TommyZ

At the end of the school day, everyone is itching to leave. If you let one go ... they all would go before the bell and you as the teacher could be in hot water with the administration. You didn't mention anything about the color of the trees ... was I right about that? Yes, that is true, you didn't say anything about where the story takes place but I was wondering if you had some idea when you wrote the story. It is a neat sounding place. I guess we will have to agree to disagree on "magnetizing". It does not seem to sound right to me. It (in my opinion) is a weak word to use the way you use it in a lot of your stories.

I had a little trouble with this story in the beginning because of all the errors in it. The second half of it was much better. It was pretty depressing to read that Zac couldn't be happy because he realized that there was so much pain in the world, that it would be wrong if he ever did find happiness. This, of course, was resolved in the end. Grandpa says there are three types of people. i think there is a 4th type. There are people (maybe a lot more that we would think) that are just trying to survive. They spend much of their life doing that. If you think about it a little, you realize that most people (even the ones that think they have enough resources) are an unfortunate event or catistropic lost that would put them in a position where they couldn't afford to live. There are few people that can put this aside (like Zac's parents) and do their best to make a better world. The first few paragraphs of this story really got me to thinking. Alec is trying to figure out how he can fit into the world. He has friends but is more a loner. I could really relate to what he was thinking. I don't think it had much to do with his gayness. It had more to do with the mystery of how the world works and how he can interact in a positive way. Why is there so much pain in the world? Why do some people need to take advantage of others? There seems to be enough people in the world that are successful. If they all got together and decided to help the people who are disadvantaged, it wouldn't be very long before everyone had a real chance for happiness. But how can you get it all organized so it will work? No one has the answer to that but Zac and Alec would really like to know the answer. These are really big questions to cover in a short story. I can't help feeling that these tough questions completely over shadowed the romance between the two boys. You have this big idealogical aspect and then the conflicting love between Zac and Alec. It's an interesting mix, but just like the first review, I have to say I wish there was more.

I like poetry and sometime I get it and many times I do not. When I don't get it I do have curiosity as to what the author meant by it. You ask serious authors about their work and most will tell you that each will view it differently and that is all you get. That's fine. I don't like it, but that is okay. anyway what I get out of this poem is that there is a boy who sees another boy and is immediately attracted to him but there is just a small amount of time that passes (as described by this poem) He wonders if the guy is gay but he guesses that he is not but if there were some way that they could have a meaningful relationship, that guy wouldn't work out unless he was willing to come out to the world. The greatest thing about the guy is his eyes. It is a poem that describes a very very short period of time.

This is an interesting little short story. I did pick up a few errors. Since I pointed some out in my last review and they were accepted pretty well, I guess I will do it again. "There isn't goint too snow this Christmas but" "There really hadn't been snowing this year" "thick brown mass of trees" ___ This doesn't seem to be correct because it is getting dark and even in twilight the tress would not appear to be brown, they probably would look black. "It was magnetizing ..." ____ It wouldn't be magnetizing .... maybe mesmerizing There is a place in the story where the boy is waiting for the final bell and he askes to go to the bathroom (in school) .... Well, I (as a teacher) have had classes during this time in high school and I can tell you that teachers would not let a student leave to go to the lavatory during this time. It just would not happen. You would have to have a very good reason to leave then and you couldn't just get out that easily. If you said you were going to throw up .... I would just hand you a bucket .... really. There was so much left out of the story. There were so many questions unanswered. But that was fine. The reader could fill some in. The one question I had was, would these two get together as a couple? I couldn't decide one way or the there.

