(HSSC2) Suffocation

Suffocation

It was just another night at the mortuary. The air conditioner wasn’t working. Bob was eating a big mac and yellow sauce slid from his mouth onto his blood-stained tee-shirt. Bob looked at the neat row of stainless steel tables with corpses on them. The dead people were dressed in the clothes they died in.

“Hey Al,” he laughed, “When we finish draining them, we can just leave them open, put on the air conditioner and still make it to the Halloween party.”

I looked at the corpses. It felt like a couple were looking back at me. A shiver went through me. There was quite a variety tonight, a high school cheer leader, a cop, a nun, a minister, a few kids, a road kill I think was a big dog or a deer.

A noise startled us. A large glass vase slid off a counter and shattered on the floor. The shards reflected the harsh florescent lights like a spider’s cluster of eyes reflecting a full moon and stars.

“What’s that noise?!” I looked at the corpses, then at Bob.

“I don’t know!”

“It wasn’t one of them, was it?!”

“How am I supposed to know?!” It’s not like last year, anymore!

I heard wolves howling from the foothills surrounding the mortuary. “Do you hear that?!”

Bob start howling back. “It’s coming from the police firing range or the cemetery by the abandoned church by the graves.

“Do you have to howl like that!? You’re scaring me.”

Bob start pacing around the room, first slowly, then faster and faster. “I can’t help it,” he said. “It’s a full moon.”



There was a light flickering in the sky that got bigger. It became a falling star knocking off the tree tops and setting them on fire. The fire jumped from tree to tree. The flames shown on the tombstones and the crosses and statues cast quivering shadows. The graves were moving.

I ran closer to the windows and pressed my face against the glass. The glass began to sweat from my breath. “Not again!” I said, “It’ll get me for sure, this time!” I started to cry. Bob grabbed me.

“You’re okay!, Bob said. “You’re okay!”

“No! They’re gonna get me!



They came from the woods. Dark shapes that looked like apes or people covered with long hair running on their hands and knees. Their teeth and eyes lit by the flames.

Thunder crashed and they scattered back, cowering, into the woods. Lightning flashed and rain fell, splattering with hail against the windows.

Bob wiped the moisture off the window and pressed his face and palms against the glass. “The rain is putting out the fire.”

“But the fire scared them away,” I said. The air in the room began to fill with smoke and ashes. “There must be a window open someplace! Where?! Close it!”

“The clouds! The clouds!” Bob pointed at the night.

Bats had been smoked out of their caves and covered the night like millions of ants. They crashed against the windows and shattered the glass. Their wings or claws or teeth cut my face. I covered my eyes with my hands. My face bled onto my hands and onto my white shirtsleeves. They flew like a whip crashing around us, crashing into the florescent lights till the room was dark. Then they flew out towards the moon.



I started to change. Slowly at first. My skin started to crawl, it was pulled and pinched then became liquid and flowed off me baring my bones and organs. Bob start howling again, and I heard the hooves of the creatures running towards me from the forest.



It became harder to breathe. The room was filled with smoke and the ashes filled my mouth and stung my eyes. My lungs couldn’t get enough air. I start gasping for breath. I was afraid at any moment I would smother. I took shorter and shorter breaths. I tried to force the air into my lungs. But I couldn’t. I was panting. But I couldn’t breathe. If only I could make it to the car. Then drive to a hospital. I wanted to live. I wasn’t ready to die. Not now. Not here. Not this way.


There was no air left in the room. That was the last thing I remembered. No air anymore. No air to breathe. It felt soft. I couldn’t hear, things sounded very far away. The pulse was beating in my neck. I stopped breathing and lay still, no longer struggling. I waited.

I waited like the night waits for eternity to end. I waited like a lonely man waits for a lover that never comes. I waited like sorrow that was lost but knew the way home, some day. A life waiting to be lived, or born, or seeded or conceived. A joy that couldn’t get out, that couldn’t get free. I waited for death, but death wouldn’t wait for me.



