This blog is currently in its third iteration. It started off as a way for me to collect my thoughts and ramblings about World of Warcraft, and as a journal, of sorts.  Then, I kind of got bored with World of Warcraft and thought, maybe I will use this blog as a place for me to post my creative writings and practice the craft of writing and all that silly nonsense.  Then, well, then life got complicated. I got married. I had a kid. I moved to New Jersey. Like I said. Complicated.

I was reminiscing about how much I enjoyed writing this blog when I started in…holy crap, 2009! And I realized how much I missed it.  I let life get in the way. I let my own insecurities as a writer get in the way. I let a lot of things get in the way. But you know what, no more.

I wish I could tell you what this blog is about. I wish I could come up with some pithy mission statement and find a way to convince not only new people to come read what I have to say, but convince them to keep coming back. But I can’t. It’s a work in progress. I’m writing for myself, I guess, and whatever comes, comes. If I find a specific thing to channel everything into, great. If not, well, I’m really not going to worry about it.  And, I’ve rambled on enough already. I’ve got posts to work on.

“[Insert clever sign off phrase here]”

~Fizz/Ben

            His heart fluttered at the thought of her.  They had only just met, but he was already smitten.  They had already made a deep and last connection.  He could feel it.

            Man this car is disgusting, Seamus thought.  The back seat was full of half eaten candy bars, fast food wrappers, empty bottles of energy drinks, old socks, a detailed map of the city, and hundreds upon hundreds of photographs.  Seamus was a wonderful photographer.  He owned a small portraits shop in the mall, right next to the coffee shop where he had met Lisa.

            What a natural. She acts like the camera isn’t even there, Seamus thought, holding up a candid photo of Lisa that he’d managed to snap on their date the night before.  She hadn’t seemed particularly upset when he’d pulled out his camera and took picture after picture of her.  In fact, she seemed to have enjoyed it.

            She looks the best in this one, he thought.  He held up another picture of Lisa, the first one he’d taken of her as she left her office on her way home.  I should make her a collage, he thought, suddenly inspired.

            He cleared a pile of Kleenex and lotion off the back seat and laid out a handful of pictures. He had the one of her leaving work, as well as the candid of her.  He also had one of her in the car, one of her eating dinner, and one of her at the gym.  He had a bunch of her at home–sitting in her living room, feeding her cat, watering her plants, and even a really nice one of her in the shower.

            Man, am I glad I sprung for that telephoto lens, he thought.  He’d had to spend most of their date stuck in his car, as he wasn’t good with crowds.  They made him nervous.  But, he didn’t want to seem standoffish, so towards the end of the evening, after he’d made sure that she’d gotten home safe, he climbed the tree outside her bedroom window so they could hang out for a while.  Then, because he was a gentleman, he made sure that she got to sleep ok.

            It took him nearly two hours to get the last of the junk out of his car.  Then he spent another hour getting out the smell.  He wanted to make sure that everything was perfect.  He opened the trunk and began to line the edges with soft carpeting.  He put in a long cushion, a few throw pillows, and even a reading light.  After all, he wanted Lisa to be comfortable.  It was important to impress a lady like that on a second date.

Reality Check

It started one lovely weekend in September when I first moved in to my new apartment in Brooklyn, and ended on a cold winter night in February on a fire escape in my underpants.

When I first moved to New York City, I arrived with all the gusto and determination of Canadian illegally crossing the border into the States.  I had just graduated from Yale with a degree in business.  I wanted to get a degree in Art History at Berkeley, but my father told me once that “no son of mine is going to become some hippy liberal faggot.  You’ll be a Yale man just like me, and your grandfather, and your great grandfather.  You’ve got quite a legacy to live up to my boy.”

During my time at Yale I traveled a well-blazed trail.  I joined all the same clubs my father had been in.  I took all the same classes he had taken.  I was in the same fraternity that he, and his father, and his father’s father had been in.   I was living a life that had already been lived.  As I approached graduation the question that came most often was, “So, what company are you going to work for after school?”

I hated the question.  There was only one answer they would accept anyway and that was, “Oh I’m going to go work at my father’s firm in New York.”  It was what was expected of a legacy like me.

When you’re life’s path is as well laid out as mine, you have to find creative ways to make your own choices.  I couldn’t rebel in any normal teenage way.  If I had died my hair or joined a band or, god forbid, voted democrat, I would have been shipped off to West Point faster than I could say ‘art school’.  So I found unique ways to rebel.

Once I wrote a paper on why the capitalism model would benefit from more government regulation.  I joined the lacrosse team.  When I got to Yale, I didn’t join the glee club.

And when I finally moved to New York, instead of living in Manhattan in the family apartment, I found my own place out in Brooklyn.  It was small, but nice.  And it was clean.  I was trying to rebel not live in a third world country. Brooklyn was just ‘urban’ enough to ruffle my father’s feathers without him cutting me off completely.  I’d also hoped that being in Brooklyn would allow me to experience art and theater and culture in a way that I’d never been able to experience before.  It was like having a mistress.  A mistress called Art.

I know, it sounds totally pretentious.  But you have to remember; I spent my life being groomed for a world of ‘high culture.’  The Opera, the Ballet, and the Symphony were all acceptable.  Musicals, plays, and rock shows were not.  The Metropolitan Museum of Art was acceptable.  The MoMA was not.  And in Brooklyn I had a chance to experience all of those unacceptable forms of culture without being an embarrassment to the legacy.

When I told my father about it, I expected him to sigh his heavy disapproving sigh and start talking me out of it.  But instead he surprised me.

“What a great idea son! Brooklyn is an up and coming area, and buying a building down there could be a wonderful investment.  I’ll set something up with my real estate agent.  The building will have to be in my name at first, of course, but if you prove yourself, I just might transfer over the title.”

I hadn’t expected that.  It wasn’t what I wanted.  I had no desire to own any property; I just wanted to live in a tiny apartment off the beaten path.  But, there was no arguing with my father once he’d made up his mind.

