Confessions of a Starving Mystery Writer

Robert B. Parker..RIP

2010-01-19T19:14:00.003-05:00

Author Robert B. Parker died yesterday. It seems as though if you live long enough, all icons seem to fade into dust.

Of the living mystery authors, Robert B. Parker was perhaps and Elmore Leonard executed the type of writing styles I aspire to.

"We were at the other end of life..." Robert B. Parker

The Death of Erik Ivan James

2009-10-18T15:05:00.002-05:00

I knew a man named Jerry Ogg that wrote on the Blogisphere as Erik Ivan James. http://erikivanjames.blogspot.com - he was a great renaissance man. He has a completed novel that he was shopping to publishers but hadn't yet gotten pciked up.

The following is something he wrote a couple of years ago and sums up the last several months of his life. He was a Veitnam Vet and had been a well repsected legal consultant. He had been to the hieghts of his profession and to the depths of human misery. I loved Jerry and he will be greatly missed. He did good things.

"Middle-aged and well traveled in the trenches of human gutters; he wept through his story of hopelessness and despair. He cried over the loss of his soul.

He asked if it would ever get better. He asked if he would ever know peace within himself. He asked if he would ever again find dignity. He asked if he could ever again know love.

That night, he would destroy the most precious of gifts. He would pinch out the flame on the candle of his life.

I’ll always wonder what more...."
Jerry Ogg(aka Erik Ivan James)

Firefall Cinderella

2009-07-28T16:55:00.001-05:00

Dream On...lines on my face, getting clearer

2009-07-28T16:48:00.001-05:00

New Respect for Tom Cruise

2009-06-27T11:13:00.000-05:00

I love this.....

The Snake...Al Wilson

2009-06-13T09:01:00.001-05:00

If............Rudyard Kipling

2009-06-03T19:13:00.002-05:00

If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

Hallelujah Jeff Buckley Live

2009-05-22T09:08:00.001-05:00

I will . . . Survive

2009-05-14T17:58:00.000-05:00

Heartless

2009-05-14T17:56:00.000-05:00

Potential Client DUI Arrest 101

2009-05-02T15:08:00.000-05:00

I Guess You'd Have to Lived the 80's

2009-04-07T18:45:00.000-05:00

Feelin Good - Nina Simone

2009-04-01T18:39:00.000-05:00

I'm Yours

2009-03-22T17:04:00.003-05:00

Gotta love it.... Jason Mraz. There is still good music out there.

It's Alright Ma, I'm Only Bleeding by Dylan

2008-10-27T18:27:00.003-05:00

It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)
Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child's balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying.
Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool's gold mouthpiece
The hollow horn plays wasted wordsProves to warn
That he not busy being born
Is busy dying.
Temptation's page flies out the door
You follow, find yourself at war
Watch waterfalls of pity roar
You feel to moan but unlike before
You discover
That you'd just be
One more person crying.
So don't fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
It's alright, Ma, I'm only sighing.
As some warn victory, some downfall
Private reasons great or small
Can be seen in the eyes of those that call
To make all that should be killed to crawl
While others say don't hate nothing at all
Except hatred.
Disillusioned words like bullets bark
As human gods aim for their mark
Made everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark
It's easy to see without looking too far
That not muchIs really sacred.
While preachers preach of evil fates
Teachers teach that knowledge waits
Can lead to hundred-dollar plates
Goodness hides behind its gates
But even the president of the United States
Sometimes must have
To stand naked.
An' though the rules of the road have been lodged
It's only people's games that you got to dodge
And it's alright, Ma, I can make it.
Advertising signs that con you
Into thinking you're the one
That can do what's never been done
That can win what's never been won
Meantime life outside goes on
All around you.
You lose yourself, you reappear
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling distant voice, unclear
Startles your sleeping ears to hear
That somebody thinks
They really found you.
A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit to satisfy
Insure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not fergit
That it is not he or she or them or it
That you belong to.
Although the masters make the rules
For the wise men and the fools
I got nothing, Ma, to live up to.
For them that must obey authority
That they do not respect in any degree
Who despise their jobs, their destinies
Speak jealously of them that are free
Cultivate their flowers to be
Nothing more than something
They invest in.
While some on principles baptized
To strict party platform ties
Social clubs in drag disguise
Outsiders they can freely criticize
Tell nothing except who to idolize
And then say God bless him.
While one who sings with his tongue on fire
Gargles in the rat race choir
Bent out of shape from society's pliers
Cares not to come up any higher
But rather get you down in the hole
That he's in.
But I mean no harm nor put fault
On anyone that lives in a vault
But it's alright, Ma, if I can't please him.
Old lady judges watch people in pairs
Limited in sex, they dare
To push fake morals, insult and stare
While money doesn't talk, it swears
Obscenity, who really cares
Propaganda, all is phony.
While them that defend what they cannot see
With a killer's pride, security
It blows the minds most bitterly
For them that think death's honesty
Won't fall upon them naturally
Life sometimes
Must get lonely.
My eyes collide head-on with stuffed graveyards
False gods, I scuff
At pettiness which plays so rough
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs
Kick my legs to crash it off
Say okay, I have had enough
What else can you show me?
And if my thought-dreams could be seen
They'd probably put my head in a guillotine
But it's alright, Ma, it's life, and life only....

Poetry of Bob Dylan

Looting of America:Fourth Horseman of the Apocalypse

2008-09-29T19:21:00.004-05:00

COMING TO A NIEGHBORHOOD NEAR YOU...SOON$$$$$

Chickens...comin home to roost. CONTEXT

2008-03-28T16:15:00.005-05:00

I first must say that I am not an Obama supporter.

I am not a Clinton supporter.

I am not even a Democrat.

But...someone should say it.

The mainstream media's daily whipping of Obama and his pastor seems a bit unjust and misplaced.

It is very likely to make Obama unelectable in November or lose the nomination and destroy his Pastor's legacy.

For shame.

Please watch the following:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOdlnzkeoyQ

You decide if the comments are taken out of context, if the true message has been obliterated and distorted with collective misstatements, and snippets pieced together to develop the incendiary loop shown nightly on cable news.

I wonder if any of the screaming heads and pundits have taken the time to view the entire sermon to determine what if any truth may be found in the ultimate message.

Hillary ducking sniper fire....

2008-03-28T15:47:00.003-05:00

Real danger...and an insult to the secret service and US military that they would have the First Lady, her daughter, & Sinbad the comedian such danger.

CHECK IT OUT:

Hillary in Bosnia http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxVsdS887HA&feature=related

Has our threshold of holding a politician to the truth sunk so low that we can't see this as a flatout lie...and she is seeking the highest office is the land.

I actually doubt her judgement, if it was true, that she would put her daughter in harms way.

...and the beat goes on.

2008-02-02T18:09:00.000-05:00

It's the new year and I have yet to post a new blog. In the past I have tried inspirational, trite, crap that I tried to pass off as good writing.

This year, we'll see.

Late happy new year to all and good luck in 2008.

With terrorists stapping bombs to mentally impared women and detonating them in Baghdad pet stores and our Presidential hopefuls tearing each other apart on religion, race, and the like it looks like we're in for a looooooonnnnnnngggggggg year.

But hey, if they pass the Stimulous Package we'll all be getting a "free" check in the mail. Isn'tr there some line about the three biggest lies told?

A Man: a short story Part I

2007-12-15T14:34:00.000-05:00

A man sits.

Alone.

He stares.

Christmas. To him it doesn't seem like Christmas.

He used to love Christmas. The presents. He loved to buy presents.

He would travel far and wide for just the right gift for the ones he loved. He really enjoyed wrapping presents. He'd buy special ribbons and bows and lace. He loved to give presents. In fact he loved to give of himself to every one.

As long as he can remember, he lived for Christmas. The singing, the smells, the smiles - it warmed him.

Nothing warms him now. He feels cold. Alone.

It started benignly enough. He had kidney stones and a back ache. His doctor prescribed Vicodin.

Vicodin. That's what did it. That's where it started. Kidney stones, a back ache and Vicodin.

He liked Vicodin too much. The elixer from hell. He got hooked.

His supply ran out. He wanted more. He broke the law.

He was embarrassed. He's still embarrassed.

He recovered. Or so he thought. Therapy. Counseling. It was tough but he kicked it. Completed what was required by the state and it was expunged -it never happened or so he thought.

