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The Official Website of Jonathan Schiefer

           When I walk into a park, is the tranquility I feel inherent in the location?  Or is that feeling something I attach to the park and that manifests in me when I enter said park?

            A famous philosopher, his name escapes me right now, asked if nothing existed.  He posed story of a friend (we’ll call him Jake) who went into a coffee shop looking for another friend (his name is Alex).  Jake walks into the coffee shop, but he’s running a little late.  As such, when Jake enters the shop, he looks around for Alex.  But Alex friend is not there.  As Jake scans the room, he does not see the people in the room, only that each person is not Alex.  By that argument, the philosopher concluded that “nothing” does not actually exist, but is imposed on the environment by Jake, as he searched for Alex, but instead finds only the absence of Alex.

            I could apply that same thinking to the park and say that the park is not tranquil, peaceful, or pleasant, but only that I find it so.  It is possible that someone else doesn’t like parks at all; they would only feel uncomfortable in the park, always wanting to go somewhere else.  Perhaps that person wants to go home and play a video game, or watch sports on TV.  Or, maybe that person had something horrible happen to them in a park, and deep in their brains, all parks represent that horrible event.

            If I take that stance, then I can go back to Alex and say that Park Hater doesn’t feel the park as it is, but is imposing his own view onto the location rather than experiencing the location for what it is.  He doesn’t feel uncomfortable because of the park, but because of what the park is or is not.  To him, it is not his TV but, it is  the place where he had a bad experience.

            Well, then, let’s apply the same thing to me: Maybe I had good experiences in a park, and bad ones with the TV.  Couldn’t I be doing the exact same thing as the other man, only in reverse?  I’m bringing my pleasant times of potlucks and Frisbees to the park.

            But then I’ve got to ask another question: why does the park tend to give people a sense of peace and relaxation and tranquility?  I could say it’s because people have something in them that craves natural things, as apposed to man-made things.  But that would not combine with the natural fear we should have of the wilderness and the man-eating beasts that lay therein.  From an evolutionary perspective, we should be afraid of the wilderness; it equates to exposure to danger and a lack of shelter from the elements.

            By that same token, I could say, from the same evolutionary perspective, that we, as a species, have spent far more time outside than we, as a species, have in huts, houses, or skyscrapers.  So, the park does not represent a lack of safety as much as it satisfies some great need inside me, that it reminds me of home.  However, that is still me imposing my view on the park, and not the park itself.

            By the obviously un-exhaustive arguments mentioned above, it could be said that the park doesn’t universally exude any feeling from all humans.  But that’s just it!  The park is nothing without someone to view it.  It is simply a location. Without someone knowing about it, it isn’t even a location.  The park, without conscious interaction, is a place that isn’t where we are, forever undefined until we enter it.

            Does that mean the park doesn’t exist until someone enters it?  Or, more commonly, “If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”

            That forces another question: what difference does it make, other than a fallen tree?  The only value the tree has to me is when I encounter it, either first hand or vicariously through the experiences of another.

            What if that fallen tree killed my pet dog that had wandered into the woods while I was away at the grocery store?  As long as I’m at the grocery store, the dog is still alive to me.  It is only once I return home that the dog’s death, and the falling tree become real to me.  Until I interact with the death of my dog, he is still alive to me, in every way.

            There is another argument related to this: If I am alone, without experiences of any kind, will I be aware of anything?  If I have no experiences by which to orient myself, do I have any thoughts?  Rene Descartes argued that the basis for our knowledge of existence is thought.  But I cannot simply think.  I can think of something, but without that something, my thoughts are stagnate. And, if I’m not having any thoughts, do I exist?

            A Zen monk might say that it is only when one removes judgment, removes thought, then and only then can one truly experience reality.  But, if there is no reality to experience, then where is that monk’s argument?

           So, the park does not exist, in any real way, without my being in it.  However, I do not exist without the experience of a park either.  So, it is neither the park nor myself that have existence, but only when I’m in relationship with the park, experiencing it, do either of us exist.

          There are two kinds of people in the world: those who love cats and those who love dogs. And then there are snake people. I love dogs. I can’t remember a time growing up when my family didn’t have at least one dog, and usually two. For a few years there were four dogs, but that only lasted about three years. And they weren’t purse dogs either. I grew up in coyote country, so if you wanted a dog, it had to be big enough to stay away from coyotes or beat them in a fight. Thus, dobermans and a sheep dog.
          But my first pet was a cat. She was a good cat when she decided to show up. Usually she was outside, eating mice or gophers or birds, and leaving the best parts for us on our welcome mat. But when my parents decided to move, we gathered up our dogs, but the cat was not to be found.
Enter cats in the country.

