vernontalks - "going to the edge and back, one word at a time."

In the last podcast of vernontalks Season 2, I welcome everyone back after a summer hiatus and reveal intimate details about the premiere of my second short film titled "Inside Out", the ending sequel to my first short film, "Upside Down". (both films can be located on my YouTube page '3 Castl3s Film').  

After a year in which I : severely injured my foot in a work related accident in March, sold our home in July and moved a state away for a better job opportunity, then moved us back due to certain issues that arose and me securing a better job for me and my family back in our home state, needless to say I have a lot of things to chat about and discuss when it comes to life and its curveballs. 

I'm sure I'm not the only one that feels this way and can only imagine the stories all of you could share with me.  

Not only do I inspire myself by getting some verbal weight off my shoulders, but I hope my level headed revelations have some way of inspiring others who may be listening to my words.  I ask myself 'where to go from here?' and seriously contemplate out loud where that direction may be me for my life and my art (vernonwrites.com). 

Where does destiny leads us if we let her? I guess there's only one way to find out. 

I appreciate all of you. I hope all of your dreams are coming true. I hope you have great mental health and are in a place in your life where you are happy and content. Your time means the world to me, and I hope you never, ever feel like you are walking alone in this life. 

You are not. 

Trust me!

In this podcast, I dig into the premise of the phrase "Don't Look Down" and how it applies to me and my current struggle - getting second and third degree burns on my foot and having to get a skin graft to repair the damage. I not only give eye witness testimony of what I encountered in the days following my accident, but I also discuss the mental, physical, and spiritual battle that exists with this type of injury.

What does one do when faced with pain and the unknown that we call the future? Do you give up? Do you keep climbing your mountain? Do you question yourself? Do you reflect? Do you become angry? Do you let fear creep in? Do you remain confident?

After going through a traumatic event, some people would say they are no longer the same person they were before. Some would say they are a better version of what they used to be. Some might confess to being the same person.

I know where I stand and am proud to know, when I'm nervous about being at a high, foreign elevation, all I really need to do is stare at the incredible view in front of me and not do the one thing that my body tempts me into doing - looking down. From here on out, I have to promise myself to keep my line of sight facing forward so it is easier for me to take that first step and walk.

The lesson was simple and it was there, in front of me, the entire time.

In this episode, I talk about the New Year 2022 and all of the things in between.

Where does life have you right now? Using your mirrors to look behind you? Stuck in neutral while you check your gauges and GPS? Or looking forward at the undiscovered landscape that lies in the distance?

Life is not always easy (especially this day and age), and we need to be thankful for good health and the friends and family that get us through our tough spots. We are in this journey together, and we can do great things if we allow ourselves to.

Every human being on this earth is answered in three simple forms: 'Yes', 'No', and 'Wait'. 

Which one is hardest for you to hear and digest?

I know what mine is!

Do you?

In this podcast, I discuss a somewhat big, personal, artistic occurrence that is to take place this week - the premiere of my short film. 

The title is Upside Down, and it revolves around the one thing that connects all of us - that thing being loss. Whether we have lost a piece of ourselves or a tangible piece of something out "there", we have all experienced this occurrence because it does not discriminate race, religion, orientation, political status, or socio-economic status. 

Loss knows no boundaries, and this film is going to depict this in its most raw and natural form.  

Come, have a listen, and enjoy me expressing the excitement, the anxiousness, the nostalgia, of this peculiar position as I continue forward on my non-linear journey through time and space.

The time is not now. Quit believing that lie. The time was yesterday! 

Have you ever known someone who continuously said, "I'm Not Happy", and did nothing to change their situational mindset? Have you ever known someone who said that phrase of inevitable doom and took steps to transform their life into something better and more meaningful? Now, the three point three million dollar question - have you ever been, or currently are, one of those two people?

In my new podcast, "I'm Not Happy", we dissect this declarative occurrence and figure out the whys, whens, whos, and whats of being in a temporal funk of the such. 

Only one solution exists.

Considering life is short and time is not being sold on shelves quite yet, what can we do to get to where we need to be so we can finally be happy? 

To start off Season 2 of my new podcasting venture, I tell the listener what we are headed for this time around. Season 2 is going to take a different direction than Season 1, and I look forward to the journey that we are going to embark on as our scenery changes for this leg of the road trip. 

