The Man On The Corner

Bit of oddness from last night. Drifting off to sleep but suddenly this thought came into my head in the form of a picture and I couldn't make the picture go away so I started writing about it. Wrote a little bit, tried to go back to sleep but thought some more about it and had to write some more. 

 No idea where this is going. Maybe it's going nowhere. It's interesting just as it is but I might want to expand it.

The problem is I have no idea where to expand it it's just an idle fought from drifting off to sleep.

Anyway you look at it, I like it. 

 

The Man on the Corner

There was a man sitting on the corner of the empty street. The kind of man you'd glance at and ignore, except there was no one else in sight and that made him odd. Short hair, bit messy, stylishly dirty brown. Mostly shaven and just a little bit not. Either well tan or Hispanic. Wearing dark blue sweats. The kind of sweats you looked at and thought not I wonder what brand those are but instead I wonder if he's just so rich he doesn't give a damn or so poor he can't afford anything better?

The odd man on the corner just sat there, leaning against a lamp post. One leg stretched out one up at an angle. His hands just laying across his thighs, dangling. He was staring across the street. But there wasn't anything there to see. Just an old storefront. Empty now. Waiting for October when it could transform into a Halloween store. But right now it was nothing; just an empty store.

Trevor wouldn't normally have given the man more than a momentary glance without a single thought but he would either have to walk between the man and the store, putting himself in line with that empty stare or he would have to walk the narrow space on the sidewalk right behind that post. Close enough to be  reached if the man turned out to be aggressive. It shouldn't bother me thought Trevor. I'm bigger, heavier, damn all in better shape. So why does he concern me. What is it about him that it makes me uneasy?

Deciding the whole thing was stupid, Trevor  walked on but just as he reached behind the man without breaking his stare the oddball began to speak. He had a deep voice. A rich voice. Sounded like a professional voice actor narrating a deeply meaningful scene. "Its not too late," he declared. "You aren't committed yet."

The voice was rich and pleasant but somehow Trevor broke out in goosebumps and hustled off down the street. He glanced back.  The man was still sitting there, as if he never moved, never spoken.  Still rather ragged, still staring.

But that isn't right, he thought. The man, he thought, is me.

And so it was. he was the man. Sitting there staring. The empty window stared back. It was full of Halloween horror already. Only it was real. And then Trevor realized he really had to pee. But  although the dream was creepy and weird he didn't want to wake up. Waking up meant throwing away the warm covers, getting out into the cold bedroom. He had takien the advice he read on the Internet,  begun to sleep at 65°. It did make for a better sleep, but damn it was awfully hard when he had to get out of bed before morning when the smart thermostat had warmed the room up .

He struggled back-and-forth for a while. Eventually he had to admit that he couldn't get the dream to start up again. As he headed for the bathroom he couldn't help thinking, "What would've happened if I'd stay asleep? Where was that weird dream going?"

The Witch Queen and Her Monster

I've been telling myself this occasionally to put myself to sleep. The story developed pretty well and so, since tomorrow I'm going to visit Dallas and Nixon, I thought that today I'd write it out for them and for Fae since those three are the only little ones I have right now. 12/18/25 5:20

The Witch Queen and Her Monster

The fey. The Fairies. The sidhe.  The fair folk.

They have many names and even more stories, but though they once were as common as the grass beneath your feet, today they're as rare  as a flying car.

It isn't that they ceased to exist.  It's just that they aren't exactly here anymore. 

They've retreated from this world of noise and iron and steel to a softer, quieter world of their own making.

Since they built it as their new home, it suits them. The only thing it lacks is people. You might think the faries have no need for people, but I assure you that they do.

To understand that you must know a thing or two about the fair folk.

First and foremost, they are not truly little people. Some of them are quite large and even the tiny ones aren't people at all. They may look human but they do not think or feel as you and I do.

They exist for pleasure. They only care about their fun. 

The Scots will tell you there are two courts or groups of the fey, the Unseelie Court and the Seelie Court.  The Unseelie Court are not nice at all.  They  find their joy in hurting humans.  They don't think of themselves as being cruel or mean. They just think of humans as toys to be played with and discarded when they aren't any longer fun.  They are very like a cat which plays with the mice it catches --not  to be cruel, but just to have some fun.

