James Rozoff's Blog, page 33

Looking Into The Dark Places

Like any other genre, writing books that deal in horror and the supernatural requires a fair amount of research. Sometimes the research is merely for inspiration, other times I need to know the specifics of how something is done or if it can be done at all. I think more than most, though, my research tends to take me to dark places.
Not all the research I do is on scary or shocking subjects. For Perchance to Dream, I had to learn a little bit about sailing and The Apostle Islands. I had to make a few phone calls to know if sailboats were available for rent in November. I visited The Wisconsin Dells in order to make sure my memory of the place was correct and also to see if anything inspired me. While there, I found a place that had some tremendous beer on tap at reasonable prices. All in all, that was some enjoyable research.
But then there are the other subjects I feel compelled to delve into. In The Amazing Morse, I had to know what a dead body would look like after sitting in a house for a few weeks. I had to find out what a human’s physiological reactions would be to being strangled. These are not pleasant subjects and to be honest, I wouldn’t have minded skipping such research. In older days, perhaps, I could have merely made mention of the act without any kind of detail. But the modern age seems to demand accuracy and detail. Since the information is so readily available, I feel compelled to make use of it.
The Amazing Morse storyline involved a psychic, so I wanted as much information as possible on the subject. With a background in magic and an interest in Houdini, I was already familiar with the spiritualist movement of the early 20th Century, so I decided to make my psychic someone who was well researched in the history of spiritualism On her bookshelf were books that I’d heard referenced in Houdini biographies. A few grace my own bookshelves, while some I hope never to see in person. It’s hard to look into such things sometimes, and I have definite limits as to what I will or will not research.
I don’t believe in spiritualism, psychics, or much of that sort of thing, so it isn’t all that frightening to me. What does start to disturb me is something like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ixwC6tm_CcI don’t expect anyone to sit through the whole show, I certainly haven’t. Although I have watched far more of it than is probably healthy for me. What disturbs me about it is that while it initially seems sort of batshit crazy, there is a certain amount of sense to it as well. Once you start buying into the premise, once you start to give it just a little bit of your trust, it kind of makes sense. Not only that, it brings in genuinely scary and real facts such as the existence of the MK Ultra program. There are some truths here that get past the typical citizen.
But that is not an isolated video. Take a look around YouTube sometime and see just how many similar conspiracy-related videos there are that involve reptilian aliens in disguise as politicians, the illuminati, etc. And each of these videos have hundreds of thousands of views. Again, most of them contain a good amount of fact-based reasoning, at least as much as your typical news program provides. YouTube can lead you down some interesting rabbit holes.
The worst part of researching for books that involve horror, though, are the real life horrors that exist, the evil that lurks in the heart of men. As Perchance To Dream involved a suicide cult, I felt the need to understand what people involved in such a cult must be going through. I have come across interviews of Heaven’s Gate members giving their last thoughts about how they are going to catch the comet out of this world and onto a higher plane of existence. I have watched film footage of casualties of WWI, men whose faces no longer resemble a human’s, men with thousand yard stares and shell shock so bad they could not stand up. The worst of it is that I don’t think I’ll end up using any of that research, as my book seems to have taken a different direction.
But assuredly, the most disturbing thing I have come across is this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkookcrAnSEThis is the audio recording of Jim Jones' final message to his people in Jonestown and the resulting killing. I don’t recommend listening. But it is out there. Just like evil, it is out there.
And why do I do it, you may ask? I think that if such ideas are dealt with in fiction, we are able to—if not understand—at least cope with some of the darkness that exists. Since I was a child, I always enjoyed watching scary movies, reading scary comics, telling scary stories late at night when friends would sleep over. It was never a question of rooting for the bad guys or celebrating sin. I think it deals with not wanting to be afraid, and being afraid does not mean what we feel when peering into the darkness, but being so afraid of the truth, good or bad, that we are afraid to look at all.

Free Books You Should Own

I recently wrote about the fact that, as an author, I have to compete with all of those who have come before me. Not only that, but many of the greatest books ever written are available absolutely free. With that thought in mind, I did a little searching and have assembled a short list of essential books that are available for free on Kindle. I'm sure they are available electronically in other ways than Kindle, but things being what they are, it's easiest just to share the Kindle links. I've only just scratched the surface, so look for more lists to come.


