Tag: Challenge

That light at the end of the tunnel

It’s a long-standing joke that the light at the end of the tunnel is the headlight of an express train coming right at you.
Metaphorically speaking this is quite often true if you are a pessimist, but since I’ve converted to being an optimist, a bit like changing religions, l think I’ve seen the ‘light’.
It’s a lot like coming up from the bottom of a deep pool, breaking the surface, and taking that first long gulp of air.
Along with that elated feeling that you’re not going to drown.
What’s this got to do with anything, you ask.
Perhaps nothing.
As an allegory, it represents to me as a time when l finally get over a period of self-doubt, where a series of events started to make me question why l want to be a writer.
I mean why put yourself through rejections, sometimes scathing criticism, snd the have the people whom you thought were your friends suddenly start questions your choices after initially wholeheartedly supporting you.
Are we only a success or supportable if we are earning a sufficient wage?
Is this why so many people don’t give up their day job, and then find themselves plying this ‘other trade’ during the dark hours of the night, only to find themselves being criticized for other but no less subjective reasons.
It seems like a no-win situation but these are the times when your mettle is tested severely.
But in the end, it is worth it when the book is finished and it is published, even if it is only on Amazon, not that publishing on Amazon is any less important that if it was with a mainstream publisher.
You can sit back and say with pride l did that.
And that metaphorical light, you ask.
When you make a sale.

And what was the inspiration behind the story “[Any title you’ve written]”

As accomplished as we can be at putting words on paper, what is it that makes it so difficult to sit in a chair with a camera on you, and saying words rather than writing them?

Er and um seem to crop up a lot in verbal speech.

OK, it was a simple question; “What motivates you to write?”

Damn.

My brain just turned to mush, and the words come out sounding like a drunken sailor after a night out on the town.

The written answer to the question is simple; “The idea that someone will read what I have written, and quite possibly enjoy it; that is motivation enough.”

It highlights the difficulties of the novice author.

Not only are there the constant demands of creating a ‘brand’ and building a ‘following’, there is also the need to market oneself, and the interview is one of the more effective ways of doing this.

If only I can settle the nerves.

I mean, really, it is only my granddaughter who is conducting the interview, and the questions are relatively simple.

The trouble is, I’ve never had to do it before, well, perhaps in an interview for a job, but that is less daunting.  That usually sticks to a predefined format.

Here the narrative can go in any direction.  There are set questions, but the interviewer, in her inimitable manner, can sometimes slide a question in out of left field.

For instance, “Your character Zoe the assassin, is she based on someone you know, or an amalgam of other characters you’ve read about or seen in movies?”

That was an interesting question, and one that has several answers, but the one most relevant was; “It was the secret alter ego of one of the women I used to work with.  I asked her one day if she wasn’t doing what she was, what she would like to do.  It fascinated me that other people had a desire to be something more exotic in an alter ego.”

Of course, the next question was about what I wanted to be in an alter ego.

Maybe I’ll tell you next time.

In a word: Drink

Everyone loves a drink, and that interesting expression, ‘what’s your poison’ often resonates at a bar when among friends.

The thing is, we are supposed to know what our friends drink, me, for instance, I like beer, preferably in a bottle and not local mass-produced brew if I can avoid it.

But, some like white wine, no preference to type, some like cocktails like a Manhattan, or a Long Island Iced Tea, very dangerous if made correctly which quite often it isn’t, or champagne, the real thing not just leftover wine carbonated and given a name like ‘sparkling …’ something.

Every now and then we need to have more than one drink, and that desire is fuelled by our emotions.  A celebration, it’s two or three, just enough to allow the euphoria to seep in.  A tragedy of any sort means more than a few, usually prefixed with a statement like, ‘I need to get hammered’, but not literally.

Perhaps that’s why it’s called drowning our sorrows.

Of course, there are other meanings for the word ‘drink’ and often poets, and romance novelists will refer to a phrase such as ‘drink in…’ where it may refer to a loving gaze or a look of adulation.  You could also, at a stretch, drink in the sight of a magnificent landscape.

Then, at the end of that drinking session, good or bad, where you may have had the opportunity to drink in looks or locations, you might, if you didn’t play your cards right, get thrown in the drink.

Not in the glass, that’s a bit small, but it means a much larger body of water such as a pool, a lake, or the ocean.

And lastly, but probably not the only context for the word ‘drink’, it could be said you were ‘driven to drink’, and I don’t mean by another drinker to the hotel, bar, restaurant or party.

Driven to drink means you blame someone else for your recently acquired desire to drink as much as you can so that it blots out something or someone.

I’m officially blaming my dog for my drinking problem.  He drove me to drink.

And that’s all I have to say about it.

Pour me another drink, will you?

Yet another story bubbles to the surface…

I write about spies, washed out, worn out or thrown out.

It’s another idea, and another lot of scribbling to go in the ‘when I’m at a loss for a new story’ book.

The first sentence of a novel is always the hardest. Like I guess many others, I sit and ponder what I’m going to write, whether it will be relevant, whether it will pull the reader into my world, and cause them to read on.

