Transcript
Speaker: Greetings friends. Thank you for joining us on the mentally odd cast where each week our guests regale us with tales of the creative process through the lens of addiction, recovery, mental and emotional health, trauma, treatment, medication, all that there, because we believe that no matter what you are going through, you are not alone and you can make art about it.
Speaker: Art helps. Find us on Ko-Fi, that's K-O-F-I, to support the podcast and get all the back issues of Sometimes Hilarious Horror Magazine.
Speaker: You are listening to the Mentally Oddcast. My name is Wednesday, leave Friday. Do find us on Ko-fi. This week, we have Patrick Frivald, and he is a four-time Bram Stoker Award finalist, the author of 10 novels and dozens of short stories for publications such as Weird Tales and Dark Discoveries.
Speaker: He is a high school teacher, of physics, robotics, and American Sign Language, and a beekeeper specializing in hot pepper-infused honey. We will definitely talk more about that.
Speaker: He lives in western New York with his beautiful wife, parrots, dogs, cats, chickens, and several million stinging insects. a member of the Horror Writers Association and International Thriller Writers, he has a soft spot for slavering monsters of all kinds. Welcome, Patrick.
Speaker: Hi, thank you very much for having me. Oh, it is my pleasure. I'm so glad you could be here. um We always start by asking guests to tell us the story of the first horror movie that they remember seeing. So I cannot wait to hear yours.
Speaker: right. So, um, unlike a lot of horror writers, I'm generally not big on horror movies. I don't watch a lot of horror movies. And, uh, many of those that I've seen, I don't particularly enjoy. Um, however, i distinctly remember and enjoy, um John Carpenter's the thing. Um, so I have, um, I have eight brothers and two sisters. I'm the second youngest.
Speaker: Um, and, I spent many a day sitting on the couch unnoticed by my parents late at night watching a slew of things which weren't so much horror movies, but there was Tales from the Dark Side, The Outer Limits, ah The Twilight Zone, followed by Monty Python and then Benny Hill.
Speaker: Wow. And that particular lineup, I saw many, many, many times growing up. And I think that that did a lot to twist my brain into the various ways that it's twisted. um So in terms of horror movies, I do have to pick The Thing.
Speaker: I love that movie. It's... um It's a horror movie that ah um I saw when I was very young, but also i really, really enjoy. And I'm talking about John Carpenter's remake of The Thing, of course. um and but But in terms of like the overall...
Speaker: horror aspect of things, you know, the Outer Limits, the Twilight Zone, Tales from the Dark Side, all of those kind of mingle together in my brain to be the first exposure to horror that I have as as a viewer.
Speaker: I see. i have to say Tales from the Dark Side is so underrated. Because you you just don't hear people talking about that. the way i mean, I hear more people talk about the Friday the 13th series more than I hear Tales from the Dark Side. And that is a shame.
Speaker: Sure, sure. um And i ah to ah to be honest, I don't know that I could tell you anything about the Friday 13th series. Yeah. Like, ah I really, I'm like, wait, which one has Jason and which has Freddy and which has Michael Myers? Like, literally for me, it's not really on my radar, the movie side of things.
Speaker: And if you ask me to name specific episodes of... tales from the dark side or the outer limits or um to lesser extent the twilight zone um i i might have a difficult time doing so i've seen a lot more of the twilight zone in recent years simply because like there are marathons on thanksgiving or whatever because i guess that's what you do but it's it's a matter of it's it's a It's a vibe, right, that that I've absorbed over the years from those shows that I've never really gotten from the movies.
Speaker: Okay, well, that makes sense. Especially when you talk about something like Twilight Zone, which, I mean, Rod Serling was a man with a vision. He had... an agenda, and he had the skill and talent and connections to pull it off. So I think, though, that Twilight Zone is kind of like Monty Python in that...
Speaker: There are that handful of classic, great episodes that everybody remembers and can quote from. you know, in Twilight Zone, a lot of those haunt us. But if you ever see, like once the DVD collections come out and you get the whole thing, you're like, wow, there's there's a lot of weak links here.
Speaker: Yeah, um I love the Twilight Zone. and And even some of the ones that that are are have have this huge cult or pop culture following, like ah William Shatner with the goblin on the plane thing. Like, that one never really did much for me. um But the there are there's a ton of... The Twilight Zone was kind of horror, kind of sci-fi.
Speaker: but always socially relevant, right? Rod Serling was, yes um we we take pride here in New York that he was one of us. um And, you know, he was a quasi suicidal man with a ton of PTSD who decided to focus all of his efforts and energy into storytelling about fundamentally about compassion and and about how humanity strays from compassion.
Speaker: And so to me, the Twilight Zone holds a really special place in my heart in terms of what was his, like not even necessarily the specific stories, but what was his intentions and how well did he pull it off?
Speaker: And the fact that you can turn on Turner Classic movies on any given whatever day and suddenly there's a there's a Twilight Zone ah marathon, I think, helps speak to the legacy that he hoped to create um actually in Realization.
Speaker: Well, yes, and it holds up. I mean, all of it, I shouldn't say all of it, but so much of it holds up so well. Monsters are due on Maple Street. You can show that to people today.
Speaker: And not only is it going to be completely engrossing, but people will understand like what's being said. Like, wow, those people should have calmed down. Those people should have waited a minute. They should have talked to each other. Like all these different things.
Speaker: um Yeah, you you look at um the the remake of The Twilight Zone from a few years ago, and the thing is, you could, rather than trying to redo The Twilight Zone with new stories,
Speaker: for a modern audience, you could update every single twilight zone episode with, um, a little bit more modern dialogue, but definitely more modern special effects.
Speaker: And I think every single episode could come out as totally relevant to a modern audience. Oh yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you took death's head revisited, but made it an ice officer,
Speaker: That would be insane. Yeah. you know know, the guy that goes back to the camp and the the victims of the camp are like, oh, hey, we're ghosts now and we've got some things to tell you. Yeah. um So so you're not you're you're not just a horror guy. i think I think I initially thought of you as a horror guy because I knew you through the HWA. Sure. but But you you do lots of stuff. You're a sci-fi guy you You have, it it seems, a love of of black comedy, even if if it isn't necessarily known by that.
Speaker: Because a lot of people ah have difficulty parsing the line between horror and dark comedy. I certainly do. People tell me, hey, your book isn't even horror. That's a comedy. Like, no.
Speaker: um So how do you determine... what what What's the process for deciding what your next project is going to be, what genre it's going to be, what genre is best to tell the story that you want to tell? How do you get there?
Speaker: um You know, even from the very beginning, I i think that um I've never cared. um Genre is something that is determined by publishers ah to figure out what sells.
Speaker: Um, so like you look at, uh, Krause's novel, Angel Down, that just won the Pulitzer Prize, right? People are calling it, oh, it's weird fiction. Oh, it's horror. Oh, it's magical realism. Oh, it's this. Oh, it's that. It's all of that. All of that argument is really just about, uh, what can we do to get more money for this product?
Speaker: Uh, when it comes to genre, so, one of my very early works, Twice Shy. It was my first published novel. It wasn't the first I wrote, but my first published novel, Twice Shy. um it's ah It's a zombie novel, but it i wouldn't I would never have really called it horror, um even though some really horrific things happened and some people said it scared the shit out of them. It...
Speaker: it's With Twice Shy, there's only one zombie and she's the main character and she's taking drugs so that nobody knows that she's a zombie.
Speaker: I wrote it as a as a deep satire of high school life. The premise is that high school students are hilarious, sometimes on purpose.
Speaker: Um... but often enough, not on purpose. And, um, and that, that kids are often dealing with things that are very, very serious. Um, I, it's kind of a flippant book.
Speaker: Um, but it's, yeah it's kids are dealing with things that are very, very serious and very, very critical to like real life.
Speaker: And yet they're generally brushing that aside to focus on trivial things. Excuse me. Like do boys like me do, you know, is, am I popular? Things like that. Whereas this just takes that and turns it up to a spinal tap in 11, right? Where it's like, she's worried about, does my crush Mike still like me now that I have to hide the fact that I'm a zombie. So I can't do the things that I used to be able to do.
Speaker: Whereas, If the wrong people find out that she is what she is, then black helicopters are going to swoop into town and incinerate her and all of her friends.
Speaker: um So there's this there's this juxtaposition between what she's worried about and what she should be worried about. And there's a subtext there of why that I never really get into. So it's it's it's a dark satire, but it it it means more.
Speaker: even when you're reading it on the surface, I kind of had two audiences for it. I had people who were like, Hey, that's very, that, that, that's a, uh, that's a, I had people who were, who were like, Oh, I love Annie. And I identify with her journey. And this is so emotional and so impactful and blah, blah, blah. And I had other people who were like, dude, that is hilarious.
Speaker: um And and both of those audiences are completely valid because I i wrote it kind of to be both for for both of those audiences, which are very different audiences.
Speaker: And yet at the same time, it's also about something more where it's about, the you know, What are people, how do people deal with really traumatic, traumatic and really um upsetting and difficult things?
Speaker: when they're just trying to get through life, whatever life happens to be. And in this case, it's the life of a high school girl. So she's worried about high school girl things. um And so it's is that a horror story? Is that a dark comedy satire? Is it a rumination on um the absolute horrors of modern life?
Speaker: Sure. It's, I wrote it to be whatever it is. And I try and bury myself in what the what the characters are doing and then let other people worry about what they get out of it.
Speaker: Although I do try and help. I do try and inject certain things. If people are looking for it, like if you're looking for it, you'll find it. And if you're not looking for it, you'll miss it. And that's okay. Okay.
Speaker: all right. Well, that makes sense. Now, when I invited you on the show, you mentioned that you are skeptical of the whole concept of neurodivergence and that everyone is a bit off center and shouldn't necessarily be defined as a problem to be fixed or a riddle to be solved. am Am I understanding that correctly? Kind of. um i was I was.
Speaker: that That's something that's easy to misinterpret, I think. So I want to preface my answer to that with um if you are dealing with anything, anything at all, that makes it difficult for you to interact in society at large.
