Hello, all. Yes, I’m back. Just call me the “Twice in One Day” Madchronicler. I just got some sad news that I want to share. Why? Because sometimes, you just have to. A couple of months ago I entered a short story in a contest. Long story short? It didn’t win. Me = Bummed.
This is not the first time I did something like this and it failed, but this one? It meant a lot to me. The reward wasn’t exactly amazing and I’m not going to post the contest or any details, herein. But it was very symbolic in ways that maybe I’ll be better able to explicate one day. But not now. Now, I just want to share it with you, because the one thing that I was not allowed to do was “publish” it until such time as it either won, or was rejected. No such constraints, now.
I want to share it with you. Why? A couple of reasons. The first? It’s about one of my daughters, co-starring my wife. And the second? ‘Cause it’s not every day I write a short story. It’s not exactly my cup ‘o tea. But this one? Well, I guess I’ll just let it speak for itself. It’s not long: 1174 words to be exact. And here it is. I call it…
The Wandering Seeker, a Short Story
I am awakened from my slumber by the sound of someone whimpering in the room next to mine. I crawl from beneath my covers, exit my room, arrive at her door and slowly push it open. By the dull glow of the light in her fish tank, I see her sitting bolt upright in her bed with tears upon her cheeks. I make my way toward her and she acknowledges my approach with a forced smile.
“What is it kiddo?” I ask as I sit upon the side of her bed. She immediately secures herself in my embrace.
“I can’t sleep.”
“Why not?”
“I heard something outside.”
“What did you hear?” I ask and tighten my embrace.
“Crying,” she says, her voice muffled by my nightshirt.
“Crying? Well, that’s nothing to be afraid of. It’s probably just the Wandering Seeker.”
“The who?”
“The Wandering Seeker,” I repeat, “didn’t Mommy or I ever tell you about him?”
“No.”
“Well,” I say, “lie down, and I’ll tell you his story.”
“Is it a scary story?”
“Not very. And I promise that it has a happy ending.”
“Okay,” she says. She lies down, crawls back beneath her covers and wraps my once-teddy bear in her arms. I clear my throat and gaze out her window. The shade is up, and the full moon is rising over the trees beyond it.
I remember.
“The biggest question that people ask is why does the Wandering Seeker cry?”
She tilts her head inquisitively, “Why does he, Daddy?”
“You’ll find out,” I answer, “when I’m done, okay?”
“Okay,” she says.
I nod. “Once upon a time, there was a man who wandered the world… the worlds looking for answers to his questions.”
“What did he look like?”
“His face changed. Most days it would have a beard upon it, but other days it wouldn’t. Despite the changes, though, one thing remained constant.”
“What?”
“His eyes,” I say, “his eyes were deep blue.”
She smiles, and holds her teddy bear closer, “Was he a nice man?”
“He was,” I say, “but he could also be mean. Being mean was his way of keeping himself safe. But his intentions were always good.”
“That’s good,” she says.
“And he was,” I continue, “for the most part. But he made mistakes and was afraid of making them again. He had lots of cuts and bruises, too, and he was looking for the one thing that would make them all better.”
“A band aid?”
“The right sized one,” I say, “but the cuts and bruises? They hurt. And because they hurt, he cried. Just like you do when you fall down and scrape your knee. It wasn’t like falling down, though. It was a different kind of hurt. You see, he hurt up here”—I gesture to my head—“and here”—I gesture to my heart—“and those are the worst kinds of hurt. He cried because he didn’t have a Daddy to come into his room and comfort him. He cried because he didn’t have a little girl to tell his stories too.”
“A little girl like me?”
“Exactly like you,” I answer, and plant a kiss upon her forehead, “he wandered the world, telling his stories to the people he encountered. His travels… his search for the answers took him many different places, and he met many different people along the way.”
“Where did he go?”
“All over. He visited worlds made of chrome and steel, and he saw the love that blossomed within them. He traveled from one world to the one right next door searching for paradise. His wanderings took him back through his own past, and he did battle with it over and over again.”
“Wow,” she says.
“That’s what I said when I first heard the story, too. And he had many adventures beyond those. He learned from each one, and grew each time. Despite his adventures, though? He still hurt. Yet finally…”
I pause, and she glances at me curiously, “What, Daddy?”
“Well,” I continue, “the day came when he knew he had to end his travels. That day he realized that a peaceful life was better than the one he’d been living.”
