Another poem

This one has a somewhat elementary rhyme scheme, but the more I read it, the more I like it. What do you think?

Legacy
By Eric Eckert

When we age, we strain to see
Just what our legacy will be.
A chest of treasure, silver and gold
Or simply the feat of growing old?

A castle, some jewels? No, I do not believe
Those are the things that we would like to leave
Behind to the loved ones who relied so much
On our abilities, our strengths and, at times, our touch.

Who we are – that is something to consider,
Not what we’ve collected, those things leave us bitter.
Not want for belongings, materials will fade.
But want for the laughter, the time that was made.

Dinners at home ‘round the table at night,
The pat on the back for a chore that’s done right,
A good wish in a card, maybe a note to say hi.
Those are the legacies for which we should strive.

A trip to the ballpark, or a hike through the trees,
Catch in the back yard, or fishing the streams.
Time with a coloring book, a story before bed.
Those are the wonders that will be remembered.

Have we served our own masters with selfish delight?
Or did we pass on what we knew to be right?
Responsibility, stewardship, justice, faith –
How about caring for others? Or giving all away?

Did we talk with one face yet act with the other?
Did we engage? Or did we ignore our brothers?
Did we care for our neighbors, for their spiritual being?
Or did we walk on by and pretend not to see?

Did we submit to the Lord? Put our lives in His hands?
Or did we do it ourselves, and forego all His plans?
Were we selfish, impure, drunk, or enslaved?
Did we acknowledge our weakness and ask to be saved?

Did we pass on to children a reflection of Christ?
Or did we concentrate on ourselves and lose sight
Of the goal, our one chance in this mortal life
To make peace and love, to subdue any strife?

At the end, we’ll reflect on our words and our deeds.
And what will grow will be the results of the seeds
That we planted and tended during our brief time.
Will our legacies blossom, or will they wither and die?

I am guilty, convicted of the words that I write.
I want to love and live better, so that I might
Hand down to my children a me that they’ll see
Tried his best to provide for their spiritual needs.

Time, faith and love are the best things we give
Our legacies, our gifts, are the ways that we live.

Copyright 2008

A new poem

I played around with a new poem. What do you think? Is it too much? (PS -- while I wanted some funky spacing, I just can't seem to get the correct spacing on this blog post!)

On Writing

My arms are strong in the deep water
Shoulders stretched
Elbows bent down at right angles
Forearms circling like eggbeaters
Circling like eggbeaters
Legs kicking
Pushing me up

A breath
Between intermittent waves
A faraway shore
Success if I can make it

Waves carry me forward
Then pull me back
Forward
Then back

Progress is slow, tedious
But there is progress
And my arms and legs still move

At night
Black water sloshes against my cheeks
To sleep would be to die
To lose my strength to die
My arms give out
Give in
To the density of the waves
And the movement of the water

The movement of the water

The movement of the water

My legs, determined still to win the shore

At daybreak
Sun reflects off the sand,
Uncut diamonds for the picking
My goal is the shore
The faraway shore,
Respite from the fight,
The constant battle to breathe

The weight
Of the water
Against
My chest

More waves

Salt and sun bake my tears,
Tears that come with the loss of my legs
The faraway shore
Now invisible through crusted eyes
The smell of the shore is strong
And the water continues to move

Waves
More frequent now
Dip
And rise
Dip
And rise

Kelp glances off my wrinkled toes
The blisters on my eyelids
Don’t hurt as much
My strength’s absorbed by the water
So I float
On my back
Head first toward the shore

The smell of the shore is strong
And the water continues to move

At dusk
Sand bristles along my back
A crab clips at the base of my neck
Driftwood pounds my ear
My lips are blistered shut
I am blind

Yet the smell of the shore is strong
And the water continues to move me

out

to

sea

again

Copyright 2008

Back in the saddle

Well, I started writing the novel again. But I had to read through the whole thing first. And the fun thing about that is this: The last thing I had written is now the preface to the book. A section of text that would have been buried in the middle of the book fits quite well at the beginning. It was like the proverbial lightbulb came on. Sometimes I guess you just have to step away from something for awhile...

I also decided to break up my chapters. So, some of them are actually pretty short -- about two pages. Personally, I think it works great. I'm just making chapters wherever there's a natural scene change, or a change in tone. So, if you're following this blog -- and you're probably not -- keep your fingers crossed that I continue. I have renewed faith in this thing and I want to keep that passion alive.