The day that I moved in to my apartment was the best day of my life.  It was the day that I met Ellie.  It was a warm weekend in September.  One of the last warm weekends in New York before the cold settles in.

She was across the hall from me.  The building was a pre-war six-floor walk up.  My apartment was at the rear, and had a lovely view of the back wall of the apartments behind us.

I’d wanted to move in myself but my dad insisted that we hire a moving company.  I knew that it would instantly mark me as an outsider, but there was nothing I could do about it.  The guys were moving the last of my stuff upstairs when I saw her.

The movers had decided that I was too useless to help them move anything heavy because of my ‘girl arms’ so I had been given the jog of watching the truck.  She came around the corner like the sunrise.  The whole street brightened as she walked by.  She was tall, with long red hair and the most striking green eyes I’d ever seen.  She moved down the street with the type of self-assurance that only comes from not giving a crap about what anyone else thinks of you.  I stared at her, transfixed as she walked down the sidewalk towards me.

As she neared the apartment building she caught sight of me.  She walked over and stuck out her hand and said, “Hey there Suit, you come to buy the building and boot us out?”

For a minute I forgot how to speak. I forgot how to shake someone’s hand.  I stuck out my hand but instead of taking hers to shake it, I gave her a very awkward side-facing high five.  I laughed nervously and stammered, “yeah, in moving me today now yes am.”

She looked at me for a moment, and then laughed.  “You wanna try that again, Suit?”

“Suit?” I said, confused.

“Yeah, Suit. I can tell by you shiny black dress shoes and that finely pressed shirt that you’re one of those corporate types.  The kind who come to Brooklyn to ‘slum it’ with the artists and the hipsters, until of course they can’t pay their rent, and then out they go.” She stared.  I wasn’t sure if I should be offended or not.  She didn’t seem to be mocking me.  It was as if she were giving the weather report.  ‘It looks like rain, and you’re a corporate tool.’  No value judgment, just a statement of facts.

“I…er…I… I’m not here to ‘slum it’, I like Brooklyn!” I protested.

“Oh yes, I’m sure you’re just here to ‘soak up the art.’  And the letter I just received from my new landlord has nothing to do with you?” She was starting to get upset.

“I’m not…well, that is…my father did buy the building, but I…”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” She said flatly.

Every time I saw her after that it was a mixed experience.  I longed to catch sight of her, to see her smile or catch a whiff of her perfume.  But every time I actually interacted with her she would ask me something like, “How does it feel to rape the lower class?” or “How many pensions did you steal from today?”  And it was still said with that strange tone, devoid of angry judgment, just a harsh statement of facts.

It went for months. And yet, I longed for those moments.  I tried to work up a real amount of courage to talk to her for real, but her questions cut me to the core.  Was I really as awful as she made me out to be?  I didn’t feel like I was raping anyone, and I know I wasn’t stealing from anyone’s pensions… I wanted to tell her that I wasn’t like the other ‘suits’, that I was just doing it because of parental pressure and that I really wanted to be an artist.  But it always felt like such a cowardly thing to say.  So instead we continued with our ritual.  She would ask me when the next rent hike was coming, and I’d assure her there wasn’t going to be one.  Occasionally my father would make me ask her to pay the rent when she was late and she’d tell me that she’d pay up when this that or the other thing was fixed in the building.

Once I did manage to work up enough courage to ask her if she’d like to have dinner with me.  She stared at me as if I had three heads and said, “Everything about you is fake.  You pretend to be poor by living in this building.  You pretend to love art and culture.  But you’re a suit.  Tell you what; if you ever do anything real, then I’ll get dinner with you.”

One cold February evening I was sitting in my apartment watching re-runs of the Jeffersons when I heard a strange *scritch scritch scritch* noise coming from the kitchen.  I looked over just in time to see a small brown mouse dart out from under the fridge and go under a bookshelf.

Now, I should mention, I hate mice.  I don’t know why.  Something about them just creeps me out.  So a mouse in my house was the very last thing that I wanted to see.  And with all the other crap going on in my life, this was one thing that I was not going to stand for.  I was going to take control of the situation.  I was going to get rid of this mouse.

At the same time though… I didn’t want to kill it.  I’m kind of a big old softy.  I don’t even like killing bugs.  So I came up with a plan to capture it and release it outside.  I began constructing a mouse-proof barrier that would guide the mouse out from under the bookshelf and force him into a cup that I had set up as the ‘cage.’  As I was nearing completion of this mish-mash contraption, the mouse made a run for it.  The trap at the end wasn’t set up yet, and the mouse bolted straight under my front door.

Despite being ill prepared for it, the chase was on.  There was no way I was going to let this mouse win this fight.  I needed a victory.  Still holding a cup that I was going to use to fill the last small gap in the anti-mouse wall, I took off after him.  I think he was as surprised as I was that I had actually given chase that rather than try and get under the doors of another apartment, he just continued on down the stairs.  Flight after flight I chased him, periodically trying to catch him with the cup I was holding.

The building has no apartments on the ground floor.  You enter from the sidewalk and you go straight into a flight of stairs.  When you get to the second floor, you go through a second—locked—door.  I chased that little bastard right through that second door and got halfway down the stairs when I heard it slam shut behind me.

The sound of that door slamming was deafening.  The screech of the hinges, the rushing sound of wind as it cut through the air, and the heavy thud as it locked into place—that sound rang throughout the building and shook me to my core.

Then came the awful realization.  I didn’t have my keys.

Because that mouse had bolted before I was ready for it I had forgotten to grab my keys.  And my shoes.  And my robe.   So there I was, running down the stairs in my underpants with no way of getting back into my apartment, chasing a little mouse who, in a way, had outwitted me rather than the other way around like I’d hoped.  But, by damn, I was going to get rid of that mouse!  I followed through and chased him the rest of the way down the stairs, opened the door, and let him run off into the cold February night.

