You remember the line from Risky Business... "Sometimes you just have to say what the heck." Or something along those lines... ;) The last two days I've been feeling the spirit of mischief sweeping over me and telling me to do things and say things that I've been keeping bottled up for a while. This is dangerous. These are the sorts of paths that once you start down them, you don't know where they'll take you. Some might take you in good directions, some in bad. I read on Facebook today that an old friend, David Johnson, was going "All In" in pursuit of his career. That's the sort of feeling this is - that reckless kind where you take a flyer on your life and let the chips fall where they may.
This morning I was reading of people standing in the middle of the street protesting the California Supreme Court's ruling on Prop. 8 and they were being arrested. And I suddenly thought, "Why am I not being arrested?" Nevermind the fact that I'm not that overwrought with emotion on either side of this issue, the feeling was, "Why can't I get that passionate about something that I would be arrested for it?" Why am I not committing acts of social justice? Reckless thoughts... thoughts that interfere with my normal life.
I'm constantly amazed at the faith shown by Ariel Vanderhorst over at Bittersweet Life. Straight out of compton (or Seminary, whichever...) he started up a new Church Plant in Downtown K.C.. And after all this time, its roots are finally beginning to find solid soil. Granted, this is God's doing, but to have the faith to take up such a challenge with a family and kids, is simply wonderful.
I'm also profoundly jealous of the wisdom of Randall Sherman over at Hinterland. Though we might not always agree in life, I can never fault his logic nor his wisdom. I admire the fact that he keeps reciting his beliefs in a straightforward and logical way that makes my responses sound foolish or shrilly emotional. I find myself agreeing with him even when I don't want to and I strongly suspect that he's right more often than I am. I remember in boot camp when I first arrived and the recruits in the final week looked at us and universally offered us encouragement, "You can do it! If I can make it, you can!" When I finally reached the final week of boot camp, I found myself offering the same advice to the new recruits. I see the esteemed Mr. Sherman as my final week boot camp advice. I may not understand it yet, or agree with it, but I know that in a little while, I'll be parroting it back to others.
Maybe these feelings shall pass. Maybe I'll quickly return to a point where I am in control of my life and continue to proceed cautiously. But in recent weeks I've thrown in my hat for a trip to Kenya that I can not afford and have agreed to preach a sermon without any concept of what I'm going to say. Today I dropped a reality bomb on my Director and then I requested a new friendship with an old flame on Facebook. None of these things make any sort of logical sense. Everyone of them is rocking my boat and sending me down uncharted paths.
And I don't care... I'm tired of being in control. I'm ready to take this life for a spin and see where I end up. Fear is still there, but for now, mischief is in control and I've no idea where its taking me. All I know is that if I can have the faith of Ariel and the wisdom of Randall, I should be okay. If not, there's always the shrill and the emotional. They've worked so well for me before!
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
The Sermon Part Three
Everything is going perfectly. I spent the entire day not thinking about the sermon at all. My brain, which has been a bit of mush the last couple of days, is resting.
The resting of your brain is an important step in the writing process. This is the part of the process that in cooking would be the equivalent to sitting on the couch watching TV while the water boils. It's a chance to kick your feet up and think happy thoughts about the work yet to come. Usually, in the writing process, I use this period to think about other projects while I let my ideas simmer. Eventually, I'll ease my brain back on to the subject and it'll usually smell delicious and almost ready to eat. Then I know I'm ready to write.
But more importantly, its just a chance to let your brain lie fallow for a few days. You can visit people, see movies, share a laugh or two, and not constantly be thinking of some project in the back of your mind.
So, no sermon news today. Just me and the latest DVD of MI-5 from Netflix to occupy my cavernous and breezy mind. Good times... good times!
The resting of your brain is an important step in the writing process. This is the part of the process that in cooking would be the equivalent to sitting on the couch watching TV while the water boils. It's a chance to kick your feet up and think happy thoughts about the work yet to come. Usually, in the writing process, I use this period to think about other projects while I let my ideas simmer. Eventually, I'll ease my brain back on to the subject and it'll usually smell delicious and almost ready to eat. Then I know I'm ready to write.
But more importantly, its just a chance to let your brain lie fallow for a few days. You can visit people, see movies, share a laugh or two, and not constantly be thinking of some project in the back of your mind.
So, no sermon news today. Just me and the latest DVD of MI-5 from Netflix to occupy my cavernous and breezy mind. Good times... good times!
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
The Sermon Pt. 2
When I write a novel, I find that I know the story and all the events that go into it long before I really hear the voice of the main character. Sometimes I can go three quarters of the way through the story before finding that voice. And then, of course, I have to go back and rewrite everything. I'm expecting this to be much the same.
There is a certain voice that needs to be heard in this sermon. Its not my voice. Its not your voice. Its God's voice. When it comes down to it, my journey is about finding God and I must make it clear that it was God that was leading me the entire time (not that I was smart enough to always follow him - NO, WILL, YOUR OTHER LEFT! ;) I have now written the opening paragraph of my sermon about 100 times in my head in four days. None of these paragraphs worked. They were all well written. Any one of them could have been the beginning to my story. None of them, however, had the right voice. Indeed, the hardest part to writing anything is finding the right voice. But when its a novel, I'm just looking for a certain point of view, a certain manner of narration, that matches the story I'm writing. In a sermon, I'm looking for something infinitely more wonderful.
Hearing that voice is never easy. Can you imagine the author that was given the task to write something in the Bible? I mean Paul had it easy. He was just writing a letter to another church. That the letters turned out well can be seen in the fact that they're in the Bible. Can you imagine if someone were to approach you and say, "I need five pages that we're going to put in the Bible." I'm sorry, but that's just a little pressure there. Yet, whether its five pages for the Bible, a letter to the early church, or a ten minute sermon, the voice is always going to be the same. The hard part then is not the writing, but the listening.
God has a tendency of dropping subtle hints to me (probably because anything more abrupt would fry my precious neurons). I've at least finally learned to keep an open mind that things that don't make sense, or thoughts that seem bizarre to me, probably have a deeper meaning that I haven't yet considered. I store these thoughts and observations in the back of my mind, much the same way that plot threads and bits of character dialog tend to collect back there. The back of my mind is the attic of my brain. Eventually God will drop the big bombshell on me and suddenly, like a fresh ray of light into a darkened tomb, all of those little pieces that I've been storing back there will be illuminated and I'll finally figure out some new little piece of the puzzle.
So God has been challenging me lately with trying to come to terms with Jesus's divinity. And then I started having thoughts about how I was getting tired of reading all of those "notes" at the bottom of my Training Bible and was ready to just enjoy the Word without the expert commentary. And then a while later I thought that perhaps I'd finally reached a point where I was sick of "learning" about the Bible and that maybe I was ready to experience it. Then I had a vision of me walking in Kenya, which led me to realize that I was going to Kenya, which started to galvanize all these pieces together (I'm a lot slow on the uptake) which finally led to this invitation to deliver a sermon... and like the Get Behind Me Satan, Peter, I still stood there with a blank expression on my face and a look of incomprehension - "Who? Me?" until God finally delivered the message all non-challant like, "Maybe you could, I don't know, talk about your journey or something... wink... wink... wink!"
BOOYA! OH, NOW I GET IT!
I'm in good company when it comes to spiritual smarts. I figure St. Peter and I are definitely going to get some fishing done whenever I join them in Heaven (catch and release, of course ;) We'll probably drink a beer or two and talk about our love of the stooges. Of course, I'll be talking about the film stars, he'll be talking about the other apostles ;)
Anyway, I'm a little slow on hearing God's voice, but I've at least learned to be patient. He'll continue to drop pieces in my lap and let me sort through them at my own pace and eventually I should be able to do a reasonable facsimile of God's voice in my sermon. And then, when I deliver it, there will probably be a spiritual brother or sister out there who might hear it and have a tiny little thought implanted in the back of their brain, or even, God-willing, a big BOOYA moment of their own.
In the meantime, ears open, brain clear (as if that's hard) and I'm off to trying to hear God's word for me.
There is a certain voice that needs to be heard in this sermon. Its not my voice. Its not your voice. Its God's voice. When it comes down to it, my journey is about finding God and I must make it clear that it was God that was leading me the entire time (not that I was smart enough to always follow him - NO, WILL, YOUR OTHER LEFT! ;) I have now written the opening paragraph of my sermon about 100 times in my head in four days. None of these paragraphs worked. They were all well written. Any one of them could have been the beginning to my story. None of them, however, had the right voice. Indeed, the hardest part to writing anything is finding the right voice. But when its a novel, I'm just looking for a certain point of view, a certain manner of narration, that matches the story I'm writing. In a sermon, I'm looking for something infinitely more wonderful.
