The Light

He celebrated youth, his eyes bright, holding a lifetime of possibilities. He stood on the doorstep of the old building, his hand hovering at his future - to knock or walk away.

Summoning his courage, managing to keep his excitement in check, he knocked on the door. It must have felt like jumping off a cliff as adrenaline pulsed through him, the opportunity to back out vanishing.

I opened the door, greeting him, the same adrenaline finding me. He was the first person I’d dated since the call I’d taken, abruptly ending my thirteen-year relationship. Greeting this boy was one more step out of a funk that began with a mantra of self-abuse for letting someone I loved slip away. The young man’s age meant I was expecting this to go only one way. That’s what I was looking for; something exciting, something liberating; something disposable. He didn’t care I was older. At nineteen he was half my age. We shared enough in our backgrounds to make the age gap less ridiculous, but I wasn’t kidding myself about what this was.

His name was Alexander, but he called himself Sasha. It was the familiar name given to him by his family and friends. He was charming, well spoken even in his second language and from a wealthy, privileged world of expectations and demands that I knew only too well. He was heading to the train station, en route to Berlin, to study engineering. His parents were paying for the course and covering his living expenses. Nothing was too much for their beloved first son; except their time.

I knew this part of his story. In a privileged world time is a rare commodity. I understood how debilitating that lack of interest could be. The benefit was freedom and independence; the disadvantage - a stranded self-confidence. It took a force of pent-up sexual desire to overcome and bring this young man to my door. It was why he’d shown up, or at least part of it. The other piece of the jigsaw was selecting a foreigner with no possible connection to anyone in his world. That meant no possibility of being outed before he was ready.

The freedom he enjoyed from his parent’s lack of supervision allowed him to alter his travel plans by a weekend and find the perfect accomplice. I was lucky enough to be the person he chose. A nineteen-year-old, arriving at my door like room service, with plans to spend the weekend, before heading to a university, a thousand miles away. He had no plans to return before my contract would end and by then, I’d be half a world away. It was the perfect formula for a one night stand.

My apartment was old and ornate. It sat within the forgotten ghetto that cast a shadow over the city. The small portion of preserved ghetto wall, with it’s even smaller memorial plaque, along with the bagel sellers on every street corner, screamed the ghosts of a dark past discreetly ignored by most. It was a city that prided itself on looking forward, not back. That made it the perfect place for Sasha to vanish for a weekend.

He arrived with his provisions for his new life, worn on his back in a pack that towered over him and made each step unsteady. He unclipped and leveraged the heavy backpack to the floor in my front hall. We sat in the small galley kitchen trading small talk.

I didn’t know the etiquette of the online hook-up back then. It was early in the millennium, the diplomacy of the left swipe was still years away. In time I would learn, on welcoming strangers for sex, small talk was entirely unnecessary, but here and now, it seemed the least we should do before taking things further.

We did take it further. We began in the bedroom before visiting almost every room in the house over the next three days. Sasha transformed from a shy timid young man to one who thought nothing of walking around the house naked, as if he belonged. He stayed like that, on display, for almost all of his time with me, enjoying his new found freedom. He only dressed when we went out; the first time being when we ran out of alcohol. The two of us wandered down to the nearby market, through the late October snow that transformed the city and made any trip outside an extraordinary adventure. Sasha found my awe at the squeaking snow amusing. We swapped stories about childhood that brought us closer.

We bought a chicken, beer and some rather sad looking vegetables from a shop-assistant who assured us they would taste better than they looked. It wasn’t the season for healthy eating, and this wasn’t a city offering spring vegetables out of season in any but the wealthiest suburbs. My suburb seemed lost in time, lurching to catch up to a modern world, but not quite able.

Back home I roasted the chicken with potatoes and carrots. We drank and ate and slept together until we wanted nothing but sleep. We continued like this for two more days, without any real care for anyone or anything happening outside the apartment.

On the third day, Sasha told me he wanted to take me somewhere special, to share something of the local customs. I was curious and let him lead.

We jumped in a taxi and arrived at a cemetery, crowded with people, sombre as they passed between the stones and mausoleums. They placed lit candles on the graves of family members, friends, or on stones of the great names of the city, now all resting together as equals.

