expressive break part 2

                     Just Standing here

Standing here. No one will come anywhere near me. I’m just standing here on one foot.

 I cry, my shirt is as soaked as my face. My other foot is out in front, then the strong wind from the place I want to go knocks me backward.

 I scream in pain but no one will come anywhere near me. I stand back up putting my foot back half over the edge, my other foot out in front. The strong wind won’t let me go forward, so I can just stand here…until the wind slows enough.

 I cry, my shirt is as soaked as my face. I scream from pain and no one will come anywhere near me. I wait to fall and die, left alone just standing here. Fucking standing here.

Day 2100 AS (8-4-09)

Expressive poetry break

Ghosts

 When people are like ghosts, what do you do?

 When you need someone to give a fuck and no one shows up.

 When you just want someone to fucking talk to and no one you listen to will listen to you.

 When you feel the pain in loneliness because no one wants to be there.

When there is a gun in your hand and a barrel in your mouth because no one cares.

 When you are lost, when you have no hope….

When your light is gone….when there is only one way to be with your beloved…..

…and there is no one to stop you from pulling the trigger.

 What do you do…when people are like ghosts?

                 Day 2118AS

Hard reality

 Edit edit edit. I had to see what reading the book was like from a readers perspective. While doing that edit for grammar and some content. Something I have figured out about my book is that it is a little longer than most. I did not intend this to be, it just happened that way.
It's only fair I read it since I am not exactly the avid reader. If I can't tolerate it or it's length how can I possible expect anyone else to feel like reading it too?
 That turned out to be a good thing. It took me 9 days total and I found that I did not mind reading it, after a few things were fixed!
 As I search for new publishing possibilities it came to my attention that there are things I can do in stages to prepare the book for publishing. I tried a Booster campaign that got me no closer to cover design than I was already. Quite the opposite, the shirts sold some and there was such sweet support from my Google Plus friends that I decided to make sure they got their shirts. When time came I ordered the remaining shirts to make the minimum but got no cover design funds in the process.

All good! Destiny has a design and this was not part of it. Time to figure out what next.
 Then something really cool happens. During a hangout on the air my friend Priya Sharma and I get the attention of one of the participants in the hangout who is talking about a fascinating program she devised. Tara Meyer-Robson liked the conversation we were having in the comments section which made her decide to contact us. I was offered her program at a substantial discount! Being already interested at full price I jumped on the gift and graciously thanked her profusely.
 Going through the program blew my mind at how easy she makes every step. Once I finished reading through....well....there was nothing but gratitude! This is where it takes a strange turn. I could not do something she described about creating graphics. There was another friend who creates amazing graphics named Vishal Singh, he told me about the program he uses and where I can find the download. That began my exploration. Soon I had taught myself the program and was creating 'things'. My doodles became more serious, I was creating actual graphics. Had learned the photo manipulation and free design well enough to make some things that would make great t-shirts.

  This takes me onto a new direction. One that puts the book on the back burner for a while and lets me be the artist in a new medium to add to my paintings! That's fine with me right now because I need a break from this stress! Creating is what I like to do and it's time for that again.  As to the book, there is more editing to be done, no cover design possibility yet, and I have no ability to hire the people to get this done. Definitely time to take a break and let destiny point the way. I'll just edit on my own anf try to shorten it more.





  
 Now another bonus excerpt from my book because you stuck with me!
Page 4 (with the rest of 3)

  Hi ho hi ho a back to work I go. I’m liking this new job so far and a lot of the people I am working with seem pretty cool. It’s too bad my high school friend Joe is on p.m. though, it would be nice to hang with him again because after I graduated everything went crazy for the last 6 years. We, tragically, lost touch. However, Phil, Dina, Gisong, Joy and Wendy, all good nurses and people that I am enjoying learning about. When   Phil and I were partnered together they gave us a patient load twice normal size to make up for the sick call out they received earlier. No big deal though, we got things done very quickly as a team, we’ve had no complaints only compliments.

