So I was putting out a new letter this week, and it was the first so far to get a written response!
The letter: "I never meant for you to find out. I didn't want to hurt you. I was lonely and you were far away."
The response: "Shit. Need to get your life fixed."
So not the most intelligent response but hey. Someone read it.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Sunday, September 5, 2010
So Hey There
SO you may have noticed that below, I've posted the first chapter in the serialized story. Yay.
I'm lazy today, so the supershorts will start up again tomorrow and hopefully my work ethic will return. Or not.
I'm lazy today, so the supershorts will start up again tomorrow and hopefully my work ethic will return. Or not.
Windows and Doors (Part 1)
My soul is from elsewhere, I'm sure of that, and I intend to end up there. -Rumi
He wasn't entirely sure what towns the bus was in between, but he knew they were miles away from anything worth being near.
And he liked it.
He wasn't even sure what town he'd bought the ticket for. But it was far enough away. And every time he woke up, there was new land outside the window, that he'd never seen. Places he hadn't had the time to stain or bruise with things he wouldn't want to remember. So he rode on and on and on. He might just every line he could until he hit the ocean, or maybe dip down into Mexico. The weather would be nice at least.
He turned his phone on for the first time since leaving in a tiny bullshit town somewhere in the middle of Texas. Twenty seven missed calls. Eighteen new voicemails.
He stomped the battery into peices, threw the phone in the bus station trash can, and kept riding.
People started to look a little different out here. Skin tones deepened, clothing changed. The accents started getting a little more unfamiliar. He felt displaced, and happy to be drifting.
He stopped riding buses somewhere in Arizona. He started riding trains again, like he did when he was younger and running away from home. There was probably something in that for a psychiatrist to parse out and explain away. Something about fear, and something about sex.
The trains ran out in California, and there was water stretching out under gray sky. And there was a feeling in the air, that felt like somehting good.
He wondered about traveling, and about running, as he looked out on waves and waves and waves. He thought about the beats, and how they spent their time running around the country. That the word beat came from beatitude. He wondered if the distance behind him brought him any closer to heaven. He threw his driver's license and his passport into the ocean.
He wasn't entirely sure what towns the bus was in between, but he knew they were miles away from anything worth being near.
And he liked it.
He wasn't even sure what town he'd bought the ticket for. But it was far enough away. And every time he woke up, there was new land outside the window, that he'd never seen. Places he hadn't had the time to stain or bruise with things he wouldn't want to remember. So he rode on and on and on. He might just every line he could until he hit the ocean, or maybe dip down into Mexico. The weather would be nice at least.
He turned his phone on for the first time since leaving in a tiny bullshit town somewhere in the middle of Texas. Twenty seven missed calls. Eighteen new voicemails.
He stomped the battery into peices, threw the phone in the bus station trash can, and kept riding.
People started to look a little different out here. Skin tones deepened, clothing changed. The accents started getting a little more unfamiliar. He felt displaced, and happy to be drifting.
He stopped riding buses somewhere in Arizona. He started riding trains again, like he did when he was younger and running away from home. There was probably something in that for a psychiatrist to parse out and explain away. Something about fear, and something about sex.
The trains ran out in California, and there was water stretching out under gray sky. And there was a feeling in the air, that felt like somehting good.
He wondered about traveling, and about running, as he looked out on waves and waves and waves. He thought about the beats, and how they spent their time running around the country. That the word beat came from beatitude. He wondered if the distance behind him brought him any closer to heaven. He threw his driver's license and his passport into the ocean.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Something That Is Cool That We Should Do Together
I hope you enjoy those stories below.
But there is something better than reading stories.
Helping make new ones.
Like I said before, Wednesdays on this blog will be a time to start and update a monthly project in storytelling and September's is (drum roll):
THE INTERCEPTED LETTERS PROJECT
Over the course of this month, I'll be leaving snippets of imaginary correspondence around town and campus, and giving you guys (the three of you reading) a weekly peak into what I'm leaving and what the reactions have been, if any.
Now your part.
Leave your own notes around, and see what happens. Post them in the comments to this post and tell me and everyone what's been happening.
