Building Your Writing Toolkit: Part 7.2 - Voice as Stain

When you hear your professor speaking does it remind you of your father? When you hear your friend speaking do you think of a cousin? When your boss talks to you does it sound like your mom? Probably not – each of the people you know has unique cadences to their speech and a distinct diction that makes them sound unlike most of the other people you know. You have a unique pattern of speech yourself, one which those listening to you can hear and identify you by.

Writers, however, must be able to command a number of different patterns of speech that they can use realistically for their writing. The rhythm of a poet’s poem is different from the rhythm that same poet would use writing an in-class essay; the diction an essayist uses when speaking to his brother is probably very different than the word choices he would make in his writing.

All of us have different voices for different occasions. You don’t speak to a child the same way you speak to a police officer, and you don’t speak to a bartender the same way you speak to your boyfriend. You also have different written voices. You may sound different when you’re writing a poem than you do when you’re writing an essay, and different when you’re writing an essay than when you’re writing a short story. But regardless of what you’re writing you should still sound like you.

Professors often notice (and complain) that students don’t have a voice of their own in their essays. The reason that students abandon their own voice is because they’re striving to sound academic in their writing – they think that there is a single proper tone that they can strike that will instantly make their papers more academic, just as many students believe a five-paragraph structure is required for academic writing – both suppositions are incorrect and both lead to bland, uniform student work.

Similarly many writers strive for a poetic tone in their poetry and fiction, imagining that if they are able to use properly poetic words and sultry enough phrasing that their work will instantly be more artistic – you frequently hear people describing this kind of language as “flowery” and in my mind that’s not a compliment: remember that flowers are a plant’s genitals – I don’t want a bunch of flora-dongs assaulting me either physically or mentally.

Good writing is, always has been, and always will be about good content. Content is the core of good writing and everything else is, to an extent, window-dressing. But it’s up to a writer to decide whether their content is dressed up tastefully or trashily, and much of what makes a piece “trashy” is what makes it trite or cliché. Writers who are afraid to insert their own voice into their writing frequently fall back on “safe” voices – the kinds of voices that have been used in the genre forever – in other words they use cliché and lessen the value of their writing by making it into something that a reader has heard a million times before and is sick of before getting past the first few lines.

Here’s an example from my own writing: I’m currently creating a character called Dr. Denkmann. She is a psychologist in her late thirties. Here are four genre examples of I one could introduce this character if I was aiming for a certain voice.

“The doctor stood before her dark window, watching the rain pound the pavement below. She had curves that wouldn’t quit, legs that went ’til Tuseday, and a look on her face that said trouble was heading my way.”

“A delicate, russet curl had escaped from Dr. Denkmann’s tight bun. It caught the soft light from the window as she looked up at me, gently adding a dusky hue to the blush rising on her cheeks and casting intricate shadows on her slowly heaving breast.”

“The doctor turned sharply away from the window and brought up a new screen on her desk. The smooth, rigid planes of her face relayed to me that bad news was on its way and the glint in her eyes, like cold, distant stars, only confirmed that my day was about to get a lot worse.”

“Alicia pressed her hand to the window and turned her face to me with a trembling lip. I had only just realized that I loved her and I waited, nervous, for her to confirm the worst – cancer, killing our love when it was young enough to be precious and old enough to have completely changed me from an asshole bad boy into a gentle, caring man.”

So were you able to pick up on the tried, true, tired voice in each of those? (I’ll give you the last one – it was the tone of a Nicholas Sparks novel, Sparks being the only living author to have pioneered a voice in his writing alone that is simultaneously addictive to women and repulsive to anyone who doesn’t like reading sappy books about mended men and women with horrible diseases.) Even if you didn’t manage to pin down the voice without more hints, you’ll be able to get it for sure when I ask which of these is romance? Or which of these is Noir? Or Science Fiction? Now it’s obvious. Painfully and depressingly obvious. Why is it obvious? All of these descriptions have the same core elements: the doctor, the window, and an indication that the doctor is upset. Now try to pin down the genre in the description that I actually wrote:

“Dr. Denkmann moved with a jarring, forest animal grace. Her wide hips and narrow shoulders were a startling contrast to her slender legs, capped with narrow black heels that clacked like a deer’s hooves when she walked. I caught her silhouetted against the window’s dim gray light, her absurd frame supported on a dancer’s legs, before she turned and sat, staring at me with a frown so slight that it was almost obscured by her glasses.”

