Unlocked: An anthology
Today I wanted to let everyone know that a piece of my flash fiction is part of an anthology now available here on Amazon. Titled Unlocked the anthology is a joint effort by members of a Frederick, Maryland writers group of which I have been a member.
Each story in some fashion involved a key, in homage to one of our local heroes, Francis Scott Key, author of The Star Spangled Banner.
The profits from sale of the anthology will go to out local literacy council.
Sci-fi, literary, fantasy, and several other genres are represented within this collection of micro-fiction.
So consider treating yourself, or someone you know, to some short-fiction, while contributing to a worthy cause!
Side note: This will in all likelihood by my final original post on the blog for 2015, though I plan to repost some Christmas-oriented material throughout the remainder of the season.
Put Off By Potomac Edison
I had originally planned to dedicate today’s post to spreading the word about one of my stories that appeared in a local short story anthology. But within the hour I was so put off by something, that the only hope I have in calming down about it is to “talk” about it, and spread the word to see if at least one or two other people in the world would have been as upset by what happened as I am.
Below is word for word what I just wrote to the local power company, Potomac Edison, about how disgusted I was by one of their employees, and it’s got nothing to do with their utility service. Reprinting it here says it all, so I’ll leave it at that, but I hope somebody somewhere feels at least PR indigestion over it.
I am writing to you not as a customer in need of your service, but as a citizen disgusted by the actions and attitudes of one of your employees.
At approximately 2:15 PM on December 10, 2015, I was walking along “B” Street in Brunswick, Maryland, where one of your trucks and employees was dispatched. The vehicle was parked, engine off, on the side of the road.
As I approached, someone’s pet cat, (judging by the collar on same) walked under the vehicle, and promptly jumped up into the machinery of same, out of site.
Not wanting the animal to go unnoticed by the driver, I crossed the street, and inquired as to who was driving the Potomac Edison truck. Several people pointed to the employee. I informed him of the cat, advising him he may want to pat the hood on his truck a few times, to make sure the cat was safely out of the way before starting the engine and driving off.
Your employee’s response is the reason for this correspondence.
“Guess it’s a dead cat, then,” he said, without even looking away from the work he was doing.
So put off and disgusted by this was I, that I left the area, intent on making this known to you.
I was not about to confront a man much bigger and stronger than myself, nor was I going to go banging on someone else’s vehicle to keep the cat safe. So I feel all I could do was let you know about this incident, and to express my disgust over one of your employees. (Whose name I do not have.)
As a business, you are obviously designed to make money. It’s not part of your mission to look out after animal welfare. But when an animal just happens to cross the path of one of your employees, and said employee is informed by someone from the community of the issue, is it truly detrimental to your bottom line to have someone be extra certain someone’s pet is not ripped to shreds by one of your vehicles? Is the 60 seconds of time it would require going to derail the business concerns of Potomac Edison to such a great degree?
If this is the attitude of your average employee, I’m ashamed that the local community is forced to receive its power from the likes of your company.
I have only my word to prove any of this, and your own discernment. You’ll have to decide not only if I’m telling the truth about this, but if it is something you even want to spend any time contemplating. I can do no more. I only hope the animal in question lost interest in your vehicle in enough time to escape becoming “a dead cat, then.”
Repost: Yes Virginia, There Was a Writer
Due to it being the most reprinted newspaper editorial in the history of the English language (verified), most people, regardless of their faith, are familiar with this piece, known now to history as “Yes, Virginia. There is a Santa Claus.”
Unsigned at the time of its publication in The Sun in 1897, it was of course written in response to a letter received from eight year old Virginia O’Hanlon Douglas. Though over time there has been some amount of scholarly doubt as to whether or not an eight year old actually penned the letter bearing her name (appearing as “Virginia O’Hanlon” in the paper), the woman to whom the letter has been attributed lived a life that was rather well documented. Her Wikipedia page, as well as other more legitimate sources cover her life in plentiful, if not meticulous detail. Virginia herself received fan mail for the rest of her life, to which she graciously responded. She indicated near the end of her life that the attention she received as a result of her famous letter had effected her life in a positive way.