It was All Saints Eve. It seemed the whole city had come to pay their respects. The brightest graves were the soldiers and citizens who fell during the uprising against the Nazis and were now forever honoured in this place on this night.

The whole cemetery flickered and shone brightly from a sea of candles. Even long forgotten names received a good share of flames, the passers-by unwilling to leave any soul in darkness.

We walked in silence, part of the orderly progression, filing by gravestones, reading the names and dates. It was particularly moving, considering I was a stranger, but there is something universal in the dead being respectfully honoured. It’s a tip of the hat through time to those who delivered us and gave us what we have, and never more poignant than in this city, in this cemetery.

That night was to be my last with Sasha. With fresh supplies of alcohol and a feeling of goodwill from our All Saints evening, we filled up the large bath, lit our candles and balanced the ledger for our earlier religious respect.

In the morning we shared a cooked breakfast, then a hug and Sasha, with his heavy pack, still balanced precariously on his shoulders, headed out my front door and away, towards the train station and a life filled with a thousand challenges.

I came back inside and felt quite contented. As far as random hook-ups go it was a great success; a no-strings, fleeting but enjoyable weekend with a young man I would always remember.

The next weeks rolled by without being noticed. I was working for a large company who brought me in to guide a large job. I forgot about Sasha and the time we’d spent together, as the days and weeks brought me new people and places to fill my time.

At Christmas, I had a few days off. With no family around and a flight home offering more time in the air than on the ground, I was looking forward to being a hermit and binge watching whatever I could find to watch.

There was a knock at the door. I was surprised. I didn’t know anyone, so I assumed it was a neighbour or a salesperson. I opened the door to Sasha who threw his arms around my neck and hugged me close. He had the same backpack strapped to him, although this time it was hardly holding anything, and a plastic bag clutched tight in hand. He smiled wide on seeing me and kissed me passionately.

“Surprise!”  

As he enjoyed my astonished look, he explained he’d told his parents he wanted to stay over Christmas in his university dorm room to study. He’d then jumped a train to come and see me and not them. He failed to notice my concern and sauntered in to take over the house with the casual ease of belonging that he’d adopted when we were last together.

He handed me the plastic bag he’d been clutching so tightly. It was a present. I opened the bag and found a stunning desk lamp. It was hand crafted in steel and chrome, with a light that looked like a car headlight from the 1920’s, held in place by railroad tracks of dual metal straps on either side, which gently sloped in an art-deco design to metal plates that formed a layered shield effect as a base. It was heavy and looked extraordinarily expensive. Sasha beamed a smile. He knew I was a writer and he wanted something to remind me of him, while I was sitting at my desk working. I thanked him as my stomach pounded a panicked beat, searching to send an alert to my conscience. This kid was in love, and I wasn’t.

My conscience heard the distant drums and ignored them as we hit the bed and picked up where we’d left off. The next morning, after more sex, I become a little more distant. Sasha didn’t notice. I tried to encourage him to go home and visit his parents – he didn’t want to leave my house. I tried to suggest he should go back to Berlin early, as I had so much work to get done. He paraded naked and suggested we re-visit the lounge chair with the wide and sturdy armrests. My work, and attempts to drive him away, could wait.

Another day and Sasha noticed my mood becoming icy. He wanted to talk. I could tell he was upset. I told him it was a mistake for him to come without telling me. It crushed him. He looked like a lost puppy. I felt awful, but I told myself it was the right thing to do. I wasn’t the first person he’d been with, but I suspect I may have been the first person he’d been with he could identify.

Coming out is an extraordinary journey, littered with a huge number of men hiding from everyone, including themselves, and seeking totally anonymous sex with other men. It’s a sad world of shadows and secrets, and when you finally find someone who stands out in the open, it’s so easy to project every hope you’ve ever had onto them. For me, Sasha’s infatuation was flattering. I felt younger than I had in years and it would have been so easy to go with it, leading him on, knowing full well we had no future.

He was a good looking nineteen-year-old at the very beginning of his university experience. Only a complete arsehole would have him miss any of that on a false promise, driven by middle-aged vanity.

