Author: Paul Keene

An Angel for Grandpa

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The Golden Age of Hollywood Lives

Fun loving bachelor, Auggie Mondo, steps back from the easel to view his street scene painting and bumps into out-going Paris tourist, Nona. The well-known plein air artist catches Nona in his arms before she falls to the ground. Love at first sight strikes. The two marry and return to the Beverly Hills Mondo estate.

Nona is overtaken with happiness when she announces her pregnancy to Auggie. Nona’s joy is dampened by Auggie’s reactions.

Tragedy strikes.

An unknown visitor rings at the Mondo front gate demanding to see her grandpa. Through tears, suspense, and struggles the Mondo inhabitants and spirits face, a story of love unfolds.

How can a father push his son away? What makes a daughter fear a mother who is dead? Can a child sent across the country to a private school at the age of nine forgive his father?

Housekeeper Juanita Lorenzo goes from rags to riches, but a bleak childhood ignites fears of life and love throwing her in a triangle of damaged hearts: housekeeper, father, and son.

While a friend, mother, and wife from the other side works to reunite her husband and son, Juanita discovers that she must mend her own heart before she can find love, joy, and happiness.

 

Sure as Death and Taxes

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We complain and curse taxes openly but push death aside until faced with it. Bring up taxes and you can’t get a word in sideways.  Mention death and the oxygen runs from the room. Is it enough to know that someday you will die, and leave it at that?

Everyone knows they’re going to die: what’s the point?

Accepting that we will die doesn’t lessen the fear and worry that vary among each of us. It’s not about wills, insurances, and funeral services, although having them in place is important. The point is to become at ease with death. Not just at the time of death, but throughout the interim of living.

Address after death beliefs

Knowing what to expect after our last breath eases the fear of dying (thanatophobia) that can cause panic and anxiety. Explore after-death opinions. Start with your own opinions and then research the topic. Discuss the topic with others, including spiritualism to agnostics, organized religions from Christian to non-christian. Be open-minded. Read books and accounts of those who have had near-death experiences (NDE), and the afterlife.

Create Expectations

The unknown instills fear. Form opinions and fine-tune them. Remember, these are your beliefs, what you expect although no one knows what happens until it takes place. Once you have after-death expectations, get back to the joy of living. Embrace the time you have before dying. Your life will reflect the love of living and spread to your family, friends, and others. The ease reflected by your actions when the time comes will be noticed by those left behind, helping them heal.

 

 

Embracing Hope: the good and the bad

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Hope is expressed in music lyrics, poetry, fiction, and the pastor’s sermon. It’s a much-used expression that has different meanings to those doing the hoping:

  • “I hope Barbara goes to the dance with me if not, I’ll ask Sue.”
  • “Now that I’ve washed the car, I hope it doesn’t rain.”
  • “I hope and pray that they caught the malignancy in time.”
  • “They’re cutting staff and I’m hoping to keep my job until I find another.”

Jim Carrey gave a super graduation address. It’s well worth viewing and you won’t regret the twenty-some minutes.

My dad used to say, “To sit on your butt and hope is a waste of time. It’s the action that gets results.” I had said something about hoping to get a good grade on a history test. To put this in perspective, my parents had received a report of missing assignments and sporadic attendance, along with the midterm D- grade. Although it would’ve been a hardship on Mom and Dad, I had to turn over the keys to my ’52 Bel Aire.

I loved that car. It motivated me to get my act together for two nights in a row before I turned to hope and threw in a prayer or two and scored 53% on the test. I learned that hope without action didn’t work. And I learned to walk back and forth to school and all activities.

Hoping is often tied to wishing. I hope this, I wish that… without taking action that brings change. Hope is the spark that ignites action. Can you live without hope? It would be giving up, living a dismal life–not making the best in the present, no expectations of the future. Never looking forward to a new day.

The overuse of hope has lowered its importance and value. Hoping for safety and protection in times of disaster is more than hoping a Rock Star venue has some good seats left. Hope combined with prayer to God, the Universe, or the energy that you believe keeps the planets in line is powerful.