The state passed a law. All convicted felons must submit a DNA sample for the database. He complied.

He hears a moan or maybe a groan. He realizes it's coming from him. He's shaking his head now. Hard. This must be a dream. A horrible dream. A nightmare.

"For shame" He says to noone.

"FOR SHAME!"

He put his trust in the system . . . and here he sits.

But he thinks of the woman. The woman he never knew. How her life was mercilously taken from her. He feels bad for her family. He feels bad for his family. Christmas is bad. Christmas time is the worst. Too many lost Christmases.

Justice. American justice. Such a hollow word. Such a farce. He relied on it. He depended on it. He believed that the truth would out. That the jury would see and believe the truth.

But that didn't happen. It didn't take long. They deliberated only a few hours. Friday afternoon. Not long at all. Get home for the weekend. After a long trial the jury had their verdict. Fast. It was Friday. The weekend.

"Guilty."

The word rang in his head.

Reverberated.

His mouth went dry now just as it did when he actually heard the word. He could not move. Paralysis. His mind thought of the Christmases that would never be. The gifts he would never be able to buy and wrap. The suprised and happy faces of the ones he loved.

Every year it was getting harder. He wanted to yell. He wanted to scream. Noone wanted to listen.

He didn't know, never met, didn't run in the same circles the woman but she was dead. His DNA was on her and he was in prison for life without parole.

"for shame . . . "

It's a Gas

2007-08-25T21:17:00.000-05:00

It's been a looooooonnnnnnnnng time since I have posted.

I have no idea where the time has gone. My small law practice is growing - my fiction production is not.

I recently discovered YouTube where, while searching for guitar lessons, I found this video of a version of Classical Gas. Check it out.........it's a gas.

If you like'd that, check out Bohemian Rhapsody.

Day Job

2007-05-27T17:56:00.000-05:00

I returned to work, "the day job" this past November. It has been taking up every waking moment trying to rebuild a law practice in a very bad Michigan ecomony.

I haven't written but a few pages of bad fiction in about six months. I miss it. There was an escape and freedom I enjoyed writing fiction that I do not get from writing briefs, motions, and objections.

I hope to return to blogging and writing fiction soon. There are many stories I wrote that need revisions, revisions, revisions. I seem to lack the persistence necessary to be a true writer or my timing has been off.

I hope all of my fellow bloggers and readers are well and hope one day to retrun with gusto to the blogshere.

It's cold and lonely out here in the real world. . .

Bong Hits for Jesus

2007-03-21T17:15:00.000-05:00

During a school parade in 2002, a Juneau-Douglas High School student named Joseph Frederick and some friends unfurled a 14-foot banner that read "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" just as cameras were passing them.

Little did Mr. Federick know that his joke would set in motion a l1st amendment legal battle that will soon be decided by the US Supreme Court. Only in America can a school board, Kenneth Starr, and the Bush Administration be pitted against the religious right, the ACLU, and Mr. Federick. Politics and strange bedfellows.

As reported by an MTV article, the dispute is the first school freedom of speech case to be heard by the Supreme Court in 40 years.

"The case of Morse vs. Frederick could have serious implications on the limits of speech in public schools for generations to come, with one expert saying that a win for the administration's side could create schools in which any form of speech that isn't directly related to the "stated educational mission" is stamped out and forbidden. "

Rosa Parks never thought that her refusal to give up her seat would have such tremedous effects to our culture. Who would ever think "Bong Hits for Jesus" could too...

2007-01-15T15:29:00.000-05:00

MLK

In Honor of Martin Luther King

2007-01-15T15:11:00.000-05:00

"In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
MLK, Silence

Society or members of it seem to eliminate good leaders before they are able to make their ultimate contribution.

Martin Luther King made real strides to mend the American racial divide only to be hounded by government, threatened by racists, and ultimately assassinated for his belief's and influence.

It was America's loss, possibly the worlds.

2007-01-14T22:46:00.000-05:00

FDR...where are you when we need you?

The only thing we have to fear....

2007-01-14T22:12:00.000-05:00

After watching the screaming punditry and media tsunami that we are all doomed, I believe we need to get a grip. Roosevelt's inaguration speech tag line was my inspiration - then I went back and read it...

It begins:

"I am certain that my fellow Americans expect that on my induction into the Presidency I will address them with a candor and a decision which the present situation of our people impel. This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days." Read it all at http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5057/

The parties in power want us all to fear; the sun burning out, an astroid, terrorists, global warming, crime, skin cancer, hair loss, erectile disfunction, etc. Once they have us scared, we're fucked. We vote wrong, we erroneously spend money, etc.

Let's get a grip. Think about it. Regain our composure, and take back our country. Demand leadership. Stop the "hold you nose and vote" The two party system aint working.

Someone suggest a viable alternative...

Or we're Fucked and destined for the route of the Roman Empire and the dodo bird.

2007-01-08T21:38:00.000-05:00

Plutoed

2007-01-08T20:17:00.000-05:00

No longer a planet, Pluto

Pluto'ed

2007-01-08T19:55:00.000-05:00

It was my wish to write something profound for the new year. I struggled and struggled. I saw a recent article about Pluto, and there appeared a blog post.

The American Dialect Society 2006 Word of the Year is Plutoed or "to pluto" as "to demote or devalue someone or something, as happened to the former planet Pluto when the General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union decided Pluto no longer met its definition of a planet."

At one time I thought I could write. I have been Pluoed, by myself. I haven't or do not want it enough. There is a sacrifice required. A pound of flesh to be given that I cannot muster.

I write, at times, well. It is sporadic, not professional. Not enough. If before they toss the last shovel of dirt in my face, I find that bit of inspiration, I intend to write it.

I really enjoy blogging, but most of what I read and have written is tedious bullshit.

The only thing that resonates is honesty and realism. I try and fail.

Plutoed.

2006-12-26T12:39:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas!

Blogger Out of Beta

2006-12-22T00:41:00.000-05:00

Blogger has emerged from there Beta test.

I'm not sure how this will effect my blog. During beta, Blogger ate a couple of my templates - So, I'm a little apprehensive how the new Blogger will work.

The new features are described in a PC Magazine article, Blogger Leaves Beta.

If my blog disappears, you"ll know why.

2006-12-12T11:45:00.000-05:00

Hope

If we lose our way, remember

2006-12-12T11:39:00.000-05:00

The New Colossus
by Emma Lararus
(On a plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty)

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

2006-12-10T15:46:00.000-05:00

Great Pacific War Cover

The Power of The Novel: Hector Bywater and Pearl Harbor

2006-12-10T15:01:00.000-05:00

It amazes me the power and influence of fiction - the novel.

Hector Bywater's 1925 novel The Great Pacific War predicted the sneak attack by Japan that would commence a war between the US and Japan. It also accurately predicted many details of the war that would occur.

Though flawed in some of the details, it was immediately translated into Japanese and reportly had a significant influence on the man who would become the supreme commander of Japanese forces in the Pacific and planner of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Fleet Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto.

An excellent account of the details is reported in an article at www.amercianheritage.com .

It is interesting in a time when truth is becoming hard to find, fiction is becoming more truthful than reported news, memoirs, and media that purports veracity.

Do novels need Bibliographies?

2006-12-07T11:19:00.001-05:00

Norman Mailer's new novel "The Castle in the Forest," includes a list of 126 authors and titles that enriched the book.

Michael Crichton's new novel, "Next," contains a seven-page bibliography listing 36 books that Crichton read while researching the book, along with citations for 12 articles published in newspapers or other publications and 12 Internet sources.

As reported in the International Herald Tribune article "Literature: Do novels really need bibliographies?", this seems to be the trend.

In todays litigious society, is this really necessary?

It seems fiction will likely be more true then memoirs, go figure...

The Plan per Robin Williams

2006-12-05T13:38:00.000-05:00

Robin Williams, wearing a shirt that says "I love New York " in Arabic.

Robin Williams' plan...

"I see a lot of people yelling for peace but I have not heard of a plan for Peace. So, here's one plan."

"The US will apologize to the world for our "interference" in their affairs, Past & present. You know, Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Tojo, Noriega, Milosevic, Hussein, and the rest of those "good ole boys", we will never "interfere" again.

