Spotlight Review: Owen Fiddler, A Journey Best Not Taken… But a Book Well Worth Reading

There are times when reading a book, you happen upon an unexpected lesson, and a shining gift wrapped up in darkness. Its wisdom comes from the voice of its writer. It makes you think, discover, nod your head and relate as you read along. I just completed such a novel. It reached my inner voice, gave me a lesson in humanity, in faith, and in mankind. The book is called “Owen Fiddler.” It’s actually written by a fellow blogger, Marvin Wilson. While I was aware that Mr. Wilson was a writer, until now, I didn’t realize the fully loaded caliber of his gift. This book is the real deal. It has more than left a lasting impression on me. Owen Fiddler has branded my spirit, like a cautionary tattoo.

This is the tale of a man who is a drunken, gambling, womanizing malcontent. He has no redeeming qualities whatsoever, and yet something about his story compels you to read further. As the novel begins, Owen is awakening from another of his habitual stupors. He’s falling down drunk, crawling around on the floor, being sick enough to call a few toilet yodels, all before heading off to another thankless day at work.

Right away, as a reader you find nothing to root for in this cat, and he only gets worse.

Owen has no luck, and never had any. He blames everyone for his station, but himself. He is one of those tedious people who never seemed to take life or his responsibilities very seriously. As Owen stumbles off to his soulless gig, he is busy cursing the world and damning his place in it… but then something quite unexpected happens. The hapless Owen sees a pocketbook on the ground, picks it up and discovers it’s filled with thousands of dollars in cash!

He can’t believe his sudden change of fortune. He chooses not to listen to that quiet inner voice of common decency. He doesn’t even search the contents for any I.D. He simply takes the money, tosses the pocketbook aside, and goes on this way with plans to spend it on endless boozing and wild fits debauchery.

However, this one act of selfish uncaring leads to a tragic set of events. Here, the author takes an ironic twist in storytelling and it is a brilliantly effective one. Without giving too much away, finding the money leads Owen Fiddler on a journey into a deeper darkness.


The novel shifts back in time to when Owen was a boy and details how so often the choices we make in our youth can haunt us for the rest of our lives. Owen is abusive to everyone, has little regard for his mother and brother, and cheats at games played with his friends. He steals a bike from the neighborhood, and runs away when the cops show up at his home. In running away, Owen unknowingly enters into a newer darker strange world filled with runners and pimps, dealers and hardcore criminals. No longer homeward bound, the boy doesn’t look back. Instead, he becomes a street kid who embraces the fake freedom of never going to school and doing as he damn-well pleases. His life now consists of having sex with loose women before his time, and running drugs for the big boys uptown. Once busted by a plain-clothes cop, juvenile detention awaits him. Life there is worse than ever, and when he finally emerges, he is a hardened teen, unready and unwilling to embrace a new life with his family.


The precarious events of Owen’s story are harrowing and filled with the terrible details of what can happen when we fail to acknowledge our blessings, refuse to accept the onus of our actions, and neglect to live up to our potential.

Owen is good at only one thing: sex. His earlier experiences taught him well in that department, and with this skill he is rarely at a lack for fast-food companionship. What he does lack is the vision to look inward and to believe in something real and necessary for his own personal happiness.

What is so fascinating about this book is that for all his peccadilloes, everyone knows an Owen Fiddler. He’s that cat who doesn’t give a damn; the one who will always find some lame excuse for his behavior, and curses most anyone who comes into his path. He dismisses his mother’s love and rejects his caring stepfather. He despises his younger brother for being everything good and decent that Owen clearly isn’t. Once he finds a kind and beautiful woman who actually loves him, and he cheats on her during their honeymoon. He is his own worst enemy, and yet he doesn’t have the clarity or the guts to realize it.

I didn’t much like Owen, the man. But I loved Owen Fiddler, the novel.

Of course, even a troubled soul like Owen can’t go through his journey without some sort of redemption, and it is here the author surprises, astounds and enlightens his reader.

The closing chapters of this superior story elevated the form of visual-spiritual-transcendent writing for me. It was so otherworldly, so perfect in detail, so imaginatively rendered that it stunned my eyes and warmed my soul.

I used to think that for something to be Great, it had to make me cry. I’m not an easy crier, so to find greatness was always a challenge. This book didn’t make me cry (though the final confession scene between Owen and his ex-wife Jewel DID make me a tad misty). No. Art is truly Great when it makes us think of things differently, view them with new and different eyes and challenge the old perceptions we once held.