She cocks her head and looks at me askance, “What’s ‘peaceful?’”
“Good question,” I respond.
“I get it from you.”
I smile, “The best way to describe peaceful is happy. You see, the Wandering Seeker realized that he could never really be happy traveling the world… the worlds alone. One day, he was standing alone on a beach. He gazed at the ocean, and he realized that truehappiness would only come from settling down and putting his wanderings behind him. In time, he found what he was looking for. He found the right sized band aid. He settled down. He doesn’t wander any longer.”
“Then why do I hear him?”
“You only hear an echo of him,” I answer, “He’s not really out there anymore. Not in body. In dreams, though? He’s still searching. Still seeking happiness. Answers. The places that he went? He revisits them when he can, but he now knows that there’s a difference between fantasy and reality. Now that he has responsibilities, he knows that he needs to focus on themand not his dreams. But that echo? It’ll always remain, crying on nights like tonight, because all of his experiences? They affect him, even now.”
“Is he a ghost?” she inquires, her eyes opening widely and a shade of her previous fear reentering her voice.
“No,” I say, “there are no ghosts, sweetheart. Ghosts are created by people to scare little girls. But they aren’t real. They’re fantasy, too. Not reality.”
“That’s good,” she says, smiles and re-closes her eyes.
“It is,” I conclude, “and that? That’s the story of the Wandering Seeker. Do you understand?”
She opens her deep, brown eyes and gazes into mine, “I think so. But Daddy?”
“Yeah, kiddo?” I reply with a sniffle.
“Why are you crying?”
Surprised, I raise my hand to my cheek. It comes away wet. I glance at the tears that sparkle upon it in the burgeoning moonlight. Somewhere beyond my daughter’s window, I hear the distant sobbing of the Wandering Seeker. I smile. Without another word, I kiss her upon her forehead.
“Anothergood question,” I answer.
She smiles, “Will you tell me someday?”
I nod. “I will. I promise that I’ll tell you all of the Wandering Seeker’s stories one day.”
“Okay,” she says, “I love you Daddy.”
“I love you too,” I say. She curls up beneath her coverlet, hugs her teddy bear close and closes her eyes one, final time. Per her slow and methodical breathing I understand that she is asleep. I stand from her bed and exit her room. I reenter mine and make my way quietly over to my bed. I crawl back into it. Instinctively, my wife shifts and her arm falls over my chest. I kiss the moonlight that dapples there.
Dream or reality, I embrace the contentment.
Short, maybe sweet and definitely contrite. What can I say? They only gave me 1200 words to work with. Oh, well. I did the best that I could. No worries. This, too, shall pass. I hope you enjoyed it. Have a good night ladies and gents. Hug your little ones closely, and keep your ears opened for the Wandering Seeker. There will always be a little part of him out there.
To say that this past weekend was a whirlwind one for your old buddy the Madchronicler, AKA Frank Marsh is an understatement. Between Saturday AM and this morning at approximately three or 3:30 when I finally got my youngest minion, AKA Natalie, AKA “Smallish Bear” to sleep I attended a Raspberry Festival, changed a fish tank, did laundry, got a customer in South Carolina out of an after hours jam, took a younger lady out on her first date to see “Monsters University” (that’d be my oldest minion, AKA Cara, AKA “Biggish Bear”), went to Dutch Wonderland, drove home, cleaned up a bucket or two full of puke (Biggish Bear again), did more laundry (puke sheets; BLEAH), watched “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets,” struggled with Smallish Bear to get her to go to sleep until three or 3:30 this AM, got up on roughly three hours of sleep, slammed a Monster Ultra before driving 45 minutes to work and am now drinking Monster Ultra numero dos while I catch up on work/begin writing this blog entry. Thankfully, Daft Punk just came on the radio. I am now grooving to “Get Lucky (Radio Edit)” at my desk while typing these words. My boss stopped in front of my desk and looked at me like I was doing something wrong. I looked him straight in the eyes, smiled and said:
“Been up all night to have fun. Been up all night to have fun. Been up all night to have fun. Been up all night to Get Lucky (Radio Edit).” Which is actually pretty f*cking accurate save for the “getting lucky” part. That’s probably the one thing that didn’t happen to me this weekend. Or did it? I’ll never tell. If I did, Mama Bear, AKA Nicole, AKA Sweetie would likely kick my a**. “I don’t know. It’s a mystery.”
