Category Archives: Writing

Writing

Writing Practice Review: Days 4-6

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This past week started out so well in the realm of writing. Sadly, illness took over and everything stopped after Thursday. Hopefully this coming week will show more promise. Either way, I’m going to go easy on myself. Scolding myself for lack of perfection in these things just gets me down, making it less likely I’ll get back up again.

At any rate, here’s the writing practice I got in since last Tuesday.

Day 4: 1200+ words. This piece is a bit of backstory and/or my attempt to explore a character concept. I like the idea of a dragonborn fighter who is currently working as a mercenary to pay bills, but is extremely unsatisfied with the kinds of jobs his recruiter obliges him to do. I feel like a good Dungeon Master could work with that to create a hook that draws my fighter into a more satisfying adventure and a life he’s more comfortable with. Of course, the DM might also ask me to change a few details here. For example, I wrote the scene as if it’s happening in the world of Fehrun and the DM might want to place their campaign in a different world. I’m actually okay with that. I just picked locations in Fehrun to make the story easier to write. I’d have no problems changing the details. Of course, I still need to work on this character. The story raises other questions like how and why did my fighter become a mercenary in the first place? Why isn’t he with the other warriors of his clan?

Day 5: 300+ words. This piece is quite short, but it’s what I wanted to write. I felt like anything I might do to try to increase the word count would have diminished what I was going for. Better to focus on Gene’s experience of playing as well as the effects of the music.

Day 6: 1000+ words. Another dialogue-intensive piece. What can I say? I love my dialogue. Originally Karbath was supposed to just wander through the bar and maybe even witness a few fights. I even considered the possibility that he would end up int he ring after all. But the challenge from the young kid just suggested what I considered a more interesting direction for the scene. I also hope that Karbath’s wish that he could be more than just some fighter shone through. In many ways, I think he hoped to steer the kid towards a life he and his circumstances denied himself.

Writing

Writing Practice: Days 1-3

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As I’ve mentioned from time to time, I like to write. I’ve started a number of different novels, though I’ve stopped each one for various reasons, though the common theme seems to be life getting in the way in forms of relationship stuff, health issues, or work draining too much of my time. The bug has hit me again, though this time it’s slightly different. I just feel like I need to get writing again as a form of creative expression and even self-discipline. So I decided on Saturday that I would set a goal to practice writing once a day. I have an informal goal of 1000 words each day, though I’m not holding myself too strictly to that goal. The fact that my first practice missed the mark by roughly 300 words is something I’ve learned to live with. Besides, I overshot by an additional 600+ words on the third day, so I’m figuring it will all even out.

In deciding to do this, I found myself facing a logistical question: Where do I post my stuff? Do I post it here? Do I create a new blog? Or do I keep it in my Writing Dot Com portfolio? Do I cross-post and just flood the Internet with the same pieces of writing?

I decided to keep my creative writing over at Writing Dot Com. That choice made sense to me because there’s a stronger community there, and there’s a chance that someone will see a piece I did and offer a review and even constructive feedback. That’s something I need right now. One of my biggest disappointments with blogging is that it can be very difficult to garner any reader interaction or feedback, which I will admit is something I crave every now and then.

Plus, I didn’t really want to turn this blog into a writer’s blog. I hope to actually start posting more about sexuality, spirituality, and politics as soon as I feel like I have something notable to say. (That’s a whole blog post in its own right.) And I want to get back into the podcast, and will keep posting episodes here as well.

But I still wanted to make my creative writing a part of this blog as it’s my main blog and online presence (well, second to Twitter maybe) and such an important part of my life needs to be represented here as well. So I will be doing a weekly “Writing Practice” review post. Every Tuesday, I will do a single post that provides a link of practice writing I produced since the previous Tuesday’s post. I also hope to include a bit of commentary on each piece, offering insights into why I wrote it or why i personally like it or even what issues I see with it. That way, my readers here can keep apprised of my writing without me overwhelming the blog. And hopefully doing this will get me blogging about other stuff too.

So welcome to the first Writing Practice Review! This post only has three days of practice to showcase.

