F. P. Dorchak

Speculative Fiction (New Weird) Author

The Terminator

Bob Mayer—The Terminator

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I’ve met Bob Mayer.

Met him at the 2008 Pikes Peak Writers Conference (PPWC) in Colorado Springs, Colorado. I’d read a couple of his Area 51 novels. Liked them. So, I thought, here’s a pretty cool guy…why not go meet him and see what he’s like. I liked how he didn’t ignore all the security measures in secure settings and write his characters out of sticky situations by just changing the scene (and instead had to show some crafty maneuvering around said security systems, not ignoring that there are measures to detect your every move and high security places would have them!). Anyway, I thought I’d introduce myself to him.

Yeaaah, about that….

Bob has said in posts that he’s become a bit more outgoing, more personable since he’s been out in the wild, but when I first met him, well…not so much. I remember when I first introduced myself to him at a PPWC mixer years ago and I found myself pulling my own teeth just to get him to talk. After a while I was answering my own questions…and it took me a couple of sentences to realize…well, he’d long since disappeared…

It was like he’d wielded some arcane form of Ninja Kung-fu sfumare on me.

To this day, I don’t know how he’d done that.

So…I was reading one of his blog posts last weekend, his “Traits of Successful Writers II,” and I realized I just had to share about Bob…as The Terminator. In this post he says words to the effect that the best thing about writers’ groups is not the actual writing stuff…but the different characters—the actual people, the writers—in the writer’s group. Trying to figure out their motivations…why they “act the way they do.”

OMG. Flashback…PPWC 2008.

You see, Bob is an extremely observant fellow. A former Green Beret (the big white words on this webpage say it all…).  He’s always watching…observing. I say this not because I know Bob any kind of “well,” but because I’d actually caught him doing so one night at the PPWC hotel’s bar. I was a few feet away from him, hidden by and blending in with the indigenous human foliage. As I scanned the room, I spotted Bob. By himself. And what Bob was doing was…

Studying.

Assessing.

Taking in the lay of the land.

I watched as he took it all in…the people, the terrain, and (I assumed) who was a threat…who he could take…how he could take ’em…even his own method of extraction. I wondered what manner of Special Forces (SF) witchery he had concealed upon his person…you know, besides his hands, feet, elbows, and head. I was sure in a pinch he could use his ear lobes in ways that would make grown men cry…or perhaps a better way of stating this is that Bob would have men use their own ear lobes in ways that would make them cry….

Anyway, as I carried on my insipid, casual conversation…throwing out well-placed laughter here and there…I observed Bob. He seemed to flit in and out of existence (dang it, how does he do that?).

He was laser-like in his gaze. I imagined his mind…his physical vision…was something very much like the Terminator Vision, above…

Scan Mode…

Analysis: THREAT

Assessment: NEUTRALIZE

MALE HT: 510

WT: 0173

ENDOMORPH

INEBRIATED…HITTING ON UNINTERESTED HOT AGENT

Weapon Selection: LEFT PINKY

Weapon Employment: MAXIMUM DAMAGE/EMBARRASSMENT

Yeah, that’s how I see Bob. As the Terminator. When he looks at you he’s not really looking at you.

He’s looking through you.

Into your soul.

And it hurts.

He knows how you move…what your beliefs are…which foot you use to step forward with…what your dominant hand is…and what you had for breakfast…three nights ago…yeah, that’s right…nights. He knew you ate your breakfast for dinner that night. All by observing how you hold yourself, how you behave in public, hold your drink, your mannerisms. The lies you’re telling agents and editors…your friends (you bastard!).

Special Forces training.

Ninja Kung-fu sfumare training.

So, when I read that blog post, those—and similar passages—where he always asks different questions than your average non-Green Beret (like, “There’s what they are saying and there is what they are meaning.“), it brought me back to that dark, crowded bar. To observing the silent, restrained “Quiet Professional” (because, make no mistake about it, however Bob described himself to the public, to the unlucky target-of-opportunity who tries to strike up a conversation with him…at least at that point in his life…Bob was still wound up in his SF mode from what I observed…) as he continued to stalk the jungles of his past….

He was frigging sizing up everybody…the layout of the bar…and why those who built the bar built it the way they did…and what were (and are) their thoughts on the current political climate….

I returned to my conversation. Tossed out (I thought) a rather well-placed laugh.

When I next looked over to Bob—

He was looking directly at me.

Eyes laser-like. Full of knowing.

He took a sip from his drink.

Never blinked.

I peed my pants.

He fricking knew everything about me—I damned-well felt my soul being downloaded into him.

What does that feel like?

