Writing with Drive

My fiendish plan worked! As I said in my previous post, I've been thinking lately about doing some writing, both dusting off some old unfinished projects, and starting on some new stuff. Both of these projects would require some library research, so I got the bright idea to upload what I had written to Google Drive (Google's online word processing app) so that whether I was at home or at the library, I would have access to all my files without the aid of a laptop, tablet, smartphone, or other portable device that I can't afford right now. This morning on a visit to the nearest branch of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Public Library, I logged into Google Drive, found one of my unfinished stories, and made a small addition. When I got home and checked my computer, there was the addition, ready and waiting. I've spent the last few minutes rereading what I've written so far and tinkering with it. It's a strange feeling; it's been years since I worked on this story, but in another sense, it feels as if I've never been away. Can I keep this going? I hope so.

Relocation

After the home invasion I described in the previous post, my family and I were very concerned about my physical safety. I didn't really want to stay in a place where my life could be at risk, and my family certainly didn't want me to be here. What to do?

My brother Allen, God Bless Him, boldly stepped up with a solution. He took out a loan to buy a condo unit in Charlotte, NC that has already been modified to accommodate a person with a disability. His offer to buy the property was immediately accepted, and the pre-move planning and preparations have gone remarkably well and smoothly, to me a sure sign of God's providence at work. Now only a few days remain before The Big Move. My old apartment is littered with bags, boxes, and whatnot. I don't know how we will get it all into the truck and trailer we'll be using, but I guess we'll figure something out. I suspect it will look something like this:

I'm excited, nervous, and a little sad to be leaving the people and the community that I've lived in for nearly a dozen years, but it's plainly time to go. The community where I'm living now has been dying a slow and painful death for years, and by moving to Charlotte, I'll be closer to family and a new resident of one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas in the country with better housing, better medical care, better transportation, better cultural opportunities, and overall better quality of life. Change and striking out into the unknown can be scary, but I'm choosing to look upon this experience as an adventure. As Bilbo Baggins says in The Lord of the Rings, "I'm quite ready for another adventure." See you on the other side!

More About My Dad

2nd Lieutenant William S. Leslie
9 Oct 1943, Age 20
So young!

Friday morning I got a long-awaited letter from the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis in response to my latest requests for my father's World War II service records. My search was partially successful. It confirmed that I had indeed found his wartime serial number (0-668096) and it also confirmed my long-held suspicion that his complete service records, if they were ever held there, were destroyed in a fire in July 1973. However, the letter also stated that, "[w]e used alternate sources to reconstruct some record data lost in the fire," and included two copies of a Certification of Military Service that includes his complete dates of service, including a short period as an enlisted man that I did not know about. I am so very proud.

The date of his enlistment conflicts slightly with some other information that I have (ironically, also supplied by the National Archives and Records Administration which oversees the National Personnel Records Center), so I may have to look into this further to make sure the details are correct. Also, although the caption on the original photo of my Dad identifies him as a 1st Lieutenant as of October 1943, I believe he was actually a 2nd Lieutenant at the time. The accident reports I mentioned in a previous entry bear this out.

I Found My Dad

Caption on the back of the original photo reads:
"1st Lt. William S. Leslie, 20 years old, Oct. 9 1943"
(Scanned image supplied by William F. Leslie)

Note: A slightly different version of this post can be found here.

This past weekend was big for me. I found my Dad.

In the past, I've blogged about wanting to find out more about what my late father did in World War II. This past weekend, I took the first concrete steps toward finding out.

Early Saturday morning I received a long-awaited e-mail from Craig Fuller of the Aviation Archaeological Investigation and Research (AAIR) website that maintains a database of accident reports involving World War II aircraft. The e-mail contained a link to a page where I could download copies of two reports of two accidents involving my father, William Stewart Leslie, during his pilot training in World War II. The serial number of the "Leslie, William S." in these reports matches exactly the serial number on a set of dog tags in my family's possession, so I know this is my Dad. Now that I know for certain his rank and serial number and the group and squadron he was attached to at the time of the accidents, I can use these pieces of information to try and locate more details about his military service.

In the first accident, he was returning to Camp Campbell (now Fort Campbell), Kentucky after a routine cross-country training flight early on the morning of 15 August 1943. He landed about ten feet short of the end of the runway because the sun was in his eyes, and when he landed, the spindle supporting the left landing gear on his Bell P-39F AirCobra broke, causing the landing gear on that side to collapse. The board investigating the accident concluded:

Bell P-39F AirCobra with U. S. Army Air Forces Markings

Although pilot did land a few feet short of hard surfaced runway due to the fact that his visual judgment was hindered because he was landing into the sun at 0830 o'clock, it is not the opinion of the board that this fact would have been a factor in causing the landing gear to fail. It is a known fact that landing gear spindles on P-39 Airplanes are light and delicate. It is believed that spindle had Crystallized and cracked.

In the second accident, he was leaving Camp Campbell for another routine cross country training flight on the afternoon of 25 October 1943 when ice formed in the carburetor of his North American P-51 Mustang, causing a sudden and and complete engine failure. The official report reads:

North American P-51 Mustang

"After about 50 minutes of flying there was a tremendous backfire and engine failed. Pilot made crash landing, wheels up" in a farmer's cornfield near Scottsville, Kentucky.