How could this be? How could it have come to this? I didn’t expect it. Had no idea. No one had told me. I hadn’t even suspected. Was this what it had been about all the time and I had missed it? I’d been blind? Unaware of it? Asleep?

And now, was I to wake, to dream, to touch or feel? The thoughts reeled in my mind like reflections on the water for my first 600 years of dying.


Then, it was time for the Halloween party. Perhaps I’d missed it, but it was now the Witch’s Sabbath and All Hallowed Eve and time for the dead to rise.

I looked around the room, and the corpses on the tables started to quiver then rise, faces ashen, white, stripped of feelings and signs of life. They sat up, brushed off their clothes, pushed their mouths into dead grins with their fingers then planted their feet upon the floor to rise.

“C’mon,” Bob said, jumping up from the floor. “Is this your costume? Are you going as yourself in eternity?”

“That’s ridiculous,” I laughed. But I wondered, was it true. I looked normal, as if nothing had happened at all. “What’s going on?”

Bob was amused. “You fell asleep. You must have had a nightmare.”

“A nightmare?” Maybe I had. “The windows aren’t broken.”

Bob didn’t know what to make of me. “That’s right.”

I looked at the corpses on the table. They were all cut open and drained. A few were still draining. The room was cold.

“C’mon,” Bob said. “Let’s go to the Halloween party.”



We walked towards the car. The wind was blowing about 40 mph in from the sea and the air was clear. Bob got in the car after me. “I feel like someone’s watching me,” I said. “Someone’s listening to us talk.”

“You’re paranoid. What’d you get stoned or something?”

“No.” I wanted to leave, now. My skin was crawling. Bob howled at the moon.

“That’s getting real old, man. Why don’t you knock that stuff off?”

“Because I’m the undead, that’s why.”

“Yeah, right.” I don’t know why I believed him. His eyes felt cold, his face was ashen and had no sign of life. There seemed to be no spirit in him. It had died long ago and what was left was a killing and eating machine with no soul. “When did it happen to you, Bob?”

“What?”

“When did you turn off to life, stop living. When did you die?”

“I don’t remember. It’s nothing you notice right away. The neighbors, maybe they died a long time ago, or maybe they didn’t. You just notice a little bit at first… never any guilt about eating meat, no longer talking to the kids but everyday treating them more and more like objects. Then one day, it’s too late. They’re thirteen and not kids anymore. It’s like that.”

“Like that?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s cold.”

“So what. It’s not like we live forever.”



My next 600 years was the time we spent in the car driving to the party. I kept looking back over my shoulder because I felt them watching me. I knew they were in the car behind me. Then it would drive by and it wasn’t them. That’s when I knew they were in the next car coming up on me. I tried not looking into the rear view mirror so they wouldn’t see my eyes and into my soul and see who I really was and how I felt. When they got next to me, I wouldn’t look at them. Not until they were passed. That wasn’t them, either. They must be in the next car, the one way back in my mirror. I had a few seconds to relax. They were too far back to notice me. About six or ten cars were coming up to get me. I tried to hold the steering wheel still, so the car would go in a straight line. It seemed no matter how tightly I held the steering wheel, the car kept weaving just enough to be noticed. I waited for the red lights to come on behind me. What was he waiting for? Why didn’t he turn the siren on? He drove next to me, his eyes just far enough back to be out of the line of sight. Maybe he’d drive by. He drove by. There was a big police star on the side of his door. Then he sped ahead, turned on his flashing lights and siren and start chasing the car in front of me. I was sweating and my heart was pounding in my throat. We’d just driven a mile or two from the mortuary, and had about another hour’s drive. I looked in the mirror. The other cars were passing me on the right and left. I looked straight ahead, afraid to look at them. They kept passing for 600 years.

Bob didn’t seem to notice. Why should he? He’d died. There was nothing in him illegal, not even a prayer, not one protest, he didn’t question anything. He’d changed from the man I knew and didn’t care about anything except getting off or getting over. He slept for the whole six centuries till I pulled up in front of the party, he opened his eyes.