          Buying a cat in the country is like cooking steak for the coyotes. You like the cat, you might even grow close to the cat, but it’s only a matter of time before the cat gets eaten and you have to replace it. One time we bought a pair of orange cats. One lasted longer than the other, but soon, they both were meals for coyotes. And then there was Chloe. Chloe was a BAD cat. She loved my brother but crapped in my room. She sprayed (that’s cat talk for pee) into our central air conditioner, costing my parents thousands of dollars and stinking up the ENTIRE house.

          Chloe’s last morning at my house is as follows: my dad was getting up for work. Chloe walks over to my dad’s pillow and when she sees him looking at her, she craps on his pillow! My dad grabs her and… removes her from the bed. That, of course woke up my mom, who loved Chloe. My dad, on his way out the door, looked at my mom and said, “When I come back, that cat is not going to be here.” And so Chloe got donated to a neighbor who lived further out in the wilderness than we did. Last I heard, Chloe was eaten by a cougar.

          And then I got married!

          My wife is terrified of dogs. We have one car between us, and I needed it one day. But she had somewhere she had to go for her work and so I drove her. I let her out and with a book in my hand, I prepared to wait in the car until she was back. In about thirty seconds she came back, being chased by a chihuahua! With a bigger dog, she clung to me, hoping that I would placate the dog and send it back to the hell from which it came. So, owning a dog is out!

          And then there are cats. She’s allergic to cats. So, owning a cat is out, and that’s fine with me.

          One of my wife’s clients had a snake she didn’t want. I love snakes. That’s probably the residue of growing up in a rural town. So now we own a snake. His name (it might be a she) is Creepy Head because he’s a burrowing snake and he keeps just the first inch of his head visible near the watering hole, waiting for food. And that’s creepy!

          Creepy Head was free and costs ten dollars a month to feed. He eats live mice, which suits me just fine (short but horrible story). He doesn’t give off cat dander, doesn’t bark or pee down air conditioner ducts, he doesn’t even strike at people. The only sound Creepy Head makes, other than when it’s slowly and brutally strangling mice, is ruffling the walnut shavings while he burrows. Of course, thanks to Genesis 3:15, my wife is more afraid of him–he’s just a living non-poisonous rope–than she is of dogs. But even she likes watching him eat!

          Yesterday I had the privilege to go on set while a TV commercial was being shot. The car that was the main focus of the commercial was worth $750,000. It was not the most expensive car the shop made. Next to the aforementioned car was another one, not finished yet, being built for a famous country musician and his equally famous wife. In another room was a Ford Model T, with the original frame, built in 1911. When I put my hand on the steel of that frame and closed my eyes, I thought I could hear the iron smelting and men yelling over the sounds of metal on metal hammering. It nearly me tear up.

          In the design office was a man in a picture with Jay Leno. The picture right next to it was the same man, standing in front of a VERY flashy sports car and Hugh Hefner. The $750,000 car was being built for a man in his twenties who inherited about $3 billion.

          During the commercial shoot the entire workshop was filled with exhaust from the car as the builder revved the engine. It was loud! When they opened the engine compartment it was so elegant in its design that my friend said it looked, “like it doesn’t work.” The undercarriage was a piece of art equal in its efficiency.

          On the drive home, at around midnight, I got to thinking: I wonder what kind of miles per gallon those cars get. When I posted that thought on twitter, a friend commented that anyone with a billion dollars probably doesn’t care how much it costs to fill the tank. But I wasn’t getting at the economic price of gas; I was thinking about its ecological price.

          I bought a 2007 Honda Civic. It was more expensive than any car I had ever purchased before, but I liked the way it looked. It’s looks weren’t what swayed me, though. The car, on average, gets 40 miles per gallon, when I average 70 miles per hour on the freeway, with the air conditioner on. It is also certified as an “Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle” or ULEV. I bought that car because it was comfortable and because it was reasonable environmentally friendly.