That did leave me with a pretty big problem though.  The building didn’t have an intercom system or doorbells at the entrance.  It was the middle of the night so it was incredibly unlikely that anyone would be passing through anytime soon.

I banged on the door for a solid twenty minutes.  I banged on the walls.  I even banged on the exposed water pipe that snaked its way past the doorframe.  But it was a futile effort.

I wasn’t quite sure what to do at this point.  I really didn’t want to wait 4 hours for someone to finally come through on their way to work.  Besides, what would I do?  I sure as hell wasn’t going to sleep.  And being in my underpants and sans shoes, walking around the city was out of the question as well.

For about twenty minutes I sat there on the steps trying to figure out what to do.  Then I had a thought.  If I could someone get to my window, I could get in, as it wasn’t locked.  All I needed to do was get to the rear of the building.  It did mean that I had to go outside though.  I psyched myself up, got my blood pumping to stay warm, and headed outside.  I used the cup that I had brought with me to prop open the door so that I didn’t get stuck in a worse predicament.  I walked up and down the block, looking for a pathway to the back of the building.  I even checked to see if the cellar was open.  No luck.  Then I tried the fire escape.

It was a little tricky, as fire escapes don’t go down to ground level except by way of an extendable ladder that was just out of my reach.  I had to drag over a trashcan to even have a remote hope of reaching it.

My hope was to climb up the fire escape to the roof, walk across, and then head down the other side to my apartment.  What I didn’t realize before I’d climbed up was that the fire escape didn’t go all the way to the roof.  There was no way I’d be able to get to my apartment.

I was stuck. On a fire escape.  In February.  At three in the morning.  In my underwear.  Things couldn’t possibly get any worse.

And that’s when I hear Ellie’s voice.

“Well, if this is your way of doing something real, I hope you’ve got a good explanation.”

“How could you loose an entire squadron of elves, and half a contingent of reindeer in one night?  Do you have any idea how much your little stunt is going to cost me?  What were you thinking?  An unauthorized fly by, in a major metropolitan area, during the day, in November for cripes sake!  Hundreds of people saw you Zant! How are we going to explain this one?  The US military is already up my ass about the sightings last Christmas over Des Moines, and now this? Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

Kringle was angry.  His broad face, usually happy, was drawn up.  His eyes twinkled, but not with merriment.  The man was known for shaking when he laughed, and Zant couldn’t help but notice that his belly shook just as much like a bowl full of jelly when he yelled. This wasn’t the first time Kringle had yelled at him.  There was the mistake in Cairo, and that time in Sydney.  Not to mention the week in London where Zant had lost his toy bag.  Fortunately he was able to find it, but not after a well meaning charity organization had given away nearly everything inside it.  Which was impressive considering bags like his held hundreds of thousands of gifts.

“I’m sorry Mr. Kringle.  I just thought that if I got some more flight time in that I could make the roster this year.  I’ve been practicing on the simulator, but it’s just not the same, you know?  I need to feel the wind on my face, really guide that sleigh through some sweet maneuvers.” Zant waved his hand in a flying motion, simulating the sleigh ducking and weaving.  Half-way through his third barrel roll he realized he was only making matters worse. He got off Kringle’s desk, and sat down.

Kringle glared at him.  He was silent for a long while before letting out a heavy sigh. He stood and walked over to the bay window overlooking the factory floor.  “Zant, please understand.  What we do here is important.  The humans, they need this. They have so much misery in their lives, so much hate and anger.  The Holiday season is the one time during the year that they manage to try and be happy.  Sure, not all of them get into it, but the ones that do, well, they need our help.  Without us spreading Cheer and Joy, and delivering those gifts, well, this planet would tear itself apart.  Right now our numbers are down.  Only thirty percent of the world’s population participates in some sort of Holiday activity.  Our Christmas and Hanukkah numbers are down.  The Kwanza numbers are up, but they are starting to plateau.  If we loose any more people to disbelief and misery, well, we might end up loosing the contract on Earth.  And if we pulled out, do you know what would happen?”

Zant thought for a moment, trying desperately to come up with the right answer, “Um, we would, uh, loose the contract to the Trillians?”

Kringle chuckled, “No my boy. Perhaps a few decades ago another company could have come in and taken over, but the numbers are just too low these days.  If we pulled out, there would be no more Holiday.  No more Cheer.  No more gift deliveries.  Humanity would fall completely into the abyss of disbelief.”

“I don’t think I understand what this has to do with me.” Zant said.

“My boy, humans are tricky creatures.  They all say that in order to believe in something that they must first see it.  But do you know what happens when they see something? They explain it away. They rationalize it. They push it further in to disbelief.  Part of what we rely on is faith.  We need these folks to believe in us, without seeing us, because that’s what gives them strength. If they can find it within themselves to believe in something they can’t see, like us, then they allow themselves the possibility to believe in other things they can’t see, like the goodness in their fellow man.

“Your stunt last night, well, that lost us a lot of good people.  By allowing yourself to be seen in broad daylight, you allowed them to activate their rationalizations.  Yes, they saw a sleigh flying through the air, being pulled by reindeer, but their rational minds just won’t allow them to believe that’s really what happened. Look here, read this.”

Kringle walked over to his desk and rifled through a stack of newspapers until he found the one he was looking for and handed it to Zant.

Zant looked it over and read the headline, “Flying Reindeer.  Military experiment, or Macy’s marketing stunt?” He looked up at Kringle. “But, they saw me! With their own eyes! How could they not believe?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to explain to you my boy. Humanity has been through so much in the last century that they simply cannot believe in something so outright, especially if it claims to be doing good.  They will look for the hidden agenda, the secret scam. Sure, they may want to believe that there is good in the world, but when directly confronted with goodness, for some reason, they simply have a hard time accepting it.  Which is why we use such a light touch.  We want people to be effected by what we do, but in little ways.

“Which is why, my boy, that I think it’s time you returned to the home world.  I just don’t think you’re cut out to be a Claus.”

