THE MALLS ARE ALIVE WITH THE SOUND OF MUZAK

THE JOY OF STORY

John M. Daniel’s Blog

November 28, 2015

Greetings! Well, another Thanksgiving has come and gone. Did everybody get enough to eat? Anybody want some more sweet potatoes? Then there was so-called “Black Friday,” the busiest shopping day of the year. That’s a tradition I’ve successfully missed every year of my life. Now, as we enter the liturgical season of Advent, I turn my attention to another form of storytelling, namely song. 

And speaking of music and storytelling, don't forget to read the promotion of Mary Kiki Wilcox's book A Song Just for Me, which follows my piece.

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Like most folks, I do a fair amount of shopping between Thanksgiving and Christmas, partly to buy presents for loved ones, but also for a chance to hear cornball Christmas music so dear to my heart. It’s in the air during the holiday season, along with the sound of the cash register. It seems as if every shopping center has its own public address system, used only once a year, so that by the end of a day’s shopping it’s nigh on impossible to get those Christmas songs out of our heads, and we keep hearing “Winter Wonderland,” over and over in our heads, for hours after we’ve left the scene.

Wait. “Winter Wonderland”? That’s not Christmas music. There’s no mention of Christmas in the song. Neither Christmas: the Christmas of Jesus or the Christmas of Santa. “Winter Wonderland” simply, and nicely too, celebrates snow, sleigh bells, snowmen, cozy fires, and of course love (valid all year round, if we’re lucky). So this is a song for winter, not for Christmas.

There are many standards in the American Songbook devoted to celebrating winter (most also celebrating love, meaning they celebrate the combination of winter and love). Some of these belong in anybody’s list of fine standard oldies, and they include “I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm,” “Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow,” “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” “Snowfall,” and “Sleigh Ride.” I could do without “Frosty the Snowman,” but we’ll have to include “Jingle Bells.” None of these songs have anything to do with Christmas.

Why do we hear these winter standards only during the late fall and first few days of winter, ending, almost screeching to a halt, right after December 25? Don’t we want to celebrate meadows of snow and cozy fires all winter long? Nope: these songs have become nothing more than merchandising tools, to be fed almost intravenously to shoppers like mood-elevating drugs, whose function is to part us from our money. It’s nice, I admit, that these songs do what they can keep us happy in what can otherwise be a stressful time. But wouldn’t it be nice to put a positive musical spin on winter all winter long?

Now you’ve got me started. Next question: why is it we never (or very, very seldom) hear genuine old-fashioned Christmas carols during the holiday season anymore? I know we can hear them at church, but for those of us who don’t go to church and get most of our music from the media—car radio, iPod, Pandora, or Muzak—whatever happened to those songs that celebrate the Nativity? The Nativity, whether you accept it as history or as folklore, is a story full of meaning. Why have the media suppressed it? Some of my favorite songs are about the Nativity story: “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” “Oh Little Town of Bethlehem,” “Away in a Manger,” and “The First Noel,” to name only a few. I was raised without church, but still our family sang these songs when I was a child, and I have loved the story as much as the melody in every one of them ever since.

So I ask: why are these sacred and semi-sacred songs being suppressed? Is this a Church-and-State issue? Are we afraid of turning off the non-Christian customers? Or has our out-of-control culture become immune to any spiritual sentiment that predates “A Charlie Brown Christmas”?

Okay. I also love, and still hear, the secular Christmas songs of old and not-so-old, such as “Deck the Halls” (old) and “The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting)” (not-so-old). I’m glad to hear them, all of them, but there are a couple I miss. “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” Why don’t we hear these so much? Because they’re sad songs, and they don’t do the trick they’re supposed to do.

Wait, you say. “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”? You hear that one all the time during the shopping season, right? You think you do, but you’re hearing the happy version, the one that sings “Hang a shining star upon the highest bough” (sheesh). The original lyric, the real lyric, written during World War II, is about separated families and has the line (in the same spot in the song) “Until Then We’ll Have to Muddle Through Somehow.” (Note: The original lyric, the sad one, tells a story. The feel-good new version doesn’t. Just sayin’.) Well, I’m not trying to spread gloom here, but come on. We can take it. Christmas, for all its joy, generosity, salvation, and shopping mania, can also be a sad time, and we should sing about that as well. We have a right to sing the (red and green) blues.

