Room 101

I thought it would be fun, and possibly cathartic, to write a personal version of 1984's Room 101. I've had a severe revulsion and fear of invertebrates for nearly all my life, which has led to a fair few embarrassing incidents and turned otherwise pleasant and productive summers of landscaping at the martial arts school into waking nightmares. The first time I was able to control myself through such an encounter was at my grandfather's burial, where I stood staring at a struggling earthworm, doing my best to keep still and focus on my breath. I have a handle on it now, but am still occasionally overcome with disgust when I see the things. I have since given this as a prompt to several of my classes, and I've seen some very inventive tortures. What would be in your Room 101? Let me know in the comments.

Aaron has been in the care of the Ministry of Love for some four months. The why of it has long since lost significance. Reasons and exceptions only matter in the subjunctive; when time has passed, truth is much more linear. Aaron’s new life began when, armed with tear gas and truncheons, they dragged him, hands and ankles bound, into the night.

Beginnings

This is my most revised bit of writing. I've been redrafting it occasionally since 2005, and this is the first time I've shared it with more than one person at a time. What drives you to share the world behind your eyes? Let me know below.

He had been at the tree for some time now. He’d walked across the beautiful wilderness that had only recently become his home, wandering from his comfortable origins at the bidding of some incomprehensible longing that issued from his chest, and his wandering had brought him to the tree. There, he stopped, and he considered his next move. He rested at the tree and he allowed his mind to unravel.

He remained in that spot longer than one would think possible, but this was a man for whom time meant very little, who had no obligations anywhere else, who until recently knew nothing of death. He knew that there was really no time before that time, and he was right, but soon times would change. Soon, he would move again, move away from that tree and toward the wide world that he never knew, and that would be the start of another time.

So we write. We write because we have more things to say than people to tell, because stories are independent of authors and wish to be told, because writing links the writer to the reader and to the word, and because whether it was the Bodhi or an apple tree makes all the difference in the world.

What has changed?

Lord Vetinari is still the perfect tyrant. Om remains a progressive and responsive god. Rincewind, as ever, is the most heroic of all cowards, and Lobsang marches on.

So what has changed? No one will ask about Mrs. Cake. Young Sam will never grow up. Granny Weatherwax will never walk proudly over black sand. Dios is satisfied. All is still; the auditors think they've won. The one day that was not today will never be tomorrow.

We knew much about Sir Terry. We knew more of him than most of us can know of one another, because he shared much more of the world behind his eyes than many ever do. We still know him, know his world, and now we know the void in which it floats, and flies, and stretches, and swims. What has changed is only what we never knew, and the loss and the longing that we feel is personal, which is not the same as important.

It's tempting to let that be an ending, but that simply Does not happen.

Now read on.

An hour's tribute

I run a martial arts school in Pennsylvania. On the evening after Terry Pratchett passed, I started class by telling my students "People's whole lives do pass before their eyes just before they die. The process is called living," and that they had only one chance to make it a life they would be proud of, and that every hour wasted would be an hour they regretted.

The Vaudeville Act

This was a simple exercise for a creative writing class in 2008; I was asked to write a story around an evocative painting. I decided to try it in second person, and I'm pretty pleased with the result. The narrative voice reminds me of someone I've missed for a long time. Have you ever tried writing dialog in the voice of someone you know well? How'd it work out for you?

Hey kid, did your dad ever take you to one of these shows? No? Well, let me tell you, you’re in for a treat. Yes, sir. It may not be much to look at now, but when I was a boy, this theater was the most popular spot in town. Your dad and I used to come up here with your granddad, you know, when we were young, and we’d stay here for hours in these same seats watching the show. Oh, yes. It’d be one act after another all evening, and you could stay for as many shows as you like for with just one ticket so long as you stayed in the theater.

Context

This story was inspired by a friend of a friend of mine who wrote an article worried about the messages their daughter might learn from bits of conventional parental wisdom. I tried to capture that uncertainty without taking a stand one way or the other, or letting it get preachy. Not sure how well it comes across. I'd welcome any comments. Do you think this similarity is significant, or just coincidental?


“Oh, come on, sweetie. There’s nothing to be afraid of, I promise.” His daughter had begged, had pleaded for days to come here to the fair, had talked non-stop about the roller coaster since she had first seen it, and now, standing in front of it, she had attached herself to his hip like an aviophobe to an aisle seat.

Bad

This was part of an exercise I attempted while I was teaching in Korea. I tried to write a story a day based on Red Riding Hood for as long as I could keep it up, and didn't even make it through a week. I was pretty pleased with the one I wrote before this, a direct retelling with all the metaphors and symbolism stripped away, but that has unfortunately lost to the silicon aether. This one's the sad result of too many victorious villain films and Neil Gaiman short stories. I think the main problem here is that I tried to make the narrator too many things within a limited first person monologue. If anyone has any other input on where I went wrong here, I'd appreciate reading it.


Before we begin, I should tell you that you were right when you said I am not like other men. Those who know me best do not know me at all. You understand? Or rather, they know me twice. On the one hand, they know my face, my manner, my deeds, and my trade. They think this is all there is to know of me, just like you did. On the other hand, they, like you, know my reputation. It has been the work of a lifetime to ensure that they should never associate the two. Don't you feel honored to have that privilege?