Speaker: then that can be a difficult thing for you and you might need um additional services, you might need therapy, you might need um accommodations, you might need, there's there's all kinds of things and I don't wanna delegitimize Any of that.
Speaker: so when i said that to you what i what i want to be clear about is that i think that it's not that people aren't that weird it's that everybody is really freaking weird um if you were to take how the human brain works and start sticking it on a bunch of graphs. Let's say at a bare minimum, you've got 50 graphs of various ways that people interact with the universe around them and or with themselves, whether it's introversion, extroversion, if it's um auditory stimulus versus oral stimulus versus, you can name a whole bunch of things. And if you name all these things, chances are really good that humans, all 8 billion-ish of us, land on a bell curve.
Speaker: And so when it comes to neurodivergence, if you take those 50 things and you say, who is within two sigma of normal, quote unquote normal being the middle of the bell curve, normal is a loaded word.
Speaker: um And who is outside of two sigma? Outside of two sigma is like 3%. But 3% of a billion people is a whole lot of people.
Speaker: Mm-hmm. And then when you take that there's 50 of these things, or I don't think 50 is nearly enough. It's 50 things or a hundred things or however many things there are.
Speaker: And you take any human being and you go, okay, where do you land all of this stuff? The idea that any human being is going to land within two sigma of quote unquote normal on any of the, on all of this is,
Speaker: Probably nonsense. I think the the most neurodivergent human being on the planet would be someone who isn't neurodivergent on any of those bell curves.
Speaker: Someone who lands within one sigma of of quote unquote normal on everything. That would be like, whoa, what the heck is that? There's this notion of normal that I don't think applies. So um I think that the way your question is phrased might make it come across that I think that I'm very insensitive toward those who are
Speaker: off normal when in fact it's the other way around. Well, I mean, there's a line of thinking that basically we should all be cool to each other, whether we know that someone has something mental or emotional going on or not.
Speaker: You know, like the weird autistic person and and, you know, people make fun of the weird autistic person. And then you say, hey, man, he's autistic. What the fuck is wrong with you? And instead of saying, wow, I was an asshole, I probably shouldn't have been. They say, well, how was I supposed to know he was autistic?
Speaker: And that's the that's the point. Just don't be a dick to anyone if you can help it. Yeah, yeah. always help it But that's the goal. I'll go even further than that. So, yeah, there there was a lovely autistic guy who helped me this morning with some beekeeping stuff I needed to do.
Speaker: And I'd never met him before, but. No, i'll go eat I'll go even a step further. It's... We're all abnormal. There's no such thing as normal. Normal is a fiction.
Speaker: And... Some of us are abnormal in ways that are... More compatible... With... Society as a whole.
Speaker: And some of us are abnormal in ways that are less compatible. And... That doesn't mean that those of us who are abnormal in ways that are more normal or less less normal are better or worse human beings or are less or more worthwhile human beings.
Speaker: Everybody is a worthwhile human being and how their
Speaker: overlap of however many bell curves we've got going on interacts with society is not a reason to treat them with anything other than compassion and respect and love.
Speaker: And so that, that's where my comment about neurodivergence being bullshit is, is that I'll bet you, if you pick the most normal human being we could find on this planet and you gave them whatever tests you'd find somewhere where you'd be like, whoa, that dude is a freak.
Speaker: ah Yes. It's just that the way that dude is a freak doesn't manifest in a way that
Speaker: strongly impacts that freak dude's interactions with society as a whole. Yes, i mean because, yes, we're all judged by society based on how well we function within that society.
Speaker: So if you can't keep a job, for example, you're seen as being less valuable than people who can. Yeah, yeah. So you do have kids. But I mean, even something as simple as being a night person.
Speaker: can super impact like your entire school career. Cause when you're a kid and you go to school, there's not an option to start that at three in the afternoon. You gotta get up early and you gotta get there and focus and pay attention. And if you can't, people start to think there's something wrong with you. Yeah. And you know, what's quote unquote wrong with you is that you need sleep, you know? Right. And and being a night person, a night person versus a day person,
Speaker: evolutionarily, it was super important to have both, right? Yes. Like, look at... um Look at... bike Look at... um Colorblind people.
Speaker: So... um the The vast majority of colorblindness in Homo sapiens is in men. And... It's a lot more than people think. I don't remember the exact number, but it's big.
Speaker: And... You look at that and say, why would why would that be... a common trait in humans. So ah obviously I'm talking about something that's not mental. I'm talking about something that's physiological, right? The, the number of cones in the number of types of cones in your eyeball, but it's, but it's an evolutionary thing and the brain is part of the body. So what I'm saying is not about the brain, but it certainly applies to those types of things.
Speaker: Um, It's only been in recent years that we've discovered that people who are red, green, colorblind or blue, yellow colorblind. Are fantastically better at picking out.
Speaker: Camouflage.
Speaker: So those of us with quote unquote normal human vision, just our trichromat normal, boring ass people like we are. When you are looking at someone who is wearing a ghillie suit in a field that has been designed to fool people into being part of the field, a lot of us can be completely fooled and just be like, we have no idea that there's a person out there or a tank out there or whatever it is.
Speaker: Whereas with someone who's colorblind, they've found that those people are often much, much more tuned in with, oh, there's something there that doesn't match the, the I don't know, the the visual textural pattern, whatever it happens to be, where they can be like, hey, there's a dude right there.
Speaker: Whereas... wild, because my husband is colorblind. Okay. um So I have not tested that hypothesis, and now I have to. um And well, and and good luck because I don't I don't it. This has been peer reviewed and I know that it's out there. um Have fun performing experiments on your loved ones. not that I've ever done.
Speaker: But dude, we're taking up paintball. It's absolutely shown that people who are colorblind are. way better at picking out camouflage designed for the non-colorblind. And so if you think about evolutionary biology and you think about, oh, this person is a night owl and they're colorblind,
Speaker: their odds of being able to pick out enemy warriors sneaking up on your camp, random animals sneaking up on your camp, whatever it happens to be that makes us quote unquote normal people unable to see the threat, they can be like, yeah, right there.
Speaker: That's the thing. And so it's a It's an evolutionary advantage for the group as a whole to have some percentage of people to be quote unquote abnormal.
Speaker: And I very much doubt that the same thing is not true of pretty much every other neurophysical, neurological thing.
Speaker: condition that meets or at least almost all of them that that you encounter in in modern day society Well, yeah, I mean, if if people have always had this condition, there has to be a reason for it, because if there wasn't, it wouldn't have lasted, right? I mean, just biologically, we tend to weed stuff out if it's not working. Right, I mean, ah so maybe is the answer. um It's not that there's an absolute yes or no, just because something might be a disadvantage doesn't mean that it won't carry through.
Speaker: But it's more likely to carry through if it provides some kind of advantage, not necessarily to the individual. And this is where a lot of Darwinian libertarian douchebags fall on their faces.
Speaker: It doesn't necessarily have to be beneficial to the individual themselves. But if it's in aggregate beneficial to the to the whole individual,
Speaker: then there's a reason why those things might carry forward genetically. And we have had seen such massive change in the last 500 years, thousand years, 2000 years, um compared to what we normally see biologically.
Speaker: So that some of those things might look like a, what the hell everybody else, When if you try and put it into context of us as a species, you just go, yeah, of course you'd want some of those people hanging around. There's ah there's a massive advantage to that.
Speaker: um And I think that's where you see some neurodivergence, quote unquote. um Again, I don't love the phrase, but I'm willing to accept the phrase. You you see people who are neurodivergent in ways that today make them stand out in ways that are often perceived as negative.
Speaker: Whereas in the past, people would be like, well, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the guy who helps us not die. Right. Right. So. Well, you know, like how the person with mobility issues in the tribe is often the person who can interpret, you know, whatever divination tools they're using, or they can communicate with the gods or some other skill that people, you know, quote unquote, normal, sane people don't have. I mean, that's why there's such a high instance of quote unquote, neurodivergent people in the arts, because we've all got these perspectives
Speaker: that help us to sort of translate the human experience into art to express things in ah in a different way that can reach people you know in a way that they wouldn't normally think something through.
Speaker: Sure. now i think you can even look at, um even if you try to restrict things just in terms of survival of the group, like straight up strict survival going back 100,000
Speaker: People who are in the arts tend to be better at abstract thinking. If they're into visual arts, they tend to be better at various visual things, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker: It's just different people are better at different things. And we are a communal species and we have been for a very long time. um The whole...
Speaker: Social Darwinist idea falls apart because you're not talking about a person passing on their genetic lineage. You are talking about a society of people passing on an aggregate genetic lineage that helps everyone. And I think that that leads to a great deal more diversity. Please keep in mind, I'm not a biologist. I'm not a geneticist. My training is in physics. So to some extent through most of my life, I'm talking out my ass. But um
Speaker: insofar as my ass can make some sense, you're looking at a a an aggregate behavior that results in aggregate behavior.
Speaker: ah traits, in aggregate traits that are necessarily divergent because we are not a super organism trying to do a thing. We are a communal group who are trying to survive collectively. So even just just basing it back to the, you know, bringing it back to the absolute most basic caveman-ish type society,
Speaker: neurodivergence and other divergence is a strength, not a weakness. Right? And the fact that we treat the noticeably divergent today as freaks says something very negative ah about us, both in terms of a moral and ethical failing on our part, but also just in terms of a biologically stupid failing on our part as well.
Speaker: Wow, that's that's really interesting. I wish I could pause and think about that for a while before we continued, honestly. um You know, I actually want to tie that into a few different things, one of which is that how well you're able to function with your baseline, you know, genetic and and biological and and emotional makeup depends very much on where you are in the world and what is expected of you.
Speaker: Which is why Americans tend to have, and I don't have the data in front of me, but a higher rate of getting a diagnosis, of seeking therapy, of seeking medication, even bearing in mind how many people, like I think everybody you know could name someone in their life who would benefit from therapy and they know they would never get it. um But here in America, so much is expected of people.
Speaker: Especially now, now that like fascists have taken over the country and people are working like 60 hour weeks and still not able to pay their bills. You know, time is at a minimum. Everything is like fast and expensive and people don't get to rest in between, you know, like their jobs and their lives. And you get single parents and like the education system is all crazy like that.
