Keeping On Truckin' . . .

Do you ever get the feeling that you are rolling manure up a steep hill, all the time praying you don't stumble and let it all slide back on top of you? No? You haven't? Well, that is how I feel in regards to my sputtering attempt at writing Misdemeanors & Felonies. I really get weary of complaining all the time about the project, but I have come to understand that this blog/diary/whatever is just for that; the mulling over different problems within the structure of the writing . . . Or lack of writing.

I didn't attempt to write one single word yesterday. I think that is wise. Misdemeanors & Felonies seems to be a book that is going to take more time and more thought than anything I have attempted to date. You really wouldn't think that would be the case, would you? As I have mentioned before, the story is already been told by the mere fact that I have lived it. It is, after all, the story of my life, so what's the big deal about writing it? Not exactly sure, I'll leave that question for the shrinks among us to ponder and mull. But I do believe that it all has to do with the integrity of what I am writing as opposed to just the mechanics of the actual writing of it.

I will be on Chapter 6 today though. It will be mostly about the awakening of sex as something which drives me and everyone else almost throughout our lives, especially during our young years of self-discovery. It will involve a "hideout," and friend and neighbor Charles, and another neighbor by the name of Libby. The discovery of girls is a wondrous event in a young boys life, albeit not without puzzlement which will last until death claims us. That the female of the species is so . . . aggravatingly different from us is the same reason that we go to great lengths to conquer and control (hahaha!) them. This line of thinking causes me to recall an old saying I have heard . . . Man chases woman until she catches him. It doesn't get much plainer than that . . . So! Chapter 6 will be the first chapter to deal with the sexual side of moi, but definitely not the last one. To say that I have been driven to extremes by my sexual nature would be an understatement. Chapter 6 will involve other friends of the very young Jerry Pat by the name of Loel and Noel Dobson (yes, they were twins).

I feel good about this upcoming chapter, not at all leery of it as I have been in the preceding ones. I don't exactly know why that is. Is my feeling of inadequacy's concerning this book and my ability to write it ebbing? I sure as hell hope so. I never thought I would turn out to be such a weenie when the day finally arrived for me to put down, for the record, my life. But I have turned out to be that weenie, I'm afraid. It's that is it so damn personal and I know I am going to have to put things in the book that is going to make me uneasy. I'm not ashamed of what I have done, although I am mortified about some of them. But shame doesn't enter into the equation, because what has happened is over and like another famous saying goes, . . . The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, / Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit / Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, / Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it -- Omar Khayyam. So shame doesn't have a place in the retelling of what happened. Remorse? Yes. I am so very remorseful of some of my deeds and misdeeds, so much soo that it will not be a good day when I finally get around to chiseling them out of my soul and writing them down.

Anyway, I look forward to having a good day, never mind all my rambling about remorse and shame, etc., and I need to get to it . . . Later . . .

MY NOVELS:

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Mission Accomplished

After three days Chapter 5 is in the can. I think I know what is wrong with my muddled thinking concerning all of my problems writing Misdemeanors & Felonies. It's the genre, stupid! I am treading in new and uncharted waters and sometimes I feel like I am drowning in the riptide of emotions. You ever been so emotional that you could not explain to anyone how you were feeling? I get that same sinking feeling each and every chapter I compose. Will it ease as I continue to plod along on this story of mine? I very much doubt it. I think it will only get worse. Where before I could make up names, like Martin Rayne Kirby, and give him some background, put him in spots where danger is involved and get him out of said danger, this time it is different, it is real

The thing is with writing memoirs the plot has already been written for you by your very own self over however many years you have been alive and kicking. That should make it easier, eh? Not. At least not in my case. I find myself floundering around, splashing in the shallow end of the pool of memories and dreading . . . fearing . . . To venture into the deep water of my own making, wondering if, when I get into that deep water will it drown me. I know that it is going to affect me deeply, that's a given. Sometimes I have had niggling doubts that my life has been all that interesting that can fill a book.

But then, that is not the reason Misdemeanors & Felonies is being written.

It is being written in order to give something to my children; not to make up for what I havn't given them all these years, my love and affection and strength. No, of course that isn't it, but maybe the book will at least give them a chance to look into my mind. At least they might know what I was pursuing all those years I tramped across America looking for who the hell knew what. I hope so. I hope they will be able to and say, "Okay, now I know. It doesn't make up for what the SOB did, but now I recognize a little about why he was the way he was."

That is all I can ask for.

I suppose I am in need of expert help on this project of mine. Writing a factual story of your life is miles away from making up fiction. I find myself thinking that there is much too much narrative, but I think narrative is the accepted protocol when writing memoirs. The ones I have read, I seem to remember were about ninety percent narrative. I picked up a book called Hole In The Sky, by William Kittredge, which is a thin book of his memoirs and almost all of it is written in the narrative. So, I understand that I am doing nothing wrong, but being an old fiction writer I cringe when I look over each chapter and don't see a lot of white spaces on the page. White spaces, of course would mean that there is a lot of dialogue, which helps a reader stay interested in what he is reading. I suppose readers, however, understand the difference in the two genres and is not concerned. They are reading a memoir in order to find out about a particular person's take on his own life and I can only hope I can make my narrative interesting enough to keep that reader reading . . . That, of course, remains to be seen . . . See you tomorrow . . .

MY NOVELS:

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Bogged Down

I am bogged down on Chapter 5. Actually I'm not bogged down, I can't even get started. Too many things floating through my brain these last couple of days which distract me. Also, I am finding myself fighting the story. It's like all of a sudden I don't want to do it. That's stupid, but I guess I should have realized this was going to happen because of the nature of what I am doing. I imagine that it will happen many times during the writing of this first draft of Misdemeanors & Felonies. I find myself trying, already, to hold back and holding back is not what I am about here. If I try to skip over certain areas now, what the hell do I expect myself to do when the telling of this story really get personal and rough? So, I will fight through this early mini-crises and carry on with the book.

I do need to quit allowing certain things to distract me, however. I seek out distractions like a speed freak looking for a hit of meth, knowing it isn't good for me, but craving the distractions nevertheless. If I am distracted, then I am not writing. If I am not writing, I will not finish this book. If I do not finish this book it will really put me in a dark hole of my own making. So! Today is the day to get Chapter 5 done.

When things like this happen I always revert back to the theory that this book was not meant to be written. Like I have said before, I have attempted to write the long-awaited story before and have actually written two complete novels, Homecoming and Three Corners. Neither of them addressed issues I wanted to to address and so I junked them. They were so alien to what I want to do with Misdemeanors & Felonies that it is like black and white. But they are done and maybe can be made into entirely different novels at some point in time.

