I wanted to share something I have been working on. I am writing a memoir inspired novella about life on my grandparents’ farm. The novella is not complete, but I wanted to share and get some feedback from you whether you’d like to see more of this. Many Thanks for your comments.
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Chapter 1
My eyes fly open as I awake with a jerk. On my back, I lay in the bed listening for the cause of my rousing. I hear nothing but my own breathing and the “bom, bom, bom” of my heart.. My eyes adjust to the dim light filtering in through the window next to the bed. As I peer outside, the moon has already set, so the only light is from the myriad of stars glittering in the clear dark sky.
I sit up and scan the room. The double bed is spacious when sleeping only one. Though the night is dark and clear, the air is warm to the point of being close. The window to my left is propped open by a two foot long piece of two-by-two. The window screen prevents the insects from entering the room but blocks none of the non-existent breeze. Sitting up in the bed, I let slip the single white sheet speckled in an ornate gold flower print and the air has a pleasant cool touch hinting at a time. It won’t be long until dawn brings morning to the sky. The dark paneled walls, white tiled ceiling, and white doors sporting black iron knobs and locks are plain but have a beauty born of utility. The chest and armoire flanking the door in front of the bed, dresser with mirror to my right, and headboard on which I am leaning are painted a pale shade of lime, matching the curtains.
At last, the sound that summoned me out of the land of dreams into the darkness of the bedroom drifts in through the window. The sound confirms my feeling about the time. I now know that it is about half past four in the morning, for that is the time the train comes through. Very faintly, if I concentrate, I can pick out the sounds of the wheels clattering on the tracks. The train’s whistle sounds again, the lonely call echoing off the mountain behind the house and off the ridge on the other side of the valley, sounding as if the night were answering in return its own lonely call. Feeling that all is right with the world, I slip back under the single sheet and drift back to sleep while the train calls and slips further away on its own journey through the clear dark night.
Birds chirping and the buzzing of a bee at the window rouse me. As my eyelids part to allow the morning sun’s glow to wake me, the bee gives up on buzzing at the window and zooms off to appealing destinations known only to bees. Yawning, I enjoy the luxurious pleasure of a full body stretch. There is no rush, so I allow my ears to soak up the sounds of activities unseen. I notice that a breeze, unfelt through the open window, has risen in the upper branches of trees outside and set the leaves to whisper softly to each other. As the breeze fades, I can hear a hinge in need of some oiling protesting with a prolonged squeak, immediately followed by a large wooden slat door banging closed.
My ears strain to pick out sounds. I notice someone else is moving in the house, the sounds of footsteps on the hardwood floor. Realizing what this must mean and what is happening at the other end of the house, I sit bolt upright and throw back the covers. I swing my legs to my right, sitting now on the edge of the bed. As my bare feet touch the shiny and smooth brown hardwood boards, the predawn chill having found a home in these boards’ rushes onto my skin causing me to shiver involuntarily. The unexpected chill bolts up through my legs as it draws a quick breath out of me. In the morning light, I see myself reflected in the dresser mirror to the right of the bed. I am in need of both food and sunshine.
Moving quickly, to avoid undue exposure to the chilly floor, I pull on a t-shirt, slip into my slightly worn and faded blue-jean cut-offs, and don socks and sneakers. For a moment I freeze, listening. The crunch of boots on gravel appears to emanate from both the open window and under the closed door. I tie my sneakers as I hear the boots mount the three concrete steps and cross the wooden porch. As I reach the closed door and turn the black iron knob, the familiar sound of a spring being stretched comes from just beyond. I pull open the door as the boots step up into the hall. Before me stands a man in his late 50’s, wearing a white shirt under blue denim overalls and clad in brown high-topped work boots. The man’s face is kindly and a bit serene; his hair is dark with a dusting of white as are the whiskers on his firm jaw and chin. As he steps into the short hallway from the porch, he spots me coming out of the bedroom. Lifting his right arm, I slip into a one-arm hug.
“Good morning. D’you sleep well?” GranDad, asks, his face breaking into a wide smile as he looks down at me.
Catching scents of hay, potatoes, tobacco, and the bleach from his shirt, I return the hug with two arms and reply, “Yes, sir.”
“You hungry?”
“Yes, sir!”
He says, “I reckon breakfast is about ready. Come on.”
With that, he releases me from the hug, turns to his left and opens another white wooden door like the one which I exited. Following him, we walk into the den.
Powdery mildew is a constant problem this time of year on my cucumbers. The leaves die, exposing the young cucumbers to the sun and, though their taste is unaffected, they turn partly yellow.
In Brazil and New Zealand, growers are spraying skim milk on plants to control the problem.
The recipe is 1-cup of skim milk to 9-cups of water, and spray plant leaves top and bottom.