Writer's Digest Links

My friend Angela on Wicked Wordsmith posted the link to the following Writer's Digest site. The link lists the 101 Best Websites for 2008. I haven't checked them all out, but I will.

Personal essays

I've recently been reading The Norton Book of Personal Essays. I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in essay writing and memoir. As you might know, my thesis centered on creative nonfiction, and the personal essay is something that I've been studying lately. Some of the selections in this book are very good. Favorites so far: Willa Cather's A Chance Meeting, F. Scott Fitzgerald's Sleeping and Waking, and H.L. Mencken's Reflections on Journalism.

Joyce Carol Oates on writing characters

Where have I been? Thanks for asking...

I received an email from a wonderful friend of mine who said she actually reads this blog. I knew that there were a few of you out there, but I didn't know that you'd miss it -- even a little bit. So, here is my excuse for not updating for nearly two months: I have been finishing up my thesis. Yes, I finished it. Yes, it's now turned in to Missouri State University's Graduate College for review. Yes, I will graduate with a Masters in English-Creative Writing on May 16! Finally. Four years of pecking at this degree will finally yield fruit. What fruit? I have no clue. But hopefully it's something tasty.

With my thesis, I tried to couple my passion for journalism with my passion for creative writing, so the final product was a collection of three creative nonfiction pieces -- stories from my life that I hope people (at least those on my thesis committee) could maybe find somewhat thought-provoking. One piece is called "Spiritual Battle," and it examines my relationship with my idol, my grandfather and his reaction to my marriage announcement. (Grandpa, a devout Catholic, my godfather and confirmation sponsor, felt I was abandoning my religion by so readily agreeing to be married in another church.) Another is called "Hope for Change" and it reflects on my experience seeing an African man hanging from a tower in downtown Springfield. That day and that image have changed me. The third is called "Goat Lady" and is the "story behind the story" of an article I wrote when I was a working journalist.

I have been neck deep in this thesis for a year. I'm glad I did it, but I had some issues with the whole creative non-fiction thing. Here is an excerpt from my Introduction that might help you understand the "issues" that I faced:

I’ve heard and read that the freedom that comes with creative nonfiction is liberating. If liberation means that I can “play tennis without the net” then I would agree. But if liberation means turning the microscope on myself and revealing my opinions and criticisms to the world, then I’ve found that to be excruciating.

Journalists have the safety of providing the facts and letting their readers make up their own minds. With creative nonfiction, the author shares his subjective thoughts. That part was a challenge. However, I discovered it is easier for me to criticize myself than to criticize others. With this collection, I try to open up – I really do. I do my best to be intimate. I present the facts. I experiment with style and structure. But when it comes to criticizing others, I often find myself fading back into the shadows of “Here are the facts. You decide.”

Anyway, the clouds are lifting and I'm am re-energizing to pick up where I left off on the novel. It's a great story. I just hope I can tell it!

"Cousin, you live, even if you dance to my tune"

I just picked up a copy of Writers on Writing, Volume II. I was struck by Dorothy Gallagher's essay: "Recognizing the Book that Needs to be Written."

As you know, my thesis is a series of creative nonfiction pieces. I have been struggling with what to include in my stories, how much truth there needs to be and whether everything must be shared.

The complete essay can be found here on the NY Times site. Here are a few exerpts from the essay that I thought I'd share:

I have never written fiction, and this memoir may be as close as I ever get to it. No more than a biography or a novel is memoir true to life. Because, truly, life is just one damn thing after another. The writer's business is to find the shape in unruly life and to serve her story. Not, you may note, to serve her family, or to serve the truth, but to serve the story. There really is no choice. A reporter of fact is in service to the facts, a eulogist to the family of the dead, but a writer serves the story without apology to competing claims.

***

Now you may ask: Just what is the relation of your memoir to the truth?

It is as close as it can be.

The moment you put pen to paper and begin to shape a story, the essential nature of life -- that one damn thing after another -- is lost. No matter how ambiguous you try to make a story, no matter how many ends you leave hanging, it's a package made to travel.

Everything that happened is not in my stories; how could it be? Memory is selective, storytelling insists on itself. But there is nothing in my stories that did not happen. In their essence they are true.

Or a shade of true.

***

What do you think about these ideas?

Snow days are great for productivity

Today was a great day.

