>Hartford, CT - May 11-13
>Hawaii (Maui) - June 9-21
>Chicago - July 8-10
>Boston - July - Dates TBD
>Dallas - August - Dates TBD
>New York - October - Dates TBD
>Washington DC - Oct - Dates TBD
Dennis Lowery: On Writing About Your Life... Your Story | How to start, plan and organize your memoir or story This is not a guide to teach you how to become a writer. There are countless books, courses, articles and websites that can help you with that. They can teach you proper grammar, structure and even how to format your manuscript for publication. Those are all things that come with having a rough draft to polish and make pretty.
This IS a guide to help you make actual progress and do what needs to come first—the most important step you must take if you want to write your story. Creating a first draft (the rough draft you can then begin to make pretty and polished).
I write in a handful of genres--and sometimes my stories spread across them. I also post eclectic musings about my worldview on life, tips on writing, and publishing. I occasionally use coarse language but not to offend by gratuitous use but rather for emphasis. Included among my posts and writings will be occasional plugs for my business, my books and my client's books. I reserve that right--hey it's my blog!
No part of this website may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from Dennis M. Lowery, except to print posts for personal reading, send a site or post link to others you feel would enjoy them or for brief quotations as would be used in a review.
The past couple of fiction writing projects, and one's I'm working on now, I've taken to writing the concepts and many of the scenes out longhand on a pad of yellow paper. For some reason the settings and dialog develop and flow much easier and I find it amazing how fast I can write them the old-fashioned way with pencil and paper.
I have to admit while writing recently, in the zone and the words pouring onto the paper and digging it because some of it is really good--one part of my brain paused and thought, "I need to be sure to save this." As if I was looking for the Control-S command on the pad!
The scan below is of the first page of handwritten notes for a story idea (working title, Maid Man) about a Mafia hit man who has a sex-change operation, with kind of a twist up of The Sopranos meets 50 Shades of Grey. I've planned this story for further work in early 2014. [You can click on the following image to expand if you'd like to read the notes.]
I'm sure you know how it is--something sparks an idea and you just have to jot it down and put a pin in the idea (holding it so it doesn't get lost). That's what happened here.
A couple of years ago I put a one line note, "The Forbidden Journals", in my idea book and even registered the domain name with thoughts of what I could write with that theme in mind: A series of stories that all start when someone finds and reads something they shouldn't have. It becomes a trigger event that literally changes their life in a scary, painful but ultimately positive way--they become more than they ever thought they could be.
While I was working on something else, an idea popped in my head and I stopped to type it out and felt it a small but good piece that could be developed further for the opening of, The Forbidden Journals | Book One. Here's the draft opening:
I read of places I’ve never been and
would never go to and some that never were. Enduring the boredom of being
between the here and there of my father’s routine courier route everything was
the same—always. I’d been taught to pilot manually but also taught what buttons
to push and what instructions to give the ships computer—and when to do so.
Life was a checklist and between
the tick marks I read.
And dreamed.
And endured my existence.
Until the day I read something my
father had hidden from me but kept as if a secret treasure (or curse) held
close to the breast. Perhaps it was because it was seemingly all he had left
from his father… from his [my?] family. Something more than the vague and all too brief stories
he would share with me when I pressed to learn more about my family.
Who we
were.
Where we came from.
Why we lived as we did.
He wouldn’t tell me. Never
explained why. And I never knew who or what I
was… until that day, laying on the gray decking mat in my room, I read what I shouldn’t have.
Upcoming story by Dennis Lowery... (the excerpt is further below underneath the cover image):
PREMISE: Michael
wants badly to become a successful writer. Bestselling… hit Hollywood and the
big time. Big book launch parties. Big money. Bright lights and girls with
big…. well you know. Big. The trappings of wealth and living large. New York
lunches and caviar dreams.
He wants it so badly he accepts an offer he can’t refuse… only he finds out too late it means he becomes the Devil’s writer. As he is dragged deeper
into what the Devil wants (and uses his writing for), he discovers in himself a
depth of humanity--something he didn't expect to find having become so jaded
and full of avarice. Can it lead to his salvation and to beating the Devil at
his own game?
This is a story of self-discovery and
redemption.
Michael held his card; it read only, Stephan Abaddon Tan. They stood in a sitting area just off the
lobby of the airport hotel where they had decided to meet.
“Are you an agent?” Michael asked.
“Not exactly…”
“Are you a publisher?”
“Not exactly…,” he offered nothing more.