Ten Free Books  1.       The Call Of The Wild by Jack Londonhttp://www.amazon.com/Call-Wild-Jack-London-ebook/dp/B0083ZBW2Y/ref=sr_1_5?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388895658&sr=1-5&keywords=jack+london
2.       The People Of The Abyss by Jack London
http://www.amazon.com/People-Abyss-Jack-London-ebook/dp/B0082S2B40/ref=sr_1_15?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388895719&sr=1-15&keywords=jack+london
3.       Martin Eden by Jack London
http://www.amazon.com/Martin-Eden-Jack-London-ebook/dp/B004TPFKPM/ref=sr_1_17?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388895809&sr=1-17&keywords=jack+london 4.       The Iron Heel by Jack London
http://www.amazon.com/Iron-Heel-Jack-London-ebook/dp/B00847CZZO/ref=sr_1_6?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388895895&sr=1-6&keywords=jack+london

5.       The Octopus by Frank Norris
http://www.amazon.com/Octopus-story-California-Frank-Norris-ebook/dp/B0083Z80AQ/ref=sr_1_3?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388896028&sr=1-3&keywords=frank+norris 6.       The Picture Of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wildehttp://www.amazon.com/Picture-Dorian-Gray-Oscar-Wilde-ebook/dp/B0084AXZK0/ref=sr_1_5?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388896148&sr=1-5&keywords=john+steinbeck
7.       The House Of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne
http://www.amazon.com/House-Seven-Gables-Nathaniel-Hawthorne-ebook/dp/B0083ZR2KU/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388976189&sr=1-1&keywords=house+of+seven+gables 8.       The Republic by Plato
http://www.amazon.com/Republic-Plato-ebook/dp/B0082SV87G/ref=sr_1_1?s=digitaltext&ie=UTF8&qid=1388976467&sr=1-1&keywords=plato+republic
9.       Symposium by Plato
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_5?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=plato%20republic&sprefix=plato%2Cdigital-text%2C367#/ref=sr_st?keywords=plato+republic&qid=1388976463&rh=n%3A133140011%2Ck%3Aplato+republic&sort=price 
10.   Heart Of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
http://www.amazon.com/Heart-Darkness-Joseph-Conrad-ebook/dp/B0084AMNWQ/ref=sr_1_3?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1388976914&sr=1-3&keywords=heart+of+darkness

I will be giving away free Kindle e-book copies of my new...

I will be giving away free Kindle e-book copies of my newest novel, Perchance to Dream, for another 28 hours. 32 have been given away so far, go ahead and grab one for yourself: http://www.amazon.com/Perchance-Dream-Amazing-Morse-Rozoff-ebook/dp/B00F7O5C20/ref=la_B00847RE9G_1_3_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1388889432&sr=1-3

Here is a brief description:

While Dave Morse is busy during the day pursuing his dream of becoming a famous magician, at night his dreams are pursuing him. In his dreams, he catches glimpses of abandoned children, suicide cults, and raging infernos. The worst part of it is that he knows what he sees in the night he will eventually encounter in his waking hours. With no other course of action available, Dave must pursue his nightmares in search of answers.

While this story follows the events from The Amazing Morse, it is intended as a standalone novel and is a good entry into the world of The Amazing Morse.

Free Kindle Copy Of Perchance To Dream

Beginning Saturday and going through Sunday, I will be giving away e-book versions of my newest book Perchance To Dream in the hopes of getting some positive reviews and perhaps creating a bit of buzz. To get your free copy (beginning at midnight on January 4), click here: http://www.amazon.com/Perchance-Dream-Amazing-Morse-Rozoff-ebook/dp/B00F7O5C20/ref=la_B00847RE9G_1_3_title_0_main?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1388808884&sr=1-3

Feel free to share this information with anyone you feel might be interested in a tale of sophisticated horror.

Why Buy A Scrawny Chicken When They're Giving Away Steak For Free?

