My Novels

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

Spooky Movies & Old Houses

I keep planning to write an entry, have numerous ideas to discuss...but put it off. I have become the world's worst procrastinator. I am starting this now, even IF I get interrupted, since I am waiting on DH to get here for our evening meal.

We decided to end our Sunday afternoon rides for now, due to the high gas prices. Instead, we are going to see a movie, which is more affordable. Just recently a new theater complex opened, and we have eight movies to choose from -- hopefully one worth the half ticket price for a matinee. This past Sunday we watched, "The Skeleton Key," and I really loved it. If you like old houses, you will enjoy this movie; it's heavy on atmosphere, set near New Orleans in an old, creepy antebellum mansion. There's no gore, and though there's a few good scares, it is also a supernatural mystery/thriller. I don't want to include any "spoilers" but I will say that it has a deeper philosophical premise than most movies in this category, and will leave you "thinking" about various aspects long after you go home. Or at least, that is how it affected me.

Since I was so impressed by the antebellum house, I did a bit of research online, but couldn't find a thing about the one used in the movie. I finally contacted the writer of an article about the movie, asked her if she knew the location of the house or its history. And she replied that the movie company was not going to publicize the house and/or its location, due to the 90-year-old couple who owned it and liked their privacy. Say what? That seems extremely strange to me, unless it's just a ploy the movie people are using in order to sell the DVD (went it's released) with more information about that place. I can't imagine an entire movie company, along with actors/actresses and crew could enter a small Louisiana region and keep it quiet! :-) However, there was indeed something oddly eerie about that old mansion, and I wondered if it might actually be in the decrepit state shown in the filming? It's puzzling, if nothing else.

I'm also reading a good novel set in an old house in North Carolina. I have always loved old houses, and enjoy stories set in such places. Living in ours has proven interesing, and there are times when I HAVE felt an uneasiness about events that have taken place here over the past year and half. Do I believe in ghosts? Not really, but I DO think that some form of "energy" might remain in a location where humans have had intense emotional experiences -- and certainly, we ALL know a home is our central place for passionate feelings.

I've had a few eerie occurances since living here myself: the latest was when I turned off the TV, walked across the room, and it turned itself back on! I once had a peculiar experience right before falling asleep, hearing the kerosene lanterns on the bedroom fireplace mantle rattling, nothing to cause it. And of course, there's been the unending weird bad luck of DH with his health (though, naturally, this could just be aging -- but at 57, it's a bit unnerving for him/me). Not to mention that almost all the men who have lived here since the original owner have had heart attacks (like DH) -- with the exception of the young guy, who had the near-fatal tractor accident at the creek. Who knows? I've not discovered any horrible tragedies related to this house, but the original owners only died in the 80s, and they had long lives here. If there's any kind of negative energy, it would probably be theirs, though I can find no significant reason for that. Perhaps only that they loved the place, and never wanted to leave. Both the parents and their two daughters/husbands are buried in a nearby cemetery. There is only one living grandson, and I have his address...but just haven't tried to contact him. I do think he could provide some interesting information about the house, as well as possibly some old photos of how it looked originally. Since I'm still working on the "Time Capsule" I may yet contact him, see if he has anything he'd like to contribute before I lock it away for future owners.

We've had thunderstorms every afternoon for a week or so, and it has helped end our dry spell. I only wish my dry spell of not writing would end as well. I DO have some great ideas, if only I could get motivated to write the actual stories!

I'm going to end this with a writing inspiration from a past master:

Kerouac's Belief and Technique for Modern Prose

List of Essentials
Jack Kerouac

* Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for yr own joy
* Submissive to everything, open, listening
* Try never get drunk outside yr own house
* Be in love with yr life
* Something that you feel will find its own form
* Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind
* Blow as deep as you want to blow
* Write what you want bottomless from bottom of mind
* The unspeakable visions of the individual
* No time for poetry but exactly what is
* Visionary tics shivering in the chest
* In tranced fixation dreaming upon object before you
* Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition
* Like Proust be an old teahead of time
* Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog
* The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye
* Write in recollection and amazement for yourself
* Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea
* Accept loss forever
* Believe in the holy contour of life
* Struggle to sketch the flow that already exists intact in mind
* Don't think of words when you stop but to see picture better
* Keep track of every day the date emblazoned in yr morning
* No fear or shame in the dignity of yr experience, language & knowledge
* Write for the world to read and see yr exact pictures of it
* Bookmovie is the movie in words, the visual American form
* In Praise of Character in the Bleak inhuman Loneliness
* Composing wild, undisciplined, pure, coming in from under, crazier the better
* You're a Genius all the time
* Writer-Director of Earthly movies Sponsored & Angeled in Heaven

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I purchased a wood stove wanted to save on the heating cost this year.my Fireplace Tool site related to everything about fire places and wood stoves.So save on the higher heating cost and burn some wood.Have a great day bye.
Fireplace Tool