The cat never understands that the mouse is alive and has feelings. As far as the cat knows, it's just a fuzzy squeaking toy.

Do not start to think  that the Seelie Court is entirely friendly.  They like people, or did in the days when they lived among us.  They thought of the people as belonging to them, not as toys, but rather as pets.  As long as people were nice to them; they were nice to their people.

But even with them you needed to be very careful. If you offended them, whether deliberately or accidentally, they were angry.  Having even a Seelie Court Fey angry at you was like having a curse of the worst bad luck you can imagine.

Bad things would happen to you all day long, every day… Or at least they would until the fairy got bored and then forgot about you altogether.

So now that you have a quick bit of knowledge about the ways of these strange beings, I will tell you the story of how a small human child came to be called the Witch Queen.

The world is a very old place. It has a lot of history that we know and a lot of history we haven't yet learned and a lot of history that has been lost in the distant depths of time.  This story tells of a time very long ago and long since forgotten. It took place in a great island kingdom that has long since sunk deep beneath the waves and now is not even known to memory. How I got to hear the story, I cannot tell you. If I did, the Seelie Court would not be pleased with me.  And only once in all my life did I offend them, and I learned the lesson and will never do so again.

It all happened back in those days when the world of the magic and the world of the ordinary often bumped into each other.  Then there was a kingdom which produced many goods, but lacked some others. A neighboring kingdom was a good trader with them and each could provide what the other lacked, but the two countries were separated by a mountain range and all traffic had to go through a pass which was known as the Ashthorn Pass since it went along the edge of the Ashthorn Valley.  It was high in the mountains and no one lived there but merchant caravans went through in both directions all the time. As the journey was a long one travellers often camped along the roadside. And, as humans always do, they told each other stories as they sat by their fires. One story which was often repeated because it was so exciting was about a great monster, a beast that was half real and half Fey.

In those days, when the line between real and magic was thin, simply telling a really good story was often enough would make it come true. Sure enough, one night when a merchant was telling the old tale about the horrible monster of Ashthorn Valley, everyone in front of him suddenly screamed and ran away into the darkness. He very slowly turned around, hoping they were pretending just to make him scared, only to find himself looking at a creature that was bigger than the largest bear he'd ever seen. Its claws were like the sharpest daggers. Its teeth looked like a thousand giant nails... he didn't know much else about the monster because he fainted from so much fear.

The next day his friends came carefully creeping back into camp they found him still out cold, and he was cold. The fire had sputtered out hours before.

The monster wasn't from the Unseelie Court, so once it chased them away  it disappeared. Still, from that day forward, it loudly roared that, This valley is mine!"whenever it saw a caravan attempting the passage.  This quickly convinced everyone that it wasn't from the Seelie Court either.

So the caravans stopped traveling, and the trade dried up on both sides.  Both nations suffered.

In his palace, the king gathered all of his counselors and they prepared a war plan. It wasn't wise to offend the fair folk, especially huge monstrous members of the fair folk, but both nations needed their caravans to get through.

The night before the army was to march and set fire to all the woods to drive the creature out, the king and his generals sat about their table discussing what would happen at sunrise. The army would set out. The plans were complete. They would confront this beast and they intended to win.

Suddenly a chill rolled over all the table and everyone began to shiver. They looked out the windows and saw only a thick black fog. There was a crashing sound in the throne room.  Their swords were swiftly drawn and all rushed out to confront whatever was there.

In the room they saw only a shattered window and a bunch of strange black fog rolling in. Right in front of the window it began to curl and swirl and wrap around itself until it became the monster.

"Mine! All the Ashthorn  Valley is mine!" The beast roared so loudly that all the windows in the great room shattered.

These were not  merchants. These were a king and his warriors and they had their swords drawn as they closed upon the threat.  The enemy was unlike any  that they had ever faced. 

Not only was he strong, he was a magic creature so the king and all his men found themselves moving very very slowly as if they were trying to run while deep underwater. The monster thought to put an end into them until he heard a noise that made him turn and look.

The king had only a daughter who, knowing that one day she would be queen, disobeyed her orders and often came sneaking out when they were councils of war to be spied upon. 

She looked at the raging fairy and was frightened to the bone. But when it looked at her, instead of running away, she ran over to a soldier and pulled what for a grown man was a long dagger out of his belt. For a man, a long dagger. For such a little girl it might as well have been a sword.

