Das Hier #24

This is my wall. 

I started working on it five years ago when I inherited my parents' home following their tragic deaths in a single car accident.

I was devastated by their passing and took solace in the pursuit of art, that I had left behind 15 years earlier after a stupid fight with them that was all my fault because I was young and stupid.

And newly determined to explore art, even though, as they rightly pointed out, that pursuing art would most likely involve me living a hard scrabble life.

I didn't want to live a hard scrabble life and thinking that they were just being mean because they were old, they weren't, they were barely half the way through their forties as they married young and had me in their second year of said marriage and being in your forties is not old.

It's the later prime of life.

The long and the short of it is that I threw a fit and didn't talk to them for four years as I threw myself into a job that I unsuited for but applied myself to in such a way that I kept it and could have still been working there today if I wanted.

I no longer work there, but I gave that place 10 years of my life and built up a nice little cushion because I've always lived a simple life and was content to live a very simple life.

Or cheap, as some friends have said. But

I have no words today as you can tell by looking at the time between the first writing that I did today and the latest one, which began five hours apart.

So you can imagine my surprise that the words that I actually wrote at the the aforementioned time were deleted when I was organizing my postings and lost those words.

Fortunately, the words that I wrote in the first writing were not lost and I only lost the few words that I wrote this quarter.

And I remember the most important part of what was lost, which is this extreme lack of drive to write is very human.

Yes, you can take offence at that because it's meant as one since I am an alien and I never would have done such a thing on my homeworld.

I would say home, but I have chosen the Earth as my new home so this home and this is where I did it.

But not to worry Earthers, I do love you and you can get over an insult from a friend I'm sure.

Of course, my drive has returned so I am good to bring us into the camp at the base of the writer's mountain that we swore to keep to because we are determined to collectively write a million words.

And yes, I do think that it will be up to me to bring us all the way there as they continue to struggle through their own shiite and won't be doing any writing today.

But I do need to stop harping on them because the negativity is not going us any good is it.

Also, I am fully capable of shouldering the share of the load that I have thus far borne as I have already written 25,971 words through yesterday and almost surely will write 30,000 words this month which is a good month and if I can match in those months, what I've done in this one, my share of the load will be 360,000 words.

I've done the math.

That will require them to only write 160,000 words each. I know that Franklin is up to the task as he's already written well more than his share of that already which helps Halston who's in the back with Dalton and can't be expected to carry that much since Halston's a poet and Dalton can only write once a week.

And we come to Brayden, whose average based on this month is going to be short of that suggested goal of 160,000 so I'm looking at him to step it up in the months to come because I don't want top have to ask Franklin to carry more than what he's carrying now. Though he would be up for it and if it comes to it, for the betterment of our quest, I would let him take the lead.

But only i we have to and if Brayden steps up like I know that he can, Franklin won't have to.

So Brayden, if you're listening, I am asking you to finish second behind me in the shouldering of the 1,032,020 word load.

Yes, I want our total to pass his, even though his accomplishment will always be greater than ours, if we hit that tally, we will be able to take solace in besting him in this one thing.

Tell me that you can do this Brayden. Honestly, it''s not even asking you do that much another 10,000 words a month would get you second place behind me if I have any say in it because I want Franklin's total to be capped at 200,000 words.

Have I set us up for a big fail by throwing out a decayear count of 1,032,020? Because right now, the calaculations that I've been making are based off of a million word year, which is a far cry from that other count.

We can surely do it with another 6,400 each, which ain't no thing to me, since I've been feeling the drive to write this whole time and have only not pitched in five times so far, which is impressive.

But that's a lot to ask from Halston and Dalton.

So once again Brayden, I look to you and yes, to a lesser extent, Franklin, though I'd be over the moon to see that Brayden wrote 10,000 more instead of 6,400.

You can do that can't you Brayden? Find yourself and come back with a scarily fierce drive that takes you from third to first, because I would love to finish second to you.

