The Lisa Life

Gobsmacked

Monday, Martin and I had several errands to run and were out of the house most of the day.  When we got home, I checked the answering machine and had a message from my friend Loretta.

Our mutual friend Ronni's husband had committed suicide.

To say I was shocked is an understatement.  Last year, for my big 40th birthday party, Jim and Ronni came to Michigan from Texas and spent a few days as our guests.  We had great fun.  Martin and I enjoyed their company so much.  Jim and Martin had a lot of fun, both being history buffs.

Jim tickled me.  He was so pleased to have scored a couple of heavyweight tee shirts on sale at Meijer's.  He thought my pepper grinder from McCormick was the bomb.  He bought a Jesus action figure doll in Hell.  He liked driving our old Focus SVT because it was a manual and it was fun to drive.  He liked bloody marys.  So do I.

Now, I'm really pissed at him.  My heart breaks for Ronni.  No matter what the problem, suicide isn't the answer.  It's the ultimate selfish eff you to everyone you know, especially your family.

Ronni is an exceptionally strong woman but this has gobsmacked me in such a way, I can't imagine what she is feeling right now.  I'll say what she said:  If you are a praying person, a prayer wouldn't be a bad thing right now.  If you aren't a praying person, please send her positive thoughts and energy during this terrible time.

Love ya, Ronni.

Long Time Gone

I've been gone for a while, haven't I?  You missed me, didn't you?  Well, tell me you did, at least.  Humor me.

That is not to say that I haven't been writing.  I just haven't been writing here.  You will notice that two fiction pieces I previously posted have vanished, poof, gone like Britney Spears' sanity.  That is because one I just wasn't happy with and it needs to hide for a while until I rework it. The other piece was edited, slashed, hacked to pieces, rearranged, rewritten, edited again by friends and today, I sent it off to two magazines in hopes of getting it into print.  I don't have high expectations, I don't think I'm the next great hope in fiction, but I am proud that I finished it and actually put it into manuscript form and sent it out. 

I am also working on a novel. Yeah yeah yeah, so is every other blogger on earth, right?  I have completed Chapter Five and I'm working on Chapter Six.  It's about a woman whose husband goes down on the Edmund Fitzgerald.  I'm trying to make it as historically accurate as possible and now, I know more about the Fitz that the men who actually crewed the boat probably did. 

I am the featured author in my writer's group next week.  This alternately thrills me (I am an attention whore, after all) and scares me.  I am very insecure about writing fiction.  I never thought I would be good at it but what I've written so far, I think it's pretty good.  My writing group is a great bunch, though, and I trust their judgment and know I'll get good suggestions and feedback.

Other than that, I've been doing my usual things.  Cooking, reading, watching more television than is good for me, hanging out with my mother-in-law and helping her with a few things, letting Mia eat ice cream for lunch.  The usual.

Question

If you are up at midnight on a weeknight watching scrapbooking on Home Shopping Network, just how far away from throwing that rope over the beam and letting it all go are you?

Easy Rider

This has got to be one of the top five stoner flicks of all time.  In fact, I think a certain blog author may have participated in certain games in which whenever the word "man" was used in the movie, certain actions occurred. 

That was back in the olden days, of course.  I digress.

East Rider is on Comcast On Demand right now, so we watched it again, man.  It's sort of the quintessential 60s movie.  It's got drugs, man.  It's got a great soundtrack (one song: Don't Bogart That Joint), It's got hippies, man, and sex. It's even got a commune and a Mardi Gras scene.  Note to self: Don't do LSD and go to a cemetery in New Orleans during Mardi Gras.  It stars Dennis Hopper, Peter Fonda looking very hot and a very young Jack Nicholson.  Phil Spector even makes a cameo.  Wonder if he was batshit crazy then, too?

It's written by Dennis Hopper, Peter Fonda and Terry Southern and pretty much started the trend for independent films. 

One of the best scenes in the movie occurs when Jack Nicholson's character George, an obvious good ole frat boy type, gets high for the first time and explains his theories regarding UFOs.

Not really a feel good movie, but an important movie for reasons beyond being one of the top five five stoner movies of all time.   It's especially topical now, given the current state of the world.

Watch it and find out why.

On Writing, By Stephen King

On Writing, A Memoir Of The Craft, by Stephen King

I had read this remarkable work a few years back, on the recommendation of my friend Loretta.   Recently, it was mentioned and praised by my writing group, so I found an inexpensive used copy on Amazon and bought it to not only read again, but to refer to when I get stalled in my writing.

I've been a Stephen King fan for years.  I distinctly remember where I was and what I was doing when I read several of his books.  Salem's Lot: the first night I spent in my first apartment, a third floor walk-up in an old row house in Bethlehem PA,  furnished with only a lamp and a sleeping bag until the furniture got moved in.  Scared the bejesus out of me.  The Stand: During a week-long vacation down the Jersey shore,  I went to the beach every day and read it all the way through and started it all over again.  It felt like the characters were friends.  Misery: On a plane going to California.  I gasped involuntarily several times throughout and had to stop reading to compose myself.  Cujo: One of the last summer vacations I took en famille to the cabin up North.  So, Mr. King has provided the backdrop to many of my memories. 

I haven't been so impressed with most of what he's done after Gerald's Game, but he's so prolific and such a good storyteller, his works stand the test of time.  I was thrilled to read On Writing, to get a glimpse of how he works.

On Writing delivers.  Two of his suggestions I can readily agree with:  write a lot and read a lot.  He also suggests not watching a lot of television, but I disagree with that.  Although a lot of tv is pure unadulterated crap (The Bachelor?  Survivor?  90210?) there are some well-written shows and these can be an inspiration as well. 

He has useful advice about the workmanship of writing.  That it is work, that you need to have a workspace of your own, no matter how humble (he wrote Carrie in the laundry room of his double wide trailer) and you need to write nearly day.  He suggests 1000 words a day at minimum.  He also recommends that after your first draft is done, you let some select friends/family read what you've written for feedback.

As with most of King's works, there is underlying humor and smart-ass remarks are sprinkled throughout.  If you are a fledgling writer or just a Constant Reader who has an interest in the art, I highly recommend On Writing as a reasonable enough explanation for the whole thing.