#ThursdayDoors: Gardens and Lotus Eaters

March 29, 2018March 29, 2018JT Twissel 14 Comments

Guess where I found this door.

I’ll give you a clue. When the rains finally give way to glorious sun-filled days, where do you generally tend to stray? The bank? The dentist? Or perhaps you wander down the street to a place where you can buy seeds to plant and birdbaths for your friends.

A place decorated for Easter and Halloween and all holidays in between, where you can ask why your calla lilies didn’t bloom this year or get fertilizer tips for a picky Bird of Paradise.

I must admit, the first days of spring you’ll likely find me hanging out on the Isle of the Lotus Eaters waiting for Odysseus to arrive and shake me out of my stupor. Perhaps then I’ll have more to share with the doors folks over at Norm’s who’ve made Thursdays an around the world adventure.

A tip for time travel

March 21, 2018March 21, 2018JT Twissel 36 Comments

I keep dreaming up stupider and stupider ideas for the ending of The Return of Flipka. My latest had her time traveling from 1978 to 2016 as a part of an FBI plot to stop the presidency of Donald Trump and yes, aliens were involved. Obviously I’m in a slump. If the weather were better I’d forget my writing gig and go down to the teahouse and paint. But the teahouse has no heat.

I write this sniveling, whiny post while listening to Rachmaninoff, someone so gifted that he could not possibly have ever suffered from writer’s block. Or so one would think.

Of course, he did. As a young man he needed therapy for a depression that plagued him for four years and came and went throughout his life. One of his most famous pieces, The Bells, was inspired by another famously depressed artist, Edgar Allen Poe.

I don’t know nearly as much about classical music as I’d like but luckily my husband once belonged to one of those CD of the month clubs. I don’t know why as most of the hundred or so CDs he received are still wrapped in plastic but his loss is my gain. So now I’m going through composer by composer and trying to learn something about each one.

First I was hooked on Bach (whose birthday is coincidentally today). His compositions aren’t as rhapsodic and soulful as Rachmaninoff but it is possible to listen to them over and over again. Try listening repeatedly to Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, I dare you. That piece is so achingly romantic it’s been used as the sound track for many a movie, including Somewhere in Time.

In this movie, for those of you who haven’t seen it, Christopher Reeve is a playwright who’s approached after his debut show by an elderly woman who hands him a pocket watch and says “come back to me.” He forgets about the incident until, while on vacation, he becomes obsessed with the portrait of a woman who lived in the early 1900s. Many plot convulsions later he manages to hypnotize himself and go back in time and meet her. Unfortunately he can’t stay back in time forever. He has to return to present day where he finds out his true love has just died of old age. After this point the plot goes into an infinite loop of past and present spinning like tops and all because of a little self-hypnotism.

Okay, I guess my time travel idea for the Return of Flipka is not so crazy after all, is it? (yes, it is!)

Why we need Sheriff Taylor

March 12, 2018September 8, 2024JT Twissel 21 Comments

The other day I watched an episode of The Andy Griffith Show while having tea. That show, for those of you who’ve never seen it, is unapologetically set in Trump country. That is, if Mayberry had been a real town and not a set on a backlot in Hollywood.

Deputy Sheriff Barney Fife locks up the whole town for minor infractions of the law when Sheriff Taylor is out of town.

The townsfolk of Mayberry are not sophisticated or worldly. Few have been far from the county line. But they have a strong sense of pride in their small town and are hurt when outsiders call them country bumpkins. Of course the town did have its stereotypes: Otis, the town drunk, Goober and Gomer, the village simpletons, and Floyd the barber who can’t stand electric razors. But they are treated gently and shown to be, despite their gullibility, decent folk at heart. It’s their lack of worldliness that causes them to leap to judgement and act accordingly. When a stranger comes to town claiming to be something he most definitely is not, they take him at his word. Similarly if a stranger comes to town and keeps to himself then he must be hiding a deep, dark past. The lack of regular interaction with strangers causes them to be either too trusting or too suspicious. In either event, it’s Sheriff Taylor who has to expose the truth, but, in a way that doesn’t make anyone feel foolish or cruel. He knows that simply telling someone they’ve been duped will make them defensive and then they won’t listen. And then they will make up alternative facts to believe. Does it sound familiar?