Speaker: if If people are examining the life that they live, they're going to see that that's a lot. It's a lot to ask of people. And if you can't make that work, it's not because there's something wrong with you. It's because everything that's going on is wrong. And just because some people appear to be managing it and and remaining high functioning, that doesn't mean that everyone should reasonably be expected to do that.
Speaker: Now, I can tell you early on in my mental health journey, when I was able to like, after I went no contact with my family, I started getting therapy. And one of my first thoughts was, well, who says I'm the one with the problem?
Speaker: You know, why am I the one that's in here getting therapy when this person is an absolute dick and this person is an abuser and they're not getting therapy? Why am I the one that's seen as as the wrong one that needs to be fixed and managed? And, you know, and the answer that they give you is that if you are the one who is unhappy, you can't change other people and you can't change the world, but you can change yourself.
Speaker: And that was tricky for me because I do think that we have an obligation to leave our parts of the world better than we found it, but not at the expense of ourself, if that makes sense. well I mean, like, I still haven't necessarily found the in-between between taking care of myself, but also trying to change the mindset of people that I think are wrong and are hurting people and, you know, yada, yada, yada, all that there.
Speaker: Yeah. um
Speaker: I think my general philosophy in answer to your your your scenario there is ah fuck them. um And and that sounds kind of flippant, but at the same time, fuck them.
Speaker: I'm responsible for me. And yeah, like I, I do what I need to do to get through it life and things like that. And, and, and there are people around me who they're doing what they need to, to get through life. And there are way too many people who are doing what they want to, to make it harder for other people to get through life.
Speaker: And I don't identify with those people at all. Um, Look, I recognize the fact that there is a fundamental disconnect between the way I think about the world and the way the vast majority of my family and the people I grew up with think about the world.
Speaker: um And that disconnect is everybody's problem because somebody is in charge.
Speaker: Like if nobody was in charge, you would be like, okay, you think what you think and I think what I think and we're all good and let's move on and do our thing. um But somebody is in charge. And when you're looking at who's in charge, in regardless of what kind of in-charge system, whether it's a a dictatorship or communism or socialism or a pure democracy or representative democracy or whatever it happens to be, somebody's in charge.
Speaker: And those people who are in charge usually have a vested interest in forcing people forcing people in line And i just wish we weren't like that. And I i don't understand why we're like that. um It's something where I i don't understand. And while on an intellectual level, I try to understand where people are coming from in terms of culture and religion and various other things, where where they're approaching these types of issues.
Speaker: At the same time, i never want to truly empathize with their position because fuck them.
Speaker: um Yeah, be well... yeah A lot of people are dicks because they're afraid of things and they can't get a handle on their fear. So it's like the people that confuse being strong with being a a bully, you know, like crushing things that are weak makes them feel strong. That whole thing. It's fear based. And.
Speaker: My impulse when I see someone who is afraid is to say, hey, man, you don't have to be afraid. Obama's not really coming to kill your grandparents. You were told that by bad people or, you know, whatever it is, the fear that's making people hateful.
Speaker: But they They get so dug in. And certainly there's things that I'm afraid of. And maybe that makes me like a worse person or whatever. like I don't know. But that's the hope. The hope is that you won't turn your fear into an excuse for hurting people.
Speaker: um A lot of times when I talk about MAGA boys online, I refer to them as Morlocks. And sometimes that gets a chuckle. Because that's what I think of. I think of the... you know, like they're they're caveman types.
Speaker: And maybe that sounds insulting, but I don't even know that they would be insulted by it. It's not like they're sitting around reading literary periodicals. um
Speaker: i be Yeah, getting little tangency there. Yeah, um my issue with that to some degree is that um when people say, oh, these people are voting against their best interests. It's like, well, or maybe you don't understand what they believe their best interests to be. um True. there's There's a, so I, a good, a good number of my family members are MAGA and I, I do not understand it at all.
Speaker: um And yet I at least try to intellectually figure it out.
Speaker: And so, but for for years and years, people, oh, these people are voting against their best interests. It's like, okay, um have you properly identified what they believe their best best interests to be? Now, don't get me wrong. There's a whole lot of leopards eating faces.
Speaker: um oh yeah. Going on there, too, where even the things they think they're voting for are do not end up being the things that they're voting for because blah, blah, blah. But... even then, um and they're what they think their best interests are might be horrific.
Speaker: um you know, the the the absolute inhumanity that people will inflict on others because they don't have a right to live here.
Speaker: Whereas, like, I have a right to live here. Why? Because my parents were born here. Why? Because their great-grandparents stole this spot from the Native Americans, you know? Right, right. That kind of thing.
Speaker: but But even if you don't even dig that deep and you just go, okay, what is it? that they're actually perceiving as their best interests. And um for a lot of these people, their best interests are fundamentally not financial.
Speaker: you You look at people who are dirt poor living in Appalachia or Oklahoma or whatever, who are barely getting by. And what they believe their best interests are is in preserving preserving the the culture, if we could be as kind as possible in trying to phrase this, um preserving preserving the culture in which they grew up, preserving the world in which they grew up. And to them, that's their best interest. So when you say, oh, they're voting against their best interests, it's like, well, no, they're voting against what you are calling their best interest.
Speaker: They're not voting against what they feel is their best interest. And don't get me wrong. Their best interest might be a racist, sexist, and or otherwise horrible thing. I'm not i'm not making, in for the purposes of this point, I'm not making any of those kinds of judgment calls. I'm just saying that when you are looking at other people and you are trying to assess what where they're at and what they're doing and how they feel and how they're acting. And as is is important in a democracy, how they're voting, there's a fundamental problem with taking external controls, applying it to others and then going, Oh, I, okay, I get it. They're just fucking stupid.
Speaker: Um, well, I would certainly make the case that it is fucking stupid to care about white supremacy more than you care about things like healthcare or your spouse not being dragged off by masked men in unmarked vans. Yeah. But when you're trying to convince, a hundred percent agree with you. 100%.
Speaker: But when you're trying to shift minds, when you're trying to shift hearts, when you're trying to knock people out of their equilibrium into a point where they might consider something else, you can't start there.
Speaker: You can't start with, you're a fucking moron and a racist and a shithead. You have to start somewhere with, what ah you You have to start somewhere closer to where are you and where are you looking for things to go? And i you're absolutely correct that a lot of it is ah absolutely embedded in fear.
Speaker: because they're afraid of things going places that they don't like, that it's uncomfortable, et cetera, et cetera. But you can't just say you're a fucking coward or you're a fucking racist or you're a, and don't get me wrong. I block a lot of people on Facebook. I think I've blocked more people than I am friends on social media. Um, I'm, there's plenty of people that are not worth engaging with, but if we're trying to be honest about how to even begin to have a conversation with someone, It can't start with, here's why you're a fucking moron.
Speaker: It can't. Yeah, mean, what what you're saying makes sense. I think that, in my experience, it can be difficult. Like, people will start out with a real argument and a salient point, and before you know it, the conversation has devolved into, well, fuck you, you voted for a pedophile. And...
Speaker: I don't know if it's because this is we're on the same Internet. We know that there are people that show show up just to start shit. You know, they see that somebody is happy and celebrating that Abdul El Saeed won. So they just show up and start talking about 9-11 apropos of nothing.
Speaker: Right. Like, that dude was nine years old. If you think he did 9-11, you're kind of an idiot. But yeah back to what you were saying, you can't start there. You can't start with, hey, you fucking idiot.
Speaker: Because sometimes it's also hard to tell whether someone has really, really been taken in by propaganda or if they're just an a-hole starting shit. You know, you you can't always know.
Speaker: Well, and and to bring it to the to the theme of the of the the podcast, um confirmation bias is a real thing. i am and And so and and the reason it's a real thing, I mean, the the.
Speaker: Part of your brain that registers physical pain is the same part of your brain that registers social pain, being like we don't like to be embarrassed.
Speaker: um We don't like to be wrong. ah We don't especially don't like to be called out as wrong in public because let's back up 10,000 years or so.
Speaker: If you are the person who's always wrong about shit, you get thrown out of the tribe. You are now ostracized and you're going to die in the wilderness because There's you're on your own.
Speaker: And this is a cooperative society. Now we're not every man for itself. Again, social star Darwinism is bullshit. This is a cooperative society. We live in tribes. And if you get kicked out of the tribe because we all think you're a douchebag, you're dead.
Speaker: And so there is a legitimate biological evolution in the human brain to feel social pain and embarrassment as actual physical pain. And we know this.
Speaker: And so people don't like to be wrong. They don't want to be wrong. They especially don't like to be wrong in public, but it's even hard in private. And so what we do is when we're wrong, we just reject the things that tell us we're wrong. And then we accept information that tells us we're right. And that confirmation bias is something that we all do, every one of us. And I try to be super aware of it. I try to not do that as much as possible. And I know I do it because we all do.
Speaker: The human brain is hardwired into it. And when you look at, so then when you apply that to
Speaker: Bipartisanship or partisanship in general. when you When you apply that to Democrats and you apply that to Republicans to make it specifically about the United States. um Democrats don't wanna be Like they don't want to be in disagreement with other Democrats. Republicans don't want to be in disagreement with other Republicans. And so when shit shifts in one direction or another, a whole bunch of people who didn't believe something at one point suddenly find themselves going along and then they find themselves believing it
Speaker: Um, we, we know that, that when you are told something over and over and over and over and over again, even if you knew it was false at first, you come to believe it. When you hear something enough, you tend to believe it. This is why i think Rush Limbaugh rest in piss, um, started off, um,
Speaker: he was pretty damn funny. When he first started on national radio, my parents were listening to Limbaugh. I was in, I was a kid. I was living in my parents' house. I was listening listening to it too.
Speaker: And he was pretty funny a lot of the time. Some of that stuff was more mean spirited than I realized at the time due to my upbringing, but some of it wasn't. Some of it was just funny.