“What or who the hell are you then?”
“I love your choice of expression.”
“What?”
“What you say and write… the words you
choose. I like them very much,” he almost whispered in a still smooth tone that
made Michael want to check the corners of his mouth for oil on the hinges. The
ghost of his smile flickered like heat coming off asphalt on a hot
Texas summer day. A long slender finger, nails, almost tapering to a point,
tapped those lips. As if thinking about what to say next.
“As I told you in my email and our call.
I’m looking for a writer,” his upraised hand headed off Michael’s interruption,
“I give them the research, characters and plot and they write the story for
me.”
At his pause, Michael asked, “Then you’re talking about fiction…”
“Yes. At first. Afterwards it may be
considered creative nonfiction but once done it’s done and no matter to me.” He
walked around the sitting area looking at the pictures on the wall. Noting they
were all prints… nothing original… nothing valuable.
“What the hell does that mean… fiction then
nonfiction?” Michael followed him over to the window.
“Again, I so love your expressive choice of
words,” he touched the drapes, rubbing them between thumb and forefinger, as if
checking the quality of the fabric. “Fiction to nonfiction does not matter.” He
turned to face Michael. “Are you interested in the position?”
“What’s the pay? Per word… per page or do
you…”
“…there is no pay…”
Michael snorted, “That’s not gonna work,
you need to…”
“Silence,” though not loud, the word stuck
in the air like a sharp knife in wood and hung there vibrating. “There is not
any pay for these specific stories but I can promise great reward for all the
others you write.”
“How the hell are you going to do that?”
“You’re colorful… do you like that word so
much?”
“What?”
“Never mind… I digress. Are you
interested?” He looked at Michael the same way he had just looked at the
furnishings. Calculating.
“What genre will these stories be…
adventure, thriller, science fiction… horror?”
His smile settled in and broadened, “Horror, most assuredly.” The gray
mustache curled like smoke over the red rim of his mouth. “Oh yes… definitely.”
# # #
If you'd be interested in following progress on my stories please let me know via email (see the sidebar contact link) or sign up for updates on new posts (where I announce news and updates on projects, etc.)
Coming Fall 2013
from James Zumwalt and by Dennis Lowery --
A discovery that
can be a boon or bane… depending on whose hands it falls in. The race is on,
and losing could lead to our world’s annihilation.
Investigation of an
ancient gold artifact and a “perfect storm” of scientific, historic and
prophetic events lead to a world-changing discovery and a race by groups with
opposing interests who seek global domination or liberation—with civilization’s
devastation a possible outcome.
Based, in
part, on a true story…
Contact me if you'd like to see the full story synopsis.
This is not the final version and has not been through a final polishing and tweaking... please keep that in mind as you read.
PREMISE: Witches and cats choose each other... Balthazar finally 'meets' and chooses his Witch only to find out it's a little human girl in her Halloween costume. They have to work out their different perspectives and prejudices before they see they were truly meant for each other. And they discover something about themselves that changes both their lives forever. Perception and prejudice can be set aside and overcome if something is important enough to make us change them. And what is more powerful than love?
First Chapter Draft follows...
(click on the image for full size)
By Dennis Lowery
October 24, 2013
The
house was an outlier–on the thin border between what was once an old but good area
and one already gone bad—and it was a lot like them. Something and someone that
got left behind. The effects of unfortunate events. ‘It needs a lot of work…
but then so do Audrey and me,’ Clarinda thought as she hugged her daughter on
the front porch of the house. “Mind the loose boards, honey,” she cautioned as
Audrey walked to the far end and craned her neck to look down the side yard. ‘I’ve
got to get her some decent clothes that fit,’ she thought, looking at Audrey,
who always seemed to have on pants showing too much ankle or that bunched
around her shoes. She sighed to herself feeling the stinging remorse of a
parent struggling to provide for their children.
Clarinda Stockard was as much a victim of the recession as
the house itself with the doubt when her mother-in-law died as to whom legally
held the mortgage and title to the property. That mess left the house vacant
for nearly two years until the estate was settled. With that resolved she
decided to move to Weathersfield, Connecticut with her 12- soon, in a week, to
be 13-year-old daughter, Audrey. Hoping a new home and new opportunity would
wash away the past and create or at least have the promise of a happy new life.
Audrey had been silent during the long ride up; seeming to
be reading one of her books but not turning the pages as often—a sure sign she
wasn’t really reading—she normally raced through books but was blessed with the
ability to remember everything she read. And she read all the time. ‘Did she
read more to remember her father, who’d loved books and taught her to read, or
to keep her mind occupied to ignore what’s happened,’ Clarinda wondered, not
for the first time.
