Attempt Resurrection

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0400

Wow. It's been a long time. I greatly apologize for the complete disappearance of these newsletters, but as the title suggests, this is my attempt at resurrection. My High School years are over, and now a new chapter of my life is beginning: College. I will be going to Georgia State University with Business Management as my Major and Music as my Minor. What does this mean in terms of my book that I've been working on for so long? Absolutely nothing. Progress will continue, however and whenever I find time, as has been the case for so very very long.
   I find it pertinent to tell you, now that I've finally admitted it to myself, that The Alliance is not at all in the stage of editing. It is, in fact, in a stage of being rewritten. It's hard, writing an entire book, learning afterwards about what the qualities of a good book entail, and then coming back to said book and realizing that it's absolute rubbish. But I'm attempting to fix that, and so far it's working.
   I started all of this thinking it would be easy, I would write out the biggest story my mind had ever created, and then I would get noticed, and write a beloved story that everyone would enjoy. The Alliance didn't go that route, instead it was a rookie's naive attempt at literature. But I am no longer a rookie, and I have learned my lesson. Writing a book takes much more than just writing it out. You have to feel the character you put into your stories, and you have to make them REAL. My characters were not real, but I am proud to say that they are alive. They are so dear to my heart now.
   The Alliance is coming along just fine, and while I put my best efforts into telling the story that it was always supposed to tell, I'm making it even better.
   I don't care how long it takes, I've said it before, probably incredulously so, but this book will see the light of day. It will be finished.

Improv of the Month
   BEAUTIFUL DISASTER improvision by Stephen Adams
   Tim stalled in his car for a minute, pretending to fiddle with his phone while he carefully watched the house for any sign of movement. The light in the second window from the left flickered off and a shadow passed behind the glass of the door. Slowly, Tim made his way out of his car as Paul came out of the house to greet him.
   Both were obviously hesitant, and yet both of their hearts were fluttering frantically.
   The first thing Tim noticed about Paul was his hair, as he had the day before, the way it seemed to carefully be placed in just the right spot but how at the same time it seemed tossed to the side carelessly. The second was his eyes, the perfect way the amber and blueish green tones clashed harmoniously. They both smiled when their eyes finally locked, and Tim pulled Paul into an embrace. It was brief, but still something special that neither could explain.
   “Hi,” Paul gasped a little.
   “Hey,” Tim replied with the tiniest sort of giggle.
   Silently, Paul led Tim into the house and introduced him to his parents. Once the regular greetings were exchanged, they retreated to his bedroom, and there they remained for the remainder of the evening.
   Lying there, staring at each other and talking about everything to nothing, they slowly got closer and closer until their bodies were entwined and their lips had touched. Kissing and exploring each others bodies through their clothes, they stayed tangled in each other for hours, basking in the bliss that they brought to each other. Once they had run out of useless things to talk about they simply got lost in each others eyes and ran their fingers through each others hair.
   Tim was enchanted, Paul was mystified, and when the time came for the two to part, they stood outside Tim’s car and kissed one last time. But it was not a kiss of finality; it was a promise, a promise of a next time and maybe something more. But Tim couldn’t read that far into it. To him, that last kiss was to remind him during the coming days of what he had to look forward to the next time he would see Paul.
   With spirit soaring, heart racing, and mind spinning so perfectly out of control, Tim drove home slowly, his iPod cranked to full volume on songs that lifted him up even higher until he felt like he had been lifted far into outer space. The sad truth of the matter, however, was that he eventually had to come back down to Earth, and yet even though he did so, the buzz stayed with him. And every time he thought about Paul over the next few days, his heart skipped a beat.
   This was the perfect start to a perfect future. This was the start of something much more magical than lovers past. The beautiful beginning to what could easily become a beautiful disaster.