Speaker: But I think that he, along with Glenn Beck and a variety of others, they said things over and over and over again so that their shtick became their reality where what they used to know they were goofing about became what they truly believed and i think to some extent that's actually inevitable the more i've learned about neurobiology the more i think that they they doomed themselves with their shtick
Speaker: And I think you see that a lot with politicians today and you see that a lot with partisans who are not politicians, but who are just really partisan to one party or another where they They just say something to themselves enough and enough and enough that whatever it was is now what they believe to be true. And they're going to reject anything that contradicts that. And they're going to accept anything that reinforces that. We are all susceptible to this.
Speaker: um This is how human brains work. We're hardwired to be this way. And... trying to get yourself out of that trap.
Speaker: I don't even know how possible it is. I think it's possible to at least get yourself somewhat out of this trap, but it's, It's vicious and I see it everywhere. Looking at people that I used to know well, who I'm like, I don't want anything to do with you. Looking at at at people who they've even come to agree with me more. And then I look and go, yeah, okay, but, and yet right you try and push against any of that. And all you're doing is you're just going to ram, so you're going to just going to slam face first into that confirmation bias. And, um,
Speaker: it's gonna cause an explosion.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. And it's, that's terrifying. It is. Cause I find it the older I get, the um The more i am trying to incorporate certain attitudes into my existence, things like so saying things like, wow, i I guess I was wrong. That sucks. you know And then get the real information that that I didn't have before. Or to say to someone, I had not considered it that way.
Speaker: Thank you for taking the time to explain. You know, i yes, I think my my training as a physicist early on helped with that to some degree because the general attitude of the physicist is we don't know what the hell we're talking about.
Speaker: You're going to have to try really, really, really, really hard to convince me. And the number one person, the easiest person to fool is myself. So how far do you have to go to convince me that you might be on the way to a model that is more correct than what we had before.
Speaker: and But the vast majority of life doesn't work that way. Now, another thing that you told me during the pre-interview is that you were once told you have, quote, an uncommon ability to turn off your fight or flight response, end quote. How does that present?
Speaker: All right. So um it was a weird thing. So I was I was dating a girl in high school. I know that sounds odd um to actually be dating a girl. But no. So I was dating a girl in high school and we came very, very close to getting into a a serious car accident.
Speaker: Her mom was driving. Her brother was in the front seat and she and I were in the back seat. And um she insisted I sit in the middle so she can see everything I was doing with my hands.
Speaker: my there she she she She was real realistic human being. She was dating six or she was ah the parent of a 16 year old. um But um we almost got into a very serious car accident.
Speaker: And we all stopped. And she looked up in the rear view mirror and she looked at me. And she, oh, she was a psychiatrist, by the way. This is important. um And she looked at me. She goes, huh?
Speaker: She goes, hold out your hand. So I held out my hand. And then she said, you're strangely calm. And I said, all right.
Speaker: She's like, could I do some tests on you? And I said, um, my parents will probably have to sign off on that. And she's like, all right. So she drew up some paperwork and cause she was a professor as well. And, um, um, she drew some paperwork and then we, we did a variety of tests and things. And she, she told me that my, my fight or flight response is, um, is atypical.
Speaker: And, um, It was just something. And I just, I just told her, I'm like, yeah, well, you know, there, there was nothing I could do about it. So what was I supposed to do?
Speaker: And she's like, this is kind of as, this is like a kind of sociopathy. And, uh, I was like, uh, all right. And what?
Speaker: What's that? No, or whatever. No, she she was is cool. um She was cool and I liked her daughter. um But no, she but so i actually went in and did some tests and whatever with her and her team.
Speaker: And um she said that it's it's really pretty uncommon where it just appears that I can choose to not react in like ah mentally, emotionally not react.
Speaker: in situations. And I was like, okay, because to me, I just thought that's what people could do, right? It wasn't weird to me, because what's weird to you is only dependent upon your frame of reference, right? It's like when peace people ask me, what's it like to be a twin? It's like, I don't know, what's like to not be a twin? What's it like to be from a huge family? I don't know, what's it like to not be from a huge family? um This was kind of a similar thing where it was like, um this is abnormal. And I was just like, okay.
Speaker: she's like, neat. And then, you know, I broke up with her daughter. um She dumped me, by the way, which is pretty typical. ah um But, and then we we moved on. We're actually still friends, but we went ah about our separate ways and whatever else. And then, yeah.
Speaker: Uh, it's just, but I have noticed that there have been situations in my life where other people are freaking out and I'm just like, uh, or we could react rationally to this situation.
Speaker: um and i recognize that this that in myself that this is something that is not typical um and it has been back to the whole like evolutionary like what the tribe needs that's got to be huge the guy that doesn't panic when we find out there's a rival tribe coming to get us in the middle of the night you're the guy that doesn't panic That's handy. I hope no one kills you because the tribe needs that. Yeah, I mean, and and you hope it's not something more like leprosy where it's like, oh, I can't feel my digits, so I lose them. um You kind of hope that that you're like you're not in a situation where you're like, oh I hope this isn't something that completely screws me. Yeah.
Speaker: I think it's it's done me some reasonable good in my professional life as well, where you get situations where the shit hits the fan, i had work or whatever else, and then everybody's like freaking out about it. And it's like, well, wait a minute. what What do we do about this? It's like life doesn't have a rewind button.
Speaker: We have a situation that cannot be controlled retroactively. Where do we go from here to try and achieve the best outcome?
Speaker: um And so to me, it's always been something that's been super useful. It has been difficult at times to try and understand other people's reactions to things.
Speaker: I have to stop and be like, okay, wait, how, it's not even how would other people think, because I don't know how other people would think. It's how do I think other people, like, what do I think other people are thinking at this moment?
Speaker: If you get what I mean, like it it's, ah it causes, i had another person asked me a question about this in terms of my writing. um And it's like, you know, when you're trying to write believable characters, you want to write characters that other people can sympathize with and empathize with and put themselves in their shoes. And so when you're doing that, you need to be able to say, okay, when confronted with situation X,
Speaker: How are realistic people going to respond? And how do I write that if I'm not a realistic people?
Speaker: um And I don't know. I hope I've done a good job with that but over time. Yeah, go ahead. yeah go ahead Do you ever send ah a piece to a beta reader and it'll be something that you've agonized over it and they'll give it back and be like, why didn't they just do blah? It's the most reasonable thing in the world. And it was something you never would have thought of. Does that happen to you? um
Speaker: Generally not so much. I think I do a pretty good job in delving into my characters. um I have a really excellent beta reading group as well. um just wonderful. Most of us have been part of the same group for almost 20 years now. Um, and, um, yeah, we're, we're, we're primarily an online group and we have, uh, we're all over the place there. There's Western New York and California and Costa Rica and, uh, various other Canada.
Speaker: Um, so we're from, we're from all over the place and we all have a lot of writing experience. Um, like a lot of, there's a couple of Nebula awards and some Bram Stoker awards and lots of Bram Stoker nominations and this and that and the other amongst the whole group.
Speaker: It's a group of people who are, are really dedicated to, um, making things great. Um, I have had people ask me like, why would this person behave this way in this situation?
Speaker: Um, It's not generally not too terribly often and generally like, oh, well, this is why, this is what's going on in their head. um I haven't had too many situations where people have have said, it's like, no, people just don't act like that.
Speaker: um But part of that is affect on my part. um Where I recognize while I'm writing, i need to be writing characters that are going to at least reasonably behave in a way that most people would find reasonable.
Speaker: Okay. All right. um You know, we're actually about at the halfway point. So this is when I stop and I thank our big donors. um If you want to donate to the show, not you, you, but like all of you, um we are located on Ko-Fi. That's ko-fi.com.
Speaker: where we are sometimes hilarious horror or you can also find us under the mentally oddcast um and so we are thanking this week allison huff nimu ravenfall my good friend low key and brianna simmons so thanks so much to them and if you want to be on that very prestigious list you just have to give us a little money it's how we keep the lights on around here Now, Patrick, I have never been to where you live, but you describe it as remote and idyllic, and that is the setting of a slasher movie to me. So how is that going? Is it inspiring?
Speaker: um So, as I mentioned before, I don't really watch horror movies um in terms of slashes and whatnot. No, I've, so I live in the middle of nowhere. um I bought this house from my parents after living elsewhere for 10 years. I was looking to move back to the area while they were looking to move south to Virginia. So I live in the house I grew up in. We moved here when I was four years old.
Speaker: i lived here through high school and then was gone for 10 years. And then I moved back and I've been here for 23 more years. So um I've been here a long time.
Speaker: and all of my neighbors are trees. And over, but over a long period of time, I have had people come to the house to visit. So I've done a couple of writer's retreats that have included people from not too far away like Buffalo, but also New York City and Canada. um So I've had people come in from some pretty urban areas.
Speaker: um and ah But I've also had just you know random friends from from the various places. i know I know people from all over now, right? And no, it is funny when, like when it's dark out, it's really, really dark out.
Speaker: um One of the jokes I like to tell about where I live, ah as I ask people, um you've heard of a one stoplight town? Yeah, we don't have one of those. ah And so there are no street lights. There are no stoplights. I live next to 2,700 acres of state forest.
Speaker: It's very, very, very rural. This is not suburbia. um I get annoyed that in the wintertime when the leaves fall off the trees, I can tell that other human beings live in my zip code because I can see lights.
Speaker: Um, but in the summer you can't see it. So, but I've had people where it's, it's nighttime and they'll, it's, it's so dark. And in the winter time, it's really quiet in the summer. You get all kinds of white noise from all the insects and stuff. Just, there's this constant hum of noise.
Speaker: Um, but beyond that constant hum of noise, you'll occasionally hear owls or this or that or the other, or a deer barking and it'll freak them the fuck out. And it's hilarious because,
Speaker: Like, I don't hear sirens, and i don't I generally don't hear car motors and stuff at any any general given time, but especially at night here, it gets really, really, really, if not necessarily quiet, at least devoid of human noises.
Speaker: And then when you get a chipmunk rustling in the brush and then friends from the city are like, oh my God, what is that? It's like, that that's a mini bear. It's like, what do you mean? like It's a chipmunk.
Speaker: It's 200 ounces and it's rustling through the grass. How do you know it's a chipmunk? im like, I don't, but it's probably a chipmunk. What if it's a bear? It's not bears are quieter than that. Um, right it's, um, yeah, it's, this is a very, very quiet, uh, downright serene area.