Day 1: 700+ words. This scene is semi-auto-biographical in that it’s based on actual experiences I hd when I went out dancing in my late thirties and early forties. I always found it interesting that guys who — if I had tried to hit them up or talk to them on a dating app — would generally think they’re too good (attractive or young (and the latter was often a totally valid point) for me would suddenly be watching me while I danced. I can only assume it was because they saw and desired the freedom I had to be myself — a fat, uncoordinated guy dancing like none of that mattered — while they were still concerned about their image.

Day 2: 1100+ words. I normally write male POV characters, and I actually wanted to try writing a female POV character instead. Also, I really wanted to play with the idea of a young woman who knows she’s “supposed” to play the helpless damsel waiting to be rescued and refuses to accept that role. I’m not making any promises, but I feel like this day’s practice has the potential to become an actual story, as it got a bit more detailed than I originally intended . Also, the ending of the scene took me completely by surprise. It’s always a good sign when a writing project takes on a life of its own like that — if a little scary.

Day 3: 1600+ words. This scene also took on a bit of a life of its own. When I started it, I just planned on having a young apprentice (Lance) working on a potion. I quickly added Cecilia to help him figure out what he was doing wrong. Plus that gave me a chance to add dialogue to the scene and I love dialogue. (Some people seem to think I have a knack for it.) Everything else about this scene was “discovered” as I continued writing. I am fascinated by the idea of a teacher — of anything, not just alchemy — stressing the importance of collaboration in the field of study. Too often, education seems to be framed as competitive.

A note on word counts: I usually write this stuff in Google Docs before I post it to Writing Dot Com. Weirdly, the two sites rarely agree on the word count of any piece. And since I don’t care about precision, I’ve decided to rectify the problem by just rounding down to the nearest hundred. Both sites seem to agree that much, at least.

Writing

Writer Woes

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The Hand that WritesSo, I’m a bit bummed.  Back in the summer, I started writing a speculative fiction short story with the intent of submitting it for publication to Icarus, a quarterly magazine that publishes spec-fic pieces featuring leading gay male characters.  I sent it out to a small group of friends who agreed to proofread it and offer critiques.  Due to it taking time for my readers to get me feedback and my health issues toward the end of summer and the beginning of fall, I kind of let the whole thing slide.  A couple weeks ago, I started thinking about the story and started thinking about picking it back up again.

It looks like if I’m going to get back to the story, I’m going to have to start by hunting for a new magazine to submit it to.  When I received my notice that the Winter 2013/2014 issue was available, it came with an announcement that the magazine is being discontinued.  The winter issue is the last issue it will be.

So now I have a story about to enter into the editing phase without a home.  Which is a bummer.  So far, my quick Google search does not show any other magazines that focus on spec-fic with gay male characters, so I will have to look for a magazine that either focuses on spec-fic in general or one that either focuses on any story with gay characters or stories written by LGBT authors.  Which is fine by me.  The bigger problem is that in its first draft form, my story is already almost 5,350 words long.  (To add a few things suggested by readers, I expect the final draft will be a bit longer.  Icarus allowed stories to be up to 9,000 words (they they reminded authors that longer was not always better and the magazine preferred something closer to 5,000 words.)  Other magazines, like Apex (5,000) and Jonathan (3,500), have much lower maximum word count limits.  So either I have to revise the story to meet those limits (which would be challenging at best), or I have to cross a bunch of possible candidates off my list of places to submit to.

Part of me is tempted to just forget about it, post the story to my WdC portfolio, and start over from scratch with a new idea to get published.  After all, that was my main purpose in writing this story.  I wanted to actually get published.  (Plus the fact that I would’ve gotten a small amount of money if my story hit print was a nice touch.)

But damn.

 

Writing

Short Story: Awkward Timing for a Conversation

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Last night, rather than work on my novel, I decided to write a short story.  I decided to cross-post that story here to my blog.  I hope you enjoy.

I walked into the restaurant and scanned the dining room. I spotted Trent sitting at a table for two near one window. He spotted me and waved, shooting me his patented smile. I nodded to the host and gestured toward my boyfriend. She nodded in response and said, “Enjoy.”

I crossed the thirty feet and sat at the empty table. “Well, hello there,” Trent said as he absentmindedly ran his hand through his meticulously combed hair. He already had a beer sitting in front of him.