As long as I’m on personal rants, let me mention a secular Christmas song (a Santa song, as opposed to a Jesus song) that I do not like. “Here Comes Santa Claus.” Don’t get me wrong: I’m all for the fat man, and I love “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.” But “Here Comes Santa Claus” crosses the line into theology and it sends me through the roof: the song gets progressively pseudo-religious until the last line: “So let’s give thanks to the Lord above that Santa comes tonight.”

I hope I haven’t given the impression that I’m anti-Christmas. I even enjoy the Muzak version of Christmas. If elevators and department stores are the only places to hear some of these songs anymore, well, I’ll be there, humming along.

But on my list for Santa this year I ask for:

1. Winter songs all winter long
2. Christmas carols (Jesus songs) at Christmas
3. The original lyric for “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”
4. Never to hear “Here Comes Santa Claus” again.

In exchange for item number four, I would make great sacrifice. I would agree to hear “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas” and “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth” once a day, all Advent long.

Note: A different, longer version of this essay first appeared in Black Lamb magazine.

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And now a word from our sponsor:

Recently Published by Daniel & Daniel

A Song Just for Me

Stirred by Music to Conversation and Compassion

by Mary Kiki Wilcox

ISBN 978-1-56474-556-9

96 pages, paperback, $12.00

For ordering information, click here
or phone (800) 662-8351

Mary Kiki Wilcox volunteers in the Health Center of her senior community, taking recorded music, on a CD player, to the residents in the Assisted Living and Skilled Nursing Facilities. They listen together in their weekly “Mostly Music” sessions, or individually, in their rooms. The music she shares ranges from classical to popular standards and show tunes.

 

“I have been moved by what the residents teach me as they listen to music and then talk together,” Mary Wilcox explains. “I didn’t want to lose what was happening, nor could I be quiet about it. I want people within and outside the Health Center to know about the compassion and enthusiasm of the residents and staff and to expand others’ imagination and vision of what is possible in a health center. And so I began writing stories.…” These stories make up her new book, A Song Just for Me.

 

Mary’s gift of sharing has had results. Clearly the elderly, even those with dementia, respond positively to music. As the residents listen and talk together, they are moved by this activity and they are having a good time and enjoying each other. The Health Center staff have seen the positive results and have arranged for more of the residents to attend the group sessions and for Mary to take music to the rooms of those who cannot be moved.

 

When Mary read some of her stories at another health center, members of the staff there wanted to learn more and expressed interest in doing something similar in their facility. Mary hopes A Song Just for Me will encourage more health care professionals—service providers, caregivers, and hospice workers—to offer similar programs.

 

She fondly recalls an exchange with a bedridden neighbor: “How long did that Mozart concerto take to play?” the patient asked.

 “Twenty-five minutes,” Mary answered.

 “Just think, for twenty-five minutes I’ve had no pain at all.”

 

Mary Kiki Wilcox has a Ph.D. from Stanford University, was a teacher and principal in the San Francisco public schools, and senior education researcher at SRI International. She lives at Channing House, a senior community in Palo Alto, California. 

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Call for submissions: Your 99-Word Stories

The deadline for December’s 99-word story submissions is December First. That’s this week, folks! The stories will appear on my blog post for December 12.

note: this 99-word story feature is a game, not a contest. Obey the rules and I’ll include your story. I may edit the story to make it stronger, and it’s understood that you will submit to my editing willingly. That’s an unwritten rule.

Rules for the 99-word story feature are as follows:

1. Your story must be 99 words long, exactly.

2. One story per writer, per month.

3. The story must be a story. That means it needs plot (something or somebody has to change), characters, and conflict.

4. The story must be inspired by the prompt I assign.

5. The deadline: the first of the month. Stories will appear on this blog the second Saturday of the month.

6. I will copy edit the story. The author of the story retains all rights.

7. Email me your story (in the body of your email, or as a Word attachment) to: jmd@danielpublishing.com

THIS MONTH’S PROMPT FOR NEXT MONTH’S 99-WORD STORY: Write a Christmas (or seasonal) story in 99 words, with the following first line: “I promised my parents I would never tell this to anyone.” If you follow the rules, your story will appear on this blog December 12.

