Update

Hello again! It has been a long time. Summer is coming, Memorial Day weekend is over, and the Lakers meet the defending champion Spurs in San Antonio tonight for Game 4 of the NBA's Western Conference Finals. My life has been busy as of late, also. As some may know, I've been dealing with some health issues for the past year or so. Recently, there were some minor complications that took my focus away from my work. The good news is that I have decided the key to healing is to carry on with my life undeterred, so I have begun to do that.

Admittedly, there has been some added stress at first and while I find adversity inspires my creative side, that only comes after I digest events. The well of ideas tends to dry up during the moment of stress itself. However, my droughts are usually followed by floods, and so I have kept myself immersed in the arts, as I love to do: reading the second installment of Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, watching things like the film Molière and series LOST, and listening to music from The Shins and Damien Rice. I'm looking forward to the time, hopefully inevitable, in which I continue creating my own art.

I have made one change to the blog which you can see in the right hand column. I just recently began using Twitter. It's pretty amazing, and interestingly, it's a technological advance designed to simplify communication. Anyway, you can find me on the web site under "jtmurphy” or simply check this blog from time to time as the Twitter Updates are synced live. Since it has been such a long time, I'm posting a special treat... the rough draft opening of my latest project. The working title is: Body & Soul. Enjoy!


Guillo sits in his apartment, looking through the tree outside of his huge picture window into the sky. In his eyes, he looks far away from his setting, but he snaps back into focus in an instant. He then picks up his paintbrush, selects the appropriate shade of blue from his acrylics, and continues filling in the sky above his jungle scene. Guillo's canvas is situated in front of that south facing window and next to the east wall. On the canvas is the scene, where green dominates. Sky filters in at the top only, then the green begins very lightly and then progressively becomes darker and denser all the way to the jungle floor. Trees and leaves and all manner of plants fill the background, everything green. The yellowed circle of leaves in the foreground's center, then, draws the eye to the action of the piece. A black panther is out in the open, looking forward to a place not pictured. Viewing the painting, she would be staring off to the left. On her back is a curious creature, a bright blue parrot with a large beak. He faces the opposite direction looking behind her, checking out the path they came from, although that is also not pictured. The painting is almost finished, but the details that are left are the most important.

Quickly, Guillo finishes up his sky and stares blankly at the un-detailed parts of his animals and jungle. His face squeezes in a perplexed moment, and he puts down his paintbrush. Then, he draws in a deep breath, lets it out slowly, and looks up. This is his favorite corner of the large studio apartment his parents bought for him three years ago. Although, to call it a studio is a gross understatement as the space is more like an open dance hall. The southeast corner is where Guillo works. Each one of his paintings, now highly acclaimed, was done right here.

2008

The New Year will start with a bit of fun for me, but then it will get really difficult. My new beginning will be an emotional one. I'm calling the 4th as the anniversary of my lung collapse. I first felt the chest pain on that day. That is followed by the one-year mark of the opening of "13" and I'm still very proud of that. Then, I'll have the capper. I will be a whole year removed from the collapse diagnosis on the 8th and the reinflation procedure on the 9th. It's going to be a vulnerable time for me, although I have no qualms about admitting that. The fear of something like that happening again is still alive in me. Even in my most positive frame of mind, I anticipate reliving those feelings once again.

As 2007 comes to a close, I feel like I am positioned for a great year coming up despite the year I had. My health has turned a corner and I feel like I have at least found the road to recovery on the map. When I deal with a health issue, all I need is to be comfortable with the treatment and plan of attack. I feel very confident as soon as I have that. That has been true of my current concerns as well. The good news as of now is that not only do I have good mental confidence, but I also have physical confidence based on how my body is responding.

Creatively, it has been some time since I have been this inspired to write. I have about five solid ideas running concurrently in my head day in and day out. Ideas, of course, are wonderful. But this isn't an IBM advert, and I won't get paid to ideate. I might get paid to write. Now, it's a simple matter of discipline, research, and continued health improvement. I've got Joseph Campbell and his Power of Myth. I've got three world-class doctors and a couple of excellent nurses. The discipline is up to me. Uh Oh.

