madd
fictional

THE MIDNIGHT EDITION

Tag: Inspiration

  • Passage Through the Graveyard of Earthworms

    dead-worms-in-ohio

    My monotony needed twisting today, so I went for a stroll, sans iPod. You know, breathe in a bit of city fresh air, clear some cobwebs, that sort of deal.

    There I was walking down the street, mind-sifting through character conversations and scene settings, when I looked down at the pavement and realized that I was traipsing through what looked like the aftermath of the Great Worm War of 2013. The sidewalk was a battlefield littered with the corpses of thousands of earthworms that coated an entire city block.

    Logically I knew how this could have happened. I knew they came to the surface either during the heavy rains–but it’s been dry weather for the past week–or to pair off and mate only to get caught on things that are hard for them to crawl across, like sidewalks and subsequently fry on the surface from sun rays–but that normally occurs during spring.

    So, what then? Had there actually been a battle? Warring clans pitched against one another over territorial disputes? Factions in conflict over the claiming of a throne? Families locked in a deadly dispute over an unholy union?

    Or was it a warning?

    As I stood there, staring at their dried remains, curled into runic shapes, I wondered if they had been somehow gifted with a vision of the approaching apocalypse and had sacrificed themselves in an effort to warn us in the only language they knew. The last Germanic language spoken to them by man before the two species went their separate ways.

    In that moment I felt like Indiana Jones in the passageway to the Grail chamber, trying to decipher the worm cadavers’ possible portents of doom, only without the aid of a diary or Sean Connery whispering something about, “Only the penitent man will pass.” or like John Nash without an ounce of the mental code breaking ability.

    And I stood there. Longer than I’m comfortable admitting. Frustrated by the limits of my linguistics. Finally, I forced myself to move on, but not before making a promise:

    No more outdoor strolls without my iPod.

    Sally forth and be writeful.

    ©2013 Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys

    Creative Commons License

  • A Message to My Younger Self: Try Harder

    “I have no doubt that my story will end in very much the same manner as it began, with a secret. And as I stand at the crossroads, caught at the precise moment where a lifetime of secrets left untold should either be revealed or die forever, I stare at the younger man, eyes full of dreams that have not yet been crushed ‘neath the heel of reality, and find it difficult to believe that I was once him.” — Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys, The Very Fabric of Time Itself

    I was riding the ferry today and it was one of those rare occasions when I wasn’t plugged into my iPod. I had just finished listening to an episode of The Afternoon Drama (a daily BBC radio play series) and as I was letting the weight of the story settle in, I overheard a conversation between a couple. They were talking about the five messages they would include in a letter if they were able to have it delivered to their younger selves.

    This, of course, got me thinking about my own letter and how difficult a process it would be to write. The younger me, we’ll call him Li’l Rhy for the sake of this post, was a card carrying member of The Bronx Chapter of the International Skeptics Society who wouldn’t have believed 1) the letter came from the future, and more importantly, 2) that his future self had written it.

    Also, I’m sure if I flat out told him of the obstacles he would face, that information would be redacted by some faceless wage slave at the Temporal Post Office, so the message would have to be as succinct as possible. And, if I’m honest, I wasn’t in love with the notion of sending five messages because that seemed a bit much to me. No one follows all five pieces of advice they receive. Humans just aren’t built that way. I’d either have to settle on offering Li’l Rhy three pieces of advice, hoping that at least one of them stuck, or offer one simple, yet key, bit of advice with a unifying thread. Most likely I’d go with the second option.

    The next problem is offering the exact piece of advice Li’l Rhy would listen to. That’s a toughie, that one. Yup. Yes siree, Bob. Sigh. I guess it would all have to fall under the category of Try Harder, as in:

    Love fiercely and try harder not to break hearts. Befriend the friendless and try harder not to burn bridges. Laugh more and try harder not to take life too seriously. Follow your bliss and try harder to stave off the darkness. Turn off the TV and try harder to think deeply. Take your time but try harder to avoid procrastination. Dream bigger and try harder to stop worrying about dreams not coming true. And stay away from Jane Hester. Sure, she’s pretty to look at but she’s nothing but trouble and It. Will. Not. End. Well.

    I’m sure that last bit will get redacted, but here’s hoping!

    ©2013 Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys

  • My Mad Fat Brain Bug: A Story Box Full of Regret

    storyboxside_comicbookpoems

    The damnedest thing can place a bug in your brain. Rod Serling is the source of one of mine.

    It happened while I was deep within my Twilight Zone infatuation phase, in the prehistoric information days before civilian access to the internet, when I devoured every Serling-related book, article or fanzine I could lay my grubby little mitts on. In one of the pieces, I read how Rod’s widow, Carol, found a number of scripts and stories amongst her late husband’s possessions that were unproduced at the time.

    And thus the bug found a home in my grey matter.

    I pictured Rod in the final moments before he shuffled off this mortal coil, his gaze sliding across the room until it fell on the closet door, eyes filled with that unique brand of sadness only known to writers. Carol would remember that stare and later be drawn to the closet by a mysterious force that urged her to dig out a box buried deep beneath the material remnants of Rod’s life, shed like so much old skin. A box filled with his regrets, the stories that remained untold, that never found a proper home.