Yet despite all this, only one thing stands out in my mind. Choice “D”: None of the Above. That choice? The Amish statues at Dutch Wonderland. You know the ones I’m talking about, don’t you? An Amish husband and his Amish wife, sitting in front of their Amish hut within which an Amish maid feeds an Amish boy (who looked frighteningly Aryan) next to a room in which an Amish midwife tends to an Amish baby. AND breathe. I’d post a picture of it here but sadly, I don’t have one and I can’t find one online. Mama Bear took a pic of me copping a feel off the Amish wife but she hasn’t posted it yet (I can be REALLY juvenile sometimes). As soon as she does, though, I promise I will amend this blog entry and post it. Until then, you’re just going to have to trust me when I say that it DOES exist, I DID feel it up and it was one of the single freakiest things I’ve ever seen in my almost 38 year existence on this side of the proverbial wormhole of existence.
My fear of inanimate objects like statues has existed for a long time. Long before everyone and their grandmothers/grandfathers saw the Doctor Who episode “Blink” and adopted it. BTW, if you’ve never watched an episode of Doctor Who (something I find sacrilegious) and you’re looking to start, watch “Blink.” No lie: It will freak you the f*ck out. The premise is simple: Statues and gargoyles that are actually an alien species called The Weeping Angels that can only move when you’re not seeing them, i.e. when you’re staring at one of them and you blink and the next thing you know, the f*cking thing is right. Up. In. Your. GRILL, barring it’s stone fangs at you in a silent scream. If they touch you “POW.” See you in the past. They’re sustained through the consumption of life experiences. They touch you, they consume every Raspberry Festival you attended, every fish tank you changed BLAH, BLAH, BLAH every time you sang “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk to your boss while he stood in front of your desk, scowling down at you and banish you to the past where you are forced to live out not your life, but A life. Some succeed. Many just end up growing old and dying alone. Freaked out yet? Watch the episode. Trust me: You will be. End unannounced parenthetical aside. I now return you to my regular inane ramblings, already in progress.
My fear of inanimate objects like statues and, in my case, MANNEQUINS stems from an episode of the original “The Twilight Zone” that my Biological subjected me to at a very young age. I don’t remember when, but I remember IT perfectly. The episode was called “The After Hours” and in summation? It’s about mannequins coming to life. There’s more to it… A LOT more, and for your viewing pleasure (if you’ve got 20 minutes to kill), here it is. Embedded for your convenience. Both parts, courtesy of my friends at YouTube.
Did you enjoy it? If you watched it, of course. If you didn’t? No worries. I know I’m not the only one in my subjective reality that suffers from an irrational fear of inanimate objects. If you, too, are afflicted by… get ready… Automatonophobia (thank you, Google), there’s no need for you to watch “The After Hours” to understand where I’m coming from. And if you don’t? You’re lucky. The bottom line? I don’t like anything that maintains a lifelike visage while being inanimate. Sh*t, I don’t like anything not human that looks human. And Amish husband and his wife? They fall squarely into this category. So I don’t like them. But sadly? I can’t get them the f*ck out of my head.
As I stood there with my tongue out and my right hand firmly cupped around Amish wife’s firm, fiberglass breast posing for a picture, my mind began racing as it so often does when I am in… well, any situation, really. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: The strangest things inspire me. Amish husband and his wife, along with their entire Amish brood were no exception. Someone said “they look like they’re about to come alive” and in my mind? They did. Cue the short story development process, a process that I am incredibly familiar with, but not one that I am very adept at. In short? I’m not very good at writing short stories.
Don’t get me wrong: I’ve written plenty. Two dozen or so total, actually. But that’s over the course of what I like to call my “Writing Life” as opposed to my “Non-Writing Life” that pre-dated it, AKA the period of my life in which I dabbled in everything from theater to sports, only to find that I really wasn’t particularly good at anything BUT writing. Okay, so maybe I was pretty good at the whole acting-thing, but sports-wise? My greatest achievement was when I beat Billy Ring (Booyakasha, Billy; RESPECT) in a game of Rough House, AKA basketball without rules, and even that’s debatable: He may have let me win though he always denied it thereafter. Anywhos, two dozen or so short stories over the space of almost two decades does not = An impressive short story output considering how many novels I’ve written, re-written, finished or just started, and how many Dissertations, pieces of Mental Flatulence and blog entries I’ve written.