Hearing that voice is never easy. Can you imagine the author that was given the task to write something in the Bible? I mean Paul had it easy. He was just writing a letter to another church. That the letters turned out well can be seen in the fact that they're in the Bible. Can you imagine if someone were to approach you and say, "I need five pages that we're going to put in the Bible." I'm sorry, but that's just a little pressure there. Yet, whether its five pages for the Bible, a letter to the early church, or a ten minute sermon, the voice is always going to be the same. The hard part then is not the writing, but the listening.
God has a tendency of dropping subtle hints to me (probably because anything more abrupt would fry my precious neurons). I've at least finally learned to keep an open mind that things that don't make sense, or thoughts that seem bizarre to me, probably have a deeper meaning that I haven't yet considered. I store these thoughts and observations in the back of my mind, much the same way that plot threads and bits of character dialog tend to collect back there. The back of my mind is the attic of my brain. Eventually God will drop the big bombshell on me and suddenly, like a fresh ray of light into a darkened tomb, all of those little pieces that I've been storing back there will be illuminated and I'll finally figure out some new little piece of the puzzle.
So God has been challenging me lately with trying to come to terms with Jesus's divinity. And then I started having thoughts about how I was getting tired of reading all of those "notes" at the bottom of my Training Bible and was ready to just enjoy the Word without the expert commentary. And then a while later I thought that perhaps I'd finally reached a point where I was sick of "learning" about the Bible and that maybe I was ready to experience it. Then I had a vision of me walking in Kenya, which led me to realize that I was going to Kenya, which started to galvanize all these pieces together (I'm a lot slow on the uptake) which finally led to this invitation to deliver a sermon... and like the Get Behind Me Satan, Peter, I still stood there with a blank expression on my face and a look of incomprehension - "Who? Me?" until God finally delivered the message all non-challant like, "Maybe you could, I don't know, talk about your journey or something... wink... wink... wink!"
BOOYA! OH, NOW I GET IT!
I'm in good company when it comes to spiritual smarts. I figure St. Peter and I are definitely going to get some fishing done whenever I join them in Heaven (catch and release, of course ;) We'll probably drink a beer or two and talk about our love of the stooges. Of course, I'll be talking about the film stars, he'll be talking about the other apostles ;)
Anyway, I'm a little slow on hearing God's voice, but I've at least learned to be patient. He'll continue to drop pieces in my lap and let me sort through them at my own pace and eventually I should be able to do a reasonable facsimile of God's voice in my sermon. And then, when I deliver it, there will probably be a spiritual brother or sister out there who might hear it and have a tiny little thought implanted in the back of their brain, or even, God-willing, a big BOOYA moment of their own.
In the meantime, ears open, brain clear (as if that's hard) and I'm off to trying to hear God's word for me.
Monday, May 18, 2009
The Sermon Part One
Last Thursday, my Pastor took me aside and asked me if I'd be willing to do the sermon on June 14th. Now, normally, at this point I'd probably say something like, "Sure." After all, I'm asked all the time to read scripture or sing or play bells or help set up chairs or make coffee or deliver a message or run an ice cream social - tons of things. And, beyond that, I've been writing steadily since second grade. So no big deal. No sweat. I'll just whip that puppy out and... I just stood there, my eyes bugging out, my head breaking into a sweat, and a nervous laugh escaping from my mouth. ME? Seriously? A sermon? What the heck would I say? What the heck would anyone want to hear from me?
"We've noticed that you've had quite a journey the last year and we thought you might want to share it."
Hmmm... well... there's that. I mean, in the last twelve months I've been to Reno on a business trip, Alaska on vacation, Mississippi on a mission trip, and Idaho on a fishing trip. I've written, produced, edited, and premiered a film. I've stopped being a youth leader. I've served my final year as a stat man for basketball. I've finished my second go around with school. Um... pretty par for the course for me, but to others, it might seem like quite a bit of living in 12 months.
Still, what would I say about those things? A laundry list of deeds is one thing, meaning behind that list are another. I told my Pastor that I'd think about it and then I went home.
By the time I'd gotten home, I was filled with this giddy sense of adventure. God was calling me to write a sermon knowing darn well the sorts of things I like to say! It was like proof that not only did God exist but that deep down at heart, He was a geek just like me! I immediately began to brainstorm ideas.
Songs popped into my head first, as they always do when I'm thinking of God. I have a tendency of thinking in terms of cultural references - movies, books, songs - and when it comes to religion, I will just burst into song, "Great is the Lord!" or "Holy, Holy, Holy!" or "Jesus is the rock and he rolls my blues away!" (Okay, maybe not that last one ;) I know some people experience music as this holy devout way to connect to God and therefore they have very strong opinions about the kinds of music that should be played in church. I experience music the same way today that I experienced it as a kid - COOL! I'm sorry. I just love to sing. Any song. Anywhere. If it gets caught on my tongue, its going to get sung! And since most of the songs that I know off the top of my head happen to be Christian songs, that's mostly what I sing on a daily basis.
So, my first thought was to do a sing-a-long sermon. I'd make a point and illustrate it with song, getting the entire congregation to sing along with me on these tunes that we all know and love - like a campfire sing-a-long. I'd like to say that I quickly nixed this idea but I still think it holds a certain amount of fascination for me.
My second thought was that my journey was some sort of epic adventure leading me ever onward in a quest to find Jesus. Closer to the truth, perhaps, without quite so much epicicity. I imagined breaking out my bullwhip and entering the church to the sweeping refrains of the Raiders of the Lost Ark theme song. If Adventure has a Christian name, it must be Yahweh! Williana Robison and the Christian Path! Now playing!
The various ideas tickled me and I had a big smile on my face for a good twenty four hours. Finally, I decided that clearly something that made me this happy could be nothing other than heaven sent - a well received command from God. Despite the fact that I still don't have a clue what to say or what anyone would want to hear from me, I have gone ahead and agreed to do the sermon on June 14th.
Tomorrow, I'll discuss scripture, as my ever expanding quest for a decent sermon continues.
"We've noticed that you've had quite a journey the last year and we thought you might want to share it."
Hmmm... well... there's that. I mean, in the last twelve months I've been to Reno on a business trip, Alaska on vacation, Mississippi on a mission trip, and Idaho on a fishing trip. I've written, produced, edited, and premiered a film. I've stopped being a youth leader. I've served my final year as a stat man for basketball. I've finished my second go around with school. Um... pretty par for the course for me, but to others, it might seem like quite a bit of living in 12 months.
Still, what would I say about those things? A laundry list of deeds is one thing, meaning behind that list are another. I told my Pastor that I'd think about it and then I went home.
By the time I'd gotten home, I was filled with this giddy sense of adventure. God was calling me to write a sermon knowing darn well the sorts of things I like to say! It was like proof that not only did God exist but that deep down at heart, He was a geek just like me! I immediately began to brainstorm ideas.
Songs popped into my head first, as they always do when I'm thinking of God. I have a tendency of thinking in terms of cultural references - movies, books, songs - and when it comes to religion, I will just burst into song, "Great is the Lord!" or "Holy, Holy, Holy!" or "Jesus is the rock and he rolls my blues away!" (Okay, maybe not that last one ;) I know some people experience music as this holy devout way to connect to God and therefore they have very strong opinions about the kinds of music that should be played in church. I experience music the same way today that I experienced it as a kid - COOL! I'm sorry. I just love to sing. Any song. Anywhere. If it gets caught on my tongue, its going to get sung! And since most of the songs that I know off the top of my head happen to be Christian songs, that's mostly what I sing on a daily basis.
So, my first thought was to do a sing-a-long sermon. I'd make a point and illustrate it with song, getting the entire congregation to sing along with me on these tunes that we all know and love - like a campfire sing-a-long. I'd like to say that I quickly nixed this idea but I still think it holds a certain amount of fascination for me.
My second thought was that my journey was some sort of epic adventure leading me ever onward in a quest to find Jesus. Closer to the truth, perhaps, without quite so much epicicity. I imagined breaking out my bullwhip and entering the church to the sweeping refrains of the Raiders of the Lost Ark theme song. If Adventure has a Christian name, it must be Yahweh! Williana Robison and the Christian Path! Now playing!