I actually do participate in the time-honored tradition of making New Year's resolutions. Usually, I also participate in the time-honored tradition of breaking New Year's resolutions. I'm going to try something new this year. I'm going to maintain my past resolutions, but define them more specifically so they can actually be, you know, accomplished. I want to always be in the middle of a book, but this year I resolve to read for at least one hour each week. I'm going to write every day, but this year I'll do this by planning the time to write at least two sentences per day. I need to make quicker, more lasting decisions and that will be achieved by making at least one choice each day based purely on instinct. I have other, more private, resolutions I have made and I hope to accomplish them in the same way.

Enjoy celebrating on New Year's Eve. It doesn't usually live up to expectations, but we can still have fun nonetheless, right? Take a couple aspirin when you get up the next day and watch the Rose Parade. I've always kept a special place in my heart for the Tournament. And I can't wait for the last Trojan win of the season in the Rose Bowl.

Happy New Year!

Endurance

Note: This is a long one.

There are many kinds of endurance in life. The one I needed when my lung collapsed was very different from some other ones I've needed. It started with a complete drop in my spirits the moment I was diagnosed. I'll never forget it. I was somewhat concerned going in, just considering the fact that the chest pain I was experiencing had lasted for about a week. But I was concerned in the way you think, "I really should get this thing checked out and fixed." I had no idea what I was in for, but I recognized it the instant I saw the x-ray results. My heart dropped.

With as much experience with medical situations as I have had, I could almost say I have an amateur background in medicine. I can make educated guesses about the causes of symptoms I have or other people tell me about. Most medical professionals, when they meet me, also recognize that they can speak intelligently (as far as medicine goes) with me about whatever condition they are treating. Most especially, I have had enough x-rays that I can recognize basic and/or obvious issues pretty quickly. That was the case with my pneumothorax. I saw this steeply angled black triangle going diagonal from the top of my chest to my lower right side. Well, guess what, black in the middle of an x-ray is bad.

I remember sort of sinking my head back, almost before the doctor gave his diagnosis. Since I'd never heard of the technical term, pneumothorax, it gave me a moment of what was ultimately false hope when he said so matter-of-factly, "Oh yeah, he has a pneumothorax." Then he pointed it out, to be sure, and said, "Your right lung is completely collapsed." Even though, I have a good amount of basic medical knowledge, there are some areas that concern my health where fear overtakes thinking through the situation logically. Critical respiratory issues are one of those areas.

The tears were hard to restrain when the diagnosis hit home. I had a real mix of emotions at the time. I wanted to simply panic, but my stronger side held that in check because I think I knew deep down that the best thing I could do was listen to the doctor and prepare for whatever treatment was to come. Honestly, nothing could have prepared me. The doctor told me what he needed to, so I would understand the procedure, but nothing more, so I wouldn't go running for the hills.

Even not being fully aware of the pain I would endure, I was really scared. It's funny the different responses to fear people have. My reaction was to e-mail a lady friend of mine to whom I was close and hope for her support, even if it was just by knowing she would read it the next day. Thinking back, there are many reasons I chose her, but mostly it was because I assumed she could handle the bad news in its unresolved form. How presumptuous of me! And it was at the time, but the nice thing about hindsight is that now I know she was the perfect choice. Indeed, she wrote to me that night, comforting me, and telling me she was there. It was something crucial to hold on to during the following day with the procedure looming.

I awoke the next morning too early, naturally, and quickly got dressed and into the chair. My routine at the time was to take my morning medicine and then put on the breathing machine for an hour to make me comfortable. So I did that. Problem was, I had some bad pressure in my head and legs. Stress. Since we had to get to the hospital so early, I was only able to take half the time on the breather. The shortness of breath amped up the pain. Then it was time to get in the car.

It was cold. I remember vividly how freezing I felt when I got in the car. It was so, so cold. Of course, I asked for some heat but I barely began warming by the time I arrived at the hospital and had to get out. The rest of the ride I spent focused on breathing, both to compensate for the shortness and as meditation to fight the pain. This ride was way too short.

