Title Writer Shed Stories: Vol. 3 Second Thoughts
Authors Mark Blickley, Mark Bruce, Maryam El-Shall, Amy Gordon, John Guzlowski, Jenna Klobucher, Chris Kok, Megan Mary Moore, John Muro, Simon Plant, Sherry Shahan, E.H. Warrington, Emily West, and Lucy Zhang (EDITOR: DAVID W. BERNER)
Genre FICTION/MEMOIR/POETRY Collection
Publisher WRITER SHED PRESS
Book Blurb
Writer Shed Stories, Vol. 3: Second Thoughts is the third volume in a yearly literary journal from Writer Shed Press. This edition includes fiction, essays, and poetry from around the world—stories of lost and found souls, new beginnings, regret, and love. Contributing writers: Mark Blickley, Mark Bruce, Maryam El-Shall, Amy Gordon, John Guzlowski, Jenna Klobucher, Chris Kok, Megan Mary Moore, John Muro, Simon Plant, Sherry Shahan, E.H. Warrington, Emily West, and Lucy Zhang
Excerpt
I am old now, but I do not think that I fear death. Sometimes I get upset that while I am rotting in the dirt others will be drinking beer and dancing, or laying on a beach with closed eyes, caressed by the sun. My love of history has been an enormous help in smothering my panic of not being alive.
Ever since I was a child, I’ve adored hearing city elders tell stories about Cartagena. How my ancestors fought and killed the Spanish invader Juan de la Cosa when he tried to steal a 132-pound golden porcupine from our Sinu temple. And how we citizens repelled an attack of the English armada that included George Washington’s half-brother Lawrence. Or when the great North American female matador, Patricia McCormick, one of the finest bullfighters of her time, slew a bull at the beloved Circo Teatro. Streaked in blood, she knelt by the animal she just killed and stroked its head while screaming out, “I love this brave bull!”
I can accept and enjoy that all these events took place without my being alive to witness them, so why should I regret events I will be unable to experience after I die? I have come to believe that when we die, we return to wherever we were the year before our birth. As I was born in 1959, I will simply return to whatever I was doing in 1958 and that’s where I will be for eternity. There seem to be very few second chances in life, and I suspect the same will be true in death.
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