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The First Joker In The Deck
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TITLE (EDIT)
The First Joker In The Deck
DESCRIPTION
This is an essay about my personal philosophy, or lack thereof.
[1,098 words]
TITLE KEYWORD
Mind
AUTHOR
Kevin Myrick

K Myrick

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
I'm currently a College Student enrolled at Auburn University in Auburn, AL. I'm studying Political Science, but thinking of changing my major to English, or double majoring. I'm interested in computers, the outdoors and of course, writing. I read a lot instead of watching TV, because in truth there is nothing more of value to watch on TV anymore.
[December 2003]
AUTHOR'S OTHER TITLES (22)
A Conversation With God (Short Stories) Basically, its a short story with sort of a twisted view on the whole walking with god on the beach theme that you see around. I dunno, it was sort of one of those late night writes. Yeah, I'm an athe... [1,230 words]
A Gunslinger's Death Is Always Best (Short Stories) The Sixth in the Sierra Madre Stories, finally typed up for your enjoyment. [3,668 words] [Crime]
Chapter One: A Stiff Shot Of Southern Comfort (Novels) It's an idea I had for a novel, no title yet. No worries though, I'm sure I'll have something by chapter two. Enjoy! [1,314 words] [Literary Fiction]
Fireworks At Christmas (Short Stories) This is the fifth story in the continuing series called the Sierra Madre Stories. [3,274 words] [Literary Fiction]
Headboards And Tombstones (Short Stories) The fourth story in the Sierra Madre Series/Stories, this one is about the boyfriend mostly. Some backstory, some flashback. Hope everyone enjoys. [2,898 words] [Literary Fiction]
How To Read This Diatribe (Essays) The very beginning letter from myself to you about a new series of essays, stories, and miscellaneous things I'm writing about. [317 words] [Mind]
In The Beginning (Short Stories) The followup to "The Last Two Minutes of an Insane Man's Life", which takes the reader back to the beginning, retracing the steps to how he has a gun to his head. [1,225 words] [Literary Fiction]
Last Two Minutes Of An Insane Man's Life (Short Stories) The story of a man who is insane and has his inner demons leave him after trying to commit suicide. It ends ironically, I guess. Note: Strong Language and some sexual content. Not safe for children's ... [914 words] [Literary Fiction]
No Longer A Smoking America (Essays) I wrote this paper for my college english comp class, and decided it was worthy enough to publish. Maybe. Anyhow, take it with a grain of salt folks, and if you see something you think is wrong, pleas... [1,483 words] [Mind]
Roundabout Love (Short Stories) The story of two people who shouldn't be able to fall in love, but came together. [1,187 words] [Drama]
Sail Away (Short Stories) An autobiographical story that ends with a point about the quest for the meaning of life, and what the meaning of life is to me, the author. [1,295 words]
Six Of Hearts (Essays) First Post in my 52 series of essays on how I dislike social websites like thefacebook.com, and my adventures in online dating. [654 words] [Mind]
Something About Good Decisions (Novels) Chapter two of something else I've been working on. Taking the last chapter's comments into view, I've decided to shift away from the whole "writer as a main character" theme to "who are those two guy... [2,322 words]
Southern Roadtrips- Part One (Novels) The Prologue and First Two chapters of a novella I'm writing called "Southern Roadtrips". At least, that's what I'm calling it right now. Characters and Stories are based on fact, but I've taken creat... [3,315 words] [Travel]
Southern Roadtrips-Chapter Four (Novels) This chapter, while describing a small portion of my time in Chattanooga, does better to describe my feelings about myself and my parent's divorce. [1,442 words] [Travel]
The Death Of Smith And Jones In Sierra Madre (Short Stories) The next story in the "Sierra Madre Stories" series in which describes the death of Smith and Jones, two of the four who are responsible for the death of Mary. It also includes an interesting anecdote... [3,072 words] [Literary Fiction]
The Family Of Four (Non-Fiction) For my friends at college. [1,014 words]
The Four Of Clubs (Essays) Second part to the Four of Diamonds. It has been called "a bible." [2,726 words] [Mind]
The Four Of Diamonds (Essays) A bit of a rant about my generation's debt, prescription drugs, healthcare, and George W. Bush. Just read, I swear it's interesting. [1,963 words] [Mind]
The Man From Sierra Madre (Short Stories) The second in the "Sierra Madre Series" with more death and an interesting plot twist at the end. Or, at least I think it's interesting. [3,659 words] [Literary Fiction]
The Massacre Of Sierra Madre (Short Stories) The beginning of a series I'm calling "The Sierra Madre Stories", this is the first one in a long list of stories. It involves everyone's favorite subjects: Drugs, death and money. [3,637 words] [Literary Fiction]
Thinking About My Father (Short Stories) A Sort of Essay/Short Story about the relationship with my father. [979 words] [Literary Fiction]
The First Joker In The Deck
Kevin Myrick

