating, and signing up for Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. I also take out a cheap subscription to Microsoft Office. I need Word for manuscripts, and Excel to budget, Powerpoint to dazzle.
I take to reading the information about ‘creating an author presence on the internet’ and see that perhaps I need to have a ‘blog’, whatever that is, and a website.
There’s free and there’s not so free.
Damn. A day wasted in computer and social media land. They even had something called the ‘cloud’. I think I have been out of the computer world too long, having transferred into middle management just as the next phase of the computer technology started making an impact.
Tomorrow I tackle blogging.
I can’t sleep, not without writing something for the day. My thoughts have been swirling around Bill and Jennifer, and it’s time to bring them together, and by, guess what, a calamity!
I start scribbling:
Hospitals were places I rarely visited. Like others who shared my fear, it would take a rather compelling reason to get me there. On this occasion, it had been a compelling reason. If I hadn’t got to the hospital when I did, I would now be dead.
When I woke, it was to disorientation and confusion. I didn’t remember much of anything that had happened after having lunch with Jennifer, and running into Aitchison.
When I finally came from the depths of unconsciousness and returned to whatever version of reality that was running at the time, I found myself in a position where any movement, including breathing, was painful.
It was dark, the shapes were blurry, and some moved. As objects slowly came into focus, activity increased, and more people arrived. My major concern at that time was the sensation of immobility, and of how difficult it was to breathe, or, more to the point, how painful. Muffled voices spoke in a strange language. After a short time, consciousness slipped away, as, mercifully, did the pain.
It was another week, though it seemed like a month before I realized where I was. It had taken a while, but it was definitely a hospital. One of the shadowy figures also became recognizable.
Jennifer.
She, too, had a number of bandages, and the black and blue look of a person who’d just survived a hit and run.
Then I remembered.
Aitchison.
Outside the restaurant.
When my eyes finally came into focus I looked at her and saw her smile. Another realization, though it became clearer sometime later, was that my hand was in hers, and as she squeezed it gently, I felt it give me strength.
“Welcome back.” She was quite close, close enough for her perfume to overpower the clinical disinfectant.
“Where did I go?” My voice was barely above a whisper, my throat dry.
“We’re not sure. You died once. Now you only have eight lives left.”
It was odd that I’d heard it before, somewhere in the distant past, so I believed I had fewer lives to spare. I looked at her. “Aitchison?”
“He didn’t make it.”
“You?”
“I got caught in the crossfire. So did you. The police said Aitchison was the target. We were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
I’d heard that before, too. I think that was Richardson’s problem, and he’d suffered the same fate, but his end result was terminal.
The conversation had exhausted me, and the pain returned. It was still difficult to breathe, and I dared not look where most of the tubes were going. Tears ran down my cheeks as the pain became unbearable. I heard her call a nurse, and not long after the pain receded. So did my consciousness.
As some may be aware, but many not, Chester, my faithful writing assistant, mice catcher, and general pain in the neck, passed away some months ago.
Recently I was running a series based on his adventures, under the title of Past Conversations with my cat.
For those who have not had the chance to read about all of his exploits I will run the series again from Episode 1
These are the memories of our time together…
This is Chester. He has suddenly become delusional.
I’m not sure if a cat can become so, but since I gave him a role in one of my stories, he’s started acting weirdly.
I’m sure if he could wear sunglasses indoors he would. As it is, it’s head in the air, looking straight ahead, ignoring everything and everyone around him.
I think about opening the concertina doors that lead into the dining room just to see if he crashes into them.
He thinks, no doubt, that I think he’s just sniffing the air to see if there are any mice to be caught, but I’m on to him.
As he strolls past I say, “Perhaps I might turn that role into a walk on.”
He stops in mid step, and turns his head.
“You can’t. I’ve read the latest chapter. I’m integral to the plot.”
I smile. “You do realise often the best roles end up on the cutting room floor, or in this case, perhaps I’ll start editing early. There’s such a thing as the delete key.”
Smug, or is that haughty, look gone.
“Just go back to being your usual self,” I say, “and I’ll reconsider your role.”
“Does that mean no fresh fish for lunch today?”
“Don’t push your luck.”
I’m sure cats can’t shrug, but he gives it his best shot, and continues on his way minus the attitude.
There’s something to be said for a story that starts like a James Bond movie, throwing you straight in the deep end, a perfect way of getting to know the main character, David, or is that Alistair?
A retired spy, well not so much a spy as a retired errand boy, David’s rather wry description of his talents, and a woman that most men would give their left arm for, not exactly the ideal couple, but there is a spark in a meeting that may or may not have been a set up.
But as the story progressed, the question I kept asking myself was why he’d bother.
And, page after unrelenting page, you find out.
Susan is exactly the sort of woman the pique his interest. Then, inexplicably, she disappears. That might have been the end to it, but Prendergast, that shadowy enigma, David’s ex boss who loves playing games with real people, gives him an ultimatum, find her or come back to work.
Nothing like an offer that’s a double edged sword!
A dragon for a mother, a sister he didn’t know about, Susan’s BFF who is not what she seems or a friend indeed, and Susan’s father who, up till David meets her, couldn’t be less interested, his nemesis proves to be the impossible dream, and he’s always just that one step behind.