"We will withdraw our troops from all over the world, starting with Germany , South Korea , the Middle East, and the Philippines. They don't want us there. We would station troops at our borders. No one allowed sneaking through holes in the fence."

"All illegal aliens have 90 days to get their affairs together and leave, we'll give them a free trip home. After 90 days the remainder will be gathered up and deported immediately, regardless of whom or where they are. They're illegal!!! France will welcome them."

"All future visitors will be thoroughly checked and limited to 90 days unless given a special permit!!!! No one from a terrorist nation will be allowed in. If you don't like it there, change it yourself and don't hide here. Asylum would never be available to anyone. We don't need any more cab drivers or 7-11 cashiers."

"No foreign "students" over age 21. The older ones are the bombers. If they don't attend classes, they get a "D" and it's back home baby."

"The US will make a strong effort to become self-sufficient energy wise. This will include developing nonpolluting sources of energy but will require a temporary drilling of oil in the Alaskan wilderness. The caribou will have to cope for a while."

"Offer Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries $10 a barrel for their oil. If they don't like it, we'll go someplace else. They can go somewhere else to sell their production. (About a week of the wells filling up the storage sites would be enough.)"

"If there is a famine or other natural catastrophe in the world, we will not "interfere." They can pray to Allah or whomever, for seeds, rain, cement or whatever they need. Besides most of us know that what we give them is stolen or given to the army. The people who need it most get very little, if anything."

"Ship the UN Headquarters to an isolated island someplace. We don't need the spies and fair weather friends here. Besides, the building would make a good homeless shelter or lockup for illegal aliens."

"All Americans must go to charm and beauty school. That way, no one can call us "Ugly Americans" any longer."

"The Language we speak is ENGLISH...learn it...or LEAVE..."

"Now, isn't that a winner of a plan? The Statue of Liberty is no longer saying "Give me your tired, your poor, our huddled masses. She's got a baseball bat and she's yelling, 'you want a piece of me?' "

2006-12-04T15:42:00.000-05:00

Iraq study Group

Full Circle

2006-11-16T21:16:00.000-05:00

I've come full circle...or is it just a circle jerk?

Blogger beta ate my last last blog teplate so I've return from which I came. I'll be working on a new template but I'm trying to write and submit. So if anyone is getting vertigo from my incessant format changes - sorry.

Dan Brown, Da Vinci, & the Supremes

2006-11-14T22:53:00.000-05:00

It was reported yesterday, Dan Brown dodged a big bullet yesterday - do-wop-do-wop.

The US Supreme Court declined to take up and review a federal judge and a federal appeals court panel's dismissal of a lawsuit alleging illegal use of another author's book as a templet for Brown's Da Vinci Code as reported in a Christian Science Monitor article.

There are many things I could say, over 60 millions copies sold, created a genre that didn't exist...yada, yada.

I think he still has to fight the same battle in Brittan.

The trials and tribulations of a bestselling author - I'm jealous.

Veteran's Day 2006

2006-11-12T01:51:00.000-05:00

All politics aside, 3,125 Americans have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Many, many more have been wounded physically and psychologically.

I pray for those who serve, their families, and those have served throughout our tortured history. I wish to honor all of our fallen soldiers. They have given the supreme sacrifice for freedoms we hold dear.

Though I am a veteran, I never served during hostilities. For those who have in the past or do, I salute and honor you.

The following portion of John Donne's poem was an epigraph for Ernest Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls. I hope it is fitting and appropriate.

No man is an island, entire of itself;
every man is a piece of the continent,
a part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less,
as well as if a promontory were,
as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were:
any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind,
and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
it tolls for thee.

2006-11-10T18:33:00.000-05:00

Confessions of a Starving Mystery Writer

Sir Spam-alot

2006-11-10T18:10:00.000-05:00

As Popeye said, "That's all I can stand, I can't standz no more!"

I give up. Spam has infiltrated my posts like locusts. This forced me to abandon the template that I really liked; the K1 Black.

This current template is temporary and I apologize for its Spartan nature.

Sorry for the changes but I recieved 200 spam messages today and I have had enough. I deleted about 5 prior posts infected by over 1000 spam messages.

I will be working on a redesign this coming week.

Quote of the Day: T.S. Eliot

2006-11-08T22:14:00.000-05:00

An election is coming. Universal peace is declared and the foxes have a sincere interest in prolonging the lives of the poultry.
T. S. Eliot

If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?
T. S. Eliot

Devil's Night

2006-10-31T18:31:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween or Devil's Night as they call it in Detroit.

They burn riot, burn, and loot on Devil's Night in Detroit. No pussy trick or treating for them.

Have a safe one...

Artist's Descent

2006-10-27T14:16:00.000-05:00

Artist William Utermohlen chronicles his descent into the dementia of Alzheimers by self portraits painted over the span of nearly forty years as reported in a recent NYT article.

Utermohlen's self portraits, displayed in a multimedia slideshow , are a moving, striking, and saddening evolution of an artist's perception of himself during his slow slide into the depths of this disease.

Mr. Utermohlen, now 73, no longer paints and now lives in a nursing home.

This post was inspired by a post by Austin Kleon.

Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Chandler

2006-10-24T17:23:00.000-05:00

It's hard. It's fucking hard. To write, to create, well written fiction.

My idols did it and until recently I didn't know how hard it was for them too. I thought they all sat down and wrote brilliant words that ended up in thier novels. How niave I was.

They revised. They massaged. They sculpted the words, sentences, and paragraghs.

Epiphany.

Revision, I am learning is the key to good writing.

Revision, revision, revision. It sucks - but there, I believe, is where the gold lies.

The road is tough and the gate is narrow but with revision I hope to plough through it.

I look to the great ones for guidence, inspiration, and a roadmap. I've been told before the ones I admires time has come and gone. I disagree.

Good writing is good writing and it is ageless.

So - ask not for whom the bell tolls...

Learning to Write or Searching for Aristotle?

2006-10-23T18:21:00.000-05:00

Ok, I thought this would be easier. I've written for most of my life. Not a novel, but I've written just the same.

It seems like I'm just learning to walk. I tried short stories as my labratory with some limited success. It just didn't get me there. I am struggling with plot. I want to tell a good story that is character driven but in the end I want a good story.

I've tried to outline several times and it leads me no where. I'm working on Aristotle's three act structure with plot points at the end of act I & II. I guess I am missing a critical element or component.

The only thing I have figured out is the more I write the better I get. Go figure.

Words of Wisdom on Writing

2006-10-14T16:49:00.000-05:00

10 Writing Rules from Elmore Leonard
drawing by Austin Kleon

Quote of the Day: You

2006-10-07T09:30:00.000-05:00

Don't compromise yourself. You are all you've got.
Janis Joplin

DUI Stop

2006-10-03T22:49:00.000-05:00


Don't get caught drunk driving

2006-10-02T21:33:00.000-05:00

Grief

A fiction scene: Grief

2006-10-02T21:09:00.000-05:00

Breath came heavy and labored after an eleven-hour drive south under stress and grief Detective Harry Beam was unfamiliar with. He witnessed and investigated all manners of death from the heinous to the benign. Never had he suffered the loss of a parent until yesterday. His mother died the day before. He was notified yesterday. It stung. It hurt. It seemed unbearable.

Heart attack. They said. Advanced lung cancer but the heart attack killed her. No real surprise, the lung cancer. She smoked three packs of cigarettes a day for the last fifty-five years. She was a poster child for lung cancer, suffering debilitating coughing fits that would last for increasing durations.

He sat quietly in front of the decaying house of his youth, visited just months before. He lit a cigarette. Now, only one person still lives in this home - his father. The front yard had been cleaned up and the trees, trees that Harry and his mother had planted together in his early teens were trimmed and neat but the house seemed vacant. The smells were familiar and briefly took his thoughts back in time to when she was younger. His heart sank further.

Harry sensed that an integral part of the house and him were lost, never to return. His mother never was a good housekeeper but she kept the house and yard filled exotic smells, sounds, and sights. Fresh spices grew, rare flowers, tropical birds and fish were kept, cooking, religious music and sermons from the radio were pervasive. It was all gone.

He tried to picture her, in his mind’s eye, when she had been happy and alive. It was hard to do. She had had a very hard life, filled with abuse, death, disease, mental illness, addiction, poverty, and abandonment. The first glimpses of happiness Harry witnessed were while he was in his teens but they were few and far between. He moved away at seventeen and rarely visited.

