fifty thousand words.

"when asked, 'how do you write?' I invariably answer, 'one word at a time.'"

-stephen king.

today i'm beginning my june project. rather than sitting around to relax in my scheduled downtime, my goal is to write a novel (albeit an awful one) in that time instead. this was inspired by a few things: the first is that fact that i've been meaning to write a novel for several years now; the second is wanting my downtime to go towards something besides high scores; and lastly, the suggestion of my friend eric. eric gave me a lead to national novel writing month (http://www.nanowrimo.org/), which basically is an event that invites you to take one month and write a novel (at least fifty-thousand words in length) from scratch, start to finish. the actual month takes place in november, but i decided to give it a solo run in june--we all know i'm impatient.


for my mother's sake, i'll remind you it's a downtime project, and my schoolwork, work, etc. come before it. just the fact that i'll have a pet project for a month is a wonderful thought. 


it will never be published, likely never be read. but it'll be written--that's worth something, right?

fluid inspirations.

there are several years between the writing of stephen king's "pet semetary" and its being published. this is, in part, because of its inspiration. the book was inspired by a series of events taken place in his rented home in maine. the house was just alongside a major truck route which would be the cause of death for man local pets. because of this, there had been established a pet cemetery on the other side of the freeway. after burying his daughter's cat (a victim of the busy road), the principle of 'the cat came back' came to mind. the idea of this dead cat being buried and coming back, as he puts it, "alive but fundamentally different." a zombie cat, if you will. the question was then, what would happen if a person were to be buried there? it was this, in combination with a recent experience of narrowly stopping his son from being struck by a car that gave inspiration to the feelings, ideas, and story of semetary. however, when king had finished the book, he didn't review or submit it for publication for several years. he saw the inspirations of the work, and he simply wasn't ready to touch something with roots in the idea of a loved child coming back from the grave to kill--particularly as that idea was at least partially rooted in the experience of his own son nearly being killed. not for a period of time, anyway. eventually it was published, of course, and gained great popularity.

i'm not writing a novel, and nothing that i'm working on has near as deep or upsetting roots. however, to a degree, i can appreciate the idea of creating something and whether in the act or ex post facto, having some serious misgivings about it because of what inspired it. i think that's why i tend to take the more liberal feeling towards art and say that art's inspiration and meaning are flexible according to the environment surrounding it.

i don't normally post stuff i write--mainly because i feel if i'm going to share it at all, i'll play it. but, for this once, i'll break that rule. this is a song i wrote on my mission while in boston, england. we drove by a fish and chips shop called "queen of the sea" with the word "fish" before it and the word "chips" after it. i scrapped the "chips" and stole the remaining words to make the title of a very simple song. at the time, it had some loose inspirations. about two years later, the meaning would change, affecting my perception of the inspirations, happened again about a year after that, and is still changing today. anyway, i thought i'd share it. and as a sidenote--this is a sad song, but it's played with cheer. so as you read it, don't let it sound too tragic.

"fish, queen of the sea."
so swim, oh swim away. swim away oh sea queen.
you know i love you dear, but we know you're no ruler here.
you off and heading home, with and among your own,
means more than you being mine.

so swim, oh swim away. swim away oh darling.
both families wondering now why we are even bothering.
i wish that we could be, a royal family.
you know i'd walk and swim the line.

but you are a sea queen, and i'm a man king.
we fell into love's trap, now we have to mind the gap.
the problems we're to face aren't solved by being in love.
where could we even live--what place is neither underwater nor above?

and my people say of me, "our king is crazy.
he sees her fleeting whim, he sees it as her loving him.
he sacrificed and sought her, old retired triton's daughter--
did he think fate would care?"

but please my lady, do be pleased to know
it's i that's over them, and i still love you so.
put water out of thought, still if you i'd caught
you're optimistic dreams i would share.

but you are a sea queen, and i'm a man king.
we fell into love's trap, now we have to mind the gap.
the problems we're to face aren't solved by being in love.
where could we even live--what place is neither underwater nor above?

sea queen, oh sea queen. stranger love old time has seen--
but no doubt we're the strongest love that's been all as strange.
cruelest of jokes it seems. tinkering with our hearts and dreams.
no doubt we're the pride or shame of all the loves time has arranged.

you know i love you but farewell.
me to the sea, you to the land.
we do not match though we belong.
i hope our hearts will understand.


was this song originally written with a girl in mind? why yes, yes it was. over the years, has this been about the same girl? no. has it always been about girls? no. in fact, for quite a while it was about my not being a theater major. long story short, at this point, the inspiration (though sentimental) has given way to application. i apply this song to my current situations when i play it, as i do with everything i've ever written. i like it that way.

so. why was stephen king able to publish this story? i think, in part, because there comes a point that you can stand apart from your own work and its inspirations and at least begin to appreciate and view it objectively. when that happens, you can enjoy what you made without having to enjoy where it came from.

wow... this post has gotten long winded. i'll try to wrap it up.

i started a song on monday and finished it wednesday. its inspirations and implications are already changing. that fluidity is greatly appreciated. so what's the moral of this post? could be that some things are changing, could be that i'm a non-linearist when it comes to time, could be that whatever is causing a person upset can be altered by perception, or it could be that i've a motive i won't bother sharing.

ironic as it may be, its changed a few time while writing it.

