A Puzzle And A Haiku Have A Baby

I'm getting a kick out of writing these microstories. This first one was like figuring out a puzzle. How do I create a full scene with each tweet when I have less than characters? The answer: graph paper and loads of rewrites.

I've fallen in love with Sharpie Liquid Pencils. I know it's an erasable pen, but the ink looks really pencilly, and after about 24 hours it's indelible. That means lots of working time for rewrites and no smudgy notes. Yay Sharpie!

Twit Lit? What do you call a story told in Tweets?

I listened to an Accidental Creative podcast yesterday. The show was an interview with Noah Scalin, who created the Skull-a-Day blog. I was really inspired by his project and decided to create one of my own . I'm going to tweet a super short story every day for a year and a day (love the fairy tale-ishness of that). Some tweets will be complete stories, others will be just a portion of a tweet series. Tweet-tastic I'm psyched.

What's Next?

I'll have the next short story ready to upload by the end of May. I finally have a working title that I might keep : Seeds of Fate. It's part of a quotation from Harry S. Truman;  "Actions are the seed of fate deeds grow into destiny." I'm still open to another title, but this was the one that evoked the theme of the story for me. 

This story takes place in the world of my novel many years in the past. I'm kind of toying with the idea of fate. Are certain events predestined? Can we influence our destiny? If we can to what degree?

Speaking of predestination, tomorrow is May 21, the projected date of the "Rapture," sort of a kick off party to the Christian doomsday. The excitement this latest end of the world scenario has ignighted (the second by Harold Camping btw) makes me think a lot of people believe in predestination.

Is there a date set for the end of the world in a cosmic outlook calendar? I don't know, but I'd like to think we are free to create our own destinies both individually and collectively as a species. In any case, as an eclectic pagan, I don't have to worry about being kidnapped naked by a supernatural being.  Wow, doesn't that sound like the plot of a paranormal romance?

The Great Saunter 2011

Last Saturday I participated in the Great Saunter, a 32 mile hike around the perimeter of Manhattan sponsored by the Shorewalkers.

I arrived at W 42nd St., in time for the late start at 9:30 am, then set off on the greenway.  Bright, cool, and breezy it was a perfect day for a long walk.

I've spent the last few months working through Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way and Walking In This World with a group of friends. One of the tools Cameron suggests for artists is the Artist walk, a 20 minute walk where you just observe your own thoughts and the world. For me, the Great Saunter was an artist walk on steroids.

Starting at the Circle Line terminal brought back the time my parent's took me and my sister to Bear Mountain for a picnic. I think I was about 5 or 6 years old.

I passed the Intrepid Air Sea Space museum. I visited it for the first time last summer and got to meet a veteran who served on the ship. He told me the story of how he rode out a typhoon on board the Intrepid  during WWII.

It was great to slow down and really enjoy the parks and greenways.

 

There were little moments of surprise and delight every where. I even saw just a bit of the views that inspired the Hudson River School painters of the 19th century.

I called it a saunter at around 1:15 pm when there was a short burst of rain. By then I'd pass through Dewitt Clinton Park, Riverside Park, West Harlem Piers Park, Riverbank State Park and walked 7 miles of NYC Greenways.

I left the greenway at W158 st and Riverside Drive. The beauty of living in NYC is that you can spend the day walking through green spaces and still pop out just a few blocks from a subway station. I got the #1 at W 157 st and Broadway and headed for home tired, but refreshed at the same time.

My next urban hiking adventure is to walk the next leg of the greenway from W158 st to the Little Red Light House in Inwood.

Next year I'm walking all 32 miles of the Great Saunter.

I feel like Rocky

I saw a quotation today that really inspired me:

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”--Theodore Roosevelt

Self-Published

Last month I started a small publishing company(Triskelion Enterprises) and published my first short story, Spirit Wolf: A Short Story. The experience was a little nerve wracking, but exciting as hell. Today, a friend saw the story on Amazon after googling me, and she said that it looked like a real book. That made my day.