Zant was crushed.  Being a Claus was all he’d ever wanted since he was young. The problem was, he was a screw up. He hadn’t done very well on his entrance exams, and his flight test had been near disastrous. The only reason he had gotten accepted to the academy was because of his family connection to Kringle. He always thought that once he was actually at the North pole that things would be different. That being around other Clauses would give him the drive and the focus to improve.

“Mr. Kringle I–”

“You’re flight points are low, you can’t make it down a chimney without getting stuck, you’ve only got a sixty percent gift delivery accuracy rate, and on top of it all, you still don’t know the names of the Eight.”

“But uncle–”

“No but’s Zant. It’s time you went home. There’s a transport ship leaving tomorrow, and I want you to be on it.”

“Tomorrow? But that means I’ll miss the Season this year! Please, uncle, I mean, Mr. Kringle, please let me stay until after Christmas. If I’m going to be sent home, at least let me have one more holiday.” Zant did his best not to cry.  Being a Claus was all he had wanted since he was young.  He had to convince Kringle to let him stay. If he could stay one more Christmas, he was sure that he could figure out a way to prove that he was worth of being a Claus.

“Zant, I–”

“Please, just one more Christmas,” Zant couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. “Please…” He lay his head in his hands and sobbed.

“Alright Zant. One more Christmas. But you’re on the next transport after New Years, got it?”

Zant looked up, “Really? Oh thank you sir! Thank you!” He ran over to give his uncle a hug. “You don’t know how much this means to me! I promise, I won’t let you down. No more screw ups from now on.”

Kringle peeled Zant’s arms from around his waist, “Alright my boy, alright, that’s quite enough. Report to Trixin in the morning. And you better know all the names of the Eight and be able to tell them apart”

“Yes sir!” Zant started towards the door.

“Zant?”

“Yes Mr. Kringle?”

“Forgetting something?” Kringle held up Zant’s toy bag.

“Oh, of course. Sorry sir. Won’t happen again. No more screw ups from now on.”

“I don’t understand…so this pill turns you into God?”

“Well, sorta. I mean, you get to be god-like for an hour or so, but it wears off. Look man, you said you wanted to experience something crazy and wild your last night out. This is the cream of the crop right here.”

Travis looked at his friend. Tom and he had been buddies since they were kids and now on the night before Travis was going to get shipped off to the front lines of the Mars wars, Tom had come to give his friend the time of his life. Tom was like that. Wild. Fun. A little crazy. His plans sometimes had a tendency to cause severe headaches, a bit of property damage, and one night they managed to lose an officers’ dog for an hour. As in, the damn dog disappeared. Tom had been fiddling with the base’s new transport system and the dog had followed them in and stepped on the pad. If it wasn’t for Trisha they would have all ended up in the brig.

“Look man, this one here? It will let you fly. This one will let you walk through walls. The purple one gives you super strength. And the green one? Well that one’s my favorite. Lets you see through anything. Like clothing. Catch my drift?”

“I don’t know Tom, the last time I took something you gave me I ended up naked, on top of the barracks screaming for the Mars rebels to come down and fight a real man.”

Tom laughed, “Yeah, that was pretty awesome.” Travis shot him an angry look. “I mean it wasn’t … no, it was awesome.”

Travis stood up and started to walk out.

“Oh don’t be like that ya big baby. Look these don’t have any side effects I promise. You retain all your mental faculties the whole time, and they only last an hour or so. Come on, take the green one, and then take this one that lets you fly. Imagine this, taking Trish out for a flight, and then finally being able to see what she looks like under that uniform, eh?” Tom handed him the pills.

“You promise me that there won’t be side effects?” Travis asked.

“You have my word as a gentleman and a scholar,” Tom said. “There won’t be any side effects–” Travis swallowed the pills. “–hopefully.”

“Can’t we talk somewhere more…private?”

“Oh relax Suul, sit down, have a drink! Enjoy yourself! Hey, sweet cheeks! Let’s have a round for me and my friend here!”

“Good Gods Trean, are you trying to get caught?”

“You need to relax more. Look, we’ve got a new girl performing tonight. I can arrange a private party for you later if you like.”

“If you’re not interested in doing business, I’m leaving.”

“Ok, ok. Let’s go to my office.”

“You want ya drinks Mr. Trean?”

“Bring ‘em to the office in a few minutes sweet cheeks. My friend and I need to conduct some private business.”

“Sure thing baby.”

“Alright, come in. Try not to have a heart attack. It wouldn’t do us well if I had to call the herrishons to take you to the med center. Sit, sit.”

“Look I came a long way. Do you have the device or not?”

“Straight to business, eh Suul? That’s what I like about you Telkin rebels. No nonsense. You know, I knew a couple of Rehad rebels once, used to come in here all the time and–”

“Here’s ya drinks baby”

“You are lovely sweet cheeks. What would I do without you?”

“Ya’d have ta get yer own drinks. I’ll be in the kitchen if ya need me.”

“Mmmm–mmm! You ever seen a beauty like that before? Amazing body on that one. And the things Aealin does at night–make you believe in all ten gods!”

“The device. Yes? Or no?”

“Yes. Do you have the payment?”

“I’m ready to credit your account as soon as I see it.”

“It’s in the box, behind you. You’ll find that everything is in perfect working condition. Exactly like you specified.”

“It’s blue.”

“What?”

“The device. It’s blue. I told you, it had to be red.”

“What does that matter? The device will still provide a constant source of power, and won’t give off any noise either. You’re engines will run for 100 years on that thing.”

“You think I’m a fool Trean? Blue modules are Illani modules. Trackable. That’s why it had to be red.”

“Hey, look, I’m sure we can work out something! Tell ya what, I’ll get you a new one! Half off. How does that sound?”

“It sounds like you don’t know Telkin rebels as well as you think. Tell you what is actually going to happen. I’m taking this device, and you can consider it a gift.”

“Ha! Oh Suul, you think you can just walk out without paying me what I’m due?”