I am one who belittles most writers when they complain that they have "writers block." I maintain that there is no such thing as writers block, merely it is a regrouping of ideas. Some people like to use that ancient, tired expression to excuse the fact that they are not writers at all, merely someone who likes to proclaim to the world that they are . . . What I am experiencing here is not writers block . . . Writers block does not exist . . . Chapter 5 coming up . . .

MY NOVELS:

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Malingering

The surreal guy on the left is kinda how I am feeling at the moment . . . Not all here. A reflection of myself which is temporal and hard to grasp. Yesterday was a day which nothing got done on Misdemeanors & Felonies. Zip. Nada . . . Nuttin'. There are times, when, to quote my daughter Patricia, I get into a funk and life and its problems and projects seems to not be worth dealing with. I have been prone to the "funk" all of my life, as I assume most people are, but they never last long in my case. So! Saying that, am I ready for today's challenge, to push out the necessary words which will compromise Chapter 5?

Maybe.

I say maybe, not because I don't want to write, but because I'm not feeling up to snuff today, but hopefully it will not last all day and I can do some work. The next few chapters will deal with the years leading up to the awful teenage years. As bad as children may feel about their childhood up to the point where they . . . Mature . . . At least physically, nothing they have experienced can hope to warn them about the angst which awaits them as they ease into their teens. It is then that rebellion and self-examination and sexual feeling all combine to wreck havoc in the normal teen, never mind those who has have been raised in a house of turmoil and confusion.

But the pre-teen years are, in fact, the most important years in the life of a child. It is during those years that our heads are crammed full of what to do and what not to do in the society in which the teen finds themselves living among. It should be years of molding the child into a persona who can function sanely in the world around him. It should not be years with constant stress. Of course, none of us live in ideal situations, our parents carry around their own set of problems which were pressed upon them by their parents and it goes on like this, ad nauseum, in each generation. Still, there are the normal stresses which come from raising a family and then there are stresses which are fabricated.

So, I shall not malinger two days in a row! Feeling bad or not, Chapter 5 will begin and possibly be finished today, although I seriously doubt that I will finish it. This chapter, like I said, is the springboard to my life in the Taylor, Arkansas school system. I remember those days, especially the high school days with a mixture of happiness, but mixed with pain and shame . . . I will attempt to "tell it like it was" . . . See you tomorrow . . .

Early Years

Yes indeed, that is a good graphic for what was going on in the last chapter of Misdemeanors & Felonies . . . Chapter 4 to be exact.

The Early Years . . .

A time of excitement and a time of realizing that there was another world past the doors of Sam and Orean Bolton's doors. I started to school. Fell in love. Learned how to get attention by being the class clown, and all this in the first grade.

We all have the tendency to look back at our life, and the older we become, the more we seem to do that. Of course there is more to look back to as the years pile up, but still, nostalgia is commonplace among us. The thing is, I am finding out, that looking back in your mind about things that happened fifty some odd years ago is one thing, but to look back at it and try to recreate it on a page of a book, is quite another. One tends to sit staring at the monitor like a sad sack until something comes. And I am finding out that it is hard to do that. I know, I've been saying that writing this story would be hard, but what I was really talking about was the connection between my children's mothers and what happened or didn't happen to send me on down the road. And I know that is going to be difficult, but the simple fact of trying to compile a chapter, say like Chapter 4, where it was mostly about being at one of the one-a-month Sunday get-togethers at my grandparents log house out in the country. Whereas I can picture it in my thoughts, but it is not that easy to try to capture the essence of those once-a-month soirees.

Be that as it may, the Misdemeanors & Felonies is going along. I don't expect it to flow as some of my novels. Novels are fiction and if you get stuck you can always back up and go in another direction. I suppose in a manner of speaking you can do the same thing in an autobiography up to a point. You can, if stuck, just quit what you are trying to write and jump twenty or so years ahead of where you are and play that up. I don't like to do that, however, it is a "thing" with me to finish what I have started. At least when it comes to writing. Too bad I didn't have that same sense of ethics as pertaining to life all those years ago. I wouldn't have to be writing Misdemeanors & Felonies if I'd taken care of business then.

Ah, but I didn't and now I am writing it, so we have to go with what we have. I imagine I'll start to get in the groove as far as my writing flow pretty soon, at least I hope so, because I want to get this first draft done, because I know that is when the real work will begin, the editing of it. I wish I could afford a professional editor, but I have never been able to go that route, and I know I won't be able to now. Unless I hit the lottery, and since I hardly ever play the damn thing, I'm not looking for that.

I am finding out that writing about your past gives you an omniscient way of seeing things. It is like the fact that my mother lived her whole life with a severe case of inferiority complex. I didn't know that then. I didn't even know that she seems to have passed it on to me and all those years of roaming and getting into trouble was a direct result of that problem. I would have denied it, and fought you bloody if you had come to me during, say, the sixties, and sat me down and tried to explain that fact to me. But you'd have been right. I just went about it differently than did my mother. Whereas she wanted everyone to admire her and what pitiful little possessions she had, I was hell bent on destroying anything that smacked of "respectability." That gene in me, if it was a gene, who the hell knows, caused a lot of people a lot of problems.

Tomorrow . . .

MY NOVELS:

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Tree Cats

The photo has nothing to do with anything literary. These cats were birthed in this old oak tree in the apartment complex where I live. Their mother either died or just took off, leaving them to fare for themselves a while back. Well! You know how people are, everybody here has taken on the job of seeing after them. But they won't come down from the tree. Why should they? They have it made. See where the yellow cat is standing? There is an indention where we place food for them. The old oak has been rotted out from the inside and there are tunnels running all through it, a good hiding place for the kittens. The yellow one is allowing me to scratch its ears and neck, and one of the girls in the office actually had it in her hand yesterday. They are a good thing to have happened and it is great to see people concerned for their welfare . . . Gotta love it!!!

I am finding out that writing this blog/diary/journal as I begin Misdemeanors & Felonies is becoming important to me in ways I hadn't thought of before. I have attempted to write journals concerning other writings before, but could never quite get it right. I suppose the reason I am "getting it right" now is the nature of what I am writing about in the first place. Misdemeanors & Felonies is, or will be in practical terms, the same things as this blog. A vehicle to 'fess up and relate truths, however painful they might be to do. This is something I believe I have spent years on-the-job-training in order to get it done, and get it done right. All the other words I have spilt onto the pages of my novels, short stories and poetry have only been a learning experience for Misdemeanors & Felonies, where I will expose my most inner thoughts, I truly believe that.