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Thank you for tuning in. I hope you’ll be back next week. Meanwhile, may you find joy in reading and/or writing stories!

http://www.danielpublishing.com/jmd/index.html

IS WRITING HARD WORK?

THE JOY OF STORY

John M. Daniel’s Blog

November 21, 2015

Greetings! This week, beginning on the third Saturday in November, I’m pleased to welcome author James R. Callan, who is here to tell us how he finds joy in writing. But first, as usual, a long-winded introduction by yours truly.

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My friend Eileen Obser, a popular writing teacher and editor and the author of the memoir Only You, recently reminded me that one of my brief essays was a repeat from a post that had appeared some time ago on this blog (before my year-long hiatus). It’s true; I admit it. In fact several of my weekly ponderings have been, and will continue to be, retreads, having appeared before on this blog or in the magazine Black Lamb. Some of them are even rewrites of short chapters in my book (now out of print) Structure, Style and Truth: Elements of the Short Story. I first used most of my ideas, advice, and jokes in classes and workshops I taught or led in my teaching days. At some point in the future I plan to assemble all these little essays into a book that I’ll self-publish. I’ll call it (of course) The Joy of Story.

In my teaching days, I presented at a lot of writing conferences. At nearly every one of those conferences, somebody supposedly worth listening to—a teacher, a workshop leader, or a guest celebrity speaker—would tell the assembled writers who had paid money for professional wisdom and advice that writing was mostly heavy labor. Hard, frustrating, lonely work. Blood, sweat, and tears. Not fun. Only a crazy person, a neurotic, an alcoholic, or a glutton for self-punishment would want to be a writer.

My response: Bullll-oney. Sure, writing is work. Of course it is. So is golf, even if you love the game. So is cooking, so is gardening, or painting, or auto mechanics, or woodworking. Or any other pastime that gives you joy. And the more you enjoy it, the harder you work at it, and vice versa.

Writing can be rewarding in terms of fame and fortune, but often it’s not. So what? If you get joy out of writing itself, you’ve already won the game.

What’s to enjoy about writing? I’ll let James R. Callan answer that question. Jim is a prolific writer and a good one.

§§§

THE JOY OF CREATING

by James R. Callan

For most of us, the real reward in writing is the pleasure it gives us when we produce a sentence or paragraph that captures what we feel inside. To a non-writer, this may seem silly. Why would writing a good paragraph make you happy? Or it might seem routine. Doesn’t every paragraph you write make you happy?

 

Over My Dead Body had its genesis in a fight my wife and I had with a company over eminent domain. Keystone wanted to come across our land with their oil pipeline, clear-cutting a swath one hundred and fifty feet wide and a third of a mile long. In the end, they won and the bulldozers came in to push down hundred-foot-tall pine trees, fifty-year-old oaks and large hickories.

I knew right then I would write a book involving the use of eminent domain to seize land by a private, for-profit corporation.

I write murder mysteries. So, I did not write about the Keystone Pipeline because, as far as I know, no one got killed over its construction. Likewise, I didn’t want to directly attack any known entity. As we all know by heart, “All names, characters, places, and events are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to real persons, places, or events is coincidental.”

As time went by and the book began to take shape, I found my displeasure with the pipeline company dissipating and my joy in the book taking over. I used several characters from Cleaned by Fire and it was good to get back in touch with them. Also, I introduced Father Frank’s sister, Maggie, and she made me smile every time she appeared in a scene. A non-writer might find it strange that a character could bring out emotions much like meeting an old friend. But it certainly happens. I had written a suspense book between Cleansed by Fire and this new book, Over My Dead Body. It was good to revisit my friends from the earlier book. And I was very pleased and happy with how Maggie turned out.

Did writing this book give me joy? Absolutely. Were there times when I was frustrated with how the writing was going? Sure. But the over-riding feeling was one of pleasure. I was producing pose that made me happy. Even creating a good “bad guy,” can bring a smile to my face. Developing characters a reader can recognize as real, three-dimensional persons is very rewarding.

