The Confabulator Cafe

Author: ljenkins

  • Pencils Down: You’re Living a Lie

    Stop.

    No matter where you are in your novel right now, just walk away. There’s no point in finishing. We were sold a bill of goods.

    Now you might be saying to yourself, “No, Larry. I’m almost there. 50K is within striking distance.”

    Well, I’m with you fellow sufferers. I’ve got the end goal in my sight, and I was all hyped for that final push until reality hit me in the face this morning. For those of you who haven’t ventured out into the world today (and I’m sure there are many of you, and can I just say you might want to mix in a shower every now and then) here’s how it went down.

    When I was first encouraged to go on this grand hateful adventure, it was my understanding that the final week would be magical. Scantily clad groupies would line the streets and cheer us on with words of encouragement and promises of . . . affection. It is a well-known fact that the opposite sex finds the supple, sloth-like physique of us writer folk irresistible, and I was ready to claim my just rewards. I had, after all, spent countless hours not at the gym, so I was due.

    Having just returned home from walking my children to school, I am sad to report the streets of my neighborhood were largely devoid of anything overtly sexy. (I exclude myself from this sample group, of course.) It is my concern that this may not be a localized phenomenon, and if that is the case, why are any of us killing ourselves over this?

    If we are not writing for glory, sex, and the vanquishing of our enemies, then what is wrong with us? Is it possible we need to recalibrate our goals?

    I say we put a pin in that for now. No need to do anything drastic.

    On the off chance that this morning was just a fluke, I’m going to cobble a few words together and see if the afternoon provides better results.

    You, though. You should just quit. Groupies love a quitter.

  • Don’t Lose Sleep Over it: Oh, Wait. You have No Choice.

    All right, so we’re nineteen days in and here’s the biggest takeaway I’ve learned so far: NaNo is a jealous and vengeful god. If you ever want to have a relationship with something that does not give a damn about the way you feel, I encourage you to participate in NaNoWriMo.

    Don’t get me wrong, the people involved are great, and it’s the support and camaraderie that suckers us in year after year and convinces us that we’re having fun in this collective misery. And I think we are having fun, at least most of us are, but I can’t help but wonder if we’re not the best judges of what constitutes a good time.

    You know how when you’re really tired even the lamest joke can sound funny?

    I think that’s where a lot of us are right now. We’re teetering on the brink of exhaustion, but it’s a shared experience, so that makes it somehow better. I, for one, have only hazy memories of the previous eighteen days. But I also get a general sense of warmth when I try to recall this month, so I’m sure I’ll be on board again when next November rolls around.

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  • Goodbye, Gloria. Rest in Peace.

    My grandmother passed away last night.

    It seems like the kind of thing you should say at the start of an article like this.

    I had already made a mental sketch of what I was going to say today, but that seems to have gone by the wayside now. For those of you curious, NaNo is still going well for me, and I expect to cross the finish line this year. If anything, writing is a welcome distraction at this point.

    In the days ahead, I’m hoping to dive in and disappear and let the world around me dissolve into whatever hell it chooses. I’d like to believe that I can make an active choice not to think about things that I know are going to be unpleasant, but that’s not going to happen. When I don’t talk, my characters do, and this will undoubtedly come up in a chapter or a story soon.

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  • Slow and Steady Wins the Race

    Dear NaNo:

    I’m still coming for you.

    I know we’re only four days into this hateful, little blood sport, but I’m happy to report that Team Jenkins is still alive and on target. This does not bode well for you. 

    Last year, I was behind after day one. I was disheartened and running scared because I knew there was almost no chance that I’d make up that word count. Even though I tried to remain upbeat and confident, there was a big part of me that never really expected to cross the finish line. So when the defeat finally came, it wasn’t a total surprise.

    The sting of the loss, though . . . that hurt more than I’d anticipated. And I have you to thank for that savory piece of misery.         

    Well, my frenemy, I hope you enjoyed it while it lasted. Because this year you are f*#ked.

    I’m at the keyboard every day. The outline of where I’m going is a little vague, the roadmap is kind of faded, but I push on anyway. And the words are always there.

    I have no idea where they’re coming from, but they’re there. So I write them down. And after a while, they slowly add up.

    Just to reiterate: this does not bode well for you.

    I am going to enjoy kicking your ass. 