Rabelais never had to go toe to toe with Cervantes, nor did Hugo ever have to duke it out with Twain. And while the Greek playwrights of antiquity certainly had their competition, they never had to contend with Shakespeare. The point I’m trying to make is that it’s hard to be a writer nowadays. Oh, I’m not whining, just trying to make a point before stating my case. You see, I’m trying to justify my existence, need to prove that there’s a reason for me to write, if only to myself.
Nowadays, not only does a writer have to compete in the same arena (that arena, let’s face it, is more or less Amazon) as the greatest writers of all ages, he has to compete on an uneven playing field. Click on Amazon, and you will find many of the world’s great books available as e-books. Furthermore, they are available at the click of a button. Even worse (for a modern day author, that is, certainly not for the human race), most of these books are available for free! Look, here’s Othello. Go ahead and take it: http://www.amazon.com/Othello-William-Shakespeare-ebook/dp/B00847TGNI/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1388626655&sr=8-5&keywords=william+ShakespeareSo why would anyone want to pay to read my works when there is a lifetime supply of great literature available for free?
You may think me arrogant for even mentioning my work next to those of such giants. I should be more humble. The contemporary take would be for me to say that I am doing something different. Or else, I am giving people what they want, even if what they want is crap. See, that way it’s not my fault for writing crap. Somehow it seems to be en vogue to pay lip service to the great writers while at the same time not following their spirit. And if one dares to say that one is attempting to write serious literature, one is immediately labeled a pompous ass.
So let me be a pompous ass. But it is not my ego that makes me attempt to scale such mountains, it is the genius of those who have inspired me that cause me to do so. It is they who have shown me what humans are capable of, and it is in their eyes that I would feel shamed if I were to attempt anything less. To think that I stand shoulder to shoulder with the greats would be arrogant, but it is not arrogance to make the attempt of climbing the same mountains they have climbed. If I fall, it is only myself that I injure. I do not say I will succeed, I merely make the attempt. Even if I never ascend to anywhere near their heights, I at least have raised myself somewhat from the muck where I began.
Is it arrogance to try to attempt to make great art? I feel it is greater arrogance to give to readers anything less than the best of what I have in me. Again, I know I’m not Shakespeare, but I’m not going to try to limit myself because of it. It’s not my job to evaluate my work, I merely need to bring out the best that is in me to the best of my ability.
But the original question remains: why buy my books when the works of the greatest writers of history are not only eminently available but for the most part free? Because none of them can address life as it exists in the 21st Century. I would like to believe that I can take much of the knowledge and vision of the writers I have read and apply them to the rather unique time in history in which we are living. Even though I believe myself to be rooted in the past, it is in the present that I live my life, and the present shapes my writing as much as the authors who have influenced me.
A lot has been learned in the sciences in the last hundred years, much of which alters the way man sees himself and his relationship to the larger universe. The great writers were able to intuit much of what science has borne out. If Nathaniel Hawthorne had access to all of the knowledge of modern day psychology, he couldn’t have written Young Goodman Brown any better. But the modern world has given us many different perspectives, many new pieces to the puzzle we call life. I hope to make use of those pieces, to fit them in with the puzzle so many before me have been working on assembling. And while I would never assume to be so arrogant as to believe I could stand shoulder to shoulder with literature’s luminaries, I am perhaps egotistical enough to think I might yet stand upon their shoulders to some small degree. It is at least my obligation to try.

A New Year's Realization, Not A Resolution

Who you are and what you do today is most likely who you will be and what you will do tomorrow. That thought occurred to me the other day, and it kind of stuck in my head. This can be a positive or a negative thought, it’s up to each of us to decide. I choose to think that it is in my power—now, at this moment—to work on becoming the person I wish to be.
Too often we make our path in life more difficult than it needs to be. We set ourselves up for failure by demanding of our future selves what we are incapable of achieving today. We set unrealistic goals for ourselves because we do not wish to see ourselves as we truly are. Our true selves, we tell ourselves, the ones that we are destined to become, are out there somewhere in the future, and we wait for them as we would a knight in shining armor.
But that knight in armor never comes. He does not exist because we have not been working on developing him. We have alienated our true powers, the ones that we possess in the here and now, the power to work with the time and talent that is immediately before us.
We often do not wish to see ourselves for who we truly are, and instead create an ego ideal of ourselves, some flawless creature that will someday emerge from the cocoon that we currently are. When we do not live up to that impossible idea of ourselves, we then create another image of ourselves: that of a worthless sinner who is unworthy of any success or happiness. Both images are false, both equally damaging. They tend to work together, alternating in a cycle.
It is a cycle we must break if we are to achieve any real self-satisfaction in life. We are neither the helpless child nor the fully arrived adult. We are somewhere in the middle, in a constant state of becoming more, but never quite arriving. We will never be perfect since as we approach our goals we will see more goals beyond them. There is no promised land, no end point, but there is the constant opportunity to go further than we have before, perhaps further than we even believed possible.
It takes a degree of faith, I suppose. We need to believe in the process before we can fully commit to it. We need to taste a degree of success before we understand how it can come about. Or else we can learn about success by watching the behavior of another and learning from it. Lastly, there may be someone in our lives who believes in us even when we ourselves cannot. I don’t imagine that anyone can go through life being successful without a mix of all three of those factors. And once we have earned a degree of success ourselves, we are in a position to inspire and believe in others. If there is a promised land, we will have to work together to get there.
So I have not made any New Year’s resolutions. I am merely trying to live this day the way I would like to see myself living my future. The opportunity is there, why not take it? Oh, and let me just end this post by saying: “I believe in you.”