“You’ve always been an arrogant bastard Trean. You’ve been trying to screw me since the first time we met. And yes, I know about your contact will the Illani officials. I bet you even think they are on their way to arrest me and reward you right now don’t you?”

“How did you–?”

“Transport’s ready ta go baby. Ya get tha device?”

“Aealin? What? I don’t understand…”

“Aealin isn’t just some whore you picked up off the street. She’s been working for us for a long time. We sent her here to make sure we could stay one step ahead of you when you tried to turn us over to the Illani.”

“You little bitch. I’ll…ugh..I’m…gonna…”

“Oh, did I forget to mention? That Rehad ale you are so found of has been laced with one of my own creations. What you are undoubtedly feeling now is a sudden, severe disorientation, followed by nausea and a headache. I regret to inform you, but the last few moments of your life are going to be extremely…unpleasant. Your body will feel like it’s on fire, and then ice cold. Then you won’t be able to move. After that…well, I don’t want to ruin the surprise now do I?

“You…you can’t…”

“Take the device. Meet me at the transport in five. I’m going to check his back room safe before we leave, see if he’s got anything else that we can use.

Only thirty yards stood between Corr and freedom. The tall reeds whipped at his unexposed skin as he ran towards the forest edge. He did his best to protect his face with his hands, but every step he took was more painful than the last. He knew that once he passed the edge of the Riverlands and entered the lowland forests of Endrin he would be beyond the outer edge of any patrolmen of the Rhen Alliance.

When he finally reached the forest’s edge he slowed his pace a little. Corr knew he still needed to stay on the lookout for bandits and wildlings, but compared to the torture he’d just escaped, the residents of the lowland forests didn’t worry him so much. Corr had to formulate a plan and decide where to go. The dense growth of the forest would provide him with the much-needed cover to stop and finally rest. It might even give him the chance to start a fire to stave of the chill of the night. He needed help. He needed to find someone who could help him figure out what was happening to him–someone who wouldn’t drive him from his home or lock him in a dungeon and subject him to endless torture.

As he traveled Corr reflected on the state he was in. It had been two weeks since his escape. For the first three days he just ran. He didn’t care where he was going, he just knew he needed to get away. The Riverlands weren’t safe. Too many Alliance soldiers patrolled the region. Corr believed that if he could just make it out of the Riverlands and into the lowland forests he would be out of danger. On the fourth day he found a small cave to hide in and slept for a day and a half. When he finally awoke, he briefly considered staying in the cave forever, living with a family of raccoons, but he forced himself to keep going. He rested during the day, sleeping when he could, and walked at night. His sight at night had always been good but with the promise of freedom in front of him and the threat of death behind him he found himself able to see better than any highland owl he’d ever encountered.

Suddenly he heard a low groaning noise that caused him to stop dead in his tracks. Corr listened intently for the sound, trying to gauge what it was, and where it was coming from. The sound came again, off to his left. He changed his course, and cautiously made his way towards to noise. A few paces away the trees opened into a small clearing. In the center of the clearing was a large stump–the last remnants of a long dead tree, its thick trunk likely carried away by wildlings or eaten away by wood mites. In a way, this place looked almost magical–a place suspended in time. It was silent in the clearing, except for the groaning, and the additional sound of heavy labored breathing.

He carefully moved into the clearing, and closer towards the sounds. As Corr approached the massive tree stump he saw a wild boar, its right front leg twisted and broken. A large amount of blood surrounded the boar, and as he approached, the large swine couldn’t even lift its head in acknowledgement, let alone stand to run away in fear. Corr stood for a moment, looking into the wild pigs’ eyes, sharing a strange kinship with the beast over the pain and suffering they had both recently experienced. A part of him wished that there was something he could do to heal the animal, but he also knew that the beast was far beyond any sort of help. Corr knew that at this point the best thing to do would be to end the poor beasts’ misery, and then thank the gods that he would finally have the chance at a real meal.

Corr had no weapons on him and the closest thing he had to a blade was the small shard of glass he had used to cut his bonds in his escape. Fortunately he had spent quite a bit of time as a youth helping the town butcher slaughter, gut, and strip all sorts of livestock, so he was not without experience in this matter. He knelt beside the boar and put a hand on the animals’ head. He lowered his own head, closed his eyes, and thanked the boar for giving its life so that he could live. Then Corr grabbed a large nearby rock, and made quick work of things.

The fire spit and hissed as the fat from the roasting meat dripped onto the coals. Corr cursed to himself as a stray ember singed his hand as he reached in to turn the spit. The aroma from the cooking boar alone was nearly enough to fill his stomach. It had been a painfully long time since he’d had anything of real substance to eat, and it took everything in him to give the boar time to cook properly. While Corr was in prison he never got more than stale bread and fetid water and in the time that he’d escaped he’d only managed to find grubs and berries. To say that he was hungry would to severely understate the situation. Corr’s mind began to wander.

“Everyone breaks eventually. You can resist all you want, but eventually, you will tell me what you know.” Those had been the first words that his torturer had spoken to him. He could still hear the twisted man’s croaking voice in his head. The guards called him The Keeper. He was a short man, twisted by some crippling childhood malady. The Keeper was fond of inflicting terrible pain on Corr–pain that brought him to the very brink of insanity and threatened to turn him into a mindless wretch, devoid of any consciousness besides feral instinct. But always right before he felt like he was going to get swallowed into the abyss The Keeper pulled him back. The man terrified Corr. If he hadn’t escaped when he had…

The fire cracked and popped again, drawing him back in to the moment. Finally deciding that the swine was cooked enough he pulled the spit out of the fire and ripped off a chunk. Without waiting for it to cool he tore into the flesh with everything he had.

“May I share your fire duna?”

