Thursday, March 26, 2009

Incident on a Rain-Soaked Corner

I'm way overdue to put up a new story here (and the world collectively stops holding its breath, right? Ahem).
This one's new-ish; I wrote it last month. I like it, but that's just me. It's nice and nasty.
Enjoy.

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Work Tomorrow

So I had this back injury, right? A pretty bad one, bad enough to lay me up for several months. Herniated disc. Sciatica. Couldn't even walk for awhile, used a cane, took tons of pain pills, etc, etc. No fun at all.
But, after the initial couple of months in which I couldn't do anything, I started physical therapy and gradually began getting better. Eventually, I started writing again (propped up in bed, laptop balanced on a pillow) and as the weeks went by my output really skyrocketed. Beginning in November of last year, I was writing like a madman (however a madman writes).
I pumped out almost two hundred pages of a novel. I wrote four short stories. I posted tons of book reviews on my Facebook account (because I was reading tons of books) and updated this blog two or three times a week.
In other words, I was getting a little taste of what it's like to live the life of a WRITER.
I liked it. A lot.
But now it's time for all that to wind down. I started back to work this week; my day job that pays the bills. It'll take some time getting used to it again, after being away so long. And it feels kinda weird, having my day now belong to someone else, not me. You know what I mean. It's what we all do.
The writing output, of course, will drop off dramatically. I'll be lucky to get in two pages a day during the week. I'll go from reading two or three books a week to, maybe, one tops. My postings here will be more infrequent (actually, they've already declined these last two or three weeks, as I devoted more time to the novel-- knowing my time was running out).
I'm not complaining, exactly... most writers have to share their valuable time with the outside world in order to get by. I know this. And let's be honest, in this economy I'm goddamn lucky to have a job.
But I'm awful selfish. And I'll miss these last few months.
Gotta sign off now; getting late, and I have to get up early to go to work tomorrow. Look for another short story here next Monday.
'til next time,
Heath

Sunday, March 1, 2009

A Freeway on Earth

Here's another story. It's probably the lightest thing I've written; not a damn thing dark about it, except maybe how utterly sad it is how we are all slaves to our paychecks, yeah? The central character, Frank, is in such a panic to make it to work on time that aspects of an existence outside his job go right by him. Actually, come to think of it, that IS rather dark after all.
But honestly, the story is just meant to be diverting and mildly entertaining. I think. You decide; it's right over there in the usual spot.