“I wasn’t sleeping,” Bob rubbed his eyes. “I just had my eyes closed. Are we there, yet?”

“Yes. What are we going to use for costumes? We didn’t bother to bring the clothes from any of the corpses for the masquerade party.”

Bob gave me a questioning look. “All we have to do is step out into the moonlight, and we’ll change. Just like last year, remember?”

“No. I don’t remember anything. It seems like the ride took a hundred years.” It had taken 600 years.

“Seems more like 600 years, to me. I thought we’d never get here.” Bob stepped out into the moonlight.

I was afraid to get out of the car. I’d gone through enough changes just getting here.

(cont)


[edit on 20-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

I didn’t need any more drama. They say what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. They tell you to face your fear. But you don’t have to, not if you want to stay alive. The best thing to stay alive is not to face your fears. There’s a reason they’re your fears. Don’t ever forget that. It’s not like the door to heaven will suddenly open up and golden light will walk through and beautiful women will walk out and welcome you home. It’s more like you’re homeless and have no place to stay and nothing to eat and don’t want to be arrested for vagrancy and spend an eternity in debtor’s prison. I rolled down the car window and pushed my hand out. The yellow moonlight fell onto my hand. The moonlight went right through my hand and fell on the ground. I was surprised. It didn’t hurt. I guess something had happened during the long drive and I didn’t even notice it happening. I got out of the car and the moonlight shone through me, like I was transparent or invisible except to myself. I didn’t get it.

“C’mon, let’s go in,” Bob said.

That’s when I saw him for the first time. “What’s happened to you?”

“Nothing.”

“Is that your costume, or is that you?”

“I don’t know. What difference does it make?”

“I don’t know. None, I guess. But, you’re imaginary. You’re not even here.”

“So what?” Bob took off toward the old deserted church, where the party was already in full swing.

It didn’t make any sense, the church was right next to the mortuary. How could it have taken 600 years to drive a couple hundred yards? Time was so long but it was so short, it made no sense at all. It wasn’t Time at all, it was Life that made no sense. There was no time. There was aging. As soon as I thought that I know I had reached the point of no return. I knew better than that, I never should have opened that door, I never should even have walked up to it. What was I trying to prove, that I was immortal. And how would I prove I’d live forever …by dying? That’s where thinking got me after 1,200 years. I was still going around in circles. Pretending things made sense. Pretending there were reasons. Arguing over nothing. Fighting over reflections of who I thought I was projected onto the innocent faces of other phenomena. Fighting myself for 1,200 years. It was some kind of crazy joke. Is that what immortality was? But I wasn’t dead yet, so I could I taste it. How could it sit on the edge of my intuition like a ghost of living past and living present and living future, all shoved into a masquerade ball on Halloween in a deserted church surrounded by a graveyard next to a mortuary. I couldn’t wait to go inside the party. I pulled open the church door and went inside. I guess that’s what a deathwish is, wishing you’d live forever, opening up the door, and walking into the party like everything was just the way it was.



I remember what Loretta had said, one of the most beautiful women in the world, a gin and tonic in her hand, leaning against the wall, “Isn’t it awful? How can you stand the loneliness.”

I was young at the time, about 300 years old. I still felt my oats, knew I’d score if I was patient and could wait it out a few more decades, here or there, and I’d meet someone and jump in the sack for a few years that later seemed like a few minutes of splendor in the sunshine on the bed, my favorite music playing, rolling in the arms of love, rocking and rolling, sweating, coming like it would never stop all night long and all day long day after day, week after week, year after year, decade after decade. But, each time, now I see it was really only a few minutes. Each of the women I’d loved was like a photograph in an album I’d discarded in another life that no longer fit and almost never could have been at all, for all it was worth. It was measured in character, in loss, in ignorance and youth. I didn’t recognize anyone at the party. How could I? Everyone was wearing costumes until midnight, the bewitching hour.

