Notes to Self: #6

This world is still loaded with miracles.

Notes to Self: #5

The light of my candle can outshine any torch.

Notes to Self: #4

Do not pretend to understand the workings of the universe. You do not.

Notes to Self: #3

To the degree that you expect fairness in life, you reveal the juvenility of your mind and the immaturity of your spirit.

Notes to Self: #2

From the moment we are born, we are like an arrow launched into the sky. We move through each day, speeding onward in unstoppable flight, traversing our single arc. And like an arrow, we do not know when or where the moment will come when we shall strike home.

The Adventures of Heracles Mendoza: The Golden Lion, Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The feeling of liquid running over his teeth, around his tongue, and down his throat brought Les back to consciousness. His mouth grew warm and began to tingle, touched by a certain sweetness, something like honey, but deeper, richer. The way whipped cream is deeper and richer than air, he thought, still very groggy. A feeling of warmth trailed in the liquid’s wake, moving down his throat and into his stomach. Once there, the tingling fire began spreading through his body. His heart responded with a quickening, strengthening beat.

There had been pain in his head, though he had only been dimly aware of it till just then. Now it was lifting, dissolved by some effortless power. Relief flooded through him, sweeping away all the pain and discomfort like so much floating debris. The effect was so powerful that he thought he was going to melt, and slide off the table into a grateful puddle on the floor.

When the surge finally receded, it left him empty and cavernous and hollow inside. The sensation was brief, reminding him of that hanging moment he always felt just before an elevator would stop. It was supplanted by a growing sense of renewed energy and strength. Expanding rapidly, his entire body was soon alive with fresh vitality and a raw, wild sensation of power. He reacted by jumping up from the table on which he lay, even before he opened his eyes. Only a hand restrained him. A very large hand.

“Do not try to stand quite yet,” a reassuring voice said. “Allow the initial effects to run their course. It won’t be long.”

Les blinked, trying to focus. The giant was standing beside him. His name was Polydeuces, Les remembered with a clarity that surprised him. Pol, he had said. Something was different, though. His overwhelming fear of the man was missing. “Where am I?”

“The Portalhouse, young master.” Pol replied, smiling down at him.

Les blinked and stretched his eyes until the room around him came into dazzling focus. It was large and open, and lined with a dozen long, gleaming silver tables, arranged like a dining hall with a wide aisle down the center. The walls were made of seamless panels, silvery-steel, laden with beautifully inscribed patterns. A large landscape picture hung on the opposite side, the green of its meadows, and the blue of its sky ridiculously bright against the metal wall. To his right, a high counter ran the breadth of the room. Behind the counter, extending all the way to the softly glowing ceiling, were shelves crowded with bottles, jars, and bowls of various sizes and shapes. At the opposite end of the room stood a pair of very solid-looking metal doors.

“Young master,” Pol said, “I would like to introduce you to ’Dora. It is she who prepared the elixir which restored you to health.” Les looked around in confusion. He didn’t see anyone else in the room.

The Golden Lion, Chapter 3

Les rode on a blast of pure black speed for what seemed like forever, and yet like one impossibly suspended moment. Then there was a lightning crack, and with it the movement simply stopped. Les clamped his eyes shut against the gray light that was suddenly there. When he opened them, a little at a time, he saw that the couple with the baby was gone, and all the nearby seats were vacant.

"Hello?" he called out. The hollow silence supplied the answer he instinctively feared: he was alone. Did I black out? It didn't feel like he had passed out. He thought he remembered the whole thing: the burst of golden light, the sudden darkness, the directionless whoosh of acceleration. But where is everyone? He must've blacked out, he decided, at least part of the time. It was the only way to explain the absence of the other passengers.

"Hello," he called again and tried to stand. His seat belt, still fastened, yanked him down. Les felt for the buckle, found that it was jammed and wouldn't release. A small, electric spark of dread coursed through him. Was that why he been left behind? Because his seatbelt was stuck? Was anybody coming back for him? He couldn't believe they would just leave him all alone.