Speaker: Um, Yeah, if you were going to write a horror movie, that that's a funny thing, right? Is is when people write things like ah whatever, Crystal Lake, it's so forth. It's because that's the different.
Speaker: And so different is scary. right Right, right. When I was growing up. People would tell stories about shit that happened in the city. And when I'm talking about the city, I'm talking about Rochester, New York.
Speaker: Which is not exactly a hellscape of doom, but specific ah streets got like a mythic quality. When I was growing growing up, it was Genesee Street and Lyle Avenue, which is funny because later in college, I lived on Genesee Street for a while.
Speaker: um And it was not at all the way it was mythologized. But but the the mythology of the city and all the things that could happen to you in the city, those were terrifying to the people who live here.
Speaker: Whereas when you look at slasher movies, whether whether you're at summer camp or you're just living out, you find a cabin in the woods or whatever else. um You know, when I was in high school, there was in a there's an abandoned cabin up above one of the parks that is not too near, and not too far from here, where teenagers would go up and like bang and smoke weed and drink and things, the things that will get you murdered in a horror movie. Right. that This was just one of the places you could do that where parents weren't around, where you it's very unlikely that you would get busted by anybody.
Speaker: And it wasn't scary to anybody. That was the place that you went to bang and smoke weed and drink and whatever people were doing. I didn't do those things. I was busy playing Dungeons and Dragons with my friends. The the the people who went up to I went to this cabin once just to check it out and no part of it was scary. It was just like, oh, OK, this is where people come to do this.
Speaker: Goodness gracious, those mattresses are disgusting. It was there was there was nothing, nothing, nothing scary about it. Whereas I think from the lens of someone coming from the city, that place would have been creepy as hell.
Speaker: yeah So yeah, so I think that how's it going? It's going fine because that stuff is fiction and it's a fear of the other.
Speaker: And this isn't my other. This is my normal. Well, but you also don't have a fight or flight response, dude, or it's optional. Yeah, but I've been there with other people too, and they they haven't had a problem either. So I don't think in this particular case, that's just a matter of me saying, yeah, I'm a weird freak. No, no, now I got to come and visit and see for myself. We got to determine who's right about this. Yeah, so here's the thing. You're welcome here anytime. i don't know if that cabin is still standing, but we can certainly go try and find it.
Speaker: And I promise not to be the cannibal that eats you. if you I'll bring a blanket. It sounds like I'll need one. very Yeah, no yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, now we got to talk about honey because here's the thing.
Speaker: I grew up thinking that I didn't like honey, but it turned out i had never really eaten real honey. I was eating that crap in the bear in the grocery store that was like yellow corn syrup. So it turns out honey is delicious. So I'm excited to know how you became a beekeeper. um So when I was a kid, up behind the house,
Speaker: This is a strange thing. Up behind the house, off to the side where my mom had a horse pasture, there were some colonies of bees. And nobody had taken care of them for years.
Speaker: um And I only found out later that my neighbor didn't know where they were from. And the people who owned the house prior to my parents didn't know they were where they were from either. So I don't know where those bees came from. But I got to see them kind of up close as a kid for a little bit.
Speaker: But we pretty much stayed away from them. um But they were kind of interesting. It was kind of neat. And then um fast forward many, many, many years. So this is about 20-ish years ago.
Speaker: I'm about 30-ish. And I'm at my mechanics and he's got honey for sale. And I was like, hey, are you a beekeeper? And he said, yeah. Like, that's really cool. I've always been kind of interested in that. And he said, well, I have an extra suit if you'd like to come out and check it out.
Speaker: He's like, I've got a couple extra suits. So me and my twin brother went out and we we checked out his thing and he showed us ah the basics of checking on some colonies of bees.
Speaker: And we thought that was really cool. And my brother didn't end up getting bitten with the bug, but I was like hey, this should be fun. I'll i'll try and get a couple of colonies of bees. And so a couple colonies um ah got completely out of hand. So now it's a side gig for me. But that's really how it started was just me asking my mechanic, who was a beekeeper, like, hey, this is neat. Can you show me what's up? And he said, sure. Yeah.
Speaker: So not terribly long after that, I ended up being the vice president and then the president of our local beekeepers association. Um, and I haven't done that in a long time, but, um, But yeah, it was just something that I fell into because I thought it was neat.
Speaker: And bees are really cool. I actually like bees more than I like honey. um The honey you get in the grocery store now, at least in New York, there are labeling requirements where it can't be corn syrup.
Speaker: um You can buy honey syrup, which is like a dollar for one of those little bears. Right, right. Ingredients that's almost entirely corn syrup with just a tiny dab of honey. and It's the same thing you could have bought 10 years ago for $5 a jar. And now it's a dollar a jar because of labeling honesty.
Speaker: But, i but yeah, with honey, I, everything I do is small batch. So if you buy real honey from the store now, like from Subie or one one of these giant corporation corporations, um they're buying honey from,
Speaker: thousands of beekeepers around the country and then mixing it in these huge vats and putting it in bottles. And here's the thing. It's perfectly good. There's nothing wrong with that honey. It's, it's perfectly good honey, uh, that will taste good.
Speaker: Um, I liken it, to scotch. Do you drink scotch at all? No. and Okay. So um for those who do, a single malt scotch tends to have a lot of character. Every single place that makes their own single malt scotch. Some are smokier and some are more bitter and some are sweeter and some are this and some are that. And so they've got all these different notes of flavor to them. But then you can also go to a store and buy a blended scotch. Jameson, I think, is a good brand example. where you just go in and you buy, and every bottle of Jameson you buy anywhere in the world tastes just like every other bottle of Jameson anywhere in the world. Because what they're doing is they're they're buying from these small batch guys, and then they're mixing it all together in huge vats.
Speaker: And what happens is it smooths out. So it's it's not going to be nearly as bitter. It's not going to be as smoky. It's not going to be as this. It's not going to be as that. It's going to be an average of everything. And so honey's the same way. There's nothing wrong with a blended whiskey, and there's plenty of people who like those.
Speaker: A blended honey, there's nothing wrong with it. You go to the store and you buy a blended honey, what you're getting is probably ah a mix of a whole bunch of different stuff that has been blended together, and so that all of the really unique notes have been blended out, but you end up with something that's nice and tasty. Whereas if you buy something that's small batch,
Speaker: you're going to get an extraordinary amount of variety. And that variety is huge. um Autumn olive or in early spring or locust is super, super floral and really, really light in color. It's super pale. It's almost like slightly yellow water.
Speaker: And buckwheat honey is almost jet black and kind of tastes oatmeal-y. And, you know, all of those things go into blended honey and you end up with just the honey you get at the store but when you buy small batch honey you end up with all that different character but you don't end up with that consistency okay see that makes a ton of sense to me because i got some subi honey recently even though i usually get my honey and i'm actually looking it up right now
Speaker: Okay, I get it from a company called Nate's Organic Honey. And it's raw, unfiltered honey. They do organic and they also do like a conventional one. But I was taken aback when I first tasted it because it was so complex.
Speaker: And so like, I mean, i wanted to talk about it with someone, which is not my feeling when I when i eat soupy honey. um So yes, so I have... ah very much an appreciation for the distinction that you described. Yeah. So the the very first batch of honey that I ever made, um it was an extremely rainy year.
Speaker: And the honey I got was very dark and very thick and tasted extremely raisiny with a kind of vanilla aftertaste.
Speaker: And then something that I in particular found kind of off putting like this off kind of off putting kind of bitter note at the end of it. And I was like, I'm a writer. I can spin anything into something cool. So I described the things that made it interesting and unique. And I sold all of this honey and there were a bunch of people who bought it and they loved it. I did not describe it as an off putting aftertaste. Um,
Speaker: and And and people loved it. And my brother, Jake, funny enough, he kept a bottle for he had it for years because he knew it was just this unique once in a while thing.
Speaker: And he had it for years and he said it never crystallized, which I thought was very interesting because all honey eventually crystallizes. yeah Yeah. And I think.
Speaker: Knowing more than I did back then, that what I ended up with was it was a bunch of honeydew. um And honeydew primarily comes from Turkey, but ah you can get it other places.
Speaker: um When aphids chew pine trees... they secrete a liquid that is high in sugar. So ants will milk aphids for, for sugar.
Speaker: um So honeybees will actually suck. This is pretty gross, but they'll suck the liquid right out of the ah aphids butts, essentially as nectar and turn it into honey.
Speaker: And that's what we call honeydew. um And reading the descriptions of how honeydew tastes, I was like, it was raining so much that I think the flowers weren't producing enough nectar. And there are enough pine trees around here, and there's always plenty of aphids, that what my bees probably produced that first year was honeydew.
Speaker: And I've never had anything like it. And it's not something that I would go out of my way to buy. Personally, the aftertaste was just blech to me. But I had customers who absolutely adored it as an interesting and unique thing that they'd never had before. And so for me, I just ride the wave. Every year, the weather's different. What blooms well versus what doesn't bloom as well is a little different. Every year, every season is a little different. And so whatever you get is whatever you get.
Speaker: Nice. Love it. So you sell honey and you also make hot sauces, right? So how do we get some? So my website is frogspointhoney.com.
Speaker: Um, my, my house, this land that I live on, ah was on a map back in 1860 called frogs point, uh, which given how many frogs are yelling during the summer, I understand how that happened. Um, but so I, I saw that. So I just, I named my company frogs point honey and frogs point honey.com. I sell honey and hot honey. i do hot maple syrup. I have a variety of hot sauces that also contain honey because, you know, that's what I do. So I grow all the peppers. I keep the bees.
Speaker: um i do not grow all of the spices. The maple syrup I buy from a Mennonite down the road, I don't do the maple syrup myself. But a lot of it is stuff that comes from my own garden. And it's just fun. it's a It's a fun side gig as I go about life and do things I enjoy.
Speaker: And you have a roadside stand, right? That uses the honor system. I do. i do How's that going? So honor system with cameras. Um, so, uh, when I first started, I did not have the cameras and I was losing a significant amount of, uh, product to what in retail they call inventory shrinkage, AKA assholes stealing stuff from you. Um, and, um,
Speaker: So I got a camera. Originally i started with ah with a, with a deer camera and then somebody stole the camera as well as all of the honey off my stand. these were Great.
