Posts filed under ‘OBSERVATIONS & OPINIONS’
THE FUTURE
My daughter, Lynn, is marching on Saturday.
She is an great daughter and outstanding person.
Just recognized by the USDA as a woman farmer, she is making her mark in the world.
Let’s hope her generation gets involved to make this country and world a better place.
And takes notes for the future.
OBSERVATIONS & OPINIONS: WHAT IS OUR FUTURE?
There was a time when I viewed the news on both Fox and MSNBC. I saw reports on both stations concerning the same incident. And by their reporting, I could not believe they were discussing the same issue. I have come to realize, in this day and age with so many channels available, you can select your source of facts and hear what you what to hear, what fits your view of life.
I’ve stopped listening to the news.
I should be using this blog to tell of my writing success. Unfortunately, if I depended on my career news, this blog would cease to exist. I should be writing articles to help other writers be published. That will come soon, I promise.
Now, back to the purpose of this article.
As I stated at the beginning, in this day and age a vast amount of reporting is slanted. You can hear what you want to hear without facts getting in the way. But with almost everyone able to record what is happening around them and countless cameras observing our lives there is the opportunity to record the raw truth. However, it is easy to alter photos and videos. It comes to a point ‘what do you believe’?
As an aside, I chuckle when someone decides to rob a convenience store and there are enough photos of the event to fill a family album.
To prove my point on video alteration, I saw a video on UTUBE of a propane leak and people were leaving their cars and running down the highway to safety, then the massive explosion came. I also saw the same video again, but this time there was a flying saucer in the sky and the world was under attack. Both presented as fact.
I have seen, granted in a news source known to report the news fitting their agenda, videos of protests occurring in North Carolina which, in all honest, scared the shit out of me. Protests where freedom of speech was denied by the authorities and arrests were made of whom ever made the effort to voice their opinion. I felt as if I was watching a movie in which a foreign government or calculated purpose was taking over our country. I could not believe this was my home. I don’t think these were altered, but once or twice in the last 69 years I’ve been wrong. This is to provide a bit of levity. We all need a bit of laughter these days, and a spoon full of sugar.
A HORROR LEGEND IS GONE
I should have posted this piece on Halloween night, but better late than never. I feel this small piece of horror history needs to be shared.
As a writer of horror, I look to the roots of my addition. The source which first opened the world of horror to me has just died at the age of 98. At least they think he died.
He was one of the elements which first opened the world of horror to me. He was Zacherly, the host of a late-night Saturday show centered on classic horror movies. If you didn’t live in the Philadelphia, New Jersey, the New York area, you probably have never heard of him.
Born John Zacherle in 1918, he provided all the original classic horror movies. Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy and the Invisible Man among others. If the movie he was showing was not a classic, but a cheesy effort, he would interrupt the film to make comments or insert his image into the film.
During breaks he would camp it up standing in the coffin of his wife, stake pierced. Also, he would talk to Gasport, a potato sack containing who knows what hanging on the wall. Only Zacherly could understand what this sack said, which I found out from Zacherle’s obituary was his son. Go figure.
Another activity, often perused by this ghoulish host, was brain surgery. The brains looking very much like cauliflower. I hesitate to speculate who these brains belonged to, but it is tempting.
I was a teenager when this was all happening. Offered by Zacherly was a passport to Transylvania. Of course I sent away for one. With a bright red cover, it was a cherished possession. It was lost before I had a chance to use it.
A legend is gone. I hope he lives on in reruns, or that murky world where horror meets reality.
URSULA LE GUIN
I recently read an article in the New York Times concerning Ursula Le Guin, a renowned writer of science fiction and fantasy, and her enshrinement in the Library of America.
Included in this article was a speech she gave concerning the state of publishing and the value authors must seek for their work. For those writers out there, I hope you find it educational and rewarding.
Sorry this link doesn’t work. But if you are interested, go to The New York Times site. You can read a limited of articles for free. For writers and readers of science fiction, this work is valuable.
CRITICS
I’m working on a short story, Cliff’s Note, recently rejected but with a good comment and helpful suggestions. I have a rewrite and decided to try the story on my roommates.
First I tried the story on Sammy (Samantha). Here is her response, not good, but she wanted to get close to my work.
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Next I looked to Millie for an opinion, hoping for a more positive response. After pondering their reaction, I decided I had more work to do.
