The Perfect Ending

[cal val]

Hi there...

I have no doubt that my efforts at being coy about my 'project' have been pretty feeble and that most of you who have known me the past few years have easily figured out what it is. So... I've decided to stop being (futilely) coy. I'm telling a story. It's fiction, but, as anybody who's attempted storytelling knows, the best stories come from one's own real experiences.

It's the age old and ever popular hero's odyssey/love story formula. There are two heroes in this story... male and female... friends and lovers... and it's about their lives intertwining... coming together and separating as they both go through their separate odysseys and grow as individuals.

One of the missing parts of my story is the ending... the 'real life experience' ending hasn't happened yet... and I'm not waiting for it. I was planning on writing the ending that I want to happen in 'real life'... which is that they reunite, rekindle and live happily ever after. I was working on that ending... fleshing it out... just before retiring to bed... and what do you know!?!

For the first time in awhile, I dreamt about him (because his birthday is tomorrow maybe?)... AND that ending. Except there was a twist I didn't count on and didn't like. When we were finally to the point we were ready to chance it again, my girlfriend (in the dream only... it was someone I've never met) tells me that she's decided to go after him... to try to seduce him. I sputter and spit and stutter and tell her how I feel about him and ask her to back off, but she says, "So what? I'm still going for him. May the best woman win." And then I woke up (about 2AM)... rather confused and disoriented. I asked the Yi what the dream was about, and they answered 17.1 to 45.

Then I thought maybe I wouldn't write the ending I want to happen in real life but something else instead (could the dream have been the catalyst for that change?). So I've been thinking about other possibilities, and I thought I would put them to you all... give those of us who want it an opportunity to stretch our creative muscle. So... what ending do you like?

a. They reunite and rekindle and live happily ever after (ala most love stories).

b. They reunite, they still love each other very much, but it's too late. He made her wait too long, and she met someone else and decides to stay her new course (sort of ala "The Way We Were").

c. They reunite and rekindle and begin to live happily ever after but he or she dies suddenly soon thereafter (ala "Cold Mountain").

d. They never reunite, but remain in love with each until their dying days (ala "Bridges of Madison County").

or...

e. [Insert write-in vote here].


Anyway, thanks for any creative thoughts you have to offer. I hope you have fun in the process.

Love,

Val

PS... Anyone got any ideas on how to get the best bang for my buck on a laptop (absolute necessity when writing a novel or screenplay). I don't want to start big... but I want it to be upgradable. I want at least 256 mgs of RAM, 20 gig HD, read AND write CDrom... and Pentium, NOT Celeron processor. Don't even talk to me about a Celeron processor... life's too short. *grin*... Thanks!

 

[bruce]

How exciting! Sort of a hex. 63 or 64 deal, huh?

My vote is for "d.", ala Casablanca (sorta). Reminds me of Paul Simon's "Kodachrome": It's more colorful in our (viewer's) sweet little imagination.

And I think you and Yi interpreted your dream spot on.

 

[micheline]

get more than 256 ram...my advice

a and d are nice, but too BOR-ing...I vote for a creative "e"....he moves to LA on extended temporary business, you "run into each other" under the scaffold....... but the passion ignites in anger....you are pissed that he could take so long, he is still mad about what happened long ago.....

you quarrel and part but you both find that the other is unavoidable.evrywhere you go, you seem to bump into each other...and each time, a little more of the frustration comes out in heated talks and passionately wary interchanges....

in spite of this, understanding begins to grow out of these encounters and words, a tender shoot of new intimacy begins to sprout.

the crescendo is when passion finally melts into the uninhibited expression of love and longing, tears....inevitable, imperfect, and open-ended.........

 

[jte]

Fun with Val time...

She joins a convent.

The end.

<------ !

- Jeff

 

[bruce]

There?s always the paranormal twist option. When they part ways, they go back to another time period, either from the same lifetime or an earlier one or future one? To sensationalize, throughout the story are flashbacks (or flash-forwards?) to the other time period, which is understood only at the end, when they return.

Hey, no dumb ideas when brainstorming, right?

 

[cal val]

<blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!><font size=1>quote:</font>

Hey, no dumb ideas when brainstorming, right?<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote> Absolutely none! I'm loving everything I've read so far (even Jeff's *lol*) and am looking forward to seeing more.

