Tag: #amediting

How does a story change in the retelling, and retelling, and …

I was reading an article about the bible the other day, and what I gathered to be the writers intent was that the end result was an accumulation of many times retold and translated stories.  Of course, it’s not quite as simple as that, but…

It sort of relates to another story I read years ago and re-enacted with a few friends to check its veracity.  What happens is the first person is given the correct story, then having memorized it, relates it to the second and then along a chain of ten people.

The story related by the tenth person, when compared to the original, had only part’s of the original story and for some reason new elements that somehow were misinterpretations of original story elements.

This perhaps could be put down to the individuals upbringing and background, which always gets used in the interpretation of what they are told.  We all use different methods to remember things and this will always impact how we interpret and relate information.

It’s also the same when three different eyewitnesses to an accident will rarely agree on the details.  Certain elements will be the same, but others will not.

A case in point, when individual family members recall events involving all of them, each will remember seminal events differently, and usually, from their perspective, it will revolve around where they perceive they fit in the family hierarchy.  A stronger brother or sister will always see it differently to a weaker one.

My childhood memories are basically different to my brothers, and I suspect those events that he fails to recall are deliberately cast away because either they didn’t affect him, or there were so horrible, he deliberately cast them out.

We all tend to do that.  Some memories he has of the so-called old days I have no recollection of.  But in saying that, sometimes I learn something new, that he had remembered, or I had forgotten, so there’s a slight shift in the narrative.

So it seems to me memories are, in one respect, a choice, and in another, what we can remember at the time.  We often choose to remember the good ones and cast out the bad.  Sometime we might embellish an incident, others we might gloss over it.

Was that the case of when it finally came to putting the biblical story down on paper (or in stone as the case may be), it was an amalgam of similar stories told a number of times, each relating it according to their memories and, perhaps, storytelling abilities?

However we look at it, remember it, or relate it, the old days, the days of yesteryear will always be different each time we speak about them.  Until, of course, until someone finally commits the story to paper.

 

Another start to another story, again

I have a stab at improving this starting piece every now and then, a project that started about a year or so ago, and I find myself rewriting the start over and over because I’m not satisfied with the characterization.

It’s not so much the storyline, as it is in trying to create sympathy for the character, and not find him as dull as ditchwater.  He’s improving with age.  As writers, we tend to create colourful characters and shy away from those who are dull and boring, because after all, as a reader, you want to become something or someone who is far from ordinary.  Well, Graham is starting out ordinary, but he will be anything but by the time I write those words ‘The End’.

I promise.

 

I am the master of my own destiny.

My father had drummed that into me, as well as my older brother and younger sister, over and over, until it became a mantra.

For them.

I could not say I didn’t have the same advantages afforded to them, afforded to me.  I did.

But somewhere lost in the translation, someone forgot to tell me that it was only advice, not an order, and mistaking it for the latter, I struck out on my own path.

And for the next ten years, it was a long and winding path that led me to this point in time, in a small room that held nothing to tell me where I came from, or who I really was.

My parents were very wealthy with an Upper Westside Apartment in Manhattan and a holiday house in Martha’s Vineyard, my sister had a successful medical career and married a most eligible bachelor, as expected, and my brother, he was a politician.

I’d not seen any of them in at least five years, and they hadn’t called me.

You see, I was the black sheep of the family.  I dropped out of college when it all became too much, and drifted.  Seasonal labourer, farm hand, factory worker, add job man, and night watchman. 

At least now I had a uniform, and a gun, and looked like I’d made something of myself.

It was hard to say why, just before I was about to head out of the factory to end my shift, that those thoughts about them came into my mind.   They might be gone, but I guess I would never forget about them.  I wondered briefly if any of them thought about me.

 

It was 3 a.m. and it was like standing on the exact epicentre of the South Pole.  I’d just stepped from the factory warehouse into the car park.

The car was covered in snow.  The weather was clear now, but I could feel more snow was coming.  A white Christmas?  That’s all I needed.  I hoped I remembered to put the antifreeze in my radiator this time.

As I approached my car, the light went on inside an SUV parked next to my car.  The door opened and what looked to be a woman was getting out of the car.

“Graham?”

