Author: sarastarkwrites

NOLA vs. NaNo

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Yes, I’m sitting in my room in the Vieux Carré [that’s the French Quarter of New Orleans, for those of you who are uninitiated]. And I’m writing. Yes, I am. I got up a bit earlier than usual, which wasn’t an easy feat considering I spend last night amongst the partiers on Bourbon Street.

IMG_1134So far I have written 1100+ words, pretty good words, not just words where my character wanders around for several pages doing nothing of interest. Personally, I consider this writing to be exceptional considering I have a headache of Herculean proportions — after a Mango frozen something and several Hurricanes, my last drink was a Hand Grenade, and right now, it feels a bit like one went off in my cranium.

Of course my opinion of the quality of what I wrote for NaNo and for this post is subject to change tomorrow or next week. But for now, I think I’ll go watch the Georgia/Florida game and have a Hurricane, or three, with lunch. Go Dawgs!!

Today at BlackBeary Condo – If you’d just learn to…

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There’s a mystery that BlackBeary can’t solve, an absolute horror she can’t wrap her mind around. And no matter how hard she tries, no matter how brilliant she is, she has yet to decipher exactly why it happens so often. Or even once, for that matter.

Every morning her human pulls herself from bed and staggers into the cold-hard room that’s attached to the bedroom. Her human then strips off her night-clothes, pulls back a double curtain, fiddles with a silver knob on the wall, waits a few minutes, and then… and then BlackBeary’s world tips on its side and the absurd becomes real.

Her human steps into a spray of water. Yes. OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAWater. She willingly steps into a spray of water.

But the real craziness is that her human apparently doesn’t mind. She seems to enjoy it, and it baffles BlackBeary that anyone or anything would voluntarily step into water when they don’t have to.

BlackBeary shivers remembering the times, few though they were, when her human bathed her the stupid human way. Her human would say all the nice words, coaxing BlackBeary with sweet sounds and sometimes with treats, lulling her into a false sense of security. And then wham, before BlackBeary had fully realized what was happening, her human had picked her up and headed for a sink full of water. Despite using all her strength, despite spreading her arms and legs as far as they could reach, despite holding onto the edges of the sink, despite screaming as loud as catly possible, eventually BlackBeary’s muscles tired and she ended up in the warm, soapy water.

During those moments, if she could have, BlackBeary would have killed her human. Because the only thing worse than being shoved into a sink full of warm water is coming out soaking wet, all cold and defeated. And then… and then being towel dried. Like that helps. Like a warm towel is a panacea for all the awfulness that had just occurred.

But even with those foul memories surfacing at the sight of her human standing under the spray of water, often times BlackBeary will peek around the back of the curtains hanging in the cold-hard room, will meow out a warning to her human. Because deep down she loves her human. After all, who else gives her Fancy Feast twice a day? After all, there are far more evil people in this world. That Kathleen is a perfect example.

When the love for her human outweighs her disgust at what her human is doing, BlackBeary’ll shove her face around the curtains, and giving her human the sad kitty eyes, she will say, There’s no need to do that. If you’d just learn to lick yourself… Come out of there. It’s just crazy.

Exorcising My Demons: A Little Dog

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There are moments that make us who we are, that stay with us for a lifetime, constantly prodding us to remember, making sure we never act the same way again. More and more, these moments show up in my writing, hidden in some anecdote or as character back-story. I hope that by writing this, it will exorcise a demon I’ve carried for a long time.

This particular moments involves a little dog, a no-account stray that wandered onto our farm one day when I was twelve or so. I don’t even remember much about what it physically looked like except that it was scrawny from near-starvation and had a coat of unmemorable blah-brown. It wasn’t a big dog, certainly not one that could defend your property, and had probably been thrown out a car window because the owner had no use for it anymore. That happens a lot, and not just out in the country. It saddens me that animals are disposable. Don’t want to pay the vet bill because it’s eaten one too many socks, just let it die. New boyfriend doesn’t like cats, just get rid of it. I am particularly susceptible to those actions because of that little dog.

Like all dogs, it just wanted to be loved.

Instead, what happened was it got chained up, and I was told, or more likely I volunteered, to take care of it.  For our previous dog, my father had built a beautiful dog house, a smaller version of our own house, right down to the shingles and the color of the paint. And at the time, I thought nothing of the little dog being chained up. It’s what everyone did. It was a dog’s life.

It could have been a great life, but it wasn’t.

