The World is Burning

Like a flame of burning methanol, the state of the world burns in an invisible fire.

There is a war on us.  The people of the world live in divisive fear of each other and the power tripping, government money lovers are enjoying every minute of their controlled demolition of our lives so they can line their pockets and enjoy the status of their power over the people they consider nothing more than mindless sheep.

There are wars raging, governments untrusted, men and woman of power stepping on the backs of everyone below them, controlling everything; there is manipulation of beliefs, abuse of power and the bodies of the ones who speak loudly lining the path under their feet. Disinformation runs rampant out of the Media's mouth.

Protests of peace don't work anymore as laws reach around justice for the corporation instead of standing up and creating a safe barrier for those that would be trampled, who then become less the protester and more the looter.  Have we come to a time where violence is the only way to bring change again?  Is this the only way the powerful will hear and be thwarted?  They will never let go of what they have-- greed has a strong grip and they will never be mindful of giving anything back.

We live in a world where war is a business.  It profits far more than peace ever will but at the high price of the innocent.  Is that worth it?  In the disguise of fighting to sustain our "freedom", we are lied to to fight for (and die for) the grasp of power and control for those in power.  The needs of the many, choked out by the greed of the few.

We have become blind; sheep, weak with the comfort of our measly paychecks, with being stuck forever paying off debts for most things that are unnecessary and unneeded.  We are completely used to the slavery we find ourselves chained to as our "freedoms" are fewer and fewer.  All while of our government is telling us what we owe, what's right and what's wrong, who's going to be our leader, why we owe tax upon tax.  Our government is no righteous being to look up to.  Our government is dark; a seedy, dirty little man with control it should not have but, for some reason, we cannot find the urge to stick our boot down on his neck to bring him back under our control.  We the people. Do we even realize there are far more of us than there ever will be of them?  Why have we become so passive?

A very large percentage of the American public doesn't even vote!  And then some of those same non-voters riot through the streets, destroying public property and assaulting fellow Americans simply because they think they didn't get their way.

We are fools. Fools who believe that our government has our back and our interest held in the greater good, they they are in service to us to create the America that was proposed to us since the beginning of its establishment.  Even then, we were dangled a dream; a dream stolen from the natives who had already been living there, a dream created this way can only sour.  And it had become just that-- Sour.

Is there hope?  If so, where is it?

Is Humanity even a worthy cause anymore?  Are we worth saving?  Or is everything kindling for the fire that rages, feeding off us all until nothing is left?

I'll take my chances with the idea of Hope and that humanity can overcome the fire and shine.

A Short Story: The Ends of the Earth

I take a deep breath, leaning my ragged and worn body against an old, splintered, fallen tree.  I'm tired.  The sky is dark, as it always was now-- days are dark gray and the nights are just, for lack of a better word, darker. The wind is crisp, hinting at a rain oncoming from the blanketed blackness at the western horizon.

I sit down at the fire pit I've put together, under my shelter. My wallet sits in my hand-- I always take it out of my back pocket so I don't sit lopsided.  It's habit now.  I turn it over and over in my hand, looking at it curiously.  It's black and worn down to the edges, rubbed grey in more areas than where it's still black.  I'm not sure if it was even real leather-- the label wore away  long ago.

What I thought was my whole being and my whole identity, right here in my hand; everything I am-- My name, my weight and height, my address, my eye color; my identity.  It used to hold my money and my debt, my family in a little picture and little notes to myself for whatever reason.

I flipped it open and slid out my driver's license between my thumb and index finger and really look at it.  I laugh at its pointlessness. It means nothing now. There was no point to any of it anymore.  I see all there was in my wallet, took one more deep breath, and toss it deep into the glowing embers of the fire before me.  I sit and watch it burn away to a small, black mass; to nothing.

Everything that was has become something different now.  Everything is changed.  Everything.

The things that weighed heavy on our minds back before the end were gone now-- smart phones, Hollywood gossip, politics, football, so called "reality" shows, video games, Viagra, enhancement surgeries-- all things that didn't even matter. They were nothing more than a distraction.

And most of the things that did matter, they're gone, too.  All of it. Gone.

I am alone.  Again.

