One Story, One Day: Trenches

Eyes gaze at me longingly from between the wooden panels of the attics northern wall. I ignore them and continue folding the laundry. It's eyes follow my hands as I stack towels inside a worn brown basket on top of the washing machine. I've lived here alone since my parents died last year and I inherited my childhood home. The eyes, I think, are only a recent occurrence. The truth is, they could have been here the whole time, I just didn't notice them until recently. My head wants to say that it's only a creative response to living alone, but It feels different.

As I descend the stairs the thing moves along the wall, getting a better view. Before I take the last step I stare right back at it. Two empty points seemingly floating in the blackness. I'm not afraid, my parents are dead, and I'm not afraid. A low growl bites the warm, wet air in front of me. I sneer right back. Whatever you are, I'm not afraid.

When I sleep the creature worms it's way into my dreams, but it can't hurt me. It's not like Freddy Kruger, for all I know it's just afraid and fighting to be heard. Maybe I'm doing the same thing. Tonight I'm suspended in the air by some invisible force around my legs. Below me is the ocean stretching out for eternity in every direction. Out of the water a pale, dead face, the size of a whale, erupts from the waves to swallow me. Right before it's cracked lips close I recognize the face as my father. When I wake up, I calmly go downstairs to the kitchen and make a cup of coffee. I guess you could say that it's all becoming routine.

I take sips of the warm, caramel liquid and let it warm my throat. Somethings not right, the flavor is a little off. When I look inside the cup, the light brown color of the creamer is being swallowed up by a dark circle. When I put my finger into the cup, it's cold as ice. My finger is covered in a thick layer of blood; something is breathing into my ear. In the reflection of my chrome mug I see a distorted face covered in scars, but I'm not afraid.

So the bad news is that Tor didn't accept my short story, but it didn't hurt as much as I thought it would. I've read that the life of a writer is filled with disappointment, I'm just now finding it out first hand. Hopefully, with a little research, some of the ideas that I'm posting on this blog will become something in time. The above piece is part of a series that I keep coming back to about dark things in dark places. Shadows in the dark. It's funny because I don't believe in ghosts, which makes it even more terrifying for me to imagine something skulking around in places where I assume nothing exists.

One Story, One Day: Bandages

Feb, 21st 2005
Today I fell down and scratched my knee playing at the junk yard. It doesn't hurt bad, it only bled for a minute. The scab will be awesome. My aunt grounded me for about a month, totally worth it. I finally got to kiss a girl!

Feb, 28th 2005
It's been about a week since I messed up my knee, it still hurts and bleeds sometimes. My aunt says I don't need anything on it. It'll be okay my aunt is always right.

March, 3rd 2005
While I was playing at school today I passed out at the playground. When I woke up I was back at home in bed. My aunt says it was just hot and that I shouldn't play so rough. The scratch on my knee is red and itches a lot. She says it looks better, I don't need a band-aid.

March, 4th 2005 (Final Entry)
Today I stayd home from school because i fell sik. It hard to even write anthing down. Maybe I feel better tomorow. Still no band aid.

One Story, One Day: Earth is Dead

I had a story to write about today, but it seems that it has flown before I had the chance to tag it. I'm hoping that in writing this I'll figure it out. It either had to do with regret, or loss, and was possibly a science fiction story. It may have been about twins as well, or one guy with a split personality that gives him the appearance of having a twin. That would be interesting, but I'm not sure how it would play out. More in a minute, after I put the kid to bed and try out some of these new chips! I'm a fucking pig, I know.

So I just found out that possibly the greatest learning program for kids is coming back! To be honest, I hadn't actually seen the program since elementary school, but at that age it was one of the coolest shows in town. Of course I'm talking about Reading Rainbow, hosted by that lovable visor wearing host from Star Trek: TNG. My two favorite things in elementary school were reading and Star Trek, so I made sure to watch it every chance that I could get.

It turns out that the program was canceled in 2009 but since it's cancellation the host has been working his butt off trying to find a way to get it back into the hands of kids. His answer: make it mobile. Listen, kids are just as addicted to technology as their tablet gobbling parents. The problem is that, while "some" parents are actually using them for "smart" things, kids are more interested in watching YouTube and playing inane match three games than doing anything educational. It seems that the Reading Rainbow crew has realized this and created a program that provides all the same information that was available through the television program but have added a touch of interactivity to keeps the kids interested. The result is something that I cant wait to find a way to kids into the hands of my own kids when it is "hopefully" released for Android in the future. At the moment, it's an IOS only release.