  The end of my shift approaches, Nooo please noooo! They don’t need anyone to do a double, think it’s funny the new guy asks. I blame it on needing to catch up for my “2 weeks off”, which wasn’t a total lie, I kinda needed the income, but my interests were truly with having more time with Sheila.

  On the way back to the house what Sheila had told me about her accident ran over and over in my head. Especially the time of year thing that she is sad about, wishing I could do something to cheer her up even just a little. So when I get home…I run upstairs to grab my potent smokables, kick on some music and think of Dreamgirl to see what kind of evil plans I can concoct to snare her heart, or cheer her up some.

  After three hours in the house alone chilling myself out with my dear friend Maryjane, people starting arriving home for the day. First April, then Liz, and then Joe and T.J.

When dinner was done April and T.J. felt like tossing back a few beers so I joined in just to get my mind off of Sheila for a while. We got pretty messed up and ended up playing some computer game for hours. It didn’t get my mind off of Sheila completely, as I kinda didn’t want it to anyway, but just enough to calm my brain was what I wanted. That night after I fall asleep that thing that always happens when I see Dreamgirl does so again, but this time she doesn’t disappear before I can reach her. Instead, she walks up to me and gives me a huge hug. I think the dreams have changed forever. Finally we make contact when we never have before. In the dream reality we are very friendly, if you know what I mean. She was waiting for me to pick her up to go to the Crocker art gallery for our date. The strange thing was that Sheila was walking around (in the dreams she was never in a wheelchair, she was her pre-collision self), but I remember putting her chair in the trunk just in case we needed it which made me quickly realize any doubt I had that Sheila was NOT the woman I’ve seen for years while asleep was completely gone. A funny thing happened at the end of this dream, I took Sheila home and after we kissed goodnight we went into different apartments that were next to each other. My last thought was “WOW! That’s where she lives, how weird that we live right next to each other. Talk about convenience factor!”

Waking was quite the experience. The reality of what happened in my sleep put me in an unusually good mood. Solid confirmation in my mind that Sheila is the one I have been seeing all these years. As messed up as the last two months has been, being burned out of my apartment, losing 90% of all I own, the complete upheaval of my life and even getting fired for refusing to wear a back brace that caused my back pain…a lot of crap! Now suddenly the most unexpected thing happens, in the most unexpected place and time. Talk about weird timing. The thought comes, my life was burned away save the most precious things, my old job dispatched by another’s stupidity. Though I could have fought for the job and easily won because I had a corporate level rep. handling my pre-termination grievance who wanted me to fight, it felt right to just let it go. Poor Mary, the nursing director, lost her job a few days later because of the situation. I found out through the letter I received offering me future employment at such time I should be searching.  I will say this about that job; the people I worked with at the Eskaton facility and the Homestead of Fair Oaks itself was a great facility where I m still happy to have been employed. Even after my termination I had no ill feelings toward Mary, something else was going on in her life that messed with her emotions.

what I came up with

 More madness! Okay, so the decision was wade to go the self publishing route once and for all time eternal. Now what?! 

 Time to figure it out. When I type in "self publishing" all kinds of places pop up. This begins months of searching, querying, sending samples, getting the same responses. 'We would love to work with you, have a look at our publishing packages and choose the right one for you."

 I'm a little confused. When you write a book with an interesting story, if done right there should be no problem in return on investment. So why would they be charging up front? Where's the incentive to be clever and make sure the books have their best chance? it was nice to be so sought after, but it's for the wrong reasons. So far the best thing I have found is Amazon's publishing services. Oddly that was the first place I looked into. 

Dread sets in at the feeling of getting nowhere. Everything has to be paid for, like editing, cover, interior, blurb (whatever that is). What do I do when I have no way to acquire those services? There's also a recurring theme in that the book should be as polished as possible before an editor gets it.  With all the warnings about doing it yourself when you have no clue what to do I began to ask more questions in my "authorship university". Somewhere I hear about these places that do the self publishing but require no up front money from the author. Good luck finding them though! I found 3, only 3, and none of them do memoir/bio. Maybe I should call it a true life romance and go for that genre. For now I do the only thing I can, gather intel on editing and edit edit edit.