The movers had arrived before them and brought in the boxes
for the kitchen and bathrooms along with the furniture. Her sofa, chairs, and
tables were well-worn and patched in places, but with her new employer helping
to pay for the movers, keeping them was less expensive than buying new
furniture. What she owned and brought with them along with what was left in the
house would do well enough for now. Stretching to get the kink out of her back
from the drive, she and Audrey unloaded the van bringing in boxes of personal
things and suitcases packed with clothes.
Carrying
one of her boxes to the room her mother said was hers, Audrey set it next to
the mattress and bed frame leaning against the wall. She and her mother would
need to assemble it soon. It was already evening and night was falling. Audrey
looked out the bedroom window onto a scene lit by the setting sun spilling over
the house. She faced an expanse of yard with a white disc of the moon starting
to show just over the back tree line. In the back yard was the biggest tree
stump she’d ever seen. It looked as wide as the kitchen counter top was long, maybe
bigger. Carpeting the ground were thousands of leaves—a gorgeous mix of reds,
orange and shaded browns resting in the end of day sunshine slanting down. No
tree. No cut up pieces. Just a whopping big stump and a blanket of oak leaves.
Further back on the fence line, surrounded by much smaller trees, stood what
looked like an almost equally large tree. Its gnarled trunk and branches poked
into the gray sky like hands grasping at the low clouds; the moonrise brushing the
fingers but soon to fit as if held in its hands.
Her mother called from the kitchen, “I’m going to get some
groceries. It’s getting a little late to cook, do you want me to find a drive
through and get some hamburgers and fries or would you like pizza?” In the
silence, she left her mom hanging in, she heard steps coming towards her room,
“Audrey, do you want burgers or pizza?” This time she heard a tinge of
irritation in her mother’s voice as she stood in the doorway.
“Burgers are fine, Mom.”
“Do you want to go with me?”
“No,” and before her Mom filled the pause, “I’ll unpack my
things while you get food.”
“Okay, I’ll be back as fast as I can. Stay in the house and
keep your cell phone on. Call me if you need to.”
Clarinda got in her van and reversing the route that brought
her to the house got back to a main intersection bordered on the corners by a
supermarket, a PriceRite and two fast-food places, a Burger King and a Tilted
Kilt. ‘Not sure about that Kilt place so definitely Burger King,’ she thought
as she pulled into the parking lot. Thinking of many things other than buying
milk, coffee and toilet paper she grabbed a shopping cart nearby and wheeled it
into the PriceRite (an American company
with Impossibly, Incredibly, Inconceivably Low Prices Every Day!) The
move to a new town, the way it had worked, out was not the best timing and made
a difficult school year for Audrey even harder. Tomorrow would be spent getting
her registered, a locker assignment and class schedule for her to start on
Monday the 28th. ‘She’ll have three days to get acclimated, but I
have to report to my new job late tomorrow, Friday evening, and work through
the weekend.’ The following thought caught at her heart, as it had each of the
last four years, ‘next Thursday was the anniversary of the worst day of her
life.’
Audrey stepped
onto the back porch, finding the switch near the door and snapping on the light
only for it to last just a handful of seconds before a flash then the darkness left
by a burnt out bulb. But the rising moon offered some light to see, and she
used her cell phone like a night light. She held it close and low to the ground
as she stepped through the leaves—a ‘shlusshing’ shuffling sound as her feet
pushed leaves aside. She could dimly see the stump ahead of her. It rose up
knee-length from the ground, and she almost stumbled as her feet struck its
widening base roots spread out unseen beneath the leaves. Stepping up, dragging
leaves along, she moved to the center about three feet in.
She’d
been here, at this house, once before—for three or four hours—after her
father’s funeral and seen what once stood where she now sat. But they hadn’t let
her go in the back yard to touch the tree that had been there for as long as
anyone could remember. Her father had been born in Weathersfield and spent his
childhood and most of his teen years here, until he turned 18 and joined the military.
He’d instructed that he be buried next to his twin sister who had died at
sixteen—a loss he’d never quite gotten over until Audrey’s birth. It had been a
six hour drive up I-95, following the hearse, from Dover, Delaware to
Weathersfield, Connecticut—on top of a three hour drive from Dulles airport,
outside of Washington DC, to Dover and that after a two and a half hour flight
from Florida to Dulles. They left the next day right after the funeral. It was
the most terrible and wounding 24-hour period in her life. Now she had to stay
here, all because it had worked out for her Mom to take over the house, her
father had been raised in, when her grandmother died.