After the first couple of weeks the newness wore off and my own personal drama took over. Two nights in a row I fell asleep angry, wishing that dog had never shown up in our yard. The damn dog whined all night, pulling on its chain right outside my bedroom window. It was only on the third night, when the dog sounded so pitiful I thought I might cry that I pulled away from my own self-pity and actually felt some compassion. For something else. What if it was afraid? What if it was lonely? I knew those feelings. My heart, the part of me that I was never able to protect well enough, opened to the little dog. That’s when I realized that I hadn’t fed it or given it water for at least two days. And because it was chained up, it couldn’t even try to help itself, couldn’t run away and find food. Or water.

I had been so wrapped up in my own problems, so self-involved, that I neglected and almost killed a sad little dog. An animal that depended on me for its life.

Yes, I ran out, in the middle of the night and filled both bowls. And yes the dog lived. But the sound of the little dog whining haunts me, keeps me from falling asleep at night. Over forty years later, I can still hear it, hear the pain in its voice.

Some people would grant me absolution, would make excuses. You were just a kid. You had a sucky life. You were living the dog’s life. But the one excuse that I abhor is It was just a dog.

It wasn’t just a dog. It was a living creature. And I hurt it. Though my own dark ego, I caused it pain.

You may be thinking that to write this I’m still that self-involved person. And you would be right. For reasons I haven’t yet allowed myself to put to paper, for reasons I still don’t fully understand, I live in my head. But I’ve learned where the line is, where self-interest becomes destructive. To myself and those creatures around me.

Obsession – Not by Calvin Klein

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To obsess, that is my life.

Nothing in my life ever happens without lots of thought invested. Thought before, like “what if?” and thought after, like “what the fuck?” or “why?”

This state of mind is paralyzing to say the very least. And it has molded my life. Oh yes, it has.

Contrary to popular opinion by the medical community, I must read myself to sleep because if I turn the light off before I reach the point where I can no longer keep my eyes open another moment, I will lay and stew in all the bad mistakes I’ve made, reliving each one of them in vivid Technicolor. Or if something is pending, even something little and of no account, I’ll ponder what the thousand potential outcomes are.  And if somehow, for whatever reason, even though I am dropping the book –actually now it would be my Kindle–onto my face from exhaustion, if I turn that light off a second too soon, then my mind starts spinning out horrific situations in which I am the starring character.

But this obsessive behavior doesn’t just disturb my sleep patterns, it affects my every move. Should I have let the old lady go ahead of me? Should I just ignore the asshole drivers on the road? Should I change jobs? Does my manager want me to change jobs? Did I do the right thing? What could I have done better? Why did I act the way I did?

Should I have written this post? Do I want to expose myself to the world like this? Will others find me disturbing or pathetic? Or sad? Or boring? Will they think me a self-involved asshole/moron/waste-of-space?

This post was mentally spawned by Today’s Daily Post, Verbal Confirmation: To be, to have, to think, to move — which of these verbs is the one you feel most connected to? Or is there another verb that characterizes you better?

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/verbal-confirmation/

Today at BlackBeary Condo – No Such Thing as Excess

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It’s early, early morning, and BlackBeary is hungry, but her human won’t wake up, not even after a lot of nudging and singing. In her head, BlackBeary hears the opening lines from her version of the Golden Earring song, Twilight Zone:

Somewhere in a condo’s dark hallway,
There’s a cat starting to realize
That eternal fate has turn its back on her

It’s two A.M.

“It’s two A.M. and the food is gone,” BlackBeary sings. “I’m sitting here waitin’ the plate’s still warm. Maybe my human’s is tired of takin’ orders. Rawr, there’s a hunger on the loose, a growlin’ in my core.”

She purrs the words, the middle lines she can never remember, and then continues…

“Mrroww, I’m sneaking into the twilight zone. Should be a cat house, but doesn’t feel like home. My food’s disappeared, nowhere under moon and star. So what am I to do now that I’ve pushed too hard?”

Weak from the lack of Fancy Feast, BlackBeary curls up behind the stinky-new-smelling sofa, and ponders whether Edna Ferber was right. Perhaps too much of everything is as bad as too little.

The silliness, the absurdity of having too much cat food clears her hunger haze for a moment, and her sanity returns. No, she thinks. She’s a cat. Excess is good. Especially an excess of Fancy Feast.

She pulls herself up, her hungry muscles screaming, and saunters down the dark hallway. It’s two A.M., time to wake up her human.

BlackBeary sings, “The human’ll come to know. When the claws hit her nose. Merrrrow, merrow, when the claws hit her nose.”

PingBack: http://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/no-excess/

Asbe & Uvi – The Story Begins

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This is the first little bit of a sub-story that I’m writing as part of my Work-in-Progress. There’s much more. In fact I’m working on it today, much further into this story line, but I thought I’d share some of it with you.  It’s still in the first draft phase.  I’d love to hear your thoughts on it.

