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Author’s Note
Burnt Bread
It came to be while watching the Discovery Channel. Enough said.
Now, I know that the first thing that popped into your head when you saw ‘Rites of Passage’ was that Indigo Girls album, right? But here’s something else to chew on: The ultimate rite of passage in the Massai culture for boys is when, from age 13 to 16, they are mass circumcised and shunned to the wilderness of East Africa for two years. The only way to complete the rite is to successfully kill a lion.
Up for it?
We see it all the time, people suffering or working to belong. College fraternities humiliating the new guy until he either gives in and leaves, or goes numb to the torture. High School cliques making anyone wanting to join the group get a tattoo, smoke weed, stab a classmate. Nobody just accepts you; there’s no place you can go without proving yourself. Even when joining a church, you have to do something. You have to dip your head in water to walk alongside Jesus. You will never be accepted for being just you; you will only ever be as good as your best impression, your best lie- your coldest stare. Even with street gangs you have to shoot someone. Everyone has their own challenges dropped down to them from generations and generations before them. In high school as a freshman, you are beat up on, made fun of, all of it to test your endurance, your dedication. It might sound funny, but the leader of your little groups went through the same shit. The leader is just the reflection of his leader, who was a reflection of his leader, who was a reflection of his leader, who was a reflection of someone so messed up as to decide that any new member must drink cow urine. Sleep well knowing that somewhere a boy scout is pissing on an electric fence, one only wonders where this originated. Even a police department plays its little pranks. The military has boot camp, the world has college. In a world where some grotesque task must be performed to join a country club or Friday night writing seminar, what is sacred anymore? Where the “I want you” of Uncle Sam is as big a lie as the “I love you” of your girlfriend. Nobody wants you; nobody needs you. They don’t want your abs that aren’t rock hard; they don’t need your tainted smile or your extensive pornography collection. No group in the world is looking for you the way you are, the overdeveloped illusion of what came out of your mothers womb. They aren’t interested in your s ob stories, your troubles. If you can’t deliver your life story in a thirty minute TV slot or cram it into a three page resume, they don’t need you. You will never belong to anything, because the second someone takes you in, the moment someone even considers giving you a paycheck, you’ve lost you. You are no longer the individual living breathing human, but a snake. You are a number amongst numbers rather than a face amongst names. You see, the world has tricked you into believing that you are special, or even remotely important. In fact, you have become an object. So why bother taking that first step, you might ask? The answer is quite simple, if you could just step right over here…
Hubert H. Humphrey
The kids in Eden’s Cross are mostly a well-behaved bunch. They play tag, or marbles, or swim in Doherty pond. They build forts and lemonade stands and finance make-believe kingdoms. Except for on June 4th. When the summer months sweep in, warm and soft, the children go curiously quiet. They keep to themselves, sparing only a few words at mealtimes. Their parents (the ones that were born in Eden’s Cross, at least) stay mostly silent, too. Except for the occasional, worried look.
Then, at last, when the evening of the 4th breaks, the oldest of the children troop down to the pond and gather by the old willow on the far bank. Between two old roots, just inches clear of the water, a hole gapes in the mud. One by one, the children reach into the hole, far enough that the mud stains one sleeve on their t-shirts. If they’re lucky, nothing happens. They pull theirs arms back out, grin foolishly at their fears, and wait for the next child. If they’re unlucky…
Mr. Peters still has two tiny marks on his arm, right above the wrist. And he was born before the war.
Every community has them. They might not be nearly so sinister as the ritual at Eden’s Cross, but people just don’t seem to be capable of not celebrating the ways that they grow up. There are birthdays and graduations and religious ceremonies—quiet or extravagant—to mark all the milestones in lives. These are official rites of passage: the kind that other people give to you. Often, they involve passing through an ordeal of some sort. In Kenya, the Masai tribe awards social status to any young male who goes out onto the savannah and comes back dragging a dead lion. In America, communities celebrate the souls the survive high school.
Of course, this isn’t the only form that rites of passage can take. That would be boring, and writing should never be boring. Almost unnoticed beside the big, ceremonial…ceremonies, are the personal rites of passage: the kind that you give yourself. These aren’t the same for every person, but they tend to take similar forms. First friend. First sports team. First kiss. First love-struck smile. First time striking out on your own. First time lost in an airport. First story.
With personal rites of passage, you only realize that they’re happening as they’re happening. You might be walking back to the car, chatting about the movie you saw, laughing a little too long because you’re drunk on the night, then all of a sudden you find yourself leaning in, and—rite of passage. You might not have seen it creeping up on you, but you most certainly know it when it’s happening.