I labeled this episode "Dreamcatchers" because I wanted to talk about dreams, people, and the chase that goes into making them a reality. Why do dreams come true? Why do dreams not come true? Why do failed dreams sometimes lead to something better than what we were chasing before? Where do we find the balance considering the world wants to steal as much as it can from us, now, more than it ever has?

After listening to "Dreamcatchers", I hope all of you realize that you are not in this fight alone - the fight of pursuing your dreams with relentless dedication and focus until they manifest into the greatest thing that any person could ever ask for - validation - and the magical word you hear when you finally make it,

"Congratulations!" 

Listen to "Dreamcatchers" and pass it along. You got this. Always have, from the day you were born into this puzzle that we are all trying to put together - the puzzle of life!

www.vernonwrites.com

In my last podcast of Season 1, "Make A Night Out", we discuss an instance when you conjure up that one scene from a movie and proceed to live it out with someone else who desires the same perfection. 

We are introduced to the narrator, a man who is bored at home, lounging on his couch while surfing a dating app. An idea shoots through his head to wake him out of his temporary slumber. His idea - visit the hottest club in town on the hottest night of the week and live out a scenario he has only seen on television or in the movies. To add to the complexity of the situation, the narrator wants to dive into this Hollywood dream scene with someone who catches his eye and never lets it go.

Does he succeed in fulfilling his wildest fantasy or does it merely slip through his fingers like his life is currently doing with each second he wastes on his couch?

There's only way to find out.

Listen to, "Make A Night Out!"

In this podcast, we talk about the one term that a significant other does not like to be referred or compared to, that descriptive word being 'typical'.

In this reading, the narrator finds himself toe to toe with the love of his life, in a scene that simultaneously overwhelms all of his senses because of its cosmic, neon noir. While she plays her own version of cat and mouse, he tries his best to fight off the notion of thinking that particular word in regards to his soulmate. Even when the game gets hot and heavy, he does everything he can to maintain his composure and make sure that one deadly word does not enter his brain or leave his mouth.

Does he succeed in sneaking around this common debacle or does his significant other's antics finally prod him into the inevitable.

There's only one way to find out.

Listen to, "She's Far From Typical."

In this podcast, we talk about sealing the deal and bringing it home when you have a somewhat choppy conversation with your loved one after a long day of work.

Have you and your significant other partook in a conversation that went completely downhill after you asked what the plans were for dinner? Who was the one that rebounded the disconnect that existed between two heavy phone lines? Was it him? Was it her? Was it you?

"Bunnies, Bulls, and Bathtubs" is narrated from a man's perspective of such a situation. Just when it seems like all hope is lost, the narrator digs down and settles a somewhat chaotic day with ideas that only begins to tickle the imaginations of other homesick lovers. 

Does he succeed in turning around the love of his life's composure with simple plans that he waits to complicate once she gets home after her long day?

There's only one way to find out!

Listen to "Bunnies, Bulls, and Bathtubs."

In this podcast, I talk about the time I was asked to clean out a religious lady's house after her passing. From that experience, I was able to construct a writing that resonates a dark, more sinister side to Southern living. 

People say "home is where the heart is", yet what happens when home does not feel like home anymore? In a land labeled as 'God's Country', what happens when you see and encounter more demons than angels? What happens when riding bicycles on a dirt road is long forgotten and is exchanged for lethargic revelations?

After boxing away this spiritually devout Catholics life in numerous cardboard boxes and wrapping her life treasures in bubble wrap, what did I really gain from this experience? Was I asked to do this sacred job and carry it through with grace and fragility because no one else would have? Out of all the places this woman could have lived and call home, why did she choose a corn laced, soybean surrounding, hog farm smelling Southern backdrop?

I'm constantly looking for a way out, yet she was looking and found a way in.

Why?

This truly cannot be the land of milk and honey.

This is the land of Southern Shadows Gothic.   

In this podcast, I discuss an occasion when your present self writes your future self a letter of encouragement for a point in time of great need.  

At some crossroad during our walk of life, there has come a time when we wanted to give up on something, save face, and abandon a dream or desire, whatever that 'thing' might have been. When things did not pan out how you thought they should, how did you respond? When years upon years passed by and it seemed like your dream was out of reach, did you let it go or did you continue to relentlessly chase after it?

Whatever the scenario could have been or will be, what guiding words lifted you up and made you persevere in the face of adversity? 

Were those words of comfort and encouragement your own?

'Dear Future Self', written in the present for a future you which, when looked upon, was a pre-determined intervention in the past.  

