Such Things

The Way Station Madsen Morrow was eight years old the first time she met Father Christmas. She’d come downstairs to investigate a noise (sofa legs scratching on the floor as if shoved) that seemed to have come from the living room. It was empty when she got there; stockings hung, tree sparkling, fire burning low. “Well, that’s strange,” she thought and also said out loud. This is was what characters on television did when they were by themselves. Madsen was very fond of television and watched it as often as possible. She was about to head back upstairs and into bed when she heard a new sound; a humming sound, coming from down the hall. “Ah-ha,” she said (this also from television). It was the toilet fan humming. Someone was inside if the light from the crack beneath the door could be trusted. “Who’s there?” she demanded. The light and fan went off at once. “It’s too late for that. You’d have done better not to turn everything off. Then maybe I’d have fig

Hey, remember when I worked as a movie theater projectionist? I had embarrassing amounts of free time in which to read, watch trailers, pace, or write and illustrate stories on notebook paper. Never mind the illustrations, but here's a story I wrote when I should have been working. Cai and the Devil in the Deep, Dark Woods A girl named Cai was walking home through the woods late one night. The woods were deep. The woods were dark. But she was a brave girl and unafraid. She did not know that just up ahead, the Devil was lying in wait. He appeared to her in the shape of a man, beautiful and naked. He said: "Won't you take some tea with me "In my home beneath the earth? "A life lived alone is a life without worth, "So won't you come and be with me?" But Cai was clever as well as brave. She knew that the Devil was in the woods at night. And that he was always hungry. And that he liked to eat little girls. So she said: "No, I will not go w

As most of you who might be reading this know, a few years back I took it upon myself to track down and watch all 28 Godzilla movies, culminating in "Godzilla: Final Wars," the last planned entry for a decade or so. After several months spent in a monster movie haze, I finally finished. And felt a little (a lot) sad. I had climbed the mountain and stood alone at the top, unsure of what to do next. So I tried to unpack the experience by writing a 28 part (one for each movie) retelling of "The Wizard of Oz" story featuring characters from each of the three major eras of the Godzilla franchise trekking through a crumbling Tokyo to confront the monster, emotionally healing one another along the way. I got two or three parts in before I realized that this was a colossal waste of time. This first part more or less stands on its own, however, and no one but Missy has ever read it before. And I still sort of like it. Here it is. For the record, Sachiko is a peripher

So my plan (if you're interested) is to periodically post stories that I've written here on this blog. Let me know what you think (unless you hate them) even if you hate them (but please don't hate them).