He never thought it would hit him this hard. They weren’t close, their relationship strained and tortured throughout his childhood and young adulthood. But he loved her. And now he missed her. Longed to tell her all the things he did not say and now would never be said. She was likely in a better place. She was a strong believer in God and now had been called home.

He entered the house to the faint remnants of her existence. It was hard to bear. His father sat at the kitchen table smoking an unfiltered Camel. He didn’t look far behind her, health wise. He looked dazed.
“Harry?” A grim smile came across his lips. “How was your trip?”
“Long.”
“I figured. You drive straight through?”
“Yeah. Eleven hours. My butt is sore.”
“Can I fix you something to eat? You want some coffee or iced tea?”
“Na. Just want to come see you before I checked into the hotel. You ok?”
“As well as can be expected. Your brother has been really helpful. I’m not sure what I’d have done without him. You sure I can’t fix you something to eat?”
“No. Any way I can help?”
“Everything is taken care of. All the arrangements have been made. Visitation will be tomorrow from 7 to 8 p.m. at Southern Memorial Funeral Home and there’ll be a graveside service at 11 p.m. the following morning. You know it’s great to see you, I’m just sorry it’s under these circumstances.”
“I’m beat. I’m heading to the hotel to crash for tonight. I’ll see you tomorrow at the visitation.”
“Ok. I’ll see you there.”

Harry attended the visitation but appalled to find out the funeral home had charged his father about ten thousand dollars for a barebones casket, the visitation, and burial. One last fucking by the system on the way out, Harry thought, death, taxes, and funeral charges – all inescapable. They charged a thousand dollars just to dig the hole.

Harry looked with hesitation, into the casket. She looked at peace. More at peace than Harry had seen her in years. Visiting with people he didn’t know or know him left Harry feeling sick. An old friend of his mothers told him that in tenth grade she had been offered a scholarship to the University of North Carolina but turned it down when she got pregnant with Harry. Guilt racked him.

He slipped out of the funeral home early and headed straight for the bar next to the hotel. He proceeded to get drunk. Very drunk. Vodka had been his mother’s drink of choice and in her honor he drank it – excessively.

Hung over, the next morning he arrived late at the gravesite to hear people that didn’t know her speak platitudes and praise about her. He felt he may throw up as he choked back tears. He wanted to speak. He wanted to tell about who she really was. How she tried to live a good life, sacrificed, helped those in need to her detriment. But what we be the point. Harry knew. His father knew. Those helped knew. That’s all that mattered. Harry stood by the casket and put his hand on the cool metal top. He roved his hand and reached down. pulled a red rose from an arrangement of flowers at his feet, and placed it gently on top where his hand was.

"Good bye." Harry walked away from the service, got in his car, and started the long drive back to Detroit.

Regrets came in waves. The farther he got away, the harder the waves hit. For the last twenty-five years he abandoned his mother, as she had been abandoned by most in her life. It seemed to Harry that life was continuing a vicious circle. Harry reviewed his relationships with women. The failures. His relationship with his mother. Its failure.

It was a long ride back. He began to long for Detroit, its blood, loss of life, pain, and suffering that only it can provide.

2006-09-25T13:28:00.000-05:00

Lightning Strikes - Fiction Coming Soon

Death

2006-09-18T00:06:00.000-05:00

My mother died and i have asked my brother to help me blog. I have lost it. sorry.

2006-09-15T21:14:00.000-05:00

Storm on the horizon

Summer Ends

2006-09-13T20:21:00.002-05:00

The summer season comes to an end and the thought of winter heating fuel bills makes me queasy.

Gotta love it. Oil companies in action.

The beauty of fall is on the horizon, leaves change, a chill in the air.

This is suppose to be my year but the months are quickly slipping away. Things are falling into place and the writing is coming back.

So it goes..

2006-09-06T19:16:00.000-05:00

Smoldering

Quote of the Day: Inspiration and Life

2006-09-06T18:49:00.000-05:00

In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.
Albert Schweitzer

Pimp My Blog

2006-09-04T17:18:00.000-05:00

For those of you who live in a cave, under a rock, or in Canada there's a popular show on MTV called Pimp My Ride. The show takes someones car, usually a less fortunate persons (usually the car is a piece of shit), and fixes it up in maximum style, comfort, and luxury.

I am hijacking this concept for my blog.

I am requesting and hoping that all who stop by drop a suggestion as how to make this blog the best in my chosen genre and corner of the blog universe, i.e. Pimp My Blog.

So please leave any suggestions. They will be greatfully appreciated.

Detroit

2006-09-03T14:14:00.000-05:00

Detroit.

Most say it, "Dee-Troit." A city with curruption, decay, and a faded beauty that duplicates where I think America is heading in coming years if we don't change our ways.

A squandered wealth built on the automobile industry slowly sliding into the abyss.

Detroit is the city I have picked as the location for several short stories and novels. It has everything the mystery and suspense genre requires.

I will be posting some stories soon. Thank you all, those who have continued to follow the antics of The Starving Mystery Writer. I think I may have removed my head from my ass and am back on track.

I hope.

Comments Now Working

2006-09-03T13:51:00.000-05:00

The comments now work. Please click on the number beside the blog title. Thanks.

RJB

Quote of the Day: Fellini on Dreams

2006-09-02T19:24:00.000-05:00

"Our dreams are our real life. My fantasies and obsessions are not only my reality, but the stuff of which my films are made."
Fredrico Fellini

Confessions of a Starving Mystery Writer

2006-08-30T23:21:00.000-05:00

I have developed a renewed interest in writing and blogging so I am working on a new look for this blog. Please bear with me as I figure out how to migrate all the headings, settings, and links to the new template.

Thanks for stopping by. New substantive content will be posted very soon.

RJB

Quote of the Day: Darkness

2006-08-26T18:27:00.000-05:00

In a real dark night of the soul, it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day.
F. Scott Fitzgerald

2006-08-23T16:19:00.000-05:00

Katrina August 28, 2005 at stongest point NASA sat.

Talent

2006-08-07T09:35:00.000-05:00

A man lays prostrate before his God. The man is neither young nor old, fat nor thin, attractive nor ugly. His life is passing him by and he is not fullfiling his life's purpose nor does he realize what his purpose may be.

He cries out to God "I have nothing left, I have nothing to give, to be, to aspire. Please give me talent."

God is silent.

"I look back and my best days of youth are gone, I look forward and all I see is infirmity, old age, and decline. I have yet to accomplish a thing and know not what to do next. Please help me."

God is silent.

"I dispare, I pray, I drink, and still talent eludes me. What must I do?"

God remains silent but stirs and a breeze blows upon the man.

"Dear God, if you will not answer, please at least give me a sign."

The man becomes aware that he is not prostrate but sitting at his desk. His face is down on a crisp piece of white paper. In his hand is a fountain pen. Written on the page in his script is "Write, write, write...you damned fool."

He begins to cry and then to write.

Quote of the Day: In Search of Honest Prose

2006-08-01T15:26:00.000-05:00

The hardest thing in the world to do is to write straight honest prose on human beings. First you have to know the subject; then you have to know how to write. Both take a lifetime to learn…

Ernest Hemingway

Sucking the Devil's C*ck...

2006-07-05T12:38:00.000-05:00

Selling out. I've resisted it my whole life, beat of a different drummer and all that. Path not taken. Yada, yada. Selling out has different levels and each industry has its pinacle. I could mention a few bestselling authors but...

I have never worked for anyone for very long but lately I've been tempted by the Devil. The illusive big money job. Offered. Sike. No deal. But, God how I wanted it.

There seems to be rules to life that I can niether figure out nor adhear to. After months of anticipation I am back to the drawing board.

I think I'm going to write about it...and then drink about it. Maybe not in that order, maybe simultaniously.

"They" say for ever closed door, several open. Is there a selling out window, or do I just get on my knees?

The Unknown Destination...IT

2006-05-31T19:08:00.000-05:00

For anyone still visits this blog, as you have seen, I have been in the slow slide away from posting with any regularity. Unfortunately, my writing has suffered the same fate.

This wasn't exactly by design. A few things occured that shifted my focus away from writing and back towards life and the "real job".