Author Marvin Wilson managed this SUPERBLY with the story of Owen Fiddler. The writer uses an eloquent language to elevate his tale. His descriptions are often poetic and lyrical to the point where they reach elegance, even in a story that reveals so little beauty until its memorable conclusion. He took me into a world I always knew existed, but always did my best to avoid.

Being one who doesn’t like to be hit over the head with religion lessons, Owen Fiddler made me appreciate that The Word doesn’t necessarily need to bombard us in order to be FELT, digested or absorbed. This is a morality tale at its finest.

Wilson, as the writer-storyteller became a wicked force, a sexy force, a spiritual force, and most of all, an Enlightened force. Once turning the final page of this opus, I could honestly say I felt CHANGED from having read it.

What more can any writer ask from an audience?


If you want an unexpected surprise, I would highly suggest you pick up Owen Fiddler by Marvin Wilson. In it, you will find deceptively wrapped in a shroud of darkness, one of life’s most shining gifts.



Snatch JOY, and snatch this book!


You can find it at: Owen Fiddler



It can also be purchased on Amazon.com, at: Owen

One.

Lin

My Letter of Outrage To The NY Post

Dear Editor, Most Specifically, Rubbery Rupert Murdock:

Congratulations, on this, your latest salvo into the world of racist journalism! As a Black Man, I deeply appreciate this newest honor you’ve shown my brethren and me, especially with this being Black History Month and all! Thank you.

It still seems that in SOME eyes, we are and will forever be doomed to the tunnel-vision scope of your tragically limited perceptions of us. We are not inventors, not doctors, not lawyers, not astronauts. We are not Congressmen, not Senators, and certainly NOT Presidents! No. We are apes and monkeys.

It is both shameful and incredulous that you claim not to have known of the cartoon’s dubious implications. It is beyond sad, that in 2009, you, your so-called journalists, and your cartoonists have yet to evolve from a mindset steeped in good ole Jim Crowism.




It is no secret that racist minds have long attached the image of gorillas, monkeys, chimpanzees and simians to the visage of African-Americans in this country. Only a FOOL would bother to deny that this was clearly your intent! The cartoon's caption furthermore targets one very specific Black man: The President. How sick! How dangerous! How dare you!

How could this not be obvious to you, or to anyone on your staff, regardless of their education?

Any image that hints at the assassination of anyone, much less the Leader of the Free World is an image based in evil. Period.

If this were truly an ill-conceived and harmless depiction of a current event, it might be forgiven. However, only the deeply uninformed would believe this to be a mistake or an egregious error in judgment, because your history of blatant yellow journalism, your habit of ridiculing, debasing, besmirching and demonizing blacks in this city and this country is a long and ugly one.

Having once been a regular reader, I can site chapter and verse of the many times you’ve used your paper to sway public opinion in a negative light whenever it featured people of color.

Was it not YOUR paper that has referred to young back men as ‘BEASTS?’

Is it not your paper, which will systematically ignore the achievements of blacks, or usher them to a less visible section, and yet gives front page headlines to any negative incident or crime where people of color are involved? Does the arrest of Spike Lee’s father for possessing a ten-dollar bag of heroin really necessitate front-page news? Apparently in the pages of The Post it does.

Since those days of your not-so-subtle racist headlines, your aggressively right-winged slants, your ugly ways of reporting stories that are geared at degrading black and brown people, I had already long ago boycotted your rag. Hopefully, with this latest event, thousands of others will do the came.

It is my wish that you will come to know such explicit racial hatred, shameless dodging of the facts, and your fake-ass passion-free apologies will no longer be tolerated. Perhaps when your revenues begin to slip even further, THEN you will finally get the message.

Wake UP!


L.M. Ross

Poem: Love’s Sly Ride

After the roses,
And chocolate candy
After candlelit dinner
And late night brandies…

Your lips
Caress the kiss
Of my lips. We share
A wet language:
Of dueling
Tongues
And rattling breaths.

Your hand
Treks slowly
Down this
Path that leads to
The contour
At the small of
My back.

My fingers become these
Rapid heat-seekers,
Reading the hot
Braille of
Your skin. And you are

A pulse beat… and
A knowing smile.
A face of twitching
Fire, and a wild
Undulation. You are
A catch of sweltering
Breath… a torrid
Rhythm and
A swerving of hips.

You are
An urgent voice inside a dream
That whispers softly,
Then crucifies
My name.

And I am part
Animal,
Part man, inflamed.
And I am passion’s
Insane beast!
My hunger
An exclamation, yearning
Your sweet relief.

