Scatterbrained, can't focus. So here's some random thoughts.
We finally have cool computer technology, like a 70's scifi movie. Unfortunately, it's Microsoft technology. Which means it's a distopian future that's only bright enough that we need shield our eyes.
Also, on the topic of story openers, sometimes you get them right off. Most times, I think people could follow the story advice I heard a long time ago, "Write it all out, toss the first third in the waste bin, and rewrite the opening line for that point." Sometime I write the opener as the last piece. But sometimes good stuff comes right off the Muses teletype (not a Story Bone).
"It was three weeks after the funeral that the crying began. I got up, half dead and on automatic at two in the morning, said to my wife, "I'll get her," and stumbled to the nursery. It was only when I saw all the boxes ready for Goodwill that I remembered she was gone."
2 comments:
Speaking from the vantage point of someone that is currently getting up at 2 (and often 3 and 4) in the morning to tend to a terrified 2 year old or a fussy 6 month old, that opener grabs me right in the gut.
I think a lot more about mortality (theirs and mine) than I used to. I guess when you have something precious, you worry about losing it. Their little lives are so new and deserve a full run, and mine is more necessary to give them a good upbringing.
A close friend of the family just found out their 3 year old has leukemia. Thank God they caught it very early and he is responding very well to the treatment (kemo). He has an excellent chance of a full and permanent remission but they still have a long road to travel to get there.
Makes you actually grateful to hear that wailing. Means they are still breathing and that you are still there to hear it.
Thanks, that's the effect I was going for. At the party (I was at Dan's on Saturday to catch up with friends), I didn't want to tell too much of the story, 'cause I didn't know how you or Jen would react. Plus, it was still formulating in my head. But when you brought out the baby monitors, it was just that weird synchronicity that made me blurt it out.
Last Thursday night, as I was going to bed, I had an idea to use a baby monitor as a way to talk with the dead. And then on the way home Friday that first line started banging around my head. I had to pull over and write it down. I wrote about two pages. Then Friday night I kept turning on the light to write down more of the story. Saturday night I worked out some more of the story.
Yeah, I'm glad that your friends found it early and that the kid is responding to treatments.
My research shows a lot of stories about people getting EVPs off the baby monitors, but I have something else in mind (insert evil laugh here).
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