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Should you put hope on a higher pedestal giving it more importance? Does having hope make our lives better, or not? I’d love to hear your thoughts.  Please leave a comment below:

Spiritual beings having a human experience

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We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience ~ Pierre Teilhard De Chardin

I developed an interest in the paranormal during my college years. Being open to it could’ve increased the awareness of my own experiences. After a divorce, I moved into an old house across from the school where I worked. The first week I was awakened with a slap on my behind at three AM each morning. Then came the footsteps up the basement stairs stopping at the door. Needless to say, my life was turned upside down. Not as severe as Garth Andrews’s life, but enough to plant a story in my head.

The first three books I wrote were a coming of age series that explored a music-talented protagonist’s obsessive-compulsive behaviors that led to addictions. A ghost that came with a pawn shop guitar was a strong supporting character, but the supernatural runs the show in Human Experience.

The novel has a colorful cast that includes a variety of spirits:

  • ghosts
  • poltergeist
  • guardian angels
  • spirit guides
  • and more

The notice of divorce not only takes protagonist Garth Andrews by surprise but drives him into a deep depression that clouds the hold unseen inhabitants of the house have on him. He is torn between protecting his children and fulfilling a selfish lust.

The novel, Human Experience, endorses Pierre Teilhard De Chardin’s belief that we are here to learn from our experiences.

About the Author

Hope, Humor, and the Supernatural

Paul Keene writes literary fiction from his Idaho home near the Swan Falls bird refuge. He enjoys exploring the outdoors, working in the herb garden, and drinking bold coffee while reading on the back deck. The author loves life and enjoys friends, family, and dogs. Humor and gratitude lighten his heart.

Spirits, Angels, Ghosts, and sounds in the night

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      Shadows come and go. You turn to look at whoever is staring at you. No one is there. You smell a scent of perfume, tobacco, or food that stirs a memory as it fills the room.

The veil is getting thinner, and thinner. 

Some think it becomes thinner at Halloween. Others say it has become thinner over the past decade. Then there are those who push spirits aside. “When you take your last breath that’s it–you’re gone, no heaven, no hell,” they say.

Others Say

“Someone sits at the foot of the bed. It’s my husband–I smell the Old Spice cologne and love that he watches over me.”

 

How do we know?

It’s great that we do our own thinking and have our own beliefs. That’s the way it should be. I confess that I believe in spirits. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ve not only felt them, but I’ve also seen a couple. Good thing I wasn’t living in the 1690s.

Seriously, even though we have our own take on the Other Side, Life after Death, or whether or not it exists–how do we know for sure? We can listen to others, attend church, accept what others say, and draw our own conclusions, but how do we know if we’re right?

We won’t until it happens.

  • If we go to heaven, we’ll undoubtedly love it
  • If hell is as bad as it’s described we’ll probably hate it
  • If there is no afterlife, we won’t know and it won’t matter

What do you think? Your opinions are appreciated and are of value.

 

 

 

 

 

Age is in the mind: Do you know where your keys are?

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Anyone blowing out 49 candles on a cake knows that age is in the mind…and back, hips, and down there, too.

The “age is in your mind” and similar nonsense comes from a category of higher education. The awarded degrees, although somewhat different, begin with the B.S. (Bull Shit), followed by the M.S. (More Shit) and Piled Higher and Deeper, Ph.D.

animated-elderly-image-0063

Before we know it, we exchange scotch for green tea, red beef for tofu, coffee for stool softeners, and dirty magazines for cross-word puzzles. Forgive the clichés, but youth really is wasted on the young. The kid using the blower to clear the lawn of autumn leaves, and smacking his hands to turn off the lamp makes me cry. Sits and plays video games when he could’ve been chasing girls–me oh my!

Old age strikes out of nowhere isn’t true. It begins the minute we’re born and creeps up while we’re having too much fun to notice the warning signs.

Help is available. Same as a Big Box hardware store has everything needed to renew the appearance of a weathered house there are shops on every corner loaded with tonics, lotions, and treatments that disguise the wear and tear of old age.

