Tag Archives: life

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The Deepest of Pains

We writers are a strange breed. We spend quite a lot of time being different people, in different places, doing different things. I have been every race under the sun, I have been nearly every occupation, and I have drifted from being the kindest of hearts to the most vile and repugnant of them all. I feel that to truly write a good story you must become your characters, and not just your heroes either. Now of course this doesn’t mean I occupy my time kicking kittens and popping balloons when I’m writing a villain, but I do take the time to seclude myself and get into the head of each of my characters, living as them, breathing as them, dying as them.

There’s a movie Will Farrell was in, Stranger Than Fiction, which I regrettably never got to finish but enjoyed immensely nonetheless. In that movie, the writer therein would make common practice of becoming every experience she was writing, culminating in my favorite scene, the “dying” scene. The writer is stuck in that she is trying desperately to find the right way to kill her protagonist, and spends much of the movie in various states of “death”. One of my favorite scenes has her standing barefoot on the edge of her coffee table. The woman who is supposed to be helping to motivate her and keep her on task walks into the room and asks what she’s doing. The writer replies “I’m going to kill myself” and after gathering her nerve, jumps off of the table. A few moments later she declares “No, that’s not it either” and sets about finding a new way to “end her life”. Another favorite has the writer standing in a powerful rainstorm, contemplating the sensation of drowning. To me, these are some of the purist representations of the place many writers take themselves when creating the most authentic of works.

I try not to work on a novel when anyone else is in my house. I’m routinely walking, jogging or running up and down the hallway and bounding all over the room depending on what the circumstance demands. I speak in no fewer than three different languages, most of them in human tongue, at varying pitches and octaves with varying levels of ferocity and timidity. I speak and act the parts of heroes, villains, boys and girls. Humans, aliens, angels, devils, all of them. On rare occasion I’ll let an extremely curious friend in on small parts of my creative process, but have to date shown no one the process in totality.

Writing is a very private and intimate thing. Writing is a very public and outspoken thing. Writing simply is.

 

I spend a lot of my time contemplating worsts. Depending on the type of story I’m working on, as I lay still and “dive”, I contemplate what the worst something is. One of those worsts is pain. Not physical, rather spiritual, emotional and psychological. In the stories of others, whether a novel, an anime, a movie or a video game, I am always looking to feel something. I’m very off put by media that makes me feel nothing. That isn’t to say I don’t enjoy, say, Expendables 2 for instance (which makes me feel quite a broad range of things to be truthful :D), and I’m far from the critic who decries any media that is not “artsy” and “avant garde”, but I need to feel something. I once spent an entire day listening to four hundred different versions of “Cry Me a River” trying to find one that made me feel on the level I was looking for. I haven’t quite found the sound I’m looking for, but Susan Boyle has a lovely rendition.

There are times that I ponder what is the worst pain or most frustrating pain to find oneself in. I can’t really put into words my interest in that anymore than I can in the macabre, dissonant or whatever else is in between, but it’s something that makes me curious nonetheless. I think that, in many ways as writers we use our novels as a catharsis  as a means to push through our struggles, celebrate the joys of the world, or simply experience something unique, different and new.

There are some stories, such as Epsilon’s Eclipse that I write simply because I desire to challenge myself, to see if I can write something that seems quite impossible to do with a Christian emphasis. There are other stories such as The Ballad of the Damned that I write because of an interest in the genre. There are other stories, such as The Blackest Rain, that come to life because I needed an outlet for my struggles at the time, and writing is how the world makes sense to me.

I would like to take this time to state quite clearly that this world makes very little sense to me; it is simultaneously uninteresting and the most interesting thing in existence, and filled with both the most wretched examples of life, and the most wonderful caricatures thereof. In short, the world is a beautiful ugly awful wonderful place that is very exciting to experience each turn anew.

Writing helps me gain perspective and push through certain experiences. I pondered this evening the question of what I find to be the most awful or deepest of pains. If you asked me this question two years ago (was it two? I honestly stopped counting quite a bit ago), I would say that one of the deepest pains that can be inflicted upon you is that of caring for someone more than they care for you. Today, I think the most frustrating one is feeling as though you cannot be heard.