As much as I wanted the ride to take as long as possible, the wait I went through once I actually arrived at radiology was agonizing. At that point, when there was no escape, I just wanted to get it over with. I was still in terrible pain, hunched over and waiting for the key parts of my working lung to open up, and afraid. They called my name, and immediately that stuff meant nothing, well, except for the afraid part. There was just no way I would be mentally prepared in time.

I remember one of the office workers who takes care of registration coming in the radiology room and putting on my bracelet, and then the nurse who made the comment I'll never forget. To all the radiology nurses out there, please don't ever say this to a patient asking about the pain of having a lung reinflated: "Most patients describe it as annoying." Wow. Really didn't know how to take that one, so I disregarded it and focused on getting on the table & making sure I was as comfortable as possible. Amazing how little that mattered. After I got settled, I had to be alone except for the nurses and doctor. I was too disoriented to worry about that, and now I'm glad that no one stayed to watch the procedure.

There was this giant active x-ray machine over me, about 6 inches from my face. I'm lucky that I don't get claustrophobic, but I certainly felt like I was in it, in this thing 'til the end, and there was nothing I could do about it. The radiologist walked in, ready to go, and introduced himself. He rubbed some freezing cold alcohol on me and then marked a blue dot way over on the side of my right pectoral between two ribs. A lovely target. Then he put a sterile blue field over the area that actually sort of covered my face. It was disorienting, but looking back, it was good to be blocked from the vision of what the radiologist was doing. Last was the almost completely useless local anesthetic that could not possibly reach the area that needed it most. Then came the main event.

I felt the needle slide in the very superficial flesh, knowing I could take that. But then it met some stiff resistance: the chest wall. He said, "Okay here we go." As good a job he did, that innocent sentence struck the most fear into me. Before I could ask him what he was talking about, I felt him push really hard, I heard a pop, and there was a lightning strike. I knew then why God created the word, “fuck,” and I used that wisdom many times. Luckily, since I couldn't breathe, I couldn't say anything very loud. Soon, I was appealing to God directly. That was the worst pain in my life. I could not imagine being stabbed for real. The needle took a chest tube in with it so that the air in my chest cavity could be sucked out. It felt like a sumo wrestler sitting on my chest, and the pain was so, so unbearable as the lung re-expanded. Finally, the nurse asked if she could give me morphine. I answered, "Yes," almost before she finished asking me the question. First, the drugs brought me back to sanity and then I could actually feel good later when I was resting in an actual hospital bed.

Unfortunately, that is not the end as it I ended up requiring a hospital stay. But that is a different kind of endurance. And a morphine vacation is a much better way to end the day.

My Year in Review (Part Two)

Note: I move into my next year Sunday, when I turn 24. Here are my thoughts as one year impacts the next.

As I begin to look forward, it is important for me to internalize those lessons I've learned over the past year. I'm not sure there's really any sort of process which will allow me to do that, but I think a simple awareness that those lessons are important is all that is necessary.

Some of the lessons a person might take from my friend Chuck's death are age-old lessons, and ones that I am already intimately familiar with. The fragility of life, appreciating each day, time being so fleeting, trying not to waste life on the negatives, those are things that I already know, but it never hurts to have them reconfirmed. Or better yet, it always hurts and that's why they need to be reconfirmed.

The other lessons are most certainly not cookie-cutter optimism, but they are real, and true optimism for me is about taking a realistic fact of life and applying it to myself in a positive way. Death doesn't wait for someone even if they are important, or young, or have things to do. That doesn't make loss any easier. Dealing with it, in fact or in potential, is a constant struggle. But it tells me that it's not worth individual stress. It's out of my control, and if I can let go of that, I think about all the other things in life that I can let go. There is positivity in the finality of death. It brings many realizations. The hard part is keeping those realizations vivid in mind when everyday life begins to take its toll. If I can do that, maybe I won't be scared to tell this person how I feel or maybe I won't find reasons not to do this thing I want to do. That's a liberating feeling.