Inside my eyes
You shine and hum
There is some
Thing in you,
Like a shooting star...
And all of me longs
To catch your

F
A
L
L.

And beneath me
You sweetly quiver
As I lunge…


We are rays of
Light and sweat
Commingling.
We are sighs
And moans
And the rustle of
Sheets swinging.


We are walking
Tongues and hot
Stalking paws.
We are the song
Of angels and
The howl of dogs!

We are a strange
Contortion, and
A rough day’s
Abortion.

We are
A sultry map of steamy
Geography. We become
A happy,
Nappy journey
Through pleasured peaks
And cherished valleys.


We are the lush cry and
The shuttering gasp! We are
Rush of consummation, and
The climatic
SCREAM!

And then…


Your lips caress
This waiting pucker at
The kiss of
My lips.

I levitate.
As my soul shifts
From the gist of
Love’s sly ride…

I … I… I… bask in this utter
Thrill of you, panting,
Convulsing by my side.

And still your
Hand surveys
This Braille of
Me

And you touch
And you touch
Those downy narrow
Places where even

Cupid with his arrow

Would blush.






One Love.


Lin

THE DEVIL IS A TALENT SCOUT

“The devil ain’t nothin’ but a talent scout!”

Those were the words of my Great Aunt Bessie. When I was a kid, she’d utter these strange, crazy expressions that made absolutely no sense to me. But then, the older I became, the wisdom, the knowing inside those things she’d said would end up haunting me slowly.

Maybe the devil was, is, and will always be a devious talent scout, stalking, constantly searching for some new and Magnificent Misery. He must innately possess the primal instinct to smell it. He whiffs it, and very odor of it makes his dick erect. When the devil sees misery, when he witnesses desolation encased in human flesh, it makes him grin his sickly grin and he grows even more aroused.


I can't really say I know the way someone feels, even when the person hosting that feeling might be someone close to me, or even someone I love. I can sincerely sympathize with the best of them, but to say that I empathize with them… that would be lie. You can love someone to their core, know they’re in pain, and still never identify the degree, texture, the depth or temperature of their anguish.

When you love someone, you don’t always see him or her as they are, because what you love about them most is their spirit. It’s the essential part of a person that makes them beautiful or ugly. Knowing this to be true, Addy had a beautiful spirit. It didn’t matter to me that his fluctuating weight had become problematic. By the time he was twelve he weighed almost 300 pounds. It became apparent to everyone that my brother wasn’t just plump or chubby anymore. Addy was morbidly obese. I knew this reality made him deeply unhappy in his skin.

Over the years, I’d overheard my parents arguing about it so many times in their bedroom. Gig’s voice wore a trace of shame and something very close to disgust.

“What the HELL are you feedin’ that boy? I told you his ass needed to be on a diet… but you just keep on feeding him all that fatty food! It’s getting outta hand, Dakota!”

“Shhhhh! Keep your voice down! I feed that boy three square meals a day. That’s it. That's all. But then, he takes his allowance and he buys candy and sweets, cakes and cookies and chips and soda. He’s slick about it. He hides them because he knows I don’t want him eating that junk!”

“So, when does he eat it?”

“Late at night when I’m asleep. I can’t police the child at all hours. I’ve tried for years to steer him away for that stuff. He does as I say, and he’ll lose a little weight. But he always ends up gaining even more of it back. Our son has a problem, Gig!”


I was glad Addy didn’t hear them. But even if he had, nothing Gig or Dakota could say would’ve been worse than the things he’d been called at school. It was there he heard so many cruel and unfeeling words aimed at him; and his classmates would say those things to deliberately to break his spirit. Kids who are bullies can be the most insensitive beings on the planet. They never take into account how their words can cut or brand a sensitive soul forever. Maybe this never occurs to them. And for those who are aware, who know what their words and actions can do, and they purposely use them anyway… shame on those sad and internally fucked up people!

This is what some human beings do to one another. They do or say some brutally heartless thing for shits and giggles… or to wound and make someone suffer.

I cannot say I knew how it felt to be Addy. But the part of my brother that lived within me, would so often weep for him.

The truth of this hurts… truly hurts in some deep secret place inside of the viscera.
The truth is you want to hurt all those hurters back.
The truth is you wonder if anyone will ever love you, and just you, flaws and all, completely, honestly and unconditionally.


Her name was Allison. Allison Andrews. From the time Addy was in the fifth grade, he’d nursed his own silent yet undying crush for her.