It shook in her hands because it was heavy and because she was frightened.  But she was more angry than frightened and so she shouted, "You leave my Daddy alone!"

Then she charged at the creature and began stabbing him as hard as she could. There are things I didn't mention about the fair folk because I thought you already knew them, but I'll say now  just in case you don't. They are very allergic to iron. Not much else can cause them any harm. As this was so long ago, people weren't making swords and knives out of iron. They were making them out of a thing called bronze. Bronze can't hurt a fae.

The monster was surprised, but even more it was interested.  The little girl in her nightgown was so interesting that it just stood there and watched her stabbing and chopping away at its knees. Her father the king and his generals were still trying to move and could barely do so, all  they could do was to watch in horror as she put herself in danger.

In fact, this was about the best thing she could possibly have done because it made the creature amused by her. He was not an unseelie monster who simply enjoyed hurting people, he just wasn't committed to the Seelie Court either.  He thought that this tiny little thing so desperately trying to hurt him might just be fun.

He reached down and pinched the sword between his thumb and pointer finger and lifted it high above the floor to just above his head. 

This, of course, also pulled her up since she wasn't about to let the only thing that made her feel at least a little bit safe out of her grip.  She couldn't swing the dagger any longer, so she began fiercely kicking at his chest. This was the most fun he'd ever had in his short existence.  It was so much more fun than merely scaring merchants.

He thought about what he knew of human ways, which wasn't really much but he had asked around among his fellow fair folk for "details you should know before taking on a human royal court".

He thought of a very fun game to play.  This was even more fun because he would set all the rules, but he would be doing so by pretending to follow the rules that humans had laid down, forcing them to honor it.

He smiled happily, which made his teeth show and made everyone in the room  think he was about to eat her. Instead, he gently lowered her down and knelt before her.  "They call you a princess, do they not?" he asked a very surprisingly gentle tone.

She nodded since she was too afraid to speak without shouting.

He grinned even more widely.  "Well then, Princess, make me your Lord Monster and grant me the fiefdom of Ashthorn Valley for me to command forever after and I shall swear my fealty to you as my liege."

Everyone in the room stopped struggling as they stared in wonder at such a promise.

The little Princess, having observed such rites before knew what to do.  She managed to lift the dagger up and drop it down upon the creature's shoulder, then lift it up and drop it on the other. Her voice trembled and she said the words as best she could remember, "I dub thee my Lord Monster.  I grant unto thee the fiefdom of Ashthorn Valley."

The monster had not stopped grinning, but bowed his head and said, "I swear unto you my fealty and vow that I shall protect your lands as long as you protect mine."

"But," she added in a voice that could barely be heard as she was frightened as she had never been before, "You must grant passage for caravans through the pass."  She knew that this was the cause of all the troubles because she was a good little spy who seen far more than her father ever intended her to know at her young age of his supposedly secret meetings with his generals.

"Yet they would intrude upon my fiefdom, surely you would permit me to tax them." He was obviously enjoying the game.

"What tax would a fairy want?" she asked in a voice quite strong because she was so surprised she forgot to be afraid for a moment.

"Every month when the moon is new and the nights are dark, I wish the freedom to hunt the King's deer in his private estate. And I shall take no more than two."  After all, he was a monster, and hunting came quite naturally to him.

She nodded since it seemed fair to her.

The monster then put out his hand and above it bright light grew. The light came swirling and spinning in and it spun itself into a globe the size of her head. The globe turned pale silver blue and became a copy of the moon. Then the beast blew on it gently and light spun out making it smaller and smaller until it was the size of a cherry. Another breath and threads of light streamed out of it and formed into a beautiful chain of silver. Very carefully the beast placed it over her neck and said to her, "This shall be the sign of our pact.  It will shine as the moon does shine and when it turns dark I shall have my hunt. Further, should you have need of me, My Liege, call to it and I shall hear and answer."

Then he spun about turning back into a black mist which floated out through the shattered window and washed away out into the night.

Many years later, when she sat upon the throne, the two still held to their pact.  Being the only kingdom in all the land that had a monster Fey upon their side, her kingdom knew peace.  Those who supported her called her the Fairy Queen, since her oldest and most loyal subject was now a member of the Seelie Court.  

Those who did not like her called her the Witch Queen because she ruled a monster.