I found it fascinating that after Don Knotts’ death the actor Billie Bob Thornton wrote:

“Don Knotts gave us the best character, the most clearly drawn, most perfect American, most perfect human ever.”

He was referring to the character of Barney Fife, the bumbling deputy sheriff of Mayberry. Barney is a mass of contradictions – overly confident (one might say self-delusional) one moment and full of insecurities the next. If you’re unfamiliar with the show, below is the shortest clip I could find. Barney is the one in uniform. What do you think? Perfect human?

Art is not Breath and Blood

March 10, 2018JT Twissel Leave a comment

From the darkest moments come the perfect moments, if we’re lucky.

tin hats

Art is born by secrets, hidden in the fold of a dress, an afterthought of silence. When we know, but cannot soften the blow, we make art and find glory in those perfect moments. Our hands and mind become the same and are exulted of this Earth. Yet, there is always a missing. A hole left to fill. A darkness upon our brow as we betray what we call life and death.

Wrapping our arms around our bodies, in complete awareness, the secret unfolds across an ocean of pain and we circle down inside ourselves. We turn others away. Sleep is often a release, but it is in the work, the shaping of our personal hell, that we raise the walls and lock the gates. Sometimes it is frantic; hopeless in the way of sending Morse code as the ship sinks and heavy eyes take us down. Other times we…

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Death and the little thing called life

March 2, 2018September 8, 2024JT Twissel 30 Comments

The other day a friend told me about a Netflix show, the Frankenstein Chronicles, that interested him. So I decided to check it out.

If you haven’t been following the series, first of all, it’s set at a time when London was literally a sewer, they burnt coal with no restrictions, and poor families tossed children they couldn’t feed out into the streets to fend for themselves. In addition, Sean Bean (aka the beheaded Ned Starke from the Game of Thrones) plays a detective tasked with finding the “monster” who’s been mutilating dead children and grotesquely stitching them back together again. It’s critical to find this person because when Jesus returns to earth those of us who’ve been good will get to sit next to him but only if we have a body to reoccupy. Preferably one that has not been chopped up or in other ways violated. Jesus is evidently a bit picky about who he keeps company with.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Jan, you’ve gone off the nut once again. So let me explain. In the 1800s, medicine was evolving into a science. Doctors were on the verge of many advances to help prevent premature deaths from childbirth to plagues. But only, dot dot dot, if they could get a better understanding of human anatomy and to do that they needed, dot dot dot, corpses. The corpses were happily provided by prisons and poor houses as those blokes weren’t going to sit next to Jesus anyway. But innocent children were off-limits.

Ned Starke to the rescue

As to why the preoccupation with death, remember life wasn’t so great back then. This fact was seized upon by preachers promising a meet and greet with the big JC, thereby making death the reward for a virtuous life. So, in the Frankenstein Chronicles, when mutilated children’s bodies begin littering the shores of the river Thames, fingers are pointed at the scientific community. It must be doctors dumping their botched experiments, thereby depriving children of a wonderful after life experience. Our hero has a different theory but I doubt I’ll stick around to watch all three seasons (sheesh) just to find out if he’s right. To me these Netflix series’ start out with an interesting concept but then somewhat rapidly become expensive soap operas sans the cheesey acting. However, the producers and screen writers have done a brilliant job of depicting the environment that spawned early horror classics such as Frankenstein and Dracula.

As a writer I’m not sure we’re always aware of the environmental and societal forces shaping our work. I doubt either Mary Shelley or Bram Stoker thought “I’m surrounded by death so I might as well write about it.” But maybe I should speak only for myself. What do you think?

I have to say something, sorry

February 20, 2018February 20, 2018JT Twissel 33 Comments

It seems necessary to speak of it, even though it is unspeakable. Not to say a word and to continue writing posts absurd and silly, to keep things light and easy, knowing that in a couple of days it will be old news, well, that’s the smart thing for a blogger to do, isn’t it? Besides, what more could I possibly add to the gun control debate? Nothing that hasn’t been said a thousand times before.

“There’s people that eats up the whole earth and all the people in it.”

“Then there’s people that stand around and watch them do it.”

