The Process of Inspiration

I like to keep a few beers in the fridge, otherwise it’s like I don’t want to go home sometimes. Life can be a bit depressing if you’re stuck in a one-bedroom apartment without even a TV or a radio. Because I work on the internet, it tends not to be relaxing entertainment—it’s like I’m always working, or at least looking for inspiration, and sometimes coming up dry.

I had a stint like that recently. A couple of days went by, and I had no ideas for stories. Then I stopped in at my brother’s place, had a coffee and watched TV for a while. I don’t know what it is about TV, but something struck me and I had an idea. It was one of those old war documentaries.

It’s like I couldn’t wait to go home and begin writing it. On the way, I stopped off at the park because I wanted a list of names and the plaque on an old memorial was just what I needed. So I stopped in and took a photo of one.

A couple of writing sessions later, I had a two thousand word short story, all ready to submit to the pro markets. It started off with the title, ‘Cenotaph,’ but now I’m calling it ‘In Memoriam,’ and it’s science fiction set a couple of centuries in the future.

I’ll submit that around and see how it goes. If all else fails, it can be published on this blog, and ultimately, the more strong stories I have, the more strong collections I can produce and self-publish.

New material is a good thing. If I had one good idea a day, I would be happy as far as writing short stories is concerned.

***

I was grumpy this morning, and that rarely results in any good ideas. And I had nothing. Basically, I get in the car and then get a coffee. I go for a drive in the country. I saw a few birds, and a few side-roads, and a few farms and cars going along…no big thing. It’s February in southern Ontario.

Going to see my brother, he was asleep on the couch, so I put the Weather Network on the TV and just sat there for a while. I was thinking about that one damned bird I saw. They all look the same, it’s kind of sparrow-like. There are flocks of birds. They seem to be composed of more than one species. In summer, males are in breeding plumage. In winter, they’re very drab and it’s hard to identify the species at all.

Why not use this in a science-fiction story? The aliens don’t have to be avians—certain characteristics, social characteristics, behaviour in the breeding season, the fact that they have a breeding season at all, this is good groundwork for alien-building and consequent world-building.

And all of a sudden, I remembered some dumb little four-word title I wrote in a document mysteriously called ‘Titles.’

‘The Towel of Babar.’ Now, if someone told me to write a story about a towel, owned by a guy named Babar, and make it work as science-fiction, I probably wouldn’t be able to do it. Yet some germ of the original concept convinced me to write it down, and I still vaguely remembered the idea. It was a parody of the Shroud of Turin. Ah, but now I could see things, little bits and pieces from a certain point of view—the POV of a specific but as yet un-named character.

You guessed it—I butted out my smoke, put my coffee cup in the sink, left my brother snoozing on the couch, and headed home to begin writing it up.

For me, the process of inspiration is sort of osmotic—I have to suck in something from the external world, whether from books or TV or the radio, or even just getting out of the house for a while.

To live completely without influences would be the death of any writer. I have a pretty good imagination, but it requires feeding from time to time. Not so much from other people’s books, which might lead to a tendency for imitation, which is not necessarily a bad thing in moderation. I am far more likely to get inspired and excited about an idea I had myself, and which only I could properly write.

I imitate other writers by writing too—let’s put it that way.

I would submit that any idea I once had remains in my subconscious. The challenge lies in digging it out, which is not a logical process by any means. It is intuitive and yes, creative. I think that while the apartment is often pretty quiet and mostly without distraction, that fact sometimes becomes a barrier to new ideas. The imagination needs to be stimulated with new impressions and the new thoughts they engender.

The process of inspiration is continually ongoing, and it requires new stimuli more than anything else.

Here's another perspective on inspiration.

Photo: 'Inspiration,' William Adolphe Bouguereau, (Wiki, Public Domain.)

Star Trash

In life we have to take someone else’s word for a lot of things.

