Hosing Down the Drought That Is March

  My New Year’s Resolution for 2011 was to write one short story a month.

Simple right?

So far I have just barely kept that up, writing a rather lengthy piece dealing with high school “relationships” in January and in February I wrote one about the effects of arrogance and following the crowd… in high school.

Those are fine and good and all, but I’m looking to develop a more professional sort of portfolio here

I’ve always felt that the best pieces I produce are on topics that have a lot of raw emotion at their core. Which is why it’s rare to find a happy piece in my collection.  

But what I wanted to do for the month of March was create a story about something that makes me sick.

Sick like, perturbed, ruffled, shocked, horrified.

When I had this idea, my initial instinct went a little like this:

“NO!”

Because when I write I have to connect myself to the subject matter fully and intensely. And I’m usually averse to making myself ill.

But you know that raw emotion I was talking about earlier? Subject matter like that makes you feel something volatile. And that’s what fiction is about, making the reader feel something.

An example of this can be seen in Ray Bradbury’s short story, ‘The Veldt.’

Which you can read here à http://www.veddma.com/veddma/Veldt.htm (seriously, you won’t be sorry)

Now, I can’t speak for every reader, but the sickening subject matter ( a mash up of two situations that make me ill, children disrespecting their parents and dependence on technology) of the story really affected me.

So without further ado, here is my list of things that make me sick:
1. Blatant disrespect for parents/authority figures
2. Dependence on technology
3. Self-induced depression
4. Materialism
5. Bold-faced apathy
6.Hate crimes
7. Bodily maltreatment

These are making me feel nauseous just skimming their surfaces… I guess that’s a good thing.

Wish me luck?