 Now more bonus for you since you read this so graciously! Another excerpt from this thing I keep blabbing about.

So what though, Wendy knows them and will be helpful, and it’s a lot faster for me to have her patient knowledge immediately handy. It saves the wasted time of my incessant questions! What is your mobility-do you stand up or need help-do I need to be careful of anything-blah-blah-blah. . I went off doing whatever task came along from whatever source it was presented. Since it was all the typical daily nursing tasks that I had done thousands of times already they required little in the way of cognitive processing so my mind was always on…you know who!

  While running around the halls of station 1 getting the patients ready for breakfast when lookie there!, Sheilas light is on! And away I go! Knock-knock on the door  and announce myself so she knows who the invader will be whom answers her beckon. Oh glory be! Sheila pushed the call light AND she wants coffee AND she is really happy to see me be the one that answered. When she said “HI ALEX!” I think my heart froze in place for a moment, or maybe it was TIME that froze. There is that beautiful face. We’re talking and I am part of the conversation, but I kept wanting to ask her if she wants Mr. Right-only- for-her-because-now-that-I’ve-seen-you-no-one-else-is-possible, but you know! Gotta be COO’  about shit fo’ now and let us both learn some stuff about each other. So I go and get Sheila her morning coffee. Again the same reaction, she loves it! The whole coffee thing wasn’t just a fluke of the cosmos. When the breakfast trays came I once again found Sheila’s and happily delivered it thinking how I would do this for her at home if I could get her to my place. For now I’ll settle for simply being able to do it at all.

 The rest of the day went pretty well, but the best part was smoke breaks when I got to sit with Sheila and yak about whatever. It turns out we have a lot in common. We like the same in music, movies, and fun. We watched many of the same classic TV shows growing up and both even spent most of our lives in Sacramento. During my lunch break I had no appetite because I was too excited, I knew Sheila would be outside and we would have the entire break to sit and talk. That conversation she told me about her getting her wheelchair via car wreck in which she hit her back against the dashboard of her friends’ car breaking her spine at T8 while severing her spinal cord. It was at this time of year the wreck happened so she was always a little depressed when it rolled around. Her sad anniversary was just over a month away on Nov.17, which will close 7 years. Damn! I wanted to hug her before, imagine how much I wanted to after hearing THAT. As I sit there talking with her I keep thinking ‘she’s so freakin’ hot that even 7 years in a chair can’t touch it!’. That’s around about when I asked slyly about her boyfriend, being really happy when she tells me she has no romantic entanglements a’cuz I get to snatch her up!! All I gotta do is get her to want it enough to open her heart. She gives me a little crack of the door I’m gonna climb right the hell in there and claim that gorgeous pumper for MINE, and take her places her spirit never imagined. I MEAN,C’MON, I have been thinking about this all through my teen years, I got plans toward her.

  Dang! My watch is beeping! Lunch break is over, I have to go back to work. And things were going so well! Man I wish I could kiss her! With those sexy lips I’ll bet they feel really warm and soft. Hey! At least the lunch trays will be arriving soon, hopefully I can grab hers again. Of course there’s always the luck of the call light!

Query letters and self-publishing

  Do you know that feeling of the boat sinking and you being in a turbulent ocean? Yeah.
  It's not easy to find answers about self publishing but there are so many places to check into. What does one do? Send queries to the ones that sound good, and are not too expensive. What I figure out is that I don't have the resources to cover the expenses. That means having to be very picky.
 When that got too annoying to research I went back to finding agents to query and figuring out that letter. A web stumble put me where I could ask an actual agent to evaluate my letters. Evan was awesome and he didn't work on memoirs so no conflict. So far I had been getting the usual responses, automated or no thanks. It's hard to be insulted when they are simply not taking any new projects.

