This is a test…a quick writing challenge to see if I can spin off some truly quick blog piece with a few of my thoughts upon waking this morning almost as quickly as I can spin off a Facebook post.
Ha.
For some reason, Facebook musings come without the same intentional writing process…they seem…less permanent, perhaps…and less involved…than a blog piece.
I’ve been writing more, and recently have had some deep encouragement from an old friend, a woman I knew from church years back.
I intend to keep writing…for whatever and whomever it is worth.
Because I have a story to tell – it is a complicated story – but I do want to tell it, for whatever it is worth.
I have a short story finished up – a comedic serious piece – based loosely and creatively on a real event in my college life. Another friend this past summer said I should call in to The Moth with the teaser opening and see if they would take it on as a project.
I would be a little shy about that, and I also like to control my own art and expressions.
Ha.
Imagine THAT.
On December 17 I saw an article in my newsfeed about how Shirley Jackson wrote one of her most famous short stories, The Lottery, in one day. I thought it might be fun to take on that same writing challenge and attempted to dictate the story in full – in bits and pieces to my email throughout that day – while working on other tasks.
I was not successful in completing it in one day, it needed additional work, but I finished it up this past week. My friend heard it last week and said she could see the piece in The New Yorker.
Actually, here is a link to Shirley Jackson’s publication of the story in that magazine, in 1948.
Maybe it’s a crazy idea…but what do I have to lose? I’ve read about how to submit things…and will do it pretty soon. These pieces cannot be previously published, even on one’s blog. If I don’t hear back in 90 days I am to assume it was blase and unwanted, ha!
Another friend said, “It would be their loss.”
Friends that encourage my writing are so wonderful.
Back in 2006 I started writing some stories from my childhood with some simple cartoonish illustrations.
I’ve also recently worked on continuing some things in that vein. My story is somewhat similar to the story of Jeanette Walls in The Glass Castle.
I think it’s funny somewhat, at times, my thoughts upon waking…
I keep a certain picture of Jesus on my nightstand, and there is a story to why I love this image, given to me in an 11 x 14 frame by a Catholic woman in my neighborhood that babysat me when I was in late grade school.
As an artist who does portraits, this image fascinates me on several levels. I really feel when I stare at the representation of Jesus’ expression here, it is almost like the Mona Lisa. You could perceive any number of expressive communications…there is some nebulous look to it…Jesus might be sad, or he might be making some dry-humored, dead-pan remark or observation of me.
Ha.
I have quite the God-given imagination, I suppose.
I mean, God created this entire world with all the strangeness that goes on here.
Nothing new under the sun…and the Bible says, “He who sits in the heavens laughs!”
Ha.
How’s that for ripping some text out of context…?
So this morning for some reason I was thinking of one illustration I did in 2006 for a story – it was of my dad with Red Man chewing tobacco, doing his best not to laugh at some shenanigans perpetrated on our driveway by me and a couple friends in the neighborhood…the illustrated short story was called Crime and Punishment of the Problem Child…and I may eventually post and link it here…
And I was also thinking of another illustration I did several weeks ago…with my dad and references to Marlboros.
I was thinking of time frames in my mind…my dad had his first heart attack in 1976 when I was in 7th grade. I realized that while I threw in the image of him chewing tobacco in a story that happened more likely around 1973 to 1975…that it doesn’t always matter precise details in creative storytelling.
Sometimes we take some artistic licenses to tell a good story without compromising the underlying true parts, and sometimes our memories can be composites of images and recollections.
And that is OK.
I “think” my dad smoked Marlboros, although even this could be wrong. I “think” my mom smoked Salems although this, too, could be wrong.
Maybe they both smoked Lucky Strikes or…Camels… yes maybe that was it…
What is true is that I remember my dad with his cigarettes and coffee, mostly after dinner but other times outside, etc., and his clear stress level in this situation with my mother’s mental illness.
I kinda recall him stopping when he had the first heart attack but maybe in fact he did stop for some reason in the years shortly before that.
Keep in min, he was born in 1913 and 49 when I was born. He died at age 65 of a second heart attack in 1979.
What is a clear, true and great story about him was told to me in my mid-twenties by his best friend, Herb Ewing, whom he worked with in the Soil Conservation Department in Elkton, Maryland.
Herb said that he and my dad were out on some field assignment or something and my dad said to him, “See this…I have one cigarette left…I’m going to smoke it and this will be my last one.”
Herb said he did that, and never touched another one again.
He did, however, take up chewing tobacco and I can recall his spittoons and even wanting to try it, too, ha ha! Of course he wouldn’t really let me but I do have a vague memory of being given just a tiny taste of this strong tasting stuff.
Honestly it was a little gross…but that was my Daddy then…walking around with cups to spit in and picking up packs of Red Man when we would grocery shop together. Because, of course, my mother was too busy spying on people and contacting the FBI to do normal things like cook and grocery shop.
From what I’ve heard about smoking cessation, that showed a lot of willpower. But I guess he still needed the nicotine.
As for me, honestly, I don’t understand, personally, why anyone would smoke. But my dad was a World War II vet, and of that generation.
During my first semester of college, I was at Tradewinds (in Elkton, I believe) with some friends – this was a dance/bar…and my friend did smoke Marboros. I remember going outside, and she offered me one.
I took one hacking puff, and basically said, “no thanks…”
My curiosity was immediately put to rest…
I am also now recalling how sometimes I do little (maybe strange) acts of self-empowerment, and how I think about my father’s care for me and trying to make the situation better, to his own detriment, day after day after day after day…. Once, probably around 2016 or 2017, when I was going through a very difficult time…I actually went and bought a package of Red Man tobacco and Marlboros and simply tucked them into my office desk drawer.
I had zero intention of chewing them or smoking, ha ha, it was just some self-empowering act that reminded me…you are stronger than you may feel right now…and braver than you know…
I also recall reading an article on how to “answer” certain people who upset you in certain types of “patterned ways” and how to answer, simply, each of these specific ways when you recognize it happening. I took a small pen and wrote these short answers on each cigarette…ha ha…how’s that for creative self-therapy.
As I recall, they were things such as, “I am sorry you see things that way…”
Because, I’m just not very good in thinking that way in the moment of upset.
It was some type of emotional/cognitive exercise for me…really not sure it ultimately helped…but the situation did eventually resolve. I made it resolved in the very best way for myself, given all things, sadly…
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(I think the key to spinning these off more quickly may be to not proof too well nor bold and italicize anything…or put in links to references. Maybe I will do that later. So far…30 minutes on this and about to publish to this strangely evolving blog! Update: the next day, another 45 minutes to edit, link, bold, and add in a few more thoughts…)
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I suppose people should be able to read things without all that. (Ha…but it does help in blogging…so I did it next day…finding errors…etc!)
I mean…they do on FACEBOOK…right?!!
Thank You For Reading
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