Where Writing Ideas Come From (Guest Post By Jennifer Willis)

Today we welcome special guest blogger Jennifer Willis, who is not a character from the Joel Suzuki series, but a person from our very own plane of existence!

She lives in Portland, Oregon and is the author of the Valhalla series, the Mars Adventure Romance Series, and the standalone novel Rhythm. Be sure to check those out, as well as her own blog. Take it away, Jen!

Where Writing Ideas Come From

by Jennifer Willis

Earlier this morning, I received a "regrets" letter from the Jan Michalski Foundation, regarding my application for one of their "Swiss tree house" writer residencies for 2017. I hadn't realized how much I'd been looking forward to that opportunity until it was taken away, but that's how things work sometimes, right? I'd even gone so far as picking out the travel backpack I'd wanted to test out on the trip to Switzerland, and had spent a few minutes thinking about a possible weekend hop to Paris during the residency. I was also making copious mental and virtual notes on the project I intended to undertake. I was making real plans.

So, out of my disappointment this morning, I started brainstorming other possible retreats for the coming months that would allow me to tackle the same project. I thought about designing my own retreat - something that would no doubt involve a yurt. I also remembered the Amtrak writer residencies that stirred so much whimsy and controversy when they were first announced, and that got me to thinking about writing on a train.

Because who wouldn't be inspired to write on a train? That, of course, led me to consider all the reasons I would not want to write on a train, such as:

- I didn't get any sleep the night before from all the stopping and starting and clackety-clacking.
- My laptop keeps sliding off the sleeper cabin desk whenever we come around a bend.
- Kids are screaming in the narrow corridor outside my door.
- My muscles are cramping up and my body is screaming for real exercise because I've been cooped up on a freaking train for a whole week.

So, focusing on this last point, I tried to imagine ways to get decent exercise on a long-haul train journey, assuming you never get off the train. I have a nifty set of resistance bands, and those could help, but what about aerobic exercise? Short of doing calisthenics in a cramped sleeper cabin, what could I do? I didn't think running at full speed up and down the sleeper car corridor would be a good idea. I'd likely lose my footing if/when the train jostled, and I also figured there would be "train rules" about such behavior. So I'd be doing wind sprints and end up getting thrown in train jail for my troubles.

Train jail! That's what you write about. A contemporary, Hemingway-esque journey across the American heartland and into the soul, but with boxcars instead of bullfights.

And that's how story ideas are born, when you're standing at the sink brushing your teeth first thing on a Monday morning.

This post originally appeared at jennifer-willis.com on December 12, 2016.

Evidence That We Are Living In A Simulation?

As a big fan of The Matrix trilogy (yes, I even like Reloaded and Revolutions), I've always had a suspicion that one of its core premises - that we're living in some form of simulated reality - could very well be true.

Many words have been written on this subject, most of which are very well thought out and technical, so I'm not going to bother rehashing anything that's already been said. Instead, I'm going to present you with a few examples from my own life of possible evidence that the Matrix is, indeed, real.

1. Dead Chickens

I've always been amazed at the fact that on any given day, I can go to any one of dozens of different commercial establishments within a few miles of my house and purchase fresh pieces of dead chickens - and this is just in my little corner of the world. So my questions are: where do all these chickens come from? Are there really enough farms to produce this continuous stream of poultry? I've asked some people I know who work in food service about this, but their answers are usually some variant of either "I have no idea" or "sure, why not" or "stop asking me about this already." Now beef, I can sort of understand, because cows are huge, but chickens are these scrawny little birds with only two wings each as far as I can tell and I can buy a bucketful of those things any time of the day with no problem. I also get that some places "dilute" their chicken meat with other substances when creating things like nuggets or patties, but that seems to represent only a small fraction of the forms that dead chickens come in. So if you know the answer to this particular question, please let me know...or are all Tyson employees actually Agents??