The things that weigh heavy now are the things we never saw in the first place.  The simple things. The necessary things. As the rain moves closer, almost overhead, I push myself further back under my shelter.  Several thick drops of rain start the wet patter around me.  There's plenty of time to think nowadays.  It's still much better to do it dry instead of wet if you can help it.

Here I am, at the end of the Earth, thinking about what was, just trying to stay dry.  I'm just trying to survive.  One more day.

Where I've Been, Part Four: The Story of Us

All right, slap me.

It's been almost two full years since I last wrote here (until recently getting back into it), and to my own defense, I have been trying to get used to an amazing change in an incredible new life.  I'm slowly getting into the groove here. Marriage will do that to you. Let me say first and foremost, the state of being married is such an amazing place to be in.  My wife, as some of you know, is everything I ever prayed for and dreamt about.  Every day I am reminded how waiting for the right person really paid off.  Neither one of us would've been good for the other had we met twenty years ago.  It just goes to show, God has plans.

So, we got married, saved up some money, paid off a lot of debt and built a house.  We have a good plan for our lives and are in it hand in hand; a team effort.  The laughter we share is contagious and I love the way she looks at me when my antics confuse her to no end.  My relationship with my step-daughter has prospered further than I could've ever imagined.  She no longer wants to burn me alive and treats me with (mostly) respect.  We share an amazing playfulness and have our own routines that I couldn't have imagined when this journey started.  There are still some things to work on (and there always will be.  I'm not an idiot.) but I find a great relief in knowing she accepts me as a step-father and role model for her life.  And that is no small responsibility.

I'm enjoying my work and am trying to gain as much experience as I can while I'm here.  It keeps me busy and challenged and I like that.

In what little spare time I have, I've been writing a novel.  I have several ideas for one but I chose this one because the basic outline has already been done through a screenplay I wrote with my friend Chuck Whitlock years ago, called "The Messengers".  It's literally been "in the making" for a little over a decade.  Sigh.  But, I'm feeling really good about the possibility of finishing it.  I've already gotten about thirty pages written (transcribed from only nine pages of the script so I'm going to have a great first draft.) and am looking forward to where the dusty road takes me.

All in all, these words are written by a happy man; a man who honestly never thought he would be allowed to experience such profound love and joy.  I am thankful.  No longer am I waiting for the proverbial rugs to be pulled out from under every endeavor I try, no longer am I stewing a victimized mentality or a "woe-is-me" complex.  No.  I refuse to let the darkness win.  There is no room for shadow in the light.  The shadows only distract and writing about them helps me keep the light on.

I'm just a man.
Who is a husband, a best friend, a step-father, a son and a son-in-law,  a grandson, and a human... being; living the best I can with the only life I know.

Let's keep going.

A Short Halloween Story: Halloween Night on the Tracks

Halloween Night, 1981


 There were four of them.  Scotty Masters, Amana Simms, Michelle Rhodes, and Liz Street.

They were running late, trying to get back home before sunset, as promised, but the allure of catching every passing home for another handful of candy was too much to pass up.  Besides, it was only a matter of minutes at each stop.  If that.
The sun crept lower and lower into the horizon and below the great dismal swamp tree line.  The sky was a dark, blood red on the horizon and a dark purply-black covered the sky. They were going to be late and if they didn't step it up, they were going to be in trouble.

Scotty was the oldest.  He was a big, solid, short hair-cutted twelve-year-old boy on the verge of becoming a big, solid, short hair-cutted man.  Slow but sweet and easy to have around.  He was dressed in rags and ace bandages and tissue paper with painted black circles around his eyes in a pretty good rendition of a Mummy.

Amana and Michelle were best friends and were the unofficial leaders of the group.  They made the plans, they made the decisions they made the rules.  And everyone just followed.  It was their idea to push the limits of when they should be home and their idea to take some time and head over the old rail road tracks to get more candy from the homes just across the way there.  They were used to getting into and out of a lot of trouble.  These two were always together and they were both dressed as nearly matching green-faced and warted Witches, big, black pointy hats and all.

Liz was simply what they liked to call a tag-along.  Her and her family were newer to the area and they were all slowly becoming good friends.  She was a happier child with thick, curly white-blond hair.  She was also the funnier one so it seemed fitting that she was dressed as a Clown.  She was holding up an LED lantern, supposedly to help guide them but not doing a great job falling behind all the time.

