Flash Fiction: Testimony of Johnathan Lawrence, Murder Trial #4565

April 24, 2015April 24, 2015 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

Um, I’m not really sure what happened here. I felt the pressure to write something new tonight, as I don’t want to disappoint those that have been looking for something new from me each night, but also because I really need to push myself to write everyday.

And when I push myself, I really do seem to surprise myself. Nothing is perfect, but it sure is entertaining sometimes. I also might be watching reruns of Bones tonight…which might act as some accidental inspiration. 😉

Happy Weekend everyone!

The Testimony of Johnathan Lawrence, Murder Trial #4565.

She’s got that look that she’s been used too many times. Like her face would have dried up, if she didn’t keep applying make up. Maybe last week she had a someone, maybe it was yesterday. What’s the term they use for women who have…let me say…”been around the bend?”

Ah, she had her uses I suppose. Her hair was that smooth, silky black, her eyes wounded, her lips pouty. I loved the way she chewed them when she was speaking to me. As if every word next out of that sticky, pink mouth was going to say something holy – something worthy of remembering. She didn’t really have a sense of humor. It took her a while to get to the point. Or maybe that’s just because she thought too much about the answer. Thinks that maybe saying the wrong thing will get her hit again. Just how it happened when she was ten, just how it happened when she first slept with her ex-boyfriend.

[The first lawyer asks the witness] Did you hit her John?

No! I didn’t hit her! What kind of jackass do you think I am? I just like it when she did what she does. You know…down there. God, the magic of a woman’s mouth. You know, I liked it when she got real slippery…would giggle like a little girl. [Someone clears their throat. Probably the lawyer]. Huh. So that’s why she looked so wounded. You’d think she’d have figured out that’s not the way to be. Turns a man off, you know? I guess all the hitting made her stupid. She sure was nice to look at, though.

What was the name she gave me? Hell, if I remember. Anita? No, Laura? Yes, Laura. Laura Tippleton. She told me that she liked to go downtown sometimes at Midnight. That’s where they would find her. You know…her “conquests.” [Witness laughs]. That’s where she found me.

[The second lawyer, this one female asks:] Did she like to go down to the river?

Well, I guess. Maybe she would skip rocks or something like that. Fish. You know, she used to say if you look at the surface of the water long enough you could see the future, I just thought she got hit in the head too many times.

[The first lawyer looks up from the table where he sits next to a young man; a greasy young man who is hand cuffed and wears an orange jump suit.]

[The female lawyer asks] Do you think she saw anything in the river?

[The witness on the stand looks puzzled. He rubs at the grizzle on his face. Adjusts his red cap with oil-stained fingers.]

[The judge begs him to answer the question.]

[The witness’s eyes cross and his mouth works, then pauses, and then he speaks.] I guess not then, huh? Because that’s where they found her, isn’t? Hell, you never know the finality of life until it is staring you in the face. Plum, staring you in the face. Would have been nice of the river to tell her that. Maybe they wouldn’t have found her like they did. I wish I could have told her that. I, well…I’m sorry I couldn’t remember her name.

[The female lawyer gives him a long, hard look, but it is not completely unkind. Her eyes glance, just once over to the judge. She speaks.] No further questions.

A start at Flash-fiction: Smelling Sunshine

April 15, 2015April 15, 2015 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

Just some musings in the car parking lot while I was waiting for my boyfriend to get out of work this afternoon. I’ve been trying to push my self to write more and more this week and it’s funny how comfortable I seem to be writing in the oddest of places.

Put me in front of my desk at home in my office and suddenly there’s everything else to do and check out. Like youtube. And facebook, and of course, 5 amazingly awesome recipes and articles and gah! I am a terrible person sometimes.

I’m actually pretty proud of this. I’m not sure what it is, exactly, but I’ll call it a start to some flash fiction, which I want to try to write more of. I do consider myself a fiction writer afterall, but…I’m having fun dabbling in a little bit of everything at the moment.

I hope everyone is having a great evening. Happy Writing!

Smelling Sunshine

I blink, unable to see. The glare from the cars in the parking lot blind me; their busty trunks and fenders glisten, catching the day’s brilliance in colors of blue, gray, white and green. I can hear the brrrrggh of cars running and the rumbling cough and sputter of a car that doesn’t want to start.

The cool air blows through my car window and it smells like exhaust, tires and left-over winter, but its icicle-taste has gone stale in my mouth. Spring is in the air now and the world looks cheery, full of fake promises; like when a person says one thing and means another.

Sure, the world can look great on the outside if it wants to. The sky that robin’s egg blue, with white wispy clouds so high up, you wonder if the scientists up in space can see what you see. But inside and outside, everything and everyone is often something different.

