It was his third time around the planet. Each time he looked down he saw a lifeless expanse, from the sand he could nearly touch to the horizon. He thought about the place he left, a land of water and rivers and willow trees and ants. A place of computers, robots, and technots, and where every fantasy can, in the neurons and synapses of the brain, register memory and make a man sweat. He thought about leaving Martha. He could not return.

The landscape below sped approximately at the rate of his ship, 630 kilometers per hour. He began to fire the forward thrusters and stabilizers, which would begin to slow the ship until he could touch down on the soft sand. The land would support the ship. He knew this because he watched the descent of his welcome probe 18 hours earlier, seeing it touch down and stretch its legs firmly into the ground.

This was better. A land of solace and death. He deserved this, he thought.

In six years he would transform the planet from sand and buried organic material to a planet which could support a small community of people. Ten years after that, he could greet thousands to his planet, which would then have atmosphere, rain, and a sky that would be between the color of cobalt and turquoise. That is, if he landed with care. And if he set up a sublunary communicator. And if he perched his ballast beacon toward Earth. If he cared to pack the ballast beacon. If he cared.

Disappointed by the fork in the road, the traveler picked up the utensil and stuck it in his pocket. He imagined on his walk the next time he would spot a fork in the road. That time, he thought, he would place it in his other pocket.

Congratulating himself on his attentive planning, he began a careful plan to spot forks in the road.

She was a dusty girl from Tulsa. He was a scotch drinker from Sioux Falls. They leaned over the table at each other and spoke over a score of Jackson Browne, Stevie Wonder, Stevie Nicks, and Sade. She wondered if they could sip drinks slower and make the conversation last until dawn. She wondered if they would sip coffee in the morning. This morning. Tomorrow morning. For the rest of her life. He thought about his ex wife. His mistake. Juggling emotions, plates falling, broken pieces all over the floor.

They held hands. Spun to the beat of drums, trumpets, Lionel Ritche. All night long.

Exchanged cell phone numbers.

Doors closed. No mistake.

She walked left, towards the table next to the pay phone, and sat down next to Diane and Julie. He walked out and turned towards the sports bar. Crossed the street. Crossed his heart. Crossed his fingers. And returned to the the girl from Tulsa.

It's like this - After surprising my teachers, my wife, and myself, I finished with a M.A. in Education and thought I would get a teaching job in a public school with no problem. Then I thought I would accept a job at a private school or even tutoring at Sylvan. I don't want to post a lot about my trials and that is one reason I'm not writing a lot. Right now, I am substitute teaching and learning a lot of lessons. I am learning how to treat students well. I am learning to teach to students with short attention spans. I am learning that strategies that work with children with ADD or ADHD OR Asperger's syndrome will work with any child in the class. I have worked with disruptive students and "lost my cool". I have worked with distruptive children and smiled, laughed, sang a clean up song and thought "I could do this forever." I find that substitute teaching is not fair, since the substitute does not have the respect nor the credibility of the classroom teacher. But it is a necessary temporary vocation, especially when I realize how teachers have lives too. Teachers have homes and children and obligations. Teachers need to take days off and trust their students are going to be taught ... professionally.

I do not remember a single substitute teacher when I was growing up. I do not want to be substitute teaching. The work is difficult. The pay is appropriate, considering the supply and the demand. But I also care about students. I am not going to let students run the class. No. In fact, I have tried to establish some norms when I have worked in jobs more than one day.

I have not posted a lot in the past few months because I do not want my trials in this transition year to be open for examination. There are trails, yet I am strong enough to know that some principal, some school is going to be fortunate to land a surprising talent like myself. Conceited? Well, maybe confident. Confident enough with a sprinkle of humility. I am not am a perfect polished diamond, but I am a teacher. I am a good teacher. I am creative, prepared, spontaneous, willing to learn, energetic, intelligent and wise. And I am getting better every day.

And yet another post about writing. Is there a magic formula for being a writer? Observe, Think, Write.

My daughter and I drove to a public library today. When I was about to turn the car into the library parking lot, I noticed the lot was empty and there were police cars and barriers blocking the way. Except for the police presence and the media, the outside of the building was eerily quiet. I turned right into an adjacent parking lot and I asked a by-stander, for he was literally standing by the closed parking lot, "What's going on?" It turns out there was a fatal shooting in the parking lot this morning.

Is this something to write a story about? Probably not. We came home, my wife was on the couch watching Oprah, but at a break we recorded the noon news and later saw the reporter describing the scene from the library parking lot.

Now this question has been on my mind for some time now. Not a week or a year but maybe for 20 or 30 years. I sit in front of my computer and I wonder what good writers are doing right now. Alfred Flan is writing at his word processor a third version of chapter three, in a novel called Chapter Three. Margaret O'Sullivan works with pen in hand. She invites the words like the biscotto, sometimes called biscotti, in her tea. You get the idea. Fred Winters, Carleton Chambers, Carmen Arnette. David Tumbarello. You get the idea. The only difference is that I have never thought of myself as a book writer. I can write prose pieces. I can string some pretty genius words together and occasionally impress my professors or some other person of importance. In seven months I will have an article published. I made an impression on an editor.

Today I read three stories. Incredible stories. Quite often I read a story and I stop myself about the time I finish the sentence "I can do that." I think the words and I remember I have never had success writing fiction. What is it about character, setting, events, and voice? I got the voice part. At least I've had it when I respond to prompts in graduate school. "Compare the emphasis on differentiated instruction in Fountas & Pinnell versus Martha Combs works on teaching elementary school language arts skills." Oh, I got that covered. Ask me write my thoughts or response to any scholarly topic. Got that too.

Now fiction. Fiction. Elusive.

Here is my thought of the night. Writing begins with an idea. Hum-wow. but it is true -- writing begins with an idea. Well, actually, it can also begin with writing, I suppose, but in the creative mind of Mr. Tumbarello, this thought is going to carry me to write my first book. (The author actually attempted to begin a book last year while taking a class on children's literature, but he bailed out after about three chapters, when the list of characters began to get greater than four.) And my brilliant idea of the night, besides the one mentioned in the second sentence of this paragraph, is the following: write about a boy who says "I can do that." Of course the irony is charming. If one can personify irony, which is an appropriate aside, since Ovid's Metamorphosis sits to my left on the desk by my PC.

So draft one would begin like this:
"On Friday, Charlie Templeton finished reading his favorite book, Biker Sam, for the fifth time that week."
and it would end like this:
"He closed the book and wondered about the boy this story would inspire."

I'm sure there are some appropriate pages & lines that will go in between those brilliant book ends, but I am not ready to .......

A handful of dreamdust for my pirate
He can hear the Pacific singing
The sea meets delight in his saltwater eyes
Icy pictures of the water are captured in his ring


The petals of night are unfolding
A mermaids map floats by on the rolling green
A Japanese fishing float
Carries my soul out to the whales
And out to the deep

I wonder 'bout the herds of the sea
If they will hurt or if they will help me?

Swimming with my fallen blossoms
I drink from the source above...

A handful of dreamdust for my pirate
He can hear the Pacific singing.


Try this link or this link.

Picture Day!! Some pictures from my "graduation" evening:












Some pictures from Silver Lake:

Now I'm not in favor of throwing shoes at the President of the United States, but there are some humorous gifs of the incident here.