After Reading A Pushcart-Nominated Horror Story, etc.

"Everything, All At Once, Forever" by Michael Wehunt

One of the best things about reading short stories is that they're (duh) short.  This one was just four pages long (on my computer screen anyway) and very well-written.  Very emotionally-draining and depressing, too, but don't let that sway you from reading it for free, here.  (Read it; it took just five minutes, if that.) So the cool thing about this story, besides the story itself--which I'm told is strongly based on an episode of The Twilight Zone from the 80s--is that it was nominated for a prestigious Pushcart Prize.  These prizes are usually given to stories from established writers of mainstream or literary fiction, so for a "literary horror" story to be nominated is quite an achievement.  If you get the chance, go to Wehunt's website here, and look at all of the short stories he's had published in 2013, and earlier.  I won't lie; made me more than a little jealous, especially since he was published in magazines that have rejected politely declined some of my stuff.  And for the record, I don't know the guy at all--not on Goodreads, or LinkedIn, or anything.  I just liked his story, and am glad that a genre writer got nominated for a Pushcart.  Now if he wins...

"The Emperor of Ice-Cream" by Wallace Stevens

A very short poem of just 16 lines (two stanzas of 8 lines), and world-famous, I thought I'd give it a shot again, because the last line (the title) of the two stanzas always confused me.  ("The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.") But I'd forgotten why I was confused, and maybe now that I'm old, and not a confused English major of 20 or 21, and I had a vague memory of the poem being about how temporary life is, I figured I'd get it this time.  Which I did.  Or, I think I did.  Here it is, if you'd like to see for yourself.   And, it's okay if you don't get part of it.  Try to resist reading online about what the poem means.  Such things are often correct, yet still written by stuffy or boring professorial-sounding people who take the life out of all things great.  I'd rather you not get a little of it, but like it for reasons of your own, then get all of it, but be turned off from poems because of the elitist-voiced explanations.  (I'm reminded of the teacher who fired Robin Williams in Dead Poet's Society, standing in front of the class and saying, "What is poetry?")  Exactly the opposite of what Williams' character did, for the same reasons I'm saying here.  Reading poetry is like reading Joyce's Ulysses, or some parts of the Bible: it's the self-revelations learned upon the journey of reading and self-discovery that really matter, not what someone tells you something means--even if they're right.

"Ulysses" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

This one's a little longer--70 total lines--but written so well that it should be quick reading.  You can read and listen to it here, if you're so inclined.  It ends with a line that, I think, Churchill made famous--"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield"--as the British were getting bombed by the Germans in WWII.  Anyway, it was next in the anthology I was browsing through, and I remember it was a dramatic monologue, which I like because they're quick and easy to read, though a little longer than my preference for poems.  (Poe famously said that all good poems are short--and then wrote some really long ones.)  I liked this one because it says that just because you're old, that doesn't mean you're done.  (The poem is geared towards someone much older than I am, but still.)  My favorite lines from it (and I should have them put up on a giant poster somewhere):

How dull it is to make a pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
...
Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,...
...Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the Western stars, until I die...

(Me again.)  That's one thing I never understood about some people: How they can stand being bored.  How they maybe don't get bored because maybe they're not interested in much to begin with, so they don't know the comparison.  I rarely sleep or remain still, which is not always a good thing, but at least I know that our time here is not infinite, and I don't want to waste a moment not being interested in something. I just don't understand how some people just aren't curious.  Why is it okay for some people to do nothing, all the time?

2 Reasons to Link In

I finally joined LinkedIn about a year ago, after lots of invites.  I got one from someone I sort of communicated with anyway, and I wanted to see what it had to offer.  What I've learned is that it's like most other internet social sites out there: it clearly states not to just invite everybody, and it clearly states not to just accept everyone's invitation...and then people just do what they want anyway.  The reasons I've stayed with it:

1.  As a writer, you'll benefit just by having your works, websites and blogs mentioned on your profile page.  Then, whenever you comment on something that you really do want to comment on, your icon shows up, and if someone found your comment interesting or helpful, they can click on your icon, see your works and sites, and now you have another customer, or blog viewer.  You'll immediately see the difference between amateurs and pros.  Stick to the latter.  To that end,

2.  About 95% (and that's being nice) of the stuff that comes your way is unworthy of your time--but 5% isn't, and that's the nugget you swill for.  Every great now and then, someone will say something helpful about blog traffic, or an agent, or you'll make a business contact, etc.  When you find something interesting, you learn from it, you comment on it, and you're off.  I met an editor of an anthology this way, and was able to write and sell a piece to her.  That's what LinkedIn is really for--and you have to very quickly sift through the chaff to see something sparkle.  I get the weekly feeds from my groups--all 40 or 50 of them!!!--but it takes me no longer than an hour a week to go through them all, make the comments that I want, meet the people I want, etc.