Les began to notice strange things about the plane. For one, the cabin was completely unlit, illuminated only by the dingy daylight coming through the windows. The light strips that bordered the aisle were out, as were all the ceiling lights. It was as if the plane's power had been cut off, yet the plane itself was perfectly intact. Then there was the undeniable tinge of gold. It was everywhere: the seats, the floor, the entire interior of the cabin. At first he wondered if perhaps the brilliant bombardment he had endured was having a lingering effect on his vision. But when he looked down at himself, his clothes were unaffected, and his own skin was its usual bronzy-brown. Confused, he looked to the window and was startled by another difference: the glass in his window was missing. He raised a finger, and slowly pushed it through the opening. "What the--" he mumbled. "The window's gone?" He twisted around, checking the others. All of them looked empty, as if someone had come along and collected all the glass. When could that have happened? he wondered. And why?

Les's stomach, which he had forgotten about, began to writhe again. With a low moan, he glanced outside. Only then did he notice they were not on an airport runway, or at an airport at all. Instead, it appeared that the plane was parked on gray rock, flat as concrete, spreading out in all directions. In the far distance Les could see a towering, arcing wall of sheer rock of the same gray color, its upper edge visible only when he cranked his head to one side and peered upward through the window. Where are we? He scanned along the base of the cliff, and finally found a solitary building, dwarfed beneath the high wall. Beyond that, he could find no other sign of life, not even a single shrub, or a blade of grass.

Must've had to make some kind of emergency landing, he surmised. But that still doesn't explain where everyone went, or why they left me here. He swallowed hard, blocking the rising terror at his throat. Wait, he told himself. Maybe everybody else is on the other side of the plane where I can't see them. Or maybe they're in that building. "If I could just get this stupid seatbelt off," he snarled. Grasping it with both hands, Les tried his best to force the buckle to open. He pulled until his arms began to tremble, and his strength gave out, but it still wouldn't budge. Then he tried to wriggle out from under the strap, but he couldn't move more than a few inches either way. Frustrated, Les threw himself back against the seat. His head struck a cushion that he knew was made of soft foam, but felt hard as steel. It clanged hollowly.

"Ow!" he cried, twisting back and giving his seat an evil look. "What is going on around here?"

He was still rubbing his head when movement outside the window caught his eye. A man was crossing the expanse between the plane and the building. Within a few minutes, he had drawn close enough that Les could see he was dressed in some kind of pale blue business suit. The bright yellow flash of his tie stood out, even at this distance. The man appeared to be quite large, though that was difficult to judge against the emptiness of the surroundings. He carried some kind of bag in one hand, and walked at a brisk pace. Les watched him, nervous but hopeful that he was coming to free him.

The Golden Lion, Chapter 2

Les finally reached the gate near the end of the terminal. The waiting area was already crowded. After searching briefly, he was able to find a single empty seat overlooking the tarmac through a high window wall. With a sigh of relief, he slumped into the chair. His stomach was aching badly, and his legs were still a little weak. He wiped a film of sweat from his face with a corner of his shirt. Navigating through the airport had turned out to be an even worse experience than he imagined.

It started off well enough. The lady at the check-in counter had been kind. When she saw that he was traveling by himself, she gave him a map of the airport, circling in red both the security checkpoint and the gate. As she did so, she instructed him to tell the gate attendants that he was something called an ‘unaccompanied minor,’ which should allow him to board the plane early. She even offered to have someone escort him from the security checkpoint to the gate. Les politely refused, thinking it would look pretty stupid to be walking around with an airline employee like he was a lost child. Still, he appreciated her concern, even as he resented himself. He was pretty sure she had only been so considerate because she saw how nervous he was.

Getting through security was a very different matter. First, there was the line. When Les saw it, snaking back and forth through a cordoned maze of black straps and chrome posts, he immediately began to worry. With a groan, he traced the line backwards, and took his place at the end. The people were bunched so tightly that Les couldn’t even be sure how many times the line folded back on itself. All he could do was wait, watching for the periodic spurts of movement, each of which traveled down the line like a slow-moving millipede. When the ripple reached him, Les shuffled forward a few feet, then stopped. This is going to take forever, he moaned to himself. I’m gonna miss my flight.

At each turn in the line, Les would try to look ahead, and see how far he was from the checkpoint. It was during one of these moments that he happened to lock eyes with one of the security agents. Les’ heart spiked, and he quickly looked away. After that, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the man was tracking him, though he was very careful not to look directly at him again. Stop being so nervous, Les told himself savagely. They might think I’m a terrorist or something. You don’t want to end up in a very small room with a very large man wearing latex gloves, do you?