I’m just taking my dear departed mother’s word for it, when I say that I am twenty-eight years old, or that my father was a man named Brendan Hartle, and that he was abducted by aliens a long time ago.

But if that is true, then he must have beaten them at their own game, just as my mom Layla said. Otherwise, I suppose I wouldn’t be here, and I wouldn’t have the ship, and yet I can’t verify anything. I can’t prove anything either way.

For whatever reason, I was just sitting there thinking my melancholy and philosophical thoughts, when I saw this object, cruising along all unbeknownst to itself. This was a totally unfamiliar configuration. The ship and I had been evading the Imperium’s ships forever, or so it seemed. We were familiar with most configurations, but this one was all-new.

“What the hell is that?”

“It’s a probe.”

“Yes, I see that. Where did it come from, and where is it going? Can you tell me who made it?”

“Well…it’s heading towards the Centralian Empire,” The machine didn't recognize it. “Back-tracking…it came from there, that is to say it might have originated at any point on this line…”

If it hadn’t made any turns, yeah, yeah…

The cabin lights dimmed and the appropriate vectors appeared, hovering in the air before eyes, with relevant star bodies and other objects and polities displayed for my inspection.

“What do you think is out there?” The question was a little obscure, but the machine was fairly intuitive.

“Perhaps whoever built the probe?” It replied without a trace of mockery, but I have often wondered.

“All right, smart-ass, let’s go have a look at that thing.” Without further ado, I began to strap myself in securely, and prepared for up-close and personal maneuvers with another starship.

After a half a minute of study, the ship’s computer had an incomplete verdict on the data.

“It’s surprisingly big. I have no idea what they’re using for fuel. We’ll have to get closer.” It waited for my instructions.

“Okay.” My sole surviving shipmate, the computer, began edging us into an intercept vector.

***

“There’s letters or a word on it. It says ‘ESA,’ unless I’m much mistaken, and ‘Artemis,’ on the side of the thing.” Our lenses were zoomed in to the max.

“That doesn’t correspond to anything in the registry. But as you know the registry hasn’t been updated in too many years for any reasonable degree of accuracy.”

That was true enough, but we would have had to interact with an Imperial data terminal somewhere to update it, and I preferred to leave absolutely no traces of our whereabouts, at any time, for any reason. Theoretically it was possible to do it wirelessly and anonymously, but then our knowledge of anti-hacking technologies and capabilities was out of date as well. Always, caution and stealth were best.

“When will it arrive in Centralian space?”

“At this speed, in about four and a half months.”

“Okay. That’s a relief. I don’t know what to do about it…”

The thing had English lettering on the side of it. I sat there in shock. It had taken too long to sink in.

“Flight computer!”

“Yes?”

“Figure out just exactly where this thing came from.” My father had a bunch of old books, old music, and they were all lettered in the same script that was on that probe.

As we pulled up alongside, at a distance of a half a kilometre, the sheer size of it became more apparent.

It was a good three kilometres long, and maybe a third of a kilometre in diameter, and there was no way the Centralians would let that thing go sailing through their jurisdiction without challenge.

From what little I knew about Earth, based upon what my mother had told me, the people of Earth didn’t know anything about the Centralian Empire, or their clients and allies and associates.

“Well, it’s definitely unmanned.” The computer indicated its agreement.

What the hell the Earthmen were trying to accomplish with that vessel was incomprehensible. But one way or another, either they, or we, or both, were about to get in a whole lot of trouble.

***

I was trying to figure out what to do next.

“If we can shut it off, or stop it, or even redirect it temporarily, maybe we can salvage it.” That was my first notion.

Cash rules the anonymous economy.

“We’ll have to determine how and where it is controlled."  The computer had a hint of doubt in its usually emotionless voice.

This spoke volumes for its actual state of mind.

“I’ll be careful. But I was thinking of re-routing it, and that would give us more time to think it all through.” It was not to be, for just at that moment we were hailed by a squadron of roving Imperial destroyers, which was quite a shock as they really had no right or reason to be here at this moment in time.