Okay, story idea for the day. A colony consisting of engineers, scientists, psychologists, a handful of average people, and their families, wake up on the moon on Christmas morning. Artificial snow is pumped into their individual home bubbles in order to simulate the experience of being back home.  A mother has woken up at around 5 in the morning, lunar standard, to put the finishing touches on Christmas Morning. She steps outside and takes a look at the other bubbles in her block, taking in the ambiance, the lights that are being projected onto the surface of each bubble.

She looks up as earth, massive and majestic, quietly passes by. She thinks about the last time she woke up and felt real snow between her freezing toes. She was about 15 when her parents were assigned to be part of the first "family" to live on other world. Tears were shed over losing friends yada yada yada, her kids have never heard the familiar crunch of real snow. All they have is fluff. She thinks about the idea that they'll be able to return next year when she notices something off about Earth. All the lights are off, and then the entire planet seems to catch fire.

Earth is Dead.

One Story, One Day: Bodysnatcher

     Okay so I'm cheating a little bit with this one. I didn't have as much time to work on this story as I would have liked and I wanted to make sure to get this one in before at least one o'clock in the morning. So this isn't as much a story as it is an idea. An Idea that there is a group of people, or psychics, that can watch you from inside your own head, and even control you if need be. These people work for a special division of the police force in which criminals are tracked, and sometimes taken control of. And of course, for every positive their is a negative, their are spirits or evil forces that have gained the ability to take control of people and corrupt them. Anyway, this is a crappy little piece that I wrote for a possible story in the future called Bodysnatcher. 

The eyes in the rear view mirror looked back at me. His head shook uncontrollably as he scrambled to find something in his car as he sped down the empty highway. Hold it here, it's not time yet. Give it away, give it away, give it away now. I can feel his consciousness trying to beat me out and press me into a corner. A phone rings and he presses it to his ear. I can't hear the person on the other end, but I can hear him. 

"Yes. Yes I know, you don't have to tell me that!" he says. "I'll meet you at you're place." Got it. I shove the entirety of my consciousnesses in on him. No soul defense, I am able to completely control his body while his mind is trapped in a cage. I call the detectives office and tell the director that this body has been tagged and ready for spirit tracking. When I leave, I leave behind a small part of myself to jump back in whenever the time comes. 

When the man gets to the meeting I enter the body again and watch. A young girl, no older than thirteen or fourteen, is caged in a corner of the room. Taking control back of his body, I pull a pistol from the mans waistband and aim it at his partner. Before he can pull his piece he's down and I'm freeing the girl from the girl and bringing her outside where a police cruiser is waiting, suspended just above the air. 

"Who are you?" she asks. 

"You'll never know." I burn out the mans neural network and he collapses on the pavement. 

One Story - One Day: Abortion

Disclaimer: This was written in the time span of less than a day in order to describe feelings related to the events that proceeded. Prepare for grammar and logical errors that would otherwise be non-existent in a fully put together piece of work.

Flash Fiction - Abortion

        She could feel them, seeds of who they might be, as they made home her solid frame. She could feel them as they rearranged her from the inside until she met their needs. They would feed and grow until, she knew, they would leave as they always do. But for some reason this time, something was different.
She couldn't see them, could understand exactly what was happening. They had been with her for years when a pain, like the ripping of a saw, cut deep into her abdomen. Something was wrong, but who could help? All she could do was wait.
Then as sudden as a burst of wind swarming with razer blades, the faceless came. They tore open her womb and with no regard to her structure or health, ripped one of them away. Her dress was torn to shreds, eyes bloodshot, and her womb emptier than it was before. As she laid down to sleep she whispered to herself
"It needed a cure, not a knife, it needed love, not a knife, it needed compassion, not a knife." The silent sound of air whisped through the vacuum of a gutted door.

One Story - One Day

Sorry in advance for the terrible grammar, I wrote this in a hurry.