Though I should also thank Franklin, who we can't do this without, even if I would love that myself, I know that we can't. We need him, so please, Franklin, don't storm off in a huff when I welcome Brayden back to the active roster and he overtakes you because you're not meant to lead, not when what you write is about your life.

We need more stories and tales told poetically. That's just the facts my friend.

We are 904 words, as of the last count, from breaking the trend of having one day each week be a day where we fail to reach the camp at the base of the mountain.

As fails go, the writing of more than a thousand words, collectively, or even better, individually, that's a good high bar that many of you humans wouldn't even fail to on your best day and it's okay for us to have two a month, but anything more is too much fail.

And honestly, I'd prefer fewer such days because the base camp days are probably going to win more days than I thought that they woould which means we're going to need the good peak days to be on the higher end than they are now.

So don't be surprised when we gather together one day this decayear and bang out 10,000 words, especially since that was one of the reasons that the good Petrie wrote as many words as he did, he had many of those good peak days.

Though he also had too many days where he barely hardly wrote and we haven't had any days like this. Nor will we. I promise you that.

Unless we all get ourselves laid on the same day and she happens to be some kind nympho hottie that demands our hoodedness and all one of us can do is  write acrptic message about what's going on and to apologize for the lack of words.

Of course, I don't even know if I want to lay myself down with one of you human females because I like aliens, even though I've chosen to live here where there are so few aliens to be found.

So that's far less likely to happen to me, but unless it's my day off, I'm going to have to tell her that I only take one day off a weak and I draw each day, so you're going to have to get out of my bed and walk out the door.

Even if your smile cuts me like a happy knife that bleeds happiness and makes me swoon. Not from a loss of blood, but the freeing of the happy that I haven't had in far too long.

Has it really been that long since Saetha and I lay together like it was the most natural of things to do?

It has been.

I can't speak for the others, but that's not even a thought in my head, though I admit that the thought of Saetha beckoning me with her come hither look as she coyly played with her jaethes while her eyes rolled back like she was about to pparade because she couldn't wait for me because I am slower than the average male of my kind to pick up on those come hither signals

Okay, mayb e it is on my mind, I am still a male after all.

But at the expense of the reach to the great climb?

No.

And my being alien means it's far more likely to happen to one of the others than it is to me so I don't even have to worry about that because I am going to carry more days than any of them.

I've already won today for a fact, so that ties me with Franklin and I am sure to take the lead because there's only three more days after this and I will probably win two of them.

At least.

Halston will take the last day with 2100 words of poetry just to throw the poet's gauntlet down as I write 917 words because I drew a really good drawing that day and all the words that I wrote then will be for a story that I will finish in February.

or did you think that I can only write if I'm posting for Das Hier?

Silly humans, I could spend the whole day writing whatever and just post a message here, saying there won't be more Das Hier in this sppace because we all started a website where we've decided to let the world in on most of what we're writing.

And that is what we're going to do.

Expect that happen on the 1st of February.

This site will be moved on from as we seek to monetize our quest for 1,032,020 words.

We hope you come along for the ride.

But I could only not talk to my parents for so long, though admiuttedly, four years is four years too long, we made peace with each other and they were happy that I had thrown myself into my work and had made something of myself, even if it wasn't what I wanted for myself, they were quick to point out that being adult means you do the things necessary to support yourself.

And even after we made our peace, I continued to work hard with my eyes on the prize of giving them my best years, all the while I gave time to my parents when I could.

After ten years however, I'd had enough and when that final season came to an end, I thanked my boss for all the years that we had spent as boss and employee but that it was time for me to move on.

And I could rightly say that I had never done him wrong by quittin mid-season, or walking away for a time only to come back. I'd given him all the seasons that I thought that I could.

So he had no reason but to look me in the eyes and tell me that he would miss seeing me at work because I'd always given him my best and never given him reason to express his lesser side with me.

We all have one of course, even if we would rather not admit that it is there, it just is.

Mind you, after a month of taking it easy and doing next to nothing, I needed to do something with myself.

