My computer is back!!!

I finally got my computer back in working order. I have been writing in my head and now feel safe to put it on the page.
I love the fact that everyone you meet has a story. Today the moving company sent a man, Jerry, to pre-access the contents of our house. He had a lovely accent so just  before he left I asked him where he was from originally. He asked me to guess. I guessed he was Italian because he sounded so much like a missionary we had once had serving in our area who was from Italy. He was impressed. His name is Italian but his father immigrated to the US from Italy and then  moved to California and ultimately Mexico to begin a vineyard. He brought some of the original grapes that now spread across the Napa Valley. When Jerry was fourteen his father sent him to his uncle's home in Washington DC to be raised. Jerry's uncle was very well connected in Washington and Jerry got to meet the Eisenhowers, the Kennedys, and many other of the great political leaders this was back in 1956. He was just a teenager at the time and didn't understand who all it was he had met. He remembers being terrified when he moved to Washington because no one spoke Spanish. He got lost many times when he was coming home from school because he had to change buses.
He served in the military during the Korean War and the Vietnam War. When he came home from Vietnam he thought it would be a good time to apply for US citizenship. He was stationed in Georgia. He failed the 144 question test. He called his uncle to give him the bad news and his uncle said let me call Bobby. The phone rings and Jerry answers. "This is the Attorney General. I'm sorry about the mix up. Get a couple of you buddies and report to General thus and so. He will swear you in as a US citizen. We are very honored by the service you have preformed for our country." It was Robert Kennedy. Jerry was living 3 blocks away from the Ambassador Hotel when Bobby got shot.
Everybody has a story. Isn't it great!

Goals for 2012

First let me preamble this by giving a short history of my computer woes. My three-year-old compaq laptop started falling apart, literally. The plastic frame around the screen popped apart. I taped it. It got worst. I taped it some more. Finally we decided to get me a new laptop. We ordered a HP from Sam's Club. It arrived I was ecstatic. Cristin got my old laptop. She used duct tape. She learned that gravity is stronger than duct tape as the frame would slowly pull apart each time she taped it back together. My new computer made a popping noise one day and then the screen went black. I tried to fix it by hooking up to the desk top's monitor but nothing I did through the HP website made any difference. I ended up calling HP. They sent me a box and I sent in my new computer to be repaired. I got it back and was very excited to get to work. I even spent a day downloading my CD collection on itunes. Another popping noise, another black screen, another call to HP and they are over-nighting me another box to mail back my computer for further repairs. They said it has to come back to the repair center at least four times before they will consider replacing it. BOOOOO!
I have set myself a rather lofty goal. I want to finish the big Sci Fi novel this year, in fact I would like to get it done in the next three or four months. I figured out approximately how many more words I have to write and if I write 500 words on the novel a day I can finish it in 45 days.
So last week was my first week to attempt this. I wrote 550 words the first day I was ecstatic. I only got 150 the second day. Not so excited. Then I only did 100 words the third day and my computer broke down. One of the attempts over the phone to fix my computer resulted in a restore and a loss of about 150 words that I had written. (I wasn't happy with that section anyway). I am still determined to keep up the pace even if I have to hand write these next few days.

Starting a Writing Group

I have mourned the loss of the my Auburn Writing Group. I felt like I was in the midst  of very august company, five out of the eight of us had PhDs and the other lady was getting her Masters. I love those ladies and gent. Even though I am not a published author or a college graduate I have decided to start my own writing group. It is stepping out of my comfort zone and taking a huge risk but so far I feel giddy with the very thought of it. I have been reading up on the art of writing and attending another writing group to see how they work. The local librarian is very excited about it, my friend who is a published author is very encouraging and she thinks I can get the local paper to help set up a writing contest to kick it off. So wish me luck.
There is a Fantasy author named John Brown whose blog I love to follow because he is constantly dishing out writing helps. Today I read an interview he gave and I wanted to link it to my blog so I could reference it later. It is http://mayalassiter.com/2011/05/how-writers-do-what-they-do-john-brown/ .He gives an amazing response to the idea of writer's block and I am excited to put him to the test.

Feral

I entered this story in the Writer's Cramp Contest on Writing.com. The contest is to write a story (a thousand words or less) or poem (forty lines or less) within 24 hours  and follow the prompt. I WON!!!
Yesterday's prompt was to write a story or poem using the bold face words. Here is today's winner.


Feral


It was the smell that hit me first as I opened the door to Regina’s little house. The stale smell of grease, cat urine and feces brought tears to my eyes. I pulled the front of my shirt up over my nose and got a small whiff of the light floral perfume that was my trade mark. When my nephew Scotty would hug me he’d croon, “Aunt Julie you smell just like yourself”. My little trick only worked for a breath or two. I marveled again how someone could live like this. I hovered on the doorsill debating where to put my foot. The floor was littered with debris; clothes, plates with half eaten food, DVD cases, open jigsaw puzzle boxes with pieces spilling out, towels, stacks of books, and fast food bags.