But I have ideas for them. Often, actually. Like I said before, the strangest things inspire me. Take the Monster Ultra I just cracked. Yes, another one. Numero tres. Three = The maximum allotment of caffeine drinks one is supposed to consume in a 24 hour time period, and I’m drinking my third in 12. I generally only drink a max of two in 24. Survey says? This last one will either get me through the rest of my day or cause me to have a heart attack. I’d prefer the former but in the event of the latter? Well, at least I’ll get to lay down. Every time I drink a Monster Ultra and feel the initial rush of energy that follows, I remember the short story that I wrote back in college when I was popping Vivarin, No-Dose and 357 Magnum like it was going out of style. It was called “Last Will and Testament” and it was about a guy who OD’d on caffeine pills and wrote about it while he was OD’ing. It’s very psychological. It’s not for the faint of heart. And it’s not very good. AT ALL.
You see, my short stories have always been very psychological, i.e. I haven’t written many that were simply stand alone tales. Two stand out in my mind. I recently submitted one–“The Day of Final Departure”–to a short story contest only to have it summarily rejected for being too… for lack of a better phrase, “long winded.” And I’ll admit: It was. But it was meant to act as a prequel to a larger idea which has, summarily, been pushed to the proverbial back burner. Not because of the failure of the story. On the contrary: I actually like it a lot and think it has an emotional core that resonates with the reader (that’d be the exact opposite of what the anthology editor told me, i.e. “it does not have an emotional core and it does not resonate with the reader”). But because CHILDREN OF ENDWORLD has moved to the forefront of my creative universe. The other that stands out in my mind was called “Origin of Couch” and unless you were on the inside of a little email debate between me and my friends entitled “The Couch Chronicles” back in 2006 you’d have no f*cking idea what it’s about so I’m just going to leave it at that. If you want to read the whole chronicle, message me and I’ll forward you a copy. Once I get the two dozen or so people that contributed to it to sign off on it, that is.
Yet the ideas keep coming. Like this most recent one. So why not write it and the handful of other ones that are dancing around in my head right now down? Because… and this is why I think I generally fail at writing short stories, i.e. THE POINT so if you’ve been waiting for it PLEASE pay attention… when I write, I WRITE. I write until my idea is done. Spent. When I’m writing something long like a novel, each chapter is a separate idea: Equal (and sometimes unequal) parts of the greater whole. I can stop and start again because most times? The idea is big enough to contain everything. Blog entries? They’re more like journal writing, i.e. stream of consciousness. I simply write until I get tired, go back, make sure I followed through on my ideas and tidy it up/complete it with a winky emoticon, and a smiley face. It’s how I used to write essays and term papers in school, as well.
But short stories? Short stories are self-contained tales that have a beginning, a middle and an end. They’re written with restraint by people that are able to practice restraint. Those people? I admire the hell out of them because they are able to give you, the reader a literary Amuse Bouche and leave you satisfied. Me? I’m like the guy who only knows how to make chili. I make a killer batch: I’ve perfected my recipe. But it’s all I can do unless I give you chili on a Ritz and try to pass it off as an appetizer. Fact: It’s still f*cking chili, even with a dollop of spray cheese on the top of it. There are many variations to the recipe–spicy, mild, tomato heavy, bean heavy–but it’s still, at it’s emotional core, a flavorful yet saccharine concoction of about 12 different ingredients and spices. Jesus, talk about wordy. Maybe that editor was right about your old buddy the Madchronicler, AKA Frank Marsh, AKA… Papa Bear? Oh sure. Why the f*ck not?
I guess what it all boils down to is this one, indisputable fact: I’m not the greatest storyteller. I don’t exactly excel at “once upon a times” and “they lived happily ever afters.” I’ve never written a story like “The After Hours” that would appear on a show like “The (original) Twilight Zone.” When it comes to the idea of the formulaic, basic story ark? I don’t do it very well. I don’t rock beginnings, middles and ends the way others do. I’m more of a “story in progress” kind of guy. I like to pick up the action mid-scene: Throw you into the story. For me, exposition can come later. Involvement comes from meeting pre-existing characters with pre-existing back stories and personalities and getting to know them… to love them over time. I’m fascinated with my characters and I like to get in their heads. They’re like real people. Real people? Real people are “stories in progress” when you meet them. Getting to know them and their history is oft times an exhilarating experience. But that’s the disconnect. Me = A pretty good writer (I hope), albeit a bit wordy. Okay, maybe more than a BIT wordy (I’m like Robert Jordan but without a bestseller to my credit). But me = A good storyteller? Um… yeah. Not so much.