Balthazar saw a burst
of light and then a flicker. It moved towards the root source of the great
tree—the Grand White—an Old One that had been murdered almost five years ago,
when he was newborn. He cursed the thought of its death. He’d been born within
its embrace… favored because his clan tree was among the oldest—strong and
wise. But his family was no more… gone just like the Old One. Curious, he
easily moved along the branch reaching farther out and closest towards the
light flickering in his yard.
The
shape, a lighter shadow in the dusk, held something that lit the hands cupping
it. He could see clearly now it was a small human with finely shaped hands. The
long, slender fingers seemed to play upon whatever it was that emitted the
light. In the slow, quiet, way of all cats of his kind, he crept down the tree
onto the ground. Approaching the root source, his passage through the leaves
hardly stirred them. When he was a few feet away, he stopped to watch and
listen. He saw the lighted thing the human held also had two vines coming from it
each running up the front of the human’s clothing, and entering the head
through the ears. What was that and for what purpose? Inching closer, he rolled
his ears forward—focusing. He could see that it was a female human, her face
framed in a small illuminated oval, her eyes closed and from her ears… from her
ears leaked… sound? Music?
“I put a spell on you…
cause you're mine. You better stop th…” Audrey pulled her ear plugs out;
she’d heard something. Something close. She scanned the darkness around her,
the shining moon not bright enough, yet, to help her see anything close to the
ground or in the leaves. There. Facing her, right above the edge of the stump
were two black triangles, slightly lighter inside. As she watched they rose and
below them, two yellow eyes peered at her just above the rim. For a brief
moment, they flashed a brilliant golden topaz that lanced into her green eyes—as
if a spark jumped across.
He stopped. How could she see or even hear him? He was not
the biggest, most powerful cat, but he was the quietest and not since he was
three had he been seen when he did not want to be. As he raised his eyes, he
felt more than saw the emerald flash from the girl’s eyes. He continued to feel
it with his eyes closed—a tingling—as he quickly backed away, returning to his
perch high in the only remaining great tree within his rights to climb. Enough
foolishness he chided himself, the Querency
had begun at midnight with the Choosing
only one week away. It was his fifth and last chance—it must be this year! He
climbed higher putting his back to the nearly full moon as he watched for a
sign… a connection… he was waiting for his Witch.
One morning, several months ago, my wife, Daphne, mentioned she'd
had the oddest dream the night before; "There
was this boy and for some reason, he was talking and acting like John Wayne... How weird is
that?"
I agreed... Very strange; she's not one to have wild
dreams and flights of imaginative fancy. But I believe that sometimes things
you dream or envision are seeds planted or are a burr under your saddle (had to
say that, given the subject) that eventually you have to bring to completion
or cause you to take action.
And so it was with this; it stuck in my head and
in spare moments I noodled about how to construct the story and what I wanted for
a cover (I'm big on having a visually evocative image to bind with the story).
Below you'll see the cover concept, Karen, my daughter and Project Coordinator for my company, Adducent, created for me. Following is a blurb about the story
premise (this is subject to change as, over the next few months, I fit it in
spare time to improve further and draft the story):
Jack Wicek
is 13 years old, and it seems for seven of them since he entered first grade,
he'd been, at best, ignored by his peers, and at worst, bullied mercilessly.
What makes matters even lousier is that his father and mother are no help. Life had
run roughshod over them, too. Their world centered on just getting by with a
"what can we do... it's
not our fault, attitude." A victim's mentality they'd passed on
to Jack.
One day, the
pack was particularly rabid, and Jack was on the run. A race many times (most
times) he lost and a few times, he'd won—a clean getaway. This was another
losing day—the worst one. Cutting through traffic, Jack is hit by a car; slamming
him and his bike to the side of the street, where Jack strikes his head on a
fire hydrant.
At the
hospital, doctors tell Jack's parents part of his skull is caved in, and he is
in emergency surgery. Thankfully Jack survives. But he's in a coma for a period of
time, and when he awakes is going to need weeks, if not months, of recovery.
Jack's parents are underinsured and certainly can't miss work to be with
Jack--so Jack's grandfather (his mom's father, 'Eddard'—not
Edward—who’s more than a little odd) comes to stay with them and to
help with Jack. The grandfather brings with him his entire collection of John
Wayne DVDs and day-in, day-out he watches them with Jack, even when Jack was unconscious
or sleeping--it was a steady diet, almost 24/7.