She was a lovely young girl to look at, with her shoulder-length plaits and light sienna skin. Addy would spend days constructing these homemade Valentine cards and putting in a little poem he’d composed especially for Miss Allison. Addy and Allison. Allison and Addy. It was such a beautiful dream in his mind. He’d never found the courage to approach her directly with these cards or with his feelings for her. He seemed to take his own delight in secretly placing the anonymous cards in her cubbyhole, and then hiding behind the classroom door to see that slow smile trace across her face. He’d done this for three years straight. But then came junior high school, where the kids seemed to up the ante in the game of human cruelty.

Someone had apparently seen him place that year’s card into the slits of her locker’s door. Someone obviously told her that the card was from that ‘big, fat Swinton boy.’

But instead of being flattered by the careful and poetic attention he’d shown her for three years, and instead of applying just a little touch of sensitivity, Miss Allison chose a different method of giving my brother his due.

She waited until lunchtime, when the school’s cafeteria was full, and then she stood on her chair, and said:

“Hey, everyone… guess what? I got another special Valentine this year. Isn’t it beautiful?” She held it up to show the crowd. Everyone present was paying attention, because this was Allison Andrews, the prettiest girl in all of junior high. And then she read it, out loud:


‘Every day you grow more beautiful…
Every year my heart explodes…
Every time I’m near you.
My love just grows and grows.

Every time I long to tell you
But every year I get more shy…
So I’ll quietly ask you
Once again,
Would you please
Be my Valentine?’

The crowd of kids actually applauded, quite loudly. I imagine Addy was a little embarrassed, and maybe just a little proud in that moment.

But then she, Miss Allison Andrews, announced:

“Wow! I wish I knew who my secret Valentine was… because if I knew, I’d give him a big wet kiss. And I don’t care who it is,” she said. Then she twisted her face in a way that wasn’t so pretty anymore, and she said, “As long as ain’t that big’ fat, gross, two tons of ugly, SWINTON boy!”

I can’t even begin to imagine what hearing those words coming from Allison did to my brother’s soul. All I know is, Addy got up looking astonished and damaged and winded and thousand unutterably painful things, and he ran as fast as he possibly could from that cafeteria filled with viciousness and that coarse cutting noise of laughter.

I wanted to kick her ass. I wanted to kick the ass of each person who’d coldly laughed at him. I wanted to… but I couldn’t kick everyone’s ass.

And because I loved him, there were times I wanted to fight for him, and I did. I couldn’t that day, because had Addy disappeared.

That was the first day of many painful adolescent days ahead, and the first time my little brother ran away from Coolsville.

His disappearance lasted for three days.

“The devil ain’t nothin’ but a talent scout,” Aunt Bessie said.

* * * * *
I believe the devil is indeed, a talent scout, in search of some Grand Misery… and when he finds it, sees it, sniffs it, tastes it and feels it, his raging red dick grows more erect.

I believe in the devil just as much, and just as fiercely as I believe in God. Too many people mistake the devil’s place of business as a hellish underground community. I believe only the hellish part to be true.

My Great Aunt Bessie once said something else in her infinite wisdom:
“People need to take God outta the sky and put Him where he belongs… in they hearts.”

Borrowing that old sage’s philosophy, then by the same token, maybe some people take Satan from the underground, and they let him breed within their souls.





# # #

Excerpt from the novel "Like Litter In The Wind," by L.M. Ross



One.

No Oscar, Golden Globe, Nor An NAACP Joint, But A Noble Award Nonetheless!

Peep the emblem to the left. The lovely, most kind and mad industrious Miz Write has bestowed this award upon me. It's called The Helping Hand Award. I am very humbled, grateful, surprised and yes, elated to be in receipt of it. Whenever I’m told that something I’ve written or done has ‘inspired’ someone, it brings a smile and a certain peace to my spirit. I think maybe that’s a part of what we’re all here to do in some way or in some act we perform.

I’ve been blogging in various places for nearly five years, and in that time I have forged some incredible relationships and networks of support. It just feels good to know that you’ve touched someone, encouraged someone, reached them in a visceral place, or made them consider something positive and affirming in their own lives.

Since writing is probably what I do best (well, maybe second best) I’ve become proficient at reciting my interior and being that everyman who pretty much feels what everyone else feels, in certain degrees. I’m not a psychiatrist, not a Holy Man, nor a martyr. I’m just a very human being, and my shoulders have grown stronger from helping to lift and uplift others in my path. And you know what? I’m cool with that…so thankyaverrrmuch!


Anyway, the award reads as follows:


You are receiving this Emblem in recognition for your mentoring, support, and encouragement to a fellow blogger is no small fete! It is evidence that you have gone well beyond the call of duty by your continued efforts to "leave the pile higher than you found it"! It is further evidence that your blog(s)has been identified as the epitome of excellence and is certainly admired.