This blog is about to take a whole different turn than what I had originally intended. You see, my brother was recently arrested for something that completely blew the tops off of all of our heads. He's always been a good, if silent, brother and lives with me. The charges are so outrageous that they could lead to him being in jail for a year or more. Needless to say, but I'm going to say it anyway, our entire family is devastated. My mother is often historical, he's the first person on our side of the family to be arrested and the last person that we expected it to happen to.

Anyway, my brother isn't a bad guy. Far from it, he just has a few personality quirks that keep some people from enjoying him more than others. What he got arrested for didn't harm anyone, I'm not sure why he did it, but I've always felt that he might be a little unstable in an "I need someone to talk to" kind of way. In prison he most likely won't get that, but I've got to get him something. With your help I'll hopefully be able to send him a little more money because target money doesn't really give me any extra to send. My mother works for nearly the same wage that I do as well.

This blog is going to become a fundraiser to make sure that my brother has all the things that he needs while in prison; Hygiene Materials, the junk food he loves, and time on his phone card to make sure that he can talk to us almost every day. The most important thing that you can do for a loved one while he is away is keep in contact. They have to know that there are people out there that care. So if you are reading this and you know my little brother, go and see him, I'm sure he will appreciate it. Visitations are every day except Sunday, twice a week, for 15 minutes at a time.

I'm sure if many of you look up his name on the internet and find out what he did, you might feel strange that I am going to such lengths to make sure that he is okay. He's never been a violent person, never committed a violent act, and he would never go out of his way to make someone else's life harder than it has to be. What he performed was an act of having seen something that he shouldn't have. Have you ever seen a shock site? Two girls one cup ring any bells? How many of you saw that and immediately thought "Dude this is messed up" then set out to see if there was anything else just as bad? There was no perversion present, possibly just a disturbed mind that needs help. Maybe he could get help in prison, but this isn't about that. This is about affording him the things that will keep him going while he is there.

Now to the mission. Every day that my brother is in jail I'm going to spend a portion of the day putting together a story that I will post to this blog. If you read the story, I only ask that you donate at the very least a dollar to my brothers health and well being. We all know that the backwards prison system won't lift a finger to do it. Not every story is going to be a winner, but I'll do my best to keep you entertained for the time that you spend reading them. At the bottom of the page will be a link to an account where I will be taking these donations. Once I reach a certain amount of money I will take it out and give it to the prison. This will ensure that things aren't as bad as they could be and that he always has a link to the world outside.

Thank you for your time, please comment with anything that might help my family through this troubling time.

The Oldfolks Home

I'm one of those people that doesn't like finishing things, but I love starting them. Over the course of the past four or five years I've began at least six or seven different blog projects with the aim of discussing different topics of interest within the Gaming and Music communities. Every time I give up within the first few weeks when I get too lazy to post anything and I said "fuck it who wants to read my shit anyway" like some miserable chump. I was sincerely about to do that with this blog when a voice popped in my head that said "Stick it out you fucker, it'll make you a better writer, what would you grandfather say?"

My grandfather was one of the most important figures in my life, even though I can't say I completely remember our time together. He passed away while I was rather young and I didn't appreciate the time that we had. The things I do remember are the puppies, the movies, and flying a kite out of the back window of his pickup truck.

Sometime between the ages of six and twelve I remember stumbling around and enjoying the salient traquility of my grandfathers backyard. I would often watch him grow vegetables that I would never taste, because I was a picky asshole; raise chickens that would lay eggs that for the longest time I wouldn't eat, because I was a picky asshole; and see him skin rabbits that I wouldn't eat, because I thought that was the grossest thing in the world.

One day he decided to produce a mysterious box from some unknown place that I still haven't asked my parents about. Who knows, this entire event may be a figment of my imagination. He overturned the box and out poured a flood of puppies that proceeded to trample me and my twin brother and lick us until we were both screaming so loud that I swear my parents thought they were goring us. I would never enjoy the presence of a dog again until I was much older. I don't know exactly what they did, but when I was a child I was afraid of everything. I know, however, that my grampa was just trying to make me smile, despite my parents objections that this exact scenario would probably play out.

The thing about grandparents is that they get to love you without having to control you. They are there to furnish your imagination while your parents are there to make sure you get up for school the next day. The day he let me flourish a kite by letting it fly from the rear window of his pick up truck, I knew that I could do anything. It might sound strange to an adult, but as a child, it was the coolest thing in the world to me. I'm not sure he would be proud of where I'm at today, but as I get older I am continuing to make amends for the stupid mistakes that I made as a younger, less engaged adult.