--trace.

respectowiggles and drinks.

"good morning, guests. though when i say good i don't mean it won't turn to rain or it might be snow, or fog, or thunder. you didn't get any sleep, i dare say."

there's something innately good and wholesome about reading in public spaces. i think the stereotypical yuppie reading in a coffee shop is onto something.

today i finished the silver chair from the chronicles of narnia. it's my third time reading through the series, and it's been quite enjoyable rereading and finding the stuff i'd missed in the readings prior. i've been reading through the series at work on break and when the cleanings done at the end of shift. today at work's end i had just short seventy pages left, and on the way home stopped at a local burger place and finished the book over a 'stubby double with cheese' and an order of fries. i'm not sure why it is, but for some reason reading a book in my room is completely different from reading somewhere outside the door of my apartment. i think it's the fact that you're going out of the way for leisure. you're not bored at home so you read. you're not going out to take care of business. you're going somewhere with a book for the purpose of doing something you don't need to do, you just want to do it. and there's something very freeing about that.

tonight, keeping with typical habit, i picked up a soda with the meal and enjoyed about a can's worth of dr. pepper and coke (a lovely little pop cocktail, or poptail, called 'black gold' according to the burger king soda charts). it's interesting. i used to get medium drinks. i don't anymore as i made the realization that my satisfaction with my drink has nothing to do with the size and everything to do with simply having that annoying, but nonetheless satisfying sort of growling noise you get when there isn't enough soda left to fill the straw. this started as i realized that a medium drink is often double or double plus the size of a can of soda, yet i'm as satisfied finishing one as the other, and the can typically doesn't end in the same digestive unease. so i started getting sodas that are closer in size to cans than kegs. i'm now actually enjoying the meals more. just an interesting little observation. if you're big on big sodas, i might recommend giving this a try.

and that's about it for now. thrilling business, no?

chris kirkpatrick.

this is going to be a short post. and as such, i thought i'd name it after the shortest member of nsync, chris kirkpatrick.


yes, i know the photo isn't really all that fair, but he really is the shortest. ask any real fan and they'll tell you the same.

anyway, short post. i'm attempting to start up a new blog. it's basically themed around notebook art, as in the kind you draw during class, on the phone, at work, or anywhere else where you're really not supposed to be. this is just sort of an invitation to submit some if you wouldn't mind sharing it. you can submit your work or questions to therealreasonfornotebooks@gmail.com. when i get the blog up and running (which is contingent on how much i recieve, if any) i'll post a link to it, of course.

so please do submit. we'll see if this can get anywhere. and we're not picky. if you drew a flaming scorpion in microsoft paint when you should have been studying, submit it.

thanks. i hope to recieve some from the lot of you.

the worm is the spice... the spice is the worm.

autumn purchased dune on saturday, and we were able to watch it the same night. i'd forgotten how awesome that book was.

i think i read it when i was a sophomore in highschool. i'm guessing this because i think i gave it to shane york in mr. millward's classroom when i had finished. anyway, it's always fun to sort of rediscover something you enjoyed at one point, but had since forgotten. it's good stuff.

for those unaquainted with dune, muad'dib, melange and house atreides, let me begin by informing you that patrick stewart is in the film. this alone would make it worth seeing the film as he stars as gurney halleck, who happens to be a favorite character of mine. if nothing here can sway you to read the book, maybe this can sway you to see the movie. both are worth doing, but nobody has all the time in the world, so i'll understand either way. but yeah, patrick is great here, so don't miss out.

i won't bother spending time giving you a synopsis because there are many available already (wikipedia has a winner as always, click here). however, it is awesome, and you should check it out if you're at all a sci-fi type. to be honest, i don't really even consider myself a sci-fi person beyond star wars (flight of the navigator and the last starfighter don't count, i think... but i love those in case you were wondering). so if you enjoyed that, you'll probably like this as well.
because it's awesome.

and now, on a completely unrelated note, i'd like to share something i felt might be of interest to anyone who found interest in this post.

GANDOLFPIO THE GOLD

i'm not sure i've ever seen sci-fi and fantasy blended in such a beautiful way. it's like the best of both worlds (though the star wars galaxy is cooler... at least in the film world). and on that note, goodbye for now.