Bibliophile

I moved!  Not far, but things are still in boxes because I won’t be staying in my current living situation for very long.  I brought the book I was working out of with me, but I have yet to find it.  A few online friends started a writing circle though.  Each week we get a list of random items and have to fit them all into a short story.  I decided I’ll post my submissions here, too. 

 First week’s items:

1. Broken French horn

2. Tape dispenser

3. Cocaine

4. Blue M&M

5. Hand sanitizer

6. Pin oak

7. Polka dot bra with broken strap

8. Banana bobble head

9. Sickle

10. Calculator

Bonus word: Sock monkey

All of these submissions will be untitled. 

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“Fuck!”

Jen held her palm to her forehead, squeezing her eyes shut. Generally, air is the only thing nature ever intended to enter the nose. Everything else is supposed to be deflected, even if it’s good for you. Saline solution, for example, while not harmful, can be rather unpleasant when inhaled through your nasal cavity. Rebelling against nature definitely has its consequences. Jen, ever the rebel, had just snorted one fat line of cocaine. This was more than just unpleasant. The pain she was currently recovering from was like brain freeze. After a couple of seconds, she started exhaling and inhaling at a regular tempo again. She performed her ritual of swiping the excess from her Clinique pocket mirror and sweeping it onto her gums. She began singing “Oh, Susanna!” with all the sweetness of a broken French horn as she packed the rest of her stash away in her stash box which went back into her purse and down into the bottom left drawer of her desk.

Jen wasn’t a druggie for the pleasure or the rush they provided. She was a druggie for survival. Jen hadn’t had a feeling that wasn’t chemically enhanced or a direct result of being chemically enhanced in 4 years. She was a smart girl with a clear grip on the beating her body was taking, but the advantages of being up or down on sheer whim empowered her in an odd way that justified her vices. Somewhere in the beginning, it was fun. She and her friends would get together and experiment with all types of mind-altering substances. She decided hallucinogens were not for her after an unfortunate LSD incident where she chased Randy Newheart around the backyard with a sickle convinced he was a zombie. Amanda and Rob had to tackle her and take her inside the house, barricading all doors and windows until she had calmed down enough to go back outside and apologize profusely to Randy for trying to decapitate him. These days, she just needed the drugs to function-uppers to make it through the day and downers to make it through the night. She kept her stash in a small, pin oak box. It wasn’t anything fancy, but it was small enough to fit in her purse and snapped closed to guarantee nothing would be getting in or out.

Tonight was Open House Night for Bassett Elementary School. Jen had taken a teaching position at the school two years ago. She taught one of the three first grade classes. The children were due to arrive in about fifteen minutes with their parents to show off all the things they had accomplished so far in the school year. It was her job to mingle and assure parents that their kids were normal, smart, and oh-so-delightful additions to her classroom. Hence, the fat line of cocaine. Talking to parents was not an easy task and she needed all the help she could get. She adjusted the items on her desk to her satisfaction. One night in the first week of this school year while on a speed binge, she found herself with an extra hour to herself after preparing her lessons for the next day. She decided her desk needed some organization. The order was so perfect, she didn’t dare touch it for the rest of the school year. From left to right, she had: a purple homework tray, hand sanitizer, a writing utensil holder with pens arranged by color and pencils so sharp they could be considered a weapon, an electric pencil sharpener, a stapler, a red tape dispenser, and a banana bobble head. Directly in front of her, she had a day calendar opened up to today’s date with Open House written in red and underlined three times for emphasis and a calculator situated to the left of it.

Jen stood up from her desk, taking the tape dispenser with her to fix a wayward sock monkey that had fallen off of its display. Her floral dress flowed gracefully off of her angular frame. She paused momentarily to fix the safety pin that was scratching against her skin. It was barely holding together the strap of her polka dot bra that had snapped earlier that day. Just then, there was a knock on the door. Jen had forgotten to unlock it. She glided over to the door to open it up for her first visitor of the evening. When she opened the door, she found Principal Green on the other side.

“Oh hi, Principal Green!,” Jen said with a big grin on her face. “Come on in. I’m just about ready for this night to get started.”

Principal Green stepped inside the classroom and closed the door shut behind her. Jen made her way to the display case to fix the fallen sock monkey back into place.

“I need to have a word with you, Ms. Weaver,” Principal Green said in a serious tone. Jen was still fidgeting with the sock monkey, not able to position it in a way that pleased her. Principal Green kept her eyes on her. With one eyebrow raised she asked, “Will you have a seat?”

Jen turned around to see the concern on the principal’s face. “Of course,” she meekly replied, finding herself starting to sweat with nervous energy. She took the nearest desk to the display. “What can I help you with?”

“Ms. Weaver, I received some calls from a few concerned parents this evening after school. Did you fall asleep in the middle of class?” Principal Green looked right into Jen’s eyes.