Like a kid, I was excited to have a snow day. Usually, I enjoy getting up and going to work -- even on Mondays. But this morning I was still struggling with a mean sickness that has dogged me and the rest of my family for more than three weeks. So, it was nice to see that I'd have another day to recover. In the mean time, I was able to complete another 11 pages of my thesis and FINALLY finish Erik Larson's Devil in the White City. I just finished the book a few minutes before midnight.

If you haven't read this book, go out and buy it today. Fantastic book. It leaves no stone unturned. Great historic piece filled with suspense and mystery, as well as an in-depth look at one of the most influential happenings in our country's history -- the Chicago World's Fair.

The book only left me with one question. As a St. Louisan, I've always held tight to the legend that the massive Ferris wheel that appeared at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair (but which debuted at the earlier exposition in Chicago) was dismanteled and is buried in Forest Park. Larson's book stops short of saying where those massive sections of steel went. So, Erik, if you're reading this, can you help me out on that??

Did I say it was a great book? I need to post some snippets, so you can see what I'm talking about.

Keep the action going

I'm still reading Erik Larson's Devil in the White City. It's still a very good book that concentrates on two stories: the architechts who create the 1898 World's Fair in Chicago, and a maniacal serial killer operating a few blocks away.

Larson is an incredible writer, and he has done awesome research on this subject. No proverbial stone is unturned. But the strong -- albeit sensational -- part of the story is the serial killer. And what I've found is that I'm fascinated by his story. But, as the book progresses (I'm on page 238), his story is interrupted by HUGE chunks of that which concentrates on the architects. When that happens, the action (for me, anyway) slows down considerably. It's frustrating. I want to skip those parts and flip pages to find more about the killer. I won't, though, because I want the full experience the way the author intended.

This does not discount the author's writing ability because I find him to be tremendous. And, in all fairness to the author, this book was in the history section of Barnes and Noble rather than the true crime section. So, I'm guessing that the main thrust (and, obviously, the part with the most archival material) is the architect story with the serial killer just being an added bonus.

I still recommend this title.

Some questions:

Have you had this experience with books before? If so, what titles? (I think the worst was the "Left Behind" series. I did skip around through those!)

Are there tricks to keep the action going, rather than bogging the reader down in detail?

Are writers cheating the reader if we don't provide the "details" -- even if they're mundane?

Writing longhand

My wife and I still can't afford a laptop. So, while I'm away for five days in Denver, I'll probably spend some time writing longhand. During some of the little spare time I'll have during the conference, I plan to work on my thesis, as well as (hopefully) my novel.

It's amazing how quickly we've lost our "ability" to write in longhand. All of those notes that were passed around in high school and junior high were written in longhand. Back then we were happy to do it, even eager to do it, daily.

Last month, I had to use longhand to write four pages of essays for my linguistics final. It was almost excruciating -- literally -- because I was also writing in pencil. PENCIL??!! I had four of them onhand because there is little worse than writing page after page of single-space with a dull pencil. Actually, over the past year, I've kept several sharp pencils on my desk. There's just something refreshing about pencils.

I used to have pretty nice handwriting. But when I became a reporter, that was all shot to heck. I developed my own shorthand and myriad symbols, which eventually led to some whacked-out mess of ink that only reporters could (amazingly) decipher.

I think I'm going to try to write longhand more often. Books are being published lately dealing with letters that people have written to each other (I'm thinking specifically of books that feature letters between John and Abigail Adams and one that centers on an amazing amount of correspondence to and from Henry James). There was an art to that type of writing. There's something personal, individual, about longhand letter writing. You can almost "see" how the people were feeling when they were writing.

Now we're deluged with sterile emails, that if it wern't for those stupid smiley faces, we'd never be able to tell how the person was feeling -- whether they're being sarcastic, etc.

I've saved many letters that were written to me over the years. They're fun to go back and read. I've saved very few emails.

I think there's an exercise in all of this. I'd like to begin writing more letters to my wife -- something aside from the little notes I jot down in her birthday and anniversary cards. I think she'll appreciate that.

But...that's letter writing. When you want to write a book, there's no better method than typing. I'll probably end up with a hand cramp. But, as they say, no pain, no novel.

Subplots and organization

I'm going to admit that I haven't spent a lot of time on the novel lately, but I am anxious about getting back to it, as I am constantly thinking up ideas.