I will take my lessons into the next year. I expect to continue prioritizing my quality of life and continue doing things the way that is right for me. Knowing now that it's not so simple as just supporting or not supporting myself emotionally, I can trust others with my burdens. I can trust that my strength is, in fact, a source of love. Continuing on, I'll use that source of love in the depth I feel it for others. My meaning of life is simple: to love, to be loved, and to do what I love.

Being able to step back from a situation and observe it from many sides has always been a skill of mine. I also feel I have a talent for self-analysis, and as I grow older, I find I can do more than just spot my weaknesses or areas I need to improve. At this point in my life, I find myself able to see my strengths and not only that, but I can be confident in those talents. I know I can write. When I combine that with my other abilities, the path through which I should take my writing becomes clear. After some conversations and some deep thinking, I have learned how to make this blog part of an active writing project. I'm certainly excited to begin writing my story, which is what I'll be doing now and then.

My new year begins Sunday. I plan to officially end my education at USC by writing a letter to the administration that did so much for me, and to the people I owe a great deal of appreciation. I plan to appreciate, and enjoy and love, all the loved ones that fill up my life. And I plan to begin writing the stories that have made me who I am.

My Year in Review (Part One)

Note: my 24th year is drawing to a close and will end on my 24th birthday, Sunday. I've decided to take a look back today in Part One.

There's no way around it: it has been a long, hard year for me. Like I've always said, I'm a positive guy, but even I have to admit that I faced a lot of negatives. You might say it was a rebuilding year, if I may use a sports analogy. The negatives will follow me into the next year in many ways, but I still foresee the significant shift that hopefully comes with each new year. First, however, I take stock.

I lost my dear friend, Chuck, about a month after my last birthday. He was my long-time orthopedic doctor who did my spinal fusion, recommended me to USC, and was really a stalwart ally. He "got" my sense of humor and used it in each of the many times I had to go see him to assess my condition. To this day, I still sometimes feel like it's vulgar to use him for some sort of lesson, but then I think that we are always learning and the best teachers are those people we meet who become our friends. I think about my spinal fusion surgery. One of the things I wrote after Chuck died was that if you had to have a scar like the one I did, you would be lucky to have one this beautiful. I said it in a mostly facetious manner, but if I had to take away a lesson it would be what I wrote, and I have Chuck to thank for that.

Some months later, thankfully after the USC Trojans demolished Michigan in the Rose Bowl, my right lung collapsed. The pain of the reinflation procedure was quite literally the worst in my life. There is no other way I can put it than to say, I felt messed up after that. I'm used to feeling vulnerable as there is a continual process of accepting certain realities. But the fear of that happening again, of that pain and that vulnerability, will be with me for a long time. I did a lot of growing up that day, as I think about it. I didn't have anyone there to comfort me during the procedure, but in this case I was glad. It's difficult to explain beyond that.

The hospital stay that followed was difficult. However, it reconfirmed in me the belief that the way I go about my life and the way I approach things is right for me. I wouldn't have gotten through that without my m.o., and the fact that it has worked and continues to do so says a lot to me. While I got through the hospital stay, the hospital stay, unfortunately, got through me. I had a nice little souvenir called a wound care situation with which I was left. This one is testing my endurance, but I have much precedent in the way of battles won, therefore I take comfort in the fact that I will soon turn a corner.

There were many worrisome events, but what I found in direct proportion to that stress & tension was the depth of love from my loved ones. Mentally and emotionally, I have always been a self-starter and more so, a self supporter. I was probably so effective at that because I didn't have that ability physically. This was a year, however, where I needed my loved ones. I really really needed support from the outside-in. I received that support, many times over. My family took on many burdens and made sure I was well taken care of. My nieces and nephews came over to play and watch movies. The visits from my friends were numerous and heartfelt. Some friends helped me find entertainment. Another showed me that my strength was a source of love. I noticed, as well, that my love for others deepened and in many cases, did so in a way that many people will not know or understand.

