Something new for a change..

this is a teaser of something I've been working on with josh picco, i'll give you an epilogue and a brief look at the first chapter part i'm certain about keeping. please let your fresh sets of eyes be my guide as to whether or not my writing is on the right track..

bm


...


- Epilogue -

There’s a certain atmosphere created within a party’s headquarters on the night, and particularly the precise moment, of a big win for one of their comrades. The raw electricity between supporters and members of the media lights up a room like the burst of engulfed birch bark on a glowing ember. Common men and women stand side by side with a sense of pride, of victory, of being on the winning side.
Some people could just use a win, so long as we convince ourselves that political wins can compete with any personal win in life. Above the outpouring of joy, tears flowing, signs waving, blood teetering through veins in a manner only seldom achieved, there remains a calming and cooling sense of empowerment for those involved. For the man of the hour, whose campaign of sweat and political strategizing has led to this monumental moment.
Those who are present, who felt the muscles across their chest and every tooth in their head clench simultaneously in anticipation of poll results as they sporadically arrive, remember every moment. They remember wiping their brow and wondering if the drumming in their ears was their own heart beating or the sounds of the thousand hearts around them, beating in a rhythm of strict cacophony.
There’s a brief lull in the crowd as the newly elected successor to Canada’s leadership begins to speak. It was said to have sounded like a rain was falling all around them on this night.

- CHAPTER ONE -

He remembered the cold shiver running up his neck the first time he had heard the rats. This is not where he was intended to be, and he knew it only to be true the first night he would later spend away from the apartment building he called home. An apathetic superintendent, too much turnover in tenants when you lock up the thieves and the vagrants, just a scum-infested shit hole to try and call home.
If you could, that is. Hell, you had to call it something.
Every morning was a gamble. You would set an alarm the night before, but it was only a fail-safe. More often than not, Dean awoke to the beating of single rain droplets as they fell from the festering ceiling tiles to his forehead, as well as into several strategically placed buckets throughout the room. He had decided, long ago, that the position of his bed in the room was the ideal spot to avoid significant water damaging the mattress or rusting the bed frame, save for the one single leak perpetually landing on the tip of his brow. A constant, and somehow reliable, thumping. It made him think of an abacus he had once seen in his grandparent’s den, and the noise it made as he slid the weighted beads from one side to another in time. He felt the seconds of every night creak on and on, as each drip of water hit the bottom of the buckets surrounding him. Thankfully, they only needed to be emptied once every four or five days. More than that, and he would finally bring himself to knock on the door of his superintendent and demand it be fixed.
That, or he would move out. Whichever came first, he thought. Dean was too a timid man to consider making choices that affected his life so drastically.

all we know

There’s a twitch in his leg.
There’s a moment, as he opens his eyes each morning, when he comes face to face with another version of himself. Though it’s alarming in a way only possible when awoken suddenly, it fades seamlessly into a comforting yet alert state.
A familiar state.
He’s always thought it reminded him of someone abruptly pulling a warm set of sheets from the contortions of his body, leaving nothing but a bitter cold to embrace him. It is all that is happiness and near and normal, and as surely as it has always been there, it is not.
But, wait.
All of a sudden, there is a new normal. You’ve re-evaluated your stance regarding the whole matter, and the way things became turns, before your very eyes, into the way things are, have been, and perhaps will be.
And each day of his life begins this way. It assures him to know he will be forced to look into the eyes of all that could have been with him, to him, for him.
He accepts what is, sidesteps what may be, and lives the paradox of, to his dying day, hanging on each moment until the moment a new day begins.
He opens his eyes.

once.

A brand new year! I guess other than the feeling inside of a blank slate before you, today is like any other Saturday afternoon.
Spent sitting inside, most likely in front of the TV with the roommates, either reading wikipedia or trying to finish the ever-loving task I have taken on of finishing The Dark Tower series. Only somewhere in the range of 900 pages to go.
There's a sort of interesting point to be made on my perspective of this series as an over-arching whole. From day one, I've known the final act (and even final line) of the series as a passing fact from before I was even aware of the series. And though its setting was made apparent to me from my first sitting with The Gunslinger, it is only beginning to dawn on me (as I work my way through the sixth, Song of Susannah) what the true significance of this epic finale will mean for the characters I have grown to adore.

Go, then. There are other worlds than these.
- Jake Chambers, The Gunslinger

Besides all this nonsense, I've been on a bit of a roll with writing and developing some compositions I've been working on all fall. The bits and pieces of work I managed to squeeze in have been flowering in this spring of all winters, and as the grass prematurely blooms, so do my thoughts and ideas as to where this year will take me. There are horizons all around me to be expanded, and it's seldom been the task of anyone but myself to explore all possibilities.
It's an exciting time in life, and I couldn't be more thrilled to see where it takes me.

It's really pleasing me to see my friends taking such an active interest in working on all of our musicianship as a collective whole. As Tristan so aptly put it, we all manage our time and control our habits by creating scheduled rehearsals/practice. As an engaged group rather than a passive lone soul, we can work together to get ourselves to a level of comfort with our instruments AND as one single sound made of many.

If I get a chance soon, I'll start discussion regarding Dry Twist Productions. It's a little idea Lisa and I have cooked up, and when there's details there'll be details.

-brad