Can you find a clear genre in that? What if I told you that Dr. Denkmann was a character in a horror story? Or a psychological thriller? Or a science fiction, noir, or romance novel? Would it fit with your common conception of any of those things? Probably not, and that is why most genre novels are derided by literature classes – they are genres that so infect the stories within them that most authors lose their voice to the genre. And fuck that bullshit – you can put any voice you want into any kind of writing you want. Dr. Denkmann is a side character in a psychological thriller, by the way, but I hate writing in tingly, questioning voices – nervousness isn’t conducive to character building – so I try to keep my writing MY writing and genre expectations can die in a fire for all I care.

So how do you assert your voice in your writing, whatever it may be? Well, first you have to know what your voice is. I like adding humor and vulgarity to almost everything I write. I know that because I’ve written a lot of shitty, flowery poetry. Flowery isn’t my thing. I had to practice a lot to know what kind of voice sounds right for me when I’m writing. I wrote a lot of stodgy, academic-sounding essays before I figured out that you can work a clever turn of phrase, a dash of hyperbole, and occasional obscenity into an academic paper and still have it turn out well. I’ve tried (you wouldn’t believe how I’ve tried) to write simpering, simmering romances just so I could have something to try to sell to a publisher but I always get twenty pages in and feel like my brain has turned into a milk shake. You assert your voice by writing, writing a lot, and messing up a lot before you figure out what works for you. And once you’ve found it you do your damndest to never write in someone else’s voice again.

Figure out metaphors that are amusing to you, adjectives that you like and aren’t tired of hearing. Here’s an exercise: in 100 words or fewer describe a bathroom. Describe it in every genre that you can think of. Then give yourself a thousand words and set a scene in that bathroom, and use those thousand words describing it the way you want to. Do it over and over and over until you are happy with the result. Then look at the result and really examine it – what makes you happy about it? What sounds like you? Hand your scene to a friend (or a professor – someone who can actually be critical of you but who knows you pretty well) and ask them if it sounds like you. Then the next day try the same exercise with an animal instead of a bathroom. The next day try a car. The next day try a person. When you’ve worked on it long enough (and it does actually take a lot of work) you’ll have found the elements in your writing that add up to your unique voice. Befriend these elements. Cultivate them. Cuddle them and bring them flowers. Then use them as much as possible to distinguish your writing from the writing around you.

Sorry if that’s massively unhelpful, and sorry if you thought there was going to be a quick fix. There’s never a quick fix when it comes to writing well – you should know that by now.

That’s all for now, Folks. I’ve allowed myself to ramble a little too much, but I’ll be back next week with advice on creating voices for your characters. After that I think we’re moving on to dialogue, or perhaps tone. Tell me which of the two you would prefer in the comments and that’s what our next subject will be.

Thanks for reading, and stay Tasteful,

Cheers,

     - Alli

Letter To The Leaves: The Art of the Flow

My Fellow Contributors,


I first want to point out that our fourth issue, and the last of volume one, hit the intangible shelves of the internet today. I want to give a big thanks to everyone on the masthead, our readers and our contributors. Without your dedication, diligence and love, this issue (which I must say is our best yet) would not have ended this chapter of our magazines story on such a high note.

Now with that said, back to the topic at hand.

My goal with this blog is not to give you my "definition" of what Flowetry is. Rather I hope to start a dialogue between us in hopes of exploring this medium together.

At first glance it is easy to see the etymology of the word. There are two parts of the word. The first part of the word is Flow and the second is -etry coming from the word poetry. From this dissection I get two ideas right off the bat.

My first idea points out the fact that the art of Flowing is a dynamic, powerful, and exciting medium through which to enjoy the spoken word. When my friends and I  circle up at a party or even around a camp fire and drop a track to spit on, we are doing the same thing the bards were doing in ancient Greece when they circled up and recited a few lines from the Odyssey. We are creating a story; stringing together words on a beat in such a way that they are pleasing to the ear. It must be noted before I continue that Flowing goes far beyond hip hop or any other musical connotation.

When I flow, it is a largely spontaneous mental exercise. I have no idea what I am going to say or what I am going to flow about next until I begin to speak. One word feeds the next, which feeds the next and so on.