A blanket covered the couch to hide the rips and tears, a pile of clothes lay in soft mound on one end. The cushions sagged sadly evidence that the frame of the couch had long since given in to the stress of constant use. Regina lived in that hollowed out space. The remotes to the television were on the coffee table within easy reach along with half filled drink glasses, empty chip bags, fingernail polish bottles, a brush, change in all its denominations and pill bottles. Her pillow lay across the back of the couch. She slept there because the bed was inaccessible.

Once I had tried to help. Everything I had touched in that house had something living under it evidenced by scurrying coach roaches and mouse droppings. Five days later I had twenty bags of trash piled against her front fence for the garbage collectors. The benefits lasted less than a week.

Some kind soul thought it would be a good idea to give Regina a kitten to keep her company. She was enthralled but barely able to care for herself. The cat became feral in that jungle of debris and soon was nursing kittens in a cave like space under the overburdened bed. After many tears on her part and cajoling on my part I convinced her to let me collect the cat and her kittens from the apartment and take them to the pound. It had to be a day she wasn’t there or it would break her heart. She left to go visit friends for a week and gave me the key to her little duplex home.

I nudged a box of crackers out of the way and stepped into the apartment a cardboard box in one hand and a mesh net with a long handle in the other. I followed the path from the living room into the kitchen. Flour dusted the table top; a crusted mixing bowl, a rolling pin and a jar of grape jelly were evidence of her biscuit making. Pans were piled high in the sink washed only as need. Regina cooked like a chef. Cook books, one of her vices, lined every shelf and were piled in corners; Southern Living, Betty Crocker, Captain Fergus's Cajun Fish Fry, 30-minute Recipes, The Great Little Pumpkin Cookbook, The Art of Mexican Cooking and dozens more. The church pot lucks were always risky so I brought her to my house and let her use my ingredients averting the danger of food poisoning or the hidden cock roach in a dish.

I nearly gagged as I passed the bathroom. It was truly loathsome. Fetid brown water filled the perpetually clogged bathtub. Unmentionable bathroom debris was scattered across the floor.

Regina’s mother hit her on the head with an iron skillet when she was a little girl. The State took her out of the home and put her in girl’s facility. She never made it into the foster care program because of her brain damage. She was indomitable to me.

Clothes spilled onto the floor from the mound on the bed. I set the box down next to an inaccessible dresser. The bright white walls were remarkable blank amid all this chaos. I moved enough clothes to a far corner so I could peer into the darkness under the bed. I heard plaintive mewing.

I kept up a steady, soothing banter, “here, kitty, kitty… sweet kitty…Its okay darlings…I won’t hurt you…here, kitty.” Slowly I reached the net under the bed. I could see their little outlines. The mother cat cowered further under the bed and spit as I got close to her babies. I lowered the net over the first little head and gently drew it out. “It’s okay, it’s okay… easy now.” The kitten became a little ball of incensed fury. I disengaged it from the net and dropped it into the cardboard box. I reached my net in for a second go. The kitten in the box became frantic, the mother was hissing and spitting at me. I nabbed the second kitten and slowly drew it out from under the bed.

As I straighten up a mass of indignant, crazed, mother-instinct driven, feline clawed her way up my legs, chest and face, leaping off my head twisting in mid air ready to do battle again. I stumbled out of the bedroom door knocking over the box with the trapped kitten in it. I was out the front door in seconds. I stood on the porch my heart racing my whole body shaking. I looked down at my bleeding arms and touched the scratches on my face with my trembling fingers.

I disinfected every inch of my body when I got home.

Two days later I let the animal control people into Regina’s apartment. I waited outside.

(937 words)

Help Me Tell My Story

I went to the DAWGs tonight. I attended the Dallas Area Writer's Group in Cedar Hill, TX.

The keynote speaker was Frank Ball. It was well worth my time. He talked about how to make a story that readers will be engaged in. What the elements of a captivating story are and how to condense the essense of your story into two sentences using theses elements. His website is helpmetellmystory.com. I am pumped. He challenged us to just write 15 minutes a day. So that is my goal to write something, anything for fifteen minutes each day. I'll keep you posted.

Fibonacci Poetry

Fibonacci Poems


0, 0+1=1, 1+1=2, 1+2=3, 2+3=5, 3+5=8, 5+8=13, 8+13=21, 13+21=34

0,1,2,3,5,13,21,34 etc

So my idea is to count each line as the equation that leads to the next number.

So the first line has one syllable, the next line has that syllable plus the one more to make two.

The next line has the last syllable from the previous line plus two more.

Then you take the last two syllables from that line and then add to it the three from the next number.

Here is an example:

0

1 Weep

1,1 Weep not

1,2 Not for me

2,3 For me the day shines

3,5 The day shines in bright golden hues

5,8 In bright golden hues the flowers bend to kiss the sun

8,13 The flowers bend to kiss the sun while my heart wanders toward you in the twice-blessed meadow.

13,21 While my heart wanders toward you in the twice-blessed meadow that cradles your body in foreign soil my soul yearns for a heavenly reunion.

The traditional Fibonacci Poem (or Fib, which is its slang name) is almost like a hiaku. Each line is the syllables of the next number. For example.

0
1 Peace
1 rolls
2 through me
3 when you smile.
5 My bare skin tingles
8 with the brush of your loving touch.

Just One Person

I'm needing a kick in the pants. I just need to believe in myself. Found this song and love it.