Pat Tillman Does Not Belong in the NFL Hall of Fame

It's been twelve years now since ol' number 42 (40) died.  This past Friday, on the anniversary (funny word for marking the passage of time for a death, isn't it?) of Pat Tillman's passing,  NFL commentator Chris Collinsworth tweeted the following:

 "If it were my decision Pat Tillman would have been a 1st ballot Hall Of Famer."

It was a gracious thing to say, a gesture of remembrance and respect.

Peter King: It's my football, and
don't you forget it.

Peter King, the venerable columnist for Sports Illustrated, responded to the tweet by saying,

 "Not mine."

He then went on, apparently forgetting that brevity is the soul of wit, (not to mention the soul of Twitter):

"IMO: Silly to confuse patriotism with athletic greatness. Some will disagree with me. That’s fine. It’s a free country."

Predictably, his open invitation to disagree with him ignited a Twitter brush fire that he then spent the remainder of the day trying to fight, basically by saying the same thing over and over:

"Football players should be judged for the Hall of Fame based on their football credentials. Nothing else."

"My feelings about this, as a voter for the Hall, is players should be judged for football only. Nothing else."

The Golden Lion, Chapter 1

“Nervous?” Lisa said, casting a glance at Les’ rapidly jiggling leg.

“No,” Les replied. His leg stilled.

“So, how was it staying at nana’s and tata’s? How’s La Jolla?” she asked.

Les shrugged. “Okay.”

“Did nana make her green chile?” Les didn’t respond. Lisa gave him a prolonged glance. “Talkative today, aren’t we?” she said archly.

Les said nothing, just stared straight out the windshield as they raced along the freeway.

As she drove, Lisa’s eyes flitted between the road and her brother. “You’re nervous about flying by yourself, aren’t you?”

“No I’m not,” he answered curtly. In fact, Les was nervous about the flight to Seattle, and growing more so by the minute. But he knew better than to admit it to his older sister. Years of bitter experience had taught him that.

“So what’s bothering you?”

“I’m fine, Lisa. Just drop it.”

Lisa was silent for a few moments. “Les, it’s okay,” she said, her voice assuming a softer, lulling quality that Les knew all too well. Here it comes. The heartfelt invitation to spill my guts. How many times have I fallen for that one? It was her one of her most effective tactics, and it always began the same way: she would ply him relentlessly with sincere, sisterly overtures to confidence. He could tell her anything, she would say. She would listen to him without judging, no matter what it was. Mom and dad would never find out. And she sounded so authentic, so convincing, that, even though he knew she was lying, she would still somehow persuade him into believing her. He would reveal whatever dark, horrible secret he was hiding, or the embarrassing incident at school, or the lamest, most stupid little thing; it didn’t seem to matter how big or small it was. It only mattered that she could get it out of him. Well, not this time, sister.

Les leaned back, looked sideways out the door window. The city of San Diego sparkled in the bright blue sunshine, the towers and skyscrapers stark and straight and proper against the ocean. Behind them, the graceful curve of the Coronado Bridge rose and dipped.

“So, how’dja do in your games?” she asked after a time.

Oh, like I don’t know this one, Les thought. Change subjects, get me to lower my guard, and then come back in for the kill. You’re being way too obvious, Leese. Hardly one semester away from home, and you’re losing your touch. “We went one-and-two,” he said finally, in answer to her question.

“Oh,” she said. “Not so good, huh? What happened?”

Les shrugged as if it wasn’t important.

“So what team are you on this year? JV?”

Les nodded once. If she was set on dragging something out of him, he was going to make her work as hard he could.

“Well, that’s good,” Lisa replied, undeterred. “I mean, at least you’re not on that freshman team you hated so much last year.”

Les stared down at the floorboards. “Yeah, well, that really wasn’t an option, since I’m a sophomore now,” he said acidly.

“I know that. I just meant, well, I mean, you made the cut, right? Plus, now you get to be on the same team with your bestie, so life’s a beach, no?”

Les turned from the window, leveled his eyes coldly at his sister. “Yeah, it’s a real beach.”

