Screenplay

Well, regardless of popular opinion, I do more with my writing than just blabber about things. This a screenplay Im working on. The story is mainly true, but somethings will be changed an added to add depth to the story. This short part ends aburptly, but if anyone cares to see the rest as it progresses I will be happy to update it as it is written. The story is about the rise and fall of small town football dynsty.



The following events are based on a true story. Some names have been changed, and events added to promote to the story line, and some are my own analogies that are not proven true.

-Shot of players practicing, Coach Gillispie standing to the side with a clip board, watching, and pointing and yelling-

Narrator: Football. A sport to millions, a way of life to thousands of kids in small town America.

-Shot of football players entering the gym during a pep rally-

Narrator: I guess that’s what turned me away from it. I loved the attention.

-Shot of the narrator entering the gym with the rest of the football players-

Narrator: But I was young, and I made some mistakes.

-Shot of narrator in the coaches office-

Narrator: Im not going to play anymore Coach, football isn’t for me.

-Shot of the Coach with a saddened look on his face. Shot changes to the narrator standing on the track at sun set, still in his pads after his last practice, a few minutes after telling his coach he was quitting. Another larger coach walks up behind him-

Other Coach: Son I know how you feel. It’s a lot of work and a lot of stress, but its worth it.

Narrator: It isn’t what I want Coach Corkren.

Corkren: Your gonna regret this for the rest of your life. . . What grade are you in son?

Narrator: 9th.

Corkren: If you stayed in the weight room you could make it. You’ve got the talent.

-The narrator looks at the coach for moment before walking away. Shot changes to a party the following Saturday. The narrator in the middle of it.-

Narrator: In our small town we had never had a successful football program. . . until G came.

-Shot goes back to the practice. G slapping kids on the helmet, hollering and encouraging them.-

Narrator: Coach G came to Lawrence county when I was in 7th grade, and he turned our football program around. We was a 4A school, and we hadn’t beaten or small 1A county rivals
Hatton in 10 years.

Shot goes to the Hatton and Lawrence County football game. Coach G and Coach Corkren standing on the sidelines with head sets on, running up and down the sidelines. The camera focuses on the field. The quarter back taking the snap and rolling around, completing a long touch down pass. The shot goes back to Coach G jumping up and down, and then having the water cooler dumped on him. Shot goes to the score board. Home(LC) 35, Away(Hatton) 0.-

Narrator: Everyone was behind him. The booster club build him a house, and his son fitted in at school. He took us to a 8-2 season, the first winning season we has seen in nearly 18 years. I was playing Junior Varsity at the time. But when it came time for me to make my decision to play varsity my heart wasn’t in it.

Shot changes to the Narrator after his last practice, wearing shorts and a cut off t-shirt. A teenager walks up to him.-

Teenager: Ben, you quit?

Narrator(Ben): Yeah. I thought you said you were going to?

Teenager: Man. . . my parents said I need to keep playing. They said I wouldn’t have to work as long as I was playing.

-Ben shakes his head and opens his car door and pulls off. The other teen watches him go, shaking his head.-

The Voice That Isn't Heard

Sometimes I sit and ponder the meaning of my existence. There are so many questions in life; what am I going to do for a living, where am I going to live, who am I going to share it with, but all of these fall short in comparison to the significant of my existence. No matter what I do or how I live is irrelevant if I don’t fulfill my destiny.

I am a strong believer in destiny. I think every single person was given a purpose, a meaning to their life. There is meaning in every thing, there is "reason." I don’t think we all have a "fate" that no matter what the circumstances are that we have no say in the matter, but I believe we have a meaning. That somehow we are suppose to make a difference, or impact someone’s life, and leave our footprints in their heart.

I think I was meant to write my feelings and my ideas. I’m not saying that I was gifted with the infinite knowledge to know everything from every angle or every aspect of human nature, don’t think that. But I do believe I was meant to say what I think, feel, and understand. Everyone has basic principals that makes them the way they are, and if you can understand their motives you can better understand why they think in the mind set that they do.

So as long as there is breathe in me, and a pen or a keypad in my reach, I will remain a voice, even if it isn’t heard.

