Writer's Digestion

My teacher told me I had the penmanship to become a doctor. If you read my last piece , you may not be surprised to know that I used to want to be a doctor. Wanting to be a doctor (even though it’s not the right career for you) is a common condition, with a simple cure. To be free of a misguided desire to become a doctor, one must simply actually try to become a doctor, and call me in the morning. That was the avenue I chose. It’s actually really hard to become a doctor! That’s what I was told. I had really good grades in high school, but my worst subject by far was called something called chemistry.  Ok, I thought, if that’s my toughest subject, and being a doctor is tough, well then I’ll do my degree in that… Cuz you could do biology, but there are a lot of biology majors out there who “wanted to be doctors”. By the time I started my second year of college, with the determination to prepare for med school I was well aware that there are people in virtually every profession who “w...

“Life is pain…Anyone who says differently is selling something.” - The Princess Bride Hi, again. In my film-writing class at UVic, we watched the pilot to Buffy the Vampire Slayer . I remember watching the show a couple of times as a kid (not the finest hour of my older siblings), and being a bit scared. What I remember creeping me out the most was a part where she is reading people’s minds and hearing everyone’s thoughts. It was just creepy to me to hear so many voices and be inside the minds of so many people. Ironic that getting inside people’s heads seems to be something fundamental about being human, and functioning in today’s world (of course to a point—boundaries are good). In that first episode there are a number of stereotypical nineties insults and teen one-liners. It was amusing to me to learn that Joss Whedon didn’t want the show to become dated, so rather than using what the kids of the day were saying, he came up with his own slang, and ironically much of that worked its ...

I write for me, but I go through the trouble of making it accessible, for you (and for me).     Welcome.     Here, I will feature my work. I need to write, and I need to share. So here we are. Me sharing; you reading. Here we go. Isn’t this fun? So, I used to play in a band. No, not a cool one. A high school concert band; not even the jazz band, I know. I played the trumpet, though. That’s one of the cool ones, I guess… Anyway, the reason I bring it up is cuz I remember in between songs, at a performance the conductor would introduce the next piece. He would comment, he would joke. I remember thinking it was kind of self-indulgent of him, and kind of boring. However, I’ve come to really appreciate those interludes and their importance. I went to the symphony once, and they did the same thing. And in Disney’s Fantasia 2000 , they do the same thing and its just part of the whole experience. So, think of this blog as kind of a concert. I present my songs...