She looked at him, perplexed, until she had deciphered his response. “What, Omar made Varsity?”

“Of course he did,” Les said, “because that’s how things always work for me.” He paused, and then groaned loudly. “No, that’s not fair,” he said. “I mean, he totally deserves it. He led JV in scoring last year. Offensive rebounds. Steals. He was their best player, hands down. ‘Course it didn’t hurt that he grew five inches in the last twelve months.”

“Really?” Lisa said, evidently surprised. “So what is he now?”

“Six-one-and-a-half,” Les said. “He said his doctor told him he probably had four or five more inches left to grow.”

“Omar?” Lisa said, surprised. “In eighth grade, you two were the almost the same height.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” Les said icily. Then, sensing an opportunity to take a shot of his own, added, “Besides, you haven’t been around in forever. If you had, you would’ve seen him.”

Remembering a Fallen Nemesis: The Columbia House Record Club

Welp, the time has come to bid farewell to another great institution of the lost American cultural landscape.

Yes, it’s time to say goodbye to the Columbia House Record Club.

Actually, Columbia House Record Club ceased to exist ten years ago, when it merged with BMG. And they stopped selling mail-order music in 2009, so the ‘Record’ part of the club has been gone for some six years now.

Still, the announcement earlier this month made me wistful.

How I wish I could go back to a time when I could buy my record albums through the mail. You know, wait for one of those bimonthly club catalogs to come, make my selection, buy a stamp, send the order back, and then pay fifteen bucks for the privilege of waiting three weeks for the record to arrive. So much better than the way things are now, when you have to go online, choose your album from Amazon, pay for it with one click, and listen to it now.

Actually, I learned a lot from The Columbia House Record Club. A lot about business. A lot about life.

Repaying the Debt #4: David Letterman

So tomorrow is David Letterman’s last show. It’s a remarkable thing. Some call it the end of an era. For me, the era of which Dave was part has been over for awhile now. But then again, I don’t even feel like I’m a part of the era in which I find myself.

I first met Dave sometime in 1984. I was fifteen or so, and I had recently talked my parents into letting me have a TV in my room under the pretext that I needed one for my TI-994A (if you don’t know what that is, google it). The TV was a little 13” black and white job. Offbrand, of course. Paid for it with my paper route money, or maybe I had started working at Lionel Playworld by then. The thing was, I was only supposed to use the TV as a monitor. And for the most part, I abided by my parents’ wishes. But late one night, I dared to turn it on. In the course of flipping through the six or seven available channels, I suddenly found myself confronted by the image of a pudgy, bespectacled man. His odd, distorted face completely filled the screen. I don’t remember what he was doing, or why he was so close to the camera. It didn’t matter. All I knew was that on my television was a man who looked like a Gary Larson cartoon come to life. It’s all I needed to see. I was hooked.

Brain Drool

Work continues apace on the novel (that pace being glacial (and not of the global warming variety, but of the older, proverbial kind)). In addition to consuming vast quantities of time, it is also absorbing nearly all my mental energy (you try drinking orange juice in your coffee instead of milk!). All I have room for anymore are the occasional oddball thoughts that will manifest in my brain, and then melt away through the voluminous gaps (the human brain is, after all, 90% air*). For some reason, today I have a few still clinging to my gray matter. I'm going to share them, if only so I can clear space for still more thoughts on Greek mythology, the many intractable problems of narrative writing, and how many ways I can come up with to describe rocks.

Parenthood: that glorious state of existence where the days pass like weeks, and the years pass like months.

Conventional wisdom isn't just an oxymoron; it's an impossibility.

Does this happen to anyone else? Listening to John Lennon's Imagine, and he sings the line: Imagine all the people/Livin' for today... I always have the same reaction. What is he thinking? Six billion people living for today? That's my definition of a nightmare. Knowing that we all have to come back again tomorrow is the only thing that keeps the social order going. Without it, we'd have sheer chaos. I think I must be missing the point...



* I have no idea if that is true.

Peter Jackson's Hobbit Trilogy in Three Words

Overthought

Overwrought


















Overfought

And now, thankfully, it's just over.