Well, I know its been awhile since I wrote last and lot of things have been going on. First of all my computer crash a few weeks ago and I lost every song I had ever written. Its a depressing thing(I only had about five or six memorized.) I guess I'll just have to pick the peices back up and start all over.

Secondly, schools started back and Im in my senior year now. I have early dissmissal so I get out at 11:20. Its almost like Im not even there. I have really iffy feelings about this year. I want to go to college and major in journalism, but I honestly don't think I have the capabilites to be a prosfessional writer. I write raw and from the heart, and its going to be difficult finding a job that wants a writer like me instead of some politicaly correct writer that has as many dimensions to him as a peice of paper.

And most of all. . . I'm scared. All my life I've know school. Walking down the hallways with my friends and holding my head up high has always been my element. Im at my best at school because I know the politics of it, I know the humanity of my teachers, and I know the social scene of my friends. The world is differant, and I dont know if Im as good at the world as I am at high school.

I would like to say Hi to razz. I've missed reading your posts, and someday I hope I delevelop my own unqie style as well as you have.

Im glad to be back, and maybe someone out there somewhere is glad to have me back as well.

A Kid With Dixie on His Mind,
-Ben Thompson

Doors.

Im writing this post as a response to a question that I have heard numerous times, "How does your mind work when you start writing?"

----

Imagine seeing a long hall way, lined with hundreds of doors on each side. Each door has a name etched on it, but some only have question marks. Some of the doors open easily, with a simple turn of the door knob. Others remain locked.

When I take a pen and hold in my hands, or when I stare at an empty word doc., my mind goes to this hallway. I stand at the center surrounded by the doors. . . and then it happens.

All of the doors open, I dont mean they gently creak open, they fling open with so much vigor its as if they have been waiting all my life to open. My hand meets the paper and I start writing.

My mind races into each room, exploring it. And I keep writing, writing, writing. I write with so much intensity I break out in a cold sweat. I enter each room, exploring it, understanding it.

Some of the question marks are erased, their name replacing what I did not understand before. Love, Hope, Fear, Ambition, Science, Religion, Death; all of these doors are there.

And as soon as it began its over and Im left on my knees in the hall way. I look down at the paper, and sometimes I cant even recognize what I wrote.

Mike.

I have never tried to push my religious beliefs on anyone, because God knows Im nowhere near the example of Christianity. But this is story that I think needs to be told.
----

My Dads best friend while I was growing up was a neighbor of ours that went to the same high school as him. His name was Mike. He was a ladies man, a mans man. In my perspective as a young boy, he was the embodiment of a man. A hard worker, charismatic, everyone who ever meet him instantly fell in love with him.

As I grew older he was always there. He use to go hunting, my brother and my Dad and Mike, and Mike would sit on the tailgate of his truck and tell me these amazing stories of all the mischief he had gotten into when he was younger. We would sit and laugh all night long, back when life was simple.

Mike was a heavy smoker. Whenever you crossed paths with Mile he would always have a Mountain Dew and a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. It was his persona, it added to his character.

Mikes mother had always been active in the small Church of Christ located in the heart of our small community. But for some reason Mike was never a religious man, his life style didn't suit religion.

About two years ago Mike was doing some work around his mothers house, cutting up trees with a chainsaw for fire wood. He slipped and cut his leg and it required some stitches. After a few weeks Mike went back to the hospital to have the stitches taken out, Mike never left the hospital.

Now that I think about it he most have been sick for sometime. But he wasn't the kind of guy to let you know he wasn't feeling right. After they took the stitches out Mike must have told the doctor to run some test. Mike was dying of lung cancer. And his condition went on rapid fire. He went from working in the yard to being on a hospital bed in less than a week.

He was in the ICU for probably a week before we went to see him. He was slipping in and out of a coma, so the doctors would only allow the family to go back and see him. So my Mother and my Sister and I spent the time we were there talking to his family.

After about three hours Mikes mother comes from the ICU crying. Everyone went limp, and somewhere through her sobs she managed to say "No! No! These are happy tears."

