The Fragments of Early Life

Forty years of doubt and recriminations: It has been a life.

Truth be told, I’ve very few memories of my first dozen years of wakefulness. They’re foggy at best. And even those rare memories are smeared and dreamy:

…my mother plays cards with a groups of clucking women. One takes out her teeth and snaps them in my face. They all laugh, as I hide crying in the closet.

…my brother helps me climb out the window, and I sit on the front porch, waiting for someone to come along and tell me where my mother has gone.

…my brother and a girl play with a lighter. They find the flame, but can’t put it out. They hide the lighter in the closet. Firetrucks are loud and bright red.

…falling out of the window of a two-story house.

…a car door opens and I am launched into the street. I remember screeching, and I think it’s tires.

Don’t Starve a Writer

Writing is important – a part of our lives and being. It’s a job like any other, but it’s something more for those of us who need to create.

A husband, lover or young children will compete for time with a career as a writer. I know how tough that can be. So many of us (our loved ones and ourselves) forget that writing is a real job, with demands of mind and time. It’s easy enough to forgive our loved ones those stolen moments – they may not always understand what writing demands. But ourselves – sometimes we forget that writing is a real task – a job like that 8-hour a-day mind stealer that you left behind when you walked out of the office. We forget that we must dedicate a certain amount of time to writing every single day.

We find that we tell ourselves that writing is flexible. We can let other demands snatch at our attention, divide and divert us, and tell ourselves that writing time will flex around those demands.

And that’s how we get thinner and thinner – not our bodies, but our minds. (Sure, you can get skinny by chasing a couple of single digit munchkins around, but let’s skip that for a now.) By letting our writing job take second place (sometimes it should, most times it should not), we starve ourselves.

I keep saying we. I mean you and me. We need to write and not feel guilty, or rushed, or that we’re falling into a rut.

Atlantic City – snippet

I love Atlantic City as a hunting ground. Mobsters made the city their home long before gambling was legalized in the ’70s. And slavers established a firm grip in the early 1800s and continue to use AC as a port of call. These days, the slavers sell the  youths to wealthy European, Middle Eastern and Asian businessmen.

America’s Playground

But what I remember best about Atlantic City is that the woman wrote the SCUM Manifesto was raised on its dirty streets. Valerie Solanas was born in Ventnor, just a couple of miles from the heart of Atlantic City. I don’t typically  associate with humans, but I met this strangely violent girl when she was just a child. Even then, Valerie hated the world, particularly men.

It would be years before she shot Andy Warhol.

“SCUM — dominant, secure, self-confident, nasty, violent, selfish, independent, proud, thrill-seeking, free-wheeling, arrogant females, who consider themselves fit to rule the universe, who have free-wheeled to the limits of this ‘society’ and are ready to wheel on to something far beyond what it has to offer”

More TwitterFic – Today’s postings again

We thought the @MD_awkward when he removed the liver instead of the spleen. Then we realized, the doctor was preparing for supper.

Tonight’s TwitterFic – It’s about You 2

The spell was inscribed into Michael’s flesh with @Blackfireink taken from a phoenix’s heart. That’s why as a zombie, he’s indestructable.

When he found it, Philip held the @philo_diamond high and screamed his joy, until the harpie swooped and snatched it from his grasp.

“It @RGoodship,” the zombie growled. “It have lots of meat inside.” Trapped in the hold, a hundred humans shivered in anticipation.

“We need the @Kindlbookreview of the Necronomicon,” he said. “That’s our only hope of ending this zombie plague.”

We found @RichardTEckhart‘s legs by the busted bicycle, where the zombie horde tore him to pieces.

We took advice to @ReadHeavily as the best defense against zombies. Alas, upon conversion, zombies lose literacy and tend to devour readers.

They called @JeannieWalker1, because Jeannie was the first zombie to stop shuffling and stride quickly after her prey.

When Jennifer saw the @ShadowPhoenix32 swoop down over the city, she knew the Zombie Apocalypse was about to begin.

It was a simple spell with one word: @jezri1. Yet, only with the proper accent would it bring Nirvana. Otherwise, Armageddon beckoned.

I really love the @twisted_twins. Did I say love? I meant stalk. Did I say stalk? I meant to say shove them in a Trunk with a @_DeadHooker

“We’ve got to get @AmyLunderman said. “She’s the key to the zombie infection.” Too late, Lunderman found out that Amy had broken free.

“We’ve got the big gun,” James screamed “The @BumpFire2012. That’ll stop ’em!” But no matter how big the gun, the zombies kept coming.

“Beware the @fire_lass. It’s the only way we can be sure the zombies are dead.” But Sonya was already a zombie, and smothered the flames.