"By the Pricking of my Thumbs"

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 21:37:38 -0400

Have two months really already flown by? Have I really gone so long without a single lick of work completed on my (still) upcoming novel? It saddens me a little to know that progress on The Alliance has taken such a literal halt, but for the time being, that’s all that can be done. Now, I’m not saying that the project has been stopped. I have said it once, and I will say it again: I don’t care how long it will take, one way or another this book will be completed! And I still mean that. At the current moment, however, I’ve got so much stress and so many different people counting on me that I hardly have any energy to work on the novel, let alone time. I couldn’t even find the time or energy to write last month’s newsletter, as it were, and even this month’s is coming to you late! I can’t be sure if I did or didn’t start working on the book in October, but for some reason this is the month I credit as the beginning of the novel, and it just hit me: three years ago this month, I started this project. The evolution of it all has been so amazing. To watch my writing evolve into what it is now is so intriguing, and to look back at all that I’ve accomplished since then is truly inspiring. But it’s not what is collecting dust in the past that truly catches my eye, it’s what is waiting for me and my career(s) in the future that I wonder about. Because, and I promise you this, “by the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes!”

(What a festive way to end that!)

Improv of the Month(s)
Sincerely Paul Improvision by Stephen Adams

Dear Paul,
I cannot explain anything to you until you understand who you are. You cannot keep living like this. You cannot continue this routine you have found yourself repeating day by day. You are too lonely to find friends, and yet you are too cowardly to find the courage to. I fear that if you keep this up you may die alone, that you may never know what it truly means to have someone care about so much that they would give their own life for you. You need to know that feeling. But will you ever? Can you ever? Is there even anyone out there that would bother to care? After all this time, no one has even tried to reach out to you, so what makes you or I think that anyone ever will? It’s been twenty four years . . . twenty four long lonely years. Do you really want to see the rest of them? You’ve seen all there is to see now, except the intimate love of another human, and with the notion that you will never see that, what else is there to live for? After all this time you still do not fully understand the man living inside you, so why not just give up now. We could leave world behind, you and me. We could pick ourselves up and leave, and we’d never have to look back. I mean, really, what’s there even to look back to? I guess all I am trying to say is that I have finally come to the conclusion that I do not want to continue searching this world for something I will not find, and because I am too much a coward to let it all go alone, I am asking if you will join me. You don’t have to answer immediately, you can take time to think about it, but I already have it all planned out. Just don’t take too long. You can write me back your answer, if you like, but if not . . . well, you know where to find me.

Sincerely,
Paul

Oh, What a Hankering

Tue, 3 Aug 2010 02:20:53 -0400

What’s there to write about? Has anything exceptionally exciting happened this past month? Not really . . . aside from my hunkering down on the editing of The Alliance, and letting it pry my attention away from things I needed to have done, but didn’t, this past month has been, well, boring. This up coming month of August, however, is sure to bring a slew of eventful things, like auditions, unemployment, and of course, school. I do not doubt for one second that those of you who are reading this have missed that one little fact. Kids get excited for a new year, and Parents get excited for a break.
In two day—my word, is it really that soon?—my last year of High School begins, and what will be my last year of being a carefree, bill-free, and worry-free kid will commence. My life is a bout to begin, and I am now being faced with what I plan to do with it. And oh, the plans I have.
I see a bright future ahead. Now, if only I can get this darn book finished and published.

Improv of the Month
Watching Improvision by Stephen Adams

Our world is full of pain, cruelty, and suffering, but is it accurate to say that all of it is mental? Should we be expected to see the positive in everything, and ignore the negative? Is the person at fault really the person seeing the negative, versus the person who created the negative? I have asked myself these questions every day, and have come to the conclusion that they cannot be answered. Because some things in this world just cannot be fixed: like me.

Monday

It was like any other day. I sat on the side of Kipper Street, watching the cars go by, guessing what kind of lives the people inside them lived. One, I decided, was a lawyer. The man drove a nice car, and wore a nice suit, and I guessed he was heading to a very important court date.
By the determined way he drove his vehicle, I concluded that the case in question would be won in his client’s favor.
I saw an angry mother, reaching behind her seat to her screaming child and nearly swerving into the cars in the other lane. I guessed that a few minutes before, she was at home, dealing with an uncooperative son and arguing with her husband about menial things like taxes and child care.
And I saw a man crying, with no one to cling onto and no one to talk to—the way I saw it, at least. He was gay, I guessed, and he had just been broken by a lover he dreamed he would spend forever with. I tried to think of a story for him that was separate from my own, but I couldn’t.
Like him, I had no one. Like him, I was socially inept. Like him, the rest of the world looked down on me with scalding glares. Like him, I had been broken.
So I sat and cried with the man—though I do not know how much longer he did—for the rest of the day, until the day was spent, and I was forced to head home.

