Adam Phillips

Duh. I should have checked stuff out before I griped. Thanks.

Dom's one of my favorites too. But look at the guy's output. I just have one story going and it's taken the greater part of the decade to get it out there because my offline life is so busy! I can only imagine that Dom is off living his life and that as of now he's said what he has to say, narratively. I look for him to be back when he gets the itch to say more.

The controversy, and the discussion of it, demonstrate that increasing recognition and respect for diversity of all kinds leads to some cultural questions that are not always easy to answer when we consider how, at a cultural level, to put that recognition and respect into practice.

1. Obviously, alphabetically-advantaged authors get placed at the head of the "authors" listing at G.A. Stories, and there's nothing inherently fair about that. But it really annoys me to see authors who begin their screen names with punctuation marks just to get to the top of the list. Why not just create a nom de plume that starts with an "a" if you're so all-fired bound and determined to be at the top? 2. In a perfect world, I'd have separate alphabetical listings for Hosted Authors, Promising Authors, Authors, Poets, Validateds, and Newbies. But nobody asked me. So I'll just shut up now and continue on with my snail-like production schedule.

After months of delay while I worked on my head, I've posted Chapter 32 of Crosscurrents. https://www.gayauthors.org/story/adam-phillips/crosscurrents Andy's looking toward his future, and finally he has some undiluted happiness and some hope, and just a hint of trepidation. Thanks for your patience. I'll get the remaining chapters of CC out much more quickly. It's my goal to be finished by the end of 2011.

Studying sucks. And not in the good way like you do hahahaha. So I'm taking a break to send you this.How's the week, soccerboy? Sorry I didn't get down there Friday but the weekend of cramming paid off. I kicked major ass on the eco exam. I saw from the website you got three goals though. Impressive. I got a reward for you the next time I see you. lolSpeaking of that call me tonight okay? Wanna know if I should come down Fri. or wait till Sat. Just thinking about getting with you has me wound a

I'm still waiting for one proofreader to finish. I promise I'll post it as soon as I get a response and make whatever corrections I need to. Many apologies for the delay. But that's standard operating procedure with me, right?

I'm about to finish up Crosscurrents 32--I'll be finished by year's end, I promise--and after that, I'll be starting on some more stories. The next one I'll be working on is a short story--a very dark one, actually--that I'm probably going to call Solve. Anyway, I've created a Facebook page almost entirely for keeping my readers posted concerning what I'm working on next and how things are progressing. I'm not a huge Facebook fan, and in fact I deleted my main account over a year ago...but I thought this would be a nice way for my online readers to keep track of what I'm up to. I'll also post a limited amount of personal stuff. Anyway, if you'd like, I'll be happy to add you. Here's my page: http://www.facebook.com/aaphillips820 See you there, maybe.

Crosscurrents 32 is now in the hands of my proofreaders. If they don't spend the entire weekend drinking and partying, it should get posted early next week.

It's partially written. 2011 has been a weird year and it's thrown me a little off-track re: Crosscurrents, but I'm ready to get back to it. I'll get serious about it over the weekend, and maybe by next weekend I can have it posted. --Adam

For reasons I've covered before, Kaen, I don't have a lot of control over the "plot." It's going to be what it's going to be. The "trust" you're giving over to me doesn't belong in my hands, because I don't have it within my power to "do the best for Andy and Matt." What I'm saying is that I didn't exactly create the plot; I lived it. Having lived it, though, I can speak with some authority when I say you won't want to slit your wrists when it's all over. After all, I didn't.

I know it's been forever since I've posted a new chapter of Crosscurrents. Toward the beginning of the summer we were having our house remodeled on the inside and my computer was under a tarp. After that, my computer broke and was in the shop for two weeks. In between all that, it's been a brutal summer at times on other fronts, and I haven't felt like writing. There are about three more chapters to go, and I'm determined to finish the story by the end of the year. I'm committing myself to sitting down with it daily until it's done. Come January 2012 I'll be ready and excited to start some of the other stories that I've been anxious to get to if I could ever get CC finished. Look for a new chapter of CC by the end of the month.

Damn. From a strictly literary standpoint...well, hell, where were you when I was fretting about this before? That might have been a great narrative solution. Now I've already gone and committed myself to resolving things with a sequel. If you'd have spoken up earlier with your idea, you could have saved me a lot of upcoming work!