It’s the lie that rubs me the wrong way and gets under my skin (please note the above cliché apology).

Before you send nasty comments, let me say that I support both positive thinking and higher education. Having said this, I avoid stepping in my degrees.

I’m a bit confused about where I was going with this, but today is Bingo day at the Senior Center, and I have to find my keys.

The real writer please stand

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The writer and two imposters faced the panel and answered questions. Among the highfalutin words sprinkled in the questions were artistic, clever, imaginative, inspiration, and creative spirit.

He could be profiled as visionary or daydreamer, but so could the plumber and banker beside him. The author wanted to discuss the force that drives him to write, but the question was never asked.

The force that drives the writer

Bone-chilling fears during youth took root in the corners of his mind. He feared the dark, heights, and loss. Shadows appeared in the night. Evil hid under the bed and behind the closet door.

Loss of money, possessions… love, success. He checked the door locks twice, three times, and two more.

Childhood memories cluttered his head–racing home from horror films at the movie theater, Grandma’s bedtime story of Granddaddy Longfingers who made his home underneath the bed, and Grandpa’s stories of the Great Depression.

Heated voices woke him. A door slammed, an engine started, and a mother wept. Relationships are colored with fear.

He never woke one morning and decided to become a writer. It struck and never lay at rest. Journal, notepad, or whiteness of a computer screen, the act of writing paved the road to meaning and understanding. Characters and plot forced him face-to-face with inner demons.

The taping ended. The author went home, poured a drink, and fired up the computer.

Writing, kids, and ADHD

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Sit at the desk. Don’t wiggle, don’t bounce, or turn upside down. Stay.

Haha.

If a prankster posted a Keep Out sign on the school’s front gate, a number of kids would conclude the sign meant them.

As teacher and principal before ADD/HD became common teacher jargon, the kids struggling with moderate/severe ADD/HD symptoms were often placed in emotionally disturbed (ED) special education classrooms.

When I retired from teaching, I put two novels on hold that were in various stages of outline, draft, and research and wrote Running Nowhere, a coming of age trilogy. The three books tell the story of Conor Kelman—a boy with ADD/HD during a time before the disorder was recognized.

I wrote the trilogy in hopes that those familiar with ADHD would find solace, and a weird comfort in recognizing the hardship and struggle children-parents-students-teachers face coping with ADHD.

The books are fiction, written for entertainment. Nothing clinical inside the pages, but those familiar with ADHD will recognize the symptoms and the addictive, obsessive, impulsive behaviors. Yes, behaviors that many kids coming of age have. However, the ADD/HD group will recognize the struggle and inward pain of being different.

Today, the ADD/HD acronym is everywhere. Yet, kids suffer. Frustrated with teacher conferences one after another that produce no change, parents panic when ringtones announce a call from the school.

Sadly, ADD/HD is the butt of jokes. To many, it’s a non-existent cop-out, not a disorder but an excuse for poor parenting and run-away behaviors.

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What do you think? Real or excuse? Over-diagnosed? Meds or natural treatment? What are your thoughts and experiences with ADD/HD and school? Your input will benefit others.

Something to call his own

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Conor Kelman comes of age during a time when hyperactivity was unlabeled. Teachers and parents considered him to be insolent, stubborn, and difficult to control. After all, he never paid attention and was always in the wrong place. In those days, parents and teachers used the switch, belt, and paddle to correct him.

The fifth-grade teacher called striking students with her hand or whatever she held in her hand, love pats. Conor’s best friend, Billy Dill, said Conor was the most loved kid in fifth grade.

Conor’s first love was Gabbie the Gibson guitar he brought home from a pawnshop. The ghost of Red Nolan came with the guitar, but they had a love and hate relationship.

His second love was Wylina. He met her in third grade and she introduced him to coffee and cigarettes in the fifth grade. They planned to marry until Conor’s folks moved him to Minidoka County, and Wylina went to the Caldwell Fair with another boy.

Seems as though Conor had spent his entire life trying to fit-in and searching something to call his own.