My girlfriend, Jess, tells me that I should start off this first essay about my personal
philosophy. The only problem I can forsee with that idea is that at any given point in time,
I don't really have a personal philosophy about anything. This is how open to interpretation
and molding my mind is. Let us take the War in Iraq for example. I don't like the idea of war
to begin with, but felt it the only way to truly destroy the old regime under Saddam Hussein.
I don't like why we went into Iraq, and let's face it everyone, the whole weapons of mass
descruction reason is getting a bit old. (As a sidenote here, I should probably mention that a bunch
of people I know, who know people in high places like their father for instance, says that they did have
something. But what does that mean, something? I want more concrete proof damnit. I feel as a citizen of
the United States, a taxpayer at that, I should be given something. Just a little can of mustard gas.)

So I guess the only thing to do is to try to give you, as the reader, a bit of an understanding of how
my mind works to begin with. I get an idea in my head, or song stuck, and I fiddle with it for a
while. Try to mold it towards my own understanding of how I think the world works. And the world works
this way: everything, everyone, and pretty much all matter acts according to rules. And those rules
include, but are not limited to, gravity, physics, and most importantly, oxygen. Oxygen, or the consumption
of, is very important to humans, and other matter on this tiny green and blue speck in this big milky way
galaxy, so really, I call it a rule. Because in the abscence of this rule, we have chaos. And chaos
tends to make things suck. Thus, I like to think of this as a rule.

Now, it might be the paint fumes from where the painters just got done a few hours ago talking, but I
like to think of this as something to hold on to. And now, I guess I should get down to the nitty gritty
of who I like to think I really am. And that is a hopeless romantic dreamer. That's right, I'm a dreamer. And
I like to think I'm romantic, in some sense of the word. And yes, Jess disagrees with me on this, even though
she says she's kidding. (And now the ass kicking on her part will begin as soon as I post this.)

Part of this whole problem with being a hopeless romantic dreamer is that I inevitably think that things will
work out the way I want them to. Which is not the case at all. I reference pretty much my entire life up to
this post as a case study of why being a dreamer of any form is pretty much a sucky existence, except for the
love part. The love part is cool because most of the time, things do sort of work out the way you think it
will. Or, if you will, dream it to come out. But until one of my dreams comes true, I'm not holding my breath.
I don't really forsee the likelihood of me becoming the greatest novelist of all time happening, but I'll settle
for being published and getting to teach college kids. I mean, that would be cool. At least, I think it would be.

Oh, and just to be perfectly honest here, my mind jumps around. A lot. It's something I can't help, and I think
it's mild Attention Deficit Disorder. But then again, when I need to have razor focus on something, I can do it.
So who knows. And since I don't do drugs, we can't blame it on the drugs, or the drinking. (Unless you count
the pack of cigarettes I smoke a day along with the pot of coffee. Mmmm, Mexican Hat Dance coffee. That stuff
is the shit.)

But I should go back to the original point of this whole spiel, which is to talk about my personal philosophy,
or lack thereof. Which shows the point that most of the people in the "greatest generation" (also known as the
Generation who fought in World War II) make of anyone from Generation X onwards, and that is that we are a bunch
of pot smoking slackers who like to wear their hair long and read bad poetry. (If you want to read good poetry,
go for Edgar Allen Poe, John Donne, or my personal favorite, the eminant slacker himself, Allen Ginsberg.) And
in some instances, I agree with the views of that generation. We've had no great war, no great depression to be
able to truly find the stuff we're made of. And we're currently being burdened with a War on Terror. Well, we're
being burdened with a lot of things. Too many to list here at one time. But at some point, I'm sure I'll cover all
of these topics at one time or another over the year. Especially the Environment, Hybrid Vehicles, Perscription
Medicine, HMO's and Doctors (any why I don't like them), Social Security and why we're going to hell.

Did I mention that, we're all going to hell for one reason or another. I'll get there. It'll be close to the end.
When you might actually stop reading this whole diatribe over everything under the sun I can think of to write about.
So you can pretty much stop now if you're a gun-toting (I like guns though, so don't worry. Nothing bad about guns)
bible-thumping republican oil tycoon. Or if you're a pinko commie liberal who thinks the worst thing in the world
BESIDES the War in Iraq is the fact the next Yanni album doesn't sound like the last one, which by the way, is your
favorite. That, or you can put those ideas aside and read for a bit.

Just remember, I have no personal philosophy. And this is livejournal (or, in this case, Storymania.) So if you've got
something to say back, say it. Just don't think I won't use these comments against you later. I tend to like to reply to
my comments with very thought out, well researched retorts that make you look well, not so clever anymore. But its more
likely that you'll hate me and stop reading in about five seconds, so I'll give you that.

Now you can stop reading.

 

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COPYRIGHT NOTICE
© 2005 Kevin Myrick
STORYMANIA PUBLICATION DATE
January 2005
NUMBER OF TIMES TITLE VIEWED
1987
 

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