Something of this difficulty can be seen in More Than a Fairytale Book 1: Xea’s Story. The protagonist has a very rocky relationship with their parents, and an all but nonexistent one with their sister. In this novel we see Xea struggling to deal with a very painful secret in the past, as well as a family in which there is nothing in common and very little to relate to. The relationship we see between father and child in particular is a quite difficult one for Xea to reconcile and push through, and the relationship between siblings is one in which communication has little to no weight, bearing or possibility.

I think the most frustrating thing is feeling as though what you have to say doesn’t matter, or that the person you wish to say it to simply won’t listen, change or budge. Now, in many situations this is actually quite easy to deal with. Aggravating though it my be, you can always walk away from a friend or significant other. Well, unless you’re married. Then you’d best find a way to work that out! Ah, but I digress, in a friend or a boyfriend/girlfriend you can simply decide enough is enough and part ways either for a time or something more permanent. This becomes more complicated when the individual whom you feel you matter very little to is say, a boss or family member.

Before anyone takes this out of context, my boss is super mega awesome.

I have both been recently and in the past in one of the less desirable scenarios, as have many of my friends, and to put it frankly, it sucks. I think that the more you love, adore or look up to and respect the individual, the more infuriating the situation becomes. You begin a downward spiral in which you feel your best is never good enough, you rack your brain constantly trying to find the right thing to say, you feel like it’s impossible to speak to the person about anything that upsets you or hurts you, because you feel that individual simply doesn’t care. Perhaps you’ve tried, perhaps that person only responds to you with anger, or an antagonistic tone. Perhaps experience has taught you that no matter what you do it will not be received, or met with ridicule. Perhaps you’ve explored every option that you can imagine, and yet something beyond you feeling worse than when you began yet eludes you.

What’s the solution?

*shrug*

Heaven if I know!

That’s the wonderful thing about being human; not a one of us has all of the answers. Part of why I write the books that I do, beyond spreading the gospel in an innovative way and spinning a good yarn, is because I figure there’s no such thing as new pain under the sun. If you’re experiencing something awful, chances are someone else in the world has and is as well. If you have no idea what to do about it, I can guarantee you that there are hundreds, even thousands of others that a grasping at quicksand just as gravely as you are. I figure, for the pains that I’ve figured out, perhaps someone else can read my novels and figure something out too. If nothing else, perhaps they’ll see that life goes on, and it does get better.

If I haven’t figured it out, well, at least you know you’re not the only one going through it!

I have learned quite strongly if nothing else in my life, you can’t force someone to change or to listen. For those people that you can do something about, perhaps it’s time to do something about. For those that you can’t, well…

A little prayer goes a long way. Good evening everyone, be blessed and may God watch over you all.

 

-Eugene W.
a.k.a. Xeawn R.

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So, Let’s Talk about Death!

So, let’s talk death huh? Yaaay! This is a topic that most people tend to shy away from, which is very interesting. If you are a saved and baptized believer, you know that as Vlad Dracul would say “Transient guests are we.”

We exist in a world that despises both us and our Lord and Savior, and we know that once we depart from this place we’re going to the most wonderful, peaceful and pain free place that we can’t possibly even begin to fathom. Yet people are afraid to talk about dying.

For those of us that are left behind, it can be an awful feeling where, we know our loved ones are in a much better place, but that doesn’t matter too much at the time because we want them here. We want them with us. We miss them, we love them, we need them, and nothing can really prepare you for the pain and loss that you’ll experience, even if you knew it was coming for some time.

I remember when my grandmother Wenona Irma Ward passed, I was completely and totally devastated. I’d been taking care of her for three years as she had gotten very ill in her late life, and every day she was such a large part of mine. I would get up in the morning and come to her room after checking on her all throughout the night. I would help her up, and once she was ready to face her day I’d make sure she had a good breakfast. I would call and check on her and talk to her throughout the day, and when I came home I would make her dinner.

