Red's CD Project: Afterword

Note: Maybe this will only be interesting to me, but I thought I'd jot down what's in my head and see what you all think. Sorry it got a little long. 


“The scariest moment is always just before you start. After that, things can only get better.” – Stephen King

Seventy-five days and roughly 14,000 words later, I return to this quote that I used to introduce this project. Of all the things Stephen King could be talking about, he’s discussing writing. I’ve never found a more accurate statement about this dirty little habit that I’ve little or no intention of kicking. Sitting in front of the blank screen with a couple words or maybe a sentence or two tickling the synapses in my brain is terribly scary because once I start I never know where I’m going to end up. Doesn’t it get better as the lines start to add up? Usually, but that is not always the case.

I’d say nearly every time I sat down to type on this project during the last 12 weeks that I experienced some level on anxiety. At first, it was did this story have the legs to make it through 38 sections. If so, was there anything about it to warrant such an endeavor. Gradually, that fear subsided and gave way to a new one. Do I have enough sections left to fit what I want to put in here? I never totally conquered that one, but it did get blocked out by one all encompassing fear. Am I going to screw this up?

No wonder writers are notorious drinkers.

In the beginning…

So where did this story come from? Unlike some of the other things I’ve posted on here and many other things that haven’t appeared that have kicked around my brain for years, this story seemed materialize from thin air. In fact, many of the historical tidbits and religious connotations that appear later are things that I would never have predicted writing about.

But, the statement that this came from nowhere is entirely accurate. It was stirred to the forefront by the first song lyric I used from The Band. For those that don’t want to look back – Oh, the streets of Rome are filled with rubble. Ancient footprints are everywhere.

I guess I was a little like a bride looking for something old. This little line made me think about the fall of Rome. Then I started thinking about the fall of other great civilizations and other significant historical events. I came to one unscientific and unverified conclusion – every generation something big happens, and that big event includes bloodshed.

Well, what if one family was indirectly responsible for these events? Like it was their calling to stir the pot. How was that torch passed? The Glock family was born (without their complete lineage fully realized in my mind).

Early on, I hit one minor stumbling block and one I still might have to work through. The world theater from the end of WWII in the 1940s to now has been relatively quiet. Sure, there was Vietnam, the Gulf Wars and the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

So what the hell did Hal’s father do? I went with the assassination route. I almost think that I have to go back and work on this. Part me almost thinks that Hal’s father was a failure. While many this assassination attempts were successful, did any of them cause any real devastating global events? My uneducated answer is no. Maybe I am wrong with that. Although, I think Hal’s father was allowed a pass, because Hal’s grandfather had been very successful in steering Hitler toward his madness.

The lyrics and songs

I found the use and importance of these lyrics to vary in importance depending upon the lyric and the section. By halfway through the story, my vision of the story was shaping up and thus I started to skim the songs for lyrics that matched up with what I wanted to write rather than shaping the text by the lyric.

It’s still a fun exercise trying to see how they tie together. At times, I found that song titles or album titles or band names played just as much a part of the text as the lyric I picked out.

I liked this process in that sense. In the edit, I’ll probably pull the lyrics altogether because I am not sure they add that much and they will probably confuse new readers to the text more than they help them.

Essentially, this process was developed to introduce these albums to Snake. I guess the hope is that when he listens to them, he’ll think about Hal’s adventure and wonder about some the issues the story brought up.

Although, I did find it interesting to find dark lyrics even in the brightest of songs.

Oh, God

First and foremost, I am no religious scholar. My Christian knowledge is dependent upon a lot church and Sunday school growing up where I didn’t usually pay full attention to say the least and my English Lit classes where professors would say “notice the religious symbology” and everyone in the class would shake their head as if they understood what they hell they were talking about. My knowledge on the Islamic faith is even less. I had to think every time I wrote whether I should put Muslim or Islamic. One’s a religion the other is the people that follow that religion. I sort of survived by using the cliff notes version of the religion, but as I edit I’ll probably have to take a closer look at their beliefs and customs.