Only FIVE? *sigh* Decisions! Decisions! Aiight! Below are some bloggers who write from the heart and by doing so, they inspire me. This is my small way of saying THANK YOU for your inspiration:



Wandering Caravan

Free Spirit


D-Place


Broken Mannequin


Joaquin Carvel




Receiving the Emblem from a seasoned blogger (such as… ahem… myself!) is a testimony to you that you're on the right track, and that your voice is being heard and FELT. It gives credence that there are those out here in the blogsphere who recognize your potential even if you don't. Keep up the good work, and remember to "Pay it Forward".



As for the vets who have been in the game for longer than a minute and yet consistently provide a steady stream of much-needed inspiration, the award goes to:


Greeneyes


Kate


Carleen


Spice


Faith



A host of mad congrats to you all!!


The Rules:

1. Select 10 bloggers: 5 you consider your blogging Helping Hand then "Pay it Forward" by extending your "Helping Hand" to 5 additional bloggers in support and encouragement for their efforts.

2, In passing on the Emblem, each recipient must provide the name of blog or blog author with a link for others to visit. Each recipient must show the Emblem and put the name and link to the blog that has given it to her or him.

3. Link the Emblem to this post: Helping Hand: Much Obliged and Paying it Forward so that others will know it origin and impetus.

4. If you have not already done so, show your recipients some love by adding them to your blog roll, Technorati Favorite list, or in any other way to further let them know that their blog voice is important to you and being heard.

5. Add your name to The Helping Hand meme and don't forget to leave a comment as a permanent record of all Helping Hand recipients.

6. Display the rules.


Okay? A Warm and hearty congratulations to all the winners of this highly coveted and most prestigious award in blogdom!


Snatch JOY... by inspiring someone!


One.

Barack Becomes President Today... And The Feeling is EBULLIENT!

e·bul·lient ( -b l y nt, -b l -)
adj.
1. Zestfully enthusiastic. A boiling up or over; effervescence.
2. high spirit; exhilaration; exuberance.

Is anyone else feeling strangely hopeful today? There is a feeling of beauty all around on this January 20th. The whole world is witnessing a major zeitgeist, a powerful spirit of change. That we are alive to experience it and to grasp the full and historic significance of it is a truly a-once-in-a-lifetime Blessing.

“Ebullient” (along with exquisite) is one of my all-time favorite words. I like the way it feels on my tongue, how it churns and flows and uplifts my spirit. Today, I am truly ebullient. I believe much of America and the world feels the same way.


“We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.”

I wonder how many of us truly believed in those words. This was always taught in my home by my parents. Yet when I opened the door and ventured into the world, there were always others determined to make me think and feel that it was all a lie. My skin-color, whether implied, or plainly stated, was something that in THEIR eyes, made me inferior. I was thought to be lesser than, believed to be not as good, not as worthy of honor, not as intelligent, and not as necessary in the world.

Yes, many of us were told that we could become anything; and that whatever we put our minds to, with hard work, determination and the Belief in God, anything was possible. But even when armed with this concept, even if it infiltrated our belief systems, we tended to place limitations upon our own potential. No one, not a soul ever once told ME that I could someday BE President. It was too large to imagine, too impossible to grasp.

Barack has transcended the myth of racial inferiority and brought forth this glorious and exquisitely hopeful new reality.


On Election Day, 2008, Obama, by his singular vision, by his sheer determination, by his character, his will and the will of the American people caused a revolution within the American mindset. He proved that, yes, little black and brown boys can indeed dream bigger, wider and greater, and not only dream but to make those dreams manifest. YES WE CAN!

Perhaps even greater than this, the people of this Country overcame their differences, their ignorances, their prejudices, their taboos, and their fears and they made the decision that HE was the RIGHT man for this awesome responsibility. They, the MAJORITY, chose him! Their hopes and faith and dreams were placed in HIM, Barack Obama, not his skin-tone, not his heritage, but his Manhood, his intellect, his vision, his character, and his 'audacity of hope' was just what this country needed in these turbulent times.

Having known my history in this country as a black man, only to witness just how far we’ve come, yes, today I am indeed ebullient.




Somewhere I just know that my late father, my grandparents, and my ancestors (once kings and queens, and then American slaves) are equally filled with this radiant and most exquisite ebullience.




May The Creator Bless and watch over Barack Obama! May God Bless America and The World!

One.

Poem For The Marchers~ By L.M. Ross

I marched
Because
My Freedom was
A bastardized entity.

