Shouts From Down Under

When thoughts evaporate along with confidence...um..oh no..

Where do people go when they disappear?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPBJgpK0Ulc

Regularly you hear on the news, or see the police posts on Facebook about the next person who's vanished without a trace.

Some, granted, are found either living or deceased, but the ones that are never found also, over time, disappear from people's memories.

Yes, the question by Michael in the VSauce video, "How long after you disappear will people begin asking questions (if ever)?" is a sobering jolt of reality.

It not only doesn't happen to somebody else, but seems to happen a lot more frequently than say, winning the lottery. But not as much as cancer. Cancer is becoming everyone's close friend, or first cousin. Perhaps it won't be long before people will feel guilty for being odd; not having cancer.

So where do our thoughts go, when they trail off, and we have a silence in our skull that disappoints, and no matter how long we wait or try to relax, doesn't deliver anything except doses of depression and the more we think on it, the more Diddley Squat we delight in.

Yes, the silence is like they say. Deafening.

But as I've mumbled before, white pages or screen are just the colour of thinking, waiting for us to gouge dictionary and thesaurus, google and notebook, for a clue to anything worth writing. And reading.

I note Stephen King's 20 tips for writers.

http://www.openculture.com/2014/03/stephen-kings-top-20-rules-for-writers.html

1. First write for yourself, and then worry about the audience. “When you write a story, you’re telling yourself the story. When you rewrite, your main job is taking out all the things that are not the story.”

2. Don’t use passive voice. “Timid writers like passive verbs for the same reason that timid lovers like passive partners. The passive voice is safe.”

3. Avoid adverbs. “The adverb is not your friend.”

4. Avoid adverbs, especially after “he said” and “she said.”

5. But don’t obsess over perfect grammar. “The object of fiction isn’t grammatical correctness but to make the reader welcome and then tell a story.”

6. The magic is in you. “I’m convinced that fear is at the root of most bad writing.”

7. Read, read, read. ”If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write.”

8. Don’t worry about making other people happy. “If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway.”

9. Turn off the TV. “TV—while working out or anywhere else—really is about the last thing an aspiring writer needs.”

10. You have three months. “The first draft of a book—even a long one—should take no more than three months, the length of a season.”

11. There are two secrets to success. “I stayed physical healthy, and I stayed married.”

12. Write one word at a time. “Whether it’s a vignette of a single page or an epic trilogy like ‘The Lord of the Rings,’ the work is always accomplished one word at a time.”

13. Eliminate distraction. “There’s should be no telephone in your writing room, certainly no TV or videogames for you to fool around with.”

14. Stick to your own style. “One cannot imitate a writer’s approach to a particular genre, no matter how simple what that writer is doing may seem.”

15. Dig. “Stories are relics, part of an undiscovered pre-existing world. The writer’s job is to use the tools in his or her toolbox to get as much of each one out of the ground intact as possible.”

16. Take a break. “You’ll find reading your book over after a six-week layoff to be a strange, often exhilarating experience.”

17. Leave out the boring parts and kill your darlings. “(kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.)”

18. The research shouldn’t overshadow the story. “Remember that word back. That’s where the research belongs: as far in the background and the back story as you can get it.”

19. You become a writer simply by reading and writing. “You learn best by reading a lot and writing a lot, and the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach yourself.”

20. Writing is about getting happy. “Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid or making friends. Writing is magic, as much as the water of life as any other creative art. The water is free. So drink.”

For more of King’s wisdom - Barnes & Noble’s blog. (http://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/stephen-kings-top-20-rules-for-writers/)

Anyway. Whatever.

A random sidetrack that's about the only thing besides fluff and dust particles sitting in my head at the moment;

Invalid Photo #1034175 Guess which of these fillies / geldings / mares/ stallions / ponies / nags / brumbies (horses) are called after yours truly?

Yes, I believe one of them is named Sparky. Must be a bit of a grumpy, fly-of-the-handle type, maybe doesn't like to be ridden either.

******

People / Readers may wonder why I choose provocative subjects and seem to take a resistive stance in writing about them.
Well, that's the key isn't it.

Something we never want our blogs to become, or our writing in any form, is boring.

Are we in danger of becoming a Bore Pump?

Surely we could think up something mighty interesting, in two seconds, if we were in mortal danger. Or one of our loved ones were.
What if we are wrong about eternity? What if we are living a lie, and the ones who'll pay the price are the dearest in our eyes?

Maybe we could ask the one in charge about it, and by asking in the right manner, we'll allow him to take that weight of worry off our shoulders, because one things for certain. We can't do anything about it ourselves, whatever our beliefs. The world is too big, and often, so is our pride and stubbornness.

Maybe the message is to stop worrying about worrying and relax about writing. There, you've already thought of something to blog about, haven't you?

Sparky

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