(no subject)
So it's been months since an update. I know, I'm over due. In my defense, I've been writing and very busy. I've completed short stories, essays, and even 120-page work that is perhaps the most god-aweful thing I've ever written. No lie, it's just plain bad. But I've been writing again. Reworking some stuff, changing other stuff, making up new stuff.
I need help. Feed back. I'm trying a new style, a slightly more flashy style. Something that gives me more room to jump and play around but might come across as overdone, as too heady and too playful. Lately I've been keeping my exposition and narrators drier than a Mormon martini, so this a jump to something very out of the ordinary for me to attempt. Below I'll post a small fragment and would heavily appreciate any criticisms you've got.
The Seven Deaths of Tristan Marley
What follows is an account of the loved, hated, and fiercely admired, and therefore documented, repeated deaths of Tristan Marley in chronological form, skipping the first one.
Death #2
The day that Rachel Bogel chose to end her life began like any other. The sun had set the day before on a Tuesday, the moon chased the sun till the sun chased the moon and the brilliant rising horizon was covered over a gathering of dense gray clouds on that chilly autumn day. A pity, because Rachel had hoped to see the sun one last time; especially the rising. Having a very feminine poetic nature she recognized a beautiful irony in experiencing the sunset of her life while watching the sun rise. She had even gotten up early for it. But even though disappointed with this turn of the weather, she managed to find a metaphorical fulfillment in thinking the clouds resembled curtains on a show performed to an uncaring world three hundred and sixty-five days a year. She also briefly considered the sun an eye closing it's cloudy lid, refusing to watch her act. But she quickly realized how overly dramatic she was being and refused to pontificate any further on the happenstance weather of a random Wednesday morning. It was important to proceed with a clear mind after all.
She, one Rachel Bogel of 23 Linwood Lane, was to commit one act of murder, irredeemable in the eyes of the Catholic church, upon herself. Having been raised in a religious household, education had been expelled upon her on the severity of the task, of the unrepentant nature of suicide. But after years of building up to this moment of this day, this momentous day, all the warnings did was simply add to the her sense of melo-drama and finality.
The reason of death was uncertain. Rachel, being a poetic soul would love to contain in her soon to end life a lost love, a tragic intrigue, or some other form of ostentation with which she could hurtle herself into the afterlife like a fantastic Dr. Faustus crying her woe. But there was no intrigue, romance of whirlwind proportions, and the truth was that her life could be expressed in one short, barely stifled yawn. She had dated but found no love worth telling of. She attempted business conquests and been met with not failure or success but mediocrity. Mediocre, sufficient, average, standard as though from a factory mold. Yawns, yawns, yawns. Her life was comprised of them. Bored blinks, stifled sighs, and yawns. It was a lonely existence. And she had enough. It was time to make one grand final stab at excitement. A shout in the silence. A flash of pinkish red in the gray sky, a thing that could at last be called 'special'. Something for everyone or no one to puzzle over, whichever would be more poetic.
Sitting on her roof in her pink pajama pants and a white t-shirt that was too large for her, she watched the gray clouds cheat her last sunrise from her, hording the glory of of the morning to their own private viewing. In her hand was a half drank cup of coffee that tasted as bland as her clouds. How she would have loved to see an expanse of blue eclipsed by a searing ball of flame before she committed the act. She imagined the sky an endless ocean over her head and herself a poorly creature stuck on the reefs deep beneath the waves. It was time to break the surface of the sky and breathe. To finally really breathe, in deep gasps the air of infinity and nothingness. Time to transcend.
Standing up, she stretched and a mildly crisp wind ran across her, revealing that for all her constrictions of mediocrity, she was beautiful. Long tangles of dark hair caught in the breeze and her shirt pulled ever so slightly across her chest, outlining her lithe frame. Not able to suppress it, she let out a yawn and climbed back into the second story window of her home.
She had spent the past few days itemizing and packaging all her worldly possessions. Now all the proof of her worldly presence was carefully categorized in packing boxes, ready for transport to her next of kin. These boxes sat randomly scattered around on the floor labeled with their contents.All that remained was the bed she slept in with her blankets and pillows strewn all over from a restless night, kitchen appliances she thought she might need last minute, and other furniture obviously too large for packaging such as a couch, dining room table, three chairs, and a piano she never learned more than three songs on. Sitting on her table was one pink bottle holding sixty white sleeping pills that were prescribed to be taken no more than two every twenty-four hours. Her key to freedom. She intended to take them all with a glass of water, lay her suicide card down on the table for whoever found her to read and puzzle over while she slept eternally in her room.
Thinking of it as the eulogy she could write for herself, she had taken great care in writing her suicide card. It read as follows:
'I suppose this my suicide note. It feels embarrassing to write a suicide note, like I'm confessing some crime, but I guess everyone has moments when they have said, "I could kill myself right now." My entire life has been that one long, unfalteringly terrible moment. After so many short years of busy noise, I am stuck in one long moment that screams a static silence, a siren of white noise augmenting the emptiness. Like a telephone hum in your ear after the person's hung up abruptly while you were trying so hard to tell them something. Except now I have nothing left to say.'
She had written the note in her head for months, not quite realizing she would ever pen it in the flesh till suddenly she found herself sitting at her table, devoid of tears, writing it at a deliberately painstakingly slow pace, willing herself to stop at any moment. To decide her conclusion could be improved some way. But her hand never stopped writing the note till it was finished. There was no other way. The stage was set. The clouds would lift and the curtains would be drawn and she would be seen by the eye of the sun and the world and all the curious eyes for what she was: special.