Because...
A contemptuous America
Made a slaughter of
My dignity.
I marched because
My flesh
Had become
The food of rabid beasts.
I marched because
Men who looked
Like me
Hung on nooses…
Strung from poplar trees.







I marched because
Injustice had become
The rule…
And I marched because
The Constitution
Had run out of
Excuses.

I marched
Because the klan carried
Crooked crosses,
And this country stood by
As we counted
Our losses.

I marched
Because my weary soul
Ached for the balm of
Righteous. I marched because
The swift boot of
Cruelty kept
Trampling upon
My spirit.

I marched because
A King
Whispered softly…
And my distressed
Humanity could
Hear it.





I marched because
My worthiness was
Shunned. I marched because
A Change
Had to come.

I marched because
A man named
Martin came to
Realign my spine,
And re-ignited
My flame…
And I marched
For me, and
My ancestors,
In Freedom's name.






I marched
And my flame
Sustained the jets
Of water hoses.
I marched
Against the fury of
Those voices
Screaming "NO!"

I marched and
I marched, because
The dictates of
Righteousness
Told me so…

Happy Birthday Dr. King... because of YOU, the flame grows Taller!


Snatch JOY with Freedom's Grip!




** It seems that mere days before Barack Obama takes the office of President of United States, a part of the dream for freedom and equality has finally been realized. Somewhere, I just know Martin must be smiling.



One Love.

A Few "Sacred" Thoughts

One of the most talented and egregiously slept-on artists around is the lovely and profound Ms. Amel Larrieux. I dig most everything this beautiful sister has done over the course of the last decade or so. However, lately, I’ve been revisiting, what is, in my humble opinion, her most brilliant opus, the CD entitled ‘Bravebird.’ In particular, I’ve contemplated the meaning, the thought, the sound and vision in a song she did called “Sacred”.

The thing is, it’s one of those pieces of music that defines ART, because it makes me go all internal. It causes me to question the things I hold Truly Sacred. Here, I mean Sacred with a CAPITAL “S.”

Not to get all gushy-gooey sentimental, yet it occurs to me that some people don’t really hold very much Sacred anymore.

Yet, we've witnessed lives, homes, material possessions so quickly taken away in a blink of an eye, or in a hurricane’s destructive wind. Knowing that nothing is promised, and all things have a shelf-life, it’s best not to place too much emotional investment in something that doesn't contain a pulse, breath or a heartbeat.

But some people and some ideas and some internal qualities remain Sacred to me.


My family and my quirky and closest friends are Sacred to me.

Those who say they LOVE me, and who mean it with every fiber of their being, they are Sacred to me.

My ability to stretch and bend and see beyond my finite limitations... this is Sacred to me.

The memory of those I’ve loved and lost and who have left behind tender moments and lessons in their wake, this is forever Sacred to me.

Waking up each day without some horrible pain or chronic limitation, just waking up and breathing, this is Sacred to me.

The sound of music which uplifts my spirit, calms my rage, possesses the ability to hold my soul tethered to a most excellent note, this is Sacred to me.

The joy inherent within a child’s laughter, the assurance of their well-being, and the sensitivity inside their tears, this is Sacred to me.

The gift of creativity and the ability to muster strength in times of stress, this is Sacred to me.

Love of any kind that is enduring and true, and real and tangible, this is so damn Sacred to me.



Anyway... if you read this entry, and come up empty, vacant of anything you hold Sacred… then, whoever you are, and wherever you are, I’ll feel sorry for you.





One.

Sometimes I Feel Like a Meaningless Scribe

Dear Diary:

I've decided to name this entry: Sometimes I Feel Like a Meaningless Scribe. Damn, I love that title! It’s loosely based upon the song “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.” It’s a Jazz classic, covered by so many greats, though, for my money, Jimmy Scott does the most heart-wrenching version of it. But I digress.

Focus! Focus! Focus, damn it!

It’s been another one of THOSE days. You know, the usual shit: editors and agents of indifference, the terse impersonal rejection slips, people not feeling me… yanno, that usual shit.

No. I have no lingering questions inside my soul about whether I was born to be a writer. It’s one of the few things on this planet that I KNOW for sure. But my lingering question so often becomes: have I chosen the right medium?

Diary, I am a very private person, by nature. You know this. I am that quintessential Still Waters Run Deep kinda cat. Feelings come sweeping in like tides, swelling and rolling in massive waves inside me sometimes, and I tend to express them in a Universal way. That’s my style, my thing, I guess.

The other day my close friend K told me that I “don’t write about who I am."