§

Asbe pretends to be asleep as Uvi creeps toward her. Father won’t let them sleep in the same bed, says it’s not right. So, as soon as Uvi wakes, he sneaks into bed with her. Every day he tries to trick her. He tries so hard to be quiet, wanting to scare her or maybe surprise her, but he has all the grace of a baby bear.

With her eyes closed, she pictures him getting nearer, can hear each tip-toed step across their bedroom’s rugs, first his football rug and then her Winnie the Pooh rug. She can hear his soft intake of breath as his excitement builds, feels him climb up onto her bed. She pretends to roll over in her sleep facing him so that he doesn’t have to crawl over her. Last time, scrambling over her, his knee went into her belly making her nearly pee on herself.

She waits until he’s poised, kneeling on the bed beside her, waits until she feels his warm breath on her face. He has done this a thousand times, yet he is still surprised when she opens her eyes and whispers in their secret language, “<Caught you.>”

Uvi falls down on the bed beside her and laughs. She loves the sound of his laughter. So she reaches her hands out and tickles him until they are both wiggling and giggling, quietly.

After tickling is over, they snuggle together, Uvi wrapping his arms around her, both relishing the moment. Once Father is aware they’re awake, they will have to be separate. It feels unnatural to be separate, but even at age five they know to obey Father.

“<How old are we today?>” Uvi says.

Asbe holds up her hand showing five fingers. “<This many.>”

“<Nu-uh.>”

She hugs him close. “<Hu-huh, our birthday.>”

“<What we do today?>”

“<Don’t know.>”

Uvi pushes her away and clambers his way to his knees, sensing the air like a dog. “<I smell pancakes.>”

“<I hope they’re blueberry.>”

“<Me too. Birthday pancakes.>” Falling back onto the bed facing her, he laughs as if it’s the funniest joke he’s ever heard and then slaps his hand over his mouth.

Asbe puts a finger to his lips, reminding him to be quiet.

He nods.

She tugs the blanket over him. “<Maybe the park?>”

He smiles, his eyes closing. “<Maybe a party.>”

She pulls him closer, breathing in the scent of sleep sweat on his jammies and the Johnson’s Baby Shampoo that Mommy uses on both of them, and allows her eyes to close as well, allows herself to feel how natural it is to have Uvi beside her. Just for a couple of minutes.

Milestone: 1K Visits

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Yay!!!  My first real post was published on June 1st of this year.  And in that three and a half months, I’ve now had 1000 visits to my page.

For some of you, that may not sound like a lot, but I’m building a presence and only posting about me and my writing. Plus, I suck at marketing myself, or anything. So it’s spectacular that I’ve had 1000 visits already.

Thank you all for visiting!!

Today at BlackBeary Condo – Not the Medicine

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IMG_20140918_192757.xIt’s that time of night again when BlackBeary’s human stands at the kitchen sink, her old, under-exercised body jiggling vigorously as she shakes the ugly brown bottle. Of medicine. If she’s feeling kind, BlackBeary admits that at least her human doesn’t try to be sneaky, doesn’t try to trick her about it. But that’s where her human is not so smart.

As soon as her human starts brandishing the bottle, BlackBeary leaps from wherever she happens to be so beautifully perched and runs toward the safety of the under-mattress. But halfway down the hall, she stops, turns, and waits to make sure her human is watching. Unable to resist taunting her human, BlackBeary gives her the scary eyes, and says, “You’ll never take me alive, bitch.” For a long moment, she holds her pose of defiance and then sprints into the bedroom and under the bed.

Obviously knowing she’s been bested, BlackBeary imagines her human slinking back to the stinky-new-smelling chair and reading until it’s time for bed.

But by the time her human’s ready for bed, BlackBeary has napped and has long since forgotten about the nasty little syringe of liquid medicine.

So, feeling in need of a good chin scratch, BlackBeary leaps up onto the bed and settles down just within arm’s reach of her human. She doesn’t like to make it too easy for her human, even when it means getting petted. She doesn’t want her human to think that BlackBeary needs her or wants to be around her. It’s just convenient to allow her human to pet her on the bed.

And just as BlackBeary is drifting off toward her seventeenth nap of the day, her human grabs her by the scruff of the neck.

“Not the medicine,” BlackBeary says, struggling to get away. “Please. Not the medicine.” She gives her human the sad round eyes, but it apparently isn’t effective enough.

“I don’t like this any more than you do.”

“Not the medicine, Momma.”