Love,

Val

 

[matt]

Throughout the story, as the lovers part and separate, it coincides with a natural phenomena occuring in space between twin comets. The lovers movements mimic the joining and dividing of the univeral phenomenon. Towards the end, the comets finally settle together on their path through the cosmos, their tales merge to form one, and the earthly lovers simultaneously stand in silence, a simple smile lighting the space between them which speaks a world of unity. As above, so below.

I know I know, Im an incurable romantic at heart, so try not to be sick

 

[cal val]

Micheline...

'fess up. You're a writer by trade, aren't you? That was great. I love it.

Bruce...

Not a bad idea at all. The past is definitely going in. Weaving it in is a great idea.

Jeff...

LMAO

Matt...

I love your comet runner idea. Everytime I think about it, I feel warm all over. If you're not a writer yet, are you at least thinking about it?

This a lot of fun for me. I knew there would be a lot of great responses. I know there's a lot more out there too.

Love,

Val

 

[auriel]

hey val!
congrats on coming out (phase 1?)

"to persue what you desire shall be the whole of the law"- that alister crowley agitprop pops to mind, as i just learned that he was a devotee of the changes, and even wrote a commentary (which seems to have been lost)-

anyway, so why not this for an ending [E],in line with your dream and cast, she persues him almost to the point of stalking- tastefully- setting up accidental meetings, etc.(remember 17 & 18 are a pair), till she anyway sees she is getting into some kind of hunter's head which is heady but scares her; and at the same time, she runs into the competition (at a concert[45]?) which scares her too. we leave her weighing options diverse and extreme but we somehow know she'll do just fine. . .
that 27 no changes, remember? was that project-relevant? then in the hunt for nourishment you could research this ending. . . ;:}

 

[jerryd]

Val, dont forget to save the main for the sequel, doing them (characters) both in means you have to think of another story line next time. >\)?

 

[cal val]

Hi Auriel...

Oh no... this isn't phase 1. It's more like phase 3. I have over two hundred pages of notes on the computer I just finally moved home in August from Virginia where it had been in storage for over a year. The story happened to me while I was in Virginia.

I have no idea if this story is going to be the huge financial success I know I'm going to enjoy. I just know I have to tell it. It doesn't matter if anyone likes it or not. It doesn't matter if I make any money from telling it. It just matters that I tell it.

Hexagram 27... actually something came up this weekend regarding 27. And I'm still pondering it. Part of my story is a series of dreams, the first one was about fate and destiny and recurred until I accepted what 'the men in grey' were trying to teach me. Up until I accepted it, I'd been about 98% atheist... registering in the red anyway on the theist/atheist scale. When I finally accepted it (which was quite a moment for me), the dream stopped recurring. But 'the men in grey' were back a few nights later in a new dream with a project for me... they said I was to create a webpage about the marriage of heaven and earth.

So this weekend I was re-reading "The Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan (I read it many years before the dream sequence), and she wrote, "She and Wu Tsing had been joined in tyandi, heaven and earth, so theirs was a spiritual marriage arranged by a matchmaker, ordered by his parents, and protected by the spirits of their ancestors."

That triggered a string of awarenesses, and I talked to the Yi about it. I said, "So this marriage you've readied me for is a marriage of heaven and earth?" And they answered 50 to 27. I found that answer most intriguing because they've already done 50 to death for me... there's a thread about it here about two or so years ago (I got 50 in answer to everything for days and days), but I still don't believe any of us really got what they were trying to tell me. I think I've still to learn that. Now that they've put the 50 and 27 together maybe I'll learn it sooner than later.

Love,

Val

 

[jte]

Ya know, Val, I've never seen nor heard of a movie about how someone's life was changed by the Yi Jing. Your story might make for an interesting movie if/after you do your book.

I mean, shouldn't there be a movie out there about the Yi and how it can transform people's lives?

It sounds just crazy enough to work, ya know what I mean...

- Jeff

 

[cal val]

Hi Jeff...

Oh boy did you ever hit a hot button. The dreams were very cinematic, and this was an 'ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances' kind of thing, AND right in the middle of it all I started dreaming about an old friend I haven't seen for about 15 years and would be quite happy if I never saw again. He's a very successful filmmaker, so at first, because of the way I feel about him, I thought his sudden reappearance in my dreams was nothing more than symbolic as to the direction to go with my story.

But I don't really know. And I've decided not to focus on it... it makes me crazy. Instead I just write my story... let it roll off my fingers onto the keyboard any old way it wants to... and then when I'm finished I'll refine it. If it becomes a script later, great... if the script becomes a movie after that... even better.

Love,

Val