“I…I don’t think so.” Jen tried to think back, but found that her mind was too frazzled to recall anything beyond a couple of minutes ago.

“Are you feeling okay?”

“Yes. I’m perfectly fine, and I didn’t fall asleep in class today.”

Principal Green studied her for a while longer. The silence hung in the air between the two of them. Jen’s mind worked overtime trying to understand what the principal could be implying. Does she know?, she wondered.

Principal Green finally spoke up. “Go home tonight, Ms. Weaver. I’ll see to it that your classroom gets locked up at the end of the night. See me tomorrow in my office before you start work.”

Jen, feeling defensive, started to raise her voice. “I don’t need to go home. I’m fine. I don’t know what those calls were about, but there’s nothing wrong with me or the way I’ve been conducting class.” She ran her fingers through her hair to calm herself down.

“You may or may not have fallen asleep in class today, but the other teachers and I have noticed that you exhibit some very bizarre behavior sometimes. You say you are well, but you do not look well, Ms. Weaver. I certainly can’t have you meeting with parents in the state you are in, especially considering the calls I have received. Please leave. We will discuss what has happened here tomorrow morning.” Principal Green stood up from the desk she was leaning on.

Jen sat in the too-small desk stunned before finally getting up. She walked over to her desk to retrieve her purse from the bottom drawer and exited the classroom without looking at the principal again. She was angry at having been thrown out of the classroom, but frightened at the same time that maybe her ugly habits had caught up with her. Everyone eventually came to a point where everything starts to go downhill. Was this the beginning of her descent? On the way to her car she spotted Billy, one of her favorite students, running toward her. She put on a smile despite the upsetting scene that had just occurred.

“Hi, Mrs. Weaverrrrr!” he bounced into a spot right in front of her.

“Hi Billy! What do you have there?”

“M&Ms,” Billy said in his usual booming voice. He was almost deaf in one ear, and turned the volume up on his own voice to compensate. He held out his hand to let Jen take a closer look. There were five M&Ms staining the palm of his hand blue.

“I see. What happened to yellow and red and brown and green?”

“Oscar has the whole bag. He doesn’t like the blue M&Ms so he gave them to me,” Billy explained with a sparkle in his eye.

“Well, one person’s blue M&M is another person’s treasure. Have fun, Billy.”

“Where are you going, Ms. Weaver?”

“I don’t feel too good, Billy. I’m going home. I’ll see you tomorrow in class though!”

“Okay. Bye, Mrs. Weaver!” Billy ran off to join other groups of people that were arriving for the night.

Jen walked the rest of the way to her car in a hurry. She didn’t want to keep explaining to people why she wouldn’t be in attendance tonight. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was in deep trouble. She could almost feel Principal Green’s penetrating look on her. She got in her car, and pressed her forehead against the top of the steering wheel. Jen took a few deep breaths there before starting her car and driving off. She hoped she had not just lied when she said she would be back.

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So…I haven’t updated in a while.  I’ve been meaning to.  I’m just awful at following through on some things.  I did something kind of neat while I was away though.  I teach a Driver License Study Session at the library I work at.  I developed the class from scratch.  It was designed to help people study for the written test to get the California driver license.  It became a huge success, and we average 40-50 people every week now.  Anyone in the library field knows these kinds of numbers are hard to come by, especially on a weekly basis.  Other city and county entities in the Southern California region have taken notice, and have been sending people to my library to observe how I conduct the class.  My boss asked me if I could do something in a written format to share with the recreation department and senior center.  I ended up writing a handbook for the class that includes: a basic class outline, a powerpoint presentation on signs, a bibliography, tests and answer keys, and more.  It took a lot of time, effort, blood, sweat, and tears, but I finally finished it this week.  My boss liked it so much, she took it up to the Library Director.  SHE liked it so much, she’s presenting it next week in front of the California Library Board of Directors.  Needless to say, I’m proud of it.  You might also say it’s my first published book.  We all start somewhere!

 Alright…so…more exercises.  This is about character development.  I’m supposed to jot down some things about characters, which will supposedly be a part of something else later.  Bear with me.

 Character 1:  A young boy, Anthony, who wants to escape the blandness and boredom that comes with an overnight stay in a hospital room.

Character 2:  A very strict nurse.  She comes across as harsh and domineering, but she has a way of taking blood samples in such a way that you hardly notice she has stuck the needle in your arm.

Back to Character 1:  Presents a fear-nothing attitude to the world, but cries before, during, and, for a few seconds, after he has to give a blood sample.

 This is going somewhere…promise.