With the third kind of rite of passage, you don’t even realize what it is until much later. Because of that, I’m going to call it an ‘invisible’ right of passage. There’s no fanfare to herald it, and there’s no flash of recognition when suddenly you’re in the middle of it. Just today, I found myself thinking “Huh. So that was sophomore year.” Not once, during the last two semesters did I think “Hey, so this is sophomore year.” I mostly thought things like “This paper needs to be done yesterday,” and “I would slaughter villagers for an enchilada right about now,” and “I shall live like a decadent king off of these pilfered cafeteria tea packets.” Now that the school year has just about sidled to a close, I can look back on all those thoughts and lump them under the category of ‘sophomore year.’
So, what does this all have to do with writing? I suppose the enchiladas bit might not be relevant, but everything else relates to writing because it relates to people. As a general rule, people tend to write stories about people. If you, dear reader, find yourself writing a story about a person, keep in mind that characters grow in the same ways that we do. The fantasy genre might be known for the first type of rite of passage (“Oh, it’s Beowulf’s first smoten Grendle! Hrothgar will be so pleased,”) but that doesn’t mean it can’t incorporate the other two. Build some personal and invisible rites into your storyline. You might like the results.
As I was lurking around
the forums for some humor or arguments, I found an author that might
fit the bill for this month’s theme.
His
name is iamthedave.
Anyone up for some
strange fantasy?
Ever wondered what it
was like to switch sexes?
This probably
sounds like a really bad advertisement, but iamthedave went the
entire ‘create your own fantasy’ route and came up with some real
gender bending rites of passage. He didn’t skip on how this would
affect the culture, either. In his publications, he goes to great
pains to shape the culture and storyline of all the species he
creates.
The gender changing is an
integral part of two of his races, and they both seem to have a
different meaning to the culture of those species. It’s pretty
interesting to see the mindsets of either one and how they undergo
the whole rite/ceremony.
So if you’re
into alternative fantasy or if you’re sick of elves and dwarves, it
might be worth your while to glance over his stories a little. It
certainly presents a new look at how you can fiddle with making a
race, not to mention that it’s a good read.
This one is a little harder to define than its predecessors. Rites of passage aren’t as simple as, say, superpowers or monsters. However, the phrase is defined.
rite of passage, a ritual or ceremony signifying an event in a person's life indicative of a transition from one stage to another, as from adolescence to adulthood.
Almost every culture has a tradition of passing a boy through some sort of test to become a man. With some, he had to go out for a period of time and live off the land. If he came back, he passed. Some traditions call for fasting and prayer. Very intense prayer. Others may require a certain act to “seal the deal,” as it were. I think we all know what I mean by that...
The only thing that is the same through all cultures that have traditions of a rite of passage is that it is only for guys. Girls don’t participate, especially in the ‘living off the land’ ones. I suppose the only way for a girl to transition to a woman is to be able to bear children.
In light of this, I propose a challenge. I wasn’t aware we could do this until a month ago. But now... there’s no stopping me! Ha!
In any case, I would like to see a story or poem or short story or even haiku about a girl’s rite of passage. It can be some sort of defiance story where she pretends to be male to prove her worth or it can be a culture that offers a non-gender-biased rite of passage. She has to be of appropriate age, though. Twenty-two year old people don’t exactly qualify to become adults through a series of tests. Unless, of course, you want to make up an entire civilization where people age differently... that sounds like too much trouble, though.
If you participate in this challenge, I only ask that you notify me (felicia13) that you’re going to do it. Any and all information you need to contact me can be found on my profile.
Back to the main point of this article. The comparison of boys and men.
Boys are immature, act rashly, and often care about nothing but themselves. There are instances where this isn’t true (my brother, Henrico, for example), but I think it applies to boys in general. Men, on the other hand, are only slightly more rational and are still very immature.
The difference, you ask? Well, there’s the age gap, for one. Boys are under twelve. Men are older than twenty-one. Real men can drink whenever they want to. That weird place between thirteen and twenty is sometimes called ‘adolescence.’ Awkward, to say the least. Most rites of passage occur during this period.
It doesn’t make sense to test someone very young for skills they will need as an adult. So, the lull period between ‘kid’ and ‘grown-up,’ becomes the best time to do the testing. Hooray for teenagers.