And that’s the objective, to capture the reader’s imagination and want to see what’s going to happen next.

The problem is, we have to set the scene.

Or do we?

Do we need to cover the who, what, where, and when criteria in that first sentence? Can we just start with the edge of the seat suspense, like,

 

The first bullet hit the concrete wall about six inches above my head with a resounding thwack that scared the living daylights out of me. The second, sent on its way within a fraction of a second of the first found its mark, the edge of my shoulder, slicing through the material, and creasing skin and flesh. There was blood and then panic.

Milliseconds later my brain registered the near-miss and sent the instruction: get down you idiot.

I hit the ground just as another bullet slammed into the concrete where my head had just been.

 

It can use some more work, fewer commas, perhaps shorter, sharper sentences to convey the urgency and danger.

Perhaps we could paint a picture of the main character.

He tentatively has the name of Jackson Galworthy. He has always aspired to be a ‘secret agent’ or ‘spy’ and but through luck more than anything else, he was given his opportunity. The problem is he failed his first test and failure means washing out of the program.

What had ‘they’ said? When the shit hits the fan, you need to be calm, cool and collected. He’d been anything but.

Maybe we’ll flesh the character out as we go along.

OK, I just had another thought for an opening,

 

Light snow was still falling, past the stage where each flake dissolved as it hit the ground, and now starting to gather in white patches.

It was cold, very cold, and even with the three layers I still shivered.

What surprised me was the silence, but, of course, it was a graveyard beside an ancient church, and everyone who had attended the funeral service had left.

It was a short service for the few that came and a shorter burial. No one seemed keen to hang around, not with the evening darkness and the snow setting in.

I stood, not far from the filled grave looking at it, but not looking at it. Was I expecting it’s occupant to rise again? Was I expecting forgiveness? I certainly didn’t deserve it.

The truth is, I was responsible for this person’s death, making a mistake a more seasoned professional might not, and the reason why I was shown the door. I had been given very simple instructions; protect this man at all costs.

It was going to be a simple extraction, go in, get the target, and get out before anyone noticed.

A pity then I was the only one who got that memo.

 

Any thoughts?

In a word: Pear

Now, how did such a simple word that described a piece of fruit become so tangled?

The English language of course.

It throws up many a variation of the same sounding word, just to confuse us.

Just think, there is also pair, and pare.

But a pear, that’s a piece of fruit.

And if you’re not careful things can go pear shaped very quickly.

Then there’s pair, which means there’s two of something the same, such as a pair of socks

Except in my house it’s more than likely that pair of socks are an odd pair.

Then there’s pare, which is to take the outer layer off such as an orange.

It can also mean to cut down, as in staff after restructuring an organisation.

Well, it’s that time again…

The clock just ticked over to June 7th, I’m my part of the world, and it is my birthday.  Of course, I wasn’t born at one minute past midnight, in fact, I don’t think I know when I was born, and will probably never know because my mother has dementia and doesn’t even remember me.

I guess this is what happens when you get old.  By now, most people my age have parents who have died, and they’re moving into that phase of their life where they get to travel and do all those things they said they’d do when they retired.

Wrong.

COVID 19 put paid to all of that.

We have people out there saying that it’s almost safe to go back out into the world, but, sadly, I don’t believe them.  Perhaps if I was 30 and could fight the virus off I might think differently, but alas I’m not.

So having waited all this time to do all those things retirees do, the world has changed and we can’t do anything, at least, not yet, until a cure is found.  And if a cure is not found?

Millions of old people will either die of the virus or die alone in very miserable circumstances.

Hey, it’s supposed to be a fun day, a birthday, not all doom and gloom.

Right here, right now, we thought we had it all under control.  Then, this morning we hear a man with the virus went from one city to another, infecting people in the plane, visiting friends, 15 to be precise, and infecting them, and then on another plane, infecting them, then his place of work, where who knows how many he infected.

One person.  That’s right, one single solitary person asymptomatically carrying the virus, allegedly not knowing he was infected, has caused a crisis that could exponentially explode into a second wave.  Imagine if he infects fifty people who infect another fifty each and so on.

And for days, a week or so before this, next to none positive cases.  We thought the worst was over.

But…

It’s still here, still lurking in the shadows, and we are not safe.

I guess it just means one thing, from now on I have to live every day as if it is my last day because the chances are it just might be.

But at least for today, I will get to have a party.

Oh, sorry, family only and not more than 20, and we must still practise social distancing.

In a word: Right

Am I right?  Or is that correct?

In the moral sense, or in answering a question?

Do I have a right to …

As an entitlement?

Maybe

But right means generally to be correct, but the word itself can be used, like many others in a variety of ways

Such as, do we have any rights any more, since the government is slowly shutting down our freedoms, and, you guessed it, rights.

What about a right angle, we know this as being an angle of 90 degrees

How about I right a wrong, returning a bad situation to a good one?

Are you left-handed or right-handed?

Are you one of those people who can’t tell their left from their right?

And who was it that decided what was your left or your right, ever thought about that?  I didn’t until just now.  Good luck finding an answer on Google.