So for me, the joy of writing comes from creating sentences and paragraphs that sing in my heart, and creating characters that are real, interesting, and entertaining. I achieved both with Over My Dead Body. I hope the reader will find joy in meeting and getting to know these people, and finding how they deal with the problems they encounter. And when this happens, I get yet another joy from writing.

Over My Dead Body is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions at: http://amzn.to/1BmYQ0Q. The audio version should be available in early 2016.

After a successful career in mathematics and computer science, receiving grants from the National Science Foundation and NASA, and being listed in Who’s Who in Computer Science and Two Thousand Notable Americans, James R. Callan turned to his first love—writing.  He has had four non-fiction books published.  He now concentrates on his favorite genre, mystery/suspense.  His eleventh book is scheduled to release in 2016.

www.jamesrcallan.com

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Call for submissions: Your 99-Word Stories

The deadline for December’s 99-word story submissions is December 1. The stories will appear on my blog post for December 12.

Note: this 99-word story feature is a game, not a contest. Obey the rules and I’ll include your story. I may edit the story to make it stronger, and it’s understood that you will submit to my editing willingly. That’s an unwritten rule.

Rules for the 99-word story feature are as follows:

1. Your story must be 99 words long, exactly.

2. One story per writer, per month.

3. The story must be a story. That means it needs plot (something or somebody has to change), characters, and conflict.

4. The story must be inspired by the prompt I assign.

5. The deadline: the first of the month. Stories will appear on this blog the second Saturday of the month.

6. I will copy edit the story. The author of the story retains all rights.

7. Email me your story (in the body of your email, or as a Word attachment) to: jmd@danielpublishing.com

THIS MONTH’S PROMPT FOR NEXT MONTH’S 99-WORD STORY:

Write a Christmas (or seasonal) story in 99 words, with the following first line: “I promised my parents I would never tell this to anyone.” If you follow the rules, your story will appear on this blog December 12.

§§§

Thanks for dropping by! See you next week, I hope. Meanwhile, keep reading, keep writing, and work hard at what brings you joy.

The Joyful Writer and His Muse

http://www.danielpublishing.com/jmd/index.html

SINCE WHEN? SINCE WHY?

THE JOY OF STORY

John M. Daniel’s Blog

November 14, 2015

Greetings! This being the second Saturday of the month, I take pleasure in presenting ten 99-word stories sent to me during the month of October. You’ll find them waiting for you below. But first I’d like to say a few words about the word “since.”

My friend Craig sent me an essay by John Crowley, clipped from Harper’s Magazine. The “Easy Chair” essay put forth Crowley’s “crank theory” (his words) that “the human sense of time has its origin in story.” I’m quick to concur, and if it’s a crank theory, call me a crank. Story is made up of a sequence of events, involving a passage of time. A change happens in every story that is a story, and there is a difference between a character before that event and the same character after the event.

But a plot is more complicated than a mere sequence of events. Crowley, quoting E.M. Forster, distinguishes between “story” and “plot,” maintaining that the former can be a mere sequence of events, whereas the latter is more complicated: plot involves not just sequence, but also consequence. He illustrates the point with a simple story, “Boy meets girl and then joins monastery.” That’s a story. But “Boy meets girl, girl spurns boy, and so boy joins monastery” shows a causal relationship between before and after. A change through time, plus a reason for the change.

I have never distinguished “plot” from “story” this way. I say a story, by which I mean the thing a writer toils to create, must have consequence as well as sequence. Semantics, shmemantics. It all can be summed up in the single (or double) word “since.”

Since means after. My new novel, The King’s Eye, has been available since late September.

Since means because. Since I’m proud of this new book of mine, and since I have this opportunity to show it off to you, I have chosen The King’s Eye as this week’s featured book. You’ll find a description of the book below.

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First, though, the 99-word stories. In the ten stories that follow, you’ll find both sequence and consequence. A woman entered a bar, and then the woman left the bar. She left the bar after (since) she entered the bar. But there’s a change: When the woman left the bar she was smiling. Why? Because (since) something happened in the bar that made her smile.