Several movies, animated specials, and other works have been created that tell the story of Virginia and her letter. She has become a rather integral part of the Christmas zeitgeist. At least in the United States.
Coming in a distant second to Virginia in this story, in regards to eventual fame, scholarly investigation, dramatic presentation in various media, and inspiration to generations of Christmas lovers? One Francis Pharcellus Church. Who was he? Nobody special. Just the man who actually wrote the editorial itself.
I don’t want to go on and on about that. But I did think it worthy of mention that the author of the words which move so many of us that love Christmas, and the work of whom sparked the most popular editorial of all time seem almost to be an after thought.
“Oh yeah,” folklore personified seems to say. “He took care of that whole writing part of the Virginia story.”
Folks, nothing against Virginia, but in the end Mr. Church was the story. Mr. Church is the story.
Yet his section of the link I provided is basically just his picture. His Wikipedia entry merely mentions he wrote the piece, where he went to school, that he died childless and where his body is buried. It’s barely longer than the piece for which he is (not so) famous.
Now I am not beating up anybody over this. Virginia deserved some attention and admiration. However I do confess it has over the years annoyed me a bit that though it is Mr. Church’s work that instantly captured that hearts of millions, it continues to be Virginia’s story.
So, that being said, allow me, on this Christmas Eve of all days, to talk a little bit about what this work of Francis Pharcellus Church says about him, and about writing.
Set aside how famous it is. Really think about the piece. The prose is eloquent but concise. Touching on a multifaceted and deep spiritual truth in a manner that is accessible to an eight year old without boring an adult reader. It both confirms the truth about “Santa Claus”, without blowing the mystique of Santa Claus. It upholds the magical in a child’s Christmas experience without telling one single lie or half truth. On top of it all its magnificent diction makes it perfect for easy recitation or performance.
In other words, it is a brilliant piece of writing that accomplished its mission. And far, far more.
There is much we will never know about the circumstances of Mr. Church composing this editorial. We cannot know what exactly Mr. Church was thinking when he wrote the piece. We probably have no way of knowing if it was assigned to him as opposed to being a request he made to write it. And certainly his muse, like those of all us writers, will remain a mystery. Certainly more of a mystery than what Virginia went on to do with the rest of her life.
Still I think we can make a few assumptions safely. It is safe to say that this was more than a staff writer cutting his pay check. There is a superior quality of soul within the words. I find it hard to accept he didn’t believe each and every one of them as he wrote it.
Safe, also, is the assumption that Church had no idea of the impact he was about to have on an entire nation’s holiday experience over the next hundred-plus years and counting. Anybody who sits down to pen something with that as a goal needs to be locked up someplace.
He did know, as we know, one thing; he was a writer. It was his job to write, and to do so well. To live up to the standard’s expected of him by his employer and by himself. Pursuant to that, he sat down (as so many of us have before and since) with a goal, a resource, his experience, his talent, and his words. And he penned something. Something to which he could not (or would not) attach his name originally. And as a result of his gift for words, he changed not only Virginia’s life, but millions of others. Perhaps even Christmas itself to some degree. And all of that would be true whether or not the “Virginia” letter was really written by an eight year old.
This is why I write. This is why I seek out places and opportunities to make use of this talent I apparently have to assemble words in such a way as to effect, inspire, change, entertain, inform, provoke, and perhaps on occasion save other people. It is why I chose to be a starving freelancer for now. (Unless some perfect staff writing position should show up.) It is why I do my damnedest to write even though I know that nobody is reading. Why, despite a hiatus here and there I muster up within myself time after time that exhausting, that perplexing, that frustrating, that miraculous and inexplicable component within my spirit that accounts for me being a writer.