Wandering. I guess that's what the last few months have been. As Moses did for 40 years in the dessert, I, between projects always, and I mean always wander the tortures of the damned.

Like a pinball I bounce between conflicting and often diametrically opposed vocations and eventually something pops or smacks me in the head as to the appropriate direction my life is to take.

Well, as of today, I have many balls bouncing - in that pinball machine - with a possible tilt in the offing. I continue, futilely, to pump more and more quarters into the damn machine with little hint of the end game. Life, as I know it, will definitely change...

But, where will it all lead?

The Dark Hallway

2006-05-01T14:24:00.000-05:00

Jason Evans had a pretty cool contest last week to write a 250 word story about the below picture. The 250 words that follows was my entry....

I lay, gasping for breath, bleeding from a sucking chest wound, face down on the floor, just below my favorite Monet painting. I felt the cold wood floor against my cheek and tasted something bitter and metallic as the puddle of blood reached and surrounded my face and lips. Bathed in the dim light by two antique Victorian lamps, my vision blurred as life began to leave my body.

The painting had been purchased at a Sotheby’s Auction in New York after I had won my biggest divorce case several years ago, my lover’s case. This pleasant memory ebbed and flowed as my breathing became more ragged and I started to loose consciousness; I struggled to take in air but my lungs wouldn’t cooperate. I tried to stand only to feel the icy steel of the blade that had been shoved into my chest only moments before against my neck.

I slumped back to the floor, resting now on my side facing the light, to look up at my attacker. Haloed by light, her golden hair shimmered as her curls gently framed her face, an angry face, and a face I knew very well.

I looked into her eyes as she shoved the knife again into my chest. My gaze fell on the painting, the painting that I loved, killed by the woman I loved, as life left darkness and silence encased me.

With my last breath, I forced out my final word, “Why?”

“Liar!” She whispered.

Belly Up....to Bar

2006-04-27T16:04:00.000-05:00

There’s this place I used to frequent just across the street from Yale in New Haven, Connecticut – its name is Bar. That’s right just Bar. Future Presidents, Congressman and women, Senators, and power brokers congregated there on any given night to kill brain cells. I spent many nights there many nights doing the same.

In the spirit of the Bunions and inspired by Jaye, I will heretofore attempt to create a fictionalized version of that bar populated by the blog characters that I know and love. Hopefully I will not insult anyone to badly.

So there’s this place I go for a drink, conversation, and to ogle the mental musings of some pretty exception folks and the also ogle the asses of beautiful women. Quirky, yes. Opinionated. I’d say so. It’s not the place for the weak of heart. It’s a dirt floor, sock ‘em in the eye, bar where intellectuals, writers, politicians, poets, artists, want-a-be’s, never was’s, never will be’s, the famous, and infamous, all drink from the same trough. The Blog Bar, no place like it on the planet.

It was a firehouse at one time with all the firehouse accoutrements still affixed. On warm summer evenings the roll-up overhead doors are opened to the street and well worn picnic tables are moved out to the sidewalk. The walls and furniture inside is a cross between art deco and late twentieth century house of ill repute. When the wind blows in the right direction, the strong odor of stale beer, urine, and vomit waft through the place and commingle with clove cigarettes and the hint of pot being smoked in the bathrooms. I dig this place though the crowd is rough and fights breakout often.

The regulars are at the oval bar as I take my usual seat facing the opened overheads. I ask for my usual two fingers of Glenlivet on crushed ice as I hear Ivan down at the end of the bar saying something loudly about a Greek God with a large penis. Erik Ivan James nurses an orange juice and looks at Ivan with skepticism.
“Yes, just like the poetry of Dylan and Green Day, there is a Greek God that punished pillagers of fields by sodomizing them.” Ivan says as he sucks down his last gulp of Glenfiddich.
“Seems a bit harsh, don’t you think?”
“He was a God with an enormous penis, he’s just using the tools at hand. Barkeep, another round.”

Sandra enters the conversation but rambles on with a dissertation that goes through the history of Greek Mythology, the average length of an North American man’s penis, comparative anatomy of the New England Newt, and why woman don’t pee standing up and I forgot what Ivan originally was talking about. I guzzled my drink and ordered another.

M.G. long missing from the scene enters the conversation and begins to argue syntax, “ly”, and “was” usage with Sandra. Sandra remains on the penis topic and then implies something about masturbation and bestiality. This peaks Ivan's interest, so he buys Sandra a drink and sits down next to her. To piss M.G. off she starts excessively using adjectives and switch ing POV and tense throughout her lengthy diatribe.

Ms. Snark walks in and is immediately surrounded by writers who hit on her. No, not the trying to get laid “hitting on”, more of a publication mating dance. She is barraged with a thousand unanswerable questions of to seduce an agent, get signed, and get published. She shrugs them off with, “write a damn good book, good query letter, and follow-up. Now get out of my face.”

J.A. sitting at the very end of the bar, having had way too many Scotches, spits a stream of alcohol into the back bar as he cracks up and begins to pontificate about the necessity and benefits of self-promotion and marketing. He ends his tirade with “Fuck SASEs”.

Bernita sits quietly at the bar appart from the others drawing coat hanger cartoons on the bar napkins. I holler across the bar to her , "how's the book coming? Are you putting a lot of sex in it?"
She scowls at me and then smiles, "You men, sex, sex, sex. Is that all you ever think about?"
"Yeah, that and food."
"Well, sex was very prevalent in Medieval times and a time traveling modern woman will have a twenty first century sex drive so I think you"ll like it." She said as she went back to her drawing.
"I'm sure I will."

Microe, Pammy, and 10-8-ious, are all playing pool and talking about having a blog-in that never seems to happen. They are all smoking cigars, drinking cognac, and are in various stages of undress. Wild Bill is sitting in a chair behind it all with a big smile on his face. There conversation turns to hot tubbing.

Jaye walks in with low-rise jeans and a bright midriff shirt. I eye the crack of her ass as she sits down in the open barstool next to me.

“What the hell are you looking at?” She says with a smile.

“A soccer mom wearing low rise jeans? I was looking for your tattoo.”

“Oh, I think you're looking in the wrong place.”

“I couldn’t remember where you said it was.”

“Not there.”

“Sorry, men’s eyes are like a magnet to a female butt crack. You expose it and our eyes go right there. We can’t control it. It’s Pavlovian. Are you going to show it to me?”

“Yeah, right. I don't think my husband would approve. When are you going to start blogging and writing again?”

“I don’t know. Life keeps getting in the way. I’m trying to make a living. I have a new love interest. I’m still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up.”

“Don’t we all.” She says as she shakes her head. “Don’t we all. Hey bartender, what’s a gal gotta do to get a drink around here…”

Tides: a poem...sort of

2006-04-22T20:10:00.000-05:00

Tides roll,
as prisms reflect unseen hues,

Winds whisper and hint,
of dreams
that batter shores and shoals,
with a journey beyond conception,

Fate fades,
precious reality rests
where the Sun sets

Thoughts of youth subside,
reside and resolve

the ultimate,
the inevitable,
will occur,

as tides roll,

sun sets,

changes,

reflects,

and fades. . .

by RJB

The Big Litter Box in the Sky

2006-04-15T16:57:00.000-05:00

Once there was a cat in my life and now there is none. The once was a woman in my life and now there is a new one. The cat was one its ninth life when it entered my life, the woman was, well…

Mystery writers seem attracted to cats for what ever reason. Perhaps it’s their independent nature with uncontrollable personalities that border on neurotic.

My cat was originally revived with an oxygen acetylene torch at the manufacturing plant I was running at the time, after a young child had flung the poor kitten from the hayloft at a nearby barn. I thought if it had the spirit to survive it deserved a good home, so I had it for the last seven years.

I had a love hate relationship with it. Its name was Dino after Dean Martin, though I mostly called it Honey. A mutt, orange and white, with the temperament of a pit bull. Honey began as an indoor cat until I was held over in China a week and I came back to a very pissed off cat that had torn up parts of the basement where I had left it. So Honey became an outdoor cat from then on, only venturing back inside when I felt sorry for it on brutally cold days or I was good and drunk and it was the only thing on this planet that cared about me.