Personally, I don’t know why the traditional rites of passage have been discontinued. Sending the youth of today out into the wilderness with little more than a knife and the clothes on their backs would be good for tomorrow. Imagine leaders who could actually lead and people who could stay with their ideals no matter what. If you have to survive alone for a few weeks, your priorities suddenly get straightened out.
Honestly? Rites of passage are as old as mankind because we know, instinctively, that not all people are fit to lead. If you can prove to everyone that you are capable of taking care of yourself by yourself, you prove, in part, that you can also take care of others. We all need a leader to turn to in hard times because, as a whole, society would be lost if left to its own devices. Leaders provide that support that we so desperately need.
If we let just anyone lead, bad, horrible things can happen. Rites of passage separate the boys from the men and allow the good leaders to stand out among their peers. Such tradition is not best forgotten... notice how many issues have only become problematic since we dispensed of things like rites of passage.
Society needs a wake-up call sometimes. Consider this the warning alarm before you hit snooze.
Hannah Arendt
It happens midway through the movie. You know the scene. Usually it’s right after the hero has suffered a crushing defeat, renewed his determination, and found a mentor. The mentor then takes the hero aside, crouches down, and whispers the secret to his eventual victory: the training montage. Then, sometimes, there’s a song.
The point of the training montage is simple. Film costs money and audiences get restless in long movies. No one wants to see the male lead execute four hundred push-ups on the stepping stones over a waterfall. Mostly no one. It’s much easier to condense the days (possibly years) of heroic aerobics into a five minute segment. That way, everything stays nice and credible and no one’s money is wasted.
Of course, there are a few fundamental differences between books and movies. Techniques that work perfectly in one sometimes need a little revision before they can work in the other. One of the things that regular ol’ writers have that screenwriters do not have is loads of time to play with. A written training sequence can take pages, chapters, or engulf entire books with its papery maw. Believe me. I’ve seen it happen. 8½ by 11 jaws gnashing, confetti flying…it’s not a pretty sight.
The obvious solution here is to take the training montage format from film and drop it right into your story. Here’s what that would look like:
Beowulf stands in the middle of a windy moor. His brown, braided hair cascades over his shoulder. Cue the opening guitar chords.
Beowulf is engaged in fisticuffs with a dragon. The dragon looks down its monocle at him, then floors him with a right hook.
Cold water pounds down around him as Beowulf meditates under a waterfall.
An old woman in a cave beats Beowulf at chess.
More waterfall.
The dragon, tentatively kicking Beowulf’s unconscious body.
More waterfall.
Beowulf grabs the chess board, and chases the old woman out of the cave with it.
Beowulf is still meditating under the waterfall, but the waters have parted around him out of respect. His rugged shoulders are completely dry.
Beowulf, roundhouse-kicking the dragon in the jaw.
Beowulf stands in the middle of the windy moor. His brown hair cascades over his shoulder. Fade out music.
That was a little choppy, wasn’t it? There’s a certain style to it, of course. With the right sort of story, it could work. However, there’s a way to adapt the training montage to any story.
I’m not a film student, but I suspect that the training montage is driven mostly by its rapid transition between scenes. It doesn’t linger. It doesn’t develop the scenario it’s presenting. It just flashes an image to the audience, then moves on to the next one. Scene. Cut. Scene. Cut. Peek-a-boo. The audience has to fill in the stuff in between the scenes on their own.
It isn’t very easy for a writer to use this sort of transition, though. It’s a little bit too quick to flow evenly. Paper tends to be slower than celluloid, so it’s hard to cut from image to image mid-scene without the reader noticing. Instead, switch from image to image at the end of every scene. Try to keep these scenes comparatively short (unless the whole story is about your character’s training. Don’t worry. It happens.) Inside of a chapter, you should have covered enough training to give your hero a sizeable leg up against the forces of evil. Or good. Neutral. Whatever.
One last note, before I wrap this up: don’t be afraid to develop your character during his training. If he’s honing his skills out of determination, desperation, or an urge to impress the ladies, he’s probably going through a lot of mental changes, too. Maybe you should let him take a break between training sessions to talk with his friends or his mentor. Yes, it can be cliché. Mid-montage conversations tend to follow a certain formula. They’re still a valuable asset in character development, and an important counterpart to the ancient and venerated training montage.
W. Somerset Maugham
Okay. Quite often in stories, I noticed that the main character is going or goes through a pivotal point in his life. Whether it be something like an age growth, like turning sixteen and officially into a man (or woman), a growth in rank or station, like getting a college degree or rising in rank in an army, or even a mental growth, like changing their views on something. Point is, most or all stories are about growth.
Now that we are past that, there is quite often a ceremony involved in such goings-on, and you need to know when to implement these ceremonies into your story. If it were a big deal to join the national army in your story, then there would probably be a ceremony involved. Even from thinking of ceremonies, you can get great ideas for new stories. With me so far?
Now, lets say that your story is about a boy who is picked out for a wizard academy. Depending on how you want to model said academy, there may or may not be a ceremony involved. If the academy takes on one student a year, then yes, it is fair to say there is some sort of welcoming party in his honor. Even if it is a group and they are all taken at once, it would probably involve some sort of ceremony.
But also existing in this writing world is such a thing as reasons not to have a ceremony. Who is going to throw a Going-Off-to-College-Party for a street urchin? Why would, during the quest to stop his personal evil overlord, a hero stop for a party about he turning sixteen and into a man? Some things make no logical sense and can be easily picked out by most writers.
In conclusion, let us review:
Ceremonies in Rites of Passage are important and perhaps necessary to writing Many stories involve some growth, and therefore may need a ceremonyBut there are some instances where a ceremony is impractical
And there you have it. A short guide to ceremonies involving Rites of Passage.
Stories can be built around rites of passage. But let’s break it down.
Most rites of passage if not all have to do with family tradition. Therefore, your reader will recognize any sort of mission to prove oneself in one’s family as a rite of passage, though it’s not strictly limited to that. It could be for a cult, a sorority, a group of friends…
I won’t go into major details, but here are some ideas and guidelines.
Good scenarios: Path of Death deal. Going into some dark cave or something and having obstacles to bypass, stuff to fight, et cetera with an item to obtain. Toss in a couple of riddles if you can. Everyone loves riddles if they’re part of a story.
Challenging one’s father (or elder of some sort) in a battle. Not necessarily a grudge/hate battle, but that’s totally acceptable.
Hunting some kind of beast with a simple weapon.
Following in a father’s/brother’s footsteps and accomplishing what they did (not like saving the world—something small that can be accomplished without making the entire story about it).
Okay, there’s some ideas. Maybe you’ve got some better ones. Good! Using your own idea lets you mold it into its own shape; your own preference. Now…a smattering of guidelines.
First off, you need your character to be young. Young being less than 20, preferably less than 18. Usually, rites of passage are more of an archaic thing—you won’t see one happening in the middle of a bustling Chicago-esque place or era. In fiction, a rite of passage had better be something crazy-huge and really marvelous if you want to entertain your reader. Killing monster: good. Drinking from some special chalice: bad.
Rites of passage, by definition, carry a heavy weight. I.e., they aren’t something that is going to be done quickly and certainly not easily. You must make it a great challenge for your character not only to enhance the story but to give it realism and a true sense of importance.
Such events as these also carry an important psychological strain to accompany their physical aspect—or it can be an entire mentally-stimulating bit for your character. Regardless, it has to take a toll on their mindset. A negative one, possibly one that impairs their ability to fight or think clearly.
Reward. It doesn’t necessarily have to be material—it could be recognition or acceptance—but there absolutely must be motivation both for your reader and your character. You could shroud the reward in mystery; that’s an effective tactic to hook your reader and make him wonder, What will come of this?
There. That is all I can muster up from what is a very busy mind as of now. Hopefully it helps you out—if not, I can live with it. Thanks for taking a look-see and stay tuned to Stop The Press!
Kahlil Gibran
Continued from the last edition of Stop the Press.
The burned out buildings and crumbling walls of Slash’s subconscious started to shimmer and undulate, bending Slash’s twisted sense of reality even further out of whack. The children of Mrs. Dullen’s English class were deeply confused as the dead world melted around them and revealed the classroom with its chalkboard, desk, apple, and the works.
“Was that all just a dream?” Chad asked no one in particular, though someone in particular answered. Slash.
“It depends on your perception of reality, oh mighty imperceptible one. You just can’t listen to me, can you? Honestly.” Slash seemed aggravated, as though something had woken him up from a good dream.
“Wow, he’s not an eleven in the morning person, is he?” Brock commented, glad that he was no longer empathetic (otherwise he would have to endure Slash’s rage full-on) The twenty classmates heard a loud knock at the door; the only apparent reason for Slash’s awakening. Annie hopped up from her chair, pigtails flying, to answer the knock. She opened the heavy metal school door to a lanky black boy in all white with bleach blonde dreadlocks and incredibly light amber eyes.
“Hi! How may I help you?” she said perkily, blue eyes bright.
The boy looked a little fazed, as though he had been wandering for a long time. “Oh, hello. Is this Mrs. Dullen’s class? I’m her new student.” Annie nodded an affirmative to his question, and then ran over to Mrs. Dullen’s desk.
“Oh look, a note from Mrs. Dullen!” She called out to the whole class. The note told them that a new student from the private school down the road would be joining their class.
“Oh, so you must be Ryan!” Annie greeted the new boy, referring to the name on the note. The new kid nodded happily and stuck out his hand for a handshake. Annie shook it awkwardly, then sat back down at her desk. Ryan took the only seat that wasn’t already occupied by students or tissue boxes alike in the five by five classroom; a seat in front of Slash, next to Brock (the worst seat around).
“Now that you’re here, you need to do a few things to be accepted. A rite of passage, for the common folk.” Slash said quietly, his hat covering his face. Though he must have been grinning, because Brad continued in an eerie tone, “That’s right, Ryan; you must be accepted by our group or forever be an outcast.” The other students caught on and started acting cult-like, looking at Brad and Slash as their leaders (since they thought of it). Brad pulled Slash into a coat closet, saying “Slash and I need to confer-”
“In a coat closet?” Annie asked.
“Yes, in a coat closet, it’s our secret meeting room, remember?” Brad sighed and dragged Slash the rest of the way in.
In the coat closet, the two boys brainstormed for rite of passage ideas. They came up with a few good ones and walked out.
“Brad and I have discussed the terms of the passage, and have decided on three tasks that Ryan shall have to complete before he is admitted into our ranks.” Slash grabbed a piece of chalk and all of the students (but Ryan) prepared to go to his perception world. Disappointment ensued, however, when Slash simply wrote three tasks labeled 1 – 3.
1. Ryan must start and continue a discussion on Rites of Passage
2. Gain his superpower
3. Buy eighteen boxes of tissues or three bottles of cough medicine for Mrs. Dullen (she’s running out, you know)
Or he could just search for the missing eleven boxes of tissues that are around here somewhere.
Ryan laced his fingers together and put them behind his head. “That oughta be easy enough. Bring it on!” He leaned back in his chair and said “Rites of Passage. Lets start discussing.”
“Rite of passage – a significant transitional event. An event or act that marks a significant transition in a human life. A ceremony marking a changed status. A ceremony that marks somebody’s passage from one stage of life to another, for example, from childhood to puberty or from unmarried to married life.” Ned recited from the dictionary beside his desk. All of the students turned to Ryan to start the discussion.
“Well, the first thing I think of when I think of rites of passage would be admittance to an elite group,” He looked pointedly at Brad and Slash, “or the trials that members of Indian tribes had to go through in order to become men. In Battle of Jericho, a group of boys had to complete an array of tasks that varied from disgusting to dangerous in order to be a part of a highly respected group. In the end one of the members died, and the group reverted to their original, non-dangerous customs.”
“Preparations for a rite of passage or the rite itself can span most of the book, depending on how in-depth you go.” Brock piped up.
“Rites can be comical, such as Finding Nemo’s Ring of Fire passage. In order to be accepted in the fish tank clan, he had to swim through a stream of bubbles caused by a plastic volcano.” Chad commented.
“Rites of passage vary depending on gender, genre, and what you’re trying to get into. That’s why these rites seem simple; all you’re doing is being accepted by an English class.” Slash stated rather simply.
“At the skate park man, in order to be accepted into my skating clan, The Bruisers, you have to do a radical trick man! You should have seen my routine, it was extreme!” Bailey almost shouted, until Annie said “Inside voice, now Bailey. You know no one really cares.”
Slash looked at the two girls skeptically for a moment and looked at Brock with a ‘does that count as a discussion?’ look on his face. Brock shrugged in response, so Slash crossed it off of the list.
Slash set down the chalk and pointed at number two on the list. “Okay, task two. Finding your superpower. Could someone hand be a pillow or something? It’s hard to fall asleep on a wooden desk.”
To be continued…
The practice of psychology is riddled with many fancy terms and strange traditions, but if you care to sift through the terminology and the Freud (damn it, I said that word), what you’ll most likely find is a lot of theories about human development, mostly about the development of the mental state. One particularly interesting construct proposed by a German named Erik Homburger Erikson (take this man seriously, please) contributes psychosocial development to eight stages. Each of these stages is characterized by a ‘psychosocial’ crisis, known in simple terms as a ‘turning point’ in life. In order to develop from one stage to the next, we supposedly resolve the conflict that is causing the crisis. Conflict is resolved through creating a balance between the positive and negative aspects of each stage and failure to resolve these crises will hinder healthy psychosocial development. Now, these stages aren’t iron clad rules of development, but they might be worth considering when you are thinking about serious character development and flaws.
Stage 1: Basic trust
versus basic mistrust
At this stage, infants are
provided an opportunity to develop trust with other people to
provide basic needs such as food, warmth and love. If his
environment is a safe one, then trust between the child and his care
takers develops and opens the path up for trust later on in life.
Should his environment be neglecting and untrustworthy, then he may
learn to be suspicious and mistrustful of people. A balance of
trust and mistrust is often achieved in this stage. Of course,
there are plenty of later opportunities to learn to trust and
mistrust, but the earliest development of this is in infancy.
Stage 2: Autonomy
versus shame and doubt
During early childhood,
young children are learning the boundaries of their new found
abilities such as walking and speech. If he is allowed to explore
freely, then he will develop a sense of autonomy (confidence in
their deciding ability). If the child is constantly discouraged
from following their interests, then they will learn to doubt and
feel shame for their abilities. Some balance between autonomy and
shame should be adequate in teaching self control and discipline.
Stage 3: Initiative
versus guilt
In the preschooling
years, interaction between individuals of the same age groups
increase. If a child is overly confident in his abilities and feels
as though initiating activities such as cutting off his own hair is
acceptable, then he may be too independent to conform to society
norms and therefore never gain a sense of social responsibility. On
the other hand, if he is made to feel guilty about every independent
action, then he may never develop initiative. In this stage, the
child should learns to develop initiative without too much guilt.
Stage 4: Industry
versus Inferiority
This stage is fairly
simple. The primary school age child learns to be productive and
value productivity. The tasks he partakes in and the feedback he
receives can instill a sense of industry or inferiority. Racism,
sexism or other discrimination can make a child feel inferior to
others, and his actions in the future may reflect this.
Stage 5: Identity
versus role confusion
Adolescence is recognized
as the most turbulent time in development. The main role of the
adolescent is to find his identity in his world. Identity is
described as an organization of beliefs, abilities, needs and self
perceptions influenced by peers, guardians and idols. There are
four identity statuses that an adolescent can be in. Identity
achievement is when the adolescent has resolved Stage 5 through
exploring different roles and choosing to stick with one. Identity
foreclosure is achieved when an adolescent adopts similar ideologies
to his significant others without exploring other options. Another
status is identity diffusion when an adolescent does not have any
clear goals and is yet to make any decisions. Moratorium is the
postponing of a commitment to any set of values.
Stage 6: Intimacy
versus isolation
From the age of
approximately 20 – 30, the main task is to achieve some degree of
intimacy with others and not remain in isolation. In this stage, a
young adult may choose to develop intimacy easily with many people,
which can lead to promiscuity, or remain socially and emotionally
isolated, unable to form relationships.
Stage 7: Generativity
versus self absorption
Adults can choose to be
generative, which shows through their concern for producing
offspring or contributing in other ways to the community through
arts, science, writing, inventing and other productive processes
that will help future generations. Or they can choose not to and
instead, care for no one and cease to be a productive member of
society.
Stage 8: Ego integrity
versus despair
This stage starts at
around retirement age. Ego integrity is achieved through coming to
terms with the past and present with an awareness of death.
Concerns about illness and other problems can lead to despair.
These eight stages of psychosocial development may be something to think about when shaping characters or trying to understand why people are the way they are. At each stage, the choices and environmental factors are important influences to be considered.
Rolling Credits...
LEMMINGS
Mobman
You are MUCH easier to
stab if you'd just turn around...
WyrdWolf
Guru
of Irrelevance and Irreverence
WyrdWolf
is a talking Lupine who occasionally brings back a nice dead rabbit
or bird for his best friends.
Solemn Coyote
Has
been charged by the Powers That Be with ‘bringing sexy back.’
Probably.
Heatless Flame
Dark Lord of Light
Despite limitations
involving lack of heat, managed to light an evil dictator aflame
recently. Thank god for friction. And thank god for writing.
Canilla
Stylo
I'm
hearing voices in my head... And not the usual ones, either.
Striped
Feather
Part
time Sue-slayer and professional procrastinator.
Felicia13
If
you’ve gotten this far, I’m sure you know the drill.
Burnt Bread
Wheat Magnet
Gets in trouble for bring up the
rear.
Next Issue: Oceans
Submissions Due: 25th June.
Submissions will not be accepted after the 27th to allow for time zones and alien time zones.