To that, I said: "DAMN LIE!"

Maybe I don’t give a detailed accounting of all my emotional bowel movements, but everything I write is about WHO I am, or what I feel, or what I question. That's REAL! Everything I write is about what makes my heart beat faster, or gives me a chill, or breaks my face, or hurts my spirit, or fundamentally fulfills me. And truthfully, I don’t know any other way to be.


Still, Sometimes I Feel Like a Meaningless Scribe.

Nakedness from me makes some people uncomfortable.

Maybe those people are essentially prudes.

Honesty from me makes some people uneasy.

Maybe those people need to get real with themselves…


Sometimes I feel Like a Meaningless Scribe.


Dear Diary:


Guess what? I’ve been rejected again. It’s okay to mock me. I’ve been mocked before. Perhaps it’s Mocking Season. The thing is, I spend all this time writing, editing, rewriting, reediting, and trying my level best to create something that’s close to perfection. Not perfect. Writing is never perfect… but I aim for as close as I can humanly get. And then… I breeeeeeeathe... because I’m done, and breeeeeeeathing is so damn necessary.


I’ve prayed. I’ve purged. I’ve vented. It’s out of me!

Now, comes that hard part: putting a few choice words on paper in the form of a query letter that some invisible stranger will read and hopefully become intrigued enough to what to read more.

Why? Because a Voice, perhaps the whisper of a muse, or perhaps God’s Voice whispered to me, and I listened and I took these copious notes. I’ve slaved and spent night and day, endless hours upon the lonely stage my creativity, writing down what I see, and what I hear, and what I feel and what I think and what I dream. And I want to, and I need to, and I must share these things with the world. And I think, just maybe the world needs to read these things to better understand its own humanity. That’s it. That’s all.

Diary, today arrived with yet another rejection slip… and it feels as if they’ve flushed me, and my words, my thoughts, my dreams and my meaning down their cyber toilet, like a pile of worthless feces. I mean, WTF? Shame on them!

Diary, you KNOW, I’ll never be FELT in a letter that takes 30 seconds to read. I am not and have never been anyone’s fast-food writer. I’m an ARTIST, damn it! The Creator made me this way: all strange and odd and talented and beautiful and ugly and deep and joyous and sad and real... and human.

Diary, it saddens me that people choose not to spend enough *quality* time to FEEL me and absorb what I bring. They don’t bother to open the museum doors of my mind, or walk through the hallways and down the corridor of my heart. And few who do, they didn’t come to stay, to check the art, to hear the sounds, to read the text, or to smoke my verbal herb.

What is it about these words I write? Do they terrify? Does The Truth terrify? Then just maybe people need to be terrified.

Diary, if writing were cuisine, I offer soul food. Maybe for some, it’s hard to chew. Perhaps, for some, it’s an acquired taste. I’ve no doubt the flavor might leave a symphony on the tongue. But they’ve got to open their damn mouths (or their minds) and savor the shit.


Feel me? Of course, YOU do. That’s never been the prob.


Oh, Diary. Sometimes I feel like a Meaningless Scribe.

Or sometimes it seems people would like to make a scribe feel that way.

You see this rant is about Art and Craft and Time and Care and the Meaning of Writing… of penning something Real, from the soul… and it appears some agents and editors and people will never get it.

That’s sad to me. That’s fucking tragic, in fact. I think I’ll pray for those people.

See, I have no lingering question inside my soul of whether I was born to be a writer.

It’s one of the few things on this planet that I KNOW for sure. But so often my lingering question becomes, whether or not I’ve chosen the right medium. Today, Dear Diary, I find myself wondering if I'm preaching to the wrong choir.

*Ponders*


One.

The Demise of a Place Called 'Journalspace'

Happy New Year!

I’m not so much into resolutions. Instead, I tend to make key promises to myself. This year I’ve made a vow to take nothing, absolutely NOTHING for granted.

To mirror this very fact, I just discovered the other day that Journalspace, a site I’d been blogging on for close to five years... is suddenly no more. Gone. POOF! Finished. Finis. Kaput.

Back the early days of my netdom, a young friend hipped me to the world of blogging. He sent me to his page on this strange new place, a website called Journalspace. I read his political rants and poetry, and I thought: This is kinda interesting… like keeping a diary, online. I’d always been a cat who narrated my thoughts on paper. This was no different— only I’d record my emotional terrain on a screen. Cool. So, I tried it. This was back in late March of 2004. It was a very freeing concept.