It was a voice I was familiar with, though I hadn’t heard it for a long time.

I looked again and was shocked to see my ultra successful sister, Penelope.  She was leaning against the front fender, and from what I could see, didn’t look too well.

How on earth did she find me, after all the years that had passed?  Perhaps that sparked my un-conciliatory question, “What do you want?”

I could see the surprise and then hurt in her expression.  Perhaps I had been a little harsh.  Whatever she felt, it passed, and she said, “Help.”

My help?  Help with what? I was the last person who could help her, or anyone for that matter, with anything.   But curiosity got the better of me.  “Why?”

“I think my husband is trying to kill me.”

Then, with that said, she slid down the side of the car, and I could see, in the arc lamps lighting the car park, a trail of blood.

My first thought, she needed the help of a doctor, not a stupid brother, then a second thought, call 911, which I did, and hoped like hell they got here in time.

And, yes, there was a third thought that crossed my mind.  Whether or not I would be blamed for this event.

 

© Charles Heath 2019

In a word: Under

Under by itself is a rather boring word, you know, under the moon, under the sea, under the influence, which is not hard to be if you’ve been hypnotised or after a few drinks.

Under is anything beneath something else.

But add it to some other words like,

Underrated, which means it is better than what others give it credit.

Underwear, what you would wear underneath your clothes.

Understudy, the person who takes over a lead role when the lead is incapacitated.  And how many understudies are guilty of harming the lead, in order to get a big break?

And not get away with it?

Understood, an agreement that might or might not be in writing that something will happen, that is, it is understood that I will be the next president.

Or not.  Who on earth would really want to be president of anything?

So in the spirit of trying to confuse everyone all of the time, I have a conundrum in the form of a question, what is the difference between under and underneath.

To me there is none, you can be under the sea or underneath the sea, or under the table or underneath the table, but then there’s another, you can be under the influence but not underneath the influence, though technically you could,  if you wanted to use confusing English.

And, just to add to the confusion further, I can say that the submarine sailed under the sea, underneath the sea, but, in actual fact, it doesn’t.

What is under the sea is the sand, or sea bed, and a submarine does not plough its way through the sand, does it.

What we really are saying is that a submarine moves through the water.

Just saying…

“The Things We Do For Love” – Coming soon

Is love the metaphorical equivalent to ‘walking the plank’; a dive into uncharted waters?

For Henry the only romance he was interested in was a life at sea, and when away from it, he strived to find sanctuary from his family and perhaps life itself.  It takes him to a small village by the sea, s place he never expected to find another just like him, Michelle, whom he soon discovers is as mysterious as she is beautiful.

Henry had long since given up the notion of finding romance, and Michelle couldn’t get involved for reasons she could never explain, but in the end both acknowledge that something happened the moment they first met.  

Plans were made, plans were revised, and hopes were shattered.

A chance encounter causes Michelle’s past to catch up with her, and whatever hope she had of having a normal life with Henry, or anyone else, is gone.  To keep him alive she has to destroy her blossoming relationship, an act that breaks her heart and shatters his.

But can love conquer all?

It takes a few words of encouragement from an unlikely source to send Henry and his friend Radly on an odyssey into the darkest corners of the red light district in a race against time to find and rescue the woman he finally realizes is the love of his life.

The cover, at the moment, looks like this:

lovecoverfinal1

In a word: will

Now that I’ve hit the age of 65, I now have to give some consideration to creating a will.

You know, that document that specifies which child gets what, or if you think any or all of them don’t deserve what’s left of the hard-earned millions, which cat or dog will inherit a fortune.

A will is both a reason for siblings or beneficiaries to kill to get a reward or the fact you have to make one so that the state doesn’t inherit your fortune.

This is only one use of the word.

Another might be that it’s possible to have something like the will to carry on.

Carry on what?

Life, a marriage, a business relationship.

Does it require will power, or is it a matter of where there’s a will there’s a way?

I will come over. I will turn up tomorrow.

In this sense, it is promoting futility.

Of course, seeing is believing.

And as a bit of self-serving advertising, I’m going to promote a new story, actually titled, The Will.