I should have known better than to get too focused on something that wasn’t really my concern…but they almost had us with our pants down.

“Nine minutes to intercept…”

“Dummies!”

They should have just kept creeping up on us, carefully stalking us from the other side of the probe. The little wheep-wheep-wheep of the hailing alarm nattered at me from the console speaker.

“Would you like to respond?”

“Nope.” I gavethe straps a quick cinch.

“Destroy the probe.” I took manual control through the stalks and blasted us out of there at full design speed plus a little something extra just for luck.

I was pissed at them damned Imperial destroyers, but maybe we would get a crack at them guys another day.

“Target destroyed.” The computer reported. “Tracking multiple targets…out of range. Out of range.”

“Are they following?”

“No. They are investigating.”

“Damn! That’s bad news for the Earth.”

The Imperium had at least as much simple curiousity as we did, and a lot more to lose.

One thing harsh experience has taught me above all, is not to get too involved in other people’s problems.


END

Photo: NASA, Bimodal Nuclear Thermal Rocket. (Public Domain.)

For more on Brendan Hartle and Layla, read 'The Case of the Curious Killers.'

When art butts heads with commerce.

I’ve got one of those stories that sort of works at less than 4,000 words. Yet I know it’s a shitty way to end a story. By keeping it short, I can submit to the most markets, and there aren’t all that many to begin with.*

There is something to be said for the safe, sane, conventional approach—it’s the generally recognized way of doing things. Rebellion for the sake of rebellion is kid stuff. I need better motivation, or at least a long and rambling manifesto…right? I don’t feel like writing that for free. (The mark of a real pro. – ed.)

To sell the story for five or ten bucks, and have it archived in perpetuity on a website operated by a perfectly nice person, (which I cheerfully admit,) doesn’t make a whole lot of sense either. All that does is gratify my vanity, and not much else.

Giving away a big long story that I sweated over for days, just for exposure, again archived for the life of the site, is another option. Exactly how much exposure would I get?

Aren’t I the ruddy great artist guy? Or is it all about the money, then?

Yet the right thing to do is to tease it out to its natural length, because otherwise the first thing that goes is description, and the second thing is characterization. I need the plot, at a minimum, just to get to the end. Otherwise I have no idea of what happens.

This thing is so short it looks like the plot was beheaded, and at the same time, my instinct tells me that to take the basic premise to 60,000-word novel length would be to pad the thing out. Padding for word count isn’t really an option, once there’s nowhere to submit it anyway! And making it novel-sized just for the sake of a given cover price is kind of cheesy as well.

Getting a magazine sale would bring some prestige, some credibility. It would represent cash money, which is always good.

On the other hand, I could write it to its natural length and self-publish it. Say it ends up at 12,000 words. Or 32,000. We’ll call it a novella or novelette, whatever. If I sold five copies a month across a number of retailers, earning $0.60 per sale, then that’s three dollars per month. Over the course of a year, that’s $36.00 in income that I didn’t have before. Okay, after ten years, I’ve earned $360.00 from one short story that was never submitted to anyone. Let’s assume I am competent to edit it, (and I am,) and also assuming I pay nothing for cover images or formatting, (which I won’t.) Is it a good story? This is where the actual ‘talent’ comes into play. Everything else is applied effort, and a certain amount of cost-benefit analysis, (which I can do.)

Do I, ah, have any talent? I guess we’ll never know until we try, right?

Huh. This is fun! I’ve never really looked at it that way.

More than anything, I want my stories to be read. They have a better chance of that happening if they’re being published, rather than sitting on my hard-drive waiting for conditions to be perfect. And conditions, are never perfect.

So this is where art begins to head-butt with commerce. At one cent a word, my story is worth less than forty bucks, as realistically speaking I’m not ready for prime-time just yet. I’ve never made a pro sale, so, ah, why expect one now? Especially with this particular story, which I already admit is kind of truncated?