It took three days to wear him down. He kept finding excuses for my attitude, hoping it would change. At one stage he begged me to cut his hair with my hair trimmer, and I’m sure it was only to have my attention focused on him for a moment more. The hair cut was lousy, but he smiled, thanked me and said he loved it.

He left my house earlier than planned. He’d finally accepted my harsh, cold message. The All Saints weekend was a moment in time he couldn’t get back. I wasn’t to be the love of his life and whatever he’d projected onto those few days had been too much too soon.

I watched him dejectedly trudge down the snow cleared footpaths on his way to the taxi rank that would deliver him back to the station. A few weeks later I moved to a modern apartment on the very edge of the reclaimed ghetto border. I never heard from Sasha again. I hope he didn’t turn up to that old apartment looking for me, but I will never know.

I stayed in that remarkable city for another year, until my contract ended. When it came time to leave I gave the few personal possessions I’d added to my apartment to a close friend: my desk and chair, my bike and Sasha’s light. That beautiful, expensive, perfect lamp, that sat on my desk for my time there. Some nights I would stare at it and hate myself a little for what it reminded me of, of how I’d treated Sasha. Some nights I’d let it serve a fond recollection of that first, perfect long weekend we’d spent together.

I told my friend to take it, that it was too heavy for me to travel with, and in a way, it was. It could never serve as a light for me to work; it was the light of a broken heart.

Sometimes, even now, I think of Sasha, of where he might be, of what he’s done with his life? Did he find someone he could trust and fall in love? I’m sure he did, and maybe, just maybe he’s travelled far enough from that All Souls Eve to understand why two visits could be so very different – and why I still see the light from that lamp.    

The Emperor’s Sugar Pot

Irene was perfectly content. Her eightieth birthday was some years behind her, how many, she'd never tell. 

The weatherboard house was comfortable. Her husband, Alan, had passed away over a decade ago and ever since Irene lived a perfectly satisfied life, in her perfectly functional house, surrounded by her perfectly uncomplicated world.

She wasn’t lonely; Homer saw to that. The white cockatoo was now at least twenty years old. No one knew his exact age and like Irene the proud and loyal bird wasn’t about to reveal it. His life expectancy meant he would surely outlive Irene by many years and he seemed to know this as he stood guard over her night and day, waiting for a time where he’d leave her side and take on life alone.

Homer had the run of the house. He’d been rescued by Irene and Alan years before. The bird was lying virtually dead on the road, the victim of a hit and run and unable to fly from a wing that would never be what it once was, he now waddled, almost mocking Irene’s gait, as they hung washing on the old line and came and went from the house into the backyard like a perfectly comfortable pair.

Over the years Irene had served as baby-sitter to her neighbours. Five nearby families had used her services, but as children grow, Aunt Reenie, as she became known, was more invited for tea than to watch young adults who no longer needed her looking out for them. Now she was just happy for the conversation and happier still for the many friends she’d gained through no more than living nearby and being a perfectly agreeable woman.

Days, weeks and even years would pass with Irene traveling a simple routine that left her sleeping soundly at night, satisfied by the way life was treating her.

Then she saw an announcement at the end of her favourite TV show and she sat mesmerized. She made up her mind on the spot to be bold and take up the adventure; the Antiques Road show was coming to town. She spent weeks selecting a number of household items to have appraised. She chose items solely on the basis of her favourite presenters. She took a painting, small enough to fit in her basket on wheels, not for art’s sake, but because the art expert was a frightfully well spoken, slim man with graying hair. She thought he was attractive and in his sixties she fantasized about taking him as her toy-boy. He wore bow ties and Reenie had a thing for bow ties.

She took a carved soapstone polar bear she and her husband had bought from indigenous Canadian tribesmen when they toured all the best known Canadian tourist spots and almost as an afterthought, and despite great consternation from Homer, she emptied her sugar pot of its sugar and loaded it almost as an afterthought.