Speaker: So now I have, I have wired and unwired cameras. I have a ton of them on my house and I have a reputation for being a bastard about it. um Like if you, if, well, cause the problem is if someone steals an $8 bottle of honey today, it'll be two next month and it'll be five the month after, you know, 10 bucks now becomes a hundred bucks later.
Speaker: Um, So, and I can't do much about people who are, who, who swing through like once. I did have a guy, he did a smash and grab. Basically he, it was a guy at a giant orange tractor trailer, um, who pulled up, pulled an arm load of honey off the stand, dumped it in the front seat of his truck and drove away. And it was like 150 bucks worth of honey all at once. And at the time I didn't have my cameras set up to see license plates.
Speaker: So it's like orange Mack truck. That's all I've got. And it wasn't enough and nobody had anything to go on. So was just, I just sucked it up, but that was a long time ago. This is maybe, that was maybe 15 years ago.
Speaker: Um, over time, I have learned about camera placement. So now you can't get anywhere near my house without me knowing everything about you. I can see your license plate. I see your car, your make model of your car. I've got night vision.
Speaker: i can see your face if you walk up to the stand. um And I have a reputation for being an absolute bastard. Two years ago, a woman walked up to the stand. She grabbed a $8 bottle of honey and she stuck $2 in the box.
Speaker: And... It's not a suggestion. Unfortunately for her... Um, I had checked the stand and run to town and then came back and checked the stand. Generally just like if I'm outside, I just bother to check cause it's there.
Speaker: And so I checked the stand and emptied it of cash and whatever. And then I went and did my thing. And then I came back and there were $2. And of course I have nothing for sale for $2. Right? So I was like, okay, two bucks. So I went and I looked and I had her license plate and I had her face. Um,
Speaker: And I just, I posted on Facebook. I've got a stand that says, or I've got a sign that says, ah shoplifters will be shamed on social media and prosecuted.
Speaker: Um, so I, I put her name and I didn't have her name. Sorry. I put her license plate and her face on Facebook and said, this person took a $8 bottle of honey. She only paid me two and she owes me $6. And, um, she immediately complained and said that I had ruined her life and things. And then she came um came with the camera and she, she wrote, fuck you on her butt cheeks and then moon to the camera, which was exciting. Yeah. um she also paid me my six dollars um that she owed me um but um peep i have this reputation now of being someone where i will go after you for 50 cents and i don't want to be that guy but you have to be that guy um i i tried not i i get it tried to be that guy
Speaker: We get lots of packages stolen here. And as you know, I have a business, so we we do soaps and little gifts and stuff. And they're not... The things that we sell are not necessities.
Speaker: No one needs these. No one is going to go hungry or, you know, become ill because they don't have these things. Right. Which means stealing them makes you a dick.
Speaker: A selfish, entitled... Probably narcissistic dick. um And then we we put out a camera as well. And our camera was stolen. So that was disappointing. Because we had one. And it had to be a neighbor. Because you need a key to get into the building. But real, real sticky fingers. And I i mean.
Speaker: I started thinking about booby trapping them. But I'm like, no, you know what? I'm not putting any more money into this. I have eight. Um, four of them are obvious on purpose and four of them are hidden on purpose.
Speaker: Nice. But I have, I have eight. You can't get anywhere near any of my cameras without being on the other cameras. And no matter what you do to the camera, you've gotten to, i will see you. So that wouldn't stop someone if they were determined, if they're want to wear gloves and a mask and then black out their license plates and pull up and do their thing. They could do that, but generally people are not doing that.
Speaker: Um, It's because they don't think of themselves as criminals. They think they're just getting this one quick thing. Well, I don't know. The dude who stole the camera as well as all the stuff definitely thought of themselves as a criminal. But yeah, no, there's there's a distinction you made there. And people have shared this online before and I have mixed feelings about it was, oh, if you see someone stealing food, no, you didn't.
Speaker: And was like, well... From a store. From a big box retail establishment. Not from a person. Even then, it depends on the food. Like, if you see someone stealing lobster, they're probably just a shithead. If you see someone stealing a bag of rice, they're probably just hungry.
Speaker: um Whereas, you're right. Like, i sell a luxury product. um nobody needs any of what I sell. And I actually, I donate honey and money a lot to my local, there's a little local love food pantry in my town that I helped them actually form a 501c3 so now people can donate um and get target them and get a tax write-off, which is nice because it helps businesses donate more. But I do donate a bunch to...
Speaker: people who need it and they can go and take that. And that's not fast. Whereas if the exact same person took the exact same thing off my stand without asking that's theft. And it's a problem. It's like go to the free pantry that I donate stuff to and take it from there because that's, that's what I've given. So that be like, I, I absolutely have sympathy for people who don't,
Speaker: are hungry. I absolutely do. And I give a more money than my wife knows to, ah to people who are hungry.
Speaker: That is not going to stop me from nailing you to the fucking wall. If you steal $6 from me on my honey stand, it's a different thing. Well, I mean, it's called citizenship.
Speaker: You just don't go around being a dick to people. and Oh, you do, don't you? So many people do. ah I mean, i i try not to. I don't always live up to my own expectations, but I do i do try to live a life that's relatively free of dicketry.
Speaker: Exactly. And so should we all. um Moving on to your work, um I want to start by asking how the the current sociopolitical climate is impacting your creative endeavors. You having more work output, less? How's it going? um I have had less over the past year. I'm not going to get into details over the past year. Um, but it's slowed down, but I do have projects I'm working on, um, in terms of like sociopolitics involve, uh, like influencing my work. I have always included that kind of thing.
Speaker: If you're looking for it. I mean, I think my most popular series is like, uh, If you just want to read it as a wham bam thank you ma'am. it's ah It's like hyper violent Captain America versus Fallen Angels. You know it's it's a it's a super fast paced action superhero horror series.
Speaker: But there's absolutely social commentary in there if you're looking for it. And I think by and large most people who read it and enjoyed the series didn't see it.
Speaker: and that's okay. But for those who did, it's absolutely there. So in in terms of what I'm choosing to write, it It hasn't really affected things. um My general stress level over the past year has slowed things down, but I am steadily plugging away at stuff and I have several projects.
Speaker: I've got something coming out in October and I have an agent who just a bit on one of my novels and I'm not sure where that'll go. And then I have another novel that an agent said, as soon as you're done with that, I want to represent that. That's what I'm working on right now.
Speaker: No, it's really stupid, but it's it's super fun. So I've basically written a crime thriller that is using the works of Taylor Swift as um as not only as inspiration for plot, but as, what do you call it?
Speaker: and
Speaker: The cutout words for for like ransom notes. Yeah, there we go. Ransom notes. what we're It's basically a ransom notes. It's a massive ransom notes of Taylor Swift stuff as a crime thriller.
Speaker: and like Like refrigerator magnets. Yes, exactly. um where Where I'm taking, I'm averaging over one Easter egg every 60 words.
Speaker: But if you didn't know it, you wouldn't know it. Like the goal is if you had no idea of what the conceit of this novel was, you'd read it and go, that was one heck of a crime thriller. That was super cool. There was con men and murder and this and that and the other. And that was super fun. What a great beach read that was.
Speaker: But if you know the conceit and you're interested, you'd be like, wait a minute, how many Easter eggs can I find? So it's, um it's an Easter egg hunt. It's the hardest thing I've ever written. i'm having a lot of fun with it.
Speaker: It's, it's way slower than anything I've ever written. it's It's so hard for me to get through a chapter on this, but it's super fun. Wow.
Speaker: Okay. So if somebody is unfamiliar with your body of work, where is the best place to start? ah Probably. So my business card, I guess, would be my short story collection in the Garden of Rusting Gods.
Speaker: um So it's um it's a mix of a bunch of this of short stories I've written over the years. So I write horror. I write sci fi. I write fantasy, magical realism. You know, like I kind of scattershot. I write whatever I want to write. And in the Garden of Rusting Gods is a nice snapshot of a wide variety of things that I like to write. So if if someone was interested in what, um, in the kinds of things I do, that would probably be, uh, the right place to go.
Speaker: If they're interested in my straight up horror, my novel murmur is like the closest I have to what anyone would consider like a horror novel. um Murmur but but yeah in the garden of resting gods is where I would go if I were looking to find out more about me and the kind of stuff I write.
Speaker: Cool. Did you have a link tree right so we can put that the description so everybody can find everything. Uh, probably, uh, maybe, um, I have my name. I'm the only Patrick Frivald on the planet. Um, I'll, I'll send you the link to get a link tree and not that they pay me or anything, but they're great. And it's such a handy way to put up one link and it goes to all your stuff.
Speaker: Sounds good. Um, now, now you're going to be sharing a short story with us at the end of the episode. What do we need to know about it? You want to set it up? Yeah, sure. So um this is so my twin brother is probably my biggest critic.
Speaker: And this is like the only story he has ever read of mine where he said something better than that doesn't suck. um So it's called A Creative Urge. It's in the collection I just mentioned in the Garden of Resting Gods. And it is a rumination on grief that is folded into the mythos of The King in Yellow.
Speaker: Okay. All right. Wow.
Speaker: So sweet. So we'll have that at the end of the episode. We are nearing the end of our time. So I want to ask if there is anything that you wanted to talk about that we did not get to.
Speaker: um So if I could just randomly plug my own thing, if you're into into mid grade, um I have a new series coming out and the first book is debuting this October on October 13th is Mitch Craft Vacation Magic School.
Speaker: Mitch is the only kid in his class who absolutely sucks at magic. So he is sent to vacation magic school as a last ditch effort to try and get his abilities up to the point where he won't be stuck in a remedial class rather than going on to eighth grade with all of his friends. Wow.
Speaker: It was somewhat inspired by, um I was driving by somewhere and it's not that uncommon around here. I saw a sign that said vacation Bible school. And I was like, you know, if there were ever any three words that didn't belong together, it would be vacation, Bible and school.