Pursuing art of course was my first thought, but I knew that I had no name to draw excited fans to me and the art that I wanted to do was not the kind that could be monetized with the snap of one's fingers, so I knew that I needed a job to keep me afloat and leave my nest egg untouched,m which was the only thing that I was going to do because I had spent all those years building it up that I wasn't going to spend it away in two years.

That would be stupid.

And I was not a stupid man. 

Could I have returned to my last job? Yes, but it would have been awkward to ask to come back then say that I had work fewer hours each week because I want to devote some of my energy to this other thing.

What kind of fool does that?

So I didn't even call him and float this terrible idea past him.

WHat I did was find a job that I could give enough hours to that would allow me to pursue my artistic ambitions and still stay afloat.

All I needed to do was figure out a way to satisfy those ambitions in such a way that they could be monetized to make up the difference. between what I'd lost in the full-timing and won back in the part-timing and the whatever other.

First though, I needed a job because I was sure that I could figure out a monetizeable artistica.

But enough of that story now yes? I'm not feeling it enough and will let it simmer inside my imagination and I'll cotninue it when I am good and ready because I am going to do more writing than just here.

Also, I know how close we are to the first good peak, even though it's improbable for me, it's impossible for you, if there are any writers reading these words of mine once they have been posted that is.

You're just haumans and i am an alien and my fingers can fly across the keybaords fast than yours.

So writing the better part of 700 words in a half our hour isn;t too much for me.

I might still fail because I have my limits, the same as you, it's just that my limits are less than yours.

Now, now, don't be butthurt, as you humans are fond of saying. Well, some of you, just accept that I am better in many things than you and be happy that I have decided to help four humans do what if took one human to do.

No, it isn't arrogant if it's true.

Though to be fair to the good Petrie, I know that I could never write 1,05,805 words in a single year, even in a leap year, but I can surely lead the way for a small collective.

So this is the day where I stop being such a negative and encourage my fellow writers to reach beyond their own selves and walk walk down the path of writer and find the hidden path that the good Petrie found as we millionize the decayear.

Yes, I admit that it will be hard, but I'm looking at 400,000 as my share of the load and that can only take the pressure off the others.

Of course, there's nothing to stop me from aiming higher and trying to reach the halfway point. 

The math is now in my favour again, don't be surprised if I return to the story because you won't be seeing any of it here past tonight.

Aye, it will be finished away from your curious eyes. That's just the way that it has to be.

At least for now, because we did discuss te idea of posting all of our collective writing for the decayear on the site, but we've decided not to.

Rest assured however, all my postings for Das Hier will be public.

And if I can write half a million words and only charge you 30.00$ for eleven months, that's a steal!

Come on, you know that it is.

If it wasn't for the fact that the end of the night is coming.  think that I'd surely hit the second good peak because I am feeling the words.

But not because I had a supper of Hamburger, Fries, a Clementine and two donuts, along with one of your rotgutter drinks. Coca-What-Now? it once contained how much of what?

My people never would have sold such a product to trusting fools, even in our most backwward of days.

That's a story for another day though. I'm not here to talk about my people's past. or yours, beyond the curious history of Coca-What-Now, which had the What Now as an ingredient only in the early years.

And no one's alive form that time anyway.

So no harm no foul right?

Exactly.

Or not, as quick look at the googles tell me that it was a part of the drink, in admittedly a very small percentage until 1929, which math tells me is recent enough for there to be some people still alive.

This is something they officially deny, so who am I say with certainty that it happened since I hadn't even hear of your world until five year ago and wasn't alive until 60 years before that.

But it has the ring of shall we say, frankency?

Yes, frankency it is.  

And having just proven the speed of my alien fingers with a 4th quarter of 2152 words and counting in only 90 minutes, I'm going to grin like a fool that had just lain down with the sweet Saetha and end my writing day here.

Be well humans. I like you a lot.

Charles Petrie

Date
01-28-20

Time

11:41-11:59=18, 16:41-17:59=78, 22:28-23:58=90
186 Minutes

Word Count
251+611+2205