Yeah, well...uhh...last year here, I did get into a pretty ugly head-to-head with an evolution-denier in an Evolution thread. I mean, a person can only take so much stupidity and ignorance. I've been careful to avoid that kind of stuff since then. After all that, I've tried to operate around here with the philosophy "if you can't say something nice," etc., etc. No point in going postal on clueless near-strangers. It's the people I know who usually get the sharp end of the stick once in a while. All that's to say that some of my readers and groupies are far too familiar with what they've termed Adamic Blasts. But GA isn't a good place for those. They been good to me, so I try my best to behave here.

Odd. the link works fine for me. But thanks for the YouTube link. It's a half-step flat there, presumably to keep the copyright police from automatically finding it and deleting it, but it gives people the general idea. I'll check out the Lyle Lovett stuff. I know of him, but can't say I've ever listened to a lot of his stuff.

Uhh...I never enjoy discussing Crosscurrents in terms of my offline life, but the discussion might have some merit in terms of how the autobiographical nature of the story sometimes compromises its literary quality. As far as the scene goes, that's pretty much how it happened. My dad's study also serves as the home's library, and I got my love of reading deep and wide from him. His study has books of every kind, on every topic imagineable. He even has it organized and categorized like a library. The analytical tone of the discussion is typical of the way he and I interact. There's also plenty of warmth, and I think the scene itself conveys that...but we both tend to go with our heads rather than our hearts when a crisis hits. Uh. Well. Okay. Again, autobiography rears its ugly head. I really hate dragging my offline life into this to the point of making explicit identifications of some offline reality with the narrative of CC, but you're right. It's a literary flaw. It came from a deeper place and sort of escaped not only my notice, but also my proofreaders', I think. And they're three smart, smart people. See, when I write this stuff, I have to get in touch with those memories and the feelings that are associated with them. The real-life Matt calls me "Drew" sometimes, especially in moments like that, and those memories rose up so strong when I was writing, it just sort of came out. And now I guess that reveals a little something I'd just as soon not have revealed, but on the order of things it's less of a reveal than is conceding that the story's autobiographical, and anyway, we all have to suffer for our art. I can't tell you how many times "Adam" makes it onto the page when I write on CC, and also Matt's real name. These days, as a matter of course I run a search-and-replace before I send to my proofreaders. Usually. Before that, my proofreaders were usually pretty good about finding them. Problem is, they know Matt's real name (and mine, of course), and they e-know Matt himself, and so they didn't always catch them either. Some astute reader would write in, and I'd have to rush a correction before anyone else caught it. Beyond that, I think in a couple of forums which shall remain nameless, my proofreaders have seen "Matt" call me "Drew." Hence, it was so natural to me, it didn't hit me that I'd never used it before, and it was so natural to my proofreaders, it never occurred to them either. You only get flamed hard by me if you're a tool. And anyway, the Police here at GA pretty much keep a watchful eye on that sort of thing. Haven't you noticed the 1984-like placidity of this place? Get Arbour to tell you some war stories... Anyway, thanks for a provocative and insightful post. And thanks for the kind words.

Thanks, Sparky. I'll try to get the next one out real soon.

Well, as the author tells the story, Andy over-analyzes because since his early childhood he's always experienced the world as a threatening, dangerous place, and he tries to scope out potential threats wherever possible so he can neutralize them. That kind of approach to life can really wear down a person after a while, but if you see the world as threatening and believe you're the only one who can look after yourself, that's what you do, isn't it?

14th annual. But you're on the right track.

Just thought I'd say hi to all of y'all from the beach. I hope you're having a good Fourth long weekend. I know I am.

This is a little one-chapter piece of erotica. I have three other stories in various stages of completion scattered all over the Internet, and I thought I'd start bringing them here to Gay Authors. I'll complete them from here too. Since this one was complete, I decided to start the migration with this one. Anyway, here's the link: http://www.gayauthor...heconfrontation

A couple of online friends have a falling-out; one of them caves and makes a drastic decision.