And now, it’s been a long time since I started this meditation, and since I have no more to say on the subject, I turn the floor over to the ten talented writers who contributed to this week’s post.

§§§

Here it is: the monthly 99-word story feature!

For this month’s 99-word story feature, I challenged writers to write a story using the following sentence: “The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.”

•••

RUTHIE GETS PICKED UP IN A BAR

by Madelyn Lorber

It was her great-grandson’s birthday celebration, and Ruth knew she had to go, though every ninety-five-year-old bone in her rebelled, and her bed beckoned. She drove to the restaurant.

Fighting skeletal shrinking and osteoporosis, she struggled to climb upon a vacant bar stool.

Gentle hands around her waist lifted her.

“Bartender,” she said, “bring this gallant knight his drink of choice; a Martini for me.”

When her family arrived they registered shock. Ruthie, flirting with a stranger!

As she departed, the young gent kissed her.

Ruth walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

SENIOR JACKPOT

by Jerry Giammatteo

She nursed her Guinness at the bar and watched the poker game. The men never let her play.

“Some other time, Grandma,” they would say, but never invited her to join.

Tonight, a regular was missing. “This is your chance, Grandma. Want to play? I promise we’ll go easy on you.”

“Thank you, boys,” she said sweetly, sitting down.

Three hours later, she dropped a fifty on the bar from a wad of bills. “A round of stout for these nice boys, please. They’re broke.”

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

WHO WON AT TOMBSTONE?

by Charlotte Painter 

         Heavyset, wearing a thick jacket, she came through the swinging doors and joined the dart game. In five minutes she’d beat hell out of us.

         She sat at the poker table, placing her pistol aside. We watched every move but, man, she had the cards. She cleaned us out; our bucks turned her jacket into armor. The place was buzzing.

         Who the hell was she?

         She stood up, twirled her pistol, said, sorry, she had a date at the OK corral. 

         The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

••• 

COME HERE OFTEN?

by Michael J. Quinn

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face. Her smile came from the acts of her husband, whom she had followed. He had showered, gotten all dressed up, and gone out to the bar. He sat down and ordered his gin and tonic. He looked at the beautiful woman sitting next to him and asked, “So tell me, do I come here often?”

Alzheimers can make spouses smile sometimes. So long as she knew he was safe; and the bartender knew to call her if he left.

She would come back for him later.

•••

PASSING THE BAR

by Pat Shevlin

She found everything she needed at Riordan’s: sustenance, companionship, a hearth, and Bailey, the chocolate lab. It had been her home away from home since her husband’s death, twenty years ago.

Blowing snow carried her small frame through the front door this blustery night. Michael, the bartender, greeted her. “Rosie, you look like you need a hot toddy.”

“Please.” She winked as she claimed her post.

Before leaving, she leaned over and placed an envelope at the register containing a deed naming Michael the new owner.

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

THE ENTERTAINER

by Cathy Mayrides

The bar was full of “the-world-owes-me-a-living” types, determined to drink away their sorrows. One old woman was particularly demoralized. With a sour beer smell and a bartender who couldn’t raise anyone’s spirits, it was simply a gloomy place.

A boy of three approached outside. He looked in and played to the crowd. He danced and smiled, and the patrons stepped up to the window. The boy waved. They waved back.

He left.

So did the bar’s melancholy.

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

FRIDAY NIGHT…AGAIN

by Rita Kushner

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face. He remained inside, refusing to leave, although she implored him to come home. Others nearby could hear her begging; she smiled in embarrassment.

That night her daughter had phoned. “I can’t leave the kids, Mom. Please drive him home.”

The old woman knew the routine; it would continue for years.

And so it did, until he drunkenly slept through the house fire which consumed him.

Never again did she have to walk out of the bar while her son-in-law kept drinking, a smile on his face.

•••

ANOTHER NIGHT AT O’MALLEY’S

by Eileen Obser

It was just another night at O’Malley’s.

Men and women sat on barstools or stood holding their drinks—talking, laughing, sharing the latest gossip and jokes. Cigarette smoke created a white haze in the air.