Question Your Assumptions

It’s hard to have a good argument anymore. People no longer seem to have the time to put thoughts together in an articulate manner. So rushed are we to get as much accomplished as possible, we tend to put our minds on auto pilot. When a button is pushed by someone else’s statement, we go into a pre-programmed mode, unleashing a whole series of assumptions based upon the simplest of statements.
I try to have fun with this tendency. Actually, my first response is to get angry over it, but it wouldn’t do any good. So I tend to post comments on Facebook like: “The fact that the media is overwhelmingly liberal is proof that the free market doesn’t work.” It’s not a statement that anyone can actually agree with, as it seems to offend everyone’s ideology, whatever it may be. It is a paradox, or koan, something to slow down the thought process, make people aware of the assumptions they make and question their validity.
People tend to develop certain ideas early on and never question them. They shape the way we see our lives, determine the paths we follow. That’s not in and of itself a bad thing, but it can limit us. Many people are able to go quite far with limited perception, but where exactly is it taking them? Many people are running a marathon without once stopping to figure out where the finish line is.
And that is exactly the point. It seems rather foolish to follow a path set for oneself as a child without taking the occasional break to reassess the situation. But biases formed early on cause people to do exactly that. They heard something when they were young that made sense to them, and it led them towards a political or religious or whatever viewpoint that defines any argument for them henceforth. It builds around them a world of ideas, with laws every bit as demanding as physical laws. When a certain word like “abortion” or “taxes” is mentioned, it releases a whole lot of associations that may or not apply to the circumstance at hand.
A person’s worldview may be quite accurate, but it never is a substitute for reality: there will always be some discrepancy between the two. When we forget that the ideas we have are merely that, when we forget to question ourselves and our assumptions, we lose the ability to react to unique situations. We become like mollusks, dragging around with us a shell that confines and limits us. We are living beings capable of always growing and progressing, but we run the risk of falling into ruts that determine in which way our living energies are employed.
It is easy enough for the individual to fall into ruts of his own making, but it is easier still for people to fall into ruts designed for them by others. There have always been those who are interested in determining the way you think, and the machinations for propaganda have never been so sophisticated as they are now. Vast sums of money are spent in order to shape the way you cast your vote, even more money spent on assuring that you become a good consumer. It is the rare home that does not have a television or several raising the children, despite the parent’s best intentions. The message, whether it comes from Coke or from Pepsi, is that you need to drink more soft drinks that decay teeth and cause diabetes.
Most of us believe we are not being fooled or manipulated in any way. We all are proud of our individuality, even though we express it in more or less the same way with only minor differentiation. Some of us root for the Broncos and some for the Steelers, but we’re all watching the games, all being implanted with the same commercial messages every few minutes.
Commercial culture is a more dominant mindset than perhaps any the world has ever known. While the church may have ruled the Middle Ages, it did not preach to us in our homes, did not follow us to work. Nor did it employ psychologists to determine which subconscious buttons to push. We are prey to a propaganda machine George Orwell could not have imagined, and yet most of us don’t even realize it’s there, or else believe that we are immune to it. But we are sheep in wolf’s clothing, imagining ourselves to be rugged individualists rather than the pack animals we really are. The great majority of us are not even aware of the subconscious workings that determine our actions, and most of those who are aware are actively employed at making money off of it.
Try this: take your most basic assumptions, and look for a different way of seeing them. Try taking a left the next time you assume you are supposed to turn right. Turn your television to a different channel than the one you are used to, or better yet, turn it off and permit yourself to be alone with your thoughts. If you’re working hard to further your life, make sure the direction you’re heading is the one you’ve chosen, not one that has been chosen for you.