He nearly choked as he jumped up and whirled around towards the voice. A tall figure stood about 6 paces away from him. The stranger’s voice was clearly female, but it carried a thick accent. The woman was wrapped in a long dark green cloak, with a hood that covered her face. For a moment Corr considered making a run for it, but he quickly decided that in his current state he wouldn’t make it very far, and if the strange woman was an enemy she’d overtake and kill him faster than he could blink. Besides, if the hooded figure wasn’t an enemy, Corr would be out a warm fire and a perfectly good boar.

“I am sorry duna, I meant not to frighten you. I was seeing your fire and hoped I might find someone who would be willing to show a little hospitality,” the woman said, stepping a little closer, removing her hood. “If you mean to attack me duna, I am not sure that is the most effective weapon choice” she said, gesturing towards the leg of boar the man held in his hand.

Suddenly Corr felt flush with embarrassment as he realized that he was brandishing the boar leg like a small dagger, but he quickly returned to distrust and fear.

“What are you doing in the middle of the Endrin Forests?”

“I might ask the same of you, duna. A strange ad’ononi, dressed in rags, looking like he has never bathed in his life–but I suppose since it is your fire, and your boar, I will go first.”

She crossed to the other side of the fire and sat down. The warm firelight shone off the woman’s dark skin, revealing long intricate tattoos running down the sides of her face and neck. The tattoos marked her as Crealish. Corr didn’t know much about the people from the southern lands of Creal, but everyone knew about their tattoos. Creal children received their first tattoos across their shoulders at a very young age. As they got older or moved up the social ladder they would add to the tattoos in size and complexity. Crealish people believed that their tattoos held some type of power, protecting them and giving them strength. Corr had no idea how they worked or what they really did, but the fact that this woman’s tattoos went all the way up her face must have meant she was either very old, or very important.

“I am running. Or more truthfully, I am hiding. ”

“From what, exactly?”

“From life. It has not exactly been good to me.”

Corr wanted to ask her more, but her tone told him that she was not interested in discussing the matter further. He desperately needed the company, and didn’t want to risk her leaving by offending her. He changed the subject.

“What’s your name?”.

“Samantha.”

The man snorted a chuckle.

“Why do you laugh, duna?”

“Nothing,” he stifled his laughter, “it’s just, I thought that all you Crealish had names like Krrikken or Culdrutn or something. Samantha, well, that’s a Rhenen name.”

“My Crealish name is difficult for the Rhenen tongue. And for the last 30 years I’ve been living among you duoni. I got tired of you people butchering my name, so I decided to change it. Now, I think I have fulfilled my end of the bargain. I told you who I am and what I am doing here. May I share your fire now, duna?”

Again Corr wanted to press her for more information, but thought better of it. Instead, he just nodded.

“And the boar, duna?” she gestured towards the meat.

Corr nodded again.

“Thank you, duna” Samantha smiled as she took the meat. It had been so long since anyone had smiled at him that the expression seemed unnatural. As Corr looked at her smiling face, he felt his guard drop ever so slightly. He wanted to trust her. Every part of him yearned for someone to whom he could tell his story. Someone who would listen without fear or anger. Someone that might even be able to believe him. If not for the sudden pain across his back, he might have told her everything right then and there. Unable to bear the intensity of the pain, he stumbled back and sat down. The exhaustion of his ordeal crashed against his body like a giant wave.

“Are you ok, duna?” Samantha asked, concerned.

“Yes, I’m fine, I just…”

“You’re bleeding!” Samantha cried out with a start. Corr felt a warm trickle of blood make its way down his arm, around his wrist, and drip off his fingers. Samantha rushed over to him and before he could protest, started to removed his shirt.

“Let me look duna,” she said, not as a request. He didn’t bother trying to stop her.

As Samantha pulled off the tattered rags that only barely qualified as his shirt, her smiling face twisted into a mixture of shock, horror, and deep sadness. He flinched in pain as the matted cloth tore away from his skin. Samantha stared at him, dumbfounded. Across Corr’s entire back and shoulders ran long, wide, deep gashes in various stages of scabbing, festering, and oozing.

“What happened to you, duna?”

Corr grimaced at the burning pain and looked up at her. “Life… hasn’t exactly been good to me either.”

At the beginning of the episode Doctor Crusher is trying to save the Captains life after he was attacked on an away mission. She is loosing him.  Picard seemingly passes to the ‘afterlife’ where he is greeted by Q.  Q informs him that he is dead, that this is the afterlife that he (Q) is God and so forth.  They go back and forth for a bit with their dry repartee.  Q tells Picard he died because his mechanical heart failed, and asks, “By the way, how did you lose yours anyway?”

“A mistake.” Picard says flatly.

“Is that a regret I hear?” Q asks, mockingly.

“I regret many things from those days.” Picard replies.

Picard sees a vision of a bar fight, in which a Nausicaan stabs him in the back.  He laments for a while about how he was young and foolish and arrogant and so forth. Q asks him if he had it all to live over again, would he?  Picard replies in the affirmative, and suddenly finds himself transported back in time, to his 21-year old self.

It is a moment in Picard’s life shortly before he gets into that bar fight with a Nausicaan.  Q informs him that he now gets to relive his life and after having to making extensive assurances that nothing he does or doesn’t do will affect the timeline (“You’re not that important [Jean-Luc]!”), Picard goes on his merry way, determined to correct all the foolhardy mistakes he made as an arrogant youth.

Picard avoids the fight and Q whisks him back to the future.  He’s not dying on the operating table, but he is neither is he Captain of the Enterprise.  In fact he finds himself a Lt. Junior Grade in the astrophysics department.  His entire life has changed.

Jean-Luc Picard changes that one event in his life and it completely rewrites who he is an entire person.  He’s no longer passionate, bold, imaginative, capable of command or willing to take chances of any kind.  He never learned to move beyond himself, to achieve great things.  Picard demands that Q return things to normal.  Q informs him that if events are corrected that Picard will die on the operating table.  The Captain says, “I would rather die as the man I was, that live one more day in that life.”  Q sends Picard back so that he can get stabbed in the bar fight.  He is returned to the sickbay in the future (or, rather, his present) and then deciding Picard has learned his lesson, Q allows him to live.