I ran into this series at Nifty. Today, i read entire story. One of the things I like about it Jace's view of is sexually. For most of the series he is of the opinion that he isn't gay, or doesn't wish to be labeled as such or just does not want to think about it. I like this approach in a story. There are a lot of people that feel this way about sexually and it is good to read in a story how one person deals with it. The writing is very good. It is so good that I think that I could never write as well. So, it is a bit of a downer for me. Then again, within this story there are suggestions for beginning writers which are very well presented. I took those to heart. And then, there is the poetry. How long did it take you to write just those parts? I found myself reading some of it very slowly and more than once. This is not a big thing but there are a couple of places in the story where you meant to say the word "show" but wrote "snow" instead. As I look at my kedboard I can see how you made that mistake. I was patently waiting for the sexual parts of the story. The wait was worth it. Usually these parts of stories are predictable but not in this story. It starts out with a school type excercise??? Really? I actually was very into it. Both boys were commited writers so when Jace made the suggestion to describe what was in front of them, it was very sexy in a nonconventional way. It was so well done. One of the things I like to do in a gay romance story is to be able to visualize the dialog between the characters. The way you write the dialog makes this very easy to do. I did not plan to read the whole thing. I just couldn't leave it alone. Do I have any suggestions? Sure, keep writing. You certainly impressed the hell out of me.

I get depressed from time to time. It usually starts when I experience a series of small set backs that keep piling up and then depression hits me. I feel that (this is for me now) depression is some type of chemical inbalance in my body. I can feel it take hold of me and from experience, I know that if I wait it out long enough it will go away. It has never gotten bad enough for me to consider suicide but I can see how some people who do seriously think about commiting sucide can get to that point. You just get to feeling so bad that it doesn't matter what you have done with you life, whether you were successful or not, you just want to throw in all your cards.

I have a doctor (male) that I see every 3 months now. He is okay. He will listen. He has he's opinions which are probably more correct than mine. Some times he is stand-offish which is fine with me. Now that I am a bit older I really feel that my health is in my hands. I know what I have to do in terms of eating (in two words NO FAT) and be a vagen, exercise (which I do but not enough) and get my weight down (I'm not that over wt but I know I have to be skinny. That last thing about getting skinny is very important to me now. I am in my 60's and I want to prepare for my 70's and 80's and hopefully 90's. God, I know what is coming. All these old people with walkers and stupid looks on their faces .... shit. I don't want that. I know there will be some major bumps in the road because the road is already turning into gravel. So, as far as a doctor, I look at it this way. If something major does come along, it's really a crap shoot if it is handled properly. Doctors know generally how to do things but they are not experts in what they do as far as treating ME. So, I don't expect all that much if say, I get cancer. If I had a lot of money, I would have several doctors on retainer and that retainer would be large enough that they would be very interested in keeping me alive. Then, you would get really super treatment. So that is not going to happen unless I will this 300 million lottery .. Oh wait! I didn't even buy a ticket ... so it's not going to happen.

Yeah, well that is going to happen. You have to deal with it. What I mean is not get so upset about that. I think that is hard to do especially if you are a young driver. The correct mind set (I am talking from experience here) when you are driving is to let the stupid stuff go and stick to the main objective we all should have when we are out on the road. That is ... TO GET TO YOUR DESTINATION WITHOUT HITTING ANYTHING! SAFELY! That means, driving is not a race with some other jerk that just has to get infront of you in traffic. What the f is that? So you get there a little later. Big sh*t. If you see someone approaching you from the rear, just get over to the slow lane if possible. Avoid touchy situations before they could possiblity cause an accident. I really dislike these old farts (Hey, I'm an old fart and I don't do this!) that drive in the fast lane going the speed limit. I know they are thinking " I'm going the speed limit so you ass*oles behind me should just slow down and I'm going to make you slow down. That is just wrong. Unfortunately there are some drivers that are not aware that they are on the road with anyone else. They are out there and they are so clueless (because of their age) that they shouldn't be driving.

Yeah, I remember the blob also. When I was a kid it did creap me out. There was this one part where the Blob engulfs this guy and then the blob opens up a little and you see the skill of the guy inside ... that was scary to me!