This stuff isn’t easy, folks. But it can be worth it, when you get it right. Even more worth it when the right people read at the right time what a writer composes. Just as they did for Francis Pharcellus Church. Just as they still do 113 years after he submitted it to the paper.
Was that ubiquitous yet beloved editorial a fluke? Did Church merely get lucky, and strike a cord or two, or a million? Maybe. But I think not. He was, as history tells us a “veteran” journalist, which means he had been writing large amounts of copy for at least quite a few years. That experience may have sharpened him and his words over time in just the right way to make his tapping into the consciousness of a whole culture more likely than it otherwise would have been. But that isn’t being lucky. That’s showing up. We get rewarded for showing up.
Thus far I have shown up to write far more often than I have been rewarded for same. And I get weary of it. Sometimes I even step away for weeks at a time. But the knowledge that showing up can lead to that one moment, article, sentence, speech or novel that changes everything eventually brings me back to the bottom of that hill, ready to push that bolder ever upward. I wonder if Francis Pharcellus Church ever felt that way.
As I mentioned, we know Church died having had no children. But did he? If children be extensions of ourselves and our love, while also taking on a life of their own as time goes on, I say perhaps the man did have at least one child. That child was an unsigned editorial in the September 21, 1897 edition of the New York Sun. And look at how many children, of all ages, it has touched in the decades since.
All because there was once a writer who showed up.
-Originally posted in December, 2010
New York Times Notable Books of 2015
The list is out. As subjective as any such lists are, though I am sure there are many overlaps.
Have you read any of these? I have. One. I read Rachel Cusk’s Outline. I wasn’t impressed. You can read my review of it here if you like.
It was actually a surprise to me that I had read any on such a list. I had forgotten about the Cusk book, and when I saw it on the list, I thought I had read it in 2014 anyway. Obviously I was wrong about that.
Why am I surprised by having read something on this list? A few reasons.
One, like I said, si that such lists are subjective. The literati falls into patterns that are predictable eventually, and many, as I said, will include the same books among their own lists of notable titles for the year. That’s just the way it is. Yes, it is partially about the quality and the impact of the book, of course, but I feel bold enough to say there is some amount of peer pressure involved, if you will.
All this by way of saying I don’t often seek out such lists to assist me in choosing my next read. There happen to be a handful of titles on this year’s list that I think I’d like to read someday, but not because they are on the list. one of them I heard about last month on the radio, not knowing of course it would be on this list.
Yet, I never have had a great need to read the “in” book, the one everyone is talking about. So, I often don’t think to look at such lists, and in turn, I don’t become acquainted with most titles on said lists until later, once the lists are obsolete. When I do end up reading one of the “hot books,” it’s usually after the buzz, (whether deserved or undeserved) has faded somewhat. When I come across a title physically, at the library, or I hear someone speak of having enjoyed it. Or, on the radio or whatever.
This isn’t a grand indictment of what is popular and/or will dissected academically. I’d read a current bestseller or today’s darling of the intelligentsia, no problem, if it otherwise appealed to me. About half of the time it doesn’t, but when it does, I’ll read it right off the press if I am in the mood. But a book is forever, even if hype is not. I will be no more or less likely to enjoy a book from this list in 2017 than I am in the waning days of 2015.
Maybe if I met more often with people who discussed books, I’d put in more of a specific effort to pick up some of the latest topics of literary discussion among readers. But I simply don’t travel in such groups very often. There is no water cooler near which I can gather with other readers to dig into a trending title. So I usually wait until it’s easily available, and discuss it with myself.
Plus, I’m a slow reader anyway; by the time I finished one notable book on such a list, others have probably moved on to the next two.
I’ll never chase a trend with all of my energy as some will do, but I might start paying attention to these lists a bit more often, just as a source for something else to read…in three years.
I Struck Oil…
Oil painting that is.