          But the cars I saw last night, not one of them was designed with the environment in mind. They were beautiful to look at and amazingly powerful. But they were nearly cruel to the earth.
And then, while I rode my bike to the bank this morning, I started thinking some more: why do the rich get to own cars and jets and yachts that flagrantly pollute the environment? Does being rich mean that when they will be protected when the leaves fall off the trees because the air is more carbon monoxide than carbon dioxide? Do they simply not care?

          On my bike ride, I passed street after street, car after car, almost all of which cost less than $30,000 new, and nearly universally got better gas milage than those commercial cars.

          In the movie A Bug’s Life the villain explains that their enemies (the ants) out number then a thousand to one, and that when they realize that, the villain and his plush life of living off the poor ants would come to a swift and horrible end.

          Let the rich have their Bugatti Veyrons, their Gulf-stream Vs and their Wallypower yachts. We out-number then a thousand to one. If they choose to squander the environment, well, we people who can’t afford yachts and jets and super-cars will change the world, making in cleaner for our children. And when the rich have consumed the world’s resources and all the trees are gone, and all the poor have died because we couldn’t afford all new space stations complete with beef-vats and hydroponic gardens, and a small metal room they can never leave, they will have their reward.

          Okay, maybe that’s a bit extreme. After all, you can’t fix anyone. You can only change yourself, and even that’s hard!

          Last week was extraordinarily productive for me. I posted a podcast for Writing Thyme, finished worked on the 4th draft of my novel and sent it off to a friend to read, and posted an introduction to my short story feed Treeless Shorts. Now, I’m debating on what to do next week. Of course, I’ll post another episode of Writing Thyme. But that’s just what I do for Monday. I’ve got to work on short stories related to my aforementioned novel, and edit the ones I’ve already written.

          So, that’s that. Now, about the title of this post, Anticipation! As I wrote, I sent off my latest draft of my latest novel to a reader. He’s a published writing I truly respect, both as a person and as a writer. But the last time I had the novel reviewed, it took me two weeks to recover. Now, I’m emotionally prepping myself for the same thing. I think I made some real improvements in the latest draft, and I’m hoping it’s close to publishable, but I don’t know. And that not knowing is really hard. I mean, it’s like I sent out my heart, in the form of a solid year’s worth of work!

          Holly Lisle said writing is like dancing on stage, naked. I think she was right about that. I love dancing and being naked (I’m in the metaphor here!) but it stings when others say, “You’re fat,” or “You need to take some serious lessons.”

          As I said, the writer who is now reviewing my novel is a good guy and I know he’s a nice person and a good writer, which means I’m going to get good critiques. But anything less than “You are the best writer who ever lived,” stings. Maybe it’s ego. Maybe it’s pride or a lack of it. I don’t know. But I’m driven by passion, and I write from my heart. So I feel it, whether it’s good or bad, I feel it. And that’s part of being a writer, I guess.

          I was listening to Mur Lafferty’s I Should Be Writing Episode 100, and it inspired me to do something I’d been considering for quite a while: yep, my own podcast. It’s about writing. So, if you want to hear what I think about writing, check out Writing Thyme

          Hope you like it!

          A recent acquaintance of mine, Matthew Wayne Selznick, has asked the readers of his blog (I read his blog, that’s how I found out) to list these names and link back to his site. So, without further words from me

          “Here’s to Theresa Copell. Pat Copell. Tony Vick. Willie Asher. Steve Smith. Gina Bloxham. Donovan Spencely. Sean Truitt. Steve Harvey. Holly. Tony Lekas. J.D. Christie. Phil Clevenger. Craig Clevenger. J.J. Minue. Paula Stromberg. Jill and Dave Stewart. Matt Brown. Russell Scott. Ron Russell. Gus Contreras. Andrea Lucas. To name a few. I miss you all, and I hope you’re well.”

          If one of those names is yours, and you know/knew a guy named Matt Selznick, click THIS LINK.

          Thank you.

          Thus ends this phase of the experiment.

          I am a part of a fortunate group of writers who has found other writers willing (and able) to read and comment on my work. The comments from the members of my group have forced me to improve my craft and hone my skills. They have helped me take what I now consider to be rough drafts and turn them into pieces I’m proud to send out. They are a group of people I call friends.

          However, part of receiving critiques is getting criticism. As I get better at writing, the criticism is easier to take and has become more a process of fine-tuning an already good piece than teaching me how to write. But, as happened to me recently, sometimes I bring in a story that has a lot of work left in it, in this case, a novel. I’ve spent over a year writing and rewriting it. And before that, the novel is a product of a short screenplay, which was a product of a short story. I’ve been working on this novel for almost five years.