The second idea encompasses the last part of the word, -etry and by extension poetry. In this part of the medium notions such as meter, rhythm, content, rhyme scheme and form come into account. Where flowing is largely spontaneous, poetry is more about revising. It is about working through the inconsistencies of symbolism and theme. It is where the skill of the writer is put to the test and shown off.

But you see, just ranting off a few drunk lines at a party, that just happen to rhyme, doesn't make you a strong poet. Just like writing, preparing, and reading a poem to a crowd doesn't make you an M/C. What you need is bravado, presence, confidence, and dedication. What you need is a medium which can combine these two and create a new way of enjoying the spoken word.

And when we put these two together we get such a medium. A medium which is both dynamic and structured. Chaotic and fluid. This medium resonates with a particular population of poets who are looking for a way of expressing their words in such a way that captures and holds the attention of their audience.


It is a way of weaving words in such a way that whirl in the wind of your audience.

Play music with words and paint pictures with sounds. Share your voice.


And now its time for you to share your thoughts are on the subject.

Please and Thank You.



As Always

Undoubtedly Yours,

Bermuda the Man

p.s.

Be. Do. Share.

A Brief Interruption

UPDATE -
If you're having trouble downloading, pop over to THIS PAGE and you'll find a possible solution as well as a stumbling explanation. 

We will return to your regularly scheduled blog after this brief announcement:

Hey Dudes, we've got a new issue out. Click the link to download -

Volume 1 Issue 4

That is all. Please return to your previous enjoyment of our rantings.

Thanks,
     - Alli

Is it Better to Burn Out?

Is it Better to Burn Out?

In his frequently quoted and often debated song, “Hey Hey, My My,” Neil Young said, “it’s better to burn out than to fade away.” This song speaks to the artistry of gritty music that makes its point in an often assaulting or fiery display and soon disappears. Young pays tribute to the punk scene, grunge music, and all music with the ability to transcend genres through its emphasis of the sudden explosion or burst of imagination in music, making it relevant. I have recently been haunted by Young’s lyrics and I began pondering how Young’s philosophy applies to the writing process.

I have always attributed my success, if you can call it that, to my tenacity. After all, I am not the most intelligent human being. Don’t get me wrong, I have been complimented/insulted with such statements/criticisms as, “You think far too much.” This of course, if you think about it, doesn’t say anything about my level of intelligence. There are far too many of my peers who are better read than me. I am no grammar Nazi. But what I have always prided myself on is my tenacity. Sheer force and willpower has carried me through the majority of my undergrad classes. But what is a writer to do when she is tired, really fucking tired of it all. Maybe this exasperation is coming from the fact that it is week 8 of the last quarter of my undergrad degree. Nevertheless, the question of how to keep a student or writer’s fire stoked is an ongoing concern of mine.

 In the past I would thrive when my back was against the wall. Tell me I can’t do it. Tell me someone else is better than me and I come out rhetorically swinging.  But what do you do when you are all alone and all that you have is a slew of due dates staring you in the face. There is no professor baiting you. There are no intense personal dilemmas weighing you down that you must break free of. It is just you and total silence. In these instances, I suppose, a writer must turn to dedication, but dedication is such an uninteresting word. Dedication doesn’t fire you up or burn your gut. I guess I am just addicted to the rush of always teetering on the edge of running out of gas. Now I am finally running out. Now what? Guts can get you through an undergrad program, but I doubt they’re enough to ensure success in a master’s program, let alone a PhD program.  If you are looking for some big answer that is going to recharge and re-inspire your waning passion or provide you with some insightful life plan, I haven’t got it. All I can offer is my honesty and strange musings. So I turn this over to you, reader. What do you do to keep charged? What inspires your writing or more specifically successful longevity?

Lennon weighed in on Young’s message and harshly criticized it defending the brilliance of an artist with staying power. He basically criticized Young’s glamorization of early tragic death, insisting he valued vitality and artists like Gloria Swanson and Greta Garbo. I suppose both Young and Lennon have valid points, but I can’t help being continually attracted to the destructive flame. Then again, “once you are gone you can never come back."

Where Did All The Culture Go?

Lately, I’ve noticed that modern culture has lost its relationship with its roots. More and more, it seems to me that my society doesn’t cherish the thoughts of the men and women who came before them. In the consumerist, self-centered society that is modern America, is literature being left behind?  