Over the years Homer had, it was sad to say, become an addict, learning to remove the lid of that pot and indulge to his heart’s content in sugar. He didn’t do it regularly and Reenie was sure he’d say, if he could string a sentence of his random words together to utter intelligent comment, that he had his habit under control, but the number of times she’d found the bird raving in the wee hours, high on the white crystal, she couldn’t count. She excused his behavior as he excused her liking for the odd sherry or three from time to time.

Irene gathered her ‘Road Show’ booty and wheeled her trolley along the street to the bus stop. She sat up front in the bus, referring to her small map to guide her. When she spotted the street she wanted she alighted and walked the short distance to the grounds of the historic monastery. She joined a long queue of equally graying and pedantic collectors, clutching their cherished items, each hoping for a history or news of a re-discovered treasure.

Reenie only had eyes for her presenters and never entertained the idea any of her tributes would be worth a second look. She waited and waited. Finally her art critic’s smile and extended hand beckoned her forward and he played up his warmth and charm as Reenie flirted back. The man knew this would play well with the viewers, Irene blushed; today’s bow tie was particularly striking. The man described her art as naïve, an unknown amateur. Reenie couldn’t care less. 

Her flirtation went completely undetected by the eloquent expert. Once her art had been appraised she was so flustered she needed to sit and gather herself before joining the queue for her next favourite appraiser.

This time she held her soapstone carving. The sculpture expert was camp, no other way to describe him and his face seemed to collapse in on itself as he smiled and gushed at everything he saw. He found the carving exquisite, rare, a one of a kind item and worth twenty dollars – maybe – on a good day.

“But it’s the memory, isn’t it? It’s an object cherished by you and bringing memories of a trip you and your husband took so I’m sure, in your eyes, priceless,” his face pushed its features together as he beamed his on-air smile.

Reenie waited in another long queue and on more than one occasion she thought about leaving, but the final expert, the man who gushed and glowed over porcelain was now working himself into a rapture over a fine figurine statue not ten collectors ahead of her. Thirty minutes on Irene was ushered centre stage by an assistant.

Squeak, squeak, squeak, went the left wheel of her carry trolley. The expert patronized Reenie as he built up expectations for her reveal. She reached into her trolley and presented her small sugar pot. The expert took it with a smile and looked it over before freezing. He began to tremble then fumble. He went to his pocket and took out an eye piece.

“Where did this come from?” he asked, staring intently at the markings on the pot’s underside.

“My husband was in Korea and he brought home little things. I really don’t know much about it, but it’s good for sugar,” Reenie offered.

The expert kept looking the pot over like he didn’t believe, like his hands had gone numb and had lost feeling, like he was a two year old unable to make sense of the object he held or its purpose.

“Sugar?” he accused with scornful tone that would better suit a judge dressing down a recalcitrant vandal. Reenie nodded. The expert waved his hand and a production assistant raced over.

“This,” he told her without explanation. The assistant turned to Irene.

“Can you take it out and hand it to him for the camera exactly like you did before?” the young girl asked. Irene went to take the sugar pot back from the expert, but he clutched it tight and shook his head.

“No,” he withered. The assistant looked to him with confusion.

“She has to do the reveal for the camera,” the girl repeated sternly.

“Urghhh,” the presenter whimpered in a strangled falsetto. 

The assistant took the sugar pot from the white-knuckled hands clutching at the artifact and handed it back to Reenie. She shot her frozen expert a look of scorn and encouraged him to 'get it together' with her eyes. 

Without concern and failing to grasp any of what was unfolding around her, Irene took her pot and placed it harshly back in her trolley basket.

“Arghhhh!” shrieked the presenter, clutching at nothing. 

The man took a moment to gather himself and then the camera rolled and Irene rummaged a second time and pulled out the pot. This time the expert took it quickly and seemed to relax when he had it back in his hand.

“It’s lovely,” he said with a tight smile. “Can I ask how you came by it?”

“My husband was in Korea during the war. He was a lawyer, working with the Americans so he was able to buy some souvenirs.”

“Interesting,” the expert said as he fingered the pot and rubbed it passionately like he’d just been re-united with a long lost child.

“Well, I can tell you it’s not Korean, it’s Chinese. A small, beautifully worked and hand painted piece of porcelain. And I can see from the markings exactly where it was made. Have you ever had this valued?” The man’s growing confidence was building up to surprise he knew was his to deliver.

