Star Wars: Reconsidering the sequel trilogy

 

GeekTyrant, one of my favorite websites, reminds us that this week is the tenth anniversary of the release of the trailer for Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens.  I will never forget that night.  I was reloading YouTube every ten seconds, waiting for the trailer to publish.  And when it finally dropped...

I guarantee you that I watched that thing at least a dozen times before going to bed.  Oh sure, there had been the teaser earlier that April, but this was the full-blown serious look at what the first chapter of Star Wars's "sequel trilogy" was offering.  And it was glorious!  Everything about that trailer was spot-on perfect: the glimpses, the dialogue, the music... just completely epic.

Here it is if you haven't watched it in awhile (or if you've never had the pleasure of seeing it at all until now):

It had been seven years since the previous Star Wars film, Revenge of the Sith.  That there could be a new movie for the saga was something many of us had given up on ever happening.  And then in 2012 came the news that Episode VII was coming in three years.

That day was one of the happiest that we collectively had, in quite a long time.  And that trailer for The Force Awakens reflected that.  It really did herald the imminent arrival of a new Star Wars movie.  Our dream was coming true.  The most beloved mythology of the modern era was going to expand.  It was going to keep going, on into the future.  Indeed, it was going to be altogether possible that there would be no end to Star Wars, until the end of time.  I couldn't help but think that I would not live to see every Star Wars movie, and there was some great comfort to draw from that.  The way that grown men plant trees, in whose shades their great-grandchildren will play, though they themselves will never see it.

The trailer for The Force Awakens promised that.  And more.  And we could not see anything but something remarkable coming about, beyond our wildest aspirations.  And that's what we got, right?

Right?

Let's get the obvious out of the way: the Star Wars sequel trilogy left a lot to be desired.  It's easily the weakest of the three eras of the classic saga of the Skywalker family.  For one thing it's painfully clear that there wasn't a grand design from the beginning of production.  Now, there was a plan for the sequel trilogy.  George Lucas had included it in the deal that he signed with Disney when he sold Lucasfilm and the related companies.  But what that was, we'll probably never fully know.  Kathleen Kennedy and the other Disney bigwigs abandoned Lucas's plans and instead went for something all their own.  And odds are that in large part it was inferior to The Maker's design for the saga he created in the first place.

So there was no master plan, as Disney intended to execute.  "But wait, Chris, did the original trilogy have such a master plan??"  I'll grant you, that such a concise plot diagrammed out did not exist at the time of A New Hope's release.  Lucas and Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan were writing The Empire Strikes Back by the seat of their pants.  That it is arguably the greatest Star Wars movie of all time is testament to the vision that they came up with together.  Their work on Episode V established the method by which all future Star Wars should be designed and carried out.  That method carried over into Return of the Jedi.  And when it came time years later to begin work on the prequel trilogy, Lucas already had the architecture established to go back in the saga's timeline and tell the story of young Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker.  And that worked beautifully, too.

The prequel trilogy had none of that.  Or if it did, it was a vague semblance of an over-arching plot.  Once again the writing was by "the seat of their pants".  But there was never a solid plan.

My personal biggest beef about the sequel trilogy?  It's how Supreme Leader Snoke was treated.  The Force Awakens portended that Snoke was going to be a major villain.  The new grand adversary for the next generation of the heroes of the saga.  I loved Snoke as a character.  I saw the movie three times in the theater and each time I knew Snoke was about to appear, I paid especially close attention.  Snoke captured my imagination.  Who was he?  What was he?  My theory was that he was going to be revealed to be the ultimate bad guy behind everything wrong that had happened in the saga.  Snoke could have been the one who created the Sith themselves, for all we knew.  Snoke was an example of Chekov's rule of drama: if you see the gun mounted on the wall in act one, it must be fired in act three.  And I wanted to see that gun go off.

But as The Last Jedi showed us, that was not to be.  Snoke wound up a wasted character.  And I absolutely hate what came of Snoke in The Rise of Skywalker. Snoke deserved better.  And we could have had that, if there had been a master plan in mind that was going to be honored by the filmmakers.

Just one of the many problems that I have with the sequel era.

The last time I had watched any of the sequel trilogy was probably about two years ago.  I set The Rise of Skywalker playing for background noise as I worked on some writing projects one Sunday afternoon.  I couldn't get through it.  I got about halfway through the movie before realizing that I wasn't tuning in at all even peripherally.  So I stopped the movie and instead started playing the Marx Brothers's movie Duck Soup: a good comedy for stimulating the synapses.  And at the time I wondered if I would ever watch any Star Wars movie again, ever.  Episodes seven through nine had practically ruined something that I had carried with me since the first moment I saw an Artoo-Detoo action figure, at four years old.  Star Wars seemed to be something that for all intents and purposes, was dead to me from now on.

But something funny happened recently...

It was a few weeks ago.  A couple of days before my book was published.  For nigh on two months I had plunged myself into preparing every facet of what it means to bring a book to the public.  Everything from going over the manuscript a dozen times over, to designing the cover, to porting the book to Kindle ebook format.  If I wasn't eating or sleeping or working or playing with my dog Tammy, I was focused on getting the book ready.  And in the end it was finally finished, ready for the printer or download on October 1st.

I was thoroughly exhausted.  My brain was drained.  Mentally I was a man poured out.  The book had been submitted.  It was finally out of my hands.  It was something that would soon be in the possession of readers and hopefully there would be many of them and more to the point, I hoped that they would find that it was a book well worth reading.