You may think differently. Maybe I’m being to hard on myself. Perhaps. But I don’t see it that way. Even if I am being harder on myself than I need to be it’s in my nature to push myself. That said, there are two short stories that are at the forefront of my mind, presently: One new and one old. Both have beginnings, middles and ends, and I vow that over the next few weeks I WILL write them. If for nothing else for the fact that doing so will be a much needed exercise in restraint. I’ve been working on it in CHILDREN, and so far, I’m happy with the results. We shall see if I can parlay that into a standalone, short story or two. In my defense, there is STILL my as-of-yet untitled (because I legally can’t tell you the title without being disqualified) short story that I submitted a few months ago for a fellowship. The results = Pending. I should know a bit more within the next month but until then? The least I can do is try. As that eminent sage of wisdom Yoda once said, “try not. DO. Or do not. There is no try.”
‘Course, being able to devote time to such an exercise while maintaining my pace on CHILDREN (106 pages strong as of last Friday; this weekend kind of threw a monkey wrench into my proverbial “Writing Machine”) is going to be difficult. I’d also rather not sacrifice either this blog, or the ENDWORLD site in the process. It is also contingent on a few of, if not ALL OF the above listed contingencies that occurred over the last three days NOT occurring again. Certain things are, of course, unavoidable. There’s no way to know when Biggish Bear’s going to get dehydrated and get sick despite plying her with an inexhaustible supply of water. She’s just slightly sub-four years old. She dove off our love seat last night, landed on her head and somersaulted over. That’s the bad news (it also might have contributed to her “condition” last evening though she seems fine today). The good? Her form was spectacular. I think there may be a career in it for her. My daughter, the Olympic diver. Just because I sucked at sports doesn’t mean she will, right?
There’s also no way to know when Smallish Bear is going to wake up in the middle of the night and not want to go back to sleep. She is, after all, just barely post-one and given to dramatics, even moreso than I was. On my BEST days as an actOR (emphasis on the “OR”) I couldn’t feign sadness the way she did last night. She parlayed my weeping heart into a three hour long stay of proverbial execution (and by “execution” I mean “bed time”) that ended with her cooing happily to herself in her crib at three or 3:30 this AM and me wondering just how in the hell I was going to function all day on three hours of sleep. Well, I’ve managed. And I’m not dead yet though admittedly, Monster Ultra numero tres is REALLY coursing through my system, presently. It’s like I’m back in college after popping two Vivarin, No-Dose or Magnum 357 again, only I know that the crash tonight is going to be ten times worse. I seriously need to reconsider my caffeine consumption moving forward. 38 does not = 21, on this side of the proverbial wormhole of existence or ANY.
You control what you can. THAT is the way of things, guys. “The way of the Force.” It’s kinda’ like writing a short story, something that I have never been very good at but something that I am going to focus on moving forward (at least for the immediate future): The writer controls the beginning, the middle and the end. He or she controls how wordy it gets and how much of an emotional core it has. He or she also controls how relevant it is or not (inside jokes between a group of two dozen or so friends do NOT sell). He or she is either born with the restraint required to do it right or needs to learn it. Me? I was born with the capacity to write. It’s in my genes (thanks, Biological). But restraint? The capacity to be a storyteller and not just a writer? That is something I’ve been working on for years. I honestly believe I’m finally getting to the point that I can do it. I wouldn’t have published ENDWORLD if I didn’t. But I’ve still got a ways to go until I’m satisfied with it. I may already be more skilled at it than he was, but it’s in my nature to push myself. Because…
Once upon a time, there lived a guy that called himself the Madchronicler, AKA Frank Marsh, AKA Papa Bear. He saw inspiration in everything from a a Daft Punk song to a Doctor Who episode. One day while “functioning” on a limited amount of sleep and under the influence or more caffeine than he had ingested since college, he decided to write a short story about an Amish husband and his wife, how they became statues sitting on a bench at Dutch Wonderland and how SHE–the wife–ended up with some stranger acting like a juvenile and copping a feel of her fiberglass breast. And as for who or what lives happily ever after?
That, guys, is a “story in progress.” Stay tuned for the answer.
