Long Awaited update

He was afraid? "Goddamnit!" he said to the trees. All was good, they didn't mind his harsh words. "How am I so afraid! What am I so afraid of?" Fear pierced his chest, punctuating each unspoken syllable with a successive stab. He was afraid of change. "NO I'M NOT!" He feared the judge, the persecutor, a familiar face. The fears of hate, prospectual hate, from those who previously approved; from those who had invested hope in his potential as being a youth. He was well enough intelligent at that. THEY BELIEVED IN HIM! ...and he could let them down. NO! He WOULD let them down. He let out an intense audible cry like that of an enraged moose. "RRRRRROOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!"

"I have no training, no natural skill, or common sense! Not like Jacob, not like WILLIAM FUCKING TATE!" He screamed his self-pitied anger at a mottled patch of evergreens; the anger in his voice now matching his aggressive pushes against the petals of his bike.

He looked down in surprise at his feet and let off the petals. His anger drained to fear and disgust, but the pity remained. For a moment he disliked himself more than he thought was ever humanly possible. He was always the nicest person; and how low had this situation sunken him?

He slumped onto the handlebars with a sigh and coasted the bike onto a patch of grass at the side of the road. Wildflowers shuffled out of the way as Bart slumped from his bike and let it rest sideways on the edge of the pavement. Cool north winds carrying clean crisp air from the tops of the peaks blew a tear from his eye onto a tuft of dandelions.

*Note: needs transition between this paragraph and the previous one. Too much of a jump in the level of anger.

Evolutions

He had a decision to make. On the 14th of October every year, the people of his town would hold a sort of a career festival. Maybe even an Identity festival, Bart might describe to an outsider who hadn't seen the thing before. The leaders of the town, the mayor and councilmen and such, would bring in representatives and businessmen, who were (can't think of the word* "without fail") drawn in by the people-of-Sumpterville's infamous work ethic. "Like Germans," some would say, "but better! Can you believe that? Work themselves to the bone, and do a damn good job too!" Bart couldn't deny this. It was a fact of life, and at least one thing he could rely on to anchor this reality to. A lot of other things, however, didn't help too much solidify Bart's anchor-hold.

Bart breathed deeply in and coughed as the cold crisp air dried out the inside of his throat. He loved this weather. The world felt like a slate ready to be wiped clean by a soft frosty rag and made anew, in the spring, with a spread of colorful bright Expo markers. To feel the Earth in the midst of its enormously dynamic cycle of rebirth, to escape the oppressive stagnation of the humid stale summer months, was heaven to Bart.
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz went the gears of his bike as he coasted down a rare sloping stretch of his path up the snow-capped mountain.

Part 2

Bart rolled steadily on his old rusty red ten-speed bike down the hilly back country road.

Unincorporated old Sumpterville.

A few sparse crickets and June Bugs whizzed by, enacting a droning and chirping chorus upon his ears, silhouetted in the soft clickety-clack of the percussion gears of his bike. A few greenish-gold trees of the stubborn early-autumn forest rolled right easily by as Bart slowly lost all of his bearing amongst his numerous thoughts. Unfortunately for him, he was oblivious to the breath-taking scenic view of the looming yellow, red, green, and brown magestic mountain that the thin trees at its wide hilly base frequently allowed.

A view kings and magistrates could kill for, Bart had once thought. Truly a sight to behold.

A sight that a few, not from around these parts, have had the pleasure to behold. Sumpterville seemed to almost innately keep out travelers of any sort looking to vacation on top of its cool Appalachian slopes. And yet, it quite firmly managed to stay vital without the slightest strain on the townsfolk or business within the wide city limits.

Bartholomew's tire hit a bump and he blinked.

Sumpterville's industry was made of its own people. Made of Its own family and friends and long-winded relationships that were as old as the people they attached themselves to. Bart himself had a large family, he knew that to be a fact. They weren't hicks. In fact, they were surprisingly a very well cultured bunch, that is, the people of Sumpterville. Extremely polite and friendly, but not the kind of friendly nosy over-eccentricssm often wrote of in Stephen King-esque horror isolationist novels. No, they were good, good people.

Bart needed time to think, and that's what nature gave to him. Time to think and a space to do his thinking in. A need others thought no one needed. A need evident in his determined half-daydreamed push up the wispy autumn road.

The colloquial thing at the time in Sumpterville was to gather hay in the western fields, in the morning, and then in the eastern fields in the early evening. A pattern such as this would seem strange, but alas is not. The people of Sumpterville were practical in the least and in all probability coined the very phrase "work smart, not hard" if not then commenced to take it to the bank and cash it in the hope that in twenty years or so this investment would earn a nice sum of interest.
"The mountains," however, provided the un-obvious answer to that stupid question. The mountains provided them shelter from the warm morning sun and the dead, stagnant heat of the late afternoon/ evening. A curious town it was though. The only town in all of known civilization, in all of the history of humanity, to exist on both sides of a mountain.

Confessions of a Tetris Addict: a man of mental porn

It always amazes me how some people just own at life, like they were born to succeed, like well-being just cascades down upon them like a lawn chair in a warm summer rain. In my mind I see a pyramid. Anyone familiar with basic geometry knows that when one alters the height of a pyramid to maintain the previous proportions or geometric ratios of that object, one must also extend all other dimensions of that object at the same rate. ANYWHOOO! I figured this perfectly conceptualizes the total existence of the human being, for sure. The height represents overall personal success while everything below represents skills, achievements, talent, lesser levels of success. The crest is like overall awesome points while everything below that is what built the tower up to its current high score. This guys been around, he's done sh** some of us could only dream of accomplishing, and hes built himself the big diversified base that supports his huge enormous looming apex of a brain. This man was born to succeed, and it makes me wonder if this man's predisposition to awesome is genetic or a learned experience. It makes me wonder if some people are predispositioned to just care more than others. Where does this sense of innate drive come from? Who knows? You can't prove a thing, not when metaphysics are in the play.

Hotdogs in the Microwave

Have you ever experienced the dilemma of putting something in the microwave to defrost or whatnot only to have it completely destroyed because you felt it could use "one more minute" or "it hasn't been in there long enough."? I feel like life's like that, like were afraid to pull out prematurely, like we feel sometimes if we could only stay in kitchen, microwave, poker game a little bit longer we can end up a little bit further to the top. A little bit higher up the corporate or social ladder, but life's a gamble, and sometimes you leave your hotdogs in the microwave too long and they explode.