Take this person. She is average height. Average looks with a plain T-shirt with writing on that stretches across her boobs, that says something obscene like “Bob’s Big Ones,” that makes you read what it says and everything else underneath.

Maybe she shouldn’t have left the house in those sweat pants. But she looks tired. Her brown hair is pulled back in a pony tail, and she wears a harassed expression. She’ll thank the cashier who wishes her a great day as she grabs her groceries, but inside she’s really thinking: God, just one more day. Am I really where I’m meant to be?

An old man in the deli misses his late wife of fifty years. A middle-aged woman clutches a tomato in her hand in the middle of the produce and worries her husband is having an affair with his secretary; this is just the color of lipstick that she would wear. A college student with braids, glasses and uni-brow, listens to music and thinks about geology as she grabs at a container of hummus.

Every life’s a puzzle, and every puzzle a piece of the mystery. We are never what we say we are, and that includes the weather. Maybe that’s why I have this feeling that something bad is about to happen. I can just hear my mother right now: Oh, stop, you are being ridiculous. My boyfriend would tell me I am being dramatic.

But it’s there waiting for you. Waiting…Waiting…Waiting for you to….Strike! Just kidding. Waiting for you to wake up and open your eyes and smell the sunshine.

And I’ll see and see, and breathe it in as long as I can.

Life is what that is. Life.

An English Major’s Struggle To Find a Job

January 16, 2015 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

I recently took a new job here, (go figure, right?)…something that has me typing information at a desk, not customer service, not worrying about sales pitch – did I get it right? Just plain old monotonous information, and type-type typing away.

And while this job was described to me as incredibly boring, I can’t but help be somewhat relieved. Left to my own thoughts, my own devices, I am more productive, less stressed and overall satisfied. Plus, I don’t have to talk to anyone if I don’t want to. Is it sad how much this is a relief to me?

Ever since college I have been struggling finding my way or niche in this world…I watch friends of mine, graduates from the same college get jobs at corporations, in the classroom, or go on to pursue higher education at graduate school.

I am proud of them and their accomplishments, but where does that leave me? Taking a job in retail, in customer service, in collections…finding places that pay the big bucks with little need to think or grow? I don’t live in an area that offers an overwhelming amount of options, either. I feel like I have ruined my job experience…even the manager that recently interviewed me said he was worried about hiring me…”Your job history seems a little…scattered,” he said.

“Oh, I know,” I said, and then shrugged. What could I say?

“I missed the boat when it came to moving to Florida?”

“I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up?”

Life is difficult and not always forgiving when it comes to pursuing your dreams and passions. I got an English degree, so everyone assumed that I wanted to be a teacher. I worked in customer service, so everyone assumed that I’m great on the phone, and love to help others. (I am great on the phone by the way. Former debt collector here, watch out!)

But what to do…what to do, when all of the world seems to be telling me that I am a failure? I took the jobs…because I needed the money. Not everyone has a savings or rich relatives. (Oh, but wouldn’t that be nice!)Since I was a young teen, the one thing that I consider myself great at is writing. This led to the thought: “I’ll be a writer.” Yet, with the pressure on to pay the bills…is such a desire a pipe dream? Or should I really just bite the bullet and go back to college…even though I don’t know what I want to study?

The questions are endless and the emotions boarding on that feeling of overwhelming sadness. I think the real answer to these questions are:

Do what makes you happy and don’t worry what everyone else thinks.

My head is grasping for the words of advice I’ve heard many times: “Don’t give up, you’ll get there.”

“Believe in yourself.”

“Never stop writing.”

“Don’t lose faith in yourself.”

Yet, they seem to be falling on deaf ears this afternoon, or falling in the cracks of heater and getting lodged there, (God knows little heat is getting out!).

The sun is peaking out of the clouds now, and the snow has finally stopped. For some reason Dory’s voice from Finding Nemo has snuck its way into my head:

“Just keep swimming…just keep swimming…What do we do? We swim!”

Hmm…I am a terrible swimmer, but I can keep going, no matter how difficult it is…

The truth of the matter is, I am not unhappy here, sitting at my desk in the sunshine, which is creeping through to land on the floor and the cheery, yellow walls of my office.

I can keep on swimming, and I can begin to stop listening to what others think…because only my opinion matters in this instance. Being a writer is my pipe dream, and that’s all that matters.

I can keep on swimming no matter the cost.

Poetry: I can write haiku, can you?

January 16, 2015January 16, 2015 / Ajmorse / 2 Comments

It’s snowing outside, tiny flakes coming down from the sky in all directions, swirling chaotically around cars and the pavement outside my window.