"Damn, I hate this frozen Yankee hell-hole," I said to myself, maybe even out loud. "Fuckin' cold wind in the fuckin' winter." A girl, all bundled up and on her way to her car, turned and looked at me funny, so I must have said it out loud. This was crazy. What the fuck was I doing here? You know damn well what you're doing here, the Voice inside said. You know the Voice; the one inside that always busts your balls when you've been a prick. You can only hope and pray that you didn't drive all

Get a grip on them hosses, cowboy. Let me disagree with the premise: Is there anything in the prologue that tells you where the story is going, exactly? I already told y'all many times that by the time the story is over and done with, you won't want to slit your wrists. Let me submit that none of you (well, none of you who ain't in some hypothetical-but-probably-nonexistent super-secret by-invitation-only Yahoo-style group) know just what specific melancholy thing it is that has Andy thinking the things he's thinking in the Prologue, so you have no way of judging just what's going on that has caused Andy to do his Empty Room thinking. Also, surely by now you know that just because Andy thinks something, that don't mean it's necessarily so. Of course, if we get to the end of the story and the ending leaves Andy hanging because he's mistaken on something yet again--though the reader can't know for sure that he is--well, I'll grant you that the fact that he's sometimes wrong in what he thinks is no consolation. Because that still leaves him and you, Gentle Reader(s), in turmoil. But then, that's the kind of thing that sequels are often for. Speaking entirely hypothetically. Seriously...I think that many of you are now interested not only in Crosscurrents, but in Matt and Andy and their relationship. I gotta tell you I'm deeply humbled and flattered. What higher praise could an author ask for than to have readers care about the emotional lives of his characters? And so, in the spirit of your concern not just for a story that you've enjoyed reading but for some of the characters within it, let me say once again that you haven't seen the last of our intrepid duo once you read the final words of Crosscurrents. There's a reason for this, and that reason is related to the reason that I can't simply "shock all of [you and] make [emphasis mine] Angie the culprit." See...thing is...putting it that way makes it appear that I'm in command of the story. You think I write this thing? I sit down to write a chapter, and the story tells me what's going to happen. I don't make anything happen. For at least two reasons. One of them has to do with the fact that the writing often takes on a life of its own and decides what I'm going to tell at any given juncture. Even decides how much detail I'm going to put in. It's fornits, I tell you. (Look it up.) It ain't me. That's why I've been waffling over whether there'll be 34 or 35 chapters. I don't know yet. It depends on what the writing decides. Uhh...that was a rabbit trail, no? Anyway, back to the "reason for this." The reason you ain't heard the last of Andy and Matt. See, when Andy started telling his story, he was in that condo thinking back during Spring Break 2003. He starts reminiscing, and gets to the end of his look back--in a narrative sense--in the space of a weekend of reflection. But in reality--I mean, I have to be joking in what I'm about to say, since Andy and Matt are literary characters instead of living, breathing people, right?--Andy's been narrating this story for eight years! And...uhh...well, you know, if Andy were a real person, some things might have happened in the story between Andy and Matt--things between that weekend at the condo, and, say, now--that Andy hadn't yet experienced in that spring of 2003. So what he thought was a natural kind of end to the Andy and Matt story, well, that wasn't really an end. Their story keeps on going past that weekend of his final spring break. That's the sort of strictly hypothetical thing that would necessitate a sequel. (Let the reader understand, as the Good Book says.) And in fact, you'll see a sequel. Probably about ten chapters in length. Called Finding Home. It'll be narrated by Matt, and he'll be picking up the story where Andy left it off. And he'll take it to about the year 2007...but he'll cover the ground a lot quicker than Andy, who is long-winded as hell. Right, JB? Why 2007? Well, maybe because that's when the story that CC begins to tell finally resolves itself for good and all. Or maybe not, maybe I'm just blowin' smoke up your ass. Yeah. I'm being a smart-ass. It's therapeutic. I've been in a weird place since the latter part of January. There's been a crazy situation cooking in my life and it's f**ked with me and just yesterday I started getting back toward Normal. And boy, are y'all gonna be sorry.

Good. I'm glad you did that. I want my readers to know what those songs sound like as they read the words. For some of my long-time readers, I actually assembled a zipfile of mp3s of the songs of CC and made them available on a file-sharing site, but that file's not around any more. Oh, Cjay. So much faith in Andy. And for so little reason. I'm not saying you'll be proven wrong. I'm not saying you won't, either. I'm just saying. See, I know Andy. And I'll tell ya, the boy's haunted. Seems like there's always something inside that can flare up any minute to cause trouble. And remember, as an author, I still have the Prologue to validate in some fashion or another, and it wasn't exactly all sunshine.