All this was so long ago that no one remembers any more detail. What were the names of these people? What was the name of their kingdom? For that matter, what was the name of the monster? No one knows...except the sidhe, and they're not telling.

Still, it is rumored that the enchanted necklace of the moon still holds its power and that if only it could be found, the monster can yet be called to become a friend to whomsoever finds it.

Duty Calls

I told myself that I would set a time for myself so that I would begin writing again. I love writing. Outside of family it is my favorite activity. But it is also the hardest work I've ever done. Although often the result of the effort is very negative on my health, yet I don't think I can live without writing. Back to the point, I told myself I'd write in October so I wouldn't feel guilty until then. Well, it's October. And my friend Bobby seemed disappointed when I told him he wasn't doing any serious writing. For whatever reason it helps me a great deal to write when I feel that I'm writing to please someone.

Actually, now that I think about it that makes sense. If I write it in my head, which is my normal procedure, that satisfies me. The point of writing it down on paper, an extremely difficult enterprise, is really only useful if someone's going to read it. So, here we are. I do not intend to post the entire story but I will post a little bit I have gotten down today. I remind everyone that this opening excerpt is protected by the copyright laws of the United States and is my intellectual property.


Whiskey on a Sunday
(...drinking buttermilk through the week, whiskey on a Sunday...)

Late night. Quiet night. The children were nestled all snug in their beds. Their parents were deep in REM rest.
When from the cell phone there rose such a clatter, the two dads woke up to see what was the matter.

"Damn friggin…" Still half asleep but recognizing the shrill steam whistle he used for his sister's number, Mark Carter was ready to kill.

His husband Sam, also still half asleep knew the drill. He grabbed the phone, tapped answer to shut it up before it rang a fourth time and then ignored it to regain some peace.

"OK, steady, remember what we said? I'll take care of it, you just get back to sleep." Almost instantly realizing he had just thrown gasoline on the fire, he immediately injected, "Cleansing breath! Cleansing breath! Come on, deep! Deep."

He was answered by a growl, which he carefully ignored. "No. Don't say anything. I'll take care of her. Please. You' ll wake up the boys." Sam struggled to keep his gaze calm and steady and watchd the anger begin to fade in Marcus' reddened eyes.

And that was enough for now. He gently backed out of bed still trying to get a grip on being awake in the real world and headed out the door while making soothing nonsense sounds. He was rewarded with a muted angry grumble which suggested Marcus was falling back to sleep; probably an angry sleep with angry dreams, but at least sleep.

After a quick check to see that the boys were still asleep, they were, he moved into the kitchen and finally paid attention to the cell phone. "Jenny, why do you hate me? Why do you hate your brother?"

The only answer he got was, "Sorry."

"That's nice. You're sorry. I'm awake. I think your brother is going back to sleep. No, I'm sure he is. Because he's not here yelling at the phone while I try to talk to you."

Then he was awake enough to ask a very pertinent question, "Why did you call on his phone? Why didn't you call on mine?"

"I did call on yours. You'd turned it off."   Astonishingly, she had chutzpa to sound like the aggrieved party.

"That's because we are trying to get some sleep. That's because it's Friday night. That's because the boys will be up at 7:30 tomorrow morning like they always are. That's because we'd like to get a little sleep before that happens." He glanced over the microwave, "Oh Lord! Are you aware, Jennifer, but it is 2:34 in the morning?"

Perhaps realizing the impact of her actions, she responded "Yes?"

"OK. You know I'm going to listen to you. I always listen to you. But first I would like to vent a little steam. That all right with you? Because if it isn't, then just hang up and I'll talk to you tomorrow. During the day. When people are awake."  He waited, then he took the silence as consent.  "You know what your brother said after the last time you called us in the middle of the night?  Of course you don't. But now I'm going to tell you.

First, he said that the next time you do this I should ask you to Google the lyrics to a song. The song is called Laura. By Billy Joel. Listen to it.

Then he told me that the next time you called either I would tell this to you or he would. So I am.  He said you should stop living in those sitcoms you  watch all the time. He said in the real world there are no cute adorable completely safe gay friends that a woman can always come to anytime of the day or night and talk to and is always so understanding that he always makes things right because he's so sweet and lovable and safe."  His word spliced together into one smooth and unpunctuated sentence.