2. The Relative Lack of New Music

There are two "rock" stations in the Portland market, both of which play either all "classic" (up to and including the '80s) or "classic" with some "modern" ('90s) thrown in. There's also an "alternative" station that plays some newer stuff, but hardly any of it is "rock." When I was in Boise, Idaho a few weeks ago, the piped-in music at the local mall was all pop hits from the '80s. My son's 2017 graduating class chose "Hey Ya!" by OutKast - released in 2003 - as their class song, and at their graduation ceremony, their class musicians performed "Time After Time" by Cyndi Lauper (released in 1983). And at Autism Empowerment's Tween and Teen Social Game Club Night this past weekend, one boy declared to me that his favorite music is from the '80s, while another said that his favorite songs are from the '90s. Could this be because music created within the last 10-15 years is just not that good? Or could it be because the Machines are being lazy and recycling ideas? You decide.

3. Fargo

This story comes courtesy of my friend and fellow Second Player Score member, Kyle Gilbert. Last week he and his wife were watching an episode of the second season of Fargo, which is set in 1979. At one point during the show, one of the characters said "I'll text you later." The following conversation ensued:

Kyle: Wait, what did he just say?
Wife: I don't know, but it sounded wrong.
Kyle: Yeah, I think he said "I'll text you later."
Wife: You're right, he did!
Kyle: There was no texting in 1979!
Wife: I know!
Kyle: I'm gonna call FX and complain. Their writers really messed that one up.
Wife: Let's listen to it again.

So they rewound the show and replayed that part of it. But this time, not only did the character not say "I'll text you later," he didn't say anything at all. So obviously the Machines caught their mistake and corrected it, but not until it was too late. Dun-dun-dun.

That's it for now, but I'll let you know when I have more examples. In the meantime, if you have some of your own, feel free to write them in the comments (which, hopefully, the Machines will not delete before I've had a chance to read them.)

The New Doctor

I cannot wait for tomorrow's announcement. It's all I've been thinking about. If you're a Doctor Who fan, you know the feeling.

Just for the record, here's my prediction-slash-wishful-thinking: after Wimbledon is over, the announcement comes on. It shows the TARDIS materializing in the middle of a large room full of Daleks. The door opens and, as a heroic theme song starts to play, Kris Marshall steps out.

He looks around at the Daleks surrounding him. They slowly close in, raising their guns. The camera cuts back and forth between them as the tension rises.

Then, finally, one of the Daleks says "Exterminate!" Kris responds by yelling "Doctor?!" And then Phoebe Waller-Bridge or Hayley Atwell or Olivia Colman or Jodie Whittaker jumps out of the TARDIS, waving a sonic screwdriver around and saying "Yes, yes, I'm here!"

Please, BBC.

Five Years!

Editor's note: we interrupt the ongoing series about courage in fiction and in real life to bring you this special announcement.

Hello! It's July 2017, the five-year anniversary of the Joel Suzuki Series. Can you believe it's been five years already? It feels like just yesterday that Volume One debuted as "Secret of the Songshell, Book One of the Spectraland Saga" with launch parties at Thatcher's Coffee and Ash Street Saloon.

Classic

It's also the five-year anniversary of this blog, which started with a post called "Discovering Bands." Ah, they grow up so quickly, don't they?

Anyway, as part of the anniversary celebration, I'll be doing a couple of public events this month. First up is the inaugural Words and Pictures Festival at Cascade Park Community Library this Saturday, July 15th from 11am-330pm.

I'll be there with a bunch of other awesome local authors and illustrators doing readings, talkings, signings, jugglings, and cool skateboard tricks. Okay, maybe not those last two. Oh, and we'll also have books for sale! The library is located at 600 NE 136th Avenue, Vancouver WA.

Then next on the schedule is Family Literacy Night at the Barnes & Noble in Eugene, Oregon on Thursday, July 20th from 6pm-8pm. I'll be joined by fellow local authors Roslyn McFarland and Gwendalyn Belle as well as super special guest Torin Tashima!

If you live in that area - or even if you don't - it'll be a great opportunity to meet the inspiration behind the Joel Suzuki Series (as well as that other guy who happens to be writing it.) The Eugene Barnes & Noble is at 1163 Valley River Drive, Eugene, OR.

So come on out and say happy birthday to Joel and Felicity!