Once I made the connection between the Glock line and the story of Cain and Abel, I became enamored with that “religious symbology” stuff. It’s not accident that Hal kills his victims in a field with a stone. It’s not accident that there was three graves which is symbolic of the holy trinity. Although, I admit that one I sort of lose how the victims represent the branches of said trinity. Other things are more obvious – the snake, the wolf, the fact that Hal’s wife is Mary and she gets pregnant. The spilling the blood of the innocent is religious also and connects with the image of the lamb being slain by the wolf from the beginning of the story.

The field, which the Snake mentions in his comment on the last section, evolved into the big symbol of the story. While some saw the field as evil, I see it as the representation of the continuation of the process. Each generation a new crop grows tall and strong till the harvest comes and it is destroyed. So I guess the field represents society to some degree.

The field also binds the family to Cain, who was the farmer of the two brothers. I always thought it was odd that God favored the offering of the slain animal over that of the grown plant. That choice drives this story. It shows that, at least the Old Testament God, favored spilt blood over creation. Ultimately, this leads Cain to sacrifice his brother. An in the twist, Cain is cast away to Nod with a wife (who’s identity is a biblical mystery, but doesn’t Hal also gain his wife by making his sacrifice). Cain is marked but also allowed to live his life.

It’s easy to get carried away with this stuff once you start. I hope that didn’t become the case here. Most of all, I wanted the reader to question what is God’s role in this story.

So he’s crazy, right

Snake posed the question of Hal’s sanity in one of his comments. Maybe Hal is crazy. Maybe Abdul is also crazy. Maybe it’s a coincidence that their paths cross. The modern world has become obsessed with sanity. One can overlook any act by claiming insanity.

I wanted to run on the idea that there was a time in this world when it was perfectly acceptable to believe that someone was inherently evil or, at the very least, capable of being inflicted with evil. Isn’t that what really happens to both Hal and Addul? Both men catch evil like the common cold and both let it run its course to get well again. Although, I don’t believe Abdul ever reaches that point.

One and the same

Something unattended happened as I started dealing with Hal and Abdul. I realized that they were the same person in opposite realities. Hal is a free man that in imprisoned by a duty to create evil. In order for him to gain everything back that he has lost, he has to perform these tasks. Abdul is imprisoned in a cell, but he’ll lose everything by gaining his freedom.

With that being said, Mary and Misba essentially fulfill the same role for both men. The symbolic nature of the Virgin Mary and the meaning of Misba’s name as innocent one is also unattended, but it’s a fortunate coincidence.

I also feel like that as these two cultures actually do continue to escalate violence in the real world. These two men represent the fact that they’re good and bad men and women on both sides.

Something I continue to ask myself is whether or not Abdul’s turn is due to Hal’s presence or is he a separate pawn in the great plan. Abdul hears the snake and wolf on his own. I don’t believe Hal planted these sounds outside his cell.

Is it bad to like these guys?

Hal and Abdul are two guys that do some nasty things. Yet, we meet them both as vulnerable and broken men. We sympathize with their problems. Even when they do terrible things, we sort of understand why they are doing it.

In the end, this comes down to being able to rationalize motives. The readers don’t look at these men’s crimes as senseless. They are motivated by love, maybe by God, and certainly by being pushed to extremes.

It’s sort of like the question pretty much everyone asks when they hear someone does something heinous – “How could anybody do such a thing?”

That’s the question everyone hears, the question not verbalized and maybe not even consciously realized is “Could I ever do such a thing?”

Hal and Abdul are the answers to how normal people with their societies can be pushed to that extreme. The story’s answer to the second question inevitably is “yes.”

What’s next

Well, Mr. King compares writing a story to digging up a dinosaur. I’ve framed the ground where the skeleton is buried. Now I need to get out my toolbox and the brushes to start working out all the details.

Maybe in another 75 days or so, I’ll know exactly what I have here.