“Never. I use it for sugar.”

The presenter held his frozen smile that hid his fury at Irene’s ignorance.

“I see,” he managed. “Well, Chinese, as I said and fired in the imperial kiln. I can tell that by this imperial seal.” He pointed out the marking. “This means it was made by a master craftsman working for the royal house. The house in question is Quinlong, Emperor Quinlong from the Quin Dynasty around seventeen hundred.”

“That’s interesting,” Irene said with genuine intrigue. “How did it come to be in Korea?”

“There was widespread looting before and after the Second World War, but items were also given away to dignitaries and colonial diplomats so it’s not necessarily anything untoward.”

Irene nodded.

“Now, normally with an incomplete pot I would say we have some bad news. You can see the lip here, which tells me at one time there would have been a lid to go with this.”

“Oh yes,” Irene interrupted, shaking the side of her trolley to flip the contents that clinked together. “I have it here somewhere.” She reached down to find the lid, again jangling the trolley’s contents as she rummaged.
"Dear God, woman!” The expert blurted, losing himself and dropping his polite demeanor on camera. Irene came up with the lid and held it looking perplexed by the man’s harsh tone.

“And there it is,” the man said in a stunned monotone. “It’s complete.” He took the lid and fitted it to the sugar pot.

“How nice.” He had that held smile again, his face fixed in the manner of someone trying to be polite in the face of blatant stupidity.

“So, we have a royal pot, complete, from a master craftsman and about two hundred and fifty years old, without even a crack. Remarkable.”

“Would they have used it for sugar?” Irene asked curious to know if she and the emperor shared the use in common.

“Possibly, who knows, that’s not the point. I’m not sure you fully understand what I'm telling you.”

“Yes. It's an old emperor's sugar pot,” Irene said, sliding her jaw to the side and looking at the man for the first time with her own disparaging look. 

“Would you like to know the value?” The expert said, believing this might shock Irene into understanding what she had.

“I guess,” Irene said with nominal interest.

“I would be comfortable with an estimate of ten million dollars.”

“For a sugar pot?” Irene exclaimed, screwing up her face with incredulity.

The next few weeks were a whirlwind as Irene was paraded on chat shows, morning and night. She was interviewed in magazines and entertained by a parade of experts who all wanted only the best for Irene – and her pot.

When the circus died down the genuine bidders moved in and offered her options to sell with ever more favourable terms. They put forward cash bids from private buyers and proposals from galleries promising plaques in her name, provided she gifted the gallery, or at very least loaned them the pot for their collection.

“I’ve decided I’d like to keep it. It really is perfect for what I use it for,” Irene finally announced at a press conference. “Apart from it having sentimental value, because of my late husband,” she explained, “The top here,” she pointed out the small indent, “Fits the spoon I bought for it perfectly.”

The press conference thrust Irene into a second tsunami of publicity. The public clambered for news of the sweet old lady who was turning her back on a fortune for the sake of sentiment and a handy sugar dispenser.

Twitter went crazy. One of the night time talk show hosts helped her register a twitter handle live on-air and she quickly built up over a million followers. When one of the young teens she had once baby-sat recorded her and Homer for his Youtube channel his subscribers went from 352 to half a million overnight. Irene was hot property.

Over the next few months she listened to impassioned pleas from many who explained how important the pot was and how it was culturally significant to the Chinese people, although, from what she could tell, it was only significant to very wealthy Chinese people who wanted to own the pot for their private collection.

Museums and galleries contacted her on a daily basis claiming people the world over had a right to view such a masterpiece and even those who knew Irene personally tried to persuade her to sell so she could reap the rewards and buy whatever she wanted to make her life easier and give her security.

Irene denied them all.

“I have everything I want,” she explained, “And that includes using my pot for sugar.”

The online community glorified Irene even more. She became a meme against excess and greed. Everything that mentioned her name was instantly up-voted on Reddit and her twitter account and the Youtube channel featuring her became substantial earners.