The important thing is to not let yourself get carried away.  The most important thing about promoting yourself is to have something worth promoting.  That means, write.  Finish what you're writing.  Send it out.  The best marketing tool you've got is your work.  Make sure you've got enough of it.  Don't blog more than you write.

I'm in the Mood for Something Random

Random thoughts:

I've put pictures on most of the blog entries on this site.  Go look at 'em.

Most overlooked Christmas movie: Die Hard!  Sure, A Christmas Story is funny, and Charlie Brown cartoons are cuter and more nostalgic, but who can deny that Die Hard kicked Christmas butt in the 80s?  I still quote Alan Rickman saying: "When Alexander saw the breath of his domain, he wept for there were no more worlds to conquer.  Benefits of a classical education."  I remember seeing it in the theater and people laughed A LOT, and we were blown away by the sound.  One of the first to use the new sound technologies.

I'm seriously jonesing Sherlock Holmes.  Don't know why.  Haven't seen the latest Robert Downey movie.  But I did just buy an awesome huge book of the short stories as originally published in The Strand Magazine, with the original drawings by Sidney Paget, and the original type from that era.  Cool, man.  I'm listening to a reading of Sherlock Holmes by the guy who does Shut Up and Think!  Go there and check him out.  He sounds a bit like Rush Limbaugh, but I'm not holding that against him.  He must get a ton of traffic, because two ads precede everything you click on.

Gotta work more on my writing and on my paper.  A bit of anxiety is beginning to creep in about both.  Paper is due December 7th or so.

Losing weight isn't hard.  A few simple rules: Burn off more calories than you consume.  Do more, eat less.

I will never be able to clean out this office.  I fight an avalanche of paper and mountains of books every day.

I'm busy almost every second of the day, but I never seem to get everything done that I want/need to get done.  How can that be?

I have more books to read than all books combined that I have ever read.  Or it just seems that way.

Baseball season couldn't start soon enough.  I'm hoping that it'll be so cold this winter that it won't snow.

I'm feeling so overwhelmed that I Googled daily planner forms and printed them out and am using them.  I can't tell if that's responsible, or pathetic.

I have at least three short stories I haven't sent out yet.  I have three novels I'm trying to write, all at once.

I go back to work tomorrow.  It's been 4 days and I haven't come close to accomplishing everything I wanted.  I realize that I'm coming across as a bit of a nut about this.  I feel like I'm losing time, but for what?

I'm tired of the Blogger stats not working.  What happened?  Blogger says it's working on it.

I got accepted to RIC and URI networking sites on LinkedIn, but when I scrolled through the members, I didn't know any of them.  I'm a member of 20 groups, just on LinkedIn alone, which seems like too many, and not enough, at the same time.  I become exhausted and eye-strained just responding to all those things.

Josh Hamilton and Joey Votto will be one-hit wonders, especially Votto.  His 328 total bases for an MVP has to be amongst the all-time lows.  Hamilton has a few more good years if he keeps his eyes on the prize.

That's enough randomness for now.  There'll be more to come, believe me.

Gotta Cut Back

I haven't officially recovered from Thanksgiving, but I am already ruing the fact that I can't eat everyday what I ate then.  Baked mac and cheese; bread; five different desserts; lasagna; cornbread; mashed potatoes; a few other things I've already forgotten--all that while visiting with my better half's clan.  Then, at a friend's, one slice of apple pie, one slice of pumpkin cream pie, and one slice of chocolate cream pie.  Surprised I could walk the next day!  Whew!

As I write this blog, and comment on the 20 groups I've joined--and that's just on LinkedIn!--and update my profiles on all those sites, and more, it's occurred to me that I'm doing so much to advertise my writing that it's prevented me from getting any writing done!  How absurd!  So I've decided, starting now, to only spend an hour commenting on these things per day, and unfortunately I'm going to have to completely put aside all of the mss. I said I'd try to review for this blog and/or my site.  (In my defense, I gave all those folks a lot of IFs, but I still feel badly about it.)  I just can't do it all, plus my actual career (which itself would exhaust most normal people), plus take care of the house and have something that at least mimics a life.  And, oh yeah, the reading and writing that must get done.  I mean, I just realized right now that I've left a blanket in the washing machine for a few days, and my hallways look like mineshafts.

Gotta do less to do more.  I need some sort of daily schedule, like Ben Franklin kept.

And a special get well to my better half's mother, who was not feeling well on Thanksgiving and had to stay in.

That just ain't right.  Better than on Christmas, I guess.