I wrote a neat draft of the introduction, with a lot of questions. Then I said to myself, “You’re giving away the ending of the story again. The surprising part is supposed to be after the asterisks. Besides, do not insult the readers’ intelligence. They’ll see what you’ve had in mind. Or they’ll see what they’ll see, and that’s it.” I believe my inner voice was right. So I deleted the draft, and started the intro anew.
This piece was written several years ago, during a somewhat long period of unemployment for me. Suddenly I had too much free time on my hands, and nothing to do. Instead of focusing all my efforts on finding a new job, I took the skeleton of my dream of becoming a professional writer out of the closet, resurrected it, and got down to writing. When I gave this story to a friend of mine to read it, he said it reminded him of Minority Report. To this day, I still can’t find any similarities. Maybe you will.
28 October 2007 at 7:30
I don’t see “Minority Report” either. What job do you have now? If I can be a little nosey.
28 October 2007 at 15:40
I’m still a translator, just not a freelance one, now. For five or six years, I had the freedom to choose my own working hours, whether to do a certain translation or not. The downside was that sometimes there was more work than I could handle, other times I just waited for a phone call from an employer. No calls, no money — as simple as that. I guess in the end I chose security over freedom. My present job is 9-to-5, but I learned new things and gained more experience, so this makes it even in my book.
2 November 2007 at 18:06
Hurry up. I can’t hold my breath much longer. What? Oh, yea! I have been holding my breath in anticipation of your next installment, and my lips are blue and my cheeks are puffed and my eyes are bugging out. Hurry!
5 November 2007 at 22:15
Whatsamatter? Why haven’t you come back? Did I piss you off somehow? Does my breath stink? Do I need deodorant? Do you have a new boyfriend, girlfriend or husband and simply do not have time to write or post? You give me a taste of your imagination and then just go away? Come back Little Sheba, come back. Or Raven! or El Volgero (what ever that means. You were going to tell us, but you haven’t yet.) I await your next installment, so hurry.
8 November 2007 at 19:42
I’m finally back. I was away for like ten days (obvious, isn’t it?), but now I’m here again, dead tired, alive tired, whatever. So I’ll dig up something from the archives, and it’ll be posted for the weekend, at the latest.
Thanks so much for the interest in my short stories. I haven’t been offended in any way — hey, my skin is as thick as rhinoceros’s. No new girlfriend or wife either, but I don’t intend to change her anyway. I really don’t have much time for writing, but there’s quite a few things I’ve written in the past, so stay tuned — there’ll be new posts.