Mike had woken from a three day coma and said that he wanted to be baptized, and that he wanted my father there. They called my dad at work and within an hour he was there. Everyone else had relocated to the water therapy center, and the preacher had already been there comforting Mikes mother. So I elected to stay and wait on my father.

When my dad got of the elevator I quickly motioned for him to follow me. We raced down the halls of the hospital and made it just in time to watch them lower Mike into the water, and come out as a new man. And now that I think back, that had to be the hardest part for me. Seeing my hero, someone I had always looked up to, so weak with the disease that he couldn't even lift his own arms made me understand the mortality of man.

After the baptism they relocated Mike to a normal hospital room so more people could see him. My father and I walked beside the stretcher and talked to Mike as we made the trip to his new room. Mike was losing his voice, but he ackownledge that he knew my father and I, and I remember him smiling as we talked to him.

When we made it to the new room we all stood around his bed. Me, my father, my sister, my mother, Mikes brother, Mikes mother, and Mikes daughter, and the preacher. He all held hands in a circle and prayed. I thank God that I was graced with the honor to be a part of that moment.

Three days later Mike died. And when we got the call I sat down and started writing. Because sometimes all I can do is just write(maybe sometime I will add what I wrote into here). And I gave it to Mikes mom, just to help her in her time of sorrow.

At Mikes funeral, at the very end, the preacher read what I wrote, and credited me for writing it. There, at that moment, in the remembrance of a great man and our last good-bye, they gave -me- the final statement. That was the most honoring day of my life.

That Should Be Me

When I walk into the doors of small town high school I walk past the group of gothics. The outcasts, the misunderstood ones. I say hey to a few that speak to me and I walk on down the hall to my locker, where my group of friends stand each morning. As I walk I see a kid sittin in the hall against the wall. Dressed in black with long shaggy hair, a note book proped on his bent knees, and hes lost somewhere inside his words as he trasnlates them to paper. They dont understand him, they look down on him, and sometimes I feel like I should be him.

God, I Gotta Get Out of Here

Is it normal to feel so alone at such a young age? I don't mean alone as being un-accepted or popular. I've always had friends, more than I care for, and I "fit in." But this place, this county, this town, it feels so... shallow.

Everyone here is content. Their content with working in a factory on an assembly line from nine to five everyday. Content with raising a few kids and sending them to the same high school they went to. Content with dying without ever seeing the world in all its glory. Content without analyzing the depts of their emotions, and pondering the questions of life.

Sometimes I feel cursed with this mind God has given me. This artistic nature to try to produce something beautiful, and understand my emotions, and think deeper than the content factory worker. Its great in some sense, because some may say that Im talented. But imagine not being able to sleep at night because the windmill in my mind never stops turning. I lie awake, sometimes on the near point of an anxiety attack, thinking about death, or loneliness, or religion, or trying to justify my anger and resent. And I dont drift off to sleep. I become so exhausted sleep over takes me. And when I finally do sleep, its always black. No dreams. I remember having five dreams my entire life.

And then I have this desire, born of flame, and burning deep down within the very essence of who I am. Its burning, burning... burning. Its my calling. And Im not sure what its direction is, but its goal is greatness.

And sometimes at night, I lie awake thinking about the road, and adventuring like the hippies of yesterday.
God, I gotta get out of here.

That Old Oak Tree

I live on small plot of land that my mothers family has owned for over four generations. And standing tall, with its roots resting deep in the ground, is an old oak tree. Its branches still blossom with its green leaves, but they hang low, crooked down by the passing of time.

Underneath it, my grandfather purposed to my grandmother. My mother found solace sitting in its limbs as a little girl. My sister would hide in it, only when me and my brother were annoying her. And my dad would grill underneath it on those hot summer days, because it offered him the best shade from the treacherous Alabama sun. Underneath that same oak tree, I wrote my first song.

And now, even as time passes, I still find my self sitting under its branches, with my guitar and a pen and pad. I feel the wind, and I hear its song. I watch subconsciously as the shadows of the branches sway over my pad. I lean back against its bark, and wonder, why can't I be that oak tree.