 Obviously his was no easy answer to find. One thing I have been picking up on thanks to my "Authorship university" is that while I might be thinking about which road to follow it is wise to continue on my path of querying. No matter what everyone does say something alike to the effect of this being a personal choice. Basically don't ask them who they worked with and what they thought. One little problem I have is I have only had web service for 6 months for the firs time ever so I have no idea the rules of social interaction. Right now just read some posts, post a question, and be glad someone bothers to answer.

 As the next few weeks passed I grew to hate the traditional route for my book. It's true life as it happened with all the details I could absolutely verify, or were personal only to us so you have no choice but to believe it! Nyah nyah! Self-pub is my way. So, do you think I went all out to figure out how and where and all that junk, NO! It's enough I figured out that much, but there is still a book being written. Don't ask the authors for contact ideas, but about how to write properly and they flow like a slough!

Especially editors! I meet Karen Conlin early into my incessant questioning and was glad I did. "Grammar Nazi" was a new term to me that her and a few others joked about, yet the information they were giving me in their joviality helped me catch mistakes I had made. Fixed those before they would find out!
 The way I figure it, I need to make this the best it can be even before I figure out what to do next. It's not like I didn't have the time being on disability and stuck in my apartment.

 Now I have another gift of my book for you who take the time to read this blog! Page2.

  As Phil and I went back to our duties I’m riding a new high. My workday is going to be smooooooth as silk no matter what. This is my third day on the job, my first on the floor, and not even two hours into it and I get to meet DREAMGIRL. I really thought she was something I conjured in my imagination. It turns out she is an actual live human named SHEILA KAY.

  The workday went very smoothly. Every chance I could find to be around Sheila got snatched up with a quickness that could snap bones. If her call light went on I ran to answer, when lunch came I hunted for her tray in the cart to deliver it for her. She asked for coffee at breakfast, she likes hers the same as I. When she drank she said it was “exactly perfect!” , and that everyone else resorted to bringing  sugar and cream packets.

Me getting her coffee that day was the first thing that really opened Sheila up to me. So for the rest of the day my cigarette breaks were timed by Sheila being outside already. I’m talking about looking out the windows of various patients rooms at the smoking area.

When 15:00 came and I had to clock out for the day….well...I would have happily worked double-shift to spend another 8 hours near Dreamgirl, but they didn’t need anyone so I had to leave. OH MAN did that suck. I wanted to take Sheila home with me. What would have happened if I had told her…she probably would have laughed and thought nothing about it.

  While driving back to Liz and Joe's house my brain was in a fog. There were moments I wasn’t sure if I was really awake. When I got to the house no one else was there so I broke out my pipe, packed it with bud and toked in celebration and to help process the days occurrences. Not every day does one get to meet a person they thought they made up in their twisted little mind. While sitting there with my pipe I got to wondering if Sheila would smoke pot or would I have to keep it to myself. She smokes cigs , so… maybe.

 The rest of the day I mostly wanted it to be the next workday so it would be time to go to work. Besides, going back gives me a chance to confirm Sheila still exists, I won’t be completely convinced until I see her again.

  After a mostly sleepless weekend I get up the next Monday anxious to go to work. This new job so far has been surreal, what will day 2 show me? So far at no time have I ever looked so forward to clock in for the day. Driving time was occupied with thoughts of  seeing Dreamgirl, being partially convinced Friday didn’t happen the way I think or maybe not at all. That brain fog stuck because the only thing I recall clearly is getting myself down the 300 hall to see if Sheilas name was on the right doorplate, and being well outside the solar system in the time it took between seeing her name and taking the next breath. As much as a euphoric moment I may be having there is a job I need to do no matter how I feel, so I went to it with some new strange kind of energy, which was useful for the trip back to Earth to rejoin my body. My conversations were of the task at hand, keeping certain thoughts to myself, of course. After all I don’t want to come across as crazy or stalkery, that aint me. I’m simply trying to figure out how to peak Sheilas interests, twang her romantic bone, make her heart melt, start obsessing about ME! OH Yeah baby. This new day brings my new assignment. I will be on the 200 hall with Wendy, and Joy & Lisa do the 300 hall. I will be busy myself because I am not accustomed to the patients completely. So what though, Wendy knows them and will be helpful, and it’s a lot faster for me to have her patient knowledge immediately handy. It saves the wasted time of my incessant questions!

