A quick 500 words.

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No whining? So I have to write without whining? How does that even work? I’m supposed to have this gift rattling around inside of me, but I don’t know how to get the muse to show up at my door. As I get rolling I need to eradicate the BE verb and use action verbs that can stand on their own. The rain fell softly on the tin roof. Wow is that dull. I have lived a life that I do not realize its potential. If I operate on the premise that I am afraid then at least I have somewhere to start from. I am afraid of becoming famous. That much I know. I am no longer afraid of drinking simply because I have had one beer. I am still afraid of visiting a dentist for any reason. I would much rather read a good book than just about anything else. I need to be loved, but I do not really believe that to be true. I don’t seem old enough to be old, but I remember being young s if it were yesterday. I must be in the continuum of middle age. Any day now my pension will kick in safe as houses. Writing is my new gig and I intend to make the most of it. If I can just write one book I will be happy, win a prize or two and make some money…great. Accept phone calls? No way. I have no real need for vanity apart from having a healthy ego. A certain amount of wealth would do very nicely. I remember riding my old red Schwinn bicycle for whole days without using my hands. I can even remember being able to smell Food, trees, breakfast. Now I can breath, but not smell. I would like to be deaf, I have even asked God to strike me deaf, maybe just so I can smell again. Breakfast would be very nice to smell. I used to Spelunk a bit when I was young and doing something other than reading. I have rappelled and enjoyed that very much. I even climbed Der Zugspitze in West Germany, well it was West Germany at the time. I am a Cold War Veteran. I like that. I spend quite a bit of time thinking about Europe, the history of it and the modern dichotomy that espionage makes use of. I visited castles and drove on Der Autobahn. I was also a Scoutmaster in the Boy Scouts of America and was voted into the Order of the Arrow as an adult. The OA is Scouting version of the National Honor Society. I consider it my highest honor. When I mas outprossesing from Hahn Air Base the Education advisor took several looks at my transcript and asked my why I have joined the military as an Enlisted person I had no real answer for her. I finally finished my BA in 2014 majoring in Liberal Arts because I wanted to major in too many things over the years.

Try Again

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Only me, that is what it takes to be a writer. I am the one that can make or break his new life of mine. What I can come up with will be nice to see because I cannot see anything in my mind’s eye when I am typing this apart from the occasional looking up to make sure this is all getting printed off/typed up. I am a big fan o the books by Anne Lammot, Natalie Goldberg, Stephen King, Eudora Welty, Annie Dillard, etc. That’s writing books. Authors that I like, collect, read, and have met include Norman Mailer, Ernest Hemingway, John Ronald Ruel Tolkien, John Steinbeck, Annie Dillard, and William Faulkner. I went through grade school, junior high, and high school without writing one single paper or book report. If you add up all of the papers that I wrote for college it might be over fifty pages, but I doubt it. I simply haven’t written enough and I sure haven’t read enough to even think about becoming a serious writer.

I hope to change all of this very soon when I embark on taking these several courses @ UW. I just went to a four hour class on Science Fiction & Fantasy and on the writing business. I will try to write a thousand or more words every day and see if that gets me up and running again. Only time, and a bunch of writing will tell what I am really made of.

Genealogy

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I have worked long and hard on my family tree. My mom started all of this work back in the 1970’s and gave me copies of what she was able to discover in the early Eighties, but was unable to find a Patriot that we descended from or anything except our “immigrant ancestor” which she said was John Lewis who gave five sons to the American Revolution. We descend from one of his daughters. Over the many years since I have worked on and repaired what she had found and I have even thrown it all out an started again many times. I have two versions of my family tree saved on Ancestry, an almost anything goes version with much of what I have learned and a strict version with only what I can find that record after record supports. I have been doing genealogy for so long that it bores me even to talk about it anymore.

I have traced back to at least 34 Patriots who served in the American Revolution, more on my dad’s side than on my mom’s side, and I have joined the Sons of the American Revolution I intend to maintain that membership for as long as I live. We are in the process of proving a Patriot for my wife, Annie, so that she can join the Daughters of the American Revolution. I have even traced back to the kings and queens of Europe.

I have done dozens of family trees for people. I have traced people back to the Revolution, the Mayflower, Native Americans, and Royalty.