The Real Story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

The Real Story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer

Had a very shiny nose

Yes, kids, that’s how the old song starts. Of course, we all know that Rudolph had (and continues to have) a red nose, but most people don’t how just how shiny it really was.

And if you ever saw it

You would even say it glows

You could say it glows. You could also say that a searchlight glows, or a five-alarm fire glows, or the sun glows. Take it from me, kids, glows doesn’t begin to cover it.

All of the other reindeer

Used to laugh and call him names

I’m sorry to say, things did come to a point where most of the other reindeer teased him mercilessly. But the truth is, Rudolph’s nose shone so brightly that it was physically difficult to be around the little guy. His nose wasn’t just a nuisance to the other reindeer, it was downright hazardous. Why, his own mother and father had to wear welding masks just to put him to bed at night. The others couldn’t even get close enough to talk to him without risking permanent damage to their eyes. No one could understand how a reindeer’s nose could be so infernally bright, and some of them thought it was just plain unnatural. A few were afraid of him.

Come Dancing

Most days, I listen to Van Halen, Foo Fighters, or Green Day to help me through my “Thirty Minutes of Hell” workout, you know, something high energy and especially loud, which helps drown out the sounds of me panting and the occasional groan. Today, though, their brand of accompaniment doesn’t strike me right, and so I go with something else: The Kinks’ Live - The Road. As the title suggests, it is a mostly live album, a collection of songs recorded in concert by that most English of English bands circa 1987.

It seems an unlikely choice, I know, but it works surprisingly well. The Kinks happen to be my all-time favorite band, and they flat out know how to rock in concert. I crank through the first three songs, and before I know it, I’ve already whittled twelve minutes off today’s timed descent into suffering. The fourth song begins. It’s “Come Dancing.”

If you were around in the eighties, you might remember “Come Dancing.” It was the last big hit The Kinks ever had. It’s a bright, breezy song with a wistful, melancholy message, the kind that Ray Davies is so adept at writing. It’s the kind of song that seems crafted specifically to be remembered fondly. It’s the kind of song that you could easily imagine being sung in an English pub during the wee hours of the morning a hundred and fifty years from now.

Elliptical Batman

So I was on the elliptical this morning, slogging my way through “thirty minutes of hell,” an accurate – if not quite affectionate – name for my workout. At some point, I catch a glance of an old lunchbox on the shelf nearby. It’s a childhood relic recaptured through the magic of ebay, an old metal lunchbox with Marvel superheroes adorning every side. The side that’s facing out shows Spiderman, Thor and Captain America. They are showing off, their athletic muscularity on bountiful display in powerful, iconic poses. I cannot see myself, but I know what I must look like in comparison as I sweat and strain and groan: a pale reflection filtered through a funhouse mirror.

Suddenly, I hate these guys.

As I struggle to cultivate (or even hang on to) the comparatively small amount of muscle mass I possess, as I grapple with this stupid machine in an increasingly tenuous battle to fend off the excess weight that seems determined to envelop me, as I endure these thirty minutes of hell each day just so I can continue to keep some degree of fitness part of my identity, it dawns on me that those guys over there on the shelf have it easy. They always have, and they always will. None of them had to earn their muscle, or fight off the insidious advance of middle age obesity. Spiderman spontaneously sprouted muscles after being bitten by a radioactive spider. Thor was born a god. Gods never have to throw themselves in the path of an oncoming exercise machine. Sure, Steve Rogers started life as a scrawny runt – he and I had at least that much in common – but then he went and got injected by a super-secret super-soldier serum (which conveniently went missing long before I got my turn) and then, WHAM!, next thing you know he’s Captain America. He’s set for life. He might retain some vague recollection of what it was like to be a scrawny runt, but he’s never going to have to deal with the twin scourges of visceral and subcutaneous belly fat.

The Adventures of Heracles Mendoza - Sneak peak!

After months of revising and rewriting and polishing, I finally have a chunk of the novel ready to read that stands a decent chance of not embarrassing me. Just to be clear, I said a decent chance. I have written a prologue, which I am currently undecided about using, mostly because the tone and style of it is so very different from the book itself. Still, I'm posting it here because it does introduce the character in what I hope is a charming manner, plus it serves the additional purpose of raising the question as to who exactly the narrator of this story really is, and that, it seems to me, is a very fair question.