The movie that creaped me out the most was the movie "Hostel" It was suppose to be a horror movie but it really was a slasher movie with all these 20 something guys and girls being torchered and killed. Bluck ... really bad Then I noticed on cable they came out with a "Hostel 2" movie. Naturally I had to watch it, and wouldn't you know? It was worse then the first one! I mean it was just a bloody gory mess. They had this sweet, innocent, virgin girl bookworm type who never did anything ... she gets strapped up by her legs and gutted ... how do they get away with making movies like this? There was no plot to it. Is this the crap that younger people like to go to now a days? And this stuff does cater to the young. I would have thought that "Hostel" would have at least been a limited release movie but it was a main release.

I did like reading this story. When the theme of balance was presented at the beginning of the story, I thought it was the balance between the relationship that was forming between Brandon and the main character. What one partner gave to the relationship, the other complemented that, making the the relationship something special. This appears not to be the case as the main character found out later. The main character (was the name of him every given??) and Brandon had a fantastic paring with "hot visceral sex" and satisfying emotional support given by both. All very well described in this short story. So in the end, the balance that the main character thought he had with Brandon was actually a different point of balance. A point that would require the main character to give up a lot more than he realized, that is, if he wanted a relationship to continue. Now I get to the question asked in the end. "what would you do?" Loving relationship between people alway experience change. Give and take (balance?). That give and take (in my opinion) is what is alway driving the change experienced by the couple as they constantly try to achieve happiness together. Now, you are sticking in a third person into the mix. I don't see how that could ever work ... unless ... unless she knows about Brandon's gay lover. If she would accept it ... (wouldn't that be an interesting scenario?*), then you would have a three balance point relation that would require (again in my opinion) them all to live together. Since that is unlikely, the main character (even thought it would hurt tremendously) should just cut bait and go look for different guy. He would be much better off seeking a "honest" boyfriend. *I just have to add this because your story brought this to mind. There was a recent movie called "Savages". In that movie there was one of these 3 way (two men and one woman) relationships. The guys were completely str8 and they both had a sexual relationship with the girl even though the girl was warned by an observant enemy that she should be careful because these "boys" loved each other more than anybody else. So, were they really str8? Maybe ... anyway is was an interesting addition to a movie.

I think this is a great post that explains very well what it is like to be versatile Y_B. "sharing dominace" would be a good sexual basis for a gay relationship. Who knows? A total bottom might just turn into a versatile gay man with the right partner. As you said "it all depends on the other person." I might be totally off base here but I think a lot of bottom boys (like myself) are bad ass aggressive when it comes to competitive enterprizes like sports. I would love to crush your gonads in golf or maybe tennis. I might feel a little bad for you afterwards but dominating the shit out of you during the "fight" is just piss ant right on! Ya know? But if they every made sex a competitive sport, I would lose every time.

I got a pet peeve that bothers the shit out of me. It seems that for my height my pants belt loops, or sometimes my pants pockets are just the right distance off the floor so that when I walk through a doorway sometimes, I get snagged in the little metal plate that surrounds the hole the door latch fits into and "rip", I loose my belt loop or "rip", I get a big tear in my pocket. I mean, this is ridiculous! How does this happen? It just does. It's not like I raise my arms over my head and scoot over, sticking my hips out so I playing rumba with the doorway. F, sometime the enter door knob is grabbed by my pocket and I am immediately pulled backwards wondering what the F is going on. F F F Just the other day, I had these new cargo shorts on and I walked by (not fast mind you) a open lower kitchen cabinet and the handle of the cabinet somehow got in the folds of one of the lower pockets of the pants and rippppp ... a big hole ... my F'n glasses case fell out of my pocket!! What? Are you F'n kidding???

So NASA makes this mulit-million dollar machine that has to slow down from 13,000 mph to 0mph in 7 minutes, ignite the engines at the right time, lowers the SUV sized rover ... and hopefully it still works ... How did they every convince the guys with the money to do this??? That is an amazine part of the story

It's pretty simple. Sandusky did his job well. He was a respected part of PSU. Paterno didn't want to believe that someone he knew so well could do something like that. Paterno in the end, wanted to protect the university's rep. He had a lot of power and he used it to do just that, protect PSU. Bad decision.