The board investigating the accident recommended "that pilots be directed to use full carburetor heat when atmospheric conditions indicate that moderate to severe icing conditions exist," and "That WILLIAM S. LESLIE, 2nd Lt. Air Corps, Res., be relieved of all responsibility in this accident."

I'm relieved to know that in both cases, the investigating boards concluded that Dad did not cause or was not directly responsible for the accident.  A pilot is always ultimately responsible for everything that happens on board his aircraft, but apparently in these cases there were mitigating circumstances. A severe enough accident might have caused Dad to wash out of pilot training, which I think might have broken his heart. Dad loved flying.

I admire his persistence, too. One accident is one thing, but after the second one, I would have considered the Quartermaster Corps or the Navy!

New Genealogy Blog!

Mine.

As you might have deduced from my last post, dear readers, the genealogy bug has bitten me hard. I've created a new family history-themed blog "From Aberdeen to Alabama" to chronicle my adventures in pursuit of my Leslie ancestors. The title reflects my working assumption that my family originated in Aberdeenshire in northeastern Scotland, immigrated to the United States, and somehow, over several generations, worked its way to south central Alabama, where my paternal grandfather was born. That mysterious "somehow" is the subject of my search. If you want to see what I find out, come along and read. I'm really hoping that I might eventually draw the attention of distant relatives or other genealogists who are researching the same families I am. I'd appreciate any tips, tricks, or pointers more experienced family history researchers can offer, and put forth my own stumbling efforts in the hope that they may be useful to other noobs and neophytes. Enjoy!

Cheezburger of Teh Day

This LOL completely sums up my state of mind. I've been feeling rotten all day for medical reasons, and I just wanted a little sympathy. Thank you. This concludes this self-pitying whine. We now return you to your regularly scheduled internet browsing.

Brother, Can You Spare A Click?

Ah, Christmastime! Snowflakes. Mistletoe. Sleigh bells. Twinkly lights. And the real reason for the season: SHOPPING!

Just kidding. But I do have a serious reason for talking about shopping. I'll be blunt: I'm desperately short of cash at the moment. I'll be even more blunt: I'm broke. But you, dear readers, can help with that. As you can see, there are ads for Amazon.com and other retailers all over the site. If you are considering a Christmas purchase from Amazon or one of these other retailers, please click on the banner ads on this site before you make your purchase. Please ask all your friends, neighbors, relatives, pets, and complete strangers to do likewise. That way, I'll receive a small percentage of the purchase price, you'll get a bargain on Christmas gifts, and help generate some Christmas cheer for your humble blog host. I thank you for your support.

And now for a musical selection. Take it away, Al!

Readin' and 'Ritin' (But No 'Rithmetic)

Hello There! Yes, I know there's been some serious blog fade around here lately, but I am still alive and kicking, Thanks Be To God! I believe I'm finally over the consarned, goshdarned, !@#$%^&* medical problems that (sometimes literally) cramped my style for much of the summer. Now that I'm feeling more or less normal (whatever that is), I'm beginning to think again about serious questions, such as what I can do to support myself. I'm receiving disability payments and have some savings, but I'd like to be generating income as well as spending it.

Before I got sick, I was thinking about doing some fiction writing, resuming work on a project I had laid aside awhile back. I am slowly getting back into that. I'm a great one for thinking about writing, but not so hot on actually doing it. I have a pretty fierce inner critic who tells me that writing fiction is a waste of time and a way of avoiding reality (I think he's related to my Scottish Calvinist ancestors). However, when I can get him to shut up, I read and listen to other people's fiction. I've listened to two podcast versions of Treasure Island in honor of Talk Like a Pirate Day, and am currently reading Michael Flynn's excellent medieval Catholic science fiction novel Eifelheim and Phil and Kaja Foglio's "gaslamp fantasy comic" Girl Genius.

As if that weren't enough, I'm also listening to a  series of podcasts on the works of J. R. R. Tolkien. In his introductory episode, the host of these podcasts, a professor of medieval literature, cites an essay of Tolkien's, "On Fairy Stories," that I just can't wait to read for myself. In it Tolkien argues that the urge to create imaginary worlds in fiction is a natural human desire since humans are made in the image and likeness of a God who is Himself a creator of worlds. Furthermore, the desire to create magical or fantastic worlds in which extraordinary things happen is not an escape from reality or a denial of reality but a reminder to humans that our world contains spiritual realities that go beyond what we can see or prove in ordinary day to day sense experience.

A Christian justification for writing speculative or fantastic fiction could be hugely liberating and could open up a whole new world of creativity for me. I have to ask myself, "Why shouldn't I try to create my own fictional worlds, worlds that could be every bit as exciting as the worlds I am currently visiting as a reader? Why shouldn't I find out if readers will enjoy visiting these worlds as much as I enjoyed creating them?