    So in closing, my dear NaNo, I know I haven’t jumped out of the gate with an impressive 10,000 or 15,000 word count, but guess what? Slow and steady wins the race. I just have to keep stringing these words together, line by line and day by day, until eventually you fall.

    And then you can suck on the misery for a while.

    Your friend,

    Me

  • Dear NaNo: I’m Coming for You

    I’m generally a guy who hates unfinished business.

    Whenever a project languishes, it eats away at me. I don’t sleep, I get pissy, and I start withdrawing from my friends and family. I just want to be left alone to stew in my own frustration.

    Unfinished is the status of the last novel I set out to write, and it’s been that way for far too long. I love the story, and it has its fair share of really funny sections, but for whatever reason, I never saw it through to the end.

    Well, it’s about time that stopped.

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  • Midway Mark (Flash Fiction)

    I remember the last time we thought she was dying.

    We had gathered there in the small, curtained hospital room, a place devoid of both privacy and hope. We’d taken turns kissing her cheeks for good luck, a small mercy suggested by one of the nurses. We’d said goodbye without speaking the words because the pending loss was still too awful to accept. And then they’d wheeled her away, presumably forever.

    My grandmother had seemed unaware of any of us at the time. As they took her, her eyes had been filled with a wild, rolling panic, like an animal whose only thoughts are to flee the fear and the pain and the death it knew was stalking it. Gone was the elder matriarch who’d held sway over us all, replaced instead by this being whose sole purpose was to survive.

    It had seemed unlikely at the time, but we should have known better. Our family doesn’t die that way.

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  • Whispers and Running Starts

    For me, the hardest part of any story is figuring out where to begin.

    I think everything you write, whether it be a short story or a novel or even a chapter of a novel, has multiple points of entry. The challenge is finding that introductory sweet spot that both grabs the reader and gives you a running start into the rest of the tale.

    It’s hard. And in my experience, it takes a bit of time to get there.

    Even if I know what a story is about, I have to let it cook on some back burner in my brain before I can write it down. I’m usually not thinking about some plot point or trying to figure out the twist. I’m waiting on one of the characters to say something that piques my interest.

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  • Failed Conversion

    (Broadcast transcript provided by Station URHI, Holy Roller Radio. Creators of the forthcoming documentary Glock and Awe: God’s plan for you and your guns.)

    HOST:    Happy Monday, people! And thank you for tuning in to this week’s edition of The Wooly Pulpit, America’s premier destination for hairy men of God and the nation who loves them. 

    As always, I am your host, Cubby Carlson, and boy, do we have a great show for you tonight.

    Joining us in studio, New Argo’s newest Bible Bear, the reverend Mike Mackey. He’ll talk about becoming ordained, forming his own church, and if there’s anyone special in his life, aside from the Big Guy, I mean.

    (Laughs) 

    But before we get to the good stuff, and let me tell you people, from where I’m sitting, it is Very. Good. Stuff. Here’s a quick word from our sponsors. (more…)

  • The Writer’s Wife: Maybe a Test, Never a Target

    When it comes to writing, my wife and I have an odd relationship.

    She goes out of her way to be supportive of my writing endeavors. She encourages me, she tries to make sure I carve out time in my schedule to write, and she understands when I hit a creative rough patch and need to just escape the house and family for a few hours of in-my-own-head time.

    I have no doubt she’s in my corner when it comes to this writing thing.

    The bit that’s probably weird to a lot of people is that, to my knowledge, my wife reads very little of what I produce. It’s not that she doesn’t want to read it, but there are times when I caution her not to seek it out.

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  • Scout Pack (Flash Fiction)

    You know that expression “you can’t take it with you”? That shit does not apply to resentment.

    Violent death aside, the thing that really chaps my ass is that I saw it coming. I knew better than to turn my back on the creepy, yoked-up, tatted kid. He was trouble, right from the start.

    This kid they called Pope, he was never quite all there. The other guys, they all carried tension in their shoulders every day. They knew that none of this was going to end well. They understood that waking up day after day didn’t make them lucky. It made them outliers.

    Sooner or later the math was going to catch up to them. One day, probably real soon, the statistics they’d been dodging were going to sneak up and pop a cap in their collective asses. And nobody wants to die alone.

    Boy was the joke on them.

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