Speaker: ah And that was sort of the impetus for this. So it's it's sort of the the very much anti Harry Potter. um Mitch is a a sympathetic, smart, well-read kid who is just.
Speaker: absolutely god awful at doing anything magical so um and i i think i'm i'm it's coming from apocryphal press uh and i'm i'm really hoping that it does really well i would love to turn it into a very long running series nice so when you when you start a series do you plot out the whole thing? Are you one of those or do you kind of make it up as you go along as it were? um So it it depends a bit. So, you know, like plotters versus pantsers. um
Speaker: I when I write novels, I tend to plot them I pants my plot, as it were. um I just like, oh, what if this happened? What if this happened? What if this happened? Until I get three or four pages of what ifs on the page. And then I go through and I edit that and I tweak that and I work with that until I've massaged it into an outline of ah of a story and then I'll write it. um In terms of a series, um it depends on the series. So Mitchcraft is designed to be episodic. So each book is going to be pretty well plotted out, um but it'll be a little bit um Simpson-ish in that
Speaker: you could you should be able to pick them up anywhere. I envision sort of like a Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys kind of thing where you can just pick up any given book and read it and go, okay, that was a fun Mitch Craft book, you know if you're a 10-year-old or 12-year-old or 13-year-old.
Speaker: But my other series that I've written, i have planned out significantly more. So I want... if I'm going to write a story, I want a complete arc before I start. I want to at least have a good, reasonable idea of what is going to happen with the protagonist and the other main general main characters throughout the entire arc. And then I can write books that lead into that arc as you go and build it as you go. um
Speaker: I never ever want to George R.R. Martin people. Yeah, um and I know that feeling. I've met George. I was his lackey at Stoker con in Palm beach some years ago. i never spoke to him on this particular subject, but you know, the whole, um, not that anyone wants to mention his name anymore, but Neil Gaiman saying, um, George Martin is not your bitch.
Speaker: Uh, it's like, isn't he though? Didn't he promise a story when he started publishing these books? Yeah, I'm with you, man. I think that,
Speaker: creatives, if you've made a promise to your fans, to the people who are, that that gave you this career that you have, that yes, you have an obligation to keep your word to them. And if you can't, then they are owed an explanation.
Speaker: I, ah you know, as a writer myself, who has been stalling the fuck out of my latest trilogy, i get it. you You can't do that to the fans. so And if you do, you can expect the fans to take issue with that. Strong issue.
Speaker: So you don't necessarily owe anybody an explanation, but at the same time, ah they have a right to be pissed off about it. um the crown was ah A Crown of Stars by Kate Elliott was originally going to be a trilogy, and then it got pushed to five books, and then five books got pushed to six. um It's a wonderful fantasy series. I absolutely adore it. It's one of my favorite fantasy series ever. But when three books wasn't going to be enough,
Speaker: She like, this is before blogs were a big thing or anything else. She was sending out her newsletter saying, Hey, it's going to be longer, but don't worry. I'm going to get it done. And then book four came out. And then as she was halfway through book five, she sent something out saying, okay, book five is not going to be the end, but book six will.
Speaker: It's going to be a six book series. I'm going to finish the whole thing. I promise you. And she did. And it's wonderful. And it's, it's, it's one of the greatest fantasy series I've ever read. i love it so much, but reading it as it went along, you know, it was a little disappointing to be like, Oh, okay. So there's, Oh, so we got to wait.
Speaker: Oh, okay. So I got to wait a little more, but she did it. um Contrast that to like the wheel of time. that was originally supposed to be a three book series that became five, that became 10, that became 12, that became, Oh, he's dead. And then Sanderson finished it. Then Sanderson finished it for him. Um, using his notes, like on, he spent his last year on his deathbed, giving him his notes, uh, for to Brandon Sanderson. So Sanderson could finish And then Sanderson was going to do one last book. Oh, wait, it's two. Oh, wait, it's three, which it did fine. It did finally finish.
Speaker: And i I think that it could have been one of the most spectacular five book fans five book fantasy series in the existence of fantasy had those 15 books been properly edited down into five. but But Robert Jordan, you know, he just, he, it's another book. It's another book. It's another book. And some of those books, you're just like, well, nothing happened in this book. um And I never want to be that guy.
Speaker: um I don't want to be the person who wrote book 10 and 11 of The Wheel of Time. I don't want to be the guy who wrote book four and five of A Song of Ice and Fire. um To me, there's an obligation to the reader to know where you're going, to have a plan to get there, and to get there.
Speaker: um because you started telling this story and just stopping and going, yeah, well, you know, that's what I got, man, is ze it's pretty shitty, right? So I'm not worried about that. So right now, all of the series that I've written are done. So Twice Shy was a duology. It's two books. I might have a third in me, but the second didn't promise a third. So it's like if I ever write a third, it'll be like, oh, OK, that's something new.
Speaker: that can finish things out, but it's not necessary. The Matt Rowley books was four books and done. um And that's what it needed to be. And that's what it was. It's a four book series and that's what it is. um The Mitch craft books are, like i said, plan to be very serial. So they're not, they're not intended to have this giant massive over overarching thing that needs to finish.
Speaker: Um, it'll be each book should be a self-contained story. That is a fun story in the world of Mitch who sucks at magic and his friends who don't. Um, and, uh, so, but yeah, when it, when it comes to a series, I realize I'm babbling on in terms of the answer to the question, but when it comes to a series, it, it depends to some extent on the type of series. But if you're writing something with a giant overarching plot, um,
Speaker: you kind of owe it to your reader to get there. And I don't think I will ever start anything that I don't know where it, it should end up and have a good idea of how it's going to get there.
Speaker: Okay. All right. And finally, we do like to give guests a chance to ask me a question if they have one. So if you do, now's the time.
Speaker: So I guess ah my my prime question to you, being as someone who's not particularly neuro spicy, why did you ask me on this podcast? That was my question for you.
Speaker: Oh, well, that's interesting. um It's um it is because, first of all, I have not developed the skill yet or the the a method to approach people and say, hey, are you neurodivergent?
Speaker: um because some people are offended by that question then it like colors me permanently in there oh yeah that's the bitch that asked if i was insane like no no i i didn't but um i invited you because a you're in the horror community and i see you online enough to know that you are articulate and well read which leads me to think that a if you're not neurodivergent you're going to have some opinions on it and b that i would probably enjoy talking to you for two hours And that you would have a perspective that is different enough from my own that it will have value for listeners. And that's really where I was when I asked you.
Speaker: Very good. And so my follow up to that is just what is your overall, if you want anyone to get anything out of what you are doing here on this podcast, what would you like that to be?
Speaker: I think the the hope is that it will humanize people who often are relegated to stereotypes. um i've had i try to have as many different kinds of perspectives on the show as I can, and also to um approach people that tend to disagree with me on on at least one or two issues. I've had people, had a guy on here that defended Elon Musk.
Speaker: You know, I've had, ah you know, trans people because i don't i don't know a whole lot about trans people. And that's a group that is in need of some perspective sharing because there's so much bad information going on.
Speaker: about that community. um I've talked to some ah people of color about their standing in their various literary or artistic communities, how they feel that they're received.
Speaker: um and And generally, like I have... this This dichotomy, because one of my favorite movies is It's a Wonderful Life. I usually watch it once in the summer and then once or twice at Christmas time. I think it's one of the most important movies and the messages in that movie are so valuable.
Speaker: And every year I get frustrated again, because so many of the people that are also at home watching that movie are missing every salient point that it makes. Right.
Speaker: And so my Rod Serling-ish quality is that I say, how do I reach people? how do I get people this information? and my hope is that if I bring in an array of guests and they are willing to be generous with their time and with their stories, and we can talk about movies and books and humanize people and then share these experiences, that the people who who could value and benefit from that information will get it. And they'll get it in a way that's entertaining and enjoyable. Like that's that's the hope.
Speaker: Well, that's wonderful. And you honor me by bringing me in be a part of that. I thank very much. well Well, cool. It is now time for the Mad Lib, which is the most fun part of the show. So I hope you're ready for it. ah Let's see. We need to start with some nouns. I need one, two, three, four singular nouns.
Speaker: Four singular nouns. Okay. o Pepper. Box. Tree.
Speaker: And one more. Oh, you said four. I have a master's degree in physics, so I can count. Honest. Wait, pepper, box, and tree. What was the other one?
Speaker: There wasn't one. i can count. I didn't say I did it properly this time. Ah! ah Oh, let's go with chair.
Speaker: OK, and i need a number.
Speaker: and let's see, adjectives. I need one, two, three adjectives.
Speaker: Adjectives. Big. Small.
Speaker: Interesting. Flat.
Speaker: um Okay, so a part of the body. Knee.
Speaker: A celebrity female. This has got to be Taylor Swift. All right. Now we also had person in room male, and that is always the guest. And person in room female, which is me.
Speaker: And let's see, another part of the body. Toe.
Speaker: And another number. Hmm, six. And finally, a place.
Speaker: New York City.
Speaker: Okay, so this is called Talk Show Queens. After a 17-year reign as daytime TV's most popular talk show pepper, Wetnessa Walters finally announced her retirement.
Speaker: On her big farewell show, she recalled the moments nearest and dearest to her knee. When famed Hollywood actor and leading box, Patrick proclaimed his love for Taylor Swift, then surprised everyone by getting down on one toe and proposing with a six-carat diamond tree.
Speaker: when a woman and the chair she gave up for adoption 20 years ago were reunited. oh wow. And when each member of the small audience was given a fully loaded, fuel efficient, interesting convertible and an all expenses paid trip to New York City.
Speaker: All these answers were like way too useful and appropriate. Apparently, yeah. That's not the kind of irreverence we usually see with- Sorry. could have been way grosser.
Speaker: Whatever, Logic Boy. I'm factual. My name's Patrick. Me, me, me. Dude, thank you so much for being on the show. I had an amazing time and I learned some stuff, so that's always good. well Thank you so much for having me. i appreciate it.
Speaker: right on. We want to remind listeners to do find us on coffee so you can send us some love and find out who's coming on the show later and any episodes that you missed and all that there. So we'll see everybody next week.