One thing I've realized is that there HAS to be a series of subplots -- something that is making the job of writing a little harder because I've realized that you can't just concentrate on the main storyline. Basically, there just wouldn't be the depth that I believe a novel requires.

My novel -- right now titled "The Father's Forgiveness" -- deals with several mainstream issues, including the death penalty (I'm intrigued right now with the Supreme Court's decision to hear a case about a guy who is scheduled to die for raping a child), as well as several religious issues which pit Catholic views against other ideologies. I grew up Catholic, and while I still hold dear to many of the Church's teachings, my thoughts on various issues (including the death penalty) differ greatly. Since one of the main characters is a priest, this is making for some great discussion in the book and has prompted a lot of soul searching on my part.

Anyway -- getting back to subplots and organization. I am considering using a tool that I learned about in a screenwriting course. I think I'm going to use 3x5 index cards to write out scenes, and then I will use those cards as puzzle pieces to create the best possible story I can imagine.

Have any of you used this technique in your writing? (I don't get a lot of comments here, but I like to pose questions in case someone stumbles upon this blog and decides to contribute.)

Archival treasures -- and a little apology

First off, I want to apologize for the "little vacation" I took from this blog. It had nothing to do with the blog, other than the fact that I hadn't worked much -- if any -- on the novel or my thesis for about four weeks! I was preparing for a final, writing the paper for my linguistics course and gearing down for the Christmas break, which is now over.

This is crunch time for my thesis, as the first draft is due in February. I'm sticking with the creative non-fiction and have found some new inspiration for some essays that I will write.

Since I have been working at Missouri State University, I've been captivated by our archives in the Meyer Library. People actually donate documents and memorabilia from their lives that -- if combed through carefully -- tell fascinating stories.

When was the last time you "dug" through your own archives?

The Christmas break allowed me some time to do that. I am so blessed to have a mother that has boxed up most of the things from my childhood, as well as momentos, writings, etc. from high school and college years.

In my old bedroom closet sits a wooden toy box with a treasure trove of Eric memorabilia. Right now, it is only of interest to my mother and me; but, hopefully, my sons will one day enjoy browsing through the items.

This Christmas I was on a quest to prove that I was once a promising artist. I was scouring the Eric archives for a high school sketchbook. After locating it (and realizing that that path probably wasn't as promising as I believed), I also found a manilla envelope. In the envelope was the only hard copy of an essay that I wrote in 1994. I hadn't seen this essay since my senior year in high school, and I was very excited to find it.

The essay chronicled a four-hour visit with Baseball Hall of Fame broadcaster and longtime St. Louis Cardinal announcer Jack Buck -- a St. Louis legend, who is father to now uber-popular Joe Buck.

Over the years -- mostly at parties -- I have called forth my memories from that evening at KMOX radio. But this essay, which was written as part of a class project, filled in so many gaps that I had forgotten.

I intend to use this essay to help me write a portion of my thesis. Finding this work helped me to understand just how important "original" work can be -- especially when the goal is to provide accurate history.

I'm also convinced that EVERY life is interesting and adventurous in one way or another. That's why being a storyteller is so much fun!

A great mystery is dialogue, hmm?

My 4-year-old son has been watching the original three Star Wars movies for the past few months. Not too long ago (and not too far far away), he came up to me and said, "Love you I do" in his best Yoda voice. It was hilarious!

I am taking a pretty confusing linguistics theory class at the moment -- my fault, not the professor's -- so I used the prompt from my son to write my final paper on "Yoda-speak" and the Jedi Master's use of sentence inversion in The Empire Strikes Back.

What I realized while writing this paper is that Yoda's lexicon defines him as much as his green skin, diminutive size or his masterful use of The Force.

That made me analyze the dialogue in my novel, as well as pose some other dialogue-related questions:

1. Does my dialogue help define my characters?
2. Have I fallen into any dialogue traps? (using useless words, writing dialogue when I could paraphrase, etc.?
3. Can individual lexicons be over-used? (Personally, I think Yoda's has been overdone in subsequent films)
4. What are some good examples of great dialogue? Some Mark Twain and To Kill a Mockingbird comes to mind.
5. Are there any good dialogue resources out there?

Thanks for listening...er, reading.

First Chapters

I recently had a noted author write to me with this advice: "First chapters are critical in getting the attention of an agent, and agents are critical in getting your work before publishers."