And how many times have you wished you were in the right place at the right time???

Then, of course, if English is a second language, how about confusing right with write.

Means something quite different, doesn’t it?

How about rite?  Yes, I guess if we were in the habit of chopping chicken heads off and dancing around a fire, that might be its meaning,

But…

It too has a lot of different meanings

Are you confused yet?

Past conversations with my cat – 69

This is Chester. He’s looking for a cool spot to lie down.

We’ve been having something of a heat wave for the last few days, temperatures soaring above the mid-thirties, and nearly as high as forty degrees centigrade.

So, this morning we watched the ice hockey, and even Chester stayed the distance, not so he could smirk when the Maple Leafs lost, but to channel the idea it was cold somewhere else in the world.

And it worked for a while. Having been to the ice hockey in Toronto in person, I know just how cold it was.

After that, it was a matter of leaving the doors opens to let what breeze there was flow through the house, so Chester first sat by the front door, then the back door, then came out to see me.

Time for the air conditioner.

Yes, we have air conditioning, and yes, the cost of electricity in this country is horrendous.  It was why we had solar panels put in.

I just leave it as long as possible before turning it on.

I thought about toying with him, but he’s sitting on the keyboard looking angry.

Now was the right time.

Past conversations with my cat – 68

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This is Chester.  We’re both a little tired this morning.

I spent a little too much time on the next few chapters of my NaNoWriMo project and lost track of time.  It was going so well, I thought it best not to interrupt the flow of words.

But…

This morning, after getting to bed about 2:30 am, I found it hard to get out of bed.

Fortunately, as usual, I had the cat alarm clock wake me out of deep sleep to be informed that it was breakfast.

I looked at the clock and saw it was 6:30 am.

I mean to say, Chester was with me at 2:30 when I was writing, and he didn’t tell me that it was time to go to bed, much earlier than I did.

I think he enjoys torturing me like this.

So…

I get up, get him breakfast, some smelly fish food that even he turns his nose up at, and go out to the writing room with the intention of getting on with the story.

Next thing I know, there’s a gentle tapping on my forehead,

I wake up and it’s Chester.

What? I ask.  You can’t possibly want more food.

No.  I thought you were dead.

That’s amusing, he sees me asleep in bed and doesn’t think I’m dead.

How could you think that?

There are only two reasons why people become inanimate in their chair, they have suffered a heart attack or stroke, or they’re dead.

What about simply falling asleep because they’re too tired, and their faithful assistant didn’t tell them to go to bed earlier?

Look, let’s not make a beak deal out of this.  I was concerned.  Perhaps I won’t be next time.  A final glare and he jumps down off the keyboard, which left a page of endless d’s on the page I had been working on.

Perhaps he’s getting old and forgetful, or, suddenly he realises I mean more to him than just giving him food and cleaning the litter.  No, stop deluding yourself.  You’re his friend, he’s not your friend.

Oh, well, for a moment there…

With self-isolation, is there a reason to get out of bed?

I sometimes wonder if there is.

Is that depression speaking, or am I just tired from all the late nights?

Unlike most writers, authors, and bloggers I don’t have a day job.  You could say it’s one of the benefits of getting old, this retirement thing, but after a while, not having a reason to get out of bed starts working on your subconscious.

The idea of having a job, and going to work, is a good reason to drag yourself out of bed every morning.  And because of this, the idea of sleeping in takes on a whole new meaning.

Of course, in these times of pandemic, self-isolation, the notion that us older more vulnerable people should not eave the house, for some it might become a long, lonely, and miserable existence.  For me, it will be the exact opposite in one sense, I don’t have to go anywhere, be anywhere, or do anything.

You know, I’ll just lie here for a few more minutes, and then I’ll get up.  Having turned off the alarm, the eyelids flutter, and before you know it, half an hour had passed, and you wake up in fright, knowing you’re going to be late.

In retirement, that doesn’t happen.  There is no alarm, there is no guilty pleasure in spending those extra minutes in bed.

Of course, this tardiness, or lack of desire could be because I find I do my best writing in the dead of night, often not getting to bed before 2 a.m.   Last night it was a little later because of a story I’m working on came to life with a new idea.

It had been stagnating because it’s I’d got to a point at Part 29, and I was not sure where the story was heading and whilst I had an idea about where it was going to go, in the end, we’re off in a different direction, and the words flowed.

You just don’t stop writing when you hit a vein.

But this isn’t always the case.  This morning I have an excuse to stay in bed, but most others I don’t.

But lately, I have found something that gives me that same reason I used to have to get up every morning.  Checking the pandemic numbers, and in particular, the infections and deaths in the US, and whether or not it was wise to reopen.  And I particularly like watching Mr. Trump, and what he has to say.

It’s round about the time we usually go away somewhere overseas for a month, but with the pandemic, and no cure in sight, the problem is nowhere in the world is safe anymore, so holidays, except in our own country, are out.

So from where I’m lying down, there’s no reason to get out of bed, but just let me lie here for a few more minutes and think about that.