Rachel thought of this, descending, slowly, ceremoniously down the steps of her house to her dining room table where the glass of water and the pills were. She would show the world there was so much more to her than a yawn, and the time to do it was now. She got to the bottom of the steps and was about to enter the dining room before she suddenly stopped and screamed in surprise at what she saw.
I need help. Feed back. I'm trying a new style, a slightly more flashy style. Something that gives me more room to jump and play around but might come across as overdone, as too heady and too playful. Lately I've been keeping my exposition and narrators drier than a Mormon martini, so this a jump to something very out of the ordinary for me to attempt. Below I'll post a small fragment and would heavily appreciate any criticisms you've got.
The Seven Deaths of Tristan Marley
What follows is an account of the loved, hated, and fiercely admired, and therefore documented, repeated deaths of Tristan Marley in chronological form, skipping the first one.
Death #2
The day that Rachel Bogel chose to end her life began like any other. The sun had set the day before on a Tuesday, the moon chased the sun till the sun chased the moon and the brilliant rising horizon was covered over a gathering of dense gray clouds on that chilly autumn day. A pity, because Rachel had hoped to see the sun one last time; especially the rising. Having a very feminine poetic nature she recognized a beautiful irony in experiencing the sunset of her life while watching the sun rise. She had even gotten up early for it. But even though disappointed with this turn of the weather, she managed to find a metaphorical fulfillment in thinking the clouds resembled curtains on a show performed to an uncaring world three hundred and sixty-five days a year. She also briefly considered the sun an eye closing it's cloudy lid, refusing to watch her act. But she quickly realized how overly dramatic she was being and refused to pontificate any further on the happenstance weather of a random Wednesday morning. It was important to proceed with a clear mind after all.
She, one Rachel Bogel of 23 Linwood Lane, was to commit one act of murder, irredeemable in the eyes of the Catholic church, upon herself. Having been raised in a religious household, education had been expelled upon her on the severity of the task, of the unrepentant nature of suicide. But after years of building up to this moment of this day, this momentous day, all the warnings did was simply add to the her sense of melo-drama and finality.
The reason of death was uncertain. Rachel, being a poetic soul would love to contain in her soon to end life a lost love, a tragic intrigue, or some other form of ostentation with which she could hurtle herself into the afterlife like a fantastic Dr. Faustus crying her woe. But there was no intrigue, romance of whirlwind proportions, and the truth was that her life could be expressed in one short, barely stifled yawn. She had dated but found no love worth telling of. She attempted business conquests and been met with not failure or success but mediocrity. Mediocre, sufficient, average, standard as though from a factory mold. Yawns, yawns, yawns. Her life was comprised of them. Bored blinks, stifled sighs, and yawns. It was a lonely existence. And she had enough. It was time to make one grand final stab at excitement. A shout in the silence. A flash of pinkish red in the gray sky, a thing that could at last be called 'special'. Something for everyone or no one to puzzle over, whichever would be more poetic.
Sitting on her roof in her pink pajama pants and a white t-shirt that was too large for her, she watched the gray clouds cheat her last sunrise from her, hording the glory of of the morning to their own private viewing. In her hand was a half drank cup of coffee that tasted as bland as her clouds. How she would have loved to see an expanse of blue eclipsed by a searing ball of flame before she committed the act. She imagined the sky an endless ocean over her head and herself a poorly creature stuck on the reefs deep beneath the waves. It was time to break the surface of the sky and breathe. To finally really breathe, in deep gasps the air of infinity and nothingness. Time to transcend.
Standing up, she stretched and a mildly crisp wind ran across her, revealing that for all her constrictions of mediocrity, she was beautiful. Long tangles of dark hair caught in the breeze and her shirt pulled ever so slightly across her chest, outlining her lithe frame. Not able to suppress it, she let out a yawn and climbed back into the second story window of her home.
She had spent the past few days itemizing and packaging all her worldly possessions. Now all the proof of her worldly presence was carefully categorized in packing boxes, ready for transport to her next of kin. These boxes sat randomly scattered around on the floor labeled with their contents.All that remained was the bed she slept in with her blankets and pillows strewn all over from a restless night, kitchen appliances she thought she might need last minute, and other furniture obviously too large for packaging such as a couch, dining room table, three chairs, and a piano she never learned more than three songs on. Sitting on her table was one pink bottle holding sixty white sleeping pills that were prescribed to be taken no more than two every twenty-four hours. Her key to freedom. She intended to take them all with a glass of water, lay her suicide card down on the table for whoever found her to read and puzzle over while she slept eternally in her room.
Thinking of it as the eulogy she could write for herself, she had taken great care in writing her suicide card. It read as follows:
'I suppose this my suicide note. It feels embarrassing to write a suicide note, like I'm confessing some crime, but I guess everyone has moments when they have said, "I could kill myself right now." My entire life has been that one long, unfalteringly terrible moment. After so many short years of busy noise, I am stuck in one long moment that screams a static silence, a siren of white noise augmenting the emptiness. Like a telephone hum in your ear after the person's hung up abruptly while you were trying so hard to tell them something. Except now I have nothing left to say.'
She had written the note in her head for months, not quite realizing she would ever pen it in the flesh till suddenly she found herself sitting at her table, devoid of tears, writing it at a deliberately painstakingly slow pace, willing herself to stop at any moment. To decide her conclusion could be improved some way. But her hand never stopped writing the note till it was finished. There was no other way. The stage was set. The clouds would lift and the curtains would be drawn and she would be seen by the eye of the sun and the world and all the curious eyes for what she was: special.
Rachel thought of this, descending, slowly, ceremoniously down the steps of her house to her dining room table where the glass of water and the pills were. She would show the world there was so much more to her than a yawn, and the time to do it was now. She got to the bottom of the steps and was about to enter the dining room before she suddenly stopped and screamed in surprise at what she saw.