Tuesday

It was like any other day. I sat on the benches of Halwarts County Park, watching the people pass by, guessing what kind of people they were. It wasn’t too hard to do, really. Like, for instance, a pretty brunette girl went jogging by, oblivious to everyone around her, and by the way she moved her hips, by the way she kept her head steady and gaze fixed, I knew that she was an overachiever.
One little girl, with bright blue eyes and a bubbly little personality, was selling cookies, but I saw her for what she really was: a cheat, a con artist, and a scam.
I saw a couple walking, hand in hand, and immediately felt the empty feeling in the pit of my stomach rise again. I missed my wife, my kids, my life. But they had all been taken away. The truck driver who fell asleep at the wheel just as they were heading home made sure of that.
Their memory overwhelmed me.
Their ghostly faces humbled me.
And so I sat, watching the happy people walk past me as I cried my sorrow away, and none of them ever batted an eye. None of them even cared to step out of their happy little worlds to save an unhappy man from his.

Wednesday

It was like any other night. I awoke, as I usually did, on my own personal little slab of cardboard in Halwarts County Park beneath some tall bushes, so that park security wouldn’t evict me from the only home I had left.
It was still dark. The moon was still out, and the stars were still glimmering, so I just lie there, staring up at the little wonders and contemplating their existence. I watched the moon shower the world below it with the light it reflected, and I wondered what it would be like to walk its surface like the astronauts did.
I watched the stars around it twinkle and sparkle with such understated beauty that I couldn’t help but gasp. The very sight of them made me wonder if someone else somewhere out there was watching me as well, but I figured that was impossible.
A jingle of keys interrupted my thoughts from somewhere to my left, and the distinct, deep voice of Gary the Security Guy bellowed from outside my hiding place.
“You again? I’m sorry, pal, but you can’t stay here. How many times do we have to tell you? Go to a shelter or something. We have rules, man.”
As usual, I was sent packing, though that is a blatant understatement, as I really had nothing but my makeshift bed to pack.
I leaned against the gates of Halwarts County Park as I usually did after being caught, and I cried for the home I once had, for the bed I once occupied, and the life I once had.

Thursday

It was like any other morning. After being forced to sleep outside of the place I called home for the second night in a row, I made my way to the clinic.
Just two blocks down, the clinic was where I went every Thursday morning. If I wanted to continue living, a visit was a necessity, but my will to live was beginning to die, and on this particularly overcast morning, I found it difficult to even want to prolong my life for another miserable week.
I sat in the waiting room with the others. There was Phillip, a cancer patient like me, and Joseph, a dying victim of the AIDS pandemic. Mary was there as well, pregnant with a baby girl, but I knew, just by watching her, that she would bear twins.
I watched my friends read newspapers and magazines and text on their fancy phones, and I felt myself grow tired, tired of waiting for death to come and claim me, impatient even, and finally tired of living the way I had chosen to live. The experiment was done, I knew now what it felt like to have nothing and be nothing, and I now knew what it was like to watch the world carry on as I was slowly claimed by the life threatening illness that plagued me. I knew now what it was like to be alone, with no one to care for you, no one to want to help you, no one to offer you a room other than a cardboard slab. I took a moment to recount everything I had encountered in the past month that I lived on the streets, and started to cry.
I felt the pain of the world dump onto my shoulders, and as I stood up to meet my nurse, I collapsed.