What happens
to Jack, when he comes out of the coma, and begins his recovery, is
extraordinary. His life, and that of his parents, is never the same again.
A beautiful young woman, named
Cindy, lived in a rural area just south and west of Jacksonville, Florida. She lived
alone in a house that had been left to her by her grandmother who had just
passed away. At 22, she had recently graduated from the University of Florida
and was uncommonly responsible for a young lady. Her parents, who lived about
90 miles away in Atlantic Beach, worried about her being there by herself, but she
had her dog, Goliath, a German shepherd, to protect her. They always told Cindy
to lock all the windows and doors (including the deadbolt) when she was home. So
at night she shut and locked the windows and doors—smiling to herself at her
parents worry but heeding their advice.
But one fall night shortly after
she moved in, the day before Halloween and the first cool snap (a taste of
winter), a window in the family room, facing the back yard would not close fully.
Trying as best as she could, she finally got the window shut, but it would not lock.
She left the window closed but unlocked. It had been a long day working late at
her new job and nearly 9:00PM before she sat down to dinner. Finishing and
putting her dishes in the washer she decided to turn in for the night. Taking a
quick shower, she turned off her bathroom light, walked the few steps down the hall
to her room and was in bed at 10:20PM, with Goliath at the foot of her bed,
leaving her door open, so he could get a drink in the kitchen, if he wanted it
in the night. Dead tired, she was soon asleep.
Suddenly awake, she turned over and
looked at her clock... it was 1:33. Wondering what had woken her—usually a
sound and solid sleeper—she burrowed down pulling her blanket tighter… when she
heard a noise down the hall. A dripping sound; “those damned tile floors sure carried sound,” she thought. But a
leaky faucet dripping into the drain of her bathroom sink didn’t warrant getting
out of a warm bed. “No big deal,” she
decided as her eyes started to close and she reached her hand over the side of the
bed; Goliath always started out laying with her, but even though it was a
nice-sized four-poster, he wasn’t comfortable on the high bed for long, and always
moved to the floor beside it; when Cindy reached down he always licked her hand–it was reassurance that he was there and would protect her.
At 2:03, her eyes snapped open again;
hearing something… it seemed the drip was louder. Annoyed now, but still not
wanting to get up to check it out, she decided to call a plumber when she got
to work. Drowsily she reached down and Goliath licked her hand as she returned
to sleep.
At 6:00, her alarm clock radio
went off, to start her busy day. A bit groggy, it didn’t register that her
bedroom door was now closed. Opening it, she walked to the bathroom, pulled the
shower curtain back, and there was Goliath, hung up by the shower head, throat
cut open. The noise she’d heard was his blood dripping into a puddle on the
floor of the walk-in shower! Shrieking she ran to her bedroom slamming the door
shut behind her... and there on the floor, next to her bed she saw a small
note, written in blood, and saying, “HUMANS CAN LICK, TOO, MY BEAUTIFUL. I’ll
SEE YOU SOON.”
The blare of the radio coming back on jarred her—she’d hit the snooze
button the first time:
"BREAKING NEWS -- Authorities are searching for
a prisoner who escaped late yesterday while being transferred for extradition to
California law enforcement authorities. 23-year-old Isaiah Creel is a
white male with dark eyes, black hair, 5 feet 6 and weighs 165 pounds. He has several
noticeable tattoos, the most prominent of which are on his arms; intertwining
vines with thorns that extend to the backs of his hands. He was last seen
wearing OCSO orange and white striped pants and white OCSO shirts with “OCSO
Convict” printed on the back. Creel was recently arrested in Casselberry, near Orlando, and is wanted in California for the brutal murder of five young women in the
San Francisco Bay area. Believed to be mentally unstable, he first killed the victim’s
pets in the night, leaving a written message that he would see them again—-police believe he would then remain in the house, killing the victim shortly after they were awake.
He is considered extremely dangerous—do not approach—do not confront. Anyone
with any information or sightings of Creel should contact local law enforcement
or the Florida State Police at 800-555-1212."
Slamming the off button she grabbed for her cell phone on the night
stand as she dropped the note from her shaking hand. Then heard the echo of a
step outside her bedroom door and saw the doorknob turn…
Witches and cats choose each other... this little cat, Balthazar, finally 'meets' and chooses his Witch only to find out it's a little human girl in her Halloween costume. They have to work out their different perspectives and prejudices before they see they were truly meant for each other.
