Hello

☀️

[thefirstbillionseconds]

"During the darkest days of the AIDS crisis we buried our friends in the morning, we protested in the afternoon, and we danced all night, and it was the dance that kept us in the fight because it was the dance we were fighting for." -Dan Savage

Don't forget to dance.

[thefirstbillionseconds]

Star of Bethlehem

Once upon a time there was a lonely little star out in the big wide sky. It was dark, except for this little star. She was the only one in the universe. Then God said let there be light and Bang! There were billions of stars and the little star wasn’t lonely anymore. And that felt good for a while. But then the little star started to feel ordinary. Before she had been the only star in the whole universe and that made her special even if she was lonely. Now she was one of billions and she wasn’t special anymore. She was just like everyone else. Some stars were bigger, some were brighter, some exploded into many colors, others into black holes. Some had planets orbiting them and some had multiple suns orbiting each other. But this little star was just a normal star. Nothing special about her.

Then one day God said, “I’m doing something amazing on this tiny blue planet way out on the edge of the universe. I’m going to send my son, a part of myself, down to live with the people so that they can be saved. But I need a way for people to find him. I need to shine a light to guide them. I need a very special star.”

All the stars quivered with anticipation. They started chattering excitedly.

“Can I do it?” a T-Tauri star twinkled, doing somersaults and bursting with energy.

“Oooh nooo,” breathed a white dwarf, mysteriously. “I shall do it.”

“Not me,” said that black dwarf with a sigh. “I don’t really feel like doing anything. I’m just really tired. There’s only so much you can expect from one star.”

“No one is asking you to!” the red giant spat, glaring at him.

“I don’t understand,” the neutron star said densely. “You want us to what?”

“ARRGHHHHHHH!” the super giant growled monstrously for no apparent reason. He was always mad at something.

A proto star cooed happily as a red dwarf made funny faces at it. Neither were paying much attention as they were perfectly happy just where they were.

“It sounds fun. Like a big birthday party. I’m all for it. I could turn it up down on earth!” a pulsar said in her valley girl accent twirling around in circles until the black dwarf nearby had to stop watching or he was going to be sick.

Rigel, one of the more popular stars, didn’t want to appear too interested. Instead he wore the expression of one who thought they were the obvious choice when he smugly said, “We’ll just have to see who God chooses.”

A black hole breathed heavily nearby but didn’t say anything. He just stared at them all from the dark, never once blinking.

The Earth’s Sun watched all the action carefully. The Sun was very interested in seeing who they would be working with for the next couple months. They hoped it would be a star they liked. One that wasn’t annoying or bothersome.

God called everyone to attention and they all went silent. The little star looked at all the other stars and wondered who would be chosen. There were so many good choices. She waited with bated breath. Nothing this exciting had happened since the Big Bang of light God created all those years ago.

God went directly to the little star, the average star, the ordinary star, and God said, “I choose you.”

“Me?”

The little star looked around. Surely God must mean some other star. One that was brighter, or bigger. She looked around, but all the stars were staring at her. There must be some mistake. Why would God choose an ordinary star like her?

“Yes,” God said. “I chose you long ago to be the guiding light. Before there were any stars in the sky, before there was an earth or a moon or a sun. I created you especially for this and I have always known you would be the star to lead the way.”

“But,” the little star sputtered. “But, I’m just ordinary.”

“You are extraordinary. There is no such thing as ordinary. I created every star in the sky to be unique and special. Every being in the universe is important and there are no exceptions,” God said lovingly.

“But what if I can’t do it?” the little star said with a quiver in her voice. This was a lot of responsibility, and she was frightened.

“Do not be afraid. I chose you because I know you can do it. And I will be right there with you the whole time,” God said with a smile.

“Really?” the little star asked.

“I promise,” God said.

And so when the child, who was God’s son, part of God himself, was born on that bright blue planet in the town of Bethlehem, one very important little star lit up the way so that shepherds and wise men alike could find him and praise him.

The little star took her job very seriously, burning brighter and hotter than she ever had before. She lit up the sky at night lighting the way to Bethlehem. To the manger, and the baby. She watched as shepherds marveled at her light. She led the wise men each night as they made their way towards her. She shivered in the cold and rejoiced in the light. And God never once left her side.

She used every ounce of strength she had until one day God said, “That’s enough.”

“Did I do okay?” the little star asked.

“You’ve done extraordinarily well little one. I’m proud of you. You can rest now,” God told her.

The little star smiled at God. She looked down on the earth one last time, then closed her eyes and rested as she felt the very last bit of herself burn up. She went dark, never to shine again, but she was content. She was so very content and happy. And she never felt lonely or ordinary again.