Influences Part 2: Erich Fromm

 
Looking back on the individuals I consider influences, it’s hard to choose someone more influential than Erich Fromm. No writer of fiction was he, but a psychologist who wrote books of social psychology. A brief summary of his works and ideas are in order.
While being at least agnostic and probably an atheist, Fromm appreciated the wisdom which arose from the world’s great religions. He was a scientist who realized that the intellect cannot provide man with the ultimate answers to his existence, that those answers were to be found through direct experience. He explained the story of Adam and Eve and their expulsion from The Garden Of Eden as the human experience of developing an awareness of mortality. Man, having eaten from the tree of knowledge, is now more than an animal and is thus cut off from his animal connection to nature. Permanently exiled from the Garden of Eden, he must find a new relationship to nature, allowing for his intellect and all his human qualities. This is a difficult journey, one which we are often willing to turn from, to return to a simpler state, to regress to our childish nature. But there is no turning back, and attempting to do so makes for an inability to face life on its terms, leading to neuroses and the limiting of our human powers and qualities. Life is a constant state of being born, we are constantly growing and becoming what we are to the utmost of our potentiality.
According to Fromm, Love is the only answer to the human condition of separation, the separation of man from nature as well as the separation of the child from the parent. And as each individual is confronted with the human condition, so too are societies confronting the same issues. Societies are sick or healthy to the degree that they enable the individual to grow both independently and as loving members of the society. Indeed, Fromm would claim that humans who do not learn to become individuals, to become themselves, are incapable of truly loving others. The person who is not developed loves incompletely. He sees the beloved either as he would an all-giving mother or as a possession to be owned. Neither way does he perceive the other as a human being, and so will always be deluded, never feeling comfortable in a relationship.
Fromm, who studied under Freud, describes the individual’s ability to relate to the world around him according to his growth as a person, or maturity level. If a person has not progressed beyond his relationship with his mother (i.e. a helpless child who must be nourished), he feels helpless. If he has not progressed beyond his relationship with his father (i.e. the need to accomplish in order to earn his father’s approval), he is uncaring and unable to relate to his own emotions. In a parallel manner, primitive man worshipped a mother god, one who he could not influence but did not judge him. As civilizations evolved, humanity began to worship a male god, one who set forth rules that, if obeyed, would enable the person to find favor with his deity. But the mature individual is one who does not seek to make of god an image, either male or female. To him, God is the personification of all goodness, one that can be appreciated through direct experience, but never defined by something so small as the human intellect. Thus, the ultimate revelation of religion is a nameless God, as described in the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, it was a sin even to mention the name of God. Similarly, Fromm quotes Lao Tzu, who says, “The Tao that can be named is not the true Tao.”
With these thoughts giving a basic background to the human condition, Fromm then went on to interpret modern societies. He differed from most of those in his field who believed a healthy individual is one who is able to fit in well with the society in which he exists. Fromm believed that fitting into a society that was not healthy or sane was not a satisfactory response for a sane person. And writing as he did in the 1950’s, he found any society that accepted the possibility of nuclear war was not sane.
If anyone is interested in his works, I’d recommend The Art Of Loving as a good entry point, followed by The Sane Society. I found it difficult giving a synopsis of Erich Fromm’s ideas, so infused are my own by them. I do them scant justice in this brief summary.
I usually am greatly humbled in my attempts to further the ideas of people such as Erich Fromm, knowing that intellectually I will never be able to contribute the effort and talent they posessed. But if through my work I can shine some light upon those who have influenced me, perhaps I am doing some good. And in one respect I have something that Erich Fromm did not have—a new era upon which to apply the insights of people much more intelligent and insightful than myself.  His stamp upon my writing is inescapable to anyone familiar with his work. His thoughts apply even more today than they did when they were written, an idea that is disturbing but speaks to his genius.