When the rollercoaster finally came to a halt, and I could start breathing again, it was an ending that was completely unexpected.
These gardens are very tightly put together and are interspersed with buildings that you can go in and look at as distinct from just looking in from the outside.
There are lots of paths that wind around interspersed with rocks which may or may not be sculpted, and equally interspersed with trees, bushes, and small plants. In the middle is a lake which usually has lotus plants in bloom, but they are not in season.
The gardens were built around a small lake that was filled with fish of all sizes and colours
The buildings were also a contrast for those built for the men
and those for the women
In the middle of the garden was a significant rock pillar
surrounded by certain areas of the garden that had smaller rock formations
At the end of the garden is a large collection of bonsai trees, some of which are quite exquisite.
50 photographs, 50 stories, of which there is one of the 50 below.
They all start with –
A picture paints … well, as many words as you like. For instance:
And, the story:
Have you ever watched your hopes and dreams simply just fly away?
Everything I thought I wanted and needed had just left in an aeroplane, and although I said I was not going to, i came to the airport to see the plane leave. Not the person on it, that would have been far too difficult and emotional, but perhaps it was symbolic, the end of one life and the start of another.
But no matter what I thought or felt, we had both come to the right decision. She needed the opportunity to spread her wings. It was probably not the best idea for her to apply for the job without telling me, but I understood her reasons.
She was in a rut. Though her job was a very good one, it was not as demanding as she had expected, particularly after the last promotion, but with it came resentment from others on her level, that she, the youngest of the group would get the position.
It was something that had been weighing down of her for the last three months, and if noticed it, the late nights, the moodiness, sometimes a flash of temper. I knew she had one, no one could have such red hair and not, but she had always kept it in check.
And, then there was us, together, and after seven years, it felt like we were going nowhere. Perhaps that was down to my lack of ambition, and though she never said it, lack of sophistication. It hadn’t been an issue, well, not until her last promotion, and the fact she had to entertain more, and frankly I felt like an embarrassment to her.
So, there it was, three days ago, the beginning of the weekend, and we had planned to go away for a few days and take stock. We both acknowledged we needed to talk, but it never seemed the right time.
It was then she said she had quit her job and found a new one. Starting the following Monday.
Ok, that took me by surprise, not so much that it something I sort of guessed might happen, but that she would just blurt it out.
I think that right then, at that moment, I could feel her frustration with everything around her.
What surprised her was my reaction. None.
I simply asked where who, and when.
A world-class newspaper, in New York, and she had to be there in a week.
A week.
It was all the time I had left with her.
I remember I just shrugged and asked if the planned weekend away was off.
She stood on the other side of the kitchen counter, hands around a cup of coffee she had just poured, and that one thing I remembered was the lone tear that ran down her cheek.
Is that all you want to know?
I did, yes, but we had lost that intimacy we used to have when she would have told me what was happening, and we would have brainstormed solutions. I might be a cabinet maker but I still had a brain, was what I overheard her tell a friend once.
There’s not much to ask, I said. You’ve been desperately unhappy and haven’t been able to hide it all that well, you have been under a lot of pressure trying to deal with a group of troglodytes, and you’ve been leaning on Bentley’s shoulder instead of mine, and I get it, he’s got more experience in that place, and the politics that go with it, and is still an ally.
Her immediate superior and instrumental in her getting the position, but unlike some men in his position he had not taken advantage of a situation like some men would. And even if she had made a move, which I doubted, that was not the sort of woman she was, he would have politely declined.
One of the very few happily married men in that organisation, so I heard.
So, she said, you’re not just a pretty face.
Par for the course for a cabinet maker whose university degree is in psychology. It doesn’t take rocket science to see what was happening to you. I just didn’t think it was my place to jump in unless you asked me, and when you didn’t, well, that told me everything I needed to know.
Yes, our relationship had a use by date, and it was in the next few days.
I was thinking, she said, that you might come with me, you can make cabinets anywhere.
I could, but I think the real problem wasn’t just the job. It was everything around her and going with her, that would just be a constant reminder of what had been holding her back. I didn’t want that for her and said so.
Then the only question left was, what do we do now?
Go shopping for suitcases. Bags to pack, and places to go.
Getting on the roller coaster is easy. On the beginning, it’s a slow easy ride, followed by the slow climb to the top. It’s much like some relationships, they start out easy, they require a little work to get to the next level, follows by the adrenaline rush when it all comes together.
What most people forget is that what comes down must go back up, and life is pretty much a roller coaster with highs and lows.
Our roller coaster had just come or of the final turn and we were braking so that it stops at the station.
There was no question of going with her to New York. Yes, I promised I’d come over and visit her, but that was a promise with crossed fingers behind my back. After a few months in t the new job the last thing shed want was a reminder of what she left behind. New friends new life.
We packed her bags, three out everything she didn’t want, a free trips to the op shop with stiff she knew others would like to have, and basically, by the time she was ready to go, there was nothing left of her in the apartment, or anywhere.