Today, in my “Geography of California” class, my professor played a video from his vault that explained the environmental impact of the channelization of the Los Angeles River. What struck me most about the old video was not the touching shots of native birds nesting under man-made bridges, or the dramatic pull-away camera tricks that caught the LA skyline behind a haze of fog as the sun set behind the edge of the concrete waterway; it was that during one of the many cheesy scenes of a man talking in front of a green screen, the decision to pave the river was described as a “Faustian bargain.”

Now, I hate to sound pretentious, but I’m pretty sure that the other students – mostly freshman – in that general education class had no idea what the speaker meant by “Faustian.” Hell, I didn’t even learn about Faust until my Senior Symposium class that I took this last winter, and that was after already reading many times more than the average engineer. In the case of this old video about the LA River, I’m afraid the reference to literature was lost because our society simply doesn’t care anymore.

Let me jump back a few days. I was standing in line at the Poly Fresh, a convenience store on campus, balancing a book, Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being, on my head (it’s just what I do), when an older man in line behind me asked what class I was reading such a great book for. While we waited in line together we talked about the novel and about his position as a music professor who loves literature. At the end of our little talk, as I was approaching the register, he nodded his head and asked, “Muss es sein?” (Must it be?). To which, I responded, “Es muss sein!” (It must be!). It isn’t surprising that we got quite a few confused stares from the eavesdropping customers in line with us.

Again, the apathy towards literature became hauntingly apparent to me. The people in the store looked at us as if we were crazy men, spouting off nonsense – and, in a society that doesn’t embrace literature as a bridge for the emotions of individuals to interact with one another, perhaps we were.

It’s almost sad to compare ourselves to the Greeks. Likely, for a Greek man living at the peak of his civilization’s success, it would have been difficult to go a day without experiencing what we now have come to call the Classics; perhaps in Athens a man couldn’t walk through the center of his city-state without running into a relief of Athena, or Poseidon, or some other deity, and, most likely, he could not go the day without hearing of some reference to great Greek literature. The stories of his people surrounded him, and they connected him to his fellow man. Every man could relate to his neighbor through the myths that they were both raised on, and society built upon itself in this way.

Today, the closest thing I’d say we have to the relationship that the people of Greece had with their art and culture is our relationship with Superhero comics. Our society doesn’t seem to care about literature anymore, and our myths are now our movies.

Tonight’s blog post is a pretty short one. I simply wanted to point out my concerns and tell a few stories from my past week on campus. So, what do you think? Will our society ever fully lose its sense of art and culture? And will “The Avengers” be a great work of art that is regularly referenced a thousand years from now?

Poetry About Cats

A few years ago my husband accidentally ended up at a poetry reading. This was unpleasant for almost everyone involved, since my husband doesn't much care for poetry and poets tend to be scared of large angry men wearing camouflage. Also my husband is something of an asshole. This was a reading that featured poetry of the more deplorable sort, all flow and form and no content - the kind of reading where the audience snaps their fingers and nods, full of insight and benevolent enlightenment and benign sneers, as poets read about their exes and stare at their shoes.

After hearing about the depth of someone's soul for the umpteenth time my husband got up from his work (the reading had appeared around him while he was working on some technical drawings) and approached the microphone. He cleared his throat and this is what he said:

 "My cat peed in the corner.
Poor Kitty.
Poor Me.

My dad told me to clean it up.
I hate you dad.
Bad Kitty.
Poor Me."

He sat down to thunderous silence broken by nervous shuffling and a few half-hearted finger snaps. I was horrified.

"They were just reading their poetry - getting up there and making fun of them was mean," I said.
"But their poetry was awful," he replied.
"They weren't very good poets, but they were talking about things that meant something to them - they were sharing their feelings."
"So was I," he said, "I shared my feelings of annoyance with their bad poems by sharing a bad poem that I had written."
"But you invaded their activity, you broke the mood."
"Good," he said, "when they invaded my coffee shop they interrupted my mood. Why am I the bad guy?"
That did bring me up a little short. I tried one more thing: "but why did you have to make up a poem about cat piss?"
"Maybe cat piss is important to me. Maybe my cat is really important to me. What's wrong with a poem about a subject like cat piss if that subject speaks to the poet?"
"Well there's nothing wrong with it if you MEAN it, but you didn't mean anything there, you just wanted to make fun of them."
"No, I just wanted to let them know that their poetry was cat piss."
"You're an asshole."
"No, I'm a Dadaist and that was performance art. My medium was angry poets."
And I laughed. He may be an asshole, but at least he's a funny asshole.