The train was on a pretty normal once a month schedule and it had passed through not two weeks prior to this Halloween night.  Rumor was making its rounds that the railroad wouldn't be coming through any more once the new year hit.  It was as good as gone to the townsfolk.  So, when the four of them decided to cross over for a quick ransacking of candy at a few more houses, none of them thought twice about any danger of it as they were two weeks until the next scheduled crossing would be.

Crossed over, they did-- one after another, rushing but not quite running.  They hit the first house all at once.  Amana and Michelle hit the door bell together, giggling while they did so.  When the door opened, the four of them playfully yelled, "TRICK OR TREAT!".  Oh My and What do we have here was overly exaggerated from inside the doorway.  The home owner spoke to each of them in turn-- with Liz last as always-- praising their costumes and then politely sending them on their way and telling them to be safe.

They heard the whistle blow from halfway down the sidewalk of the third house-- the final house-- according to Scotty.  He wanted to get home and start eating his take.  The four of them froze at the sound and Liz quietly asked, "Is that the train?"

"Of course it's the train!"  He started to bounce, thinking through what to do.  "Aw man, if we don't beat it, we'll have to wait for the whole thing to go by and then we'll totally be late!  I can't get in trouble for being late again."  At this last comment, he started back toward the road and the tracks, picking up his pace at every step.  The others followed, now at a near run.  They picked up their pace, eyes following the light of the oncoming train sliding so fast, ever so forward.  They started running and were so close together, they were unconsciously holding on to one another in a line, like you'd see small children doing on a field trip in some museum.  They rushed to the tracks, then seeing the oncoming train, they ran.

Liz, at the end of the line, tripped and fell hard to the ground just shy of the tracks.  Scotty, at the front of the line and pulling them hard, was at the front.  His foot had just crossed the first bar crossing over.  Liz's fall caused a chain reaction; Amana got tripped up into Michelle and Michelle fell forward in a slump into Scotty's feet, tripping him up.  He fell hard on the second bar of the track.  Liz looked up just in time to see them disappear in a sickening thump. The train's brakes screamed sparks.  The rush of air blasted her with a fine red mist.  When she realized she was still holding Amana's hand, she screamed and couldn't stop.

The tragedy-- as it was called-- nearly destroyed the small town.  It was never the same again.  The fun that was once Halloween night trick or treating had turned into a harsh memory that spoiled and rotted any thought of a fun family night out.

The tracks were haunted with the memory.  Gone; hidden beneath an overgrowth of grass and shifted dirt.  There were stories floating around that the last house the children went to was haunted by their spirits at unrest and every year they would cross the tracks again and knock on the door for tricks or treats.  No one really believed it but when the people who had lived at that house moved away, they were unable to sell the property and eventually had to take a huge loss, leaving it to the bank.  For years and years, that house stood empty; slowly breaking down and becoming the vision slow death; a reminder of its last witness.

The town kept on.  Every town has it's secrets and this one was no different.  After quite a few years, they all but left the house and the tragedy at the tracks there.  They didn't forget but they certainly tucked it away down deep.

Liz grew up.  She carried the shame and guilt of her clumsiness killing her three friends that night and was never really able to fix that brokenness in her mind.  She was in and out of Psychiatric hospitals and had seen a large number of shrinks, none of whom really helped her move on to forgive herself.  She supposed that was because she deserved what she got.  Eventually, the money ran out and she couldn't afford the hospitals or the therapy.  She couldn't work and when she lost her last job-- cashier at the Wendy's in town-- she stopped trying.  She walked the country roads at night and hunkered down under the bridge out of town by day, living there, homeless.  Some nights she would walk by the house by the tracks and would stare at it  and the tracks until the sun peeked over the horizon.

Twenty years have passed.

Halloween was only two days away and Liz found herself at the doorstep of that house once more. When the sun fell that night, she decided to break one of the side windows and crawl in. She felt drawn to it more and more over the years so she thought she would give it what it wants.

She stayed there overnight and through the next day, sitting silently in the gathered dust in the corner or sleeping soundly on the decaying carpet.  She stayed there, waiting for Halloween and whatever trick or treat it might bring this year.

Halloween Night, 2001

All Halloween day she sat in the front room of the house, staring at the front door.  There were a couple of times when some of the neighborhood teens would drive by and dare one of their own to run up and knock on the door.  They would immediately run away, screeching their tires almost all the way across the tracks back into town.  She paid them no mind and before she knew it, the quiet came on again and the sun started to fall, crest the horizon, then disappear, letting the night return.

She fell asleep.

She woke up with a start.  There was a light, slow knock at the door.  She heard it again and when it stopped, she heard, "Trick... or... treat..." come from the other side, almost a whisper.  She got up and walked to the door, pulling a knife out of her olive drab coat pocket.  She whispered to herself, "We gotta hurry... the train is coming..."  She reached out to the door and opened it slowly, it's rusted hinges creaking loudly into the night.

There stood two nearly identical witches and a big mummy behind them.  They didn't move.  Liz noticed their costumes were dirty and splotched with patches of dark stain.  Their bodies hung at odd angles as if missing certain vital pieces.  They spoke again, low, "Trick... or... treat...?"

Liz was crying, holding up the knife between her and them.  "I'm so sorry.  I didn't mean to get you hurt... I didn't mean it!"
"...killed..." they whispered.  She realized right then they were right; she had gotten them killed.  She always knew it was her fault. All the psychiatry in world couldn't change that fact. "You're right, I'm sorry..."  She looked at the knife and lowered it.
"Trick... or... treat...?"  they whispered again.  And again.  As a question.  They wanted something from her.  She thought she knew what that was.  They wanted her dead too.  They were all meant to die that night.  It's only fair, right? she thought.

"Trick or treat?"  she repeated slowly, tears streaming again, focused on the knife in her hand.  "How about both?"  She lifted the knife to her throat and cut deep into her neck.  The two little witches and the one large mummy watched her fall slowly, settling to the floor, her blood puddling slowly over and around her on the old matted carpet.  They watched her as her eyes faded away and her body went limp.  They watched her until she was gone.

On the front porch of the house, the one big mummy and the two little witches turned away and started toward the tracks.  A faint blow of a train's whistle shot out into the night, far off.  The door to the house at the tracks closed with a gentle thump, pulled by a little clown who followed them again out into the night and over the tracks.  One last time, a tag-along.


The End.

Writing, waiting, writing; A novel in the works...

So, I'm trying to write a novel.  Not just one, but many.  I have an incredible amount of ideas (all written in notes and story titles and short blurbs here and there) but, we all know, ideas can only be ideas; they are not a novel or a finished story.  They can only ever be ideas.

Quite a few years ago, I came across an opportunity to write a screenplay for a contest.  I talked to a close friend about it and we decided that we would tag team the writing and see what we came up with.  The kicker was it had to be done in less than a month.  So, our adventure began and we wrote a one hundred page screenplay in about three weeks.  It was called The Messengers: Hell Follows and the idea was sparked by a passage I had read in the Bible-- Revelations 11; The Two Witnesses.  The idea was to cross that story over into a genre that might work with the stylistic story that I had read from Revelations.  So, we made it a supernatural western.
We didn't win the contest but we did finish a full length screenplay and that felt amazing.

Since then, I've written four screenplays on spec but I always wanted to come back to that original source of pride for me-- the finished work.  Of course, it wasn't really finished.  We barely had time to do any other drafts and because of that, I know the story is full of holes.

About a year ago, I came back to the idea.  I thought to myself that I really enjoyed the writing process and maybe I should take a chance at writing a novel.  This is where my brain went full Tsunami with the ideas.  I can tell you, ideas is one area I have no trouble at all with.  Then, I calmed my thoughts and wondered what I needed to do to start on one idea.  I came back to The Messengers; the story was pretty much all already there and all i'd need to do is go through it and fill in the holes.  So, that's what I've been doing.  I'm working on a novel called The Messengers and have made some pretty good progress squeezing almost 60 pages worth of writing out of about 30 pages of screenplay.

Now, I just want to finish it and do one more draft to smooth things out, making sure it flows and makes sense to the reader (if there will be any).  I can feel it and I know once I finish one, I won't want to stop there and the next one will be a little easier and the one after that, even more easy.  I know they won't be easy, but hopefully, the more gets done, the easier the work will come.