Now it all makes sense to me, all the false starts. I could never quite grasp the reason why I was never allowed to write it before, no matter how hard I tried. There were reasons for my failure. One was the fact that I was deluding myself by using the fiction genre and Martin Rayne Kirby as its hero. It was a cop-out. I think I knew that even as I was attempting it, but my ego wouldn't allow that fact to penetrate my thought process. I understand now that fact, and another one even more important, that what happened to me on August 15, 2007 when I received the little email from my daughter. It didn't take me long to realize that I had all my duck in a row, to use a metaphor, and the writing of Misdemeanors & Felonies could finally begin with a new name. I have given my failed attempts different names in the past, names like My Story or Rayne's Road, among others. After a few days of contact with Patricia, I knew what must be done. She, as my other children, Nick and Paula/Candence have a need to know why their father wasn't around to help their mother raise them. I am attempting to tell why.

Today I will start on Chapter 4.

MY NOVELS:

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

It Is Legit Now

This morning I saved the first three chapters of Misdemeanors & Felonies on a disc, thereby giving it credibility, at least in my eyes. The first draft is officially underway. I had already written the first chapter and even posted it on http://www.authorsden.com/ and at my blog on my Myspace site, http://www.myspace.com/writetomurder under the title "Notes From The Author." I have since changed that to Chapter 1. Then I wrote, over the last three days another chapter and it will be Chapter 2. I had also written about an incident which happened in a blackberry patch for Chapter 1, but changed it to Chapter 3. Whew! Getting confused yet? It will probably get worse as this monster develops, but that is why they call the first writing of anything first drafts and they are subject to scrutiny and revision. I think the getting started is going to be the most trying, but I believe I am finally on my way to really getting into the story. Let us hope. Anyway, I feel so good about what I have done so far that I have put it on a disc, and that is progress.

I haven't read too many autobiographies, but those I have read are all about when this happened and where this happened, down to the second almost. I won't be able to give an exact date for much of this book, it will have to be in generalities, like "sometime in the early sixties," or "the fifth grade." Although I imagine as I get immersed within the structure of the book and the people who will populate it, dates and places will become more clearer as I will have been thinking of them and if you think about something long enough, things sometimes become more clearer. But precise dates do not matter. I have a long standing problem with dates. I think a lot of men do, whereas most woman can give you the date, the time, the layout of the living room and whether or not the flowers are fake or real. Viva la difference!!!

Someone in the last couple of day said for me to quit beating up on myself. Easier said than done, but I will try. The thing is, I have a lot to beat myself up for. I spent most of my life running from myself and my inferiority complexes. Yes, indeed, I had those big time, and maybe, just maybe, by the time I finish the book the reason for all those damn complexes will be apparent. Does that absolve me of my failures? Hell no, it does not, but at least I have an inkling as to why I did some of the incredible things I did. Misdemeanors. There were multitudes of those. We all have misdemeanors in our lives, but some of us take them to the extreme. I did. Felonies. Not content with the misdemeanors I was committing, I had to go and become a full-fledged outlaw. I committed felonies of the heart and felonies of the unlawful kind. The heart felonies scared other people, the lawful felonies were dealt with by the federal government.

After the last draft of Misdemeanors & Felonies is completed the reader will know where the germ of my insecurities came from. Again, I don't blame. I used to, but not anymore, because whatever happened in our past, there comes a time when we have minds of our own, but some, like me, refused to use it. I hope to cover everything in the book . . . I am anxious to do so . . . See you tomorrow . . .

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

FINALLY!!!

I named this post "FINALLY!!!" because after three missteps I finally figured out how to begin Misdemeanors & Felonies. That is not to say that I am writing my butt off. Far from it. I have been working on Chapter 1 for four days. Normally, when I run into such a challenge on a writing project I scuttle it, or at least save it on a disc to go back to it later. Not this time, however. I won't be scuttling anything, because if I don't get this written now it will never be written, and it must be finished.

I've always said that I would never change one damn thing in my life even if I had the chance. Of course that was youthful arrogance talking even as I grew out of youth and into middle age. Now, however, in the autumn-winter of my days, if I had the chance I'd change a hell of a lot of things. It is the erosion of pride that allows the old in us to understand that it was the not wanting to own up to making mistakes that made us say stupid things like we would never change our life if given a chance to.

Changing what happened in my life, however, is not what Misdemeanors & Felonies will be about. No, as you already know, if you've been reading my words over the past few weeks this book is all about owning up to my mistakes as I grew into old manhood. And the few times when I did some things correctly.

What I really want to do is just bog myself up in the writing of the book and shut out everything and everybody out of my life until I finish the first draft. I have done this before and it does seem to work. When your mind is centered on one thing and one thing only; when eating a meal is a distraction; when sleeping is beset by nightmares concerning the story and you have to get up in the middle of the night two or three times to jot down scenes and conversations and whatever, it has a tendency to paralyze you and ostracize you from society. It may be good for the book, but you tend to lose friends and wind up in divorce court if you go that route.

Still, if I thought I could get away with writing Misdemeanors & Felonies in that manner I'd do it in a heartbeat, such is my passion for getting this thing written. By April. That's my projected date for it. April 2, in fact, my birthday. But I couldn't make it work. There is going to be much too much heartache and shame within the covers of this tell-all book for me to allow myself to immerse myself in it completely. I'm afraid it would take over my life and I might not be able to extricate myself from it when it was finished. Either that or I would just succumb to the horrendous pain and agony about certain portions of my life and I would just . . . die. I am not afraid of death, although I do want to cheat it as many years as I can be a viable human being, but to leave this earth before the book is in certain people's hands is unthinkable. So I need to keep some semblance of reality about me. I need to post my poems on www.authorsden.com and comment on those who I like. I need to run my errands and be civil to my wife and those around me. I need to do all these things because it is the only way I will be able to deal with the book and all of its drama and tragedies and . . .

To reiterate what I said in the beginning of this post . . . FINALLY!!! I figured out a way to start the book . . . Later . . .

