...and the sad thing is, it could get worse

So, I've come up for air after spending the past four months or so writing a novel.

I've spent the time doing that, looking for a real job (no joy there), and taking a walk every day. I've been without a television or a radio. YouTube has been my friend. I've listened to a lot of music, but I've pretty much been ignoring what's been going on in the world. Anything I've known about what's been going on in the world has come from either Facebook or Ravelry, a website for knitters.

Don't laugh. Ravelry sometimes scoops the national networks when something big happens because, with over 2 million members, Ravelry is everywhere and Ravelrs are smart.

Anyway, in the past few days since I sent the manusscript off to soe beta readers, I've been looking at a bit of news. And, you know, I wish I hadn't. It's just too depressing, both the headlines and the background noise. Rioting in Egypt. Extremists beheading hostages. Both Sarah Palin and Donald Trump are talking about running for president again. Televangelist John Hagee thinks that the unemployed should be made to starve to death - well, I think the word he used was "allowed" to starve to death, but it comes out to the same thing.

That last may be the thing that bothers me the most. Because, you know, I'm still unemployed. Working, since writing is very damn hard work, and only people who have never written think otherwise, but getting paid for work right now. And, at this point, I'm not only not making money, but I'm losing the place where I've been staying tomorrow and I don't have anywhere to go. And becuase of that, this Hagee guy, who professes to be a Christian, wants me to die.

He doesn't know me. He knows nothing of my circumstances. He isn't doing anything, as far as I've been able to discover, to find jobs for the unemployed. He just wants to abandon a growing segment of the population of our country to die because...well, I'm not sure exactly why. He says the Bible says that those who don't work shouldn't be allowed to eat. However, I'm not sure that his attitude really represents the sort of Christian charity that I was taught that followers of Christ are supposed to show their fellow human beings.

I guess it's par for the course in a country where the rich are getting richer, the middle class is in danger of becoming the poor, and much of the corporate world advocates not only not paying workers a living wage but wants minimum wage laws overturned so that they don't even have to pay their workers a minimum wage that is inadequate to support an individual, much less a family. There are times when I think a certain segment of our society (and I'm looking at you right now, Koch Brothers) won't be happy until we becoe a feudal society, where a very small number of very reach individuals owns the rest of us, body and soul. There is something very wrong when, in the richest country in the world, there are not jobs for everyone who wants one, where some people don't have a roof over their heads and enough food to keep them healthy enough to work.

Because, God knows, I want to work. I'm willing to do anything I can physically do - and, of course, that is legal and moral. But, in three years of looking, of submitting so many resumes that I've lost track of their number, I haven't gotten even one interview. Oh, people want my labor. They just don't want to pay for it. So, I've done volunteer work. I've tried to generate my own job by advertising my tutoring services, but it seems like everyone who has enquired about getting tutoring for themselves or their children suddenly loses interest when they discover that I expect to be paid for my work. You know, like everybody else in the world.

I realize that I've said most, if not all, of this here before, in other posts. But I have to be honest: I'm getting kind of tired of being expected to do a thing, but then denied the basic conditions in which to do that thing. I'm told by society - get a job. But then I'm not given the opportunity to compete for a job by interviewing for jobs. Even worse than that, I'm condemned by certain segments of society for not working, but then I'm told, through their rhetoric in the media, that because I'm not already working, I'm not even allowed to have the basics to be able to have a chance to win the job if I do get an interview. I don't deserve, in their opinion, even a place to sleep safely, a place to keep myself and my clothes clean, enough food to keep myself healthy enough to do a job if I can even find one. I'm not entitled to have a phone and an address - but who is going to hire anyone who doesn't live anywhere and who can't be reached by phone to come in for an interview?

You know, I intended to write a nice, upbeat, "Yay, I wrote a novel...I've always wanted to do that" post today, since I've been away so long. But I just don't have "upbeat" in me today. And yeah, I'm feeling a little sorry for myself today. But things aren't all bad. I'm getting some mentoring toward getting some money coming in from my writing. It isn't going to be easy, working from the street, but I'm determined. Well, some people would call it stubborn. I'm going to fight these idiots who think I should just be written off because I happened to lose a job in the general downsizing that came in the wake of the financial sector shooting the world economy in the head.

But, you know, as stubborn as I am, as determined as I am, there is a stubborn, contrary part of me that almost wishes that the whole situation had made me suicidal. Becuase if I was - and I am not, so don't worry about me - I'd find a way to get me to John Hagee's church, and I'd sit down on their front lawn or whatever it has, and I'd have me this big sign that said: "Okay. You think I deserve to starve to death. Great. I'll just sit right here and do that for you and see how you like watching it. See how you like how that really looks in practice."

Becauase if I deserve to starve to death, the people who want that deserve to have to watch it, up close and personal.

Movie Monday: The Richard Matheson Edition

I had planned on writing about movie trivia today. And I'll still get to some of that eventually.

However, when I started to do some research on one of the bits of trivia that I intended to write about, it came to my attention that writer Richard Matheson died earlier this year. One of the legends in the field of fantasy, science fiction, and horror, Matheson wrote novels, screenplays, and teleplays that have entered the larger cultural consciousness. Mention "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet", and even people who are not fans of the genre probably know what you're talking about. Bring up "The Incredible Shrinking Man", and even more people will know exactly the film you are referring to. Even people who claim not to "do" fantasy have probably seen "Somewhere in Time."