I am not suggesting that I will drop everything and try to become the next J. R. R. Tolkien, or the next J. K. Rowling, or even the next Stan Lee. I know that trying to make a living writing fiction is a long shot even under the best of circumstances. Most manuscripts are never published, most published books are never reviewed, and most reviewed books never sell millions of copies. Every author I've ever read who has written about the craft of writing, however, explains that real authors never write solely for the money. They write because there are stories that authors would like to tell, want to tell, and need to tell.

What I am suggesting is that I am going to see what stories I can tell, and see who else might like to read them. I'll probably never make a dime, but I might possibly make a few bucks and might even make millions, although I consider this last possibility highly unlikely. I just hope the journey will be fun. When I think about the situation in this light, the question becomes not so much, "What am I going to do to support myself?" as, "What can I do to keep the lights on and groceries in the fridge while I write?" The second is a far more interesting question than the first.

My 15 Minutes of Fame

Well, Good Golly, Miss Molly! I'm almost famous.

It seems my recent review of Alan Moore's graphic novel Watchmen has come to the attention of some bloggers I really respect, including John C. Wright, Mark Shea, and some other folks who have asked me to be a guest blogger at ModernConservative.com

Recently, John C. Wright, author of science fiction, master of obscure pop culture references, moral philosopher of the blogosphere, and recent Catholic convert, blogged about how much he hated the film version of Alan Moore's graphic novel V for Vendetta. In the comments I mentioned that I had a very similar reaction to Watchmen and included the link to my review in my comment.

Then, I'll be darned if Mr. Wright didn't actually read the review, quoting it approvingly and at length in a post on his own website. He was particularly impressed with the way in which I was able to cite a pop culture icon of yesteryear, The Shadow, and the great Catholic apologist G. K. Chesterton, in the same essay. Mr. Wright observed:

My comment: Anyone who mentions both Chesterton and The Shadow in the same paragraph has won my favor, and therefore shall be made one of my ministers and granted way-cool ninja-jedi Mind Control powers, once my dirigible planet enters the solar system from the transplutonian darkness. Perhaps I will make him master of Australia, and wed him to my beautiful but evil daughter, Princess Aura.

To which I replied:

You are far too gracious, O Mighty One! I'd settle for the flight powers of the Hawkmen and a ride in your dirigible planet. I'm sure your beautiful but evil daughter Princess Aura is a swell gal, in an evil sort of way, but she's not gonna, like, murder me in my sleep or anything, is she? Just askin'.

This exchange, in turn, came to the attention of Mark Shea, who is, in my humble opinion, the dean of the Catholic blogosphere. He wrote that my essay was "full of wisdom and insight." Imagine! Mark Shea said that something written by li'l ol' me was "full of wisdom and insight." I'm all tingly. Usually the stuff I write around here is definitely full of . . . something . . . but it ain't wisdom and insight!

In the comments to a subsequent post, I received an invitation from one David Marcoe to be a guest blogger for the Modern Conservative website. We corresponded at length, and I am still waiting for final word as to whether they would like me to blog for them. I may include my e-mail to them as a future post.

Stay tuned.

More Shameless Self-Promotion

In the hopes that I might get more reader feedback in response to my Shadow/Superman fan fiction story Shadows of Steel, I posted it on the FanFiction.net archive site. To go directly to my story, you can click this link, or you can go to the FanFiction.net main page, click on the "Movies" link, scroll through the list of movies until you find "Shadow," and click on it. Since my story is the most recent Shadow story posted, it will be at the top of the list. You can also find the story on my personal website.Hope you enjoy it!

"Shadows of Steel" Now Available!

Fans of Old-Time Radio
Fans of Pulp Fiction
Fans of Classic Comics
Ladies and Gentlemen . . .

Your Attention Please . . .

Thrilling Tales, the online pulp magazine
and
It's All Straw, the blog

Proudly Present . . .

Shadows of Steel: A Shadow/Superman Adventure

This is an all-new adventure in the classic style featuring two of the greatest heroes from The Golden Age of comics, pulp fiction, and old-time radio: Superman and The Shadow:

It is 1938. Lamont Cranston, The Shadow, has been kidnapped. Margo Lane appeals to her sister Lois Lane for help in finding Lamont, unaware that the old flame who has re-entered her life is at the center of the kidnap plot! Only the Man of Steel can save the Master of Darkness, and only the two heroes together can save a nation on the brink of war! Don't miss all the action in Shadows of Steel!

I had the basic idea for this story years ago when I realized the simple, blindingly obvious fact that Superman's girlfriend, Lois Lane, and The Shadow's girlfriend, Margo Lane, had the same last name. What if Lois and Margo Lane were related? Would that bring the two men, the two superheroes in their lives together? Of course it would! This story was the result. I've been working on it over a year now, and it's finally here! Do go read it and tell me what you think. Tell your friends, your relations, and complete strangers if necessary, about this story if you think they would like it. Since it involves two copyrighted and licensed characters, I can't possibly publish it via conventional means without being sued down to my last nickel for copyright infringement. So, like millions of other fan fiction or "fanfic" writers, I'm putting it up on the Web absolutely free for you good people to read and, I hope, to enjoy. Please send me feedback at: "niallmor at earthlink dot net," only replace the dot and the at as appropriate. (You know the drill). Cheerio!