The various ideas tickled me and I had a big smile on my face for a good twenty four hours. Finally, I decided that clearly something that made me this happy could be nothing other than heaven sent - a well received command from God. Despite the fact that I still don't have a clue what to say or what anyone would want to hear from me, I have gone ahead and agreed to do the sermon on June 14th.
Tomorrow, I'll discuss scripture, as my ever expanding quest for a decent sermon continues.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Beach Blanket Pacifica
Ever since a certain Beach closed up shop for a technological time out, strange things have been happening - unnatural things. First, Manny Ramirez gets caught for drugs and gets a 50 game suspension. (How do you even manage that in this day and age? That'd be like a Credit Card company going bankrupt because it forgot to raise its rates...) Second, a new Star Trek comes out and completely alters the entire Star Trek universe - a universe that has survived everything from conquest by Twitter fiends (or as we fans like to call them - The Borg) to a dearth of whales. Yet, hand the reigns over to the disciples of Rimbaldi and wham bam thank you bad robot, everything is changed lickety-split. And third, LOST manages to implode and explode my brain at exactly the same moment causing me to see white where there was once only black.
Is it just me, or does the Universe need to have its balance restored? Is it my destiny to get Andy to start blogging again? Do I need to travel back in time and blow him up before he starts twittering thus preventing this whole need to take time off from blogging in the first place? I don't know... but I wrote down the answer in a journal and I'm going to consult that right now...
Is it just me, or does the Universe need to have its balance restored? Is it my destiny to get Andy to start blogging again? Do I need to travel back in time and blow him up before he starts twittering thus preventing this whole need to take time off from blogging in the first place? I don't know... but I wrote down the answer in a journal and I'm going to consult that right now...
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Wolverine vs. Watchmen
You probably already know what I'm going to say about this... and you'd be wrong. Watchmen is the single greatest comic book series in history - in fact, its one of the single greatest works of fiction of the last 100 years. Wolverine is a great comic book character, but the writers of this particular movie, will be lucky to not be nominated for a Razzie. And yet... and yet...
When I saw Watchmen earlier this year it was naturally with a bit of curiosity. How had they translated one of the greatest stories ever told into the movie? A dense multilayered look at the psychology and need for superheroes and supervillains in our society and what, realistically, might have happened had they ever been real - did not translate well onto the big screen. Changes that were made to shorten the complex narrative didn't work, and as they related to the end of the film, that meant that the end of the film didn't work. And the Ultimate truth of film is that you can't have a film without an ending. I didn't hate Watchmen, but I did feel that the exercise of making it had been in vain.
Wolverine, on the other hand, has been kicked and dragged through the mud by pundits and fans alike. Essentially an origin story for our favorite adamantium clawed mutant, Wolverine delves into his past and tells his story. There are flourishes and gusto and battles and soap operaish moments and, overall, Wolverine as a film is like a comic book. And, as such, I actually dug it.
There were moments in Wolverine that didn't make any sort of film sense - like the part where Wolvie and a recently introduced hero fight (ostensibly because of a misunderstanding over who Wolvie was working for). If this had been a film, I would have pulled out my hair and said, "That doesn't make any sense!" But as a long time reader of comics, it made perfect COMIC sense. Heroes fight each other all the time. Nobody gets hurt because really the writers and artists just want to see what would happen if Spiderman and Captain America took each other on, for instance. Things like this would be excised out of a good movie script. But not in Wolverine. One gets the impression that the writers of this flick not only understand comic book writing, but embraced it for this film. The scenes, as written, convey that feeling of the panel and the dialog bubbles and even the dramatic lighting and posing. There's not a single frame of this movie that you couldn't snip out and paste directly into a comic book.
So, really, for a change you could skip the film and just read the comic book adaption and get the same thing. And yet, here again is one of the reasons I dug Wolverine. No comic book would have ever told such a straight forward origin story for Wolverine. This was like someone taking and editing five years of comics into a single coherent storyline and selling it for the same 99 cents as any other issue. When I was a kid reading comics and imagining the great movies that could be made from them, this was more in line with my thinking. I wasn't thinking, let's make an artistic masterpiece like last year's Dark Knight, I was thinking, "Let's take this comic book that I'm reading and make it bigger, longer, and more complete." That's exactly what Wolverine is... a bigger, longer, and more complete comic movie.
And the winner is... Wolverine... almost.
I have to knock them for one of the all time worst endings ever! Not the ending you see in real time, but the ending they tack on to the end of film after the credits roll (I understand there are two different versions, but the one I saw was bad enough for both of them). Last summer, Marvel Films made a great move by tacking on extra endings to Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk. These endings were there to introduce the idea of SHIELD and the AVENGERS. Great ideas and well executed. In Wolverine's ending, we see our hero (sans memory) in a bar in Japan. The waitress asks Wolvie if he's drinking to forget and he replies, "No... I'm drinking to remember." Huh? WTF?! That was the whole scene. Not only did it not make any freaking sense, there wasn't any damn reason to wait through all the credits for it. It added NOTHING! NOTHING, DAMN IT! So, Wolverine loses a point for having the worst ten seconds of film in history and then tacking it on to a place of geek film honor - after the credits - so that all of the character's die hard fans can be fully exposed to it. Someone needs to go back to editing school.
In the end, I'll have to give them a tie. Niether film will I watch again. Neither film will I buy on DVD. But I mostly enjoyed the experience of both films. I just enjoyed Wolverine a lot more... until the very end.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
I'm Not LOST At All!
My mind is just getting battered this week and I wanted to share some quick thoughts with you on the things that are beating me senseless.
First - LOST - I'm really enjoying the heck out of this show. This season especially has played right into my wheelhouse of pleasure - time travel. Before I became an uber-blogger, and before I attempted to write my first novel, I spent three years writing short stories around one theme - time travel. In that time I probably spent the equivalent of months bashing through every possible time travel theory you could invent. So when I see a complex and compelling time travel story, I just get all gooey inside. Its like having all the fun of writing a really complex time travel series without any of the work or headaches. Much more enjoyable to let someone else try and figure out all that continuity and keep it straight. So for me, LOST is awesome. My Dad, on the other hand, is completely... well, LOST. And I don't blame him cause I'm guessing that the average person might find some of the show hard to follow. Not me, though, I've already been there and done that.
Second - Novel #2 - which I'm really enjoying the heck out of writing because... yep, you guessed it, its all about time travel! It's a complex and compelling time travel story with tons of continuity to keep straight. But for those of you who might assume that I'm being somehow inspired by LOST, I've been trying to write this story for years. But last summer I finally found the piece of the puzzle that I'd been missing and its all finally falling into place. I just finished the final reveal chapter last night, so the only thing left is to wrap up the synopsis and begin the actual writing. I can't wait!
Third - God - Aside from the Kenya trip which weighs on my mind constantly, I have been having a hard time associating with God lately and I finally figured out that my intellectual stumbling block is based on a Character trait that I can't wrap my brain around. In many depictions of Jesus that are not Biblical in nature, we see Jesus as a caring, loving, guy - a leader of men who also happens to be the son of God. So, in my mind, I'm picturing the sort of guy we all like to hang around - only better. Take your best friend, scrub out all the swear words, drinking, and carousing, and add a touch of humility, kindness, and compelling leadership, and that's basically the Jesus I depict. That Jesus is easy to see walking around the Holy Land with a group of 12 guys doing their thing, joking around, bonding, etc... But then, there's the other Jesus - the one who is the son of God, the Most High, the revered and worshiped and praised! The Jesus that bends every knee and collects every hallelujah! Its not that I can't picture Him... I can. Easily. Its that I can't reconcile the two together. I can't picture a guy swapping jokes with his friends one second and being the object of total submission and praise the next. Anyway, this is something I need to work through, but this stumbling block has been on my mind a great deal lately and its something I'm trying to reconcile... whenever I'm not traveling backwards or forwards or sideways in time, that is.