We would eat together and talk about our days, and we would break bread together. I would sit and have tea with her and we would talk about everything under the sun. She would share with me her memories, her joys, her sorrows and her regrets. When she knew that it was her time, two days before we took her to the hospital, she told me

“Grandson, dearest, I want you to promise me something.”

And I said

“Yes ma’am?”

And she said

“Everyone else is going cry when I go home. I’d tell them not to, but, they won’t listen. But you, don’t you cry until I go home. I want you to smile to me, and talk to me, and sing to me, right up until I’m gone. I don’t want my death to cause anyone pain; it’s a happy occasion. When I go though, then you can cry. Promise?”

And I nodded and said

“Yes ma’am.”

And I honored her promise.

I knew that my grandmother was passing, and even then I wasn’t prepared. What really broke me was I wasn’t there when she died. I don’t regret it; she told me “Boy, you better go to work!” and so I did. I’d stayed at the hospital for like, three days and nights with her, and then I went into work that morning. I got the call right after a meeting I was at ended, that was slipping and it was time. I got to the hospital a handful of minutes after she was gone.

I honored my promise and didn’t cry until they had put her in the bag and taken her away. I thought I was ready. I clearly wasn’t. I completely fell apart and sobbed so hard I almost collapsed.

My family and my friends protected and supported me during this time, and I think on her now with nothing but the fondest of memories. Death is never something we’re prepared for, but it always means something. It is no respecter of person; whether you are rich or poor, young or old, brave or cowardly, death comes for us all. The only difference is, where will you go when you die?

John 3:16, “For God so loved the world he gave his only son that whosoever believeth in him shant perish but instead have everlasting life.”

John 4:16 “I am the way the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me.”

Death is permanent, death is no respecter of person, and death should always mean something.

One convention that I’m never very fond of is killing a character and then bringing them back and then killing a character and then bringing them back and so on and so forth. I don’t necessarily mind that near death suspenseful moment where you’re holding your breath and hoping and praying the hero will open their eyes and make it, as long as it’s not dreadfully over used. Overall though, I feel like when you kill a character, especially a protagonist, and then you’re like “Oh wait, I’m totally okay!” that just sorta makes the whole experience feel cheapened.

Now, I think in the right place it can be a well done plot device, but I feel like in that instance it shouldn’t be one of those “I watched you get shot/stabbed right in the head/heart! How are you still here?”

“Oh, well, using the ancient technique of/using the power of/using time travel/using etc. I came back!” type of deals.

By and large I’m a firm believer that when you die, you’re dead. Unless you’ve got a darn good reason to suddenly not be dead, if you die in one of my novels you’re gone. In that regard, I try to be exceedingly cautious when I make the decision to end a character’s life, hero or villain. When someone dies, or when you’re afraid that someone is going to die, it means so much more when you know that there’s nothing that can change what’s coming.

When you understand the weight and importance of death in a Dragon House Studios novel, and you’re reading and being taken on this hard won hard fought journey where nothing is promised, you’re pulled in so much deeper than before. I think two of the greatest compliments I’ve ever received on my writing was when one person told me “I was so mad at you! I was so scared that ___ was going to die, and you just dragged that out and I kept waiting and hoping and then there were the blank pages of silence and then-“ and I’m just gonna stop right there before something gets spoiled for you.

The other compliment was when someone, a friend, came up and punched me in the arm shouting “YOU JERK! YOU KILLED ___! I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU KILLED ____! I HATE YOU SO MUCH RIGHT NOW!!!”

Yeah, it was pretty great.

This is gonna sound a little bit morbid, but, I feel like if I’m able to elicit that strong of a reaction out of character death then I’ve done my job well. You’re endeared to a character, you’re attached to them, you love them and you care for their well-being. When they hurt, you hurt. When they smile, you smile. When they experience loss, you experience that loss right along with them…and when they die…

It means something.

So, do you know where you’re going when you’re gone? How do you feel about character deaths? Have you experienced a loss that shook you as well? Take heart and faith in the love and goodness of God and His promises, and know that there’s a home in heaven for all of us. This has been a Dragon House Studios spotlight. Much love, God bless, and be safe out there.

-Eugene A.R. Ward
“Xeawn”