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People of all ages struggle with their own behavioral and learning disorders and/or relationships with those who do. Your thoughts and ideas will help others. Comment Below.

Bully Target: Smart, Pretty and Shy

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She put the hairbrush away and smiled at the reflection from the mirror. She couldn’t remember the last time she smiled before going to school.  But, this was a new school; it would be different.

She looked at the floor to avoid the stares as she went to her first class. Two boys whistled at her and mumbled words she was happy not to hear.

When she reached her math class, three girls stood in front of the doorway. She smiled tentatively and said hello.  However, the three placed their folded arms against their chests and glared back. They had something to say, but there were no smiles.

“You look like a tramp in that skirt.”

“And, it violates the dress code.”

“Maybe she’s blind.”

“All we need is another bitch in this school that thinks she’s hot.”

A boy wearing a letterman jacket approached and the girls parted. “We’ll talk to you when we walk you home,” one of the girls said, following her friends into the classroom.

She fled to the restroom, locked the door to the stall, and sent a text. She huddled over the toilet with her feet on the lid and waited for her mom’s answer.

Footsteps hit hard tile. Her body jerked from the bolt of nerves that shot through her.

A voice echoed.”It’s the resource officer. Come out.”

“Sit,” the resource officer said, pointing to the chair. She looked down at the girl. “Make friends and you’ll be happy here.” She paused before turning to leave. “You’re safe in this school–you need to get that in your head.”

Through the glass of the outer office, threatening eyes watched her.

Clutching her phone, she drew in rapid breaths, searching for air that had disappeared.

Please share your views on bullying in the schools: Is it a problem? If so, how can we eliminate bullying in our schools?

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Making It

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He received the invite. Nashville’s Grand Ole’ Opry. Now, it was real. Satisfaction cut through the engraved stress marks on his face that belied his young years. He had earned it. Rough schedules, racking up miles across the country, opening shows with a mixture of envy and admiration for those who had paid their dues.

Billed as the new Hank Williams those close to him shuddered at the commonality.

Blinding lights, applause, screams, hands reaching to touch him played in his head as he splashed water against his face and patted down his hair. The paraphernalia used earlier set on the counter beside the sink. One more time to pull him through. Good that he forgot to put it away, he told himself ignoring the real reason. The effect didn’t last that long, just enough to get him on stage.

“Twenty minutes,” the chauffeur said through the phone.

Muscles tightened. His stomach quivered. He washed white pills down with bourbon to calm the nerves, but his thoughts were on the bathroom counter. One last time his mind reasoned. Before the show, before walking onto that famous auditorium with pieces of wood from the Ryman auditorium.

The wood Hank Williams stood.

The stretcher disappeared out the door. That close to making it his chauffeur thought with a tear in his eye.

Your Comments and Shares are appreciated. Thank you, Paul.

Stale donuts from the bakery

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She loaded the children into the shiny Lincoln and drove down the tree-studded drive to the highway. Every Saturday, the mother watched from the window as her aunt took her brother and sister to the bakery. The donut run, as the mother called it, never failed to bring joy to her children.

When they returned, the eccentric aunt set the bag filled with soft, warm donuts on the counter next to last Saturday’s bag. It was a simple rule. You eat the old donuts before getting into the new bag.

Knowing that they would never experience the taste of the fresh donuts, how many Saturdays before the children’s joy faded? It had been seven months since the spinster aunt invited them to move in and the children were as enthused as the first time.

“What is so great going to get donuts knowing they will be hard as a rock before you eat them?”

“It’s not eating the donut, it’s imagining how it tastes,” said one. “It’s like going to the dog pound even though you can’t bring one home,” said another.

“They are beautiful. Covered in frosting–pink, white, chocolate, sprinkles, dusted in powdered sugar, filled with jelly–different shapes and sizes.”

“It’s hard to choose.”

“So Auntie let us take all the time we want.”

“But,” the mother said, “you always bring back a dozen plain cake donuts.”

“That’s what Auntie orders. We eat ours at the donut shop.”

A smile spread across the mother’s dampened cheeks.

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