When every reasonable suggestion to curb mass shootings receives responses so idiotic that they bugger the imagination and killings just keep on, the tendency is to give up. To accept the fact that there are people in this world with no empathy. Until their child, in a fit of rage or depression, kills dozens of kindergartners with a semi-automatic weapon that they swear was locked up and they become instant pariahs in their communities. Until they’re forced to change their names and move far away. Then they’ll get it. But then it will be too late.

“We’ll own this country someday. They won’t even try to stop us.”

As I was writing this post I heard that one hundred students from Florida are on their way to the state capital to try to talk to the legislators. Instead of thoughts and prayers, let’s send them something they really need: COURAGE, STRENGTH and LOVE.

The images in this blog are from the movie Little Foxes, based on the play by Lillian Hellman.

The Beans versus the Cheese Steaks

February 5, 2018July 29, 2018JT Twissel 28 Comments

This should be Philly’s mascot

While watching the Superbowl last night I began to wonder how teams come up with their mascots. For example, the Patriots. I’m sure the people in Philadelphia are every bit as patriotic as Bostonians so how come Boston gets that name?

Not to mention that there are probably as many eagles in Philly as there are bears wandering the suburbs of Chicago. And let’s face it: New Orleans is hardly full of saints.

So why don’t cities rebrand their teams to promote what they’re famous for? Chicago could become the Pizzas; Tampa could become the Prunes, and Los Angeles, the Diet Pills.

This would lead to all sorts of tasty matchups, like the Portland Granolas versus the Seattle Oysters or the Milwaukee Pretzels versus the Minneapolis Cheddars.

How about your local teams? What would they promote? Me, I would be rooting for the San Francisco Sourdoughs as they battle Atlanta Peaches.

Licking wounds that won’t heal is called being a writer

January 28, 2018July 20, 2021JT Twissel 36 Comments

For over a year now, I’ve licked wounds that refuse to heal. I’m a failure. My books, despite kind reviews from friends and colleagues, didn’t sell well and so my publisher went out of business.

Okay, perhaps it wasn’t totally my fault.

Many Booktrope writers immediately republished after being kicked to the curb. But I thought it was a good opportunity to address the confusion some readers had over the ending of my great masterpiece, Flipka. My plan was re-introduce sections the original editor suggested I remove. They were my precious little babies, so beautifully written and funny and close to my heart. But she killed them.

Well, y’all can probably guess the folly of that sort of thinking. Yes, according to not one but two editors, reintroducing those sections resulted in an even smeller pile of dog shit. Total and complete manure, not worthy of dirtying your boots on.

Those of you who are writers, I can feel you cringing in sympathy and I thank you for it.

Anyway, it would have felt good to quit. Stamped the whole effort with a Failure, get over it label and burnt all copies of Flipka past and present in the fireplace. I could have invited all of my friends over for KFC (who am I kidding, I don’t have any friends) to witness the celebration of my failure and they could have said things to me like “I could write a great story” or “Why did you ever want to be a writer in the first place?” and fed greasy chicken bones to the insatiable flames of failure. Probably a few of my imaginary friends would not have survived that particular party.

But I’m haunted by the characters I created. I can’t leave them in a simmering pot of pooh, now can I? So back I go to writing. I may return now and then if I have something I think worthy of your time to read but otherwise, it’s back to the agonies for me.

I do plan to keep up with those bloggers who have been so supportive of me. Thanks, thanks and thanks again.

Today I declare 2018 has begun, said no one sane

January 16, 2018January 16, 2018JT Twissel 26 Comments

I’ve packed away the ornaments and washed and stored the Christmas plates, thus I declare that today, January 15th, the holidays are over and the new year may begin. The last of my extended family has been feted and fattened and now, with no more excuses at my disposal, I will attempt to get back on track.

It used to take me a full day to decorate for the holidays and a full day to pack everything away. Not any more. These days I hang a few treasured memories on a plastic birch tree.

The cheery group below from Finland remind me of the many times they saved me from mountain trolls dwelling in impenetrable forests around my castle. A gift from a family friend, they’re as old as they look.

This snowman, made from shell, was sent to my children from Hong Kong.

This tin spiral is a toddler magnet. I bought it at a country store in New Hampshire.

My dining table centerpiece is a gold foil wrapped cardboard star which hangs from an archaic candelabra.