First - LOST - I'm really enjoying the heck out of this show. This season especially has played right into my wheelhouse of pleasure - time travel. Before I became an uber-blogger, and before I attempted to write my first novel, I spent three years writing short stories around one theme - time travel. In that time I probably spent the equivalent of months bashing through every possible time travel theory you could invent. So when I see a complex and compelling time travel story, I just get all gooey inside. Its like having all the fun of writing a really complex time travel series without any of the work or headaches. Much more enjoyable to let someone else try and figure out all that continuity and keep it straight. So for me, LOST is awesome. My Dad, on the other hand, is completely... well, LOST. And I don't blame him cause I'm guessing that the average person might find some of the show hard to follow. Not me, though, I've already been there and done that.
Second - Novel #2 - which I'm really enjoying the heck out of writing because... yep, you guessed it, its all about time travel! It's a complex and compelling time travel story with tons of continuity to keep straight. But for those of you who might assume that I'm being somehow inspired by LOST, I've been trying to write this story for years. But last summer I finally found the piece of the puzzle that I'd been missing and its all finally falling into place. I just finished the final reveal chapter last night, so the only thing left is to wrap up the synopsis and begin the actual writing. I can't wait!
Third - God - Aside from the Kenya trip which weighs on my mind constantly, I have been having a hard time associating with God lately and I finally figured out that my intellectual stumbling block is based on a Character trait that I can't wrap my brain around. In many depictions of Jesus that are not Biblical in nature, we see Jesus as a caring, loving, guy - a leader of men who also happens to be the son of God. So, in my mind, I'm picturing the sort of guy we all like to hang around - only better. Take your best friend, scrub out all the swear words, drinking, and carousing, and add a touch of humility, kindness, and compelling leadership, and that's basically the Jesus I depict. That Jesus is easy to see walking around the Holy Land with a group of 12 guys doing their thing, joking around, bonding, etc... But then, there's the other Jesus - the one who is the son of God, the Most High, the revered and worshiped and praised! The Jesus that bends every knee and collects every hallelujah! Its not that I can't picture Him... I can. Easily. Its that I can't reconcile the two together. I can't picture a guy swapping jokes with his friends one second and being the object of total submission and praise the next. Anyway, this is something I need to work through, but this stumbling block has been on my mind a great deal lately and its something I'm trying to reconcile... whenever I'm not traveling backwards or forwards or sideways in time, that is.
Monday, April 27, 2009
The Road
"What I want to know is what's next? If I do this, how far do I go?"
Profoundly deep and personal questions asked of no one in particular on a journey down a long road by a good friend of mine. The answers, I suspect, will come in due time. But the timing of these questions of concern over a path whose end cannot be seen came to me right as I stood at a crossroads in my own life, and right after I had finally gained the answer that I knew I would find.
When I reached the end of my last path it was March of 2000. I had been with Century Theatres for nearly 9 years by that point and knew that I could no longer bide my time with them any longer. Without having any clue what I would do next, I wrote out my two weeks notice and handed it in. At that time, I had only a vague notion of the God that would walk with me over the next part of my journey.
Within a week I had a new job - one that afforded me weekends for the first time since I'd left High School. I decided to go back to church, having existed in that gray area of the unchurched for far too long by that point. Soon I made a commitment to myself to start reading the Bible - something I'd never done before in any meaningful way. I committed to one chapter a night. I wondered to myself if I'd ever be able to keep that up. After a couple of months, I found myself being drawn to the Lakeside choir and to bell ringing. I'd had no intention of doing either ever again. Then there was a new opening in the previously well staffed youth group. I volunteered to fill it. I had no idea what I was getting into. A few months after that, I was asked to sit on the church's governing body. I considered it carefully, but eventually accepted the position.
During the three years I was on the governing body, my church was rocked with scandals, three clergy people and one music director left before we were able to call a new minister, and I found myself not only assisting the youth group, but actually leading it. I was tempted to leave many times, but I stuck with this rocky road because God had called me to it. It was three of the most difficult years in my life.
My leadership of the youth led me to some special relationships. Two of the youths approached me and wanted to make a movie. I said, okay. We made a movie. It sucked. So I went back to film school to figure out a way to make the movie better. Three years later, I finished my first film and have plans to make more.
After seven years as youth leader at my church, I finally felt called to lay down the leadership of the youth in order to go in a different direction - where, I didn't know. This January, I joined fellow church members on a mission trip to Pearlington, MS to help rebuild homes and lives left devastated by Katrina. I ended up gaining so much more than I gave. When I got back to church, I knew I couldn't wait another year to get involved again. I looked around and found another group that was planning to help street children in Kenya.
Kenya? What the heck did I know about Kenya? Wait just one second here... what's next? If I do this, how far down this road will I go?
I went to the meetings and watched the movies. I tried to figure out what it was that I was supposed to do here. They needed someone to film something... okay, but it didn't feel right - not my calling. I jumped at the opportunity to help plan the trip to Kenya by a small group of volunteers. Trip planning is something I'm good at and something I enjoy. Why, I'm planning three trips of my own over the next three years to Florida and Europe and... what's one more trip to plan? Was this what God wanted me to do? Was this going to be a short journey after all?
Less than half an hour before I heard those words uttered yesterday, I had a vision. I was walking down a dusty road. People were passing me on both sides - women carrying large jars on their heads and men dressed in loose cotton shirts and wearing shorts and sandals. I had a group of small children running in my wake carrying a soccer ball. And I knew that I was in Kenya and that my heart was full of love and peace and understanding.
No, my dear Will, you do not get to stay home and help others go to Africa. You must go to Africa and feed my sheep.
So, sometime next January or February, I will board a plane for Kenya. I don't have a darn clue how I'm going to pay for it. I don't have a darn clue what I'm going to do there. I don't know what this means for my job or my plans or anything else. But I've seen it happen. I will walk that road because that is where I am called.
Profoundly deep and personal questions asked of no one in particular on a journey down a long road by a good friend of mine. The answers, I suspect, will come in due time. But the timing of these questions of concern over a path whose end cannot be seen came to me right as I stood at a crossroads in my own life, and right after I had finally gained the answer that I knew I would find.
When I reached the end of my last path it was March of 2000. I had been with Century Theatres for nearly 9 years by that point and knew that I could no longer bide my time with them any longer. Without having any clue what I would do next, I wrote out my two weeks notice and handed it in. At that time, I had only a vague notion of the God that would walk with me over the next part of my journey.
Within a week I had a new job - one that afforded me weekends for the first time since I'd left High School. I decided to go back to church, having existed in that gray area of the unchurched for far too long by that point. Soon I made a commitment to myself to start reading the Bible - something I'd never done before in any meaningful way. I committed to one chapter a night. I wondered to myself if I'd ever be able to keep that up. After a couple of months, I found myself being drawn to the Lakeside choir and to bell ringing. I'd had no intention of doing either ever again. Then there was a new opening in the previously well staffed youth group. I volunteered to fill it. I had no idea what I was getting into. A few months after that, I was asked to sit on the church's governing body. I considered it carefully, but eventually accepted the position.
During the three years I was on the governing body, my church was rocked with scandals, three clergy people and one music director left before we were able to call a new minister, and I found myself not only assisting the youth group, but actually leading it. I was tempted to leave many times, but I stuck with this rocky road because God had called me to it. It was three of the most difficult years in my life.
My leadership of the youth led me to some special relationships. Two of the youths approached me and wanted to make a movie. I said, okay. We made a movie. It sucked. So I went back to film school to figure out a way to make the movie better. Three years later, I finished my first film and have plans to make more.
After seven years as youth leader at my church, I finally felt called to lay down the leadership of the youth in order to go in a different direction - where, I didn't know. This January, I joined fellow church members on a mission trip to Pearlington, MS to help rebuild homes and lives left devastated by Katrina. I ended up gaining so much more than I gave. When I got back to church, I knew I couldn't wait another year to get involved again. I looked around and found another group that was planning to help street children in Kenya.
Kenya? What the heck did I know about Kenya? Wait just one second here... what's next? If I do this, how far down this road will I go?
I went to the meetings and watched the movies. I tried to figure out what it was that I was supposed to do here. They needed someone to film something... okay, but it didn't feel right - not my calling. I jumped at the opportunity to help plan the trip to Kenya by a small group of volunteers. Trip planning is something I'm good at and something I enjoy. Why, I'm planning three trips of my own over the next three years to Florida and Europe and... what's one more trip to plan? Was this what God wanted me to do? Was this going to be a short journey after all?
Less than half an hour before I heard those words uttered yesterday, I had a vision. I was walking down a dusty road. People were passing me on both sides - women carrying large jars on their heads and men dressed in loose cotton shirts and wearing shorts and sandals. I had a group of small children running in my wake carrying a soccer ball. And I knew that I was in Kenya and that my heart was full of love and peace and understanding.