Here’s another simple equation. If the average turnaround time is two weeks, and you keep getting rejected, you can submit your story twenty-six times in a year, assuming there are that many markets in your genre. Starting at the top first, at some point, and after some time, as you go farther and farther down the list, you are in the ‘for the love’ or exposure markets. At that point, you can give it away for free or self-publish it.

*Noteworthy is the fact that Duotrope, a market listing service, which has an astonishing 4,468 listings or so, is now a paid-membership service. Yeah, if you pay for this service, it’s part of your cost-benefit analysis.

Ralan: at any given time, there are so many pro, so many semipro, so many pay and so many exposure markets. Also at any given time, anything up to one-third or even half might not be accepting submissions, due to the volume of submissions and the limits of each magazine. And some of them require postal submissions. Submitting from Canada to the U.S., this entails a $0.85 U.S. stamp for the self-addressed stamped envelope. Lately, the USPS website won’t let me complete a transaction, as they are ‘experiencing technical difficulties’ which have gone on for weeks now. Also, not all markets are science fiction, fantasy, whatever. Mystery markets seem especially few and far between. I recently wrote a 17,000-word mystery. Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine wants no more than 12,000 words. The Strand, which published Conan Doyle all those years ago, requires postal submissions. Crimewave, in the U.K., same thing. I have little choice but to publish that myself as well, assuming I can create a good marketing image.

Next time someone says 'self publishing is the last resort of failed writers,' you can either laugh in their face or smack them around a bit for me. Your choice, but I promise I will be eternally grateful either way.

***

As for giving stories away, shorter is better, and flash fiction is an art form in itself.

Is it wrong to try and make money from our art?

Why not, all the best ones do. Incidentally, pointing at Vincent van Gogh and mentioning that only one of his works sold in his lifetime is a cop-out. It’s just another excuse. He never sacrificed quality for the sake of a sale, did he? But then he had the dream real bad...

I may be a little stupid, but I’m not that crazy.

Vincent is the one we all remember, isn’t he?


END

Photo: 'Starry Night Over the Rhone.' Vincent van Gogh. (Public Domain.)

The Chase.

We rounded the top of the mountain and started down. The road dropped a thousand feet in the next mile. It passed at lightning speed. The road was like standing waves at the bottom of a big set of rapids. We kept flying over the top of the hills but I was in a company car so I didn’t care.

One more big hill and we were in the city. His car was on my left, big and rectangular, edging out in front as I kept the throttle down.

When we came over the top of the first big hill in town, his car, then mine lifted, hitting after a short hop with a bang.

On the next hill, and the next, we flew up and crashed down again, neither willing to give an inch. Traffic was light, which helped. He cut across my bow and dove to the right onto a ramp leading to surface streets.

Swerving sharply, I followed him down.

The green Ford pulled into the curb. He got out and started running on an angle, sort of towards me somewhat. I stopped a hundred feet away, looking to see if he had a weapon.

The son of a bitch jumped down an open manhole cover. My reaction was to look around and see another manhole. It was right there.

Running over and sticking a finger down the hole, I lifted the heavy thing enough to get my other hand underneath and lift the cover. Dragging it aside, exposing most of the hole, I clambered down a narrow metal ladder into the sewer.

He must be off to the right, and in that direction I heard splashing and other noises. As I ran in ankle-deep water, a pillar of brilliant sunlight appeared. This was the way, I was sure of it. I kept on, seeing in the distance a flickering and then another pillar of light coming down from above in the foetid smog of the tunnel.

I splashed to a stop.

There was a ladder and I climbed it without hesitation. Bracing my legs and feet on the slippery painted steel rungs, I shoved the cover up and aside even as the wheels of a bus rumbled past my head. I ducked for a second and then climbed out, thinking that now people in cars would at least be able to see me.