So with nothing else to occupy my time with, without really comprehending why I was doing it, I put in my Blu-ray Disc of The Force Awakens.  I situated myself on the sofa, not actually braced for one thing or another.  Just needing to have some distraction from my being so wiped out from the book.

And before I knew what was going on, I discovered that I was liking the movie.  An awful lot.  Maybe more than a person should.

Suddenly I was transported back to that night in December of 2015, when I met my lifelong best friend Chad and his wife at a cinema in Raleigh, as we watched the first showing of Episode VII.  And that was a wonderful night indeed, in every way.  I left that theater and hit the highway for the two-hour drive back home and my mind was on fire about the new Star Wars movie.  It had been everything and more that I had expected it to be.

Lo and behold, as I watched The Force Awakens playing in my living room, those memories came rushing back.  And I appreciated anew how precious those were and why they were precious and it did indeed involve that being a good Star Wars film after all.

I decided that I wanted to keep the vibe going.  And so I settled in to watch the next movie: The Last Jedi.

It is perhaps the most problematic Star Wars film ever produced.  Thoughts of disappointment went through my gray matter, and I braced myself for the two-plus hours to come.  I wondered to myself, "Why am I doing this to myself?"  But I had started this by watching The Force Awakens and I had to stay committed to the agenda.  I was going to watch the entire sequel trilogy, come what may.

Well.  Well indeed...

As I've said, as we all know, The Last Jedi is the most issue-ridden chapter of the entire saga.  But watching it with a mind absent discrimination, with refreshened eyes... so help me I found myself enjoying The Last Jedi more than I had before.

I was greatly surprised.  Genuinely shocked, even.  I was able to overlook its shortcomings and instead respect its strengths.  And there are many.  Was Snoke mishandled?  Yes, I will always believe that for the most part.  But his death in The Last Jedi was certainly a shock that very few people if anyone at all saw coming.

What I especially appreciate about The Last Jedi is that perhaps more than any other episode in the saga, it delves into the workings of the Force.  The scene where Luke has Rey reaching out, feeling the world around her - cold and warmth, life and death - is absolutely beautiful.  Not since The Empire Strikes Back came out in 1980 had the Force been so metaphysically examined.  I love that scene!

And then there is the fight between Luke and his nephew.  Yes, maybe it could have ended better: with Luke living and going on to play a much bigger role in the next film.  But as a duel between two Force-users, it definitely satisfies.  I kept thinking while watching that scene for the first time that Luke was being awfully self-restrained.  He was fighting by not fighting.  Luke was being a true Jedi master, as we had never seen him before.  Actually, this was the very first time that we were seeing him as a master at all.  And it did satisfy, it really did.

I finished watching The Last Jedi much more forgiving about that movie.  Definitely not perfect.  But it's also not the train wreck that I had first perceived it to be (and maybe had come to believe it as being simply because other people were saying how bad it is).  With renewed eyes, and a refreshened mind, it was to considerable length a film worthy of Star Wars.

My revisit to the sequel trilogy was two-thirds done.  And so it was that I resolved to watch The Rise of Skywalker.  Would the trend continue?  Might I come to have new feelings about the final film in the story of the Skywalker clan?  Or would the trilogy irredeemably collapse, to be forever stricken from being considered as a worthy chapter of the Star Wars saga?

Once more, I was surprised.  The Rise of Skywalker held up much better than I remembered it doing.

The ending of The Rise of Skywalker is almost what I had imagined for most of my life would be the perfect ending to the entire nine movies mythology: the Skywalker family coming back to Tatooine, accompanied by the droids, with the twin suns above the horizon.  So help me that's how I dreamed of the final scene of Episode IX all my childhood and beyond.  And what we see in The Rise of Skywalker is darn nearly that.  My biggest complaint about it is that it doesn't have Artoo-Detoo and See-Threepio in that scene: they were the first two characters we saw in A New Hope and it would have been fitting if they were two of the last characters we saw in the final movie.  But I suppose that can be let slide.

Yes, The Rise of Skywalker isn't perfect.  But some things about it aren't so bad.  When I think of "somehow Palpatine returned", I remember that Palpatine did return, pretty much by the same method (cloning, Dark Side magik etc.) in the Dark Empire series by Dark Horse Comics in 1992: the very first Star Wars comic of the Expanded Universe.  George Lucas seriously loved the idea of bringing the Emperor back, enough so that he gave trade paperbacks of Dark Empire to all the Lucasfilm employees as Christmas presents.  So that particular idea isn't very alien to Star Wars lore.  Of course, Lucas was also the one who suggested killing Chewbacca in the novel Vector Prime, so there's that too, but anyway...

When Episode IX had finished playing, I found myself thinking that the sequel trilogy wasn't too awful after all.  It did pretty well, all things considered.  The untimely death of Carrie Fisher no doubt detrimentally impacted the story.  From what I've heard, the intention was that Leia was going to figure enormously into the final film.  J.J. Abrams and his team should be given some credit: they did the best that they could do with the little they were given, and it's something to be thankful for that they had all that extra footage of Fisher left over from the filming of The Force Awakens to work with.  It's not a "perfect" fit.  It's a bit clumsy, if we are to be honest.  But that can be forgiven, under the circumstances.