Perception and prejudice can be set aside and overcome
if something is important enough to make us change them. And what is more powerful than love?
FIRST DRAFT OF CHAPTER ONE
24 October 2013
The house was an outlier–on the thin border between what was once an old but good area and one already gone bad—and it was a lot like them. Something and someone that got left behind. The effects of unfortunate events. ‘It needs a lot of work… but then so do Audrey and me,’ Clarinda thought as she hugged her daughter on the front porch of the house. “Mind the loose boards, honey,” she cautioned as Audrey walked to the far end and craned her neck to look down the side yard. ‘I’ve got to get her some decent clothes that fit,’ she thought, looking at Audrey, who always seemed to have on pants showing too much ankle or that bunched around her shoes. She sighed to herself feeling the stinging remorse of a parent struggling to provide for their children.
Clarinda Stockard was as much a victim of the recession as the house itself with the doubt when her mother-in-law died as to whom legally held the mortgage and title to the property. That mess left the house vacant for nearly two years until the estate was settled. With that resolved she decided to move to Weathersfield, Connecticut with her 12- soon, in a week, to be 13-year-old daughter, Audrey. Hoping a new home and new opportunity would wash away the past and create or at least have the promise of a happy new life.
Audrey had been silent during the long ride up; seeming to be reading one of her books but not turning the pages as often—a sure sign she wasn’t really reading—she normally raced through books but was blessed with the ability to remember everything she read. And she read all the time. ‘Did she read more to remember her father, who’d loved books and taught her to read, or to keep her mind occupied to ignore what’s happened,’ Clarinda wondered, not for the first time.
The movers had arrived before them and brought in the boxes for the kitchen and bathrooms along with the furniture. Her sofa, chairs, and tables were well-worn and patched in places, but with her new employer helping to pay for the movers, keeping them was less expensive than buying new furniture. What she owned and brought with them along with what was left in the house would do well enough for now. Stretching to get the kink out of her back from the drive, she and Audrey unloaded the van bringing in boxes of personal things and suitcases packed with clothes.
Carrying one of her boxes to the room her mother said was hers, Audrey set it next to the mattress and bed frame leaning against the wall. She and her mother would need to assemble it soon. It was already evening and night was falling. Audrey looked out the bedroom window onto a scene lit by the setting sun spilling over the house. She faced an expanse of yard with a white disc of the moon starting to show just over the back tree line. In the back yard was the biggest tree stump she’d ever seen. It looked as wide as the kitchen counter top maybe bigger. Carpeting the ground were thousands of leaves—a gorgeous mix of reds, orange and shaded browns resting in the end of day sunshine slanting down. No tree. No cut up pieces. Just a whopping big stump and a blanket of oak leaves. Further back on the fence line, surrounded by much smaller trees, stood what looked like an almost equally large tree. Its gnarled trunk and branches poked into the gray sky like hands grasping at the low clouds; the moonrise brushing the fingers but soon to fit as if held in its hands.
Her mother called from the kitchen, “I’m going to get some groceries. It’s getting a little late to cook, do you want me to find a drive through and get some hamburgers and fries or would you like pizza?” In the silence, she left her mom hanging in, she heard steps coming towards her room, “Audrey, do you want burgers or pizza?” This time she heard a tinge of irritation in her mother’s voice as she stood in the doorway.
“Burgers are fine, Mom.”
“Do you want to go with me?”
“No,” and before her Mom filled the pause, “I’ll unpack my things while you get food.”
“Okay, I’ll be back as fast as I can. Stay in the house and keep your cell phone on. Call me if you need to.”
Clarinda got in her van and reversing the route that brought her to the house got back to a main intersection bordered on the corners by a supermarket, a PriceRite and two fast-food places, a Burger King and a Tilted Kilt. ‘Not sure about that Kilt place so definitely Burger King,’ she thought as she pulled into the parking lot. Thinking of many things other than buying milk, coffee and toilet paper she grabbed a shopping cart nearby and wheeled it into the PriceRite (an American company with Impossibly, Incredibly, Inconceivably Low Prices Every Day!) The move to a new town, the way it had worked, out was not the best timing and made a difficult school year for Audrey even harder. Tomorrow would be spent getting her registered, a locker assignment and class schedule for her to start on Monday the 29th. ‘She’ll have a few days to get acclimated, but I have to report to my new job the day after tomorrow, on Friday and work through the weekend.’ The following thought caught at her heart, as it had each of the last four years, ‘next Wednesday was the anniversary of the worst day of her life.’