In this podcast, I talk about the one lustful, erotic thing that draws us closer and closer to something we long for - 'INfatUatiON'.

In this reading, the narrator treats 'INfatUatiON' as though she were a bodied entity and calls her out on the way she makes him feel. With everything on the table, the seducing, promiscuous emotion hears an earful of what she has been haunting him with ever since she first started ghosting him.

With a reading filled with numerous, memorable one liners, 'INfatUatiON' will stick with you after it is long over and leave you thinking about how this one deadly sin has affected you in your life. 

The draw. The lure. The trap. The capture. The longing.

That is only the beginning of 'INfatUatiON'. 

For this podcast, we discuss what the senses experience during that one magical date that you cannot jog from your memory. 

What do you see? What do you feel? What do you taste? What do you smell? More importantly, what do you hear?

On this date, the narrator is going out with a girl he has known for quite some time. All her mannerisms strike his senses and sends them into a panicked fury. It starts to affect his body. It starts to affect his eyes and ears until his curiosity is peaked to seismic levels. He tries to put her on the spot, yet she finds a way to turn the spotlight back to him and his imagination.

How does this perfect date end and where does it lead?

There's only one way to find out.

Use your ears and listen to 'The Sounds I Know'. 

In this podcast, I let loose on the world around me by reading a free verse style ramble filled with valid truths that are oppositely contrary to things we may believe are perfectly normal.

How is your brain wired? Is it burned out? Is it scattered? Is it coherent? Is it sane? What is it truly thinking? How does it speak to you from time to time? What do your eyes feed your brain? When your brain observes what it observes, how does all that information decipher so it makes sense to you, if it ever does?

'Am i An astronaut' is a joyride you will not soon forget. This podcast combines everything the world has to offer and speaks it through one hopefully hopeless soul in the reality of today, a world in which everything is running forwardly backwards, creating traffic jams all across our globe. 

In this podcast, we talk about the things we remember, the things that are burned into our memory, the things that plague our brain when a certain something is hard to forget. In this instance, that thing, that something, that someone, is a girl.

Pulled from a writing from my blogging website, 'Me Remember You' is narrated from the standpoint of a guy thinking about the impressions his dream girl has left on him. Everything that makes this girl intoxicating, all the raw soulful emotions and heartfelt feelings, come rushing at the narrator in a full force heat wave.  

The narrator admits that, "every time he was near her, she caught his eye like a lipstick stained cigarette sitting in a murder suspect's ashtray."

The point is not will we ever forget someone.

The point is - how do we remember them!

This is 'Me Remember You.' 

This podcast revolves around a phone conversation or text message that could possibly keep someone from going over the edge. The blog post, which this reading was taken from, is one of my most viewed posts on my website for the entire year of 2020. 

I am a firm believer that if someone is on your mind, in a positive way, and that person has been on the down and outs unbeknownst to you, then their mental presence could be for a reason and that is your inclination to reach out through phone call or text message. We do not know what other people are encountering in their daily walk of life or what they are going through, and the only support system they could ever receive would be someone taking time out of their scheduled lives to send a little unconditional love their way.  

Mental health and awareness is a real thing, and I'm sure most of us have found ourselves riding the seesaw of life, hoping someone would reach out to us during our time in need as we remain frozen in our current mindset. Your phone call, text message, card, or other form of correspondence could be the one lifeline that helps bring a struggling soul back into the lifeboat with us as we brave the rough seas of life.

* I dedicate this podcast and blog post to anyone who has lost someone due to mental health issues. You are constantly in my thoughts and prayers * 

In this podcast, we discuss the term 'just the other day' and see where it can lead us if we allow it. Whether the outcome is positive or negative, when you sit in the present and verbally express that statement, you go to a moment in the past and meld the fabric of your current reality with that memory.

In the second half of this podcast, I refer to a fictional blog post writing of mine titled 'Just the Other Day'. The narrator of the story goes back to a point in time when he was admiring a girl he was on a date with. When throwing himself into that certain juxtaposition, his senses overwhelm him and he loses himself in the moment. Since his perfect experience is going to stick in his brain for the days, weeks, and months to come, he lets his world crumble around him and his date so his future memory of that moment will be branded the way it was intended.

Just the other day, I was *fill in the blanks*.

Just the other day, I felt *fill in the blanks*.

... just the other day, I ...

In this podcast, I discuss the difference a year can make when it comes to your work life. 