Wish me luck.  The Messengers will come to a little town of 'Salem and they will bring truth and they will be justice.  Not for themselves but for the fearful and the lost, the broken and the weak.  They will speak for those who can't.

Thanks for listening.  I'm off to write.

Right Where It Counts...

The Accountant (2016, R)

Directed by Gavin O'Connor

Starring Ben Affleck, Anna Kendrick, J.K. Simmons and Jon Bernthal

A little slow on the starting line but well worth getting out of the gate.  This is a rare "action" movie that takes the chance of little to no action in the first half to two-thirds of the movie to concentrate solely on character development and building the blocks of the bigger story for us to pick up and run with.  It is a smart move in this case.  We can take the time to connect with the characters, becoming more involved and more invested in who they are and what made them that way, pointing us toward a far more satisfying resolution.

Ben Affleck brings us a different take on an otherwise over saturated character in the action movie realm-- the assassin with a conscience.  I liked it.  The filmmakers and Affleck have joined together to bring us a fairly original take on this and I, for one, really enjoyed it.

The rest of the cast was very well chosen as well.  Anna Kendrick and Ben Affleck's back and forth are both endearing and awkward (in a good way) enough to make you care about both of them and where they end up.  Jon Bernthal is a wonderful addition as well.  It's good to see that he is making his own way; from his start on The Walking Dead and his extremely well done Punisher on Netflix's DareDevil, Bernthal will be around for a long while.

All in all, The Accountant was a really good movie.  Pulls you in to the story and the action with well rounded and believable characters. 

Enjoy.

The Magnificent Western...

The Magnificent Seven (2016, PG-13)

Directed by Antoine Fuqua

Starring Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke and Vincent D'Onofrio

As far as I know, this is the fourth incarnation of this story-- and by that, I mean that this is the third vision brought to the screen based on the movie The Seven Samurai by Akira Kurosawa.  The first of those being The Magnificent Seven version in 1960 (and I'll include along with it the sequel-- The Return of the Magnificent Seven).  Then there was a TV show (on what network, I have now forgotten) Starring Michael Biehn and Ron Pearlman, which lasted a couple of seasons.  And lastly Antoine Fuqua's vision which is now in theaters.  Now, I know in my last post talking briefly about Hell or High Water, I mentioned the overwhelming amount of regurgitated reboots and remakes coming out of Hollywood is bothersome.  However, having said that, I will also say that (when done well and when keeping in the spirit of the original) sometimes the story is just THAT good.

This is one of those stories; a small town brought to the brink of hopelessness by a money hungry businessman surrounded by paid mercenaries, instilling suffering and control for his own benefit.  He rules with ruthlessness and fear, killing whomever gets in his way.  The townspeople come together in desperation and throw in everything they own to hire their own law to help them fight back.  And fight back, they do.  It's a story of outlaws, justice and redemption-- great themes for the western film genre.

Antoine Fugua has put together a great film that is perfectly cast and entertaining to the last shot.  What a great ride.  Kick your heels up, lean back, oil up your guns and enjoy.

Brice

Come Hell or High Water...

Hell or High Water (R)
Starring Jeff Bridges, Ben Foster and Chris Pine
Directed by David Mackenzie

In a time of Hollywood rehash, remake and regurgitate, we have a new take on an old stand by-- robbin' banks.  Here we have a story of two brothers caught in a hard place with one just out of a prison stint and coming home to nothing and the other having nothing to come home to.  They are caught in a spiral of desperation and decide they have nothing to lose and wage a war against the bank that destroyed the prosperity of their family.

We've all seen bank heist movies and that's what this is, but it's different enough to pull you in and enjoy the ride.  The characters are very well rounded and believable (even Jeff Bridges playing another character of law enforcement who slurs his speech-- annoying, yes, but still good) and the story puts us in a place we can all understand.  It has a feel of western and modern day, much like No Country For Old Men and ultimately is a surprise of a movie.

Thank you, Hollywood, for this sleeper hit.  Maybe stop with all the remakes for a while and do more like this for the people.  This is what we want.

Enjoy.

Brice