In about a month’s time Journalspace became MY SPOT, my hang, and my joint! Soon I was getting my blog on daily. It was my BOOM, and my BIP, my religion, my habit, my purge place, my safe space, and my literary jones. I’d write early in the morning and post my cries, my moans, my hollas, my groans, confounderations (I made that one up) my ponderations (that one too), my hilarities, and my celebrations on the regular. Mainly, I did this for me, to gain a sense of clarity and self-discipline. I treated it much like a job, a gig with a deadline, and I’ve always been a stickler for the all-mighty deadline. I didn’t write with an eye on entertaining anyone. I didn’t even have an audience, and this suited me fine. Gradually, folks rolled through and read me. This was a slow process, but a gratifying one, as people I didn’t know and had never met related to something I’d written. Such is the human experience. We are all more alike than we are different.


And still, I blogged.

My page was called One Moanman In Time. My tag, my nick, my personna there was "Bluemoaner." He was very much ME, amplified, poeting, prosing, ranting, riffing and such. When readers left a comment, I‘d go to their blogs, read them, see what was going on in their lives, and leave a comment as well. It was akin to meeting a new friend who lived on the other side of my screen. It was fascinating, educational, enlightening, heartwarming, and sometimes even harrowing and depressing.

I ‘met’ some interesting characters, some fantastic writers, some like-souls, some confessional poets, some not-so-desperate housewives, some prime connections and even a precious handful of people whom I now consider friends forever… or as long as forever lasts.

And still, I blogged.

Journalspace became my second crib, and the folks there, a second family. As time passed, I actually DID meet a few. We vibed in a most cool and uncommon way.

And still, I blogged. For nearly five YEARS!

If you think back on your life in the past five years you’re bound to have gone through some major changes emotionally, physically and spiritually. Think about it: people who started out alone are suddenly no longer alone. Some find love, some have their hearts broken, some find God, and some stop believing in Him. Some heal, some get married, some make babies, and some lose babies, some get divorced, and some suffer the demise of loved ones. In that time frame, kids start college and graduate, find new careers, settle down, and people grow in innumerable ways.

Five years. Half a decade. This too shall pass.


And Still, I Blogged.

Five years ago, I was a starving poet/artist/budding novelist with one book published, and a disappointing love life. In the time since, I’ve three books published, a small but loyal following, a promising love life, and have just finished another book, which, to date, has an uncertain future.


About a year-and-a-half ago, Journalspace (which was often problematic) suffered a major snafu and lost priceless entries, and thousands of comments made over the years. Many of those comments read like a story of how I became acquainted with my net-friends there, how those associations grew, prospered and bore new fruit. The loss of those exchanges signaled the beginning of the end for me. All things come to pass. Something changed. If blogging were a kind of marriage, that breakdown in communication would lead to our eventual separation.

Things transitioned. I spent less time reporting and narrating the events of my life. I had books to write, literature to create, and dedicated my energies in that direction. Afterward, when I took time out to write something new on Journalspace, only the most faithful few would stop by to read me. People have short attention spans. There was a lesson in this, too. It signaled that online, much like in real life, only a rare and priceless True Blues will care about you, and really treasure and honor your relationship.

Yet, to this very day, I still blog… and just as I did in the very beginning, I do so for me. I do it for clarity, for emotional purging. I do it to make sense of the world around me. I do it to explain me to ME. If no one reads it, it’s aiight. If no one comments, it’s all Kool and the Gang. Blogging isn’t always necessarily a shared concept.

I’ve lots of stories under my belt, a few life lessons, and load of new knowledge and stuff I didn’t possess before. Everyone’s got a story of how they made it, survived from point A to point B, and the journey of getting there is what makes us all unique.

And so the death of Journalspace feels strange to me.

People who didn’t save their entries have now perhaps lost them for good. Without warning… POOF! Their writing, their stories, their shared joys, their confessions and their cries have all disappeared into an uncaring cyber black hole. Journalspace has died a quick mercy-free death because there were apparently ghosts in the machine (the servers).

If you’re still reading this long-azz entry, there is actually a method to my madness. The lesson is this:

Save your entries! Backup your work! The net is not infallible. Things fall apart. If you’ve made a real connection through blogging, request that person(s) email so you’ll remain connected. Don’t allow your associations to dry up and die, simply because the gods of cyberspace failed you!

If you’re a serious blogger who records your life, your work, your cries, your whispers, your screams to the world, and the moderator of this or any other site loses your stuff, shame on them!

But if you fail to back it up so that you still have viable evidence of it, well then, shame on YOU!

And still, I’ll blog.



Take nothing for granted!

Happy New Year!



One.