And that was my day re-experiencing episodes 7, 8, and 9 of the Star Wars saga.  I went to bed that night, against all sensibilities, with my love of Star Wars re-ignited.  It hadn't been wasted at all.  I could call myself a true fan again.  The "Star Wars shrine" in my living room - that displays among other things my copy of Heir to the Empire signed by Timothy Zahn, my Yoda puppet autographed by "Weird A" Yankovic, my personal lightsaber, and my beloved Chewbacca mug that my best friend from college gave to me - is again something I can be proud of having to showcase something from my childhood that I've carried along all this time.

The Force Awakens is an amazing film.  And the next two movies, if not completely up to par with Episode VII, are more than passable on their own.  They are Star Wars movies, with all the lumps and warts that come with that.  Even A New Hope was considered by many to be more than a little ridiculous when it premiered in 1977.  It has been more than forgiven for its faults.

I do believe, absolutely, that with the passage of time episodes 7, 8, and 9 are going to be better regarded than they are today.  The weakest of the trilogy is easily The Last Jedi, but the rest of it isn't too terribly bad.  The kids seem to like it.  Especially young girls, who found a kindred spirit in Rey, and that can't be a bad thing in any way whatsoever.

I was astounded by how much more I liked these three movies than I had before.  They are not perfect, but in the end they comprise what they are: a Star Wars trilogy. I can accept it.  Just as I can accept the quirks and weaknesses of any of the other six Star Wars movies.

Give the sequels another five or ten years.  I'll bet that in time the seventh, eighth, and ninth Star Wars movies are going to be as welcome into the canon as the rest of the saga.  I have tremendous confidence that is going to happen.

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My book is getting around!

Here it is during a cruise to St. Martin, St. Thomas, and Nassau in the Bahamas:

Much thanks to good friend Roberta for sending this along :-) 

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With "No Kings" coverage, media is demonstrating why it cannot be trusted

I'm only making this post because what I've been observing since yesterday especially has become so prevalent and provocative, it practically demands being noted.

For sake of those years and decades from now who won't know what I'm talking about (because it will have been long forgotten), today is the day when a second "No Kings" protest is being had across the country.  This is going to be the latest in a series of allegedly "home-grown activism" by leftists who can't stop being bitter because President Donald Trump won the 2024 election over Kamala Harris (thank God she wasn't elected).

I could say much about the events scheduled for today.  About how they are not "organic" at all but are being organized and funded by evil men like George Soros.  I could note that these "protests" will do absolutely nothing because they are in the end about nothing.  They are only a tempter tantrum without defined purpose.

I could say much.  But I'm choosing to home in on what is to me anyway the worst thing about the "No Kings protests" set for today...

Mainly, how much the mainstream press has abandoned all pretense of objectivity and gone all-out overboard in promoting the event.

Since early yesterday my Facebook feed has become loaded with news outlets instructing readers and viewers about the "No Kings" stunt, letting it be known in no uncertain terms where the marches are going to be, how to plan for them and what to bring, etc.  They are also making it quite clear that this is a protest against Donald Trump and his policies, that it's "anti-fascist" (whatever that means)...

Where were these people when there were protests against Joe Biden when he was president?  Because there were some.  Where have these same media outlets been when groups such as March for Life have rallied against abortion?

We all know the answer, even if some live in denial of it.  It's because in vast part there is no free and unbiased press in America (or in most other places in the western world).  Our "journalists" are in the tank for liberalism/leftism/socialism and they will do absolutely anything they can get away with doing to promote that ideology.

It's no secret that the press hates Trump and his supporters.  But I've never seen it so blatant as it has become in the past few days, with so many media outlets tooting the horn for "No Kings".  Television stations, the networks, the print outlets... with very few exceptions they've dropped all pretense of being fair and balanced.  I'm sure they think they are taking up a noble cause, and that's why they are justifying their bias, but in truth they are only hitching themselves to partisan politics and screw all notion of journalistic ethics.

I'm not a die-hard Donald Trump supporter.  You'll never see me wearing a red "Make America Great Again" hat.  I don't believe in throwing in completely behind any elected official or other leader and that is what too many have been doing with Trump.  I will say that he has earned my respect on many issues, especially when it comes to defending American sovereignty at our borders.  I don't think most other Americans are quite fully in line behind Trump either, and that's a healthy thing.  And we especially see what's going on with the press.

The subjectivity that most of the media is demonstrating in regard to "No Kings" should disturb anyone who still holds that the press in any way can be trusted at all.  This is not news that they are disseminating.  It is propaganda.  And there is no reason why they should be granted accommodation by this administration or any other.

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A much-warranted update on my bipolar disorder

Was looking over my blog this afternoon, and I came to something I hadn't given much thought to in awhile: the Being Bipolar series. That's the project I began in the fall of 2010 (wow, FIFTEEN years ago!) chronicling what it is to have bipolar disorder.  Or as many, including increasingly myself, refer to it as manic depression.

It's been a year and a half since the most recent Being Bipolar article.  There's never been any intended regular schedule for them.  I've composed them as they come to me.  As with so much else that I produce I believe more in quality than quantity.  And though I've lived with bipolar disorder for half of my life now, it's still something that I find myself taking time to ruminate upon.  But I like to think that the series has been a successful one, and I look forward to writing more for it.

But it's been eighteen months since that last article.  And maybe it's time to do some reflection on what has transpired between then and now.

Because, for whatever reason, my manic depression has been MUCH more under control for at least a year.  I think the last time I had any really serious episode was this past April.  That was a depressive one and thankfully I got through it (it's good to have friends who care about you enough to let you call them at 1 in the morning... but that was 10 p.m. to them in California so it worked out).