I remember what Sundance Acacia had said, there in the hallway outside her kitchen, the light emanating from her face in sparkling auras. She was so beautiful. She was a midwife. Brought life into the world. How could it have ever worked. I was a mortician. I watched death, made my living off it. She made her living off life, bringing life into the world. I made my living off the dead. We were opposites. Not exactly opposites because we were both alive. But now, looking back into Time, I see her joy and my sorrow probably as clearly as she had seen it then in my blindness.

The hollowness came. Here at the party in the midst of drunken revelry, of spiritual masquerade, of drunken abandon. Why was it haunting me now, this stillness, this emptiness. Of all places, of all times, why now? I felt alone. Silent. Still. Not dead but the next best thing. Feeling apart from the party. It was like hell was my best and only friend, and wasn’t talking to me. They were all gone, all of them I’d ever loved, pages in a book in a library of books in a world of libraries and thousands and thousands of phonebooks that were discarded every year. We used them at the mortuary when we’d cremate the corpses. Dump-trucks would deliver them every day outside the crematorium ovens. I looked in one once and found my name, before I threw it into the fire while the fire turned all evidence of life, laughter and sorrow, triumph and defeat into ashes. We put the ashes into metal boxes or pottery. It was a mistake to use pottery because a loved one of the deceased could drop it and break it open and fill the air with ashes and choke on them as they dried out your tonque with regret and clogged your throat so you couldn’t breath and you started to suffocate in the memories of your love and those who had held you and kept you and loved you then died and left you, here. This was quite a party, all right. We were all dressed up in costumes of who we were, trying to disquise ourselves from our disquises, laughing laughter that was not laughter, speaking of peace that was not peace, of immortality that was mortal, of eternity that ended over and over again and again in a desert of junked and broken lifetimes or in a grocery store filling a shopping bag with dreams of another time and place called yesterday or tomorrow but never now. Now was the Halloween party, the costume ball, the witch’s Sabbath in an orgy dancing within the flames of hell itself.



I walked out of the crowd into a hallway where I could catch my breath. I could feel them through the walls, feel their thoughts, feel their attention. But that was better than looking into their faces and reading their entire lives written in their eyes with glowing cigarettes and tears, disappointment frozen in their grins and shallows with Jack Daniels, mud slides, joints and lines while the dying graced the world with last gasps in torment on a spiritual battlefield sheeple can not see but for the fear of death which is not death from a life that is not life but stillborn abandon.

There was no place I could go. I turned to God but God turned away from me. That was impossible, but it happened. An angel told me it was my fault, that I was blind, that I didn’t understand love was just an illusion like everything else. But, I knew better. A devil agreed with me but then I changed my mind and so did he. Witches cursed and made wax and mud effigies and spilt blood on them but that didn’t hurt me, only damning them to an insufferable mirror existence of flames and shadows while infants of the innocent slept in peace or were burnt and maimed in war. Little Bo Peep had lost her sheep and didn’t know where to find them, but here they were, at the Halloween party bleeting and baaing and making little sheep after sneaking away into bathrooms and bedrooms and closets propagating themselves into being like ants and flies did. I grabbed a plastic cup and filled it from a punch bowl of champagne and wine and 7 Up and vodka and whatever exotic powders evil had pissed in. Then, went outside alone in the snow-dusted stillness in the dark hour before the dawn, staring at the moon and its reflections in the ice crystals frozen in a divine crust each crystal reflecting spectrums of rainbows on the ground, just like the stars flashing different colors above in the black sky. Everything was spinning because I was a little drunk. I got lost in the snow and was terrified. My head was on fire. I knew they were out there and suddenly I didn’t care about them, anymore. And watched the sun begin to rise on another cursed day. It was very beautiful.


[edit on 20-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

Really, really good. A bit deeper than most.

Look forward to reading more of your writing around here.

Originally posted by sdp333
Really, really good. A bit deeper than most.
Look forward to reading more of your writing around here.

Thank you. Your reply matters to me a lot.