Speaker: Tears streamed down Cassie's face as she smeared paint across the canvas with her bare hands. Bilious green covered the pond in the foreground. smothered the silhouette of children on swing sets and the craggy, vine-covered trees clawing at the sky behind them, obliterating a month's work under its unrelenting stain.
Speaker: She dipped her hand into another can, and it came up dark red like old blood. That red mingled with green and vicious slashes to form a muddy brown, the same muddy brown that covered the torn and broken canvases littering her studio floor.
Speaker: The urge to destroy is also a creative urge. Mikhail Bakunin's words gave her no sucker as she tore the last of her portfolio from the easel and broke it across her knee, smearing herself with more paint, mangled colors that already covered her t-shirt, shorts, bare feet, and every inch of her skin.
Speaker: Chest heaving, sweaty paint dripping in her eyes from tangles of paint-soaked hair, she finally collapsed to a sitting position on the floor. For a moment, all she could do was breathe, lightheaded, even hunger a memory of something some other her might feel.
Speaker: Before the accident, her last four paintings, all fields of flowers, had sold for a combined total of $28,000, almost matching the salary she earned as a science teacher at a prestigious but chronically underfunded charter school.
Speaker: After the accident, her next three, still nature scenes but dark and haunted, had sold for $80,000.
Speaker: An up-and-coming hot property on the New York scene, she'd quit her job and rented a larger space, large enough to paint what she wished, when she wished. Somewhere she didn't have to share with roommates, with a lover only if she wanted to.
Speaker: She didn't want to. It didn't make the slightest bit of sense that somebody could be there one moment and not be there the next, love and light and warmth replaced by a broken doll of cold meat and cracked bones.
Speaker: They'd caught the man that had killed Tess, convicted him of manslaughter on a suspended license after three DWIs, sentenced him to ten years in prison, ten years to pay for a lifetime, and it had done nothing to bring her back.
Speaker: Life held no closure, only endings. The ability to pinpoint the moment her mind had slipped didn't make Cassie feel any better. After the call, she'd insisted on seeing the body, barging past her unwilling and hostile mother-in-law to kiss those cold, bloody lips one last time, to slip the ring from her wife's finger and put it on her own until death did them part.
Speaker: She grieved, and how she'd grieved, but hadn't broken. No, that came later. During the trial, she'd insisted on looking at the crime scene photographs, digital images of red blood on green grass where Steve Barrington's SUV had hit tests at 70 miles an hour, throwing her mangled body from the sidewalk into the park.
Speaker: Cassie knew every curve of that body, had more than once peeled the sunshine yellow jogging suit from it, but in that misshapen mass she recognized none of her love. And yet a knife of familiarity stabbed behind her eye at the twisted lines and unnerving curves that had once been her Tessie's limbs.
Speaker: A body couldn't lie like that, not in a Euclidean world, not in a universe where colors were merely spectral frequencies interpreted by primates who'd outgrown the jungle, where shapes defined a three-dimensional space of real things.
Speaker: A body couldn't take that shape, and a mind couldn't see it, not without a slip, a fracture, a bending of what is to accommodate what had to become. Such a shape could not exist, not in human form, not in any form.
Speaker: But it did, right there in full color, on glossy print too flat to encompass that terrible form. Cassie knew that shape with the deepest part of her being, and despite the months since, it would not let her go.
Speaker: The shape ate her dreams, turned every waking moment into a nightmare of need. To see it again, to never see it again, to think about it always and never.
Speaker: That moment, that glimpse of the picture before the detective had hidden it away, had stolen her capacity for joy and love, kidnapped her muse, and replaced both with a need she didn't understand.
Speaker: The urge to create is also a destructive urge. She stumbled into the pile of canvases, knocking them aside with her legs, and fell to her hands and knees.
Speaker: Scrabbling through them, she found a dry one she'd ruined days before, back when she still ate, before she'd run out of booze, before her phone had died and taken with it her link to the world outside her apartment.
Speaker: She wiped paint from her hands onto her shirt and picked it up, adding fingerprint smudges to the edges as she set it on the easel. Streaks of red and green melded through the dark brown substrate, whirls and streaks that were, at least, possible whirls and streaks.
Speaker: Far too possible. With a trembling hand, she picked up a brush and a pot of canary yellow paint, almost the same color as her wife's jogging suit. She dipped the brush and pulled back with a hiss.
Speaker: A bead of red blood formed across the inside of her thumb where she'd cut it on the lid. Another her, one from another life, she might have sucked the blood from the injury, applied a band-aid, perhaps some antibiotic ointment.
Speaker: Instead, this her, the new her, the her who couldn't unsee that abominable shape, gripped the brush and let the blood run in rivulets down her forearm and across her fingers.
Speaker: Tessie's shattered body screamed through the void, guiding Cassie's hand as it slashed across the canvas, painting streaks and bends in too many dimensions to mimic the broken form her murderer had left on the grass.
Speaker: Cassie's blood trickled down the brush and spotted the canvas. She attacked it with the bristles, melding it with the yellow to create a cacophony of hues from deep ochre to bright sunshine and everything in between.
Speaker: Layer built upon layer as the sun set in ambers and slept then rose blood red to the sounds of distant church bells and set again under stars that blazed blue-white until at last Cassie stumbled back and fell to her knees, eyes locked on the dark majesty of her creation.
Speaker: The yellow glyph blazed from the canvas like the moon. no as the moon, and somehow stretching up and beyond that moon stood jagged spires that reached into an infinite midnight sky, a great crystalline city formed complete from worlds of dark red and green and brown, a city she had no memory of painting.
Speaker: In such a city, Lovers could shatter into impossible tangles of flesh and bone, yet live to still shed their moonlight, and under such moonlight could dark between creatures raise their haunted voices in dissonant, piteous praise of a master that knew no pity.
Speaker: In such a city a spouse could die, yet become the moon. Cassie reached forward as if to touch the moon that was her wife, and her eyes widened in wonder. Her fingers took on a pallid gleam not from the windows, not from the incandescent bulbs hanging from the ceiling, but from the moon glyph's soft glow.
Speaker: She basked in her wife's cool mystery, arms dotted with goose pimples from the breeze off the lake. A thought seized her, wonderful and terrible and inevitable.
Speaker: Towers so tall they touch the moon. Dark waters, before unseen and also unpainted, lapped at the cracked rocky shores of the impossible city, yellow moonlight also flickering from those moving waves, Tessie shimmers in an eternal dappled dance.
Speaker: From that shore a faint breeze carried the taste of salt and blood and the faint, nose-wrinkling memories of dead fish and rotting seaweed. With that breeze on her skin, the scent of the ancient shore and her lungs, she closed her eyes and crawled through.
Speaker: Water, too hot and so, so cold, covered her hands and knees, lapped at her thighs and elbows, soaked her clothes and weighed her down. It caressed her, called to her, tugged gently at her sweatshirt, offered her sweet sleep under its glossy surface.
Speaker: But that surface reflected the moon. With murmured thanks for the offer, she shed her wet clothing and stepped onto the shore, let the wind bring goosebumps to her pale, paint-smeared skin.
Speaker: The water's cooed disappointment drowned under the lap of waves. Jagged rocks pricked at her feet, cut them as she crossed the dark crystal shards, some as large as swords, most ground to fine sand.
Speaker: Wet footprints tinged red with smeared brushstrokes behind her as she approached the great clutching spires, taller than the tallest of mountains, taller than the heavens. She turned from them to look up at the spires, taller than the moon, my moon.
Speaker: Between creatures carried their shadows with them as they slinked from building to building. watching her approach with chittering anticipation. She walked and walked for unknown hours, hours and days, as the curve of the earth revealed more and more of the city below the horizon.
Speaker: When at last she got close enough that the impossible city met the ground, the between creatures sang to her shrill notes no human voice could sing, rim on harmonies no human mind could hold, dancing in prime-numbered time signatures, hard warnings and soft blessings in a language she didn't understand.
Speaker: She hummed to them in her own rough way, too human, too real, and yet they heard her and sniffed the air and came to her. They offered their hands as jagged and broken as the rocks that had shredded her calloused, scarred feet so long ago.
Speaker: Cloaked in shadow and tipped with shining black claws, their hard fingers dripped a silky venom that twinkled with unlight. She took those offered hands, ran her soft fingers across their roughness,
Speaker: touched her fingers to her tongue to taste their poison, bittersweet like honey and turpentine. It burned her throat, brought a rough edge to her song, and they sang it with her.
Speaker: They took her hands again and led her forward, into the city, and then up and up, always higher toward that soft yellow light. Where there were stairs or ladders leading upward, or bridges across the black chasms between spires, she took them.
Speaker: And where there were not, she made them, painting them with her mind in reds and greens and browns in her quest to reach the moon that was her love. Bright blue stars birthed and died and birthed and died, born and reborn from the nuclear ashes of their ancestors, an endless ballet without rhyme or purpose casting metals through the void to live and die in an endless dance of birth and death and heavier, explosive rebirth.
Speaker: Yet in those strange aeons the sun never rose, never set, never dared show its face, never dared hide her love, the moon. And the moon, her moon, never moved, never once yielded its place in the sky.
Speaker: Yellow paint dripped from it to spatter across the gantries and bridges and towers of the silent city. Tessa's broken light swallowed by the darkness that could not be satiated even as it dripped across Cassie's bridges and staircases, even as it dribbled into the dark, hungry seas that surrounded the impossible city.
Speaker: But still the moon dripped, and never did its paint light wane. She climbed, and the between things climbed with her, and as they climbed, her body withered, skin stretched tight over bone and gristle and desiccated muscle, organs drying and crumbling to nothing, yet still full of glorious, unending purpose.
Speaker: It didn't matter. She could still walk, still paint, still climb. And how she climbed. The between creatures sang to her their impossible songs while she climbed, and as the aeons passed she learned them, joined their harmonies with her own, singing their song to the moon, her moon, her broken love, dripping its yellow light across broken spires and breaking waves.
Speaker: Again and again she reached for it with shadow-cloaked claws dripping silky black venom that twinkled with unlight. her straining voice keening with the need for one more touch, one more embrace, one more kiss of her lover's yellow light.