No end....

                No end to the misery

 No matter how much I think, I can find no end.

NO matter who I meet I will always be alone. Every night, alone. After the call ends, alone.

No matter who I meet I can never fall in love. I already am in love. I am tuned only to that love.

 No matter what I do, who I help, what kindness I show, how much I lie to be social, there is always the same misery under the reflection of a memory.

No matter who I’ve met I have always been alone. Every night, alone, after the call ends, alone.

No matter how much I think, I can find no end to the misery.

Dedicated in memory of

Sheila Rayburn-Vain  3-1-63 to 11-5-03

Forsaken (an expressive)

                            Forsaken

   Back to exile, never leave exile, always in exile.

Demand from me, using me, abusing me,

don’t hear me, don’t see me, why look? Don’t!

You won’t, it scares you, I see you fear,

You’re stupid!

 If you knew…really knew,

you would fall to your knees to cry.

My horror grows, it makes yours sand to me.

Bow to my dark power.

I bow to your beauty.

Written on day 1238AS

Query letters and annoyance.

 Now that I have decided to find and agent the query letter comes into play. I have no idea how to do that, have never seen one, don't know what to say in one. When not actually writing this is what I try to figure out. I drafted one, tried to keep it simple, like he wants, send it, and wait. Try coming up with a different one for another agent, repeating this six more times. Mostly getting automated responses.
 The research into publishing continues leading me to Google plus when I needed a break and got curious about that "+you" in the corner. That curiosity turned out to be a good thing. I discovered a couple communities, one in particular that would become my "Author university". People there were surprisingly easy to communicate with and I got to ask editors, e-book publishers, many other writers who had published something. They gave me a great deal to consider and interesting questions to research.
 As I look deeper into the mechanics of publishing I really don't like much of what I read about the traditional route. Unless you're a celebrity or linked to one, you can pretty much forget it. Of course the right agent will get you a deal, but will you want it when it's done and will the book that is released even be your work? Considering what I wrote this is highly unacceptable. You just can't go changing what happened in real life and have it still be true. I didn't write a fiction based on our real story, it's our real story in its horror or beauty.
 It looks like I had better find out how to self publish.



Now a new idea. To you few souls who chose to read my blog, I give you the first page of the book "9 Years of Heaven in Hell", and if you want more I'll do more on future posts.

The Collision

 

Oct. 07,1994, I am at work, Phil and I are finishing with getting his patients ready for breakfast. I go to take some soiled linens to the hopper for rinsing when I see something coming at me in the hallway out of the corner of my eye so I stop in my tracks to avoid a collision. Then I see the object about to hit me is a person in a wheelchair flying down the hall. The face I see is that of a woman I have only seen in my sleep. The realization stuns my mind. Am I awake? It is 08:00, or maybe I just think that. I’m pretty sure I am awake. It feels like cosmic lightning is exploding my brain, that never happens in my dream and I always feel her looking at me before I see her. THIS MUST BE REAL!!

  “PHILLIP!! I JUST SAW A WOMAN IN A WHEELCHAIR ZOOMING UP THE HALL,WHO IS SHE?-- I dunno what did she look like?-- SHE IS YOUNG LOOKING, SANDY BROWN HAIR.-- That sounds like SHEILA, was it SHEILA?-- I DON’T KNOW THAT’S WHY I’M ASKING YOU.-- Where was she going?-- TOWARD THE SNACK MACHINE BUT THE OTHER WAY.-- Did she go outside?-- I THINK SO.-- That sounds like SHEILA going out for a smoke before breakfast.-- YOU GOTTA INTRODUCE ME TO HER.-- Okay, we’ll finish here and go for a smoke break.-- WHAT DO WE HAVE LEFT TO DO?-- Just get ‘Doc’ up and rinse what you’re holding.-- YOU GET THAT I’LL RINSE THESE.”