View from my office window.

Naturally this makes me want to write, of course. I don’t know what it is…maybe because it’s warm in our apartment, I woke up refreshed (finally) after a good nights sleep and I have the day off from work.

Maybe there’s something in the way that snowy sleepy days naturally put me in a thoughtful mood, and thoughtful moods generally lead to writing…if I were a painter, I’d paint the heck out of a glorious snowy day, but alas, the best brush I have, is the brush of words on blank, blank paper.

And of course, the last sentence I just wrote had me thinking about haiku poems. It’s been ages since I’ve written one…not since college three years ago. I found a refresher at this website, here.

(From the website:) The haiku is a Japanese verse in three lines. Line one has 5 syllables, line 2 has 7 syllables and line three has 5 syllables. Haiku is a mood poem and it doesn’t use any metaphors or similes.

View of the moon and snowy trees at my Grandma’s house, the evening of Thanksgiving.

I don’t usually think of myself as a poet. My advance poetry teacher in college said to me once, “You are definitely a fiction writer.” And that seemed to cement the idea in my brain. He didn’t mean to say that I was inept at poetry, just that eventually all writers make a choice, and I am a lover of stories and so naturally fiction was my style of choice.

But lately, I am constantly reminded by poetry why writing descriptive, lyrical words are so important. Why some fiction is just poetry in an extended form. In a single poem, an image is created in just a few words. I think poetry is a great way to remind fiction writers how important it is to show, not tell what is happening in the story, but to focus on the concise, and descriptive words.

Here’s some haiku of my own. Some silly, some serious, some not really haiku poems at all, but all poetry:

The bright yellow sun shines

through icicles hanging

on the windowsill

icicles remind

us to mind the cold weather

bundle up you beasts

dogs don’t like the snow

wagging their tails between gusts

shivering snow and wind

the snow swirls around the pavement

children walk by with parents

hands howling in their gloves

So much depends upon a red wheelbarrow…

(Just kidding! haha…can’t get this poem out of my head for some reason! For those that don’t know this is the start of a poem, “The Red Wheelbarrow,” by William Carlos Williams. I remember there were those that either loved it or hated it in my poetry class. There was a great debate that followed about it.)

And lastly, another haiku of my own:

The dead of winter

snow falls down on black pavement

eat lunch, eat sunlight

This has been a lot of fun for me this afternoon. Feel free to comment with your own, if you like!

Happy Writing!

What Makes Life Worth Living?

January 6, 2015 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

These last couple of day have been stressful for us. My car is in the shop, it is 7 degrees outside, and until I get paid next week, I have about $2.

Life is not exactly easy when you live paycheck to paycheck, and although I am trying to look on the positive side, sometimes I do start to hyperventilate. The man in my life, although he pretends to be all manly and tough most of the time, said it this way: “We have each other, babe.”

And as corny as that sounds, I had a thought about it. It may seem like the end of the world when you can’t pay your bills, but it’s really not. Sure, you get behind, it happens. But life is in the people you love, in the people who love you and in the times you share together.

Love doesn’t pay the bills, but it sure does remind you what makes life worth living. And that’s all I need for the time being.

Oh, and brownies:

I made these tonight with this recipe here, (with my own tweaks of course) and I think these will go well with a cup of hot coco, yes? 🙂

I counted on my fingers before bed…I have a at least fifteen friends and family that love me. I am not without love in my life. I am poor, but I am not worthless.

These thoughts of failure, life stresses and worthlessness made me think of what Clarence writes in George’s book in the end of It’s a Wonderful Life:

“Remember, George: no man is a failure who has friends.”

No…they are most definitely not. I hope everyone is keeping warm, and positive this cold, Tuesday night.

Happy Writing everyone!

It Really IS a Wonderful Life…

December 26, 2014December 28, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

These last couple days have been a blast. Christmas isn’t apparently just one day in our house, we have been celebrating more of a Christmas week. I think it is definitely time to start eating healthier again, though, and to start exercising. And on that note, while taking a walk on Christmas day near my Grandma’s house, we came upon an old cemetery, and this headstone:

Not only is it interesting that this person from middle-of no-where-upstate, New York, fought and died for his country, someone somewhere out there still appreciates him. He was a veteran and that still matters, even if it happened over 50 years ago.

The flowers in front of his headstone were blown over and covered with leaves, but we dusted them off, and nestled them in front of his grave. The wind was blowing and the rain started splattering on our faces, and I tried to identify the significance this moment could possibly have.

Was it sad to be in a graveyard on Christmas afternoon? Was the rain and gloominess really just a way to emphasize it? Every little detail became so important suddenly: the curiosity on my boyfriend’s face as he yells across the headstones: “Look at this one, babe!”