This year marked the end of my education at USC. While I was sad to say goodbye to the yearly life force I found there, to many of the people I met, and to the wonderful educators, it also marked the beginning of my foray into professional writing. I was so fortunate to work with Jason and feel so indebted to the people involved (all of them). Especially considering the fact that I finished the project before any health concerns began, of course it was right under the wire, I feel very lucky. Soon after that, I began this very weblog which has very effectively kept me connected to my writing.

The Matrix, Myth, and Me

"Myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human manifestation..." -- Joseph Campbell

I'm about to start reading my new book, The Matrix and Philosophy, and I thought I'd give an insight into a subject that fascinates me in all aspects of my life: myth. I use "myth" here in the academic sense, not the common sense which connotes a story that is fake. There is at least some sort of truth in every way that I use "myth". I find myself drawn to mythology and, in particular, the hero's journey. This applies especially to the messianic figure. These things are a pleasure to see in fiction, no matter the medium, and I feel compelled in some way to include mythology in my own work. Beyond that, however, there are also applications toward everyday living in the real world.

I always had a general affinity for mythic tales and stories told on an epic scale. In fact, The Matrix trilogy is one of my all-time favorites. I find myself to be one of the few people who loved the second and third installments as much as the first. Fortunately, a couple of years ago I found this Essays Collection written by someone who loved The Matrix as much as I did. Even better was the fact that he had a much deeper and more detailed understanding of the philosophical, mythological, and religious concepts & symbolism prevalent throughout the films. I highly recommend his essays, but I suggest an extra cup of coffee or two before reading. It is certainly an impressive synthesis of many of the world's cultures into one grand story.

Through these essays, I was introduced to Joseph Campbell who wrote Hero with a Thousand Faces. He also had a famous interview broadcast on PBS called The Power of Myth. Campbell is most famous for describing the hero's journey, which appears in some way or another across many cultures.

The more I've learned and read, the more enthusiastic I have become. I think it is definitely common to have the need to feel like we are doing something important. I always wanted my writing to feel like it could be something greater than the sum of its parts. Myth is where I get that feeling. So I resolved to fit into some kind of mythic framework. There are many ways to do this, and I expect it to come about naturally. I look forward both to writing straightforward about mythology but also to exploring how common, everyday life can also apply.

JT, the matrix has you.

Dailies

When you don't know what else to write about, write about writing! One of the most difficult things I have found in my writing is not getting inspired, it is managing all the simultaneous inspirations that are always spinning through my head. An overabundance of ideas is both a blessing and a curse. I have numerous examples of great literary visions that stall completely when I put pen to paper.

Getting ideas is fairly predictable for me. Seeing their endpoint in a grand unveiling of storytelling is a most simple matter. It's that tiny part in between that always seems to be a nagging problem. Point A to Point B. The problem with it is that the particular story I'm inspired to write at any given moment is ruled by an ethereal, mysterious, and certainly complex process that I may never understand. So, there are usually around six simultaneous Point A's trying to reach six simultaneous Point B's. Huge problem.

My friends, I believe I have solved my problem thanks to taking a page from film. There are many similarities between literature and film, especially on a philosophical level. Obviously, both require a vision. Both require the ability to take and weave complex elements into a cohesive story. Both need editing, and in my case, self-editing. Both are essentially like sculpture. Their success is in channeling what is basically the madness of creative inspiration into a story understandable beyond the artist himself. So, thanks to film I have a new management strategy for story-writing.

At the end of the day of shooting, a director will usually sit down and watch all of the footage, raw or otherwise, that was shot on that particular day. Intuitively, these collections of footage are called dailies. I, too, have decided to keep a set of dailies for each story that I write. This way I can tell the parts of the story I want when I'm inspired to tell them, and then reassemble them in the main file. If I get stalled while writing in the main file, I can go to the dailies. Or, if one character or part of the story in the dailies stalls, I can stop and move on to another one.

Sometimes, I believe I have a measure of control over my creative abilities that I don't, in fact, have. It is a mistake to think that I can completely direct creative inspiration. But, I believe a strategy like this will allow me to harness it. Who knows? Maybe my productivity will jump up a notch.