Audrey stepped onto the back porch, finding the switch near the door and snapping on the light only for it to last just a handful of seconds before a flash then the darkness left by a burnt out bulb. But the rising moon offered some light to see, and she used her cell phone like a night light. She held it close and low to the ground as she stepped through the leaves—a ‘shlusshing’ shuffling sound as her feet pushed leaves aside. She could dimly see the stump ahead of her. It rose up knee-length from the ground, and she almost stumbled as her feet struck its widening base roots spread out unseen beneath the leaves. Stepping up, dragging leaves along, she moved to the center about three feet in.
She’d been here, at this house, once before—for three or four hours—after her father’s funeral and seen what once stood where she now sat. But they hadn’t let her go in the back yard to touch the tree that had been there for as long as anyone could remember. Her father had been born in Weathersfield and spent his childhood and most of his teen years here, until he turned 18 and joined the military. He’d instructed that he be buried next to his twin sister who had died at sixteen—a loss he’d never quite gotten over until Audrey’s birth. It had been a six hour drive up I-95, following the hearse, from Dover, Delaware to Weathersfield, Connecticut—on top of a three hour drive from Dulles airport, outside of Washington DC, to Dover and that after a two and a half hour flight from Florida to Dulles. They left the next day right after the funeral. It was the most terrible and wounding 24-hour period in her life. Now she had to stay here, all because it had worked out for her Mom to take over the house, her father had been raised in, when her grandmother died.
Balthazar saw a burst of light and then a flicker. It moved towards the root source of the great tree—the Grand White—an Old One that had been murdered almost five years ago, when he was newborn. He cursed the thought of its death. He’d been born within its embrace… favored because his clan tree was among the oldest—strong and wise. But his family was no more… gone just like the Old One. Curious, he easily moved along the branch reaching farther out and closest towards the light flickering in his yard.
The shape, a lighter shadow in the dusk, held something that lit the hands cupping it. He could see clearly now it was a small human with finely shaped hands. The long, slender fingers seemed to play upon whatever it was that emitted the light. In the slow, quiet, way of all cats of his kind, he crept down the tree onto the ground. Approaching the root source, his passage through the leaves hardly stirred them. When he was a few feet away, he stopped to watch and listen. He saw the lighted thing the human held also had two vines coming from it each running up the front of the human’s clothing, and entering the head through the ears. What was that and for what purpose? Inching closer, he rolled his ears forward—focusing. He could see that it was a female human, her face framed in a small illuminated oval, her eyes closed and from her ears… from her ears leaked… sound? Music?
“I put a spell on you… cause you're mine. You better stop th…” Audrey pulled her ear plugs out; she’d heard something. Something close. She scanned the darkness around her, the shining moon not bright enough, yet, to help her see anything close to the ground or in the leaves. There. Facing her, right above the edge of the stump were two black triangles, slightly lighter inside. As she watched they rose and below them, two yellow eyes peered at her just above the rim. For a brief moment, they flashed a brilliant golden topaz that lanced into her green eyes—as if a spark jumped across.
He stopped. How could she see or even hear him? He was not the biggest, most powerful cat, but he was the quietest and not since he was three had he been seen when he did not want to be. As he raised his eyes, he felt more than saw the emerald flash from the girl’s eyes. He continued to feel it with his eyes closed—a tingling—as he quickly backed away, returning to his perch high in the only remaining great tree within his rights to climb. Enough foolishness he chided himself, the Querency had begun at midnight with the Choosing only one week away. It was his fifth and last chance—it must be this year! He climbed higher putting his back to the nearly full moon as he watched for a sign… a connection… he was waiting for his Witch.
This wonderfully intriguing image makes me think... "what if..."
By Dennis Lowery
And that easily leads me to create a story or story line about this version of Earth and how its configuration created civilizations that were (are) very different than todays.
One of my personal projects in development--planned for publication in 2013.
A story of how a death led to saving a life.
Excerpt from the development draft:
She fought the mortal coldness of a soul without hope; it lapped around her, rising higher. “What to do… what to do!” she screamed inside her head. It hadn't even been a matter of love, at least for him. The shock that came with realizing that she was on her own in this numbed her even more than the cold wind flailing the station platform.
