Man in the mirror (Brotin Tale 6)

For PART ONE go read Brian Miller's post at WAYSTATION ONE. If you just read this first or by itself, it will not make any sense!

I start to regain consciousness, but there is still a fog enveloping my brain. A strange scene begins to play out in my head. I sit back against the wall of the bathroom and while staring at the dilapidated woodwork, my mind begins to take me to another place.

I find myself at the front desk of Bill's Motor Inn, only things are very different. The hotel is sparkling and shiny, almost as if it were just built. A Carl Perkins song is playing on the radio in the lobby. It was not the clear crisp radio signal of the modern world, but that static filled AM broadcast which was common years ago. The parking lot is adorned with old cars, most of which appeared to be fifties models.

I approach the desk and ask the young woman for a room. Her name is Hazel. She is a very friendly teenager, obviously working through her summer vacation. There is no real concern about security or identification, she just asks for the payment and gives me a bronze key. It is the same room number that I am in now. The key is shiny and new, just like the lock that it fits in. The room is not well used. As a matter of fact, it is possible that I am one of its first guests.

I put my bags down in the corner and make my way to the bathroom. The smell of fresh paint greets me as I enter. It is so clean, but everything is also antique looking. The bath tub looks inviting. It is just the thing that I need to relax me after my day. I fill the tub with hot water and let my body soak up the warm sensation.

Suddenly I hear a noise. Opening my eyes, I look out of the bathroom and see that there is a man at the bed. He throws a case down on the new bedding and flips it open. The man reaches in and pulls out two guns and then walks over to the window and sneaks a peek out through the curtains. He is apparently nervous about something.

I don’t know what to do. Obviously the front desk gave two different men the key to the same room. When the man disappears from my view, I rise from the tub and wrap a towel around myself. I will have to go out and tell him about the mix up. I really have no other option at this point. I walk into the main area of the room and find the man peering out of another window with his back turned toward me.

“Excuse me,” I say, “I think that the front desk made a mistake.”

The man whirls around and immediately fires two bullets into my stomach area. I stumble back into the bathroom holding my gut. The white towel is turning red under my hands. As I look in the mirror, something suddenly occurs to me. This seems to be a memory of mine, but the image staring back at me is not me. It is the same man who I saw in the mirror behind me earlier. The same man whose image caused me to fall to the floor in this old hotel room. I realize that the man who I saw in the mirror was not the same man who had opened the case of guns on the bed. There were two different men in my original delusion.

The vision ends and I stand up. Staring into the mirror once more, I now see only the modern day version of myself. I am so freaked out by the event that I gather my belongings and head to check out. Maybe I will settle on one of those rooms with the key card after all.

I approach the front desk and find that there is an elderly woman working. There is something familiar about the old lady. As she turns to me, I see that her name tag says “Hazel”. There is a strange look in her eyes as she stares at me.

“Don’t I know you?” she asks.

“I don’t think so,” I say as I hand her the key.

“Something happened here when I was a teenager and you remind me so much of…… Well, never mind, it couldn’t be.”

“You never know,” I say while a shiver runs down my spine. “You never know.”

As I walk out of the lobby, the oldies station is playing a Carl Perkins song. It sounds so different on Satellite.

LOVE in a Nut Shell

It has been said that one of the toughest things to do is to clarify the meaning of the word "LOVE".

I have always struggled in my attempts to define it because I had never really experienced the feeling.

Lately, though, I have come to understand the word and get a better grip on its meaning.

To me......

Love is when being with someone can change your belief system and the outlook that you have had on life!

Love is driving from sun up until sundown just to hold someone's hand.

Love is when another person's health, safety, and happiness become more important to you than your own.

Love is a kiss that connects you to someones heart!

Love is when you have to say goodbye and it feels like your insides have been torn out!

Love is when tears that come from being apart can be happy and sad all at one time.

Love is knowing that some day soon everything will be very good!


Maybe I still don't understand it 100%, but I think that I am learning!

Memes and Themes

I used to do tons of memes. I started out doing Aloha Friday and Wordless Weds. I went on to do Thursday Thirteen and even tried starting some of my own with Rhyming Wednesday and Happy Hour Friday. I really try to stay away from most of them anymore.

Aloha Friday and Wordless Wednesday are a great way to get people to your blog, but there is no personal connection with most of the people who leave comments. It really is just a tit for tat thing that boils down to “I will show you mine if you show me yours”. The questions associated with Aloha Friday are often way too generic, ranging from “What is your favorite color?” to “What time do you usually go to bed?”. I got bored with it real fast. Wordless Weds can be interesting, but for me, I feel like it is just a space filler most of the time.

I tried my own Memes and they never took off, which is fine with me. Looking back, I am really glad that they did not.

I did Random Tuesday thoughts for the longest time. It was fun jumping from subject to subject, but I found that random thoughts are very tough to comment on. The posts are so slammed pack with random thinking that it becomes tough to retain all of the information as a reader. I stopped doing RTT because of that.

There is also Six Word Saturday. Most people write six words and then write a 300 word explanation of the six words. Kind of defeats the purpose, or so it seems. I think that if you need to keep a post down to six words, then you are probably having some sort of creative drought.

There are newer ones like Flash 55 and Sunday 160. The 55’s can be creative, but the typical comment of a 55 is “Great 55, mine is up”. Basically, people just use each others post as an advertisement for their own. As far as the 160.… why limit yourself to 160 characters? If you have an idea or thought, just write it down. If it turns out to be 700 characters, what is the big deal? It seems to me that blogging has become an idea where people’s thought process is “How can I write as little as possible and still get people to leave me a comment.”

I think that Theme Thursday and the more recent Magpie Tales are good in the sense that they do not limit creativity at all. I respect that.

I am by no means trying to slam the people who have created these ideas. They are all interesting concepts. All that I am saying is that when we start doing them week in and week out, our blogs become a less personal and predictable. I am now off to do my most hated Meme…..YARD WORK SUNDAY! lol

Flash 1478 (Intruder)

Story deleted due to copyright concerns

For my Angel

An Angel came into my life
To help me clearly see
Beyond the dead end which I viewed
As the future meant for me

My heart once broken down
Now has found a loving beat
And I owe it to my Angel
Was it our destiny to meet?

I have often been informed
That God does have a plan
But I tend to be a skeptic
A doubtful sort of man

Though lately I’ve been feeling
That my thoughts should be confessed
There must be something Holy
For me to feel so blessed

So for those of you who know me
And think this rather odd
I am thankful for my Angel
Who was sent to me from God.

I love you, BV!

A Mother's Day Tale (fiction)

Story deleted due to copyright concerns

Fastball

Story deleted due to copyright concerns

Up on the roof

This was one of the first stories that I wrote for the blog. Most of you probably have not seen it.

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Story deleted due to copyright concerns