His head stuck out in a crowd of pedestrians and his eyes locked on mine, even as his face and shoulders dropped furtively. He ran through traffic, dodging oncoming cars, and then running through cursing pedestrians until confronted by a subway entrance. He plunged down the stairs as I followed at full tilt.

He disappeared into the crowded station and I paused, looking around at the train about to depart.

Someone thrust something into my hand and then strode away.

It was a telegram, I’d only seen pictures in old books.

The thing was in Swahili, as far as I could see.

Crumpling it in frustration, I tossed it in the general vicinity of a nearby trash receptacle and strode into the echoing space, looking all about for my quarry.

I had a funny feeling I knew what the paper said, I had a funny feeling I knew who sent it, and I had a funny feeling that since I couldn’t read Swahili, the bastard was tormenting me and I meant to have a word with him about it.

***

I lay on the couch, phone beside me on the coffee table, a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, an ashtray and a pack of smokes and a lighter.

I waited for two return calls, one from the Ministry of Love. I was hoping Melanie would call so I could relate how I had the quarry in my sights and was hot on his trail—although really I was laying on the couch waiting for phone calls.

The other call was my intellectual property lawyer. I had written a sushi cookbook, with a fairly high heat rating which might sound nonsensical but the romance hacks know what it means, and of course some knucklehead publisher wanted it; which was just what I didn’t need right now as moonlighting from the Ministry is frowned upon, and contract negotiations take more time than I have these days.

Also my impression of our subject was twofold: one, he wasn’t really well-suited to marriage, never mind that he had ignored our summons and had failed to appear in court. What was the point? That was my question there. I had a second point, didn’t I? Sorry.

The phone rang, as I suspected it would sooner or later.

“Hey.”

“You son of a bitch!”

“What? Who is this?” The computer started talking but I waved it off.

“Fuck, Mister. Why are you chasing me?”

“You are under advisement. Anything you say can and will be taken down and used against you in Social Court…”

“Stuff it—and lay off. I got a girlfriend—a real one.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Then you should have shown up and told the judge. You should have filed the documents. Anyway, you can’t prove it by me. You’re always driving around real fast and popping in and out of manholes. I don’t see no girlfriend. Where do you live? I’ll come around and have a look.”

There was a long silence.

Finally he spoke.

“Fine. Be that way.”

It was all I was going to get out of him, but was it enough?

Yes.

***

See, when a man says he has a girlfriend, it means one of two things. Either he is lying, or he must show up at the mall from time to time.

Oh, you know what I’m talking about: standing there with his hands in his pockets as she holds up dress after dress in front of herself, and asking him what he thinks, right?

Trying real hard to look interested and not gay if you know what I mean. It’s not like we haven’t all done it, right?

I sat in a coffee shop that had the advantage of covering two major avenues in our local mall, with the bonus of an actual good cup of coffee, which, quite frankly, I can’t get at home. Never mind the price. I’m on an expense account.

If I was stuck in the office I’d have to drink the coffee there. They say it’s free. Half of them are bald and sweaty. Their opinion means nothing to me.

Sitting and listening to Yes, Starship Trooper on my ear-plants, I had a disposable plastic celebrity e-magazine on the table in front of me and good cover from a series of Boston ferns in planters along the railing that set the place off from the mall proper.

Sure enough, Buddy showed up. It was perfect, I’d only been there fifteen or twenty minutes, but I am well trained after all.

Somehow he made me. It was uncanny. I saw him, and kind of looked away when his head swung around to speak to the lady at his side. When I looked back involuntarily, hoping to see him engaged with her, his eyes were locked right on mine and he was already grabbing her arm.

His mouth opened.

I shoved my chair back, and taking three powerful strides, I threw myself at the barricade and flew over right in front of a fellow in a powered chair who threw himself to the ground in sheer fright, but them’s the breaks and the chase was on again.

Right up until I ran past the girl, intent on Buddy, who was fifty metres away, running as fast as he could and probably faster than I could…she swung her big purse in a roundhouse that caught me right in the mouth. My feet flew up, the last thing I remember for a second or two anyway, and then I hit the floor, a loud crack coming from the immediate vicinity of the back of my head.