The way the land curves and rolls; the mounds of grass, the moss that grows in splotches; and the path that cuts through the cemetery between tall, long-limbed trees. If you stood at one end of the path and looked down it, you get the impression that it goes on forever; that life continues somewhere on the “other side” where the road ends.

And meanwhile, the sky is so gray the clouds seem grumpy, like steel-gray eyebrows furrowed in disappointment, that it seems nearly impossible to find the light in the darkness, to stand tall and go about your day.

Except, I wasn’t sad or disappointed, I just felt…blessed. I was thankful to be where I am, in the country I am, with the people who I love and that belong to me. I felt proud for this soldier who had represented my country, and honored that I was the one who righted his flowers, to tell him, (even if it was just in a small way), that he did matter and still does to those who understand freedom and cherish it like I do.

I felt irony because of the name on the headstone, which happens to be the veteran’s father: George Bailey.

George Bailey, the name of the character in It’s a Wonderful Life, the man who didn’t know what wealth truly was until it was taken away from him. That our worth isn’t measured in the dollars in our pockets, but in the lives we touch and the people who love us most.

And isn’t that at the heart of Christmas?

I had a fantastic holiday, and I hope everyone else did, too. Did you do anything special this year? Vacation in the tropics? I’d love to hear about it.

Happy Writing everyone!

The Hunger Games, Mockingjay Part 1 Review: Jennifer Lawrence IS the Mockingjay

November 25, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

If you haven’t read the books, or haven’t seen the latest Hunger Games movie, Mockingjay Part 1, beware there are spoilers ahead.

The last time we saw Katniss Everdeen, was in Catching Fire after she had destroyed the arena and was picked up by the rebellion. In Mockingjay Part one, Katniss is left to pick up the broken pieces of her sanity, and to come to terms with the things she didn’t know existed before: namely, the rebellion and district 13.

In the excitement to remove her from the crumbling wreckage of the quarter quell, Peeta was captured by the capitol. District 12 was destroyed, and the remaining survivors find sanctuary in District 13. Although destroyed on the surface many years ago, district 13 managed to survive underground with the leadership of President Coin, who runs their district with strict military precision.

This is something that’s difficult for Katniss, because she is sick of being told what to do, and where to go, especially when all she wants to do is escape the pain of the people she has lost. She agrees to be the Mockingjay, a symbol of the rebellion, only if Peeta and the other victors that were captured are rescued from the Capitol. The Mockingjay will be promoted in a series of promos to help encourage the districts to join the cause and fight against the Capitol.

What is most noticeable about this movie: the intensity. Everything has been brought up about ten notches. The first two films are mostly told from Katniss’ perspective, which is true to the novel, but for the fist time, we get a more elaborate view of the events that are happening outside of Katniss’ point of view. We see exchanges between President Coin, (Julianne Moore) and game maker, Plutarch Heavensbee (Phillip Seymore Hoffman), and also scenes between Plutarch and Effie Trinket (Elizabeth Banks). There are also, numerous shots of the rebellion that happen in the other districts as well.

Emotions are high; fear, and anger and heartache simmer just below the surface and it’s not difficult to catch the emotion behind the revolution, the need to fight for the right to live. This change in perspective makes sense, as Katniss’ state of mind is not always completely together, and it is clear that there is something larger at stake here.

Katniss is often joined by her old friend Gale, (Liam Hemsworth) and new friend Finnick Odair (Sam Claflin), but she obtains new friends in her entourage; the most surprising (and bad-ass looking) is one member of her camera crew, Cressida (Natalie Dormer) who some might know as Margaery, on Game of Thrones.

If the great cast might not draw you in, how about the soundtrack? Lorde recorded four songs for the film and even Jennifer Lawrence has her own track. Although she claims she is a terrible singer, the song she sings in the film, “The Hanging Tree,” is hauntingly beautiful and almost eerie in the way it lingers in your mind afterwards. There is no other actor alive (I believe) that would be able to play the role of Katniss so well.

“Fire IS catching.”

Here’s a look at J-Law’s awesome singing:

Short Story Page Update: “Endtown”

November 15, 2014November 15, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

Today is a lazy day. I meant to run errands, but it’s dismally cold out there, and there is hot coco in the cabinet and cold pizza in a fridge, and what with that waiting for me, what more can a girl want? 😉

How about some writing and a short story update? I have added my story “Endtown” to my short story’s page, which you can view up there ^ at the top of this website or here.

Endtown

The short story focuses on Genevieve, a teenager who died way too early. Both her and the friends she makes there are in Limbo, or “the in-between,” in neither Heaven or Hell. They are the Watchers; the eyes that no one sees on earth, silently helping the Angels fight a war between the demons.