The young owner of the Youtube channel arranged to deposit what he felt was a fair split of his ad earnings into Irene’s account. Given every cent was due to the postings featuring Irene, the young teen was relieved and delighted when Irene didn’t challenge what he felt was a ‘fair split’. 

Subscribers to the Youtube channel doubled the night Homer was featured. The bird was in a feisty mood and told Irene to go fuck herself. Irene gave him a blast that sounded like any wife tired of her husband’s uncouth ways in front of company and ended with the foul mouthed and seemingly repentant bird hiding his head under his wing in a perfectly time finale to a neat thirty seconds of hilarious vision.  

More money flowed Irene’s way from the hosted ads and when Irene donated all her earnings to animal shelters she gained even more followers. 

Her fame piqued the night she unwittingly engaged Ricky Gervaise in an argument about God. A series of twitter texts she thought were private sent the twitterverse into re-tweet meltdown. Irene’s followers built into the millions and she suddenly had good wishes and opportunities she could never have conceived coming her way. She simply couldn’t keep up.

A sophisticated alarm system was arranged for her house with a twenty four hour security 'call-out' service. It was donated by a gallery who gained a verbal ‘maybe’ to be left the pot in Irene’s will. Irene was only willing to commit to a maybe because she wanted to leave the pot to Homer, given the birds addiction and his liking for his regular supplier; Emperor Quinlong’s pot.

As the years rolled by Irene never left the public consciousness. To the young she was an anarchist unable to be corrupted by big money. To some she was an eccentric fool turning her back on a lifestyle they all craved. To others she was a woman who simply didn’t want her familiar ways to change; an advocate to simple living.

She, her pot and Homer featured in a tea commercial where Homer removed the pot’s lid on command. Every time that particular ad came on screen, the expert, who still recalled the pot’s discovery as his greatest ‘Roadshow’ moment, had to turn the TV off in case, this time, the bird broke his beloved treasure.

She knew she’d have to make a decision about what to do with her pot after she was gone. She knew her life was nearing its end when her legs started to swell badly in the heat and simple things, like a walk in her yard, became almost impossible. She began using a Zimmer frame and spent hours sitting, trying not to stress and worry about what she should do with her most valuable possession.

Some nights she would end looking at that pot, trying to conceive how such a thing could be causing her so much concern. She gave up checking her twitter account when @douchecanoe85 relentlessly tweeted, ‘Pass the #sugar – biatch!’ for weeks on end.

She simply couldn’t decide what to do, or who to donate the treasure to on her passing. If she left it to her faithful bird she could never ensure her wishes would be carried out. It was beyond her comprehension that so many people were so desperate to possess her sugar pot and so many of them were prepared to engage in devious diplomacy to get what they wanted.

Every solution she devised seemed to delight some and deeply hurt others.

What had happened to her simple life shared with her foul mouthed, yet otherwise silent avian partner? She was losing sleep and becoming one of those people she swore she would never become; a worrier.

Then one night she was woken by a sharp, shattering noise. She sat terrified in her bed and waited for her state of the art alarm to fire. It stayed silent. The twenty four hour security firm that monitored the system never called.

Irene got out of bed, slipped on her threadbare terry toweling gown and cat face slippers and padded down the hall on her Zimmer frame. She could hear the intruder rooting around in the kitchen. She moved stealthily to the end of the hall and peered into the moonlit room.

There he was, dancing with bobbing head, strutting with everything but a glow stick, raving on her table – Homer was high on sugar and displaying moves like Jagger.

Homer cocked his head sideways spying his mistress, eyeballing her before strutting back to the other side of the old Formica topped table where he brazenly and provocatively danced, urging Irene to join him with her own silky moves. He flicked his beak into some spilled sugar, throwing some Irene’s way, daring her to join his party.

Irene turned on the old fluorescent light and saw it for the first time. Surrounded by the heap of sugar on the floor, splashed out across the streaked linoleum, the Emperor’s pot was shattered, irreparable, unrecognizable.

It took Irene some time to sweep the shards and sugar up. She resorted to hands and knees and Homer only occasionally shimmied to the side of the table to check on her. He was convinced she was indulging and he was happy to be left to do the same with his stash of sugar still on the table.

