IDENTITY CRISIS

More from The Fishing Trip. Setup: Inside a hotel room, Durham watches the news to learn of  the reactions to his latest escapade. 
    Durham, Roman, Mason or whatever anyone chose to call him, put the heels of his feet on the coffee table and leaned back in his chair. He chewed on fries, surfed through TV channels and watched the newscast for the fourth time in one evening. Nothing had changed. For sixteen straight hours every bit of free broadcasts had been on the fire and the ‘tragic’ end of six guiding lights in the community.  No matter what channel or news outlet he turned to no one gave even a small inkling of believing the explosion and burning of the cabin in the woods was more than a freak accident. The main focus had been on the personal lives of the men killed in the explosion. They were being heralded and recognized for the good they had performed in society. Cried over by the wives who were obviously still unaware of the evil that had been removed from their midst.
     When would the truth come to the surface? What had Penny and her husband done with the information he had given them? Had he wasted his time? Promising himself to put the word out on the hidden activities of the Six on Top and if nothing was mentioned within the next eight hours, Durham wiped the grease and salt from his fingertips to the front of his jeans and was in the act of flicking off the television when he spied a familiar face in the crowd of investigators searching through the rubble of the burnt out building, Mason Valhoun. He would know him anywhere. His old buddy in salvation and his superhero counterpart.  From the ragged scar on his cheek to his deceptively casual stance, nothing about the guy had changed. But wait a minute; stuffing the last bit of fries in his mouth he dropped his feet to the floor and leaned closer to the television’s screen.  He read the banner under Mason’s image, the thump of the wooden chair’s legs barely registering through the shock in his brain. Whoa, had Joshua changed his name?  Not that it mattered, he had changed his own many times, but it had not changed the person he was. But, what cruel act of faith would strike and make him Penny’s husband? What in hell. How had he missed that fact? He admonished himself for his lax in investigation. His job was not a place for haphazard mistakes. Hopefully Penny didn’t have an urge to confide everything to her husband or she would be up a damned creek and on her own because he had driven twelve straight hours across the country to be as far away as possible from the area. Besides, there would be no way to even tie him to anything. Penny didn’t know his real name or even what he really looked like. Hell he had almost forgotten what he really looked like.
Once the braided extensions had been removed, brown contacts flushed down the toilet, and dark hued theater makeup removed from his skin he didn’t resemble the man named Durham one little bit. He looked in the mirror over the sofa table and rubbed the short reddish-brown curls on the top of his head. The dyed hair did a terrific job of changing his appearance. Add the natural hazel colored eyes and he now looked as if the name Mason could really belong to him. A great new look for a person who may have to make a comeback. I wonder what Joshua Brooke will think of that?   Read more Excerpts: THE FISHING TRIP

Getting To Know Yourself

I saw this picture of myself a family member had posted on Facebook of all places and at first I wondered, who is that? I look at myself once in the morning and never really pay attention to what I look like or who I am. Have you ever wondered who you really are? Whose skin are you really wearing? Are you just your mother’s child? Your husband’s wife? Your children’s mother? Who are you at work? Church? With your acquaintances? It’s amazing how the skin gets kneaded and transformed when peer pressure is pushing on you. From the day of birth we are constantly trying and somehow succeeding in changing ourselves to fit into whatever skin that is pushed our way. Lately I am having the hardest time trying to figure out who I am and what I am supposed to be doing in life. As long as I can remember I wanted to be an artist and then I wanted to write. How happy I was when I realized I could do both. How I fell into the field of childcare I don’t know. I constantly hear how I have a gift from God, this is where and what I am supposed to be doing…yada, yada, blah, blah, blah...you know the words. Over the past few weeks I have been feeling as if my skin has been stretched around this profession by those around me and I am about to pop a thread. I believe writing a blog really helps, because as I write the answers to my thoughts always come forth. It's not that I want to stop working with children it is the knowledge that my world around me is really changing. My main reason for working from home was to be with my daughters. My daughters are remolding me from the 'mommy skin' into the mother skin. The youngest has graduated from home-school and the middle daughter (my first college graduate, the eldest will graduate soon)has bought her own home. Life has changed. I have been their instructor in life for twenty-six very close years and the new skin that's trying to take over is grating. I feel like I'm a butterfly stuck in between the cocoon and the free world and just like that butterfly I need a moment of rest. 
Last year I'll made 52 and shook out the wrinkles of the new skin and became a whole new me. The me I have always wanted to be. A published writer. I have set my goals in stone and if I have to throw them at this glass wall that's holding me back from the finish line of success, I will.

The Interviewed Character

I am so into the new storyline I have going that I decided to make a trailer to promote the characters. See their interviews at the site-IN THE CHAIR. Here you can read an excerpt.In the meantime, enjoy the show. The new novel is called The Fishing Trip

So Much Like Writing

This is a post of a dog's day. One night I looked at Gracie sleeping on the cold floor in the livingroom and said, Gracie go to bed. She hates sleeping on the bare floor (she will even lay on an envelope to be off the floor), but called herself keeping me company. The old thing got up, stretched and began walking upstairs.  Every once in a while looking back like a little kid with that 'why?' stare. She is so funny. After watching her I also thought about how determined she is when she wants something. Even if it is just to play. It just goes to show we can learn from any and everybody.

We choose our goal.

Work at it until someone pays attention, 

and then enjoy the benefits and the glory.

Life Demands Action

I have (I think) finally found my writing platform. I have read a lot about the need of one and could never really figure out what to build on and now I know. My platform is based on the premise life demands action.

