On top of my dresser in my bedroom sits a ceramic dish in the form of an upturned baseball glove.
It holds any manner of small items like keys, a couple of plastic things (I have no idea what they are for, I think the yellow one is the firing pin safety plug for one of my guns….I think….) and other stuff. Occasionally I go through drawers, closets, file cabinets, the “lost world” under my bed looking to “clean” up clutter and possibly locate things I forgot I had, which I almost always find. Why dear God why, do I have a 16 pound sledge hammer under my bed?
Well, it’s there in case I need to pound my way out of the rubble, ya never know…..

I didn’t realize till the other night I have 12 pairs of brand new, never worn shoes, boots and athletic type footwear in one end of my closet as well as numerous shirts (15 - 20), and pricey sweaters which I’ll probably never wear unless I strike it rich and buy a 100′ sailboat or go-fast boat.

The expensive tan suede cowboy boots are a must for anyone who plans on maybe owning another horse someday.Which I do.
It could happen….

At this point in my writing career I should be used to thinking like one. It’s almost a totally invasive thought process for me now. However, in rummaging through the items in the ceramic glove on my dresser I found 2 or 3 old, really old keys and my reaction was of course that of a writer.

Now, any normal person would grab the items and ask another normal person, if available, such as a wife, or elderly relative(who knows more than she’s telling) if they knew what these items might go to or if they maybe recognize them, right? But, if you’re a writer, an action adventure thriller mass market commerical fiction author, which I am, then the imagination goes wild with possibilities. It will ignore or in fact zoom right past a typical thought process. (It’s a gift…..the doctor says….)
After getting past a tidal wave of fear that I was suffering from early dimentia because I could recall no memory of what the keys opened or went to, my buzzing writers mind began to explore possible answers.

One of the keys looked a lot like the key to a safe deposit box and in fact probably is(I DON’T have a safe deposit box, so, right off the bat the plot thickens) but I imagined and had the clarity to structure it in a mental outline, that it did in fact belong to a safe deposit box in a bank  in another state or foreign country far away. And, that in said box were old black and white snapshots of people who looked like me, papers that a long lost relative left for me to find, and still more keys which were to an abandoned villa in the french alps that was waiting for me to arrive and discover who murdered my long lost relative, the patriarch of my bloodline and said villa, that also had a really big heated swimming pool with jacuzzi. Maybe they were my real mother or father and knew I would one day find the truth about who I really am, and my destiny as rightful heir and rebel leader of an oppressed people long held under the death grip of an evil dictator of this country. I needed to find that box, get into it, take the stacks of money, papers, maps (if any), cool Rolex diving watch, and begin a perilous journey into the unknown. I would need to locate and buy a weapon and bullets when I arrived, the cash would come in handy.

I wondered if there might be any good bbq joints in any of the surrounding villages.

But why an odd amount of 87,000 dollars, American? What if someone was watching for the arrival of a “deliverer”(which would be me or a character yet to be named) and had a plot in place to murder them too?                       I might need a team of mercenaries which also means I would have to charter a private jet or yacht (aha! I knew the meaning of the pricey sweaters and boat shoes would make sense to me!) to make a stealth entry through a friendly bordering country, one that would, for a price and through a contact named Calderone, be willing to supply us with weapons, night vision goggles and a helicopter, a fast one.

Hold on, 87,000 dollars wasn’t looking like so much money all of a sudden. I needed to examine the old papers in that box to see if they held the clues to how or where I might find the funding my ancestor surely knew I would need.

Yes! An account statement from this same bank, upon which I was named and had access to, held almost 3 million dollars. Ok, we’re in business, I was good to go.

How stupid I was to have walked past this key sitting on my dresser all this time.

Maybe fate played a hand, not letting me come upon the truth until I was capable and had a willing heart. Interesting…..

Perhaps this was why I had unknowingly bought and stored clothes I would need for this perilous journey. The sledge hammer made sense now too…..

It all seemed to fit together somehow.

But who could I now trust? The answer: NO ONE! Not even my dog, who seems to be eyeing me suspiciously lately.

As soon as “Wheel of Fortune” was over I would probe Granny for information on family history since any and all she could tell me might, just might, keep me and my team alive. It might require her potty chair, duct tape and a hot lamp.We’ll see if she cracks.

Trust no one, tell no one. Check. Passport. Check. Box of Twinkies. Check.

