reevaluation.

Unfortunately, and even more unfortunate that it’s not very surprising, the book was not completed by the end of 2009. Or at least to my knowledge.

I like to think I was able to recover my lost two chapters deep in the Hades of my dead computer and hand them over to Jon Krakauer, who was able to finish the book and create a New York Times bestseller overnight.

Now that I’m back in reality, I’ve come to the decision after much thought that it’s time to reevaluate Yellow and the process I’m going about creating this book. I’ve obviously created a roadblock for myself, always convincing myself I never have enough time to work on it, and that perhaps I should just forget about it since I lost months of work on two chapters in a matter of minutes.

I’m not real sure what the future holds for this book, but of course, I never knew what the future held to begin with. I’m contemplating a name change … I’m not fully committed to it yet, but I’m thinking it might be the right way to go. And through these weeks of self-pity and bitterness, I came across something worthwhile: a better beginning. Sometimes good can come out of the bad, and it’s time to build on that.

I’m not a guy for New Year’s resolutions or spur-of-the-moment inspirations that are going to drastically change everything. I’ve carefully thought how I’m going to go about this book from this point on, and in the manner that results in a completion date before the end of this new decade. There’s no better time to write this story about love, and it’s time to move on, and move forward.

Thanks for stopping by.

-chase

pothole.

It started as any other Tuesday, or Wednesday. I can’t remember.

All I can remember is my computer would turn on, hum a little and then slowly die into oblivion.

After a few tries, panic set in. After about 100 tries, my heart was shattered.

I’m still waiting for the right time — as in finances — to take my beloved Hewlett Packard to the doctor, but over several weeks, I have started to accept the fate that Chapters 1 and 2 of Yellow may be gone forever.

I have no choice but to persevere, move on and start over. I’ll continue to pray that my hard drive can be salvaged, that I can get back those hours of work that I poured into my dream.

Perhaps it was God telling me that my book just wasn’t any good. So, if it happens again, I’ll know for sure.

I’ve had a few inquiries as to why I haven’t updated this bad boy in a while, and I’m thankful there are four people in the world who care about this book! I’ll be updating more often in the near future, and hopefully I can just pick up where I left off.

…chase…

You gotta believe.

Hello, friends.

It’s been a while, a good hundred days, since my last update on “Yellow.” My apologies for the delay, but I come into this post very excited, stressed and somewhat relieved.

Besides some forseeable tweaks in the future, Chapters 1 and 2 are complete.

I still face a very long road ahead of me, but the stage is set for what I pray and believe is a truly beautiful, wonderful story of two teenagers who come from completely different walks of life, only to find each other and fall in love. That love will be tested time and time again, the pursuit of love will be great and my goal is for all of us to be able to learn about the truth and honesty of love, even if it’s from a couple of teenagers.

Chapters 1 and 2 are written for the sole reason to introduce two very different characters: Gehrig in Chapter 1 — or as it is called in the book, “The Cure for Pain;” and Abigail in Chapter 2, or “Meant to Live.”

Both characters experience such direct tragedy that it takes them down roads that I’m sure none of us could ever imagine in our life, or at least as a seventeen-year-old. The tragedies set the stage for the rest of the book, and going through the process of creating love between two very different people is a very exhaustive process. It’s a love story obviously filled with love and tragedy, but injected along with those will be great amounts of comedy, passion, learning and teaching.

Writing these two chapters have caused me to break down in tears multiple times in the middle of my writing. I believe in honest, straight from the depths of my heart writing, and I can honestly say, no matter how good or bad the book might be at its completion, I am completely pouring all my soul into this book. I’ve fallen in love with the lives of both of the main characters, and I am almost overtaken with thoughts every day of my life on how I am going to adequately portray their story. These two characters are very much fiction, but also very much real in mind and in inspiration.

I will only give a little insight to what I’ve written so far, because it must be a surprise at completion!

A lot of people have asked me what the book is exactly about. I can only offer this: Two seventeen-year-olds, Gehrig and Abigail, from completely different walks of life meet in small-town school, but of course, not in the most normal of ways. Girl sees boy. Girl pursues boy. They fall in love, and everything in between and thereafter. Life changes in a span of eight or nine months than they have experienced all the years before.

Others have asked about my inspirations. Man, there are so many. Music, movies, baseball, personal experiences, hometown, friends, family, my wife. All of them will be injected some way or another. It’s beautiful chaos in my head, and I hope so much that it can become a beautiful masterpiece, at least to me, on paper.

I can offer a couple of inspirational notes: I might have mentioned it before, but I’ll do it again. All the chapters are song titles and pertain to what is going on in each chapter. Now that might have to change down the road, but for now when it’s unpublished, that’s how it’s going to be. I get a lot of my musical inspiration from my favorite band, Switchfoot. Jon Foreman, the band’s lead singer, wrote “The Cure for Pain” for a solo album and “Meant to Live” is one of Switchfoot’s biggest hits on its best-selling album, The Beautiful Letdown. There will be other song titles from different bands, of course, but you’ll likely find the majority come from Switchfoot and/or Jon Foreman. My dream is to have Mr. Foreman write the foreword or epilogue for the book, and he’s just the type of person I would love to have associated with my book. His goal in his songwriting is experiencing pain, overcoming pain and experiencing love on a supernatural level. That is my goal in my writing.

Another inspirational note that I will likely only share here: Gehrig and Abigail will the names of my first two children. My wife, Jordan, and I already have them picked and there’s no better tribute to my kids than to have them a part of the biggest dream I have ever had in my life.

**************************************************************

With that said, I also have some great, great news to share! If you’re reading this you probably already know, but I will throw it out there anyway. Jordan and I are moving back to Texas! We missed home terribly, and it gives us so much happiness and peace knowing that we can finally go back home to be closer to our family and friends. I will return to my old company, the Tyler Morning Telegraph, where I’ll be taking a new editor position.

This will not only give me the opportunity to live closer to our families and friends, but will also give us more time to do things that we haven’t been able to do in a while since we are usually on the road back to Texas every chance we get. I’ll be working a lot of day shifts back in Tyler, which will definitely give me more time to work on “Yellow” and hopefully achieve my goal of having it done by the end of the year.

Moving back to Texas was definitely a prayer answered, and we are praising God every day that He is allowing us to be back in Tyler. And a lot of our family and friends have been praying for that, too, and we appreciate you more than ever.

**************************************************************

Now a quick return to the book. Keep checking back as I keep updating, and I promise it will be more frequent since I will have more time to write. This is an incredible journey, and I know it will go much smoother with you following two fascinating characters as they experience a tremendous part of their lives.

I will leave you with the lyrics to “The Cure for Pain” by Jon Foreman and “Meant to Live” by Switchfoot.

Read them multiple times if you have to. Take in the words. Believe in them.

Believe in the unbelievable. Because if you can’t do that, there’s no reason worth living.

Much love,

Chase

Jon Foreman: The Cure For Pain
I’m not sure why it always flows downhill
Why broken cisterns never could stay filled
I’ve spent ten years singing gravity away
But the water keeps on falling from the sky

And here tonight while the stars are blacking out
With every hope and dream I’ve ever had in doubt
I’ve spent ten years trying to sing these doubts away
But the water keeps on falling from my eyes

And heaven knows… heaven knows
I tried to find a cure for the pain
Oh my Lord! to suffer like you do…
It would be a lie to run away

So blood is fire pulsing through our veins
We’re either riders or fools behind the reigns
I’ve spent 10 years trying to sing it all away
but the water keeps on falling from my tries

Switchfoot: Meant to Live
Fumbling his confidence
And wondering why the world has passed him by
Hoping that he’s bent for more than arguments,
And failed attempts to fly.
Fly.

We were meant to live for so much more
have we lost ourselves?
Somewhere we live inside
Somewhere we live inside
We were meant to live for so much more
Have we lost ourselves?
Somewhere we live inside

Dreaming about Providence
And whether mice or men have second tries
Maybe we’ve been livin with our eyes half open
Maybe we’re bent and broken. Broken

We were meant to live for so much more
Have we lost ourselves?
Somewhere we live inside
Somewhere we live inside
We were meant to live for so much more
Have we lost ourselves?
Somewhere we live inside

We want more than this world’s got to offer
We want more than this world’s got to offer
We want more than the wars of our fathers
And everything inside screams for second life

Yeahhh!

We were meant to live for so much more
Have we lost ourselves?
We were meant to live for so much more
Have we lost ourselves?
We were meant to live for so much more
Have we lost ourselves?
We were meant to live
We were meant to live

‘parade with me …’

To kick off this enlightening, philosophical, brilliant, earth-shattering, award-winning blog post, I will give you an original, never-read-or-heard-before, trend-setting, five-word, 18-letter piece of pure, perfect prose:

Writing a book is hard.

I have a newly found fondness and admiration for George Washington. I know I’m stepping out on a long limb here, but in my time studying this nation’s first president and reading some pretty incredible stuff about him (side note: read 1776 … start now), I’ve realized just how incredibly brilliant this man was at such a trying time in our nation’s birth. He took over an army despite never winning any sort of military conflict. His experience and successes in such a position were simply non-existent. But he found something in himself and in the thousands of men he led into battle that resulted in one of the greatest stories and triumphs this world has ever seen. 

What does George Washington have to do with my book? On the cover, nothing. Between the lines, everything. 

To quote the great General on January 3, 1777: “Parade with me my brave fellows, we will have them soon!” He shouted these words to his men at the Battle of Princeton, which many argue is one of the greatest victories by the Americans in the Revolutionary War. It was a battle won like many other, and ultimately victory was had and a country was born.

Washington’s leadership and courage shook a nation and rocked the world. Despite doubts about himself, Washington believed in what he loved, and fought for it. 

The same will happen in Yellow. 

I’m at the stage in this excruciating process of developing story lines for the book. Considering I’ve never done this before, and I’m stubborn enough not to read “Writing Books for Dummies” or anything else of the like, I’m taking this one step at a time in a manner in which I’m familiar. Once I’ve nailed down each major story line and am able to develop the story enough to reach the climax and am able to start coming down the mountain, the actual writing will begin. I don’t know how many times I’ve opened Microsoft Word and just tried to write from the beginning right then. It took me a while, but that doesn’t work for me. 

I’ve found a lot of influences for this story. I’ve found influence from personal experiences, family members, stories of friends and strangers, movies and music. The titles of each chapter will be the titles of songs I feel are crucial to the story, and most of all, the characters and their lifestyles. Kahlen and Gehrig, the two main characters, couldn’t be more different to the naked eye (especially to each other), but much of their similarities can be found in the words that belong to these songs. 

I play the story over and over through my head, and I catch myself way too often molding my story with others that have already been written, or even filmed. I get a lot of influence from these, but still need to nail down that story that’s new and unique. I read that, if you average it out, a book is published every thirty seconds around the world. Finding that unique story no one else has read or written is difficult enough, but reading a statistic like that is a punch in the gut. I’m searching for storylines and angles that are unique and valuable to this story, and I feel like through my intense prayer and thought that I’m finally getting closer to that goal. 

What I hope to be one of the unique aspects of this story will be the personal journals for each of the main characters. The book will be written in third person, but I want to add the first-person feel and dive into the minds of each of these two incredible people. The song titles and imagery they provide to each chapter are another aspect I have for this.

I will release the names of each chapter as they’re written. That way those of you who read this can listen to the song, get a feel for the situation and be involved in the journey. I want to bring along as many people as I can, because honestly, I can’t do this by myself. I’m not that good. 

Over the past few years in my life, especially the last year, I’ve desperately tried to mold myself into a person who cherishes the life and the person, not the material things. Of course, on a journalist’s salary, you kind of have to do that anyway … but lately, it’s weighing on my heart more and more. I’ve seen people — some I know, others not at all — who are experiencing situations beyond my control, and more often than not, beyond theirs, too. Some I’ve attempted to help, others I pray for … but in the end, I always feel it’s never enough. I’ve felt an intense calling on my heart to play a bigger role to help others who need that help more than I could ever dream of needing. Some of these people are in my own family. Others, I may never see their face or hear their voice. But I know they need what I can offer more than anything I could ever want to buy. 

My goal isn’t to get this book published. My goal is for this story to have an impact, even it’s one person (besides me, of course!). If it gets published and is successful, great. If it gets published and flops, great. If it gets rejected and all I have is a printed stack of papers, great. But my goal remains this: I want the story to be read, and I want the story to impact people. I want the stories of Kahlen and Gehrig to have an effect on others like they have had on me, despite the fact they’re fictitious.

One of the ways I hope to be able to spread the impact of this book will happen if it does get published. No matter how much money it makes — whether it’s fifty bucks or five million (I laughed, too) — I will only keep half. Words can only impact so many people, but making an effort in the lives of others through monetary donations and time spent helping those can make a difference beyond anything we can ever imagine.

If the book does get published, twenty-five percent of all earnings will be donated to Stand Up 2 Cancer (standup2cancer.org) and twenty-five percent to To Write Love On Her Arms (twloha.com). These are two organizations that I hold very near to my heart, and I pray that one day I can offer anything I can to help these two wonderful organizations as they try to make a difference in this world. If you want, go to their Web sites and see what they’re about. Both organizations are involved with issues that have not only affected my life personally, but also many people around me. I think it’s safe to say we all know someone who has had to face the nightmare that is cancer. Most of us can say we’ve lost someone to the terrible disease. And I think we all know someone, or perhaps experienced ourselves, who has dealt or deals with depression, self-injury and personal anguish. 

This world needs people who care, and people who are willing to help. I’ve tried to put myself in the position to help many times before, but it’s been far too long since I’ve helped make a difference. I want to do it again, and this is one way I pray I can help. And I hope this story can provide opportunities for my wife and I to make a difference.  I’ve always considered myself a visionary, and now it’s time to start being one.

Of course, there is that selfish part of me that wants this story to be published. I won’t lie. But what I won’t do — an oath I’ve made to myself and my Maker — is be controlled by the material aspect of it. I’m not looking for fame. I’m looking for my stamp, my mark to make a difference, but still keep myself out of the limelight. That’s why I want to use it to make a difference, and donate … and be a part of something special.

So, I can part with this: the story will begin very soon. That means you have to drop in more often, because this thing is going to be updated constantly with my progress, my struggles and my triumphs in my writing. The story won’t be easy, and I wish there was some author out there to put my thoughts down for me. It’s my goal and my prayer to finish this thing in 2009. I know I can get there, and I’m glad to have you along for the journey. 

-csquared-

a prelude

Yellow is the story. It’s his story. It’s her story. It’s their story.

Girl meets guy. Girl chases guy. Both share astonishing, yet inspiring stories.

This story will have joy, sadness, redemption, failure, desire and triumph. Victory and defeat. Love and heartbreak. Music and movies. Life and death.

The ideas are aplenty. I don’t plan on getting anything published or getting past what I feel is the absolute best I can do. But as I pour all of me into this book, I will chronicle my journey here, and I invite you to join along. I plan on giving insight to the story, the characters and their journeys. My goal is to have it complete by the end of the year. I’ve promised myself time and time again to write my book and finish by a certain time, but with it finally (almost) nailed down, I’m ready.

Thanks for participating at this point. I’ll also share some cool stuff that’s going on in the life of Jordan and Chase (and Monster). Stay tuned.

-csquared-