Like your guts are being sucked out through your you-know-what. And the accompanying vacuum is like a black hole in your colon.

He knew I’d been eying him.

Knew I thought I knew what he was doing….

I checked myself. Yup, still peeing my pants.

Felt Number 2 close at hand.

I blinked.

Gone. He was gone.

Had he ever really been there?

I saw him—or thought I did—a couple times after that…but every time I blinked, he was no longer there. Curiously, during the rest of the conference I had the strangest urge to tug at my earlobes, come to my feet, and belt out a few choruses of Zip-e-de-do-da! in the middle of conference sessions.

More SF Ninja mind tricks?

I may never know.

Anyway, I like how Bob thinks. His blog posts go counter to traditional thinking (pun intended). He analyzes everything.

Motivations. Outcomes. Potentials. Probabilities. Blueprints.

He is the very definition of Special Forces: unconventional.

He is someone to listen to. Learn from.

Observe.

But just realize that whatever you think you’re observing about Bob…is only part of the picture…if it’s even there at all.

Sfumare.

He’s a master at this stuff. A master at obfuscation.

A master of unconventional writefare.

And he has his Terminator Vision set on you.

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Fine Print: Mr. Mayer may surely be analyzing why I wrote this. Or not. In any event, I apologize, Mr. Mayer, for the current state of my mind and whatever you unearth in there. This post was written purely for the story and nothing else (it’s always about the story with me…even if it embarrasses me). No disrespect is intended to Mr. Mayer’s Green Beret background or himself as a person—I have nothing but respect for this guy and all his efforts in the publishing industry. He’s unconventional and forward thinking. We need more of this in many areas of life and I applaud him. Thank you, Mr. Mayer, for all you’ve done and continue to do…and thanks for not showing up behind me at my desk (yes, I just checked six…) after having posted this…

…at least I don’t think you’re that slightly different-looking part to my wallpaper I’ve never noticed before behind me and why the hell are my earlobes so damned itchy….

Bob Mayer’s Write on the River site: https://writeitforward.wordpress.com/

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Follow Me If You Wanna Live

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The other day, as I was working on my newest manuscript, an action/adventure conspiracy theory, and fielding some tweets and such, it dawned on me in a way it had never really “reached me” that when you gather a following, you’ve created, well, an extended family. And as with your traditional family, you don’t really want to let your family “down” in anything you do. This includes (in the not-exactly-saving-the-world writer life I live, cause I know some are actually saving lives out there…) blog posts, tweets, responding to e-mails, grippin’-and-grinnin’ out in the “wild,” in public, et cet.

Yeah, I knew this on an intellectual level, but it just kinda hit me in a way that made me shake my head as if hit by a haymaker.

It’s not anywhere near like I’m any kind of a household name, but I do have a growing list of followers…and these people—yes, they’re flesh-and-blood people, not just “followers”—are following me for a reason. Now, sure that reason could be “just” to further their own purposes, and that’s fine, but it’s also because they might have found something of interest in me and my efforts—just like with any of you out there. When each of us clicks that “Follow,” I’m thinking many-to-most of us don’t just do it willy-nilly. That we kinda pick people who do something that interests us or aligns with us in some way. So, the reverse is true. That just hit me in a deeper, Zen-like way the other day.

We’re upholding a “public trust,” of sorts. We all are, those of us who publicly perform anything. And it behooves us to do our best in not letting people down with our efforts. Not discounting our audience. Putting forth our best efforts. Caring about what we put out into the Universe.

And then I thought about my work. Good Lord, what would happen were I to actually sell this series of mine…where people were to buy my efforts and actually want to see more?

Again, intellectually, knew all this. Was just experiencing this idea from another point of view.

And, no, I’m not jumping the gun. Just toying with concepts, as I usually do; finally fully grasping the emotional gravity of “just trying to sell a book.” Cause it’s far more than that—just selling books—about making money. It’s about creating relationships. It’s about

People.

Flesh and blood (you know…as opposed to zombies and all that undead rot—not that I’d turn any of them away, either!)

It’s about not letting anyone down with sub-par efforts. Respecting the readership.

That’s what I felt. A kind of far-reaching feel to everything, of an emotion depth extending out into the world. That everything I feel and do about what I read…each and every one of you do, too. You’re not just a stat number, a mere point-of-purchase drone. You’re a person, with real likes and dislikes, troubles, goals—a life—and you’re taking time out of your day to check me out, see what I’m about. Spend some time reading my words. And I need to respect that.

Perhaps I’m overthinking it, but I respect your choice in following me and I deeply thank each of you. I always promise to put my best effort forward, and I thank you for taking the time out of your day to stop by and read my posts, short stories, or novel.