 I went to the soiled linen closet as fast as I could, rinsed the pads almost clean, washed hands and grabbed 2 cigs. Headed back to the patient room to meet Phil, whom was walking the hall toward me.

    “Are you ready Phil ?

     “Yeah, just let me get a smoke.”

  I pull one out of my pocket and hand it to Phil. He is surprised I have one of his cigarettes. Until I tell him I noticed when we were introduced that we smoke the same brand and type, so I grabbed 2 of mine. Off we went. When we got outside Phil and SHEILA greeted each other, then Phil intro’d us and for the first time in my life I get to touch the lady in my dreams. I am actually looking at her, she isn’t going to disappear into the crowd, I KNOW HER NAME, and what her voice sounds like!!

 All we seem to be doing is sitting around smoking. That may be what THEY were up to, I was having one HELL of a moment. NINETEEN YEARS seeing her in dreams, wondering ‘who is she?!’, and thinking that even if we met how could I be interesting to someone so freakishly gorgeous? Man!! After all this time I’m sitting here with her, ALIVE IN THE FLESH! Sitting here staring at her…I’m realizing she is perfect.

 HEY SAM! LOOK AT HER LEFT HAND!! YES!! NO RING!! GIVE ME A CHANCE, BABY, I’LL FIX THAT RIGHT GOTT DAMM NOW!!!

 It’s so funny, a conversation is taking place, I am part of it because we are all talking about me being new on the floor, working with Phil as my orientation, general stuff designed to introduce a patient to new staff. All the while I want to pick Sheila up into my arms and tell her how I have been waiting for her since I was four, if she will fall in love with me I will treat her like a GODDESS showing her a love to the like she would never dare hope be real! I wanted to kiss her then ask her to marry me right there! Yeah, then she would probably scream, yell at me, and never want to see my freakshow face ever again.

I guess playing it cool is the better choice. Ummyeah, wait for the right moment, look for any opportunity to get close. DAMN! Smoke break is over.

Now I get serious

 It was obvious by May that this book thing was really happening. I learned to care for the laptop so it doesn't crash, figured out some tricks when it did, and was nearing 200 pages having no idea how long my book was Really. The breakthrough is that I finally admitted to 2 people what I was doing. I'm writing a book!
 Time to get serious about this now. I had done a little looking into how one publishes a book, taking the first route that came to mind. How do they choose? When I'm not writing I'm looking at the publishing house websites. Unless I were a celebrity they are hard to impress. I also keep seeing the hint that they only talk to Agents. So looking into the publishing companies is a waste of time for me, I need an agent.
 However, there is a thing called "Self publishing" I keep having pop up in my searches too. How does that work?

 It turns out you have to have the money to back your project. I don't have that option, so it looks like I had better go with finding an agent.
 Two months of half-assed searching came to an end. I am getting closer and I have no doubt it will be finished. Instead of finishing it and figuring out what to do, it feels better to do that part when I don't feel like writing. It's not like I don't have the time!

 This means it's time to find an agent. Blind searching turned up Agentquery, which led me to a couple of other sites I can't recall. Handy though because I get to learn the rules. Agents are so nit-picky! Easy to see why though. If I got thousands of books I'd be too. Their requests sound perfectly reasonable, but a few are very specific and use terms I do not know. I was in medical, not publishing. Who knows what an intracardial catheter is? No one in publishing unless they had to have one. The point is that I can not comply when I don't know what they want. Obviously a bad fit. Then comes along another monster I have to deal with...the dreaded Query Letter!