Alright so now that we’ve gotten that out of the way…

It got me thinking about the choices I’ve made in my life, and how often I’ve wished that I could go back and rewrite portions of it.  I would say there are very very few things from my past that I’m ashamed of.  But I would be lying if I said that there are very few things that I regret or am embarrassed by.  Some of the things that I regret aren’t even so much based on mistakes I made, but by just being in the wrong place and the wrong time.

I’m going to share three quick examples. One I’m embarrassed by, one I regret, and one that I simply wished I could have changed the surrounding circumstances.

The first story, Embarrassment: During my freshman year at college I met this very cute girl at the bookstore. We were standing in line to pick up our required textbooks and syllabi. We talked and flirted and bemoaned the price of textbooks. It was exciting and fun, especially because flirting was not something that came naturally to me and the fact that an actual girl flirting with me was a concept as foreign to me as the inner workings of the Serbian economy.

Eventually we got to the front of the line, got our printout of what books we needed and went our separate ways. Aside from leaving the bookstore much happier than one normally might after spending that much money on textbooks, I didn’t think much of the experience and quickly put it out of my mind. And it probably would have stayed that way, except that the very next Tuesday I discovered that not only was she in the same lecture hall as me, but she remembered who I was.

I really wanted to be brave and actually ask this girl out.  Every Monday evening for 4 Mondays in a row I would tell myself that the next morning in class I would ask her out.  And every Tuesday morning for 4 weeks in a row, I chickened out.  Luckily, I caught a break.  Our professor wanted us to go see a play off in Brooklyn, and then write a report about it.  The tickets were free, all we had to do was put in for what day we wanted to go.  It was the perfect ‘in’.  We both had to see it, it was free, and it was all the way in Brooklyn, which for college freshmen in New York City automatically meant ‘evening adventure’.

Oh, did I mention that she lived in the same dorm as me?  Because that’s an important part of the story.

Later that Tuesday evening (after the assignment to see the show had been given out), I arrived home to find that my roommate and his girlfriend had made 12 loaves of banana bread.  I don’t remember why which is a shame, because one can’t help but wonder, why in the world would someone make 12 loaves of banana bread?  I guess we can only speculate.  Anyway, I decided to use the banana bread as an opportunity to head over to this girls dorm room and finally ask her out.

I picked the nicest looking loaf, took a shower, shaved, put on my nicest T shirt and cleanest shorts, mustered all my courage and headed out.  I was almost too chicken to get out of the elevator.  But I did.  I rang the bell and the door suddenly swung wide open.  I was greeted not by the tall, pretty redhead from class, but a small, dark haired, scary looking emo girl.  Needless to say, I was a little surprised.  I asked her if her roommate was home and she demanded to know who I was.  I started to tell her, but she interrupted me by saying, “Oh! You’re the guy from her lecture hall!”

She got this look on her face that was a mixture of excitement and horror.  Like when you’ve been standing in line for that roller-coaster that you drove 40 miles just to ride, and you finally get to the front of the line, when suddenly your stomach informs you that “you are going to have diarrhea”.  She called back for her roommate who came out of the side room, sporting a similar facial expression, though with less “oh, yay!” and more “oh, shit!”.  We stood awkwardly in the doorway and made small talk for a minute or two, and I offered her the banana bread.  Her roommate took up a spectator seat  on the couch right by the door and watched.  Looking back, I’m a little surprised she didn’t make popcorn.  Anyway, I was just about to ask her on the big date when this guy appears from the kitchen.  In his cross from the kitchen to the bedrooms he paused briefly enough to give me a long, hard stink eye.

It threw me off for a second, but I managed to get the question out.  Her face lit up, like I just handed her a box, and when she opened it up she discovered it was full of puppies.  But then, she grew pale, and sort of sad, like she realized that puppies, while cute and awesome, cause cancer if you touch them. She didn’t say no.  Instead she tried to change the subject.

Stupidly, I asked her, “who was that guy with the wicked stink eye?”

She looked at me like she was the President of the United states I had just asked her for America’s nuclear launch codes.

“He’s just a friend of mine,” she replied with a concerted effort of dismissal.

I tried asking her again if she was interested in going to the show with me, not saying anything about it being a date, just using the excuse that since we both had to go see the show, it might be fun to go together.  She waffled back and forth for a minute and said something like, “well I think I was already planning on going with a group of friends already.”  She was being evasive, so I doubled down.  This time I was going to be clear about wanting it to be a date.  I said, “alright, well, I’m really interested in getting to know you better, and would love to take you out sometime.  I think you’re beautiful, enchanting, and intelligent.  I think that we’ve got a really good chance at something special here, and all it takes is for you to say yes to going out with me on Friday night.”  Or… something to that effect.  I’m sure that I was totally charming and suave, and not awkward and weird in any way.

She started moving towards the door in that way that says, “we should take this into the hallway,” when Sergeant Stink Eye walked out of the bedroom area and stopped in the hall.  He wasn’t close enough to be considered in the room or as if he was part of the conversation, but he was close enough to assert his presence.

I couldn’t help myself.  If only I’d kept my big fat mouth shut, we might have had that date that Friday.  But we didn’t.  Because I didn’t.  Instead, I opened my aforementioned big fat mouth and asked, “So, wait a minute, who is that guy, really?”

Her roommate snorted back a laugh.  The poor girl was stuck.  She looked at me and sighed, “Well, I guess… I guess he’s sorta, kinda my boyfriend.”  I was so embarrassed.  Not only had I asked this girl out in front of her boyfriend twice, but her roommate got to see the whole thing.  On top of that I had to watch Sergeant Stink Eye get called this girls’, “sort of boyfriend” in a tone that clearly indicated this was likely to change fairly soon, possibly within the next 20 minutes.  I vaguely remember mumbling something about seeing her in class and hightailed it out of there as fast as humanly possible.