I was feeling somewhat nostalgic for my next podcast so I browsed my catalogue of writings on my website and came across one that became even more dear to my heart after re-reading it a year later. 

Before the pandemic emerged out of nowhere, I was self employed, running the family business. After the pandemic appeared and lingered around, the family business slowly dwindled away. A job that had provided so much for me and my family was now obsolete and we were left fending for ourselves during a global pandemic. 

For an entire summer, I was unemployed and worked a couple of odd and end jobs, finally landing a stable job last October. Looking back at my previous self employment, a job that I carried with pride for at least fifteen years, I have realized that I did not have it as bad as I thought I did way back then. I know many of you have felt that way at some point in time of your life. 

An epiphany then tickles my ears when it comes to business - "there's a big difference between the aged and the ageless."

This podcast revolves around a short fiction story posted on my blogging website.

1 Missed Call centers around a person who has been involved in an extended breakup and is surprised when the other person calls them out of the blue. The person they parted ways with was an individual who completed them in every way possible and continues to haunt their thoughts and dreams. Since the narrator was incognito at the time of the call and missed it, they immediately start to fixate on the 'Missed Call' notification on their phone. 

From there the journey begins and carries the reader or listener on a ride that many of us can relate to in some form or fashion. By story's end, something happens to the narrator. The reader or listener will hang onto every word until the very last sentence and must decide the fate of the narrator and what that one notification has conjured up inside their brain and body. 

1 Missed Call.

 What will you do with your notification? 

In this podcast, we rehash one of my more emotional fictional short stories from my blogging website. This writing hits on a deeper emotional level than some of my other essays and has a twist ending that the reader or listener never sees coming. 

When I started writing this piece, I did not know which way I wanted the story to flow. One hour later, I, myself, was carried on a journey that left my mind wandering, my heart heart torn, and my eyes wanting to water. 

If I revealed anything else about this writing and this podcast, it would only ruin it, so, I implore you, if you have ever felt love and it slipped through your fingers, then this is the podcast for you.

With all the noise around you, there is one thing that will catch your ear and never let you go.

That being - *silence*.   

In this podcast, we venture back to an old writing of mine and dive into its spoken word, free verse style. Throughout my journey as a writer, I always wanted to try to stand behind a microphone at an open mic night and recite spoken word feelings and emotions, whether scripted or from the free verse of my brain. I consider this podcast my first venture into that endeavor. 

Each line of my poem contains three words only and delivers a message that remains valid. 

Through this podcast, I hope to remind the listener or reader that each one of us has words to deliver, whether spoken or not, and our story has the ability to change the world in a positive way. All of us can learn something from one another if we are brave enough to sit down and listen to the emotions we are trying to effectively express without being offended.

These Three Words.

What are yours?  

In this podcast, we dive into a short fiction read titled The Morning Fog. This was one of my earlier blog posts that did not receive a lot of views, yet, with the spoken word, something tells me that it might have a different effect.

Imagine being alone on a straight line highway before sunrise. The only thing to the sides of you are tall pine trees. Up ahead, you see a thick white patch of invisible mist about to envelope you and your car. You enter it and are carried to another parallel as your imagination starts to wander. 

What does your mind see?

What does your soul experience? 

All of that and more in this podcast.

In this podcast, I introduce one of my most viewed blog posts from my website and do something that I have not done until this very moment - read one of my written works aloud to my listeners and readers.

Cattywampus. What does it mean for us, as humans? Where will it lead us? Where will we go? 

What if the if what?

The possibilities are endless.

So are you!  

In this podcast, I talk about the negative mindset I fought while receiving countless rejection letters in the mail from book publishers. I also address the struggle I went through while trying to independently publish my novels on my own.

I conclude that I do not regret anything I have been through because I would not be where I currently am without these experiences. 

From here, it is all progress - and progress is good!

In this podcast, I briefly discuss my high school years leading into college. I talk about the journey of self discovery while attending the university, and the ups and downs I encountered there. I discuss, in detail, the time I plagiarized a college essay and was caught by my professor. The results of my actions had me being brought before the dean and dropped from the class with an F letter grade.

I end our podcast discussion by letting the listener know that our mistakes do not define us. The only thing standing in our way of us manifesting our dreams is ourselves. Life is too short to give up.

Do not let anyone convince you otherwise.

In this podcast, I introduce myself and what I hope to accomplish while on this journey.