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Time Is Not On My Side

That's right, the clock is ticking. We are only transitory beings who inhabit the earth for a tiny fraction of time before we are gone . . . Poof! . . . Kaput. In the ego of the brain, however, we think we are much more important than just the small impact most of us have on the world, never mind the universe. Still, while we are here, alive and breathing, we seek out ways to give ourselves more earthy status, if you will. We do this by as many different means as there are people to do them. Some of us are great painters, humanists, soul-savers, despots and these are only a few examples of how we put an imprint on what we believe is immorality. Not a few of us believe that we have something to share with the world, and that something is our life story. What crud! How egotistical is that? Since the explosion of the World Wide Web, however, has brought about a sudden increase in those of us who believe they are authors, poets, or men and women of letters. We are aided and abetted in this notion by the influx of Print-On-Demand Internet companies. This phenomena has given the lowest of us the notion that what we scribble down, no matter how inferior it stands up to the truly great writers of the ages, that we mean something. Finally, the common man (and YES!) woman, that our words and our thoughts count.

I am of the opinion that, yes, they do. Do the biggest majority of us who have to go the POD route really have something to say? I maintain that we do. It may be drivel to everyone else, but it is our drivel and I think somewhere in the Constitution of the United States there is an amendment that stipulates just that . . . Well, if there isn't it needs to be. But the sad truth is that for the most of us our writing is only for ourselves and those around us that we shove our books to in order to hear them say what a wonderful talent we have,, whether or not they believe it out not.

Why am I going on and on? Because I lump myself in with all the rest of the frustrated writers who have had visions of fame, fortune and respect of critics and world-wide recognition of our writing abilities and how astute our words really are. Sadly, I have come to the realization that fame, fortune and world-wide respect concerning my art will not come. At least in my lifetime. Actually, I am beginning to come to the conclusion that I should be paying more attention to a world that is set to denote into a full-fledged war. Actually we are in the first phases of the third world war, but too many people have their heads buried in the sand to understand this.

I'm been rambling on about things because I really hate getting to the point. I am having a helluva time getting started on Misdemeanors & Felonies, just like I thought I would. I'm not even sure I know where I want to start,, although I think I may solved that problem yesterday. I do know one thing, I don't want to write it from womb to the present, like a history book. Although I have chucked the idea of writing it in the novel mode, I still want it to be a good read. It'll come. I have not doubt that it will come, it is just hard to get started on the road to there. I kept saying that this was going to be difficult to write, but in the back of my mind I actually didn't think it would be that difficult . . . But it's going to be a mojoker to deal with . . . But deal with it I shall . . . But like this posting's title says, time is not on my side . . . Didn't go to the library yesterday . . . I will today . . .

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Haha!! Yeah, right . . . The graphic is about my debut on television last night. A few days ago I received an email from someone by the name of Sheila and she wanted to know if I would be interested in appearing on LCN (The Louisiana Connection Network), a new cable network who is trying to become something bigger. I told her that my dance card was empty for the foreseeable future and yes, I sure would be interested. She wanted to know if Thursday would be okay, and again I said yes, indeed, Thursday would be just fine.

I was okay until I got to the station and met Sheila and the two co-hosts who were going to do the interview, a virtual Ménage å trois. One was a good-looking blond and the other one was an older man, and as they they began going over things with me about what was going to happen, I began to get the dry mouth and nervous feeling. They said not to sweat it, I'd be just fine, but I wasn't too sure that I would, in fact, be "just fine. Then a few minutes before the taping began, and we were all in our places on the set, my microphone they had pinned to my shirt wouldn't work. That had the effect of shooting my nerves up a full 100 points. But they fixed it and now we were ready. Well, they were ready, I just wanted to get the hell out of that chair and flee for the front door.

But I didn't. I did get up and made a mad dash for the water cooler and quenched what had become the Saraha Desert in my mouth. By the time I came back it was showtime (how you like that, one fifteen minutes on air and I'm an old pro at the terminology? Gotta love it!) and before I knew it we were "doing it." The two co-hosts had a few things to say, welcoming the viewers, etc., before they bared their fangs and turned to me with blood in their eyes. What happened next is kind of a blur. I remember answering questions my two inquisitors asked of me to the best of my ability, all the while trying not to smile. Because of my blasted teeth. One is chipped in front. As old as I am, what do I care how I look? Still, I was there trying to promote my books, therefore myself, so appearances do count.

As we talked I began to see that the two co-hosts weren't really out for my blood and were actually very nice and tried their best to help me do what I needed to do to push the books. The books . . . My Mother's Revenge, Margaret and David: A Love Story, and my most recent one, Write To Murder were discussed one at a time, with me giving the plot as best I could. Toward the end of the interview I started to relax somewhat and even as I was speaking I was thinking that my voice sounded about an octave higher than normal, God knows how it will sound when they air the program. I have to call today and find out when the program will air and what the name of the darn program is! Can you believe I forgot that? I told you I was nervous. Oh, Sheila said that I would be able to obtain a copy of the segment of the show I was on . . . That was nice . . .

Today, I go to the library for their annual book sale and will try to find a couple of memoirs to help me deal with how to go about writing Misdemeanors & Felonies. I should be able to find something . . .

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Opening The Locks Within

The lock and key represents me unlocking the secrets of my heart and life. Putting them out there for all to see. Scary . . .

It has been a whirlwind of emotion and work for the last few weeks after I made the pledge to write, finally, Misdemeanors & Felonies and now it is time to step back and contemplate what I have just set myself up for. I went into this project with an emotionally high, as I have done most of my life, "damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead." But something happened which pulled me up short, not that I am getting cold feet in regard to writing the book, not in the least, it shall be written. But a new-found friend, Mike, has said some thing which makes sense. The gist of what he said was, "Do you even know how to write a book of memoirs?"

Huh?

Damn! I hadn't thought of that before. But now that he has brought it up . . . Hell no, I don't. I haven't even read many memoirs. In my mind I assumed I was going to write it like I do everything else . . . As fiction. How stupid was that idea? Pretty stupid, I would say. Even before Mike brought up some of his ideas and question I had already decided that writing a book of my life as fiction was a no-no. Not that my life couldn't be turned into a hell of a book of fiction, that isn't what I am about here. So here I am, getting ready to write the book as it should be, by first person, with real names and incidents.

I was also advised to read a couple of autobiographies to see how to go about writing mine. I think I'll go to the library today and ask one of the librarians I know to recommend one or two to read. I've been writing for a long time now, and in the back of my mind I feel that I have a handle of how I want Misdemeanors & Felonies to be . . . But shock upon shock, I have been wrong before. Yes, I know, it is beyond belief, but I have and so I think taking a look at one one or two autobiographies would be beneficial . . . At the least, it wouldn't hurt.