[thefirstbillionseconds]

To the man wandering aimlessly down by the lake at sunset last night with the woeful eyes and an empty leash in your hand… I hope you’re okay

[thefirstbillionseconds]

I have the right to change my mind As often as I think That is why I write in pencil And say things with a wink But when I write “I Love You” I write it down in ink.

[August 7th: write a 5-line poem featuring the word “ink”.]

[thefirstbillionseconds]

August 5th: write a short story titled “Nail-Biter”

Have you ever met a nail-biter? Well nice to meet you, now you have! My problem started off like everyone else’s, at the Monster Truck Nativity Pageant for Christmas Eve Mass many years ago. I was in the choir of angels and I rode a small four-wheeler. I was five years old. So there I was, watching the Megadome fill up with people, astride my mini four-wheeler with Joseph looming over me in his monster truck. The other kids were excited but I was terrified. I started biting my nails because I saw the director doing it. That was the first time. They tasted salty and the satisfying sound my teeth made when they broke through the nail and came together was downright calming. I was hooked.

In the end the show was a hit. I drove my little four-wheeler around in circles with the other kids as Gabriel’s monster truck hit the big ramp and soared through the air proclaiming the birth of Christ. It was spectacular.

But my problem with nail-biting grew and by the time I was seven my parents had started to notice. They tried many things. Just telling me to stop, trying to calm me, bribing me, painting my nails. Nothing worked. I actually didn’t mind the taste of the paint. By the time I was a teenager I had no nails. My fingers were just weird rounded nubs at the end.

But the addiction was not gone. I just had to be more creative. It started with my parents. I would sneak into their room at night while they were fast asleep and carefully find a finger with a good nail on it. I would just take a nibble or two at the beginning. It didn’t take long to grow my confidence and before long I could chew a whole hand by morning. They eventually found out and kicked me out. I slept on friends couches after that. I did the same to them too and one by one they all kicked me out too. I ran out of friends.

Then the internet took off. I found a whole forum of people who nail-bite. These were my people. They understood me. Or I thought they did. We all got together in the Finger Lakes in New York. We were having a good time until I took the hand of my new-found friend and started to chomp down on crunchy crescents on the end of her fingers. She recoiled in horror to my surprise. It was then that I discovered they were all a group of recovery nail-biters and that they only ever bit their own nails. I felt duped. They kicked me out too.

I hit rock-bottom after that. I won’t go into too much detail, but there was an incident involving a Malibu book club, organic mimosas, and an actual real life ninja. I narrowly avoided jail and that was a wake up call for me. But the incident also inspired me. Those rich housewives in the book club, none of whom actually read the book they were discussing, had the most spectacular nails I had ever seen. They were magnificent. I knew my path forward.

They say that you should avoid your addictions, but I thought that was silly if the addiction wasn’t harming anyone. And so, I opened a nail salon. I charge people a boatload of money for organic, natural, vegan nail service. If you tell people you are using an ancient form of nail trimming that promotes health and spiritual well-being, then you can charge people 300 dollars to bite their nails off. I’m booked out for weeks. I’ve been featured in countless magazines and news stories, including a two page spread in Vogue. I have a mansion and many cars and a little tiny useless dog that I named Manny.

Life is good, and it’s all because I was a nail-biter.

[thefirstbillionseconds]

August 3rd: Make a new character profile inspired by the color blue. (I don’t really know how to do a character profile, so this is what I came up with after doing no research other than to confirm that blueberries grew on bushes)

Hugh Harry, the blueberry.

He’s a new blueberry still on the bush.

His fears are birds and beetles.

He loves the sun and gentle rains.

It’s June and his life is really good. He’s doesn’t know about the July harvest. No one does. Except the birds. They told the blueberries that while the birds eat some of the berries, in July a great beast comes out nowhere and rips all of the blueberries right off of their bushes. Hugh Harry doesn’t believe them. The birds are mean. They wouldn’t tell him the truth.

Hugh Harry gets harvested.

He and his family get separated in the chaos of harvest.

Hugh goes on a long journey all over the world. It gets very cold. He stays very cold. It’s dark.

One day after he’s been sitting still for a while he hears someone. The bag opens. And Hugh Harry is dumped into a glass container. There’s bananas here. And yogurt. He’s in a strange world. He can hear the humans talking.

“I’m making smoothies. Do you want one?”

[thefirstbillionseconds]

August 2nd: Write a script for a radio station interview between a blunt presenter and a shy scientist who just made their first discovery.