It fought constantly with anything; raccoons, possums, other cats, me. It would come home bloodied, with shredded ears, fur of unknown animals in its claws. It developed a Elvis sneer. Its tongue stuck out constantly. It developed a flatulence problem that would usually rear its head around the female in my life. It all fit its attitude. It became quite the hunter bringing me all manner of critters and leaving it at my doorstep.

It used to disappear for a couple weeks at a time and I feared each time it would not return. It’s been gone for about two months now and this time I think it has finally gone to the big litter box in the sky. I miss that battered cat. It’s funny how an animal can enter your life and change it. Much has changed for over the time I had it.

Jobs, women, life.

I never really thought of myself as a cat person but that cat filed a void in my life for many years through many relationships and many ups and downs. I hope where ever it is something or someone does the same for it.

Life and Writing, an assessment

2006-04-06T09:22:00.000-05:00

Why does life seem to get in the way of all plans?

I had intended to be well on my way towards completition of my novel, have several short stories submitted for publication, have the business book that I am co-authoring nearing completion, finish a play that I'm in the second act of, etc., etc., etc.

Life interviens. Work. Dating. Career. Pursuit of love. Dissappointments. Triumphs.

The creative flame that was once burning brightly is flickering, the heart still beats, but the hand no long writes. The interest and passion is still there and my mind turns to it briefly during the day but demands for other things sidetrack me. I can see why Raymond Chandler was not too prolific. To live to write, you must live.

The life I wish to live is no longer nine to five, punch the clock, get the pension. Money, for sure, is very important but relationships are more so. The American dream, as advertised, no longer holds any interest.

So, off I go, chasing dragons to slay, damsils to save, and to write.

To write.

I am recommiting to writing every day. If it's any good, I'll post some here...

Quotes of the Day: Love via Sally

2006-04-05T21:05:00.000-05:00

"if i love you with all of my heart, she said what will you give me? and then she stopped and said i didn't have to answer that because she was going to do it any way." -kahlil gibran, the beloved

"the thought of you sings, smiles,shines, and dances like a joyous fire that gives out a thousand colors. and penetrating warmth."
-gustave flaubert

"...love was just saying ah what the heck and letting go, and accepting,...yes, love was accepting."
-rick bass, the watch

"once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see each other whole against the sky."
-rainer maria rilke

" the greatest weakness of most humans, is their hesitancy to tell others how much they love them."
-o.a. battista

"what is a friend?
a soul dwelling in two bodies."
-aristotle

"silence is holy. it draws people together, because only those who are comfortable with each other can sit without speaking. this is a great paradox." -nicholas sparks

"the brain may take advice, but not the heart, and love, having no geography, knows no boudries: weight and sink it deep, no matter, it will rise and find the surface: and why not? any love is natural and beautiful that lies within a person's nature; only hypocrites would hold a man responsible for what he loves, emotional illiterates and those of rightious envy, who in their agitated concern, mistake so frequently the arrows pointing to heaven to the ones that leads to hell."
-capote, other voices, other rooms

Quotes of the Day: Changes

2006-04-04T19:06:00.000-05:00

The changes in our life must come from the impossibility to live otherwise than according to the demands of our conscience not from our mental resolution to try a new form of life.
Leo Tolstoy

Nature gives to every time and season some beauties of its own; and from morning to night, as from the cradle to the grave, it is but a succession of changes so gentle and easy that we can scarcely mark their progress.
Charles Dickens

For me, a landscape does not exist in its own right, since its appearance changes at every moment; but the surrounding atmosphere brings it to life - the light and the air which vary continually. For me, it is only the surrounding atmosphere which gives subjects their true value. Claude Monet

Colors, like features, follow the changes of the emotions.
Pablo Picasso

2006-04-04T19:01:00.000-05:00

Insanity

Quote of the Day: Dichotomy & Creativity

2006-03-28T18:00:00.000-05:00

Never permit a dichotomy to rule your life, a dichotomy in which you hate what you do so you can have pleasure in your spare time. Look for a situation in which your work will give you as much happiness as your spare time.
Pablo Picasso