Personally, from a reader's standpoint, I find that "first chapters are critical in getting the attention of the reader" too!

Some people judge a book by its cover. I often judge one by the first two or three pages -- and if the writing's good, the first chapter.

One of my favorite pastimes is going to Borders or Barnes and Noble, grabbing a half dozen titles from the stacks and sitting down to read with a cafe mocha. Last Sunday, my wife and I had the rare opportunity to break away from the kids and go to Barnes and Noble to do just that.

I brought my pile of books back to the tiny table and began to read. I was really excited about one particular author, so I grabbed several of his books. Unfortunately, I wasn't hooked by his writing style, so I put them down and picked up a random book from the "new fiction" shelf. I was captivated.

The book: Leo Furey's The Long Run

Wow! I haven't had a book grip my attention like that in awhile. I read the first chapter and was amazed at the emotions I went through. I literally laughed outloud at one character, Brother McCann, and then found myself ready to reach through the pages and kick him in the head until he was comatose. I was very impressed, and I can't wait to buy the book (My finances that night were going toward a movie -- American Gangster -- that was worth every inflated penny). I only hope the entire novel can live up to "first chapter" expectations.

The last few books that really caught my attention like that were Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones and Truman Capote's In Cold Blood.

A very good resource for "first chapters" is the NY Times "First Chapters" site.

A few discussion questions:

1. What are some books with first chapters that grabbed your attention?


2. Do you find that subsequent chapters -- even endings -- often don't live up to first chapters?


3. Do you often trudge through clunky first chapters because you know that a good story is around the bend?


4. For writers, how much importance do you place on the first chapter?

Cliff-hangers and chapter organization

I posted earlier with a question about chapter length and organization. Although I received no comments on this site, I also posed the question to the Crimespace community. Here are some tips that I receieved:

* Some readers don't like to be burdened with having to hang in there for 20 pages before turning off the light. Others get irritated by one page chapters. In the end you have to do what feels right for your book.


* Virtually all of my scenes end with some sort of cliff-hanger. Not all of them are of the Bad-Guy-Pulls-A-Gun variety either. I try to end with some sort of a twist or reversal which increases tension and (hopefully) forces the reader to go on to the next chapter.

* Let your writing flow naturally. It's better than having a preconceived notion of what it's supposed to "look" like. If you're on your second chapter, chances are it will end up looking a lot different in the second draft anyway. My chapters in the last book start out long in the beginning and get shorter and shorter as I raised the pulse of the reader.


Personally, one of the best books I've read (in terms of cliff-hangers) was The Da Vinci Code. When I read that book (prior to all of the plot points being revealed on every major network), I couldn't put it down. EVERY chapter left me wanting more. I read it in about three days but had to force myself to put it down on the night stand and go to bed.

I thank everyone who took the time on Crimespace to answer. I've decided to just write and break to a next chapter when it feels right. I'm in the middle of Chapter 3 right now, but I've already started Chapter 4. Now, I just need to fill in the gaps!

Things I'm learning along the way

This blog is actually working...

No, there are not very many comments coming in (yet), but by writing my occasional posts, I have been motivated to work on my book and to seek out resources that I didn't know existed before I started this (Wicked Wordsmith, Crimespace, etc). As of today, my book is at 22 pages and I'm well into chapter 2! This is exciting for me because I have a definite direction for this work -- and that is a huge accomplishment for me, as I've started many things that just kind of fell flat.

Some things that I'm learning along the way:

1. The characters really do drive themselves. Yes, I have a conclusion in mind, but my protagonist has a life of his own. I often find myself saying things like: "He'd do this instead of that" or I'll go back and make significant changes because I'd have Tommy doing something that was totally out of character.

2. I read somewhere that you shouldn't introduce secondary characters without having them reappear again with some significance. That makes a lot of sense, when I think about it. I've actually introduced some characters for flavor, but coming across that advice, I need to figure out how they'll reappear. I'm actually very excited about this and have some ideas.

3. I need to write when I don't want to write. The other night, my wife and I were lounging on the couch and flipping channels. I told her: "I hate nights like this when you feel like you've just wasted an entire evening." She said "Why don't you go write?" At first, I felt like saying "I'm tired" or "I just don't have it in me tonight." Instead, I got up and dragged myself to the computer and pounded out three pages or so. I started to get tired and wanted to quit midway through a scene, but I continued to write -- just to finish the scene and "turn the corner." Before I went to bed, I had revised the first chapter (again) and was well on my way into Chapter 2 (It might even be time to move to Chapter 3). I was tired the next morning, but something had been accomplished -- which is the point, right?