Matheson had a hand in the creation of all these films and television episodes and many, many more. In several cases, he wrote both the novels and the screenplays for the films they were based on. Others of his novels have been filmed more than once.

"I Am Legend" is an example of how Hollywood has felt that Matheson's work bears repeating. He published "I Am Legend" in 1954. In 1964, it was filmed as "The Last Man on Earth" and starred Vincent Price as the only man left on Earth who hasn't been affected by a plague that has turned the rest of humanity into zombie/vampires. Hollywood revisited the story in 1971, this time calling it "The Omega Man" and with the Vincent Price role taken over by Charlton Heston. More recently, the story reclaimed its original title, "I Am Legend" (2007), with a new star, Will Smith.

Matheson also wrote "The Shrinking Man" (1956), which became "The Incredible Shrinking Man" on screen in 1957 and then transmuted into "The Incredible Shrinking Woman" in 1981. "The Incredible Shrinking Man" is a classic science fiction/horror film that follows the 1950s convention of blaming the horrible fate of some unfortunate human on radioactivity. Here is the trailer from when the 1957 film was released:



Other films that were made from Matheson's work, some with the screenplay also written by him and some not, include but are not limited to "What Dreams May Come (novel, 1978; film, 1998); "Stir of Echoes" (1999), from the novel "A Stir of Echoes"; and "Hell House" (1971), which was filmed as "The Legend of Hell House" in 1973). "Somewhere in Time" (1980), the great romantic time-travel fantasy starring Christopher Reeve, Jane Seymour, and Christopher Plummer, was adapted by Matheson from his 1975 novel "Bid Time Return". The made-for-TV film "Duel" (1971), directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Dennis Weaver, was adapted by Matheson from one of his short stories. We'll be back to "Duel" in a little bit. Here is the trailer for "Somewhere in Time":



Matheson also adapted classic science fiction and horror stories by other writers for the screen. In 1961, he adapted two Jules Verne novels, "Robur the Conqueror" and "Master of the World", into a film, also called "Master of the World". This film, which starred Vincent Price and Charles Bronson, featured a flying ship, fascinated me when I saw it as a child. Here is the trailer:



Matheson also adapted several Edgar Allen Poe stories for the screen, including "The Fall of the House of Usher", which became "House of Usher" (1960) onscreen; "The Pit and the Pendulum" (1961); "Tales of Terror" (1962) which included "Morella", an amalgam of "The Black Cat" and "The Cask of Amontillado", and "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar"; and "The Raven" (1963), the cast for which included not only Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, and Boris Karloff, but also a very young Jack Nicholson. All of these films were directed by Roger Corman."

In addition to his film work and his novels, Matheson also wrote for television, including several episodes for the original "Twilight Zone" and a classic episode of "Star Trek", "The Enemy Within" (1966). One of the episodes he wrote for "The Twilight Zone" was actually filmed twice, once for the original series in 1963 and again as the fourth segment of "Twilight Zone: The Movie", in 1983). Matheson also wrote what is, for my money, the most frightening episode of "The Twilight Zone" ever filmed, "Little Girl Lost" (1962). This story concerns a little girl who disappears from her bedroom one night. Her parents can't find her, but they can hear her. I won't say more, because if you haven't seen this episode, you really need to, and I don't want to spoil it for you. I first saw this episode when I was maybe six years old, and it scared me more than anything in any film or TV show ever has. Ever. And really, you need to see it. Go search for it on YouTube. The whole episode is available there.

Matheson had such a long and rich career, it would take days to review everything he wrote. And so I won't do that. However, I do want to return to the whole idea of movie trivia for a moment because one of my favorite pieces of trivia concerns the TV film "Duel" which I mentioned before. According to several sources I've come across, Matheson discussed at various times how he came to write the short story that the film was based on. It is an interesting story for anyone who has ever been tempted to ask a writer the question all writers dread: "Where do you get your ideas?"

Turns out, Matheson got the idea for the story that became "Duel" on November 22, 1963, the day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Apparently, Matheson and a friend of his were in Simi Valley, California, playing golf, when they heard that Kennedy had been killed. They decided that they needed to get back to Los Angeles, so they packed up and drove back toward L.A. At that time, the only road between Simi Valley and the San Fernando Valley and L.A. was the narrow, winding, two-lane road over Santa Susana Pass. The road was a dangerous one, with sheer drop-offs in several places. As the two men navigated the road, a truck came up behind them and tailgated them for a fair distance. It was apparently a fairly nerve-wracking experience, and a story, and then the screenplay, came out of it.

This story is interesting to me for a few reasons. First of all, I'm always fascinated by writers describing their process. Second of all, I know that road and traveled along it frequently all through my childhood because I grew up in Simi Valley and when I was young it was a small enough town that one had to travel to San Fernando Valley or Los Angeles to do most shopping. I can picture being tailgated by a truck on that road, where the truck couldn't pass because the road is too winding and there are no shoulders large enough for a car to pull over and let it by. It would be an extremely frightening experience. The other reason that this particular story intrigues me is that it is dated so accurately. I know, as most of us who were alive and old enough to remember do, exactly where I was on the day Kennedy was shot. And because I know where I was, I know that I was within a few miles of the area where the event that gave rise to the story happened to Matheson and his companion at the time it happened to them. Which tickles my senses of proximity and synchronicity.

Yeah, I know. I'm a geek.

Anyway, I thought I'd leave you with the trailer for "Duel", which was, by the way not filmed on the road where Matheson got the idea for the original story. It would have been a lot more frightening if it had been.