On the positive side, I have managed to actually get started. The first chapter is done, first draft and all that, but still, you must begin somewhere and I think it is the right beginning.

Whew! I seem to be spending much more damn time "talking" about the book than actually writing it. It is something different and it is going to be a special book . . . Still, although I feel pretty good these days, I realized I am only one breath away from a stroke or heart attack, or even being killed in an automobile wreck. In other words, I need to get my ass in gear . . . And I will . . . Very soon . . . Later . . .

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

I Quit Worrying

I quit worrying. Really! When it came time for me to begin putting my words where my mouth has been, I ran into a lot of whining and malingering, worrying about how I was going to do this damn story. With all the worrying going on, I haven't gotten off to a very good start. What have I gotten done today? Nada. Nuttin'. I've been doing everything but writing Misdemeanors & Felonies! That stops as of now. It is too late in the day to do anything with the story, I do have a routine and in about thirty minutes I'll be going inside to watch a little television with my wife, Dottie. I just wanted to get this down this afternoon, kinda get a head start on tomorrow, because I won't post it until in the morning.

STOP! LOOK! LISTEN!

This morning I have come to a decision that is really a non-decision, really. Forget all that crap I've been writing about using my doppelganger, Martin Rayne Kirby to front for me in this "tell all" damn book . . . No. Hell no! I refuse to hide behind a figment of my imagination. The book will be written as it should be, in the first person AND with me, Jerry Pat Bolton, doing the writing AND talking.

I was taking the easy way out and it ain't going to work. Subconsciously, I was going to use Martin Rayne Kirby as a kind of an "out." So, later when someone brought up a passage or cident from the book I could have always said, "Well, you know, some of this is fiction, I'll leave it to you to decipher which is real and which is not.

No.

That ain't gonna fly. I will write this book, using my real name and real names of those people I come into contact with, and, at the end I will have written a true account of everything that has happened to me from age six until however old I will be when I finish this momentous task. No excuses. No denials. Nothing but the truth as I remember it to be.

Will this make it harder to write? Don't know. Don't care. I shan't (love that word) hide behind Martin Rayne Kirby, however I do like that name, so I imagine he'll turn up in future writings of mine.

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742


Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842


Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Chapter 1 . . .

Okay, Misdemeanors & Felonies has begun. For real. I am shaky as hell now that I am actually involved with the writing of this long awaited story. Although I have started putting down words which might even make it through all of the edits and revisions that will have to be done, I feel a nervousness about me that is hard to explain. I find myself questioning everything. Should it be third person rather than first person. I have decided this book is going to be hard enough to write without adding more problems, so I'm going with third person. I feel more comfortable writing in third person, especially novels, so third person it is. I have decided to let Martin Rayne Kirby (my doppelganger) do his thing and move the book forward, but every so often I plan on inserting something called A Note From The Author as I did in the beginning. When I do this I will use first person, because I want to be speaking directly to the reader, explaining what maybe Martin, in his third person persona, could not. The A Note From The Author will not be long, two or three pages at the most.

I have never written a book where I have people who are anxious to read it as I have now. My children, Patricia, for one, wants to read it she says and I believe that she does. Paula/Candance? I don't know about her, I feel she is upset with me at the moment. I told Marionette, her mother something about her situation that I knew she didn't want me to tell. I did it because I am very concerned about how her life has disintegrated to the extent that I fear for her life. She seems to not be able to take a sober enough breath in order to see what she is doing to herself and her husband, Mark. I am not a praying man, but desperate situations call for desperate measures, so I do send a prayer for her safety. When I wrote the "sober" word, I didn't mean she was an alcoholic, no, she is involved heavily with drugs, the prescription kind and the street kind.

That leaves Nick. He has chosen to not correspond with me. Patricia only tells me that he is "detatched." I'm not sure what she means by that. She also says he put himself through college and he is a genius with computers, et al. I did, at Patricia's request, send him a short email on his Myspace site, but he hasn't answered. By the time Misdemeanors & Felonies is written, hopefully he will want to read it, if only to settle his mind about any questions he might have about me. This book will not answer everything, I know that even before I get into it. Some might say that I am writing it in order to gain some sympathy from y children, but if I thought that possibility was even feasible, I wouldn't write another word. I am not looking for sympathy, I am looking for truth as I see it and lived it. I can only hope that will be enough.

Like I said, I am shaky. I am scared. I am terrified. I am also committed to Misdemeanors & Felonies becoming a book within the next year, maybe even as soon as March or April of next year. April would be good. April 2, my birthday . . . Later . . .

It Is Crunch Time!!!

My ordeal of note filing is DONE!!! Now the scary part begins. The actual writing of the story. I worked up the first draft yesterday afternoon, a sort of explanation of what is to come and why. I include it here, but this will probably be the only excerpt from the story I will put here and I'm only doing it here, and a few other places, because I want whoever reads it to understand what it is going to be all about. So, here it is . . .


A Note From The Author



I can tell the story now. They are all accounted for.

I can almost hear Martin gagging upon hearing me think those words.

Martin Rayne Kirby. My doppelganger.

My doppelganger who will once again become me, Jerry Pat Bolton, as he did all those years past, as I attempt to tell my story. A memoir, if you will, but where the names will be changed; but not to fear, the major players in this continuing drama will know who they are.

I use the form of fiction in an attempt to make this story entertaining. I feel that if I were to write it as a tell-it-like-the-way-it-happened it would be dull way to go about it. I also realize that many auto-biographies are not completely factual. I intend to be factual here, whether it is fiction or not. How can that be?

How can you write fiction and call it factual. Because, the main players herein, although their names have been changed, will know who they are. They will also understand that I have not sugar-coated anything I have writing about them, or myself, and it will be, in face, factual.

I use my alter ego, Martin Rayne Kirby because I am, to this day, more comfortable in his psyche than I am in mine. I have been able to move Martin through the labyrinth of my life up until now more easily than I could Jerry Pat Bolton. It is difficult to explain, but being a writer I know you expect me to explain it anyway. Let me just say, my birthright was bastardized and therefore I like Martin, with all his warts, much better than I like myself.

My confidant and all around rascally rogue through all of it was Martin, the prompting of my transgressions against those who came into contact with me. Most tragically it was those who found themselves in love with me that Martin Rayne, i.e., Jerry Pat treated with dire consequences.

They are all accounted for.