No, my dear Will, you do not get to stay home and help others go to Africa. You must go to Africa and feed my sheep.
So, sometime next January or February, I will board a plane for Kenya. I don't have a darn clue how I'm going to pay for it. I don't have a darn clue what I'm going to do there. I don't know what this means for my job or my plans or anything else. But I've seen it happen. I will walk that road because that is where I am called.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
When Networks Attack!
Here is the problem with this country in a nutshell. You know those commercials on TV that show the guy with his Cell Phone network walking around (Verizon, I believe)? You know, everywhere he goes he allegedly has about ten million people following him because he's connected to them all through this mythical network. While that seems like a fantasy, in some cases it can be very real, and that's the problem.
Miss California apparently discovered that the hard way. She was asked a question about Gay Marriage. She responded in the way that she believed. Everyone in her "network" immediately jumped up and said, "You Go Girl!" Everyone in the other "network" immediately shunned and vilified her. The two "networks" then started attacking each other. Words were exchanged. Then fists. Then it was a carnal blood bath of Biblical proportions like a giant media fueled dog fight. At the center of it all, one young woman expressing her opinion like she's done a million times before, who probably had no concept that her network was standing behind her, rabid, and itching for a fight. Nor that the other side was hiding in the shadows waiting for the exact same thing.
Its easy to see how most people in this country are a little gun shy about expressing their real opinions when large networks roam around ready to take the fight to them at any second. Every turn of phrase, every opinion expressed, even well conceived arguments for or against any subject out there is likely to set one or the other network off causing mass catastrophe over the simplest of words.
What started as a spot on parody about the rabid nature of Americans on South Park has unfortunately become a reality. Discourse is now a blood sport.
To be fair, a pageant contestant isn't exactly hiding herself from world opinion. She shouldn't be naive enough to assume that every word she says and every gesture she makes won't be immediately analyzed by the people that seem to care about this stuff. But having a rabid argument over pumps or high heels is a bit different than starting world war three because of a beauty queen's opinion on gay marriage.
Seriously, President Obama needs to have a giant Bong-In for the entire country and just tell us all to Mellow Out Already! That would be a great way to spend our stimulus money! (Oh... and it wouldn't hurt the California economy either ;)
Miss California apparently discovered that the hard way. She was asked a question about Gay Marriage. She responded in the way that she believed. Everyone in her "network" immediately jumped up and said, "You Go Girl!" Everyone in the other "network" immediately shunned and vilified her. The two "networks" then started attacking each other. Words were exchanged. Then fists. Then it was a carnal blood bath of Biblical proportions like a giant media fueled dog fight. At the center of it all, one young woman expressing her opinion like she's done a million times before, who probably had no concept that her network was standing behind her, rabid, and itching for a fight. Nor that the other side was hiding in the shadows waiting for the exact same thing.
Its easy to see how most people in this country are a little gun shy about expressing their real opinions when large networks roam around ready to take the fight to them at any second. Every turn of phrase, every opinion expressed, even well conceived arguments for or against any subject out there is likely to set one or the other network off causing mass catastrophe over the simplest of words.
What started as a spot on parody about the rabid nature of Americans on South Park has unfortunately become a reality. Discourse is now a blood sport.
To be fair, a pageant contestant isn't exactly hiding herself from world opinion. She shouldn't be naive enough to assume that every word she says and every gesture she makes won't be immediately analyzed by the people that seem to care about this stuff. But having a rabid argument over pumps or high heels is a bit different than starting world war three because of a beauty queen's opinion on gay marriage.
Seriously, President Obama needs to have a giant Bong-In for the entire country and just tell us all to Mellow Out Already! That would be a great way to spend our stimulus money! (Oh... and it wouldn't hurt the California economy either ;)
Monday, April 20, 2009
Important News!
Skinny People To Blame For Global Warming and High Medical Costs - (TAC)
It has been clearly proven in a study that athletically skinny people are to blame for most of societies ills, not overweight people as has been reported in the past.
"It's just a case of the blind leading the blind," says Dr. Knotso Fast, lead investigator of the study, "Skinny people clearly want to see the world through their eyes and therefore anyone not like them must be to blame for all of societies troubles. This is clearly the worst miscarriage of scientific justice since the scientific community tried to claim that smoking pot lead to violent crimes."
In this study, it was clearly shown that an increased range of activity such as skiing, snowboarding, skydiving, skateboarding, wakeboarding, windsurfing, bungee jumping, strenous excercise, bicycling, etc... actually lead to more accidents and deaths, and higher doctor's bills, than the combined effects of diabetes, heart disease, and other illnesses related to obesity.
"Its worst than that," Dr. Fast added, "Because these people tend to live longer and thus generate all the medical bills of geriatric people as well. If they were to develop a fine case of heart disease, say, they'd cut off at least ten years of medical costs at the end of their lives."
In addition, the study clearly proved that while obese people need more fuel to move their added mass around, thus increasing their impact on global warming, their lack of movement in general more than offset the cost of the additional mass.
"These people just don't move... that's the whole reason they're obese in the first place," Dr. Fast explained, "They don't hike or swim or play golf or soccer and, therefore, they don't drive to all of those locations. Generally, the fitter you are, the more active you are, and the more active you are, the greater your carbon footprint. Clearly this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black."
As well, the fact that obese people tend to die younger means that their lifelong carbon footprint ends up being much smaller in the long run and doesn't add to the problems of over-population.
"If you were to read those other reports, you would be left with the conclusion that the best thing for Planet Earth would be for everyone to be fit, young, fertile and blessed with an overabundance of opportunities to procreate - and that's the worst possible scenario for earth. Believe it or not, obese people are doing us all a favor by dying young. We should encourage more obesity, not less."
Clearly, Dr. Fast's study has not been received well by the 90210-ish scientific community, but he's not concerned.
"Someday my research will be regarded as visionary."
It has been clearly proven in a study that athletically skinny people are to blame for most of societies ills, not overweight people as has been reported in the past.
"It's just a case of the blind leading the blind," says Dr. Knotso Fast, lead investigator of the study, "Skinny people clearly want to see the world through their eyes and therefore anyone not like them must be to blame for all of societies troubles. This is clearly the worst miscarriage of scientific justice since the scientific community tried to claim that smoking pot lead to violent crimes."
In this study, it was clearly shown that an increased range of activity such as skiing, snowboarding, skydiving, skateboarding, wakeboarding, windsurfing, bungee jumping, strenous excercise, bicycling, etc... actually lead to more accidents and deaths, and higher doctor's bills, than the combined effects of diabetes, heart disease, and other illnesses related to obesity.
"Its worst than that," Dr. Fast added, "Because these people tend to live longer and thus generate all the medical bills of geriatric people as well. If they were to develop a fine case of heart disease, say, they'd cut off at least ten years of medical costs at the end of their lives."
In addition, the study clearly proved that while obese people need more fuel to move their added mass around, thus increasing their impact on global warming, their lack of movement in general more than offset the cost of the additional mass.
"These people just don't move... that's the whole reason they're obese in the first place," Dr. Fast explained, "They don't hike or swim or play golf or soccer and, therefore, they don't drive to all of those locations. Generally, the fitter you are, the more active you are, and the more active you are, the greater your carbon footprint. Clearly this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black."
As well, the fact that obese people tend to die younger means that their lifelong carbon footprint ends up being much smaller in the long run and doesn't add to the problems of over-population.
"If you were to read those other reports, you would be left with the conclusion that the best thing for Planet Earth would be for everyone to be fit, young, fertile and blessed with an overabundance of opportunities to procreate - and that's the worst possible scenario for earth. Believe it or not, obese people are doing us all a favor by dying young. We should encourage more obesity, not less."
Clearly, Dr. Fast's study has not been received well by the 90210-ish scientific community, but he's not concerned.
"Someday my research will be regarded as visionary."
Friday, April 17, 2009
THIS JUST IN!
The Bush Administration had terror suspects tortured. Oh my God... who would have thought?!
I admit to being on the fence about President Obama for the past three months. I don't know a fiduciary fund from a fickle finger of fate and you've got plenty of expert naysayers on both sides telling us the bailout was one or the other. So, no comment. I just don't have a clue whether this bailout and budget will work or not, but I know that its too early to max out my credit card just yet. So, for the most part, the President's performance for the first three months has been average - which is just fine.