Whether it is nonfiction, YA, picture book, or a novel making a statement will be the goal. There are many things happening in the world which ticks me the hell off. I, as a citizen in the ‘real’ world can’t change society with a flick of my hand, but my laptop keys can kick butt and change fallacies. I can write people to fulfill my dreams. I can have them do what needs to be done and get away with it. .

And because I think a proven rapist (especially of a child) should be caught and beaten to death on the spot and because I am tired of injustices in the judicial system where it seems sexual predators, pedophiles, and deviants have lenient sentences or get away with their crime I wrote The Fishing Trip. where the good guy is the grey matter. I know its not as easy as black and white, but I bet if redemption fell hard on creeps like that, this sort of crime would end quickly, I'm just sayin'. There are other countries that don't play with this part of society. Today I am starting interviews with the characters from THE FISHING TRIP @ In the Chair . 

Come over and get to meet them.

My life demanding action (which must have been festering in my subconscious) caused me to write Beads on a String America's Racially Intertwined History. You can learn all about the reasons behind this enormous feat HERE.

The Perfect Solution which is discussed Here had the first characters to sit In the Chair  .  

These are just a few of my steps unto my platform. I shall be polishing my words, strengthening my platform and building me a bookshelf. Because I shall write the perfect query to the perfect agent and I will need a place to put all my published books.

Writing Your Ego to Hell

For the past few days I have stuck with my goals and stayed off the internet blogs-hard because I see the new posts through twitter and die inside to see the new 'word', but I must get something published or grow very old trying.
I have been outwardly cheering on those shouting with their newly published babies in their hands and beating myself inside for the failure I have had. I want to believe my failure was more than an ego thing.

A few years ago I did get two books published and felt very proud of myself. I had my book signing and sold 27 books on that very day inside the Books-a-Million and 10 more at BN the next weekend. I had an article in essence magazine, and many great reviews. But then I stopped and really READ the final product. It was terrible. Not the story or the premise, but the product and I cried foul. I felt horrible. The company (Publish America) I had chosen to publish the books (through the advice of a horrible agent) had botched up the job. In the contract they promised editing and such, but pages were left out and no editing done.I was heartbroken. I was really torn up when I found out an editor from Ballantine books had been interested in the novel and the agent chose not to go with him. How could he have directed me to such an author mill. I recommend reading  Victoria Strauss' blog-Writers Beware if you want to stay ahead of the game.

It is awesome to have a book published and people congratulating you. You feel as if you have finally done something good and right in the world. It's like being a parent. How proud you are of your accomplishment. And like your child you only want them (it) to be seen in the best light. I told myself I wouldn't want my child ridiculed, mistreated, and put out in ignorance so how could I do it to words from my heart? Especially when they are subjects I believe in? I shot my ego to hell and fought for the return of my contract. I'm mad at myself because now I have doubt in my abilities. Sometimes we just have to take ourselves out of the limelight and start over.

I have learned a lot. Write, rewrite and learn for yourself. Don't run on your ego or you will shoot your own self to hell. My time for redemption is near.

THE FISHING TRIP- Chpt. 5 One For All

A quick view from The Fishing Trip a work in progress.

Scene-Durham is on his way to handle-up on some last minute business before leaving town.

     Durham drove the F150 sixty miles into the woods at thirty miles over the speed limit with the windows down, the cool wind aiding the cigar smoke to swirl through the trucks interior. The sounds of Battle Without Honor or Humility from the Kill Bill movie blaring in the silence of the dark cool night air. This was his theme song. He loved a good challenge and tonight he had a big one, even if he was the only one who knew it.


     The cabin where he was driving was now filled with the sickest single group of sadistic perverts he had ever come across. At the moment they were sitting in a warm fully equipped cabin watching their homemade child porn on a 52 inch flat screen television, drinking and eating and having a laughing good time. They had trusted him when he said he was going to run into town for more supplies. The same way those little children had trusted them. Each of their wives and children had either won a trip or were on sleepovers or pretty much engaged somewhere else for the week. Unaware of how their lives were about to change for the better. Those cretins in the cabin trusted and believed he had wanted to invest in their porno film making business. Durham found it mind numbing how easily it had been to fool people who prided themselves on being cunning and conniving. They thought they had made it to the ‘big times’, an often repeated phrase from the FedEx man as they had fished off what they believed to be his yacht in the middle of the ocean the day before. Durham’s intention had been to blow the boat up in the middle of the water after he had gotten safely away, but when Bertrand began talking and then begging about a wish to own a cabin, Durham began a discussion intimating the pretense of possibly selling. What they didn’t know was, yeah he was selling alright; selling them a bunch of crap and a trip to hell.

     For twenty years he had used the cabin as a way to remind himself of the reasons he did the things he did and the person he really was inside. A superhero, a savior of sorts and not the mad killing machine his stepfather and all of the f’in fathers had turned him into.
   
     The cabin was his protection against the ‘kryptonite of doubt and fear’. He would sit on the porch leaning back on a wooden chair, feet on the rail and smoke a cigarette as he had seen so many men do in the movies, Clint Eastwood especially. He’d sit squint his eyed in the sunset and through the burning smoke of the cigarette, watch the still waters of the lake rolling over the umpteen bodies buried in its depths and smile at the fact they were piled one on top the other and his stepfather was the foundation. The platform for the superhero for children he had become.

     Durham turned off the music as he drew nearer the building. From his vantage point he could see the television through the huge pate glass windows and was sickened over the events occurring on the screen. The sight of a child screaming and crying while being raped and the images of the sorry bastards sitting on the couch and chairs laughing and cheering through the windows fueled his intentions to end their life. They deserved a quick and fitting punishment. Adjusting the gloves on his hands and covering the soles of his boots with plastic bags Durham slid out of the truck.