Another 15 minutes

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I start off with a Memoir class in a couple of weeks. I have to follow instructions and write about my past, my past, of a person that I don’t even want to know, me. I really am looking forward to these classes, I just wish I could do them online,but after I graduated from college I said that if I ever do anymore schooling I would do it in person…so we shall see. y problem is that I do not like people and don’t really want to have anything to do with them. What’s next now that I’m retired? I do not know. I just want to get on a motorcycle and ride because that’s all that makes sense to me now that I am faced with the rest of my life. Theo Nestor talks about 26 minute exercises in her book and on her blog. I guess I will look at that before I write again…this afternoon. The best leadership I have ever witnessed was in Scouting followed by the United States Air Force. I saw a company destroy itself over the 0 years that I worked there and I will be very surprised if I have a pension for very long. I am going to give my life, what’s left of it, the best shot I can, but I don’t know what to do from day to day. Holy Catfish I want to go 100 plus on a bike and not give 2 fucks what happens to me. Is that so wrong? I hope and pray that I can stand to be with people for 3 hours out of every week for the next several months. Mouths! That’s what I don’t like about people. Well I have one too so I ill have to learn to live and let live. Just a few minutes to go and I get to do something else! What, I don’t know. I miss many of the people that I have worked with over the years, but I am done with blue collar work for the rest of my life. If I can’t make it on brains then I do not make it. Maybe a little training in the writing arts is what I need. Ciao

Kings

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This is just a quick list of my Royal great-grandparents.

English: Henry VIII, Henry VII, Edward IV, Edward III, Edward II, Edward I, Henry III, John, Henry II, Henry I, Matilda, Stephen, William the Conqueror, Harold II, Edmund II Ironside, Aethelred II the Unready, Edgar the Peaceful, Edmund I the Magnificent, Edward I the Elder, Alfred the Great, Aethelred I, Aethelwulf, Egbert.

Scottish: James I, Robert III, Robert II, Robert the Bruce, Alexander II, William I the Lion, David I the Saint, Donald III Bane, Malcolm III Canmore, Duncan I the Gracious, Malcolm II, Kenneth II, Malcolm I, Donald II Dasachtach, Constantine I, Kenneth MacAlpin.

Education

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When I was a child I found out that school was fascinating and that the possibilities were endless. The more I found out, the more I wanted to know, and the world became fascinating. Junior high was the last time I felt free to learn any and all things. By high school, our choices were being limited to the point that I felt it was a waste of time. College is when you find out that there are limits as to what you can do in a lifetime. Your friends take different courses from you and you find out that some colleges just don’t have majors you are interested in. When a high flyer decides to go to graduate school the end is in sight. The world is no longer amazing with unlimited vistas…you now have to concentrate on what amounts to what can fit on the end of pin. I kept changing my major because I didn’t like being limited. My major went from Psychology, to Literature, to Mathematics, and finally to History. I finished with a Liberal Arts degree with three minors. Perhaps I should have stuck with my initial plan. University of London AB in Philosophy where I would teach myself philosophy and sit for all of my proctored exams at the end. It seems that I need some structure though, so I ended up taking twenty five standardized tests and having my results forwarded to Excelsior College in New York, a state I have yet to visit. In less than one month I will start a series of writing classes in hopes of becoming a writer and in earning a writing certificate…and in becoming an alumni of the University of Washington. Writing Practice every day from here out as per Natalie Goldberg.

Liberal Until

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I was a Liberal until about six months into Bill Clinton’s reign of terror. At that point I realized that I was a blind Liberal no more and really started doing my own research and finding out the truth behind the fiasco of that presidency. I have Bill & Hillary to thank for becoming a Conservative and for wanting to pursue my education.

Try Until

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When we were all very small our parent(s) made us try until we succeeded in walking. I believe that is almost the last time anyone trys in their life. I have done a number of “try until I gave ups” and a few total defeats along the way, but I have never tried until I succeeded in anything, except walking. Things I might want to try until..? Magician; Writer & Poet; Athlete; Christian? We will see, but I need to try until or I will go crazy.

15 Minutes

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I have been dreaming the same dream since I was very young. A group of large barrels are suspended above the ocean and are supported with large ropes. There is an above rope and a below rope portion to this rigging along the waterline. The creatures who live here are Hobbit-like in size and temperament and can travel around the barrels by walking on the suspension ropes. The barrels are far enough above the sea so that seeing what they are walking above is quite difficult. There is a kind of egalitarian government that is quietly agreed upon. No one gets hurt or has problems with one another. The seasons change and weather happens, but the many are quite happy just being left alone to eat the bounty of the water below. How they got there is a matter for conjecture. No one knows for sure what the true history is or is to be passed down. I would think that aircraft would be spotted if this were a tale told in the modern sense, but maybe as an allegory would be best. I know of no better way than to just write and to see what comes out. Nonsense verbs are part of the sing song way they speak. Many a small person would love to live here among the barrels. We shall see what we can let fly.