But over the last week or so, I've become increasingly impressed. First, the way he let the Navy handle the Pirate situation means doom and gloom for the pirates. Quite frankly, I'm not entirely sure why we didn't handle the whole thing over to the Navy Seals as a training exercise a long time ago. Here boys, have some bullets and have at 'em. But when push came to shove, we not only saved the life of an American hero, but we showed the rest of the world that Navy Seals are bad ass once again! And all the President had to do was get out of the way. Good President. Smart President.
Next, he defied conventional wisdom with regards to Cuba by being the first person to acknowledge that our "blockade" of Cuba hadn't done diddly squat to bring about the end of communism in that nation. I'm surprised that the Reaganite Repubs hadn't figured this out years ago. What brought down the Berlin Wall? Was it rampant militarism and constant vigilance? Or was it the desire of young, easily impressionable and revolutionary aged, kids for blue jeans and rock and roll? The American Brand is extremely seductive and totally corruptive. We need to export it like the plague! Instead of dropping bombs on North Korea, we should drop IPODS and Girls Gone Wild videos. The President seems to recognize that any chink in that wall that keeps US goods out of Cuba will allow us to corrupt that nation's youth faster than a full fledged invasion of Cuba with nothing but Navy Seals. OOH RAH!
And finally, the President did something that neither the last two Presidents could do. He moved past partisan bickering and Congressional hearings, and just went ahead and came to his own conclusion about governmental wrongdoing. Instead of bogging down Congress with endless hearings and political posturing about who was doing the right thing and when, President Obama simply released the reports on torture during the previous administration. And then he pardoned everyone involved. Nobody is going to jail. The nation takes its well-deserved black eye and then moves on. And the sooner we all forget about it, the sooner it becomes history. Imagine if they'd taken that approach with the Mitchell report? Heck, we might not even be in this current economic tailspin had Congress been more concerned with the economy than with whether A-Rod was injecting a banned substance into his rear to get another 50 feet on his home run!
Now, to be fair, there are a fair number of intelligence implications of these reports being revealed. However, I think the implications pale in comparison to the knowledge that these things were done. And believe me, the people who were having this done to them, already knew, and already hate us. So, I'm not sure that the downside is all that large. After all, if you want to convince the rest of the world that the bad old days are behind us, the first thing you have to do is wash your hands of those practices and allow everyone to see that you have a clean slate. In the end, I think we are actually safer than we were yesterday because we've taken our first real steps towards combating that perception in the rest of the world that America is evil and hypocritical. They may not like what we stand for, but at least they'll know that we do keep our word and cherish our laws.
So, for now, I'm saying that President Obama has impressed me this week. I don't know that I'll always be on his side, but so far, he hasn't stumbled in my opinion. And eventually, I think he might even quiet some of the polarizing vitriol in this country - which would be a great legacy for any president.
I admit to being on the fence about President Obama for the past three months. I don't know a fiduciary fund from a fickle finger of fate and you've got plenty of expert naysayers on both sides telling us the bailout was one or the other. So, no comment. I just don't have a clue whether this bailout and budget will work or not, but I know that its too early to max out my credit card just yet. So, for the most part, the President's performance for the first three months has been average - which is just fine.
But over the last week or so, I've become increasingly impressed. First, the way he let the Navy handle the Pirate situation means doom and gloom for the pirates. Quite frankly, I'm not entirely sure why we didn't handle the whole thing over to the Navy Seals as a training exercise a long time ago. Here boys, have some bullets and have at 'em. But when push came to shove, we not only saved the life of an American hero, but we showed the rest of the world that Navy Seals are bad ass once again! And all the President had to do was get out of the way. Good President. Smart President.
Next, he defied conventional wisdom with regards to Cuba by being the first person to acknowledge that our "blockade" of Cuba hadn't done diddly squat to bring about the end of communism in that nation. I'm surprised that the Reaganite Repubs hadn't figured this out years ago. What brought down the Berlin Wall? Was it rampant militarism and constant vigilance? Or was it the desire of young, easily impressionable and revolutionary aged, kids for blue jeans and rock and roll? The American Brand is extremely seductive and totally corruptive. We need to export it like the plague! Instead of dropping bombs on North Korea, we should drop IPODS and Girls Gone Wild videos. The President seems to recognize that any chink in that wall that keeps US goods out of Cuba will allow us to corrupt that nation's youth faster than a full fledged invasion of Cuba with nothing but Navy Seals. OOH RAH!
And finally, the President did something that neither the last two Presidents could do. He moved past partisan bickering and Congressional hearings, and just went ahead and came to his own conclusion about governmental wrongdoing. Instead of bogging down Congress with endless hearings and political posturing about who was doing the right thing and when, President Obama simply released the reports on torture during the previous administration. And then he pardoned everyone involved. Nobody is going to jail. The nation takes its well-deserved black eye and then moves on. And the sooner we all forget about it, the sooner it becomes history. Imagine if they'd taken that approach with the Mitchell report? Heck, we might not even be in this current economic tailspin had Congress been more concerned with the economy than with whether A-Rod was injecting a banned substance into his rear to get another 50 feet on his home run!
Now, to be fair, there are a fair number of intelligence implications of these reports being revealed. However, I think the implications pale in comparison to the knowledge that these things were done. And believe me, the people who were having this done to them, already knew, and already hate us. So, I'm not sure that the downside is all that large. After all, if you want to convince the rest of the world that the bad old days are behind us, the first thing you have to do is wash your hands of those practices and allow everyone to see that you have a clean slate. In the end, I think we are actually safer than we were yesterday because we've taken our first real steps towards combating that perception in the rest of the world that America is evil and hypocritical. They may not like what we stand for, but at least they'll know that we do keep our word and cherish our laws.
So, for now, I'm saying that President Obama has impressed me this week. I don't know that I'll always be on his side, but so far, he hasn't stumbled in my opinion. And eventually, I think he might even quiet some of the polarizing vitriol in this country - which would be a great legacy for any president.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
The Year We Make Contact
Russia and the US are about to destroy each other with nuclear weapons. A member of the crew has died. The mysterious monolith continues to taunt them from the orbit of Jupiter. The crew of the Discovery is still dead. And now, they have to take a slow trip back to Earth with the previously homicidal HAL-9000 in charge of the ship and their life support functions. Things couldn't look bleaker.
And then a message... "Something's going to happen." "What? What's going to happen?" "Something WONDERFUL!"
This scene from "2010" is probably one of my favorite moments from all Sci-Fi movies because it speaks of seemingly incomprehensible hope in the face of impenetrable darkness.
I said it last year and I'll say it again. Economic recession, wars, personal disasters, and all the incredible bad news that seems to be piling up around us; and I can't help but sharing this message that I keep receiving...
"Something's going to happen. Something WONDERFUL!"
I know I must be crazy. I know that I can't see a few months in front of me because of the darkness crowding around my own life. But I still can't shake the feeling, the almost certainty, that great things are just around the corner.
Keep the faith! Keep the hope! And be assured of wonderful times ahead!
And then a message... "Something's going to happen." "What? What's going to happen?" "Something WONDERFUL!"
This scene from "2010" is probably one of my favorite moments from all Sci-Fi movies because it speaks of seemingly incomprehensible hope in the face of impenetrable darkness.
I said it last year and I'll say it again. Economic recession, wars, personal disasters, and all the incredible bad news that seems to be piling up around us; and I can't help but sharing this message that I keep receiving...
"Something's going to happen. Something WONDERFUL!"
I know I must be crazy. I know that I can't see a few months in front of me because of the darkness crowding around my own life. But I still can't shake the feeling, the almost certainty, that great things are just around the corner.
Keep the faith! Keep the hope! And be assured of wonderful times ahead!
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
The Big Story In The Little Box
About nine months ago I dreamt up the entire plot of my second novel. It literally came to me in a single day. I started thinking up ideas and then I wrote them down in four pages of notes and the next thing I knew, I had the entire story.
All I had to do was flesh it out a bit.
Nine months later and I'm just now reaching the end of the synopsis. So, a few things happened along the way that did delay the writing. One was the movie. That took up a huge chunk of time. But the other was the realization that this plot was so darned complicated that I had to tread lightly and deftly while writing it or I would end up writing myself into a corner, or worse, make some illogical leap in the story structure that would cause my readers to groan and put the book down.