Despite her pleas, her human grabs the syringe and quickly squishes the nasty concoction into BlackBeary’s mouth.

The awful junk coats the inside of BlackBeary’s mouth making her want to gag. “Blakkkkkk.” And she does gag, drooling all over the quilt. That’ll teach her human to squish vile stuff into her mouth. “Ick. Ick. Ick.”

“I’m sorry, baby,” her human says. “I know you don’t like it.”

Her human takes BlackBeary into her arms and gives her a loving scratch behind the ears and a kiss on the head as if that will grant forgiveness.  She then gently sets BlackBeary on the bed and for a good long time, scratches her all over, knowing all the right spots. Especially the belly spots.

For the night, all is forgiven. But as BlackBeary once again drifts toward that seventeenth nap of the day, she sighs. “Sneaky bitch.”

Why Raven Doesn’t Sing

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OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIn the Land of Before, Raven had a twin Brother. Besides being extremely intelligent and full of trickery, besides having an innate love of games, each brother had specific talents. Raven’s gifts were his guile and beauty, while his Brother was known for his voice and charm. The Humans said that Raven’s beauty could call forth the Sun on a cloudy day and his Brother’s voice could make the Sky weep with joy.

Raven would spend his days preening, admiring himself in the tidal pools while his Brother would fly over the Earth serenading the Humans. And even though everyone recognized Raven’s magnificent features, were beguiled by his handsomeness,  they loved Raven’s twin for his generous spirit.

One day Old Man happened to be wandering by the tidal pools and noticed Raven gazing at his reflection.  “Hello Raven,” Old Man said. “I see you’re spending your time wisely.”

“Just look at how exquisite I am Old Man,” Raven said. “Who could resist gazing on a visage as pleasing as this? I certainly can not.”

“If only you could sing as divinely as your Brother,” Old Man said. “Then the Humans would adore you too.”

Raven hopped on a rock, cocked his head at the Old Man and said, “What’s this? You think the Humans love my Brother more?”

“Most definitely,” the Old Man said.

It was then, at that very moment, that Raven decided he must steal the love of the Humans away from his Brother. Raven didn’t care about being useful. He only wanted to be treasured, cherished. More than his Brother.

The next day Raven was walking through the Forest when he came upon his Brother, accidentally on purpose. “Hello Brother of mine,” Raven said, but he threw his voice so that it sounded as if he had a bad cold.

“What’s wrong, Raven,” his Brother asked. “You don’t sound so good.”

“I’ve got a tickle in my throat,” Raven said.

“Is this a trick, Raven? You are the only one who loves pranks more than I do.”

“No joke, Brother. My voice has been bothering me for some few days now. Could you take a look?”

Raven’s twin Brother hovered nearby, still wary of some shenanigans in the making.

Raven made himself cough, patted himself on his chest and then opened his mouth. “Take a peek.” He motioned for his Brother to gaze deep inside.

“I don’t see anything.”

“Look closer,” Raven said, opening his mouth wider while pounding his chest with his fist.

Now concerned for Raven’s health, his Brother came even nearer. Near enough that Raven was able to swallow him.

“Now I’ll–” Raven croaked out. He patted his chest for real this time. “Now I’ll have my brother’s voice–” The words came out rough, almost like a real cough. “That and my pleasing appearance. All the Humans will love me.” Exhausted, he sat on a rock and gazed out at the Puget Sound. “I just need to become accustomed—Caw, Caw–accustomed to wielding such a powerful  voice. Caw. It’ll just take a bit of getting used to. Caw.”

But try as he might, not only could he not sing, he couldn’t even talk easily any more. He cawed out every word, as if there were feathers continually tickling his throat.

The next day, Old Man came out to the tidal pools. “Where’s your Brother been, Raven?”

“Caw—Caw—“

“That sounds pretty bad. I can’t really understand you.”

“Caw—Caw—” Raven struggled to sound out the words. But they wouldn’t coalesce in his throat.

“Sound like you’ve got a Brother, umm sounds like you’ve got a Frog in your throat.” The Old Man laughed. “But I guess we’ll never know.” Before he turned to walk away, he said, “I just wanted you to know that the Humans have erected a tribute to your missing Brother, a Mountain pass. Not only will it be useful to the Humans, as your Brother was,  it will also, when the Wind whistles down the tunnel, remind them of your Brother’s lovely voice.”

“Caw—“

“What’s that you say? They still adore him? Why yes they do. Even more.”

“Caw—Caw—Caw—Caw—“

~ o ~

*NOTE: this fable is my own creation, but is referential in style and story to the many Native American Raven stories that I’ve read. It will be used, at least in part, in my Work in Progress.