One loud, fat man kept cackling above the din. An elderly couple sitting nearby drank in silence, but the woman frowned at the man. When her husband stood to leave, she followed. Removing a party horn from her purse, she blew hard on it, into the fat man’s ear.

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

RED

by Matthew Ryan

The red neon sign fizzles as I enter the dimly lit tavern.

Rudy hits me again. Red sits legs crossed, perched on the barstool.

Like an aging gypsy, Red possesses a unique style. Men eye her porcelain gams.

Red sits poised, cigarette in hand. A coiffed red hive of teased hair, wrists adorned by faux gemstones.

Men ogle Red’s strut from perch to the loo. There’s an audible gasp as Red pees at the urinal. As Red sashays to the door, queries abound. Was that a drag queen?

The old lady exits the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

TRICK OR TREAT

 Debra Benigno

“Have you seen this man?”

The bartender studied the photo the old woman thrust in his face.

“It’s Halloween; everyone’s in costume.”

She ordered a highball and searched the bar. She knew she’d find him.

She spotted a voluptuous Wonder Woman across the room.

He’s got to be close.

Really? A cowboy with a measly bandeau covering his mouth?

She watched him fondle Wonder Woman.

He never noticed the old lady who spiked his drink.

Lying, cheating bastard. She adjusted her shawl and her mask.

The old woman walked out of the bar with a smile on her face.

•••

§§§

AND NOW A WORD FROM OUR SPONSOR

THE KING’S EYE

A Fantasy of the Farther Isles

by John M. Daniel

The King’s Eye is available on Kindle, Nook, and wherever else ebooks are sold.

The kings and queens of the Farther Isles have gathered at the castle of High King Rohar, as they do every year on the Summer Solstice, to pledge their loyalty. But before the ceremony is over, the Giant Clobber from the Isle of the South Wind storms into the Great Hall, steals the High King’s crystal left eye right out of its socket, then disappears into the night. 



The outraged High King offers to reward anyone who will slay the Giant and bring back the crystal eye. The reward: half of Rohar’s kingdom and the hand of his daughter, Llanaa, in marriage.

The only one to stand up to the challenge is Prince Frogge, a twelve-year-old boy from the Isle of Fens. 

Frogge finds a partner, Rodney Trapper, the goatherd’s son—tall, strong, and seventeen—and together the lads set out on their quest: to sail to the Isle of South Wind and do battle with the Giant Clobber in the Meadow of Mayhem. It’s a fight no one believes they can win.

Their adventures take a full year, during which they travel from Isle to Farther Isle, in a boat that sails itself, guided mysteriously by the Stars. 

The King's Eye is a story romantic and magical, full of love and death, heroes and scoundrels, bravery and cowardice, danger and high hopes. This tale will delight anyone old enough to read and young enough to believe that a goatherd's son could win the heart of a princess.

§§§

Call for submissions: Your 99-Word Stories

The deadline for December’s 99-word story submissions is December 1. The stories will appear on my blog post for December 12.

note: this 99-word story feature is a game, not a contest. Obey the rules and I’ll include your story. I may edit the story to make it stronger, and it’s understood that you will submit to my editing willingly. That’s an unwritten rule.

Rules for the 99-word story feature are as follows:

1. Your story must be 99 words long, exactly.

2. One story per writer, per month.

3. The story must be a story. That means it needs plot (something or somebody has to change), characters, and conflict.

4. The story must be inspired by the prompt I assign.

5. The deadline: the first of the month. Stories will appear on this blog the second Saturday of the month.

6. I will copy edit the story. The author of the story retains all rights.

7. Email me your story (in the body of your email, or as a Word attachment) to: jmd@danielpublishing.com

THIS MONTH’S PROMPT FOR NEXT MONTH’S 99-WORD STORY:

Write a Christmas (or seasonal) story in 99 words, with the following first line: “I promised my parents I would never tell this to anyone.” If you follow the rules, your story will appear on this blog December 12.

§§§

Thanks for dropping by! See you next week, I hope. Next week I’ll be showcasing a guest post by novelist James Callan.

Meanwhile, keep reading, keep writing, and continue to enjoy the Joy of Story!

http://www.danielpublishing.com/jmd/index.html