She stared down, yelling at me and I had no idea what she was saying. It was all gibberish at that point.

***

When I regained my equilibrium, I got to my feet, wobbled, then set off in pursuit as his beau hurled foul epithets, retreating in the direction of Provincial Food Court.

He was just ahead of me, running back and forth in a panic. A door opened and he leapt in.
Buddy was in a semi-cylindrical transparent elevator just heading up beside mossy waterfalls and curving balconies on the boutique level. There was one standing empty, so I grabbed it. Hitting the button, I stared up through the curving plastic sides as he stared down at me.

The Mall of the Two Canadas, which is in Cobourg, the nation’s half-capital on the edge of the Blow-Up Lands, was relatively familiar, as I had pursued suspects before and…we passed the first level and kept going. I knew the place a bit, and I had a hunch he couldn’t get out of the elevator and go left.

My elevator was on the right of his. I was a good ten or twelve seconds behind him. Interesting prospect.

We went past the next level. He looked wildly around, and I took a quick glance at the line of numbers above the elevator door. There were twelve more floors, but then I had a com-unit and he had to get back down again…

Speaking of com-units, maybe it was time I used mine. He stared, mouth working as I held it up and spoke into it briefly.

The elevator stopped and he slapped the button as my heart rate ramped up in anticipation and the one I was in came to the fourth floor. I stabbed the button. The wall separating us was formed and textured concrete. His elevator was empty.

Taking a deep breath, I stepped to the door just as running footsteps came belting along just beside me. He must have thought I couldn’t do it, and that all he had to do was keep running at top speed and he would be safe. I let him have it right on the jaw as he went by.

Out cold, it took him a long time to crash, as he bounced and spun along the opposite wall, rubbery legs carrying him along as he sank lower and lower to the pavement, coming to rest about ten yards from where I stood. The light at the end of the hallway darkened and a familiar form beamed at me in silent approval.

“Bert.”

“Sir.”

“Can you stand between me and the elevators? His alleged girlfriend is still out there.” I wiped blood off my mouth with the back of my hand.

“Yes, sir.”

I think Bert was originally enhanced with a view to circus strong-arm acts or piano-juggling or something, but with his metre-wide shoulders in the way, she would hopefully think twice about interfering with our duties. It was our only recourse, as women of child-bearing age are exempt from most criminal statutes.

I knelt beside the suspect to put the radio-tracking plasti-cuffs on. His eyes were moving and his left cheek was all scuffed and bloody from the wall. He offered no further resistance.

“Buddy 0997-334-B, you are under arrest for evasion of matrimony and failure to report to the court as specified.”

“But I told you…bastards…”

“Yeah, yeah, you got a girlfriend. I think I might have just met her. Look, Buddy, I ain’t judging you.”

I finished reading the spiel. It’s the law.

There was a commotion behind me as an elevator door opened up and then the lady was clinging to Bert’s back and trying to beat him into submission, clinging to his hair with her left hand and swinging the purse like there was rocks in it.

He gave me a look.

“She’ll give up in a minute.”

He shrugged.

Hauling my prisoner to his feet, I led him back to my elevator of choice, where the lady decided she didn’t feel like riding down with us after all, and hence down to the main floor for transport to the Ministry of Love holding facility on Holbourn Avenue, where our subject was booked and would be held for the statutory bail hearing and arraignment in Social Court.

It's all in a day's work, and it takes all kinds to make a world, I suppose.

***

Photo: Inspired by the film 'Bullitt,' Wikipedia, fair use/parody.

For more on the world of 2030 A.D. and the Ministry of Love, go here.

Don't give up that day job. Chris Hadfield fanfic.