The Jerk: Hey idiots, we’re back on 101.1 The Jerk coming at you live today with one of those nerdy types here to tell us about a discovery she made. Our nerd here today is Haley Atwood. Haley, good to have you on the show.

Haley Atwood: Thank you.

The Jerk: So tell us what you do and keep it simple for my educationally challenged listeners out there.

Haley Atwood: Um I’m a scientist with the GoodWell Research Company. I study microscopic organisms.

The Jerk: So really tiny stuff that no one really cares about?

Haley Atwood: I care about it.

The Jerk: Okay so what is your discovery?

Haley Atwood: I found microscopic organisms inside a meteorite that fell to earth.

The Jerk: You’re going to have to speak up a little honey. The sound guys can only do so much.

Haley Atwood: (clearing her throat) These organisms inside the meteorite were living and survived the intense heat of entry into the atmosphere as well as the vacuum conditions of space.

The Jerk: So you found little tiny cells that were still alive. Why is that a big deal?

Haley Atwood: They prove that there’s life outside of Earth.

The Jerk: Well you heard it here folks, Haley here has discovered aliens! We all thought they would come in cool space ships, but they came in a rock and they’re so small you can’t even see them. Not very exciting is it?

Haley Atwood: Well yeah they’re small, but there could be major repercussions from this discovery. There could be more forms of life, maybe even space ships, from the planet that this rock originated from. There could be a danger to human life if the organism were to infect a human body. There could be vast medical discoveries that come out of this extraterrestrial organism.

The Jerk: All that from a rock. We should build a statue of you. Ha!

Haley Atwood: Well I don’t—

The Jerk: What happens if this organism is deadly and infectious like you said. You’d probably be the first to succumb to it, huh? Another nerd taken from us due to science. It seems like science is more harmful than not, don’t you think? The atom bomb, the lab-cooked viruses, all the failed experiments. I think we should just leave well enough alone.

Haley Atwood: I am testing the organism for infectious markers.

The Jerk: What did you do, lick the rock?

Haley Atwood: Yes.

The Jerk: What?

Haley Atwood: I licked it.

The Jerk: (laughing uneasily) That’s very funny.

Haley Atwood: I licked it, but I also took a vaccine made from it so it will not affect me.

The Jerk: That’s insane.

Haley Atwood: Well I’m just a nerd.

The Jerk: But wouldn’t you still be able to carry the disease? Pass it to other people?

Haley Atwood: Yes absolutely.

The Jerk: (leaning slightly away from her) So am I in danger?

Haley Atwood: Very much so. Yes.

The Jerk: …

Haley Atwood: Are you feeling okay?

The Jerk: Why would you expose me to a potentially deadly virus? Why would you expose yourself and then go out in public?!

Haley Atwood: I’m a scientist. I do experiments. Sometimes you need real world conditions to study things properly. When I worked for the government there were so many rules and restrictions. But now with GoodWell Research company I can experiment freely. They support scientists completely. I chose you specifically because I know that you are blunt and will tell it like it is. You harass all the scientists that come on your show without any filter. You talk constantly. You are the perfect subject to test out the virus on because you will give me lots of data.

The Jerk: If this is a joke, tell me now. If not, I’m going to sue your company and you personally until every last one of you is living on the streets. I’m going to —

Haley Atwood: What’s happening? Are you feeling something?

The Jerk: My throat is burning. My fingers have gone numb. This is real? I’m actually infected with some alien virus?!

Haley Atwood: Yes, now if you could focus on your symptoms, I will take notes. Please speak clearly.

The Jerk: Someone call 911!

Haley Atwood: It’s too late for that now. They will need a full hazmat team and that will take hours. I see that your arms and legs are swelling. How do they feel?

The Jerk: Everything feels like its burning.

Haley Atwood: Note that the skin is turning a bluish, violet color but the patient appears to be breathing just fine. It doesn’t appear to be due to lack of oxygen.

The Jerk: Help me!

Haley Atwood: The head and abdomen are now swelling.

The Jerk: I look like a marshmallow man!

Haley Atwood: That’s funny. I like that.

The Jerk: oh no something is changing. Everything feels like it’s constricting.

Haley Atwood: Yes it looks like everything is now squeezing in. The coloring is changing to a sickly green now.

The Jerk: I’m thirsty!

Haley Atwood: Hmm interesting.

The Jerk: I can’t, I, I. Ugh. Argh.

Haley Atwood: The patient seems to have lost the ability to speak. Such a shame. Brain function seems limited too. He is now staring into space. He’s taken on the classic characteristics of a zombie. How fascinating. I think I’ll call this virus the zombie virus. I am going to be famous. Thank you very much Mr. The Jerk. You have made my whole career. I will be in the history books.