Five little words strung together, not meaning much of anything to the casual reader. But they mean everything to me. My children are accounted for. That means I know where they are. I know what towns they live in. It has not always been that way. In fact, for the biggest part of my life I did not know my children, or where they were. Whose fault is that?

Mine and mine alone.

Still, I wondered and worried about them and I did attempt to find them. Did I hire a detective agency to look for them? No. I guess then you can say I halfheartedly looked for my children. However you want to say it, I looked. The tough truth was I probably subconsciously didn't think I deserved to know. I felt they would, after all the years without me, be better off without knowing their dad, because I had let all three of them down.

I sit here in my den in front of the computer, perplexed. How do I go about starting these words of the past?

See? This is my quandary. I've found myself at a point in life where I'm at odds about how to begin something as important as this, my most important literary effort. It may be important to my children, if no one else. It goes without saying if I can't start the damned thing, I sure as hell can't finish it. Einstein I may not be, but I'm positive about that.

Why do I want to undertake this chore? Why do I want to rehash old wounds, to uncover all the pain which is sure to accompany it?

Because three innocent children suffered for my mistakes. That is all the reason needed. My life has come full circle now and there are things which need to be said about how that miracle came to be. As I do this I know that it is going to tear at the fabric of my soul and bring literary blood along with tears of sadness, but it is something which absolutely must be done.

Why?

Will Paula and Patricia and Nick care about my words? I don't know. Why should they be concerned with this small town boy from Arkansas they have never known; who left them to spin in the wind while he spent decades trying to figure out who he was? Who we are is actually a simple thing of just being us, without all the pretense and b.s., but I wasn't the first, or the last that couldn't look into that mirror without seeing a fraud; therefore I kept trying to make myself into what I thought the world demanded. So! Will they care about my words? I don't know. I hope so. I hope they will find something here to maybe soothe old hurts, and that is enough impetus to get me through the hard words.

And hard words they will be, at least some of them. I am reminded of a saying I heard once and have never forgotten: The first thing a man remembers is longing and the last thing he is conscious of before death is the same.

I seem to be drawn to my dark past like a moth to a flame. I pray that, unlike the moth, I will not be consumed by the very flame which attracts me.

MY NOVELS:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742
Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842
Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Making Progress . . . Slowly

All that stuff on the left? It is Arabic for I Will Not Surrender, and I think it should be printed on the dollar bill right under "E Pluribus Unum." Far too many in this country are cowards and do not understand that there are powerful and dedicated people out there who want to destroy us. If we yield to the naysayers and cut and run from Iraq, it very well could be the death knell for America. It will mean that of the last three major wars we have fought, Korea, Vietnam and Iraq, we have listened to the haters of America and pulled out prematurely, and we all know pulling out before it's time is a no-no . . .

Okay, 'nuff of my political thoughts . . .

I am beginning to see daylight on the note amassing, if I can stay on it I am sure I will be through with it in a day or two, because what I thought were more notes is actually some characterization profiles I'd done over the years. And this is good that I'll be through sooner, because I'm becoming weary because it is just so boring. Although I know it is a necessary thing. You know what? I'm still mulling over whether or not I should use everybody's real name in Misdemeanors & Felonies. I want this to be autobiographic so the renaming of everyone seems to be cheating. The more I think about it the more determined I am to just do the book the conventional way (and that's a switch, because I sure as hell aren't what you would call conventional.) and go for the "honest" approach. But it isn't set in stone, for I do also believe I will be able to write a better book the fictionalized autobiography . . . We'll see.

I have understood for quite a few years now, that history isn't very important when a person is young. Who cares? That was always my attitude. But when we grown into old age, you begin to look at history with an entirely different slant. Usually you have more history behind you than you haver future before you, and THAT is what makes us older folks think differently about what has gone on before. That is especially true if you are like me and have made more than the alloted mistakes and errors in my lifetime. History then is a heavy anvil across your shoulders. But if you are like me and have been lucky enough to have been "found" by my mistakes and crimes of the heart, and I am in a position to write about it, tthen history takes on another meaning altogether. It is possible to rearrange history, or at least the history others have been told. I don't mean change history, but tell the other side of it. If I can be truthful, without holding back, I believe history can be melded into one, which hopefully will be what really happened. Emotions seem to get in the way when history is told and sometimes things are left out.

I know this. My history is fraught with betrayal, hurtful words, insecurity and a lot more and I intend to address all of that with as unbiased a way as I can. Of course, I can't be completely unbiased, but I'm going to damn well try. What everyone connected with me and my history do NOT need is more of the sme "telling it like I want to, not as it was" attitude. I promise I shall not do that.

Until tomorrow . . .

My Books:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742
Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842
Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Drat!!! )(~!^%$@*&

This is my daughter, Paula. She has changed her name over the years to Candance Rain-Travers . . .

Okay. When I wrote the title for this entry I was getting something off my mind, because )(~!^%$@*& is exactly how I feel about now concerning this project of mine. Today, as I was shaving, I got this familiar feeling of fear that I will never be able to pull Misdemeanors & Felonies off. I say familiar, because I have had the same sinking feelings of failure throughout my life. Sometimes when I get these signals that I can't do whatever it is I want to do, I capitulate and . . . Quit. Not this time, however. The old gremlins are not strong enough to wreck this project. The book will be written, hopefully in a way that gives whoever reading it a reason to pause and reflect on their own blunders in their own life. Someone mentioned the fact, just today, that the mistakes of our past is what defines us and gives us character . . . (Thanks Mike) . . . I agree with that premise and can only hope it isn't too late for me to make up to those who have taken the time, who have wanted to know me, to make them smile and understand that I love them.

Humans seem to go about making the same mistakes, each generation never learning from past generations. I am seeing, up close and personal, that being played out by things I have learned today also. It would seem that we would look to the mistakes of the past and do everything within our power to not make them ourselves, but that does not seem to be the case.

Misdemeanors & Felonies will be my attempt to put things . . . Not right, that can never be. Some things cannot be excused. But if I can write this story the way I hope I can, maybe it will at least give those who are involved and others who are interested a feeling that, although what has gone down in the past can't be excused, but at least my story may cause those wonderful people I am writing it for a time to reflect and forgive. If I can manage to make that happen my life's wirk will be done and I will die (hopefully at a much later date) a fulfilled man.

Misdemeamors & Felonies! I am still working on all those notes I have taken over the years. It won't be long before I strike the first word of the novel/memior . . .

My Novels . . .

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742
Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842
Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

My Characters . . .

The photo is my handsome son, Nick . . .