And here's the first letter I'm leaving:
I saw you last night. And I saw him. I would have hit him if I didn't think I might have missed and punched you. And that didn't seem like a good way to convince you I was better than him. But I still wanted to.
But there is something better than reading stories.
Helping make new ones.
Like I said before, Wednesdays on this blog will be a time to start and update a monthly project in storytelling and September's is (drum roll):
THE INTERCEPTED LETTERS PROJECT
Over the course of this month, I'll be leaving snippets of imaginary correspondence around town and campus, and giving you guys (the three of you reading) a weekly peak into what I'm leaving and what the reactions have been, if any.
Now your part.
Leave your own notes around, and see what happens. Post them in the comments to this post and tell me and everyone what's been happening.
And here's the first letter I'm leaving:
I saw you last night. And I saw him. I would have hit him if I didn't think I might have missed and punched you. And that didn't seem like a good way to convince you I was better than him. But I still wanted to.
An Email I Found Saved To Drafts The Morning After That I Don't Remember Writing
There is a thing you should knl;ow.
(I meantui ekverythingf I saiigd.n I just say I don'tm becausrte I'm afraid.
I loveni you.
Kind of.
(I meantui ekverythingf I saiigd.n I just say I don'tm becausrte I'm afraid.
I loveni you.
Kind of.
Coffee
The woman with the green eyes and the dark brown hair comes in every morning, around six unless she's running late, and orders one cup of coffee black. Sometimes she orders something to eat along with it. Has she missed breakfast those days? Or just wants something sweet. There are other customers, that smile more, that talk more. But I don't pay as much attention. I open the store, I sell a few cups to people that keep hellish early morning hours and I wait for the woman with the green eyes to tell me something I know by heart already.
The Girl From Boston Rides Again
She hasn't told anyone her name since she was seventeen and riding a bus for hours to run from a home she hated, and then hitching rides on trains with kids not much older than her all the way North to a place that felt a little more like home than home ever did.
They all call her by different names. Some call her Red, for her hair, or Freckles. One or two assholes call her Fire-Crotch for the same reason, but always quiet and behind her back since the last one to say it in ear shot hasn't ever smiled the same again. One friend calls her the Girl From Boston (she hasn't ever told him she's from West Virginia, and she won't ever. He has to know though, just listening to her voice.)
She's not sure why she stopped using her name, maybe just because no good ever came from it. Sometimes she gives fakes, but usually she lets other peoplen make up their own for her. That started on the first train she hopped.
There was a ratty looking kid in a black shirt, eyeing her, not in thhat hungry-creepy way that people on buses do, or the way some men do to every woman they ever meet. There was a curiosity there. She asked him what in the hell he was looking at, not knowing why exactly she was so angry someone wanted to meet her.
"Hey there. I'm Sammy. Who're you?"
"Me."
"I meant what's your name."
Silence. Shifting of weight. "I don't have one."
No one speaks again. Sammy didn't understand why, thought she was threatened by him. But she wasn't. She was just tired of being what she was. Tired of being anything in particular. So after that she wasn't.
They all call her by different names. Some call her Red, for her hair, or Freckles. One or two assholes call her Fire-Crotch for the same reason, but always quiet and behind her back since the last one to say it in ear shot hasn't ever smiled the same again. One friend calls her the Girl From Boston (she hasn't ever told him she's from West Virginia, and she won't ever. He has to know though, just listening to her voice.)
She's not sure why she stopped using her name, maybe just because no good ever came from it. Sometimes she gives fakes, but usually she lets other peoplen make up their own for her. That started on the first train she hopped.
There was a ratty looking kid in a black shirt, eyeing her, not in thhat hungry-creepy way that people on buses do, or the way some men do to every woman they ever meet. There was a curiosity there. She asked him what in the hell he was looking at, not knowing why exactly she was so angry someone wanted to meet her.
"Hey there. I'm Sammy. Who're you?"
"Me."
"I meant what's your name."
Silence. Shifting of weight. "I don't have one."
No one speaks again. Sammy didn't understand why, thought she was threatened by him. But she wasn't. She was just tired of being what she was. Tired of being anything in particular. So after that she wasn't.
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