Friday

It was unlike any other day. Today was unique. Today only happened once. After all, you only died once.
I drifted into and out of consciousness, trying my very best to hold on a little bit longer to see if my life would really end as miserably as it was. But as I watched the door, waiting for someone to come through it and shower me with their compassion and love, I realized that it would remain empty as long as I occupied this room.
When the pregnant mother would give birth in it three days later, however, people would pass in and out as often as they did at the supermarket. And one day after that, when an AIDS patient would have an episode and be admitted into the very same room, his lover would visit, kissing his cheek and caressing his skin while he recovered. Two weeks after that, even, as another cancer patient would come to the very same room to die as I was, his family would flood the door.
Right now, however, it remained empty.
But for the first time in my life, that didn’t bother me. For the first time in my life, I simply thought about how busy the door would be if the only family I had ever known was still living. And I took comfort in the fact that they were waiting for me. Once I passed, I would be reunited with them, and we would spend the rest of eternity together with an absence of the pains of the world I was about to leave.
For the first time in my life, I didn’t cry: I smiled.
From the moment my wife and kids were killed, to the moment I found out I would die of cancer, and the moment I decided to live the life of someone who had nothing, I was miserable, but finally, I was beginning to find peace.
I was finally seeing the positive, through the negative, and my life didn’t seem so sad anymore. My life had been beautiful, and I had lived it well. Could I have asked for much more?
I asked myself that question as I watched an angel pass through the doorway.
“Honey?” She had a compassionate, loving look on her familiar, beautiful face. She gathered me up in her arms, and as we drifted away from Earth together for the last time, she whispered into my ear, “It’s time for you to come home.”

Summer of Tests, Trials, and Treats

Thu, 8 Jul 2010 14:28:37 -0400

What a whirlwind this summer is proving to be. Work work work, sun sun sun, it’s all getting so very old. It’s that time of the summer now, that I begin to miss the hectic halls of school, and the annoying desks in annoying classes. But this year will be my last. My Senior Year is fast approaching, and that can only mean more stress, more responsibilities, and more hardships. All I can say is BRING IT ON.
It’s been near impossible to work on the book these past few weeks, but what little time I do find for it, I try my best to utilize. With that being said, I have recently taken time away to add on to the website, and change the website. That’s right, the website has undergone yet another makeover, but in addition to that, you may now access the website through two different URLs: the regular www.StephenAdamsBooks.com, and the new www.OfficialSAA.com.
I know what you’re thinking, Why change the website?
Well, while I know the website was pretty much AMAZING the way I had it, it was getting to be a real chore to update and change different things and it was confined to only a flash version, but now I am using a different program to update things, and while it no longer provides fancy graphics and music, this new look will be much easier to manage and maintain.
A lot of different obstacles keep standing between me and the goal I’m aiming for—the completion of The Alliance—and while I know everyone is well past the point of impatience, I am working as hard as I can, and am confident that by the end of these final edits, this book will be well worth the wait.
Just bear with me.

Improv of the Month
Piano Man Improvision by Stephen Adams

Carson Dailey was not bothered by simple, human things as emotions. He was stoic, unyielding, and coldhearted. If he passed a beggar in the street, he nearly beat them off his heels and carried on his way. If he saw a young man heartbroken, hysterical, and begging for forgiveness, he would grunt, and think to himself how pathetic the man looked. But despite his dreadful personality, Mr. Dailey had a gift, and with that gift he had the ability to change the world. Only, he chose not to.
That was until he decided to pass that gift on to me.
I would meet him in the evening, during the week, around maybe seven o’clock or so, and he would teach me until the precise stroke of ten. I’d march up to his lonely little front porch, and immediately the door would open and he’d be waiting.
His favorite greeting was, “You’re late.”
He’d lead the way into his study, where he kept the magnificent instrument, and he would begin to play. And for three straight hours, I would listen.
That is how he thought I would learn, and I dared not tell him any different. Because being given the privilege of listening was well good enough for me.
Mr. Dailey was an artist. He was a magician. He was a god, trapped in a human’s body. Maybe that’s why he seemed to hate the world, I don’t know, he would never talk to me.
The moment his fingers began to strike the keys of his piano, it was like magic. The world exploded with color, ribbons of light weaved their way through the air, and worlds of wonder and imagination sparked to life.
In a way, the lessons worked. It made me want to learn. It made me want to play. And with his music—his magic—I sat down and learned, and I became an artist, too. I became a magician. But to godly status, I never reached. That status remained with Mr. Dailey until the day he died.
But he will forever remain to be my Piano Man.
He will forever inspire me, even through death.
Because I knew that beneath the hate and the cold was a vulnerable, tortured soul, that just needed someone to love it.
He just needed someone to love him.