“Did you order me anything yet?” I asked.

“I wasn’t sure what you’d want, to be honest. But if you know, I’ll call our waiter.” He raised a hand and shouted toward the server station. “Cody!”

A young man about five years younger than me walked over. He had blonde hair, was about 5’9” and a somewhat slim build. “Hi. You must be Alex,” he said to me. “May I get you something to drink?”

“A virgin daiquiri, please,” I said. I was a bit taken aback that the waiter knew my name.

“Certainly. I’ll have that for you in just a moment,” Cody said as he hurried away.

“Thank you,” I called after him. I turned back to Trent at that point. “Have you been here long?”

“Ten or fifteen minutes maybe,” he replied. “Just long enough to get to know our waiter a bit.”

“That’s cool,” I said. “Sorry to keep you waiting. I got hung up at work. Sue asked me to review a short document right at four.”

“No problem. Cody was a dear and kept me entertained.”

I tried hard not to wrinkle my nose. Was he trying to make me jealous again? “Well, that’s good. He seems like a sweetheart.”

“I didn’t flirt with him, in case you’re wondering,” Trent said in a tone that was almost too nonchalant.

“Oh, okay,” I said as I tried to resist the urge to rise to the bait.

“So, were you wondering?”

“Not really,” I said. It amazed me that I was being honest when I said that. Even one month ago, I would have been wondering. Hell, I would’ve been paranoid.

“It’s tempting though. I bet you he’d call me if I gave him my number.”

“It’s possible,” I said. This was getting irritating and I didn’t want to make a scene in the middle of the restaurant. “So, must be you mentioned my name to him?”

“Yeah, I said you were meeting me. And yes, I told him you were my boyfriend,” he said.

“Ah, okay.” I still wondered why he’d give a guy who knows he’s taken his number, but I had quit trying to understand Trent’s actions a few weeks ago.

Cody returned with my drink. “Here you are. Do you both know what you’d like?”

“Is the chicken in the chicken caesar salad grilled or fried?” I asked.

“Oh please, Alex. Like it matters. Having grilled chicken for one meal isn’t going to magically make you lose twenty pounds,” Trent said. He was often annoyed with my finicky food choices.

Cody stood looking at Trent with an astonished gaze. “It’s grilled.”

“Then I’ll have that. I prefer the taste of grilled chicken to fried chicken,” I said.

“And you?” Cody asked Trent.

“Oh, I’ll have a small order of ribs. Standard barbecue sauce.”

“Alright. And for your potato?”

“Baked and loaded.” Cody nodded and left to enter our order into the system. Trent commented to me, “I really think I will give him my number. Just to see what he does.”

I took a sip of my drink. “Okay.”

“You’re not going to object?”

“No, I’m not,” I said.

“So what? Are you going to punish me with the silent treatment?”

“No.”

“Oh,” he said, his face a mix of relief and confusion. “So, what did you want to talk about?”

“Let’s wait until after dinner, shall we?” I said.

“Oh, it’s going to be one of those conversations!” he said. “And here you said you weren’t going to make a big deal over me coming on to Cody. You just need to accept that this is the way I am already.”

I set my drink down. “I do,” I said trying to keep the irritation out of my voice.

“Well, good. It’s about time you just accept the relationship the way it is.”

I sighed. “I didn’t want to talk about this in the middle of the restaurant, but you keep pushing. So maybe it’s better if we just get it out of the way. I do accept this is way you are and the way our relationship is going to keep going.” I took a deep breath, then added, “That’s why I’ve decided that it’s time to end our relationship.”

Trent laughed. “You can’t be serious.”

I nodded. “I am.”

“You’re dumping me?”

“Yeah, I guess you could say that. I just think we’re in different places in our life and we both need to accept that. I need to accept that.”

“I can’t believe this. I’m the best thing that has ever happened to you.” I shrugged. I felt that point was debatable, but didn’t feel like debating it. I just wanted this conversation to be over. He pressed, “You’ll never land someone as good looking or as sexy as I am again.”

I shrugged again. “You might be right. I’m willing to take that chance.”

“I’ll replace you by the end of tonight! You’re likely to be alone for weeks or even months.”

A thought occurred to me. “Are you really trying to get me to stay with you by trying to get me afraid of being alone?”