Good day, everyone! Happy Pi Day! No, I’m not talking about “pie.” I’m talking about Pi, alias the irrational number that we all learned about in math: 3.14 et cetera, et cetera. Though a piece of pie would taste good to this sugar-deprived, pseudo-madman right about now. Sadly, my desire for a piece of pie will have to remain unfulfilled until such time as I reduce my blood sugar from where it is to a manageable number sans medication. Thanks, Doc L. I know you’ve got my best interests in mind, but really? Depriving me of pie… of anything with sugar in it is almost as bad as depriving me of caffeine. At least I can get the latter with no sugar in it. I can’t exactly get sugar without sugar.
Oh f*ck. I’ve gone cross-eyed again.
Believe it or not, Pi Day, irrational numbers and my sugar intake (or lack thereof) are not the things perplexing my oft perplexed mind, currently. In truth? There really isn’t anything newperplexing me save for the same sh*t that has been on my mind for the last couple of weeks (book stuff, of which you guys are already aware). Instead, I’m reflective. Yesterday, at the urging of my wife, I did something that I never thought I’d do. I entered a short story in a contest. But not just any old contest. I’ve done that plenty of times before this. No, guys. I entered a short story in a contest sponsored by an organization that specializes in giving non-professional authors like myself with children an opportunity to showcase their work. Sounds innocent enough, right?
And it is. In fact, I’m very impressed with the organization and what it stands for. So why write that its “something that I never thought I’d do?” There are multiple reasons, none of which reflect poorly on the organization in question or others like it. Primarily? I wrote that because X-amount of years ago when I wrote “The Wandering Seeker,” I never dreamed that the scene portrayed in it would be a scene from my own life.
I don’t know if I can publish it here on “Random Musings of a Pseudo-Madman.” That’s http://www.randommusingsofapseudomadman.com. Yes, I wrote “.com,” and not “.wordpress.com.” I have, as of yesterday afternoon, purchased the domain name though really? The prospect of anyone ever using a domain name even remotely similar to it is pretty remote. What can I say? It’s a part of my ongoing bid to dominate the internet on my side of the proverbial wormhole of existence. I already own “frankmarsh.net” and am eyeing up “frankmarsh.com” if the person in DC that holds it ever relinquishes it. To quote one of my all time favorite cartoons:
Pay no attention to the snippet of Raul Julia from “Street Fighter: The Movie” at the end of the clip. I’m sorry, but it was the cleanest one I could find on Youtube. And really, WTF does Raul Julia have to do with “Pinky and the Brain?” Note to self: Make sure to tag this blog entry with “randomness,” as well, when completed. Thanks for f*cking my world up, WelsheyOneder.
But I digress. I was writing that I don’t know if I can publish “The Wandering Seeker” here because of the contest rules. No submissions of previously published material can be entered. Once I put something on “Random Musings” it becomes a part of the Eminent Public Domain. I don’t know if blog publishing counts as publishing so rather than risk it, I think I’ll deign to not post it. That doesn’t mean I can’t tell you about it, though.
In short (and it had to be: 1200 words max;limiting a short story to 1200 words is almost as daunting a task as writing a novel, at least for my long-winded a**), “The Wandering Seeker” is the story of a father who is awakened in the middle of the night by his daughter whimpering in the room next to his. He goes into check on her and asks her what’s wrong. She informs him that she heard crying outside her window and it woke her up. “Oh, that’s nothing,” the father says, “that’s just the Wandering Seeker.” She asks him who the Wandering Seeker is and he tells her a story about a person that used to wander the world… “the worlds” searching for answers. His travels took him many places but in the end? He ended up settling for a normal life and not an abnormal, pseudo-chaotic one. He met a woman, fell in love with and married her. He had a couple of kids. “He doesn’t wander anymore.” The tears that the man’s daughter heard? They were an echo of the Wandering Seeker’s tears. “He cried because he didn’t have a family to love” her father tells her, “but now? He doesn’t wander anymore. He’s stopped crying. But occasionally you can hear him on nights like this one.”
There’s a bit more but rather than ruin the O’Henry ending (which, if you know me is pretty predictable), I think I’ll stop there. Keep your fingers crossed, guys. I’m still waiting for my “big break” and while I don’t know if thiscould be it, the reward and the platform said reward would provide me would be very, very beneficial to a burgeoning writer, about to publish his first novel. But the contest? It really is supplemental to the story: A story which I wrote long before I met Nicole.