Anyway, yes: manic depression hasn't plagued me nearly as much in the past year or so than it has most of the time since the winter of 2000, when the symptoms first came about.  My thoughts aren't racing like they have before.  Depressive episodes fade much sooner.  I'm better able to focus my thoughts, without them going completely off the rails.  I'm sleeping better.  My appetite and eating habits are much healthier (and I'm grateful that my weight is NOT anywhere near where it was at the height of my struggle with bipolar disorder circa 2010 or so).  My relationships with others has come to be improved, I believe.  My interest in subject matters has increased.  I'm reading a lot more for pleasure.  My frequency of writing is something that could be better, but I think that's improving.

That latter pertains to the central activity I've been focused on for most of the past two years: completing my book.  For the better part of a decade I had been writing for it on and off.  It was January 2024 when I decided to home-in on true dedication to producing my autobiography, as so many (especially Dad) have said they wanted me to write.  So that's what I've been doing when I wasn't working a job or taking care of my dog Tammy.  I made every other iota of my being focused on writing what became known as Keeping the Tryst.  Until the week before last November when the first draft was finished.  A few weeks later I began editing and revision and that was a whole another process altogether.  But finally, on October 1st, my book was released.  And people seem to be really enjoying it.

I think working on the book was a tremendously therapeutic thing for me to set about doing.  I seem to be at my best when I've got something significant to work on.  A few months after being diagnosed with bipolar disorder, I focused on working on Forcery, my first movie.  All of those issues and concerns and nuances, doing my best to keep everyone happy and safe (emphasis on "safe") provided a calming balm to my troubled mind.  In those months during 2004 I found a serenity that I have rarely come to know again since.  And then I found a similar serenity in 2006 when I ran for school board in Rockingham County, North Carolina.  Those were three months when I felt completely detached from the madness.  I was too concerned with being a candidate for public office and everything that comes with that, especially with keeping detailed records of contributions and expenditures.  I was free during that time.  My passion and creativity was bursting and I felt like I was dancing in fire without being singed.

Focusing on the book for the past nearly two years provided another period of serenity.  The longest yet.  It's gone on for so long that what few episodes have come about in that time, have been so minor as to almost be completely inconsequential.

So now that the book has been published, I'm working on marketing it.  And that has become yet another project to focus on.  And paralleling that, I believe the time has come to begin writing more op-ed material for consideration toward being published.  The last time I composed anything of that nature was nine months ago.  I need to get back into that.  It was what began my writing career all those years ago in high school, after all.  Writing for the purpose of encouraging others to "think a little differently" has been my biggest motivator when it comes to working with pen and keyboard.  The season has come to get back into that.

Will bipolar disorder come raging back again?  It is something I must be braced for.  I've been on pretty much the same regimen of medications that I've been on for fifteen years now.  They've maintained efficacy quite well.  But I must be prepared for some time in the future when those no longer work as well, if at all.  That is an ever-present risk.  It could come next week or a year from now or ten.  It may not come at all.

As with everything else, I'm taking it one day at a time.  Being thankful for what mind that I do have.  Making the most of that.  Living better than what for many years I had thought possible.

Who knows.  Maybe God will bring a special lady into my life after all, sooner than later.

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A new reader question about Keeping the Tryst

Following the first question a few days ago,  I've received another query from someone who is reading my new book Keeping the Tryst. And it's a good one...

"What was the 'most disturbing visual aid' that anyone in the argumentative writing class had ever seen, that involved a jar of tea, some aluminum foil and three or four balls of Silly Putty?"

Ahhh yes.  That.  It was January of 1993, when I was at Rockingham Community College, when I did that little stunt.  Involving nothing but items found at the average grocery store or Walmart.

Listen: I'm not sharing that with anybody.  It's something you HAD to be there to experience.  Twenty-some innocent souls including Mr. Conte the instructor were there to witness it and I doubt any of them have spoken about it either.  I doubt they've even wanted to think about it.  It was just too much.

All I'll say is that the power of suggestion can be a terrible, terrible thing.

It did help get our group an "A" though.  And Mr. Conte said that it made him think about some things he'd never considered before.  And after that stunt it seems EVERY other group had to have a gimmick to make their presentation stand out. 😀

Funny thing though: Every class that Mr. Conte took roll for after that, he would call out my name and then give me this look, like "Oh Lord please don't do anything crazy today."

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Former writer admits what we all know: Doctor Who is DEAD

I know: this pic is from "The Name Of The Doctor" from the Steven Moffat era.  Its bleakness is plenty fitting for this post though.

There might well be volumes written, many years from now, about what happened to Doctor Who: the much-beloved British science-fiction television series that had delighted generations of viewers around the world.  Maybe those to come will take to heart the lesson of why the show defied so much, only to die at the hands of liberal ideology.

To Russell T. Davies and Chris Chibnall before him: the Doctor is dead... and you killed him!

Oh sure, Davies had his moments when he initially ran the show between 2005 and 2009, but there was still a good measure of respect for the saga, for the writing and for the audience.  Chibnall was the one who first pulled the trigger in earnest though, when he decided to make the Doctor a woman (there is a dynamic at work in Doctor Who and the Doctor should ALWAYS be male in keeping to that) and then made practically every episode a sermon about leftism.

Then Davies took over again.  And that's when the show truly went to hell.