Trent stuttered. “What? How can you accuse me of that?”

“I’m not. I’m asking.”

“Whatever. This is all your therapist’s fault. She’s been turning you against me, hasn’t she?”

I laughed out loud at that one. “You mean the therapist that you insisted I go see in the first place because you felt I was just too paranoid?” Another thought occurred to me. “You wanted her to convince me I was just fucked up in the head, didn’t you? It’s just another way you’ve tried to manipulate me.” I paused, then added, “And yes, that one was an accusation.”

Trent sputtered. “I don’t have to stand for this. I’m out of here. He stood up and stormed toward the door.

I sighed and pulled out my phone and sent a text message to my friend, Sally. “It’s done. It wasn’t pretty, but thank god it’s done.”

I had just hit send when I heard Cody’s voice from beside me. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I will be. Hey, can you do me a favor? Can you try to put a stop on the ribs?”

“Sure, no problem. Um, do you want me to cancel your salad too? I mean, if you need to leave after that, I understand.”

“Actually, I think I’d rather stick around and enjoy a pleasant meal.”

“That’s cool,” Cody said. “Let me run to the kitchen and take care of the ribs. I thanked him as he ran back to the kitchen.

Sally responded, congratulating me and asked when I’d be seeing my therapist next. I told her I had scheduled an appointment for tomorrow afternoon, though I was feeling surprisingly good about it.

Cody came back. “I was able to cancel the ribs. I also talked to the manager and he agreed to take the beers off your bill.”

“Beers? So he had more than just the one.”

“Yeah, he finished one before you got here. So, not that it’s any of my business, but I’m sorry.”

I shrugged. “Thanks. But I’m glad it’s over. I wish I had ended it even sooner. Putting up with him for ten months was just way too much.”

“No doubt. You certainly deserve better.”

The host came over and spoke to Cody. “When you get a chance, I need to talk to you.”

I smirked. “Let me guess, my ex gave you a business card to give to Cody.”

She blushed and shuffled her feet. “Yeah. I’m sorry. That was a really shitty thing of him to do.”

Cody asked her, “You tossed it, right?”

“I figured that’s what you’d want me to do.”

“Damn right. Are you sure you’re okay, Alex?”

“I’ll be fine. To be honest, I’m feeling kind of relieved. And I hope you didn’t turn him down just because of me.”

Cody snorted. “Hell no. He was an ass. Besides, at the risk of being too forward, I’d rather have your number.”

I blinked. “Are you serious?”

His coworker laughed. “Honey, he’s serious. Besides, he’d never play you after the experience you just had. He’s not like that.” Cody just nodded in agreement with her.

“Well, I’m flattered. But I think I need a bit of time. I’m feeling good about breaking up with him, but I still need to sort through things.”

“Understandable,” Cody said. “Though if I gave you my number, would you hold onto it and consider using it when you got things sorted?”

I considered this for a moment. “Sure. Though it’s probably going to be a few weeks.”

“That’s fine.” He tore a page out of his pad, scribbled on it, and handed it to me. It had his name and number written on it. “Thanks, Cody. And could I get another daiquiri? Non-virgin this time.”

“Coming right up.” He walked away. I smiled, surprised that the night wasn’t a total disaster.

Writing

Musings on Writing

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"Write Drunk; edit sober."Tomorrow is my big day and my massive four day weekend is half over.  Today, I hope to spend a good amount of time doing some writing, as that’s the other reason that I decided to take these two days off.  Originally, I had hoped to have the first draft of my novel completed by June.  Well, that didn’t happen.  So I decided I wanted a couple extra days to put in some more work.

Granted, I don’t think that a couple days are going to get me back on track.  I’m looking at where I am and where I want to go and I realize that I have a long way to go.  Of course, I’m also realizing that a lot of what I’m writing will probably get cut.  It’s that, or have a book that rivals “War and Peace1” in terms of length.  And I have no delusions that I’m the next Tolstoy.

I’ve considered jumping ahead in the story, but have decided against it.  I figure I’d rather write everything out and then cut 90% of it.  After all, the more I have written, I figure the more I have to choose from in figuring out what’s the best, most compelling and most relevant 10% to keep.