The obsession continues

 This strange obsession with typing has begun to get on my nerves! Honestly, hopes that the laptop would crash and never work again grow as my annoyance grows. Most of the time I swear I have nothing to do with it. It's happening, I see it, I am aware of it, but not really there for it. Who is this crazy-ass writing a book? I know, a space alien put a chip in my brain and it's controlling me! Okay, right. Yes, I actually thought this. Then a voice in my head sounding like Sheila told me to shut up because I was too distracting. So I did.

 Once I reached 124 pages it was time to stop and see how it reads so far. Will ya' look at that! There is a pattern and side track stories are minimal, can even be shortened, but it's being told from a third person. Not a conscious decision on my part, but I really like it. Those books I chose to teach me my structure are coming in really handy! Good. No more thinking about any of the editing stuff now, just get the whole thing out and fix it later.

 It's telling the story of this beautiful paralyzed woman meeting a nurse that has been seeing her in his dreams for 20 years from a similar perspective of someone watching a movie and telling someone the full story in "bullet points". The only things being described are what is known and fact. That's the important part. No embellishment. This is a true story and needs to remain factual, or I can say "fuck it!" and delete it right damn now! No? Not allowed? Okay fine then! Do your thing,destiny, I'll stay out of the way. But if you're pulling a twisted trick on me I will choke your celestial ass out! Hopefully I will have enough material to reach around 180-200 pages. Fingers are crossed!

Two Hearts Intertwined, One love One mind Eternal

The beginning of an obsession.

 The computer crashing was scary. It really seemed this experiment came to an end, I was so wrong. Over the rest of March the process continued. At some point in every day I found myself in front of the laptop typing. More often my memories were being activated for the specific time frame I was covering. I'm more aware of how it works, and have been letting it do what it wants. Something was bothering me though. I don't know how to write a novel. With so much information what do I decide to put in and leave out. It crosses my mind that I really am writing a book, not that I want to jinx it by admitting what I'm doing.
 It needs to be coherent. Since there is no telling Sheila's side, it has to be about us both. The original design was for her to write her view and me mine, then we combine them into one book with two sides being told. Everything was going fine until I read what had been written and a voice in my head not my own kept telling me I had things in the wrong place. After 2 weeks of correction, I took a couple of days off and it began again. Before the end of the month I had nearly 50 pages. Around 2 pages a day seemed pretty good, for someone with no clue. I still didn't want to tell anyone what I was doing. If the computer crashed and I lost it all, that would suck! Crashes were happening a lot and the computer wasn't acting right. Mike got a phone call to ask if he would look at it and see what I have done to mess it up. User error! Mike sent Robyn and she showed me all kinds of neat computer things to keep me in line. Everything was back on track.
 Over April my page average increased rising to 3.5 per day. My typing skills were picking up too. Still, I would not admit to anyone my secret project. Until one fateful day in the middle of the month....I had taken a break after typing for a bit early in the day. While riding my high of where I was in the story because it was coming to a really happy part, I answered Abby(neighbor) asking if anything interesting was going on because I seem in a strange mood. Before my brain caught on to what I said I had already told her "I think I'm writing a book." The secret was out now, she had to know details. Since I'm her brother from another father and mother, I answered her questions candidly. But she is the only one who knows!

How it started part 4

  For one whole day Nothing new was typed on the word program. There are a few pages down, but I'm not writing a book or anything. Just seemed to be typing to play with the program. Something is going on other than that, but i am not privy to those details. Since it was happening before I made a facebook profile for Sheila's birthday, it wasn't that.
 What started it up again was the following day I got curious to read the whole story in the computer. Reading did something to my memory because I was seeing the video of every day like someone plugged my head into the TV. For pure enjoyment sake I let the video play as the words led me. It came to the last paragraph, but I wanted to watch more. Too bad so sad go cry to your mommy. When I reached the last word, the video didn't stop, and neither did the words.
 An hour later Farscape came on so I stopped watching the video in my head and staring at the screen. My fingers were moving a lot, catching up with where I ended. You know, I kind of knew I was typing but paid it no attention. For that matter wasn't sure what I typed. So I scroll back to where it all started for the evening. 30 seconds after starting to read I see a blue screen telling me about some error with popcorn, or something, and that it was going to dump memory. It won't react to me. Something like this is what I expected. That's over. Now let's see if I can get the laptop to work again.
 Lucky me, it's back on. What happens if I open the word? In the immortal words of John Rambo, "Nothing is over!"