The good news is that I've actually worked through all the kinks, finally, and am racing again at breakneck speed towards the end. The even better news is that I didn't have to compromise any of the fun or the action of this book in order to weave such a complex plot. This story sizzles along from Howland Island in the Pacific (that's a hint) to the fall of Shanghai, Berlin in the 30's, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and an explosive finale that you will never see coming. There is romance, action, Nazi's, conspiracies, and plenty of swashbuckling to go around.
All this in only 24 chapters and about 280 pages (estimated). As soon as the synopsis is done, I'll start straight away into the first draft of the story. I'm guessing two drafts because it might take me a while to get just the right tone for the characters.
And tonight, we're starting the actual script for film #2 - still tentatively titled, Dane. So, I said that I would take a semester off from film to write and so far, that's exactly what I'm doing.
Writing keeps the realities of the world at bay. When I'm writing I can imagine my life any way I want it to be, and that means no wars, no murders, no crappy TV, and no financial recession. For those of you struggling with the problems of this world, I would suggest sitting back with a good book or a good pen and paper. Either way, you will be transported to a world away from your own for a while, like a mini-vacation. Then you can come back to the real world refreshed and ready to rumble.
All I had to do was flesh it out a bit.
Nine months later and I'm just now reaching the end of the synopsis. So, a few things happened along the way that did delay the writing. One was the movie. That took up a huge chunk of time. But the other was the realization that this plot was so darned complicated that I had to tread lightly and deftly while writing it or I would end up writing myself into a corner, or worse, make some illogical leap in the story structure that would cause my readers to groan and put the book down.
The good news is that I've actually worked through all the kinks, finally, and am racing again at breakneck speed towards the end. The even better news is that I didn't have to compromise any of the fun or the action of this book in order to weave such a complex plot. This story sizzles along from Howland Island in the Pacific (that's a hint) to the fall of Shanghai, Berlin in the 30's, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and an explosive finale that you will never see coming. There is romance, action, Nazi's, conspiracies, and plenty of swashbuckling to go around.
All this in only 24 chapters and about 280 pages (estimated). As soon as the synopsis is done, I'll start straight away into the first draft of the story. I'm guessing two drafts because it might take me a while to get just the right tone for the characters.
And tonight, we're starting the actual script for film #2 - still tentatively titled, Dane. So, I said that I would take a semester off from film to write and so far, that's exactly what I'm doing.
Writing keeps the realities of the world at bay. When I'm writing I can imagine my life any way I want it to be, and that means no wars, no murders, no crappy TV, and no financial recession. For those of you struggling with the problems of this world, I would suggest sitting back with a good book or a good pen and paper. Either way, you will be transported to a world away from your own for a while, like a mini-vacation. Then you can come back to the real world refreshed and ready to rumble.
Thursday, April 09, 2009
Musings From The Left Coast
Don't have anything profound to say, especially after having read the wonderful post from Musings From The Hinterland that can be found here. Compared to such a poetically thought out logic piece, I gladly accept my place in the intellectual pantheon as a boot-licker. ;) No, but seriously, Randall's summation of the Garden at Gethsemane was thrilling in its implications and a wonderful picture of the true nature of Holy Week.
Beyond that, Andy at Mile From The Beach is no longer allowed to attend Giants games - not because he lost last night's game to Milwaukee, but because he allowed the opposing PITCHER to hit a three run homer off Hall-of-Famer, Randy Johnson. On a two strike, two out pitch nonetheless. Clearly, at the very least, he should remove his Giants hat and burn it as a sacrifice to appease the Baseball God and maybe he should find some baseball virgin and take them to a game and toss them to the Garlic Fries. Something must be done to remove this stain on his baseball soul.
Speaking of truly strange religions and mystical implications, LOST is getting wonderfully good as it hurtles towards its season Five ending. I love the fact that it can both show you something completely new and yet leave you completely befuddled about what it all means. Which gets me to an idea for a category that my Dad and I came up with yesterday...
What is the WORST possible way for LOST to end? I mean aside from the obvious It Was All A Dream... what would be the nightmare ending for a show that has captivated its viewers from the very beginning with its mysteries upon mysteries? What would be the one thing at the heart of the puzzle that would make you toss your TV out the window so that you could enjoy watching it smash into tiny pieces on the ground below?
I'll take your answers in the comments below.
Beyond that, Andy at Mile From The Beach is no longer allowed to attend Giants games - not because he lost last night's game to Milwaukee, but because he allowed the opposing PITCHER to hit a three run homer off Hall-of-Famer, Randy Johnson. On a two strike, two out pitch nonetheless. Clearly, at the very least, he should remove his Giants hat and burn it as a sacrifice to appease the Baseball God and maybe he should find some baseball virgin and take them to a game and toss them to the Garlic Fries. Something must be done to remove this stain on his baseball soul.
Speaking of truly strange religions and mystical implications, LOST is getting wonderfully good as it hurtles towards its season Five ending. I love the fact that it can both show you something completely new and yet leave you completely befuddled about what it all means. Which gets me to an idea for a category that my Dad and I came up with yesterday...
What is the WORST possible way for LOST to end? I mean aside from the obvious It Was All A Dream... what would be the nightmare ending for a show that has captivated its viewers from the very beginning with its mysteries upon mysteries? What would be the one thing at the heart of the puzzle that would make you toss your TV out the window so that you could enjoy watching it smash into tiny pieces on the ground below?
I'll take your answers in the comments below.
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
Get A Rope!
I'm normally against the Death Penalty because I don't think it actually solves anything and is questionable on moral grounds. Still, when I hear about an 8 year old girl being killed and dumped into a pond inside a suitcase, it gets my dander up. If someone were to come through my office now ready to deputize a posse, I'd be the first one to sign up (well, I might have to stand in line...). There are times for frontier justice... and this feels like one of those times!
Thursday, April 02, 2009
Perfection
Today is the day I give up my long struggle to be perfect.
As in most things in my life, I have been proceeding under the false assumption that by playing fair, following my coaches advice, and working hard, I would achieve perfection. I have struggled day in and day out to do the right thing while others around me struggled to get ahead by any means necessary. We have all been seeking the same glory. And we have all failed.
But now my thinking has undergone a radical conversion based upon a simple mathematical formula. Glory can not be achieved by seeking perfection, but only in perfection itself. We can never be perfect, therefore we can never reach perfection. The only way to reach glory is to have it given to us by someone who has achieved it. He will give it freely to all who ask PROVIDED that they admit their mistakes and ask forgiveness for them. Since only those with mistakes can ask for forgiveness, anyone seeking perfection is not seeking glory.
Therefore, I have decided to abandon my long struggle to be perfect and will instead use my time seeking something else. Whatever that something else is, I'm bound to suck at it... gloriously.
As in most things in my life, I have been proceeding under the false assumption that by playing fair, following my coaches advice, and working hard, I would achieve perfection. I have struggled day in and day out to do the right thing while others around me struggled to get ahead by any means necessary. We have all been seeking the same glory. And we have all failed.
But now my thinking has undergone a radical conversion based upon a simple mathematical formula. Glory can not be achieved by seeking perfection, but only in perfection itself. We can never be perfect, therefore we can never reach perfection. The only way to reach glory is to have it given to us by someone who has achieved it. He will give it freely to all who ask PROVIDED that they admit their mistakes and ask forgiveness for them. Since only those with mistakes can ask for forgiveness, anyone seeking perfection is not seeking glory.
Therefore, I have decided to abandon my long struggle to be perfect and will instead use my time seeking something else. Whatever that something else is, I'm bound to suck at it... gloriously.
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
The Process Begins Again
Last night, Vagabond Pictures reached an important new milestone - the completion of the synopsis of our second film, "Dane". For those who aren't familiar with the process of writing a film, there are certain steps you follow before a film is complete. Each step reveals a little bit more about the project. After coming up with an idea (first step), a very basic beginning, middle and end are figured out (step two), and then the entire story is fleshed out from beginning to end in a very basic Good guy shoots Bad guy type format which is called the Synopsis (third step). At this point, the writers know the entire story from beginning to end. So now, if you were to ask me what it was about, I could tell you with much more confidence.
In house building terms, the synopsis would be the framing. It doesn't look anything like a house, but its the structure upon which everything relies. If the framing is screwed up, the house will fall down before its finished. So in terms of writing, the synopsis might just be the most important part.