Plus my choice to write everything out is an act of rebellion against my inner critic and my attempt to keep him reigned in.  Ever since I figured out that Ernest Hemingway2 was right (see the attached image) was on to something, the inner critic has been fairly well behaved.  I figure if I start trying to mentally edit out stuff and only write what I think might make the final cut now, I’ll jinx that.

In closing, I’d like to share a recent excerpt from the chapter I’m currently working on.

“Well, watching you get your sex on and actually enjoy some intimacy has been kind of fun, to be honest,” Ted said. “As for being obsessed, I think you were much more obsessed when you were single. If anything, it seems like dating Nate has made you find a new interest in life in general.”

I considered that. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. I mean, I have the stuff going on with the youth, though that has more to do with Steve getting me involved than dating Nate. Plus there’s the possibility of me taking some classes. Which again is really about work and not my love life.”

“But haven’t you told me you’ve been doing a lot more drawing in your spare time, too?”

“Well, yeah. I figure I need something to do on the evenings when I’m not hanging out with Nate or working with the teens.”

“What did you used to do with your evenings?”

“Honestly? Watched television and surfed the Internet while wishing I’d meet someone special.” I cringed as I said it. “Wow, that sounds pretty sad, doesn’t it?”

“It sounds like someone who was depressed, if you really want to know my opinion.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. So why didn’t you say anything.”

Ted placed a hand on my shoulder. “Curt? I tried. Why do you think I kept telling you that you needed to get out and meet people? I even suggested you talk to a professional a couple times.”

“And I brushed the idea off,” I said smiling ruefully. “Sorry about that.”

“Don’t apologize to me, guy. Your choices to stay secluded and sad didn’t affect me. Well, other than being sad to see a great friend do that to himself.”

“So, do you still think I should talk to someone?”

“Ultimately, only you can make that call.”

“But don’t you have an opinion?” I pressed.

Ted considered long and hard. “After Zach died, I spent some time in therapy. Mostly for grief, though we did cover a few other things. After my experience, I admit that I’m one of those people who thinks anyone can probably benefit from a few conversations with a therapist they can trust and open up to.”

“So that’s a yes?”

“Sort of. But at the same time, I’m not as worried about you right now as I used to be. I see you turning yourself around right now. You’re much more cheerful. You’re looking forward to working with your church’s teens. You’re doing things you love. And you even seem to be starting to set some boundaries with people like Tina. Plus it sounds like you might be starting to express your needs with Nate.”

“So that’s a no?” I asked. I was getting confused.

“I’m saying that it really is entirely up to you. Though can I ask you something?”

“Sure,” I said hesitantly.

“Okay. Let me first say that I think you and Nate make a cute couple and that I hope that you stay together for a long time, even all of your lives. However, just hypothetically suppose that the two of you break up for some reason. Do you think you’d still do all the other stuff you’re doing now and do them so enthusiastically? Or do you think you’d revert back to your sad, isolated self?”

“You don’t ask easy questions, do you?”

“No, I don’t. That’s why I don’t actually expect you to answer it, and certainly not right this minute. I’m just asking you to think about it carefully.”

I nodded. “I will. I promise.”

1Interestingly, according to Wikipedia, there are several other novels that are larger than Tolstoy’s book.

2Interestingly, I found this really cool post exploring that Hemingway quote while searching for an image containing it.

Writing

Making peace with being a non-NaNo-er.

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In a lot of ways, I love NaNoWriMo.  For the random person who might come to my blog (I think all my regulars are at least familiar, if not actual participants), that’s National Novel Writing Month, which has occurred every November since 1999.  The idea is that the organizers encourage all writers who have dreams of writing a novel to go for it, writing a 50,000+ word story in a single month.  In many ways, it’s a great idea.  It encourages the whole concept of “Don’t think, edit, or worry. Just write!  There’ll be plenty of time to do that other stuff once you get it done.”  It also makes the writing process a community-supported event.  I’ve watched several people encourage each other, keeping up the excitement and — most importantly — keeping the ink flowing or the keys clicking.  It’s a great idea and a lot of people benefit from it.