Holding an E-minor chord with fingertips already sore, Chris carefully dragged the plectrum across bronze and steel strings, gratified by the nearly-in-tune response. He fiddled with the tuning head. For him, trying to get the tuning on the second string was the worst. It had a habit of breaking. He tightened it way beyond its limits time and time again.

Striking again, the chord sounded better. He moved to the A-minor, and fooled around by moving the exact finger configuration by one fret or one string and one beat at a time. By pulling hard and squeezing hard, he could get a little reverb, a little tremolo out of it. The trouble was that he had to think about it. Real guitar players made it look easy because for them, it was easy. It had become easy, while he despaired of ever learning it. There wasn’t much enjoyment in it. It was like he just couldn’t let go and break away and be alone with himself.

There would always be an imaginary someone looking over his shoulder. He knew he was bad, and yet he couldn’t just get over it. It was his own self-consciousness, always ready to beat him up for some minor personal flaw. Wasn’t he being introspective tonight. Hmn. His body rotated and he drifted towards the bulkhead and the doorframe not far behind. He had a moment or two yet at his present velocity. He stuck out his left foot at the exact moment and stabilized; now drifting slowly back in the opposite spin and direction.

There were no words for what he was feeling right now. Somewhere in the world, a man or a woman had those words, but Chris was no poet. He had worked extremely hard to be here, sacrificed much to be where he was today. The guitar brought home just what that meant over the course of a man’s life. His job gave him fulfillment. That fulfillment wasn’t the whole picture, not by a long shot. He almost wished he hadn’t brought the thing, it seemed like every time he turned the corner, it reminded him of its own futility. What at first seemed like a glib PR stunt was backfiring deep in the guts. Okay, there were plenty of frustrated folk-singers and wannabe rock stars out there, all hung up on the day job and the mortgage payments. But this was just something he’d always wanted to do.

He tried a D-7, then back to the E-minor. It was about all he had ever learned of the guitar. His hands, marvelous at other jobs, were too stiff, too wooden. He didn’t think in those terms, those expressive, emotive terms where art made sense and science seemed so irrelevant. Yet he had been so sure at one time that there was science behind music and that essentially anyone could learn it. But Chris, try as he might, hadn’t learned it.

Those hands flew an aircraft just fine. He flew fully-prepared for each flight, yet once in the air, the machine took a marvelous physical intuition and turned it into a kind of joy…but the guitar took something he didn’t have. Confronted by his reflection against the dark side of the Earth out there, his nose tickled. One whisker was poking up and out. He’d have to trim the thing soon or it would drive him nuts. At one time he thought that the fighter-pilot mustache spelled rebellion. It said ‘I am an individual.’ He had to subsume so much in order to succeed. It was his one little indulgence. It was still there, always in the back of his head. That little voice.

There were times when he wished he could sit on the floor, back to the wall. He’d thought once or twice of doing something about it. A little contact cement, some Velcro strapping, it wouldn’t be that hard. He could strap himself down. Microgravity made guitar practice difficult. He had been kidding himself if he thought he would finally find enough time to really learn how to play the thing. It was a lifelong ambition, one of many that would not be realized. He missed the kids, he missed Helene.

What was unexpected was the raw poignancy of his emotions. All those people down there, all of those warring nations, all of that sublime suffering, all of the joy and wonder and simple longing that lay three hundred kilometres below. They were just on the other side of that window. When he tried to say what was in his heart it just sounded so hokey.

More than anything, he would have liked to be able to sing all of those down below, a song, a song of love, or something like that. It was a beautifully sad thought, maybe even the thought of a poet. He had much more practical concerns.

There were voices nearby, engaged in some cheerful dispute. It sounded like Pavel and Tom. His moment of solitude was over. With a small grin and a shake of his head, he put the instrument away, and then went through the hatch and along through the next compartment to see what was up.

END

Editor’s Note: Don’t give up that day job. Here’s a song for you. ‘What I got.’ – Sublime

Chris Hadfield is on Twitter. 

Chris Hadfield's photos from space, (Daily Mail.)

***