4. Do chapters have to be similar in length? At this point, I'm deciding they don't because my second chapter ends naturally at about half the length of the first. Is this appropriate, or is there some rule regarding chapter length?

Looking forward to some comments!!

Considering a change

I am very disgruntled with my creative nonfiction thesis project -- so disgruntled, in fact, that I'm considering a change. I want to write fiction! But I've taken no fiction writing courses because there haven't been any offered after 5 p.m., when I could take them.

Some challenges I've discovered with creative nonfiction:

1. It's tough to analyze yourself and to then put it down on paper.
2. When people are still living, it's tough to analyze them and put it down on paper -- for me, there is a genuine fear of upsetting someone. Facts are facts, and they should speak for themselves (in theory and within the confines of objective journalism); but...when delving into creative nonfiction, you let your judgements show, and that still seems pretty risky to me.
3. I've got some great nonfiction ideas, but I feel rushed to write those stories based upon a thesis deadline.
4. Right now, I want to write fiction -- plain and simple!

Any thoughts?

Resident Tiller of the Soil

Are you the "resident tiller of the soil" or "the trading seaman?"

In Walter Benjamin's "The Storyteller: Reflections on the Works of Nikolai Leskov", the author examines these two groups.

Experience which is passed on from mouth to mouth is the source from which
all storytellers have drawn. And among those who have written down the tales, it
is the great ones whose written version differs least from the speech of the
many nameless storytellers. Incidentally, among the last named there are two
groups which, to be sure, overlap in many ways. And the figure of the
storyteller gets its full corporeality only for the one who can picture them
both. “When someone goes on a trip, he has something to tell about,” goes
the German saying, and people imagine the storyteller as someone who has come
from afar. But they enjoy no less listening to the man who has stayed at home,
making an honest living, and who knows the local tales and traditions. If one
wants to picture these two groups through their archaic representatives, one is
embodied in the resident tiller of the soil, and the other in the trading
seaman. Indeed, each sphere of life has, as it were, produced its own tribe of
storytellers. ...

The actual extension of the realm of storytelling in its full historical breadth is inconceivable without the most intimate interpenetration of these two archaic types. Such an interpenetration was achieved particularly by the Middle Ages in their trade structure. The resident master craftsman and the traveling journeymen worked together in the same rooms; and every master had been a traveling journeyman before he settled down in his home town or somewhere else. If peasants and seamen were past masters of storytelling, the artisan class was its university. In it was
combined the lore of faraway places, such as a much-traveled man brings home,
with the lore of the past, as it best reveals itself to natives of a place.

At this point in my "career" I consider myself a resident tiller of the soil -- "the man who has stayed at home, making an honest living, and who knows the local tales and traditions."

As a journalist, I have taken what others have told me, organized it, and passed it on. So far, that's been my form of storytelling (which, Benjamin would argue -- along with the novel -- is a step down from the oral tradition).

There's a lot more to the essay than what I've shown here, but I like the imagery of digging up the stories and sharing them with others. As writers, that's our job -- whether the stories come from others or from our own personal experiences, expressed in both fiction and non-fiction.

What do you think?

(Actually, I think I confused myself in all of this ...)

A few questions

What's in a name?

Do you ever have trouble naming your characters? My protagonist is Thomas "Tommy" Richter. I wanted a good German name, but now I'm re-thinking my choice -- Is the name "Tommy" appropriate for a 30-something? My thinking is that he's "Tommy" to the people in his neighborhood and "Thomas" in the workplace. Is that too distracting? Are there any really good resources out there for character naming?

Using real places?

Are there any dangers having your characters going to real places, like real universities? Right now, I have Tommy as a graduate of St. Louis University, but it's basically a place-holder until I can do some more research. Tommy is a journalist, but I haven't checked to see if SLU has a journalism program. I went to a Missouri school with a journalism program, but it's not in St. Louis. I want Tommy to go to a school in St. Louis. Does "creating" a university -- even if it's just a brief mention -- give the story less credibility?

Any good examples out there of dream sequences?

I'm looking for a creative way to insert a dream -- in real time -- into my story. Do you know of any good examples?

Thanks for any help you can provide.