Look, I had my hopes up.  I knew nothing of Ncuti Gatwa.  Just as I had known nothing of Peter Capaldi and Matt Smith when they were announced to be their respective Doctors.  But I was willing to give them a chance.  I was willing and eager to be surprised.

But Gatwa very quickly proved that of all the people who have ever played the Doctor, he is hands-down the very worst.  That he casually and chronically insulted everyone who didn't like the new direction of the show, telling them to "touch grass" instead, only made it worse.

(Maybe it's just me but I also don't think the Doctor should wear a dress.)

Here's what I think happened in the past few years: Doctor Who became Russell T. Davies' midlife crisis.  In the time between 2009 and 2022 Davies came to be confronted with his mortality.  He has no family of his own, his lifestyle prohibits having any progeny.  So Davies became driven to inflict his personal mark on the one thing that has proven to give him a sense of immortality: his work on Doctor Who.  And so Davies made it all about himself.  He opened up the spigot of his wokery.  In the process he drove away the core audience of Doctor Who.  Davies seriously believed that his fellow leftists were going to be legion enough to sustain his "work".

Doctor Who stopped being the show that it had been since 1963 and instead became a vehicle for leftist propaganda.  And the true fans departed.  They took Davies and Chibnall at their word: they had been told that they weren't welcome, so they grabbed their hats and left.

Former Doctor Who writer Robert Shearman has come forth to tell us what we all know: the show has been brought to a screeching halt right at the edge of an open grave.  And there is no foreseeable plan to bring it back.

The series is stuck where it last left off: Ncuti Gatwa's "Fourteenth Doctor" regenerating into the form of Billie Piper (who has at various times played the Doctor's companion Rose ever since the show first restarted in 2005).  It was a cheap stunt that underscored the obvious: the showrunners didn't know what they were doing.  Their ideology is all that mattered to them.  They were handed the keys to one of the most respected science-fiction mythologies ever crafted and they destroyed it with gross negligence.

For what it's worth, here's what I think: Doctor Who needs not just a hiatus but major invasive surgery under most potent anesthesia.  Let it be asleep for the next five or ten years.  And then pick up the show but ignoring everything from the Chibnall era on forward.  The final canonical words of the Doctor before regenerating should be those of the Twelfth: "Doctor, I let you go."  Let the Doctor disappear in that flash of light and in his place... a true Doctor.  One bereft of egotistical management and political agendas.

A dire measure?  Yes.  Yes it is.  But it's the only one I can see that will resurrect the Doctor Who franchise and correct its course.

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First question from a reader about Keeping the Tryst

Okay, someone just asked the very first question that I've been given about Keeping the Tryst.  This is from a person has finished part one.

Here's the question: "What was the joke that you told your uncle?"

If you've been reading the book, scroll down past the spoiler space and you'll find the answer...

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The question pertains to the joke that Mom asked me to share with my Uncle Frank, who was Dad's brother-in-law, late that night after they got back from the hospital following Dad's accident earlier in the afternoon.

I had heard this joke at school earlier that afternoon.  And I admit that at the time I thought it was pretty funny, though I hadn't grasped yet just how serious it really was.  It's not a joke I would tell now, forty years later.

Here's the joke:

"What do you call Rock Hudson in a wheelchair?"

"Roll-AIDS."

This wasn't very long after actor Rock Hudson had died of AIDS.  Hudson's coming forward about being infected with HIV was a revelation that sent shockwaves through American pop culture.  And of course Rolaids is a popular antacid/heartburn medication.

Definitely an Eighties-era joke and like I said, it's not one I would tell anyone these days.  But I fleetingly mention it in the book, it sort of adds to the scene that I'm describing: Mom and Uncle Frank returning after being at the hospital all evening, bringing cold hamburgers from Hardee's for my sister and mine's dinner.  When I had told Mom the joke on the way back from school that afternoon she said she didn't like it.  And now here was Mom wanting me to share that same joke with my uncle.  It kind of underscores how dire the day had become just like that (Chris snaps fingers).

If any more questions come, I'll be sure to provide an answer (as best I can).

And if you want to read my book here's the page on Amazon where you can find Keeping the Tryst.  Available in hardcover and for Kindle readers and apps.

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It's been a week since Keeping the Tryst was published...

...and I just checked the metrics.  According to the report, the book has sold very well so far, considering that I'm a relative unknown (outside of this blog, various stunts over the years and the occasional op-ed piece).  Right now it's holding at around #90 in the survival biographies genre, and hovering about #1200 among all memoirs in the Kindle store.  Not bad at all for a newly-minted book author eight days in.

I've gotten some feedback from people who have bought the Keeping the Tryst hardcover.  Every one has commented on how readable it is, despite the 537 pages length.  The font size and the cream-colored paper are very easy on the eyes, and that the chapters are divided into so many sections also makes the book readily digestible and fast-moving.  One person read the entire book in two days.

At the moment, I'm quite pleased about what's happened since its release.  I'm hoping that there will get to be some word-of-mouth and that others will consider purchasing and reading it.  I never expected to be a bestselling author right out the gate and that probably won't happen.  But a lot of people over the years have said that my story is one that many would find not just interesting, but captivating.  I believe them, enough so that I worked on this book on-and-off for over a decade.  I've said that if even just one person found reading it to be time well spent, then my task as an author will be successful.  Based on the figures I looked at earlier, the book has smashed through that target... and how!

Keeping the Tryst is available in hardcover edition and in Kindle ebook format.