But I was thinking about the whole episode recently and wondering why it still bothers and amuses me: I came to the realization that it sticks in my memory because poetry about cats is uniformly awful. I've been running into a lot of cat-based poetry recently and I'm sick of it.

We've had submissions of cat poetry for the magazine. My cat-obsessed friend wanted to know what I thought of her poems about her cats, and then wanted to know what I thought about her cats. At work we recovered a file for a client - it ended up being two-hundred pages of a prose-poetry novel about a cat with a Ph.D.

Fuck poetry about cats. Fuck cat people. On the way home from work today I saw a Prius with the license plate "MY2CATS". Hey cat people, let me let you in on a secret: nobody wants to hear about your cats. I'm sure they're adorable, I'm sure you love them, I'm sure they're little ladies an prim little gentlemen with the oh-so-tidy way they clean up after themselves, but no one gives a shit. Want an example? Go to Cracked.Com and look up Christina H. - she's a comedy writer whose column is called "Let Me Tell You About My Cats!", which is funny because she understands that no one ever wants to hear about anyone's cats. Want another example? Wordsworth was a really good poet, and here's a pretty goddamn bad poem he wrote about a cat:

That way look, my infant, lo!
What a pretty baby-show!
See the kitten on the wall,
sporting with the leaves that fall.
Withered leaves - one - two and three
from the lofty elder tree.
Though the calm and frosty air,
of this morning bright and fair.
Eddying round and round they sink,
softly, slowly; one might think.
From the motions that are made,
every little leaf conveyed
Sylph or Faery hither tending,
to this lower world descending.
Each invisible and mute,
in his wavering parachute.

But the Kitten, how she starts,
crouches, stretches, paws, and darts!
First at one, and then its fellow,
just as light and just as yellow.
There are many now - now one,
now they stop and there are none:
What intenseness of desire,
in her upward eye of fire!
With a tiger-leap half-way,
now she meets the coming prey.
Lets it go as fast, and then;
Has it in her power again.
Now she works with three or four,
like an Indian conjuror;
quick as he in feats of art,
far beyond in joy of heart.
Where her antics played in the eye,
of a thousand standers-by,
clapping hands with shout and stare,
what would little Tabby care!
For the plaudits of the crowd?
Over happy to be proud,
over wealthy in the treasure
of her exceeding pleasure!

You can find "The Kitten and the Falling Leaves" in lots of places, but I found that particular version at catquotes.com, which includes pages like "Cat Quotes - Several Hundred Quotes by Famous, anonymous, and other cat lovers" and "Famous Cat Lovers - NEW" and is where the Internet's nightmares come from.

Long story short, cats are like any other subject - if it gives you a noticeable erection you probably shouldn't write a poem in which the reader can sense that erection. Stop drooling over your subjects, it grosses readers out.

As a counter example, subtlety is a frequent component of strong poems.  Here's a Carl Sandburg poem that is not about cats:
The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

 "Fog" is about fog but touches on fog using imagery we all understand as it is associated with cats. Carl Sandburg's cat-boner is not visible here, nor is a fog-boner or any other kind of engorgement. See? Subtle.

 So anyway, shut up about cats, chill out about your subject, and aim for subtlety. Sorry to derail you all from my normal series (we're on to voice right now) but my cat died today and I wasn't feeling up to writing a thoughtful, considered blog. Coincidentally, if you've got a moment to spare you should totally google "I'm sad because my cat died today" and enjoy the unintentional hilarity.

Later dudes. Be excellent to each other.

Cheers,
      - Alli

"There Is Grandeur in this Life" -- Richard Dawkins

I was very excited to read Slick’s latest blog post. Like him, I, too, have been reading a lot of science-based texts – more specifically, I have been reading a lot of Dawkins. I finished the God Delusion – I know, this is more of a philosophically grounded text rather than a scientific one – and I started The Greatest Show on Earth a couple of days ago. The issue I’ll be tackling for the sake of this article, though, will be in regards to an idea Dawkins put forward in the former text.