This appeared on a website called My Organic Garden. The scientists research originally appeared in a professional journal called “Crop Science” and reported that the milk serves as a germicidal, killing fungus spores and stimulates the plant to become more resistant to disease.
If you, simply, cannot take my word for it, watch the vlurb (video blurb) of a dozen of the biggest names in podcast fiction and trust their word. The end result is that you should pick up a copy of this book today!
Yesterday, late in the afternoon, I joined the ranks of the unemployed.
Under mounting pressure to do more with less (more work with less orders), the company where I had been working for the past 15 months, released me back into the wild.
Like many other companies around the country, the economy has finally affected sales and orders. April looked like it was building toward a good Summer construction season, but May definitely slammed the door in the face. And so, I am a freelance agent again.
Normally, this site is for the pursual of my writing and related interests. Today, I am sharing more of my “day job” life. I am looking for something to do with my days. My resume is updated and located at the Resume link at the top of this page. Also, I have a LinkedIn page that has been updated. You can find the link to the right, in the sidebar, and also here.
If you hear of any opportunities around Birmingham or Charlotte, please let me know.
Many Thanks!
CA
—UPDATE—
Just as I was posting this message, I found out that more people from my former company have been let go. It seems that the recession has planted a foot firmly in Columbia, SC.
To my friends and followers who still have jobs, Keep your Headphones on and your Heads down.
As a teenager, my father tried, repeatedly, to counsel me. He would advise me to find something I like doing and be the very best I can at it. I thought I heard him and took his advise to heart, as much as any teenage boy really listens to his father and the life lessons being offered, before life’s trials create the need for such lessons.
It occurs to me, now that I have two teenage sons of my own, that I have begun giving the same advice to my sons. It is amazing how much of the advice is handed down without much thought. You think you are giving the best, heart-felt, advice from your many years of experience only to hear your own father’s voice in your head echoing the very same advice.
My father had told me to find something I like doing. In his own way, he was echoing the sentiment that if you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life. His addition of “and be the best you can,” really nailed it home – when I thought about it. My father was advising me to be a specialist.
Thinking I knew what I was doing, I chose “computers” as the thing I liked doing and thought I was on the right track. As opposed to my father’s advice, I had selected to be a generalist within the field of, what would become, Information Technology. In the early days of microcomputers (the old term for a PC), it was still possible to be a generalist – a sort of computer renaissance man – knowing hardware, software, security, networking, programming, and management while keeping current on all aspects of the computer industry.
By the time I was finishing college, however, this was already changing and I had refocused as a hardware and networking generalist, leaving the programming for those hardy souls content to sit in the computer labs and dorm rooms until the wee hours pouring over hexadecimal and archaic commands to get their tasks accomplished. I was very happy with a screwdriver in my back pocket working on computer hardware and wiring the computers together into the rudiments of a network.
As time progressed, I added various applications to my working toolkit and even expanded into a specialized form of development on the Lotus Notes platform. I stubbornly attempted to remain as general as I could, with the thought that with a broad base of experience and skills, I could get a job nearly anywhere.
The field of Information Technology has evolved, as many others have, into a field of specialists. Just like there are very few general Doctors or general Lawyers, most specializing in specific parts of the body or of the law, respectively, such it is in IT, with Security, Networking, Programming, Administration, Support, Project Management, Analysis, and Operations.
Here I am, in my midcareer as an old generalist with a few concentrations, Project Management, Analysis, Systems Administration, and Corporate Messaging, trying to decide on what specialization I would like to pursue. Here I am, with teenagers of my own, and I am still trying to take my father’s advice for success – find something I like doing and be the very best I can at it.
I have to say that I really enjoy teamwork. Some of the most enjoyable and productive jobs I have ever had have been because of a good team. There are several aspects that separate a good team for the rest. These aspects are the same despite the team being a single function or cross function team.
A good team is exemplified by a sense of camaraderie. This feeling that binds the team together can be limited to the office, but can also spill out into evenings at the bar or restaurant. This is especially true for consultants or coworkers travelling to a remote site to accomplish a common task or project. The sense that the team is more of a unit is necessary for all good team efforts. Without the binding force of camaraderie, the team reverts into individuals at the first sign of pressure. The team dissolves from “we” to “he and she” and all hopes at effective or efficient teamwork is lost.
The second aspect to a good team is a shared sense of purpose. A sense of purpose can only be kept alive by a unit, whether that unit is an individual or a team. The purpose is the goal or series of goals that, usually, is the reason for the team’s creation. Without a sense of camaraderie, the team’s purpose will be interpreted differently by the individuals and the team loses its ability to achieve a common goal. Once the team has a shared sense of purpose, all efforts, tasks, and support can then be directed toward the common goal and the team can succeed.