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I need to make more posts like this

Time was, that I used to make a lot of posts about weird and unusual news items.  For awhile around 2009 I was posting an average of three and a half times every day and more often than not they were wacky stories I found around the Intertubes.  The notion has crossed my mind at times that maybe I should do more of that.  Blogging doesn't seem to be as big as it used to be but this is still my real estate in cyberspace and I do my best to tend to it.  So maybe a bit of fresh soil would be nice...

With that in mind here's a story I found on X/Twitter today, about an interesting-sounding chap who prefers his meat rare:

So Game Wardens in Texas have arrested this guy, 39 year old Ethan McNeely from Oregon. 

He was crouched in the woods attempting to hunt squirrels with nothing but his hands and teeth near Lake Tawakoni Dam 

Ethan insists that “I’m a primal predator, not a sportsman” and argued with the officers that “God-given claws and fangs” exempt him requiring a hunting license. 

Ethan goes on saying “If I catch it with my molars, that’s between me and Mother Nature” while reportedly spitting out a mouth full of tree bark. 

Game wardens have stated that while his hunting techniques are unique, there exists no game law that makes exceptions for “wannabe cavemen”. 

Ethan was booked on charges of hunting without a license and disorderly conduct after he reportedly growled at the officers. He maintains that he’s being persecuted saying “they can cage me but they’ll never cage my inner wolf.”

 

Ahhh Oregon, the "Florida Man" refuge of the Northwest.  But I suppose in an age when we're supposed to tolerate people "identifying" as everything from the opposite gender to kittens, we can forgive a man for assuming the role of werewolf.

The judge should dismiss the charges, on the grounds that this man has comedic value.

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"God must have needed a photographer, and He got the very best with Tim."

That was one of the very first thoughts that came to mind this morning.

My heart felt like it broke into a hundred pieces yesterday afternoon, upon hearing of the passing of my very good friend Tim Talley.

Tim was many things to many people.  I suppose the first aspect that comes to the minds of lots of folks is that he was an amazing photographer.  For more than forty years Tim made his mark not just in Reidsville and Rockingham County, but throughout the Piedmont region.  Tim was blessed with an incredible vision and sense of composition.  The man worked with light the way that the finest sculptors work with clay.  Tim came up with seemingly countless ways of staging photos and he would go to whatever lengths it took to pull them off.  He also had a way of bringing out the best of his subjects.  Everyone was beautiful in his eye and he knew how to capture and convey that with his camera.  Tim had ways of pulling off the almost impossible... like when he coaxed my dachshund Tammy into sitting still when we did a photo shoot with him in 2017.  I had told him that if he could do that then he was a better man than me... and lo and behold he did it!

If nothing else then the many thousands of portraits that he made, hanging in family living rooms throughout the region, attests to his talent.

Those who knew him best, though, will remember him for so much else.

Tim was a devoted husband to his wife Donna, and a father to his son Brandon.  He absolutely adored Brandon's wife and their three daughters. When Tim finally retired some years ago, it was always with it borne in mind that he and Donna were going to move to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania so he could be closer to Brandon and his family.

And once Tim got situated in Lancaster County, he very quickly made friends among the people there, especially his Amish neighbors.  I think Tim might have been the one photographer they trusted enough with his getting an occasional picture of them (but not for widespread publication, those were meant for his friends and family).  Not long after relocating there, Tim became the driver of a tour bus, and he became much beloved for his knowledge, his sense of humor, and just the fact that he was a southerner driving visitors around "Amish Country".

Tim's good cheer and friendliness were absolutely contagious.  His smile lit up everything... and every one... who came into his proximity.  I don't think Tim ever met a stranger.  And in that regard, he certainly became a role model for my own place in this world.

Tim had principles.  He stood resolute upon them.  I think it's safe to say that there were some people who didn't agree with those.  But there was too much respect for Tim than to think any less of him for those.  With Tim, you knew where he was positioned.  And that had to be admired by all who knew him or knew of him.

Tim devoted his life to serving God, in whatever capacity that might be.  God gave him a talent and Tim was determined to make the most of it.  He truly was a brother in Christ who cared for all who came into his life, for however long or brief it might have been.

I think that most of all, though, what especially rends my heart right now, is that I have lost a true friend.

I had my photo taken by Tim several times.  I also knew him from the Boy Scouts.  He and I were adult leaders in Reidsville's Troop 797.  In fact, that's where I first laid eyes on him, after seeing his work displayed around the area for years already.  Once, a month or so before I graduated from high school, Tim and me and several other Scouts and Scouters made a long drive to camp in the North Carolina mountains for a weekend and to hike part of the Appalachian Trail.  Tim made sure to bring a camera along to snap photos.  He took to mountain hiking the way a fish takes to water.  The troop also went camping a few times at Tim's place outside of Reidsville.

We were already friends.  When Facebook came along that gave us more opportunity to keep in touch on a regular basis.  Tim often shared some of his latest handiwork, and he was ever eager to demonstrate to his readers how he worked his trade.  I learned a lot about photography from Tim and his informal academy.  I believe a lot of people did, too.

Well, I could say so much, much more.  All that I really know since yesterday afternoon is that the world has lost a tremendously talented man, a family has lost a husband and a father and a grandfather, two communities hundreds of miles apart have lost a respected citizen, and I have lost a wonderful friend.

Until we meet again, Tim.  Thank you for being you. And I thank God that He let you be in our lives, for however brief a season it seemed.

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Keeping The Tryst has been released!!