Sometimes I jazz my sculptures up with scarves and tams. Below are busts of my children done before my wrist weakened and I could no longer handle clay.

So, everything’s back to normal and it’s time to get back to work. But not today. Not because I’m honoring Dr. Martin Luther King but because it’s my father’s birthday and he’s been gone for over a decade now. They may have shared the same birthday but Dad would have joined a nudist colony before he’d have joined a protest march.

Tomorrow, yes, tomorrow I’ll get back to work. Any advice as to how I’ll accomplish this miracle?

A Door You Don’t Want to Open

January 11, 2018July 21, 2021JT Twissel 37 Comments

From my junior high school yearbook.

By high school I’d decided that I wanted no trinkets (such as yearbooks) to remind me of the four miserable years I’d spent in high school. Truth be told, I probably brought on my own misery by telling my classmates that everything they held dear was stupid. Football – stupid. Proms – stupid. Cheerleading – really, really stupid. And what was smart? Protesting senseless wars, archaic dress codes and, well, just about anything. It’s a miracle my classmates didn’t drown me in PE, which I probably also protested.

However, before I became such a sanctimonious nincompoop, I was an insecure junior high schooler desperate to fit in. Not only did I buy yearbooks, but I had everyone I ran into sign the darn things, even the teachers!

Recently I cracked open my junior high school yearbook. I was looking for a name mentioned by a friend that sounded familiar. I didn’t find the name but I was opening a door that should have remained forever closed.

First to the good memories: Above is my favorite science teacher. He was young, red-haired and fool-hardy enough to lead an astronomy club full of thirteen-year- olds up to the shingled rooftop of a four-story building where there was nothing to stop anyone of us from rolling off the edge.

My German teacher insisted we call him Herr Assmus. I guess he figured that if he was going to be teased for his name by students, he might as well go along with the gag. However he had his limits. One day, after being forced to teach German in a room also used for Sex Education, he erupted in a fury: “I cannot teach German with a penis staring at me!” Then he proceeded to rip a diagram of a penis off the wall while we all cracked up.

This teacher hated me. I had absolutely no homemaking skills and practically burnt down her kitchen.

My art teacher reminded me of Tony Randall from the Odd Couple. Fastidious and neat but always smiling.

Our custodian was always on the spot when we forgot the combinations to our locker but never scolded us. I guess that’s why he got a special place in the yearbook.

Nori had it all: Looks, athletic ability, and a stable family. He was also an alcoholic. I went out with him once in high school; he picked me up drunk and took me to a party with other football players and their girlfriends. There he proceeded to get even drunker and wandered off to a bedroom where the school’s “easy” girl serviced the boys while their prim girlfriends sat together and gossiped. One of the other football players became disgusted with the game and took me home. Not long after, Nori drove off a cliff up at Tahoe.

After his death, we found out his other “shameful” secret: he was Jewish.

Blake took one psychedelic too many and ended up in the state mental institute. When we went to see him, he claimed to be Jesus. Not long after, he also died.

Dee was so cute and bubbly that all the boys had crushes on her, even the ones from out in the sticks where she would have been called “colored” or worse. She disappeared from school one day without a word. Months later we found out from our sex education teacher that she’d bled to death in an alley in Oakland, California after an illegal abortion. I often think about her. Fourteen years old.

My mother tried to set me up with this guy because his father was a self-made millionaire. He had a Trump-like personality and actually shot someone he’d never met in the back thinking he’d get away with it. Pretty boy didn’t last long in jail.

Above is the James Dean of our class. His rebellious streak got him slapped around (and worse) by the male teachers (hey – this was a different time).He’s probably in jail but I liked him.

This gal actually murdered someone and got away with it. But it was okay because he was a Piute Indian and she was the daughter of a prominent socialite. On her picture she wrote “Nancy is a queer.” As far as I know, she is still alive.

Okay – we didn’t all turn out to be murderers or drug addicts or dead in an alley somewhere. Jon, who was a neighbor of mine, is a lawyer who worked in the Obama administration. The last time I saw Johanna and Lucille was at the premiere of their art show at the De Young Museum. Steve was Mr. Popular all through school because he was kind and thoughtful to everyone. He’s a basketball coach out in Winnemucca.