          Psyched about how good I thought the novel was, I began to ramp up my process and ready myself to send it out. Enter my aforementioned critique group. They told me that… a lot of stuff still needs to be worked on. One woman, with good intentions, suggested I write something else entirely. Another member said the piece was lacking on several key areas, and got so bad that she actually put it down!

          OUCH!

          So, how do I deal with these comments and thoughts about my work, keeping in mind that they are coming from people whose opinions I trust? The members of my group are better writers than I am, which is to say, when they do produce work, it’s of a caliber I am not yet capable of attaining. So, I can’t just dismiss what they say as foolish. Moreover, they both had the same comments, which means that’s two opinions saying the same thing: one more reason I can’t let it go.

          But there’s still that OUCH! I’m an emotional person. One of the reasons my wife loves me is because of my emotions. When I hear that my work isn’t as good as it ought to be, after YEARS of toil, it stings. It totally sapped all my energy. I’ve been crabby and loafing about since that meeting. But the reality remains, what should I do with that piece? Should I put it aside and move on to something else? Should I quit writing entirely? After all, if I can’t make something of quality after four years of labor, does the capacity to make it good even exist within me?

          Or, should I listen to their criticism, keeping in mind where they are as people? Should I listen to what they said, and listen to what they meant?

          I cried when I heard what they said. I considered a career change. I even considered spending the rest of my life leveling up my World of Warcraft character. But I’m not going to do any of those things.

          I can’t just let the piece die! Even before I submitted it to the writing group, I knew it was not quite as good as I could make it. I didn’t know what it needed, but thanks to my writing group, I’ve got a pretty good idea where to start. So, starting tomorrow, I’m picking up my keyboard, setting it on my lap and taking notes on exactly what needs to be fixed. I’m going to pick myself up, put on some bandages and see what I’ve got left.

          Writing, the hard part, is the emotional stuff. It’s rejections in the mail and rejections in writing groups. It’s rejection by peers who think I’m not really doing anything with my life because I don’t go to an office everyday. It’s the internal struggle where I think that I’m not really working toward a career, but just living in a play-land, dreaming my life away.

          But writing can be done. Creative writing can be done. There are people all over the world who have made careers in creative writing. It is not a fantasy, no pun intended. It is something real that has been achieved by real people, almost all of whom have a healthy stack of rejection letters.

          I’m a writer and that means I love writing. It also means, if I’m happy, that I’m writing something I love and about which I feel passionately. It is this passion that drives me forward. It is that passion that flames the desire to continue until a novel is completed; it usually takes me about three months to finish a single draft of a novel. So, there has to be a lot of drive to keep an ADHD guy like myself on track.

          And then something strange happened two days ago. I was riding my bike around and I came to a friends house. That friend was dying via a form of food poisoning. He couldn’t make himself throw up, he knew he was going to die. Straight out of James Bond’s Casino Royale, I mixed up a cup of water with A LOT of salt in it. Sure enough, within five minutes my friend had thrown up the poisoned food and we were on our way to the hospital to make sure nothing else had gone wrong.

          I saved someone’s life the other day. A human being is alive who would otherwise be dead, if I had not intervened. Up until yesterday I’ve been thinking that my writing is the best thing I can do.
          While I still love it and totally intend on continuing, right now, it just doesn’t have the same potency as it did four days ago. My writing is probably not going to save any lives. It could, but I doubt it. My wife called me a hero. I don’t know if that’s true. But I do know this: every time I see my friend, I’ll know that I’ve done something great and that the world is a slightly better place because of it.

          One of the real downsides about the broadening world of self-publication/self-marketing is that it cuts out the middle-man who sometimes acts as a quality filter. That means, the consumer is either stuck with the ugly and time-consuming task for sifting through the slush (slush is a writing industry term referring to the pile of submissions on an editor’s or publisher’s desk, made by writers who neither have contracts nor agents) themselves.

          How about a website that rates self-published authors/artists/musicians! The site could make money by using Google Addsense. And that would be it’s public side. It could also have an artists side where people who have services artists need: agents; managers; graphic designers; etc.

          And who would these great sifters be? Why, they could be people hired by the site or it could be fans themselves. The latter would be ideal since there are more fans and thus more sifters.

          That’s today’s idea. I’ll let you know if I have any more.