My own experiences with NaNo — and I’ve tried twice — are different. For me personally, NaNo is a source of stress, insecurity and guilt.  I look at the goal of Nano, and I immediately start trembling at the thought of trying to write an average of 1,667 words every day for thirty consecutive days.  I just don’t work that way.  No matter how pumped I might start out the process, it starts to feel like a challenge and a chore, usually before the second week is over.  That just further crushes my creativity.  So most years — including this year — I don’t bother trying.

Of course, that leads to feelings of guilt and insecurity.  Again, I see all my friends pushing along and getting all excited, and there’s the small part of me that starts in on the self-judgement.  “Why aren’t I doing this?  Why can’t I do it?  Hell, why am I not even willing to try?”

This year, I’m saying to hell with all that.  I have tried.  It didn’t work for me.  I’m choosing to believe that that’s okay.  If my creative processes need a more leisurely schedule than what NaNo requires, that’s perfectly okay.  After all, if there’s one thing I’ve learned growing up a straight-acting fundie boy only to become hedonistic Pagan flamer, it’s that it’s okay to be different and honor the fact that I’m different.

So to all my friends who are participating in NaNo, I say good luck.  I look forward to hearing about your progress and will gladly celebrate your success at the end of the month.  But as for me, my path is different.  And I’m finally getting to the point where I’m okay with that.

Emotions, Meta-Blogging, Writing

Still alive and sharing a link

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Hello all!

Man, I’ve been silent for months now.  In some ways, it’s a shame that I’ve allowed this blog to remain untouched after spending November and December working so hard to get a regular schedule going.  But alas, I felt it was necessary.  Trying to keep it going through January — when I was completely unmotivated due to memories bringing up personal emotional issues (I’m fine now, thanks for asking) would have been disastrous, I feel.  At that point, keeping the blog going started to feel like an obligation of drudgery rather than something of I enjoy.  So rather than totally kill my own love for my blog, I decided to take a break.

I hope to pick this blog back up again, so I appreciate anyone who is willing to keep it in their newsreaders or on their blogrolls.  I won’t make any promises of when or how frequently I will return right now, as my attentions have also been focused elsewhere.  During my absence here, I started a new blogging project, which I’m really getting into.  Unfortunately, due to the nature of that project, I’m required to do it under anonymity.  That means that I am unable to let you all know where or how to find it.  Sorry.

I’m also trying to get back into writing more, which means my Writing.Com portfolio is slowly starting to see some action.  (My apologies to the prudes and those just not interested in male-to-male sex, but most of the stuff I’m working on right now is sexual/erotic fiction.)  I also just updated my writing-specific blog over there with an entry about one advantage visual media has over the written word.  I encourage you to check it out, though I warn you that it relies heavily on spoilers to the movie The Sitter.

I hope you all are well. Drop me a comment and let me know what’s new with you.

Memories, Writing

Entering a writing contest and reminiscing about roleplaying

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Writing samples: Parker 75

Image by churl via Flickr

I’ve spent the past several days playing around with Writing.com (WDC).  It’s been good for me, as it’s helped get me motivated again to actually write.  And I’ve enjoyed the feedback I’ve gotten from some truly skilled writers over there.  Tonight, I decided to further participate in the site by joining my first writing contest.  I chose to submit an entry to the Character Creation Contest. I figure I’m pretty good at character creation, so it’s a good place to get my feet wet. I’ll move on to more challenging contests — one that force me to work on my weak points — as time goes by. So I put together a character profile for Hargath, a dark priest.

Hargath is actually a recreated and edited version of a character I played in an online freeform roleplaying campaign. The way I came up with him always amused me.

When the group on the BBS decided to set up the room for the campaign, I hadn’t decided if I was going to participate yet. So I sat back as people started making posts introducing their characters. I noticed that everyone was creating noticeably good — as in morally upright — characters. As I watched the party form up, I realized that this was looking like it would be a campaign where the players worked together perfectly well.

Now, perhaps it’s because one of my favorite roleplaying games (though I never got to actually play it) was Paranoia, but that state of affairs didn’t sit well with me. I felt that like good storytelling, good role-playing (I’m also of the opinion that the difference between the two is almost negligible) required some conflict between characters. It wasn’t enough to just have to overcome the obstacles of the NPC’s. There needed to be some obstacles to teamwork that needed to be overcome as well.