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Sam wasn’t sure if it was a wonderful sign or a sign of disaster but Sam knew that it was the answer he’d been waiting for.  He’d been driving down the freeway in an autopilot state mulling over the pros and cons in his mind.  Ann wouldn’t wait forever.  She’s too smart for that.  She would realize soon that he was a dead end and move on to someone that would chase after her forever and ever.  And she deserved that.  When she asked him to come to Florida with her, the answer had seemed so easy.  Of course not.  Drop his career?  His friends?  The familiarity of a place he’d spent his whole life?  He let her go thinking she, like most other women, would hardly be missed after a couple of weeks of moping.  A couple of months later and he couldn’t help but think he’d made a mistake.  Every night they talked only confirmed it.  Driving down the freeway, Sam thought about Florida.  Sometimes good things involve a little risk.  Ann was perfect for him, and perfection has it’s price.  He looked up from his haze, scanning the road, when it appeared- a Nike billboard.  “Just do it.”  How could he argue?

This was a freewriting exercise.  The prompt is in bold.

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Drawing from things that have happened to me over the past week, I’m to write down 10 things that may serve as story ideas.  Then I need to pick out the idea that is the most promising, and write down a few ways in which it can turn into a story.  So…

1.  Going to a club and having a bad night.

2.  Went to see Bad Religion

3.  A crazy neighbor yelled at me.

4.  Took my husband to get tattooed.

5.  Taught my DMV class.

6.  Did Starlab for the first time.

7.   Fubaring.

8.  Downloaded music from a band that I turned out not caring for.

9.  Cleaned out my dirty car.  Kind of.

10.  Hung out with Billy.

I think the whole concept of a social networking site could make a great story.  For one, there’s no shortage to the characters that can be created and there’s no shortage of inspiration for those characters.  It’s a way to connect with people, but how meaningful are those connections?  How genuine?  It’s not exactly reality, but can reality be created from a place where people can edit themselves?  Who are you talking to and how annoying are they really?  What would come out of their mouths if they couldn’t backspace and delete?  This idea is total chick lit material which is not usually what I write, but it could still be good.

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Now that I have this blog, I sort of feel pressured to write something fantastic in it.  As a result, I just haven’t written.  Nothing will improve this way, so I made a deal with myself.  I’ll write every Sunday.  Maybe I’ll write more than once a week, but never less.  I think having some writing prompts handy will help me out, so I picked up the book Writing Fiction: The Practical Guide From New York’s Acclaimed Creative Writing School.  It’s a neat book.  It talks about the mechanics of writing a work of fiction, but every few pages it has a prompt where it asks that you apply some of the things you’ve just read.  So that’s what I’m working with for now unless I’m struck with a genius idea for a story.

 The first exercise asks that I choose a work of fiction that I adore, state why I loved reading this work, and list several ways with which I think the author achieved this effect.

Here’s the problem- I’m a memoir reader.  Memoirs, biography, non-fiction….that’s what I’m really into right now.  So I had to dig deep for a book that was appropriate for this exercise.  I’m going to go with J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  After having read the whole series, I was impressed with the way she tied all loose ends, her wordplay, her character development, and her ability to write in a way that is appealing to both children, teens, and adults. 

As for how she achieved all this, I have a few ideas:

1.  I would love to get my hands on this woman’s notebook.  Surely, there must be one and it must be a monster of a notebook, thick with details, character studies and perhaps things that never even made it into the book.  That’s what I imagine, anyways.

2.  I believe wordplay is an innate ability.  There is a lot one can do to improve language skills and language arts, but there are some things that just come naturally to some people more than others and there are some things that just can’t be taught.  Though I have above average language skills, I do have some limitations.  I’ll be trying to work on what I can, but I may never be as gifted as Miss Rowling or some other authors that I idolize.

3.  Her characters are extremely well developed.  They all have their own personalities.  There are certain things each character would do when presented with a certain situation.  She must love every single one of them.  By this seventh book, she’s been living with them in her head for years now.  I imagine she has spent a good deal of time just thinking about what a character would do and say and WHY. 

4.  In the end, what Rowling has created is a classic Campbellian hero story.  Can you really go wrong with this model?  I suppose you can.  I’m sure there is a way.  However, this model is one that catches the hearts of people of all ages and walks of life.  Odysseus to Luke Skywalker- don’t we love them all?  BUT…you wouldn’t see young children waiting in line for the next installment of The Odyssey.  So what happened here?  Again, I think it all comes back to language skills.  The language she uses is simple and readable but the storyline is complex enough for the mature reader to appreciate.  This, coupled with Rowling’s wonderful imagination is what makes Harry Potter special and I think he’ll stick around.

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I’ve been wanting one of these for a while.  Some awesome, blue-haired guy made it happen.  Now that I have a pet blog of my very own, I’m pretty excited.  I have blogs on other sites, and I write a lot of nonsense in them.  I’ll still be writing nonsense in this one, but with a sense of purpose.  I’ve been told that my writing is very good from those that have read my short stories.  I’d like to develop that skill, so I’ll be posting writing exercises and short stories with a splattering of anecdotes from the library that I work at.  Oh…and probably lots of Billy, because I can’t leave my little love child out of anything that I do.  He insists.

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