The chief enemy of creativity is "good" sense.
Pablo Picasso

Quotes of the Day: Friendship & Love

2006-03-21T10:00:00.000-05:00

Friendship is a single soul dwelling in two bodies.
Aristotle

There is no remedy for love but to love more.
Henry David Thoreau

Short Story...Under The Bridge

2006-03-16T08:42:00.000-05:00

Click.
“Son of a bitch!” Trevor Barrow removed the cold gun muzzle from his temple and let his pistol hand fall and began to sob. “I can’t do anything right.”
He leaned back against his late model, dark blue, Mercedes. His double-breasted suit was rumpled, a silk tie hung loose around his thick neck. He drew a half empty fifth of Glenlivet Scotch to his lips and gulped. Wiping his lips on a shirtsleeve, he smeared Scotch across the raised monogrammed cuff.
Trevor’s car sat under a bridge in a seedy part of downtown Detroit between two abandoned factories. The cars exhaust fumes commingled with the wafting sewer steam to create a toxic fog that enveloped him. The acrid smell of rotting garbage, urine, and sewer gas made him cough as a chill went through him.
Flames licked out of a nearby rusty 55-gallon barrel. He sat the bottle on the roof of the car and steadied it. In a quick movement, he racked the slide to chamber a round. Shadows danced in a semi-circle from the radiant light.
With a grimace, he placed the gun to his head and screamed, “AAAAHHHH” He again pulled the trigger.
Click. As the hammer hit the firing pin the clip slid out of the gun and hit the asphalt with a thud.
“Damn it!” Trevor quickly picked up the clip and slid it back in.
“What the hell you doin’?’” a voice asked. It seemed to come from a pile of newspapers by the burning barrel.
“Huh?” Startled, Trevor pulled the gun from his head and pointed it at the newspapers. “Who’s there?”
“Can’t you find a better place to off yourself than in my house?”
Trevor scanned the area. “Who’s there?”
“God, you dumb ass. Go find somewhere else for your crap. You’re disturbing my peace.”
“Who are you? What are you doing here?” Trevor stumbled over and kicked the newspapers. Underneath, found only garbage and concrete.
“What are going to do, hit me with that thing? Throw it at me? It aint worth a flying... If it were, you’d have been done the first pull. You poor lucky bastard.”
Trevor squinted and peered through the darkness beyond the flames. He could barely make out the silhouette of a tall skinny man leaning against a pylon of the bridge.
“Come out of there. Whoever you are,” Trevor said as he waved his gun, motioning the shadow out.
“You are a little confused, aren’t you buddy?”
“Huh?”
“You have no right to order me to do anything, and pointing that piece of junk at me is meaningless. My will to live is less than yours. So piss off.”
“Look, I’m not a murderer. I want to kill myself, not you. I won’t hurt you. Just come out.”
The shadow seemed to ponder the situation for a few seconds, and then said, “Alright, I’ll come out, but put that gun down on the car and bring the bottle over here.”
Trevor backed over to the car, set the gun on the hood, grabbed the bottle off the roof, and walked back toward the voice.
The man stooped to pick something up and then slowly emerged from the shadows. He looked haggard and malnourished with long gray hair and matching beard. His weather beaten face had a hangdog look. A threadbare tweed suit hung lifelessly on his frail frame. It looked as though it had been an expensive suit sometime in the past.
In one hand, balanced against his hip, he held two aluminum lawn chairs with faded floral print webbing. He unfolded each one, set them by the burning drum, and said, “Cop a squat and hand me that bottle.”
Trevor sat down and passed the man the bottle. The man uncorked it, took two big gulps, and choked, “Damn that’s the good, I aint had Glenlivet in years.”
They sat for a few moments unsure of what to say. The man finally broke the silence by saying, “What’s your problem junior? You evidently have money. Nice car. Fine clothes. Looks like a Rolex on your wrist. What gives?”
Trevor stared beyond the barrel flames to the Detroit River. He could hear waves breaking against the bridge’s pylons. Tires thumped on bridge grating as cars entered and left Canada. He muttered, “First thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers. ”
“Shakespeare? King Henry the Sixth… What tragedy has befallen you son?”
“I am a lawyer.”
“Ok, that sucks, but it’s not worth killing yourself over.”
“You don’t get it.”
“No, I guess I don’t. But I used to be a lawyer, long ago.”
Trevor laughed, shook his head, and looked him over, “Yeah? You must have been a real good one.”
“Twenty years ago, I was. This was a $1,500 suit back then.” He brushed dirt from one of the lapels.
“So, you’re a homeless lawyer, just my luck. Did God send you to be my guardian angel?”
“Right. I’ve been living under this bridge for twenty damn years just waiting for your dumb ass to come down here to kill yourself. Did you inherit your money or what? You can’t be much of an attorney.”
“I am . . . I’m too good of an attorney.”
“Ok, I’ll bite. What kind of an attorney are you?”
“Defense.”
The man began to howl with laughter, “Great.”
“What’s so funny?”
“I was a prosecutor.” He said trying to contain himself.
“Look, I’m very good. I have it all. I was educated at Yale. I have a mansion, the summer homes, an apartment in New York, a yacht, sports cars, trophy wife, mistress, and all the money I can spend. I just can’t do it anymore. I can’t take it.”
“The pressure?”
“No. Getting people off.”
“That’s what defense attorneys do - the good ones anyway.”
“I don’t want it. Look old man you’re not exactly in a position to be giving me advice. You live under a bridge for Christ sake.”
“Ah, taking the Lord’s name in vane and insulting me. Tisk.Tisk.”
“Sorry. I just don’t know what to do.”
“Quit. Sell everything. Move south where it’s warm.”
“It’s not that easy. Something happened. Something I can’t live with.”
“You can live with whatever you want to live with, junior. I walked away from the prosecutor’s job because I couldn’t do it anymore either.”
“Why?”
The man stood and held his hands close to the barrel’s flames. His brow furrowed as he pondered an answer. “That was a long time ago. I try not to think about it, actually do everything I can to forget it.” He paused for a long moment. He started to speak. Stopped and then said, “It was a murder case.”
“So, was mine.” Trevor said.
The man hesitated again, “I sent a guy to Jackson for a murder. He was raped and killed the first week he got there. When it happened, I thought, good riddance.”
“That’s what prosecutors do. You can’t control what happens in prison.”
“Yeah, but during the trial there was something I didn’t like. It didn’t feel right. The defendant didn’t seem to fit the crime.”
“The jury must have thought there was enough evidence to convict.”
“It all turned on the testimony of a cop. A cop we later found to be dirty. He admitted to perjury and planting evidence in my murder case in exchange for a plea agreement. But by then, the defendant was dead.”
“Oh shit.”
“Yeah, an innocent man died, and I lost faith in myself and in the system. The line between good guys and bad had become too blurred.” The man turned to face Trevor; tears glistened in the corners of his eyes. “I’ve been down here ever since.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Yeah, you said that.”
“No, I mean, that’s kind of what happened to me, but from the other side. I got a guilty man acquitted two weeks ago. He was accused of Murder in the First, Aggravated First Degree Criminal Sexual Conduct, and Use of a Firearm during the commission of a felony. The works. He walked…because of me.”
“So, that’s what you do. That’s your job. Don’t beat yourself up over it. How do you know the guy’s guilty?”
“It was on the news a couple hours ago. They caught him burying two naked young girls in his back yard. The news reported evidence of rape…”
They both said nothing for a few moments. Sirens roared in the distance. Trevor’s car ran quietly, waves sloshed against the pylons. Tires thumped above on the bridge grating.
The old man walked over to the car and picked up the gun. He pulled out the clip, looked at it, tapped it against his hip and slid it back into place. He racked the slide, pointed it towards the burning barrel and pulled the trigger.
The gun recoiled, emitted a loud pop, and a muzzle flash as one round pierced the barrel dead center. Embers and ashes plumed into the air as he shook his head and said, “Having nothing, nothing can he loose.”
He flipped the gun around, grasped it by the slide and placed the grip back into Trevor’s hand. The old man slowly returned to his lawn chair, leaned back, and stretched his legs. He appeared to drift off to sleep.
Trevor shook his head and stuck the gun into his waistband. “Shakespeare.” He walked over to the car and opened the door. “Since I’ve got nothing to loose now, I’m thinking North Carolina. You want to go?”
The man didn’t answer. His eyes were closed.
“Hey?” Trevor yelled at the man.
The man didn’t move.
Trevor walked over and touched the man’s shoulder. He still didn’t move. He shook him gently. No response. Taking the man by the wrist, Trevor felt for a pulse. There was none.
“Finally, he has peace.” Trevor walked back over to the car, got in, and drove away. Shaking his head he said to noone, “ Having nothing, nothing can he loose…”

Quote of the Day: Nietzsche

2006-03-15T09:51:00.000-05:00

A woman may very well form a friendship with a man, but for this to endure, it must be assisted by a little physical antipathy.

Ah, women. They make the highs higher and the lows more frequent.

And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
Friedrich Nietzsche

Distraction and the Blog

2006-03-14T08:04:00.000-05:00

Life has gotten busy of late, in very good ways. Blogging, unforunately took a back seat. I have decided to get back into the dating world and restart my career in consulting and law. I've found an office, started wearing a suit, tie, underwear, and socks and re-entered society. I'm working out daily, eating right, and consuming less alcohol.

This past week I've returned to court, the art scene, and smoozed past and future clients. I've been out on an excellent date with a beautiful, intelligent, woman and traveled a bit.

These distractions were well needed and long in coming. Writing and blogging are now back on my agenda and you should see a notable difference in the topics I choose to blog about.

Thanks for stopping by...

Quotes of the Day: Of Writing, Risk & Love

2006-03-14T07:57:00.000-05:00

If you do not breathe through writing, if you do not cry out in writing, or sing in writing, then don't write, because our culture has no use for it.
Anais Nin

It takes courage to push yourself to places that you have never been before... to test your limits... to break through barriers. And the day came when the risk it took to remain tight inside the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.
Anais Nin

Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you do not know what it will bring back, a new life, a new friend, a new love, a new country.
Anais Nin

Being Published...at what cost?

2006-03-08T21:40:00.000-05:00

To be published, at what cost? The end game is getting published, but with the current proliferation of e-publishing, vanity publishing and the like ,what does a writer gain for being published at any cost?

As some of you know, I am in a mystery writers critique group. A recent potential new writer came to our last meeting and was so distraught over her recent publishing experience that she had been unable to write since publication. She received no advance, no editting, and no marketing, advertising, or distribution of her book. She did give up the rights to her book and the characters involved thereof. I was wondering why the hell she would want to be published this bad, but really you and I know why.

In the pursuit of publication, authors give up too much, with little in return. Preditors and Editors Website is supposedly a watch dog but I have heard horror stories from writers that have published with houses that receive passing marks or negative marks and authors had an opposite experience.

Where do you draw the line? When is what they offer, not an offer at all?

The horror. The Horror.

Quotes of the Day: Past & Future

2006-03-06T19:05:00.000-05:00

What is past is prologue.
William Shakespeare

I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.
William Shakespeare

The only thing we know about the future is that it will be different.
Peter F. Drucker

The best way to predict the future is to create it.
Peter F. Drucker

Creativity

2006-03-04T13:53:00.000-05:00

For some unknown reason, creativity courses again through my mind. After a prolonged fallow time, writing creatively has returned in full force.

Why now? Personal resolution? Dark clouds passed? The storm has moved beyond me?

I have no idea why, it just happened.

How do you spur creativity? Go to a special physical or mental place? Is there an exercise?

Quotes of the Day: Creativity

2006-03-04T13:50:00.000-05:00

The chief enemy of creativity is "good" sense.
Pablo Picasso

Almost always, the creative dedicated minority has made the world better.
Martin Luther King, Jr.

The creative writer uses his life as well as being its victim; he can control, in his work, the self-presentation that in actuality is at the mercy of a thousand accidents. John Updike

Astray: A short story beginning or a scene

2006-03-02T17:10:00.000-05:00

Detective Harry Beam sat way outside his jurisdiction in front of a disheveled house in rural North Carolina. As he stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray of a non-descript black sedan, he opened the door and stepped out on the gravel-strewn driveway. He walked and entered the disintegrating side door of the house without knocking. The air was thick with grease, cooking seafood, and cigarette smoke.