The Dark Part of Darkness

In the upcoming and future entries, I will be expanding on the feelings of the characters I describe. Recently, I have found that I'm focusing primarily on states of being in which I have invested so much of myself in living in the real world. While that's good for me as a person, I feel it's important to delve deeper as a writer. I'm going to begin exploring the darker parts of my characters. There has to be a reason to look to the good. I think there is always some force that causes us to hope, almost as a reactionary behavior. If these characters don't need strength and courage, optimism and hope, they won't have it. So, I will be focused on giving them those reasons. Some stories may not have rays of hope initially. I will also be exploring some characters that are not sympathetic and may even be villainous.

After all, what good is a protagonist without an antagonist? This update is simply fair warning. I'm not the type of person who spends too much time on despair or anger. I mostly choose reasons to be happy over reasons to be sad. Like I've said many times, however, the harmony needs the dissonance. Don't worry when you see those entries. It's still just little old me. But I think they will be important and I look forward to getting to work on those.

I realized also, that with the introduction of my Song Series posts and all the links I provided, I did not provide any way to actually hear "The Stone". Thanks to YouTube, I can. This version clocks in at about 7 minutes. Enjoy:

Free Will and Roman à Clef

The concept of free will in creative fiction is an intriguing one. Obviously, a character cannot be free in the true, real-world sense. A character is at the mercy of its author's omnipotence. Taking into account the entire body of work, predestination is a very clear force acting on each character. But there are certainly ways of approximating some type of simulated quality of free will. A goal of mine is to somehow free the character as he exists within the world I've created. I do this with originality. I don't use that term to self-congratulate, I mean originality as an artistic device.

Good writing does not employ roman à clef. This describes characters and events in the fiction that are literally one-to-one translations of characters and events in the real world. It is similar to allegory, but more personal to the author. At first, I made exceptions for satire. But even in that case, good satire both comments on and transcends its source material. Now, I am naturally inspired by the people I know & meet, through both their good and bad qualities, and those qualities will surely find their way into my writing. However, my characters deserve more than to be simple composites.

For me, good dynamic characters are persons. I take the inspirations I feel and the composites they derive and throw them into a character, but I feel it is necessary to go beyond that. I want to get to a sense of completion, and I need originality to do it. Each character needs its own genetic makeup.

Through styles, mannerisms, quirks, and temperaments, I can begin to establish identities that separate the characters from any real-world translations. Hopefully, they will reach some sort of individual definition. The characters can never make free choices, but they can be created from a place of freshness. I believe it's a success when they can be defined as well-developed, unique persons. Like us!

The long road to a finished work.

I'm not one to say how writing, or art for that matter, should be done. I can only speak for myself and the methods that work best for me. Many writers work in many ways. Some write from scratch without a notion of what is coming next. Others brainstorm, prewrite, outline, and plan everything out in amazing detail. Many revise and rewrite regardless of method. I would hope that most would agree the method is second to the act of creating something.

Personally, I think an analogy of piloting an airplane (how about an F-16) would be best for my style. I like to take off suddenly and just get up in the air to fly. I probably have no idea where I'm going. Then, once the initial thrill settles, that's when I draw up my flight plan. I'll execute that plan, but I reserve the express right to deviate if I see the need. At last, I lead when I'm good and ready. So the FAA probably wouldn't like that and not too many people would want to ride with me, but it works for my writing style.

There is a cliché of advice that is often said about writing, "Write what you know." I'm really on the fence about it. As far as story elements and the plot go, this phrase is very safe, but for me, writing is where I leave the safe zone. On the other hand, the emotional and thematic content of what I know is easily applicable to an otherworld of fiction.

My writing mostly assumes a good world. It is a complete range of harmony and dissonance that makes things great. And I try to depict that. There must be a complete version that includes pain & suffering, difference, and challenge within the broader picture. In order for this to be authentic, I feel these qualities should be born out of true experiences in my life. This is where a gift can be both a blessing and curse. I'm thankful for the inspiration that strikes. Unfortunately, however, it can come with consequences.

So, I am now on the long road to a finished work. Part of that involves feeling up to writing. My flight plan is set. Now, it's a simple matter of getting to my destination and landing. Let's go there.