Backwater Swirls
Bennie is me snapping to reality twenty years ago living on my own land deep in the Oklahoma woods. I'd hitchhiked 10,000 miles around the country trying to stay alive playing guitar and singing. That was a flop. I ran back to New Jersey and got a job singing at a local bar outside the Fort Dix/MaGuire AFB. That was a hit. The owner let me build to a quartet of friends I'd known from Philly. That was a gas, a smash. I loved it, saved my money and bought twelve and a half acres in the middle of the Oklahoma woods, cut a road through and pitched a tent, decided to raise registered dairy goats, thought I had it easy. I had a lot to learn.
This is the first story I ever wrote, over twenty
years ago, and the first to get published.
After that I wrote a scene about a man running through the woods escaping from
something. I had no idea where I was going with him or what he was running
from, but that offshoot later became a piece of Chapter five in
"SALAMANDERS".
I start most of my stuff with a scene, never really knowing where I'm going or when the story will end. Many writers disagree with that approach, but I've had fun with it. More important to me and my writing is trying to keep an objective narrator throughout the piece and not "tell" the reader how a character feels. Some of my fellow internet Writing Workshop folk didn't agree and sent me down here to the basement. That "cold idea" about writing was a no-no. I started this story mainly as an exercise to find out if what I believed was true, see if it was possible to create unwritten emotions, hit the readers with their own imaginations instead of a two-by-four. As the story grew, I knew where it ended. It's quick, still needs a little tweaking here and there, especially in the kitchen scene before they speak, but I like it.
I guess this one came from being alone with too many barmaids too late at night in too many bars. Jessie became a major character in "SALAMANDERS". A slightly altered version of this story became a chapter in the novel.
...AND SOME I WORRIED OVER TOO MUCH AS I WROTE THEM.
Once in a while I go to sleep seeing story scenes and wake up in the middle of the night with an AHA! that will work and a lot of AHA!s that didn't. The answer's in my subconscious somewhere. I feel it in my bones. Meanwhile, I'll keep easing myself to sleep watching the scenes. That usually works for me.
The Oklahoma woods introduced me to a lot of
characters. I never understood the importance of "write what you
know" until I'd left.
Twenty years later, in New Orleans, I stared at a blank page for days
before realizing I'd already lived a handful of stories and seen a bunch of
characters, me included. "Orville" is a fictional character. The
characters in his story are a composite of folks I remember.
I've only recently (3/10/06) added this story here. It's a piece of my working novel "Annie and the Mick" that seems to stand on its own legs as a short story.
I've only recently returned to this website. 
(Huff Huff). It now sometimes changes many times
a day, sometimes once a week. Please come back often to see it grow as I continue to learn.
I've got a lot of stuff you might like reading, including notes I made as I
learned to write. I was on an internet Writer's Workshop then, and said what I
felt like saying and got "sent to the basement" because of my views
about how to write. I'm still learning, still in the basement. I've saved my
notes and plan another link to them as soon as I get organized. Right now I'm
floating on a mattress with all my notes somewhere under water.
I have help down here, though: Harvey, my pet roach, and Harriet, his new bride, have helped a lot, maybe because their adventures are submerged in the original "Basement Notes" and they want to bring them up for re-editing. I suspect, though, they think they'll be featured in a "SALAMANDERS" movie. Hmmm...
This page and all
novel excerpts and short stories in links are
copyright © 1997 Pete Murphy
Vitamin B
Thanks for stopping by.
I'd love to hear your comments. Pete