A one-eyed black pit bull lay motionless on the floor in front of the kerosene heater. He stepped over it. An older woman slowly breathed oxygen through the airlines fished throughout the door casings of the decaying house from an oxygen machine that wheezed silently with every breath. She sat at the Formica kitchen table in a well-worn nightgown, aged glasses, no teeth and a complacent look. Very pretty at one time, now her hair was black with gray streaks, matted and hung in sweaty stringy clumps. Now she was just old. Beauty remained but very faint, hidden, subdued, and masked by old age and infirmity. Her exhalations came in deep gasps. She still loved life, fast escaping her, but could do nothing about it - despair, boredom, and pain on her face. She sipped iced tea.

Harry sat down at the table with her.

The furnace had broken thirty some years ago when he was a teen, since then hand held kerosene heaters heated only the main three rooms; kitchen, den, living room – all the other rooms remained unheated. Mornings, he awoke during high school with frost on he inside of my windows and sometimes on my bed covers. He slept fully dressed and bolted from the house at first light.

The old man wore a crisp white shirt, ironed black slacks, a skinny black tie, and a full white beard and mustache to cover his severe weight loss. The reason for business dress ended long ago, but he continued. He busied himself. He cooked. He waited on her and Harry. Lovingly - without complaint or hesitation. He looked like he now weighed about ninety pounds.

The old man slid a plate in front of Harry, shrimp, deviled crab, homemade macaroni and cheese, and steaming collard greens with big hunks of fatback dispersed thought. Harry devoured the shrimp first. There is nothing like butterflied pan-fried shrimp.

As Harry sat trying not to weep, he stared at the two people he barely recognized, who gave him life and raised him the best they could.

“You been to the doctor lately Dad?”

“Those bastards? I’m not going to them for minor aches and pains.” He said with a thick southern drawl.

“You look like you’ve lost a lot of weight since I was here last.”

“Na.”

“Dad, you know those ties are way out of style.”

“Harry, they always come back.” He shook his head and sighed, “I’ve been wearing these ties since the 50’s, and they always come back in style.” This was a standard interchange and he was right.

The spring in his step gone, the quick joke, the hearty laugh no more. Even the barbs poked back and forth were gone. Harry’s and his father never spoke of anything of substance. Always Notre Dame football, hats, ties, anything but life. Now, with his life was near its end Harry stumbled for words.

“Dad?”

“Yeah, son?”

“Can I have some more shrimp?”

“Sure.” He threw six more fist sized butterflied, crab stuffed shrimp in a big black wrought iron pan with a big hunk of Crisco. It sizzled as he stirred with a spatula. “These are prawns, ya know. They’ll be done in a few minutes. You want something to drink? You need cocktail sauce? Hot sauce?”

“Some iced tea.”

His father pulled out a Ball jar, filled it with ice and tea and sat it on the table.

The house, once a good-sized five bedroom, housed and raised four boys years ago, but now it crumbled around them. Yellow nicotine, grease, and thick dust dripped down the walls, paint pealed, the whole house cried for attention. Attention that would never come from it’s current owners.

Death hung in the air, thick and humid. A smell so thick Harry could taste it.

Shrimp, crab, and collards was also thick in the air. Smells of a childhood that had rallied friends and neighbors to this house in droves for many years and still. Any time of the day or night to have Dad pull out pots or pans and cook a meal. The Southern way. No one could be hungery. Feed everyone. They could barely afford to feed themselves but they did not complain. Don’t talk. Eat.

The family was never close. The turbulent 70’s snuffed out any thing that Harry had in common with them. Vietnam. Free love. Hippy culture. His dad was forty, when he was born, and my age now, was and is a complete enigma. They very rarely spoke, and if they did, it was usually because Harry had fucked up in some major way – and he fucked up often in my youth and more in his teen years.

By the time Harry was eighteen, he had totaled the family car, been arrested several times for drunk driving, shoplifting, assault, grand theft, auto theft, and many, many, other crimes. He had joined the Army to cleanse his record and get needed direction and discipline in his life. It had worked but distanced him from his parents.

So now, Harry sat at his table once again. Being fed again near end of his father’s journey, wanting to apologize and ask forgiveness.

“Dad?”

“Yeah son.”

“That’s some damn good shrimp. Is the crab from down at the marina.”

“Na. That’s some frozen crap I picked up last week. Fresh is a whole lot better. I”ll get some fresh for you next time you come down. Mom? You want some deviled crab?”

“Please.” She said.

“Harry?”

“Yeah, Dad.”

“You want some collards with that?”

“Don’t put yourself out.”

“Na. Just take a minute. It’s frozen though. Grew it last year. I’m not sure I have the energy to put a garden in this year. But I got some fatback to throw in this. You’ll like it.”

“Ok.”

A flurry of plastic and pans and the greens were on the stove on high heat. Before long the house emanated the smell of fatback, that bacon-y hog jowl smell that’s fat when rendered gave any green a southern flavor that once acquired was impossible to resist.
Harry looked at his frail father. White shirt, black pants, and that damn skinny tie, his father smiled and whistled as he cooked. He loved this. Serving. This was his life...

Quote of the Day: Don't Think Twice, It's All Right

2006-03-02T10:46:00.000-05:00

"I'm walkin' down that long, lonesome road, babe
Where I'm bound, I can't tell
But goodbye's too good a word, gal
So I'll just say fare thee well
I ain't sayin' you treated me unkind
You could have done better but I don't mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
But don't think twice, it's all right

Bob Dylan

2006-03-02T10:40:00.000-05:00

The Earth At Night

Quotes of the Day: Frost For A Hard Winter

2006-03-01T09:10:00.001-05:00

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life:
it goes on.
Robert Frost

Don't ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.
Robert Frost

A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.
Robert Frost

Rejection and Redemption

2006-02-26T14:48:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I received my first rejection letter from Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. It was my very first rejection for my writing. I must admit it stings. It was a form letter of about three sentences.

It came at an interesting time in my life –on the very day I was to meet a former love to see if our relationship would be worthy of another try – it wasn’t. She rejected me. Our relationship has been over for several months and this last conversation hammered the total and complete end home. Finality. I know it’s for the best, and in deep in my heart, I know she made the right decision. Though, knowing that doesn’t make the pain any less.

I just got back from a trip to see my parents. They are aged and in frail health. I only get to see them once a year. This year may have been the last time I will see them. I tried in vain to say the things I wanted to say to them but the words would not come out.

For several months, I have been taking a personal inventory, looking hard at actions, motivations, and myself. Specifically, how so I have seemed to ruin good relationships with very good women. I feel lucky to be have been involved in more than my fair share of them.

The last few months have been turbulent for me but good in ways that will bear fruit later this year. My personal reassessment has identified several areas that I need to work on, which I am doing. This time has been very painful but also a particularly fertile time for my personal growth and enrichment. The hurt has been beneficial.

Rejection has caused reflection, improvement, and in the end made me stronger. I feel redeemed, renewed, and ready for the challenges ahead.

The rejected story will polished a little more and will be going out tomorrow afternoon to another magazine. I will be reentering the dating scene this week also. I am working out eating better, drinking less, and ready to continue the journey that this life has for me.

Thank you, everyone in blogland that has supported and given encouragement through my rough patches in the road. I will be blogging full strength tomorrow.

Sincerely,

RJB

Quotes of the Day: Rejection

2006-02-26T14:46:00.000-05:00

There's nothing like rejection to make you do an inventory of yourself.
James Lee Burke

Every rejection is incremental payment on your dues that in some way will be translated back into your work.
James Lee Burke

Quotes of the Day: The Task

2006-02-25T15:33:00.000-05:00

A man may fulfill the object of his existence by asking a question he cannot answer, and attempting a task he cannot achieve.
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out.
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Substance coming soon

2006-02-23T10:19:00.000-05:00

I have been out of town for the last several days, working through some personal issues and have been unable to blog with any substance.

Thank you for continuing to visit. I will return to substantive blogging early next week.

Thanks.

RJB

Quote of the Day: Resolution

2006-02-23T10:18:00.001-05:00

The changes in our life must come from the impossibility to live otherwise than according to the demands of our conscience not from our mental resolution to try a new form of life.
Leo Tolstoy

Quotes of the Day: Forgiveness

2006-02-22T09:26:00.000-05:00

Forgiveness is the remission of sins. For it is by this that what has been lost, and was found, is saved from being lost again.
Saint Augustine

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heal that has crushed it.
Mark Twain

Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit. Peter Ustinov

2006-02-21T00:07:00.000-05:00

It was 2 degrees yesterday. Here is where my mind wandered.