Conflict = Life

 

     As a creative writing teacher at The High School for Creative and Performing Arts, I had the challenge of teaching a Fiction course.  When I first started, there were no books, no curriculum, no prior syllabus... nothing.  My principal just handed me a binder with the word "fiction" on it and that was pretty much my  foundation for constructing the course.  I didn't mind; I was young and energetic and was very interested in writing. 

     During my teaching tenure there, I gravitated toward the short story genre.  This genre served the my purposes well - first of all it was short, so it enabled me to really focus on the respective structure and language so as to illustrate to my students what to model and what to avoid.  In my opinion, the class evolved over the years and offered a substantive study of the short story.  At some point during my preparation for this class I had an epiphany:  the short story was a lot like our lives.  First, let me share a kind of "literary equation" that I penned during this time:  Character + Conflict = Plot.  It's important to note here (and I expressed this to my classes a countless number of times) that without conflict, there would be no plot, no story.  Often I'd pose this question:  Can there be a short story without a conflict?  Of course, there were always attempts made by some of my writing students to argue that this brand of "conflict-less" story was possible, but ultimately I'd prevail and maintain conflict was an inherent part of the short story equation and that without it... again... there would be no story.  

     With respect to my literary equation, of course, we are the characters... the "plot" is the course of events that our lives happen to take.   But what about the "conflict"?  Naturally, our lives are beleaguered with conflicts throughout and arguably, the impetus which drives the progression of our lives.  Think about it:  how we act and react to these conflicts presented to us leads us to make certain decisions which ultimately determine our destiny.  Now, what happens if somehow "conflict" is removed from our lives (of course, impossible... but just suppose) what would drive our actions?  What would motivate us?  What would we have to react to?  Not a whole lot... perhaps our existence would be pretty boring...  uneventful - just like a short story with no conflict.  

Presence of The Past

 

      There is a paradoxical dichotomy in the way that the past exists in our present.  We have had friendships and previous relationships in our past.  These memories often play themselves out, time after time in the labyrinths of our minds... and never seem to change.  In fact, these recollections can't change: they are a part of a time that has already been shaped; so no matter how we may regard them, no matter how many times we re-create a conversation or re-think a decision, no matter how desperately we'd desperately give anything to visit that precious loved one just one more time,  the end result will be the same.... over and over again...  The sobering reality reigns supreme:  We cannot change the past.   Although the memories of our friendships still exist in our minds exactly as as they were years ago, the present, here and now experience with these respective individuals is of a different essence.  Therein lies the paradox - we know our friends, we remember them... we believe they are exactly the same as we recall from our past, but the reality is they are just not the same... nor are we for that matter... nor are our relationships with them.  So there is the challenge: dealing with the presence of the past. 

1. 

My Way

"The record shows, I took the blows... and did it:  My Way".  When contemplative and look back, I might not make the same choices; be more collaborative...  maybe foster a more broad perspective.  

Perhaps would not have taken on the establishment with no backing, scattered support.  As the years pass, I realize that time does not really heal all wounds... but it can distract you from them and if fortunate, time will illuminate a bit of clarity.  It is up to the individual to process that clarity, forge ahead, and hope to achieve the victories that may await in the horizon.

Swooning Souls

 

I've always been moved by the end of James Joyce's "The Dead":  

 It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

These snowflakes swirling and indiscriminately falling from the sky to land "upon all the living and the dead" often inhabit my mind.  I envision these flakes to be the souls of beloved friends and family members that are no longer with me.  Perhaps their very essence is intricately designed in each snowflake - swooning souls... whirling freely and as they mesh and blend in communion.