Inheritance can resolve monetary problems, and not only that, set one of the siblings up financially for life. All they have to do is wrest the family home from the dying fingers of a mother who had seen it all.

Into the mix comes the grandson, a man who sometimes is a son but mostly a grandson, someone who doesn’t fit in, who doesn’t want to follow family tradition, and who prefers to go to his grandmothers rather than going home to his family.

He is constantly appalled at his mother’s lack of respect for her mother and suddenly finds himself in the middle of a battle between his grandmother and her daughter, his mother, over the family estate.

Who will win?

That’s a question that will be answered when you read the book.

“The Things We Do For Love” – Coming soon

Is love the metaphorical equivalent to ‘walking the plank’; a dive into uncharted waters?

For Henry the only romance he was interested in was a life at sea, and when away from it, he strived to find sanctuary from his family and perhaps life itself.  It takes him to a small village by the sea, s place he never expected to find another just like him, Michelle, whom he soon discovers is as mysterious as she is beautiful.

Henry had long since given up the notion of finding romance, and Michelle couldn’t get involved for reasons she could never explain, but in the end both acknowledge that something happened the moment they first met.  

Plans were made, plans were revised, and hopes were shattered.

A chance encounter causes Michelle’s past to catch up with her, and whatever hope she had of having a normal life with Henry, or anyone else, is gone.  To keep him alive she has to destroy her blossoming relationship, an act that breaks her heart and shatters his.

But can love conquer all?

It takes a few words of encouragement from an unlikely source to send Henry and his friend Radly on an odyssey into the darkest corners of the red light district in a race against time to find and rescue the woman he finally realizes is the love of his life.

The cover, at the moment, looks like this:

lovecoverfinal1

“The Things We Do For Love” – Coming soon

Is love the metaphorical equivalent to ‘walking the plank’; a dive into uncharted waters?

For Henry the only romance he was interested in was a life at sea, and when away from it, he strived to find sanctuary from his family and perhaps life itself.  It takes him to a small village by the sea, s place he never expected to find another just like him, Michelle, whom he soon discovers is as mysterious as she is beautiful.

Henry had long since given up the notion of finding romance, and Michelle couldn’t get involved for reasons she could never explain, but in the end both acknowledge that something happened the moment they first met.  

Plans were made, plans were revised, and hopes were shattered.

A chance encounter causes Michelle’s past to catch up with her, and whatever hope she had of having a normal life with Henry, or anyone else, is gone.  To keep him alive she has to destroy her blossoming relationship, an act that breaks her heart and shatters his.

But can love conquer all?

It takes a few words of encouragement from an unlikely source to send Henry and his friend Radly on an odyssey into the darkest corners of the red light district in a race against time to find and rescue the woman he finally realizes is the love of his life.

The cover, at the moment, looks like this:

lovecoverfinal1

What happens after the action-packed start – Part 18

Our hero knows he’s in serious trouble.

The problem is, there are familiar faces and a question of who is a friend and who is foe made all the more difficult because of the enemy, if it was the enemy, simply because it didn’t look or sound or act like the enemy.

Now, it appears, his problems stem from another operation he participated in.

 

The debriefing team were not quite what I expected, a man and a woman, one a Major, the other a Lieutenant, and it was apparent they had just met before coming into the room.

He was Major Lallo, Army intelligence, and the woman, Lieutenant Jill Monroe, a familiar name as I’m sure I’d heard it before.

Lallo was not a fighting soldier, he was a paperwork man.  I suspect he was more at home with an order book, and filing communications though that didn’t explain the rank, which he would have to have front line experience to attain.

Monroe looked to me to be the sort of woman soldier that had to prove she was better than any man and had the muscular form to go with it.  Not the sort of a woman to get into a fight over or against.

She stood at the end of the bed, and I suspect by her posture that she was there to make sure I didn’t run, which, by the way, was physically impossible.

Lallo sat in the chair beside the bed, tried to make himself comfortable.  He was going to ask the questions.  He had a small notebook he took out of his pocket with a list of questions.  The small pencil that slotted into the binding was there to write down the answers if any.  I was not sure I was up to answer any questions.