I suppose by the time I get to the point where I can begin the actual writing of Misdemeanors & Felonies I'll have everything settled in my mind. I really want to use real names, but I think maybe it will be easier if I don't. And the story is going to be hard enough to write without added problems. I realize that all my rambling on about "voice" and "characters" and how hard the damn thing is going to be to write is getting monotonous and I plan to quit my whining. It's just that I don't know about this. I mean, this is the story I have been preparing myself for forty-some-odd-years to write and now that the time has come to either write the damn thing or hang my head in mortified shame. I shan't (love that word) hang my head, I will write the story, hopefully I will write it so those who find themselves between the pages will not feel harshly about how I portray them.

A little history lesson: The idea for writing of Misdemeanors & Felonies came about in the early sixties as I began my odyssey across America in search of whatever the rest of those lonely road followers look for. I hadn't given it a name, this quest I was on. I only knew that I could not stay in my hometown of Taylor, Arkansas (Three Corners in the book). I grew up with a severe case of inferiority complex concerning that town and all the inhabitants of it. It is hard to explain, but I felt ashamed of who I was and thought everybody in town looked at me with judgemental eyes. Was I wrong to think this? I don't know. I doubt it, because I have the same feelings even today, and that is probably why I have not been back to my hometown in twenty years.

As I traveled the roads, highways and byways of America in those crazy years and the thought that I would someday write a story about what I had done. What I thought I would write and what I am eventually going to write are nothing alike. In the beginning I had thought I would write the story of a boy who left home and stayed gone for many years, but one day he eventually made it back there. He was the latest of many prodigal sons to return home and I wrote two novels with that concept in mind, Homecoming and Three Corners. Neither one of them was what I had envisioned and I was beginning to believe I was never going to write the story.

Then Patricia, my daughter I hadn't seen in thirty-eight years, found me and Misdemeanors & Felonies reared it's head and said, "Hey! YOU! This is what you were supposed to write. So it is. It will be about a man who made so many mistakes and did so many bad things that I'm afraid the reader might learn to hate him. I hope not, because Patricia, Nick and Paula need to understand why they were without a father as they grew into the beautiful and handsome people they are.

The note taking will go on for at least another week. Then the outline, and finally the story . . .

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742
Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842
Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Misdemeanors & Felonies Voice . . .

Picture is of Patricia, my beautiful daughter . . .

First person is the only way to write Misdemeanors & Felonies. Although it will be written more or less as a novel and I personally like novels in the third person, this little jewel has to be first person. "First person omnipresent," if there is even such a voice recognized. I imagine there is, because I've read too many books where the narrator is in first person and he is looking back over his life, therefore knowing everything which took place. That makes it omnipresent in my book. I imagine there will be section where I will want to go into third person to make a segment more dramatic, but the reader will realize, if I do my job correctly, that the narrator, Martin Rayne Kirby, is reminiscing about how exactly a scene went down. Anyway, since Misdemeanors & Felonies will be semi-autobiographical first person will command more respenct from the reader . . . Provided there will be any readers.

How to go about writing it. That is causing me some problems. Should I go in chronological order, beginging in my childhood and bringing the book to a ending with what is happening today in my life? No. Borning. Borning. Borning. And I want this book to be anything but borning. I envision the narrator (me in Martin Rayne Kirby's voice) retired and thinking back on the past. I envision something going on in Martin's life, and America as a whole, as a backdrop for these reminiscing thoughts. Events which may, or may not, happen, but could very well take place if our leaders are not careful. So, in essense, the reader will be treated with a LOT to digest, but if I am as good a writer as I think I am I will be able to pull this off. I am excited and ready to get to it, but I realize me going through all the notes and assembling them is a necessary evil. I am running across so much stuff I haven't though of in many years, but are vibrant to the story. Besides, dealing with the notes give me time to reflect about what I am getting ready to undertake and mull things over here, which in turn helps me make up my mind about what I want to do with Misdemeanors & Felonies.

Okay. I've mulled and thought enough . . . Tomorrow we'll do it again . . . How about that?

Struggling with notes, etc. . .

The idea of writing Misdemeanors & Felonies makes me feel like I am conducting my own hanging . . .

When you have this vision, this desire in your heart to do something, and you have it for something like forty years off and on, you tend to accumulate a LOT of material concerning it. Notes. Scribbles. Some that, by now, hardly make any sense. Still, they made sense back then, so I am obliged to incorporate these scribbles and half written sentences and some things which look like hieroglyphics into my research.

Even so, as I began to think about the task before me I shudder and wonder if I can really pull this off. So much happens in a person's life, especially one who has . . . wondered about like a gypsy, that the dates and places and events all seem to fuse into one another like so much melted butter. When I sit here and think about what is before me, I mean really think about it, it scares the hell outta me.

It does not deter me, however. I have my story I must tell, whether it will ever be read by anyone or not is beside the point. I must tell it. Why? That is the question, isn't it? Why do I want to lay my soul bare for the whole world to see and maybe even scoff at? Because, as I have said before, I can tell the story now. They are all accounted for. Also, I suppose I am selfish in the telling of the story, because I need to do it to ease my own heart and conscience. I'm not looking for redemption, except maybe, if at all possible, from my children some sense of understanding. If that is not forthcoming, the telling of the story still will not have been in vain. I need to do a little understanding about certain things in my life also, and I'm hoping that as I write the words to Misdemeanors & Felonies a sense of forgiveness concerning my own "growing up" problems can, if not be understood, at least be seen in a different light.

As far as I know, I am looking at least another week of "note collecting" before I can go on to the next phase of the project, that being making an outline of what happened when, where and why. The outline shouldn't take too long, probably only a few days. I don't plan a detailed outline because it will be useless. As I begin writing the story, my thought process will recall things I am sure I can't remember as I make the outline.

After the outline is done the actual writing of Misdemeanors and Felonies can truly begin. THAT scares the bejesus out of me . . . And excites me at the same time. The sensation of fear and excitement is sorta like someone lying on a beach with the lower portion of his body in the cool water and his upper body being stroked by the hot sun . . . Surreal . . . See you tomorrow . . .

My novels:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742
Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842
Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

9-11 Anniversary . . .

How could we forget, but I believe a lot of people have already.

It Is Taking Some Time . . .

These scattered, hodgepodge sheets of paper these notes are transcribed on will be the death of me. The monster called research is horrible, but I must press on. A lot of the notes are still in the hand-written form, but most (thankfully) have been printed out as hard copy. If the notes are on paper, why then, are you going over them all again to put back on computer files" you might ask. Legitimate question. Because it will be much easier for me to find what I am looking for after I actually begin to write Misdemeanors & Felonies. In stead of having to turn page after page looking for things I can just scroll down the page and voila! there it is.

