Author Archives: Brian B Baker

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About Brian B Baker

I write horror stories, review books, and talk about depression, and how I get through all of it.

Writing Through the Falling Ash

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Searching through the files of our lives, they must look like the deleted technology of a long-lost civilization, long burnt down, crashed and falling to ash.

We watch the reel, enjoying the moments of joy and cringe at the moments of self-realization.

Each of these moments have created who we are, the wrinkles, age and that odd grey color in our hair which we swear wasn’t there yesterday.

These moments are unspoiled by time, life and the things we’ve done since.

Through the years of tears, and every one has a year of tears, no one’s life is perfect.

Staying in a reel, we see watch the life we had, and think about the things yet to come. The loves, loss and the disappointment.

There’s nothing more disconcerting than not being able to see these things. Pulling these files from their roster, some collecting dust, others fresh from the other day, none of them are bad, they just are what they are.

Leading our lives through years, days and hours, each new thing we discover is different, but it may feel the same.

We have the same feelings, but different. The same pain without consequence or the laughter without the joke.

There are some of these which lead to our goals and our strength.

Running through the life which never changes, or appears not to things don’t fall away.

These things add caution and fire to what we want. Going  through, we see the difference of who we’ve become, what’s fallen away, what our foundation has become and where the ash has fallen.

First, Write the Story

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Staring into the future; the road seems long.
The less we know about what’s coming the better we may feel.
Last week I hoped for the best,  but those hopes were dashed Monday.
My writing and this blog have become my extension. The part of me I let out into the world.
This happens because I like letting people,  especially artists into my world. There are many reasons I enjoy this. Mainly because I want to help new writers who feel their writing being crushed under the weight of their day job,  family and responsibilities outside of writing.
I often think of where I was a few years ago,  and how I dealt with the frustrations of finding the time to write.
I dealt with them by arguing with my wife,  getting angry with my kids and hating who I was.
These things took over who I was,  and they made me unbearable to live with, my wife will attest to that fact.
With each short story or novel I’ve gained more confidence,  and I feel my writing has grown by leaps in the last year.
I attribute that to writing as much as possible.
It’s best to finish stories,  but sometimes you learn more from the unfinished stories and how not to craft a story than from finishing the story.
When I started writing I’d never use an outline,  today I find them indispensable.
I sketch the outline,  get the points of that part of the story down and start writing.
I thought it would restrict me,  I was wrong.
Get through the story then edit, but first write the story.

The Day

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There are days you think about constantly, days you hope for and days you wish didn’t happen.

Today was the latter.

Abbey

We found you at Dewey, before it was the ASPCA, and a kill shelter. You were laying, your head between your feet, staring at nothing and looked very sad.

I told mom that you were the one I wanted. She said, are you sure, and with your sad face, I knew you were the one.

We picked you up the next day, you’d been spade and were given a piece of paper to get you chipped. We arrived home, showed you your bed and your crate and you went to your bed as if you’d been living with us the entire time.

We took you on vacations when we could, hikes to Mt. Charleston and Red Rock.

You loved the time we hiked Ice Box canyon as you splashed in the water, showing your hound dog roots and letting the world know with your bark and beller.

It was a few years before we had your little brother, though you became protective of him regardless of the fact he was human and you were not.

You protected him like a big sister, watched over him and we knew immediately that we could trust you with him.

As your brother grew older, he played with your ears and tail and you didn’t mind, you seemed to enjoy it.

After your brother, your sister came a few years later, and you were just as protective of her.

We took you on less hikes because your age and joints didn’t agree with you. We weren’t sure when the day would come, and when it did, I cried liked a baby.

You’ve meant so much more than you would believe.

You laid next to me when I was knocked down with migraines. You knew I wasn’t doing well, and were my guardian from the world outside the bedroom door, always lifting your head to see who’d come in the room.

We decided on your time because we knew that a few months wouldn’t be worth watching you suffer through lymphoma at 16.

When we meet you in the next life I will thank you for being there for me, my family and being the best dog I could hope for in any lifetime.

I’ll see you in my next life Abbey.

Writing the each and every

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Books Stacked to the ceiling in New Orleans book shop.

Books Stacked to the ceiling in New Orleans book shop.

The window is cracked,  there’s a soft breeze across the desert and the blue skies stand out against a cloudless sky.

I watch my kids run through the room,  their clothes catching the breeze, my daughter’s cape flapping,  my son’s mask pressed tightly to his face.

My superheroes tear up the house as they chase each other.

Watching I’m reminded of the things I focus on too much, and the things I must focus on more.

We happen to think about our writing, at least as early writers, as horrible.

The reason we think this way is mostly because it is, at least for most of us, I mean we’re not all genius level writers, we have to learn to write well.

The thing about watching my kids play on a daily basis, they do their playing oblivious to the world around them.

This is what new writers usually don’t do.

They don’t write and ignore the world, they may get their writing time in, but they don’t lock themselves away like the more experienced writers.

The wind begins to die down, my kids are preparing for lunch, or dinner, I’m not sure as the day has moved by faster than normal, and in between the hours of my writing schedule; I see their asking for daddy to play.

I skirt away from the desk to play with them, as they beg me to get away from my writing.

I stop them, “I have a few hundred words to go. After I’m done, I promise.” I tell them.

After the hundred words, I set aside the laptop, rush downstairs as they sit on the couch, eager for a trip to the park.

Another sunset comes, we head back to the house, my wife is getting started on dinner, I pitch in, cutting the chicken, as I learned in a meat store in my late teens, and sit down as the I put music on the radio.

It’s one of my favorite days, but it’s still a writing day.

They’re finally asleep, my wife is doing the dishes, I have my laptop out again to get my notes from the day added to my laptop.

I finish and sit with my wife for an hour watching Supernatural.

 

Writer’s and their Window Dressing.

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They gather in the field, each one of them finding something they hadn’t thought would be there.

Standing in the sun, the crisp air moving through the pasture, the scent of lilacs flows through.

The lilacs, like the people are window dressing for the start of a story, they are something to use, something to give the reader a taste of the future of the story.

Will the scent of lilacs be used later in the story? Will it ever come up again, who knows.

The story we tell, and the window dressing we use to invite readers into our story is what makes us writers. There are our tools.

The window dressing is only a peak, just as the field, whomever is in the field, the crisp air and the scent of lilacs is dressing.

Each of us use different things for window dressing, but it’s all window dressing.

Standing in the middle of the street, he waves his arm while another taxi flies past him.

The ledge he stands on suctions him to curb, the drop is hundreds of feet, but he still tries to get a taxi, even as another ignores him and flies by in a gust of air.

Depending on how you read the above, or whether you understand that the story is possibly science fiction, you see the story differently.

Each story is different because each writer is different.

Something you write may not be published when another writer’s work is, that’s just how it is, and genre doesn’t matter.

Our writing is ours; it belongs to no one else. We write because we’re writers.

What are you using for window dressing to pull readers in?