Now, as mortifying as that experience was, I wouldn’t change anything about it.  It took a lot of courage to ask that girl out.  And despite the awkwardness that ensued, it was important for me to know that I could be brave and do something like that.

That’s what it sounds like in my head, pretty much all of the time. My internal critic has been with me all of my life. At one point, he was my imaginary friend. When I was little I don’t remember him being this much of a jerk–in fact, I have vague memories that we even got along and had fun together. We’d go on imaginary adventures and explore the deep recesses of my mind, making up new and exciting worlds, and creating new and amazing experiences. I don’t know when my imaginary friend turned in to my internal editor. I would guess sometime around the 7th grade, when I started getting my first real ‘do something creative’ assignments that didn’t involve paste, construction paper, or glitter. (I’m not knocking those materials as a viable art medium, I’m just saying that it’s pretty difficult for my internal editor to criticize elementary school level creations.)

Anyway, the reason I talk about my internal editor as being a transformation of my imaginary friend is because to me, the editor is almost like a real person. Just like the imaginary friend is to a child, the editor exists. He sits beside me, looking over my shoulder, talks to me, hangs out with me all the time, etc. The difference between him and normal imaginary friends is, well, he’s a dick. He never has anything positive to say. Often times he will interrupt a perfectly good train of thought to say, “That’s stupid,” or “You really are just the worst.” And I talk right back. Out loud. Sometimes in a mumbled whisper, but more often than not in a normal speaking voice. Sometimes I even yell at him. There have been times that I will be at work thinking about how I need to do X,Y, and Z, and that I should do them in various orders, and my internal editor-jerk-face will say something like, “that’s a really stupid way of doing things,” and I will find myself justifying my decisions, out loud. It gets really awkward when I realize that not only am I talking to him out loud, but that there are other people right next to me, looking at me like I’m crazy. The worst is when I’m casually talking to myself and I’m walking up the stairs, or around the corner in a hallway, and suddenly someone will be standing there and I’ll have to think really hard to figure out if I was just talking out loud or if it was just in my head. I always hope that it was just in my head, but judging by the looks on their faces, I’m usually not.

You know what? My internal editor needs a name. For now, let’s call him….Richard. You know, ‘cause it can be shortened to Dick.

Anyway, Richard and I have a pretty stressful relationship. He never lets up. Ever. Never ever ever never. Ever. He criticizes and mocks everything I do. I am constantly having to justify my actions to him. Even if it’s something as mundane as how I choose to tie my shoes, he’s there, ready with a snide remark. It can be very tiring.

I’m trying to learn how to quiet him, or at least, ignore him. I still don’t know how. He always manages to get the best of me in the end. It’s just something I need to keep at I guess. I feel like I’ve spent a lot of time not doing something (like writing creatively) because Richard will tell me that it’s a stupid idea and is a waste of time so why bother.

Having such a strong internal editor isn’t all bad though. It has taught me how to justify my thoughts and actions. For the things that I am absolutely sure about, I can usually win the argument without much fuss, and it makes it so that if a real person in real life asks me to justify my actions then I am able to do that.

My problem is learning how to strike a balance. I don’t want to get rid of him forever, but it would be nice if I could figure out a way to turn him off, at least during the first draft. Once the first draft is finished, then Dick can come around and tell me all the things that are wrong with it. But at least by then I’ll have a better idea of the overall picture so I’ll be able to tell him why I think he’s wrong.

I’m really hoping that the upcoming NaNoWriMo project will be a great help for this. In order to get 50,000 words down in a month I’m going to have to turn him off. For a whole month no less! I’m worried that I won’t be able to do it. I ‘m worried that I will get so bogged down in what Richard has to say to me that I won’t be able to make it past 5,000 words. Or even 500. Or even 5.

Nevertheless, I am going to try. So, wish me luck.

[Insert clever sign off phrase here]

These people worship Rhythm and Vibration.  They believe that their deity manifests itself through vibration.  It’s not all sound that’s sacred–it’s specific rhythmic vibrations.  The longer, louder, and slower, the better.  They believe that the chaotic noises of nature (e.g. wind, thunder, quakes, etc) are their God fighting the Silence.  The Silence seeks to still everything, and stop all life.  These people believe that the human heartbeat was given to mankind as a reminder and connection to God.  They believe that the Silence seeks to quiet their rhythm by causing chaos in man’s soul. Sin causes the harmony of their own rhythm to fall out of sync with their God’s rhythm.

Adherents always carry with them a small drum that they can bang on to keep rhythm while they meditate.  Their holy sites are places where the natural vibration of the earth can heard without wind, thunder, or earthquakes.  Their churches are oval shaped, open roofed amphitheaters, that are acoustically perfect.  At their central headquarters they have constructed a massive gong that rings twice an hour.  It is loud enough to be heard miles and miles away, and the bell takes nearly half of an hour to stop reverberating.

Musicians are considered holy men.  Adding tone to the rhythm is the ‘creative’ way of praying.  Those that play an instrument that emits tones that can be controlled are venerated.  However, percussionists are more highly respected than any other because the simple rhythm is considered to be more powerful and more directly connected to God than anything else.

It is said that the greatest of this religions holy men was a percussionist who laid out a beat for over a year, without stopping.  The very rhythm itself was enough to sustain him.  He did not eat.  He did not speak.  He did not move, save it were to beat on his drum.  When he finally stopped, not out of exhaustion, but seemingly out of nirvana, he immediately died.

Physical vibration is not the only form of holy rhythm.  Natural cycles such as life and death, the rising and setting of the sun, the phases of the moon, or the changing of the seasons happen in a steady rhythm. These are dependable things. War, selfishness, hatred, etc are all things that disrupt the natural cycle and rhythm of things and pull people away from God.

Hell for these people is to be pulled apart by their own chaos that they cease to exist in any recognizable way. They are simply scattered sounds.

Their ultimate desire is to bring their own lives into such rhythmic harmony that they transform into beings of pure vibration and are caught up to be with their God forever.