Cancer took him later, and sadly, a lot of my clearest memories are of him struggling to survive despite lacking the finances for the best treatments possible. The last words that I remember him saying to me were "When I get better, we're gonna go fishing" with a smile that still breaks my heart to think about. I don't believe in god, but I hope he's somewhere safe and special.

I'm working on my creativity, trying to write like I always promised myself I would, I'm educating myself a little bit everyday through school and serious reading, I want him to be proud of me. This blog is dedicated to my grandfathers memory. I may not be a great writer now, I may never be the greatest writer in the world, but I'm going to try; for him. How about you readers? How are you doing making your grandparents or that special someone proud?  Any stories that you'd like to share? Leave them in the comments below.

Later, the origin of the blogs name :)

Little Light of Love

I’m not a politician and don’t pretend that I know more about the political arena than the next average joe. From my own soapbox however, logic seems to have little to do with it. Obscene amounts of money are thrown around by various political affiliates in an effort to get you to believe exactly what they believe so that they don’t have to believe what you do. So what I’m about to tell you isn't coming from a political perspective, but one of absolute logic without respect to religion or the political arena.

While listening to someone close to me talk about her day, at one point she stopped to mention the fact that some people close to her had expressed their disgust regarding same-sex relationships. This prompted me to look up some of the latest studies regarding same-sex relationships, particular ones where children are involved. The ability of anyone to take care of and love a child in need is something that I have always believed in, and this is what I learned.

On February 13th, 2013 the American Sociological Association submitted an Amicus Brief, which is a document that is submitted to a court by an individual or group not directly involved in the case, which served two different goals. One was to rebuke known inaccurate research and assertions from a study conducted by Mark Regnerus, and the other was to present and review sound researched backed by well over 100 other social scientists in the field.

Some of the bullet points of the overall brief:

• “...Positive child well being is the product of stability in the relationship between the two parents, stability in the relationship between the parents and child, and greater parental socioeconomic resources.”
• “Some of the studies cited by BLAG and the Proposition 8 Proponents show that stability improves child outcomes, they confirm that marriage rights for same-sex couples and the federal recognition of such marriages are likely to improve the well-being of children of same-sex parents by providing enhanced family stability.”
• Social science research confirms that the academic performance of children raised by same-sex parents is indistinguishable from that of children raised by opposite-sex parents.

Every bit of information in the brief is based upon research that was conducted from several different respected studies, one of which is the NLLFS, or the National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study. Beginning in 1986, this study followed about 80 same-sex lesbian families as their children are raised from birth to adulthood. After the child has reached adulthood they compiled the day and found something interesting.

The children that had grown up with and around lesbian parents were just as capable, sometimes more so, than those raised in a primarily heterosexual household. This information is essentially compounded when you look at another study by the Australian Study of Child Health in Same-Sex Families. Their interim report of around 500 families, the largest study of it’s kind, found that “children of same-sex couples scored higher than the national average for overall health and family cohesion...”

The Only downside that could possibly be found is that, depending on the community that these couples live in, is the discrimination from said community. To be honest however, once enough same-sex couples have children, it’ll become the norm and what outrage there is will be a thing of the past. I hope that whomever looks over the studies and information that I have pointed out will see that the benefits of allowing same-sex couples to have children far outweighs the potential downfalls, of which there are none.

Old Friends, New Friends, Dead Friends, Bed Friends

if there’s one event that I dread attending more than any other, it’s the good ol’ high school reunion. I just ‘know’ that I’m one of those guys, the one that told everyone he was going to by such and such time I was going to be so amazing and great, only to have done exactly fuck since high school. I spent about a year in a band that didn’t go anywhere because we were all too busy enjoying the music we heard instead of creating the music that we ‘were’. I know, it’s a damned cheese fest, but it’s mine.

Enough with the rambling. So, I was going through my normal routine at work, cleaning up the store in preparation for whoever was coming tomorrow. As I was rounding an aisle, about to start straightening up an endcap that some asshole decided he could destroy, a customer came around at the same time and nearly ran into me with her shopping car. I grinned like I was trained to and bared my crooked teeth and she did the same. As I was giving her the company slogan of; “Can I help you find your stuff?” I remember her.