It is just dawning on me what a monumental task I have set for myself. As I have related before, I had decided at one point to make three novels out of it. The early years . . . The on-the-road years (which were many) . . . and the later years. But hell, who am I to think my life deserve three books? So, I will capitulate and just do one, and that will be plenty I believe. I'm not writing it for prestige or money or fame anyway, it is going to be for my three children to do with as they like.

I'm as ready for Misdemeanors & Felonies, however, as I ever will be . . . It is now or never . . . Short entry today, I'm not feeling that great and my attention span is affected . . . Until tomorrow . . .

My novels:

My Mother's Revenge . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1132742

Margaret and David: A Love Story . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/1072842

Write To Murder . . . http://www.lulu.com/content/956621

Sunday Morning . . .

There are so many images and thoughts about situations I have been in over the years which flood into my mind as I go about collecting and filing my notes on the computer. It is mind-blogging. Some are delightful, but some are not. But isn't that the way it should be? Man cannot be expected to go from birth to grave perfect in every way, how absolutely boring a life that would be. Still . . . Some of the things we've done in our past cause us to cringe when pulled up from our memories . . . Some of us make horrible mistakes and shudder with shame and pray no one finds out about them.

That, however, is what Misdemeanors & Felonies: A Memoir is all about. I think the title says it all. Although I have had this story on my mind for many, many years, now that the preliminary gathering of notes is under way I am amazed at what is coming back to me that I have kept even from myself all these years. Some of these long lost memories just scare the hell out of me and I wonder, truly wonder, if I am going to be able to incorporate these dark remembrances into the story.

Oh, but I must. That is what the writing of the story is all about. Truth. Reality as seen from a distance. So why should I bother myself caring about what people will think of me if they read the book. There are really only three people whose thoughts about Misdemeanors & Felonies: A Memoir I care about. Paula, Patricia and Nick. Even so, it is going to be difficult retelling some of my misdemeanors and felonies . . . It is important, however, that I do not skim over the dark things.This long awaited story; will it be a dud? Sometimes I have had such high expectations about something and for so long, that when it finally does happen it didn't live up to my expectations. Will that be the fate of Misdemeanors & Felonies: A Memoir? Only if I cheat on telling it and I shan't (love that word) do that.

Research & Collecting Notes . . .

Like the word man to the left, I have, for many years been collecting word notes for the book I always knew I was going to write. Actually I had finally decided to make it three books . . . The young Martin Rayne Kirby (my alter ego) . . . The years after he left home, which would include the turbulent sixties and his loves and failures . . . Then to the old man that he has, to every one's disbelief who knew him, wandered into old age. These notes are massive and are all over the place. I did, a few years ago, try to at least get them on the computer in the form of floppy disks. the last computer I bought didn't have a floppy disk and I decided not to have one put in, because the way to save information has changed. Anyway, before I changed computers I put everything I could find about Martin on hard copy and I am very happy that I did. Now I just have to wade through all of the stuff and recopy what I think I will need to write Misdemeanors and Felonies.

It is going to take some time to do all of this, but I had rather spend the time now, before I even start writing the story, because it will save me time in the long run. That is what I will be doing for the unforeseeable future.

As I compile these notes and data I will also be thinking and mulling over just how the story is going to be told. In the first person? Probably. How many pages to spend on each section. Parts of it like my early years won't take up much, I just want to put enough of Martin's early years to give the reader a sense of why he might have turned out as he did. Of course the wild and woolly sixties will probably take up most of the book, because a LOT happened then, to Martin and the country. I am trying to come to grips with how awesome a task I have set for myself, but I don't want to dwell on it long or I will chicken out on the whole deal and I can't do that. This is a story that must be told if no one ever reads it but my children.

With that in mind, let me get out of here and get to work . . .

Misdemeanors & Felonies . . .

Yesterday, September 6, 2007 I began writing my fictionalized autobiography. I have named it Misdemeanors & Felonies because I spent much of my life in the muck and mire of said misdemeanors and felonies. In the writing of my story I will attempt to honestly deal with my shortcomings, my loves, and the fact that I wallowed for too many years in the stench of self-love to the determent of others, some who cared deeply for me and who I shunned as I continuously chased after the elusive, nay, non-existence of Jerry Pat Bolton . . . Because the Jerry Pat Bolton I thought I was chasing was not a real and viable person . . . I did, in effect, chase something (myself) all those years not realizing that my frantic chase for a Utopian and glorious me, that I was actually running away from who I was.

While I was chasing the fading rainbow of myself I was also causing a lot of heartache to a lot of people who came into contact with me and some who found themselves in love with me. Or at least in love with the persona I was playing out at that time. Due to the physical attraction to the opposite sex, I fathered children. It is these children I let down the most. It is to these children I feel a need to at least try and give them some idea of who their father is, and more to the point who I was "back then."

Am I going to try to whitewash my sins of misdemeanors and felonies so they might feel some compassion toward me? No, I am not. I am going to attempt, with the best of my ability, to tell it like it was and hope it will at least give them some of the answers they have built up through the years. When the book is finished and read, there may be some discrepancies between what I say and accounts handed down to them by others. I shan't try to argue pro or con concerning these different accounts of the same event. Maybe I won't even be asked to, because as I said, I will NOT whitewash my misdemeanors and felonies. Will Misdemeanors & Felonies be a book of chastisement of moi? Not completely, only when it is necessary. Not many people are completely bad or rotten or mean-hearted, but most of us have those traits and some of us act them out more than others. Still . . . I know that I am basically not a bad person, although I have done bad things . . . We grow . . . We learn . . .

Writing this is going to be difficult. I will have to go about in in a way I have never used before because of the very nature of the book. First thing is to make me an outline. I hate outlines when it comes to writing, but in this case it has to happen, because of the biography style of writing it will be. I have to know when such and such happened and who, what, and where it happened . . . So it is going to be hard to do. I have no idea how long it is going to take, I only hope I can stay in good enough health to get it done. I'm a fast writer, usually, so I don't think it will take too long . . . It all depends on my mental state as I recreate situations I have long tried to push out of my thoughts . . . Yesterday was the first day in the creation of this, my feeble attempt at settling up a debt my children deserve to hear, whether they will want to hear my voice in this matter or not, it must be done . . .