After the prologue, there are links to a PDF version of Chapters 1-4 as well as a link to a Word document that readers can complete and return to me if they wish to send me feedback. Or feel free to comment directly on the blog. Thanks for reading!

PROLOGUE

Where to begin?

Many writers like to start their stories with a bang, jumping right into the middle of some hot mess, trying to hook the reader with a shocking dose of tense, dizzying commotion. Others take the slow, methodical approach, carefully setting the scene, and then zooming in slowly like a camera until the main character is front and center.

But, really, a story can start any old way. I suspect that deciding just where to begin a story is a problem that drives writers crazy. Or maybe it’s just me. I wish I knew for sure. I don’t know too many writers.

Take this story, for example. This one begins on a sunny morning in the city of El Cajon, a suburb of San Diego, which is a large metropolis in the state of California, in the country of The United States, in the Year of Our Lord 2009. It begins with a fourteen-year-old (almost fifteen) boy by the name of Les Mendoza, as he plays basketball with a couple of friends on Monday, June 10^th, the first real day of summer break (because everyone knows that weekends don’t count…).

But is that the best place for the story to start?

Bull-leaping lives!

Ever since setting to work on my novel, I’ve been digging deep into the mythology and ancient history of the Greeks. One unexpected (but cool) side effect is that some otherwise random news story or fragment of ephemera will catch my attention because it recalls or connects with something from that time. A great example of this is the following photo, which chanced across my computer’s homepage a week or so ago:

This is a picture of a man sailing over a charging bull, looking much like an Acapulco cliff diver, only sideways. One thing we can say for sure about this guy is that when he landed, it wasn’t in water. Hopefully, it was just sawdust, or sand, or something equally inoffensive. Anyway, it makes for a compelling image, and instantly raises the question: What is this man doing, and where did he get those nifty socks?

I’ve had no luck with the socks yet, but it only took a few clicks to learn that the man is called a recortador, a professional bull-leaper. That’s right, he leaps over bulls for a living. The sport is called recortes, and the premise is to avoid being gored and trampled by a stampeding bull while still picking up points for style. To do this, the recortador relies on courage, preternatural agility, and an uncanny knack for knowing where the bull is going to go. The only weapons he takes into the arena are his wits and an unlimited supply of hair product.

Throwing the Penalty Flag on Muppets Most Wanted

I am already on record as being a huge fan of the Muppets, going back to the early days of The Muppet Show. And I wasn’t shy about professing my love for the recent Muppets reboot (2011) starring Jason Segel and Amy Adams, because it resurrected so much of the pure whimsy, joyful exuberance and gently caring spirit of the first and best Muppet film, 1979’s The Muppet Movie.

So how does the new film, Muppets Most Wanted, fare in comparison? Well, let’s just say that it’s a frog of a different color. Not a completely different color. Just a few shades off. After the opening number, MMW never quite rises to the level of its predecessor. It’s not that it can’t quite hit the high notes; it’s more like it’s not clear that they’re trying. Generally speaking though, it does meet the Muppet standard for entertainment value, and that means kids and adults alike will enjoy the film, in their own ways. Grown-ups will guffaw at the moments of parody, the playful pop-culture references and the quick one-liners, while kids will have fun watching the silly and colorful antics of the characters. It may not be the Muppets at their best, but it is them in their most familiar habitat.

One thing I confess I don’t understand about Muppets Most Wanted is the intentional decision by the filmmakers to loosely shadow the storyline of The Great Muppet Caper (1981). In The Muppets, the theme of reviving past greatness by getting the group back together again naturally lent itself to multiple parallels to the original, which was the story of Kermit and how he gathered the group together in the first place. MMW does something similar with its call-back film. Both are predicated on the Muppets venturing overseas and getting entangled in a major heist.

But why? The Muppets had something to say about reinvention and facing the future that actually builds upon the original, but that is not the case for this newest film. Both Muppets Most Wanted and The Great Muppet Caper are varieties of caper film, but there is no necessary link between them. So what’s the point? Why not set off in some new, different direction with MMW? The Great Muppet Caper wasn’t that great to begin with. Why use it as a model? And does this mean the next film is going to be The Muppets Take New Jersey?