Eleven years of on and off work.  A lot of things happened in that time.  Quite a few events and situations that kept changing the shape of the project.  All of that effort and at times sacrifice... and it culminates in tonight.

Keeping the Tryst hardcover edition just popped up on Amazon a short while ago.

Here's the hardcover version's page.  You can order that now.  The Kindle ebook version (Amazon page here) is still showing pre-orders but I imagine that status is going to change soon.

I don't know what else to say right now.  Just so very thrilled to see my book on sale, and maybe it will enlighten and edify and even entertain its readers.  That's one of the goals I had all along in writing it.

Okay, I didn't sleep at all last night, and I've got some work to do in the morning, so I'm going to turn in for the evening.  But I go to bed tonight a published book author... and that's a pretty neat feeling :-) 

Hope y'all enjoy it.

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Keeping the Tryst: The first copy has arrived!

It got here about thirty minutes ago.

As you can see Tammy approves! :-)

Keeping the Tryst arrives in hardcover and for Kindle ebook this coming Wednesday, October 1st, at 12:00 a.m. UTC.  That's 8:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on September 30th.  My friends and I are thinking of having a small release party counting down to the moment it publishes.  Hey how many times do you get to say in your life that your first book is being published? :-D 

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Happy Anniversary to The Rocky Horror Picture Show!

 Released in America fifty years ago yesterday, September 26 1975.

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An Elon student's very impressive op-ed about Queens merger

Last week my alma mater, Elon University, announced that it was merging with Queens University over a hundred miles away in Charlotte, North Carolina.  Which was a proclamation that had me - and many others it seems - scratching their heads.  What exactly is Elon's angle here?  The last time that Elon made any significant branching-out was the law school in Greensboro some years ago.  But that's vastly different from wholesale engulfing another higher-learning institution.

Along with the seemingly unceasing construction that's been going on for as long as I can remember (I graduated in 1999), it's now coming inescapably apparent that Elon has a voracious appetite for real estate and that's not necessarily a good thing.

Current Elon student Alex Nettles has composed an extremely well-written, researched and articulated opinion piece that's been published on Elon's in-house news operation.  "The Elon Empire: Why the Queens University merger shows deeper problems" is a nigh-on brutal intervention for the college's expansion ambitions.  In it, Nettles argues that Elon is looking more toward its geographic footprint more than where it should really matter.  Namely, increasing its endowment, which has become imperiled by current trends regarding enrollment at colleges nationwide.  As Nettles describes it...

Elon has a fixation on qualifying its success with physical growth. Go on a walk through campus. You’ll see why tours are a big deal here. They have a lot of buildings to point to, like a guide in Greece pointing to ruins. 

Outside of Richard W. Sankey hall, tour guides lead groups around, while gesturing at buildings. The steel frame of the Health EU building hangs in the distance. The construction site used to be an open field. Distant sounds of steel come close to disorienting the guide's extroversion. There is a legacy of physical growth as progress on campus. 

This legacy can be traced with how much we spend. The Health EU Building will cost $60 million, the East Neighborhood Commons cost $19.7 million and Founders and Innovation Hall cost $31 Million. A rough estimation of $110.7 Million since 2022. For perspective, the most recent endowment statistic was $322 million. 

So think about it.The endowment is our pool of money to shield a university from years of downturns.  We’ve spent 34% of our 2023 endowment. The money didn’t come straight from the endowment, but it reveals a lot. 

Well, it's just an enormously enlightening - and rather disturbing, if we are going to be honest - opinion piece.  Mr. Nettles should be proud of himself for the work itself and much more so, having the courage to put the issue in the forefront of the administration's awareness.  From one Elon columnist to another: bravo Alex Nettles! 

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Thankful to God for my Tammy

This has been a scary week at Knight Shift Headquarters.  Very scary.

On Monday, my miniature dachshund Tammy started yelping in pain at the least touch that I gave her.  Especially around her ears.  She's had ear infections before and they can be a real nuisance.  But she's never cried out before when I've tried to examine them.

Then came Tuesday.  And Tammy took a turn for the worst.

She had jumped up onto my bed that morning, and refused to move from her spot.  She hadn't eaten anything, she hadn't drank any water.  She didn't seem motivated by anything at all.

About noon Tammy laid down near my pillow.  Her breathing was labored.  And as the evening wore on it gradually became less pronounced.  She had this look in her eye, that I'd never seen before.  She looked... I don't know.  Tired.  Resigned.

I was really in fear of something.  That these were going to be Tammy's final hours.

I'm aware of things.  Next week she'll be thirteen and a half.  Tammy has been in great overall health, but dogs, like humans, don't live forever.  But I've made it a sacred mission of mine to give her a good long meaningful life, for as long as I can.  A few nights before Dad passed I promised him that I'd look after Tammy.  She was his dog too.  Indeed, she was more his dog than anyone else's.  He was the one who first had the idea of opening our home to a miniature dachshund puppy in 2012.  He was the one who named her.  She's always been her daddy's dog.  I'm just the guy who's taken care of her since Dad left us almost eleven years ago.

Two nights ago I really did find myself thinking that this might be it.  That she didn't have long.  I was bracing myself for the inevitable.  I knelt down by the bed and asked God for a miracle.  But I also told Him that if this was when Tammy and I had to be parted, I was thankful for all the years that He let us have.  They have been wonderful years.  Tammy and I have looked after each other all this time.  I've taken care of her and she's taken care of me.  We spent a year traveling across America together, and in that time she visited 18 states, played on the beaches of both the Atlantic and Pacific, has met so many people... I've tried my best to give her a good life, as full a one as a dog might have.