You know those girls in high school that nerds like us (I’m assuming you are) can’t seem to get close to without completely losing our balls? Yeah well, she wasn't quite there but she was in a clique that was friends with someone from that clique. Anyway, before she could walk off, I continued to grin like an idiot, mostly because I was filled with a mixture of two different emotions; excitement and dread.

“Oh my god” she said, “How are you?” It’s weird, if I was asked that question by anyone else, I’d say great. I have two wonderful future step-children, a family that loves me, and best of all; I’m alive. The difference is that, this is a person that I haven’t spoke to in about ten years. Even when we were in high school I think we may have said a handful of words to each other. I had to come up with something that I had done since then to make me sound like a semi-regular human being. Hmm....Blank.

Literally every moment of my life flashed before my eyes like a man caught on a ledge with no way out. Strangely, when I was in high school I would have lied my way out to make myself sound better than I actually was.

“I’m here....” I said, arms indicating my humble retail store surroundings. Bless her I thought, she just smiled and shrugged her shoulders without making any signals that my career was probably a hell of a lot worse than hers at this point. Reciprocating the question, I asked “What have you been up to since high school?”

“I teach children now.” she said.

“That is just awesome” I say, fully drowning myself in the knowledge that I am a failure in my professional life. I didn’t matter that I was finally trying to get one of my short stories published and, to that effect, actually finishing stories, because I haven’t done it yet, I feel like total shit. We say goodbye and she goes on to leave the headache inducing fluorescent lighting behind her while I continue fixing up that shitty end cap that some shitty customer decided to leave looking like shit.

For the rest of my shift I continued to think about friends and just people that I were friends with in highschool. Would I still be friends with them today? Or would we have changed so much that being friends would be impossible? I know that I’ve done worse than a lot of my peers, but have I done any better? I know that at least one of those bits of that conversation is going to make it into a story a one point or another.

How about that? Ever see anyone that you couldn’t stand in high school that you know you could talk to now with ease? Any friends that are now enemies? Leave me a comment below. Until next time star gazers.

Welcome To The Armada

When I purchased the latest Humble Ebook Bundle, I did it with the intention of grabbing a few titles that I’ve wanted to read but didn’t have the money to pick them all up individually. Being a poor, broke retail employee isn’t everything that they make it look like in the movies; it’s actually worse.

So I’m sitting at my desk, which is actually a bed, and pick one of the books at random to read a few pages and decide on what to read ‘after’ I finish up Anna Karenina. Because I want to look like a smarty pants asshole and finish up some classics that no one else in my small circle of friends have ever touched. My eyes settle on a book that was, to best honest, my last choice.

On the surface, Just a Geek is the perfect book for me. It’s essentially a collection of blog posts that form a narrative from the blog of former Star Trek actor now writer and sometimes comic Wil Wheaton. Personally, he’s always been one of those people that come across as genuinely funny and relatable.  However, I was hesitant because I was afraid that this would be one long book about Star Trek and after finishing the excellent John Skalzi novel Red Shirts, I wanted something more real.

Little did I know that many hours later I would forget about Anna and her scandalous escapades and find myself completely stuck in the completely heartfelt and amusing thoughts of a man that I now admire with a depth that can only be felt by truly connecting one nerd to another.

My life has been anything but perfect, I’ve made some terrible decisions and an equal amount of good ones. I am one of those 26 year old nerdy guys that still lives with his parents. I’m marrying a girl with two sons of her own. The only good I’ve done for myself is recently acquired an associate's degree and plan to continue (not this year however) to earn a Bachelor's in English.

Working retail means that I have to scrimp and save until I find a better job and am better able to help in the support of my soon to be family. It has been an extremely sobering experience to say the least. The way in which Will has gotten into my head and allowed me to think about where I am and how far I still need to go is stupendous. I really cannot recommend it enough, even at full price.

What I hope that you guys get out of this post is that I love to read and talk about what I read, play games and talk about what I’m playing, and write a lot. In the next week or so I might, if I feel comfortable enough, post a scene that I’m working on for a short story and ask for some feedback. I don’t have a particular focus on what I write, as long as I find it interesting.

So, any books that you can recommend? Personally I’m into classic literature, Science Fiction, anything literary, I’ll even read a good mystery or horror if you can give me a reason. Until next time, KNOWLEDGE IS POWER.