Her friends would be seeing her off at the airport, and that’s when I told her I was not coming, that moment the taxi arrived to take her away forever. I remember standing there, watching the taxi go. It was going to be, and was, as hard as it was to watch the plane leave.
So, there I was, finally staring at the blank sky, around me a dozen other plane spotters, a rather motley crew of plane enthusiasts.
Already that morning there’s been 6 different types of plane depart, and I could hear another winding up its engines for take-off.
People coming, people going.
Maybe I would go to New York in a couple of months, not to see her, but just see what the attraction was. Or maybe I would drop in, just to see how she was.
As one of my friends told me when I gave him the news, the future is never written in stone, and it’s about time you broadened your horizons.
Once you realise that life if not going to improve much while you are a child and have no control over what happens to you, you take that life and toss it into a compartment.
Then, it’s not simply a matter of your imagination taking over and transporting you to another world, one that is better than where you are. That isn’t yet formed.
Your imagination needs fuel, from what you see, what you hear, from people other than those around you. Yes, it’s not all sit at home and mope about.
With my attention elsewhere, I walked into a man who was hurrying in the opposite direction. He was a big man with a scar running down the left side of his face from eye socket to mouth, and who was also wearing a black shirt with a red tie.
That was all I remembered as my heart almost stopped.
He apologized as he stepped to one side, the same way I stepped, as I also muttered an apology.
I kept my eyes down. He was not the sort of man I wanted to recognize later in a lineup. I stepped to the other side and so did he. It was one of those situations. Finally getting out of sync, he kept going in his direction, and I towards the bus, which was now pulling away from the curb.
Getting my breath back, I just stood riveted to the spot watching it join the traffic. I looked back over my shoulder, but the man I’d run into had gone. I shrugged and looked at my watch. It would be a few minutes before the next bus arrived.
Wait, or walk? I could also go by subway, but it was a long walk to the station. What the hell, I needed the exercise.
At the first intersection, the ‘Walk’ sign had just flashed to ‘Don’t Walk’. I thought I’d save a few minutes by not waiting for the next green light. As I stepped onto the road, I heard the screeching of tires.
A yellow car stopped inches from me.
It was a high powered sports car, perhaps a Lamborghini. I knew what they looked like because Marcus Bartleby owned one, as did every other junior executive in the city with a rich father.
Everyone stopped to look at me, then the car. It was that sort of car. I could see the driver through the windscreen shaking his fist, and I could see he was yelling too, but I couldn’t hear him. I stepped back onto the sidewalk, and he drove on. The moment had passed and everyone went back to their business.
My heart rate hadn’t come down from the last encounter. Now it was approaching cardiac arrest, so I took a few minutes and several sets of lights to regain composure.
At the next intersection, I waited for the green light, and then a few seconds more, just to be sure. I was no longer in a hurry.
At the next, I heard what sounded like a gunshot. A few people looked around, worried expressions on their faces, but when it happened again, I saw it was an old car backfiring. I also saw another yellow car, much the same as the one before, stopped on the side of the road. I thought nothing of it, other than it was the second yellow car I’d seen.
At the next intersection, I realized I was subconsciously heading towards Harry’s new bar. It was somewhere on 6th Avenue, so I continued walking in what I thought was the right direction.
I don’t know why I looked behind me at the next intersection, but I did. There was another yellow car on the side of the road, not far from me. It, too, looked the same as the original Lamborghini, and I was starting to think it was not a coincidence.
Moments after crossing the road, I heard the roar of a sports car engine and saw the yellow car accelerate past me. As it passed by, I saw there were two people in it, and the blurry image of the passenger; a large man with a red tie.
Now my imagination was playing tricks.
It could not be the same man. He was going in a different direction.
In the few minutes I’d been standing on the pavement, it had started to snow; early for this time of year, and marking the start of what could be a long cold winter. I shuddered, and it was not necessarily because of the temperature.
I looked up and saw a neon light advertising a bar, coincidentally the one Harry had ‘found’ and, looking once in the direction of the departing yellow car, I decided to go in. I would have a few drinks and then leave by the back door if it had one.
Self published authors are fully aware that perhaps the easiest part of the writing journey is the actual writing. Well, compared to the marketing aspect I believe it is.
I have read a lot of articles, suggestions and tips and tricks to market the book to the reading public. It is, to say the least, a lot harder to market eBooks than perhaps their hard or paper covered relatives. This is despite the millions of eReaders out there.
Then there is that other fickle part of the publishing cycle, the need for reviews. Good reviews of course. As we are learning, reviews can be bought. Currently Amazon is out there seeking out these reviews and reviewers and it will be interesting to see the result of their actions.
All the advice I have seen and read tells me that reviews should not be paid for, that reviews will come with sales. It might be a difficult cycle, more reviews means more sales, etc. And getting those first sales …
Therein lies the conundrum. It is a question of paying for advertising, or working it out for ourselves. I guess if I were to get more sales, I could afford the advertising … yes, back on the merry-go-round!
And yet, the harder the road, the more I enjoy what I do. It is exhilarating while writing, it is a joy to finish the first draft, it is accomplishment when it is published, but when you sell that first book, well, there is no other feeling like it.
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 