My thoughts are interrupted by footsteps echoing down the long, cold tile hallway. An assasin? Maybe. Or, it could be my sexy seductress wife wondering if I was ready to go out for BBQ. I deftly slip the key into my pocket, or maybe I should place it back in the glove so no one would know I now knew, and of my pending mission.
I decide the key stays with me from now on, let the chips fall where they may.

I think after dinner I’ll take my significant other, who could be a planted agent, to the “SpyShop” to see if it rattles her calm exterior, and to get some cool stuff.

In the meantime I must collect my thoughts and potential best-seller ideas and commit them to paper, or a program in my computer. I pledge to myself to continue to monitor my surroundings at all times for good story ideas and at all costs to develop them.

The mind of a writer.

Some would say that were it not for the minds of  writers humanity might still be chasing food with clubs, still others might say - Thank God for patient editors, agents, mental institutions and artist communities.

Whatever your thoughts may be, I for one am blessed and pleased to have the mind of a writer.

Keep writing writers! I Love Ya!

Just an update for you folks who subscribe and for new readers!                                                                                                         You can also reach me at thewritersroad@comcast.net and THANKS for coming by.

Hello again fellow writers!

Sparing you the long list of reasons, many of which appear on page one of “Excuses For Not Writing”,(which will be out in the fall with a major publisher) let me just say Thanks to a writer who pointed out to me yesterday the actual amount of time it had been since my last post.                                                                                                                                                    Denial is such a sweet thing until shattered by reality.

So here I sit answering the call of the wild, the wild within me. Or maybe I’m just trying to quiet the accusing voice of guilt, or the deafening scream of fear.

I must tell you, to many of the authors and writers out there in internet land, that without your example and diligence many of us who aspire to write would quickly get, and stay, lost. Lost to time, endlessly chasing the tail of our dreams…  (I’m laughing, trying to picture myself doing this)

I write, sometimes, a trucking blog on another site that I actually visit occasionally when I run out of reasons not to. I’m one of those types who has to come to the end of myself to be able to see clearly where I’m at on the writer’s road.  More often than not, like right now, I am horrified at how much time has passed since I turned in any direction but a straight forward charge. All too often, too focused too far ahead, I neglect the foundational, the “here and now” aspects of effort that more experienced writers understand. Why is it, even the most talented, determined people still fall prey to this bottomless pit?

I can’t answer that.

I wish I could, but instead of trying to reason it myself or find someone to whine my finely crafted delusions too, (which I could easily do), I’ve chosen to sit….and write.

Victory? No. Triumph? Not even close.

Sweaty, bloody, battered, hotly pursued by the demons of my soul I climb over the last obstacle in my journey to salvation? Getting warmer………maybe.

The reality is that, for me, this is more than just a learning process. It’s a gauntlet, of sorts, that I am, at all costs, determined to “endeavor to persevere”  within. That is, if I can stay the course long enough to develop as a writer the skills and the bodies of work that might qualify me to stand alongside those who have gone before me. Those, whose example and courage has cut a trail through an otherwise impassable wilderness, one I never could have hoped to find my way in.

For some of us, the horizon of our dreams may be obscured by the clouds of our pasts, circumstance or doubt and fear. I would be the first to step forward to serve as the poster boy for the “unlikeliest” of survival stories, forget about ever hoping to be counted among the few successful “writer’s” of our day. But, just to still be alive.                            A living witness to the portion of dimension between the moments that will define my life, moments I cross between hanging precariously over the abyss of time, on the bridge of hope.

The moments I live and die by.

That I may yet become a “writer” remains to be seen, however, I am thrilled to keep putting one foot in front of the other here on the writer’s road.  Some of you are too far ahead, in the distance for me to see you, but I have your tracks here in the sand before me……Thank you for that……

Now, if I can just keep moving and not stop long enough to be too pleased with myself….

Characters in the 2 stories I am working on, soon to be set once again into motion, haven’t seemed to notice the timeless freeze frame they’ve been in, and still are, in….. except for one Chase Rage. He keeps looking at his titanium Seiko Dive watch and giving me that “look”…..shattered glass falls from his tattered clothing, the blood of an “innocent” runs down his face….millions of lives and the fate of several nations hang in the balance…..his co-worker, a lovable ditz and  trusted friend, mother of a 4 year old that could be his,  just took a bullet to the head, a bullet that was meant for him…..the bad guys are about to find out why he changed his name to Chase Rage..and why he’s decided “To Hunt the Hunter”

Chase says “we have to move”.  He’s scanning the surrounding office towers through the infra-red vision scope on his suppressed assault rifle…..the power outage due to a horrific west coast storm…..he’s taking the shot….

Keep writing writers! I Love ya!