A few weeks ago I declared my intention to try out oil painting for the first time. I’ve always wanted to do it, and though I have no intentions of doing it all the time, or taking classes in same, I decided to at last seriously look into experimenting with it.
When materials were on sale at the local art store, I knew this was the time.
I bought one canvas. 8 by 10. Five tubes of paint, and some brushes. (All on sale.)
There was no plan. No sketch, no model. I just started oozing the paint onto a makeshift palette. (Used to be the back of an entertainment center I threw out. Even had a hole for my thumb already in it.) Just this act was satisfying. For years in college I saw friends and dorm mates working with oils, knowing of course how expensive it could be, and how much their grades depended on having good material. I never bothered asking permission to mess around with their stuff. But earlier this month I got to at last squeeze paint out of a tube.
I started with green, just sort of gliding the brush over the canvas as I had seen people do a million times on TV and in person. It looked like grass, so I made a hill. Then onto oozing of the blue for the sky.
So I did have a scene now. A few things I tried didn’t work. I suppose certain colors don’t show up over other colors. A regular painter could say why, but I can’t. I just repairs the issue as best I could, (mostly by adding paint and painting over it until the undesired result was covered.)
I thought about the next day, what i wanted to put in the picture. I used a butter knife to rather successful effect to create roses on the grassy hill I’d made. I settled on a small cottage. I hadn’t intended to attempt anything so recognizable, complex and man made. But I had a hill, something had to go on it, right? Besides, I know just enough about paintings to understand balance and composition. And I lack the skill to paint a tree. A few strokes, and a cottage was born.
A circular swirl of mixed color and a small pond was born. (Color mixing was the aspect of this I think I’ve looked forward to most. It didn’t disappoint. It couldn’t really, as I had no specific end result in mind for most of the mixing.)
It was a dark, cool painting so far, and I very much wanted to use the quite bright yellow paint I had. Though for a while I debated with myself over the cliche’ nature of putting the sun in the picture, I reminded myself that this was all about experimenting. I put said sun in the corner, painting only about a fourth of it “in frame.”The thick, creamy vibrancy of the yellow paint contrasted, as I had hoped, with the cool, darker colors of the rest of the piece. Plus it was fun to slather it right onto the blue background of the sky.
Though I wasn’t trying to be professional, I knew the sky needed clouds, for proper balance. As I didn’t have white (not on sale) I played around with the yellow, and sort of “wisped” some thin, off color clouds into existence. I hope the pass as rainy clouds, but if not, they are still there for the visual balance.
I then winged it with a few details by way of techniques I only just vaguely remember people talking about here and there; defining, slight shading. I knew less about that than I did painting the main stuff, but to tell you the truth, if I didn’t get it totally correct from the standpoint of technique, I think I “made the point” in a sort of impressionist way.
And to me oil is always impressionist, even if in the real world is it not. I like paintings most that look like paintings. I like seeing the swirls and the indentations of brush strokes. I like it when one can look at a work and say, “oil paint.” That may be why I am a fan of actual Impressionism.
Therefore I also enjoyed creating a painting like that. By definition it isn’t an Impressionist painting, I’m sure. But that’s what I let myself feel like as went about creating the scene, stroke by stroke to the beat of the scraping percussion of brush hairs across a canvass.
“Cottage Near Roses” I called it.
A few days later I took another part of that old entertainment center back…thick cardboard i think it is, and did an abstract painting. In some ways I enjoyed that even more. I mixed more, painted even more thickly, and with more abandon. The result is nonetheless ordered, brighter than the first painting, and suggests, I think, a sense of movement, if not of the art than of me, the artist as I created same.
Painting helps writing helps music helps acting helps dance helps sculpture, and so on. Any order you like. Art begets art, and while I don’t yet know if I will make oil painting a regular, lifelong thing, I still have plenty of paint left. (Though I need some turpentine next time, I lacked it this time.) I’ll keep on begetting oil paintings at least a few more times.
Ty Unglebower 