The Jerk: Hrghhh

Haley Atwood: You have a nice evening as well!

Haley Atwood leaves the studio, screams can be heard faintly in the mics as she opens the door to leave.

[thefirstbillionseconds]

August 1st: Write a short story that tackles a conversation between two characters in a hospital waiting room.

Botched Robbery

“We just need to know what happened,” the cop said, his bald head glistening in the sterile white lights of the hospital waiting room.

“It’s a funny story actually,” Mark said, sipping on the Diet Coke the cops offered to him from the vending machine, and snacking on the Cheetos that they didn’t offer.

“Can you start from the beginning?” the cop said, grimacing at Mark licking the orange dust off of his fingers.

“Okay, yeah cool. Me and my buddy Carl walk into the house and there’s two robbers there grabbing all the stuff!”

The cop nods and writes in his notebook.

“One guy is in the bedroom dumping all the jewelry into a bag. The other guy was in the kitchen trying to pry open a safe. There’s a pile of all the silverware, the iPads, the game consoles, a bunch of good stuff by the doorway. Carl thought we should leave, but I wanted to confront them. I mean they were taking all our stuff!”

“Can you describe the robbers?”

“You already got them, didn’t you?”

“Just, for the record. Please.”

“Oh yeah I remember them perfectly. I think I have a photographic memory,” Mark said, “the little short fat guy was short and fat. He had brown hair and a pedo-stache.”

The cop interrupted him, “what’s a pedo-stache?”

“You know, a creepy mustache.”

The cop nodded but very slightly twitched his nose, giving his own mustache a disgruntled wiggle. “And the other guy?”

“He was ripped, tons of tattoos, super fit. He looks like he worked out everyday in prison. Great hair. Your classic ‘hot-dude’. I don’t know why he’s robbing houses. He easily could be a model. Maybe he didn’t like the model lifestyle. I’ve heard it’s tough.”

The cop sighed. “When did they notice you?”

“Me and Carl looked around for weapons and a tactical advantage point. You know, we’re not stupid. So I grabbed a vase and Carl grabbed an umbrella. I went one way to distract the guy in the kitchen, the hot one. Carl went around to the back kitchen entrance. The robber saw me as soon as I entered the room. The hot robber yelled at me and asked what I was doing. Carl behind him was able to grab a knife from the knife block on the counter. But the hot robber was coming at me so I lunged at him with the vase, but the rug caught the toe of my shoe and I tripped. The vase in my hand shattered when I hit the floor. Then Carl behind him accidentally knocked the knife block over as he pulled out a knife, so hot robber turned around. Carl lost his balance. Did I say we were super drunk already? We were super drunk. So Carl grabbed the umbrella with the hook part toward hot robber because that part is more dangerous. He tried to hit hot robber over the head with the hook part of the umbrella, but hot robber stopped it like some kind of action movie. Just with one hand. It was impressive. But anyway. That. Caused the umbrella to pop open at Carl, which caused Carl to stab himself in the leg with the bread knife. And now we’re here in the hospital. You know the doctors said that he just missed his artery by like 3 inches. He almost died.”

“So Carl stabbed himself?” the cop asked.

“Huh, kinda I guess. I would blame the umbrella in your official report.”

“Okay what happened after the stabbing?”

“After that the short fat guy came out of the bedroom and started yelling at everyone. My man Carl was in a lot of pain, so I pulled out the knife to try to help. That made the fat robber yell louder. He found a belt in the closet and tied it tight around Carl’s leg. He called it a tournament. I don’t think he knew what he was talking about because a tournament is for sports. Anyway after that the robbers were about to go, but then the cops showed up. Someone must have called 911.”

“Yes we got a call about suspicious activity in the house.” The cop said looking back at his notes.

“Well good thing you guys came because those robbers were taking what didn’t belong to them.”

The cop frowned, still looking at his notes, “this says that the neighbor thought the house has been empty all week because the family that lives there is on vacation.”

“There hasn’t been anyone there since last Friday!” Mark said, dumping the remaining orange Cheeto crumbs into his mouth.

“So it’s not your house?”

“Nope.”

“Or Carl’s?”

“He wishes!”

“So what were you doing there?”

“We were there to rob the place of course!”

[thefirstbillionseconds]

I have no problem getting my characters into all kinds of trouble. The problem is I don’t know how to get them out of it.

[thefirstbillionseconds]

I think black holes move faster than the speed of light and that’s why we can’t see them

[writingdotcoffee]

“Correct what you can; learn from what you can’t.”

— Toni Morrison

[writingdotcoffee]

“A word after a word after a word is power.”

— Margaret Atwood