WRITERS CROSSING THE LINE
While attending a dinner with a friend, his wife said, “Glad you have a hobby like writing.” My then-wife saw me bristle and understood why. This incident occurred some time ago but not forgotten.
At the time of this event I had already been published and aware of the agony associated on being a writer on the quest to being an author. I have pondered the issues of writing and differences of the title as writer as a hobby or writer as a profession and arrived at the following conclusion.
My thoughts are these. As I went for putting words on paper to attempting publication, I felt writing could no longer be deemed a hobby after experiencing the rejections, multiple times of my work. After some thought, I realized writing can be a pleasant pastime; that some write for the sheer joy of the experience. Never seeking publication, only enjoying the mind wandering to places they would never have considered. Simply enjoying the process of creativity.
Writing is a hobby until you decide to publish. It is then you crossed the Rubicon. There is no going back. You crossed the line from hobby to profession, and God help you. For unless you are extremely talented, a writing gem hidden from the world, you will most likely experience rejection. The words you consider magnificence will push upon the brick wall of reality.
But if you goal is to become an author you will experience a level of doubt and rejection you never anticipated. But someday, if you carry on, your work will find a home and you are on the road of being an author. The difference between writer and author is perseverance.
You made it!
You’re an author now and the years of writing as a hobby are behind you.
LIVES THAT MATTER
With the recent event on both sides of the spectrum of gun violence I am lost in sadness and anger.
I could say I understand the sentiment behind ‘Black Lives Matter, but as a white man there is no way I can appreciate the tension the black man experiences walking or driving.
Our society has become a gun-toting society out of fear and hate. I’m sick of hearing about mass murders, people of color killed and now those with the mission to protect us slaughtered. Neither side is totally right or totally wrong. After all we are human, prone to mistakes and anger.
What it comes down to is the problem of the acceptance of guns in our country. Even when 20 six year olds were killed in Sandy Hook and robbed of their future, our government does nothing to change gun laws. The massacre in Orlando resulted in the same result. What does it take to make a change of us killing us?
There is a sickness in this country, one born hundreds of years ago and haunts us to this day. In reality, there is more than one sickness and what can we do to cure the disease our society must cure to remain the nation we once were and need to be in the future.
I pray that someday the dedication to ‘Black Lives Matter’ would transition into ‘All Lives Matter’.
Am I a dreamer, or is there hope?
LOIS LANE (NOEL NEILL) HAS DIED
Being a lover of science fiction from an early age, I, of course, watched Superman on TV during the fifties.
I just read that Noel Neill, who played Lois Lane, had died at the age of 95. I had to have watched every episode where Noel Neill playing Lois Lane appeared beside George Reeves playing Superman.
Here are some musings about how that past Superman would have a problem dealing in the current day and age. It struck me, in this day and age, with cellphones the predominate means of communication and phone booths a thing of the past, where in our current society could Superman change?
Also, a pair of glasses was his disguise. I must admit, when I remove my glasses people around me expect me to fly. I continually disappoint them, so far. And also, what would happen if Superman developed a super zit on the tip of his nose? Would taking off his glasses still conceal his identity?
Questions keeping me up some nights. I’m sure they have the same effect on you.
POEMS & FLEETING THOUGHTS: ORLANDO
Once again guns take lives,
Once again talk of gun control
Will fill the media,
And politicians will profess
How they will solve
The problem,
And once again,
Nothing will be done.
THE READING WORLD WAR II WEEKEND
The World War II weekend at the Reading Airport is now history. A short time ago I posted a piece describing the event and providing the date. Along with the information I included my first published short story centered on that weekend event.
After working the mornings of all three days of the event this year, I would like to share some observations.
We had quite a few veterans of that war, along with more recent wars, in attendance. I watched the World War II veterans, mostly in wheelchairs or supported by walkers, make their way through the gate to relive their youth. Although there was one spry 94 year old, who could have passed for 70, come to enjoy the show and I’m sure relive a time long gone. I tried to imagine what life was like when they were young men, in a foreign country, facing death any day. And what life must have been like for the civilians. In this day and age, could we muster the dedication on the scale to defeat the evil foe of that era?
These gallant men, participants belonging to the great greatest generation, rapidly dwindling, need to reveal their experiences. If you know a participant of that war, gently try to persuade them to talk of their experiences. Some are just waiting for someone to ask.
Also, if you know someone who lived during that era on the home front, ask them to share their experiences during that stressful time.
Their history needs to be preserved while we can still touch it.
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