How it started, part 3

  While watching television I began to wonder about when certain shows had aired for the first time and when others were playing. My recent acquisition of the interwebs gave me a research tool I didn't have before. It was too new to me, I grew frustrated making me stop. Then the behavior of the two days prior began to surface once again. This time I tried something new, let it happen and keep my mind as blank as I can. Curiosity was growing, what would happen? Will it run it's course? How far will this go? It looks like I intend to write our book, Sheila. The problem is that I don't want to write our book without you. That doesn't seem to matter since my fingers are still typing and not what I am thinking.
  The last I remembered was being on page 4, having to count the pages since I don't know how to put numbers on the pages. After 3 hours of intermittent typing I wanted to know how far I had gotten now. As far as I knew I had maybe typed another page, but there were seven and about to hit eight if I hadn't stopped. What had I typed? After finding the place where I had left off the reading begins. These are my memories, but I can't recall that much vivid detail autonomously, how did I type in into a laptop? Now I'm getting annoyed. Everything is true, and putting memories into the proper place in my head. Somethings I thought happened later or earlier, but the pages were right, not me. It was freaking me out a little. Time came to close the program for the sake of my remaining sanity.
  The television wasn't distraction enough. Questions about the information I need would not leave me alone. Time to try the web again. This led to more frustration. My "fuckit" circuitry triggered and there was no more typing that last day of February. Now my occupying thoughts were about Sheila's birthday the next morning.
What would her pretty flowers look like?

How it started, pt 2

 February 2013 continued.
 My fingers finally stop giving me the chance to look at the screen. I see a recollection of the first day I was on the floor at my new job and how Sheila almost ran me over with her wheelchair before the first 90 minutes had closed. There was just over a full page too. This time I closed the window saving the data. Slightly annoyed, I went back to the chair she bought me and watched the television program I wanted to see. It didn't take long before that fog came back and it brought something else. What, I do not know.
 A commercial comes on, I went back to the dining table and had opened the document, the typing was underway once again, and I just cleared my head to let whatever was happening continue. At least until my program returned. The next commercial break and without a thought I was back in front of the laptop watching my fingers get used to the key placement. As they type away I'm thinking how funny it is that I haven't done so in more than 20 years, while wondering "what's going on here?".
 Seriously, I want to know sort of, but don't think anything beyond I'm just messing with the program to see what I can figure out how to do. The commercials end, I close and save, then go back to watching the tele. This strange behavior continued over the next program too, but I found myself ignoring more of the program with each session. Then a recent re-run of the show I was waiting for got sacrificed since I had seen it not long ago. While not paying attention to the whole thing I had managed to type our 4 whole pages and moved into the 5th. I did not realize how much had been written nor did I know how it read. So it was time to see what was there again.
 Something strange became clear very quickly, there was more fine detail on the pages than I easily recall. It was like reliving those moments. While reading I kept having moments of oh yeah! I remember that! Oh wow, how could I have forgotten that moment? By the time I reached the end of my typing I felt like a passenger to the process, watching it unfold, being asked what I thought of the part written.  

How it started: a retro blog

February 26, 2013 the only program in this laptop my neighbor Mike gave me that I have not messed with is the Word program. I opened a new document and began typing what I know most, not thinking about anything. Five minutes later closed the program not saving a thing.
 While a low point in my television watching came and I had time to kill my mind went into a fog. Sort of a trans. Before I knew it I was in front of the laptop again typing wildly. I was too busy looking at the keyboard to notice what story was on the screen. My mind started to catch on to the fog, and blow it clear enough for me to realize what was happening. My fingers were still typing while I got curious about what they were doing. What in the world am I typing?