Love and Loss

Wed, 2 Jun 2010 23:45:43 -0400

The quote, "You never know what you have until it's gone," was proven true to me this month upon the passing of my dog and best friend, Carter, on May 26th, 2010. He was old, slowing down, and the vet told us that she thought he had stomach cancer and that his heart was failing, so we decided, upon her telling us that he was in a lot of pain and would soon pass, to put him out of his misery.  I remember feeling numb when my mother told me what was going to happen, and I cried until no more tears would flow. Then we arrived at the veterinary office, and as they carried our sickly family member out onto the examination table, the tears came again, and they didn't go until long into the night. He didn't even have enough strength to wag his tail when he saw us, and somehow I think he knew what was to come. I remember sobbing as he looked up at me, but I wouldn't take my hand off of him and I refused to leave him alone as they began the necessary injections—I wanted to be by his side, holding him as he slipped away from us forever.  First, they gave him a muscle relaxant: they said it would make him sleepy, and it did. My mother, my sister, myself, and even my father wept as we each held onto him, whispering into his ear, petting him for the last time. And he just looked at each one of us in turn, longingly, apologetically, as if he were trying to say sorry for not being able to hold on any longer, but I tried my best, through the tears and the sobs, to convey to him a look that said he would always be there in our hearts, and that it was okay for him to let go: even if I didn't want him to.    I always knew that someday he would pass, that he would be gone, but as I watched the vet inject that last, pink shot, and my best friend's breathing ceased, I couldn't help but feel robbed and unprepared—it felt sudden and unexpected, but the signs of his impending death had been all around us, we just failed to really see them for what they were, or even let ourselves acknowledge that he would ever die. But he would. And he did.    I cried over his lifeless body for what seemed like days, but finally forced myself away to collapse in choking tears against the car. The devastation I felt cannot accurately be described by any word or phrase. I continued to sob while driving home, until I collapsed on the couch at home, saw his empty bed, bowls, and chew toys, and cried until my body was too exhausted to continue, and I fell asleep.    When I woke, I heard my mother weeping, hysterically, and I went and cried more with her. It surprised me to see her crying over him, and it still did every day after that when she came home and cried. She seemed always to complain about him, and at one point even said that she couldn't wait until he was gone, but now that he is, I think she finally understands how crucial he was—and is—to our family.    I cannot describe to you how depressing our house is now that our puppy is absent from it. I find myself dreading the thought of even coming home, because I know I will think about him, miss him, and again slip into depression over him.
   Not a day goes by that I don’t think about him: he used to come and listen when I played piano, and curl up at my feet whenever I would be watching TV or writing, but now I don't get to enjoy those little golden moments that I took for granted. Even when it's raining I subconsciously look for him, and when I’m downstairs in my room, I still listen for his tiny clicking footsteps to accompany my family's, but they never will anymore. I realize now how big of an impact he made on my life by simply always being there, and it's led me to wonder how I didn't notice it before. And it's made me wonder where he is, now that he’s crossed over. Is he watching over us? Mom told us that she believed dogs go to heaven, but how does she know? Is his spirit still walking along side us, comforting us whenever his passing saddens us? Only time will tell, when we join him one day.
   We are still waiting for a call from the vet to tell us Carter's ashes have arrived, and when they do, we plan on holding a small family ceremony to spread some of the ashes in our backyard, where he spent most of his time.    Tomorrow, June 2, 2010, my father and I are departing for Colorado for my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary, a family reunion on my mom’s side of the family. I'm hoping it will get my mind off of things, and that being with family will help me heal.    School is out now, and I'm working more than ever now that Six Flags is open full-time for the season. Work on the book is scarce now, through the grief and work and traveling, but I, as usual, am trying my best.
    There is no improv of the month this month, as recounting the death of my dog has drained me emotionally, but it will pick back up next month.   Until then, I hold a grieving, healing pen.
Stephen