The thing they never tell you when you are saying your goodbyes: how quiet death is. For a long time she felt like she existed, except there are no formal introductions to the places you wake up in. In Sunday school she learned it this way: You go to Heaven if you are good; Hell is for the sinners and the unclean. But what she didn’t know, was that there were places that existed for the In-Between. Limbo wasn’t just for those who slept and never woke up.

It was the story I did as a continuation story on here. I was very proud with the characters and story that came out of it. I can certainly see the potential for more stories to come from this. 🙂

Happy Writing!

Oh, and for those doing NaNoWriMo, are you doing so much better than me? Is someone actually getting some writing done? (siigh). Best of luck to us all!

The Faces that We Wear

October 26, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

It’s easy to seem like an angel on social media – especially when all that you post is positive things: your boyfriend giving you flowers, going out to dinner, making food, shout-outs to friends you haven’t seen in a while.

Me at Clear water beach, Fl. (I love these sunshiny pictures of myself).

What is important is the face that you wear when no one else is around. And for me that includes: Sunday morning hair all lop-sided to one side, standing in front of the refrigerator in a nightie, gnawing on cold chicken wings and pizza.

(Oh, and I forgot to add the little happy dance I do when I eat something that is yummy.)

The point? We all present ourselves in a different way depending on where we are…and if you are the rare individual who is able to treat everyone with the same type of sauce, then good for you. You are rare and few in between.

Most of us don’t have that luxury. We wear our professional faces to work, our worried ones find comfort from Mom, the harassed need-a-glass-of-wine look we share with our girlfriends (or maybe that’s just me), and our significant others see everything in between, bare skin and all.

And maybe that’s the point I’m trying to make. We may wear different faces to different people but its the face that you wear when you are around your significant other and yourself that is the most important of all.

He or she is the one who should know your faults, should know what makes you cry, should know that you’re not always an angel, despite how hard you try to be. 😉

Its our faults that make us who we are. I know I’m not perfect. I’m stubborn. I’m whiny. I suck at housework. I’m grumpy in the early morning, I take three-hour naps and I’ll eat food until it makes me sick; drink wine on a week night.

Yet, despite my flaws, I have managed to find someone who loves me in spite of all those things. (And I didn’t even mentioned the winter blues that I get.) He puts up with me and I with him, and isn’t that true definition of belonging?

To love someone’s insides and outsides, despite the many different faces that we wear. Love is a many splendid thing. And sure, love is blind.

But maybe that’s the point: No one is perfect. And we should never pretend to be.

Pancake Saturday!

October 25, 2014 / Ajmorse / Leave a comment

I think I have a secret desire in life to make every pancake known to man…case in point: today’s breakfast!

Chocolate chip and apple pancakes. (I was going to make orange pancakes, but I didn’t have any orange juice. They sound fantastic though!)

I like making them small…they look so cute on the plate.

And they are wonderful when paired with any side…Like breakfast sausage, of course.

Today is a lazy Saturday, and I thought I’d take a moment and enjoy it. I don’t get them very often, but when I do, they are glorious. 🙂

I like the sleepy feel of a Saturday morning, when you can shut off your alarm and sleep in. When the sunshine creeps its way into the window, promising freedom…either relaxation in the unexpected warmth, or adventures in the bright sunshine, in the air and the blue sky, of a moment where you can look up and bask in the empty spaces.

A lot happens on a Saturday, or not at all. It’s your choice to do what you will. Maybe shopping, maybe baking…maybe a day trip to the mountains or ocean (if there is one close by). Maybe its the day where you buy antiques…you are forever looking for that pepper shaker that matches the salt shaker that your grandma has.

Maybe its the only day you get to spend time with your kids; so you take them to the park, buy them fast food and send them back to Mom with stinky stains on their shirts and smiles on their faces.

Maybe its a project day: time to get that painting done on the house that you haven’t had time for. Change the oil in your car.

If you are an artist, maybe its the day you paint, or a writer: the day you work on crafting that story that needs a lot of work. Maybe you write a letter to a friend you haven’t seen in a while.

Or maybe, you have to work. And another day is your “Saturday.”

But whatever the case, Saturday is like a gift…something that brings us joy the moment the day unwraps it for us.

I like to spend mine with good food, company and my projects. I have some laundry to get done, to finish painting some picture frames and a story that needs a plot. Today is already a busy day, and I don’t intend to waste it.

How do you like to spend your Saturday, or days off? 🙂

A. J. Morse

Some fiction, some poetry, and a lot of writer's block.

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