Shear brilliance, must have taken a long time to write. Absolutely great well done star and flag.

That was quite astounding. It perhaps took you a little while to warm up, the beginning could use a bit more grab and the ending a little restraint. But on the whole you flew, some incredible prose, you weave an ambience that is both externally manifested to the narrator but also express the innerlandscape-looking-outward brilliantly. I am quite taken aback. Very good. You have a talent.

Very good... I loved it.

It played on all my senses and gave great visuals. Look forward to reading more of your work.

Star / flag from me.

Cheers,

JQ.

Originally posted by franspeakfree
Shear brilliance, must have taken a long time to write. Absolutely great well done star and flag.

Thank you so much, franspeakfree.

It took a lifetime of writing, since I was 7 and now I'm 61. It took a lifetime of making choices to pursue my creativity rather than money but I was born to it so it's not like it was really my choice. But it was a conscious decision always to pursue my creativity whether it was writing or music or painting or singing or composing or playing instruments or poetry or investigative reporting for justice or oral journalism or just being as loving as I could be. Often that meant working 40-60 hours week at some start-up then working afterhours another 40-60 hours a week on my work. I learned to have faith in my creative process, to navigate by feeling ... at first it was unconscious (to keep from smothering), then it became a conscious process of not messing with the feelings, of letting the feeling alone not messing it up with thoughts ... then just letting it express itself and knowing if I would step aside from trying to control it, it could live and be born.

The actual writing was done in an initial session of about 10-20 minutes, then the next morning another 20-30 minutes. It's about knowing when the image is born, when it is free, and not being demanding, not overstating the intuitive expression by trying to consciously reform it or teach it anything ... the intuition is there to teach us. I've always started with a title image and almost a closing feeling ... but I leave the closing feeling undefined.

Like in this story, I could have felt a closing feeling of horror, but I respected the creative process enough TO NOT SELL OUT MY SELF, but to remain true to the expression that had chosen words. I could have written a horror that was your last impression ... but CHOSE not to impose it because of the creative flow.

Well, your comment was so brief, and mine so very windy. It's just because I only live in my work, I guess. And that's all I know.

p.s. art is always trying to live and survive

[edit on 21-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

Originally posted by KilgoreTrout
you weave an ambience that is both externally manifested to the narrator but also express the innerlandscape-looking-outward brilliantly. I am quite taken aback. Very good. You have a talent.

Thank you so much.

I live for that 'flying' you described. I was warming up in effect because I didn't know what I was going to say until it started saying itself. I liked what you said about the "innerlandscape-looking-outward" -- that's very brilliantly put, to be able to use four words ... innerlandscape-looking-outward ... and yet I knew exactly what you meant by it. By the way, I've read some of your very brilliant writing in prose in a reply to a post.

Perhaps brilliance comes from passion and study and concern and respect, for I've seen those qualities in your work.

Originally posted by John Q
Very good... I loved it.

.

Thank you very much.

It played on all my senses and gave great visuals. Look forward to reading more of your work.

The shorter fictional pieces I can usually spit out ... but the longer ones that take hundreds or thousands of pages, I create a dramatic staircase and adhere to it ... especially if I'm writing a drama or a screenplay -- not that any have ever sold or ever will. Which is to say, it's a lifestyle not a vocation, and one that, apparently, requires an implicit rather than explicit vow of poverty ... if I'm being observant or distressed or bored or empty enough to notice it.

Thanks for your kind words.

[edit on 21-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

Nice one, well done

I wrote a short Halloween story a while ago too but I don't know if I may copy it into this thread so I will link it.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Originally posted by Grey Magic
Nice one, well done

Thank you!

I wrote a short Halloween story a while ago too but I don't know if I may copy it into this thread so I will link it.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I just read the first line and it's great! ...I'm going to read it after finishing this post and a U2U. In fact, I just read it. That's very good. It's very immediate ...real ...striking.

You need to send a U2U to intrepid and tell him you'd like him to move the story into this contest short story forum, give him the url and ask him to move it for you.

