INTRODUCTION TO "EXHIBITIONIST AT THE PICTURE SHOW"

Welcome to the second month of what I hope will be some productive activity, especially as I will soon release the second story from Tales From Memorial Union, one that is now placed firmly on the University Of Wisconsin-Madison campus. But first a little backstory...

Many years ago, I actually entered into a writing contest. I honestly do not know what possessed me to even attempt such a feat, especially considering my trepidation with displaying my writing publicly. But perhaps, I reasoned to myself, that since no one reading anything that I may chose to write and submit into the contest would know me at all, the story could almost be seen as having been written anonymously and therefore, the exercise of the writing could be paramount to me rather than any potential response to it.

So, I had an idea and began diligently hammering it out into what you will soon be able to read for yourselves. With this writing contest, there were indeed a series of rules, most notably a word count, something that really forced me to remain on target and not head down into any diversions, side stories or anything one might regard as superfluous. It was me at my most streamlined as the story itself runs about 13 typed, double spaced pages, a mere fraction of what "Fourteen" runs (and what "December Boys" and "Paul Westerberg" will ultimately run).

Now, I present to you "Exhibitionist At The Picture Show," originally written in 2002, the third story written for Tales From Memorial Union, but might possibly position itself as what would follow "Fourteen" as I am envisioning something lighter in tone after being enveloped by a healthy dose of teen angst. This story features a first person narrative, and essentially three main characters, named, Sean (the narrator), Theresa (his girlfriend) and a third named Lauren, who serves a crucial element. This material, as I look at it now, also carries some of the seeds for my Savage Cinema site--in fact, I previously published just a tiny portion of this story on that site in an appreciation of the Ken Russell film adaptation of The Who's "Tommy" (1975). I hope to break the story into four short parts and release it over the course of this month to spread things out a bit Intrigued? I hope so!

Oh yes...the title is a play upon Mussorgsky's "Pictures At An Exhibition" and as for the story itself, yes, it all really happened...

As for the writing contest,  I didn't win and wasn't even recognized in an conceivable ways for the attempt. But that's OK. I just wanted to see if I could write something. I did and that's good enough for me.

Stay tuned...