I really did come close to giving up.  I called one of my best friends and poured my heart out to him about what was going on.  And sometime during our conversation I did something that I haven't done in over ten years.  Something that I had thought was impossible to do, because I've come to think that the meds I take to manage my bipolar disorder had taken it away from me forever...

I started crying.  Real honest tears.  I cried for Tammy.  I couldn't imagine life without her.  It's just she and I in the area where we live.  We're half an hour from friends in Greenville, South Carolina.  If anything happened to either of us, the other would be left alone.

I didn't want to be left alone without her.

So I cried.  And it felt good.  It felt like a lot of things that I've carried pain about for over a decade came out.  I'm a grown man and I cried my heart out and some part of me was loving it.

I cried and I hoped somehow that God might see it.

The call ended.  I laid down next to Tammy.  And not for the first time that day, I prayed.

Then, about 8 p.m., Tammy suddenly jerked to life.

She came to, jumped up, stood on all four feet, walked around on the top of the bed, and then... she leapt off the bed and landed squarely on the bedroom floor.

Until the day that I die, it will be something that I will NEVER forget.

Tammy shot me a look.  If I were to translate what her eyes were telling me, it would be a single word: "Nope!"

She was telling me in her own way "Not now.  Not this night.  I'm not done yet."

Tammy walked around the room for a minute or so.  Then she went to my sleeping bag that's on the floor, she "nests" on it every now and then.  She curled up and laid her head down.

I called another friend, who I had been keeping informed all afternoon.  I told her about Tammy's leap.  And then in the midst of our phone call Tammy came to her feet again, got up and walked to her food dish where I had poured some food a few hours earlier.  She ate it all.  She then drank some water.  And then she walked out the door and into the hallway where I put her doggy pads.  She peed a lot and then went back to her nest.

That was two nights ago.

If anyone had told me 48 hours ago how Tammy would be tonight, I would not have believed it.  It really, truly is a miracle.  God reached down and touched Tammy.

It's now Thursday night.  Today Tammy has eaten a full meal, has also eaten some of her bacon-flavored dog treats as well as some of the chicken nuggets I made for dinner last night, is peeing and pooping normally, her breathing is regular, and earlier today she jumped up on the sofa as I was working on some stuff with my iPad.  I didn't even hear her come into the living room: she just suddenly appeared.  She's letting me rub her belly, which she likes.  She's yawning, in that very cute way that she yawns.  And she's smiling now, that patented Tammy-grin.

I am just totally shocked.  Bewildered.  In awe.  God has brought my dog from the edge of death and restored vibrant life to her.

She's still a little woozy.  I'm giving her half a tablet of Benadryl every six hours.  One of my best friends suggested that Tammy perhaps has had an allergic reaction to something.  It's possible.  Dogs, just like humans, have different reactions as they get older.  If that's the case then the Benadryl is likely addressing that.  It's making her a little drowsy.  She's snoozing atop a blanket on the living room floor as  I write these words, I gave her another half-tablet about an hour and a half ago.

My dog is alive, and recovering.  She's going to make it.  Two nights ago I thought she was gone.  I was desperately praying for a miracle.

And God sent one.

Our Lord spoke of the kingdom of Heaven being like the woman who loses a coin, and searches for it and cannot find it.  And then when she does, she tells all her friends and neighbors that she has found it and she praises God for it.

I almost lost my dog.  My sweetest little friend in this life.  Tammy gets a bit of space in the book I've written that will be published next week.  She's owed that.  She has kept me from making some horrible mistakes over the years.  I couldn't go through with them because well, who would take care of her if not me?  Like I said, we've taken care of each other.

I am compelled to praise God tonight.  And as I ask Him each night, I hope that He will give Tammy and me many more years together.

From now on, if anyone asks me if I have faith in God, I will absolutely say yes.  Because I've seen Him work. Tammy's leap from the bed the other night and recovery since then is testament to that.

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Forgive me, for I have sinned (against good grammar)...

This is something I need to get off my chest, before anyone jumps flunky on me about it.  Because YES I know this is wrong.  I'm well aware of it.  But it's not something I can go back and fix so I might as well embrace the horror.

Here is a snapshot of Keeping the Tryst's page on Amazon (for the Kindle edition).  Notice anything?

The "the" in the title is capitalized.  It shouldn't be.  "The" is such a minor word that it's VERY rarely if EVER used in the title of something (except for songs, it seems like every word in a song title is capitalized for some reason).

It SHOULD be expressed as "Keeping the Tryst", and not "Keeping The Tryst".  What happened?  Blame me for typing it so fast on the hardcover edition's title field and not recognizing it until after I had submitted that one to Amazon.  I did it on the Kindle edition too but then realized what I had done.   I can repair the "damage" on the Kindle version but for some reason the system isn't letting me do it for the hardcover.  So I pretty much am just shrugging and capitalizing it as "Keeping The Tryst" for both of them.  The subtitles are appropriately capitalized properly though.

So, that's the story behind that.  But I hope that readers will be kind and overlook it and still be able to enjoy the book.  And hey, maybe in time it will be that I have established some precedent and it becomes good grammar after all: capitalizing every word in a title, but not the subtitle.  It could be my own humble lil' addition to the English language.

A writer can hope, can't he??

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