The story title must also have (HSSC2) in front of the title like the stories at the top of the page.

Interesting read. Reminds me of the phrase, "Whether there is heaven or hell, thinking makes it so" Hamlet.

Perhaps you should consider becoming a part time writer while getting paid at the same time. Writers write because they must. This is one of the best methods of clarifying all that goes on in the mind; to put one's thoughts on paper for clarity and closure. Sometimes we need to know what is going on in our head, therefor we write to bring our thoughts into light and perhaps become more enlightened in the process.

Here are some links below of which you may find of interest.

en.wikipedia.org...

en.wikipedia.org...

www.asascreenwriters.com...

reply to post by counterterrorist


Yeah man, you seem to have a gift for descriptive writing, 'took' me some places I'd not experienced previously.

Thanks

Perseus Apex: Interesting read.

counterterrorist: Thank you.

Perseus Apex: Perhaps you should consider becoming a part time writer while getting paid at the same time.

counterterrorist: I've tried my whole life but am still trying. Some say, 'very trying'. Sent an email to 1,500 agents ... can never get one, and when I did once or twice they were f*****-up and ugly.

Perseus Apex: Writers write because they must. This is one of the best methods of clarifying all that goes on in the mind; to put one's thoughts on paper for clarity and closure.

counterterrorist: I know. Writing this story has really put my other posts better, more full of life.

Perseus Apex: Here are some links below of which you may find of interest. en.wikipedia.org... en.wikipedia.org... www.asascreenwriters.com...

counterterrorist: thanks. I just checked them out.
---

here are a few of my books ... not one makes a penny. I use a writing name.

The first two I self-published in 1991 & 1995, respectively the oral history was critically hailed but financially failed because I had no money to print them and it took me till 2005 to publish them again.

Old Rails' Tales reviewed by NYT as one of the best books of the year in 1991 but I was publishing it myself and had no money so ... that's how it goes.

New American Underground Poetry, vol I: The Babarians of San Francisco - poets from hell

The next four (4) I did the book design for, did the graphic design of the covers, as well as writing, editing, copy-editing, proofing, production coordination:
This I self-published in Jan of this year. Sold 2-3 total.
A Noah's Ark of Recurring Celebration: San Francisco Annual Event History - Winners of the Human Race ... Storytellin' Muni Drivers 20th Anniversary Edition

This one I self-published in Feb of this year. Sold 1.
American Civilian Counter-terrorist Manual: a fictional autobiography of Ronald Reagan a historical novel. Note, that is where my name, counterterrorist, came from. I also rewrote it into a slim abridged edition for an agent who turned out to be a fraud. And I've not published the abridged edition (although I was planning on it but now am not).

This one I self-published in Mar of this year. Sold 3.
Storytellin' Muni Drivers, vol 1-6: 20th Anniversary Edition, true stories by San Francisco municipal railway drivers of cable cars, diesel buses, streetcars, trolleys & trams

This one I was so discouraged I decided not to publish in April.
Calypso Kings & Carnival Queens

MOD -- this is not an advertisement, it's just trying to rap with writers and get some writing friends to interact with. If you want to you can remove the links, but please leave the titles. It's just about all I have to show for my life -- writing since 9 years old, now 61, and poor as a churchmouse BUT rich in spirit.

It's like Perseus Apex said: Writers write because they must.

Well, I self-published because I could never find an agent or a publisher to represent me.

When I was a senior in college I was chosen by the Book Of The Month Club as the best fiction writer of all college students graduating that year in North America ... but my college mistakenly reported I was not a student and I was disqualified and forfeit a $3,000 fellowship award ... and it's been the story of my life ever since. But I had to write, had to keep seeing who I was -- furiously, around the clock for 40 more years ... and never really 'made it' as a writer. Yet.

The reason I wrote this story was because I wanted to start writing short stories again, only wrote 1 or 2 in last 40 years ...and because I like writing contests because they're challenging and give me a kick.