Complementary skills are the bellwether that determines the success of the team. Once a team has pulled together through a sense of camaraderie and has a shared sense of purpose, then individual skill sets come together to separate the good teams from the great teams. On single function teams, where all the members share a common skill set, it is the individual experiences, outlooks, vision, or secondary skills that can be added to the team that will enable them to approach greatness. For the multi- or cross-functional team, any common or complementary skills only serve to bring further cohesion to the teams’ efforts and it is the individual skills, understanding, mentoring, and leadership that generates the team momentum into greatness.
The most successful, and most enjoyable, teams I have ever worked on have been those where I was a part of something greater than myself, those that I brought my skills and experience to the table and combined it with the talents of the other members to reach a common goal. In most of those teams, each member rose to a leadership role as time went on and as the team needed their particular talents. Each member was trusted and empowered and as a result great teamwork resulted.
Krista Detor – With her highly acclaimed album, ‘Mudshow’, Krista Detor was established as a gifted player on the world stage. Now, with her follow-up album, ‘Cover Their Eyes’, together with partner and producer, David Weber, she’s created a collection of brilliantly provocative and compelling songs that push the edges of genre while remaining close throughout to the lyrical thread that defines her work.
Tonight, at 8:00 pm (Alaska time) or 12:00, midnight (Eastern), Krista will be performing a House Concert at the Whole Wheat Radio palace in Talkeetna, Alaska.
The entire concert will be webcast, live, from Whole Wheat Radio. If you would like to listen, please click on the link below and join us in celebrating a wonderful artist and a very unique concert setting. More information about Krista and the concert, as well as the location to purchase signed CDs of her music, can be found here.
If you would prefer to just listen to the concert, this link will spawn your music player to begin the feed.
Please visit Whole Wheat Radio.org for more information about this and all the other wonderful music.
I am very gratified by the responses I have received from the podcast. It pains me to have to say this, but while I have been doing the podcast, I have been concentrating on improving the sound quality and have not been concentrating on my writing.
My writing is what brings you to listen and what drives me to share. Podcasting is interfering with my writing and must be carefully examined.
Here is the short story – I am not gone forever. I will be putting out recordings, but they will be every month or so, instead of weekly. I have two books on the table right now and they need finishing, because I have the ideas for another percolating in the back of my brain.
Please continue your subscriptions. I will be back, but I am taking a hiatus to get my books in order so I can bring you new stories.
I will be recording these books as podcasts once they are complete, so your patience will be rewarded, I hope, to your satisfaction.
Thank you again for all the feedback and I will not let you down.
You know you’re getting old when you hear a song that you loved as a teenager used as Musak (background instrumental music) for the Weather Channel.
Last week, I heard an instrumental version of “Find your way back” by Jefferson Starship used as background on the Weather Channel. After I figured out why the tune sounded familiar, I felt really old.
I was chatting with a friend, over lunch today, when it suddenly hit me – No, not the glass of water!
We are the fortunate few – those of us who have hung on to our jobs – as we have seen friends and coworkers lose theirs and heard of many others from friends and family and on the news.
We have all been feeling it for some time now, this heaviness in the air. A not so distant dread that moves like a little black rain cloud, looking for someone on whose parade to rain. Having lived through a couple of recessions and a corporate merger, I have now figured out the analogy that captures this feeling.
The quote is from “The Princess Bride” and Westley is relating his experience on the Dread Pirate Roberts’ ship. As the Dread Pirate Roberts tells Westley each night,
“Good work. Sleep well. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.”
Now we have the phrase that sums up the feeling. We go to work and we do our best with the full knowledge that we could be just like so many others in the blink of an eye.
If you have not seen “The Princess Bride” (GASP!) or it has been too long to enjoy the reference, forget the milk this week and go rent a movie.
To borrow another quote, “Good night, and good luck.”
I am an Information Technology professional, living in Tuscaloosa, AL. I have 16 years of experience in Systems/Network Administration, Project Management, Messaging/Groupware Administration, Security Analysis, and IT Business Analysis.
During the Summer of 2007, my family spent 5 months in Nairobi, Kenya while my wife did research for her PhD in Medical and Cultural Anthropology. While we were living in Kenya, I realized an unfulfilled need to write.
This blog represents my light-hearted steps toward a writing career.
What this means is:
If you like an idea you see here and would like to take it in a different direction, expand on it or it sparks another side story or inspiration - great!
You can share the stories with your friends, your lover, your mother, your brother, on your podcast, on your internet radio station, but you cannot make money from it and you have to tell them where it came from.
words of wisdom
The one important thing I have learned over the years is the difference between taking one's WORK seriously and one's SELF seriously. The first is IMPERATIVE and the second is DISASTROUS.
Yesterday, late in the afternoon, I joined the ranks of the unemployed.
