The Little Things

On days where I have no inspiration to write, I really think about the little things in my life. A few months back my father was diagnosed with liver cancer. When you think for your entire life your father is this indestructible man that is immune to things, like dying, life reminds you just how naive you are. It just makes a simple writing problem seem almost silly.

My father is a high school math teacher and has a deep lusting relationship with making money as his second job. He'll sell his shoes he is wearing if you offered him a good price. Before his diagnosis, I had no aspirations of joining his capitalistic goals of selling my own shoes, but then it hit me like a punch to the grill: this is the way to spend more time with him.

We have many things in common: love for our sports teams, playing sports, and now a passion to sell things, just to name a few.

Today happens to be my parents 31st anniversary. I've been extremely lucky with having two awesome people that I can call Mom and Dad. The crazy thing is they have no idea I love to write. If I told pops that I have my own blog now, he would probably say, "What the hell is a blog?"

Today will be a great day to bust out the three-buck-chuck of wine from Trader Joe's and bust out my pad out of paper. Thinking about the little things always clears my head. To you Dad!

A.C.W.

The Scary World of the Unknown

It's amazing that I've had this other writing personality in my mind for years, my one true self, and I'm sitting here today without a word to say; those that know me would find that hard to believe! Yes, my name is A.C.W.-anonymous closet writer, my wife told me to put a pseudo so I would feel comfortable-and I have a writing addiction. Yes, I am a virgin when it comes to the world of "blogging."

For some reason I've never thought about blogging as an option. This officially is my attempt to open my proverbial closet door and shout, "I LOVE WRITING!" Not that I just love it, but that I crave it. That feels so much better.

Before I let loose of my inner vulturous words that seem to have been circling my brain for 29 years, this wouldn't be possible if it weren't for two people: my wife and Murees Dupe. My wife is the only person that even knows about my secret passion. She's been very supportive since she found out about my "other love."

Secondly, Murees is the one that took the time to give a heart felt response to my email! She may not think it was heart felt, but, to me, the feeling that a complete stranger would take time out of their busy day to respond to me, the way that she did... I felt it necessary to listen to her advice and start blogging. This couldn't have been possible without her gentle persuasion.

Now, a sample of the "circling vultures." I know that I have had multiple writing errors just in this blog alone, but, when I write a story, I don't look back at my errors, or if my punctuation is correct. I love the idea of getting out all of my thoughts onto paper, without structure, without laws or boundaries. For me, when I just freestyle a story, things come out that I had no idea would come out, i.e. right now lol. I know you might be saying, "Duh, it's called a first draft."

I used to do this exercise with my buddy-we had to be like ten or eleven at the time-I would write a page, then he would write a page, etc... By doing it like this, it eliminated just sitting down and setting limits to a character by writing an outline or on note cards. This process of free-writing had made things so much easier for me in the beginning. Obviously I don't do this with my buddy now...sad lol.

This has already lifted a gigantic monkey off of my shoulders. I know what I just wrote thousands of people probably do, or, might be saying, "Dude, stop talking."

I am sooooooooooooo sorry for boring the cyber-world with a sample of my thoughts! I wanted to keep this brief. Murees, you were right, this has helped tremendously. Thank you. I think I stopped shaking like a leaf by the third paragraph.

A.C.W.