Paying Attention In A World Of Distractions

Psst. Is there anyone there? I was just wondering if the sight of a block of text would send people running, just wondering if people actually took the time to read anymore, or if exciting visuals are required to capture the attention of people on the internet.
Not that I’m judging anyone. I too feel the lure of distraction. We are surrounded by it these days, and concentration requires the lack of it. But distraction is just that, it is never a good thing. Distraction is the world catching us by our weaknesses, playing on our baser desires for instant gratification because the things that give us deeper rewards require more of us than we are willing to give. Take that last sentence, for example: it was long enough to test one’s limits of attention. Are you still there?
The world turns at a speed undreamed of by past ages, and there is always something to take our mind off anything that is too involved. Indeed, if there is one thing the communication age has achieved, it is the providing of a never ending source of distractions. I worry about this, as I wonder if people are still capable of deeply thought opinions. Not at work, of course, we do what we have to do when it comes to bringing home a paycheck. But if we are never without distractions, are we still capable of and—perhaps more importantly—willing to think long and hard about anything?
I ask this question as a concerned citizen of the world, but I also have personal reasons for asking this. As a writer, I wonder if anyone is still interested in reading nowadays. Perhaps more importantly, is anyone still interested in reading fiction that may cause you to have to think a little bit? Is anybody interested in the deeper problems of human existence, those unanswerable but still fascinating questions that were asked by the likes of Lao Tze and Socrates millennia ago? Again, I am not desiring to judge, I merely would like to know if there is a point to the whole blogging and writing thing. I find myself susceptible to the desire for instant gratification, feel myself drawn to pictures of puppies, but there is still something uniquely gratifying about delving deeply into some subject of interest.
Perhaps it is a matter of too much information. We are given so much that we feel the need to take only the most satisfying of what comes our way, never willing to spend too much time to get to the heart of the matter. Just think, people used to have to get up to turn the channel on a television.
As for me, I must confess that with my introduction to the internet my reading has curtailed somewhat. Of course, there are never clear answers to questions such as these. There are many reasons why this is so: I have a great deal more obligations on my time right now, sandwiched as I am between people both older and younger than me who need my assistance. Also, I seem to be devoting all of my free time to writing nowadays. But I have found writing to give me the same satisfaction that reading always has. I am able to think deeply about issues that are important and cannot easily be understood. I cannot fast forward to the end to see how things turn out, but am forced to experience the journey as it comes. My appreciation seems to be heightened by a more leisurely pace, and I am able to plunge the depths of a few things rather than skim the surface of everything. But what about you? Are you still here? I’d really like to know.

Bits Of Me In The Amazing Morse

I think the art of writing fiction is to pull from genuine emotions and experiences and then write a story around those emotions and experiences. As far as The Amazing Morse stories go, there is a good deal of me in them, but it is so mixed in with pure imagination that the reader could easily confuse the two. So just since I’ve had people confuse one with the other, I thought I’d share a few examples of real life that found their way into my first novel, The Amazing Morse.
I found myself sitting in my little carpeted-walled cubicle at work one day, and it dawned on me that this was it, this was my life. This wasn’t a dress rehearsal, it wasn’t something I was doing for the moment, this was my life! All those childhood dreams of being an astronaut, a baseball player, a writer, none of that was what my life was all about. The panic set in and it set in hard. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had a lot worse jobs, but I always knew they were just something that got me by until my real life began. But I was trapped now with all the responsibilities that being an adult with a family brings. Life is supposed to magical, and here I was with all of the magic drained away, leaving only the sensible and practical.
This was a strong emotion and I wanted to share it. I’m rather proud of the story I built up to go around it, a magician who was not doing what he loved. He had a phobia of contained spaces, and so could not be an escape artist like Houdini, and therefore did not believe in himself enough to pursue his dreams. Dave Morse could have been nothing else but a magician.
In another part of the book, I have Dave recollecting something he’d heard a concert pianist say about performing and relating it to his performing magic on stage. There is a freedom performing an art that one is well practiced in, even when repeating the same trick or piece thousands of times. One feels connected to a flow, similar to what Michael Jordan described as being in “the zone”. The description of playing a piano piece where all the notes are written and yet bringing one’s own emotion and interpretation to it is from my own experience. While certainly no concert pianist, I have had the opportunity to develop a certain amount of technique on the piano. I had one glorious summer of being laid-off and I played my piano at least two hours every day. I got good enough with a fair amount of pieces that I found myself watching my fingers play while not being conscious of moving them. I can feel the same feeling sometimes while writing, when my thoughts fly and my pen or my typing hurry in pursuit. It is a wonderful feeling to have, like finding a beautiful place in nature where one can sit and contemplate and simply be.
There is also an experience that I had which I included in The Amazing Morse. While driving down the road with a friend one day, he noticed a little sign for a psychic, or a fortune teller, or something on that order. My friend, Kevin, and I always seemed to find the unusual when we were together. Intrigued, we talked each other into going in. Stepping inside, I had the most unsettling feeling go right through my body as though a wave went through me and took some part of me along with it. To this day, I can’t explain what that was about, but it has stayed with me. That was the very first kernel of story, around which everything else grew. A visit to an odd looking psychic (she really was rather odd-looking) that seemed to cause a change in someone. The story grew slowly as it gathered both from my life experiences and my imagination. And that is what I have found writing fiction to be, both reality and fantasy. But then again, so is life.