She glanced around… so many people that seemed to have no place or purpose; they drooped and shuffled as if the gusts shoved them from here to there. Others moving with clear direction—clearly they had jobs to go to or the prospect of one that made them move so steadily or stand so firm with shoulders squared and head up. There were children, too, many homeless and abandoned by their parents—left to shift for themselves. She noticed one bright-haired girl, coatless in a once-bright blue dress as she shivered from person to person, a trembling tray of apples to offer them, “Apple, Sir?... Apple, Ma’am?” No takers, though and she watched her smile dip and then struggle to rise as the girl bravely approached the man next to her. “Trains coming,” she thought, glancing down the track, as the sound grew and people started to press together ready to board and escape the bitter wind. As if giving it one last try; the little girl lifted her tray to the man who not deigning to see her brusquely pushed by causing her to stumble and fall from the platform. The train’s screech covered her scream and that of the little girl as the engine’s steel wheels swallowed the girl spitting shreds of red-dampened blue fabric to the side of the rails. In the cold silence looking away from the girl’s body she saw an apple at her feet. Stooping she picked it up gently, as if cradling the girl to ease her pain, and as she stood, though not clearly formed, the seed was planted for what she must do for the life she carried within.
Story Premise:
An unwedded young woman who finds herself pregnant in a time when society would condemn and ostracize her witnesses a tragic event that changes the course of her life and that of the child she carries. Instead of secretly having an abortion she decides to have the child and to raise it no matter the repercussions.
The letters were sharply creased from years in their envelopes stacked tightly in the small box barely large enough to hold them. Thirty of them, about ten pages apiece, each dated the same month and date a year apart. The one on top dated the day the man was found dead and hand written on the nursing home’s stationery.
Brittle in her hands, easy to tear, as she read them what unfolded was a realization life was as delicate as the paper she held in her hand. They spoke of love and cruel loss and what happens when we let our dreams die. They told of a secret that should have died aborning, choices and decisions made and not made that shaped what was to come. “Secrets, choices and decisions,” she murmured, which brought her squarely back into her own life. “Damn…”
Story Premise:
At a nursing home, a resident dies with no next of kin and with his personal effects is found a box of letters. Curious, a new employee at the home tasked with gathering his belongings decides to keep the letters—she takes them home with her and begins to read. The early letters are typed on plain paper and in business size envelopes, the middle letters are a mix of typed and handwritten on different paper and various kinds of envelopes, the later letters are handwritten—with the final letter dated the day of his death written on the home’s stationary. From his records she knew he hung on to life seemingly to reach the date to complete his letter. When done he sealed and put it away with the others and died.
Many of the letters are smudged, use a mix of pencil and different ink (obviously written at different times but kept to finish on the date for the letter). The last letter is blotched in places; some ink runs as if water had dropped on the letters as he wrote.
Each letter talks about moments in his life at that time and speaks to his wife and children. With the section for each child specific to their age and what they might be going through at that point in their life. To his wife he talks about the beauty they shared, the hardships of life, the challenges their children face in life and worries about the world around them.
As the man’s story unfolds through the letters she tries to find out details about him and his family. She finds that address on the letters does exist, but no one there knows the man. If he or his family lived there at all.
Interspersed with the story behind the letters is the story of this young woman trying to find her way in life and dealing with estrangement from her own family.
And in finding herself – she also discovers the startling truth of the man and his letters.
Our world holds so many hidden things--real and tangible yet unknown. Who knows what's out there for us to discover!
Geomagnetic imaging reveals an ancient city beneath a flat, featureless plain in Syria...before a single shovel or trowel dug into the earth! Al Rawda was occupied around 4000 years ago, and lies east of Hama, Syria.
I find our world's past fascinating and there is so much that we still don't know -- and many things we thought we did know only to find out the "conventional" thinking was misinterpreted, flat out wrong and in some instances fabricated to meet someone's agenda.
Truth is truth... and we'll discover more as time goes by. Here's a bit from one of my favorite songs (from the group, Traffic):
Take a walk down by the river. There's a lot that you can learn
If you listen to... if you listen to the water. You will hear the sound.
You will hear the sound.
Of life.
There's a million different voices. There is happiness and strife.
Messages waiting. They are waiting there.
For you.
Like hidden treasure.
There's a lot our world can teach us. We must look, listen and learn. (The premise of two of my fiction works and series in development touches on important things unknown now, to the world at large, but that will be revealed in time.)
![The Forbidden Journals | Book One [Draft Opening]](http://adducentinc.com/wp-content/uploads/The-Forbidden-Journals-Book-One-by-Dennis-Lowery.jpg)