[edit on 23-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

Originally posted by FewWorldOrder
Yeah man, you seem to have a gift for descriptive writing, 'took' me some places I'd not experienced previously.

Thanks

Thank you. Those places where you've not been before are where I live. I'm so pleased you liked it and went traveling w/me ... a lot of those places I don't go to either, until I write them down and see where I've been and where I am. Strangely, I don't seem to see where I'm going, though -- only where I've been. Funny thing is, that at the time I'm usually blind to where I am. Kind of a joke, I guess, on me. But, I'm trying to get into the present. Isn't that a hoot, my whole life I lived in the past or the future, but not in the present. I'll probably make it when I'm 6 feet under (buried). Although ... now that I think about it, I'd rather burn and then go swimming (be cremated then distributed in the ocean or a river ... anything but a toilet).

[edit on 23-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

Wow. Very good!

Thanks for the opportunity to read it! [smile]

Originally posted by counterterrorist
When I was a senior in college I was chosen by the Book Of The Month Club as the best fiction writer of all college students graduating that year in North America ... but my college mistakenly reported I was not a student and I was disqualified and forfeit a $3,000 fellowship award ... and it's been the story of my life ever since. But I had to write, had to keep seeing who I was -- furiously, around the clock for 40 more years ... and never really 'made it' as a writer. Yet.

This is my great sadness with the world today, so much talent left to fend for itself. I think that all we can do is support each other and scrape by the best that we can.

I've made the decision to give myself over to writing, I have fought it and supressed it for a very long time. I have a young child so I have responsibilities and I have only self-belief that no matter the outcome I know that this is my path. I accept the poverty, the rejection and the isolation, like you it is no great loss for I have a multitude of universes inside my head to explore and inhabit, but I struggle to know whether this is a good life for a child. Whether I can be a good writer and a good mother. I fear that I may have to wait a few more years until I can be the writer that I want to be. I practice in the meantime, but have yet to find the courage to completely let go for any length of time, in the way that I see others able to, like yourself. I know that I can though, and I didn't for a long time. Far too much self-control and restraint for my own good.

Thank you for your kind words, they mean a lot, and for telling us a little more about yourself. I wish that you had had more success, but in a way the fact that you haven't, but still know that you are living the life that you want to live, gives me a little more strength to follow the path I have chosen.

Best wishes
KT

Originally posted by Amaterasu
Wow. Very good!

Thanks for the opportunity to read it! [smile]

So glad to hear from you, again. Read your posts about you and your husband being 'homeless' as of a few days ago. It seems you haven't lost your 'Wow'. I hope you keep a diary, even if it's only a paragraph about each day, your greatest ups and downs. Maybe it should only be a paragraph each day. Some days it could be very long.

It might be a very good chronicle of what thousands of people are going through -- but are overlooked. Maybe even millions of people. Perhaps your husband could keep a similar diary, as well.

Oh, by the way, the urls your sent in a reply to me once, of all those amazing quotes ... here they are again, for all the writers who read these pages, from you, via me, to them. So, it is your gift to us.

Now ... I've got to find them; be right back: ...I've been looking for an hour, just one more place to look ... nope, 60-70 minutes ... maybe you could post the link here to all those quotes you sent me in two parts. I don't seem to have the links anymore, in an easy-to-find place ... which is odd, since I put them in a special place so I'd know where they were ... one more place to look. Nope. Wrong. Duh -- guess where I found them?

On my desktop in my folder called 'thread' which are my ats posts -- in a word file named, 'quotes'. Who but me would be so dumb as to put all the quotes in a file, called, 'quotes'. --no wonder I couldn't find them.

'dreamslaughter' - part 1 and part 2

now, let's see if this post will post -- I'll make a copy first for insurance.

It posted and I checked the links and they worked.

Thanks, again.

[edit on 23-10-2008 by counterterrorist]

reply to post by counterterrorist


I'm keeping the experience in my head and will likely use it to write a story. I'm pretty good at filing things for stories.

As for the links... Glad you found them. [smile]