Irene tipped the sugar encrusted porcelain pieces, glistening like glass, into the bin. A day later that bin was emptied into her wheelie bin and four days after that the contents were collected and taken away to a suburban tip where the ten million dollar shattered dream was buried among a thousand other disposable bits and pieces, now lost among other formerly coveted items. 

The ants swarmed and found the crystal treasure clinging to the porcelain pieces – they left the pieces of the pot – to them it was worthless.

Irene’s death brought with it her final wave of publicity. She was both revered as an icon and reviled as a selfish old hag who kept to herself a fortune that could have helped so many. Then the real news broke; the pot was missing. The house was torn apart before security was even thought of. The treasure hunters found nothing.

Rumours began to fly: Irene had been cremated and her ashes interred in her priceless pot. She had it hidden. It was stolen and secreted away by the Chinese government. 

The legend of the Quinlong sugar pot began to grow. The pot became hunted by hundreds of treasure seekers looking to get rich quick. Irene’s pot had become part of buried treasure folklore.

When the bulldozers moved in to clear Irene’s land, an area of the rubble, many times sifted and searched without reward went unnoticed. It included a green glass pot with a silver spoon lying nearby. The pot contained sugar and even when a feisty cockatoo swooped awkwardly with damaged wing to fend off anyone who tried to move that green glass pot, no-one connected the dots.

Alone and lost, the glass pot had no value to anyone but Irene and Homer. To them it was the equal of Emperor Quinlong's pot, because both were perfectly good for holding sugar.   

Inner City - Short Stories and Rhymes

If you're a career writer then you know all about rejection. I must be close to a thousand over my career. Mostly I send off a letter, a script, a story, a few opening chapters to a novel - having followed all the guidelines I could find - or all the things I'd done on those times when I was successful - and simply never heard back.

Well over 50% of my efforts have met with nothing - which is the most frustrating rejection of all. Did they get it, did they read it? Who knows. I guess most of the other rejections take this form.

              Dear Scott,
                     Thank you for allowing us to read (Insert title here). Unfortunately.....(rejection excuse here).We wish you well with the project and your future career.
                Incredibly Sincerely,
                Miggins McGee (Secretary to the personal assistant of the person you sent it to)

            After 'unfortunately'.... you can insert:  The project is not for us right now. It is not something we would be looking for. It is similar to a project we have in development. It seemed long and would take more than a few minutes to read.
                       Please feel free to create your own and message me with them!!

                Of course, I'm not arrogant to ignore the fact that some of the many rejections I've had should have read.... Unfortunately it was a piece of shit/it needs further development/it was sloppy - were you in a rush? etc etc.

                       And no doubt some were. I've had just as many bad ideas as good I think and at the time I thought the story ideas were world beaters. Often I'd spend months, once years on a project before the fog cleared and I saw it for what it was - Yuk! Someone get the shovel. I don't know what it is about people, me included, that makes us unable to see something because we get attached to it. I find sticking something away and then coming back to it after at least 6 weeks does wonders. I also have, over many years, become much better at knowing my strengths and weaknesses as a writer. For some strange reason there's a disconnect between my left and right brains. When I'm creating it's all about the story - I split infinitives all over the place.  Lose my ability to spell or even more embarrassing, spell phonetically and sometimes really simple words. When I spotted that over and over again I realised something weird was going on.

                        When I stick something in a drawer and get back to it - those things stand out so clearly - if I can stop myself getting swept back into story mode that is - for me that's a hard thing with something like a novel. So these days I am never too quick to release something - I am just not skilled enough as an editor to edit something I'm still creatively engaged with.

Anyway - Inner City was written in 1999. I had my then agent send it out. But it was a raunchier sluttier version of the book I know have. And I don't think my agent liked it because he took forever, over 6 months, to send it to anyone and then I only ever saw one rejection letter.
"I liked this book, I liked it so much I took it to bed with me. So why am I know making you an offer...."
Maybe he only showed me that letter because it came so close - who will ever know. But I remember it word for word because it seemed to come so close. Just say no for goodness sakes!