    You don’t have to say it, I know that’s all rubbish. Simply me fictionally placing myself in the position of a man I never met. If Rod had any regrets at all, I certainly wasn’t privy to them. But that doesn’t make my brain bug any less real.

    You see, I have a box–well, it started off as a file folder and grew into a box–filled with stories in various stages of development. Ideas written on scraps of paper, composition notebooks loaded with concepts and outlines, and completed stories that only exist in paper form–written pre-computer on an Underwood typewriter, circa 1950–as I haven’t gotten down to the laborious task of transferring them to my computer.

    I don’t discuss my box much and I only brought it up to respond to an email I recently received (copied and answered here with permission):

    “I want to write a blog but I’m scared of being exposed and having people judge or attack me because of my opinions and I don’t think I have the writing skills to get my point across in the right way. What gives you the courage to write?“

    Guess what? Self-doubt and anxiety regarding humiliation and criticism is all part of the process and grist for the mill, so welcome to the club. What separates writers from non-writers is that instead of running away from that fear, we invite it in for wine and cheese. Befriend the beast that frightens you most because there’s a story just waiting to be revealed in that encounter.

    It’s true that honest writing takes courage, as does sharing your writing with people who may not be kind in their opinion of it, but you also have to realize that it’s not your job to make people like your writing. Some people will flat out hate it because of your views (see: The Opinions Expressed) or your writing style, and because they may not know any better, can possibly hate you because of it. Hopefully, it’ll be the minority. Accept it as an unavoidable truth and move on.

    As for the question, “What gives [me] the courage to write?” Everyone has their own reason for writing, and fear of acceptance isn’t high on my list. Sure, it’d be great if the unwashed masses loved my work, but the simple truth is all writing has its audience, whether infinite or infinitesimal, and if you never put your writing out there, there’s no chance in hell of your audience ever finding it.

    The real reason I write is because of the aforementioned box. I just don’t want to be lying on my deathbed–hopefully many, many, many years from now–and staring at that damned box full of unwritten stories. I no doubt will have my fair share of regrets in my final days, but I’m determined not to have that box be one of them.

    And since we’re on the topic of regrets, I recently read a book, “The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing” by Bronnie Ware, a palliative care nurse who cited the most common lamentations as being:

    1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
    2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
    3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
    4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
    5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

    So, while I can’t offer you reasons why you should write, I can tell you that most of the regrets listed above factor heavily in my need to write.

    In closing, someone once wrote, “writing is like getting into a small boat with a wonky paddle and busted compass and setting out on rough waters in search of unknown lands.”

    Paddle forth and be regret-freely writeful.

    ©2013 Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys

    Creative Commons License

    Author’s note: Since I’m never at a loss for ideas, I don’t dip into my story box as much as I’d like to, though I occasionally slip one or two of them into or in between current projects. The story idea folder on my computer… that’s a whole different story.

  • Micro-Fiction Corner: A Field Guide to Procrastinators

    Micro-Fiction Corner: A Field Guide to Procrastinators

    A note on method: Specimens were observed in their natural habitat — desks, kitchen tables, the fifteen minutes before a deadline stretched to feel like fifteen years. Field notes follow.

    The Reorganizer (Procrastinatus domesticus)

    Cannot begin the task until the desk is clean. Cannot clean the desk until the drawer is sorted. Cannot sort the drawer until every object in it has been considered, once, thoroughly, as though it might explain something. It will not. Continue anyway.

    The Researcher (Procrastinatus academicus)

    Requires “just one more source” before writing a single word. Has forty-one tabs open. Believes, sincerely, that the forty-second will be the one that makes starting unnecessary — that if it just reads enough, the work will have already been done by someone else, somewhere, and it can go back to bed.

    The Reply-Guy (Procrastinatus socialis)

    Will answer every message in every inbox before answering the one thing that actually needs answering. Prized by friends for availability. Mysterious to itself for the same reason.

    The Waiter (Procrastinatus temporis)

    Believes conditions will improve. Is waiting for better light, a clearer head, a Tuesday instead of a Monday. Has been waiting since March.

    Note: if you’ve read this far without doing the thing you’re avoiding, congratulations, you’re a specimen.

    I know because I catalogued you the way I catalogue myself — from a safe, Latin-flavored distance, like naming the thing makes it a different thing, something that happens to a type and not to a person. Not to me, specifically, at 11:40 p.m., writing entries about other people’s rooms instead of opening the file with my name on it.

    The truth is there’s a fifth entry I left out.

    The Guide-Writer (Procrastinatus scribens)

    Studies the species so thoroughly it forgets to stop being one. Finds real comfort in the taxonomy — in believing that if it can just describe the avoidance precisely enough, categorize it, give it a habitat and a call, it will have done something. It has not.

    It is, however, very good at writing field guides.

    Go do the thing.

    ©2012 Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys