Andrew Bellacomo
Stories (4/0)
Not Even Past
The oak tree leans where it always did but the rope swing is gone, and the house is dark and cavernous, and windows broken. It’s cold and I’m inside now and the fireplace is empty. I remember Christmas fires, the warmth, my grandmother. I remember learning to read with her in that room as flames leaped and snaped before us, my grandfather at the bellows. Outside the winter grass is green. Blossoms of spring under a clear blue sky. Cool breeze on my wet cheek, two cardinals on a low branch. I kneel, and I pray.
By Andrew Bellacomo11 months ago in Fiction
The Courage It Takes to Face Obscurity
Writing training can be immensely helpful, but one thing that I think can happen when people get trained in creative writing, is that they get advice that runs counter to their instincts. So they start questioning their instincts just a little bit, and when they turn in work, their teachers use the same basic standards to sift through their writing and correct them again and again and therefore they start to actively suppress some of the characteristics of their writing that make it truly unique, that could make it stand out. Thier teachers use these standards because they have very often improved writing, perhaps because they most often improve writing. Sometimes though, the guidance is can be aimed at an attempt to appeal to the widest possible audience. It is my theory that there can be a side effect to some of this training - a watering down of the writer’s distinctive voice.
By Andrew Bellacomo2 years ago in Motivation
On Thin Ice
The dogs looked like strange and restless spirits against the barren arctic landscape. The life brimming in them seemed to contradict their surroundings and took on a quality of the unreal. Their harnesses jingled, dull and metallic in the sharp air, as they danced and pulled with impatience.
By Andrew Bellacomo3 years ago in Fiction
The Paths We Take
As we were all told more and more last year to stay in, I went out. Over the past year I have found solace in the most basic and ancient of human activities. I work at a creative job, writing and directing commercials and web videos, I take acting classes, and write as many personal projects as I can in the time that I have. Because of all this, I welcome any activity that gets me out of my head and into my senses, moving my body and observing the natural world. Over these last twelve months, I have developed a formidable walking habit. I take walking breaks like smoke breaks now. At my job, I’ll slip out for a fifteen minute jaunt down to the river after lunch, or I might even stop the car for a stroll through the park in my neighborhood on the way home.
By Andrew Bellacomo3 years ago in Humans