Near the end of the book, if not the end, Dawkins brings to light the fact that there are four pillars by which people come to trust and follow god. They are as follows: explanation, exhortation, consolation, and inspiration. These four things are the marrow of, I’m assuming, all religions – especially those in which a personal relationship with a supernatural deity is a crucial component. These things, however, need not be grounded in spirituality. I will discuss briefly each of these three concepts. Following this discussion, I would like to see your thoughts on the subject.

Explanation is a big one, which is why, I assume, it is the first to be listed (the order is obviously not alphabetic). Early religions were formulated in order to explain why things happened. We now know – if we truly can, that is – that these religions didn’t explain much. We assume there is no Jove living high above us (or among us, raping human women, no less) or a Loki perpetually fucking the Aesir up. These gods were meant to explain the universe in order to make it less scary. I, however, think there are better, more sufficient ways to explain the universe. As far as we know – and to the fullest extent that we can currently know – the universe is 14-some-odd billion years old. I won’t go into that more than I need to, nor will I go into this discussion more than I need to seeing as this part of my article can go on for thousands of pages. If anyone is interested, though, there is a fantastic book called Just Six Numbers by Reese that sheds some light on the six factors that shape and mold the universe into the elegant thing it is today. Also, anything by Brian Greene would be good – namely The Elegant Universe. I think physics, mixed with chemistry and biology, is more than enough to explain the universe, and by said explanation, it is easy to create meaning for oneself. After all, that is why we have books, folks.   

Moving on to exhortation, Dawkins uses exhortation to discuss issues of morality, specifically doing so by claiming morality does not come from any religious doctrine. According to an article Dawkins cites when lecturing about the matter of religious-based morality, there is no civilization on this earth that does not share one thing in common: the “Golden Rule.” We all know the Golden Rule, and, assuming you aren’t a psychopath or a crazed sycophantic zealot, everyone generally abides by it. The Golden Rule is, essentially, do to others that which you would like them to do to you. This phenomenon has an evolutionary explanation. In the early ascension of man through the homo family, small bands of people formed tribes, and it was advantageous to do good to others. This notion was primarily kept within familial boundaries; however, as more and more humans began to enter the world, it became more and more likely that human “A” would run into human “B” even though they were not immediately related. This notion has been embedded into our psyche and now lies latently in our neurology. Interestingly enough, our propensity to follow the Golden Rule is now a misfire. For example, I am going to Paris in December. If I meet a middle aged Parisian man on the streets, the chances of meeting the same man a second time are remarkably slim. I would, though, certainly abide by the Golden Rule while interacting with this man, and this is because the misfiring of a human’s Golden Rule inclination is still prevalent in the brain.

Consolation. This is something we all need. Though it may sound romantic, a sense of consolation is quite necessary for human beings in order to thrive. We are fragile creatures living in a rather unforgiving, indifferent universe. If you take a minute to look around – I mean really take in the devastating ubiquity of our vast universe – it becomes quite apparent that a majority of it is uninhabitable; in fact, if a human were to suddenly find his or herself in a random part of the universe at a given moment, said human would almost certainly die instantly. This is a harsh reality, but it is the way the universe is. So where do we find consolation on this tiny blue dot (harkening back to Sagan)? Again, looking around we can find a multitude of beauty and elegance, both on our planet and off of it. Having a basic understanding of the universe allows one to fully appreciate the unique beauty that is the cosmos. Not to mention one only has to walk a few blocks down any street in America in order to find a library or museum filled with art and literature. Understanding of all these beautiful things provides me with more than enough consolation and reassurance that life is a miraculous, beautiful thing that I refuse to take for granted.

Finally, we come to inspiration. This, I think, is the most remarkable aspect of Dawkins’ argument. I believe the last chapter of his book is called, “There Is Grandeur in this Life.” This is a beautiful title and it wraps up the whole book so well. There is beyond a shadow of a doubt so much beauty in this world and in this life. Dawkins illustrates a beautiful picture in his book. He says – and I’m, again, paraphrasing here – that if we look at the timeline of the universe, the totality of the existence of everything can be measured on an astronomically large ruler. We, the people alive today, are but a laser point trudging slowly across its surface with everything behind and beyond the point shrouded in darkness. This, again, illustrates the miraculous nature of our lives, and it implores us not to take it for granted. To be alive during this pinprick on the ruler of time is a special thing, and we all ought to “run faster, stretch our arms out farther, [for] one fine morning…*”

So please folks, let me know what you think.

J

*taken from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby