Rommi's Top Stories

I want to open this pillar post by admitting that we're all tied to the pillar, in a manner of speaking. Each of us, I hope, has something in our life that is more important than writing. Or, perhaps, many things. This is the pillar to which our work is tied. Chained, even. Me, I wouldn't have it otherwise, as I explained in the Rommentary to my song On Your Way.

I started publishing on Vocal in October of 2021. Going on four years! When I first came here, we didn't have comment sections, but there were a lot of good folks, many of whom are still here, networking on Meta/facebook, trying to get some action going for each other.

I respect that a lot, but as an asocial person with time-consuming responsibilities besides, networking has always been a burden for me, which draws away from the quality and quantity of my work (more on this in the Rommentary to my top story Scattered Thoughts, Like Rain, which you'll find below in the Poetry section).

This doesn't seem to be the case for most folks. Networking seems to make many of you better writers, and I've no qualms with that. I've absolutely enjoyed watching writers grow on this platform. But for me, some measure of solitude is, also absolutely, required.

This is why reciprocal reads are so important to me. If you read my work, I will read yours--provided, of course, that you don't come across as a robot, a scammer, or just plain disingenuous.

I also peek at the feed, every once in a while, and select someone I've never read before so I can expand, little by little, my subscription list. But there's no way I can get to everyone on it all the time, so I tend to gravitate back to those with whom I've already developed a rapport... or with whom, at the very least, I have rapped.

On that note, some folks might think I'm out here handing out many a "Well-wrought!" like candy just to lure you my way.

I'm not. Sometimes I read work from folks who do not reciprocate as often as I read. I'm not expecting an exact tit-for-tat, but doing what I can in the time I have.

Then there are alternate examples, the most obvious of which would be dear Dharrsheena (find her work here), who reads so much more than she writes. I've genuinely enjoyed reading her work, and am always delighted and excited when she comments and I see something new on her profile.

The quality of the work I read here varies, but the quality of the people who hold my attention by putting in the work to improve (hence the screenshot of the definition above) and also graciously taking the time to read my own, is stellar, and I am thankful for that, dear reader.

What's most important is not that we are the best in every instance, but that we are sincere in our efforts to show the world the little part of our soul which completes the whole, for better or worse.

Not everyone does this through writing, of course.

Our work in the world is naturally best when it suits our innate capabilities; but it is not for me to decide what that means for another.

Such is their journey, and should we cross paths, my best practice must be to encourage them on their own before I go my way, though this does not mean we won't cross paths again!

Time, once spent, is never regained. Time, therefore, is not money, as the old saying goes, for money cannot replace it or buy it back.

Those important things in my life--that pillar to which I am chained--take precedent over social networking, as does writing. Writing is the way I process life, and it helps me to sort through those important things.

I wrote my first short story in grade one. It was a page long, on that gray paper with the wide dotted lines, so it was really just a paragraph. It's in a chest somewhere in the mess of memories my dearly departed mother left me, but without searching it out, I can recall it was about a superhero dog who shot basketballs from his paws.

I was told by multiple adults who knew me since I was born that I was speaking full sentences by one and having dialogues with them by the time I was five, so obviously, I'm not antisocial.

My pop once remarked (perhaps euphemistically) that I had the "gift of gab".

My creative impulse consumes me. I have a smartphone now, in which I can write anything at a moment's notice. But I used to carry a pen and a little notebook around with me everywhere, madly dashing the whirlwind of my thoughts onto the paper like a tweaked splatterpainter attacking a canvas.

Absent my notebook--which my absent-mind would every so often forget to grab--I would scribble on napkins, scrap paper, cardboard, fabric, or myself, if necessary, to keep an idea.

I also left a lot of doggerel on bathroom stalls and white-painted walls. The statute of limitations having passed, I hope, for such meager youthful offenses, I am willing to admit it, though I am neither proud nor ashamed.

So without further ado, below are my top stories, organized by form, with two addendums:

It is all, in some way or another, Philosophy.

I created a third category for The ShambElla Saga, which is finished, and which I hope you will take the time to read in its entirety. Even so, those individual stories, I think, are accessible, even out of context.

I will be organizing them from most to least recent.

Poetry:

Prose:

The ShambElla Saga (this will be from least to most recent):