The next step in "Dane" will be to take the synopsis and scene by scene flesh it out into a script. In the first draft of the script, we will give voice to the characters, describe their movements, and start to visualize the look of the film (locations, time of day, important props, etc...) And then in subsequent drafts of the script, we will simply refine the script until we have exactly the story we want.
Ironically, the completion of the script is only one third of the story creation process. The story gets further refined during the actual filming as Director, Actors, and Crew work to bring nuance and meaning to the words. And then the story gets its ultimate polish when it goes to Post Production and editing, sound, and music are added to make the film a real world that you can visit for the duration of the story. But no matter how much additional polishing that will be done to the story, at its core you will still find the structure created by the synopsis.
We've created the story... now begins the process of making the film.
(Oh, and did I mention we want to start filming in June... so, the next part might be a little rushed. ;)
In house building terms, the synopsis would be the framing. It doesn't look anything like a house, but its the structure upon which everything relies. If the framing is screwed up, the house will fall down before its finished. So in terms of writing, the synopsis might just be the most important part.
The next step in "Dane" will be to take the synopsis and scene by scene flesh it out into a script. In the first draft of the script, we will give voice to the characters, describe their movements, and start to visualize the look of the film (locations, time of day, important props, etc...) And then in subsequent drafts of the script, we will simply refine the script until we have exactly the story we want.
Ironically, the completion of the script is only one third of the story creation process. The story gets further refined during the actual filming as Director, Actors, and Crew work to bring nuance and meaning to the words. And then the story gets its ultimate polish when it goes to Post Production and editing, sound, and music are added to make the film a real world that you can visit for the duration of the story. But no matter how much additional polishing that will be done to the story, at its core you will still find the structure created by the synopsis.
We've created the story... now begins the process of making the film.
(Oh, and did I mention we want to start filming in June... so, the next part might be a little rushed. ;)
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
The Line on the Horizon is Red Ink
Here is my fiscally sound economic strategy.
1) If I don't buy the latest U2 Album, I will save money.
2) However, since I know that if I go online to Itunes, I will probably buy the latest U2 Album, I will not go on Itunes and be tempted... thus I will save money.
3) If however, I hear the latest U2 Album on the radio, I will likely be tempted to visit Itunes and buy the latest U2 Album, therefore, I will stop listening to the radio and will not go on Itunes and not be tempted... and I will save money.
4) On the other hand, if I hear someone humming the latest U2 Album, I will wonder what they are humming, turn on my radio, hear the latest U2 Album, go to Itunes and buy the latest U2 Album, therefore, I will put my fingers in my ears so that I can't hear anyone humming the latest U2 album, and will not turn on the radio, go to Itunes, and buy the latest U2 album... and money will be saved.
5) I am not aware of it, but there is a slight chance that I might be able to read the lips of someone singing a U2 song, and not recognizing the words, unplug my fingers from my ears to hear the tune, leading me to the radio to hear the song, then going to Itunes and downloading the latest U2 album, therefore I will pluck out my eyes and... AAAAAIIIIIGGGGHHHHHH!!! That hurts! Okay... I will wear extremely dark sunglasses, put my fingers in my ears, not turn on the radio, not go onto Itunes, and not download the latest U2 album... thus saving myself a fortune and dooming the entire world economy.
Dang you, U2, for causing this economic crisis!
1) If I don't buy the latest U2 Album, I will save money.
2) However, since I know that if I go online to Itunes, I will probably buy the latest U2 Album, I will not go on Itunes and be tempted... thus I will save money.
3) If however, I hear the latest U2 Album on the radio, I will likely be tempted to visit Itunes and buy the latest U2 Album, therefore, I will stop listening to the radio and will not go on Itunes and not be tempted... and I will save money.
4) On the other hand, if I hear someone humming the latest U2 Album, I will wonder what they are humming, turn on my radio, hear the latest U2 Album, go to Itunes and buy the latest U2 Album, therefore, I will put my fingers in my ears so that I can't hear anyone humming the latest U2 album, and will not turn on the radio, go to Itunes, and buy the latest U2 album... and money will be saved.
5) I am not aware of it, but there is a slight chance that I might be able to read the lips of someone singing a U2 song, and not recognizing the words, unplug my fingers from my ears to hear the tune, leading me to the radio to hear the song, then going to Itunes and downloading the latest U2 album, therefore I will pluck out my eyes and... AAAAAIIIIIGGGGHHHHHH!!! That hurts! Okay... I will wear extremely dark sunglasses, put my fingers in my ears, not turn on the radio, not go onto Itunes, and not download the latest U2 album... thus saving myself a fortune and dooming the entire world economy.
Dang you, U2, for causing this economic crisis!
Monday, March 30, 2009
The short and short of it... A Trip Summary!
I was sitting on a warm sandy bank of the Salmon River, wearing a heavy coat, but warm and content. A half empty bottle of cool beer sat next to me in a slightly carved out section of the bank. My fishing pole lay next to me, cold water still glistening on the line that I had just removed from the river. In front of me, the river flowed by downstream, right to left. I watched as my friend's (Russ) bobber drifted lazily by hoping to see that familiar tug that indicated a fat Steelhead had just bit on the hook. I smiled - content and happy and completely void of all thoughts of work, family, and the daily grind. Fat, happy flakes of snow floated by as yet another small flurry wafted gently around us, dropping white dandruff all over my heavy coat. I was completely unaffected by its cold or wetness and could only enjoy it for the beauty of its design. Across the river, about two hundred feet away, a herd of mountain Big Horn Sheep grazed on the free wild mountain grass of the lower slope of a mountain. They were visiting the lower elevations while their normal homes were being covered in fresh white powder. I watched the sheep butt heads over a few fine tufts of grass and thought of the wonder and miracle of Idaho.
On the way home on Friday, we passed a field of fallow land covered by a herd of Elk at least 300 strong. We had to stop our truck and wait as a small family unit of 20 or so Elk crossed the road in front of us.
My fishing pole remained empty for the entire seven days I was in Idaho, but I had the fishing trip of a lifetime. Planning your next trip? Might I suggest the Land of the Yankee Fork in central Idaho? Your cell phones won't work. Your radios won't work. The fishing might suck. But you will not find a better place to recharge your batteries.
On the way home on Friday, we passed a field of fallow land covered by a herd of Elk at least 300 strong. We had to stop our truck and wait as a small family unit of 20 or so Elk crossed the road in front of us.
My fishing pole remained empty for the entire seven days I was in Idaho, but I had the fishing trip of a lifetime. Planning your next trip? Might I suggest the Land of the Yankee Fork in central Idaho? Your cell phones won't work. Your radios won't work. The fishing might suck. But you will not find a better place to recharge your batteries.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Deep Thoughts Before A Fishin' Trip
I read this headline on AOL:
Proof that tiny reality star actually eats.
And here is a breakdown of my thoughts:
Wait... what is a reality star? Is that some sort of pulsar that exists in one plane of reality but not in others? And why is it so tiny? And what kind of matter is it eating? I mean, if its tiny, I can see why astronomers might not have...
Oh, wait... its just another darn People Magazine story. Never mind. Apparently I had left my astrophysicist filter on my brain this morning.
I need a vacation.
And on that note, I'm off to wintery Challis, Idaho for a week of sitting on the bank of the mighty Salmon river while getting snowed upon and watching the river allegedly filled with fish float by in front of my hard rock perch. Oh, and I'll be eating hot dogs and drinking beer while enjoying all this outdoorsy scenery and fresh air - to which I say, there's a reason I go back year after year for more! Have a great 11 days while I'm gone.
Will
Proof that tiny reality star actually eats.
And here is a breakdown of my thoughts:
Wait... what is a reality star? Is that some sort of pulsar that exists in one plane of reality but not in others? And why is it so tiny? And what kind of matter is it eating? I mean, if its tiny, I can see why astronomers might not have...
Oh, wait... its just another darn People Magazine story. Never mind. Apparently I had left my astrophysicist filter on my brain this morning.
I need a vacation.
And on that note, I'm off to wintery Challis, Idaho for a week of sitting on the bank of the mighty Salmon river while getting snowed upon and watching the river allegedly filled with fish float by in front of my hard rock perch. Oh, and I'll be eating hot dogs and drinking beer while enjoying all this outdoorsy scenery and fresh air - to which I say, there's a reason I go back year after year for more! Have a great 11 days while I'm gone.
Will
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