You see, “The Wandering Seeker” was another one of my early-adulthood attempts to envision my life as I desired it to be, and not as it was at the time. But the amazing thing about it? As opposed to my other attempts to write “Autobiographical Fiction,” the events depicted in “The Wandering Seeker?” Well sh*t. Theycame true. Everything down to the color and style of my wife’s hair in it (brown and curly, a part of the story which I was, sadly, forced to edit out to get it under 1200 words), the color of my daughter’s eyes, her age and the style of her own hair (aspects of the story that I did retain; in essence, I made it 1200 words about a father and his daughter and not 2000 words about a father and his family).
Now, you could argue this eventuality a couple of ways. You could say that the story, which was written with my ideal in mind some 15 plus, very odd years ago could not help but come true. You could say that I would not have settled for anything less than the woman pictured in the story and the little girl that was, quite obviously, a hybrid of her appearance and my own. Contrary to that interpretation is another, though. One word… a word that I’m leery of attaching to anything for fear of either sounding like someone not grounded in reality, alias someone who believes in things like the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny. Or that Pi has a final number. That word? Fate. Or destiny. Or any number of other synonyms that exist.
Let me be frank with you, guys (no pun intended, or course): I don’t believe in fate, destiny or whatever you want to call it. I believe in pulling myself up by my bootstraps. I believe in free will. But I do believe that we all have a purpose and that purpose is hard-wired into our souls pre-conception. Getting there? It’s up to us. Some of us achieve our purpose and some of us don’t. How we are judged by the almighty for our incapacity to either use what he or she gave us or not is purely speculation on my part. I won’t know if I succeeded until I’m gone from this world… from these worlds. Even then I may not know. But I trust in the belief that I have clung to since I was a child. If one day, I die and find out that it was all a farce? Well sh*t. It won’t be the first time someone played a cruel joke on me. Hardy har-har. Insert pie in the face here.
But being a good husband and father? I truly believe that those things are a part of, if not my whole purpose. The scene that I pictured in my story? It was bound to happen, but not because it was destined to. Nor because I had the foresight to extrapolate what mine and my ideal woman’s daughter would look like at 20-something years young. I don’t even know that I could do that now at 37, going on 38 years old. It happened because when God or whatever gods you believe in was dolling out souls back in late 1974 and early 1975, he or she took one look at the wispy “stuff” that was going to make up mine and said, “do you know what? This one? He’s going to be a good husband and a good dad. He’s going to put his family before anything and everything else in his life. If his daughter calls his name crying in the middle of the night, he’s not going to roll over and cover his head with a pillow. He’s going to get up, no matter how drowsy he is, and make his way groggily into her room. He’s going to sit with her and tell her a story. I’ll let him decide the content of it.”
That’s me, folks. About as plain as can be, really. I’ve been summed up in many ways by many, different people over the course of my… for the most part… un-extraordinary life. Some have called me a lover. Some, a fighter. Some, a big p*ssy and some a fedora and trench coat wearing elitist (you know who you are). I really could give a flying f*ck what people think of me. Some may believe that this blog is just another means of me, drawing undue attention to myself and I’ll concede that while I don’t believe that people always embody the traits of the Zodiac sign that they were born under–mine was Leo, BTW–that particular trait? Yep. I do have it. But only to a degree. I am also humble. I believe that everything that I have, pre-programmed or not, is a gift. And I cherish it. My family? My ability to write? My sometimes quirky sense of humor? My capacity to love unconditionally? All.
I mentioned earlier in this blog post that I was not perplexed, but reflective. I’m reflective about where I am now this chilly, mid-March Pi Day in 2013, and where I was then, an undetermined day of an undetermined month some 15 plus, very odd years ago when I first wrote “The Wandering Seeker.” Back then, the life that I have now was a dream. Today? Well, guys, I may not yet be a published writer… I may only be a part of the Eminent Public Domain currently… whatever I am, there is one thing that I am for sure. And that is? If you know me you already know the answer. I’m the guy who got out of bed and told one of, or both of his whimpering daughters the story of the Wandering Seeker. Beyond that?
Well sh*t. You don’t want me to give away the O’Henry ending now, do you?
“They’re Pinky, they’re Pinky and the Brain Brain Brain Brain Brain.”
Random Musings of a Pseudo-Madman, Version 2.0 