So Inner City sat around for over ten years - forgotten. I wrote another novel - It's a boy. The story of my (now ex) partner and I raising his cousin who was involved with drugs and homeless. It's both funny and sad - how can you not laugh when a kid steals a gay man's Jean Paul Gualtier Cologne - pours it down the sink and makes a bong from the bottle! It almost got the boy killed! But no-one was interested in a non-fiction account of two guys raising a troubled thirteen year old homophobic boy. Into the files with you you go!

I did discuss this story with a producer who convinced me to turn it into a screenplay. That screenplay gained development money from the NSW Film and TV Office and was a finalist in the 2009 Southern California Film festival screenplay Comp - but it's a long way from being produced.

Next I wrote a novel, The Bride Wore Cocaine. This was a tough birth and I paid $500 dollars to get it professionally reviewed. The review basically read - Yuk! I mean - it was a violent kick to the you know where. It was the worst critique of anything ever.
"This doesn't work. You begin with a murder but never solve it, you should make this a murder mystery....."
At the time I accepted the book was crap and let it be forgotten as well. I was working overseas, living in places that spoke little English and were minus 30 degrees in winter - locking me away. I wrote poems and short stories in my spare time. I drank lots of vodka to try and fit in with the locals (Do not do this! Ever. Poles and Russian are better vodka drinkers than.... Just don't - especially the women. Dangerous!)

Then I wrote a miniseries that people raved about but no-one wanted to produce because it was a period drama. It had a great director wanting to direct, a producer - it was ready to go and based on a true story. and While heads of Network drama actually rang me - OMG! - they rang to let me know it truly had been considered and unfortunately..... (See above).

But one of those TV drama people said it would make a great novel. So I began writing. And at 80 pages sent it off and so far so good. I have some interest.... enough to ask for more at least. So we will see... but it does mean I have 75% of a new novel to write.

But I also let those interested know I'd written other novels. They didn't care - didn't want to read any part. Inner City usually meets rejection with - "we are not interested in Science Fiction." I personally think there is a disconnect between the people who are most usually in the publishing business vetting manuscripts and Science Fiction. These are not fans!

It's a boy is about Gay people so it either received those wrinkles around the nose and an "Oooooh!" or "There's no market for that." Really - the pink dollar has disappeared. The group with the single biggest percentage of disposable income.... how about we tape an 'E' inside every cover?

And finally The Bride Wore Cocaine - Interest Zero. It is an evil little piece of pop culture that parties on crystal meth all night long and cheats with every little biscuit that looks in its direction. It is a very naughty novel. So no from the publishers.

But it got me thinking again about self publishing. I started by putting a novel on a blog like this one and over a thousand people have visited in just over three months. Inner City Blog Then I found Smashwords. Beautiful beautiful Smashwords. So over the past months - Since about February, I have re-edited everything and re-read it. And that critique I got for 'Bride' - it's by far the best thing I've written. The structure may drop a few people off because it's written in a parallel linear narrative four years apart. But there's a good reason for this - and I think it works. So rasberry to you critique person! And I'm looking forward to it being read by others to see what they think.

So that's the story of why and how I suddenly burst onto Smashwords. It isn't like Lizzy Ford who is writing up a storm (Check out her blog here Guerrilla Wordfare if you want to see a determined kick arse approach to getting yourself noticed and accepted as a working writer. wow! I took notes from her approach!)

I am simply polishing and uploading the last ten years of my writing life. All done in isolation. Read before smashwords by about 3 people and now over night being read by thousands!  I will eventually put a price on some of it (Never the rhymes - they're just silly doodles!!!) - but If I can get to 10,000 or so downloads with something - then I feel $1.99 wouldn't be asking too much.

So I hope people like what they're reading. The poems I figured - what the hell. Some were written in Poland, Russia, London, Indonesia, Paris and some back home in Oz. But what good are they sitting never read by anyone.... that's why even they got bundled up and put online to be read. There were a dozen or so more, but those were either too private(embarrassing) or too emo(Embarrassing) to be read by anyone but me. LOL

And happy Queens Birthday to everyone! Nothing but respects Lizzy!

Oi! Lizzie - Where can I read Scott's Writing?