He waited for an answer. After a bit, it came. "There's one. There's you.  And that Laura crack is unjustified. I'm not just anybody, I'm your sister in law.  I'm the little sister you always wanted but never had."

He let out a long plaintive sigh. "Maybe I was wrong to want a little sister."

"You're being really mean. Maybe I should just hang up. I guess I'm really sorry. I just needed somebody to talk to."  She sounded sad.

He knew her well enough to realize she really meant it. So now he found himself feeling guilty for being upset that she had destroyed the peace and serenity of an otherwise perfectly pleasant Friday.

"Cleansing breath. Deep cleansing breath."  He told himself. Then he took it in. Then he breathed it out, very slowly. "Jennifer, you know I love you. But tomorrow the boys will be up. And you'd think they had an alarm clock set the way they get up almost exactly at 7:30. It's been a long week and we're both very tired. So I've got a deal for you."

He waited, but when there was no answer he proceeded, "I will listen to you. For as long as you want. Then, tomorrow morning at 7 o'clock you will let yourself into the apartment, very, very quietly. Then you will sit in front of our closed bedroom door. When the boys wake up they will be delighted to see their Auntie Jenny waiting to get them dressed, get them fed, and take them out for the day."

"How long?" she asked is if she had room for bargaining.

"2 o'clock. Until 2 o'clock." He was very definite.

"Noon." She tried to be firm, but she knew she was not on stable ground.

"2 o'clock or good night. You choose." His tone left no room for negotiation.

"OK. You got me. I wouldn't have called if this wasn't important, so OK." She didn't let any of her exultation show. This way she got the attention she needed, and got to spend a day with her beloved nephews. Good deal. No, great deal.  Trump, I got you beat!

Inauguration Day

Today

Warm January
Gentle day
The sun rains down
Through window glass
Slowly flowing its way
Across the floor
Gliding, sliding
Like a skater on the ice


Inauguration Day

Mr. Obama
Back again


Writing day

The poem
The words
The flow
Like the sun come down
To gently flood her way
Across the earth

She's just there
She just flows
The day is warm
And it is good

On writing and family. We often hear about how terrible many kinds of artists have been as parents. I, even as a kid learning these things in school, felt that these could not be great men. What ever their accomplishments, they failed at the most basic of human tasks, taking care of your children.

As a writer, I write very little. For years it was due to putting my family first. Now it is a combination of that and my health. Family now does not impede my writing, except for my Prodigal Daughter, who wounds my heart and soul each and every day. I lose sleep and have had my health deteriorate stressing over my Lost Lambs. This makes me a better parent than so many artists, but it makes me a terrible artist. I produce far too little. I am not true to my art.

I do not excuse the artists, great and small, who neglected their families, but I understand them far better now. If they were not great men, they were great artists. I fear I am neither.

Sorry, but after the joy of Christmas Eve and the delight of a Christmas which turned out to be amazingly good, I am feeling down since I must mail gifts to my four little ones who live only an hour away. How my Prodigal Daughter can be so full of hate on Christmas, towards people who love her so much, eludes me, but so it is.

On that, let me note that Onna and James, both of whom she wants me to disown as a condition of seeing her and my Lost Lambs again, have never regarded her as a step sister. They grew up calling her, and still call her their sister. For a few months when she first tried to force them out of my life, they started calling her, for the first time ever, their step sister. It didn’t last. They love her too much, even when she is acting so abominably. They are back to referring to her as their sister. I seem to have managed to teach some of my children the value of love. I did something right.

Sorry to be so down, but so it is today. Remember the surprise and delight I had in having a joyful Christmas Eve and a wonderful family Christmas. Kids all over the place, noise, mess, presents to wrestle out of those horrible shrink wrap packages...well, you know a family Christmas. I loved it.

I wasn’t even upset by poor Alex's throwing up on the stairs and in front of the kitchen. I was worried about him, of course, but it wasn’t bad. He admitted he had sneaked a peanut butter cookie at another relative's house. He knows to avoid anything with peanuts, but when everyone else is enjoying a treat, it is so hard for a kid to accept that limit. He was fine, just an upset stomach. As soon as he threw up, he felt great. Ah, Christmas.

I remember as a custodian that the worst day of the year for those dreaded vomit calls from a desperate teacher was always the last day before Christmas vacation -- room parties and lots and lots of treats...