In case you can't make it to these events or want to buy your copies ahead of time, Volumes One, Two and Three of the Joel Suzuki Series are available at these fine links:

Joel Suzuki, Volume One: Secret of the Songshell
Joel Suzuki, Volume Two: Mystery of the Moonfire
Joel Suzuki, Volume Three: Legend of the Loudstone

We Get Through It, Because We Get Through It Together

Part of an ongoing series about courage in fiction and in real life

In the season ten finale of Doctor Who, the Doctor willingly risks his life to save a small farming community from an advancing army of Cybermen.

Thing is though, with the Doctor, doing something like that isn't that much of a risk because - as fans of the show know - if the Doctor dies, he'll just regenerate into a new version of himself (herself?)

Most of us aren't quite as fortunate. If we die, we generally don't start giving off bursts of yellow energy before changing into someone else. Which makes it even more impressive, I think, when people who aren't the Doctor put themselves in harm's way to help others.

Here's an interview I did with James, a real-life Doctor - a firefighter paramedic, actually - from California who has been practicing his profession for almost two decades now. I hope you find his story as interesting, informative, and inspiring as I did.

(Editor's note: answers have been edited for brevity and clarity.)

Is your job something that you always wanted to do (and continue to want to do), despite knowing the risks? If so, why?

My first recollection of being interested in this job was when I was around 4 or 5. My grandfather was a fireman, and he would often tell me stories about what it was like. Also, one of the popular shows of the time was Emergency!, which made the whole job look like a series of adventures and good times - for a show about life and death there was very little death or downside depicted.

I don't really know that I had a real understanding of the risks involved even as I began taking some prerequisite classes. There were discussions of the dangers, but until I started working in the field it was all something of an abstract concept. As I've grown in the job, though, I've seen and experienced many of the risks first hand. I've lost colleagues and seen many of them injured at one point or another. I, myself, have been pretty fortunate over the course of my career to have only received cuts, bruises, and minor burns.

Despite that, I still believe that I have the best job in the world. I don't really know of anything else I would rather do. It makes me proud to be there when people need me, and to have the skills, knowledge, and experience to solve their issue or stabilize them long enough to facilitate transport to a higher level of care.

Do you feel fear and/or stress at any point, and if so, when? When you first get called to a situation, when you arrive at the scene, or at some other time?

Stress seems most often to be like background music to me at this point in my career. It's there, but it's almost always just below notice. For me, stress doesn't really start to play a role until something goes sideways during the call. We have treatment protocols for patients and standard operating guidelines for incidents that we start with, but occasionally things don't fit into those templates so we have to adjust on the fly.

If you do feel stress, how do you overcome it? Are you just naturally "wired" to deal with it, or does it take practice and experience?

I don't think anyone is naturally "wired" to deal with the stress that we endure at times. It takes practice and training to stay on course when things are going wrong.

Having relationships with your crew and coworkers helps. We drive each other. There is a collective confidence when I'm working with experienced and competent people that I've known a long time.

Is there a long-term stress factor? If so, how do you deal with that?

The short answer is "of course there is." Some of the things we see and deal with leave lasting impressions. I can still remember almost everything about my first pediatric CPR - the boy's name, the porch, his mother arriving on scene, her anguished wails as our efforts failed to bring her child back. Those things stick with me and occasionally I have dreams about it. It's all a form of post-traumatic stress disorder. My employer offers a counseling program, but therapy often begins once we get back on the engine. We talk out the situation on the way back to the station and that's pretty much the end of it most of the time.

How do you "psych yourself up" in dangerous situations? Is it the motivation of knowing you're doing a good deed? Is there a thrill or an adrenaline rush factor involved?

When I first got hired, it was easy to be wound up for every call. As I've gained experience, most of the time I'm more calculating than I used to be. There is an intrinsic reward for helping people, whether it be a small thing or truly making a difference. It's a validation of your training and your choices. My crew and I have saved people's lives, and that's an awesome feeling.

And yes, of course there's an adrenaline rush - any time you go crawling into a burning structure there's some sort of thrill involved. It's the feeling of going where almost no one else goes and getting the job done.

It really comes down to the fact that I work with good, experienced people who aren't going to let me do anything dangerous alone. My saying is "we get through it, because we get through it together."