Settled, he started with, “You don’t have to answer, but I suggest you do.  I think by now you are starting to realise that, no matter how strong you think you might be, you’re not.  If you decided to be unforthcoming, then you can be assured that we will be interrogating you with a lot more, shall we say, enthusiasm than in the past.”

By the way he said it, I got the impression he would be the one.  His tone had changed suddenly, to a man who enjoyed others discomfort, and he was looking forward to breaking me if it came to that.

“And if I don’t have the answers to your questions, or should I say, not the answers you are expecting, what then?”

“One step at a time.  We’ll start with the easy questions first.”

I’m not quite sure what he classified as easy.  I didn’t think there were any.

“How long have you been at this base?”

Maybe I was wrong.  “Two months, three days.”

“How did your transfer to this specific base come about?”

“I don’t know.  I was at a training base in Ohio one day, then being presented with orders to get the next transport out the next.”

“Did you, or someone else you know, request your transfer to a new base?”

I didn’t think that was possible.  Someone of my rank went where they were told to go.

“No.  I’m a Sergeant, not a General.”

But was it possible Colonel Bamfield arranged for me to be transferred.  Given the fact he was here, now, it was not beyond the realms of possibility.  But if so, why?

“What was your function at your last base?”

What had this to do with my current situation or anything else for that matter?

“Instructor.”

“In what?”

“Infiltration, covert operations.”

“And I’m assuming then you been involved in these, shall we say, covert operations?”

No use denying it.  It was obvious he had seen my file, which all of a sudden had some very disturbing possibilities.  Just how much information though.

“Yes, but they’re classified and I can’t tell you anything and that.”

“Normally that would be the case, but…”  He left the sentence hanging there for a few seconds before adding, “There was a problem with your last operation, the reason, it appears, you were transferred to the training base in Ohio.  Is that correct?”

A mission that I had been told never to mention, speak of to anyone, no matter how high their rank in the military or government, or even think about again.

A mission I was told had been buried so deep it would never see the light of day.

Until now.

 

© Charles Heath 2019

In a word: Leg

Aside from the fact it is one of those necessary items to walk with, and the fact we can have two or four for most humans and animals, there are a few other uses for the word ‘leg’.

Like…

‘You haven’t got a leg to stand on’, doesn’t necessarily mean you have no legs, but that you are in a precarious position.

“the table had ornate legs’, yes, even non-living objects can have legs, like tables and chairs.

“It was the fifth leg of the race’, meaning it can be a stage of a race.

“He was legless’, meaning that he was too drunk to stand up.  Some might think being legless is a badge of honour, but I suspect those people have been drinking a long time and the alcohol has destroyed most of their brain cells.

“leg it!’, meaning get the hell out of here before you’re caught.

Then, finally, ‘he’s on his last legs’, meaning that he’s exhausted, or about to die.

I’m sure there’s more but that’ll do for now.

I have to use my legs to get some exercise, of which the first leg is to the tripod to check if its legs are stable, and the second leg is to come back to the table and replace one of the legs which is broken.  Then I’ll leg it to the pub where hopefully I won’t become legless.

Hmm…

In a word: Happy

“I’m happy to be being here.”

Yes, I actually heard that answer given in a television interview, and thought, at the time, it was a quaint expression.

But in reality, this was a person for whom English was a second language, and that was, quite literally, their translation from their language to English.

Suffice to say, that person was not happy when lost the event she was participating in.

But that particular memory was triggered by another event.

Someone asked me how happy I was.

Happy is another of those words like good, thrown around like a rag doll, used without consequence, or regard for its true meaning.

“After everything that’s happened, you should be the happiest man alive!”

I’m happy.

I should be, to them.

A real friend might also say, “Are you sure, you don’t look happy.”

I hesitate but say, “Sure.  I woke up with a headache,” or some other lame reason.

But, in reality, I’m not ‘happy’.  Convention says that we should be happy if everything is going well.  In my case, it is, to a certain extent, but it is what’s happening within that’s the problem.  We say it because people expect it.

I find there is no use complaining because no one will listen, and definitely, no one likes serial complainers.

True.

But somewhere in all those complaints will be the truth, the one item that is bugging us.

It is a case of whether we are prepared to listen.  Really listen.

And not necessarily take people at their word.