So I decided to introduce a dark priest. I forget what his name was, and I don’t think I described him quite as well as I’ve described Hargath. But he was definitely the dark cloud looming over the party. And his presence did make for some interesting role-playing.

Shortly before the campaign fell apart (those of us involve simply found ourselves with not enough time to continue it), I remember an exchange between my priest and the mage that my friend, Ben played. At one point, the party came up against a particularly nasty captain we had to get rid of. The party agreed that assassination was the best course of action, and my priest volunteered to do the dirty work. The mage decided that my priest needed a disguise in order to get close enough. The mage happily helped out in that department obliged, by transforming my priest into a woman!

Of course, my priest got his revenge. His new disguise allowed him to get the captain in private and dispatch the captain in a formal ritual sacrifice to the dark goddess. And the mage’s spell further enabled my priest to psychically link said mage to the victim. The end result, the mage experienced everything done to the captain as if it was happening to him. Ben thought the whole idea was a hoot. In fact, he wrote the entire scene for me because I didn’t have time.

Of course, my choice of characters did create problems between me and at least one other player. Another friend, Jared, played a Druid. Jared was interested in Druidism himself at the time. And my priest character did a couple things (like steal the soul of a horse so that it would bend to his will) that freaked Jared out. Note that I said it freaked Jared out rather than his character. Jared was mad at me for days. That much was unfortunate. But as I explained to him, part of role-playing and fiction is allowing some characters to do things we wouldn’t dream of doing in real life. After all, if all characters were the goody-two-shoes most of us try to be, our games and stories wouldn’t be nearly as interesting.

And I admit that playing an evil character helped me write such characters much better.

Gender and Sexuality, Writing

Excerpt from a new story project

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The following is from the first chapter of a new story I’m working on:

Josh
awoke with a start. He let out a strangled gasp before his mind began
to process his surroundings. He looked round, finding himself in his
own bedroom. His sheets were pushed off to one side, probably due to
him moving around in his sleep. He took a few deep breaths to calm
himself. He willed his heart to return to a slower rhythm. “It was only
a dream. Only a dream,” he whispered. “It doesn’t mean anything. Guys
dream about all kinds of things.”



He knew that was true enough. He had done a bit of research online, and
found that a lot of young guys dreamed about having sex with other guys
and still grew up to be heterosexual. He’d even read that some
experiment with male friends before going on to get married. So he
tried to reassure himself that this one dream didn’t mean he was one of
those terrible homosexuals.



However, his mind kept nagging at him. This wasn’t just one dream,
after all. He had been having a few dreams like this since he turned
fourteen nine months ago. He wondered if there was a point where it
quit being something any normal teenager might experience and starting
being the sign of something more serious.


“And it’s not just the dreams,” he whispered to himself as he lay
there, confused and frightened. “After all, I’ve been getting those
feelings when I’m awake too.” He thought back to that afternoon he and
Tim went skinny-dipping. While it had been innocent fun when they had
actually gone swimming at age eleven, it morphed into something more
sinister-seeming whenever he thought of it now. Tim had even suggested
they go skinny dipping again this past summer. But the thoughts and
feelings it stirred in Josh kept him coming up with excuses to put off
such an excursion.



Josh lay there, feeling more miserable the more he thought about
everything. He wondered how his parents, who raised him to be a good
little Baptist boy, would react if he told them he was attracted to
other guys. He wondered if they would send him to counseling or even
disown him. He was too afraid to find out.



And yet, he yearned to tell someone, anyone. He hated having to keep
this secret. It felt like a terrible burden – a burden he didn’t want –
to carry alone. And yet, he didn’t know anyone he could tell. He was
pretty sure everyone he knew would react badly.



“No, you’re on your own on this one. Just try to make the best of it,”
he told himself. Then he added in a quick prayer, “God, please help me.
And forgive me. I don’t want to be gay. I want to do what you want me
to.” He rolled over and waited for sleep to claim him again, to give
him a break from all his worries and doubts.


If you like it, please read the rest of the chapter and follow the story using the links above.  I hope to write more soon.  And of course, feel free to check out the rest of my portfolio on Writing.Com.  Though I’ll warn you that some of the other stories are sexually explicit.